The dream baker

5 books on an island

2011-01-14T22:22:00.002Z

For the new year, instead of useless resolutions, I propose my list of 5 books I'd take to a deserted island (if I will ever get to such a marvellous place).

1. Le città invisibili, Italo Calvino.

2. A Hundred Years of Solitude, Marquez.

3. All the works of Shakespeare (to read aloud to myself)

4. a la Recherche du Temps Perdu, Proust

5. The Great Gastby, Fitzgerald.

And if there is still room in my suitcase: all the books on Lord Peter Wimsey by D. L. Sayers, Thus Spake Zarathustra by Nietzsche, Leviathan by Hobbes, Minima Moralia by Adorno, the Bible (by you-know-who), the Ethics of Aristotle and Spinoza, something by Yaakov Shabtai, Walter Benjamin, Crime and Punishment, The Memoirs of Adrian and the entire oeuvre on Winnie the Pooh.

purity

2010-12-23T14:21:00.003Z

Now is the season when everybody mush be good. Everyone tries to be kind and loving to their neighbours, as the holiday spirit demands. Oh, of course it is 'their' holiday. Does not regard 'us'. Funnily, right in the season of togetherness explodes a disgusting bubble of hatred when demonstrators in Tel Aviv demand the immediate expulsion of Africans from their city. As we are at it, let them throw out the Arabs as well, because they corrupt 'our daughters'.

Racial and ethnic hatred seems too deeply embedded in human nature. Could it ever be extinct? Who will have the courage to condemn it against the crowds? Sometimes, white people are less hated than the blacks. But this is meagre consolation. The hate arrow can easily be directed at minorities of every kind and sort. There is no salvation from the hatred, not even the holidays goodwill. Only sheer Hobbesian egoism can help: we must insist to resist the evil because we can still remember how terrible it would be if the arrow pointed at us.

Adorabile Adorno

2010-12-14T22:45:00.002Z

"Per chi non ha più la patria, annche e proprio lo scrivere può diventare una sorta di abitazione. (..) L'esigenza di indurirsi e di non indulgere alla pietà di se stessi comprende in sé anche quella più tecnica di prevenire, con estrema cura, le cadute della tensione intelletuale e di eliminare tutto ciò che si viene a formare come un'incrostazione nel lavoro in corso, che continua a girare a vuoto, e che forse, in uno stadio antecedente, contribuiva a create, come ciarla o pettegolezzo, la calda atmosfera in cui l'opera può crescere e svilupparsi, ma che ora non è più che un residuo muffito e un deposito stantio. Alla fine allo scrittore non è concesso di abitare nemmeno nello scrivere. "

51. Dietro lo specchio, Minima Moralia.

Past-icide

2010-12-11T18:16:00.003Z

1. Bologna in the winter sun, with the light scent of roast chestnuts, fills me with a subtle joy of reviving the nicer moments of the past. I had a rewarding hot chocolate in the caffe where I used to have breakfast in my first year before I discovered it was a fascist meeting spot; I sat in the sun in Piazza Santo Stefano and read Adorno; I had lunch in the osteria dell'Orsa; I had a posh marrocchino at Terzi; biked quickly down via Zamboni without watching out the cars; passed hours looking for inspiring books in the great bookshops; checked the fancy foodshops in the old market allies and obviously bought nothing of their expansive food, but had aperitivo at Tamburini.

A stroll in my old almamater to admire all that is human, local, temporary and yet strangely eternal.

2. Went to see The Special Relationship. Martin Sheen's Blair is a lost, yet cunning, youth in search for a mentor; Denis Quaid's Clinton is the worn-out, over-smiling infantile leader of the Free World. Both wanted glory and influence; in a sense, according to the movie, both just wanted to be loved, squashed between interests, wives, lovers, and annoying belligerent far-away countries. But somehow I felt these 'good guys' are too good. This is not politics, this is idealized liberalism. Were the filmmakers too keen to believe their characters' compelling speeches? Was there another story, more complicated, of pressures, power relations, impressive counselors and complex networks of the Political? It is nicer to believe that it all depended on Tony's smile, until the 'bad boy Bush' came along and ended the party. How much the 'special relationship' a real friendship and how much a myth? Since the movie is a clear contribution to the myth, while claiming there was a franc friendship, the answer to this question remains unclear.

Occupation!

2010-12-01T23:08:00.003Z

Last Sunday I occupied the Senate House in Cambridge.

Well, more accurately, I joined in to those who had already stayed in the elegant SCR of the distinguished university. They have been there since Friday, taking part in what may be the most civilized, clean and polite occupation of a university. Indeed, the elegantly dressed guards of the building cheerfully chatted with the students as these illegally wandered about on the fancy lawn in front of the building. Quite subversive.

Substantially, the occupation is quite justified in underlining the practical and theoretical deficiencies of the proposal to raise university fees. As Raymond Geuss suggested in his talk with the students, subjecting universities to the logic of the market is not meritocratic or egalitarian. Education is not an individualistic purchasable benefit, but a public good.

Sadly, the protests have been too civilized. In order to make a political point one must have an enemy. Here it seems that the students are not regarded as worthy political rivals by the University, who will not negotiate, or by the Police, who will not forcefully evacuate. Thus, the students are marooned in the SCR, happily enjoying a long pyjamas party. Perhaps in order to succeed, a more decisive and less peaceful approach is needed. Are the well-bred Britons up to it? I dwell in my skepticism.

The best travel companion

2010-11-23T16:25:00.002Z

Michael Palin described himself as the best travel companion because he never complains, eats what's available, always in for taking an adventurous road, has a torch and his own toilet paper, and a large supply of biscuits.

My best travel companion would indeed need to resist complaining (mostly because I cannot). Passion for gastronomic adventures is necessary. Seriousness about travelling, alongside a good sense of humour are very useful. Torch and biscuits are indeed a must, and perhaps sunblock, for lighter complexions.

But most of all, my adventures mate will have to be of the entrepreneurial kind. Knock on my door and take me away to hit the road together!

oral history

2010-11-14T23:15:00.000Z

One night, after the soviets were in town for too many months, they heard that the Germans were moving north. There it was, the moment they all thought would come, and preferred to ignore. Her father worked in a newspaper and his friends still kept in touch every now and then, checking his family managed somehow after he died. One of them, a short mild-speaking man, told her mother this was a real danger for them all, that the Germans are not merciful. She had no patience for her mother's hesitation. She got up and looked around the room, there was not much they could actually take, if they really had only three days before the Germans arrived. This was the general estimate, that it would take them three days to cross the plains towards Riga.

One thing was clear, though. Abrasha could not come with them. His father did not want to leave, and he promised his mother, who was fortunate enough to get a certificate to emigrate to Palestine, that he would not leave his father alone. The next day, as she and her two younger sisters debated if winter jackets were necessary, he came to say goodbye. There was no way she could really say goodbye, he was too important to leave behind, but she was too afraid to stay. I will find you one day, he smiled. Maybe you will, but she knew she would never really be wholly herself anymore. One forgets, but one cannot remain the same. I will still love you, she whispered. And the next day she took the last train to Russia, with mother and the sisters. The men had already been drafted long ago, and Harry sent a photo in uniform. Photos were too important to leave behind, and at the very last moment she went back home, ran home as if her life depended on it, and took the photo album from her desk, leaving behind her secret album, locked in her night table. I will be back, anyway, she mumbled, not wanting to break open her nice little table.

She ran back to the station, her mother shouting anxiously. She stood quietly as the train moved, packed full. Please step down, the head of the train announced, the train will not continue. They were almost at the border, but the Russians would not let the train in. airplanes swarmed the skies, and randomly dropped bombs on the few intact houses sparse in the abandoned fields. let's go on, let's go on, there was panic in her voice. She was always the one to decide at home, and without knowing why, her mother signaled to the others to follow, not to look for shelter in the little farmhouse, like their fellow travelers did. A few moments later, the house was reduced to a pile of rubbles. How far this all seemed from their neat, clean apartment in the city centre, near the famous cafe where everybody went dancing at night. She could not stop and think about it. And she has always been very practical. But she wished he could be there, to smile at her, as they were all running as fast as they could, towards the Russian checkpoint.

Skinny Diving

2010-11-14T00:10:00.000Z

I grew up without dreams. Perhaps this is a cruel way to forget my unfulfilled hopes. But to cultivate future dreams one has to imagine oneself engaged with others, and I have never done so. Today it is almost a virtue because I can tolerate the silence even in company. I am never embarrassed by the liberty to be lost in my own thoughts. It was only during my first train journey on my own that the possibility of dreaming, that the urge to make 'something of myself', sneaked into my soul. And instantly followed the vague recollection of my Grandmother's famous dictum. In one of the many long afternoons in my grandmother's kitchen, chatting over milky tea and airy torte, she announced, finally finding the words after years of brooding: 'your Grandfather wanted to make something of himself but just did not know how!'

It was with such gentle sense of failure that I departed onto life; I have never really grown to resent it. My Grandfather's dreamlike retirement from life remained an imperative relict of life founded on false illusions and imagined love. I do not mean it to sound unsympathetic but often in family matters the sooner the truth is out, the better. It was a three hours train trip from my new home, yet unable to fulfill the emotional expectations of a 'home', to my newer home, at the University. I took the noon train on purpose. It is often populated with talkative old men who like to share their pearls of wisdom with young lovely things like me. In my mind those strange encounters had about them a romantic and old-fashioned air, quite remote from life as we live it, dreamless and detached.

The hot October sun glazed the countryside with sparks of gold. The green infinite fields were spotted with lovely villas, often reduced to rubble and abandoned by their inhabitants for dislike of the annoying railway bustle. The real beauty of a landscape can never be fully appreciated from a passing train since its velocity undermines the need of attention to details. The traveler is satisfied with the smears of vivid green and the typical yellow of the Tuscan palazzo, and demands no more. I was alone in my wagon. A young man pushed open the sliding door and came in. After sitting down near the door, at the farthest corner away from me, he asked if the seat was free. I reply it is. He wore gold-rimmed round glasses that made him look older. His yellow hair was rough like strands of coarse hay just as the ones neatly piled in the fields out of the window. I took out a little notebook and started writing.

'Cos'è che scrivi?'

'I miei appunti'.

'Ah, i tuoi preziosi pensierini sulla vita e sull'amore?'

'Esattamente. E ti sei dimenticato dei sogni persi.'

'Giusto, giusto. Le sofferenze del mondo.' A thin wide smile like a horizontal line divides his face in two.

'Come è il tuo nome?' he asked nonchalantly as if it just slipped his mind.

'Ella.' I often have to repeat it because my L is too soft, but now I decided not to.

'Piacere. Carmine.' He smoothly slips to the next seat, just one away from me.

'E cos'è che fai nella vita? Scrivi storielle?'

'No, sono pasticiera. Tu?'

'Vendo fiori. Non sembri una pasticiera, nemmeno una pasticiera trozkista!' He was smirking with joy, glancing to see if I got the joke. I conceded him a little smile, which he took as an invitation to the seat in front of me. His phone rangs quite loudly. He lifted a slender finger, signaling that 'it will only take a moment', and dove into a long conversation. It is essential to keep my eyes on the quaint rural view.

'eccomi,' he turned back to me and leaned forward swiftly, his elbows resting on his knees, his breath almost in my face.

'E quindi, dove eravamo?' If this phony conversation persisted he might cease to be a stranger and would dissolve into the undistinguishable continuum of insignificant encounters that fill everyday life. I silently stared at his pale blue eyes, hidden behind those horrible glasses. This was the last glimpse before the train hurried into a tunnel. Under the hum of the train there was our tense breathing. No respectable young man would promptly move forward, take my hands in his, and kiss me. How banal and commonplace could that be? The kiss, like a flow of fresh water on a drought dried field, soon was absorbed and disappeared in a dizzyingly deep abyss on memories. His tender lips and thin, dry fingers were well accustomed to facilitating his ways to a girl. 'It was all that you wanted,' his eyes sneered at me, 'and now that you got it you pretend to be better.' Mea Culpa. And I stepped out of the show down to the busy platform at the station of Bologna, finding my way out of the crowd, overwhelmed with a sickening sense of defeat to an unpronounced dream of mindless temptation.

Skinny diving can be attempted only once and never again. It is the breathtaking excitement of taking one's clothes off on the shore by a very dark lake in the heart of night. The tremendous mind-clearing shock when the naked body encounters the freezing water. Then comes the rediscovery of the silent freedom of movement, swimming in the black shiny water. And the expected torturing walk on the pointy, slippery rocks back to shore, to the fake redemption of dressing up and hiding away until the morning comes up again.

geopolitics

2010-11-13T22:01:00.005Z

living abroad makes one reconsider the obvious banalities of one's life, choices and past. What my grandfather would have said of my choice to live abroad? After all the sacrifices, the individual human sacrifices made to realize the zionist dream to live in the fatherland? Does any state enjoy a truly uncontested legal and political position, that does not derive from power relations, statute of limitations or mere historical convention?

And yet, I am proud of my little acts of objection. And very curious to know what my grandfather would have thought of my criticism, would he acknowledged them as legitimate political doubts, or discredited them as subversive, demoralizing heresy? Is the Israeli society mature enough to accept this criticism? As much as I want to be cosmopolitan, my personal history is still the history of a place, of choices of people who were related in one way or another to places. They all defined themselves in relation to places, fighting for their survival in unwelcoming places, shifting alliances, proclaiming their connections to new lands.

Like most of us, I define myself in relation to places. They formed me and allowed me to be me, and different, and yet again me. I acknowledge the places in me, the dark, yellowish streets of Tel Aviv, the reddish streets of Bologna, the elegant cafes and gardens of Paris, the unending avenues of New York and the rolling hills of Umbria, and the dreaming spires of Oxford. Now, those not yet defined horizons of Cambridge. They are all somewhat me. But I will never be theirs; I feel a strong need to resist belonging.

Cambridge

2010-10-26T22:56:00.003Z

Cambridge and Oxford are very similar and very different. But I am always the same. Always looking for adventures, fantastic food, and cheerful company. The Blog has returned to life, with a promise for more intellectual and culinary updates to come.

