Thursday, March 29

creative writing: letter to George


Dear George,

I thought I would write you a story. I met this guy a few months back or maybe years, I don't know. Whenever I try to remember I start coughing up weird turquoise steam.

I met him when I was on my annual walk in a deciduous forest. I go just before the winter when all the leaves have fallen and it makes a pleasing sound when you step on them. This particular forest is special, when you turn around two times anticlockwise a mysterious music starts to play. I call it String trio no. 5 in C minor. I believe Beethoven has a similar one. We used to be friends, Beethoven and I, I would read oriental recipes to him but then he went deaf and our friendship lost its magic. He died a few months after the last recipe. Moon cakes. He couldn’t remember the amount of red azuki beans to put in so he accidentally overdosed. It was a Monday.

If you turn around three times clockwise while patting your right shoulder with your left ring finger, Bach's Sonatas and partitas for solo violin start to resonate in between the trees. Me and Bach used to be friends too. He would paint my face as the notes. In some of his late pieces if you look close enough, generally using a quality magnifying glass or a little microscope, you will see my miniature faces instead of the note heads.

This time I tried something else. I turned around two times clockwise and pushed my nose like a car horn with my right palm. The forest went quiet and a dim turquoise light appeared. I came closer and realised it was a man in a dark beige Sherlock-Holmes overcoat, hovering peacefully above the ground. I couldn't see his face. He gestured something and started moving away sideways. I followed in the same manner. It seemed like the right thing to do at the time. We walked for quite a while, probably the distance between Liverpool and Glasgow. He never turned around. It was growing dark. I felt like an bull in a china shop, stumbling and getting hit in the face by invisible branches. His steps were noiseless. I didn't find it strange back then but when I think about it now I know I should have escaped the very moment he started muttering words in a language that vaguely reminded me of French. He was saying “merde” quite a lot.

We got to a little opening. It was completely dark, one of those moonless nights. There was something big and pink in front of us. I was surprised to recognise my old felty hat that I had lost eight years ago but twenty times bigger. “This is it,” he said without turning. The voice sounded oddly familiar. I was confused. “What's the point of taking me to my hat if I can't wear it?” I asked. “Go put it on,” he answered, moderately annoyed. There was something in his voice that made me trust him. I approached the hat and touched it. It felt the same, maybe a little more asperate. I stood there not quite knowing what to do. The man was nervously stomping on the ground. He had obviously somewhere else to be. I tried to figure out what I was expected to do, I racked my brains but that only made me realise I forgot to iron my socks that morning. I just stood there in that awkward position, my right hand on the hat. “If you do a handstand it will look like a boat,” he exhaled loudly. I was saddened by the fact that I didn't think of it myself. I tried to do a handstand but unfortunately I was never really good at it. My arms were too weak and I hit my head a few times. The man was frowning and gesturing wildly. He was furious because I didn't understand. I gave him an apologetic look. He turned around. I could see his face now.
Turns out it was you.


I must say I am a little surprised. You smile and we talk about Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata and how we should perform it in the London Underground. It's hard to set the date, you're still trying to speak French. After a while you get bored. We go home, I take the hat with me. At home you make me a cup of tea. We're sitting at the dining table and I get lost in thought. I am knitting my brows. I say: “George, we have a problem. The hat doesn't go with my burgundy winter coat.” You look at me sympathetically. We doze off.

I dream about 18th century paintings and brain surgery, you dream about hair dye. In the morning we discuss the plan how to invade the London Underground with our music, you suggest we pretend it's the 1970s but I never really liked hippies. I do the laundry hoping the hat gets smaller with washing. We go buy a new coat. It's green. When we come back the washing machine is still going. I open it after it finishes with a roaring sound. The hat is the perfect size but it's purple now. It reminds me of the one aunt Eliza gave me when I was little. I hated it, it was itchy and I didn't want to have a purple head. It also doesn't go with either of my coats. I throw it out the window.

You make beef stew and we dine together like old times. I'm a fan of your roasted vegetables, you like my trifle. We converse about the civil commotions in the Middle East. You claim the problem is religion, I say it's the US. I have a quick google to prove you wrong. It works and I am squirming with joy. You sit by the piano and play the Fifth Symphony. It's in C minor.
We then go to sleep.

Monday, March 19

asos rucksack challenge

I ordered this rucksack on ebay the other day - got it delivered today so I decided why not celebrate by taking part in the Asos rucksack challenge. You take a picture of the contents of your rucksack and send it to myrucksack@asos.com. I loved this project, I have been wanting to do something like this for months now so I finally got around to it. Instead of studying that is. It is now my timeline cover too. I do get obsessed with things.
What's in the pictures:
Swedish Army Backpack - Ebay - £6.50
My Dad's oldschool camera - Praktika
Virginia Cigarettes vintage tin - thrifted - £4
Books I'm currently reading
Sunglasses - H&M
Scarf - thrifted - £1
My Grandpa's watch

one sunday afternoon


Went to the chocolate festival in Brighton this weekend. Brighton is the first of four stops, details on http://www.festivalchocolate.co.uk/, some personal views on twitter under #TheChocFest. Everything looked so good but unfortunately my pictures of chocolate cakes and cookies aren't that presentable so I cannot share. I had an amazing honeycomb icecream though, first cone icecream this year actually. This is how I imagine all my lazy Sundays.
 

