Tag: normality

Normal Is Another World

Hamar WilliamsLeave a comment

It was just recently the one year anniversary of the massacre of three Mormon women and six of their children in Mexico. Their cars ambushed in the hills near their home at La Mora close to the US border. Caught up in local Cartel violence; the exact reasons and culprits are still unknown. They will likely never get real answers. It was a brutal event which understandably brought international attention and shock and just for a second it opened up a community to the eyes of the world.

With over seven billion people on earth there are over seven billion different ways of being raised to understand life and the world around. Mormons can be ridiculed for it, but they offer an example of another way of life. With my experience of growing up, understanding how people like these Mormons live their lives is not always easy. To begin with we view them through the narrow prism of our own conditioning and view their actions as if they thought as we do. But why would they, having grown up in a Mormon community in the north of Mexico, their experience in the large part is beyond my comprehension. Saying that having Anglo-European origins, they likely won’t be as far removed as we might first think.

I look at the women and struggle to understand how they could be happy with a husband who also has other wives. The young women growing up and ultimately being prepared for a life of baby making. The two women discussed in the BBC article have over one hundred children and grandchildren in total. That is simply remarkable. Or at least it’s remarkable for someone who comes from a country which will likely start to experience falling birth rates in the near future. The understanding of these women also comes from the experience of women with a very different attitude to sharing their men.

This isn’t to say all cultures are right in all their own ways and we need to respect people in their cultural sensitivities. If a culture is abusive of someone within it, then that is still wrong. It’s being able to identify the grey areas between what is abuse and what is simply misinterpretation because of your own cultural understanding of the world. There are plenty of examples throughout history which suggest we have at times got it very wrong. I look at the huge group of children in the pictures and think what a lovely childhood they must have growing up together, it’s just a shame it’s tinged with God and all that that entails. Many run away from Mormonism or don’t continue it’s practises, but someone growing up in that world will likely have a different perspective of God’s influence and all their brothers and sisters. Normal is always normal in our own eyes.

We can be critical too of people to don’t reject these worlds they grew up in. Unable to understand why they don’t walk away from what seems so obvious. With such sentiment all we do is miss the irony that we are unable to walk away from the more detrimental and destructive aspects of our own societies and ways of life. There are many and we vary in levels of obliviousness towards them. I can imagine a Mormon from this rural community finding all sorts of faults with the behaviour of the average city dwelling northern European.

This all simply comes from imagining growing up not as me but as a kid in this community. What a completely different understanding of the world, or of home they must have. Then imagine someone from Asia or Africa, or even southern Europe. It’s just important to remember sometimes that what we think isn’t necessarily the only way of thinking. How we experience a moment is not the only way of experiencing it. Normal is not always normal in others eyes after all.

La Peste

Hamar WilliamsLeave a comment

There are times when certain books need to be revisited. With current events, even though they seem to be drawing to a close, it might be worth pointing people in the direction of Albert Camus’ The Plague. It’s probably quite obvious why it’s a suitable book. Set in Oran in Camus’ native Algeria, he tells of the story of a city in quarantine trying to deal with the ravages of a plague working it’s way through the populace. The protagonist is a doctor trying to find answers in scientific explanations while the ruling classes prefer to prevaricate, cover up and live on false hope. Painfully relevant to contemporary events in our own Oran as an island cut off. Having been written in the years immediately after the Second World War, the plague was also supposed to represent the Nazi occupation, one Camus experienced first hand working as a publisher in the French Resistance. Apparently in Britain alone, sales of the ebook have risen by three thousand percent which is quite remarkable.

There was an article in The Sunday Times a few weeks ago that was a translation of a letter Camus wrote to doctors during the early years of the war. In it he offers advice to doctors in how best to deal with plagues. I assume there must have been a lot of plagues back then, unless this was also a reference to Nazi occupation. It is in many ways a precursor to his book. He gives some advice on how best to avoid exposure, the importance of wine “to lessen the dismay that will engulf you” and probably most importantly of all to “never get used to seeing people die”. Sometimes it’s easy to not notice the new normal slowly ebbing it’s way into taking over our existence and once death becomes normalised, life will lose some of the value it once held. In times of plagues, pandemics and political occupations it is always vital to remember what is not normal. If that does become the case, well wine will always help.

