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Constellation: Crux (The Cross)
Mood: Busy bee / tired
Song: Si J'avais du Talent * Solam


Wooo. Busy as hell in here. Sorry for the lack of updates in here (I know some people are pissed at me!)

Anyway, we are hosting the Francophone Film Week in our movie theater. And because it is organized by the Lebanese Cultural Ministry, it means that we have to do everything by ourselves. The bastards there are engaged in the ‘make the least effort possible’ policy.
So of course we are working overload.

Since my boss is on a business trip, we had to take care of everything. It’s nice when you are in charge of everything, though tiring.

We are a very small team of young people who took the event into hands, since my boss left. But I am the one who’s most acquainted with the places, so you know how things turn out to be.

It's very interesting to run a festival. From acquiring the copies, to the tests, the press, meet and greet the people, the debates after the screenings, to the less interesting aspects, make sure someone is on the ticket booth, the projectionist is there, the tests for the films are done, the theater and the space is clean …

The films all come from countries who speak French: Bulgaria, Romania, Switzerland, Canada, Tchad, Senegal, Morocco, Egypt, Lebanon and France (naturally). We had some interesting choices, though some suck.

On Friday, we had a Swiss evening. First there was a film, followed by a concert for the Swiss duo Solam, and a reception with good Swiss wine at the end.
I had to present the evening and introduce the ambassador of Switzerland. You can't imagine how stressed I was. The outcome was perfect, that's because we worked our ass off to have everything done correctly.

Though most of the time you don't have the time to be stressed. Each day there is a problem that you have to solve instantly. That's when you learn most to work fast and intelligently.














On a side note, I have chosen the constellation Crux since it goes well with the Swiss flag. It is a very bright constellation in the Southern hemisphere, though it is the smallest among the 88 constellations. It has some very luminous stars among which Acrux (which stands for Alpha Cruxis), one of the 15 brightest stars.

The festival is not over yet. But I will take the opportunity to thank my wonderful teammates Maral and Sarra without whom we couldn't have done the amazing work we did, the projectionists Rami and Marwan as well as the staff from the theater for all their help.

The show must go on!

Flitting Upon the Ruins

Place: The Universe
Mood: Floating

Song: Across the Universe * The Beatles

"Jai guru deva om

Nothing's gonna change my world"

Pictures from a trip to the Bekaa region this Sunday...

The Dormancy Ship

Constellation: The Great Ship Argo Navis

Mood: Speedy

Song: Fast As You Can * Fiona Apple

How fast do you lead your life? When I went to France, I noticed people run to catch their metro, climb up the escalator swiftly …

Here, in Arab countries, everything is slowed down, sluggish. I believe life has stopped since 500 years in this part of the world, and we're still waiting for it to kick off again.
Centuries ago, Arabs gave an imprint in such vivid matters as astronomy, mathematics and medicine. But now, god knows what the improvements are here, if not to build treasure islands in lifeless cities on one hand, and oppress freedom of expression, encouraging extremist fundamentalism in the name of religion (!) and oppress women, on the other.

Alright, that was not my main topic of interest, it just slipped out of my hands.
Let's get back to the original question.
How fast do you lead your life?

Are you a seafaring man who's sailing to the speed of the jagged wind, or you're the one who's sleeping waiting for the gentle airstreams to wake you up?

And since, we will are tackling the sea and the ships, needless to say that I'll talk now about the Argonaut's ship, which used to be the largest constellation in the sky.

This great ship was used by Jason of the Argonauts in the Greek mythology, in search of the Golden Fleece.
Now, it is divided into four constellations: the Sails (Vela), the Poop (Puppis), the Compass (Pyxis) and the Keel of the Ship (Carina), which holds the second brightest star in our sky: Canopus.

This is a Southern hemisphere constellation; hence Canopus can barely be visible for the inhabitants of Europe.

Since I went to the beach last weekend, I took those two car pictures. Totally stylish me thinks. One stands for the slowness of things, while the other is for a steadier tempo, say much faster one. Which one are you?

The None-existent Nothing

Element: Black Holes
Mood: Nonexistent
Song: Teardrop * Massive Attack feat. Liz Frazer

What do you do when you feel nothing. No negative thoughts, no positive ones, just NOTHING. You feel this nothing.
It eats you alive. It burns your skin. It invades your thoughts. It's the total void.

I think it's much worse than being in a depression phase. Because here, you can't think of something. But still, your mind is overfunctionning with random thoughts that only feed the 'nothing' aspect you are going through.

In the realm of astronomy, black holes are super massive elements (the most super massive of the universe) that are so massive that any electromagnetic radiation cannot escape them. Therefore they suck everything that comes in their way, including light.

Come to think of a Black Hole grasping the whole energy of your own being. Aspirations, thoughts, freewill… You think you're free at times when in fact you are bound in something you cannot escape from. You know it exists but you cannot spot it.

An imaginary hole that has all the elements of being real. You think you're floating in it, when in fact, you are only stagnating.

As Liz Frazer of Cocteau Twins whispers in this Massive Attack's Teardrop:
"Gentle impulsion, shakes me makes me lighter"

There is certainly an impulsion. You know it exists, but it stabs you so hard that you even forget it is within you. And Nothingness takes care of the rest

To by-pass this cloud, I chose a new scheme for the weekend. I went to the sea on Saturday, and to the mountains on Sunday.

The Sea

Song: The Sea * Morcheeba

"Sea gulls scavenge, steal ice cream, worries vanish, within my dream

I left my soul there, down by the sea, I lost control here, living free"

The Sea is always an experience. Just the sound of waves, some light breeze, the unfadable blue… It certainly brings certain vivid emotions to you. And although emotions are not necessarily a good push to one's behavior, they definitely revive in you those downbeat ideas to you that you want to trample upon.

So the Sea pushed my limits to think about freeing myself from the cocoon I was in. The immense blue sure had an effect. This vastness eradicated this bewildered that I live in, was it just for a couple of minutes.

The Mountains

Song: Song from Half-Mountain * Dan Fogelberg

"Now the wind is still, in a moment it will be raging

Now my soul is young, in a moment it will be aging.

And high above the pines I wrote several lines

And left them in a bottle for you to find."

Contrasting with the Blue, the Green. My favorite color. I went to my native village with my Tunisian friend Sarra, in the aim of visiting. Nature has always had this automatic rush of utter positivist tantrum on my being. Just seeing the Green, all these flowers, rocks, birds…

Yesterday, Sarra and I decided to just let go and enjoy ourselves. We wandered through Nature and just felt the wind. We filled the place with seeds of laughs, even if they were temporary ones.

I thought when I would come back, they would have grown. I could take them back from Mother Nature, and learn to live with them, eventually.