REPTIL

Reptil - a Spanish phototale

Paul Auster's New York Maze.

Below I publish once written paper on Auster's novel The New York Trilogy. This is one of my favorites novels that's why I decided to deliver a lecture on it back in 2004. I strongly recommend this novel to anyone who likes detective stories. But be aware - this one is definitely not "a classical" detective story.  

PAUL AUSTER’S NEW YORK MAZE

            The subject of this paper concerns the creation of the novel by the author and reader in Paul Auster’s The New York Trilogy. This paper focuses on the development of characters as well as on the importance of the reader. While working on this project I predominantly consulted Chris Pace’s thesis that describes the concepts of Auster’s books.

            The New York Trilogy is comprised of three short novels (City of Glass, Ghosts and The Locked Room). They start like conventional detective stories. In City of Glass, Daniel Quinn – a writer of detective novels – takes on the role of a detective named Paul Auster in order to find the whereabouts and true intentions of puzzling Peter Stilmann. In Ghosts, there is also the detective quest to explore hidden motives of characters. In this novel, the detective named Blue is hired at the beginning of the novel by a man named White to watch a man called Black. Unlike Quinn who is merely a writer of detective stories and experiments with pretending to be a detective, Blue’s profession is investigation and spying people. The third novel The Locked Room also starts very curiously. A boyhood friend (who narrates the story) starts to investigate the life of his pal Fanshawe. The plot commences when Fanshawe disappears, leaving behind his wife and a child but also unpublished manuscripts.

            What can we expect from a classical novel? Peter Huhn in his article “The Detective as Reader: Narrativity and Reading Concepts in Detective Fiction” distinguishes in the plot of the classical detective novel “two basically separate stories – the story of the crime (which consists of action) and the story of the investigation (which is concerned with knowledge).”[1] Detective novels have rigid conventions of how the plot must develop, what the role of character is and also how the roles of the reader and author function. “The readers in addition to characters are fated to follow the dictates of the author because it is the author who chooses the setting, the action, and the plot (...) he or she [the readers] must rely on the God-like near-omnipotence of the detective for a proper reading of reality’s text. This powerlessness on the reader‘s part is indicative of the general relationship between all readers and all authors. Seen in this light, texts become locked rooms to which only the author has the keys.”[2]

            In The New York Trilogy, Auster destroys the conventions of a detective novel. He also abandons the stereotype of reading the detective novel. He accomplishes it by making his characters aware of their existences as characters. But before that they must realize that they had fallen into a trap set by the author; that they are the characters placed in a novel written by someone who can control them; someone who controls their actions, words they speak – an omnipotent creator. Chris Pace comments: “they [the characters] have been placed in a labyrinth by the author, a maze which often gives them the illusion of control, but which in truth is designed especially for them (or are they designed especially for it?), so that what appear to be choices on their parts are actually predestined actions determined for them by the invisible author.”[3]

An example may come from City of Glass. Daniel Quinn, while following Peter Stilmann, gets enmeshed in a maze of deduction.  Hoping to solve Stilmann’s mystery, Quinn interprets possible clues that Stilmann might have left. The clues are possible but not certain. According to Quinn, there are important clues but somebody else (i.e. the reader) might find them meaningless. Quinn’s interpretation of these clues is farfetched. Daniel Quinn as well as Blue from Ghosts believe that “each word tallies exactly with the thing described” only to find later that “words do not necessary work, that it is possible for them to obscure the things they are trying to say.”[4] In this respect the language becomes “a barrier between oneself and others, rather than a means of clear communication.”[5]

            To facilitate the problem and not to reveal too much of the Quinn’s perplexing story let me recall a similar case that happened to a famous cartoon character – Johnny Bravo. In one of Bravo’s cartoons, Johnny goes in panic because his mom does not appear on time at home. He is terrified because of a thought that something could have happened to her. He decides to call for help the detective who advertises his services on TV. The man together with Johnny roams the streets in search for the missing mom. The cartoon detective seeks every possible thing that in his opinion is the clue to reveal the mystery of the missing mother. For example, Johnny and the detective enter a restaurant in which they are served fortune cookies. The detective treats the message that he found inside the cookie as a credible premise and strong evidence that leads to the kidnapped mom. He goes after each sign that instead of revealing the truth makes the situation more complicated. The cartoon detective behaves in similar way like Daniel Quinn from City of Glass. They both believe that signs “scattered” on the streets will help finding the solution to the secret. But their interpretations of the signs lead them astray, direct them into a blind allay. The more signs they wish to interpret the more obscure the world becomes and the farther from the truth. The whole world becomes “becomes a giant city of glass with each person trapped in a room by him or herself, where we can all see one another, but no one can hear a word that the other say.”[6]

