Hooray, Hooray, It's a Holi Holiday - Blog

Random Recollections from my trip to Kas on the Lycian Way in Turkey

Animal Magic

The cockeral in the picture above is Duke.  He lived with some other cockerals and hens opposite the hotel where we stayed in Kas.  There were also two dogs.  In the hotel itself there were four or five cats, usually wondering round and taking an interest in anything you happened to be eating.

And the area around the hotel wasn't the only place where the animals roamed free.  And the night time was when they were at their liveliest, and I've never heard a noisier place after the sun had set, with a constant background of barking, screeching, yowling, howling, clucking and crowing, from the moment you went to bed until it was time to get up.  And that was apart from the call to prayer through loudspeakers that could happen anytime between 4.30 and 6.30 AM.  All of this would have been quite impressive and maybe even amusing if you didn't have to be up to go sea kayaking, canyoning or mountain biking the next day, which I usually did (yeah, I know, just call me action man).  As it was, my annoyance was mitigated when I reminded myself that I was on holiday, so I just admired the din.

Dogs are like cats in Kas.  What I mean by that is they are not constrained by backyards or leads (I saw a dog on a lead once while I was there and it made for a strange sight in that context), they just go where they will.  For someone who is nervous of dogs this could represent a problem, and I heard a few complaints along these lines, but to me it added to the relaxed ambiance of a Mediterranean town.  Indeed, most of the dogs I saw during the daytime were doing this:

Resting before their evening's festivities no doubt.  For the most part, the dogs, cats and chickens of Kas were indifferent towards me, which I didn't mind at all.  The exception was this chap:

This is one of the hotel cats that I accidentally trod on during the first evening I was there and seemed to take it as a sign that I needed adopting. Or maybe he thought I'd feed him more because of the guilt. Either way I managed to gain an occasional companion for my stay due to my clumsiness.

Turkish Delights

Speaking of feeding, let's have a look at some of the food!  Some people get annoyed at the habit some people have of photographing their dinner but I'm not one of them.  A well presented plate of food is like art, for me, with the added bonus of whetting your appetite.  Some of the lovely meals I sampled were:

Calamari stuffed with prawns and spinach

A proper Turkish kebab - much healthier than the post pub grub you get in the UK

Buffet food with grilled sea bass that we ate during our evening on a boat

No good desert shots, sorry about that.  However, speaking of the boat meal...

A Moment of Happiness

In a previous blog I discussed the pursuit of Happiness.  This thought came to mind one evening during the holiday, when the group I was with took a sunset boat trip...

 ... out to a sheltered bay off Meis island. 

When we reached the bay, darkness had fallen, and I lay back on the foredeck of our little boat with a glass of wine in my hand. The general conversation melted away into the background. 

To my left I could see Venus, the Evening star, setting behind the hills of the island.  To my right the lights of Kas twinkled into the night.

Above me the mast of the boat rocked gently back and forth.  And beyond the mast shone the numberless stars.  For the first time in my life (to my knowledge) I saw the band of the Milky Way arcing across the sky.  It was very beautiful.

And for a minute I forgot everything and lived in the moment.

Then we got called for dinner, so that was alright!

Overall, it was an enjoyable and memorable holiday.  Thank you to everyone who shared in it and made it the experience it was.

I will leave you with a typical weather forecast for Kas.

   

Funayūrei

The next thing I knew I was over the side

The black waters rose up to enfold me

The cold night without

Became the inner night of the ocean's depths

The endless expanse of water

That would become my tomb

My head broke the water's freezing surface

The ship that bore me already receding

To a distant point

On the bleak, storm ravaged horizon

Marooned among the towering waves

Suddenly alone, utterly lost

The waters closed above my pleading lips

Encased in silence my body descends

Towards the locker

Sparks and flashes from dying Neurons

Images from birth to grave

Tears lost at sea

Here's the good ship Francesca

Its business is your pleasure

Her captain will make your voyage a joy

That's certain by any measure

It cuts through the mighty Atlantic

Searching for the Northern Lights

With days of relaxation and shopping

Followed by crazy party nights

Has anyone seen daft old Jim

Who tells stories of his novelty shed

He knocked back a right old skinful

Before he excused himself to bed

We'd better go and check he's alright

Last night was blowing up a storm

He might have fell and banged his head

Before he managed to find his dorm

Jim!  There you are, daft old goat!

