#there's this french song where they said there's no race or religion to be in quarantine

[shadowbannedthehedgehog]

aklfdja;klsjd je blague mais watching and remembering all those collective like songs n stuff 'known' persons did during the lockdown got me thinking myb we need another pandemic lmaoooo

[ikevamp-shrine]

Thank you @yanderepuck​ for giving me the courage to post this😊❤

Please ignore the crappy drawing of her, but that's kinda what she appears like in my mind. I will be writing with her character in future posts.

Name: Elizabeth Tudor

Vampire Type: Lesser Vampire

Height: 5’4

Birthday: September 7th

Occupation: Former Queen of England

Appearance: 

Long, curly (and extremely thick) strawberry blonde hair, fair skin, red lips, and intense icy blue eyes. Her stance is strong, regale, and respectable. Her skin is littered with smallpox scars (only a few, very unnoticeable ones residing on her face, neck, and hands). Her expression is usually blank and unreadable. Her movements are controlled and polite. Her brows thick and stomach soft. Legs long and fingers thin and graceful. There are patches of freckles on her shoulders that mix with her scars causing a unique blend of color. Thick thighs and pale, maintained feet. Smaller breasts.

Childhood:

When her brother, Edward, was born from her father and his new wife, Catherine, her line to the throne was pushed back even further (she was declared third in line). Thankfully she was not neglected instead her father, known for his cruelty, treated all his children with affection and love. She became very close with her half brother and was said to be inseparable. She was also very close with and benefited from the love her step mother, Catherine, showed her.

When her brother, Edward, was born from her father and his new wife, Catherine, her line to the throne was pushed back even further (she was declared third in line). Thankfully she was not neglected instead her father, known for his cruelty, treated all his children with affection and love. She became very close with her half brother and was said to be inseparable. She was also very close with and benefited from the love her step mother, Catherine, showed her.

She was taught a rigorous education normally only given to male heirs and was applauded for her perseverance and memory. She became fluent in French and Italian which profited when conducting diplomacy years later. Her involvement with the Reformation shaped the course of the nation, but she held no interest in religion.

With her father’s death, her step mother married the lord high admiral, Thomas, which resulted in his decapitation due to his intent to rape and impregnate Elizabeth forcing her to marry him in order for him to rule the kingdom. He was said to be overly flirtatious and acting inappropriately familiar with the young girl when around her (which one of the reasons she doesn’t like Arthur, his flirtatious nature reminds her of her past).

She was raised around sexism and taught that women were likely to act on impulsion and passion making them unfit to rule. Men were taught the arts of war and told they are the ones who dominate women while women were urged to keep their head down, mouth shut, and attend their needlework. She had remained unmarried, her want to remain single overshadowing any thoughts of seeking out relations with a man. She was rumored to have burst out in tears when Queen Mary, her older sister, had proposed to marry Elizabeth to a duke. This became a national concern when Elizabeth became queen and refused to take a husband, going against the belief that a woman’s place was a wife. It also raised worries that she would die childless, ending her bloodline, and giving Elizabeth’s title to Mary, Queen of Scots, a catholic posing a threat to the Protestants of England.

Dislikes: 

her privacy being intruded on, loud talking, 3am, those who play weak and stupid or whine to get what they want, people who are lazy but still expect to reach their goals, women who chase men and believe they need a man to be successful in life, messy rooms, fake personalities and cheaters (in both games and relationships)

Likes: 

walks in the garden at midnight, the sound of the birds singing their life’s song as the warmth of the day’s first rays of sun trace her skin, reading, learning new things, burning candles, smiling faces, happy children, the smell of freshly baked bread, warm blankets, animals, the laughter of children, hunting, dancing, and horseback (bareback more often than naught)

Personality: 

She appears cold at first because of her bluntness and blank (almost annoyed) expression. Unreasonably serious with a strong sense of duty, responsibility, and morals. She is a firm believer in working harder than everyone else to achieve greatness. A highly intelligent woman that believe women are equal to their male counterpart. Extremely stubborn in a non-disrespectful way. She is adaptable, disciplined, dignified, and confident with a wit and tongue as sharp as, if not sharper, than any of the residents. She is blunt, doesn’t sugarcoat the truth, and is always honest. Focused, logical, and exceedingly loyal to those she decides to put her trust in. She is protective and straightforward but rather quiet. She tends to keep to herself. She is paranoid and distrustful when meeting new people but will not show it. She tries to work on it, but she can be very vengeful when it comes to people betraying her or hurting those she loves.

Preferred company: 

Theo, Leonardo, Isaac, Jean, Vincent

Relationships (platonic, romantic, etc.):  

Jean- platonic with a chance of something more

Has a deep understanding with Jean. They don’t really talk about each other to each other; their conversations mainly consist of stiff, dead toned jokes that you wouldn’t be able to tell they were jokes until specified. She is one of the few people that has actually seen a sober Jean smile. He is extremely protective of her and will stand behind her just so he has the peace of mind that her back is guarded. If she asked, he would show her what is under his eye patch, no matter what lingering emotions he has on the ‘ugliness under the fabric’. His blade is always ready, his mind perfectly clear, when it comes to the safety and well being of the woman he had found himself connecting to in ways no one had before. Often, they go horse back riding together, Napoleon will sometimes accompany but its only when her and the former solider are alone does she throw her head back, her laughs unrestrained while the wind rips through her hair and clothing. Jean will race her and chuckle at how free she looks, but of course she doesn’t hear. Spares with and helps better the woman’s defenses and attacks along with Napoleon  

Mozart- platonic

Sometimes Mozart look for her and demand Elizabeth to listen to his new piece until she raises an eyebrow, daring him not to correct his wording. He’ll swallow thickly and glance off to the side, a scoff on his lips as he apologizes. She’ll nod and follow him to music room. Mozart will stare at her impatiently until she gives her honest (and extremely blunt) opinion. He values her words and while alone the pianist will replay the slight quirk of her lips as she praised his efforts. He has a small obsession with her and it drives him insane

Vincent- brotherly platonic and Theo- they horny for each other but don’t want to cross that line of friendship so they dance around their feelings while making out every once in a while

Has a soft spot for Theo and Vincent because their relationship makes her think of her brother. She only sees Vincent as a brother and will only allow him to do her makeup when he asks to, but with Theo its completely different. She sees Theo as a partner, a man she shares many values and goals with. She respects him and their shared opinions on responsibility and productivity. They understand each other intuitively and can conversate with just fleeting touches and quick glances of their eyes. There is a thick sexual tension that builds between them overtime resulting in hurried, frantic, sloppy kisses in hallways where the couple battle for dominance by pushing each other against walls and gripping roughly at the other’s clothing

Napoleon- just housemates (not friends or lovers)

She can and usually feels uncomfortable when around Napoleon. She has chalked it down to the fact they are both the leader ‘alpha’ types that ruled enemy lands. Truly, they just don’t have much in common and find it hard to build a meaningful relationship. Spares with and helps better the woman’s defenses and attacks along with Jean

Arthur- just housemates

Can sometimes get too snippy with Arthur. While she does find enjoyment in his jokes at times, she despises the sexual aspects of the author. Finds his skirt chasing habits understandable but disgusting. Admires his intelligence but can’t stand how he is able to tell you where have been just by the dust on your hand (she likes her privacy). Will play chess and pool with him even though she knows she will lose just because she enjoys playing. Will sometimes have deep conversations with Arthur in front of the fire place, both nursing a glass of alcohol, their eyes never leaving the fire as to not break the imaginary protective barrier around the two that eye contact will shatter. Smirks at his quirks and jokes sometimes and it literally makes Arthur’s heart leap because ‘damn a queen just found amusement in my joke.’ He internally freaked out the first time he met her mainly because the mansion now had two previous rulers instead of one and the newest one scared the living daylights out of him.

Comte- there is nothing between them

Doesn’t trust Comte as far as she can throw him. She can see the darkness in his heart and his past behind his eyes. She can see the death he’s caused- the pain, and while she knows that she, herself, has caused the death of many, she still has a deeply rooted gut feeling telling her to stay away from the pureblood. He wants her trust but soon realizes her opinion on him is similar to Jean’s. She will not take any gifts other than what is necessary from him (ex. Dresses for parties)

Dazai- just housemates

Dazai tries avoiding her. He feels suffocated when around and the victim of her stare. He feels as if her eyes and actions pick him apart and leave his in his barest, rawest form, and it scares him to no end. She does find his window habit hilarious though and will give him a hand up when he falls

Shakespeare- they don’t get involved with each other

She can tell Shakespeare’s mind is being manipulated, by what is the question she has yet to reveal though. She can tell he is dangerous. One who’s actions are watched and controlled by another always are. His unpredictable nature and mysterious, secret filled smile is what causes her to feel uneasy around him. She doesn’t ignore him, but she doesn’t want to be involved with the playwright and his actions so she tends to just quietly leave the room when he enters. He is polite to her and compliments her when they do talk but his fancy wording sometimes annoys Elizabeth, especially when she just wants to get away from him. She believes he is a good man at heart lead astray by forces more powerful than him, but still finds his company rather unnecessary. 

Sebastian- they respect one another, are not friends but have decent conversations

Has an interesting relationship with Sebastian. She wouldn’t call him a friend, she has very few of those so it is understandable, but she does respect him for his work ethic just as he respects her for her accomplishments and standing in history. She let him interview him once and nearly laughed out loud from how excited he got. They always have a cup of coffee or tea in the morning together, Elizabeth not quite woken up yet so they sip in comforting silence. Sebastian usually asks how she slept and she responds by telling him about her dreams if she had one. She’ll end up helping him cook breakfast.

Leonardo- friends with a chance of something more

Elizabeth appreciates Leonardo’s straightforwardness and honesty, so they have a decent trusting relationship, but his matureness makes her feel like a little girl again and it bothers her. Her thoughts tend to be: she was a queen; she ruled a country with a strength that rivaled even the greatest men, she should not look at this chain-smoking man with admiration in her eyes like a giddy school girl, flustered over a boy telling her she is cute, while around the Italian. The start of their relationship was rocky, due to Elizabeth’s personal feelings on the man- Leonardo could have cared less, but soon enough they started to appreciate each other’s qualities. Leonardo is mainly the only one she allows to touch her hair. They often speak Italian together on the balcony as Leonardo smoke a cigarillo and Elizabeth reads.

Isaac- they have the chance of being more than friends but their relationship is mainly just comforting one another through their presence and (when needed) touch- they also trust each other whole heartedly

Adores Isaac and will purposely sought him out just so she can listen to his calming ramblings while he tinkers away, a book in her hand and two cooling cups of coffee on the surface closest to the pair. He gets so red around her; at times he turns snow white from the intensity in her gaze and how her eyes never stray from her company. They share an endless loyalty to each other. Neither knows when the bond form, it just happened on its own (and very suddenly). Isaac has lost control and bit her but instead of reacting in anger she accepted it and pulled him closer, shuddering with each frenzied suck against her neck, her nails gently scratching the scalp of a whimpering Isaac. When Isaac finally came to his senses, he tried pulling away, his voice thick with unshed tears as his panicked words rang through the air until Elizabeth grabbed him and held him close, shushing Isaac as he trembled with regret and guilt in her arms. They had held each other for hours until they feel asleep in each other embraces. Isaac will link pinkies with Elizabeth when he is being picked on without realizing it for support and something to ground him so his thoughts don’t run too wild. Elizabeth will just glare and clear her throat and Arthur will shut his mouth while looking at the former queen as if he was a kicked puppy. She has a habit of fixing his clothing or hair after he nervously pulls, picks, or twists at it- Isaac doesn’t even notice it after a while. His face does burn intensely though when she places a hand on his overactive, bouncing knee when he is anxious.

Fun facts:

Due to her makeup being poisoned by her undetermined enemy, which resulted in her death, she refuses to wear any cosmetics other than what Vincent personally makes (learned how to from Leonardo) and puts on her skin himself when going to events if he asks to.

She tends to wear clothing that covers all skin other than her neck and face when leaving the mansion due to children being scared by her smallpox scars.

She usually never strays from wine unless her emotions become a little too overwhelming for her to just push the feelings down, only then will she drink something stronger.

Elizabeth is a quiet, peaceful drunk that tends to curl up on the couch, her shoes discarded on the floor, her hair loose and flowing over the decorative pillow she’ll grab and hug tightly to her chest.

She died a virgin and has remained one ever since her resurrection.

The former queen is hesitant to allow others to touch her hair from her past concerning the loss of said strands (a result of surviving smallpox), but if she trusts someone enough and knows they’ll be gentle she’ll let them style the curls, even if she is tense the entire time.

Prefers to braid her hair herself and wrap in into a bun due to the protective nature of the style.

Loves sleeping in but is often unable to due to insomnia.

She is highly particular when it comes to cleaning and organization. She has told Sebastian not to worry about cleaning her things or doing her laundry, instead she does it herself with up most focus and determination.

When she does open up or is around the boys long enough, they realize her heart is truly kind and nurturing instead of what she appears when first met (a cold-hearted woman with a resolve like steel). This is especially apparent when around animals.

She is very sarcastic and doesn’t mean any harm but usually her joking words sound hateful due to her dead tone and blank face.

Her voice is deeper and soothing, most times holding no emotion which creeps Dazai and Arthur out

Lives by “no pain no gain”

Doesn’t waste her breath on hate- if she doesn’t like someone or feels as if she can’t trust them then they just don’t exist to her. She won’t hesitate to cut someone off without warning.

Has a bad habit of bottling her emotions which causes her to explode when pushed over the edge resulting in one of the very rare moments where her anger creates an electric static in the room that demands the attention of anyone present. She doesn’t shout or scream but her words are sharper than a blade, her eyes burn with a fiery rage while she takes control of the room, overwhelming anyone (even Napoleon) and making them feel as if they are an ant beneath her boot.

Her eyes freak many people out- they feel as if the ice like orbs are staring straight into their soul, picking apart their insides, leaving nothing but shredded organs and an empty husk of what used to be a strong mind.

Can always tell when someone is lying. It’s a gut feeling, and her gut is always right.

She still wears her coronation ring on her wedding finger as a sign of her symbolic marriage to her people and country

[loadsofplaces]

Madagascar

General Information Madagascar is the fourth largest island in the world. It's located in the Indian ocean 400 KM off the coast of Southeastern Africa. It is, however, not exactly a typical East African country as the inhabitants' (the island was settled only about 1.300 years ago) heritage is mostly traced back to South East Asia, likely Indonesia (The official language, Malagasy, belongs to the Austronesian family) and African cultural influences arrived in large parts from Western Africa due to the ties brought by the common French colonial rule (while other East African countries were usually under British or Portuguese rule). Madagascar is generally quite multicultural, as about 10% of 27 million inhabitants have a more recent immigration history, often from China or South Asia

Veneration of the dead Over 40% of Malagasy people still follow the islands' traditional religion, which revolves mainly around ancestor worship. Houses have a Zorofirarazana, a corner of the ancestors. The family tomb, the Fasandrazana (pictured) is of utmost importance, people often spend a lot of money on burials and tombs and to be exiled from the family tomb is considered to be the biggest punishment. Some rituals for example are the Tromba, for which songs in a specific style are played and the ancestors' spirits are said to possess the host, ready to give advice to the living. The Famadiahna, usually held around every 7 -9 years based on ancestors visiting dreams, family astrologists' advice and current abilities of the family to hold it, is a ritual in which a corpse is exhumed, gets their clothes changed, and is then taken to their old village in a procession with music and "dancing with the dead", for then to be returned to the grave after a few days. Travellers commenting negatively about this tradition or calling it "strange" is usually considered very offensive.

