nomadic view magazine no.2

8/14/2019 Nomadic View Magazine No.2

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NomadicNomadic

ViewView

Selected Posts from : http://nomadicjoe.blogspot.com/

No.2 2009

A Wanderer's Observations

BlacklackMan'san'sHandand

The ShootingThe Shooting

My First Job -y First Job -Chinese Restauranthinese Restaurant

Interview with Vincentnterview with VincentShaw- Part 2haw- Part 2Annus Horribilus in Turkey


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Black Man'sHand

My First Job -ChineseRestaurant

Contents

TheShooting

Interview with

Vincent Shaw-Part 2Annus Horribilus inTurkey

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Nomadic View Magazine is acollection of blog posts fromhttp://nomadicjoe.blogspot.co

All stories contained are copywritten and are to be reprintedby permission only.

If you have any comments orquestions about the magazine orthe material, feel free to contactme at the blog.Any contributions are welcomeas well.

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The Thief

fiction 21
http://nomadicjoe.blogspot.com/http://nomadicjoe.blogspot.com/


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4/22

Black Man's Hand

I don't recall any particularinstruction in my home on

the subject of race.

Originally Posted 11/7/08http://nomadicjoe.blogspot.com/2008/11/shooting.html
http://nomadicjoe.blogspot.com/2008/11/shooting.htmlhttp://nomadicjoe.blogspot.com/2008/11/shooting.html


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However it was done, as myparents often did, so covertly andso successfully, that I never evennoticed it. My parents were very

clever that way and they taughtme a great many things in a verysubtle way. Of course, it was atime of significant changes inattitudes about race andArkansas, where they had beenraised was hardly the mostprogressive in this regard in the60s. They were not perfect, but

overall they were slightly betterthan most in that time and in thatplace.

Sometimes, however, my liberalsensibilities were shaken by aremark that I deemedunforgivable. It is easy to becondescending and judgmentalof parents when you are ateenager, especially a shelteredchild of the shopping malls andsubdivisions and well-fundededucation. It was easy to turn upmy nose at some spare remarkmy mother might make aboutniggers. When I called her on it,

she would say,No.. now. Not allblacks are niggers. Only the onesthat think they are better than thewhites. This was enough toconfuse me for I hadn't workedout all the details of my opinions..I still haven't.

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Black Man's Hand


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On this subject, my father wasless conservative than mymother and his feelings had been

shaped by practical experience.He had fought in Koreanalongside of black Americans.Listen, when people areshooting at you, you don't got alot of time to decide who youwant on your side firing back. Myfather had a few black co-workers as friends at the plant.

His co-worker was married to awhite woman and my mothertook her stand, I have nothingagainst it in theory. But I just feelsorry for the poor children.(Satisfyingly ironic at thismoment in history, isn't it? Toobad my mother didn't live long

enough to see this day.)

I recall sitting in her mother'skitchen and my grandfather,Sam, was teasing mygrandmother because sherefused to take free eggs off ablack man. Sam, Sam. Don't tellthat. Still, at her funereal, I

learned that, to my astonishment,she privately tutored blackchildren when she was a teacher.This was one reason that shewas popular with the blackfamilies although some irrationalnotions trapped in her mind werehard to dispel.

Black Man's Hand


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On the furthest extreme was myuncle. My uncle would regularlytell me when I visited his farm in

Arkansas, They're no better thanmonkeys. He would have adisgusted look on his face. Why,have you ever looked at a blackman's hand? Well, have you?Looks just like a monkey's.

This was something I heard justabout every time I was there. The

first times it struck me as a jokeand that he was surelypretending to believe this. Andthen, it began to annoy mebecause it appeared- and this istrue for all bigotry- that he wouldnot be happy until I appeared toshare his convictions. I can say, I

never did but this meant havingto hear the same rubbish overand over. Have you ever seen ablack man's hands? The palm ofhis hands?

