“You look kinda gay wearing that.”

That’s it.

That’s the sum total of everything she has to say when I show up here and meet her and look at her and attempt to tell her everything that I ever wanted her to know.

I “attempted”, apparently.

And why is it, really, that a man can’t wear colorful clothing? Particularly when it’s May but feels like late July and the heat permeates everything; the heat is omnipresent; the heat is like god.

“You look kind of gay wearing that.” She says. Again.

“Just…drive?” I barely mumble.

Tokyo is so hot I pack extra T-shirts in my bag before I leave every morning but up here, just over an hour away by bullet train straight into the abyss, it’s like autumn in New York and I shiver and stare out the window into the blackness of Shizuoka prefecture.

This place is a wasteland.

It’s covered in contrivance but it’s all really just a wasteland.  I can’t believe people live here.  They wake up, they have coffee, they shit before going to work and then they die. People actually live here and it blows my mind.

She pulls out of Mishima station, turns right onto a dark road and the little car accelerates.I sigh sort of loudly and she reaches over with her left hand and turns up the radio.   The J-pop voices croon out of the speakers, my nightmares all realities, and I can only blink dully when the obligatory English lyric in the song is eked out by a tiny tin-like boy-band voice, “Girl, you’re fucking perfect…“

I reach over with my right hand and snap the radio dial off.

“Spare me.” I mutter into the window.

“Nante?” What did you say? She asks in an overly healthy and unaffected voice. Her voice matches the late night contrivance of the surroundings we now rocket past in this desperate little vehicle.

“Nothing. Nandemonai.” I sigh again and run a hand through my hair. “Riku ha? Mo netta?” How is Riku? He’s sleeping already? I ask.

She doesn’t answer me but keeps her hands on the steering wheel, “Ten and Two” and we cruise through the Mishima darkness and I shiver because it’s become really cold even though Tokyo is so warm right now I’m forced to wear colorful clothing. Everyone in Tokyo is wearing shorts. Everyone in Tokyo is going to festivals. Everyone in Tokyo.

The car turns right on to a large, well-lit and absolutely empty, black top highway. We pass a large, well-lit McDonald’s and I look inside as we drive by and it’s nearly empty, abandoned, but there is a young couple sitting by the window in a booth and they are laughing.  The guy turns and somehow manages to look right at me as we drive by. He’s still grinning and looks right at me so I turn and look straight ahead at the deserted highway.

I try to think of something, anything to say that might be appropriate but nothing comes to mind so I ask again, in Japanese, “Is Riku sleeping already?”

She focuses intensely on the deserted highway, too big and overly developed for an area that has the pulse of a ninety year old waiting to die in a cancer ward, and then finally after what seems to be a frozen millennium says, ” He should be in bed.”

Then we turn left onto the little street that drops down a hill, passes a lonely 7/11 and then we turn left again and go through a tunnel which is lit with big purple lights and then we turn right onto the winding little mountain road, the only honest road I’ve seen here, that leads up to her families house.

It bends and curves and snakes and whips past dozens of little homes.  Some are old and some are new. Some are shuttered up and some are not but everyone has their lights out. Some have little gardens or tiny rice paddies.  Some are more western and some have the construction style particular to rural Japan.  Some seem warm and some seem empty.  We then turn left onto the final stretch of dark road climbing the little mountain up to her place. A place I have been to many, many times.

It’s particularly dark and in the little car now, I’m freezing.  I can see my breath come out of my mouth in little faint plumes of smoke and I glance at her and her face is set and she’s so small, almost child like, and I look left out the window and can see a half-moon over the valley; it’s a clear, straight, tired and cold night here and in the middle of the valley is half a bridge that they are building but I can’t imagine to where because the entire place is completely and utterly empty.

It’s completely devoid of life. They are building a massive cement bridge to nowhere.

We finally pull up in front of her house and after she shuts off the engine and pulls the keys out of the ignition we get out of the car and I notice again, as always, that she is tiny; the top of her head coming to, maybe, my lower chest and I am flooded, nearly overwhelmed by an immense wave of melancholy and regret before I breath out into the night, noticing the freshness of the air here:

“Just, spare me, man.” No one replies.

It takes about an hour for us to talk to her parents, who are un-animated, almost mechanical in their disdain for first me but also, clearly for her, and then sign and stamp our divorce documents.  I leave the house as soon as possible and wait outside in the cold and dark and emptiness for a taxi I call with my mobile.  I don’t get to see my son.

I stay at a business hotel near the station and have two canned chu-hi’s before dropping into a sweaty and restless sleep on a hard bed in front of a huge window that overlooks the depressing town of Mishima.

The next morning at six-twenty I am standing on the platform waiting for the shinkansen and I’m holding a coffee I bought at the hotel from a girl and her name was “Sayuri” and I read it aloud from her name tag while she made my coffee and she had said “Oh, your Japanese is good.” And I just told her I like her name. And now I look across Mishima from the open air platform and see Mount Fuji sitting there; massive and alarmingly abrupt, covered in snow, it’s backdrop a relentlessly light blue sky that stretches to forever.

I sip the coffee Sayuri made me and the train slowly pulls up so I wait for the doors to open and I board.

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Greetings and salutations my fine feathered ‘Gaijin’ comrades er uhh I mean friends. So how is life in Japan these days? I take it you’re probably having your monthly “What the hell am I doing in Japan?” menstruation right about now. Don’t worry so am I. It really is nothing to be ashamed of and In fact, it is completely one hundred percent normal. So don’t fret or feel sad lonely and depressed just grin and bear it and take comfort knowing there are others out there that feel the exact same way as you do. OK, and In the meantime perhaps I can offer you some words of comfort and wisdom a little ‘verbal Tampax’ if you will, to ease the discomfort.

