Yellow Peril by Tze Ming Mok

‘Whither the New Zealand Chinese community?’ people were asking. ‘How oh how shall we navigate the perilous and two-faced seas of political identity?’ But the most important question was ultimately this: ‘Where are all the hot Chinese guys at?’

You’ll have to wade through to the end for the answer to that. Sorry. It does say 'ultimately', doesn't it?

Before the full Banana report, may I briefly note four things.

1. Screw the Australian government.
2. Screw the Chinese government.
3. Free Ching Cheong (please follow this link).
4. Make any jokes about Ching Cheong’s name and I’ll smash you.

Right. Bananas.

The crowd was Old. Old Generation, and largely, well, just Old. This was a reflection of the organisers - the New Zealand Chinese Association, which is an Old Generation Association, and full of old people. But there was a younger contingent, including a fair amount of overseas-born Southeast Asians, 1.5ers, and on the first day of the conference, probably about 20 international students. A hand count on the first day put the proportions at about 70-80% old Generation Chinese.

There’s too much to cover, the speakers will be putting their notes onto the conference site shortly, and you want to get to the end to find out about the hot guys. But these were some highlights:

Yuk King Tan talking quiet mellifluous iconoclasm, in front of a video of her artwork, which consisted of burning down art galleries. Stunning.

Mua Strickson-Pua, pointing out (and I keep saying this without anyone ever believing me) that Tana Umaga is Chinese.

The snippet of Roseanne Liang's documentary on her parents' ruling that she can only marry her Pakeha boyfriend if he asks for her hand in marriage in Mandarin (screening at the International Film Festival).

Mayor of Gisborne Meng Foon, in between talking a fair amount of assimilationist nonsense after the conference dinner, coming up with an absolute gem that I’ve been waiting a long time for someone to say: that Chinese people really need to chill out and relax.

After which I went home and studiously wrote my speech between 11:30 pm and 2:00 am.

And then there was the final throwdown. The heavyweight clash. This was nothing to do with me, I assure you. There were noticeable growing pains on display as the new generations outstripped the old, and we strove to hold it all together. But there was certainly no clean 'Old Generation'/'New Generation' split.

I was the last scheduled speaker of the conference, and after my speech, we broke for afternoon tea, whereupon lots of Old Generation types came up and said nice things to me. Eventually struggling out of the lecture theatre, and back to the company of my younger comrades and media hacks, I was granted the full benefit of the Errol Kiong kacang-sweet buttercup glow, and the Keith Ng anarcho-Hobbesian pixie-grin. Said Keith: “You fucked some shit up man!”

“What?” I said, “What do you mean? What do you mean?” I didn't know what he meant.

Then, Tony Chuah of the conference committee came by to alert me to the fact that I had “really pissed everyone off” including himself, although I still can’t quite figure out who he meant by ‘everyone’, or what exactly in my speech had pissed them off, and he didn’t tell me. He might have thought that I would automatically know, or that I had even written my speech expressly to piss someone off. But actually, I’m just so totally out of touch with the Old Generation, that I have no idea what they expect from me.

Given that the conservative element of the Old Generation community seems to think that everything I say is controversial in some way, I have no way of differentiating one degree of their perception of controversy from another. None. I honestly have no freakin’ clue. I generally assume they are mortified by my behaviour, not because of my actual opinions, but because I’m fairly honest, direct, and outspoken about my opinion. The great thing about being a Chinese person subjected to the approbation of the conservative end of the Old Generation Chinese community for being outspoken, is this: they find being outspoken so unnerving that they never actually tell you that you suck, why you suck, or …well …anything to your face at all actually.

So you can just ignore them.

But this is not very productive. I was totally bemused about Tony’s comment even by the end of a lunch the next day at which Keith Ng (even less Old Generation than me) made an exhaustive and heroic effort to explain it to me, or at least come up with a hypothesis. And sure, I can see why my speech might have confused or unsettled some people’s idea of their own identity… but still can’t figure out what was so specifically angering.