Finally, I told my father how muchthis disturbed me and that I washaving trouble even listening to

him if he had to keep repeatingthese things. I was taught, yousee, as a guest in somebody'shome, you must treat them withrespect and courtesy but this was

becoming harder and harder.

Black Man's Hand

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So.Eisenhower brought black and

whites together in Korean for thefirst time.I was not convinced. But still.. is itright? Is that an excuse?My father sighed. No. But you gotto look at it this way. When do youthink was the last time he looked ata black man's hand?I wouldn't know.

I do. Never. I would bet he hasnever been been within a mile of ablack man. And that was perfectlycorrect. This kind of bigotry is basedon ignorance and an extreme lackof experience with the larger worldwe must share with other peoples.Whether they are aware of it or not,these people live in a shrinkingworld, looking and finding negativeexamples to support theirunderdeveloped ideas. It isn't anexcuse by any means, and thereare certain things that thinkingpeople must not tolerate. However,that could be a reason, at least, onereason. And armed with the reason

for a problem, we may be able tofind a solution.My father slowly folded his knifeand smiled at me How the hellwould he know what a black man'shand looked like?

Black Man's Hand


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A Terragen Summer Photo

What is

Terragen?

http://www.planetside.co.uk/terrag

Terragen is a scenery generator, createdwith the goal of generatingphotorealistic landscape images andanimations. It is available for Windowsand the Mac OS. At this stage in itsdevelopment, Terragen is free forpersonal, noncommercial use.

Although Terragen is a continually

evolving work-in-progress, it is alreadycapable of near-photorealistic results forprofessional landscape visualisation,special effects, art and recreation.Terragen has been used in a variety ofcommercial applications including film,television and music videos, games andmultimedia, books, magazines and printadvertisements.

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http://www.planetside.co.uk/terragen/http://www.planetside.co.uk/terragen/


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An elderly woman wakes up with a start,shocked by some distant noise. It is aboutseven or eight in the morning, She gets outbed slowly, and makes her way down thesteps and into her kitchen. She makes her

breakfast and all the while she is drinking hercoffee, she has the most peculiar feeling. Atthat moment, she notices from the corner ofher eye, a strange shape moving past thepicture window in the living room. As shecreeps around the corner, she can clearlymake out a tall man peering into her home.


What happens in the suburbshat happens in the suburbsSTAYS in the suburbsTAYS in the suburbs

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Bravely, she unlocks the door

leaving the chain on, and asks theman what he wants. It is a

policeman and he is trying to speakto her but suddenly, she realizes

that she has forgotten to attach her

hearing aid. A bit later, the officer istelling her very slowly and verygently, Im sorry to have to tell youthis, lady, but a car has run into the

side of your house. She notices over his shoulder, a gathering o

curious neighbors in her front yard,a pair of muddy tears across the

grass and a greenish Impala

improbably parked in her lawnSomebody is taking photographsThen, the policeman takes her elbow

and says,And, theres a dead manin the car.

All this occurred in the summer when I turned nine. My subdivision in St. Louiscounty was an extremely quiet place to live normally. Summers in humid Augustand it felt like Time itself was slowly rolling to a stop. Tract homes of the samedesign and families with striking similarities. At that time, crime, especially

murder was something that belonged in the city. There was, of course, theoccasional act of vandalism- usually as a kind of revenge to a crank. But murder?It had seemed unthinkable. This wasnt the Bronx, for goodness sakes. And mostsurprising of all was the confessed murderer was none other than my ownneighbor, Mr. Staten.


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George Staten was a heavy white haired (a crew-cut) Texan. He wasso shy that, to us children, he often seemed gruff. On the other hand,his exuberant wife, Fay, with her hair dyed jet black and spun likeconfection, was like a sister to my mother and George was a good

friend to my dad.