            Finally, all major characters (Quinn, Blue, Fanshawe’s best friend) manage to escape from the confines of the book. Starting from that point they are no longer the protagonists in one of the books written by some invisible author. They become authors of their own life, acting according to their wish, choosing on their own:

         Where he goes after that is not important. (…) I myself prefer to think that he went far away, boarding a train that morning and going out West to start a new life. It is even possible that America was not the end of it. In my secret dreams, I like to think of Blue booking passage on some ship and sailing to China. Let it be China, then, and we’ll leave it at that. For now is the moment that Blue stands up from his chair, puts on his hat, and walks through the door. And for this moment on, we know nothing.[7]

            Blue, the spying detective from Ghosts, is also locked in a room of the novel. He has to break free and escape from the compulsory way of being that was imposed on him by the invisible author. Blue is confined to his room from where he looks through the window and spies on Black. The windows of the room are directly opposite the room which Black inhabits. White who hired Blue pays for the rent; he previously equipped the apartment with clothes, food and other supplies. Blue has perfect conditions for sitting in the room and watching Black. What also keeps Blue in this room is that his subject of observation does not go out often. Blue is trapped in his room. There is nothing he can do but sit at the desk and watch Black, writing down everything he sees. What Black does is also sitting at the desk and writing or reading. It is after some time that Blue realizes he is trapped. His sole action enslaves him, makes him feel ensnared. He realizes his own isolation: “They have trapped Blue into doing nothing, into being so inactive as to reduce his life to almost no life at all. He feels like a man who has been condemned to sit in a room and go on reading a book for the rest of his life.”[8] Blue has been placed in a locked room and like other characters in the novel he experiences constant surveillance. Pace shrewdly comments:        

Despite the fact that Blue is supposedly the one writing about Black, it is actually Black who is the author, the controller of the situation, because it is his actions that dictate what Blue will write. Even when Blue leaves the locked room which White has rented for him, it is only to follow Black. His actions are no longer his own, but rather fated for him depending on Black’s actions. This situation becomes even more mysterious and raises even more questions about authors and characters when we learn that Black, posing as White, was probably the man who hired him in the first place.[9]

In Locked Room, the unnamed narrator realizes that he has become a character in a work of fiction written by his boyhood friend Fanshawe. After the mysterious disappearance, the narrator publishes Fanshawe’s works, marries his forlorn wife and takes care of the child. Firstly, it sounds like an odd series of coincidences. But then the narrator receives a letter from Fanshawe who thanks him for helping his family but on the other hand wants to be treated as a dead man. This raises suspicions about the recent events that had happened to the narrator. It seems that Fanshawe pulls the strings and that he had arranged the narrator’s past few months of life. The narrator literally takes Fanshawe’s place while Fanshawe hides himself from the outside world. “The narrator is trapped in a locked room that appears to be as large as the world and to include all possibilities within it, but which in reality is so tiny that he is constrained no matter what he does. He has almost no chance to escape, because he cannot even define the boundaries that make up his prison.”[10] The narrator finally reclaims his identity by reclaiming his creative power. He discovers his potential as an author, creator of the world and master of words. He realizes his potential as an artist while sitting in a bar. He calls newly met girl Fayaway after the character from Melville’s novel Typee. Then he discerns an American walking in and also tries to match a name for him:

I had never seen this man before, and yet there was something familiar about him, something that stopped me from turning away: a brief scald, a weird synapse of recognition. I tried out various names on him, shunted him through the past, unraveled the spool of associations – but nothing happened. He’s no one, I said to myself, finally giving up. And then, out of the blue, by some muddled chain of reasoning, I finished the thought by adding: and if he’s no one, then he must be Fanshawe (…) I exulted in the sheer falsity of my assertion, celebrating the new power I has just bestowed upon myself. I was the sublime alchemist who could change the world at will. This man was Fanshawe because I said he was Fanshawe, and that was all there was to it.[11]

The narrator has escaped from the locked room by naming people according to his will. Therefore, he creates his individual world that is subdued to his control. He escaped from Fanshawe’s universe and is now able to create a world of his own. Auster makes his characters become aware of their own existence and their potential to act like an author of the novel.

            Apart from characters the readers also have their role in creating the novel. Chris Pace explains:

Auster, through the process of making his characters self-aware, encourages the readers to realize their own potential as creators in the telling of the story, to become conscious of the ways in which they shape the book. Rather than confining us to the role of unconsciously filling in the blanks, Auster instead forces us to recognize the power of our imagination in constructing the text.[12]

Later the author of “Escaping from the Locked Room” clarifies and says that “Auster makes his characters aware that like some readers, they are trapped in the locked room of a conventionally structured novel whose structures lead only back to the text itself, and not to the world that exists outside of the novel.”[13]

            Daniel Quinn realizes that the reader plays very important role in constructing the novel. While waiting in the railway station, he observes a girl reading one of his books. Instead of feeling content, he is quite disappointed and angry. He feels offended because she skims the pages that had cost him so much effort. Though he is offended he is still interested in the girl’s opinion of the book:

(…) ‘I was just wondering if you liked the book.’

