Photo Week Funny Friday

When Jack London had his portrait made by the noted San Francisco photographer Arnold Genthe, London began the encounter with effusive praise for the photographic art of his friend and fellow bohemian, Genthe. “you must have a wonderful camera…It must be the best camera in the world…You must show me your camera.” Genthe then used his standard studio camera to make what has since become a classic picture of Jack London. When the sitting was finished, Genthe could not contain himself: “I have read your books, Jack, and I think they are important works of art. You must have a wonderful typewriter.”

Q: What did Mozart do when his Olympus broke?

A: He borrowed Pachelbel’s Canon.

Two new models are waiting as the photographer gets his equipment ready.

One model says to the other,”What is he doing now?”

“He’s getting ready to focus”, she replies.

To which the first model exclaims,”FOCUS, but he hasn’t even paid us yet!”

A photographer in a park took a self portrait.

Due to lighting conditions he used the built in flash on the camera.

He was arrested for flashing and exposing himself in the park.

Almost without notice, a massive storm began to build on the horizon. Soon winds began to pick up in and around the town, and flashes of lightning could be seen and the distant roll of thunder could be heard and felt.

In this climate a mother worried about the safety of her child, the little girl who would be walking home from school at just this moment. She quickly got into her car and began to drive the route from her house to the school yard.

Before long, the mother spotted her daughter. Surprisingly, the little girl was not frightened by the approaching storm. Instead, she seemed gleeful, and at each flash of lightning and roar of thunder, she would stop, look, and smile. One lightning bolt followed another and with each the little girl stopped, looked at the streak of lightning, and smiled.

By the time the mother reached her daughter she was quite curious. Calling for her daughter to get in the car, she asked, "Why are you smiling at the storm?"

The little girl answered with a smile and a giggle, "Because God keeps taking pictures of me."

Limerick Spot:

A dying mosquito exclaimed,

"A chemist has poisoned my brain!"

The cause of his sorrow

Was para-dichloro-

Diphenyl-trichloroethane*

* The pesticide DDT

Photo Week: The Kitchen Debate

Photo Week continued:

There is an interesting story to the above photograph, which was taken nearly 54 years ago.

Before quoting the photographer, it is worthwhile to know the background, which is interesting also in its own right.

The following paragraphs are from the History.com website at:

http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/nixon-debates-khrushchev-at-a-fair-in-moscow

24 July 1959

On this day in 1959, at a U.S. Trade and Cultural Fair in Moscow, Vice President Richard Nixon enters into a heated discussion with Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev over the merits of capitalism versus communism. Since the conversation occurred in the middle of a display of modern American kitchen conveniences, it became known as the kitchen debate.

Although the fair was designed to be a cultural exchange of goodwill with the Soviet Union, the competitive relationship between American capitalism and Soviet communism was immediately evident. When Nixon and Khrushchev unexpectedly met near the kitchen exhibit, they began to spar verbally about whose technology was superior. Khrushchev, who requested that his comments not be censored by the American media, came off as more combative. At first, Nixon remained relatively calm and diplomatic, urging more cultural exchange between the two countries and suggesting that the Soviet Union be more open to non-communist ideas. At one point, Nixon told Khrushchev that he and the Soviets didn't know everything, to which Khrushchev responded if I don't know everything I would say that you don't know anything about communism except fear. Nixon also politely but pointedly accused Khrushchev of dominating the conversation and said that he would have made a good lawyer, eliciting hearty laughter from the crowd of press and observers. However, when Khrushchev claimed that American-made capitalist luxuries such as toasters, juicers and automatic dishwashers were too expensive for the American working class, Nixon leaned in, poked Khrushchev in the chest with his finger and declared that ANY American worker could buy one.

The entire discussion was captured for posterity on a tape recorder as well as by television cameras, two advances in technology to which Nixon proudly pointed as examples of America's economic superiority. Although Khrushchev defended his country's economic prowess--the Russians were ahead of the Americans in rocket technology at the time--he too acted the diplomat by extending an unprecedented invitation to Nixon to speak to the Russian public on television on August 1. In that speech, which was uncensored, Nixon boldly challenged the Russian people to rethink their commitment to communism.

