Sunday, April 30, 2006
Saturday, April 29, 2006
12 months in reflection
This same time last year, I was looking at things I’ve accumulated in my apartment. Trying to figure out what was going back with me and what would be left behind, to be scattered among my friends. Red futon goes to Andrew, cream futon and blue chair to Skye and Stephen, drawers to my successor, and tomato plants to Asuka. The things I decided to take, I hauled at Ariel’s place in my 60 liter backpack. It took eight trips to fill a one cubic feet cardboard box.
Ariel offered to drive my stuff to her place, but I insisted on transporting them myself. I wanted to carry them. Slowly. I wanted to feel the weight of my possession. The way I’ve done since I was twelve. The first bag I carried was a red duffle bag. My brother helped me dragged it across Hong Kong’s airport. Before we departed, my mother forced her hands through the metal fence that separated us from her; she clung to the strap of my bag and my brother’s black backpack. When I was fifteen, I carried that same duffle bag. I walked and walked. Every step assuring me that I was heading for safety. Everything I owned stuffed in that bag, this time without my brother to help me.
Moving. Belongings. I don’t acquire only because I don’t like parting. If I buy a glass, I would want to relocate with it. Leaving it means leaving a piece of me. There’s only so much of my heart, what’s left is mine—mine to keep.
A lover told me once that he didn’t know me after three years. The imbalanced of information bothered him--the lightness unbearable. I couldn’t tell him that if I share, I would take all the pieces of me back, peel the skin where I've written.
___________________________________________________________________
Ariel offered to drive my stuff to her place, but I insisted on transporting them myself. I wanted to carry them. Slowly. I wanted to feel the weight of my possession. The way I’ve done since I was twelve. The first bag I carried was a red duffle bag. My brother helped me dragged it across Hong Kong’s airport. Before we departed, my mother forced her hands through the metal fence that separated us from her; she clung to the strap of my bag and my brother’s black backpack. When I was fifteen, I carried that same duffle bag. I walked and walked. Every step assuring me that I was heading for safety. Everything I owned stuffed in that bag, this time without my brother to help me.
Moving. Belongings. I don’t acquire only because I don’t like parting. If I buy a glass, I would want to relocate with it. Leaving it means leaving a piece of me. There’s only so much of my heart, what’s left is mine—mine to keep.
A lover told me once that he didn’t know me after three years. The imbalanced of information bothered him--the lightness unbearable. I couldn’t tell him that if I share, I would take all the pieces of me back, peel the skin where I've written.
___________________________________________________________________
Friday, April 28, 2006
A new Comrade
For six months I thought Bobbi is a man. Bobbi turns out to be a tiny red head woman who has the sweetest smile. She's a book store worker at the UBC. She's also an amazing book reviewer. I met her yesterday after selling my old textbooks. In December, she caught my eyes, she said, Blackbird is the wittiest book she’s read in awhile. I love this book. Stephen and Skye came to my house with dinner and their copy of Blackbird two Februaries ago. I was lonely and sad; and they knew the perfect way to cheer me. They were sweet and unselfish, unlike me, I would never offer a book with unbroken spine. But there they were in my doorstep, Skye carrying a picnic basket and Stephen holding Basilieres’s words in his hands.
I normally stopped at the bookstore between my Philosophy and Rhetoric class. I took stocks of all the books waiting for me. The concept of meeting Bobbi crossed my mind every time I read her recent review. Yet, each time I pushed this away. It was hard enough having to explain to my family why I stood outside Manila’s red light district waiting for Sionil Jose. I didn’t want to add stalking reviewers to my list.
Meeting her was accidental. I didn’t force it.
I got giddy talking to her. Meeting someone who loves the same kind of books is rare. Book lovers aren’t like music lovers. There aren’t enough of us around.
I normally stopped at the bookstore between my Philosophy and Rhetoric class. I took stocks of all the books waiting for me. The concept of meeting Bobbi crossed my mind every time I read her recent review. Yet, each time I pushed this away. It was hard enough having to explain to my family why I stood outside Manila’s red light district waiting for Sionil Jose. I didn’t want to add stalking reviewers to my list.
Meeting her was accidental. I didn’t force it.
I got giddy talking to her. Meeting someone who loves the same kind of books is rare. Book lovers aren’t like music lovers. There aren’t enough of us around.
Thursday, April 27, 2006
rice papers i carry
I wrote this two years ago on my shouji. Ripped, folded and carried it across the Pacific.
David's Gray's falling leaves....in seconds he becomes alive.
I'm at Stella's and he's putting salsa on his baked eggs.
"That's the last time we're drinking that much gin."
