Looking back

Look at these expressions, these facial traits. Did they exist only on the artists' mind, or are they an attempt to represent real people, two who once lived and breathed in this planet of ours? Why were they portrayed? What questions did they ask themselves, and what were their everyday concerns?

According to radio-carbon dating techniques, these two miniature human heads were carved on mammoth ivory around twenty seven thousand years ago. They were found at a site in the Czech Republic called Dolni Věstonice, also famous for being the place of origin of the oldest known ceramic in the world. A good example of the latter is the Věstonická Venuše or Venus of Dolni Věstonice. These rests of our deepest past move me deeply. I think of the hands that gave shape to these objects and the hands that may have touched them later. I know I'll never know those lives, but I like to wonder about them and the events that led to these figurines ending up buried in the ground for over 25 millennia.

In 2004 a tomograph scan of the Věstonická Venuše allowed researchers to reconstruct the fingerprint of a child between 7 and 15 years of age who had handled the statuette before the clay hardened and was fired.

The Rape of Children's Minds

That is what most religions must do in order to survive: force themselves on the vulnerable and defenseless minds of children.

A Question of Duration

Apparently senseless parallel lines within an oval of compressed silicate dust, almost like the fossil of an impossibly bloated protozoan. But no, we know better: it is the print a booted foot left on the pocked surface of the moon.

Only 40 years have passed and already we wonder, is this footprint still up there? Has it changed much?

We often read how in the absence of an atmosphere, and without neither weather nor tectonic activity, man made marks on the moon should last eons. Yet, apart from micrometeorites, there are all kind of atomic and subatomic particles colliding against the moon all the time. How long will it take those processes to erase even that tiny mark?

Who will know in ten thousand years the name of the man wearing the boot that made the print?

If it endures a million years, will anyone know the shape of the foot that filled the boot, or what species it belonged to?

Will anybody ever go back up there to see these prints again, or is this picture all we'll ever have? Are they ever to be anything else than the human equivalent of a dog pissing against a tree-trunk? A mere "we were here" sign?

Will they be engulfed by the sun when it goes nova?

Will they survive us, the last sign of our ever having existed, and then at the moment of truth be wiped out by the rocket exhaust of the next species that lands on the moon?

Will they be covered and preserved by a molecule-thick diamond film, on an inhabited moon seeded with sweeping seas of grasses and incredibly tall and limber forests?

Do the men who made them long for those few hours on another world, almost 40 years ago?

Records of Progress

Records of Progress, or RoPs, as we affectionately call them, are an expression of our innermost sadomasochistic drives. We might as well refer to them as RoPes and be done with it, for they tie us up and hopelessly bind us in a cycle of punishment and reward.

Rather than write a 600 character review of each of my students, it'd be great to just sit with each but for half of 600 seconds and tell them face to face how I feel about their performance, their behavior in class and towards their classmates, and what are the areas they can work on.