The existence of the Old Generation Chinese community only dawned on me properly when Dragons on the Long White Cloud came out in 1996. My father gave it to me for, I think, my eighteenth birthday - and you know, I was damn excited. It was election year. I thought it would be a radical ethnic-pride touchstone with which to fight The Enemy Who Shall Not be Named. So I went through the bloody thing looking for my own family, but all I found was this: "...and this figure does not even take into account that some Southeast Asians, such as Indonesians, Malaysians etc, may be 'Chinese'..."

Right.

I may be…

‘Chinese’.

‘Thanks a lot Manying!’ I thought. ‘I’m Chinese! If this book isn’t about me, who the hell is it about?’

It was only then that it really hit home that there were all these Chinese people in New Zealand with …big extended families! Who all spoke English with Kiwi accents, even the parents and old people! Who couldn’t speak Chinese! Who clumped together in these… things called …communities! Who really were all related and that this is why when white people met me they would ask if I was related to blah-blah-blah Wong-Doo and I’d say ‘no, and that’s not even a real name’ but actually, it is! That some of these people based their sense of New Zealand belonging, and their sense of entitlement to belong, on the fact that they’d been in the country five times as long as my family. Suddenly, a lot of things made sense.

It was also around this time that I heard elements of the Old Generation community were actually disapproving of people who spoke out to criticise racism and defend Chinese people.

Now that was a total mindfuck.

Because I never had any contact whatsoever with them growing up here, I find it quite difficult to gauge Old Generation community reaction to my opinions. This is why I’ve inserted all the audience reactions to my speech that I recall, to help me figure it out. From the comments I received after the speech, there had to be, in that lecture theatre, a split in opinion between the conservative older leadership and the majority of the crowd. But the bulk of the crowd was Old Generation. And they were behind me (though they didn’t necessarily always share my sense of humour).

Wong Liu Sheung who was chairing that session, said in her introduction that she thought that my opinions are courageous, and that I rush in “where angels dare not tread”, but I don’t believe this is true at all. All I do is express my opinion, and that is not an act of courage when I have no disapproving community to slam me down or throw me out. Aside from Derek, my parents are my only family in this country and they generally agree with me. Even when they don’t, they’re happy that I participate in political discourse, given that they grew up in countries that paid lip-service to democratic procedure, but where meaningful democracy was not possible. That’s a large part of why they came here. So it’s no big deal for me to say what I think.

But what would be courageous would be if someone from the Old School did what I did. Now that would be putting your balls on the line. And somebody did so that day. It was the most impressive moment of the conference.

The issue was exclusion and exclusivity, and it all happened in the final open-slather forum session, entitled ‘Where to from here?’, chaired by NZCA Chairman Kai Luey. This was after I had ‘pissed everyone off’ with my speech, so what I’m about to describe doesn’t factor into my bemusement over that issue (sure, I can see why they might be pissed off at me now, but not because of the speech). Kai Luey had just rebuffed a suggestion from the bright young president of the International Students Association of Unitec. Ben had suggested that International Students had been somewhat underrepresented, and could play a greater role in the next conference – perhaps even by hosting it at Unitec. Kai said, in essence, that International Students are not real New Zealanders and therefore not the NZCA’s concern. And that they could have their own conference if they wanted. I responded in a fury to this, as anyone could have expected, slamming Kai for being divisive, ungracious, and being out of touch with the importance of the transient yet permanent International Student presence in our cities – particularly the impact it has on the cultural life and cultural identity of Auckland. I didn’t make the obvious point that the first generation of his family in New Zealand were probably not permanent residents when they arrived either. Neither were mine. In fact, my parents were interns at Auckland Hospital when they came to New Zealand. That’s right - international students.

I didn’t expect anyone to back me up, but lively discussion continued. And suddenly, Kai Luey came under sustained attack from Dr Jim Ng, prestigious historian and Chair of the Chinese Poll Tax Heritage Fund - the Oldest of the Old Generation. It was OG vs OG. Jim seemed truly outraged that Kai had drawn these lines around language, citizenship and communities, and harangued him for missing the point of the whole conference.

