Yesterday morning I met John for coffee and toast. We talked about places to go in China and he’s connecting me with someone who runs the pottery workshop. We went to a few local art spaces. He’s a charming man and I’ve really warmed to him. I walked down the river and took a tour boat to see a floating restaurant and we weaved in and out of rows of fishing boats. Then I walked around town and sorted out a new sim card.
I filmed a lot today and became especially excited about a t-shirt and a pair of shorts on a hanger each, drying by the side of the main road. Each time a vehicle passed, the clothes would sway in the wind. It’s cheesy, like the paper bag moment in American Beauty. Sometimes you just have to embrace the cheese and crank it up.
I’ve also been taking photos of the trees here for my tree surgeon friend Robert. I know he’s going to love them. I stumbled across this scene:
Translated this means ‘Tree Cutting Party’.
Yesterday evening I met Dan and we went to Kowloon on his motorbike. I’ve never been on a motorbike before. Blasts of hot air kept smashing me in the face. The neon skyscrapers flashed before me like a 1980’s graphic equalizer. This was a ride to remember. The sweet smells changed rapidly. It’s all about trust, going with the movements of the driver and the bike. It reminds me of sticky hands in Kung Fu. I don’t want this to end as I’m suddenly growing fonder of HK.
Everyone loves dabbling in a bit of long exposure. Art for snazzy trendy offices.
The billionaire with the fast cars messaged me and I’m going to send him some photos of his cars and invite him to the exhibition. I’ve noticed the car and number plate trend continuing.
The Irish poet Robert messaged me and we are going to a poetry reading night soon. I’m making friends and feeling more content. Now I need to pack up my things, as as I want to get out of the studio. This is all possible now that I have funding to be able to financially move around.
I danced around the studio in a pink cape and knickers, whilst dying my hair.
Things were looking up, until I had contact with E, who told me he was going to use and that he can’t take any pressure. I told him I must cut contact as it’s only making me anxious. Then he blocked me. I suppose this is punishment or him trying to have some power over something in his life.
This morning I met John again for coffee and toast, then we went to Blindspot Gallery. Martin Parr had a show and publication with this space. The people are so lovely and we discussed the current exhibition ‘Shikijo: eroticism in Japanese photography’.
‘The 7,000 square foot gallery space, one of the largest in Hong Kong, is located in Wong Chuk Hang, an industrial area in the south side of Hong Kong island.’
Permission granted by the gallery to use their photographs of the space.
I’ve been naked a lot in the studio as the heat is unbearable. Flies and mosquitoes are sticking to me and I’m sticking to everything else. Insect repellent is burning my skin and it’s really greasy. I have the runs and I feel sick and lonely.
Today I just want to hide away. I’m trying all these exhilarating things to take over the trauma I’ve been going through, to placate the heavy low inside. Nothing is working, roller coasters, motorbike rides, being away from the UK, hopefully there will be a turn in my thinking soon. There’s something called ‘letting go with love’, when dealing with addicts. I’ve been in contact with E as he’s been doing a cold turkey detox. I don’t have much hope for him, he never makes it past day two. I sense when he’s going to use because he is angry with me, abrupt and makes excuses to stop contact. He says it’s because I’m heavy and it’s emotional stress. He says he will be dead when I get back and then blocks me. I know he will read this, so somehow I will talk to him through this. This is how it has been on and off for months.
Being a heroin addict is so self-indulgent and full of lies. I have been trying to help him but everything is about him using or not using. I feel somewhat relieved because nobody can make someone give up. They have to decide that it’s time to give up the turbulent life they are leading. It’s easier to give someone up than to give heroin up, I know that from not growing up with my mother. My exhibition is revolved around their using, so you will understand the context as I explore the relevance of being here. This trip wasn’t meant to be for three months, initially I was planning up to four weeks. Then E wanted to come with me, so we planned for longer. As soon as all the drama unfolded I booked to be away for even longer. I can’t find answers for why I chose to stay in it when I’m focusing on them and they can’t reach their rock bottom, if they ever do, with me around. It feels cruel but I have to detach.
My mother shows me that a happy ending isn’t always possible, as she is dying. Regarding E, he is young and not done. No nurturing mother and no knight in shining armour for me. I tried to fix them wanting to fix. Ultimately it ends with them lying and abruptly cutting me off because only they can they be alone with their one true love, heroin. Heroin is the mistress and the pull is far too great. Their brains need reprogramming through rehab and/or Narcotics Anonymous. Step one: We admitted we were powerless over our addiction, that our lives have become unmanageable.
I recorded my mother, her ex boyfriend and E together and I’m playing it back now. E said ‘Helen’s right though, once you go to opiates, you forget about everything else though, don’t you?’. My mother admitted she sold a portrait I had painted of her for a bag of smack. E looks fit and well, as he was on a subutex script, although he does look uncomfortable. The conversation revolves around all kinds drugs and blockers. ‘I used to look down on junkies when I was a junkie. In the gutter looking down at people’. He smiles and my mothers ex agrees. Patrick and I exchange looks. He has an insight into all I have to deal with. I didn’t know why I was recording, I just knew that I wanted to get some footage in case one of them dies. You begin to come to terms with death, knowing that the chances of it happening through overdosing, are high. My mother, I call her Helen, tells me ‘I like your boyfriend’ and ‘I LOVE heroin’. They go on to compare collapsed veins. This was the first time they met and most likely the last time.
Heroin addicted stars make the headlines, look at Amy Winehouse and Pete Doherty. Lots of us felt sorry for Amy and not for Pete. We watched her demise and wanted to help.
This is how I’ve felt towards E. I wanted to help him but every option punched me in the gut. There is nothing good about living with addicts, who go missing for days on end. I remember our first Christmas togther, we were decorating our tree. Half way through he said ‘I need to go and score’. I finished decorating the tree alone, turned the lights on and sunk low. This wasn’t that perfect moment you see in films. He came home and injected, with the tree as a backdrop.
You give them money that you can’t really afford, lie for them and drive yourself into insanity, for little or no rescue or rewards. They are the stars of the show until we begin saying no. Your life becomes about obsessing about them and their addiction. You are there to pick them up and they are not there to pick you up, there’s no exchange due to it being ‘emotionally heavy’. Loved ones usually stay and wait for a change, it’s a lonely place to be, because you are the only person fighting for their sobriety. Nothing changes if nothing changes.
I’ve often thought about the word ‘Sonder’.
‘The realisation that each random passerby is living a life as vivid and complex as your own—populated with their own ambitions, friends, routines, worries and inherited craziness—an epic story that continues invisibly around you like an anthill sprawling deep underground, with elaborate passageways to thousands of other lives that you’ll never know existed, in which you might appear only once, as an extra sipping coffee in the background, as a blur of traffic passing on the highway, as a lighted window at dusk.’
Oh yeah, a bird fell from a tall building and landed in front of me with a thud. Friends are sending me photos and videos of it raining back in England. I miss the cold rain. It needs to rain here. I should get on with editing but I can’t face the footage today. If all else fails I can always hang the greased up body stained bed sheet in the gallery. I might try to play some Nirvana on Jimmy’s electric guitar.
