"Europa verantwoordde de kolonisatie van de rest van de wereld met mooie begrippen als beschaving en vooruitgang, terwijl het in realiteit een manier was om greep te krijgen op de natuurlijke rijkdommen van andere volkeren. Dat moet ik jou als Belg niet uitleggen. India, dat zichzelf ziet als een eenentwintigste-eeuwse supermacht, heeft die mogelijkheid niet, dus koloniseert het zichzelf. Op de plaatsen waar rijkdom in de grond zit, koloniseert India zijn eigen bevolking en territorium. Om dat te verantwoorden worden ook hier de begrippen beschaving, geluk en vooruitgang geherdefinieerd."
http://www.mo.be/artikel/arundhati-roy-stop-de-verspilling-herover-de-verbeelding
donderdag 28 april 2011
woensdag 27 april 2011
The world is coming to an end
As I’m walking down the street I think to myself ‘the world is fucked up and it’d be better for everyone to commit suicide’. After that I buy a ticket on the tram. The tram driver is very polite, even greets me with a smile and I notice how his uniform and tie completely, impeccably match, just like his hairdo and his smile. I take a seat and wait and look outside the window, avoiding to make any eye contact with any of the other passengers. The two old ladies with their dogs chatting about the 16-year old daughter of someone they know. How she turned out to be pregnant not so long ago. What a shame it is. Or the guy in the suit reading the financial pages of a high profile newspaper. No doubt checking how his stocks are holding up. Or the boy with his long, black, leather overcoat wearing lipstick, perhaps trying to shock the world with his looks, maybe wanting to make a statement against all kinds of conventions in our society, or maybe against his teachers that fail to recognize his self proclaimed artistic talents, or maybe against his parents who order him to be home by one o’clock every Saturday night. But I ignore them all. Thank god for ipod. Or discman. Or walkman, for all I care. I don’t want to sound like a snob here after all. Once arrived in the city center I get off the tram, glad to be leaving the bunch of losers on it behind me.
What was it again I had set out for myself to do? Oh yes, buying flowers for my girlfriend. That sweet little angel of mine that cooks me delicious dinners, surprises me with little presents every now and then and has sworn to love me until the moon falls from the sky, the stars don’t see the point in shining anymore and the deserts have taken over control of all the other earthly landscapes. And even then, she has told me, I will still love you. Someone who says those kind of things to me is bound to be the love of my life. That’s the only thing I’m almost sure about. And I love her too. And pitty her as well, because every day she has to face all kinds of people at the bookshop she works in. People with bad breath, people with dandruff on their shoulders, people who have no time, no manners, no deodorant. People who think they always should be served first. People who think she has nothing else to do all day, but wait for them to come so she can help them with that sweet smile on that beautiful face of hers and who in the end still have the guts to ask for a discount. And Orthodox Jews who are afraid she will touch them when handing back their change, because someone, somewhere, at some point has decided it is forbidden for them to touch any non Orthodox Jewish women. Still, she manages to be patient with them. As she is patient with me.
‘Hey Stijn, how are you?!’ someone behind me suddenly asks. I turn around and immediately recognize Paul, a guy I’ve been to school with years ago. I pretend not to recognize him. ‘It’s me, Paul, the guy you’ve been to school with, remember?’ Do I look like I’d remember you if I didn’t have such a great memory for all the scapegoats, wankers and tossers that crossed my path at some sorry point in my life? ‘Hi Paul, I’m fine, how are you?’
Although I’m not the kind of writer who likes to omit any thrilling details from his daily life, right now I can’t be bothered to describe the chitchat that follows between Paul and me, which ends up in Paul asking me to go and have a drink somewhere, which I agree with in all my weakness. So we go to some pub I know and sit down to have that drink.
‘An apple juice, please’ I say when the waitress comes around. Paul orders a beer. ‘You’re drinking apple juice?’ Paul asks with a certain disdain in his voice. ‘Yes’ I say, ‘I find it refreshing and I like the taste’. What’s his fucking problem anyway? I’ll tell you what his problem is. It’s 14h26 in the afternoon and he’s drinking beer. That’s what his problem is. Paul seems to be pondering over my answer, while we wait in silence for the apple juice and the beer to arrive. I light a cigarette. ‘I didn’t know you smoked. I thought you were always so much against smoking’ Paul tries to change the subject. ‘I still am very much against smoking’. For christ sake, does anyone need these kind of conversations? Paul looks confused. ‘Well, I guess many things have changed since our school days’.
‘That’s an almost certain probability, Paul’.
