The man with the white shirt

When the man with the white shirt came onto the stage last night, my heart skipped. I was again 16, in my room, listening to his songs and learning his lyrics by heart. Yesterday, he was handsome but plain: a white shirt, black trousers, his hair not as long. But he was still Brett, he was still the one.

When I first moved to the UK, back in 2001, I thought I had missed the train of seeing Suede live. And then I sort of forgot them for a while, their angst and melancholy didn't seem to fit my newfound life. But they were always there, in the background, singing my dark star, she's not dead, still life and the asphalt world to my deaf ears.

And then last night I saw them live for the first time. It's exhilarating to see the band that you felt defined you for years, there, in front of you, some few meters aware from you. And when Brett came down to the crowd, I felt like running to him, like an infatuated groupie. I got embarrassed and stayed where I was.

When the played Trash last night, followed magnanimously by Animal Nitrate (my God that riff still sounds good), I was back. Back to my room, back to my 16 year old self, back to this feeling of discovering the world, of discovering myself. Discovering oneself through others, isn't this what adolescence is all about? And I felt this happy nostalgia, seeing my old self from afar, I nodded and she nodded back, we said hallow and parted ways again. What a feeling to see your youth, albeit briefly, and like what you see.

Love always, Brett, Suede. Let's chase the dragon from our home, indeed. 

Summer thoughts (take I)

Summer came and went, without a post, without a trace, really. Easily the fastest summer in a while. What happened? Why did it go so fast? Why am I back, my tan fading fast, trying to fight off the rain?But anyway...

This year it dawned on me that I live a double life: most of the year in Belfast, my second home, and in the summer and Christmas holidays, back in my first home, in Greece. This October it will be 12 years that I am away from Greece (a scary thought that I cannot really process most of the time), which means that the people I have back home are diminishing rapidly: my family, my cousins, my new nephews and nieces and old, trusty friends. When I go to Greece, I want to see them, but even more I want to have the illusion that I actually have a life there. A life where I can have someone to go out for a coffee with, or go for a drink with, or go to the beach with, or go shopping with, or go to an island with. I expect to have these people because I always did in the past: I am Greek, I have greek friends, right? Thing is, I am not there for these people, not in their everyday life. At best I am at the other end of a line, a fuzzy picture on Skype, and that when we manage to co-ordinate. But I'm not there there, am I? And still I expect to have these people on stand by when I decide to grace them with my presence for a month in the summer. And most of the time they indulge me, and they make me feel normal. As if they put their life on hold and just half-live when I'm not there and then when I come, we resume our life together. Sometimes though this doesn't really work. People are not available when I want to go on holiday. Or they have other things to do when I want to go shopping. Or they bring other people (OTHER friends) when we go to the beach. And then I get annoyed, or even worse sad. Because I know deep down that this double life is just a bunch of bullshit. I am a nomad, I always used to say, and I used to like this thought.

But this also means I don't have two homes.

It simply means I have none. 

Soundtrack to a Belfast summer

Since I haven't written a lot recently, I might as well post a couple of songs I've been obsessing with recently:



La la, la la la la la la la la la (Sam Smith is killing it this year, what a voice. Boy George anyone?)



These people are seriously funny (just keep looking at Pharell's face.... Priceless)



Another amazing summer tune -  and what a line for a tattoo: The ceiling can't hold us...

And finally, THE summer tune of 2013 (and it's only June)



Welcome back Daft Punk. And Pharell. And bonus another tatoo-worthy line: I'm up all night to get lucky...

Happy summer everyone! 

Survivor's guilt

These days I am suffering from extensive survivor's guilt.

I am Greek, I live abroad, and I live well. I have a house, a good job (that I love), a husband (who also has a good job that he loves). I am thinking of promotion (which I can get at some point).

I am travelling to Greece at least twice a year, I go on holidays.

I can afford nice things, for myself and for my friends. I buy beautiful clothes, my husband has an expensive bike.

On one hand, I deserve these things. I studied for 8 years, and I work hard.

On the other hand though, so do my friends in Greece. They studied too. They work hard too. And yet, they cannot afford half the things I do.

Suicides are up in Greece, drug use is up, HIV is up, violent, racist, hate crime is up. Violence against women is up.

But the story in the media is always the same: lazy Greeks start paying taxes and shut up.

I only have two words for anyone who thinks that: FUCK OFF. 

Sci-fi

I love sci-fi movies, I really do.

From the unbearably classic Blade Runner, to the dark Minority Report, from the Alien quadrilogy (or at least the first two) to Alice in wonderland in fancy leather coats, sorry I meant the Matrix, sic-fi movies make me cringe. Perhaps it's this archetypical fear of the unknown, the worry that death will come from above, from outside and not from within. Perhaps it's the dystopian future, that I adore in literature too (1984, brave new world, never let me go etc), I don't know what it is, just sci-fi fascinates me.

So, even Oblivion, which is not great, and whose script, as correctly pointed out in this Guardian video review, is a massive mishmash of other sic-fi references (a little bit of Matrix meets Mad Max meets Alien meets Ghost in the Shell meets a bit of Lost meets the Truman show meets of course a bit of Oedipus Rex -- every movie needs a bit of Greek tragedy, no?), I actually enjoyed. Tom Cruise is as stereotypical as it gets, and the storyline did have to get explained to me, but the questions the movie poses have been and will always be important: what makes us human? What makes a being a man, and not a machine (alien, clone or whatever)? Is it our subtle love for literature -- as it also happened in the "humanisation" of the Stasi operative in the lives of others? Is it just our inquisitive nature -- you know that when Vicky says "I don't want to know" that she is lost for ever? Is it simply our ability to love?

Oblivion does not pose any new questions, all the above, we've heard it all before. But isn't it worth it hearing it again, especially with such a beautiful set as a backdrop? 

The Godfather

Welcome to the world, you might tell me, but I watched the Godfather movies this week, for the first time ever. I know, crazy, right? But there is something to be said about leaving gems to be enjoyed later in life when you have a bit more brain to enjoy them. Or at least that's my excuse.

Every time I watch (listen to/read) a masterpiece, I think of my time wasted reading/listening to/watching utter and absolute shite. Truly a waste through and through. People tend to think (me included) that "light" movies/literature etc are good for one's tired mind, they take no effort and they are essentially harmless, a good time-passing device. But they give you nothing, NOTHING in return, that's the problem. Just wasted hours and a nagging feeling of annoyance.

Movies like the Godfather, now that's another story alltogether. The story, the subtlety of the "take home message", the acting, Pacino, my god Pacino is amazing. His face doesn't move. And yet he resonates pain.

I think I've heard somewhere that Michael Corleone reluctant ascent to the top of the Corleone family, in the first movie is akin to Hamlet's indecision to do what is expected of him in Shakespeare's classic. Two anti-heroes, one fate. To me though, the second movie, Michael's paranoia, total ruthlessness and utter descent to hell is really what turns this story into a masterpiece. Ah, and of course Robert de Niro's amazing performance in the parallel narrative of the, much less conflicted, Vito Colreone.

I don't have a lot more to write, besides what is there more to say about the Godfather. Only take home message from me (mostly to myself if to anyone) would be just to stop watching trash and focus on the masterpieces of this world. And there are plenty.

A good week

I am having a good week.

Like a really good week.

I wake up happy.

I am not stressed.

I feel normal.

Rare but nice and as such it needed to be commemorated through this banal post.