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 This page is the informal log of my transiency process, in reverse chronological order.
+October - 6 November
+In a poetic piece playing on Alice in Wonderland and titled A Map of Six Impossible Things, Iranian-born, Paris-raised, New-York-based writer Lila Azam Zanganeh, author of The Enchanter: Nabokov and Happiness, imagines:
+"The impossible city is a city made of all cities. It is neither a city of the future nor a city of the past. It is a longing for the city. A city of stone and a city of glass. It is a city of spires and transparent abysses. A city of rivers streaming into an expanse of blue. It is a city of dubious beauty. Yet also a city of staggering beauty. A city of belfries harried by the screams of seagulls. A city of evergreen hills and lucid water. It is a city of children running down heaps of garbage. A city of drowsy bays and flying men and opal lakes. It is a city of sand and dunes, a city where the first and last human are covered in dust. It is a city of convents, fig-scented gardens and singing mounts. A city of redbrick castles with wide-open arms. It is a city of stone churches smelling of green water at sunup. A city of saints. It is a city of connecting islands. A city with only one weeping willow hunched over a promontory. It is a city of minarets and violet towers. A city of dreams long gone and lingering still. It is a city stippled with gold and yearning for the sun. It is all the cities you have seen and never seen. And it is the last city standing on the edge of the world, a second before the sun slips into the water."
+Oh Mollenbeek!
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+This week i was truly inspired. By something very simple and very human. I was giving two workshops, two days in the Castle of Kareveld followed by three days more conventional sessions for toddlers near Tour&Taxis. Due to a unexpectedly busy schedule i was looking for the ways to cancel it. Thinking that it will tire me out and i wont be able to accomplish all i want to do this month. It did tire me out and i had lots of pain (mainly to some bizarre shoe accident) but i also observed something very beautiful.
+First workshop was a walk-in activity were everyone just could pass by and do some simple paintings using pancake dough and old colourful spices. It was a great success. Pieter and I ended up with a logistic problem to accommodate everyone willing to sit at our table. Some kids didn't want to move and made one painting after the other. On the second day also the fathers joined in. It is so great to see adults playing with such simple stuff and having fun.
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+Second workshop was designed for very young kids (2,5-5 years) to explore sensory perception. We played with flour and soap, cooked pasta and soup, made birds out of green dough, danced, roared like animals and so much more. The group was both french and dutch speaking. So total mess you could say. But i had the most wonderful assistant. A young muslim boy (about 17 years old) that helped not only by translating but cared with so much love and commitment for the little ones and me that at some times i even questioned why do i get paid for this and not him? There was also two other young muslim boys assisting the workshop next door and them too were so unbelievably familiar, relaxed, sweet, caring, funny and so on...I was truly touched by them. Except for Jura i never experienced such a devoted assistance from the youngsters. It breaks all the stereotypes that even i had.
+After Brussels attacks last spring there was so much talks about how such terror acts are attacks on the western values. But seeing these boys and other muslim women working so passionately with local youth i think exactly this community and its values got attacked and hurt much more. People that are constantly busy with making sure there are no walls between languages, ethnicity, religion, economical status and just quietly building bridges between all these families living in the same area. I'm very happy and honoured i could do a little thing among them as wel. I always felt that due to my limited knowing of french i miss out on this direct interaction with such groups. Well now they speak dutch and english. So about the time i make more effort to learn french as well...