Sex, Chocolate, and Buddhism

Dhr. Seven and Crystal Quintero, Wisdom Quarterly; S.F. Asian Art Museum (asianart.org)

Gorgeous Idea

Rare Buddhist masterpieces on display

Imagine talks that are informal, impromptu, in-gallery conversations. Imagine that they are facilitated by scholars, artists, filmmakers, and writers. Imagine that the facilitators explore ideas arising from the artwork on view in the exhibition "Gorgeous." And when done imaging, visit the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco to see them brought to life. Each facilitator presents an idea that piques the curiosity of the host and the audience then engages in a session to investigate it through two or three artworks:

• Gorgeous Idea: The Aura of an Ore with Jeff Durham

  August 7, 2014, 7:00-8:00 pm (free with museum admission, $5 after 5:00 pm. Meet near the information desk. Evenings, Talks, and Lectures. Buddhist expert Jeff Durham hosted "Enter the Mandala: Cosmic Mind Maps" at the Norton Simon.
  
• Sex, Chocolate, and Kimonos with Tina Takemoto

  August 14, 7:00-8:00 pm (free with museum admission, $5 after 5:00 pm). Meet near the information desk:

Caveat emptor: you get what you pay for.

How do artists use sex, food, physicality, and clothing to seduce and deceive viewers? Tina Takemoto explores how sexuality and race are deployed in artworks presented in Gorgeous that engage with cross-dressing, masquerade, embodiment, and ethnic drag.

Tina Takemoto is an artist and associate professor of visual studies at California College of the Arts in San Francisco.
 
Takemoto's research explores the hidden dimensions of same-sex intimacy and queer sexuality for Japanese Americans incarcerated during WW II. She has...received grants funded by Art Matters, James Irvine Foundation, and San Francisco Arts Commission. Her film Looking for Jiro received Best Experimental Film Jury Award at the Austin Gay and Lesbian Int'l Film Festival. Her articles appear in Afterimage, Art Journal, GLQ, Performance Research, Radical Teacher, Theatre Survey, Women and Performance, and the anthology Thinking Through the Skin. Takemoto is board president of the Queer Cultural Center and co-founder of Queer Conversations on Culture and the Arts. On occasion, she makes guerrilla appearances as Michael Jackson and Bjork-Geisha.

• The Skin/Skein I’m In with Việt Lê

  September 4, 7:00-8:00 pm (free with museum admission, $5 after 5:00 pm). Meet near the information desk.
• Behind Closed Doors with Michael Stabile

  September 11, 7:00-8:00 pm (free with museum admission, $5 after 5:00 pm). Meet near the information desk. Details

Sex, Chocolate, and Buddhism
Wisdom Quarterly and Ven. K. Sri Dhammananda (Question Time)

Don't we have a parlor to get to? - Oh, S, we're gonna to be late! - I think they'll understand.

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"Chocolate" is a fruit seed crushed with sugar.

We have a gorgeous idea, too. Crystal, what should our idea be? We can tell Jeff, and maybe he'll do it.

 

We can take a cue from Prof. Takemoto and concentrate on sex and chocolate! Did you know that chocolate is a fruit? 

What are you talking about? Chocolat is a fat. 

 

Yes, but Theobroma cacao -- "cocoa, the food of the devas" is the bitter crushed pit of a tropical fruit mixed with sugar or some sweetener, like raw agave, to take the edge off.

Chocolate Buddha (Patosoftineto/flickr)

That's rad; we should make raw chocolate, mold it into little Buddha bars, and hand them out at our talk -- our parlor room discussion -- about sex.

They would never go for it. San Francisco is way too uptight.

Maybe, but they let Jeff do Cosmic Mandalas in the main gallery, converting museum space into an actual, working sacred mandala.

True, that's true. But sex is a touchy subject for Americans. We're Judeo-Christian Puritans whether we like it or not, and most of us don't even realize how uptight we are.

"Touchy" subject is right. Maybe we should start with hugs -- chocolates and a snuggle party!

This is a Parlor.

Whatever, did you know that all sexual misconduct is sexual conduct BUT not all sexual conduct is sexual misconduct?

The real life mandala at the SF Asian Art Museum (Dr. Jeff Durham/asianart.org)

.

A woman discover the sensual scent of flowers

What, well, obviously! "All whales are fish, but not all fish are whales."

Fish are whales?

Whatever, things that live and swim in water all day.

What is sexual misconduct?

