Sound: Miyavi - Itoshi hito

Over the course of the past 3 days of being 23 and more drastically changed than ever during the course of the past 23 years...this one has made two new observations, but for what use is any of it in the end? I'm one of those people who'll put great things in writing and not find it in me to live by them. Perhaps it is a lack of self worth. Perhaps it is disillusionment.

Peanut butter and powder hot choclate does not taste like a Snicker bar.
Tanzanian nut-meg-and-other-spices tea tastes great :)

...no these are not the two observations I made, you foo'!

Yesterday I met this cool Argintinian jewlery maker in Camden Town. Today I bumped into him again while I was looking for something else, found out his name is Fabrizzio (Elest: Is that an Argentinian name? Fabrizzio: No, Italian!) and that his hands are all caloused and burnt coz he makes all his jewlery himself (Fabrizzio: look. -spreads out hands proudly). His English was rubbish but he told me that: "In Argentina we have no money, no work, no food... but we have korason -heart."

The universe might be telling me again, that I need to go somewhere where human passion hasn't died yet.

'Fantasies have to be unrealistic, because the moment, the second that you get what you seek, you don't, you can't want it any more. In order to continue to exist, desire must have it's objects perpetually absent. It's not the 'it' that you want it's the fantasy of 'it'. Desire supports crazy fantasies. This is what pascal means when he says that we are only truly happy when daydreaming about future happiness. That's why we say the hunt is sweeter than the kill, or be careful what you wish for, not because you'll get it but because you're doomed to not want it once you do. The lesson of Lacan is, living by your wants will never make you happy, what it means to be fully human is to strive to live by ideas and ideals, and not to measure your life in terms of your desires but those small moments of integrity, passion, rationality, even self sacrifice...because in the end, the only way that we can measure the significance of our own lives is by valuing the lives of others.'

-The Life of David Gale-

...Because it's relevant.

Wallpaper.
I don't have a gun.
In any case though, apparently women tend to leap to their deaths, when committing suicide (La Petite Soldat - Jean Luke Godard. (No offence to those who have a special place in their hearts for the razor blade. (Ah we just love flinching at the idea. (I dare you to visualise something graphic. (No I'm not a friggin masochist, I'm a writer, and I'm trying to shock you.) So a gun wouldn't be much use then...funny though, that someone should bring that up. 'Tis true that it is feminine, but I doubt the appeal has anything to do with cowardice personally...I think the act of leaping is defined by leaping away from and leaping to. Fleeing and seeking some 'measure of release and comfort from the receiving end of the leap. It's also more impulsive, urgent and poetic in its motion...then again I can suck meaning and melancholy out of a theme park ride. Sheer nonsense. Hence my fondness of cynical, railing characters like Jaques (As You Like It- The Bard.) He tha man!...Because he is an intellect and a miserable git. In fact, I must go home and extract some quotes from the play, specifically the one about sucking melancholy, and make them mine own.

Alex, Andreus and the other loud, funny, Norwegian dude just walked into the office, in very selfconciously sharp suits and have promptly started shedding jackets and ties... Ah that's better, they're back to their usual scruffy selves now... Andreus just winked at me. He's nice...but can someone please tell me what it means when men do that? Is it ok for me to continue idiotly smiling back, as I do? I'm not being paranoid, I'm just wondering if I'm being naive.

Woohoo! Amy asked if I'd help her out with something else after lunch! I'm free of the Wallpapers! (Al)

I leave you now, for I must be off to our Beenie-spotting lunch with Shakila, who txs me that she is dying of boredom.

Miyavi love, all around.
Over and out.

Elle est starts writing.
This is what happens when yours truely gets a Royal Holloway creative writing MA rejection.
Hoola hoops man: OI, ROYAL 'OLLOWAY! NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
And yet, we care not...I quote Gordon:
'Hi Elest. Stupid Holloway. What do they know? Not much, clearly.'
Yes.
We'll show 'em when 'The Violinist and Alexis Jezeabel' wins the booker, white bread, and pulitzer in every field known to man, and becomes an international, nay intergalactical best seller for the next fifteen years (and 300 light years), after which it will turn into a modern classic and some hundered years later, a classic classic!
We'll show THEM, that Davinci man what can't write to save his life, and Hollywood, who I shant be selling my rights to, thank you! (Inshallah)
Ps. Zadie Smith can kiss my hiney.
The stupid five letter 'B' word.