Recovered from your evening's repast?

You need to get some food in your belly

Let's go and get some breakfast

You're awfully quiet this morning

Has the hangover got your tongue?

Let's have some hair of the dog

That'll bring back a sense of fun!

Jim, I never took you for a soup fan

That ladle would feed the whole crew!

Don't have the lot you greedy thing

There's more mouths to feed than just you!

"I don't call this a ladle," said Jim coldly

"The true word for this thing is 'hishaku'

It is the tool with which my vengeance

Shall be brought down with fury upon you

"You'll never eat again," pronounced the man with grey skin

"It's not soup but the ocean this thing dishes

For the ocean has judged and found you guilty

And now you're going down to join the fishes

For I fell overboard and was left

I screamed for help, and nobody came

Think on that, when Davy Jones comes for you

And remember that you die in shame"

In truth that was not Jim that stood there

In his place stood a Funayūrei

A name whispered in fear by the eastern folk

A ghost for a soul lost at sea

And from the hishaku as he called it

A flood of saltwater came streaming

And the passengers turned and fled in terror from that place

Filling the ship with their screaming

---

In the cold grey morning I watch, impassive

The last survivors calling out, helpless

Just as I was

Mere specks in an endless valley of water

That rises and falls

And slowly consumes them

Quieter now, they are disappearing one by one

Down to the same place

Becoming as I

Their struggles fade, their spirits bow

Hope fails at last

Silence descending

I remain by the grave

A new sister

Is standing by my side

We depart

Further judgements await

The waves continue, eternal

 

The Pursuit of Happiness

Should we pursue happiness?

I watched a very witty graduation speech by an Australian comedian called Tim Minchin.  In it, he listed the 9 principles that he thought one should live their life by:

1. You don't have to have a dream.

2. Don't seek happiness.

3. Remember, it's all luck.

4. Exercise.

5. Be hard on your opinions.

6. Be a teacher.

7. Define yourself by what you love.

8. Respect people with less power than you.

9. Don't rush.

The one that caught my eye the most was Don’t seek happiness.  This interested me in its diametric opposition to the American 'ideal' which we know as ‘The Pursuit of Happiness.'

‘The Pursuit of Happiness' is a principle, an ideal that I have admired without reservation in the past.  This is probably because other sets of ideals and principles set out by nation states were always ‘weighty’ and of very 'high' morality and worthiness.  Witness similar initial stipulations proposed by post revolutionary France, and the Marxist inspired protocols of Russia, USA's future cold war enemy (in its incarnation as the USSR).  If there was an argument for America as a more attractive destination for those seeking a new life, I thought to myself, surely then this "Happiness clause" was it?
 
John Lennon, of course, famously got in trouble at school for answering the question "what do you want to be when you grow up" with the answer "to be happy".

On the other hand the legendary motor racing driver Niki Lauda, declared that "happiness is the enemy".  Who is right, I wonder?

The answer, possibly, lies between the urge to 'act' and the contentment to simply 'be'.  Should we try to change the world or should we be content to simply wonder at it?  There's your existential conundrum for the day.

The Gamut of Emotions

Gamut?!  Gamut?!  What kind of stupid word is that anyway?  Can't we just say range?!  Anyway...  let's take a look at my handy gamutometor of emotion...

Note that madness lies both above ecstasy, below despair and off the scale at either end of the gamutometer.  Now, considering madness goes hand in hand with genius, we must logically conclude that one must ride a wave of intense emotion in order to express whatever world changing idea is in one's genius's locker.  And it's okay Mr Spock, you can still be a genius despite your emotion free outlook.  You're half alien.

