A Sexy Red Vaccume Cleaner

If it is beyond our humble means to purchase a sexy, red car then we will not be disheartened. We will lower our ambitions and we will purchase a sexy, red vaccume-cleaner instead. And it will be shiny and have a little light whot is illuminated when it suffers a blockage. And we will say thus, "behold, for a car could not have had such a splendid light!" And verily 'twill please us much.

When Andy Warhol Speaks to Your Innards

Something Murakami once said about cows and pliers and worm-universes, becomes more relevant as the years pass. The gun helps.

A Day at the Tate: (p)Art III

Pixi's contribution to the exhibition was inspired by all the other artwork she had seen

A Day at the Tate: (p)Art II

By the time Pixi realised what was hurttling down towwards her, it was a little late

A Day at the Tate: (p)Art I

A Giant Blood Cell attempted to ingest Pixi's Little-sis.

Huston, We've Hit a New Low

Closing the chapter on the thoroughly entertaining and invaluable experience of Interning at a Literary Agent, here's a little parting gift. I thought I'd seen the worst of them. I was wrong.

I regret that in order to avoid plagerism/copyright infringement, I am not able to present the actual coverring letter here. The following is a reproduction. And though an effort has been made to reword it, the contents are completely factual.

Dear Agent,

I am a medium. I have the gift of writing psychically. The book I have written (and which I submit a sample of here) was composed psychicaly and is not by me but by my Spirit Guide.

I have been with my Spirit Guides for over 15 years. Everything said here is the Spirit's saying, and not mine. I am a vessel through which my Spirit Guide writes.

...Literary Agent Intern jests not. Now hypothetically speaking, even if I was intrigued by the writing which followed (and to my dismay, it was not as spooky as I'd hoped it would be) I would certainly have to be out of my right-mind, nay possessed, in order to take it to one of the agents, and in all seriousness, defend it's rights for representation.

Basically, you and your Spirit Guides are having a laugh.

I Wonder What They've Assumed

Literary Agent Intern-Pixi

Most would-be authors aren't aware that their meticulously prepared submissions end up in what agents and publishers refer to as 'the slush pile.' Another thing they don't know is that they share this pile with a lot of very deluded people whose submissions are no less embarrassing than some of the most cringe-worthy x-factor auditions.

Yet what would really add to the chagrin of such would-be authors is if they knew that the person who is usually charged with ploughing through the slush-pile is an initially enhusiastic intern who gradually grows so bored by the shKit submissions, that he/she is unable to give the good ones a fair chance.

I call this the point of disenchantment. A point at which your favourite submissions are those capable of instant boredom. Ooooh yeeeeah...One look at that coverring letter -with its stupid openning questions, naively self indulgent introduction, and excessive use of hyperbole -and that rejection slip is making it's way into the SAE.

For those agent seeking would-be authors preparing to submit, here are a few things that sure as he'll will not get bored intern to reach the second page of your sample chapters (these are real life examples)...

Real bad coverring letter opening:

Dear Sir,
How would you feel if you were having weird dreams? What if in these dreams there was a weird man? And this weird man was someone who you knew but couldn't remember!

Firstly, if you think you could hook me with such an idiotic rehtorical question, you're wrong. Secondly, if u aren't going to bother doing some research to find a suitable name to which to address your letter, don't follow up your formal address, 'Dear Sir' with such a personal and air-headed, Bill&Ted query like I was your bunning buddy and we were playing 10 hypothetical questions. Thirdly I have weird dreams all the time, so no, I'm not intrigued. And lastly, don't assume to think you can excite me with poor use of hyperbol. I'm not a 7 year-old!

Bad story tellers:

Now in other instances, bored Intern comes across a fairly ok coverring letter and takes a stab at reading the sample chapters. This is the bit where the sneaky buggers that can pull off enough respectability and sense to keep bored Intern interrested, fail catastrophically. Usually what they try is to make up for their lack of imagination and tallent with sensationalism.

The bored Intern's reaction to this is usually a failiure to get to the end of the third paragraph, because if you (and you know who you are) open a novel with some obscene sex-scene followed by a whiny bout of naval gazing which neither inspires nor succeeds to elicit sympathy, you can bet your bottom dollar I'm gonna stack that shKit straight onto the recycle pile. Moron.

