We like texture

Ek kan nie besluit of ek vandag gelewe het met “die lewe is kort” of “die lewe is lank” as my motief nie. Jy sien, ek het omtrent heeldag voor die TV gesit en games speel. Die trend in games deesdae is om vir jou te wys hoe lank jy al gespeel het daaraan, (byvoorbeeld, 7 ure in totaal) en my syfers vandag het my so bietjie ongemaklik gemaak. Dis ‘n lang tyd. Daar is ander games wat ek weet drie volle dae elk in my lewensgeskiedenis opmaak.


Mens voel tog nie jy het jou tyd gemors as jy ‘n goeie fliek gekyk het nie. Waarskynlik het jy iets geleer, of iets verstaan vir die eerste keer. Maar games leer mens selde sulke “truths” van ons emosionele landskap.


Wat (goeie) games wel doen, is om ‘n reeks uitdagings voor jou te stel. Streng gesproke is die loon vir sukses niks nie. Jy het gewen, so what? Maar die gym ook is niks meer as ‘n plek waar mense fisiese uitdagings vir hulself stel nie. Hoekom? Jy verbeter jouself: die volgende keer kan hulle strawwer gestel word, binne of buite die gym.


Ek is nie een om my geheue, reflekse of probleemoplossingsvaardighede dikwels te probeer oefen nie. Maar as ek ‘n goeie game speel, gebeur dit vanself. Daar is inspanning, daarbo in my kop. Dit kan tog nie ‘n slegte ding wees nie. Ek word baie meer uitgedaag deur my games as deur die nuutste Huisgenoot.


Maar as mens terug gaan na die lone van sukses, kan ons onderskei tussen virtuele lone (so te sê immateriëel) en werklike lone. Die virtuele loon om ‘n game klaar te maak is dikwels iets verreikend en fantasties, tipies dat die wêreld gered word van bose magte. As jou verbeelding saamspeel, as jy jou ongeloof kan toesmeer met fantasie, dan word die virtuele lone van sukses beide oortuigend en belangrik vir jou as speler. Wen jy dan die game, het jy ‘n avontuur meegemaak, veel meer as net ‘n dinkskrum.


Jou virtuele geskiedenis skakel dan in by jou egte geskiedenis, dit word deel van jou storie omdat jy daarin geglo het en dit vir jou sin gemaak het. Jy was daar. Dit was pret.


Ek is een van daai wat omgee en glo waarin ek speel. Dit meen seker my dag was nie ‘n mors van tyd nie.
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My trip to Japan has lived up to very high expectations that I have had since early childhood. However, much of my time in Tokyo was spent in conference rooms and department stores, rather than staples of traditional culture like museums and great buildings.



I have spent one day in Kyoto and it has shown me a more traditional Japan; one just as valuable as the world-leading Tokyo metropolis.



With an (authentic) Japanese family, we toured three of the more renowned Buddhist temples of Kyoto. Buddhism here is intertwined with the beliefs of Shinto, which dictates that there are spirits in almost all earthly things. The Japanese, appropriately, have a very utalitarian view of religion. It is said that they are Shinto at birth, Christian at marriage, and Buddhist at death, reflecting their preference in ceremony at those important stages of life.



What makes these temples special is that they show how architecture and landscaping can be created in the service of simple but powerful ideas.



The rock garden at Ryoanji Temple is an enlightening example. It is comprised of four islands of clustered rocks, laid out on a clean lawn of raked white gravel, in the Zen-style. There are fifteen rocks in total, a number that is considered ‘complete’ in Buddhist thinking. In this rock garden, however, it is impossible to see all fifteen rocks at the same time. If you shift your perpspective to reveal the missing rock, another will disappear from view. Only from above, that is to say in ‘heaven’, is all revealed.



The lesson, of course, is that in our mortal state the full set of facts is never availed to us. We can only know or understand so much of our crises and opportunities. It is a humbling realisation, and one that may console you to your past, or prepare you for the future.



