Brendan I. Koerner's Blog, page 134

A Feast Fit for Khans

An American scholar digs into the sort of debauched Mongolian feast that, alas, we’ve only had in our wildest dreams:

Sheep fat! Stuffed beef intestine! Goat’s head! Petrified curds, harder than jawbreakers! And, of course, buuz. I ate them all, these foods that not so long ago had my fork shaking. Two bottles of vodka appeared, and were gone. In the corner, a newborn calf slept, then stood up; when it started to pee a boy put a jar beneath it as if it were a leaking roof. A little girl danced to

Corporal Gee Eye

Okay, we’ve got a spare second while Microkhan Jr. roams about the Sandman’s domain, so it’s time to dash off today’s installment of NtHWS Extras. Our focus today is on the cartoon art of World War II—not the stuff from the homefront op-ed pages, but rather the quasi-humorous strips meant to bolster troop morale. The most famous of these, of course, is the work of Bill Mauldin, who slogged through Europe with the 45th Infantry Division. Mauldin’s work remains celebrated to this day, and the man

In Single Parenthood, There I Stood

Apologies for the slow start today. As previously mentioned, Microkhan is solely in charge of Microkhan Jr. this week, due to the missus being off in Los Angeles hawking her fine, fine lingerie. Factor in the screenplay and our primary paying gig, and you’ve got a recipe for utter chaos and exhaustion.

As a small token of our gratitude for your patience, please accept the baffling Indonesian video above. Enjoy, and we’ll circle back to you in the p.m.

Citizen Journalism in Sri Lanka

The Sri Lankan government is sadly adept at squelching journalism, which makes the crowdsourced Groundviews a truly precious gem. Proudly calling itself “Sri Lanka’s first and only citizens journalism website,” Groundviews provides a rare English-language peek at the mood on Colombo’s streets. The site has been in peak form as the nation’s civil war has drawn to its bloody close, providing a series of posts examining Sri Lanka’s post-Tigers future. Of particular note is this sobering take on Pre

When Monkeys Herald Death

We’re gone for the day’s remainder, crashing on a Wired deadline. So we’ll leave you with the clip above from Werner Herzog’s classic Aguirre, The Wrath of God, which recently re-blew our collective mind. The final shot, in which the camera circles around the megalomaniacal conquistador’s monkey-infested raft? Beyond brilliant.

Read about the real Lope de Aguirre here. Turns out he was a bit more successful than Herzog gave him credit for.

An Obscure Flashpoint

Today’s NtHWS Extras installment will have some modern flavor, as we look at one of the planet’s most obscure—and potentially most lethal—territorial disputes: The Sino-Indian tussle over Arunachal Pradesh, where a fair chunk of Now the Hell Will Start is set.

The enormous Arunachal is arguably India’s most remote province, populated largely by tribal groups with historical roots in Tibet and Western China. During the Sino-Indian War of 1962, China occupied the province before unilaterally pullin

The Bernie Madoff of Farming

Wall Street certainly didn’t have a monopoly on moral decay during the run-up to Depression v2.0. There was also some jiggery-pokery going down in the Heartland, albeit of the modest seven-figure variety:

A man convicted in what prosecutors said was North Dakota’s largest farm fraud case has lost another appeal of the government’s attempt to collect money from him…

[Duane:] Huber, who farmed and worked as an insurance agent in Wimbledon, in southeastern North Dakota, was accused of operating sham f

“Film Them…Film Them All!”

“Harrowing” is probably the only word to describe the above trailer for Burma VJ, a new Danish film that consists largely of illicitly shot video of the 2007 protests. As we know from first-hand experience, Burma is one of the toughest reporting gigs around, which makes the proliferation of disruptive media all the more important to the nation’s struggle for political sanity. Unfortunately, as this film appears to so depressingly illustrate, anonymity remains a challenge no matter how well you t

Money, Meet Mouth

A lighthearted pox on Harry Truman for coining the phrase “The buck stops here.” Our problem isn’t the sentiment itself, but rather the way it’s been glibly abused over the years. Countless beseiged executives have uttered those four words, only to go right on scapegoating when their situations inevitably worsen. Ever the skeptic, Microkhan reaction upon the hearing the phrase nowadays is to slap his mighty forehead and accept that ass-covering is sure to follow.

So when an exec genuinely places

“This is for the Molokai Cops…”

Screenplayin’ and parentin’ for the day’s remainder, so we’re gonna leave you with a follow-up to last week’s Bad Movie Friday winner, the seminal Hard Ticket to Hawaii. This particular scene does not feature unnecessary use of a rocket launcher, but it does teach us all a valuable lesson: When a stranger asks you to Frisbee, never lay down your submachine gun. (SFW, assuming your boss agrees with the FCC re: the word ass.)