swaps

Family Collab #? (shawnan & the kids), multimedia

Memory Drawing #6? (forgive me if I've posted this one before, I can't remember)

Pictures

The Jungle Book, After Captain Goldstar

Alright, I tried several different ways to post this. But it was too difficult to try and get the context, which is key. BUT if you read this and want to find out what it is go to:

projectguttenburg.org, Kipling, The Jungle Book part 2, "The Kings Ankus", p. 64

"A Jungle-dweller gets to learn by experience as much as many doctors know of poisonous plants and berries. Mowgli sniffed the smoke that came up from the fire , broke off a morsel of the blakend bread, tasted it , and spat it out again.
'Apple of death,' he coughed. 'The first must have made it ready in the food for these, who killed him, having first killed the Gond.'
'Good hunting, indeed'! The kills follow close,' sadi Bagheera.
"Apple of Death" is what the Jungle call thorn apple or dhatura, the readiest poison of all India"

It's interesting to me as the story has to do with Mowgli taking an incredibly valuable jeweled piece of treasure out of this corrupted lair. He has no use for it but he takes it out into the world. The thing guarding it screams out as Mowgli takes it: "It is Death! It is Death! It is Death!".
When I read it I really quickly thought of the connection with Goldstar's journeying and exploration. As well as MOanez's posts a while back on Morality. Anyhoo, check it out and don't call me 'the boy'.

PS: unless you're Carlos, cuz you treated my teeth with genrosity and respect when i needed it. You may call me what you wish.

Manmade Earthquake

What do you think about this?
http://www.aroundglobe.net/2010/01/haiti-us-created-earthquake-in-haiti.html

Say it

I feel as though I'm getting naked here, but isn't this what beta blog is all about? being naked in front of your friends and letting them tell you you should really remove that unsightly mole? ...these are lyrics for a song that might go on the record. tell me what you think.... i'm scared to know, but I'm okay with the fear now. i'm constantly learning. i like them because 1. they fit the melody I hear in my head and 2. they came in a moment where i truly felt this feeling. but is that enough to make it good? en français i would say "j'ai besoin de recul" (I need an objective point of view). lyrics intimidate me. and so, i'm officially ranting, but what i want to say is that i respect you, beta friends, contributing poets and masters of verse, so sock it to me assholes! i mean friends! whom i love and respect, and am only chastising because of my love and respect (and it helps not to be so intimidated)....

say it

I can't go on like I'm the one
I used to think so but what have we become
Yesterday I was your true love lady
It's all faded away

Chorus:
Why don't you just say it, baby
you don't want this anymore
You love me but you've got to let me go
I just need to hear it, darling (if it's true)
That that old feeling's gone
And there ain't no use in tryin' to hold on
Ain't no use baby

It's so hard to loosen my grip
Afraid to lose the man my heart's with
but holdin' on does nobody no good
It's time to let this happen like it should

chorus

If you love something, they say to set it free
If it comes back, baby, it's meant to be
The door is open if you want to leave

chorus

Köln

some images from my trip to Germany...the locks where across a bridge on the Rhine, something to do with love where all these people put locks on the bridge as symbols of their relationships. Then the Kölner Dome, an amazing Gothic cathedral featuring stained glass by Gerhard Richter. more to come....

Dans mon panier j'ai

An animated short by Nat Dupont!

Life lessons, from Renzo Gracie

Look at the past and learn to make a better future

“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly; who errs and comes short again and again; because there is not effort without error and shortcomings; but who does actually strive to do the deed; who knows the great enthusiasm, the great devotion, who spends himself in a worthy cause, who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement and who at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly. So that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat.” Theodore Roosevelt

Exhibition Announcement

I will have an exhibition starting mid-March, at the Piano Nobile Gallery

I would like a title, but am not sure what to do. Any ideas would be welcome. Some of the "themes" in my art are:
life/death
longing/isolation
celebration/liberation
beauty - design/nature
chosen/accidental or automatic
Meaning/Spirituality
Plurality/Diversity/Multiplicity
Imagination/observation
Or something unrelated. I was thinking "Watching Paint Dry", hehe.

