Winterreise

Last spring (it must have been April or so), courtesy of a colleague from my last year of Bachelor's, I read a book entitled "How I Became Stupid", written by a man named Martin Page. Much to my disappointment, the book gave neither definite instructions, nor a weekly training plan. It was mostly just a rant about the materialism that encroaches contemporary society.

Right... this blog post is not about that book.

Yes, it was a fun book to read, but the words gave off a repetitive smell of frustration (... this is where you smile...), and the whole endeavor suffered from a horribly-picked target audience. I think of the people who need to read it, and most haven't cracked open any book in ages. Or maybe they have, I couldn't possibly know. I could say I've learned better than to be judgmental of others, but that would be pretentious. In fact, I just don't care to judge.

So, anyway, I was hoping that this book would teach me how to become stupid ("laid back about life", if you prefer a fancier wording), and since we're both here dealing with this blog post, we can both agree that something went terribly wrong along the way, and I've failed. Although it happens that I sometimes feel stupid, I'm afraid that's a very different feeling. Reality always turns to kick me in the butt like a donkey on steroids.

 Stanley Library at Girton College

Christmas, for some reason, is usually important to me. I'm not religious, although for cultural reasons, I will say I'm sort-of Christian (I'm spiritual, but no Jesus, bibles, or Popes for me, thank you very much). I loathe the fir tree massacre that goes on on Christmas. I hate the flocks of entranced shoppers who create stampedes in supermarkets, and I'm also not that big on giving and receiving presents. But underneath all that, I love Christmas for the personal experience that it stirs up in me. I definitely looked forward to Christmas.

But the problem is that attachment spawns expectation, and like Charles Dickens himself tried to warn us, "Great Expectations" lead to nothing good in life. I'm sitting at the table, looking at the top-right corner of my monitor that reads "Sat, Jan 5", and I'm trying to figure out what the f**k just happened over the past two weeks, while I'm downing one glass of wine after the other. I'm not sad, I just... am. I'm wondering whether Christmas actually was the most recent thing I've given up on.

A few weeks ago, I attended a Christmas carol concert at the Stanley Library in Girton College. Schubert's Winterreise. True to the name of the song cycle, a few days later I was boasting on having booked 3 flights, 3 train rides, 2 bus rides and 1 car ride, all for 218£ - Heathrow to Heathrow. To the wrong people, and out of nervousness, but I was boasting. I was going to gloriously roam half of Europe (extra-)low-cost, so that I could be home for Christmas. I was going to have a great Christmas. Eventually and predictably, I felt like I was putting on a show for myself, and I simply didn't want to attend my own show. Subconscious self-defense, I suppose. I'm supposed to make an effort towards nice holidays, not all the effort. "Home", whatever that means, was the most isolating and depressing place I've been to in the past few months - hardly surprising for Everybodyleftville.

Driving would have normally made me tick, but after my father said "Catch!" and threw me the car keys (much to my surprise, I may add), half an hour later I found myself just holding them and staring at the car. I felt nothing. "OK, maybe if I drive 130 km/h... Still nothing? OK, maybe if I drive on the left instead... no? Slow down and drift sideways into the next curve? Ho-hum... OK, let's face it, this isn't working."

My grandmother is very old. There were moments when she did not recognize me, and I simply didn't know how to deal with it. I thought I would be wiser and more prepared for this, but I just cowardly locked myself inside my head, far from anyone else, and threw away the key. I was hugging her, yet she didn't seem to acknowledge that it was me. Everything was wrong. I left.

At the moment of reading "How I Became Stupid" last year, I saw the point, but I didn't know just how to get there. Whether I want it or not, though, things are starting to fall into place in that direction for me. Slowly but surely, one day I'll get to the point where I can write a post to advertise my achievement of complete, utter stupidity.

Angst vor Reflexionen

This blog post was going to have a carefully crafted introduction, but as I was sitting in my dimly-lit plane seat from Vienna to Frankfurt, wedged between a Norwegian woman and her morbidly obese and distinctly smelly husband (approximately 20% of whom was overflowing into my seat in all ways possible), I lost all hope :-). I remember putting my backpack in the luggage compartment, looking down at the seats, and then my jaw dropping to accompany the blank stare on my face. The first (and only) thing that came to my mind was to ask whether they might want to swap places so that they could travel next to each other, but my pretension to innocence did not persuade the poor woman. She declined with such a candid Poker smile that I had no choice but to sigh and squeeze in, thinking to myself that she's good and comforting myself with the fact that I'm likely neither the first nor the last individual whose personal space these two have violated.

Last week saw me through the beginning of a rather strange case of cabin fever. Cambridge is, by all means, one of the best and most productive places I've ever lived in, but you can have too much of a good thing. My final week before the end of lectures in Cambridge was nothing short of a rat race to meet remaining deadlines, an effort which ended up wearing me down far worse than I would feel comfortable to admit. Strangely enough, when I think of deadlines, it's not the work that gets me. I love my work, and once I'm in the right mindset, I usually am efficient. It's what happens after the submission that gives me angst: that feeling that you've put your life on hold and should somehow make up for the week, that feeling of healthy energy that makes you want to go out, buy Christmas lights and treat yourself to some good coffee and honest, involved conversation that makes you lose track of time. It is this energy that pushes you to clean your room at 6:00 o'clock in the morning and that makes papers temporarily reflect off of your cortex.

More often than not, though, your good mood ends up simply being shot down by frustration when you realize that despite all efforts you invest, having yourself a good time is actually made a lot harder than it's supposed to be. Without realizing, a chilling thought sprouts at the back of your mind: "What am I doing? Is this pathetic? Why did I bother?". And then the joy slips into a feeling of acute general unease and you simmer for days in your belief that some sort of injustice is unfolding, and that it's not in your power to change things (or worse yet, other people).

It was in this slightly angry and claustrophobic state that I found myself waiting on the curb for the 797 bus to Heathrow three days ago, at 3:00 o'clock in the morning. I was occasionally jumping up and down in the dark to warm up, but otherwise assumed an inertial pose: raised collar, tucked scarf, headphones pushed deep in my ears, volume maxed on the music, hands in my pockets, eyes looking strictly below the 45 degrees angle so as not to risk being bothered by anyone. Later on that day, stepping down in Vienna was a breath of fresh air. Well, maybe it didn't have to be Vienna in particular, but I realized that I needed to get away.

