ALICE HERZ-SOMMER: THE LADY IN NUMBER 6, 3 YEARS ON

Photo sourced through http://nickreedent.com/photos/

Have you ever met a person whose life story seemed too big to conceive, whose presence seemed divine, almost holy, like a piece of history that accidentally found itself in your bare hands for a little while?

Her name was Alice, and she was my piece of history on a Wednesday afternoon in the winter of 2010. She was meant to be merely a University project, part of my ‘Interview Skills’ module, aimed to make me a better journalist. I never got to be a journalist, but I will not forget my teacher, who foolishly yet truly believed I could be one, constantly encouraging me to push my own limits and reach out farther.

My moment with Alice

I saw her one night on the Russell Howard’s Good News show, and immediately knew I had to meet her. I had no clue as to how to contact her, and so I did what every good journalism student does: research. I must have spent about a week Googling and Facebooking and Twittering until I finally got her phone number from a previous interviewer. And when I called, I shivered. And when she told me to ‘come tomorrow, two o’clock’ and put down the phone, I cried like a little girl.

I went up to North London and had my amateur interview with a professional pianist. She had just had her 107^th birthday, and her flat was filled with colourful flowers. She was warm, sharp, human, but mostly – happy. I asked her about her life, and she asked me about mine. I promised I would visit.

Alice and me in 2010

It has been nearly 3 years now, and I haven’t been back. I know, it sounds all too much like Mitch Albom’s confession in Tuesdays with Morrie, right before he realises his life isn’t really going the way he thought it was, and decides to spend less time working and more time with the people he cares about. Well, that might be relevant, but allow me to make a conscious decision to postpone dealing with this urgent matter for later.

I was recently emailed by a certain Dave N, notifying me of the upcoming documentary The Lady in Number 6, which has apparently qualified to receive a nomination for the Academy Awards. ‘As part of our appreciation for Alice as a person and as a sense of inspiration,’ he wrote, ‘the producers have started the "Alice Challenge." The goal is to give Alice 1,000,000 birthday wishes for her 110th birthday, and send an amazing message to a wonderful individual.”

I know I’m no saint, and re-posting about my experience would probably not clear my conscience or make me feel like a better person. But I at least owe this to you, whoever you may be, to share that bit of exciting news, hoping to take on the Russell Howard role rather than Mitch Albom’s, and inspire you to your own encounter with a piece of history, who, well, might make you cry like a little girl too.

Photo sourced through http://nickreedent.com/photos/

James Emmett, Media Photographer

An interview with James Emmett, photographer from Hackney, east London, who holds in his repertoire working as Chief Photographer in the Hackney Gazette, moving to the London's National News Agency, and currently working as freelance for national and international publications and magazines such as The Independent, Daily Mail, The Scotsman, New Books Magazine, The Oldie Magazine and Der Spiegel. 

Emmett has worked with musicians, authors and politicians, as well as covering local and national news.

We talk about his work, from photographing eccentric celebrities like Juliette Lewis and Wayne Coyne of the Flaming Lips to serious news events like the 2011 London Riots. 

He tells me about his biggest inspirations such as photographer Jim Marshall and his controversial photograph of Johnny Cash, artistic creativity that has to be drawn during a few seconds press shot, as well as the difficulties and limitations of working for national publications, complying to house styles and the ‘mission’ of shooting photographs as an automatic, mechanical action. 

As for the future of media photography, Emmett is quite positive that media photographers will stick around for longer: "There will always be a need for people to gather information, whether it's used online, on a watch, a newspaper, or the TV... They need humans to go and collect this information."

LIKE A COMPLETE UNKNOWN: Bob Dylan at the FEIS Festival 2011

Lost: one musical legend, cult condition, last seen with magical abilities to sweep millions off their feet with his old enchanting songs.

No, that’s not the guy who was performing at the FEIS festival last Saturday in Finsbury Park. The guy I’m talking about is known for his poetic lyrics, and not his defected speech problem. The guy I was looking for is famous for bringing out a rebellious-yet-pacifistic atmosphere among his devoted audience, whereas this guy was just bringing out the rebellious part out of the annoyed audience.

Expectations. My comrades & I, proudly presenting our backstage passes before the show

I didn’t presume to understand the relation between the Jewish-American singer/songwriter and this Irish music festival, otherwise filled with patriotic acts such as the meritorious Cranberries and the Irish answer to Johnny Cash, Christy Moore. I did not even expect much from the 70-year-old poet who was never known for his mighty vocal abilities.

I did, however, expect to be filled with nostalgic euphoria, the kind you get whenever an old, loved musician tries to perform a classic you grew up on without doing it justice (because, let’s face it, it ALWAYS sounds better when played in your home stereo / iPod), but despite that still manages to deliver his grace to the forgiving audience. 