I nod in silence. It's three in the afternoon. The sun hurts my eyes. I would have opted to stay on his couch reading a book, but he insisted on having breakfast. He kept rehydrating me to force me out of bed. To shower away the night's stench.
Normally he'd jump in the shower. But after a night of gin, sex is laborious, the same way trading words become pointless. When I got out of the shower my hair was tangled. I refused to buy conditioner and leave it at his flat. And he never bothered to shelf things I needed, the way other lovers would.
Lovers offer the strangest thing: pink purse, framed happy photos, apartment keys. In his case, he offered me Naomi Klein's No Logo on our second date. Betrand Russel's Why I am not a Christian appeared the next day on my porch the first time he spent the night in my single yellow bed.
"There's a brush on the counter of the dresser," as he looked at my dripping hair.
"Uh-huh." It belonged to his previous lover. Unlike me, she brought things in his apartment. Face cream, hair wax, conditioner. I discovered them neatly aligned in his medicine cabinet. Perhaps, they wanted permanence. Or perhaps, she wanted to look human when she walked back to her place.
I used all her stuff till they ran out. I also used her brush till I saw no point to it. I would have continued using it if it was the right bristles.
Lovers and Property. How could it be wrong to have ownership? To be claimed. To announce that you're in love. There isn't.
My relationship with him is shifting. I feel it as I sit across, watching him chew. I've seen the expiration date on the milk carton, but I turned the date so he wouldn't notice.
A friend told me that there's no such thing as soul mates. Relationship doesn't even have to have love. That all relationship is a contract. Sex is a part of the contract, so is sharing the bills. She said this so passionately, I almost believed her. Except her words didn't carry the weight of what's trully behind her heart. Like all good friends, I agreed. And we ordered more wine. Like all good friends, I spat on the architect's name that broke her heart.
David's Gray's falling leaves....in seconds he becomes alive.
I'm at Stella's and he's putting salsa on his baked eggs.
"That's the last time we're drinking that much gin."
I nod in silence. It's three in the afternoon. The sun hurts my eyes. I would have opted to stay on his couch reading a book, but he insisted on having breakfast. He kept rehydrating me to force me out of bed. To shower away the night's stench.
Normally he'd jump in the shower. But after a night of gin, sex is laborious, the same way trading words become pointless. When I got out of the shower my hair was tangled. I refused to buy conditioner and leave it at his flat. And he never bothered to shelf things I needed, the way other lovers would.
Lovers offer the strangest thing: pink purse, framed happy photos, apartment keys. In his case, he offered me Naomi Klein's No Logo on our second date. Betrand Russel's Why I am not a Christian appeared the next day on my porch the first time he spent the night in my single yellow bed.
"There's a brush on the counter of the dresser," as he looked at my dripping hair.
"Uh-huh." It belonged to his previous lover. Unlike me, she brought things in his apartment. Face cream, hair wax, conditioner. I discovered them neatly aligned in his medicine cabinet. Perhaps, they wanted permanence. Or perhaps, she wanted to look human when she walked back to her place.
I used all her stuff till they ran out. I also used her brush till I saw no point to it. I would have continued using it if it was the right bristles.
Lovers and Property. How could it be wrong to have ownership? To be claimed. To announce that you're in love. There isn't.
My relationship with him is shifting. I feel it as I sit across, watching him chew. I've seen the expiration date on the milk carton, but I turned the date so he wouldn't notice.
A friend told me that there's no such thing as soul mates. Relationship doesn't even have to have love. That all relationship is a contract. Sex is a part of the contract, so is sharing the bills. She said this so passionately, I almost believed her. Except her words didn't carry the weight of what's trully behind her heart. Like all good friends, I agreed. And we ordered more wine. Like all good friends, I spat on the architect's name that broke her heart.
Wednesday, April 26, 2006
Done. Finito. Tapos. Owari.
It all began with me telling myself to get out of bed in the morning. Then, it progressed to me telling myself to leave the shower. As the water pellets down my skin, I would stand there till my brown skin turns red, prolonging warmth. Now this self talk has spilled to every waking minute. I could no longer do anything without verbalization. I have become one of those that address themselves in the third person.
“Malani, go get your BC driver’s license today.”
“Malani, you don’t need that third glass of scotch.”
"Malani, you can’t have that brownie. You’ve only been studying for two hours. Reward means that you’ve actually done something.”
“Malani, you’re so lame. I can’t believe you’re giving up after five hours writing your rhetoric paper.”
“Malani, toughen up. Shove more Shakespeare down your throat.”
“Read! Study! Write! Research! Work Harder!”