In 1960, Khrushchev travelled to the United States and met with President Dwight D Eisenhower. 

In 1972, Nixon, by then president of the United States, made a trip to the Soviet Union. Throughout his tenure in office, he worked to engage the Soviets in constructive dialogue about ending the arms race and the Cold War.

According to a comment elsewhere, quoting the photographer Elliott Erwitt:

Erwitt was also there when the now famous "Kitchen Debate" between Khrushchev and Nixon unfolded unexpectedly in a model kitchen in Macy's during a Moscow industrial fair. Said Erwitt of the encounter:

It was ridiculous. Nixon was saying, "We're richer than you are", and Khrushchev would say, "We are catching up and we will surpass you." That was the level of the debate. At one point Nixon was getting so irritating I thought I heard Khrushchev say in Russian "Go fuck my grandmother."

Erwitt's snap of Nixon javelining his pointer finger into Khrushchev's lapel would go on to be an iconic image of Nixon's presidential campaign:

Erwitt’s photo was used by Nixon’s campaign managers to create a persona of Nixon as a strong, tough and forceful man, a no-nonsense politician unwilling to take crap, who had put Kruschev in his place. Little matter that that was not the reality. In 1968 that image took Tricky Dick to the Presidency.

(Btw, Helen Gahagan Douglas gave Nixon the nickname "Tricky Dick" during the 1950 U.S. Senate race in California, in reference to Nixon's alleged use of dirty tricks during the campaign).

Here is another view of the Kitchen Debate:

Photo Week: 10 Old Sydney Town Pics

Some bygone buildings . . . 

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Fort Macquarie 1870

Fort Macquarie was built on the end of Bennelong Point, where the Sydney Opera House now stands. Completed by convict labour in 1821 using stone from the Domain, the fort had 15 guns and housed a small garrison. The powder magazine beneath the tower was capable of storing 350 barrels of gunpowder. The fort was demolished in 1901 to make way for the tramway sheds that occupied the site until the construction of the Opera House.

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Free Public Library, corner of Bent & Macquarie Sts, Sydney, 1877

In 1845 the Australian Subscription Library moved to the corner of Macquarie and Bent Streets. It was taken over by the Government in 1869 and renamed the Free Public Library of NSW. It was demolished for the Premier Wing of the State Office Block (1967). This in turn was demolished for the Aurora Place/Macquarie Apartments complex, which won both the Wilkinson and Sulman architecture awards in 2004.

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Royal Arcade, Sydney, 1892

The Royal Arcade ran from George Street near the markets, through to Pitt Street, near the School of Arts. Over 90 metres long, it was well lit, with a lofty celestory and gas lamps. There were 31 shops on the ground floor, 36 offices on the first floor and a photographic studio above them at the George Street end. Of Sydney’s five Victorian arcades, only the Strand survived twentieth century development, the Royal disappearing beneath the Hilton Hotel in the mid 1970s.

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Volunteer Hotel, Pitt Street, Sydney, c 1870

This building had been on the south-west corner of Pitt and Park Streets since the 1840s as a butcher’s shop. By the 1850s it had become the Butchers Arms Hotel, which changed its name to the Volunteer Hotel around 1862. It was demolished in 1882, to be replaced by the Equitable Building. This became Park House, one of several buildings in the block now owned by the Sydney City Council and planned for demolition to create an open square opposite the Town Hall.

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Weatherboard Buildings, Market Street, Cnr Clarence Street, Sydney, 1875

This photograph accompanied a scathing Government report into the city’s sewerage system. Of these dwellings, it said, ‘Anyone who may be curious to know how long Colonial timber will last, until, by the combined action of the elements, white ants, and other sources of destruction, it becomes triturated into powder, can satisfy their curiosity by ascertaining the date on which these houses were constructed. The corner house is occupied and used as a butcher's shop; it is a filthy stinking place...’

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46-52 Arthur Street, North Sydney, the street having been resumed and all buildings demolished for the Warringah Freeway in the 1960s.

