intimate walk with Rebecca

This was Rebecca's first email: 
'I'd like to walk with you in Stockholm while you're here. I lack intimacy in my life and would find it interesting, though a bit scary, to spend time with someone who works with this as an artistic topic. I think the relation to the other is essential and am curious to see how this will feel and be addressed in a setting like this; a casual walk in the city of Stockholm with an artist whose topic is intimacy and myself who lack intimacy in my life.' 
In her second email she wrote: 
'what about Sunday? That would suit me! Is it ok to be anonymous or go under a fake name in your project?' 
This afternoon I tried to think a little bit about expectations and about what is at stake for me in the intimate walks project. Carola's email response prompted me to look again into the ethical implications of my research. What do I actually want to achieve with it? Am I really looking for intimacy? What do I take? What do I give? 
I'd been feeling foggy in my thinking.  Had slept in late and spent the afternoon at Artipelag, the private art museum out toward the archipelago where Kristina works. It's right on the water surrounded by forests. I had space in my head to take in the nature, taking in the art was a challenge though.

At 7pm I met Rebecca at Slussen in front of the flower stand, same place where I had met Carola, but the flowers were gone already this time. 7pm is sunset time. I was actually a bit tired from the whole day although it hadn't been such a long one. I felt languid and not terribly open to meet strangers. At artipelag out on the parking lot I had watched a young Swedish family for a long time while waiting for the bus. I was fascinated by the playful choreography of the three kids. How they clambered up on rocks, got their hands dirty digging in the earth and horsed around with their father was a very enjoyable spectacle and made me smile despite my melancholic mood. 

Rebecca arrived on her bike. I said I didn't really have a plan where to walk and after some negotiation she decided to leave the bike at the metro station and we walked eastward from Slussen to the cliff overlooking the bay. Rebecca was rather tired also. She had been trying to find somebody to teach her an animation program because she wanted to work with animation for a project. She is a visual artist and has recently finished the fine arts school in Stockholm. Rebecca was talking a lot and seemed a bit restless. I noticed that when meeting a stranger I tend to have difficulties to really follow and understand what that person is saying if they talk a lot. Suddenly I found myself talking also. I wanted to be more true to my impulses and not just play the accommodating intimacy host. So I tried to explain my questions and concerns about the project. After Carola's feedback I'd started to put into question my competence to make the intimate walk into a beneficial and interesting activity for both parties involved. Now in hindsight, I feel that it was good to express my doubts and concerns and to lay my cards on the table. I think this 'confession' of sorts came across as quite genuine and made Rebecca understand that I didn't have a very clear and thought-through concept as is often expected in the visual arts field. So while following my impulse to explain myself and express my current state of mind I noticed that Rebecca is a very good listener. And right there something had already changed on the intimacy barometer. There was another kind of connection and another kind of listening . . . 

As we were looking out over the bay, she showed me about 5 towers in different parts of the city and told me about a project for which she worked with young female singers who all stood on a different tower and sung a type of melancholic Swedish yodel. I had to think of Rapunzel. This yodel was traditionally sung by young women who were herding cattle. Across the bay there was an amusement park with a ferris wheel. I had to think of a short story by Haruki Murakami in which a woman gets stuck overnight in a ferris wheel and sees her own apartment from the gondola high in the air and watches herself making love with a stranger in her bedroom which freaks her out completely. 

We continued our walk and from listening to Rebecca speak I concluded that she is a bit of a workaholic like me. Or at least that work and projects are always the top priority. She expressed her wish to take more care of intimate friendships and I could relate to that. I also feel guilty for not keeping in touch with people and for normally putting work at the top of the list. She mentioned that she experiences a lot of anger and impatience coming from stress, but that she doesn't have very good tools to reduce stress in her life. She started to take some African dance classes, but she doesn't go regularly. We ended up complaining about the art market and the tough conditions and the pressure and competitive spirit and the whole spiel. It didn't feel very constructive. But it's a topic any two artists like to indulge in to feel more connected it seems. 

