I am so against everything that I cannot even stand the sober version of myself...but I am pretty good at working, at least when that means to be totally alone...

Tomorrow there will be a post on Calvino...

I am so sad and silent

Wedding invitation

one of the few girls, who drove me really crazy at some point of my life, is getting married soon...the first...not the last, I guess...

The Times are A-Changing...

The beauty and charm of italian women...is something you cannot get totally rid of...my love for jazz, W. Marsalis and its music from 20 years ago...the beauty of a sunrise in Berlin...the loneliness of a man still in love with his past...the long chain of sleepless late nights, and hangovering dayafters...

She was in my dreams yesterday...what is it going to happen in the next few hours?

My friend Hrovje is becoming famous...

Video

I love her

Barack bei der Siegessäule

I think it is the first time after a long time taht I am really sorry I will not be able to be present at somebody´s speech...
NYT on Obama in Berlin.

Of women and of the sources of perpetual misunderstanding

Initial remark: A post that is accurately generalising and provocative

They need to know the end of anything so badly; they pretend after a while to know it anyway...they are full of ex-post explanations and a priori thoughts that you will never be able to assume...
They want both to tell you the end of a story - movie or book, personal or general - and to show you they were right...
They need to be sure they know what is going on...
They guess they are sure they know what you think...in the worst cases even why you think so...
They think that a choice is not a risk, rather a solution...
They think they do act strategically, while they mostly believe you are maybe able to be tactical, in the best case scenario...
They think surprise belongs to the basket of things they have already thought could happen...
They believe feelings are a confirmation of reality...
They (worst of all) need to explain and not to understand...

It is much more likely that I find myself lagging behind some sort of unescapable right/wrong discussion than a true/false one...

dienstag der 22.

When you think you need to smoke, but you actually just have not eaten for ages...
When you think you are just in a bad mood, but you have been drinking too much, too often...
When you think your day is too long...
When you do not do anything for hours...
When you look for some plans, and you find yourself in the laziest mood ever...
When you realize you have good friends, but it is not enough...
When you think you can spend time by yourself, and yourself does not agree...
When sex is just the fullfilment of a biological need...
When there is no beauty all around...
When you hope music is the answer, or at least the company...
When you are not able to go into a shop by yourself...
When you escape company, because you know you would actually need it...

When you realize that it could be worse, of course, but really much worse...?

The newest Restaurant in Barcelona

Enzo and Rachel´s new challenge: there you go!

7...14...21...28...

More news from nowhere

That is all I managed to read lately....two amazing books, anyway...

Milan Kundera: Kniha smíchu a zapomnění
Italo Calvino: le lezioni americane

....

This feeling of litost surrounds me anyway
....

Silver Jews - "Lookout Mountain, Lookout Sea"
Rufus Wainwright - "Rufus Wainwright"
Califone - "Roots and Crowns"
Low - "Trust"
Jack Rose - "Jack Rose"
Califone - "Quicksand/cradlesnakes"
Antony and the Johnsons - "Antony and the Johnsons"
Edith Piaf - "The very Best of Edith Piaf"
Gordon Lightfoot - "Gordon Lightfoot: Complete Greatest Hits"

Why am I so blind / with my eyes wide open...

Answers...?

What did i share with her? Why am I so unable, uncapable to understand people for what they are? What am I for a person, then, that is the next question...
There is no solution...My mind has been running in circles since November...I have no energy left for that...there is no solution anyway...just the defeat.

I bought a cheap turntable and two boxes...I can finally say I have a stereo home...first time in my life, that is kind of awkward of me, since I am such a music junkie...anyway I started to collect Lps and singles and it is so much fun.

I am going to Prague on friday, so this year as well I manage to go once more back to the beloved -complicatedly beloved- Czech Republic...I read today that the thing C.Republic and Italy share the most lately, is their fear for Roma people...it is unbelievable to realize that...there are probably twice as much American people in C. Republic as Roma; while in Italy, well Italy, should we even try to find an explanation?

Antony and the Johnsons - I am a Bird Now
Joan as a Police Woman - To Survive
Bonnie P. Billy - Lie Down in the Light
Mark Lanegan and Isobel Campbell - Sunday at Devil Dirt
Portishead - III

Need of confirmation...

I am sure there is no better jazz Lp than "Ballads" by J. Coltrane Quartet;
I am sure she is the most beautiful woman I have ever met;
I am sure I will keep on asking myself why we are not meant to be together;
I am sure I will never be rich;
I am sure I do not believe in God;
I am sure I will never be a supporter of the German national team;


I wonder why I do need to make all these clear...

When it is not so obvious but you feel you chose the right spot for yourself.

P. Graham on cities and stimuli.

...even more than 5 Million Downloads in a day!

Get the New Firefox, I have it since they launched and I find it very smart...
Spread the fox...

