Years ago, I took a little holiday.
I left my dreary corporate life for ten days in Scotland where I went to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival – a cornucopia of the performing arts.
Every street corner, bar and amphitheatre comes alive with all kinds of singing and dancing magic.
When I returned to Dubai, I scribbled down a few thoughts – which I want to share with you today. I didn’t know it at the time but…this reverence for the arts would soon become the cornerstone of my business.
Here is my poetry/prose for your reading pleasure.
Be still my beating heart… for its tugging hasn’t seemed to have stopped since I left Edinburgh and that mad beast, the Fringe.
The beautiful absurdity, elegance, and comedic tragedy of every street magician, escape artist, musician, dancer and poet.
The man who wept so deeply when the violins reached crescendo.
The swaying bodies in a pleasant trance. The feet, the tapping feet…betraying even the most sombre festival goer. The artfulness of expression rising beyond culture, age or orientation.
Once on stage, the performer comes ALIVE.
Artists in flow, on stage, in dance… seem to be in their most natural state.
The state we must all be in…before we are crippled by the shackles of rationality, criticism and conformity.
The painted faces, laser beams and rhymes reveal to me our most authentic state.
Creativity isn’t a performance. No, not at all.
Indeed it is us, who are the real performers. Biting back tears, muting our joyousness, masking our natural colourful appearances and stifling our internal rhythm.
This is an act we’re struggling to put on.
And what a dull performance it is.
No, take me away from the act of constant seeking of status, approval, validation, quarterly reports and perfectly manicured nails.
I prefer the land of the surreal and most absurd.
Where hours and hours of practice culminates on a stage.
Take me to that rawness. Where a tear shed by one is shed by all.
Where smiles take shape of their own accord. Bodies uncontrollably shake with laughter which rumbles from deep within and forms creases around the eyes.
Take me to the place where the only way to communicate is through discretion, innuendo, tragic sophistication and magic.
Where you’re not escaping it all.
No, you’re living, laughing, crying and being.
Take me to that place which evokes in everyone that feeling of happiness, desperation and life.
Take me to that place where you don’t feel that burning sensation in the pit of your stomach when the emails come rolling in.
Let my shoulders forever be sat well past my ears – nay, let them be always in a posture of generosity.
Generosity to support, laugh, cry, donate, create and give to these creators, performers and lovers.
Give them a laugh – a reason to keep going. A reason to know that their magic wasn’t a bad choice. That the value they add to our lives is real. And may even be the most important thing our society needs beyond the most basic needs.
History may be written by the winners but it is preserved and carried on through our songs, stories and dances.
The performing arts seep into our bones and skulls. If our unconscious directs everything in our life and listens with open ears to the cues we’re sending it…then let’s be intentional about the cues.
Let the cues be strong melodies with meaningful rhetoric.
How wonderful, this. The arts.
How sad and wrong that anyone should go a day without the ability to soothe their being in it. Whether a walk in the park, a swelling crescendo of strings… how wrong that you should forget it.
And, still. I know I will.
I’m scared I will. I don’t want to.
I don’t want to lose that focus, that appreciation, that nagging sense of awe and readiness to be in awe – to be raw.
I’m scared that I will forget what it feels like to be in that world where you don’t have to bite your tongue or clench your jaw.
And so, I write this to the backdrop of violins in my office. I tell myself to remember to keep that Fringe feeling alive within me.
To keep it strong.
To keep the absurd playfulness and joy in the forefront of my mind.
To keep that readiness to smile and walk with a lightness in my gait.
To remember that Welcome World isn’t just a marketing slogan – it is a reminder of how we should approach our lives.
With a sense of welcomeness, mischief, playfulness, vulnerability, courage and openness.
And for that, Edinburgh Fringe, I’m forever grateful.
Stay with me, as I will, you.
Until we meet again.