Eventually we found ourselves in the courtyard of some conference hotel with a nice lawn and some benches under trees (still overlooking the bay). The night was slowly falling. I felt like proposing some exercises. Either 10 minutes sitting in silence or singing together on the bench. Rebecca seemed happy to try them and chose to do the silent presence exercise first cause she found it more challenging. So we sat 10 minutes in silence being present. I felt her rather uncomfortable and tried my best to send out accommodating and friendly energy. We looked at each other in the eyes sometimes and cracked a smile ever so often. About halfway into the exercise the lanterns of the park went on. Twice we took a deep breath together because we noticed that we were both tensing up. Afterwards we talked. She confessed that it hadn't been easy but that with the time something relaxed. We decided to do the singing also. We looked over at the amusement park at the other side of the bay and sent some initially careful and then more and more full-bodied yodels, yowls and improvised melodies into the night of the city. It felt very nice to do and fun. As we walked back to Slussen I think we both felt tired in a more fulfilled way. 

intimate walk and hot chocolate with Carola

I met Carola at Slussen in front of the flower stand in the rain at 3pm Friday. She recognized me by the white cap and walked up to me with an inviting smile on a calm, relaxed face surrounded by a curly hairdo. Later on she told me that she had had her hair done recently and was still getting used to it. The curls are natural though. It's not exactly an Afro but it surrounds her soft and angelic face like an aura made of black curls with one tuft on the left side next to her face dyed blond. She didn't bring any rain clothes cause she can't stand them, but didn't mind walking through the rain. She made a very self-assured, almost stoic first impression on me. Maybe stoic isn't the right word. More resting in herself, at home in her body and at ease, unaffected by the bad weather it seemed. I imagined she could be a therapist or a tour guide maybe . . . used to approaching strangers in an accommodating way.  I had my windbreaker and it wasn't pouring cats and dogs. So we walked over to Gamla Stan, the old historic city center. I realize how important first impressions are. They occupy my memory and stay there. It's not easy to get rid of them. She told me that she used to live close to Fittja where I'm staying. That's where she grew up in fact. So for some reason I immediately placed her in the immigration slash ethnic box - also because of her skin color. Not typically Swedish at all. I would have guessed some Italian or Israeli roots or maybe even Egyptian or Turkish. And then I kept being amazed how intelligent and eloquent she was, how well she chose her words and how versatile with her vocabulary - but not in a 'I want to impress' kind of way. I found myself on an intimate walk with a very well-educated and charming young woman. I found out that she had just finished composing school. And before had studied sound engineering. She had also been involved in theater projects. She asked me about the relation of my artistic work with therapy, because apparently something was mentioned on the facebook page where Kristina had advertised the intimate walks. So I told her how it all had started with 'White Horse - an attempt at live therapy' which was more meant as an ironic twist on therapy in the theater . . . and how from then on the therapeutic approach stuck to me almost like a label or signature or light in the dark or red line to follow. She explained to me how in her composition pieces she also works with her own shit (as she put it) a lot. And then she said something about how tiring this can get. At the beginning of the year she was diagnosed with ADHD just like her sister had been. It's really becoming a hype this diagnosis. I was curious how this diagnosis had affected her and her artistic work. She went on talking about a composition piece that she made based on the crystal memory as opposed to the work memory. (These are terms literally translated from Swedish) One being more like the short-term memory and the other more long-term if I understood correctly. She described in much more eloquent words than I'm using now how some melodies and sounds would have these short echoes and reverberations. If I'm not mistaken this is how Carola transformed the ADHD diagnosis into her artistic work. But maybe I'm wrong and should get diagnosed with ADHD as well, because when it gets to the nitty-gritty stuff of some artistic concept I often lose track and get a bit lost. We arrived in a courtyard of a Finnish church. There were some flower beds and a war memorial (of either the Finnish or the Second World War). Carola said that she comes here often with her friends because it's so quiet and nobody ever comes here. They would sit there for hours talking and drinking coffee. At night time it's especially intimate and peaceful she said. We couldn't sit down because it was all wet from the rain. Instead we walked onwards to a square where Carola showed me a famous cannon ball that had been fired into the corner of a building during some civil unrest in the Middle Ages. She explained the whole story as we were standing on that square pointing right at the cannon ball and for about 5 minutes I simply couldn't see the cannon ball because I thought it was in the wall or a shop window right around the corner. There was a huge sign at the corner of the building and for a while I started looking for the cannon ball inside of that sign. And I already felt stupid for maybe not knowing what a cannon ball actually looks like and if I knew I'd for sure be able to detect it. But in the end I spotted it right above the sign, dug into the wall right on the corner of that building as Rebecca had explained all along. I really should get tested for ADHD. . .

