On fate, and airports

Some people believe in leaving it up to fate (are you kidding me?), some people believe in planning everything to the smallest detail (oh, come on).  And some people weigh their options and make sound decisions, but still like to think that sometimes fate might have a little something to do with it.  These people are the ones who enjoy those moments, when you've booked an airplane ticket and really the only reason you have a layover in that particular city and a glass of wine at that particular bar, is that the airfaire search engine you used happened to find that ticket, and you happened to search for it on the day when it was marked at its lowest price.  These moments, when you sit at that airport bar, are when it is easiest to put life into perspective, and appreciate, that it might have been your sound decisions or it might have been fate, that put you there.

Mr. Giggles (The Little Question)

I have a bunny, his name is Mr. Giggles...  That was his name in the catalog when I ordered him as a make-it-yourself stuffed toy somewhere around 8th grade.  A toy bunny, yes.

Well anyhow, Mr. Giggles sits on the rim of my couch against the wall, along with a kitty that was left behind by a little girl several years ago at the restaurant where I worked.  Kitty doesn't have a name, but they are both white, with pink ears, and although Mr. Giggles doesn't have eyes - they're closed, he is Mr. Giggles after all - I'm sure they would be blue like Kitty's if they were open.  So let's call her Ms. Kitty.

So in an intense moment of yet another Sex and the City episode, grasping that light-bulb moment that the show can instill in your thoughts, something made me remember Ms. Kitty.  I was sitting right on that couch, and Mr. Giggles and Ms. Kitty were just a head rotation away, and...

Well I had Mr. Giggles and Ms. Kitty gently snuggling on the rim of the couch, nose to cheek, ear to ear - that kind of thing.  But somewhere in the past few weeks or maybe few months, I guess Mr. Giggles had...rotated.  Anyhow, when I looked, Ms. Kitty was smelling Mr. Giggle's a**!

I said, "Mr. Giggles!!!"

And then I grabbed Ms. Kitty, or should I say Mrs. Giggles, brushed the fake fur away from her fake blue eyes and made sure that Mr. Giggles was in a decent position before I let her back.

I guess you never know when something will have a life of its own.

The Big Question

What if we personify nature?  Imagine that it is angry.  What if we have done too much to hurt nature; built too many houses, polluted too much air?  What if nature is angry and retaliating?

Do we have to personify it to see it in this way?  Isn't this exactly what is happening?  Nature, the environment, can no longer take the pressure we have put on it.  The recent disasters – the typhoons, the Hurricanes – are a result of what we have done, of how we have ruined nature.  We don't have to give nature our human qualities to see what it happening.

Where have humans come from anyways? Nature created us. Through years of evolution we came out with a mutation no other thing or creature had – a big brain. We have been able to gain power over all the other creatures, over diseases, even over nature to some extent. But in the end, we have ruined this planet. Now that we are beginning to suspect the damage we have caused, we’re saying, “Let’s go to Mars. Is there water on Mars? Can we live on Mars?” Are we just going from one planet to the next, leaving them ruined along the way, like carelessly jumping from one relationship to the next, breaking one heart, and moving on to break the next one? Is this all our big brains have given us, is this all we are capable of?

We have evolved to have big brains and we have learned how to use them, but in the end, what have they given us? We have destroyed our own planet and all the other living things on it. And unless we go to Mars, and then onto the next planet, and manage to keep surviving and moving on in this fashion, we will destroy ourselves. Our big brains will kill us.

Let’s think about all the great things our brain power has given us: solutions to diseases, the knowledge to produce technology. The technology has polluted the environment and is threatening the planet, the diseases have evolved and died out along with us. Perhaps some of these diseases would never have evolved if we hadn't gone so far out of nature?  I'll try to personify nature again.  Nature has long known that we are on the path to destruction and it has punished us along the way with various diseases. Diseases that we have overcome so far. But at some point we won't be able to keep up with it, we won't be able to overcome everything nature throws at us. We cannot deny that nature is a stronger force then us humans.

If our brains have caused so much damage, where did they come from?  Well, following Darwin’s theory, creatures have been evolving and this is what we ended up with.  I say “end up” but is this the end? Evolution has gone on for millions of years. Maybe we are just a small part of it. Maybe our brains are like those giraffes whose necks were not long enough to reach the leaves on the tallest trees. Maybe we were one of those mutations that was not good for survival, and now we are dying off.

Another question is what makes us think we should personify nature? Why do we think that prescribing human qualities to other things gives them additional validity? Nature is clearly the stronger force. Shouldn't we be nature-ify-ing things instead? To personify means to assign emotions and feelings to an object, or another creature.  We assume that other things do not have these emotions, and that emotions make us superior. But what have our emotions achieved? Religion, love, hatred – they have all caused so much bloodshed, and have they done anything for the greater good? The people who refuse to utilize animal products because they feel sad for the animals that have to die for them, are they the only ones using emotions for the good of nature and other creatures?