King Andrianampoinimerina and his palace King Andrianampoinimerina ruled the island from 1787 to 1810 and is considered a major figure in its history as he reunited Madagascar in 1797 and ruled during a prosperous period. His palace, just outside of the capital Antananarivo is a UNESCO world heritage site and still serves as the setting for ancestral rites on certain holidays.

Unique wildlife 90 % of Madagascar's wildlife is endemic, as in, found nowhere else except for Madagascar. The most famous typically Malagasy animals are of course Lemurs and Fossa (another fun fact - those are the only animals in the movie "Madagascar" that are actually part of Madagascar wildlife). Lemurs originally came from other parts of Africa, but lost the evolutionary race to monkeys there while Madagascar, after breaking away from the continent, stayed their haven. Here, they are also considered sacred by people with myths surrounding them, such as one about a lemur saving a boy falling from a tree. While not unique to Madagascar (But 59 subspecies of it are!), most of the worlds' chameleons can also be found there. Contrary to many places in continental Africa, wildlife in Madagascar is relatively "non-threatening" as the Fossa is already the largest mammal predator and there are no animals with poison strong enough to be lethal for humans. There are, however, a few crocodiles, but they are quite rare.

The importance of directions in architecture When building a house, Malagasy people are traditionally very conscious of where everything is directed to. The front of a house should face West, to best appreciate sun sets. Windows should face North, while the East facade should be closed. When it comes to furniture, there are ideas about letting positive energies circulate somewhat reminiscent of Feng Shui. The North stands for happiness and wealth, so besides windows, the head of a bed should also face there. The South symbolizes production. Besides directions, there are also other superstitions related to housebuilding - for example building should best start on Thursdays, as it's the first day of the week according to the Malagasy calendar and things started on it will last (which is why funerals are not supposed to be held then - to avoid a series "lasting" funerals). ~Anastasia

Sources: https://www.britannica.com/place/Madagascar https://malagasya.com/malagasy-culture/ https://thefactfile.org/madagascar-facts/ https://monkeysandmountains.com/madagascar-facts/ https://theculturetrip.com/africa/madagascar/articles/9-customs-and-traditions-only-locals-from-madagascar-can-understand/ https://afrikanza.com/blogs/culture-history/facts-about-madagascar

[hvnc]

( nadia hilker / cis woc ) HANA FISCHER is 24 years old and is a POST GRAD at thales university. SHE is majoring in MODERN LANGUAGES and is known for being THE ENIGMATIC as SHE can be CALCULATING and TALENTED as well as PHLEGMATIC and BRUTAL. every time i see her, she reminds me of SUNGLASSES WORN INDOORS, NAIL POLISH TO MATCH A MOOD, THE SOUND OF METRONOME. ( chels / 33 / she ; her / cst )

CRIES it has been a minute since i’ve done the intro thing, but here goes...

trigger warnings: drowning/death ; drugs i’m sure ; violence probably, car accident/death yes.

basic stats and fun stuff ;;

name: hana fischer-capone. [ the engimatic ] 

 age: 24.

major: modern languages.

sign: taurus.

mbti: infj

religion: catholic. [ yeah i know...it might seem like bs but she does take it seriously only if the topic is touched, despite her ungodly antics ] i never said she wasn’t a walking contradiction to herself simply because her mood convinces her something is ‘right’ or ‘wrong’.

sexual orientation: bisexual. strong female preference.

romantic orientation: demi/aromantic spectrum.

hogwarts house: slytherin. [ with hufflepuff tendencies ]

favorite song: bittersweet symphony.

clubs: debate vp . clubs ‘unknown’. [ past riot club member ]

sports: equestrian league ; on-court tennis ; ballet/dance.

fun extra ‘habits’: roller derby, poker, illegal street racing.

family: wolfe fischer [ drug & audi imports. alive ] ; nicola capone [ artist. alive ] ; otto fischer-capone [ deceased age 2 ]

steven: family friends/acquaintances from a young age.

growing up ;;

hana was born in berlin germany on april 28th, and was raised there solidly until the age of ten.  summer & holiday vacations were spent between a few family homes, residing in annecy, amalfi, bruges.

languages in the home included german, italian and french. she did not learn english until traveling abroad began at the age of ten.

she was an only child for the first three years of her life, and then her little brother otto was born. he died at the age of two by drowning in the small child’s pool in the yard. hana witnessed this. she remembers this event and does not speak about it or the circumstances surrounding it. [ feel free to ask me though i’d be more than happy to explain if your muse is interested in insight/knowledge about this; ie friend connections she might have confided to. ]

from that point on, as an only child, hana was spoiled in mostly gentle ways. she had everything she needed and wanted, was pampered by her mother and prized by her father. she hated both of those things and fought tirelessly for her own freedom to the point where, when she’s around her parents it’s hard to tell if she’s the parent or if they are. when hana is home she seemingly runs the house, in a sense...she does so as she has been groomed from an early age to take over ‘family-work’. the good thing in this sense of being in control is that hana turned out just and responsible, rarely abusing her pull over her family or her voice over her family.

at the age of twelve wolfe and nicola moved with hana stateside and settled in portland, maine, where her father worked with every string he could pull that would earn him the right to the capone family name he had married into. despite nicola wishing for a quiet and peaceful family home, the property of hana’s maine home harbored tunnels and a boat house that allowed wolfe to make problems disappear quietly and often with his young daughter well in ‘the know’. this granted him a massive network of connections with justified fear in his presence. and for hana...a sense of legacy she has yet to decide upon. some days it means freedom and power, other days...it means a chain around her neck and clipped wings. nicola keeps her cheek turned in the other direction and devoted her time doting on their only daughter. but with such work came intense isolation. though hana’s childhood property was as equipped to entertain her as a private summer camp might, she was often left to her own devices while enjoying artful and elite activities. this led her to pick up a habit of fleeing or calling her own shots, forming her own antics, such as bringing home her father’s rival colleague’s sons when her bed craved company. the more security cameras on the property caught, the better.

she reveled the summers spent flying back to germany, home to the culture she missed. she would spend her time on the waters of annecy or listlessly trailing her fingertips through cherry wine poolside in italy, but eventually, as all things with hana, the glass would be tipped to shatter on the marble and she would once again flee for the sake of herself; delving into the cultures she found herself immersed in frequently in the surrounding areas.

university bound ;;

she attended Gisela Gymnasium as a child in Munich before moving to the US solidly. she was privately tutored at home through her travels.

for the duration of her high school education, hana attended Choate Rosemary Hall.

she was invited to oxford and princeton. hana adamantly refused invitation to anything her father pushed for, ie yale. her mother pushed her towards juilliard but that too was shunned by hana. oxford invitation would have sent her out of the states and away from her family. pursuing her love for modern languages, hana chose to accept a year at oxford, in order to advance her studies in english,  and then she was princeton-bound.

when she then transferred to state-side to princeton. she completed her sophomore year, but havoc within Princeton’s Riot Society that hana was a member of, resulted in her quiet transfer.

redacted information ;;

the summer before sophomore year hana drove her audi off of a princeton bridge as a final challenge to gain entrance into the riot club. the passenger and fellow running-mate with her was killed. due to the society’s influence and connections it was written off as an accident due to brake failure. hana became a member after that night and was one of 3 voted into ruling member status six months later for the upcoming year. she sometimes suffers from light sensitivity as a result of her head hitting her window.

as a ruling member, and as a challenge to underclassman wishing to join the following year, hana gifted the nominations with trinkets packed with cocaine without their knowledge. as a show of their trust in her and the society hana asked they keep these trinkets on themselves at all times. she then prompted a drug search on the university and those who did not follow her one room by keeping the trinket on their persons, rooms were searched and they were eliminated from the society process with academic consequences. for those who did as she asked and carried the drugs, her sniffed out but ignored by the canines. this was to show the reach and power of the society and to prove what the society was capable of protecting their members from.

connection ideas ;;

dealing: hana is not a big user herself, IF ever, it would be rare that she uses, however, naturally that is because she likes cleanly passing product to those who know she carries and receives shipments through her family. she’s not the type to pass all over campus and at parties, it’s more elite and private than that. she will always have cocaine within her grasp, ritalin, adderall to pass off quickly and quietly. she will not look at someone fondly if asked for drugs she considers trash like heroine or meth or cannabis. she won’t knock anyone for it, it’s none of her business nor does she care, but she might simply pretend she didn’t hear or see them at all. think of her as the cool big sister in this department i guess or a bad influence, both probably.??

spoiled, rich, elitist…and cultured?: hana was raised very cultured to western europe so if your bb frequented places such as germany, italy, france, austria or switzerland, on holidays, long summer months spent on yachts or in vineyards, museums and the like, they may know her that way. so connections with long-time friends thick with spoiled elitist trash summers…is basically her aesthetic. if someone speaks other languages she’ll likely want private conversations that soothe the ‘homesick’ feeling. she’s majoring modern languages and also just native german herself.

from around: hana is one of those people in the lives of those she knows, who is just always around, not in hovering sense ever she is far to reclusive in her own rights for that, but…that girl they met when their parents shipped them off, that girl they met again years later and remembered, in a sense of consistency, there and then gone, but always sort of …there.

family friends: her dad is a rich piece of shit tbh working organized crime, her mother is an angel that’s just too sweet for someone a little salty like hana to stomach for long, so maybe family parties were held and they met that way, maybe they both hated the parties and had no one else to talk to but each other, and hated that more, or maybe it became almost a sibling relationship and banter happens, as well as,…hana having someone to call first when she’s gone and done something her father would be proud of them both, while her mother sinks into the family’s catholic church to pray over both of their sorry asses. (crimes likely for this connection: basic street crimes, drugs, interrogation if it comes down to a problematic person needing to be dealt with, basic mayhem on a whim.)

confidant: likely the first person hana goes to if there is ever a problem she is having, even for just a talk or advice as a friend, no big deal mostly, but this person is likely someone she looks up to greatly as a mentor over her, someone who’s more the first to know things about her, truths about her, and the on-goings in her life.

know your worth: all in all she might not be impressed with someone. she knows what she wants and where she’s going, this can be a negative connection where she just does not see them belonging anywhere near her, but that doesn’t mean that can’t develop into something else. bc it should!! this could be a connection where she’s more likely to push someone to the brink or challenge someone harder if they need a push, negative or positive. either she’s amused by someone’s failures because they’re proving her right, or she really does want to see someone succeed. 

these are just ‘themed starting points’, seriously hmu with ‘familial, rival, platonic, ex, etc’ and i will run with it.

a little about me CHELS ;;

i’m a capricorn

and a slytherin...

honestly this might say enough, whether it’s a good thing or a bad thing..i’m not sure tbh. 

[lajuliettebeauchamp]

(  ayca aysin turan, female, she/her) — a member of the  [   beauchamp  ]  family seeks entry to the society !  [ juliette  ]  is a  [ 28]  year old   [  fashion model ]  who hails from  [ new york  ]  ,  who call them  [  saccharine ]  .  although their peers know them for being  [ kindhearted  ]  and  [ warm ]  ,  their reputation for being  [   gullible ]  and  [  materialistic  ]  might hinder their relations with current society members. while the  [ beauchamp ]  family is known for  [ being famous in hollywood  ]  ,  the society’s hopeful  [  pandora ]  is better remembered by  [  painted lips and winged eyes, circle of friends who only appear on socials, cameras flashing in face at shows and events  ]  .  initial reports say their goal of  [  september issue of vogue ]  would be their first priority after being inducted, although who’s to say that won’t change ?    ———   (  ooc annie & central & 23 & she/her )

BASICS.

Name: juliette Charlotte beauchamp Nickname: julia, jules, julie Gender & Pronouns: female she/her Age & DOB: 23 april 1992 Zodiac sign: taurus Orientation: bisexual  Nationality: american with turkish descent Ethnicity: white; turkish; french Religion: n/a Neuroses: n/a

HISTORY.

Hometown: los angeles, california Father: dennis beauchamp  Mother: scarlette asker-beauchamp  Siblings, if any: n/a Extended family: a few aunts on her mother’s side Educational background:

brentwood school; where juliette took extracurricular activities in ballet and cheerleading

gap year when an agency discovered her and she began modeling

new york university; juliette attended for 2 years before deciding to focus on her modeling career. she would have graduated with a bachelor’s in english and history

Languages spoken: english & french Occupational history: 

started off doing ad campaigns for beauty brands

transitioned into doing model campaigns for fashion 

did a show for marc jacobs and was discovered by other brands

has modeled for all well-known brands and walked over sixty shows

THE SOCIETY.

Codename: pandora  Meaning: Pandora had a jar containing all manner of misery and evil. Zeus sent her to Epimetheus, who forgot the warning of his brother Prometheus and made Pandora his wife. She afterward opened the jar, from which the evils flew out over the earth. Hope alone remained inside, the lid having been shut down before she could escape. In a later story the jar contained not evils but blessings, which would have been preserved for the human race had they not been lost through the opening of the jar out of curiosity. 

Traditionalist or Reformist?: traditionalist  Goals in the society: get to know more people in other circles. the only friends she has beyond the society are invested in being a model and feigning friendships for the media. Opinion on the society: juliette doesn’t have much reserved feelings for the society. she trusts most of everyone in there while also keeping an eye on herself. 

PERSONALITY.

MBTI: INFJ;  INFJs are usually reserved but highly sensitive to how others feel. They are typically idealistic, with high moral standards and a strong focus on the future. INFJs enjoy thinking about deep topics and contemplating the meaning of life. The INFJ type is said to be one of the rarest with just one to three percent of the population exhibiting this personality type. Enneagram: advocate/idealist  Temperament: peaceful phlegmatic Hogwarts House: ravenclaw Inspirations/Parallels: lily rose depp, gigi hadid, karli kloss Tropes: the confidant, social climber, the fashionista 

YOUR MUSE AS ..:

A piece of art: The Water Lily Pond Claude Monet A song: to be alone, hozier A book:  Pygmalion George Bernard Shaw A movie: Notting Hill  A TV show: Bold Type, Sex and the City A historical era: 90s A historical figure: audrey hepburn  A fictional character: andy from devil wears prada   A colour: yellow An animal: cat

YOUR MUSE’S DREAM ..:

Job: fashion editor or critique  Vacation: paris  Day: not having anything to do and be able to see her friends and family As a child: to be a screenplay writer Last night: too many lights That they gave up on: being normal That they have right now: be more social and extroverted. make a change by using her platform

[random-thought-depository]

Re: my last post: I started thinking along those lines when I read this section of Charles Mann’s 1491:

“Who today would want to live in the Greece of Plato and Socrates, with its slavery, constant warfare, institutionalized pederasty, and relentless culling of surplus population? Yet Athens had a coruscating tradition of rhetoric, lyric drama, and philosophy. So did Tenochtitlan and the other cities in the Triple Alliance. In fact, the corpus of writings in classical Nahuatl, the language of the Alliance, is even larger than the corpus of texts in classical Greek.

The Nahuatl word tlamatini (literally "he who knows things") meant something akin to "thinker-teacher" - a philosopher, if you will. The tlamatini, who "himself was writing and wisdom," was expected to write and maintain the codices and live in a way that set a moral example. "He puts a mirror before others," the Mexica said. In what may have been the first large-scale compulsory education program in history, every male citizen of the Triple Alliance, no matter what his social class, had to attend one sort of school or another until the age of sixteen. Many tlamatinime (the plural form of the word) taught at the elite academies that trained the next generation of priests, teachers, and high administrators.

Like Greek philosophy, the teachings of the tlamatinime were only tenuously connected to the official dogma of Tlacaelel. ... But the tlamatinime shared the religion's sense of the evanescence of existence. "Truly do we live on Earth?" asked a poem or song attributed to Nezahualcoyotl (1402-72), a founding figure in Mesoamerica thought and the tlatoani of Texcoco, one of the other two members of the Triple Alliance. His lyric, among the most famous in the Nahuatl canon, answers its own question:

Not forever on earth; only a little while here. Be it jade, it shatters. Be it gold, it breaks. Be it a quetzal feather, it tears apart. Not forever on earth; only a little while here.

