"burn after reading"

a delightful caper, a total lark of a film. atta boys cohen bros. quite a departure from 'no country for old men'.

with an impressive star cast - must say the males (george clooney, brad pitt, john malkovich) did a far better job of it than the females (frances mcdormand, tilda swinson). clooney and pitt have engagingly entertained us earlier in the ocean's series with their implicit understanding and tacit communication. here they (plus malkovich at most times though not always) amuse us with their comical almost caricaturish parody of their own characters. mcdormand is a lttle too empathic towards her character and swinson swings.


pitt and clooney play their roles once removed and spoof themselves with such aplomb that they carry you with ease into the spirit of the film. but if you can't get into the burlesque lampoonery (at the risk of over-stating) then you might as well walk out for you will get nothing. but if you manage to slip into the farce then there are laughs galore and the kind that make you fall off your seat while holding your stomach.

as the film's caption states 'intelligence is relative'. sometimes you have to lose it to get it. get it?

frida oh frida

frida is one of the finest transpersonal artists i know. she looks at herself in the most uncompromising way possible and depicts what she sees with her consummate skill and artistic ability. she does not shirk, she does not flinch. does she glorify, does she exaggerate? i do not think so. but she is looking at her self under a magnifying glass of sorts, so the focus is clear and unequivocal.

an attractive woman with her unconventional personality shining through and making her look strikingly handsome. in her paintings she often presents herself in traditional dress and hairdo. her inner states of torment, desire, longing, resolve, determination, stoic suffering, endurance, pain, love, connection, tenderness, conflict, acceptance, rage, violence, passion, pride, hope, nurturance etc. etc. are expressed in the most nuanced and detailed strokes of her brush. her unflinching portrayal of her most intimate subject - herself gives her both the opportunity to distance herself from her expereince and the ability to integrate it in such a way that she emerges larger than the subject-object duality. to see her work is to see a testament to the courage and resilience of her spirit.

at the risk of sounding grandiose i must admit that i was very pleasantly surprised to see several common themes and modes of expression in her work and mine. however i must also acknowledge at the very outset that her skill and her craft, her talent and her concentration, her command on her brush and tools is far superior to mine, my attempts in comparison are raw at best. she is a modern day master, i a novice awaiting recognition...

nevertheless i too love to portray both the sun and the moon in one painting many times, i often show the man in the tree and the tree in the man and am prone to depict physical roots on people. sometimes the colours are similar and often the emotions...
i am concerned about gender roles, i see myself primarily in my intimate relationship with my man, i strive for equality on all levels, i am conflicted about my identity in terms of traditonal values and modern ideas, i recognize i am larger than the sum of my expereinces although my expereinces are what constitute me and i need/attempt to look at them with utmost attention and awareness.

frida reassures me that such attention is indeed possible and inspires me on my journey as an artist and contemporary woman...

i am grateful to sfmoma for this opportunity to see her original works though i do wish she were not being peddled quite as much, her status as an icon of our times notwithstanding.

some links on frida
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frida_Kahlo
http://www.artchive.com/artchive/K/kahlo.html
http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/kahlo_frida.html

link to my art works
http://www.digmeart.com/contemporary%20indian%20art.htm

split level poem

i marry one
and love another;

i live with one
and long for another;

i copulate with one
and commune with another;

i wed one
and bed another;

i cook for one
and eat with another;

i clean for one
and mess with another;

i wash for one
and dress for another;

i knit for one
and am warm with another;

i comfort one
and reassure another;

i keep house for one
and feel at home with another;

i am aware of one
and appreciate another;

i taste one
and savour another;

i survive one
and thrive with another;

i complete one
and fulfill another;

i satiate one
and sublimate another;

i entrust one
and have faith in another;

i make a home for one
and belong with another;

i am in fact with one
and fantasize another.

long time no write

i thought with my h'band away i would write and paint and generally flourish. instead i watched films on dvd and tv serials and read. occassionally i checked emails or played games on the internet - favourites being word games like text-twist, bookworm and puzzles - mahjong is up there on number one then bejeweled, jewel quest, tetrus etc. i used to be a big fan of ceaser-III but have not got around to that in a while.

anyway one of the reasons for not blogging was that i wanted more anonimity. the kind of thoughts and feelings i was going through i did not really want to post them up there. but that is the whole idea of the blog to be honest with what is. yet thoughts and feelings are such ephemeral beings i may not feel the same tomorrow but it will be up there on the blog and if tomorrow's feelings have not been written and put up then people will assume that is the way i still feel. not that that many people read the blog anyways, but even then more anonimity would mean i could be more honest. contradiction in terms? i wonder!

i saw a wonderful film called 'adaptation'. it is about the adaptation of a book into a film. the screenplay writer is a fat balding socially-challenged guy, who is kind of stuck in his life. so he wants the film to reflect that where nothing much ever happens and his twin brother is staying with him and writes a script for the first time packed with hollywood cliches and churns out a successful potboiler and our film too incorporates all of that while spoofing it in such a subtle way. i find the ouroborus comment very fitting. it could have been too self-explanatory but the way it is done, it fits. the film stars meryl streep as a new york journalist and nicolas cage as the script writer. but the exceptional acting comes from chris cooper, the orchid hunter, who got an academy award for his performance.

