The guardian at this meeting was Pema Pera and the comments are his.
That morning, Maxine was already in the tea house, when I walked in.
Pema Pera: Hi Maxine!
Maxine Walden: hi, Pema
Pema Pera: Are you floating, or is it just my screen?
Pema Pera: And you haven’t had any green tea yet, I guess.
Maxine Walden: oh, yes I am again…
Maxine Walden: no, guess I have not had green tea in SL, have it a lot in RL
Pema Pera: shall we go outside for a change? I see that Types is also sitting near the pond there.
Maxine Walden: am having a bit of trouble with my SL gear this morning, I will be happy to go out
We stepped out and saw Types sitting at the other side of the pond. It turned out that he was IMing with someone else, so we did not want to disturb him. However, the weather was nice, and we decided to stay outside. Usually, when we sit on the stone benches, we face the tea house, and others sitting or standing there. This time, however, we faced in the opposite direction, looking at the water.
Pema Pera: Hi Types!
Types Sideways: oh hi Pema
Pema Pera: Nice scenery isn’t it!
Types Sideways: two conversations so my response may be delayed
Pema Pera: no problem!
Types Sideways: yep
Pema Pera: Maxine, it’s nice to face the water, isn’t it?
Types Sideways: hi Maxine
Pema Pera: we always sit on these benches looking the other way
Maxine Walden: yes, it is, very nice, thanks for suggesting we come out.
Maxine Walden: Hi, Types, nice to see you
Pema Pera: it is so intriguing how powerful the environment changes our moods and hence our conversations!
Types Sideways: you too
Maxine Walden: it is intriguing…I have always been interested in that phenomenon in RL as well as SL
Maxine Walden: it is like breathing in the atmosphere just as the oxygen
Pema Pera: yes, indeed.
Pema Pera: Is there any loose end from previous conversations that you would like to pick up?
Maxine Walden: seems like more more openness…any loose ends…let me see
Maxine Walden: there always seem to be meandering threads as memory from one conversation to the next
Pema Pera: or something new, that would be fine too!
Pema Pera: For example, I believe you mentioned that actions, like creating a balloon and riding in it, could be complementary to using words and verbal analysis — didn’t you say something like that?
Maxine Walden: yes, we ‘think’ via actions a lot, and maybe it is the more basic, ancient ‘language’
Maxine Walden: I also think that things that we cannot ‘think’ about are registered in the body…so action picks up or expresses those ‘unthought thoughts’ too
Types took off, and we continued our conversation.
Types Sideways: bye Pema Maxine see you later
Maxine Walden: the spaciousness of the PaB ‘holdings’ — bye Types–
Maxine Walden: the spaciousness may allow a lot of physical expression and experience
Pema Pera: bye Types!
Maxine Walden: am I noting from your gestures the probably fatigue still from jetlag? nearly midnite again in Japan
Maxine Walden: probable jetlag
Pema Pera: which gestures?
Pema Pera: ah, you mean my AO?
Pema Pera: Animation override?
Maxine Walden: AO? oh, yes, perhaps,
Pema Pera: haha, that has nothing to do with my control
Pema Pera: if I switch it off, I am sitting more still, like now
Pema Pera: this is the default
Pema Pera: like your avatar
Maxine had noticed how my avatar kept moving his hands and body more than default avatars. I demonstrated how avatar override causes those motions, by switching the AO off temporarily. As a result, my avatar became a lot more quiet ;>)
Pema Pera: Just like you can buy clothes, and hair and skin and shape
Pema Pera: you can also buy more natural gestures, less stiff and frozen, through which you avatar keeps moving in a more natural and fluid way
Maxine Walden: ah, another learning
Maxine Walden: it is interesting I have SL and three computers and this one, my office laptop, seems to give me less access than the others..like I cannot find Inventory and some other things on the screen here; am exploring why this might be, but interesting just to experience the variability
Maxine Walden: still the experience of being or Being in SL is still quite interesting
Maxine Walden: no matter which computer I am on
Maxine Walden: and Being seems to be becoming more and more a constant in the everyday background
Maxine Walden: Imagine you have a lot of things going on nearly simultaneously these days, in SL with all the acquisitions and RL as well
Maxine Walden: hard to imagine you having much ‘free space’ for contemplation
Pema Pera: oh yes, many things, both in RL and SL, and in SL both in astro and PaB and in PaB indeed land sales, organizational questions, talks with individuals, keeping up the blogs and then of course showing up here three times a day . .. . .
Pema Pera: showing up here is now my kind of contemplation
Pema Pera: as for Being, yes, Being grounds everything, and at the same time it is not abstract, it is the most concrete resource — although both words and actions can’t reach it; they are expressions of it.
Pema Pera: Combing back to actions and words, perhaps both are equally secondary, with some kind of “seeing” more primary
Maxine Walden: yes, I fully agree that words and actions are only the expressions of a more primary seeing or being, Being
Maxine then mentioned her discussion in our Qwaq-based WoK Forums.