I was truly happy to meet Stephanie on the first evening and catch up over a beer, and to the sound of a live band, but my joy was neither about the band, nor the beer - it simply had been too long since we'd met and this was a confirmation for me that there are people in your life who don't end up disappearing. When I bought a cup of melange and a baked apple dusted with cinnamon from a street vendor, it wasn't the sweets I was buying: it was really the comfort of cheerful Christmas memories and my grandmother's baking which I grew up with, and the assurance that I can still enjoy these feelings regardless of how old I am. Alas, it wasn't the food which I remember from the meals we had during the conference, but the discussions with Virginia, Dimitar and Prof. Turner, which led to my downloading and reading "Animal Farm" by George Orwell later on that same night - amazing book, by the way; I wish someone had told me to read this as a child.

As I was leaning back in my chair on the way to the airport, I was staring at how the window reflexion of the inside of the train was overlaying (and partly obscuring) the city lights shining through from the other side of the glass, and thinking away in the night. It really is hard to see the beauty of the outside world if you let your inner troubles cover it up with unfounded projections.

Die ganze Hundert

I did two things that I am very proud of today.

For one, I've finished with the final coursework deadline for the remainder of December. It was nice to finally be able to put away the piles of drafts, notes, scribbled print-outs, and books that had prevented me from seeing the surface of my desk for weeks. Being in possession of a newly found inner peace, I took the time to organize the lecture handouts in chronological order, punch holes into them and bind them in separate folders. Hell, I even wiped the dust off the bookshelves! I've always been fascinated with the amount of patience and tranquility that takes over me when I've finally finished some piece of work that I am happy with.

My cleaning spree didn't last very long though,... mainly because there's only so much dust you can wipe in one room. I contemplated taking the vacuum cleaner out of the pantry for a moment, and inflicting my OCD on the carpet, but a quick look at my phone confirmed that maybe this wouldn't be the appropriate thing to do at, you know... 6:25am. Apparently, crashing Luana's after-party at Churchill for a beer with the guys and a round of a board games last night was still no match for an episode of my insomnia. I went to sleep at 2:00 and subsequently woke up at 4:00, and that was it.

Lacking any further ideas, I put on some chill-out music and turned to the calendar to see what my day would look like. For the first time in two months, there was next to nothing on it (in my calendar's defense, it was Sunday after all; the rest of the week is still packed). However, I did burst into a smile when I saw the "Final Test - 100" title of the day's single event, staring back at me from the screen in bold typeface. I rolled up my sleeves, got on the floor, and let out to myself:

"OK, Adrian... this is it. Let's do this!"

Today, for the first time in my life, and after nine weeks of training, I did one hundred consecutive, correct push-ups :-).

I'm guessing by now, my average reader will have said something along the lines of "I think I can do about N." Who knows, perhaps some of you will even try to see how many you can do. And then, perhaps you will wonder why this is worth a blog post, and how much of a self-confident prick I must be for wanting to show off. Where am I getting at, anyway?

I'm not saying I did 100 push-ups because I want to show off. I'm saying it because I want to tell you that you can do it, too.

 *  *  *

The first time this challenge came up in a conversation that I had with Marek at work this summer, I asked myself the one thing that I always ask myself when people tell me that something is hard: Well, yeah, I believe you that it's hard, but just how hard can it be?

Others have obviously done it before, so what's to stop me from following in their footsteps? I don't mean without proper training, of course, but there's nothing eventually unattainable for the average person in 100 push-ups. Say one push-up takes 2 seconds, then the whole thing should take about three to four minutes. Can it really be that hard to exert yourself for four minutes?!

The first time I tried I could barely do 30. And I was expecting that. So then I thought... well, if I followed a training schedule, and every week I tested (and forced) myself to do 5 more than the week before, then I'm bound to hit 100 at some point, right? I looked online and within 20 minutes, I found myself this training schedule. The only thing you need to do is set aside half an hour, three times a week. Anyone can follow some instructions on a training plan, they've broken it down for you to the point where it's brain-dead! So why doesn't everyone?

There's one more thing separating the "can"s and the "do"s in this world: commitment. You will get to 100, if you stick to the schedule, because numbers do not lie. But that's only if you stick to the schedule. If you really want to do it, you can, but there have to be no excuses, and no exceptions. You train three times a week, period.

In my case, pushing my physical limits never had anything to do with setting records. Many people can do way better than I ever have done at these things. What I'm really doing is enforcing discipline, and reaffirming that my brain controls my body, rather than the other way around. Your chest may burn, your elbows may shake, you may feel like you're about to die, but you must never forget that your muscles have no mind of their own. If you are willing to ignore all that, and if your brain is determined to send the signal down your spine, then your muscles will contract, and you will do another push-up. It is in that position that you finally get to know yourself. It is the addiction of needing to prove yourself to yourself that keeps the people in this video doing what they do.

To me, straining myself is simply a journey of self-discovery, and a source of self-respect. When I first started running 10Ks in 8th grade, a friend of mine who was very good at running told me something that I believe really sums it up:

"When you've just done your 15th lap and you feel like you can't run any further... that's when the track actually begins, and when you make the decision of whether you're going to finish or quit. Everything up to that point was just... warm-up."

So I guess, it's up to you now... :-).

Scherben bringen Glück

Am recitit recent articolele mai vechi de pe blog. Nu am făcut-o din dorința de a mă agăța de trecut, ci dimpotrivă, pentru că simt că am lăsat în urmă o perioadă plină de probleme personale și nesiguranță pe care nu am putut să o interiorizez pe măsură ce o trăiam din cauza implicării directe. Pretind că am o înțelegere bună la persoana întâi asupra lucrurilor care s-au întâmplat, dar intuiam că văzute din exterior, întâmplările ar arăta mult diferit.

Astfel, am considerat recitirea blogului ca pe lectură obiectivă, necesară și educativă. M-am așezat ieri seară în fața laptopului cu o cană de ceai și am luat totul în ordine cronologică, post cu post.