Great Western architecture is often informed by powerful ideas or highly conceptual aesthetics. But the link between idea and structure can be very tenuous. Without falling into the trap of mystifying everything that comes from the East, I would welcome the construction of more of these brick and mortar parables in our part of the world to illustrate certain wisdoms in an unassuming way. It has been really well done in Japan.



If there are such examples in the West, by the way, I would really like to hear about them.




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i wanted to title this post "holy cow", but i would have been dishonoured.


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Photography buddies will be glad to know I've been keeping up the habit.

Here are some pictures from the New Year's Day Parade:


I love this guy.


The latest Batman movie had the lowest budget of all.










A veteran.


A not-so veteran. Scary.

See you soon.
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I've been aworkin', leaving little time for abloggin', but I do have some pictures for you:


Leaves


More leaves


The bigger, albeit darker, picture. Oh, and more leaves


Buckingham noir? No?


Some notes from New Year (what I saw):

- A couple, combined age approx 180, hobbling out of McDonalds at 11.15 in central London. The old man's lips were permanently drawn back and he seemed to be able to see only as far as his nose. The woman would have been no more than five feet tall standing straight up, but her Quasimodesque forward hunch made her look about 4'5.

I've seen faster glaciers than those two. Yet they're out and about on New Year's Eve. A golden star for effort, I guess.

- A clearly anorexic girl waits outside the McDonalds. She is shivering so hard that if she were wearing stilettos they would start cracking through the pavement. She tries to light a cigarette, fails time after time because she can't hold the fag still. Eventually, she manages to light one. The cigarettes are so slender, out of proportion almost.

A girl in a nearby group drops a cigarette very carelessly. She practically throws it to the ground. She goes to the Slender Smoker and bums another. The thing is, there was a look from the thin girl as the careless one explained. She understood, she was a good person and she wanted to help out. Not just a goods transfer.

She hands it over, and then resumes shivering on her own.

- A tiny Japanese man walks up to a huge officer of the Met Police. Sunglasses, badass moustache and serious biceps. The tourist gestures some request, and I expect a beating, or a rejection, at least.

No, the cop gets onto his motorcycle, and poses for a friendly pic. Another. Then one with his colleague. The tourist skips off, having taken one of the best postcards of his life.
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Happy New Year's Eve, everyone.

I'm in front of the telly. My Carlsberg half-litre is within clutching distance. Trent Reznor blaring on a TV radio channel. Rain, rain, rain. So far, this is THE PARTY OF THE YEAR.

Why do people expect so much from the last night of the year???

I'm definitely going to give it my best shot. We've bought some booze, and will soon be heading to some public place to be as merry as the next group.

But elsewhere, people are dancing in a club, having paid at least 40 pounds to get inside. Any other night of the year, they could be there for free, or at least a third of what they paid on the 31st of December.

Again: why do people expect so much?
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Pedestrian crossings

I press the button, but take the opportunity to cross before the light turns green. A line of cars queues up in front of the zebra crossing, frozen by the red light even though there are no pedestrians near the crossing.

Crazy christenings

An ethnically Indian grocery boy struggles to put a box on the top shelf. His name tag reads: Stalin.

Masters of the universe

Homeless people distributing The Big Issue have obviously realised that at Christmas, competition is fierce.

Two of my favourite sales pitches:

"The Big Issue, the ideal Christmas present... for someone you don't really like."

and

"Buy The Big Issue so I can pay my butler!"

Eavesdropping

London is arguably the best location in the world for eavesdropping.

Barely pipping the riveting political discussion on the US's relations with OPEC countries I overheard today, this one between two little girls was pretty special:

"So if you had to get rid of a bomb, where would you put it?"

"I'd put it really really deep in the ground."

"But then it would go off and it would kill all the earthworms."

"Oh."

"Yeah."

"Well, that wouldn't do, would it?"
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