Hoshinjutsu

Hoshinjutsu was developed by the late Glenn J. Morris, PhD (1944-2006), a master instructor in the martial arts, organizational psychologist, corporate consultant and author on such topics as martial arts, transpersonal psychology and Taoist meditation. 

Dr. Morris trained in the martial arts for close to fifty years. He extensively studied such diverse martial arts as Jujutsu, Judo, Tai Chi, different forms of Kung Fu, Savate, Okinawan Karate, Budo Taijutsu/Ninjutsu, Boxing and Wrestling. He earned his first black belt in 1965. He taught self-defense courses in Germany while serving in the U.S. Army and began teaching his Hoshinjutsu system of meditation and martial techniques at Hillsdale College in Michigan in 1980.

On April 1, 2006 Dr. Glenn Morris passed on and left the Hoshinjutsu system as his legacy.

Smokers

Yes, I have to admit I have a dislike of smoking. But, what do you do when you come across so many good shots of men (and women) smoking from under their beret?

      

Red Beret for Roger Federer

"Stunned and shaken, Roger Federer stood on center court during the French Open final wondering if the intruder who had just appeared and ‘got in his face’ posed a threat.   Police arrested the man, who will be charged with illegally entering a sports stadium.

The on-court intruder leaped into the area of play early in the second set, getting through a section of photographers sitting in the front row and hopping over the small wall separating them from the red clay.  The man tried to put a red beret on Federer’s head and then ran around the court, waving a Barcelona soccer team flag."

See it here on Youtube.

More Happy Pictures

 

Following the nice pictures of David and Ainhoa, last Saturday, these are slightly different wedding pictures. 

Sure, everyone his/her own wedding, of course. 
I wore khaki slacks and a rough woolen vest, while Megan wore a beautiful shiny brown dress (my daughter was told off at school, not so long ago, for drawing a bride in a brown dress - "everyone knows brides don't wear brown..."), but isn't it a bit sad if you feel you need to wear a military uniform on your wedding day...

David's Wedding Txapela

No, I didn't get married wearing a txapela. Of course, I should have,  but... I didn't (and far too happily married to do it again).

This man, David (David Who? I have no idea - I could not find any more information apart from the date), did wear his, with pride and it looks good. 

A long and happy marriage, Ainhoa and David!

Truffles

A truffle is a rare, edible mushroom that is considered a delicacy in many parts of the world. Generally harvested in the wild, they are quite expensive. Truffles are often confused with chocolate-covered truffles, a confectionery that has no relation to mushroom truffles.
Requiring climates with mild weather changes, truffles grow in a limited number of places including France, Italy, Croatia, and Slovenia. Truffles are also collected in the United States, in states like Oregon and Washington, as well as parts of the Middle East, North Africa and New Zealand. 

They grow approximately one foot (30 cm) underground among the roots of oak, elm, chestnut, pine, and willow trees where they form a symbiotic relationship with the environment.
There are dozens of different types of truffles ranging in size from a walnut to an apple. Truffles are irregularly-shaped with sometimes smooth, though usually bumpy or wrinkled caps.

Truffle hunting is big business during truffle season, which generally lasts from fall to spring. Each year, trufficulteurs use specially-trained dogs that find the buried treasures, usually at night. In the past, female pigs or sows were used to hunt for truffles, as the pungent odor that the truffles emit is similar to that of a male pig. The sows were difficult to hold back once the truffle was located, however, and would readily consume the expensive delicacy. For this reason most hunters now use truffle dogs.

The taste of a truffle is often compared to garlic blended with an earthiness or pungent, mushroomy flavor. They are most often served uncooked and shaved into foods like pasta, salads, or omelets. They are also served in light sauces, on fondue, or even on pizza.
Of the many varieties of truffles, some of the most famous are the Italian white truffle, the French black truffle, the summer black truffle, and the March truffle. The white truffle, often referred to as the white diamond, is considered the rarest type of truffle, demanding one of the highest prices. In general, truffles are among the most expensive natural foods in the world, selling for hundreds or thousands of US Dollars (USD) per pound (0.45 kg).

