A late "my trip to (Chinese) Hell" post

Back in January I made a quick trip to Singapore, because I could, quite cheaply.  I've only posted once about it, but I said I would make a separate post about Singapore's most unusual semi-touristy site to visit, Haw Par Villa.

Wikipedia confirms that it's only moderately famous now - there was an attempt to make it into a "theme park" but that didn't pan out, so now the large grounds are just open for free, with only one paid section, the cheerily named Hell's Museum, which is discussed below.

For the uninitiated,  the grounds are the site of a former mansion and gardens built in the 1930's by the rich family which came up with Tiger Balm - a product still very much associated with  Singapore.

Here's a photo of the mansion which, in a feat of poor timing, was finished in 1937:

The Japanese took it over after their invasion, ruined the place, and it was demolished after the war.  Given it was such a distinctive modernist/art deco-ish design, I wonder if anyone has the internal floorplan: it would be extremely cool to see it rebuilt.   Now, there's just some concrete where it used to stand:

 

The surrounding gardens were filled with a large number of somewhat eccentric looking dioramas  mostly about Chinese and Buddhist folklore and morality - said to have been made to entice the builder's younger  brother to come live with him in Singapore.   So some of it dates back to the 1930's, although other parts (including I think the most famous part - the garish and luridly violent depiction of the 10 courts of Chinese Hell) was built after the war.

It's these weird and wonderful sculptures and dioramas, most of which are in reasonable repair, which people - although fewer over the years - come to see:

 

The Monkey King is at the top of that one:

There are many dioramas showing vices with a 1930's flavour:

Some sculptures (more modern ones I think) are just wacky for the sake of wacky, it seems:

But as mentioned above, the most famous section is the Chinese Hell part, which is now incorporated in the relatively new Hell's Museum, for which there is an $18 entrance fee.

To my pleasant surprise, this smallish but well curated Museum deals in a very erudite fashion with the whole question of belief in an afterlife in history and various cultures.  It was obviously created with detailed input from one or more academics in the field of comparative religion.   This is right up my alley - it felt very compatible with the Youtube content on Religion for Breakfast which I like watching.  It's worth waiting for the free guided tour, which saves a lot of reading of quite extensive notes on the walls.   

The tour ends in the enclosed area depicting various parts of Chinese Hell.  Most scenes are graphically violent, but in such lurid way it's hard to take offence.  From memory, it starts with a preliminary trial:

then the good proceed to Paradise via the Silver or Golden bridges: 

 but for the sinner, it's a look into the Mirror of Retribution:

and onto the various courts overseen by various Kings, with punishments designed for different types of sin.  There didn't seem any particular rhyme or reason for the types of punishment to matching the sin, though:

Some court examples:

I think one of the above was for cheating students, and said to be the most popular for parents to show their kids (!).   Oh yeah, it's in the one involving dismemberment.  

 

 

Here we go - I assume this woman "caused trouble" for her parents?:

After (I think) 3 years of trouncing through Hell, the soul is given a herbal elixir in the Pavilion of Forgetfulness that causes them to forget everything about their past lives before they are reborn, as animal or human (or something else?), again depending on past karma.  

I'm not sure how canonical this depiction is, so to speak.  I think other versions have 18 courts, and I see on some website that the 10 courts are given these titles (which don't match up exactly with the Haw Par version?):

 I'm particularly amused to see the "Office of Fair Trading" in there - although the "Sixteen Departments of Heart Gouging" also sounds amusingly bureaucratic.   

Anyway, it seems clear that the downside of no internet, TV or cinema back in the day was too much time for people to imagine horrors.  Although, I have to admit, there is a high degree of - um - entertaining elaborate adventurousness? about a lot of Chinese supernatural folklore, isn't there? 

I didn't know about this Buddhist character, for example (see the sign following):

 

Yeah, yeah, I suppose Christians have St Michael slaying a dragon, and Jesus himself doing something ill-defined during the Descent into Hell:  but if it were written by the Chinese, it would have been with a glowing sword with which 10,000 demons were slayed...or something more elaborate.

Finally, one of the oddest (and surely most photographed) sculptures is this one, which the guide said was intended to illustrate a folkloric story about the good young woman and mother who forsook her own hungry child to feed breast milk to her ill and hungry mother:

 

Yes, a heroine for filial piety:  but a bit extreme for Western tastes.

