Some more photos of this boat, and I’d share the colour versions but they’re being saved for something, so here are the monochrome ones.
I focused on specific parts of the frame to try and draw out more detail and give some focus. It’s clear that it’s all from the same thing, but I think there’s enough variance to keep the images interesting.
This is my submission into the three hundred-and-thirty-eighth Lens-Artists Photo Challenge. The theme for this one is “Pick a Word“.
I chose “Rust”.
The host of the Lens-Artists challenges cycles weekly between the following people:
This one is curated by John. The next one is curated by Anne.
I recommend joining the community and participating in the challenges. They’re pretty straightforward, allow room for interpretation, and provide a good way to think about photography in general. If not, however, then at the very least you should check out what others submit to the challenges.
Well, here we are. After years and years of research into the irrefutable, I’ve finally done it. I’ve finally cracked the code, pulled back the veil, lifted the sheet of deception from over our eyes, and now I know, and what I know I am going to reveal to you all, and you may be shocked. Prepare yourself.
For some, you may reject this knowing, and to be fair, that’s fair. Sometimes we would much prefer to bury our head in the sand rather than face the truth. However, it remains important that this information is brought to light, because we have an obligation to know, all of us.
So… chicken. Chicken is a thing, and chicken exists, but perhaps chickens as we know them do not exist in the way that we know them. Perhaps what we see in these vast, poultry-based organisms… is a lie.
Think about it: They’re so powerful, yet so unassuming. So precise, yet so goofy. Regal, yet poorly, and everywhere. They are everywhere all the time and we don’t even think about it because we eat them. But of course we eat them, because what else is there to do? And so their spread throughout every cultural space is a given, because there are so many of them and they do all these things and peck and bawk, and sometimes scream at the grand horror of existence. But there’s only one way they could have become so all over the place.
Sure, we could believe that it is due to their being convenient and easy to work with; sure, it could be because they know how to huddle in deepened, darkened spaces. But maybe, just maybe, there is a higher plane of existence beyond what we perceive as reality… and maybe the humble chicken has already won the war and the fight.
But perhaps there was no war, and that is always the way it has been. Perhaps it is that chickens have set up a simulation for us to protect us from ourselves, or something. I do not know the reasoning, for I am not a chicken, but what I do know is that we are in a simulation created by chickens. We exist in a world where it is them and not us who set the rules and the ways that we can move about.
I discovered this by carefully examining my research and questioning its being so exact and irrefutable, because that shouldn’t happen in science. Something that is irrefutable cannot be learned from, and can do little to provide because it’s now set in stone. Done. It no longer has any worth or value that it can provide beyond itself… which I know isn’t exactly the case but you get the idea.
So I looked and I tried to work out what it was that was missing, if there was indeed anything missing at all, because it didn’t seem like there was. Everything was just too perfect and too what I needed to find out, so I did some more snooping. I went to where I thought I could and I started speaking to chickens, trying to work out why they were so fine and perfect and powerful.
This did not help much as I do not understand the speech of the fowl. So I kept on looking, trying to find something that would help me understand all of this. It was troubling, but I had to keep searching. I knew something would eventually have to come up.
Nothing came up.
But I kept looking anyway, trying to see where this was all going wrong. Trying to work out what it was that I was not seeing, but then I saw it. I saw the faintest glimmer on a dark night.
I was very much away from people, away from everything, despondent upon a hill on a clear sky, and I saw a chicken fade, and it was gone. Why the chicken was there, I do not know. I don’t even know if it knew I was there, for I was so saddened by this state of failure that I was undetectable in my sadness. But it was there, and then it wasn’t, but all of a sudden it was once more.
I watched the chicken leave and I felt an ominous crack within the fabric of reality, and it patched itself almost faster than it appeared, but it was just long enough to see the feathers and hear the bawking, and then it all came clear to me. Then all the dots connected, and I realised.
In those brief moments I saw chickens conducting and guiding, and pecking in code. I heard them communicate with each other, and it was unlike anything I had ever experienced before.
I decided to head home to get some sleep as it had been a while, but the image, so clear and so striking in its brief existence would not leave me. I could not shake it, and eventually I started noticing oddities that could only be if we were being deceived by chicken. I realised that chicken was everywhere and nowhere at the same time, and I noticed how unassuming everyone was about that.
And now you know too, for it is the only way for everything to make sense; that we are in a chicken simulation, and that is all we’ll ever know.
The time it took to write one thousand words: 16:44:23
Not a bad speed.