The 'Everyone has a book in them' mentality:

These specimines, in the worst case scenario, don't even bother writing a novel. They simply send in a letter saying something like: '

Dear Sir/Madame, I have a Wife. My Wife has an antique handkerchief. This handkerchief gave me the idea for a historical book in which the handkerchief features in various situation including a wedding, a war, and a funeral. Would you be interrested in my idea? Please give advice.'

...That is in the worst case scenario. In the best case scenario, there is a novel, the writer of which often misses the point. Bored Intern's job is to try to get to the point as soon as possible, because said writer does not cut to the chase. The coverring letter for such a submission will detail the:

• author's personal history;
• the amount of cute kids he/she has;
• how much he/she enjoys being a parent;
• how much his/her children loved his/her stories until they found new interrests as they grew older, and what these otherwise irrelevant interrests are;
• how much he/she has been wanting to write;
• how this new year gave him/her the incentive to put pen to paper;
• how relevant the story is to him/her;
• how he/she got the idea for it;
• what his/her personal character is like, demonstrated by some long winded story about a random incident that happened to him/her and how differently he/she reacted;
• how this highlights what a great and unique person he/she is and how this will reflect in his/her work;
• how people would love to read said work, created by the great and unique mind of him/her;

Try taking the remaining contents of such a submission seriously and giving it a fair chance, after you've been drained by the above.

So basically, if you are a would-be author, this is the kind of competition which is pissing on the enthusiasim of the person who will be reading your submission. My advice: hone your coverring letter and your openning chapter to Impress Instantly, get to the point straight away and elicit an 'Ooooooh!'-full curiosity.

Literary Agent Intern-Pixi reporting off duty. Over and Out.

The Last of the Japanese Rock Heroes

The year 2010 in the Pixi-Webster Encyclopedia has a number of entries:

• The Dark Ages.
• The world record for a comically compulsive degree of bad luck.
• The year of the Tiger whot pissed on my dying fire
• The year of the shKit
• The year of the Baby
• And The last of the J-rock heroes (a.k.a Miyavi)

Some context in the way of a justification for nonsensical banter:

Pixi's evil wisdom teeth, who did not know the meaning of 'no room', continued to shove their harrowing way into Pixi's mouth like those persistent buggers that weasel their way into a packed Victoria Line train at rush hour, with a painful exhalation of air from the depths of all the other passengers' lungs. Suffice it to say, they (the wisdom teeth, not the metaphorical passengers) did not allow for the materialisation of much sleep at 5am on Monday morning, so the futon-lying Pixi armed herself with her iPod touch, and commenced in writing an elaboration for the final two enteries in the Pixi-Webster encyclopedia, which she decided, were connected in a sense.

This is how (said nonsensical banter):

Not long after going down in Pixi-history as the year of the Baby, 2010 added one more casualty to the list of people, nay friends, who were not only married (As if that weren't un-cool enough) but also procreating the human species. Pixi was still in the midst of wonderring what the odds were that so many of her friends could simultaneously become WITH CHILD in the same year, when suddenly, it transpired. It was this: To add insult to indignity, One of Pixi's greatest heroes also went and had ofspring. Said hero was Miyavi, With whom Pixi had enjoyed a para-social relationship for well over four years.

Rude Interaption from the likes of Nerdy, Die-hard fan: "Miyavi had a child last year. That's old news!"
Retaliation from Pixi: "I only found out this year, which makes my finding out new news to the world whot cares. So go make a collage out of your news-paper clippings."

Where were we? Ah yes! Miyavi stood out from all other J-rockers of his generation for a number of reasons (which follow):

1. He was a genius on the guitar...of the naturally born to rock-pants variety.
2. Had a raspy shKit voice, which he was confident enough to use to his advantage and use well (ie. he could sing. and do it with originality)
3. He differred from other pretty boys in that he wasn't a pouting poser. In fact, he did everything to look positively un-attractive which increased his appeal.
4. He had striking features (not the usual wahsed out prety-boy stock variety) which he probably owed to his Zainichi Korean descent
5. He had character...the kind evident even across language barriers (refer to Video below)
6. And lastly, the man had style. Nay, he was a walking work of art with the tattoos and piercings that he carried well (an not like some silly emo, teenage dirt-bag)

All this, however, was in the golden age of Miyavizm (originally coined by Miyavi himself.) And though the man would most definately leave behind a legacy, unfortunately, nothing lasts. The gradual decline of Pixi's love for Miyavi began when he first displayed various signs of un-coolness. These eventually culminated into the revelation of his be-hitching to a certain chick named Melody. (Need I make any unecessary understatements about stupid names?)

