yuki – Cubilone's Dimension

Το χιόνι έλιωσε, το καλοκαίρι τέλειωσε

Το προηγούμενο μου ποστ ήταν για τον θάνατο της Γκρίζας. Η ειρωνεία της ζωής δεν άργησε να ξανακάνει την εμφάνιση της σε όλο της το μεγαλείο.
Μερικές ώρες αφού είχα γράψει το ποστ, με πήρε τηλέφωνο η Δέσποινα.

“Έλα Κιούμπι, η Γιούκι είναι μέσα στο σπίτι;”
“Όχι, γιατί;”
“Έλα γρήγορα…”

Φτάνω λίγα λεπτά αργότερα και βλέπω μια Γιούκι να είναι χωμένη κάτω από το τελευταίο σκαλοπάτι της εξωτερικής σκάλας στο ακριβώς απέναντι σπίτι, αυτό με τις πολλές γλάστρες και την Βίλμα (την μόνιμα έγκυο σκύλα). Δεν σάλευε. Και ένα παιδάκι, ούτε τριών δεν θα ήταν, το παιδί του ζευγαριού που την βρήκε, προσπαθούσε να την πιάσει. Μπορεί να πίστευε ότι ήταν λούτρινο κουκλάκι…

:'(

Ό,τι σκότωσε την Γκρίζα μάλλον ήταν αυτό που το κατάφερε και για την Γιούκι. Φόλα; Ποντικοφάρμακο; Κάποιο οικοδομικό υλικό; Ποιος, γιατί;;; Πέρασε την αρρώστια που παραλίγο να την στείλει πριν την ώρα της και κάποιος ο οποίος μάλλον ποτέ δεν αγάπησε ή αγαπήθηκε στην ζωή του αποφάσισε να πάρει την πρωτοβουλία;

Η ειρωνεία της ζωής σε όλο της το μεγαλείο.

Η εικόνα της κοκκαλωμένης Γιούκι να μην βγαίνει από κάτω από το σκαλοπάτι μου χαράχτηκε στην μνήμη. Το τελευταίο της βλέμα, τα μισόκλειστα βλέφαρα, το ξεραμένο αίμα στο στόμα και στον πισινό. Δεν θα γράψω περισσότερα. Δεν μπορώ να περιγράψω τι ένιωσα εκείνη την στιγμή και τι συνεχίζω να νιώθω. Δεν μπορώ να το περιγράψω συναισθηματικά όπως έκανα για την Γκρίζα… Ξέρω πολύ καλά τι ένιωθα για την γάτα που με συντρόφευε τα τελευταία 2,5 χρόνια. Και απλά… ίσως να μην μπορεί να χωρέσει εδώ. Δεν το έχω συνειδητοποιήσει από τότε… 5 μέρες κιόλας. Όχι. Δεν μπορεί να χωρέσει εδώ. Όχι τώρα.

Χώρεσε όμως στην κηδεία της. Ούτε αυτήν θα την ξεχάσω ποτέ. Τόσο έντονη και αληθινή, μέσα σε όλη την θλίψη. Ευχαριστώ όλους σας για την βοήθεια και που απλά ήσασταν εκεί: Δέσποινα, Γκάρετ, Μόρντρεντ, Νένη, Έλενα… Θα ήταν πολύ πιο δύσκολο χωρίς εσάς.

Το χιόνι έλιωσε
Το καλοκαίρι τέλειωσε
Το νερό ποτίζει
Στον ουρανό γυρίζει

Japanese for snow

I love anniversaries and birthdays. Their meaning transcends human social constructions: they come in intervals of 365 days, the number of days the earth takes to draw a full circle (or eclipse) around the sun and arrive at the same relative spot in space from which it began. So birthdays, anniversaries and other annual events are good opportunities to look back at how things were when the earth’s position was last the same. Just as the circle comes to its closure (and a new one opens every single day).

