July 12. The human predicament.

This day is intentionally left out. Writing this some weeks later, I can hardly remember what I did. I guess I hung out with my new friends in Seoul. Played pool on the 28th floor of an apartment building overlooking greater Seoul and the surrounding mountains we hiked a few days ago. Watching movies and sleeping on soft pillows. Probably.

Consider yet another depiction of the human predicament:

"You are not alone" he tells her with a deep, hissing voice in an attempt to console her. He leans over her and tries to kiss her forehead. He feels her sweat on his lips, it tastes like warm butter. She moves her head away. "Don't. Don't lie to me." He takes a napkin and wipes her forehead. "I'm not lying to you, I'm here, look!" He takes off his sweater and shirt and then takes her hand, slowly moving it towards his breast. "It's my heart, do you feel it?" She nods dimly, like a schoolgirl that has asked a silly question. "I feel it. You are here." He sighs. "Do you understand now? You are not alone!" he says, rising his voice a little bit. "But I still feel alone" she whispers. "Please don't. Don't let me down!" he yells to her and then he takes of his pants. A painful smile lingers on the girls lips. He enters her body. Five minutes later it's over. He throws away the condom and makes himself a cup of coffee to stay awake. When he comes back, he sits next to her and caresses her cheek. "You are not alone" his voice is singing now he feels, he is the little hummingbird courting her, she is the purpose of his life, the enigma of first and last and infinite love. His hands is striking her hair and he keeps repeating his words. "I know" she replies because she knows how much he needs her.

June 25. A Nobel Writer.

I walk around the Namdaemung area, and enter the famous market. A Japanese history writer takes me into his friend's Ginseng store. He has written some books about Korean-Japanese history.
"Five books. But I still very poor."
-"Aren't most writers?"
"You will have success. Be Nobel writer."
His friend smiles. "Nobel writer." he repeats nodding his head and let some more cigarette smoke pass his lips. In the ashtray they have laid wet some paper to neutralize the smell of smoke. I smile back and suck on the ginseng candy. "You poor. Take many" he says and demonstrates what he expects me to do by grabbing a fistfull of candies.
"No, thank you". He fumed again and I imagined being in a Wong Kar-Wai movie.
"You can be Nobel writer" he repeats.
"Yes", I say, and then I tell him the truth.
"I want to be a noble writer."

That evening... you know what. I'm visiting like heaven and stuff. It's a little bit personal but so interesting that I want to mention at least something here. It is a mise-en-scène, a trick of the mind, that I'm sitting on that leather chair. "It's like I'm dreaming" the mother says and yes YES, that is what it's supposed to be. A dream, the past is a dream never dreamt. I ask for a dictionary. What is this all about? Stammering "it is a thing of the past" and silence. Silence in heaven - damn I've been there, what's that as a traveling destination. Getting all tipsy and stuff, will they serve ambrosian here (and marchmellows). Continue. In Korean - what a challenge. So I miss her. Want to see she's happy and all. Happy. You know, my mother: her I cannot visit no-more, but she I can, still, now, today, on the eve of her birthday. "She veeerrry angry" the mother says. Tame smile from the father. "It depends on her mind." Of course. Never mind. At least I know you guys are healthy. Thanks for letting me peek in again. And by the way, are you still so keen about Jesus and going to church and all? Yes. But you don't seem so keen about the forgiveness business. You know what? I think that religious veil is just a farce. A shrewd means to cope with your own bitter and vindictive personality. I know some psychology, and I can tell. Worshipping that beautiful man on the cross, chanting amen and all the world is love - why? Take your mental shovel and dig, dig deep. You ploughed the ground to sow the seed of hatred. I know, you don't want to hear it. It's too ugly. The smooth chants of Jesus and the smiles and the sermons of redemption and forgiveness they enable you to be inhumanely cruel to others, to people from outside of your pious contemptuous pack. But it's cool de ma part. Look, it's good for a writer, like doing a field experiment, stuff like that. What? It's an interesting experience. The intermingling of present and past, things that last and those that pass, the quintessence of so many pages of prose of prose of Proust. Anonymity here please, privacy. But if you're going trough something similar just contact me I'm sure we can work something out. You want to cope with someone's death? Get rid of someone else, but make sure that person is still alive somewhere on the planet. Wait a couple of years and then visit that person. If you plan and execute it well that might be like a lever to scoop you out of your mourning.

June 25. Pleasures.

Seoul is a city of pleasures. I mean, it's a brilliantly composed ouverture to heaven with all its incredible restaurants, comfortable private cinemas (DVD-bang), relaxing saunas, karaokebars, 24-hour-nightlife, well-kept parks, shining glass facades facing every street - and quiet Buddhist temple retreats.

