argue with me

I feel like I’m engaging with a new phase in my education.  In my first year at the University of Toronto, I went to university looking for dramatic friends, for whacked-out experiences and for something more magical than realistic – a fantasy encouraged by St. George’s buildings.  Eventually, I found the magic.

However, it wasn’t anything that I would have expected (although, knowing my nerdy, studious self, I should have guessed): my magic was time alone (big ups to V. Woolf to this one, although we became friends only in my second year).  I love reading, like any good writer (a compliment hidden within). I devour stories that contrast and conflict and argue with me.  I dig into darkness and wallow in fluff; I bask in an eternity of untied endings.

I am hungry for information like I’ve never been except for in a high school politics class that incited a desire within me to prove something.  I was surprised at the new feeling that I had something to even prove.  Never before had I realized that I had something to say – and never had I felt the urgent necessity to say it. Out loud. In front of everyone that I could force to sit still for 3 minutes.

Now, I am ravenous for smart arguments and strong research and valuable points made in long discussions about anything.

I still love politics, like I did in high school, and although it took a back seat to my meandering through the world of Classic Lit for a while, every time I talk about it I get excited. Socialism. Elections. Control. Traffic Laws. Bike Lanes. Rob Ford!

A lot of my curiousity comes from the people around me.  My father drives my often-rabid and occasionally disgusting need to know more about religion.  My mother ignites my interest in family politics, gender relations and psychology.  My boyfriend forces me to pay attention to the administration of politics in the capitalistic world we live in, something that, after having talked to him for hours about, I feel very few people actually talk about.  My friends make me curious about relationships, social interactions (really? Him? Again?) and the mental stability of people who are living out Soap Operas without any idea that they’re the star.  My cat causes me to wonder about my abilities to take care of other living things (aka. I want a kitten. Now).  My own life, little and influential as it is, gets me curious about finding out how I can make my indent on this planet.  I want to be a part of the public debate, whether that is through poetry, publications or blogs. I want to teach people what I know.  I want to learn more than what I know. I want to be the best at something. (Mainly writing.) (All things, really, but my ego is a topic for another, lengthier post.)

All of these things in my world, the blogs I read, the articles I dig myself down into the couch for, the books whose every line I want to scribble into my disintegrating notebooks due to their astonishing genius: they make me so freaking …. excited!

How could you not be?  How is this not the most exciting thing in the world, learning what makes us alive and not only live but also cut people off in traffic, look for jobs with resumes pulled out of trash cans and stay with boyfriends that your part-time job pays for?

What makes everything go?

Don’t say it’s time.  Because we made that up too.  But why?

Because we enjoy progress.  Grasping at every sheaf of paper that will fit into the binders between our eyes.  We enjoy that.

Or at least I do.

-Arina

see, i’m forced to write about shit like this

What do you have to be so angry about?  The issues some groups are protesting about have nothing to do with the World.  Canada isn’t really doing much WRONG as compared to places like Iran (who killed thousands of their people for protesting a fraudulent election last summer), and the G8 AND G20 summit come together to talk about international issues: things like the Israeli-Gaza conflict (will never be solved), the transparency of nuclear programs of “rogue” states (also will never be solved until the policer of all nuclear weapons is no longer the only country that has deployed them in the history of the world), and other “big shit”.

Capitalism isn’t going anywhere after 50 pissed off Canadians dressed in black throw a brick through Starbucks or American Apparel.  The country’s outrageous budget (seriously, $1 billion dollars?) for security that is being wasted on the streets of Toronto NOT catching the people setting police cars on fire and throwing bricks is what is making people upset.  I mean, anarchists are freaking ANARCHISTS FOR A REASON.  Everyone complaining about ruining our city blah blah blah – these kids don’t support the fundamentals of GOVERNMENT – you think they care about crashing one store of the most powerful corporate coffee chain on the planet? Fuck. No.  (But then again, neither do those companies, so in the end, who does care? And what’s the point? Oh yeah, I forgot, there WAS NONE.)