Let’s take a long slow deep breath, that’s it, slowly, as you inhale visualize the 2.5mm pollution particle filled air from China seeping deeper and deeper into the lower cavities of your lungs, energizing each and every capillary, hold and exhale. Ahhh see don’t you feel better now? I knew you would, now let’s just hope there was no radioactive pollen in there.

In all seriousness it’s not that bad of a place is it? Japan. And if it was, you’re smart, you wouldn’t still be here would you? Think of all the idiosyncrasies you have developed and experiences you’ve had since setting foot in the land of the rising sun. I am as sure as the shit caked on the side of a Japanese squatter toilet by the guy who just used it before you that you wouldn’t want to trade them or give them away for anything.

The characters and friends you have made, all priceless. Except that one son of a bitch you work with on Wednesdays, God we hate him. Don’t call me ‘Dude’ ever again you fucking cunt. Whoops, OK, let me clarify something, I am a zen master; but every now and then I like to come down to the earthly realm and vent my frustrations just like the rest of you. Lets continue..

Remember that time you were stalked by your 50 year old butt ugly boss with missing teeth who kept asking you to marry her? That was not so funny at the time, but now you can just look back and laugh about it right, hahaha. Same goes for all of you who went down with the Nova ship. I told you that last payment was never going to come.

Anyway, my point is that with time all your troubles and obstacles that seemed so insurmountable at the time will become trivial distant memories floating around in your continually alcohol flooded cranium and will not phase you in the least bit. Your early years here in Japan have made you strong and give you strength to do and accomplish all your dreams.

OK, Still not convinced this is the place for you? OK, fair enough, It’s not my job to convince you it is or isn’t . Only you can ultimately decide where you belong on this great big planet. Search your heart and search your soul and then walk around Tokyo on a warm spring day looking at all the female 20 somethings in short skirts and high heels prancing down the street and then you will know where you truly belong.

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With the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan counter insurgency has again entered our mainstream vocabulary. Last year there was a great article describing the history of this much sought after strategy, starting with the grandfather of counter insurgency French military philosopher, David Galula.

Galula was working for the French government in 40s China when he was captured by Mao’s communist forces during the Chinese civil war. While being held prisoner he witnessed a new kind of warfare; one where the fighting men of the communists blended in with the general population or as Chairman Mao put it, “The guerrilla must move amongst the people as a fish swims in the sea.”

Nothing to see here. Just a normal fish like all you other fish

Galula saw the success of this new strategy that did away with conventional armies, set-piece battles and front lines. Victory instead was inside the heads of the millions of individuals that the insurgents lived among. If these fighters could persuade the people to believe in their cause and to help them – then the conventional forces would always be surrounded – and the traditional army would be defeated no matter how many victories they won.

Galula saw the problems this new strategy would cause in future wars as the old powers fought violent uprisings, using tactics they honed during World War II. So he worked to develop a strategy to defeat this new breed of insurgents. What he came up with was a strategy where he would fight fire with fire, or what we now call counter insurgency. As the guerrilla fighter moved amongst the people Galula recognized that the opposing forces would also have to do the same thing; live, work and blend in with the surrounding population. Instead of winning the minds of the locals over with communism their minds would have to be won over by promising democracy, and a new/better system of governance. As Galula tested out his theories in the French Empire’s numerous insurgencies America was first introduced to this new concept via the Hollywood, blockbuster movie, The Ugly American

JFK was fascinated by the movie and the military theory behind it and so when he came to power he set up a Special Group, Counterinsurgency in the Pentagon, SGCI. The problem though was that there weren’t any counter insurgency experts in America so they brought over Galula to lecture the Americans on this new theory. By this time Galula had published his book, Counterinsurgency Warfare: Theory and Practice
and so it was during these lectures that he laid out for the Americans the strengths, but in his view more importantly the weakness, of the Counter insurgency problem. Promises of democracy and better governance were just that, promises; promises that were rarely followed through and definitely not something that could compete with the utopia workers paradise that was promised by the communists. The Kryptonite of Counterinsurgency was that it had to offer a better life, something that at the time corrupt regimes couldn’t or wouldn’t offer.

The Americans ignored this weakness as they thought they had the answer to the workers paradise issue. They put their own twist on Counter insurgency by adding their secret weapon, capitalism. The Americans reasoned that they could apply market forces to counter insurgency as a replacement for promises of better governance, promising money instead of freedom. They even created a fancy name for this, “The Cost/Benefit-Coercion theory of Counterinsurgency.”

Put into practice in Vietnam, via Operation Phoenix, the Americans followed the counter insurgency doctrine by setting up special groups under the new market force infused system. These people were labeled by that great tradition of military speak, “rational actors”. Then, as Mao preached, these rational actors would “move amongst the people as a fish swims in the sea.” Yet these fishes instead of having their heads filled with dreams of a communist utopia, had visions of wads of cash dancing in their heads. The Americans offered awards and bounties for the enemy fish in the Vietnamese population, the communist and anti-government officials. X amount of dollars for a Vietcong village official, even more for a district officer.

The problem with this is that Vietnamese culture was based on a complex value system of village rivalries and blood feuds. The “rational actors” quickly saw the benefit of the bounty system and started bagging Vietcong officials, quite successfully in fact. Tens of thousands were captured or killed but then the rational actors expanded their activities to include their village rivals; the families and allies of these rivals. Then as per Vietnam’s blood feud rituals the families of those killed retaliated against the rational actor’s allies and families who then killed more in revenge setting off a bloody cycle of violence that disillusioned everyone. The Americans were helpless as their contacts assured them that the people they were torturing and murdering were red, card carrying communists. Even if they wanted to the Americans couldn’t check it out as they were totally dependent on the Vietnamese teams for info on the insurgents. Chomsky in his book For Reasons of State quotes an American official recounting his time with the Vietnamese:

A United States intelligence officer attached to the Phoenix program in the Mekong Delta states that when he arrived in his district, he was given a list of 200 names of people who were to be killed, and when he left six months later, 260 had been killed, but none of those on his list.

