Back to Mobile.
Never easy to come back to a life made only of work and little else, especially after spending many weeks with family and friends in places that fit me well.
I have to re-adjust to driving and not using my legs and bike as a way to transport myself between two points. The first days since I got back here, I felt I was in a cage....now I am just passively trying to adapt again. It is very hard for me to understand how people can settle for a life in which they depends from their car to go anywhere. The weather is fantastic here, it calls for spending time outside biking or walking. But this is simply impossible. There is nowhere to go to by walk and drivers are just not used to people biking, so that biking is calling for a suicide most likely....except for very few places. I miss being able to walk or bike to work....I leave 10 minutes away from work and still, I have to drive.
Yesterday I was relaxing at the pool in my apartment complex. The maximum distance within this apartment complex is maybe 10 minutes by walk, if not less. A family drove from their apartment to the swimming pool. They were not carrying something heavy. The kids were not so little. I guess they are just not used to use their legs.....and then some people complain about being overweight.....what about moving more? I understand here it is not easy, because Mobile is not walkable or bikeable, but at least for short distances and when it is possible....at least as providing a good example for the kids.
It is a very different life style. I am not used to this. It is not the US. In Washington many people bike...actually, there are so many crazy bikers, they are dangerous sometimes.
Another thing I am not used to. Guns. We had an orientation at work. They showed us a video about how to be prepared and train in the case a shooting would occur in the work place. My colleagues, a room filled with about 30 other people, mostly Americans, found this completely normal. Myself and another Japanese woman, both clearly not used to this, were speechless. I got extremely depressed after the video. It is difficult to explain. I am just not used to this.
Here you can have guns, shotguns, whatever you want, in your car or on you.
It is normal.
My students told me story of growing up shooting at snakes. It is normal. It is what they are used to. Driving everywhere and depending on cars, being used to guns and shooting.
Not an easy adjustment for an European who grew up in a small town in Tuscany and who always lived, until now, in very small towns or if not small, bike and walk friendly.
Showing posts with label Luoghi. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Luoghi. Show all posts
Sunday, August 17, 2014
Saturday, December 14, 2013
That's about it
Here we are. Last night in my apartment here in Portugal.
I feel miserably sad.
I had so many troubles with this apartment, the rain filtering inside the windows and flooding my kitchen, the bad landlord, the continuous reparations needed.
But I loved this place. The ocean view. The possibility to walk or run on the beach, next to the beach whenever I wanted.
And that's it. I am leaving. After tomorrow, very early in the morning.
I can't help but thinking of my mood and my hopes and all what was going on inside me when I arrived here two years ago. It seems yesterday, and instead it is not and so so many things happened in these two years.
When I arrived here, I was not even together with my husband. We had broken up since more than six months and I honestly didn't consider a reconciliation and getting back together a possibility, although we always stayed in touch.
When I arrived here, I thought that I would find a way to have at least a friendship with the olandesino. I couldn't have been wronger.
When I arrived here, I was terribly sad for having left my friend and the working group in Montpellier, but also full of hope for my life and my work here. I thought that I could make friends outside work and have a full life here. I sadly didn't make any close friends....I honestly didn't even try so hard, as it took me one year to figure out my life here and adapt and then I basically got engaged and knew I would move again. But I anyway met people I like a lot here and that in one or another way I will think about even from far.
Nothing went as I saw or imagined in my head, except for the fact that I already knew from the first time that I would have loved this little city where I decided to live.
I can't imagine myself starting over again, in another country, in another city. I don't know how many times I moved around from place to place and had to start over again. And every time, it takes me almost a year to just get settled in a place and even longer to start making friends and having a life...and then as in this case, it is time to leave again.
I feel that in the last months I am trying to block everything inside myself, the fear, the sadness, the anguishing of having to move again and start over in another place with another culture, other people, another life. I am tired of this. I was tired of this two years ago, when I came here in Portugal and I promised myself that I wouldn't move again unless was for something stable where I could settle for many years and have a life, with friends, routine, my things, where I could feel rooted.
