Journey is the destination...

Ithaka

As you set out for Ithaka hope the voyage is a long one, full of adventure, full of discovery. Laistrygonians and Cyclops, angry Poseidon—don’t be afraid of them: you’ll never find things like that on your way as long as you keep your thoughts raised high, as long as a rare excitement stirs your spirit and your body. Laistrygonians and Cyclops, wild Poseidon—you won’t encounter them unless you bring them along inside your soul, unless your soul sets them up in front of you. Hope the voyage is a long one. May there be many a summer morning when, with what pleasure, what joy, you come into harbors seen for the first time; may you stop at Phoenician trading stations to buy fine things, mother of pearl and coral, amber and ebony, sensual perfume of every kind— as many sensual perfumes as you can; and may you visit many Egyptian cities to gather stores of knowledge from their scholars. Keep Ithaka always in your mind. Arriving there is what you are destined for. But do not hurry the journey at all. Better if it lasts for years, so you are old by the time you reach the island, wealthy with all you have gained on the way, not expecting Ithaka to make you rich. Ithaka gave you the marvelous journey. Without her you would not have set out. She has nothing left to give you now. And if you find her poor, Ithaka won’t have fooled you. Wise as you will have become, so full of experience, you will have understood by then what these Ithakas mean. C.P. Cavafy

Washington Heights in London

Been pushed into a deep well of nostalgia this past week for my formidable years growing up in Washington Heights, up on the tail end of the rodent-shaped island Manhattan, not only uptown but uphill, the city on a slant from North to South.

Two topical launches have hit London celebrating my old hood, Linda Mannheim's Above Sugar Hill, a series of short stories based in the neighbourhood, cutting across time, race, gender and class... something in itself distinctly American. The second is In The Heights, premiering in London for the first time, a musical that takes on the stories of struggle and survival in the ga-heh/toe.

For the first time since moving to London I sat and wondered what it would be like if I had never left the Heights.... I wasn't even living there when I left NY anyway, having ended up in Loisaida, another colourful place featured in the musical Rent.

Washington Heights was an incredible place, full of solid pre-war buildings with sunken living rooms, big parks, river views, hills, nestled comfortably between the FDR and the West Side Highway, with two bolts sticking out of its neck like Frankenstein, GWB (George Washington Bridge) on one side and Alexander Hamilton bridge right across the other. This meant this perpetual buzzing of traffic all around the area, non stop 24 hours a day, windows always covered in fine brake dust... And inside the Heights a cocoon of people mixing together, Boricua's & Quisqueyana's (The native names of Puerto Rico and Dominican Republic), Hasidic jews, left over Irish who hadn't yet moved up to the Bronx, and random other NYers like us the Chilean family taking refuge from Queens.

I remember being really proud because Dr. Ruth, the TV pop sex therapist lived in the hood! The area was rough no doubt but you knew which streets to go to and which not to. I really remember it as one giant playground, running along the river, cutting class and drinking 40's in the playground of Bennett park, the giant games of manhunt in Fort Tryon park, walking around with an MC jacket and a knife I would never really use. All part of the NY trade I guess...

I highly recommend both the book and the musical, I found both totally entertaining, especially for a London audience... of course, I'm a willing subject. What Mannheim achieves is to honour the other in her stories, the child, the mother, the awkward teen, the outcast. It's a relief for the main characters to not be populated by the standard fare. The language, the politics and the social struggle all made me feel serious empathy and reminded me of my own long road walked. The stories made me remember my first girlfriend who lived above me on the 5th floor with her coke-head father, sharing a bunk bed in a 1-bedroom, who said 'ated' instead of 'eaten', and thought going to the movie theater where your feet stuck to the floor was a step up from her usual dates to the park... This is the joy of reading Above Sugar Hill, the retelling of the stories that don't often get told, the desperation to 'get out' but the attachments that keep us where we are. If I didn't like Influx Press enough after reading Marshland, I'm now feeling pretty much represented in their choices of books to publish.

In The Heights, touched upon some of the same positive points as well. In full American razzmatazz force the cast sing, jump and sweat across the floor and in front of your face. Their energy is visceral, powerful, contagious and at times cheesy, but hell its an American musical, just go with it. I will fully admit I came into the Southwark Playhouse with pretty low expectations but instead left elated and proud of seeing my old hood on stage to a British public. Of course there are flaws in trying to be something you're not, recreating the Heights would be impossible, but I really didn't care, I still think they did a stellar job. Except for the soy milk prop in the bodega (deli), okay that made me chuckle! Course I was the insider often laughing by myself at things they said and no one really got. The Abuelita character reminded me of an old Cuban woman who lived in an apartment by the lobby entrance to my building. She never let go of missing Cuba, she feared the area and the other Latinos, always worried she would get clobbered in the head while walking the streets. And after 50 years of living in the Heights, never assimilating and never learning English she died as she feared but in that way can only happen in the Big City: the ceiling above her bed fell on her in her sleep and crushed her to death... Another story lost in the echo of a million voices in the urban jungle....

So get a full dose of some real New York grit in your teeth. Read the book and see the show, you'll be in for a treat, and then lets grab a pint and I'll tell you where the best pizza in the hood really is... If its still there.

