KAIDIE TRANS-MIGRATING? 5
Cabled-up, taken a deep breath, pink-socked, wobbled, ready to take off, to re-turn, to life, on earth. Thummmmpppppppppppppppppppplunginggggggggggggggggggggfreefalling.................. (tbc)
KAIDIE DIES: Variation 16 (Happy Aprilsss Foolsss)
Discovered buried alive and burdened to death under layers and layers of her compulsive hoarding of mappings. Every mapping is unique; each mapping is capable of yet more mappings. There's simply no bleeding end to it because everything is connected to everything else. Huffed and puffed, overloaded, hence Kaidie kabooms, has a headache and heartburn and cold sores and piles under all these piles, implodes, as a rather happy April's Fool, smiling.
**2010 December performance-lecture at the Slade School of Dine Art**
Yes we are still rather dead. So here is a mini-retrospective of sorts.
This is a performance-lecture held 2010 December 1 at the Slade School of DIne Art, Nondon, UK. In the ‘live’ version, we would be reading the script ‘live’; in this recorded version, you can hear us (flipping the pages of the script).
What is crucial to note that, all this was so (very nearly) impeccable and mindblowing at that point in time, ie 2010 December 1. Yet, restless beings that we are, that you know we are, this is not fixed in stone (is any? Even stones are not fixed [in stone], for they move, do they not??). We have (clearly) moved on, specifically, improved, in leaps and bounds of course. As you know we are simply incapable of producing anything run of the mill, but evolution-believers (and practitioners) that we are, many of the points raised in this performance have shifted, and many of the imageries have also been transformed. For ever-newer-better-higher-faster-good-better-best rundowns/out-lines/maps/cosmologies and other configurations, come back here often though even that can be slower than what we think while we are on the run etc etc. And, we all know that there can never be a ‘final’ version – even as we reach the ‘final’, for, so long as our stamina (speed and endurance) lasts, we will keep on running.
And the more we run, the better we can run, the further we can run. So, each variation is as ‘final’ as they get.
Point is, run, and you will find your own way. Or rather, ways. So, there you go. Here we are.
This performance-lecture was undertaken as part of our MPhil upgrade to PhD status at the Slade School of Dine Art, University College Nondon, UK. The opening and closing musical accompaniment is created by our usual Co-Runner, PHILIP TAN
WERNER HERZOG (‘My mandate is poetry. Period.’) WAS CHARMING, AS EXPECTED. Unexpected: technical cockup, and a very cocky ‘interviewer’ who should be subjected to a Kinski rant, 23 March 2011.
In the midst of a mid-journey lassitude and systematic switching-off-of-things-&-people, we came across the astounding news that the legendary German auteur Werner Herzog was visiting Nondon. The many powerful works of the poet-philosopher (our favourite include Fitzcarraldo, Even Dwarfs Started Small, the Enigma of Kasper Hauser, My Best Fiend and Heart of Glass) have long haunted/irritated/angered/moved/inspired/stirred us across our many lifetimes. Magical as they are polemical, we have always made at least one of his films compulsory viewing for our students in our previous lives. As we run, out of breath, and everywhere we run, anytime we run, across lands, ages, cultures and political circumstances, Herzog is one we turn to whenever we feel that we are losing our bearings (Other guides we turn to include Tarkovsky, Chris Marker, Apichatpong, EM Cioran, Pessoa, Chagall, Bach, Beethoven, Barthes, Tristram Shandy, Maguerite Duras, Samuel Beckett). (Not that losing one’s bearings is a bad thing, for not being clear, being confused, having doubts, being torn both and all sides leftrightcentre by opposing sentiments, being pissed off, being irritated by pesky things, finding everything and everybody pesky, feeling lethargic, and hitting of walls are vital parts of any meaningful process of working.) We have had the privilege of encountering Herzog in the flesh in a previous life and were, as expected, charmed by Herzog ‘live’ (a very polished, calculated performance by the maestro no doubt). Hence, when the chance to catch him again here, in Nondon, in this life, popped up, we ran for it. Literally.
2 things spoiled our evening: 1) repeated technical cock-ups: The microphones registered a noise throughout, and the projector failed to work at a few points. For a £30 ticket in a grand, 900-seater situated in the posh Belgravia, such flaws were surely unforgivable – not to mention utterly embarassing, in the presence of a top-notch filmmaker; not to mention too that many in the crowd were clearly people with professional relationships to the film/cultural industry in one way or another (everyone of whom was polite- in the pictures above, look at the neat queues we form the entire evening as we patiently awaited for the doors to open!). To say the least, this was a booboo, big time. 2) The next thing that spoiled our evening was the interviewer. Or ‘interviewer’, so-called. Aware that there are many young (what society labels as ‘underaged’ and ‘vulnerable’?) people who read this running blog, we shall sum up the work of this interviewer as such: very, very, very, very, very, very cr*p’ that evening (or all evenings? and day times?). Let us explain (for we are responsible adults [470days-old as we are, out of our 1000-day lifespan) who support any claims of ours, however obvious, with studiously-crafted elucidations). Although it was alleged (by the interviewer) that the interviewer had worked with Herzog on several occassions before, and that the interviewer and the filmmaker are personal friends (another allegation put forward by the interviewer himself, with comments such as ‘your wife told me that …’), the interviewer did not seem to have done enough homework, and was even disrepectful to his subject: Not only did he abruptly interrupt Herzog throughout the 2.5 hours, he would look at his watch in an obvious manner. We are disinterested in interviewers who are only fawning to their subject (even if for the goal of ‘getting more’ out of them), but this really felt profoundly wrong and cringe-inducing, for, the interviewer seemed to try way too hard in getting across his own agenda – that is, that he, and not just his celebrity subjects, had a personality, too – which only goes to show his own insecurity and incompetence (the personality of the best interviewers/interpretants would naturally shine through – see Jeremy Paxman, Jon Snow and Glenn Gould for instance). There was no effort whatsoever from the interviewer to build a rapport/chemistry/lively tension with his subject. And, when the projector broke down, said interviewer even went on hissy fits – as if he was the star of the show and the one being allowed to have hissy fits – and Herzog even calmed him down. In classic Herzog-ian manner, the filmmaker returned the frivololity, rudeness with a picture of calm, no doubt honed for several years by his fiery working relationship with the superbly brilliant but/and supremely mad Klaus Kinski. Herzog was above the petty and attention-seeking tactics of the interviewer, towards whom we feel not anger but sympathy – for feeling the need to do what he did. So what if this same interviewer is said to have interviewed several big names? This one gig he did that we saw was, simply put, not interesting. Not interesting at all. And it seems that we are far from alone in our evaluation of the interviewer’s diabolical performance for the evening.
Speaking of diabolicalness and human foibles, we leave us with Herzog’s quote: that ‘the common denominator of the Universe is not harmony, but chaos, hostility and murder’.