Who cares, our talk will be about sexual conduct.

Cool.

But Amber's not going to give the go ahead on this presentation.

Hmmm...I've got it! We'll run it by Seth instead.

Yes!

Worse comes to worse, we'll convince Ashley.

No, worse comes to worse they'll say we're parlor talkers. That chocolate had better be good, good like fudge.

We can quote Ven. Dr. K. Sri Dhammananda, the renowned Sri Lankan Theravada scholar-monk from Malaysia who says in Question Time:

Is sex bad?

As human beings, we have bodies that crave for all kinds of pleasures. Not only sex, we crave for food, pleasurable fragrances, sounds, sights, tastes, and tangibles.

If we deny ourselves these as being "sinful" then we repress natural desires. Instead of repressing these natural desires, we must seek to understand how and why they arise and to realize that it is not in our best intere3sts to pander to physical desires.

The victim of maya (illusion) sees the body as real and craves to satisfy a longing for sense desires (kama), which covers all kinds of sensual pleasure.

As the person, the being, matures spiritually, illusion is replaced with knowledge and wisdom (vidya and prajna). With spiritual matureity, the body is seen as an illusion and the person naturally grows out of craving. Here we see the spritually advanced being renounces sex (and other five sense strand pursuits) just as a child stops playing with toys as s/he grows up.

Quagmire is a pandaka (Family Guy)

There is nothing intrinsically wrong with sex. What is wrong is attachment and slavery to it, in believing that indulgence in sex can bring ultimate happiness.

This is the problem with the exploitation of sex by the mass entertainment industry today -- perpetuating the myth that sex can bring lasting happiness.

The third of the Five Precepts recited in daily Buddhist practice is, "I undertake the training rule to refrain from sexual misconduct." 

First, let's not that there is no compulsion, no fear of punishment for the infringement of any "divine law" here, but rather -- when we recognize the danger of attachment to sex, we freely take the steps (training rule) to grow out of it, that is, "I undertake."

(From Question Time with Venerable Dr. K. Sri Dhammananda, 2012, pp. 40-41, Buddhist Maha Vihara, Malaysia, Sasana Abhiwurdhi Wardhana Society).

Cooking with Native American Foods (recipes)

Xochitl, Ashley Wells, Dev, (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly, Tim Martinez, UrbanHomestead.org

Cooking with Native Foods at Path to Freedom Urban Homestead Annex, Pasadena

 

Precious and abundant acorn

Tim Martinez, Outreach Coordinator for the Arroyo Seco Foundation, led a workshop on Cooking With Native Foods.

 

The ancient Native diet centered on the Three Sisters -- squash, tepary, and a staple grain.

Tim Martinez preps his table (WQ)

Native peoples were largely vegetarian [a custom they perhaps learned from the earliest Chinese and Afghan Buddhist missionaries]. In any case, according to Martinez, all Native children were raised vegetarian up to the age of 10 to keep them hearty, healthy, and in the habit of eating their vegetables and firmly establishing lifelong good habits.

Anais looks on: The Aztec impact (WQ)

Other plants from the Americas have become staples worldwide -- chocolate (xocolatl, the food of the devas, Theobroma cacao), potatoes, tomatoes, peanuts, herbs, wild rice, avocados, chia, quinoa, cactus pad, and prickly pear. Some have yet to become famous. The acorn would have if only it had been easier to grow and process, but it comes from oak trees and contains tannins that must be soaked and rinsed off repeatedly.

Feasting on succotash, nopal/toyon berry stir fry, acorn bread, and chocolate (WQ)

 

Aztec feast (Florentine Codex)

What did we learn? It turns out much of the "Native" diet was preserved in Mexico. And with the popularity of Mexican food in California, the entire country enjoys "Native cuisine" without realizing the venerable history of our favorite foods: salsa, tacos, savory beans, stevia/agave sweetened desserts, and that dream grass at the center of our super genetically modifiable syrup and flakes.