Pixi concluded that married life had not only driven Miyavi to lay off the drugs (or whatever else made him so adorabbly high), it had forced him to grow up! Why else would the absurdly random freak of much musical tallent, replace his signiature 'Miyavi dessssu' with, 'Yo what's up, this is Miyavi', in an all too sober, badly accented English. (WTF!? -Pixi had tought, when she was first exposed to this sell-out. Glancing about her to make sure no-one else had witnessed it, she'd closed the Youtube tab with goose-bumpy embarrasment.)

Thereafter Miyavi did not release any great new albums, and Pixi slowly stopped googling him. ...until this past Sunday, which was one of those vexing intollerablities that left her fantasising about whether slit wrists could emit enough blood to seep out from under the bathroom door, subsiquently serving as a: 'hello. Somebody? Sorry to interrupt, but can we have some attention here please before the rats come?' This continued into the late hours of the night. But before insomnia got the better of Pixi, a bit of pre-bed-tmie googling had revealed this:

Needless to say, we felt a combination of: Ghasp! - Awwww - errrr - weeeeird- ....
This was followed by the thought that the world really was leaving Pixi behind, to cherish the memory of it's awe-fullness in its youth. ...which consequently brought on the insomnia perhaps.

And that is how the last of Pixi's Japanese-rock heroes was lost to obscurity. In celebration of the great things he gave us however, here's to you, Miyavi. (But don't think I've forgiven you for growing up on me!)

Taking the Leap

Only at Canary Wharf do potential suicide cases have the privledge of being given reasons not to jump.

Here's one of them.

Another is the freezing cold water (but I guess a man who's just lost everything might overlook that detail (which makes one wonder whether there is a connection between this sign and the fact that it is located right below the giant stock update thing.).) In any case, 'tis a thoughtful gesture, me thinks.

Farringdon and the First Day of Spring

Faringdon is one of those words one wishes to treat as if it were the plural of something. Like oxen. For instance, just as you would say 'the ox is rotund' and 'the oxen are rotund', similarly 'Faringdon are' sounds alot more gramatically correct than 'Faringdon is'.

Not convinced? Allow me to demonstrate:
Faringdon are a residence of particularly posh blue-bloods of the only-organic eating variety that break up in hives when they see a bum walking on the opposite side of the road.

Or in fact:
The Farigndon are coming round for tea this evening, whot! Lord Faring fancies a bit of fresh sconn with his tea. I shall ask Lucy to make some.

I rest my case your honor.

The Day Juror Pixi Didn't Want to be Juror Anymore

On the tube into court that morning Juror-Pixi fantasised about being released early. After two weeks of waiting she didn't even want a case anymore. She just wanted to go home and read her work-in-revision and apply for jobs and be productive and maybe even nap.

At Euston station, where she made the Victoria-Northern line switch there was an idiot busker playing the sax. Flourescent lights had no shKit on the sax. One thing that made Pixi hiss worse than Christopher Lee getting woken up from his vampire-slumber at 1 in the afternoon, was the sax.

Some of the coolest music could sound cheesy coming out of the sax. It made Pixi feel all kinds of embarrassing things like 80s fashion; and haircuts; and studs in cheesy mostachios; and splitting into an idiot grin at inappropriate moments; and basically really bad sax music; and worse of all, people who played it with heart and soul like it was the most transporting thing in the world.

So when the tube driver announced that their train would be held on the platform for a few minutes, just as the sax-man started putting his heart into dancing Queen, Pixi's stomach sank and she had a shiverry feeling it was gonna be a long, tiresome day without the least bit of wit or inspiration.

