SERENITY

The last few months (since April actually) have been hectic in terms of house and mood changes, mainly due to the job search, but I want this period to touch to an end before I write about it in detail.

Today I took a long walk by the sea, spending one hour sitting in the sun on some deserted rocks and reading from the Book of Psalms. Around me gathered some tiny birds making funny noises. I had one of my  happiness moments, filled with peace and the sensation that everything is perfect the way it is: the caressing warmth and light of the sun, the blue of the sea and the sound of the waves crashing on the rocks, the cute birds and the words in the book. 

During the last few weeks I was asked in a couple of job interviews what motivates me, what makes me wake up in the morning, and both times I answered it is the light of sun, the fact of being alive, a flower, the smile of a child, anything, really. And today there was a real epiphany, we are so affected by all the continuous CHANGES we go through, and try to cling to people, situations and objects, when the one thing that doesn't change is whatever is called CREATION: nature, people, animals. I would add art to it, art is to me the highest expression of the human aspiration to overcome its mortal condition. Every little beautiful detail we can observe and watch with love and care gives us a feeling of fulfillment, if only we were open and softhearted enough. Celebrate LIFE!

JUST BREATHE

A partir de hoy voy escribir en la lengua que hablan mis pensamientos en el momento.

Camino junto al Atlántico, hay una luminosidad especial, que precede o sigue la lluvia, sobre el mar una mezcla de azules y grises claros, debajo el agua como un vidrio verdoso, casi fosforescente, en movimiento. Camino por la ciudad y me siento como ahogándome en mi globo de cristal. Me siento caminando por una pecera, atrapada, incapaz de comunicarme. No hay mañana, hay sólo hoy, implacable, mañana no sé por donde empezar. Como un personaje de Kafka, o como llegar a una estación en medio del campo sin saber cuando llega el próximo tren para llevarte a cualquier otro lugar que se puede nombrar. Mi puesto de trabajo, donde sigo desde febrero, está anunciado oficialmente como disponible para quien quiera presentarse, desde hace dos días. Yo no recibí ninguna noticias, pero sé que vendrá, como sabes que una roca que empezó a deslizarse por la montaña te aplastará si no te apartas de su camino. Siento que ya no puedo respirar hondo. No sé cuando recibiré el aviso para salir de aquí, de la oficina y el apartamento. Otra vez cajas, otra vez en el camino...hacia donde?

Camino y cuando paro, en el tren, o para comer,  continuo leyendo "La viajera" de Karla Suarez, un  libro que sentí que necesitaba leer, tan solo por el nombre que llevaba. La viajera es una mujer que cambió mucha veces de ciudad: La Habana, Sao Paulo, México DF, Madrid, Paris, Roma...y continua. Pretende buscar su Ítaca, porque en ninguna de estas ciudades no se sintió en su casa. Para, respira hondo, siente la ciudad, vive, trabaja, se enamora, hasta tiene un hijo, pero no se queda. Un poco como mi historia, me fui de Montréal porque la ciudad no me hablaba, de vuelta a Bucarest sentí lo mismo, una llamada para irme, y luego en Barcelona estaba bien cuando decidí que valía la pena venir a Lisboa para hacer el trabajo que llevaba tiempo soñando hacer. Y ahora es todo lo que tengo aquí. Y se me despiden, como te deshaces de un trapo viejo, qué? Para donde?

Portugal está mal, España igual, el puesto que dejé en Catalunya se ocupó, quedó libre y volvió a estar ocupado. Bucarest...allí solo tengo a mi familia y a unos pocos amigos, que se vuelven siempre menos. Me imagino en medio de un camino de donde salen otros mil tentáculos, hacia todos los países y las ciudades posibles,  con  todas mis cajas, sin saber como cargar con ellas, ni por donde coger. Cambié demasiados países estos últimos dos años (que ya van para tres), ya no aguanto más.

Nel mezzo del cammin di nostra vita 
mi ritrovai per una selva oscura

ché la diritta via era smarrita.

Ahi quanto a dir qual era è cosa dura

5esta selva selvaggia e aspra e forte

che nel pensier rinova la paura!

Y tiento recordarme como se respira. No entrar en pánico, pensar que hay soluciones, a pesar de estar sola al otro lado de Europa, en la orilla del Atlántico, con tanto horizonte abierto delante que hasta parece irónico. Irme no sería huir y huir y huir, una y otra vez? No sería más sabio tentar de quedarme y echar por fin algo como raíces?

FOR READERS

Got a reading questionnaire on Facebook, in Spanish, but I'd rather deal with it here.