They would spend hours taking apart things and putting things backtogether, from lawn-mowers to carburetors, in some kind of hope of

improvement. Like my father, George had traveled up from thebackwaters -of Texas, in his case- in search of work in the city. Afterthe Korean War, as the Cold War really took off and the airlineindustry developed, McDonnell Douglas, , created a kind of hiringvacuum, sucking up all the undereducated veterans returning home.

The story behind this peculiar event was fairly straightforward. Fay,unable to sleep, was watching TV late into the night. She heard astrange noise and when she went to the window to look, she wassurprised to find a unidentified car parked in their own driveway. Still

more worrying, in the darkness, she saw two strangers moving aboutin the shadows.She woke her husband and told him this news. He, being a Texan,unlocked the firearm cabinet and withdrew a rifle. As he left thehouse, the two men tried to flee, one ran off down the street and theother (presumably the owner of the car) hopped into the drivers seatand pulled back out of the driveway. What happened next can only beverified by the witness and murderer. George had his rifle up on hisshoulder targeting the driver, as a threat only.

However, at that moment, the driver gambled that it was a bluff andaimed his revolver at Mr. Staten. In self-defense, he fired his rifle, thebullet entering the right temple and exiting under his arm. The carrolled down the street lazily, flopping over the curb and bumped intothe side of a home at the end of the street.

The story behind this peculiarThe story behind this peculiarevent was fairly straightforward.event was fairly straightforward.


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There was only one problem. When the police later searched the car, they foundno weapon at all. It was theorized that the driver had pointed his finger at myneighbor, attempting to frighten him. Obviously, he had never met a man fromTexas.When the police located the dead mans partner, they learned that the pair hadspent most of the night breaking into homes and cars and removing as much as

possible. When Fay had looked out the window, they had just begun loading itinto the back seat of their Impala. Police also told our families that this pair werequite familiar to the authorities, having committed similar crimes in otherneighborhoods.So began the worst year of living for the Statens. Law suits were immediatelyfiled by grieving relatives of the victim. George lost so much time from his workthat nearly lost his job and his house. He certainly lost his privacy with newscrews all over the neighborhood. Worst of all, the victim had had a lot of friendswhose characters were apparently no better. And for many months, they wouldtake turn throwing bottles through the Statens front windows.

I recall one day, as summer was coming to a close, Fay had just left our homeand her son dashed back to our home and told us to come quick. We all dartedoutside and saw poor Fay rolling about on the ground, crying and senselesslyclutching at herself. I stood there with my eyes as wide as possible, trying to takein every detail. So, I noted to myself, this is what a nervous breakdown actuallylooks like.

Obviously, he had never met a manObviously, he had never met a man

from Texas.from Texas.

There was one thing I could never understand about the shooting. How was itpossible that I could have slept through this high drama? After all, murder, asregrettable as it was, was something that people liked discussing and watchingon TV and in the cinema. Almost every episode of McMillan and Wife had at leastone murder. And this was an event- my own event- that I could have shared in

great detail with my friends when school opened. And the murderer was my ownnext door neighborhood. Somebody I knew.And yet, somehow, it all happened while I was calmly sleeping, dreaming myhappy dreams of swimming and high diving, of GI Joes, and Gilligan's Island,and daring exploits on bicycles. We later figured the sound of the rifle wasdrowned out by our air conditioner running at full blast. August nights are usuallyquite unbearable in St. Louis so in the end, I decided the trade-off was probablyworth it.

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15/22

My father was a firm believer that hard work solidified thehuman character- an antidote to too much television watching,no doubt, although he himself probably hated his job more thanhe openly admitted. As well as being a presumptive promoter ofthe American work ethic, he also believed that I felt thateverything was going to be handed to me on a silver platter andit wasn't. You had to work for it.

Somehow I gave him the idea that I felt that the world owed meliving- I never quite understood this phrase which probablymade it true- and buddy, I was headed for a rude awakening oneday. Very soon.

