Tiergarten
is well-described on Wikipedia at this link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gro%C3%9Fer_Tiergarten, so I won’t include much more in
the way of descriptions in this post. I am posting some photos I took in the
garden. The day we were there was a hot sweltering summer day, and the sunlight
was very strong. The photos have an unusual, almost shimmering look to them—you
know it’s summertime when you take a close look at them. But the heat wasn’t unbearable,
and it was in fact nice to walk in the shadows of the many trees in the garden.
Friday, July 13, 2012
Tiergarten in Berlin
Tiergarten, a large public park in Berlin, is translated as ’animal garden’ because it
was originally designed as a hunting area for the king in the 1500s. At present, it is a lovely urban park for the
citizens of Berlin, and about the only (visible) animals that frequent the park
are rabbits. In fact, there are so many rabbits (and apparently they are so
destructive to the flower gardens in the park) that several of the park’s small
gardens are closed off with barriers to both the public and the rabbits. When we were walking
around in Tiergarten recently, I noticed mounds of earth here and there, and
wondered what they were. Now I know. Rabbits are energetic little creatures,
God love them, but their activities are destructive to flower and vegetable gardens.
I wonder if the barriers do manage to keep the rabbits out. The flower gardens
appeared to be in good shape, so perhaps the barriers are working. But for how long?
Monday, July 9, 2012
Monday morning in Oslo
Update on the weather—about the same as it’s
been the past few days. Raining today; it rained yesterday (although it cleared
up nicely last evening—long enough for me to get in a bike ride), and it rained
a bit on Saturday as well. But we enjoyed two restaurant visits in spite of the
weather, sitting indoors of course—on Friday evening at Mucho Mas for excellent
Mexican food, and on Saturday evening we found our way to Jonoe at Ringnes Park
for some excellent sushi. We’re on vacation now for the next four weeks, so it’s
only to pray for some nice weather. I hope whoever created the Higgs boson is
listening to our prayers!!
I saw an article today in Britain’s
newspaper The Guardian, that the weather in England isn’t much better than
here. Rain, and lots of it. And more to come. That’s what’s predicted for Oslo
this week. So I guess I better tackle my indoor projects that are waiting for
me. No time like the present! Still working on my photo and writing projects,
so I guess I won’t complain (too much) about the weather. I’ve sorted through
my recent photos and organized them. I’ve created a few photo blog posts and
written a few posts for my other blogs. The house is in order, household tasks are
mostly done, and now I can read and write to my heart’s content.
The USA is experiencing one of the worst
heat waves on record, with temperatures over 100 degrees Fahrenheit. I can attest to that, as I grew up in New York, and I can
only remember one or two summers in my growing up when the temperatures even
approached 100 degrees Fahrenheit (about 38 degrees Celsius) or went slightly
over that temperature. New York summers were always warm and humid though, and
it was nice to come inside to an air-conditioned home or office to cool down. Or
perhaps we ran through someone’s sprinkler to cool down; I remember doing this
often as a child. There were always some homeowners who were watering their
lawns and who didn’t mind that we ran through their sprinklers. I remember some
wicked New York thunderstorms, with intense thunder and a lot of lightning,
followed by torrential rains. And then, the storm was over and the sun came out
and life went back to summer normal. But when I talk to family and friends now
about the weather in New York, many of them say it’s nothing like it was when
we were young. So I have to conclude that either we all have collectively bad
memories, or that weather patterns have definitely changed. Whether the changes
are natural or the result of global warming, I cannot say. But I can also say
that summers in Oslo are not like they were in the early 1990s when I first
moved here, so I really do believe that weather patterns are changing. I can
remember longer periods with sunshine in June and July in Oslo, where it was
possible to go out on the boat without being drenched by a sudden rainstorm. It’s
harder to trust that there will be stable weather now, anywhere.
Sunday, July 8, 2012
Friday, July 6, 2012
Berlin's East Side Gallery
I mentioned in my last post that I would be posting some photos of Berlin's East Side Gallery, which is a 1.3 km long section of the Berlin Wall that consists of 105 paintings by artists from all over the world. All of the paintings are unique and beautiful in their own way, so the fact that I have chosen ten of them in no way suggests that these were the best. But they were ten paintings that have a dramatic flair about them, many of them are colorful, and they get their message across very clearly.
