Where do these stairs go?

Bangalore to Budapest ~ Learning and CrossFit in India and Hungary

atlantisoverthesea@gmail.com (Anonymous) — Sat, 8 Nov 2014 05:24:00 -0800

I recently returned from a one week holiday in Budapest. (pause) Budapest in October is a cooly restrained elegance. Dark and tightly symmetrical, the urban landscape presented this lonesome traveller with his first taste of culture shock in a very long time. After living amid the hullabaloo of Bangalore, the scantly populated shadows of the Hungarian capital seemed like a uniform ghost. A spectral, silent haunting. Especially in the mornings when the icy mist of late Autumn moved breathless across the Danube. It was not the sort of trip I had anticipated. People wait for the lights to change before crossing the streets.

In all honesty, I went to Budapest because I had heard it mentioned several times while on my last adventure in Turkey. It sounded like a place to get your hipster on, sup fine espresso and party until the early morn. And it is. But it is other things as well. Perhaps I arrived too late in the season. With Summer a slowly setting memory, the night scene did not take me in her arms. Travel is just as much about who you meet as it is where you go. I just didn't meet those kinds of people.

Instead of drinking and dancing and posing in laneway coffee houses (okay... fine. I posed in coffee houses. But only one. Espresso Embassy. If you go to Budapest, go there.), I found myself poking about in museums, wandering inspired down streets old and dark, and discussing history with not-so-party inclined individuals of a similar age bracket to my own. The quiet and introspective nature of this experience was laden with rewards. I spent much time sitting here or there, scribbling in my journal and reading Raymond Carver. These are things I have done in India as well... but when work resumes, the writing quells. The isolation made room for reflection and decision making. It also meant that I was in good shape (not hungover) and able to make it to a few CrossFit classes.

(Warning: if you have no interest in CrossFit or exercise in general, then you might want to stop reading now.)

CrossFit is young in India. It remains largely unknown but appears to be gaining popularity. In the third largest city (population in excess of 9 million) in the world's largest democracy, there are exactly four boxes to choose from. In the Hungarian capital, which boasts a population of 1.8 million, there are five. By a similar point of comparison, my home town of Melbourne (which has a population of 4 million) has at least 50 boxes in the inner city alone and over 100 if you include the suburbs. CrossFit is huge in Australia. And I have never done it there.

But it is exciting to be a part of a new fitness movement in India. And it is encouraging to know that one can satisfy their passion for this crazy stuff (my friends think I've joined a cult) just about anywhere in the world (there is no CrossFit in Antarctica or Bhutan, but there are two boxes in Kabul). Though, on arrival at the Reebok Duna CrossFit (reebokcrossfitduna.com), I was a bit apprehensive about training in new place with different people. We're a pretty tight bunch at my place in Indra Nagar (thetribefitness.com), and while I'm not the strongest or most agile fella in the place, I hold my own and usually do quite well in the WODs. So going to a different box in Budapest was a touch scary. For starters, Hungarian people tend to be a bit bigger than your average Indian. And it is in Eastern Europe, which is a part of the world associated with serious weight lifting. CrossFit has been happening there for a lot longer. The men and women are extremely fit and take their training very seriously. Writ short, I was expecting to have my ass handed to me.

And my expectations were not inaccurate. There were athletes at Duna who were doing my one rep max for squats as a warm up. The venue itself was an old warehouse space on Obuda island with a grey and brooding view of the gentle Danube. When sprints were programmed, we bolted through icy winds and rain beside the river. The industrial charm of the venue and work ethic of the athletes inspired an almost ecstatic atmosphere. I don't know if my fellow trainers shared my wide-eyed joy, but the experience of lifting heavy weights in Budapest was just too bloody romantic. I gushed as I slid a barbell back onto the rack, then thought about where else I might get the opportunity to train. Perhaps I'll hit a new PR with my clean and jerk in Berlin. Or smash a benchmark WOD while travelling in Iran. It is fun to think about.

And what new ideas about programming can be learnt by moving about, training with as many coaches as possible? While the set up and style of CrossFit gyms might be largely uniform (though I expect boxes in Dubai, New York or Shanghai would have their idiosyncratic differences), the training experience in Budapest was distinct from the one in Bangalore, and not in immediately obvious ways. Like I said, I was expecting to be destroyed by the Hungarian CrossFit experience. But this was not necessarily the case. They were hard and they were heavy. But they were not excessive. Which may or may not be indicative of a usual week at Duna. You can never tell with CrossFit. No two workouts are exactly alike.

For the very brief time that I was there, the coaches were following the 5-3-1 strength training method devised by Jim Wendler. The coaches informed me that the box had had a recent influx of new members and that this had necessitated a return to some fundamentals. I had come along during the third week of a cycle (for those unfamiliar with 5-3-1, Wendler's programming operates on a four week rotation of set/rep ranges and percentages. See jimwendler.com) so the work looked a bit like this:

Squats:
2 warm up sets of 8 reps @ 50% of your 1RM.
3 working sets. 1 of 5 reps @ 75% (or 1RM), 3 reps @ 85%, and 1 rep or more at 95%.

This obviously didn't take very long. The WOD that followed was either a benchmark like Fran (thrusters and pull ups for 21-15-9 reps as fast as possible), or a combination of movements that complemented the major lift of the day. For example, after dead lifts, the WOD consisted of sprints, kettlebell swings and lunges. All great movements for developing power and kinaesthetic awareness in the hips and pelvis.

The WODs at Tribe, on the other hand, tend to have a stronger focus on metabolic conditioning. Again, it depends on the day. And we have done a lot of heavy lifting during the short term of my membership at Tribe. But the WODs are always absolute monsters, and scaling (reduction of weight or rep ranges - acceptable and negotiable at Duna) is frowned upon. The trainers in Bangalore (at least at my box) bite off a lot and they chew hard. Bodies hit the floor in dizzy pirouettes as the final reps are performed. When the energy to rise is summoned, a stencil-like arrangement of sweat angels bears witness to the brutality of the work.

As if that wasn't enough, and inspired by my time in Budapest, I got chatting with the trainers at Tribe and we decided to start following the Wendler method in addition to the regular, one hour workouts. So Tuesday last week looked a bit like:

Week two Wendler's program: Squats (warm up plus 3 working sets of 3 reps at 70% 80% and 90%).

Then the regular class, which consisted of: a) another warm up routine, b) handstands and handstand push ups, then c) four cycles of push presses and hang cleans (eight minutes of continuous work - seriously intense shit) and then a bonus challenge of 50 burpees as fast as possible. I. Was. Dusted.

All up, the workout lasted 90 minutes. And we do this (or something that looks like it) four days per week. On the fifth day we just do the regular 60 minute programming. There is some yoga in there somewhere as well. One of the fellas I'm training with goes in for a sixth day, just for the fun of it.

Which prompts me to wonder: are we doing way too much?

If you read Jim Wendler's book (which I am), he encourages following his programming for primary lifts with some ancillary work not more than four days per week. I can't imagine his routines lasting more than 45 minutes and they are based on "tried and tested" methods for achieving maximum strength gains gradually over time. The man is a monster (having pumped out squats with over 1,000 lbs on his neck) and his method is extremely well regarded. He discourages deviations of any sort. But here we are slotting it in before a 60 minute session that consistently leaves its participants unable to descend a set of stairs. Wendler claims that the slower, less-is-more approach is designed to avoid plateaus and burn out. So is this 90 minute business sustainable? It is seriously hardcore and I don't think I've ever routinely worked so hard in my life. But it isn't as much work as the Outlaw Way (theoutlawway.com), and that's a method that made the best of the best in Budapest raise his eyebrows and exhale: "that is awesome programming!"

