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Monday, October 28, 2002

11:20 Lula lá
Congratulations! Lula, our leftest candidate ever, won the Brazilian presidential elections. We're all curious about the coming years and hoping for the best. This change of perspective makes me very happy: I started voting for Lula in 1989, at the first Brazilian democratic elections in almost thirty years. I remember my disappointment at the results (also at all the following elections). That was one of the things I took into consideration when deciding to leave the country. At the time I felt the future I hoped for was consistently different than that of most of my fellow Brazilians. Now that may have changed a little bit.

A brief overview of Brazilian history.
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Sunday, October 27, 2002

23:40 Beaufort!
There were very strong winds blowing outside my window when I woke up this morning. At lunch time the area in front of Centraal Station had to be evacuated to protect the passers-by from the roof tiles that were blown away from the station building. Paul called from Rotterdam saying a big storm had probably killed the little tree on his balcony. P.A. called from the airport saying all flights leaving Amsterdam were delayed and might be cancelled altogether. Dewald also reported cancelled flights and bad weather in London. I spent the afternoon and evening in the studio hearing the rain and winds pounding outside and strange whistling sounds penetrating through unknown little gaps and cracks. A few hours later I adventured outside on my bike and witnessed a surreal Leidsestraat where several trams rested, dark and empty like big abandoned toys. A while later I got a call from Carl and Yan saying a storm was building up in Vienna.
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Saturday, October 26, 2002

23:59 Closure
Unexpectedly pleasant visit from P.A. Lots of stuff was brought up and old situations that were implicitly resolved became explicitly resolved. Kindness and trust restored.

Ach, time, always reliable after all.

We joined together the demonstration against the Iraqi war and marched through the center of Amsterdam and had open-faced sandwiches and coffee. I then went to the studio, got some work done and wrote sad, relieving e-mails. Some days end up crammed with meaningful actions.
Like Saturday, October 26, 2002.
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12:45 Last night: I came into my apartment and found a handwritten note waiting for me on the tatami:
Hallo bewoners*

We had in the appartment above you a boiler how was lekkage.
I am sorry to say to you that I did go in your appartment to check the dammage and it is a little water on the seling
And also sorry for a theek your touwel
If there are more problems you let me know ok
my pfone nr = 06 #### ####

Marcel
plummer
*bewoner is the Dutch word for inhabitant.
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Friday, October 25, 2002

10:26 Last night: I was living somewhere else. It wasn't better or worse, just normal. I was going up the stairs and had to pass through the apartment of the neighbour. She had lots of purple things in her place: clothes, towels, rugs. All purple. I had to move some furniture (or maybe a washing machine) slightly aside to be able to proceed to the upper floor where I lived. I caught a glimpse of TV images where an elephant was hanging from somewhere. Was it dead? It startled me and felt like some sort of revelation.
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Tuesday, October 15, 2002

15:12 pros·thet·ics
The branch of medicine or surgery that deals with the production and application of artificial body parts.
I'll give you extra parts. I promise.
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Sunday, October 13, 2002

02:37 Back
One year ago: enjoying my new apartment, Teodora's visit, Paula C.'s visit.
Two years ago: Richard and I swimming at the pool of the Montréal Olympic stadium.
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Thursday, October 10, 2002

09:54 My sweater smells like video
It gets colder by the day in Amsterdam, and it's been unusually sunny and dry. Gloves and thicker coats and pullovers emerge, including my thick black/brown turtle neck sweater. As I was putting it on this morning I (who knows why) recognized the nice smell of new video equipment (flash back to my early days of MTV Brazil, where I spent endless hours inside brand new, air-conditioned edit suites).
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Tuesday, October 08, 2002

13:25 "The fourth dimentional construct is made of water."
(Roberta Sparrow, 'The Philosophy of Time Travel')


Dark, darkest, darko

It's been three months since I saw Richard Kelly's Donnie Darko and it remains being the most enjoyable movie experience I've had in a long while. Since a few weeks I keep hearing Gabriëlle, Dan and Fred raving about the film's web site and today I finally took the time to check it out. Amazing – not only does it keep up with the strange atmosphere of the movie but also adds some extra details and evidence to the story, including most of the contents of Roberta Sparrow's book 'The Philosophy of Time Travel", a key element in the movie narrative and something that remains a mystery until you go through the different levels of the site. The quality of the interaction design is so good it even neutralizes/justifies the otherwise ikky raygun-like graphics. Have a look.
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Saturday, October 05, 2002

21:35 Facts of the matter
Gabriëlle invited some close friends for her birthday at the hortus botanicus, and then for a drink at her apartment. At the hortus we had cake in the palmhouse and checked out several other greenhouses full of butterflies and tropical plants (many of which I knew from my mom's garden...). Back at Gab's place we drank and snacked and yakked away; my own culinary contributions generated many compliments, which made me very happy. I had prepared a mix of cream cheese, sage, rosemary, thyme and basil (to be eaten with Wäsa crackers) and also something else I came up with at the last minute: strips of raw fennel sprinkled with ground seaweed, sea salt and roasted sesame seeds. I barely ever cook, and having people appreciate the results feels good.

