Saturday morning, and no sooner had I stepped out of the subway train at Gangbyeon Station than this man accosted me. He noted that I was a foreigner and thus maybe an easy mark. Equally monolingual, he indicated that he was hungry and wanted me...
All right, I come from a different time. The Southwest Conference ruled supreme in my youth. Kern Tips’ radio broadcasts, the Cotton Bowl on January 1, colorful pennants representing Texas, Rice, SMU, Baylor, Texas Tech, Texas A&M...
A spinal fusion (ouch!) performed by Dr. T. Wiley Hodges at Presbyterian Hospital on June 5, 1970 effectively removed me from the Bryan Adams basketball team. There was just one in those days, limited to boys. Girls never played basketball—right?...
The Tokyo Olympics of 2021 are about to begin, and that is reason enough to hark back some 85 years. I refer to the so-called Nazi Games of 1936, held at Berlin’s new 110,000-seat Olympic Stadium. Swastikas were flying everywhere, as were chants...
Ah, the 1972 University of Texas football season! I was a sophomore, attending every game at Memorial Stadium and in October at the Cotton Bowl; OU spanked us there rather badly, 27-0. Since our quarterback, Alan Lowry, was a converted DB it...
I have been to Hahoe Folk Village near Andong, the Minsok Folk Village in Yongin, the Jeonju Hanok Village and maybe a couple of others in my travels around Korea over the last 13 years. All of them have their charms. But when my friend Teresa...
Classical music is a capacious topic and one about which I have no expertise. On the contrary, I am a real dilettante, and I guess this is my saving grace—I know that I don’t know much. I took a relevant course in college some 4 ½ decades ago, I...
In mid-June, I took a deep breath and plunged into this 1,200-page bio. It was challenging and yet invigorating to learn about Robert Moses, the master builder of New York City (and, indeed, much of New York State) between 1924 and his forced...
I met Randy Matson once. The year was 1995, and the setting was the Texas Sports Hall of Fame in Waco. I had come up from Austin to witness the induction of former SMU football star Jerry LeVias. Matson, a member of the Hall since 1974, was there...
I take sports history seriously. If a guy or a team or a league deserves to be blasted, I do not hesitate to pile on the TNT and hit the detonator button. But when somebody merits recognition and praise, I am willing to give it in abundance...
I have an ongoing, long-distance, light-hearted dispute with my friend Gary Scoggins in Dallas, Texas. The subject is reading. He prefers the modern means of using a Kindle or some other electronic device. Better yet, Gary likes to listen to...
What is it about Lebanon, the Lebanese and their diaspora? This Middle Eastern nation, the home of splendid cedar trees mentioned prominently in the Epic of Gilgamesh and the Bible, from which the ancient Phoenicians set sail, devoid of natural...
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