A physicist, an mathematician and a chemist were locked in a jail cell, and were working hard on devising escape plans.

Chemist: If we could get a few organic materials, I could figure how to make them react and cause an explosion that will destroy the wall and let us out.

They all thought it was a great idea, but since it is not obvious to find any chemical around, they needed an alternative.

Physicist: I studied the structure of the walls, and saw a few cracks propagating through it. I have figured the optimal way to hit the wall so that it will yield in the shortest time, letting us out. The only hic is that it requires a heavy object which we do not have...

Again, a great idea, but still it was important to know if the mathematician had a better, easier idea. They both turned to him, and he stood straight, looked at them and started talking.

Mathematician : Assume we were out of this cell; assume further we had never been in here...

The poor guy never got to the conclusion of his statement. The physicist and chemist used him to hit the wall, and they were free.

Today I revisited my livejournal for the first time in a few weeks. It comes as no surprise that there is nothing new, it will be worrying matter otherwise. Christmas is around the corner, and I thought it nice to change the theme of this page to reflect the mood in this season.

Enfin un souffle d'air frais
Un endroit vivable sur cette terre
Un endroit pas a un visa pres
Enfin souffle le vent de la mer
La bas j'irais de temps en temps
Quand mon travail m'en laissera le temps

I woke up too early this morning, what says I? Woke up? This is such an erroneous statement, it is almost a lie. Well, it is. I did not sleep at all of the night, like the preceding night, and the one before that. I can’t quite recall when I last had a good night sleep. Perhaps because I was sleeping that night? Well I am as awake as one may be at this moment; it is my understanding that you have to be awake when you travel by train at night unless you don’t mind being robbed of all your belongings, including your clothes. I do not speak of my experience, for I do not plan to find out about that myself. I have heard enough stories of that type to have learnt something, be they true or not totally false. From not sleeping at night to be writing in the train, I wonder where the connection is. Perhaps there is none, but I am sure there has been a digression. About digressions, it is unbelievable how they happen even in the most coherent speeches, texts…this is one of the second order. Chronic insomnia is what I diagnosed myself with tonight. Its daytime symptoms are apathy and restlessness. The causes of this condition are multiple, and it took me a while to understand that it is needless to try to deconvolute in order to find in what proportion they contribute. In other words, I opted for the bad old technique that focuses on curing the symptoms of the condition. It works well for patients in a terminal stage of a disease :-) . My approach was simple: Have fun. So much fun that at the end of the day, I will be so exhausted that the forces (curse of a physicist) that tend to keep me awake all the time will have to compromise and let me rest, for that will be the only way for them if they hoped to ever have me back. Now the question was what could be so fun? I am a simple guy, maybe too simple. I like reading, writing, and sightseeing. That’s why I am in the train now. I walked to the train station at 03:00 A.M. and there was a train leaving to Florence, the historical city. I took that train. Five hours later I was in the city tour bus, and now, 30 hours after I left home, I am still in the train. It was so fun walking down those streets that on the way back I took the wrong train; not my fault, but there’s no point blaming now. Who could I blame anyway? The controller told me that I should not have just read the sign that shows the destination of the train, but listen to the announcement. I call this being lost in the midst of language and cultural barriers. The wrong train evidently took me to the wrong city where I had to spend the night in the train station reading while waiting for the right train. It is often said that the one thing that is worse than missing the train is taking the wrong train, but in this case it wasn’t. It was an agreeable journey, not planned at all, that is with no room for disappointment. I would love to write all about the great places I visited in Florence: Galileo’s house, The Medicis house, Da vinci and Michaelangelo’s works, Tchaikovsky’s house, Dostoevsky’s desk, but I am falling asleep now. The train is taking me home and maybe when I wake up, I will remember to do that. There is a family sitting opposite to me, their little daughter is smiling. It looks like she is smiling back at me, maybe I am too. I am happy to finally get a good rest.

I went to the other side of the mirror.
It was neither wonderland nor the path of the dead.
It was not even the wizarding world.
It was just a symmetric joke.

I know the answers
To many questions that have puzzled humans for centuries.
I know the answer to the big "why?".
I have witnessed the expansion of the universe, of my universe.
I know exactly what Lamartine meant.
I could re-invent Van Gogh.
Above all I know one thing.
That there are still things beyond my understanding.
I know that too!

Personnage triste
La face sans expression
reve de demain
sous le vent doux de Trieste

I am hesitating to refer to Bora using a personal pronoun. This is simply because I was not told what was his/her gender when we got acquainted. If I had to make an educated guess about that, I will surely say male. My guess will of course repose upon my assumption that Eol from the Greek mythology is also a male. Notwithstanding this uncertainty on my new friend's gender, I totally enjoy the sound of Bora's voice every day. Sitting by the window, listening to Bora's stories about his home in the north pole, I dream and marvel at what it is like living one's dream every single day. Bora was born in the north pole and travels everyday distances one can just imagine. Besides the Adriatic and Mediterranean seas, the only ones that are privileged to come across his way are the people living near the gulf of Trieste. He is a great friend who talks to me all the time, and maybe listens back when I say something.

