between us

a thousand miles
more than five years
a thousand smiles
and so many tears

norske skog

Det var ikke den beste natten før det skjedde. Mor ble veldig syk om middagstid, og vi kunne ikke bestemme hva var det som gjorde det, eller hva var best å gjøre om det. Det var bare mer ironisk siden mor var på en såkalte helsedag hvor hun var sjekket for forskjellige helseproblemene tidligere i dagen. Resultatene var ikke bra, men de viste ikke noe problem med magen hennes som virket å gi henne en veldig vanskelig stund senere. Iallfall kunne hun sovne endelig. Og kanskje årsaken for at jeg hadde denne rare drømmen var ikke bare det at jeg leste en norsk bok, men også at jeg hadde fokus nok til å oppleve det mens jeg fortsatt å lese det.

Jeg kan ikke huske at jeg kjente det var faktisk en drøm mens jeg drømte. Kanskje det var for godt. Men da måtte jeg tenke litt til å forklare på norsk hva var det som skjedde, våknet jeg likevel. Usikkerhet? Ikke nok selvtillit? Iallfall reiste vi med buss i stor snø da kom bussen til stopp mens den prøvde å kjøre opp en bro. Vi var enda over land med taket under oss, da vi steig av og forsøkte å finne snarveien til jobben. Plutselig glidde vi ned på takene og samtidig prøvde å ikke falle ned. Etter at vi tok noen ganske severdige manøvrer, befant vi oss på en liten gård omringet av små trehus. Så gikk vi inn hva som virket et skur men det var faktisk et verksted.

Jeg tror at jeg forsto bare der at vi var i Norge. Så etter at jeg tenkte i noen minutter, begynte jeg å forklare til menneskene der hva var det som skjedde. Det virker morsomt nå å huske at jeg introduserte meg og sa at vi kom fra Ungarn. Viser det noe mer enn at jeg tenker på nye intervjuer hvor de kan sjekke min norsk? Jeg tror det. Uansett av hva var det som skjedde, vi hadde overlevd det og klarte å gå til å få hjelp og veiledning. Jeg kunne også snakke for oss med beboerne i et fremmedt land. Jeg tror det er et tegn av økende selvtillit med å snakke norsk og kanskje med å finne en ny jobb også.

Victory vs. Visitors

Found out last night that the old Jewish man in a movie whom I'd been thinking for many years now, says Shalom to the Nazis entering the room with machine guns, is actually talking to extraterrestrial invaders. The rest is correct but all this is happening in the TV series 'V' I saw as a kid. That face and scene had stuck with me without me remembering the circumstances it all took place under.

Though the story has a parallel to things that happened during the world wars, and I guess, not only by coincidence. It's about totalitarianism and how the propaganda, nice on the surface can completely deceive people's mind. Or in many cases make them fear so much those who they think are on power that they rather surrender and even give up those around them to save their own lives.

Also the glass containers with thousands of human bodies in them that resistance spies see on a spaceship have obviously affected scenes, for instance, in The Matrix where people were used as energy source the same way. On the other hand it resembles a lot of all that happened in concentration camps where creatures with a human appearance (I just wouldn't call them human) were collecting people and experimenting on them, thus causing them endless suffering and pain, and evidently killing many of them.

The visitors in this TV series also decide to use human shape and first behave friendly with the earthlings in public to reach their goal easier which is to get all the water from this planet, since they ran short of it. In 'Signs' the aliens who don't bother using a camouflage, come to harvest mankind and they can be destroyed by water. In 'The Man Who Fell to Earth' it's only one friendly and secretive alien who arrives to get back a whole lot of water for his deserting home, but is found out by Earth-men and through a series of experiments is made into one of us while his spaceship gets destroyed. I can also recall the Tommyknockers where the visitors take on the bodies of the locals to hide and to take over the place.

The queue is quite long, nevertheless the story goes about us all the time. How we abuse each other and the planet we live on. And in 'V' when they come to take this old Jewish man, he leaves his family with the message 'If we don't help each other, we haven't learned a thing'.

Norwegian Wood

It wasn't the best night before it all happened. Mom got very sick by dinner time, and we couldn't decide what might have caused it, or what would be best to do. It was just the more ironic since the same day she'd been to a so-called prevention day attending different kind of health checks, X-rays and so on. The results were not too good either, but didn't refer to any issue with her digestion that seemed to cause her a very hard time later on. However she could go to sleep in the end, and maybe my strange dream was caused by not only reading on in a Norwegian book, but also focusing on it enough to kind of living it while getting on with it.

In my dream I don't remember to have realized it that I was actually dreaming. Maybe that's a good sign. But then when I needed to think a little bit while explaining what happened in Norwegian, then I woke up... Uncertainty? Ikke nok selvtillit? Anyhow, we were traveling by bus in huge snow, when it had to stop while going up on a bridge. We were still above land with roofs below us when we got off, trying to find out how to get to work the soonest from there. All of a sudden we were sliding down the roofs, at the same time trying not to fall off. Then after a few quite impressive movements we were in amongst small wooden houses closing in on a little yard. So we stepped into what looked like a little shed and turned out to be a workshop.

There, and I think only there I've realized that we were in Norway, and so after a few moments thinking, started to explain to the men there what had happened. Funny to remember now that I introduced myself, and said we came from Hungary. Does this reveal more than just me thinking about new interviews where they might test my language skills? I do think so. No matter what happened we've survived and succeeded to get as far as asking for help and guidance. Also I could speak on our behalves with the locals in a foreign land. I take it as a sign for growing self-confidence when speaking Norwegian, and maybe in my job seeking, too.

a liveable life is a pretense

Been a while now since I had that brainstorm right before I could fall asleep. Then it all came to me so clear to the smallest details, all my feelings and reasons. By now most of it got lost, only had a few thoughts jot down the next morning. It was about why I have started this blog, what was it I've been trying to express here. Since then I was very lucky to get in touch after long long years with friends who helped me a lot to talk about it, well about myself.

The blog itself changed, too. Not so dark, the header photo less horrible; hopefully reflecting my own feelings. I have also chosen a different title to it. Originally it bore a Ray Bradbury short story's. A time travel, but also a travel into the human soul, with its hopes and fears. What would you change if you had the chance. Specially if you could see the consequences beforehand. Not to mention, would that make it any better. I like a lot this kind of sci-fi; more like a study on us mankind and an opinion on our societies and achievements.

The site name resembled my job, referring to the many years dealing with computers at a multinational company; Man Eating Machine. At the same time it was a tribute to the Grace Jones song Corporate Cannibal she made with Brian Eno. A bow to both of them, as well as to their way of talking about the topic. It says it all about commercialism, empty lies and lives coming true through them. Inequalities in artificially created and regulated social systems lacking any sign of updating its views according to changes in it.
Whereas in technical self-developing systems the creators and rulers rely on the laws of nature. However the laws of economics and jurisdiction seem to be so far from that successful self-balancing world. Actually the law cannot help the one who needs it most. Eno put it as 'Culture is everything we don't have to do' but then we don't have to live like this either.We could act by nature not only in biotechnology, or the arts, but in the everyday life, even if it sounds idealistic.