“The fact remains that none of this is easy. Despite your masks and sachets, the vinegar and the protective clothing, despite the calmness of your courage and tireless effort, the day will come when you can no longer bear this city of dying people…their cries, their terror that knows no future. The day will come when you will want to shout out your disgust in the face of everyone’s pain and fear. When that day comes, there will no longer be any solution I can offer, other than compassion, which is the sister of ignorance”

A Daily Update

Hamar WilliamsLeave a comment

I’ve been making pizza today. Lot’s of pizza. I have made them before from scratch and it is very satisfying going through the whole process from start to finish. Today though I did it in my friends bakery with all the machinery and stonebaked ovens to put a slightly different spin on proceedings. We made about twenty as well and delivered them to some friends in the village. Seemingly all the takeaways in the area have closed due to this virus which is probably not a bad idea but there would certainly be benefits to all involved in keeping them open. My friends bakery is still open because it is essential, people need their bread and pies.

There has always been something satisfying about cooking something like pizzas from beginning to end and there have been a few times I’ve cooked them in wood burning ovens which adds to the satisfaction as you’re standing in front of a roasting hot fire and sweating, and it’s intense, and you’re drinking beer, and you’re in full on adrenaline mode and you feel alive. Fuck that’s good fun. Especially when you’re cooking for a lot of people. I miss fires, I miss sitting around them, I miss cooking them, I miss sourcing wood, I miss my axe, I miss that moment when you realise the fire has taken, oh I just miss it. There is a lot to be said for normal existence and working a job and living in a house, it’s been an interesting experience which has taught me a lot, but how I would like to be back in my van, on the road and making a fire.

There’s no driving into nature in these moments and I’m pleased that is the case. People shouldn’t be leaving the city and potentially taking the virus out to rural communities which won’t be able to cope. The talk today was of a couple from London who had come up to stay in the holiday home for the weekend. The locals are not happy, I’ll be surprised if they’re not lynched before the end of tomorrow. They may need a new holiday home after this. People are quick to forget though. Once this all blows over they’ll just become another couple of outsiders spending money and their faces will blur in with everyone else’s. That’s how it works.

That’s the thing around these parts. Without the tourists I couldn’t imagine how much of a dump these little villages would be. They’re so insular but if you’ve got cash, well fuck it you’re my friend. It’s like that everywhere though lets be honest. I’m not sure how I got here. In life as much as in this piece. I was going to tell you all about the pizza fun I’ve been having but it’s been a long day and I’m already three beers deep since I got in, realised it was late and sat down to write this. That may explain a lot of things. Oh I wish I was at the edge of a lake somewhere, parked up in my van and sitting all cozy around a fire. But if I was doing all that then I wouldn’t have had the pleasure of making pizzas all day. We forget what we have when we desire everything else.

Movement

Hamar WilliamsLeave a comment

I will attempt to write this without sounding like some arse who just wants to boast about all the wonderful adventures I have. It is simply an attempt to give a little background to the person whose words you are hopefully enjoying reading. The reason for this is that today I have arrived in Dublin for a Christmas with relatives over here and I realised I am back abroad again despite the fact I thought I was done with it for this year. Over the last ten or so years I have traveled pretty intensely, convincing myself I’m stopping but ultimately just taking a break. This year I started in Scotland before following this route – Spain – Gibraltar – Spain – Italy – Scotland – Ireland – Scotland – Ireland – Spain – Ireland – Scotland – Sweden – Estonia – Finland – Sweden – Scotland – Australia – Scotland – Spain – England – Ireland – Scotland? Each stay was for a variety of lengths and mostly they were for living, sailing, stag partying and family holidays. It has been quite the year, my carbon footprint must be massive despite the fact I sailed between many of them. Australia alone is the equivalent carbon that I can be allotted for my entire years consumption were we to successfully avoid a two degree rise and ultimate human doom. I don’t regret any of these trips even though it means I am certainly part of the problem. I once spent two years not flying, my high point was the overnight train from Paris to Madrid but I’ve made no attempt to repeat that period of ideological superiority and I don’t mind.

The point is I travel a lot, and after the last trip to Spain I thought I was finished for the year. The question is, will I ever finish. I’ve had many conversations with people who tell me that I am so lucky to be living such a great and free life, and I wince and suffer, I try to explain I’m tired, want some normality and can’t stop despite wanting and being desperate to. And then I’m off again, and so happy in the adventure and discovery once more. For this is a life worth loving but one I can’t bring myself to love anymore until I’m doing it again, or fantasising about such things. People experiencing normality want adventure, and people with constant adventure seem to want normality. What a ridiculous species of monkey we are.

And then I went and got distracted, and drunk…and now I’m drunk. I should leave it there I’ll finish it properly tomorrow.