Although there have been rumours that we are at the end of history, I believe that such a conviction is self-indulgent. It doesn't take into account the futility of the ammount of time we have in which we can call ourselves more or less in charge of our own lifes, let alone the process of defining our history. This is not the end, no, we are in the middle of it. And if you like it or not, that's the only place where we will ever be.
And so am I, desperately reflecting on a memory of a slice of my life, trying to get a narrative out of it, with the good old moral, comic side stories and the winning or waning of the main guy. But it just ain't that way. It's fighting the chaos, it's making do. Time slips, skids, stops, slides, floats. Memories fade, change, resurface, rewind.
I look for the perspective that shows me everything, but find that the sun blinds me or fog has come onto the lands. It's ok. It will always be that way.
Sunday, 12 October 2008
Thursday, 11 September 2008
Long Time - A Lot Seen
Although this message is written from the boring computer room of my new university, it must be said that this computer is about as far away as possible from the one that last hosted my postings. I have arrived in the Netherlands, but in between here and Melbourne a lot has met my eye, penetrated my nose, deafened my ears and brushed my skin. After months of turbulence the heavier particles sink in, and the big picture is starting to show. It is only here that a summary seems to be possible.
My uni time at Monash accumulated in an excellent record and an award from the Dean for outstanding academic results and added to that I feel that my academic experience overseas has shaped my future ambitions in a certain direction. After finishing the shipload of papers, I had time to see the different faces of OZ. South Australia impressed me with its vast nothingness towards the North and excellent National Parks, where unexpected encounters with the strangest animals -and people- seemed part of the everyday life. Sydney showed its better side with the Bienalle in full swing and a nice break from the Melbourne weather.
My three week road trip with Will really impressed me in many ways, were it not the ever growing and all consuming pile of clothes, utensils, toys, gear, personal items etc. on the back seat - eventually named 'the shit'-, than maybe the accidental surfing with dolphins, our encounter with 'Ze Germans', our very international stay at the University of the Sunshine coast that sprang from it, the ever upping temperature while heading North, the beauty of driving a car with cruise control for over 3000 k. and the friendship that we managed to built over such an intense contact.
After a few days in wonderful Darwin, in season and full with tourists and US army personel, I parted with the continent that hosted me for such a while and arrived in Asia, virtually a stop over on the way back... but one that took almost six weeks. The main chunck of time was spent covering Vietnam from South to North, but Malaysia and Hong Kong were support acts that entertained a couple of days each. Vietnam was very different from places visited before and I blame it on the communist government system, but with its rough and tumble haggling, fantastic street food, and unpronouncable language it had alot of the ingredients I like in other countries.
And last wednesday my airplane touched down in Amsterdam and a feel of closure has reached me the last couple of days, while digging into the uni reader, and discussing photography's medium specificity. Not that I've put my backpack away yet, since my lack of a permanent place to stay has kept me in the travel mode. But in the Netherlands its easier to find my way around, and my scope of mobility has narrowed a lot. I will lay low for now, but stay tuned for next year!
My uni time at Monash accumulated in an excellent record and an award from the Dean for outstanding academic results and added to that I feel that my academic experience overseas has shaped my future ambitions in a certain direction. After finishing the shipload of papers, I had time to see the different faces of OZ. South Australia impressed me with its vast nothingness towards the North and excellent National Parks, where unexpected encounters with the strangest animals -and people- seemed part of the everyday life. Sydney showed its better side with the Bienalle in full swing and a nice break from the Melbourne weather.
My three week road trip with Will really impressed me in many ways, were it not the ever growing and all consuming pile of clothes, utensils, toys, gear, personal items etc. on the back seat - eventually named 'the shit'-, than maybe the accidental surfing with dolphins, our encounter with 'Ze Germans', our very international stay at the University of the Sunshine coast that sprang from it, the ever upping temperature while heading North, the beauty of driving a car with cruise control for over 3000 k. and the friendship that we managed to built over such an intense contact.
