i am under pressure for posting some pictures of my home... so here you go.





i live at 26 highland street in waltham, which is part of greater boston and if you just turn left to the prospect street where many latinoamericanos live and where i had my hair-cut at a dominican (as far as i remember... ) hairdresser's and then reach the main street, it goes all the way directly to watertown and cambridge without any place which would mark the end of one neighborhood and the start of another. actually, if you go up the hill near the maths department (the brandeis campus is on the other way from highland street on the south street), you could see the boston skyline. it's 20 minutes by bus or commuter rail or car to downtown.



highland street is mainly wooden houses. even the condominiums are wooden and not cement. ours is a two-family house which means that it is has two appartments or two houses attached to one another. our appartment has two floors, the first one being a kitchen, a dining room and the living room which are all connected (no doors, i like it!), the second one - three bedrooms and the bathroom.



i live here with two friends - john from ghana who found this place for us and arto from istanbul who is actually armenian.





my room is the smallest one, but at least it was furnished when i got in. and the pictures on the walls make it cozy. dozens of smiling friendly faces... from vilnius, santaka, greece, bologna, miami and boston. unfortunately, like in italy, again no nice view from the window... and no sun or moon... just another house. i should first come and look my room in the "eyes" next time before signing the lease... and i have been thinking about moving to cambridge, but i feel so homish here that i'm hesitating... i love cambridge that much. but i also feel at home here already and i don't feel like leaving mi companeros di cuarto.





in the basement which has a separate entrance, separate kitchen and separate life all in all lives vimal, he is from india and has been here for quite a while. he brought us some cookies yesterday and hepled to arrange the internet when "comcast" guys did their worst. we also have a small yard and a terace but we don't use it as the doors to it is broken and the landlord (who is definitely of italian descent) has not fixed it yet.



(this is not my house:))

so, postcards and letters very are welcome at:

26 Highland street,
Waltham, MA 02453-3441,
the United States of America

buenas noches, todos! esta el otono, pero las hojas no cambian color... today we went to the science museum to see the gunther von hagens' exhibition "body worlds".



i haven't paid that much for an exhibition ever in my life... 21 dollars... i miss washington and its policy of free museums... and the exhibition was... interesting... and shocking... human bodies or - to be more precise - the muscles, the skeletons, arteries and veins, all the organs etc, etc... for example, one "work of art" was a human being divided into two separate bodies - one of his bones, the other - of his muscles... and there were muscle-men playing baseball and soccer, and ice-skating and skiing... and there were embrios of the humans... and one women reduced to muscles with several months' old baby in her womb. scandalous. von hagens, the creator of these bodies, wrote:

"the plastinated post-mortal body illuminates the soul by its very absence. plastination transforms the body, an object of individual mourning, into an object of reverence, learning, enlightment and appreciation".

and the brochures announce: ORIGINAL, AUTHENTIC, INSPIRING. original and authentic? is it an authentic - the really real - body or the work of art? or maybe let's leave these questions aside, as they don't lead anywhere. the official website is somehow not working, but you can get the impressions here - http://www.mos.org/bodyworlds/.

after the exhibition we went to the quincy market - the place of an old boston market where now you can buy thai, indian, greek, italian, japanese or whatever else food. delicioso:) and quincy is always packed with people, especially on sundays. after long considerations, i had some greek salad which were nothing like the traditional ones we had in greece... andrea got the japanese food and diego the thai. daniela only had some juice and some snacks. good meal after the day of exploration of human bodies... to strenghten our own.





outside we observed many performances by street artists... there were the hip hop dancers, there was a guy who literally got through the tennis racket... from the head to his toes... and there was one who tried to escape the mad-man's clothes, his hands being tied behind his back. and there were the alive sculptures, so wide-spread in europe. this is similar to the "body worlds" exhibition, just outside... some of those people could well be placed under the glass. people amazed by their own bodies and those of the others. flesh. real people. forgotten bodies in the times of digital technologies and virtual life. unfortunately, it was forbidden to take pictures inside the museum. i was excited by the sight... people staring at human bodies, at the flesh without the skin... and by staring i mean staring... from all around... the back and the front and the under of the exposed corpses.





and the sunday was over with the walk in the boston common and the public gardens. the kite in the wind and many squirrels everywhere. and people, spending the last hours of this warm and humid weekend. boston really has unpredictable weather.









pero... manana es lunes... tomorrow is monday. unfortunately or luckily? i don't know... i like it all here.



and these are my sunflowers at night, i did not have a picture of them before... and it is their last days... on the way home with the red hot chilli peppers.

