Category: LifeBlogging

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The social animal

leirenerousseau


“Man is by nature a social animal; an individual who is unsocial naturally and not accidentally is either beneath our notice or more than human. Society is something that precedes the individual. Anyone who either cannot lead the common life or is so self-sufficient as not to need to, and therefore does not partake of society, is either a beast or a god.” Aristotle

One of the first lessons I learned as a philosophy student it was about the human condition and the innately characteristic of humans to exist around each other. In other words, people need other people to co-exist, in order to be fulfilled and have a sense of cohesion or purpose.

Back then I had no idea what this means. It was a completely new concept and I was not even close or had the capacity to comprehend, by far, how an individual could live outside of society.

Anyway, I don’t have the arrogance to think that I know now but since I experience “unprecedented times” – as they say in all the serious articles – I have enough time to reflect upon this theory.

The days are passing slowly and the “social isolation” becomes a brutal reality. I realise that humans are very creative at coming together. If you are anything like me (and you cannot stay away from news and social media) you probably saw all those videos where (Italians) start singing in their balconies and create beautiful, empowering social gatherings in unique ways, or simply, people are risking their lives (and some others more) by overruling the obvious (imposed) new ways of interacting by the authorities – only to be around each other. The simple fact of not meeting a friend is incomprehensible at this point for many of us, yet, some cannot even conceive the idea of staying far from the others, even tough as a temporary measure. Not one single type/tool of new technology can replace the human interaction.

I used to think about myself as a rather antisocial, introvert personality (I still do), yet, these rules are weighing heavy on my mental state (and physical for that matter) since only the idea that I am not allowed to go to a movie, a concert or any other type of collective gathering with humans that you feel connected through a common nominator, is simply not conceivable and it gives me some terrible anxiety.

We all understand this is temporary (or is it?), we try to stay positive and get the best out of a situation that hit us so fast and so hard that we choose to ignore. Yet, instead of ignoring, the best is to acknowledge and try to come to terms with the fact that staying far one from the other it is ultimately something that is bringing us together.

Rant over.

Namaste. Stay safe.

Photo by Julia Kuzenkov on Pexels.com
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Mooning around

leirenerousseau

” Informal Mooning definition: expose one’s buttocks to someone in order to insult or amuse them.”

From the category “Stories at the museum” today I share with you one of the funniest  (!literally depending on how you look at it) true story. giphy

So, there is this museum: there is history, projections, and predictions about Europe, wars, and very interactive integrated sophisticated multimedia devices for the European citizens to have a thrilling and enjoyable experience (ultimately they pay for it, so make it worth their money).

One of these fabulous interactive devices are two voting booths – to educate and encourage individuals to vote(!) with a glitch to make it more contemporary – you can make a selfie at the end of your vote which is displayed on a lengthy screen and remains there forever with the rest of amateurs that had the willingness to do so – so you have your picture displayed together with hundreds or thousands other visitors.

Fun,  informative and most of all entertaining.

So there is this group of teenagers. Danish, beautiful (!) and tech-savvy, smart, happy, educated and all that love the kind of interaction the museum is offering. Obviously, the selfie part is by far one of the best. Because they literally selfied(!) their asses on it. Oh, and somehow they’ve added Hitler on the big display too.

Oh, you gotta love The Danes. They are funny too besides that humongous happiness they show off.

end of story (not really but! it gets confidential).

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I want my Innsæi back

leirenerousseau

 

Seeing this documentary, I started to wonder where my “sea within” has gone. And I came up with a not so different narrative.

As a little girl I thought that the world is limited to the universe that was around me: the grey communist building I was living surrounded by even more morose buildings in my neighbourhood, the little-improvised garden in the back guarded fiercely by two old ladies, the empty market a few minutes walk from me, that was for some reason open every day even though you couldn’t literally buy any food, the two cemented long stairs up the hill next to my building, promising to take you somewhere in a different and magical new dimension – stairs that I was not brave enough to climb out of fear for what I remember to be a long time during my childhood. (Later on, I discovered that those stairs are, indeed, the way to a new and different reality).

In my defense, back then, I did not have any TV, internet or a smart phone to open so many and endless possibilities as we have today. Yet, we had books and imagination. And intuition.

“Innsæi” – translates literally from ancient Icelandic as intuition. However, I’ve read that in Iceland, it has multiple meanings. It can also mean “the sea within” – the borderless nature of our inner world, a constantly moving world of vision, feelings and imagination beyond words. It can mean “to see within” which means to know yourself and to know yourself well enough to be able to put yourself in other people’s shoes. And it can mean “to see from the inside out” which is to have a strong inner compass to navigate your way in our ever-changing world.

At the moment, it seems that I am taking part along with humanity in a sort of collective soul sickness. A global epidemic of existential distress. Distraction, entertainment we call it. Noise. The constant noise in today’s world turns off the contact with oneself. The noise of the external world is muting the sound of our internal world, therefore, the intuition pays the price for it.