This time last year, when the summer seemed close and all, something very important happened: a young white felis catus, a.k.a kitten, came into my life. It was a sunny morning. I was walking down the street close to Mousiko Kafeneio, not at all aware of what was about to happen, when I saw Oliva sitting there holding a kitten. It was grey and white. She told me she got it from a veterinarian right next to the post office. I went to have a look and there they were: two white kittens, the one with splashes of black (or was it black with splashes of white?) Myrsini, the vet, told me that someone’s cat had given birth and they’d brought the kittens to her so that she could give them away. Me and Mario did take both away, not sure yet who and if we’d keep them. My initial thought was actually to keep both kitties but Mario offered to adopt one. We paraded up Ermou street, big new expensive cat toilet in hand and kitties on shoulder all the way to Mario’s place. It didn’t take long for Mario to realise that having a kitten around that generally doesn’t know where the right place to poop is was a bit too much. Eventually Mordread tried to keep the B&W one. He couldn’t keep her either though so he returned her to the vet. I, however, had fallen in love with the white one before we had even stepped out of the vet’s.

I remember once telling Ines that if I ever had a white cat, I’d call her Yuki, which is japanese for snow. I’ll admit that I did sit and think about the white kitty’s name for a while but it didn’t take me more than a few hours to naturally start calling the little bright-coloured storm Yuki. I will never forget our first night together. I prepared a nice little bed for her lining my fruit basket with a red shirt and a dirty pair of jeans and invited her to join me into the world of dreams. Though reluctantly, she stepped into the comfy-looking bowl and eventually called it a night. The next morning I woke up and saw her curled up and sleeping peacefully.

All wasn’t well, however. When I said that kittens don’t know where to poop, I really meant it. Yuki was barely 3 months old when I first got her and she couldn’t properly climb into her toilet so a lot of the time she’d just poo and piss wherever. I remember somehow “feeling” that she’d gotta go and I’d promptly pick her up and put her in the toilet. When she would indeed relieve herself, I felt genuinely happy and satisfied with myself. But the first week had a lot of waking up in the middle of the night because Yuki would have a nice case of diarroea under my bed. It seems that during the first week diarroea was the only thing that would come out of her little feline bottom. Thankfully that soon stopped.

One of the hardest decisions I had to take in September when I had her neutered. I was anxious she’d leave and get ran over or something. Or she may have had litters of kitties every few months. I still question my decision when I think that I’ll never see Yuki-kittens or my cat will never have sex, but I guess this is human thinking in the end.

What I really like about my cat is that she’s genuinely good. And I mean good as in lawful good. She’ll never attack out of spite or hate. On the contrary she loves attacking just for fun or when she wants to play. I also love it when she comes and sits in my lap whenever I’m on the computer. She loves climbing to the highest (and often silliest) spot in the apartment. She’s perfect with strangers. When she was little, I often used to leave her care to friends when I was away from home for whatever reason. She’s also grown used to travelling which is always good. Most funnily of all, my little feline lacks any grace cats are generally known for. As we often say with Alex, Yuki has all the elegance of a happy-go-lucky dog. As they say, pets become like their owners…

In the end, I really love my cat. Even one year later and now she’s no longer a kitten but a proud full grown adult cat, even against all odds and expectations from others and even myself that my lifestyle wouldn’t allow taking care of an animal, I can see us maturing together.

My first day with Yuki was May 6th 2008.

Pink Dawn

It’s 7:30AM. Me and Mordread are sitting in my futon couch, going though the last, epic stages of The Force Unleashed, watching the final twists and turns of its plot unfold. Outside it is raining. The gentle sound of the drops hitting the street outside is audible even through the soundproof aluminum windows. It manages to reach our ears, as well as the lightsaber hums, Darth Vader’s iconic scuba breathing and the sound of lightning coming out of Starkiller’s fingertips. The sky is not entirely grey; in fact, its colour would be best described as a kind of dim pink. Soon I would witness what should have been the tie-in between the original and the prequels, the old and the new, the successful and the perhaps disappointing. My drowzy mind, amidst all this, was thinking that the line had been crossed; a new blog entry was finally at hand.

