So, no matter how we want it to last forever, the summer will end. Not yet, but soon. Our busy schedules return to full swing, and so does the pressure of being a fit, active member of a society idolizing the disciplined body.
Really- have you seen the gym floor on those first, cold fall days, when people start getting anxious and hating the effects of summer laissez-faire on their physique? It is a cattle fair. Last only a short while, before most people just give up, relax and stop panicking. At the end of the day, life is short. Don´t get me wrong- it is good to do sports, but it should not be an obsession. And all you Tracy Anderson -wannabes, I hear you, but choose to ignore you. My prerogative, let´s put it this way.
So what to do, to get the inspiration for a jog or two? Let´s turn to the help of the rich and famous.
Surely, a nice fellow from the land of Venezuela can help, no? Meet the friendly dictator leader Mr. Hugo Chavez, who just recently recovered from some health problems of his own. Now the new lifestyle is just oozing out of him. So much so, that he decided to share his fave moves with the rest of us mere mortals. After all, he is the Man, who claimed capitalism was the reason behind the end of life in Mars. A man to follow, certainly. So there we go. Don´t get all obsessed with the head tilt, though. I´m sure it is not good to do too many repetitions in a row.
The speed, with which the formerly purely communist China is embracing capitalism is breathtaking. In fact, the speed is so frantic that it leaves behind us -the people. Ten large cities are being built every year. Property bubble has created suburbs (yes, China has them) lacking actual habitants and shopping malls waiting for customers to arrive. The reason? The vast majority of Chinese people simply do not possess the means to purchase these brand new homes or visit the few operating shops in these brand new shopping "paradises". Seventy (70) % of the new apartments remain unoccupied.
The Chinese government´s belief in growing its economy with massive building is unparalleled. Simply continuing to build without demand obviously cannot continue forever.
This video gives a look of the growing phenomenon, which we might also call an example of groupthink gone horribly wrong.
In the midst of sad and tragic occurrences happening in Japan right now, people have remembered another old incident involving radiation and nuclear plants. Namely, April 26, 1986 and Chernobyl. 25 years have passed, and now the once dead ghost town seems to be puzzling with journalists, extreme travelers and well, nature. In 1986, the reactor of Chernobyl nuclear power plant (80 miles north of Kiev) exploded and spew out enough radioactivity to make up Hiroshima bombing 100 times over. Nature recovered, albeit barely. Strange deformities and tumors are abundant and visible on the fauna of the area, yet, they strive and exist.
The remains of the evil reactor were covered with a concrete sarcophagus 25 years ago- but it is slowly caving in and needs to be replaced. The poisonous mix of radioactive isotopes underneath the crumbling covering is still alive and well for the next 24 000 years. This certainly gives chills when thinking about the situation in Japan.
Sound artist Peter Cusack has recorded the sound scape of Chernobyl in 2006, and his recordings give hope for the once barren and sterile land. I highly recommend listening to his otherwork as well, like the sounds of the Azerbaijan oil fields. All Cusack´s recordings involve areas of environmental damage.
The art form of science fiction is a clever tool when depicting the unimaginable: alternate worlds, technology beyond our possibilities, other life forms and para-psychological theories. It liberates the imagination to see over to the other side: what could be, what might one day be possible. Just remember, back in the day cell phones and televisions were science fiction for Jules Verne. Scifi can be useful in freeing our minds from the shackles of everyday rationality, but it is also a handy little weapon in the wars of propaganda.When done artfully, scifi can be armored to either question the prevalent political system or to reinforce it.
Coincidentally, the first science fiction movie on space travel was not done in the US, but in the newly formed Soviet Union by the filmmaker Yakov Protazanov. Aelita: The Queen of Mars (1924) was a silent film, based on a novel by Alexei Tolstoy. Protazanov´s work has undoubtedly influenced a number of later works in the same genre, most notably Fritz Lang´s famous Metropolis (1927).