The waitress arrives with our drinks. She’s definitely not over twenty and is wearing a nice skirt allowing her beautifully tanned legs to get the appreciative looks they deserve. I imagine waiting for her until the end of her shift and going together to her place to play sexual games, one of which including me licking a green olive that is pressed between her divinely pink labia minora as she stands naked above me on the kitchen floor. Black olives really don’t do it for me. Green olives are the only kind I like. Though I had to learn to appreciate them. It’s an acquired taste, as they say. Anyway, I think waitresses are per definition one of the sexiest creatures on this planet. They are one of the main reasons for me to frequent bars. Even the ugly waitresses. This one looks far from ugly however.
‘Could I have a steak with french fries as well, please?’ I don’t know if it’s the thought of olives, but suddenly I feel hungry as hell. ‘Of course sir’ the lovely waitress replies. ‘How do you want your steak?’ ‘Well done’.
‘Djeezes, are you eating steak at this time of day?’ Paul says surprised. I’m telling you, this Paul is really starting to get on my nerves. Not only is he asking unnecessary questions, he also throws in words like ‘djeezes’, which he probably thinks is cool, except that it’s not. Perhaps for a teenager it is. But not for him and certainly not for me. If I had a chainsaw I’d cut him in a million little pieces and feed him to the pigeons. Or just a fork. I’d fork him down. But I’m completely unarmed.
‘I feel like eating steak Paul. And I think that when someone has an appetite for steak and can afford to buy it, no time of day should stop him giving in to his appetite.’
‘I guess you’re right about that, but I couldn’t eat steak. I’m a vegetarian.’
‘Of course I’m right, you idiot.’
Paul didn’t hear me because while sipping at his beer he was unashamedly checking out the waitress’ behind as she was walking away from our table, that disrespectful pervert.
‘Im sorry, what did you say?’
‘I said, why would you want to be a vegetarian?’
‘There’s plenty of reasons, actually. Apart from the fact that you feel much better and have much more energy, there’s also the fact that people in third world countries are starving because they need all their harvest to feed their cattle, so we, rich Western people can eat nice steaks.’
‘That’s a lot of facts. I see you’ve given it a lot of thought, Paul. Those are very convincing arguments indeed. In fact so much so that I think that after this steak I’ll never eat meat again.’ I may drop dead on the spot if I meant that.
Paul finishes his beer and stands up. ‘I’m glad to have convinced you Stijn. But I have to go now. Got to pick up my children at school.’ The thought of Paul having offspring mercilessly cuts my appetite. ‘Too bad you have to go already Paul. I hope we’ll bump into each other again so we can talk a bit more’.
‘I was just about to say the same. See you around Stijn. It was nice meeting you again.’ He leaves the bar without paying for his beer, the jerk.
After having finished my steak, leaving more in my plate than I manage to eat, I ask for the bill, pay it, adding a reasonable tip for the waitress and go to the flower shop.
It’s closed.
I walk back home where my perfect girlfriend is waiting for me. I take her in my arms, kiss her and tell her the world is coming to an end. Then I ly down on the sofa with my head on her lap and finally fall asleep.
What was it again I had set out for myself to do? Oh yes, buying flowers for my girlfriend. That sweet little angel of mine that cooks me delicious dinners, surprises me with little presents every now and then and has sworn to love me until the moon falls from the sky, the stars don’t see the point in shining anymore and the deserts have taken over control of all the other earthly landscapes. And even then, she has told me, I will still love you. Someone who says those kind of things to me is bound to be the love of my life. That’s the only thing I’m almost sure about. And I love her too. And pitty her as well, because every day she has to face all kinds of people at the bookshop she works in. People with bad breath, people with dandruff on their shoulders, people who have no time, no manners, no deodorant. People who think they always should be served first. People who think she has nothing else to do all day, but wait for them to come so she can help them with that sweet smile on that beautiful face of hers and who in the end still have the guts to ask for a discount. And Orthodox Jews who are afraid she will touch them when handing back their change, because someone, somewhere, at some point has decided it is forbidden for them to touch any non Orthodox Jewish women. Still, she manages to be patient with them. As she is patient with me.
‘Hey Stijn, how are you?!’ someone behind me suddenly asks. I turn around and immediately recognize Paul, a guy I’ve been to school with years ago. I pretend not to recognize him. ‘It’s me, Paul, the guy you’ve been to school with, remember?’ Do I look like I’d remember you if I didn’t have such a great memory for all the scapegoats, wankers and tossers that crossed my path at some sorry point in my life? ‘Hi Paul, I’m fine, how are you?’
Although I’m not the kind of writer who likes to omit any thrilling details from his daily life, right now I can’t be bothered to describe the chitchat that follows between Paul and me, which ends up in Paul asking me to go and have a drink somewhere, which I agree with in all my weakness. So we go to some pub I know and sit down to have that drink.