If you are in Berlin, visit this wonderful outdoor gallery. As I wrote previously, it has to be experienced in person in order to get the full effect of the immensity of what the wall represented and what the fall of the wall opened up. I normally copyright my photos, but have not done so this time, as these paintings are not mine. They belong to the world, and it was a privilege to experience them.
If you are in Berlin, visit this wonderful outdoor gallery. As I wrote previously, it has to be experienced in person in order to get the full effect of the immensity of what the wall represented and what the fall of the wall opened up. I normally copyright my photos, but have not done so this time, as these paintings are not mine. They belong to the world, and it was a privilege to experience them.
Monday, July 2, 2012
Sunday evening in Berlin
11 pm in
Berlin—sitting in our room at the Hotel Palace Berlin and listening to
the celebrations in the streets outside—cars honking and people cheering. Spain
just won the UEFA soccer cup; they beat Italy 4-0. The other night it was the
Italians cheering in the streets after having beaten Germany. Now midnight, and
the celebrations continue…….
Dinner
tonight was pasta at a restaurant called Noah’s, where our friendly waiter,
after noticing that I had finished a particularly spicy penne all’ arrabbiata
dish, commented that I had done a ‘good job’ since I had finished it despite
its numbing effects on my lips and tongue. It was very good, even though it was
probably the hottest version of this dish that I have ever consumed. Sat
outdoors and just breathed in the scent of the linden trees, and enjoyed the
warmth of the summer evening.
Spent some
time sorting through all my photos of Berlin and Leipzig (about eight hundred
or so). What would we do without digital cameras these days? I cannot even
remember what it was like to use film, although I do remember some trips in the
1990s when I took a few hundred photos using film. Many of my photos of Berlin
this week came out really well, especially photos of the East Side Gallery—a
1.3 km long section of the Berlin Wall that consists of 105 paintings by
artists from all over the world; it is located on Mühlenstraße in the Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg
district. It has to be experienced—the paintings are incredible. I’ll be
posting some photos from this exhibit shortly.
Reflecting
on our stay here in Berlin. We’ve done the Berlin Wall walking tour; what
struck me was how this part of history was also a part of my generation—we grew
up hearing about the Berlin Wall and reading newspaper articles about the
misery associated with its existence, and then experiencing the fall of the
wall in 1989. Visiting the Chapel of Reconciliation was particularly moving;
this chapel was built on the site of the old Church of Reconciliation
(Versöhnungskirche) on Bernauer Straße in the Mitte district of Berlin. The
chapel had a black-and-white photo exhibition until the end of June (we caught
it just in time) called Mauerkinder (translation ‘Wall Children’) by Thomas
Hoepker, which was emotionally-wrenching to see, mostly because the children,
photographed during the early 1960s, seemed so unaware of what horrors were
going on around them--innocents in a world that had become hell.
Thinking
about the sparrows that are in abundance in this city; like sparrows
everywhere, they are nearly tame, and will take a piece of bread right out of
your fingers. We watched a number of them help themselves to one young man’s French
fries while we sat eating our hamburgers at Burger King. Then there was the caged
crow at the Berlin Zoo, who ‘talked’ to me while we stood there and watched
him, and who followed me in his cage as I walked away, cawing loudly. It’s tough
to see birds and animals in cages; I have mixed feelings about zoos, more so
now that I am older. You wish for them what you would wish for yourself—the freedom
to live an unfettered life. I know it’s not always possible, and yet, it’s
still a wish. A wish for animals and birds, and a wish for mankind too,
especially for those individuals who suffer at the hands of dictators and totalitarian regimes.