To begin with, I am quite taken aback by being admitted (by force) to the Sciences. Apparently now I am doing 'social sciences'. Which means there are vigorous, systematic rules to follow in order to achieve the longed-for 'inference'. I rebel. I don't find this jargon attractive at all. It does not help me to understand the path that history of ideas should take. Prediction? Causality? Description? I cannot help but think that my historical thinker were not very systematic, not scientific. Thus the rigidity of the social sciences stiffens their thought, rather than illuminates it. I long for the intellectual freedom and flexibility (too loose, for some), of good old history. Am I only being lazy?

parigina

2010-05-29T09:16:00.001Z

This is a link to a friend's blog, delightfully writing on her future projects in Paris to get undeserved money. Do follow!

http://inviaggiocongeniuscard.it/progetti/paris-j-arrive

Two political comments

2010-05-06T22:19:00.004Z

1. Elections in Britain are a more subtle and eloquent event than in the US. Strangely, I have had the chance to observe election campaigns only in countries where I do not have the right to vote. This allowed for a detached and cool-headed observation that is in a way more interesting. In the UK I was struck by the fact that citizens of the Commonwealth residents in the UK can vote for general elections. I was also struck by the smooth rhetoric style of most candidates, in clear contrast with what we see in more populist/orchestrated campaigns like in America, or by the more simpleton approach of the southern Mediterranean politicians. UK is also unique in that a major policy making for the Labour party is an aristocratic lord. The contradictions of an Empire are very much present also today, when Northern Ireland becomes a crucial factor in determining the composition of the Westminster Parliament.

2. Talking of empire, I ran into a shocking and startling series made by the BBC entitled 'Fascist Legacy'. Based on historical research and well-documented, this series exposes the atrocities committed by the Italian fascist empire. Although many have already accepted the fact that the Italians have deviated significantly from their international reputation of harmless, inapt and lazy people, the scale of the Italian war crimes overseas is appalling. It is ironic that Marshall Badoglio, condemned by the exiled Ethiopian as a war criminal, was later the leader of the anti-fascist republican government under American auspices. Evidently, some acts of imperial warfare that were completely legitimate in 1820 were not so in 1935. The silence of the League of Nations at the colonization of its member by another, proved that some atrocities could be tolerated if far enough from Geneva. The following years were a sufficient proof the impossibility of keeping the silenced, well known colonial atrocities from slowly and terribly leaking into Europe. To that the BBC series remains a constant reminder.

The Ethiopian Emperor Selassie in Jerusalem, on his way to exile in London, 1935

Freedom Vs. Speech

2010-04-05T09:03:00.003Z

An interesting case of the contradiction of the media is revealing itself in the Israeli and international blogosphere. A young woman (23) is under house-arrest for four months for leaking secret documents of the Israeli army to a daily newspaper. The documents showed that military leaders intentionally ignored the supreme court decisions regarding the legitimacy and legality of direct killing of Palestinian military leaders. While those documents, classified 'top secret' have no implication on Israel's current security, they manifest clearly the indifference of the army headquarters to the legal decisions of Israel's supreme court. For her 'treason', the woman is being trialled and facing a long jail sentence. No such risk for the military leaders, whose actions are masqueraded efficiently by the censorship.

The Israeli public is still unaware of the whole case, which was not reported in local newspapers because of gag order. However, the blog scene, the international press and Google all report the case extensively, criticizing the Israeli censorship. What is the use of censorship in the era of internet? How can an Israeli gag-order be justified while international press liberally write on the case for weeks? Even if her actions were by all means illegal, there is no justification for obscuring the whole case in the Israeli press: the constant striving of the Israeli army to hide its actions from the criticizing eye of the world, to avoid public discussion, to subdue democratic debate, is no longer legitimate. This case, and perhaps unknown others, remind us that Israel is not as democratic as we would like it to be. We are also reminded that Internet can give us new democratic spheres in which to express our views and concerns, to enhance democracy and freedom, at least virtually. Obviously, this is not enough, and we should remember that those, like the young woman, who try to act in the real and not virtual world, are still prone to pay a high price. But as Seneca teaches us, to live fully one must think and act within one's society.

Unnecessary

2010-04-02T19:52:00.004Z

Most of the things that are worth doing in life can be tagged 'unnecessary'. Cuisine is one of them. A sudden craving for creativity urged me to bake spelt buns yesterday. It was a whole lot of unnecessary fuss. We even had to light up the fireplace, to heat the dough so it would rise (thanks to U.). A walk in the woods is also quite unnecessary. Instead, one can do so many more important activities, like laundry. Travel is also unnecessary. It can be quite tiresome, expensive and lengthy. Sitting in the train, for hours, for a whole day, to have a brief moment of bliss, is admittedly unnecessary. Reading is also unnecessary, since one's stupidity and ignorance are incurable. To love is unnecessary: it a mere distraction at best, a constant sufferance at worst.

Indeed, the best things in life are not 'necessary': they are voluntary, and that is their great charm. It is a great satisfaction to be able to create, out of nothing, some delight, albeit superficial and temporary: the homely, lovely smell of fresh warm bread is worth the fatigue of baking. The sight of a tilled green field that elucidates a busy mind is worth the long walk. A glimpse of love, a moment of joy, justify a long boring voyage.

Like prince Mishkin of Dostoevsky's Idiot, I am astonished time and again by the obviousness of the better choice, and our difficulty to make it. Rational calculations lead us astray, practical considerations dilute our dreams. It is better sometimes to be an 'idiot', to do the unnecessary and the ridiculous, and maybe, if one is really lucky, to make a change for the better.

On the brevity of life

2010-03-23T20:45:00.002Z

In the muddle of Roman imperial politics, Seneca was hardly a political naive. His manipulations were shrewdly contemplated, yet in the political turmoil of his times he was one who, perhaps, distanced himself less than others from the values he believed in. But quite obviously he was too out-maneuvered by the court politics of Nero and his lovely mother. Before slitting his wrists at the Emperor's command, in his own bath-tub, at least according to later depictions, Seneca was kind enough to share some of his philosophical thoughts.

Life is short. We all emerge into the world, die and soon forgotten. How to live life fully? What is good life? Those are the questions Philosophy tried to answer for ages. And like many prior and later philosophers, Seneca proposes an answer focused on philosophy itself. Life should be lived in contemplation. But the actual thinking is not enough: one should not seclude oneself from life in dedication to some useless study. A life worth living is one focused on themes like justice, truth, social happiness. Contemplation to a public end. Seneca ridicules most common habits as mundane: self-grooming, money-hunting, power-struggles, lust and hedonism are not acceptable life goals. They distract us from our vocation, the only occupation that may offer some worthy satisfaction. To live life fully, one should think of oneself within one's society. To think of the world, to suffer for the world, and to call for improvement and reform.

Although his call reaches us from far away, we should look back to Seneca, not for guidance, but for inspiration.

Three Sisters

2010-03-11T15:12:00.003Z

Life is suffering, and nothing could possibly change that.

Last night I saw the Oxford production of Chechov's Three Sisters. It is a very russian play: intellectual, self-reflective and disillusioned. Each sister is miserable in her own way. Each wants so much: to be loved, happy, to live life fully and excitedly. To live in Moscow. Each fails in her own way, for prosaic, everyday reasons. It is not her own failure, but life that displays its true, non idyllic nature. There can be nothing, nothing to improve their destinies: not their sharp intellects, not their beauty, passion or professional independence. Happiness is out of this world.

And the colonel continues theorizing, that maybe in 400 years progress will come, and bring along the end of all suffering. They all know it is not so, and he is the first to admit it. He spends his life fighting, theorizing, being madly in love and never satisfied.

But we all must live. We must accept the suffering, and live. We must want to live, not only condescend. The evening was far from despair. Once the inevitability of sufferance is accepted, there can be calm. Happiness may be beyond human reach, but nonetheless, we are still given the privilege of theorizing.

On liberation

2010-03-01T00:23:00.003Z

This is a true story, like all stories. She was not a young woman, but not very old either. She lived in a northern European country, and had an unsatisfying bureaucratic job. Her parents lived in a near-by town, and their disapproving regard was cast over her life. She woke up every day to live the same day all over again. In August she went to visit friends in Italy, and worked in their garden to pay for her meals. It was easy to surrender to gluten pleasures, as there were rarely any other ones she could afford. A good plate of pasta, or maybe two, were a brisk moment of joy.

One day she won the lottery. I know it sounds ridiculously increadible, but it is true. She did not even fill a card, she was just picked by her phone number, quite randomly. She sold her little apartment, and moved to a wonderful villa in Italy. She decorated it expensively, picking and choosing designer chairs and lamps. She bought a new car, with an open roof, to travel in the Italian sun. Life was perfect. She was freed from her joyless job. She travelled in Europe with her fancy car. But it was not enough.

One of her friends took her to vacation in a third-world exotic country. He introduced her to some friends, who lived in a splendidly authentic little village. They were poor but happy. She was thrilled. One of them, let's call him Fidel, was a young hansom fisherman. He lived in a little hut, with his family. For lack of room he had to sleep in his mother's bed. But this was quite normal, they answered to her surprised look. Everyday he left the hut and went to the sea, where he set by the water and looked at the beautiful girls lying down to tan on the silky sand. At night he would set sail and go sailing, but not very often. Since he would not earn more than 20 dollars a month, there was no need to stress. He would have just as little, with or without working. Life went on.

When she saw Fidel, she understood what was lacking in her life. She needed a man. Freed from financial concerns, she, as an emancipated modern European woman, felt the urgent need to tie herself in new obligations. She gave Fidel expensive gifts. At first she gave him cash money, more than a year's pay at a time. Than she was told it might be offensive, and so she bought him expensive toys, like an international phone so he could call her, and a computer, so he coul dwrite to her while they were apart. Fidel accepted the gifts as if they were the just token of her admiration. It came as no surprise that she proposed to him to get married. His little affectionate gestures, too-wide a smile or a forced hug, were enough to satisfy her great craving for warmth. His exotic looks were more than she could even hope for. She longed for a lover. A man.

If it were a tale of fiction, there might have been a different ending. But since this is a true story, it could end in but one way. As soon as their marriage was official, Fidel detached himself from his new bride. He ignored her calls on his new expansive phone, and did not answer the emails she sent him when she was in Europe for a short visit home. She returned to his little village, just to discover he was still spending his nights in his mother's bed and could not be convinced to change his habits. Her passionate pleads could not move him. He still went to the beach, but stopped fishing, now that he was a rich man. She was a ruined woman. You would think it is silly, that she could get as many man as she wanted for her money. But his betrayal could not be overcome. Self-inflicted pain is the least forgettable. All her money could not free her, for she knew not how to be free.

No Red Velvet Here, Please!

2010-02-14T14:25:00.002Z

Valentine's day was never much of a treat. The notion of having secret valentines lurking for me behind dark corners waiting to give me little red heart-shaped chocolate boxes is not my idea of romance. The strong connection between love and food is cried out loud today. Chocolate means love. Red frosting is a sign of affection. Dinner in two is the eternal (well, at least till tomorrow) token of romance. Bubbly Champagne swarms the loving mind like a flood of sparkling blood. Whenever food is loaded with metaphors, it loses its taste under the weight of expectations. Like Elizabeth Berrett Browning reminds us, let's love for love's sake. And eat for food's sake, without the unnecessary fuss.

Dreams and cakes

2010-02-08T01:40:00.002Z

The last few days were quite full of both dreams and cakes. It is easier to begin with the latter. I tried the orange-chocolate cake of nigella lawson, to great success. I first got her book, 'how to be a domestic goddess' when I was twelve, from my aunt. We were in new york city, at the manhatan town house of rich friends of my aunt. The hostess made latkes by nigella's recipe. The evening was not very thrilling. The house was indeed very posh but I was too young and sincere to appreciate it. So I looked in the cookbook and copied recipes. Later my aunt gave me the book for my birthday, so enthusiastic I was.
The orange-chocolate was a great success. And indeed, as my greatest critique admitted, there was no way to improve upon it. Later in the week I made the lemon trifle with whipped cream and berries. The whipped cream here is heavier, as if to prepare one for the cold long winter days.
From early age I had this dream of Tea Party. Afternoon tea was an unattainable desire of cakes, tiny sandwiches, scones and clotted cream. I had a little book with recipes I would follow meticulously. But without England it was not the same. In London we had Assam tea and a coconut cake with gooseberries and Greek yoghurt cream. It was subtle and sophisticated and reminded me of the (not so far) days when only cakes could awake in me this uncontrollable enthusiasm and joie de vivre.
In formal hall in college, there was a little macaron on the top of the pinc raspberry dessert this week. It was the final conquest of the French idealism by the British down-to-earth college food. The parisian dreams are over now. I can go on living my current life in peace: there are macarons also in Oxford. They are quite as ridiculous and pink as in Paris. Only the promise of glamour is gone. Instead, there is an air of sobriety that is much more adequate to my present pretences, to my overwhelming passions. Perhaps reconciliation of Paris and Oxford, of cakes and dreams, is not so far-fetched after all.

A British walk

2010-02-02T11:22:00.002Z

This was a very british morning. Indeed not one you would dedicate to a walk. Grey covered sky, drizzling rain that invites to hide in a cosy corner with a good cup of tea. Instead we went for a walk. The path extended between two strands of the green, weedy river, spotted by little ducks and geese who sunk their head in the water for a quick wash. The bare trees leaned over the path, decorating the landscape with a grate of thin quircky branches. At the end of the path was the meaddow, like taken out of a Jean Austen novel. The green grass brighted in contrast to the light grey skies, where clouds were in constant move. Pheasents and horses completed the hunting scene. The flood made an ocean of the far end of the meaddow, reflecting the grey skies over the fresh green grass. It was the perfect scenario for a thinking tour, a walk in the nature to reformulate one's ideas. Outside of the library, the world seems to glow with inspiration. Away from my computer and books and notes, the air is sweeter and promising. I took a mouthful of country air and went back.

Culinary weekend at Oxford - a complete report

2010-01-27T00:09:00.002Z

For Italians it is tempting to praise Italian food and snub everything else. The simplicity and high quality of the raw materials in the Italian cuisine make it almost riskless. Yet strangely, it does not export well: Italian restaurants overseas tend to be a miserable disappointment.

When A., my Italian friend, came to visit this weekend any pretence for equaling the Italian food traditions at Oxford were soon abandoned. Instead, we launched a speedy tour of the least Italian culinary venues Oxford has to offer.