It’s terrible to say that a lot of the old Chinese guys there looked similar – but I suppose that’s what you get at a certain age, especially if you are all Cantonese, originally from the same few villages, and often somewhat related to each other. Kai and Jim are two similar looking solid grey Cantonese men, with cheerful jowls, dark ochre skin, and pouchy eyes. And one of them was yelling, bawling at the other from back row centre, “that doesn’t equate to leadership!”

Kai, in classic Old Generation style, said nothing.

When it all drew to a close, myself and a bunch of my friends who have taken to calling ourselves ‘The Movement’ in not entirely facetious terms, clamoured around Jim Ng who emerged from the theatre looking shaken, accompanied by his frowning wife. We were slapping his back, and pumping his hand, shouting "people’s hero!"’ and "you da man!", and he was overwhelmed and surprised. “I was getting kicked in the leg, and elbowed” he said mock-querulously, gesturing to his wife and relatives, “I’m not going to get any tea tonight!” I'd believe that. Now that’s courage.

Kai is now proposing a series of seminars to keep the momentum and debate going, and has written me a very gracious email.

So, this is as exciting and dramatic an ethnic political community as I've ever been a part of. It's laudable that the NZCA had the vision to even bring people who disagreed with each other together into the same space so that we could disagree face to face. For some people, it's the first time they've met other young Chinese people with an interest in political and community engagement and activism. And you know what? There are more of us than you might think. It would be lazy and cliched to say 'the Chinese community has finally come of age', but tonight, I'm taking Meng Foon's advice about slacking off to heart.

So where were the hot Chinese guys at? My favourite relative in the world (we made a deal I'd say that, but it's still true) step-cousin-in-law Derek Cheng, notes that he was in Hamilton, and also, later, speaking to The Enemy Who Must Not Be Named. Manying Ip's son was marking Law School test papers. Wait a minute, no he wasn't - that slacker was blogging! Chris Cheung and his other hot friend just wanted to talk about identity. Word of advice: 'let's talk about identity issues babe' no longer works as a pick-up line. Chinese guys really do just want to talk about identity. For god's sake. The rest were either gay or journalists. And still wanted to talk about identity. I think I got more attention from the Old Guys. I suppose that's not all bad.

Edit: this just in from Tony Chuah

Oh god I hate being misquoted, and what's worse, cut short to look like some kind of old school conservative bigot. That's the last thing I'd want to be identified with (completely). Maybe in terms of geneology I can make some (half) claim to belonging to the old crew. [...] I wasn't speaking for all of "us". It was just me that was "pissed off" because you mainly right. I hope that clears some things up for you.

No wonder I didn't get it. Frankly, I'm still confused, but will get back to Tony on that one.

Were you expecting me to say something about the New Zealand First immigration policy? Do I really have to? Can't I just crawl inside a bowl of noodles and not come out until all the old ladies who hate me die off?

It's no fun when your enemies are old ladies. It's not like you can beat them up and feel good about it. But they can beat you up. It has happened to me. That's right, a racist old lady once tried to beat me up.

It was 14 August, 2004. A bunch of local activists had organised a packed meeting at the Newtown Community Centre in Wellington, following the desecration of several Jewish cemeteries. I was called outside to talk to a journalist. Waiting on the pavement was the National Front (all six of them). Offended that they hadn't been welcomed into the meeting, a seemingly insane little old lady who happened to be the wife of the National Front's Secretary, started ranting at me and boob-bashing me, trying to shove me onto the street with the full strength of her rotund body. This was actually rather funny. A little old lady was trying to beat me up. I kept trying to dance around her, but she didn't let up, she just came and came at me. It was like being repeatedly buffeted by a giant, stodgy, poisonous scone. I was laughing in shock, unsure what to do. In the end, a policeman intervened and warned her off.

I didn't press charges.

Taking this anecdote as analogy for the New Zealand First onslaught, I have a range of options:

a) Be angry
b) Be upset
c) Be afraid
d) Laugh
e) Ignore
f) Calmly and rationally expose all falacious, cynical and divisive propaganda for what it is.