More than 3 hours later, the time is now 11:05. October 3rd, 2008. Rain sporadically cheers my ears but the sun has decided that its no time for playing hide-and-seek. The result is a wonderful colour of the sky. A fantastically unusual bright cloudy grey. Isn’t it strange that I often choose to write when my mind is working in ambiguous ways, powered by the strength of overnight determination but deterred by sleepiness? This fact could mean many things, quite controversial in their own right. Is it because I deem blogging so important a task that only the special moments of sleeplessness can truly get it going? Is it because writing is a time-consuming activity, best left for when my time constraints are only limited by my fatigue? Is it just because I’m bored and feel somehow special that I want to share my thoughts with the world (surrounding me)? I digress…

It’s been almost 3 months since my last blog entry. 3 busy, important, fascinating months. My last entry was written just hours before our journey to Europe had begun. Now, in mere weeks 2 months will have gone by since we returned from our trip. I won’t go into much detail about how it was, what it meant to me/us, if it was interesting or if I have any pictures to share. Answer to last two questions is yes. To the first two it is… well. I just can’t do it now. When I first came back from the trip, I was eager to tell everyone about it! Trying to remember every little detail so that it doesn’t get lost somewhere in the mists of memory lest it isn’t readily available so as to tell anyone who might be interested or write right here in Cubimension. But my enthusiasm was quickly discouraged. Not all that many people, especially friends, were genuinely interested in what I had to tell or show (I might write something else on this subject one day. It’s a deep matter). A lot of them will never read these lines either but the sentiment remains. It does sound too self-important, (as much of this particular entry, forgive me!) but I think it does have some right to be. Anyway, to not sound too melodramatic about something that doesn’t deserve it, if anyone would really like to ask me anything about our experience out there, I’d really gladly discuss anything! YEAH! But as it is now, I just can’t bring myself to summarise 38 days of travel for a questionable audience. Alexandra says that if we write all that happened down (something we did try to do…) we’ll remember it much easier. I kind of agree but writing it down isn’t exactly easy in the first place (hell, visit this topic on MyAegean and maybe you’ll catch some of all the previous feeling: http://my.aegean.gr/web/ftopict-991.html. But when it comes down to it, for whom do I opperate this site anyway, is it just to showcase what I do and am all about or is it too more like a personal dia… ANYWAY! My apologies for this nervous breakdown! 😀

OK after this last bit my post has lost the aethereal tone it had in the beginning. Fudge it, it was taking too long to think of all the difficult words anyway! What else has been going on? Well on August 23rd I first walked through the door of my current home. It was the week I was looking for my new place to stay. I was with Kira/George/Darthy. I’m not sure he had a good time, since I had to wake up early every morning just to take care of all the sudden obligations and do some new-home-hunting. We did have our very fair share of nargile and WoW discussions though (yes I was always the debunker! Sort of…) August 23rd was also Mordread’s 20th b-day. This can’t have been random cause now he’s my new neighbour! Walks in for gaming sessions, brings Pepsi along, takes care of the cat when I’m away — everything a good neighbour should do! Thanks Mordread, you’re a star! 🙂 After another week in Athens, IKEAing, meeting up with long lost friends and celebrating Alexandra’s nameday, it was time for me, her and mum to come back to Mytilini armed and ready! September 3rd-8th was the moving to brand-new home preperations. The two girls helped me a lot and I do so love them for it, even though one of them worked significantly more than the other, oops shouldn’t have let that one slip! 😀 It was a great time us being together, had some talks, some good breakfasts and stuff. And I can’t forget mention: whut!! We played Rock Band all together. Mum played a video game. As we say in greek, many bakeries fell in ruins on that day…

The real fun started when mum left, which was right on the day we moved! For another week, it was just me and Alex taking care of the brand new home. We painted every room in crazy happy colours, pondered on what should go where, watched sick and crazy funny movies, cooked some tasty food (I tell you, squeezing meatballs isn’t nearly as disgusting as it once seemed… nor is chopping turkey), quarreled for a little bit just to break all the happy tension, played lots of Geometry Wars (and Alexandra made a brave new footing into the world of Hexic! A round of applause for our would-be hardcore please), explored the new surrounding area, discovered that afternoons are sexy too (sometimes sexier than evenings), quarreled a bit more to keep things balanced, and had to keep Yuki’s teen sexual heat under contro as well. Shut windows, air-condition. Yeah. This is what brought that happy week to a close. I did something I will never forgive myself for doing which was nevertheless necessary… *read on*

