TIFF - Achilles and the Tortoise

What if the person who you really love can not give up following his or her dream and makes your life really hard? Would you give up on him/her? Or you would be willing to support him/her by sacrificing your time, energy, and maybe love? Well, some people might not want to call it "sacrifice" though..



The movie "Achilles and the Tortoise" became my first experience of the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) , finally after three years of life in Toronto. Directed by Takeshi Kitano, a.k.a. Beat Takeshi as a Japanese actor and a comedian, who is also a Golden Lion winner of the Venice Film Festival in 1997 with "HANA-BI." I grew up with watching him on TV as a comedian, and his way of humor including lots of bad words entertained kids so much, like some schools and PTA had banned their students and kids watching his shows. Many kids were against it and therefore it became a kind of social issue at that time in 80's.

* One of his comedy shows was broad casted in U.S. in 2003 with its English title "Most Extreme Elimination Challenge (MXC)," and "Takeshi's Castle" in U.K., Germany, and Philippine, "Humor Amarillo" in Spain. So you can probably watch some of them on YouTube. This show made almost every family in Japan laugh so much and his image better.

The title of this movie comes from the one of Zeno's paradoxes, "When the tortoise starts running one interval ahead than Achilles who is an immortal and able to run really fast, the tortoise would never be caught up by him." In the reality, he would, eventually, but in the world of the consciousness of sub-one which is infinity, he would never. This is the paradox.

* * Zeno : An ancient Greek natural philosopher of the Eleatics, born in Elea, South Italy (around BC 490 - 430).

[ About the movie ]




The story is about a man, Machisu, (named after a famous French painter "Henri Matisse") who loves drawing and painting, and wants to be a famous as an painter, and his wife, Sachiko, who understands and supports him devotedly. Even though his life as a son of a rich guy and could anything that little boy wanted was totally changed to the opposite, when he had to go through his parents' death. Since then, only he has focused was to become a famous painter, as his parents were dreaming of with him.

The movie is divided into three parts; his childhood, adolescent years, and adulthood, and each of them have some paradoxes (I'm not going to spoil those juicy parts Pepe, like I almost did to Ruben last time about "Kite Runner"!!). What interests me is, that you might be able to guess that Achilles could be Machisu, but the tortoise can be anything, depending on how you feel about these paradoxes. There are plenty of elements that you can think of as the tortoise; moreover, those the tortoises-to-be can give you each different themes what this movie tried to tell you.

OK, I will give you only one sentence that you might will miss from one scene. When you watch this movie, this sentence probably will not have its subtitle since this is not a spoken line. One of Machisu's painting has a caption says "Belief brings possibility." To me, this can be both, true and false. If you don't believe what you can, you will never achieve the point you were dreaming of; however, you might not achieve ever or you can not know when you will achieve. Possibility is only possibility forever when the percentage is less than 100. You are not sure if possibility turns out to be fulfillment, other than you strongly "believe"the possibility of fulfillment.

I heard some applauses when the movie started to show the end roll; moreover, I heard some people (both in Japanese and English) said that they did not understand at all. This kind of style can create mixed reputations or reviews, because of the answer or theme of the movie is not crystal clear, like his other movie Dolls(1987). It is not like Hollywood blockbuster movie which tells you easily what is good and what is bad so you have to think about it or just push away to think.

Anyway, only one thing I am sure is, that I can not be like Sachiko, the wife of Machisu. I probably would feel that I can not help Machisu like she did, if I were her. I would understand what he loves and wish I could help him using all of the things and emotions I have. But I would get scared of the reality. I can not even imagine how deep Sachiko loved him..

I liked this movie. This could not be my favorite of Takeshi Kitano's work unfortunately; however, the style of using children brilliantly in his movies has still remained and the music is also very, very beautiful and matches the atmosphere. I was relieved that Kitano did not use his favorite (so as mine!!) composer Joe Hisaishi who has also created Hayao Miyazaki's Studio Ghibli world with his beautiful, nostalgic aria and harmony. The new composer Kitano chose for this movie is Yuki Kajiura who works for many TV advertisements, game softwares, and some animation films, I think she succeeded to make fans of Hisaishi's music in Kitano's movie satisfied as keeping Hisaishi world by using the same style of harmony he uses (mix uses of the 6th, 7th, and 9th cords with the basic triad, and uses of the Musical mode). I'm going to buy this soundtrack CD for sure!!

