@2011 Kyria Abrahams

World, prepare to Duck and Cover. Brianna Karp, blogger, advocate, and author of the upcoming memoir: ‘The Girl’s Guide To Homelessness” – Villard April 2011 – is getting ready to blow up like an unexploded ordnance in a quiet schoolyard in Myanmar. I know these things. For example, I saw The Decemberists at New York’s Mercury Lounge in 2003 and now they have the number 1 album in the entire United States of America. That’s an entire country — like Africa! If we were in Africa right now, Brianna Karp would ride by you on horseback like Janjaweed and slice the hands off your children with an uncorrected reader’s proof while you sputter and cry: why, god, why?

Why? Because Brianna is adorable, unpretentious, and had a seriously eff’d up childhood. She’s already been on CNN, The Today Show, and is courted by Augusten Burrough’s agent. Having gone thrifting with her in Orange County, I can also vouch for the fact that she has fabulous taste in antique desks.

Like me, Brianna was raised as a Jehovah’s Witnesses. Unlike me, she had a severely mentally ill and physically abusive mother who launched her into the arms of homeless by the age of 18. The upside? She’ll probably be on Oprah.

(Is there any tragedy that could possibly happen in your life that being on Oprah wouldn’t make okay? I mean, maybe if you were personally raped by Oprah. But I think everything else would be made a-ok.)

For the purposes of this column, Brianna has a tattoo on her buttocks. The reason? Because her mother hit her so hard that her goddamn ass scarred. Jesus effing christ, no wonder she has a book. No wonder you will read it.

Brianna describes the Jehovah’s Witness as a “very high-control cult whose members are not allowed to get tattoos.” I think that is as good a definition as any.

“I left the group quietly at 18 and publicly a couple of years ago,” she says. “It was very freeing to make a decision of my own regarding my body, and feel sort of like I’d reclaimed it after years of abuse. I had been free for a year when I decided to just go for it. I don’t regret it.”

Recently, I asked Brianna a few questions about the fairie upon her buttocks.

Kyria: You got the tattoo to cover up a scar on your right ass cheek, of all places. Tell us more about that.

Brianna: I was physically abused by my mother for many years. She would whip me with spatulas and beat me with other household objects like cutting boards and umbrellas. On more than one occasion she would break her implements over my body but keep right on beating me with the jagged edge. In fourth grade, when I was nine, I was lacerated quite deep, so badly that I bled through my pants the next day at school and was sent to the nurse, who was so horrified that she called CPS, which of course caused a whole other brou-ha-ha in and of itself.

KA: Are you 100% happy with it, or would you change anything about it?

BK: I don’t think I’d change anything. I loved it when I picked it out, and I still love it. There was a time period when one or two girlfriends of mine expressed disapproval after I’d gotten it — because it wasn’t what THEY would have picked, naturally — and that made me nervous. I spent a couple of weeks second-guessing myself, but eventually I figured ‘fuck ‘em’. I’m super happy with it. I like the artwork, I like the size, I like the colors, and it does its job.

KA: What does this tattoo symbolize to you?

BK: The scarring made me feel ashamed, especially after I became an adult and began to be sexually active. I had no self-esteem and wanted to feel beautiful and sexy in front of boyfriends, but instead (irrational or not) I felt hideous. As a 19th birthday gift to myself, I decided to get a coverup tattoo. I’m an atheist, but I’m also a voracious reader and have always been fascinated by mythology and fairy tales, so a faery seemed natural, and I really loved the artwork. Plus I like to pretend that she’s kind of my alter ego. The part of me that’s less inhibited and shy (because I’m super-duper, cripplingly shy).

KA: What’s the best compliment you’ve ever gotten on the tattoo?

BK: I don’t tend to show it off much, since that involves flashing my bum at people, and I’m not the exhibitionist type. Probably the best compliments I’ve gotten were from people (occasionally boyfriends) who didn’t like tattoos and were skeptical that they could find a tattoo attractive, but after seeing mine, expressed surprise that they actually liked it and thought it was pretty. Especially an “ass tattoo”. I think a lot of people didn’t think there was any way or reason that it could be tastefully done. Some people want to know why, and if they hear the story about why I got it, they tend to soften up a bit.

KA: What’s the most ridiculous or obnoxious comment someone has ever made about it?