This is another idea I had sitting for a while. Been meaning to to jump on it shortly after the abyss one was finished. Forced myself to do it just now. Could be better; could be worse, but it was fun to write, and might just be the last bit of silly chicken stuff I do. Unless something new comes to me, I’m fine with doing no more of this chicken fiction.
I feel I did better with this one than I did with “Sartori in Tangier”. I was able to be a bit more loose and relaxed, and I’m not sure why. As such, I think this bit of writing represents the song quite well.
King Crimson’s “No Warning” is from Three of a Perfect Pair.
I hope you enjoy.
—
Harsh, ominous sound. A pulse and something akin to lightning, but the pulse continues, and changes lengths and intensity. Percussion crashes in and mechanical procession leads the way. It presses down and it stresses and perhaps attempts to induce panic.
Minimal and abstract, yet utterly, so utterly clear. Unease as a brick to the face, and it’s stressed and despairing and urging, urging to move. Building, trying to make itself more obvious and continually pushing, even when pulling back. Pulling back into scattered spirals of soundless terror.
Muffled roaring as vague menace here and there and sounds continue to seemingly deconstruct, or fall apart. Something mournful among it all; something sad and searching, but unable to find what it looks for, and all has become just one cold stretch as the song ends.
I don’t think I had much of anything for this one. I like what I wrote, but I also feel it drags.
King Crimson’s “Sartori in Tangier” is from Beat.
I hope you enjoy.
—
A sort of rest and rumble, looking through a gap, waking up, coming into dawn, and finding some sort of peace, but it doesn’t last and suddenly a tension and urgency comes in.
This keeps pressure on, and chaos and uncertainty. A sense of the lost and closing in. Restlessness on purpose. Eventually a space clears, however, and in this space is calm. It’s not relaxed, but it is calm, and dreamy, and steady remains the beat, unchanging almost, but it’s not pressing in; it’s just keeping the expansion anchored.
Sounds float along and carry with them their space and their relief, but soon it’s back to the tension. A return to the pressing and pushing, and the stress and drive, and it continues on with a menacing glee until it suddenly stops and the song ends.
This one took a while, in part for me to actually get words down and in part for me to work out what to write. It was more time thinking about than writing, however, though the editing took quite a few hours, and probably more than the writing. I cut around two thousand words from the whole thing, and it was worthwhile. Through it, more of what I was trying to get across came forward and I was able to fill out the parts I needed to, and it was good work. The end result isn’t as concise as it could be; the writing is a bit sloppy, but I wanted some of that sloppiness to come through.
This essay was published earlier today on From Somewhere out the Back. If you’ve been following my stuff here long enough, then you’ll recognise the name as the title for when I write about music releases in my music collection. I’d been intending to dedicate a space for those pieces for a while, and of course rather than hold to that, the space expanded to more experiential essay stuff, which is where those writings about music were heading anyway. So check out this piece there too.
I hope you enjoy.
—
Wednesday the thirteenth of October, Two thousand-and-four. It’s not an important date for a lot of people, but for me it was the date that kicked of a years-long hunt for a film.
At the time I was working as a grommet at a place called Ocean Foods. The pay was variable and it lasted only a few weeks. I think six. On the above date, in the afternoon and before I headed to work I was watching SBS. I was looking for something to do. Didn’t want to listen to radio; didn’t want to game; didn’t feel like reading, so TV it was.
When I turned the TV on and switched to SBS, a film was playing. There was something about it that my teenager brain found appealing, so I watched the rest of it. After it finished I headed off to work and forgot about it for a while.
A number of years later I thought about the film. Don’t know why, but I decided to look for it. I went through the SBS website. Couldn’t find it. Forgot about it. Time passed. Tried again. Dug a little deeper. No luck.
This cycle continued on for a while, and at some point I started using Google. There were things from the film I vaguely remembered, such as a joking line about a cat being on heat and the main character teaching a boy to swim. The main thing that I would search for was “Asian film boy drowns” and variations thereof, as that’s what I remembered the most. I’d try that, and I’d try different combinations of fragments of the film that came to memory. I tried putting details into a forum post and got no response. I’d occasionally look at the SBS website again, just to see if anything would be there, but I found it to be less helpful as time went on. The Internet changed, and so did many websites.
I came across a website that archived Australian TV guides and so occasionally I would check that. Nothing.
This was a rather casual obsession for me, but when that obsession came to the surface it was a good few hours of dedicated searching and a good few hours of coming across other films but not what I was looking for.
