Born to live in glory and passion.

Who doesn’t remember Lady Oscar? Jordanian kids of my generation and up to ten years older grew up with this fascinating anime originally called The Rose of Versailles and dubbed in Arabic. In my opinion, Lady Oscar was the ultimate BEST anime ever shown on Jordanian/Arabic TV stations.

I am very nostalgic today. I found myself watching old cartoons on YouTube and repressing my tears. When I found that almost ALL the episodes of Lady Oscar were on there, and in Arabic, I almost cried. To me, Lady Oscar was more than an anime character. Looking at my life, my tastes, my personality now, I understand exactly how she affected me. This was a powerful, intelligent, and no-crap lady who was raised as a man and competed with, and always outshone, her male counterparts. On top of all that, her wardrobe was absolutely gorgeous.

The Rose of Versailles focuses on Oscar François de Jarjayes, a girl raised as a man to become her father’s successor as leader of the Palace Guards. A brilliant combatant with a strong sense of justice, Oscar is proud of the life she leads, but becomes torn between class loyalty and her desire to help the impoverished as revolution brews among the oppressed lower class. Also important to the story are her conflicting desires to live life as both a militiant and a regular woman as well as her relationships with Marie Antoinette, Count Axel von Fersen, and servant and best friend André Grandier.

Lady Oscar was this fabulously strong-willed woman who set, I believe, an excellent example for the thousands of Arab girls who watched her. Now that I think of it, I find it amazing how the anime was ever played on Arab TVs since Lady Oscar’s sexuality was a bit ambiguous. Perhaps the people who censor shows did not get that part, but hey, all the better for us.

There are some shoujo-ai elements embodied in the relationship between Oscar and her protégée Rosalie Lamorlière, the secret daughter of the scheming Madame de Polignac, whose admiration for Oscar may be interpreted as either idol worship or romantic love coming from her possible bisexuality. Many of the court ladies also greatly adore Oscar, openly admiring her at parties and become very jealous when she brings female companions to them.

I remember hating Rosalie too and feeling a very strong attraction to Lady Oscar. I also remember loving André Grandier and hoping they would end up together, him and Oscar, which never happened. There was this imposing sexual and intellectual tension throughout the show, and thinking back, again I wonder how it was broadcasted on Arab TVs in the 20th century. If that was intentional, it was very progressive. If not, well, it didn’t screw me up so the people who censor shows need not feel guilty about letting it slip.

I used to love everything Oscar wore; those military jackets and tight riding pants, the white fitted French-cuff shirts, the fine ruffled collars, the knee-high boots– everything. I still love the look today, and looking at my tastes in fashion, I see Oscar and the period she lived in in most everything I fancy. She was a fine fencer and rider, too. I’ve always wanted to learn fencing and to have a horse, but I learned how to shoot instead. That was more doable.

I used to admire and respect Oscar for being so strong, for being able to always hold her own in front of the men she led, and for being a good person. She was controversial and great. I still remember how heartbroken I was when she died, and although I watched the show tons of times, I cried every time. Oscar was a phenomenon, not just a cartoon show. The anime had a message about gender equality, history, love and loyalty.

I really wish more shows of the type would air on Arab TVs, as Oscar taught me a lot and became a role model of sorts to me. I am still very much in love with the character and the show as a whole, and right now I am looking for a way to purchase the complete episodes on DVD.

This was my humble tribute to Lady Oscar, the rose of Versailles and my role model.

I have recently become obsessed with classical music to an unprecedented degree. I am very deeply in love with a Carl Orff composition called O Fortuna, which is the title of one of 24 Latin poem collection called Carmina Burana, dating back to the 13th century.

I have always had a profound, at times sinful, attraction to dark moods. By nature, I have a morbid mind and a tendency to appreciate the obscure, the gloomy, and the depressing. Within this context, I am a blink away from worshiping O Fortuna.

O Fortuna (Chorus)

O Fortuna
velut luna
statu variabilis,

semper crescis
aut decrescis;
vita detestabilis

nunc obdurat
et tunc curat
ludo mentis aciem,

egestatem,
potestatem
dissolvit ut glaciem.

Sors immanis
et inanis,
rota tu volubilis,

status malus,
vana salus
semper dissolubilis,

obumbrata
et velata
michi quoque niteris;

nunc per ludum
dorsum nudum
fero tui sceleris.

Sors salutis
et virtutis
michi nunc contraria,

est affectus
et defectus
semper in angaria.

Hac in hora
sine mora
corde pulsum tangite;

quod per sortem
sternit fortem,
mecum omnes plangite!

