"East is East and West is West and never the twain shall meet," Rudyard Kipling once wrote.
This quote has inspired the title for both my humorous blinks at international marriage and Don Maloney's classic Japan Times column of years ago, "Never the Twain," which also poked fun at life in Japan.
Yet, at the moment nothing seems even remotely funny. Mesmerized by the carnage on the TV screen late last Tuesday night and on into Wednesday morning, I admit to having had no first thoughts whatsoever -- not even knee jerk reactions. Instead I felt crushed by an immeasurable sorrow that left me unable to shuffle from my liv- ingroom.