Tag Archive | happiness

Thank you, Mr. Garfitt.

Jesus came to banish fear.

jesus of wigan Though I haven’t gone through the entire book yet, the few parts that I have read so far are making good sense to me. For one, I can see that it’s obviously made out of love, that it’s a true labor of love, and it deserves much respect and consideration. Thank you, Francis Garfitt, for writing this fascinating and refreshing book about a living man and a living story that was calcified within just a few pages two thousand years ago.

I have always gone by the thought that if truth is in God, that if ‘truth’ is an embodiment of God, then there’s no way of disproving Him nor that our insistence on “defending” Him will add to that truthfulness. In pursuing my personal studies on that distant world of two thousand years ago when Jesus of Nazareth shook his world, I would like to listen to this particular voice that projects Jesus’ story’s context through a personal conviction using the platform of the contemporary world. ‘Evangelism’, after all, is not limited to the mainstream’s definition of it, if the reader sees it as that. A storyteller is by all means entitled to any artful way of delivering an old story with full relevance. We, those of us who want to keep on telling a story that has been stamped ‘unchangeable’, may just have to take the courage to step out of the silenced crowd and speak in a way that will make the story enabling again even to those who have been rendered numb by the challenges of everyday survival — the way that Jesus of Nazareth did. That’s love. Jesus of Wigan

What I especially find refreshing among the narratives is the inclusion of the scientific perspective in order to bring about a multi-perspective handling of whatever scene is featured. In this book science is integrated as a tool for looking at what is. The outcome resonates with the Hebrew worldview where things are dealt with integrally, like for example that a human being is not allocated into body-&-soul parts. So far I can see it doesn’t pretend to know everything yet it’s a humbling book. It will make one look at things differently, make one recall the time when one realized that things are not what they are as seen on the surface. It will encourage you to love. It will confirm your simplest reasons for wishing for happiness.

(Note: Today is May 19, 2016. This was written 2 years ago. I need to update it soon. I just got to find the time. Get the book if you can. Jesus of Wigan by Francis Garfitt. You will like it even if you’re not interested in the religious side of it. ❤

Update: May 20, 2016. I edited the original script and added a few words. Still, that is not the ‘update’ that I meant. It will then look like a review of the book.)

Thanks for dropping by. Have a great day, everyone! 🙂

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sacadalang

April 12, 2014 at 10:41 pm

🙂 I have your book today, in paper. I don’t know when I can finish it considering that I’m not supposed to do anything else besides looking for certain things in books for a year at least, but actually I’m now on John’s first baptism. I’m liking John and I can easily connect him with that John in the desert, both with passions of that intensity. But how I wish I knew more of European economy/history so that I could get more laughs out of your quirky statements — I mean, I had my first big laugh at page (though unnumbered) 3 of Introduction and I anticipate that there are lots like it in this your thickish book. Though I think I just go open some more of your book for reasons other than greed for knowledge, otherwise things will just not get right with me. One has to be ready for the things that you say in here 🙂 . What made me confident enough to get a copy was that a few days ago I finally had a gut feeling of what evil is. The subject of evil isn’t an attractive material for me and so I haven’t read up on the academic discussions on it, nor am I interested in the macabre in popular media. But recently, in a flash, I realized that I understood that evil is the attempt to choke/snuff out/strangle life, to negate life. Something happened to me and I felt like I was going to be annihilated, something is trying to deny my essence, and if I let it be I would end up a living dead, a nothing — and so it dawned on me that this, then, is what evil is. I decided to find a way to stay alive despite the presence of this thing that would callously wipe me off from existence if I let it. So I thought that a retelling of Jesus’ story like the way you’re doing is worth looking into, with the horrors of modern metropolitan living, and they shouldn’t disturb me as much anymore due to my newly found knowledge (haha looks like this leads me further into my “knowledge-of-good-and-evil” musings…). I’m wary like this because I’m not familiar with big city living, and the little that I’ve experienced of it I didn’t really like… but I do like the way you explain the will to power … I agree with what you say in there … and I can’t help wanting to catch your words at each right-hand page because they look like they might fall off any time — this was the first big laugh, actually 🙂 THANK YOU for your great effort in this book. May many people come to read it.
francisgarfitt

April 13, 2014 at 11:40 pm

Dear Sacadalang,

thank you so much for the comment and for buying a copy of my book. I’m glad you are liking John. He is based on a guy that I met whilst doing some voluntary work. He was working as an ‘enlightened witness’ with other ex-prisoners and this idea of a ‘witness of the light’ kept bringing me back to him whenever I tried to visualise John the Baptist. I was genuinely humbled to meet him. I only met him once, but maybe that is how life is.

I think that your gut feeling of what evil is, is important. George Macdonald wrote of the shadow inside us all in his book Phantastes, a fairy story for adults. In it he wrote that the affirmation of evil is the negation of all else. So take care of yourself, negation is anti-hope, the anti-social anti-value that builds on feelings of isolation, then anger, then destruction… either of self or others. In the same way that the key to madness is personal to each of us, so is the path to oneness. I love your blogs, their enthusiasm and infectious joy. I don’t know all the films and TV shows you mention, but what I enjoy is learning why you enjoy them. So keep it up, we are all part of the pattern.

It took me 7 years to write the book, and I always felt that if it touched one person then that was worth it, that whatever I was doing meant something more than just another writer with another book. Sometimes I felt like giving it up as a bad job, and even now I’m not happy with it, I can see the flaws, particularly in grammar. So thank you once again for taking the time to read it.

kind regards

Fran
sacadalang

April 14, 2014 at 4:00 am

Dear Fran,
thank you for replying, for the reply, for Phantastes, for John, and for the encouragement — yep, I have a good idea now about the self-destruction and the wanting-to-quit parts, thanks to my experiences — ach, the grammar, well, grammar does not rule so to say … all I know is that I’m reading a genuine specimen of contemporary British English and for me that’s good enough 🙂
-wishing-you-a-nice-week-
ang sacada lang

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( 4.0 out of 5 stars Philosophy with a difference 8 Aug 2013 / By Viv M)

I found this book shocking at times and unlike any other “religious” book I’ve ever read. It is an imaginative modern interpretation of the gospel story. I enjoyed the references to Wigan, and there is plenty of humour. It’s a retelling of history with complex twists.

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4.0 out of 5 stars Are you on the path? 4 Aug 2013 / By Mark S) If you are trying to find a path to faith this book will help. The authors take on the New Testament and the disciples of Jesus provide some great reflective moments for the reader, which disciple are you? The author’s link to modern day diseases, such as the craving for power and certainty, provide an interesting view of the New Testament story and highlight how shallow our modern day lives have become. Our constant desire for instant gratification and oneupmanship are clearly exposed in this insightful work.

A great read and it really challenged my thoughts. This book has really helped me to think more clearly about what Jesus was really trying to achieve. I don’t agree with all of the authors views but the thought provoking nature helped me to further understand the Bible itself. Well done a great first book.

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find your rhythm

Apr4

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Isadora Duncan was a famous American dancer. please click on to enlarge. thank you.

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wake up.

resume your dance.

let every cell in your body remember their rhythm.

find your feet, grapple,

find your ground, dig,

touch the earth, reach out, strain yourself,

come back to your voice.

you are beloved.

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This excerpt is part of Estes’ discussion, in her book Women Who Run With the Wolves, using the tale of The Little Match Girl by Hans Christian Andersen, that one of the girl who froze while trying to sell matches on the street but instead lit them one after the other in attempts to keep warm/safe/comfortable.

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captured from Women Who Run With the Wolves page, slightly edited

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Women-Who-Run-With-the-Wolves-by-Clarissa-Pinkola-Estes/180239888679436

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find your laughter

Apr3

(edited April 5, 2014)

!good morning

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…for a long time, some time ago, I didn’t know that I was sick until I realized that I had lost my laughter…

If you have not come across the author/psychiatrist/storyteller [Dr.] Clarissa Pinkola Estes, or anyone like her, or just anyone that even a tiny bit slightly resembles what her book, Women Who Run With The Wolves, brings to the noosphere, then let me introduce her name to you with a quote from that book, on laughter (to enlarge images, please click on them)

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… this is where the quote may be found on the net:

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… laughter is essential … if you don’t have it yet, your particular kind of laughter, the one that connects you to your beating heart, the one right there, at the core of you, or, if you’ve lost it, then may you gather your strength in order to find it … !and this goes for everyone, of course! … the book is for everyone, so the author emphasizes, despite its title 😉

ciao for now

chic and pretty … beauty defined

origin page: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Women-Who-Run-With-the-Wolves-by-Clarissa-Pinkola-Estes/180239888679436

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Chungking Express, pineapples, the lotus

Mar21

30 tins of pineapple. Why pineapples? I don’t know. I did not try to understand. I just watched. The lighting is too dim for my liking. Too much movement. Blurs. Too crowded for my liking. Smell of people. Smell of street garbage. Filthy walls. At least it doesn’t snow in Hong Kong. Tattered washrag hung on window grills is a familiar sight to me. When clear water has been wrung from it then I can trust on its cleanliness, its readiness for the next use.

The blonde really really looked out of place even from the start. Her hair looked all wrong, an oversized prop. She reminded me of my favorite Saint’s gesticulating disguise.

What are you doing here? You’re supposed to be doing your homework.

Sorry, I can’t stop watching just yet. Kaneshiro Takeshi looks really really neat. And he’s ready to fall in love again. I can’t imagine him and the blonde together. Ah. Maybe that’s why she asks for his age. Arrrgh, Cop # 223 is just 24? 25? I heard from somewhere that Hong Kong cops are very capable. They have to be, with trouble always threatening to happen all over the place. (Sorry, but this is the impression I got from James Clavell.) I’m not sure if it still is the case (i.e., excellent police force commensurating for constant threats) because I don’t hear of them nowadays as much as I do of the other countries’. What do I know about Hong Kong, anyway? I haven’t looked it up since the time that I paid attention to Dirk Struan and his rival Brock, and then to Ian Dunross immediately right after that, he who was given the face of Remington Steele. But at least by then I came to know that Hong Kong’s waterways are not fit for swimming in. Or is it just that one where they had to jump to save themselves from burning on board? That was a romantic moment for, uh, I forgot who… But boy was it dirty. One gulp of the water would, uh, dirty their, uh, stomach? intestines? What about the eyes and the ears?