Meanwhile, I’ve learned about the world (yet, not enough), travel some – my limited universe expanded to a great extent (yet, not enough), I’ve seen markets that I could never dream about (yet, not enough), I am not afraid to climb stairs: real or fictive (yet, none displaying any magical universe). Despite all that, I seem to have lost my precious innsæi. And I want it back.

Namaste.

 

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May the badge be with you

leirenerousseau

People are strange creatures. We have weird behaviours, habits, beliefs and views on life. Nothing extraordinary so far, I know, this is no revolutionary discovery.

Every day I learn a little bit more how complex, weird and wonderful creatures we are. We, humans I mean.

I am not saying this in a condescending way, I am just fascinated how we all react different in various circumstances and how entitled, we believe we are, to behave in a certain way in a specific situation.  The spectrum of emotions is sometimes so easy to read and often I am shocked, offended (it’s true that I am easily to be offended), angry (that too), amused or fall into admiration towards some “human” responses to an external stimulus. It’s true that I am never left indifferent. What is also true, is that whenever I discover a crumble of goodness, humanity, kindness in a complete stranger I am deeply moved, sometimes to the point of tears. (I know, it doesn’t sound like me, but for some reason I am quite emotional lately or maybe just plainly old).

Since yesterday was Europe day (yey!) all the EU officials had their day off and how can Europe be celebrated better if not by visiting the new open museum about European history?

Undoubtedly, all of you, have seen at some point a zombies movie. Right? Imagine a crowd of zombies with badges.  All of them, without exception had this gesture, with their badge, when I tried to approach them in order to help with the orientation:  like they were trying to exorcise me with their badge (talk to the badge sort of :D))

I have never seen a crowd of people feeling so empowered as this one is with a badge.

But this is not what i wanted to say. I was all about emotions and stuff.  On some of the dark corridors – the darkest maybe due to the themes: totalitarianism, WWI and WWII, there was this old couple. Very old, holding hands and walking slowly among the impressive media display of Hitler and the aesthetically eye pleasing Nazi propaganda army (its not me who came up with this metaphor, however i agree at some level, and yes, i will burn in hell for saying it).  This couple walking among the horrors of wars, holding hands and deeply watching the exhibition was something beautiful, so natural and relaxing. I was just watching them, not saying a word with their eyes filled with tears and strongly holding hands. I’ve read somewhere that heaven is love.

Namaste

 

LifeBlogging

The decadent decade 

leirenerousseau

Since you are dying to know: I am going home (Romania is my home, feel the pride, the joy, the excitement. No, really.)

I am sure that most of you have that (annoying) Romanian friend: bitching about his country yet shoving “tuica” (read alcoholic coma inducer) or some other Romanian delights to you, with pride and sense of ownership.

Or, on the contrary your friend loves his country, promotes it with every occasion by showing you all the YouTube videos about the Carpathian Garden (I am really sorry Kathrin, it will not happen again); your friend is signing all possible /existing petitions on the internet to help a noble cause in his country.(Because that ALWAYS works, we all know that).
Your friend could also be an annoyingly (i)lliterate that copy paste quotes about the tragedy of being (Romanian) (“De l’Inconvénient d’être né” – what else?) while travelling in some  (any) other country with condescendence and superiority.
Or, maybe your Romanian friend is funny and cool (just like me, ha!); has all the jokes in his sleeve and good sarcasm when required (moreover, when is not required) yet still has a tiny amount of inferiority when faced with other great nations. 

Somehow, the inferiority feeling stick with some (also) due to the bad image depicted in the last ten years (at least) by the media machine or due to complex psychological factors that I won’t dwell into here.

I am guilty of all that, tough i never indulged “țuica” – only some good old Jagermeister (!) and some other beverages not worthy of being mentioned. Somehow, I felt is important to mention this.

It happens that, this year,  ten years have passed since I left home to discover new horizons: sounds poetic, I cannot say the past ten years have been only poetry. 

I’ve learned some, yet there is still so much out there to learn. The learning process is never ending, we are not the finished product until the end, I guess. 

There are, still, plenty of new places I want to discover, new cultures and people, other ways of seeing life and the world. I am grateful to have the privilege of discovering all these new places, I am still in awe every time a plane is taking off (even after so many repetitions of the same process) and I find myself in this little machine above continents and countries, oceans and mountains, in the clouds, closer to the sun, further from the lands.

And every time I step out is a new exciting place ready to be discovered,  a different climate from the one I left behind – sometimes with differences from even 40 degrees to -5, new people, so similar yet so different from what I know, new landscapes, beautiful and mesmerising new sites, different religions and beliefs. 

Every single one of these places taught me something. That what I know is not the absolute truth, or that my convictions can be changed when seen in a different perspective, that I almost never know until I actually see it/experience myself, that even tough born and raised in a former communist country I am so much more privileged than other people across the globe, that poverty takes various faces and it’s shown differently in different circumstances, that people and situations are not there forever, that life is unpredictable in a million different ways. 

What I wanted to say? Oh, that I am happy to go home today. 

Namaste.