So, as you can tell, I was very happy with this visit to a pretty uniquely eccentric, and actually educational (if you go into the Museum) place - I hope it manages to survive well into the future.

Some videos with unusual stories

First, the poor Nepalese have been preyed upon to sell kidneys to Indian surgeons.  (Not sure if the typical customer is a rich Indian - but it wouldn't be surprising if foreigners seeking a fast and cheap option did this too): 

 

Next, Sabine Hossenfelder seems impressed with a recent paper that argues quantum gravity would affect causality.  As she says at the end, some might argue that this means gravity can't be treated that way, after all.  Who knows?

 

In other sciencey news, I think I might have seen this aircraft before, but it is deeply weird looking. Apparently, the company is only selling a system for testing hypersonic flying devices - it's not even about launching into space (AFAICT):  

 

And finally, the All Knowing Algorithm put me onto this guy for the first time, who has been taking a decade or so to provide geographical summaries of every country in the world (and as he is up to Vietnam, that's about to end.)   This video is not one of his formal summary ones, but just a tavelogue of his trip to Ho Chi Minh City.   He seems quite interested in the same things I am - he likes visiting temples and considering the nature of local religion and spirituality.   It's very likeable content:

Hot in Singapore

I've noticed some people on Twitter complaining about the heat in Singapore over the last couple of weeks.  Given that it seemed to me every time I have been there that it's a pretty uniform 30 - 33 degrees maximum there, I thought I would look at current temperatures:

 

Yes, they have had good reason to complain.

The government takes very seriously the problem of future climate change.   As they should.

Some notes on Kobe

I never got around to talking much about the days spent in Kobe on my last trip to Japan.

Given that it's a popular port on cruise ship itineraries, I think quite a lot of people have been there on a quick day visit, despite it not exactly being renowned for any "must do" site to visit.   That said, I thought it was a very pleasant city, with interesting geography, being  hemmed in between mountain and the sea:

 

It has quite a few European style buildings, including some old traders' houses, tree lined streets, and a popular Chinatown:

 

But the best thing we did there, and which is probably not so well known by visiting Australians, is to catch the cable train and cable car to the old onsen town of Arima.

The cable car situation there is a little confusing, because there is one that goes up to a lookout that leaves from close to the centre of town (and which we did not visit); the other one is a cable train a bit out of the centre of town that goes up to Mount Rokko, where you then catch a bus to a cable car that takes you to Arima.  Here's the map showing their departure points:

It's the Maya Cable station which is the one to get to Arima.  (We caught a bus to get to the cable station from our hotel in the centre of town, but it wouldn't be too expensive via taxi either.)   Here are a few photos:

And at the top of the ride, you are greeted with a spectacular view back over the city:

The most distant island there (on the left side) is the airport that is built on an artificial island of which, later on the trip, I happened to get a good picture from my flight:

Anyway, you have to catch a bus from the cable train to the cable car station, but on the way there is a small botanical garden which you can hop off and see.  It was rather pretty, being autumn and all:

 

Oh, and look, more odd sculpture:

(In case you can't make it out, it's an upside down peeing boy balancing on a pink figure's foot.)

Anyway, you then continue on the mountain bus to another lookout, when you can see over to neighbouring Osaka, as well as back to Kobe:

Need I say, it's a spectacular view.

Then onto the cable car, which only takes about 12 minutes or so to get to Arima, but the views again are great:

And Arima itself is a pretty charming old onsen town, with some narrow streets and lots of onsen to stay in overnight:

 

And you should stay in an onsen at least one night on any visit to Japan.  They're great.

That temple, unfortunately not open, is very old:  according to the sign, established in 727 and restored in 1191 - with the cherry blossom tree 270 years old.

 

Incidentally, to get back to Kobe we just caught a bus, and given that it can travel through a tunnel or two, the trip is very quick - about 45 minutes from memory - but not nearly as scenic as going via Mount Rokko, of course.

So yes, I would recommend Kobe, at least if the weather is nice and you take the opportunity to make this very spectacular side trip.

Drug issues noted

This story on the ABC this Easter weekend seemingly came out of nowhere.  It's on a topic we very rarely hear about:  people who have persistent perception/mental health issues after the use of hallucinogenic drugs:   

Sheree da Costa lost her son Joey to suicide and believes he would still be alive if he hadn't developed hallucinogenic persistent perception disorder (HPPD) as a teenager.