… I’m supposed to be doing my homework so I have to do this fast…

I thought of comparing Chungking Express with Brillante Mendoza’s Serbis but somehow I don’t think I can, or should. They’re both unforgettable films, yes, of dreamlike quality. But the first is of upbeat daylight while the latter is of fading twilight. Both do not cover up the filth of the city, yes, telling things as they are. Both employ shadows much, yes. I wouldn’t really choose to watch a film with lots of shadows and which reminds me of the real smell of a really crowded city but I like both films. Although Serbis left me wistful, ashamed that I live in comfort and still fret while many have to work hard at keeping their world from falling apart, it told me to be careful that I don’t talk about things just for the sake of saying something. There are reasons behind reasons behind reasons behind reasons of things. Chungking Express, on the other hand, left me giddy. Like the way The Longest Night in Shanghai did. I need to first become a student of filmmaking before I could get over my dislike of the use of so much shadow and dark lighting. If it has lots of shadows then I don’t want to be dragged into the kind of deep thoughts that will never get to see the light of the sun. But whereas The Longest Night in Shanghai was obviously a romantic comedy right from the start, with Chungking Express I didn’t know what to make of it until Cop # 223 insisted that the storekeeper consider the pineapple cans’ feelings.

Chungking Express is just another face of (a) love story. As the story unfolds, as you continue to stare at the screen despite the (for me) depressive backdrop, as you continue to stick with Cop # 223 first and then Cop # 663 next, you will feel your heart finally taking a rest, then you will remember how happy you were when you were just falling in love but couldn’t talk about it with anyone just yet.

30 tins of pineapple. How could he eat all that in one go? Did I misunderstand the scene? What a kid he still is, 25 and already a cop. Calling up elementary school girl friends, his uncle, aunt, cousin. A cry baby, complaining to his dog that he doesn’t eat the pineapples with him, not the usual cool hero image. But so handsome, and so neat, so a non-cop, so un-bismirched, so not belonging to the filth of his city and of his job. And Tony Leung, so boy-next-door. So kawaii, even. And Faye Wong, an elfin who has to deafen her mind against her own thoughts.

Cop 223, Kaneshiro Takeshi, is dumped by his girlfriend May on April 1. He waits out for her until his birthday on May 1, buying a tin of pineapple marked May 1 as the expiration date every day. The blonde hires people to smuggle drugs but is duped, jeopardizing her safety. She had to act first before running for her life. They meet and become each other’s savior. He eats lots of Cesar’s Salad and other foodstuff as he waits for dawn. They part. He was already out by 6 AM running away his sadness, the exact time he turns 25. Cop 663, Tony Leung, is dumped by his flight attendant girlfriend. He hopes she comes back. The elfin, Faye Wong, works for her cousin’s street side food store. They first talk to each other when he buys Cesar’s Salad. She grows a crush on him. He’s a regular customer, a friend of her cousin, and the latter suggests to him that he tries fish and chips also. His girlfriend comes back and looks for him at his usual street corner but it was his day off. She leaves a letter. Everyone reads it: flight cancelled, it says. There’re house keys in the envelope. When he stops going to the food store the elfin finds funny ways to stay in contact with him. Then Tony Leung smiles and you’ll conclude that he’s a very handsome guy. That’s the story. I had to say it to dampen the hype. Why the film earns a full post from me requires researching before I can say something on it. So I have to forget the why part for now. There are scenes that support Hong Kong’s reputation, that anything is possible there. There are scenes that say something on immigrants, or aliens, or contract workers. There are scenes that brought me back to my home city’s open air meal spots and produce markets. Pork with rice is also a favorite among us, and vegetables in a big basket carried over the shoulders is also a normal sight.

I don’t know exactly what “Chungking Express” is. Is it a train? Is Chungking a place? Does it have a cultural significance? Does the film’s name even mean anything at all? Is it saying anything about the constant rush in an Asian metropolis? The store is called “Midnight Express”. It opens until late at night. There was a train at the first half of the story, but the blonde who escaped by it has no scene by the Midnight Express. Is the film somehow a statement of how people stay disconnected though packed together within just 0.01 cm of reaching-out distance from one another? Is it a statement similar to the message of the lotus flower, that it blooms triumphant and pristine over the muck beneath it?

Hong Kong, 香港, Xiānggǎng, Hsiangkang, means “fragrant harbor”, after all.

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Turn Left, Turn Right

added 28March2014. Other Kaneshiro Takeshi films that have inspired me similarly: Lost and Found, Sweet Rain, Turn Left Turn Right, K-20 Legend of the Mask, and the ‘drama’ series Golden Bowl. Each one deserves its own post. I have yet to discover the others similar to these. His historical/war movies are fine but preferably for me the less blood spilt the better; though I do appreciate them all the same as venues for his range of artistry 😉 ciao for now . . .

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Unexpectedly Meeting Kiyoha & Seiji, in Sakuran

Feb21

Updated April 3, 2014 🙂 All these captures from the film enlarge when clicked on ❤

PART ONE.

Sakuran (2006) is the most riotously color-full film I have ever seen. The kaleidoscopic backdrops are enough for me to like this movie. Its soundtracks are as engaging (Ringo Shiina’s album Heisei Fuuzoku = Japanese Manners). Most of them sound celebratory, some are as defiant as courageous splashes of adolescent rebelliousness, and at the correct times so mournful that they transport me back to reality all the way to the tears.

It is based on a manga, one which I have not read and so I have no points of reference other than the little that I know of Japan like its woodwork, clothing, paper walls, woodblock prints, communal bath, ground drenched by rain-pour, a field of cherry trees in bloom, a stiff sense of honor and shame. It was a very enlightening tour into a past life yet also instructive of norms that prevail. Sakuran will not pale against any comics-rendition of the life of an independent-willed girl sold and reared in a pleasure district of feudal Japan, in a courtesan house.

This is not a film for those who see all women entertainers, past and present, who dress up and perform roles like that of the geishas of today as nothing but just dispensable prostitutes. If it is approached with this mindset then the film will be reduced into just another commercial project, having profit as the worshiped purpose. The foundational but covered-up elements of soul-captivity and abandonment of alternative life choices will get trampled under the power of the intent to titillate. The heroine in this film represents those who constantly rage against their caged fate — it is her refusal to be dampened that always gets her in trouble with the others and it is around this characteristic of hers that the story revolves.

6. Seiji is behind Kiyoha _parade of Higurashi the Oiran

The Oiran Parade, which is still done until today.

For a fact, there are distinctions between Japanese women entertainers of the past and geishas of today, and other classifications I am not familiar with. This can most likely be easily surfed in the net (see the added note * below). There are those that were termed as courtesans, which connote sexual involvement, whereas geishas are professional entertainers, very expensive, very strictly trained in the well-defined structure of the traditional Japanese arts. Entertainers such as the geisha are living icons of entrenched Japanese ideals, expressions of a unique worldview set in studied harmony. They are breathing windows into a world where many would like to be but couldn’t. They are 3-D picture frames, animated paintings, enfleshed music. Though this film may not lead us down into the depths of a courtesan’s introspections it does form a bridge with which we are allowed to see a glimpse of the richness of souls inhabiting a so-called “floating world”. (added 1March14: There’s the film Yoshiwara Enjo, which is also called Tokyo Bordello, set in the 20th century that treats issues related to the floating world with more depth than Sakuran does. There’s also a legend going by the term Oiran Abyss or Oiran Edge that tells of several courtesans’ tragic fate, but I still haven’t looked this up.)

If there is one fault in the film it is that the main character has too pretty a face, a potential distraction from the seriousness of the running themes. But when seen against the fact that this is a real-life rendering of a manga heroine, Kiyoha, then the choice is perfect. Anna Tsuchiya does give Kiyoha a distinctive persona, one that is a bit different from the rest. Moreover, she does not hesitate to move the appropriate facial muscles, and admirably too, to generate the range of emotions felt by either Kiyoha the tigress, or Kiyoha the kitten and several more.

In this film is where I first saw Masanobu Ando, as Seiji, who is among my favorite heroes. Seiji is not a man of expressive passions. His role is that of a dedicated and upright businessman and overseer of the establishment. He has to have eyes at the back of his head for Kiyoha though, because he has learned early on that she is not the meek conformist. Nevertheless Kiyoha has a higher regard for him than for the house’s owners, who in turn trust him in his ability to peacefully handle her. Kiyoha’s personal little girl apprentice addresses him in honorifics, as Seiji-dono (whereas its equivalent would be Seiji-sama nowadays).

7. Sakuran_2007 the Yoshiwara main street at dawn

Unlit Yoshiwara main street at dawn. This aquarium, in the foreground, is hoisted on top of the entrance gate.

For the fans of Oguri Shun, I assure you that you’ll see his face here within a span of 10 seconds only, but it’s a face that will surprise and delight you. He made the most of the 10 seconds to make a very unforgettable appearance.

Kiyoha’s last glimpse of her hometown was with the cherry blossoms, sakura, lining the road as a madam hurries her to her new house. She enters the gates of the red district at night, when all the lanterns along the main street are lit and she, the little girl, is just as appreciative of the sights as she was with the sakura. But not for long she gets fed up with the all-women company within the enclosure and she develops the perpetual urge to run away, which she does attempt sometimes. Women can be bitches to girls who have complexes — usually girls, or any human, will not run away from where there is warmth. Plus, she misses the sakura. Seiji, who was already a young adult by then, catches up with her at a little shrine in the district during one of these flight urges. In this shrine stands a forlorn cherry tree that has never bloomed even once. He placates her and promises to take her out of the enclosure once this tree shows a flower. In fact, no sakura has ever bloomed within this entire pleasure district.

Kiyoha grows up retaining her independent spirit. She scratches and growls whenever she is wronged. She does not guard her speech or her actions as rigidly as the other girls do. She has become a streamlined rebel, conforming yet apart. Then her heart gets broken by a puppy of a man. Seiji supports her as she adds more rigidity to her back. She goes on with living, generously giving affection to whomever she likes — to little trainee entertainers, to elderly or penniless clients — she does not discriminate, and being nasty to those who violate the common codes of courtesy.

She gets pregnant by an anonymous father, then loses the baby. Seiji nurses her like a mother throughout her pain, staying up beside her bed. As she mourns for her baby Seiji’s surrender to their separate fates is palpable. Seiji was born of a “whore”, of an unknown father, and his conversation with her was analogous to a declaration of a non-obsessive love. When she woke up in the middle of the night, still physically weak, she covers the now sleeping Seiji with her blanket and then goes out to seek peace at the shrine. There only the bright moon could see and hear her, in her midnight blue kimono with a print like that of distant galaxies. Seiji tracks her down. He feels her pain and he stays put like the nearby cherry tree as he catches her sobbed surrender to a loss so great she felt like her breath was being drawn from out of her. Seiji comforts her like a father or a brother or a sister would.

