Burning pages

I went to a wedding reception last week. Someone who I've known for 13 years. She of course looked beautiful  in her wedding dress, but as happy as I was for her, it was probably one of the most surreal times of my life.

It only seemed like yesterday when we were going in seedy rock clubs and trying to dance to songs that we thought made us look cool. I recognised a good few people at the reception. All with kids, married, overweight etc.

I spoke to the bride-no longer than 2 minutes. It seemed like after 13 years of knowing her, in those 2 minutes I had absolutely no idea who she even was. Will I ever get to know her again?? What happened to all the talks that we had?? All the times we went out?? All the memories?? Where did they even go??

It felt like I had been reading a really long amazing book but after every page I read, the page had set on fire and I would never be able to read it again no matter how good it was-until eventually no matter how hard I tried to remember reading this book, to remember the words from this book, I would eventually forget some pages, some chapters. And some things that make me who I am now. I couldn't help but feel a bit lost.

It was only until a few days later after thinking about it a lot that I felt less empty and that the good thing about it all was that I actually realised that I still hopefully have a lot of my own book still to write and that while it still lasts, I and everybody I know can at least enjoy reading it as much as possible-even if a lot of the pages may get forgotten in time.

No samosas in Somalia.

It's really hard to imagine actually starving to death. Everyone, when they are hungry claims "I'm starving." You're really not. Apparently one-third of the population in Somalia are facing starvation. There is no food, no water as there hasn't been any rain for ages and isn't due any until another 4 months!

Some people ask why people in third world countries like Somalia have children. Many reasons. Lack of birth control which I don't think would be used anyway due to stupid religious beliefs. Some hope that when the children are old enough, they may be able to help earn money in the future and I even think that in some cases, they just want a child to make themselves happy. I don't know if I agree with all of this. I understand that it's just human nature to want sex but to have families with about 8 or 9 children being brought up in poverty isn't good. I really can't see a way out of the situation unless EVERYONE in the world helps. Every single working person can afford to donate just a little bit at least. If you want to help, here is one of many links you can donate to:-


http://www.helpsomaliafoundation.org/

Going back to the title, I read one of the craziest things that I have ever read or heard (I'm not counting stuff said from idiots that I've wrote about in this blog) and I'm putting it alongside with the idiots who thought it was going to be the end of the world. But this might even be stupider than that. In Somalia, they have banned samosas. Why?? Because some leaders in Somalia-a strict Muslim country-said that the samosa with it's triangle shape resembles The Holy Trinity and Christianity.

You decide how bizarre that is. Surely then, they will have to ban EVERYTHING triangular?? Dairylea triangles?? Bicycle seats??

Graphic Novels/Comics #2!!!

Strangley, after I wrote my last post on this subject, just a few hours later I read 2 articles in the morning paper. One of them was about the famine in Somalia which was going to be the subject on my next post -I'll get onto that later- and the other one was about comics! Weird.

The article was about how readers are now reading comics less and less. It said in this day and age, people are watching more and more things online through computers, phones and whatever else there is. So, The DC universe are going to start their stories all over again from the beginning. All the characters will still be the same but in the 21st centuary and more up-to-date. This could be a bit worrying. What if Superman has a love affair with that chunk of lard that they call Katy Perry?? What if WonderWoman goes on Big Brother or the X Factor?? What if Batman gets a facebook????

I thought part of the whole reading of Superhero adventures was because of the nostalgia. If people with Superpowers were bought up in this day and age, then I think that the world might be even more fucked up than it already is.

Graphic Novels/Comics

The first thing I want to say about this topic is that how a stupid tag of "nerd" is associated with anyone that likes Graphic Novels and Comics. This is very wrong.

Graphic Novels and Comics can actually have really great stories, amazing art, can stir the imagination and the creative side of a person with the originality in them. They can be inspiring not just for writers and artists, but for people too. Maybe if a person who lived their whole life through comic books, dressed up as superheroes everyday and then went on to believe that they were actual superheroes could maybe as well as being super-delusional, be classed as a geek as this would be very peculiar behaviour. However, I don't actually personally know anybody like this anyway. I bet anyone who reads this doesn't either.

They are written for people of all ages, some are written for just adults. It's not just all about the Marvel Superheroes like Spider-Man, The X-Men, Captain America and The Fantastic Four or the DC Superheroes like Batman, Superman, WonderWoman and Green Lantern-even though some stories I hae read from these titles are amazing-there are hundereds of independent comics that are just great stories in themselves.

These stories aren't just about Superheroes/Villians flying about blowing things up. The stories can be just like any other-connecting with human emotions like grief and experiencing loss. The battle between good and evil which goes on in everyday life. Apparantly, recently one of The Fantastic Four members got killed. The Human Torch Johnny Storm gets killed. It actually made the national news as did Peter Parker getting killed as Spider-Man in the Ultimate Universe. (The Ultimate Universe is a alternative to the normal Marvel Universe where Peter Parker as Spider-Man is still alive and swinging but in the Ultimate Universe gets killed by The Green Goblin and then someone else becomes Spider-Man. Some guy called Miles Morales who is half-black and half-latino! Apparantly the writers/editors wanted to be "more 21st centuary" and wanted to be culturally diversed and about how our society today is muticultural. I think it's really fucked up and that they could've made someone totally new who is half-black and half latino but know full well that they would have trouble selling whoever that would've been). Can you imagine the readers who follow them every week and have been for years and in some cases even decades feel?

I wanted to buy a book the other day and had no idea what to get and then I realised why not look for a graphic novel as I haven't been to a comic book shop for nearly 2 years now. I used to go once a month and am probably going to start doing that so again.

I bought a couple of my favourite ever graphic novel to a couple of people once who've never read one in their lives and their comments were "Oh man that was amazing" and "I nearly cried halfway through that-brilliant".

So I'm not encouraging people in telling them "Go to the comic book shop now!" I'm telling people to not be shallow and categorize/sterotype anyone that does enjoy reading Graphic Novels/Comics. You don't want to be as narrow minded as half the ridiculous people that I slate on this blog.