The last covering Cash ever....

If you could read my mind love
What a tale my thoughts could tell
Just like an old time movie
bout a ghost from a wishin well
In a castle dark or a fortress strong
With chains upon my feet
You know that ghost is me
And I will never be set free
As long as Im a ghost that you cant see
If I could read your mind love
What a tale your thoughts could tell
Just like a paperback novel
The kind that drugstores sell
When you reach the part where the heartaches come
The hero would be me
But heroes often fail
And you wont read that book again
Because the endings just too hard to take

Id walk away like a movie star
Who gets burned in a three way script
Enter number two
A movie queen to play the scene
Of bringing all the good things out in me
But for now love, lets be real
* I never thought I could act this way *
And Ive got to say that I just dont get it
I dont know where we went wrong
But the feelins gone
And I just cant get it back

If you could read my mind love
What a tale my thoughts could tell
Just like an old time movie
bout a ghost from a wishin well
In a castle dark or a fortress strong
With chains upon my feet
But stories always end
And if you read between the lines
Youll know that Im just tryin to understand
The feelins that you lack
I never thought I could feel this way
And Ive got to say that I just to get it
I dont know where we went wrong
But the feelins gone
And I just cant get it back

Invincible

Listen, buy, enjoy.

I like this song so much, how, and it is just a blues...

Said the moon was ours, yeah
Said the moon was ours, the hell with the day
The sunlight is always gonna take love away
Brings up suspicions and alibies
But I can see blue, tear-blinded eyes
Lies, lies, lies, ohh lies

I got a stone where my heart should be
I got a stone where my heart should be
And nothing I do will make you love me
I'd leave this time, break all my ties
Be no more use for any disguise
Lies, lies, lies, ohh lies

I wanna die without pain
I wanna die, oh, without pain
All this deception I just can't maintain
The sun, moon, the stars in the sky
It'd hurt me too bad if you said goodbye
Lies, lies, lies, ohh lies

Vor 3 Jahre in Reichenberg

Encrypted post...

Listening to some piano sonatas by Rachmaninov...kind of cheesy, you could  say...it is relaxing and the opposite of what is going on in my highly-turkish.populated neighbourhood: fireworks, cars and flags all over the place...to je skoda, cesky republiku...
Reading the plans concerning the rebuild of Moscow in the 30s, what the fuck...I found myself in very funny and strange situations, and it is obviously not at all about what I have to read for class...I probably have a big role in being doing the wrong thing...
Even if I do not want to, I am actually counting the days...it should be soon, at the end of the month probably...
I feel home in the new apartment and it is a feeling I had not felt for more than 2 years...
How I miss you anyway...a cent for every time I forced myself not to think about it....

do you want to take this..............?

The coolest husband ever...P.H.

I want it loud

you are going to be mine....

blah blah

MGMT : Oracular Spectular
Grizzly Bear: Yellow House
Notwist: the Devil You and Me
Rino Gaetano: Aida ´93
Espers: II

Flying shoes

My parents are thinking about going to Prague for a week in July: I guess Ill join them for the week-end...
Ill also have to go to work to Nice in September, that is actually great news, after eight years having been away...Nice, j´arrive...

I also try to plan some vacations for the end of August, beginning of September (presuming that my bank account will soon return to be a 4 digits one): favourite spots, so far:

- Eastern Greece
- Western Turkey
- Canary Islands
- Southern France
- Southern Portugal
- Croatian Coast

As you can easily understand the necessary conditions are few : not too expensive, deep blue sea, good fish cuisine, sunny 95% of the time and in top of it with a depressing, trashy/non-existent night life scene.

If you knew anybody who has an empty room, a cage with toilet, a bush with roof or a broken cabriolet in any of these areas, please let me know...you would definitely emprove the rating of your karma/aura or your chances not to go to hell...I tell ya...

Bye bye Sydney

Adieu

Voyeurs?

I posted more stuff lately...unfortunately we are still by a quite mediocre 1 reaction every fifth post, on the average...not very interactive...apparently readers are more than those who post...that is nice to know...
I wonder whether I should change the "whole policy" of this blog and make it "spicier"...
Ill give this thought a try then, let us see what happens...
All I can say, in my first attempt to bring some fresh air into this, is that tonight I have a date...
It is the first time that it happens since October 2006...so I guess it is really big news...

I woke up at 5.15 a.m. this morning: I am not sure Ill be very brilliant tonight...whatever, the girl is really interesting.
A hug for the whole of you...

Because........

Why is J. Johnson so famous?
Why are Italian voters so damned stubborn?
Why does every sunday newspaper bullshit about food recipes?
Why are Germans so stiff?
Why will the Olympics take place in Beijing?
Why is London so expensive?
Why do Turkish men drive only BMW cars?
Why do Swiss people talk so funny any of the languages they are supposed to know?
Why is Venice so empty?
Why is San Francisco so far away?
Why does Haneke make another "Funny Games"?
Why doesn´t my flatmate like cats?
Why is Lausitzerstrasse always on the spot?