There was no forgiveness amid the audience on that rainy, muddy Saturday. The over-fatigued artist started his set trying to cover his frog-like voice by adopting a Tom Waits style, when performing classics like “It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue”. The only reason we actually recognised the song was due to the high-alertness of the guy standing in front of us, commenting to his irritated friends, “You know that song, ‘It’s all over now baby blue’? This is it!”

The rest of the set list followed with either unfamiliar tracks or classics that you never had a shot recognising anyway. And so none of us got that nostalgic rush we were hoping to get. But we were still building on the encore to save the evening.

An indifferent audience

To my surprise, once Dylan was off the stage, the encore didn’t take long to happen – perhaps a sign of an impatient audience not to be tangled with. 

It started with the much-needed classic Like a Rolling Stone. And for three minutes there, everyone was chanting to it as if begging for a last chance of that festival atmosphere we were all lacking so desperately.

Needless to say, after that song was finished, my partners and I were having difficulties recognising the last two, All Along the Watchtower and Blowin’ in the Wind, due to the tired mumbling of the lyrics and the completely altered familiar tunes we were waiting for.

What could have been a glorious evening, was carelessly blown in the wind. And rain.

The view from up stage...

MY ATTEMPT AT LIVING WITHOUT MODERN TECHNOLOGY

My name is Iris and I’m a techno-holic. I live in London – a city that thrives on technology more than most places on earth, working, studying and socialising through modern technology.

The day I accidently left my mobile phone at work was the trigger to my experiment. Using my home landline to call my colleague who had my phone, whose number I got off another colleague who happened to be on Skype, we were planning a meeting point for me to pick up the holy medium. Yes, it was as complicated as it sounds. “If you leave your house in seven minutes, you’ll get there at roughly the same time as me,” said the nervous colleague once we’ve decided on a spot we both knew.

This operation was detailed to military level, and that was over a mobile phone. What happens when there are more variables lost in the equation? Emails, Skype, Facebook, Messenger: could you even imagine life without it?

The ironic thing is that this is just how we used to live until not so long ago. How we did it is long forgotten, a mission impossible for some. “Horrible idea,” my 43-year-old sister emailed me, “can’t you write about something else? Are you out of ideas?”. “Impossible,” my 16-year-old niece declared, “you’re not gonna make it.” Even my friend Jo, who adores a good experiment, was willing to put her money on my cracking after two hours of daylight.   

As for my expectations, I gave it 48 hours, and I was being generous. As a foreign journalism student, with family and friends based in Israel, with whom I communicate online on a daily basis, not to mention my consistent correspondence with lecturers and potential interviewees – I am consciously throwing myself into a well of paranoia and anxiety.

I started “the cut-off” on Thursday morning, after replying all emails and letting the world know of my bold experiment (and possible insanity). I equipped myself with my old Sony Discman and picked out one CD to accompany the commute to Birkbeck’s library. Ashamed of my gigantic vintage gadget out in display in front of my fellow passengers, I hid it well in my bag and relished the shaking voices of Simon and Garfunkel as the train shook along. The cumbersome machinery did not leave my bag on the way back: I chose to listen to my carriage mates instead.

Getting home that evening, I had my dinner and was about to retire to my laptop for my studying-before-bed ritual. I swear I could feel a light shiver as I realised I couldn’t. I wanted to call one of my friends in Ealing and meet up for a late chat, so I rescued a few numbers off the prepared-in-advance hardcopy phonebook and literally picked up the receiver and dialed.

Iron Rule #1: People will generally not take late-night calls from unknown numbers. 

And so I found myself staring at non-quality television content for the remainder of the non-productive evening. 

Finally, realising I’m expecting a text from work, informing me of a pick-up time for tomorrow’s shift, I checked my mobile: crack of dawn pick-up. Disappointed in myself, I turned the phone off and started over.

The next morning was a struggle against the closest thing I know to addiction, realising I will not get my habitual dose of news and emails to go with my tea. So I managed to get to work without giving up to temptation, learning about the Japanese tsunami from horrified colleagues.

But unless I was aiming to get fired, my working day as a shift leader had to consist of not screening my manager whenever the mobile phone rang and projected the intimidating words “Omer Boss”. And, of course, the odd Google search for customers’ contact numbers. “You can’t do that,” one of my colleagues commented, justifiably. “What’s the point if you’re using it here?”

I postponed the experiment until after my usual working weekend at Heathrow had finished and started over.

Iron Rule #2: Anything relating to work will not regress 20 years with me.

