10-24-2013, 11:29 AM
It was that rarest of Doom gatherings: Scapino, DM and me. Both DM and I would have bet millions that Scapino would have been a no show.
It started with the ad on Facebook about the Philosophy of Shaolin at UCLA. The seminar was to be part of the Shaolin Temple Cultural Festival held in Los Angeles from October 11-13. My part in the affair was to shuttle around DM and G2. But Scapino saw the ad and said he would attend. Ha, said I, but I sent him the info about where and when.
The planning for the 'Winging It Tour 2013™" was going to be fun since the venues for the various activities were scattered across Los Angeles separated by car choked ribbons of concrete. And on top of this, I decided this weekend would be even more fun if I was running a fever the entire time. Fortunately, it was the tail end of the cold, so the fever was in it's milder stages, but it did add some nice heavy sweating during a few occasions.
The first leg of the tour involved getting DM and G2 from the airport to Temple City to the Puja Ceremony. This was done during rush hour but I was supplied with car pool lanes and my Fast Track fee avoidance device. I felt I spent an inordinate time talking to poor G2 about carpool lanes, Fast-track fees, and the different thicknesses of rush hour traffic in Los Angeles. The first trip went well and the luck was with us. We found the last spot in the cramped lot at the Shaolin Temple Cultural Center and entered the building minutes before the ceremony started. Yay, pictures. The best ones came post ceremony when I photographed the Abbot palling around with Chan Pui. I also got some nice shots of the Abbot wearing 3D glasses.
I'm thinking the participants in the Puja ceremony were aghast at all the media coverage taking place. Shaolin YanXu did ask people to stay out of the room where the Abbot was going to lead the ceremony, but that didn't happen. I stayed out until I saw I was the only one with reticence but then I bid that adieu and joined my fellow paparazzo filling the temple area with bright flashes of light.
We did a quick jaunt to downtown and back in order to check DM and G2 into their lovely hotel surrounded by a high a fence in what wasn't a very reputable part of downtown.
DM and G2 did the first of their not quite successful interviews with one of the Masters. I had actually photographed this master at the Shaolin Temple. He is not a man who is fond of the camera. I along with dozens of others photographed the poor people taking the combat classes. I'm thinking there were more people taking photographs than actually participating in the workshops.
Next stop was UCLA. Temple City is North East of downtown and UCLA is west of downtown. This meant crossing through downtown during the afternoon rush hour. But the traffic gods were with us and we got there in record time. The hiccup came when we got to UCLA and had to find the actual building which held the symposium. I had seen a map where the room was on the west side of campus. The map we had in hand said it was on east side of campus. The intern parking agents eventually sent us to the proper Health Sciences Building.
The Health Sciences building was a maze with most of the direction signs removed in favor of the plastic that was covering up the ongoing construction. We kidnapped some poor soul and made her lead us to the right room. We should have left bread crumbs to get us back to where we parked the car.
The room we had was pretty crappy. The microphones didn't work. Somebody had used a sharpie on the white boards instead of a dry erase marker. We got to see notes from long ago still on the borads in front of the room. The chairs looked liked something out of the fifties. It didn't seem like it was in keeping with the stature of the rest of the STC Festival. The crowd was small, the larger percentage given over to the warrior monks traveling with the abbot.
There was some discussion to where the Abbot would stay during the lecture, a suitable room where he could wait in comfort, but he just came in and sat in the front row.
At this point there was still no sign of Scapino. I had some texts from him saying he was on his way, but I would believe that when I saw it.
Also my nemesis in the form of a Chinese documentary crew showed up. I had placed my camera in the middle of the back row, a prime spot. They were a bit grumpy that I already had the prime spot, but 'Ha' the spoils go to the people who arrive early, or so I thought.
The abbot spoke to the small group in Chinese without the benefit of a translator which was odd. A man got up after he was done and sort of summarized what he said. During the speech and all the subsequent speeches, the Chinese Camera crew made a tremendous racket moving around the room. They thought nothing of walking across the front of the room blocking the speakers to move their gear for different shots. I think they bought the noisiest tripod in existence.
In other recording news, because I could hear it in my head phones, the whole thing sounded terrible. Although the speakers thought they were miced, they weren't. All of them spoke into a small reading lamp that was attached to the podium. I could hear one photographer very clearly who thought it was cool to take a photo about every ten seconds with his iPhone. Thankfully a lot of the noise that blared to me on the headphones wasn't picked up by the camera.
After the discussion, they opened up the floor for questions. One nice exchange student from China who wore a USC shirt of all things asked if the Shaolin Temple could help make the national soccer team of China better. Fortunately there weren't more questions. After that, the Abbot exited to his motorcade and CHP escort and headed off.
Halfway through, the miracle happened and suddenly there were three Doom brothers in the room not just two. Scapino had fought his traffic nightmare and made it to the show. You'll have to get his reactions on how he thought the show went. But he did show. Kudos to him.
Now, we had been promised a short Shaolin Warrior monk show after the talk. But once the Warrior Monks saw the Abbot depart, they were looking to make their own escape. G2 put an end to that. We had been promised monks and monks is what we are going to get.
They performed a short set in the central courtyard. My favorite part was the whip demo because it was incredibly loud in the confined space of the courtyard. The echoes from the loud cracks just kept bouncing around us. This was probably the smallest crowd for which the Warrior Monks performed on their tour through the US. It was good for me since I was the only one there with a video camera and they set up right in front of me. Nothing makes me happier than good footage.
Afterwards 3/5's of the original Doom and G2 went to the Stinking Rose for dinner. Poor G2 was again bored to tears by reminisces of early Doom Days. She was nice enough to pick up the check after all that punishment.
The best moment came at the valet. In an age old tradition, Scapino had come to the restaurant cashless and needed to borrow money to get his car back from the attendant. A priceless end to a long day.