it was a week ago that i met the first indian. i was on my way back from the market, on the prospect street. as usually, i didn't press the button for the green light trusting the drivers, and, i did not have time to realize what had happened, but there was a truck just in front of me and an indian sitting in it, watching me. that moment expanded into eternity, the time stopped, it was just his face that i saw. and then i crossed the street and did not look back, but the image will remain in my memories. i don't even know what indian he was... might be a hopi or cherokee, or maya, or inca. they still live here, in this world, the same, but different, inhabiting the world which obeys other laws then they do. several days ago in the "new york times" there was an article about the U.S. - mexico border, where the tohono o'odham nation lives wandering freely from one state to another. they can move across the border without their passports because it is their land. but the authorities are concerned about the increasing flow of mexican immigrants and the drug mafia and want to build a big wall in arizona. the indians will not accept that. and the government is not going to do anything without first getting their permission. a state in a state, one world intruding into another, two distinct orders overlapping and living side by side without conflicts.



but conflicts do arise in mexico, in chiapas, which is near the guatemala border and where the maya live. at class we were discussing the zapatista movement all week. the professor brought some movies from the independent media project in chiapas and made a presentation on the use of revolutionary symbols in mexico... its art... from the time of zapata and his eyes... and one guy showed us a small zapatista soldier which he carried in his bag. "zapaturismo" is expanding... the small zapatista soldier is a fetish. yesterday at "au bon pain" in harvard square i was trying not to attract attention to my red-covered marx and engels reader. the chapter on commodity fetishism was so far the most interesting part of marx i have read... maybe except the letters to his wife and to his companero that were reprinted in "nemunas". marx is different here, writing about the secrets and mysteries. we look at the social relations of men, but we see the objectivity of the products... we think they have intrinsic value, they are alive, they are magical, to use marx's words. i remember the old days when my parents tried to persuade me not to believe in commercials by saying that "coca-cola" or "l'oreal" are not better than other sodas and shampoos, but they cost more because of the publicity. although my parents don't like marx, they do agree with him on commodity fetishism. but today i found out that a "fetico" was a portuguese word for a small nkisi figurine that was used in rituals by the bakongo tribe in west africa. it was an object acting as a person. like in yesterday's open lecture my favourite professor was talking about the silver and the minerals in mexico's mines. minerals get their names, people make tatoos of the particular shafts where some precious stones are discovered, they travel through places and people and collections and acquire more and more value. they live forever and they live progressively, whereas the mines die... like a living organism with veins under the ground. never before had i heard of the anthropology of time. "rocks of ages: mexican minerals, time and the concept of resources" was the title of the lecture which i expected to be about archeology, but it wasn't. anthropology is the play between the strange and the familiar... you can write about a tribe in papua new guinnea and so make the strange to be familiar, or you can analyse capitalist economy or the community of the subway, and so make the familiar the strange. it's always the wonder and the will to explore.



today is rosh hashanah, the jewish new year, which counts to 5767 from tonight. and "the new york times" is full of enormous greetings... the space in the paper bought by "macy's" and "bloomingdale", and some other big companies which want to give at least some respect for "the others" before beginning the christmas' mania. but my friends at the anthropology department didn't know about it as none of them is jewish. being in this school maybe they should at least give us some sheets of information to understand the "strange". like with the flags of nine eleven which many foreign students misunderstood. neither did the nice driver of the night shuttle that brought me home from cambridge last night know anything about it. but now we feel it. the friday parties are cancelled and all the cafes are closed, people are going home... for new year... and i'm staying and feeling more and more at home. not only in boston, but also in the department. studying here is like being at the seminars of the "invisible college", day and night. it is knowledge that matters to me.

in the garden of the house close to me somebody is growing the sunflowers... they are so big that the windows of that wooden house are hidden from the sight of the passers-by. but today as i looked at their yellow faces looking down i felt that they are leaving... it might be the last sunny and warm days in new england, although the weather here changes every day and after the chilly evenings last week, this weekend brought a relief. maybe the whales have not yet left the shores of boston and we could go to watch them... in october they go away and come back only in spring... i have never seen a whale...

today was the first time i said no. i didn't go to boston, even if ksenia invited me to the common to read my book there. "basta!" about the zapatista rebellion in chiapas, mexico, which is not the romantic indians fighting for their rights but much more and much less at the same time. it's complex... yesterday at harvard bookstore there was the biography of subcomandante marcos on the same shelf with eight-hundred page long books on che guevara. this reminded me of bologna and the subcultural marxism there, of the power of che t-shirt and of the italian communist songs we used to sing at nights. i miss italy. this is not the first time i think about that. something more than just missing europe. italy was very beautiful. i don't abuse this word. it was beautiful in the sense that it was aesthetic... the renaissance florence or medieval ravena, vast vineyards of toscana and small towns in the colline of romagna just above forli... there is something beautiful in the way italians eat and in the way they dress, also something more in the way they chat in the market... and it is rich beauty. i felt it in my blood. even being sad and lonely there is part of the beauty that surrounds you. nostalgia comes along with the cultural heritage... deep thoughts walking down the silent dark streets of the old city... it is not that beautiful to be sad in america. imagine some small town somewhere in the midwest which you definitely see in many movies and someone sad there... it would hurt because that saddness is not the same as the beautiful italian longing for home... maybe that's the reason my letters from italy were nice and here i can't write the same. or i couldn't. there are some places which have become so dear to me that i could spend an evening just walking there all alone... boston downtown... and especially cambridge...



