Departing the Dam, Dante-style

Dante tells us that at the centre of the Inferno, Satan lies bound to his waist in ice, endlessly devouring Cassius, Brutus, and Judas Iscariot while waiting to be freed from his prison, and to rise once more upon the land of the living.

That may well have been true once, but Mr. Aligheri has been dead for some time, and the temperature continues to rise around the globe, and the ice dwindles with each day.

There are many more deserving souls than the assassins of Caesar that deserve to be the primal focus of Lucifer's ministrations. Judas carried out his orders, fulfilled his destiny, praised God.

La Divina Comedia can be read on three levels: The literal, where Dante stumbles upon a gate to Hell and goes on to be guided through the three Catholic afterlives; The political, where Dante puts those he disagrees with through eternal torment, while heaping God's favour on those he deems likeminded; and most importantly, the allegorical - where Dante's journey represents the one we all make - through each Canto, moving from Inferno, to Purgatorio, Paradiso, and finally our self/soul/will joins God and becomes the All.
The eternal fallacy that this is a just world we live in continues to plague the downtrodden, the despised. I'm getting ahead of myself.

Dante gripped me immediately.

I too felt midway through my life, confused, or lost in a dark wood. I felt plagued by more than three symbolic beasts. I needed to walk outside of the city, to escape the corruption and malice temporarily.

We both met messengers claiming to be from God, asking to guide us back home. However this is where my path and Dante's differed. While he accepted Virgi's offer, I asked him for directions and walked on by myself.

Where am I going with this? I am sat in my new apartment in Amsterdam, and couldn't face a day in the office. I have been lured away from my chosen path with false desires. Negative influences pervade me, flowing through me as I walk through the city, and as they do they stain - dying my lighter hues a murky black.

My body follows my infected mind, and screams at me for release.

I shouldn't have settled here. The ultimate trap of the open prison, the one I fell into, is to give the prisoners exactly what they want, provided they are good prisoners.

In Purgatory any type of vice is available, and yet it seems each person here has lost their tastes for most vices, following a hazy script, carrying out sin by mechanical action rather than deliberate thought. Following the wrong orders.

Purgatory is a different system to Hell, with different goals. Here, suffering is the knowledge that we have left behind Hell, but we are not yet fully awakened in God's Presence. Everything is taken for granted. I need a walk.

The weather outside is almost trademark Dutch: 19 degrees celsius, dry, huge black thunder clouds above. Since starting my new job here in Amsterdam I noticed very quickly how obsessed with the weather people are. Checking the forecast before making any decisions, complaining that the weather doesn't fit their schedules. Perhaps this ill will shapes the climate? Once again I'm running off on a tangent.

I have arrived at the conclusion that Amsterdam has lost it's sparkle for me - I lose sight of it's beauty when I don the blinkers of the mind, and stare at the cobbled stones, the bikepaths...the floor. Some part of me misses the Inferno of my life. With almost characteristic haste, I have decided to quit my job, move out of my apartment, and with a month's salary head to Morocco, then through Tunisia to Libya, and finally, the spiritual destination of my pilgrimage, Egypt.

I have spent so long bitching and moaning about the world's media, I have decided it's time I create some of my own. So, I plan on getting a cheap camera, packing a sleeping bag, and after a weekend in England having a last catch up with friends for a time, I will travel by bus to Barcelona, and then hitch-hike to the very south of Spain, and catch the ferry to Morocco.

While there I can acclimatise to Africa, adjust to the almost assault on my senses. Already I can feel the dream thread tugging, telling me to hurry, to move. But I can wait slightly. Once a decision has been made, a certain freedom is revealed and a burden is lifted.

Amsterdam is still unique, and it holds a special place in my heart. It has it's own energies, both light and dark, that flow into you, pick you up, spin your mind around, and place it back down behind you. Yeah.

No matter how saintly or sinful you are, this city leaves it's stains on the psyche, in a way that is both cleansing and cursing.

My point is that this city is multi-faceted, and each of it's reflections dazzle - for a time. It is a vicious city - it swallows you - irregardless of colour, creed, or religion, but the process of digestion is not pleasant.

