Update to the Mr. Yoo saga

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Okay, I'll admit it, the Mr. Yoo saga might not be much of a saga. The last few days have yielded absolutely no Yoo sightings so I have no proof of his exhibitionism that I mentioned in the last blog on the subject. Sadly, despite some certain goading, I've heard nothing from his domicile.

I had cast some bait in the form of a letter to the editor. I wrote it on the second and it was published the Sunday after. Thus far, no bite. At least not yet. I might need to assure somehow that he reads the letter.

If you're interested, you can go check out the slightly edited version online. Aside from inserting an unnecessary comma, removing a couple words and messing up an instance of subject-verb agreement, changing city to county in reference to ordinances (I intentionally used city because that's specifically what the neighbor said, neglecting that Maui has a county government), and editing out a beloved semi-colon, the published version isn't that much more exciting--it's only The Maui News.

But for those of you deciding you'd rather not click the link to mauinews.com or who would like to compare versions, I've included the original text:

Speaking as a mainland-born, yet long-time resident familiar with Hawai’i’s local culture, I can attest that not being local can present special challenges for those trying to adapt.

Regardless of the complexities of the cultural tension, there are things that those unfamiliar with the local culture can do to ease tensions and reduce the alienation of themselves or others. The International Herald Tribune ran an article on Nyamko Sabuni, Sweden’s controversial Minister for Integration and Gender Equalize that highlighted her blunt advice to immigrants (Jan. 12, 2006). Speaking as an expatriate herself and aiming to reduce the de facto alienation that immigrants face in a new culture, she urges immigrants to Sweden to “make an effort to adapt to the society where they live.”

It was run-in on New Year’s Eve reminded me of this issue. Friends and family had gathered at my Sprecklesville home to set off fireworks when a neighbor, taking issue with the practice, celebrated with outright lying about city ordinances and by threatening to call the Police—not the way I’d choose to ring in the new year. Hawai’i provides a cultural melange that makes it nearly impossible to embrace every tradition; a common thread, though, is the Aloha Spirit. Swearing at neighbors, lying, and threatening to call the police is not the Aloha Spirit. Subscribing to the Aloha Spirit can do wonders to help one integrate into the local culture and to not put one at odds with others. Maybe once we can handle that, we can start making amends that are long past due.

Good to meet you, Mr. Yoo (or is it You?).

Upon arriving at my parent's home in Maui two weeks go and at heading to my old room the first time in nine months, my mom gave me a warning that we had a new next-door neighbor and that this old man has a penchant for hanging outside his house and wetting himself down right in the view from my window on the second floor of my house. Since the, the shuttered blinds on that side of the room have been a reminder of his all-bearing presence. But during my New Year's Eve celebrations, the notion of having a next-door neighbor was the furthest thing from my mind.

Overall, the man has been a mystery to my parents. Then I met him. I met my new neighbor in what I believe to be the worst way possible, save for him throwing the new neighbor pie back in my face. Now, I've come to not expect much from the residents of the house next door. The first impressions of the the man living next door upon my family's move the house in which I grew up was poor; he took issue at nearly everything my family, and in particular, I, would do. His house stood as the lone mess in our properly manicured neighborhood. Somehow, I devised the metaphor that his house was a barf bag, pardon me, an air sickness bag. Oh, how it irritated me when the spiders would creep from his house through the palm tree barrier that separated us from him. To continue with the metaphor, our house was a pristine paper grocery filled with the most delectable treats and his bag quite often tainted our bag--no, house. Regardless of the state of his abode, if there was something bothering him about my family and our practices, he would call. If I was practicing my trombone and it wasn't too his liking, he would call, even if he was thousands of miles away in Canada to yell at my mother and demand that we stop torturing demented elephants or else he would call animal control on us. If our dog was making even the slightest noise, he would call, yell, and threaten to sic animal control on us, which, in retrospect, would have been a great way to rid ourselves of that wretched pomeranian.