It may be hard to believe, but the term 'sausage' hides a whole world full of gastronomic surprises. The owner of this temple of sausages does not believe in the Italian saying: «La gente deve ignorare come vengono fatte due cose: le leggi e le salsicce». This ex-navy officer produces elite sausages and boasts about their organic and local origins. Not only there is a wide variety of sausages (we tested the Cumberland, wild boar, apple-pork, lamb-apricot), but they are accompanied by an inspiring selection of mash and gravies. As Mario Minaccia knows, I am not a fan of sausages. Yet these were hard to resist. Their mild texture reminded me of the description of the sausages the king of Luxemburg offered to the Little Man in one of Erich Kestner's famous books.

This was hardly the end of it. The next day began with a light breakfast, but continued with a very British lunch at the covered market. This time we experimented another British institution: the pie. The vote fell on two traditional pies, one with lamb and the other with beef, both laying peacefully on a bed of mashed potatoes, and decorated with a green scoop of mashed peas, served in an Emyle plate that reminded me of the second world war (my grandmother had one like this when she escaped Latvia to the Siberian freeze in 1939).
Afterwards we were in no form to have one of Ben's Cookies, although we shamelessly contemplated it. We went to the museum instead.
For fear of nationalistic sentiments towards the perfide Albion, we decided to cross the Chanel and entered a fancy french patisserie for our afternoon tea. We needed some external stimulus after our intellectual resources were severely drained at the museum. A hot cuppa tea soon did the trick. We had a creamy and sweet almond croissant as well, just to be on the safe side. The froggies did not disappoint, and we were relieved to know that in a moment of extreme crisis we can rely on this patisserie for an immediate supply of macarons as well, although A. justly remarked that their color is a bit more violet than desired.

The evening was hardly setting on this lovely city when we embarked on our next culinary expedition, this time to the exotic Indian restaurant in the hipper side of town. We were not put off by the terrible acoustics at the place, that A. described as a long corridor turned into a restaurant. The waiter brought to our table some crispy bread, similar to the Sardenian pan-carasau, but oilier, accompanied by different and unidentified 'dips' and sauces. We did not inquire much since it seemed dangerous to stop one of the hurrying waiters, always bringing more and more steaming-hot pans of food to the table next to ours. We randomly picked from the menu two kinds of curry, one with lamb and the other with chicken. These turned out as basically the same, only that one was with lamb and the second with chicken.. In this moment I felt the need to deepen my knowledge of imperial cultures, perhaps more in the direction of south-Asian colonial cuisine. But it was too late, and we had our curry with pleasure, looking curiously at the variety of dished ordered by the next table, as a proof that the menu contained more than two very similar dishes.
To conclude a British night we went to the pub. Yet we are not so traditional and obvious, so we insisted on having a cider instead of a beer (it's healthier, fruit is good for you!). The distinct taste of the cider reminded me of past adventures with the Chef in down town Paris, and with this nostalgic tone the day came to a bibulous end.

Sunday began as it should with a Sunday brunch. Or, rather, with an Italian coffee, since we were too early for brunch. But our plate of sausages, bacon and eggs did not delay much. Along with the necessary toast, salted butter and jam, and a good cuppa tea, this was a serious English Breakfast that prepares one for the battle. Indeed, when we stepped outside of the college dining hall, the sun filled our eyes and we headed to the park, to rejoice at being alive!
Lunch was obviously superfluous. But we did find the chance to fit in a Ben's Cookie, with chocolate chips and nuts, after climbing St. Michael's tower to see the town from above.
Dinner time came, quite sooner then expected, and we headed to the pub, to have one of those gratifying pub meals that Jerom K Jerom wrote so often about. A dish of roast lamb, with potatoes, vegetables and lots of gravy revived the well known stories. Yet for dessert the bread and butter pudding was sold out, and we had to satisfy ourselves with less than perfect chocolate fudge. It is a pity because the pudding would have been the perfect proof that to make a dessert one does not need anything beside the left-overs of breakfast. It would have taught the tiramisu nation a good lesson. But we shall keep it for the next time.

Swinging between metropole and the imperial periphery, between glorious isolation and continental traditions, we somehow managed to survive the weekend. And now, back to my books.

money makes the scholar

2010-01-21T14:15:00.003Z

The life of the scholar is hardly about books, articles and conferences. Ask any professor, and he will tell you most of one's time passes in desperate search for funding. As we go along our academic path, instead of discovering new financial sources for our mostly interesting projects, we often end up facing dead ends. As I go further in my research for financial resources for my PhD, I have found out the uselessness of my nationality, the hopelessness of the competition, and the major obstacle of being already a student at Oxford, and in the wrong college, thus not eligible to many an award. Apparently, my profile does not allow me to apply to any scholarship around here.
Perhaps this is another little hint that I should leave the library and my intellectual aspirations behind and dedicate my time and energies to better ends, like patisserie!

The dream baker may have to abandon the dream, and put on the baker's uniform again.

Cosmopolitanism

2010-01-20T12:47:00.003Z

Yesterday I attended a conference on 'cosmopolitanism and emotions'. The speaker stressed the importance of 'gratitude' and 'compassion' as emotions that promote cosmopolitanism. I think he got it all wrong. Cosmopolitanism is not about feeling sorry for others, or about feeling grateful for a foreign country for giving one a 'permit of stay'. For me cosmopolitanism is a rational, moral obligation, in the Kantian sense. A cosmopolitan can live happily in different places, and interact with different people, without need for national bonds. It is a thought decision, not an irrational emotion. It should be a foundation for normative action, not a pledge for global pity and Rowels-inspired communality.

Sitting in a British coffee shop, I read about the Dardanelles and contemplate an answer to a funding institution, about how my studies may improve the political situation in Israel. I may feel more linked to my homeland, in that I keep reading local newspapers and worry about political degeneration. But I rationally choose to tie my existence with the wider world, to hope for a non-national impact of my studies. Cosmopolitanism is a choice, not a feeling. Political theory should focus on enhancing rational thought, rather than succumbing to random individual feelings.

Back to Oxford

2010-01-19T21:47:00.002Z

Your constant traveler has finally returned to her new alma mater, Oxford. After baking in different parts of Italy, under difficult conditions (including lack of hand whisk that had to be acquired specifically for the production of a chocolate cake with vanilla custard and a lemon cake with whipped cream), I am back to my books.
As a part of my plans for the next years I had answer the silly question: what do you want to be remembered for? Indeed, as suggested to me more than once, I would like to be rememberd as a magnificant baker. Helas, my current occupations seem like obstacles on the way to this noble objective. On the path to (improbable) intellectual greatness, I abandoned my culinary imagination.
Tomorrow is market day, a perfect occasion to get the pentry filled with various patisserie raw materials. And now that I have no distractions in the area (or rather, no one to blame for unsuccessful caes), I should undertake my baking projects more seriously. So that at least one day, in the future, an old man may recall with love and nostalgy a faboulous cake he had tasted from the hands of your Dream Baker.

Travels of the immigrant

2009-12-16T20:52:00.003Z

Yesterday I read the book I wish to have written myself. A strange feeling of familiarity surrounded me thru the reading, as my eyes rapidly owned the words, my fingers restlessly waiting to be allowed to turn the page. Perhaps it is the mark of great literature: a close resamlance to our own unexpressed ideas.

It is the story of an immigrant, a german who lives in England for many years, but cannot reconcile his personal self with his homeland's sins, and with his new homeland's aloofness. He travels along the east coast of the British isle, passing thru long forgotten villages, in deserted fields, by decadent villas. He tells the stories of the people who inhabitated these places centuries ago, who make a foreign landscape familiar through their broken dreams, neglected achievements, useless lives. He tells his own story, one of a man who ceaslessly looks for an identity he willingly gave away when he disowned the country whose kulture he insists to prolong. He asks the questions that metter the most, about the relations between a man and his past, his polis, his chosen habitat, the intertwining histories that reappear along his way. Most of all, he recounts of the doubts, that are an eternal part of the life of those who chose travels as their destiny.

W. G. Sebald, Rings of Saturn

Religion and politics

2009-12-13T21:45:00.004Z

Most of us would like to believe we are living in a modern world, composed by independent, sovereign, and sometimes even liberal states. This is off course an illusion. However, let's pretend, for the sake of the argument, that it may be valid to some extent. One of the crucial aspects of modernity is the realtion between the State and Religion: the Reformation, the Renaissance, and the Enlightenment are only three of the many stepstones of modernity that undid the bond between the ruler and the bishop. A modern state is not always secular, as advocates of liberalism would like it to be, but it is clear that at least officially, politics is not determined in the church.

As the minister of justice in Israel has just made clearer the other day, the pretention that the state has as its source of legitimacy the people's will is a mere illusion. For Mr. Neeman, the Israeli state should return to the laws of the Torah, and adopt them as its formal and determining code of laws. Indeed, why trouble ourselves with writing a constitution, when we have a whole set of laws already written? The uproar was notable. But again, those who cite the declaration of independence that states clearly that Israel is a jewish and democratic state of its citizens, regardless of sex, religion, race, shut their eyes to the immidiate reality. The fact is that in Israel the laws of the Torah are already the civil law in many aspects of daily life (marriage, transportation, consumption). As much as we would like to believe ourselves rational and universal, the jewish aspect of quotidianity in Israel is undeinable.

Political theology is hardly an old-fashioned concept in the Levant. Many cite the Torah as the source of contemporary legitimacy of Israeli presence in various places, like Hebron. Our right to be in Israel is religious, and our presence there cannot, therefore be secular. Moreover, the political power of the religious leaders makes their voice heard, even if they might not represent the majority of the population. Is the claim that politics can be detached from religion a mere irrealistic pretence? Should Israel follow the repubblican example and abandon its religious foundations to adopt a more democratic concept of a state? And how can it maintain its legitimacy, at least in the eyes of its Israeli citizens, while ceasing to be a Jewish state? What more, such a decision would cost the Israeli leaders the financial support of the Jewish comunities abroad, which is not something they are prone to give up easily.

Dazzling 20's, and what not

2009-12-10T00:48:00.004Z

From all the periods in history, or at least the more recent history, the one I find most inspiring id the 20's. London and New York, the great metropolises, sparkled with style, champagne and buzz, as the boys went to the club and the girls had some martini before the tennis match. Ah, all if you were rich and preferably of some noble status, and better still, oxbridge education.

Bowties and silk gowns for dinner at home (if your home was a huge Edwardian mention with sport grounds and seven servants, maids and butlers), lovely picnics in the country-side (if you could afford a fashionable cabriolet car to take you there) and a dazzling night at the bar, drinking yourself away while listening to a fabulous blond singing Ira Berlin.

Yes, I have doubtlessly read too much Jeeves and Wooster, (P.G. Wodehouse). Somehow, in England, or rather, here at Oxford, it is almost possible to believe that it can still be true. And watching Fry and Laurie as the perfectly knowledgeable genial valet and his half-wit though good-sport young master, I cannot but fall into a dreamy decadence. Wooster tries to avoid finding both a wife and a job, at all costs, while assaulted by his many manipulative aunts. Jeeves, on the other hand, has to sort it all out in the end, and make sure that Wooster's tie matches his socks! Highly complicated mission. In the meantime, they find time to entertain themselves, in a very British manner.

Enjoy, and all that!

Jeeves and Wooster singing Minnie the Moocher

On God

2009-12-07T17:42:00.002Z

"A man who has no understanding of Jewish humour may have the highest liberal principles and the best and most enlightened intentions, but he will have an incomplete understanding of Jewish nationality".

This quote of A. Zimmern, the world's first academic professor of International Relations, reminded me today of the new movie by the Cohen bros., A Serious Man. Indeed, Jewish nationality is based on humour, especially the eastern-European version. In the movie theater, I was the only one laughing when all the 'gentiles' were silent: the movie was a black parody of the same old woody Allen Jewish dilemmas that stand at the basis of Jewish modern Identity, and therefore, nationality.

Is it a story of a modern Job, a man who has lost everything, and returns to his Jewish roots to find some comforting explanations? First, his story is not one of arbitrary loss, but also of arbitrary victories, like his undeserved tenure and his son's stoned yet successful Bar-Mitzvah. In his sufferings, our hero goes to various Rabbis, who, quite predictably, direct him to accept God's will as it is, no questions asked. But are the origins of his sufferings in divine determinism, like Job, that have no connection to his own latent passivity? Or perhaps his passivity should be contrasted not to God's will but to the Society's will? Indeed, our Serious Man, who thinks everyone is as slow and permissive as he is, wonders once and again at his wife, his children, his peers, and their incredible ability to act, to realize their wills. He is a puppet on strings, but not one that is controlled by some arbitrary, incomprehensible divine force. He is controlled by a series of very mundane, materialistic interests of the people that surround him. As his wife insists, he should go to the Rabbi for some help. But as they both know, the Rabbi will offer no truth, no salvation. At most, the Rabbi will get the poor little Jew out of the way of his wife, who would then be free to pursue the life she wanted.

Losing everything and winning everything, our hero is always at lost. And unlike Job, there could be no redemption, because he cannot bring himself to believe full-heatedly that there is a reason. He drifts ahead. He accepts the hollowness of his life. Unlike Job, he accepts suffering because of the very modern hollowness of his life, and not because he is reinforced by his burning faith. And so, this funny story of a man who slides forward in his socially-determined life, ends abruptly, as all true stories do.

The dream baker is back to the kitchen

2009-12-06T15:28:00.004Z

Many a lovely day passed since the last and dramatic post about my vis-à-vis encounter with a wild boar. Indeed, some extreme adventures have taken place, yet, helas, it is too late now to recount them. Writing from a little room in the city of Oxford, where dreams are hiding in libraries and beer is cheaper than water, your humble baker decided to lift her eyes from the books and return to the kitchen.

Today was no day for a reading. finally the sun came out, and with a crisp blue sky invited me to leave my cosy grove and to explore the street. Surrounded by Christmas galore, I remembered Carla's debate on national identities. Should I feel a greater kick out of Chanuka? Am I entitled to rejoice for sparkly decorations and starry fairy-lights and be indifferent to candle-sticks and menorahs? Although I feel honestly unbothered by these deep perplexities, I decided to take an action and throw a Chanuka dinner tonight. Latkes in the manu and joy in our hearts, it is mostly for others that I bother to revive these old memories of wintery nights at my grandmother's house, where a mixed odor of sugar and oil filled the air while my Grandpa sang the usual blessing on the candles.

