Breakfast

On Sunday I woke up to the smell of freshly baked scones, ready to be consumed with Jod's own homemade preserves: orange marmalade and strawberry jam.

They readily were.

Chomsky note III

I guess you realised the Chomsky visit was constrained by a very detailed and tightly laid-out protocol. So, the only time off the Chomskys had was on Thursday morning, before their flying off to Greece. Instead of taking the time off and relax, he went to a conference and listened to a number of talks. The cab driver picked him up from the conference venue to take them directly to the airport…

In other words, I am not sure the Edison percentages (genius consisting of 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration) are quite accurate, but it does take a lot of perspiration to achieve anything of note, really. Which is quite a statement coming from a lazy cat like me.

Of course, it was a week full of wonders not just because of Chomsky — but more on that later: I've got work to do!

Chomsky note II

On our way to meet the person who would give him the guided tour, Chomsky looked exactly like any other almost-80 year old American tourist, in his jeans, with his bag and his baseball cap, although a curiously quiet one. The difference was all in the detail, as ever, in him asking me the right kind of questions in order to interpret the Old City around him. I was deeply impressed at how non-judgemental he was.

Later, over lunch, when his protocol host complained to him that he “disappointed some with his comments” (what a wonderful thing for a host to say and how very insightful in the case of Chomsky, too), I commented that the comments were greeted with a roar of applause. “Yes”, admitted the protocol host, “but many were disappointed, too”. Chomsky smiled whimsically and replied along the lines of not having been brought all the way to the Outpost to say what people would like to hear; his wife leaned towards me and whimsically whispered that “Noam is known to have caused controversy before”, somehow understating.

The one thing that perplexed Chomsky was the fact that student organisations are controlled by political parties in the Principality, “they act as the parties’ beachhead among young people”, I added. Of course, this is yet another rubbish thing Outposters have imported from Compatridia, I quickly added.

After that, the protocol host and some other protocol people switched to the local lingo and were discretely praising each other for having brought over “such a great thinker ” (helloooo, it was Great Westphalian who brought Chomsky over); they pointed out to each other that he is “a dissident” and that he has even opposed Israel, despite being Jewish (something unthinkable in the sheep pens called Principality and Compatridia, where we should all go ‘baa’ in the ethnically correct manner); the person having offered the delightful tour explained the amount of work being put into it, as its purpose was for “Chomsky to understand a couple of things about the place and its history”. Thankfully, I was there to talk to Carol Chomsky, explaining to her that she was not missing anything of note, and, crucially, the Floating Islander to talk to Chomsky.

Chomsky note I

Chomsky came to the Outpost. He gave his political talk first. The ceremonies hall was packed and I only managed to get in using my special job skills, i.e. playing the authority / authoritarian figure. The visit was organised by Great Westphalian, but his Mighty Employer partly hijacked the whole affair and almost made it into a media circus, with many seats reserved for local politicians and such noted anti-imperialist activists as the American Embassy’s Public Affairs officer. Thankfully, besides grim-looking figures (like me) and politicians, a great many young people and local grassroots activists made it into the room, these having arrived really early (some of them, like Zapata, after having been warned by Loxias himself — I am happy I did).

I sat on the floor squeezed among University professors ousted from their seats by politicians and other assorted local dignitaries, the President of the Principality Parliament’s feet almost touching my back. Chomsky gets on stage, an old man, starts talking with a slight slur. ‘Oh dear’, I thought, ‘he’s too old’. Wrong. He quickly warmed up and gave a wonderful talk on the huge responsibility of intellectuals, an elite to the sustenance and comfort of which considerable resources go to; he talked in terms of a major moral crisis about their unwillingness to speak the truth, to reveal and chastise injustice. I was so captivated (although I am known for my relatively limited attention span) that, when the President of the Parliament started whispering to a mandarin seated next to him, I turned around with my finger raised and gave him a gorgonian look that immediately petrified him. Hehe.

Chomsky turned even the silliest question into a stimulating answer. For instance, to the worn-out demand “tell us what to do” he replied “as the Bolivian farmers did: get informed, debate, act”. He also delivered the following gem of an answer, to the frenetic applause of the activists present — and to the consternation of the local mummified dignitaries, who until that moment probably thought Chomsky was a handy token anti-americanist to base their own crass ‘nationalist-disguised-as-anti-imperialist’ propaganda on:

It’s convenient to blame outsiders for the problems. It’s not for me to recommend solutions but it’s usually a good idea everywhere to look in the mirror and ask what we can do right where we are to mitigate and limit problems that are very serious and have to be overcome.

At night I hardly slept: I would give the Chomskys a tour of the Old City the following day, then I would have lunch with them, all thanks to Great Westphalian squeezing me into their protocol-rich schedule.

I did. Chomsky survived sunstroke, two cars racing in the narrow streets of the Old City towards him and an erratic moped, as well as my fast walking pace and rolling commentary. During that day, it gradually became evident to me why a quasi-cult of personality has been created of him: he is obviously a thinker of a platonic scale (“so they say”, commented his wife). If he were not the most humble and modest person I have met (making us all surrounding him, with our egos and opinions and conceit, plainly nauseating in contrast), had he in the slightest encouraged this quasi-cult to develop into an endorsed fan club, he could have very easily corrupted himself and others: such is the charisma radiating out of this soft-spoken old man, who prefers listening to interrupting. But here we had a man blushing visibly (at a distance of 50 metres) for becoming vested with the gowns of the Outpost University (!) later that evening, a man carefully listening to a well-prepared, focused and pleasantly informative (but arrogant) historian giving him a layperson’s guided tour, a man dizzyingly courteous.

