we still can manage to look at those we value high, and tell them that we do.
we still have the days, and hours, and minutes, to befriend those we care for.
we are alive, and can live now – not tomorrow, not yesterday.
the ever now is the kairos, is where the divine is.
the time that is now, is all the time we have.
before that, too, will be swept away.
the sacral space is the same in size (or volume), regardless of the time-space it occupies at a given moment.
this causes two problems in humans: first, their refusal to see the sacral space for what it is,
second, their inability to celebrate the sacral in any meaningful way.
if a society or culture remove one focus of the sacral, either another of equal power, or many of inferior power take its place (the sum of the inferior foci equals that of the removed focus).
does this ring any bells? jingle? clang?
however, i think, if the sacral space gets too fragmented, it loses any sense and sacrality. and in this loss, like the titanic, it takes many lives with it.
still no ding? dong? toll?
terry pratchett is, and will be, one of my all-time favourite authors who, possibly, can do no wrong in a literary creative sense. his books are precise, observant, real, witty, scathing, clever, unforgettable and extremely well formulated.
films, of course, are not books. films are too visual. in addition, any film featuring anyterry pratchett work, will be inferior by default: the pratchett books are so full of allusion, imaginative contradictory descriptions and language play that they are simply impossible to visualise. thus, i’d say – turning a discworld novel into a film (maybe except some of the picture books) is a mission impossible.
that said, it is time to look at the film in hand (or on screen). the hogfather.
as a standalone installation, the film is quite watchable. a’tuin the star-turtle traverses the cosmos cinematically, the city of ankh-morpork is much cleaner than one could have expected, the living horse of death is beautiful, the hogs are..well..hog. mista te-a-time is totally annoying, and susan the demonic governess – perfectly sane. the death is a beautiful six-foot skeleton with a very scenic scythe. the death of rats, for whatever reason has the head of a miniature horse… except some moments of overacting and suchlike, the cast is the perfect comedy complement. the fights are fought, the good beats the evil, all the monsters are banished from the cellar, and all the children wished a good night. Read More
and so, my students said, saturday will be the judgement day. and then i asked – do you have the grammar exam so early? no, they said, it’s more like the end of the world come this saturday. so i went to the google, and dug round a bit.
it turned out to be much more than a grammar exam. it turned out to be one more of those ‘judgement days’ that various sort-of-christian sects are so fond of proclaiming since C1 AD. the usual schedule. the usual scheme. today, may 21, 2011, will be the day when the true believers will be taken up in rapture to heaven. one thing i really found fascinating on the website (http://judgementday2011.com/) was a t-shirt saying “rapture ready”.
and then i thought two things:
first, the sheer arrogance of those calculi (calculating the exact date of the judgement day, based on imagined numbers, they say they found in the bible). the sheer stupidity and literal-mindedness that will bring many people to ruin. the lack of imagination, to think that |harold camping|+|bible-reading|=god. Read More
in the beginning, there was a language, and a kid. the language was centuries older than the kid. then the language was grafted onto the kid, and the language grew into a world. but the kid loved mathematics, and regarded the language only as a useful tool.
as i look back at my school years – very hazy memories – languages was never my aim nor worth any particular interest. yes i was not bad at them. given the amount of books i had read, having learnt my letters at the tender age of 4, and extremely good mechanical memory, that was no surprise. i was fascinated by philosophy – such as it was possible under the communist ideology; but my heart lay in the sciences, particularly mathematics and chemistry. because only in abstraction could i feel freedom.
and then i calculated the odds for admission at the university: english – not likely. chemistry – almost certain. maths – definitely. maths also had the additional enrolment, so it was double certain. i went for english, thinking that if i fail, there is always maths. i did not fail completely.
after many trials and battles, and weird things, i found out this Read More
the horsemen (2009). a film about a police inspector solving a series of murders thematically tied to the four horsemen of the apocalipse, only to find out that his own son is one of the said horsemen.
it is a film about this horribly crippled world, and, in a sense, about what happens when people neglect relationships. it is a film about the disease of haste and how the best intentions lead to the most spectacular failures.
it is a film about loss, and jealousy, and desperate decisions. and the thing that when there is a broken relationship, a sacrifice is necessary to set things right.
it is also a film about how important it is to do love, to do relationships, not only promises and endless tomorrows and thens. Read More
Isa 35:2-5
There [in the blossoming desert land] the Lord will display his glory,
the splendour of our God.
With this news, strengthen those who have tired hands,
and encourage those who have weak knees.
Say to those with fearful hearts,
“Be strong, and do not fear,
for your God is coming to destroy your enemies.
He is coming to save you.”
And when he comes, he will open the eyes of the blind
and unplug the ears of the deaf.
a prophet exits the dry and unwelcoming land to bring news of its direct opposite.
what makes the desert blossom? what changes the gruff and unforgiving land into a welcoming garden?
it is the transforming experience of the presence of the living god – a moment of truth and life itself.
parallels between dry, parched, unwelcome, desert, deserted wasteland and people: tired hands, weak knees, fearful hearts, blindness, inability to hear, inability to move.
the prophet assures the people that god takes spiritual dryness personally – and is sure coming to fight it.
there hypothetically are two kinds of desert periods in life: a) the enemy of god period and b) the pre-prophetic period. Read More