The me that talks to myself is one bossy person. Good thing I don’t know many people on the streets of Vancouver. I scare myself. I don’t mind if people think I’m a little crazy. There is actually comfort to not having to pay attention to the people walking around me. Is caring about what other’s thought a form of shallowness? Hmmmm.....
Last night I wrote my last exam. My feet moved with incredible lightness as I hopped and skipped all the way to the bus stop at nine:thirty. Now, I’m hoping that myself would stop talking to me in that demanding way for I am free. Yes. I am FREE.
“Malani, go get your BC driver’s license today.”
“Malani, you don’t need that third glass of scotch.”
"Malani, you can’t have that brownie. You’ve only been studying for two hours. Reward means that you’ve actually done something.”
“Malani, you’re so lame. I can’t believe you’re giving up after five hours writing your rhetoric paper.”
“Malani, toughen up. Shove more Shakespeare down your throat.”
“Read! Study! Write! Research! Work Harder!”
The me that talks to myself is one bossy person. Good thing I don’t know many people on the streets of Vancouver. I scare myself. I don’t mind if people think I’m a little crazy. There is actually comfort to not having to pay attention to the people walking around me. Is caring about what other’s thought a form of shallowness? Hmmmm.....
Last night I wrote my last exam. My feet moved with incredible lightness as I hopped and skipped all the way to the bus stop at nine:thirty. Now, I’m hoping that myself would stop talking to me in that demanding way for I am free. Yes. I am FREE.
Tuesday, April 18, 2006
My Kick Ass Group
For three months, I spent countless of hours in Flex hammering out our adaptation of Lear. Our production was brilliant. Most importantly, I got to know nine really awesome people that I would have never met if it wasn't for this course.
I am really proud of how beautiful we worked together. This is enormous because I hate co-operative learning and group projects. Numerous occasions my group set aside personal issues and differences to maintain group harmony. Meagan said it best, "I didn't care what play Claire is in, I just wanted to be in her group." Heck, we all wanted to be in Claire's group. Claire, I am so your groupie. No, really, you should have seen one of the other groups. It was painful to watch them, not because they were awful, but because you could see that they did not like each other.
Well, Lear is finished and I have nine people that continue to harrass me and fill my inbox with sappy messages of wanting to get together.
Sunday, April 16, 2006
Tuesday, April 04, 2006
Mango Cake
Our Lear production goes on tomorrow. I'm excited, nervous, frightened, and I'm going to throw up again.
Sunday, March 26, 2006
apartment 1986
Wednesday, March 22, 2006
take me to Bhutan
Why is it that you’ve never taken a husband? For my upcoming trip home, I’m lining my pockets with responses to this question. Practicing ways in which to put people at ease:
- You see, I’m not blessed like you.
- I like being alone.
- I'm too set in my ways.
- Don’t worry I have no intention of stealing your husband. I find adultery immoral.
You must find a man to enjoy your youth, after all it is fading. Is that grey hair I see in your braids? But never mind that, your body is still beautiful--your face youthful.
I’ve become a character in Soul Mountain. I’ve joined the thousands of nameless men and women that travel for movement. My identity reduced to a pronoun. Let me shun that, no more of that.
I’m really tired of school. I’m supposed to be writing one of my endless papers. Only I keep thinking of a country in the Himalayas, of monks dressed in ochre-red robes, being surrounded by playful school children dashing home from school. Anya leaves for Bhutan in less than a month. I wish I could go with her. I’m tired of Vancouver and of the rain.
Tuesday, March 21, 2006
on the 15th floor
Before he leaves for work in the morning, he kneels beside the bed and kisses me goodbye on the lips. I hear the door close and I doze back to sleep. When I wake, I linger in bed for an hour or two; inhaling his cologne on the sheets. I’m playing a different role.
"You promised that you’d always be safe here with me. Promises open the door to be broken…"
There are locked drawers and trunks. Picking them crosses my mind. I push away this thought by looking at boxes and boxes of spices in his cupboards. In the process, I discover a coffee drinker with twenty types of tea. What kind of a man is he? A man who has four types of flour, irons his underwear, and bellows Russian songs as he waters his orchids. To hate him I make him eat Tagalog food with his hands. I give no instruction and wait for him to fail.
There’s a line in the Constant Gardner when Rachel Weizs says to Ralph Finnes, “You can learn me.”
Let me learn you. This is an invitation to love . . . no…no…no, it’s too soon for that. And my heart is not something I give. His neighborhood grocer asked me if I just moved in the area. I smiled and I formed the words in my lips, “I’m trying on a suit.”