Making tortillas by hand 1836 (Karl Nebel)

Berries, veggies, roots, tender greens (like miner's lettuce and lamb's quarter), nuts and seeds, herbs -- the Natives had it all. What they also had, which we seem to have lost in America, was a reverent way of eating inherited from their Aztec forbears. That dietary advice, according to Martinez, ran:
 

Aztec warrior at Mayan revival celebration Kukulkan pyramid, Dec. 21, 2012 (ABC.net.au)

Cosmic time on the Aztec calendar

Listen! Above all, be prudent in food, as in drink, for many things pertain to it. Do not eat excessively of required sustenance. When you do something and perspire, or when you work, it is necessary to break your fast. Furthermore, show courtesy and prudence in this way: When about to eat, be neither hasty nor impetuous. Do not take food in excess. Do not break up your tortillas. Do not put a large amount in your mouth or swallow food unchewed. Do not gulp like a dog when you eat... Eat slowly, calmly, quietly. This is traditional Aztec advice. And with that we reverently savored our succotash. 

 

RECIPES
Wisdom Quarterly Test Kitchen

Savory stir fry of fresh veggies (WQ)

Cactus/California Holly (Toyon) STIR FRY: Scrape prickles from two small cactus pads with sharp knife (or purchase cleaned and diced). Wash. Bring to a boil in two cups of water; rinse to remove mucilage, which is healthy to drink when cool. Mince purple onion, tomato, and any green leafy vegetable. Sauté in light oil. Add toyon berries and a dash of sea salt or savory tamari. Serve over multi-colored quinoa (a pre-corn pseudocereal) and/or amaranth (a sacred grain of Asia and the Americas), both of which look like millet and are prepared like rice).

WARRIOR'S BREAKFAST: Boil 1 cup acorn meal until mushy. (Available from health food stores, mail order, or easily made using aluminum-free Bob's Red Mill baking soda in rinse to quickly remove tannins using a blender). Add half cup cooked amaranth. Toss in rolled quinoa flakes or rolled oats to reduce mushiness. Sprinkle in 2 tbsps. of chia seeds. Top with half cup of dried elderberries, cranberries, or fresh blueberries, raspberries, and blackberries. Drizzle with raw agave nectar to taste and a sprinkle of Aztec superfood spirulina. Best eaten with wooden utensils. Feeds multiple warriors.

TONGVA-MEXICA GUACAMOLE: To make an easy ahuacate salsa (Aztec aphrodisiac), take one or more ripe avocados, cut, remove seed, mash in bowl. Add half cup minced cilantro (coriander leaves), one medium jalapeno (mild) or serrano (hot) chile to taste, diced tomato, cucumber, and celery. Sprinkle with sea salt. Douse in fresh cut lemon juice. Enjoy cold with Beanfield's corn-free bean and rice chips. (To store, cover airtight with more lemon juice as this prevents oxidation). 
 
BROILED SAVORY TOFU: In honor of the Chinese-led Afghan Buddhist missionaries discovering America more than a thousand years before Columbus, here is a fusion dish: Slice 1 firm block of tofu into large squares then lengthwise into pyramids. (Or use Beyond Meat Strips, which tastes so good it may freak diners out. Mix 1/2 cup of dried herbs (each to taste: rubbed sage, rosemary, dried onion, garlic, leeks, sesame, or simply use 21 Seasoning Salute) and a good quality ground Himalayan or sea salt. Mix the dry herbal mixture with a 1/2 cup of California olive oil.

Marinated broiled, baked, roasted tofu with herbs, olive oil (WQ/outoftheordinaryfood)

 
Place in ceramic or glass baking dish. Marinate pyramids, strips, or slabs in lemon juice from 1 lemon and 1/2 a cup of preservative-free shoyu soy sauce for 1 hour. Brush on herb/oil mixture. Bake for 15 minutes. Then broil under flames until well browned (just a few minutes keeping an eye not to blacken).

Broiled tofu "pyramids" taste the best!

Serve with sauteed greens (kale, collards, chickweed, spinach, saag, or bok choy), or small white baked potatoes garnished with coconut cream (which is a healthy fat), and/or fluffy wild rice (which takes longer to cook than brown rice).
 

(BBC documentary) Say goodbye to corn. Poison Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs) placed in American food by poison and pesticide maker Monsanto, Inc. cause allergies, auto-immune disorders, chronic inflammation, diabetes, heart disease, thyroid disease, mental disorders... and the FDA knows humans and animals are being harmed. But many FDA officials are former and future executives at Monsanto such as lawyer Michael Taylor now US "Food Safety Czar."

Learn how to turn your urban yard into a self-sufficient organic farm. Invite the Dervaes.

• Eat the Weeds!
• VIDEO: Baking bread with Acorn 
• What's in a name? The avocado story (NPR)
• The world's best vegan Nacho chips
• A world of American vegetarian possibilities
• Saving Native land: Hahamongna