Comments on: Chiburger to go

By: Aceface

Aceface — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 15:18:42 +0000

Overthinker:

”Japanese curry is not a concept any Indian would recognise, for example”

You’d think so,right?
http://www.nakamuraya.co.jp/curry_room/room_01.html

This guy is father of modern Japanese curry.
It even has a sales copy”中村屋のカレーは恋と革命の味！”・

By: Aceface

Aceface — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 15:03:23 +0000

Did I just read the words,”Mcdonalds”,”William Burroughs” and “Feng Shui” all in one post?
What were you smoking when you were working on this,Bill?

I think “Paul” gave us a link to some whacky discussion forum on how difficult it is for a dorky gaijin to order a junk food that’s not even on menu in Mcdonalds few weeks ago.
There were some insightful cultural explanation why the Japanese employee refuses of which I forgot.

By: bender

bender — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 07:21:26 +0000

Bill:

I think McDonald’s is trying to evolve into something like Starbucks. They’re making premium coffee now. And they’re probably trying to change their cheap red-and-yellow diner look into a “hip” design…and Japanese-like designs are considered “hip”, I guess. So they adorn the walls with tsuru and koi. If it’s accepted in SoCal, it’ll spread nation-wide. Maybe.

By: ampontan

ampontan — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 03:16:30 +0000

Ponta: Paul contributes his viewpoint to the Comments occasionally. One time he wondered if living in Japan too long made me a “self-loathing racist”.

Aceface followed his links and discovered that he wrote a blog called “Nippon N*gger”.

I ain’t losing any sleep over it.

Bender: That designer, or whoever was advising her on symbols, wasn’t much better.

McDonald’s is to nutritious food as that AP article is to informed journalism.

By: ponta

ponta — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 00:16:58 +0000

The premise would appear to be that anyone who thinks Asian concepts should be used as they are actually used in Asia is being needlessly dogmatic.

Then why does he need to get out of Asia more often?
And why does Paul want to describe him as a dork?
I had to look it up in the dictionary,
dork noun [C] SLANGa stupid awkward person.
Did Paul just want to call names?
Is that non-Asian way?

By: Bender

Bender — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 00:02:53 +0000

Wasn’t Bill just trying to say that some journalists and academics who write about Asian culture are not qualified? They’re supposed to enlighten us, not misinform us with junk. Not so much concern over innocent consumers appreciating the aesthetics of Zen or whatever without really understanding the deep philosophy behind them.

By: slim

slim — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 22:08:18 +0000

but how far are we to allowing the dumbing-down and general appropriation of ideas?

That ship has sailed in all too many cases, certainly with word “Zen”.

By: Overthinker

Overthinker — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 16:09:38 +0000

The premise would appear to be that anyone who thinks Asian concepts should be used as they are actually used in Asia is being needlessly dogmatic. There is a point to this (Japanese curry is not a concept any Indian would recognise, for example), but how far are we to allowing the dumbing-down and general appropriation of ideas? When Californians sit around pretending to be Zen because they have a little stone garden outside, then what do they imagine real Zen is like?

By: ponta

ponta — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 12:49:49 +0000

(1)“I don’t use the term that way and I don’t disagree with your takedown of this sloppily done AP story, but sometimes it pays to be a bit less literal when dealing with lighter fare in the realm of pop culture.”

In other words, (2)Ampontan is a dork who needs to get out of Asia more often.

How does (2) follow form (1)?
I am very interested in other premises you are assuming to get (2).

By: Paul

Paul — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 12:37:31 +0000

“I don’t use the term that way and I don’t disagree with your takedown of this sloppily done AP story, but sometimes it pays to be a bit less literal when dealing with lighter fare in the realm of pop culture.”

In other words, Ampontan is a dork who needs to get out of Asia more often.