In Vietnam it led to chaos in the South and was a big factor leading to the South’s defeat, in 1975. However other governments would take up the call with their own death squads in Asia and the Americas while the CIA watched. Fish chasing fish in a sea of blood.

While in South America death squads roamed latin America, the American military had shelved the strategy. Fast forward to the invasion of Iraq in 2003. Rumsfeld’s new army quickly destroyed the Iraqi government but was stumped on what to do with the headless Iraqi population that it was now responsible for. After a series of mis-steps, like disbanding the Iraqi army, a growing insurgency was festering in Iraq. In response the American generals dusted off the “The Cost/Benefit-Coercion theory of Counterinsurgency” theory books and started setting up Iraqi militias to deal with the Iraqi insurgency. Again these “fish” were able to successfully swim in the Iraqi population and deal debilitating blows to the Islamic fighters who like the Vietcong had a message and dream to spread, not communism this time, but Islamic jihad. The American’s cash bounty system was able to rein them in, Bob Woodward even insists that they, not the surge, were the reason the Iraqi insurgency collapsed:

The truth is that other factors were as or even more important than the Surge … Beginning in about May 2006 the US military and intelligence agencies launched a series of TOP SECRET operations … Senior military officers and officials at the White House have asked me not to publish the details but these covert activities had a far-reaching effect on the violence and were very possibly the biggest factor in reducing it. Several said that 85-90% of the successful operations

This was recently highlighted by the emerging activities of Colonel James Steele. Steele was a veteran of the Dirty Wars in Central and South America. In the 80s he was linked to the death squads that operated in the Salvadoran Civil War and even managed to get caught up in the Iran Contra affair. He was called in during Iraq and spent some time setting up the Counterinsurgency hit teams that were so effective in reining in the Iraqi insurgency. Then, just as before in Vietnam, the American sponsored Iraqi fish got out of control. The Iraqi hit teams, mostly made up of Shiites, started carrying out their own operations against the  Sunni population and it quickly spiraled out of control. This is all beautifully shown in the Guardian documentary, Searching for Steele:

However the movie like many attempts to look back at American actions during all these conflicts is flawed. With the benefit of hindsight historians, activists look back in history and see an evil American puppet pulling the strings telling these third world “rational actors” how to act. When we should consider another possibility, market forces or profit.

Vietnam and Iraq were cases of a new theory being applied to warfare and the flawed use of market force aspect of America’s “Cost/Benefit-Coercion theory of Counterinsurgency” to correct the Kryptonite of Counterinsurgency. Much like if we allow deregulation and freedom to the wall street brokers of the financial market forces they will find a way to peak, profit and then collapse in a puddle of their own greed. In Vietnam and Iraq the Americans were getting results and through sheer incompetence let events spin out of control. There were no American puppet masters but there were market forces inevitably, like a law of nature, spinning out of control only instead of millions of dollars lost it was millions of lives.

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Years ago I read this book, The Devil of Nanking. The story revolves around a western girl traveling to Tokyo because she is obsessed about finding this Japanese WWII film footage. I won’t get into the story but one of the key plot points was that she was staying in this abandoned building in central Tokyo. Now that always struck me as weird as property in central Tokyo is in short supply and pretty sought after. It doesn’t make sense to have an abandoned building in central Tokyo but, as I’ve talked about many times, making money and Japan don’t always go together.

As the years have wore on, and I got to know the city, I’ve ended up stumbling across abandoned buildings, boarded up, often for years. These blocked off concrete blocks sit empty while nature slowly reclaims them. Sometimes they are in quite luxurious neighborhoods where it doesn’t make sense to have this property just sitting and not making money. Yet this is Japan where things can get forgotten, even things that have the potential to bring in Yen hand over fist.

The Kichijoji Castle

- Google Map

The Kichijoji Castle is a house that is right next to one of the best parks in Tokyo, Inokashira Park. It has been boarded up for at least 10 years and even though it sits on some of the choice real estate in Tokyo no one has touched it … except for some kids who probably explore its, and each others, depths in the darkest of nights.

Daikanyama Dilapidation

- Google Map

Daikanyama is one of the trendiest areas of Tokyo. This is where the rich and hip Japanese go to buy $300 jeans and sip $14 fruito soy milk lattes. Yet among all the glitz and glamour sits this apartment block. Resting right next to the beautiful cherry blossom lined Meguro river it has about twenty bachelor pad units that could easily rent for $1000 a month. Yet it sits empty, left to the elements while its owners piss away tens of thousands of dollars a month in rental income. Google Maps seem to show people living in it when they drove the map car through in 2009 but its been empty for at least a couple of years.

Forgotten Factory

- Google Map

This warehouse / factory looks like its been sitting there for decades. Out front among the ivy is some machinery that looks like it was last used during the start of the industrial revolution. Yet this building is right next to Temple University’s Japan Campus in the heart of Azabu-Jūban a residential neighborhood where foreigners constantly out bid each other to live in some tiny bachelor pad.

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Before Lord of the Rings, before Kull the Conqueror,  before Willow and even before Red Sonia…there was Conan the Barbarian.

Although most movies these days are more about simply making money or driving yet another talentless talking puppet to undeserving-millionaire-idiot status, occasionally movies still teach us a lesson or two. Miami Vice taught me that long hair is still a legit option in male fashion and G.I. Joe: The rise of Cobra showed me that there is something worse than pouring acid in my eyes.  Despite these gems, they just don’t seem to make them like they used to.

