I've Been Interviewed

[shanmonster]

curtana poses a few questions. Here are the results.

You and f00dave seem (to me, at least) to be remarkably different people - so what do you think keeps you together and happy?

We are very different people, and I think that's part of the reason we get along so very well. We're rather like the Yin-Yang. He's very much a linear thinker whereas I'm extremely lateral. He's mentally oriented, and I'm overwhelmingly physical. He searches for generalizations, and I'm always looking for exceptions to the rule. He's a specialist, and I'm a jack of all trades. He has blond hair, and I have black hair.... We fill each others gaps and make one another complete.

What was the most unpleasant experience you've ever had as a dancer? And what was the best?

I'd say my worst experience was when I danced at a punk/ska concert several years ago. I was wearing a new costume I had just finished making that morning. It had wrist cuffs with long, trailing scarves hanging from them which spun out as I twirled. I thought it was a really spiffy idea. However, it was entirely the wrong thing to wear to a punk gig. As I danced on a very cramped stage with a five-person band and three other dancers, the teenaged yobs in the front row thought it would be a great idea if they started hoarking phlegm on us. We danced amidst a green, gobby rain, and then, when I thought it couldn't get any worse, someone in the audience grabbed one of my spinning veils and tore it off me. My first reaction was to jump into the audience and get it back, but my common sense reared up in time to let me realize I'd probably end up completely nekkid if I did so.

To top it all off, when we finished dancing, all of us dancers had somehow managed to lock ourselves out of the room where all our stuff was, and we couldn't get changed or get our wallets or anything. Finally, we managed to find someone with a master key, but I went home feeling pretty dejected, crusty, and disgusting. But this experience wasn't as bad for me as it must have been for one of the other dancers. It was her first time performing for an audience.

I think my best experience as a dancer was when I danced at the Halifax Experimental Music Festival two years ago with Drums and Machines. At first, it was shaping up to be a bad show. I was sick with a particularly awful cold. I was one big asthma attack, and I couldn't breathe through my nose because my sinuses were completely clogged. I could barely walk at a normal pace without feeling dizzy, and the performance was a high-energy twenty-minute set. However, with the power of western medicine (ie. asthma inhalers, cough drops, and lots of cold medicines), I somehow managed to put on a brilliant performance. We had a good-sized and wonderfully-appreciative audience, and the entire show went without a hitch. I even managed to do a rollover with my sword on my head, and this was without wax on the blade or hairspray on my head. Anyone who's ever worked with my sword knows what a total slippery bitch it can be, so they'd realize this experience is right up on the miracle scale alongside Jesus walking on water. I ended the show with a really intense Zaar-inspired dance, and it scared the bejeezus out of some of the audience, just as it was intended to do.

What prompted you to start documenting your life on the internet?

It all started in 1995. I was living in Moncton and, at that point, was starving for intellectual stimulation. f00 was my only intellectual peer for quite some time, and I could feel my smarts leaking out of me. The best way I could think to keep my mind in working order was to force myself to continue researching and writing. I began writing life-writing, and since I've always been an attention slut, decided to put these writings up online. Since then, my daily life-writing has taken on a life of its own.

Can you pinpoint the (or several) moments when you started to doubt your religious upbringing?

A few memories readily spring to mind. I think the first might have been during one of the many interminable religious meetings I attended. The topic was independent thought, and it was brought home that independent thought was to be avoided. We were to be as sheep, not goats. Who were we to question what God had ordained for us? Independent thought leads to an opening of the mind which can allow devil-inspired thoughts to enter. Well, the devil must have entered my mind, because I rebelled at thinking in the same way as everyone else. It also seemed to me that if people were to question their religions to make sure that they had the right one, then the same thing should also apply to Jehovah's Witnesses.