On Monday I was scheduled to interview my next victim: James Sargent, a young eccentric musician. Needless to say, researching the character without going online equals no research at all. So I shamefully browsed his Myspace and Facebook profiles and gave myself one last serious take at this, starting over. Again.

After a successful technology-free day of studying at home and taking a long relaxing walk at Lammas Park, instead of my usual break of Facebook chatting and online fashion browsing, I headed for my Monday evening class. The interview was scheduled for 20 minutes later.

The commute to the meeting point, where tube delays are never strangers, raised my stress level to interfacing heart attack, as I wasn’t able to notify the young and restless musician of my possible tardiness. How did yesterday’s businessmen do it? According to my journalism teacher, Ross Biddiscombe, starting the interview on the wrong foot by being late is a suicide mission. So I chose life: I gave in and turned my mobile back on.

I know what you’re thinking: I didn’t live up to my goal. In fact, I didn’t live up to half of it. In my defense, my 16-year-old niece was surprisingly discerning: it’s impossible. I could do it, but then I’d be unemployed, isolated and most importantly – unable to practice journalism properly.

Iron Rule #3: Our world is so technologically dependent that we dread more the day our computer crashes than the death toll of a tsunami. 

MASTER OF HIS DOMAIN

This is a one man show. It’s not the best in town, but it would leave you utterly in love with a strange, charming London geek. This is James Sargent, a 21-year-old bass player who’s adopted the trendy Mark Zuckerberg speed-talking style while turning old Game Boys into synthesizers to pay for lunch.

To James, music is noise. It’s anything that makes a sound. Until he takes it apart and changes its sound. “Synthesizers are designed to make music, whereas a Game Boy was never made to play all these notes: It was made to play Super Mario. So I’m tricking it into making sound, getting a completely unique sound out of it,” he explains, while examining the potential in my digital recorder.

How does one engage in such an attempt to fiddle with music, I wondered. James was eight when he started taking stuff apart, just for fun. “I remember it clearly,” he said. “I spilled a drink over my sister’s toy, and it started making these crazy noises. I thought, I’ve gotta know how that works.”

And as James quickly found out, sugary drinks have the same effect as your thumb. “What you do is open it, find the circuit board and just rub your thumb through it, until it makes a contact with some points and changes the way it makes the sound,” to put it simply. “Then you make different interfaces on it. I used to cover them in copper foil to get certain noises. It took me three days the first time I did it, and about a half an hour now.”

From then on, James was addicted, filling his pockets with “old broken toys with five-buttoned keyboards on them”. At 14 he discovered a whole community in America as fascinated about it as he was. But it wasn’t until he met Luke, his band mate in Omega Undigital, that he started making music out of it. “We spent a lot of time listening to Daft Punk, Justice and those French electro genres. We started loving it, brought some toys around, made a drum machine and just jammed out with guitars, basses and these crazy instruments.“

Omega Undigital was James’ first electro band amongst many, until starting his current one, Overlooked, which he describes as “Led Zeppelin meets Foo Fighters, progressive grungy American”. When I asked him about the sudden change in genres, he modestly replied: “As much as I like electro music, I don’t think I’m good enough to achieve the craziness of this electro sound that’s going on in my brain.”

So at 18, inspired by Muse’s “Hysteria”, James bought the cheapest bass guitar eBay had to offer, and taught himself how to play. “My mom made me play the trumpet when I was ten, which taught me how to read music. It’s like a language: how you generate it requires different skills, where actually it’s all the same 12 notes.”

He also sings back-up vocals, plays guitar and “rules” the bongos, apparently. Not bad for a 21-year-old ex-drama student, who discovered his frustration with the education system after an A in physics and an F in arts. “The system isn’t designed for wild, crazy people like me. Getting an A in physics doesn’t mean I know anything about it.” Is this why you ruled out the theoretical way of learning instruments? “Possibly. I may have earned some deep instinctual hatred of learning,” he noted, laughing. “I teach myself. People say I can talk about stuff, and I guess there’s nothing I can’t tell you about chromatic aberration or diffraction, that I just learned off Wikipedia or asking people. If I enjoy something and I don’t understand it, I have to know everything about it, and I don’t stop researching.”

Overlooked was only created three months ago and already rehearsing a 30-minute set for a gig in New Cross Inn on April 6^th. But James seems quite blasé about it all. “I don’t think we have the determination to play Wembley. I always thought living in a mansion and having a harem of beautiful women and a swimming pool on top of a mountain top is just an added bonus,” he said. “It’s all about enjoying the music. If you have fun just getting up there and playing then that’s it, you’ve achieved nirvana.”

But what about the old drama student, who in the beginning of our interview declared his yearning to be recognised and have people applauding him, I asked, the boy who put aside his unique passion of electronic discoveries for his greater passion of performing on stage? “I always preferred being in the chorus line. I’m a nervous individual,” he bashfully admitted.