Let me know when you watch this movie, so we can discuss about it!!

The poster of Achilles and the Tortoise

Capital Punishment

Twice a week, there are opportunities to talk about sensitive issues. One of the topics of this week was "Capital Punishment."

I'm going to mention the history of Canadian capital punishment.
Canada decided the day of abolition of death penalty for murder as July 14, 1976, by the result 130:124 of free vote; however, Lester Pearson (Liberal) canceled all death penalties as a matter of policy, when he won as a prime minister in 1963. (The last execution in Canada was occurred on December 11, 1962.)
Since then, first-degree murderer is given a mandatory life sentence with no chance of parole for 25 years.

This is the map of "Capital Punishment Laws of the World" (Wikipedia, January 29, 2008)

As you see, many countries in the world are still having capital punishment legally, such as China, Japan, Saudi Arabia, and many states in U.S., etc.

Many of the students who had joined this debate, were focusing "justice" so that capital punishment should be legal in Canada too. While listening their opinions, a big doubt was emerging into my head.
If murder - terminating somebody's life, - is unforgivable act and the biggest sin as human being, why can the government kill somebody? That does not make sense. In other words, as well as murderer is an object as capture and punishment whatever the reason the murderer had for terminating somebody's life, the government should not be allowed to kill the person whatever the reason is.

On the other hand, I understand how the people related to the victim or society feels massive loss, sadness, and hatred, but does the "eye for eye" justice really work for those people? Will they be happy or satisfied even though the victim will never come back by eliminating the murderer? Revenge can even create the same feelings on other people like family of "the criminal," and they sometimes strongly believe that the system made mistake.

Also, some people say that capital punishment reduces the crime rate. Well, yeah, it can plant the seed of fear on some people as "Don't wanna die? Then don't kill" (except some serial killers or psychopaths - they kill people without caring their own lives). But, society can not learn the true meaning of the preciousness of human life and why no one has the right to kill somebody. It sounds the same to me as that "I can not steal that bicycle because my parents will be really upset." What will come next? "You know what? I think I can steal it if I would not be caught!"

One more reason I think we should not have capital punishment is, the death penalty by mistake, as I mentioned above. It actually happens in the world and many cases were found as innocence, after those "criminals" were executed (see "Wrongful execution").

According to the writer of the ORBIS, "Since 1973, when the supreme court affirmed the constitutionality of the death penalty, the United States has executed just over 1,000 people, while more than 120 have been released from death row."
What is the justice for them? Should their family do revenge somehow? When is this cycle of anger and sadness going to end?

What surprised me was the fact that people were executed even though their "crime" is not murder or attempted murder.
In Iran, a 16 year old girl was raped by a 51 year old married man. She was arrested by the criminal sentence that she did not tell anybody about the rape. Her neighbor testified that she was immoral since she was already (corporally) punished for being alone with a boy when she was 13 years old. She could not prove the fact of the rape; furthermore, she took off her veil and threw it away in court. From her looks, the court decided that her age was 22 years old (!!) and she was given death penalty and her execution was performed the next day after the court's decision without any notice to her family. The man who raped her had only 95 times of corporal punishment. This case was reported by BBC (the British Broadcasting Corporation) in 2006 to the world for the first time.

As long as capital punishment exists, wrongful execution exists too, since only the murderer and the victim know the real truth. As you may know, the true criminal can be non-criminal, if their lawyer cleverly does very good job for them. Sometimes innocent people can be criminals, depending on the prosecutors.

But I still can not answer fully to the justice for victims. Because the level of how we feel can be different and sometime the time makes different. After going throw their hard time to face their loss, some of them start to wish the same thing will not happen to other people.
I would be glad to know what you think.

For further information and statistics, see Amnesty International website.

Nostalgia

After we said goodbye to Ruben, who was our classmate and had to go back to his country Mexico at the end of July (it was a very sad moment), Ayana, Maria, Rafael and I went down south to explore the hot, hot summer.

