And then I come back home, on my way, I borrowed the book “The old man and the sea”.

Here begins the story:
“He was an old man who fished alone in a skiff in the Gulf Stream and he had gone eighty-four days now without taking a fish”

I thought, “I am an old boy who composed alone in a cellar in a building and I had gone hundreds of days now without compose a piece”

When I was home, watched the category III film, “Piano teacher”. It’s a marvellous film. French film-makers pay much respect to music. All the actors really knows music, they perform Schoenberg Klavierstucke, Schubert piano sonata, lieder, not fake! All music in the film are performed wonderfully, not amateur… not like Hong Kong films, all music-playing are fake!

It somehow shows the coldness of conservatory life as a way to become professional performers. Teacher-student relationship is sometimes like one person forcing another person to follow his/her way. To tell the student that you are not good enough, your way of practising is wrong, you must follow my way. Like one personality crushing another… Although it is not always like that, but it’s not always easy that teacher and students can talk in an equal position like friends. I’m always in doubt of “education”, which is often just “socialization” - forcing someone to follow the existing rules of a community.