All Saints' Day Survivor

In the Christian calendar, November 1st is a celebration of the dead, All Saints' Day, a bank holiday in France. Traditionally families purchase chrysanthemums, heather or cyclamens (usually impressive potted displays) and take them down to cemeteries in order to fleurir les tombes, flower their (loved ones) graves. Needless to say, florists and garden centres make a tidy profit that gears them up into the festive season, by then less than 8 weeks away!

Mum's the word! (June 2017)

You guessed it, All Saints' Day has been co-opted into a consumerist feat, with a sea of floral displays that pours out of the flower shops onto the pavements and inflates in volume by the day, in the run-up to November 1st. Then plants migrate from flower shops to car boots and from car boots to the tombs, and before Christmas most will have migrated from the tombs to the cemetery bins - in heaps! Incredibly wasteful and downright ridiculous but this is the way it has been programmed into the French.

Because sadly family values in France are not as sacred as they once were and catholic religion has taken a nosedive, graves are rarely visited, although All Saints' Day remains the one and only yearly reminder still anchored in the collective psyche that encourages the modern busy Christian to pay graves a visit - and leave a proof of their visit behind, in the shape of a big fat chrysanthemum that battles it out for space with other relatives' mums! Don't you bother watering your offering because par une opération du Saint-Esprit, by the Holy Spirit intervention, pots will somewhat self-water or at least absorb little morning dew they can in order to survive the run-up to Winter if they don't get knocked off the tomb by the competition and the elements and roll down the alleyway like a poor cosplay version of Jackie Chan to end up wedged between the tool shed and a bench.

Chrysanthemum to the left, nasturtium to the right, under the watchful eye of Némo! (Sept. 2017)

Life as an All Saints' Day chrysanthemum is all about survival: it's mean out there. Tampered with genetically in order to yield all sorts of crazy colours and patterns, chemically fattened up in order to grow fat and fast like a Christmas turkey of the floral kind, produce blooms ten a zillion that will magically burst open in time for the Day of the Dead. Showtime in the graveyard but by November 2nd there is no-one left around to admire the flowers! Then the draughty unforgiving graveyards take a toll on their petals into a crumpled-up, dried-out worn-out affair. Lack of care its toll, and the trip to the bin is a short, disdainful and unceremonious whack and go.

Through this tale of doom and gloom interspersed by a brief showtime stint and casting couch moment on the florist's shelf, one of those mums I saved from the basket of deplorables. Now it takes pride of place on my south-facing terrace, pampered and watered and whispered to! I saved it from my village's overflowing cemetery bin last December as I was gingerly walking past with Tickle, casting a sideways glance in search of a discarded, unloved, unrequited empty flower pot container (or filled with a dead plant) which I could save from trash and call my own and take home to repurpose into a pot for my Winter seedlings.

Pride of place! (Nov. 2017)

The mum was totally dried out, a browned-out crispy sorry sight! I took it home, disposed of the dead twigs and stored the pot with the soil in it in the cellar for a good month, almost forgetting about it. Then one day I noticed a shoot on the surface of the soil and then another one! I took the pot out onto the terrace, took a long hard look at those incredible green shoots battling for survival. I watered them and witnessed the gradual resurrection of the mum! It has since rewarded me with several flowerings. It is currently a feast of multicoloured blooms of white, canary yellow, orange and magenta red, a rainbow of delight! Let me tell you: I am the proud mum of one proud mum!

The moral of the story: when everything looks dead and done, give it another go, it might surprise you!

Paul Gauguin: Painter in Paradise

Gauguin, Voyage de Tahiti lands upon our shores as a compelling welcome distraction to an otherwise calamitous September of hurricanes, earthquakes, civil unrest and threats of WWIII. Despite its languorous title, it promises no Tropical bliss or frangipani blossoms as it whisks us away from our daily contrivance and the Autumn chill for the Paradise atolls of French Polynesia, the backdrop to the last decade in the life of anti-conformist 19th century French Post-Impressionist painter Paul Gauguin (1848-1903) who had fled modern civilisation in order to live the simple life, immersed in nature.

(pict source)

Few of us will have been aware of Gauguin's life beyond his enchanting Polynesian portraits, and the film by Edouard Deluc attempts to remedy that. Be warned though that any hope for a smooth, fancy-free voyage across lush lands and ombré waters sprawled below heavenly Summer skies is 'compromised' as our voyage is in fact a tale of trouble in Paradise... and this means dark clouds!

Soon the landscapes of the island merge with the landscapes of a troubled mind. This is no blockbuster, no special effect in sight, no big budget, and no unnecessary pathos. It commands however a certain curiosity and sensitivity on the part of the viewer in order to appreciate such a movie. Here we have a painter's tale of Paradise lost.

'Haere Mai', oil on burlap by Paul Gauguin, via Guggenheim Museum, NYC

Gauguin, Voyage de Tahiti depicts Gauguin the artist (Koké as the locals called him) entertwined with the man himself, who had rejected the French Establishment, relinquished wife and offspring who he could no longer financially support, only to get caught up by his demons and by Establishment again thousands of miles later. This is a tale of artistic genius, moral dilemma, financial destitution, a tale of redemption and disillusion, a quest for identity and authenticity, a depiction of mysticism and a rejection of the so-called civilised world.