The lovely thing about traditions is that one can carry them along, and reveal them to one's new friends, as an exotic relic of another world. Living on the edge, I hop between the secure memorabilia and the unknown future, both equally mine, equally imagined. The only way to live in peace with one's national identity is to reinvent it constantly. And as long as I make Latkes, my grandma knows that I have not lost my way.

No vacation for old man

2009-08-04T12:08:00.004Z

I decided to dedicate the last few hours of my vacation at home to a short dive in the pool. Yesterday's rains chilled the water, and I stood on the first step of the pool, contemplating the best way to dive into the water. In my meditations, I glanced briefly on the green lush hills surrounding me, so pictoresque in the morning sun. I looked right again. Something was moving behind the apple-tree. It was black, hairy, plump and snorting, with a long, evil-looking nose stuck in the grass. It was a wil boar. A wild boar!! It took me 2 seconds to grasp the seriousness of the situation and to run into the house, where my mother was cooking lunch. In the meantime, the cinghiale walked slowly and calmly towards the house, as if saying, oh, I don't mind you, please go on running around, it's quite funny! But mom did not think it was so funny, and she shooed him, as they shoo flies, or stray cats, back to the sunflowers camp.
And I thought life at the country-side was boring! If we had a gun, we could have had some wild boar ragu' for lunch. But I did not, and had to be content with a plateful of zucchini and some carrots from the garden.

Today's crop: Ricotta souffle' with blackberry coulis and country-style peace cake

2009-08-03T19:14:00.002Z

Home and away

2009-08-03T15:29:00.004Z

Coming back home is for me the pure sensation of idleness. The laziness of lack of obligations, knowing I am queen of my own demure, is the essence of homelyness. The geografical location is secondary. I have called 'home' various rooms and houses. What matters is the feeling of sheer calmness, leading my days between food, books and short strolls outdoors. Being at home means doing nothing without feeling guilty.

Tomorrow I will be in three different places I've called home. One will not be mine for much longer, the other has never been truly mine, and the third constantly risks a reduction to abstract nostalgy. But I can still recall with a smile the beautiful hours of idleness in my Paris appartment, in glowing April afternoons. Those moments of daydreams have invested rue de Bac with a comforting domestic souvenirs, much stronger than the Westwood room I lived in for the same period of time. It is the depth of the intellectual and emotional experience that determines homely connection.

A future experiment to establish a new Home requires the happy reunion of the laziness of idle existance, and the comforting excitement of human relations. How will it be possible to reconcile hours of void with the presence of another individual? And perhaps this is the greatest acid-test of all: those who are able to share moments of idleness, will prevail.

Bologna

2009-03-24T08:02:00.003Z

The hours did not seem to pass. Trapped in an airplane, airports, borders and bureaucracy. But it ended like everything does. I am in Bologna. Los Angeles is so far, also mentally. I cannot deny I feel at home again. Between the light-green walls, in the hot stuffy room, looking at the office building in front of the Collegio, it is home again.

I recount my LA experiences. I remember, I distort my adventures without even trying, it comes naturally. I had a great time. Out of life, unreal, dream-like existence in the meanders of Westwood. And today I woke up at dusk because am still jet lagged. I am going back to quotidianity, starting with an oral exam, my last exam of the BA, this morning in San Gio'. I love oral exams, it is like a theatrical performance. I can be myself, only better. I like arriving at the end, completing my missions. But Bologna will never end in me, will always live strong and persistent, and my soul will be moulded in its image.

The fog begins to evaporate away from the city in the morning light, and from my life, that seems finally to take a shape slightly closer to my dreams. Although sometimes I cannot express in so many words my wishes, afraid that verbal conceptualization may prevent realization, I am calmer now. It was all worth it. The suffering and the exhaustion, the distance, hélas the distance, are now compensated with a new fresh outlook. I cannot believe it may be truth. But so far it seems like it is. One day I will tell you all about it. Now I have to run, to take my very last exam in Bologna.

Pompeii

2009-03-14T08:03:00.003Z

I read a title in Repubblica today, of an article about couples who wanted to get married in Pompeii, dressed up as ancient Romans. For a moment I wanted to be there, wrapped up in a light dress, tightened on my waist by a leather ornamented belt, a crown of fresh olive leaves on my head, mount Vesuvius on the background. Very romantic. Almost like a wedding in Vegas, dressed up as Elvis Presley and Persilia.

Why do people want to live their wedding as a once in a lifetime exceptionally exciting experience? When I worked in the fashion boutique, I wished to a costumer, the mother of the bride, happiness and joy in the wedding. She, a wise woman, (the wife of Moshe Dayan's son), told me it's happiness in life that mattered, not in the nocial ceremony. This banal moment I will never forget. If I ever get married, it will be in a simple dress, my own, without grandiose celebrations, without pretentiousness. Although a theme wedding in Pompeii is very tempting indeed. I wonder if my grandmother will agree to come (I believe there were some Jews in Pompeii as well, maybe we can hold the ceremony at the ashed synagogue!)

Madeleine

2009-03-05T08:40:00.002Z

Spain, end of May.

I was fantastically, calmly happy then, unaware of the greater happiness that was only days away. In the last morning, as I left the apartment at the unearthly hour of 6AM, the chorroria workshop in front of the building was open, and misty smell of fried dough filled the foggy morning like rays of gold through the grayish blue. Few days earlier, we dipped the chorros in the caffe con leche at the local bar. Little spots of oil floated on the brownish coffee in the simple glasses. We drank it. I can still smell the cloud of oil filling the air. It was very early, and the city was still hiding its pleasures, dormant. The moment of going back to Bologna had arrived, and I was crossing the cold streets with my little suitcase, unaware of future happiness, already so full of joy. I love coming back to Bologna, and to the smokey hot air that fills Ugo Bassi on a dense, yellow spring day, like the one before my birthday, when I came back to Bologna, overwhelmed with happiness, only to discover, merely four or five days later, that I could be so much happier, so much more myself. Madrid will always remind me of the stuffy smell of frying chorros, and the surprising recognition that happiness has no limits.

Memories of a dispatched girl

2009-03-05T03:58:00.003Z

I enjoy Californian sun, eat Chinese for lunch with Israeli friend, eat sushi for dinner with Italian friends, read Italian books (Zolo) and write about it all in French. Sometimes I do get tired, and think of you, who live in a world apart, so far, where the weather is always the same, the girls are pale and the professors are serious, and don't make live demonstrations of phalanx.

Suddenly today, after reading so much about cosmopolitanism, I missed my Grandmothers. And also my dead Grandpa, who I didn't really appreciate at the time. He always promised me gifts, in minuscule descriptions, but never gave them. He was very enthusiastic about the Maginot line, and even went to see the mushrooms. Whenever he traveled abroad, he always visited a supermarket, to compare the price of the tomatoes.

Note

2009-03-01T00:58:00.002Z

The beautiful thing about my blog is that it is Mine (good old truism). I can write in it the silliest thing and still be spared your critical glaze, as you rise your eyebrow and wonder who cares.

Well, today I went to the beach with precious friends who make me laugh freely. It was very hot and joy floated in my mind and heart. When others are nostalgic, I tend not to be, never do what others do.

I bought various things today. Asparagus, a lovely navy blue silk dress for formal dinners, a pair of grey jeans, cappuccino ice cream.

In three weeks I will be back. Where is my life? Where should my dreams become true? And more importantly, when?

Coca and Kocka

2009-02-26T03:15:00.004Z

Today, instead of going to Jurgen Kocka's seminar on west-Germany's historians, I went to hear Francisco Santos Kalderon, Columbia's Vice President, whose name is surely familiar to those who read Marquez' News of a Kidnapping. The novel tells the real story of Santos' kidnapping, along other prominent Colombian political figures, by the FARC in the 90'. Santos was held by FARC for two months, a relatively short period (see Betancourt case). The novel renders very truthfully the personal and public influence of the kidnapping on the Colombian democratic liberal political elite, as well as on the general Colombian society.
However, in his talk today, Santos referred to this extreme experience very briefly. He basically admitted that in his world tours to promote international aid in Colombia, he noticed the international community is not very interested in themes of human rights, and the effects the drug traffic in Columbia has on the political and social spheres in the country. In contrast, there is a vast interest in cosmopolitan environmental law: the drag traffic entails the destruction of the rain forests and bio diversity in Colombia. Therefore, more than talking on how growing coca to satisfy the western demand for cocaine undermines the human rights of the Colombian citizens, he stressed the impact of drug traffic on the extinction of rare frogs.
Perhaps his realistic approach is the correct one. Maybe the international community is not interested in cosmopolitan human rights, but in cosmopolitan environmental laws, since the nature is an asset of humanity and has to be sustained on an global dimension. Yet, I find it sad that the frog's rights are more supported than the human ones (with all due respect to the frog community).

cosmopolitanism and patriotism

2009-02-16T03:00:00.002Z

Mably tried to reconcile in the 18th century between the particular and the universal, the patriotic feeling and the cosmopolitan outlook. The only way out is to aim at good of humanity, within the particular realities of the nation states.
Banal? Perhaps. But I do think there is a constant need to bridge the two urgent human needs, the wish to belong, and the urge to discover the world. Even me, doubtlessly leaning more towards the cosmopolitan, try nonetheless to hold on to some sort of belonging, to see my moral obligations in the particular zone and not only towards the foggy notion of 'humanity'.
The only way out is to pursue ceaselessly what I think is moral and right, hoping not to change my mind too abruptly, and not to encounter the coldness of reality at my door, telling me I got it all wrong.

About the israeli elections

2009-02-13T03:09:00.002Z

Just a mini-thought
What did the great historian Perry Anderson say to me about the Israeli elections? "Well, at least a right wing government will be more coherent". And he was not being cynical. Indeed, the left has killed itself away and the a true right wing government will both represent the general public opinion, and the recent trend in Israeli policy, that used to use the Labour collaboration as a fig leaf.

One the one hand, perhaps the deluded left should look at reality straight in the eyes and admit defeat: indeed, a Likud-Liebermann government will reflect the people's will, apparently. And it will state clearly what has been already whispered for a while: Israel does not want Peace. Gidon Levy said something like that too.

But I refuse to accept that what is coherent is necessarily positive. No such argument will convince me that Israel is going in a positive direction, towards peace, justice, freedom. But I do, sadly, accept it is the most coherent government possible at the moment, especially as the left does not exist (well it haven't for while) and Kadima has absolutely nothing to offer besides a powerful campaign manager.

Marxism in Westwood

2009-02-08T04:09:00.002Z

I was reading Bill Warren's (the forgotten British Marxist) apology of Imperialism in a cafe' in Westwood. There is a certain amount of absurdity in reading a marxist (for in his eyes he was the truest marxist of them all), in an italian cafe' in a Los Angeles commercial neighbourhood surrounded with shops. Warren continuously claims capitalism was a good thing brought to the third world by imperialism, allowing it to progress. Even though it had its contradiction, capitalism doubtlessly created in those nations better living conditions than proto-capitalist society could ever afford. What about the wars, cultural sacrifice and rural impoverishment? Well, it all shrinks in comparison to the benefits of health care and consumption, and those who do not see that are merely romantic.

Sitting at the center of capitalism, I can clearly see why one would rather be capitalistic and poor, than non capitalistic and poor. At least the Brazilian poor can rejoice at the fact that Sao Paolo coffee beans are used to produce lousy coffee that makes westwood inhabitants much happier.

Getty Villa

2009-02-03T02:35:00.003Z

A strange combination of cement and neo-classical columns welcomes the visitors at the Getty Villa in Malibu. The flourishing garden is truly lovely, just as the cute little fake roman statues scattered in it. However, it seems to me that only in California can it seem normal to place a quite comprehensive and respectable exhibition of ancient roman and Greek art and crafts in a fake roman villa, decorated with Greek columns, frescoes, marble staircase and roman paving stones. Alas, it is admittedly one of the loveliest places I have yet seen here, and perhaps it is just because it is fakely roman. Yet, a miserable fake, since it lacks the seriousness and severity that make Rome what it is, all but a playground for the rich bourgeoisie.

Gaston Lenotre, died.

2009-02-02T03:08:00.002Z

The Dream Baker is devastated with the death of one of the most prominent cultural figures of our times. This month, Gaston Lenotre, the famous French patissier, who formed generations of talented and inspiring pastry chefs, passed away to a world of wonderful macarons and delicious croissants. Beato lui.

I allow myself the presumptuousness of saying that Lenotre and I had a lot in common. Besides a common birthday (separated by merely 65 years), we both shared the deep respect to food as a true expression of humanity and culture. The appreciation of smooth crisp surface of a tiny macaron, filled with a silky cream, the perfection of a well whipped cream topping a St. Honore', the satisfaction in creating a truly marvelous Opera (a world famous cake he invented), are feelings that bridge many cultural gaps, and render all people, or at least those with a sweet tooth, closer.

I had a chance to take a look at Chef Lenotre in action. When I lived in Paris, I took an exceptional course in the Lenotre cooking school, where serious chefs taught happy amateurs the secrets of pastry making in one afternoon. As we were whipping our butter to make the butter-cream filling, suddenly Chef Lenotre came in. Our instructor straitened up, not abandoning his whisk, and saluted his Chef with distinct hello. Chef Lenotre passed between us, observing amiably our work. Indeed, he uttered "Allez-y, les enfants", as the legend goes! My coffee macarons acquired a flair of tradition and chic, bestowed upon them by this man's seriousness and dedication.

May I be able to achieve one day the extreme pleasure and satisfaction of inventing a cake, as Opera, that would enter the eternal cannon of the French Patisserie! Ah, one is still allowed to dream, thank heavens.

A belated thought on Holocaust memorial day

2009-01-29T01:53:00.002Z

1/ The Holocaust is not revived for one day, for me it is a constant moment. My grandmother's stories emphasize in my mind the extreme difference between her and my own 16 years old self. What is the use of thinking how I would have affronted persecution, flight for life, disease and physical suffering. I am too well nourished to be able to comprehend hunger, and my grandmother greatest achievement, in her own eyes, is that I shall never be persecuted for what I am, that I shall live in security.

2/ The Holocaust is a constant background of the political and public life in Israel, and perhaps because of that I feel a bitter sweet closeness to the suffering of people with whom I supposedly share a destiny. The horrors of the Holocaust are brought out every time there is a need to legitimize political decisions. If we are not to attack, we are to perish. I wonder how deep this mentality is sewed into me.