Thursday, June 28, 2012
A New Yorker in Germany
This week I
am A New Yorker in Germany. After
many years of driving through Germany on the way to visit and vacation in other
European countries, I decided it was time to explore Germany. As luck would
have it, the International Society for Advancement of Cytometry (ISAC) CYTO 2012 conference (http://cytoconference.org/CYTO/pages/default.aspx) took place in Leipzig, Germany this
past week, and my husband and I were in attendance, along with some of our
Norwegian colleagues. What is always nice for me about these particular international
conferences is that I end up meeting American colleagues from the different
places where I have previously worked—Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center
and the University of California at San Francisco. This time around was no
exception—it was a pleasure to catch up with earlier colleagues like Zbigniew, Bill,
and Claudia. The ISAC conferences are special for me, because it was at one of
them, in Cambridge, England, that I met my husband for the first time, and for
the second time when the annual conference was held in Breckenridge, Colorado.
After that, we became a couple and have since attended many other such
conferences together. The society has evolved through the years to meet the
changing needs of its members, but remains at its core a flow cytometry society,
although it now embraces image cytometry and mass spectroscopy as it moves into
the future.
As a pre-teen and teenager, I had a pen pal in New Zealand, by the name of Lillian. We wrote to each
other from the time we were twelve years old until we were about sixteen, at
which point the letters stopped. But I had learned a lot about New Zealand and her
about the USA during that time. When I last heard from her, she had decided to
take a job working on the New Zealand railroad. I still treasure the small gifts I
received from her—volcanic sand and a hei-tiki necklace (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hei-tiki). I was reminded of her this past week because
I had the pleasure of talking to a new conference attendee from New Zealand by
the name of Kylie—it was a pleasure to meet her. Meeting her reminded me of
what these conferences are really all about—encountering new people and forming
new networks and connections. But it was our conversation about New Zealand
films and also about how the New Zealand government has worked hard to
integrate the Māori people, that I remember most. I want to find some of the films
she mentioned, and to read a bit more about New Zealand society generally.
It is true
what the Dalai Lama says— ‘Once a year, go someplace you’ve never been before’.
Because you never know who you’re going to meet, or what kind of experiences
you’ll walk away with. This by itself—the excitement of unwrapping the unknown—is
worth the time it takes to travel to new places. It doesn’t matter if the
purpose of the trip is business or vacation. It is about staying open to the
world around us. I’ll be writing more about Germany in coming posts. I’m happy
we finally decided to spend some time here. From what I’ve seen so far, it is a
fascinating country of contrasts.
Tuesday, June 19, 2012
Norwegian Wood festival website and Facebook site
For those of you who want to know more about the Norwegian Wood four-day music festival that takes place in Oslo each year in June, you can find information on their website: http://www.norwegianwood.no/
They are also on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/pages/NORWEGIAN-WOOD-FESTIVALEN/115503931808030
Check these sites out. Each year there are a lot of good bands and artists that make their way to Frogner Bad in Oslo's Frogner Park. You can read about who has performed at this festival previously on the website.
They are also on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/pages/NORWEGIAN-WOOD-FESTIVALEN/115503931808030
Check these sites out. Each year there are a lot of good bands and artists that make their way to Frogner Bad in Oslo's Frogner Park. You can read about who has performed at this festival previously on the website.
Monday, June 18, 2012
Sting and The Hounds of Winter at Norwegian Wood 2012
I had the pleasure of hearing Sting last night at a packed Norwegian Wood. I got hooked on The Police songs very early, but never got to hear the band live. So it was good to finally get to hear Sting. This was his playlist last night:
·
All this time
·
Every little thing she does is magic
·
Englishman in New York
·
Seven days
·
Demolition man
·
I hung my head
·
Driven to tears
·
Fields of gold
·
Message in a bottle
·
Synchronicity
·
Shape of my heart
·
Love is stronger than justice (The munificent
seven)
·
The hounds of winter
·
The end of the game
·
Never coming home
·
Desert rose
·
King of pain
·
Every breath you take
·
Next to you
He did a great version of ‘The Hounds of Winter’. My God,
what a fantastic song—beautiful haunting lyrics and melody. The background
vocals last night were done by a young woman who had an incredible voice—her
voice sent chills down my spine. Lovely. I’m including the lyrics to the song here (pure poetry),
along with aYouTube video of the song above.