I start resuscitating my hibernating writer side today, so blog entries will be less about what I did, and more what I did.

I am reading Plays because my friend Jean-Marie adviced me to do so. Today I am enthousiastic about Brecht's "The Rise and Fall of Mahagonny" which has a very acceptable English translation made in 1960 for a planned staging by W.H. Auden and Chester Kallman. Now enjoy a few quotes from that play.

You've learned to mix your cocktails every way
You've seen the moonlight shining on the wall:
The bar is shut, the bar of Mandalay:
And why does nothing make sense at all?
You tell me, please, why nothing makes sense at all.

Clap your hands when a hurricane strikes:
Who cares for being immortal?
When a man can do just what he likes
Who's afraid of the storm at his portal?

One means to eat all you are able;
Two, to change your loves about;
Three means the ring and gaming table;
Four, to drink until you pass out.
Moreover, better get this clear
That Don'ts are not permitted here.
Morover, better get it clear
That Don'ts are not permitted here!

June 23. Seven Lively Sins.

Let's do nothing today! Look around a bit, peek in a bookstore, and read some theater. Walk the busy center of Seoul, observe the people moving on and off. I am shocked that Namdaemun, the "Great South Gate" has been burnt down by some lunatic protesting againt the incumbent president. It is perhaps the most important symbol of this country, and it is being reconstructed to its original state as far as possible. Tradition should be.

Seven lively sins. Here is a list of the seven traditional sins:

Wrath

Avarice

Sloth

Pride

Lust

Envy

Gluttony

The first letters form the words "wasp leg". Bzbzbzbzbzbzbzzzz - sting! sting!

We could call for some characters to impersonate the seven lively sins, and they would all talk to each other. Avarice says "hi Sloth how are you, what are you doing this weekend." Sloth replies "o not much, actually nothing, just sleeping, hanging out. How about you?" - "I don't know yet. I want everything." And Gluttony says "Let's have dinner then!" and they invite Pride too. Pride tells Envy disdainfully that he goes to a better plays. Envy him/herself ends up sharing some drinks with Wrath, whom Pride put down last week. And when they are too drunk to think Lust comes by and does them all.

But I don't like this. We could also do something like "Seven", the Bradpittian movie or Brecht's "Seven deadly sins" but that has already been done. So - hey, don't yawn, this is not supposed to be boring - I'm sorry I'm not writing about where I eat, sleep, drink and shit. I'm sorry I'm not writing about attractions and tourist treasures. Instead I'm spinning and shaking my mind like a bartender who has been drinking on the job shakes his drinks. So, what can we do about those seven lively sins? Let them go undercover and let the reader find out that it can be his neigbor? You like Unsinn? I do. Do you feel detached with the person who is writing these lines? That's what Unsinn can do for us. It's not easy in our society to produce pure nonsense. When you put your personality behind it, people will interpret your words in a way that they always make sense, no matter what. You cannot escape that. Even this. Parakeet, hyperblasphemian daredevil, finch pincher. There's no escape from the industry of sense. So, let's get back to the seven lively sins then.

Worthy art thou, o lively sin? Worthy of what? Of a feisty fling. Of no more than a second's lust and envy of that second, envy of thy self. Dance, o lively sin! More thou want? It's not enough? Avarice is croaching up your legs, o lively sin, there's nowhere you could go. Yes I know: you will devour that one second, and sins will sprout from your feasting. Gluttony and sloth and pride, you will find yourself wretched o lively sin, shipwrecked and clinging to that one second that spurred your existence. Concerted you will all go down, the seven of you, and all you lively sins will yell with stark open mouths as you descent. And all of you will be big in going down but the biggest of you all will be wrath. Keep dancing as you go down thou lively sin. Thou hath enough - now we begin.

June 22. What does Literature do?

So I live in a megalopolis again. I'm so behind with the writing I need to make long hours in fancy coffee houses here. It's hard work to keep up with the poignancy. After repeating yourself a few times, reactions will be lame and "whatever". It ages too fast. Writing that is not thought through but penned down in an an outburst of inspiration is either very soon forgotten or cult. So I read some earlier entries here in this body of text. There are no jades, don't worry, you didn't miss a thing. There were cumbersome reflections, laughable thoughts - not much to be fond of. But that's a good thing! A purgatory. The composition of this "body" of text has lead - for me - to see more clearly what writing can do, which goals it can set for itself, and what it cannot do. It's never omnipotent.

