Xn3cTs

Cultural symbols have some kind of consistency. And rightly or wrongly (I mean, one could always present arguments that would show the inappropriateness of a symbol or sets of symbols), the associations have been formed and set through the millenia. One cannot simply do away with a symbol that has been passed and accepted by cultures/traditions, etc. One can, however, question and undermine the seeming “naturalness” that these symbols have come to acquire (like what Nietzsche, Derrida, among others, have done).

The association of “black” with “male” and “white” with “female” (at least, symbolically) is not consistent with, and I’d even say, goes against the grain of, tradition of symbolical associations with gender archetypes. Check it out for yourself. Research on this topic.

Even the very moral association of “black” with “evil” and “white” with “good” is consistent with the disparaging of the “feminine principle” that Brown himself presents in his novel.

Which leads me back to Nietzsche… the earth/matter, feminine, black, deceptive, as opposed to the spirit, male, white, beholden to the truth… and which does he champion?

Neither.

Rather, he asks, probably with a grin on his face, “What if truth were a woman?” (which can be read as “what if the truth were lying/deceptive?”)

So, again, rather than simply overturning the tables or reassigning the good values with the opposing pole (i.e., saying that “male” is “evil” and “female” is “good”), one gains an insight into the interconnection/interweaving/inter-reliance, complexity, and perhaps, even complicity of the bipolar signs/symbols into our understanding of this world.

The world is to a large extent, amoral, and because of this, both cruel and innocent. It is us humans/cultures who assign values, depending on our perceived needs/wants in given situations. It is when these values harden/ossify that they become dangerous to life/living.

best regards,
ian

I loved the Matrix and Moulin Rouge, despite their being hyped. On the other hand, I did watch Lord of the Rings 1 & 2, but stayed away from 3. Tried reading book 1, but just managed a few paragraphs, and then stopped… (Well, perhaps someday…)

Did “The Unbearable Lightness of Being” have that much hype? I love that novel, have read it twice, and think of it as the kind/type of novel I’d love to write if I ever get the chance of writing one. (Haven’t seen the film adaptation with Daniel Day-Lewis…)

As for “The Da Vinci Code,” if you find a copy lying around, it’s worth reading din naman. For one thing, I do subscribe to the recuperation/rehabilitation of the “sacred feminine.”

One other reason why I stayed away from Dan Brown’s novel is that I’ve read Umberto Eco’s “Foucault’s Pendulum” and from what I had heard about “The Da Vinci Code,” it seemed to me to be a “Foucault’s Pendulum”-wanna-be.

I’m currently re-reading Eco’s novel. (I read it years ago, mistakenly thinking that it’d help me write a paper on Michel Foucault. Wala palang connect. Ibang Foucault ‘to… Or, meron din, if one looks at the obsession for power and techniques of power…)

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Read “The Da Vinci Code” in 2005, after deliberately ignoring it for quite some time because of the hype. And then saw the movie later.

Well, the wealth of information (esp. regarding symbols) is generally sound. But it doesn’t hold a candle to the erudition of Umberto Eco’s “Foucalt’s Pendulum.” (I have yet to understand the elaborate explanation of how Foucault’s Pendulum works…)

One thing I liked in the novel is the rather sympathetic portrayal of the head of the Opus Dei, Bishop Aringarosa.  (Not so in the movie.)  I’ve heard a lot of negative publicity regarding the Opus Dei and their founder Jose Ma. Escriva. (From the late Larry Henares, in his TV show and Philippine Daily Inquirer column, as well as from a Filipino priest who studied in a university run by the Opus Dei…) Bishop Aringarosa may be ultra-conservative in his theology but in the end, when the time came for his faith to be tested, his heart proved to be ultimately in the right place.

Also, it had a more hopeful, happy ending than “Foucault’s Pendulum,” which was darker and more poignant. Eco’s novel bewails the lack of understanding that so-called believers/enlightened ones have. Parang si Elsa sa Himala: “Walang himala! Ang himala ay nasa puso ng tao!”

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“2046.”

If you fell in love with Mr. Chow (Tony Leung) and Mrs. Chan (Maggie Cheung) — who, along with Zhang Ziyi, was in Zhang Yimou’s “Hero” — in Wong Kar Wai’s “In the Mood for Love,” you shouldn’t miss this wonderful masterpiece of a sequel!