3/ The Holocaust has shattered all confidence my Grandma ever had in the goodness of non-Jews. Her greatest fear is that I shall mingle with them, and thus, willing or not, will lose my own identity. It is well beyond religion. There is according to her, something that unifies all Jews, a guarantee of moral stature, that the gentles lack. To my grandma's diapprovement, I am too much of a cosmopolitan, humanist if you wish, to accept her view, that is more common than one may expect. The sense of the community in me is lacking, and balanced with an exaggerated amount of cynical individualism. And what can be more Jewish than that? I have definitely read too much Arendt, Benjamin and Luxemburg.

Political

2009-01-28T06:16:00.002Z

"Today we even recognize the secret law of this vocabulary and know that the most terrible war is pursued only in the name of peace, the most terrible oppression only in the name of freedom, the most terrible inhumanity only in the name of humanity."
Carl Schmitt, The Age of Neutralizations and Depoliticizations (1929).

I have struggled for the last month or so, about the war. In Gaza. What can I, who is so far away, and hardly committed to any active opposition, can possibly say about a war, if that can be called a war, killing hundreds, yet gaining full public support by the aggressor people.

1/Obviously I opposed the war from its very first moment, yet this is easy when one is far from the center of propaganda and when one is far from Sderot. What can I answer to the people of Sderot who are bombarded with rockets for years, and demand tranquility? My obvious reply, that killing others will not promote tranquility, does not seem to convince them, since I cannot offer another, more effective course of action. The old saying that the Arabs understand only power prevails. I do not know how it feels to live under rains of rockets. But I cannot possibly, morally, agree that bombs on Gaza will resolve the situation. Like in a platonic dialogue, I find myself strongly opposed to war, knowing it is wrong on every aspect, and yet unable to provide strong arguments.

2/ How can people believe, and they do for what I read in the newspaper, that war can promote peace? In Gaza was a very cruel act of violence, not even war because it was not truly reciprocal, in the name of peace. The army was killing children to protect them from the oppressive Hamas. This absurd and sad argument was written also in an article by A.B. Yehoshua, the writer so beloved in Italy. I think it speaks for itself.

3/ I am against the war but also against the Hamas. Life in Israel is never black and white, and I am a person of the grey zone anyway. I enjoy thinking and considering each matter from both viewpoints, never chauvinistically supporting one side. But my conclusion is sadly pessimistic. I see suffering on both sides, but also cruelty and blindness. Is it banal to say that only time will allow a solution?

4/ I do not like to write about politics because often I feel my position is not very original, or very inspiring. Yet maybe I am wrong, maybe it is important, in these times when it seems like all men support death and destruction, to rise up a voice, perhaps meek and naive, for courage and, yes, peace. How banal. That is all I can do right now, from my little room in Westwood. And this passivity is almost insupportable.

Victory

2009-01-21T06:38:00.003Z

It is true that past experiences make us stronger, the failures engraved in our souls render our hearts fiercer, ready to combat. I think only people who have all that they want can say that. My failures hunt me also when I win. They empower my dreams, but also weaken my arms when I have to get into the arena and fight. Words disappear, the fear overcomes any ambition.

And yet, I have won before. But winning seems, how presumptuous, natural. I take no notice.
Today I confessed another failure, alas I can tell the stories of my misachievementes with cynical distant. Yet it hurts, even more than the realistic appreciation of the near future, that hides in it new promising failures. Every failure can be turned into a clamorous success, said my grandma, and she was right. But I like better striking victories.

This blog is partially a failure. I write it mainlt to see my words written down, to imagine someone reads them, though they lack, of course, any importance. I wish I'd write about politics, about war. That might have been inspiring, but I am afraid my pessimism is hardly a torch of hope.

Right now I just want to stop this mad race, lay back, and think, do what I like to do. Maybe bake a cake. I cannot take another loss, when I have gained so much already. Sometimes it is better to have nothing to lose. No, I don't really believe in that.

il cielo è sempre più blu

2009-01-04T04:28:00.003Z

in the last days i have tried to avoid the computer. it makes me miserable. firstly, my computer is full of things I have to do and try to postpone as far as possible, and looking them up makes me anxious. Second, I find the Internet depressing, and Z. Bauman would agree, I think. Third, well, I had better things to do. Forth, i did not want to see Gaza.

Strangely, in the last few days, from five different sources i got the same massage. Two were books, Galli, Calvino. One cinema director, Allen. and two thinking friends.
It seems a lost cause, and it probably is. Success is not guaranteed by justice, but by sheer luck, or by power. The world is not just, my love. But the only thing to do is to go on fighting, ardently believing that the sacrifice can bring a change, even if it is rationally clear it will not, because the success is handed blindly, not justly.

it takes a lot of strength to live like that. to fight ardently. to acknowledge good from bad. not to give in to the banal, sentimentl idealism, nor to the cynical realism. And i know it will go on and worsen, with or without me. I should fight, but i cannot. All i can do is write, and even that...

Back to the future

2008-12-14T15:27:00.003Z

"Let's throw i-ching", said Z, when dinner was over and so was the conversation.
"Think of a question about the future (not a yes-no question), then throw the three coins six times. I-ching will answer your question, and more."

I was trying to come up with a question suitable for social moments as this, not too embarrassingly personal nor too cynically wide. I hesitated. A sudden wave of fear surrounded me. Do I really want to know the future? My future?

Despite my rationally critical stature, I tend to comply with forecasts and predictions. The charming promise of secret, dark knowledge has always casted a spell upon my cynicism. I am sure had I lived in Etruria, I would have been just as taken with the Disciplina Etrusca, and would have believed whatever the augur would have read to me in random chicken liver. So I bravely decided to ask. And thus I threw the coins. Six times.

My numbers were 38 and 40. Z read the answer.You are now in a transition point between conflict and liberation. If you only have the boldness to act firmly, you will be liberated from doubt and be transited to the glorious success. You should not let others determine your choices, should follow your instincts and win. Soon the solution to your problem will come, and you will be free and happy again.

Well, isn't that what life is all about? In a way, it did answer my question, as it might have answered many others. Perhaps the secret is in the "might": I asked only that one question, and got my answer. Now I can act, empowered by destiny. Or merely by some mysterious old Chinese master, who sits in his Chinese hut, with his long Chinese moustache, and predicts my very interesting future.

p.s. In a Chinese restaurant in San Francisco, I discovered in a fortune cookie the following prediction: Sing and rejoice, because Luck is smiling to you. So I sang, I always do.

Fine Primo Tempo

2008-12-10T09:43:00.002Z

Tomorrow I am back to Italy.

3 months (almost)
19 units (too many)
50 books and articles read (and counting)
4 new ideas (that I am proud of)
1 new language (ruski yazik, I hate it)
2 museums (Getty, MOCA)
3 trips to the Beach (Santa Monica and Venice)
1 big trip to San Francisco (and Berkeley)
2 TV and newspaper interviews
2 hamburgers eaten (In n' Out)
18 bagels with cream cheese consumed (approx.)
1 guy I miss the most
too many friends far away (sadly)
a bunch of new friends (fortunately)
lots of fun (though LA is really ugly)
new dreams

I am glad to go home.
To be continued.

Quicky

2008-12-09T04:45:00.002Z

In the midst of darkness, when the demons running in the mind, help comes often from an unexpected source. Instead of running madly in the predictable direction, I should sit still and wait.

It is enough to lift one's head, to breath deeply, to listen to Ella and Louis, or to pop from the 80'.

I hate cliches, but more often than not they come in handy. Happiness depends on others' smiles as well.

Julius Caesar brought up to my mind tonight memories from Tel Aviv. I know I could not have done things differently, but I am glad the passing time makes me forget.

San Francisco

2008-12-05T01:58:00.004Z

Sitting at the dock of the bay, looking at the ocean coming to take me away. Now I can see clearly the ocean between us. As near as we can get, it will always be there.

Ottis Redding and Eric Clapton are fighting for my attention. Somehow San Francisco Bay is an inspiration for lost dreams and loves. How come the wonderful misty blue-gray horizon could not but arise melancholic exasperation for lost hopes? I rebel. I dream. I look at those silly sea lions, waiting, or indifferent, to the public applause. the ocean in a promise for an endlessly changing continuity.

San Francisco is a roller coaster, an open city, there for you to enjoy. It makes you feel all is possible even when it is not. Driving up and down the hills, from China to Italy, from water to water, there is a homely atmosphere. Impossible to explain, or maybe I don't want to try hard enough. It is a city to live in, a remote life, forgetting the eternity of the ocean.

In caffe Trieste we had a wonderful cheesecake and a real italian cappucino. A strong feeling of remoteness held me when the barista responded in Italian. Are all the places the same? Could it be the same to travel so far and to stay in one's room? This question cannot be answered but in retrospect. And now I want to travel, to move, to feel the anxiety of the airport and the train station. To feel my heart beating again above the endless, invincible ocean.

Platitude

2008-11-22T06:09:00.002Z

All those little moments of literature occur at night, when the thought is clear and the air is crisp and silent with the unspoken words of the day.
The day's fervor, the sunny enthusiasm, give their place to the nocturne subtlety. This moment is not truly mine. The hegemony of my mind gives away to the anarchic dream to free itself from my will. I give in. I fly away, I fortuitously leave my impassive stature and write. I cannot contain myself. I cannot refrain from writing although the bookstores are full of others' fervent words.
The need to exchange words for life becomes imminent at night. The power of my words against your silence threatens to outburst at once, to break my resistance. That is the right moment for a nocturne of Chopin, lightly caressing my thoughts into the tranquility. I breathe deeply. Strangely, in that moment of complete solitude, that Arendt would have scorned as useless contemplation, I find myself again. Your silence refuels my imagination, and my words are the new building blocks of my reality. The night is deep and obscuring, and unexpectedly, I like it again.

Bad example and good advice

2008-11-14T03:00:00.002Z

I am very good at listening to others complaining for inner struggles similar to mine. I encourage, with great words and courageous expressions, to overcome fear, to express the dream in so many words. As I shift my look towards myself, the doubts rise up like wild shrubbery of words, filling up with green wilderness the secret angles of my mind.
I give presumably good advice and secret bad example at the very same time.

Reading Hannah Arendt and talking to you I realize again how concentration on my private self is sterile, limited, selfish. The political is the only aspect of human activity in which man can really realize himself to a full extant. Only by acting for the common cause can one truly fulfill a greater existence. I sometimes despise my own reluctance to face the moral and political crisis in Israel. I wish to understand it better, and yet I cannot bring myself to focus on it professionally. Too much emotional involvement, too much fear of looking at familiar cruelties.

As wide as my wings may be, I wonder if one can ever fly high enough not to see the place where one was born. Arendt again, could never disentangle herself from her Jewishness, though it had no importance to her personally. I can see myself as a free individual, cosmopolitan and independent. But at the end of the day, the failure of the Zionist dream stands clear at my doorstep, and I cannot say that I do not care.
I cannot give any good advice, and the worst example possible is ignavy.

Abstract thought

2008-11-12T09:09:00.002Z

The last moment of the linguistic development in a child is the abstract thought. In the last years my abstract thoughts were never formed in my mother tongue. There is never a certainty that one can think as profoundly in a non native language. The barrier seems more mental than other. Perhaps also the fear of not being fully understood, or of not having grasped the crucial points of the discussion.

Abstract thoughts in foreign language are like walking on clouds. For a moment a glimpse of clear bright sky is seen, much bluer than ever before. But every step holds a threat of fall into the emptiness of lacking words.

Since I am an optimist of nature, I go on whispering my noble ideas in unfamiliar languages, pretending there are no other possibilities, wondering if there is a whole archive of Hebrew thoughts hiding within me, waiting to be explored, or perhaps lost in translation.

Cake

2008-11-10T10:02:00.002Z

My way of making friends has always been cake. And tonight it ravished again. A smooth chocolate cake with crisp raspberry sorbet have guided my way, along with witty conversation, of course, to the joys of new international friendships.

While dreaming of you, and imagining an unreachable future, I bake. I think it is the most altruistic way of dealing with the stress, encompassing it with a lovely perfume of chocolate.

Black

2008-11-06T07:30:00.002Z

America is back to Black but I am not moved, unlike all the students that gathered yesterday on campus to cry at Obama's speech. I guess my cynicism does not allow me to be truly impressed by politics, not even by politicians who want us to dream. Yes, his was a perfect speech, he touched each and every point in the American Dream (the self help, the uniqueness, the Independence, the dream, the destiny, and Love). He even got his daughters a new puppy! The perfect man.

In ancient Rome it wouldn't have impressed anyone that he is black. It seems that some 2000 years ago, the Romans were far more open than the contemporary Americans. Romans had Etruscan kings, dark-skinned senators, immigrants all over the place. But ethnicity did not play an important role in the political and cultural life. Progress does not necessarily mean improvement.

And to finish this deep post with a darker tone, I cannot study for the Roman History midterm due to severe toothache, that's accompanying me for about a week now. I truly do not understand how, with all this pain, stress and Roman History I can still be so very happy. Well, at least unlike our little Barack, I do not have the whole world's problems to resolve, merely my own.

"They are great, those Italians!"

2008-11-03T08:27:00.003Z

Exclaimed my UCLA professor of Roman history, as I came to see him on his office hours. He took his legs off the table, and looked at me with a mixture of boredom and sneer.
"So you study contemporary history, and yet they make you take Roman and Greek history as well? If Contemporary history had been a requirment when I studied at college, and I did ancient, I would never have graduated!"
This thought obviously seemed to amuse him, just like his favorite Simpsons jokes at class. And than one says the Americans are nerrow minded. Ah. I am speechless. Or maybe just polite.

Santa Monica

2008-10-26T04:40:00.002Z

A very busy day began at the beach, where only the sound of the waves crushing on the warm, golden sand disturbed the peace of my mind. Armed with a pair of shorts (!), I dedicated myself to the sun. After a few hours of intense work on my California tan, we went to have some nachos and burritos on the pier. Soon after lunch, the perfect time, came the best moment of the day: The Roller Coaster!! That was a tremendously cathartic moment, in which you are sure you are going to die, thrown out of the speeding cart, and you scream your soul out, but than you survive, shaking-legged, happy. Following, we headed towards the promenade, the shopping street of the city, where young people sing, dance, and mostly, shop. We joined the crowds. Soon my fascinating appeal attracted a sweet-talking TV producer, who asked me if I'd grant an interview to Bob Greene, Opera Winfrey's personal trainer. As I was in a generous mood, I agreed, to A.'s great terror. After being dully make-uped, I conversed cordially with dear Bob, whose blue eyes stared at me intensely as he was asking me what is my favorite sport activity. A cold coffee at the bookstore's cafe ended a merry Saturday, that will be finally concluded in an international German-Australian party tonight.

