Tolstoy ...

... said that "The aim of an artist is not to solve a problem irrefutably, but to make people love life in all its countless, inexhaustible manifestations".

So let's paint, sing, write, read, act, dream, or simply think on this cold winter day ...

Incedies ...

... is a Canadian film made by Denis Villeneuve, based on the play "Scorched" by Wajdi Mouawad. It is about family, love, hatred, irrational anger, broken promises, obscenity of war


Letter 1
I speak to the son, not to the torturer.
Whatever happens, I'll always love you.
I promised you that when you were born, my son.
Whatever happens, I will always love you.
I looked for you all my life.
I found you.
You couldn't recognise me.
You've a tattoo on your right heel.
I saw it.  I recognised you.
You are beautiful.
I wrapped you in tenderness, my love.
Take solace, for nothing means more than being together.
You were born of love.
So your bother and sister were born of love too.
Nothing means more than being  together.
Your mother, Nawal Marwan.
Prisoner no. 72




Letter 2
My loves, where does your story being.  
At your birth?  If so, it begins in horror.
At the birth of your father?  If so, then it begins in a great love story.
But I say your story begins with a promise,
to break the chain of anger
Thanks to you, today I have finally kept it.
The chain is broken.
Finally I can take the time to cradle you
to greatly sing a lullaby to console you.
Nothing means more than being together
I love you.
Your mother, Nawal

Invisible man ...

... By Ralph Ellison is a complex novel with multiple layers but its overarching theme for me is our individual identity in the midst of societal demands and the chaos of day-to-day life. I wonder how often I am invisible to others and even to myself ... Are others also invisible to me?

"And my problem was that I always tried to go in everyone’s way but my own. I have also been called one thing and then another while no one really wished to hear what I called myself. So after years of trying to adopt the opinions of others I finally rebelled. I am an invisible man."

I will follow you into the dark ...

... by Death Cab for Cutie ... reminds me of "Last night", a Canadian film from the last milliennium ... What would you be doing if today is the last day on earth?  It would be an interesting (and possibly the best) way for you to know if you are in love with someone.  Would you spend your last day on earth trying to find them, not knowing if you would reach them? Does seaching in the midst of uncertainity affect the meaning of your action? ... I did once, but now I am not so sure ...

Love of mine some day you will die
But I'll be close behind
I'll follow you into the dark

No blinding light or tunnels to gates of white
Just our hands clasped so tight
Waiting for the hint of a spark

If Heaven and Hell decide
That they both are satisfied
Illuminate the NOs on their vacancy signs


If there's no one beside you
When your soul embarks
Then I'll follow you into the dark


In Catholic school as vicious as Roman rule
I got my knuckles bruised by a lady in black
And I held my tongue as she told me
"Son fear is the heart of love"
So I never went back


If Heaven and Hell decide
That they both are satisfied
Illuminate the NOs on their vacancy signs

If there's no one beside you
When your soul embarks
Then I'll follow you into the dark


You and me have seen everything to see
From Bangkok to Calgary
And the soles of your shoes are all worn down
The time for sleep is now


It's nothing to cry about
'cause we'll hold each other soon
In the blackest of rooms


If Heaven and Hell decide
That they both are satisfied
Illuminate the No's on their vacancy signs


If there's no one beside you
When your soul embarks
Then I'll follow you into the dark
Then I'll follow you into the dark

Leo Tolstoy ...

... in "What Then Must We Do?" said ... "I sit on a man's back, choking him and making him carry me, and yet assure myself and others that I am very sorry for him and wish to ease his lot by all possible means -- except by getting off his back".

Sorry about the doom ...

... is the song by Slow Club which I listened to, as I cleared up tonight, after one of the best Birthday celebrations I have ever had; very authentic and relaxed.  Awesome friends, lovely eclectic mix of food (Vietnamese/Chinese prawns starter, Sri Lanka salmon curry, French poached pears), truffles, wines, just the right amount of competitiveness at Cranium, thrown in organising a November holiday, and ending up watching lots of random Elmo youtube videos (with some feeble attempts from us to imitate his chicken dancing!) ... Nearly perfect, even without some in depth discussion about the meaning of life :p ... 


The lyrics for this song has a real sense of hopelessness to it, but the music is liked a lullaby, very soothing.  Maybe this moment in time for me involves finally closing a heavy polished wooden door, saying a proper goodbye to an era, and embracing the times ahead with a head filled with crazy explorations and a heart full of adventitious dream ...