I had to have Yuki neutered. I wasn’t happy that I had to keep windows shut to keep her tomcat-seeking skills at bay and neither was she. But having little Yukinos around wasn’t the problem here. The problem was that there’s the bloody busy road just down the street. One sexy night out for Yuki could be her last, as she made a perfect white contrast against the cold, hard pavement . They’d be one in their lifelessness… Nightmare inducing, I agree wholeheartedly. So for us to be both happy (or for me to be happy and at least hoping she will be happy rid of her sexual distractions or at least indifferent to their absence — pleasure or pain) it was a tough, not to mention costly decision. Seeing her dizzy from the anaesthesia was a cruel pleasure though, have to admit! She also bit her stitches out, had an open wound Mordread thankfully treated while I was away in Chios visiting good old Fanis, ignorant and blissful about Yuki. We had her second stitches removed yesterday. All is well with Yuki now. She’s as playful, active, cuddly, hungry (for “milk” and more serious food) as ever! Minus her uterus.

While Alexandra was here I tried another first. I pursued the foundations of some career as a waiter/barman at none other than Mousiko Kafeneio. Yes, the one and only! It took no less than 2 weeks of me trying to make coffees and other beverages, failing, drinking my concoctions and always looking somehow confused to realise that I was not entirely suitable for the job. Not because I wasn’t any good at all at it but due to new emergency weekend tactics by me and Alexandra that can’t allow any weekend work obligations. No less, of course because of Piscean inherent looking-for-excuses when being in situations I don’t particularly like, behaviour; that woman pulled no punches when it came to rookie training. She demanded I took full care of bar and service within my second week! Negotiating unacceptable. Hey, at least now I have some experience. And hey, I did eat and drink for a few days for free. That’s something! And now I can set out for some less stressful work solution. English teaching here I come (?!).

If we undserstood something together with my little sugary crabby (believe me it sounds better in greek) these weeks, it’s that we cannot manage to be apart for more than a few days. Meaningless misunderstandings through MSN (which is the DEVIL!), general dysphoria and everything just proves that. We couldn’t not meet last weekend (even though there were more fights last week because I didn’t have any money, which by the way made me cook some truly good but thick chickpeas (name sucks in english, revythia all the way) but it was urgent so I could just find some but it doesn’t work that way and and and and it wasn’t hard for things to just settle right. Last weekend in Athens was just made in heaven. Everything was so great! We had such a great time within such few hours. If our emergency weekend plan ends up like this, it’s going to be grand.

Well. It’s 13:05 straight! Hah, I’ve been writing for 2 hours straight. And now again, it’s all stuff that only interests me in the end. Maybe Alex as well. But I feel very satisfied that I finally came down to writing something! If you’ve reached this end, dear reader, we should hang around more!

Next blog may be (but it may also not be) about all the new games, movies, music, books and cool stuff that has come to my attention recently. It’s going to be big! Don’t expect it soon! 😀

Update if you May!

My last post was pretty sad and uncertain. Almost a whole month later, a lot of things have happened. First of all, Easter holidays have come and gone. 15 days that felt like 5. Seriously, time went by so fast. Back in January, the Christmas holidays, really did feel like 23 days. Now… I barely had any time at all to do anything, or so I felt. Alex, close friends and meetings (lots and lots of those two categories), a bit of Aegina and a bit of rural Larissa for the otherwise festive days… It was definitely the most unorthodox (pun intended) Easter I’ve had. I think it’s because I spent the really FESTIVE YEAH WE’RE GONNA EAT TILL WE GO NUCLEAR days away from my parents and close to my love.

Highlights of stuff in no particular order:

1. Improbable, by Adam Fawer. A mystery novel/action thriller/scientific manifesto/philosophical exploration that tells the tale of David Caine, an epileptic gambler that becomes Laplace’s Demon. It goes through various theories about probability, determinism, the idea of multiple dimensions (my favourite!) and the like, all the while maintaining a very tight plot and working on very interesting, distinct and memorable characters. Its scientific insight on mostly philosophical matters is great food for thought… A well-written but surprisingly unknown book, I recommend it to anyone who likes their science as well as their nail-biting suspense in one tight package.