‘An apple juice, please’ I say when the waitress comes around. Paul orders a beer. ‘You’re drinking apple juice?’ Paul asks with a certain disdain in his voice. ‘Yes’ I say, ‘I find it refreshing and I like the taste’. What’s his fucking problem anyway? I’ll tell you what his problem is. It’s 14h26 in the afternoon and he’s drinking beer. That’s what his problem is. Paul seems to be pondering over my answer, while we wait in silence for the apple juice and the beer to arrive. I light a cigarette. ‘I didn’t know you smoked. I thought you were always so much against smoking’ Paul tries to change the subject. ‘I still am very much against smoking’. For christ sake, does anyone need these kind of conversations? Paul looks confused. ‘Well, I guess many things have changed since our school days’.
‘That’s an almost certain probability, Paul’.
The waitress arrives with our drinks. She’s definitely not over twenty and is wearing a nice skirt allowing her beautifully tanned legs to get the appreciative looks they deserve. I imagine waiting for her until the end of her shift and going together to her place to play sexual games, one of which including me licking a green olive that is pressed between her divinely pink labia minora as she stands naked above me on the kitchen floor. Black olives really don’t do it for me. Green olives are the only kind I like. Though I had to learn to appreciate them. It’s an acquired taste, as they say. Anyway, I think waitresses are per definition one of the sexiest creatures on this planet. They are one of the main reasons for me to frequent bars. Even the ugly waitresses. This one looks far from ugly however.
‘Could I have a steak with french fries as well, please?’ I don’t know if it’s the thought of olives, but suddenly I feel hungry as hell. ‘Of course sir’ the lovely waitress replies. ‘How do you want your steak?’ ‘Well done’.
‘Djeezes, are you eating steak at this time of day?’ Paul says surprised. I’m telling you, this Paul is really starting to get on my nerves. Not only is he asking unnecessary questions, he also throws in words like ‘djeezes’, which he probably thinks is cool, except that it’s not. Perhaps for a teenager it is. But not for him and certainly not for me. If I had a chainsaw I’d cut him in a million little pieces and feed him to the pigeons. Or just a fork. I’d fork him down. But I’m completely unarmed.
‘I feel like eating steak Paul. And I think that when someone has an appetite for steak and can afford to buy it, no time of day should stop him giving in to his appetite.’
‘I guess you’re right about that, but I couldn’t eat steak. I’m a vegetarian.’
‘Of course I’m right, you idiot.’
Paul didn’t hear me because while sipping at his beer he was unashamedly checking out the waitress’ behind as she was walking away from our table, that disrespectful pervert.
‘Im sorry, what did you say?’
‘I said, why would you want to be a vegetarian?’
‘There’s plenty of reasons, actually. Apart from the fact that you feel much better and have much more energy, there’s also the fact that people in third world countries are starving because they need all their harvest to feed their cattle, so we, rich Western people can eat nice steaks.’
‘That’s a lot of facts. I see you’ve given it a lot of thought, Paul. Those are very convincing arguments indeed. In fact so much so that I think that after this steak I’ll never eat meat again.’ I may drop dead on the spot if I meant that.
Paul finishes his beer and stands up. ‘I’m glad to have convinced you Stijn. But I have to go now. Got to pick up my children at school.’ The thought of Paul having offspring mercilessly cuts my appetite. ‘Too bad you have to go already Paul. I hope we’ll bump into each other again so we can talk a bit more’.
‘I was just about to say the same. See you around Stijn. It was nice meeting you again.’ He leaves the bar without paying for his beer, the jerk.
After having finished my steak, leaving more in my plate than I manage to eat, I ask for the bill, pay it, adding a reasonable tip for the waitress and go to the flower shop.
It’s closed.
I walk back home where my perfect girlfriend is waiting for me. I take her in my arms, kiss her and tell her the world is coming to an end. Then I ly down on the sofa with my head on her lap and finally fall asleep.
Non-belongers
"For a long time I have believed (...) that in every generation there are a few souls, call them lucky or cursed, who are simply born not belonging, who come into the world semi-detached, if you like, without strong affiliation to family or location or nation or race; that there may be even millions, billions of such souls, as many non-belongers as belongers, perhaps; that, in sum, the phenomenon may be as "natural" a manifestation of human nature as its opposite, but one that has been mostly frustrated, throughout human history, by lack of opportunity. And not only by that: for those who value stability, who fear transience, uncertainty, change, have erected a powerful system of stigmas and taboos against rootlessness, that disruptive, anti-social force, so that we mostly conform, we pretend to be motivated by loyalties and solidarities we do not really feel, we hide our secret identities beneath the false skins of those identities which bear the belongers' seal of approval. But the truth is leaking out in our dreams; alone in our beds (because we are all alone at night, even if we do not sleep by ourselves), we soar, we fly, we flee. And in the waking dreams our societies permit, in our myths, our arts, our songs, we celebrate the non-belongers, the different ones, the outlaws, the freaks. What we forbid ourselves we pay good money to watch, in a playhouse or movie theatre, or to read about between the secret covers of a book. Our libraries, our palaces of entertainment tell the truth. The tramp, the assassin, the rebel, the thief, the mutant, the outcast, the delinquent, the devil, the sinner, the traveller, the gangster, the runner, the mask: if we did not recognize in them our least-fulfilled needs, we would not invent them over and over again, in every place, in every language, in every time.