I worked for 3 years at an IT service desk, most of all because it pays reasonable. It was not my dream job; answering 40-50 calls a day, documenting everything, while also trying to fix the issue within the shortest time. I don't think I'm a robot, but this job got me close to turn into one. One of the most frightening things was not the job though, but the feedback. Once a customer said 'hallo?!' after I introduced myself, following the official script, for the manieth time that day. So I asked if she could hear me at all - she thought I was an answering machine. I'm looking for something more human; a job where I can help people more directly, and go less into technical details. Of course, that's not easier at all, but very different.

Now my blog and me the writer are called the same name; heathen. It refers to what I'm thinking about most these days even if only subconsciously. All my searches and trials to live a life that makes me feel real. Something that reaches beyond a job to earn a living, things that have to be done a daily base. Also a solution and a help to prevent more mistakes. Instead a guidance I can trust because I believe it's coming from love and care.

in this lonely crowd it's always time

It is a funny feeling turning forty and realizing you have basically not changed a bit. But at least you can see it clear now.

...can you. I put the above down only a week ago or so, and then found a friend from fifteen years ago. So the next two paragraphs are quoting what I told her about myself, maybe as a conclusion of what I started to think about when writing here the first sentence. Also an afterthought of an evening what I spent with a new friend.

The most interesting in it all is to find that I'm not a bit different in the very ego, and I'm not sure if I wonder whether that's good or not. As it seems like that entity, myself, is developing in many different ways, or call it gathering experience, but still stays the same essence. And it is so very different in each and every person, but is sharing one thing: a yearning and searching for the ultimate answer that fills in all the missing parts.

I guess this is my way of looking for God in all the diverse communities and various religions; it's a never-ending story. And it is so, because I don't dare to look for the answer in myself. This is more or less how I felt last night on that Shabbat ceremony and the family-like dinner afterwards. I think, the reason is that I know exactly how serious it is to answer a call so overwhelming. In a way that holds me back from giving in, fearing I might lose all I have now. Even though I know I have nothing in the whole wide world, but this chance.

A few days ago I met a friend (after long enough time so she could have born a baby almost one year old now) who told me she loved her plants, so she wouldn't want to get rid of them when moving, and would rather give a key to her place to a neighbor so they could water them if she needed to go away for a while. Actually what stroke me was the way she put it. She said these were her plants she loved, so she wouldn't leave them there or sell them when she'd move, but would want to take them with her, wanted the same plants to be around at a new place, too.

I remember I've always wondered when heard that people gave name to their plants, if there was something wrong with me not being so attached to them. I loved plants and flowers, but for me they could be substituted. Their loss didn't mean much to me, no matter what way it happened. When the cat who moved in with us for seven years, had to go, it was certainly much harder. Still I tried to keep the event or the fact of his irreversible absence away from myself, instead keeping his memory alive and laugh at all the fun we had together. Much later when I settled some fish in a tank, mortality showed faster and in a more aggressive way. They used to attack each other now and then, and though I experimented with all the knowledge I could gain, to keep them there for the longest possible time, I didn't succeed very often.

I could go further and talk about friends, and also about how much I dared to show love, being afraid of becoming too vulnerable, so that I couldn't bare the consequences. Maybe that would sound strange to derive it from my relationships with other living things. However a friend I'm missing now, probably because she told me that she needed to tear out faraway friends from heart, she taught me to give away with love the most valuable things I had to people I thought I loved. For me books, talking to me as if letters from faraway friends, used to be of inestimable value. And I could learn to give them away, and if you'd think I could always find them again, some were really old or editions out of print. Anyhow, then it meant more to think of the stories in them, and specially why it was exactly that friend I had given them to.

I think this all goes back to how I turned from a wild child into a so-called introverted nerd at an early age. Could a flashback of a half empty home, a missing dad and brother lead to a feeling of such uncertainty of what's real and what's fantasy that one can relate then from then on, to everything in his life the same way. When searching for explanations, and finding the acceptable reasons hurt too much. I guess within the books and through them in other people's lives and sufferings I found a way to understand the reason why. I have also found much more valuable things, too, that helped to search further beyond what a family event would mean for me. So I daresay I'm glad I found more people to help me to see what could cause my dad to act like he did, for instance, when reading his mum's diary about the world war.

At the same time all that brings up even more questions about people in general, the reason that can turn us into something so empty that we can cause such feelings to each other. Why we need to act superior trying to prove something or because we all felt at one point abandoned and valueless. I believe understanding this, and what's more accepting it without anger, or becoming/feeling indifferent, but with love, is only possible by accepting the only one who could become superior to all by completely humiliating himself and letting himself be hurt by becoming totally abandoned of all love. And accepting such a limitless and unconditional love takes humility that can be only provided by someone who went through all this. Why does this sound scary to me.


Story Sample - The Lonely Crowd: A Study of the Changing American Character

Silver Screen - Provenance & Providence (The X-files, Season 9)
Song Selection - David Bowie: New Angels of Promise

Lion City

I was offered an exceptional chance to go for a business trip to Singapore, for the invitation of our customer to train their new resources who takes over our job. Of course, I accepted it, though it was a very tight schedule: I arrived late Sunday night, and left next Friday night. However I was still hoping to make it a tourist visit in the evenings. The offices were very close to the airport, just one station from it with the MRT, the monorail train. Here you see the Spaceship Enterprise-looking roof above the station. No, it's not me trying to look like Grace Jones with her extreme hat wear. To the right it's the huge building of the Expo with constant sales offering 50% bargain on even high-quality electronic products.

The Quincy hotel where I stayed at was a 1-hour train ride from work. So I spent a lot of time traveling in between each day, and felt like getting back from work to my room for a shower and to change clothes. As the country is almost by the Equator, and surrounded by the ocean the temperature is always close to 30°C, and the air is very humid. One day I took my shorts and a T-shirt with me to work, so that I could change there, and make it faster to head for sightseeing. Unfortunately the monsoon-like rain started in the afternoon, and went on into the evening. This is Quincy.

I haven't bothered to take any pics of it. Might be so because we had some misunderstanding about settling the bill. When I checked in after a 16-hours flight, I told the receptionist this was a business trip and the company paid for the room. When I showed her the confirmation number she told me they had booked the room through a web site, but had not paid for it. So I had to give her my own bank card to be able to check in. The next day I told about this to the company, and then the whole week was spent chasing my own money which was kept as deposit by the hotel. It is actually still not released, as for some reason, they waited for me to check out, and only then put the deposit on the card the company provided them on my second day there.

This is Esplanade Art Center with different cultural events each day; theater plays, movies, exhibitions, dance shows from all over the world. The roof (once again something extravagant) forms two halves of the local durian fruit. The company made sure on my last night that I got to see something of the city, and took me to the Marina Bay, one of the most famous sights. This is where Esplanade is located along with many other important places, and breathtaking architectural wonders. The newest one is the Sands Hotel offering luxury accommodation, shopping, dining, world class entertainment, and casinos. The whole place is built by an amazing design, the towers forming waves and supporting an enormous ark with palm tree avenues on it.