“If you think, from this prelude, that anything like a romance is preparing for you, reader, you never were more mistaken.” Charlotte Bronte didn’t believe in love. Somebody cut off her hair and lied to her face. I just found out that it is she who wrote one of my favorite quotes, “Something real, cool, and solid, lies before you; something unromantic as Monday morning.”
"You promised that you’d always be safe here with me. Promises open the door to be broken…"
There are locked drawers and trunks. Picking them crosses my mind. I push away this thought by looking at boxes and boxes of spices in his cupboards. In the process, I discover a coffee drinker with twenty types of tea. What kind of a man is he? A man who has four types of flour, irons his underwear, and bellows Russian songs as he waters his orchids. To hate him I make him eat Tagalog food with his hands. I give no instruction and wait for him to fail.
There’s a line in the Constant Gardner when Rachel Weizs says to Ralph Finnes, “You can learn me.”
Let me learn you. This is an invitation to love . . . no…no…no, it’s too soon for that. And my heart is not something I give. His neighborhood grocer asked me if I just moved in the area. I smiled and I formed the words in my lips, “I’m trying on a suit.”
“If you think, from this prelude, that anything like a romance is preparing for you, reader, you never were more mistaken.” Charlotte Bronte didn’t believe in love. Somebody cut off her hair and lied to her face. I just found out that it is she who wrote one of my favorite quotes, “Something real, cool, and solid, lies before you; something unromantic as Monday morning.”
Tuesday, March 07, 2006
my curses on you and your shitty hygienist
I had a dentist visit today, and I feel mightily abused. He wasn’t personal at all. He was sloppy. Twice water ran down the side of my mouth and snaked its way to my neck until my orange turtleneck drank it. All the while he stole glances at the reception desk while he had a screeching electronic plaque remover in my mouth. After he was finished, he tossed me to his equally sloppy hygienist. She didn’t even floss between every tooth, and then she asked me if I have floss for my bridge. When I replied with a “Yes” she told me that I could do them at home. For this abused, I paid $200. Okay, so my insurance company paid 180 and I paid 20, regardless, I feel sorry for my insurance company having to fork off 180 for such lousy service.
What ever happen to the days when you used to go to the dentist and get a tootsie roll? He and his squirting fluoride hygienist gave me a toothbrush and un-waxed floss. They didn’t even give me a choice on what kind of fluoride I wanted. The fact that all fluoride taste like cum that makes you gag was and is not the point. The point is, give me a choice: pina-colada, watermelon, grape, bubblegum. A choice! I don’t care just give me a choice! And don't think that I didn't know that you knew that my eye glasses had splatters of blood on them. You kept starring at them, unsure whether you should give me kleenex. But that's not the worst, the four eyed geek tried to up-sell me. He said I need braces to fix my bottom teeth. Huh! Yeah, as if I would ever set foot on your office again—never I say, never! What were you thinking, that I'm unexperienced nugget or that I just got off the boat. Well, I did--just got off the boat--and yes I do leave in the East side slum. But common BRACES!!!
The only reason I went there was that my dentist left the damn mosquito infested muddy river. Where he and his Louis Vuitton clad wearing wife went, I wish, I knew. Oh, Dr. Grant where did you go? I miss, your peppermint scented office, the way you used to tell me how much your wife spent in her New York shopping sprees, the fact that you never tried to break my jaw so that I'd have straighter teeth, and stories of your drunken youth roaming around Europe. Dr. Grant, please, please come back. I promise I would floss and brush daily.
What ever happen to the days when you used to go to the dentist and get a tootsie roll? He and his squirting fluoride hygienist gave me a toothbrush and un-waxed floss. They didn’t even give me a choice on what kind of fluoride I wanted. The fact that all fluoride taste like cum that makes you gag was and is not the point. The point is, give me a choice: pina-colada, watermelon, grape, bubblegum. A choice! I don’t care just give me a choice! And don't think that I didn't know that you knew that my eye glasses had splatters of blood on them. You kept starring at them, unsure whether you should give me kleenex. But that's not the worst, the four eyed geek tried to up-sell me. He said I need braces to fix my bottom teeth. Huh! Yeah, as if I would ever set foot on your office again—never I say, never! What were you thinking, that I'm unexperienced nugget or that I just got off the boat. Well, I did--just got off the boat--and yes I do leave in the East side slum. But common BRACES!!!
The only reason I went there was that my dentist left the damn mosquito infested muddy river. Where he and his Louis Vuitton clad wearing wife went, I wish, I knew. Oh, Dr. Grant where did you go? I miss, your peppermint scented office, the way you used to tell me how much your wife spent in her New York shopping sprees, the fact that you never tried to break my jaw so that I'd have straighter teeth, and stories of your drunken youth roaming around Europe. Dr. Grant, please, please come back. I promise I would floss and brush daily.