They have a strong but well-guarded bond. Kiyoha is the head courtesan, Higurashi the Oiran, the main reason why their business flourishes. Seiji is the house’s chosen heir and is soon to be married to the owners’ niece. In his heart he would rather have Kiyoha, but, shikataganai, he cannot. It cannot be helped. Convention, duty, and gratitude to the couple who reared him and supported his mother prevent this. A samurai falls in love with Higurashi, puts a forest of blooming cherry trees all over the district, formally and publicly announces his intention to marry her, being rich enough to give the house the amount to offset their loss of her to him. But in her heart she’d rather have Seiji. Similarly, shikataganai, it cannot be helped. She is but a bought woman bound to the rules of the house, and a powerful samurai must not be embarrassed.

Kiyoha and Seiji, on the last of the evenings she’ll be at the house, speak their goodbyes and well wishes to each other by subdued glances and short words. No drama. No fanfare. No lingering exchanges. Their faces, softly lit in this late night, spoke loudly enough in the stillness and in the helplessness of it all.

The following morning while the fog has not yet lifted Kiyoha arrives almost breathless at the little shrine. Her face lifts a smile. There Seiji stands, staring up at the tree. A desperate storm is raging in their separate lives but they greet each other as if each day in the world will always turn out bathed in golden sunrise. Then surprise. A gift.

Domo arigato gozaimashita, Sakuran. An adolescent who is attentive of life will easily understand the plot. But most likely it will take one who has truly lived and loved to sense the delicate layers of this fairytale-like story. A non-Japanese will, of course, perceive many of the themes differently, like possibly being confused that the oiran (an artist as well as a courtesan) is more highly regarded than the geisha (strictly an artist only)*.

In the end one of its general messages could be that it takes a tremendous amount of courage to get hold of a happiness that is outside the bounds of convention. And faith, too. As Kiyoha’s first lover told her before he died, “There can’t be a cherry tree that doesn’t flower.” However, there are different sorts of conventions to be basing happiness on. Seiji’s & Kiyoha’s family in the house think they have chosen the foolish way but for me, one from the audience, I concur with them. Seiji has forever been witnessing Kiyoha raging against the world that is full of suffering, as she herself described it in one of their dialogues.

“World” meaning where she finds herself now and from which there seems to be no escape. Seiji, too, may have silently raged against the way his entire life has been, and will henceforth be, tied to the house where his mother once worked. They are like the two goldfishes living in just a few handfuls of water. Happily for them they dared that there is life outside the gilded cage (though none for the poor fishes outside the bowl). Sometimes, too, happiness is just a matter of timing, or that only those who look out for it will catch it as it passes by.

*added 1March14: Thanks to the page http://www.kawaiistudyjapan.com/?p=197 I now know that sakuran means confusion. Indeed, almost each frame is a riot to the eyes. It’s right on the film’s theme: Kiyoha’s life is surrounded by a confusion of flamboyance and artifices; she herself constantly fights to stave off confusion in her thoughts and feelings; there’s an aquarium stuck on top of the Yoshiwara’s gate defying/mocking the fishes’ inability to be suspended in air, although its primary message would have to be “captivity”.

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PART TWO. …half of the story retold in pictures…

Kiyoha leaves home.

It was night time and there was a feast when she first entered the Yoshiwara gate.

3 a. Kiyoha, fascinated at first sight of Yoshiwara at night

The sight was fascinating to her.

She keeps attempting to run away.

Seiji catches up with her at the Inari Shrine.

3a. Seiji tells Kiyoha to stop trying to run away

He tells her to stop trying to run away.

3b. Seiji shows Kiyoha the cherry tree and says he'll take her out of Yoshiwara once it flowers.

He shows her the cherry tree, and says he’ll take her out of the Yoshiwara once it blooms.

3 c. Kiyoha is punished for attempting to run away

She is punished for her misbehavior.

Kiyoha is betrayed by her lover, Soujiro.

She is punished for her misbehavior.

6. Seiji knows Kiyoha's going out to look for Soujiro

Seiji asks her if she’s ready to face anything as she stealthily goes out to search for Soujiro.

Seiji tells her not to waste her tears on Soujiro.

Seiji rushes in at the commotion.

He holds Kiyoha back.

10. Seiji drags Kiyoha away from the fight

He drags her away from the fight.

He tells her three things… Cry and you lose.

… Love and you lose.

… Win and you lose.

14. Oiran Parade of Higurashi from Tamagikuya, Yoshiwara _Sakuran 2006

Kiyoha succumbs and becomes the Tamagikuya Oiran, Higurashi. This is her parade.

It is Seiji who is behind her…

16. Kiyoha surrenders and becomes Higurashi Oiran

The Oiran, the highest ranking courtesan of the floating world, is a highly regarded person.

17. Seiji & Kiyoha, performing their roles bravely

Higurashi and Seiji, at the center of the frame, dutifully perform their roles in life.

18. goldfish hoisted atop Yoshiwara's gate

Night view of the goldfish atop Yoshiwara’s gate.

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I’m So Happy!

Jan9

ahahaha! I can’t believe I did it! I’ve been trying the entire afternoon and evening to patiently wait for Young’s Analytical Concordance to the Bible to load on my computer but to no avail. It’s a black-white-pdf file from archive.org, that very generous organization, and although I just got a brand new hardbound copy for only US$19.97 still I thought an electronic copy would be handy for printing out individual pages.

As usual I sought for opinions on the net, after hours of waiting already, searching for why it takes a long time for young’s analytic concordance pdf to download from archive.org, and I got answers pertaining to hardware. Okay, so now I realize how backward my notebook is — on 1.66GHz, 1GB memory but which I have a 4MB flash drive for ReadyBoost, 32-bit , Windows 7 — and through Mozilla Firefox, using Adobe Acrobat. I checked my plug-ins and it says they’re all updated. By this time I started to seriously consider scraping my savings for new hardware, maybe a 64-bit, 8 MB RAM at least. Kalibutan. (= “that’s how it is in this world”). If I need it then it’s justified that I get one.

Then I searched for why is my pdf reader so slow and I got introduced to alternatives to Adobe Acrobat. Cool. So many generous people in the world. It seems I have been stuck in ignorance about such popular information. What I did next was, after hours and hours of just letting the loading run I closed the window. I’ve had enough. (Side by side with the loading, earlier, I found another pdf file, Young’s Literal Translation of the Bible, and I downloaded + saved it, real fast, so that was a reward on the side.) Only the background applications were running, the Word and everything else closed, cache and cookies already emptied, the lot, and I have not played my music even in hopes of giving all the computer’s attention to the downloading…that’s how naive I can get 🙂

Still hope dies hard, ahahaha, so I tried once more BUT THIS TIME closing Firefox and using Google Chrome instead. Ah! A homecoming feeling rushed in as I remember that previously I have switched my Chrome language into Tagalog. How nice, that although it was more than a year since I last used that browser, & that now the Start Page that greeted me is a beautiful city-at-night poster with an option for chill-out music that will play as long as the browser is on, still the dialogues with me are in Tagalog.

Okay, so I came back to that archive.org page and loaded the same pdf file (uhm, I didn’t check what the reader was this time. Most likely still Acrobat) and VOILA! It gave me the whole 192 MB file in about 10 minutes! Happy happy day!

If anyone out there has the same problem as I’ve had then I hope this little whoopi! of mine here can give you an idea. More power to us all on our continuous self-education in the cyber realm. Patience & perseverance pays. …. ooops, I’m not saying here which software is better than what …. just sharing what I experienced, that’s all …. and if you need a plethora of Bible translations all at once and real quick — e-Sword, search for it and download — you’d be amazed at how generous human beings can be ♥ ♥ ♥

🙂

!many thanks to the owners for the photos here

🙂

Dear Actor/Actress, I Respect You

Nov3

Dear South Korean Actress/Actor,

A very warm hello from an admirer. Please stay a while and read what I have to say from my heart.

I have been watching your projects, dramas mostly, for quite a while now and you have never failed to solicit my admiration. I have always found you amazingly competent in your portrayals of the many faces of humanity. You have provided windows for me from where I could see glimpses of that part of living that I may have a blind spot on, or that I am barred from seeing by reason of points of perception.

Yes, I have not been drawn to your projects for the purpose of entertainment alone. You might say you don’t understand my point since, after all, entertainment is your business. But please understand that audiences do vary greatly. Not all of us are up for the sole purpose of being “entertained”. Besides, there are many other media for ‘entertainment’. Well, okay, your colorful clothes and your music accompaniments have entertained me, and many a time the funny portrayals, too, but they’re not really the meat of what I’m after. I’m really after the story of humanity.

Please take my present post with a bright perspective — the reason why I had the urgency to write this NOW is that I have just Googled “dark side of Korean film industry” and the first three entries that came up confirmed my suspicion. Of course these things do not happen in your country alone. I suspect that it’s worse with another actor/actress in another country. However, it’s you that appears on my screen most of the time nowadays that I feel compelled to do something about it.

You see, for quite a while now I have marveled at the quantity and quality of dramas produced in your country. They are very good and there simply are so many of them. Then I noticed that you, dear actress/actor, appear in so many projects so that if your role was evil in a ‘previous’ project I had to re-program my perception of your face (not you as a person) as someone who is very likable in this ‘newer’ project that you are in. I am forced to adjust to your new persona fast, and it’s not really nice for my psyche. I have this feeling, therefore, that the projects you appear in are devalued as works of art —- instead of being rendered the proper respect as expressions of human creativity, like paintings and classical music/theater, your dramas/movies are being treated like mass-produced commodity, cheapened.

Actually it’s the historical stories that I’m more fond of. I do appreciate how difficult it is to make these. The costumes are heavy, or sometimes too thin for winter. In some there has to be rough horse action. In the fights you have to risk your bones and skin. Even the speech is not familiar to you. And even if you’re just a face in the background, without a speaking part, I really could see that you give a very convincing performance. Although I would forget your name I would still be able to remember you because I see you again and again as I watch another and yet another drama. And when I see you in a modern-day setting I will suddenly give a yelp of delight because your face will look different now that you don’t have a gat or a hanbok or a slave’s clothes on.

Honestly I value the stories that you appear in, that you act on, and I do spend time in digesting them. I analyze them. I think about the events. I reflect on them. I do so because they make me think about my life, about the life of my friends and acquaintances, about the lives of those who live similarly to the situations in the story that you appeared in, on screen. Your stories make me reflect on the human situation. As I said earlier, I do not value them for entertainment’s sake. I value them for what they can teach me about life.