I talk to the wind

There is no reason in drinking so much...there is not even a need for it...it just happens...I am really proud of myself tonight because at half past 2 I took the way home...
The new album from Portishead does not belong to the present, not even to the future...such a huge disappointment...
I miss playing, laughing, being in vacation and she. Period.

Recent readings

Vonnegut - Slaughterhouse-Five
Arendt - Eichmann in Jerusalem
McEwan - On Chesil Beach
McEwan - Enduring Love
Hobsbawm - On the Edge of the New Century

Posting and being posted...

"I think most people who maintain blogs are doing it for some of the same reasons I do: they like the idea that there’s a place where a record of their existence is kept — a house with an always-open door where people who are looking for you can check on you, compare notes with you and tell you what they think of you."
Have a look

Bemerkungen um ein langweiliges Leben

I smoked a cigarette this afternoon while working and met by chance an italian girl who is working in another Insitute, just in front of mine. She studied the same as I, in the same small and depressing city (Forlí) but started three years and a half ago. Well, you know what happened, she asked me if she could use the informal language with me (in German you can either use the second singular person - informal - or the third plural - formal...in italian is something similar)...
Do I look so old? Serious I do look for sure...that is more a feeling than a anything else...anyway it has been really surprising...
Actually I have been talking with a couple of friends about my dark circles around the eyes on saturday night...apparently some people think already they are a sort of permanent feature of my look...that is probably true but kind of sad at the same time...
Is there a way to get rid of those? Is there a way to be 27 years old and not think that the best is somehow gone, at some point of somebody´s life that we are not actually able to remember?
It would be cool to be like the main character of this book I am reading: able to let his mind fly back and forth throughout his own life, having consciousness of what went first and what afterwards, but in the condition of flying back to some older moments and consider them again...(by the way, the book is from Vonnegut and I am not sure this character looks really "normal"...enough of this).
The history of Riga and Charchow today, Peter the Great tomorrow...the only 2 new issues I am coping with so far...peace.

I'm waiting for the train
Subway that only goes one way
The stupid thing that'll come to pull us apart
And make everybody late
You spent everything you had
Wanted everything to stop that bad
Now I'm a crashed credit card registered to Smith -
Not the name that you called me with
You turned white like a saint
I'm tired of dancing on a pot of gold-flaked paint
Oh we're so very precious, you and I
And everything that you do makes me want to die
Oh I just told the biggest lie
I just told the biggest lie
The biggest lie

Show me the dirt pile
And I will pray that the soul can take
Three stowaways
You vanish with no guile
And I will not pay
But the soul can wait
The soul can wait
Well it is still pretty wet
With all these leaks
We’ll be fine
We’ll be fine
But if it’s still pretty wet
With all these leaks
We'll be fine, oh
And supervised
Show me the dirt pile
And I will pray that the soul can take
Three stowaways
And you vanish with no guile
And I will not pay
But the soul can wait
I felt you so much today
I know you try
You tried straight into my heart
You fly straight into my heart
Girl, I know you try
You fly straight into my heart
You fly straight into my heart
But here comes the fault...
So much for make believe, I'm not sold
So much of dreams deceive, I'm not prepared to know
Your heart makes me feel
Your heart makes me bold
For always and ever, I'll never let go
Always concealed
Safe and inside, alive!
Show me the dirt pile
And I will pray that the soul can take
Three stowaways
In a passion it broke
I pull the black from the grey
But the soul can wait
I felt you so much today...

Back on track

I moved in the new apartement with my friend Marthe...the flat is soo huge and sunny and empty in equal parts...
I live in hier, in the most turkish part of Berlin , apparently...

University began again and the courses are much better, now that I finally managed to change the main subject and landed to history, leaving the boring stuff about path dependency, insitutionalism and transition/transformation...fuck yeah!

I have been in Spain for a week, visited so many beautiful places, that I could hardly believe it! Sevilla is an amazing city, I think I would like to fall in love again in that city, if that is ever gonna happen...the sea, the food, my friends there, the dry and sunny weather have been amazing...I would higly recommend to update your priority list concerning travels and find a way to plan a visit to Andalusia: it just rocks!

The new apartment has a small but cozy extra room, so if you want to come and stay in Berlin for a while, you know you just have to let me know on time and you are welcome.

Working and studying and working keeps me busy and that is all I can wish for myself right now...the rest will come someday.

I guess that is it!
take care.