yesterday on my way back from the bar at one at night i was thinking about that. sad because i had to go home already but tired as well... we only met at eight or so with karima, ksenia, diego and andrea and sergio, who are also chilean, to go to one irish pub for some guiness or wine and then to another bar where we had to separate. and i only had one glass of grapefruit juice. one friend of ksenia's who is a filmmaker came to join us. it turned out that he is of italian descent and can speak italian but with the weird american accent. he told me that bologna is all full of communists which he doesn't like... and he is able to get tickets to the rolling stones concert... and he also praised american burgers... you can get the best in los angeles but also the ones from boston are better than anything europeans have ever tried. ksenia had two last night but i wasn't hungry. however, i still remember the burgers from the place ergys took us some weeks ago. that was good.



on my way back sitting in the bus i wanted to write something in the new notebook i got from the harvard bookstore last night. it is a moleskine, the legendary notebook originally made by small french bookbinders and used by picasso, van gogh and hemingway... no in stores again after someone in milano decided to renew this traditional design. i bought it for my field-notes, for anhtropological observations once i finally meet the armenians and the turkish... or for some other spontaneous thoughts which are always better than all the pre-planned essays. however, last night i did not have a pen... so my thoughts sank into sleep on the bus home... just to wake up and realize that there is the red big moon to guide my way to highland street.

why remember maldini? in the morning i went shopping and was wearing the t-shirt of the "rossoneri" with the name of maldini. to my greatest surprise people at the supermarket and those on the street all noticed me... and smiled, and commented and explained their reaction to their friends who had never herd of "the famous italian soccer player". but most have heard. boston has a huge italian population in the north end. and arto told me today that "the rolling stones", "red hot chilli peppers" and eric clapton are coming there in a month or so. need to get the tickets at least for one show. and with uli we'll participate in the lottery to go skydiving. some new experiences... today i'm some how a bit tired as yesterday i came back at four and when i woke up eva and justinas had already left... i hope they have some time in new york and... home... what we did yesterday was a relaxed evening... it all started with the T.G.I.F. and the free snacks and drinks. as usually i met here the few fulbrighters, some new students interested in my camera, and most of the friends... some still have classes till late and that's so unfair as they never make it for the evening at usdan.



(here is carlos from colombia together with the girl from turkey and the fulbright guy from guatemala... i'm so ashamed not to know the names...)

just after all the food and drinks were over, we went to one comedy show in downtown boston...



(simon contemplating in front of the skyline we were looking for... did i mention that i signed up for the photography club? tomorrow in cambridge they will take pictures of people contemplating... so, here is mine:))

going to the comedy evening was arranged for the students living at charles river appartments but simon, uli, michael and stephan invited me to come and so i did. in fact, the show was... strange... i mean, i don't understand american humour... not funny... only the last lady was ok... but still i was looking at the watch and the end of the show.





and the show was over... applause...



afterwards we were about to do the bar tour... the american way to spend the evening if you are not in miami and don't go dancing. usually it's just going from one bar to another with the passport in your hand so that they can check whether you are over twenty-one. and in most of the bars there is no place to move around, the music is too loud to talk, so people just drink...



and spend a lot of money... however, i say "we were about to do the tour" as it did only begin... we went to "whiskey's" to have some cuba libres and margaritas and then to "hong kong" in cambridge.



(political show discussing labor problems in new england in the cambridge bar... you don't hear anything because of the music, but still...)

but just as the dances on the third floor started, the lights went on and... at two o'clock it was over! in boston they close the bars at two... unbelievable. even in vilnius they are open till five. at least some. while here, none. so we just sat talking at the closed cafe in harvard square and took the shuttle home...

as i was walking alone home the arabic moon was visible in the starry sky... and i was thinking about the book by three refugees from southern sudan i'm reading now... but later about that.

now i have to read some marx and get ready for the evening. it seems that again i'm meeting karima, ksenia and diego at harvard.