BK: Eh. The usual, probably. The standard “how will you feel when you’re 80 and it’s all wrinkled and nasty?” (as if I won’t have *real* problems to worry about when I’m 80) or “what if the man of your dreams finds it hideous and never wants to fuck you doggie style again?” or “Don’t you feel like you’ve desecrated the temple of your body and ruined your natural feminine beauty?” Stupid stuff, really. People can be such assholes.

KA: Did your Jehovah’s Witness upbringing factor into the tattoo? Do you have to hide it from your family?

BK: My entire family is still in the cult. I hid it from them as best I could, but one day I dropped my little sister off at a train station. When I hugged her goodbye, the back of my shirt hiked up and I guess you could see the very tip of one of my faery’s wings peeking out of the top of my jeans. She looked down and saw it, and freaked out. I begged her not to tell our mother. She promised not to, and right after I left, she dialed our mom up and ratted me out. My mom wouldn’t speak to me for 6 months. When she did start speaking to me again, she would refuse to be in the same room with me if I was changing clothes, and would exclaim, “I just CAN’T LOOK AT YOU with that disgusting THING on your body!!!” It was pretty depressing, and passive-aggressive.

My family is no longer allowed to speak to me at all, since I’ve publicly stated that I do not wish to be affiliated with their religion, which enforces shunning of members who no longer believe the teachings, even members’ own children. They have made the choice to abide by the church’s shunning rule. Losing your family over a difference of religion sucks. But I guess at least I don’t need to deal with them picking on my tattoo anymore.

KA: Shout out to the artist, please.

BK: The shop is Hi-Fi Tattoo in Placentia, CA, but I think at that time it was called something different. My artist’s name was Yoshi. I went to probably 8 or 9 different shops and checked out a bunch of portfolios before picking him. I didn’t figure it was a decision to be taken lightly.

KA: Plans for more ink? There’s always more.

BK: So I’ve been told by many, many, many people, although I honestly think I’m happy with just my one and have no plans for more. Maybe I’m the rare exception to the rule. If I ever did get another one, I suppose I’d pick a painting by my favorite artist, Alphonse Mucha, but it’d be tough to think of a location for it. I don’t think the busy/cluttered look is for me, really, and I’m so shy, I wouldn’t feel like displaying a tattoo. The one I have isn’t visible while I’m wearing regular clothing, and I got it for me, not really for anyone else. I’m cool with that. It’s just what works for me.

More about Brianna

_________________________________

Kyria Abrahams is the author of ’I’m Perfect, You’re Doomed: Tales from a Jehovah’s Witness Upbringing.’ Growing up in a fundamentalist Christian home, she had two video games, one of which was ”Math Dragon.” She worked professionally as a web designer from 2000 to 2005 and once animated a palm tree using Flash. An avid photographer, her camera is a Canon A-1 film SLR from 1978. She is close friends with several nerds.

Hikari Takano’s the man! Our pal conducts a compelling and revealing interview with one of Hollywood’s true iconoclasts.

Rourke dishes on his dark days, his boxing career, the actor’s studio…and why Ben Affleck sucks!

Check out the full interview HERE

___________________________

For more incredible interviews from Hikari, check out his collosal website Hikari Takano Interviews!!

Ah…these kids today, I tell ya’!

In this telling gem of a video, the ZR’s latest intrepid reporter, ‘roving” Rich Collier, takes to the wild New York City streets to randomly interview some of today’s youth in order to ascertain how much they know about the greatest band of all time…their answers may surprise you.

Jeebus, who’s responsible for these zygotes growing up to be such blithering muldoons? Is it the parents, the internet, or is it just something innately deficient in their generational DNA? I dunno…you decide!

Oh yes, and once again…welcome aboard ‘Roving’ Rich…you’re one hell of a funny guy!

_______________________

‘Roving’ Rich Collier is a brother in arms, who likes to be called ‘moonlight’, but we prefer to call him ‘roving’. He’s an undiscovered genius, who fears one day he’ll wind up homeless, living in a cardboard box outside an OTB in Harlem. I disagree…he’s gonna make it after all! His colossal website ‘I Hate Young People’ is a celebration of all things young, arrogant and jaw-droppingly stupid…you MUST check it out! 

Our pal Hikari Takano does it again, nabbing an exclusive interview with director David O. Russell.