In another verse assigned to Nezahualcoyotl this theme emerged even more baldly:

Like a painting, we will be erased. Like a flower, we will dry up here on earth. Like plumed vestments of the precious bird, That precious bird with the agile neck, We will come to an end.

Contemplating mortality, thinkers in many cultures have drawn solace from the prospect of life after death. This consolation was denied to the Mexica, who were agonizingly uncertain about what happened to the soul. "Do flowers go to the region of the dead?" Nezahualcoyotl asked. "In the Beyond are we still dead or do we live?" Many if not most tlamatinime saw existence as Nabokov feared: "a brief crack of light between two eternities of darkness."

In Nahuatl rhetoric, things were frequently represented by the unusual device of naming two of their elements - a kind of doubled Homeric epithet. Instead of directly mentioning his body, a poet might refer to "my hand, my foot" (noma nocxi), which the savvy listener would know was a synecdoche, in the same way that readers of English know that writers who mention "the crown" are actually talking about the entire monarch, and not just the headgear. Similarly, the poet's speech would be "his word, his breath" (itlatol ihiyo). A double-barreled term for "truth" is neltilitztli tzintliztli, which means something like "fundamental truth, true basic principle." In Nahuatl, the words almost shimmer with connotation: what was true was well grounded, stable and immutable, enduring above all.

Because we human beings are transitory, our lives as ephemeral as dreams, the tlamatinime suggested that immutable truth is by its nature beyond human experience. On the ever-changing earth, wrote Leon-Portilla, the Mexican historian, "nothing is 'true' in the Nahuatl sense of the word." Time and again, the tlamatinime wrestled with this dilemma. How can beings of the moment grasp the perduring? It would be like asking a stone to understand mortality.

According to Leon-Portilla, one exit from this philosophical blind alley was seen by the fifteenth-century poet Ayocuan Cuetzpaltzin, who described it metaphorically, as poets will, by invoking the coyolli bird, known for its bell-like song:

He goes his way singing, offering flowers. And his words rain down Like jade and quetzal plumes. Is this what pleases the Giver of Life? Is that the only truth on earth?

Ayocuan's remarks cannot be fully understood out of the Nahuatl context, Leon-Portilla argued. "Flowers and song" was a standard double epithet for poetry, the highest art; "jade and quetzal feathers" was a synecdoche for great value, in the way Europeans might refer to "gold and silver." The song of the bird, spontaneously produced, stands for aesthetic inspiration. Ayocuan was suggesting, Leon-Portilla said, that there is a time when humankind can touch the enduring truths that underlie our fleeting lives. That time is at the moment of artistic creation. "From whence come the flowers [the artistic creations] that enrapture man?" asks the poet. "The songs that intoxicate, the lovely songs?" And he answers: "Only from His [that is, Omoteotl's] home do they come, from the innermost part of heaven." Through art alone, the Mexica said, can human beings approach the real.

Cut short by Cortes, Mexica philosophy did not have the chance to reach as far as Greek or Chinese philosophy. But surviving testimony intimates that it was well on its way. The stacks of Nahuatl manuscripts in Mexican archives depict the tlamatinime meeting to exchange ideas and gossip, as did the Vienna Circle and the French philosophes and the Taisho-period Kyoto school. The musings of the tlamatinime occurred in the intellectual neighborhoods frequented by philosophers from Brussels to Beijing, but the mix was entirely the Mexica's own. Voltaire, Rousseau, and Hobbes never had a chance to speak with these men or even know of their existence - and here, at last, we begin to appreciate the enormity of the calamity, for the disintegration of native America was a loss not just to those societies but to the human enterprise as a whole.

Having grown separately for millennia, the Americas were a boundless sea of novel ideas, dreams, stories, philosophies, religions, moralities, discoveries, and all the other products of the mind. Few things are more sublime or characteristically human than the cross-fertilization of cultures. The simple discovery by Europe of the existence of the Americas caused an intellectual ferment. How much grander would have been the tumult if Indian societies had survived in full splendor!” - Charles Mann, 1491.

The obvious subtext, of course, is that this is completely erased from the pop culture memory of the Aztecs, and we mostly only remember the ugliest parts of Aztec culture. I feel this section of 1491 is very poignant.

And it makes me imagine something like... the Worldwar books, but the Race won and completely conquered Earth in the 1940s, and a historian in that world writing centuries later, writing about Martin Luther and Kant and Nietzsche and German Romanticism and German Expressionism and the Institute of Sexology so on, in a world where nobody but specialist historians remembers these things, and writing about them in this sort of tone of “Did you know there was more to German culture than Nazism? Did you know that Nazi ideology was only one particularly nasty part of a much bigger, older, richer culture, and that bigger culture included very cool, interesting, beautiful things that were only very tenuously connected to Nazism or were even opposed to it? Wild, huh? Really makes you think!”

[margridarnauds]

angel-starbeam replied to your post: Gotta love how Tumblr buys into Victorian...

Elaborate please.

I’m not sure if I’m ultimately elaborating or just tossing word vomit into the void here, but here goes nothing!

Obviously, this is dealing more with the specific phenomenon that I’ve noticed re: posts about Europe being essentially unwashed savages while everywhere else was going through some sort of golden age. Which! Around the world, people were doing cool things. Obviously, discussing the events of, say, the Golden Age of Islam or the achievements of the Aztecs and Mayans are important, especially when it comes to combatting Eurocentrism in the study of history.

But, at the same time, there’s absolutely no need to do that while throwing the Middle Ages under the bus, and it’s right next to the idea that somehow all knowledge of the ancient world died after some singular burning of the Library of Alexandria and oh, how painful, we all had to go through the DARK AGES. (Which. No one dealing with the field calls it “The Dark Ages.” Because it wasn’t.) 

Sanitation wasn’t AS GOOD as practiced in, say, the times of the Romans, depending on where you are in Europe and in what time during the nearly thousand years that we call the Middle Ages you’re situated in. (I repeat: A THOUSAND YEARS. THE ENTIRE CONTINENT. Like, that would be the same as lumping people in the present with people who lived in the 11th century and not taking into account regional diversity. It’d almost be like, you know, completely generalizing a 3000 year old civilization. I mean, who would even do that?)Because the Romans had aqueducts all over the place and were meticulous about their cleaning. (Though they also used a little sponge on a stick to wipe themselves with after going to the bathroom.) But, if you’re in one of the Nordic countries during this time, you’re going to have a wash day, and we know they washed their faces every morning. (The idea that they cleansed themselves without washing the bowl is something that has been heavily debated, but the general consensus I’ve personally seen is “they washed it in-between cleanings”.) We have Anglo-Saxon writers talking about the Vikings and essentially going, “Stupid Norsemen with their fancy hair and their wash days and their jewelry, looting our country, running off with our women. What do they have that we don’t?” 

Around the rest of Europe, we know that the common people had communal baths and, for the nobles, they would have their own individual baths, occasionally using it as a source of bonding (much like the Romans did, when they would conduct business together). We get a lovely account of Charlemagne that says that, “he would invite not only his sons to bathe with him, but his nobles and friends as well, and occasionally even a crowd of attendants and bodyguards, so that sometimes a hundred men or more would be in the water together.” And I’ll take this one moment to also mention that one of the most famous legends of the Middle Ages, Melusine, literally revolves around a woman being left in the privacy of her bath as one of the terms of her marriage (which is then broken. Which then causes problems. Because you don’t break prohibitions like that when it comes to marriages in medieval literature. It never ends well.)

And, of course, since we’re not just talking hygiene, but a general outlook on culture, which is such a BROAD category as far as talking “sophistication” and “advancement”, I will remind whoever might be willing to read this that medieval manuscripts and stained glass windows are two of the things we IMMEDIATELY spring to when we think “The Middle Ages” and both of them are time consuming, meticulous activities. To give a hint: As an amateur stained glass artist, I can spend probably about 10 hours non-stop on a project of about 40-60 pieces, supposing I already had the glass on hand and a pattern in place. That involves cutting the design out, tracing it in the glass, labelling it, cutting the glass out, getting it sawed to size, foiling it, and then sautering it. The pieces you see in a cathedral, like at Chartres? 

Those are THOUSANDS of pieces, most of which was made in an approximately 35 year period from about 1200-1235. Like, Chartres originally had 176 glass WINDOWS. I can’t even begin to imagine it. And, also. You’re working with GLASS. AKA “One wrong move and you will feel the pain of a thousand cuts.” Ask a stained glass artist. They’ll have stories. And when I’m working, I’m working with the advantage of modern equipment to cut the glass out. And the one thing they did at Chartres that I still can’t do? Painting. So, not only did those pieces of glass have to be perfectly cut and put into place, but THEN they had to be painted. The folds in the robes, the faces on the angels and the saints, the detailing along the edges...all that stuff is painted on. And with a lot of that glass? We can’t replicate those colors anymore. And, I mean, Chartres wasn’t the ONLY cathedral with stained glass in Europe at the time, just probably the best surviving one of the group. 

And, of course, in terms of manuscripts... 

So, yeah, Europe was a “cultural backwater” that was creating breathtaking works of art that took DECADES to create. And, of course, all of this relies on the idea of “Europe” and “The rest of the world’ being isolated which SURPRISE they weren’t. Like, you’ve got Greek and Roman books going to the Middle East, then being translated, then having Arabic natural philosophers working with the ideas and improving on them, then them being brought back to Europe  and translated, usually into Latin because it was the language of the academics and the learned AKA the only ones who were rich enough to buy this type of thing. You’ve got Arabic writers traveling around the place, writing about what they’ve seen, like Ahmad ibn Fadlan. And of course up until Isabella and Ferdinand commit genocide during the Reconquista, you’ve got the Moors in Spain. So, while the majority population of Europe was what we’d call white today, to just lump it all together into a homogenized group to prop up another location really only serves to, for want of a more academic term, shit on EVERYONE ELSE who was in Europe at the time. Like, it’s not just inaccurate, it’s buying into the idea propagated by white supremacists that the face of the Middle Ages was a bunch of white men. 

Alright, now that I’ve probably spent way too long on this part of the rant, onto the “Victorian propaganda”. And, really, I’m being overly harsh on the Victorians here, because the Renaissance (lit. “Rebirth) and the Enlightenment’s also to blame and really set the stage, posturing themselves as the successors to Greek and Roman thought after centuries of darkness. “Enlightenment” - “Dark Ages”, the idea is kind of in the words used to describe them. Which completely ignores the long, long history of natural and other forms of philosophy in the Middle Ages that made it possible for Voltaire, Descartes and co. to so much as wipe their noses. The Middle Ages becomes a time of religion and superstition, not like our time, oh no, we’re above that. We’re Free Thinkers™. This is also where we get the idea of “Gothic” architecture being used to describe medieval architecture, because OH MY GOD HOW BARBARIC. IT’S NOT GREEK. (Yes, they were the equivalent of those fifteen year olds who post melancholy comments on YouTube videos of 60s songs about how “Teens today don’t understand REAL music.) And what’s the classic setting for the 18th century gothic novel? A medieval castle or an abbey, filled with leftovers from the barbaric past, focusing on heightened emotions and the supernatural, as opposed to the focus on reason that characterized the era, especially as exemplified by the French Revolution which attempted to turn rational ideals into political reality. (Whether they succeeded or not, and if they didn’t then WOULD they have if not for *insert factor here* is another discussion altogether and would probably cost me my life.)

That being said, the term would become popularized during the 19th century, so I’m rolling with that. 

But, the Victorians brought one MAJOR development that would kind of determine how ideas of race and civilization would be dealt with for many, many years, Darwin’s On the Origin of Species. And, as soon as the book hits, people start talking about it, the good, the bad, and the ugly. And here, we’re definitely dealing with the UGLY. 

“This aggressive colonial competition at the end of the century drew support from supposedly scientific and biological ideas about racial superiority and inferiority. Darwin’s Descent of Man suggested a graduated evolutionary chain of development. It seemed to sanction ideas of ‘primitive’ peoples supposedly lower on the evolutionary scale than the white Europeans who were invariably presented as the model of evolved civilisation.”

Now, obviously, this idea was used first and foremost to deal with race. BUT if white Europeans are more “evolved” then they have to have evolved from something, and the Middle Ages were convenient to this image, especially when the Enlightenment had already done a decent job of beginning to distort the record. If humans were animals, descended from primates, then, by this manner of thinking, the history of humanity is evolution in action, with the weak being weeded out by the strong and the humanity of centuries past being obviously less involved than the humanity of the present. As Lewis Henry Morgan wrote, “It can now be asserted upon convincing evidence that savagery preceded barbarism in all the tribes of mankind, as barbarism is known to have preceded civilization.” It’s a very convenient, nice little ladder that they’ve created there, and it’s one that conveniently throws anyone who’s not a white Victorian male under the bus.

I wouldn’t say that Darwinism necessarily created anything NEW in terms of dealing with Middle Ages, but it did provide confirmation to Victorian males that they were The Pinnacle of Evolution and that the human race is moving in a grand new direction that will eventually eliminate Lesser Societies (gee, I wonder how THAT theory could be used and abused.) And, of course, with Darwinism, you have the debate between science and religion, the Middle Ages being heavily associated with religion...it’s a mess. 

However, in all fairness to the 19th century, these ideas weren’t NECESSARILY the only belief in vogue, as some people also viewed the Middle Ages through a highly nostalgic lens, looking back at a simpler time, before the Enlightenment. “Many of the qualities the Romantics saw in the period – elevation of faith over rationalism; devotion to hierarchy, tradition, and authority; emphasis on communal rather than individual artistic and intellectual achievement – were the same as those recognized by Renaissance and Enlightenment thinkers, only viewed in positive rather than negative terms, prompted by rejection of modernity, religious revival, or some combination of the two.” This was a period of time that was still dealing with the CATACLYSMIC affects of the French Revolution a century before. Which is also why so many white supremacists like to wank over it. Because it reminds them of a happier, nicer time with strict gender roles and little cultural diversity. (NEWSFLASH ASSHOLES: THAT ISN’T WHAT HAPPENED. AT ALL. FUCK OUT OF MY FIELD. but i digress) 

(Okay, technically this comes from 1900, so not a 19th century painting, but STILL Victorian.)

 Which also gives you a harsh BACKLASH, as people start to rebut that by painting the Middle Ages as a period where science was sacrificed to religion, most notably in the White-Draper Conflict thesis, which, suffice it to say, is INSANELY simplistic. And you’ve got people like Auguste Comte who expressed a high regard for both the Middle Ages AND Darwin in his creation of Positivism, which earned him some amount of scorn, such as when Auguste Blanqui wrote, “These blind systematisers’ mania for progress regardless of what happens even leads them to indict, as a reactionary movement and negative impulse, the renaissance of Greco-Latin letters, and according to them this victory over the loathsome works of the Middle Ages was a backwards step.” You’d almost get the idea he didn’t like it. This is also, incidentally, where we get the idea that everyone in the Middle Ages was rolling around, believing that the Earth was flat. Because of course everyone in the Middle Ages was a religious nut. (Note: I’m saying this as an atheist.) 

So, really, there’s a heavy amount of religion VS science, romanticism VS rationalism, etc. 