So, okay, what do I really want to say to you, dear actress/actor? I want to say to you that I really wish for you to take care of your well-being. I don’t want you to be pressured into ‘entertaining’ me so much so that you don’t get enough sleep anymore. It could happen that I would really start crying for you, as a person, even before your face is shown on screen on your next project because my suspicions were confirmed that you are being constrained by the business side of entertainment. Please, if it happens that you already have enough money to live a healthy lifestyle then don’t push yourself to overwork for my sake. I will not be happy if you do so. Just seeing that you are working hard to be a good performer is already inspiring for me. I would already appreciate it that you are someone who is serious about your job and your responsibilities. I respect you as you are, even if I saw you in one project only, and my respect and admiration for you will not lessen just because you did not have a good project this year, or because other fans did not like the way you looked in your last appearance.

Please understand that however your face is structured you are handsome/beautiful to me. Your original face is beautiful. I’m your fan, and I know that you are also a human being like me. I am your fan because I admire the way you could get into a character’s shoes after just reading about him/her merely days or hours before filming. I bet many of the roles you were able to excellently portray you did them without consulting encyclopedias or psychiatry journals or historical accounts.

Please take care of yourself. Next time I see the eye bags heavy under your eyes I would know that it was not because you stayed out late drinking with friends, but it was because most likely you pushed yourself to work too hard, for me. Sometimes your paleness is obvious despite the make-up and lighting. I would really hate it if you got sick because you overworked for my sake. Instead of making me happy to see your face again, it would make me sad, even if your role is funny.

Thank you very much for all your hard work. You have already given me so much. You have shown to me how beautiful Korea and its people is. Your drama stories have encouraged me. The goodness of heart that I could see in the characters you play have inspired me, in my living. I owe you so much, so I thought it’s my turn to extend my support for you. I wish for you to find real happiness in life. I wish for you to love yourself, too, much more than I love the characters that you bring to life on screen.

It’s gotten into a long message now, and it’s already midnight so I have to say goodnight. 🙂 Goodnight, dear beautiful person. Have a lovely new day tomorrow. May God bless you.

——————

added on 9March2014:

I felt that I needed to say more about this matter.

There are video clips readily available online about almost anything in the known universe. Among these I came across one that gave me a glimpse of a world that I did not suspect existed. It’s an in-house training establishment for entertainer wannabe’s. This particular one I found was of Eric Mun’s, which made me feel awed at the intensity of dedication he gives to these training periods. That’s the first time I became aware that behind Kpop’s glamour is also a world of sweat and tears.

Joongki, Jihyo, Kwangsoo _ep21

Lately, which makes me quite late into the game, I discovered that aside from Song Ji Hyo there’s also Lee Kwang Soo (and Song Joong Ki in the past) in the South Korean variety show Running Man. I never bothered with variety shows because they always made me feel like I waste my enthusiasms in paying attention to them. But since it’s these three, whom I belatedly discovered to be close friends, and who are favorites to me individually, that are in this show then I watched one episode. That was Episode 2. That was memorable because I had not been able to laugh that loud and long about anything for many years now. For a Filipino this phenomenon is unusual — not having laughed hard for a long time — since we always have opportunities to laugh our guts out with family and friends.

In watching a bit more of that show I gradually found it irksome that the true personalities of the members are suppressed during the show. For instance I hate it that Lee Kwang Soo is being projected as inept and stupid, because he clearly isn’t. I hate it that Song Ji Hyo is being made the “female” to the “male” of whoever that will guarantee continuous high ratings to the show. I somehow feel that it’s a disrespect to Song Ji Hyo as a person because if she were not a female then she wouldn’t be paired off like this, just an object, to one guy or another. I am frustrated that she and the guys are not free to express themselves during the show. Somehow I feel cheated by the fact that though I’m anticipating to witness true camaraderie among personalities that, I’d like to believe, by now have become real friends in the real sense, (yet) what I see are faked interactions.

A show has to be scripted, obviously. But the question of to script or not to script, or how to script, is not what I’m touching on here.

I’ve become this affected (!hahaha) because I have come to like each of the members of Running Man. I do not see Kim Jong Kook as frightening. I can sense his finesse and gentleness. I do not see Haha as inept. He has a solid sense of responsibility and self confidence. Song Joong Ki comes across as an intellectual to me, a sort of an academician, someone who loves learning but just happens to have a beautiful face. Though Kang Gary is constantly teased of his looks he actually oozes of sexuality, and he is totally far from being ugly. Same with Lee Kwang Soo.

Jihyo & Kwangsoo

This guy is smart but he suppresses it. I saw him only once, in Dongyi, and I thought of how he amazingly could pull off that character. He’s just good at making silly faces but actually he’s handsome. (Whew… I am a bit disappointed with myself in having to use the handsome-ugly categorization here because I feel strongly against this mass media gauge that is used in the distortion of humanity’s sense of beauty, and hence all values that are related to this sense, like self-acceptance.)

But the fact is that the entertainment industry is a reflection of humanity’s greed for sensual gratification. That is, involving the senses. The term is already mentioned: for entertainment. Since the market potential is huge then the greed for unprecedented profits is also boundless. That’s what humanity is like.

The reason why I felt the urgency to add to this post is because I found additional information relevant to the topic. If you’re interested at what is going on, at the real situation, the one that is hidden from those who are not willing to dig deep, then I would like to share these three links with you:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-13760064

http://xypherfarrell.hubpages.com/hub/KPop-JPop-Why-are-People-Hating-it

http://xypherfarrell.hubpages.com/hub/REAL-Bad-Boys-of-Korean-Entertainment

(I’ve bookmarked the bad-boys page because I’m now ready to get acquainted with them, to see for myself these ones who are admirable for their courage. Also, Kang Gary is there.)

I’m sorry that it’s only these that I can share with you for now. I know that it’s as bad in other countries (e.g., USA, India), but I don’t have time yet to look for the specifics. I don’t exactly know how it goes in the Philippines but it’s safe to assume that it’s also messy and bloody. It’s a lucrative livelihood, after all. Where greed is great, corruption in corresponding levels is also present. Myself being a Filipino, I could easily imagine how it is plus allowing that fact could be stranger than fiction here.

Though I will remain enthusiastic for film productions I will not stay blind on the struggles of the small people who are involved in it. They are the ones whose faces are peddled on screen. They are the ones who touch my life, even bring me needed courage at times. I will not be like a pimp for them, raving about their work and selling it to the world by my praises, without being aware that I as a fan am also responsible for the pressure that constantly hounds them. Only a few of them are lucky enough to be born or be granted with the privilege of choice, like Kaneshiro Takeshi and Lee Seo Jin. Most of them are just struggling artists. Most of them are just bread winners who are stuck in a job that is actually a prison to them.

I’ve decided to just choose first the Running Man episodes where only the core members are interacting amongst themselves. I now see them as close friends. — The Filipino equivalent is the barkada. One’s barkada are the people that one hangs out with, each one being an important part of the others’ lives, to share laughs and other emotions with, a venue for self-expression, to grow up with, to explore reality with, a quasi-family. — Of course, I will watch all episodes that has Song Joong Ki in it and I will especially cherish those where he, Song Ji Hyo, and Lee Kwang Soo are on the same team.When I’m done with all those episodes I’d choose again from the episodes where artists that I admire have come as guests, like Jackie Chan, Cha In Pyo, Eric Mun, and Ji Jin Hee.

Each time I watch them I will especially be alert for spontaneous interactions, the ones that bring out their unguarded emotions. In this way I’d feel like I’m having fun with them, too. Because this is how it is among barkada — just being with each other’s company is a guarantee for an opportunity to celebrate life, a partaking of well-being.

Thus, I will not watch Running Man merely for my entertainment and doses of laughter. I will watch it because I want to celebrate life through friendship, though vicariously for now.

♥♥

many thanks to the sites that made these pictures here available for everyone; all enlarge, some much, some a bit, when clicked on ♥

♥♥

[added April 3, 2014] Kwangsoo enthusiastically greets Jihyo upon seeing her as she joins the gang late in the games in episode 189, tired as she is after more than 10 hours’ travel to Melbourne. Much younger Kim Woobin, Kwangsoo’s teammate, respectfully looks on and laughs at his elders as they end up squabbling.

❤

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Buddha Luther Happiness the Sun

Oct31

It’s not easy to talk about Christianity when it’s wrapped up with centuries of jargon. Most of the time it frightens me to approach even one topic among the myriads in it. Having grown up in a cultural pot heavily influenced by community existence plus animism/fatalism and Roman Catholicism no wonder it came to my mind that should I abandon the family’s religious affiliation I might be condemning myself to a lifetime of ostracism and most probably the fires of hell.

Okay.

So when I say that Buddhism says “Life is suffering” I am in the position to acknowledge that I certainly have not come to grasp all the nuances that Buddhism offers about this topic. But, to be sure, I know what suffering is. I haven’t gone hungry for a day but I know what suffering is. I haven’t been confined in hospital (thank you, Lord) for a minute but I know what suffering is. I haven’t had a toothache ever (thank you, Lord) but I know what suffering is.

As I was turning into an adult what has gradually become mystifying for me is the figure of the crucified Jesus prominently displayed in churches, even on the altar. (On the aside, where I grew up it was of St. Sebastian’s at the altar, partially disrobed and stuck with arrows, with the accompanying crimson paint for the dripping blood at his sides.) In the church where I tend to go to while I’m here (in a place very far away from home) it’s a painting of the Crucifixion so gloomy, so medieval Europe, right there where you would see it looming large before you as you wait for the minister to administer the bread and the wine to you, and especially when you happen to stand (some kneel) in the middle of the row. (Another aside, not that I’m an expert on paintings, and I still am ignorant on who the respected artist is, but I have it in mind to respectfully ask from an elder in resident as to why the proportion of the figures seem a bit lacking lengthwise, while I assimilate whatever aspect of beauty I could take away with me from such an agony-inducing representation.)

Now, life is suffering, I say this is true. I cannot overemphasize on the billions who go hungry everyday. I could imagine that for those who haven’t had a material lack in life there would still be the agony of not being able to obtain the latest car model the soonest time desired, or the temporary irritation of having lost a million dollars in a business transaction that would be rectified anyway in the hundreds of million dollar profit in other transactions. For girls, probably a run in the stockings, a glitch in the make-up, a boyfriend who seems to wane or simply the lack of one, a brand bag beyond the momentary budget, the bitchiness of another girl. Crazy life. Of course there’s more, and more to it, but I’m just randomly picking up from popular commercial images.