At the beginning we were going to visit Toronto Island on that day, but we realized that we did not have time to go there and come back in time for the baseball game.
So we decided to walk around the waterfront area and spend some time there; it ended up as a great chatting time about general stuff and a discussion about some English grammar (we are so good students!).

Did you know that there is a beach at Harbourfront?
I've lived in Toronto for about 3 years now, but I didn't know about this beach.. Whenever people say about "beach of Toronto" I thought they meant one of two; the beaches, or the beach in Toronto Island. But this beach had sand, and people were sitting, reading, and playing with their kids or lying down to get tan when we visited. Some were under yellow parasols and avoiding the sun, and some were just exposing themselves wherever they liked.
Walking around and looking at them made me feel a little weird. It was an ideally beautiful beach in the middle of such a metropolitan city; however, I could not wipe this feeling out from my head, even though I grew up in the town in front of the Pacific Ocean and beach should have been familiar view for me.

Of course. This beach is artificial. The sand on this beach is surrounded by concrete frames and not touched to the lake. You usually see people or children playing at the edge of the water if this is a real beach. No wonder everything looked too organized here, this is a part of the port park in Harbourfront.
Even though this is artificial, I could smell "waterfront." People in Japan express this smell as "salty scent," (Ayana sensed it too!) and it gave me a flashback of the beach in my hometown.

* * *It is called Shonan-Kaigan ("Kaigan" means coast), and has a shallow beach so people can easily swim, play and sit on the sand. The color of sand is not as beautiful as this artificial beach in Toronto, because it contains pieces of volcanic rock from Mt. Fuji (picture above) and magnetic iron ore (In some areas of this beach, you can actually see the magnetic attraction!), which make the color of the sand darker.


In the bottom picture, the sand seems to be sent from some other country, although it is still the same beach as other pictures. There is beach sports competitions every summer in this particular area, such as volleyball and lifesaving, and the original sand (the top picture) could hurt people's bare feet. Also the sand monument (art) competition is held by students and local artists every year.

Well, I should stop around here.. Otherwise, I would get home sick. Home sick? Maybe it is more like nostalgia. I am very glad that I found this beach in Toronto even though artificial, and I will visit again sometimes when I become very sentimental.

Mr. Suicide - Isn't that too much?

Do you like taking a bath? We love it.
Recently we moved to the new apartment and it didn't have a plug for our bath tub. We decided to buy one which I had specific idea for. I searched on the internet where I can buy this product without walking around and wasting my time, and I found the shop "Ashley" in Downtown Toronto.

Have you been to this shop? This is an expensive gift shop which sells high quality plates and utensils mainly; such as china, ceramic, pottery, crystal, and so on. People seem to like register for their wedding gift or buy expensive gift for somebody else, there are always many customers walking around and getting advice from the shopkeepers.

Ashley also have big shelves of designer's collection of everyday sundries, which I love to browse like a gallery. One of my favorites is Alessi, an Italian company, established in 1921. They produce designer's goods which are modern, artistic, sophisticated, and neat. Some of you may have seen their products;

Wine Opener / Sommelier Knife

Kettle / Basket / Juicer
The bath plug I wanted was designed by Massimo Giacon for Alessi in 2000. It has a name, "Mr. Suicide".



He floats to the surface like reaching for air when you take a bath. When I saw him first time, I just fell in love with.

Yes, I went to Ashely and asked the shopkeeper lady. She told me that she is going to bring the product from the storage room after I purchased it, so I paid and waited. 5 minutes later, she told me to wait little more. "He" was probably the cheapest products Ashely has, I thought it was taking a time to look for. Then 5 minutes later, she came back with a bag and full of smile.

"I am so sorry that it took so long to wrap."



What? I didn't ask for wrapping. What is this golden box with this golden ribbon?
Hum, maybe it is somebody else's, because it looks more than three times bigger than Mr. Suicide..

"Oh no, this is yours, a bath plug. Thank you dear, have a great evening."

Ooookkkkaaayyy.
She gave me the bag has a big golden box with a big golden ribbon, and a receipt looks like a small birthday card. This hard, again "gold", card was folded in half, had date, my name, address, phone number, - Wait a minute, how did she know my personal information? Oh yes, she asked me when I paid! It was so natural and fast and I didn't even notice that I was asked. Wow, she could do a good job if she was a scammer..(or I am a damn) It also had information of price, product name, company's name and how I paid. Now I have to shred this golden receipt after I check if the product has no problem.