Pot spune fără să exagerez că m-am speriat și întristat în același timp. Mi-a părut rău să mă văd constant deprimat, nedormit, încordat, nervos... mereu gata să ripostez. Mi s-a părut de neiertat faptul că mă aflam într-un mediu atât de nociv. Fusesem supus la atâtea frustrări acumulate - de la glume proaste și atitudini de superioritate care nu se mai sfârșeau și până la nedreptăți evidente - și la atât de puțină apreciere reală, încât zilele se reduseseră la un efort constant de a "face față". A pretinde entuziasm, creativitate și empatie de la un om aflat sub atâta presiune și care se agață disperat de orice - inclusiv lucruri și oameni care îi fac rău - este o glumă proastă.

* * *

Simt nevoia să împărtășesc ceea ce cred eu că a fost cel mai important lucru pe care l-am învățat în ultimul an, în eventualitatea în care poate ajuta și pe altcineva să își regăsească liniștea: faptul că în săptămânile imediat de dinainte și de după licență mi-am dat în sfârșit voie să mă las cuprins de furia și ura pe care le acumulasem. Până atunci, din cauza obosealii (la figurat), mă lăsasem convins că ar fi vina mea pentru că mă simt trist, jignit, nerespectat, neîndreptățit. TOTUL devenise vina mea. Spunându-mi-se că nu am dreptate nici măcar dacă mă supăr, ajunsesem într-o imposibilitate psihologică de unde nu mai aveam nici un fel de perspectivă.

Îmi aduc aminte că mi-am dat licența și n-am avut nici un fel reacție. Nu aveam pretenția să ies din sală pe un covoraș roșu și să arunce îngeri cu confetii în fața mea, dar știu că am ieșit pe ușa facultății și singurul lucru pe care l-am văzut sub secretariat a fost canicula care radia din asfalt... atestată de un câine vagabond, prăfuit și paralizat de căldură la intrarea în holul EC. Mi-am pus sictirit ochelarii de soare și m-am dus acasă. Aveam și insomnie și jet-lag, așa că mi-am petrecut cele trei nopți din România ciclând odată la 10 minute prin toate posturile de televiziune. Se vorbea în spume despre datul jos al lui Băsescu; aș fi vrut să pot da doi bani... dar indiferența mea era blindată.

De la București la Londra avusesem turbulențe atât de mari incât am văzut pentru prima oară o stewardeză părăsind podeaua și dând cu capul de compartimentele de bagaje. Am privit scena vreo 5-10 secunde, și apoi m-am întors la citit "Zorba Grecul", făcând abstracție de drama ceilorlalți călători care retrăiau înfiorați propria lor scenă din Lost. Am aterizat în New York pe la miezul nopții. Când am intrat în apartament, m-am lovit de o liniște apăsătoare. Andrada plecase încă de Luni înapoi la LA, și era mult prea târziu ca să mai sun pe cineva să ieșim la o bere, așa că mi-am pus niște muzică, am făcut duș sictirit și apoi mi-am făcut ceva de mâncare. Robotic și fără chef.

Mi-am terminat sandwich-ul în liniște, m-am ridicat de la masă, am pus farfuria și cuțitul în chiuvetă, și am dat drumul la apă. Am spălat întâi cuțitul, și l-am pus înapoi în sertar, apoi farfuria. Am ridicat-o vertical în fața ochilor și m-am uitat la reflexia peliculei subțiri de apă care încă se mai scurgea de pe porțelan în chiuvetă, apoi am scuturat-o de câteva ori în aer înainte de a o șterge cu prosopul și am pus-o alături.

Am terminat de strâns masa în liniște și de pus totul la loc în frigider, apoi m-am întors la farfuria de pe tejghea. Am ridicat-o, am cântărit-o de câteva ori în mâna dreaptă, și în loc să o pun înapoi în dulăpiorul de deasupra capului... am lăsat-o pur și simplu să cadă pe parchet.

Atunci când privești ceva cu atenție, senzația este că timpul încetinește. Am avut timp să percep în tihnă, frame cu frame: căderea, contactul cu podeaua, cum a erupt și s-a stins sunetul cioburilor. Nu știu să îmi explic nici acum conform cărui raționament am făcut asta, dar știu că în momentul în care am auzit cum se sparge farfuria, am simțit că mă cuprinde un fior cald aducător de liniște. Am rămas fascinat, eliberat.

Intrigat de ceea ce tocmai descoperisem, m-am întors la dulap și am luat încă o farfurie din teanc. Am întors-o pe spate și am citit abțibildul oval: "White Porcelain. Made in Portland. Price: $6.00".

Aha...  6 dolari, deci... bineee... zob de pământ! Următoarea. Zob. Alta la rând...

Dacă toată lumea ar fi conștientă de efectul pe care îl poți obține de pe urma a opt farfurii, societatea n-ar mai avea nevoie de terapeuți. După ce am terminat teancul, am început să mă simt în sfârșit mai bine. Am început să mă simt... real. Am luat mătura din debara și am strâns mizeria pe care o făcusem pe jos, am pus cioburile într-o pungă și le-am dus la ghenă. Mă întrebam amuzat în care coș de gunoi să le arunc: reciclabil sau nereciclabil? Landfill sau waste? Exemplele de pe tomberoane nu acopereau situația mea. Hm... :-).

După ce mi-am dat în final voie să mă las cuprins și controlat de ura din mine (întâi ezitant, depășindu-mi recordurile la sală sau la jogging, apoi din ce în ce mai agresiv, sărind cu parașuta și conducând cu 90-100 de mile la oră și radioul dat la maxim), am început încet-încet să îmi revin din toate punctele de vedere. Am început să observ apusul, gustul cafelei pe care o torn în mine, magazinele pe lângă care trec și zâmbetul ocazional din partea cealaltă de metrou. Și, cel mai important, am început să mă liniștesc.

Cele două lecții pe care l-am învățat sunt că (a) singurele probleme pe care le avem în viață ni le creează cei din jur ca urmare a lipsei de respect, și ca să aibă o scuză pentru a ne marginaliza, și (b) că arhaicul proverb German pe care l-am auzit de la bunica mea este cât se poate de avărat: cioburile chiar aduc noroc.

Unschuldiger Sehtest

Voi începe prin a declara că nu sunt un cunoscător al artei. Domnul Roman, profesorul meu de Desen din școala generală (un om mult supracalificat pentru jobul modest pe care a sfârșit să-l practice) ar putea să absoarbă o audiență de câteva zeci de persoane într-un monolog fascinant despre adimensionalitatea unei mâzgâleli neuniforme de vopsea. De fapt, garantez că nu te-ai mai fi putut uita vreodată cu aceiași ochi la incompetența zugravului tău, în ciuda lipsei evidente de intenție artistică.