The Hounds Of Winter by Sting
Mercury falling
I rise from my bed,
Collect my thoughts together
I have to hold my head
It seems that she's gone
And somehow I am pinned by
The Hounds of Winter
Howling in the wind
I walk through the day
My coat around my ears
I look for my companion
I have to dry my tears
It seems that she's gone
Leaving me too soon
I'm as dark as December
I'm as cold as the Man in the Moon
I still see her face
As beautiful as day
It's easy to remember
Remember my love that way
All I hear is that lonesome sound
The Hounds of Winter
They follow me down
I can't make up the fire
The way that she could
I spend all my days
In the search for dry wood
Board all the windows and close the front door
I can't believe she won't be here anymore
I still see her face
As beautiful as day
It's easy to remember
Remember my love that way
All I hear is that lonesome sound
The Hounds of Winter
They follow me down
A season for joy
A season for sorrow
Where she's gone
I will surely, surely follow
She brightened my day
She warmed the coldest night
The Hounds of Winter
They got me in their sights
I still see her face
As beautiful as day
It's easy to remember
Remember my love that way
All I hear is that lonesome sound
The Hounds of Winter
They harry me down
Sunday, June 17, 2012
How NOT to win friends and influence people, part 2
I got to
thinking about the different behaviors I experience in the space of a day, and
about the effects they have on me. I am the recipient of both good and bad
behavior. What I know for sure is that bad behavior—mean, sarcastic, insulting,
passive-aggressive, psychologically-abusive behavior---has the following effect
on me. I seek out specific parts of my brain and heart that will allow me to
ignore the person(s) in question. That will allow me to look at them while they
are behaving badly and ‘be’ another place in my head and heart—a peaceful,
calm, relaxing, spiritual place. One that is far away from the person(s) in
question. It works. You just have to know how to go into yourself to find it.
And I promise you that it creates exactly the effect you’re hoping for—the person(s)
behaving badly get annoyed and go away. It is so important to keep your cool
when such person(s) go on the attack. If they cannot reach you, cannot knock you
off your center, they go looking for other potential victims to dump on. And
that is what they want to do—dump on you, no doubts about that. They are so
unhappy inside that they want to share their misery with others. The old
saying, ‘misery loves company’, is still alive and well in 2012. It takes many
forms, but anyone who has experienced a ‘dumper’ knows exactly what I’m talking
about.
But think
about what bad behavior creates in a society made up of individuals, some of
whom respond to bad behavior like I do. Enough of it, and you end up with
people who turn away from leaders, politicians, authority figures—who decide
for themselves how they’re going to respond, how they’re going to live each
day, what they’re going to let in and what they’re going to shut out. They also
decide who they’re going to listen to and who deserves their loyalty. In other words, they cannot be easily
controlled or brainwashed. So in one sense, you could argue that bad behavior
creates independent individuals in some cases, at least in the cases of those
individuals who have the societal freedom to respond as they wish. I don’t know
what it would be like to live in a totalitarian regime, where any untoward
response could be met with punishment and/or prison. I can only speculate about
what could happen in a free society, like the one I live in. It still surprises
me that intelligent people in leadership positions behave badly, that they dump
on others (out of insecurity or their own misery?), that they blame others for
their shortcomings, and that they cannot offer praise or a gentle spirit
instead of criticism and a harassing nature. It’s nice to know that I can
remove myself from their misery-loaded situations, instead of responding as
they wish, which is to enmesh myself in their soap opera dramas.
Saturday, June 16, 2012
How NOT to win friends and influence people
My
apologies to Dale Carnegie who wrote the book How to Win Friends and Influence People, a motivational book that
was published in 1936 and which is still immensely popular all these years
later. I simply had to comment on some of the leader behaviors that I have been witness to this past month in my workplace, which never cease to amaze me (or others I discuss them with). I’m
not the target of these particular behaviors; other colleagues are the unlucky ones for
the time being.
How would
you like to be at this kind of meeting, one that I recently attended as an observer, where a manager spent most of the time negatively comparing his employees to a new stellar employee? And when these employees attempted to object, as some of them did, they were told that they are mediocre (in
Norwegian—‘middelmådige) workers at best, and that mostly what they do is sit
on their butts and keep their jobs warm (in Norwegian—‘å ruge på sin stilling’, much like a bird would do sitting on its nest to keep the eggs warm).