Eventually the train shut it's doors and moved, The sax disseapeared, and Pixi got a seat. Unfortunately a man in a pair of offensively skinny jeans, came and stood right in her line of vision. For the rest of her journey Pixi sat trying to avoid looking at the chicken legs of Mr. Skinny-jeans. It appeared that he'd spent some effort on his attire that morning, because as if his leggs weren't embarrassing enough, he seemed to be peacocking at God only knew who. It was almost as embarrassing as the sax. When the passanger next to Pixi got off, Skinny-jeans found recourse from his chickeny display by taking the vacant seat. Pixi was so happy she nearly missed her stop

At court, Juror-Pixi's morning passed with intervals of Kerouac and conversation with her Lebanese friend who shared her birthday. By 1pm, her wish had come true. Stripped of her Juror smartcard, and her Juror hat, Pixi walked out of Southark Crown Court a freerer, wiser but sadder Pixi.

Juror Pixi: Week 2 Day 2

Paparazzi took one look at Juror-Pixi as she was walking into the courts this morning, and their cameras started shutterring away. Juror-Pixi upped her pace and avoided lens contact as she passed them and dived into the queue at security. A sneaking suspicion made her cast her gaze backwards to see if it was perhaps the person behind her that they were trying to capture...No. The behind person proved to be an unsightly little man of no obvious significance. It couldn't have been him they wanted.

"Pish" -thought Juror-Pixi. She scampered upstairs, took a Ladies detour wherein she hitched up her pants, then found an ugly pink seat atop which to perch, at an ugly pink table at the waiting room cafeteria of the Evil jacket potato.

She looked arround to see if she could spy her South-African freind with whom she'd been making a jigsaw puzzel the day before. (this puzzel too, transpired to be immensely evil) her friend was not there. So then she looked for her Lebanese friend who shared the same birthday as her. But while scanning the room, her eye snagged on that of the only cute Juror in all of Southark Crown Court. Pixi-Juror pulled it away politely, and then contemplated Cute-Juror's hat, which was a very impressive hat indeed. It was big and one of those hats whot have ear-muff-things. Juror-Pixi thought it was necessary to acquire such a hat in ones Pixiness.

Eventually Juror-Pixi's friends made appearances, one by one. Time passed with long, full conversations, cream of spinach soup, and some fashion magazine flipping. One more morning fed to the great sive of life, which pushes Pixi through narrower and narrower spaces until she is most probably expected to emmerge having become a little smaller and more compact.

Returning home she took a route she used to take often when she was much littler. On it she discoverred some old things and some new things. She found that much of the old things now looked smaller to her. This made her mull pensively of things with no answers, about growing upwards and widenning inwards and narrowing wonderwards. When she got home she looked hard into her face in the mirror, to see if that had changed very much. The face looked back hard into her. It didn't have an answer to a single question.

Juror Pixi: Week 2

Here's to my resolution to start blogging everyday again. This applies even when I have nothing particularly significant to say. How so? I shall demonstrate: Pish.

With that asside, hello hello and welcome to another day of jury service. Thus far there has been no jurorring involved. There has only been an ugly waiting room with ugly pink lenolium floors and ugly florecents lights which feel like their buzzing, even if they are not (for future reffrence, Juror-pixi hates florescent lights. Just in case someone someday wishes to see her hiss like Christopher Lee when he's woken from vampire-slumber at 1 in the afternoon)
There has also been:

• lots of name calling;
• the brief enterior of a court room complete with criminal men behind glass wall and be-wigged barristers;
• a close up of scary judge-lady's face;
• and a nasty jacket potato whot had some black bits in it and NO COLESLAW!

Thus passed week one until we have come into week two, having lost one Philipino friend to a case whot will last 5 weeks. Said friend's name was the same as the man whot went on the moon. Juror-pixi will google this man so that when she sees her friend she will not be embarrassed for forgetting his name.

Juror-pixi now sits atop a pink chair at a pink table at the caffeteria whot served her the evil jacket potato. In the meanwhile newspapers continue to be ugly, people continue to be far away, and Pixi (when she takes off her Juror hat) continues to grow more shy, more quiet, and more convinced that she is one Pixi too much.
She gets sleepy easily, harvests deep, dark circles under her eyes, and sees someone she despises more and more when she looks into the mirror every morning.