Desperately trying to blend in with Dutch culture, I started to notice my attitude to possessions and money began to change - when you "Go Dutch" you don't just split the bill evenly - everything is worked out meticulously to make sure "what's mine is mine and what's yours is yours".

Which, for the most part, is fine. Good, even. But this is not true sharing. True sharing isn't charity, but a way to mutually benefit. Whether this benefit is physical, financial or spiritual, the act of giving helps the giver more than the recipient. So when you remove this aspect from the equation - when everyone gives only exactly their share, the soul is never fufilled. Each major religion holds to this tenet - that to give brings one closer to God - whatever description of God you use.

Maybe that's one reason the depression rate for the Netherlands is fourth in the world (according to Forbes), falling behind the US, Ukraine, and France.

The golden rule of "When in Rome, do as the Romans do" can cause suffering. We have all heard the comparison that when you go to someone else's house you play by their rules. Visiting someone's home is a lot different to living in it. I found my typically English politeness and deference to be treated by scorn, or as a sign of weakness by certain inhabitants. I found I had to identify each person I met, assess their want with me, and then nine times out of ten politely refuse whatever they were offering me.

Suddenly I was in a city thronged with people, talking to everyone, and completely alone. At least Amsterdam taught me that - how to react to such a wide range of situations, in a completely new style. But when you gaze into the abyss, it also gazes into you - what I saw in others, they saw in me. Mutual hatred? At times. Isolation can breed despair, and fear. That fear becomes magnified onto others - and when we cause other people to be afraid, they either fight or flee. Neither is good for a healthy relationship. Purging myself of this initial distrust to the world remains difficult, but a worthwhile struggle.

Perhaps Saint Ambrose should have spent more time in Rome and glanced at some of the cucifixions there before making twee remarks.

My thoughts are full of the bad times here, and I feel I'm being overly critical. The city life is getting to me. I find it hard to breathe sometimes (nothing to do with my smoking habit thank you so very much for asking), feeling the vibrations of the city pulse in my head. A constant chatter of information that I can't drown out.

I need to escape - not from Amsterdam per se, but The West. Morocco represents the cheapest and easiest way out of the continent. From there I can start to truly learn, and wander, to The East.

Gormless Gibberish

Felt the need to put pen to paper (literally) again. Sat outside in the Sun, writing whatever forces it's way into my brain...


_________________________________________


Hope springs eternal
Springs dry up in time
Move time to the side
See the glass lightly

Third eye, going blind
Libations with Amrita
Delve inside their minds

Destitue through fury
Paralysed with fear
Warm them; Enduring
Keep them ever near

__________________________________________

In battle-frayed cloth
We await the sign to
Anoint ourselves and walk on
to a fabled arena

No blood stains this barren Golgotha
Air dancing, crackling with menace

Gaze, unblinking at the enemy,
The whooping taunts of the beserk

Blood

Lust

___________________________________


Sun beads slide down the temple
The faithful assemble

Seated before majesty,
Yet the seasons slip

Confusion reigns, king for a day
The fools speaks, and
is dismissed

God answers misspoken desire,
Beggars ride, once more
they lead the charge into the tide

Where drowning laughter infects, destroys
The spiral narrows, sucking hope and
Mounted lost fire, flares.

A beam pierces the cloud,
The flock gathers, then spreads,

A new message is transmitted

God leaves us then- another stands in his stead
Judgment day is this then
The rise of the living dead

______________________________________

If there was one target, one aim,
Should it be taken no matter the cost?
Battle lines blur
"No plan survives first contact"
"All agents defect and all resisters sell out"

Whichever victor emerges must resist the temptation
For glory
Sacrificing the many
For privilege.

Privilege be damned.

Line us up in rows
Start the Thanatos machine
Those whose voice is driven by fear
Wolves lie in wait

"Fear is the mind killer" the
killer
is focused into anger
futility

We fight amongst ourselves, while
others sit back, pick up the pieces

We must unite at last against the common enemy
My friend
Else free thought will be cast down forever

_______________________________

Terror, terror, in the heather
Run away! Now or never
I'd rather bite the fucking leather

________________________________

The Shaman's Secret II: Hopped up in Holland

Since my last post about Salvia, I have had the opportunity/necessity to take it again twice more.