It’s an interesting development, and it amazes me yet again that leaders in
any workplace, in 2012, have not yet understood that insults, sarcasm and passive-aggression
don’t win them friends, nor do they motivate the employees who are the targets
of this behavior. The targets seem to have decided to mount a counter-offense,
which has led to conflict between them and the leader(s) in question. And
who knows where it will all end? I am a spectator at present and will likely
remain so, unless I get forcibly dragged into the fray. Perhaps all of this is a test to separate the wheat from the chaff, or to get the perceived 'lazy' employees to quit. A management strategy to get rid of dead weight. Who can really know?
I find this
type of behavior so unprofessional and childish. I will allow for the following: that leaders can think what they want to think about
their employees, for example, that they are lazy and unproductive, but that they
should NEVER voice such opinions publicly in a meeting format, in front of
these employees’ colleagues, as was the case here. I was witness to what
occurred, as were several of my colleagues. None of us liked this behavior. We ended up at a loss for words--blindsided--in other words, taken aback by it, so that it is difficult to mount a response. These are the types of discussions
that are best conducted behind closed doors, between the employees in question and
their bosses. But this doesn’t happen in my workplace. Rather, everyone should
know what the leaders think about the employees in question—a modern form for
putting folks in the public stocks and letting them stand on display for all to mock.
I really do believe that some leaders think this type of behavior will light
fires under the butts of the employees they think are lazy and unmotivated. That treating them negatively will create a positive result. I know that it will not. How do I know
this? Because I have had the privilege and responsibility of mentoring a good number of PhD and
Master’s students during the past ten years, and motivating them to do a good
job NEVER involved insulting them or degrading them publicly. I am happy to
report that I have not treated any of them badly. Ever. The result being that
they voice their satisfaction with my mentoring, guidance, help and advice. I
can attest to the fact that being nice and caring about their development and
progress yield results. It also creates self-confidence where there might not
have been much at the start point. Helping people to believe in themselves—their
talents and gifts—is a gift in and of itself, a gift that creates personal and
spiritual growth in the persons who practice this. I think this is common sense, but I'm wondering if perhaps some of these leaders need to find Dale Carnegie's book on their desks come Christmas time.
Friday, June 8, 2012
Rules for Living, from the Dalai Lama
1. Take
into account that great love and great achievements involve great risk.
2. When
you lose, don’t lose the lesson.
3.
Follow the three Rs: Respect for self; Respect for others; Responsibility for
all your actions.
4. Remember that not getting what you want is
sometimes a wonderful stroke of luck.
5. Learn
the rules so you know how to break them properly.
6. Don’t
let a little dispute injure a great friendship.
7. When
you realize you’ve made a mistake, take immediate steps to correct it.
8. Spend
some time alone every day.
9. Open
your arms to change, but don’t let go of your values.
10.
Remember that silence is sometimes the best answer.
11. Live
a good, honorable life. Then when you get older and think back, you’ll be able
to enjoy it a second time.
12. A
loving atmosphere in your home is the foundation for your life.
13. In
disagreements with loved ones, deal only with the current situation. Don’t
bring up the past.
14.
Share your knowledge. It’s a way to achieve immortality.
15. Be
gentle with the earth.
16. Once a year, go someplace you’ve never been
before.
17.
Remember that the best relationship is one in which your love for each other
exceeds your need for each other.
18.
Judge your success by what you had to give up in order to get it.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
One of my good friends has these rules hung up on a wall in her apartment; she reads them everyday. I think that's a great idea. I've read through them more than once and each time I find something else that strikes me as important when I reflect on them. There is much wisdom in them.
Thursday, June 7, 2012
Saying goodbye to Ray Bradbury: Your books live on.
I have previously written about some of my favorite authors
and books, both this year (February 8th) and last year (August 30th).
I included sci-fi writer Ray Bradbury as one of my favorite authors and The
Martian Chronicles, Something Wicked This Way Comes, Fahrenheit 451, Dandelion
Wine, and The Illustrated Man as some of my
favorite books. I think when I read The
Martian Chronicles for the first time, I got hooked. Just plain hooked.