Pain is a social determinant of health - C. Quiñonez

memory

Please excuse my writing style as my brain is not all the way put together again. Im going to write all this out in order to further the recapitulatory process. We were stopped in Banos. A sort of banf-like resort town surrounded by volcanoes and hot springs. I bought myself a bottle of Old Times Whisky and was relaxing in the courtyard of our hostal when I was drawn to a lit room. Entering in I saw a squat indian dude with long hair and various shamanic parephenalia laying around like feathers and stones, a blow gun etc. He was talking to a buddy of mine who was knowledgable in the use of San Pedro Cactus. I asked the dude who he was and he said he was a shaman and flexed his muscles with a big grin like arnold. I said ´¨me too!¨¨ and sat down and we talked for a long time about the changing patterns of the earth and the use of plants. His name was Sebastien and he said I was welcome to join him. He was on his way to visit his father in a remote Shuar village to do ayahuasca ceremonies. He tells me that he was recently kidnapped at gunpoint by tribesmen along the boarder of Peru. Apparenlty they thought Sebastien was a ´mafioso´ who was in their village looking for human organs to sell. Im not sure how he escaped but he was on his way to see his father to be cleansed. So my lovely companion and I hopped on the bus with Sebastien the next day and were on our way. Once in the village we were introduced to the whole family. Then it was time to meet Enrique the 95 year old shaman. We went into his little house and he was waiting for us sitting in a chair with a spear and a feather head dress and ceremonial paint on his face. We translated our intentions thru Sebastien and he agreed to cure us in the jungle for 10 days. So we walked with Enrique and one of his other sons David out into the jungle to a remote cabin. Enrique is like a clown. Always laughing. Despite being 95 his hair is completely black and he is very spry. Apparently he still has an active sex life and is the father of a dozen children. He has killed many people, and describes to me cutting off heads in the war. We arrive at this sort of rundown cabin complex. It seems like this cabin had been busy in the past but now most of the buildings were falling down. Next to the cabin was a river and it was surrounded by virgen jungle. David is an ex military commando. He's squat and solidly built kind of like an indian Joe Pesci. He's got crude military tattoos all over his body. He trained as a parachute commander in the US. David has two wives. He always dressed in military gear and was always carying a shotgun and a machete. He took us out for walks to see the plants and wildlife.These people are very small and sort of square and bowlegged. Over the ten days we exchange information about lifestyle and history. They are particularily interested in the way the indiginous of Canada live and what they hunt. We ate meals of fish wrapped in leaves and roasted on the fire. Ten varieties of bananas cooked in ten ways. One night David came back late with an armidillo he had hunted. We spent ten days at the cabin. I consumed ayahuasca twice and another plant called floripundeo which I have yet to identify on the internet. I beleive it some kind of Magnolia tree. Now I have a much better understanding of how ayahuasca works. Its a meditation aid. The purpose of life is meditational states. These states can't be achieved unless the stomach is empty. The process goes like this. The day of taking ayahuasca we would fast. We d cook the stuff during the day its made of this vine boiled for about 8 hours along with these leaves of another plant. Then once the sun went down we would drink the foul tasting drink. It tastes really bad and drinking a whole glass is a real chore. About an hour later all of the sounds of the jungle would become really loud, amazingly loud like the sounds are filling your head. Its difficult to open the eyes and the whole body is buzzing. Its difficult to move and is best just to sit there. This vibration goes on and on and feels really weird un describable. Eventually Enrique starts singing these weird songs and making these weird noises like whistling and breathing funny and these sounds have a really strange effect on your mind as if the sounds are reverberating through your whole body. There's this intense sense of vibration. At some point it all gets to be too much and you get up and hurl. I hurled a lot! Once the hurling is over everything is golden. All the senses are extremely refined. You still need to move really slow like you re perpetually doing thai chi. Now is the time to lay down in the hammock and really meditate. You re in a hightened state of awareness. Perception has been slowed down. You can see tracers. You can see the aura. Closing the eyes and thinking about something or someone, brings that image crystal clear into your mind's eye. Words and poetry all of a sudden become instilled with incredible meaning. This is the meditational state. I got the feeling that this state was the purpose of living. The pool of the black star. Reaching into the spiraling pool, I pulled out a future memory. Weights are lifted and burdens released as the knots are undone and the spool is unwound. I wrote a song and will sing it for you when I get back. Next day you eat more bananas. Go for a swim. Walk through the jungle. There are medicines and uses for everything. Spiders as big as your face. Butterflies, hummingbirds. We were feeling really good. Like new. Medicine.