I had decided to buy the 25x again, not that I wasn't keen to try visiting the 'other place' for a longer, and more immersive time, but I somehow knew that I would be sharing at least one trip with someone else.

Rumour and misinformation continues to be spread about this plant extract, and therefore people are experimenting in a potentially hazardous way. I was talking to a group of Greek tourists the other day, and they wanted a party drug, similar to MDMA and were considering Salvia as it was legal and affordable.

I told them how Salvia is a completely unique drug. No other psychedelic works in the same way. It works as a dissociative, which by itself is relatively common-place, but combined with the plant's other properties, allows for a existential journey. They decided to try some nitrous with their weed instead, which was much more fun all round.

The first of my salvia trips this year was in Rotterdam. I was working in the worst office imaginable – a call centre that specialised in surveys. The horror, the horror. I had been feeling increasingly depressed, putting effort into giving large corporations personal data instead of doing something worthwhile with my life.

Paid by the second, with very little money, I decided with customary abandon to fuck it all, and spend most of the little money I had on drugs and poker. The rest I wasted on food. I mention this to demonstrate what I mean by the “necessity” to take Salvia – I needed guidance. I felt lost.

While at my local coffee shop, Bamboo, I began talking to a Colombian gentleman who had also emigrated. As he may not be comfortable with having his story told publicly, I'll call him Manuel. He told me over a couple of chess games how he was making good money now, in a job he liked, and had no desire to return to his homeland. We swapped stories about travel and women, and as the roaches piled in the ashtray, we began to talk of deeper things.

Nothing particularly out of the ordinary, at least for people who spend any amount of time within a recreational drug community, but eventually the topic of conversation moved from terrestrial journeys to psychonautical ones.

We had both taken mushrooms and discussed the fractals we saw, the perspectives we gained. He had also taken Salvia, but with little success. I told him I had some that I had been wanting to take, and he was welcome to join me. He agreed to meet me at the cafe the same time tomorrow.

True to his word, we met again, smoked some more to prepare, then walked to his house nearby.

He put on some ambient background music, we arranged the furniture, then he prepared the pipe. In my opinion he put a little too much in – I usually use a fairly decent pinch but he filled the bowl, and I told him we can both trip on this amount. He was skeptical, having tried before, but I reassured him, telling him to hold the smoke in for a lot longer this time.

He nodded, and lit the extract with a BIC lighter (zippo's aren't too good), inhaled, and holding his breath passed the pipe to me. I copied him, and slumped back on the pillows. I started to count the seconds in my head. We stared into each other's eyes, unblinking – each feeling the strain of the hot smoke in our mouths, throats, and lungs – willing each other to hold for longer.

My eyes began to well with tears as my mental timing passed the 30 mark, whereas he still looked non-plussed. I felt a cough begin, and tried to hold it back, but in the same way you can't completely hold back a sneeze, I coughed a little with my mouth closed, making a sort of rasping noise, and I felt the need to laugh maniacally at the absurdity of the situation.

My lungs bursting, I let the smoke out, before immediately taking a few more breaths. Smiling, Manuel watched me then calmly blew out the smoke. Git.

Immediately, the world around me began to change. It's a very hard process to describe, especially without using jargon. Phrases like “breaking on through” and “tripping out” conjure images not nearly adequate enough.

The wall in front of me was plain white, and in my peripheral vision was the computer screen and an empty chair. When I exhaled, it was like someone had dropped an invisible pebble in the centre of my vision, and like water, transparent ripples began to spread across my eyes. The ripples resonated slowly, similar to a stop-motion film, in time to the music, although the music had changed. Not in the same way it changes on cannabis – where you can appreciate extra subtleties of the music, here a purely instrumental piece had changed: All I could hear was a few bars of a artificial voice saying the same nonsense syllables looping again and again, I smiled in recollection and closed my eyes – to a vision of what seemed outer space – shooting stars whirled across me momentarily, suns dazzled me. Keeping my eyes closed, I moved, not physically, but with will. I glided around this bright, throbbing light, the same nonsense verse repeating in my head, and felt the presence of Manuel briefly. I opened my eyes, and the room was normal again, although the music had completely gone. It occurred to me that the music shouldn't have stopped, and I felt disappointment that the artificial voice had left.

