blog – Page 3 – SKETCHMAN BORIS

cartoon blog day 37: You didn’t expect that 1/2

I don’t believe we are all equal yet, because we are different. You might say “I love everyone or at least I accept everyone”. You can say that when you have actually met everyone in the world.

I am glad you are open to suggestions when you say you accept people despite their differences, I applaud that but your tolerance level is limited, limited to what you know to be differences. What if you encounter something or someone outside of the realm you call different?

I said all that so you can be aware of it. Because not knowing all that is different is not the problem. The problem is most people not being objectively aware of their disposition towards those who are different.

But we are happy to discover similarities with strangers despite all the cultural differences thrown at us as if having the same biological features is not enough (two eyes, one mouth, two ears, etc).

Grant Morrison (my hero) said that since we began as a single cell organism, that cell split and that cell is within all of us. Just think about that for a moment.

To be continued…

Cartoon BLOG DAY 36: FILTERED SELF

They don’t want you to be yourself, they want a filtered self.

I have already made it clear why I hate the typical motivational quotes. When you hear BE YOURSELF, as useful as it is people usually take it in many different ways.

For me being yourself is not being against or being ignorant of the opinions others have of you. It means being aware of your influences and keep a healthy detachment from them, whether they are your friends, literature, the people you consider mentors, etc.

Because technically it’s impossible to be yourself because to be yourself you need to have complete free will, but we don’t. We are constrained by wherever we were meant to belong or wherever we choose to belong.

I am not going to blame it on the system, I am aware of the system, I am just trying to make it in it. Because succeeding within a constrained environment is intelligence.

For your information here are some definitions of intelligence:

Google: The ability to acquire and apply knowledge and skills

merriam-webster.com: (1) The ability to learn or understand or to deal with new or trying situations. (2) The ability to apply knowledge to manipulate one’s environment or to think abstractly as measured by objective criteria.

dictionary-cambridge.org: The ability to learn, understand, and make judgments or have opinions that are based on reason.

collinsdictionary.com: intelligence is the ability to think, reason, and understand instead of doing things automatically or by instinct.

Cartoon blog day 35: English teacher

20181122 CBD35 English class

i sometimes think back on how arrogant I was. My plan seemed simple then: Quit my corporate job, find a teaching job (to teach English/French) to make money and pay the bills while I try to make a name for myself as a cartoonist, comic book artist.

Why teaching? I figured it would be a job which would give me enough free time to work on my art.

I said I was arrogant because I was so sure that I would find a teaching job easily. As achievable as it was I forgot that I chose to do it in Bangkok, Thailand. I love it here but there are still a lot of people who think only native speakers, meaning people from the U.S, UK, Australia and so on who can teach proper English.

I am proud of myself for finding the teaching job and spending the free time creating cartoons, webcomics, podcasts, videos about movies and blogging. I am also proud of the company which hired me as teacher.

When I see my friends on WhatsApp group complain about MONDAYS and waiting the test of the week for FRIDAY. I see the time fly as I enjoy teaching and creating. So I consider myself lucky.

I am a strong believer in learning by doing because I don’t have a choice and I hope I will get better and give better content here and the other platforms on which I create. I am only getting started, If you are an artist talk to people and keep yourself informed.

Always have a plan even if the plan only makes sense to you.

Bonne journée.

Cartoon blog day 34: Indian names

Let me tell you a story which might resemble that of Gulliver’s travels. I was born and raised in India. I did my higher studies in Europe and now I am living in Thailand. I remember how people found my Indian last name difficult to pronounce. They could do it if they tried but they were worried they would say it wrong and offend me in a way.

When I came to Thailand their names were even longer than the Indian names I knew.

I don’t know to what extent but there are many similarities between Indian and Thai cultures. Their language seem to come from Sanskrit which if I have to simplify, is for south Asian languages what Latin is for French, English, Spanish (to name the the ones I know).

Thanks to the book Bridging the gap by Kriengsak Niratpattanasai, I understood the reason behind the long last names in Thailand. According to the book, Thai people submit their first name and last name to the government officials. “The office then searched the records for identical last names. The name had to be unique and different from those already in use […] As time went by, unique names became harder to come by. More and more syllables were tacked on, resulting in the long names we see today.” (Bridging the gap, Niratpattanasai)

I also found another thing, I don’t know if everybody in Thailand will agree though. In Europe, Indians are usually seen as the shy ones, in Thailand however they are seen as highly competitive, in certain cases aggressive.

Interesting isn’t it?

Cartoon blog day 32: Perfume

Our sense of smell is very interesting isn’t it?

Whether it’s your apartment where you can get used to the smell given a certain moment so much so you have to go out and come back again inside to smell what your visitors smell.

If you really care about what your apartment smells, looks like, I suggest you invite people. I live in a small one room apartment and I invite people so I can force myself to clean it regularly.

Sometimes, I give up, it’s not about not having time it’s just you become accustomed to your own mess, whether it’s your room or in your decisions.

I firmly believe in this: Your beliefs are valid if you can talk about them comfortably with other people.

Especially as an artist you might have a dream, that doesn’t mean it’s the right dream. Of course apart from my handful of close friends nobody including my wonderful mother can understand the joy of storytelling especially telling stories in comics.

You don’t need to constantly get approval of the path you choose but you do need to keep yourself in check and your closest friends will be the safety net when you make mistakes. The only way to teach, learn and grow IS by sharing as much as possible because it’s by being out of your comfort zone that you’ll improve.

Bonne journée.