Really, and this is my own personal opinion/open-ended question that I’m not really sure can ever be answered, any take on “civilized” and “uncivilized” or any real barometer for advancement of cultures is going to be flawed, because ultimately what are you using as your yardstick? Are we really that far up the imperialism ass still that we’re judging historical cultures by how closely they resemble us, with everyone else being “primitives”, or, to use the language of the God-awful Tumblr post, a “cultural backwater”? Does it have to be in ALL areas, or just in a few? If a civilization practices human sacrifice on a massive scale but builds some awesome monuments, do they get the “more civilized than the others” stamp? Hey, at least they had running water! What about if they give rape the death penalty, but only if it’s a free woman? What standards of living do they have to have to make the cut? Is there a minimal limit for monuments, and if so, how are we judging what a monument is?

We all want to show that our pet favorites are “advanced,” that they did marvelous things so much better than everywhere else, but I’m not sure anyone’s willing to have the conversation on what “better” or “advanced” mean in this instance. 

Tl;dr: The Middle Ages were not as filthy as they’ve been made out to be, they DID produce cultural artifacts of great beauty, and do we really want to use descriptions of “cultural backwaters” and “progress” and “advancement” that rely heavily on notions popularized during the 18th and 19th centuries as a means of justifying imperialism? Especially when said notion promotes the idea, POPULARIZED BY WHITE SUPREMACISTS, that the Middle Ages in Europe were populated by a homogenous white population? Like, is that the hill you really want to die on, Tumblr? Is it really? 

[divinum-pacis]

History of Rosicrucianism

The Rosicrucian Order, AMORC, is known internationally by its traditional and authentic title, the Ancient and Mystical Order Rosae Crucis, from which is derived the acronym “AMORC.” The Ancient and Mystical Order Rosae Crucis is the Latin form of the organization’s name, which literally translates into the Ancient Mystical Order of the Rose Cross. There is no religious connotation associated with this symbol; the Rose Cross symbol predates Christianity. The cross symbolically represents the human body and the rose represents the individual’s unfolding consciousness. Together, the rose and cross represent the experiences and challenges of a thoughtful life well lived. Thus, by our name and symbol we represent the ancient Rosicrucian Tradition, perpetuating the true traditions of Rosicrucian movements from centuries past to the present day.

The history of the Rosicrucian Order, AMORC, may be divided into two general classifications: traditional and chronological. The traditional history consists of mystical allegories and fascinating legends that have been passed down for centuries by word of mouth. The Rosicrucian Order’s chronological accounts are based on specific dates and verifiable facts.

Roots in the Ancient World

The Rosicrucian movement, of which the Rosicrucian Order, AMORC, is the most prominent modern representative, has its roots in the mystery traditions, philosophy, and myths of ancient Egypt dating back to approximately 1500 BCE. In antiquity the word “mystery” referred to a special gnosis, a secret wisdom. Thousands of years ago in ancient Egypt select bodies or schools were formed to explore the mysteries of life and learn the secrets of this hidden wisdom. Only sincere students, displaying a desire for knowledge and meeting certain tests were considered worthy of being inducted into these mysteries. Over the course of centuries these mystery schools added an initiatory dimension to the knowledge they transmitted.

 It is further traditionally related that the Order’s first member-students met in secluded chambers in magnificent old temples, where, as candidates, they were initiated into the great mysteries. Their mystical studies then assumed a more closed character and were held exclusively in temples which had been built for that purpose. Rosicrucian tradition relates that the great pyramids of Giza were most sacred in the eyes of initiates. Contrary to what many historians believe, our tradition relates that the Giza pyramids were not built to be the tombs of pharaohs, but were actually places of study and mystical initiation. The mystery schools, over centuries of time, gradually evolved into great centers of learning, attracting students from throughout the known world. 

Pharaoh Thutmose III, who ruled Egypt from 1500 to 1447 BCE, organized the first esoteric school of initiates founded upon principles and methods similar to those perpetuated today by the Rosicrucian Order, AMORC. Decades later Pharaoh Amenhotep IV was initiated into the secret school. This most enlightened pharaoh—history’s first monotheist—was so inspired by the mystery teachings that he gave a completely new direction to Egypt’s religion and philosophy. He established a religion which recognized the Aton, the solar disk, as being the symbol of the sole deity—the foundation of life itself, the symbol of Light, Truth, and Joy—and changed his name to Akhnaton to reflect these new ideas. And although the earlier religion was later reestablished, the mystical idea was put forth in human consciousness, and its flame never died. 

Centuries later, Greek philosophers such as Thales and Pythagoras, the Roman philosopher Plotinus, and others, journeyed to Egypt and were initiated into the mystery schools. They then brought their advanced learning and wisdom to the Western world. Their experiences are the first records of what eventually grew and blossomed into the Rosicrucian Order. The name of the Order, as it is now known, was to come much later. However, the Rosicrucian Order always perpetuated its heritage of ancient symbolism and principles.

Early European Beginnings

It was in the time of Charlemagne (742–814) that the French philosopher Arnaud introduced the mystical teachings into France, and from there they spread to much of Western Europe. Throughout medieval Europe mystical knowledge was often necessarily couched in symbolism or disguised and hidden in the love songs of Troubadours, the formularies of Alchemists, the symbolical system known as the Kabbalah, and the rituals of Orders of Knighthood. 

While much of medieval Europe lay in darkness, the highly advanced Arab civilization preserved a large body of the mystical teachings through texts translated directly from the great libraries of the ancient world, such as Egypt’s Alexandria Library. Philosophy, medicine, mathematics, and alchemy were all important subjects preserved in these libraries and later transmitted to Europe by way of the Arabs. 

Alchemy—the art of transmutation—came into prominence with the Alexandrian Greeks. It was then introduced to the Arabs, who then transmitted this art and forerunner of chemistry to Europe. The alchemists played a tremendous part in the early history of the Rosicrucian Order. While many alchemists were interested in making gold, some were more concerned with the transmutation of human character. European alchemists and Knights Templar, in contact with the Arab civilization at the time of the Crusades, brought much of this wisdom to the West. In Europe the transcendental alchemists—mystics and philosophers—sought to transmute the base elements of human character into the more noble virtues and to release the wisdom of the divine self within the individual. Some of the renowned alchemists who were also Rosicrucians or were closely associated with them were Albertus Magnus, Roger Bacon, Paracelsus, Cagliostro, Nicholas Flamel, and Robert Fludd. 

As the saying goes, “The truth shall make you free.” Consequently, those who sought Truth and attempted to expound it to their fellow humans became the objects of persecution by tyrannical rulers or narrow religious systems. For several centuries, due to the lack of freedom of thought, the Order had to conceal itself under various names. However, in all times and places the Order never ceased its activities, perpetuating its ideals and its teachings, participating directly or indirectly in the advancement of the arts, sciences, and civilization in general, and always emphasizing the equality of men and women and the true solidarity of all humanity. As the Renaissance burst upon Europe with a flash of new interest in the arts and sciences, a mysterious publication printed in seventeenth century Germany and called the Fama Fraternitatis heralded a renewed interest in Rosicrucianism throughout Europe.

The Fama introduces Christian Rosenkreuz, a mythical character who was said to have traveled to centers of learning in the Near East and who personified the revived interest in esoteric studies and mystical learning. 

As part of this great renewal, the renowned Sir Francis Bacon (1561–1626), English philosopher, essayist, and statesperson, directed the Rosicrucian Order and its activities both in England and on the continent.

Cross the Atlantic

In the late seventeenth century, following a plan originally proposed by Francis Bacon in The New Atlantis, a colony of Rosicrucian leaders was organized to establish the Rosicrucian arts and sciences in America. In 1694 Rosicrucian settlers made the perilous journey across the Atlantic Ocean in a specially chartered vessel, the Sarah Maria, under the leadership of Johannes Kelpius, master of a Rosicrucian Lodge in Europe. Landing in Philadelphia, the colonists established their first settlement and later moved further west in Pennsylvania. These Rosicrucian communities made valuable contributions to the newly emerging American culture in the fields of printing, philosophy, the sciences, and arts. Later, such eminent Americans as Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, and Thomas Paine were intimately connected with the Rosicrucian community. In fact, many Rosicrucians played an important role in the great alchemical and social process leading to the founding of a new nation. 

Throughout history, there have been periods of greater and lesser activity of Rosicrucianism around the world. While inactive in the Americas during the nineteenth century, the Order was very active in France, Germany, Switzerland, Russia, Spain, and other lands during this time. 

In 1909 the American businessperson and philosopher H. Spencer Lewis journeyed to France, where he was duly initiated into the Rosicrucian Order and chartered with the responsibility of renewing Rosicrucian activity in America. With H. Spencer Lewis as its president, the Rosicrucian Order, AMORC, was incorporated in 1915 in New York City. In 1927 the Order moved its headquarters to San Jose, California—the site of present-day Rosicrucian Park. 

Over the past century hundreds of thousands of people have been students of the Rosicrucian teachings. From the beginning, both men and women have played an equal role in the Rosicrucian Order, without regard to religion or race.

Throughout history a number of prominent persons in the fields of science and the arts have been associated with the Rosicrucian movement, such as Leonardo da Vinci (1452–1519), Cornelius Heinrich Agrippa (1486–1535), Paracelsus (1493–1541). Francois Rabelais (1494–1553), Theresa of Avila (1515–1582), John of the Cross (1542–1591), Francis Bacon (1561–1626), Robert Fludd (1574–1637), Jacob Boehme (1575–1624), Rene Descartes (1596–1650), Blaise Pascal (1623–1662), Baruch Spinoza (1632– 1677), Isaac Newton (1642–1727), Gottfried Wilhelm Leibnitz (1646–1716), Benjamin Franklin (1706–1790), Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826), Michael Faraday (1791–1867), Ella Wheeler Wilcox (1850–1919), Marie Corelli (1855–1924), Claude Debussy (1862– 1918), Erik Satie (1866–1925), and Edith Piaf (1916–1963). Today’s Rosicrucian legacy consists of a vast collection of knowledge which has come down to us through many centuries to enrich the cultural and spiritual heritage of AMORC. To the knowledge passed on by the sages of ancient Egypt were added philosophical concepts expressed by the great thinkers of ancient Greece, India, and the Arab world. Then, a few centuries later, the mystical precepts of Rosicrucian alchemists of the Middle Ages were formulated, followed by the vast expansion of knowledge which occurred from the Renaissance to the present day.

Source: The Mastery of Life, pgs. 19-23

[mas-lina]

ASK GAME

65 Questions You Aren't Used To

1. Do you ever doubt the existence of others than you? - sometimes i wonder if the people i like from afar are just a figment of my imagination since i have never met them in real life.

2. On a scale of 1-5, how afraid of the dark are you? - i’d say about 2 since i’m only scared occasionally if i have watched something creepy and my mind is running wild.

3. The person you would never want to meet? - does hitler count? aside from him and all the dictators that have ruined the world i’d say all the people i knew in high school and about everyone in my old town.

4. What is your favorite word? - i used to say it’s “bitch” just for the laughs of it but it’s actually “patootie” because it sounds cute and idiotic at the same time and i remember reading it in a shakespeare poem once and laughing like crazy.

5. If you were a type of tree, what would you be? - i guess i’d be a baobab tree because it’s sturdy and it sounds like my nickname “baba”.

6. When you looked in the mirror this morning what was the first thing you thought? - “seriously why are the bags under my eyes so dark and big?”

7. What shirt are you wearing? - a simple black shirt.

8. What do you label yourself as? - if it’s in regards to sexuality i’m a bisexual and if it’s everything else i’m a curious idiot.

9. Bright room or dark room? - dark room.

10. What were you doing at midnight last night? - sitting on my laptop watching “100 days my prince”.

11. Favorite age you’ve been so far? - i don’t think i’ve reached my favourite age yet but if i have to pick one i’d say about 19 because i went to live with my best friend and started a new life away from everyone else so in a way i became independent. 

12. Who told you they loved you last? - i guess my mom although i don’t remember when.

13. Your worst enemy? - my laziness and lack of will.

14. What is your current desktop picture? - monsta x’s minhyuk <3

15. Do you like someone? - in real life i have no romantic interest.

16. The last song you listened to? - dreamcatcher - wonderland

17. You can press a button that will make any one person explode. Who would you blow up? - myself so i can see how it feels.

18. Who would you really like to just punch in the face? - sometimes my family members drive me up the wall to a point where i’d think about punching them in the face.

19. If anyone could be your slave for a day, who would it be and what would they have to do? - bill gates and he’d have to buy me whatever i want.

20. What is your best physical attribute? (showing said attribute is optional) - if i have to pick something it would be my eyes because they’re the most distinctive feature i have.

21. If you were the opposite sex for one day, what would you look like and what would you do? - i’d be a huge buff macho man just to see how it feels and i’d probably just ogle myself in the mirror and walk around to see how people react to me.

22. Do you have a secret talent? If yes, what is it? - i can make my fingers look like claws and move them in a weird snappish way.

23. What is one unique thing you’re afraid of? - bacteria.

24. You can only have one kind of sandwich. Every sandwich ingredient known to humankind is at your disposal. - butter on french toast.

25. You just found $100! How are you going to spend it? - on monsta x merchandise and food ^^

26. You just got a free plane ticket to anywhere in the world, but you have to leave immediately. Where are you going to go? - seoul, south korea.

27. An angel appears out of Heaven and offers you a lifetime supply of the alcoholic beverage of your choice. “Be brand-specific” it says. Man! What are you gonna say about that? Even if you don’t drink booze there’s something you can figure out… so what’s it gonna be? - bailey’s is the only alcoholic drink i actually enjoy and would buy myself.

28. You discover a beautiful island upon which you may build your own society. You make the rules. What is the first rule you put into place? - everyone is created equal so there shall be no discrimination regarding race, religion, gender or sexuality.

29. What is your favorite expletive? - motherfucker.

30. Your house is on fire, holy shit! You have just enough time to run in there and grab ONE inanimate object. Don’t worry, your loved ones and pets have already made it out safely. So what’s the one thing you’re going to save from that blazing inferno? - my stuffed animals.......

31. You can erase any horrible experience from your past. What will it be? - watching my pet getting sick knowing she’d eventually die and being unable to help.

32. You got kicked out of the country for being a time-traveling heathen who sleeps with celebrities and has super-powers. But check out this cool shit… you can move to anywhere else in the world! - kanazawa, japan.

33. The Celestial Gates Of Beyond have opened, much to your surprise because you didn’t think such a thing existed. Death appears. As it turns out, Death is actually a pretty cool entity, and happens to be in a fantastic mood. Death offers to return the friend/family-member/person/etc. of your choice to the living world. Who will you bring back? - my grandfather.

34. What was your last dream about? - falling down a flight of stairs.

35. Are you a good dancer? - i’d say decent but i could be better with practice.

36. Have you ever been admitted to the hospital? - thankfully no.

37. Have you ever built a snowman? - many times but never in the design i wanted to.

38. What is the color of your socks? - orange.

39. What type of music do you like? - i like all music but usually i would always gravitate towards rhythm and blues, jazz or classical.

40. Do you prefer sunrises or sunsets? -sunsets.

41. What is your favorite milkshake flavor? - i don’t drink milkshakes but i’d probably enjoy strawberry ones.

42. What football team do you support? (I will answer in terms of American football as well as soccer) - liverpool football club and i’m suffering every day for it.

43. Do you have any scars? - a big one on my knee from when i fell as a child and nearly busted my kneecap.

44. What do you want to be when you graduate? - a boss....kidding :D a writer or researcher.

45. If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be? - the way i look and my attitude towards people demeaning and disrespecting me.

46. Are you reliable? - i really wish i could say i was but i’d have to say no.

47. If you could ask your future self one question, what would it be? - do we still live with the mentality of a 15 year-old or have we grown?

48. Do you hold grudges? - most of the time no but on special occasions i can grow to be vengeful towards someone i dislike.

49. If you could breed two animals together to defy the laws of nature, what new animal would you create? - a penguin with a bird so it will be able to fly.