Things to Do in 30 Days
Write 6 papers
Re-write my rhetoric paper
Read Shirley by Charlotte Bronte
Work on resume
1 in class essay exam
Memorize 700 lines of King Lear
Get a job
Go for 2 interviews this Thursday
Apply for Education faculty at SFU
Beg ex-colleagues to write reference letters attesting my quasi-brilliance
Find cheap storage
Income tax
Keep my SANITY!!!!
Re-write my rhetoric paper
Read Shirley by Charlotte Bronte
Work on resume
1 in class essay exam
Memorize 700 lines of King Lear
Get a job
Go for 2 interviews this Thursday
Apply for Education faculty at SFU
Beg ex-colleagues to write reference letters attesting my quasi-brilliance
Find cheap storage
Income tax
Keep my SANITY!!!!
Saturday, March 04, 2006
do we ever heal
If only I could remove myself from this moment by focusing my fingers on these keys. I want to close my eyes and not see her running around our Victorian home. I want Jen to come home. My ears wait for the front door to open. I anticipate her waltzing into my room to erase last night’s news. I promise, if you do, we would wake and not remember the sting of frost bitten cheeks.
This morning forgotten memories came flooding back. At night after she tucked us to bed I could hear her cry through the thin bamboo walls. Frozen, I couldn’t stretch my hands and reach out to her. I imagined running my fingers through her hair a hundred-million times, rehearsed soothing words on the rooftop of our house, and yet every night I turned to stone.
“She was my only,” he said while he turned over cards with his crooked fingers. Ralph is a remnant of a colonial era where men wore starched white linens in the blistering heat of his conquered land. Except, Ralph never conquered any land. He is displaced. A refugee roaming South East Asia. The only home his ever known disappeared in the heart of Africa. His only love died of tuberculosis after the Second World War while they were attending university in England.
Ralph is a beautiful man. He fed me stories and asked nothing for payment. My English companion was jealous of him. He wanted me away from this old man and his narratives. He wanted to take me to the beaches of Penang, to dance with me in the moonlight, and kiss my neck. He couldn’t understand why every night I left him in the lobby to join Ralph for tea.
Words were slipping through her fingers, she tried to catch them, and carefully realign them into sentences. “I sat on the handle bar of his bike,” she said. She paused and tears rolled down her cheeks. She opened her wounds and showed them to me. “We were nineteen. The future was ours. Then one day he was gone….I could…I could, would never be the same.”
This morning forgotten memories came flooding back. At night after she tucked us to bed I could hear her cry through the thin bamboo walls. Frozen, I couldn’t stretch my hands and reach out to her. I imagined running my fingers through her hair a hundred-million times, rehearsed soothing words on the rooftop of our house, and yet every night I turned to stone.
“She was my only,” he said while he turned over cards with his crooked fingers. Ralph is a remnant of a colonial era where men wore starched white linens in the blistering heat of his conquered land. Except, Ralph never conquered any land. He is displaced. A refugee roaming South East Asia. The only home his ever known disappeared in the heart of Africa. His only love died of tuberculosis after the Second World War while they were attending university in England.
Ralph is a beautiful man. He fed me stories and asked nothing for payment. My English companion was jealous of him. He wanted me away from this old man and his narratives. He wanted to take me to the beaches of Penang, to dance with me in the moonlight, and kiss my neck. He couldn’t understand why every night I left him in the lobby to join Ralph for tea.
Words were slipping through her fingers, she tried to catch them, and carefully realign them into sentences. “I sat on the handle bar of his bike,” she said. She paused and tears rolled down her cheeks. She opened her wounds and showed them to me. “We were nineteen. The future was ours. Then one day he was gone….I could…I could, would never be the same.”
Thursday, February 23, 2006
how much do these words weigh?
"Language is sheer emptiness, compared to the substance of the things they name." K. Burke
I do not offer road maps. My words are fiction. They are utterances that refer to the realm of what they are not. Trust your own memories. Mine are tangled. Nor do I want your own language to help me rebuild a new vocabulary. Words to me are as mysterious as the stars in the sky. So please don't ask for definitions or clarifications, for I have none to give.
I do not offer road maps. My words are fiction. They are utterances that refer to the realm of what they are not. Trust your own memories. Mine are tangled. Nor do I want your own language to help me rebuild a new vocabulary. Words to me are as mysterious as the stars in the sky. So please don't ask for definitions or clarifications, for I have none to give.