All they do is watch V for Vendetta over and over again until they convince themselves that Canada is actually North Korea and they decide to fix it with bricks and spray paint.  Listen, the world has bigger problems.  I know that change starts locally, but come on!

All I’m saying is this:

1. The “anarchists” are stupid.  They’re not the legitimate “protesters” in Toronto.
2. The people complaining about the anarchists, however, are also stupid – do you even know the issues being discussed in the G20?  Does it matter that they’re all getting together and talking about saving themselves financially and all they’ve come up with so far – the representatives of some of the most powerful countries in the world – is “to each his own plan”?

I’m pissed with THAT.  The chaos that comes with a major international event is expected, and the $1 billion should have covered our “what if’s”. The fact that it didn’t and we have no reliable medics on the protest sites (see: asking police about where they are and hearing “I was wondering that too”, is NOT a show of a properly made back-up plan) and no policemen actually doing their jobs and therefore having to call in MONTREAL POLICE (yes, confronting criminals in dangerous situations is part of their job description, no matter how scary it may be) is what is PISSING ME OFF.  Not the little kids running around and saying “Fuck the Man”.

Assholes, yes: controllable, yes.  Controlled? No.

I’m flitting between emotions about everything that’s happening.  All I know is that I’m not going near it.  There are no issues I care about enough to get beaten up by my own police force for/hit by a stray brick from an idiot.  While both the anarchist group riots and the lack of useful police presence is unsettling, I don’t wonder why the world doesn’t care.  It has had it’s share of riots in the past couple of years, and we are by far the least deathly.

The problem is that our protests should have never escalated to tear gas in the first place.  This is ruining our image of the peace-lovin’ Canada.  Wad up with that, protestistas? All Canadians want is a little bitta loving!  Just, not $1 billion worth of loving… too much is too much and what I say, goes.

-Arina

PS. Here’s a very quick blog from a few live protesters: interesting take on the police brutality/usefullness/planning strategies from the front lines: justin & lex @ g20

LOOK a baluga wail! oh, ho ho ho.

Very moody lately. Frustrated about mood.  But also – passed my G test! Time for the old-fashioned pasttime of drinking & driving!  Wonderful.  Otherwise, what else is a G license good for? So I can drive on the highway in the dead of night? Woo-hoo! Alas, we did a little seafood/white vino celebration anyway with my mum and sister.

Going downtown today, hopefully.  A little “shopping” and more watching Luminato opening night concert at Yonge-Dundas Square. My friend that is leaving for Egypt soon is coming with me (as well as my Persian friend).  I’m very excited to see her because she’s been doing summer school, lives in the same area as me, but I haven’t seen since the end of winter semester (April).  Bugger!  I really want a Brit’sh accent.  Aye! Or Australian! Or basically like any of the characters from LOST, except the Koreans.  I don’t think Korean accents are very sexy.  I can’t believe Charlie DIED. He’s probably alive somewhere, working for Ben or something creepy like that.

Last night I helped my sister create a Stringed instrument for school. Right now she’s in grade 3 and I don’t friggen understand what they’re teaching them.  Why do you need to know how to make an instrument? Will it help you do your taxes? Is it fun when it’s being graded? Does Peter Griffin DIE after watching LOST?  The answer to all of these questions, is NO.  Personally (if you watched the video, like you should’ve!) I enjoy Matthew Fox’s heavy breathing.

You know what’s sad? All of my TV shows have gone and died.  Now I am TV show-less (for the summer!) and sad and don’t really know what to do with myself. So I’ve been trying to find other TV shows, but no luck.  I mean, when I was doing a steady stream of catching up with like 8 different shows throughout the school year, I managed to get all of my projects done and even do some reading on the side. Casual reading! Now – all I do is troll the internet and I’m not even reading anything interesting. I’ve lost the will.