…back to the Cross and back to Buddhism… :

Whatever joy there is in the world
Arises from wishing for others’ happiness.
Whatever suffering there is in the world
Arises from wishing for your own happiness.

―Shantideva.

Putting it another way: All who are unhappy are so because they looked for their own happiness. All who are happy are so because they looked for the happiness of others. — I ran into this quote earlier in the week and I recalled it as I was reading something on Lohr’s paper**. This was what I read, and I really need to copy the two paragraphs from pages 250-1, with which I need to include the notes, too, emphases and italicizing mine (…and… a beautiful excerpt from the consequent paragraph is in yesterday’s post) :

This concept of suffering is different than a sympathetic affiliation with those less fortunate or the common association of Jesus with those who suffer in society – the downtrodden and overlooked.[1] An image of Jesus in solidarity with the oppressed provides an excellent model for Christians who want to walk in the footsteps of God in Christ. It entails a not-so-glamorous path of self-effacement and humility and leads to a sense of liberation. But, the concept of a suffering God in the theology of the cross goes further than this. It indicates that God intimately knows the depths of human sorrows and pains. It also juxtaposes the violence of execution with the glory of resurrection. “The horror of Golgotha is the only way to the kingdom.”[2] This is a theology of the cross. It has to do with, among other things, atonement, Christology and salvation.

A theology of the cross is also a model of God’s grace. It represents a “reversal” of direction: “God comes to us; we do not mount up to god. Atonement occurs when God succeeds in getting through to us who live under wrath and law. … A ‘happy exchange’ takes place: Jesus takes our sinful nature and gives us his righteous and immortal life.”[3] There is no theology of the cross without the person of Jesus, and in it one finds a model of going out from oneself and partaking in suffering. The theology of the cross teaches self-denial – putting oneself in the place of the other – and sacrificial love – the kind of love that is at the heart of the activity on the cross. This implies that the Godly model is one of active engagement – of assuming the context of the other – a concept that certainly has implications for interfaith relationships.

[1] For a statement on Jesus’ “solidarity and compassion with others, that is, the deviant, the irrelevant, the marginalized, the oppressed, all in all the lowest of the low” see Paul Chung’s, “The Uniqueness of Christianity in Relation to Buddhism” in Christ the One and Only, Sung Wook Chung (ed.), (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2005), 176.

[2] Braaten and Jenson eds., Christian Dogmatics vol 2, (Philadelpiha: Fortress Press, 1984), 58.

[3] Braaten and Jenson (eds.), Christian Dogmatics vol 2, 47.

—————————————————————————————

I’d say that within these two paragraphs a wide range of in themselves ‘wide’, and crucial, topics are encompassed. There’s Liberation theology, asceticism/monasticism, biblical anthropology, pluralism, religious dialogues, as well as the ones explicitly mentioned within, and more. Whoa, that’s all way too much to handle at once…

Anyway, for now, what struck me the most was this: Buddhism and Christianity (respective branches or denominations aside) have the concept of suffering as a basic foundation in their articulations. So I was thinking that if one gets to the root of it all it really is suffering that is the most gripping reality to human existence. I could formulate it this way, too: the best way that God can get across to our consciousness (feeling and thinking combined) is through ‘suffering’. It’s the phenomenon right on the spot of urgency. It has to be on this medium that an effective communication, so to speak, can happen. So, I say to myself, wow, Christianity and Buddhism (sorry, I haven’t reached the stage of exploring the other areas yet) see each other eye to eye in this. Amazing.

Hahaha on second thoughts I see myself as very naive here because, well, if you really get rough on it why the heck do humans seek this numinous if not to, well, ‘get away’ from angst/emptiness/suffering/whatnot? Hence all the religions and mysticisms et cetera. Even Miyamoto Musashi who depended only on himself was I say a person of a deep sense of the numinous, along with all the samurai who took their swords really seriously. Chincha.

Anyway again, on happiness now… When I was younger I took for granted all these quotes on happiness that I would come across from time to time. I didn’t have the consciousness of ‘wanting to be happy’. I guess it was because I was yet very ignorant (I still am but a little less so, meaning that I’ve just discovered that I really don’t know anything, haha). Moreover there’s family and friends and relatives and neighbors and everyone around in the city in the island in the country and so what’s there to be unhappy about? There’s always something to eat and something to do and something to look forward to, and so what’s there to be unhappy about? I could not appreciate the idea of “wanting to be happy”, seeking/pursuing happiness, because I did not perceive it as something lacking in our lives where I grew up. Moreover, if laughter is a measurement of it we sure have lots of opportunity for it regardless of the situation. Chincha. Sure there was sadness and anger and gloom but at least for myself I did not associate it with being ‘unhappy’ or that happiness has gone and I needed to ‘have’ it again. Hehehe (… there you go… 🙂 … well, whatever… ) and although until now I still have this ‘steady’ disposition (yup, despite everything, and as measured by the amount of aid-less continuous sleep I get every night, at least 7 hours, thank you Lord) it has come to the stage where I’ve begun to sincerely appreciate the wisdom of the simplest of quotes, like Buddha’s:

Joy grows in us not out of possessions or wealth.

True joy of life comes out of a wise and loving heart.

Wow, so simply put, even cheapened by the casual use of it commercially, but I could only imagine the amount of suffering, or the sense of it, that had to be ruminated on before such a realization is reached. Siddhartha Gautama and those who have the kind of heart he had are awesome. What does it take to have a wise heart? What does it take to have a loving heart? Who do have these, and if so then how do they look at life, and how do they deal with their existence, how do they lead their lives? These are really the biggies.

Suffering, the perception of it, the experience of it, is a prerequisite to life’s realizations. It is those who have no sense of ‘suffering‘ — what it is like, how it feels, how it is like — who are not able to appreciate the value of life, of another human, of friendship, of presence, of being…

I don’t know how to wrap up this introspection. Perhaps it’s best if I simply don’t attempt to … or have I already wrapped it up…? …whatever…. Incidentally today is the celebration day for the Reformation. So it’s a holiday and all the shops are closed, all the students have dragged their suitcases across the hall since yesterday already and are now home for the weekend, since tomorrow is Friday and only the nerds go to school on a Friday (haha, you can debate on that). Incidentally, too, there are scholars that argue that the religious affiliation I belong to now cannot be strictly traced back to the Reformation. Whatever. And the Reformation itself was a source of angst for Luther himself. Haha, crazy world. No wonder I find myself deeply appreciating Zen Buddhism many a time.

a book on Martin Luther by Prof. Hans Schwarz

Again anyway, I’d like to dedicate this composition to the contributions of Martin Luther to humankind. I for myself, granting how I grew up, can understand a bit the pressure that he underwent when he was formulating his 95 theses, and so for now I’d situate myself more on the positive end of the spectrum of like-vs-dislike for him. But, as how life is, shikataganai (for my favorite Korean drama characters it would be otoke? = what can one do? ), Luther couldn’t possibly have expected to be able to control all ‘the particles surrounding him that would naturally move in the Brownian motion way’ — poor Luther, his name has to shoulder much of the responsibility for all events that can be said to have stemmed off from his actions and words. It’s good to know (anyway) that Lutherans do openly acknowledge his faults and are in fact confessing that the institution’s (if it can be spoken of as that) actions do consider this phenomenon as an important part of the ‘background’.

Ah, what a happy day. And the sun is up and strong! Hahaha I sound like I’m a worshipper of the sun, but many times I feel I could understand why this phenomenon, worshipping the sun, has existed across the globe and all throughout history. The sun just being there, so powerful, it’s really wonderful I could feel all my cells rejoicing!

♥♥

** can be accessed from: https://ore.exeter.ac.uk/repository/handle/10036/86921

— this paper is by Mary Christine Lohr entitled Finding a Lutheran Theology of Religions: Ecclesial Traditions and Interfaith Dialogue submitted to the University of Exeter in 2009. I still have a few more pages to read. It’s very good, speaking from a seriously-researching layperson’s point of view, and I’m very happy to have found it. So generous of Exeter to have it available for everyone.

old pond —
— frog-jump-in
!splash
by Matsuo Basho

P. S. There’s this 2003 movie Luther that has Joseph Fiennes in it, of course it’s not enough to show about Luther but it’s good. There’s this 55-minute documentary (An Empires Special) Reluctant Revolutionary, it’s also good. Though just take time to research on your own because perspectives and articulations vary and are relative. The nailing of the theses on the castle church door may not have happened and other tidbits like that could be important for a serious student. Nevertheless, for his time Martin Luther was one awesome personality. Miyamoto Musashi lived in the late 16th century Japan and is a respected historical figure by his many accomplishments in swordsmanship, the arts, and philosophy. Zen Buddhism is a major component of Japanese life ever since its practice there (as a separate school it started there about the 12th century). It is said that Musashi had a Zen priest for a teacher — I read up about Musashi from a 5-part novel by Eiji Yoshikawa, but that was many many years ago; recently I got to watch NHK’s 49-episode Musashi drama and it’s said to be faithful to the novel — but more on this next time, and not that I really know much … whew 🙂 [dear different websites, thanks for the lovely pictures, if it’s yours and you don’t want them here just please tell me… thanks again!]

Ciao!

♥♥

A Frozen Flower: a look at a story of how an honest love triangle turns into a struggle on personhood

May21

1. Frozen Flower 2008 _Han Baek gets caught

Han Baek, who was eloping with a palace maid, gets caught by his brother guards.

Hello everyone 🙂 Today is Mach 1, 2014 and I am set to put captures for this post. I don’t have spare time actually, meaning I’m stealing this opportunity hahaha, but I’ve noticed that many people drop by to look over this post. I therefore felt compelled to fix things up a bit here primarily for my peace of mind. I’ve never intended to leave this post bare of illustrations and so now that Ms. Song Ji Hyo is in a new drama, Emergency Couple, I thought it’s as good a time as any to put an effort here once and for all. This update also marks the time that I squealed of delight after finding out that these favorites of mine are connected by close friendship: Jo In Sung, Song Joong Ki, Lee Kwang Soo, and Song Ji Hyo. Also, Joo Jin Mo is currently doing Empress Ki (which I’ll have to tackle in a separate post another time, by the major reasons that it has the cast of Damo plus another favorite of mine, Ji Chang Wook 🙂 This post is just a little expression of support for professionals from whom I have benefited much by way of insight acquisition. The fonts in pink are links to my other two posts that have more to say on this.

2. Frozen Flower 2008 _finding a way to save Han Baek

Hong Lim was very carefully trying to find a way to save Han Baek from being punished with death.