So, are you still doing it, I asked curiously about his strange hobby. “That’s the reason I bought food this week: selling one for £70,” he replied with a winning smile. “It’s fun. It’s a bit of money. Nothing’s a challenge with electronics, it’s absurdly simple. Slap Pop bass line is a challenge, that’s incredibly hard. The electronic stuff is like bread and butter. It got me into music, and now I’m just making money off it.”

The one man show, ladies and gentlemen: the autodidact electrical artist, still wiping the milk off his lips.

https://www.facebook.com/jameath

Students, welcome to the jungle

“Welcome to the jungle,” Axl Rose chanted in 1987 about Kingston, Washington, as he realised how scary that strange town could be. Well, the 1980s have long passed, none of us shares the Axl Rose survival skills and London is certainly no Rural Town, USA. London embraces thousands of foreign students every year, most of whom in their early and innocent 20s, seeking a home away from home while adapting new lingual and cultural skills. Welcome to the jungle, version 2011, London, UK

Over the past 15 years, the number of Chinese students in the London School of Economics increased from 20 to more than 600. As a foreign student myself, I’m no stranger to the social anxiety one adopts in such a strange milieu. We come here to study, enrich our distant worlds and explore a new culture. But how much are we allowing ourselves to taste?

“I don’t see myself fitting in socially. Nada, Zero,” said Noga Kaplan, Tourism and Planning student at the University of Westminster, originally from Israel. “It’s a combination of having no opportunities and the locals not giving you a chance. I thought being in university would make me socialise with them, but it didn’t happen. They don’t share the same mindset.“

Noga wasn’t the only one facing the culture shock. Iranian student Talieh Zarezadeh told me of her experiences at South Thames College. “I honestly didn’t know how to talk to people or react to some of the things they said: are they kidding me or is it serious? Should I laugh or should I just listen to them?”

Thames Valley University music student, Julia Kalnobricka, from Latvia, experienced a more culturally suitable welcoming: “My first encounter with the culture was having drinks in a pub, at noon, which is weird. The local students were always bragging about how much they drank the night before. To them, for some reason, I seemed like a posh and extravagant stuck-up girl who doesn’t like them, which wasn’t the case.”

Apparently binge drinking is a consensus when it comes to British things one has to get used to. Mor Bakal, Israeli student at Goldsmiths College, told me: “Whenever we go out, it’s always drinking in a pub. It’s very British. I find it lovely, from a distant perspective. Like a need for a catalyst to express feelings and lose control. They all tell me they really want to see me get drunk – I don’t usually keep things inside, so I don’t feel I need this alcohol to let go. It’s nice every now and then, but I couldn’t do it too often. I’m not used to it.”

Daiki Ichikawa, Japanese student at Goldsmiths, sees it as a blessing: “I’m a typical Japanese character, so pretty shy. Pubs are a good opportunity for us to get friends, socialise.”

Julia isn’t particularly fond of “pub crawls”: “That’s just not for me. That’s a big difference between my culture and the British one: it’s all about getting drunk.” Indeed, a resistant liver is one of the most crucial things one must equip himself with when arriving to the Kingdom. But there is more to the British culture than alcohol. 

 

During the 1970s, the Chinese students living in a university residence in London shared one TV set with the British ones, and were only interested in watching current affairs. They set up a rota of guarding the TV from the British students, who wanted to watch football. But it seems like times have changed: most of the foreign students I talked to enjoy the ball chasing culture. Even girls: “It’s charming, being part of a community and belonging to a group,” said Mor.

So, is it as scary as we make it out to be? Apparently the major difficulty for most foreign students is the language barrier, which makes them seem less accessible to the locals. “Nobody likes waiting until the other person gets a sentence out,” Noga testified, understandingly. “It’s tiring.”

But the cultural barriers go beyond that. “Even though I speak English, the whole mentality is hard to get into,” said Nicole Micha, design student from Greece. “They have their own slang and celebrities, which I don’t know, so I don’t always get the jokes,” Noga added. “I copied them by observing them,” Talieh explained her way of coping, “researching words like ‘chav’ and ’posh’.”

Accordingly, the famous British “quiz nights”, where us students might find ourselves sometimes, socialising with the locals, could be tricky. “I refuse doing pub quizzes because I didn’t grow up here,” Julia explained, “so I don’t know the TV personalities and politicians. My British friends don’t realise it, as I spend a lot of time with them so in their minds I’m one of them.”

And yet, at the end of the day, this forging experience is invigorating. As Nicole stated, “you learn something new all the time.” Talieh even increased her appetite to go around the world and experience different cultures. “I haven’t had this feeling before I came to London,” she admitted.