"That was the actual tipping point for Joey," she said.

HPPD results in disturbed vision, where a sufferer may constantly see visual snow, haloes or trails.

Many also experience out-of-body sensations and extreme anxiety.

It's triggered by the use of psychedelic drugs and has been described as the "trip that never ends".

With the use of illegal drugs on the rise and the emergence of psychedelics in the treatment of mental health disorders, there are calls for greater awareness and more research into the condition.

Sheree said her son's experience of HPPD was "a living hell".

Joey developed HPPD after taking a psychedelic drug at the age of 17 when he was in his final year at school, affecting his vision.

"Where school was concerned words were starting the slide off the page so he couldn't study, he couldn't read, and reading was something that he was very good at," she said.

Joey dropped out of school and eventually told his parents, who tried to help as much as they could.

"But to be honest we were in the dark as well until we started to do research of our own," Sheree said.

"Even to us it seemed hopeless because, where do you go? Especially here in Australia."

Ms da Costa said she and Joey often talked about raising awareness about HPPD together.

Now she is advocating on his behalf to call for more research into the condition.

Well, yeah, I knew that some hippy LSD users going nuts and never recovering in California in the 1960's was a real thing (and led to its criminalisation - while others call it a mere "moral panic" that wasn't justified), we all know that in recent years a "pro-psychedelics" push back has been happening.   Yet in this article, we have a couple of researchers (father and daughter, actually) talking about HPPD as a significant issue:

Researcher Anneliese McConnell said HPPD was reported to affect about 5 per cent of hallucinogen users, but she thinks the real numbers are much higher.

"It's not a small population we're talking about," Dr McConnell said.....

Much of the existing research on HPPD is focused on describing the condition.

Psychiatrist Harry McConnell said a lot more research needed to be done into the basic mechanisms of how it occurred, who was at risk and treatments.

He and his daughter Anneliese McConnell — a researcher at the Western Sydney University School of Medicine — have looked into whether HPPD is associated with other disorders such as migraines accompanied by visual auras or tinnitus.

"It's difficult to get funding in this area. I think it's difficult to get funding in a lot of areas related to drug and alcohol use and HPPD is no exception here," he said.

It's seems that while it has been known about for a long time, it's been only gradually getting more attention: 

To get some more detail on prevalence, I'll quote a 2021 review article:

Of the various health issues caused by the steady, worldwide increase in illicit drug use, HPPD is an underreported and still poorly understood condition (UN Office on Drugs Crime, 2019). Sound prevalence rates are lacking, but the DSM-5 suggests that 4.2% of all hallucinogen users experience HPPD-like symptoms (American Psychiatric Association, 2013). In their literature study, Halpern and Pope (2003) estimate that such symptoms emerge in <5% of all patients treated with LSD-assisted psychotherapy but in up to 50% of polydrug users. Sometimes two subtypes of HPPD are distinguished based on their severity and comorbidity. Type 1 is considered to be the milder variant, where perceptual symptoms are infrequent and barely affect general functioning, with the experiences being predominantly denoted as pleasant (and occasionally as “free trips”). The prognosis is said to be good, with the course often being self-limiting and not requiring professional help (World Health Organization, 2018). Type-2 HPPD, however, is described as causing significant impairment in daily and occupational functioning, while the prognosis is poor, with symptoms lasting up to years or even decades, albeit that large-scale follow-up studies to back this up are scarce (Noushad et al., 2015).

Although it is unknown what proportion of those experiencing HPPD seek professional help, only a small group manages to procure the help they need. This is at least partly due to a lack of knowledge of HPPD among general practitioners and medical specialists. It is widely believed that pharmacological treatment regimens and psychotherapy have little to no effect on HPPD (Lerner et al., 2014c). Since evidence-based treatment guidelines are still to be developed, patients often receive practice-based interventions with off-label medications such as adrenergic agonists, antidepressants, antiepileptics, antipsychotics, benzodiazepines, beta blockers, calcium-channel blockers, catechol-o-methyl transferase inhibitors, and opioid receptor antagonists. The evidence for the effects of these treatments is lacking since they have only been described in case reports and open-label treatment studies.

This seems to be another case where my innate leeriness of recreational drug use finds some evidence falling into its lap, so to speak.  