Will this system of training reap the desired results?

It is early days and for the moment I feel amazing. I get excited about the work and I love being at the box. It might be too early to say if the additional work is having an impact, but I am inclined to think that it will only boost what we are already doing. A recent video on the Barbell Shrugged blog (not super keen on references to Ayn Rand, but they know their lifting) revealed that brute strength is the key to success in competitive exercise.

So I/we have a long way to go if regionals are a dream one is even remotely entertaining. But, as Fernando Pessoa noted in the Book of Disquiet, "We live through action, that is, through the will. Those of us - be we geniuses or beggars - who do not know how to want are brothers in our shared impotence."

I may not ever participate in serious CrossFit competition, but I know that I want to get stronger and that this inspires me to search for the "tried and tested" methods for doing so. Why do I want to get stronger? That is a question for another time. But for now, I want to work. I want to train and to feel the effort and exhaustion shake me out of thought and reflection. I want to feel myself pushed to the limit and know that this is existence and that there is creativity, achievement and growth in all things.

Through these misunderstandings between myself and the world, I want to feel alive.

Waking Up

atlantisoverthesea@gmail.com (Anonymous) — Sun, 21 Sep 2014 23:08:00 -0700

It has been a long time between posts and not for lack of things to share. I have been ruminating extensively over the role of writing in my life. Its function and demands. Journalling is something I have always done, though to varying degrees of intensity, and blogging was more survival technique than habit when I travelled through India and parts of Europe in 2008. After that, my desire to describe my life in psuedo-metaphysical language gradually tapered off. When I came back to India is 2012, I was optimistic that new surroundings would provide new inspiration. And inspire it did, but not in the ways I anticipated.

Ask the musician Scott Walker what he has been doing in the lengthy periods between recordings and he will answer simply: "I have lived". And perhaps that is as specific as one needs to be. The process of decision making is an odd one, and I rarely understand why I do anything. But when I look back at the story of my life, everything seems to fit together. Even those moments when I really thought I was making a mess of it, retroactively turn into glistening sign posts that marked the way. Anxiety and fear can overwhelm and consume us as we negotiate the schisms between who we are, what we feel and where we think we should be. But even though I might have been tearing myself apart in side, there are few regrets that I carry with me. As one of Tolstoy's charismatic protagonists reflects in War and Peace, "I have lived well, but thought badly." And in similar moments of romantic solitude, one might almost feel the influence of some spiritual navigation system. A voice deep within, whispering directions as we stagger blind among the scattered debris. Call it intuition, spider senses or simply "the heart" - retrospectively, we can convince ourselves that all the time we were being tossed this way and that on confusing tides of consciousness, we unconsciously knew exactly where we were going.

And, if I am honest about it, most of the big changes in my life have required very little conscious thought. They seemed to emerge suddenly and without effort, and always at the right time.

For example, ask me a month ago what I was planning to do this year and I would have told you a story about a 30 something male who has spent over two years living in Bangalore and now feels it is time to start preparing for the next adventure. The next place. Somewhere new and abundant with possibilities. Funny how things change so suddenly. I am now thinking about staying for another two to three years, completing my masters in education, and immersing myself in the local fitness scene. And none of this would have made any sense (and perhaps still doesn't) until two weeks ago when I first walked in to a CrossFit Box in Indra Nagar.

The slow road...

Those who have known me a long time may recall that as a child I was one of the least physically gifted students in my school. Awkward and uncoordinated, my enforced participation in team sports was routinely preceded by the crushing experience of being chosen dead last by whichever team captain drew the shorter straw. In a combined class of almost sixty students, this public display of sporting/social status was a slow and tedious process that brought ones' willingness to participate into bleak alignment with a quietly deteriorating belief in ones' ability. The result: I hated sport.

And I still don't especially like sport. Or sporting culture for that matter. But I am hopelessly obsessed with exercise, and have been a serial monogamist with different physical disciplines since my late teens. Weight lifting, basketball, juggling, fire twirling, acrobatics, trapeze, physical theatre, dance, yoga, etc. I even trained as a massage therapist way back when I first graduated from high school. One can conclude that he has a certain, almost spiritual fascination with movement and the body. And this fascination has now settled into regular attendance as a CrossFit gym (or "box") in Bangalore. I was doing my own version of CrossFit for the last nine months at a regular gym in Frazer Town. But since moving to a certified venue with certified trainers, where I am participating in structured (near ritualisitic) workouts with like minded devotees, my life has changed. Dramatically.

There is a popular adage, parodying the initiations in David Fincher's Fight Club, doing the rounds on fitness related social networks: "The first rule of CrossFit, never shut up about CrossFit." Similarly, an image of a woman crumbling in what appears to be a nervous breakdown laments: "Accidentally asked a CrossFit person about CrossFit. Lost 45 minutes of my day." I have seen the eye rolls that CrossFit discussion inspires in those with no personal connection to the activity, and so have done my best to remain mute about it when in social settings. But these amusing memes seem to reflect a certain hostility towards the form. And, perhaps understandably, the rise of CrossFit has triggered a lot of critical debate about the sport's pros and cons. Indeed, many remain reluctant to acknowledge it as a sport at all. But, say what you will, CrossFit has tapped into philosophies and behaviours in a creative way that strongly appeals to and reflects the values of the current Western Zeitgeist.

However, I have no desire to enter into the various debates that surround CrossFit here. Let's leave that for the fitness journalists, sports critics and exercise ambassadors. What I can say with certainty is that I have felt a profound sense of peace since I started participating in this multi-facted, dynamic and extremely intense form of exercise. It is a peace that has eluded me for many years, and I have only known momentarily and in specific contexts. I felt it while trekking in Nepal, and I have had glimpses of it while attending butoh dance classes or when on stage with Chotto Matte. But this calm in exertion is a slippery fish, and has never lasted very long. When it happens, I feel like I am present and love can flow through me. Whatever that means.

But it seems oxymoronic to suggest that a discipline that is so demanding, so overwhelming, so all consuming in its moment of action, can induce a profound sort of inner tranquility. Take a look at the images of army personnel pasted all over the Cross Fit website (www.crossfit.com), or consider the "go hard or go home" attitude that has become synonymous with the method, and inner peace may sound like an unlikely bi-product. But, oddly enough, this is what I have found. An almost spiritual connection with "the moment" through the performance of extreme physical exertion. Actually... to me that makes perfect sense.

In Waking Up, Sam Harris observes:

Most of us spend our time seeking happiness and security without acknowledging the underlying purpose of our search. Each of us is looking for a path back to the present: We are trying to find good enough reasons to be satisfied now.

Acknowledging that this is the structure of the game we are playing allows us to play it differently. How we pay attention to the present moment largely determines the character of our experience and, therefore, the quality of our lives.

For me, this echoes the belief that presence - a full and electrifying immersion in "the now" - is essential if we are to live full and authentic lives. No matter what the medium, we all seek a connection to the present moment, whether it be through art, song, writing, meditation, dance or travel. We all want to feel alive now. And perhaps the medium changes as we pass from one age to the next. I can think of no one for whom a single "something" is "everything" all the time. But for me, right now, CrossFit has become that medium. The vehicle through which I have been able to transcend fear and doubt and become completely and utterly present. Left lying on the floor, drenched in sweat, my heart thudding desperate in my ears, I forget about "I" and the self conscious stories that orbit that foggy illusion. Attending absolutely to the specifics of the workout, I feel peace and quiet. An ecstatic calm emerges that is perhaps only possible when the obstacles one faces are immediate and measurable. In this state of accelerated crisis, the luxuries of fear and anxiety fade. One must simply cope with the all out and uncompromising demands of the present.