So maybe not all of us always fit in, or it might just take more time than we expected. One thing is for sure– the best way to survive the jungle is to fully engage in it. And don’t forget to have fun.

Where has all the music gone?

You better keep up, or you’ll end up like me. I used to be a professional music enthusiast, the go-to girl when it came to music news. But the digital age overpowered music as I knew it faster than Paris Hilton’s singing career, and left me hanging behind this new tech-revolving world.

Long gone are the days of the mysterious singer/songwriter knocking on the doors of record companies and recording studios with his guitar. Today’s new striving artists barely need to leave their bedrooms, assuming those are accessorised with a computer, broadband and an affordable mixing and editing program, instruments optional.

I was triggered by Tomer Run’s story, a friend of mine who gained exposure to a new American series, Bar Karma, from the comfort of his humble home in North London. In a matter of days he set up a track with a 1960s sound, using the help of some friends and a lot of technology, and enrolled on an online competition. He was announced a finalist the next day.

“I'm starting to do more of that now,” he enthusiastically announced. “I'm getting loads of work opportunities through music-jobs.co.uk”. The website indabamusic.com, which arranged the competition of composing a soundtrack to Bar Karma, is a great way to pitch as well, he told me. “It offers fantastic opportunities like remixing John Legend and The Roots.”

The home recording techniques are no secret to any musician: with the right programs you could easily record, edit and mix your own material. “The last time I recorded was with my iphone,” said Omri Ran, long time musician owning his own mini recording studio at home. “That was amusing, I was surprised by its quality! It’s nothing professional  and won’t sound as good as something recorded on your computer, but it’s a nice option.” And when it comes down to publicising, well, the options are growing fast.

We all remember Myspace, the ultimate platform for any beginner artist seeking to share his music with a worldwide audience. “The tide really turned with The Arctic Monkeys, who were the first band to be signed to a major label on the strength of their Myspace following, which opened the doors and ears of the people with the power,” Jon Jefford told me, the guitar player for DeepSeaGreen, a London garage rock band. “Music has shifted and the days of the 60s and 70s are almost gone. People don’t go out to listen to unsigned bands unless they are hyped up in a music magazine, so the only way to reach them is through online means.”

The funny thing is, Myspace is not the hottest thing anymore. That too evaporated quickly, as Gil Zausmer, an acknowledged musician and sound designer revealed. “It completely died out. People  aren’t online anymore and it all seems like one big cacophony of monologues instead of networking.”

While Myspace is ‘yesterday’s news’, it did leave its mark on the evolving industry. Websites like reverbnation.com allow you to get your music into online stores such as iTunes and Amazon.

Whether this is a positive change to music publishing or not is debatable. “Getting songs online is essential, but there are so many acts out there it just gets lost,” Zausmer explained. “There isn’t enough focus for a decent period of time – it’s all too instant. With main firms or channels 15 years ago, propagating music to segmented assemblies, you'd have certain groups listening to certain genres at a certain time, with not as many options as we have today, therefore a 'buzz' or a trend could exist. But what you have now is just a mess, defragmentation of those assemblies and main channels, causing inflation in music conveyance. So no trends, no scenes, no buzz – just mainstream regurgitated crap.”

We could choose to look at it as a new age to music industry, for better or worse. I choose to see it as a new genre of music: artists like Jackson and his Computer Band and The Arctic Monkeys, setting up a milestone in home recording and self publishing, created a fresh sound to modern music. Music is swiftly catching up with technology, and we better hurry up as well.

ALICE HERZ-SOMMER, THE PHILOSOPHER OF MUSIC

Born 1903, concert pianist and holocaust survivor Alice Herz-Sommer has never lost her passion for music. In fact, she owes her life to it. She now lives in north London, with her Steinway piano.

“Art is difficult. When you know something a 100 per cent, your satisfaction is happiness. It happens very often that I’m not a 100 per cent, but it’s a good thing – I work more and more!”

Walking up to Alice’s door, I prepared myself for going back in time. The Austro-Hungarian Empire, two World Wars, Israel and London are a lot to take in one lifetime. But this remarkable woman has done it all, with beaming grace.

Alice Herz-Sommer has seen the worst life has to offer, having survived the holocaust and owing it to the talent she’s been blessed with. She was a world famous pianist, recognised amongst musicians like Gustav Mahler (“difficult character”), Antonín Dvořák, Josef Suk, and Vítězslav Novák, some of whom used to visit her childhood home in Prague, alongside intellectuals like Franz Kafka. “I played especially Czech music, and they were thankful for what I did. Everywhere in the world they played Czech music. People loved it.”