I also find it a bit odd that the ABC seems to be quite open to running cautionary stories about hallucinogens lately.   (Is there some story commissioning producer there who has a relatively conservative attitude to illicit drug use?)  I say this because don't think I ever got around to noting here this story that appeared on 7.30 in February that highlighted psychiatrists who worry that people are getting entirely the wrong impression from the TGA's decision to legalise the use of psilocybin and ecstasy under strict guidelines:

The Royal College of Psychiatrists (RANZCP) says people may be getting the wrong impression about the availability of some psychedelic drugs, following an historic 2023 decision to take them off the prohibited drug list.

"There's a definite risk of patients having significantly elevated expectations," says the chair of RANZCP's Psychedelic Steering Group, Professor Richard Harvey.

"Some of the marketing, what we see on the web … is suggestions that these are treatments or substances that everybody should use, that all psychiatrists should be prescribing — there's absolutely not, by any means, the evidence that is the situation."...

The drugs are only available for therapeutic use in conjunction with intensive therapy carried out by authorised practitioners.

7.30 can only confirm two cases of psychedelic drug prescriptions since the TGA's decision came into effect in July last year.

Dr Cassidy says the process was complicated and expensive.

But the information in the story that most caught my eye was this:

Professor Susan Rossell from Swinburne University of Technology says there's a trend across published psilocybin studies.

"About a third seem to have some very positive effects, a third nothing really, and a third do have some negative long-term consequences about the so-called bad trip," she said.

Professor Rossell's team is trying to find out what are the predictors of success.

"We know this intervention is going to be really expensive, it involves a lot of therapy.

"So if we can make some predictions as to who it's going to benefit the most, wouldn't that be the best way forward?"

About a third can have negative long term consequences!   We don't see that talked about much, if at all.    I mean, I get that people who are going to try it are probably doing so as something of a last resort, but nonetheless, her comments indicate that there is still a very significant risk of making their problems worse.  How many treatments are allowed with a risk profile that high?

Anyway, in other odd drug news this Easter, it was surprising to read that the victims of a drug overdoes on the Gold Coast were a group or women in their early 40's - not the typical age range or gender group you expect to be going on a recreational drug binder.  (Well, unless they are rich and doing cocaine.)    But it turns out that the woman who died was a new age eccentric:

Known as a “Shamanic medicine woman” on her social media, Whittaker proudly worked to “build an army of courageous, empowered, soul driven women who are here to create change and make magic”.

Her work revolved around New Age spirituality.

As to the drugs that killed her (and sent her friends to hospital too), it's not yet known for sure, but:

...early reports have referred to the substance as a "drug cocktail," including ketamine, GHB or fantasy. 

And in yet more drug use news, it was widely reported that Queensland had decided to allow pill testing at a music festival for the first time.   The TV news reports showed it to be a very modern hippy-ish style where the point of being there is to be off their collective faces.

I don't know - I would prefer to deal with the problem by banning festivals I don't like the look of!  But I would say that, wouldn't I...  

 

A distinctive image

Update:  Some context.  This was an artwork that was in a side room at the cable car station at the top of the ride from Kobe to Mt Rokko, when I was there last year.   I never found out the details, but there were artworks (temporarily, I think) around several spots on Mt Rokko, not all disturbing like this one.

I think the photo came out in very remarkable fashion - something about the lighting makes it look artificial, and (to my mind) a bit like the cut out animation artwork that featured in Monty Python. 

I thought, as it gives a general impression of suffering, it was apt to post it on Good Friday.

I must get around to posting other photos taken on the Mt Rokko area.  They have sat on my phone for a long time, but I finally transferred them to the laptop, where I find it easier to post and edit photos.

An odd fellow

So, out of sordid curiosity I did read that profile of Andrew Huberman, who I had briefly watched on Youtube, but only once or twice.  Here's how Daily Beast starts its description of the article:

Andrew Huberman is a straight-talking science podcaster known for his hours-long episodes about biohacking, and for having muscles almost as big as his brain. But the new-media darling has a secret mental asset revealed Monday by New York Magazine’s Intelligencer: the flexibility and logistical acuity to manage multiple concurrent affairs with women spread across the continental U.S.

He certainly seems a very odd man, and the oddest thing in the article was his claim (made through a spokesman, apparently) that the long term girlfriend whose story is the backbone of the article was going through IVF with him not to necessarily have children, but to create embryos together.  What sense does that make?  IVF is no walk in the park, by all accounts, and doing it to only "make embryos" just doesn't make much sense.  (Unless he thought he could sell them via his Youtube videos, or something!) 