Points to note:

• The wire clotheslines, kept low enough for mum to hang out the washing and then being propped higher with wooden poles.

• The outside toilets, accessible to the sanitary workers via rear lanes. These days the lanes in the inner suburbs serve no further purpose and attract rubbish dumping, vermin and drug activity. Councils therefore frequently sell the rear lane portions to the allotments in front of them. Back in 1926 a toilet was often referred to by the slang name “dunny”.

According to Wikipedia:

The dunny is an Australian expression for an outside toilet or outhouse. The person who appeared weekly to empty the pan beneath the seat was known as the dunnyman. The word derives from the British dialect word dunnekin, meaning dung-house. It is now an informal word used for any lavatory and is most often used referring to drop or pit lavatories in the Australian bush, which are also called thunderboxes.

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Wynard Station, Sydney, 1930, pouring the roof slab

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75 Blue Street, North Sydney 1926

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35-47 Junction Street, North Sydney 1926 –now part of the Pacific Highway

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Rear of Alderson Street, Sydney (NSW), 1900

From a series of images showing the areas in Sydney affected by the outbreak of Bubonic Plague in 1900. Taken by Mr. John Degotardi, Jr., photographer from the Department of Public Works, the images depict the state of the houses and 'slum' buildings at the time of the outbreak and the cleansing and disinfecting operations which followed.

Note that it shows the rear yards, toilets and “dunny lane” mentioned earlier. In this case the photograph also shows another aspect of the outside toilet system: that the pans were accessible from the lane without needing to enter the premises. The pans were removed by means of a small door at the rear of the toilet which enabled the pan to be removed without having to eb[

Photo Week: Time Travel

Insofar as the posts on the weekend were wordy, followed up by yesterday’s photographs post, I have designated the rest of this week and the coming weekend Photo Week, all the Bytes will be photograph based and related.

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Time Travellers on Film.

For those who don’t believe in time travel, there is photographic evidence, the truth is out there . . . 

#1: 1928 Charlie Chaplin film

The above still is from a Charlie Chaplin film, The Circus, dating from 1928. It clearly shows a woman (?) holding a mobile telephone to her ear. Don’t ask me how this was possible when there were no mobile telephone towers at the time. It may be that there is a mundane explanation, such as the person is holding an early type hearing aid, or that she was scratching an itch or shielding from the sun, but nonetheless there are more things in Heaven and earth than are dreamt of in our philosophy.

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#2: 1941 Bridge opening

The above photograph is of the reopening of the South Fork Bridge in 1941 and comes from a photographic exhibition in Canada. The dude with the sunnies is clearly not from 1941. Skeptics may well point out that the style of sunglasses first appeared in the 1920’s and that he is wearing a shirt with an emblem of the type often worn by sports teams of the period, but you have to wonder.

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#3. Woman with Mobile Telephone, 1938

Another out of time pic. 

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#4. Astronaut carving, Salamanca Cathedral:

For those still not believing in time travel, here is the incontrovertible proof: the carving of an astronaut in the decorated facade of a 16th century church in Salamanca, Spain. 

Nahh, I can’t make that stick. There really is a carving of an astronaut but it was added in 1992 during restoration work, it being a tradition of cathedral builders and restorers to include a contemporary symbol on the building as a means of "signing" their work. In this case the astronaut was used as a symbol of the 20th century.

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As Jerry Springer puts it, a final thought . . .

Till next time, take care of yourself and each other.

10 Old Photographs

“What I like about photographs is that they capture a moment that’s gone forever, impossible to reproduce.”

- Karl Lagerfeld

Byter Terry sent me an email with a collection of old photographs, mostly about events and people in America but all fascinating in some way: to show what once was but is no longer; to show how far we have come; to show horror, discrimination and intolerance, the march of time, humour, history and the just plain weird. These days every person carries a camera via mobile phones and we have the power to disseminate photographs immediately when they are taken, but it was not always so. I will post Terry’s emailed pics in a number of parts, Part 1 today. Some have been the subject of previous Bytes posts.

Thanks, Tezza.

The inauguration of Abraham Lincoln in 1861

Hippo cart in 1924. The hippo belonged to a circus and apparently enjoyed pulling the cart as a trick.