Then came time for the floripundeo. The floripundeo is a tree with these big wonderfull smelling white flowers that hang down. I was to drink some along with David's son who everyone called Little Man or Pequino Hombre. Enrique took us to this stream and we crouched down. Enrique scraped the bark of the plant into a bowl. Then he took the bark and squeezed the water out. He led me to one of the enormous ceiba trees that is like ten feet across like from Endor. He went up to the tree and had this minny conversation with it I think he was telling the tree to look after me. Then I drank some of the stuff, not more than a couple of table spoons. They had put some big leaves under the tree for us to sit down. Later the Little Man came and sat next to me and we waited. I can remember thinking, darnit I dont think I drank enough nothing's happening. Then the next thing that I can remember for sure was the next day! But my memory is full of visions;

a small spider bit me on the ankle three times

I saw two bright lights in the sky that spiralled around each other and then took off.

I heard many stories about ufo's in the news and then I saw a ufo on tv.

I saw two strange looking men in white outfits with big white hats. When I looked at one of the men his eyes were glowing. I think these men were inca or maybe shuar spirits based on their outfits. One of the men showed me an animal fetus.

I picked up a big beam that was on the ground and hoisted it up. Once it was up I realized it was much too heavy for me to support by myself. I had to keep moving around it using all my strength to keep it from falling. All my muscles were put to the test and were quivering with exertion. Eventually I was able to lower it to the ground avoiding all the animals that were running around. One of the animals was my old cat Smoky and one of the animals was an ocelot.(David told me that I was doing this for about 2 hours. Struggling against one of the fixed beams of the house. Enrique did an impression of me and we laughed for a long time)

David told me that for a long time I was sitting at the table counting invisible money. He took this to be an omen that I would be rich in the future.

I saw a bag and tried to pick it up but it was impossible heavy. It seems like there was a highpowerd magnet at the bottom of the bag. Later this bag was being used by someone to drain impurities from my body.

I was shown shrunken heads and the process by which heads are shrunk.

I also remember walking around and falling and bumping my head over and over but I wasnt hurt the next day. Everytime I fell I thought it was the funniest thing ever!

The next day I woke up and went fishing. Enrique told me that my vision would be obscured for the next three days. While I was fishing if I relaxed my mind I could hear conversations. They literally sounded like tv channels or radio stations. Or telephone converstions. Like my mind was a radio transiever.

Little man stayed out in the woods for two days in a tree. David said that the jungle would look after him when he came back he was covered with mosquito bites on every part of his body, He was about 13 years old. That day I was stung by something and my body broke out in a rash. David prepared a special brew and we were bothed bathed in it the next day.

We payed them in dream catchers and about 100 dollars.

I trully feel like a new man. Now we re in banos headed to the beach to get some more sun. Sorry for the boring writing style I just had to get this information down so that I dont forget it.

At what level does morality exist?

individual behaviour + social considerations = morality

(or, is morality the necessary relation of individual behaviour and social decisions about self-regulation? Is morality then a purely social phenomenon? Does an individual morality even exist in this sense?)

This is how my papers start

Critical realism
Presents the limits of a social ontology
Moral realism
Presents the limits of a moral ontology
The social determinants of health
Presents the limits of what influences our vital component
Implications for policy
Change can only be political, and by this I mean power.

The circuit of capital (or how we got into this mess)

Thinking of my youth

In November 2006, artist collaboration Goldin+Senneby visited the site in Sonoma Valley where the Bliss image was taken, re-photographing the same view ten years later. Their work 'After Microsoft' ^[8] was first shown in the exhibition "Paris was Yesterday" at gallery La Vitrine in April 2007 ^[9] and has later been exhibited at Galeria Vermelho, São Paulo ^[10], and 300m3 in Gothenburg. ^[11]

Stop Hand Gives Way to a Glowing Man (update)

Here it is-- Speak, the Hungarian Rapper

Thanks Josey. This is fresh, real, and in your face. Speak, speakin' the truth.

Or, well, um, at least his heart is in the right place, yeah?

And more importantly, yih, c'mon.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=--Vaz9jW054

Stop the war. yeah. c'mon.