And I thought I came to UCLA to study.

5 o'clock

2008-10-23T07:28:00.003Z

No, it is not tea time, deary. I am sitting on the grounds, the fresh green grass fills the air with summer mist, the sky is, obviously, California Blue, and the sun is right over the last red brick building of the campus. It is five o'clock, and the bells begin to toll, first their little tune, than the time, and finally a piece of classical music I know but cannot name just now. The squirrels run around me frenetically, while every body seems to dose off on the grass, day dreaming while I read Arendt.

Cutting briefly this naturalistic idyll, I go to the library to watch an episode of Brigada, the famous (or notorious) Russian TV series that accurately (!?) presents the Russian society as it sees itself. It is the story of an ex solider, who after the fall of the soviet union goes back home to his old friends, to find that they are involved with local thugs, and that his sweetheart has become a prostitute. He wins her back in a boxing fight against the main gangster, nicknamed Fly, but than changes his mind, and leaves her, accusing her of betraying his pure love with her mundane occupation. Well, what can I say more. A fascinating self portrait of Russia. Can't wait to see the next episode. Will keep you updated.

Here is the opening tune, for you all to enjoy.

Campus

2008-10-19T21:17:00.003Z

Really, no need to be so stressed, life is made to be taken easily. Whenever I try to be serious, it usually turns out to be unnecessary. I should calm down and relax, let life guide me. Breath deeply.

Campus is lovely, all green and brick. I take it for granted, as I so often do, but that does not mean I don't appreciate. Westwood is boring, but I did have some nice pancakes in a little coffee shop there. Mild compensation.

Life is what you make of it. I am not sure I would have chosen LA again, of all places. But as I am already here, I might as well look for some adventures. Calmly.

seriously

2008-10-16T05:27:00.002Z

I wonder how much the past is hunting us, and how much we are carrying it along out of our own free will. The Israeli aspect has been to me a quick escape from difficult exam questions in Bologna. I have left Israel to do history differently, not only from the Jewish and Israeli aspects, like is very commonly done, at least in high school. But now I keep on turning to Israel for examples, confrontations and theories. It is the first thing to come to my mind.

Trying to decide on a subject for my thesis, I wonder how much it is me who want co confront once and for all the political issue of Israel, and how much it is my laziness that prevents me from looking for something new. Perhaps it is a sincere need, my personal chance, to research the roots of all that I do not like about Israel. But not all historians have to deal with their own past, and a thesis is not a psychological therapy.

Probably I am giving that too much importance, trying, as always, to analyse every glimpse and every thought. I should leave Israel behind, once and for all, and go on. Find a new passion, that will not be an escapist excuse. Yet, a sort of vocation, a hope to be able to contribute, in a way, to improve the sad reality, will not leave me alone.

Moral sins

2008-10-14T03:00:00.002Z

Today I went to the dentist. At my old age it gets you to think of the eternal body-soul dichotomy, how the soul may resist decay, but the body does not.

The dentist was quite kind, yet very talkative. For a moment he brought this fantastic scene of Little Shop of Horrors into my mind. It was not quite as extreme, but almost. The sad moral of the story, kids, go to your dentist, before it is too late.

7 kings

2008-10-11T05:23:00.004Z

One of the difficult courses in my department at UCLA is Roman History.

Oh, it is comforting I have no nationalistic Italian feelings to offend.

Talking of the 7 kings of Rome, whose names the American students cannot pronounce, (besides Numa, maybe), the prof. he refered to the improbability of a 35 years' reign (an elementry school topic in Italy, says U.) Saying that unlike in royal families today, at the time of the Roman monarchy 35 was way over life expectency. Today, he insists, in one of the last places the Monarchy has still survived, the "so called" United Kingdom, a royalty might face a mortal fear only by the hands of the.. Paparazzi. And to conclude his argumantation, the prof. says, well, I know it is not NICE of me to say that about a lovely princess like Lady D, but I can do that because I am AMERICAN. And this country was founded as a giant middle finger (!) to the UK.

And than he went on talking about the seven kings of Rome.

Beta Theta Pi

2008-10-10T08:13:00.005Z

The whole idea of fraternity is one of those typical american things: pseudo-classic influance (these are Greek fraternities, inspired by the times of the great philosophers), yet at the end there is nothing more to it that old booze and gals. For the party they turned the fraternity house into a jungle. Funny it was, like a scene out of American Pie. And I wonder what do they do in fraternities, besides drinking and smoking and BBQing.

So many social organizations in UCLA. The american Spartakists. The young Armenians. The Muslim union. Jews for Jesus. Chinese traditional dancers. Salsa fans. You name it. I, nonconformist as I am, don't incline to join in the party. I have always been of those who sit away from the group, watching, meditating, sending over a handful of witty critique, picking carefully my companions. The view is always clearer from the outside. Happily, anthropology revives itself in my life as a great excuse to jump into the wilderness once in a while, yet my scientific vocation pulls me out always, on the last moment. One more story to add to my little black notebook.

UCLA

2008-10-07T07:46:00.002Z

UCLA campus is all you can imagine thinking of an American campus. Red brick buildings imitating Oxford, green fields, marching band practicing in the afternoon and lots of fraternities and societies advocating their uniqueness in the pathways, trying to make you join in. I do not really know why I have not had that thrilling heart leap when I came here. Somehow nothing seems new, I am not really surprised. UCLA is all one can imagine of an American college. It is a world out of the world, in a city without a city.

The ivory tower. UCLA explicitly shows how people close themselves away from life, trying to meditate about it. Although many scholars may accuse me of simplicity, I think that in a campus far away from "real life", it can be very difficult to truly comprehend the world, if ever such a possibility was open to us mortals. It seems ridiculous to assist to a post-colonialism seminar, where students, full of guilt, try to observe the new Marxist power relations that determine the life of poor immigrants, that they may have never seen. I am a fruit of pragmatic, down to earth education, and I ask myself sometimes what is the purpose of all these thinkings. U. might have had a quick, reproaching reply for that, just as Weber. But my doubts are not so easy to sweep.

Around the world, my friends seem happy. The neighbour's grass is always greener, yet I won't stop watering mine. I don't really know what I was expecting when coming to LA, maybe to live a myth that is so very different than my own quite fixed character. I do not wish to change, and I doubt being able to change LA. Maybe there is room for co-existence.

In the meantime, here it seems like it is all about Israel, bringing me down again to my past deficiencies. I feel somewhat obliged to understand better, after all it is a part of me. Yet, it seems silly to beat around the same Israeli bush all my academic life. So I end up doing nothing, just passing my time, meditating.

Venice

2008-10-03T04:39:00.003Z

Not even one gondola in this Venice. Instead, there is the sea, all blue and wide, never ending. The send seems soft and warm, but I did not have the time or the bathing suite to explore it. Along the beach, Arabs and Israelis, who else, were selling penny sunglasses, cheap jewels and ethnic tattoos. Me and Nadia set for lunch at a typically American restaurant, with red checkered table plastic cloth, and had BLT (bacon lettuce tomato) and hot pastrami sandwiches. The sun was hot, maybe too grilling for Nad's delicate European complexion, but than again, everything is so much more beautiful in sunshine.

I have not seen Nad for so long. We always meet away from home, in Paris, and now in Venice, CA. She is all that I am not: extroverted, loud, socially vivid. I enjoy her hearty laughs as I tell her about my life. It is comforting to see the present reflected in the past, it reassures me of my own continuity.

And by the way, while on the road, I got a call from housing saying I may move into a single apartment tomorrow. The hours of persuasion at the various offices, the resistance to the hundreds of "no", were well payed. Although I have not seen the new room, I trust Virginia Woolf was right: it can be small and dull, but it will be A Room of My Own.

L. A.

2008-09-29T03:35:00.002Z

The plane lowered towards the yellow mist that hided the city of Los Angeles. The last rays of sunshine colored the city in a lovely orange, that was a fine combination with the mountains and desert that surround the city. Los Angeles is a new city. It is spread over the territory, like a huge forest of low, private houses with no center nor specific orientation. You could crop a bit of that city, put it in a suburb of any other American city, and no one would have noticed the difference.

After almost four days in LA, I realize that as it usually goes, prejudices are very well rooted in reality. This city is not lovable, and it's culture is shallow and fake. The best thing here is the weather, which is not to be underestimated. A tee shirt is more than enough here. Yet, LA is somewhat too easy going, it compromises the spirit of the place. There is not the awe, the overwhelming excitement of walking in the streets on New York. LA is not poetic, it is not witty, it is too self-absorbed.

Living in LA, a place that stands for all those things that are not important to me, enhances my spirit, reinforces my confidence in my own principles. I do not adore the world around me, I do not spend my time on idle pleasures. The shallowness of this town encourages me to concentrate my existence around my own orbit, which may not be such a bad thing, after all. And it is clearer to me now than ever: I'd rather spend my life in a place with a history.

Words are like water in her mouth

2008-09-03T21:46:00.002Z

Tanto la lingua non dovrebbe fare differenza. Tanto mi capiscono uguale. Ma perché mi sembra che in Italiano non riesco proprio ad esprimere i miei pensieri profondi, astratti?

Nonostante ciò, spesso sono più accasata a Bologna che altrove. Un muro di parole strane, lontane sebbene escono dalla mia bocca, mi proteggono. Posso rivelare tutto, ma non sarò mai nuda, perché non è la mia lingua. Inglese non lo è nemmeno. Certe idee mi si formano in parole solo in certe lingue. Quando mi sento dire ani ohev otach, le parole penetrano più facilmente la mia anima, sebbene posso credere anche alle esclamazioni in lingua straniera.

Sarà che le parole senza passato, senza traumi, sono come acqua nella mia bocca, corrono, limpide, e spariscono senza lasciare gusto, con voglia di più.

*This post was written in Italian, as a tribute to the Italian readers of this insignificant blog. Graditi i commenti, in tutte le lingue.

Noctambule

2008-08-29T07:45:00.003Z

The heat was swarming viciously in the avenue, surrounding the people, young and merry on Thursday night. Tel Aviv is a city of bored people waiting to be amused. Any Amusement will do, as long as it will be replaced by a new one soon enough. I wonder how deep in the stamp the city has left in me.

And now it is the new cava-bar that is the hottest thing. A tiny insignificant spot, on the corner of the avenue and one of the pseudo chic streets where "young people" go to hang out at night. The pavement before the bar, rotten, blackened with eternal traffic, is packed with high spirited girls wearing cheap colorful summer dresses, holding old-fashioned shallow cava goblets, laughing with guys in geans and tee shirt, unshaved, corase, holding cava bottles, waiting to pour some more to fuel the laughter.

"This town is so sick, I love it," says M. as we move with our goblets and bottle to seat by the memorial fountain in the avenue. People wait in line just to drink some fuzzy spanish wine, while out of the shop next door curves a long cue of people longing to eat some cold over-priced yogurt.

I have lost my alcohol resistance. It is all your fault, you make me drink fruit smoothies instead of wine. We continued to Neve Tzedeck, the oldest neighbourhood in town, where the houses are small and colonial-styled, and the streets are packed with french tourists admiring the middle eastern elegance. A new wine bar was our venue. The wine was obviously the same as anywhere, nothing worth writing home about. One cannot be very demanding, it gets frustrating. So we set on the bench outside, looking at the happy people inside, feeling our joy being replaced by a certain heavy exhausted thoughtfulness.

I cannot help meditating on the destiny of the world when I am sitting, somewhat drunk, on a lonely bench in forgotten street, in a over self estimating city, in the middle of an eternal armed conflict: it makes me feel so sentimental, like losing myself at night and finding me again in the morning, bright and shiny, unknown.

Life resolutions

2008-08-24T13:39:00.003Z

There comes a time when one must decide what to do with one's life.

I find it very difficult. I swing between many little skills and one life devotion, that hangs still in the dark, faceless.

I ceaslessly wonder if I should stop giving myself completely, diving head into the water. I think it is stamped too deeply into my soul to ignore. Yet my soul is like a million facets, that reflects daylight and moonrays in million different ways. Don't think knowing one facet you have known me all. I am not as pretentious as saying I know myself thoroughly as yet.

Adventures are needed, but are mostly inside of me. External stimulus is exciting, but not necessary. I can fly in my mind higher than anywhere you can imagine. But I want you to fly with me, it is more extreme. (Although some corners of my mind will not be revealed, you see.)

My chest is bursting with undirected ambition. I will never be calm. I don't ever want to.

Post 150

2008-08-20T07:30:00.002Z

I suspect very few of you still read this. Oh, don't think I'm complaining. I rather like writing knowing no one will read. Real freedom.

Somehow I have felt of late that I have lost myself. That I am not so very sure of what I want to do, of who I really am. I decided to stop looking for my reflection in your eyes. It is not so very easy. But I will succeed.

What else? Life goes on. Yesterday I wanted to go to a gallery opening near my home in Tel Aviv, but D. came over and we had a long chat. She understands my problems too well. Sometimes, when your thought are expressed by other's words, they seem more important and urgent. I will have to leave my prolems to Time, as I have no solutions for them now. I hate waiting. No Patience at all.

I want to do everything, but my father tells me to stop running. Never do for others more than they would do for you. I guess he may be right. I don't like asking for attention. I like giving. Not as sarcastic as you think. My public image is quite wrong, you know. Yet people tell me to wait, not to give myself completely, not to jump into the water all at once. I cannot decide if jumping or waiting is strategically better. And what would the Frankfort School say on that?

Yes, I am still here.

2008-08-14T16:42:00.001Z

(Paris 7/2008)

I have finally regaind my peace of mind. Something in me is craving to write again. I am back on the move.

Cooking class

2008-07-08T22:14:00.003Z

1. Adalgisa came from Due Santi. She has lived there all her life and had no plans to move, nor after the death of her late husband. Her husband has met me once, she told me, at the house, when it was still under construction and he came over to look for some wild asparagus in the woods around. I impressed him as a well aducated girl, she said. Since his death she gave up coffee, anyway she cannot sleep at night, so why worsen the problem? But otherwise she carries on, life never stops, till it finally does. A-dal-gi-sa. Reminds me of the night at the opera (Norma, of course) when your breath hit my nape, and I knew you were there, silently.