So I just got home and found in my inbox a message from geuzen Femke Snelting (following her previous one with a pepper bread recipe) entitled 'What happens when you bake a cake?":
When fat and sugar are mixed together - the process is called creaming - little bubbles of air are being trapped in the mixture, each one surrounded by a film of fat (which is why the mixture changes colour during creaming as the trapped air creates a foam). It is this air which creates the lightness in the finished cake, but unless beaten egg is added to the mixture the fat would collapse and the air escape during cooking. The egg white conveniently forms a layer around each air bubble, and as the temperature of the cake rises in the heat if the oven, this layer coagulates and forms a rigid wall round each bubble, preventing it from bursting and ruining the texture of the cake. During the baking the bubbles of air will expand and the cake will 'rise'. At the same time the stretchy gluten in the flour - which has formed an elastic network around the air bubbles - will stretch until, at a higher temperature, it loses elasticity and the shape of the cake becomes fixed. But until that moment is reached the expansion process must be allowed to continue uninterrupted. Which is why a) the cake should be baked as soon as it is mixed and b), even more importantly, the oven door should never be opened in the early stages of cooking.

(Delia Smith: What Happens When You Bake A Cake?)

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Friday, October 04, 2002

23:33 Posting here makes me feel better.
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22:07 Bad news from far away
I got a call today from my brother Cássio. He told me our mother had what seems to be a minor heart attack. She's in intensive care since yesterday. Exams will now determine the best course of action. I just spent some time on the phone with my sister. While we talked my muted TV was playing world news and I briefly saw images of four tornados, side by side, over the ocean. Strange, strange, strange, strange.
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21:12


(AP Photo/Cabinet Jean Philippe Zoppini, HO)

Artist rendition of the "AZ Island", a project designed by French architect Jean-Philippe Zoppini and made available Thursday Sept. 26, 2002. The 400 meter (1320 feet) long and 300 meter (990 feet) large vessel could host 4,000 cabins on 15 storeys, its own port and facilities to be like a moving city on the sea. No price was available for the project but a model could be presented at the Sea Trade exhibition of Miami in March 2003.
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20:01 From Dunne & Raby's web site:
Park Interactives:
A collection of furniture for adults (attached and single) to meet and play.



The spaces in the gardens of the Villa Medici are like rooms, outdoor rooms without furniture. We would like to furnish them, and provide suggestions for how these neutral spaces could be used. Parks are strange places. During the day happy families play out idealised scenarios of modern life, while at night they become sites for a variety of illicit activities. Our furniture will make some of these night time activities more convenient and at the same time offer a critique of the kind of design that is always trying to make things nice, convenient, user-friendly, efficient and ergonomic (especially public furniture).

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Tuesday, October 01, 2002

23:51 Haptonomic ethic and deontology
(From Haptonomie.org)
Haptonomic applications are at present adapted to the principal professions of their practitioners ; they depend consequently, on the deontological ethic of these professions.

A fundamental and essential ethic

However - and this is most important - for all forms of haptonomic application, in no matter which discipline, the fundamental and essential haptonomic ethic is, by its very nature, valid and of prime importance.

This ethic is founded on the norms of the haptonomic approach, which take into account more than fifty years of experience, to wit:

• abstention from all forms of dirigisme on the part of the professional authority, especially all abuse of power.
• a conduct during the encounter which is without bias, unprejudiced, prudent, respectful, attentive, considerate, (a frank and unguarded self-presentation).
• an open-minded presence, transparent and clear, (an honest self-presence).
• a consideration of the categorical imperative "Totus sed non totaliter" (the whole person, but not in his totality), which comprises an optimum affective approach, whilst preserving a distance which respects the human and his particularity, representing the "self-restraint" as "contained love".
• The greatest caution regarding emotional, psychotactile and psychohaptic contact, taking into account (with an indubitable clarity, without contempt or ambiguity) the desired aim, in the approach, the accompaniment, the care, the help or the therapy, in such a way that the approached person can confirm this intentional clarity as real, strongly felt and experienced.
• an unconditional respect for the right of the approached person to self determination, calling on his own ability to make decisions, freely and independently, over the choice or stance taken regarding any matter of vital or existential concern to him.
• In consequence of the aforementioned, an abstention from all forms of application of haptonomic phenomenality, or its continuation, each time that the above mentionned criteria are not openly demonstrated in such a way that the approached person is able to fully confirm them in all respects, and agree of his own free will to this form of application and its continuation.
• a consideration consistent with the values and fundamental aims of the haptonomic approach - no matter what therapeutic aim is being pursued - which is characterised by the disclosure of the Goodness of the approached person ; the rational confirmation of his existence (existentia) and the affective confirmation of his essential being (essentia).
• ensure the implementation of a clear and indisputable detachment at the end of each session.
• refusal of all forms of advertisement - of any kind - regarding haptonomy and its applications.

It is therefore clear that at the base of all forms of application of haptonomic phenomenality is a fundamental and normalised haptonomic ethic and deontology.

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10:45 ¡It's a boy and I will spare no exclamation marks!


¡Brechtje has a brother!
¡New Inklaar baby is in the house!
¡Welcome in, Sybrand Ebbe!
¡Well done, Ineke and Fred!

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