I have been woking for eight days in a row...in the last five did not sleep more than 4 hours on the average...But I have been in Budapest, that is actually a city with some rare magic...I think it is on the top three of my favourite European cities...
The faces of people over there, especially those who are a bit older (60), speak about history, changes, the time going by...I could sit for hours in a cafe in Pest and just look at the faces of the guests...
I will do it soon, and if any of you wants to join me, you are welcome...

I have been five days away from Berlin and as soon as you are back, you realize how many people are just taking drugs as a way (the only one)to enjoy their free time...I find it so boring, oh man...

Yesterday I have been to the concert of this girl, it was fine...but once more my friends and I had to discuss with some super boring German guests, who think they should have the same silence at the concert like the one they get listening the Cd at their boring, Ikea styled, with fucking Beck´s filled up apartments...shame on them and vive la vie!

Flying to Spain in one hour, trying to sum up some reasoning out of this six weeks of work and alcohol as never in my life before...she is still there all around me, cannot avoid that from happening...she is there whenever a small bite of beauty comes to me, when something extraordinary happens, when something very ordinary happens, when I am happy, when I am lonely, when I think I am over and I am not...lately she comes in my dreams pretty frequently too...

She does not know that, I do not dare to ask how she is or what she is doing there..I am so scared, really really scared, man how scared I am, that she is doing great..I am scared that some days (too) soon she will be back here and show me once more she is all I would like to have from a woman...I know it is still like that, but at least there is no visual implications so far...

You say sadness, I say sure

Bad thoughts running around at night,
A sense of inappropriate emptiness,
A creeping obsession with the past,
A loss of time,
Classes not taken,
Packs of cigarettes smoked,
once more,
The silence all around,
in the office, home, on the street
a telephone ringing
but very seldom,
calls from the old same good people.
An anger sedated only by loads of drinks,
every second day, since ages.

New Stuff I Have Been Lately Listening To

Mission of Burma - Signals, Calls, and Marches
Adele - 19
The Kills - Midnight Boom
The Gutter Twins - Saturnalia
Turandot - Puccini

Spiritual - Soulsavers

Jesus, I don't wanna die alone
Jesus oh Jesus I don't wanna die alone
My love was untrue
Now all I have is you
Jesus oh Jesus I don't wanna die alone
Jesus, I don't wanna die alone
Jesus oh Jesus I don't wanna die alone
My love was untrue
Now all I have is you
Jesus oh Jesus I don't wanna die alone
Jesus, Jesus
All my trouble
All my pain
Will leave me once again alone

Is there is something wrong with me? Am I too complicated? Did I get spoiled through my own doubts and distrust of all these things lately?
It is still so fucking cold in here...

Zwischen alten und neuen Sachen fühlt sich man einsam

Love - Love
The Walkabouts - Train leaves at eight
Soulsavers - It is not how far you fall it´s the way you land
The Drones - Wait Long By The River And The Bodies Of Your Enemies Will Float By
Love - Da Capo
Stephen Malkmus - Real Emotional Trash

17th is my number

Today is March, the 17th...

1. March, the 17th 2006: I came to Berlin with luggage, a guitar and 600 euro.
2. February, the 17th 2007: I ended my European voluntary project.
3. March, the 17th 2007: I took a flight from Düsseldorf to Sydney.
4. April, the 17th 2007: I came back in Hamburg
5. November, the 17th 2007: instead of enjoying an Interpol concert, we decided to take a break.
6. February, the 17th 2008: she left Berlin for Bologna.
7. March, the 17th 2008: I am back from a two-days-trip in Hamburg and think I miss it all.

Tuesday in the Gneisenaustrasse

There have been no great news in the last period...
The best I can write is as follows:

I am going to Hamburg on Saturday morning for the week-end...unfortunately alone.
I bought a cool bicycle today: Spring is coming....
I saw Band of Horses in a club yesterday: I liked them, and my eyes got even wet a couple of times...
I am going to Spain in April for a week, by myself...
I do not like the last album by Nick Cave and the B.S....boring...
I am not going to Italy until August, fortunately.
The song "Revival" by the Soulsavers, with M. Lanegan singing is hitting my head non-stop since Saturday night...and it is cool...
I want to see a W.Allen´s movie I have not seen yet.
I deserve more good sex.
I am still in love.

The wireless internet connection for free is back!

slippery slippery slippery slope

Don't walk the plank like I did
You will be dispensed with
When you've become inconvenient
In the harrowdown hill
Where you went to school
That's where I am
That's where I'm lying down

Did I fall or was I pushed?
Did I fall or was I pushed?
And where's the blood?
And where's the blood?

