Book Notes: Sepharad by Antonio Munoz Molina

Image Source: Concentration Camp by Aspius

"Generalizations are harmful, I should know, but the real problem is our species, We’re aggressive primates much more dangerous than gorillas or chimpanzees; we carry cruelty and the will to dominate in our brains, and we get the oldest part of the brain from our reptile ancestors. I know the story that’s going around, that in the evolution of the species the instinct for cooperation has served us better than the law of the survival of the fittest. Except that some primates cooperate to wipe others out."

-from Sepharad - p. 316

Antonio Munoz Molina
Translated from the Spanish by Margaret Sayers Peden
Copyright 2001 Harcourt Publishing Co. Florida

I do not know what attracted me to Nazi literature eversince I read Viktor Frankl's 1946 book Man's Search for Meaning which chronicles his experiences as a concentration camp inmate and described his everyday struggles of finding reasons to live despite the horrors of the death camp. That book teaches us how to find meaning in the midst of extreme suffering. Frankl also concludes that there are only two races of men, decent men and indecent. Therefore, no country is free of either of them, and thus there were "decent" Filipino policemen and "indecent" HongKong employers. So, let us not hate each other. (I was thinking of writing a commentary about that Manila hostage crisis but I’m sure at this time, nothing was left unsaid – so let us move on.)

I already watched many movies relating to Hitler, the war and the concentration camps and the Jews, such as The Boy in  Striped Pajamas, Valkyrie, Stalingrad and a lot more. Therefore, when I came across this book in BookSale SM Megamall (yes, I usually buy second hand books), I immediately bought it.

  
However, it took me a month to finish reading this book, because this is not an ordinary novel, and not an easy read. It is like cross-stitching which requires hardwork to form an amazing piece. In this novel, Antonio Munoz Molina tells 17 different stories about the Holocaust, Stalin’s purges, the Death Camps and the local Sephardic diaspora. He writes about the way memories overlap and interconnect, thread by thread. A sense of salvaging memory. Lives that deserves to be told – fade from memory as if they never existed. The novel is like a dark eulogy to the “disappeared.” Molina artfully incorporates the narratives of those who suffered through the Nazi or Soviet terrors or both – part fiction part history.

This novel also reflects some old truths that are present even in our modern world. We meet people everyday, our officemates, friends and thousands of strangers in the street. If we commit something wrong or just being wrongly accused, will they hide us when the authorities come or will they betray us? This novel tells us that we can never be sure of them, or of ourselves. 

Quotable Quote From the Book: (Quote about Travel)

"I don’t believe it’s true what they say, that as you travel you become a different person. What happens is that you grow lighter, you shed your obligations and your obligations and your past, just as you reduce everything you possess to the few items you need for your luggage. The most burdensome aspect of our identity is based on what others know or think about us. They look at us and they know what they know, and in silence they force us to be what they expect us to be, to act according to a certain habits our previous behavior has established, or according to suspicions that we weren’t aware we have awakened."  --p. 22, Sepharad: character musings--

_____________________

Book Review/Resources for Sepharad, Antonio Muñoz Molina 

[compiled by: Yodz de Veas Insigne]

• I'm A Stranger Here Myself :  New York Times review by Michael Pye
• Weary from tyranny's repeated blows Anonymity the only refuge: San Francisco Chronicle review by Theodore Roszak
• Exile and loss resonate in 'Sepharad':  Deseret Morning News review by Kason Swensen
• What is Sepharad:  Wikipedia Article
• Antonio Muñoz Molina: Official Homepage
• Comprehensive Articles: Antonio Muñoz Molina

Orgasm

I am currently reading the book “No Ordinary Moments” by Dan Millman and came across one section which I think worth sharing. It is a section about the primary gateways of stress release, which includes orgasm.   

Orgasm serves as a universal and relatively benign method of tension release, through masturbation, sex with a partner or spontaneously, as in nocturnal emissions (“wet dreams”). As an inherent biological drive to help ensure continuation of the species, orgasm can be distinguished from higher motives of love, affection or intimacy – we can, and often do, achieve orgasm without any of these higher motives. Mutually consenting adults can and do engage in uncommitted “sports sex” – having orgasms, then going their separate ways. However, the highest form of sexual intimacy includes both love and desire.

As with the other gateways, sexuality only becomes problematic when it becomes compulsive or addictive – when we abuse it rather than use it. Those who become addicted to orgasm pursue a variety of means to achieve it and tend to use partners or themselves as sex objects in order to release tension.

In today’s world, indiscriminate, promiscuous, unprotected sexual relations have become a high-risk behavior with serious even fatal consequences – not to mention the emotional turmoil related to the regret, deceit, and insecurity that sometimes accompany affairs.

For those without a partner, masturbation is recommended as a means of managing our sexual-creative energies. A near universal practice, masturbation provides an accessible gateway of release with no emotional strings attached. Masturbation seems preferable to deceitful, loveless, and compulsive sexual encounters that risk disease, pregnancy, or one-sided emotional entanglements. Masturbation also helps resolve, in a simple and harmless way, different levels of sexual desire in a relationship; if our partner is not interested or available when we desire orgasm, we can masturbate to relieve the sexual tension.

By definition, however, masturbation does not involve relationship with anyone else; it involves no circuit of energy exchange, vulnerability or intimacy. Those who are addicted to this particular gateway even though a partner is available may want to re-examine the level of openness and communication in their relationship, and to explore deeper levels of sexual intimacy.

The fewer internal obstructions we have, the less compelling our need for orgasm. With less need, we have more to give, which enhances the intimacy of our sexual relationship. Reduced pressure for orgasm is quite different, however, from inhibited drives, sexual blocks or repression, or guilt driven attempts at celibacy, which may signal a need to seek professional help.

Source: Millman, Dan. 1992. No Ordinary Moments: A Peaceful Warrior’s Guide to Daily Life. California, USA:H. J. Kramer Inc. p. 68-69 

Ten Stupid Things Men Do To Mess Up Their Lives

While reading the book "10 Stupid Things Men Do To Mess Up Their Lives" by Dr. Laura Schlessinger, I received these cute pictures via forwarded e-mail entitled "Why Men Need Parents"

I was about to write a short book note for posting here and thought that these pictures are worth sharing together with the short summary of the book.

Would you agree with these?

1. STUPID CHIVALRY.

    By getting involved with the wrong woman (weak, flaky, damaged, needy, desperate, stupid, untrustworthy, immature, etc.) you think that your love will save/transform her.

 2. STUPID INDEPENDENCE 

     Unwilling to admit “need” for bonding and intimacy, you hide in excesses of work, play, drink, drugs, porn, and meaningless sex. 

3. STUPID AMBITION 

    Unable to comfortably and proudly accept your inherent importance to society and family as husband and father, you bow to the false idols of money, toys, power and status.

4. STUPID STRENGTH  

   Uncomfortable with feeling weak, vulnerable, useless, powerless, or rejected,you use intimidation, force, or passive-aggressiveness to regain control.

 5. STUPID SEX 

     Taking an attraction, opportunity, or erection as a “sign,” you measure your masculinity and power by sexual conquests, infidelities, and orgasms. 

 

 6. STUPID MATRIMONY 

      Lacking a mature sense of the purpose, meaning, or value of marriage, you realize too late you’ve gone down the aisle with the wrong woman for the wrong reasons and feel helpless to “fix it."

 

 7. STUPID HUSBANDING 

     Thinking that marriage is the honorable discharge from loving courtship, you continue to live as thought you were single and your “mommy-wife” will take care of everything else.

 

 8. STUPID PARENTING 

     Believing that only women/mothers nurture children, you withdraw from hands-on parenting to assert your masculine importance, missing out on the true “soul food” of a child’s hug. 

9. STUPID BOYISHNESS 

    Having not yet worked out a comfortable emotional and social understanding with your mother, you form relationships with women that become geared to avenge, resolve, or protect you from your ties to Mommy. 

 

  10. STUPID MACHISMO 

         Understanding the true and meaningful difference between being male and a man, you can become a man.

_______________________________ 

Summarized & Compiled by Yodz Insigne

Source: Schlessinger, Laura, "10 Stupid Things Men Do To Mess Up Their Lives" New York:Harper Collins, 2002.

Image Source:  via forwarded e-mail (if you own the above pictures Contact Yodz for image deletion request or proper source citation)

Quis Custodiet Ipsos Custodes: Notes on the Spears of God

In the early decades of the twenty-first century, the most commonly held truth is that knowledge is power. Yet a select few men and women begin to suspect what few will admit: we know nothing at all.

The world’s oil resources have dwindled. The rich are turning richer and the power-mongers are becoming more powerful. China and the United States dominate the globe in a geopolitical chess match. The human mind has merged with the cybergrid, yet the human race seems not to have evolved much at all.

Then, on a remote South American mountain, two scientists stumble on a grisly scene. Here, while trying to protect an ancient sacred rock, a primitive tribe has been slaughtered. No witnesses remain to reveal what could have inspired such carnage. Or so it would seem.

In the international arena, meanwhile, a new global race is on: a weapon capable of tipping the balance of power is discovered. Among the competitors are a National Security Agency director who is playing at an elaborate doublecross within his own agency and a vengeance-seeking Israeli meteor hunter. Shamans and zealots, geniuses and madmen–all seek to unlock mysteries that fell to earth millennia ago. But the key lies with four mute children who may unwittingly hold the secret to the planet’s survival–or its destruction.

Summary

Latin America features ecological "islands" called "tepuis," jungle realms so isolated from their neighbors that evolution proceeds in unique ways. In one such pocket biosphere lives a tribe called the Mawari. They are possessed of a strange meteorite that fell to Earth generations ago. This worshipped object carried biological agents that infected the Mawari and gave them strange mental powers. Now, their existence made known to outsiders, the tribe will become the focus of the First World's greed. But what the Westerners don't realize is that by breaking the isolation of the Mawari they are infecting the whole world with the germs of a potential apocalypse (or salvation, if the two can even be distinguished).

Central to the fate of the Mawari are two scientists, Michael Miskulin and Susan Yamada. They are on an expedition to the region, backed by the finances of Miskulin's rich uncle, Paul Larkin. When they arrive, they find all the adult Mawaris slaughtered and only four children left in hiding. The scientists bring the orphan children back to America and the refuge of Larkin's home.

It eventuates that the slaughter was engineered by one Gen. Retticker, who is in charge of a military project to create the perfect soldier. He wants to reverse-engineer the mental powers of the Mawari for his own uses, and has his own pet scientist, Darla Pittman, in his employ. Darla doesn't know about the genocide necessary to secure her a certain meteorite sample, and she goes to work eagerly.

But Retticker's strings are being pulled in turn by a weird cabal: Doctor Vang, leader of a conspiracy to boost mankind onto a new evolutionary plateau, and his associates, evangelist George Otis and adventurer Victor Fremdkunst. This cabal plans to trigger the End Times by stoking war in the Middle East. And the last major player is Jim Brescoll, head of the NSA, who has his own designs on the Mawari survivors.

But the wild card is that the four Mawari children—Alii, Aubrey, Ebu and Ka-dalun—have plugged into the global infosphere and are about to start pulling cosmic strings of their own.


MY THOUGHTS AND PERSONAL OPINION 

The truth behind the fiction

Technology has always been an important factor in war. The latest breakthroughs within bio and nanotechnology is being converted and transferred for defense purposes. The shift from dependence on military hardware to dependence on scientists show the diffusion of military power.

