Wrong face up, or Czech absurdity

We were sitting in one of many parks in Prague, sipping delicious Pilsners, chatting and waging a crazy war against an inexplicable army of flying insects (which I believe anticipated further events) when we realized that the evening is like an empty glass and we are very thirsty. Flicking through a dozen of free leaflets recommending plenty of venues to fill up the glass with, Cornelia noticed, to our delight, the ad informing about Petr Zelenka Quartet at Balbinova Poeticka Hospudka. There was no hesitation, and no time – we buried the hatchet with insects and left the park.
We reached our destination after a twenty-minute walk and realized that the farther from the centre of the city, the less people you could communicate with in English. The owner of the place was only able to sell the tickets and confirm that Petr Zelenka was playing that day. Excited and elated, the three of us sat by the table, as close to the scene as possible just to find out in a matter of seconds that the only Petr Zelenka we knew was a famous film director. Now, the Petr Zelenka in front of us was a talented jazz musician. Despite being a bit thrown off the balance, we realized that we were there for the music no matter which Petr Zelenka was to perform and our benevolence was rewarded with a great deal of tasty tunes that evening.

The Late Lover

I opened The History of Philosophy by Władysław Tatarkiewicz and paged the book to read about Abelard. I learned that Pierre Abelard’s career as a thinker flourished and he was distinguished figure at his own time, but he was not a typical philosopher-theologian of the Middle Ages. His short but intensive life was filled with enthusiastically received lectures, persecution, ecstatic love and drama. Never had Abelard assumed that he would make the history as a lover – not thinker.
Who was she?
Heloise was much younger than him. Was it her face, her voice, or the beauty of her mind that turned Abelard into a passionate lover? As a professor of logic, Abelard could explain lots of things; he could even blend faith and reason together. Alas, he was helpless in the face of emotions. It is surprising how a man of reason could have developed such an intense feeling.
When I read the letters the lovers wrote to each other I am perplexed. I become an intruding witness of their romance. Why am I doing this? Why were the letters published? It is not literature only (I recall Werter’s letters – how boring). Their history is a real drama. They had a child and then secretly married. They both were severely punished for the sins of the flesh. Abelard was mutilated. He couldn’t bear the dishonour and that’s why he became a monk. Heloise became a nun. Abelard died at the age of 37. Heloise died about twenty years later and was buried beside him.
In one of his letters Abelard wrote:
I live in a barbarous country, the language of which I don’t understand; I have no conversation but with the rudest people. My walks are on the inaccessible shore of a sea which is always stormy.
The first word that comes to my mind is alienation. Why do some love stories have to end with a misfortune? Why are some lovers to remain lonely and unfulfilled?
Is it their illustrious romance, the history of two beautiful minds that once became one flesh to be humiliated and parted for ages that makes the story captivating? Or is it us, who are just unfulfilled as they were?
(sylwia_t)

From ***@***, by Suzanne

This is more of a real folk song:

The soldier came knocking upon the queen’s door
He said, “I am not fighting for you any more”
The queen knew she’d seen his face someplace before
And slowly she let him inside.

He said, “I’ve watched your palace up here on the hill
And I’ve wondered who’s the woman for whom we all kill
But I am leaving tomorrow and you can do what you will
Only first I am asking you why.”

Down in the long narrow hall he was led
Into her rooms with her tapestries red
And she never once took the crown from her head
She asked him there to sit down.

He said, “I see you now, and you are so very young
But I’ve seen more battles lost than I have battles won
And I’ve got this intuition, says it’s all for your fun
And now will you tell me why?”

Read more..

a commission on the Way of the Cross day

You like to walk your ways, those which you know, those you are accustomed to. You never want to try any new ways, out of fear. And the whole life is spent on the same way, to and fro. Like a horse that knows its way home and is able to come back even blindfolded. To work, and back from work, to school and back from school, to the grocery and back form the grocery, on vacation and back from vacation. The same way all the time.

He let Himself be led a different way, a way He hadn’t known before, a unique way.

How absolutely fantastic it is to enter the way which you have never tried before, the way you put your steps on for the first time, the way that was not planned before, or maybe even not wanted before. Only then you may feel you live for real.