Generally speaking, I’m in awe. At the same time, I am glad I have kept my contact with him to a minimum all these years: I have miserably few things to tell him, really (although I am proud he and his wife enjoyed the bit of the Outpost Capital tour I gave them).

A week full of wonders

The week ending today (or yesterday) was certainly as eventful as six months of 'normal' life. This was not (exclusively) a welcome thing: excitement brings exhaustion and I would wake up every single day with quite visible black circles highlighting the yellow of my eyes, yawning and craving for sleep after the stress and the excitement and the wonders and the alcohol of the previous day. Every single day. Emotions also ran high (or haywire, or whatever you call it when too many significant things happen simultaneously, when life suddenly becomes hyperdense).

To give you an idea, here is a photo I shot before going to lunch with the person in it. I will probably dedicate a post to meeting him when I find some time.

The wise tortoise, always carrying her home around

dedicated to Petite
For years Jod was treating our rented flat as a temporary solution, as a place not worth investing in furniture or decorations for. One reason is that it is very large by urban standards (and quite modest by Outpost ones), so buying lots of stuff we would later have to give up did not sound like a great idea. Another reason is that well, you know, we do not like it here, so we could be out of the door and on our way back to where we came from (the West, to put it in Tolkienesque terms) any time really. A third reason we did not really want to commit ourselves to our lovely flat (four years on, I still cannot see it as ‘little’), albeit not one prominent in our minds, is that, well, it is rented, not owned.

All in all, we have been in four Outposters’ rented flats, all the other Outposters we know own their flat or house. Now, three of them had a really ‘temporary’ character about them (the fourth belongs to One of the Seven), what with their hanging bare light bulbs, their dismally naked off-white walls, their lack of curtains and all those piles of stuff leaning against the corners of the rooms — generally speaking, with their abject lack of any ‘homely’ feel. We therefore understood why our own flat is ’so relaxing and cosy’ to many Outposters; the implicature is “… although you are actually renting it.”

The above was triggered by a hilarious election poster in the streets of the Outpost Capital. It shows a couple in virtual chiaroscuro, hugging each other against the unseen elements and some unspeakable, subtle but acutely present threat, something like a sense of despair. The blurb goes like this:

We love each other, but how are we going to start a family without owning a home?

I saw the poster, one in a series highlighting problems of ordinary, real people in the beginning of May, but only last night did I have the time to go to the right-wing party’s website in order to download it and offer it to you as a treat. Alas! Although the rest of the series is still proudly there (about drugs, taxes, crime, unemployment…), the particular poster seems to have been deprecated by now: I could find it nowhere.

Today’s walk

You know about my Sunday walks by now.

As usual, I shot ruins

I also took a picture of a block of flats in the Old City exclusively housing immigrants. Facing it (not in the picture) is a better-conserved block exclusively housing intellectuals, colleagues and One of the Seven.

A bougainvillea flourish, from the Town Hall gardens

The island of Kea

We also went to the Greek island of Kea. Greek islands are paradisical in the Spring, but then anywhere is gorgeous when Spring finally gets there.

This is the island capital's topmost neighbourhood.

Another view of it

Another country path.

Pictures from the Home City

You are not here for the writing, you are for the pictures, aren't you?

Here are some pictures from my recent visit to where I come from.

This is a statue outside the Old Compatrido Parliament.

Urban landscape

Another urban facade

Graduands

Last night we went to Jod’s School’s Graduation / Prom Night — after the graduands invited selected few teachers and ‘companions’ (one of which is me). I was not exactly thrilled at the prospect of spending an evening with final year high-schoolers, not to mention that the whole experience is wholly alien to me: where I come from there is a 5-day excursion for final year pupils to mark their graduation, no smart dress parties and ballroom dancing. Well, no ballroom dancing here, either: just a slideshow with the best and worst of the school’s final year, some dancing, lots of hotel food and stunning-looking 18-year olds.

Let me put it this way: the percentage of preternaturally ugly people in the Outpost seems (to foreign eyes like mine) to be significantly high. In contrast to this, the vast majority of the prom crowd looked decent, to say the least, with some amazingly stunning highlights. Ugliness was severely under-represented. This is not due my usual bias for youth and young people — most of us old farts in the room agreed some of these young adults looked fabulous in their smart dress. This place must really be improving, somehow.

I for myself felt almost jealous: they are eighteen and life seemed to be a thing that has been going on for them for at least, say, 3 or 4 years, whereas I barely started living when I was 19. If you belong to the doomed ’80s generation of big hair, Ronnie Reagan, white trousers and Duran Duran, you are probably well aware of what I am talking about.

During the celebrations, the girl band representing the Netherlands in this year’s Eurovision Song contest stormed the room, sang a traditional Greek (!) song about when the next boat to an island is — or something, were applauded, said thank you and left. They are apparently touring Europe promoting their song and asking for our phone votes and they happened to stay in the hotel where the party was last night: