Set your monkey free

1. I always sleep alphabetically but last night God forgot and removed the W. I was sent back to sleep twice through the V.

2. In some parts of the world, the clocks are set back an hour at three in the afternoon rather than three in the morning. People sit back down to tea, and all the children who finished school at 2.30 are required to come back.

3. It’s an old story. I was in love but found the object of my desire terribly fickle – one hour cool, one hour on fire. Only at the bullring did it become clear that the matador with the floppy bangs had a twin brother.

4. As Chuang Tzu says: ‘To wear out your brain trying to make things into one without realizing they are all the same – this is called “three in the morning.” What do I mean by “three in the morning?” When the monkey trainer was handing out acorns, he said, “You get three in the morning and four and night.” This made all the monkeys furious. “Well, then,” he said, “you get four in the morning and three at night.” The monkeys were all delighted. There was no change in the reality behind the words, and yet the monkeys responded with joy and anger. Let them, if they want to.’

5. The year I spent in China was more like three years. At first the days were all equal, but soon moved unevenly as wheelbarrows pushed by a child. Pollution and endless exertion aged me threefold. The only way to offset this effect was to sleep all day, one brushstroke at a time. But once the Tiananmen Square massacre happened, time had spun out of control. When I set off for home it was as if one year were three. But three that flew by.