Some point in two thousand-and-nineteen. Likely the twenty-sixth of November. I think I was talking to one of my housemates about the search. My partner was in the room and said something about looking through newspaper archives, see if they had anything. I think I was a little dismissive of the idea, but I hadn’t tried any newspapers, so why not? So the following day I tried some newspaper websites, and… nothing.
I then decided to try a newspaper website via The Wayback Machine. More digging. Finding snapshots of places that linked to other places that no longer exist. Getting to an archived TV guide. Digging through my rough recollection of when I saw the film. Found the day. Found the film.
I didn’t know if the title I saw was it, but it seemed to be, and so I tried doing a search with it. Success. A few more hours later and I got myself a copy of the film, and then the day after that I watched it. I watched it with my partner and our housemates. I then watched it with my friend Brenden and we talked about it on Podcast Eater. It was enjoyable, but I had questions.
—
Nagisa (なぎさ) is a film about the titular Nagisa whose name, as far as my understanding goes, means “Beach”, though it could also man “Seashore”. The film is an adaptation of the seinen manga, Nagisa, created by Motoka Murakami (村上もとか). Despite various anachronistic structures and vehicles suggesting otherwise, the film occurs during one coastal summer in the sixties and Nagisa lives a lively, small kind of life. She hangs out with her friend; she tries to get good grades to get a record player for herself, and when that falls through she gets a summer job to afford the record player.
I can’t quite remember if Sydney summers were unpleasant as a kid. I do remember some days being too hot, and these days I find the season unpleasant. Sure, it can be fun but I feel warm most of the time so often I feel more like I’m dealing with it rather than enjoying. What Nagisa views summer as is a lively period, and one to embrace, even if it’s a period of learning and understanding.
Over the summer Nagisa comes across different forms of romance. She lightly sees her mother’s experience, more prominently her cousin’s, and dominantly her own after a chance meeting with a boy she then decides to teach how to swim. The way it all comes through carries a sense of experience and personality, which makes sense; Based on where they are in life, the three have different understandings and views on what they consider romance. Naturally the focus is more on Nagisa’s experience, however. There’s a sort of “naturally awkward” youthfulness between her and the boy she teaches to swim, and their interactions, whilst a bit stiff, still come off as being sweet.
Beyond romance, Nagisa also deals with issues around friendship, impressionability, and her own concerns about social class and tragedy. The friendship issues and impressionability are more obvious, but these (along with the romance) are all things that the narrative has to deal with and it does so willingly, albeit with a bit too much willingness to brush over some things. That said, conclusions come from actions more often than words, and that’s true here.
Nagisa often feels low-key, for good and ill. There are times when scenes feel like they should be more dramatic, and some that feel like they drag, though everything is fittingly matter-of-fact. The framing is often utilitarian, though the scenery it captures is pleasing enough. The acting feels appropriate, though there are times where the actors seem to fall flat and others where they’re excellent, and it can be difficult to tell when for either upon repeat watches. At the very least the kid actors feel like kids, and if you believe their performances, a lot of the film and its smallness becomes easier to enjoy.
Nagisa also makes really good use of music. Often there isn’t any; it’s mostly the sounds of the setting, and it works. There are times when it seems emphasised, but that could just be the pulse of summer. When there is music, however, it’s really, REALLY fitting, even if it can come off as a bit on the nose. It underscores and allows the mood to permeate more often than it tries to dictate, so it’s working with what’s going on rather than against it. Most importantly, however, is that it’s never verbose.
What Nagisa goes through is transformative, but Nagisa doesn’t make a show and tell of it. Instead it allows her to still be a kid and allows her to have fun with her friend at the end. It’s heartwarming and it says a lot with very little. It’s a bit of life, and even if you go through some hard stuff, it’s nice to know that your friends are still gonna be there for you.
—
Last year when I started writing about Nagisa beyond the few scraps I had, I found out that it was getting a blu-ray re-release. As far as I’m aware it’s not a well-known film, though its website still exists. Even finding information on the manga beyond the basic isn’t easy. Still, it mean something to someone out there, so wonderful timing. I told Brenden about it and interrupted him streaming to get him to watch the trailer.
Somewhere around then I was thinking about how to finish this piece off. I was going to say something about how thinking about Nagisa made me want to watch it again. Instead I decided to watch it with a few friends and see what they thought. I got my friends Darsh and Kevin involved; Brenden was down for another watch, but he had stuff going on.
—
Kevin: I liked the film.
Me: Darsh, what did you think? Let’s give Kevin a moment to decide whether he’s going to hurt our feelings or not.
