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"Meisje, meisje, als je valt, altijd iets van maken." 

- Sonia Gaskell - 

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The village where we live consists mainly of farmers, but our father is a “swan” — a traffic police officer on a motorbike. He often suffers from sleepwalking. Sometimes it happens that at 5 a.m. he puts on his police uniform, helmet included, and wanders through the house. To prevent him from doing anything dangerous, our mother lifts him up while he is still asleep and carries him upstairs, back into the bedroom. Like newlyweds carrying each other over the threshold, but with a helmet. And more often. You might think that is love.

 

In 1993, Rani De Coninck wins the Miss Belgium beauty pageant. Another 26-year-old girl in a purple wool sweater and blonde highlights misses out on the title. She is crowned “Miss Sympathy” — a title awarded to the most sympathetic contestant. Our father finds her so sympathetic that he leaves our home and rents an apartment with her overlooking the sea. Sometimes he pushes her onto the kitchen table and she pulls her perfect legs up and wraps them around him. They laugh and kiss with tongues while the sea crashes heavily against the quay in the background. We have never seen anything so romantic. Except in The Sound of Music, when Maria blushes while looking into the captain’s eyes as they waltz at a Nazi party — and that is definitely love.

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When Li is six, she uses a stolen key to open the candy cupboard and scoop out the homemade advocaat of our mother. Interrupted by a strange sound, she walks to the corner window and sees a giant helicopter-like object descending straight from the sky, as if trying to land in the garden. It occasionally jerks back up into the air, coming dangerously close to the side wall of the house. Stuttering, the machine touches the ground, exactly on the spot where the sandbox used to be. For a moment, nothing happens. Everything stands still, except the freshly cut grass. Then the helicopter door opens, and our father steps out, bent over. He waves happily at her. Li looks at our mother, who has come to stand next to her, mouth slightly open. She does not smile. She orders all curtains to be closed and everyone to stay inside. For once, we are allowed to touch the ivory-white curtains with our fingers.

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On December 10, 2022, De Morgen ran the headline: “Six former board members of Lernout & Hauspie (L&H) have been ordered by the Ghent Court of Appeal to pay damages totaling 655 million euros, to be distributed among approximately 4,000 civil parties. Years ago there were more than 10,000, but 20 years have passed: people have died, and others have given up. The only defendants still held jointly liable are the six board members who were also convicted of fraud. Alongside Jo Lernout and Pol Hauspie, these include Nico Willaert, Gaston Bastiaens, Carl Dammekens, and Tony Snauwaert.” The latter is our father.

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Note on the project

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This project is no longer in development and will not go into production. Following the death by suicide of our third sister, during this development, the work has been put on hold indefinitely. This event fundamentally changed the context and conditions of the project, and made it impossible to continue its development as initially intended. The existing material remains as an archive of a process that is now interrupted and unresolved.

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Credits |
 

concept: Kim Snauwaert

dramaturgy: Simon Baetens

choreography: Charlotte Vanden Eynde
scenography: Ika Schwander
performance: Charlotte Gillain, Hendrik Van Doorn

met de steun van: De Grote Post, C-takt, Monty, De Brakke Grond, CAMPO

een project van Between Us vzw: www.betweenus.be

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