Reality had returned all too soon. I looked at Manuel.

“Where is this. I don't like it.” he said, saucer-eyed. He had moved his legs protectively to his chest, and was fixated on the corner of the desk.

“Relax, man. It's ok. You're fine.”

“No, no. I don't like it here.”

“Stay calm.”

He turned and looked into my eyes once more. This time, when he looked at me, there was no challenge, no bravado there – only the fear of a man who has been confronted with proof of his God.

He said something in Dutch, and I told him I didn't understand. He ignored me and said something else. I repeated myself, and he ignored me again. I patiently listened to him have a conversation I understood none of, waiting for the feeling to return to my legs.

I tried a different approach, and waved at him. He blinked rapidly, then sat back with his feet on the floor again.

“Whoa.” he said, superfluously.

“Yeah. How are you?”

“I didn't like it. I saw a lot of things. You were an old man with a grey beard, and you were talking to me in Dutch, telling me things I needed to hear.”

“Uh....huh. I heard you speaking in Dutch, but I just told you I didn't understand.”

“No man. You understood. I don't want to do it ever again, but I feel like I know what I have to do now.”

We smoked a couple more joints, and feeling a little jealous I received no revelation of my own, I walked back to my flat, much of what I had seen and heard already slipping from my mind.

The next day I decided I had to get out of the call centre. I started applying for jobs all over Holland, and my attitude at the call centre grew to confrontational levels. Previously only sneaking out for a cigarette, I was now calmly walking outside and having a joint. Yet I remained employed. At GDCC, an “agent” (employee/drone) is measured by the number of “interviews” (surveys) he completes with a respondent. Respondents were only people who met certain criteria, which varied project to project. These projects were all for large corporations – American pharmaceuticals, nternational well-known software companies, and others. For example, on the first project we were told to say we were calling from a company that is doing research for the NHS, and if there is anyone in the household who is 18 or over and suffers from atrial fibrillation or heart arrhythmia.

As we were calling randomly generated numbers in the UK, the “incidence rate” (number of people who fit in the survey's criteria) was about 1%. We were set a target of one completed survey per four hour shift.

Between 8am and 8pm we wasted the time of every type of person imaginable back home – old people's homes, hospitals, everyone. I felt the hatred of every poor person who was awakened on Saturday morning by my request to discuss heart disease with them.

When someone was lucky enough to speak to someone with the condition, they tended to want to talk – they were usually people in their 60's or older, who liked having someone to talk to.

After completing my first survey (I wasted an hour of a 84 year old woman's time who struggled to reach the phone), it became apparent that the company who had paid for GDCC to carry out the survey had nothing to do with the NHS. Questions like “Have you ever been unable to receive a test due to medical bills?” or “How many times did you change your insurance provider in the last 12 months?” made it fairly clear they were a US company, and “Would you rather take your medication once daily or twice daily?” shows they were concerned about redeveloping their brand rather than saving lives.

I decided to start encouraging people to talk to me, even if they didn't qualify for our surveys, and my success rate was the highest in the team. As you can imagine, the staff turnover at GDCC was unbelievably big, and as the only way to distinguish yourself was through survey success, I was worth more to them than they were to me. They turned a blind eye to my constant late arrivals, smoking in undesignated areas at undesignated times.

I felt invulnerable, but still trapped in the prison of a call centre.

I wrote how I saw society as a prison ( http://duskmoor.blogspot.com/2011/05/pyrrhic-plutocracy-by-martin-peel-on.html – Pyrrhic Plutocracy ), infuriated by the constant hidden barriers around us.

On my lunch break a couple of days later, I was rolling my customary after-lunch joint next to Central Station when a police man and woman approached me.

“It is illegal to smoke here.” the man said.

“I'm not smoking, I'm rolling.” I replied, standing up.

“What are you rolling?”

“Weed. “

“How much do you have?”

“I don't know, about 2 grams.”

“It is illegal to smoke here, only in coffee shop or your house.”

“I know. I wasn't smoking, I was rolling.”