Eu nu am asemenea talente oratorice, deși din perspectiva unui consumator de artă tind să apreciez acele opere care reușesc să mă informeze direct de existența unei idei de care nimeni nu m-ar fi putut face conștient prin cuvinte.

Astă vară mă plimbam prin galeria națională de artă din New York. Se poate spune despre acel muzeu că este... well... mare, așa că este imposibil să acorzi fiecărui tablou minimul de atenție pe care o merită ca să poți vedea la el mai mult decât vopsea 2D. A fost însă un tablou, unul în mod special, pe care mi-au căzut ochii din momentul în care am pășit pragul încăperii și de care nu m-am putut dezlipi decât cu multă greutate, aproape luat de mână și tras afară din cameră.

Îmi aduc aminte cum inițial am stat cu brațele încurcișate și superficial amuzat în fața lui. Apoi, încet-încet, expresia feței mi-a devenit serioasă, în încercarea de a-mi însuși înțelesul primar, pentru ca în cele din urmă să încep să zâmbesc brusc sub efectul unei revelații pe cât de comică, pe atât de elegantă.

 

În lipsa unei atitudini modeste vis-a-vis de lumea din jurul tău, este greu sau chiar imposibil să realizezi adevărata recursivitate din acest tablou, împreună cu ironia care decurge din ea.

Cel mai izolant este, însă, faptul că natura conținutului îl face imposibil de transmis între oameni. Fie ești dispus să-l vezi, și îl vezi... fie nu.

Tänze mit Wölfen

It's 4 o'clock in the afternoon and I'm resting on a sun-bathed bench (the only one, actually) in Belgrade. Belgrade, Montana, that is. The original Belgrade is, by a rough approximation, on the opposite side of the globe, most likely witnessing its inhabitants sleep away their daily worries. It's a sweet and mellow 23 degrees Celsius outside and there's gentle sunlight churning down through the leaves of the oak overshadowing me and my maverick bench.

There's really not much worth mentioning about Belgrade, MT. Houses are few and far in between, sprinkled randomly across a grid of streets that one would have no trouble counting on their toes and fingers. A couple of kids dressed in dusty rags and with scab-covered knees and elbows are playing with a red, cheap and dirty plastic ball next to a court overrun with weeds. There's a dog panting in the sun, likely contemplating on his only bone that he chewed out of any anatomical shape (over weeks, I am sure). There's just one main road, but along neither of its stretches - straddling the plains to the horizon - is there a single car to be seen disturbing the desolation.

This could very well have been a modest village in my childhood's Romania. One of the boys playing football in the dirt could have been me, of 18 years ago. The adult me, however, is just a traveller in this time-forgotten place. I walked miles in the sun along a deserted highway to reach this haven and now I'm lavishing in the peace and silence I've come to discover.

I'm happy to be back on the road. Only 10 days ago, I was diligently tending to my life in New York. A very peaceful, happy and rewarding life by any account, but about as far apart from nature as lives can get these days. I assume - I've never been to Beijing.

* * *

Let's wind back to 10 days ago, then. Friday evening in my apartment on the East 36 Street in Manhattan. I'm in a hurry to turn the place upside down. I have a flight to California in the morning and I want to vacate the place before I leave. I'm hastily turning down Andrea and the other guys for our Friday night at the pub and instead, I'm stuffing all of my textile possessions in the washing machine in a desperate effort to get everything cleaned, dried and folded neatly into place. If I'm going to leave my worldly stuff with Marek while I go hiking in the wilderness, it has to be packed and carried down to East Village by 5:00 AM, or else he'll leave to Brooklyn for an appointment and leave me with no other storage option.

I can't pull it off. I pack whatever I can and leave two bags with him. My hiking gear and clothes will fly with me and I resort to leave the rest of my stuff with a third guy. My crap is now distributed all over New York, but this is the least of my concerns as I am rushing down the stairs of Penn Station in a desperate effort to make it to the airport on time.

Note to self: I have to stop catching the bloody planes 10 minutes before they take off. I was lucky the past three times, but it makes sense expecting that to run out at some point. I sit down in the plane and breathe out in relaxation. I made it. Shortly after, the previous sleepless 48 hours overwhelm me in an instance and I doze off. I remember waking up in Dallas to connect flights, suffering from a tooth-gnawing headache that the painkillers don't seem to be able to help. I am sort of lingering with my eyes half-open and my sinuses clogged as if I'd been working in an asbestos plant for 10 years and I'm patiently waiting to get to Fresno.

It eventually happens. Ștefan has been waiting for me at the airport. We hop in the rental car and drive to Visalia to buy supplies for the hike. After raiding the supermarket at the day's final business half-hour, we head back to the car and drive to a parking lot where we can assume our newly-found homeless status and turn the car into means of accommodation.

I swear, of all the cars I've ever slept in, that one ranked worst. I must have been tossing and turning every 10 minutes. It was also freezing (welcome to sunny California, eh?) and my headache wasn't getting any better, if anything. We somehow doze the night off and with the crack of dawn, set for the nearest McDonald's to abuse their sanitation facilities during our morning hygiene routine. I find that brushing my teeth at 7 o'clock in the restroom of some fast food restaurant is as empowering as it is awkward, and after taking and washing my single-use plastic spoon from the breakfast tray, I am finally ready to assume my tramp transformation.

Visalia, in front of the McDonald's before dropping the car.

We drop the car, take our 20 kg backpacks and start for the mountains. So long Visalia, so long civilization. I am genuinely smiling with my eyes and soul for the first time in months.

Despite our plans not working out quite as expected, we manage to pick up our hiking permits and start at the High Sierra Nevada trail head by 2:00 PM. It's late, and we have 11 miles to cover till the first night's camp, but I am burning with enthusiasm. I pay my respects to the giant sequoia grove and we dive into the mountains.

