The Cao Dai Tay Ninh Temple of Dallas

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A few years ago, I was browsing Google Maps, as one does, and I happened across the Cao Dai Tay Ninh Temple of Dallas. That was intriguing. I wanted to take a look.

Usually when I visit Dallas, I spend time in the northeast part of the city, at about 2 o’clock from downtown. The temple is in the southwest at about 8 o’clock from downtown, so I knew that it might be awhile before I made it down that way.

February 17 turned out to be the day we visited the Cao Dai Tay Ninh Temple of Dallas. This is the entrance. I think.
Cao Dai Tay Ninh Temple of DallasThe temple belongs to an overseas branch of the Caodai religion of Vietnam.

“Caodaism is a relatively new, syncretistic, monotheistic religion with strongly political character, established in 1926 in Southern Vietnam…” writes Md. Shaikh Farid. “It draws upon ethical precepts from Confucianism and Buddhism, occult practices from Taoism, theories of karma and rebirth from Buddhism and hierarchical organization from Roman Catholicism…

“This synthesis of elements adapted from other religions into a functioning religious movement manifests itself in such common Caodai practices as priestly celibacy, vegetarianism, seance inquiry and spirit communication, reverence for ancestors and prayers for the dead, fervent proselytism, and sessions of meditative self-cultivation.”

The temple is in a part of the city of that’s mostly devoted to light industrial buildings, mobile homes and undeveloped properties. Presumably, the site was affordable for local Caodai devotees.

I’d never heard of that religion until I made an excursion from Saigon in 1994 to the main Caodaist temple, the Holy See of the religion, in Tay Ninh, Vietnam. Here’s a picture I took of that building.

Cao Dai Tay Ninh Temple VietnamA more detailed description of the various influences that went into the building is here. An amalgam of Chinese and Indian and other elements, it seems.

The temple in Dallas, from roughly the same angle.
Cao Dai Tay Ninh Temple of DallasThe similarities between the Holy See and the Dallas temple were apparent at once, though I’m pretty sure that the Holy See is larger, and some details are different.

The Dallas temple is still a work in progress. This was especially noticeable when we went inside — a side door was open — and noticed construction materials and tools here and there.
Cao Dai Tay Ninh Temple of DallasThough smaller, the Dallas interior also had strong similarities to the one in Tay Ninh.
Cao Dai Tay Ninh Temple VietnamAs I understand it, services are at midnight, 6 a.m., noon and 6 p.m. We visited around 3 p.m., so no Caodai worshipers were around in Dallas. The tour in Vietnam was timed to see the noon service, so we saw the worshipers in their various colorful robes, each color with a distinct meaning best known within the religion, though ordinary worshipers are in white.

It’s good to travel to exotic places and see exotic things. Like you can in Dallas.

Texas Winter ’19

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My recent trip to wintertime Texas took me to Dallas and Fort Worth, San Antonio, and a few other burgs. February is winter in Texas, but it’s a pale moon of a winter compared with where I live. During the trip, temps varied but didn’t drop below freezing, and we experienced rain but no ice or snow.

I spent the weekdays working, but I also visited my brothers, one nephew and his family, one nephew by himself and a friend I’ve known for 45 years now.

I made it to a few new places and a few familiar old places. No matter how often you go somewhere, there are always new places, and no matter how familiar an old place is, there are always new aspects.

One new place was the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth, which I’ve had a mind to see since we went to Wrightwood 659 in December. Tadao Ando designed both Wrightwood and the Modern, which is easy to visit from Dallas, as Jay and I did: just pop on over on I-30.

While gadding around in greater DFW, we also saw the Cao Dai Tay Ninh Temple and the Cambodian Buddhist Temple of Dallas, whose neighbors in the southwest of the city are the likes of Mission Foods, Standard Meat, Cartamundi USA and Old Dominion Freight Line.

In San Antonio, we had the benefit of a free evening admission to the McNay Art Museum — an example of a familiar place offering some new things to see. Later, while on the road between San Antonio and Dallas, we stopped by the Hays County Courthouse in San Marcos and the San Marcos City Cemetery, whose burials go back to the 1870s.

Had some good meals along the way too. In San Antonio, a dinner at one of the Paesanos locations, a local Italian restaurant with roots in the 1968 world’s fair. Good pork shank and gnocchi. In Waco, a lunch at a joint that goes even further back: the curiously named Health Camp, in business, as the exterior says, since 1949. Good burger and shake.

In Dallas, on the day I flew in, I enjoyed sausage and homemade sauerkraut and Texas beer and other good things at my nephew Sam’s house, on the occasion of his 36th birthday. Naturally there was birthday cake too.