It started with the ad on Facebook about the Philosophy of Shaolin at UCLA. The seminar was to be part of the Shaolin Temple Cultural Festival held in Los Angeles from October 11-13. My part in the affair was to shuttle around DM and G2. But Scapino saw the ad and said he would attend. Ha, said I, but I sent him the info about where and when.
The planning for the 'Winging It Tour 2013™" was going to be fun since the venues for the various activities were scattered across Los Angeles separated by car choked ribbons of concrete. And on top of this, I decided this weekend would be even more fun if I was running a fever the entire time. Fortunately, it was the tail end of the cold, so the fever was in it's milder stages, but it did add some nice heavy sweating during a few occasions.
The first leg of the tour involved getting DM and G2 from the airport to Temple City to the Puja Ceremony. This was done during rush hour but I was supplied with car pool lanes and my Fast Track fee avoidance device. I felt I spent an inordinate time talking to poor G2 about carpool lanes, Fast-track fees, and the different thicknesses of rush hour traffic in Los Angeles. The first trip went well and the luck was with us. We found the last spot in the cramped lot at the Shaolin Temple Cultural Center and entered the building minutes before the ceremony started. Yay, pictures. The best ones came post ceremony when I photographed the Abbot palling around with Chan Pui. I also got some nice shots of the Abbot wearing 3D glasses.
I'm thinking the participants in the Puja ceremony were aghast at all the media coverage taking place. Shaolin YanXu did ask people to stay out of the room where the Abbot was going to lead the ceremony, but that didn't happen. I stayed out until I saw I was the only one with reticence but then I bid that adieu and joined my fellow paparazzo filling the temple area with bright flashes of light.
We did a quick jaunt to downtown and back in order to check DM and G2 into their lovely hotel surrounded by a high a fence in what wasn't a very reputable part of downtown.
DM and G2 did the first of their not quite successful interviews with one of the Masters. I had actually photographed this master at the Shaolin Temple. He is not a man who is fond of the camera. I along with dozens of others photographed the poor people taking the combat classes. I'm thinking there were more people taking photographs than actually participating in the workshops.
Next stop was UCLA. Temple City is North East of downtown and UCLA is west of downtown. This meant crossing through downtown during the afternoon rush hour. But the traffic gods were with us and we got there in record time. The hiccup came when we got to UCLA and had to find the actual building which held the symposium. I had seen a map where the room was on the west side of campus. The map we had in hand said it was on east side of campus. The intern parking agents eventually sent us to the proper Health Sciences Building.
The Health Sciences building was a maze with most of the direction signs removed in favor of the plastic that was covering up the ongoing construction. We kidnapped some poor soul and made her lead us to the right room. We should have left bread crumbs to get us back to where we parked the car.
The room we had was pretty crappy. The microphones didn't work. Somebody had used a sharpie on the white boards instead of a dry erase marker. We got to see notes from long ago still on the borads in front of the room. The chairs looked liked something out of the fifties. It didn't seem like it was in keeping with the stature of the rest of the STC Festival. The crowd was small, the larger percentage given over to the warrior monks traveling with the abbot.
There was some discussion to where the Abbot would stay during the lecture, a suitable room where he could wait in comfort, but he just came in and sat in the front row.
At this point there was still no sign of Scapino. I had some texts from him saying he was on his way, but I would believe that when I saw it.
Also my nemesis in the form of a Chinese documentary crew showed up. I had placed my camera in the middle of the back row, a prime spot. They were a bit grumpy that I already had the prime spot, but 'Ha' the spoils go to the people who arrive early, or so I thought.
The abbot spoke to the small group in Chinese without the benefit of a translator which was odd. A man got up after he was done and sort of summarized what he said. During the speech and all the subsequent speeches, the Chinese Camera crew made a tremendous racket moving around the room. They thought nothing of walking across the front of the room blocking the speakers to move their gear for different shots. I think they bought the noisiest tripod in existence.
In other recording news, because I could hear it in my head phones, the whole thing sounded terrible. Although the speakers thought they were miced, they weren't. All of them spoke into a small reading lamp that was attached to the podium. I could hear one photographer very clearly who thought it was cool to take a photo about every ten seconds with his iPhone. Thankfully a lot of the noise that blared to me on the headphones wasn't picked up by the camera.
After the discussion, they opened up the floor for questions. One nice exchange student from China who wore a USC shirt of all things asked if the Shaolin Temple could help make the national soccer team of China better. Fortunately there weren't more questions. After that, the Abbot exited to his motorcade and CHP escort and headed off.
Halfway through, the miracle happened and suddenly there were three Doom brothers in the room not just two. Scapino had fought his traffic nightmare and made it to the show. You'll have to get his reactions on how he thought the show went. But he did show. Kudos to him.
Now, we had been promised a short Shaolin Warrior monk show after the talk. But once the Warrior Monks saw the Abbot depart, they were looking to make their own escape. G2 put an end to that. We had been promised monks and monks is what we are going to get.
They performed a short set in the central courtyard. My favorite part was the whip demo because it was incredibly loud in the confined space of the courtyard. The echoes from the loud cracks just kept bouncing around us. This was probably the smallest crowd for which the Warrior Monks performed on their tour through the US. It was good for me since I was the only one there with a video camera and they set up right in front of me. Nothing makes me happier than good footage.
Afterwards 3/5's of the original Doom and G2 went to the Stinking Rose for dinner. Poor G2 was again bored to tears by reminisces of early Doom Days. She was nice enough to pick up the check after all that punishment.
The best moment came at the valet. In an age old tradition, Scapino had come to the restaurant cashless and needed to borrow money to get his car back from the attendant. A priceless end to a long day.
So much for the flickr badge idea. Dammit