1) What author appears most often on your bookshelf?

Maybe Italo Calvino, Bruce Chatwin and Jorge Amado, but the range of my preferences varies tremendously.

2) You owe most copies of which book?

None I remember. I bought twice Le città invisibili by Calvino, as I gave away the first one.

3) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?

For a long time it was Stavrogin from "The Possessed" by Dostoevsky si Darcy from "Pride and Prejudice", I liked the mysterious hard to get guys. Now nty heart has its feet on Earth:)

4) What book did you read again most often?

I don't really get back to it. Probably short stories by Chekhov and Bulgakov, plays by Shakespeare.

5) What was your fav book when you were 10?

I remember the authors: Alexandre Dumas and Jules Verne, Russians Nosov - Adventures of Dunno, Rybakov - The Dirk and The Bronze Bird, Obruchev - Plutonia & Sannikov Land (SF fantastic books about living prehistoric animals), Uspensky - Crocodile Gena, some two other Russian books with real animal stories and a beautiful anthology of Asian fairytales. All these books had the virtue of opening me towards other cultures, a curiosity that I will never lose.

6) Worst book you've read last year?

I've read a good deal of bibliography for my thesis, all were good:) The last bad book I remember: 11 minutes by Coelho, sometime in 2004

7) Best last year's book?

Hard to say, amongst the latest books I've read there are the ones by Romanian author Felicia Mihali, published in Québec: Luc, le chinois et moi; La reine et le soldat; Sweet, Sweet China and Dina.

8) If you should force someone to read a book, what would that be?

Shakespeare's plays for the large range of aspects, feelings, subjects and literary craft.

9) Who do you think should get a Nobel prize for literature?

It is unfair to choose a single author, still: Salman Rushdie and Umberto Eco (whose personal libraries hold about 50.000 books, by the way)

10) What book would you like to see adapted to the big screen?

Already done - Lord of the Rings, I've read it 12-13 years ago. Oh yes, all the Asian fairytales of my childhood:)

11) Describe the strangest dream including a writer, a book or a fictional character?

Can't remember.

12) The least cultured book you've read?

Lately, obviously 11 minutes.

13) The most difficult book you've read?

It was hard to deal with Kafka, it gave me some terrible anxiety states. "Doctor Faustus" by Mann, I couldn't even finish it.

14) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?

Most clearly the Russian: classics (Dostoevsky, Gogol, Goncharov, a little less Tolstoy - too exemplary for my taste), a modern who became classic: Bulgakov, the contemporary Bulat Okudjava, even if he's not really Russian. I also do like the French, but not in such a passionate way as the Russians. I went crazy for Balzac, Zola and Giraudoux in my teens. There are Marc Augé and François Laplantine in anthropology.

15) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?

Shakespeare. Milton I haven't read. I love Chaucer, but there's no one like the good ol' Will.

16) What do you mind most about reading?

That I can't do it while I walk:)

17) Your fav novel?

What?! I do not intend to spend my day writing this list.

18) Do you play?

I don't like card games, nor videogames and I'm lousy with sports. The last time I played Monopoly, the Lord of the Rings variant, about three years ago.

19)Short stories?

Bulgakov, Buzzati, Calvino, Pirandello, Borges.

20) Non-fiction?

Anthropology, travel and psychology. No self-help and new-age, please.

21) Favourite writer?

Far too many, some are to be found within the above answers, less the Japanese, Ismail Kadaré and Milan Kundera. Also Latin-Americans: Marquez, Llosa, Amado, Cortazar, Carpentier, Arenas, some Borges. Spanish Cervantes, Almudena Grandes and Antonio Gala, Portuguese Fernando Pessoa. Some playwriters: Pirandello, Brecht, antique tragedy, Racine, O'Neill. Poets: D.H. Lawrence, Eugenio Montale, Giuseppe Ungaretti, Antonio Machado came with me to Canada. I do not exclude Romanians, only most of them were mandatory in school. Examples: Rebreanu and Camil Petrescu.

22) What writer do you think is over appreciated?

Paulo Coelho...brrrrrrrr

23) Book to take on a desert island?

The ones I haven't dare to read yet: Iliad and Odissey, Divine Comedy

24) And...what are you reading now?

Mother Russia: the feminine myth in Russian culture, by Joanna Hubbs and Des îles et des hommes - Françoise Péron, a study about the Britanny islands. Then I start again with Romanian contemporaries, many to be found at Bibliothéque Nationale du Québec, starting with cu Veronica A. Cara - Baba Lina.

JULY 17 - BEIRUT, WHAT'S NEXT?