Reminded me of the morning, late in my college career, when Jay called me to tell me that Sam had been born. Been an uncle ever since.

Valentain Day Special

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Time for a late winter break. Back to posting around February 24, much closer to the winter-springish domain of March-April, which is always worth looking forward to.

Saw this today on a package of sushi.
I won’t mock the grocery store for its spelling. I wasn’t a particularly good speller in my younger days. I have vague memories of teachers getting on my case about it. Later I got better, but never flawless, down to the present. Even now there are words I can never quite remember.

I have a hunch that my spelling deficiencies helped me become a more competent writer. I’d want to write a certain word, but couldn’t remember how it was spelled. So I’d think of another way to say what I wanted to say. If that isn’t an important writing skill, I’ll be a monkey’s uncle.

Does anyone say that anymore? I queried Ann about the phrase. She’d never heard it. Come to think of it, I can’t remember the last time I heard anyone use it. I think my 8th grade math teacher used to say it occasionally, but that was 45 years ago.

This is in the public domain and I want to use it.

How often do we hear about James M. Cox anymore? Seldom to never. All it takes is 99 years. If anything, he’s noted as the running mate of FDR, even though Cox was top man on the ticket.

Let’s hear it for the public domain. Expanding again as it should.

Here’s a remarkable bit of animation, by a young Iranian named Majid Adin.

I’ll never hear “Rocket Man” quite the same again. But I also associate it with a fellow I knew in high school who attached a small rocket launcher on top of his station wagon and rigged it so he could shoot off small rockets while the car was moving.

The launcher was horizontal, so the rockets went backward from his car. I didn’t just hear about that, either. I saw him do it once on a highway, from another car not far away.

Glad to see that Merle Hazard is still recording. Still amusing, too.

Channeling Tom Lehrer some, I’d say, though Lehrer didn’t do much country and western, unless you count “The Wild West is Where I Want to Be.” I want to hear Hazard’s song about Weimar Republic hyperinflation too.

I’m sorry I missed this Joan Jett video when it was new 30 years ago. But definitely better late than never.

It’s a cover, of course, but who cares. I only learned about a year ago that AC/DC borrowed the title from Beany and Cecil, a cartoon from before my time and which never showed up in reruns that I knew of.

Finally, a comic in which a character makes up something on the spot: about bread mines in this case. I like that.

Three Presidential Postcards

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Got a press release last night and I glanced at the first line: Naava’s co-founder and CEO Aki Soudunsaari becomes Strategy Director, and long-time KONE employee Arttu Salmenhaara becomes the new Naava CEO.

Scanned it: aa aa aa aa. From Finland, I thought.

Yep. Seems that Helsinki-based Naava makes green walls. The release boasts (as releases tend to): Naava is no ordinary green or plant wall – it is a piece of furniture that promotes wellbeing, a biological air purifier, humidifier and, when needed, a space divider all in one.

Speaking of plant life, the sun came out today but temps remained below freezing. So we enjoyed the minor spectacle of icy plants in the sunshine.

Ephemeral for sure. Above freezing is predicted for tomorrow.

The following are a few more postcards from my minuscule U.S. presidential collection, all postwar chief executives.

Actually, that isn’t the presidential Eisenhower to the left, it’s General of the Army Eisenhower. Thomas E. Stephens painted the portrait. The image of Kennedy on the right I hadn’t seen until I bought the card at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum.

The card doesn’t tell me, but a little Googling reveals that the JFK picture was taken by Cecil Stoughton, who was the president’s official photographer, aboard the yacht Honey Fitz off Hyannis Port, August 31, 1963.

Finally, Jimmy Carter. Mostly Rosalynn, but Jimmy’s back there. Actually President-elect Carter, since the image is dated January 19, 1977, the day before he took office. No photographer attributed and I haven’t been able to track it down.

The card reflects the brief period when the Carters wanted to emphasize that they were jus’ regular folks. As you might remember, Jimmy and Rosalynn walked from the Capitol to the White House in the post-inaugural parade the next day, an unprecedented act. Must have given the Secret Service fits, but nothing bad came of it.

William Henry Harrison and the King of Toilet-Paper Art

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Last night the atmosphere couldn’t make up its mind between snow and rain. So the compromise was ice.

Lovely on the plants. Otherwise, a pain in the ass. Literally, if you fall down.

In honor of Abraham Lincoln’s 210th birthday, I assembled my collection of U.S. presidential postcards in one place. It didn’t take long. I only have about two dozen. They come in two classes: those depicting U.S. presidents and those depicting places associated with them.

It’s a limited selection because I haven’t been trying very hard to accumulate them over the years. I have the following presidents on postcards: Jefferson, Jackson, William Henry Harrison, Andrew Johnson, Benjamin Harrison, Hoover, Eisenhower, Kennedy, Carter, Reagan and Clinton. But not Lincoln.

I also have one depicting George Mifflin Dallas, 11th Vice President of the United States, who was Polk’s VP. Don’t hear much about him.

Oddly enough, I have more of William Henry Harrison than any other president: three cards dedicated to that briefest of chief executives. Here are two side-by-side cards of Harrison in his days of military glory, around the time of the Battle of Tippecanoe and the Battle of the Thames.
On the left is an 1814 painting by Rembrandt Peale that hangs in Grouseland in Indiana. On the right is an 1813 painting by John Wesley Jarvis, also at Grouseland. I got both cards when we were there for a low price that made me think the museum was getting rid of its stock of postcards, never to replace them.

At some other time I acquired the card on the right, an older Harrison — around the time of his election? Probably, since the flag in the background has 26 stars, which lasted from 1837 to 1845, between the admissions of Michigan and Florida.

An artist named Morris Katz (1932-2010) painted the image of Harrison in 1967. One of a series of presidential portraits that year for Katz, apparently. I have another one of his of Benjamin Harrison, from the same year .

From what I’ve read about Katz, he probably whipped out all of the presidential portraits in a single afternoon. A 1978 article in New York magazine called him “the king of toilet-paper art” and said that he called himself “the world’s fastest painter, creator of instant art.”

“Toilet-paper art”? I wondered exactly what that involved. The article says: “Using only a palette knife and a roll of toilet paper to apply paint, he whips off a landscape oil in under ten minutes…”

This video illustrates his technique. Essentially, Katz used bunched up toilet paper as a kind of sponge to apply the paint. He’s no Rembrandt Peale, but I’ll take him over mutant-eyed Margaret Keane children any day. One of the dentists I visited as a child had her paintings on the wall, or at least paintings in that style, and damned if they weren’t unnerving.

Century of Progress, Missent to Kansas City

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Had my slip and fall over the weekend. That happens about once per winter. Light snow was falling on Sunday, just enough to cover up a patch of ice waiting for me on a sidewalk. You know how it is. By the time you realize you’re falling, you’re on the ground.

Ann was next to me and helped me to my feet again. I knew I had children for a reason. This time, no bone damage or even bruises or any pain. Sometimes you get lucky.

The risk isn’t over. Until 9 a.m. Tuesday, the NWS says: “Total snow accumulations of 1 to 4 inches expected with highest amounts in the north. Ice accumulations of up to one quarter of an inch possible across portions of Lee, DeKalb, Kane, and DuPage Counties…

“Strong westerly winds are expected to develop Tuesday afternoon and continue Tuesday night. These strong winds may result in blowing snow and may also increase the threat of power outages…”

Oh, boy. Days like this, time to dwell on the past. Someone else’s past. At some point during the last few years, I acquired this postcard for a modest sum.
It’s a genuine penny postcard, depicting the General Motors Building at the 1933 world’s fair in Chicago. The Century of Progress Exposition, to use its formal name.

A product of the Reuben H. Donnelley Co., whom I assume was tasked to make cards for the fair. Not, as it turns out, the same entity as R.R. Donnelley Publishing, but a separate company founded by Richard Robert Donnelley’s son, Reuben H. Donnelley. Guess he didn’t want to work for the old man.

The card was mailed from the fair, postmarked 9 p.m. July 17, 1933, a Monday, and sent to a Mrs. A.G. Drew of St. Joseph, Mo. Interestingly, there’s another postmark that says “Missent to Kansas City, July 18, 1933.” Hope the delay wasn’t too long for Mrs. Drew.

When I lived in Osaka, one day I got a beaten up envelope in the mail that had been about three weeks in transit from the United States, or two weeks longer than usual. Stamped on the bottom (in English) was “Missent to Manila.”

Ann at 16

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After the deep freeze at the end of January, we had some warmer days — above freezing, quite a relief — and more recently just ordinary winter cold. The sort of persistent chill that makes February both the shortest and the longest month.

On Saturday, Ann had friends over for her 16th birthday.

She requested a birthday pie. Chocolate and peanut butter, made by a local grocery store that does fine pies.