Lista de nombres

Ana Akari Åse Adrienne Anett Amelie Airiin Ailani
Andrés Amir August Aqqalukkuluk Atta Attila Alejandro Akamu
Bethania Benedetta Beatriz Bianka Borana Basha Buhle Bhudevi
Bogdan Banteaymolu Boris Bagdat Bhakta Bassiri Bunsuke Bane
Celeste Cecilia Camilla Chloé Carolina Cynthia Claudia Charumati
Charles Craig Carl Collin Cirilo César Cuauhtémoc Chandra
Daniela Deolinda Dandago Dubie Dawa Dinali Delisile Dhakshina
Doriyush Diego Dominik David Dick Dimuth Dlamini Deven
Eunice Ellie Elaheh Eva Emmi Enka Endora Eshe
Emiliano Esteban Erik Ezequiel Emmanuel Erlet Edin Ekon
Fabiola Fanele Filipa Fiorella Fátima Fumiko Fatoumata Falala
Facundo Francesco Ferenz Faaez Farhan Forrest Félix Fabumi
Gabriela Gjertrud Gili Guillermina Gro Gorreti Galilea Ghariza
Gerardo Gustav Giovanni Grzegorz George Göran Göksan Gamba
Hilda Hanna Herborg Harriet Heather HuiLing Haily Habika
Hans Håvard Hernán Horacio HaiDo Humberto Haden Hondo
Ingvill Ingrid Isilda Ingunn Irenea Itzel Iesha Isabis
Iván Ilias Isaac Ignacio Igor Itay Iain Issa
Jahnvi Jarmila Jodi-Ann Jacqueline Jariya Jigna Jacey Jendayi
Jorge Juan Jens Justice Jonathan Jim Jabari Jabulani
Kerstin Kaisa Katerina Kelli Klara Kübra Kadence Kainda
Klaus Kwasi Karamo Kaoru Kai Koketso Kadeem Kofi
Lucía Laura Linnéa Leila Liv Lorela Ladonna Lea
Leonardo Luis Lukas Lauge Luciano Lorne Lachlan Latif
Marina Margherita Mina Mette Mirza Monika Maeve Molara
Mads Mithat Marcelo Mahmoud Malthe Morten Magen Mikel
Nélida Nana Nuria Negar Nina Noelia Nakia Nekane
Natalino Neo Nareg Niko Nagi Noah Najee Naalnish
Olga Ortal Oumou Outi Octavia Otilia Oceana Oddveig
Omar Øyvind Osvaldo Oscar Oliver Otto Oakley Odakota
Pilar Palevi Paula Pia Pirita Phumzile Paloma Padraigin
Pedro Palden Philipp Per Pavel Pujan Paris Parounag
Qunchao Qin Qian Qingzhen QueThanh Qenehelo Quiana Qetura
Quentin Quinn Qiamuddin Qais Qwei Qaf Quillan Qabic
Razan Ruth Ragnhild Rochelle Rabia Rikke Rae Raysel
Raphaël Radigan Reginald Rudy Roman Rida Rahul Raimundo
Sonela Sabrina Saara Sandra SiJie Sumaya Sakura Sadaf
Sergio Shasanka Savant Seng Sebastian Søren Sameer Sachi
Tiina Taman Tania ThiQui Tamara Tekber Tabatha Taimi
Tsering Talha Tamim Tiziano Tien Tenzin Tad Taavetti
Upange Unity Umman Urška Ursula Uzma Ulyssa Upala
Umur Uldis Uros Ulrich Ugo Uzair Uriel Ulfmaerr
Volha Vera Vanessa Vaida Vivian Verónica Valencia Valechka
Valeri Vichetrath Ville Vedran Vítor Volkan Vaughn Vaclav
Wenao Wanwisa Wincy Wipawan Winda WunMin Wanda Wachiwi
Walter William Wonder Wendell Weston Wola Wade Wafiyy
Xiaohang Xilonem Xóchitl Xaina Xi Xuelan Xiomara Xuxa
Xiaolong Xianming Xiaochen Xavier Xan Xabiso Xander Ximun
Yara Yukiko Yaru Yfat YatMan Yenhy Yahaira Yaletha
Yilikal Yunior Youssef Yauheni Yiannis Yerzhan Yaakov Yahya
Zainatou Zeynep Zhenia Zaza Zuzana Zimasa Zaylee Zagiri
Zacharia Zweli Zmicer Zoran Zaid Ziv Zaire Zabdiel

Not necessary, but still

I love to be alive, even with headaches and fears and uncertainties and muscle aches, and awkwardnesses and whatever may come my way. I love to be alive.

Marked

Here at the college students continue with their midnight birthday celebrations. Not the happiest of traditions (nor the healthiest), but at least they now make a point of doing their baking before 22:30, which means that the number of fire alarms has really gone down.

In any case, tonight's celebrant, Amira, has a sister staying at my place for the weekend, and she herself happened to be here when the clock struck twelve... Students then came in, threw a coat over her head, and carried her out.

