Corona Virus and hands

I live in Indonesia and anywhere in Asia it's easy not to shake hands. Here in Bali the two-handed bow is practiced everywhere, even by Muslims, but the hand on the heart which is popular with Muslims is common too. In Japan, people just tilt their bodies forward some as a polite bow. And with all the Western influence, shaking hands is popular too - high fives and fist bumps and other varieties learned from mass media as well. Two days ago I decided to stop shaking hands. It's come up three times and it's easy to indicate one doesn't want to. A doc I saw on TV said it's better to hug. The NHS of England has not yet suggested people stop doing it. Some world leaders have stopped. Lots being written about this online. I like all the methods of greeting but for now will keep this no hand shaking up. Actually the main greeting here is people calling out to each other greetings as they pass each other.

Sampah

Sampah is trash in Indonesian. We make compost from kitchen waste and and some garden droppings, but we don't have the room to use all the leaves that fall here. So we have a large container for organic sampah and a small one for non organic, small because we recycle plastic, paper, and metal. Our house cleaner (which we're required by law to employ) got into the habit of putting the non organic and organic together. I told her that I know that they throw it all in the truck and it just goes to landfill, but it's too painful for me to see them mixed. Bali could be enriching it's soil with compost instead of chemical fertilizers. And they definitely should use the kitchen waste for compost or to feed pigs - if they must have pigs. Waste management is a big problem here and they know it and it's a big problem almost everywhere including the US. The solutions do not require new technology, just the will to deal with it and change the way things are being done. 

Editorial on Nature/Climate Change

In the Line of Fire

A Simple Guide

to Climate Change - BBC

Names

I've always noticed that almost everyone thinks they're particularly bad at remembering names. I am. I've never been particularly good at keeping up with the names of characters in movies or any show on TV. I was describing how things went in an episode of the series Silicon Valley to Katrinka. She'd fallen asleep. Nine characters were involved in the telling. I had to tell it by giving them descriptive names - the big guy, the nice woman, the CEO of PP, etc. When I was through I said, "Wow. I didn't remember the name of a single one - and it was the last show of the 2nd season.."

"I won't worry until you can't remember mine," she said.  

Minding 4

Once when Kelly was about five years old, he got tired of waiting for me at a California Conservation Corpts meeting in Portrero Hill in San Francisco and walked off without telling me. We were meeting at some sort of school with an interior courtyard and playground but that wasn't good enough and he was gone. I called his mother, Dianne, and soon there were many people looking for him, me driving up and down streets all around. No cell phones back then in 78. If he'd gone the wrong direction he could have walked into scary Hunter's Point. But I figured he went down hill and maybe into the Mission District. Occasional big wide streets on the way. After about thirty minutes I stopped  the car and said to myself, "He's my son. I should drive straight to him." And I did. Went right to the corner at Market and Guerrero and there he was with a nice man holding his hand helping him cross the street with the light. I jumped out of the car, thanked the man, and I don't know what I said to Kelly, but I wasn't angry, just super relieved. He was two blocks from the Zen Center and had gone about three and a half miles. Told me he waited for adults at intersections. Wow.     

Peace of Mind

A woman in a dream asked me to spend the night with her. I told her that would surely be nice but that I have a mate and I value peace of mind. When I woke up, I thought, "Good for you."  I was reminded of Fidel Castro, who used to smoke a box of cigars a day, saying that he knew he'd really quit when he stopped smoking in his dreams.