So we have explained who ‘we’ are; now THIS IS YOU! … So there you are. Nice to meet you, too.
Just as running is an accessible undertaking, our tactic of trans-dimensional running can be utilised by anyone. Those who submit themselves to what William Gibson terms as the ‘consensual hallucination’ of Cyberspace, and those who cower in fear from the Digital Revolution alike, will find the tactic useful, too.
In our previous post, we have explained the use of the personal plural pronoun ‘we’ in our work. Now, the question is, who on googleearth are you?
Reproduced above is a section of our weekly report with regards to the audience-ship of this breathtaking running log /travel blog: So there are nearly 700 of unique you-s who read this blog daily; on some days there are only 821 pages viewed, while on others as many as double that (1552) pages get read. On average you read 1.66 pages each time, for a duration long enough for you to be registered as unique.
So there you are. That is as far as we are able to establish. We have no idea however with regards to your background, location, character, gender, height, weight, sense of humour (if any?), political view, world view, if you are passing by, or if you have run into this by mistake, or if you are a regular returnee running with us all this while, or if you are reading with disdain, spitting at your computer screen. You are probably a mixture of some of these.
Well, nice to meet you, too. We are Kaidie.
‘LIST OF THINGS THAT QUICKEN THE HEART’: Closing the year (2010) with an other Chris Marker quote (1983), this time after Sei Shonagon (1002)
(Over) stretching ourselves to get geared up for more mindbodyblowing trans-dimensional runs (2 layers of socks) in the new year 2011.
Chris Marker, San Soleil, 1983: ‘Shonagon had a passion for lists: the list of ‘elegant things,’ ‘distressing things,’ or even of ‘things not worth doing.’ One day she got the idea of drawing up a list of ‘things that quicken the heart.’ Not a bad criterion I realise when I’m filming …’
Sei Shonagon’s elegant and evocative list, The Pillow Book, 1002 (italics ours): ‘Sparrow feeding their young. To pass a place where babies are playing. To sleep in a room where some fine incense has been burnt. To notice that one’s elegant Chinese mirror has become a little cloudy. To see a gentleman stop his carriage before one’s gage and instruct his attendants to announce his arrival. To wash one’s hair, make one’s toilet, and put on scented robes; even if not a soul sees one, these preparations still produce an inner pleasure. It is not and one is expecting a visitor. Suddenly one is startled by the sound of rain-drops, which the wind blows against the shutters.’
Kaidie’s list, post Xmas, 2010, on the cusp (cusp – what a lovely word) of an other new year, 2011:
1. The moment of realisation that our legs have been working in perfect synchronicity with our arms, mind, emotions, environment, weather, and that we had been un-self-conscious of this happening; that we have fully inhabited, embodied and embedded running.
2. The moment of realisation that we have been living+working+playing in the city of Nondon, and that we had been un-self-conscious of it; that we have fully inhabited, embodied and embedded ourselves in this great city.
3. When beginning to structure and write a new chapter (it soon gets extremely laboured and tedious, and is nothing but meticulous building, or precise shearing and stripping of, block by block, bit by bit).
4. Experiencing the transition/cut between from the black-and-white opening sequence of Tarkovsky’s Mirror (of a man overcoming his stutter) and the first scene of the film proper a-washed in luscious green.
5. Experiencing the transition/cut between the closing sequence of Marker’s Sans Soleil and the final credits (of 3 children on a road in Iceland); the moment when the woman moves in La Jetee (1962).
6. Experiencing the first notes of Glenn Gould’s rendition of Bach’s Goldberg Variations, and, with the assistance of good earphones, the melancholic-ecstasy in Gould humming/singing.
7. When water from the very hot shower first hits our skin after we emerge from the lukewarm swimming pool (afterwards, it is merely utilitarian).
8. In the first 30 seconds of acquisition, licking the foamy head off a very hot cappuccino thickly dusted with cocoa (but as soon as the bubbles fizzle off, so too, does our interest).
9. The moment of falling into a deranged, swirling, topsyturvy, eternal, divine love at first bite with toro sashimi shrewdly laced with fresh wasabi (how it stings!); ditto, at first sight and bite, with Sainsbury’s bakery’s 99p cheese twist (or that pecan and maple pastry thing 79p) (Our heart quicken, and misses a few beats. Gulp.)
10. The sudden / brief moment of mutual recognition of something of a spark of sorts happening (before it/whateveritis falls into numbing patterns that we run away from, and move on, hollering, ‘Enough!’, because we do not have the stamina or interest to sustain such a spark; that a spark is such only because it is momentary; anything longer than momentary ceases to be such).
As we stuff our faces with stuffed birds/puds/sprouts/mulling about, shall we have a DISCOURSE? (RUNNING TO & FRO, from the Latin ‘discursus’)?
Hard at work (as if): reading, or rather, posing with books that we have ordered for the library. If we hold the books close enough, hopefully our skin will be able to absorb all the contents, swiftly. And paraphrase them enough to regurgitate in our writing, too, hopefully.
Before you complain that we have been less-than-diligent in our postings in the past couple of months, we must tell you that it is because we have been extremely hard at work writing something else, namely our grand 80,000-word fabulousness and sweetness of our thesis, which theorises our critical strategy of trans-dimensional running for our 21st century technologically-enabled multiverse.
To write, we have to read too, of course. Here are some pictorial evidence of us (LOOKING AS IF WE ARE VERY) hard at work, reading some of the books that we have ordered. We particularly enjoy running with Dr Bernd Heinrich in his Why We Run: A Natural History. Himself is a TOP marathon and ultramarathon runner (coming in as champion, at the age of 41, a race of 100km in 6 hours 30 minutes in 1981 in Chicago!!), award-winning biologist Dr Heinrich presents a dazzling story of why human beings, compared to our relatives in the animal kingdom, run. One of our favourite quotes is found on page 103. It is a conversation between the author and his friend, when the former ran 5-minutes faster than what the friend predicted.
As is usually the case in science, you make a prediction, and if it comes out close, you are happy because you’re potentially right with one idea, and if it comes out different, you’re closer to some other idea that you didn’t even think of before. That’s even better.
What a beautiful, powerful thought. And this comes from the perfectionist and overachiever of the writer-scientist-ultrarunner. To stray from an expectation is not a sign of defeat, but instead, a potentially exciting route of discovery into something that one didn’t expect, perhaps leading one to something else that is even more interesting than where one could have ventured.
Dr Heinrich’s writing is simple and clear, while also loaded with first-hand anecdotes (so this is not some armchair critic/theoryhead who only sits on their fatarses in their ivory towers and conceptualise about the world and the moons and the stars till the cows come home, or as one of our favourite artists ever, the brilliant Groucho Marx, says in the 1933 cccclassssssiccccc Duck Soup, ‘I could dance with you till the cows come home. On second thoughts, I’d rather dance with the cows till you came home.‘) We are, frankly speaking, dogtired of all those highfalutin empty gibberish expounded by the socalled pureminds of the socalled academia, some of whom really are only capable of blowing pungent wind through their holycracks.