* * *

The High Sierra Nevada Trail Topographical Map

Day one was only moderately adventurous in nature. But the first time we turned on the Eastern slope of the mountains to face the soaring, jagged gray granite peaks of the Sierra Nevada, my heart skipped a beat. All I could think of was how happy I was. Truly, genuinely happy. We came across a deer on the trail the same day and as the night was closing in on us, also the first bear (albeit from more of a distance). As our trail was sloping down into its first canyon, we began to wonder whether we'd make it to Bearpaw Meadow by nightfall. I certainly started to doubt it and as we were pushing ourselves into our 11th mile, it first dawned on us that being stranded by dark in thick, bear-infested woods is undesirable enough to scare the crap out of anyone (the jury is still out on Bear Grylls).

Short of stumbling in the dark like troglodytes, we find a post which points us to the camp. Perhaps a quarter of an hour later and we would have walked right past it in pitch black darkness. We manage to catch a glimpse of a flash light among the trees and hear people. We're relieved to have made it, do our best to set up the tent, take off our hiking boots and fall asleep on what was really solid ground but felt like a fluffy mattress of top-notch quality.

Day 2, edge of waterfall about one mile downstream from Hamilton Lake.

Despite the 11 miles of our glorious first day, there had not been much uphill terrain to cover. That was the first change we noticed on the second day, which started off with the trail diving into a steep precipice only to painfully work its way back up from the bottom, 3,000ft along the course of a stream. The heat (remember, this is still a desert of sorts) was radiating from the rocks violently enough to layer the atmosphere into mirage-spawning turbulences and there was a pungent herbal tea smell in the air from all the blooming shrubbery that was slowly cooking, caught in between the granite cliffs and the merciless noon sun. We slowly made our way along the canyon wall up until Hamilton Lake, at which point we were ready to throw in the towel and claim the worst to have been over. Only it didn't quite work out that way.

Hamilton Lake we reached by 3:00 PM all right, but as I was soaking by blistering feet and dusty knees in the lukewarm waters of the lake, a quick glance at the cliffs rising 2,000ft on all sides of the water surface tipped me off that the day's steepest ascent had yet to begin.

Day 2, trail towards Kaweah Gap.

To call it anything but brutal would mean being disrespectful to the beauty of that pass. With the trail barely spanning in between a vertical cliff to the left and a vertical precipice to the right, I suddenly became aware of my foothold and my balance, trying to sneak in peeks at the emptiness below me that were short enough to not throw my breathing rhythm off course but long enough to make my knees soften a bit and my muscles burn with the sting of adrenaline.

Streams are scarce on cliff offshoots, but the cold glacial water quenches even the thirstiest of hikers, and manipulating the green algae to direct the trickles into your flask is guaranteed to make you appreciate the sanctity of fresh drinking water. By the time we had made it into the alpine meadows at 10,000ft, we had passed the still and ice-cold Precipice Lake and were now heading to Kaweah Gap, the day's highest elevation point.

Kaweah Gap was cold and windy as the sun was setting opposite to the valley, and we picked up the pace downhill towards what we were hoping would be Big Arroyo camp. We never made it to the camp this time, though, so we stopped close to a creek and set up camp on some mossy grass patch just as the sun had gone under. It felt good to be this high up under the clean, starry, desert sky and with all the fatigue from the climb throbbing though my leg muscles, no sooner had my head touched the ground than I flipped out into dreamland.

Day 3, Big Arroyo Canyon.

We had a slow start on our third day, not because we were tired (we were) or because we were lazy (we weren't), but because the beauty of our camp site stunned us into amazement as soon as we had peeked our heads out of the tent. Our friends we had met two days before at Bearpaw Meadow and with whom we had raced up the canyon wall towards Kaweah Gap passed us on the trail soon after and we then got ourselves together, packed up and started South-East, towards the Big Arroyo, and then further beyond, to Morraine Lake. The day went by uneventfully, save for, perhaps, our blisters which had begun developing due to the couple dosen miles of continuous trekking. We started crossing a high alpine plateau of serene beauty: basically littered with deer, dried lake beds, pristine glens and ancient woodland. We made it to Morraine Lake by 4:00 PM and seeing that the lake was not as clean and lifeless as we had hoped for, it probably wouldn't have served our bathing target well (Ștefan got in and won himself a leech on the foot, while I resorted to the more conservative approach of just washing my hair, lest birds should nest in it).

All in all, we had lunch and decided to try and push towards descending 2,000ft into the Kern River canyon down below, where the map had generously indicated the presence of thermal hot springs. We got up, picked our backpacks and off we went, lured by the promise of a hot bath in open air in the middle of nowhere.

Little did we know that life had just intended to stop being the careless walk in the park it had been up until then. The initial descent went well. We met four rangers who had just opened up a new trail section they had been working on for months. We had the privilege of being the first hikers to set foot on that piece of trail ever in the history of the park. Further down, along the stretch of trail cut out of a steep precipice, we passed a horse caravan carrying supplies up the mountain. Needless to say, I barely fit with my backpack and laden gait on the narrow trail, how the horses did it exceeds my understanding. Furthermore, how both I and the horses might pass each other brought up a sharp reminder of NP-completeness.

The rangers stopped the caravan at a distance and told us to pull off into the precipice. The one leading said that horses might spook of people resting uphill and jump off the cliff, but should the threat come from below, then they wouldn't have any other option than to carry on. With some acceptable difficulty on our part, we passed the caravan and made it further down the face of the cliff into the Kern River basin.

When we stepped on the river shores, instead of the much longed for camp site, our eyes had no choice than to rest on an arrow pole indicating we'd still have to cover 2 more miles to the hot springs. With the sun almost down and perhaps no more than an hour and a half of light left, we started frantically in the direction of the arrow, worried that at the low altitude we had descended to and with the thick forest and the cave-ridden canyon walls surrounding us, bear encounters would lean towards becoming a certainty rather than a possibility.

We had already done 13.5 hard miles that day when we crossed the Kern River on a wooden bridge. The map indicated that the hot springs would be on the Eastern (current) river bank so we kept advancing until half an hour before dark, we suddenly realized we had lost the trail. Worse even, we were trapped between the canyon wall and what we thought was the river in an area with thick undergrowth. We desperately tried to find boot tracks, but in doing so I only managed to (a) contaminate the area with my own boot tracks and (b) discover bear paw tracks which I decided to not mention anything out loud about. I suddenly realized I had met no one on the trail since the junction and with all the hard facts piling up on top of our sense of being lost, we decided to set up camp and stay where we were over night. We didn't eat anything because we didn't want the bears sensing food, so we just took our backpacks far away from the tent, got in our sleeping bags and tried to hope for the best.