Hooked on a genre of writing that drew me in and kept me engrossed for much of
my life thus far. I couldn’t have been more than twelve or thirteen years old
when I first read The Martian Chronicles.
Even at that age I understood that we might not be alone in the universe. And
even though there may not be Martians on Mars, Bradbury’s book was a
fascinating entry into a world that has never stopped intriguing me. We wonder
about what is out there in space, and we imagine all sorts of alien creatures
and humanoids. In The Martian Chronicles,
we as humans did not expect to be met by creatures who could read our minds in
an effort to make us ‘feel at home’, only to turn on us in the darkness. The Martians
we met on Mars looked like us—family and friends from home—and the travelers
from earth, who missed home, were easily led down that path.
I wrote a post
about The Martian Chronicles and Solaris on June 21st, 2011.
In honor of Ray Bradbury, who passed away on June 5th at the age of
91, I am including part of this post today, the part that has to do with The Martian Chronicles. Rest in peace,
Ray Bradbury and thank you for your wonderful books. For those of you who have
never picked up his books, now is the time to do so.
-------------------------------
(Excerpted from my post The Martian Chronicles and Solaris
from June 21st, 2011):
I have
been a fan of science fiction since I was a teenager, probably from the time I
first read The Martian Chronicles by Ray Bradbury. I also read Something Wicked This Way
Comes, The Illustrated Man and Fahrenheit 451, and enjoyed them all. Bradbury is a
thought-provoking and outstanding sci-fi writer (90 years old and still with
us), and his books have a haunting quality about them. You don’t forget them
easily. I don’t recall all of the stories in The Martian Chronicles in detail, just that there were
certain parts that were quite scary in that what was suggested was considerably
terrifying. You just knew that something terrible was going to happen to some
of the earthlings who made it to Mars, and it did (the third expedition was
liquidated by the Martians who posed as dead family members such that the
deluded (and lonely) crew ended up just giving in to the delusions). The
following passage from the chapter ‘April 2000: The Third Expedition’ is an example of the type of
terror Bradbury could instill in his readers: “And wouldn’t it be horrible
and terrifying to discover that all of this was part of some great clever plan
by the Martians to divide and conquer us, and kill us? Sometime during the
night, perhaps my brother here on this bed will change form, melt, shift and
become another thing, a terrible thing, a Martian. It would be very simple for
him to just turn over in bed and put a knife into my heart……..His hands were
shaking under the covers. His body was cold. Suddenly it was not a theory.
Suddenly he was very afraid……..Carefully he lifted the covers, rolled them
back. He slipped from bed and was walking softly across the room when his
brother’s voice said, ‘Where are you going?’…...’For a drink of water’. ‘But
you’re not thirsty’. ‘Yes, yes, I am’. ‘No, you’re not’. Captain John Black
broke and ran across the room. He screamed. He screamed twice. He never reached
the door”.
This was
all Bradbury wrote about the actual murder of Captain John Black and the
massacres of the crew of the third expedition. You knew that murders were
occurring in the rest of the Martian houses who had crew members staying with
them because they were the ‘families’ of these crew members, but Bradbury
didn’t have to elaborate at all about them, because it was left to our
imaginations to figure out what was happening to them all. Superb sci-fi horror
in a category all its own.
Friday, June 1, 2012
Ridley Scott's Prometheus
Last night I did something I haven’t done many times before
in my life. I attended the pre-premiere of a movie whose release I have been
eagerly anticipating—Ridley Scott’s Prometheus.
The film’s official release date in Norway is today, June 1st. But
the Colosseum movie theater in Oslo showed the film last night (9pm showing
only) to a packed house, which in and of itself was an enjoyable experience. The
film was introduced by a young man who apparently works for an American company
in Norway involved in the film’s promotion. At one point he asked for a show of
hands for how many women were in the audience. I guess because men outnumber
women when it comes to liking sci-fi films? Anyway, there were a lot of women
in the audience. Never occurred to me before that sci-fi might be a genre
dominated by men, since I personally know more women than men who enjoy sci-fi
books and films. But never mind—I want to tell you about the film.