Russell has had one hell of a run so far, helming such indie classics as ‘Spanking the Monkey’ and ‘Flirting With Disaster’. This year, David was bestowed with perhaps the greatest honor of his career thus far, as his latest film ‘The Fighter’ was nominated for seven Academy Awards, including two for ‘Best Picture’ and ‘Best Director.

Check out the interview here!

___________________________

For more incredible interviews from Hikari, check out his collosal website Hikari Takano Interviews!!

Our pal Hikari Takano does it again, as he puts together one of the most comprehensive interviews with one of the greatest directors that ever lived.

Conversing on topics like ‘the importance of money’, ‘the making of Mulholland Drive’ and ‘the benefits of meditation’, this fascinating discussion brings a fresh insight into the mind of the a true genius.

Click HERE for the full interview. And while your there, make sure to check out all the other great conversations Hikari’s got posted!

We here at the Z Report are big fans of New York City’s pride and joy – Takeru Kobayashi. We feel he’s really elevated competitive eating from a strictly amateur-based past time, solely comprised of fat dudes who enjoy a few hot dogs on the weekend, to a truly legitimate sport.

His unique persona and distinct Manga-like look have totally re-defined the gestalt of the ‘eating contest’. In fact, we think he’s had a direct influence on shows like ‘Man vs. Food’, ‘Glutton for Punishment’ and ‘Bizarre Foods’.

So when we got the opportunity for an exclusive interview with the reclusive champion, we jumped at the chance!

ZEITGEISTY: Have you ever been approached to star in your own food-based TV show, perhaps a show similar to Man vs. Food?

TAKERU KOBAYASHI: Yes. I have.. even recently. Before ever coming to the States, I had already been on a Japanese food-based TV show, called The Food Battle Club. I won on that show, which was the first reason I became know as a “food fighter” in my own country.We have yet to have the perfect situation for a new food-based tv show, but I would love for that to happen!

Z: Have you ever seen any of these ‘food competition’ types of TV shows, and if so, what are your thoughts on them?

TK: I know about these shows, but I have never seen them. I just recently got a tv- so there are many things I have never seen yet.

Z: This past competition in July at that ‘certain competion held out in Coney Island’, there was a bit of controversy when it was reported that you ‘stormed the stage’. What exactly happened there…was it all just blown out of proportion by the press?

TK: Since I was not offered a contract I could sign, I was unable to be in the contest.  I decided to go anyway with friends to cheer on my fellow competitors who were going to compete. I wore a “Free Kobi” shirt along with friends to express that I should to be freed from the contract and compete. While we were in the crowd, fans began to notice that I was amongst them instead of on the stage and realized something was wrong. Many people started chanting, “Let him eat!, let him eat!”.. I got excited from the chanting and cheering, and before I knew it, my body had taken me onto the stage.  It wasn’t a planned or intentional action. It just happened.

ZR: Does your competitive eating have an effect on your regular eating? Meaning, has all of the training, and stuffing yourself negatively impacted on how you relate to food in general?

TK: Yes. It completely effects my regular eating. When I am eating normally, I don’t feel that I need to eat alot or that I am racing against a time. I am free to really appreciate the taste, the atmosphere of where I am, to be able to enjoy the time and situation of eating a meal. It has not negatively effected how I relate to food in general, at all. Oppositely, it has made me appreciate it. I and “food” have a great relationship.

Z: I’ve heard that you train in the gym 3-4 times a week, and that it’s mostly weight training. What is the connection between lifting weights, and eating as much as you can?

TK: Weight control. By weight lifting, I can control my weight and keep it exactly where I want. Mentally, the connection can also be the same. When lifting weights, there is a level of endurance that when is met, gives me a high- at this point, I can actually keep going more. When eating “as much as you can”, there is also that same point of endurance where I get the same rush, and suddenly I can eat more.

Z: Do you throw up your food after a competition?

TK: No. Never.

Z: Not to be too graphic, but I’m sure people would be interested…after eating such volume, is going to the bathroom afterwards ever a problem?

TK: No. It is not a problem. Releasing is only good for the body after eating.

Z: What is your favourite food? What is your least favourite food?

TK: My favorite foods are tofu, yogurt, bagels with lox spread, & springrolls. My least favorite food is “shirako”, which is milt from fish. It’s a delicacy in many countries, as in Japan. 

Z: I’ve read that if you weren’t a professional eater, you’d be a professional baseball player. Which is your favourite American team and your favourite player?