50. What is the most unusual conversation you’ve ever had? - every conversation i have with my grandmother and all the “advice” she gives me.

51. Are you a good liar? - yes.

52. How long could you go without talking? - i think i’d be able to go about a week if i really put myself to it but i enjoy talking to myself so it might be more difficult than anticipated.

53. What has been you worst haircut/style? - a waffle one where they burnt my hair from the roots just so i could look like a member of a 90s girl group.

54. Have you ever baked your own cake? - the only time i have baked a cake was when my best friend got sick and i wanted to give her something special to cheer her up.

55. Can you do any accents other than your own? - i’m pretty good at an american and a british one. i could even do a bit of scottish and irish if i prictice.

56. What do you like on your toast? - butter.

57. What is the last thing you drew a picture of? - the sun and it looked like a puddle with some rays coming out of it.

58. What would be you dream car? - a smart or a mini cooper.

59. Do you sing in the shower? Or do anything unusual in the shower? Explain. - i do sing in the shower and sometimes i start contemplating my life.

60. Do you believe in aliens? - i believe we can’t be alone in the whole universe but i don’t believe in the made up ufo sightings nor the green little men.

61. Do you often read your horoscope? - i don’t believe in the horoscope nor the zodiac except when i’m looking for a laugh.

62. What is your favorite letter of the alphabet? - my own letter which in english would be B.

63. Which is cooler: dinosaurs or dragons? - dragons are the coolest <3

64. What do you think about babies? - i love and adore babies <3 they are perfect little stupid angels and should be protected at all costs.

65. Who's your favourite classical composer? - beethoven and mozart are untouchable and immortal but if i have to give a less cliche answer besides them i would say claude debussy, rachmaninoff, chopin and johann strauss II. i could go on but i will get boring.

66. A bonus question from me because I'm curious - If you could teleport to one place on this planet right at this moment which would it be and why? - northern canada so i can see the aurora borealis which is at its peak during october, november and december.

[primusicanalysis]

Les Miserables The Best Music Scene!

For anyone who knows musical theater or loves movies with music included in general, you have to watch this movie, based on a French historical novel, which led to the making of the incredible Oscar nominated movie, which truly revolves around war between the rich and poor. The reason why one of my favorite music scenes, are in this, is because it truly deals with a heartbreaking story that I believe still goes on even until this present day. Where men and women both, sometimes have to resort to prostitution in order to live and survive, which can also be seen in our modern times. I love this song, ‘I dreamed a dream’ which you may have also heard in the very famous x-factor season with Susan Boyle, I think it is a great song and truly shows, the beauty of what life is like, as the rich get richer and the poor get poorer, which is really what the movie focuses on. In this song, there is a beautiful line which goes along as “There was a time when men were kind When their voices were soft And their words inviting There was a time when love was blind And the world was a song And the song was exciting There was a timeThen it all went wrongI dreamed a dream in times gone by When hope was high and life worth living I dreamed, that love would never die I dreamed that God would be forgiving Then I was young and unafraid And dreams were made and used and wasted There was no ransom to be paid No song unsung, no wine untasted” 

What I love about this song is that coincides with what reality can be for the majority of people in the world, how the top 1% live lavishly and the rest of the people are in “ransom” as the song says, which can translate to debt of any kind that one must owe someone, specially in our modern times the government and how they don’t truly let you live your dreams freely, because of corporate greed. The song is really sad and Anne Hathaway after winning an Oscar, for her dedication in losing weight for the film and cutting her hair drastically, said, “she still felt sad...” showing how impactful a character can be to someone. The movie did so well, because of it’s musical theater songs and another incredible song, in the movie, that is widely popular is also ‘Do you hear the people sing’ it is so inspirational and empowering, as it talks about the revolution of the people and how they want a better life, and won’t let the government get in the way of that again. I mean a literal lyric in the song is, ‘do you hear the people sing, singing a song of angry men...a people who will NOT be slaves again...’ perhaps to include my own bias in this. I think in our times, it will always be a class war more than anything, race, religion and color make a distraction for what the people should truly be fighting which is the government’s exploitation of everyone that is not filthy rich, And this movie does a great job of that. Here is the song enjoy! :) 

The actors in this film, went on to do more incredible work thanks to this film, of course the legendary Hugh Jackman is in this as well, and what I love in this film, is that the men are vulnerable and show their emotions, as France takes a revolution as well. But they still show their strength by protecting their loved ones and it shows how men don’t just have to be one-dimensional and stoic or angry all the time. But emotional one day and fearless the next. Take a look at this incredible article about the psychology of one-dimensions and how it affects BOTH men and women equally. That is what I love about music and theater, it shows characters in all dimensions, especially this movie. 

[rjtvargas1421]

Most Rev. Michael Curry’s Moving Sermon in #RoyalWedding: A Reminder of What Love Should Be

The Royal Wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle was the most talked about event worldwide in this month of May. One of its highlights is the powerful sermon of Rev. Michael Curry.

He is the first black presiding bishop of Episcopal Church. His ancestors are from the lineage of African slaves. He is a known advocate of social justice and equality.

Everyone was moved with his sermon. The Internet admired how Most Rev. Curry explained and illustrated how love should be. The love he referred to is not simply limited to the love between husband and wife, but to all forms of love in this world.

Indeed, this world will be in a better place with the kind of love he emphasized.

The kind of love that is so strong it can overcome hatred, racism, poverty, inequality, oppression, apathy, and indifference. The kind of love that is so selfless it drives people to be willing to sacrifices their interests for the sake of everyone. The kind of love that is so gentle it teaches patience, persistence, and perseverance despite of repeated hurt, failures, and rejections.

In a world where love truly rules, each one will be in a happy family, assuring relationships, safe community, and progressive country regardless of the age, socio-economic status, religion, race, color, beliefs, ethnicity, and principles.

In a world where love inspires everybody, no one will be left behind. Every conflict and problem are given solutions through the initiative and cooperation of individuals and groups. No more heartbreaking stories on the news caused by war, crime, or poverty because love can propel improvements and breakthroughs to end them all.

We all long and desire for that world full of genuine love where the joy will always surpass the pains. It will be difficult because it needs us to go extra mile, have a change of heart, and focus on the positive always. These struggles will bear a fruitful reward in the end because every action with love has an encouraging ripple effect to ourselves and other people.

In this one life each of us have, let us always be reminded of the great driving force of love behind the things we say, do, and decide in our everyday life.

Read the full transcript of Most Rev. Michael Curry’s Sermon:

“Set me as a seal upon your heart, as a seal upon your arm; for love is strong as death, passion fierce as the grave. Its flashes are flashes of fire, a raging flame. Many waters cannot quench love, neither can floods drown it.” - Song of Songs 8:6-7

The late Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. once said, and I quote:

“We must discover the power of love, the redemptive power of love. And when we discover that, we will be able to make of this old world a new world. Love is the only way.”

There’s power in love. Do not underestimate it. Don’t even over-sentimentalize it. There’s power in love. If you don’t believe me, think about a time when you first fell in love. The whole world seemed to center around you and your beloved. Oh, there’s power, there’s power in love.

Not just in its romantic forms, but any form, any shape of love. There’s a certain sense in which when you are loved and you know it, when someone cares for you and you know it, when you love and you show it, it actually feels right. There’s something right about it.

And there’s a reason for it. The reason has to do with the source. We were made by a power of love. Our lives were and are meant to be lived in that love. That is why we are here. Ultimately the source of love is God himself. The source of all of our lives.

An old medieval poem says it:

“Where true love is found, God himself is there.”

The Bible, 1 John 4 says it this way. “Beloved, let us love one another, because love is from God; Everyone who loves is born of God. Whoever does not love does not know God For God is love.” (1John 4:4-8)

There’s power in love. Love can help and heal when nothing else can. Love can lift up and liberate for living when nothing else will. There’s power in love to show us the way to live. Set me as a seal on your heart, for love is as strong as death.

And the love that brings two people together is the same love that can bind them together, Whether on mountaintops of happiness and through valleys of hardship.

Love is strong as death Its flashes are flashes of fire. Many waters cannot quench love. Love can see you through! There’s power in love.

II

But the love of which we speak is not only for couples getting married or just for interpersonal relationships.

Jesus of Nazareth taught us that the way of love is the way to a real relationship with the God who created all of us, and the way to true relationship with each other as children of that one God, as brothers and sisters in God’s human family.

One scholar said it this way:

“Jesus had founded the most revolutionary movement in human history: a movement built on the unconditional love of God for the world and the mandate to live that love.” (Charles Marsh’s The Beloved Community)

I’m talking about power. Real power — power to change the world.

If you don’t believe me, well, there were some old slaves in America’s antebellum South who explained the dynamic power of love and why it has the power to transform.

They explained it this way — they sang a spiritual, even in the midst of their captivity, it’s one that says: “There is a balm in Gilead to make the wounded whole. There is a balm in Gilead to heal the sin sick soul. If you cannot preach like Peter, And you cannot pray like Paul, You can tell the love of Jesus, How he died to save us all. That’s the balm in Gilead.”

This way of love is the way of life. They got it — he died to save us all. He didn’t die for anything he could get out of it. Jesus did not get an honorary doctorate out of it.

He wasn’t getting anything out of it — He did it for others, for the other, for the good and well being of others. That’s what love is

Love is not selfish and self-centered. Love can be sacrificial. And in so doing, becomes redemptive. And that way of unselfish, sacrificial, redemptive love can change lives and it can change this world.

If you don’t believe me, just stop and think and imagine a world where love is the way.

Imagine our homes and families when this way of love is the way. Imagine our neighborhoods and communities when love is the way. Imagine our governments and nations when love is the way. Imagine business and commerce when this love is the way. Imagine this third old world when love is the way.

No child would go to bed hungry in such a world as that. When love is the way, we will let justice roll down like a might stream and righteousness like an ever-flowing book.

When love is the way, poverty will become history. When love is the way, the earth will be a sanctuary. When love is the way, we will lay down our swords and shields down by the riverside to study war no more.

When love is the way, there’s plenty good room — plenty good room — for all of God’s children. When love is the way, we actually treat each other like we are actually family. When love is the way, we know that God is the source of us all. We are brothers and sisters, children of God.

Brothers and sisters: that’s a new heaven, a new earth, a new world, a new human family.

Let me tell you something: Old Solomon was right in the Old Testament — that’s fire. And with this, I will sit down: we got to get you all married.

III

The late French Jesuit, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, was at once a scientist, a Roman Catholic priest, a theologian, a true mystic. His was one of the great minds and spirits of the 20th century. He suggested that the discovery and harnessing of fire was one of the great scientific and technological discoveries of human history.

Fire, to a great extent, made human civilization possible. Fire made it possible to cook food, thereby reducing the spread of disease. Fire made it possible to stay warm in cold climates, thereby marking human migration around the world a possibility.

Fire made the Bronze Age, the Iron Age, the Industrial Revolution possible. The advances of science and technology are greatly dependent on the human capacity to take fire and use it for human good.

Anybody get here in a car today? Nod your heads if you did. I know there were some carriages.

If you drove here this morning, you did so in part because of harnessed fire. I know that the Bible says I believe that Jesus walked on water, but I have to tell you, I didn’t walk across the Atlantic Ocean to get here.

Controlled fire in that plane got me here. Fire makes it possible for us to text, tweet, email, Instagram and Facebook and socially be dysfunctional with each other. Fire makes all of that possible.

De Chardin said that fire is one of the greatest discoveries in all of human histories. He then went on to say that if humanity ever harnesses the energy of fire again, if humanity ever captures the energy of love, then for the second time in the history of the world, we will have discovered fire.

Love is the very fire and energy of real life!

Dr. King was right: We must discover love. The redemptive power of love. When we do that, we will make of this old world a new world.

“My brother, my sister, God love you, God bless you. My brothers, my sisters, God love you, God bless you. And may God hold us all in those almighty hands of love. Amen.”

Click Here to Return to Homepage

Sources:

http://time.com/5283953/royal-wedding-sermon-transcript/?utm_source=twitter.com&xid=time_socialflow_twitter&utm_campaign=time&utm_medium=social

[thesinglesjukebox]

CHRISTINE AND THE QUEENS - DOESN'T MATTER

[8.25]

Coming very close to being Christine and the Queens of 2018...

Vikram Joseph: Some songs merely build momentum; "Doesn't Matter" climbs to 35,000 feet and holds its cruising altitude with all the poise and grace of a Concorde. Maybe from all the way up there things makes more sense; there are demons to be battled here - ghosts, the void, "the suicidal thoughts that are still in my head" - but in the resoluteness of its rhythm and the cresting, citrus-sour waves of synth, Heloise Letissier tries to find some perspective. "It doesn't matter, does it?" is less nihilism than just a coping mechanism, a deflection - the giveaway is "Uh, forget I said it," a sharply recognisable moment of trying to force feelings back into a pressurised container. In its quiet, elegant desperation, "Doesn't Matter" reminds me of R.E.M.'s "Losing My Religion"; I feel that "Oh no, I've said too much / I haven't said enough" comes close to mirroring the dilemma the protagonist faces here. Like Michael Stipe, Letissier forges beauty from her personal agonies; the soaring, interweaving melodies of the last 90 seconds of this are stunning. [9]

Rebecca A. Gowns: Absolute poetry. An anthem for the times, as piercing and resonant as "Once in a Lifetime," with the musical power of Haim x10 (30 Haim sisters). So good it hurts. [10]

Eleanor Graham: In stark contrast to "Girlfriend"'s playfulness, "Doesn't Matter" sees Letissier pushed to the very edge of reason, but never losing her thrilling lightness of touch. Like Cardi B and Nabokov, she is a non-native English speaker who cracks open whole new possibilities in the language. Set against minimal synths, the muttered prayer "and if I could just push this door chalked on the wall/and if after the void there's somewhere else to fall" is utterly exhilarating. [8]

Josh Love: Between "Girlfriend" and now "Doesn't Matter" I'm definitely getting the feeling Christine's forthcoming album is going to be the one for 2018 that scratches my itch for androgynous 80's-inspired dance-pop, joining the pantheon alongside the likes of MUNA, La Roux, and The Knife/Fever Ray. The two songs are excellent complements to each other too, "Doesn't Matter" all low-slung slinky where "Girlfriend" was sparkly and spunky. [7]

Thomas Inskeep: Electro rather than electro-soul, so not as good as previous single "Girlfriend," still one of my favorites of the year. But I dig the cheerleader-chant rhythm (very "Mickey"), and Chris's vocal style gets further and further under my skin. I suspect this album's gonna be really, really fine. [7]

Alex Clifton: It's been a while since I've heard crisis sound so catchy. One of the reasons I like it is precisely the tension between the lyrics and the backing -- these are thorny topics Chris is dealing with, but that bassline just wedges itself in your head to the point that it mimics the nature of obsessive and crushing thoughts. "Rage as a fabric" is so potent: the idea of wearing rage publicly (and also how it can "unravel" you) is something we've all been grappling with over the past couple of years. If only the world could look as good as this sounds. [8]

Katherine St Asaph: I keep a mental list of short, perfect moments in songs, one of which is the little swell and snap after "strange attraction" in ABBA's "I Am the City." "Doesn't Matter" is like that couple seconds stretched to song length -- which sort of demonstrates why they should remain short moments. The bridge is great but comes a minute too late. [6]

Will Adams: Yes, the French version is once again superior, and yes, the moments when the track reaches for the delicateness I loved in Chaleur Humaine are too brief. But sweeping, existential dancepop will always get a green light from me. [7]

Josh Winters: The beauty of music as an artistic medium is how, in its greatest potential, an expression of the soul manifests as an all-encompassing transference of energy from the creator to the listener, and how this action arouses the intersection between the cerebral, the physical, and the emotional. You feel it in the way it takes over your entire being: how intrinsic rhythms can suddenly make you feel like you can sprint breathlessly until you fall to your knees, how racing thoughts can cause you to spin yourself into a frenzy, how spiritual release can lift you up from the earth and bring you closer to the divine. To be able to embody and communicate such a simple truth may have to involve a long day's journey into the night, but what one finds once you're finally coming out of the dark is as enormous and expansive as the entire universe. [10]

Jonathan Bradley: The unnatural emphases in the chorus ("if I know a-NY e-XIT") bounce against the melody, standing in counterpoint to the harsh synthetic drums stutters spitting intermittently into the mix. "Lately the only people I can stand," Chris sings, "are the unraveled ones with their hands laid bare." The rest of the lyric is filled with unsettling images of "rage as a fabric," a "ribbon-legged" woman and sunlight that comes in shards, but the synths do the real unravelling, evanescing anything earthly from the song. [8]

Dorian Sinclair: There's quite a lot to love about "Doesn't Matter," particularly if, like me, you're someone who had MUNA's About U as one of their favourite albums last year. The part of the song that sticks with me most, though, is a small and subtle thing -- during the bridge, after an entire song where the production is nothing but synth-and-drum, an acoustic piano manages to creep in right at the bottom of the mix before taking greater prominence in the final repetition of the chorus. It's a tiny, tiny detail, but something about it really takes the song to the next level for me and cements it as a favourite of the year so far. [9]

Jacob Sujin Kuppermann: I suspect that if I read the lyrics to this on their own, without the masterfully tense beat (really just a low hum of bass and a dance rhythm) or Chris' vocal performance, which balances passion and worry and yearning and a dozen more emotions even in individual syllables, it would feel like too much empty and disconnected philosophizing. But when "Doesn't Matter" hits you, it erases any of those concerns -- the way it crests in the bridge and outro, as "shards of sunlight" refract through the phrasings, is the highest philosophy of all. [10]

[Read and comment on The Singles Jukebox]

[theiineducation]

We are being Silenced, We are being Blinded

By Frances Bailey

 "Phantsi ngokudundiswa nge Sibhulu phasti, phantsi ngokudundiswa nge Sibhulu phasti!" Down with being taught in Afrikaans, down with being taught in Afrikaans! 

