Sitting
here in Air China economy class, flying back up north from Hong Kong to
Beijing. I’ve an aisle
seat. It could be worse. On the way down I was knee deep between
two gents sitting in the middle. The
woman in front of me seems to think that the space under her seat belongs to
her. “No darling. The space in front of you belongs to
you. That’s where your legs go.
The space under your derriere belongs to me. You put your things under here, they will be immediately
pushed back into your world.” And
then audibly in Chinese, as she is persisting in this: “Hi. Ms.? Please don’t put things beneath your seat. Put them in front
of you. Thank you.”
Flying back up the eastern seaboard, reversing my journey of
two days prior. Settling in. In flight magazines shoved up into the
storage area, to secure two extra inches of legroom. Computer, headphones, and three newspapers all set out
before me. To my right, against
the window is a young man with a challenged sense of economy class seating
etiquette and rather sharp elbows.
He’s dozing off and his boney joints keep violating my virtual airspace.
“Don’t you see the imaginary line drawn between our two seats? “ Neither of us
is wearing long sleeved shirts so when our arms touch, it is hairy and
repulsive. Truth be told, ‘tis I
who’s more hirsute.
Yesterday I wrote that the Shenzhen Harbor crossing looked
pretty clean and orderly when I dropped a colleague off there. New facility, logical layout, pleasant
horticulture; what else do you need from a border crossing. I privately had more than one thought
that I would feel very differently when I actually confronted this
crossing. Entering the hall, it
would become clear that it was a grotty, overpopulated nightmare, like every
other Shenzhen border crossing into Hong Kong. I even imagined the blog entry that I would pen to testify
to how wrong I’d been in my initial judgment. In point of fact though, it proved reasonable. The line was quiet merciful, perhaps
five to seven minutes or so, and the crossing very straightforward. I suspect it is inconvenient for Wang-six-pack,
laobaixing to easily access this
crossing. No one was here.
Charles Earland has called the tune, for much of this tight
flight, “Living Black,” was recorded in 1970 and juxtaposed to other album
titles like “Black Talk” and “Black Drops”, one discerns a theme. The title on the tune I have on now,
“Message From a Black Man,” buttresses the vibe, but the “say it loud”
sentiment is cast back to back with other more predictable pop numbers like
“Aquarius” and “More Today Than Yesterday.”
Walking around today I the Elements Mall in Kowloon today,
before boarding the Airport Express, I had a flash of “More Today Than
Yesterday.” Where did it come
from? Now, I hadn’t a conscious
memory of listening to that song for years. I recall that WCBS Radio in New York employed it in a commercial
I’d seen some 40 years ago. And
there I was on the escalator considering how, whoever it was came up with the
lyrical formula of “more than yesterday” and contrasted it with “not as much as
tomorrow.” Why had it popped up like that out of nowhere into my
consciousness? Was it some
subliminal mall music that I wasn’t aware of? I wonder because now, here on the plane the tune’s come on
twice. Mssr. Earland has a
version, on both “Black Talk” and a live version on “Living Black.”
And appropriate it was that the tune came upon me heading
down an escalator, for now, having looked it up, and found that it was written
and performed by a group called the Spiral Starecase. There is lip-synched period video of Pat Upton who penned
the tune pretending to perform the number with the band in 1969 on
Youtube. Apparently they were
spawned out of an Air Force talent contest. Somehow this makes sense as I consider the two-step of the
large, mustachioed bass player Bobby Raymond. With a gun to my ear I wouldn’t have been able to have named
the Spiral Starecase, let alone understood the misspelling was
intentional. Its not a very “black
talk” aesthetic with this lot, at first glance. Tough to imagine this crew
managing “I’m black and I’m 洋洋得意[1]. But
the #16 hit, was sufficiently swinging for Charles and as a result I know more
much more about the both of them than yesterday. Though I doubt I’ll pursue it much further, tomorrow.
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