“Show me your identification.”

I sighed, all I wanted was a quiet joint before returning to the hell of the call centre. I handed over my passport, and the man walked away slightly and checked my details with the station. He walked back to me, but didn't hand back the passport.

“You were in Amsterdam in 2009?”

“Yes...”

“You were given a fine for 110 euros that you did not pay?”

“I don't think so...for what?”

“You were sleeping in the streets.”

It came back to me then. It was raining, and I had no money. I was in my sleeping bag, shivering, only partly sheltered by an slightly enclosed alleyway. I saw a police car pull up, and a uniformed man walk towards me. Thank God, I thought naively. He'll take me to a shelter, or at least let me stay in a cell for a night.

He stops in front of me, and hands me a yellow piece of paper. I look at it, uncomprehending.

“It is illegal to sleep here. You must pay 110 euros.”

The anger I felt was immense. I couldn't believe that Holland, so proud of it's liberal “don't fuck with me I don't fuck with you” attitude had laws like this. I tried to explain to him that if I had 110 euros I wouldn't be sat on the street in the rain, but he told me to tell it to the people in the station, and that if I didn't pay it within 14 days the fine would increase.

Furious, I packed my soaked sleeping bag and walked to the station. I was told there was nothing on the system, and I had no fine to pay. Assuming this was the cop's way of making me move from where I was, I shrugged and slept in an alley a little further out of the centre.

Back to Rotterdam, and I explained my story to him. He told me that I must either pay the fine now, or because it has not been paid for so long, go to jail for two days. I laughed in disbelief and said I don't have 110 euros until payday. He shrugged and said I must accompany him to the station.

I asked if I could make some phone calls to try and borrow some money. He said it would

take too long, and was unacceptable. I asked if I could tell my boss what was happening – he said I could ring someone as we went to the station. I rang a co-worker and blubbered something about what had happened in 30 seconds before I was told to hang up.

I had no choice but to walk with them. As we walked, the female police officer said “You people are all the same. You don't have money for a house, but you have money for drugs.”

The poisonous bitch. She didn't listen as I practically shouted how just because people can't afford to pay vastly over-infalted house prices doesn't mean they cannot have a few small luxuries. I knew it was useless though. Her blinkered view of the law rendered her incompetent to serve it.

As I was being checked in, two plain clothes detectives came up to the desk next to me, laughing and joking with a man who had been arrested. One of the officers was juggling with a bag of white powder, easily 10g, probably cocaine. I later found out that interestingly it is legal to possess cocaine, and he was given it back when he was released. Not that it held my attention for long, as I was told I was going to be searched.

He walked me into a private room, and told me to take my clothes off. I saw him put on some surgical gloves and cursed. I started to remove my underwear and he told me that was fine. He waved a metal detector over me and then after searching my clothes gave them back to me. However, I couldn't keep my belt, or shoelaces in case I tried to kill myself, and my boots had steel toe-caps so I couldn't have them either. I was given a pair of what looked like reformed carrier bags, and then taken to my new home for the next 48 hours.

I was given a letter ( http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10150344851774050.403677.756839049&type=1#!/photo.php?fbid=10150344852149050&set=a.10150344851774050.403677.756839049&type=1&theater ) explaining, amongst other things, that I would be given two cigarette/exercise breaks of 30 minutes each every day, that the button on the sink dispenses two cups of water every ten minutes, I would be given reading material, that in order to flush the toilet I must use the intercom and ask the guard, and, most importantly, I have a right to a lawyer.

During the next 48 hours I had a lot of time to think, and I couldn't help but take notice of the sequence of events – after feeling the need to remark on society being a prison, society decides to send me to an actual prison.

Having convinced the officers at the station I suffered from bi-polar disorder, I was eventually given medical grade valium to help me sleep through my stay, but the experience has stayed with me.

When I was released I was given back my possessions (including my weed which was a first) and stepped out of the station into perfect sun shine. I walked 100 metres from the station and smoked a joint. It tasted incredible.

That feeling of joy stayed with me for about a week, until the crushing monotony of the call centre raised it's head again. Every second I was there hammered home the fact I was still in prison. Unable to leave the desk without losing pay, I repeated the monotonous script on the computer screen to thousands of people all over the world.