Carola proposed to seek shelter and go for a coffee in a gay cafe where they supposedly had some of the best coffees and hot chocolates in town and a lot of chocolate pastries and the famous cinnamon buns! It was a very old establishment from the 16hundreds. We ordered two hot chocolates and a cinnamon bun to share. For the sake of intimacy and gezelligheid I decided to betray my Vegan principles and savor this as a special treat. Inside the cafe we started talking about relationships. We realized that we both never had a lasting relationship for the whole span of our adult lives. This lack in our lives made for an intimate connection. There we were - two adult strangers afraid of intimacy, afraid of commitment - sharing our fears and hopes over a hot chocolate and a cinnamon bun . . . listening and probing, asking questions and encouraging each other. Carola told me how her father recently called her one morning when she was still a bit hung over because she had picked up this macho guy in a bar the night before. And she ended up telling her father on the phone and wondering out loud why she kept doing this - going home with these straight, strong guys who remind her of her father and who she simply couldn't stay with for longer than a few days or a week. And her father replied in a very matter-of-fact tone of voice: 'No you shouldn't go out with these macho guys. They are not your type' as if it was the most obvious bit of information in the world. This is the kind of intimate stuff Carola shared with me and more . . . for example that she is falling in love with and possibly starting a relationship with a woman on Öland, but that she is scared shitless and that she might need some more time. And that this woman doesn't let her touch her unless she is ready to commit to something serious. Carola finds this respectful and fair. And I, in return, of course had to tell her about my love affair in Uruguay. . . put on hold and waiting to turn into a relationship . . . or not . . . and that I'm afraid to project things into this relationship because I want to keep myself from being disappointed when I see Gonzalo again at the end of September. And that we never even skyped in two years of not seeing each other but only kept in touch via email. 

There was a real need and care in sharing and talking. It was one of the most talkative intimate walks I've ever done - maybe due to the fact that we sat in that cafe for more than half of the time spent together. But if felt like a real connection and I'd be very curious to know the sequel to the love story on Öland. We also talked about the problematic relationships with our fathers and mothers which are always intimate by their very nature. And for a long time we talked about auras - Carola is able to read auras. She learned it from a classmate in school. She doesn't do it so much anymore. But she used to be able to see people's energies without even making a special effort and this created a very colorful world for her . . . which in turn made it difficult for her to focus sometimes. So now she always asks for permission first. Because auras are private.
Immediately after the walk Carola sent me this message:
i hope this is not out of "concept" but i wanted to say this meeting touched me in a sense.
under the form of intimate i felt i pushed my boundries and in that also saw something new in me.
when i dare to open up and show myself, i am also able to meet someone else and see them. There's a kind of love in that. Platonic and universal but still. Thank you!
After I sent her the text to double-check she replied: 
It's a cute story, and it made me smile. And I also feel flattered by your description, thank you. Though very intimate, it's kind of the nature of the game and your private depiction.
I reacted to two things, wanted to sleep on it though.
At first I thought the macho story was alright, that kind of information doesn't really bother me. but there was something about it. a kind of tone that makes me feel vulnerable, left on a limb. A feeling I didn't have while sharing. I think it lies in the sentence "This is the kind of intimate stuff Carola shared with me and more . . ."
My own reflection on you text though. And I say this as in a continuous talk on what intimacy really is. You seem surprised on the type of information I am sharing. I think people find different things private, and in that sense I might be very open as I am used to be with my friends. I find it more intimate to tell someone exactly what i am feeling than to tell the story of a one night stand. in that perhaps private and intimate are totally different things. I keep thinking of what your friend the monastery owner said on intimacy, that it's being yourself to the fullest in a group of people. For me that is a kind of trust. Knowing that you won't be abandoned or despised for who you are. I am being very straight forward again, but that is the controversy for me. In the meeting i felt trust, in the text i also feel a distance. Like I didn't meet you but instead was investigated by a zoologist. Although you do express a connection as well. There are a lot of grey scales and shades in the world. These I reacted strongly to.
And this I wrote in response: 
Thanks for your sincere feedback. When looking at the text again, I realize that it is written with quite some distance. Could this be due to the fact that I didn't write much about my feelings and subjective reactions to the 'zoological subject' I was investigating? It's strange that it turned out that way. Because I think I usually put more of that subjective analytical stuff in. Maybe I tried to be more succinct and leave more space for ambiguity or asking the reader to read in between the lines. Although I'm not really sure what I would want them to read there. . . But you're right that I maybe hit a certain detachment and coolness in my tone. I can see it clearly in the text now that you pointed your finger at it. Maybe I'm a bit tired of observing and analyzing my own meandering thoughts and self-conscious behavior in an exchange with a stranger. Possibly I'm not thinking so much in this very period of my life. You write about grey shades and scales. Do you feel I neglected them in the report? I think the very essence of this project lies in a grey zone. 

Do you feel betrayed in your trust after reading the text? Do you question my sincerity? 