We are however disappointed with Christopher McDougall’s Born To Run, albeit its extremely exciting premise of learning to run ultra-distances from the humble and hidden tribe of the amazing Tarahumara Indians of Mexico, who have run all their lives, since they first ran away from the invading Spanish (what a poetic and empowering imagery!!). What we find disagreeable however is ultrarunner-and-journalist McDougall’s writing style which has the irritating trying-hard-to-be-cute-and-oh-so-personal-first-person-narrative-smug-frockingfullofselfbelief-noironywhatsoever-chest-beating-we-are-the-world-we-rule-the-world-yayyayay-watch-us-we-feel-ohsofrockinggood-about-ourselves approach also neatly encapsulated in the American talk show which we quite absolutely cannot stand (unless, of course, if it is so very bad that it is very good, out & out excessively trashy The Jerry Springer Show – Jerry! Jerry! we chant, fists in the air and on other guests’ holy bodies).
Philosopher and runner Michael Austin was the one who drew our attention to, in his good (although could-be-better, if each essay by the different philosopher-runners wasn’t so short but was more developed) Running and Philosophy, the etymology of the word ‘discourse’, which comes from the Latin discursus, and which refers to a running to-&-fro! What a poetic image. We have said this before, but we will say this again (because we keep getting asked!), but to all the snobs who still insist that walking is the only valid psychogeographical strategy, we say that you are too closed-minded, and that you really should try running (YES WE CHALLENGE YOU TO SWEAT IT OUT AND GET YOUR ‘PUREMINDS’ AND FATARSES MOVIN’!) to see how it works. Alan Turing would go for a 2-3hour run midday, to run away problems from that he faced at work; yet, it was in the middle of such a run that he conceptualised the beginnings of the modern computer.
Now, what better synthesis of the mind-body-technology-imagination could you get??
WE ARE PRESENTING OUR COLLABORATIVE WORK WITH DR. JAMIE O’BRIEN on 16 NOVEMBER.
Image taken from DH website
On Tuesday 16 November, we are making a 10-minute presentation with Dr Jamie O’Brien (aka Majei!) on our ongoing research, at the Slade School of Dine Art, University College Nondon. (We are also making a short, 7-minute power-fruit-punched presentation of our work before that!). Led by Dr O’Brien, an artist who is also a Research Fellow of the Digital Humanities of University College Nondon, the research aims to create a conceptual prototype of a (new kind of) collaborative space, with the final aim of the creation of an ‘augmented reality guidebook’ that would be useful for both members of Headway East London, as well as all other Nondoners at large! Jamie works closely with the leader of the Discovery Programme at Headway East, psychologist Ben Graham, who has been responsible for new and innovative work under the Discovery Progamme with the members of Headway East London. Ben was also the one who took the picture below, which shows ourselves (in blue, pretending to look very, very hard at work, knowing that the camera was looking), Dr O’Brien (in check shirt), Firoza (in white), Joshua (in stripes) and Byron (who is very shy and hence, hiding behind Jamie, in blue), in the midst of generating a series of maps, caught in a video shoot in July 2010 for Social Care TV.
Picture and words by Ben Graham from the Discovery Blog.
Please click here to have a look at the video commissioned by Social Care TV, from which you can learn more about the excellent work of Headway East, as well as other organisations working with people with learning difficulties. You can see details of this mapping session, as well as other mapping exercises by members of Headway East here. To attend the 16 November presentation, please register here. See you soon/see you later/see you sooner or later!
Image from Social Care TV website.
You can see a documentation of the evening’s presentation on artist Laura Cinti’s site! Laura herself also made a presentation that evening on her research with live organisms (Thank you Laura!)
Composite image by artist Laura Cinti, published in her websitsite. As you can see, we are quite vertically-challenged behind the lecturn that we cannot fully prove our presence that evening.
FOLLOWING THE FOOTSTEPS OF WALID RAAD / THE ATLAS GROUP at the Whitechapel Gallery!
Place: Nondon. Date: 2 November 2010. Time: from 13:00hr GMT. Starting point/point of departure: Central Nondon. Loop point: Whitechapel Art Gallery. What for: To see Walid Raad's show. Route: via the City. How was it, then: Crowded. Nice Gherkin you've got. Pet peeves: 1) Shoveling past people dangling cigarettes in their fingers. 2) Women/very large people who walk slowly but occupying entire pavements 3) Women/'girls' (sic) who are in a large group but walking very slowly or giggling and chatting away in the middle of the pavement believing that they look cute and are drawing attention - indeed, from an angry runner 4) Children/babies/prams with young parents with same level of entitlement as the chatty women and fat bastards who block entire pavements and roads, as if they are the first people on earth who have given birth and hence demand special treatment and that the rest of the world have been created from playdoh. We don't blame the kids but we blame their smugly parents. GET OUT OF OUR £k*fING FACE!!!! Attire: Short-sleeved T-shirt and shorts. Temperature: 14 degrees celsius (sweaty run). Smell: Not So Terribly Good for an art gallery (or elsewhere). Quality of outward-bound run: Painful now with not one, but BOTH legs with shin splints. Could not get a comfortable gait. At least our limp is balanced now. Run back was easier and even sweatier.
On 2 November, we awoke from a 12-hour sleep (after none the previous night) to run through the City to the Whitechapel Gallery. There are many, many artists we admire (Chris Marker, Marc Chagall, AES+F, Tarkovsky, Fernando Pessoa et al). Walid Raad/Atlas Group is one of these people whose footsteps we (attempt to) follow. In a previous life we had the privilege of experiencing his performance-lecture in a workshop we attended. Already conflating fact with fiction, objectivity with subjectivity, history with memory, ‘official’ grand narratives with micronarrative in our own work, and already familiar with the genres of the essay film, performance as practitioner, lecturer and sometime writer, Raad’s performance-lecture made an impact.
At this Whitechapel show, Raad’s appropriation of museum aesthetics in a trademark clinical austerity in his approach is chillingly disturbing as it is dead funny. We particularly love the small model of a gallery which contains tiny precise replica of his work.
We realised that there was another source of chilliness, and that came from our exposed legs. Another observation: except for primary school kids, not many other gallery-goers wear shorts. Was that why we received some interesting looks from the gallery-sitters, as we did when we visited the Wolfgang Tillmans show after a 30km run in Hyde Park? Will spandex and leg warmers have saved us from the faux pas (if it was indeed one), and also help us look ‘tuned in’ onto the retro ’80s look (or at the very least, an artistically clever and ironic wink/nod, that the artistically clever and ironic art world would approve of)? As usual, suggestions and advice welcome.
The above is the GPS track of our run to the gallery and back, totaling about 8.9km. For a detailed version of this and other GPS tracks of ours in Life 1.0, look here.
Anyhow. Go run with Walid Raad. He’s not bad at all.