We spent the dinner open-air right by the bay, so we had a view on the gorgeous Sands Hotel, and all the skyscrapers on the other side. The cuisine is just as mixed as the population bringing here their culture and food, and sharing it all in their new home. We could choose from Chinese, Thai, Indonesian and Indian; different kinds of sea food, vegetarian and also Western food by which they meant Mexican at some places. Anyhow we had marinated crispy chicken wings in soy sauce served with mixed rice, some beef and chicken BBQ with a variety of dips, devil fish (or similar to that) pieces roasted and served on bamboo bed covered in some very spicy sauce, and shrimps in cereal coat. Oh and don't forget the local Tiger Beer! :-D

I really loved that the streets were kept clean, you felt safe even late at night in any parts of the city. It takes a strict government to fine even people spitting chewing gums in the street, but it works. The locals and also those like most of my trainees, who just moved there, were very open and friendly. Tax is very low, and the economy is growing full speed. Public transportation and food is very cheap, and the MRT is built to take you basically anywhere in the city. I would definitely go back if I'll ever have the chance again, but next time as a tourist spending my whole day discovering the place.

Starlight, Moonlight

There at the very edge
where all your hopes lay
there you get a glance at the past
of unthinkable distances

And so you become the future
for all of them who came to see
so curious and trustful
from faraway galaxies


Story Sample - 

Silver Screen - Sein und Zeit (The X-files, Season 7)
Song Selection - Harold Budd & Brian Eno: Not Yet Remembered

Fjelltur

Hjembyen min ligger på et flat land. Det er ingen fjell der og ingen sjø heller. Så begge dele har vært og skal alltid blir noe uvanlig, ubegripelig og vidunderlig for meg. Jeg har reist til mange steder i verden og likte best å være ved havet. Der føler jeg så rolig og samtidig vil jeg dra borte på vaiene. Jeg blir nyskjerrig hva ligger der over vannet, men jeg blir også rolig når jeg ser på det endeløs vannet. Kanskje på denne grunnen ble jeg mer fortryllet av store vann enn av fjell. Men det kunne være sånt fordi jeg hadde ikke vært i høye fjell tidligere. Jeg pleide gå på fjelltur i området rundt Budapest og noen ganger i Mátra og Mecsek.

I fjor sommer var jeg på besøk hos en venn i Bergen. Sammen tok vi toget til Upsete, en fjellbygde hvor vi leide en hytte. I området gikk vi på fjelltur, selv om været skiftet ganske ofte og det regnet hver eneste dag. Vanligvis kunne vi gå rundt ett av fjellene i nærheten av hytta hver dag. Men en dag var det bare opp og ned et fjell. Det varte meget langt sånt også. Jeg husker at vi fulgte en bekk og vi kunne ikke bestemme at vi skulle krysse den eller fortsette på den samme siden. Småblomster og andre vakre detaljer engasjerte oss også mange ganger.

Etter vi gikk over massevis av motbakker, sto vi ved siden av et stort vann. Det var islagte enda i ende av juli, det lå så høyt. Det straktes lang mellom fjelltopper og vi kunne ikke se hvor stiene svang frem. På himmelen så vi noen mørke skyer komme, og det ble sent også. Likevel snudde vi, siden det var umulig å finne ut hvilken retning vi skulle fortsette fram. Da gikk vi rett ned i den samme dalen hvor vi hadde kommet opp fra. Når vi så opp mot fjell, fikk vi øye på tykk tåk som kom ned plutselig. Var vi opp der enda, kunne vi ikke se ingenting og finne tråkket ned heller. Til slutt fant vi veien tilbake til hytta i regnet som startet rett da.

Iallfall jeg skal alltid huske denne usikkerhet som jeg følte når vi var opp der ved siden av det islagte vannet. Det så hemmelighetsfult og farlig ut og samtidig som om det innbød oss å oppdage hva finntes rundt det. Jeg så på alle retninger da vi sto der og plutselig forsto at vi kunne lett blitt mistet, gikk vi bare tilfeldig noe retning. Og senere hvis vi prøvde å fortsette i tåket og måtte finne veien ut, hadde det blitt kanskje altfor vanskelig. Jeg vet jo at min venn er veldig god ved å gå i fjellene, fordi han vokset opp i et slikt området. Allikevel var jeg sikkert veldig glad å gå nedover i dalen bort fra tåket og miste sjanse for dette eventyret.

Qu'ran

Dette er navnet på de helige skriftene i islam, på engelsk. Jeg vil skrive om en sang med den samme tittelen. Det er fra en plate laget på den samme måten som noen sanger på min favorittplate Low. Brian Eno hjalp med verkene på Low mens David Bowie (komponist til Low) var optatt med personlige saker. Det skjedde så at en dag når Eno var alene i studio, brukte han en lite del av piano spill. Faktisk det var den lille sønnen til manageren, som klimpret der, på instrumentet. Stykken da ble brukt som grunnlag for en hele sang. Det hørtes ganske eksperimentelt ut og Eno trodde at det kunne bli brukt som en instrumental del på albumet. Derimot når Bowie kom tilbaket, sang han noen ord i tillegg, som ikke var på et ekte språk. Men det passet veldig bra med melodien, så ble det brukt, og sangen ble særlig populær og brukt i mange dokumentarfilmer.

Noen år senere jobbte Eno med David Byrne fra bandet Talking Heads, som Eno hadde samarbeidet med før. Da brukte de denne teknikken igjen i studio, bare omvendt. De fant religiøse sanger og radioprogrammer fra forkjellige land, og etterpå lagte de musikk til dem. Sangene ble valgt fra album lagt i tidligere år, noen av dem var afrikanske gospler, og andre var tatt fra arabiske sangerer. Tittelen til albumet kommer fra en roman av Amos Tutuola, nigeriansk forfatter. My Life in the Bush of Ghosts (Mitt liv i åndenes skog) handler om en gutt som opplever utrolige eventyr i åndeverden, mens han forsøker å unngå fra slavehandlere. På en sang brukte Eno og Byrne lyden av muslimene som leste fra Koran.

Jeg hadde mitt første eventyret i den muslimske verden omtrent femten år før, da besøkte jeg broren min i Eilat, Israel, og sammen krysset vi gransen til Egypt. Vi fant en sjåfør på den andre siden, som kjørte oss gjennom ørkenen ned til en by ved det Røde Hav. Vi har reist en god stund, og det begynnte å skumre, da stoppte føreren plutselig, steg av bilen og åpnet motortoppen. Ingen snakket for noen minutter, og jeg ble sikker at vi kunne ikke fortsette. Broren min kikket ut av bilvinduet og sa til meg ’Det er Ramadan. Nå spiser de bare når de kan se på den første stjernen på himmelen.’

Ti år senere jobbte jeg i Tel-Aviv, og nesten hver fredag spaserte jeg langs kysten til Middelhavet etter jobb. Jeg likte best å gå til den gamle bydelen, Jaffa. Der kjøpte jeg en stor kopp iskaffe, satt ned i skyggen til trærne, og leste eller bare sa bort over havet. Det var i nærheten av en moské, som fintes bare noen skritt borte fra favorittplassen min. Det var skrevet ved døren at denne var samlingplassen for muslimene for å lese Koran. Da begynnte muezzinen å synge, løpte alle kattene som gikk der i alle retninger plutselig. Men det gjorde jeg ikke. Det minte meg på denne sangen, Qu'ran.