Why?

awkwarrrrrrrrrd (giraffe).

-Arina

discovering new words

Sometimes I just want to read something coherent, you know?  With sentences that lead from one to the second like cause and effect and about the same topic.  Poetry grinds me sometimes, yes, I know, even me, but the funny part is that I haven’t actually been writing any poetry lately, or reading, but it just feels like the way everyone writes sometimes is like a poem.  Like, they’ll start off with one thing and then get interrupted and then “segue” into a whole new thing.

Speaking of which, I always thought segue was spelled S-E-G-U-E, and that little scooter thing was a S-E-G-W-A-Y, which basically means I’m a genius because I’m right, and everyone (ALL WRITERS EVERYWHERE that I read, of course) that has been writing segway as meaning a transition into something is SO TOTALLY WRONG.

Arina – 1, All Else – 0.

I hate when you think you have a thing going and then you are all super-perfect and then something one gets sidetracked and you’re left all sitting at home in your pajamas at 2 pm on a Tuesday eating chocolate chips and watching Gilmore Girls instead of, well, conquering the world, as a sprightly, 20 year old girl of my volition should be.  ALAS-

I went to a movie by myself yesterday.  Have you guys ever done that? It was incredibly freeing.  It was like riding the bus – a previously conquered fear that I have no grown to absolutely adore because it gives you time to listen to your own stream of consciousness, and sometimes, well, I am pretty amusing.  Anyway, so in the movie theatre, after I had already handed the ticket girllady my ticket (oui, only un pour moi) without the admonishing and sinister looks of shunning that I expected, I was all commenting on all the marketing techniques of the various advertisements and thinking about Kick Ass vs. The Last Airbender movies and how the girl (Hit Girl or something, played by some young lass) got so much harshing of her mellow about being young and acting in violent movies, whereas the kid in the Airbender movie just gets like rave reviews (or like, expectations, since the movie hasn’t actually come out yet) without all the drama-fied looking down upon-age.  Why? Gender.

Gender-ism.

Totes McGotes! You heard me folks.  Sexism is out. Genderism is IN.  Hop on the bandwagon while it’s hot and fresh and rolling down in the Pride Parade, which will, by the way, have to fund itself this year in Toronto, since, according to the mayor: “No”.  Well, maybe he said something about the economy, but whenever I read articles like that I just pawn it off to some political plotting and write simple, one-syllable words and pretend the situation really doesn’t extend itself past the vowel.

It does, but, well, you can look it up for yourself.

I also read this post on blogTO and LOVED Theresa the commenter.  I usually don’t read that far down but the issue was something I remember discussing a few years back.  She was witty and angry and oooh don’t I love a spiteful woman.  She makes a good point, and made me reconsider the idea of public funding.  Ventures are allowed to cater to their own identities and turn away those that do not adhere to their rules: just because it is a religious foundation does not make the rules of business any different.  I, however, in my ignorance, still fume about all the cool shit Catholic schools had that public schools didn’t, even all the way up in Markham, which is in the outer boundaries of the GTA.

Plus, it gave me a nice perspective on the teacher’s market in Ontario, which is grim and kind of prickly at best.  So much for Teachers College as a Plan B (which, let’s admit it, is the Plan B for all Bachelors of Art…) (Except I’m actually pretty passionate about teaching, I just never really wanted to take the tests in Ontario… I want my TEOFL though.. or the TESOL? I don’t know what they’re called but they’re more or less Teaching English as a Second/Foreign Language classes).  Maybe this’ll mean I actually get to pursue a Masters somewhere international in a field that will actually provide me with a job after I graduate (think digital marketing sort of thing?)

So, anywhoozer -

tomorrow I might end up at The Central for a BAM! Youth Slam (ie. Arina’s too old to slam here now so she’ll just sit in the back, cheer on the kiddies and get really, really drunk night) with my friend Aamir.  That’ll be nice.  And productive. And! I will bring my camera so hopefully I’ll have something to bring back and show you guys.