My First Job -Chinese Restaurant

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16/22

I was told I had better stop and smell the coffee. A few

days after my 16th birthday, my father gave me plenty ofopportunity to smell the coffee by waking me up everymorning at 5 a.m to ask me if I had found a job yet.That was his way and it took me a long time and a lot ofgrowing to understand my father and for him tounderstand me.

I have had an unusually wide range of employment andvery few of them I actually enjoyed. My very first formalob was a part-time position at Pagoda Chinese

Restaurant when I turned 16. My boss' name was, I kidyou not, Harry Wong. He was a pretty nice boss but anervous man who had a tendency to avoid eye contactand say, "Yeah, right." for every question. His wife whowas always pregnant in the time I was there- like some perpetually ripening melon- and worked in the back,cooking and chopping cabbage and onions. Assorted

relatives added the appropriate Oriental complexion tothe establishment with Harry himself doling out the MaiTais with umbrellas and coconut flavor cocktails.

Pagoda was a popular place and at that time, my

neighborhood did not have much in the way ofinternational cuisine. It was ideally located near a largeshopping mall, a MacDonald's and a quasi-ritzy hotel.The decor of a Chinese restaurant, if it is worth itsstuff, must be dim and slightly strange, tassels hangfrom lights, dragons on walls, reliefs on the doors, andnearly recognizable songs which turn out to be sung ina twangy Chinese female voice.

My First Job - Chinese Restaurant

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Initially I started out as a waiter. I was given a butterscotch colorjacket that constantly seemed to crawl up my back all night, blackclip on bow tie, black polyester pants and a white shirt. Harry was

rather fussy when it came to the appearance of his staff.Waiter training was covered in about 3 minutes my first day. It wasnot hard work, but you had to stand on your feet all day and keepyour eyes open for empty glasses and plates.

My career as a waiter, sadly, did not last long. After accidentally pouring jasmine tea down a poor child's back, I was hastilydemoted to the position of dish washer. Dish washing was hot andsteamy work and not a lot of fun. The waiters found inordinate pleasure in withholding the trays of dirty dishes and glasses andsuch as long as possible and then bringing them all at once.

The washing equipment was just barely functional and it was oftenrough going trying to keep up withthe traffic. Steam would fill the roomwhen the doors of the dishwasherwere flung open. The trays holdingthe newly cleaned dishes were

scalding hot and had to be stackedand plates had to be double checkedand returned for further use.

The conversations between thekitchen, if not in Chinese, usuallyinteresting enough and nobodyseemed to take things very seriously but amongst the waiters arguments

and peeved looks and hissed remarkswere commonplace. It was the effectof having to smile and be polite allday for minimum wage plus tips.

My First Job - Chinese Restaurant

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Annus Horribilus in TurkeyInterview with Vincent Shaw- Part 2nterview with Vincent Shaw- Part 2

In Part 1 of this interview with VinceShaw, we heard of his experiencesworking in a private company in Turkey.On advice of the company's lawyer,Shaw became a partner. Shaw soonlearned that legal requirements forworking permission were not at all thatclear for company partners in Turkey.

Now last time, you told us that a local tax oficial came to your office and fined you for workingillegally. Despite the fact that you actually owned a percentage of the company.

Correct. Then the foreigner's office called me and ordered me to report to the police station atnine on a Friday morning.

I imagine you were pretty shaken up. Did you have any idea what they wanted?

I had a very bad feeling. But I kept saying to myself. Maybe it is a formality or something. I keptthinking that if it was really bad news, wouldn't they come to the office and take me there?

So you went there.

When I got there, they asked for my passport and my ikhamet izin. That is a little blue bookthey give you to show you are in the country legally. The woman told me that, since I had beenfound to be working illegally, I had broken the terms of my permission and that I would have toleave the country within 5 days. And I would not be able to return for a year. Actually, they werenot too sure. It was possible that I would not be able to return for 5 years. They were, like, veryuncompromising and that was their final answer. They didn't care about the details.

What? Did you tell them the circumstances?It was a simple case for them. I had worked illegally. My permission to live in Turkey was beingtaken away.