I leave you with Samuel Beckett:
"Habit is a compromise effected between the individual and his environment, or between the individual and his own organic eccentricities, the guarantee of a dull inviolability, the lightening-conductor of his existence. Habit is the ballast that chains the dog to his vomit. Breathing is habit. Life is habit."

Yesterday afternoon I was high on sheisha.
Last night I was high on bleach.
This morning I'm high on job searches.
I'm gonna go out for a bit to get high on that SunShiiiii-iiiiiine...looks mighty fiiii-iiiine, to meeeeee-eeee!

Why do flowers grow out of little cracks and crevices, in places where no one can even see them?
Because even though.
That's why.
...
Dance to 'be' in the act of dancing. Dance in the face of an oblivion of emptiness, loneliness, sadness and your futility... in a grey, drab, refuse.
Because you are not here to have to prove yourself to the world. You are here to 'be', for one who knows you even when you are hidden. Even when you know not yourself.

There's your sign.

SunShiiiii-iiiine! Over HeeeeREEE! (with a strong Egyptian accent)
...weeehaaee! So nice.

SHIKKKT! I'M SUPPOSED TO BE TEACHING TODAY! OH MY GOD, I'D FORGOT COMPLETELY!

The glorious pod of mainstream in all its mainstream glory and glorified mainstreamness is playing:
Something -Hajime Chitose

I'm reading and writing about all these successful designers with their well established companies etc. and I'm thinking it's all bull shiKt. (with a capital 'K')
For a moment I put myself in their places and think, Jane Gordon Clark of Ornamenta, launched when I was 3 years old...I do not want to end up like you! I don't want to spend half my life, working and struggling at the same game to stay afloat, only to achieve what you have: a state of being too financially comfortable and well established to stop working at the age of...yes, you look well over 50. No offence.
I don't want to have a big massive house in the South London suburbs, and two kids in private schools ...crap, this woman's got real flower petals pressed into her wallpapers! And they're textured! This changes everything...hang on a sec while I write this down...

...Now where was I before I was so rudely interrupted by wallpaper samples? Ah yes...my uncle. South London Suburbs house. Two kids in private schools. And a chain of old people's homes.
So, we've established what we DON'T want...what do we DO want?
I don't know.
I just hope that I don't end up like these people, ia, and my kids aren't brought up pre-conditioned to the notion of fitting a certain criteria. What do I mean? Think my uncle's kids. And then think the following scenario:

Uncle: you guys have actually done really well for yourselves, getting
into the universities you've gotten into. (and you know he's thinking:
considering you're from a broken marriage, grown up in
some crap North London area, and gone to rubbish schools coz your
father never took the responsibility to ensure otherwise.)
Elest: (very pissed off) Yeah, coz we're so messed up, right?
Uncle & Aunt: Oh No! No, we didn't mean that!

Piss off. I know what you meant. My mom did a hell of a fine job bringing us up on her own, and I'm glad I never got the life your kids are getting. Right now, I'm the happiest person in the world, because I can think outside your dumb box.
Wish I'd remember it more often.
Alhamdullah.

Conclusion: Down with Jane Gordon Clark. Up with Chocolate Trufle Aero!

Ps. The weather's amazing outside!

At FRIGGIN last!
Been trying to log onto blogger for the past half hour. And now that I'm on, I forgot what I needed to say. That's just smashing. Shame on u blog! I'm gonna go take a bath, and while I'm gone, u think very hard about what you've done!

Ps. We got our windows today and the kitchen is finaly complete, Alhamdullah...
WOOHOOOO!
Pps. The Tea Building is full of loads of arty farty design companies and publishers, and likewise, lots of arty farty peoples. We are in the midst of cool, once again...possibly cooler than Think Publishing. Our boss, however, is a Canadian guy with a very gay accent, who was having a huge row with some press person this afternoon, so that the entire office fell silent to listen intensely. After which everyone started gossiping about him.
With the boss asside though, I've spent my day writing about something which is so absurdly random in it's sheer mundane boringness, 'twill blow thy mind away...(drum roll) WALLPAPER! Tada!
Now, you're thinking said task is probably as interresting as a life support machine. You're thinking wrong... researching tea-total football heroes was worse. Not to mention, I get to look at lots of pretty pictures. :)
Ppss. My father is in London this weekend.
Pppss. I feel the need to dye my hair again. Red or Pink?