English Translation

O Fortune,
like the moon
you are changeable,

ever waxing
and waning;
hateful life

first oppresses
and then soothes
as fancy takes it;

poverty
and power
it melts them like ice.

Fate - monstrous
and empty,
you whirling wheel,

you are malevolent,
well-being is vain
and always fades to nothing,

shadowed
and veiled
you plague me too;

now through the game
I bring my bare back
to your villainy.

Fate is against me
in health
and virtue,

driven on
and weighted down,
always enslaved.

So at this hour
without delay
pluck the vibrating strings;

since Fate
strikes down the strong man,
everyone weep with me!

Download O Fortuna - Carl Orff here. Everyone weep with me.

Well of Loneliness, 1943
Carl Kahl

What do you do when your soul mates drift away?

Do you lull your melancholy with hopes of future quick, poor visits every now and then? Do you anxiously wait for them to be cloned, replaced by exact types to keep you company when it rains and you’re hungry? Do you propose unnecessary plans just so you can bask in the memories only they share with you? Do you sit alone and get acquainted with yourself, and miss them all the same? Do you secretly wish they would not go away to a distant land, to the arms of a lover, and wish they remain yours forever?

What do you do, what can you do that is not in vain? Tell me.

- The Little Theater. At MoMA, July 12th 2007.

You may want to watch these two short clips about Dali and his art:

Online Videos by Veoh.com

Online Videos by Veoh.com

Even if it wasn’t for my twisted dreams involving elements of his surrealist works, Robert De Niro and a finger in an open bullet wound in my throat, honestly, you know I can relate to someone who said:

Take me, I am the drug; take me, I am hallucinogenic.

Finally! After five days of terrible dependence and relevant immobility…Havana Brown returned home! My precious companion is now an image of perfection. Beautiful, beautiful Havana.

I wasn’t so sure the insurance company’s garage will do a good job at giving her the plastic surgery she needed. I think I was even terrified she would return with a clumsy patch across her face. I called the company so many times this morning, every 30 minutes or so, and literally gazzazet-hom until they finally promised they will call me when she arrives to their HQ.

At around 2 PM the company called and asked me to come pick up Havana. I left the office in a hurry and when I got to HQ my eyes were searching, looking around, trying to find her…”Will there be a patch?”… “Will it be a cheap paint-job?”…”Where is she?”

An image of perfection, that’s what I saw when I spotted her parked next to a restaurant close by. You’d think an insurance company would have a parking lot around, but not in this land of virtually non-existent oversight. I checked Havana out, and, satisfied with the surgery, claimed the keys to that vixen.

Before:

After:

You know that my fascination with serial killers and cannibalism must have reached its peak of perversion when I celebrate the voting of my favourite on-screen character of all time, Dr.Hannibal Lecter, as the all-time top movie villain. I strangely feel a personal connection to Lecter, and that adds to my pride that he has received this honour.

Indeed, Lecter embodies supreme intellect and malice combined in one person and yet leaving some room for something humane, as odd as this may sound. He and Lucifer are not that different if you reflect on their build-up for a moment; the similarity of their names is but a cliché if you don’t dig deeper. I am sure Lecter would want you to try something new; dig deeper — you might find splendid dark things.

Voted the all-time movie villain in an American Film Institute poll, Thomas Harris’ epicurean madman has been played by three actors: Brian Cox in the 1986 Manhunter (based on the novel Red Dragon), Gaspard Ulliel as the teen Lecter in this year’s Hannibal Rising and Hopkins in The Silence of the Lambs, Hannibal and the 2002 remake of Red Dragon. Audiences connected with Lecter for his majesty and eclat as much as his dark sadism. I’ve chosen the 2001 Hannibal because, promoted from featured player to antihero, Lecter finally gets to display his sick talents center-stage; and because Hopkins makes this mad genius more insinuating and horrifying than ever.

Source: Time — Top 25 Greatest Villain

I was heart-broken twice. Once when Tsuki-san died, and once again when I saw his clone in the street and had my joy crushed instantly.

But Tsuki-san is back from the dead! He came back home after a month’s absence, dirty, beaten, and thin. My Tsuki is still alive — he never died! Or did he die, and then felt so bad for me that he returned? Cat resurrection?

Doesn’t this seem very weird? My father found him dead in the street a couple of weeks ago and I mourned him and considered a hamster for a mini-companion during my rebound time. My sister was about to get me one today but she changed her mind in the last minute. Tsuki’s girlfriend never visited us while he was gone… And Tsuki came home and brought her with him!

I gave him a bath, as I had promised myself when I saw his clone. He hated me for it, of course, but that’s OK. Who cares if he hates water as long as he is alive? Sing along: My baby is home and the joke was on me.

Welcome back, Tsuki-san!