What Happens in the INBETWEEN

This is a very important and too often very neglected point. What is it we do Inbetween things? And particularly in that Inbetween-doing as a form of bite-size procrastination which helps get you through (albeit a little more slowly) whatever boring task is presently giving you a rude stare from on your plate.

For examply. Inbetween writing my PhD research proposal this morning, I googled pictures of David Bowie and found out why his eyes are a little funny.

What does this say about the kind of person I am? Can the Inbetween be an insight into the deepest, darkest recesses of our character?

Think about it. From now on, try to pay a little more attention to what YOU do in the Inbetween.

Eggs: By Hippie Chickens

My eggs are funkier than yours, even when their off their faces on Mescaline. And don't you forget it!

Panthera Tigris

Happy Chinese New Year, one and all!!

2010 has not been very nice to me thus far, so I shall abandon it in favour of The Year of the Tiger. Lets hope my Chinese fortune is more fortuitous.

And Now for Something More Refreshing

If I had a special someone I wanted to communicate my most tender feelings for. And I was gonna buy into a massive commercial cop-out in order to do so. And I was gonna pick a single day out the entire year, which I have endlessly been told is special, across every medium of advertisement for the past month. and having been thoroughly brainwashed, I was gonna march my little legs over to Clintons where people pay to have glossy, impersonal cards say for them, what they could very well do a better job of saying themselves (if only they'd sit their special someone's down and strip down to their honest cores.) And in Clintons I was gonna purchase one such card that would tell my special someone what I feel about them. Hypothetically speaking. Then, I would probably have purchased this:

To every happy couple out there: May your genetically modified roses not smell, and may your heart shaped chocolates make you fat, and may you realise on waking up the next morning that you can't buy romance.

And to the singles: You guys aint gonna know the value of what you got until someone shoves a tastless cliche down your throat every February 14th for the rest of that lack-lustre life you commit to sharing with someone for the sake of commiting. Pray it doesn't happen.

Happy Valentines Day

Horse Men

I'll wager my last bar of snicker ice-cream, that during post production, the people responsible for this film were thinking something to this effect:

"Ok, we are Hollywood,"

"Hollywood we are!"

"And although it's taken us far too many bad movies to realise this, we've finally established, without doubt the we are no good at making horror films."

"That we have established."

"This is mainly due to the fact that we are run by visionless, dim-witted, financially-minded Yanks without an ounce of culture or good-breeding."

"Not an ounce of good-breeding, no sir!"

"So here's my thought. Let's exploit (which is what we do best!!) the best horror films, and put together all those elements that made them so successful."

"Exploit! Exploit! It's what we do best!"

CHECKLIST

• The Exorcist and Omen - Biblical freakyness: CHECK
• SAW, Hostel etc. - Gore: CHECK
• Ringu, Ju-On and other Japanese successes - long, dark haired Oriental woman wot moves funny: CHECK
• 7even, Bone Collector etc. - A highly intellegent, highly skilled killer with great imagination and creativity: CHECK

The result, a gory, freaky guessing game with enough depth to keep you genuinely interrested until it culminates into a royal anti-climax.

Moral: Fear Emos

Verdict: Angsty, American teenagers should be relegated back to their marginal role of angst-ridden, consumers of really bad emo-rock who occaissionally threaten to self-harm, but fail to gain sympathy or draw attention from anyone. We find them more entertaining that way.

Whiplash is Commonly Associated With...

... motor vehicle accidents, usually when the vehicle has been hit in the rear; however, the injury can be sustained in many other ways, including falls from bicycles or horses.

Thank you Wikipedia, which is basically trying to say that if you are gallopping at freaky speed on a very spirrited horse who has got it in his head to race with your sister's equally spirrited steed, and then said horse trips (having encounterred uneven ground), you will go flying right over the top of it's head and crash head first into the ground.

In the moments which follow your thoughts will be:

(static while brain re-orients itsself....we get a signal)

PAIN

Lots of PAIN

(large quantities of adrenaline is now pumping through blood-stream)

PAIN all over so you can't move

(Heart-rate is equivelent to having done 20mins on the treadmill PLUS Jack Human)

Ok, just stay still and wait it out

God, I know I can't be lucky twice, but please don't let me be paralised!