Meanwhile, there is a dinner with fellow believers to share, an afterparty for "Phantom" 25th anniversary to dance to, "Jewels" to watch, lovely friends to see, ancient Egypt to visit, and of course, good old psychotherapy session to attend to ... Life is never bleak at this end of the world, but tremendously blessed ... 


I agree you were right to say we're doomed 
Cuz there isn't a chance that I'll get to be in your arms soon 
Cuz I'm back on the road now 
And there is nothing that we can do 
I have to find a way to make the days pass soon 

We spend our time looking for which one fits best 
And in the morning I am waking 
And I'm wondering how its me who ended up like this 
Cuz I'm the one who said it would be easy 
Now I'm the one whose feeling worse 
Cuz I agreed that I would never be put first 

And I know your heart is beating slow 
And out of time with mine 

So now I'll say goodbye

Nuovo cinema Paradiso ...

... was released as "Cinema Paradiso", a visually stunning Italian film written and directed by Giuseooe Tornatore. The story itself is very simple; an autobiography of a film marker whose childhood evolved around the Cinema Paradiso and his friendship with "Alfredo".  A sense of nostalgia permeates throughout the film, bathing in bittersweet helplessness.  The last scene was a montage of all the kiss scenes which the priest has ordered to be cut, allowing the broken fragments to end in an embrace  ... 


When Toto fell in love,
Alfredo: Once upon a time, a king gave a feast. And there came the most beautiful princesses of the realm. Now, a soldier, who was standing guard, saw the king's daughter go by. She was the most beautiful one, and he immediately fell in love with her. But what could a poor soldier do when it came to the daughter of the king? Well, finally, one day, he managed to meet her, and he told her that he could no longer live without her. The princess was so impressed by his strong feelings that she said to the soldier: "If you can wait 100 days and 100 nights under my balcony, then at the end of it, I shall be yours." Damn! The soldier immediately went there and waited one day. And two days. And ten. And then twenty. And every evening, the princess looked out of her window, but he never moved. During rain, during wind, during snow, he was always there. The bird shat on his head, and the bees stung him, but he didn't budge. After ninety nights, he had become all dried up, all white, and the tears streamed from his eyes. He couldn't hold them back. He no longer had the strength to sleep. All that time, the princess watched him. And on the 99th night, the soldier stood up, took his chair, and went away. 


At the seaside,
Alfredo: Living here day by day, you think it's the center of the world. You believe nothing will ever change. Then you leave: a year, two years. When you come back, everything's changed. The thread's broken. What you came to find isn't there. What was yours is gone. You have to go away for a long time... many years... before you can come back and find your people. The land where you were born. But now, no. It's not possible. Right now you're blinder than I am. 
Salvatore: Who said that? Gary Cooper? James Stewart? Henry Fonda? Eh?
Alfredo: No, Toto. Nobody said it. This time it's all me. Life isn't like in the movies. Life... is much harder. 

It's Friday I'm in love ...

... is a song by The Cure.  It is not the most profound lyrics on earth, but it is a great end-of-summer song ... (I am still holding on despite the wind, at least, the sun is shining!).


I don't care if Monday's blue
Tuesday's gray and Wednesday too
Thursday I don't care about you
It's Friday, I'm in love

Monday you can fall apart
Tuesday, Wednesday break my heart
Oh, Thursday doesn't even start
It's Friday I'm in love

Saturday, wait
And Sunday always comes too late
But Friday, never hesitate...

I don't care if Mondays black
Tuesday, Wednesday - heart attack
Thursday, never looking back
It's Friday, I'm in love

Monday, you can hold your head
Tuesday, Wednesday stay in bed
Or Thursday - watch the walls instead
It's Friday, I'm in love

Saturday, wait
And Sunday always comes too late
But Friday, never hesitate...

Dressed up to the eyes
It's a wonderful surprise
To see your shoes and your spirits rise
Throwing out your frown
And just smiling at the sound
And as sleek as a sheik
Spinning round and round
Always take a big bite
It's such a gorgeous sight
To see you eat in the middle of the night
You can never get enough
Enough of this stuff
It's Friday, I'm in love

I don't care if Monday's blue
Tuesday's gray and Wednesday too
Thursday I don't care about you
It's Friday, I'm in love

Monday you can fall apart
Tuesday, Wednesday break my heart
Thursday doesn't even start
It's Friday I'm in love

Gone with the wind ...