Instead, two years after, all my stuff is in boxes again, spread between Italy, my husband's apartment, the future place where I will live, and somewhere in between these places, traveling.
I am fully aware that I didn't need this change again. I am also aware that it could never have worked between my husband and I if I would have stayed where I am. I guess that when I decided to marry him, I knew that I would have had to move again. Surely, I was hoping to move with him and not to move to be alone again in a new place, just closer to him. But I would never give up my work and I would never want him to give up what he has for me without something to do that he likes.
Someone told me that "I want it all" and this is just not possible in life.
I don't feel that I want it all. I don't have my family close to me and I don't have my friends near me.
I just have a job doing what I like (and I hope to like doing it in this new place and to find a pleasant working environment) and a husband closer by than now. I understand that it is a lot and much more that what other people have, but it is certainly not having it all and I made a lot of sacrifices for my work and my personal life.
I just know that I will miss here, this little village, the view I have from the windows of my apartment, running along the ocean, the wind and the waves...I will miss all this so so much.
I feel miserably sad.
I had so many troubles with this apartment, the rain filtering inside the windows and flooding my kitchen, the bad landlord, the continuous reparations needed.
But I loved this place. The ocean view. The possibility to walk or run on the beach, next to the beach whenever I wanted.
And that's it. I am leaving. After tomorrow, very early in the morning.
I can't help but thinking of my mood and my hopes and all what was going on inside me when I arrived here two years ago. It seems yesterday, and instead it is not and so so many things happened in these two years.
When I arrived here, I was not even together with my husband. We had broken up since more than six months and I honestly didn't consider a reconciliation and getting back together a possibility, although we always stayed in touch.
When I arrived here, I thought that I would find a way to have at least a friendship with the olandesino. I couldn't have been wronger.
When I arrived here, I was terribly sad for having left my friend and the working group in Montpellier, but also full of hope for my life and my work here. I thought that I could make friends outside work and have a full life here. I sadly didn't make any close friends....I honestly didn't even try so hard, as it took me one year to figure out my life here and adapt and then I basically got engaged and knew I would move again. But I anyway met people I like a lot here and that in one or another way I will think about even from far.
Nothing went as I saw or imagined in my head, except for the fact that I already knew from the first time that I would have loved this little city where I decided to live.
I can't imagine myself starting over again, in another country, in another city. I don't know how many times I moved around from place to place and had to start over again. And every time, it takes me almost a year to just get settled in a place and even longer to start making friends and having a life...and then as in this case, it is time to leave again.
I feel that in the last months I am trying to block everything inside myself, the fear, the sadness, the anguishing of having to move again and start over in another place with another culture, other people, another life. I am tired of this. I was tired of this two years ago, when I came here in Portugal and I promised myself that I wouldn't move again unless was for something stable where I could settle for many years and have a life, with friends, routine, my things, where I could feel rooted.
Instead, two years after, all my stuff is in boxes again, spread between Italy, my husband's apartment, the future place where I will live, and somewhere in between these places, traveling.
I am fully aware that I didn't need this change again. I am also aware that it could never have worked between my husband and I if I would have stayed where I am. I guess that when I decided to marry him, I knew that I would have had to move again. Surely, I was hoping to move with him and not to move to be alone again in a new place, just closer to him. But I would never give up my work and I would never want him to give up what he has for me without something to do that he likes.
Someone told me that "I want it all" and this is just not possible in life.
I don't feel that I want it all. I don't have my family close to me and I don't have my friends near me.
I just have a job doing what I like (and I hope to like doing it in this new place and to find a pleasant working environment) and a husband closer by than now. I understand that it is a lot and much more that what other people have, but it is certainly not having it all and I made a lot of sacrifices for my work and my personal life.
I just know that I will miss here, this little village, the view I have from the windows of my apartment, running along the ocean, the wind and the waves...I will miss all this so so much.
Monday, September 10, 2012
Moglie e buoi dei paesi tuoi
And this is another common say that we use in Italy...literally it reads : wife and beefs of your country.