Tuesday, February 21, 2006
Barely awake
All three close male friends I have had, had names started with Ds. Two actually had the same name, except one said his with a French accent.
We talk for hours, forget the time…
I’m writing this at four thirty in the morning occasionally glancing at my single bed. Imagining crumpled sheets, and seeing the outline of my body snugged under a red comforter. The other day my new lover woke me up in the middle of a dream. He whispered soothing words as he wrapped his arms around me. The first time I heard that I dream was from one of the Ds. He said it to me holding a triangle egg sandwich as we waited for the ski lift to open. He told me that I was hurt. And that I cried in my sleep. He’s a light sleeper. I didn’t believe him.
Ariel and Skye speak of dreams. It’s one of their favorite subjects while we drive for hours in search of an onsen. In the back seat I grow silent. I focus on trees, rice paddies, and the sound of moving water. My only contribution is the same sentence, “I don’t dream.”
We had to share a room in our first day in the tropics. I was on my way to volunteer at an orphanage in Thailand. He had already arrived at his destination. I woke up with my arm in the air and his hand on my wrist. No words were traded. We fell back to sleep. In the morning he said that I dreamt a violent dream. I denied it and hid the imprints of his finger tips.
It’s five I could see a silhouette of a man walking across the street. I have three more papers to write and 200 pages of Mary Shelley to read. But first, sleep.
We talk for hours, forget the time…
I’m writing this at four thirty in the morning occasionally glancing at my single bed. Imagining crumpled sheets, and seeing the outline of my body snugged under a red comforter. The other day my new lover woke me up in the middle of a dream. He whispered soothing words as he wrapped his arms around me. The first time I heard that I dream was from one of the Ds. He said it to me holding a triangle egg sandwich as we waited for the ski lift to open. He told me that I was hurt. And that I cried in my sleep. He’s a light sleeper. I didn’t believe him.
Ariel and Skye speak of dreams. It’s one of their favorite subjects while we drive for hours in search of an onsen. In the back seat I grow silent. I focus on trees, rice paddies, and the sound of moving water. My only contribution is the same sentence, “I don’t dream.”
We had to share a room in our first day in the tropics. I was on my way to volunteer at an orphanage in Thailand. He had already arrived at his destination. I woke up with my arm in the air and his hand on my wrist. No words were traded. We fell back to sleep. In the morning he said that I dreamt a violent dream. I denied it and hid the imprints of his finger tips.
It’s five I could see a silhouette of a man walking across the street. I have three more papers to write and 200 pages of Mary Shelley to read. But first, sleep.
Sunday, February 12, 2006
Yaletown Love
Is soooo not red hot! Thank goodness for tasty martinis and awesome commentaries from Mr. Jay. His play by play captured the essence of 30s and 40s looking for Friday night love. Some of the unforgettable moments of the evening donated by desperate housewives, Tara Reid look alike and her diamond pendant “H” bling, silicone breasts, boy bands with diamond earings (i'm still blinded by all that bling), peroxide blonde hair, men in tight shirts, silicone lips, and of course Anya’s come hither look. Thanks to her we had to relocate as some middle age metro sexual thought we were giving him the look. Mark also did an amazing maneuver. The cougars were out on the prowl and I was truly impressed with his smile and bolt routine. All in all no one suffered any casualties. Good times!
Thursday, February 09, 2006
"Expectations"
(sorry this is not the painting i saw, but it'll give you an idea)
I spent seventeen hours on the train to see Monet and fell in love with Lucio Fontana. “Spatial Concept, Expectations” hides in the annex of O’Hara Museum of Art in Kurashiki. All day it listens to Monet, Degas, Cezanne, Matisse, and Renoir's admirers utter the word utsukushii (beautiful). They certainly are and deserve every adorations, but for me they dull in comparison to Fontana’s canvass. When I first saw "Expectations," my eyes immediately focused on the red sliced skin. I felt the sharpness of the knife that wounded it three times in clean deliberate strokes—violent—sleepless and yearning. Drawn I came closer and closer. Then just as by chance of my discovery, a museum attendant briskly passed by creating the slightest breeze that made the canvass move, spaces were revealed. Spaces that exemplified the constant movements between lovers: anticipation, declaration, hurt, pleasant surprise, withdrawal, desire, love, rejection.
The next day I remember running through the canals lined with willow trees, the smell of sembe (rice crackers) in the air and my feet barely touching the ground. I was running to see Fontana. I was running to see an image of love.
Thursday, February 02, 2006
Rossetti's take on Love
To give, to give, not to receive!