CHAT WITH KAIDIE ‘LIVE’ SATURDAY 16:00hrs + SUNDAY 18:30hrs (Singapore time)! We’re at ‘kaidie3rdlife’ on Skype.
Above: From the ARTSingapore catalogue. Below: from I-S magazine, Singapore.
Talk ‘live’ with Kaidie on Skype on 7th, 9th and 10th October at ART Singapore 2010!
As you are aware, we are going to be virtualy a-live at ART Singapore 2010. Directed by Meena Mylvaganam, who is also one of our co-runners in our grandiouse quest, this is an annual event of contemporary art from Asia. We will be presenting a 50-minute film and prints for sale. In addition, we will also talk with YOU, our dear Conspirators of Pleasure, at the following times (Singapore time, followed by British Summer Time): Thursday 7 oct 20:00 Singapore at the Gala opening dinner of the show (13:00hrs BST); 9 October Saturday 16:00 Singapore (09:00hrs BST); 10 October Sunday 18:30hrs Singapore (11:30hrs BST). Come grab us and have a chat with us! The following is an article published in the Business Times Singapore, following an interview with us – via Skype of course – on 16 September.
This article has been cropped – and you CAN NO LONGER read the original here!! Unless you pay a subscription fee… How terribly interesting! Not. And, as usual, there are inaccuracies in the article at different levels, factual (for instance we are only 10 months old, not already 3 years old as reported) and otherwise (We are not Kaidie ‘because’ of the necessity of following our own footsteps of having generated a traveler persona; we run, and we are Kaidie, and we travel, and we have been travelling for twenty years, because we are against stagnancy, complacency, passivity and the status quo, including our own. We say this as we remove cobwebs from our hair, eyebrows, armpits, nostrils, legs and toes, having been sitting at the library combing our way slowly and painfully, over a Chapter that we are writing…). But as usual, let us not nitpick. See you soon. Not. Maybe.
WHERE DOES KAIDIE DO HER WORLDCHANGINGearthshatteringTEETHCLENCHING WRITING? Nondon on the run: Summer 2010 #2
I am certain that by now, you, My Dear Collaborator, are on no uncertain terms the level of our unsurpassable intelligence. That said, we decide that even for a near-impeccable being, there is always room for self-improvement, in this Life 3.0 of ours. In the attempt to look and, indeed, be(come) brainier by way of osmosis and association, we have been running about the Reading Rooms in the British Library this summer. Oh, we feel sehr brainy. (And yes, what a fabulous summer it has been! We can’t help but clap and smile and slap our thunderandlightning thighs in smug satisfaction. Well done us!)
Given the gravely serious nature of the work that we undertake at the BL (is any body smiling in any of these pictures??) these expeditions are generally uneventful, except that we dropped our Garmin Forerunner 405 GPS device sometime in May, or rather, it decided to slip off our wrist, as the strap was broken. Apparently, someone picked it up and returned it to Security. We were lucky that it was the British Library and not, say, the zoo, a pub, public loo, childcare centre (how all the terrible kids would have trampled on, or even eaten the device! Luckily we do not visit such nightmarish places and meet screamy spoilt tots with mini-me-s!!), swimming pool, or our Fark. Our saviour must have been some old (0r pretend-old- have you met those men who are not yet middle-aged but dress up to be such, in tweed jackets, brown shoes and full beards – as if looking middle-aged lends them authority or wisdom? Perhaps we should try this too, in case only hanging out at the BL reading rooms does not suffice), wealthy academic type on high moral grounds, or an ignorant prick who thought that that was a ‘mere’ ‘watch’.WITH 755 DAYS LEFT ON OUR LIFE (or DEATH) SENTENCE (until the last day of the Nondon Olympics on 09.09.2012), HERE IS AN OTHER MINDMAP OF/FROM KAIDIE’S SEMBLANCE OF LIFE (3.0).
I trust not premonitions and I fear not omens. I flee / not from slander nor poison. / There is no death. / We are all immortal. All is immortal. Fear not / death at seventeen nor at seventy. / There is only reality and light. / There is neither dark nor death / in this, our world. / We have reached the beach and I / am one of those who pull the nets in when / immortality arrives in batches. Live / in a house and it will not crumble. I will summon / a century at will, enter / and build my house in it. That is why / your children and your wives all share my board, the table / serving forefather and grandson: the future is decided now.
As read by Arseni Tarkovsky in Andrei Tarkovsky’s Mirror, 1975
** Currently #5 in the War of Films contest: CLAUDIA TOMAZ’S film about KAIDIE AND HER MEANING OF LIFE 3.0. VOTE NOW!** Vote by clicking on + sign at the top of video player. ** Don’t forget to vote for Episode 2, Run Kaidie Run, too!**
A LIFE 2.0 RE-PRESENTATION OF A LIFE 1.0 SHOW THAT IS ENDING IN A FEW HOURS: Kaidie’s metamap exhibition #6.
Where do statues go after they die? Statues die when people stop looking at them (Chris Marker and Alain Resnais, 1953). Kaidie’s metamap is of a less resilient material than bronze, and, like Kaidie, has a prescribed lifespan. It begins dying this evening 17:00hrs, and from 11:00hrs tomorrow (after our morning run), we will remove the papers, tapes, blu tacks, glue dots, marker pen marks, other marks, tracks, traces, bits, pieces, things, remnants, et ceteras. We will paint over the walls and floors where we had been, and leave the space as we found it, as if we had never been there, clearing all paths, as if it had never known existence in the first place (good for it) (for its own good).
That things die, that they die from one dimension, that they do not last, that they are one-offs, that they are transient and are not foolishly forever, that they can live on – if we so allow them to – in the realm of imagination, perhaps ever/even more animatedly, ferociously and zestfully, is a concept that we quite adore. (We – you, my Dear Readers, and us- have been there before, when we paid a pilgrimage to Heidiland in a bid to visit the legendary Heidi, who was all but absent, and how we were relieved that she could not be found in Life 1.0, for it only strengthens her presence in our Life 2.0). We relish in the cruelty of this, as we adore how it allows us to train and celebrate the/our power of imagination. (‘I’m wondering what this all means to you’, he asks. I am silent. ‘You are immaterial; you do not exist. In fact, you are already dead,’ I want to say, which to my mind is not negative, in our same Heidi-logic, but which would inevitably be taken to be otherwise. So I keep silent.)
The work dies from Life 1.0, our primary world, but/and migrates to / returns to / re-starts in Life 2.0, in the virtual and imaginary realm, and exists as if it has done all this while, independent of the one in the physical world. One is not lesser than the other. To be pedantic, the Life 1.0 metamap in the exhibition ‘came from’ Life 2.0 in the ‘first place’, with the 120 maps and images created on the screen, and having previously only existed in Cyberspace. Already, even as it is alive, we are re-creating Life 2.0 re-presentations of it, in a parallel realm. The work is the same work in either lives, but the Life 1.0 ‘version’ also completely differs and is independent of the Life 2.0 one. In fact, there is no ‘essential’ work. When we run restlessly between Life 1.0 and Life 2.0, we are re-creating the/a work again.