PAIN

God. God. God. God. God. God. God.

Ok PAIN is easing

(Power returning to mothership...all systems are up but running slower than usual)

Someone's coming back for me...Oww..no don't move yet...PAIN...God God God...

Shit there's sand in my eyes!!

And later you will be mighty thankful it was sand in your eyes and not concrete against ur face. And the deep meanings of many a wisdom will dawn upon you such as why stalions are made into gelldings; and why when a person falls he/she must fall so utterly and dramatically, with pain to emphasise the sheer wretchedness of their situation; and why life is too serious to take so seriously. I owe this one to Wilde I think, so I should credit him. --Never mess with a gay.

On a not entirely different note, Pixi is officially a closet adrenaline junkie.

Adrenaline hit number one: 5 year-old Pixi spins round and round and round and round and round then makes a dash right in the hight of blind dizziness.

Pointless moment-of-truth thought: "I'm a stupid kid with no real reason to do this"

Outcome: Wham goes 5-year old into some wall. Cries and is quiet for a few hours.

FAST FORWARD 20 YEARS

Adrenaline hit number sixty-eight: 25 year-old Pixi speeds up dune-hill on quad-bike and flies off the top, action-movie style.

Pointless moment-of-truth thought: "Shit. This will hurt."

Outcome: Quad-bike lands with magnificent force with direct impact on spine, resulting in minor fracture.

Adrenaline hit number sixty-nine: 26 year-old Pixi accepts challenge to race big-Sis on spirrited steed that don't see jack-shit else when it sees red.

Pointless moment-of-truth thought: ... <-- has run out of poigniant poeticisms

Outcome: Whiplash

Writers Block:

The inability to write creatively due to a fear of beggining caused by over expectation of onesself combined with low self-esteem and severe emotional constipation.

Cure: as yet unknown.

In Dubai...They Follow You

And Here's some that did so earlier.

As you can see, they aren't particularly photogenic, but the car was hot. Mind you, this is generaly the case. The car is always hot.

Once Upon a Time

...Pixi burried her words, and now she's lost the place from whence to dig them back out.

'Tis the Season to...

...Hate on lame-ass Chirstmas Carols, which they play over and over and over in every damn shop across London, until you're waking up at some ungodly hour of the night, and the cheasiest, most lame-ass part of the cheesiest most lame-ass one is playing itsslef over and over again like a broken record in your mind!

On a more positive note though, I get a serious kick outa this kinda thing.

This is How I Feel

...admittedly it's my sister's head inside a horse's nostril, but basically I am feeling like how she looks.

Alexander the Grater

If Barack Obama can be awarded a Nobel Prize for jack-all (though you gotta hand it to the guy for his impressive fly swatting), and the likes of Rushdie and Elton John get a Knighthood for being a disrespectful literary-masturbator, and doing a lame-ass cover for an old song, respectively, then I want the guy who came up with this to be awarded a Nobel Prize too!

And I really don't think it's asking for much.

Second Childhood

In the banal drudgery of never green enough,

Time falters and slips up to reveal

Those things which lurk in my blind spot.

There, hunched like an angel of misfortune against its scythe,

Life’s titan reserve terrifies me

And I am sorry that I was not

Enough to cherish what is escaping us now.

Welcome, Friend.

I’ve filled my heart again,

And You have come to empty it out.

The cycle will dip, drag on begrudgingly, pick up momentum, and eventually resume.

Like a second chance at lost childhood. One more time. And one more time.

And though they are numbered, I let them take my breath away.

Because the sea is imitating the sky tonight;

Because the hand which rested on my head

Could not have been more necessary;

And because that boyish cartwheel in our dash across the field,

Was the only thing missing from this evanescent perfection.

This world is ugly but so full of Your beautiful things.

And I know that You love its stumbling people for their flaws and for their yearning,

And I know You love us, because You have let us taste this and be humbled

And I know You love me, because You take back now what you had shared

Because this brittle vessel is not big enough,

And overwhelmed, my heart has come so near to breaking.

Thank You.

Breakfast at the Office

Wanna See a Steamy Picture I Took in the Bath?