I long to pour myself, my soul
Not to keep back or count or leave
But king to king to give the whole
I long for one to stir my deep—
I have had enough of help and gift—
I long for one to search and sift
Myself, to take myself and keep.
I long to pour myself, my soul
Not to keep back or count or leave
But king to king to give the whole
I long for one to stir my deep—
I have had enough of help and gift—
I long for one to search and sift
Myself, to take myself and keep.
C. Rossetti
In this poem Christina Rossetti yearns for a relationship. She desires “to give”, to pour herself to another, and to be taken, to be ravished. Rossetti was similar to many intellectual women of the Victorian era in that she never married because the institution of marriage meant acceptance of biases imposed upon her gender by her society. The Victorian era divided women and men and allocated separate spheres for both. This isn’t to state that the male sphere was completely without its limitations. Certainly, Rossetti’s society was unfair for both genders.
As I read her work I’m glad that I didn’t live in this period, for I wouldn’t have known how to cope with its inadequacies and limitations. In many ways I think I would become cynical, and like Rossetti develop a negative view of romantic love, “No sooner have you feasted on beauty with your eyes then your mind tells you that beauty is vain and beauty passes.” It's sad to think beauty passes because it doesn’t. It changes. It transforms and replaces the fleeting beauty that first catches the eyes to something mystically sacred. Love is climbing trees; it’s about walking on its branches, and with free will falling with your arms open, as you descend be enveloped by the bluest endless sky, then landing on beds of daffodils with yellow petals staining your skin. This is love. This is she.
Untitled
.....and all you can do is understand that everything I ink undergoes fictionalization.
“You know you can get parasitic worms walking around bare feet,” I said as I look at the mud trapped between his toes.
“You should have told me earlier. I heard the call of crow billed drongo, I thought I could see it,” he said.
“Did you see it?” I asked.
“No,” he answered. He reached for a knife that was under my chair. The night before he used the same knife to cut triangle squares of watermelon. He scrapped his ankle with its dull side in short repetitive strokes.
“I am going for a swim,” I interrupted the silence that has formed between us.
“Uhhmm.”
In the daytime if he wasn’t showing me new species of insects, plants or trees, his words were completely rationed. I was in his world and I followed his rules. I too prefer silence. Words often fail, corner and defeat me. We speak five languages between us but in the daytime we were voiceless.
Frederik was my first lover. I’ve had boyfriends but never a lover. I was entering a new phase of relationship. I was undergoing transmutation, leaving my earlier ideals of relationship, its hope of a future. I was leaving behind words that I scribbled on my high school binders: love, together, forever, soul mates. I wanted a new word, more sober, impermanent and fleeting. Sober in wanting companionship. I no longer wanted to be wistful. I didn’t want to push my image of love to anyone because mine had been of dependency and need to fill hollowness. My past relationships were optimistic attempts to find love; along the way they became lessons of attachments and habit. I didn’t want to waste my youth in chastity either. I wanted intimacy but not the pain of goodbyes.
I first saw Frederik when I was leaving the island of Palawan and heading to Sabah. I just spent 16 months in Luzon searching and linking pieces of stories I remember, to stories offered to me by distant relatives, their friends and church records. I was curious when I saw him at the port. I was taking a local leaky boat and wondered if he had made a wrong turn somewhere. His clothes were worn out but clean. I studied him in intervals, taking short glances, cautious not to be caught. For the next month our path kept crossing. Our eyes met as we passed each other by the road. He became a familiar face amidst constant changing landscape and transient people. It wasn’t until I reached Kuching that we traded words. I can’t remember who initialized it but we established we were heading to Bako in two days. We agreed to share a boat to reduced expense. Hiring private jetties had been the biggest cost of moving from Sabah to Sarawak. My funds were dwindling and I needed to find people to share costs.
Talking to Frederik was different. He didn’t immediately ask where I was from or where I had been. Travelers at an instant will ask you where you are from and boast where they had been. I didn’t want kinship based on political lines of nationality. I was glad when he didn’t ask me. I didn’t want to explain. I wanted no narratives and he understood. I agreed to meet him at a bus station. The following day we hopped on a local bus that had no doors and windows. It was a half hour drive and when we got to the port we met a man named Abdul. Abdul was a tall man. His job transporting people from Kuching to Bako required him to spend countless hours in the sun which made it difficult to access his age based solely on his skin. Abdul spoke English to us, “One person, forty ringgit. Five person forty ringgit.”
“Let’s wait. Maybe someone will come,” I suggested.
“Okay,” he agreed.
We sat on a riverbank and stared at houses across. The stilt houses were still made of natural materials, I wondered how long before concrete and stucco replace wood and nipa. The more affluent families in Kuching had already made the shift. I made a mental note to pick up a book on Malay architecture.