TK: I love the Yankees, and I loved Matsui.. I also thought he should stay with the Yankees.  I always root for the teams that I have had me in the past throw their first pitches, or come as a guest.  The Mets, Indians, & Rays!

So his favorite foods are bagels with lox spread and spring rolls!! Now THAT’S a Japanese New Yorker for you!!

Check out all the latest KOBI news along with an amazing  gallery of photographs at his colossal website TAKERU-KOBAYASHI.COM.

Today, comic fans around the world are mourning the loss of Comix innovator, writer, thinker, irascible curmudgeon, Cleveland icon and all around wonderul human being, Harvey Pekar.

He was found last night, just before 1 a.m. by his wife Joyce at their home.   He was 70 years old.

Harvey Pekar began his life-long, groundbreaking, chronicle “American Splendor” in 1976, with the help of his old friend (and comix legend in his own right); R. Crumb (It was later transformed into a successful movie (starring Paul Giamatti)).

“Splendor” is one of those creative touchstones that occur once every few generations.  With it, Harvey invented a new language of expression in the comic book form.  He literally flipped the entire paradigm on its head, replacing the superhero with the “anti-hero”, thus giving a voice to the work-a-day proletariat, and more importantly than that, provided inspiration for countless other artists who followed in his footsteps, from Joe Matt to Jaime Hernandez.

I will remember him most for unvarnished and uncompromising writing-style.  He had a way of describing the minutiae of life that gave it a depth and relevance that was never before realized in quite the same way. More than a storyteller, he was a truth teller.  His spare, almost poetic descriptions of every day events cut to the core of things.  Like other great poets and writers of the same cloth (Raymond Carver, Charles Bukowski) he wrote only what was needed in an unvarnished beauty that broke your heart.

He could be touching, funny, angry, but he always told the truth..

He will be sorely, sorely missed.  

Harvey Pekar was one of a kind, but most of all, he was a real mensch… something his oft times curmudgeonly exterior belied….  

A while back I had the distinct honor and privilege of interviewing Mr. Pekar for our website.  He was warm and generous and displayed all the wit, humor, intelligience and insight that you would expect from him (reprinted below).

In honor of this good man’s passing, take the time to read what was to be one of his last interviews.

God bless you Harvey.

______________________________

ORIGINAL DATE OF INTERVIEW SUMMER 2008

Who Is Harvey Pekar?

I’m not even going to try and list all of Harvey Pekar’s accomplishments in some neat little opening paragraph, with links to sites and stuff like that.. In the first place Harv doesn’t even use the computer, and in the second place this kinda goes beyond that…I wouldn’t even know where to begin really.. I think all I can do is write a personal note of warm thanks to Dino Haspiel for setting the interview up.. It’s a rare thing when you get the chance in life to meet a real bona fide hero of yours.. It’s rarer still when he turns out to be such a down to earth, sweet and yes LOVABLE guy…

I gave Harv a call on my lunch break.. and we talked for well over an hour.. I was pretty nervous, but he was fantastic… What struck me about him, was how unaware he was that so many people out there loved and respected him so much… I dunno.. I was overcome with the guy I have to say, he’s a very special cat!

Who Is Harvey Pekar? Let him speak for himself…

****

Out of all the comix legends still out there today, you’re probably the one that’s had the most direct impact on the industry, not only on the artists and how they tell their stories, but on the reader as well, creating a new way of perceiving comix as part art, part entertainment, part literature and all truth.. There was stuff going on before you arrived on the scene, but what you created really became the blue print for what we’ve come to know as independent comix.. Not to mention the influence you’ve had on independent film and music… Do you take great pride in this legacy of yours, knowing in some way you’re partly responsible for so much art both good and bad out there today…

Uh, Well to tell you the—I mean, I can’t help the bad work, but as far as the good work I feel pretty good about that. Actually, it was a long process for me to develop a concept like I did… You wanna know what I did?

Of course!

Ok when I was a little kid – I told this story before so if it seems like its old and corny you don’t have to use it – When I was a little kid, between the ages of 6 and 11, I used to read comics like a fiend… I’ve always been a fiend for one thing or another, either sports or a comix or, you know… JAZZ, different kinds of literature… ANYWAY, so when I got to be like in the 6th grade or something like that, I just, you know all the comic book stories, I could see that they had recurring elements and they were a lot of clichés, like the most obvious being that GOOD ALWAYS WINS and other things beside that… anyway… So I just gave up on comix from then until the underground stuff started coming out in the 60s with the exception of the fact that I really liked Mad Magazine a lot, I mean KURTZMAN’s (Harvey) work… and that was a big influence on underground comix.