... is a heart shattering beautiful book by Margaret Mitchell.  Part of me wished that I have read it when I am much older, as it is so rich, so devastating, so broken, yet so full of hope in this world with its crushing reality and war ... and the ending ...

"Scarlett, I was never one to patiently pick up broken fragments and glue them together and tell myself that the mended whole was as good as new.  What is broken is broken - and I'd rather remember it as it was at its best than mend it and see the broken places as long as I lived.  Perhaps, if I were younger - " He signed.  "But I'm too old to believe in such sentimentalities as clean slates and starting all over.  I'm too old to shoulder the burden of constant lies that go with living in polite disillusionment.  I couldn't live with you now.  I wish I could care what you do or where you go, but I can't."
He drew a short breath and said lightly but softly:
"My dear, I don't give a damn".

One day ...

... by David Nicholls is not my favourite book on earth, but I like its sentiments, its hopes, its dreams, its failures, its disappointments, its tragedies, for "This is where it all begins. Everything starts here, today."

The Echo Maker ...

... by Richard Powers is a beautifully book about human miscommunication and disconnections; the search of our own identities in this fluid world, with Capgas syndrome (a condition when you believed that your loved one has been replaced by an identical-looking imposter) and cranes annual migration as the central metaphors ... Are "we" just a collection of neuronal firing and connections, or how others perceive us?  What is the notion of us?  Do we have a soul?  It is a perfect antidote to "Consciousness explained" by Daniel Dennett ...


 “I am No One
   but Tonight on North Line Road
   GOD led me to you
   so You could Live
   and bring back someone else.”

The Cherry Orchard ...

... by Anton Chekhov; a mixture of comedy and tragedy, as changes overtaken Russia ... I wonder what your cherry orchard is ...


Act 2
TROFIMOV. All Russia is our orchard. The land is great and beautiful, there are many marvellous places in it. [Pause] Think, Anya, your grandfather, your great-grandfather, and all your ancestors were serf-owners, they owned living souls; and now, doesn't something human look at you from every cherry in the orchard, every leaf and every stalk? Don't you hear voices . . . ? Oh, it's awful, your orchard is terrible; and when in the evening or at night you walk through the orchard, then the old bark on the trees sheds a dim light and the old cherry-trees seem to be dreaming of all that was a hundred, two hundred years ago, and are oppressed by their heavy visions. Still, at any rate, we've left those two hundred years behind us. So far we've gained nothing at all--we don't yet know what the past is to be to us--we only philosophize, we complain that we are dull, or we drink vodka. For it's so clear that in order to begin to live in the present we must first redeem the past, and that can only be done by suffering, by strenuous, uninterrupted labour. Understand that, Anya.


Act 3
ANYA. Mother! mother, are you crying? My dear, kind, good mother, my beautiful mother, I love you! Bless you! The cherry orchard is sold, we've got it no longer, it's true, true, but don't cry mother, you've still got your life before you, you've still your beautiful pure soul . . . Come with me, come, dear, away from here, come! We'll plant a new garden, finer than this, and you'll see it, and you'll understand, and deep joy, gentle joy will sink into your soul, like the evening sun, and you'll smile, mother! Come, dear, let's go!


Yet, did Trofimov paint a picture of our capitalist society has bought us to?


Act 2 
TROFIMOV. The human race progresses, perfecting its powers. Everything that is unattainable now will some day be near at hand and comprehensible, but we must work, we must help with all our strength those who seek to know what fate will bring. Meanwhile in Russia only a very few of us work. The vast majority of those intellectuals whom I know seek for nothing, do nothing, and are at present incapable of hard work. They call themselves intellectuals, but they use "thou" and "thee" to their servants, they treat the peasants like animals, they learn badly, they read nothing seriously, they do absolutely nothing, about science they only talk, about art they understand little. They are all serious, they all have severe faces, they all talk about important things. They philosophize, and at the same time, the vast majority of us, ninety-nine out of a hundred, live like savages, fighting and cursing at the slightest opportunity, eating filthily, sleeping in the dirt, in stuffiness, with fleas, stinks, smells, moral filth, and so on. . . And it's obvious that all our nice talk is only carried on to distract ourselves and others. Tell me, where are those créches we hear so much of? and where are those reading-rooms? People only write novels about them; they don't really exist. Only dirt, vulgarity, and Asiatic plagues really exist. . . . I'm afraid, and I don't at all like serious faces; I don't like serious conversations. Let's be quiet sooner.