This photography stuff is mucho complicado…… (I’m pretty sure that means pregnant, but believe you me – I am not mucho pregnanto), Aperture, Shutter speed, Conditions, tripods… I read The Digital Photography Book by Scott Kelby, a pre-emptive gift on my dad’s behalf a few years ago (thinking this would actually help me operate a point-and-shoot).  It was, however, incredibly helpful.  I just wish it was smaller so I could stick it in my camera case and take it with me!  Thing is that it doesn’t really go technical, which is, surprisingly a road I want to peruse because I want to know why everything works so I know how to tease it into the necessary shapes when it comes time for me to go at it seriously.  It doesn’t do that – but it gets into very good basics.

I also finished Sula by Toni Morrisson.  It was O-kay, but not as good as Song of Solomon by a long shot.  The characters and flight of Solomon just totally overshadowed the whole birthmark, robins attack, whore but not a whore thing in Sula.

Now I’m reading (slowly but surely creeping myself out by doing so) Metamorphosis by Kafka (man! is that guy creepy), and I bought Of Mice and Men by Steinbeck and Frankenstein by Mary Shelley.  I’ve read East of Eden by Steinbeck, and LOVED that book, so I’m totally looking to one of his hits.  Grapes of Wrath is next, I’ve decided.  Also – Isabel Allende.

Goodness gracious, it’s time to finish up that Gilmore Girls and finally start this crazy reading I’m doing.

Love you all, hope you and your centipedes are well.

-Arina

isn’t this supposed to be a holiday, or something?

These past two days (April 30th, May 1st) have been absolutely stunning.  Yesterday was so warm and calming, so my boyfriend proposed for us to head downtown around sunset and take some pictures and walk around.  Downside is that the bus I was taking to downtown, which is usually quite reliable – missed the right exit onto the highway and started doing loops right around my house for a good half hour, so I missed a lot of prime lighting of downtown.

However, on the brighter (or dusky, in my case) side, my favourite time of day is dusk.  Evening, when the sun mellows out sky and the buildings look like knives on the background.  We have some pretty beautiful architecture downtown.

Bringing my camera downtown gave me not as many pictures as I was expecting.  Once I saw a framed shot through my eye eyes, I pulled my viewfinder up – but I didn’t walk around with it glued to my lashes.  I’m sure I’ll get better at it all eventually.. especially when I start figuring out how all the manual settings work.  I’m still kinda AWOL on all of that, but I’m hammering it into my brain one tiny factoid at a time.  It’s proving to be a long process, but I never expected it to be easy – plus anything that costs as much as start-up DSLR’s do, requires a ratio of work : cash that is pretty precise (ie lots of both).

Anyway – I enjoyed it a lot.  Toronto is quite beautiful when it’s buzzing on a Friday night.  While I love some neighbourhood (Harbourfront, Queen St.) I’m not a big fan of some of the people there (ie. club rats near Queen and John and Adelaide, etc).  Don’t understand me wrongly – I like clubbing, it’s just that I can’t stand the atmosphere there unless I’m severely buzzed.  It’s all very exciting, youthful, blah blah blah, but I like coffee joints or bars way more, much like my boyfriend.

We stopped by the Red Room last night (I love that place!) and I was so ravishingly hungry by 11 that I practically absorbed my fajita when it was put in front of me.  And! Steamwhistle.  Yum.

Today is fantastic because okay, really, who doesn’t love the humidity and smell of a start-of-summer-after-rainfall?  I LOVE THAT SMELL.  It’s not quite as wormy smelling as an autumn rainfall, and just warm enough to be absolutely fresh and fulfilling and it’s like bathing in the warm goodness of air.  YES.

Thanks for reading, you guys!  I’m starting to fall into the rhythm of summer more and more.

-Arina