940 days ago

Friday I called my Lebanese friend Gazou (Ghazwa), to ask how she's doing and she told me her country is being destroyed. I was in deep shock, as I'm not watching TV or reading newspapers lately. She told me the whole story, besides her parents are there on holiday.

I cannot believe what is happening. I'm against any form of terrorism, but to punish innocent people for the Hezbollah and destroy the airport and the roads - this is so unfair and absurd. What is happening is not sad, is disgusting.

We live in the 21st century and by all means we can call it bloody 21st century.

I just finished "Samarkand", by Amin Maalouf, a great Lebanese writer. The book traces the story of Omar Khayyam and his manuscript (around year 1000 on the territory that's now Iran and Uzbekistan, formerly part of the Seljuk Empire). It looks to me like the world didn't change much since then.

JUNE 27 - A MIDSUMMER LONG WEEK-END'S DREAM

961 days ago

About beauties of Québec - also known as La Belle Province. I discovered another charming corner this 3 days week-end. In the Eastern Townships, nature unfolds its overwhelming beauty: forests, lakes, mountains, all glorified by the bright summer sun.

Some great friends, beautiful and talented sisters Vania and Carina, invited all their comrades to celebrate the Summer Solstice at their cottage, in the middle of an untrimmed meadow, where grass and flowers grow up to the waist and fully flavored juicy wild strawberries invite you to kneel and pick them.

Sometimes I had the impression of wandering in a field Monet painted, preceded by the bright long hair of Vania and Carina floating over the grass and crowned by huge straw hats. Or talking to a portrait painted by Gainsborough.

The gang was fantastic, like a changing puzzle, people coming and going, a few musicians, who played guitar and sang, one was composing a different song every day, claiming it to be a "classic".

We swam in the lake every day (a bit chilly on Friday), took posession of a diving boat anchored close enough, turned its radio on and lied on the deck under a bright sun. The Memphrémagog lake is deep, clean, and it stretches down to the US, surrounded by thick forests. The Owl's Head mountain peak looks above it.

I had my two breakfasts on the deck overlooking the meadow, sun shining and birds chirping. Every evening there was a barbecue, and everybody was sitting around the big table, having a feast, eating from Wedgwood vintage china. Saturday night we went out to see the stars and watch the brief glimpses of the fireflies crossing in the dark.

Behind the house there's a forest, a creek runs through it, ending up in a pond. I saw footprints of deer and racoon on the bank. I sit there Sunday morning, on the moss under the trees, reading poems by Ungaretti in a loud voice, accompanied by the birds and sound of the water caressing the stones. Also had a romantic interlude there on Sunday afternoon, kissing someone I just met, the ambiance was very inviting.

Who could ask for more? You tell me.

MAY 23, 06 - ROMANIANS OF MY AGE ARE CREATIVELY ALIVE AND KICKING, WHAT ABOUT ME?

995 days ago

I was impressed by two pieces of info these two days.

1 Catalin Mitulescu, that I briefly crossed in Romania, has a film in the "Un certain regard" section in Cannes. "THE WAY I SPENT THE END OF THE WORLD". He won a big prize with a short one - Trafic, in 2004. His wife, Andreea Valean, wrote the screenplay for both, she's also a theater director and a playwriter, I heard about her plays before, but I didn't know she was the Andreea I saw once or twice in my life, at some birthday party. They both are about my age. Apparently Martin Scorsese and Wim Wenders were involved in the production of his latest film.

2. I got the "Diary" of Sorin Stoica as an Easter gift from Romania, sent by my uncle. I started reading it, then, looking at his bio, I noticed he studied at the same Faculty as me, also worked there and...passed away this very January, being only 27! Looking him up on the net I noticed he wrote 6 books before.

Now, looking at myself I realize that if I was to die tomorrow, that's not much I would live behind. I realize my generation in Romania started being very productive, coming up as strongly creative and definitely having something to say. After a long troubled period, that generated a lot of beautiful energies. Waterlilies grow from mud.

I accumulate a lot and give out nothing.

I do have to kick my own ass and put myself to work. Write, be here, 100%, without wasting myself anymore.

Partly because of people like Sorin Stoica, who found the wonderful resources to defy disease and death and stay with us through his writings.

MARCH 23 - BACK TO WORK AND MOLIÈRE

1056 days ago

I had a successful interview this morning. I wonder if they've even seen someone else. A communications company, in the middle of the city, very classy, with many government and cultural connections. Nice old fashioned offices, not the shiny impersonal cubist spaces of nowadays.