Letter to NYC about London

Part of a writing exercise workshop, thinking back 9 years ago to when I first moved to London and writing back to a friend in NYC about my thoughts and observations about the change:

Dear Sara:

So here I am after the whirlwind of NYC for so many years, landed in a place that is somehow so similar yet polar opposite. The pace of life here is so much slower, and takes some getting used to. But slowing down feels good. I can hear myself and somehow be more the me than I was able to be before. What frustrated me about New York was everyone was always in your face all the time and I felt a lack of emotional space. Here everyone is so guarded and inside themselves. I think it must be the weather! 

The grey skies wrap you like a blanket and you feel comfortable and quiet, calming your emotions. Getting around these streets is so intense! Ive always prided myself of being an avid traveller, but my first week alone I got lost at least 10 x. There is no compass grid system to work with, you swear youre going North and suddenly its South! And with a white sky you cannot see the sun for direction. I realise now how rigid the grid system is, almost violent to our nature as organic beings. The medieval footprint here means you have to meander slowly to get anywhere, instead of pushing though a system of squares and rectangles, there are much more triangles and circles (in this case roundabouts). 

I also realise the who I am has changed by sheer context! There are few Latinos, some Americans, almost no real New Yorkers, and I have become much more an exotic of species, shorter and darker by comparison, with too sharp a tongue and too fast a pace. Need to exorcise the New York demon out of me…

One of my favourite things about London is how local it is. A big city that really is a collection of villages, people love and respect the local in a beautiful way. There is pride in the history and stories and Londoners are happy to share it with foreigners and immigrants, so I feel I am able to settle in and become one of many. Its funny only the English from outside of London tend to ask me where I am from, Londoners take it for granted that everyone is from somewhere and may instead ask what I do, or chat about the weather. Actually talking about the weather seems crucial as an ice-breaker. And you’ll never guess, everyone complains its rainy!! How funny is that? I guess it’s a social bonding method to moan and agree about the weather. Note to self, tone down the cheery attitude… 

Okay running out of space, love you and more soon! 

RMX

Artist Walk with Cooltan and Artangel

Developing a new project commissioned by Artangel and in conjunction with Cooltan.

Artangel projects are given shape by a particular place and time. They can involve journeys to unfamiliar locations, from underground hangars to abandoned libraries. Or sometimes they can offer unfamiliar experiences in more familiar environments – a terraced house, a department store or daytime television.

CoolTan Arts believes mental well-being is enhanced by the power of creativity. It’s a charity run by and for adults with mental distress. Cooltan aim to promote positive mental health/well being, bringing about a change in how participants perceive themselves, enabling people to gain greater focus and to re-establish their relationship with society. Cooltan aim to offer life long learning and enable people to achieve qualification and accreditation status in the coming year. They achieve this through quality arts education with professional outcomes such as public exhibitions, and social enterprise principles.

The project in made in collaboration with the commission of Saskia Olde Wolbers yet to be announced so will not expand on that yet.

But for my project I share this description:

This project will be a narrated walk that uses as a source of inspiration the Victorian row house situated at 87 Hackford Road where Vincent Van Gogh resided in 1873 whilst in London. It will explore letters written by Van Gogh about his experience here in London and also consider what it would have been like to see this city through his eyes, allegedly suffering from epilepsy, bi-polar disorder and delusions.

The project will explore walking around the area, passing Van Gogh’s former residence and invite people on to a new journey of discovery. This will be a one-to-one performance, in which one audience members walks on a narrated journey, which they can hear over headphones.

Guided by the product of the Cooltan workshops, the audience is encouraged to delve into an alternate reality of the city, and follow a course through our own chosen route where they will encounter the peoples, stories, rumours, and whispers that inhabit the architecture that surrounds us.

I will work together with participants on the narrative through interactive workshops that explore our own stories in connection to Van Gogh’s. As we learn about him we can learn about ourselves and share this in a special public walk.

The participant on this narrated walking tour examines their surroundings by creating interior visualisations based on their movement through the space. The world they create is influenced by the sounds and smells that come from the environment as well as introduced by what we develop.

Is they city what it seems? What happens when we stop taking it for granted and put ourselves in the vulnerable position of using our imagination publicly…

21st Century Folk Culture

A great new online initiative by the Museum of British Folklore.

There first entry looks at the Saddleworth Rushcart festival:

Saddleworth Morris Men are a group of traditional folk dancers from the north of England. Saddleworth is a valley in the Pennine hills between Manchester and Leeds, and each of the six villages in the valley has its own unique dance. Like other Morris dances from the north-west of England, they are performed in Lancashire clogs, shoes with leather uppers, wooden soles and shod with iron. The Saddleworth dances are noisy, complex and not done by any other dance groups anywhere. The team, or 'side' as it is known, are also famous for their spectacular hats, stacked high with fresh flowers.

Rushcarts are an old tradition in the region, but died out in the early 20th Century. In 1975, the Saddleworth men again built a cart, and one has been built each August since. The wooden cart, ladened with 3 tonnes of carefully cut fresh rushes stacked 5 metres high, decorated with banners and with one lucky dancer sitting on the top, is pulled around the villages by over a hundred dancers from all over England, preceded by a large band. The rushes are taken to the church and afterwards there is wrestling, gurning (face pulling), song and dance.

Photo by Bob France