Yamo

Brian and I went to have dinner at Yamo, a Burmese restaurant. The best part of the place is the open kitchen viewed from any of the only nine stools. It's diminutive space is part of the charm. It reminded me of the street vendors in Thailand, where you could get very good and cheap food. The garlic noodles were OK, but the mango and tea leaf salads were yummy. 

garlic noodles

Mango salad

Tea leaf salad

grateful insight hopefulness

Happy Bird Day, Mariah!

I'm officially in

I’m in the PLI (Principal Leadership Institute) at UC Berkeley.

When I decided to enter the PLI to get a Masters, I was hoping for confirmation of my election—peace, joy—none such came. Rather it is a feeling of anticipation. My friend, Dina, says the program is “craziness” while others say it is “intense” and “superb professional development.” But after eight years of IRFing, I have come to realize that I need to expand my knowledge and develop my skills. And I believe that this program will provide it for me. I look forward to the intellectual engagement, the capacity building and my expansion my educational knowledge. It is fourteen months of intense coursework beginning in June, I fear what it will do to my social life and time to do art.

Olmec Exhibit at the de Young

With works coming from Mexico, I was excited the Olmec: Colossal Masterworks from Ancient Mexico  was coming to the de Young. Previous exhibits, Teotihuacan: City of the Gods (1993) and the Courtly Art of the Ancient Maya (2004) were spectacular. One was left with the haunting feeling of the work these cultures left behind. I was especially looking forward to seeing the colossal heads carved from giant boulders. The Olmec civilization is considered the mother culture of Mexico, preceding the Mayan and Aztec cultures. Unfortunately we know little of the Olmec culture has it had disappeared by the time the Europeans arrived in the Americas.

The colossal head that greets you as you enter the exhibit impresses upon you the importance of this culture in the history of the Americas. The fine work on the masks and the figurine work demonstrate their skill as artisans in stone and clay. The stylized abstraction on the votive ax is quite modern; and the melding of the jaguar-men is arresting. But the exhibit on the whole left me unsatisfied: too little text to give us background knowledge or the other sculptures was not lit in the best light. Or it could be that once you have been to the museums in Mexico, any outside exhibit would not be up to par.

Jaguar-man

The head remindes me of the students I teach in the Mission.  

Votive ax

el niño

Nikky

Happy Beeday, Nikky!