The girl shrugged. ‘I’ve read better and I’ve read worse.’

Quinn wanted to drop the conversation right there, but something in him persisted. Before he could get up and leave, the words were already out of his mouth. ‘Do you find it interesting?’

The girl shrugged again and cracked her gum loudly. ‘Sort of. There’s a part where the detective gets lost. That’s kind of scary.’

‘Is he a smart detective?’

‘Yeah, he’s smart. But he talks too much.’

‘You’d like more action?’

‘I guess so.’

‘If you don’t like it, why do you go on reading?’

‘I don’t know.’ The girl shrugged once again. ‘It passes the time, I guess. Anyway, it’s no big deal. It’s just a book.’[14]

Quinn understands that the people who read his words are as important to the story as the author is; the interpreters are as important as the speakers. He realizes that no matter how simply and clearly he writes something it will still be open to as many different interpretations as there are readers. The power of the story will not necessarily derive from the power of the author, but rather from the power of the imagination of the reader and willingness to use that power.

            In The New York Trilogy characters are presented as trapped people in some kind of a locked room – either mental or physical – from which they must escape. In City of Glass, Daniel Quinn encounters a difficult task, very demanding and surpassing his power of deduction. Therefore, he gets entangled in a maze of words. Rather than a means of clear communication, language stands as a barrier between people. The world becomes a giant city of glass with each person trapped in a room by him or herself, where we can all see one another, but no one can hear a word that the others say.[15] Readers are also trapped in a locked room because are fated to follow the dictates of the author who chooses the setting, action and plot.

            Auster himself elaborates on the importance of the reader in the interview. He explains his view on the example of a fairy tale:

 [Fairy tales] are bare-boned narratives, narratives largely devoid of details, yet enormous amounts of information are communicated in a very short space, with very few words. What fairy tales prove, I think, is that it's the reader—or the listener—who actually tells the story to himself. The text is no more than a springboard for the imagination. 'Once upon a time there was a girl who lived with her mother in a house at the edge of a large wood.' You don't know what the girl looks like, you don't know what color the house is, you don't know if the mother is tall or short, fat or thin, you know next to nothing. But the mind won't allow these things to remain blank; it fills in the details itself, it creates images based on its own memories and experiences—which is why these stories resonate so deeply inside us. The listener becomes an active participant in the story.[16]

Auster points here on the reader as the one who ought to recognize the power of imagination in constructing the text. Chris Pace draws conclusions from the interview conducted with Paul Auster who says that we should not approach texts as riddles to be solved, but rather as “springboards for imagination:”

Books should make one think, and lead one to self-consciously reorder the world as an act of creation, just as the writer has consciously ordered some sort of reality in the book (…) through art and artistic creation. This is why it is so important for the reader to realize his or her creative role in the text, and write the story for him- or herself so that it provides a new way of seeing the world and understanding one's place in it. If one simply read and believed in whatever the writer said, then the conventions of the novel would take over real life, since, as Auster says, “reality is something we invent.”[17]

In Ghosts, Blue feels like a reader who reads a conventionally structured novel. It is also because Blue and the reader are “only half-alive at best, seeing the world only through words, living only through the lives of others.”[18]

Like the inactive reader of a conventionally structured novel, Blue no longer has any experiences that are truly his own; all that happens to him is a secondary reflection of Black’s actions. Black has put him into a box, whose role here as a manipulator of people in an artificial environment of his making is closely akin to that of an author.[19]

Blue is locked by the overwhelming power of the author. What distinguishes Blue from conventional characters is that he becomes conscious that he is kept locked. He recognizes the danger and states: “There is no story, no plot, no action – nothing but a man sitting alone in a room and writing a book. That’s all there is, Blue realizes, and he no longer wants any part of it. But how to get out? How to get out of the room that is the book that will go on being written for as long as he stays in the room?”[20]

‘Reality is something we invent’ – says Paul Auster and by saying that he points to the one who reads the book (not necessarily Auster’s). Readers may naturally fall in the same trap like the characters from The New York Trilogy. The conventional detective novel keeps the reader within its strict conventions. While reading such book the booklover follows the established rules of a detective novel and the ending is barely a surprise. On the other hand, Auster’s novel leaves many clues and not used alternatives that can puzzle the reader and make him aware of the arbitrariness of the characters’ choices.

---

[1] Pace, Chris. „Escaping from the Locked Room: Overthrowing the Tyranny of Artifice in Paul Auster’s New York Trilogy.”

[2] Pace, Chris. „Escaping from the Locked Room: Overthrowing the Tyranny of Artifice in Paul Auster’s New York Trilogy.”