The film was produced during the hype years of the "new era of communism", New Economic Policy. NEP stemmed from Lenin´s belief in introducing moderate "mixed-market" -measures into socialism. One of the signs of the new lax attitude was allowing foreign investment into the country, which produced a more commercially driven cinema production house, owned in part by a German organisation. Thus Mezhrabpom-Rus was able to give birth to Aelita, which arose from a curious marriage between the Soviet ideals on socialism and the good old Western capitalist business sense. The elaborate costumes and expensive set design were undoubtedly a result of this fruitful union.
Of course, Lenin understood the propaganda value of cinema. There is no question about it. At the time, the public did not understand the carefully orchestrated view on reality given by a motion picture. (One might ask if they sometimes still don´t). Aelita, however, did not receive a concordantly warm welcome from the comrades. It was deemed too Westernized, too bourgeois, and lacking short on socialist ideals. As time went by, the movie fell out of favor with the official Communist line completely. The movie attempted to portray a somewhat clear view on the Soviet society going through a transition- all re/presented in a strange space setting on an Martian planet.
The plot tells the story of a group of people coming from a post-war Soviet Union, traveling to Mars on a rocket ship. On Mars they help lead a rebellion against a ruling elite group- how fitting, one might ask. The plot offers the prerequisite love affair between the queen Aelita (pronounced almost like ´elite´) and the leader of the soviet group, Los. The affair is doomed, and Aelita is not to be trusted (like capitalism). After a series of tumultuous events, Los returns to Earth with his group of fellow-minded comrades. After impossible utopia, they find solace from the reality of Communism. Individualistic hedonism has been replaced with social duty and shared purpose.
What´s it like to have a famous friend over for a night? Or two? Or maybe a night too many?
I´ve heard a bundle of stories, but I won´t go namedropping here. Not classy, not even in a very retro sense of the way. This couple does not feel shame, however. And why should they -the man is after all our very own international man of mystery and suspense who is directing " a consuming, dangerous human rights project". (See the dating ad) If this story is true, it paints a picture of a sad case of obsession and selfishness, complete disregard for other people´s possessions and feelings. Then again, maybe we should approach this with a hint of suspicion. After all, the pesky western government officials sure know how to use propaganda to their advantage.
What puzzles me is how all those ladies fall for a white-haired ghostly elf with a laptop attached to the hip.
I´m starting to think he should take a much needed break from all those serious leaking assignments. Instead,
he could write a bestseller for all the lonely men out there in the style of "WikiArt of Seduction: How the Deviant and Spooky can bag ´em and leave ´em" . Success guaranteed.
Spanish officials announced today of a 10-year-old giving birth to a baby. Apparently the father of the baby is also a minor, although his exact age was not announced. According to Spanish law, having sex (consensual or not) with a child under the age 13 is considered a criminal offence and child abuse.
The child mother is of Romanian origin, and when asked, her mother (the new grandmother) argued this kind of phenomenon to be normal in their culture. Children having children, that is. This leads to believe that culture in question is the Romanian gypsies.
When I see 10-year-olds, they look like little tiny kids, they act and talk like kids. There is no way children in that age have sex and procreate without adult interference and sexual abuse. Am I being overly naive or onto something here?
An Ugandan newspaper "Rolling Stone" published a list of the country´s "top 100" gays and lesbians today, along with their identifying information and pictures. Next to the list was printed the words "hang them".
In Uganda, homosexuality is punishable by law up to a life in prison. Religion and old colonial laws together with Victorian moral codes are claimed to be playing a part in the attitudes against gays in much of the sub-Saharan Africa. The people named in the article are now living in fear, some having to quit jobs and live underground. The paper itself, having been in operation for mere 6 weeks, defends its actions.
Judgment against homosexuality is not, by any means, a solely African phenomenon. It lingers everywhere in our modern world. Heterosexuality is deemed as "the norm" in our expectations, laws, norms and cultural products. The majority rules, as they say. It always puzzles me how deeply rooted the ideas of "us" versus the dangerous and less valued "them" is. "Them" is a tabu, and needs to be weeded out of our way, not shaking the agreed upon view of the world. Some scientists claim this need for dichotomy in organizing our reality is wired in our brains, some claim it is learned behavior. But I wonder how long it takes from us all to accept these people and face the fear of them without talks of hanging. It is 2010. 50 years? 100?