Classic

Josey Krahn Jam Night @ The Standard

Plus Rien - Les Cowboys Fringants

Plus Rien = more of nothing; nothing left; forever nothing.



Warning: Don't watch if you're feeling uncomfortably apocalyptic, unusually sad, or otherwise fearful, grave or uncertain. Or if you don't like Quebecois pop music mon 'sti de colis.

Strange but true

Removal of the stone
doesn't make sense
in the presence of a smile

a basic contentment
that comes
in just the right place,
when tired
and ready to sleep

Removal of the stone
is not tolerance
when life just is

in beauty and
doubting her
but saved, how
when shallow
for gifts in between

Removal of the stone
Do not remove the stone
Do not remove the stone
In this light-year of G-d

The Great Quote Series and the day you died

Greatness is a transitory experience. It is never consistent. It depends in part upon the myth-making imagination of humankind. The person who experiences greatness must have a feeling for the myth he is in. He must reflect what is projected upon him. And he must have a strong sense of the sardonic. This is what uncouples him from belief in his own pretensions. The sardonic is all that permits him to move within himself. Without this quality, even occasional greatness will destroy a man. - from "Collected Sayings of Muad'Dib" by the Princess Irulan

Wish I Wastill There

I'm sorry, I'm tired

You said
It had nothing
to do
with me
your daughter
needs medicine
i said
i understood

but yet
here you are
in my face
and your face
with your
crooked moustache
and your
curled lips
you wanted
to direct it
somewhere
and now

i'm angry

i couldn't help
but think
you were wrong
in some way

and then
i didn't
zero
the pumps

i'm sorry
i'm so tired

Facebook update poem

Top status
today
loves
writing
must
people
new
where
never
kill
fight
--------
Update
my today
with love
and writing
you must
you must
people
love new
and where
you can
never kill
but fight
fight and push
the living
breathing
lovely
rage

Jean Leloup - Le monde est à pleurer

I'm not quite sure what to say about this.

I'm not sure which is trippier and more mesmerizing--the video, or the song.

In any case, Jean LeLoup is a truly original (and possibly very crazy) artist.


***

Here's what Wikipedia has to say about him: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_leloup

Jean Leclerc (born May 14, 1961) is a Québécois singer-songwriter and author from Quebec, Canada. He is popularly known as Jean Leloup (which he likes to translate to John the Wolf in English), a stage name he kept using until 2006, when he temporarily changed his name to Jean Leclerc, only to resurrect his wolf character in August 2008. He is known for his colourful personality and unique musical style in the francophone rock community.

Born in Sainte-Foy, Quebec, Leclerc grew up in Togo and Algeria, where he was influenced by traditional African rhythms.

Le Morte D'arthur, part 2

"Godspeed", by Edmund Leighton (1853-1922). Image from Wikipedia.



So, in the last part of our story, Lancelot and Guinevere had been caught in the act of maybe just possibly canoodling. Bloodshed resulted, with many knights being killed, including friends and Knights of the Round Table.

Sir Gawain, whose brothers were killed, swears revenge on Lancelot.


When we re-join our story, most of the other knights have come in on Sir Gawain's side. King Arhtur's hands are tied, and though he wants desperately to avoid a civil war, his knights press him to fight.

Leading a great army, King Arthur rides up to Lancelot's castle in the north of the country, where Lancelot and Guinevere have taken refuge along with an army of knights loyal to them. Sir Gawain, still enraged over the death of his brothers, leads King Arthur's men in an assault on the castle walls. Bitter, Lord of the Rings-style siege the castle stuff goes down for a long time, and many men of valour are killed.

The siege of the castle goes on long enough that word reaches the Pope himself, who issues a bill that the fighting must end immediately. It does.

Lancelot, with Guinevere and his surviving loyal knights, then scurries off to his native France. Arthur and Gawain and their army follow close behind, and another seige is about to go down, when...

Gawain comes forward and challenges Lancelot to come down and fight, man to man, to the death.

Whoever wins this combat wins the battle, and the loser's army will stand down.

What will Lancelot do? He's not even sure he loves this woman anymore, or if he ever did, and he wonders if this whole thing was a big mistake. He's tired of killing. He's racked with guilt. But Sir Gawain wants his head, and won't stop until one of them is dead on the battlefield.

What will he do?


(tune in next week for the thrilling conclusion...)

