Spontaneity

One of my guilty pleasures is watching on the television ‘Come dine with me’. The British version of the program can be really fun. The commentator has a really caustic sense of humour and the contestants can be quite colourful. On one of the episodes I was watching, there was an interesting conversation on the table regarding doing spontaneous things. So the question was asked, that I want to ask myself and you: ‘what’s the most spontaneous thing you've done?’

Spontaneity: noun – the condition of being spontaneous; spontaneous behaviour or action

Spontaneous: adjective - happening or done in a natural, often sudden way, without any planning or without being forced.

So, what was the most spontaneous thing I've ever done? Hmmmm. That will need lots of thinking. For me what’s when the problem starts. You see, words like ‘sudden’ and ‘without any planning’ don’t really agree with me. I like being in control of situations. I’m not the type of person that will leave on sudden holidays without having a specific destination, or on impulse decide to go bungee jumping just because I saw it while driving by a bridge. I can never see myself waking up with a hangover in a motel in Scotland for example, just because... Even, to move in with ‘JJ’ took months of persuasion and thinking, planning.

OK, I’m not a total freak. I don’t have to plan every little thing in my life. I can still get up in the morning and take the train for a nice day trip somewhere, or simply change my plans the last minute and do something completely different! But these are not really the things expected as an answer to a question like that. The answer should be something more profound and surprising. Instead of ‘I decided the last minute to go to the British Museum instead of the National Portrait Gallery’, a better answer would be ‘I followed the man of my dreams and moved to Australia’ or ‘just this morning I decided to quit my job and become an artist’!

The closest I can get to being spontaneous (I think) is the fact that I began jogging/running and went on scuba diving lessons! Both of these activities were suggested by friends unexpectedly and my positive answer came similarly without too much thinking. An old work colleague who’s also my gym buddy asked me one day to follow him on his afternoon run that same day! I remember it went awfully bad. I was out of breath, fighting for my dear life, I think around 250 meters into the run. But I was hooked and wanted to try again. The same thing more or less happened with scuba diving. A female friend of mine said she’s booked her lessons and whether I’d like to join her that same weekend. I said yes and never looked back. I could even say that I started this blog on a bit of an impulse these years ago. I didn't know what I was doing then and I still don’t know to this day.

I've made many life changing choices in my life. I've decided to permanently leave my home country and make London my new home. I've decided to move in with my boyfriend and now buy with him a house. I might not be the most spontaneous person I know, but I am very happy and grateful being me.

Gay Stereotypes in TV

There’s a new show on television called ‘The new normal’. You probably know more about it, than I do. I’m a bit slow when it comes to TV programmes. In case you haven’t seen it, it’s from the creators of Glee, so you can imagine how it’s like. I’ve only seen three quarters of the first (I think) episode in rerun. It’s about a gay couple finding a surrogate mother for their child and all the shenanigans followed by making that choice. There’s the lovely, annoyingly perfect, gay couple, the outspoken and loud African-American assistant, the traditional, very rich and homophobic grandmother of the surrogate mother and her daughter, a cute but a bit strange little girl. That little girl is like a clone taken from ‘Little Miss Sunshine’.

Before I even start, I have to say that I don’t like Glee. I never did. I’ve seen only a few episodes and those by accident. I found it predictable, not funny and the songs way too mushy, over the top and forced to be emotional. However, I know lots of people that swear by it. At least, they used to. I don’t know what’s happening now and how popular it is, after all these series. The gay characters in that show, from what I had seen, follow the general stereotypical image of gay people. The same recipe I think is followed in the ‘New Normal’.

One of the characters in the new series is extremely like a grown up ‘Kurt’ from Glee (I googled to find the character’s name). He’s a very camp, much into fashion and everything ‘pretty’, character. His boyfriend is like a character taken out of a gay romantic fiction book. He’s the exact opposite of his partner and a very down-to-Earth, intelligent, gynaecologist with a six pack (of course) with a sense for intellectuality. They also share a very nice house and a very cute dog. The surrogate mother is the forcibly likable victim of a bad relationship, starting fresh and saying all the rights things on the right time. She even wants the money from the surrogacy to study Law and create a better future for her daughter (can anyone pass me the tissues?)!

OK, maybe I’m being way too harsh. I haven’t seen much of the show to be honest and so judgmental and negative. Maybe the characters are not so two dimensional and the story evolves nicely in an interesting way. I’m not holding my breath for it though.  
 
However, I have to give much deserved credit to both shows, Glee and New Normal. They are making more gay characters likable in a mainstream TV show. They introduce more popular gay people to the everyday watching family. They’re not the first show to do that. But from what I’ve read, Glee has been so extremely popular to younger and not only generations that might be helping loads in fighting homophobia and bullying in schools (hopefully).  I might not completely agree with the way that some gay people are portrayed, but still, it is a positive thing to do.

It’s very nice that shows like ‘Modern Family’ (more to my taste to be honest) and ‘New Normal’ try to portrait and even promote gay parenthood.

As nature intended

Sometimes something appears on TV that surprises you...

Post Easter (religious) thoughts…

I had quite a lovely long weekend. Jesus Christ was thankfully resurrected. I didn’t have any doubts but our priest did take his time and the resurrection was a bit late. It is supposed to occur exactly at midnight. Most people (sometimes me included) go to church a little bit before that, to leave right after. According to custom, you are not supposed to eat (much) during the day because you mourn. By the time it gets close to midnight most people feel extremely hungry and don’t stay long after the joyful message of the resurrection is delivered...

that is so blasphemous...

Speaking of Jesus Christ, there was a very interesting program yesterday on the television. I don’t normally blog or comment on TV programs but I was surprised by it. It was called: “Derren Brown: Miracles for Sale”. According to Wikipedia, the know-it-all portal of modern times, Derren Brown is a British illusionist, mentalist, painter, writer and sceptic (yes, all that). He is one of those magicians that perform on the street and on the television. I have to admit that I am not very familiar with his work since I don’t watch telly much and this was the very first time I watched a full episode. By the way, he’s gay and fairly cute… Here’s a recent interview of his.

Derren Brown

On this episode, he wanted to confront the so-called faith healers. These people in the name of religion, faith, Jesus or whatever you want to call it, take advantage of the believers to sell them hope. The price of this healing though is very expensive and very dangerous. There have been numerous occasions where people stopped taking their medication or spent life savings and vast amounts of money to be “healed” in the name of Jesus. There is some information here.


In order for Derren to prove that most of this healing is false and these religious ‘shows’ staged, he decided to take an inexperienced performer and make a healer out of him. Through normal casting he found an ex-diving instruction and he created a man called ‘Pastor James’. During the training period, all members of Derren’s group travelled to Texas, USA, where these faith healers are renowned to perform. In six months, ‘Pastor James’ learned how to perform in a religious gathering, hypnotise the crowd and perform ‘healing’!

The show does demonstrate how these well known healers make fortunes in the expense of human misery. The tricks they pull are well organised and they can trick masses of followers. At the end of the show, ‘Pastor James’ stages a very successful healing demonstration and does prove how this so call healing is not to be taken seriously.


However, I don’t think than any progress can easily be made. It has been proven in the past how lots of these shows are staged and the healers are imposters, but still people do get victimised in the name of religion. I do believe that lack of proper education is a key factor that unfortunately is very difficult to be provided.