Last night while Elle est star gazer was moon gazing outside her flat, some black guy asked her if she was ok...
Elest: Yes, thanks.
Black guy: I thought you were crying.
Elest: No, I was looking at the moon.
Black guy: The moon. (looks up) oh. What do you call that, a half moon?
Elest: yeah. (thinks: you fool, it's a crescent!)
Black guy: Where are you from?
Elest: (thinks: it's a bit more complicated than that.) Turkey.
Black guy: In London people don't see the moon much.

Now, you think he said that coz he was thinking the only thing that can justify my sheer weirdness would have to be the utter ailenness of my ethnic background.
I like to think he said that coz he was trying to say something. ;)

Elest, are you worried about something?
Can you tell?
...
Does it matter? In the long run, against the bigger picture of things, does it bear any significance at all, when those close to you, can't even care?
We're so lonely. What does it matter if we were just that much lonelier?
I'm only saying all of this now to put off facing it. I swear I don't mean a word of it...yet.

Help,
I have done it agin,
I have been here many times before.
Hurt myself again today,
and the worst part is there's no one else to blame.
Ouch,
I have lost myself again,
Lost myself and I am no where to be found.
Yeah I think that I may break,
Lost myself again, and I feel unsafe.

Breath Me -Sia

Aloof? ...Aphasia -that's what it's called.

Listening to: Breathe Me -Sia
That's it! I don't want to write a short story, damnit! I want to write an epic! AN EPIC! DON'T SMOTHER MY PASSIONS! AND IF I'M MAKING YOU CRINGE, PISS OFF!
(pouts)
So much for being calm. But no matter, some of history's greatest geniuses and most tallented individuals were a bit mad (maniac grin) Half of them committed suicide (even freakyer maniac grin) I'm special (Miyavi maniac grin) I am also craving some Haagandazs...no not just Haagndazs, I really fancy hanging arround central London and eating Ice Cream in Lesceter Sq in the evening. This might be becuase I'm stuck in a spice smelling tip of a living room, babysitting builders who are making drilling noises over my music. I'm not moaning, I'm excited because work is finally underway. With the eminent kitchen asside though,

I WANT TO WRITE AN EPIC!

Pish

DAMN JAMES BLUNT!

Ahem, I've been at the laptop for well over 4 hours now, I've actually managed to cut down 300 words of this short story, which apparently isn't short enough, and I still have another 300 to eliminate into the depths from wence they emerged. Blast them! Insolent little Times New Roman typescript pests.
I've almost worked up the nerve to scrap the entire thing and just dish out a new tale...still have that lingerring idea of Post-Second Coming story about an evil Rock Star, but fear it might verge on the cliche and overly dramatic...not to mention, is probably yet another too-big-to-develop-in-5,000-words plot.

...Hey me, have you noticed that I'm talking to myself?
me: So you are! Oh joy!
me: No, not 'oh joy!', me, we've come dangerously close to sounding self indulgent.
me: How so?
me: 'Dear diary, today Mr. Rochester complimented my imaculately pruned rodedendrons. I dare say he has taken a liking to me...I am after all a wickedly charming girl, he a dashing young blade, and the rodedendrons a mere excuse. Not to mention they vex me. I am terribly vexed by them. I shall get Striker to urinate at their roots...it will truely be a test of Mr. Rochesters affections.' -so.
me: aha. I see.
me: What to do?
me: ...umm, go to bed?
me: An Excellent idea! Lets.

Same thing we do every night, Pinky...try to take over the world!

Chatting to Mags online and because it's 4:00 am in Dubai she seems kind of mental (wants me to turn her into a turnip...my insanity may not be entirely inherited but it's certainly justified by the amount of loonys in this family). You know what this means right? And now she's going on about some martial arts move called The Pest of Harakiri -very deadly.

With that asside though:
Hello, Elle est star gazer is back in the country of very few stars. Thank you light polution.
Verdict: Istanbul is beautiful.
I have too much to say about the trip, so I shall opt for the Goth's way out and aloofly say nothing...I shall keep it to myself, because it's MINE!

Hmmm, the sound on my laptop seems not to work. If it was, I'd be listening to Venus as a Boy -Bjork. Do I have anything substantial to write? No.
Fellow Gothling little-miss-'did you go tinkle'-Sarah is trying to convince me to sign up at My-Space...we are not convinced. Presently we are too busy trying to purchase volume 13 of Fruits Basket. (sigh. Manga...ntch, STOP ROLLING YOUR EYES AT ME!)