"I like to put my energy in life, in intensity" - Rickson Gracie

Last Night's Fire

Helio Gracie, the father of Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu

"Thanks to jiu-jitsu, to the confidence that it instilled in me, I believe in myself so much, that I think it would be unfair for me to even raise my voice to someone. [...] Jiu jitsu changed me morally and emotionally [...]. Because what you see sometimes is an individual that considers himself courageous, fighting and beating people up, while for me, every person that fights all the time is a coward, he's afraid, he is insecure, that's why he fights, because a man at peace, confident, with or without jiu-jitsu, with or without the strength, when he's confident in himself morally, he dominates the adversary with his moral strength, not with physical power, physical power is a compliment for when a person is not morally evolved."

"Never shares a big bed with once"
--The Grey Mouser--

"Man, the living creature, the creating individual, is always more important than any established style or system" - Bruce Lee

Momentus

I have moments of lunacy
enveloped in moments of secrecy
And the balls roll constant
Why is this jerk in my face

I have moments of lunacy
enveloped in moments of dignity
Land the watchtowers
on my eye nice and dry

I have moments of lunacy
enveloped in moments of tyranny
Strength vision
and satire

I have moments of lunacy
enveloped in moments of drudgery
Life is as normal
as it ever will be

The Don Breakfast Date

"It's not whether you get knocked down; it's whether you get back up." – Vince Lombardi

"Out beyond ideas of right-doing and wrong-doing there is a field. I'll meet you there." - Rumi

Untitled

I pushed
he pulled
I clutched
he wrung
I bucked
he braced
I grabbed
he ripped
I struggled
he labored
We of the mortal coil
Living, rasping
The meatwheel
Of death and divinity

Amazon

Ill start this one with another quote. Its from this book that describes a dudes conversations with his dead brother. He asks his dead brother what its like on the other side. -It is another world, a dream which cannot be expressed in words. Movement, transparency, thoughts. Here neither earthly good nor earthly evil exists. It is kind of homelessness, a kind of dream in countless dimensions and vibrations. Here, time as you conceive of it at this moment becomes a caricature. In other words, death is but a door, time is but a window. How many more ways can I express that this is not fancy words but an accurate description of the nature of reality. How can I express that this truth must be understood and realized at all costs and as soon as possible.

Anyways, I woke up in 2010 feeling brand new. That day Don Augustin loaded up the family and we all headed out to their cabin deeper in the jungle. The pickup we hired road over fjorded rivers, over crazy one lane rope bridges, past native kids scrubbing clothes with rocks in the river. Arrivinng at un unpassable stretch we climbed out and continued on by foot for an hour or two. Crossing a river we came to a huge cabin complex. Don Augustin is a reputable Shaman who owns an enormous stretch of jungle and the cabins can fit up to 40 people. All set up on posts and made out of bamboo and other local materials. Absolute paradise. Fruit trees bearing delicious candylike fruits all over the place. A river full of fish. I felt woozy and dreamlike just walking around. He led us for a walk past a massive ceiba tree like from Endor. Seats were set up around it for meditiation. Every so often Don Augustin would stop to show us this seedpod could be used for paint, this sap from this tree could cure these ailments, the bark of this tree could be used for making clothes, etc. The jungle is a medicine chest, candy factory, and clothes closet. All of the products are already so better made by mother nature it seems absurd the way we live. Arriving at a small waterfall we jumped in and started swimming upstream. He told us to meditate beside the waterfall to get into contact with the spirit who lived there. Next we meditated inside a cave tht belonged to an anaconda. We continued further upstream past villagers panning for gold. Gold is everywhere here and we saw their cup full of tiny nuggets. On our way back we climbed into a long handhewed canoe and Don Augustin paddled us all the way back to the cabins. I did yoga the rest of the day and played with the kids. The kids are like sprites, constantly running around and laughing. I never saw them cry or cause a ruccus. Once I saw them chopping up wood with a big long knife. To my amazement I found out that they were only three years old. So incredibly healthy. That night Don Augustin showed me how to prepare the ayawuaska. Its made from two plants. One plant is a thick vine and the strips are boiled for 5 hours or so until its reduced to a thick brown muddiness. We drank our cups and went off to sleep. This night Don Augustin did a cleanse. After the brew began to take its effect, we were called out one at a time to sit in front of him. He would sing his songs in the native Cechua calling the spirits and would fan our bodies in a rythem with special plants. At one point he would make this sort of horking sound and then blow the top of our heads and into our hands. As if he was blowing darts in there. Next day I asked him about it and he explained that he shooting light through our chakras. I slept like a baby. Next day we went out to visit another even bigger ceiba tree. This was probably the biggest and oldest living creature Ive ever seen. I asked him if it was possible to communicate with the tree directly and he said that you must go to the tree and fast with only water for a day. You need to be naked and be wearing traditional face paint in order for the tree to recognize who you are and what your purpose is. Later we stopped by a little pond and Don Augustin had this special plant that he took peices of and dropped into the water. Amazingly the peices off leaf would dance and swim around in the water as if it was alive. Im not sure if Ive ever seen any thing like that before and cant explain it. I got video. That night, our last, Don Augustin gave me a glass of Tobacco Tea to drink. He explained that Tobacco is one of the worlds greatest spiritual medicnes that is very usefull for cleansing all of the body and mind and spirit. It was a big brown glass of thick tea. He put his hand on my shoulder as I drank it and shook his head saying that it would most likely make me feel very sick and that I should run to my room right after drinking it. Indeed, it was probably the most foul substance I have ever consumed. Sitting on my bed I felt like I was going to die for about 5 minutes then it all past and I felt great. Don Augustin came for cleansing time and was surprised to see that I was in such good spirits. He said that My body was very strong and well prepared and that I could even drink more ayawuaska that night so I did. It was a full moon and the night was full of the music of the jungle. I stayed awake all night and walked around looking at the stars and the moon. No visions but im certain that the brews did their work. Im new. Anways we re back in town now off to see the another hare krishna ashram for ten days or so. Godbless. I wish you all warmth and enlightment.

