Paul Auster's new book

I had to see the Paul Auster page on the Wikipedia - the page I've read maybe a hundred times - to learn that the great writer has released another novel since I read - with great pleasure - his last work, Invisible. The title of the book is Sunset Park, Amazon lets you read the first eight pages or so and, as it always happens with me and Auster's books, I'm totally hooked and can't wait to get my hands on the novel.

I don't know what exactly makes Auster's novels tick - is it the polished, highly readable language? Or is it the plots that take you around New York streets, following one lonely soul after another? Maybe it's the red notebook (a standard spiralled 100-page lined notebook), which is present in almost every novel he's written? I don't know. It must be the combination of all those things and much, much more. In any case, Auster is among the very few writers (Orhan Pamuk is among them) whose every work fills me with inspiration, excitement, and joy. I like to think that these writers are my distant friends whom I have never met and who write the very books that I'm waiting to read.

Joys of fatherhood

The past weekend was full of anxiety. I felt Sartrean nausea, trying not to bend under the weight of my troubled existence. But if there was one thing that helped me live through the dull Saturday afternoon, it was the joy of playing with my son, having him in my lap, talking to him in his language of uuuus and aaaas, thinking about his future.

Looking at him I think about the feelings my father had looking at me, the anxiety he might have felt, but not expressed, about life and everything that comes with it. I am becoming such a cynic that I'm no longer upset when faced with tough luck, but when I look at my son and see how pure he is, I try not to think about the difficulties that await him on his path. Indeed, life has the power to turn us from little angels to begrudged beasts.

About the memories that fade away

The night my son was born, I was alone in my room in Ichinoya dormitory, Tsukuba, Japan, six and a half thousand kilometres away from my wife and our baby. The night was very long, I had nothing in particular to do, which made the night even longer. In the end, after hours of nervous waiting, I heard my son's voice over the phone.

The next four days I spent in Japan were a great mixture of emotions. I was very happy, perhaps the happiest man in the world, although I couldn't yet fully grasp that happiness. I was a little melancholic, the way people feel a few days before leaving a place they have become attached to. And I was very exhausted with all the packing-up and other leaving procedures, like cancelling mobile phone contract, closing bank accounts, paying the health insurance fees left over, etc. Amidst this maddening week or so, however, I have several great memories which I didn't put down on paper for some reason (although I have a thick thought notebook for such things).

I was riding my bicycle along the short but dark bicycle road to IIAS Tsukuba, a big mall in the outskirts of the town, to look for something I now don't remember. It must have been some clothes or toys for my son, who was born the day before. It is more likely that I wanted to kill some time and raise my spirits - walking around amidst large crowds and spending several hours between bookstore shelves usually inspires me.

It was getting dark as I rode to IIAS, and the little forests (or maybe I should describe them as groves) that line the bicycle track were breathing really cool wind - it was a bit too chilly. There was a new moon in the dark blue sky - a thin and shiny slice of cheese on a dark tablecloth. It was, perhaps, this combination of being on my own on with the crescent on a dark and cool bicycle track that put me in a melancholic mood, but I soon started thinking about my son. The baby who was born only several hours prior to that, whom I hadn't seen, who was so far away from me as it was impossible to imagine the real distance. I tried to communicate with my son, to speak to him. And it was then that I had the idea that I should write a diary or a collection of regular letters addressed to my son, in English, something he can read when he grows up and understand the feelings I was experiencing at that moment.

I became so excited with the idea that were I not riding a bicycle, I would start writing the first entry right away. So I made a mental note that I would write a note about that night for my son to read, but later, when it came to start writing, I didn't know how to begin and so left it at that. This is the first attempt to document that night, and if I see fit, I will write down other experiences from my life.