2. Adalgisa made fresh pasta leaves, gnocchi, and ragu. I don't want to be a casalinga, but I do learn. She has the same tricks of the great french chefs, yet without the elegant facade. She wears a flowery robe, with a differently flowery apron. She is sweaty, she works as if that is the only thing she ever wanted to do, and it is. I admire her precision. She does not tie the rosmary leaves tight for me, nor for costum, she does it rightly to satisfy her conscious, her need of perfection, almost unthought of, yet always present. She takes her ragu very seriously. It is admirable.

3. The tagliatelle al ragu rest quietly in our white plates, the wine is being poured to our glasses (Elisa will not drink it, it is the neighbour's wine and she knows how it is made and has her doubts). A door bell rings at one thirty pm, an unconcievable act for italians. Indeed, these are no Italians. My grandma's cousin and family came to visit. Surprise surprise. Good people, as they say where I come from. Adalgisa is very worried because dad went out to see to our guests, while his pasta gets cold. She gets physically unease, but we offer some more wine to smoothen her mind. Dad comes back after half an hour. He is no Italian, so he eats his pasta nontheless. Exquisite, he is congratulating Adalgisa, the ragu still on his lips. And I cannot but think of Annalisa's jars of ragu, sent lovingly from home. Will I ever be free of these memories, should I wish to be? I have to learn to plurify my life centers, mom says. To be happy without longing elsewhere all the time. Sometimes I wish to forget you, but you know I cannot. I go to bed with the perfum of fresh pasta in my nose, and my mind is bringing back you.

Who is afraid of destiny?

2008-07-03T18:16:00.002Z

I am trying not to think of the obvious, undeniable fact that these are my last days in Bologna. I may be back, I certainly will, yet it will not be the same, you will not be here. I may be happy, yes I will, but I will not smile as I have smiled at you, knocking on the so familiar door, walking behind you in the green corridor. I like dwelling in these thoughts, I always think that things may never be the same again, and I try to catalogue in my mind as many moments of the present to rejoice in other days.

My plans are many, complicated, spread over three continents. My life is exciting, yet preserves some daily routine that makes me calm. Like a storm, wondering around a lost ship, without crushing it to pieces, just sending to her mighty waves of thrill. My roommate has mononucleosis. I can see my destiny falling down on me, without any way to escape: the fatigue and the illness will cancel all my brilliant and well designed plans. I will spend this summer at home, dreaming wide awake.

I shall not succumb. I shall resist. No virus can stop me. I hope.

Are Guccini's love songs tragic, realistic, or romantic?

2008-06-29T15:38:00.006Z

Francesco Guccini - Farewell

E sorridevi e sapevi sorridere coi tuoi vent'anni portati così,
come si porta un maglione sformato su un paio di jeans;
come si sente la voglia di vivere
che scoppia un giorno e non spieghi il perchè:
un pensiero cullato o un amore che è nato e non sai che cos'è.

Giorni lunghi fra ieri e domani, giorni strani,
giorni a chiedersi tutto cos'era, vedersi ogni sera;
ogni sera passare su a prenderti con quel mio buffo montone orientale,
ogni sera là, a passo di danza, a salire le scale
e sentire i tuoi passi che arrivano, il ticchettare del tuo buonumore,
quando aprivi la porta il sorriso ogni volta mi entrava nel cuore.

Poi giù al bar dove ci si ritrova, nostra alcova,
era tanto potere parlarci, giocare a guardarci,
tra gli amici che ridono e suonano attorno ai tavoli pieni di vino,
religione del tirare tardi e aspettare mattino;
e una notte lasciasti portarti via, solo la nebbia e noi due in sentinella,
la città addormentata non era mai stata così tanto bella.

Era facile vivere allora ogni ora,
chitarre e lampi di storie fugaci, di amori rapaci,
e ogni notte inventarsi una fantasia da bravi figli dell'epoca nuova,
ogni notte sembravi chiamare la vita a una prova.
Ma stupiti e felici scoprimmo che era nato qualcosa più in fondo,
ci sembrava d'avere trovato la chiave segreta del mondo.

Non fu facile volersi bene, restare assieme
o pensare d'avere un domani e stare lontani;
tutti e due a immaginarsi: "Con chi sarà?" In ogni cosa un pensiero costante,
un ricordo lucente e durissimo come il diamante
e a ogni passo lasciare portarci via da un'emozione non piena, non colta:
rivedersi era come rinascere ancora una volta.

Ma ogni storia ha la stessa illusione, sua conclusione,
e il peccato fu creder speciale una storia normale.
Ora il tempo ci usura e ci stritola in ogni giorno che passa correndo,
sembra quasi che ironico scruti e ci guardi irridendo.
E davvero non siamo più quegli eroi pronti assieme a affrontare ogni impresa;
siamo come due foglie aggrappate su un ramo in attesa.

"The triangle tingles and the trumpet plays slow"...

Farewell, non pensarci e perdonami se ti ho portato via un poco d'estate
con qualcosa di fragile come le storie passate:
forse un tempo poteva commuoverti, ma ora è inutile credo, perchè
ogni volta che piangi e che ridi non piangi e non ridi con me...

---------------------------------

The need to remain detached, to protect oneself from the risk of getting hurt, obstacles any possibility of true happiness. I see, beneath the surface, a deep layer of existential melancholy in Guccini's lost love song. All that's left are the memories, any other aspiration is useless. Isn't it easier to give up? I am too optimistic to agree. Guccini is very calm about the cooling down of his love. There is no fight, not a word of rebelion against destiny. Or maybe he is willing to put an end to that affaire, that was not ment to last, but that was too lovely not to try. The distance, the need to stay apart may have been the critical factor in the separation: the physical love was the glue that kept them together, while the thought, the craving, was not strong enough to brigde over the geografical distance, while the doubting thoughts drill in the loving hearts, ruining the purity of their feelings. Yes, it is easy to give up, thinking that she was just another girl to be catalogued in his personal history. To go on, looking for another adventure behind the corner, not pretending that Truth as an absolute value may exist. There is not but normality, that moves on like an endless cycle of illusionary love affairs, doomed to end.

Guccini is precise, accurate, observant. He describes life, the entropic tendency to give up, to lower energy, to get used to and bored with, to move on. But he lacks the fight, the alan vital, the power to fight deterioration. I believe that power exists. And though the risk of breaking down and being shattered to pieces is always there, menacing, I think it is worth risking. Happiness is not full without peril.

lyrics

2008-06-29T15:25:00.002Z

When I was little my uncle taught me that really great songs have both innovative lyrics and thrilling music. I am attached to the words. A song cannot pass my ears without leaving the words in my mind. Sometimes even silly songs, pop hits, offer a fabulous phrase, that penetrates my thought and stays there.

----

"..and I know you're on to me,
that I only come home
when I'm so all alone
but I do believe"

----

"And I think that I could love you
Because you know how to be free,
I want you to come,
and walk this world with me"

---

"prendi il primo pulman via
tutto il resto e' gia' poesia"

----

Maybe I have heard these words in the right moment, when my mind was open and free to accept the mark of their light headed sense. Even pop-art, words made of Campbell soup cans, straight forward and candid, may have their strength.

Guccini

2008-06-22T20:08:00.004Z

At the end I had to give up and do it. I am hardly the kind of person who bends down at any slight pressure, but they have left me no escape. So I took my shoes off, rolled up my pants, and started crossing the river, along with D., M., and U., towards the small arena where the concert of Guccini was just about to begin. Even the most banal walk in the water can become exotic with the right touch of drama.

The concert was fantastic. I liked the ethos, and the coherent political roots of Guccini's songs. It is about making your choices, affronting life, realizing there may not be total happiness (I am too euphoric to agree on that point, but I shall get back to it in another post).
Of course U. knows all the lyrics. It is funny to dive into the collective memory of somebody else's youth. I understand the words, and the little jokes (politics, as always, and Guccini telling a girl with a banner "will you marry me?" that enough is enough). But surely I have missed something: the memory of moments in one's life, in which important things happened to the sound of Guccini's music.

But I have started catching up, building my own memory baggage, in that night, with the warm air and the bright stars, and the joyous singing, and the walk in Porretta, and the sandwiches, and the river, and that enormous smile.

Communication

2008-06-14T19:51:00.003Z

Yesterday I showed Y. my ink collection. "what do you do with it?", she rightly asked. "I write with my calligraphic pen," was my obvious reply.
Obvious? not so. At least to myself I must admit that I have not written in my very stylish calligraphic pen for at least two years. What seems to have taken the place of my elegant hand written messages, that I did truly wrote for people I liked, are the squalid sms. Now I do realize sms are practical, and that it is really old fashioned and tiresome to complain about the distanced, cold way in which one sends one's abbreviated feelings and thoughts to friends and relatives. But as I don't care if others think I'm a nuisance, I must say I miss letters. I miss hand-written cards, that say nothing in particular, but express that little extra emotion because someone has taken a moment to choose the card, to phrase a sincere massage. Somehow, things that are hand-written seem more real, even when the words are exactly the same.
So there is nothing wrong with sms, nor with emails. But I do adore touching the paper with the tips of the finger, sniffing the crispy smell of the card, or, plainly, that almost forgotten feeling of a letter.

Mind Reading

2008-06-11T22:19:00.004Z

I have never been very good at mind-reading. but I am not a master of Occlumency either. I cannot penetrate other's mind. Some people have that gift. I need to have the things said, clear and loud. Yet I seldom forget what has been said. Words are like smoke around me, building transparent screen between my soul and the world. I need that protection: I must soften the contact with the exteriority through the words.

Few things really matter. I do. You do. I am quite sure of that. Yet not necessarily in that order. I have learnt just now how to love the darker corners in my soul, the ones that my shiny cynicism manages to hide, usually. I have walked this floor so often, I know exactly how it is made. But now, I am surprised again. There is a new scent in the air, of excited minds, of late blossom, which is always the most beautiful, glowing in the cool summer night. Somethings cannot be put in words, you know.

Borges, Sand and Death

2008-06-02T10:44:00.006Z

I've been reading a book of short stories by Borges, one of my favorite writers. The Book of Sand was written towards the end of his life, when he was already blind and quite disconnected from the everyday reality, the perfect condition to reflect upon your life as a whole. And the stories in the book do exactly that: it is the constant examination of the self, in confront with death, with the younger self, with the other. Borges asks the same question in all his literature corpus: what is the self, and how can we be a whole entity in relation with the outside world. He shows how can our figure be reflected in the eyes of the person that stands in front of us, and in the river of History, that flows forever, as goes the famous metaphor.

But Borges is not a mere continuation of the all-too-familiar western philosophy of the Self that enquires itself: Borges is wild and violent, strong and surreal. That's why I find his writing so fascinating. He proposes the basic questions in subversive way, threatening the reader's peace of mind.

Enough. Now you have to explore it yourself. Here you can listen to the great travel writer Paul Theroux reading a nonetheless great story by Borges, about religion, identity and the choices one makes in life. An unknown piece of art. By the way, The New Yorker website (I'm sure you are all familiar with that mithycal review that is one of my world wide favorites!) hosts a very rich offer of fiction podcast, as well as written stuff. The selection o the pieces is unique, and one can always find there some inspiring ideas. Take a look.

23

2008-05-29T07:29:00.002Z

Older and wiser, doubtlessly.

So another year has passed. At least, unlike last year, this time it did not rain. But I still had the strange peasure of passing three hours of my birthday on the train, going home.

I had a wonderful hot lunch with my historic friends in Bologna. I had a wonderful dinner at home, where mom worked really hard to make some extremely elaborated food that I love.

It was a calmly happy birthday. But I'd love to celebrate in some extreme way, next week. I just have to figure out how! any ideas?

10 things I love about Madrid

2008-05-27T15:40:00.003Z

1. It wakes up late. I can have my churros y cafe con leche at 11am, without missing any early thrills. The bar will always be full with other people who, like me, woke up 10min ago. I find it very comforting.

2. Consequently, Madrilenos take their time, and never seem to be in a hurry. Dinner at 11pm is the perfect solution to make the most of one's day. These two hours of rest, between 8 and 10, when there is still narrow daylight, are very useful to lighten up one's spirit after a long day, towards a yet longer night at the cervezeria.

3. Tapas: all those little portions, elegant yet rustic, served on the bar, with a cana of light beer or cider. The endless possibilities that compose dinner, much more thrilling than the same old pasta! And not to mention the cerveza, the jamòn, the racione, and all those lovely exotic names for great food and drink.

4. Napoletanas: the local pastries, with chocolate or cream, to be taken in Mallorquina (I thing that was the name), the legendary pastry in Puerta del Sol, that still maintains the same old dècor from the 50's (why change something good?). If you pass at the rush hour (around 7pm), you might have to fight for your napoletana with some well-dressed old senoras, that take their pastries very seriously, and justly so.

5. Spanish. I don't understand one word. Honestly, I can't even say gracias with the right pronunciation (with your tongue against your teeth). But I loved being surrounded with foreign sounds, that make no sense at all. Like a trip to Mars.

6. La Baronessa. Thyssen, of course. She and Queen Sofia are doubtlessly my favorite royals (after the charming Prince William). The graceful Baronessa, who altruistically decided to share her art collection with the public, is absolutely admirable. Somehow, we remain much more impressed with the generosity of the Royals, than with that of the common people.

7. La Latina. The favorite neighbourhood, no question here. By night, going around the not so tidy streets, and into a flamenco bar, where common Spaniards sing with incredible passion and play the guitar with amazing skill, is a unique experience.

8. The J (like in Jamòn, unfortunately this blog is not yet equipped with audio effects.) Finally I've found a city where my J is widely appreciated!

9. Retiro: the city's mega park is something between wilderness and royal gardens: it has it all. More than the central park, the Retiro is spread over a huge hill over Madrid, and is the perfect hang out on a summer day.

10. The people. Everybody seem at ease in Madrid, like there is no stress in the world, like there will always be time for another cerveza, for another croqueta. Even if one has to be serious, to work hard, to achieve, the stress seems diluted by the beer and the music. Maybe that's why Madrid is perfect for vacation, less adapt for ambitions. In Madrid, your life ambition can only be to find the best bar, with the coolest and cheapest beer, with the freshest tapas, with the liveliest music, where to pass a perfect evening with friends. If you are up to more, la vida madrilena may not be your thing.

