Blood and Rain

These days I am feeling the affects of the mysterious percentage of gypsy blood flowing through my veins, as I rarely spend more than two nights in the same location at a time. Constant movement, minimum possessions (somewhere there are a whole load of boxes containing all my stuff but I haven't needed any of it in the last few months since its storage, and so I guess it's not all that important), and long train travel engender random ponderings: life, origins, identity, identity. I should note that British National Rail services, alongside London Underground Services, very much help to cultivate this line of thought as long delays and cancellations become part of the daily process. Another instigator has been the typical set of circumstances that are created through meeting a whole lot of new people who ask the same old question: 'where are you from?' which is a sort of synonym of 'who are you?' ...or is it...

I don't really know where I'm from but does that lead to me specifically questioning who I am? Perhaps. I guess it led me last week to the Odeon, Covent Garden to the opening of the DLAFF (discovering latin america film festival). The film was Jorge Navas' controversial 'la sangre y la lluvia'. (blood and rain). Set in Bogota, my birthplace, the film relies on stark realism to present the darker side of the city. Years of working for tv advertising set Navas off on a rebellious trail, in a refusal to play the commercial, capitalist fool. As Navas himself asserts, just as we are about to begin viewing, it's not meant to be light entertainment. I rediscover the streets of early childhood, mediated through the harsh night life of the city. It's not just drugs, sex, violence and death however...the filmatography is stunning, at times quite beautiful...leaving a radiant, though brooding, landscape imprinted ...to be taken away and contemplated. The message is also more than 'don't get in a taxi at night in bogota...or indeed...don't ever leave your house if you can help it' There is also love...and the potential for human connection and hope that this connection might one day be more durable.

The shocking discovery came at the end of the showing, in the director's question and answer session. There were numerous angry Colombians there who seemed to question how Navas could dare to show such a portrayal of their beautiful country to the wider world (the film has made quite a hit in numerous important festivals). 'Why didn't you think it would be better to show something more lovely...more... ?' they challenge him. 'We go to the cinema to escape' another protests. Navas is unfazed by these questions, though a little saddened, and he answers calmly. 'You can't escape the reality of your own day-today existence' he states. 'It must be faced...and if it can be changed in some way it must first be challenged in some way'. 'This is a part of our identity'.

Time worth pondering over this is not lost time then... perhaps I should be more grateful for the train delays that enable such a luxury.











ps - I guess I should acknowledge stealing a google picture which I played arounda little bit with to create the above - original accessable at: http://www.worldsbestlanguageschools.com/Bogota_Colombia2.jpg

maybe the language school is actually in one of these buildings...