6/14 Can You Hear Me Now? (or Dervishes and Drag Queens)

Coming into town.

We arrived in Chicago safely just after rush hour. Even the little bit of traffic we hit coming into town didn’t stress us out too much. We parked in Jason’s neighborhood of Lakeside (affectionately called “Boy’s Town”) and stopped in one of several Caribou Coffee locations, on Halsted.

The plan was that when we ran into Jason’s general neighborhood, we would call him. Of course, that plan was formulated when we had a working cell phone several weeks prior. Since then, my Motorola had been run over by my own car during a CD run to Mugsy’s to stock Catch the Squirrel. Yeah, it was my own damn fault, though Audra was driving at the time, I try to blame it on her (to no avail).

Anyway, the phone we were carrying was my old Samsung that had been retired specifically because it had a bad microphone. You could hear the caller, but they couldn’t hear you. It worked back in 2003 when I was with Bodó Band, but after it was knocked around enough it just stopped working well.

When the Motorola died from its Pontiac pummeling, I was about to purchase a new phone because Verizon refused to let me get a replacement without paying top price because my renewal wasn’t up yet. Just before I shelled out $200 for the cheapest phone they had, I had a stroke of genius (later I would question that descriptor). Why not use my old phone? Of course I had forgotten all about the microphone problem we had, which was the reason we upgraded to the Motorola to begin with.

So I paid $20 to reactivate the phone, $10 to transfer the phone book. That got me back in business for a couple of weeks until I realized what a piece of crap it was. So stroke of genius, {insert Borat accent here} NOT!

So it’s time to call Jason, and we get him on the line, but of course he can’t hear us. He calls us back, still nothing. We call him back. Still nothing. Then he asks us to text message him. Yeah, like I have the patience for that. Somewhere in there I learned that if give the phone the right smack, it might work for a bit, which allowed us to get a few words in about our location. “Stay where you are and I’ll find you.” OK, great because by that point I wanted to just toss the phone into Lake Michigan (which was several blocs away, but may have been possible with that level of frustration.)

My point here is, invest the $200 or whatever it is that you need for a reliable communications device when you are traveling. This seems like a no-brainer, but I have had an ongoing beef with Verizon and just didn’t want to deal with their nonsense. So in this case, I had to deal with the consequences. After this trip, and on Jason’s advice, I called Verizon customer service, and they gave me a 25% discount for a new phone, even though my contract was not up yet. Then I went to the Verizon store, and got someone who understood the idiocy of my situation, and not only did I get a new Motorola Razor for 25% off, she deducted the $20 reactivation I paid for the Samsung, and didn’t charge me for another address book transfer. So I was back to square one. Of course, I could have done that much earlier and saved myself the hassle. C’est la vie. (I also learned that Verizon will backup your address book for free, but they play this game with you where you need to keep your online account active, otherwise they charge you $1.99) More on Verizon some other time, but this is not my customer service blog.

Getting around Chicago is extremely easy. While we had the Outback, we kept it parked in Jason’s friend’s spot for most of the time we were there. We took it out for one trip, and had to move it after Jason’s friend came back. Otherwise, we used the bus system, which ran us $40 for the two passes we needed. We stuck mostly to the 147 and 146 express and 145, which took us right to where we needed to go.

After settling in at Jason and Allen’s very nice apartment, we went out to walk around the neighborhood a bit and then spent some time in downtown Chicago in the Millennium Park area. It is akin to the city parks of Philly or New York, and worth checking out for the sculptures and architecture, even if you aren’t into that sort of thing (I’m not). We visited “The Bean”, a large metallic, reflective… umm… bean-shaped art structure. It’s somewhat reminiscent of a turd from a Doctor Who villain. It provides all of the amusement of a carnival mirror, and then some.

The Bean

After admiring the distorted images of ourselves and others, we attended a performance of The Whirling Dervishes of Turkey with singer Ahmet Ozhan at the Millenium Park pavilion, a large modern stage that had just been completed recently. We had read about the performance in a newspaper shortly after arriving, and it also turned out to be the thing that Jason had planned to take us to anyway. It was on Rumi’s 800th birthday no less, something I was not attuned to, but which later added some mystery to the event.

The influence of Rumi’s work on my own creativity, and on my own philosophy of life is subtle, but far-reaching. Any opportunity to be a part of something like that is a real privilege. While based in the Sufi tradition of Islam, Rumi’s work is related, at least in spirit, to many of the Soto Zen teachings I’ve come across as a Buddhist. The two schools of thought make up the backbone of my world view which, to date, I have not written much about. Each time I try, it soon becomes apparent that either a) what I want to say has been said before, perhaps in just a different way; b) too many people who read my site would misconstrue what I write, so why bother; or c) what I end up writing misses the mark because many of the teachings that have influenced me are more about action and doing rather than reading and analyzing with words.

I saw The Whirling Dervishes of Rumi (another traveling group) back in State College some time ago at an indoor venue. That was my first experience with the Dervishes, and I will probably never forget it. After listening to the music and reading the poetry for so long, seeing it in action live and in person was breathtaking. However, this was a bit different. Perhaps it was because I had already seen a similar performance, or perhaps it was the less-intimate atmosphere, but I really had trouble staying focused on the performance. This was a free concert for the public, with some reserved seating, but mostly just lawn or concrete steps for the people who came late (like us). It was clear we wouldn’t stay for the whole thing because seating wasn’t comfortable. I can say that the acoustics were really good, and it must be a great place to see many types of music.