[3] Pace, Chris. „Escaping from the Locked Room: Overthrowing the Tyranny of Artifice in Paul Auster’s New York Trilogy.”

[4] Auster, Paul. The New York Trilogy. Great Britain: Faber and Faber Limited, 1992: 146-8.

[5] Pace, Chris. „Escaping from the Locked Room: Overthrowing the Tyranny of Artifice in Paul Auster’s New York Trilogy.”

[6] Pace, Chris. „Escaping from the Locked Room: Overthrowing the Tyranny of Artifice in Paul Auster’s New York Trilogy.”

[7] Auster, Paul. The New York Trilogy. Great Britain: Faber and Faber Limited, 1992: 195-6.

[8] Auster, Paul. The New York Trilogy. Great Britain: Faber and Faber Limited, 1992: 169.

[9] Pace, Chris. „Escaping from the Locked Room: Overthrowing the Tyranny of Artifice in Paul Auster’s New York Trilogy.”

[10] Pace, Chris. „Escaping from the Locked Room: Overthrowing the Tyranny of Artifice in Paul Auster’s New York Trilogy.”

[11] Auster, Paul. The New York Trilogy. Great Britain: Faber and Faber Limited, 1992: 295-6.

[12] Pace, Chris. „Escaping from the Locked Room: Overthrowing the Tyranny of Artifice in Paul Auster’s New York Trilogy.”

[13] Pace, Chris. „Escaping from the Locked Room: Overthrowing the Tyranny of Artifice in Paul Auster’s New York Trilogy.”

[14] Auster, Paul. The New York Trilogy. Great Britain: Faber and Faber Limited, 1992: 53.

[15] Pace, Chris. „Escaping from the Locked Room: Overthrowing the Tyranny of Artifice in Paul Auster’s New York Trilogy.”

[16] Pace, Chris. „Escaping from the Locked Room: Overthrowing the Tyranny of Artifice in Paul Auster’s New York Trilogy.”

[17] Pace, Chris. „Escaping from the Locked Room: Overthrowing the Tyranny of Artifice in Paul Auster’s New York Trilogy.”

[18] Auster, Paul. The New York Trilogy. Great Britain: Faber and Faber Limited, 1992: 169.

[19] Pace, Chris. „Escaping from the Locked Room: Overthrowing the Tyranny of Artifice in Paul Auster’s New York Trilogy.”

[20] Auster, Paul. The New York Trilogy. Great Britain: Faber and Faber Limited, 1992: 169-170.

 

Rene in the laundromat

In the laundromat Rene has already finished doing the laundry and packed his things inside a black travel suitcase on wheels. I packed the dirty clothes and washing powder in the washing machine, inserted a token and hit the start button. He started speaking Dutch then English and we rolled on a nice discussion. 37 minutes: the counter estimated time till the end of washing.
'My parents were born in Poland. Somewhere near Lodz, I guess. They were Jewish. I was born in Germany.' He looked at me from beneath his small glasses. A 73-year-old artist, painter, traveler, four times divorced, father to two daughters - he advised me not to use black socks.
'They cause more infections than white socks' he continued and mentioned some diseases you can get in India, Indonesia, he mentioned Africa and didn't forget about Palestine and Iran.
'During the war I went to France and stayed in the camp until my mother got me out of there. Then we moved to New York. It was there I learnt to fight. Antisemitic society forced me to do so. So if I come across anyone who looks suspicious, I mean, he stops me and looks like that' (he looks at me with hostility in his eyes) 'that I know he doesn't want to become friends with me, I hit first because when you got a punch as a first one, you become weaker and it's over.'
Although he was in his seventies, he looked very fit, as Zampano would have looked like in that age. But it was really his grey hair that revealed his artistic soul.
'I worked for Andy Warhole, you know him? Before that I worked in different companies, in the advertising. One year I even changed my jobs 13 times! But than I decided to split and came to Europe again. In Belgium I witnessed a lot of antisemitism. Yes, it's true.' He confirmed when I expressed my disbelief.
'I started to earn money at very low age, 14 maybe? Before entering the secondary school...New York, you have to go there. The is the place, still it's New York. Spain? There are nice women, it's true, beaches, sunny weather but you can earn there only "beans" - Jews say that, only "beans".
I waited for the washing in the laundry and chatted with Rene. He was the size of Al Pacino, dressed in two black woman beaters put one on the other, the colour of the skin revealed the southern sun and sandy beaches somewhere in the Middle-East. His well-trimmed little mustache and grey, chaotic, uncombed hair got a tinge of Salvador Dali. 22 minutes to the end.
Whenever I have a chance to chat like that I keep wondering if what he says is true. But I am not interested in the truth of facts. Whether facts are true to the reality. The focus is on the feelings a man tries to convey through the facts. The emotions that correspond to the facts, not the facts itself. Whether he survived the war is not so important as how he expresses it - can he truly express what the fact of his being in a camp really meant to him. And can a spectator get a little feeling of what it felt like to witness that situation? Because what is really important is being aware of what the war was; the actual fact can be denied or obliterated from memory. However, people's feelings last longer and are deeper, thought-provoking. When you tell a story to someone better be convincing because it doesn't have to be true, the true are feelings behind it. The story reveals facts and emotions. We can see a sequence of thoughts that throw feelings - a man lower down his voice, his head, he closes his eyes then he comes closer and bursts out with happiness, pure at that moment, he clasps his hands and almost dances in the middle of the room. His eyes sparkle with contentment. The gestures, mimic and a word following a word - all that build a story. Maybe that's why I don't like to interrupt when someone speaks. 7 minutes till Rene leaves the laundromat.
'If you stay here, in Amsterdam, and rent a flat, get a digital TV. You get BBC, Dutch TV, and all that for 7 or 8 euro. And Playboy of course! But masturbation is not good...anyway...there are TWO porn channels available!'
He took his suitcase, we shook hands and said goodbye.
'Maybe we meet again or not'. 0 minutes to end the washing of unchecked facts, honest feelings. In the laundromat where the truth comes clean washed from the dirt.

