Naiba
Da Heck Justice
This is part of a yearlong series on the second edition of Colière, the Euclidian Non-Isochronous Rhythms card deck. Each card is a pretext to gloss over one item of Romanian mythology, anthropomorphize it, all aimed at easier visualizing and audiating one particular rhythm.
Today it’s about “Naiba”.
I didn’t know this one used to be the name of a character. People employ this word as an insert to emphasize anger or surprise like in English some say “the heck” in “What the heck […]”
Apparently he is a little trickster. Maybe “The Heck” is another one, but that’s not my business.
Sympathetic devil, invoked in situations not specific to evil. In spoken language, the word Naiba can express doubt, uncertainty, and even endearment.
Ion Ghinoiu - Romanian Mythology Dictionary (2013)
On the other hand, I knew a guy that went by the stage name of Naighba. Spelled in this funky way because why not. It was the 90s. We were finally free and democratic. We went to the same high school, he was one of the first wiggers I knew. East European wiggers are something special. Always were. They really are sympathetic devils invoked in situations not specific to evil. He was so proud of this one special t-shirt he got from America with no side seam or something. I see people in the comments here still praising that red t-shirt, so maybe it really was special.
Back then there was a race to the top to get up to speed with all things Freedom and Democracy. People were taking in buckets of American culture wholesale. TV shows, movies, music. We had some timid rock scene here in the 80’s. It blew up in the 90’s and it was counterbalanced by the synthy crowd led by Depeche Mode fans. This particular British band was at the forefront of the battle with all the rock fans combined. Singlehandedly with only one hand! All of this was still running on the fumes of the 80’s that were finally allowed to permeate behind the rusty curtain.
We had all the 80’s and even some 70’s on fast forward, compressed in those first years of the 90’s. The real mavericks were those looking at the actual current situation, not those discovering Iron Maiden 10 years too late (*me). One of these mavericks was this guy who saw black people rapping on the TV and thought he wanted to be that. We only had one half-black guy in our side of the city at the time. He was quite a novelty, very popular. I never saw another black kid in our European capital for many years after. It’s still uncommon. I don’t think our first BIPOCs were so much into rap, but these other indigenous guys were.
In the 80’s the cool kids were the ones who had a VCR. “Put something in to tell you who you are1” type. In the 90’s the cool kids were the ones who had the satellite dish and watched MTV. That was before cable and all of this information dump that piled on all of us later. So they were the firestartahs. Wicked firestartah. Poised to negrify Eastern Europe this time around.
“They fail to see the extent to which America is “negrified” not only racially and demographically, but above all in its civilization, in the behavior, and tastes of Americans, even when there has been no actual mixing with negro blood.”
― Julius Evola
Replace “America” with any other location in the world these days. So our home grown Naiba was one of these Trojan horses. We praised them for free thinking and open mindedness. We were primed for it by the soviet propaganda of all things. Never thinking to express doubt or uncertainty about it, only endearment. Well, there was some resistance, but just from the crusty old guys who did not get it. This was to be the future.
Next in line came the gypsification, when some of us realized we have to make it our way. To bring it back home. We have our own shit over here after all. No need to copy verbatim the American way when we can just extract the spirit of it and paint over it with authentic home grown colors. The way of Kusturica, Bregović and beyond. But even closer to home if possible. Lower. I SAID LOOOOWEERRRR!!!
If there would be a name for this more advanced model, it should be “wipsy”. I touched on him briefly here:
Returning to the year long rhythm taxonomy we’re working on. We have this banging beat. This is one of the well known ones. Cinquillo they call it in the Latino world. Five beats spread over eight. E(5,8). I named the corresponding Coliere V1 card INCENDIARIVS (Firestarter)2. Inciting. Not only he can start physical fires, he can also ignite passions. Fires within. Like a strange love for some cultural artefacts imported from across the seas, often poorly understood and taken out of context.
Da-Dum, Da-Dum, Dum
Da-Dum, Da-Dum, Dum
Nuh-mah, Uh-nah, Eh!
Nuh-mah, Uh-nah, Ah!
You know it, it makes you move for good or ill. It gets under your skin. It flows naturally. What could go wrong? He is a sympathetic devil. We live with him. Just like we live with some of our intestinal flora and fauna. He is the one making me write this in English, employing all these tropes and clichés he made me accumulate when my eyes and ears were connected to screens and headphones. We just have to keep him in check. Be aware of our red t-shirt.
famous quote from New Model No.15 by Marylin Manson (1998). A year before our guy from da hood, Naighba released his iconic LP with his rap buddies. It was a new model indeed. Good times.
In an even earlier version this was Prometheus. Later I found more about the guy, and due to growing levels of complexity I fixed on Firestarter. It’s more playful, and a tribute to Keith Flint. He once spit water from a bottle on me while I was mosh-pitting frontstage back in ‘97, I’ll never forget him for that. He was my Naiba.
-- Back then there was a race to the top to get up to speed with all things Freedom and Democracy.
I think there is one more thing: Prosperity (in economic terms).
I am not sure was there ever a narrative which was accepted so widely, to such an extent and with such speed.
It really is a remarkable world: you live the way you like and let other’s live the way they like.
But all of that does not work if there is not enough paper money with some value which can be given to everybody (with hopes that you will get more of it as we progress more), because if that’s missing, stuff that you can do with your freedom is very limited. The whole narrative gets stuck this way. I think this is why this narrative is in big troubles now.
What was amazing to me (for decades now) is that all these things you mentioned were taken so seriously by so many people. Thinking that you can base your life individually and collectively on these things was always amazing to me. It is a remarkable skill, but it has it’s deficiencies. It is basically an experiment, and I think this how it is perceived by at least part of technocratic elites. While it works, great, but when it does not, we will figure out a new one (and stay in power). But what’s going to happen to all those who accepted it seriously?