Dancing with scissors

This past weekend, I saw Matthew Bourne's version of Edward Scissorhands. I loved it! The sets, costumes and music were all wonderful. The scissors really did work (at least they opened and closed) and looked rather dangerous. I loved Tim Burton's movie and I felt the dance captured the feeling and spirit of the original. There were two dance sequences that were most affecting to me. The topiary dance is a fantasy sequence in which Edward, sans scissors, dances with his dream cheerleader accompanied by a corps of topiary bushes. The final duet with scissors in a cemetary was so sad it brought tears to my eyes.

There were quite a lot of children in the audience, including a lot of young boys, uncommon at dance performances. My eavesdropping revealed that the young crowd loved it as much as the adults did.

Turkey Day

Thanksgiving tends to be my preferred holiday. Lots of food, no religious etiquette to be concerned about, and my aunt Yvonne (otherwise known as Gugu) always has interesting people at her annual dinner. This year, I went up early to spend the week with my sister, brother-in-law and Neve. She just turned one and is starting to get the hang of walking. As my sister says, she looks like she's drunk.

The crowd at Gugu and Al's was smaller than in the past. Several of the Thanksgiving regulars were there. Newbies Daragh and Hilary have just moved here from Ireland and it was fun to hear how they are getting the hang of living in California.

I didn't do any sightseeing in the city this time. I did spend time with a few friends who now live in the area. It's been years since Tegan, Annette and I were all in LA (in the design biz) so it was wonderful to have dinner with them. And I had tea with Deborah (from graduate school) at the Mark Hopkins. It was a beautiful day in the city (clear, no fog, but cold) and after tea, we walked around the area. I took this photo of the Transamerica building at twilight by holding my camera against a phone pole (trying to stop my hands from shivering).

"Rabbit Hole"

I saw this play by David Lindsay-Abaire this weekend. This is the play for which Cynthia Nixon (formerly of Sex and the City) won her Tony last year. It was one of the funniest plays about the death of a child that I've ever seen! Actually, there really was quite a lot of humour in it. And a lot of sadness, of course. "You'll laugh, you'll cry", it really applied to this. The writing was wonderful. My favourite character was the grandmother. She comes off at first like a bit of a ditz, but her random meanderings would eventually lead to a comment so poignant and so deep that it almost took your breath away. As with a lot of plays in LA, the actors are often people you've seen on TV. In this case, the most recognizable was the woman who played the mother of the dead child. She was Sela Ward's sister in "Once and Again".

A man who made a difference

Today I actually heard something on the radio that gave me hope and inspiration. The Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to Mohammed Yunus, the Bangladeshi man who started Grameen Bank to provide small loans to poor people to start their own businesses. He basically created the concept of 'microcredit' and has helped many poor people, predominantly women, get a small leg up in a very unfair world. This concept has spread to many other countries, so untold numbers are now being helped. I first read about Yunus through Heifer International. It humbles me to know about people like this.

Charlie & Stacy

This weekend, my cousin Charlie married Stacy Wright. They make a very cute couple and the wedding was held in the beautiful flower filled Como Conservatory in Minneapolis. Both Charlie and Stacy are pilots (he as a commercial pilot, she privately) and work for the same airline. The tables were labeled by airports that they had travelled through together as a couple, with the story of each trip and a photo on the tables. Nice personal touch. The entire Cheng clan descended upon the city. It was fun to see all of the children together. Maia seemed to enjoy saying my name ('nan nan ai yi') which was really cute (somehow it becomes really meaningful when a 2 year old finds you memorable in any way). Hunter and Austin got along famously. Mari could be quite the independent little girl. Neve seemed to be enthralled with the older kids (especially the girls). It's amazing how quickly they have all grown.

Fifth Anniversary

I can't remember what I did on September 10th, 2001. I wish I could. If I'd known that day what was to come, would I have made more of an effort to remember? Or to do something memorable?
Today, I want to toast to the world that we lived in on that day. I really miss that world.

Walking NYC

If you are in NYC and want to explore it by foot, I suggest you look up Big Onion Walking Tours. This is a company that has walking tours of all different kinds of neighbourhoods in Manhattan. Their guides all have advanced degrees in history or related fields, and they design their own tours. I took a 2 hour tour of Harlem. Our guide brought photos with him showing the various people he was telling us about, or places as they looked 'in the day'. During our tour, he showed us sites of some less well known history, such as the offices of militant activist Marcus Garvey. We saw a street of older rundown homes, but another a few blocks away was lined with gorgeous brownstones. As with many working class neighbourhoods in NY, this area is being gentrified and much of it's history is in danger of being bought up by outsiders. As we started our tour, a local resident, seeing a pack of mostly white folks (2 young black women and I were the only minorities) led by a young white guy, immediately came up to us and started asking us questions. We later learned that it's not uncommon to find a realtor leading a bunch of potential investors through the area, and the gentleman was concerned that we were such a group.