I'm coming home
I'm coming home
To make it all right
So dry your eyes

We think the same things at the same time
We just cant do anything about it

So don't ask me
Ask the ministry
Don't ask me
Ask the ministry

We think the same things at the same time
There are so many of us
So you can't count

We think the same things at the same time
There are too many of us
So you can't count

Can you see me when I'm running?
Can you see me when I'm running?
Away from them

I can't take their pressure
No one cares if you live or die
They just want me gone
They want me gone

I'm coming home
I'm coming home
To make it all right
So dry your eyes

We think the same things at the same time
We just cant do anything about it

We think the same things at the same time
There are too many of us
So you can't count

It was a slippery slippery slippery slope
It was a slippery slippery slippery slope
I feel me slipping in and out of consciousness

Monday in the Zossener strasse

I am sitting in a cafe, pretending to have something to do with my mac...my external hard drive broke up...pictures gone, music gone...realized that it is no good thing to have such a big part of your own memories stuck in a stupi sequence of 0 1 0 1...
Pretty awkward from me...
I hope everybody is doing better that I do.

Friday, just before the beginning of the end

I am nervous...for no reason, but nervous....and this week-end looks like a pretty boring one...I miss almost everything I got a year ago...and the few good new things I have got are definitely not enough...
Mr. Berlusconi is still able to tell so many bullshits in one hour...amazing...I guess he has no contender in this special field...

they tell us all the time that change is the answer, but there are moments in our life when we should feel/realize that we have all you want ...why then not taking things for what they wonderfully are, damned....why why why...???
Because we are afraid of once-for-all choices.........alternative, open, brand new, doomed, replacable, limited in time...all these adjectives are very popular and over rated nowadays, think about it...apparently we do have to think that everything can be better, all the time...I would like to hear, at least once from time to time, that we are not - fortunately - gonna live forever; that the best, maybe, is yet to come but that the best is not the absolute, is not the fucking dream that comes true...

Decisions should be taken, risks should be taken too!...once in a lifetime speeches should be screamed...and honesty should play the main role on the fucking stage of everybody´s own life...
Please, let us stop thinking that there will always be something better, cooler or whatever you say...
Because it is true that there it could be, but at the same time that is NOT gonna happen, ever...because the best is just what we have in this fucking, actual, tough - but real - life and not something sponsored by mastercard rather than easy jet...
The dream should be to do our best and not to expect the best from the universe, damned you kids born with Nutella, Barbie/Kenn and Coca Cola....
I wish to all of you to feel expirable for a second...it helps landing back on this planet...

Unkoordinierte Gedanken

Three weeks ago I left them on the table of a bar, just like that...did not realize I had lost them until it was two in the morning...I had to sleep at the restaurant...
Two weeks ago I left them home, but at least this time I thought about it all of the sudden...could not do anything, though since I had to go to work...but fortunately I met a girl that evening and spent the night at her place...
Today I left them home, once more: only when I went back from shopping I noticed my keys were not in my pocket...
I learnt to open my door without them (it is easier than you think, as long as your door is old-fashioned) and also to leave a copy in a safe place somewhere else...at least that, no?

Where is my mind?

The 10th time in Detroit

Allied Media Conference.

Fund raising during the primaries

A very smart interactive data graphic

feathers, strings, whiskers...no focus...

When as a kid it happened to me to feel lonesome, I was sure that i could talk with my pillow: I talked for hours, i was sure that it could listen and keep my thoughts for the best...I am not sure I still have the same one, though i still have one with feathers...it is unlikely that it is the same...

When I grew up a bit, I started thinking that I could do the same with my guitar, which I was playing so much that it could have even made sense...it got a name, but no clear personality, unfortunately...

After the guitar came the cats: first mine then my girlfriend´s, this last one being the most relaxed creature of the planet...that is why I thought it could be a good listener...may he was...for sure not a good advisor...

In the last years I lost confidence in this kind of confessions, and though you could think that it is better so, I strongly doubt about it...Right now I am looking all around in my room, while listening the National from 2005, considering which object should be next...or should I get another cat?

That is the reason why since months I am having a conversation with myself: it is mostly a try to get some questions answered, always the same few in the end; it usually starts early in the morning, experiences a couple of long breaks during the day due to work or reading/studying, keeps on till late at night...yesterday I was so into the conversation while having sex...scaring.

It seems my mind is still floating somewhere else as my immanent reality, for most of the time it tries to function properly...

I am going to Budapest for work between the 18th and the 2oth of April...if anybody wants an apartment in Berlin for a week-end in spring, just let me know.

Our new Master Programme in European Studies: ONLINE!

A 2-year master programme starts in September 2008. If you are interested or think somebody you know could be, please forward this link.
We have candies and chocolate bars waiting for you, if you help us!