Sorry, have to strike out f). As mentioned in a previous post, commonly experienced physical reactions to Winston Peters often delay any articulate response on my part. What with the haemorrhaging and all. And it's very tiring to recycle the same old responses to the same old election-cycle bullshit. Other people with more energy are doing that already.

So let's consider a)-c). The first period, starting around 1993 or so and capped by the '96 election, was bad, real bad. I don't want to talk about it. I don't even want to think about it. If you were there, if you were one of us, if you were just a kid like I was, you'll know what I mean. Then in 1999 it was a dormant issue, given the wipe-out New Zealand First caused itself by actually getting into government and being useless at it. Then in 2002 it was merely familiar and dull, and Peters' billboards were way too easy to deface. And finally, now, I think I could happily sleepwalk through, if it wasn't for the refugee witchhunts.

Because who gives a shit what he says about 'Asians' these days? There are enough of us, with enough socio-economic and cultural clout (in Auckland anyway) that it doesn't even matter. So what if a bunch of old folk in Orewa think Auckland is too Asian? What's it got to do with them? And it's quite flattering really, for Peters to compare Queen Street to Hong Kong. I mean, which is a more interesting walk: this street, this street, or ...this street?

I think that covers d).

We 'Asians' have our foothold and we're climbing. I wish Peters would just focus on 'Asians' this election, and leave refugees - the most vulnerable people in the country, and technically, the world - the hell alone. But that would mean shunning cowardice.

The worst thing about Winston Peters is that he doesn't mean anything he says, and we are wired for taking hypocrisy as the biggest sin, always. Can anyone really believe Peters cares about preserving traditional old white New Zealand life? He'd love it if Auckland transformed suddenly into Hong Kong! The booze! The clubs! The shoeshiners! The women! The cigarettes! You can smoke anywhere in China! Smoke in restaurants! In cinemas! In hospitals.* He'd be in heaven.

As for e), it is my firm belief that by the time I plough through this 800 page review-copy of Jung Chang's Mao: the Unknown Story, the entire membership of New Zealand First will have succumbed to generational turnover.

Let's go back again though, to everyone's favourite option: d). Now, who doesn't have at least one racist grandparent? When we brought my paternal grandmother over from Malaysia late last century, the wee Somali kids from the neighbourhood would sometimes trot into our front yard to fetch their ball and she'd practically dive for cover exclaiming 'the black people are coming to steal things!'

Here are two ways to deal with your racist grandparents:
1. Let them all go off together to a semi-rural locale, to be locked in a hall with a political demagogue; or
2. Keep them on site so you can laugh at their ignorant comments and say 'Come on Gran, don't be dumb.'

Option 2 is the one I've always employed, and I have a fair bit of hope for it. If you are a Pakeha reader, and would like to help me personally in some way, I request that you indulge in Option 2 as often as possible. Old people don't like to be laughed at. It reminds them they're old and out of touch, and still have to keep learning things. When people get a certain amount of living out of the way, they naturally think they're entitled to shut down their brains and not let in anything new. It might well happen to you soon, or maybe it has already. Just hope like hell that when it does, that you're still in meaningful contact with the rest of society.

Speaking of rebuilding connections with reality, it's nice to see that the SIS has come clean. They really do fantasise that they are the Mukhabarat. Is this surprising? I wonder if they call themselves the Gestapo when they question Germans.

Which segways perfectly into this. I managed to pick up from Fightdemback before hackers crashed their site once more tonight, that in the wake of Kyle Chapman throwing in the towel there has been a spate of lesser members jumping ship, some to the New Zealand Nazi Movement, some to a peaceful, apolitical life. Fightdemback bids them good luck with good grace.

