me= universal?

that time of the year again.
when i was younger i used to get excited about getting xmas decorations to cover out lil’ pine tree
outside and get upset that my mom did not want to conform to all the xmas ness shown on tv and in shopping malls…

sometimes it is nice to conform…
other times it is not.
sometimes it is nice to conform…
othertimes it is not
sometimes it is nice to conform…
other times it is not.
sometimes it is nice to conform…
othertimes it is not
sometimes it is nice to conform…
other times it is not.
sometimes it is nice to conform…
othertimes it is not

i am wearing a mask over my brain/mind/heart
at the moment,it feels like a safe place
i geuss it is like why peops take hallucigenics
to get to the masked state that i feel i am in at the moment,
and i did not even have any drug except for 2slices of bread, eggs, orange,slice of cake…and 4 milk chocolate covered digestive biscuits and the strange mood i woke up with this morning
sometimes food just numbs everything
i don’t feel cold,hot,warm,happy,sad,

i am too afraid to go upsatirs to my studio to start working.
i feel as though all my demons are there
i finally ‘completed’ a video piece few days ago,i digg it.
video is completely different from painting or assemblage…
there is a part of the process that is totally removed -unless you understand comp language that is,
but it does not yet feel tactile

still trying to fall inlove with all my paradoxes.

it has been a while.
things have been alot calmer in amsterdam-not really but you know it is all relative…
the zwarte piet stuff has been taken off all shop windows and are now replaced by santa clause will his red jumpsuit.
it is a relief on some part…(but sentiments have not really changed-had a meeeting with some guy who holds an important possition in the dutch govt-and damn…i will write about it another day,it is exhausting!)
we had our(participants+tutors) xmas party the other night-it turned out to be a really interesting evening.
stopped drinking at 6.am the next morning.(babalaas the next morning was awful)
and a(one of the participants) and i had a moment now things are so akward!
i kinda have a secret crush on him all of a sudden.
feeling like macy gray when she wrote that “i try ” song
i seem to stumble when i say goodbye to him.
anyhow.
i will be here in a’dam 4 xmas after all-sob sob.
but i will be home for new years.
which is excellent.
i can’t wait to wear a bare back top.
i dunno what to write.

.
i am really moved by your thoughts and words.
i am also still shaken up by yesterday..
i was looking at the video footage that a friend of mine made of me
with the sign.it is strange looking at it from another angle.
some people here think i am crazy-like fanatic for having done that>passivity is sometimes put on a pedastall interms of political action…
ya,and it is really so-that when one talks about racism
people think you are pulling out the race card or swearing.
i have to go to a seminar now,so i can’t write much further but i will try my best to upload some images

damn.

what a day!
i protested by myself in a part of the city of amsterdam.
it was against the zwarte piet (whites dressed in black face/coonface in celebration of an old tradition with racist implications/ideology)images around the city.
i cried in the middle of it.but i managed.
i had a sign that said “your racism hurts”
pointing it towards avarage people in the streets and also shop keepers with these images,golliwogs hanging on their windows and also
at the the zwarte piet and sinta klaus procesession….
alot of people were pissed off- white dutch people in particular
some saying that i have no right to say what i was saying because i am not dutch one also screamed that i should go back to my own country…
i got kicked out of the bynkorff(big departmental shopping store-kinda similar to harrods)
escorted out to the doorstep by the security gaurds in to the drizzling rain…
they had all these zwarte piet characters riding up ropes up and down smilling with glee happy to be of service to their white master sinta klauss
(saint nicholas)(patron of the sailors)(remember the dutch were the strong holds of the slave trade and one of the last if not the last, of the european countries to ban slavery and also one of the last to ‘decolonise’)(and what kind of a person is sainted whilst practicing slavery…!!!)
well i was told that i was silly and racist and stupid for thinking and saying that their racist tradition is racist
someone called me a bitch….
other people told me to deal with it…
but i also had some support from passerbys in the street who empathised with what i was saying and admired my action
in the same departmental shop i was talking about earlier,there were a couple of black girls who worked there who gave me a thumbs up-i geuss for saying what was on their minds but supresing verbally publically(is that the correct soelling of that?)
so that was good affirmation about how i was feeling and what i was doing and it helped me carry on…
and some strangers also stopped me -black and white, saying that they support what i am saying-and that was also great
some were just nodding…or looking at what i was doing for a while contemplating…

and when i cried,the fact that there had been people beside the ones who refused to look me in the eye or who were not willing to question the culture inwhich they are rooted or the aggresive people…what kinda held me up was that i had contact with people who knew what i was talking about-and who ,i hope will be inspired to make other moves that will question the status quo…
it was hard.emotional.brave…
it is not easy telling strangers about things that hurt you and having people look at you like you are mad.
i geuss it is like rape victims when they say they have been rapped and no one wants to look them in the eye no more after that …they challege the implied notions of a patrichal hegemonic sexist society by protesting/speaking out and up
or when gay people come out of the closet in a square community….
damn those people who were in the civil rights movement not only in south africa but everywhere…
they had guts-to get so many people together and stand up against the grain….
it was as though i was saying the most horrible swear word imaginable the way people were looking at me-some laughing…
enjoying the fact that their tradition hurts me.
rosa parks….damn!
lillian ngoyi and other women in the 50’s refusing to carry passes in the streets….
damn!
jesus….
biko…
ghandi….
sol plaatjie…
the list goes on…and it is not only those really well known figures,i am sure there are more who died in the process.
shit it takes something…
i admire people who have that courage to stand up for theirs and other people’s humanity.