Crazy Dunks

http://youtube.com/watch?v=_EFMTEpOeG4&feature=related

I guess the link on the right column "Bologna University, My ex-university", should be replaced by "Bologna University, my ex´s university"...small things make life pretty amazing, uh...?
Oh man

A couple of thoughts and a playlist

1. We all read in the news how women are still victims of violence, and not just in Sudan rather than in Pakistan...
The more I spend time along with them, the more I realize how many suffer from some form of violence.
Out of the three women I have been truly in love with, two suffered from violence - and not because of me, obviously (!).
In both cases it has NOT just been a slap in the face...
The number of other girls/friends of mine that have been victims of violence is huge...I guess more than an handful, and the more I spend time with friends, the more I find out about new disgusting stories...
So while I was walking in Prenzlauer Berg at five in the morning, right after having heard about the next bad story, I asked myself why on earth it is like that....and could not come out with any explanation but that the percentage of male motherfuckers in this planet is pretty high...are women in some ways exaggerating? I would not think so...

2.EU is so a bad example on how an international organization should manage its foreign policy...whether this decision of free choice for the recognition of Kosova is a wise move or not, we will probably find out in a week...whether there may have been another viable option, I am not sure...but with Spain and Romania (the 2 countries representing a seventh of the EU population) refusing the recognition, while France and Germany do, does not sound good news at all for the incoming Common Foreign Policy of the "renewed" EU...

3. The conservative vicepresident of the European Commission, Mr. Frattini, has a plan to create a pretty selective system for letting people in the EU; he also pushes for a database of migrants coming to EU...in Germany people and newspapers discussed about the plan, critizising the intellectual basis of it too...I would say it is not the best side of the EU, this one which is coming out...and when it does come from a close friend of Mr. Berlusconi is even worse.


4.Barry Adamson - Oedipus Schmoedipus
Laury Hill - Ms Hill
Thom Yorke - Complete Eraser Remixes.
Baby Dee - Safe Inside the Day
Sixteen Horsepower - Olden
Sixteen Horsepower - Folklore

The best band in town...since a decade

R A D I O H E A D

Wer will die Stasi zurück?!

Ich nicht...aber jemanden gibt´s schon...SZ darüber.

Old same story

The population of our western societies is growing older and older, and somehow there is no way to doubt that this trend shall magnify its effects in the next future.

I work in the very western side of Berlin twice a week: it looks like Maine or Wales somehow - even if I have never been in either place; this part of the city is the one that became rich after the war in a kind of fast way...nowadays next to the several embassies which grew up there in the early fifties, you see old people all over the place...centers where old people can go to live, advertisement of theatre shows that no twenty-five-years-old-person would ever dare to attend; cafés and restaurants looking fake and boring...post offices with cheesy and awefull (not even cheap!) greetings card...
Is it a positive phenomenon the one through which we are all growing older and older?
Do not get me wrong....
If the average life expectancy in Zimbabwe will eventually rise from its actual 35 years (that is a scandal and a tragedy of our times!), I will be very very happy.
But if Großvater Scholz keeps on growing older and older, more and more lonesome, more and more fixed upon his crazy ideas and believes, more and more aside from what is happening all around him until his early nineties, who is going to enjoy that? If Frau Scheidl will live until her 95, eating only saltless vegetables and tofu curry wurst, alone, angry and bitter with her family or with the memories of it, who can actually say that this is plus?

Is it good that our brain will turn into a tired and overstretched machine that has to control over a body which will still be fit in relation to that? Is it worth to get through painful treatments and deeply intrusive surgery, if the absolute difference is some more months spent on a rolling chair?
Is it not unreal and hypocritical the rhetoric of our government over "development", though combined with the apology of the elderly?

Somebody could tell me:"Well, Marco, the longer the better"...is this belief one of the new absolute of our Western morals?
I am not sure that if these people would look at themselves, they would agree with that...in the mass of old people from Berlin and from Venice, from Weimar and from Munich try, you guys, to have a look at their eyes (grey, empty, flat), to measure their patience with the rest of humanity, their loud pessimism, their inability to be on the street, see a child and just smile...it is probably bitter and progressively limiting to grow older; it is usually also very painful and full of losses (phisical, relational, mental, moral)...why do we keep on telling ourselves the story that the third (or fourth) age is a golden period of our lives? Are the first two so bad? Or is it just the last of a series of lies-that-let-us(them)-live-better?

I do think about it and wonder...