Paul Gauguin could have enjoyed a comfortable existence should he had kept to the conformist route he had taken as a marine merchant and a stockbroker's assistant, but then there would be no Paul Gauguin the artist. He died a pauper instead, yet rich within from the life and travel experiences he acquired along the way. His frugal livelihood contrasts with his oeuvre dotted across the world in art places and private collections, testimonies to his posthumous glory and recognition. When he relinquished his privileged upbringing and financial stability in order to embrace the artist's lifestyle, Gauguin embarked upon the exciting, harsh, morose, unpredictable, temptation-laced, financially unstable existence at odds with the traditional family life, the picket fence and the prim and proper.

This poster features 'Tehamana Has Many Parents', oil on jute canvas by Paul Gauguin

Vincent Cassel wears Paul Gauguin's role like a glove. One of the most prolific, versatile, immersive French actors of my generation, he excels at playing troubled characters with heart and soul: the known and the unknown, the modern and the period, the suave and the slick, the affable and the utterly despicable. In a nutshell, he lives and breathes and inhabits each of his roles. Cassel took up art classes to get under the artist's skin and learn the ropes like how to hold a paintbrush properly and how to apply paint. He caught the bug and ended up painting for himself in his spare time!

From the outset, the film appears to incarnate French cinéma d'auteur in the manner in which it explores the life of its main character. The methodology is by way of a close-range character study, down to the minutiae of glance, heartbeat and sigh. It strives for detail, and an intimate - intimist - soul journey, a stark-naked biopic portrayal in its varied facets that distills the character with spirit and truth, no embellishment or happy ending for the sake of it. It soaks in the atmosphere and takes us on with it.

'Orana Maria (We Hail Thee Mary)', by Paul Gauguin, via WikiArt

The film hasn't been out a week that it is already being criticised for its lack of objectivity. It conveniently - controversially - glosses over the fact that Gauguin then aged 43 fell in love (in lust?) with a 13-year old local Tahitian girl called Tehura (also known as Teha’amana), whom he then married. The girl was a juvenile! A closer look at Gauguin's biography reveals that his private life was dissolute: a life-long philanderer who contracted syphillis along the way, which he then transmitted to his conquests. Some will wave it off as an element of Bohemian territory - oh lovely!

Yet not looking at discrediting the critics, it must be added that the History of France and the world at large demonstrates that however morally wrong it was (is), the mature man-young girl 'paradigm' was (is) no rare occurrence, especially in the Arts, the Royal courts and under certain ideologies!

'Tahitian Pastorale', by Paul Gauguin, via WikiArt

Digression aside, such straightforward revelations in the film would have dented an already morally-questionable complex, flawed character but a glossing over ends up as a disservice and as an unvoluntary form of complicity. Truth hurts, so does its misrepresentation by way of a lie.

Those of us who had been blissfully unaware of Gauguin's dirty little secrets until today, are likely to be left confused, tainted, unsure as to whether still respect the artist, or dissociate his paintings from the man: respect the oeuvre but dislike (repudiate?) the man. Artist and man being intrinsically entertwined, this is simply impossible. My only surety in this is that I will never look at the portraits of Teha'amana and her virginal, innocent girl friends in quite the unbiased way I used to.




It remains that Paul Gauguin was a creative genius, the precursor of Modern Art and a visionary in his own right. His Art navigated the troubled waters of his soul in a spellbinding way. To see and think of him as a painter solely is restrictive: he was an accomplished artist whose Art encompassed printmaking, engraving, sculpture, ceramics and decorating. His creations are showcased in the most prestigious modern art galleries of the world, including Guggenheim and the Art Institute of Chicago, as further testament to his worldwide recognition.

"Gauguin was radically creative throughout his career. He never stopped experimenting with new methods, and his art continues to fascinate because it remains unpredictable, contradictory, and enormously varied in medium, form, and content." - Artist as Alchemist, the Paul Gauguin exhibition at the Art Institute of Chicago (June 25 - Sept. 10, 2017)

Gauguin, Voyage de Tahiti, directed by Edouard Deluc, starring Vincent Cassel, Tuhei Adams, Malik Zidi and Pua-Tai Hikutini, out now in France.

P.S: There is an interesting parallel to be drawn between Paul Gauguin and Scottish novelist, poet and travel writer Robert Louis Stevenson (1850-1894): both artist contemporaries from the second half of the 19th century, travellers and adventurers, who both died in Polynesia (Stevenson in Samoa), in middle age. Stevenson documented a particular segment of his journey to France as a short story, 'Travels with a Donkey in the Cévennes.' If Stevenson is still fondly remembered in the Cévennes to this day, it is because - according to a local politician and historian - 'he showed us the landscape that makes us who we are.' Such a statement may well apply to Gauguin too, in relation to Polynesia.

A Matriarchal Society

You may or may not have realised by now that our Western societies are moving full-throttle into matriarchies. Their manifestations are multi-fold and encompass feminism, gender theories, identity politics, equal pay, and body positive movements, all facilitated by the PC brigade, mainstream media (MSM), social justice warriors (SJW), the one-way liberal free speech and the art of virtue signalling.