Literary writing can do essentially two things. One. To illustrate a certain state of mind with a narrative or a description. So the reader can place herself in the characters or the author should they coincide. The state of mind of a drunk, a soldier, a prostitute, a businessman, we can get some idea of it by reading about them. Two. Explain the transistion of a certain state of mind to another. Why does a person deviate from the path he was expected to take? A lot of writers have attempted this - with some of the most compelling world literature as a result. And non-essentially it can make the reader and the writer better persons - and don't you dare to question the definition of 'better' at this point!

"There is a difference between truth and fiction", the old man in Tom Tykwer's 'The International', brilliantly played by Armin Müller-Stahl, says, "fiction is about making sense." It's a good movie; I saw it on the airplane from LA to Taipei, and since I have nothing else to write about, I recommend it here. A typical philosopher can't swallow this kind of sentence without responding to it somehow. They make a fist so that their knuckles get all white and say things like "sense is essentially related to some notion of truth; in order to make sense, we have to organize our thoughts around this preconception." Then they 'elaborate some more' on the subject and get all heated up by their own beautiful phrases. Laymen sit aside, mumbling "so true, so true". I guess I am an a-typical philosopher.

The next sentence is dedicated to a very special reader: a computer! sbv2y5aier.

June 20. Serendipity.

An early flight to Seoul. I am so careful not to miss it that I spend the night in the airport. Twenty box for my taxi driver it's a long way from downtown Taipei to the international airport. I arrive there at 2am and try to lay down on the chairs (why don't they have benches or double seats where you can fold yourself so nicely) but I stay awake. Waiting for a flight is not waiting for Godot of course, the flight will come with certainty and if not the cancellation announcement will come with even greater certainty. And if that doesn't happen, that means there is a general system failure and waiting is useless anyway. The floor is cleaned, the sun rises, taxis arrive, passengers talking waiting in line. The check-in counter opens baggage goes through the röntgen beams we are asked to wait until our bag has come through, just in case. Is there also a coffee at the other side of the security check? Yes, of course. A very long corridor connects the terminals, it's fun to run here. Yes, let's run here like a child. See all the businessmen in their suits do they ever smile or go crazy? I don't think so. Their well-fed bellies need the seriousness for their justification. It's fun to run, run and make fun passing the business bellies. Many people have taken out their computers and put them on their laps. Their laps are kept warm by the heat of their calculators. So, I run and look at them and through the windows and at the carpet - how much work it is to vacuum here - hello! hello! There is something I want to tell you. O, is that so? Yes, and it's, it's... can't you see it, it's that thing... that... you are so bloody serious aren't you? Your loins are warm aren't they? You are connected, wired in an intricate lacework of connections: your well-fed belly, your wife whom you promised to take care of at the altar, your boss who has filed off the rough edges of your responsibility to the smooth object of mere accountability, your childs your boundless love to them nobody will ever question. It's interesting to see... they are all connected... to justify perfectly, seamlessly your obscenely rich existence. What are you talking about? I am not obscenely rich. My neighbor is. No YOU are compared to the child in Afr... I have a child their, in Somalia, my wife takes care of it. They do send beautiful pictures of it. It goes to school now, and it gets medical attention. We support it through an organization. So the child-in-Africa thing is a node in your web too. What are you talking about? About how your mind works. It's all about yourself and the justification of your material well-being. I don't like this conversation. I do more good to the world than you. But you can never be shaken up thoroughly, you can never be, caught by surprise, your web is woven. Does it matter? Of course, it is... important... You have to be open to things beyond your web. They, deserve, it. I don't think I really get you. Open, like ruled by all the possible tasks out there, instead of by the same web of prejudicial attitudes. Open, like... your gate? My gate? Your gate is closed. You missed your plane. Think about it. You can't argue your way into being more suitably connected to reality.

I did not miss my plane of course, and arrived in Seoul after a safe flight. One hour time difference. A comfortable shuttlebus takes me to the city and I start recognizing buildings like the nyuk-ship-sam (63-story) building on the island Yeouido. It is raining. I walk into a shopping mall (this city boast with shopping malls and miles). Unfortunately, I miscommunicate with my couchsurfer and let her wait (sorry!) - I meet Kathryn Dresdenfae at her hostel first. Our hearts are completely filled up with this serendipity thing. She just bought her flight here because she had to temporarily get out of China due to visa issues. By total coincides she is in Seoul on the day I arrive here. And since we both keep our travelblogs, you could compare her June 20th entry, wouldn't that be fun?! Anyway, we have a great afternoon. In the evening I meet Yeon, my couchsurfing host, at a subway station and we hop on a bus to take me to her studio on the green Namsan mountain. She is as friendly - and cute - as a person can possibly be.