[SHAO]

Hi all,

I was a member of sailnet for some time, before I became a sailboat owner and founded the SHAO NPO. If you are interested in what we are about take a look at the main site (I can't post a link with under 10 posts, so visit here):

SHAO
sailing-across-oceans.org

Our boat is a 1982 Peterson 42, an IOR boat built for ocean racing. The original was out of aluminum, ours is fiberglass. It's in need of some major restoration, which we are commencing with as we fund-raise, over the next 18 months. You can see a few pictures of the boat in "as-such" state, on the site. The original Yanmar engine a 28Hp 3HMK runs fine (though needs maintenance) -- hull, rudder and keel seem fine (though we haven't x-rayed the fittings yet). Our first goal after restoration and outfitting is to circumnavigate Japan, over about a 7-9 month period. We will test sail around Kyushu and the Okinawan Island chain. We are on the lookout for possibilities of sailing partners and also for drydock facilities with decent labor costs, in Taiwan or The Philippines, for interior work, hull and and deck paint.

Our boat, technically a research vessel, is licensed in Japan and the skipper (me) has a Second Class Japan boat license and will have the First Class license soon, so will be free to sail Japan waters without a fixed itinerary.

That's about it -- as far as restoration design, we will set up for solo/short-handed sailing, much in the style of S/V Wings, a 1978 Peterson Serendipity 43 (find it with a search).

Nice to say 'hi' again after a year or so. I've gotten a lot of inspiration some the sailnet community over the years.

 

[Donna_F]

I looked at your website. Interesting that "aid" is last on your list. Poetry being first. That's quite a mission statement. Where does the "expedition" fall in the agenda?

 

[SHAO]

I looked at your website. Interesting that "aid" is last on your list. Poetry being first. That's quite a mission statement. Where does the "expedition" fall in the agenda?

Thanks for taking a look, and for your comments. Regarding "aid" as being last in our list, we see international charitable giving as a result of creating a social network, literary interchange and friendship (all this comes first). We write:"charitable giving based on cross-cultural understanding and appreciation" -- which is something that takes time, and especially, trust. Being something to strive towards, aid isn't a lower priority -- but it does require the development of a lot of contacts -- and attention.

It's worth adding that one remit of an NPO is "cultural interchange" -- we feel much can happen from this. And the concept of "sailing for poetry" is, we feel, novel.

Our first expedition is planned to be domestic, a circumnavigation of Japan, with many ports of call - with meetings, of poets, and visits to places, at each -- within a fairly free itinerary. We outline this here:

A Haiku Sailing Pilgrimage — Circumnavigation of Japan
sailing-across-oceans.org/npo/haiku-sailing-campaign-japan.htm

Much depends on our ability to raise funds -- we are working on this aspect now, in Japan, and will try crowd-sourcing later. Step by step . . .

 

[Donna_F]

To be honest, I only looked at your website to see if you were in violation of SailNet rules. While one part of me thinks, if you're sincere and not really just looking to have others pay for your boat (which you kinda are), then I applaud your efforts. The other part of me, the part that paid for my own boat, sees someone looking for a free ride under the guise of charity. Seen quite a few of the latter come through here and they didn't last long.

 

[SHAO]

To be honest, I only looked at your website to see if you were in violation of SailNet rules. While one part of me thinks, if you're sincere and not really just looking to have others pay for your boat (which you kinda are), then I applaud your efforts. The other part of me, the part that paid for my own boat, sees someone looking for a free ride under the guise of charity. Seen quite a few of the latter come through here and they didn't last long.

Oh! Well, this project is an extension of 17 years of research and publication, on my part as founder and leader of the Kon Nichi Translation Group, in haiku literature, here in Japan. We just finished publishing 4 volumes on Kaneko Tohta, who at age 94 is practically a living national treasure:

Recent books on Kaneko (trans.):
bit.ly/1gLOnTc

Major research papers (1999-present):
research.gendaihaiku.com

Japanese haiku poets interviewed, subtitled (German & English):
gendaihaiku.com

Most recent book on English-language haiku theory (2013):
"The Disjunctive Dragonfly": bit.ly/1i4af1s

I have not received a penny for any of the above publications. Haiku in English (as a first or second language) are being composed in over 60 countries, there is a lot of international interest in the SHAO project. It's sad to me that while a scientific research vessel is easily comprehensible (and not seen as questionable, regarding funding), a vessel set to accomplish research for the Humanities and literature is seen as suspect.

The costs involved in setting up "Intuition" as a "command and control" base of operation are quite a bit less than university research budgets involving hotels, trains, planes, etc. to conference centers -- perhaps to do much less (e.g. engage in symposia), having only very limited time (usually less than a week). And we formed a legal entity (an NPO) with financial transparency, and its own bank account.

While our idea and vision may be unique, I hope that, based on my professional work, reputation and credibility, the SHAO goals and project are considered above reproach, and in fact I was rather hoping to find some support, inspiration and good cheer from the Sailnet community.

I would add that my time on the planet is limited, as is my health. If "Intuition" is properly outfitted and SHAO is successful in the next few years, it would be a thrill to see younger folks getting involved and continuing the project. If you look over my CV and works, I think you'll see where my passion lies; it's not in looking for personal handouts. Currently I'm just in my last year of over 10 years of Japan Ministry of Education Grant support, which has allowed me to lecture internationally. If I'm successful with a next grant, it will enable the SHAO project works to become better known, worldwide. It's all of a piece.