Starting on Monday I will be executive assistant to the president. With the possibility of getting involved in projects as part of the team. I guess it is good, but after all the ups and downs I had lately I'm afraid of enjoying too much. Plus, what will happen to my great plans of going back to school? Time will tell.

The funny part is how I got there. Volunteering for the Intl Festival of Films on Art I was sent to this company offices to give a hand for the avant-première organization. I spent two days there and worked very well with the person. He was very impressed and thanked me every time he saw me. So I left my resume with him and Monday when I called as a reminder, I was told they have an open position. Out of the blue! My predecessor left suddenly Friday. So the administration manager told me he'll take a look at my CV. And today I had the interview and we agreed. I have to say this year the festival was my lucky star.

In the evening I saw Molière en hiver - Le Misanthrope sur le fond d'une piscine de quartier desafectée. In this one the French playwriter was mocking the hypocrisy of the court people at the times of Louis XIV. Not different from our jet set beautiful people. I liked it a lot, and not only because the director is Romanian. The young Québec actors were impressive, juggling with grace with the alexandrines. It's a shame they have to work as waiters or sell shoes to make ends meet. I decided to go see more plays by Cristina Iovita, she's one of this Don Quijotes who practices her art against all odds.

FEB. 06, 06 - HUMAN IDENTITY

1101 days ago

Quoting from Italian writer Alberto Moravia standing in Hiroshima "That very moment the monument raised to the memory of the most infortunate day in the human history "reacted" inside me. Suddenly, I understood that the monument was ordering me to stop recognizing myself as the citizen of a determined nation, belonging to a determined culture, but rather, in some zoological and also religious way, member of the species"

Saturday I helped out two Philippino boys for school, today one Sri Lankian and one Hindu girl. I offered to do it every Saturday morning for two hours and from 4 to 6pm one day a week. It feels so good, the kids are exceptionally sweet and well behaved, I have a feeling Oriental kids are taught to be more respectful.

I guess this is one of the things I was looking for in Canada, the feeling of belonging simply to humans, beyond borders.

FEBRUARY 2, 06 - EXISTENTIAL BLAH

1105 days ago

I shouldn't read what turns me off... Like "La noia" (The Boredom) by Alberto Moravia. Similar somehow to the "Étranger" of Camus. A guy who's completely detached from life, who finds no purpose in anything, doesn't relate to any object, person or activity. Just before that there were "Le cosmicomiche" (Cosmicomics) by my idol Italo Calvino.

Ouf! I guarantee these are not the best lecture for somebody who's unemployed. Calvino made me feel suspended between the billions of years before and after my life, a dot lost in the infinity of the universe. And Moravia, with his characters deprived of feelings - that's even worse. I started again writing my memoirs of Italy in French, this stimulates me, although nostalgia is hard to bear too.

Not many happenings I have to say. A very good Argentinian movie last Tuesday (Abrazo Partido - Lost Embrace), and on DVD "The Pianist" - Polanski, "Contempt" by Godard (from "Il Disprezzo" by the above Moravia) and "Kadosh" (Sacred) about an archi-Orthodox Jewish community in Israel and its contradictions. A gay friend from France was visiting, so Saturday night we ended up at "Sky" in the Village - the funny gay district. Latin music and queens downstairs, dance music and Québec transexuals upstairs. I find it weird to see a couple of guys dancing salsa. We had fun.

The Art Museum opened an exhibition brought from the Russian Ermitage museum. Catherine the Great (she was German by the way) and her times. Will have to see it next Wednesday. This week-end - German friend international birthday party, "Dracula" musical Québec version (I was invited) and my usual monthly Flamenco show.

Oh, I forgot to mention last Sunday hike on my neighbourhood mountain. It's really cool to have a forest hill right in the middle of the city. People go cross country skiing, snowshoeing, snowtubing and skating. The best part was that I had to do it with my long coat on, I managed to broke the zipper of the short one See the pics.

OCTOBER 21, 05 - TOO MANY QUESTIONS...

1209 days ago

I guess the book I'm reading: The Book of Restlessness (O livro do desassossego), a great existentialist erratic work of the Portuguese Fernando Pessoa doesn't help much. It preaches the only way to keep yourself intact is to withdraw as much as possible from the world and keep on dreaming. I guess I always had escapist tendencies (inherited from my father, maybe?) - ignoring real life and its responsibilities and finding comfort in books, films, thoughts, theatre - paralel illusory lifes. Pessoa's character theory is that everything is a dream anyway, and it's so silly to take anything for real and run after happiness.