Jeg hørte sangen første gang når jeg begynnte å samle plater og kjøpte den opprinnelige versjonen med Qu'ran på. Sangen måtte ble flyttet fra albumet fordi det er mot islam til å ha musikk i bakgrunnen når de leser fra Koranen. Så noen år senere når jeg fikk tak i CD-versjonen, ble jeg veldig overrasket og trist til å finne ut at det ikke inneholdt sangen. Jeg hørte den opprinnelige sangen også. Faktisk det var ikke en sang som vi tenker på det, men muslimene messer vers fra Koranen. De gjør det på en så taktfastlige måte at det høres ut egentlig som en sang med sin egen melodi. Da Eno og Byrne lagte passende musikk til det. Jeg mener at Qu'ran viser hvordan to ganske forkjellige opprinnelser kan bli brukt sammen så bra i musikk, derfor ble det en av mine favorittsangene.

and there's nothing I can do

Recently there were so many undecided plans in my life based on all the half-promises jobwise, and otherwise. Also the waiting after the many applications, with no answer (yet). Which, surely doesn't mean it made me stop or give up hope, at all. I'm still going on with my daily job research, asking friends for advice and tips. And if something available then I take my chance, keeping ears and eyes open for everything.

Still time teaches me, as usual, the lessons of patience and perseverance. At the same time it seems like while I'm trying my best, something is waiting for me there at the end of all the search. So it makes me feel like I can lay back metaphorically, thinking all is predetermined in its own way, so it will come along the corner.

There you go, I jot down this log, and my boss called that now it's a 100% that we get one month bonus contract for July, and that I'll travel to Singapore for a week to train those who take over our job there. Then while I was typing this very sentence got a call for an interview about a job where I could use my Norwegian.

It was kind of striking to receive this Sandman book Taller Tales, and read all the funny tales about recurring dreams, black and white or colored ones, after I've tried to put here my guessing of these things recently. They just finish off all of it with such elegance on a few pages with great artwork, and joking about it all the time so leisurely.


Story Sample - Richard Cowper: Custodians

Silver Screen - 
Song Selection - Beach House: Norway

a change in the weather, a view to remember

Maybe it was because of the sudden heat that I had this little colored dream. Some very beautiful small butterflies were sitting motionless on top of thin stems, as if they were flowers. It definitely had a kind of enchanted feeling about it all, like in a folk tale. The cacti simply seemed to be very small, the size of bonsai trees maybe smaller. The whole scene was so dreamlike even for a dream, as if we went to an exhibition and saw it all as a painting. Or behind glass, like a terrarium.

There was someone else there for sure we talked about the view with. I checked in my modern book of dreams that butterflies mean I live for the moment, and don't care about the future, while flowers mean that I am longing for care and love. Though wild flowers that these looked like means a healthy and good love. While cacti shows that I don't think anyone would understand me so I'd rather not tell anyone a word.


Song Selection - Mercury Rev: Butterfly's Wing

how could they explain how I feel

I recall how I started to write things out of me, soon after I'd stopped drawing. Blogs, poems whatever felt like came handy. I had to be in the mood for it. Drawing could take more time, or if not so, at least a different attitude. There's something common in them then. The way you let it flow, and somehow make its own way as it comes true. But then how can even a thousands words give back as much as a few features.

 
It must be similar to how the cavemen used to catch the moments of hunting in their colorful paintings. Thus making it successful and real. Just like I felt many times when some of my sketches became so alive that it made me think I have really created someone. I have to admit sometimes I've even destroyed the paper being afraid of calling someone, something to life unwanted. Strange as it sounds, but it's true.


Story Sample -

Silver Screen - Milagro (The X-files Season 6)
Song Selection - School of Seven Bells: Half Asleep

5E7EN

"And the pale child Bakkalon will tear at you, and Naa-Slas feed upon your pain, and Saagael on your soul." Does Gaiman refer to the pale child Bakkalon when he writes about the Sandman? Could Naa-Slas be Despair, and may Saagel be Delirium? Do his heroes anything to do with the Seven in Martin's stories?
"Even when we are most alone the Seven are always with us. I have seen Despair in the eyes of the rats. Dream comes when the shadows are darkest, and sometimes Delirium attends him."


Story Sample -  George R. R. Martin: The Lonely Songs of Laren Dorr

Silver Screen - David Fincher: Seven
Song Selection - David Bowie: Seven

words are useless, especially sentences

I wonder if we ever really remember what we heard in our dreams. Were they the exact words, meaning that we interpret them when we wake up. Do we really communicate in our dreams with language as we use it awake. Or is it some kind of much older form when you see the meaning much clearer without pronouncing it, that would eventually change it.
It's like empty promises. You'd rather not say it will be or can be done, but do so if you have the chance. Also Eno's lyrics, like dadaist verses before, show that words can sound nice and melodious, but mean nothing at all. Just agreed symbols, like their written forms, the letters. Only a way trying to capture what's beyond them.


Story Sample - Bill Willingham: Soul Food

Silver Screen - Lawrence Kasdan: Dreamcatcher
Song Selection - Suzanne Vega: Language

a day in hell

What is déja vu, actually? Chemical dysfunction of the brain, a glitch in the matrix, or could it be a (maybe infinitely) repeating course of events? Maybe a chance to fix our mistakes, like in purgatorium? Some talk about this in a mysterious way, others try to make it funny. However it always sneaks through that we are deathly serious about if not the thing itself, but the reason why. Then it can be only our human mind trying to give some meaning to everything in this world and out of it.

 
Sometimes I recognize patterns repeating, see a movie about the same thing I've just read the other day, or something happens to me, and soon after I read a very similar story in a book. Surely, you can say it's because I focus on things I'm interested in, so I can easily notice these details. It has to do with personality, of course - some big changes or the lack of them, can make things seem so similar, because we are who we are. Might change, but maybe not enough, to turn the other way, or not to act by habit, but give it a second thought.

Then it's the people we meet in our life. And I don't mean those we talk with like good old acquaintances the very first time we see them. Some people you just feel like they have a certain function in your book. Yes, just like characters from a story you also play a role in. You realize someone similar with about the same mood, acting almost the exact same way, sometimes even looking a bit or a lot like someone else before in your life, who was there. For you? Or you for them? Very likely both. Just like things can happen again and again, who knows what for, to test you? See if you know what to do this time that was missed the last time it could have been done.


Story Sample - Neil Gaiman: Other People

Silver Screen - Monday (The X-files Season 6)
Song Selection - Harold Budd: Butterfly Sunday

feeling out of place

Strange how some dreams come back. Sometimes after a long long time, and you don't know what triggered your brain. Specially when you can't think of the place, the people, the situation in there as anything related to your life. Still almost all the details ring a bell in the scene you remember when you wake up. Maybe even while you're dreaming. At least that's how it seemed to me this morning. Even though there was nothing really particular about the whole of it.

