That was how I felt when I had to stay in Brest for another day.
The initial plan was simple. After writing my last post, I was supposed to go to the Brest station, catch a train to Paris, enjoy the beautiful countryside scenery during the 4-hour train ride, and then after reaching the Charles De Gaulle, sleep at the airport, and take the plane back to Tokyo.
Alas, things didn't work out, I was shell-shocked when there wasn't a train to be caught, and ended up being forced to reschedule my flight. Thus I ended up in Brest for an extra day. It's a frustrating feeling, when all your mind is prepared to go home, and BOOM! Some unforeseeable crap happened, and I ended up being stuck.
At least I managed to finish Haruki Murakami's HARD-BOILED WONDERLAND AND THE END OF THE WORLD. It was a decent novel. Not mind-blowingly life-altering, but did its job just fine for a lonely night read.
The extra day in Brest allowed me to know people of the Brest Airport people, the pretty girl at the info counter had been particularly helpful and nice, so were the staffers of Air France who were suddenly confronted by the sight of a desperately exasperated crazy Asian dude blabbering about flight changes, whining about exploitative taxi drivers and their ungodly fares, complaining about the erratic airport shuttles etc. (I was very frustrated)
And I got to watch the ENGLAND - GERMANY match at the bar in the airport, and later, in my hotel, the ARGENTINA - MEXICO match. I usually don't care much about football (I'm a lifelong NBA fan), but during World Cup, I pretend to care, happens once every four years anyway.
Anyway, the one day in limbo went by, and I finally took to the skies a few hours ago, flying from Brest to Paris, and now, at the Charles De Gaulle airport, I wait for my transit. There gores my initial plans of sticking my head out of the windows of a train as it passes through the scenic countryside, and feeling the caresses of the wind. Of course, for all I know, I probably cannot really stick my head out of the windows. I will probably never find out.
Sometimes when I'm alone in situations like this, I enjoy the adventure I'm facing, but nonetheless I would also feel a little melancholic, a little introspective, for reasons I can never understand. It's been 3 months since I went through my last film shoot (for the short film INHALATION), quite a long break for me, I just feel eager to create something new.
After the workshop I went through in Brignogan, I know I have a story to develop into my debut feature film, and I feel pretty good about it. The rest of my year will probably be devoted to its development. But I still want to do something else as well, another short? I still have four unpremiered short films. Write a novella? I actually have two unpublished novellas (or novelettes) too. It's another one of those moments when I don't really have a particular idea, just that I'm itching for the creative process.
Of course, it's also the selfish side of me speaking. In the past few months, aside from being busy with the Cannes stuff, a coursemate of mine was also working on a short film of hers for her thesis. She had (almost) zero experience in filmmaking, and not exactly passionate in films, but she wanted to make a film, and she constantly approached me for advice, so I gave her. I'm not the most patient of teachers, and many times I ended up losing my patience, snapping, snarling, cursing. Many times I just don't understand why my own working process just didn't seem to work with others. (the constant question is along the lines of "why can't she do what I was doing? Why can't she approach things the way I did?") Quite frustrating, but I always believe that helping others with their (supposed) creative endeavours is a way to prevent myself from being rusty.
When I dedicated so many days and hours on throwing ideas at her, teaching her etc. (... I think I was anyway, although it's most probably not the case) I started yearning for some time to do my own projects, start a new one etc.
So the 'limbo' I mention in this blog post is not really just about my situation of being stuck in Brest, which is a really peaceful and nice little town (or is it a city? not sure), despite the murderous frustration I felt about, well, being stuck there. It's also about my own life (graduating from my Masters soon, supposedly continuing with PHD), my own creativity, and probably my emotions too.
The initial plan was simple. After writing my last post, I was supposed to go to the Brest station, catch a train to Paris, enjoy the beautiful countryside scenery during the 4-hour train ride, and then after reaching the Charles De Gaulle, sleep at the airport, and take the plane back to Tokyo.
Alas, things didn't work out, I was shell-shocked when there wasn't a train to be caught, and ended up being forced to reschedule my flight. Thus I ended up in Brest for an extra day. It's a frustrating feeling, when all your mind is prepared to go home, and BOOM! Some unforeseeable crap happened, and I ended up being stuck.
At least I managed to finish Haruki Murakami's HARD-BOILED WONDERLAND AND THE END OF THE WORLD. It was a decent novel. Not mind-blowingly life-altering, but did its job just fine for a lonely night read.
The extra day in Brest allowed me to know people of the Brest Airport people, the pretty girl at the info counter had been particularly helpful and nice, so were the staffers of Air France who were suddenly confronted by the sight of a desperately exasperated crazy Asian dude blabbering about flight changes, whining about exploitative taxi drivers and their ungodly fares, complaining about the erratic airport shuttles etc. (I was very frustrated)
And I got to watch the ENGLAND - GERMANY match at the bar in the airport, and later, in my hotel, the ARGENTINA - MEXICO match. I usually don't care much about football (I'm a lifelong NBA fan), but during World Cup, I pretend to care, happens once every four years anyway.
Anyway, the one day in limbo went by, and I finally took to the skies a few hours ago, flying from Brest to Paris, and now, at the Charles De Gaulle airport, I wait for my transit. There gores my initial plans of sticking my head out of the windows of a train as it passes through the scenic countryside, and feeling the caresses of the wind. Of course, for all I know, I probably cannot really stick my head out of the windows. I will probably never find out.
Sometimes when I'm alone in situations like this, I enjoy the adventure I'm facing, but nonetheless I would also feel a little melancholic, a little introspective, for reasons I can never understand. It's been 3 months since I went through my last film shoot (for the short film INHALATION), quite a long break for me, I just feel eager to create something new.
After the workshop I went through in Brignogan, I know I have a story to develop into my debut feature film, and I feel pretty good about it. The rest of my year will probably be devoted to its development. But I still want to do something else as well, another short? I still have four unpremiered short films. Write a novella? I actually have two unpublished novellas (or novelettes) too. It's another one of those moments when I don't really have a particular idea, just that I'm itching for the creative process.
Of course, it's also the selfish side of me speaking. In the past few months, aside from being busy with the Cannes stuff, a coursemate of mine was also working on a short film of hers for her thesis. She had (almost) zero experience in filmmaking, and not exactly passionate in films, but she wanted to make a film, and she constantly approached me for advice, so I gave her. I'm not the most patient of teachers, and many times I ended up losing my patience, snapping, snarling, cursing. Many times I just don't understand why my own working process just didn't seem to work with others. (the constant question is along the lines of "why can't she do what I was doing? Why can't she approach things the way I did?") Quite frustrating, but I always believe that helping others with their (supposed) creative endeavours is a way to prevent myself from being rusty.
When I dedicated so many days and hours on throwing ideas at her, teaching her etc. (... I think I was anyway, although it's most probably not the case) I started yearning for some time to do my own projects, start a new one etc.
So the 'limbo' I mention in this blog post is not really just about my situation of being stuck in Brest, which is a really peaceful and nice little town (or is it a city? not sure), despite the murderous frustration I felt about, well, being stuck there. It's also about my own life (graduating from my Masters soon, supposedly continuing with PHD), my own creativity, and probably my emotions too.