Today’s military strategy is heavily based on reconnaissance, surveillance and earth observation systems fed into pattern recognition systems that scan for military movements or troop enforcement.

Moreover, human body is now being used for weaponization. Bionic implants enhancing physical strengths shows great potential in biodesign soldier systems. Robotic retinas and “listening boosters” could give extrasensory powers. Bioengineering human tissue for extra strength, nanomedicine or genetheraphy that increase key vital soldier parameters.

The future of biotechnology and the use of human body for weaponization blurs the line between hard science and science fiction.


War and the future generation

War is a regrettable attribute of the international system. While it is not always inevitable, its frequency has caused states to remain armed and ready to defend national interests. Technology has played a leading role in extending the scope of the battlefield as well as its scale.

While we may not be able to totally banish war as an instrument of state policy, new influences may move us in directions which will allow us to limit and control – perhaps even to avert unnecessary violence and death as a result of state actions.

In all these research to enhance human capabilities, and the never-ending search for defense advancement, new opportunities arise for every nation to capture, to incorporate significant new military capabilities

How we respond to these new technologies will have profound effect on how we will see the future and how far we will evolve, and what its legacy will be for future generations.

Quis Custodiet Ipsos Custodes : Who will guard the guards?

We are now standing at the threshold of an era, which will see the introduction of a new class of weapons and technologies – those designed primarily for destruction and greater lethality. The adoption of these new capabilities will mark not just the beginning of a new technological revolution in warfare, but also a new era in the elaboration and clarification of war.

National defense is a must for every nation – to protect its territories, and to implement law and order in their respective nation.

The use of human body for weaponization - bionic implants enhancing physical strengths (biodesign soldier systems), robotic retinas and “listening boosters” for extrasensory powers, bioengineering human tissue for extra strength, nanomedicine or genetheraphy – means that technology is making us less human.

We must wake up. To restore the glory and purpose of creation. To make all humanity see the need to plan for the long-term survival of our species. To rouse us from our drive to self-destruction.

The question before us then is : Do we have the power to adopt not only to these new systems but to control and regulate their use for the purpose of long-term human survival and not for human extinction.

I leave you this question, Quis Custodiet Ipsos Custodes?

_____________________________________________________________

My book notes and personal opinion about technology and war. Submitted as part of the requirements in MIT – 502, Technological Change, Master in Information Technology under Prof. Enrico R. Hilario.

Book Citation:

Hendrix, Howard V. Spears of God. Del Rey Books:New York, 2006

_____________________________________________________________

The Legend of Sex

I was amazed by this legend about sex from the book Eleven Minutes by Paulo Coelho, also the author of the famous book "The Alchemist" [I am a fan of this author by the way], and thought of sharing it here on my blog. I also made some notes about that book around January this year and posted it in my book review blog. I'm not a fan of romance-love-story novels but I never thought sex, as presented throughout the book, could be that philosophical and poetic.

Here's the story:   

According to Plato, at the beginning of creation, men and women were not as they are now; there was just one being, who was rather short, with a body and a neck, but his head had two faces, looking in different directions. It was as if two creatures had been glued back to back, with two sets of sex organs, four legs and four arms.

The Greeks gods, however, were jealous, because this creature with four arms could work harder; with its two faces, it is always vigilant and could not be taken by surprise; and its four legs meant that it could stand or walk for long periods at a time without tiring. Even more dangerous was the fact that the creature had two different sets of sex organs and so needed no one else in order to continue reproducing.

Zeus, the supreme lord of Olympus, said “I have a plan to make these mortals lose some of their strength.”

And he cut the creature in two with a lightning bolt, thus creating the man and women. This greatly increased the population of the world, and, at the same time, disoriented and weakened its inhabitants, because now, they had to search for their lost half and embrace it and, in that embrace, regain their former strength, their ability to avoid betrayal and their stamina to walk for long periods of time and to withstand hard work.

That embrace in which the two bodies re-fuse to become one again is what we call SEX.”