Of the steer and the sailor

Lacerda again:
It was an ominous dream I had last night. During the flight on an unidentified plane to an unidentified destination, the passengers observed that the plane flies surprisingly low, not increasing its altitude but as if trying to squeeze through buildings and shyly passing under bridges. No one had any doubts about it: we were going to crash! Most of the passengers already screamed about it in their minds - I could feel their pressure on my nervous system; their thought-aching idea of burning bodies trapped in this plane-cage. Strangely enough there appeared a thought: maybe there is a chance of surviving? There are cases of a miraculous plane-wreck. Maybe believing strongly enough will do the salvation?
I found myself between two worlds, split-minded, semi-crashed but also semi-saved. My thoughts were driven by a current situation in which I found myself: I waited for a positive or negative answer regarding a job. Either I will crash getting the negative response or I will go for it receiving a green light. What I also wanted to do was to find a third alternative: the emergency exit. A parachute in the form of self-funding myself; a one-man running business that would prevent me from being dependent from anyone who could steer my actions. I wanted to be the plane and be at the steering wheel at the same time. No longer dependent on a superior, no longer relying on his decisions or mercy. I wanted to be in charge!

Astounding News!

Lacerda reporting:
During my recent research on Eric Prince and the Blackwater case I have discovered the actual etymology of the name "Blackwater". We have to trace back to a small town in northern Poland in Starogard County. There we find the name: Czarna Woda (Schwarzwasser) which translated into English means Blackwater. Being curious enough, it was during my interrogation I conducted with former Blackwater CEO Eric Prince that he mentioned Czarna Woda as one of his favourite places in Poland to have visited as a happy child. I quote:
"Yes, definitely. I took the name Blackwater straight from that little town in Poland. I have happy memories from there because once with my parents we used to canoe on Wda river. You know, serving as "a peace keeper" in Iraq or Afghanistan - very distant and foreign countries - I had to have that sort of happy thought with me, carrying all the time and remembering me about those happy moments in Czarna Woda. So, (he laughs) I decided to name my "peace and stability organization" Blackwater!"
Here I give you some information about the town. It's holidays, so folks, pack your canoe and hit Blackwater!
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Czarna_Woda

Remarque's double page

Reading Shadows in Paradise I came across pages that were bound together instead of being cut in the process of editing the book. This triggered some thoughts naturally. One of them is that although the book was printed in 1971 no one from my family (I presume) have read it since that time. If it had been the fact, he would have definitely cut the pages in order to read them comfortably. (Notice that I didn't cut the pages but struggled reading them uncut). Reading such a book for the first time since it was published (almost 40 years ago!) is like conversing with a wise and yet virgin woman. The book brings you a lot of food for thought, you can quote it several times while experiencing life and yet you are pleased with its youth, you can touch its pages and fell delicate and firm print. The fonts were not typed into computer but carefully arranged by human printers. It gives you the feel of something being finished and left in the past. A sentimental and very mysterious feeling that one likes to return to. Like with old films. Some of them are so good that you enjoy watching them several times although the camera and the way they made them are no longer being used in films.

The other meaning of two pages bound together is a semiotical one. Words that appear as sounds to us, or better said as sounds we can hear in mind, and on the other hand as concepts, images they evoke in mind. The two pages are like a sign - they are both sound and image bound in one. 