I also mentioned earlier that the National Front had been ineffectually flaming the comments page of a Landfall essay of mine republished by The Big Idea. Last week, a (Pakeha) Herald journalist was enraged enough to complain to the site, demanding that the comments be removed, which they duly were. I was a bit dismayed, as the comments so neatly summed up everything that needs to be said about the National Front. Aside from the awesome comment I quoted in my earlier post, about how I shouldn't be taking essay-prize money away from hard-working illiterate white men, I only managed to save this gem, signed by Kerry Bolton himself, long-serving senior member of the National Front, lover of the giant poison scone:

"That she should be lauded as some kind of writer of repute is typical of the kind of society NZ has become, rotten form[sic] the top downwards; a reflection of the West's cycle of decline."

Shucks, the guy knows how to swell a girl's head.

I don't think it's really fair or entirely relevant to make fun of mad right-wingers and neo-nazis based on the inadequacy of their spelling, grammar and punctuation. So I will note that Kerry can use a semicolon very nicely, that he believes the Holocaust to be a "blood libel" against the German race, and that he is a Satanist. The last minority. Sigh. Gold, all of it, and all gone.

However, there has been one new comment which I've grabbed before The Big Idea moderators pull it off the site. A girl always needs to remember the first threat of violence she receives on the internet. The anonymous commenter took exception to my description of "a little slow-moving qi gong", and possibly not just because it was a clear tautology (shame on Landfall for giving a prize to such a solecism-packed tract).

Anonymous comment May 28, 2005 - 02:19 AM
"How about i try a little fast-moving fist on your face[?]"

If it was a little old lady making this comment, it would be okay of course. Anyone here have a grandmother who surfs the net at 2:19 in the morning? No? Oh. Well in that case, maybe this is illegal, I'm not sure.

I'm not losing any sleep over it.

Given the aforementioned Mao tome, the Banana conference, and a bunch (ho ho) of other stuff, I'm taking a short break (unless I really can't help it). Until then, I've started a rudimentary website - the Emergency Invasion Kit - for you to browse if you're really bored. It's a place to keep resources and writings that people have suggested I make more readily available, such as the tip-sheets Tessie Chen and I prepared for our recent session with the Herald on 'Asian' stuff. Have a good week. And on Saturday, spare a thought, if you can, for the fallen of Tiananmen.

Come on, click through, it's time to vote! Don't you love voting? I vote every chance I get. Dad took me into the polling booth with him in 1984, put the highlighter in my hand, and suddenly, I was complicit in the New Right Revolution at the age of six.

Ever since then, I've been addicted to voting to try and reverse that blot on my record.

But how often do you get to vote for something you actually believe in? Here's your chance: Vote by June 1st in the Reporters Without Borders Freedom Blog Awards.

Where Burma sweeps the Human Rights Documentary industry, Iran has long been dominating the persecuted political blogosphere with its killer blend of one of the most vibrant, outspoken, educated, grassroots democracy-movements in the middle-east, and a regime on the back foot that just won't quit. Iran actually has its own category in the Freedom Blog awards - although because nearly all political Iranian blogs are in Farsi, the only criteria you may have for voting could be based on the amount of time each blogger has spent in prison lately.

As for the Asian category, I'm predictably and parochially torn between Mainland China's angrychineseblogger, Malaysian Jeff Ooi's Screenshots, and singabloodypore.

For Middle East/Africa, who could possibly touch riverbend? You might be interested in the Zimbabwean nominee - but the site is down. Not a good sign.

While you're feeling spoiled for choice, check out the schedule for the Asia Film Festival currently on at the Academy, also until June 1. Stick with the online version - the printed schedule has a lot of errors, and looks like a Cathay Pacific inflight menu. But the fare itself is excellent.

If you had to choose, how would you spend your Saturday night? An evening with media commentators pondering whether blogs are actually important, and thinking about drugs but not taking any? Or an evening getting down with a bunch of totally hot Korean guys? Hmm. Tough call.

If you managed to fit both in, you would have found one experience rather lovely, the other merely mindblowing. However, the evening didn't start well - word had got out that Jin, our Chinese hip-hop golden boy, had quit the game. Burnt from the lack of support from his Ruff Ryders label, bowed from carrying the hopes of the US pan-Asian youth communities on his diminutive shoulders, he pours his pride and frustrations into this one-take cri de coeur 'I Quit'. The extended version might make you concerned and maternal in the angry mid-section, then invigorated by the snap-freestyle conclusion. Let's hope that he's just a little bit tired. That he just needs some hot congee like we all do in times of trial, and will be bouncing back to the battlefront soon. He's not even twenty-three yet. Oh Jin, it can't be over! Think of the good times! The glory days!