2nd row top left: photograph of Kaidie at work by fellow artist-exhibitor, Laura Malacart. Beside that is a sketch by Kaidie of the work, before she began. Middle: Kaidie, quite knackered by now, poses with fellow artists and exhibitors Deborah Padfield and Errol Francis at the end of the humid evening of the opening 25 June. in the next picture, Errol competes with Kaidie for Person With Most Number Of Countable and Accountable Teeth Award 2010. We are fighting neck to neck, shoulder to shoulder, and- of course we are expecting this- teeth to teeth, a tooth for a tooth, gum for gum. Who do you think should win? Bottom right: Pink poster Spillage indicates the title of the show. Bottom left: Kaidie’s hand-made wall text for her new hand-made wall-text-installation, 24 June 2010, 1 day before show opened. The masking tape on the wall were to be all licked up, of course. Kaidie’s Life 3.0 ecosystem tolerates no wastage (most of the time). Check out the ‘paper tippex’ on the right hand side of the wall text as well (since there is no undo button in Life 1.0).
LAST 2 DAYS TO CATCH KAIDIE’S FIRST LIFE 1.0 INSTALLATION! Slade Centre of Research, WC1H 0AB. Kaidie’s metamap exhibition #5.
Across a 14m-wide wall, Kaidie works on site across 9 days to create a metamap consisting of 120 maps and images, that attempts to map her transdimensional run. This show departs from Kaidie’s recent works in that it utilises no multimedia, and that Kaidie installed this by herselves, got down on all fours and was all hands-on and filthy, screaming at no assistants except herselves. Slade Centre 25-30 June 2010, Nondon.
The baby in the triptych in the middle fingers the trails and links of Kaidie’s wall map – good. Then she goes on to spill red wine and pringles on my floor – no good, but she’s a baby, and we are so magnanimous as to hold no grudges against babies. And then she cries loudly, as if she was the victim! – oh, NO GOOD, but still understandable in the scheme of things (yes we are rational beings). But that is not the punchline – the adults responsible for the tot did no thing to help clean up, and escaped! – NOOO GOOD. My Dear Readers, we are sure that you have encountered ultra-righteous people with a strong sense of entitlement, who act as if they are the only on earth to have ever reproduced (THE REST OF US – if you did not already know – ARE ORPHANS MADE FROM PLAYDOH). So we – speaking as self-righteous runners and figures of imagination – had to stoop on the floor and lick up the pringles+wine+the baby’s tears+dust+hairs (thick, thin, curly, straight, blond, red, brown, black, etc), being ever so keen to store up food and drinks in our system at every opportunity in the middle of the ‘we-are-all-in-this-together’ recession.
Image of Kaidie overstretching herself by Alexandra Gomes during private view 25 June 2010 Friday. (Yes – pink, and its shades, was the order of the evening. Why? Because we have for the past few lifetimes tired of the obligatory black attires at art openings.) THANK YOU ALL for coming to the exhibition thus far, and its opening. More images of opening and exhibition to come – look out if Kaidie has caught you on camera! Did you say and smell of cheese? So, watch this space. Do not move, for soon all this will disappear from Life 1.0. (We will film ourselves de-installing the work, which had taken 9 full days to install, on Thursday in time lapse, and play it backwards, and upload it on Youtube later. Rather terribly exciting isn’t it).
25-30 JUNE: Display of WHY RUN? (WHY NOT?) and other mind+mentalmaps. Slade Centre of Research, Nondon #4
NOTHING COMES FROM NOTHING, AND RUNNING HAS SEVERAL HISTORICAL THREADS.
RUNNING CONTEXTUALISED IN THE TRADITION OF TRAVELLING AND TRAVEL LITERATURE.
WITH THE INTERNET, KAIDIE HAS MORE RABBIT HOLES TO RUN IN(TO).
RUNNING AS A SIMPLE, VISCERAL COUNTERPOINT / CRITICAL STRATEGY FOR OUR TECHNOLOGICALLY-MEDIATED REALITY. (PLUS: HULA-HOOPING IN I AM FIT FOR LIFE 2000)
THE 'WHY RUN' MAP IN ITS FULL GLORY. SEE IT (RE-) CONTEXTUALISED IN THE INSTALLATION!
25-30 JUNE: KAIDIE SHARES HER MEANDERINGMADMAPS + MANDALAS. Slade Centre of Research, Nondon #1
What: In this exhibition, there are 13 PhD and researchers on show with a wide-range of works including performance, sculpture, video installation and sound. Private view: 25 June evening. Exhibition: 25-30 June. Location: Slade Research Centre Nondon WC1H UK. Opening hours: 9am – 5pm daily except Sunday.
Kaidie exhibits her Multiple Mad Meandering Maps + Mandalas of her restless running across Life 1.0 (primary world), Life 2.0 (realm of imagination, Web 2.0 realities) and Life 3.0 (Web 3.0 AR+MR, hybrid reality). As we speak, Kaidie is creating a 14metre-wall-installation, a metamap of her maps of her intradimensional run. And there is NO multimedia in this new work, only goodoldfashion 2D ‘stuffs’. Can you believe that? Me neither. Well, come see for yourself. (We would have used the adjective ‘Magnificent’, in conjunction with the brilliant Magnificent Maps exhibition at the British Library, but that would not have been very Modest of Me, would it?)
See you around. Literally. Being all-rounded we can bounce ideas off each other. Jolly well.
May 2010: ever-expandable layers of reality -cum-running tracks
March 2010: an appropriation of the yin-yang symbol - or/and an appropriation of the pepsi logo.
December 2009: picture-perfect simple/simplistic venn diagramme of the in-between.
AS I TURN 6-MONTHS OLD, I REALISE THAT I QUITE ENJOY MY LIFE/LIVES NOW, HERE.
Unbeknownst to me at that time, my visit to Enjoy Cafe is to turn out to be profoundly life-changing. As I turn 6-months old on 12 June 2010, I wash down a dozen of the Aphrodisiac Sausages with Dettol. I am hit – not suddenly, but gradually, nicely, warmly, largo – with a realisation that I quite enjoy my life and lives now, here, in Nondon, in my Life 3.0. I think, and I know, that I enjoy where/when I am, difficult/diverting/frustrating/frivolous as it is. Society celebrates youth, in all its actual and mythological glory/beauty/recklessness/kawaii-ness/innocence (or so-called). I enjoyed being young when I was, but I also enjoy having travelled the journey (detours included) to get here, of being what(ever it is that) I am now, quite tremendously, in all its imperfections/wisdom (or lack thereof)/scars/histories/wear&tear/warts&all. And I enjoy knowing that I am enjoying it.