Hold’em

2. Catan. My interest in unusual but exciting board-games sparked just a few months ago. The Settlers of Catan is a perfect example of the kind of board games I want to try and enjoy. I downloaded a demo of the Xbox Live Arcade version and liked it, so I looked out for it and spotted the greek version of Catan in Public (Athens). I think the 35 euros I gave for it were justified thus far, but my hopes of friends suddenly becoming just as excited as I am for board games are quickly being pissed on. I’ve only had one session of Catan since I bought it, and we didn’t finish it either. 🙁

3. Cats. During the Easter holidays I came across many a kitten. I even witnessed the birth of a kitten at Alex’s cousin’s house in the countryside. It was a beautiful moment, and I knew that since then, I’d never look at cats the same way. It wasn’t long before the first opportunity since then appeared; Oliva, everybody’s favourite Italian artistic spirit, whom I met at the street first day I was in Mytilini after Easter, was holding a beautiful kitten. Long story short, I’m now a proud parent of a little kitten. Her name is Yuki, and she’s snow white! I love her and I’m sure that my cat love is only just surfacing — I know we’re going to spend many happy times together… UNLESS SHE CONTINUES PESTERING ME WHEN I’M TRYING TO GO TO SLEEP AND HAVING DIARROEA ANYWHERE BUT IN HER SANDBOX!

Use new tabs to view enlarged images.

And here’s a pic from my secret Nazionalist Kätzchen Trainingsprogramm. Oops shouldn’t have shown that!

4. Life of Pi, by Yann Martel. I read more than 3/4 of this book on my way back to Mytilini (the same trip I finished Improbable. I feel like a bookworm now! ^^). I couldn’t put it down. Simple as that. It certainly struck a chord with my animal lover part. “This story will make you believe in God” is a phrase often repeated within it and I heartily agree. Tender, brutal, religious and exotic at the same time, I can’t decide which shock was greater: the on that derived from my initial impression that the book was retelling a true story or my subsequent realisation that in fact it didn’t. Amelie director Jean-Pierre Jeunet was chosen for the creation of the silver screen rendition and he eagerly accepted. That alone speaks wonders. Read Life of Pi.

Life of Pi

5. Projects. Yes my University projects are going very well. Kthxbi.

6. Planning Eurotrip. So this is the plan: Me and Alex are leaving on July 9th to go to Finland, where we’ll work at Koli National Park, shepherding sheep and preserving the habitat. We’re volunteering to enjoy Finland’s natural beauty and relax. After that, though (somewhere around July 20th-25th) our as-of-yet unbought InterRail ticket will be valid. And then, our month-long train journey will commence! We’ll take the train from Finland back to Greece, going from Helsinki to Copenhagen, traversing Scandinavia and from there just about anywhere in Central Europe. We’ll be going to Holland, Belgium, Germany, Czech, Austria, Switzerland, Italy, Slovenia… But out schedule is wide-open and changes can of course be made. I want to stress this part: we DON’T plan on doing this just the two of us. Any participation from anyone that wants to travel with us is ENCOURAGED. We WANT company, we WANT to share the experience. Anyone that would like to join us can meet us anywhere along our trip. We’ve been stressing this for a few months now but nobody has been eager enough so now might be a bit too late. It won’t be a cheap ride, but we’re planning on making it cheaper by CouchSurfing and minimizing costs. If you are interested at all, please tell me and start making money. It’ll be either the two of us or >=4 of us, for obvious reasons. Anyway. WHILE THERE’S STILL TIME! HURRY! IT’S A UNIQUE OPPORTUNITY!

Interrail Map

7. GTA IV. It’s been a long time since ANY game received this much praise. Mordread and George bought it and I had the chance to play it and watch it — it’s one of the few games that’s actually fun to watch — at the former’s place several times. Well… It’s a great game, no doubt. The part of it that deserves 10/10 is not the actual gameplay though. The sandbox, go around shooting everyone, stealing cars, having fun with stupid (on purpose?) AI and laughing out loud many many times is notably better than GTA III & Co. but still not perfect. It’s more of the setting, story and atmosphere that are much more elaborate than previous renditions of the game. Since I’ve only played but a small part of the story, I can’t comment on how it unfolds. I can definitely say thought that if I had the €70 required to get my dirty hands on it, I’d gladly pay.

GTA IV