Many have commented a dislike over the sexual element in this film. I do not have any comment against them, and they are perfectly qualified to hold such opinions. For myself I would not want a minor younger than, say, 21 years old to view this film. That’s just a general gauge of how old an individual could be before s/he can handle well themes that s/he may have not experienced personally, such as homosexual relations and betrayal of close bonds. I believe that age is not a good marker for so-called maturity because there are youngsters who are able to process such “adult” issues with admirable capability, and there are adults who cannot see the forest because they’re focused on the individual trees.

My liking for this film does not reflect the entirety or the summary of my personal convictions, the major part of which I have not even put tabs on.

3. Frozen Flower 2008 _Hong Lim's view of the queen singing Gashiri

How the queen looks to Hong Lim as she sings Gashiri.

That is, because although I am not familiar with so-called lesbians, indeed I am very much familiar with the male counterpart, the so-called gays. But, well, these are just labels so just so there are terms that can be used for discussions and conversations. I’m sure the issues involved go way much much deeper and wider than what is promoted in popular media. What I know is that, as a Filipino who grew up in a rural setting, I have not been so much isolated by norms and religion as to condemn per se that homosexuals will go to hell. I have a handsome cousin who leans towards the feminine of traits and although I had a catastrophic fight with him decades ago over that issue I have become a big fan of his right now, even after decades of separation and even not having seen him even once since then. I also had high school classmates, dearly beloved, whom we all respect sincerely despite their deviation from the accepted norms of manliness.

3a. Frozen Flower 2008 _royal guards behind the thrones

The king and queen of Goryo seated on their thrones, the chief guard behind the queen, the sub-chief guard behind the king.

Now, for the issue on physical sexual relations with the same genders, that is a field that I personally withhold abstract speculations from because I hold the conviction that God is not trapped within conventions and norms. My gay friends love God as much as I do, and my case rests there for now.

Finally, I wanted to pretty up this post as an expression of appreciation to the three actors who made the film a success: Song Ji Hyo, Joo Jin Mo, and Jo In Sung. This is not to add pressure to their already stressful lives. I just want to say that, if ever I were a friend of any of them, to take good care of their personal health especially the emotional aspect, and that this film established my respect for them as persons. They are beautiful people and I wish them the happiness that they can identify as their own, one which is not dependent on wealth, fame, or reputation. This wish also goes for everyone in the world. I wish happiness for all of us. Kampei! 🙂 Thanks a million for dropping by and for allowing me to share some of my thoughts with you. The screen captures enlarge when clicked on. Peace ❤

… below now was the original post …

4. Frozen Flower 2008 _a fever ignites the trio's frozen state

The queen acquires a fever after the procreation ceremony. The king tends to her.

This king in our story, in ancient Goryeo, is like a god. He can do what he wants. His servants are his property. He has a retinue of eunuchs at his beck and call, all of them at a bent position in his presence. They never stand straight in his company.

This king bows down to only one person, to the emperor of Yuan whom we don’t see in the story. We see only a princess of Yuan, she who had been sent to the palace to be the king’s bride about a decade ago.

Though this king does not have a complete autonomy, still his word is law in his kingdom. This is what we understand when a violator was spared of beheading as per the king’s order.

4a. Frozen Flower 2008 _first inkling of betrayal & jealousy

The first time that Hong Lim hides something from the king.

The king in his youth gathered 36 children to himself and reared them in the palace next to him to be his trusted companions. Their body, mind, and will were trained for only one purpose: to protect him and to always be available only for him.

At one session the king asks the seated children who the best warrior in the kingdom is. Of all the answers given to him his eyes particularly shone at one boy’s answer, that it is one who willingly gives up his life for the king. Thus the love affair between this king and this bodyguard began. The king cares for all the children but his affection begins to be centered to only one, on Hong Lim.

Hong Lim becomes the respected chief of the 36 bodyguards (though one, the sub-chief, does not show proper respect by remaining seated while the others stand up and bow as Hong Lim enters their quarters).

5. Frozen Flower 2008 _there is now the problem of how Hong Lim & the queen can reach each other

Hong Lim and the queen are starting to realize that they want the communication line between them kept open.

In their close ties he is also “hyungnim”, big brother. When one of them, Han Baek, falls in love and tries to run away with one of the queen’s maids Hong Lim takes advantage of his closeness with the king to beg for Han Baek’s life. The crime entails beheading. It is a desertion of the king, a betrayal, treason (i.e., the guards are forbidden private lives). However, the king relents. Han Baek is returned to his comrades, who are greatly relieved. They hug him. They thank their chief. There is genuine affection amongst them. They are merely the king’s objects but as persons they are family. When the sub-chief sneers at Hong Lim’s accomplishment Hong Lim gives this justification: that Han Baek is one of them and hence could not possibly be left in the lurch for just a one-time offense, though this is not to be a precedence for further violations. Hong Lim subjugates the resentful sub-chief, defending the king’s honor from such snide remarks. Hong Lim is loyal to his brothers as well as to his king.

6. Frozen Flower 2008 _resignation on her face

The queen here could be trying to find her way through the helpless situation, as she slightly tilts her head back to where Hong Lim could be situated by now.

The first hint of disaster manifests when Hong Lim glances at the queen on the king’s comment on her perfume-locket, during that beautiful spring day as the royal couple was relaxing outside the palace grounds. Hong Lim’s existence is supposedly solely for the king, for the king’s wishes and wants, to protect, please, and lay one’s life to at any time. This had been his mindset ever since he first came to the palace. This is what he has been programmed to live according to. The king’s pleasure and contentment is supposedly his pleasure and contentment as well, and nothing else. Would there have been in him an element of jealousy at the king’s interest in the queen? Or perhaps just an interest at what the king is interested in?

The day before the picnic, after the Han Baek incident, we see Hong Lim gently combing the king’s hair. The king asks Hong Lim if he would do that, too, run away and leave the palace in case something similar happens to him. Hong Lim replies that he doesn’t think he could, because the king is in the palace. This, then, is the king’s fear: that Hong Lim will desert him.

7. Frozen Flower 2008 _resignation on his face

Hong Lim deliberates on whether to persist on reaching out to her. Does he or does he not give her the locket?

During the picnic the king smilingly insists to the queen on “that song of Goryeo that you usually sing”, saying that he’d like to hear her sing to them. He even solicits Hong Lim’s support in this request. (Here is an incident where the three of them are in harmony.) The surprised and flattered queen shyly obliges. We see a king who is not icy towards his queen. We could say that they are good friends, that they are comfortable with each other.

8. Frozen Flower 2008 _the second daring act _he gives her a gift

The gamble. He gives her his second gift. She receives it.

Hong Lim, whether because of the beautiful voice or of the lovely song, glances at the queen again. From his view behind the king he can see her left profile. He has now glanced at the queen long enough to be established in the plot that he is able to later recall what the potpourri-locket looks like. However, was he already drawn a long time ago to the queen’s beauty? He and his brothers would have been blind if they did not appreciate their queen’s looks at all. But the queen sings beautifully. Perhaps it is only this that he appreciates at that point. However, her song’s theme alludes to the incident with Han Baek’s attempt to run away. We see the king covering his emotions by a sip of drink. (He insisted on her singing and he got a reminder of his fear. What a day.)

9. Frozen Flower 2008 _a small gift but a big decision

She wonders at the developments, of how she has come to look at him with favor, of what to do with the gift.

Naturally, the king being outside of the palace’s protection, assassins take an attempt on him. The issue involved has something to do with the political struggle between the king and his court with the influence of Yuan on one side and the absence of an heir on the other. Yuan describes this as a “political instability”. Several members of the court, including the queen’s visiting older brother, became implicated at the attempt of the few in this assassination. At the first whiz of arrows the king lunges to his right and covers the queen with his body. (Hong Lim quickly flips the table, for shield.) Next the king asks Hong Lim if he is okay, then orders that the queen be taken away to safety. To the queen’s fright he demands for his sword and stays with his bodyguards in the fight. We see a king who has a superior skill in fencing.

Now the emperor of Yuan makes a move in the face that the king so far has not produced a progeny. The emperor now intends to crown somebody as next in line. This place belongs to the king’s son.

10. Frozen Flower 2008 _confined in an impossibility

There, he has done it finally. Whatever happens to him at his rashness he is ready to face it. He has given her something that he was not willing to share with the king. He may die because of it but he had deliberated long over it. He wanted to give it to the queen and that’s all that matters for now.

But despite having had the queen and the concubines in the palace for many years now no royal children have been produced to the kingdom. As the emperor’s representative reads this edict up on the dais we see all the courtiers bowed down beneath, on the floor, with the king at their head. The queen, on the other hand, is seated up on the dais, on her throne, next to Yuan’s representative, and next to the king’s temporarily vacated one.

The king next gathers his court. Seated now next to the queen up on their dais, bodyguards behind, members of the court express that it would be wise to conform to the emperor’s wish. The king looks and sounds resigned as he asks the court for more opinions. The queen, barely controlling her anger, decides to speak out. She lashes at the surprised court for accepting Yuan’s edict, implying that they are looking forward to the day that the present king has no power anymore over the country. The king’s nostrils slightly flares at his queen’s defense of his honor, at her publicly owning up of the fault of their being childless, saying that it is not the “still young” king who is incapacitated. Hong Lim, of course, empathizes with the queen and is moved by her show of fierce loyalty to the king. In this incident the three characters are once more in harmony with each other.

A court celebration as a way of imploring for a royal progeny. Shown is a drum dance.

By now it is clear that the king is protective of the queen, as a husband should be. That evening alone with her he tells her to go back to her native country now that his humiliation is inevitable. He does not want her to be humiliated as well. They now talk openly of the problem: he can’t “do it” with a woman. Even if she sleeps in his chambers tonight and at any other time they would still not be able to produce an heir. She in turn chooses to cling to him, to refuse to leave him and her adoptive country. She declares that this where she belongs now. The king then, perhaps encouraged by her clear support, tells her of an alternative. To beget a son for him through Hong Lim.

12. Frozen Flower 2008 _Goryeo king & queen

The king and queen in full regalia.

Indeed, as the king and Hong Lim make love we see the passion in the king’s eyes as he holds Hong Lim’s face and looks at him. It’s a sort of a helplessly fiery openly honest passion. We see that Hong Lim is at ease with this relationship he has with the king. He accepts his place as being the object of his king’s passion and willingly responds to the king’s satisfaction. We do not see any problem between them in there. Albeit, I cannot see fire in Hong Lim’s eyes as he looks at the king. This fierce passion between them will be re-enacted the morning after Hong Lim spends a night with the queen. The king had then demanded of Hong Lim’s “heart”, that it should be given to him. It will be enacted again at the last tableau, with their final swordfight. In there, however, it will be a passion to subjugate and to eliminate each other.

