So you're just supposed to give up ?

"It's not about giving up, it's about letting go, and finally accepting who you are"

May not be Japanese, but...

Pic from 9gag.com

He who fights Evil...

"Whoever battles monsters should take care not to become a monster too, for if you stare long enough into the Abyss, the Abyss stares also into you."

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil, chapter 4, no. 146

"Look therefore whether the light that is in thee be not darkness."

— Luke 11:35

"You wish that things could be back to what they used to be? Fool, what is done cannot be undone. What has been known cannot be ignored anymore. And a lie... will always remain a lie when exposed."

— N. Werther

When you begin to know something that is fundamentally different from yourself, you take a piece of it with you and it changes you and vice versa.

I want to be a magician.

"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."

Clarke's Third Law

Many people have heard this quotation, but few people really think about its implications.

We now live in a world that is so completely immersed in advanced technology that we depend upon it for our very survival.  Most of the actions that we depend upon for our everyday activities -- from flipping a switch to make the lights come on to obtaining all of our food supplies at a nearby supermarket -- are things that any individual from a century ago would consider magic.

Very few people in industrialized countries do work that is not directly assisted by electronic computers, although that computerized assistance is often quite invisible to the average person.  Few people think about things such as the fact that whenever we buy some food item at a supermarket, the next time we go to that same supermarket, they still have about the same supplies that they had before.  There are invisible infrastructures all around us that are made up of advanced technology.  Most of us just take the magic for granted.

Few people stop to consider what would happen if, in an instant, the magic went away.  If our advanced technology were suddenly and completely destroyed, how would we manage to survive?

We, as future engineers, are but the last century's magicians.

And when I look at the future that is promised to me, I can only rejoice myself, for I know, that one day, I will be part of this. I will, amongst many others, make a difference. As Neil once said, "That's one small step for man; one giant leap for mankind".

I don't know yet what I, personally, will do. What will be my contribution to the humanity. But I know one thing: I am proud. Proud of myself, of what I am and what I have to give. I may be not the best man on earth -and it will be foolish to think  likewise- but I am a good man. Can't say I always was. There are some things I regret. Things I did, said, felt. But at the end of the day, what counts is what I am, not the some mistakes I made.

Things aren't so bright today. A thick fog has covered all the surroundings outside, and it's getting cold here in the very room I am currently writing. My heart feels a bit hollow still. And yet. I survive. Because no matter what, the sun will shine once again someday. I still have friends who support me, who constantly tell me to cheer up, to not give up to all the sadness and cynicism that sometimes threatens to surge. 

I've learnt -the hard way- that no matter what may be happening now, my Destiny awaits. I'm a capable man, and through all the flaws and the pain, I've managed to make it through 'til now. I will meet Her, and She will see me for who I am. The very man she's always dreamt of. And I will suffer no more.

I've recently got to speak to my first ex on Skype. And things turned out pretty well. Of course, the conversation was a little odd at first. But then we could remember our memories without the shadow of the past making us feel too down. I had that little pinch inside me when she said if she could go back, she would have never done the things she did the way did. That she couldn't see how "amazing" I am when we first met coz we were young. And there was something in her voice that almost shattered my own voice when I had to answer her. Memories are overflowing. But now I can enjoy them. Damn, though all the wrong things we did, there was still room in our minds for the great moments we had.

She's with her new bf. Things are going pretty well as it seems. After almost a year of living afar, they now can see each other everyday. I envy and am glad for them at the same time.

I think I'll follow her advice, just stop looking for, and just let it happen. For the best surprises occur when we don't wait for them.

I'll just focus on what I have to do. But I can't wait. I want to have at least one glimpse of the future I have the right to get. 

I don't have to give up the dreams I had as the child. I can cast fire from my hands, build a device that will provide light and heat from scratch. Create hapiness from sorrow.

The Best Is Yet to Come

I want to become an engineer. I want to become someone's magician.

En un tour de main..

"August 21

My sensations are constantly changing. Sometimes a happy prospect opens before me; but alas! it is only for a moment; and then, when I am lost in reverie, I cannot help saying to myself "If [I] were to die?—Yes, she would become—and I should be"—and so I pursue a chimera, till it leads me to the edge of a precipice at which I shudder."