Like I said earlier, I have been a serial monogamist with physical disciplines, and CrossFit may sooner or later become another abandoned vehicle, rusting by the roadside. But for right now, it is working for me. And, if I am to trust that this thing has emerged at the right time and that my heart or spirit or whatever has brought me here for a "reason", then I guess I should immerse myself in it fully. I have even started running CrossFit workouts at the school. We also have a blog: siscrossfit.blogspot.com. And after those sessions with my students, I feel my entire being buzzing with optimism. So, while it may have been a long time since last I published, know that I have been living and that it has been a tumultous dance through a hazardous labyrinth. But one way or another, the heart finds the way.

Take care, and thanks for reading.

Run Just Run.

atlantisoverthesea@gmail.com (Anonymous) — Fri, 19 Jul 2013 06:24:00 -0700

I am on holidays and have been for what must be 5 weeks by now. Without the formal structure imposed by work place routine, time seems to mumble by with an anxious lethargy. One wakes later than normal. Potters about. Listens to something. Watches something. Reads something. House work is done when circumstance necessitates. Efficiency is compromised. Productivity declines. And the days blur into weeks and it goes so quickly. Like sand slipping between the fingers. And perhaps this is all part of some greater cycle of energy accumulation and expenditure. Within the teaching field a simple program of rest and recover during the holidays, followed by terms of effort and work.

But I think there is more to it than that.

I often speak to my Drama students about the importance of being "present" when on stage, as well as while performing the most mundane tasks that daily life demands. Writ alone, this sentiment rarely inspires more than silent nodding and blank stares. But if we insist on further discussion, the value of "presence" on stage and what it has to teach us about how to live becomes apparent. The performed moment is a demanding one. Suddenly thrust before an audience, actor-students find themselves carrying the burden of delivering a story, from memory, using only their bodies, voice, the space and objects provided, often while working with other individuals. It is a terrible risk. Mistakes happen. Lines are forgotten. In the heat of the moment, actors over exert themselves and things fall apart. And audiences are hard to please. To ensure that a performance is interesting for an audience (though there is no guarantee), actors must be focused. They must listen to each other and themselves with the utmost attention. When watching sand run through his/her fingers, or gazing into the empty sockets of a human skull, the actor must engage with those lifeless shapes as though each were the most important thing in the world. To really invite an audience in; to make them believe in the power of the moment, an actor must be completely present in the performance of his or her art.

But how is this relevant for understanding how we might learn to live "better"? Michel Foucault has famously observed that each individual should consider their own life a "work of art". He writes:

"What strikes me is the fact that in our society, art has become something which is related only to objects and not to individuals, or to life. That art is something which is specialized or which is done by experts who are artists. But couldn't everyone's life become a work of art? Why should the lamp or the house be an art object, but not our life?"

In a similar vein, the Japanese Butoh dancer Kazuo Ohno believed that we should see our daily lives as a dance. He claimed that between the dance one performs on stage and the dance one performs in the kitchen, there is no distinction to be made. That is, in each moment of our lives, whether on stage or walking down the street, contemplating suicide or brewing a pot of tea, we must have life coming out of us. If we conceive each moment, with or without an audience, as a dance (or work of art), then we are present, engaged, and alive. We make it our own, and we do it on our own terms. Of course, students are usually quick to identify the difficulty in sustaining such a high level of "presence" day in day out. How exactly does one dance sleep? And sometimes when you've been at school/work all day, all you want to do is flop in front of the television and vague out. Being "present" can be hard and to do it all the time can seem impossible. I agree with the students on this point. Quiet time is essential. But there is rest and there is rest. Meditation is relaxing and rejuvenating, as can be a walk by the sea or sitting in the garden. Introspection and aloneness are essential to maintaining balance and wellbeing. But if we meditate with intent, or wander the streets with our eyes open, then we do so with presence.

These ideas are bound up with the awareness of life's finitude. As I have said to my older students, though we know not when or how, we are all going to die. And everyone we have ever met, known, kissed, punched or had a drink with is going to die. Though we banish it from conscious though, it is the cruel reality of the human condition. And it is what makes life sacred. It is why we must strive to make each moment count. It is why we must insist on being present. Just before he passed away, the co-founder of Butoh, Tatsumi Hijikata, summoned his friends to the hospital. When they had congregated around his bed, he told them that he knew that he was going to die and that he was going to do so very soon. As they stood by the walls and in the door way, he struggled up out of his bed and danced for them. He danced and he danced until eventually he collapsed onto the floor and died. He danced his own death, and in doing so he took ownership of it. Until the breath left his body and his heart stopped beating, he was completely alive. Completely present. This was his gift to his closest friends. This was his final teaching.

I'm aware that all of this stuff about death and presence might seem a bit morbid for a high school classroom. The finitude of life is rarely the conscious topic of dinner time conversation, and usually something we would prefer to ignore. But should we not at least try to be aware of the bigger picture? That death will happen and that without it life would become meaningless? Does this not provide the necessary perspective for living a life free(er) of unnecessary stress and anxiety, and for being able to really feel the beauty and the poetry of our experiences? We have to use our imagination to do so, but that sounds to me like an effective use of the creative mind. Is that not the real point of education? To be able to think, to reason, and to see things from multiple perspectives. To not be eternally trapped in our own narcissistic bubble, convinced that the peak hour traffic, jammed photocopier, screaming children and cockroaches are all part of some elaborate scheme to frustrate and inconvenience "us". To help students to see the sacred in physics, the dance of math, the science of language... phenomena that exist in an unforgiving world that continues to turn with magnificent disinterest in the worries of a species so small and insignificant. To infuse this world and these things with poetry and humour, music and movement... that is our power. That is what it means to think creatively.

Speaking less formally now, all of these ideas have sort of been blurted out onto the screen without my meaning them to. When I started writing, I thought I was setting the scene to discuss my recent experiences as a road runner in Bangalore. And of course, there is much to be said on that. I love to run in the rain, and have a regular circuit through the winding streets of Cooke Town. Noisy traffic and beautiful tree-lined roads, peppered with rubbish piles and children playing. Today I decided to take a longer run along the train line and through parts of Bangalore that feel almost rural. Cows scratch their shoulders against rusty pipes while old men smoke beadies on the step of their mud-brick homes. It is a cool, monsoonal Friday afternoon and perfect for getting soaked while soaking up the heady aromas seeping from Hindu temples and Indian kitchens. I wanted to stop and walk, but pushed myself to keep running. A truck stopped to offer me a ride, which I declined. School children waved and offered high fives, which I accepted.

Exhausted and happy, I have no idea how I will spend my evening. It is raining heavily so perhaps a quiet one at home. Whatever I do, I will endeavour to be present.

The stillness of the body

atlantisoverthesea@gmail.com (Anonymous) — Wed, 27 Mar 2013 04:09:00 -0700

The following entry is an excerpt from an email sent to my mum only a short time ago:

Hi mum, it is 1pm here, so I'm guessing it must be 9.30pm there... Or something like that. Zanzibar has a gentle, lulling rhythm. It has rained every morning, and on most days this has given way to deep blue skies over tranquil, turquoise shallows. Today is a grey and gradual emptiness, stretching white sand into coral green before dissolving back into the paper white lines of surf that can't be heard. I cannot see the reef, but I can see where it must be. The ocean breaks so far out, and all between here and there is sand so soft it is like cake between your toes. Women wrapped in brilliant colour find their way between the jagged stones with bundles of seaweed born upon their heads. Since our arrival, we have cooked fish over hot coals by moonlight on the beach. We have heard the noontime call to prayer while waist deep in an African sea. We have drunk our coffee while lightning shoots like ripples creasing cross the sky.