NYC's smaller museums

I discovered a couple of small museums in NYC. The first one is the Tenement Museum. It's located in the Lower East Side, where tenement buildings are primarily located. Living in a tenement was a fact of life for just about any immigrant to NYC in the late 1800's. Every immigrant group has had a stronghold in this neighbourhood. The Museum is a reconstructed tenement and they use historically accurate objects, as well as research on actual families who have lived in the building where the Museum is located. Visits to the Museum are by scheduled tours which are thematically arranged around specific populations who have lived in the building over the years. The area is currently being gentrified (as is most of working class NYC). A wonderful ice cream shop, Il Laboratorio del Gelato, is right next door.

The second museum is the Noguchi Museum and Studio in Queen's, just on the other side of the East River. It's in a so-so neighbourhood across the street from a Costco. Isamu Noguchi was a Japanese American sculptor who is probably best known for his unique paper lanterns and iconic mid-century coffee table. The studio includes many of his rock sculptures in a serene little concrete building with a Japanese garden. When I was there, there was an interesting exhibit on his friendship and collaboration with Buckminster Fuller (of geodesic dome fame). The little shop inside has many mid-century classics and many books, and a fascinating video showing how the paper lanterns were made.

Chihuly at the New York Botanical Gardens

One of the highlights of my NYC trip was a visit to the New York Botanical Gardens to see the Chihuly glass art installations. The NYBG is located in the Bronx and is very easy to get to via a 20 minute train ride from Grand Central. Dale Chihuly is a glass artist based in Seattle. He has many pieces in art museums however he may be most popularly known for the glass flower ceiling installation at the Bellagio in Las Vegas. The installation at the NYBG included Reeds, Chandeliers, Towers, Ikebana and balls scattered throughout the grounds but mainly inside the beautiful conservatory. This place is worth visiting all on its own, and the Chihulys were spectacular in this setting. Particularly noteworthy were the installations in the two lotus ponds. The lotus and waterlilies were just starting to bloom in late June and their bright pinks and oranges were accented by a profusion of glass shapes floating in and surrounding the ponds. Each pond had a different colour scheme, and each one also had a wooden canoe filled to the brim with various glass shapes. Some of the towers and chandeliers were made of hundreds of individual pieces. I've often felt that Chihuly's work could be a little over-the-top, however in this setting, they just fit.

NYC museum renovations

NYC has seen a spate of museum upgrades in recent years. My visit coincided with reopenings of two, and the start of one. MOMA reopened last fall, and I love the new layout. There is a beautiful atrium, and when I visited, they took full advantage of the space to display a series of paintings on metal by one artist that spanned the full three walls of the space (the fourth side is a balcony). The audio guides are now free with admission (good thing given the price) and they sometimes include commentary by living artists whose works are displayed.

The Morgan reopened this spring and now features a new entry way by Renzo Piano. This space is very subdued but there is a glass elevator, which is kind of amazing. Even the doors are glass. There's more about the Morgan in a previous entry. You can also see another glass elevator at the Apple store on 5th Ave., around 60th.

The Guggenheim is currently swathed in scaffolding and netting but they have a very large exhibit of Zaha Hadid's work. She is a very avant garde architect, who hasn't had a lot built until recently. I'm still not sure if I like her architecture but the beautiful paintings that she creates as concept drawings were worth seeing. She also does a very interesting bas-relief out of card stock for some early concept models. This exhibit also highlighted how completely inappropriate this building is to display almost any kind of art. The pathways were crowded and narrow, made even more so by the layout of architectural models.

Midtown museum gem

One of the new discoveries for me was the Morgan Library. This is a museum that houses the collection of the banker J. Pierpont Morgan in his former home in midtown. He was a big collector of manuscripts and drawings. In fact, the Morgan Library has two of the three existing Guttenberg bibles printed on paper. He also has a beautiful collection of Ancient Near Eastern cylinder seals. These are small cylinders made of various stones on which are carved little stories using the typical hieroglyphs of the period. Although they don't look like Egyption hieroglyphs, it's the same idea. The cylinders are rolled onto clay where you can then view the story. The seals are displayed in cabinets along with a clay imprint and an enlargement. The carvings are beautifully detailed. The Library also has a wonderful collection of manuscripts written by famous authors (see the Bronte sisters' crabbed handwriting!) and composers. The music section includes listening stations so you can follow along with the composition.