Seeing many films at the Festival du Nouveau Cinema - the third movie internation festival in 2 month here! The symbol is a she-wolf - la louve, a black wild silhouette contrasting with a white dog in a leish. Makes me thing about Herman Hesse and his Steppenwolf - living at the border, not agreeing with social rules, and not being able to live outside of it. Had a chance, as a festival volunteer, to peek at the backstage of it.

A bit disorganised, or rather looks like organised in a hurry, with pretty basic means. With two other festivals before, sponsors had too much to choose from. People working at the welcome desk and press room looking very "artistic" - like not quite neat, opposing the images we get from other international film fests. Bon, I'm coming from a country where people spend far too much money on clothes and care about appearance, so I grew habits too

Anyway, saw one great movie: Something like happiness, from Czech Republic, I guess one of the best about the disorientation we're still going through in the East. The others, from Iran, Bulgaria, Lebanon impressed me, but didn't touch the bottom of my heart. But they've been speaking to me about all these different cultures and countries with so many problems, that still manage to maintain a good artistic level, which I find admirable. Haven't seen a Romanian film in quite a while, wondering if some good directors made it. I guess so, as one I cccasionally met a few years ago got the Gold Bear in Berlin for a short last year and Un certain regard in Cannes for his latest film.

I started looking for another job, as this way towards the industrial suburbs and back every day is torturing me. Plus the boring job per se, I'm getting claustrophobic and frustrated. I've been used to open spaces in the Caribbean Anyway, it looks like I am more marketable, now that I have the famous Canadian experience, but only in certain fields. And competition is fierce, I applied for a job with TV5 - the French international community TV channel, and found out they got 500 resumes...forget it.

Losing patience, wasting too much time with chat and e-mails, feeling my energy level goes down...that's no good. I have no solution but keep on trying. Here the best way to find a job is the people you know. And the ones I know are not that well connected...

At least I like the appartment and I can relax home. To be continued...

August 25, 05 - About hedonism, thanking friends, looking for a life purpose, identity issues

1266 days ago

Ok, Im starting with the last one...basically what I want from life is to be able to be myself - 24 hours, have a medallion that reads ESSE QUAM VIDERI - To be, rather than to seem (just got translation from Internet, I thought it was I am what you see, that's even better!). Therefor, find a job that would allow me to show and develop my real self, my best skills.

An university proffesor of mine (Roger Tessier, from Montréal!) told me once I am like a gardener that has all kinds of fruits and vegetables in his garden and doesn't know what to pick, letting some of them rotten. I guess there lies my problem: I'm unable to focus, in world that's more and more specialized.

So I'm looking for what I really, really want to do, maybe I don't even know this exists, maybe it is something still unknown to me. But I need to find it fast, as I feel I'm wasting myself.

We live in a world where hedonism - pleasure as life's ultimate purpose became most frequent way of life. Lifestyle matters so much, comfort - keep away from pain, keep away from becoming a loser, this is the worst thing that may happen. Success as a measure of all things, judged by social position, exposure, posessions. Convenient appearances, covering inner emptiness, fear of existing for real, of experiencing extreme emotions, extreme sensations replaced those.

Feeling like saying a word for my Portuguese friends who sent me two great CD's: MARIZA - TRANSPARENTE and my beloved MISIA - DIVA BOX. Mariza will be here in one month time for a concert. Funny, right? I'm going, obviously. Got also a book by Fernando Pessoa, one of the greatest modern writers. It bears the most appropriate title for the present moment: The book of anxiousness.

Well, so much for now...tomorrow I gotta go make some more money And Saturday I'll be moving alone, for the first time in my life!

August 2nd, 05 - Emptiness

1289 days ago

Sometimes I feel everything I read or watch is there on purpose...I feel such an urge to give a sense to my live. Just saw The Edukators, about these young German anarchists that break into rich villas and move furniture around, put it in absurd positions (hanged a statue...) and leave notes like Your rich days are finishing...and You have too much money.

Childish fun, somehow, dangerous...we all need adrenaline, they think they make a difference against globalization and capitalism, the other dictatorship.

Made me wonder what can I do about my life, because I need to do something, chase these feelings of futility and uselessness, of being an ant amongst others. I just comply with the system, I need to try to make a change, even if it is at a basic level. This is my main problem lately, I have no attachment to anything, life is too light...The Unbearable Lightness of Being - great book. The three years on the ship were the long break I needed to get to know myself, away from the patterns we grow up with.

Now I need to act, enough of learning to grow up. Growing up hurts (remember Alice in Wonderland?), sometimes you're too big for the space you have to live in. But I'll find a way, once I'm looking for it I'm half done. My own way.