makamkruka

'A makamkruka is - it's difficult to describe - a man who is a makamkruka is a churner, an agitator. Someone who perhaps sees things more clearly by turning everything upside down. He's a devil almost, a yaksa. Though a makamkruka, strangely, guards the sacred spot in a temple ground. No one knows why this kind of person is honoured with such a responsibility.'

Michael Ondaatje, _Anil's Ghost_

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"Hidden somewhere in this noisy, chaotic morass of society is our fellow traveler, Waldo. A man unstuck from place and time, he travels the world on foot, his only lifeline to his friends and family a litany of dreary picture-postcards sent from arbitrary locations the world over. His postcards do nothing to convey the humanity, the madness of Waldo's adventures. For that, we must go find him."

Sunday, March 27, 2005

Dear Eduardo

On the plane ride home today from the "Global Linkages / Faces aux Mondes" conference in Montreal, devoured most of Dionne Brand's memoir A Map to the Door of No Return: Notes to Belonging, which I found on sale this morning. Found myself returning again and again to this passage:

It is 4:45 a.m. I am doing what I do every time I drink too much wine and wake up suddenly at 4:45 a.m. I read. Eduardo Galeano falls open at this time: "I'm nostalgic for a country which doesn't yet exist on a map." Dear Eduardo, I am not nostalgic. Belonging does not interest me. I had once thought that it did. Until I examined the underpinnings. One is mislead when one looks at the sails and majesty of tall ships instead of their cargo. But if it were a country where you were my compatriot, then I would reconsider. And think of the things we should have to sort out.


It's 2:45 a.m. I may yet finish this book tonight.

posted by oswald | 2:44 a.m.

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