In my spare time, I continued to tell anyone who would listen about how we are controlled by an oppressive media. Murdoch's name was synonymous with every negative aspect of the regime we constantly suffer under.

So the system saw fit to test my character, and I was given a job with Tribune Media Services, an American mega-news corporation. It is now my job to write the descriptions and input schedules for services like TIVO.

Huh, “Gotta Serve Somebody” by Bob Dylan just started playing...interesting. Anyway, I am now working for the enemy for good money, and still feel trapped.

Hence I was feeling lost as before, and felt like a second Salvia trip was in order.

This time I would be on my own, in a more comfortable environment, with no-one else to distract/concern me.

It was about 10:30pm. I was sat at my desk after what felt a long day, the small electric lamp and the glare of the netbook the only lights inside my room. I put enough in to give me three hits if needed. My mp3 collection was playing on random, and with a deep breath I took the first hit. I held my breath for 40 seconds, and calmly exhaled. The music immediately changed to the same voice as before, in the same style, although I THINK different words were being looped in my head. The ripples emanated from the desk lamp this time, and I quickly took another hit. The effects grew stronger, and the ripples became more violent. Nothing was recognisable any more.

I closed my eyes, and the same light show was happening, although the colours were reversed almost. I opened and closed my eyes a few times. No changes. Suddenly I heard my landlord's voice, within my head. I feel panic rise, and resist the urge to stand. Instead I will myself backwards and wheel around. Bobbing gently up and down, close to a brightly pulsing yellow area, is a cartoon old man, drawn in sky blue.

While I am considering this person, my landlord says to me how he was wondering when I would do this, even though I told him I wouldn't do drugs on his property. I think to myself that he knew I was smoking on the balcony, and fuck it it doesn't damage the room. The cartoon grinned at me, and a few seconds later I heard the same voice. “Ja... ok ...”. The cartoon floated away from the yellow area slightly.

“How are you feeliing? Can you move around properly?”

As I tried to move around, I felt a small part of my brain process (I know how this sounds but I can't explain it any other way) show where I thought I was moving and there was a line connecting me to another circle, which I presumed was my body. I willed around, and heard the landlord again.

“Ok, I think you should maybe lie down, huh?”

I turned to where I thought my body was at the desk, and it robotically got up, and got into bed fully clothed. My viewpoint remained the same.

He told me other things, which sadly I can't remember. They were remembered on some level though. I have a vague recollection of talking to other presences and discussing my short term future. We were talking about what I would like to do, but I cant remember what was said.

I woke up the next morning fully clothed. I got up, well rested, jumped in the shower, got dressed, went to work.

I had my 3 week review. I was congratulated for doing a good job. My previous loneliness was quenched when I finally got the chance to go on a proper night out with my co-workers. My longing for a soul mate shrinks when I speak to a woman from Sweden who will come to live with me soon. I am spending my money satisfying my immediate desires, with little regard how I will survive the next weeks. I am finally independent. Everything I have asked for, I have been granted.

So why am I still unhappy?

I feel like I am being bought. Remember in The Matrix when Cypher sells out Zion to the agents just so he can have a nice suit and a rich steak? That's kind of how I feel – Rather than trying to fight against what I know to be wrong, I am lazing back, accepting the blood money, wrapping myself in the dream, rather than waking others up.

As similar minded people have told me, some people aren't ready yet. But while I continue to be aware of the daily illusion, I shall continue to try and find ways to escape this prison. I feel like I have tunneled out and have crawled back to tell my cell-mates, but they are institutionalised. They tell me they can't wake up just yet, they need a bit more money first. I try to point out the lunacy, and end up a lunatic myself.

It's sometimes difficult to talk in dreams. But some forms of communication go beyond our five senses, and I honestly believe that simply thinking the right thoughts can influence more people than solitary action.

I only intended to write a few paragraphs as a trip report, and as usual all this comes spilling out of me. I know I need to work, to write, but I start so many things, have so many ideas, I finish nothing. A problem I have faced my whole life. Someone who has everything isn't that different to someone with nothing.