Plus model wife, mom and feminist Tess Holliday urges you to #effyourbeautystandards

Yes, we are firmly treading buzzword territory here, yet instead of shrugging it off as some passing fad, we should be worried because the rise of matriarchy goes hand in hand with the neutering of male masculinity, which historically has led to system failure and societal collapse.
 
Change agents are at play in the remodelling of the West that we used to know as kids, into a new paradigm that seems at odds with traditional values: you are not losing the plot, this is all part of Cultural Marxism! It all looks good and promising in theory though - superficially - giving us the impression that we are moving into an egalitarian, fair, sustainable and empowered society. But take a harder look and you will see for yourself that we are moving into a fractured society instead.

Glamour model, drama queen, mum and a loose woman who rules her roost: Katie Price

A matriarchy is a society ruled by women, as opposed to a patriarchy, a society ruled by men. More broadly so, a matriarchy is characterised by female dominance over a family (microcosm), a corporation, government, or society at large (macrocosm).

Here is what to expect from a modern matriarchal society and note that we have already ticked every box of it:

• Emphasis is placed upon the individual within society, for their own personal needs and aggrandisements to be met: me, myself and I! Selfies galore testify to the obsessed, narcissistic reflection that has been promoted, encouraged and engineered. The quest for fickle, instant, brief fame is on.
• Permissiveness in society and emancipation of women are emphasised and blown out of proportion, misleading the young, the gullible and the confused into believing that with nothing being sacred anymore, all taboos being lifted, you can just behave any way you want, without repercussion! A society that lets go of its moral compass, that operates without bearings, and whose rules and goal posts of virtue are always shifting, is dysfunctional. Paragons of virtue, a thing of the past!
• A society run on emotion and feelings instead of reason, pragmatism and logic, makes it volatile and unpredictable!
• Questioning men's traditional role within a couple/ family, as the head of the household, bread-winner, protector, nest builder and DIYer. Questioning and attacking manhood, misinterpreting it as machismo. Men have it tough as it is nowadays: no male role models or mentors who can help shape their formative years (absent fathers, no close family members, fairweather friends, peer pressure, Mcjobs, unemployment, etc.). Compulsory military service used to bring structure, obedience, independence and used to be a rite of passage from boyhood to manhood. Besides the collapse of christianity and fragmentation of communities has also led men astray. Meanwhile equal pay between man and woman in the workplace is not a sign of equality; it is falsely empowering the woman by disempowering the man. It is also sending a signal high and clear that men are no longer considered bread-winners of the family and may be dispensed with. Patriarchal values are shaken up and belittled.
• Breaking up the traditional man-woman family set-up and ruling it out under this newfound no-holds-barred permissiveness is a sure way to undermine both the male and the female, and break down family values once and for all. We run the risk of ending up with generations of confused kids who come from test tubes and surrogacy, plus those who suffer the consequences of divorces and illicit affairs. They will have no idea who their biological parents are. Such a confusion erases in effect personal family history: no more lineage, no more anchorage, no more roots, no more identity.
• Promoting the gender-neutral agenda to kids: deterring little girls from looking girly (no more pink skirts and flowery cardigans!) and little boys from exclusively playing boys games (electric trains, football, etc.).

Neither male nor female: YouTube beauty sensation Jeffree Star

• Metrosexuality, androgyny, and asexualisation: ultimately what we are witnessing is a blurring of the physical, cosmetic, societal, and moral characteristics between male and female. This comes to light as artificial intelligence and the increased robotisation/ automation of our lives are coming into force. We are losing the humane side of our human selves and turning bionic. Transgenderism is part of the transience of modern society.
• Beauty standards are retuned and redefined. Sexualisation of pre-pubescent girls and boys on catwalks, fashion advertorials and in the entertainment industry. A body positive attitude towards obesity and its polar opposite might sound encouraging yet this brushes aside health implications and moral issues; it encourages the individual to pursue their hedonistic or punitive ways, not to aim for a balancing act. Sports and entertainment personalities are turned into heroes and role models (the Kardashians, here we go!) and given status and airtime. 
• Empowering the odd and the misfit: as harsh as this sounds, it is true. Anything goes, a woman can be fat and sloven, tarted up like a tart, tattoed up like a sailor, swearing like a trooper, polyamorous (new spiel for promiscuous), woman one day and man the next, working traditional men jobs (as an army chief, a miner or a roofer for instance), proudly sporting body hair as a badge of honour! A woman is given permission to be unwomanly. Shun at your peril and the little SJW worms will crawl out of the woodwork to give you an earful!
•  A lenient judicial system that fails to protect traditional values and puts women at risk, victimising the victim: 'She was wearing a skirt, walking home late at night, she was looking for trouble'.
•  Any cultural incompatibility is played down instead of being addressed. Thus the incompatibility between a matriarchy and an ideology that is intolerant towards women's rights and liberties (ex: Islam), this being exacerbated under the West's open-border policy and lenient immigration legislation.

When males have been stripped out of their masculinity, of their role within society, they are left with nothing but asserting their masculinity through derisive cosmetic enhancement: bushy beards and tattoos. Enough said.