Kids played nearby and I could still pick up the odd word here and there. The islands of Indonesia, Philippines and Malaysia are categorized in the same family language. Distance and isolation created hundreds of regional dialects. If political lines were drawn based on language they would divide in hundreds of regions.
Luckily we didn’t wait long. The next bus dropped off a British couple and a young American man. The poor guy spent a rough night in a bug-infested hostel. His swollen body was covered in red welts. Punctured marks on his forearm and face displayed where bugs made their incisions. As we got on the boat, the first thing the British woman asked, “Didn’t you wake up when they were biting you?”
“I was too drunk and felt nothing,” he embarrassedly admitted.
Abdul started the engine and everyone grew quiet.
“You know you can get parasitic worms walking around bare feet,” I said as I look at the mud trapped between his toes.
“You should have told me earlier. I heard the call of crow billed drongo, I thought I could see it,” he said.
“Did you see it?” I asked.
“No,” he answered. He reached for a knife that was under my chair. The night before he used the same knife to cut triangle squares of watermelon. He scrapped his ankle with its dull side in short repetitive strokes.
“I am going for a swim,” I interrupted the silence that has formed between us.
“Uhhmm.”
In the daytime if he wasn’t showing me new species of insects, plants or trees, his words were completely rationed. I was in his world and I followed his rules. I too prefer silence. Words often fail, corner and defeat me. We speak five languages between us but in the daytime we were voiceless.
Frederik was my first lover. I’ve had boyfriends but never a lover. I was entering a new phase of relationship. I was undergoing transmutation, leaving my earlier ideals of relationship, its hope of a future. I was leaving behind words that I scribbled on my high school binders: love, together, forever, soul mates. I wanted a new word, more sober, impermanent and fleeting. Sober in wanting companionship. I no longer wanted to be wistful. I didn’t want to push my image of love to anyone because mine had been of dependency and need to fill hollowness. My past relationships were optimistic attempts to find love; along the way they became lessons of attachments and habit. I didn’t want to waste my youth in chastity either. I wanted intimacy but not the pain of goodbyes.
I first saw Frederik when I was leaving the island of Palawan and heading to Sabah. I just spent 16 months in Luzon searching and linking pieces of stories I remember, to stories offered to me by distant relatives, their friends and church records. I was curious when I saw him at the port. I was taking a local leaky boat and wondered if he had made a wrong turn somewhere. His clothes were worn out but clean. I studied him in intervals, taking short glances, cautious not to be caught. For the next month our path kept crossing. Our eyes met as we passed each other by the road. He became a familiar face amidst constant changing landscape and transient people. It wasn’t until I reached Kuching that we traded words. I can’t remember who initialized it but we established we were heading to Bako in two days. We agreed to share a boat to reduced expense. Hiring private jetties had been the biggest cost of moving from Sabah to Sarawak. My funds were dwindling and I needed to find people to share costs.
Talking to Frederik was different. He didn’t immediately ask where I was from or where I had been. Travelers at an instant will ask you where you are from and boast where they had been. I didn’t want kinship based on political lines of nationality. I was glad when he didn’t ask me. I didn’t want to explain. I wanted no narratives and he understood. I agreed to meet him at a bus station. The following day we hopped on a local bus that had no doors and windows. It was a half hour drive and when we got to the port we met a man named Abdul. Abdul was a tall man. His job transporting people from Kuching to Bako required him to spend countless hours in the sun which made it difficult to access his age based solely on his skin. Abdul spoke English to us, “One person, forty ringgit. Five person forty ringgit.”
“Let’s wait. Maybe someone will come,” I suggested.
“Okay,” he agreed.
We sat on a riverbank and stared at houses across. The stilt houses were still made of natural materials, I wondered how long before concrete and stucco replace wood and nipa. The more affluent families in Kuching had already made the shift. I made a mental note to pick up a book on Malay architecture.
Kids played nearby and I could still pick up the odd word here and there. The islands of Indonesia, Philippines and Malaysia are categorized in the same family language. Distance and isolation created hundreds of regional dialects. If political lines were drawn based on language they would divide in hundreds of regions.
Luckily we didn’t wait long. The next bus dropped off a British couple and a young American man. The poor guy spent a rough night in a bug-infested hostel. His swollen body was covered in red welts. Punctured marks on his forearm and face displayed where bugs made their incisions. As we got on the boat, the first thing the British woman asked, “Didn’t you wake up when they were biting you?”
“I was too drunk and felt nothing,” he embarrassedly admitted.
Abdul started the engine and everyone grew quiet.
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