Own interpretation

Just a Little Rain
(Malvina Reynolds)

Just a little rain falling all around
The grass lifts its head to the heavenly sound
Just a little rain, just a little rain
What have they done to the rain?

Just a little boy standing in the rain
The gentle rain that falls for years
And the grass is gone and the boy disappears
And the rain keeps falling like helpless tears
And what have they done to the rain?

Just a little breeze out of the sky
The leaves nod their heads as the breeze blows by
Just a little breeze with some smoke in its eye
And what have they done to the rain?

---

When i first read the lyrics of this song, I thought they were so gentle and beautiful and sad and magical.
In fact, the imagery that it evoked was nothing like what it was really about. It was actually written as part of a campaign to stop nuclear testing in the atmosphere, which was producing fall-out. Similarly here is how the song by the Searchers sounds. This is an instance when my own imagination did a much better job of interpreting the song.
What did you guys think?

Desparately Seeking Onion

Last weekend Altavisto and I watched the movie The Fountain. Has anyone else watched it? It is one of those movies which is wonderfully acted and layered like an onion and at the end of the movie, we are left off, wondering how the layers were ordered and if the layers were real or imaginary. The hubby gave me his interpretation and although it was better than my own confused mess, I am not yet convinced. I will have to read up on it. If you have seen it and have your hypothesis handy, let me know!!

On another note, we also watched the super cool movie Super Bad. Oh yeah. Definitely on another level, but had quite a few LOL moments.

Cafe where art thou?

It's been nearly 10 days that I have stopped my two cups of coffee in the morning habit. I am drinking black tea as replacement which has much less caffeine and I no longer get headaches. However you know what I have discovered? I like the taste and smell of coffee....I miss it! I no longer need it but would like to drink it. That is good right? :-)
However I will never sink to the level of green teas... they are still yuck! :-P

Btw again where are my blogger sisters and brothers?!!!

El Laberinto del Fauno

My favourite movie of all time is El Laberinto del Fauno by the genius Guillermo del Toro. I saw it when it first came out and this weekend I watched all the extras on the dvd and the entire film with director's commentaries. If you liked the movie, I really recommend watching the movie with the commentaries because like del Toro mentions in the extras, there are so many layers to the movie and learning the layers only increases your appreciation of the movie. I am so amazed that the movie didn't get more awards -- for sure, it deserved the Oscar for best foreign movie. The acting alone was brilliant. The storyline fantastical. The score enchanting.
I won't say too much about the movie because it seems everything I want to say is better conveyed by the many reviews of the movie. So instead I will list various quotes which I liked and some comments. Note there will be sp0ilers so if you haven't seen the movie, go see it! and then read the quotes. :-)
Btw, other movies related to this which I want to watch are: The Devil's Backbone and The Little Princess.

"When we're kids, we all really believe that there is a rabbit-hole somewhere that we can tumble down and come out in a magical place. But as we grow up, the belief wanes but the need for that belief increases." This is so true. Perhaps this is why religion becomes so important to some grown ups.

And although audiences have interpreted the film's bittersweet ending as everything from a religious metaphor to a psychological allegory, del Toro offers a simpler, but more poetic, explanation, that of "I always think of that beautiful quote by Kierkegaard that says the tyrant's reign ends with his death, but the martyr's reign starts with his death. I think that is the essence of the movie: It's about living forever by choosing how you die."
At the end of the movie, I really struggled with the idea of whether the fantasy world was real or not. Why can't it be? But I guess it's not. Along the same lines, a reviewer writes: "she defies her stepfather with the knowledge he can kill her. But what he does not know is that he cannot take her life."

"The bulk of the movie deals with one question: How does one contend with overwhelming, tyrannical violence?" Everyone deals differently, from the brutal violence that Captain Vidal leashes out on those around him, to the guerrilla warfare of the rebels, the double life of Mercedes and the Dr, the acceptance of the mother and its total rejection by Ofelia.

The first lines of the movie, quoted from the faun, reads: "A long time ago, in the underground realm, where there are no lies or pain, there lived a Princess who dreamed of the human world. She dreamed of blue skies, soft breeze, and sunshine. One day, eluding her keepers, the Princess escaped. Once outside, the brightness blinded her and erased every trace of the past from her memory. She forgot who she was and where she came from. Her body suffered cold, sickness, and pain. Eventually, she died. However, her father, the King, always knew that the Princess' soul would return, perhaps in another body, in another place, at another time. And he would wait for her, until he drew his last breath, until the world stopped turning..."
This quote kind of reminded me of the parallel of this movie and that of The Little Prince where he escapes from his world and comes to earth seeking people, thinking that then he will no longer be lonely. He learns too late that you can still be lonely in a sea of people. Another of my favourite books.

Sliding Doors

One of the best things about joining facebo0k has been that I have gotten in touch with a lot of my high school friends back in W011ongong. Unfortunately, I had lost touch with everyone except for 3 wonderful people and now I got a chance to see what everyone was up to. What struck me and strikes me every time I go to their homepages is the different paths we have taken since high school. Almost everyone in that group is married, settled down with at least one kid. It's amazing, girl or boy, their profile pictures is of them holding a baby, a toddler or a kid. Sometimes a big kid and I wonder how soon after graduation they had the kid.
Meanwhile, here I am still in school with an unsettled future and as time goes by, the prospect of kids becomes more and more scary. It is such a huge responsibility and they will be here forever. The good times and the bad times. You think marriage is scary but it is nothing compared to bringing someone to life and saying "here you go, goodluck and all, it's not really a fair and just world". And the funny thing is that as time goes by, for me the responsibility of a kid becomes more scary. Don't get me wrong I want a kid or two, but when you start thinking about the why and the how and the randomness of it all, it is such a heavy responsibility... almost like playing god!! Maybe the idea is not to think about it and over-analyze it -- simply go for it. Who knows.
Going back to my school mates, it is weird how our lives are so different. From my whole year which i think had about 100 kids, give and take a few, I think only 3 people did phds and haven't had the expected sequence of events after their high school. The cool kids are nearly all homebodies and the uncool kids have come into their element. They have become cool.
Seriously going thru high school is so stressful and scarring!! you have to escape it first before you can leave behind the tangles and the shadows and become your own person.

Hypocrisy

Here is something interesting I ran into today:
"I don't understand why it is illegal for me to pay someone to have sex in private, but it is legal for me pay that person to have sex while I videotape it and put it on a DVD for public sale as long as they sign a waiver. One--and mind you, the most private one--is illegal prostitution. The other--the more public act--is legal pornography."
Seems logical no? Makes you wonder why prostitution is illegal anyway.

Anyway someone else responded with the following reason:
"The reason pornography can't be outlawed in the same way that prostitution is that, since it is filmed, written, photographed, etc. it is considered "free expression" and therefore covered by the First Amendment. Although some things that are covered by the First Amendment are outlawed (such as child pornography), the reasons behind the law have to be much more compelling to pass constitutional muster. To outlaw prostitution, the state need only prove that it has a good reason to do so, and virtually anything they can come up with is considered ok. Hope this helps."