That was the longest night I have ever spent in the wilderness, and to be honest, the only time in my life that I felt uneasy sleeping in the wilderness. It's not hard to imagine sounds while the forest in the canyon is ploughed by winds, but we eventually fell asleep towards the morning. On our fourth day, we got up early, packed everything without eating and started backtracking in order to find the trail. It turned out that what we had considered to be the river was in fact just a tributary and after crossing it, we went around a cliff spur and found the hot streams and the camp. We had spent the night no further away than 300ft from the camp. Neat.

Day 4, Kern Hot Spring.

Alas, we sat on the river banks, ate and waited for the sun to reach the bottom of the valley. The hos spring was emptying into a natural bath tub formed by a few huge rocks enclosing a pool of steaming warm water. It didn't take me long to take off all of my clothes and dive into the warm water pool; after three days of continuous walking and sweating, the sensation of being soaked in warm water on the bottom of a valley surrounded by steep white granite cliffs and on the shores of a white water river felt nothing short of the best and most exclusive jacuzzi experience on Earth. The rest of our fourth day went on uneventfully, as we made our way North to Junction Meadow along the Kern River Canyon in what was perhaps the most boring stretch of the entire trail (and for the full extent of the 9.3 miles, we met not one single human that day). Nonetheless, the night was restful and after doing some self-surgery on my blisters with my flame-sterilized pocked knife, on the fifth day we started our final ascent on the Eastern side of the Great Basin continental divide: the ascent towards Mt. Whitney.

The initial plan would have been to camp on the shores of Guitar Lake at 11,500ft up, but as luck would have it we got caught in the rain three miles before that and were forced to camp at Crabtree Meadow, at a mere 10,000ft up and under tremendous gloom from the menace of a rainy morning we were in no way prepared to face (we had brought desert gear, remember?).

The rain scare didn't last long, though, and after a moderate, but stern drizzle, the clouds dispersed and the sun came back out. We decided to leave the sleeping bags, where we had hidden in order to warm up a little, and carry out what had to be done. Ștefan went on a ridge to take some pictures while I started warming my dinner and mingling with other people on the camp in order to figure out about water availability upwards from Guitar Lake and towards the summit. I managed to run into an old lady who was a veteran of those mountains and who gave me information about the locations of creeks as well as about how we might make it back to civilization after reaching the summit.

She wasn't giving me good news, I'll leave it at that. There would be no water for 6 miles after Guitar Lake, and when I hastily misinterpreted the old lady's reference to the "every other day" bus schedule service in Lone Pine to be "every other hour", only to realize my mistake and gaze in awe, she put me down with what must have been the day's punchline:

   "Well, this is the United States. We have very bad bus service."

No kidding! As we'd later learn, not only did they have bad bus service in the desert valley East of Sierra Nevada, but they also had NO bus service on weekends. Not good news when you serendipitously plan your descent for a Friday evening.

Day 6, Guitar Lake seen from Crest Ridge.

The following morning - the morning of our sixth day of wilderness - we were happy we had spent the night at 10,000ft and not 11,500ft as we found frost on the grass not far from our tent. We got up very early and reached first Timberline and then Guitar Lake by 10:00 AM. We decided to stop at Guitar Lake to have lunch and replenish our water supplies, knowing we would be forced to cover another 6 miles and a 3,000ft in altitude difference before we would reach another stream or creek.

And then came the final ascent to Muir Peak, the junction between the main trail over the ridge of the mountain range and its offshoot leading to the summit of Mt. Whitney. The air had gotten considerably thinner with altitude and even though I religiously tried to keep to my constant climbing pace, I would start losing my breath with increasing frequency. More over, I decided to ration my water resources carefully, and in doing so I may have brought some mild dehydration upon myself. After reaching the junction, we dropped our backpacks there and started to walk towards the summit - somewhat lighter and faster, now that we were free from burden. We contemplated the desert valley stretching to the East of us, and I took a moment to remember that the year before I had forced AJ to hike with me in Bad Water Basin, the lowest, hottest and driest point in both Death Valley, the Mojave Desert and the entire North America and a mere 84 miles SE of Mt. Whitney, the highest elevation point in the lower contiguous 48 states (nature is cynical, I won't hear otherwise).

I wish I could describe my feelings as I was standing on the summit in a way that would do them justice. There I was, me, standing on the roof of Sierra Nevada, the roof of the contiguous USA, looking down on the clouds forming below me and to the right and trying to contain my emotion.

We met Will on the summit. Will had just completed the John Muir Trail (210 miles) in eight days, by himself, with a sprained ankle and a rotated knee. It didn't take much for Will to be the day's hero, but as I was beginning to feel the grasp of altitude sickness and dehydration, we signed the guest book in the metal chest and started back down. The sickness got the best of me on my way down, but somehow I managed to push myself for another 7 miles (and about 8,000ft down) despite the vertigo, the low blood pressure, the lack of oxygen and the bloodshot eyes. Will said he had his parents waiting for him at the base of the trail, in Whitney Portal village, and generously offered to give us a ride to Lone Pine, the nearest settlement.

Recovering in Lone Pine.

We bought the first available motel room in Lone Pine we could have and I took the first hot bath after a week. I couldn't wash my feet properly because they hurt too much to the touch and there was some blood oozing from some of the blisters, so I just sort of let them soak. Then I drank about three quarters of a gallon (3 litres) of iced tea and went to sleep.

The following day we got confronted with the bus issue I mentioned earlier and felt very stranded for the first time: we had crossed the whole High Sierra Nevada on foot and now we were helplessly facing the lack of public transportation (or, for that matter, any transportation) out of that remote valley and towards San Francisco. So we decided to try our luck at hitchhiking to the next town and renting a car from there. Sure enough, half an hour later a pediatric dentist gave us a ride to Bishop, the promised city of car rental opportunities.

Well, at least in theory. Bishop is just as rural and God-forgotten as Lone Pine - only slightly larger and with a McDonald's that also serves for the main landmark. We enquired at the visitor centre about how we might go on our merry way to San Francisco, and after getting some patronising smiles from the guy behind the counter, we were confronted with a challenge:

   "You're stuck here. Some people manage to hitchhike out, though... if you're good looking and..."