"En un tour de main tout change avec moi. Parfois un doux rayon de la vie veut bien se lever de nouveau et m’éclairer d’une demi-clarté, hélas ! seulement pour un moment. Quand je me perds ainsi dans des rêves, je ne puis me défendre de cette pensée Quoi ! si [je devais mourir] ! tu deviendrais… oui, elle deviendrait… Alors je poursuis ce fantôme jusqu’à ce qu’il me conduise à des abîmes sur le bord desquels je m’arrête et recule en tremblant."

(Goethe, Die Leiden des jungen Werther, Traduction et adaptation libre)

"And everytime I look at her, it's like I had been blind all my life, and was just starting to see.."

N. Werther

Today Is Where We Live.

"Le passé est mort, L'avenir n'est pas encore né.

Nous avons seulement le présent, et nous le traitons mal."

David Gemmell

Never Give Up ~ Your Destiny Awaits

Never Surrender, Always Fight for your Dream.

Even when You Think It's Vain and Hopeless,

Even when You Think This Pain Is Endless.

Always Remember, that Life's a Too Short Stream.

So Com'on Boy, Stand Up and Be Brave.

Come On! Time to Become Who You Are.

Don't Behave as a Slave, Quit Digging Your Own Grave

'Cause Now Is Your Time, and Here Is Your Star.

Know that At the End of the Day, She will Know How to Reward You.

'Cause She's The One..

One little riddle..

"Steals an event

Or even a mood.

Reveals the truth

Or shatters it.."

Clue: That's what I'll bring next Friday, and be using nearly everyday for a week ;)


Answer: A Camera.

L'Attrape-Rêves

He Wishes for the Cloths of Heaven

Had I the heavens’ embroidered cloths,

Enwrought with golden and silver light,

The blue and the dim and the dark cloths

Of night and light and the half light,

I would spread the cloths under your feet:

But I, being poor, have only my dreams;

I have spread my dreams under your feet;

Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.

______________________

Lui qui Voulait Déposer le Ciel

Si je pouvais t'offrir le bleu secret du ciel,

Brodé de lumière d'or et de reflets d'argent,

Le mystérieux secret, le secret éternel,

De la vie et du jour, de la nuit et du temps,

Avec tout mon amour je le mettrais à tes pieds.

Mais tu sais, je suis pauvre, et je n'ai que mes rêves,

J'ai déroulé mes rêves sous tes pieds

Marche doucement, car tu marches sur mes rêves.

William Butler Yeats

Note personnelle: Une fois n'est pas coutume, c'est grâce à un film que j'ai découvert ce poème, cet auteur. Il s'agit d'Equilibrium (que je recommande vivement par ailleurs.. Un petit goût de 1984..)

La citation du film est composée des trois derniers vers et diffère légèrement de la traduction (qui reste une traduction parmi tant d'autres en réalité). Mais je dois dire que même pris seuls, ces vers ont une mélodie presque  irréelle, une magie certaine. Je vous laisse en juger:

Mais tu sais, je suis pauvre, et mes rêves sont mes seuls biens.

Sous tes pas, j'ai déroulé mes rêves,

Marche doucement, car tu marches sur mes rêves...

Encore une fois, il faut avoir vu le film pour en sentir toute l'intensité. 

Et seuls, ces vers parlent alors de liberté, et d'évasion. De la fragilité de l'homme lorsqu'il se met à nu, et de l'amour dans toute sa splendeur mortifère.. 

Mais surtout, ces vers parlent de moi, puisqu'ils parlent de nous..

About the Japanese tragedy..

Juste un post d'un blogueur qui tient à garder son anonymat (don't ask me why). L'article n'est pas de moi. J'ai simplement voulu le partager étant donné qu'en dehors des blagues vaseuses des uns et de la compassion ressentie par les autres, il y a également un point que l'on ne mentionne rarement dans ce que j'ai pu remarquer. Je tiens à préciser: je ne suis pas spécialement versé dans la politique, mais ces deux paragraphes m'ont "ouvert l'esprit", et j'ai voulu le partager.