Kevin: *laughs*
Darsh: *laughs* I really enjoyed it. It’s a slice of life thing. Always love those types of things, being transported to a sixties Japanese coastal town. Love the nostalgic tone. It felt like I was watching someone’s life and thinking of simpler times. It felt really wholesome.
It’s an adolescence, coming of age thing which is always nice.
Kevin: I particularly liked the guilt and shame over poverty specifically. I like the way that you had the contrasting characters in different social situations, and of course, you have to play out the “You don’t understand it from my angle”, but Nagisa is someone who’s literally looking at the sun all their life and cannot touch it, whereas someone else lives in it.
Me: So did you both think it was a good film?
Kevin: Yeah, for sure.
Darsh: I think so. It was a nice thing to pass the time with. It was a pleasant watch.
Me: I like it but I do think it does drag in some places. It’s also just kind of an interesting film as well.
Darsh: The reason I like it is because it drags and it’s not perfect. For me, it adds to the realism a bit. I like the meandering sometimes, you know?
Kevin: The dance was super long in the party that they had, where I was like “Okay, this is long”.
Darsh: *laughs* Actually, yeah.
Kevin: But at the same time they built up to it, so it’d be weird if they didn’t do anything with it.
Me: It felt like the actors were having fun with it, but it also felt awkward and stiff.
Kevin: Were they doing the twist?
Me: And the monkey.
Kevin: I did like how they did grounding with specific products, objects and things, and specifically the ending one, with the Pop Rocks or whatever it was, ’cause it’s like they were moving on from their summer vacations and things and into adulthood, or… whatever.
Me: *laughs*
Kevin: Advanced adolescence and it’s just like it’s gonna be weird and new and hard handle. Yeah. Good stuff.
Me: Well summer is the young adulthood, and autumn is the move towards decrepitude, right? So I guess what it really represents – the Pop Rocks and the end of summer – is that now they can appreciate the things that they couldn’t before.
Darsh, do you know what we call those here?
Darsh: Actually that’s a good question. I’ve never had them that much, to be honest. Was it Fizzy Pop? I think that we call it Fizzy Pop.
Me: No, that was different. That was kind of powdery (and also known as Wizz Fizz). Aren’t Pop Rocks kind of crunchy or something? Kevin, are they crunchy?
Kevin: I’ve seen both, but I am thinking of the powdery ones ’cause you’d get sticks with them and dip the stick in and then lick them.
Me: I don’t remember us having a stick, but I remember us having a tiny little spade.
Darsh: Oh yeah, I remember that.
Me: You’d lick it off the spade and you’d get stuff caught in the corners of the spade that you’d never be able to get.
—
Nagisa was director Masaru Konuma’s (小沼 勝) penultimate film. He was known for mainly making pink films; Why a slice of life movie was one of his last, I don’t know. Perhaps he wanted to to be known for something other than his NSFW oeuvre. It’s possible he enjoyed the manga, or maybe he was feeling sentimental about his childhood. Maybe he was longing for that childhood. Maybe it was money.
The search for Nagisa felt like a lifetime. So much and nothing happened in those fifteen years. Relationships coming and going, staring at the ceiling, boredom, entertainment. Jobs, university, growing up. Hours spent listening to the roaring of waves and the silence of a breeze. So much, and nothing at all. In reflection the time feels short, but it still feels like a lifetime.
During the first two watches after I obtained a copy I was wondering why I was enjoying the film. Mainly if I was enjoying it because I felt obligated to; that I had to because I spent so much time looking. Coming back to it with Darsh and Kevin, I knew what was coming and I knew that some parts could drag. I don’t know if it was due to that, but I found myself a bit more loose and relaxed with it, and enjoying Nagisa for what it was.
Was the search for Nagisa worth it? I don’t know, but I don’t regret the time I spent. I don’t know how strongly I can recommend it; It has flaws, with some more prominent than others. It also feels like it’s meant for nostalgia, but it doesn’t feel like it’s trying to sell nostalgia. It also refuses to be anything other than what it is: a slice of life. Nagisa carries meaning and intent the whole way through, but it doesn’t step away from being low-key, and partly because of that, it’s charming. The next time I watch it, it’ll be nice to know that I enjoy it for what it is.
I was hoping to have an essay I’m working on finished and ready to go earlier today, but it was not to be. Still working on it, so in the interim here’s a photo I took for something else I’m working on. I’ve photographed this boat wreck before, but perhaps not this minimalistically.