Louise Joséphine Bourgeois

Louise Joséphine Bourgeois (25 December 1911 – 31 May 2010) was a renowned French-American artist and sculptor, best known for the spider structures, titled Maman. These pieces led to her being nicknamed the Spiderwoman. She is recognized today as the founder of confessional art.

In the late 1940s, after moving to New York City with her American husband, Robert Goldwater, she turned to sculpture.

Though her works are abstract, they are suggestive of the human figure and express themes of betrayal, anxiety, and loneliness. Her work was wholly autobiographical, inspired by her childhood trauma of discovering that her English governess was also her father’s mistress.

Louise Bourgeois spent her childhood in Choisy-le-Roi where her parents ran a tapestry restoration business. From the age of eleven, Louise helped with the job of drawing the motifs. The thread used to restore the tapestries can be metaphorically compared to the line of the drawing. As Marie-Laure Bernadac points out in her book Louise Bourgeois, La création contemporaine [Louise Bourgeois, Contemporary Creation] (Flammarion, 2006, first edition, 1995), her first automatic drawings are associated with primitive scenes of childhood, birth, and maternity. Though less immediate, painting was nevertheless one of the means of expression favoured by the artist up until the late 1940s.

In the early 1930s, Louise Bourgeois attended the School of Fine Arts and various art academies, including the Grande Chaumière, where her teacher Fernand Léger detected her vocation of sculptor. “Painting does not exist for me”, declares the artist, claiming to be attracted more by the “physical aspect of sculpture” which alone enables her the expression of emotions, the goal of her artistic approach, releasing and overcoming fear by giving form to the affect.
In 1938, she met the art historian Robert Goldwater. They married and went to live in the United States. In her first solo exhibition in 1945 in New York she presented twelve paintings. In 1947, one of the major themes of her work appeared in her drawing and painting: the femme-maison [house-woman].

Bourgeois died on 31 May 2010, at the Beth Israel Medical Center in New York City at the age of 98 from a heart attack. Wendy Williams, the managing director of the Louise Bourgeois Studio, announced the news of Bourgeois' death.She had continued to create artwork until her death, her last pieces were finished the week before.

The New York Times said that her work "shared a set of repeated themes, centered on the human body and its need for nurture and protection in a frightening world".

Thank you, Truus

The Beret as a Recruitment Item

It's an interesting phenomenon: the beret being a symbol for die-hard pacifists, peace advocating artists, high-end fashion adepts and, on the other side, the military; be it regular conscripts or professionals in Foreign legion, Green Berets and other regiments that allure to boy's imaginations. 
Many berets feature in recruitment posters, like this Canadian one:

Or this  more recent poster from Canada.






Posters from the US Army Green Berets, 






Irish posters of the WWI period:

And Rodesian recruitement for the Selous Scouts, from the pre-Zimbabwean era. 

The Beret as a Fashion Accessory

Over the decades, the beret has always been -or maybe I should say "has always returned"- as a fashion accessory. 
Marlene Dietrich (left) and Brigitte Bardot (right).

Like for this young woman in 1960's London (I won't count the knitted beret shaped hat on the lady with the buggy...). 

Catherine deNeuve ensured interest in the beret at different times during her long-spanning career.


Faye Dunaway brought the beret well in the Hollywood spotlight with the 1967 Bonnie and Clyde movie.

And in more recent times, we see Cameron Diaz and Penelope Cruz, for example. 

Hemingway, again

At a cafe in Pamplona, 1925

Ernest Hemingway has been a long time advocate of the beret, leaving a nice legacy of photographs of himself with beret and his various wifes. 

Here he shows his beret with Ava Gardner in the bullring of Valencia:

Or this one, taken on the 1st of January, 1955, with his fourth wife - journalist Mary Welsh journalist and Ava Gardner.