Just felt lost in a building, or more precisely a lobby, while searching for the exit. Guess I also felt certain that I knew the way out. But instead of finding it, looked like I was on a higher floor, in a big open area. And while looking at the folks sitting on leather sofas amongst big plants, to ask them which way to go, felt kinda intruding. Though they were just talking in couples, they seemed to be pretty private by their expressions. Suddenly found myself in front of an office, opening from this lobby, hidden in a corner. The door open, and I was told by someone in there, that they were waiting for me. Or they might just ask if they could help. But the fact that I brought attention to myself, instead of getting out on my own, filled me with a sort of shrill, like being discovered where I shouldn't be.

When I woke up my heart was beating completely out of rhythm. Who knows, it might have been some noise waking me, though right then everything was still. I could see through an opening in the blinds that the sky was the gray just before dawning. I knew immediately that I had this kind of dream before. In a way the characters seemed to be familiar. Could be just the atmosphere. I remember I was wondering a lot why on earth would I feel so scared, just by being asked. Maybe I am afraid to ask for help about something, as a matter of fact.


Story Sample - The Castle (Sandman, The Kindly Ones, prologue)

Silver Screen - Dreamland (The X-files Season 6)
Song Selection - Madonna: Bedtime Story

A Christmas memory

I lost my touch and interest
with verse, rhythm and rhyme,
Got overflown with all the rest
and didn't have much time

Electricity drew lines on the wall
rays of sun circled 'round and scrawled,
They put an eclipse behind the lamp
I loved your envelope with 47 stamps

try to imagine what silence looks like

Well, the cough wouldn't go away, though it's been nearly a week now that I 've been taking some medicine the prescribed for it. Spent some time in bed first, but I don't seem to have any symptoms of having caught a flue, not even a cold. It's just the cough, so there definitely must be something stuck there that irritates. Seems to almost cease, then the next day I don't seem to be able to stop barking with nothing coming up at all. Think I should have my chest X-rayed, just to make sure it's not something dangerous. It occured to me, since I had once a tumor removed from my body, that even though that was like five years ago, it's better to be preventive.

Otherwise it was a relatively silent period, maybe too silent. Been waiting for someone to answer mails, instead I was doing it; or longed for some stuff I'd ordered before to arrive in vain, and I've just found more and - since it's cheaper with all the extras than in the shops, and don't have to search where they're can be bought - ordered some more. Waited for some news jobwise with no result, so registered at more recruiters' sites, which I actually don't really trust would help. They never found me via those companies, well, except for this job that will end soon. So, it won't hurt, and it also makes me look on more big firms' web pages what vacancies they have. 

All in all this week did have that particular impression on me, it dragged past me so slowly, the days fell on their knees, you know the song. Though it was nice to have more time and energy to do things I wouldn't do in between the usual 12-hours shifts. Also looked more into Norwegian, both the housework, words we learned, and could pick more articles by browsing through a few newspapers. Honestly haven't read on in any of the two Norwegian books I'm in now. Instead a lot English fiction and fantasy. And watching movies, walking, talking and playing dice and cards with Mom and friends.

It might be all because I thought I've done all I could to stop this coughing, why I feel like I miss something I'm constantly yearning for, not sure. Just this strange, inexplicable sensation of not being quite able to enjoy some rest, and being away from work. At least not deep inside my soul, always looking for something, waiting to hear from someone.


Story Sample - Ray Bradbury: The Watchers

Silver Screen - Folie À Deux (The X-files Season 5)
Song Selection - Zero 7: In The Waiting Line

genetic evil in the world

Got a dry cough started a few days ago as a little itching in my throat that developed like a biological warfare into the most embarrassing barking spasms. Well, viruses are used in biological warfare, and who knows, when most people I know complain about the same stuff for months now, what's in the air, and where it's coming from... And it's just coming back in different forms, like all my friends, relatives have this thing going on, and attacking their different sensories. My problem's right now is that it doesn't matter what kind of natural help I'm using to help to get something coming up it's still only dry cough.

Also my Norwegian friend complains about this, and to that my Australian one which is quite away from Iceland, if the volcano would be suspected to cause this, but then all this started for all of us a long time ago. In Norway they had unusually dry and polluted air, well in Australia the biggest heat waves for a long while.
We talked about the volcano eruptions being part of the severe weather events that had occured in the recent years, just like the hurricanes. As if self-healing methods of the Earth to gain back the balance in the biosphere. The ironic thing with the lava and ash particles is that they are needed in a way for the air, and they're organic part of the circulation of the whole ecosystem. However they stop planes flying, for instance. On the other hand if you think of how much we destroy the ozone layer when using the stratosphere, and how all that influences the life on this planet...

It was funny too, that I've just read a short story by a Norwegian author I like very much, about a little guy getting very sick, and demanding a kinda syrup they have against caughing. Today, while trying to rest and cure myself, been listening to Eno's Thursday Afternoon on repeat. I find this one-hour long quiet piece of music so relaxing, it goes like a flow, so gentle and as if it was a self-supporting, self-enclosed system - very becalming and very likely helps in healing. I was watching some episodes from the 80's Twilight Zone series just the other day. Many of them were great and sometimes still shocking to see, but there was one in particular that worked my imagination to an extreme.

It's happening on a hot summer day when a mom and her son, while driving through lonely sun scorched meadows, meet an old man in a dirty suit, coming out of nowhere. They give him a ride, and he asks the mom to drive faster. He says the sun is after him. When he goes on telling stories about genetic evil, people coming out of the dry ground like locusts to devour humans, one tire goes flat. They stop and the mom fixes it, but when they go on the man goes on with his scary stories, too, so they get rid of him.
They take a bath in a lake somewhere ahead on the road. When it's time to go home, the boy asks if there is a different road they can take. He actually is afraid now that they can meet the evil described so vividly by the old man. Soon they are stopped by a boy younger then him in a bright white suit, who says he got lost while his family had picnic out there. So they take him with them, and while they're still driving, the summer night falls fast. Suddenly the little boy says something to the mom that sounds like insect noise, and the car breaks down. They look at the boy who asks them if they have ever wondered whether there was such a thing as genetic evil in this world.

Story Sample - Bjarte Breiteig: En liten gutt en gang (A little boy once)

Silver Screen - J.D. Feigelson: The Burning Man (story: Ray Bradbury)
Song Selection - Brian Eno: I Dormienti (The Sleepers)

In the gates of dreams

I'm falling into a strange and dreamless nap
and sure you lean your head into my lap
Like I believe my face is on your chest
every night I put it down to rest

But my eyes glow with dark peace of loneliness
or what I write is just a heap of mess
And as it happens, it has to be this way
or if it hasn't, what could I then say

meg sjøl

Jeg heter Jani, er førti år, og jobber hos et multinasjonal selskap som en analyst. Jeg har begynnt å lære norsk for omtrent to år siden, men hadde et halv år pause. I løpet av disse måneder leste jeg noen bøker på norsk for å øve på språket. Min favoritt er Bjarte Breiteigs noveller fordi han skriver morsomme og samtidig veldig dype fortellinger. De er ganske lett å forstå for utlendinger som kan noe norsk også.
Det er noen filmer jeg har sett og kunne forstå helt bra. Noen ganger bare med undertekster, da folk snakket med tydelig dialekt. Noen av filmene jeg likte best var Den brysomme mannen og Mannen som elsket Yngve. Kanskje fordi den andre spilles i Stavanger hvor jeg besøkte en god venn for noen år siden. Jeg har også noen norske kortfilmer fra denne vennen. En som jeg kan huske akkurat nå har tittelen Caravan, og er om et ungt par som krangler nok til at det blir livsfarlig.
Jeg har ventet på å starte dette kurset veldig mye, fordi jeg trenger å lære flere ord, uttrykk og grammatikk. Jeg må også gjenta noen ting jeg vet, men ikke brukte. Jeg håper at jeg kan norsk mye bedre når kurset slutter.