I realize that I can never give the complete picture of such an encounter. Our encounter was so rich. How to honor that, how to pay tribute to that? What I wrote may be a simplification and makes the meeting sound more trivial than it was . . . I guess I also thought of a general public when writing the email, trying to quickly deliver a readable and entertaining text which isn't all too ambiguous and difficult to read. I guess my style (in writing) and in interactions is a certain naivete which is appealing to some and boring to others. Maybe I should be less concerned with what people expect of me. Am I trying to defend myself? To explain myself? I feel concerned. Don't want to leave you out on that limb. I would love to meet you again and have another long talk over a tea or coffee. . . to figure out what misunderstandings I (we) created. . . to take it a bit further. It's very easy to open up without having to worry about consequences. Maybe I want life to be too simple. 

intimate walk with Jonas

Jonas was the first one who contacted me to go for a walk in Stockholm. Already two weeks prior to my arrival. So at least I knew there would be one walk happening for sure. We agreed by mail to meet at 4pm in Södermalm at the Hornstull metro station south exit. He wrote he was going to hold a minimalistic bicycle. I replied he would be able to recognize me by a white baseball cap. Finally today my first Stockholm walk. I arrived there 20 minutes early and walked once around the block. When walking around the block I noticed some soreness in my sacrum. From back-bending too much in my yoga practice last night. I tried to relax my sacrum and swing my hips a bit more to create more mobility in that area. I caught myself looking at my reflection in a shop window to makes sure my gait wasn't exaggeratedly effeminate now. It wasn't. I felt a new freedom and body awareness, but from outside the difference was minimal. I could feel it in my backbone that this intimacy project in Stockholm was going to open something in me. When getting back to the Hornstull south exit I became quite excited in a soft way. Differently from my previous intimate walks, this was the first time I was going to walk with a complete stranger. A crowd of pedestrians was crossing the street when the lights turned green and walked right towards me. I stayed there with this multitude of people coming at me and enjoyed the idea of opening myself up to all and any of them. A few young and not so young men passed me on more or less minimalistic bikes - but none of them was watching out for a white base ball cap. Then an sms. I'm at the corner. Wearing all black w bike. I looked up from my mobile phone and  saw a black figure standing with a bike at the corner 50 meters down across the street. We waved at each other and I made a sign that I was going to cross to meet him on the other side. There he was: Jonas. He was wearing dark sunglasses, black pants and a black shirt. On his forearms he had tattoos depicting two birds. His hair was thick and black. He reminded me a bit of John Travolta in Grease. Or of the cool Portuguese bike mechanic and skater who used to fix my bike in Amsterdam. I'm not sure if I really thought this when I first saw him or if I'm only making these comparisons now in hindsight. But it's funny to realize how quick I go looking for references. Probably to help me feel more safe and reassured ... that what I see and am about to get to know more intimately is not completely foreign. Julia once brought my attention to this same habit I have with landscapes.
I had walked around Hornstull the day before and had seen some people swimming in the bay in that neighborhood. This morning I wrote a quick email to Jonas saying that I would bring my swimsuit. We shook hands and exchanged a few first quick sentences to downplay the awkwardness of this blind date situation. 'So this is your minimalistic bike.' was one of mine. 'So where would you like to walk?' one of his. He remembered my proposal for a swim and said he knew a good spot for that. On the way there he was pushing his bike beside him. It was a very light weight bike with very thin tires. We talked briefly about the intimacy project. I asked him how he was related to Kristina and found out that they had met in a bar over a couple of beers. He wasn't connected to her via university or the konsthall as I had suspected. He told me about his work as a photographer. He studied in Stockholm and one year in New York. He likes taking portraits of people and explained how people who are used to having their portrait taken always hit the same kind of poses and give him the same kind of looks. I had to think of the very fashionable locals I had spotted everywhere the day before. Then we arrived at the swimming spot. A little wooden platform with railings into the water. It was a quiet spot in a residential district. I found it very inviting. He made it clear though that he wasn't going to swim as he had been sick last week. I already wore my swim trunks underneath. I found it very generous of him and a bit selfish of myself that he was going to wait there while I had my pre-announced swim. And the weather was windy and overcast so first I thought I was going to decline as well. But then I thought: No, let's do it. It felt like a good decision to follow my desire and and not let the expectations I think the other person has of me stand in the way of getting intimate with my surroundings. That merging with the waterbodies of Stockholm felt like becoming intimate with the city at some subconscious level. I felt more open and eager to take in the majestic city and the unique personality of Jonas.  He took some pictures of me swimming which made me feel a bit self-conscious, but another part of me was flattered to be shot by the photographer. From that point onwards I asked more questions and felt more awake and things flowed smoothly. We talked about the architecture we passed. About the temperament of the Swedish in winter and in the summer months. I asked him about his background which I had been curious from the beginning but didn't dare to ask right away. He was adopted from Guatemala but grew up entirely in Stockholm. He said that he didn't spend much time thinking about his origins and his adoption while growing up, but that he is now dealing with it . . . still dealing with it. He has been to Mexico City on an art scholarship, but not yet to Guatemala. We crossed a big bridge (the Västerbron) to Kungsholmen where we entered a park with an amphitheater. There we did the exercise of 5 minutes sitting in silence and just being present. First he was going to take some Ritalin. He explained me that he was diagnosed with ADHD about a year ago and that Ritalin helps him focus and be more in the moment. I said not to worry, no pressure and felt a bit arrogant and responsible for proposing this exercise. But then we did it anyway since he insisted that he wanted to try it and thought it's good for him. And I felt very touched by his sincere effort to try this even though he said it wasn't one of his strengths to do meditative practices. He can meditate best on his bike in the crazy city traffic when his full attention is required to keep him safe. We agreed to start walking back towards Hornstull metro station, but then we passed a bouldering playground. And I said let's try this. We both had a few goes at climbing up the two boulders. He said that this was more like his kind of meditation and that he had always wanted to try bouldering and never had. I did it once with Swedish Daniel in Amsterdam in an indoor climbing hall. And I came across super nice boulders and boulder-climbers in Hampi, India. But it had never occurred to me  that one could do this for free and without equipment in a park in Stockholm. If I lived here I would come here regularly to get that nice tingling sensation in fingers and lower arms. I also tried to promote the Osho dynamic meditation to Jonas. But bouldering and cycling is probably more up his alley. When our paths separated at the metro station I genuinely and enthusiastically said that I had had a great afternoon. And I think he enjoyed it too. My spirits had lifted from post - Sweet&Tender for the End of the World depression to an outdoorsy and active approach to a city and its inhabitants - and Jonas had been my intimate guide and barometer.
I sent the text to Jonas to double-check and this was his comment:
I´m ok with the text! Only thing would be that I wasn´t taking my ritalin to do the meditation, but rather, I have a time every afternoon i have to take them. It´s  when my morning-dose wears off. It just happened to be right when we were about to start the 5min meditation. Perhaps you could change that? Or if its to hard to rewrite, just take it out completly? Just that I´m kind of sensitive about what language is used about theese sort of diagnosis and medicines You know, people thinking that kind of medicine is to get high or whatever rather than to just be on level... 