Men and women shouldn't be competing against each other no matter what. They are biologically different. Men's built and musculature naturally means that they are more suited to physical tasks than women; they also are more pragmatic in their approach to life's problems.

Likewise women tend to have an attention to detail and an ability to multi-task and empathise that men do not quite get and this is fine. Biologically-speaking, men are the hunters-gatherers (providing food and shelter) and women the nurturers (looking after the home and kids). There should be no reason for a battle of the genders in the name of fighting sexism. Men and women complete each other. Within the partnership, women bring sensitivity to men's sensibility and vice versa. Equality is about complementarity of the fortes and the highly-strung feminists out there who are pushing ahead with matriarchy are failing to recognise this.


Further Reading on Cultural Marxism:

• The Frankfurt School and the War on the West, by Bill Muehlenberg
• The Frankfurt School, Western Subversion by Design, by Smash Cultural Marxism

Mireille Darc, a Role Model for French Women

Mireille Darc was more than a French actress and a household name. I would go as far as describe her as France's sweetheart - and by the same token as the understated embodiment of the French woman inside and out. With a first name that sings the sunny South of France (my mum's name!) and a surname that is a tribute to Joan of Arc, you are off to a good start!

Mireille Darc, the quintessential French woman!

Mireille was a leading actress in her younger days, a valeur sûre: effortless, true to self, a natural. Yet her film portfolio might not be considered consequential by those cinema purists who shun popular modern-day stories and comedies of errors about ordinary life. No superheroes, special effects, Shakespearean tirades or costumed dramas in sight. What interested Mireille was to portray life as it happens, without artifice.

Mireille Darc and Alain Delon: each other's biggest love in life!

A word of caution: to confine Mireille to her movie acting days would be to rob her of her vibrant off-screen personality, philanthropy, grace and kindness, her business acumen, her second career as a successful TV documentary-maker, and her involvement in TV series and theatre roles later in life. The smouldering beauty was also a muse - not least to the love of her life, the incandescent French actor Alain Delon, and a loving second mum to her stepchildren.

On screen and off screen (pict source)

Mireille was driven: a plate-spinner, fingers in many pies lady. Starry-eyed and an award-winning dancer, she left her native Provence at the age of 21 for Paris where she intended to make it. She never looked back!

Unlike many of her contemporaries (Jeanne Moreau, Brigitte Bardot, Claudia Cardinale), Mireille remained timeless, ageless. She kept her slender figure, impeccable dress sense, elegance and positive attitude. Not to mention her fresh face, trademark sleek blonde bob, beautiful gleaming smile and a glint in her eye that made her the endearing mother, sister, best friend and confidante all along. She didn't let age get in her way: who would have guessed she was in her late 70s?! She kept her health problems under wraps, behind close doors, only for the very close few; she wouldn't have allowed it to vanquish her.

Even after splitting up in 1983, those two remained close till the very end! (pict source)

Mireille's legacy is multi-fold: she is a case in point, not only to young actresses but also to women in general. She shows us how to incorporate longevity into a career, stay grounded, focused, true to self, open to opportunities that ring true to us. Follow your heart, love with all your might, stay loyal. Stay strong and do not get mislaid by the deadly temptations of the art world, excesses and burn out. Ironically very few actresses paid their respects to Mireille on her funeral yesterday. Yet the populace was there, crammed outside the gates of the Saint-Sulpice Church in Paris: they didn't let her down! Mireille was one of us and never left us. She lives on in our hearts.

No Future Without a Past

I have been incensed at the sight of the Confederate statues falling prey to the cultural marxist treatment, unceremoniously torn down, either by the local authorities or by private individuals themselves, then kicked about, trampled down and spat on. The proud, serving, dutiful, Confederate soldier and general, mocked, ridiculed, disrespected, by a bunch of savages who oscillate along that very fine line that separates the pro- from the anti-American.

George Washington's Mount Vernon

The culling of the Confederate statues is a historical and architectural auto-da-fé, promulgated under the pretence for equality. Sugar-coat it all you want, it is in no uncertain terms the rewriting of the past. It also indicates that a segment of the American populace still believes the War between North and South was a Civil War fought in the name of freedom for the black slaves. It was no Civil War, buddy, it was a Secession War: the Southern states had formed a confederate of states and expressed their wish to quit the United States, which is legal according to the Constitution. However the North didn't see it that way and anti-constitutionally declared war on the South.

The Confederate soldier statue at Old Durham County Courthouse, NC, was torn down on 14th August.

Back to Summer 2017, clashes and riots have ensued the removal of Confederate statues across the American Old South, feeding the mainstream media's anti-Trump and anti-fascist (?) frenzy at the same time. Anything goes as long as it leaves a trail of destruction of wares and reputations. The obligatory culture of blame, laced with the Soros-funded political correctness/ minority campaigns vs. white male privilege, culminates into high-voltage politicised disarray. Summer of Love, it is not.

I said it loud and clear in the comments section of The Conversation and I will say it loud and clear here:-

A nation that erases its past stands no chance of raising a future, simply because without the past, there is no future. Cleansing a nation of its history is the first step towards dismantling a nation.