I grew up watching Conan, god knows how many times, and through literally hundreds of hours spent digesting its contents I have learned seven very valuable life lessons. In fact,  I consider these lessons life changing and this is wisdom I can no longer horde greedily alone in my man cave.

I will share these now with you; prepare yourselves  for truth…

7. Say Less; Do not pontificate

The Croatians call it “proljev usta“.  In Germany they call it “Durchfall Mund“.  In the west we have an acute case of it, which experts refer to as  “diarrhea mouth-ness”. Everyone wants to talk about everything, all the time.  While healthy communication skills might be considered that which separates us from the bands of marauding, disenfranchised, rape hungry unicorns, silence can be better than the blow job you got in the closet at church in tenth grade. Maybe.

Conan the Barbarian teaches us this many times over.  It is documented and proven with the aid of Science and the YouTube.

Three minutes and thirty-seven seconds of man noise. That’s it.

I’m not a rocket surgeon, but that’s pretty special in my book.

So little chin wagging yet what does he manage to do?  Everything.  He becomes a master thief, a brilliant warrior and avenges the death of his father and super sexy mother.  He even shines ole’ Thulsa Doom on by hacking his head off in a similar fashion to how his MILF was done in the beginning of the film.

That’s class.

In addition to all of that, he also gets the girl, Valeria. How? Obviously not with moves he picked up reading The Game. He’s just an alpha male barbarian with massive pecs, arms and a ridiculously big sword. Sorry skinny guys, chicks like muscle and some quiet time.  It’s proven in the video.

It’s proven.

Give me pecs and silence. A big sword is a bonus.

6. If she seems too good to be true, then  she  is

We’ve all been there, I know I have: You’ve met an amazing girl and things are great.  She’s fun to hang out with, she lets you pick where you two are going to eat, she doesn’t bother you when you hang out with your friends and she doesn’t complain about the aromatic complications of you being on a high-protein diet; she’s totally your type.

Then one day it all goes very wrong.

Our Cimmerian friend has experienced it as well and he demonstrates how to deal with this very real life issue succinctly in the movie.

On first viewing, a foreigner in Japan might think this is a warning telling them that  frustrated country folk will only give you directions in exchange for sexual favors and you wouldn’t be entirely wrong.  But there is a bigger picture here.

This exchange can be viewed as a microcosm for so many relationships.  The initial meeting. The courting. The engaging conversations.  The hot sex in front of the fire.

Then, just as our barbarian brother begins to get comfortable, the woman starts babbling incoherent nonsense then turns into a flesh-eating hell cat and tries to rip his face off.

All of this while they’re naked.

Sounds familiar, doesn’t it? All awash with nostalgia?

Conan shows us clearly how to handle this situation simply by throwing the lunatic slut into the fire. This is the Hyborian age equivalent of blocking her on Facebook and deleting her on LINE.  Sure, she might flip out like the she-devil in the video and trans-morph into a blue ball of fire, bounce off the walls and knock over some pictures but then she’s out the door and out of your life.

Last Seen: HEARTLAND in Roppongi.

5. 20 minute anything does not exist

Whenever I am online it’s a constant barrage of advertisements for 20 minute take your pick.

20 minute abs.

20 minute arms.

20 minute chest.

That Asian guy is always trying to tell me how fat he used to be and how doctors and personal trainers hate him because he has all the 20 minute secrets. It’s annoying and what’s more, it’s bullshit.

This fucking jerk.

Here’s the thing: There’s no such thing as a “shortcut” to being huge and ripped.  It takes a lot of work, years of training and heavy compound movements.  Again, Conan of Cimmeria shows us this with his true life story.

Hey kids, ready for summer camp?

The Wheel of Pain is the uh, “device”, that Conan is chained to as a kid at about the age of 9 or 10.  Ten years later, that’s ten years later, he is a jacked up maniac super man.

Compound movements.  Pushing this thing is chest, triceps, lower back, quads and calves so basically total body and it’s heavy.  Also we can deduce that the work load was progressively more intensive. As seen in the video, as time goes on fewer and fewer people are assisting with the clearly arduous task of pushing the wheel hence resulting in a gradually increasing workload on Conan himself.

That’s how you build lean mass; heavy loads, gradually increasing over time; week-in and week-out for several years.

This is important for life. Too many people are looking for the short cut and the easy way out.  For that which is most worth having in life two things are almost always necessary; Risk and Commitment.

Throw in some forced marches, beatings and a slave trader shooting primabolin in your ass because it’s hard for you to reach your glutes while chained to the original nautilus machine, and you have a powerful Alpha male physic, the envy of gay lords and “natty” bodybuilders the world over.

4. Know People

The standard image of Conan of Cimmeria would be that of a loner. The lone wolf traveling the world in sandaled feet; broad sword always near by.  Asking nothing from others and living by his own means.

Is the  Barbarian a loner? Yes and No.

Perhaps he likes to think he is. But we also see him continuously adopt other so-called loners as friends throughout his epic journey.

In this clip, we see Conan meet and free the thief and archer known as Subotai.

Not only does Conan free him, but Subotai and he travel together and set up a fairly enterprising little B&E operation and sack the Temple of Set grabbing the “eye of the serpent”.  That makes them pretty fast friends if you ask me.  Conan released him from his chains for no other reason it seems, than for a bit of company and good thing he did because when Conan is hanging from “The Tree of Woe” , chomping on bird neck, compliments of Thulsa Doom ,  it’s Subotai that comes prancing over the hills to his rescue.

Pays to have friends. Real ones.

Next, there is “the Wizard”, expertly portrayed by Mako,  who not only tells him the way to Thulsa Doom’s “Mountain of Power”, but actually performs a goddamned dangerous magical ritual to bring him back from the dead.

