TIME

Two recent events made me think of time and how we handle it. First, my 95 year old grandmother was hospitalized, and still there at this moment. Secondly, a fellow filmmaker whom I met in Chisinau while shooting Mamaliga Blues, died of cancer.

I was able to record many conversations with my grandmother, and made some videos of her cooking old Jewish recipes. People say that photography and video made people immortal. They are there for us - forever. Somewhat. But this event also made me think of the many stories she never told on video, that I always used to hear but can also forget so easily. There is always so little time to devote to it.

I was unaware my friend had cancer and learned of his death on Facebook days ago. Viorel and I hung for a few days in Chisinau, he showed me the city's nightlife, we went to some bars, a rock concert and local restaurants. He introduced me to some of his friends and told me stories of the Soviet era. Kind and always available, I admired Viorel's sense of humor. I remember he said it was hard to film in Moldova's countryside because every little village he stopped the locals would make sure he tried their homemade wine. Inevitably drunk, the crew ended up not making the film. And then he said Moldovans regarded themselves as the Latin people of Eastern Europe. But most of his other stories I already forgot. Viorel was not recorded by me. I have only a picture with him. 

Everybody knows life is short, but the other problem is time. We always wished we had more time. Time can be interrupted all of a sudden. And it can only live through preservation of memory. Memory is endless time.

Viorel and I - our only picture - in Chisinau, 2008