The danger is that in “our”* haste to obliterate the past and customise a present that is devoid of certain elements of said past, we end up uprooting ourselves and our identities - all in the name of political correctness. This is exactly what the global agenda ultimately has in mind for us: a rewritten, pared-down historical mish-mash.

Donald J. Trump's Twitter account, 17-Aug-2017

_________

*“Our” is a generalisation I use to describe our redefined, retweaked, society: its redesign purported by the loud Godless liberal left, cultural marxists and nihilists, under the auspices of the mainstream media. A society that destroys its past has no future to look forward to and this is exactly what the leftists/ communists have in mind. A dangerous game is being played here through this history cull. Destroying statues, effigies and other monuments of historical significance: which one will be next, Mount Vernon or Mount Rushmore?



*Last updated 03-February-2018*


P.S:  The Destruction of Beauty, a visual case study of Birmingham's Chamberlain Square, by Architectural Revival.
 

'A nation that does not respect its past does not deserve the respect of the present and has no right to the future.' - Józef Piłsudzki

World Fatigue

I haven't posted an article for over three weeks, yet this blog has been on my mind. It's not that I have been suffering from writer's block because actually there are so many - too many - posts I want to write! It's more a case of having become world-weary. I think it's been progressive but it has crept up over the American presidential election, a fascinating case in point. And then the weariness exacerbated over the French presidential election which, still, I only followed from afar. The glaring reality has been staring at me in the face that the system is rigged on a worldwide scale and reality has been manufactured for us the populace for decades - maybe centuries.

Melania, more than a pretty face... (pict source)

As much as I come across as happy-go-lucky and I am an idealist, I could not allow myself to be sceptical anymore, deny facts that were pointing at a different truth, a truth that the media is portraying as fake, as conspiracist, as anti-constitutional. Pardon my French fries, but... what the duck! NGOs for the most part are a sham, as state missionaries pushing a political agenda. Socialism is NOT for the people. Climate change was brought to us as an evidence by a salesman (Gore) who jets around the world to tell us to be frugal with our car journeys. We are sold one consumed lie after another, that we buy because the media and the governing elites have us believe the thoughts they program into us.

Being a nationalist, a patriot, used to be valued. Today it is derided and mocked and associated with being a racist. Full employment used to be a nation's forte. Not anymore. They took our jobs away, shipped them over to China and replaced them with imported open-border migration. Wealth has been depleted and replaced with communitarianism no-speak lingo. Anything goes. Anything goes as a family these days, as long as it does not resemble a married man-woman couple with two kids. 

Chaos theory is Obama's Bible... (pict source)

What used to be truth is now considered wrong; what used to be wrong is now considered truth. History is being simplified. Once you have no past and can't see the future, and transience has blurred the lines between past, present and future, you find yourself in a permanent present state. You don't know your origins anymore, in fact if you are white and christian, chance is you're a white supremacist. In France, kids spend more time learning about the workings of the EU and the 'goodness' of Agenda 21 in their history classes than they do about Napoléon, Joan of Arc, Clovis or Vercingétorix. Meanwhile stateside, confederate monuments are dismantled to make way for a rewritten history under the political correctness paradigm, the biggest sham of all, that was created in order to silence free speech. If you don't know who you are and where you come from, you have no idea where you're going.

I am weary because I have been writing this blog for almost 8 years and have not even been able to build up a following. God, if I had been writing about push-up bras and the latest stilettoes and my favourite S'Mores, it would be a different story. I'd be monetising through social media and a YouTube channel: Hot or Not, Lancôme's latest highlighter. You bet: what the duck... Sometimes you should just be pretty and shut up.

Papa, Get Well Soon!

As much as I like to keep my personal life private, I still wanted to send a little boost to my dad, via this blog. He needs all the encouragement and positive reinforcement he can muster right now. Maybe you want to send him a kind thought too. My dad's a fighter, he's fought many battles in his life, and he'll pull through this one! I know this in my heart of hearts.

So then, keep fighting, Jojo, you are not alone in this, we are right there with you! DAD, YOU ARE THE BEST! ♥

Write to Your Heart's Content

Who still puts pen to paper nowadays? To those of you nodding a 'Not me', glancing away, or rolling those eyes like I'm out of touch, let it be known: the technological panacea may not apply to our personal communications after all. Time to dust off your stationery pads and replace those dried-out pens. I'm going to show you why this should be done.

Best Wishes from my hometown, via Delcampe

Our handwritten prowesses and the availability of stationery of all styles and denominations (fancy, formal, sober, classical, feminine - you name it), have been seriously put to the test by technological advances that have made it easier and quicker to communicate in our personal affairs the messages, announcements, invitations, RSVPs, thank you notes, letters and the likes. You can even send electronic postcards. Choose a template, tweak it or customise it if you wish to express some form of individuality and creativity, type up a few words and click 'send'.

Here's the catch. Notice how I put 'some form' in italic in the paragraph above. You have no reason to feel smug because no matter the fanciness and advanced level of the graphics, typeface - and/ or interface - the communication will remain purely electronic and robotic. Carrying sentiments in a personnal communication of the sort is doomed to be diluted, lost in the proverbial translation.

Souvenir from my hometown (ibid.)