More in general it means that it is wiser to chose someone with the same background for a long-term commitment, being this getting married or something else.
I thought that this say wouldn't make too much sense today and that it would be totally outdated....I recently discovered than instead different backgrounds and cultures are not always easy to melt....especially over serious matters.
Traveling as much as I do and living and moving from one country to another, my two last relationships have been with non-Italian people. Not a big deal I thought. As long as we are all open-minded we can overcome any issue....I still stand by this thought, but I have to add that overcoming cultural difference, which most of the times one doesn't even know to have, requires a lot of work and a lot of patience, from both sides when the people involved are in a relationship.
Things that for me are completely obvious for the other person may not be at all. I remember when during my first relationship with a non-Italian person, the olandesino, he always freaked out when my family would scream and yell at each other in the middle of a "normal" conversation....before being able to understand Italian, he always thought that they would end up killing each others...considering that for my family this is the normal way to communicate and to talk and that discussing with animosity can happen even for small things like where to have dinner, without anyone actually being angry at someone else, you can understand how many times he had to experience this kind of situation before realizing that it was not the end of the world and it was just a cultural difference from his own (Dutch).
Now that I am in a very committed relationship to my ex-now-new-again-boyfriend I am facing cultural differences on a regular basis......it can be quite frustrating and it requires a lot of communication, patience and compromise from both of us. It is worth it. But it is also quite some work......
We may be all connected by internet, facebook, and whatever else, but cultural differences are still there....and despite the work and the stress that the may cause in a relationship between two people with a different background, I am happy that they still exist and globalization didn't wipe them out yet!
Let's preserve differences and work to learn about them and understand what it is unfamiliar to us!
More in general it means that it is wiser to chose someone with the same background for a long-term commitment, being this getting married or something else.
I thought that this say wouldn't make too much sense today and that it would be totally outdated....I recently discovered than instead different backgrounds and cultures are not always easy to melt....especially over serious matters.
Traveling as much as I do and living and moving from one country to another, my two last relationships have been with non-Italian people. Not a big deal I thought. As long as we are all open-minded we can overcome any issue....I still stand by this thought, but I have to add that overcoming cultural difference, which most of the times one doesn't even know to have, requires a lot of work and a lot of patience, from both sides when the people involved are in a relationship.
Things that for me are completely obvious for the other person may not be at all. I remember when during my first relationship with a non-Italian person, the olandesino, he always freaked out when my family would scream and yell at each other in the middle of a "normal" conversation....before being able to understand Italian, he always thought that they would end up killing each others...considering that for my family this is the normal way to communicate and to talk and that discussing with animosity can happen even for small things like where to have dinner, without anyone actually being angry at someone else, you can understand how many times he had to experience this kind of situation before realizing that it was not the end of the world and it was just a cultural difference from his own (Dutch).
Now that I am in a very committed relationship to my ex-now-new-again-boyfriend I am facing cultural differences on a regular basis......it can be quite frustrating and it requires a lot of communication, patience and compromise from both of us. It is worth it. But it is also quite some work......
We may be all connected by internet, facebook, and whatever else, but cultural differences are still there....and despite the work and the stress that the may cause in a relationship between two people with a different background, I am happy that they still exist and globalization didn't wipe them out yet!
Let's preserve differences and work to learn about them and understand what it is unfamiliar to us!
Saturday, August 18, 2012
42nd parallel south
I got this book from my mom as a present, I cannot remember if it was last Christmas or for my birthday last year. In any case, when I got the book is not important. What it is important is that some of its pages touched me so much that I just had tears in my eyes.
I have always dreamed since years to go traveling and wondering around in Patagonia. Without a schedule. Without a goal. Just to live the place and feel it. I still don't know why Patagonia. It is just that any time I read something about it, I feel like it is my place. Maybe I am becoming too much of an hermit. I don't know. I don't necessarily think so. But I dream of the solitude of walking around in a place like Patagonia. Of being in a place where nothing can be given for granted. I have to admit that I would be too scared to go there and spend months there alone....but I always hope to find the right company to share this dream with.