How did you feel at that moment?I nearly fainted. I mean, I really nearly fainted. Some of the secretaries started looking at me,like they were frightened I was about to fall in the floor. I was about to.

Five days? How long had you been living in Turkey before that?Over ten years.

And that didn't mean anything to them?Nada.


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Your next step was to...Well I found a new lawyer. He was recommended to me by a long time friend. I mean, thatafternoon. He told me that my case was unusual. He would open a legal action in order for audge to look over my case. But he added something else. He said that during the time that my

case was awaiting a judge's review, the police could force me to leave the country. So I had tobe careful and change my address immediately.

Is that legal? Can they kick you out of a country with a review pending?According to the European Human Rights Agreements, No. The lawyer said, that it wastechnically illegal for them to deport me before a judge looks over the case and makes adecision. However, it happens every day in Turkey.

I see. Go on.So I tried to stay away. I was staying with a friend waiting for the judge's decision. But then myluck ran out one day. Some plain clothes police came up to me on the street and asked to seemy passport. He was very very serious. He told me that I had to come with him, no questionsHe said he had been watching my apartment for a week.

I suppose you mentioned the legal review?Eh. Yeah.He didn't think much about it. It was a Saturday. I didn't have much money on meHe drove me to a police station on the other side of town. Luckily I had managed to call mygood Turkish friend and he was trying to get a handle on things as much as possible. When got to the police station, there wasn't anybody else there. I asked to have a translator there butthe police officer said it wasn't necessary. I was able to call the US embassy in Ankara. Thewoman there said she would call around and see what she could find out.

That's it? Weren't you frightened? Like, Midnight Express.

Yeah, well, it was not Midnight Express. But I was shell-shocked, that's for sure. I mean, thefunny thing was, I was trying to work in the country legally. I thought that the lawyer had doneeverything correctly. He had told me I was legitimate. I mean, I suppose I could understand it ifI had knowingly tried to get away with breaking the law. Anyway, after the guy interviewed me,he told me that they would be deporting me that evening on the first boat to Greece. After thatthey took me downstairs and put me in a holding area with about a dozen other guys.

You mean in a jail cell?No. It was more like an army barracks. There were all kinds of refugees there. A guy fromSomalia, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iran.

I can imagine you were the only American there.Of course. But I have to say, the other guys there were not unfriendly. The worst reaction wasindifference. Most of them were kind of amazed to see an American in the jail with themTurkey and America were supposed to be friends. When I told them how I got there, theycouldn't believe it. Maybe they thought I was a spy or CIA or something. Later my friend cameto the jail and they let me talk to him. We talked to the director or whatever he was and askedhim if there was some way I could delay being deported until I could get some money andsome clothes. He agreed, but said I would have to stay overnight in jail and be deported thenext day.

Interview with Vincent Shaw- Part 2nterview with Vincent Shaw- Part 2


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Did you speak to the US Embassy? What did they say? Did they send anybody to help you?The woman there made a call to the Izmir branch and that person simply repeated what theforeigner's office had said. I had broken the law. Later, I asked the consul that what on earth

were job duties if it wasn't to help Americans in a time like this?

What did she say?She said they were only there to renew passports and transport the bodies of Americans backhome when necessary. I told her that she seemed more useful to dead Americans than livingones. Those people are absolutely clueless.

What about the lawyer?He 'd demanded money upfront. So he was like the invisible man. He was unavailable, in otherwords.

So you had to stay in the jail overnight?Correct. But I had to give credit to the police there. I think they felt some sympathy for me. Ofcourse, that didn't make any difference. They were all following orders and they didn't want tomake any enemies by asking any questions. . They tried to be as hospitable as they could. Theyallowed me to stay in a private area so I wouldn't be in any danger.