As much as you try to make it personal and personable, the very essence of the personal touch is missing because the personal finds its perfection in the time, effort and dedication that were put into the making of the letter. This might involve the quirks of the handwritten prose (or poetry for that matter) that makes it uniquely you, the movement of the sentence being carried out by the way you form your characters, and the pauses that make the sentences come alive, breathe. The handwritten carries a letter. The electronic does not. The handwritten makes a letter individual and unique. It is an act of creativity all to itself. The handwritten letter is a one-to-one communication that reflects the commitment of the writer to the recipient. However no matter how much you tweak and customise an electronic file, you will not be able to recreate that individuality, that uniqueness.

Now think about paper, card, envelope, stamp, stick-on embellishments. A letter is physical: it is not just about word content, it involves the type of material it is written on and this too summons feelings: the choice and quality of the paper, its finish, its size and colour, the way it was folded, how the pen glided upon it - or maybe scratched it. How the ink got absorbed into the paper, the blots, the smears, the marks, the fades, the imperfections... Now look at the paper, touch and feel it. What's its condition? Is it soft, delicate, flimsy, thin, thick, embossed, filigreed, crinkled, aged? Does it feel ordinary? Expensive? What is the handwriting like? Neat, perky, flourished, eccentric, messy, illegible, tired? How about the spelling? There is no doubt that a letter carries a lot of meaning. It has more to say than words themselves. It is clear that a letter comes alive when it is handwritten.

ibid.

I remember vividly to this day how during my very first job in a small translation office in England, I used to sneakily type up a letter to my grandma on my fancy Mac computer whenever I had some 'free time' at work. I would then mail the letter to her that very same evening. However what I was doing by means of efficiency, expediency and practicality while genuinely aiming for a letter to my grandma, she would sadly feel that efficiency, expediency and practicality of mine when she opened my letter, and that kind of killed the spirit and purpose of my letters to her. My good intentions were a mixed bag, maybe because as a keen and yet traditional letter-writer, she held the belief that unless handwritten, a letter shall never claim to be that personal and committed.

I agree that a personal letter takes time to write and you have to be in the mood to do it. Yet if you consider it a time-consuming piece of work (a chore even), and look at ways to devise it with efficiency, expediency and practicality in mind, maybe you should reconsider sending that letter at all - or opt for a less ambitious communication: a postcard.

ibid.

No matter what, I believe in rekindling the habit of letter/ card writing. I started the year by sending out a few pretty cards to some family members who I had lost touch with, and to Marie L., a 98-year-old lady friend of my grandma's who I have been visiting lately, wishing them a Happy New Year, enquiring about them and updating them on some personal news. That is a way to show you genuinely care and it will give them - and you - a boost!

Five Mantras to Live Your Life By

Life is a bed of roses: beautiful and spiky, delightful and prickly. It throws fireballs at us and teaches us lessons along the way. Up to us to receive the teaching as a learning, or else, repeat mistakes and errors of judgement and go down the wrong path, sabotaging chances. However eventually most of us will mature and develop wisdom through the proverbial school of life (a.k.a. life experience) or school of hard knocks - when life rocks the boat senseless and tests you hard.

Wisdom makes life and lifestages easier to handle and puts things into perspective thanks to the tools we develop (thought process, repartee, extrapolation, problem solving etc.), and the methods we learn - by hook or by crook - on how to deal with new situations, setbacks and adversity under all their manifestations: stress, fear, loss, grief, pain, conflict, etc.

Along the years, I've got into a habit of collating quotes and other pearls of wisdom which resonate with me most, into a Word document. Whenever I feel a little low and in search of a boost or a little guidance - or just for the pleasure of words themselves - I open the file and reach out for them.

My Pinterest board, Unrequited ♥ Love, is an extension of that file, as a collection of quotes and metaphors from prominent artists, authors, thinkers, politicians, as well as from personalities away from the public eye. You may want to refer to my board for further inspo.

Right now, check out my five steadies for a little positive reinforcement

Reasons to Heart January

There are indeed reasons to be cheerful in January! It shouldn't be dreaded or perceived as the anti-climactic month of the year - especially as it starts on a high note! Ringing in the New Year and its joyful countdown shouldn't turn into a hapless comedown. If you need a little convincing, then this post is for you.

Sitting on top of the world! Europe from space, photography by ESA astronaut Tim Peake, via Twitter

I heart January for many simple reasons. Here's ten of them, at the top of my head:
 