Hemingway, during a Pamplona bullfight, 3rd from right

And this 1960 photograph by Marcel Mitrani, Hemingway, Ava Gardner and his friend toreador Luis Miguel Dominguín.

From the Blog of Cosmogono

From the Blog of Cosmogono:

"All cosmogonics, worthy of the name, must possess a beret to use when required; when composing, measuring, painting, inventing, discoursing, go to grand galas, or simply to take out into the fresh air. So it is essential that this matter is not amenable to negotiation. The beret (black, of course) is a gadget designed to protect the head, showing our love for the head, as we often don't pay due attention to the risk that our head fails us. The berets legitimate production can be Basque or French; I use an excellent, French, pure wool, "super exposition", size 59, which inside has a beautiful coat of arms embroidered chains of Navarre, Rosicrucian with two wolves, a lion plaguing a armored tower, among other symbols. For a brief and entertaining reading on this garment, see here.

Knights of Hispania: honor to the beret should never have been lost, and we display it in our meetings, events, discussion groups and coteries!. Do not let these "petit-maitres des boinados" be worn by the primacy of the intellect!"

Jaime Caetano Braun

Jaime Caetano Braun (1924 - 1999) was a renowned payador and poet of Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil and also enjoyed prestige in Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay and Bolivia.

He was known as El Payador and sometimes used the pseudonyms of Pirajá, Martin Fierro, and Andarengo Chimango.

During his career he produced many payadas, poems and songs, always emphasizing the Rio Grande do Sul, life on the Campo and Gaucho life and local nature.

As a teenager, Jaime dreamed of becoming a doctor, but having only high school he taught himself in South American customs and  culture and home remedies.

Jaime left a legacy of poetry, books and songs:

Bibliography

§                     1954 - Galpão de Estância

§                     1958 - De Fogão em Fogão

§                     1965 - Potreiro de Guaxos

§                     1966 - Bota de Garrão

§                     1966 - Brasil Grande do Sul

§                     1966 - Passagens Perdidas

§                     1990 - Payador e Troveiro

§                     1996 - 50 Anos de Poesia

Discography

§                     1993 - Paisagens Perdidas

§                     1993 - Poemas Gaúchos

In Memoriam: Baruch "Dick" Kolthoff

"'t Zit erop, jongens..."

Today, just after midnight (CEST), my father Baruch "Dick" Kolthoff died.

I think of my father as a humane liberal in the broadest sense of the word; a born anarchist who set high moral standards for himself and tried hard in his own way to change the world for the better. 

From the Spanish Civil War to the struggle against industrial animal farming, my father lived to his principles.

His lifelong fascination for the French Revolution and Enlightenment reflected in many ways in his own life. 

A principled vegetarian he never stopped advocating animal rights, seeing animals as the weaker and defenseless species against us humans.  

I am grateful to my father for the ideas and principles he introduced to (but never forced upon) me; I can only wish I can be the same example to my children as my father was to me. 

Through the fire of great love, the wood of hatred is burnt.
Through the light of pristine awareness, the darkness of ignorance is dispelled. 

Thousands of candles can be lighted from a single candle,
and the life of the candle will not be shortened.
Happiness never decreases by being shared.

The Day of the Gaucho Pajador

The Day of the Gaucho Pajador is celebrated on 30 January, the birth-date of poet and gaucho pajador  Jayme Caetano Braun (instant translation from Portuguese). 

A 'pajador' is a poet, who sings his verses impromptu (pajada) with the accompaniment of guitar, usually in milonga. The word 'pajador' has no agreed definition and is neither Spanish or Portuguese. Absent in classical dictionaries of any language, only in the vocabulary of regional countries in South America. 

Mendonça notes that there are some hypotheses about the origin of the word pajador: some authors claim it comes from "Payo", the name of the original inhabitant of Castile, others believe from "pagueador" and others that it originated from the word "palla", a name given by the Quichua Indians of the groups gathered to sing on the playa's.