In short, it is beautiful here. Yesterday we drove to Stone Town (about 45 minutes away). It is a bit of a tourist Mecca, though we are lucky enough to be here out of season. The Zanzibar coffee house would make the ideal setting for reading Bolano and Rimbaud (I came good on one of these), and the labyrinthine streets remind me of Barcelona. The Barrie Gothic, only tropical. And African. And very, very poor... And the art is in the street and no sign of Picasso or Goya. And the old men and the veils... and the monkey huddled in the Rasta's crooked arm.

No... I guess it is not so much like Barcelona. Only a labyrinth of shops and art and smells like spices cooking and cafes. "You turn your head away. Oh the new love! You turn your head back. Oh the new love!" And I remember Hemingway's utterance about blunting the pencil while wondering the world, so that new illuminations may be written once back in the chambers of familiarity and the mundane. But this place inspires and seduces, and it is easy to imagine never having lived anywhere else and to never leave again. And still my heart peers anxiously to a world remembered, made accessible through the burdened blessings of technology.

The tide is coming in. It rises like blood or milk flowing into the heart. Tiny boats now bobbing gently, that until an hour ago sat lifeless on awkward pillars of stone. Flies are dancing on my food. Without meaning to do so, I have used this email as a rehearsal for a blog entry. Sorry for that. But I am comfortable, well fed and well rested. And I am in a beautiful part of the world.

I hope that you are well. I love you all.

Floating face down on seas of delectable bliss

atlantisoverthesea@gmail.com (Anonymous) — Mon, 20 Aug 2012 05:28:00 -0700

I have not yet found my voice. Though it would seem that I have found my feet. And while my feet wander free, it is not often that I feel the looseness drift up into the throat that I might share stories of my time here. There are reasons for this, but this is not the place. Suffice to say that whenever I sit down to share (not write, for the private writer knows little inhibition), a self consciousness seizes me. What the hell do I think I am doing? Publishing random bits of information about my poorly arranged life? What audacity! To think that anyone should read these unimportant stories about some lost stooge who has thrown himself into the vaguely unfamiliar, hoping that his life might rediscover some aromatic wind of adventure. Forgive me if you're reading this. I shall do my best to stick to details, external to myself, that might somehow amuse the reader:

Taking up the challenge from the hipstamatic posters...

In my quest for good local places to eat buttery dosas and thalis, I recently discovered an excellent blog published by a Bangalorean woman:

http://aturquoisecloud.wordpress.com/2011/04/13/the-great-bangalore-breakfast-specials/

Unfortunately my apartment complex is about 12kms north of Central Bangalore, and I don't like the idea of travelling too far for breakfast. But I've recently been getting out on the local buses, and this added to the excitement of going on a quest for food. Not to mention that on weekends my alternative is to spend the whole time lolling about in my apartment, which will make a brother crazy.

So with a list of potential venues in the Malleswaram suburb (and a few traditional music schools to inquire at) scribbled into my diary, I set out on a bus that looked like it had been an air-conditioned, luxury vehicle in a previous life. As proud as I was of travelling on the bus, with the locals (working faces not necessarily pleased to see a foreigner on their early commute), it took bloody ages for me to get to my destination. As in most parts of the world, buses don't run so regularly on weekends, and my chosen route was an obscure one. But my efforts did not go unrewarded.

The rickety bus hurtled past one of the venues on my list. The exterior of Veena Stores boasted a crowd that would rival the Boxing day opportunists moments before sale time, so I decided to catch the next stop and try my luck at Central Tiffin Rooms. From the outside, CTN appeared to be crawling with people in a manner not unlike the hordes of ants that laboriously dissect the carcasses of recently deceased spiders in summer time. My appetite won out over the waves of anxiety and I elbowed my way into the sweet smelling darkness. It appeared that finding a table would be like trying to locate a contact lens in a spa bath. I pushed my way to the back of the cafe, parried a series of startled looks, experienced an intense moment of self doubt before hustling my way back to the entry. The person in charge of collecting money from patrons gave me a curious look, then pointed to a table that had one seat free in the furthermost corner. One of the waiters took it upon himself to lead me there, wipe my seat then ask me what I wanted. Do (2) idli and eck (1) butter dosa, I blurted and he folded back into the heaving darkness. My neighbours made little effort to conceal their interest as I munched on my idlis and dosa.

I should point out that after eating in local joints for most of my time in India in 2008, and for the best part of my 3 weeks this time around, while I love the local fare, one can start to think that it is all of a similar quality. From one cafe to another, there seems little difference between vadas, dosas, chutneys, thalis. However, my perspective has received a necessary adjustment. The breakfast at the Central Tiffin Rooms was absolutely extraordinary. The dosa crackled and melted in my mouth as the corriander chutney simmered on my tongue. Amidst the grubby surrounds, barefoot wait staff and teeming crowd, I felt momentarily set adrift, floating face down on seas of delectable bliss.

I washed down the dosa with a chai and set out into the streets. An unexpected bonus to go with my breakfast: a festival in honor of Sri Ganesh is soon approaching, and to mark the occasion hundreds of women had set up in the street to create mandalas out of chalk, seeds, candles and earth. I wandered aimless among the myriad mandalas, gazing transfixed from one spiralling meditation unto the next.

A young woman asked me how I had come to know about the event and was delighted when I told her it was an accidental discovery. It would seem I was the only foreigner fortunate to stumble through Margosa Road that morning.

Then there was more time waiting for and riding buses. Exercise at the gym and another delicious lunch served on a banana leaf just up the way from my apartment. Some colleagues and I met for dinner at the Sheraton (a valuable lesson: if the food is being served in an expensive hotel then chances are that it will be awful. The vegie burger at the Sheraton cost me $12. The lime soda was $5. Breakfast and lunch combined (with chai/coffee) was less than $3 all up. The burger was near inedible), then went to see a production of The Seussification of Romeo and Juliet (I did not know that this pantoesque adaptation existed until a few days ago), directed by a local dramatist (who I have replaced as Drama teacher at Stonehill International School).

Despite the assorted satisfactions of yesterday's outings, I did not sleep well last night - this is how things have been for some weeks now - and woke feeling lethargic and deflated this morning. Being Eid, I knew that most of the shops and restaurants would be closed today. But, being Eid, I also knew that there would be something happening somewhere. And so I dragged myself out of the apartment and set off on the bus to the most famous Mosque in Bangalore, the Masjid E Khadriya. I had no idea what to expect as I made the corner approaching the mosque. What I found was a beautiful building bulging with men of many ages all adorned in white robes and taqiyah (prayer caps). Unable to approach the entry to the gardens, I was welcomed to join a man and his sons not far from the elaborately decorated gate. Recitations from the Quran bubbled and hissed through loud speakers with majestic intensity. The man stared into his hands and uttered prayer while his boys unashamedly stared at their anglo attendant. After a moment one of those nearby handed me a prayer cap of my own and I sat in stupefied reverence as a paparazziesque storm of camera phones hailed all about me. Insistant beggars tugged at my sleeve and the chanting thundered on. I caught glimpses of those glistening minarets. That wondrous onion dome.

And then the chanting stopped. People staggered to their feet and handed back each others' shoes. The stream of human traffic haphazardously negotiated its way back up Miller's road, away from the Mosque, and into the wind.

I decided to walk back to the MG Road area (good bookshops, restaurants, easy passage home, etc.). A 4km wander through old Bangalore. I recall someone telling me back in January that Bangalore was a terrible place, full of American style shopping malls and commercial enterprise.

True. Bangalore is a thickening example of booming economy India. I have not talked about the skyscrapers of UB City or the various malls that pepper the city limits. They do not interest me, though they embody an extreme of irreconcilable social inequality.