Words of mourning from Asian America:

he was one of the few positive Asian American figures in the media..." (yellowworld comment)

Thanks for opening up the world for us... And not that I was ever ashamed but you were the first that really made me proud to be asian. (myspace comment)

Could it have been Jin's penchant for Nikes that summoned this US$9000 pair of 'self-doubters' to stomp him down? (Hanzismatter's bust of this new customised Nike design really is beyond belief. It could surely only be the subtle revenge of sweatshop workers.)

A leaky portion of my sorrow will only be assuaged by an all-out splurge on Notorious MSG merchandise. As Hong Kong Fever says: "Much love to our brother Jin - we got to stick together as a people."

Yes, I namecheck a lot of Asian-American sites. Their 'movement' is advanced, yet in some ways they're behind us. Both these things seem due to the fact that their critical mass youth-culture demographic is predominantly American-born. They're confident, savvy and funny, and yet often out to prove that they can be as American as anyone else - that they speak English fluently, without Asian accents. That they aren't 'foreign'. And man, the guys sure can be kind of bitter about being perceived as uncool and not sexy. Of course, if you really were cool, you wouldn't care if people thought you weren't sexy. This isn't so relevant to what's happening in Auckland, where the creative industries are being rinsed-out and recoloured by a generation of 1.5ers and international students from the yellow lands and beyond, who may 'sound foreign' but are undisputably sexy and cool-as-fuck, and not ashamed to draw on their countries of origin for pop-and-street-culture inspiration. Here, Auckland's Asian hip-hop vanguardists Daemang Productions (DMP) rap in fluent Korean, Japanese, and ...uh, Ebonics. This critical mass is changing people's ideas about what Asians do and don't do. Last Saturday they showed, for example, that what Asians do do, if they feel like it, is bust some seriously ruthless shit on the mic.

Chatting later to cool-sexy-sane Josh Jang aka Daemang, DMP-founder and host of Planet FM's Monday night hip-hop show, Esteelo, I asked:

Do you feel proud that for the young Korean kids at your show, you’re providing something here that New Zealand-borns like me couldn’t get before?

That’s our whole motivation, about giving to the second generation. There isn’t much of a second generation of Korean people, we’re all 1.5 generation, so it’s a really good thing to do to show the second generation what could happen for them, an inspiration, motivation for the kids. At the concert on Saturday a lot of parents came with their kids and stayed at the back. Then later they were trying to get my number, like ‘Can you train my boys to be rap stars?’ That’s a really good thing to start off. Parents don’t want them to be just doctors and lawyers anymore, they know what’s right for the era. Media, all those cultural things are the most powerful things for this era - they think these things are really positive now. That’s what we need for the second generation. Someone’s gotta do this kind of thing at some stage, to open this thing up, so I’m proud we’re doing it with DMP. [Pause] Oh shit that’s too cocky! Don’t make me sound like all arrogant... But it’s kind of true though.

It's okay Josh - you can be proud. When you see a kid like Chan from Kelston Boy's High (excuse the blurry photography) get up on stage in an impromptu beat-boxing giveaway contest, and channel Rahzel the Godfather of Noyze, you're awestruck by not only the precocious skill, but the feeling that anything now is possible.

Says Josh:

Maybe people say there’s a lack of opportunities down here… but anything here is going to be like a pioneering thing. Everything we do is the first thing, the first time!

It's a good time for keeping your eyes open.

DMP's album launch packed the SkyCity Theatre with about 500 Korean kids, probably on the strength of the Esteelo following alone. It was Korfro-fever! DMP's Mr Koh (Roskill Represent!) should be officially accredited with the maintenance of the highest national proportion of 'fro to body-weight.

