Moon-watchers

Today, many people all over the globe are looking up at the Moon, because it's exceptionally close to our planet. Never before has a still-existing human seen the Moon at such a short distance. That's why it's referred to as a Super Moon.

Unfortunately, I live at a place on the edge of the French Alps that is not particularly good for moon-watching. At the present moment, when I look upwards, all I see is a super-damp sky full of super-gray clouds. So, instead of showing you any super photos, let me take advantage of the fact that I'm talking about the Moon to skip to the interesting subject of lunatics, who have strange ideas about our heavenly neighbor.

Certain lunatics believe that earthly clouds can drift behind the Moon.

 

In former times, Moon-Watchers (as imagined by Stanley Kubrick) made fabulous discoveries. Some things—such as the arrival of a metal slab from space—don't seem to have ever happened again. Other things discovered by the Moon-Watchers—such as murder—have remained with us forever.

 

Silly Twitter word

#Trending #TrendingTopics #Milkanoël

This morning, when I opened up my Twitter account, I discovered a reference to a certain US multinational famous for its milk and cocoa products, Milka.

The Twitter message I read indicated that a certain Milka hashtag was "trending”. I imagined for a moment that the proverbial cow was, at last, coming home. I wondered immediately why this item of world-shaking news about a dullish Trumpland company had hit the Twitter headlines. The answer was elementary. The purple cow was being fed on a variety of green grass called dollars. But what interested me far more than the state of the Milka cow was the linguistic absurdity of the the verb “trending”. Popular among French folk who like to give the impression that they understand English, this silly verb appears to have originated on the other side of the Atlantic.

Click the text block to enlarge it slightly

Once upon a time, even innocent kids in English-speaking communities would have known that a trend can be either up or down, positive or negative. It doesn't necessarily imply that things are getting better. For example: “There’s a nasty trend among children in slum schools to become bullies.” Or, more succinctly: “In slum schools, bulliness is trending.” Just like Milka. Or Trump, on that fateful election day.

Like a candle in the water

Yesterday evening, at a ceremony in remembrance of the terrible events of 13 November 2015, a fleet of tiny blue-white-red candles glided slowly—softly and silently—across the dark waters of the Saint-Martin Canal in the neighborhood of the Bastille in Paris.

Patrick Jardin had lost his daughter Nathalie, in charge of lighting at the Bataclan. But he was absent from yesterday’s ceremonies. His explanations were terse: “One doesn’t react to kalashnikovs with candles on the water and plaques on the wall.”

He was right in some ways, but wrong in others. Of course we have to track down terrorists and prevent them from harming our societies. This means the use of deadly weapons, not candles. But it doesn’t mean pure vengeance. In any case, yesterday, the people of Paris were not searching for terrorists to be eliminated. Nor were they thinking of criticizing Paris authorities who had not been able to protect all the citizens of the City of Light, including the young lady of the Bataclan lighting. They were simply celebrating in dignity and silence, by means of lit candles, the memory of Nathalie and the other innocent victims of 13 November 2015.

#13Novembre2015 #ParisAttacks

Anti-Trump America wakes up

Their slogan is ludicrous: "Not my president". No matter what they say, Donald Trump is indeed their president, whether they like it or not. At least for a while...

But they seem to be waking up all over the land, as if they're emerging from a nightmare. In fact, they are... even though the nightmare is still going on.

Elections don't affect God's inexistence

Thank Goodness God can't be elected in or out !

New signpost in Paris

The attacks of 15 November 2016 killed 130 people,
89 of whom died at the Bataclan.
7 attackers were destroyed.

#13Novembre2015 #ParisAttacks

Tsunami in the Antipodes

An earthquake of 7.4 magnitude has just struck New Zealand, 90 km away from Christchurch, causing a tsunami. For the moment, no victims have been found. The tremor occurred on Sunday evening at 23 hours, three and a half hours ago.

New Zealand is located near the edge of the tectonic plates of Australia and the Pacific, at a place known as the Ring of Fire, where 15,000 earthquakes are recorded every year.

Click images to enlarge slightly

#NouvelleZélande #NewZealand #earthquake

Plot of earth in Montreal

Cohen family plot at the Shaar Hashomayim
Cemetery on Friday in Montreal. 

(Giovanni Capriotti / for the Toronto Star)

Cohen at home, Los Angeles. September 24, 2016.
No more touring ahead. Cohen now concentrates
upon his family, friends and the work at hand. 
[photo by Graeme Mitchell for The New Yorker]

Sting has reopened the Bataclan

We shall always remember the
victims of 13 November 2015.

#Bataclan

La culture sera la plus forte !

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For whom is this blog written?

That’s a good question, and I thank you very much for asking it. On Saturday, 9 December 2006, my very first blog post asked a similar question.

Why have I created this blog?

I often find myself saying more or less the same everyday things in e-mails to several friends. Consequently, this blog could be a good way of avoiding such repetition. This doesn't mean that I intend to abandon the idea of sending e-mails to friends. It merely means that certain stuff can be outlined here publicly in my blog, and I can then talk about specific behind-the-scenes things in my personal e-mails. Another down-to-earth reason for this blog is that some of my friends have faulty e-mail systems, which often block my messages because they're judged to be spam. [This is notably the case for Australian customers of Big Pond.] Finally, another good reason for this blog is the possibility of my being able to express freely my feelings in domains that some of my friends judge to be taboo: for example, Aussie politics. So, I'm hoping that this new vector of expression (new for me, that is) will prove to be effective and pleasant to use.