This is my manic state. Aren't I fun? I'm also working on being a more calm, and dignified individual...And I'm brushing up on my gracefulness- Amalthea, naked but not so that King Haggard feels the need to hide his modesty -style. (Ha ha, instead of, "What is the matter with your eyes? Why can I not see myself in your eyes?" he should have said, "Why are you perving at me like that! stop x-raying me!")
Speaking of which, to answer your question Sarah, he could not have become King Lear in Shakespear's King Lear because his name's actually spelt 'Lir', Prince Lir. :)

3 things about dictators: All of them were short (in addition to which Hitler had a little bumm). All of them had mostaches (Mussolini had one in secret, and Napolian's one was French so you couldn't tell) And all of them pretended to like classical music.

Ok, I'm off... this one goes out to my very brave Tarik. I love you, man. And I know you're doing well, coz I believe you always are no matter what kind of crap you're in.

Today Huden abla said:
We're God's mountains, Elest, He wouldn't burden any one of us with more snow than we could bear. And snow melts. In time there is nothing left of it.

South Park Elest.
He he he.

...No I don't have too much time on my hands, I just couldn't sleep! :(
I have my numerous reasons.

I'm a bit paranoid about my white earpohnes. This is because absolutely every other person I see on the street also has a pair. For the first time it feels like I'm conforming to something, and it's friggin ugly! Like a dead fish, or something equally vile and bloated being carried off by the currant that is mainstream...(sigh) maybe I should have gotten a black iPod afterall...or maybe I'm just making a big deal out of this.

Had a chat with the great aunt today. Heh heh heh...MUWAHA HA HAA HAAA HAAA HAAAA HAA! I love being shameless ;)

And (because there always is one), in spite of my Peter Pan syndrome (/tragic fixation. Nabokov style. (Nothing beyond the 'look at this tangle of thorns' -openning though, because the rest of the novel was far too twisted to finish reading)) I've finally watched Finding Neverland for the first time, after deliberately having avoided doing so, all this while.
(aplause. wild cheering.)
Thank you.

Now, leaving asside the sad things in life. Thoughts of Rivkah Zim (the personal statements have been completed (more wild cheering)) have brought to mind her Bible freakyness (because Rivkah Zim is the Bible-freak-woman, not the hand-bag-lady, thank you Sarah for clarifying that) and that absurd story about Jephtah's daughter. Now, if Jephtah's daughter is Bible-note-worthy, why does she not have a name? This is one of those Cruly's wife in Of Mice and Men things right? Yes, thought so. I'll roll my feminist critic sleeves back down for the time being, because the question really gagging to be asked is: Why the hell does Jephtah's daughter 'bewail her virginity' before her father kills her? (nay! I tell thee; sacrifices her!)
If anyone has an answer to this they will cure me of many a sleepless night.

Moral: don't make promises to God lightly if you have crazy, virgin daughters.
And there was much rejoicing.

The Peter Pan sadness has gone :) ...for now.

Tonsils are curious things.
What were once a pair of seemingly useless and quiet members of Elest's anatomy, have now suddenly made their presence known by becoming seriosly inflamed.
Can't swallow my own saliva. :)
-Funny how human beings like subjecting their fellow human beings to the grizzly details of their ailments. Why do we do that? Does sympathy offer a degree of comfort in the face of physical pain/discomfort? I'm not seeking sympathy though, I'm basking in the glee of your horrified reaction when I tell you, with a Miyavi-grin, that the back of my throat is oozing puss :)
Also, I think I'm making the most of the situation because I rarely ever get seriously ill like this. In fact, this is the first time in a very long time, that we are actually on antibiotics. (we, in the multiple personality sense of the word -I'm feeling a bit lonely) And No, we're affraid this is not the kind of illness which will feel neglected and leave if we ignore it. In fact, ignoring it for a week seems to have made it worse. See, sometimes you have to know when you can get away with not giving a toss...coz sometimes you can't.
In any case:

Penicillin.
Alexander Fleming.
Ian Fleming.
James Bond.
A damn good British Literrature and Film essay.
English MA.
As yet, still incomplete MA applications.
I promise I'll do it after the review for Shooting Dogs, coz the deadline for that is sooner.
Having a hard time starting...
Arigatou to my illness.
Which brings us back to Penicillin, and I wonder how fast it works...?