If you remember Aya taking the freestyle crown at the Jin show, she made her debut on Saturday with the DMP crew, stepping up to rap in Japanese and English. Half Japanese, half Pakeha, totally hot.

There was an explosive energy that night that only comes with youth, optimism, and a certain litheness of body. I ain't saying the DMP boys could take on Dawn Raid in a scrum but they sure as hell could outrun them.

Because I had to duck out to The Great Blend, I missed The Dynamic Duo, one of South Korea's biggest hip-hop acts. I don't know, maybe this is why Amanda Wheeler thought I looked 'angry' that evening. Generally, I like to think I'm more of an angryasianman.com kind of 'angry'. From Daemang's account, The Dynamic Duo tore up SkyCity - and I don't mean the pokies or the blackjack table.

I'll post more photos in the gallery as soon as DMP sends them to me, and as soon as I figure out how to, like, use the gallery. But for now here's a cute shot of some of the younger DMP boys and friends from outside the afterparty, at... well, where else?

TM: "...and I don't know what the fuck you were saying man, but it was dope shit."
Mr Koh: "Much love!"
TM: "Asian pride!"
Mr Koh: "Asian pride!"

Planting a book is not like planting a bomb

Of all obscure experiences nested within other obscure experiences, how fares the finding of a well-thumbed English language paperback of 'The Mind of Adolf Hitler' planted on a random shelf of the Chinese Language Bookstore in Balmoral?

I was with a friend who can read a substantial half-assful of fanti, whereas I can read rudimentary jianti. But at that point, thrown off by the sudden appearance of, not only the mind, but the face of Hitler, we were between us unable to quite figure out what section of the bookstore we were in. 'What the fuck is this doing here?' I wondered politely. 'I don't get it,' said my friend Al. The store clerk was also baffled: 'Uh... it's not ours...' he said redundantly. He took it and leafed through it for about five seconds, then put it under his desk like a confiscated porno.

Ever get the feeling you're being left clues to someone else's slow mental breakdown?

Morningside for rife!

While stuffing face at QQ Rice, Al and I watched real-life 13-year old replicas of the bro'Town boys mucking around with their basketballs in the forecourt, except with Jeff the Maori replaced by Jeff the Chinese (and he wasn't no Wong from Hong Kong). We watched them from the window, giggling, and they looked at us watching them, and giggled back. Then they took off towards Yummy Court.

Buddhist street-preachers really are less annoying than Christians or Hare Krishnas

'Excuse me, are you from Auckland? I was wondering where I could find..." It was a cute, cheeky little East or Southeast Asian guy wearing a cap, jeans, an orange polar-fleece Kathmandu jacket, with an armful of books and a kiwi accent. "...all the intelligent women wearing black raincoats and ...black boots with short dark hair and wearing hats...'

I shook my head grinning and stalked onwards with a swish of my raincoat.

'Nah nah, hold up, just kidding, I'm not like that,' he protested, 'I'm a monk, see?' He lifted his cap to show his shaved head.

Ah. Orange. Kathmandu. It all seemed to make sense. Kind of.

'Do you do yoga or meditate?' he asked.
'Um, sure.'
'Are you a buddhist?'
'No, but my family is Chinese, so we use some traditional practices, but not in a religious way. You know, gong fu, qi gong, they have some overlap with Buddhism, but they're not 'religious'. But anyway, don't worry about me, I'm good.'

Oh but he hustled and bustled (so cheeky! so adorable!) and started spinning some charming line about the different guises of spirituality using clothing as a metaphor (Orange, Kathmandu, the joke just got better and better), trying to work the ethnic angle a little, and then said:

'If you want to have a look at this book, we're trying to hook people back into ancient Eastern thought and wisdom...'

He flipped open the cover of his book, and the end-papers were a busy pastel hippy-montage of the advancement of the human spirit to enlightenment, as represented by rosy-cheeked blondes rising out of the primordial sludge and replicating in ever-more-Aryan ways towards nirvana.

'But dude... those people are white.'
'Oh... you know, we're trying to appeal to a Western audience.'

I laughed some more, and he laughed too, and let me walk off into the rain.