The story is somewhat intricate and uneven; the film opens
with fantastic footage of what is supposed to be prehistoric earth; the 3D
effects give the viewer the experience of actually moving over the planet in a
low-flying spaceship. An alien human-like figure stands on the precipice of a
huge waterfall, and drinks some kind of strange liquid in a pod. He is alone. Above
him a spaceship hovers, apparently the ship that brought him there. After
drinking the liquid, his body reacts violently, transforming into some
strange-looking creature that falls off the cliff into the water; as he does, his
body explodes, releasing the DNA that will be the precursor DNA to our own. Cut
to 2089, where a group of scientists (among them Elizabeth Shaw played by Noomi
Rapace, and Charlie Holloway played by Logan Marshall-Green) interested in the origins
of humanity discover cave paintings on the Isle of Skye in Scotland that
resemble cave paintings from other archaeological digs around the world. All of
them ‘point’ to the stars; the patterns seem to be an invitation to visit that distant
world, which is exactly what these scientists are dreaming about—finding the
origins of man. Four years later, they are traveling in space on their way to
this world, in a spaceship called Prometheus. They land on this new world, and all
hell breaks loose, literally. That’s the point of these films, and also the fun
of watching them. You know something bad or evil is lurking in the wings, just
waiting for its chance to break free. I will definitely not spoil the film for
you by describing what happens; it is well-worth seeing and you will be
impressed beyond belief at the special effects and the 3D experience. I felt
like I had traveled to that world after being in the theater for two hours. I
found myself wishing the movie was longer, the effects were that good. The
images of that deserted, barren, dark world will haunt you for hours
afterwards. The fact that the plot has a few loopholes, or that there are some illogical
occurrences, was not a problem for me, although I know it is for some others
who have voiced their criticisms on IMDB. I am more interested in the atmosphere
that these kinds of films can create, and Prometheus delivers. It manages to create the world it set out to
create, just like in the Alien films.
Mythological and biblical references are prevalent in this
film. What can the story of Prometheus in Greek mythology tell us about the film’s plot? Prometheus was a Titan god who was given the task of creating mankind out of clay. Prometheus ended up in conflict with Zeus, who had given him this task, because he liked his mortal creations very much and wanted the best for them, a feeling that Zeus did not share. Zeus became angry at Prometheus for a number of things—among them that Prometheus had tricked the gods into allowing man to keep the meat from sacrificial offerings to the gods, whereas the gods got only the animal bones. As punishment, Zeus withheld fire from man; Prometheus decided to steal the fire back and deliver it to mankind, which he did. Zeus punished him by chaining him to a stake on a mountaintop where an eagle fed upon his liver, which grew back each day since Prometheus was immortal. In the film, the very idea that the scientists could obtain the knowledge of their origin can be seen as a ‘transgression’ against their divine ‘creators’ (Engineers). At the risk of over-interpreting the meaning of the film,
I couldn’t help but think of the story of Adam and Eve. Like Adam and Eve in
the garden of Paradise, who ate of the fruit from the tree of knowledge that
ended in their being banished from the garden, the scientists are ‘punished’
for trying to seek and attain the knowledge that will place them on the creative
level of their creators. The ‘gods’ are jealous; they and they alone wish to hold
the keys to (knowledge about) the creation of mankind. The gods of Greek
mythology were not all perfect gods—they could be angry, jealous, and
vindictive—just like their creations; there were any number of wars in the
heavens. The universe was thus both orderly (good) and chaotic (evil). Christian
mythology describes how Lucifer the archangel, whose name means ‘light bearer’
(interestingly enough when talking about Prometheus and his bearing of fire to
mankind) defied the will of the divine Creator and was banished to hell along
with his followers. Lucifer and his followers are the bad angels whose sin was
pride and thinking they were better than God. It is clear in the film that the
distant world that harbors so much chaos and evil for the space travelers was a
repository of ‘life’ guarded by alien humanoids that were tall, strong and
violent. Are these the bad angels? One gets the feeling that this dark world was
more like hell, where transgressors against the gods, as Prometheus was, would
have been banished.