Millenium Park stage from the lawn.

Still, a certain sense of awe was still in the atmosphere, and the weather was perfect for such an event. I was glad that Jason was interested in going to it. Jason had a lot of questions about the Dervish “sema” ceremony, and much to my surprise was not familiar with Rumi. {Later during one of our outings I made it a point to get him a small collection of Rumi’s works at Unabridged Bookstore, the place we had visited last time we were in Chicago.}

The vocal music wrapped up about 20 minutes after we got there, and then we stayed for the instrumental interlude and the Dervishes for maybe another 20 minutes. The instruments used were ney (flute), Tanbur, Ud (lute), Kanun, Kemence (spiked fiddle), Bas Kamence (bass spiked fiddle, almost like a cello), Bendir (frame drums), Halile. There were also multiple vocalists during the dance. The dance is very slow and deliberate, and if you don’t realize it is also a ritual, it is easy to get bored. However, after you’ve seen the whole thing once (as I had) and after you see the group go through one pass of the whirling, you pretty much get the idea. Had I been alone, or just with Audra, we probably would have stayed for the entire performance, but considering there were other things we wanted to do, we quietly moved on. Many others were coming and going too, and I think this somewhat degraded the impact of the event unless you were in the reserved seats.

As we exited the lawn, representatives from the cultural groups sponsoring the event were there to hand out free items like pens, DVDs and magnets – all in celebration of 800 years of Rumi’s love and wisdom. Then we walked around the grounds and gardens for another 20 minutes, still able to clearly hear the music from the stage.

After the Turkish performance, we killed some more time back at the apartment and later went to dinner at an ultra-trendy place called Ping Pong. One thing that the traveling foodie should know is that many of the interesting restaurants in youthful neighborhoods like Jason’s are very good when it comes to cuisine, but very bad when it comes to atmosphere. I say this as a thirty-something who doesn’t really give a hoot what’s projected on the walls. I also expect background music to remain in the background. I simply can not appreciate any music - whether it is techno, rock, salsa, hip hop, or whatever - if it is blasted so loud that I can’t hear the person next to me, and end up with ears ringing later in the night.

But if you are into abstract wall projections, ridiculously loud and generic techno, and florescent lighting, then Ping Pong on Halsted is for you! OK, to be fair, the food – a mix of various Asian cuisines - was very good and reasonably priced. The place was packed, right out onto the sidewalk seating, so they must be doing something right. But as a regular thing, such a place could get extremely boring, and deafening.

At least back home, you can usually excuse loud bands because the only way they can actually sound good is if they play too loud to mask their inabilities. With recorded music, it’s a different story, particularly if it is atmospheric stuff like techno. Unless you are running a dance club, why crank the volume? The only theory that I could come up with is that it helps to mask conversations, and perhaps people like the privacy, even if it is at the price of an ossicle.

Later that evening, Jason took us to Kit Kat Lounge where we were told they had very good martinis and a drag show. It turned out to be probably the best time we’ve had in a bar in a long time. Maybe ever. Very little smoke and the music was a reasonable volume. The African American drag queen came out singing “I Will Survive” karaoke style the first time, and then a while later some other song about needing a man (not sure of the title).

It was not at all uncomfortable, for those readers who may be wondering. The atmosphere was similar to what happens at a Lebanese restaurant when the belly dancer comes out. The lights change, the entertainer comes out (and this is all about entertainment) and the music comes up. Your perception of the evening, and the very space, changes. She (they prefer that pronoun) was very convincing, and gave both Audra and I the requisite winks during her act, so it was a bit confusing. Audra and Jason debated about whether the boobs were real. I think they were. If not, I was fooled. What can I say?!

Kit Kat Lounge

Jason’s friend/director Mark joined us part way through the evening. Immediately things took on a whole new light. It was kind of like having Han Solo join your table in the Cantina, (though without the Wookie). We heard stories of the mob, prices on heads, businesses gone sour and family feuds (but no shooting of Greedo). It was hard to tell what was fact and what was fiction. That was fine. We were on vacation, and it didn’t matter. For all we know it could all have been a load of Bantha fodder, but it was a fun night out nonetheless. And I am not just saying that because Mark is a happy drunk. At the end of the night Mark whipped out a Ben Franklin and tried to pay for the entire tab. Of course we tried to stop him, but it was already too late. We got the tip (which was still sizable) and called it even.

Back at the apartment we enjoyed the antics of Paris, Jason’s cat. Paris is named after Paris Hilton, and she exhibits many of the same qualities. She likes to have her picture taken, and will pose for you. I have pictures to prove it. She likes attention and petting. She even likes to drink. We were staying in the extra bedroom that technically belonged to Paris, so whenever we would come back from being away, she’d be sprawled out on the bed, Hilton-style, waiting for us to… um, pay attention to her. Paris provided much comedy and amusement throughout our stay.

Another highlight from today was the R2D2 mailboxes! The puppet shows were fun too.

Pictured here, right to left, Jeremy, R2D2, and TRSH-KN

Continued...