  The day is June 16, 1976, the day of the Soweto uprising, 10 000 students march on Orlando Stadium in protest, their song no longer silenced. They have banded together to speak out. To speak out about injustice, racial oppression and their desire to be educated properly.  "We will not be silenced" said Silindile Khanyile, current Bachelor of Arts student at Rhodes University in 2018, in echo of past sentiment.

  From the time white people set foot in Africa, roughly four hundred years ago, the black population was brutalised, enslaved, oppressed, stolen from and forced off their land and into cheap labour, all by white hands. Power was taken by the white minority while people of colour were subjected to harsh and authoritarian doctrines. White supremacy dominated society and existing political, social and economic systems were taken over and replaced. Western culture and ideology, white privilege and success prevailed at the expense of all things natively African. Black people were forced to assimilate the dominant white culture they were beaten down, degraded, and suppressed as were their cultures, ideologies and identities.

  This was the landscape from which The Black Consciousness Movement (BMC) was built. This movement was the inspiration for the June 16 protests and was first sparked in 1969 with the creation of the South African Students Organisation (SASO), headed by Steve Biko. BCM was designed to provide a platform for Black people to discuss issues particular to them and as a motion against white supremacy. Education was seen as the way forward, as playing a fundamental role in mental and physical liberation and in fostering awareness around Black existence and identity.

 The word 'consciousness' means the state of being aware of and responsive to one's surroundings and refers to a person's awareness and perceptions. BMC encompasses this idea, "Black Consciousness is to understand the injustices that have happened to black people," said Khanyile when asked about what the movement meant to her, "it's to be aware of how black people have been treated over the years, over the centuries.”

  While the values and principles of BMC sought to emphasize awareness of the self, the other and societal injustices and ongoings, the ideology also transcends this as awareness was emphasised to supplement the recognition and acceptance of black identity. According to Khulile Mjo, a second year B.A student at Rhodes, Black Consciousness is a mentality and lifestyle.

  From this we begin to see that Black Consciousness plays an important role in identity. Identity is an important part of being human; it is a necessary. Every individual seeks to discover and create an identity, one which is uniquely theirs. Identity is multifaceted, while it is based in personality many aspects work to define it.

 Identity is expressed in language, music, values, art and literature; it is adopted through family, religion, ritual, public life and material culture. The acceptance and acknowledgement of all these paradigms are important in fostering one's identity and in discovering one's place in the world, but with the forced assimilation of white culture, black identities were squashed.

 "We grow up thinking white people are superior...we need to boost our confidence," said Apiwe Maqungo, a second-year BCom student. BCM sought to encourage pride in one's self as a black individual and in everything which that entails. This boost in confidence lies in the acceptance of one's self, which is difficult to achieve when you are constantly disregarded and put down. The state of education before 1994 further worked to alienate black people from themselves, black students were forced to learn in a white language and the curriculum did not encourage their aspirations, skills and interests. Education did not attempt to mould confident and successful black individuals. Black people were put at a disadvantage and sadly this is a reality which has persisted till today.

Pictured: Aphiwe Maqungo.

 We may fly the rainbow nation banner and celebrate our new democracy. Many of us may think we are free, equal and united, that issues of racism have been snuffed out and that we are a multicultural society which embraces all identities and which gives everyone equal opportunities for education and empowerment. While it may be true that some progress has been made, the issues of subjugation and inequality are not in the past. “They are still prevalent. I know so many people who haven’t had opportunities, who sit in a classroom with 50 to 60 other people”, said  Khanyile,“the majority of Black people still live in townships”.

  With only 40,6% of Africans employed this isn’t surprising. The Matric rate for black students is 10% and while the national average of household expenditure on education is R2 531 per year, black households spend less than that at R1 656 while whites spend three-times the average at R8 069. “Some don’t know about the struggle. It is different in each household, but finance is a common issue," said Zandile Gcumisa, a first-year BCom student at Rhodes.

Pictured: Zandile Gcumisa.

 This is the current reality for many black individuals. If more than half of our population is oppressed, than we are less than half free.

  When asked about where they first learnt about black consciousness only Andile Fani, a B.A student at Rhodes, said she had learnt about it in school. This was in 10th grade history class and she felt it was negatively focused and not taught in enough depth. “The only time we learnt more about other cultures was during heritage week,” said Gcumisa. Every participant remembered learning about Hitler, but not a single one had read any works by Steve Biko, the most popular figure of Black Consciousness, and were less exposed to Es’Kia Mphahele, Njabulo Ndebele or Miriam Tlai. In fact, many of these names aren’t known by black and white individuals alike, but ask about Shakespeare, Einstein or the French revolution and you are sure to get a nod of recognition. While access to internet does aid ignorance, those who do not have this access find themselves in a difficult position.

Pictured: Andile Fani.

 The fact of the matter is that our schools perpetuate inequalities. They are westernised, and they continue to alienate black students. “I’ve been to white schools but then at the same time as being in white environments but growing up in a township, it made me confused,” said Khanyile. “I was trying to fit into a society to which I didn’t belong...I wasn't white enough and I wasn't black enough.” It would seem that the voices of the Black Consciousness Movement have become whispers. Our society is ignoring the wisdom and struggles of our past leaders or purposefully avoiding them.

  South African schools are not doing enough to encourage students to engage with texts from other cultures and perspectives and because of that we are ignorant to them. All of the interviewees felt that Black Consciousness, histories and texts from people of colour should be introduced into the curriculum, starting in primary school. They further felt that everyone should have this knowledge and be involved in the discourse of Black Consciousness. “Everyone should be involved, we need to be inclusive of each other, it’s all about love," said Maqungo.

 While this sentiment may be encouraging to some, not everyone will agree. The introduction of more inclusive texts may foster awareness and recognition of people of colour's cultures, existence and identity in black and white people alike, but white people’s involvement remains a controversy and understandably so. Some felt that white bodies should be allies, while people of colour take the lead; that black people should be dictating the necessary dialogues and discussions while white people listen. Some may even feel that white people should not get involved.

  Whatever the case, I think it should be noted that while this is a “black issue”, it was created by black people, and it cannot be remedied by black people alone. The ideal nature of society dictates that we all depend on one another and the potential of our country cannot be reached when more than half our population is at a systematic disadvantage.

 Furthermore, given that identity is also influenced by external factors and other people, this continued disregard for blackness will perpetuate in day-to-day life and interactions. This could be counteracted if more people, despite their race, are better informed in terms of these multicultural realms of thought. However, the issue at hand is not simple or straightforward and is subject to much discourse. I merely wish to establish questions and provoke thought. The answer to whether black consciousness is an important, teachable ideology depends on all South Africans. It is imperative that we make an educated decision.

[thesewomenarebadass]

Josephine Baker

Freda Josephine McDonald Baker was born on the 3rd of June 1906. She was a French burlesque dancer, singer, dancer and entertainer; an iconic symbol of the jazz age in the 1920s.

Freda Josephine Baker was born in St Louis, Missouri to Carrie McDonald. Her biological father was believed to be Eddie Carson, there was strong evidence that suggested her father was a white man which both she and her family believed, but her mother never told anyone who it was. Josephine lived in 212 Targee Street in the Mill Creek Valley neighbourhood of St Louis. As a child, she was always poorly dressed and hungry, and had little formal education.

When she was eight, Baker began to work as a live-in domestic for white families in St Louis, and when she was thirteen she worked as a waitress at the Old Chauffer’s Club, living in slums on the streets.

In Baker’s teen years, she had a troubled relationship with her mother, who did not want her to become an entertainer. Although Baker returned home with money and gifts for her family, her mother pushed her away.

Baker’s career began doing blackface comedy at a local club. The act landed her a tour in Paris, which would become her home. She opened in La Revenue Nègre in 1925 and became known for her erotic dancing. After touring Europe, she came back to France.

In her later shows, Baker was often accompanied on stage by Chiquita, her pet cheetah. Chiquita often escaped into the orchestra pit, scaring the musicians, which added excitement. She was the most successful American working in France but never attained the same reputation in America.

In 1939, Baker was recruited by French military intelligence as an “honourable correspondent”, meaning she collected whatever information she could about the German armies. When the Germans invaded, she went to her home and took in friends who were eager to help the Free French effort. She travelled through Europe, and she carried transmissions in invisible ink on sheet music to England. Later in 1941, she went to the French colonies in North Africa. She pinned notes with information inside her underwear and befriended the Pasha of Marrakech, whose support helped her through a miscarriage (the last of several). After which, she developed an infection so severe it required a hysterectomy. The infection spread and she developed peritonitis and then septicaemia.

After the war, Baker received the Croix de guerre and the Rosette de la Résistance. She was made a Chevalier of the Légion d'honneur by General Charles de Gaulle.

In 1967, she appeared in a Royal Variety Performance at the London Palladium, and then at the Monacan Red Cross Gala, celebrating her 50 years in French show business. Advancing years and exhaustion began to take their toll; she sometimes had trouble remembering lyrics, and her speeches between songs tended to ramble.

Although based in France, Baker supported the Civil Rights Movement during the 1950s. When she arrived in New York with her husband Jo, they were refused reservations at 36 hotels because of racial discrimination. She was so upset by this treatment that she wrote articles about the segregation in the United States. She gave a talk at Fisk University, a historically black college in Nashville on "France, North Africa And The Equality Of The Races In France". She refused to perform for segregated audiences in the US. Her insistence on mixed audiences helped to integrate live entertainment shows in Las Vegas. After this incident, she began receiving threatening phone calls from people claiming to be the KKK, but said that she was not afraid of them.

In 1951, Baker made charges of racism against Sherman Billingsley's Stork Club in Manhattan, where she alleged she had been refused service. Grace Kelly, who was at the club at the time, rushed over to Baker, took her by the arm and stormed out with her entire party, vowing never to return, the two women became close friends after the incident.

Baker worked with the NAACP. Her reputation as a crusader grew to such an extent that the NAACP had Sunday, May 20, 1951 declared "Josephine Baker Day". She was presented with life membership with the NAACP. The honor she was paid spurred her to further her crusading efforts with the "Save Willie McGee" rally after he was convicted of the 1948 beating death of a furniture shop owner in New Jersey. As Baker became increasingly regarded as controversial, many blacks began to shun her, fearing that her reputation would hurt their cause.

In 1963, she spoke at the March on Washington at the side of Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. Baker was the only official female speaker, and she introduced the "Negro Women for Civil Rights." After King's assassination, his widow Coretta Scott King approached Baker to ask if she would take his place as leader of the Civil Rights Movement. Baker declined, saying her children were "too young to lose their mother".

Baker was married four times. Jean-Claude Baker described his mother as bisexual. Her first marriage was to Willie Wells when she was 13 years old. The marriage was unhappy and they divorced a brief time later. Another short-lived marriage followed to Willie Baker in 1921. In 1937, Baker married Jean Lion. She and Lion separated in 1940. Lion died in 1957 of Spanish influenza. She married Jo Bouillon in 1947, but their union also ended in divorce.

Baker adopted many children, forming a family she often referred to as "The Rainbow Tribe". She wanted to prove that "children of different ethnicities and religions could still be brothers." Baker raised two daughters, French-born Marianne and Moroccan-born Stellina, and 10 sons, Korean-born Jeannot, Japanese-born Akio, Colombian-born Luis, Finnish-born Jari, French-born Jean-Claude and Noël, Israeli-born Moïse, Algerian-born Brahim, Ivorian-born Koffi, and Venezuelan-born Mara.

In her later years, Baker converted to Roman Catholicism.

On 8 April 1975, Baker starred in a retrospective revue at the Bobino in Paris. The opening night audience included Sophia Loren, Diana Ross, and Liza Minnelli. Four days later, Baker was found lying peacefully in her bed surrounded by newspapers with glowing reviews of her performance. She was in a coma after suffering a cerebral hemorrhage. She was taken to Pitié-Salpêtrière Hospital, where she died.

Her funeral was held at L'Église de la Madeleine. After a family service at Saint-Charles Church in Monte Carlo. Baker was interred at Monaco's Cimetière de Monaco.

[convivialcamera]

The Time Before, Part 3

Part 1 | Part 2

“Tell me about your research.”

Dr. Randall and I strolled along Regent Street, my arm warmly enfolded in his. It was a suffocatingly hot night, most uncharacteristic for London, but I still relished feeling the heat of his body radiate into my side as we walked together. I was a bit chastened after being chased out of the Paradise Club, but I knew from years of experience that the best way to start conversation with a scholar was to ask about his studies.

“I did most of my graduate work on the Huguenots in France.” Dr. Randall was pleased, and I had to stop myself from smirking at him, blushed with my success. “But now with my new position I’m shifting to into the 18th century — the Jacobites in Scotland and France, the rebellions and all that.”

“So, you’re interested in religious conflict during the Enlightenment?”

“The French Wars of Religion were really before the Enlightenment, but yes,” he gently corrected. “Although, my new work on the Jacobites was more a natural progression than a plan, and the dean at the University of London was excited about it.” He shrugged. “And there’s some personal interest. I had an ancestor who fought...”

“For the Jacobites?” Frank Randall was as English as they came, a Scottish rebel ancestor would have been quite incongruous.

“Oh no, for the English. An army captain.”

“I’m sure he served with great distinction,” I said gravely, with great amusement. I was sure my teasing ruse was on verge of being discovered.

“I don’t know much about him, other than what is on the genealogy chart,” Dr. Randall replied seriously.