2010

Its swealtering hot and sunny here. We have to keep the fan on all the time.

Well, we got connected to a shaman in the jungle town of Tena just east of Quito. Arriving in Quito Don Augustin and his wife Maria were there waiting to meet us at the bus depot. Really kind middle aged native couple. Tiny squarely built healhty looking people dressed in white. We made arrangements to meet the next day.

First day Don Augustin showed us shamanic landmarks around Tena. First we went to this cave complex. We dont speak much spanish so most communication happens by telepathy and hand gestures. We climbed down into this cave woth flashlights and went down and down and down for like an hour squeezing through narrow gaps and splashing through flowing water waist deep. Ive never been underground like that its a really weird feeling. Finnally we started to ascend and came out on the other side. neat. Then we went over to a waterfall and swam around there. I think it was then that I realized that I was in an environment that is the closest to paradise Ive ever been. Everything is so lush and every square inch is packed to the brim with life. There s at least 20 different sizes and kinds of ants running around everywhere building roads and carrying stuff around. The air is really thick and heavy with oxygen and goodness. Then we went to this huge rock that was covered with petroglyphs. Don Augustin explained how some were drawn for communication with extraterrestrials, some were calenders, some were about ghosts etc. There s lots of talk about extraterrestrials and spirits here.

Having some extra time visited the local zoo. This zoo is not so much a zoo but an island with animals on it. Some of the animals are in enclosures but only the naughty ones who have a history of biting people or sneaking off to town over the bridge to steal or beg food from restaurants. The monkeys were particularily nice and I spent some time picking the bugs off one monkey s back. You can even reach in and stroke the caimans although Im not sure that would be wise. Most of the animals are very freindly. Reminded me of the garden of eden. We climbed to the top of a big tower to look around and made some cell phone calls. I cant beleive I can be sitting here at the equator and Im texting my freinds at home. Is this world even real. When we went to leave the island we walked across the bridge followed by some kind of raccoon creature who probably wanted us to help him escape. Much to our dismay, the door at the end of the bridge was locked and we had to go meet Don Augustin. I broke the lock by smashing it with a peice of concrete and we made our escape.

New Years is weird here. Its kind of like halloween. There s all these people wearing masks of the bad guys of the past year like politicians and movie stars. Micheal Jackson was popular. The point is that they want to expel everything from the year before. Also people have made roadblocks and are dressed in drag and are asking you for money before you can go by. And everyone is really drunk. Strangest thing is the music style which is really fast and pretty good, almost smoky tiger style except in spanish and more catchy. Problem is they listen to the same song over and over again literally for an hour. But Ill get to that later.