But. If one ignores the well trod yellow line of Bangalore's main roads ("safe" main roads and commercial districts appear in yellow on road maps) in favor of the narrow lanes and destitute bazaars, there is a world to be discovered, rich in the twin polarities of life and death. Cows tussle over scraps udder deep in rubbish, while veiled women light candles at awkwardly stationed idols. Tiny shops pedalling all sorts of trinkets. Old men stooped over who knows what. I stopped for a chai and talked cricket (a point of reference) with two muslims.

I felt that wind of adventure (tho I shudder to call it such) for a moment there. Faint. Despairing to be found. A fleeting awareness, embedded in the crumbling walls of a melancholy street. One of hundreds in a labyrinth of human perseverance. Audacious or no, this is one more story. Unimportant. Absurd. Lived. I thank the writer, the women who create their mandalas in the middle of the road, the man and his sons. In the shade of mega malls and soaring enterprise, there is music to be heard, dosas to be devoured.

I would go on. But I won't. There are classes to prepare and a dinner to be made.

Until next time the winds are calling. I thank you. For reading.

Early days

atlantisoverthesea@gmail.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 2 Aug 2012 21:26:00 -0700

It has been a whirlwind few days since my arrival in Bangalore. And I have to keep reminding myself about the quantitative aspect of that sentence - a few DAYS - not weeks not months but days. Because it feels like I have been here a lot longer. It also feels like I have been here no time at all.

The arrival has been smooth. The good folk at Stonehill International School have gone to great ends to ensure that all of the new hire staff (17 in total) feel comfortable, well fed, prioritised. They value their staff and this shines through in the attention to detail. The size and facilities of my apartment far exceed my needs. After sharing with students, artists, academics and cafe staff for the best part of ten years, I now have a 13th floor apartment all to myself. Gym, swimming pool and tennis courts. The muslims that run the local grocery store stare at me with unexpected affection and ask questions that might be considered invasive in Western countries. It is novel to be a novel animal.

The school itself is remarkable. Large, open designed workspaces and optional outdoor learning environments for the primary years. The gardens are beautiful and security guards pepper the lawns. A bus collects the staff for delivery to the school each morning (a practice that shall be maintained until the end of the year - by which point we are expected to have our own transport - on these roads?). Upon arrival at the heavily fortified gate a guard checks the front of the bus for explosives - then gives us the ok to proceed.

The school has great facilities and employs a full-time snake catcher. Yesterday he caught a seven foot long cobra just out front of the admin building. Several staff members ran to his aid as he held the snake by the tail and warded off its coiling stabs with a short stick. He trapped its erratic movements before seizing its head while the body thrashed in opposition. A guard appeared with a fabric bag (apparently designed for the occasion) and our hero nonchalantly held the snake aloft while it bounded against his arm and shoulder. He popped it into the bag as though he were Santa delivering a sweet into a stocking, then carried it about, smiling while we marvelled at its contents. The school employs a great number of people to fulfil its many requirements.

Way back in January I was employed as an English teacher. When I arrived at the school on Monday morning I was introduced as the Drama teacher. This created some confusion. I will be teaching some English. But I am the new Drama teacher. Which spins me out a little.

Any of you who have followed my blog will know that I was, as a writer, at my most industrious when last I was travelling. I continued to write after I got back to Melbourne, but the spark had gone out of my pen - I had stopped journalling, and the occasions for publishing were separated by greater intervals. It was the desire to rediscover this spark that sat behind my decision to move overseas. I believed that working with motivated students in a foreign land might create the necessary context for reigniting that creative fire. But the subtle difference between being an English teacher and a Drama teacher makes me wonder if it might be a different set of coals that receive the stoking. I haven't written a scrap in my journal yet - and this first blog entry comes five days after my arrival - which might not sound unreasonable, but I had expected to be wilfully blogging by day two at the very latest. Perhaps it is because my arrival has been so carefully planned and catered for - I have yet to find the deep end. Perhaps it will be as simple as taking away a few ingredients, or adding a few. Or maybe a different skill set will need to be cultivated. I have only been here a few days. It has been an extremely busy few days. And it is way too soon to know.

From amid the whirling winds of Bangalore, thank you for reading.

dream

atlantisoverthesea@gmail.com (Anonymous) — Wed, 11 Jul 2012 02:18:00 -0700

A cocoon left on a table special made new born cots and spinal correction beds. Weightless sinking into fire the corpse left beneath a bridge in late winter. I stand expectant as the military sky thunders all and quaking.

One wing strums and then another. Transparent and web formed glistening wet halogens. Struggling like a larvae

Waking.

Waking found a man not sure were it dreamt of being a butterfly? Were it now a butterfly dreaming of a man?

through the chaos of the night and the honking of the horns

atlantisoverthesea@gmail.com (Anonymous) — Sun, 24 Jun 2012 03:48:00 -0700

Five weeks from now I will have moved out of my house in Fitzroy. I will have worked my final day with the wild youth of Melbourne's northern district. I will have packed some things, smiled at my sister, kissed my mother's cheek and held my father's arm. I will be boarding a plane for India, for a new job in a new city surrounded by new people. Five weeks from now.

It was nearly a year ago when I made the first preparatory step toward my imminent adventure. I was concerned with other things and dedicated little thought to how my decisions/actions would affect the landscape of my life. If anything, the last twelve months provide testimony to a separation between the lived trajectory and the torments of conscious thought. We make decisions and move toward outcomes and all the while our heads chase chickens up a tree.

I remember a friend saying that she would be sad if my plan was a success. I remember receiving an email and filling out a form. I remember asking my principal for a reference.

The application was not an easy process. It took time, preparation and sustained effort, and not once did I question my decision. This must be what others speak of, when they know that something is right. When they feel that they are on the right track. When everything "just works".

This sensation was... not a sensation. If Freud is right, that the only true feeling is anxiety (all others are simply variations thereof), then this was the one thing that was free of feeling. With dumb determination I just signed another page and transferred the set amount.

My brother, my sister, and many of our friends have stood before themselves and said "I do".

I have said "I doubt".

"I doubt" myself and all things.

This move to Bangalore? Of course I am worried. But there is little thought and little fear and only quiet anticipation. It is a gentle sense that something is about to change. That soon that which has long been still shall once again be moving, quickly... dancing through the chaos of the night and the honking of the horns.

winds calling

atlantisoverthesea@gmail.com (Anonymous) — Sat, 3 Sep 2011 22:55:00 -0700

For the longest time I have not felt the inclination to scribble down the random thoughts and occurrences that constitute my life. What have I done? Little. J'existe.

The desire (need) to write and create was smote when I returned to Melbourne. For a while there I chattered like an estranged lunatic about the bitterness of home and the will to overcome. Then there were codified grumblings and resentments, some romantic, some just cursing at the sky.

But for the first time in that topsy turvy to and fro, I feel the gypsy of my soul reach for the known not yet. My work as a teacher casts light on new direction. A confidence swells in the quiet darkness, and I feel the winds calling. Recently I applied to an agency that assists the professional courtship that brings teachers and international schools together. An interview awaits, and will be followed by further inquiries and a trip to Sydney. In a year I should be settled some place new. Some place known not yet. I let my fancy tip toe here and there, and picture cluttered streets in Shanghai, onion domes in Moscow, or the calm inlets of Basque country. It is a long time yet, and time will bring it's mysteries and lay them at my feet. Let's pray our feet find their way, and deliver us new happiness.

Maybe I will find myself in Persia...

