It wasn't meant to end this way.
All the previous residencies at this Institute went smoothly,
yet somehow the cracks were showing
from the very beginning with this month's collective.
My distance from the group was more to do with gastric discomfort
rather than any pretense of journalistic courtesy.
Standing as far back as possible was simply out of a need
to relieve any trapped wind without consequence.
Technical Assistant Wim didn't make it any easier with his contempt
for me and anyone else who set foot in the Institute.
For every fecal expulsion I would have to flush simultaneously
in the hope that the group wouldn't hear
in the guesthouse we shared opposite the Institute.
The flatulence was relentless, only it was seldom malodorous.
The constant effort of holding in or disguising my farts
all began to feel like a performance in itself.
The thinking walks in the grounds of the Sonic Catering Institute
would last just under an hour:
a vital part of their process that they wanted me to document.
No words were ever spoken
and the silence opened up the doubts and fears
that could not be voiced when I was interviewing them.
Dr. Glock's medicine didn't relieve anything
and the extreme discomfort of holding in wind
became a social nightmare.
I craved solitude
and if I couldn't find solitude, I craved noise:
the noise of each culinary collective in residence.
Noise that could cleanse, that could purify
and make me forget
as well as make others unable to hear my farts.
However, the greatest test for my disruptive stomach
was to come during the meet and greet
with the Institute's board members
followed by the first of the so-called after-dinner speeches.
Euripides.
Audience tributes were my least favorite part
of a culinary collective's residency.
Witnessing such flamboyant intimacy was not an easy thing to write about,
especially after an abattoir performance.
The torrid passion on display
was at least a distraction from my discomfort
and the fear of my stomach embarrassing me, undermining me,
turning against me and destroying me.
Where does the endless wind
that blows my stomach up like a balloon come from?
Why does it persist?
When I see joy and abandon,
my mind always reverts to this -
why can one stomach be so free and another can't?
The nights were riddled with agony
as the trapped wind took over my bowels and mind.
Every fart involved plotting and worry:
a balancing act of tension, guesswork and fear
with my buttocks pressed hard against the mattress
in the hope that the noise would be muffled enough
so as not to wake the others.
But the Lord is my portion, saith my soul,
therefore will I hope in him.
Why did I agree to a public gastroscopy?
Why couldn't I be more assertive?
Dr. Glock took a sample of my small intestine for a biopsy.
Naturally, I feared the worst
and amidst the hedonism in front of my eyes,
I could only see misery.
The night was hell:
cramps, bloating and methane at its angriest.
The group's silence during the thinking walks
soon changed from convivial to hostile,
which made it even harder to endure.
There was nowhere to hide in such an atmosphere
and the silence stifled all thought or reverie.
The arguments between Jan Stevens and the group
became increasingly fraught
and the escalating threat from The Mangrove Snacks
only added to the general tension.
My energy was at an all-time low.
My bowels felt as hard as rusty pipes
and I could feel it all getting worse.
Tomorrow, a long tube with lubricant
will be inserted deep into my rectum
and gas will inflate my bowels.
Dr. Glock gave me a laxative,
which would imprison me in the toilet for most of the night.
But before surrendering my body,
there was a stool sample to prepare.
Behold, O Lord; for I am in distress:
my bowels are troubled.
Mine heart is turned within me,
there is nothing to comfort me.
One
Two
Three
He visited me twice a year,
since he couldn't afford such exotic punishments more regularly
on his income.
He'd take the day off work when he arranged to visit me,
since our ritual depended on the expansion of time.
After the obligatory small talk, I ordered him to go into the room
where he should wait for me to arrive in a formal outfit.
My manner would change
and I'd become a different person that he paid me to be.
After making him rub my feet for as long as I wanted,
I put him on a leash
and walked him to a special toilet
where his head could be placed in
with his hands handcuffed to the side.
There, he would fall under my spell
and stay for as long as I wanted.
The sound of my approaching footsteps made him giddy
with a contradictory mixture of fear and excitement,
and he'd often tell me that the anticipation and threat
were far more potent than his eventual punishment.
He claimed that being left inside that box
cured him from all the stresses of caring for his ill mother,
along with the impotent rage he suffered
at the hands of rude and contemptuous customers
in the high-class restaurant where he worked.
He found an inner peace when left helpless under my control,
and when his punishment eventually arrived
after several hours of silent anticipation,
he underwent the most profound catharsis.
He normally found such things disgusting,
but when I sat above him and used him as my toilet,
his whole being transformed into something beyond ecstasy.
He regarded such rituals as bordering on religious,
as if what came from my body
was a communion.
The moments after his self-induced orgasm
were always a tenuous thing to navigate
once he realized how much of a mess there was to clear up,
but these rituals always ended on a cordial note
with a few passing words about the state of the chrysanthemums on my balcony.
I was too scared to go through with the colonoscopy,
but Elle made up for it with her scatological performance,
which shocked the audience so much
that none of them ventured backstage for sexual activity.
Whether I underwent the procedure in front of an audience or not
made no difference by this stage.
Everything was becoming a blur.
Technical Assistant Wim reported Elle to Jan Stevens
for deceiving the audience
with chocolate mousse instead of my excrement,
which further ruined the trust between them.
However, more importantly,
the group were turning against themselves
and all I could do was document what I was hired to do.
A second attempt at a colonoscopy was imminent,
which Elle naturally wanted to turn into a performance.
Why I went along with her plans is beyond me.
Was it her persuasion?
Was it finally a chance to participate
in something artistically viable
or was it just my hopeless inability
to say no to people?
I took the laxative powder again and this time there was no retreat
from the colon examination.
Since Dr. Glock was the performer,
Lamina and Billy allowed Elle to join them
and play with the graphic equalizer
as long as it was unplugged.
Elle became fascinated by both the sonic
and performative potential of my stomach,
but to reveal myself to an audience was a mistake.
Something so private sacrificed for the sake of art.
It was their final trip to the shops and maybe mine, too.
Nine o'clock in the morning was my appointment with Dr. Glock.
The diagnosis I was dreading kept going through my head.
Nights such as these might be something to savor
in case they are my last.
It was a daunting change of diet.
Even in foods it was not supposed to be in,
gluten was there through cross-contamination.
Then there was the social aspect that nobody warned me about;
sighing and eye-rolling
from people who thought I was being melodramatic or modish.
I also had to deal with defensive reactions from a few waiters
who felt their integrity was challenged
if I asked them about cross-contamination.
However, the change of diet returned my life to normal
and I was finally on the road to feeling healthy again.
To inaugurate my diagnosis,
Jan Stevens announced a less formal attire for the day
- jeans.
With Elle, it was all about performance
and this was no different.
If anything,
this was what she spent her whole life working towards
and I became too involved to refuse a spoonful.
As for me,
I was finally a part of something.