“Avenues for future research, I’m sure.” I felt my dress cling lightly with sweat to my sides. The street was still bustling, but the heat made everyone’s movements seem languid and slow. I felt my own heartbeat, slowing after the excitement of fleeing the nightclub but strong, as it pushed blood through my veins and into my fingertips.

“Why don't you wish to attend university?” He asked me.

“I've never been to proper school before,” I said serenely, but my heart started thumping harder in agitation. “There’s no reason to start now. Uncle Lamb wishes me to be married, and thinks dumping me at uni in London will, as they say, do the trick.”

“But you think you’re going to find a husband in the jungle whilst digging up artifacts with your uncle?”

“You’d be surprised,” I said, absently thinking of Helmut and a few other liaisons I'd had whilst digging up artifacts. Dr. Randall watched me curiously, but didn't comment further. We rounded a curve through Piccadilly Circus, and I nudged Dr. Randall towards crossing onto a side street.

“You must know where we’re headed,” Dr. Randall commented dryly.

“Oh, yes. Do you like the blues?” I asked, trying to be a little mysterious.

“The blues? Are they a new football team?”

I giggled. “No, it’s music. From the American South?” He looked at me doubtfully, but with the air of a man who was about to humor me. “New experiences are good for developing character,” I told him crisply.

The Shim-Sham Room was smaller than the Paradise Club, but packed with even more people, all of whom had a decidedly bohemian flair. Dr. Randall, in his conservative, if rumpled, suit and hat seemed positively square. The slow heat of the night gave way to the slow heat of the music; dancing couples filled the room, moving closely to the slow heat of the beat. I felt the rhythm tremble in my bones and travel down my spine. Dr. Randall stiffened beside me as he took in the scene — in fact, he looked rather alarmed, although he was quickly working to hide it. I pulled him into a corner near the entrance and inquired, “What’s wrong?”

He peeked over his shoulder, his hat low to hide his gaze, and then turned back to me. “We’re rather,” he hesitated, but then pushed on with a breath, “outnumbered.” I stared at him, my mouth open in puzzlement. I could perhaps guess at what he meant, but didn’t wish to presume. Dr. Randall gave me another meaningful look, and then, exasperated, almost quietly spat out, “By negroes.”

I widened my own eyes in exasperation, but looked over his shoulder to take my own look at the crowd. While a good deal of the patrons were African or colored, there were plenty of other races too — including whites like us, all engaged in the music or in sprightly conversation. I put a hand on his arm in reassurance. “Hardly,” I said, not unkindly. “Everyone’s having a good time.” I pulled him out of our little alcove and headed toward the bar. Parched from our flight and the walk, I was in need of a drink myself.

The song ended as I got the barkeep’s attention, and after a small round of applause the room fell into the quiet chatter among patrons. He, like many of the patrons, was African, with dark skin and eyes; when he spoke it was with a proper London accent. “What will it be, miss,” he asked in a low, velvet voice.

I smiled at him, considering. I then glanced back at Dr. Randall, who was still looking a bit stiff and uncomfortable, and decided to give him something to really worry about. Feeling mischievous, I said to the barkeep, “Absinthe, please, the usual way.” He gave me a long look, which I matched, and then reached behind him. Returning with a bottle and placing it on the bar, he turned to Dr. Randall and raised his eyebrows in question.

“Whisky,” Dr. Randall said shortly. The barkeep nodded in affirmation.

I watched as the barkeep poured a good measure of green-tinged liquor into a short glass, placed a slotted spoon with a sugar lump over the top, and then poured water over all of it, dissolving the sugar into the absinthe and giving the liquor a milky glow. He pushed the finished cocktail across the bar to me, and then quickly served Dr. Randall a generous pour of whisky. I took a sip and smiled brightly at Dr. Randall. “It’s delightful.”

“I’m sure,” he said, still not amused. The band was striking up again, and he sat down at a small table near the back, as everyone on the crowded dance floor seemed to condense together, coupling up for the next song. It was a faster, brighter tune, and my foot started tapping, but I sat down next to Dr. Randall. He leaned over and nudged my shoulder, nodding towards the dance floor, where folks were enthusiastically moving to the beat. “I never learned the Charleston,” he said, almost apologetically.

“No. You couldn’t have.” I said, flabbergasted. “I’ve been dancing it since I was a girl — I learned in Paris, you know.” I positively gulped down my drink and lept back up, grabbing his hand. “Come on, I’ll show you.”

Dr. Randall — athletic, suave, and proficient at a basic box step — turned out to have two left feet. We were laughing hysterically in eachothers arms as I tried, once again, to show him the step. “It swings a bit, you see, and then…” We smacked our legs together as we both moved forward at the same time. “Why are you trying to follow?” I asked.

“You’re teaching,” he gasped between laughs. “Aren’t you leading?”

“I’m the woman. You lead.” He took me into his arms again. “One, two, three: back, forward, forward, back… ouch!” Our ankles again smashed into one another, and I reached down to soothe my foot. “It’s really more like a tap than a step!”

He pulled me back to my feet and the grabbed me by the waist, lifting me up and spinning me around. I flung my arms about his neck and felt my knees bend behind me. I laughed into his shoulder, smelling the masculine scent of him, the whiff of cologne with a musk of sweat underneath. The music, and then the spinning, stopped. Dr. Randall set me down, sliding me against him; I felt a distinct hardness against my belly when my feet touched the floor. “Another drink?” he inquired.

“Why Dr. Randall, I do believe you’re trying to intoxicate me,” I teased.

Three absinthe cocktails later (the last was bubbly; I was sure champagne was involved) and I was pleasantly lightheaded, and perhaps just a bit tipsy. Dr. Randall had his arms about me as we danced a slow, heated blues number, somehow even hotter than the song the band played when we had first arrived. He was down to his shirt-sleeves, and had even removed his tie; I felt the heat of him move through me. We were hand-in-hand, chest-to-chest, pelvis-to pelvis, and nearly stuck together, our sweat mingling with our breath. I rested my chin on his shoulder; I liked the way I could tuck my face into his neck, where the slight roughness of a re-growing beard was beginning to come in. I liked the way we fit together; I liked the way he felt; I liked him.

Dr. Randall ran his fingers down my spine and rested his hand on my back; this time it was definitely lower than strictly proper. I grinned into his neck and he must have felt my lips move because he chuckled low in his throat. “You are so lovely,” he said in my upturned ear, so softly I almost couldn’t hear him over the music. We still swayed slowly, just barely enough to keep up the pretension of dancing. I felt his fingers in my hair, and closed my eyes, wanting to gently float away on the sensations. I lingered in the moment, longing for it to go on forever.

And then it was last call, and my reverie ended. The music stopped, fading away from my consciousness, and Dr. Randall released me from his grasp. “We should go,” he said. “It's over.”

It had been boiling inside the Shim-Sham Room, and it wasn’t any cooler as we stepped outside onto the street. The heat was like a suffocating blanket. It was unfathomably late, and the streetlights shined pools of yellow across the city. We turned our feet toward a main road, in hopes of finding a cab.

“You forget, you know,” I whispered, almost to myself. “The lights. The people. The noise. The cars and buses and trains…”

“Do you miss it?” Dr. Randall asked softly, curling his arm around me as we walked. “When you’re away?”

Did I? I was so rarely in London — or in proper civilization for that matter — that I wondered if I could properly miss something I had no claim to. “It’s not really home. I don’t have one, I suppose.”

“You haven’t a home? Am I not escorting you to your Uncle’s flat?” He chuckled.

“You haven’t done a good job of it so far,” I teased, and then sighed. “We’re hardly ever here. Nine months in Peru was the longest I’ve been anywhere in years.”

“Do you ever wish to stay?” He whispered to me, his nose caressing my ear and his cheek in my hair.

It didn’t take much. I turned my head and grasped at his shirt, pulling him to me and finally — finally — he kissed me and the world fell away. I could feel the thump of his heart, and my own heartbeat fell into time with his. His hand on my waist tightened, pulling my hips into his like we were once again dancing. I wanted...

“Oi, mate! Snog her, don’t swallow her!” A leering voice from across the street hollered at us; I spotted a group of young men who were now laughing and acting rather pleased with themselves as they ran down the street.

“Bugger off you bloody voyeurs!” I yelled after them, flashing an obscene gesture in their direction.

“Claire!” He pulled on my sleeve, regaining my full attention.

I laughed. “Yes, Frank?”

He smiled at me, a bit chastened by my tone. “Do you always use that sort of language with riff-raff?” Frank was overcoming his initial objections, and trying to be amused by my shocking and uncouth outburst.

“Only when they deserve it.” I took his hand in mine, and gestured with my head down toward the main square. “Come on, they may be cabs down there.” I hadn’t been to Trafalgar Square in years, and it was quite different at night — empty and all lit up. There wasn’t a soul in sight; no cabs either. My shoes (with rather sensible low heel and rounded toe) were meant to withstand the tribulations of travel but a night trapspaising around town, drinking, dancing and running from gamblers was pressing the limits of my comfort.

I plunked myself down on the edge of the fountain and leaned back to dip my fingers in the cool water. It felt heavenly. I looked around again; there was no one else around except Frank and myself. It was a moment’s impulse, and I quickly kicked off my shoes and then reached up my legs to unhook my stockings, pulling them off.

“What on earth are you doing?” Frank asked, astounded yet again.

“Going for a swim. You should take your shoes off.” He looked at me like my head was on fire. I pointedly ignored this look, stepped up onto the ledge of the fountain and hopped in with a splash.

“You’re insane. Do you want to get arrested?”

“It’s lovely! You should join me.” The water wasn’t very deep — it barely reached halfway up my calf — but it was cool and refreshing.

“I’m not at all amazed you’ve never been to school,” he said, teasingly sarcastic. “Some discipline would do you good.”

I sat down, and began to splash at Frank, who was looking around frantically to see that we weren’t observed. I crawled to the edge of the fountain and kneeled by the ledge. I tilted my head up and, as if he couldn’t resist, Frank bent to softly kiss me. “Don’t be a fuddy-duddy,” I whispered, cajoling him. “The water’s fine.”

I could see his intransigence breaking. “How can I resist a siren’s call?” He asked, and then bent to pull off his shoes. He removed his jacket and tie, making a neat pile on the edge with his hat on top, and then stepped into my arms. We fell together into the water, and a splendid splash echoed through the empty square. The both of us now drenched and laying in the fountain, Frank rolled onto his back and propped himself up on his forearms, while I rolled partially onto his torso, kissing him enthusiastically. “It’s the first time I’ve been cool all evening,” he whispered into my neck as his lips wandered deliciously.

“Not too cool, I hope,” I cooed back, suggestively sliding the leg I had thrown over his up towards his loins.

“Never,” he growled. He came back to my lips with ferocity. The water was cool but I suddenly wasn’t; I was on fire, every warm shiver and sensation I’d felt all evening was back with a vengeance. His hands were on my bum, pushing me up and over so I sat more squarely on his hips and I began to squirm in earnest. I rubbed against his hardness and one of his hands moved to my breast, pinching the hard nipple and making my vision blur. I was sure the water should be turning to steam. I kissed Frank hard with want, trying to reach for that final sensation that would...

A rather stern voice interrupted us: “Miss, could you please, ahem, dismount?” 

Damn. The bobbies had found us.

End part 3

Part 4

[huahsu]

YEAR OF WHAT HAPPENS ON EARTH STAYS ON EARTH

[longer version of what I contributed to the new yorker’s year-end package. you can read that here, and listen to the accompanying megamix the video team made! links to previous year’s lists at bottom.] I did not grow up going to church, and I am not a particularly religious person. A few days after the inauguration, I wandered into a nearby church and took a seat in the back pews. I’d gone there right after the election. There was some time for anyone with anything on their mind to stand up and speak. If you need others to pray for you, just let us know. A middle-aged black man in a leather jacket got up and began telling us about an argument he was having with a friend on Facebook. It was about the election, but it was actually about the intractability of racism. He was getting frustrated while describing it to us, in part because he seemed to value being the cool and level-headed one. Plus he was describing the kind of argument millions of people were having on the Internet. “I just hope he finds peace,” the guy said. He paused, then put his hands on his chest. “On a lighter note, today would have been Jimi Hendrix’s seventy-fourth birthday.” He opened up his leather jacket to show everyone his Hendrix t-shirt. “I just wanted to say that, because he was just awesome.” So I returned here, the day after marching through Manhattan with a poster that said “HOLD ON, BE STRONG.” I needed to be in a room that was powered by something other than hate--to be reminded of vision and purpose, even if they weren’t mine to claim. To listen to wisdom gleaned from a book I’ve never read, and pick and choose what I wanted. To hear others pour themselves into songs I never, ever sing along to. I wanted to steal their vibes.  Instead of a hymn, they passed out small pieces of paper with the lyrics of John Lennon’s “Imagine.” This is not the type of church people come to for the music. The pianist started playing, and I remember thinking about how it felt like magic when I learned how to play those chords as a kid. I couldn’t believe we were doing this. We sang, tentatively at first, as though we could not believe these words in this space. Picture it: singing of “no heaven” and “no religion, too,” with humility and hope, inside a house of worship. It was like an admission that faith was inadequate. All we had was one another. “Imagine” is a song I’ve heard millions of times, the type of song that is so ubiquitous that we rarely bother scrutinizing its words, its vantage point, the possibility that someone wrote these words because he actually believed them. I sang along with a room of strangers, and we looked at one another, and, for the first time in months, I began to cry.   TWO LYRICS THAT REMINDED ME OF POLITICS EVEN IF THEY HAD NOTHING TO DO WITH POLITICS "Wrote this shit January 21″ “Take me back to November / Take me back to November” “I’M AN ANGRY TEENAGER” Novelist, “Street Politician” ONCE THEY START, I HAVE TO LISTEN TO THE END Jim O’Rourke’s recently unearthed cover of Tracy Chapman’s “Fast Car” Kanye’s sitcom-length remix of “Bed” THURSDAY NIGHTS ON NBC Ross from Friends’ very Madchester guitar-y Boiler Room set DJ Seinfeld, Time Spent Away from U Nino Man, Jadakiss and Styles P, “Friends”

IN ANOTHER YEAR FULL OF NIRVANA/KURT COBAIN REFERENCES (DID YOU SEE JAY:Z’S JACKET?) MY FAVORITE SONG, PROBABLY: this Trippie Redd snippet

SOME VERSIONS OF THE NINETIES THAT WILL NEVER COME BACK THE WAY GRUNGE ENNUI HAS, BUT WERE SO POSSIBILITY-RICH TO ME BACK THEN Kicking Giant, This Being the Ballad of Kicking Giant, Halo: NYC/Olympia 1989-1993 Helium, The Dirt of Luck/The Magic City LIKE MANY WHO LOVED “A STORM IN HEAVEN,” I OVERLOOKED THEM AT THE TIME Acetone, 1992-2001 A REALLY GOOD BOOK ABOUT ACETONE, LOS ANGELES, DREAMS OF GREATNESS Sam Sweet, Hadley Lee Lightcap WOULD HAVE LOVED THIS IN 1994, 2002 OR 2017 Big Thief, Capacity CREDIBLE AND DOPE EARLY NINETIES R&B HOMAGE, SAX AND ALL Joyce Wrice, “Good Morning” SPEAKING OF THE NINETIES, LEECH MADE A MIXTAPE OF JUST THE FLOATY/DREAMY PARTS TAKEN FROM CLASSIC GOOD LOOKING/MOVING SHADOW SINGLES Leech, “Just the Liquid” FOR THE COMEDOWN, DARK-ASS STUFF ASSEMBLED EXCLUSIVELY FROM SLIPKNOT SAMPLES Croww, Prosthetics NOSTALGIA, ULTRA (UK GARAGE/BASSLINE EDITION) tqd, ukg SUMMERTIME ‘SECOND SUMMER OF LOVE’ VIBE Opus III, “It’s a Fine Day (Burt Fox remix)” UNEXPECTED BURIAL SUMMERTIME VIBES Monic, “Deep Summer (Burial remix)” NO REISSUE OR  tk ANNIVERSARY TIE-IN, JUST SOME OLD SONGS I RE/DISCOVERED THIS YEAR Active Minds, “Hobson’s Choice” El-B, “El-Brand” Kamal Abdul Alim, “Brotherhood” Spiritualized in Reykjavik  U2, “Numb (Soul Assassins remix)” U2, “Mysterious Ways (Massive Attack remix)”