In all my lives, in Nondon and elsewheres, people have often judged me to be younger than I am. But never once had/have I a desire to deny/lie (although some times I evade, because I some times like to see where it leads me when I am perceived to be more naive than I am, which is not to say that I am with out mature folly). The look of shock (or disgust) by the asker invariably provides me with a (perverse) pleasure. (Allow me to share a couple of incidents with you, my Dear Readers. Incident #1: Last week at Cally Pool: Girl asks me when I step into pool, ‘How old are you?’ Me: ‘Make a guess?’ She: ’19’. I tell her. She looks offended. Keen to restore peace, I ask her: ‘How old are you?’ ’11’, she replies. She is quite a bit taller than me. She looks me up and down. Then, both unclear of how to carry on with the conversation, we swim off in separate directions, in shock. Incident #2: At my local Tesco’s, when asked for my ID, I tell cashier my age. She stares at me, and gets her Supervisor. The women begin staring at me. ‘Perhaps it is what I’m wearing?’, I offer. ‘No, it’s your skin’, supervisor says. ‘Well luckily you are not looking close enough’. So she comes close, barely inches away from me, eyes wide open, examining me. Keen to get my bottle, I endure this unexpected scrutiny for several seconds. ‘What do you eat to look like this?’, she asks, as the cashier beeps my bottle and Tesco’s-branded cheap and nasty cakes. ‘Tesco’s cheap and nasty cakes,’ I reply. Incident #3: He, 18, guessed that I was 22. I said, ‘We could have met when I first came to Nondon, but we might not have recognised each other as you must have been in a pram (and dozy from all that milky binge-drinking).’ I think this is a hilarious image, but he clearly did not.)*
Mind you, I am by no means old, old, but having lived 6 out of my prescribed 32.8-months allowance declares that I am no spring chicken, but a mature summer barbecued pork, sweating in lard. Dripped from the previous years’ roasts.
This image has as its source several text-tree diagrammes generated by Dr. Jamie O'Brien from a programme he designed.
More than ever before, I now enjoy many things physically, intellectually and psychologically. My Life 3.0 reality is an augmented one, but with neither sillycone nor sentimentalism. The best part is that I enjoy knowing how much I am able to enjoy what I am enjoying. (A sign of smugness perhaps, or an other indication of a profound delusion. Not unike Quixote’s). And this is not a tautological statement (even though we enjoy tautologies and tautologies enjoy us). Though I have always been an introspective person, this seems an other stage of self-awareness and confidence that would have escaped me at an other age. More than ever before, I now know what I want, when I want it, and how to dispense/use/it, at the dosage that works – what specific phrase of a piece of music I wish to listen to, at what volume, for how many number of loops; what particular type of cheese I wish to savour at a particular moment, to be followed by what particular dessert at what dosage; what particular scene of a film I wish to replay in my head, to evoke or force about a particular emotion (and it is invariably a Herzog or Marker or Tarkovsky scene), at what point to wean myself off an obsession, to say ‘Enough!’ and move on; to know the exact demands of a task/race at hand, and pace myself, so that I do not burn out too quickly, so that I stay focused and clear, but allow myself refuelling and treats when the energy levels dip, and then go for a final push, a sprint, a dash, a be-all-end-all exertion, et al. I also enjoy not knowing, and enjoy knowing that I do not know, and enjoy that anticipation, anxiety, excitement, the waiting (Have you read Barthes’ elegant chapter ‘Waiting’, in A Lover’s Discourse?), the feeling silly, and curiosity. I enjoy doing what I am doing. I enjoy what I am being. I enjoy waking up every morning, excited about confronting my challenges. I enjoy a good challenge, as I always have had all my lives, as they give me a good kick, because I enjoy kicking back, hard. I enjoy wanting something and working hard for it. I enjoy achieving. I enjoy leaving. I enjoy arriving. Most of all I enjoy the process of getting there, even if the arrival is anticlimactic. In fact the arrival will invariably be. I enjoy putting in effort. I would have enjoyed not having to put in any effort, of course, but by now I know how I work, how I have to work, so I do, and I enjoy doing that. I enjoy going to bed at night, having fought the demons, windmills, and myselves and looking forward to the next set of challenges the next day. And the next. I enjoy raising the bar (including raising the Snicker bars into my mouth). I enjoy communicating with my friends in Life 2.0. I enjoy knowing you. I enjoy not knowing you. I enjoy that we may never, and/or may never desire to/need to, meet in Life 1.0. I enjoy that we might have met in Life 1.0, but do not out ourselves, because doing so would spoil everything, your idea of Kaidie, and hers, of you. I enjoy that we meet in Life 2.0. I enjoy that we meet at all. I enjoy that we meet, and share, and run together. I enjoy not knowing the fate/s of Kaidie (except that she must expire 09.09.2012). I enjoy that you play a part in Kaidie’s being. I enjoy being invited to unexpected diversions, as invented by my friends, including you, my Dear Readers, my Collaborators, my Co-creators. I enjoy being Kaidie. I enjoy that Kaidie and Life 3.0 are public properties, and open source systems, and our collective and subjective imagination. I enjoy trying and testing new things. I enjoy going where I hadn’t/ wouldn’t have. I enjoy running with you. I enjoy having virtual running companions on my 1000-day journey. I enjoy exploring new territories and unknown terrain. I enjoy not knowing. I enjoy being surprised. I enjoy that things are not written. I enjoy that Kaidie can be over written by you. I enjoy that Kaidie can be written off by you, and me, or in spite of me. I enjoy that Kaidie’s story in Life 3.0 cannot be facilitated with out your Web 2.0 assistance and good-old-fashioned imagination. I enjoy that Kaidie is not precious, that she will cease to exist, that she is me, but can be any one, any body, real or imagined, that she is fictive, but that she is me as well, that I am her, that you can be her too. I enjoy the smell of my cocoa-butter moisturiser because it smells like superrich vanilla icecream and I want to eat it but I don’t. I enjoy lying on the grass with B, G, S when the sun is shining. I enjoy walking home from Great Marlborough Street with C, and sighting a deflated football on the street and attempting to kick it, only to laugh at it, as if to mock it, but affectionately and not maliciously. I enjoy walking home with J & A from Smithfields when it is more than 20 degrees. I enjoy walking home with B from St Johns Street. I enjoy tension. I enjoy prolonging tension. I enjoy saying hello to the Hispanic cleaners. I enjoyed walking with B again, looking for food, starving, then stuffing my face with a sandwich that had hummous, and something else, and asking B if there is anything on my face, but unfortunately left with no more time to talk more. I enjoy taking time. I enjoy the luxury of time. I enjoy having a short attention span. I enjoy having the physical and mental stamina to endure long journeys/races/lives. I enjoy the sting of wasabi. I enjoy walking at 18 degrees. I enjoy running at 8-12 degrees. I enjoy running in the gym at 16 degrees, because