KATHMANDU (Reuters)- Officials at Nepal’s state-run airline have sacrificed two goats to appease Akash Bhairab, the Hindu sky god, following technical problems with one of its Boeing 757 aircraft. Nepal Airlines, which has two Boeing aircraft, has had to suspend some services in recent weeks due the problem. The goats were sacrificed in front of the troublesome aircraft Sunday at Nepal’s only international airport in Kathmandu in accordance with Hindu traditions, an official said. “The snag in the plane has now been fixed and the aircraft has resumed its flights,” said Raju K.C., a senior airline official, without explaining what the problem had been. (It’s really not necessary for me to make any snide comments on this one is it? Humanity just rules so fucking hard!)
Diableries
Their history, method of creation, and purpose are largely a matter of speculation. They originate from some time in the 19th century and are French. They were created by only a handful (perhaps 2 or 3) artists. It seems they were photographed from small clay dioramas, none of which have survived. They were presented as opaque stereo-photographs and transparent rear-projection tissues, some hand colored (as above) some a rich sepia. The mystery surrounding their origins was likely intentional in that there content, humorous and bawdy and dealing almost exclusively with satan, hell, and the dead, would likely be seen as heretical. The present thinking is that they were produced as social satire on the regime of Louis Napoleon Bonaparte who, as Napoleon III, was Emperor of France from 1852 to 1870. The relative anonymity of the creators and mystery of their origins would serve as protection against imprisonment and other dungeon-related unpleasantness. See below for a few scant examples and links to more complete resources.
The robes are not that of a tattered crackpot or insulated monastery man. Those are scholars robes and this scholar has done the research by god! He’s evaporated liquids into condensates! He’s emptied test tubes and dropped them clattering to the table! He’s unrolled scrolls and traced things back to their ancient Greek antecedents only to disgustedly clap closed weighty tomes. He’s gone grey and bald at the effort. Oh yes, he’s done the research. And what has he found? What’s it all boil down to after all? el-zilcho.
Falling somewhere just outside the realm of 19th century cure-all quackery and just shy of what anyone might consider established practice we find Dr. Roger Humbolt Remmington’s curious “16 step regimen.” Many of the 16 steps are at this point hopelessly obtuse, utilizing processes and apparatus almost certainly forgotten, but it’s an interesting item none the less and I’ve reprinted it below for your “self-helping” pleasure.
This battered bit of wood was once a ubiquitous piece of schoolroom equipment. Can you guess what it was used for? On first look, taking the terrible beating it seems to have suffered into account, it’s tempting to guess “A paddle for spanking the little brat’s backsides!”(yes, the good ol days ay?) Though I have zero doubt that this item did speed through the air only to come to rest on naughty backsides, repeatedly, punishment was not in fact its primary function. It was actually a simple primer used for teaching children their alphabet. It was called a “hornbook” and was used in classrooms for at least 400 years. The letters on the model above have long since disappeared, obviously, but take a look below for some more representative models and some accompanying history.
Excuse me Mr. Andy Rooney, for furrowing my unkempt eyebrows, and muscling in on your turf here, but- I’d like to ask a silly question to the world at large… Why is it the purveyors of movie magic, who have mastered all facets of genetics and technology, who can mold flesh like clay, who can mutate and evolve creatures at will, who plumb deep space and animate alien life, who can set loose all manner of creeping death and leaping horror, who can obliterate planets, set hordes in motion, bring the dead to shambling life, who hold sway over the cataclysmic forces of nature, who have dominion over the very fabric of space and time itself and can as such pretty convincingly re-shape reality in any manner necessary… why can’t people with these incredible powers manage to composite a single believable looking family photo?
There is Yet Another Hell
Mention historical Japanese painting to a westerner and certain images involuntarily leap to mind- Hokusai’s great wave, an idyllic nature scene, an elegant Geisha, a sparrow perched on an inky branch… even Tales of the Genji or an explicit bit of Shunga perhaps. I imagine one thing which does not readily spring to mind is H-E-Double-Hockey-Sticks, with its demons and leaping flames and pestilence and writhing souls. After all, that’s our thing! Isn’t it?
Zengraving
Came across this hypnotic video of master hand engraver Steve Lindsay completing an engraving from start to finish. It’s pretty amazing. As a designer (with the prerequisite appreciation of typography) watching someone carve perfect, beautiful letter forms from metal, and so handily, is both humbling and fun. As a (lapsed) painter I can certainly appreciate the brute hand-skill involved. Beyond that there is a definite Zen quality inherent, I’d say, to any work which denies the luxury of an eraser or undo button. Pour yourself a glass of something (the vid is accompanied by an urbane soundtrack of classical and jazz) and enjoy.
For more videos, images, and information on hand engraving see the following:
Engraving School.com, Lindsay Engraving.com, and Master Engraver.com.
Polynesian Stick Charts
The Polynesians, scattered as they were over 1,000 islands across the central and southern Pacific Ocean, were master navigators who tracked their way over a huge expanses of ocean without any of the complex mechanical aids we associate with sea fairing. They didn’t have the astrolabe or the sextant, the compass or the chronometer. They did however have aids of a sort, which though seemingly humble, were in fact the repositories of an extremely complex kind of knowledge. Called Rebbelibs, Medos. and Mattangs, today we call them simply “Stick Charts.”
“There were only occasional cigarette wrappers or paper towel like toilet paper with no pencils or ink available for communication. You could manufacture ink out of brick dust and sundry such elements and use bamboo slivers for pens. The only sure way of communicating thusly was to drop a note in an emptied toilet bucket, float a note out on your manure, hide a note at a wash trough, or scratch a message on the bottom of a rice bowl. But you had to contact the guy first to tell him all this. The preferred, most secure and most reliable method was to tap on the walls or floor pad in a rhythmic code known to us as the Tap Code.”