no Buddhist McMansions

I'm watching Tsinghua University lectures about Chinese architecture over the past 5000 years.

Me: [to Aff] "One of the professors always looks like he's secretly smiling. He looked really happy in one lecture, then he had a less flattering haircut and was less smiley in the second lecture. Now his hair is great again and he's even wearing a very Chinese style shirt."

Aff: "I hope he didn't go through a breakup during the time of the second lecture."

I'm 20% through the lectures. I learned that Chinese architecture was influenced by Confucian values of balance. 

Yin means shade, and yang means sun. The balance of yin-yang means you want a home that's not too big (too much shade) and not too high up (too much sun). The emperor had enormous public spaces, but his private living quarters were similar size to an average citizen.

the emperor's new dress

 I love this post by talented writer Sarah Miller:

I thought a lot about my lying review of that racist, boring, laughable, pseudo-intellectual movie ["The English Patient"]. I thought about how at the time, I was proud of myself for having the courage to make shit up because I was afraid to disagree with someone I wanted to impress, and also afraid of not making money. [...]

If you write thousands of sentences that have absolutely nothing to do with what you think or feel those sentences are still what you will become. You can turn yourself into another person. I turned myself into another person.

That person was very sure she understood the way the world worked. [...]

I used to think I thought the right way, like, who cares if everyone does bad things, because bad things are just what important people have to do. Who cares if Barack Obama bombs people and doesn’t even try to prosecute bankers, because that’s all just his job, and he loves gay people and yells at bigots and his wife is smart and has great arms. Who cares if Hillary Clinton is best friends with Henry Kissinger, because she is a woman and so am I, and she stands up to men, and isn’t that what feminism is all about, finally getting into the rooms, finally getting to be the one to kill the people who don’t matter? Since my life was a fantasy, I had no trouble inhabiting a larger one.

It often strikes me that it is considered immature to be unable to believe bullshit. [...]

Everyone had agreed to care about this thing, to call it good, to give it nine Academy Awards. But it was just a piece of shit sprinkled with glitter that everyone, including me, agreed to call gold.

Everyone talks about the country falling apart in November 2016, but maybe it fell apart in November 1996, when America went to see The English Patient. What if we had all turned to each other and said, “This garbage is our idea of rave-worthy cinema? Anyone else see a big problem here?”, and then there had been a massive riot?

I remember "The English Patient" when it came out in the 90s. Women raved because the male protagonist sewed the dress of the female protagonist. The dress was torn because he ripped it off her body in a fit of lust / passion. 

Tearing the woman's dress apart does not seem romantic. Why ruin the clothing? It would only take a few more seconds to remove it normally! Of course he should sew the dress he destroyed! Otherwise he gets to just mess it up and then get his rocks off and roll over and fall asleep, and she has to sew the dress back together? 

Sarah Miller is one of my favorite writers. She has many insights about the world, and turns them into clear concise stories.