Maxine Walden: We were talking about that a bit last night in Qwaq, about what one colleague mentioned as tacit knowledge and I spoke of as the unconscious…
Maxine Walden: but
Maxine Walden: this are really just different names for that region of experience we cannot ‘touch’ or tangibly see but from which flow so much of our experience
Maxine Walden: as if something flows from within through then our actions or words toward expression to ourselves and others if we can pay attention to it
Maxine Walden: I know that this differs somewhat from what you have been saying, but I find myself still fascinated with the possiblity
Pema Pera: what you call the flow from within is probably related to what I am trying to point to with the notion of Being
Maxine Walden: that the unconscious regions, like an inner cosmos, may hold the history of mankind’s experience, maybe the mammalian experience over millions of years
Maxine Walden: yes, I would imagine that to be true
Maxine Walden: (I have about 5 minutes I think)
Pema Pera: And by the way, how did your talk go in Qwaq, last Sunday as well as the discussion yesterday evening? — I’m sorry I couldn’t be there in either case.
Maxine Walden: both went well, lots of questions and interest…and prompting inquiry about how I see the ‘ways of knowing’ as complimentary but distinct from others’ views…very friendly though and seeming to bring up
Maxine Walden: more questions than answers…always the case in good discussions I think.
Maxine Walden: I sent you a copy of the presentation and titled it ‘for your planeride’ to your email but you probably have a zillion things to look to.
Maxine Walden: have to go as my early appointment is here.
Pema Pera: ah, that must have arrived at a moment that I was in a crunch and I must have still on my pile of backlog emails. I will get to it, but it may take a bit. The one thing I really should do first is catch up with my blog
Maxine Walden: See you later bye
Pema Pera: okay, see you!
I was just about to leave, but then I saw Showshow walking by, so I said hello. It turned out that he was Japanese.
Pema Pera: hi there!
showshow Camel: hi Pema
showshow Camel: nice to meet u
Pema Pera: Hi Showshow
Pema Pera: nice meeting you too.
showshow Camel: where r u from?
Pema Pera: in RL?
showshow Camel: yeah
Pema Pera: From Holland originally
Pema Pera: and you?
showshow Camel: Japan
Pema Pera: 日本人ですか？
showshow Camel: はい
showshow Camel: R u intereted in japanese culture?
Pema Pera: はい
Pema Pera: オランダ人です
Pema Pera: 今ニューヨークに住んでます。
showshow Camel: 日本語しゃべれますか？
showshow Camel: can u speak Japanese?
Pema Pera: はい
showshow Camel: wow
It turned out that Showshow had been to this area a couple times before. I mentioned our blog and meeting schedule.
Pema Pera: 初めてここへ来ましたか？
showshow Camel: ３回目です
Pema Pera: ここで毎日友達と話します
showshow Camel: ボイスチャットは、できますか？
Pema Pera: SL時間で 1:00, 7:00, 13:00, 19:00
Pema Pera: 今マイクがないんです
Pema Pera: すみません
showshow Camel: いえいえ
showshow Camel: あまりタイプが得意じゃないので
Pema Pera: http://playasbeing.wordpress.com/ で色んな情報が書いてました。
Showshow mentioned how very Japanese the tea house looked. I thought to myself that Dakini would be pleased to hear that.
showshow Camel: ここは、すごく日本的ですね？？？？
Pema Pera: そうですね
Pema Pera: 座禅まで^^
showshow Camel: 日本へ、来たことはありますか？
showshow Camel: リアルで
Pema Pera: はい今東京にいますよ w
Pema Pera: しごとのために
Pema Pera: 二ヶ月
showshow Camel: 東京のどこですか？
Pema Pera: 半蔵門
showshow Camel: wow
showshow Camel: 漢字が、得意ですね？？？？
I told Showshow that I was actually in Tokyo in RL, attending an astronomy workshop.
Pema Pera: 天文学者です
Pema Pera: どうもどうも
showshow Camel: 学会ですか？
Pema Pera: そうですが
Pema Pera: この他に共同研究もあるし
showshow Camel: あまり天文学のことは、知らないんですけど
showshow Camel: おもしろそうですね？
Pema Pera: btw、showshow のSLの名前は僕のblogで書くもいいですか？
showshow Camel: いいですよ
Pema Pera: と我々の会話の印象？
showshow Camel: 何年くらい、日本語を勉強されましたか？？？
Pema Pera: http://playasbeing.wordpress.com/ のブログです
Pema Pera: そうだねえ、２５
Pema Pera: 年間かな？
Pema Pera: 仕事のためによく日本へ来ます
Showshow had started to look at our blog, and I invited him to come back, at any of our regular sittings.
showshow Camel: あなたなブログを、少し拝見させていただきました。
showshow Camel: SLでのテキストチャットが、書いてあるんですね？
Pema Pera: はい
showshow Camel: 日本に共同研究者がいるんですか？？？
Pema Pera: はい
Pema Pera: すみません、じゃあ、今SLの天文学会へ行かなっきゃ。
showshow Camel: それでは、また
Pema Pera: ８：００時から
Pema Pera: 時間があれば
Pema Pera: 是非ここへ戻ってきて下さい。
showshow Camel: はい
showshow Camel: それでは、また
Pema Pera: じゃあまた