Ever Changing Moods

I have generally spent life at the mercy of mood swings.  The lyric "I'm up and down like a bride's nightie, I'm up and down and I don't know why, ooh, I'm happy and then I'm blue" has applied to me almost constantly.  I've learned that when you're up, accept the situation and be grateful, and that when you're down, it can sometimes be useful to locate the source of your despondency, as you may be able to correct the situation and cheer yourself up. 

Of course sometimes there is no real reason for your funk.  You're trapped inside the ageing skin of a mortal human that is hurtling through an endless uncaring cosmos on a mote of dust.  You could fill this vacuum inside you with gratuitous eating, sex, violence or blog writing.  Or you could simply appreciate the notion that if this is the worst quandary on your mind, you're probably not trapped in a famine, a natural disaster or a war zone.

Or you could get out there and pursue some happiness...

 

Autumn Haikus

Fields of aged gold

Boughs hang heavy with ripened fruit

Shimmering Cider

The year grows old

Leaves blown by the wind

Golden rainfall

The rolling fields

Fade into a mist shrouded horizon

Dark ocean of trees

The seasons turn

Cold bites the wind blowing from the North

Jacket required

Chill touches spine

Voices from ages gone whisper haunted imprecations

Costumed carnival

Young eyes sparkling

Domestic explosive detonates among the stars

Sacrificial straw man

Equinox to Solstice

Advancing nights herald Winter's Onset

Cyclic beauty

The Ghost in the Machine - Or Where Are We Going, Part 2

Our lives are increasingly being lived virtually.  As well as a literal, we also leave an electronic footprint.  In the younger generation this dual life is even more strongly realised.

For those of us who have taken part in the internet revolution, it feels strange to think that moving forward there are two versions of yourself - the 'real' you, and the virtual you.  Sometimes I think of the 'virtual me' that I have left as a computerised echo across the World Wide Web.  In my virtual life, I have taken part in many conversations and debates online.  I've shot the breeze, reacted to the issues of the day, told stories, argued, joked around, played my favourite music, lost my temper, made friends, made enemies and flirted. 

Indeed, if the diaries of such as Samuel Pepys have caused such fascination with their snapshots of 17th century life in London, what will it be like for future generations to look back at us?  As the first 'cyber generation', I would imagine that we will have a certain hold over the imagination by default.

If future generations chose, and as technology advances, I would imagine they would be able to make a perfectly serviceable facsimile of my virtual self, warts and all, that they would be able to interact with if that was their fancy.  For all I know I may have just given one of my descendents that very idea! I can only hope that my simulacrum will offer a modicum of entertainment.

We have seen films such as The Matrix, Total Recall and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (among many, many other movies and books) play with the idea of living in an artificially constructed world, and now we stand at the shoreline of that virtual universe, and the watermark is slowly rising as we witness the digitization of existence.

I wrote Where Are We Going part 1 some thirteen or fourteen years ago for a website I hosted that has long been consigned to the virtual dustbin (thank you AOL).  In this blog I speculated that one day the last 'physical' human would download themselves into a Universe contained within a subatomic cube that would then be cast adrift and float through the cosmos (if it was small enough it perhaps could  even survive the theoretical Heat Death of the Universe, thus granting us immortality).  When I look around I see we are well on course for that possible future.

I can imagine the horrified thoughts that may be coursing through the mind of a reader as they contemplate this future, trapped in a pseudo reality where you will never feel the wind upon your face or watch a sunrise and stuff like that - but the way I look at it as long as uncontrolled human interactions remain a part of your world, there will always be something there to stop you getting bored.  Besides which life, and how it is lived by that time, will have evolved to such an extent we can't know or judge what those cats will be finding groovy.

And if they get that bored they can always talk to my ghost!

Once More With Feeling - Or A Moan About Writer's Block

I've always envied those that can create prolifically.  Creatively I'm what in football terms is called a 'confidence player'.  i.e. a player for which certain things, psychological and sometimes physical, have to be in place before they can produce (including the famous 'arm round the shoulder', which is usually provided by the manager/coach, and accompanied by words that will indulge the confidence player's ego).