"all the heavy slumbers, cruel insomnias, vain dreams, spoilt pleasures, and infinitely diverse miseries that a great city contains"

Tonight I had a flying dream that I hadn't have for a good while. True it was not real flying, but it used to be like that before. Sometimes I had a walking stick and before I could realize I was going up in the air, as if on some invisible steps. This time I guess I was back that looked somewhat like the yard of my primary school, and it indeed seemed to be a kind of jumping competition. But then we could make it high enough so that you could call it flying. It took me like sliding down on the big wide steps of the main stairway from the top floor. Just letting my feet take the way down instead of stepping. Then as I popped out off the door and into the yard, where I think I just bounced like a ricochet, off the ground, and so catching a long twig that would help me forward, got then thrown on the roof. There I was speculating about the next jump, where to land to get enough speed for a bigger hop.

 
And as I was walking on the flat top of the modern part of the building, I saw a few life-sized McDo figures as if just waiting there for me. I might have had them in some earlier dreams of mine, not quite sure now, but there and then they didn't even surprise me. I wonder if they're representing danger or open threatening since I saw the movie adaptation of Stephen King's IT. I used to look up an old Book of Dreams when remembering details this clear. But sometimes they wouldn't help, not even the modern book that does have more relevant explanations most of the time. Also if I can come up with a very likely solution of the symbols, that's good enough for me. Anyhow as I reached the red-yellow clown - almost sure it was on his own by now - it started to make some low and deep grumbling noises instead of any talking. It was not frightening, though this might have been the goal, but still very distracting, and leaving me unable to calculate any safe landing plans. So it made it quite clear for me that my flying (freedom) successes were not welcome by the commercially expected (and forced), that's to put it simply, ruling by covering your eyes from your real chances.

Finally I met someone we spent some time with, in an old and partly or maybe mostly abandoned building. Sometimes I could see this person, and then without any obvious reason, only hear, and so guess of the whereabouts. But it was not like in my previous dream, when I only heard a voice as if a comment, so it didn't surprise me at all not to see the person it came from. Here it was rather different, and seemed like when this one was busy, and didn't want to be bothered, then simply became invisible. Then I could be convincing enough to gain seeing again. I'm uncertain if this was a ghost, but right there I found it was a person I knew before in my real life, and trusted or even loved.

Story Sample - Stephen King: The Tommyknockers

Silver Screen - Tommy Lee Wallac: It (story: Stephen King)

Song Selection - Roy Orbison: In Dreams

strange fascination fascinates me

It's been a while since I've watched some X-files, and even though the story I read last night was from a famous sci-fi author, but not a fantastic story. Still I had a dream where all such things happened and got mixed with elements that I only realized were from my real life, after I woke up. 

Think I was hanging out with as a boy of about ten with another kiddo, probably from the same class, though I don't remember I recognized him in the dream or when conscious. We dropped in at his place, and his mom sent him to have a bath (guess we messed ourselves while playing outside). I had to use the loo, and it was in another bathroom where the tub bottom was all scratched. So I thought this was where they bathed the dog. Funny you get such things on your mind when asleep. At least it's not a common situation or I didn't have reason to think of stuff like that lately.

Then somehow the mom with the daughter were in there, and we were discussing some more serious matters. Also I was a young adult or late teen, and so were the girl. We decided to get into the car and find a place in town. I also remember to have a seat pressed to the girl in the back of a car that even had a wider back above the wheels, making it look quite futuristic. The place was some kind of an old abandoned garage made of wood, inside a small backyard surrounded by walls. I remember we left the gate open wide, as the whole little street was completely silent in the twilight. (When I woke up I knew it was the street where the kindergarten I used to go to was, and later the way I used to go to primary school)

God only knows what we were looking for there - maybe our suddenly lost youth. For some reason, I felt like I needed to stay guard while the others were busy with their mission (I didn't feel much involved). So I was standing near the gate, and, using my hand to shade my eyes against the light coming from the garage/barn, I was looking up into the already dark sky, spotting moving lights amongst the many shiny stars. I recall - even now as I'm writing this - seeing one that I clearly found to be a plane moving smooth along its route, and some others that wouldn't bother me.

However all of a sudden something strange and inexplicable started down there. The daughter got somehow shrunk and closed inside - the best way to explain it would be, as if a ginnie in a bottle, so only her distorted face was visible, but that was projected on the surface of the wood, I guess. The others didn't seem to be anywhere anymore, no traces or clue, but I was looking for their memories, and found myself staring at some planks and nails on the structure of the barn/garage. Guess the only one who was still there with me, was the mom, but I could only hear her voice, suggesting to call the police, and also get away.

(Actually it could be that we got into the car after this, with the wider backside - which could easily happen in a dream, but also in reality/time that surprises us all the time with the way of its variations/dimensions.) And I am not quite sure because of this gap/switch in the story, if it was then that I was then walking out of this street, and looking on that square I could hardly avoid making my way home in real life (though in my dream I didn't recognize it). It was not dusk, but more like a cloudy morning, and some folks were around as on an ordinary day. Someone I saw from behind and seemed to have straw hair (literally made of straw), turned back, not looking at me with eyes, as didn't have one, but the face seemed to be made of sack canvas, and yet a pair of glass put on it under a hat.

This frightened me more than anything that went on in that little yard before. And I think it was then, that we were back there again, and showed the place to the police. As we stepped out to the street, we saw a chaotic recollection of the events we told them, as if an absurd Yellow Submarine scene, impressed on the back of a bigger vehicle. Some pictures cut out off the material world and moved in 3D, others difficult even to comprehend. The last thing I seem to be able to recall is an office I was sitting in at a computer typing the things, like I'm doing now, as if in a chat to a friend. Funnily then he answered, and I guess, he asked me to look at the display of the printer, or why else would I do that. There I read something like 'April's print fool'. And that's the end of story.

Story Sample - Ray Bradbury: The Whole Town's Sleeping

Silver Screen -  Rod Serling: The After Hours

Song Selection - Madonna: Skin

Tel-Aviv

It was no surprise to have all the flashbacks from the Spring Hill (that Tel-Aviv stands for) after I have just returned from there. I had actually arrived there in early May, and it did look beautiful like spring itself.

When the Shabbat started, and we finished working in the editorial, I used to go down to old Yafo. Sat in the shades, and read, or just looked down on the new city, and over the sea, into the distance.