Don Augustins son finnally showed up to pick us up and we made our way over to their house. Don Augustin has a big beautiful family and lives outside of town. It was dark by now and we were lead straight through the party into a concrete hovelstyl room with a bed and some benches. We cut straight to the chase and were given some cups of brownish liquid and shot them back. Tasted bad. About ten or fifteen minutes later we got tired and woozy so layed down. Don Augustin and his son started singing and making these really weird noises. My eyes were closed but visions began to appear in the static behind my eyes that went in sync with the vibrations of the music. Here s a quote from the book Im reading about ayuhaska = The Ethnic Amazonian tribes beleive that there are two worlds, our everyday materialistic world and the eternal, glorious spiritual world. Ayahuasca is considered a sacred plant. The natural chemicals in the brew will act quickly within the physical body to awaken and strengthen the Spiritual body of the person, consequently enabling one to reach the maximum level of Spiritual power with which one can truly relate to and travel to the spiritual world. I can verify that this isnt poetry or myth. Its how reality is. I didnt acheive the sort of travelling that I hoped for but I think that s because Im not pure enough. Instead I did a lot of thinking about my life and putting things into perspective. But everything I thought about became real there before me like on a screen. So if I thought about my freind Jose for example he would appear there real and lifelike. At some point in time I got up to ralf. Ralfing is common and it feels desirable. You feel like you want to expel the physical filth thats inside you. Walking around I was woozy and emediately wanted to lay down and go back to the ordering and defragging of my personal database. Things kept interupting though and and I couldnt break through into something that I could feel but not attain. So I just kept working and workign, thinking and thinking. It was actually almost like a nightmare. My life is a nightmare isnt it. All the mistakes Ive made, things Ive done wrong, people Ive hurt, time Ive wasted. All of these things appeared before me. Worst of all Don Augustin stopped singing and went to the party and they fired up the karaoke machine and ecuador music. They play the music at escrutiating volume and they keep repeating the same song over and over for hours. And then some drunk guy would come on and start raving and rambling about something with the feedback blaring in a language I couldnt understand. And because of the mental state I was extremely sensitive to all sound. And I was scrunched up intoa tiny ball in this room and all of the worst things of my life were flashing before my eyes in vivid detail and I kept having to ralf. Sometimes the music would stop and there would be this delicious silence and and I would feel this scrumptious relaxation, only for it to suddenly resume at louder volume the same song again. Certain phrases kept popping up in my mind like, The point of life is dying. I now understand that the process that I was going through is the same that happens at death. And the land of visions is what the afterlife is all about. The only point of living is to have a clear consience when you die. But that s not bad because the life after death truly is eternal and glorious. This is the truth. I thought about how strange it is how we cling so desperately to life. How we spend billions of dollars for medications and machines to keep us alive until the very last minute. How very sad life is. Why do we think its humane to put our pets to sleep when they begin to suffer in old age an yet we dont give the same courtesy to our own species. What are we so afraid of. How could our knowledge of existence have become so messed up. How did we come to deny the spirit and the world of the spirit yet we go every night when we go to sleep. It all seemed suddenly so sad and so terrible. I kept tossing and turning and the music was blaring and drunk people were yelling but at the same time somewhere inside I new that this suffering was all a part of the process and how fitting to perform such a mental and spiritual purge on New Years eve. Here is another quote from the book = The Amazonian tribes beleive that God intentionally placed this plant in the forest so that humans could benift from its devine powers. I thought a lot about God too. I wonder why most people now adays deny the existence of God. It would appear to me that God is simply a word that we use to describe the totality of all things. That concept is so useful. What a usefull word God is. Why deny it. God is everything. It seems simple. Anyways, all these things and more became clear as crystal. And I must admit that writing all this out right now is also a very usefull process whether you, my audience, think its useless drivel or not.

Anyways, I woke up the next morning feeling freaking awsome and looking forward with great anticipation to the year 2010. Two more days and nioghts followed with Don Augustin and Ill write more tommorrow but buddy at the hostel is kicking me off the computer. Peace out.

Bruce Head

Bruce Head died Wednesday afternoon in St. Boniface General Hospital from the effects of congestive heart failure and diabetes. He was 78. read more here