Oh, and the diagnosis is actually ADD. ie no Hyperactivity, hehe.

Put what I write here into the blogentry also if you want.

Anyway a very sweet text. 

Really wanna try bouldering now.....

Lonely Allegiance - intimate walks in Stockholm

I was invited to participate in the group exhibition LONELY ALLEGIANCE curated by Kristina Lindemann. Before and parallel to the exhibition I got the opportunity to take up the intimate walks again in the frame of a two-week residency at Residency Botkyrka and MDT in Stockholm.

I arrived in Stockholm on Monday. Today is Wednesday. I must say that my thinking and writing capacity and my ability to take in, process and digest information is rather slow at the moment. I see myself in a recovery process from an overload of responsability, stuck emotion, sexual frustration, alienation and insecurity which has accumulated during my last project SWEET&TENDER FOR THE  END OF THE WORLD in Bern. It was a month-long residency project with 20 artists which I coordinated and co-organized. I'm not going to try and analyze the details and reasons for this overwhelming sense of failure and confusion right now. Paradoxically to my own perception the project was deemed a success and great gift by most people involved. It was mainly my own 'movie playing in my head' that threw me so completely off balance. I did have a short, less than a week's break before coming to Stockholm during which I walked in the Swiss Alps with my friend Catalina. This little Swiss holiday didn't restore my equilibrium though and I still found myself in a state of mild depression until this morning. My friend Roger wrote to me in response to an 'intimate' email: What is THE ORGANIZER? in capital letters? Is it a role you were supposed to play? Or is more the role where you find yourself stuck in? The image of yourself? Walking is nice. Depression is ok. Right now I feel is something to deal with, only that, that's it. So don't worry, give yourself the chance to feel that too. 

Yesterday I also wrote an email to my mother apologizing for my stressed-out and consequently impolite behavior when I was at home in the village shortly before leaving again for Sweden. She replied: I hope you will slowly find yourself again during these two weeks in Stockholm. I always sense very well if you are doing well or suffering. I think you have been too ambitious with this big project. I hope that this will teach you a lesson not to bite off more than you can chew. You're not an organizer after all. Try to be content with more simple things. Don't you think you could choose a much happier and more relaxed life teaching yoga?   