Tell your friend to keep the Starbucks point card he’s trying to give you, which doesn’t use anyway and save up to keep you out of the pits of hell when the time comes.

If he’s really your friend that is.

The point is to know people and have friends, genuine friends.  If you take stock and come to the conclusion that your life is for whatever reason devoid of these, maybe you should start out by being open to new people in the oddest of circumstances.  Also, make sure to balance out your party with a thief and at least one magic user in addition to the Barbarian and the rogue or you’re fucked when you get further into the adventure.

Don’t bring a sword to a giant pharaoh-boss fire-spitting fight.

Conversely however, you should remember to…

3. Trust No One

In this life, if you want to get something genuinely amazing done, if you want to accomplish something beyond what is considered reasonable, in short if you want to be outstanding, you will usually have to do this alone.

This is because most people you know are lazy, tired and bitter; in that order.

From a very early age our Cimmerian is taught this by his father, albeit with different words and cloaked in a religious fable.

So, lets ask ourselves, “What is the riddle of steel?”

At this  point it doesn’t matter. Nothing matters if you’re totally committed and fully believe in what you are doing;  beleiving in something: a cause, a dream or just yourself.  Belief that something can and will happen is what propels us forward.  Also, it is necessary for this inspiration to come from within you.  For something to be a true calling, it has to be forged by your own hand, it cannot simply be cookie cutter or canned material cynically spit at you from some trumped up authority figure. This is another point within his fathers lecture: Follow only yourself.  Do not trust others to help you, enlighten you or support you.  It is perfectly possible, despite where you took them, what you gave them or what you did for them that in the end, they will turn their backs on you.

Don’t believe me?

Just ask this guy.

2. Stuff is not important

“Civilization” has two pillars upon which it stands and nurturing this obsessive desire to have more; more money, more possessions or more physical things, is one of them.  It’s the proverbial, age-old rat race and denouncing it is the second most profound message found in Conan the Barbarian.

In life, be it here in 2013 or in the Hyborean age, there are certain things we need to live comfortably.  But these things do not need to cost a fortune and they shouldn’t require the surrender of the majority of our lives and dignity to obtain them.  Our obsession with junk we do not need is a sickness that has locked us all into a scheme that smothers us and leaves us feeling barren, lost and unfulfilled.  Why? Because however much you get, the world you exist in is constantly taking it away and showing you someone who has more than you.  It’s an endless cycle and no matter how high you climb, you just get deeper into the hole.  King Osric preaches truth below.

Also, if one watches this tale of life closely, in the beginning we see Conan’s village in Cimmeria.  It seems to be a peaceful, productive place with various parties engaged in various forms of labor. A little more research reveals to us, based on the Conan books written in the 1930′s by Robert Howard, that in Cimmeria “no man or woman went hungry, yet no one had more than they needed.”  In addition to that, based on the way Conan’s super hot mother handles a broad sword and keeps a cool head under the pressure of a bloody massacre, the women of the village had training as well.  This all points to a collective commune type existence and before the inhabitants are all but wiped out, it seems a very tolerable place to live.

Conversely, the wealthy and powerful King Osric’s throne room is a dank, dreary old place that nobody would seem to be comfortable in.  Surrounded by riches, he is a man drowning in them.

The conclusion this tale draws for us is simple: Eliminate the unnecessary.

The things you own end up owning you.

This will not complete you.

This might.

1. Destroy the System; Define your self

No other theme is so strongly apparent in the tale of our melancholic Cimmerian than that of Anarchism.  From the beginning to the end it is the destruction and abandonment of one system, designed by someone else and imposed, after another.

In the previous point we talked about the two pillars of “civilization” and this is the second one: control of the masses by the elite.  The destruction of mechanisms of control becomes a central theme in the film early on.

Conan’s evolution is almost a metaphor for the path of every man.  He is born in a sort of anarcho-primitivist-commune; in Cimmeria all people rule together, labor is equally distributed even amongst men and women, few go hungry unless all go hungry and it seems logical to assume the concepts of “policing” or “taxation” would be laughably absurd.  He is born pure.

Tranquil Cimmerian Village: Purity.

This primitivist existence is stripped away when Thulsa Doom and his troop of pranksters show up and murder everyone, having Conan’s father mauled to death by dogs and his mother stylishly beheaded.  He is then taken south and chained to the wheel of pain.  He is now a slave, the bottom rung on “civilizations” ladder.

Telemarketing; the modern-day equivalent of the wheel of pain. Except you just get fat and it’s so much more soul stripping.

Ten years later Conan is purchased by a man with amazing red hair and is thrown into the pits as a gladiator.  Again he exists on the fringes of society killing other slaves for the crowds amusement and the financial gain of his owner.  Decadent? Yes, but Conan embraces it with a nihilistic approach explaining that to him it meant nothing.

It makes perfect sense that after losing everything and enduring the numbing ordeal of ten years forced labor that Conan would become a nihilist.

But this is not where he stays. Although anarchism and nihilism might go to the same parties this doesn’t mean they are room mates.

Conan is soon released from bondage by the man with amazing red hair and after some escaping from wolves and finding of old swords he becomes a thief, ostensibly under the tutelage of Subotai.  During their travels Conan consistently remarks about his negative impressions  of developed areas and “civilization”.  And although they embark on a stealing frenzy, while stealing the “Eye of the Serpent” we learn that in fact, Conan  still longs to find those that destroyed his village.  Instead  of mere revenge, it seems  more likely that what he is seeking is some sort of understanding.  This is  not nihilism.

Finally, after a failed attempt at infiltrating Thulsa Doom’s organization, the pivotal point in the story arrives.  Thulsa Doom and Conan discuss the “Riddle of Steel” and the nature of power.