In another instance, I remember watching a television special about a forgotten veteran of WWII. He was destitute, and in order to survive, he was forced to pawn his medals of honour. But the pawn shop wouldn't give him anything substantial for these very valuable medals, and he ended up living out on the street and eating at soup kitchens. I was supposed to feel nothing for people who did the devil's work. Soldiers are such devilish folk. Nevertheless, I was rebellious, and I wept at the unfairness of it all. I cried because I knew these veterans had believed so strongly in their cause that they'd risked all. Even if I didn't believe in their cause, I could empathize with their situation. So weeping for this fictional soldier was a definite big fuck-you to my religion.

Another memory would be the poor treatment of a JW girl I knew named Donna. Her parents were divorced, and she lived with her mother. Her mother had remarried, and Donna did not get along with her stepfather. Similarly, her stepfather seemed to have no use for Donna. Because the man of the house is the boss, Donna's mother took his part, and was very harsh with her daughter. Donna wasn't a bad girl, but she was being completely ignored or being punished far more severely than she ought to be for any transgressions. One day, Donna's mother gave me a bunch of Donna's clothing. I didn't think anything of it, because I was used to a hand-me-down lifestyle. But then I found out that Donna hadn't wanted to get rid of her clothes. Donna's mother gave me all of her favourite clothes as some sort of bizarre punishment.

Donna was disfellowshipped not long after that, and I know it happened as a result of the terrible treatment she was given by her family and by Jehovah's Witnesses who were just going along with what the family had to say about her.

As another example, JWs teach that everything in the Bible was inspired by God, and came from nowhere else. As a classics student in university, I was finding example after example of works which predated certain parts of the Bible, yet were eerily similar. It was obvious to me that certain parts of the Bible were just reworkings of various mythologies. I think this might have been the clincher for me.

I left the religion completely while in university. No wonder JWs frowned upon independent thought and academic educations.

Where do you see yourself ten years from now?

I see myself much the same as I am now, only more competent. I want to continue teaching dance, and would also like to be teaching yoga. I can also see myself teaching my own particular dance style in addition to Middle Eastern dance. Ten years down the road, I hope to have also overcome my difficulty with learning kung fu forms. I'll be one kick-ass bitch, and I'll finally have a book or two published.

---

And here's the meme that started it all:

1. Leave a comment saying you want to be interviewed.
2. I'll reply and give you five questions to answer.
3. You'll update your LJ with the five questions answered.
4. You'll include this explanation.
5. You ask other people five questions when they want to be interviewed.

Comments

[curtana.livejournal.com]

Question away! :)

[shanmonster.livejournal.com]

1. What's the most awful thing you ever experienced which is now quite comical, in retrospect?
2. In a parallel universe, what do you suppose the evil version of you is doing?
3. What is/are the most erotic book(s) you've ever read?
4. What books had the best endings?
5. What books made the biggest impression on you?

[thatnickguy.livejournal.com]

Me too! Bring it on!

[shanmonster.livejournal.com]

1. When did you start reading/collecting comics, and what particularly attracts you to the sequential art medium?
2. Do you find your tastes in comics and movies parallel one another?
3. What is your earliest memory?
4. What is your philosophy of life?
5. Granny panties or thongs?

[threemilechild.livejournal.com]

Every time I hear that story about the veteran I feel sick.

[elanya.livejournal.com]

me me

[shanmonster.livejournal.com]

1. Why pirates, anyhow?
2. If you didn't have internet access, what would you do with your time?
3. What's the dorkiest thing you've ever done?
4. What got you into dancing?
5. Granny panties or thongs?

[hypatia360.livejournal.com]

Wow.. I imagine that if anyone started to hork anything at me during a show, I would have to leave the stage.. or risk being sick on my audience. I admire your stick-to-itness and iron-stomach on that one.

Nicole

[goth-hobbit.livejournal.com]

I'm game. Question me! :)

[shanmonster.livejournal.com]

1. Why goth hobbit?
2. If you didn't do what you do now, what would you do instead?
3. What got you started in the jewellery business?
4. What's the dumbest thing you ever did?
5. And the smartest?