13. Frozen Flower 2008 _Hong Lim steals a look

Hong Lim directs a quick look at their majesties. Was he looking for something?

Disturbance is first seen in Hong Lim’s eyes when the king tells him what he wants to be done. Hong Lim bolts up in bed, passionately declaring to the king’s turned back that he can’t possibly do it. Perhaps to him it sounded like being commanded to desecrate the queen, or like being commanded to betray the king. The queen, alone in her chambers, has tearful eyes of emotions. She has long resented Hong Lim for taking away from her the rightful place as the king’s favored nurturing partner. She, a virgin, must consummate the marriage act with a person she sees as worse than a stranger. She who has wholeheartedly given her loyalty to her husband has been commanded by him to exert a very intimate effort at conceiving with a “servant”. She, a princess of the mighty Yuan, will be made equal to a mere “property” of a vassal country.

14. Frozen Flower 2008 _the queen wears Hong Lim's gift

There, he sees it. She is wearing his gift to her.

To defy the king’s wish is to humiliate him, and she is not in the position nor does she have the will to do this. She is too good a country’s subject, wife, and woman. She is foremost the king’s property, the country’s subject next, and being her own self the least–if ever she indeed has that notion at all. Hong Lim, she knows, will surely not defy the king as well. She realizes that she is helpless.

The king, having totally believed that he can always get what he wants (except in the case of Yuan), did not anticipate that these “properties” that he manipulates could get out of his control. He does not see himself as deficient (except for being heirless). He can even beat the best of his bodyguards in a swordfight at any time of the day. What best for him to do other than have his most trustworthy confidant impregnate his very loyal wife? He must have felt he had the safety nets on all sides. At that point there was no reason to suspect that either of them is capable of betraying his trust.

The royal guards perform a sword dance.

On the first consummation night the king gently lays his agitated queen in bed and silently reassures her with a very tender kiss on her lips. He lets Hong Lim in after encouraging him with a brotherly pat on the shoulder. The queen quakes as Hong Lim approaches. He sees her anguished eyes full of tears. He gives up.

The morning after, the king, taking the failure in hand with an almost imperceptible smile, encourages him again. The next night the queen has mustered more courage–she volunteers to disrobe herself. Now, as the rhythm of Hong Lim’s breathing increases, he looks at the king’s shadow against the thin dividing wall as if asking for permission to leave the king and venture into a world without the latter.

The queen eventually accepts Hong Lim. A new knowledge can be read from her face. Hong Lim, finally, rests his head beside the queen’s. They have stepped onto a threshold of no return. Ahh, so, Hong Lim can, in fact, do it. The king at the next room, hearing of that exact moment, freezes and blots his ink painting. The king has started to lose his control over the matter.

17. Frozen Flower 2008 _an embroidery gift

At the library, the queen hands over a gift to Hong Lim. It’s a head band that she herself had embroidered.

Hong Lim felt it. He excuses himself from the palace to distance himself from this overwhelming new force in his narrowly restricted existence. The queen felt it. She persistently prostrates herself in prayer to calm her confusion. Hong Lim cannot stop the force. He thinks of her in his sleeping time. He gets a new necklace to replace her lost one (during the assassins’ attempt at the picnic). He sneaks a peak at her at the palace, while she repeatedly bows in front of the altar, unbeknownst to all. He muses about her while his brothers play at the river. He hides the truth from the king whenever the latter asks of anything that might divulge a clue to his increasing attachment to the queen . She becomes sick and gets a fever.

At these times the king starts to re-establish his control over the two–he shows open affection to Hong Lim just like before, and he shows sincere concern for the queen just like before. Hong Lim will start to distance himself from the king. The king reaches out and tightens his hold against Hong Lim. These acts of insistence on control worsen, escalate, until even the sub-chief becomes horrified at the king’s madness—the first instance of which is the tragedy in the library during the night of the thunderstorm. In there the king had become like a hysterical woman scorned by her lover.

16. Frozen Flower 2008 _the king sings magnificently

The king in his magnificent voice sings Ssanghwajeom. It means “A Frozen Flower”, itself the title of the doomed situation he will shortly find himself in together with the two persons closest to him.

We see in the queen’s eyes the switch of affections. Whereas before to the king she gives warmth and to Hong Lim she is uncaring, now she turns her face away from the king, perhaps shielding her true emotions from his gaze. Little by little she looks at Hong Lim with warmth (there is that deleted scene, of another secret meeting in the library, the queen wearing a palace maid’s attire and Hong Lim wearing the head band that she embroidered for him, where she in a playful mood surprises him with a hug from behind, erasing his anxious look, and then they talk briefly, and he tearfully cradles her head in a tight embrace–a mark that they eventually see each other as equals, and are now “self-less” in their regard for each other). As to Hong Lim, whenever he is not looking at the queen, his eyes are sad, touched with a resigned and helpless look. Though he is sure of his love for the queen, and eventually of the queen’s love for him, yet these are absolutely forbidden in their context.

18. Frozen Flower 2008 _king's guards like his song

The clueless guards go on loving their king, enjoying his song. Can you see Song Joong-Ki in front? ❤ ❤ ❤

So Hong Lim continues to hide truths from the king. The sub-chief consistently works out his way into snatching for himself the affection that the king has for Hong Lim. The queen responds to Hong Lim’s signals. In the very constrained situation that they are in, where the king always finds ways to know about truths they hide from him, Hong Lim and the queen nurture their newly found world. They communicate through little gifts, and glances, and meetings whenever they can snatch them.

But Hong Lim calculates their chances of survival before the queen does. He realizes that he has no power to protect the queen from the king. He tries to put a stop to the danger when he sees that only disaster awaits him, and the queen especially, should they continue with their attachment, where they are persons of mutual high worth plus without a demand to sacrifice their personhood.

19. Frozen Flower 2008 _Hong Lim starts to distance

The morning after. Hong Lim begins to withdraw from the king’s advances.

The king has been persistently hounding him, enough to assure him that surrender is his only safety net. The king has had all traitors killed, all the high officials and even the queen’s brother. He knows of the king’s capabilities. He cuts his happiness short by surrendering to the king. His eyes now look almost lifeless.

The queen, on the other hand, did not have the understanding by this time enough for her to agree with Hong Lim. She begs him to run away with her anywhere, to “take her away”, even to the hills. He tells her of his powerlessness. She is saved from a suicide attempt. She discovers she is with child. She accepts Hong Lim’s departure (him being assigned by the king to the border stations for the purpose of “forgetting”) but has to tell him of her fear, that their child might not be safe with the king.

20. Frozen Flower 2008 _the flower unfreezes & blooms

When she thought he had left her he came looking for her. When he thought she might leave him he came looking for her.

Alas, their love for each other cannot be constrained. The king, with the help of the sub-chief, finds them despite the thunderstorm. Both, with hands tied and kneeling before the king, alternately defend each other at the cost of their lives. When Hong Lim declares twice that he loves the queen the king snaps. He makes a shocked sub-chief castrate a superior brother. The queen faints. The royal physician congratulates the king on the queen’s conception. The madness in the king’s eyes that started when Hong Lim lied about sending honeysuckle tea to the queen now grows into crazy proportions–he commands the sub-chief that all subjects private to the fatherhood of the queen’s pregnancy be killed. Except Hong Lim. The king goes to him in prison and bargains at the back turned to him, to return to how they were before, and that all would be forgotten. (Whoa! You cruelly deprive a man of an essential part of his personhood and you bargain your kingdom with him! Too late, king! Hong Lim has finally discovered that a person can live outside of your gilded cage.)

21. A Frozen Flower 2008 _self-made rice cakes declare love

She makes him rice cakes according to her home country’s customs. She tells him she loves him.

The queen, in danger to her own safety, sends brothers loyal to Hong Lim to take him away from the palace. The baby, she says, cannot have two fathers. (I guess she has projected how their lives would be in the future when the child grows up and Hong Lim is forced to live in the pain of not even be allowed to have his child call him “father”. The secret of the true fatherhood is bound to eventually leak out. Perhaps she has a good idea that Hong Lim will not be willing to be reconciled to the king anymore. Perhaps she did not anticipate that the king has gone crazy enough to ask Hong Lim for a reconciliation–she did not anticipate the king’s level of obsession with Hong Lim. She miscalculated that the king would put Hong Lim first before self-honor. Ahh, but this is a drama movie–the more angst the better.)

22. Frozen Flower 2008 _she asks if he likes the rice cake

Tearfully she asks how the rice cake tastes to him.

The king guesses right that it was the queen who has sent Hong Lim away. She denies his accusations without turning her head to answer him. When she finally does so she gives him a venomous glare.Her child is threatened yet still she insists on Hong Lim’s safety. Hong Lim, successfully spirited out of the palace, turns back against his brothers wishes in order to get the queen, and his child, out of the king’s clutches. His brothers say he has nothing to give the queen anymore. He rides fast alone. The queen’s song plays. He stops. He is resigned. He goes back to a ransacked temple-hideout, his comrades missing.

23. Frozen Flower 2008 _he admits that the rice cake is exquisite

He solemnly answers her that the taste is exquisite.

But then, how would I say anything about a king who has known the virtue of being in control all his life? Can his acts be justified in view of his insecurity and humiliation at not being capable of producing an heir? That, him being in this state, Hong Lim shouldn’t have spurned him? Did he really love Hong Lim? How many legitimate dimensions of love can one possibly talk about? He has lavished Hong Lim with gifts and attention—is this a proof of love? Whereas, Hong Lim, who has not had the privilege of choices at all, and who has been indoctrinated since childhood that his life belongs to the king, has only his integrity to give to the king—and this he did until the king initiated the triangle. Were the king’s consistent intents at forgiving Hong Lim’s betrayals proofs of love? Crazy.

24. Frozen Flower 2008 _deleted library scene _the queen in servant's dress

A deleted scene, at the library. Hong Lim is wearing the queen’s embroidered head band. She sneaks out to meet him wearing her maid’s clothing. He is worried for her and she tries to comfort him.

