Brown Motion

White guy drives black man around. Does so in the 1950s segregated America. Does lot of the driving in the deep south which is the epicenter of white supremacy over black folk. An uneducated Italian discovers the wonders of the unique life of an educated African American artist and graduates from being a driver or employee to a close friend by the end of the movie. All of the above are part of the fact set of the film Green Book.  The protagonist is Dr. Don Shirley, an African American pianist who decides to travel in the deep divided American south to perform piano recitals at venues that have been pre-selected. While he understands the rigor of this assignment he chooses to have a driver accompany him to help not just with the driving but with keeping him out of trouble along the way.  The driver, Tony Lip, is played by Viggo Mortensen, who among the Hollywood set is not well known but has done some key roles now and again.  The role of Shirley is played by t...

It was the Saint Patrick's day this Sunday.  Crowds in green attire thronged a local city fair.  While not much for gatherings with toddlers through young adults and dogs on radio flyers jostling for merry go rounds and funnel cakes, I decided to seek out green pastures elsewhere. An erstwhile quarry now a regional park fit the bill.  Settled in a valley where once the quarry provided raw material for the now sparsely used railroad, the rehabilitation work is a success.  It is now a regional walking trail alongside the lakes formed with aquifers that flood the large holes dug decades ago.  Alameda creek runs east to west along one edge of the park, finally draining out into the bay. Turtles getting shell shocked with the sun The sun was out raising the ambient to a comfortable mid 70s and the lake water cooled the air flowing over it.  Birds and the bees were making the most of it as were a few souls who found it to their liking, stro...

I was inspired to pen these completely random thoughts after reading an article relating to the St. Patrick's day festivities conducted in Chicago. First and foremost how one gets to be a saint when they were merely a patron of a place is somewhat dubious but then again having never been conferred that title I know not what it might take. That said in Chicago there is a tradition to paint their local river green on this celebratory day.  Some guy gets in a boat and dumps green dye by the buckets as he chugs along and this gives the river the color of matcha tea. Now while there are certainly folks from fish and wildlife and lakes authority checking to see the ingredient list of this dye some fish that live in these water may not take so kindly to this interference.  I imagined a world where they could lodge complaints.  What might those be? Hey- its too cloudy in here. Look ma - Nemo is turning green without algae. Why are these bipeds obsessed with the green...

Moving to a new country or region has its pluses and minuses.  With the right attitude and aptitude you can find more pluses in my opinion.  However, many traits and foibles of the local denizens can leave an outsider confounded. As Captain Haddock of the Tintin comics would exclaim - billions of blue, blistering barnacles!  That right there is a point of distinction.  When we moved to America some decades ago I began to notice that the larger culture was consuming local grown stuff.  From food products to literature there was a above average bias on American.  Except for the automobiles people drove.  Here a lot of Japanese, Korean and German sedans did have a significant market share. I can understand that America being a large place and home to majority of the world's Fortune 500 companies would produce a large number of goods and services that logically would also be consumed in the largest economy in the world.  Right here at home. But...

Freedom means a lot of different things to people.  For a self confessed, bohemian, free spirit who grew up in an intellectual household, Alex Honnold wanted to soar free of his earthly shackles and go up.  As in go up climbing rocks and walls that would faze most people on earth. The daring is not so much in climbing magnificently large boulders or rock surfaces as much as doing it without the aid of any ropes or harness or safety equipment.  Man, nature's most advanced creation scaling walls made over eons by nature grinding away in its own slow rhythm with nothing between them. Free Solo is an amazing adventure tracing the free solo attempts of a rock climber called Alex Honnold and shot on film by director, producer husband and wife team of Jimmy Chin and Elizabeth Chai. The culmination of Alex's journey up various challenging vertical surfaces through the film ends in his scaling a 3,000 feet slab of granite located in the Yosemite National Park in California,...

Our daughter is passionate about few things in life.  One of them is giving her all to an endeavor she undertakes whether in school or personal life. Her commitment is unwavering.  This was made abundantly clear when she as an officer of a local TED chapter in school organized an outing for 30 odd students to visit UC Berkeley where the largest regional gathering was to take place this weekend. So she set out to plan this well in advance.  Sponsors were recruited and tickets were sold to willing students.  A transport plan was laid out to handle the logistics of going to the University campus where TEDx was being held and yours truly was recruited to chaperone the lot.  Another teacher from school was also on the docket to sign up as an additional authority that traveled with us. Last minute they find that the teacher cannot make it.  Then comes the next blow.  The bus organized for this event was no longer an option because it was sourced by th...

Just finished reading a fascinating tale of greed and corruption written by an Indian - Canadian - American author.  Her book is titled 'Black Edge'.  Author is Sheelah Kolhatkar. It is largely a write up of a once prominent American hedge fund manager who could earn best in class rates of return for his investors.  Hedge to the lay person is a bet.  Bet that is counter to the going thesis for returns on a particular asset that can either increase or decrease in value. Originally the hedge funds were just that where bets were placed on both long and short side for  certain assets in conjunction such that it would make money to its investors regardless of the price movement. Today the hedge fund industry is much more complex and does not necessarily follow the above logic.  It is merely a limited partnership run by very smart people that takes other people's money and invests in high risk and preferably, high reward trades.  The founders are typi...