Alas, I didn't have the courage at that time to provide my forthcoming readers with the proverbial truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. It's not easy for me to reply, but let's see if I can be a little more honest today. First, I'll give you a hint. A few nights ago, I was intrigued by an unexpected early-morning dream. I found myself informing my readers that the name of my Antipodes blog would be replaced by a new title : The Notebook of William de Gamone. Readers who know me well will recognize instantly what's behind this choice.

• It's pure Rilke, associated with The Notebook of Malte Laurids Brigge.

• The author's name has been mildly Frenchified in a noble fashion by the addition of "de Gamone".

Let's no longer beat around the bush. Right from the start, ten years ago, my Antipodes blog has always been written primarily for myself. It's simply my on-screen notebook, for saving various ideas, and testing my ability to say various things in certain ways. Readers may have noticed that I've rarely gone out of my way to attract readers and their comments. Often they annoyed me, especially when I found them quarrelsome.

So, let me be perfectly clear. For whom is this blog written? Primarily, for a French-speaking fellow named William who lives at Gamone. Who has always been enchanted by the writings of Rainer Maria Rilke.

You merely wanted to catch a plane

In fact, you ended up catching a nasty bacterial infection at the level of your tail end. According to a study conducted by researchers of the University Hospital of Münster, that kind of affliction is a likely possibility in the toilets of 136 airports in 59 countries. Traces of Staphylococcus aureus were found on 5.5 % of samples from 400 door handles of toilets. To put it bluntly, disgusting data like that is enough to give you the shits.

Cohen song that's hard to understand

Leonard Cohen, 1976, in France

                                                           [photo Istvan Bajzat/Alliances]

The Cohen song Hallelujah was started in 1980, but wasn’t finally written until 1984. Naive listeners might fail to understand that it’s a highly erotic song.

An explicitly sensual version was brought out by Jeff Buckley.
Switch to YouTube to access the original Buckley's performance.

It's a song inspired by the singer's sexual relationship with a lady.

Democracy is leaving the USA

It's weird that Leonard Cohen should leave us at a moment when US democracy seems to be heading in the wrong direction. It's weird, too, that I'm celebrating memories of this great man on a public holiday in France: the 11th day of the 11th month, Armistice Day.

Towards the end of my Israel-inspired novel All the Earth is Mine [lookup in Amazon], I included an excerpt from Cohen's song. In my tale, the entire land of Israel is transformed by modern technology into a gigantic floating island, which spends its new existence sailing around the planet Earth.

Sail on, sail on, oh mighty ship of state

To the shores of need, past the reefs of greed


Though the squalls of hate


Sail on, sail on, sail on...

     

— Leonard Cohen, Democracy

Two angels and a holy man

The holy man has just left us in painful solitude.

Many years ago, in a Paris concert hall, I had the privilege of seeing
blonde Julie Christensen and dark Pearla Batella

accompanying Leonard Cohen.

They appeared to me as a pair of female angels surrounding a holy man.

Leonard Cohen on Chelsea Hotel

Like a bird in the sky

Leonard Cohen [1934-2016]

We were waiting to say farewell, dear Leonard.

We knew you were ready to leave.

You left us so elegantly, in your usual style, with no more

than a few words... for those who had already gone.

Presidential duration

I don’t like to behave like an old fortune-teller who reads magic stuff from all around him.

Over the last day or so, my mind has been invaded constantly by a conviction that President Trump will not last for very long. My imagination comes to a halt well before the New Year, probably even before Christmas… but my mind balks on what might happen to him.

Meanwhile, let me turn to an old friend, Noam Chomsky. A journalist asked him: What effect would electing Donald Trump have?

CHOMSKY: It’s hard to say because we don’t really know what he thinks. And I’m not sure he knows what he thinks. He’s perfectly capable of saying contradictory things at the same time. But there are some pretty stable elements of his ideology, if you can even grant him that concept. One of them is: “Climate change is not taking place.” As he puts it: “Forget it.” And that’s almost a death knell for the species. Not tomorrow... but the decisions we take now are going to affect things in a couple of decades. In a couple of generations, it could be catastrophic.

How is Trump going to deal with US technological giants?

The new president dreams of a friendly relationship with the smart guys in charge of Google, Apple, Facebook... who would tell him how to catch Islamic terrorists. It’s a nice idea, but those fellows might not necessarily rush out rapidly to assist Trump. Why would they? Up until now, they’ve never manifested any enthusiasm for Trump's “ideas”. In any case, computing and the Internet are such intricate phenomena that the reptilean brain of Trump would encounter huge problems in trying to understand them. Obama was smart enough to oversee correctly the elimination of Osama bin Laden. We’ll see if Trump is smart enough to catch devils that remain at large. I hope he is (with a little help from his friends), but I have my doubts.

Intelligence will inevitably prevail over idiocy

We shouldn't be too worried about Trump's victory. He might be able to earn dollars in real estate; but human beings need more than their personal wealth to change the world. They need intelligence. And Trump doesn't seem to have much of that. He will go down rapidly in world history as an American mistake. #Trump

Certain countries might take advantage of Trump's victory

Countries such as Canada and Australia might take advantage of Trump's win to attract high-level US scientists. In France, too, we might make an effort to attract various bright specialists in domains such as the development of military drones and artificial intelligence. Maybe Trump could do more for France, indirectly, than its current chief.