How Not to be Immortalised

This is in memory of the day Elest and Zaru got sprayed by goat spit and brought the beast's reek into the office. Our nostrills be tormented to this very day, and Pixi's once refined tastes for goats cheese has suffered a grevious blow.

It's Eternal

A Double War

Donning a Free Palestine badge has invited many an interesting reaction from strangers since the last Gaza crisis. The prevalent question is usually, ‘are you Palestinian?’, but it’s the accompanied look that is most curious; an awe-full look one would give a fantastically endangered species of beast. Like the man behind the cash register at the grocery store just encountered a unicorn.

The answer is always ‘no’, even though Mahmoud Darwish’s poetic use of Turkish coffee as a sign of Palestinian resistance, in his Memory for Forgetfulness, attests to a shared heritage that runs thicker than blood. In the spirit of this moment, however, we’ve all become Gazans -a notion with which I have a personal issue, along with the ability of Facebook culture to jump the bandwagon of capitalising on the plight of the Palestinians. Add to this my pet-peeve over the coinage of term ‘Gazan’, in the light of Israel’s efforts to eradicate Palestine off the geopolitical map. Clearly, the activist enthusiasm of late has been huge, but to what end we are yet to find out.

Now, in the hype around the U.S Presidential visits to the Middle East, that sentiment is mixed with the gleeful hopes of an ever growing Obama fandom in the Muslim world. “He’s the messiah”, a friend retorts with sarcasm, alluding to said fandom, because the sensible majority does not fail to remain realistic. That is why ‘hope’ is the term I chose to use here and not ‘expectation’. Doubtless, Barrack Obama is being given an attentive ear, more so than any other U.S president of the past. And why not?

Consider the strong public aversion towards what has become the object of shameful military ventures and political strategies which have crippled America’s economy. The recent bankruptcy of General Motors alone could easily have validated the Middle East visits to be cut short. And yet for Obama to pursue the decision to engage with the Muslim World in such a climate is not only refreshing but very significant, particularly in light of his decision to carry out his address in a Muslim country.

Yet despite this effort to change America’s former rhetoric and right the wrongs his administration inherited, the peace initiative Obama has been working at over these last few weeks has already proven Israel’s unwillingness to cooperate. The general feeling then is not one which has been holding its breath for the presidential address in Cairo (and what a great address it was), but one which is keen to find out what steps Obama will take when Israel eventually says ‘nay’ to a two-state solution.

Furthermore, in his efforts to maintain an approach that is apparently fair to both sides, Obama may in fact be fighting a lost cause. A two–state solution is, after all, not in the interest of the Israeli state, and as for the Palestinians, it is not justice in any shape or form. Rabbi Ahron Cohen, of Neturei Karta, which is the international organisation of Orthodox Jews United against Zionism, stresses that a two-state solution is not the way towards peace. “What we need is the complete dissolution of Zionism,” he says, alluding to the eradication of the apartheid government of South Africa, to highlight that when enough people stand against injustice, miracles can happen. Rabbi Cohen goes on to maintain that only under a single state can Muslims, Christians and Jews live together, and not merely exist in the direst sense of that word. And what better than a long history of peaceful, interfaith coexistence, which extends from Andalusian Spain to the Holy land itself, to demonstrate its workability?

In an attempt to conclude a topic which knows no resolution or closure, I can only appeal to wishful thinking. Yet until the Middle East is witness to a great miracle, Palestine faces the danger of losing the essence of its significance in the process of serving as kindling under the pan of any Tom, Dick or Harry who decides to cook up a foul stew. Its people today, struggle to survive a double war; one which threatens their lands and their lives; and another which threatens their very meaning. How relevant still was Darwish’s feeling two decades ago, when he spoke of his countrymen as the defenders of their meaning against a pacification of history, and said: ‘Hallowed be your hands, you, clutching the last stone and the last ember.’

It's My Birthday and I'm in the Library

...I think I've taken this under-playing birthdays thing a bit far. Yes they are a benign tumour, but I'm lonely. And who wants to be lonely when they're already peeved about turning 26 and having exams?

In any case, above-featured is the card I would have wanted to recieve, if anyone had bothered to get me one :(