Odds and Ends

Travel clearly is good for the writer in me. I am glad to say that August was the second busiest month, in terms of entries, on this blog. :)

I was confronted by my own deeply repressed racism the other day. It was the day where I was wandering around suburban Beograd, searching for my dentist. I was going round in circles, 30 minuets late when a Roma man, who was going through the trash and extracting the recyclable materials, called me over. In my frustration, and embarrassment at being totally clueless about where I was going, I wanted to ignore him, but I didn't. I went over and he started rattling off in Serbian, and I didn't understand anything. Eventually we figured out what the other was trying to do, and he managed to give me directions (albeit to the wrong dentist). But as he was talking to me, I noticed that I was keeping a certain distance from him and that I had my hand over my wallet in my back pocket. I had done these things subconsciously, but I felt awful once I realized what was going on.

This man had reached out and tried to help me the best he could, and my immediate reaction to him was to condemn him as a thief. It made me think back to HON 299, because I think, in some way, this is the very learned reaction, totally artificial, that Dusan was trying to get us to recognize was part of us. The critical multiculturalist in me has now exposed the deeply subconscious suspicions of otherness, embodied by this Roma man. Now I am aware of this mechanism and hope that I can deal with it in future encounters with the other.

Hmm, is it racist of me to even describe the man by (what I am assuming) is his ethnic origin? I ask this because it feels like I am not looking past his ethnicity if I continue to use it for my social cues. Rather than being a "Roma" man, maybe he is just a man.

Perfect contact

The ball seemed to hover just in front of me for what seemed like ages. It hung there, at the prefect distance from my feet. There was only one option. Players were all around me, but none had white shirts, so there were no passing options, plus the ball was asking to be smashed.

I was directly in front of the goal, but there were players in the way. There did seem to be a path through, so I went for it. I recoiled my leg, found the perfect balance (leaning slightly forward so as to keep the ball low), and swung...

...my laces shot connected perfectly, right off the perfect spot on my foot. The ball leapt forward at a blistering pace, but I knew it was going to be a powerful shot before it left my foot. I have always been blessed with a vicious right foot, and the gratifying feeling never diminishes. This one was no different, it felt good from the moment of contact.

But ultimately it was not as perfect as it felt, as the ball swerved to the right and missed the point I was going for. It also missed the goal. But by that point, the game moved on. Still, the feeling lingered and I relished it. Later I did manage a goal, but ironically it was a light tap in from a defense splitting pass.

The point of this entry is because I find it so amazing that in the 1 or 2 seconds that it took me to choose my options, and then make the shot, I went through an emotion transition, and had multiple thoughts as it was happening. Simply amazing.



I also really enjoy the crew that show up regularly. There are some great players, everyone gets along well, and there are almost never fouls or arguments. In someways, after two days of watching Football Factory International (documentary on hooligan culture), this is the perfect antidote. I can walk away from the game and feel good, physically and psychologically. It is a beautiful game, and lets me take my mind off things. In the wrong context, this leads to bad results, but not here. Here we are individuals from diverse back grounds coming together for some pure competition and out of love of the game.

Its a great thing...

La depression, la réhabilitation

"Isis, o Isis, you're a mystical child. What drives me to you is what drives me insane. I still can remember the way that you smiled on the 5th day in May, in the drizzling rain."

This is probably not the best time in the world to revisit my Bob Dylan collection, but so it goes... Sadly my copy of Bring It All Back Home (my personal fav) has gotten lost somewhere. I guess Blood On The Tracks and Blonde on Blonde will have to do for now.

~~

Today's snow day is a major blessing. If it hadn't been called, I would probably have called out of work, then dragged myself down to Math class, felt increasingly depressed as a result, then debated going home and back to bed, or trying to get work done at the library. Most likely bed would have won.

Between the anxiety provoked by math and the thesis, the failure of a personal relationship has been too much to carry. But last night I rediscovered the restorative properties of Amnesty, wine and cashew chili. The potluck at Eileen's place was so relaxing and fun, I almost forgot how broken I feel. I have been wondering around on auto pilot this last week, worried that I will leave Maine and USM without ever having created lasting relationships. But I had forgotten the good people at Amnesty. They are all so positive, caring and engaged. I always get the feeling they really want me to succeed. Its almost like having family around, family without baggage.

Leo asked me why I had a picture of Ché on my Gmail account. I had a moment of panick, how the hell could I justify this to a group of Human Rights campaigners. The Che shirt I was wearing was burning a hole in my chest... Well, I gave it to them strait up: I was attracted to his charisma, his commitment, his desire to erase geographical, economic, and psychological borders. I loved the fact that he was willing to put the cause above his own life, and that he was uncorrupt, willing at all times to do the work he himself demanded of others. But I could never reconcile all this with his bloodlust, his abuse of human rights, his advocacy of war as the mechanism of change, and his failure as a father and husband.

To my relief both Leo and Liz had just read Anderson's Ché bio. They agreed with my opinion. My caveat is that I also associate Ché with my uncle, someone I respect immensely. Well, any way... At least I have the first chapter of the thesis written, and the second chapter is being penned this, and next week (almost two weeks ahead of schedule I might add...). So today I will recover a bit of energy and direction by sitting in the window, reading up on nationalism and racial identity, looking out the window, and contemplating. The Dao will be close at hand of course:

"Gaining or losing - which is the greater scourge?" Dao 44

Meeting with Big D (part II) ~ 1/21/08

As Serbia goes to a run off election between the hardline Nationalists and the pro-EU party, on the day when America celebrates the legacy of MLK, and after an interesting debate with E about the Racino issue and racism towards Native Americans, I finally got a sit down with Dr. D to take a look at the thesis.

As it stands the thesis is something of a compromise between the initial idea/inspiration for the thesis, and Dr. B's interest in doing a field study, a personalized experience with soccer culture in a community/region where marginalized peoples engage in the game. This second part was an idea that we banded around a few months ago, but that I never really was able to develop fully in my head, at least as part of the thesis.

So today, we looked at what I was hoping to get out of this project. This is not a one off for me, but really just a first chapter/trip into this subject. Considering my basic time frame (the thesis technically being due in May), the praxis is becoming something of an issue. As it stands, I was going to look at a very general cross section of soccer players in the US, players from USM, from an indoor league, and from the pickup games at Back Bay. But this doesn't really look at the "at risk" demographic meant to be the subject of this thesis.

If I think back to Oggi's speech (almost a year ago now) what had me so crazy was the possibility that soccer was available for use as a means of conflict resolution, or as empowerment of minority/repressed/illegal/other/'immigrant' communities. Since then the paradoxical nature of this has become clear to me. That the nation state can also tap this source for its own designs, perpetuating racism, inequality, and power structures. In light of the current complaints coming from the larger EU clubs complaining that the African Nations Cup is taking away the African stars for the next few weeks; considering the debate over immigration currently in the EU, this might rather be the focus of the project.

So, the suggestion was to look at the paradox of a sport that on one side empowers these communities, and on the other, allow the Nation State to further its ambition of control and power. Instead of trying, at this juncture, to do some field study, focusing on the theory supported by examples to support either side of the argument. The question will be to see if this debate is sustainable, if the co-existence of these two antithetical ideas means soccer is inherently dangerous, or if the risk is acceptable?