I AM NOT HILZOY (obviously)

by dr ngo (posted by liberal japonicus who will quickly get his grubby fingers out of dr ngo's prose as soon as we can sort out the typepad shtuff)

Let me introduce myself with some important disclaimers:

First, I am not Hilzoy. That's OK, because no one else is. On the other hand, some denizens of Obsidian Wings cling to the hope the next front-pager will be the second coming of Hilzoy.  Not me. (In both senses: I am not the second coming, and I've given up hoping.)

Second, I am not Gary Farber, or Doctor Science, or Slacktivist http://http://www.patheos.com/blogs/slacktivist/

Each of them does an admirable job of following current events and providing many useful links to, as well as engaging commentary upon, these events.  Not me. Such writing would imply a level of commitment to – and awareness of – What's Happening in the World that I couldn't muster even when I was younger. I became a historian to escape the present, not to explain it.

So if you want the qualities represented by either of these alternatives, don't bother to read my contributions.  Or if you do read them, and I persist in being neither Hilzoy nor timely and link-friendly, don't complain.  You have been warned.

Who I am is “dr ngo” - lurker and occasional commentator here for about a decade – a retired professor of Asian history, now living in a Blue Blotch on a Red State. I've never blogged before, though I've contributed a couple of guest posts here and there, but I come from a verbal, not so say verbose, family. My son (Anarch) will also be joining the front page here; my daughter (Magistra) has a blog of her own   http://magistraetmater.blog.co.uk/ (Where history, religion and motherhood meet and have a long intellectual conversation) as does my sister (A Musing Amma) http://www.patheos.com/blogs/amusingamma/ . They don't speak for me, and I certainly don't speak for them, but there's a lot of verbiage going around.

I expect that most of my posts will be drawn from my life and readings, and will probably feature two aspects of my life: age and Asia. I am now in my 70^th year, which places me well above the ObWi average, I believe, and that fact has become central to much of my consciousness. A lot of this has to do with health – the betrayal of the body – but I will try to spare you the details, because no one really wants to know. (Even I don't want to know, but I can't avoid it.) There are other aspects of aging, however, that may prove fruitful to discuss.  And you're all going to get old, eventually – consider the alternative.

I have studied Asia for more than fifty years, written and published about it for more than forty, taught about it for more than thirty, and lived there for more than twenty years, so it's a big part of who I am and what I know. It's also REALLY big – more people there than in all the rest of the world put together – so I don't kid myself that I know more than a small fraction of what there is to know, but even that small fraction puts me well ahead of most non-Asians. As noted above, I don't try to keep up on current events much, so I won't be trying to tell you what the Asian Century looks like this week, but I may be able to provide some longer term perspective.

Beyond that, who knows? I'm interested in music (especially vocal: choral and opera), theatre, travel (now in the past: Don't Get Around Much Any More), and spectator sports. With regard to the last of these, I once said that if it moved and they kept score, I'd watch it. I've been to a Rose Bowl game, seen Major League Baseball in BOTH Wrigley Fields (bonus points for anyone who can identify the non-Chicago one), watched Gary Sobers hit a century at Lords and Greg Chappell hit one at the Sydney Cricket Ground, saw the first (legal) seven-foot high jump and what is now the oldest (juiced) track record still extant, and enjoyed many Duke basketball games – women's, and some men's – at historic Cameron Indoor Stadium, but I'm not sure any of this qualifies me to say anything significant or new about sports. On the other hand, this is the Internet, so what difference does it make?

Let the revels commence.

Comments

[Hartmut]

What parts of Asian history would you consider your specialty? To say it's a wide field would be quite an understatement, from ancient Sumer or Asia Minor to modern japan, 10000 years and about as many miles.

[dr ngo]

My specialty is modern Southeast Asia, but I've taught - at a very superficial level, admittedly - at least a little about the region from Pakistan to Japan (I don't do West Asia = Middle East), and bits of the last 2500 years or so. I'll try to indicate, when it's not readily apparent, where my "expertise" is particularly inexpert.

[Slartibartfast]

Welcome, dr ngo!

I became a historian to escape the present, not to explain it.

I thought historians studied history as a way to explain How We Got In This Mess. But non-historians probably drop the ball, here, just as non-engineers Just Don't Get It sometimes.

[Yama001]

Really looking forward to what you have to offer. Great news, and thanks for jumping in.

[Hartmut]

Do you have any idea whether the very common Japanese movie trope 'woman at spinning wheel = demon' is from genuine Japanese folklore or just got introduced by Kurosawa and copied numerous times by others? I cannot remember a single example where the presence of a spinning wheel worked on by a woman did not mean that magic was at hand (and just one or two where it was a just a prop that no one used).

[Laura Koerbeer]

Hello! I'm sure your posts will be interesting. I only know the obvious stuff about Asia and some of that probably isn't true.

I donate thirty dollars a month to an outfit called SoiDog, a rescue in Phuket, Thailand. They do spay and nueter as well as adoptions, but most importantly to me, they rescue dogs from the dog meat trade. My next dog will be a Soi dog.

[Countme-In]

Welcome back, Hilzoy.

[chris y]

Welcome. And please ask your daughter to post more often.

[opit]

Hello Not Hilzoy. While I`ve missed her and wouldn`t mind finding out how she is faring after going to Africa, a historian with an appetite for Asian cuisine is scarcely to be sniffed at. Given your choice of nom de plume I suspect your name is an acronym like mine - with yours taken from field experience.
Your age reminds me of my first post as OldePhartteInTraining in 2005 which was responded to by exMI and ThreeScoreAndTenOrMore.
I`m 65 and occasionally quip with my.opera.com nepmak2000 who is 68 ( and his acronym is obvious on arrival )
Your audience awaits. Have fun.

[JAFD]

Welcome!

So, you once watched an earlier incarnation of The Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim play, correct ?

[Countme-In]

Baseball and living to be 111 years old:

http://www.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20130601&content_id=49324808&c_id=nyy

[dr ngo]

Some brief responses:

Slarti: I thought historians studied history as a way to explain How We Got In This Mess. Not really. We study history because we like it. What you're paraphrasing is our public justification, a key element in our claim for relevance and our plea for funding (or even just attention). THOSE WHO DO NOT KNOW HISTORY ARE CONDEMNED TO REPEAT IT. Possibly true, but perhaps just as true of those who do know history.

Hartmut: I have no idea whatsoever about the Japanese spinning wheel, but have referred your question on to a friend who's a historian of modern Japan.

JAFD: Yes, I saw the original (MLB) Los Angeles Angels once, as well as their minor league predecessors. And the original Los Angeles (not San Diego) Chargers - called that because they were owned by Barron Hilton, who more or less invented the charge card. (Or so we were told.)