But that was many years ago, and all of a sudden, I had certain streets and shop windows I used to pass when living there, on my mind again. This happened one of these days, without even having some nostalgic thoughts beforehand. And the feeling was so overwhelming, as if I've just come back home through that street.

Would be great to go back, but also quite complicated, and it didn't turn out as a financial success in the first place. Guess it would be even more difficult now, also all the explanations why do I want to go back now as a citizen, after leaving the country in half a year or so as a new immigrant.

Story Sample - Meir Shalev: The Blue Mountain

Silver Screen - Terry Gilliam: Brazil

Song Selection - Kate Bush: The Dreaming

job situation (Carol but not Christmas)

I admit that I have some fears now that the end of this job I have is getting closer. And also when I think about the people I worked with in these past 3 years, as many of them could be my children or close to that age. Say I find a similar job, the chances are big to get the same average team age. The problem is I'm not sure if I can survive another dynamically flexible, multinational (at my work 5% foreigners is too much to say, but then they should be paid better...) environment. One where everyone is encouraged to develop their own personal values, but strangely in a way that they all end up acting, thinking maybe even looking the same way.

Don't get me wrong, it's not the age I can't deal with, but the habits - or maybe not even that. It can be simply that it was only me and my friends taking our job seriously even as youngsters. While the majority of these people I work with now, prefer to find the easy way. So as an interpretation of the team work, leave the actual work for the others, while they try their luck with fanning the management, if you see what I mean... And the bad thing is that they succeed this way.

I do remember how it was like to work with people of my parents' age in my early twenties. I surely didn't care much about the personal stuff, but definitely did what I was supposed to. And did it with care, and on time, and in overtime if so needed. Of course, life also seems easier at that age, then with two decades added to it.

Still I do what I'm paid for, as I'm not one of those lucky folk who have jobs what they have talent for, and enjoy to do it. Nevertheless I try and do things at work the best as I can, also because I believe it makes things easier for me, and for my colleagues. But I feel quite bad since this is not what matters when it comes to who gets a job that needs the experience.

For instance, not so long ago, there was a vacancy in a similar, almost the same job I do now, inside the company. I applied for it, and was interviewed (bit funny that was, as if I came from somewhere else, and had not been working here for years...). Now the job was given to someone who did this job for two weeks, and my experience of half year was not convincing enough. I have my doubts whether they looked at my performance though. At the end of the interview, my boss-to-be asked me 'oh, yeah, and by the way, do you play any instruments?'. Well, I don't, and agree that if it was a musical institute it had some relevance. But since it's IT support...

However, now that another vacancy had been announced at the same team, I have applied for it again. This time they have even asked for an updated CV, as if they didn't have the one at HR. So I sent it with my application. Then in a few days the team leader asked if I could send it, not again, but as if I hadn't done it already. So, I have sent it again. Now I am waiting for a word about the same position I was once rejected from, and that was given to someone who is playing in a trash metal band, after all. Well I need to earn my living some way or another. Maybe I should start to learn how to play the guitar?

Story Sample - Konrad Lorenz: Civilized Man's Eight Deadly Sins

Silver Screen - Christmas Carol (The X-files Season 5)

Song Selection - Eurythmics: Sweet Dreams (Are Made Of This)

if you prefer climate change to global warming, what would you say instead of the distruction of the ozone layer - an ecological experiment?

I praise the rain

that comes again

though polluted

it brings migraine

It is changing

day by day
makes you wish
that it would stay

But the sun is
killing as it comes
it's just burning
hardly warms

Guess I should try again with haiku...  

Story Sample - Ryūnosuke Akutagawa: Rashōmon
Silver Screen - Franny Armstrong: The Age of Stupid

Song Selection - The Mamas & the Papas: Dream A Little Dream Of Me

viiii

Jeg husker dem spaserende langs en av de små vågene omkring Stavanger. Kanskje det var hele familien, men jeg kan se klart bestemor smile, og mor som sier til sønnen sin "viiii" mens hun kaster en gren ut i sjøen. Måkene flyr bortover og skriker. Nettopp på den samme måte "viiii". Jeg smiler alltid når jeg tenker på det, selv om det skjedde mange år før.

they're scenes before your eyes

I was watching through the Bowie video collection with the same old feeling I had so many times before doing so. What new can I see? Will I still enjoy it them? I have seen it all countless times before... But then that's the very answer - I've watched them again and again because I can't get bored with them. On the contrary, they stir my imagination, make me laugh, or sad beyond any explicable reason, and when I get to the end I just wish to see, and read, and hear more from whatever Bowie has done. His lyrics, his stories, his tunes, his artwork, his characters, even the animated ones like Boz in the Nomad Soul.

Even though I've always had a talent for drawing, painting, and arranging things, I remember what a big inspiration his impersonations of all the different characters in his songs meant to me. Made me try to sketch dozens of the photos featured on the album sleeves, and try different techniques. Here are a few.

Story Sample - Hugo Wilcken: Low

Silver Screen - Walter Stern: Survive (song: David Bowie)

Song Selection - David Bowie: An Occasional Dream

Musikk for flyplasser

This is a composition I wrote for a Norwegian course I'd applied for, as part of the test. I still don't have the result, as the course will only start in another week. I'm really looking forward to it, as I had a big gap in my learning. I am still reading books, watching movies, and chat with my friend in Norway now and then. But I definitely need to learn more grammar, gain wider vocabulary, and be familiar with more expressions. This is about my big-time fav, Brian Eno, and how I 'discovered' his music, and why I like it so much. (This version is now with my teacher's correction, and suggestions from my Norwegian friend.)

Jeg ble opptatt av musikken av Brian Eno da jeg hørte på noen album av David Bowie. Bare jeg ikke visste at Eno spilte på dem, fordi jeg fikk kopiene av Low og Heroes av broren min. Det var i 1986, i en verden uten internett, og bare tittlene stod på kassettene og ikke andre detaljer. Men jeg var helt sikker på at denne musikken aldri ville bli kjedelig for meg. 
Faktisk kjøpte jeg de første Eno-platene mine, på vei til en Bowie-konsert, og brukte opp alle  sparepengene mine. Det var noen av hans tidlige solo sanger lignende de rockalbumene som han spilte sammen med Roxy Music på. Noen av Roxy medlemmene jobbet med Eno på de første platene hans. Men det jeg lurte på var den såkalte ambientmusikken som var resultat av de musikalske eksperimentene Eno gjorde i studio. På grunn av den likte jeg Low og Heroes så veldig mye. Melodiene hørtes vakre og enkle ut, men samtidig komplekse.

Dette er typisk Eno-musikk, ren eksperiment og ganske detaljert jobb. Selv om de tidligere morsomme sangene hans også viste sannheten som han selv erkjennte: Han har aldri fått musikkutdanning. Det mente også uavhengighet av tradisjonene og så kunne han gå på veier som var enda uprøvet. Som han sa det, kunne han gjøre ting som ingen hadde tenkt på før, fordi det var uvanlig, og ikke populært. Dessuten brukte han studioet som et instrument, og komponerte sine stykkene der inne. Han skrev ikke aldri musikken og sjelden tekstene, før han gikk i studioet. Han var meget påvirket av komponister som Karlheinz Stockhausen, John Cage, Philip Glass, og mange andre som experimenterte med diverse revolusjonære metoder i sine egne tider. Eno spilte noen visse melodier opp på gjentagelse og lot dem bli noe nytt på en mekanisk måte.

