The sheer brute violence of that single wave is staggering. Every house and fishing boat has been smashed, the entire length of the east coast. People who know and respect the sea well now talk of it in shock, dismay and fear. Some work to do this week.
Archive for December, 2004
Well, the Internet abounds with festive cheer today. Here in Jaffna, that part of the population not sensibly at home with the family is mostly drunk and thowing firecrackers around in the street. This has been the case since yesterday afternoon. At least it has shut the dogs up for a bit. And the Hindu crew up the road, not to be outdone, have been banging drums for about a month now.
I’ve never been much cop at Christmas. When the force of Christmas is strong, I find it entertaining to be just a bit grumpy and contrary – digging my heels in, but getting dragged along anyway. I cringe at 99% of carols, but enjoy strong harmonies. I’m not big on tinsel or mass shopping hysteria – is anyone? But ultimately I do play the game, and it’s fun to buy presents for the people who make life meaningful.
Nor am I much impressed by ritual, as I tend to find it numbing. But yesterday I found myself one of a congregation of five at Jaffna’s only Catholic mass in English, in a sparse room like a big blue dojo. There was some talk of peace, and singing, with determined voices raised above the explosions outside. And a baby Jesus on a bed of red rice.
This evening there’ll be makeshift hummus (the chickpeas are boiling as I write), leeks, red wine, Christmas pudding and whatever else people bring along, under a floppy Christmas tree and a constellation of fairy lights on our balcony. The company, stragglers all, far from our families: an Armenian rescue-worker/André Agassi lookalike who’s sadly about to go home, a sturdy Kurd who’s just arrived from Iraq, a Swiss farmer/motorcycle maintainer and another Brit (it is he who is providing the pudding). And possibly some stray Japanese & Scandinavian friends later on.
Thanks to anyone who has voted for me at the Asian Blog Awards. With your help, suddenly I’m doing OK, for a newcomer with few regular readers. I still have little idea and less illusions about what it really means, but if you’re reading this before the year is out, and you’re feeling seasonably charitable, please consider voting again. (For those weary and wary of democratic exercises, I promise this is allowed, once a day).
If you mainly check in for pictures of Jaffna, your reward for putting up with my waffle is to be found on Billy’s site.
To complete the triptych. This man was carrying fish in the box on his handlebars. They were fresh as the day, I suppose, but the box itself was pungent.
‘The examiner showed a row of unusually mutilated teeth. Was he laughing? …What was the purpose of my trip, and why was I travelling like this?
‘Again that question! Again! It was like the question asked by Tennyson about the flower in the crannied wall. That is, to answer it might involve the history of the universe… What was I going to tell this fellow? That existence had become odious to me? It was just not the kind of reply to offer under these circumstances. Could I say that the world, the world as a whole, the entire world, had set itself against life and was opposed to it – just down on life, that’s all – but that I was alive nevertheless and somehow found it impossible to go along with it? …No, I couldn’t say that either.
‘Nor: ‘You see, Mr Examiner, everything has become so tremendous and involved, why, we’re nothing but instruments of this world’s processes.’ Nor: ‘I am this kind of guy, rest is painful to me, and I have to have motion.’ Nor: ‘I’m trying to learn something, before it all gets away from me.’ As you can see for yourselves, these are all impossible answers.‘
Saul Bellow, Henderson the Rain King
Another from yesterday’s alchemical morning. The dog had just had some sort of revelation, I think.
Freud’s been popping up all over the place recently. There was that book I mentioned, then this entertaining guide to dissing him, and now David Mamet holding forth on repression, Goldilocks and war films.
I enjoyed the ride around the corner to work this morning. All quiet and golden, long shadows, birdsong, spokes whirring. I wished I’d left earlier, but I was glad to have taken a camera.
I went to see a play about Jaffna’s troubled recent history. It had a strange title: something about an ant-eaten eyelid. The best things about it – apart from its rarity here as a piece of real live theatre – were the evocative music and the imaginative choreography, which kept me going quite nicely since I couldn’t follow the dialogue. Here is a shot of the final scene. I didn’t use a flash, so it looks a little ropey and could use some touching up, but time is tight today and you get the idea.
Like most people, I tend to take pictures when the light is good, i.e. when the sun is shining. But to redress the balance, and remind you that it does indeed rain in the tropics, here’s a shot of Jaffna’s Main Street in the rain. (Indeed, there are floods, though Jaffna has got away lightly as yet.)