This is, for all intents and purposes the answer to the “Riddle of Steel”.  After this, his crucifixion and subsequent resurrection Conan himself embraces this philosophy and turns his back on all but himself and his belief in one man’s ability to be extraordinary without structures but simply through his actions.

While he and his gang of fun-loving rogues infiltrate Doom’s temple, we see the full decadence and decay propagated by the system and it’s leaders in the form of a massive cannibal soup orgy at which, ole’ Thulsa Doom morphs into a big goddamned snake. Because why not, right?

Cannibal soup orgy: Not Pure

From the pure and innocent beginnings of a primitive snow-covered forest village to the debauched apex of civilization, what comes next almost seems a foregone conclusion.

Having all his questions answered Conan now turns to simple actions (revenge) and finally the most symbolic act of system deconstruction, the beheading of Doom in front of his followers at the mountain of power.

Not only does he kill Doom, but he resists, he fights against and wins the battle for mental control that his mother, and clearly hundreds of thousands of Doom’s followers have lost, and then decapitates the shit out him.  Conan then holds the head high for all to see, re-enforcing his disregard for the authority figures (priests, clerics, teachers, presidents, police, meter-maids, celebrity figures etc)  the system imposes on us before throwing it down the stairs of the temple, then, chucking a lantern into the place and burning it to the ground.

A total and complete analogy for the abandonment if not the complete destruction of systems of power that intend to force laws, codes, rules or even thoughts upon us.

A more clear message would be hard to find and even harder to convey.

Be like Conan friends.

Crush your enemies, see them driven before you and read more by GAIJINASS:

Interview with a Dominatrix	Groper Train	7 English loan words that are totally dirty	White woman, Japan sex	Japan’s Nuclear Weapons

When she first ran a ground in 1994

A while ago Gaijinass talked about a series of images about the wreck of the Soviet Murmansk Cruiser on the coast of Norway. First launched in the 50s the aging cruiser sat in a Soviet port before being sold to India for scrap.

The Murmansk in better days

On the way to its dismemberment the tug and cruiser hit a storm and the ship landed just outside the Norwegian village of Sørvær [Google Map Link]. There it sat, half sunk, rotting, for almost 20-years. Now finally they are dealing with the shipping hazard (and possible source of radiation poisoning). Salvage contractor AF Decom built a sea wall around the ship and it appears like they are going to drain the water around the vessel and then take it apart piece by piece using machinery from APE Holland.

A live webcam from the site appears to show most of the salvage has been done.





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Commuter Hell

Guest post by NANYA

Learn about Engrish on Nanya’s site ‘PointxPoint‘ or just browse his art on his Tumblr .

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Pro-Wrestling Breast Implants

“Do you mind if I drink with you while I wait for my friends? I really hate drinking alone.”

I look at her and then look around the empty bar, think about something for a moment, then I reply.

“Yeah sure, I’m outta here in twenty but feel free to pull up a stool.”

She lets out a sigh of relief and then slides off the stool, actually getting shorter as she reaches the floor; can’t be taller than one hundred and fifty centimeters max with shoulder length dyed light brown hair and a very tight top showing off her cleavage, which unless I am losing touch with things, is enhanced. Then she picks up the bag the bar provides, full of her stuff and comes over to the big round table I’m standing at in the corner under the ceiling mounted flat screen showing Rugby highlights.

She might be half Japanese, half Philippina or Latina. She might also be a prostitute.

“Well, I’m Umi, you know…like the sea.” She says and holds out a tiny hand and I shake it.

“Gaijinass.  Nice to meet you Umi. Cheers.” I say and we both pick up our respective drinks, me a double gin tonic with two wedges of lime and her’s, I think, a rum and coke. The glasses lightly clink together.

“So, yeah I hate drinking alone.  I guess I’ve been spending too much time outside of Japan. I just can’t sit in a bar alone and drink, even if I’m waiting to meet someone. Feel like a loser, you know?”

She lights a cigarette after I offer her a Cohiba club which she turns down, and I notice some tattoos on her right wrist.  I nod at them and ask her. “What’s the deal with those?”

“What do you mean?”

“No. I mean what does it say?”

“Fuerza De Voluntad.” She pulls up the sleeve to her white top and holds up her wrist for me to see. Then, realizes something.  “Do you speak Spanish?”

“No. What’s it mean?”

“It means willpower.  I got it in rehab. I was in rehab. I used to have a major problem with some serious drugs, like serious ones and well, yeah anyway I got it in rehab and this one…” She pulls her sleeve up more and shows me another tattoo that appears to be a chain of beads running around her arm.

“…and this one is of Japanese beads, like, from Shinto or something?”

I pull up my sleeve and show her the beads I’m wearing.  And I ask her what she is up to tonight.

“Yeah, I’m supposed to meet my friend, a girl, and I wanted to get her to meet me here but she’s in Ginza with a client, and she’s a prostitute, not that there is anything wrong with that you know, I’m just saying…”

“Sure, yeah, no problem.”

“…but I think I’m going to meet a client of mine at seven-thirty and then meet her later. Maybe around mid night. What about you? What are you doing? You’re meeting someone right?”

I tell her that I’m meeting up with two friends here and then we are going to FACE club in Kabukichou to see another friend’s Professional Wrestling debut.

“FACE club? Yeah I know that. See actually, I do Muay Thai kickboxing and I’ve seen some friends from my gym fight there. It’s really near by.”

I tell her that’s cool and that I kickbox and I have trained people who have fought at FACE before.  She tells me about some of the fighters she knows, none of whom I recognize, and then I mention my gym and some of the people I know and she doesn’t know them either.  Then I ask her if she has ever fought.

“Me? No. I do the training fighting, with all the protective stuff on. What’s that called?”

“Sparring.”