• The year (habitually) starts on a high note as a festive celebration. Keep it up! Don't get yourself sucked into the bad vibes of the fatalist and the disenchanted.
• Treat the new year as a blank canvas for your projects, ideas. A new start of sorts. Visualise that joy you felt at midnight and turn it into an impetus to get started on a project. It could be anything from rewriting your resume, to turning your balcony into an herb garden, to researching an author or a discipline.
• In the northern hemisphere, days have been getting longer since the end of December, bonus! This makes Winter less drab! If you live in the southern hemisphere, fret not! The Summer there has only just started so there are still many days of good sunny weather to look forward to!
•  Be kind to yourself and don't go overboard with resolutions: keep them few, simple and achievable.
• If you need a little retail encouragement, you have Valentine's Day, Easter, Mother's Day and other landmark celebrations to look forward to, if only in terms of their window-dressing quality and the cutesy presents. Spending cash is optional when you do window-shopping!
• Reconnect with family or friends who you are not in regular contact with. In France we have les Voeux (New Year wishes) tradition, whereby we send cards or give phonecalls to people within our circles especially to wish them a Happy New Year and catch up on the news at the same time.
• Have a couple of appointments to look forward to in January, like a visit to the hairdresser (with a new hairstyle or hair colour to boot), or starting a new class or hobby.
• Go out there and enjoy nature and witness it getting ready for Spring: buds and birds! Even if you live in town, you will still be able to catch glimpses of it in your daily endeavours or by nipping down to your local park.
• Slip into a new healthy lifestyle regimen to shed those extra pounds and feel more energetic. And if you are in the cleansing mode, you may even consider a pre-Spring clean round the home or catch up with any overdue paperwork. Addressing procrastination may not sound like fun but the quicker you get round to it, the more time you will have to enjoy the rest of the year!
• Yet most of all, you should just enjoy life because life goes at the speed of light and before you know it, youth will have morphed into middle age and middle age will have morphed into retirement age... You should simply be grateful for what you have and put things into perspective. Life could be better but life could also be worse. Life is a gift and the start of a New Year is an extra validation of life. It is so good to be alive and this is the number one reason for being cheerful, my friend!

Galapagos Islands, photography by ESA astronaut Thomas Pesquet, via Flickr

God is in Your Corner

My last post of 2016 ties in with my customary yearly pep talk. We are slightly ahead of schedule here but it is a fitting moment as 2016 closes on yet another star shooting off the earth for the firmament of the afterlife: talented singer and songwriter Mr. George Michael.

George Michael, a star with human foibles. (Pict source)

The man who gave us a Christmas anthem that has been played on an endless loop (at least in Britain) in stores and pubs in the run-up to Christmas since its release over 30 years ago, died on Christmas day - alone. On the very day he had immortalised in a song that had office Christmas parties karaoke together, family members embrace one another and friends drunkenly hug in a festive embrace. The man whose song had brought people together, had faced the music of his own for many years now. The troubles in his personal life had made it clear that an unsatisfied yearning was burning him alive.

George died, alone. An ultimate and seemingly untimely irony played out in the seclusion of his postcard-perfect English cottage tucked away in rural Oxfordshire, a stone's throw away from the local church whose Christmas mass he religiously used to attend yearly - except for this year.

Home sweet home in Goring-On-Thames (Pict source)

Artists live out in the public eye - or within its periphery - the existential fears that keep some of us awake at night. Such fears exemplify why and how the quest for happiness shall not be found in fame and fortune for the latter exacerbate the loneliness that lies deep within us.

Artists and creators of George's calibre realise pretty early on in life that there is more to life than what is and that somehow we are living a lie, and artists cater for that lie. Artists burn because they put their heart and soul on the line, and this whether they ultimately become stars in their own right or not. Maybe there is no such thing as 'making it' when you are an artist, aside from achieving riches and fame, as you live head on with your innermost fears and unanswered questions. Maybe the key to contentment as an artist is about coming to terms with a blessing - or an illusion, depending how you look at it - realised for both the public and the artist.

The public, the fans, are there to witness the light live on or the sparkle fade because as much as we are fascinated with stars in the limelight, we are as fascinated - if not more so - when they face their human foibles (under all their guises and manifestations) head on in the limelight, and deal with them or fade away with them.

(Pict source)

Maybe the clue to George's personal demise may be found within the lyrics of his Christmas song because entertainment has ways to code in messages to those who care to hold God and highest wisdom in their hearts:

"Last Christmas, I gave you my heart
But the very next day, you gave it away
This year, to save me from tears
I'll give it to someone special"

Above all, being a talented artist like George is to have been bestowed Godlike qualities. And when God is in your corner, you are not alone. You are on your way to the next level. Look up the sky: if you are attentive, you may see George on his next journey.
 

P.S: I borrowed this post title from rapper DMX's words of wisdom to troubled artist Kanye West four weeks ago:

"I want to give a special shout out to Kanye. Let him know that my prayers are with him. My family’s prayers are with him. Remind him that when God is for you, who can be against you? No one or nothing. Stand strong, brother. God is in your corner."

Frank Sinatra's open letter to 'the reluctant pop star'

Pokémon Kids of Aleppo

I have non-PC questions for the mainstream media (MSM). Those people in the news being the people in the know, they should have all the answers. They've certainly had it clear cut to us for over 18 months now that Bashar al-Assad's regime must go.

Moustafa Jano Janographic

I am not disputing any of the atrocities going on - far from it. What's been unclear from the MSM though is how a one-time ally of the West, educated, learned, progressive, secular, westernised and praised by us, and seemingly on the same page as us, suddenly be pilloried... by us? Why must a country seemingly in working order, stable and prosperous to an extent, be pillaged, bombed and brought to its knees? How shall a leader whose wife, Asma al-Assad, once graced the pages of Vogue - the crème of the Establishment appreciation society, let us note - now be despised and ridiculed by said Establishment, and their country torn apart in some bizarre re-enactment of Bush's war on terror? Re-enactment as merely an extension of the on-going war on terror, fledged to any nation that is not compliant with a global agenda of some sort.