Which reminds me of the question — something I’ve wondered about occasionally — why cake? Why not birthday pie? I suppose since cakes don’t need refrigeration, they trumped pies in pre-refrigeration days.

But why cakes at all? Know who I suspect of inventing the custom? Victorians, of course.

I’m not sure how reliable this source is, but it implies that while birthday cake had antecedents in German lands before the 19th century, the Victorian middle class made it the popular custom we know today. Like the Christmas tree.

In fact, birthday celebrations themselves, especially children’s birthdays, became popular in their modern form during the mid-19th century. Can’t say I’m surprised.

Time Flies, Things Change

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Something I found today in the usual way, by not looking for it. Best to look at it full screen. After a moment the details sharpen up and wow.

In only one viewing I didn’t notice any obvious mistakes, though the thing is quick and a creation of this detail must have some. And certainly you can quibble about the difference between an “advanced culture” and an “embryonic civilization” and an “advanced civilization.” What’s history for if not to quibble over?

None of that matters. It’s fascinating to watch. It’s as if the wonderful Historical Atlas of the World came to life and with much more detail (and a soundtrack).

Just from one go-around, a few takeaways. As far as the ancient civilizations of the Near East are concerned, for example, the Romans are just a bunch of Johnny-come-latelies. As anyone from Europe would be.

Then there’s the Mongols. I know about their meteoric rise, but to see the Mongol presence on the map expand like a balloon attached to a helium tank makes it all the more impressive. No wonder it’s Chinggis Khaan International Airport.

Also, note the world population count — an educated guess in all pre-modern times — in the 14th century. Down it goes with the arrival of the Black Death.

This map must represent a lot of work. Whoever Ollie Bye is, I applaud his efforts.

Geezer Mail

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Got a paper catalog in the mail today, one that comes periodically despite the fact that I’ve never ordered anything from it, not once in however many years I’ve been on the mailing list. The merchant must be waiting patiently, hopefully, like a dog under the dinner table waiting for some food to fall its way.

It offers DVDs. I look at it and always see a few movies I’ve never heard of and probably won’t ever see. Not that I dismiss old movies, or black-and-white movies, or subtitled movies out of hand, though I hear that some people do. Rather, there isn’t enough time to see everything, or even everything worth seeing.

Besides, my attitude toward DVDs is rent, not buy.

Speaking of the passage of time, when I opened the catalog this card fell out.

Catalogs are increasingly geezer mail, and if you need any evidence of that, look no further.

Life Jackets on the Titanic

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Got an unexpected press release today from a place I visited a while ago, the Titanic Museum Attraction.

Branson, Mo. Feb 5. 2019 – For the first and only time, the largest assemblage of remaining RMS Titanic life jackets will be on exclusive display March through June 15 at the Titanic Museum Attraction in Branson, Missouri. A new dimension in “Living Titanic Exhibits” will showcase seven of only 12 known Titanic life jackets beginning March 1 in Branson.

One detail: Branson ought to stand alone in datelines. Just my opinion. AP, the arbiter of such style points, disagrees. The list of cities that take no state in datelines is fairly short, according to the AP.

Besides Branson, I’d definitely add Orlando to that list, along with Austin, Birmingham, Buffalo, El Paso, Fort Lauderdale, Nashville, and some others.

“This is a stunning, world exclusive exhibit that we’re extremely proud to bring to Branson and to millions of our Titanic followers,” said Mary Kellogg, president, COO and co-owner of Titanic Museum Attractions. “There are only 12 KNOWN Titanic life jackets left in the world. For the first time, seven of these priceless artifacts will be at Branson’s Titanic Museum Attraction.”

All-caps KNOWN in the original. True, it is a fact that I didn’t know until now, but the emphasis is too much.

Wonder where the other five are. Private collections, including at least one held by an eccentric Japanese billionaire? The Greenwich Maritime Museum? The Maritime History Archive in St. John’s, Newfoundland? Someplace even more obscure?

The release also offered some quotable facts about the sad state of emergency preparedness on that doomed steamer, specifically about its life jackets.

There were enough life jackets to protect the 2,208 passenger/crew on board Titanic… but not enough lifeboats to save them all.

Life jackets were made of hard cork and canvas, proving dangerous for many forced to jump into the water.

So not only did a lack of lifeboats fail the passengers and crew, so did relatively primitive materials science. Guess cork was the best available material in 1912. It floats, after all.

I wish the Titanic Museum Attraction well with its life jacket exhibit, though I probably won’t make it to Branson to see them. But I might go if the museum promised an exhibit of surviving deck chairs from the Titanic. You know, those that were famously re-arranged.