That was it. "Good looking", you say? Hell, I'm good looking. Leave it to me.

We walked just out of the town, past the Shell gas station, ranger hat pulled down on the back of my neck, sunglasses on and a one-inch beard hiding the rest of the wreck of a face I had after a week's continuous sunburn, and I started praying that someone would be merciful.

Someone was. A woman named Megan, on her way to organising a wedding and who just happened to have a soft spot for hikers offered to give us a ride to 10 miles out of Mammoth Lakes. We weren't sure how we'd cover the following 10 miles, but it was still better than nothing and we took her offer. Well, she kept her word and half an hour later, we were stranded on a highway across the desert, 10 miles from the next human settlement. It seemed like we were poised to approach civilization asymptotically.

So in lack of any other options, we start walking on the highway. I suppose, on a personal level it was a natural development, considering my last year's accomplishment of riding a bike on the Californian Highway 101. I seemed destined to get intimate with highways, at least until our overt homeless appearance appeased the heart of a Mexican family driving by, who offered to give us a ride the rest of the way to Mammoth Lakes.

Our third hitchhike of the day having ended without the ever-possible axe-murder or rape (or both), we ran out of ideas and crashed the McDonald's at Mammoth Lakes (yes, they do have one there as well). And blessed be he, who built one there, because it was through their free Wi-Fi that I randomly came to realize the presence of a Hertz car rental facility in Mammoth Lakes. It seemed we were almost there.

It turned out, however, that renting a car from Mammoth Lakes and dropping it in San Francisco incurs a 500$ fee on top of the actual cost of just 90$ that is charged for returning it back to Mammoth Lakes. So we took a moment to reflect on our hardcore homeless financial status and I set forth my intention to pull out the car rental scheme of my life: we would rent the car from Mammoth Lakes for 24 hours for 90$, drive it through Yosemite National Park all the way to San Francisco (well, San Jose, as it later turned out to be more convenient), rent another car from San Jose, drive both of them back over the mountains and Yosemite to Mammoth Lakes, drop the first car in Mammoth Lakes and then drive back to the Bay Area in the second car.

Treating myself to a well deserved beer at AJ's place.

Easy, right? Well, it may have taken a while, and it may have tired me to drive past the same 250 miles three times in 48 hours, but let me tell you something: the thought of driving a car through the Sierra Nevada serpentine road, with the radio turned up on my favourite Californian station (B92.9, in case you were wondering) made me giggle the whole 10 yards from the shop door to the car door. I was jumping up and down behind the wheel with happiness and excitement. And after all this was over, I got to crash AJ's place and finally allow myself two days' rest before I would regain control of my leg muscles and the energy to fly out to Yellowstone and Grand Teton and start hiking all over again.

* * *

This all happened last week. I landed in Bozeman (which is the least posh of the two airports serving the Yellowstone National Park area) six hours ago and while waiting for Ștefan to arrive on the 11:00 PM flight, decided to walk the miles separating the airport from the village of Belgrade under the peaceful Montana afternoon sun and tap in on the provincial atmosphere that I both crave and respect at the same time. There is no phone service here, no Internet connection, no plots, no politics, no snobs, no backstabbing, no worries... there's just me, and endless prairie in all directions to cancel out my inner emotional claustrophobia.

Here, close to the border with Wyoming and thousands of miles away from big city life... I am indeed, a free man :-).

Übersetzung des Weihnachtsgeschenks

Este Vineri seara, și este aproape de miezul nopții. Stau tucește pe parchet, rezemat cu spatele de perete, cu o pernă sub mine și o lampă de interior aprisă deasupra capului. N-ai crede, dar nu am alte becuri în apartament; nici eu n-am crezut la început.

Lângă mine, în stânga, pe jos, se află o carte.

Ascult muzică și scriu acest post. Prima oară când am auzit de z0n3, eram la o expoziție de fotografie în perioada liceului. Nu am mai vorbit de atunci cu fata care a ales coloana sonoră a expoziției, deși suntem prieteni pe Facebook. Dacă nu mă înșeală memoria, ea era fie autoarea a o parte din fotografii, fie cea mai bună prietenă a artistei. În orice caz, o fată extrem de citită, inteligentă și dezinhibată, lucru pe care l-am recunoscut imediat în stilul de a vorbi și de a raționa.

Într-o vreme mergeam împreună la meditații la Engleză, și mereu o ascultam fascinat cum povestește despre psihologie și literatură, înconjurați fiind de inconfundabilul fum de țigară și una dintre cele mai interesante colecții de cărți pe care am avut ocazia să îmi cadă ochii (biblioteca profesoarei noastre, Mrs. P, care ne primea cu brațele deschise la o cafea, fără să ne ia bani, ori de câte ori vroiam să filozofăm cu ea în Engleză în timpul liber).

Dar deviez.

Din când în când, arunc mulțumit câte o privire spre carte și zâmbesc. Încă o țin învelită într-aceeași pagină de ziar în care am acoperit-o în ziua în care am cumpărat-o. În doi ani, ziarul s-a îngălbenit și s-a făcut lucios. Cartea era îngălbenită încă de când am luat-o.

Nu vorbim aici despre orice carte, ci de una pe care am luat-o cu mine peste tot pe unde am fost în ultimii doi ani: la cămin, acasă la părinți, în California, iar la cămin, iar acasă la părinți, iar la cămin... evident, am luat-o cu mine și la New York. Este singura carte pe care am citit-o de mai multe ori în viața mea - și am citit. Două sute patruzeci și unu de pagini care acum doi ani mi-au schimbat ireversibil viața în mai bine.

Este o carte despre care mai mult ca sigur n-ai auzit, și al cărei nume de autor nu ți-ar spune absolut nimic. Și totuși, este cartea mea de suflet, iar acum douăzeci de minute am terminat-o în sfârșit de tradus în limba Română.

Cum am ajuns să fac asta? Dă-mi voie să încep cu începutul...

* * *

Anul trei. Sala EG105, laboratorul de Programarea Calculatoarelor. Andrada în rolul de asistent. Eu, în vizită la ora ei ca să trecem în revistă detaliile organizatorice ale unei teme de casă înainte să o publicăm. Studenții se uită circumspect la mine: mă stiu de pe forum, și unora le-am dat note mici când le-am corectat temele.