Of course, writing is not football, and it's very difficult to define what those 'certain things' might be, in creative terms, unfortunately.  For myself, engendering creativity is almost like an engine that needs a different combination of actions applied to it every time before it will 'kick start' (there's kind of an idea in there already I guess...).  The good news is that once it belches out an idea, and that light bulb clicks on, I feel compelled to scribble down whatever it's told me I should be writing about.

One day, perhaps, science will derive the mathematical formula that is behind the human creative spark.  I have mixed feelings about this prospect.  On the one hand harnessing this force could give us a very powerful tool in the advancement of knowledge and all kinds of progress.  On the other hand, would it make us any more ethical, any more moral?  At the worst I suppose it could speed us down the road to extinction as we come up with ever more creative methods of destruction.

The other reservation I have about the 'mathematical formula of creativity' is just the feeling that some mysteries should remain mysteries.  There is nothing logical I can give to justify this feeling, other than a need to believe that there is still some magic in the Universe.

Getting back to what (to the best of my knowledge) inspires me to write, I would say vision and feeling.  A vision comes to you, and it is accompanied by the feeling that the vision gives to you.  Recently, I collaborated on plotting a story based upon this picture:

The person who collaborated with me suggested that although I was making plenty of suggestions as to the concepts and the course of the story, I wasn't putting much 'feeling' into it.  At the time I did kind of dismiss the criticism as a bit girly (hope my collaborator doesn't mind me putting it in those terms if she's reading...) but upon reflection I find the criticism may have been valid.  I suppose it was down to the affect that the picture had on me, ultimately.

So is there a 'creative fuel' that can be guaranteed to supply both the 'vision' and the 'feeling'?  For me, there is: music.  Not every piece of music of course.  just certain pieces and at certain times.

And so I'll close this blog with an example of a song that has had precisely this affect, and screamed at me "I am a story waiting to happen".

Will I ever write that story?  Maybe.

If you listen to this song and get a 'vision and a feeling' then you have my commiserations - because there's something in your mind that works in a similar way to mine.

 

Message in a Bottle

What is your #MessageToVoyager ? Post a message or video to .. @NASAVoyager !

Here is the invitation I was given.  Give a message to the human made object that is the furthest away of all the objects that humanity has conspired to engineer.  A message from a fleeting life on the Pale Blue Dot that our Greatest Explorer has left behind, and will never see again.

So here goes:

"Have a great time!  I want photos!  And if you encounter any robotic super races that want to turn you into an unstoppable force of destruction bent on finding your creator, please go in the opposite direction."

All the Best

Jez

That's Me in the Corner - That's Me in the Spotlight...

There's a person I'm connected with on Twitter - you could say this person has an impestuous temperament.  But my Twitter timeline is always livened up by what they have to say.  Today this person, among all the other random 140 character pronouncements, made a declaration.

"I've just had an epiphany.  There is no God."

"That's pretty heavy," I responded.

"I know, right?"

This exhange got me thinking.  It was pretty strange to share such a moment with this person in such a way, and it shows how the world is changing.  Before the dawn of social networking, such an epiphany would have been an intensely personal and private life changing moment.  Now such an utterence is lost among the flow of updates that are announced to the world on a semi-regular basis.

"Went to the shops"

"Fed the cat"

"Rejected the concept of a Universal Creator"

"Listened to the new Red Hot Chili Peppers album (it's kicking!)"

"Jim's behaving like a right idiot at the minute"

etc

etc

The question I asked myself is, are we trivialising such moments by letting them escape in the flow of updates, statuses and random musings?  Have they become banal because of this?

I decided the answer was no.  Why?  Because the way these moments come and go is a reflection of the way life is really lived.  We have these thoughts.  We make these decisions, and then we do something else.  Whatever thoughts go through our mind, and whatever happens, when these moments have gone, we carry on.  We just get on with it.

Why? 

Because there's nothing else we can do.

"Remember life is strange
And life keeps getting stranger every day."
Procession, New Order