Luckily Kristina had arranged for me to arrive a few days early to acclimatize and get to know the context in which we are operating. I'm only officially conducting 'intimate walks' from tomorrow on.
I didn't manage to do a lot these three first days. On Monday I went shopping and bought mainly fruit and vegetables for my green smoothies and raw food diet - during Sweet&Tender for the End of the World I gave up my diet principles and slipped into old habits of drinking too much coffee and sweets to counteract a blurry mind and tired body.
So I told myself I'll use this time in Stockholm to recover a sense of intimacy and care. A regular yoga routine is also on my list of things to get back to. So far I haven't been able to find a good rhythm though and indulged in sleeping in late which I apparently needed. Fine. I promised myself not to be hard on myself for a change this time.

On Tuesday I went and had lunch with Erik and Kristina at the Mangkulturellt Centrum. Erik studied fashion design and works now as an outreach coordinator at the Botkyrka Konsthall and Mangkulturellt centrum. He made a dynamic and relaxedly efficient impression on me with his hip (self-tailored I imagine) clothing style and sleepy out of bed look.  He works with adolescents and school kids in the neighborhood trying to make art and culture more accessible to them. I also met Tatiana, a native Bolivian who works at the Mangkulturellt Centrum at the exhibition hall and in the office. I perceived her as a tough girl, but very nice. Proud of her origins. I talked to her in Spanish when she said she was from Oruro, Bolivia. It's the city with the famous carnival.

After lunch I walked with Kristina around Fittja, the neighborhood where the residency and the multicultural center are located. I couldn't help but see in her the person who invited me and therefore had certain expectations of me. The group exhibition LONELY ALLEGIANCE is her final project for her master studies in curatorship. I felt already a bit guilty because the communication by email and some skype meetings in preparation for this residency had sometimes been a bit much for me. Kristina tends to give A LOT of information and since I had for the past month been immersed in the overpowering End of the World project I often found myself unable  to filter out the truly important info from the less important. So I guess upon meeting her in person I was already a bit prejudiced and worried that I wouldn't be able to fulfill her expectations and keep up a professional dialogue with her. During the walk in Fittja she was mainly the one talking and I became aware that she was actually very accommodating and nice trying to provide me with all the information and knowledge about the neighborhood I might possibly need. She noticed when my focus drifted a bit and started to talk about the object upon which my gaze had apparently come to rest. This impressed me very much.
Eventually her pace of speech slowed down a bit and there were more pauses and silences which I appreciated. I went with her to the neighborhood library to distribute flyers and in the evening we went together to the MDT theater's season opening. Throughout this time spent together I could see that she was making a great effort to be polite and nice to people in a genuine and unobtrusive way. There had been some misunderstanding with MDT about the content and format of my 'research presentation' there. While I was already dreading problems and hard feelings, Kristina stayed patient and let me know that she wants them to be happy with the collaboration and finds it important to establish a sustainable relationship. 

Wenckebachweg 18: midnight chat with Nemesia

I had a 1am talk with Nemesia last night in the kitchen. She caught me in the act of nibbling on a slice of cheese. She was looking for Ambroise. She said she needed somebody to talk to. I was glad to be the one to share this midnight chat with her. She had moved into Wenckebachweg 18 a week ago and we had only met briefly one sunny morning in the living room when Ambroise and her shared a sumptuous brunch on the couch with lounge music. Ambroise was wearing a mini skirt, a fake fur coat and high heels that morning. Marcel had told me about Ambroise’s occasional drag actions and I felt touched and honored to finally witness one myself.
Nemesia had been evicted from a squat a few days ago and was still a bit traumatized. I didn’t realize how big an effect this eviction had on her. She seemed to be a tough&talkative girl. That was my first impression. She was wiping her eye sockets vigorously. I’m not embarrassed anymore when people cry in front of me. I was especially intrigued by Nemesia’s vigorous rubbing of her eye sockets as if this could prevent the tears from flowing.
I had just gotten back from a Korean dumpling party. She had been to a dinner with fellow academics. She writes her PHD on the squatting movement in Holland. She had enjoyed the food but found the people boring. Especially one Iranian guy who always needs to be the center of attention and was saying things like: “ I bought some lamb today. They have some really nice quality lamb in Holland!”
She told me she hadn’t realized I was a dancer. She took modern dance in college and loves to go to dance performances. She also commented on my accent. She found it slightly American with a vague European timbre or something along those lines.
I was flattered by her remark. I’m always annoyed when people detect my accent as being from the German wing all too soon. Being reminded that my accent isn’t as obviously German as Philip’s for example is very reassuring, although I’m not particularly keen on sounding American either.
Philip had left to Berlin for a week. Nemesia wasn’t the only one feeling relieved by Philip’s absence. He acts as though he owns the house and had expressed serious and vehement objections to Nemesia moving into the guest room. Philip likes to use the guest room as his office and the living room as his work space. His bedroom is only for sleeping and looking at himself in the mirror (according to Ambroise). Nemesia doesn’t understand how somebody can have three rooms in a squatted house. After all a squat is public property and should be treated as such with social responsibility.
Nemesia told me that Philip had asked her questions about her status when they first met – which social class her parents belong to etc. I find this perverse.
Status shouldn’t be an issue at all. But upon closer reflection I had to admit that in my social circle status is an issue after all. It is determined by whether people find somebody’s work interesting or not, if it sells and happens to please and intrigue. It is about pimping one’s profile and having an extended network of potential spectators, programmers, critics etc. who give value and importance to one’s artistic output.

