Saturday, March 24, 2007

To confess or not to confess

On this week's episode of Grey's Anatomy there's a betrayal. It involved a bottle of bourbon and sex. Lots of sex. Lots of great adulterous sex. They didn't see it coming. It's not like they planned it to happen. But it did, and it was a mistake. People. makes. mistake.

Then there's this question about what to do next. As Christina put it some weeks ago, when we betray each other, the path to recovery is less clear. Should you confess and hurting the one person who is always encouranging, believing and supporting you? Can you justified clearing your conscience at somebody's expense by confessing? Should you just confess and bear the consequences?

Or should you just keep it a secret and live with it? After all, ignorance is bliss.

Seriously, maybe you need to ask some advice from someone who have been touched by evil or whatever, as you are and make it back alive. Maybe from their story you can find your way to deal with your mistake.

The thing is, secret kills intimacy. You need to share important information with the one you want to connect on a deeper level. Of course there is a chance that that person will reject you, but at least you know if he sticks around he accepts you as you are. Damaged, flawed, and all.

So, what would you have done, to confess or not to confess?

Monday, March 12, 2007

Fable of the bees

Their Kings were serv'd; but Knavishly
Cheated by their own Ministry;
Many, that for their Welfare slaved,
Robbing the very Crown they saved:
Pensions were small, and they lived high,
Yet boasted of their Honesty.
-Bernard Mandeville

Nina and I were at Boijmans Museum last year discussing about the poem on the wall which was part of an installation. It was a very old poem titled 'Fable of the Bees: or, Private Vices, Publick Benefits' by a Rotterdammer physician/philosopher/political economist, Bernard Mandeville. He wrote it in 1714 as a political satire of England at the time, in which he concluded: vice as a necessary condition for economic prosperity.

Do you see any parallel between modern day Indonesia and Mandeville's 18th century England?

Friday, March 02, 2007

My 15 minutes?

"In the future everyone will be famous for fifteen minutes."
Andy Warhol
A couple of days ago, I was minding my own business when an SMS from U came. 'There's your picture in the "museum night" brochure'. I bursted to laugh. (Boy, I need to laugh these days. Thank you, U) He must be joking, I thought. What picture in what brochure?

Then, it hit me. This guy took some pictures of Nina and me at Boijmans museum last year. Good pictures. He said it's for the organization of the event and he's going to send us our pictures via email. He never did. Both Nina and I were complaining that we didn't ask for his email, because we want those pictures.

I called U, but he was travelling under the ground so the connection was lousy. Then he called me back telling me had he known that I was in the brochure, he would have taken extra for me. He teased that I should do modelling instead. Little did he know, this is not the first time that it happened to me in Low land. Too bad no body paying me for it. :)

The next day I got the brochure U talked about. And there it is... apparently I have more luck appearing in Dutch print media then in Indonesian one ;)