On saved-up luck

One of the pillars of religious or otherwise superstitious perception of the world is the way we believe we have a log of good and bad deeds kept for us by some heavenly office. We think that if we're good, we'll be rewarded, and vice versa, as if there were a reservoir for good and bad deeds, where daily or monthly balance sheets could be kept. In this same way, when things don't go our way we usually say "I'm saving up my luck for later," as though we can regularly check the universal luck counter that God (or the Universe, or whatever) is keeping track of. Thus, we think God (or the Universe, or whatever) owe us something (rewards, more luck in the future) for being good, or just for undeserved (in our understanding) suffering.

The truth is, the Universe doesn't owe us anything. It doesn't care. We can be good for our whole lives and not get a lousy penny as a reward in the end.

Pray for Japan!

Apocalyptic images coming from Japan every day. We watch news channels every hour to see if the hell that broke loose is coming to an end. This is so horrific that it seems unreal, images of cars swept, like matchboxes, off the coast and on top of nearby buildings, hundreds of villages and towns flooded with black water and mud, corpses lying face down in corners where the rescue workers haven't been able to reach them. This is a nightmare and I wish I could wake up and forget it.

Ibaraki prefecture and the beautiful town of Tsukuba, where me and my wife stayed for two years, is not too far from the epicentre of the earthquake and, more importantly, the Fukushima nuclear power plants. We have tens of friends at Tsukuba University, many of them ryuugakusei, like I was during my time in Japan. Their Facebook statuses sound scary sometimes, but the first day I was happy to read them. I was happy to hear any voices coming out of the disaster. Things seem to be returning to normalcy lately, but the fear of new quakes and nuclear plant explosions hangs in the air.

I hope this hell will be over very soon and the Japanese people will resume their lives, a little scared, maybe, but also a little more experienced, with bruises, but stronger than they were before the catastrophe. I really hope Japan will soon forget all the pain and suffering caused by this disaster, but remember the most important lessons - that the Japanese people acted as one and kept together. Many nations would crumble and never find their footing after such an apocalypsis, but not Japan - I am sure they will be back on their feet pretty soon.

I am not someone who prays regularly, but I will do so for Japan and those who are in pain. Pray for Japan!

Japan's worst earthquake in more than a century

When many of my friends started writing about tsunami in Japan, I didn't take notice. And then there was a Facebook status from my former professor about the earthquake. He was in his office (I've been in that office many times) and books fell off his two ceiling-high bookstands, he had to stop two wobbling computer monitors from falling.

Now, I have experienced many earthquakes while in Japan and by the end of my stay there had even learned not to be scared. My wife would often wake me in the middle of the night, scared, but I would just say "It will soon end, go back to sleep." And it would end soon. If I remember correctly, the worst earthquake I had while in Japan was 6.5 degrees on the Richter scale.

But this one seems to be a really bad one. I have many friends who live and study in Japan and I'm somewhat worried. From Facebook messages it looks like there are no casualties or injured in Tsukuba, at least among the people I know. I hope there will not be.

On fatherhood

I am a father for four full months now and this period, besides being the happiest in my life, has made me have second thoughts about many things in life. Most important, so far, is how I think about people and treat them.

Before, I used to judge people as my equals, fellow earth-dwellers, contemporaries - just people. I didn't care much about them unless they were close to me, I didn't think too much about the feelings each person has inside. Now that I am a father, I see in every man or woman somebody's child. Everybody wants only the best things for their offspring, and for me my son is currently the centre of all universes. I can't help looking at people through their parents' eyes and this makes me reconsider most of the ways I treat people.

Next time I have to be cruel to somebody I will not be cruel - I will just put myself in their father's shoes.

The Big Bang Theory

I try to avoid sitcoms and drama series, but I have to admit that I'm getting addicted to the named sitcom. Reasons: (1) it is smart, it makes you think, (2) lead characters are played excellently: Sheldon is great in more than one way, Penny is sexy and sociable, Leonard is an epitome of a good guy, the other two guys are also peculiar, (3) the dialogues are great, and I am big fan of dialogues ever since I first watched Pulp Fiction.