After a few days in wonderful Darwin, in season and full with tourists and US army personel, I parted with the continent that hosted me for such a while and arrived in Asia, virtually a stop over on the way back... but one that took almost six weeks. The main chunck of time was spent covering Vietnam from South to North, but Malaysia and Hong Kong were support acts that entertained a couple of days each. Vietnam was very different from places visited before and I blame it on the communist government system, but with its rough and tumble haggling, fantastic street food, and unpronouncable language it had alot of the ingredients I like in other countries.
And last wednesday my airplane touched down in Amsterdam and a feel of closure has reached me the last couple of days, while digging into the uni reader, and discussing photography's medium specificity. Not that I've put my backpack away yet, since my lack of a permanent place to stay has kept me in the travel mode. But in the Netherlands its easier to find my way around, and my scope of mobility has narrowed a lot. I will lay low for now, but stay tuned for next year!
Monday, 12 May 2008
The choppy sea of possibilities
Some things draw to a close as others come up... And through it all I experience what Lennon simply described as life, but what might as well be chaos or order or something in between.
In the following weeks I'll have to finish the four bigish essays that will finalize the official part of my university exchange, and my bachelor degree too. A step like that asks for thorough contemplation about all the ways that the future can look, and it does have quite a few potential attires.
A few weeks ago I received word from the Master committees of the Research Master Media Studies in both Amsterdam and Utrecht that I'm allowed into their two year programs, that will launch me towards a future as academic. If I want to. With a lot of choice comes a lot of responsibility, so I'm thinking a lot about it, and consequently, deciding very little.
Friends flock around me, activities are plentiful and enjoyable, and I even found a job. Moments of boredom are scarce and cherished. The reality of my situation as a scholar is one of voluntary confinement... absolutely the only way of getting research done.
As the chapter on Melbourne receives its last few revisions from the editor I sharpen my pen to describe the rest of Australia. Write it a few poems. And if really lucky, someplace might even receive a serenade. This won't be the last time you hear from me.
In the following weeks I'll have to finish the four bigish essays that will finalize the official part of my university exchange, and my bachelor degree too. A step like that asks for thorough contemplation about all the ways that the future can look, and it does have quite a few potential attires.
A few weeks ago I received word from the Master committees of the Research Master Media Studies in both Amsterdam and Utrecht that I'm allowed into their two year programs, that will launch me towards a future as academic. If I want to. With a lot of choice comes a lot of responsibility, so I'm thinking a lot about it, and consequently, deciding very little.
Friends flock around me, activities are plentiful and enjoyable, and I even found a job. Moments of boredom are scarce and cherished. The reality of my situation as a scholar is one of voluntary confinement... absolutely the only way of getting research done.
As the chapter on Melbourne receives its last few revisions from the editor I sharpen my pen to describe the rest of Australia. Write it a few poems. And if really lucky, someplace might even receive a serenade. This won't be the last time you hear from me.
Friday, 25 April 2008
Is bronze golder than silver?
A heartfelt welcome to this little piece of cyberspace on this ANZAC Friday, with the big fat drops of rain coming down on a city that welcomes every last one of 'em.
The path that the divine cowboy laid out for me lately was so incoherent that he wouldn't even dare selling it in bundled form at a petrol station. So bear with me the task ahead of making it into something close to comprehensible.
This morning I gathered with thousands of others in the six o'clock darkness to listen to a trumpet and words of national pride, after which the army handed out scrambled eggs, baked beans, half a bun and a biscuit.
This week I stayed indoors because of a nasty thing called influenza, watching a marathon of OZ classics such as Muriel's Wedding, Gallipoli and Mad Max 1, 2 & 3. Trust me, you can stop after the first of that series.
Last week I was a 'silver OZ boy' representing Monash University at the New Zealand Uni Games, which is, for those who didn't know, a country full of Kiwis. Than we were supossed to sing the Australian national anthem in a Maori welcome ceremony where I was seated right in front.... akward!
The week before I was new in a house of a Chinese-Australian couple visiting China, living with a OZ uni drop-out from the country and a Vietnamese accountancy alumni with a jolly brother apt at saying my name twice in every sentence. I liked it from the start!
And now I go to bed while the bulk of you are having a late lunch or an early breakfast... can anyone try to explain me the function of the date line again!
I'll keep up the good work if you keep up yours. Take care of yourselves and let others do their fair bit. Don't get in the way of destiny, and remember, not only average heroes die of old age.
