Writing Experiments: Step into the Bhakti-verse

Some of you might have noticed that I spend a lot of time on these blogs writing about my mother. They say that your life influence comes out of the five people you spend the most time with. For two people who spend most of their time on opposite sides of the globe, my mother and I see each other a lot. I work with her (and sometimes for her), we send each other interesting links, and like many other mothers and daughters, we Skype. (Is that a verb now? Like Google?)

Another reason we're so close is that we share so many interests. Science fiction & fantasy. Illustration. Calligraphy. And writing, of course.

My mom's writing is a strange animal. She's been going to a class for a few years now, but her degree is in film and advertising. She's also read a lot of spiritual literature, as well as writers like Robert Holdstock and Patricia McKillip, who do lyrical, descriptive work. A lot of her writing is brief but rhythmic, like a media sound bite from an alternate universe. She also really likes alliteration and parallel structure.

Lately, as a writing exercise, she re-worked one of her favourite pieces into three poems and asked me to read them and see what I thought. You can read them here: https://www.facebook.com/notes/bhakti-issa-urra/pushing-the-envelope/10151769471568360

Crafting in Difficult Conditions

with permission from Kate's Paperie, for whom I did
this illustration

I used to collect rubber stamping and scrapbooking manuals. Somerset Studios, Visual Chronicles, Rubber Stamp Journal...I loved them. But after a while these 'manuals' started to frustrate me. Every project was surrounded with an arsenal of mysterious tools, most of which cost $18.99 at HobbyCraft.

In the Philippines, and especially in my hometown, there is no Target or Michael's or giant craft store. You can't just dash out and pick up a hand press (a mythical item I've never even seen in real life), a bone folder, or a heating pad. There are no star-shaped punches or gilt frame stickers to be found, no ink pads in jewel colours, no....yes, I'll stop now.

What a good crafter does in this country is go on the hunt. Hardware stores are your best friend. Need an eyelet punch? Hit up a Handyman for a belt hole puncher and pliers and then the local bespoke tailor for your eyelet rings--figure out the rest on your own.

My mother makes jewellery and we'd been looking for wire she could make into links for two weeks. Nothing of the right size or pliability in the local malls. We had to go to the fish market! The markets are in a really dodgy part of town, where purse snatchers operate even in broad daylight. We had to stay close, and hold our bags closer. After several dead ends we wound up in a deep, dark, hole-in-the-wall store that sold fishing tackle. It looked like a passage into Narnia, after all the children had grown up and used it for storage. But this dim, filthy place that looked like the birth of tetanus was, of course, secretly magic.

We found the perfect wire--Seahorse leader line, used in trawl nets. I nervously eyed a set of fish hooks, carefully taped down under the glass shelves to protect unwary elbows, as my mother haggled over the leader line and some guitar strings. Don't even ask me why a fishing store would sell guitar strings.

No glitter, no ribbons, no fancy scalloped scissors. But they had what we wanted, and if my mom hadn't been willing to stomp around a smelly wet market I would never have known where to find it. Wear waterproof shoes and a theft-proof shoulder bag, and always wash your hands. That's hardcore crafting.

My Face in the Mirror: The City and the City review (mild spoilers)

original here

The City and the City by China Mieville: My Face in the Mirror

I finished this book last night, and read a whole bunch of reviews about it. They were very well-informed and well-written, extolling the mirror-play between Beszel and Ul Qoma in high-flown terms, delighting in Miéville's innovation of words like 'grosstopical' and 'topolganger', exploring the way Miéville wrote the bizarre into the characters' habits so the world became both believable and natural. They compare Borlú to Dragon Tattoo's Blomqvist, who I found smug and gloomy in comparison. I wanted to write something like that. 

But while reading the book, something happened that I'd never experienced before: 

[SPOILERS!]