intimate walk with Robert

I raced to his house boat in the rain to pick him up. Actually it's not his house boat, but the house boat of Andre. It's one of the last house boats in Amsterdam without a sewage system. So when I peed in their toilet it went directly into the canal.
First we had a tea and stroop koek and talked about lazy weekend moods.
Robert sometimes stays in bed all day in the weekend reading the papers. He also likes to walk around his house naked for hours on end. When he is alone. Or with lovers. It feels natural to him. He wakes up every morning at 5 am to remember his dreams and goes on dreaming in a waking state. He continues constructing his dreams once he is awake, interpreting them in a way, but not analytically, more intuitively I believe.
He likes to do circular movements in his waist when he wakes up. This movement comes natural to him. I told him that this is a Kundalini exercise. In my Kundalini class we call it grinding. It wakes up the Kundalini energy and is great for digestion. And Silke, the financial secretary at school, told me she learned the same exercise in a ritual stemming from an old Tibetan monk tradition, before the buddhists came to Tibet. I forgot the name of this tradition, but I will ask her again. Robert wasn't aware that this movement comes from any kind of Tibetan monk or Kundalini tradition.
He does it unconsciously. He just does it because his body asks for it first thing in the morning. What I love about Robert is that he often shares intimate details of his life without even being asked.
We ventured out into the drizzling Amsterdam Saturday afternoon under one, big black umbrella. This already provided a quite intimate setting. We hooked arms. Robert told me about a festival director in Bologna with hair on the outside of his ears. Robert said he reminded him of a character out of Lord of the Rings. When he met this guy he felt immediately very intimately connected and they walked arm in arm through Bologna.
Robert is very social. I admire how easy it is for him to meet people and become intimate with them. In that way he is a bit of a role model to me. He talks openly about his narcissistic side. He has discovered the stage and the performer inside rather late in his life. He likes to take pictures of himself on his laptop and publish them on his blog. He finds himself beautiful when he looks at himself in the mirror in the morning. But in a sauna for example he is often bashful about his body. He is a self-indulgent being and wants to celebrate that. Yet he can give a lot of attention, positive energy and love to others. It's true that I can feel quite special in his company.
Later at a bakhlava shop Robert asked me about my relationship with my body. I replied that I am vain - that I worry about losing my hair and getting a belly. I am striving for a perfect body. And I am not at all proud of that. It doesn't go with my values of serenity and inner peace. I tend to think I am too attached to outer appearance. Everybody wants to be desired, no? Especially performers? Somehow I find it reassuring that Robert is vain and doesn't have a problem with it. Rather than change his vanity he wants to celebrate it.
Robert once told me in a feedback that what he really likes in me is my transparency. That's a big word - transparency. And it has stuck with me ever since. I constantly question myself if I am truly being transparent or only pretending to be. More often than not I perceive myself as a total fraud. I notice that it has become very important to me what Robert thinks of me. He has been my teacher and adviser. I appreciate his directness, even bluntness in giving feedback. He always wants to get back to the essence of things, the essence of what we are doing or looking for. That has been immensely valuable for me. At the bakhlava cafe I was looking for something specific. I couldn't exactly lay my finger on it. I loved listening to Robert's stories which were vivid and lush. He gets very enthusiastic and doesn't preach, but babbles like a child - which makes him so human and approachable to me. Was I expecting something from him? I guess I most of all wanted his approval. Maybe I see in him a kind of father figure. And I try to get the recognition my father cannot give me from Robert. I noticed again my tendency of not sharing so much, but being more of a facilitator. I tried to bring up this subject. I even asked him if my analytical and self-critical behavior and way of thinking can be annoying. He said it wasn't annoying, more funny. But that it makes me stay more with myself. Instead of opening up to the other. The fact that he was/is my teacher probably has something to do with it too. I mean with my holding something back, not letting myself completely go. I wanted to share more. Robert said my being there was already enough. I respect his opinion a lot. Maybe too much. Maybe Robert is my guru. I feel I can get a lot of support from him. I shouldn't depend on that though. Yet I truly believe that Robert is a great teacher. He lets me be who I am and even encourages that - he encourages me to be more of that. Teacher-student relationships have always been slightly delicate and political to me. I think twice or even three times what I am going to say to a teacher. Robert asks for the essence. He supports my intimacy research. He congratulates me with my blog texts. He finds them enjoyable and touching. Robert is more like a friend actually. So why should I worry about political correctness? Why should I think twice. He tells me about love affairs, the loss of love, the death of his father, about swinger clubs and tantra workshops.
I told him about my fear of being a pedophile once. I wanted to make a political piece about pedophilia, about therapy and intimate stuff exposed. He told me not to start from a problem, but to expose the intimate stuff as a celebration. That's how "White Horse - an attempt at live therapy" came into being.
And now he asked me again about love and where my heart rests. In the end I felt compelled and relieved to tell him about my obsession with Rodrigo. The shame and blame I put on myself for not being able to let go. And of course he could totally relate to that. He didn't tell me to move on like everybody else does including my therapist. Instead he feels I should give myself three years to overcome this obsession. That sounds like a reasonable amount of time. If I keep blaming myself for not getting over it I will never get over it. Besides it is my right as an artist to be obsessed - self-obsessed or obsessed with others. And loving someone without being loved in return is not something to be ashamed of. The problem is not the obsession maybe, but the shame and guilt that go along with it. So I guess that's what I needed to hear from Robert. That I am ok. That loving too much in solitude is ok, that fetishes are ok, obessions are ok and melancholia is ok too.
My perception and mood had been changed by this realization. We walked back to the house boat where Andre had made a delicious fish soup and I was invited for dinner.
We each drew a Tarot card. I got one with a lot of mermaids who were creating a special bond between the sea and the skies. The tears of the sea get dried up by the sun.