On a way home, there was the elderly lady waiting for light next to me. She saw my clear bag showing a golden box with a golden ribbon so obvious, and asked me what I bought.

"Ahh, some daily goods."

I could not say that it was a tiny bath plug for myself. She said, "I love Ashley. Your friend will be very happy with that gift, whatever it is."

After I got home, I started unwrap it; took it out from the clear plastic bag, took of the top ribbon (it was stapled on the other part of ribbon), untied the ribbon, open the box, unwrap the paper with logo of Ashley, and unwrap the paper stuffed in the box...

There you are, Mr. Suicide!!!
He was in the box which Alessi originally packed him in as his own package. His face was exactly telling me how he suffered from such amount of packing supply made him difficult to breath. And the actual length of him was the one fifth of the box Ashley used.
Now every time I take a bath, he looks very comfortable to float on my bath tub, doing his job well. However, he also reminds me how much human being wastes resources for unnecessary stuff. Unnecessary - he might not be necessary to exist, he is valuable to me. So much wrapping could be valuable to somebody else. Humans might be already "Mr. Suicide" himself.

I, Student

Trying to come up with the best naming of this blog, is not easy. Actually my result was not that cool as I expected. But it's me. I am a student who had never imagined to become a student again, in my life.
After I graduated the University in Japan obtaining Bachelor of Arts ABOUT 10 years ago (Oh my gosh, a decade!!), I had built up my life there via several job titles and careers. Getting married supposed to be just a part of my life event, moreover, my life build there was about to go on as it had been, with my husband-to-be.
We used to talk about visiting his country Canada or living there in future, however I never imagined that our Canadian life would start in right away. It came so sudden.

"Can I quit my job?"

It was the day we paid for the upcoming wedding reception.
I couldn't really say no. I knew his company was doing something wrong legally and the managers were something wrong professionally. So I said "If you want".
Amazingly, He got job soon as his job hunting started in Canada. As the result, I left my country to live with my husband, and that's how I got here.

As some of you may know, people who have visitor status in Canada are unable to work while waiting for your immigration status. I was one of them, so I decided to start doing volunteer for "Canadian experience" which seems to be a common thing that employers would ask you at interviews. Then I met Social Work there and I became really into it.

Although the office did not have enough both social workers who are obtaining degrees and trained and budget to hire them more, cases which volunteers are not allowed to touch and number of clients were waiting for their tern to talk to the workers. To handle cases you need knowledge - of cause, and special training to understand them and lead them. For example, you may have some friends who are very talkative or expressive and you don't really have to guess what they are really thinking in their mind, and some who you have to doubt that they are hiding their mind behind their words or expressions so they don't throw the ball straight back makes you confuse or hard to catch. You have to know how to catch their balls even if it was extremely curved or awfully bounded. Sometimes you may have to start looking for where the ball has gone, some clients may even not be able to throw the ball with some reasons.

Anyway, I understood the path that I have to take to be a social worker. To apply the university course my resume needs more than one volunteer experience and reference letter from them, so I did another volunteer at the senior home. I will be ready to apply after I pass the ESL class safely.

My parents were not happy with my decision because of my age. They think I should have baby before it hits my limit physically. In Japan, this "next to marriage is the baby"(baby comes first in some cases) thing is very general among their generation and some still remain nowadays. Of course it is totally depends on individual values and I am NOT a feminist. There are some people actually being parents and also students, but I know I can not handle both at once. This is a lack of my ability, but that is life. You may be able to give up being a student or having a job but you will NEVER be able to quit being a parent whatever the way you attach to them, once you became.
Moreover, you never know what is going to happen to your life, just as 10 years ago I could never imagined to have my life in a different country and become a student there. My husband and I talk about our life often. He supports me and my decision happily, I may be the luckiest person in the world.

I want to be an independent. I want to be able to make choice of my life, on my own.

I, Student.
I am an ESL student now and I want to be a student in the university. You are going to know what kind of path actually I am going to walk.