This construct is in sight

atlantisoverthesea@gmail.com (Anonymous) — Mon, 9 Aug 2010 02:04:00 -0700

Our rusted cages sadly sway, some second close,
some far away,
Bitter breath that blows between, now heard my voice,
my dance, unseen,

And this, my corpse, which I forgot,
I hold,
between two broken fingers.

My palms meet in morbid prayer, communal love,
communal fair,
For it is time, and he has risen, alone he walks,
in lonely wisdom,

And though your heart may wish it not,
he hangs, aloft,
between two broken fingers.

We are alone, my desert flower, "don't, not yet!"
no not this hour,
For what it was and now lays dying, cannot go on,
cannot keep crying,

And you, my friend, who I must kill, I leave you now
so you may end,
O! spiteful thing, that we must die, and still we dance,
still. . . we try,

And you, my heart. . .

you shall someday stop your beating,
my tiny life, crushed,
between two broken fingers.

my child

atlantisoverthesea@gmail.com (Anonymous) — Sat, 17 Jul 2010 20:12:00 -0700

You do know who you are talking to? You do have some awareness of who I am, right? This morning, heaving with autumn, breaks apart as burnt paper beneath a whales tongue. Sweet memory of summer, held between our teeth. The old air of London, holds aloft a single hair. That old air, of London...

The sores in my mouth are better today. The canker tells of strange, acidic vapors - my teeth are cagey with it all. Perhaps one must dilute the existing quaquaqua... to up and have done with viscosities and verbose wall hangings. One oily figure melts into the next. An uncluttered life reflects an uncluttered head. And still there is movement in that old air. The spinning leaves remind me so.

If one should experience disasters within, then the world will bear the marks of strife. But if the mind is witness to a troubled world, and refuses to call it so, then surely strife will pollute the soul. I know from my own lies, the corrosive fictions that scatter here, now there.

Is that your fist you shake beneath the table? We have such intimate contempt for one another. Better to walk against the wind - to hear the wooden nail scratch your grimy window. It is all up with us. My body creaks like a wind blown cellar. Each bottle sings unto the melting snow - blow my child. Blow.

Sun, arise.

atlantisoverthesea@gmail.com (Anonymous) — Wed, 30 Jun 2010 21:09:00 -0700

Here, amid such ruined things,
Words, in dust, crawl and cry.
Here, alone, where symbols sing,
Set in stone, or sung to die.

Still! my breath, my beating heart,
Broken clock, or time unwind.
Alone, again, be not in fright,
Up! ol boy. Sun, arise.

A few words on/off

atlantisoverthesea@gmail.com (Anonymous) — Sat, 29 May 2010 02:11:00 -0700

It never starts on a first page, it can't, it wont.
Make this your start and the lamp light your sun.
Sweet robe of morning, when chill pursues my nakedness.
Your kiss a tongue of weeping, i miss the wanting, not the wanted.
Her eyes still cast the stone, a creature's shadow creeping.
But never in the daylight, never on the breeze.
This is the shape i make in the moonlight, i catch silver.
Were i a wolf my blood would pump quicker.
And if i were a spider, my many legs would wrap around.
The firmness of her belly offers a tongueless clue.
We cry alone together, separated by our own impossibility.
Sketching idea that phlegms from emotions unutterable.
Manufacture flame from shade - give me a picture.
Portrait of solitude, a lone lee ness, a song.
A poem of crisis and buzzing bees, they carry us.
Over earth and under the wire, catches my throat.
Curdled and gargle, as wrath of bitter toad.
Her purity (a song in A minor) suspended between two hollow trees.
Swung from a bough, beaten, dry, lidless eyes.
And toothless ears! readily suck at swollen strings.
Her hatred is my refuge, no man is an island.
I start counting backward, and lose my mark, in time.

Just checking in

atlantisoverthesea@gmail.com (Anonymous) — Sun, 25 Apr 2010 21:02:00 -0700

It has been ages since i wrote here - little reason - Just not much to share - and i harbor disdain for the current zeitgeist of narcissistic idolatry. Facebook, myspace and blogging. I hate people who self worship at these holy cyberspaces. Man i hate myself.

If you want to know a bit about what i've been up too, creatively speaking, then check out www.myspace.com/chottomattemusic We're playing stacks of gigs - and the ethos behind the music has evolved significantly.

Otherwise - living in Fitzroy. Teaching at a school in Glenroy (and absolutely loving it!). And still singing. My teacher turns 86 tomorrow. Happy Birthday Myra. I love you.

Oh, Culture vultures should quest for scraps at www.openculture.com This is my new favourite site in the whole pathetic joke of a universe.

Nokta . from Onur Senturk on Vimeo.

Merci , adieu

Actually, i think this one is better...

atlantisoverthesea@gmail.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 05:13:00 -0700

Sitting in my room, I regard each breath,
I feel my feet, my hands, my eyes in my head
And each breath in, each breath out.
I remember that I am in Melbourne, and that one day I shall die.
I hear the timber creak and a tram shuffle past at the end of the street.
I hear a saxophone and children playing with a ball, I see one of them slip and graze his knee.
I see a balloon floating on the breeze and imagine a dog sniffing at dry grass by a wire fence.
I remember my friends and the faces of my parents. I think of the sky changing colour at day break in spring, and how exciting summer is until the real heat arrives. I remember that I have a brother and a sister, I remember and I forget again.
I feel my back and imagine a forest growing between my shoulders. A white bird without eyes perches on my finger and looks for bugs beneath my nails. I remember something funny and I forget again. A fly buzzes past my ear and I see myself at work, making drinks, writing notes, singing songs. I dance around a corner and step over a chair. Spider webs hung in a corner sway and stretch. The floor moans and I remember my mother, sitting on a couch and looking so tired. I ask her to dance with me, but she looks away and stares at the wall. I feel angry because she is not old, but seems to wish she was.
I think of the future, the past and castles on a beach. I see art and music and each breath in, I see ships out at sea. Like tiny leaves, my thoughts are carried by water in a drain. A sun asphyxiated by cloud casts diamonds on the wind, making me cover my eyes. I see my body on the floor, doing push ups. I hear the ocean.
But I am none of these things. I am not even the sound of a tram shuffling past at the end of the street.

refuse to look at stars

atlantisoverthesea@gmail.com (Anonymous) — Sat, 13 Jun 2009 20:03:00 -0700

The night is clear, i keep my eyes downcast, immersed in earthly struggle, i seek the moon, a twisted dance among the quiet trees, voices tempt my ear to lonely plains,
these graceful strides amid the swamp and foggy wraiths that refuse to part,
meaning has been lost, i seek the sun, and refuse to look at stars.

Come down from your mountain, oh sweet reason, and walk awhile among us.

Things we lost in the fire.

little reason

atlantisoverthesea@gmail.com (Anonymous) — Fri, 5 Jun 2009 02:25:00 -0700

I haven't written here for some time - which does not indicate a depravity of reason. Reason for writing, reason for reflection. Little life little reason ... Reason enough. Winter has taken hold and we huddle about the hearth and squeeze turnips to amuse our inhibitions. It is dark and that is good reason to turn the lights down low. I often sit in the dark. I find it soothing to let the shadows make their offerings. We throw ideas about like a new beach ball and maybe when i have time and energy to spare i'll shove the plastic in a pot and tend to making towers grow. Maybe... this is all pretty cryptic isn't it? I apologise. We'll talk, we'll sort things out, we'll make it ok again. You still don't know who this is for. Who does this address? Is it you? Is it someone else?

I don't know. You think i tell the keys to fall?