On November 26^th, Alice celebrated her 107^th birthday. I brought her flowers, which seemed to be assimilated in the multitude of bouquets filling her flat, surrounding her old Steinway piano. “It’s an excellent piano, but it doesn’t matter! I played on very bad pianos,” she said, tapping her fingers on the table. “It’s nice to play a good instrument, but the main thing is what you know. It takes hard work – and you must love it!”

She started playing when she was five. "My eldest sister was an excellent pianist. She was teaching me until my 16th birthday. Then I studied with a pupil of Franz Liszt."

Most of Alice’s family were musicians. “We didn’t speak about anything else,” she recalled. “Every evening we went to a concert with my mother. I heard the greatest pianists.”

At 14 she already had students, and she gave the money to her mother. “They came to learn because I encouraged them. I was never nervous.” She never stopped teaching, even after coming to London at 84. “I didn’t know the language and it was a little bit difficult,” she confided in me. “I taught my grandchildren the piano. I love children, they discover the world!” she declared so passionately.

In 1943, Alice was sent with her husband and 6-year-old son to Theresienstadt (Terezín) concentration camp, a “show-camp” made for visitors from the Red Cross, simulating a rich cultural life amongst the inmates. “We had to work all day. I only played when I had a concert. Music is so wonderful, it brings you into another world. You are not anymore here.”

I asked her whether she was told what to play. “No, I decided. I was already world famous. They knew I was a musician. I loved playing Les 24 Études by Chopin: it’s like Hamlet to Shakespeare. Extraordinary. There were no notes, no books. We had to know everything by heart. And we didn’t eat.”

How did she have the energy to play, I wondered. “This I ask myself. The boy asked, ‘Why have we nothing to eat?’ What could you say? Not yet six, He asked, ‘What are Jews?’ What can you tell? How?“

Her husband, who played the violin, was sent to Auschwitz in 1944. He died of typhus shortly before the end of the war. When Israel was founded, Alice moved to Jerusalem with her son. “I had one room where the piano was, and a quiet little room where my son and I were sleeping,” she told me.

“I was never interested in operas, not like orchestras. I played the whole world. For me, playing in Israel was beautiful. I played a lot of Paul Ben-Haim and Haim Alexander.” She recalled an experience with her “pessimistic sister” while playing in Israel: “One minute before I had to go on stage, she asked me ‘Do you know how it starts?’ The worst thing she could have asked!” she said with a big laugh.

I asked her whether she plays anything other than piano. She shook her head, explaining, “You can’t do two things well. Do one thing, not necessarily music, then it’s perfect. Even when you sleep, you’re thinking of it, dreaming of it.”

Alice came to London at age 84, following her son, Raphael Sommer, a famous cellist, pianist and conductor. She takes pride in teaching him the piano. “He only wanted to work with me.” In 2001 Raphael died in Israel during a tour. “He used to come every day to eat,” she reminisced, “and he was still sitting afterwards and we spoke for hours. Wonderful relationship. He learned from me, I learned from him.”

Alice and myself, shortly after her 107th birthday

I asked her whether there’s anything she finds emotionally charged to play or listen to. She shook her head, remaining indifferent to my question. “Do you know that in Israel they refuse playing Wagner?” I insisted. “I can’t understand it,”  she said. “My best friends live in Germany. Never hated, will never hate. They did what Hitler said. Hitler was a mad man.” Hesitantly, I mentioned Reinhard Heydrich. “What do you think of him?” I asked. “Nothing,” she laughed. “He played the violin, he was a human being!”

Alice plays three hours every day: “It’s the most beautiful thing I have.” Her favourite pieces are Chopin’s Études and Schumann’s Fantasia in C Major, which are also the ones she finds the most difficult to play. But she starts with Bach – “the philosopher of music”. She works hours to learn it by heart. “Bach is the hardest thing. Extremely complicated. I write it down sometimes, out of memory.”

Suddenly she takes my hands, declaring “You have beautiful hands!” I thanked her, blushing. “Could you tell if someone has ‘hands for piano’?” I asked. “Maybe,” she examined mine, “it’s always better to have bigger hands.” She showed me that her two index fingers bend in. “It started when I was in Prague. It hurts sometimes, but I still play!” she laughed.

“Tell me,” she asked me, “what are genes? My family was all musical. My grandchildren are musical. It goes from one generation to another. What are genes?“ she wondered. “Music runs in your genes?” I asked. “Yes! This is a miracle!” she said, shining. “It makes you proud?” I smiled at her. “Thankful as well,” she added.