Also, as of yesterday, there has been a new addition to our household (which is, and continues to remain, despite all my efforts, a big dump (new boiler. missing cabinets. new kitchen. soon.)) ...No, not the boiler, Elest's iPod.
(!!)
It's theductive.

Shooting Dogs review, here I come.
...Miso soup helps.

Sounds: Joga...Where has Bjork been all my life?
Emotionaly and physically exhausted.


Life is a necklace of fears (my love)
Your uncried tears on a string.

-Bjork, Bachelorette

These sudden ups and downs are making me nauseous.
Maybe I'm bipolar.
Or just a piss-artist.
Or worse, both.

Little Minx saw cherry blossoms today and thought of ideals and passion and sacrifice...and last spring and the one before...and then that James Blunt song: In your eyes, now, I see no bravery. No bravery any more, only sadness.

Walking upto Edgware Road in the rain, with Faaria getting absurdly excited about a van making soap bubbles as it drove past, the wet pavement under NewRocks set off the following:
This moment is so beautiful. And it's sad that we are fragile, because what will become of it when we are gone?
Who is it going to matter to, when there is no one left that knows or remembers it?
Life is one big stupid tragedy if this is all. If all this beauty in our moments, in our memories, in our words, in your eyes, in my sadness, and a fleeting instant of feeling happy...is for naught in the end...of what ever and whenever.
That's why there's got to be more to come after. That's why our souls have got to be immortal, so that we will never forget. And that's why there's got to be God's love, because sometimes the love you feel is too great, and painful and fleeting, to be for anything of this world that can't keep it.

So far the MASTER plan (pun courtesy of Ryo), which is still in progress mind you, is as follows:
Little Minx is curently ruthlessly job hunting and not being a snob about it (as she'd been before) coz she is prepared to settle for any flee-bitten-jew job that'll pay somthing towards funding the MA. (Except working for NEXT or McDonalds)

Meanwhile I'll face the two final weeks of CELTA, I'll fail that bloody course MY WAY and I'll go down laughing like a maniac! Old Azazil style! (mind you, I wonder if Satan did go down laughing...? ok, joking aside, i dont think i want to wonder, I'm geting cold, sad feelings of devastation)

The current predicament now though is as follows:
Do I do a (strainght) English MA
or
the Shakespeare one
or
a Creative Writing one at Royal Holloway? ...I need advice, nay, direction, offered by a patriarchal/paternal figure. Daddy, as you would have guessed wasn't helpful-
Elest: Dad what should I do?
Dad: ... I donno Sev, what do you want me to say?
Elest: Anything. Say anything!
Dad: I donno Sev, whatever.

So, I've emailed Gordon (and for the last time, people, he's not a flirt! He's my father figure! Right up there along with Sting (and with a dad like mine, it's perfectly normal for me to be collecting father figures, Bill did. (And with two films dedicated to kill off one character, Bill's coolness is indisputable...maybe one day I can be like that: Kill Elest I. Kill Elest II (of course the cold blooded seeker of vengence will be myself- that's the twist. (where the hell was I and how did I get here??)))

And then there is the Dubai thing. 'Figure, once I've MA-applied, and if I find a job out there, I can go off for a bit to work and save in the Arabian gulf...Unless anyone has any objections...?

Ps. iPod front: we are £60 and counting. (yesssss!)
Pps. Gordon just emailed back! Who wants to come see him at the British Lib. with me on Wednesday? (Sarah? Misba?)

For Tasy, from the book we'll never publish coz it's probably too self-indulgent.

...See it all began in Stamfordhill, where a Scary Wicked 'Vat-To-Do?!' ruled a dingy little school with an iron fist. The first few days had been lonely, but then on the Friday of that week they sat the new new-girl next to the old new-girl and this is what happened several months later:

"YOU and YOU," fingers jabbing, "Alveeys making trouble! Alveeeys like dis!" Fingers making a fiddling gesture which is supposed to mean something, but the two terrified little girls forget their terror for a moment of mutual bemusement. "Dooon't look at each udder!" the terror returns with a vengeance.

It's gonna be fine inshallah, I promise.
It always has been.

...I just made a life changing decision.
Where was I when the universe, nay, God was trying to tell me something?
I'm here now.
(wrings hands)
And now to do something crazy to celebrate.
(grinns like an idiot)
...
Thank you.