And it does not matter, that some blood might be spilled on the way. After all, Life means more than life.
(michał_t)

Via Dolorosa

Wednesdays, 1.30 pm

What do we do every other Wednesday at 1.30 in GV?
We learn how to talk and listen. A group of teachers meets Jacek, a psychologist and psychotherapist, in order to spend together 1.5 hours sharing our professional experiences, opinions and comments on situations that happened to us while teaching.
Why do we do that?
To learn the demanding art of paying full attention to the other person, to listen and talk in a non-judgmental way.
Do we really need that?
Everybody needs that! I believe that most of the problems in this world are caused by our inability to communicate. Not listening, constant judging, approaching a situation in a schematic way, reacting and not responding can only lead to misunderstanding.
How is a session organized?
The Balint Group, a group method of training doctors and specialists which emphasizes the importance of the use of the emotions and personal understanding in the doctor’s work, serves us as a model. One person reports spontaneously a case from their professional experience that poses a problem. Then, members of the group help the presenter, by means of associations, questions, and interpretations, to elucidate the difficulties in the presenter’s relation with the patient. Of course we discuss our students and classroom situations.
Is it easy to talk like that?
Actually, it’s quite difficult. As teachers we are in the habit of doing things according to a certain set of rules, but here we have to stop all that and think differently. I heard that a teacher should be a controller, an organiser, an assessor, a prompter, a participant, a resource, a tutor, an observer, an explainer, an enabler, an involver, a helper … How about a teacher who is a human being, sometimes confused, disoriented, stuck? The language teacher teaches how to communicate. But what to do when communication fails?
What are the benefits?
Jacek encourages us to appreciate silence, to come up with more than one answer, to be slightly embarrassed. Let’s try and evaluate cautiously, avoid oversimplification, imagine ourselves in other person’s shoes. Let’s realise we are in a role, but we are not the role. Let’s not look for a quick fix. The effect can be uplifting, inspiring, even enlightening, but sometimes the answer can’t be found. However, we stay curious with more open, spacious mind and relaxed attitude, willing to know others (and ourselves) better.
(justyna_t)

blah blah marketing

Leopard was putting the finishing touches to his toilet. He lay in the sun, admiring the beauty of his sleek, smooth coat, so elegantly marked. He rose lazily and strolled over to the pool, the better to gaze at himself in the clear water.
‘R-r-r-really,’ he purred, ‘I am indeed beautiful. Of all the animals in the forest, I am certainly the finest.’
‘I don’t know so much about that,’ said Reynard the Fox, who was passing at the time and happened to overhear him. Leopard pretended not to hear.
‘It’s those spots,’ went on Fox more loudly. ‘What a pity you can’t change them!’
Leopard looked down his nose at Fox in a lordly way.
‘And who are you to talk?’ he said at last, showing his sharp white teeth and curling his tail scornfully. ‘With that scrubby ginger coat of yours and that bedraggled brush, I wonder you dare show yourself in public.’
‘I think I heard you say you were the finest creature in the forest,’ said Reynard. ‘How do you make that out?’
‘You may not like my spots,’ answered Leopard, ‘but most creatures admire them greatly. Then I have such sleek, luxuriant fur, such a graceful shape, and such a noble way of moving. But I suppose you think yourself even finer.’
‘Indeed I do,’ answered Reynard. ‘I may not have your spots and your glossy finish. I may not be able to creep about like a snake. But I have brains, my dear chap. I’m the cleverest, craftiest, cunningest animal in the whole creation. Why, everyone envies me my intelligence! As for you, you’ve no more wit than a hen. That’s why I’m finer than you!’
And without waiting for an answer he sped off into the woods after a rabbit.

Hype and content never meet

West Side Story by Boal

So called because of its resemblance to various dance routines in the film of that name.

Two teams are formed, standing in two lines facing each other, with a leader a few paces in front of the middle of each team.

The first leader must make a rhythmic movement forward, accompanied by a rhythmic sound, six times in succession. He thus makes six forward movements.

After the first or second repetition, his team-mates will have grasped the rhythms of his movement and his sound, and must join in, moving forwards in their line behind him.

As he advances, the opposing gang must retreat the same distance.

At the end of the sixth repetition, the leader leaves the central position and joins on the end of the line. Another leader takes his place, and faces the opposing leader, who gets through the same process – six times, advancing, he repeats his own rhythmic sound and movement, which is copied by his team-mates, who also start advancing, while the first team repeats at the same rate.