No sooner did we have ships than we rushed to the sea, sailing across oceans in paper boats. No sooner did we have cars than we hit the road. No sooner did we have airplanes than we zoomed to the furthest corners of the globe. Now we yearn for the moon's dark side, the rocky plains of Mars, the rings of Saturn, the interstellar deeps. We send mechanical photographers into orbit, or on one-way journeys to the stars, and we weep at the wonders they transmit; we are humbled by the mighty images of far-off galaxies standing like cloud pillars in the sky, and we give names to alien rocks, as if they were our pets. We hunger for warp space, for the outlying rim of time. And this is the species that kids itself it likes to stay at home, to bind itself with -what are they called again?-ties.
That's my view. You don't have to buy it. Maybe there are many of us, after all. Maybe we are disruptive and anti-social and shouldn't be allowed. You're entitled to your opinion. All I will say is: sleep soundly, baby. Sleep tight and sweet dreams."
(Salman Rushdie - The ground beneath her feet)
No sooner did we have ships than we rushed to the sea, sailing across oceans in paper boats. No sooner did we have cars than we hit the road. No sooner did we have airplanes than we zoomed to the furthest corners of the globe. Now we yearn for the moon's dark side, the rocky plains of Mars, the rings of Saturn, the interstellar deeps. We send mechanical photographers into orbit, or on one-way journeys to the stars, and we weep at the wonders they transmit; we are humbled by the mighty images of far-off galaxies standing like cloud pillars in the sky, and we give names to alien rocks, as if they were our pets. We hunger for warp space, for the outlying rim of time. And this is the species that kids itself it likes to stay at home, to bind itself with -what are they called again?-ties.
That's my view. You don't have to buy it. Maybe there are many of us, after all. Maybe we are disruptive and anti-social and shouldn't be allowed. You're entitled to your opinion. All I will say is: sleep soundly, baby. Sleep tight and sweet dreams."
(Salman Rushdie - The ground beneath her feet)
dinsdag 26 april 2011
Lonen van topvoetballers: nood aan een buitenspelval
"Manchester United heeft – één week voordat Rooney zijn peperdure kribbel zette – te kennen gegeven dat het dit jaar 95,6 miljoen euro verlies heeft gemaakt. Hoe kan het dat zo een club er ook maar aan dénkt om een speler 300.000 euro per week te betalen? Simpel, omdat de voetbalbonden dit gewoon toelaten. Barcelona boekte op hetzelfde moment 80 miljoen verlies, Real Madrid 68. De voetbaltenoren geven meer geld uit dan ze hebben, wat ook leidt tot concurrentievervalsing tegenover de kleinere clubs, die wel bestraft worden wanneer ze onzorgvuldig met hun geld omspringen."
http://www.apache.be/2011/04/lonen-van-topvoetballers-nood-aan-een-buitenspelval/
http://www.apache.be/2011/04/lonen-van-topvoetballers-nood-aan-een-buitenspelval/
India kijkt niet om naar slachtoffers van dodelijk pesticide
"De vergiftiging met endosulfan begon in de jaren tachtig toen het staatsbedrijf Plantation Corporation of Kerala (PCK) driemaal per jaar ongeveer 5000 hectare heuvels en valleien vanuit de lucht besproeide. In het gebied waar cashewnoten worden geteeld, ligt ook een tiental dorpen. De pesticiden van PCK maakten minstens negenduizend slachtoffers in het district Kasargod, aldus de koepelorganisatie Actiecomité tegen Endosulfan. Duizend slachtoffers stierven, 4800 zijn bedlegerig."
http://www.dewereldmorgen.be/artikels/2011/04/26/india-kijkt-niet-om-naar-slachtoffers-van-dodelijk-pesticide
http://www.dewereldmorgen.be/artikels/2011/04/26/india-kijkt-niet-om-naar-slachtoffers-van-dodelijk-pesticide
zondag 24 april 2011
Lives of quiet desperation
“Most people are not free. Freedom, in fact, frightens them. They follow patterns set by their parents, enforced by society, by their terrors of ‘they say’ and ‘what will they think?’ and by a constant inner dialogue that weighs duty against desire and pronounces duty the winner.
‘Lives of quiet desperation’ Thoreau called such lives – though today’s version is noisy desperation. Occasionally, a visionary comes along who seems to have conquered his fears in himself and to live with bravado and courage. People are at once terrified of such a creature – and admiring. They are also envious.”
(The Rosy Crucifixion - Henry Miller)
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