Saturday, March 17

trip to Brighton 2

Brighton is full of vintage slash second-hand slash charity shops where you can find a lot of cool stuff, not just clothingwise but literally anything. I've spent over an hour in this big shop called Snoopers Paradise which is basically an indoor flea market. It's in the middle of North Laine and you could easily spend half a day there. I found a lot of furniture that I just want to have in my room, chests of drawers and dressing tables. I also found this lovely vintage suitcase which to my surprise wasn't that overpriced. Maybe there was something wrong with it. I did thrift this nice vintage watch and a metal tin originally used for cigarettes. I have to find another use for it. It's cute though, it's got a little cat on it.



Wednesday, March 14

trip to Brighton

So I had this lovely post all written here and when I was playing with pictures I accidentally deleted the text. After half an hour of googling "retrieving clipboard" I forfeited and going to write the post again. Maybe I'll remember what I said 5 days ago...
Last weekend I went to Brighton to see my friend who is at some point going to be famous. The weather was lovely so we were doing touristy stuff, walked around the pier and I had candy floss. The thing about Brighton is that it's the gay capital of England. Maybe true. It's a sweet little city though. Most of stuff is walking distance. We walked through North Laine and laid down on the beach. We also saw some monuments.
The bottom picture is from outside the Pavilion. Quick history that may have been taken from wikipedia. The Royal Pavilion is a former royal residence located in Brighton. It was built in three campaigns, beginning in 1787, as a seaside retreat for George, Prince of Wales, from 1811 Prince Regent. It is often referred to as the Brighton Pavilion. It is built in the Indo-Saracenic style prevalent in India for most of the 19th century, with the most extravagant chinoiserie interior ever executed in the British Isles.


week in a mosaic 4 - textures

I liked the photos and the colours so I put them together with not really much chronology.
First picture is my flatmates' decoration of their friends Birthday party that they celebrated in our flat. The second one is a magnificent sunset, those colours all genuine. The third photo is Kirstie's smile on a really nice day when we had a bit of a picnic with ice-creams and tea.
The last picture in the middle row is my wall countdown for my trip to Norway and Denmark to see my friend Šárka. 21 more days to go. We still need to book our accommodation in Oslo and figure out what we are actually doing. I cannot wait to take pictures and write everything about the trip.
The last row is, quite obviously, food. The amount of bread I started to eat scares me. Considering buying bread without wheat, met a girl this weekend who's on a 'sweet no wheat' diet. She eats a lot of sweets but no wheat as you can tell from the name. Appearently she's lost a size. Hm...

xx


Keele Varsity 2012

Every year in March Keele University and Staffordshire University fight each other in sports to win a Varsity trophy. I was mainly involved in basketball as that's the sport I play here. I didn't play Varsity though. The Keele Wms team have won 70-24, an epic game. Boys weren't so lucky, they seemed to be under quite a lot of stress. We held a minute of silence before the two games for Catrin.
The boys even had cheerleaders during half time. Later on I went to Sneyd Arms, local pub, for dinner with a few friends. Had my first proper Steak and Ale Pie, thought I should order something else than Chinese Combination that I normally go for. Varsity is a big night out at the Students' Union so we all went out afterwards. Not the best night out ever as promised but we still had a lot of fun dancing to embarrassingly pop tunes.
xx

week in a mosaic 3

Hello dear friends, I have been busy and not posting anything for a while so to make up for it all I'm putting up 4 posts today.
This mosaic is a mixture of the past two weeks, top row middle picture was taken on a particularly sunny afternoon when I decided that the best way to spend my time is to go outside with appropriate refreshments, almond-cinnamon cappuccino inside the tumbler, and my course reading. I'm actually a little jealous of myself when I remember that. The picture next to it is my letter to a certain Lord.
The first one in the middle row was taken at Keele Varsity Women's Basketball, there's going to be a separate post about that. The photo in the very middle is a bit of a joke, poser picture, I was taking a photo on my phone and at the same time my pc's webcam, don't ask me what I wanted to prove. The last picture in this row is my new railcard, I can now travel cheap(er).
The third row is two photos of my hair, again don't ask me why. The one in the middle is what I wore to the Varsity night out at our students' union. Lace leggings, black mini and orange silky top. This was the day before I sprained my ankle and couldnt walk for two days.

xx