Big Apple!

At the end of June I spent a terrific week sightseeing in New York City. I haven't visited NY since 9/11 happened, and the last couple of times I was there were short trips. This time I spent 8 full days there, and was only able to cover a fraction of all there is to see. I stayed with my cousin Wilson and his wife Ming, who moved there last year. She is a Radiology resident and he works at Google. They have a great apartment in midtown, which was a wonderful location to roam the city. I even managed to venture outside of Manhattan to the Bronx and Queens. I'm going to write about a few highlights.

Portrait of artists as young men

Last week, I visited the ACE gallery which is currently showing an exhibit of art by Dennis Hopper. Yes, that Dennis Hopper. Apparently, the man is quite the photographer. In the 60's he hung out with a few young, fresh, geeky artists, you might have heard of them: Ruscha, Lichtenstein, Warhol, Rauschenberg, etc. And I do mean geeky. In the photos, they look like they could be standing around fixing computers, instead of turning the art world on its ears. Hopper also takes pictures of walls. It's more interesting than you think, he notices all kinds of interesting things on walls, and when you isolate those things from their context, it can be really beautiful.

Major baby accomplishments

Neve, my sister's daughter, rolled over on her own for the first time this Saturday. It was hilarious how invested we three adults were in her accomplishing this task. I'm not sure Neve fully realized where she was going to end up when she started leaning her legs to one side and then the rest of her followed, with a little help from an arm. She definitely has more control over her muscles than the last time I saw her (at 4 months) however she is moving something almost all the time, and I wonder if these are voluntary or not. No wonder she has to sleep so much!

Getty Villa

I realize it's March already, however back in January, I was at re-opening day of the Getty Villa. The Villa, if you'll recall, is where the original Getty museum was located. It has been closed for remodel since the Getty Center opened. The Villa now holds all of the antiquities and they are organized by theme, making it a lot of fun (and much more interesting to me) to view the artwork. The Villa itself has been opened up a lot (more windows) and the gardens now include only mediterranean plants. There is a terrific children's room, where kids can draw on vases and create their own antiquities. It's a beautiful place to spend a day.

This photo is of the lily pond, to the side of the main villa.

My favourite art show in years

A couple of weeks ago, I saw the Ecstasy show at the Geffen Contemporary branch of MOCA. What a fabulous show! I can't remember the last time I had so much fun looking at and experiencing art. And from the reaction of the crowds, I'm sure I wasn't the only one. The pieces in the show all reflected altered perceptions in some way. Some pieces were direct references to drugs (both illicit and not), some presented images in an altered, distorted way, while others worked directly to alter your own perceptions. The art came in all forms, painting, sculpture, multi-media. Some things you looked at, some you experienced, some you interacted with, a few even interacted with you. The crowd was a mix of young couples, art students, little old ladies, and parents with kids. I wish more contemporary art was like this.

Tigger, R.I.P.

On Saturday, January 7th, 2006, my beloved old cat Tigger passed away. His passing was both sudden and not unexpected. He was in good health, however he was 16 years old, which is very old for a cat. He leaves a large, furry empty space in my life. I've had him since he was a baby, and almost as long as I've lived in Southern California. He followed me to 3 homes, the last move being quite traumatic for him, although he learned to love it. He loved people and followed them around when they visited. He always wanted to see the outside, however once he got there it scared him. He knew all the dark cool places, all the sunny warm spots and the few high areas at home. He got his name from his bouncy ways as a kitten.

Three baby cousins

The end of year holidays are now over and everyone is back at work. This year, I spent the week between Xmas and New Year in Silicon Valley. The entire Cheng clan was there which this year included me, my parents and my brother's family in addition to the usual assortment of sister, aunts, uncles, cousins and young cousins. It was wonderful to see my brother's kids (Austin and Mari) meeting Neve, my sister's daughter. Mari in particular loved watching Neve. What goes through a 15 month old's head upon seeing a 2 month old baby? Does she remember that age?

Neve is now clearly attending to people's faces-she just stared and stared. She also smiles easily, a full face smile, crinkly eyes, big wide mouth. In fact, sometimes she would smile in the middle of sleeping. I wonder what kind of dreams she has?

I made it back to Southern California just before the New Year's storm and watched the Rose Bowl parade from the warmth, comfort and dryness of my living room couch.