Original subtitles

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.