Untitled Document

October 27, 2011. Photos by Henry Chan.

mini-tents:
november 24, after the eviction. i arrive and i say "everything is still here". the tents and the people were still there, in the invisible world. full of light and beauty. incredible. i use squarish pieces of cotton fabric, white, black and blue. i hang them from trees with some thread. i see ghosts, mini-tents, flags, markers of property.... the wind gently moves them.

"transform the internalized oppressor":

on november 4th, i think about a comment by a Toronto Occupier on the black and white flags i did carry there a few times at the beginning of my visits. he had said that life is not black and white and that there are greys everywhere. i choose a grey fabric and paint "transform the internalized oppressor" on it. slowly. in the afternoon, i go to St.-James park and i ask a few musicians to join me for this transformation process i want to share. at first only one musician joins and then more arrive. we are in the garden area on the south side of the park. i use a special breath to energize my oppressed cells and then i let voice be released. alltogether, we play for one hour. there is joy and light in us afterwards. the musicians continue to play after i leave. i go back for the same process on november 11th and i do it alone, on the same piece of land. i feel that there is more repressed sounds leaving my body. i feel very cold after which is a sign that a lot has left me. on november 18, i join the sacred fire when i arrive at the park. i stay there until it is time to start my process. Buffalo Runner comes to open the 4 directions and he joins me for the process. we energize our repressed cells. we voice the oppressor out and we let our voices take shape. at one point, when my head is close to the ground and my mouth releases some deeper voice, i feel that the land is talking to me. a second or so. i do not know what it says, but something happens. Buffalo Runner and I smudge each other at the end.

rooster story:

on october 25, i leave a small wooden rooster on one of the crates that are marking the stage for the newly set theatre space. on october 26, the rooster and the crates have disappeared. on october 27, i dig little holes in the cold hard dirt with my fingers. I see a mouth for the land and a sun. P. writes something on a piece of paper and he burries the paper leaving a mini hill of dirt. on october 29, there are crates again and red tape more or less marking the space. the mouth and the sun and the mini-hill have disappeared. cockfight? i know that my impulse to put the rooster was about territory, but i did not anticipate this bizarre invisible negotiation for land between the theatre stage and me.

october 24, 2011: my mind is creating a list of obstacles and fears about going to St.-James park tomorrow.... i intend to bring my black and white flags and i can see myself walking around St.-James park with the flags, but things might change there. i will listen.

october 25, 2011: i was there from 2pm to 4:30pm. P. walked around with one of my flags while i was walking with the other. we exchanged flags. we shared our experiences. i gave some attention to the ground and received different feelings depending on where i was in the park. i felt a certain sensation of "home" and some energy going towards "surrender". i gave a cigarette to one occupant and he said "merci" and kissed me on the cheek. that felt like a spark of special. after i left the park, i realized that when talking to people there, i was more myself. clearer. bolder. no interest for interface layers. just simple and direct talk. on my bicycle, i cried. what if life had no meaning at all? a necessary and unbearable truth in my spine.

october 25-26 night: i dreamt that my mother and i had a fight. she was accusing me of having done nothing to help for food and i was defending myself as i was sure i had helped considerably.

october 26, 2011: morning: i feel weak but my body still wants to go to Occupy Toronto. the weather is cold and rainy. i ponder giving and receiving. what do i give to Occupy Toronto? about St.-James: "The first "church of York” was built out of wood in 1807. It was used during the War of 1812 as a hospital. It was robbed and damaged by the American troops." Afternoon: I was there for one hour. It was a short visit and it was short because my body was giving me back a lot of weakness, fears and guilt. My usual vulnerability: fear of being sick. fear of facing the roots of my loneliness. fear of feeling the stones in my heart. fear/frustration/rage with the feeling that i float inbetween identities. fear of the unknown of "there". guilt for not staying there. guilt for not helping more. all this my shit or ours?. Action: I stood with both my flags near the gazebo and turned around according to the winds. surrender. meditation on loneliness and home. i could not surrender completely. it felt that if i were to surrender i would loose my mind. A few people asked about the flags and shared what they were seeing. one person said "death" was associated with the black. one guy asked for a hug and asked me to run in the park with a flag as he was running with the other one. when we met again, he motioned to exchange the flags, which we did. Conversation: i heard about a winterization plan and about funding from the Unions. i literally and surprisingly felt a load of heaviness going off my shoulders after that. not that i have actually taken any responsibility there, but then i understood that i unconsciously had. you too? is this my/our work? invisibly carrying something at the border of Occupy Toronto? Later: fears and guilt intensity. i feel sick.

october 26-27 night: i dreamt that i was repairing my own bike on the very narrow top of a cliff. i was almost paralyzed with the fear of falling and a friend, who was not as scared and might have more support under his body, was helping me. at some point a big cubic block of stone detached from the cliff but i was holding it with my right foot. i decided to let it go in order to survive myself. it took a long time to fall and i could not look to look whether it had crushed somebody but i felt relieved.

october 27, 2011: morning: i faced some guilt in my bed. guilt makes me smaller than my contour. and then there is fear because of the "absence" that is between the guilty and the skin. I have more energy today. there: i feel the need to give. i will write more later. afternoon: P. and i go to the theatre area. giving something is more important than the flags. the energy feels stuck and fragmented there. P. speaks about respect. i pull the leaves that are on the ground into a circle with my hands. the ground is cold and hard. P. decides to stand there. sometimes i caress the ground, sometimes i am aggressive, sometimes i am not present. P. writes something on a piece of paper and we bury the paper in a little hole that i made in the ground. i make another hole. two women join us making their own marks on the ground. the person who set this space as theatre space the other day arrives and creates a square with red tape around us. the circle of leaves disappears under this square. M. goes talk to him. he leaves. we open the tape. the circle is visible again. territory fight? as i dig my mini-holes with my cold fingers, i suddenly see a little mouth and a sun. something has happened. P. leaves. i leave too. at night, i have to keep my left fingers up because they pound with blood.

october 27-28, at night: i dreamt of a performance. there were chairs in a square space. the chairs were on desks and they were in light wood. i was behind them. there were glasses on the chairs and the glasses became filled with a liquid that i knew was made out of milk, but it looked mixed with water. now i am thinking that it had the colour of breast milk and it was slightly shiny. this colour was beautiful. a young guy had a laser to create images. i would have liked to have a laser too, but this was not possible. at some point, he created images in a cubic translucent piece of material, maybe glass. on one side, i could see a seeshore, and then see urchins and then baby feet and i found this all very beautiful. on the other side, i saw an adult leg, laying on the ground, rotting with skin open and dots of different colours and sizes. i could not believe that the same cube was showing such different images. i was looking for the reality that the cube might have been reflecting. maybe there was a reality on each sides of the cube and the cube was a mirror. maybe. this dream feels very important.

october 29, 2011: i feel addicted to Occupy Toronto. i need to go. i go. i sit on the stage and draw with mud and pencils on pieces of cardboards. i also use grease. i hang my drawings near the sign area. is the territory fight over?

rooster and mustache on a map of toronto, queen and dufferin, October 21, 2011