Holà!

2008-05-25T19:28:00.001Z

Just a quick one. Madrid is relly fantstic. Far more tan I imagined, because it is both lively and liveable. We pass our days in the bars, with churos, cerveza, tapas. Eerything is so new to me, yet seems strangely familiar.. And the food is really great!

la felicidad...

Today was very wintery, but not as wintery as that

2008-05-18T19:29:00.001Z

Sparkling with dreams and hope

2008-05-18T13:39:00.002Z

1. Not many hopes for Napoli, though. I have seen yesterday Gommora, the film about the Camora and the organized crime in Naples. Although from the cinematographic point of view it quite predictable, the subject is doubtlessly and dramatically relevant. The total influence of the organized crime clans on the everyday life in Campania is quite startling. The passivity of the population, who sees in the individual escape the only solution, is surely of not help. Yet the fact that the government, the sovereign power, accepts the situation, or at least takes no extreme measures to put an end to the Camora's power, is much more grave and frustrating. The life of Naples' youth, or at least those who grow up under the shadow of the Camora, is destined to a very limited liberty, though living in a country that pretends to be a modern democracy. The gap between the legal power of the state, and the legitimacy of its exercise within certain social groups reveals itself tragic.

2. What is better: to dream and hope, running the tiresome risk of frustration, or to expect little, and than be surprised? I have always been for the first choice. My life is a sequence of dreams, sometimes becoming a reality, mostly not. I must admit that often I have not helped my dreams to fulfill themselves. It's like blowing a soap bubble, it may explode in your face.

3. I have been talking to my Israeli friend D. of courtship cultural differences, an extremely interesting theme. She is for the active approach, very common in Israel. No contemplation, just go and get it. In my mind, in Italy it won't work. There is always some negotiation, some silence and distance, some hopes and dreams. I got used to living here, but sometimes I look nostalgically to the openness and liberty of the old times in Tel Aviv. On one hand, as D says, the Italians seem to repress their desires, to diminish lust, to think a lot. She could never live in a place like that, says D. On the other hand, the dreaming potential is greater, and so is the climax. Choosing where to live is not only the food, or the view, it is much about the mentality. I guess I am too cosmopolitan for Italy, too European for Tel Aviv, alas.

A' la recherche de la R perdue..

2008-05-16T18:15:00.002Z

1. Yesterday I found my Italian R. As it happens, I have always had it, it was just lost in my mouth. So now I can speak Italian in pseudo Italian accent, or in my normal unique accent. dilemma. I think I will stick to my eccentricity. Not even my accent will be like everybody else's! Enhance your difference!

Blurred thoughts

2008-05-14T22:40:00.004Z

1. Spring has always awaken in me secret hopes and dreams. My feet are just above the ground, not really touching, and my mind is mystified with prospects for the future, with moments of the present that I want to engrave on my stony memory. The skies are so blue sometimes, yet we hardly notice, because we have to study.

2. My friend N. is writing her dissertation on immigrating identity. She has interviewed me the other day, asking me if I feel Israeli, or post-zionist. For me Israel, Tel Aviv, are home, in the nostalgic sense, without the nationalistic mystification. I see my past there, the streets that I often walked as a child, the shops I have passed by on my way to school, the bus, the sea. But I am a wondering soul, always touring around without an orbit. And the streets of Bologna are as dear to me now, because I have not walked them alone. As for the post-zionism, I have my own definition of the term. I think being a post-zionist means comprehending the fact that Zion is not only ours, that there are other "Zionist" movements, that will not disappear, with whom Israel will have to live.

3. I do not bake as often lately. Bad, bad, at least for my public relations.

4. I seem to have that tendency, instead of checking if the water is cold with the tip of the leg, like everybody does, I jump into the pool, body and mind, to discover that it has no water at all. Scarcity of Intuition resources. Or maybe, like Donoso Cortes, I follow the Decision, an act stronger than any other, practiced under the Authority of the Divine. Yet how am I to know the Divine is there for me? It might have been comforting, an illusion of order, in my chaotic world.

5. The piano has become dear to me again. I like singing and playing to myself, at night, when almost no one listens, when the Collegio seems abandoned to its faith. And my voice fills the void between the phrases I have learnt all day, that are tightly squeezed into my mind. I dream, I hope. There is nothing else, really.

Work and Love

2008-05-06T23:02:00.004Z

1. In Singapore the government is promoting courses on how to find Love. Probably the Singaporean guys are a bit slow and shy, and the national demography suffers. Two issues: why are the guys so incompetent? Are they too shy and reserved? and also: Interesting to see the government's manipulation of private life, in 2008.

2. What is more important? Career or Love? Well, if one can have them both.. Today I eavesdropped to a conversation at the dining hall. A girl said that her roommate is married to work, but at least it cannot betray her. The roommate plans to go on vacation with her parents and their friends. She is 30..

3. Met lots of new people today. One is a son of Israeli guy who studied in Bologna and remained ever after, for love. The son can speak Hebrew (damn, even in that I am not so particular anymore..) Another guy did a stage in Jerusalem. I have not been there in five years maybe.

4. I tend to be very invidious lately, maybe because after reading Freud I realize there are many desires I have repressed. I wonder where is the limit between courage and stupidity: D. usually tells me to go for it, because you can do it. I am not insecure, really, just doubtful. But, as Galli said, Revolutions are done, and than thought of.

5. Thursday is Israel's 60 Independence day. Hurray. The left in israel is criticized of being too auto-critic, almost self-hating. I can never really bring myself to participate in national festivities. But I do not hate, I am just very critical. I do hope it does not mean the same thing in the long run.

Is the Left dead?

2008-05-02T23:10:00.002Z

After the great defeat of the Labour party in the UK, and the victory of Berlusconi in Italy and Sarcozy in france, as well as the long decline of the Left in Israel into a non-existent spirit, I ask myself today what exactly is left of the left. Why does it seem to many that the left has lost its voice and cannot offer a valid answer to the many problems with which the western world struggle today: unstable economy, educational gaps, immigration, collapsing sanitary systems, the widely feared Globalization. Not only did the voters lost faith in the left (Good Grief, they elected Crazy Boris as the Mayor of London!!), but also the very supporters of the left think its moment has passed, and will not come back for a long while.

I cannot pretend to resolve the problem with a quick post. However, the questions are left to be asked, to be reviewed critically: what has remained of the spirit of the Left today? We do not dream of a revolution. As the Frankfurt guys repeated, the industrial world has socialized us totally, into forgetting what is it that we have always dreamed about, into being cynical and calculating. Can the Left offer both Truth and Reality? Or is that too much to ask?

Perhaps the only power left for the left is in the institutions: against the mob that demands strict political power to fight the enemies of the Nation, the Left should face dynamic political entities, not overly bureaucratized, that shall restore the faith in Society, against arbitrary authority and against personal interests that dominate politics and economics. I do not know how it is to be done, but that seems like the only way. Can the Right do it as well? Maybe, yet I have never seen them trying.

Blur

2008-04-29T17:00:00.002Z

Conclusions

2008-04-29T16:50:00.005Z

1. we have got about 80+ votes in the faculty of letters, which gives us a member in the faculty council. Not bad for a first time, I'd say.

2. Family came to visit. Took 18 years old cousin to hang out in Via Zamboni with U. The mob was very exciting in her eyes, all those people spread on the sidewalks drinking beer and watching the girls pass. U. was a bit less thrilled maybe, but that did not diminish the light in cousin's eyes. How easy it is to make people happy! And that without bombo-crepe...

3. After a long day of rain, the Sun came out again, unexpectedly. It is time to explore, to find my courage. To confront unknown ideas. To have so much fun! Yes, like all of you, I am thinking of the Leninist parade of May 1st! Or, if not, we can all explore some new horizons, and occupy the faculty, to free Palestine, in Bologna, on May 8th!!

4. Oh, there was also a great day in montesole, a rediscovery of a cherished friend, a collapse, a recovery, a nice dinner on the hills, and some moments of thoughts in between. That was the last week for me. And let us not forget the bloody holiday that has just finished.. Times are chaotic lately.

Elections Day in Bologna

2008-04-22T22:04:00.003Z

Elections day has been a bit deluding. The students of the faculty of Letters and Philosophy are not great thinkers, so it seems. Studying political philosophy does not make you understand that it is important to vote, to determine your own future, or at least to prevent that the University's authorities exploit you, as they will.
People do not care. They just sit there and smoke, and tell me things will not change anyway. That is the same university where people were ready to die, or at least to get arrested to make a change, merely 30 years ago. No more Radio Alice now, you can bet.
It is not that I hope to win, as much as I hope the Student Office and Sinistra Universitaria will lose, because they do not merit the automatic consensus they have, the obvious power. I do not know how effectively corrupt they are, though I presume much, but the mere fact that they have the hegemonic power in the faculty for so many years is wrong.
Tomorrow the results. I am not nihilistic, just realistic.

My blog is overly fictionally personal.

2008-04-22T22:02:00.001Z

It is fascinating, now and than, to step out of myself, to think me besides the everyday joys. I am a prism, who breaks light into million different colored rays of light. Each of you knows just one or two colors of my soul, never the whole thing. I doubt if it necessary to know me all, the thrill will be gone.

I like seeing you, each of you separately, because in your eyes, in your words, is reflected the colored ray of light that you see of my soul, the one that is tied to yours. Seeing you, I recall parts of me that only you know, like capturing my face in a river.

I rediscover parts of you that I like, that I miss when you are gone. I wonder, are there any pieces of your soul saved just for me? Maybe I am being too demanding and egoistic, or maybe that’s what it is all about.

Mass

2008-04-15T21:45:00.003Z

These days are not getting me anywhere, or so it seems. I read and forget, move in trains with unknown faces that will forget me soon enough.

Still confused, I happily wait for Providence to move me in some path to her eyes suitable. Only time will tel if one day I shall lay back and laugh over this anxiety.

My Plans are not really getting into reality realm, but maybe that's all for the best. I have already understood I am not always able to predict my own happiness.

I want adventures, but am afraid of the results. I want to still a fridge every day, and to play the national hymn in 5am to wake up the Citizens, and to run uphill in the sun, free. I know I should let myself go, but if I do, what will be of my imminent Freudian repressions? They are too dear to me..

The truth is (there it goes, once and for all): Now is not necessarily so important, these decisions are not so indispensable. I am not the queen of the world. But I am me, and I want Everything. Isn't it frustrating not to have it all, now?

Education

2008-03-31T19:55:00.002Z

1. I find it hard to distinguish between my own happiness and social conventions on happiness. I should rebel, not follow pathes made for me by society. Sometimes, life throws me away from my fruitless run after prestige and honor, and brings me to happy oasis, where I can be myself again. That is how I got to Bologna. Against my will and my best judgement.

2. Santa Cruz. Now I am in a crossroads again. Did life do me a favor by not admitting me to Berkeley, and placing me in Santa Cruz instead, where there is an important group of scholars that have founded the History of Consciousness discipline? Or will this surf resort reveal itself boring and provincial?

3. Paris; been there, done that. But I am different now, more mature and complex. And some dear people who know how to make me happy will be there nest year as well. Should I follow adventure or friendship? Novelty or emotion?

4. I wish some old wise man could whisper in my ear some instructions for a happier life. Because by now, my moments of happiness are what's going on between my plans. I am incapable of predicting my own happiness. Is it possible to delegate that commission to someone else?

Your voice

2008-03-31T19:46:00.002Z

A brief conversation, two light headed words are enough to put me on my track again. I need to head that familiar voice, asking a favor or whatever, needing me for an instance, for some trivial unimportant matter, of everyday life. I am not so alone, I am a bit less lost than before.

Friendship is not of choice. It is that singular connection that proves you that you are happier with your friend than alone. You can contemplate friendship with other people, but it shall never be the same as a striking, first sight friendship.

I have felt that glamorous moment of happiness more than once. but my friends are mostly far away now. I miss being needed, and sitting silently on a bench in the sun, by dear friends with whom words are superfluous.

Yet a single phrase can put me on track again, can revive in me memories of lost felicities. Is it very bad to be dependent on others for my happiness? I guess, like most, I am not self-sufficient.

scientific experiment

2008-03-25T22:54:00.002Z

I have launched a new scientific experiment, regarding the most important thing, the goal of modern politics: Happiness.

I have asked young people (aged 20-25) to tell me how happy they are, from 1 to 100.

The responses were surprising.

Two of the younger subjects said 30-40%, because "I am very ambitious", and "there are many things I don't have".

A pair of lovers presented a surprising response: one says 60, the other 85. (why if people are together we think they should think the same??)

Another couple, another surprising response: she 70% and he 90%. (girls tend to be more pessimistic than guys? or maybe they are more ambitious?)

Another friend says 75, because it can get much worse: she feels lucky for her good health and economic situation (she is not a starving Indian kid, for one.)

I think the bottom line is that we have very different scales of happiness. Perhaps we do not appreciate what we have, or we naively think we deserve much more. Or some think it is impossible to arrive to 100% happy, an unachievable ideal.

You are welcome to write (in the comments) how happy you are (now, in average, also anonymous). The results will be scientifically processed for the good of humanity.

pranzone

2008-03-23T18:01:00.002Z

1. lasagna ai funghi

2. agnello arrosto con patatine al timo

3. torta ai noci e miele

4. torta al cacao con mousse al cioccolato e fragole

5. sinfull joy. I hope someone is praying for me!

Pasqua

2008-03-22T23:29:00.003Z

Holidays, what has not been said yet on the melancholy that sweeps the human kind as the occasion comes wand we all have to seat together with the family at one table and eat. Well I don't have to, at least not now, not this Pasqua. I like the solitude of Bologna, emptied in order to celebrate. I like singing aloud in my room so that no one can hear. I like reading all night and writing poetry, secretly.
Can I not do all these things every single day? Well, more or less, I can. But it is the spirit of the uncelebrated Holiday that gives freedom that special touch.
Tomorrow Pasqua Lunch after all. Lasagna, Agnello alle erbe aromatiche, Chocolate fudge, mousse and strawberries, and Deolcetto d'Alba, that reminds me of the Langhe. There is no better celebration than food, and as Remy said in Ratatouille, food follows a good cook (or something like that.)
I reach out my hand and touch a moment of bliss.

Val Camonica Ski Vacation

2008-03-17T23:56:00.002Z