at the latin american studies' class we talked about guatemala. apart from invention of the maya, their trajes, tourism and civil war, about the search for the authentic defined as the "really real" in the beauty contest where the winner is the one native maya woman who speeks ancient tongue which nobody understands (lengua), who can dance son, the traditional maya dance, and who has the original traje, the traditional dress of maya guatemalans. they also say rather political speeches in spanish... about the oppression of the indigenous by the ladinos, about the right to land etc. it seems that being against the system, being oppressed, being dissatisfied with the government and having the revolutionary potential becomes part of the "authentic maya" image. revolution is popular. and they do not speek about any particular cases so the authorities have nothing to worry about. only the general tendency to be rebellious. but neither this content of their speeches nor beauty is actually important in this contest of the mayan queen. it's authenticity. the jury is comprised of an athropologist, two linguists and some other politician. and the winner recieves a spanish dictionary as the main prize. one more article was about the murders in recent years... augmenting in guatemala, as well as brazil and peru and mexico. in guatemala more than a thousand women have been killed this year... found raped and beheaded and with the bodies totally distorted. and nobody investigates these crimes. however, there are no statistics as to how many of them are the maya and how many ladinos and foreigners... still, probably the most are maya. i talked to my guatemalan friend at the turkish feast yesterday and he said that it's not that dangerous anymore... "if you go to the tourist areas", he added.



i also found out that in one of the university's newspapers there is a section about crime at brandeis. what do the police do. here is the report from the last week:

Police Log
Posted: 9/12/06
Medical Emergency

Sept. 4-A student in North Quad was reportedly intoxicated, but he refused care.

Sept. 5-A caller in North Quad reported a female in the bathroom vomiting and feeling dizzy.

Sept. 8-A caller reported an individual with a knee injury on the athletic fields. The male patient was transported to Newton-Wellesley Hospital by ambulance.

Sept. 9-An ambulance responded to a report of an intoxicated female in North Quad.

Sept. 9-A caller on the athletic fields reported an individual with a shoulder injury. An ambulance transported the individual to Newton-Wellesley Hospital.

Sept. 9-A caller in Gosman reported an individual had received a head injury playing tennis. BEMCo treated the patient with a signed refusal for further care.

Sept. 9-A caller in the Village reported she had a sharp pain in her stomach. BEMCo responded and treated her with a signed refusal for further care.

Sept. 10-A caller from North Quad said he had too much to drink and was throwing up in the bathroom. BEMCo and Residence Life were notified, and the individual was transported by ambulance to Newton-Wellesley Hospital for further care.

Sept. 10-A caller from the Foster Mods reported an 18-year-old female was feeling faint. The individual was transported to Newton-Wellesley Hospital by ambulance for further care. Residence Life was notified.

Sept. 10-A report was received of an intoxicated male in North Quad. He was transported by ambulance to Newton-Wellesley Hospital for further care. Residence Life was notified.

Sept. 10-A female with a cut on her knee was transported to the Waltham Urgent Care Center.

Larceny-Theft

Sept. 7-University Police received a report of a past larceny on Charles River Road, which had already been reported by Waltham Police.

Burglary

Sept. 5-University Police received a report that an iPod was stolen from a lab in Bassine.

Disturbance

Sept. 4-University Police responded to a report of loud music in Ziv Quad. The music was shut-down.

Sept. 5-University Police received a report of loud music from the Charles River Apartments.

Sept. 5-A caller reported loud music and yelling in the Charles River Apartments. The residents complied when asked to quiet down.

Sept. 8-University Police responded to a complaint of loud music in Ziv Quad. The individuals quieted-down when asked.

Sept. 9-There was a report of intoxicated individuals screaming and yelling in Castle Quad. They were dispersed.

Sept. 9-A caller reported loud music coming from Rosenthal Quad. University Police didn't find the noise.

Sept. 9-A caller reported an individual playing the drums outside a building in the Charles River Apartments. University Police advised the individual to go inside.

Sept. 9-A caller reported loud noise in the Charles River Apartments. University Police found the noise was coming from an unregistered party. Residence Life was notified.

Traffic

Sept. 8-A vehicle was stopped for driving the wrong way on a one-way road by the Castle.

Sept. 10-A motor vehicle crashed through the fence in front of Gosman. Numerous vehicles in the front of G-Lot were struck. Waltham Police, Waltham Fire and AMR responded. One individual was taken to the Newton-Wellesley Hospital. The vehicle that struck the fence was towed, along with another one, by Pilgrim Auto.

Trespassing

Sept. 7-Trespass letters were issued to individuals living on campus between Edgewater Drive and the Charles River Apartments. Waltham Police assisted in the scene.

Miscellaneous

Sept. 3-There was a report of two suspicious white males with baseball caps in Ziv Quad. University Police discovered they were both actually pizza delivery men from the Prospect Street Café.

Sept. 6-A caller reported smoke by a bike rack in front of Gosman. University Police found it was actually steam.

ordinary university life. too many parties. and two many car accidents recently. yesterday when we were walking to campus with eva and justinas who came to visit me after the "work and travel usa", there was a serious accident down the south steet.