intimate tea with Raquel at the blue teahouse

This time I didn’t want to be accommodating. I realized that intimacy for me is only taking place if I am sharing as well – I mean sharing deliberately and with a vengeance. So I came into that café and talked Raquel’s head off – about my winter depression, about all my difficulties in the creative process, about healing, therapy, obstacles in life. About fear and longing and loathing in Las Vegas.
I must have sounded like a very depressed grumpy old man. I was complaining, complaining, nothing but complaining. I think Raquel was doing her best to take in all the black mess I was puking on the table. Sometimes she was offering little bits of advice, but mainly just listening. She was very patient – yet slightly surprised, I felt, to find me in such a state. At some point she said something that caught my attention: It was something about people who control so much what they are saying that it doesn’t give you space to enter. I don’t remember why she said it and I didn’t feel she was referring to me at that moment. But it made so much sense to me.
And at one point she said: Stop trying to control life because it is fucking impossible! Which I knew and had heard many times. But at that moment it really sank in and made sense.
Raquel claims to be someone who isn’t able to control what she is saying or thinking. Meaning she doesn’t think or act in a structured way, but rather follows her impulses and intuition. She has tried to live a more structured and controlled life in the past, but it didn’t work for her. She has tried to prepare and organize her thoughts before voicing them. Yet she came to realize that communication runs much more smoothly when she just speaks her mind in a kind of stream-of-consciousness way.

I think for me too that might be a much better way of communicating.

Eventually the conversation became more balanced. Meaning that I gave space to Raquel to puke her mess on the table too. Which she did in a more graceful way. And from there we started constructing new things. We talked about upcoming projects, future things we were looking forward to, hopeful things, not solutions but possibilities.

Raquel told me about a period in her life where she used to sit at a table with friends or family without saying a single word. It was a period when she felt cut off from the world, shy and introverted. And maybe we need periods like that.
I just had one at home at X-mas again. I went to my room even before dessert. My aunt asked me about the weather in Holland and my uncle about the house boats in the canals. I didn't have much to say on either subject. I didn't know how to relate to my family anymore. But now I promise I am changing. I went to the Andy Warhol exhibition and did a laughing meditation there with Helena and silver clouds. I decided during that laughing meditation to perform my life from now on as an active propelling force. I'm done with my victim. My self-pity and my passive everyday routine. My good student needs to die. I'd rather be a clown again than a control freak or wimpy victim.