Eno jobbet med massevis av bander, så lærte og oppdaget han mye som han brukte i sine verk. Ett av de betydeligste bandene for ham var Harmonia eller Cluster, som de kalte seg senere. Sammen laget de grunnen til ambientmusikk. Noe som inneholder lyder fra naturen eller andre miljøer som om de var sine egne lyder. Derfor jeg liker denne musikken så veldig godt. På den ene siden fungerer den som bakgrunnsmusikk, f. eks når man leser eller studerer. På den andre siden kan man bare lytte, og   alltid noe nytt til å finne.

Story Sample - Nick Cave: The Death of Bunny Munro

Silver Screen - Monthy Python and The Holy Grail

Song Selection - Gila: This Morning

We saw the Minotaur

It is more than funny that I just happened to read this story by Neil Gaiman entitled Closing Times before I'd share this dream of mine about such similar feelings of people at the same age facing the same fear.

I was back at primary school, in the dressing room next the gym hall located at the entrance of the building. There were two of us in there, but I can only remember knowing the person, but no face, name or if it was a real person from my life at all. Only that I was absolutely sure about their trustworthiness.
 And then all of a sudden, this certainty ceased, as summers can when it's still sunny, but the air cools down and the trees, and even the plants inside the room, start to drop their leaves in a manic terror of loosing the life-giving sun. That's how it felt to realize that my mate was not to believe in.

I asked in growing horror if the third of us came out of the gym hall, too, before turning off the lights, and closing the door. As the answer was only a 'thought so' I felt nimble in mind, but lame in limbs to move at all. Now the door was open again, but for our call to the missing one we could only hear a strange noise, resembling of horse-shoes running around there, in the fully dark hall, with an ecstatic speed. That of a tiny insect which gets inside the circle of a lamplight, and is unable to get free of its spell anymore.
And while the moment of waiting passed, I could see an idiotic smile on the other's face turned into the blind blackness, looking at what we were already sure about, was not our forgotten friend.

I gathered my mind and force, and broke out of the place to the open air - though free air brought no free breath. The light outside was very dim, that of an already passed sunset. Also I was completely sure that by leaving the place I lost my fellow.
 To answer my grim guess a Minotaur ran out of the building, and headed toward me. While I could only stand there all numb, fascinated by my own attraction to it. Simply for some crazy way of proving its ability to exist for me. I felt icy creeks running down my back, caused by the shock, as it was all so very very awful and never wished to be seen.

Ever since I used to wonder what would bring such nightmares alive. Only the noise factor like some banging somewhere in the building that woke me, or more. Is it fear, and of what? Is it the other people all the time, or myself?

It is quite a challenge to put these impressions all down, as you face them at the gate to the dreamworld, just when entering it, or maybe on your way back. So I might as well be thankful for my neighbs to wake me up right when I'm about to fall asleep, so often.

Story Sample - Neil Gaiman: The Monarch of the Glen

Silver Screen - Tsuruta Norio: Premonition

Song Selection - Brian Eno: Thursday Afternoon

An imaginary date

Sitting in the sun, with my eyes closed against it
I can hear only sounds, my face blown by cold wind,
And on the other side of my lids, it's you smiling at me
in the sun, in the wind, just as if you were here

The gulls scream as they ride the waves by the riverside
and when a boat comes by, they'd rise and away they fly,
And as I sit watching them, my right shoulder starts to ache
it was me whom you could see, wearing my own age

Is it any wonder, I reject you first?

today was a day of rejections, at least in the end I decided not to take it so bad to save me from more bad stuff, already having some flue and fever for a few days, and still having to work.

first i received a rejection from a company i have been to for a test which they told me turned out very good and even called me from the recruiter to discuss salary and such details. then today in the email they said they had to say no to me as my skills and experiences in my cv did not match their expectations, as if i did not even attend the test they valuated as very good.

recently i was applying for a course but the organization procedure seems to digest the very thing itself, but maybe i was just too impatient, and had less to do at work today, so was able to check more frequently if i got the answer from the teacher.

actually it is a norwegian course as the teacher with whom i started to learn and got so far, has been planning to move to norway. i contacted her in email like two months back now, but then she went silent more than a month ago. today i decided to call her, maybe to have good news - i was thinking she might have already moved and started a new life there.

on the contrary, when she called me back, she burst into tears when telling me things were not that good. so i got an answer in the end about someone else being rejected...

even my query to have my shift changed in case the course would start had been turned down

i had another desperate try yet, calling an old friend who has been home with a foot that has to heal before she can walk again. however she did not take answer the phone.

i think i have to admit this is not my day - or i'm just going the wrong way

Story Sample - Theodore Sturgeon: Yesterday was Monday

Silver Screen - Roy Andersson: World of Glory
Song Selection - Harmonia & Eno: Sometimes in Autumn

Yesterday was Monday

So it had/not to come to this point again, and here I go writing a blog again. I don't write it in Norwegian yet, and not in Hungarian either. For both there must be a reason, certainly. Dilemmas most likely, and when you don't solve them, they can grow like thick bush so that they make you feel losing focus, and get lost.

Surely to get here I needed at least these two days in relative peace with a mobile turned off, and only chatting, mailing, talking with friends and family. Then it came to me, after putting down a short story by Neil Gaiman, and trying to have some rest before starting another row of 12-hours night shift.

That means I lost some of it in the slumbering, but it still lives vividly in me as it occured to me in the first moment. I mean the memory that I believed to be the reason to start writing it out of me again. It could have been awaken by another story about another dimension/aspect taking over the one we're living in.

In the story a man discovers that millions of people dying around the world, made the world actually look like the way we see it, and now as they're dying, it's fading out and into something completely different. And only in these few minutes of rest I took, it was that I suddenly remembered a most unearthly experience I had as still a little kid so many years ago.

I was playing with the others in the yard of the kindergarten, running wild, and enjoying to be completely without any responsibilities. The next thing I recall is that I am screaming and crying beyond comfort in the arms of a nanny, yet feeling alien to her, too. I saw everyone around me as aliens, or what I called it then, devils.

Simple as it is, all the people around me - including the nanny holding and trying to comfort me - seemed so strange and unrecognizable to me, beyond any knowledge that would have helped me to express what made me shriek that much. So all I could do was closing my eyes, and keeping them like that. But still when I opened them, I saw the very same, even after several minutes.

That was a long time ago, and of course, during the many years, I learned to tell... Well, maybe not exactly what it was, but what science, and different people might say about it, and how they used to explain it. Sure it still wouldn't leave me alone, but it falls back in that faraway place in the back of my mind, and looks like it's coming back whenever I face changes and decisions.


Story Sample - Clifford D. Simak and Carl Jacobi: The Street That Wasn't There

Silver Screen - Jens Lien: The Bothersome Man

Song Selection - Michael Brook: Midday