another film i enjoyed watching was 'jane austen book club'. i guess i enjoy most films where life reflects fiction reflects life. for example 'stranger than fiction' and there was 'eternal sunshine of the spotless mind', though not quite the earlier theme of fiction/life being one, but it sits on the edge of reality and questions it or looks whimsically at it and that is fun. that finds a parallel with my inner reality and both reassures me and challenges me at the same time.

short

my stomach is rumbling and i realize i ought to keep my posts short and simple. so that is it for today. :)

peace - a choice and a responsibility

recently i recieved this email

"
Subject: Taken off most Internet sites because of threats

about muslims -- very scary be sure to watch (in capitals)

This is the film that has the EU and the Muslim world in a tizzy right now. Most web sites have removed it, including You Tube. All bowing to threats. Google still has it posted as of today but, will probably bow to pressure soon. Can be tough to watch in spots. But this is really what we are up against.

http://video.Google.com/videoplay?docid=3369102968312745410 <~~~Click here for the video

Video: Fitna the Movie: Geert Wilders' film about the Quran (English)

Send this to your home computer to watch---it's 16 min...but is very scary about what is going on around the world with Islam & the Muslims. The credits are at the end. We must be aware of what's going on, to protect democracy for our kids, AND ourselves. More people need to see this.................

Have heard about this film & now understand what the uproar is about. Stick with it to hear the imams preaching and the Iranian president.

If you are not aware of it, this is the film by Geert Wilders. He's a Dutch writer who is now under protection from the Islamists in the Netherlands.
"

and this was my response

"
hello XYZ

What can I say? This is a complex problem and the film is just presenting one aspect of it and generating more fear. Some statements in the film are taken out of context and put in another context to sound threatening, example the statements by Iranian president. Most iranians i know are gentle, warm and loving people. The worst part is that Islam is made out to be the enemy.

I think that the Bush regime did a lot of harm to tarnish Islam and generate fear among Americans. It made all followers of Islam into ‘the bad guys’, ‘the hateful other’. America has done unspeakable damage in Afghanistan and Iraq. And it seems Iran is being made the next target of American wrath. Thousands, nay millions, nay many more innocents have suffered because of American bombings and other attacks. And what was the justification in Afghanistan? To weed out one Osama-bin-laden, and a few followers, hundreds of entire villages were wiped out. See the film “earth and ashes” if you ever get the chance. It does not make America into an enemy, but you get some idea of the damage that was done there.

In Iraq mythical weapons of mass destruction were chased only to come up with nothing, but causing widespread havoc and destruction in the process. The Americans who are fighting there and losing their lives are suffering too, aren’t they? and over what? If I believe Michael Moore and in part I do, it is over the oil interests of a few powerfully rich Americans and their millions. I do not deny that there are many Muslims out there, who are reacting in a violent and gruesome manner. In part it is a reaction of indignation, in part it is stubbornness and an unwillingness to change. But where and when does it stop? Where and when does it end? To brand the entire community as terrorists, to look on a part of the picture and consider it the whole is unfair, to say the least.

I have several Muslim friends and many have been victims in the hindu-muslim divide and that too is unfortunate. Anytime we set up someone else as ‘the other’ and become intolerant we are heading for trouble. I am also concerned about what is happening in Netherlands. I recently read Ayaan Hirsi Ali’s book “Infidel” and got some insight into the problem they are facing. It is a very complex problem, if you take in thousands of muslims and do you allow them to practise their faith even when it goes against the cultural values of your own country, in a spirit of tolerance; or do you impose your own cultural values on them and make it a condition of their stay in the country. where does one draw the line? where are the boundaries that are healthy and respectful?

I repeat it is a complex problem, but I believe there is a solution and it can be found, if we all stay calm and focused on finding the solution. If we buy into the fear psychology often the reaction is ‘shoot first and talk later’. So let us refrain from activating one’s fears, look at all the facts out there, not just the fear-generating ones but all our expereinces of these 'other' communities and use our heads and hearts to find a way.

Deeply concerned,

meenal
"

terrorism cannot win if we do not give into terror. a trifle trite no doubt, but i go on. aggression is the mask over fear. do not succumb to terror and fear nor resort to aggresion. think out of the box and find a way that transcends the problem.

easier said than done? sure, but then we have to evolve to a higher consciousness, don't we? or do we want to fight and indulge in war-mongering for the rest of our lives? inner peace leads to outer peace. it is a choice. make it now and know that you are responsible for whatever choice you make. and you can hold on to that choice of inner peace even when you face the so-called "enemy". the next choice then is to take up arms (a la bhagavad gita) or to practise gandhian non-violence. either way if you are unattached within, unafraid, if you are at peace inside yourself, then you are evolving to the newer, higher consciousness.