L'article est en anglais au fait. Je ne le traduirais pas (sauf demande explicite) par flemme et parce que certaines expressions n'ont tout simplement pas d'équivalent "satisfaisant" à mes yeux.

Enjoy!

________________

Could we possibly have gone wrong at some point ? No shit ?

"

I can’t tell how it’s going in other countries, but at least in my country (ndlr: France), the Japanese horrible tragedy, more precisely their problem with the Fukushima nuclear plants, stirs the same nauseatingly repeated debate. To make it into a caricature, it’s “Greedy brainwashed pro-nuclear realist neocons” VS “Unrealistic green khmers living on Care Bear Planet”.

The most sickening part in this is that nobody actually listens to the other party’s arguments, but everybody’s taking advantage of the shit hitting Japan to try and prove they’re right. The Japanese shouldn’t have used such a dangerous energy, the Japanese should have instead bought safer plants for instance the ones we’re selling… ¬_¬

Fuckers without morals.

Hey, I know, my post is pointless, but it’s MY blog, you can’t prevent me from posting useless stuff when I feel like it 

(more useless rambling follows, you may wish to skip it)

A summary, if you care, of what the real debate should have been ?

- nuclear energy sucks big time, even rich western countries can’t handle it as soon as shit hits the fan, and this alea is wrongly excluded from the calculation cost of that energy. Plus, there’s not even for a century left of uranium. We can replace it, right, then let’s do it… Can we ?

- gas-powered plants, hey, it’s better, extremely cleaner and safer ! Oh, but wait, if we replace nuclear plants with gas  plants, we don’t even have 50 years of gas left, let’s hope global warming hits hard otherwise winters will be a pain in the ass.

- fuel-powered plants, it’s dirtier but at least it could last a bit more than 50 years, hopefully. Well, less, if developing countries aspire to western lifestyle and if it replaces gas or nuclear plants.

- coal power plants. WOOT, it could last 180 years if nobody ever lied on the subject (checking that figure shocked me, I thought it was 1000 years), and if it’s not replacing uranium, gas and fuel, and if the world stops developing itself and the population stops growing.

- fusion energy ? The most optimistic wisemen predict it could be made possible in 60 years at best, should it finally work. If it doesn’t work in time…

- otherwise, there’s reusable natural resources : wood-based power plants, and solar energy, and energy using sea currents, waves, wind and hydroelectric energy. Except that even the most optimistic laudators reckon it can only provide a part of a country’s energy mix, not provide energy for all the needs, it wouldn’t be producing enough even in the best case, and a too large part of it cannot produce energy 24/7 in every place needing it, leading to unsolved storing and transporting problems.

This brings back the title of my post : Could we possibly have gone wrong at some point ?

No shit ? No way !

We want a new TV, 2 or 3 kids, a new car, new plastic toys, bigger houses, holidays on another continent, new stuff, new machines, and more, and more, and more !

And we’re right to want it ! Metaphorically, we’re falling down from a cliff, but we’re right to trust we can find solutions before hitting the ground.

Or not.

Perhaps we could involve ourselves a bit more in supporting hope-bearing projects ?

Perhaps we could start devising ways to strongly reduce our environmental impact, consider having less kids, don’t you guys think ?

It’s so depressing, it’s safer to act as if wiser guys will find a magical solution worthy of Care Bear Planet, to forget about it and keep on downloading porn.

Sorry to post such a long rant from a pessimistic liberal European guy hopelessly wishing to finally read reasons to believe in a better future, that may sound rude and hypocritical to people not living with our comfortable lifestyle, or you may also disagree, but, hey, MY blog, MY ramblings 

When I was a kid, I imagined things would stay the way they were until the end of the world. As a teenager and a young adult, I learned treasures of thought born more than two thousand years ago, I learned to love modern civilisation’s ambition to create principles available for a all mankind, as long as there would be mankind.

- And now, even a 150 year prospect into the future is beyond hazardous : this fact is enraging me.

Hey, if you feel I’m dead wrong, you’re more than welcome to prove me wrong !"

[1]

Le 27 Octobre, Soir.

"J'ai tant ! et son idée dévore tout ; j'ai tant ! et sans elle tout pour moi se

réduit à rien."

Les Souffrances du Jeune Werther, Goethe