that is the lowest you can go, but the air is still stale and stuffy. I enjoy my shower at 40 degrees. I enjoy swimming in chlorine at 25 degrees. I enjoy my foamy coffee piping hot. I enjoy walking along Commercial Road with G. I enjoyed walking with S along the canal late at night, when I slipped, because I was not wearing my glasses, and where I would not have walked alone at that hour, but together it was lovely, based on a decade of friendship. I enjoyed wandering around Moscow with I as it snowed and we got lost in the circle line. I enjoyed exploring Perth with J, 2 foreigners and strangers looking for a place to go, with out a map, enjoying being lost, together. I enjoyed walking in Suomenlinna with P in a Summer midnight, when it was still bright, albeit chilly. I enjoyed being submerged in the outdoor onsen, in the mountains, when it was cold and raining, holding an umbrella, pitch black, seeing no thing, but comforted by my friends’ laughter, friends who had brought me here because I was flying off the next day. I enjoyed walking with F in Spore in my previous life, and Paris in my current, even though we have both moved on. I enjoy all my long distance flights. I enjoy not sleeping on my long distance flights. I enjoy flying across timezones, political excuses and economic selfishness. I enjoyed my 7-hour bus ride with A, with out sleep, and the subsequent croissants for breakfast, during which exactly two thousand bits of pastry were busily flaking onto the dirty trashy subway station ground, so instead of eating all 2 croissants A had only 1.2, or thereabouts, I gathered. I enjoy running, flying, swimming and living alone. I still enjoy swimming because the chlorine endorphins kick in surely and quickly. I enjoyed running in Tokyo, Fukuoka, Beppu, Oxford, Spore and Winterthur. I enjoy getting jealous of Kaidie when B tells me that he might prefer to go out with the Life 2.0, virtual Kaidie than the Life 1.0 me. I enjoy the airconditioning in the British Library and Wellcome Institute. I enjoy sweating when working out. I enjoy being underestimated. I enjoy proving myself. I enjoy proving myself wrong. I enjoy learning. I enjoy perfect pitch and hearing. I enjoy being a little short-sighted, so I see things in a slight blur when too far away. I enjoy fuzzy logic. I enjoy ambiguity. I enjoy dry humour. I enjoyed playing the piano for 11 years. I enjoy imagining an other life as a concert pianist. I enjoy walking in Regents Fark with A, not knowing where we were going, if any where, but even if no where, that was fine, as it was, as it is. I enjoyed the warmth of my filmmaker-activist friends in Sderot who were passionate about peace. I enjoyed their sincerity and kindness after I endured endless searches in order to get onto el al opening my bags emptying my hand luggage removing my battery from my laptop showing them my files body searched many times passports flipped endless questions asked. I enjoy imagining Y running in Hyde Park, although not with me. I enjoy the smell of fresh bread. I enjoy eating at least 1 banana daily. I enjoy salmon and brie. I enjoy champagne with pancakes. I enjoy olives and corn and niceness. I enjoy the smell of B’s hair. I enjoy smells. I enjoy smelling. I enjoy the smell of my coconut shampoo. I enjoyed last Thursday aplenty. I enjoyed Tuesday very much too. I enjoy enjoying the moments of enjoyment when they happen. I enjoy not trying to repeat such moments because of my insatiability. I enjoy training myself to not be nostalgic. I enjoy training myself not to be attached. I enjoy separating mind from matter. I enjoyed saying hello to the many little people at the museum, because they remind me of R, E, K, B, K, S, even though I have not met S and she, and K, and E would not recognise/remember me, that I have to start afresh with them when I next meet them, and I do not know when I will next meet them. I enjoy holding a baby or a toddler. I enjoy not being labelled as selfish for my choices, because I think the choice of reproduction is as selfish. I enjoy i-chatting with R, who knows all its functions by the age of 6. I enjoy silence when I am working. I enjoy working in silence, because I have memorised and mis-memorised how Gould does it and it swims in my head, never mind if it is a distortion of distortions of Beethoven and Bach. I enjoy the ability to be silent when with an other, because it says that we do not need to rubbish talk, even though I enjoy talking rubbish to amuse you, and me, but I enjoy being silent when we are together, because it is in silence that we are in an other space and time that we enclose for us, as and when I desire an enclosure/definition. I enjoy sleeping. I enjoy sleeping for 12 hours for a recharge. I enjoyed watching G’s eyeballs widen because I say rubbish. I always enjoy walking along Farrington Road because it is wide and gently sloped and when I walk there I am in a good mood or walking there puts me in a good mood. I enjoy walking at 6.5kmh when it is sunny. I enjoy wanting. I enjoy running the next morning. I enjoy being cooked for. I enjoy sitting at the back of a motorised bike. I think I will enjoy skydiving, bungee jumping, and deepsea diving. And freefalling. I enjoy doing things with no strings attached. I enjoy sleeping at 2200 and walking up at 0500. I enjoy running at 0700. I enjoy a disciplined life. I enjoy letting go. I enjoy being focused. I enjoy being distracted. I enjoy having a sense of control. I enjoy having my routines interrupted. I enjoy drawing lists of things to do. I enjoy drawing lists to remind me to look at my other lists. I enjoy being disrupted. I enjoy pushing myself physically and mentally as a dare to myself. I enjoy surprises. I enjoy being surprised. I enjoy smiling to fellow runners now, when I shied away from it before, but now I do it some times because it is nice when you do laps and encounter the same characters repeatedly, so you smile, and move on. I enjoy smiling and waving back when I run along Euston Road and school girls from the bus smile and wave at me this morning. I enjoyed the 7-second run the man wearing ‘Save The Children’ bright blue t-shirt did with me as I run past Kings Cross yesterday morning. I enjoy running because it calms me down and rids my anxieties, but when A asks, why are you anxious in the first place, I can not answer. I enjoy hearing my heavy breathing as I run, because it reminds me that I am breathing. I enjoy sweating as I run. I enjoy looking forward to food, drinks and not running, when I am running. I enjoy swinging my arms and propelling myself forward as I run. I enjoy running with the minimal things, without water, without ID, with no money, no baggage, no burden, just run. I enjoy running in a city, in any city, because I am no longer seen as an other, no longer small and exotic, but having some temporary ownership of the place I am running, and personalising the space I inhabit, and I gaze the city in a different manner, and I am gazed upon in a different manner, I am even taken to be a local and am asked for directions. I enjoy doing a little bouncy gait this morning, with out pain, with out aches, with some speed. I enjoy watching the blister grow on my toe. I enjoy the texture of chaffed skin from rubbing my arm against my running shirt. I enjoy my running clothes scratching my back, creating marks on my back that do not leave, where as I would have been disturbed by any mark or blemish or spot before, but now I accept some, because it comes with this activity. I enjoy taking time to warm