I often have moments of darkness when the lights are on. An imaginary owl 'hoots' in my ear. Like she has a secret. Like she's washing my neck. It doesn't matter what the sun is doing. I look for leaves and get lost in the sky. An echo of anxiety strokes my cheek and i become convinced that wolves will come to fetch me. I look into my soul and find the motel has a room. 'Vacancy', 'Rooms available'. And then the fear is creeping faster than desert lizards over sand. I become convinced that soon i will be found out. My illusions shall topple from their perch and be dashed upon the tiles. You smile unwavering, you hold your own against the tide. Neptune returns to the depths, crabs scuttle under coral. It is a struggle to swim in unknown water. I reach for driftwood. I have lost my way. The stars seem cold, distant. I swallow sea water and know i'm going mad. The night grows darker. My eyes stretch upward.

A snow owl passes. 'Hoot'. And all is calm.

School is good. Work is good. Love is good.

The music keeps on playing. I shall keep on dancing.

Little reason...

reason enough.

Benjamin

recently made applied displeased

atlantisoverthesea@gmail.com (Anonymous) — Sat, 4 Apr 2009 22:13:00 -0700

Hello,

I am living in top gear, clutch out and engine screaming. Study work music social - there is not time for stopping to stretch and reflect. My brother has been in town after returning from his summer long stint in Antarctica and i feel like i hardly saw him. Chotto Matte takes a rest for three weeks and for that i am thankful, that i may knuckle down and catch up on all the work i have been neglecting over the last few weeks. School is brilliant - theory and theorising what it means to learn - brightly burning neurons fire - i have lived and now i study life. So full to bursting. New bodies enter orbit - always exciting - distraction keeps me from sleeps that organs need to tackle turkeys. There are chickpeas in a bowl. Love is a cauliflower extending to the sky, florets like stars.

Chotto Matte played at the Ding Dong Lounge last week to a tiny audience of close friends - we do not have a name for attracting big crowds. We do not have the support required. So i will focus what energy i have on playing for venues already swingin - there are nights for noise and noisy bars - attended by splendid hungry ears. Our movements need a knowing sun - waves crash on lonely shores. A bough creaks - swing alone, swing together - a buzzing behind twisted strings.

'Are you okay?'

I think so... it is all too much. Assessment stumbles in. And the music is louder than ever before. Before you know it we'll be singing statues in gardens on the coast. Glass cracks... an imp dances sheepish.

I scream at the awkward stones - i think i hear the dawn.

Peace and pieces, probes and pores,
silent screaming and throttled caws,
Rapid release, push comes to shove,
My hands drift open, and swallow

love

atlantisoverthesea@gmail.com (Anonymous) — Sat, 28 Mar 2009 23:28:00 -0700

Hey kids. Check out this wild stuff from the first Chotto Matte gig back in December.

nothing remains

atlantisoverthesea@gmail.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 14:41:00 -0800

last friday.mp3

Here is a an unadulterated recording of a an electronic/vocal jam session performed by Dave Hicks and myself last Friday the 20th of February. It is a sprawling journey through strange habitats - haunting encounters with defiant architecture. It is also the first recording directly through desk to device - so it is relatively good quality, considering our usual lo-fi approach to capturing ourselves.

There is a weird impulse to keep recordings like this under our hats, or under our seats, out of sight - but that defies the whole "nothing remains" ethos of Chotto Matte. No matter how happy we are with a particular piece of work - we let it go, let it burn, never look back.

Paper House happened last Thursday at the Glasshouse - there were many little lessons for us in the performance. Our sound has filled out with the addition of a guitar - and the use of projections added great visual accompaniment. Without wasting anytime, we bend our crests toward the ides of March.

I am reluctant to talk at length about what we do when we're on stage - i am a little superstitious... that's all.

Hope you enjoy the recording - feedback and criticism is wanted.

Benjamin

paper house

atlantisoverthesea@gmail.com (Anonymous) — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 00:14:00 -0800

Chotto Matte presents: P A P E R H O U S E
'meditations on psychosis'

@ the Glass House : 51 Gipps St Collingwood
9-pm 19/02/09

It is time for the next Chotto Matte gig and we're back at the Glass House and the sound is bigger and fuller and i think i'm gonna wear some make-up. Two shows behind us - two remarkably different works. I feel a strange ambivalence about tomorrow's production... it will definately be our most ambitious effort - extra musicians, video art, more promotion - but what is the nature of this little evolution? What debris peppers our foaming wake?

Only time will tell, i guess.

the violence of love: the love of violence

atlantisoverthesea@gmail.com (Anonymous) — Wed, 4 Feb 2009 01:41:00 -0800

I just posted a blog entry on the chotto matte myspace, and realised that so much has happened and that i had not written anything, in this, my spiritual refuge, for so long. At least three weeks, i think. Not that there is anything particularly extraordinary about that - but it struck a chord and i listened and the vibrations seemed to call me back here, to my blog, that i may write somethings about something. And so much to tell! But not all of it... some stories need to be told and others do not. Some stories need other stories with which to coexist, to justify their tangled place in memory. I would like to tell of the other weekend when Chotto Matte played (but not that bit) and the Rainbow Serpent that followed.

The night of the Chotto Matte gig was what it was. We played. I was thrilled with the performance because i felt more powerful than the first time. Alex and David were not so chuffed because their instruments gave them grief. So 'tis with these things. That week i averaged about 3 hours sleep per night - anxiety and angst in my workplace - fear and frustration in my personal life - whatever combination of irritants gave rise to my difficult restlessness, i cannot say for sure. Then it was the show and i dreaded a sluggish performance - and was delighted to discover that my rage became a tool and a vehicle for self transformation when i took the stage. Dionysus had found his mountain and the maenads writhed in ecstasy as milk and wine oozed from their pores.

That night i could hardly close my eyes - my skin quivering with electric pulses. By the following noon i was bleary eyed and my body felt like a bad day in Baghdad. Making coffee was difficult - my muscles ached and screamed with each twist and turn. Needless to say, i was not so excited about going to a great big sweating hippy festival (uttered with affection - i have been going for ten years now and love it more each time), camping and getting jiggy on the dance floor. I recall some sleep deprivation related hallucinations during the drive to Beaufort - flashes of light in my periphery. It was a bit of a shit sandwich finding a camping spot - but we eventually decided to set up on the top of a hill at the perimeter of the property - a bit of a hike, but an extraordinary view of the festival and nearby country. This turned out to be a stroke of genius when the sun was emerging over the mist filled valley on the Monday morning.

That first night i had a few drinks but decided to make my way to bed early (2am). I slept soundly, without a sleeping mat, on a slight grade, until after 8. Strangely enough i rose refreshed and feeling fit. My frustrations and anxiety were quelled - who would believe i went to a party to get some much needed rest. The next two nights i averaged more than 8 hours - extraordinary, if you ask me.

But my intention is not to give you a blow by blow of my movements and experiences at the festival - nor is it to provide a review of the acts, the workshops or the quality of the delicious food. I would not bore you, or myself, with such trivialities. Rather, i am concerned with the something that happens at that particular festival that is life affirming, cathartic, expressive and energising. It is apparent immediately; as we arrive we are met with joyful enthusiasm, and the market seems to sigh lovingly as new eyes roam, peeling apart the carnivalesque atmosphere - meeting others who have come in search of an other worldly experience. The general feeling is one of a return to something - a strange sort of home coming. This feeling only intensifies as the party goes on.