So in ’62, Robert Crumb moved to Cleveland from Philadelphia, and he lived about a block and a half from me and he’s the guy that sort of — he and his roommate — hipped me to the underground scene, you know… and he stayed in Cleveland… he worked for the American Greeting Card company for about four years and then I guess he figured he went as far as he could go here and then moved out to San Francisco in the Winter of ‘66 or ’67… But by that time — see I was really into underground comix and I was mainly doing jazz criticism then — I started thinking that comix were generally… you know especially in those days, people looked down on comix, if you said something was like a comic book you know, you were putting it down…. But I saw there was no reason to think that they were intrinsically a limited form… ‘Cause you could choose ANY word that was in the dictionary… You got the same choice of words as SHAKESPEARE… and you got a huge variety of art styles that you could use. Comix are WORDS and PICTURES… WORDS AND PICTURES… you can do ANYTHING with WORDS and PICTURES…

So I just realized that comix at that point had never got beyond the superhero stuff mainly because of the publishers. They were just in it to make a buck and this is what sold and they didn’t want to get away from that formula. Which, I guess, if you’re a businessman and you don’t care about art too much then that’s what you can expect.

So anyway, I started thinking about ways that comix could expand and one thing I thought about was more REALISM… ‘Cause comix never had a realist movement like just about all other art forms had. So I figured if I could do some realistic comix, even if people don’t like ‘em , then maybe I would’ve gained a footnote in history… and so then I thought about doing stuff about the QUOTIDIEN LIFE… you know, “every day” life… because, for one thing, that’s all I knew… I always had a flunky job and lived in these little cramped apartments and was UNRELIEVED at that life. Day after day… BUT you know, I got excited about things like other people and stuff… you know, maybe I got worked up over a hundred dollars where someone else would get worked up for about a million, it’s the same thing… It’s all relative… It’s still a LOT OF MONEY… it’s just a question of scale…

Anyway… and also the quotidian life just is not dealt with very much in any art form because it’s thought that if everybody can identify with it, then people think it’s too COMMON to write about… BUT I DON’T.

People don’t write about things like how fucked up they get when they can’t find their keys or something like that so I thought people could really identify with that and would be really fresh…

“You invented the ENTIRE genre, that so many artists, like Joe Matt and Chester Brown, for instance, they took your blueprint and ran with it…

Yeah well, I think they’ve cited me as an influence.

But, yeah it was a long time… I didn’t even start doing the comix until 1972. Crumb was visiting me, he was living in California, and I decided to write a bunch of comic book stories. These were stories that had been in my head for YEARS. These were stories I used to tell… I was kind of like the class clown on the street corner comedian… So I had all these stories in my head and I wrote down about ten of ‘em and I gave ‘em to Crumb and I said, “Whaddaya think… are these VIABLE?” and he came back and he said, “Yeah, I’d like to take ‘em home with me and draw some of this stuff” … But he NOT ONLY DID THAT, illustrated some of my stories, which I think I’m about the only guy he ever did that for, which is something that really makes me feel good, ‘cause I have a lot of respect for Robert’s work, BUT he also told other guys about me and showed these stories around…

There was a guy named Willie Murphy who was a real good cartoonist who died young who did some of my stuff and that came out real nice and some of the stuff that Bob Armstrong did… Armstrong was in Crumb’s band, the Cheap Suit Serenaders… and he’s a good cartoonist and he did some stuff… and then as time went on I started getting more ambitious and I started thinking of writing LONGER stories and more complex stories and they were so long that they were longer than the normal comic book of that day… some of them would be like 35 pages long… So I decided — and the comic book business was in bad shape and everyone was having a hard time placing their work — so I decided in 1975 that I would PUT OUT MY OWN COMIC BOOK – AMERICAN SPLENDOR and I assumed I was gonna lose money on it, but I figured that I’ll quit spending all this money on all these rare jazz records and it’ll come out about even… AND THAT’S WHAT HAPPENED!

Cover of American Splendor #1

And after that, I got some nice articles written about me like in the Village Voice, not a whole lot, but it was encouraging. And so I just kept on going, that’s all… and it got to be more and more important to me.