So, what do you think, have you already found your other half?

Have a nice week!
yodz
____________________

Source: (story lifted from the book) Coelho, Paulo. 2004. Eleven Minutes,.New York ,New York:HarperCollins Publisher Inc. ISBN : 0-06-072675-X
Photo Credit : Yuroz "The Touch" Serigraph on Canvas

Book Notes: Eleven Minutes by Paulo Coelho

I borrowed this book from Tonet who also loves Paulo Coelho books. It is a novel about a Brazilian girl named Maria. At a very young age, she was convinced that love is a terrible thing that will make you suffer. With dreams of finding fame and fortune, a club recruiter deceived her and ends up working as a prostitute. Drifting farther and farther away from love, she develops a fascination with sex.
She fall in-love with a young painter who showed her “inner light” and later realized the possibility of a “sacred “ sex in the context of love.

The main theme of this book is about sex, prostitution, and falling in love. I do not normally read novels with this subject but Paulo Coelho, being a gifted writer, never fails to inspire me. He doesn’t just write to entertain but to inspire. I also learned a great deal of information about clitorology. Ha ha. Cool stuff.
Some passages from the book:

“Sometimes life is very mean: a person can spend days, weeks, months and years without feeling anything new. Then when a door opens – as happened with Maria when she met Ralf Hart – a positive avalanche pours in. One moment, you have nothing, the next, you have more than you can cope with.” - From page 141

“When a boss humiliates an employee, or a man humiliates his wife, he is merely being cowardly or taking his revenge on life, they are the people who never dared to look into the depths of their soul, never attempted to know the origin of that desire to unleash the wild beast or to understand that sex, pain and love are all extreme experiences. Only those who know those frontiers know life; everything else is just passing time, repeating the same tasks, growing old and dying without ever having discovered what we are doing here.
Work, marriage, children, television, bitterness, old age, the sense of having lost many things, frustrations, illness, disability, dependence on others, loneliness, death.”

From Maria’s Diary : “I am two women; one wants to have all the joy, passion, and adventure that life can give me. The other wants to be slave to routine, to family life, to the things that can planned and achieved. I’m a housewife and a prostitute, both of us living in the same body and doing battle with each other.” - Page 149-151

“I’ve confronted my demons, and my dark side. I plunged into the depths of my soul and know that I still want good things, many good things from this life.” – Ralf Hart - From page 192;

____________________
Coelho, Paulo. 2004. Eleven Minutes,.New York ,New York:HarperCollins Publisher Inc. ISBN : 0-06-072675-X

Book Notes: Warrior of the Light by Paulo Coelho

When I finished reading the “The Alchemist”, I immediately bought this book as an inspirational companion. It contains short passages, which invites every reader to live out their dreams, to embrace uncertainty in life and to rise to their own unique destiny.

This book really inspires me; hence, I named my personal blog “Struggles of the Warrior of the Light.” Paulo Coelho really helps me in bringing out the Warrior within me and showed me how to embark upon the way of the Warrior: appreciating the miracle of being alive, accepting failure and being the person I want to be.

For all the seekers out there, you must have this book.

Here are some passages from the book: (from page 84)

“You can recognize a Warrior of the Light by the look in his eye. Warriors of the Light are in the world, they form part of the world, and they were sent to the world without saddlebags or sandals. They are often cowardly. They do not always act correctly.

Warriors of the Light are wounded by the most foolish things, they worry about trivialities, they believe themselves incapable of growing, Warrior of the Light sometimes believe themselves unworthy of any blessing or miracle.

Warriors of the Light often ask themselves what they are doing here. Often they find their lives meaningless.

That is what they are Warriors of the Light. Because they fail. Because they ask questions. Because they keep looking for a meaning. And, in the end, they will find it.”

__________________________

Coelho, Paulo. 2003.Warrior of the Light, A Manual.New York: HarperCollins Publisher Inc.