Sunt căzut într-o depresie de proporții, așa că nici nu îi observ. Mă așez la un calculator liber și îmi deschid mailul. Observ unul necitit. Bloomberg mă cheamă la interviu la Londra. Zâmbesc, și o aștept pe Andrada să termine de explicat la tablă. "Andrada... vii puțin, te rog?"

Am făcut rost de cazare în ultimul moment, am împrumutat costumul și pantofii vărului meu (eu n-aveam, cel puțin nu în București), niște lire (ai ghicit: n-aveam), și mi-am luat la mine o carte cu probleme de interviu. Naiba știe, o citesc în avion. Mai bine decât nimic. Înafară de a vorbi cu Berti despre experiența lui la interviu la Bloomberg, nu mă pregătisem deloc.

Cum am ajuns în Londra, mi-am lăsat geamantanul în căminul studențesc unde găsisem cea mai ieftină cazare posibilă și am plecat să vizitez. A doua zi am petrecut-o prin muzee și galerii. Și biserici. Și piețe. A treia zi, după un mic dejun pe care l-am lungit cât s-a putut, m-am îmbrăcat "a la business" și am plecat la interviul vieții. Avea să fie Ajunul Crăciunului peste două zile și oricum mă bazam că o să primesc ofertă din altă parte, așa că n-aveam foarte mult chef de interviu, dar aparent a mers foarte bine și au fost impresionați (m-au sunat după câteva zile, de Crăciun, să îmi facă o ofertă).

În timp ce eu dădeam interviu, a început să ningă foarte tare și s-au închis toate aeroporturile. Nu îmi păsa că risc să petrec Crăciunul în Londra, am profitat de ocazie să mă plimb pe sub beculețele de pe Regent Street și prin Green Park. Totul era acoperit de zăpadă și arăta ca în basme. Se auzeau colinde de peste tot. Oamenii erau fericiți. Nu știu să descriu sentimentul... parcă timpul se oprise în loc și mă întorsesem în copilărie. (Pentru cei care nu știu, noțiunea de Crăciun stă la baza spiritualității mele.)

A doua zi de dimineață mi-am dat seama că se îngroașă gluma. Mi-au amânat zborul. Deși nu eram chiar foarte deranjat de ideea de a rămâne blocat, nu prea mai aveam bani. Începeam să regret că am cheltuit cu o zi înainte pe cafea și dulciuri de care m-aș fi putut probabil lipsi. Am decis să ies la plimbare prin nămeți (care ajunseseră la un metru și ceva), cu mâinile în buzunarele paltonului ca să țină de cald celor 12 lire și ceva care îmi mai rămăseseră.

Mi-am îndreptat pașii spre Covent Garden, unde trăsesem cu urechea de la o bătrânică din metrou că s-ar afla un târg de Crăciun. M-am plimbat printre căsuțele de lemn care vindeau vin fiert și budincă tradițională, și m-am oprit fără să vreau în fața unui moș care vindea cărți vechi pe o folie de plastic întinsă peste zăpadă.

După ce m-am uitat oarecum pierdut la cotoare, am ridicat o carte de pe jos și l-am întrbat cât face. Nu cred că voi uita vreodată schimbul de replici:

   - "That's worth one pound."

Deși mi-o vindea aproape pe degeaba, chiar și o liră din doisprezece m-ar cam fi usturat. Am dat ușor din cap și am pus-o la loc.

   - "Looking for something in particular?", m-a întrebat el.

Am dat din umeri, am zâmbit și am încercat să îi tai elanul făcând pe deșteptul.

   - "Even if I did, would you have it?"

A ridicat o carte de pe jos și mi-a întins-o:

   - "Here, you can have this for 10 pence. It's a steal, but it's Christmas. Take it."

Eram pregătit să mă întorc cu spatele și să îmi continui plimbarea, dar când am văzut titlul am devenit foarte curios, așa că i-am plătit moșului și am luat-o. S-a oferit să îmi dea o pagină de ziar să o învelesc ca să nu ningă pe ea, și i-am urmat sfatul.

* * *

Când am ajuns în cele din urmă în aeroport, am descoperit că zborul meu fusese amânat cu încă cinci ore. Erau atât de mulți oameni "eșuați" în terminal din pricina viscolului încât nu mai era chip să găsești loc nici măcar pe jos, dar apoi pe scaune. Erau reporteri care filmau pentru știri, companiile aeriene împărțeau pături pasagerior furioși ori resemnați, copii mici plângeau de oboseală... plutea în aer isteria unei tabere de refugiați.

Mi-am găsit foarte greu un loc unde să mă așez pe jos, iar după ce mi s-a terminat bateria de la MP3-player câteva ore mai târziu, m-am plictisit și mi-am adus aminte de carte. Am scos-o din rucsac, am întors-o pe toate părțile, am citit comentariile de pe spate, iar în cele din urmă, intrigat, am deschis-o:

"Chapter 1. I was eighteen years old when ..."

Jur că nu îmi aduc aminte când au trecut următoarele două ore. Nu îmi aduc aminte cum m-am urcat în avion și dacă am mâncat sau nu. Am ajuns în Otopeni pe la 3 dimineața, am trecut prin vamă, mi-am luat bagajul și apoi m-am pus pe o bancă ca să termin cartea. M-a prins răsăritul când am întors și ultima pagină, apoi am rămas acolo, uitându-mă în gol. A durat puțin până să îmi treacă sevrajul de la nesomn și de la lectură ca să mă prindă realitatea din urmă suficient cât să mă ridic și să caut un mod de a ajunge în Regie.

În aceeași noapte am luat un tren spre Suceava. Am intrat pe ușă după colindători, dar nu îmi păsa. Pentru mine, Crăciunul venise deja. Soarta îmi făcuse cel mai bun cadou de Crăciun pe care l-aș fi putut primi vreodată.

* * *

Acum o lună mi-am dat licența. După ce m-am întors în New York, mi-am dat seama brusc că am la dispoziție nopți întregi pe care nu am cu ce să mi le ocup. Vroiam liniște și introspecție.

De doi ani îmi doream să traduc cartea în Română, așa că l-am căutat pe autor (care acum are aproape 70 de ani) și i-am spus cine sunt, cum i-am descoperit cartea și faptul că vreau să o traduc. 

Mi-a mulțumit. Mi-a luat douăzeci și unu de nopți, dar azi am terminat :).