I have been busy the last few days, and I didn't really have time to write anything. I don't have much time now either, so I figured I might post some lyrics I like.
Where Do The Children Play? - Cat Stevens
Well I think its fine, building jumbo planes.
Or taking a ride on a cosmic train.
Switch on summer from a slot machine.
Yes, get what you want to if you want, cause you can get anything.
I know weve come a long way,
Were changing day to day,
But tell me, where do the children play?
Well you roll on roads over fresh green grass.
For your lorry loads pumping petrol gas.
And you make them long, and you make them tough.
But they just go on and on, and it seems that you cant get off.
Oh, I know weve come a long way,
Were changing day to day,
But tell me, where do the children play?
Well youve cracked the sky, scrapers fill the air.
But will you keep on building higher
til theres no more room up there?
Will you make us laugh, will you make us cry?
Will you tell us when to live, will you tell us when to die?
I know weve come a long way,
Were changing day to day,
But tell me, where do the children play?
Nothing more to add, it speaks for itself.
Take care and see you soon.
I'm a dreamer. I like to think about the future, my own future and what it looks like. Deep inside me I hope I'll live somewhere cold, with lots of snow, magnificent views, beautiful animals and lead a good healthy life. And although it's a sounds more like a Utopia than a real place, I keep dreaming about this place. I keep hoping that I'll live somewhere in harmony with myself, a place where I can live alone with my thoughts, ideas and my own philosophy. I'm not anti-social, I just like to have my own space.
Recently i saw the trailer of Sean Penn's new movie : "Into The Wild". I liked it, and the fact that it's about a boy who leaves behind the big city and goes on an adventure to find himself really struck me. The movie is based on a novel from Jon Krakauer, and even better, the novel and thus the movie, are based on real events. I started looking up information about the main character Chris McCandless and found a story about life, philosophy, dreams, ideas and eventualy death.
Chris was born 1968 and it wasn't long before his teachers noticed he had a very strong will, wich later would be coupled with strong idealism and physical endurance. Chris grew up, went to university and started to dislike, what he called, "the empty materialisme of American society. Influenced by the works of Jack London, Leo Tolstoy and Henry David Thoreau, he decided to leave society behind and fullfill he's biggest dream : go on a big adventure and lead a life full of philosophy, thoughts and ideas. He donated his $24,000 life savings to Oxfam and began traveling. He had periods where he worked and setteled somewhere, he also had periods where he lived alone and had no contact with other humans.
He also pursuit his biggest dream : an Alaskan Odyssey. He would live of the land, away from all other humans, and write in his journal how he, physically and spiritual, delt with the forces of nature. He found an abandoned bus and started his new life. Although he was badly geared he managed to keep himself alive, but nature always has a will on it's own. Chris weakened, probably from eating poisonous seeds, and was found dead in his bus by a group of moose hunters.
What I like so much about Chris McCandless his story is the fact that he went out into the world and decided to pursuit his dreams. He choose a life away from civilization, a life where he could think about the world, where he had time to develop his own philosophy and where he could be happy. I wished I had the courage to donate all my money and leave into the unknown. Chris did what I see as one of the most beautiful things in life, he just went for it. Although he died young and alone, I don't believe he died unhappy. Reading up on him has made me believe that he was very happy alone, that he could think about life, that he had found his place to unfold himself.
It's people like Chris that make me keep on dreaming about my beautiful Utopia. Many believe that hero's are people who save lives, who do great deeds, and yes, that maby right. But we often forget about those people who encourage us to do things, who help us keep on dreaming and who let us know that it's ok to be different. To me, Chris is one of those hero's, a simple, but great man.
Take care and see you soon.
I was born in Bruges, a small town close to the coast and the Northsea. It always felt like home, but I didn't have a special relation with it. This is my home town, end of story, or so I thought.
Last year I started university. During the week I live in Ghent, where my university is and during the weekends i'm in Bruges. I liked Ghent from the very first moment, but after a few months that feeling started to change. Yes, I still like it, but i started to miss things. I started to miss the familiar places, the little bridges crossing the water, the cafés where I went with friends, the big churches and building, the bike destroying bump filled roads, I just missed home.
In a way I had to leave my home town to realise how much it means to me. I do have a relation with this city, it's my home! And although I like to travel, go to other countries, Bruges will always be in my heart, for it is the place where I grew up, where all my memories are. Everytime I'm riding with my bike through te city I take the time to look at things, although I have seen everything a million times.
Belgium, now that is another story. I live in Bruges, wich is located in Belgium, so that makes me Belgian, and yet I never really felt Belgian. I always felt like a citizen of mankind and I never really understood why some people are so proud of their country. I like living in Belgium, we have some great social security, people are looked after, men and women have equal rights, etc. And yet, I'm not proud of my country. I don't mean that in a bad way, I mean that in way that I'm more proud of what the people, the citizens, the politcians, etc have accomplished. As I said before, I feel like a citizen of mankind, I'm more proud of what we the people have accomplished.