road trip and camping

http://picasaweb.google.com/meenal18/SequoiaParkTrip

'A' and I went on a road trip last week end. We went to the sequoia national park in CA, which is about 4 hours from where we stay. But we had many adventures and so it took considerably longer. Firstly we had to pick up some friends from Berkeley, so we took a detour and then we landed up in San Francisco because we could not quite follow the GPS. Anyhow we made it to Berkeley and picked up this couple (D, S’s brother and his wife) and their 4 year old daughter. Then we headed towards sequoia park. The original plan had been to go to Yosemite, but because of the fire the air there is rather unclean at the moment, so we switched destination to kings canyon national park and sequoia. Meanwhile our friends from San Diego, (S & C and another friend of theirs), who were to meet us there were having major adventures of their own. Somehow things were not going right and they had to wait 7 hours to get a van. D and co. were going back with them to san diego, hence they needed a large vehicle to accomodate all the people and the camping gear and food they were carrying.

We arrived at lemon grove, which was rather dry and not very attractive, near sequoia and the lemon grove camping ground around five pm. Since most of the camping gear was with S and co. we decided to go into the park and see some giant old sequoias till they arrived. The park is rather large and on mountainous terrain so it took us another couple of hours of driving to reach the sequoias. I was doing all the driving as I was the only licensed driver in that company. Meanwhile we also found out that there was place available at the some camping grounds inside the park and near the forest. So there was some back and forth communicating with S to decide where to stay. To complicate matters we were also meant to catch up with N, S’s cousin, and her hubby and bro, who had arrived there the day before and stayed in a motel. But they were to camp with us and they were waiting for us at some parking lot in the park near one of the ‘sight seeing spots’. They had been told we would be reaching latest around four or so and it was around seven by the time we arrived at this place. We had not managed to communicate with each other, since there are no mobile signals in the higher reaches of the park !

Luckily N and co. were there and we spotted them and they us and all was well on that front. We also met the sequoias there (General Sherman is considred the largest living tree in the world. It is neither the tallest, nor the broadest, and not even the oldest. but it qualifies as the largest since the density of the wood in the tree is the greatest. so folks it is the substance that counts!). The Sequoias are very beautiful although part of the redwood clan they are quite different in terms of texture and even feel. The bark feels rather soft and non-solidish to touch, like soft board. they can be very tall and very broad too.

Now we needed to decide where to put up for the night. So we went up to the camp site, which was another 1 and ½ hours away from where we were then. Boy did I get my fill of driving that day! After some back and forth-ing there in terms of booking a camp site, we found two spots and set up the tents that we had. Most of the serious food was with S and co. so we waited for our dinners too. Anyhow finally around 10.30 pm or so, they made it to the camp sites and we were all reunited and happy and the party started. :)

The next day we got into our respective cars and did some sight seeing (general grant the national christmas tree and moro rock) around the park, had a latish lunch and departed. 'N and co' and 'A and I' left for our respective homes, while S and D and co stayed on for another night of camping. The trip back was yet another adventure, which I will relate in another post or perhaps i had better continue.

We started at 3 pm and reached home at 11 pm, though officially it should have taken us 4 hrs and 15 mins. Even with a few breaks we ought to have made it by 8 to 8.30. But in between we managed to lock ourselves out of the car! Luckily it happened in a town and we were able to ask people for help and make calls to the locksmiths from a store. It being post office hours on a Sunday, we struck it rich on the fourth or fifth call. The guy who came to help us kept shaking his head as though the problem were unsolvable, while he tried this, that and the other way of trying to break in! Finally he did manage though and we shelled out the $75 gratefully and only a trifle reluctantly.

The rest of the drive was a test of patience and will and resolve, since by this time I was dead tired and rather sleepy. A night in a tent is not where I get any reasonably good sleep. i had had a couple of hours of sleep at best. We did consider putting up at a motel and driving the rest of the way in the morning, but having just paid 75 dollars over a mistake we were reluctant to shell out more dough. Anyhow I managed, though by the end of it I was testy and sulky and snappish. Just for a moment towards the end, my eyes closed involuntarily and I woke up with a start. That kept me awake and alert for some time and also roused A out of his mental musings and wanderings to be present with me. However, latent resentment soon seeped in, and I was back to struggling with the situation.

But we did make it back and all in one piece and can live to tell the tale. And some day will be able to laugh over it all!

I was all the more appreciative of how smooth and easy my trip with my cousin Medha had been after this experience. I am amazed by how the energies between people reflect in the experiences they have and in how they percieve these experiences. With A my relationship is rather tense, fraught with conflict, power games and ego battles. He reflects to me my shadow self and all my inner struggles get played out with him. When we pretend to have a good time, they soon make their way out into the wider world and we are confronted by situations that test us and bring us back to our inner stories. It is a causal relationship and learning the lesson that this relationship offers will liberate me through and through. perhaps the lesson is forgiveness.

"What we give to others, we give to ourselves. What we withhold from others, we withhold from ourselves. In any moment when we choose fear instead of love, we deny ourselves the experience of freedom. To the extent that we abandon love, to that extent we will feel it has abandoned us." from http://www.acim.org/