And the last thought sparked by double pages is that the two characters in the book are bound by their feelings, words spoken on the pages. They speak as you turn over pages and at this particular point where the two pages are bound you can read about the two lovers having a quarrel and then reuniting in a flat eating Dutch cheese. If we consider each page to have its own character then a book would be an infinite tell-tale.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BUNRu2zm6EY&NR=1

Robotnik, Centralny organ PPS, 12 August 1936

Robotnik, the newspaper of the Polish Social-Democratic Party PPS, focuses on the Spanish Civil War in July and August 1936. The Polish socialists for the first time in their history are going strong. They signed a non-aggression-treaty with the communists, and they work closely with the Peasants Party and the Jewish Workers Party, the Bund as well. The PPS plays a leading role in the many strikes that occur in 1936. Together with the Bund the PPS attains a majority position after municipal elections in Lodz.

Brasileiro

Brasileiro - watch the footage

The video and photos were taken during World Cup in 2010. Here, we are in one of Austrians pubs witnessing match between Brazil and North Korea.

Logiproblem

Q: Think of a hotel which has a finite number of rooms.

A: Is there another kind?

Q: What happens if it's full and a new guest arrives? No room-sharing.

A: The guest will be shown the door.

Q: But consider now an infinite hotel: even if it is full...a room can be found!

"start from the wrong premises and Logic can be the executioner's handmaiden."

from Logicomix

Woodstock pride

 Amsterdam will host a "gay pride" this weekend. The citizens expect thousands of gays and lesbians dancing on the boats to the beat of electronic drums. It has been quite a long time since the first "pride" was organized. Like many other similar festivals that once were organized for "ideological reasons" this too became a commercialized feast of insolent advertisements in muddling rhythms. No one seems to expect a respectful thought behind it. On the other hand, everyone expects a turmoil of loud music accompanied by half-naked men and (I hope) women. The only reason to see the pride is that it might include some artistic values. The only contemporary, big festival that is free of charge and not polluted with "capitalistic" enterprises is Polish Przystanek Woodstock (http://www.en.wosp.org.pl/)

Fistfull of curry

On Monday I decided to have a take away food. After my "8hour routine" I chose a Surinam take-away restaurant and ordered a chicken pakora. Waiting for the dish, I strolled along the streets in order to find a perfect spot to suck my dose of meat. You have to bear in mind that in the squat where I live "dead animals" are not kindly seen on the table; thus, the only safe place for me is to have them somewhere near one of Amsterdam canals. That's why I chose a nice corner to sit-it was a crossing of two canals where most of the touring ships tucked with tourists take turns ( <---- nice aliteration btw).
Having grabbed a sack full of curry I took the course towards the quey. On my way I noticed a nice alley and decided to pass through. From the corner of my eye I saw a woman lying in her white underwear as if posing for a photo. I wouldn't be surprised if I saw her in the Red Light District but it was a normal residential area. My curiosity took over and decided to come back to her, just to check if my eyes didn't delude me. Passing one more time, she waved at me. As she was lying behind the window pane I couldn't ask her why she was lying there. Anyway, it would be stupid to ask her if she lied just to relax or if she waited for a client. I assumed that she was resting on a sunbed after a hard-working day. Anyway, who cares if she does it almost naked or not? Some people need to shed their skin after work; to remove the toxic layer of themselves, of their masks that they had to take on while at office. Working people take on different, in many cases, not wanted tasks that they have to cope with while at work. These tasks lie heavily on them, they cannot agree with them, and not agreeing with them they don't agree with themselves. Being at work they often do not morally accepted tasks, things that stand beyond the truth they got used to. Once they come home they are full of lies and fed up with fighting with themselves. Seeing naked people in the centre of the city in that way I totally understand them now and promise no longer to wonder at the sight of a naked woman behind the window pane.
In the light of the setting sun I ate the curry drinking Dutch beer "la Trappe".
Just to remind you: La Trappe is the Trappist brewery from Koningshoeven Abbey. There are 7 Trappist breweries in the world. Six in Belgium and one in the Netherlands. A part of the profit from selling the beer goes to the monasteries in Indonesia and Uganda. La Trappe Isid'or is named after Brother Isidorus, the first brewer of La Trappe. It is mildly sweet in taste but also with a bitter tone and a caramel note. Its colour reminds of amber and you can smell a fruity flavour going straight from the bottle, owning its special aroma from the Perle hop.
Stay tuned for more information of the kingdom of beer from the Netherlands!

Alkmaar - traversing greenness and cheese.

Going towards Alkmaar I could sense the air's humidity. Earth, water and a little bit of sun swelled the air with wooden scent of dampness. The incense coming from the fields perspired the palms of my hands. The greenness outside the train's window entered into the nostrils. There was only a flat landscape full of plants which took advantage of the climate. Every field hit eyes with small, green rootlets that ran well-ordered one by one.

In the town, a huge chunks of cheese greeted me. They smiled with their round faces. I couldn't help but eat them, as they seemed ready to be eaten. They didn't let me down - their mellow taste melted in my mouth. Some of them were even with herbs what surmounted the taste of milk.

