It is 3am, and I'm in a beautiful apartment in the center of London, waiting for an email from the States to find out if I must leave today (and I already missing my flight back to Berlin as I type) or can stay for another week. I will update this post online, if something happens.
While I wait for this email to come, I am going to share with you whatever I can remember from the most strange, bizarre and unique period of my life- the (so far) untold story of the curse of B*****s (full name cannot be revealed without being sued or killed).
It all started when my first girlfriend (the one with the father from the previous post) has pushed me in going to a masterclass of a famous pianist from a country which is on the border with Spain, but is not France. This woman (let's call her M. for now) was living in a farm, completely isolated from the world, in the midst of wild nature, and was making a public masterclass in the farm every couple of months. I knew the woman from various recordings I had at home, and was very curious to see what is it all about. The application forms we have received were unique as well, and were full of questions like- "Do you prefer playing with a metronome or follow the music's own pulse?", "Is your body going after the music, or you prefer sitting still?", "Is nature part of your true-self?", and so on. It looked a little New-Age for my taste, but I didn't mind so much at the time. We both applied and got accepted (later we found out that there were only 6 applications, and all got accepted). When we got to the airport, her (then) assistant picked us up, and we drove 5 hours to the farm. After a long while on the highway, we took a strange exit on a very bumpy road and drove into what looked to me, total nowhere. One hour later, many olive trees have appeared and then we got there. I think it was evening, and the place looked just stunning. Below millions of stars, the torches of the farm were lit and I felt I arrived to a place of such misterious spirituality I was never seen before. M. was not there to welcome us, and the maids showed us to our room.
The farm was all designed by M., and every room had its own theme. One room (the only in the 16 rooms of the farm I never got to sleep at) was called Maharaja, and was full of Indian and Persian carpets and other goods. Another room was the Blue Room, and was filled with silken scarves and blue perfumes. All was, I must say, in the best taste possible. Each room had its own bathroom, and a big fireplace. Needless to say that couples that stayed together in such romantic atmosphere made good use of the very comfortable double-beds.
The farm was all built in a ח shape and had, besides the various rooms, a big tower that served as a library, a large swimming pool, beautiful dining room, several large living rooms, a huge wine cellar and a very big concert hall. Five minutes walk you could go to the river, visit the hens and wild pigs, look at the stars and the moon and think you are at least the next Fernando Pessoa.
I have just got an email, and I have promised you an online update. One second:
"non stop action every night- do you have what it takes?", no, I think it's not the email I was waiting for...
Back to our story- The next morning we had a fantastic breakfast and started the masterclass.
The masterclass schedule was unique- we had Yoga in the morning, various exercises connecting the body to the music, shouting exercises (I was best by far), poetry reading and a little bit of music as well. Most of the lessons were dealing with connection between body and music, and trying to differ between various "energies". I may seem a little reluctant and cynical about it now, but there were definitely some interesting things there.
In one exercise my girlfriend had to blind-fold me, and make me follow her by producing soft hums. Being the naughty girl she always was, she made me follow her to the bee-hives, almost fall in the pool, and go up the hand-rails above a rocky bottom.
Lunch and dinner were always terrific. The farm was totally vegetarian and organic (people who brought chocolates were nearly shot on the spot... Later, when I was living there, I bravely conducted an illegal chocolate trade) and every meal started with a different home-made soup, which was, by no comparison the best I ate in my life. Almost all the main dishes were an original variation on a theme by Bacalão (the country's official dish). After a few days I could not see fish anymore, and my dreams were full of grilled, juicy steaks.
Well, in order not to make this post another version of war and peace, and get to the interesting parts of the story, I will just say that I had a lot of fun that week, and me and my girlfriend came back a second and third time.
Another email: "Give your woman what she needs. Enlarge your..."- fortunately no need for that. How do they know I am not a woman, anyway? I am going to sleep, it doesn't look like I am going to receive any real emails tonight.