SAME, BUT TAIWANESE INDIE ROCK EDITION Chocolate Tiger, “Piecing Together” REISSUES, OR: PEOPLE HAVE ALWAYS BEEN WEIRD AND SPACY#, OBSESSED WITH NATURAL BEAUTY## # Planetary Peace, Synthesis # Pauline Anna Strom, Trans-Millennia Music ## Pep Llopis, Poiemusia La Nau Dels Argonaut REISSUES, OR: WHEN I WAS A CHILD THERE WERE NO BETTER SONGS THAN THE ONES THAT PLAYED THROUGH TRANSFORMERS: THE MOVIE AND FOR SOME REASON THIS JOYOUS EP REMIND ME OF THAT SHEEN, THOSE HOOKS, THE PERFECT, THEATER-SIZED ECHO Om Alec Khaoli, Say You Love Me BEST ALBUM-LENGTH METAPHOR FOR THE CITY, ITS LIMITATIONS AND POSSIBILITIES Wiki, No Mountains In Manhattan SOUNDS EXACTLY LIKE IT WAS DESCRIBED, JAMAICA VIA OUTER SPACE Equiknoxx, Colon Man I NEED TO GO OUT MORE Jex Opolis, “Mt. Belzoni” KH, “Question”

I LISTENED TO THIS ABOUT TEN TIMES, MY SENSE OF ENCHANTMENT GROWING AND GROWING EACH TIME, BEFORE REALIZING THERE WERE BARELY ANY DRUMS ON IT Mr. Mitch, Devout SERIOUSLY THE MR. MITCH ALBUM WAS REALLY MOVING AND FANTASTIC Mr. Mitch f/ Denai Moore, “Fate” CRAZY WISDOM MASTER Vince Staples, Big Fish Theory C’MON AND RAISE UP Rapsody f/ Kendrick, Lance Skiiwalker, “Power” SO ICEY Zomby, Mercury’s Rainbow ECHO PARTY Demen, Nektyr Evy Jane, “Give Me Love” THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING EARNEST Vic Mensa, The Autobiography DUNGEON FAMILY, EVEN IN DARKNESS Earthgang f/ J.I.D., “Meditate” FUNNY HOW TIME SLIPS AWAY Lee Gamble, Mnestic Pressure Pessimist, s/t NOT SURE HOW THIS BECAME THE DIWALI OF 2017 BUT OKAY French Montana f/ Mariah, Rae Sremmurd, PNB Rock, Belly, Elephant Man, Vybz Kartel, J Balvin, NORE, Wizkid, “Unforgettable” HOW ARE THIS MANY PEOPLE ON A FOUR MINUTE SONG? GOOD VIDEO THOUGH A$AP Mob f/ A$AP Rocky, Playboi Carti, Quavo, Lil Uzi Vert and Frank Ocean, “RAF” I LIKE IT WHEN FERG’S VOICE GETS ALL NAGGY Ferg, “Plain Jane” METRO BOOMIN MADE A BEAT THAT REMINDED ME OF RADIOHEAD Post Malone f/ Quavo, “Congratulations” THE MARIACHI VERSION IS PRETTY SWEET Brian Imanuel, “How I surprised Post Malone with a mariachi band” ”IF YOU’RE LOOKING FOR LYRICS, IF YOU’RE LOOKING TO CRY, IF YOU’RE LOOKING TO THINK ABOUT LIFE...” JonWayne, Rap Album Two CORNBALL PIANOS AND THEN THAT SYNTH DRAGS, AND THEN THE DRUMS KICK Tee Grizzley, “First Day Out” “BUT WILD/WITH MY MONOTONE STYLE” 21 Savage, “Bankroll” Kodak Black, “Candy Paint” Rich Chigga, “Glow Like Dat” ANNUAL SPOT RESERVED FOR LA MUSICA DE HARRY FRAUD French Montana f/ Pharrell, “Bring Dem Things” WHEN LAETITIA SAYS HER OWN NAME ON “EMBERS” Vagabon, Infinite Worlds WHEN JESSIE LEANS INTO THE WORD “FUCK” Jessie Reyez, “Figures” THAT LIGHT MISTING, THAT CASUAL SPRITZ OF SYNTHS Lanark Artefax, “Touch Absence” A GOOD ANTI-DJT THING THAT CAME OUT EARLY THIS YEAR, WHICH FEELS LIKE EONS AGO Lushlife + friends, My Idols are Dead + My Enemies are in Power THE BABY, THE FLUTES, PIERRE’S OBNOXIOUSLY LONG TAG, THE JESSE LINGARD DANCE Playboi Carti, “Magnolia” ILLEST SHIT I SAW THIS YEAR, BABY-RELATED A child at a restaurant watching an iPad and an iPhone at the same damn time “[FREE] PLAYBOI CARTI TYPE BEAT” YBN Nahmir, “Rubbin off the Paint” GUNS N ROSES, BEFORE ONE OF THE WEIRDEST BEEFS OF THE YEAR Trippie Redd f/ 6IX9INE, “POLES1469″ SOMETIMES YOU JUST HAVE TO BELIEVE YOU CAN SING, AND DO IT WITH CONVICTION, AND I WILL LISTEN Trippie Redd, “Rack City/Love Scars 2″ ALL THE BACKGROUND NOISE/ECHOED-OUT ADLIBS MAKE THIS BlocBoy JB, “No Chorus Pt 10″ SMERZ HAS FUN DESPITE THE AWKWARD OF IT ALL Smerz on NTS IT SEEMS REALLY EASY TO MAKE A GOOD-SOUNDING SONG THESE DAYS Global Dan, “Off White” OF ALL THE DOPE SHIT THAT FUTURE APPEARED ON THIS YEAR, THE MOMENT I WILL REMEMBER IS That tiny pause before he sings “I need fresh air,” when he seems happy and content IS THAT A GEORGE MICHAEL SAMPLE? Mozzy, “Prayed for This” THE FIX C Struggs, “Go to Jesus” "IT’S COOL, BUT IT’S NOT...END ZONE” Lil Uzi Vert, “XO TOUR Llif3″ AN ALBUM BOOKENDED BY TOTALLY DIFFERENT KINDS OF COLIN KAEPERNICK/TAKE A KNEE REFERENCES Miguel, War and Leisure IT WAS A VERY GOOD YEAR Brockhampton, Saturation I-III SZA, Ctrl SPEAKING OF SZA: WHAT A GREAT TITLE, BESIDES IT BEING ONE OF MY FAVORITE ALBUMS OF THE YEAR Kingdom, Tears in the Club THE KELELA ALBUM WAS LOVELY, AS ARE THESE Kelela x Bok Bok, Dub Me Apart A RANDOM YOUTUBE COVER THAT I ALSO LIKED, BECAUSE IT CAPTURED HOW MELODIC THE ORIGINAL ACTUALLY IS Kathleen Nguyen covering Kendrick and Zacari’s “Love.” DAMN. WAS GOOD Almost as good as “The Heart Part 4″ LIKE A DE LA SOUL ALBUM, SOMETHING THAT I KNOW I WILL CONTINUE ENJOYING/UNDERSTANDING ANEW FOR YEARS TO COME Tyler, the Creator, Flower Boy ”BLONDED RADIO” MADE ME JOIN APPLE MUSIC Frank Ocean, “Chanel” Frank Ocean, “Biking (solo)” Tyler and Frank, “Where This Flower Blooms” MACH HOMMY MAKES GOOD MUSIC THAT’S HARD TO ACCESS “x Earl Sweatshirt” EP ty Soundcloud IT’S A WEIRD TIME B/W THIS BEAT IS SO DEMENTED Tay-K, “The Race” PROBABLY MY FAVORITE PHARRELL BEAT Kap G f/ Pharrell, “Icha Gicha” MAYBE THE GREATEST MUSIC EVER MADE, REISSUED Pharoah Sanders

REMINDED ME OF PHAROAH, WHEN IT WASN’T REMINDING ME OF BON IVER Joseph Shabason, Aytche AND I ENJOYED AYTCHE FOR SIMILAR REASONS I LIKED ZONING OUT TO Tom Rogerson and Brian Eno, Finding Shore ANNUAL SLOT RESERVED FOR MUSIC I LOVED THAT FEATURED HARP Alice Coltrane, World Spirituality Classics Vol 1

SAME, BUT FOR HARP STUFF THAT ALSO SHOUTS OUT WAWA Mary Lattimore, Collected Pieces ANNUAL SLOT RESERVED FOR TASTEFUL VIBRAPHONE Jenifa Mayanja, “Warrior Strutt” YOU TRYING TO GET THE PIPE, TO PLAY IT, OF COURSE, AS PART OF AN EXPERIMENTAL COMPOSITION? Mary Jane Leach, Pipe Dreams THERE’S A MOMENT DURING THAT BAD BOY DOCUMENTARY CAN’T STOP WON’T STOP WHERE IT BECOMES CLEAR THAT EVERYONE WHO WORKS CLOSELY WITH DIDDY EVENTUALLY TURNS TO GOD, AND IT WAS LIKE THE STRANGE OBVERSE OF Jay Z et al, 4:44 footnotes 2016, BUT I SAT IN THE MET BREUER AND WATCHED THIS OVER AND OVER FOR ABOUT AN HOUR Arthur Jafa, “Love is the Message, The Message is Death” I WANT TO WATCH THE FULL FOUR HOURS OF THIS Dev Hynes talking to Philip Glass TRICKSTERY BUT KINDA MESMERIZING! Klein, Tommy Lolina, Lolita EP Hype Williams, Rainbow Edition “NOT ANOTHER GOT MORE SEOUL, UNLESS YOU KOREAN” (CHILLWAVE REMIX) Mogwaa, Deja Vu “THE TING GOES SKRRRAHH, PAP, PAP, KA-KA-KA/SKIDIKI-PAP-PAP, AND A PU-PU-PUDRRRR-BOOM/SKYA, DU-DU-KU-KU-DUN-DUN/POOM, POOM, YOU DON’ KNOW” Big Shaq, “Mans Not Hot” IBID., BUT “PERKY” Drake, More Life I WANTED TO LIKE THE WIZKID ALBUM MORE, BUT THIS WAS AWESOME Tiwa Savage f/ Wizkid and Spellz, “Ma Lo” LISTENED TO THIS QUITE A FEW TIMES SIMPLY BECAUSE ”BREAKING NEWS: WILD GOAT ON THE LOOSE” IS A WEIRD LINE Lancey Foux f/ AJ Tracey, Kojey Radical and Jevon, “Wild Goat” UNITED TIL I DIE BUT AJ TRACEY’S TOTTENHAM HOTSPUR KIT LAUNCH FREESTYLE HAD ME BUZZZZZZIN AJ Tracey, “False 9″ DIFFERENT TIME OF DAY, KINDA LEFT ME SPEECHLESS Grouper, “Children” Colleen, A Flame my love, a frequency Kara Lis Coverdale, Grafts Ryuichi Sakamoto, async LEFT RYUICHI SAKAMOTO ENVIOUS Metaphors: Selected Soundworks from the Cinema of Apichatpong Weerasethakul FROM OMNI TRIO TO THIS, A PRETTY VISIONARY CAREER Robert Haigh, Creatures of the Deep A SONG THAT FEATURED TWO PEOPLE WHO SHOULD BE PRETTY BIG IN THE NEXT COUPLE OF YEARS DJDS f/ Amber Mark and Marco McKinnis, “Trees on Fire” LIKE, THIS IS GREAT Amber Mark, “Lose My Cool” AWESOME YEAR FOR POTIONS Social Lovers, “Drop Me a Line” Boss, “Song for Gods” WHISKED ME BACK TO MEMORIES OF the enormous room Joakim, “Samurai” Calvin Harris f/ Frank Ocean and Migos, “Slide” Amp Fiddler, “I’m Feeling You” Chaos in the CBD, Accidental Meetings LIKE FALLING ASLEEP ON THE SUBWAY, OR A TRUCK HITTING A POTHOLE AND SPITTING OUT A RECORD COLLECTION, OR HEARING A NANOSECOND OF BRAND NUBIAN THROUGH SOMEONE’S HEADPHONES AS YOU PASS THEM ON THE STREET, IT’S A VIBE Standing on the Corner, Red Burns MIKE’S A SAVIOR Mike 1. I SPENT A LOT OF TIME THIS YEAR THINKING ABOUT THE STRENGTH, ELASTICITY, FRAGILITY, GRAIN OF THE HUMAN VOICE AND SOME OF THIS WAS TOTALLY NECESSARY AND SUBLIME Deep Throat Choir, Be Ok Diamanda Galas, All the Way Moses Sumney, Aromanticism 2. SO ACHINGLY GOOD AND INTIMATE, ESPECIALLY THAT FAINT CROAK IN THE FIRST CHORUS Rostam f/ Kelly Zutrau, “Half-Light” 3. OF COURSE THESE WORLD-MAKERS TOO Bjork, Utopia Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith, The Kid Valerie June, “Astral Plane” 3a. A STRANGE PROPOSITION THAT I ENDED UP ADORING KAS covering Sade’s "By Your Side" THE BAY AREA IS JUST DIFFERENT Droop-E, Trillionaire Thoughts Lil B, Black Ken THE “BUILD YOU UP” VIDEO WAS FUN AND ALL BUT I’M REALLY GLAD THIS WASN’T THAT Kamiayah, Before I Wake THE BAY TO L.A. AND BACK AGAIN Mozzy f/ G Perico, “Blammatory” G Perico f/ Mozzy, “What’s Real” GYEAH MC Eiht, Which Way Iz West OUTRUN THE BEAT SOB x RBE, “Lane Changing 2″ BANDS THAT ALWAYS SOUND LIKE THEMSELVES, IN WAYS THAT I FIND COMFORTING the xx, I See You King Krule, The Ooz SAME AS ABOVE, MIDDLE-AGED DIVISION The Feelies, In Between Slowdive, “Star Roving” SOMEONE WHO SOUNDS LIKE NO ONE ELSE Jlin, Black Origami THE NEW NATIONAL ANTHEM Dreezy f/ 6LACK and Kodak Black, “Spar” I LOOKED UP EACH TIME THIS CAME ON THE SHUFFLE Shanti Celeste, “Loop One/Selector”

PROBABLY MY FAVORITE SONG GoldLink f/ Brent Faiyaz and Shy Glizzy, “Crew” OR MAYBE Jorja Smith x Preditah, “On My Mind” THIS WAS SICK TOO GoldLink & Co. covering Outkast’s “Roses” MAYBE THE BEST SONG J Hus, “Did You See”

ANOTHER YEAR, ANOTHER YEAR WHERE MY FAVORITE RELEASE WAS PROBABLY FROM YAEJI, THE “GLASSES FOGGING UP” LINE WAS VERY RELATABLE Yaeji, EP2 THE SONG OF THE SPRING, SUMMER, WINTER   I MEAN, IT’S WAYNE’S WORLD, WE JUST LIVE IN IT ### SIKH DEVOTIONAL MUSIC :: 2016 SPOOKY BLACK :: 2015