My mind flashed back to the argentinean dictatorship, instantly. I never experienced it myself, but from the Nunca Jamás reports i know that's the way the military did it, too: something to cover your eyes, and you didn't know where you were being taken.

I know nothing will happen to Amira, and that her friends probably had a very nice surprise waiting for her somewhere, but still, there was an instant when i wanted to yell at them, to ask roaringly how they dare play with actions that call back such horrors.

But then i thought, there's no action in our collective repertoire that isn't evocative of some tragedy or violation. Amira was smiling when they covered her face, she wanted to be floated away in her friends' arms. I should be smiling, too. They've managed to recast past actions in a new light. There's still hope of redemption for us all.

A poem by Sheikh Saadi (1184-1283)

بنی آدم اعضای یک پیکرند
که در آفرينش ز یک گوهرند

چو عضوى به درد آورد روزگار
دگر عضوها را نماند قرار

تو کز محنت دیگران بی غمی
نشاید که نامت نهند آدمی

Human beings are members of a whole,

In creation of one essence and soul.

If one member is afflicted with pain,

Other members uneasy will remain.

If you have no sympathy for human pain,

The name of human you cannot retain.

This poem used to adorn the entrance of the Hall of Nations at the UN building, in New York. What happened to it?

Frederick Douglass & Helen Pitts

Frederick Douglass was born a slave in the early 1800s, the son of a black slave and her white owner. Separated from his mother, he was raised by a grandmother until the age of six, when she died and he was sold away. He taught himself to read, taught other slaves, was persecuted, escaped to the north, became free.

He believed that "Right is of no Sex — Truth is of no Color — God is the Father of us all, and we are all brethren."

In 1872, he was the first African American candidate to the vicepresidency. His presidential running mate was Victoria Woodhull, a suffragist. Their party was called "The Equal Rights Party". What happened to it?

In 1837 he met his future wife, Anna Murray, a free African American with whom he fathered 5 children. Anna died in 1882 and, after a year of depression, he became close to Helen Pitts, a white abolotionist and suffragist. Against the wishes of his children and her family, they married and lived together for 11 years, until his death in 1895.

"Love came to me, and I was not afraid to marry the man I loved because of his color", said Helen of their wedding. Frederick's words on the subject were: "This proves I am impartial. My first wife was the color of my mother and the second, the color of my father."

Douglass had willed his house to Pitts, but because there were not enough witness signatures on the deed, it was declared invalid. She then suggested to his children that the house be set apart as a memorial to their father, but they refused, wanting to sell it and then divide the money among themselves. With borrowed funds, she bought it herself and the memorial was started, and is alive still today.

Questions

Isn't sleep the irrefutable proof that life after death is a myth? I mean, how can anybody believe that we continue to exist as conscious entities after our brain stops functioning, if we lose our consciousness when our brain simply slows down a bit, as it does when we sleep?

Victor Cúnsolo: Vuelta de Rocha (1931)

Más Guttero: Cargadores ligures (1926)

This is the year

According to that fortune teller in Guangzhou, this is the year i will die. The guy was nice. I was begging for money to get to Hong Kong, and he lent me some and read my palm on the train. That i didn't ask him for, but thought it'd be a fun, silly thing to try. I still do.

Now, if i actually do die, will it be because he was right, because i believed him, or because like Laius in Oedipus Rex, Basilio in La vida es sueño and finally Lord Voldemort in Harry Potter, my trying to avoid the prophecy will be the means by which it is accomplished?

To prevent this last, at least, i should strive not do anything different from what i would otherwise do. But then, how can i be sure of what i would really have done if the prediction hadn't been made? Plus, what an irony if, after having made an effort to live life as usual, i ended up dying of something that could have been easily avoided with just a little deviation...

Maybe the answer is to copy that character of Borges, who tried to imagine all the possible manners his death could take in the hope that, simply because he had imagined them, they could now not happen.

Of course, if i do die, it could all simply mean that he made a lucky guess, and me an unlucky choice.