Charlie Chaplin in 1916 at the age of 27

Suntan vending machine, 1949

Annie Edison Taylor (1838-1921), the first person to survive going over Niagara Falls in a barrel. She did it in 1901 because she needed money, and after doing it said she wouldn't recommend it to anyone!

Only known authenticated photo of Billy the Kid, c 1879

Sharing bananas with a goat during the Battle of Saipan, c 1944

Jesse James, approximately 16 years old

Advertisement for Atabrine, an anti-malaria drug. Sign was put up at the 363rd station hospital in Papua, New Guinea during WWII

How could parents ensure that their children were getting sunlight and fresh air when living in apartment buildings? The baby cage, ca. 1937

Song Spot: Leonard Cohen's The Stranger Song

A bit wordy today, sorry. 

My wife, Kate, is a great fan of Leonard Cohen, always has been. Even my son loves him and went to some of his concerts when he was in Oz on his last world tour, the one where he was wearing a hat. These days he is so popular, including with young people, that he no longer seems to be characterised as Music to Slash Your Wrists/Stick Your Head in the Oven By. Though his lyrics may be hard to fathom, as with Dylan, Joni Mitchell, Billy Joel et al, nonetheless we know that they must mean something deep and profound if we could only understand them.  We also know that they are often moody, dark and depressive. According to Cohen “I don’t consider myself a pessimist. I think of a pessimist as someone who is waiting for it to rain and I feel soaked to the skin.”

Kate asked me to do a Bytes some time ago on Cohen’s The Stranger Song, which is awash with symbols, imagery, paradoxes, associations and inscrutable lyrics, not in the same sense as American Pie (Asked once what "American Pie" meant, McLean replied, "It means I never have to work again.") which has always seemed a bit too neat and glib for me.  Where McLean constructs a puzzle for us to work out, listening to Cohen is the equivalent of peering through a keyhole into his dark and morose mind. One reviewer describes the music of the Stranger Song as evoking “ that ‘sitting-in-a-dark-room-alone’ feeling better than any of the countless albums that have followed in its wake.”

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Lyrics:

The Stranger Song

It's true that all the men you knew were dealers

who said they were through with dealing

Every time you gave them shelter

I know that kind of man

It's hard to hold the hand of anyone

who is reaching for the sky just to surrender

who is reaching for the sky just to surrender.

And then sweeping up the jokers that he left behind

you find he did not leave you very much not even laughter

Like any dealer he was watching for the card

that is so high and wild

he'll never need to deal another

He was just some Joseph looking for a manger

He was just some Joseph looking for a manger.

And then leaning on your window sill

he'll say one day you caused his will

to weaken with your love and warmth and shelter

And then taking from his wallet

an old schedule of trains, he'll say

I told you when I came I was a stranger

I told you when I came I was a stranger.

But now another stranger seems

to want you to ignore his dreams

as though they were the burden of some other

O you've seen that man before

his golden arm dispatching cards

but now it's rusted from the elbows to the finger

And he wants to trade the game he plays for shelter

Yes he wants to trade the game he knows for shelter.

Ah you hate to watch another tired man

lay down his hand

like he was giving up the holy game of poker

And while he talks his dreams to sleep

you notice there's a highway

that is curling up like smoke above his shoulder

and suddenly you feel a little older

You tell him to come in sit down

but something makes you turn around

The door is open you can't close your shelter

You try the handle of the road

It opens do not be afraid

It's you my love, you who are the stranger

It's you my love, you who are the stranger.

Well, I've been waiting, I was sure

we'd meet between the trains we're waiting for

I think it's time to board another

Please understand, I never had a secret chart

to get me to the heart of this

or any other matter

When he talks like this

you don't know what he's after

When he speaks like this,

you don't know what he's after.

Let's meet tomorrow if you choose

upon the shore, beneath the bridge

that they are building on some endless river

Then he leaves the platform

for the sleeping car that's warm

You realize, he's only advertising one more shelter

And it comes to you, he never was a stranger

And you say ok the bridge or someplace later.

And leaning on your window sill ...

I told you when I came I was a stranger.

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Link:

See and hear a younger Leonard Cohen perform The Stranger Song at:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RLq7Aqd_H7g

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Background:

The Stranger Song is one of the tracks on Cohen’s 1967 debut album Songs of Leonard Cohen, which included So Long Marianne, Sisters of Mercy and Hey That’s No Way to Say Goodbye. Three of the album's songs - Winter Lady, The Stranger Song and Sisters of Mercy - were used in the 1971 Robert Altman film McCabe and Mrs Miller.

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About the lyrics:

The lyrics are carefully crafted with haunting images (“reaching for the sky just to surrender”, “He was just some Joseph looking for a manger”) but as with any analysis, whether it be Shakespeare, the Bible or Cohen’s poetic lyrics, there is always a danger of reading more into the words than is actually there.

A good summary of the song’s lyrics appears in The Album: A Guide to Pop Music’s Most Provocative, Influential and Most Important Creations by James a Perone. He writes:

Cohen returns to the theme of co-dependent relationships in the “Stranger Song”. Here, he addresses a woman who has found that every man with whom she has been emotionally involved ultimately is a “stranger” and a “dealer” who claims that he has changed his ways. Using a variety of references, including the near addiction that the card dealer has with playing the winning hand to the need that the New Testament Joseph had with finding a manger for Jesus’s birth, Cohen paints the single minded need of the stranger to control

The song is ostensibly about a woman who has had a succession of failed relationships with men wanting respite but unable to leave gambling behind and settle down. She seeks what they cannot give; they cannot give what she seeks. Cohen uses a number of images as metaphors to develop his theme of mutual dependency, failure, longing and self awareness: addiction to gambling prevents commitment, “shelter” is the temporary respite as well as the ideal that is sought, “dealing” implies control, “stranger” is the true nature of the person.

It may well be that the gambler, the stranger, is Cohen himself and that the song is autobiographical.

It's true that all the men you knew were dealers

who said they were through with dealing

Every time you gave them shelter

The speaker/singer is a man talking to a woman who has had previous relationships with men who have all been “dealers”. Although the word may have a drug connotation, in the present context it is clear that this is a reference to dealing cards. It becomes clearer further into the lyrics that the card playing is an addiction in itself and that being the dealer carries with it a connotation of control and domination. 

The woman, on the other hand, is the repeated provider of shelter, the suggestion being that she is kind and giving but taken advantage of. It becomes clear,, however, that she is also flawed in her seeking out flawed men.

From another perspective, substitute “junkie” for “dealer”, substitute drugs for for gambling and the song makes a whole lot of equivalent sense as well – the addict seeking shelter and someone to look after them, the woman who keeps entering into relationships with needy and unsuitable males who seek to depend on her, meanwhile the addiction remains the third person in the relationship.

I know that kind of man

It's hard to hold the hand of anyone

who is reaching for the sky just to surrender

who is reaching for the sky just to surrender.

The speaker says that he knows also that it is hard to trust and believe those promises, the promises of those who are reaching for the sky but in truth are simply surrendering to deeper addiction.

The men – the dealers – are always looking for something out of their reach, the win, the big pot, but in trying to get that win, they are simply becoming more addicted to the cards on a downward spiral. Gambling addiction can drag down as much as drugs, reaching for the sky may just be more losing.

And then sweeping up the jokers that he left behind

Picking up the pieces after he has left.  The jokers are useless in gambling, they are 'nothing' cards, of no value.

you find he did not leave you very much not even laughter

The men with whom she has been involved have only taken, not given, not leaving even laughter or some memories of good times shared.

Like any dealer he was watching for the card

that is so high and wild

he'll never need to deal another

Always looking for the big win, not realising that even if there is a big win, the addiction is inside like a cancer. It is the game that counts, the buzz from playing, which is why gamblers who win big often lose it just as quickly. As Shakespeare has Caesar put it, the fault is not in our stars but in ourselves, even if the dealer does believe that he will never gamble again once he has the big win.

He was just some Joseph looking for a manger

He was just some Joseph looking for a manger.