“The ears are bad, the eyes are bad. In spite of all, life is beautiful: spring, nature, your flowers – so big and beautiful,” she declared, smiling. Growing up in Israel, I’ve met many survivors and heard their stories. But this lady is not like any other. Nothing could have really prepared me for this unique, unforgettable experience, of meeting such an optimistic soul. “Art is difficult. Not only art, everything is difficult. When you know something a 100 per cent, your satisfaction is happiness. It happens very often that I’m not a 100 per cent, but it’s a good thing – I work more and more and more!”

Hotel Medea

22:45 on a Saturday night. Meeting point: North Greenwich Pier. Destination? Utterly unknown. Activity? Even vaguer. Just show up. Don’t be late, stated the anonymous email, the boat leaves at 23:00.

...Boat?

Hotel Medea is a Brazilian group of eccentric actors who have chosen to use a very interactive method of performing, while dramatising the enchanting myth of Medea, brilliantly ‘adjusting’ it to our everyday lives in the 21^st century.

For those of us less familiar with the story, Medea was the granddaughter of Helios, the god of Sun, and one of the great sorceresses in the ancient world. Jason, a handsome boy from another kingdom, tried to steal the Golden Fleece that belonged to her father, King of Colchis. But Medea and Jason fell inlove, and once Jason got holf of the Golden Fleece they ran away together, taking her younger brother with them. When the King started pursuing them, Medea killed her brother and bisected him, to delay the pursuit. After fleeing from Jason’s kingdom as well for using her sorcery to kill its King, they arrived at Corinth, where Medea bore Jason two children. But Jason had forsaken her to marry the king’s daughter, so Medea used her sorcery again to kill the bride, with a poison robe that burnt the flesh from her body, then killing her own two children as well.

Although the story goes on, this is actually where the play stops. Jason was left mourning for his two children lying in their beds, covered with roses and teddy bears that the audience, i.e. your humble servant and the rest of the random passer-byers, had thrown on their beds. Then we all moved to the main room, where a long table was set for a feast. We sat down, looking at each other, looking at all the marvellous food, looking at Medea sitting at the head of the table – finally saying, “...was it too much?” as if to share her doubts with her loyal audience. She then got up to open the doors facing the river Thames, so we all could see the crack of dawn at 5:00 am on the London docks.

It was then that we all started dining shamelessly, like starved peasants biting on warm Pain au Chocolate and some aristocratic full grain bread with butter & strawberry jam. After dancing as joyous tribe members to the celebrations of the princess’ marriage, after acting as hyped journalists covering Jason’s campaign, after being put to bed as Medea’s children (and pampered with lovely hot chocolate), after being led through alleys by the caretakers with our pyjamas when Medea decided to kill us... After being the audience for such a dynamic and brilliant spectacle, one cannot properly describe the hunger of a post white night celebration and convey this (literally) awakening experience. Giant bowls of fruit, juicy watermelons and hot porridge happily filled the magnificently long table. And once we settled our stomachs down, we got to mingle with the actors, now not in character, and listen to their perfect English that was concealed by their sexy Brazilian accents during the play.

5:30 on a Sunday morning and the game is over. My knackered date for the evening and me hopped on a shuttle that took us back to civilization, where we began our journey to bed for recovery. Sadly the distance between east London and Ealing didn’t allow me to lay my head down before 8:00, but the glorious performance hadn't left my thoughts: this was by far the most exciting and unusual night I've spent in London.

Sadly enough I don’t have any pictures of the evening, but a quick look at this video here would give you a vague idea...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0soIo4-OJLM

And of course, the link to the guys’ official website:

http://www.medea.tv/indexeng.html

The Way to Arrivals

Whenever Lona would go on one of her too frequent visits back home, she would yet again get her hopes up for nothing: approaching the arrivals doors, she’d automatically fill up with vain anticipation of someone waiting for her behind those doors. Maybe her long gone dad, who in 1987 promised to take her to San Francisco, just before evaporating there himself in the hopes of having a better life with his young and fizzy girlfriend. Maybe her first love, who had deceivingly declared his very serious intentions to be hers forever (‘and ever’) will be waiting behind those doors, still seventeen, and carry her back into the eternally romantic tragedy of adolescence. Whoever it may be, as long as there’s somebody out there waiting for me. Just for once, she thought, just one person, locking their longing eyes on her post-flight figure, with a nostalgic grin and anxious body language, is enough to make her feel missed.

But Lona was never missed. She had moved to Barcelona six years ago, hoping the alleged world’s friendliest city would bury her loneliness for good. She still had some friends back home, but every visit taught her again how easily people grow apart. Even the best of friendships could disintegrate, sometimes for reasons beyond human control.

So she always kept her eyes up, scanning the arrivals floor for anything that could possibly be waiting there for her. She would often pretend to be looking for her driver, seeking a sign with her name with deep concentration. At least those people have some kind of a home to get to, she thought, someone is expecting them.