After being at the event for more than two days, one knows their way around - one has established connections with people in a variety of locations, discovered interesting video art, immersive environments and become familiar with the sights, sounds and smells of the party. One begins to forget about the world outside - memories of that person you were before you came to this weird and wonderful place. Periods of intoxication mingle with relative clear headedness - the management of necessities and the maenadic loss of self on the dance floor. It all seems to fanttastic and unreal

Mondays are notorious as the highlight at the Rainbow Serpent Festival - everyone has been around for a few days - everyone is filthy, hung over, coming down, sleep deprived and edgy about the party coming to a close. And so the gloves come off and the music is minimal and dark and dirty and we all just let go of whatever we were holding onto and soon you're just losing it along with everyone else. Occasions of people watching - what might otherwise inspire fear or terror in a stranger, or perplexed amusement in the newly arrived, gently forces itself upon you and you cant help but just dance dance dance. I forgot about time and place and everything and my body became a sacred site for expression and worship. I know this all sounds a bit new age and wank laden - but there is an ecstatic, religious experience realised in the maddening frenzy of the dionysiac, and that is what i rediscovered only ten days ago.

I ask myself the next question: why did all the angst and fear of my daily life evaporate within hours of my arrival at this festival? Why did i feel so at home in this strange and alien world of fantasy and make believe? Why did i sob quietly when i realised it had come to an end? It can be distressing when it dawns upon us that we are more at home in the hills, surrounded by people in weird costumes, shaken with the dizzying pulse of music, than we are in the mundane world's we call our lives.

Nietzsche argued that all of life should be a determined and relentless search for experiences of intense pleasure, the attainment of which is the only reward and justification for its own pursuit. Pleasure is discovered in different ways by different people - for some it lies in the attainment of money - for others, the expenditure of money. For me... this is going to be one of those questions i can never answer wholly or satisfactorily... i guess it is partly earthed in the experience of dance and movement... but there is much more to it than that... intoxication? yeah, that is fun too... but not on its own... i never drink alone... this will go on and on, and i am really asking myself what is important to me, and maybe you are thinking about the same thing and maybe neither of us will ever be able to pin it down for sure in a way that endures... for it must keep changing, morphing and distorting, just as we must. In a world dominated by the endless and grueling pursuit of status (your job, car, designer clothes and big holiday to exotic locations, while functional, remain markers of "success"), the philosopher and wanderer within will always be unsatisfied. A part of us will always be some how taunted by a self reflexive understanding that meaning is absent in our pathetic little lives. And yet, there is something mysterious and exciting, lurking in the fog of Dionysian desire and expression - a socially sanctioned moment of communal release? or a profound opportunity for personal and collective insight into the primal substance and rhythms of who we are? Perhaps both.

There are moments when reason slips and the body is pushed to its limits - there are those who collapse with heat exhaustion, dehydration, overdose. We all know, and yet we keep on dancing. Is this perverse? We accept the violence of love. We accept the love of violence. Catharsis or catalyst, we go on chasing that distant thud of music, for what it promises and what it delivers - what it permits and what it prevents - deeper and deeper into the bowels of the earth. I embrace the darkness and the joy - and feel myself ALIVE.

atlantisoverthesea@gmail.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 03:28:00 -0800

Chotto Matte play the Glasshouse next Thursday the 22nd. Hope you like the image. Hope you can come along!

beanstalks

atlantisoverthesea@gmail.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 13 Jan 2009 22:38:00 -0800

It is now when i am sitting in my room which shall not be my room for much longer and i cast my imagination a little higher upon the beanstalk, that i may consider the plateau of recent memory - I am in my room - i am listening to Gustav Mahler (the first symphony) - it is about 26 degrees when they said it would be 39. We thought it would be dark clouds and deep crags, sweaty corpses soaking in the gutter - a broken bell struck by deaf and despairing patients - fearing death, wanting death.

In my last entry i spoke of struggle and dread - but those emotions have faded, as all things do upon the shores of time. Even when i was suffering, was i really suffering? What of suffering when one recalls the moment and its events, and all that one sees floats and flickers, a steady candle in the window, dancing, winking, like a knowing friend? I held my fear, my anxiety, suckled it and rocked its cradle. Cooing for one's affliction nurtures blindness, frenzy, rage. Discovering the horizon, yet again, my imagination forgot its paternal preoccupation, let the crib alone to burn, and set each foot before the other - gleeful about mountains.

Now i have a Kaossilator. And i promise that Chotto Matte shall seize his weathered beard and swallow the sky with eyes not meant for seeing. If you read. You should attend.

But what of recent events? There was some irritation of a personal nature - as there often is in times of vulnerability. But i have seen some of the most amazing music this last week. There was the Necks at the Corner last Monday. Had i known how immersive, moody and affecting the live phenomenon could be, twould not have been so long before i came. Such is the gulf between knowledge and experience - to know about... what a jib!

And then we went to see the Silver Apples (!) support Spiritualized. I went for the apples - but was pleasantly surprised by the spirits. Simeon had me worried - how would this great artist, now in his 70s, manage to reproduce music that was written and recorded 40 years ago, without the assistance of the drummer (with whom the project began) without compromising the overall power of the music? Was it compromised? It was compromised. It did not sound the same. Electronic beats and stomping techno rhythms stand in as a questionable replacement for live percussion. That said, the artist has successfully reinterpreted his own work in a way that is both progressive and challenging, within the realm of contemporary music, whilst remaining true to the intensity and imaginative complexity of the original vision. And he is doing it onstage, on his own - in Australia "for the first time." And if that doesn't inspire artists of all walks across all fields of creative enterprise, then nothing will. Simeon's performance was a rare and precious gift - one i shall cherish in the vaults of my memory - no matter how high i must climb in order to find it.

Monday. It was time to see Krautrock super group Harmonia play. And who would have thought three old chaps with laptops and a couple of instruments could rock the nuts off the East Brunswick club so effortlessly. Bass heavy programming and intricate melodic patterns intersecting and rejoicing on the air.

And now in the third week of 2009 i am reminding myself that it was once the third week of 2008, and 2007, and will one day be the third week of 3004. And one can't help but let go, look to the slowly setting sun, and smile.

Thank you

rage

atlantisoverthesea@gmail.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 6 Jan 2009 19:49:00 -0800

A thrown up thought thickens, curdles and coagulates like cream spilt and sputtering, strewn and simmering as the wings of midnight moths, such motley miasms quiver, quiver and dissolve - as steam on the breeze, a tongue gliding by pearly whites collecting scraps of trespass, tranquilizing, seizing with Caesar's unshaken will to power at the hour of et tu brute? We fell like honourable men to sweetly coated bullets of atrition - all men with one woman in mind, all women with one man, reflected, rippling, returning eternally - acceptance of the end our only answer to death, the ultimate beginning, breaking down and disintegrating, dislodging the illusion of the one and the whole, the whole in the one. A macrocosm and the memphis mule, alone by the pool, bring me coffee or tea, i read the clouds, watch the sun, and think of Jesus. I read the clouds, and whisper: I am.

I am suffering at the moment. After the Chotto Matte performance Melbourne came into full colour and i thought for a while that i could stay here, build a life for myself, be happy and content. I remember the rush of such ecstasy dripping from the most menial of tasks, ethereal emanating from the most bland and boring company. But the energy fades. And now i am sad. And the sadness wont budge. On Monday night, after a grinding day of repressed angst and crippling anxiety, i thought i had overcome the beast - we went and saw the Necks play at the Corner and life was affirmed and despair was abated, for a little while. Sensing the quiet rage stirring, i went for a big bike ride to Brighton and back, and somewhere in Melbourne the seizure was upon me. I spent the night sulking in the dark, my limbs heavy and brittle with the fever.

They say that anger and desperation are good, motivating emotions for overcoming and transcending situations that are unsatisfactory. And so i make manouvers and confront some demons. And there are camels, perishing on my horizon. But this is not me - this is not who i am. Broken? Miserable? Terrified? This is not okay and cannot go on any longer. My hands are shaking. It is because i am anxious. It is because i have made one tentative step. I must make another. The Beach Boys play in the background.