That man moved out and the house was mostly vacant for a couple years before Gary moved in. When you think of Gary, picture somebody right out of the movie Old School (definitely not my favorite movie ever)--a 30-something-year-old bro who never really grew out of his fraternity days along with his mail-order girlfriend and english bulldog. All in all, he was a great guy but did have his flaws. One was made very evident during his mid-30th birthday kegger. Maybe that alone says it all. Regardless, let me say that I have never seen so many high school girls and moks in one place since, well, high school. His second flaw was his ex-wife, or at least that woman he had married who subsequently started suffering from chronic illnesses and with whom he was in a legal battle and not quite separated from at that point--that kind of "ex"-wife. While she was of no concern to us neighbors, she definitely did a job on his house, destroying his 42" flat-screen TV and sports car. My parents, having pity on Gary, decided to at least help clean up that mess after the ordeal.

He moved out sometime in early 2007 and then the new guy moved in. It was not until after the fact that I learned he's not one for celebration and last night, he introduced himself to those of us actually enjoying our New Year's Eve celebration by calling the police on us. The funny thing about this is that there are many more dubiously legal activities we could have been participating in, although, this year, it seemed like most people on the island had relatively mellow celebrations. My brother and I had started making plans for the evening and by that, I mean that we had invested $200 in fireworks. That's about where our plans were thwarted. It seemed as though all of our friends were doing some combination of not being on the island, spending time with old or young family (and for some reason, the young kids and elderly grandparents did not want to join us for fireworks at midnight), working, or hanging out at their house with just one other friend, too stubborn to come over and hang out with my brother and me. Fortunately for us, a good friend, Seth, had not yet finalized his plans and came over at 10 pm to help us usher in the new year.

Aside from a couple strings of Crackling Thunder Strings that we had set of before midnight as a test run, we found the three of us at that point with about $190 in fireworks and a 45 minutes to light them all off. We started small, finessing our style, lighting off one fountains one-by-one, and quickly progressed to three, five, ten, fifteen fireworks at a time. Now, there are many more dubiously legal activities in which we could have taken part, but the old man next door decided sometime after our fireball that had once been a pile of five Crackling Thunder Strings that we were the biggest threat to his rest. So the bear came out, chastised my brother and Seth for a few minutes, and thinking he had done a sufficient job, retired--all while I was grabbing the materials for the grand finale. Hearing the commotion, I came back armed with proper information but he was gone by that point. I mean, really, there are many more dubiously legal activities during

Just as we were finished setting up the grid of fireworks for the grand finale, the neighbor came out to chat a little. Asking me my name, I responded properly, approached him, and asked him his name. Then he informed me that he was the one asking questions. So we went merrily on our way, letting him know that he was quite in the wrong and he went angrily on his way telling us that the police were indeed on their way.

Having given up, the man started towards his driveway when David decided to ask the neighbor his name and he informed us it was F*ck Yoo (or is it Yu or You?). Then Mr. Yoo retired for the night calling down curses from above.

I'm not going to lie, the whole ordeal was just a bit inconvenient as we waited for the police until about three a.m. and they never showed In fact, I'm a little concerned for our safety. Mr. Yoo, what do you think about that because I am a little bit worried. Here's what I think. I think I'm going to nominate you to head up a new neighborhood watch program.

I can see the letterheads now:

Mr. F. Yoo, Director
Sprecklesville Neighborhood Watch
34 Ulupua Pl.
Paia, HI 96779

HAPPY NEW YEAR, EVERYBODY!

Dbrovnik!

I thought working Friday nights at Starbucks store 33037 at Ka'ahumanu Center in Maui was madness. While there would be a consistent line (and sometimes a line out the door even at closing time), most people would clear the lobby so that they could peruse the mall. I'm counting twenty-five no, now over 35 Russian teenagers in the store at Div and 2nd in Spokane this fine Sunday night. And that doesn't take into account the number of kids who have come through or who are standing outside the door, smoking their cigs. But they really are quite fascinating. I've been a few conversations with some of them and whenever a new person comes to sit at the table right next to me, they all shake hands.

Sure these kids have every right to be here, but should they be out getting in trouble and drinking underagedly?

I vote yes.

Facebook and the Age of Angst

“You’re not one of those people who derives worth from the number of Facebook friend’s, are you?”