At some point in her life in Barcelona, Lona met Juan. She met him in the most irrational scenario – a scene which would seem painfully banal for any Hollywood or Indie film, but was actually surreal in her everyday life. He was a bartender, and she found herself ordering drinks for her colleagues at the bar. The bartender noticed her Nordic accent and expressed an interest in her, which led to her blatantly asking him out.  

They spent nine solid months together before she moved into his humble flat. She loved the convenience of this relationship – to her that was the essence of sinking into her comfort zone. Now that she had her other half, it didn’t really matter that she had no friends to go out with, or that all her friends back home had moved on. It didn’t matter that she hated her job as a waitress or that one of the shift leaders at the restaurant was being aggressively over-friendly at times.

And so one would assume that Lona wouldn’t be looking for anyone accidentally waiting for her in airports’ arrivals anymore. But Lona was still never greeted by a soul, and it was eating away at her. Maybe the problem lies with the fact that I’m always travelling on my own, she thought, and quickly concluded it would be the perfect time to go on holiday with her fresh new significant other.

‘Let’s go to a far away island where none of us knows a soul,’ she enthusiastically suggested. Juan chose a sleazy resort in Isla Mujeres, one where he could rest his head in and disconnect from the human world. Luck hadn’t been on his side lately, what with the death of his wife three years before, which forced him to change his whole life. After grieving for one very long year, Juan found himself in the arms of many women around town. His method to dissolve the resisting pain away included random intercourse alongside gallons of alcohol at the local bar, where his friends used to meet him everyday at 18:00 and talk about the glorious days of Luis Enrique. Inbetween meaningless remarks about football legends and women’s intimate areas, the boys would throw a ‘she never deserved it’ or a ‘you’re gonna be fine mate’, to stop him from glaring at thin air. 

The loss of his wife brought Juan to quit his job as a travel agent, as he couldn’t stand looking at couples anymore. Not to mention selling his fake enthusiasm about holiday package deals that he was planning on going to with his late wife. He sold their house and rented a studio flat downtown. He got a job as a bartender as he couldn’t sleep at nights and needed some company. And then he met Lona.

Lona’s mystery swept him away as it would any man. She had sad eyes and a kind smile, which reminded him of his late wife’s innocence. He genuinely believed he fell head over heels for her, and was finally happy again.

On the flight to Cancun Juan fell asleep. Lona was too excited to be reading her book, so she spent most of the flight looking out the window, contemplating on how weird it feels to be travelling with someone else. How strangely well she’d feel landing in such a foreign territory that, for once, isn’t foreign just to her. She was excited about sharing this intimate feeling with her other half. But Juan never woke up; he was sound asleep with his ear plugs and eye cover, leaving no access for any outside world communication.

When they landed in Cancun, they took a bus to the port from which they shipped to the island. It was a sunny, windy day, and as the boat sailed, Juan reckoned that more sleep would ease his unclear stress away.

Just as he was covering his tired eyes again, he felt the warmth of the Caribbean sun penetrating his aching bones. It felt like tiny worms invading his body, crawling through his ears into his intestines, twirling ceaselessly in his stomach. He felt strangled in his own body and was overwhelmed by it. After a long hour Lona turned to him with her enchanting smile, gently uncovering his eyes and festively announcing, “we’re here, my love.” She was flooded with immense tranquillity that she never would have thought existed in her.  

But Juan only got more ill under the blazing sun. He would stay in bed all day long watching the Spanish news on the hotel room TV and missing home. And Lona, well, she was well aware of what’s coming. She tried to spend her days outdoors, taking long walks outside the claustrophobically cheesy resort of Juan’s choice, going for a swim by the ocean every morning, chatting to the other tourists at the pub down the road every evening. She would come back late and find Juan watching a football game with aching indifference.

On the fifth night, Lona came back to a different Juan. When she got to bed, he reached her cool body with his warm arms and started kissing the back of her neck, letting his soft fingers slide down her stomach. It was as if he was acting out of mere impulse – there was no real passion there, just the kind of automatic foreplay that bored married couples perform on birthdays and anniversaries. Lona refused to give in to that apathetic deed. As he was turning her fragile body to face him, she reached for the kitchen knife that was conveniently laid under the bed. She did it quickly, fiercely, and mercilessly. His body bended to a fetal position and a soundless shriek came out of his pierced lungs. It didn’t take long. As he stopped panting, Juan’s stomach started to discharge funny coloured organisms in the shape of worms. There was no blood, just tiny worms spitted out slowly until finally covering the entire bed.

Lona got on the next plane back. When she landed in Barcelona, she smiled as she saw the Spanish police waiting for her at arrivals.