“Yeah, sprawling, I do that.  I just do it for exercise. I mean, I will do whatever comes down the pipe: Pilates, Yoga, Muay Thai Kickboxing, Jogging or whatever.  I just like to stay fit and keep my figure which is, really, not too hard for me because of my implants. So, I just have to worry about my stomach.  It’s way easier.”

I nod knowingly.

Then I bring up what to me seems to be the only possible next question.

“Well, is that safe? What with your implants and all?”

She then cups her hands underneath her breasts and lifts up and together slightly.

“Yeah it’s totally safe.”

“Really? What if you get kicked hard in one? Is that not a problem? I would just assume…”

“No it’s totally fine. The way they are, it’s like a watermelon I guess. If you crack it, nothing comes out. They aren’t like…”

“Water balloons?”

“Exactly! They aren’t like that. It’s all basically foam. So it’s really safe.”

“So, the technology is there these days?”

“Totally there.  Actually I got implants a few years ago, then got a reduction because they were too big and killing my back.”

Just then Kenji and Casey show up and I introduce them.  They each go to the bar to get drinks and Umi excuses herself and goes to the toilet.

I put another Cohiba club between my lips and light it.  The smoke is copious and a Japanese guy in a bright red T-shirt, who had been sitting behind the girl earlier, gives me a dirty look.  I just stare at him blankly for a moment and he goes back to his smart phone.

Umi comes out of the toilet and the boys come back to the table with their drinks and a refresher for me.  Then Umi, looking uncomfortable, extends her little hand to me again.

“OK guys well, I better get going to meet my friends. It was cool to meet you. Hope you have fun at the wrestling.”  I shake her hand lightly. It’s ice-cold and trembling a little.

Kenji looks at her and at me and asks, “What? You’re not going?”

I explain that I just met Umi there at the bar and she doesn’t know LionKing or me for that matter.  Casey then looks at her, and then at me and raises an eyebrow.

“Yeah I really have to get going. I mean, I totally would love to go, really, but I have to go.” She says as she reaches into the bag and grabs her coat.

I tell her it’s all good and the tickets are all reserved anyway.

“Yeah but I think I could get in if I wanted.” And she pulls on her coat and shoulders her bag.

A brief yet potently awkward moment passes between the four of us and I finally say, “Well, take it easy Umi. Have a good night. See you around.”

And she waves, smiles bizarrely and leaves the bar through the rear exit.

I turn and Casey and Kenji are both looking at me and I shrug.

Later at the wrestling event I spill a rum and coke zero all over some important documents in my bag but get home at a decent hour despite it all.

It isn’t all mystery hookers and off the top rope:

Interview with a Dominatrix	Groper Train	7 English loan words that are totally dirty	White woman, Japan sex	Japan’s Nuclear Weapons

MMA is not COMBAT

This is not fighting, this is sports.

Emlianenko Fedor

Although the funniest man on the internet, in my opinion, disagrees with me the fact remains; MMA, boxing and kickboxing are sports, not war fighting systems.

The debate has raged and raged ever since this guy named Sean (no connection to the aforementioned funny man), who lived down the street from me, got his mom to pay for his black belt at Masters Studios of Self Defense but Chris Angel still hilariously smacked the shit out of him over a misplaced Dr. Dre compact disc, in Sean’s own drive way.

Because only suburban, middle class white teenage boys actually give a shit.

As Sean lay curled in a ball just behind the white mini-van, sobbing and holding his stomach, which Chris had just propelled his size 10 Vans into, another bystander, Randy, commented that “Wow. I think Sean should quit that Karate shit.” This resonated with me because although unknown to the prince of obvious, Randy, I also practiced Karate, Shotokan, at a little Dojo run by a former Marine and his wife, not two miles from the strip mall where Sean got his Mc-Black belt.  I had been in a couple of fist fights already; two-or-three punch affairs that appeared to be the sum total of an epileptic seizure, a bushel of bursting clown balloons and a screeching night hawk,  where the worst case scenario was a busted lip or a black eye, and I had done OK;  meaning I hadn’t ended up in the fetal position, sobbing.   But seeing Sean’s ass whipping reflected what I hoped was not an option for me; that my hours and hours spent sweating with Shotokan practice and visions of Van-Damage dancing in my head had been totally fucking wasted.

Van-fucking-Damage.

Flash forward five years and there is me, disgusted, telling a much older man, regrettably, in front of his daughter and son, “These techniques are ridiculous.  Jesus Christ, I’m done with Shorin-Ryu Kenshin Kan.” And I went stomping out the training room  in the gym at the Marine Corps Air ground Combat center in Twenty-Nine Palms California like a complete prima-donna.  The next day I went with Gerald Strebrendt out into town and started learning Brazilian Ju-Jitsu with the now infamous Rafiel Torre at High Desert Ju-Jitsu.

What caused me to turn my back on seven years of Karate, having practiced both in the USA and in Okinawa, was the simple realization based on recent experiences (fights), training I received on entering the Marines, and the explosion of cage fighting, was that most traditional martial arts are simply not effective when it comes to violent combat, and that standing around doing what amounts to dance moves is not going to help you kick anyone’s ass on the street or in a war-zone.

The UFC and CAGE FIGHTING

Before the UFC, muscular bald guys with goatees, shitty tribal tattoos and tight shorts could only get together to punch and kick each other and lay in erotic positions while being part of something that rhymes with Risen Grapes.

Dana White and the UFC changed all that, by giving chemically maladjusted meat heads who were just “sort of okay” at everything a place to try to kill each other.  UFC started in 1993 and since has had 157 events.  The progression within the sport of Mixed Martial arts has been dramatic and other events such as PRIDE FC, STRIKE FORCE, KOTC, BUSHIDO and DREAM have come and gone with each event pushing the envelope of what was possible and expected from this new breed of professional prize-fighter.