In any case, I enjoy travel books. Books about places in the world. This is why I probably like so much B. Bryson's book (together with the fact that he is an amazing writer!). But this book, this specific book I am reading is not only about Patagonia and traveling below the 42nd parallel south of the world. It is about encounters with people who love this place. It is about a hard land, a difficult solitary place where people still live in a simple way, without the pressure that we have in this kind of world instead. I just read a chapter of this book about a solitary 95 years old woman living in this solitary place, in her isolated little house, drinking mate. But she is not alone, she has her dog, her sheep, her garden. I was reading about it, but I could imagine the whole place, the old lady, everything like if I was standing in front of the scenario. And the book tells about the appeal of this land to people with a lot of money who cannot appreciate the wind, the steppe, the nothing and want to use this immense space to build something on it, to change it, to destroy what it has been until now, as it happens for many other once uncontaminated places on earth. And reading this and thinking that Patagonia too will face the advancement and progresses of our civilization and most likely lose all what I ideally love about this place, the isolation, the lack of the globalization pressures, the scattered living things surviving there, the natural environments, made me extremely sad.
I love starbucks and I always enjoy getting an ice soy latte when I am in the USA. But I also love the fact that it is a treat for me, that I cannot have it all the time, because here, in most of the places in Europe, we still have little coffee places, which are one of a kind. I am not against globalization, but it shouldn't be so widespread. I like characteristic, traditional things and there are places in the world that shouldn't be bought just because someone has the money, that shouldn't be destroyed in name of making more money and making a world that looks all the same, no matter where we are. I am definitively for diversity.
Please, let Patagonia be and stay as in my dreams!
Wednesday, August 15, 2012
Love and hate
This is how I feel for my apartment in Portugal.
Most of the times, I love it.
Some other times, generally when it rains, I hate it.
It is a beautiful day today and I just spent my morning sitting in the part of my kitchen surrounded by windows and with an ocean view. Then I went for a walk on the beach, for which I need to just cross a road, and then I got back to my place to have lunch at the window while staring at the ocean and its big waves.
This is something I have been dreaming about since I can remember. Living in front of the sea...in this case it is the ocean. The same. I don't have too much choice in terms of choosing the country in which to live...generally, I have to go where I have some chances to get a job. But in this case, I feel pretty lucky. I don't necessarily like where I work, but I love where I live, and my apartment is just perfect.....
......actually, I should say ALMOST perfect.....
The pond that I have on my kitchen floor when it rains, it is now a lake....it was a pond, a manageable pond, until I realized that if I don't dry continuously the rain leaking in from the outside, I have water advancing and advancing. Yesterday, I had to wait for the person in charge of repairing things in the building to come over and look at the problem before drying the water from the floor. In about eight hours of rain, I had 1 square meter of the kitchen floor, if not more, completely covered by water, which was scarily enough continuing to advance.
Good thing that I was here and not in holidays.
Good thing that I was at home.
My frustration for this problem was not so unbearable, even if I have problems of rain leaking in the kitchen since I moved in, until the man of the building came, look at the problem and told me that a) repairing what needs to be repaired is going to be expensive, b) it is the responsibility of the building and not of my landlord, and c) IF THERE ARE NO MONEY ON THE ACCOUNT OF THE BUILDING WHO KNOWS WHEN AND IF THIS PROBLEM WILL BE TAKEN CARE OF.
Now, if the rain would come in and occupy just a spot on my kitchen floor, I wouldn't be that worried, because this apartment is so amazing for anything else, that I would never move out. However, thinking that if this would happen one of the times in which I am not here, since I travel so much, probably:
1) the furniture of the kitchen would get ruined (and this would be a problem for my landlord)
2) I would have to move my furniture away to another room any time I leave
3) and that there are electrical things in the kitchen which could be dangerous if they get in touch with a lot of water......
all these things made me thinking of what I should do in case they will really not repair it soon. If this would have been a place where it rains once in a while, I could live with the risk, but since it could rain without stop for weeks in a row.....well.....