And so on, until alternating advance and repeat, until every member of both teams has been a leader.

There can be a tendency towards repetitive aggressive sounds and actions – it is important to side–coach the actors also to make soft sounds, sometimes to use low voices, and to try to make rich and complex movements, not just ‘poum, poum, poum!’

(from Games for Actors and Non-Actors by Augusto Boal)

Variation:
The participants must use a particular designated part of their bodies to make the rhythmical movement.

Variation for GV:
To link this exercise with a series of lessons based on West Side Story, students work together and make a list of non-verbal ways of showing hatred and hostility using only hands, arms and faces. Such a warm-up can be done in pairs, before students join in the two opposing teams. Consider a use of simple percussion instrument (a rattle), to make a rhythmical syncopated sound.

west_side_diagram

Chasing Little Red Riding Hood

01 – 1.05
There comes Little Hood Keith, scampering happily down the winding path in the forest on a glorious summer morning. In one hand a small basket, full of provisions for his granny, or someone else? In the other, a twig with which he lightly hits the bark of the trees on his way, counting them rhythmically. Sniffing at the flowers, kicking at wild mushrooms, Keith is blissfully unaware that a pair of green eyes follows him along the path in the thick undergrowth.
1.06 – 2.30
At least not until he can hear a muffled crack of braking wood somewhere on one side. Then he remembers what his mum said: ‘Look ahead and walk past fast!’ So Keith resist any temptation to loiter on his way and scuttles off. But as he does so, Wolf Jack, hidden by the bushes, speeds up his pace too. And if one hairy monster wasn’t enough, there is another pair of green eyes and four wild legs – Wolf Gary has joined his brother. It’s now almost a pack!
2.31 – 4.00
Little Hood Keith doesn’t seem to lose his heart though. His small skinny legs become a centipede on speed. The boy nearly takes off in his daring, adventurous escape. What a graceful run-flight!
4.01 – 4.20
The danger peaks when Keith hears the menacing lupine growl in the impenetrable walls of green around him. Suddenly he trips over a sticking root and falls. Jack and Gary keep running wildly, perhaps planning to set a trap ahead of the poor Little Hood Keith.
4.21 – 5.19
But the wood has many traps, also for wolves. Wolf Jack, blinded by his desire to ravish, driven by the mad momentum of his scurry, can’t see a deep, deep gorge opening ahead of him and … in he dives headlong.
5.19 – 6.00
Wolf Gary, speechless, just watches his brother fall down the rocky sides, unable to get control of his body, tumbling over and over, bouncing on stones, getting mutilated, falling and falling to his death.
6.01 – 7.20
After a while, Little Hood Keith arrives to the scene. ‘Oh you brave, clever boy.’ – says Wolf Gary with a wide grin. And off they start the usual chat of the Wolf and Little Red Riding Hood that everybody knows so well. And he says to himself, ‘I’ll eat you anyway, as soon as I begin to feel that I’d like a decent meal.’

Keith Jarrett, piano
Gary Peacock, double-bass
Jack DeJohnette, drums

The Way You Look Tonight .mp3 7.9MB

Jewgitive

If only we knew more about them. More than a string of loose associations, or resentment, the Star of David evokes; more than the crumbling tombs overgrown by the grass nobody cares to cut; more than the swarthy looking faces of their grandchildren who visit this land to read the scarce plaques on buildings, engraved in the script recalling a half-forgotten nightmare. If only we heard more than the news from their own land, where the yesterday’s victims perpetuate similar atrocities they were once subjected to.
If only we knew what being a Jew meant then, when they lived next door. Today, they have become a fading spot in memory, a mark that links to few facts which only a still surviving handful of witnesses can make any sense of. So much of their world has been wiped out from the world we shared – a sense of belonging, a belief, a religion, a culture, a folklore, a common history, a destiny, a language, a sense of otherness, and a sense of community and neigbourhood.
Last night* the ghost themselves appeared on screen in black and white while their past neighbours and friends spoke of the loss. And the feeling of regret flickered dimly – if only we knew more about them, we would have more of this certainty about ourselves – where we came from and what we should really stick to today.
* a one-off screening of Po-lin. Slivers of memory, a documentary by Jolanta Dylewska, at Forum

variation on Idalah-Abal, mp3, 6.9 MB

the seasonal haiku

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