The trip ended with the sweetness of flowers. Passing through small streets and embarking on the return route I couldn't help but feel the warmness of red alabaster-like asters, a bright solution of gentian violet, blossoming lilacs and dwart elder. But before sailing off the shore I smelled the strong aroma of Dutch cheese.

Sailing the seas of cheese (kaas in Dutch) I have to mention that Alkmaar has 400 year old cheese market. The cheese carrier's guild (kaasdragersgilde) is first mentioned in 1619. Sailing further I came across the Waagplein ("weighing square") where white-dressed cheese farmers ran about the square with wheels of Gouda and Edam cheese. They carried the wheels on huge semisercular carriers hanging from their leather suspenders. There, at the market square the wheels are being weighed, tasted and sold. There are about 30,000 kilos of yellow cricular objects ready to eat!

Maybe we need genocides to keep us smiling?

"Africa is rich. But it is rich not only of minerals (coltan, diamonds, cassiterite) but also of people and their stories. They have a lot of stories to tell and they tell them with a smile on the face. However brutal and cruel a story is they tell it with a smile. I interpret it as a kind of distance to what they tell us. It's a distance we also ought to learn. The Europeans don't smile so often as Africans. Maybe it is because we forgot genocides, wars, atrocities we experienced long time ago? Maybe we need genocides to keep us smiling?"

From an interview with Nkunda Obutu.

Amstel Downtown

Amstel Downtown, part 1

Grazer Kitchen

What's the most you ever lost in a coin toss?

Imagine you come into a supermarket. You buy milk, bread and butter. You hand in money at the cash desk and expect the rest. You realize that they didn't give you 2 cents! Come on, your hard earned T W O cents!
Forget about it, forget about 2 cents and 1 cent. You won't get it anywhere in the Netherlands. They won't give it to you. It's the rule of the pocket. Too heavy pockets are not comfortable for you. You won't feel secure either with a pocket full of coins. Plus they clink and definitely lower your trousers, revealing your red pants. So, the Dutch solution is to get rid of 1 and 2 cent coins. They are withdrawn from circulation.
If you have to pay 9.58 and you hand in a 10 banknote you'll get 0.40 cents instead of 0.42. Don't worry, if the price of your favourite strawberry chocolate bar is, let's say 2.84, you can calmly hand in 2.80. As simple as that!

Deep down into human nature

From S.C.U.M. Manifesto (Society for Cutting Up Men) by Valerie Solanas:

"The male is a biological accident: the Y (male) gene is an incomplete X (female) gene, that is, it has an incomplete set of chromosomes. In other words, the male is an incomplete female, a walking abortion, aborted at the gene stage. To be male is to be deficient, emotionally limited; maleness is a deficiency disease and males are emotional cripples.

The male is completely egocentric, trapped inside himself, incapable of empathizing or identifying with others, or love, friendship, affection of tenderness. He is a completely isolated unit, incapable of rapport with anyone. His responses are entirely visceral, not cerebral; his intelligence is a mere tool in the services of his drives and needs; he is incapable of mental passion, mental interaction; he can't relate to anything other than his own physical sensations. He is a half-dead, unresponsive lump, incapable of giving or receiving pleasure or happiness; consequently, he is at best an utter bore, an inoffensive blob, since only those capable of absorption in others can be charming. He is trapped in a twilight zone halfway between humans and apes, and is far worse off than the apes because, unlike the apes, he is capable of a large array of negative feelings -- hate, jealousy, contempt, disgust, guilt, shame, doubt -- and moreover, he is aware of what he is and what he isn't. (...)

Every man, deep down, knows he's a worthless piece of shit."

and it goes like this for a couple of pages. Now, for something completely different, Shadows in Paradise by E. M. Remarque:

Love in the time of football finals

There are greater things than football. 

Bernhardiner under the bridge

'Do you want to use the subway? It's not working today.'
The man standing in front of the subway's entrance informed me in Dutch. He was in his 50s and wore a fluorescent jacket. We talked for a while. When I told him I came for internship, it turned out he was a director of theatre . He took out a piece of paper and started to write me some information about whereabouts of important Dutch institutes connected with film and animation. I wondered why he is standing under the bridge and advise against using the underground just because it doesn't work. It seemed to be his sole work here. Maybe it's normal for the Dutch to have several jobs, like a theatre director or a businessman and, on the other hand, when the theatre is closed in summer, a kind of a blue-collar job, a manual worker, a cleaner. It reminded me of a joke. Do you know the story of a man who visited a Russian immigrant nightclub in Paris? The manager wanted to impress him: 'This doorkeeper - he says - was once a general, the waiter - a count, the singer - a great prince, and so on." The guest remained silent. Soon the manager pointed to a small dachshund which the guest brought along. "What's this?", he asked politely. "This one? He was before a Bernhardiner in Berlin", the guest replied.