If you haven’t seen “In the Mood for Love,” you’d still appreciate the great film that is “2046″ (just like some people must have seen “Before Sunset” without seeing “Before Sunrise”). But I think the weight of our empathy with the travails of Mr. Chow stems from having known what he has gone through in the previous film.

It’s now a toss-up between Claude I-forgot-this-french-canadian’s-surname’s “Leolo” and Wong Kar Wai’s “2046″ as my favorite movie of all time.

Incidentally, doesn’t Tony Leung bear an uncanny resemblance to the late R.J. Leyran?

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Non Sequitur (A Reflection on Wong Kar Wai’s “2046″ and “In the Mood for Love”)
by Michael Ian Lomongo

(For the late R.J. Leyran, who bears an uncanny resemblance to Tony Leung)

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I do think that “2046″ is a very worthy sequel to “In the Mood for Love.” At first, it doesn’t appear to be that way. The only connection with the latter film seemed to be that it was the same Mr. Chow (the erstwhile writer of martial arts stories but moved on to writing sci-fi…) and his adventures in love and loving after the ill-fated affair with Mrs. Chan (Maggie Cheung).

After seeing “2046,” I’ve reached these conclusions:

2046 is the number of the room that Mr. Chow and Mrs. Chan stayed in the night she didn’t want to go home. This scene wasn’t shown in both films but Mr. Chow mentioned it in “2046.”

Mrs. Chan probably separated with her husband. The child she was with when she moved to the apartment that used to be occupied by her landlady was the fruit of that one night tryst with Mr. Chow. She went back with the vain of hope of somehow meeting up with Mr. Chow again. When she called up the office of Mr. Chow when he was in Singapore, it was because she was with child. But she couldn’t bear to speak because she didn’t want to be a “bother” to Mr. Chow.

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“He remembered his sadness well, but he could no longer remember what had made him so sad. It was that way with everything: even sadness passed, even pain and despair, as well as the joys. Everything passed, faded, lost its depth, its value, and finally there came a time when one could no longer remember what had pained one so. Pains, too, wilted and faded… Yes, doubtless this pain, this bitter need would also grow old and tired. It too would be forgotten. Nothing had permanence, and he regretted that, too.”

- Herman Hesse, “Narcissus and Goldmund”

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Am continuing my reflections on the possibility of a “Nietzschean Buddhism”…

Would like to sit again…

I’ve found something valuable in my practice. Hey, I may have not changed much but I detect a glimmer of hope… the possibility of overcoming deeply-ingrained bad habits of old. I’m no superman but like him, “I’m just out to find a better part of me.”

I came to Vipassana as a pantheist with Nietzschean leanings. I had strayed away from the Catholic Christian Church in the mid-1990’s. It was meeting Nietzsche (through his books, of course) that brought about my “conversion.” I found quite a number of my very deepest feelings and thoughts verbalized by this “madman.”

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Tantric Sex
Tantrayana… Vajrayana…

And all we ever notice is the sex! (Just look at how our Christian conditioning has warped our minds…)

What’s so special about tantric sex?

Nothing much.

It’s just that it becomes a sacred/holy activity. A prayer. A rite/ritual (not in its pejorative sense).

So, it’s pretty much how all sexual encounters should be. What’s the diff then?

It’s all in our minds.

Vajrayana/Tantrayana Buddhism is said to be the quickest path to Nirvana because it transforms (transfigures!) every activity into a sacred/holy path. Everything is holy! Everything is divine! Pan-theism!

If everything is holy, then even fucking is holy! Heck, even shitting is holy!

The Theravadin (sometimes pejoratively called “hinayana”) tradition of Buddhism presents a much more stern/disciplined, almost ascetic/atheistic/scientific face of Buddhism.

At least, that’s how it looks to me.

best regards,
ian

I remember this film I saw in one of the French Spring Film Festivals, “Chance or Coincidence” about an “eventologist” (or someething) whose “other” job is to find connections/meanings in the chance occurences of life. I don’t remember the details of the story, it’s a love story (I think). I liked it, and also this Nat King Cole song in it, with the words “For all we know/care…?” Ala lang, baka lang alam n’yo. Am being whimsical here. It might have some meaning in the greater scheme of things. Hehehe.