New discoveries on the side of global sad music: as if Morricone had written rock songs

The Sweetest Embrace
Barry Adamson and Nick Cave


Our time is done my love
We've laid it all to waste
One thousand moonlit kisses
can't sweeten this bitter taste
My desire for you is endless
and I'll love you 'till we fall
I just don't want you no more
and that's the sweetest embrace of all
To think we can find happiness
hidden in a kiss
Ah, to think we can find happiness
that's the greatest mistake there is
There is nothing left to cling to babe
There is nothing left to soil
I just don't want you no more
and that's the sweetest embrace of all
Ooohhh where did it begin
When all we did was lose
There's nothin' left to win
So lay your weapons down
they serve no purpose in your hands
And if you wanna hold me
then go ahead and hold me
I won't upset your plans
If it's revenge you want
then take it babe
Or you can walk right out the door
I just don't care anymore
And that's the sweetest embrace of all
Ooohhh where did it begin
When all we did was lose
There's nothin' left to win
It's over babe
And it really is a shame
We are losers you and me babe
In a rigged and crooked game
My desire for you is endless
And I love you most of all
I just don't want you no more
and that's the sweetest embrace of all

New music from Detroit

Watch the video, register and get the single! It is worth listening!
Do it, just do it!
Hier...

eight to go

I do not think anymore that what is happening around me has any kind of sense, at all...I do not even think that what I say now has any sense...I just feel lost, no method to apply or to emprove, no smart thing to say, not distant enough to say:"I do not care", just like a butterfly floating in everybody´s stomach...rancid, sour and lonely...fsch fsch fsch...

A new bunch of albums I have been listening to lately...

Jose Gonzalez - Veneer
Jose Gonzalez - In Our Nature
Hot Chip - Made in the Dark
Miles Davis - Isle of Wight Concert
The Fugs - It Crawled Into My Hand, Honest
Abbey Lincoln - Wholly Earth
Madrugada - Madrugada (still)

Wishlist

A 32Gb Ipod Touch is very tempting, a 16Gb Iphone almost as much as...

Late night aknowledgment

I have no idea about what I want, what I do not want, why and in which sense...

Sunday elections

Second turn, second mandate.

Berlin people from abroad...like me, like most.

This man, whom I had the chance to hear talking twice, is a very interesting fellow.
His website deserves to be checked out, and his tips about Berlin are worth a try, if you ever came to this place, city, this never ending stratification of tragic and unique events of European history.

A very interesting article on a very interesting subject

NY Times on Germany´s way to deal with its past.
Read it!

Protektionismus von unten

SZ über Nokia, die Deutsche und die Zeitverschwendung.

Brand new music - new old music

Múm - Go Go Smear the Poison Ivy
Mclusky - Mclusky Do Dallas
Cat Power - Jukebox
Bonnie "Prince" Billie - Ask Forgiveness
Karen Dalton - In My Own Time
Various Artists - I am not there O.S.T.
Kenney Stoltz - Below the Branches
Broken Social Scene - Spirit If
Blonde Redhead - Melody of Certain Damaged Lemons

Unbekannt

A friend of mine made me "know" Karen Dalton yesterday. She apparently released only two albums, we listened to the most popular: "In my own time"...called the Billie Holyday of the American folk music she played banjo and guitar...I like her attitude to singing...in the japanese version of her cd album, there is a citation from Bob Dylan´s Chronicles...a description of times where festivals and concert, reunion and events were taking place spontaneously all over the country...maybe becuase of the music of the "I am not there" movie, maybe because of the need of something new: either way I have been listening a lot of American folk music lately.

One Hundred Days

When the willow bends towards the end of day
And twilight falls again
To the funny sound that a blackbird makes
Twilight falls again
As no good reason remains, I'll do the same
Thinking of you
One day a ship comes in, one day a ship comes in
But I can't say how or when
But I know somewhere the ship comes in every day
There is no morphine, I'm only sleeping
There is no crime to dreams like this
And if you could take something with you
It would be right
Something good
From my fingertips, the cigarette throws ashes to the ground
I'd stop and talk to the girls who work this street, but I got business farther down
Like one long season of rain, I will remain
Thinking of you
One day a ship comes in
From far away a ship comes in
One hundred days you wait for it
And you know somewhere the ship comes in every day
There is no morphine, I'm only sleeping
There is no crime to dreams like this
And if you could take something with you
It would be bright
Just like something good
One day a ship comes in
One hundred days you wait for it
Something bright
Something so good
One hundred days
A ship comes in every day
You know it's good
You know it's good
A ship comes in every day
One day a ship comes in
Its good
When it's something good

I automatically wake up after 5 hours of sleep, when I am so lucky to fall asleep soon enough to have so many hours ahead me...so annoying! Whst should I do now?! Damned...It is five in the morning.

Rear-view mirror

Some people think they need memorable events in every day of their lives as a sort of fuelling effect on their existences; some other take that for granted, no matter what happens - turning stories or events upside down is a well-known practice all over the world...
I do not feel I belong to any of the two categories...still I guess special things make life special.

It would be kind of satisfying if I could remember any of these last weeks for something special...something not connected with huge hangovers or sex in the ladies´ restroom of some bar. Because, apart from that, and from the loads of music I have been listening to, it is so difficult for me to recall if some minor event took place last Monday or three fucking weeks ago...It is probably a matter of attitude, it could be argued, and I could agree too...the thing is that having spent three days home alone because of a cold made me realize that very vividly.