*****
Well, the second and third times I have been to the masterclass were not that different.
In the third time M. took me aside and asked me if I would be interested to stay there for a year, taking lessons from her and living there for free, and in return I will have to give a weekly piano lesson to the children's choir [M. had a nice project in which she took the children of the nearest villages, to form a children's choir. They came to the farm every week, and had their rehearsals in the big hall].
As I had no other plans that time (I was just finishing the academy), and it all looked very exciting to me (private lessons with M., living in this beautiful farm, being away from home for the first time), that I have agreed without thinking twice.
This farm, B*****s, was full of the most strange people I have ever met in my life. It was as if you were not looking for the farm, it was looking for you (like in a horror film).
If I was even the most retarded, untalented half-brother of David Lynch, I would make a film or a TV series that would make "Twin Peaks" look like Sesame Street.
Just a very little assortment: A young attractive girl who was working at the kitchen was caught cheating with the husband of the personal secretary of M., on the night before her wedding; a maid who upon her first day of work was called "Thersa", by mistake, changed officially her name the following day; the cook was offended by M.'s comments on the food one day, tried to poison her and ran away with lots of jewelery and electronics, and so on- there are so many stories to tell, and I am tired to say even ten percent of them all. The reoccuring theme was that every week someone new would enter the farm, gain the love of M. and the trust of everybody, and then get fired or disappear mysteriously.
A fine example of that was Tadeu, who was brought to the farm from Brazil to help M. with her daily schedule and teach me the language, in exchange for voice (!) lessons. He was not the best teacher, to put it mildly, and it didn't help that he didn't speak a word in any other language.
The year was staring with some disappointments for me- I never got any lessons from M. (for the 8 months I was there, I got only one lesson), as she avoided teaching me, and much preferred to talk about agriculture or running a piece through for me.
Teaching the kids was strange as well- I never had any teaching experience, not with total beginners, children and especially in a language I could not say more than five or six phrases (and most of them were related to female organ parts).
It was a very strange time for me. I was breaking up with my girlfriend, M. was away most of the time, it was extremely cold outside and I was left in the farm almost by myself, completely isolated from society. It was like being stuck in the most beautiful prison in the world, and with no one to talk to! Tadeu was the only person who was there, besides the maids, and I started talking to him. It appeared that he had major disappointed in his love-life, and I was trying to help him as much as I could. In a two hours long conversation (I was very proud of myself), I was talking with him about women, the differences between men and women, and their expectations, only to find out a month later that he is gay... More activities with him included tarot, reading my astrology map, talking with the dead, and other normal stuff.
So, the loneliness continued. Unlike what I thought, I didn't practice or composed more during that period, I only felt lonely- more than ever before and after that. (the short story, "hope", that appears on this blog was written in this time).
Then she appeared. In an almost Holywoodian entrance, came to the farm a beautiful, angelic woman. Everywhere she passed I could almost hear violins in my mind, an imagine a halo above her head, like a Catholic painting. Upon an investigation, she appeared to be M.'s third daughter, a Child Psychologist, who came to the farm every weekend to work with the choir children. Drawbacks- she was almost 8 years older than me, the daughter of my teacher and she had a boyfriend (a reoccuring theme throughout my life). I barely spoken to her, so much I was in awe with her presence. Every week I was counting the days before she came to the farm, and all of the situation felt a little like from "Die Schöne Mullerin".
Then she canceled her coming one week, and the next one and the one after that as well. I got sick and couldn't wait to see her. During that time I had composed songs for the choir that didn't have words, as I didn't know the language well enough to write the lyrics as well. After three weeks of absence, she finally came to the farm, and I asked her to help me write the words for my songs. It was a lot of fun, and a good opportunity to get to know her. One day we took a stroll to the river on a full moon's night, and one thing led to another.
She was very discreet at first- barely speaking to me during the day, speaking and much more than that during the night. She was afraid her mother will find out and kill both of us, which most certainly happened. But more on that, in the next post.
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