On a normal day, I’d like to think that people would not even consider asking me this question. I view Facebook as something like a social tool and a lot like a toy (oh, wait, isn’t that former part similar to what they say?). Facebook offers a myriad of applications that range from semi-practical to totally useless. I use it as my primary method of sharing tidbits of entertainment with friends as it provides an easy way to link video clips and images. The wall provides a slightly warmer (and considerably more mindless) way of connecting with friend whom you don’t care about/know well enough to call. When I’m bored, I can peruse my friends’ photo albums, looking to see how they have fared since the last time I saw them thirteen months ago. Additionally, I can leave comments solely for the purpose of entertaining numero uno. All of the above functions, as well as Fight Club, Superpoke, and all 9 to the nth power applications are fine and dandy in and of themselves. Even using them to a point that would make even the most reclusive computer nerd sick is understandable.

Now, I don't want to isolate my reader (yeah, I'm talking to you as you are the only reader), so I'll admit that I've had my share of Facebook faux pas, one such being my goal to catch up with my brother in the wall post count (currently, he’s at 3294, but I’m on my way with 1067). And back in April of 2005 when Facebook had just opened up to Whitworth, I entered an unspoken competition with Cole Casey to have the most friends. It was so unspoken that he didn’t even know it was going on until quite some time down the road. *

But there’s a limit that should not be crossed. In my opinion, that limit is more qualitative than quantitative. Of course people will exceed that limit, but when I think of these people, the preferred weapon of choice is World of Warcraft or Second Life.

But today, something was different. I woke up this morning, overwhelmed by the number of items on my to do list and slightly dismayed at the inadequacies of the previous day's text message conversations. So I began compulsively checking Facebook. I began with my profile but that only kept my mind occupied for a couple of minutes. As Facebook is a two-way street, I ended up posting on some friends' walls. I needed to get things done today, so I paced around the house trying to figure out my schedule. Distracted, I returned to Bridget, my faithful MacBook Pro, and in order to show my concern for my friends, I checked the mini feed to see how other friends were doing. And then I got to reading others' wall posts and wishing more people would contact me. But I stopped myself as I was feeling kind of creepy. I updated my status. I edited and filled in some information on some photos I had uploaded yesterday from my mobile. Then I paced around some more. Others' photos came next. I found some missing tags and filled those in. I took a shower. I commented on a string of profile pics. I ate some M&Ms for breakfast. I began messaging friends and responding to new wall posts. I actually began searching for YouTube videos to share with friends. I updated my status again, this time with something half-way witty.

At one point, I had enough and, leaving Bridget upstairs, I had a quiet time in the basement. It was the hardest 40 minutes I experienced all day.

Shortly before noon, my dear friend Penny came over. But she wasn't quite Facebook; obviously she wasn't relieving my social angst and feelings of insufficiency. Then I realized I was way beyond that line. Actually, it was Penny who helped with that when she asked me the question that opens this post. One word for Penny: Ouch.

But what hope was there for me? The answer is there was no immediate hope. I left for a secluded place, namely Westminster Hall's lounge, with hopes of clearing my mind and maybe even getting some leisure reading done. There, I found myself on the department computers at three different times checking Facebook, making sure that friends' finals and gin bottles were being finished off well. Trying a last-ditch effort to rid myself of Facebook-induced angst, I switched my method to real life. Maghan and Kamesh, you saved saved me.

So, if there's little to no hope for me, what hope is there for the generation of angsty high school students brought up on coffee drinks and emotional music? When I was in high school, I was lucky to have a cell phone. But I still communicated with my friends primarily through face-to-face conversation. What will happen to these people if one person's Internet is down? If Facebook is down?

My closing thoughs: panic and chaos will prevail. Not every child would make it through. Miscommunication would be responsible for some of the resulting hysteria and the hysteria will be responsible for the rioting and the rioting will result in bodily harm. There would be a reverse baby boom as an entire generation with no social skills dies off without ever procreating. And the old people and those socially awkward will have the last laugh.


*Oh, and just so you know, I'm currently beating Cole in my competition by a 15% margin.