up. I enjoy taking time to stretch. I enjoy fartleks when I feel stronger. I enjoy pounding on the treadmill when I am fully focused, because I have to be careful not to drift, because when I did I fell off. I enjoy hitting 14kmh on the treadmill. I enjoy counting when on the treadmill. I enjoy not counting because I count everything in my life. I enjoy taking calculated risks. I enjoy slow, long-drawn runs when I work at distances. I enjoy running alone in real life. I enjoy testing my limits. I enjoy knowing my limits. I enjoy pushing my limits. I enjoy working with my limits and limitations. I enjoy the prospect of a big bowl of boiled cauliflower/parsnips/broccoli/cougettes after my run. I enjoy that my cheap pink nail polish comes off nearly as soon as I put them on. I always enjoy my 2nd round in the Fark because that is when I am no longer anxious, but simply running, when my head is full of thoughts, and at the same time not thinking of any thing in particular, when my body is most relaxed, and when my GPS will register my faster times, not because I am racing, but because it feels good, and I know now how to make myself feel good by calling upon my running endorphins. I enjoyed a very nice run on Wednesday morning, after a nice Tuesday where no thing and every thing and some thing else happened, when I moved on the next morning, still tired and still light, but running, unthinkingly, and registered my most enjoyable and fastest 2nd round ever in a non-race condition, 10.2kmh, as opposed to my usual 9.4kmh, not terribly much better in real terms, but mentally, in unreal terms, trust me, it felt good, very good, feeling completely free from any pain, any bother, just relaxed, just 1 foot after the other, not minding the branches poking me, not minding other runners zapping past me, but bouncing on/off my shoes, not as if my shoes are super bouncy, for, mind you, it was my old Brooks, 1 out of my 3 pairs of running shoes, but this with the sole /soul soon coming off, but still I felt a bounce, a new gait that I never had before Wednesday, and best of all, I was able to control that and bring it on when I felt ready, and I knew that I felt ready, so I ran, almost bouncing sideways, arms swaying me forward, not minding how funny or ugly or clumsy I must have appeared, but enjoying the lightness of being, momentarily, in perfect control, and complete-total-freaking-fully let go at the same time. I enjoy discipline. I enjoy being a disciplinarian. I enjoy the dictum of no pain no gain. I enjoy Nondon and cannot imagine doing this, whatever it is that I am doing, any where else. I enjoy long distance calls on Skype. I enjoy running across different dimensions. I enjoy being confused about which dimension I am in, and applying different sets of values, sometimes inappropriately. I enjoy forgetting if I should have been more assertive, or am not humble/polite/modest enough, or am too much of a go-getter. I enjoy forgetting if I am not serious enough, if I am too austere, or if I am too childish. I enjoy having a large repertoire of values to pick and mix, and learning new things in each new dimension that I travel to. I enjoy my life and lives now and do not stop me from enjoying myself. I enjoy this intensity, this being filled, this being fulfilled, being empty, a half full/half empty question, being anxious, being lucid, being heightened, having no excessive things in my life, being frivolous and enjoying silly indulgences. I enjoy being reconciled. I also enjoy not being reconciled, being confused, being consistently inconsistent, being torn between violent opposing thoughts, still struggling with the theory vs. practice problem, being exhausted and wrecked by Kaidie, being Kaidie, not being Kaidie, being besides myself, being shipwrecked, being afloat, not moving my arms or legs until the next swimmer comes along and hits me off the lane, tumbling, falling down, stepping on horse poo, huffing and puffing and neighing as I run, running out of breath, holding my breath underwater, being at one and at the same time many, having many conflicting values, and having many contradictory views, having absolutely no values. I will enjoy my Summer. I enjoy staying focused. I will enjoy the next 26.8 months of my life.
* 13 July 2010: After this post was published, I read of a nice story that captures perfectly the essence of the word serendipity– of a couple who lived in seperate continents, but who were photographed 30 years earlier, in the same picture, but one of them in a pram, in the background, and a complete stranger, of course. They met 15 years ago, and only made the discovery 8 years ago just before their wedding. This sounds like a classic Kaidie scenario (of some hits and plenty of misses that we have with one another, as we traverse across lifetimes) albeit one that has a happy ending (in so far as a unification is read as a positive thing, and if endings are desirable).
UPDATABLE GLOSSARY: THE MEANING(S) OF LIFE
GLOSSARY/ WIKI ABOUT THE UNIVERSE OF KAIDIE / LIFE 3.0,? AND THE THEATRE OF CHARACTERS (ongoing). SEEKING DEFINITIONS AND ALTERNATIVE DEFINITIONS! CONTRIBUTE NOW!
VARIATIONS OF MEANING OF LIFE
* Meaning of Life
Monty Python, The Meaning of Life, 1983:
Why are we here? What’s life all about? Is God really real, or is there some doubt? Well, tonight, we’re going to sort it all out, For, tonight, it’s ‘The Meaning of Life’. What’s the point of all this hoax? Is it the chicken and the egg time? Are we just yolks? Or, perhaps, we’re just one of God’s little jokes. Well, ça c’est le ‘Meaning of Life’. Is life just a game where we make up the rules. While we’re searching for something to say, Or are we just simply spiralling coils Of self-replicating DNA. Nay, nay, nay, nay, nay, nay. In this ‘life’, what is our fate? Is there Heaven and Hell? Do we reincarnate? Is mankind evolving, or is it too late? Well, tonight, here’s ‘The Meaning of Life’. For millions, this ‘life’ is a sad vale of tears, Sitting ’round with rien nothing to say While the scientists say we’re just simply spiralling coils Of self-replicating DNA. Nay, nay, nay, nay, nay, nay. So, just why– why are we here, And just what– what– what– what do we fear? Well, ce soir, for a change, it will all be made clear, For this is ‘The Meaning of Life’. C’est le sens de la vie. This is ‘The Meaning of Life’.
* Meaningful Life
* Less Meaningless Life
* Happiness
* More of the Same
DAY 51: EXOTIC NO MORE: UNPACKED, DECONSTRUCTED, CONSUMED, AND DIGESTED.
After trying out a few things with the said object (massage my soles with it, whisper to it, write using it, drinking it), as I had never seen this thing in my entire short life, advice from my Dear Readers came in. Thanks to Corrado (via Facebook) and Stefan, I have bridged cultural barriers, crossed curiosities, worked through the object of obsession and have reconciled with it. The mystery object found in Winterthur is quite delicious indeed. Thank you very much Corrado and Stefan!
DAY 49: FOUND IN WINTERTHUR: WHAT IS THIS? IS THIS A NEW PLUGIN? WHAT SHOULD I DO WITH IT? Shall I write with it? Massage my soles with it? Put it in my nostrils? Laugh at it? Slap it? Insult it? Sit on it? Read it? Drink it? Whisper to it? Flush it? TELL ME!
To give you an idea of the proportion of curious object we are talking about, I have photoshopped in my arm and palm in the images (If you laptop is 17", scale here is 1:2.1457. If you laptop is 15", scale is 1:5.3675. If you have no laptop, go for a nice swim in the frozen lido and shout who-ray), or put on an i-pad.