The slap ...

… is a book by Christos Tsiolkas about the rippling effects of an adult slapping a child at a suburban barbecue … the perspectives of various characters in regards to the events and their lives are shared with us, leading to some confusion and understanding …

“The sufferings and the pain and the arguments and the mistakes of the past did not matter.  In the end, they did not matter.  Was that what the dream had shown him?  Manolis was glad that there was no outstanding hatred, resentment or feud that he would take to the grave with him.  He doubted Thimios had either, he was not that kind of man.  Regrets, of course, only an imbecile did not have regrets.  Regrets, some shame, a little guilt.  But they had all done the best they could, they had raised their children well, educated them, housed them, made them safe and secure.  They had all been good people.  Death was never welcome but He always came.  It was only to be truly lamented when He took the young, those neither prepared nor deserving of it.  Then death was cruel …”

Guaranteed ...

... is a song by Eddie Vedder for the film "Into the Wild" about our search for freedom in this broken, fragmented world ... 


On bended knee is no way to be free
lifting up an empty cup I ask silently
that all my destinations will accept the one that's me
so I can breath

Circles they grow and they swallow people whole
half their lives they say goodnight to wive's they'll never know
got a mind full of questions and a teacher in my soul
so it goes...

Don't come closer or I'll have to go
Holding me like gravity are places that pull
If ever there was someone to keep me at home
It would be you...

Everyone I come across in cages they bought
they think of me and my wandering
but I'm never what they thought
got my indignation but I'm pure in all my thoughts
I'm alive...

Wind in my hair, I feel part of everywhere
underneath my being is a road that disappeared
late at night I hear the trees
they're singing with the dead
overhead...

Leave it to me as I find a way to be
consider me a satelite for ever orbiting
I knew all the rules but the rules did not know me
guaranteed...

Amazing Camus ...

... has brilliantly summarised the dilemmas we face in life ... - "I don’t know whether this world has a meaning that transcends it. But I know that I cannot know that meaning and that it is impossible for me just now to know it. What can a meaning outside my condition mean to me? I can understand only in human terms. What I touch, what resists me — that I understand. And these two certainties — my appetite for the absolute and for unity and the impossibility of reducing this world to a rational and reasonable principle — I also know that I cannot reconcile them. What other truth can I admit without lying, without bringing in a hope I lack and which means nothing within the limits of my conditions?"


"Nobody realizes that some people expend tremendous energy merely to be normal." 

This poem belongs to you ...

... by David Whyte is a perfect closure ...

This poem
  belongs to you
    and is already finished,

it was begun years ago
     and I put it away

knowing it would come
   into the world
     in its own time.

In fact
   you have already read it,
     and closing the pages
       of the book,

you are now
  abandoning the projects
     of the day and putting on
       your shoes and coat
         to take a walk.

It has been long years
   since you felt like this.

You have remembered
   what I remembered,
     when I first began to write.

Such great heights ...

... by postal service is the perfect song for this summer, come rain or shine and anything else will "just not fly" ...

I am thinking it's a sign that the freckles
In our eyes are mirror images and when
We kiss they're perfectly aligned
And I have to speculate that God himself
Did make us into corresponding shapes like
Puzzle pieces from the clay
And true, it may seem like a stretch, but
Its thoughts like this that catch my troubled
Head when you're away when I am missing you to death
When you are out there on the road for
Several weeks of shows and when you scan
The radio, I hope this song will guide you home

They will see us waving from such great
Heights, 'come down now,' they'll say
But everything looks perfect from far away,
'come down now,' but we'll stay...

I tried my best to leave this all on your
Machine but the persistent beat it sounded
Thin upon listening
And that frankly will not fly. You will hear
The shrillest highs and lowest lows with
The windows down when this is guiding you home

A tale of love and darkness ....

... by Amos Oz is a semi-autobiography about a childhood in Israel, a land of love and darkness ...

"He considered all human beings to be reckless children who brought great disappointment and suffering upon themselves and each other, all of us trapped in an ending, unsubtle comedy that would generally end badly.  All roads led to suffering.  Consequently virtually everyone, in Papa's view, deserved compassion and most of their deeds were worthy of forgiveness, including all sorts of machinations, pranks, deceptions, pretensions, manipulations, false claims and pretences.  From all these he would absolve you with his faint, mischievous smile, as though saying (in Yiddish): Nu, what".