I watched movies, youtube crap, tv serials, tv shows, listened old and new music, worked a bit too, read newspapers and books, articles and magazines...now I can talk with you, him, her, anybody, about the eccentricity of Steve Albini, the similarities (I found) between Architecture in Helsinky and Broken Social Scene, the beauty and every-day-more-main-stream charme of Chan Marshall, or about Primaries in the US, the Australian Open or the right size of the glas for a Sour (at least the one size I like the most!) but I just have to admit that I am very lonely in this city.
Maybe well informed, maybe not sad or depressed anymore, probably aware that is just temporary...very alone though.

I guess Google is gonna win: my mum got a gmail account...

Playlist für einsame Berliner

The National - Boxer
Radiohead - In Rainbows (Still)
Wilco - Sky Blue Sky
PJ Harvey - White Chalk (Still)
Sons and Daughters - Gift
Band of Horses - Cease to Begin
The Beatles - The White Album
Burial - Untrue
John Vanderslice - Esmerald City
Nick Cave and Warren Ellis - O.S.T. The Assassination of Jesse James...

...coming soon:
Bonnie Prince Billy
Cat Power - Jukebox

Some more old stuff

Two years old pictures on the web.
Barbatax and I between Sardiny and Lisbon

The Spice girls will one day soon become Ministries of the Faith? A mediocre good looking high-voiced English football player will conquer prolselytes in California for the least understandable religion ever?
I truly hope so. Things do not make sense at all. That is why we usually all like fiction.

A loud lack of hope, the feeling of being in the wrong spot most of the time, a row of sleepless evenings, a girl with a boyfriend, no friends...
Plus winter.
I wish I never knew her: it is scaring for me to think that but it is just like the way it is.

South America

A friend went south.
Have a look. Patagonia.

On Apple

9 Questions and an hangover

Should I really try to get out of Berlin for a while?
Should I bring home any girl who would like to check my apartment?
Should I think that the best is yet to come?
Should I put a micro onto my classical guitar?
Should I found a band called "The Bodysnatchers"?
Should I stop reading in italian?
Should I believe there is some stuff that last longer than a while?
Should I get the driving license?
Should I watch Wayne´s World?

West of the East, East of the West...almost in the middle

SZ ueber Goerlitz

Books for this next year

1. Coetzee´s last work
2. An old novel by McEwan
3. Arendt in Jerusalem
4. Last Grass

Depressed country for aggressive people

NYTimes on my own country

I thought it was different, but it is just rebounding.

Another clone

Once more the same

Clones

The same title

I guess not looking for explanations sounds the best thing to do in moments like this one...I am just wondering whether one day memories will become explanations...whether lazyness will disappear, whether I will find a way to talk about it...
Yesterday morning I lost the flight to Berlin, so that I had to wait 11 hours in the smallest international airport of Italy...it has been pretty tough to be by myself for such a long time and avoid to feel totally empty and useless, since I did not want to look for explanations....I had lunch twice, read the whole newspaper as carefully as possible, tried with books, solved the most complicated crosswords I can solve, discussed with the hostess and lay in the sun...being a smoker would have probably helped...being so clueless once more sucks though.

Sufjan Stevens, PJ Harvey, Tori Amos B Sides, Mingus Big Band, Sweeny + Will Oldham and the last from Radiohead have been playing on my Ipod lately. You should all listen some of them, if you like.

The dom and the best abbacchio of my life

I am in Rome since yesterday, it rains and then the sun shines...walls are dark orange...this kind of beauty does not ask you to do anything special. you just have to be passive enough...at two a.m. bars and clubs do not serve any more alcohol; in every internet cafe you need to show your ID, but it still charming to be back in the capital, sure that here you can let yourself be understood...

Once more about next wednesday.

T.G.Ash in the Guardian

The song of the month: two minutes and something of poetry

Hit her with a hammer
Teeth smashed in
Red tongue twitching
Look inside her skeleton

My fingers sting
Where I feel your fingers have been
Ghostly fingers
Moving my limbs

Oh God I miss you
Oh God I miss you
Oh God I miss you
Oh God I miss you
Oh God I miss you

Daddy's in the corner
Rattling his keys
Mommy's in the doorway
Trying to leave

Nobody's listening
Nobody's listening
Nobody's listening
Nobody's listening
Nobody's listening
Nobody's listening
Nobody's listening
Nobody's listening

Oh God I miss you
Oh God I miss you
Oh God I miss you
Oh God I miss you
Oh God I miss you
Oh God I miss you

I guess that my life pretty sucks every two years because I meet too many people from the second category

NYT on Perfectionists

Report

A new report on iranian attitudes

Privacy...

American presidential campaign

NYTimes on the unthinkable

frozen conflicts in a post cold war europe: does anybody know what is going to happen?

What happens on the 12th of December?
EUobserver.