Crazy to torture and kill the four brothers that protected Hong Lim, thereby supporting him and the queen in their quest for freedom from the king. Crazy to bait Hong Lim back by putting up the queen’s head along with the brothers’ on stakes at the palace wall. As Hong Lim declares at their swordfight, the king has “cut him to his roots”. The king is a bad loser. It happens to people. From where I am coming I hesitate at blaming the king here. I only know the story based on the characters’ faces and voices and on the dialogues translated into English (hehehe). I can only understand the story based on where I’m “coming from”, which is not of the ancient Goryeo worldview. Besides, the king can sing beautifully, too (it’s the actor’s own singing voice) 🙂 His song is as haunting and poignant as the queen’s.

If Hong Lim’s sword had not become broken at that precise instance then he and the king would have thrust at each other simultaneously. As the king impales Hong Lim he asks if he was, even for one instance in the past, an object of Hong Lim’s “love”. The latter answers “no” and “never”, and drives himself forward through the length of the king’s sword in order to thrust his own halved sword into the demoralized king’s torso. Thus, the king dies open-eyed, gazing at Hong Lim’s back.

The queen did the only way she could to ensure Hong Lim’s protection, and also perhaps avenge the deaths of so many people including her brother and her personal maid (whose head on the stake with the queen’s necklace Hong Lim mistook as hers): instigate the sub-chief at killing the maddened king, to “put him out of his pains” she tells him.

Fortunately for the sub-chief, Hong Lim is already on the process of doing the deed for him. The king is having a late night snack in his bedroom as Hong Lim enters and bows his final respects, which basically is a request for the king to get hold of his sword. (Hong Lim then unsheathes his sword—from some Japanese story I read I learned that this act is an indication of an intent to strike. Swords are valued and are not supposed to be drawn out unless they are intended for use.) He’s on his last mission at freeing himself from the king’s shackles. He’s about to perform the exact opposite of what he was programmed to do all his life: take the king’s life. His anger at the king is magnificent but subtly expressed.

24a. Frozen Flower 2008 _the king says she'll have another man instead of Hong Lim

The queen is horrified at the king’s decision that another partner will be found for her. Rightly so. But by this time the king is now desperate to put a stop at whatever connection Hong Lim and the queen have.

He declares to the arrogant king (who shouts “castrated fool!” at him) that he has no fears anymore. Still, years of programming emerges as he feels a loss at having finally struck down the king. There is also that element of horror at having struck at a helpless man (this is against a warrior’s honor code), because the king, after hearing from the impaled Hong Lim that he had never been loved for even once by him, seemed to have let go of life itself simultaneous to his slightly slackened hold on the jade sword handle.

The sub-chief, aside from personal grudges, had to kill Hong Lim. His brothers behind him witnessed the treason: a trusted guard wanted for high treason has killed the king.

25. Frozen Flower 2008 _Hong Lim protects her by denying her plea

This, then, is the queen’s solution: that she and Hong Lim simply run away.

If during that meeting with the bodyguards moments ago the chief was not yet a “traitor” to them, now he clearly is. Moreover, they are not willing to put their lives in “unjustified” danger, though their faces looked unanimously aghast at the summary execution of Hong Lim by the sub-chief. (In fairness to them, the ones outside the building urged Hong Lim to leave the palace before anyone sees him. That is, they were still protecting him in his state of being wanted for high treason.) Would Hong Lim have lived even without that torso thrust?

26. Frozen Flower 2008 _Hong Lim is now the queen's all

Hong Lim, unlike the queen, knows that the king is capable of tracking them down. Moreover, something holds Hong Lim back from totally breaking out. Guilt, maybe, or the sense of honor, or responsibility. He is the trusted chief guard, after all, the most trusted by the person who is considered as equivalent to the kingdom, to the people. Many things hang on his neck and so he chooses to forsake his personal happiness.

The king had slashed at him several times before that final strike to the left breast, impaling him. That final hit was intended by the king to be a death blow, after all. Would his brothers have put aside the law and embraced him nevertheless at that hour of crisis? As Hong Lim staggered towards them his eyes seemed to say that he wanted to explain to them his side of the story, the reason why he did all this. It seemed he was asking the sub-chief to listen to him. When he was finally hit and was already falling his eyes seemed to say that he forgives the sub-chief, that he understands him and is without grudges against him, and that he accepts his fate.

The queen barges into the death tableau. She spots the king first and calls out “chonha”, perhaps not realizing yet that he’s already dead. Hong Lim’s resigned eyes light up at the sound of her voice. Her gaze shifts to him, already lying on his stomach and shaking in his last breaths.

27. Frozen Flower 2008 _that thunderstorm night

This is the result of desperation. She nearly died. They were saying goodbye. The thunderstorm begins to rage. His feelings for her are too strong for him.

She screams his name repeatedly and struggles to go to him against the guards who are restraining her. As she is being forced away Hong Lim looks at her direction, silently saying that he would have very much liked to spring up and rush to her. The sub-chief commands that she be ushered out. Her voice fades as she disappears from Hong Lim’s view. His eyes briefly show elements of regret that, perhaps, they will be parted permanently now, and that, perhaps, a sadness that he cannot stay with her and their child anymore. Perhaps also an apology that he was not able to protect her, and won’t have the chance to do so anymore. When her screams are not heard anymore Hong Lim forcibly turns his head to the direction of the king, whose eyes already had that same dead look even before he died.

28. Frozen Flower 2008 _the crucial library scene, thunderstorm raging

When reality catches up there are only two things possible, either to run away from it or to face it. They, each, decide to face it.

Did that turning of the head say that he loved the king after all? I don’t think so. He was already prepared to die before he discovered that the queen is still alive. He was already on the act of dying with his face turned towards the brothers that he grew up with, his family. When he sees that the queen is alive, what could have gone through his mind? Ultimate relief perhaps, for a treasure thought lost but is found again, and not only for this beloved woman but also for their child she carries.

But what about the last scenes of him and the king in the bliss of the olden days? As youngsters they had virtually pledged to each other that they would be together all through their lives. Ahh, but young children are highly impressionable and may be bound to change their preferences as they grow up. What about that dream of the king’s where Hong Lim as well was getting ready to shoot with the bow, in the manner that he requested for the king to re-depict in his painting? Well, the king was shocked when Hong Lim had slashed that painting. Whereas, Hong Lim wasn’t thinking about it at all, him being intent at just their sword fight.

29. Frozen Flower 2008 _the queen & Hong Lim try to save the other

She does her utmost to save him.

The king, in between strikes, demands from him if love was really that important to him. Aha. The king has come to see that there is something that he wanted from Hong Lim but was not given to him.

30. Frozen Flower 2008 _Hong Lim declares it clearly

He does his utmost to save her.

Hong Lim heatedly replies that he is thankful enough for the king in leading him to feel that same love. (Okay, so, in this context as he speaks, would this love have been for the king or for the queen? I was confused about the whole issue of who loved whom and so I tried to understand the story again. Based on this dialogue it’s clear that both meant that love which Hong Lim declared for the queen—this is based on his confession in the library, the one that made the king snap. Hong Lim had slightly straightened from his kneeling position and had fiercely reiterated, explicitly into the king’s eyes, that he loves the queen.)

31. Frozen Flower 2008 _the king's madness starts

The king felt he was dying, and he chose survival. He embraces rage.

Hong Lim experiences something worse than death (he was shouting that he’d rather be killed). Though castrated and betrayed by the one he devoted his life to, Hong Lim was freed in his sexuality and in his personhood, even in just a short period of time for him to enjoy it all. Thus it is not only the king that controls a bow, as what the king at first depicted in the painting. He, too, has now a chance to shoot with his own bow, a freedom of choice and of decision making all by himself.

32. Frozen Flower 2008 _Hong Lim begs for death instead

Not even once does Hong Lim beg for his life.

Indeed, that happy scene with the king will forever remain as a dream because in reality the king will never consent to him a freedom of equal level. The king kept on trying to keep Hong Lim by his side until right before the time he impales him.

33. Frozen Flower 2008 _the queen begs to punish her instead

The queen shares Hong Lim’s agony and is about to lose consciousness.

Hong Lim in his death is at peace with the thought that he will soon have a child who will carry life on for him. I think his last glance and tears for the king was a goodbye as well as an expression of gratitude for all that the king has given him–for the care, friendship, attention, generosity–, for having led him to find a kind self-affirming love with the queen and hence a sort of freedom, and most of all for not killing her and his child. It might also have been an apology for a misplaced rage that is supposedly the last straw for his decision at revenge, and a sadness at killing a person that he had for so long looked up to.

A deleted scene. Hong Lim forges a sword for his encounter with the king.

Perhaps there is also sadness at the pain that came to the three of them and at the senseless waste of many lives, of his brothers and the servants privy to the secret. It also seemed to say, “Ah, you’re also just a man, a powerless one, and what a pity that it all ends like this… I did wish you happiness but not the one that you kept forcing me into… at least now I’m free…”–I thought on this after noticing that his eyes had vitality until the queen was dragged away but after he turns to the right his eyes had dullness, peace, and resignation. I think he had started to cry as the sub-chief hit him. He would have died in his fallen position and not turned to the right had the queen not appeared. It seems like this last tableau brought harmony to the three of them for the last time.

As passionate their love for each other was so deadly their final clash was also.

Alas, the queen sees her beloved dying, and thankfully he sees her, only by forcing herself against the controlling power at that final moment: that event was only within the bond between the king and his 36 bodyguards. That’s why the sub-chief had to wrap up everything fast with everyone: it must be told that it was an assassin, and that they have eliminated him. The queen is not included in this bond. However, she is smart and is aware of all palace machinations. As an untouchable princess of Yuan and the queen of Goryeo, all alone now with her maid-companion also gone, she has at least the joy of having her own child. This child was born of a love that freed her and Hong Lim from fear. The king who had threatened the child’s well-being is now gone. Among her memories she will be recalling that time, on their last meeting, when Hong Lim told her to stay strong and take care of herself.

36. Frozen Flower 2008 _freedom at a high price

This didn’t even happen in the king’s dream. Hong Lim was not aiming with an arrow then.

Ahhh… the king was really convincingly frightening here… He projects an aura of velvet-covered strength… I wouldn’t have wished him to be a real person… 🙂 This movie is not for the faint of heart with regards to issues of sexuality and the tragic consequences of controlling and uncontrolled “love“. The costumes, setting, and music are of top quality—i.e., a treat for the senses and are unforgettable for those who are not familiar with lavish settings of east Asia. I will certainly watch this movie again. I am drawn to the eyes of the three main characters. The king’s make me want to go for cover. The queen’s make me want to empathize with her in the depths of her introspection. Hong Lim’s make me want to first reach out and hug him and then go out free myself and live out life. Kaja! ~~(still hoping to post some illustrations here…)~~

♥