Names written in heaven

"Przyglądałem się ulicy. Kahn pobiegł za moim wzrokiem. 

- Czy to jest to samo miasto? - zapytał. - Teraz, kiedy mówi pan już o wiele lepiej?

- Przedtem było ono obrazem i pantomimą, obecnie jest już reliefem. Posiada wypukłości i zagłębienia. Przemawia i coś się z tego rozumie. Jeszcze niewiele, i to się przyczynia do nierealności sytuacji. Przedtem każdy kierowca taksówki wydawał się sfinksem, każdy sprzedawca gazet-zagadka świata. Jescze i teraz byle kelner wydaje mi się małym Einsteinem, ale Einsteinem, którego ja już rozumiem - jeżeli oczywiście nie rozprawia o fizyce i matematyce. Zachwycenie trwa dopóty, dopóki się niczego nie potrzebuje. Jeżeli jednak o coś się zabiega, zaczynają się trudności i z wyżyn swych filozoficznych marzeń spada się do poziomu opóźnionego w rozwoju dziesięciolatka."

Remarque, Cienie w raju.

When you return to your homeland and start to speak in mothertongue you can sense the banality of words, their transparency - you are aware that most of them are meaningless and you repeat the same phrases just because you are used to them; they are easy to pronounce, sound even so obscene and ridiculous that you are surprised when speaking them. Maybe that's why I like to stay abroad, far away from mothertongue. Speaking your language always brings too many thoughts that might be not filtered by your language. But when using your second language - the one you have learnt for months, years or the one you start to speak - you always start with simple thoughts, ideas that give you the grounding for more advanced thinking. Once you have built that surrounding around you - surrounding built on words and images that reside mostly in people's minds, the people with whom you speak, then after having built that scaffold you can try and really tell them something really interesting. Like simple but powerful "I love you".

buRn aLL PRiSONS

excerpts from DE BLACKLIST (July 2010):

"In the early hours of August 23rd The Anarchist Fire sabotaged the construction of a new migrant detention centre at Rotterdam Airport. They called on everyone to set fire to the systems that seek to destroy people. Meanwhile it is almost a year ago and nothing happened. Well, nothing happened? A new consortium is going to build a new migrant detention centre [a]t Schiphol Airport! One of the participants is Strukton which makes a profit out of the detention of people who will be deported.

That was one of the reasons for us, Anarchist Arsonists, to break the silence. We want to put action where our mouth is, so in the early hours of June the 16th we set fire to the head office of Strukton in Maarssen.

Our action is aimed at the horrible situation of incarcerated migrants. Fire is meant to destroy buildings and systems, not people as happened five years ago at Schiphol. We therefore call on people to help us in our struggle against the system which kills innocent people.

ANARCHIST ARSONISTS"

The shirt I want to be buried with.

There are some things you're sure you will be using forever... My shirt is the one. Craghoppers.

9 incomplete steps to make a squat

There is nothing like living in a squat. You probably wonder how you can make one?
Here are 9 incomplete steps to make a squat. Now, you probably wonder where the missing
steps is? Good, remember to take precautions!

1. Decide on an abandoned place-i.e. the one that has not been empty for a long time
(which is from 1 year onwards).
2. Gather 30 people or more (the more the better) and set date and time of
squatting.
3. Prepare some facts, like: who owns the building or flat, why it hasn't been yet occupied
(it can help you when later the police arrrive); prepare some tools, like wooden planks, matresses, etc.
so onced you break in than you can barricade the place from inside; get a crowbar and other tool necessary
to open alocked door.
4. Go there with your group of people and encircle the place. Let the "locksmith" break in, the others
will secure the front door. Let them look like if they were on a picknick, it doesn't matter
if it is in the centre of the town.
5. Probably some curious neighbour will call the cops. When they arrive let someone talk to them and explain calmy that the place is now taken by squaters who live there (that's why you need matresses and other props to show them
that someone is living there). Caution!: you can let the police inside and show them the place
but if they behave too confident and rude DON'T LET THEM IN! On no condition! Once they are inside they can take the place over.
6. If the police try to enter the premises without your consent DON'T LET them do that!
Prepare yourself and the group to resist by forming a chain and make sinister looks.
7. If the police take action I wish you good luck, if they leave then hope they won't be back
with a special unit armed like robocops. You can now pass the symbolic key to the new owner of
the premises. He or she, in case the police come, can contact with the lawyer who will take charge of
the formal side of the flat.
8. If later the police come DON'T OPEN the door! You can hand them a piece of paper with
the number of the lawyer and ask them to contact with him.
9. Make yourself at home!

My House

Living-room. The place to meet, have dinner and chat, and smoke.

Holland vs Brazil (2nd July)

Holland vs Brazil - photodocumentary