Was also fascinated by “Sliders” (the TV series with Jerry O’Connell?) and “Sliding Doors” (with Gwyneth Paltrow).

In the TV series (based on a scientific theory, the “many-possible worlds” theory), the character played by Jerry, with his friends and professor (John Rhys-Davies), travel through a wormhole that leads to a parallel universe. Same time, different world. In some episodes, they even get to meet their alter-egos.

The movie “Sliding Doors” is premised on this one triviality: whether Gwyneth’s character is able to get on the subway on her way home or not. And the two parallel lives of Gwyneth play themselves out, each radically different from the other — all because of missing/not-missing a train ride. The movie however makes this intriguing, though perhaps unwarranted, conceit. The two Gwyneths (almost meet physically in an elevator) become “reconciled” during this scene by having only one singular experience, implying that the events which would follow from now on would be the same, even if they diverged earlier. Perhaps her inner reconciliation brought about the reconciliation of two divergent worlds? Perhaps she is owned by a destiny that’s greater than all the numerous happenstance of her life?

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Some people say that Christianity has been misunderstood. It looks to me more like it is Christianity which has misunderstood! The world, perhaps even Christ!

I’m not associating Christ with Christianity. When Nietzsche wrote “Der Anti-Christ” (usually translated as “The Anti-Christ”), his polemics was directed more to Paul and Christendom/Christianity, (a note in the translation says that it is probably more fitting to translate it as “The Anti-Christian.”) The same with Kierkegaard, his beef was with Christendom (the bureaucracy of Christianity). Christianity, as we know it today, is according to biblical scholarship, largely the work of Paul the Apostle.

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Part of the reason why I strayed away from “mother church” is my perception (whether right or wrong) that spirituality is inimical to the body.

You want to be holy/spiritual? Then, deny the body. The body, with its desires (sexual, biological, etc.) needs to be tamed, nay, caged. The body is a burden. If only we can become like angels. Pure, without the body which (unruly and with all these icky secretions, mucus, urine, etc.) always presents itself as a problem, a hindrance, an obstacle.

I’ve no problems with ascetic practices. I see their value. But when these practices get tied up with the denigration of the body, I react.

Didn’t God create the world and saw that it was good? Why then look at the body with an evil eye?

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Personalism vis-a-vis Parochialism

(A Reaction to a Piece on Personalism by Verdman)

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(an old piece written in June 2004)

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“Walang personalan. Trabaho lang.”

- a line from a movie about a cop (played by Rudy Fernandez) who summarily executes a criminal (”Markang Bungo” yata… not sure though…)

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“i think (i could be wrong, most of the time i am), that the root of our problem is our personalistic approach to life. we easily sacrifice objectivity in order to accomodate our personal affiliations, thus negating our chance to cultivate values that are necessary to achieve real progress. personalism is in every fabric of pinoylife. from the moment of birth (kung sino ang magiging ninong), up to the time of death (kung sinong asawa ang may karapatan sa bangkay). whether business, sports, politics, gov’t, etc…. personalism always plays a part. nothing wrong with cultivating personal ties per se, we are a social animal afterall, it’s when personalism is accomodated at the expense of objectivity, this is where corruption starts, first morally, then leading up to plunder.”

- Verdman (a nom de plume), On Personalism

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What’s the problem with personalism?

The way I see it, there’s nothing wrong with personalism per se. In fact, it is precisely this personalism that makes Noypis so lovable, and as Ninoy put it, “worth dying for.”

It is when personalism clashes with “objectivity” that the problem arises. It thus degenerates to parochialism. Parochialism, i.e., my interests over your interests, my family over your family, my clan over your clan, my my hey hey!… Parochialism, narrow-mindedness, “subjectivism,” bigotry…

The Philippines is relatively a young country. We’ve only started to think of ourselves as one nation during the 19th century, the credit mainly to the ilustrados (which include Rizal). (See Leon Ma. Guerrero’s “The First Filipino.”) Probably no small wonder that we’re still trying to find our bearings… still trying to get our act together.

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