The card player’s striving to win is as important to him as the search for accommodation for the birth of the Son of God was to Joseph. 

And then leaning on your window sill

he'll say one day you caused his will

to weaken with your love and warmth and shelter

When the man wants to move on, having had the woman’s warmth, love and shelter for a spell, he does so by telling her that it is in fact her fault, that she caused him to weaken by being good to him, by making things comfortable.

And then taking from his wallet

an old schedule of trains, he'll say

I told you when I came I was a stranger

I told you when I came I was a stranger.

“You knew what I was when we started, I told you I was a player."

But now another stranger a new man seems

to want you to ignore his dreams

as though they were the burden of some other

But he is no different from the last man. He wants her to ignore his lifestyle and card playing ways, his weaknesses and dreams of winning, think of that as belonging to someone else.

O you've seen that man before She realises that he is the same as the others.

his golden arm dispatching cards

but now it's rusted from the elbows to the finger

He’s been playing the game so long that his golden dealing arm is now rusted. 

And he wants to trade the game he plays for shelter

Yes he wants to trade the game he knows for shelter.

He wants to give up the game and settle down with her, have a home. A temporary refuge because he is depressed or a permanent one? Buffeted by the world where he needs a place to rest and heal?  

Ah you hate to watch another tired man

lay down his hand

like he was giving up the holy game of poker

It’s hard for her to see another man, a tired man, promise to give up gambling, something that is equivalent to being holy for the players.

And while he talks his dreams to sleep

you notice there's a highway

that is curling up like smoke above his shoulder

and suddenly you feel a little older

Even when he is making his promises she knows that they are not real, she sees over his shouler the road that will beckon him once he is healed.

You tell him to come in sit down

but something makes you turn around

The door is open you can't close your shelter

The previous patterns reassert, she offers “shelter” once again, offers her heart again, but this time something is different. 

You try the handle of the road

This time she is skeptical, realises that she should not trust the promises and assurances, or her own need, that she should walk away from the relationship.

It opens do not be afraid The narrator tells her not to be afraid of doing so.

It's you my love, you who are the stranger

It's you my love, you who are the stranger.

A difficult part but in some ways the crux of the song. In the past she has been the one giving, the men taking. There is a pattern, just as there is in abusive domestic relationships where patterns of abuser/victim are often repeated in successive relationships. In the context of the song she has been the person giving and searching for stability – home, warmth, sex, shelter – whilst the men in her life have been takers, taking temporary shelter until either the call of gambling or recuperation have lured them away again. They may have even believed that they wanted to stay with her and, in so doing, have become part of her life and world, no matter how alien to them. The narrator tells her that she is not that much different to the men with whom she has been, that each in the relationship has been co-dependent on the other. 

Well, I've been waiting, I was sure

we'd meet between the trains we're waiting for

This is the man talking, not the narrator. They are each heading on, moving on, and he had hoped to meet her again before they boarded trains to go their own ways.

I think it's time to board another

Please understand, I never had a secret chart

to get me to the heart of this

or any other matter

He explains to her that he never had a secret chart to explain or understand his actions, to make sense of it all. He seems to be indicating that he still has no sense of what he wants from life, or from her. 

When he talks like this

you don't know what he's after

When he speaks like this,

you don't know what he's after.

For her part, she understands that he still has no insight into himself but she doesn’t know what it is that he wants from her.

Let's meet tomorrow if you choose

upon the shore, beneath the bridge

that they are building on some endless river

He suggests that they meet again at some undetermined time and place in the future

Then he leaves the platform

for the sleeping car that's warm

You realize, he's only advertising one more shelter

And it comes to you, he never was a stranger

And you say ok the bridge or someplace later.

She realises that the failure of the relationships is also attributable to her, in seeking relationships with unsuitable men who have surrendered to her and depended on her. In her way she has been a “stranger” as much as the men. The reunion may or may not happen, probably not, she is alone but now she has an awareness of her flaw.

And leaning on your window sill ...

I told you when I came I was a stranger.

He repeats that she knew what he was like when they began. 

So there it is, Kate.  One of Leonard Cohen's best imho.