Melville, depressed and restless, set sail to voyage and hunt for whales. There are many reasons to sail, aren't there? I'm watching the rapid decline of ocean ecosystems, just like everyone -- my background is in poetry and sailing and I speak Japanese, and I feel that I can do something positive, personally, in the world -- it may seem entirely ornamental and even suspect to you, I realize. But then, I chose to be a poet at age 17. Please don't kill off all of the romance, along with everything else!

 

[SHAO]

Bump.

It would be nice to receive a "bon chance" or at least a "dude?!" A realize it's not Sailing Anarchy, but still. As a new member I was really forced to defend my project and in a sense my reputation. I did so. And my reply is silence. Well that's okay, it has to be. My main hope here has to do with issues of restoration and outfitting, to a budget, of this beautiful, neglected, 1980s IOR ocean race boat.

Here are a couple of haiku we've translated recently (ancient and modern):

araumi ya
sado ni yokotau
amanogawa Matsuo Bashô

raw ocean –
over Sado Island
the milky way

(Sado was known as an island of exile)

ga no manako
shakkô nareba
umi wo kô Kaneko Tōhta

within a moth’s eye
penetrated by its glowing red –
longing, the ocean


(both, in the language of the sea . . . )

 

[Donna_F]

Bump.

It would be nice to receive a "bon chance" or at least a "dude?!" A realize it's not Sailing Anarchy, but still. As a new member I was really forced to defend my project and in a sense my reputation. I did so. And my reply is silence. Well that's okay, it has to be. My main hope here has to do with issues of restoration and outfitting, to a budget, of this beautiful, neglected, 1980s IOR ocean race boat.

...

You're asking people to give you money. You should expect questions about how the money will be used.

Over 200 people viewed your thread since you posted. I would imagine if they were inclined to help your cause they have headed over to your website to do so.

 

[SHAO]

We see things rather differently, though I grasp your point of view. I'm not here on sailnet to seek funds from members, nor do I expect funds to arrive. (I would be very surprised, actually.) "Interest" and funding are completely different matters, in my experience of forums and social networking.

I do want to share the project with the Sailnet community, provide cogent background on what's up and some context for probably upcoming questions on the refit. Fair enough?

 

[SHAO]

After nearly a year of hunting around for a stable crew, we've decided to return the donated Peterson 42. It did need quite a lot of repair work (for instance gutting chunks of the interior), and the drydock, though free, was 2.5 hours away and that by toll roads -- travel in Japan is costly.

Our NPO project has been quiescent, while we've been looking for a new boat. Today we sealed the deal on a 1991 Jeanneau 35', in near-perfect condition, and local to us -- so no need to move to a new marina. Alain Maignan has circumnavigated the same model boat (in 2007-08), so we have some confidence in future outfitting and sailing plans. It seems doubtful that many here are interested in our literary/sailing adventure-challenge, but I'll keep posting from time to time, for the poets lurking among you.

Wanderer, your footsteps are
the road, and nothing more;
wanderer, there is no road,
the road is made by walking.
By walking one makes the road,
and upon glancing behind
one sees the path
that never will be trod again.
Wanderer, there is no road --
Only wakes upon the sea.

Antonio Machado, from "Proverbios y cantares" in Campos de Castilla, 1912.

 

[SHAO]

Something else I'd like to post, by way of introduction is an extract of R Buckminster Fuller's book, "Intuition"; just the first few stanzas of the 190 pp. poem. He wrote this book of prose-poetry within the space of a morning, in celebration of this signal event:

Opening lines (p.11):

Intuition: Metaphysical Music

The following thoughts regarding
The acquisition, commissioning and naming
Of a new seventeen-ton
Ocean-cruising sloop
Occurred and were inscribed
Throughout the morning hours,
Immediately preceding the moment
At which the craft was lowered
By a giant motorized sling
Into her design destined
REALIZATION
Of waterborne existence
At midday July, 31, 1968.

[Intuition was the name Fuller gave to his Morgan M-41 (CB keel). The original book cover (1970) shows him at the helm. The book begins:]

Life’s original event
And the game of life’s
Order of play
Are involuntarily initiated,
And inherently subject to modification
By the a priori mystery,
Within which consciousness first formulates
And from which enveloping and permeating mystery
Consciousness never completely separates,
But which it often ignores
Then forgets altogether
Or deliberately disdains.
And consciousness begins
As an awareness of otherness,
Which otherness-awareness requires time.
And all statements by consciousness
Are in the comparative terms
Of prior observations of consciousness
(“It’s warmer, it’s quicker, it’s bigger
Than the other or others”).
Minimal consciousness evokes time,
As a nonsimultaneous sequence of experiences.
Consciousness dawns
With the second experience.
This is why consciousness
Identified the basic increment of time
As being a second.

Not until the second experience
Did time and consciousness
Combine as human life.

Time, relativity and consciousness
Are always and only coexistent functions
Of an a priori Universe,
Which, beginning with the twoness of secondness,
Is inherently plural.

Ergo:
All monological explanations of Universe
Are inherently inadequate
And axiomatically fallacious.
There can be no single key
Nor unit building block of Universe.
. . . .
(continues)

Thus begins Fuller's navigation of Intuition. I was lucky to be able, when young, to attend Fuller's NYC Town Hall lectures -- he was traveling the world constantly at the time, lecturing. Yeah, one person's "crazy" is another's brilliance. Hell of a way to christen a boat. Hmm, "the a priori mystery"; as good a reason as any to sail for.