There was also a comment following the article (which I can't copy now, as it has gone behind a paywall) from some woman who claimed she had some dates with him, before soon deciding he was such a weirdo that she (a bit facetiously, I think) feared for her life if she slept over at his place.  Seemed to me a bit "brave" of the magazine to leave that comment there.   

Anyway, it's interesting that many on the Right think he is the victim of a "witch hunt" because he has been on shows like Joe Rogan.   Apparently, though, he generally has avoided politics in his podcast career, but it seems he is pretty popular with at least part of the (what?) "self improvement bro community". 

I don't know:  if a person is going to make a career, and a lucrative one, out of self improvement advice (an article says his podcast topics include: fitness, learning, creativity, hormones, fertility, grief, trauma, and happiness) I think there is a legitimate public interest if his own life is something of a complex mess, relationship wise.

I mean, I'm sure a lot of Right wingers enjoyed Paul Johnson's book Intellectuals (I know I did!) which was entirely about (mostly) Left leaning public intellectuals whose personal life was in complete contradiction to their public views.   

Sure, Johnson did only deal with people who were already dead:  but if you are going to try to juggle not just 2 or 3, but 5 girlfriends at once while being media famous, you have to expect public exposure if caught out.

Responsible leadership needed

There is a surge again in news about regional aboriginal lawlessness (particularly amongst youth).  The ABC notes:

• In short: Widespread unrest broke out in Alice Springs on Tuesday, including an attack on a pub by people throwing bricks at doors and windows.
• The incidents occured after a ceremony and funeral for a teenager who died when an allegedly stolen car crashed two weeks ago.
• What's next? The Alice Springs mayor is calling for the federal government to step in to address social problems in the town.

And on 7.30 the other night, they did a story on aimless youth getting into trouble in Moree.

The problem here has been a long time brewing:   the relatively moderate aboriginal leadership figures are ageing and seemingly lost influence.  They placed all their eggs for future change into the one mechanism - The Voice - which may have been well intentioned, but failed due to appearing to moderates as pretty much a mere re-run of a bureaucratic approach that had failed before, and to the young radical activists as insultingly inadequate as a power sharing arrangement. 

And of course, when the Voice failed, it meant that there was virtually uniform criticism within aboriginal advocacy of "the system" - apart from the handful (if that!) of Right wing aboriginal figures (Mundine, Price).

Given that Mundine and Price seem to be too "political" in a self interested way, and don't seem to have much of a following within aboriginal communities broadly, the end result is a real vacuum where there needs to be responsible, moderate aboriginal leadership that should be sending the right messages to aboriginal youth - that their best future lies in getting ahead in the modern world they find themselves in, regardless of historical wrongs, and this means being part of the modern economy, and all that goes with it - get a reasonable education, respect property rights, and other people of all races.  

Instead, the radical aboriginal advocacy which is currently in the ascendancy is emphasising grievance and cultural pride, which is not the messaging needed to stop crime and anti-social behaviour.  

It's unfortunate that its a Labor Party federally that is caught with this problem.   

It's also unfortunate that, as the messaging I am suggesting is easily painted as "right wing", the Right in politics just has a tainted reputation at the moment for sounding reasonable on nearly anything.   

So I think it is from the mainstream Left that there needs to be some bravery here - to try to get aboriginal leadership to break the emphasis on grievance (and cultural re-writing, such as the dubious attempt of academia to try to re-write pre-Colonial aboriginal society as something with equivalence to other technologically advanced societies), and more emphasis on the "join us" messaging.   

Of course, it is also easy to point to Labor Left apologies for past wrongs - going back to Paul Keating - as having encouraged the "pro-grievance, 24/7" style of radical aboriginal advocacy to take hold.   But this is why I say the course correction has to come from the Left too - at least they can argue in good faith that they did acknowledge past wrongs, but now is the time to move past the emphasis on that.  The Right - in figures such as Dutton and other - are easily dismissed due to never having joined the attempt to acknowledge past wrongs.  

Dumb takes noted

 

Update:  on a not so dumb note (because it's me!) - surely I'm not the only person thinking that the protective side barriers (that stop vehicles toppling off the bridge) look unusually low and inadequate for a modern bridge??