Post dedicated to Arly, who wanted to know more about Belgium. And although it's more about me and my relation with Belgium, I felt like writing this down.
Take care and see you soon.
Edit : reading through this, to check on mistakes, I noticed that I didn't really make the difference between, proud of your country and proud of the people. I think that being proud of your country means that your are proud to live there, you are proud of the system, you are proud what the country has accomplished, etc. Being proud of the people means, well in my opinion, being proud that the people of your country were able to make a great system, were able to make sure everybody is looked after, etc.
That being said, Take care and see you soon.
When I was 13 or 14, maby 15, I can't really remember, I went to France with a friend and his parents. We had a long road ahead, so my friend, who had a playstation, brought some PlayStation 2 magazines to keep us busy. I took one of the magazines, opened it on a random page and saw an article called "Deus Ex". I recognized it within seconds. I hadn't played the game, but I read somewhere on a Macintosh site that Aspyr was busy porting Deus Ex to the Mac. Knowing the internet article was quite intresting I started reading the magazine article and it didn't take long for me to realise I wanted to play this game. I started to read the article on a daily bases and when I got home I rushed to my computer and started to look for a Mac demo version.
We didn't have a fast internet connection at the time, so I grabbed an empty CD, jumped on my bike and I drove of to one of my friends. He was so kind to download it for me and burn it on the CD. When I got home I installed the demo and started playing. The demo was the first level of the game. You had to arrest a terrorist who had recently blown up the Statue of Liberty. I remember running around for hours on Liberty Island, not because I didn't know what to do, but because the level was so big and you could do a million things.
I played the demo for weeks and weeks and weeks. It was time for the game itself. I asked my dad to order it online, he did, and the waiting started. Everyday i got home from school asking my parents "Is it here? Is it here? ". I had exams at that time, so my mom was planning on giving it after the exams, but she's a terrible lair. When, one day, I asked if it had arrived, my mom said no, but she had this smile on her face, so I knew it had. She gave it to me, I installed it and got sucked into the game. Mission after mission I played, wanting more and more.
Being a young kid back then I was also exploring things. I was at an age where I realised there is somethind called politics, something called leaders. I started to learn about how the world works, about poverty, corruption, etc. Everything you hear around you has an influence on you, everything you hear and see helps you decide what you like and dislike about polictics, the world, leaders and other things that help create, destroy and shape this world.
Deus Ex is a term from Greek theatre. It's a God who comes on stage and gives a solution to a problem not even the writers were able to solve. Somehow, Deus Ex The Game was my little God, my little problem solver, who helped me create my visions and ideas about the world, it's leaders, etc.
In Deus Ex The Game you constantly have to make descissions, you have to choose between sides, non of them are good, non of them are bad. Your choices help shape and change the world of Deus Ex. It never sais "do this, do that", it gives you options and you, as a player, have to look at these options and decide for yourself what you think is the best choice. It makes sure you look at the pro's and contra's of everything it even lets you decide how the game ends.
Being a young kid back then, Deus Ex really helped me create my visions and thoughs about the real world. The world of Deus Ex is so realistic, not because it shows the world how it is today, but because everything that happens within the world of Deus Ex, could easily happen in the real world. Deus Ex told me "Kid, it's a messed up world and yet you have to create your own ideas, visions and thoughts. Never let someone decide for you. Look at what you think is the best and go for it." It made me help set the first steps in the real world. It gave me a little push to go out, speak my mind and create my view on the world of today.
Take care and see you next time.
I never really felt like i should start a blog and write down, for the whole world to see, what I feel and think. But recently that feeling has changed.
Somehow I feel like I should write down whatever I feel like writing down. No limitations. Maby I saw an ant today and now I want to talk about it, maby someone close to me passed away and I want to share his story. I feel like writing down everything and nothing, knowing that somebody out there must have five minutes to read what I have to say.
I have no idea where the discussion of making a Blog came from. Maby it's the idea that I can just write down whatever I want thats so appealing. Maby I seceretly hope that someone will read my stories, even if it's just about random stuff. The idea that people, without knowing eachother, communicate, share stories and take a few minutes to read what someone, maby thousands of miles away, has to say, somehow gives me hope.
Why does it give me hope? In a world where everything is based on speed and performance, listening and taking time for eachother has become something rare. So the idea that somebody, somewhere will hopefully read this makes me happy. No, i'm not jumping around of joy, i'm just smiling, but thats a good thing.
I wonder if this is well written, I wonder if i made spelling mistakes or not. I probably did, but that doesn't matter, I said what i wanted to say.
This first post must be so random, but hopefully I got someones attention.
Take care and see you soon.