All Quiet on the Western Front

… is a novel by Erich Maria Remarque about the First World War, narrated by Paul Baumer, a 19 years old German schoolboy-soldier, giving us an account of “a generation that was destroyed by the war – even those of it who survived the shelling”, with a common enemy being Death. 

He is right.  We’re no longer young men.  We’ve lost any desire to conquer the world.  We are refugees.  We are fleeing from ourselves.  From our lives.  We were eighteen years old, and we had just begun to love the world and to love being in it; but we had to shoot at it.  The first hell to land went straight for our hearts.  We’ve been cut off from real action, from getting on, from progress.  We don’t believe in those things any more; we believe in the war …

We have turned into dangerous animals.  We are not fighting, we are defending ourselves from annihilation.  We are not hurling our grenades against human beings – what do we know about all that in the heat of the moment? – the hands and the helmets that are after us belong to Death himself, and for the first time in three day we are able to look Death in the eyes, for the first time in three days we can defend ourselves against it, we are maddened with fury, not lying there waiting impotently for the executioner any more, we can destroy and we can kill to save ourselves, to save ourselves and to take revenge …

But here in the trenches we have lost that memory.  It no longer rises up from inside us – we are dead and the memory is far off on some distant horizon, an apparition, a puzzling reflection come to haunt us, something we are afraid of and which we love without hope.  It is strong, and our desire is strong; but it is unattainable, and we know it …

And even if someone were to give us it back, that landscape of our youth, we wouldn’t have much idea of how to handle it.  The tender, secret forces that bound it to us cannot come back to life.  We should be in the landscape, wandering around; we should remember, and love it, and be moved by the sight of it.  But it would be just the sane as when we see a photograph of one of our own friends who has been killed, and we sop to think about it.  The features are his, the face is his, and the days we spent with him take on a deceptive life in our memories; but it isn't really him …

Nowadays we would no longer have any real links with the way we used to be.  It wasn’t the awareness of how beautiful it was that meant so much to us, or of how good the atmosphere was, but the feeling of community, the way we all felt a kinship with the objects and events of our existence.  That’s what set us apart and made our parents’ world a little difficult for us to understand; because somehow we were always gently bound up with that world, submissive to it all, and the smallest thing led us onwards along the path of eternity.  Perhaps it was just the privilege of our youth – we were not yet able to see any restrictions, and we could not admit to ourselves that things would ever come to and end; expectation was in our blood, and this meant that we were at one with our lives as the day went by …

Now we would wander around like strangers in those landscapes of our youth.  We have been consumed in the fires of reality, we perceive differences only in the way tradesmen do, and we see necessities like butchers. WE are free of care no longer – we are terrifyingly indifferent.  We might be present in that world, but would we be alive in it?

We are like children, who have been abandoned and we are as experienced as old men, we are coarse, unhappy, superficial – I think that we are lost. 

Des hommes et des dieux (of Gods and men) ...

... is a silent yet dynamic film by Xavier Beauvois about a group of Cistercian monks living harmoniously with their Muslim neighbours among the Atlas mountains, until the worldly forces descended ... Decisions regarding if they should stay or leave, how to act, what to trust, what to love linger throughout the film.  Towards the end, the following letter written by one of the monks was read ... 


"Should it ever befall me, and it could happen today, to be a victim of the terrorism swallowing up all foreigners here, I would like my community, my church, my family, to remember that my life was given to God and to his country. That the Unique Master of all life was no stranger to this brutal departure. And that my death is the same as so many other violent ones, consigned to the apathy of oblivion. I've lived enough to know, I am complicit in the evil that, alas, prevails over the world and the evil that will smite me blindly. I could never desire such a death. I could never feel gladdened that these people I love be accused randomly of my murder. I know the contempt felt for the people here, indiscriminately. And I know how Islam is distorted by a certain Islamism. This country, and Islam, for me are something different. They're a body and a soul. My death, of course, will quickly vindicate those who call me naïve or idealistic, but they must know that I will be freed of a burning curiosity and, God willing, will immerse my gaze in the Father's and contemplate with him his children of Islam as he sees them. This thank-you which encompasses my entire life includes you, of course, friends of yesterday and today, and you too, friend of last minute, who knew not what you were doing. Yes, to you as well I address this thank-you and this farewell which you envisaged. May we meet again, happy thieves in Paradise, if it pleases God the Father of us both. Amen. Insha'Allah".