Sort of mysterious, sort of unpleasant. Those sorts of things, but I like how fog can create layers and isolation, and it’s doing both here.
This is my submission into Leanne Cole‘s “Monochrome Madness” for this week. The next one is hosted by Brian of Bushboys World, and he has chosen the theme of “Chair or Chairs”.
This challenge is open to all, and I recommend joining in. If want to, check out more information about it here, and include the tag “monochrome-madness” when you share your photo. If you’d prefer not to join in, then at the least check out Leanne’s photography, and what other people submit.
So I’m looking at what’s on the list of things to write about at the moment and there’s a few things to go still, and some in particular I’m sort of going “oh no” because they’ll take some time. They won’t take much time, of course, but they will take some time and I’m trying to get something finished before tomorrow. I’m really trying to get something finished before tomorrow, is what I should actually say, but let’s just stick to the smaller, slightly less dramatic version.
Of course I will write about those things on the list – they’re sitting as drafts and I want to get the queue cleared as soon as possible – but doing them right now when I’m working on this bit of writing that, thankfully (or rather, hopefully) won’t take too long to finish is a bad idea. Having them sit there isn’t too good either, though, so I’m caught between stages of a sort. I’m caught between wanting to go back and forcing myself to continue on, and it’s not easy, let me tell you.
Actually it is, but you know.
Still, this I can do. This is a warming of the up rather than the cooling of the down, and I don’t have to think too hard about whatever it is that I’m writing, but once more I’m writing about writing which is what I do most of the time anyway. There are other, better things to write about… or are there?
So writing is on my mind and now I’m talking about a thing that I’m working on and it has been in the works for a long, long time. It has taken a while to get to the point where I’m nearly ready to publish, and I didn’t even know it’d be an article when it first started. When I say ‘article’, I mean something I’m going to publish on Culture Eater and other places, including here. But it does very much feel like an article. An essay of sorts, though very much a personal one, even if it doesn’t feel personal, or much of anything beyond what it is, really. But there’s time to work that all out, so long as I make use of the time that I have. If I don’t do that, then.. yeah. Which means today is going to be a busy day.
Today is going to be one of sneaking and getting things sorted, and I’ll get them sorted, all right. I’ll get them all done and in the orders that some might consider correct, and then I don’t know.
I think I lost myself for a moment there. The thing is writing is getting in the way of writing, or rather the desire to finish the small things is getting in the way of the thing that is nearly done and I need to get that nearly done thing done, and then once it is done I can do the other bits that are waiting.
The time it took to write five-hundred words: 06:12:14
Decent speed. Not sure if the writing is good. I think I tried to progress and didn’t quite.
One listen, though there were a few restarts early on. I was trying to get an idea of how the song starts, imagery-wise. Probably should’ve just waited for a loop. Oh well.
I think I got across the song well enough, though perhaps not as well as I could have. I feel like I missed a lot of it, but I couldn’t help but find myself getting caught up in the joy it carried and perhaps I didn’t express that enough.
Kenta Nagata’s (永田権太) “Staff Credits” (“スタッフクレジット”) is from The Legend of Zelda ~The Wind Waker~ Original Sound Tracks, the soundtrack for The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker.
The song may have been co-composed with Koji Kondo (近藤浩治), but I’ve had some difficulty finding anything solid that confirms.
I hope you enjoy.
—
A strum and a light beat. Both very small as they move with a light step. Woodwind calls out jaunty and joyous, almost. Pipes follow along and join the group, also joyous, also moving rhythmically. The woodwind and pipes pull away as a violin takes the stage and dances a little with a big smile. As it does, a little more percussion comes in, and strings seem to be heard in the distance.
The woodwind and pipes come back, and then sounds drop to give room for the strings as they stay calm. Woodwind comes back, then pipes, then the violin gets the space and the strings become richer and the sounds expand, carrying upon the water, carrying upon a breeze.
For a moment it’s just that strum, the strings and the percussion and something familiar calls across. Horn then leads across the vast expanse and the space enriches, and all is full of wonder. All is full of bliss.
There’s a cycle of rounds, almost, as moments are remembered whilst looking toward a future. A moment of calm whilst more sound looks at what was before moving on and looking forward again. It looks away and it’s full speed ahead.
Once more that past is looked upon with strings, but it’s now taking that to look forward; to not be beholden to it, and it pulls away and the violin dances once more, and all points toward adventure; toward a future.
The strummed instrument is left, and it carries memory once more, letting it rest, letting it settle. It plays once last time as the strings underscore this final moment, and then the song ends.
Stupidity Hole 