I soon will wake up
And this will all be a dream
Then I will stand up
And of conciousness I will follow the stream

I will probably miss that reality
In which I dove when I felt asleep
Far away from the other reality
Of which I emerge from very deep

Then I will wonder about the limits of the virtual
And my cogito will surely be endless
Like seeking for the seed of a fruit that is seedless
And this will surely become a ritual

I will walk down my way up
With all the ups and downs
And by the river I will sit down
And marvel at how much I can dream up

They must have been lying to us
They said it was one way or the other
It was always either plus or minus

Never had anyone told any of us
That sometimes it could be neither of those
Isn't it ridiculous?

That what triggers our fear
Is as harmless as a baby dear?
As neutral as the taste of pear?

We feel defeated and accept the chaos
Just because we fear the statu quo

Without any circumlocution
Without showing off your erudition
Tell me

What explains all these circumvolutions
of my mind in action
Tell me

Why of all those differences
We have our preferences
Tell me

Why everytime the sun rises
The fear of the Darkness arises
Tell me

Where one needs to hide
For others to enjoy their pride
Tell me

How far do we have to walk
Before about the distance we can talk
Tell me

Using words I can understand
The only truth by which I will stand
Tell me

About one year ago, I had an interesting albeit sad encounter with a senior citizen at church. It was this time of the year, when everything revolves about christmas and new year festivities. I went to church for what I believe was going to be the last mass for students before they go on winter break, and I happen to be sitting next to a very old and friendly man. I call him friendly because the first impression I had of him was something very unusual. It is customary that we shake each other's hand and say good morning at the beginning of the church service, but he did not accept my handshake; instead, he offered me a hug! Well, If I was not awake yet, that must have been something of a wake-up call. He was very friendly during the whole service, dropping a comment here and there, asking a question to satisfy his curiosity-I get a lot of those- etc...Anyway we had an interesting chat, and we soon got to the sempiternal question to which I have answered at least a few thousand times: "Are you going home for Christmas?" Of course, I went all the way back to the beginning, explaining that for me home was twelve thousand miles away, that the cost of a vacation at home was a luxury for the average student, and that assuming I could offer myself this pleasure, I would still face difficulties related to administrative restrictions on travel i.e. visa... Bottom line, I told him, I would love to, but I just have to accept that I can't. Next came the other question about missing one's family in such times; usually, even the most scattered families tend to come together around that period. The old man told me he understood how I may feel about this time of the year, because he felt somewhat the same. Christmas period he said, was the saddest time of the year for him. Growing up, he said, he had his siblings, cousins, friends and other relatives all together for Christmas; such great memories. Now, even though his children and grandchildren procured him much joy everyday, there was a gap that could never be refilled around him; a gap of which he felt the depth only this time of the year. He thought I felt just like him!
It is not the typical happy story for this season, but it is one that probably reminds us how blessed we are, and how much we should value that time we get to spend with our loved ones -at least some of them- during this period of the year.

In a few minutes, what is now today will become tomorrow, or maybe what used to be tomorrow will now be known as today. Not that it matter much, we indeed see that happen every twenty four hours. What matters is that I am looking back at the last twenty four hours, trying to figure out where I came from in order to understand where I am now, and maybe hope for a better "where I am going to" .
When I think of certain instants of the day that is ending--ooops that just ended-- I wish for only one thing, that the time machine wasn't a myth.

Had I known earlier in life what pleasures one could acquire from reading classics of english literature, I would surely have devoted more time to that. By more time, I mean anything else than no time at all as I did so far. It was such an amazing experience I had last Thursday, December 14th; I could say without a glimpse of doubt that opening this book was one of the best things I did this year. I had heard about the author, and I had glanced once or twice through a poem of his, but never had I thought I will ever chance to stumble against that masterpiece containing all his tales and poems. I should here give credit to spinky for encouraging me to read it, for she guaranteed to me that I would enjoy it, regardless of my usual reading preferences. In case what precedes might make you think that I am new to the reading task, you probably would like to know that I have had the privilege to enjoy literature in several languages, that is I am not new in town, even though I am just known to a few. I even went as far as writing sometimes... Where was I? I thought this attention deficit stuff was going to be attenuated with time, but looks like no. So where was I? English literature, yes that's it! I just started reading the works by Edgar Poe, and there is just no words to describe how fascinated I am by every single word or sentence of his.