Since the MSM won't respond to me, I will have more chance of an answer from Pokémon as he quietly, compassionately sits by the side of those poor little kids caught in the frailty of life brought upon them by the globalists, shedding his digital tear to a reality that couldn't be more acutely real than the pain and suffering those little kids and babies are going through.

Moustafa Jano Janographic

By any twist of fate, is this misery being plagued upon Syria because Bashar is not singing from the same hymn sheet as those other Middle East nations that too were once prosperous, or at least on their way to modern civilisation, before being severely retrograded back to civil war chaos and theocratic regimes, like Iran, Irak, Libya, or Egypt, for the benefit of Big Oil and the global financial elite who would rather have ideologically-bankrupt rebels unleashed (ISIS)  and puppet tyrants run countries to the ground as a diversion, while crude oil carries on being pumped out and pipelined across lands and seas like poisoned blood running through diseased vessels, forwarded onwards to feed the goo to the consumerist paradigm, lining the pockets of the self-appointed rulers of this planet, namely a clique of control-crazed high-ranking financiers. Is that the reason?

Is this not a (faintly-veiled) religious war by the same token, the meticulous genocide of Christians and other minorities from ancient stock, an ethnic cleansing of sorts, that is raising no eyebrows from DC or the Vatican? Is this not part of a bigger picture, a wider roadmap, a blueprint for George Soros's open border societies, with hundreds of thousands of unvetted, undocumented, unrecorded refugees, mostly Islamist, pouring into the West, as a manufactured side effect of the war in Syria, killing two birds with one stone by redesigning both the Middle East and the Occident? History is being rewritten in real time before our very eyes, and the plot eludes us somehow because the rules have been changed. All I know is this is no Pokémon Go adventure!

Via The Daily Express

As if the web of deceit were not mucky enough for us to paddle through, things go bump on us, like the habitual James Bond villains that the financiers love to throw our way, engineering a second Cold War in the process. This time around, we are left wondering who the communists are - and it ain't Mother Russia.

In this day and age where freedom of speech is becoming a rare commodity, it is our duty to use it to bring ourselves to our senses and those around us. Use our freedom of choice to question and find out more, rather than lamely accept the MSM narrative.

World peace, the UN way, by Moustafa Jano Janographic

P.S: Should you be caught up - and stuck - in the illusion, be aware that Barack Obama is planning to surrender the U.S. control of Internet registration, privatising the DNS (Domain Name System) by handing it over to the ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers), a California-based non-profit organisation, on 1st October 2016, putting our civil liberties under tighter global scrutiny in the longer term.

P.P.S (Update 01-October-2016): You will find more information about Syria - that the MSM won't tell you about - from 21st Century Wire. The tragic Syrian situation is to be blamed on 'a neoconservative agenda promoted by NATO-funded NGOs', according to 21st Century Wire reporter Vanessa Beeley. I have every reason to believe it.

"These NGOs paint the destruction of the historic city [of Aleppo] as being caused by the Syrian government under Bashar Assad, not the violent armed insurgents which receive arms, funding and training from Western governments and their allies." - Vanessa Beeley

Via Vanessa Beeley, 04-Sept-2016

Find out more about the Syrian crisis from 21st Century Wire, MintPress News, SANA and SyrianGirlpartisan.

Mankind, The Unkind

2016 might be the Year of the Monkey according to the Chinese astrological calendar, there is still a lot of monkey business going on - out of sight, out of mind - that is making life for our smart cousins, the Primates, Hell. The one positive is that the astrological year has brought the monkey plea to the fore of the wildlife conservation agenda. Meanwhile a picture like this one is almost impossible to look at! It summons anger, resentment and powerlessness in me, and you are bound to feel the same:

PETA

This innocent little monkey sat forlornly in a padlocked cage, has likely been snatched out of his wild habitat by unscrupulous wildlife dealers, and this reality signs up the very downfall of Mankind: our flawed propensity for control of the natural environment, stealing it and locking it away, and our self-serving endeavours that put Man in the centre of the equation, using wildlife as a resource to meet our needs: entertainment (zoos, circuses and exotic pet trade), fashion (fur), medical science (testing labs), not to mention sustenance (meat) and sport (trophy hunting, poaching).

The 'Man' part of the noun 'Mankind' has the propensity to be the 'Kind' part that it is attached to. Kind to themselves, others, animals and the world at large. We truly have this kindness in us. We have a good heart at heart. Then a flurry of externals come to play, notwithstanding our lifestyle choices that command implicitly or complicitly the unrelenting attack on the natural environment. Here is the catch though: all is interrelated within the macrocosm and microcosm of life:

"Man has little chance to stop being a torturer for man so long as he will continue to practice on the animal his job as executioner." - Marguerite Yourcenar

P.S: You can do your bit! Help monkeys by hurting a bottom line, that of Air France, which is one of the last major airlines in the world to still transport primates to labs and other dens of death! Sign PETA's petition and boycott Air France until they stop being a shameful part of the deadly trade!

P.P.S:  Be a savvy consumer! PETA has issued a comprehensive database on cruelty-free companies.