I'm a romantic by nature.
If I've already got your eyes rolling, fair enough, but let's reevaluate our schema about this supposedly infantile reputation about romantics. Romantics function. Romantics make practical decisions when practical decisions are essential. Romantics can be pessimists. Romantics can think fate is a crapshoot, or, just total crap. Or not. Romantics are your grandmother, your neighbor with the tattoos and pit bull named Thor, your nine-year-old niece with the rock collection, the aspiring accountant, the atheist, the science fiction writer, the dry cleaner's assistant, the activist, the ice cream scooper, the Senator, the farmer.
I think I've made my point.
On Friday, June 1, 2012, I wrote a blog post about flying across the ocean. I had all these romantic notions clambering restlessly in my brain like marbles in a glass jar. I thought it was appropriate, when I was strapped into the plane and nested with my threadbare blanket -- compliments of Brussels Airlines -- and my Ziploc bag of nuts (protein) and my Hemingway (Garden of Eden), that I would watch a certain flick about romance and travels. I was a traveler, after all, and this was the eve of my adventure. I didn't know, on that plane, watching Before Sunrise, how I would be changed, but I knew it would happen.
Despite being a romantic, I will never claim something in my life has "come full circle" (because nothing really comes full circle; there are always lumps and gaps and wrong turns and if there's a circle I suppose it ends up looking more like a scavenger hunt), but perhaps my thoughts on movies lately have come full circle.
Because I came home to the U.S. And I watched the sequel. (As I said, bear with me).
(courtesy of "The No-Name Movie Blog")
I was reminded of Rwanda.
On the first Wednesday in Rwanda, we went to karaoke. Lauren and I called ourselves "Queens of the Night" and fumbled through Beyonce's "Run the World" (we realized we mostly just wanted to dance), we split gin and Fanta Citrone (in Rwanda, when you order a gin and soda, the waiter brings a pint of gin and a bottle of your preferred soda; when this first happened, we all knew we were in trouble) and I ended the night talking, for half an hour, with a stranger whom I never spoke with again.
His name was Allain and he used to translate for Bea the way Emmanuel translates for Bea. Now he is an English teacher at the University. We began our conversation that way most strangers do: "How are you?" "How often do you come to karaoke?" "Oh, that's nice." "Oh, how interesting." But then, I don't know, perhaps it was the Rwandan woman belting Amy Winehouse with a genuine sad fury, the gin and Fanta Citrone, the crowd bumping shoulders like concert-goers, or perhaps, as my mom will surely argue, he was "hitting on" me -- but then, I decided to be honest with him. Because I was tired of having tired conversations.
I told him why I had really come (to find true connection and explore humanity), that my grandfather had just died, that I wanted to be a writer but I didn't know how, that I had been feeling lost because things, recently, had felt so shallow on my end of the planet. He told me he wanted to be a writer, too; I asked him: "What do you want to write about, really?" It went from there.
He asked me, later, as we were standing practically nose-to-nose, glasses clinking accidentally, people pushing through and past us: "Did you ever imagine you would be standing here, connecting with someone else on this continent?" "I'd hoped so," I told him; that was the truth. "It doesn't matter that you are a woman and I am a man, that you are white and I am black, that you are American and I am Rwandan, we understand each other."
We were talking about being foreigners. And I suppose this is when it was proven. You (me, you any person) can go anywhere in the world and find someone just like you (me, you, any person).
"Those who do not step on foreign soil will not know how the corn is grown," Allain said. "That's a Rwandan proverb."
I believe that is the romance of the world.
Anyway, I suppose I had a point here. While watching the innocent banter between Celine and Jesse in Before Sunset, I felt this urgency to sprint, stumble and cartwheel through the streets and encourage conversations. Actual conversations. Real conversations. Uninhibited, courageous conversations. Do it! Do it! Yes! Do it!
Here, an excerpt from the film:
Celine: Well, for example, I was working for this organization that helped villages in Mexico. And their concern was how to get the pencils sent to the kids in these little country schools. It was not about big revolutionary ideas, it was about pencils. I see the people that do the real work and what's really sad, in a way, is that...the people who are the most giving, hard-working and capable of making this world better usually don't have the ego and ambition to be a leader. They don't see any interest in superficial rewards, they don't care if...if their name ever appears in the press. They actually enjoy the process of helping others; they're in the moment.
Jesse: Yeah, but that's so hard! You know, to be in the moment. I just feel like I'm...designed to be slightly dissatisfied with everything. You know? I mean, like...always trying to better my situation. You know, I satisfy one desire, and it just agitates another. Then I think, to hell with it, right? I mean, desire is the fuel of life, I mean, do you think it's true that if we never wanted anything, we'd never be unhappy?
Perhaps this is scripted, yes, but aren't films attempts at mirrors of reality? Well, some films. Well, attempts, at least. And the voice of Celine is a frustrated voice, a little cynical, a human who wishes more people challenged each other. A voice who imagines the world one way, but finds it difficult to inspire others in the real world.
Celine, I think I'm you.
Yanna
No comments:
Post a Comment