So where then is the world of our creators? Where do they live, since they do not live on this dark barren world? This is the question Elizabeth Shaw has at the end of the film. How come our creators were so unsatisfied with their creations that they relegated them to a hellish world? What was the transgression committed by the original creations? Did they attempt to trick their creators or to steal something of value to them, like Prometheus did with Zeus? Did they try to become the creators? Why did the creators choose earth as the place for their creations? Why did the alien humanoid in the first scene die such a violent death in order that his DNA would be spread in the waters of earth, as a precursor to our own? When did this happen, before or after the settling of the world on which the spaceship Prometheus lands? Why did things go so horribly wrong on this world? Why do the Engineers on this world want to destroy earth as is the plan when the giant spaceship attempts to take off toward the end of the film, and what stopped them up until this point? These remain unanswered questions at the end of the film. Perhaps they will be answered in a sequel, or perhaps not. In any case, the film opens for different questions and interpretations. And in the final analysis, it is perhaps not so surprising that as we (viewers and movie directors alike) age and approach our mortal ends, that the questions of where we come from, how did we get here, and where we (might) end up after death, preoccupy us. We would prefer that our lives had meaning and that it is not the emptiness of the abyss that awaits us. We would prefer heaven to the barren, deserted and dark world that the Prometheus found.
So where then is the world of our creators? Where do they live, since they do not live on this dark barren world? This is the question Elizabeth Shaw has at the end of the film. How come our creators were so unsatisfied with their creations that they relegated them to a hellish world? What was the transgression committed by the original creations? Did they attempt to trick their creators or to steal something of value to them, like Prometheus did with Zeus? Did they try to become the creators? Why did the creators choose earth as the place for their creations? Why did the alien humanoid in the first scene die such a violent death in order that his DNA would be spread in the waters of earth, as a precursor to our own? When did this happen, before or after the settling of the world on which the spaceship Prometheus lands? Why did things go so horribly wrong on this world? Why do the Engineers on this world want to destroy earth as is the plan when the giant spaceship attempts to take off toward the end of the film, and what stopped them up until this point? These remain unanswered questions at the end of the film. Perhaps they will be answered in a sequel, or perhaps not. In any case, the film opens for different questions and interpretations. And in the final analysis, it is perhaps not so surprising that as we (viewers and movie directors alike) age and approach our mortal ends, that the questions of where we come from, how did we get here, and where we (might) end up after death, preoccupy us. We would prefer that our lives had meaning and that it is not the emptiness of the abyss that awaits us. We would prefer heaven to the barren, deserted and dark world that the Prometheus found.
Wednesday, May 30, 2012
Graffiti in Oslo (street art in Oslo Norway)
Got a new photo project going--photographing the different graffiti I come across in my wanderings around Oslo. I'll share the photos with you from time to time. Here are some that I took recently. One of them I've posted before. Enjoy!
Monday, May 28, 2012
A summer moment
From the
future I remember
Days in my
past, etched in memory
Close my
eyes halfway, I can see the sunlight
Glittering
through the tree’s green leaves
Magician’s
haze
In the
heat of summer, feeling the warm sun
On my
bare arms, loving that feeling.
Wondering
if heaven had descended
Sitting
there next to you on the bench
You reading
your magazine
T-shirt
slung over your shoulder
Me
watching you and the life around us
No
particular cares
Us
watching the new magpie parents strut about
Three
little ones to care for, wondering if they could fly
In case
a cat came slinking by.
I can
see the future in the present moment
Remembering
this day this exact moment in time
And the
past from the present
When I
remember back to what I thought life would be
When I was
younger
It
starts with happiness, that warm melting feeling
When
boundaries dissolve
Feeling
gratitude, because it could all die away or change
And I am
grateful that it hasn’t.
Watching
the new generation take the place of the old
Spectator
in my life, watching others, watching myself
Everyone
gets older
Wondering
if you have the same thoughts
But I cannot
articulate them to you
You would
think that I was feeling melancholy
When the
opposite was true.
copyright Paula M. De Angelis
28 May 2012
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