Finally, if come march 3rd 2009 i'm still alive, then it'll mean that, once more, i'll have paid enough attention to another silly piece of religious baloney to have it occupy some of my neurons for decades on end. Obviously, if some part of my mind didn't still keep a measure of forbearance for "the occult", i would simply have forgotten the episode. It makes me angry and sad to think i have such little control over my brain that it may still casually focus on any kind of hocus pocus.

I can imagine the following scene, too: somehow, somewhere, a few years from now, i run across this guy and, obviously, he sees i'm still alive. When confronted with his failed prediction, he may very well say that fortune telling is no exact science (although, at the time of his prediction, and upon my asking whether any of what he said was avoidable, his answer was something about it being pretty much not so, and that destiny was destiny).

More creatively, he might say: "Ah, yes! I remember you! Of course, i knew back then you wouldn't die, but telling you you would set in motion a chain of events that meant that your life today is much better than it would otherwise have been".

If he came up with something like that, i might even consider giving him some money for sheer chutzpah. What would need no consideration at all is the well-centered and quite mighty kick that would soon meet his ass, of course.

"Composición" (Alfredo Guttero, 1928)

Messed Up Dream

It was as if i was watching a movie. Produced by me, obviously, and i was one of the actors as well. The writers and directors should be fired (probably me, too). Action quite fragmentary, but i don't know if that's because i tend not to remember whole dreams, or because it was one of those crazy independent films.

Brad Pitt and Michelle Pfeiffer were in it. In the first scene, they're a couple that's breaking up in front of a doctor. The doctor explains how break-ups work.

Then later i'm with my boyfriend. He wants to get pregnant. The aforementioned doctor manages it, explains how he did it. Something to do with a hose.

Next, my boyfriend and me are in our backyard. He's giving birth on a blue blanket on the grass. Our friends are around. I recognize only a few. My boyfriend seems calm and happy, but he has turned into a woman.

The spectator is not to know what the result of this birth is. At the beginning of the next scene, a caption at the bottom of the screen reads "Years Later". The image zooms in on a map, until you can see the outline of South Africa, except that in the dream i know it as Zambia. The camera finally stops on a dot that's a village called Respekt.

Michelle Pfeiffer and me are in a forest outside this village. It's a forest that used to be under her stewardship, but now it looks withered and sickly. We hear the noise of engines. We move cautiously through the trees. I think she may have been my boyfriend all along, but i'm just now realizing it. Our child's nowhere to be seen.

Brad Pitt has taken over the forest and is cutting it down. Among the yellow-helmeted men that are doing this job for him i recognize one of the students from my Spanish ab initio class, except in this dream he has hair that's long and blond instead of short and brown. I yell at him "How can you be doing this after i taught you!", but he smiles at me in his very friendly manner and keeps doing his job. He's cutting a tree with a chainsaw.

Pfeiffer and me try to stop all this, but someone produces a nail gun and they shot her in the leg. As my character runs towards her, the spectator that i am wonders why these men would have a nail gun when they're trying to cut wood, not put it together. Next moment, a nail is shot through my head.

The scene goes black just as it does in movies to symbolize someone's lose of consciousness, and for a moment i'm afraid i won't wake up again, but then the character played by me opens his eyes at the doctor's office, who is explaining how lucky i was. From among the public (of which i'm now dimly aware) i notice there's a gaping, bleeding hole in the middle of his\my forehead. The doctor, however, insists that "the nail slid around your skull and went out the other side, luckily".

I'm flailing on a stretcher, asking to please make my brain slow down. I'm thinking too many things at once, feel as if my mind is going to start smoking soon, so high is its speed. The nail has changed me, somehow, and the doctor confirms it by saying that yes, this is a side effect of the whole experience, and i'll have to live with it for the rest of my life. I continue to flail, arms holding me down to the stretcher, but i know my character is strangely happy. Somehow one knows he's actually pretending; in reality, he's real happy to have been so altered.