Does nature have a brain? Does it have emotions? I guess not. But if you consider everything nature has done, it follows a path, guidelines, it makes sense. What have humans done that makes sense? Is there a stronger organ than the brain? And what in the end are we trying to achieve with our brains – power? Is there a stronger organ that we don’t have, that leads to survival? Does nature have that organ, should we be trying to figure out what it is, and how we can attain it, how we can nature-ify ourselves?

I guess the question this all leads to is “What do we do?” Is there anything we can do? Do all of our questions and debates of politics, religion, family values really matter? Are we focusing on solving the wrong questions? Should we be thinking about learning from nature, about our survival? Should we be letting nature show us the way? Do we have any time left or have we made nature too angry?

One thing our brains have clearly done is “cracked the code” of nature. We have understood how it works. That speaks for something. To our knowledge, we are the only ones who have done so. But have we used this knowledge the wrong way? Is there a way for us to understand nature and coexist with it? Nature created us; why do we not take its ways into consideration when populating it?

In the grand scheme of things, is this just a little battle between humans and nature that has come out in a tie. Does nature eternally fight against its creations? Are there other little “humans” that are losing the battle somewhere else in the universe? Is this a repeating phenomenon?  Other animals also destroy bits of nature, like beavers that cut down trees.  But there are never enough of them to make a lasting impact, nature can recuperate.  Humans, because our brains have created the technology to survive in times when other creatures would not, have overpopulated nature.  It can no longer recuperate at the pace we destroying it.  We have thrown it off balance, and it is doing the same to us.

I am not sure how many of these ideas are legitimate, but the basic question is real. Our mutation, our big brains are destroying our own world. As a result of our actions, nature is throwing us hurdles that we cannot handle. People are dying. Do we turn our brains the other way and pretend not to see, or do we use them to solve these big questions?

Bhutan

Photo from Google

A very interesting story about Bhutan - "the last Buddhist kingdom" - was just aired on the Rick Steves' show (www.ricksteves.com).  It seems that the talk has not been posted yet, but I will link it when it is.

Bhutan is a small country of 742,737 people, locked in between east India and northern China.  It is still a deeply spiritual society, trying its best not to be corrupted by an uncontrollable force of modernization (to stay away from problems like its neighbor Tibet has uncovered).  A recent leader realized that the Bhutanese would benefit from going out into the real world, little by little, to receive an education and bring it back to the country.  At the same time, they also decided to let some tourists in.  However, fees for traveling within Bhutan are very high, and tourists have to follow careful rules while there.  This is all an attempt to control the entrance of globalization into Bhutan.

Many interesting points were raised during the show.  Is Bhutan being preserved as an sheltered spiritual place for the entertainment of western travelers, without regard of what that preservation is doing to the local citizens?  In the following discussion issues of poverty were raised, as well as how the Bhutanese view the western society, and the role of a Buddhist lens in all this.

Bhutan has recently been rated as the happiest society.  Policies like having a day, Tuesday, when cars are not allowed within the capital, are meant not only to keep modern features out of sight, but also to urge citizens to stop by their friends house on their walk home from work, and not watch TV.

Eek! A bear!

Hey Tübingen

Tübingen, a city in the northwest of Germany. A college town, and most interestingly, a very old college town. Established in 1477, the Univeristy of Tübingen is known for an array of important alumni, especially in the field of theology.

Today, the city embraces the activities of any other modern student body. Students bringing home carry-out pizza and beer, decorating their apartments, and posting valued texts and items on windows for passers by to see.

The postcard view of Tübingen is located right as you cross the main bridge from the train station. Five colorful houses reflecting in the water seem hardly worthy of a postcard to a person traveling in Germany for several weeks. It scares the visitor into thinking there's nothing more inside...

15th century style German houses, exclusively brick roads, uneven winding alleys, a river passing underneath a street (this street held the most prized apartments back in the day because of its great laundry access).  We were there on a chilly rainy day, but it seemed naturally quiet, hushed.  And although we didn't see too many students, everywhere we looked there were little reminders that they are there: drawing on road signs, a bottle and a couple empty glasses, parked bicycles.

"Papa, I want to wear a dress."

Whether it is the memory of the great minds who had lived there, the desire to continue the legacy, or the old architecture, Tübingen feels charged with ideas.  It's as if the gripping quiet atmosphere is an analogy of the hushed concentration that a genius might experience right before the conception of the next world shattering invention.

Out of all the window poems and wall proverbs, I picked the one that was most meticulously put together.  The text and it's Google translation is as follows:

***

Hey Tübingen - das tier in dir ist ausgebrochen!

Noch spürst du nicht was kommen wird! Doch wir sind uberall!

Versteckt lauern wir dir auf und fordern dich hler heraus:

Langst haben wir dich umzingelt und machen uns zum großen sprung bereit.

Wir sind wild!

Wir sind mutig

Wir sind neu gerig (?) & tun worauf wir lust haben!

und du?

Mit gebrüll, getöse gelachter und gezische stürzen wir uns auf dich.

Tübingen du wirst unser dschungel sein

die visonäre

***

Hey Tübingen - the animal in you is broken!

Still, you do not feel what is to come! But we are everywhere!

We lurk hidden in you and challenge you counter:

The Original

Long since we have surrounded you and make us ready for big leap.

We are wild!

We are brave

We are new g'erig & do what we have pleasure!

and you?

With roar, roar laughter and hisses we jump on you.

Tubingen you will be our jungle

the visionaries

The daily routines of history's most creative minds

Rise and shine: the daily routines of history's most creative minds | Science | The Guardian

Rise early, take walks, have a routine.
Suggestions from the great.

Berlin

I’ve been to so many cities that I have never written about.  This will hopefully be fixed.  Let’s start with Berlin – a recent destination.

As I have shared with my friends, my main impression of Berlin is that it is a city living in the memory of the war.  Whether it is because its citizens don’t want to forget those years, because the world doesn’t want the city to forget those years, or because the city just hasn’t managed to replenish itself in the years passed – reminders are everywhere.

Perhaps as a testimony to how jumbled things can become in one’s mind when seeing too many new places at once, when I set out for Berlin, after already two weeks and several countries in Europe, I could not recall any particular sights and monuments to see in the city.  I booked a hostel several blocks away from the Ostbahnhof, and intended to walk the distance by foot.  When I walked out of the station, I knew the river should be on my left, so I set out east for the hostel.  The walk was longer than I intended, so I kept checking the map and worrying if I am going in the right direction, all the time wondering about the purpose of the long dirty wall on the bank of the river.  It took me almost the whole walk to realize, “Duh, it’s the Berlin Wall.”

The Wall is impressive.  The longest remaining stretch is now called the East Side Gallery, and that is the part that I happened to walk by.  It is covered by murals done by various street artists, with motifs mainly concerning war and human rights, some referring to Berlin more directly than others.  The size of the remaining wall as it stands now is not that impressive, but of course before it was also surrounded by barbed wire, a bed of nails, and armed shooters.  What is impressive is the fact that it stands where it was; not in a glass case in a museum, but right in the place where it caused all the distress and turmoil now expressed in the murals.

I lived in the east part of Berlin, and the east part carries with it more of the harsher reminders of the war and the decades after.  As a matter of fact, some West Berliners still feel that they are being dragged down by their east side, and the same goes for west and east Germany.  Old bombed walls and graffiti are prevalent throughout the east part.  Instead of hiding these dirty, as most contemporary people would think of them, pieces of the city, Berliners live within them.  Parks and bars are set up among these faded remains and old tram tracks.  Even the scarce décor in popular bars is dark and murky, baring only memories of the recent horrors.  Every Sunday night the East Side Gallery turns into a concert hall with music ringing from in between the Wall and the river.  In addition, as a tour guide explained to us, the city is still vastly under populated, and this emptiness causes those destroyed walls to stand out more than the people.

Our tour guide on a free tour, in front of the Berliner Dom.

Aside from this history-ridden empty feeling, which struck me so much, Berlin is a brilliant modern city with lots of lively people.  One of the city’s main endeavors is rebuilding historic buildings that were destroyed in the war.  Old churches, museums, opera houses are often topped with a construction crane.  The Museum Island, formed between two branches of the Spree River, is a tight cluster of five fantastic museums with rich and diverse collections.  Classical style architecture stands out in many main squares of the city.  The night life is also famous, with its center in the Kreuzberg neighborhood, and folks arriving to experience the lively clubs from around the world.

Only image on the wall of a crowded
bar in Kreuzberg.

And yet, in all this, still everywhere little monuments, little reminders...  Much of Germany was destroyed, both physically and emotionally, but Berlin is the only city that holds within its limits the loneliness and desolation that was brought to the world in those years.

10 Best Small Towns in America

10 Best Small Towns in America | Travel News from Fodor's Travel Guides

Inspiring biographies of a few charming towns in the country.  But how do you choose one?

P.S. Does the word wine ring a bell?;-)

Gangnam Style - acoustic and lyrical

You can turn anything into music :)

La Cigara y la Hormiga

Santa:

- "Érase una vez un país en el que vivían una Cigarra y una Hormiga. La hormiga era hacendosa y trabajadora, y la cigarra no; le gustaba cantar y dormir mientras la hormiga hacía sus labores. Pasó el tiempo y la hormiga trabajó y trabajó todo el verano, ahorró cuanto pudo y en invierno la cigarra se moría de frío mientras la hormiga tenia de todo… ¡Que hija de puta la hormiga! La Cigarra llamó a la puerta de la Hormiga, que le dijo: “Cigarrita, cigarrita, si hubieras trabajado como yo, ahora no pasarías hambre ni frío…” ¡¡Y no le abrió la puerta!! ¿Quien ha escrito esto? Porque esto no es así: la hormiga ésta es una hija de la gran puta y una especuladora. Y además, aquí no dice porque unos nacen cigarras y otros hormigas, y tampoco que si naces cigarra estás jodido, y aquí, no lo cuenta…

Los lunes al sol. Fernando León de Aranoa (2002).

Gogol Bordello

Have you ever been to American wedding?

Where is the vodka, where is marinated herring?

Where is the musicians that got the taste?

Where's the supply that's gonna last three days?

Where's the band that like fanfare? Gonna keep it going 24 hour

Instead it's 1 in the morning and DJ's patching up the chords

Everybody's full of cake, staring at the floor

Proper couples start to mumble that it's time to go

People gotta get up early and they gotta go

Ah, people gotta get up early and she's got a boyfriend

And this whole fucking thing is one huge disappointment

And nothing gets these bitches going, not even gypsy kings

Nobody talks about my super theory of super everything

So be Donald Trump or be an anarchist

Make sure that your wedding doesn't end up like this
I understand the cultures of a different kind

But here word celebration just doesn't come to mind

Have you ever been to American wedding?

Where is the vodka, where is marinated herring?

Where is the musicians that got the taste?

Where's the supply that's gonna last three days?

Where's the band that like fanfare? Gonna keep it going 24 hour

Quizas Quizas Quizas

Весна

Checkmate

- What does an Australian say to a Czech?
- Checkmate.

Contemporary Classical

Contemporary classical music came to me through Amelie, in which composer Yann Tiersen provides a moving, yet modern background, perfect for the film.  The music in general is, as many say, not quite as deep and grande as the music of the traditional classical giants.  However, what is so attracting about the new style is precisely the lack of that deepness, the multitude of voices and undertones.  What we long for today is a simple tune.  No less beautiful, but simple.  Maybe it is only an illusion that life used to be more simple in the old days, in the black and white days.  But it is true, I believe for many, that when we get carried away with the burdens of the modern world, we do not want to be grabbed by Beethoven's Pathetique (although I cannot dispute its beauty).  We want instead a couple notes, a single melody; one that would let us, just for a minute, feel nothing but its light movement and its open spirit.

Granted

We often get buried by our problems.  We also often listen to others, and think that perhaps their problems are not as bad as they think they are.  The point I'm trying to make is that when we get used to our lives we start taking so many things for granted.  It's an old idea.  But think about how many things that encompasses - our jobs, houses, friendships, relationships.  Sometimes one might think he is being taken for granted, but is he not taking for granted the person he's channeling his anger at?

It is easy to see this error in other people, but it takes a lot to be able to recognize it in ourselves.  And we should all remember that even the richest, most successful person can become a culprit of this.  In fact those who have the most, have the most to lose.  They might not lose their riches, but what about the other things that make a person happy?  And so it is those aspects of our lives that we see most often and get used to, that we tend to take for granted, and it is oh so useful to remind ourselves to cherish what we have when we are lucky enough to hear someone else rambling about how much they are ready to lose.

comparative advertising

Kamasutralap

Sherlock's Mindfulness

I want to comment on something I have been noticing recently that has to do with the negative side of our quickly-changing, flashing, twenty first century world.  A lot of the young generation today is adopting new gadgets and widgets at an alarming rate.  We have TV 's and phones, net books and tablets, and TV's on our phones; and all that surrounded by constant updates, flashy news, and so on.  We have gotten used to watching TV while checking our e-mail, and talking on the phone while scrolling through Facebook.  We have gotten so used to it that we are loosing the ability to do one thing at once.  We have trouble focusing our minds on one thing.  We are easily distracted and we are always looking for some toy to play with.  We can no longer sit through a family dinner without checking Facebook.  Or sit though a school lecture without checking the news.  It won't be long until we start playing Angry Birds while having sex.

A news report recently highlighted a new book that concerned Sherlock Holmes.  The book spoke of a characteristic that separated Holmes from other people: mindfulness.  Mindfulness is the ability to focus on the present, to focus on a task without being distracted.  It is the quality that allows one to experience things fully, and understand and appreciate their entire message.  Perhaps this is what we are losing.  Perhaps we are allowing our new world to take control of us, and are shedding the qualities of our own heroes.

train to life

Sometimes I feel like my life is somewhere right next to me, but I just can't get on the right train to get to it.

Recycled Mozart

Paraguay: the musical second life of trash.