In the early days of UFC, many of the contestants were tough men from tough backgrounds that were simply OK with climbing into a metal cage to fist fight some other guy.  People like Ken Shamrock, Tito Ortiz and Tank Abbot to name a few.  These men were fighters first and athletes second.  Some of them managed to transition to being an athlete first but many could not and this ultimately meant that as the sport progressed, these classic bruisers who had learned about grappling and wrestling from necessity were marginalized and left behind.

I think however, that these men were people who could actually fight on the street far more successfully, than meny of the top-level competitors in the UFC today.  In fact, being the kind of person that has the instincts and the circumstances to be involved in violent “real word” altercations is the kind of thing that will keep you out of the upper echelons of this sport these days and that’s not a bad thing.  If MMA hopes to rise to the level of other major professional sports, it has to weed out the bad guys.  Because generally speaking, a man who has no problem cracking open some guys skull in a bar fight, also has no problem breaking any one of the innumerable rules and regulations governing a pro sports organization; you can’t have guys hanging around eye gouging each other because that shit is horrific.

MMA vs Combat

In combat there are no rules.  Shit happens at a million miles an hour and anyone involved is probably scared shit-less.  Real street fights are the same.  I’m not talking about the “fights” you had when you and this guy pushed each other, yelled and screamed at each other, pulled each others Tap-Out T-shirts and then everyone broke you up so you could both go fist each other in the men’s toilet there at the club.

I’m talking about the fights where nothing is said or screamed because party A is trying to surprise party B with a dangerous object to their head/face/dick.  When someone breaks a glass on your eye or smashes a Heineken bottle into your face, you are essentially in a combat situation and you better hope you don’t poop on yourself.  In these situations there is no time for complex techniques and nobody is trying to make you tap out but rather they are trying to make you die-die.  If someone is beating on you with a large wooden chair, they are trying to kill you and no matter how many times you practiced that slick leg lock, that mahogany chair is still crashing into your face.

MMA is sport and it’s an exciting sport at that. However it is just that and nothing else. If you are doing MMA to learn how to kick everyone’s ass to make up for being insecure your entire life, go for it, but you should define “everyone” as those people who will come onto the mat and respect the rules or will just lay there quietly while you touch them gently, quivering with excitement.

For a long time elbow strikes were not allowed in MMA because they were considered un-sportsman like. Standing up and stomping and kicking a downed opponent are currently considered un-fair and certain people are even trying to outlaw low straight kicks to the knee and leg area on the grounds that this kick could really “injure an athlete permanently.”

The fact is, all of these techniques, particularly stomping and kicking a downed opponent are fantastic things to do in a Combat situation.  Wearing a fifty pound combat load and a hard, re-enforced combat boot, a Marine driving the heel of his boot to the head of a downed opponent forcing its compression against a cement or hard packed dirt road is sure to cause massive trauma; considerably more than rolling into an arm bar.

Looking at all the options and data it’s simple enough.  MMA is one way to learn how to fight, but there is nothing saying it’s more effective than any other way.  Although, Affliction T-shirts and tribal tattoos mean that you can listen to intense videos on MTV and feel validated, all it takes is a violent person committed to hurting you and a risk assessment that is outside of your box and that stiff jab and killer-triangle choke quickly come to mean dick.

Gaijinass speaks truth, give me more:

7 Books for Warriors	Corn Soup Confessional	Cute vs Sexy	Kickboxing in Japan	7 reasons not go to the clink in Japan

They’re coming

Even though we couldn’t see them everyone could feel evil galloping down the lane, something so black that death and decay seemed to ooze from the ground

Reality: Where is the white rabbit

City of the Immortal

The immortals in their elvish ways took great pains to make it seem like their city grew from the earth

Reality: Hiking trail in China’s Yellow Mountains

Forgotten Kingdom

Behold the Dwarf Kingdom of Balin

Reality:Khao Luang Caves, Phetchaburi, Thailand

Through the Roof Underground

The Dwarves masters of stone created a hall so big that not even Gandalf’s light could penetrate the darkness

Reality: The Japanese Metropolitan Area Outer Underground Discharge Channel

Danger

You fear to pass through the mines of Moria.. the Dwarves dug too far.. you know what they awoke in the deep? There are fouler things in this world than orcs.. ancient beasts from the abyss, we make for the bridge of Khazad-dûm…….run to the other side of the gorge! your swords are of no use here! Light of Ariel, Flame of Urdhu! You shall not pass! You shall not pass! go back to the abyss from where you came. Fly you fools! fly!

Reality: The Subway, Zion National Park, Utah

Transformation

When at last I smote the Balrog upon the mountain top, I left this world, and passed through fire, water, time, each moment an age of man…… when i awoke i was no longer Gandalf the grey, but Gandalf the Flare Bearer

Reality: A sulfur miner stands inside the crater of the Kawah Ijen volcano looking towards a flow of liquid sulfur which has caught fire and burns with an eerie blue flame.

The Trees

Before our eyes a forest swaying in the wind turned into living moving beings, the herders of trees

Reality: Peter Dombrovskis’ “Myrtle Tree in Rainforest at Mount Anne” Southwest Tasmania 1984

Mount Doom

Smoke rises from the mountain of doom, the hour grows late, and Gandalf the Grey rides to Isengard, to seek my counsel, for that is why you have come, is it not, Mithrandir?

Reality: Ecuador’s Tungurahua volcano on November 30, 2010

What is this?

For cracked.com lately I’ve been doing image article research and I occasionally come across some amazing photos. Earlier I did Science Fiction as told through Old Timey War Photos. This time I’ve found enough so that instead of Sci/Fi this is LOTR.

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