Rain
The path that the divine cowboy laid out for me lately was so incoherent that he wouldn't even dare selling it in bundled form at a petrol station. So bear with me the task ahead of making it into something close to comprehensible.
This morning I gathered with thousands of others in the six o'clock darkness to listen to a trumpet and words of national pride, after which the army handed out scrambled eggs, baked beans, half a bun and a biscuit.
This week I stayed indoors because of a nasty thing called influenza, watching a marathon of OZ classics such as Muriel's Wedding, Gallipoli and Mad Max 1, 2 & 3. Trust me, you can stop after the first of that series.
Last week I was a 'silver OZ boy' representing Monash University at the New Zealand Uni Games, which is, for those who didn't know, a country full of Kiwis. Than we were supossed to sing the Australian national anthem in a Maori welcome ceremony where I was seated right in front.... akward!
The week before I was new in a house of a Chinese-Australian couple visiting China, living with a OZ uni drop-out from the country and a Vietnamese accountancy alumni with a jolly brother apt at saying my name twice in every sentence. I liked it from the start!
And now I go to bed while the bulk of you are having a late lunch or an early breakfast... can anyone try to explain me the function of the date line again!
I'll keep up the good work if you keep up yours. Take care of yourselves and let others do their fair bit. Don't get in the way of destiny, and remember, not only average heroes die of old age.
Rain
Monday, 31 March 2008
March's Fool's Day
Another month has passed within the blinking of an eye. Easter bunnies have come and gone unnoticed, only leaving a string of silver wrappers as an indication of their existence. Summer seems to have left Melbourne for a better place, leaving unclear which season is gonna take over.
In the month of March my encounters with life just kept coming like bullets bursting from a machine gun. I spent a week in New Zealand catching up with my mum and her boyfriend who had just finished a beautiful 3-week Maori trip there.
Back in Melbourne I made it into the University Basketball Team. My lack of shape made itself felt: more then once in the 2-hour long training session I felt I was gonna lose consciousness. Hardly week later I was on the plane again: of to Tasmania where I spent my Easter break in the beautiful nature. Apart from the shiploads of dead skippies on the freeways, that could easily be turned into a big road kill bbq, the island had a very provincial, easy-going atmosphere. A perfect break from early morning big city commuting to Uni.
And at this last day of the month I tackled one of the last remaining issues: I found myself a room to actually call my own for the time being.
I can't wait to see what April has in store for me...
In the month of March my encounters with life just kept coming like bullets bursting from a machine gun. I spent a week in New Zealand catching up with my mum and her boyfriend who had just finished a beautiful 3-week Maori trip there.
Back in Melbourne I made it into the University Basketball Team. My lack of shape made itself felt: more then once in the 2-hour long training session I felt I was gonna lose consciousness. Hardly week later I was on the plane again: of to Tasmania where I spent my Easter break in the beautiful nature. Apart from the shiploads of dead skippies on the freeways, that could easily be turned into a big road kill bbq, the island had a very provincial, easy-going atmosphere. A perfect break from early morning big city commuting to Uni.
And at this last day of the month I tackled one of the last remaining issues: I found myself a room to actually call my own for the time being.
I can't wait to see what April has in store for me...
Monday, 3 March 2008
A migaloo in Melbourne
G'day, how ya goin mate?A home away from home, that's what Melbourne has become. It's atmosphere is easygoing, it's neighbourhoods are green, it's locals are a friendly bunch of all world's flavours, and it's weather beats Europe's hands on.