Isn't that called solitary confinement?No. Well, they let me out of the holding area and I was able to watch TV. Then when it was timeto go to bed, they put me in a separate area alone. I didn't sleep much, of course. The irony of itwas all the other refugees were desperately trying to escape Turkey and go to Europe. Here Iwas desperate to stay in Turkey but being kicked into Europe. It is still kind of funny when I thinkabout it. It wasn't funny at the time, of course.

Then the following day, my friend had managed to collect some money and some clothes in abag. The police tried to get me to sign something before I left. I learned that it was a confessionthat I had agreed to my crime and I would agree not to return to Turkey for 60 months. Fiveyears.

Did you sign THAT?No. I refused to sign it. Later they said, it had been a mistake. I would be able to come back in ayear. So the next day, I was escorted to Cesme and put on a boat to Greece.

I can't imagine what you must have been feeling.

I was in shock, I guess. They had treated me like a criminal when I had tried to follow the laws. Ihad tried to get legal advice from so called experts and nobody knew what the law was. There isa reason for this. There is no law in Turkey. It changes from person to person and from day today.

You sound bitter.It is hard not to be. I mean, I was not caught stealing cars. Or dealing drugs or murderinganybody. And I had been in Turkey for a long time without any problem. I felt really brokenhearted I guess.



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So you were now heading to Greece. How far away was that?Oh it was close. Chios is real close. In fact, you can see the lights of Turkey from the island.That made it worse. I was like some kind of exile. I found a place to stay that night and tried to

pull myself together.In the end, I stayed there most of the summer. It wasn't a holiday. It should have been. But Iwaited and waited for the judge's ruling in my case. I waited three months. The courts shut downduring the summer. Can you believe that? Everybody goes on vacation in summer.The judge decided against my case later learned. I wonder if he had even looked at my file.

After three months, I went to renew my tourist visa for Greece and they tell me that it wasimpossible. They were part of something called Schengen.

What's that exactly?Many of the European countries are in a union and it is like the United States of Europe. If youenter one, you have enter them all. According to what the Greek police told me, as an American,you can only stay in any Schengen country for three months. Then you have to leave and youcannot return for another six months. So, you can not leave for a day and come back and havea new three month tourist visa. You have to leave after three months and not come back foranother three months. It's crazy.


Is that possible? So an American cannot stay inEurope for more than three months?That's what they said. So I decided I had hadenough of it. I decided to go back to the statesfor awhile. Take a break from traveling andrecuperate a little.

You went to New York I think. I have onequestion. You came back to Turkey. Why? Imean, after all that terrible treatment. Thecorrupt business partner, the crooked lawyers,the officials and the police. Why on earth wouldyou come back?

Turkey is my home. I wasn't born there but Ithink of it as my home. Turkish people are thebest. I mean, you can make a list of all thepeople here that screw up my life but then onthe other hand, there were a lot of people, closefriends, that worried about me and broke theirbacks trying to get me back here. You can't justthrow away ten years of your life when a crisishappens. Maybe I am an idiot, I don't know. ButI really don't want to give up on Turkey. Not justyet anyway.


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Fiction Department

You smiled back at me

shyly, distantly as I pressedthe button on my brownie

camera. Then you turned

away. An hour later, you

and your family had to

leave that beach and I

never saw you again. The

clouds rolled in from the

sea twenty minutes laterand it turned cold. It was

the last day of summer, as

it turned out.

I don't know what became

of you. I imagine youmarried some handsome

businessman. I hope youhad a fulfilling life. I hope

you were happy.

I read somewhere that

certain primitive tribes- Iforget where- dread to have

themselves photographed.It is like stealing, they say.

but the theft of a soul.

Jmorgan 2009

The Thief

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#http://www.moderna.org/lookatme/archives/429.php
http://c/Users/Mike/AppData/Roaming/OpenOffice.org/3/user/backup/#http://www.moderna.org/lookatme/archives/429.phphttp://c/Users/Mike/AppData/Roaming/OpenOffice.org/3/user/backup/#http://www.moderna.org/lookatme/archives/429.php

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