Saturday, July 21, 2007

BONFIRE TOPICS

Welcome to The Bedouin Lounge

Sifr, the arabic word means zero (English: Cipher). It is nothingness, void, the perfect circle, a cycle of unending. The ancient philosophers would say nothingness is the absence of something and anything. The invisibility.

Here, we dwell on that nothingness. Sit in a circle around an invisible bonfire and construct ourselves from that nothingness that each of us holds within ourselves. Share our experiences and points of view on a multitude of topics discussed by turns.

Every month or so, we'd find ourselves a topic on which each of us could discuss. Share your thoughts through articles and by commenting on other's articles. If you think you've already written something on the current topic in the past, feel free to share it with us. You're free to publish as many articles as you wish pertaining to the topic. For who knows, your article might just change the outlook of a fellow bedouin.

How to Publish:

This is how it works - publish your article in The Bedouins blog. While you're posting just copy-paste this link - Read All Other Articles on This Topic Here at the end of your article (on the post page itself). You must do this so that I can understand that your article is meant for this section. On my part, I'll make sure that your article is featured under SUBMITTED THOUGHTS in this page. All articles on the topics raised would be cataloged properly and archived for easy access in the future for any reader browsing the web. So, don't think of your articles as insignificant. ALL YOUR THOUGHTS COUNT.

Also, make sure that you comment on your neighborhood bedouin's articles giving your genuine thoughts.

Now let's move on to this month's topic -

Topic # 1: CHILDHOOD & PARENTING

"I do not know how it happened myself! From childhood I feared everybody; as I grew up I began to hate everybody, some for their meanness, others--well, I do not know why--just so! And now I see all the people in a different way. I am grieved for them all! I cannot understand it; but my heart turned softer when I recognized that there is truth in men, and that not all are to blame for their foulness and filth."
- Maxim Gorky, Mother

How much of ourselves do we carry from our childhood? Does our childhood ever turn into obscurity with time or does it get itself seated deeper into our sub-consciousness ultimately becoming our personality? Have you ever wondered if you're still a child?

Share with us the thoughts and experiences of your childhood, your days with your parents. Or if you're a parent yourself, your experiences of parenthood - the innocence and the fragility of your child. Tell us about the times in which you grew up (or you find your child growing up now). Enlighten Us!

SUBMITTED THOUGHTS

GET INTRODUCED TO THE BEDOUINS

Welcome to The Bedouin Lounge

Yes, just that. This is where you can get to know thy neighbor. Learn what they say about themselves. Say Hi! to them on their introductory posts or visit their personal sites to chill out. Just to mention, all of us have a refrigerator in our tents with ice over-frozen on our shelves. So, whether you're thirsty or have bruised yourself, just crash in!

D4doppleganger
Introductory Post
HIS BLOG: Who Am I? I Am ...
A Peek Inside his Tent: A doppelgänger (as in German) or fetch is the ghostly double of a living person, a sinister form of bilocation. In the vernacular, it has come to refer to any double or look-alike of a person—most commonly an "evil twin". The word is also used to describe the sensation of having glimpsed oneself in peripheral vision, in a position where there is no chance that it could have been a reflection.

Wandelaar125
Introductory Post

Mothersky
HIS SITE: Mothersky on DeviantArt
A Peek Inside his Tent: You can come here and learn more about me than almost anywhere else. I post my thoughts, my creations, and my emotions here. If you want to know how I tinker, then this is the place to do it. Enjoy =)


OKAY. YOUR TURN!

Friday, July 20, 2007

My thoughts on Childhood.

Welcome to The Bedouin Lounge

Childhood. What a beautiful, beautiful thing. The wish that one could pertain their childhood seems to be an omnipresent one; a wish that contains all the endless hopes and dreams of a race that has lost it's way through time and space.

Whether this be an argument of nature vs nurture, or something far more spiritual than that, I will hope to delve into it.

There is something about innocence that appeals to every human being. Purity of the mind, a will to accept all people as they are; these are the things that flee from us as we grow older and become acustomed to the wills of the world around us. As children, all we could think of was getting older and doing cooler things (and, of course, these thoughts only permeated our mind after we had watched such horrid things as T.V. and movies, or experienced a day with a high schooler or lifetime idol), and now, as adults or adolescents, all we want is to go back to simpler times.

Childhood is a simple thing. There is not anything more simple. I follow the motto that "Life is to complex, and this is something that needs to be seen to." Simply put, life is too complex. Why should we have to care about the latest fashions? Should what an actor has done to themselves really matter to me? (or anyone, for that matter?) Why do I have to fight so hard to give up values I hold so dear in order to become something that I don't want to be? Do I really have to work all my life in order to be happy?

The world is big to a child. As the child grows, the world around it does something strange; the world tells the child that it is actually smaller than it is. That it is A-OK to find a niche in society and sit there. There is a term for water when it sits. Stagnant, I believe. I think that we're meant to be like water--flowing--not stagnant. If one could only open there eyes and see that, as we grow, the world does not become smaller! It becomes bigger, oh so bigger, with so many things to see and do. . .so many people to talk to!

What we're doing to our children wrong. I've seen children wondering around with cellphones (and the attitudes that accompany them) and saying things I didn't say till my Sophmore year in high school! Parenting is a part of this.

Parents are becoming ever more lazy in their job. This is something we all have to live with, and always have had to live with. Now, more so in such startling numbers.

I can go on forever about what I don't like about parenting or how children are being raised; I can go on forever about how the world needs to be fixed and how things are wrong. . .but why? Why be such a pessimist? The show must go on. . ..

Childhood is something we should carry with us our whole lives. It would be wrong not to. With childhood and good parenting comes warm memories of the seasons--of smells and tastes--and of fun had at places like lakes or plains. Our childhood is what we are, and we should not forget that. Without it, we are incomplete beings (only drones among the endless waves of work). Childhood is truly, I think, what spawns a soul--what gives us the ability to smile and love--and what gives us our values and beliefs.

Those of us who can remain children even in a life that is too complex for us, too large for us, and most definitely too fast for us, can find some sort of solace or peace among this fact. If we can be children while we are adults, then we have found a sort of happiness and tool that reaches far beyond the constraints of the real world.

So! I think we should all retain our childhood--that we should be happy, fun, and innocent among other people; that we should show them what it is like to not care.

Salaam~

Read All Other Articles on This Topic Here

Sunday, July 15, 2007

PSEUDO-PHILOSOPHICAL SOUP: July

Welcome to The Bedouin Lounge

Our first topic for this month is The Meaning of "Meaning".

So, put your heads together or bang them. And let your pseudo-philosophical ideologies out of that head.

Choose a character for yourself and let me know what it in your very first comment and your name would be added under characters. This being the first time I'll take the lead -

Characters

1. The Clown as himself
2. Ela as Native Red Ant
3. [this could be you]

Wednesday, July 11, 2007

Who am I?

Welcome to The Bedouin Lounge

I am wandelaar. This is a nederlands word meaning "wanderer". I chose this name because I have been walking around my whole life long, figuratively and literally. Lately however I seem to be settling a bit so who knows!
I think that this group will suit me because in my mind I see the Bedouin as the ultimate wanderer.
I have been writing on and off all my life. I hope someday to finally publish something really worth reading but 'til then I will keep on trying.
The computer is, in spite of all my endeavours still a bit of a mystery to me so I am sure to make a lot of mistakes with posting and such. Do have patience with my fumblings.
Pleased to make your aquaintance fellow bedouins,
greetings