After last writing I've lived thru a lot, and the good news is that most of it was sublime. The never-ending celebrations of Chinese new year on Malaysia's island Pinang with lovely company, celebrating the arrival of my year, the year of the rat. Racing the waves on Bali's Kuta beach with a basketball mate that I didn't expect to encounter at this side of the world. Crashing with a random crowd at the house of a friend of a friend in a Kuala Lumpur suburb after watching three movies and terrorising the communal swimming pool. Overlooking the sunrise behind the crater of mount Bromo, neatly tucke
d away in another crater that spans over 20 kay of barren land, freezing at night and blazing during the day. Dipping into the chilly silver tipped flickering waves at the Mornington Peninsula while pelicans are doing their air plane like landing routine in the distance.Unfortunately, university has started munching away on my free time since last week, but luckily it still leaves a few chunks for me. Mondays and Fridays are off-days, and the ones in between make up my fair share of education. I decided on actually taking courses that I can learn from, staying clear from the often encountered exchange excuse: party hardy, study hardly. Three of my four courses involve typical Australian themes, one is Aboriginal History, one anthropology focusing on matters of indigeinity and Australian identity and the third is Australian Film Studies. It is really challenging for me to participate in units about which I have entirely no prior knowledge. It motivates me even more to get a good grade.
It is nice to be able to settle down for some time to get a feeling for a city after running from place to place with just enough time to take in either the Lonely Planet's highlights or a decent meal. The scales in Singapore told me which I've given way: eight kilos of my body weight were left behind somewhere in S-E Asia. The argument that although I had three kg too much in my check in luggage, the overall had gone down, convinced the smiling Qantas girl to cut me some slack.
Don't let yourself become a victim or practitioner of what Willemen so accurately describes as "a kind of promiscuous or random form of alleged internationalism that I would prefer to call an evasive cosmopolitanism masking imperial aspirations." (Willemen, 1994) Whatever that might be.
See ya's,
Reinier
Monday, 14 January 2008
Three kings and a bucket full of butter
Hi there to all of you bobsters rockin' the boat..
Just a bit South of the Equator things are heating up profoundly in Yokyakarta where yours truly made his aquaintence just a couple of days ago.
Near to the easygoing town that has only 10% of Jakarta's smog and a fragment of its inhabitants is the world famous Borobudur to be found, a truly and tremendously fascinating Buddhist temple built ages ago. Going there for sunrise wasn't actually neccesary though, because the site only opened when the sun was already up, and rainy clouds obscured it anyway...
The switch from the S-E Asias mainland to Indonesia hasn't been too easy. I expected bad facilities in the former and good facilities in the latter, but oh what a shame, it turned out to be entirely opposite, and, in Indonesia it's the rainy season too.
But not all things have been bad. The encounter with orang utangs and the wildly crying gibbons was amaaaaaaaizing, and the vulcanolake toba and the evening flight to Bali provided great views. As for the train from Jakarta to Yokya: if it werent for the neatly lined banana trees flanking the endless green patches of rices fields till the horizon I would have believed to be in one of the Netherland's more empty provinces.
And the best is yet to come! I'll hit the ol' dusty trail towards Bali, and after that: Malaysia! So much to see and so little time it makes you wanna travel forever (did anyone mention money?)
I'll finish today with a well ment 'selamat tinggal' for those who stay and 'salamat jalan' for those who go, and in between youll have to imagine my happy face: goodbye!
Just a bit South of the Equator things are heating up profoundly in Yokyakarta where yours truly made his aquaintence just a couple of days ago.
Near to the easygoing town that has only 10% of Jakarta's smog and a fragment of its inhabitants is the world famous Borobudur to be found, a truly and tremendously fascinating Buddhist temple built ages ago. Going there for sunrise wasn't actually neccesary though, because the site only opened when the sun was already up, and rainy clouds obscured it anyway...
The switch from the S-E Asias mainland to Indonesia hasn't been too easy. I expected bad facilities in the former and good facilities in the latter, but oh what a shame, it turned out to be entirely opposite, and, in Indonesia it's the rainy season too.
But not all things have been bad. The encounter with orang utangs and the wildly crying gibbons was amaaaaaaaizing, and the vulcanolake toba and the evening flight to Bali provided great views. As for the train from Jakarta to Yokya: if it werent for the neatly lined banana trees flanking the endless green patches of rices fields till the horizon I would have believed to be in one of the Netherland's more empty provinces.
And the best is yet to come! I'll hit the ol' dusty trail towards Bali, and after that: Malaysia! So much to see and so little time it makes you wanna travel forever (did anyone mention money?)
I'll finish today with a well ment 'selamat tinggal' for those who stay and 'salamat jalan' for those who go, and in between youll have to imagine my happy face: goodbye!
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