Easy thing would be moving out. But moving is stressful and more than anything else, my apartment is very peaceful, I don't have noisy neighbors, I can sleep well, I have an ocean view, I cross the road and I am on the beach where I can do sport and relax, I have a bakery next door and the supermarket just in 5 minutes walk (important point since I don't have a car), it is big so that I can host anyone who wants to visit me without anyone feeling packed like sardines, it is not too expensive, I have a garage in case of need....I can keep going on and on with all the positive points of this place.....
so, how can I solve this problem of the rain coming in and invading my kitchen if they will not fix the problem in some way?
Most of the times, I love it.
Some other times, generally when it rains, I hate it.
It is a beautiful day today and I just spent my morning sitting in the part of my kitchen surrounded by windows and with an ocean view. Then I went for a walk on the beach, for which I need to just cross a road, and then I got back to my place to have lunch at the window while staring at the ocean and its big waves.
This is something I have been dreaming about since I can remember. Living in front of the sea...in this case it is the ocean. The same. I don't have too much choice in terms of choosing the country in which to live...generally, I have to go where I have some chances to get a job. But in this case, I feel pretty lucky. I don't necessarily like where I work, but I love where I live, and my apartment is just perfect.....
......actually, I should say ALMOST perfect.....
The pond that I have on my kitchen floor when it rains, it is now a lake....it was a pond, a manageable pond, until I realized that if I don't dry continuously the rain leaking in from the outside, I have water advancing and advancing. Yesterday, I had to wait for the person in charge of repairing things in the building to come over and look at the problem before drying the water from the floor. In about eight hours of rain, I had 1 square meter of the kitchen floor, if not more, completely covered by water, which was scarily enough continuing to advance.
Good thing that I was here and not in holidays.
Good thing that I was at home.
My frustration for this problem was not so unbearable, even if I have problems of rain leaking in the kitchen since I moved in, until the man of the building came, look at the problem and told me that a) repairing what needs to be repaired is going to be expensive, b) it is the responsibility of the building and not of my landlord, and c) IF THERE ARE NO MONEY ON THE ACCOUNT OF THE BUILDING WHO KNOWS WHEN AND IF THIS PROBLEM WILL BE TAKEN CARE OF.
Now, if the rain would come in and occupy just a spot on my kitchen floor, I wouldn't be that worried, because this apartment is so amazing for anything else, that I would never move out. However, thinking that if this would happen one of the times in which I am not here, since I travel so much, probably:
1) the furniture of the kitchen would get ruined (and this would be a problem for my landlord)
2) I would have to move my furniture away to another room any time I leave
3) and that there are electrical things in the kitchen which could be dangerous if they get in touch with a lot of water......
all these things made me thinking of what I should do in case they will really not repair it soon. If this would have been a place where it rains once in a while, I could live with the risk, but since it could rain without stop for weeks in a row.....well.....
Easy thing would be moving out. But moving is stressful and more than anything else, my apartment is very peaceful, I don't have noisy neighbors, I can sleep well, I have an ocean view, I cross the road and I am on the beach where I can do sport and relax, I have a bakery next door and the supermarket just in 5 minutes walk (important point since I don't have a car), it is big so that I can host anyone who wants to visit me without anyone feeling packed like sardines, it is not too expensive, I have a garage in case of need....I can keep going on and on with all the positive points of this place.....
so, how can I solve this problem of the rain coming in and invading my kitchen if they will not fix the problem in some way?
Wednesday, May 5, 2010
traveling, traveling, traveling
I am currently in France, but traveling all the time. Meaning: one day or two I am at home, the next I am somewhere else for a couple of days (just a couple of days), then back home, then travel again and so on.All this for work.
It is quite nice to travel and I like it....but I feel a bit like a person scattered all around that as someone who is just traveling. Some days I wake up and I need some minutes to figure out where I am and what I should do that day. Plus, I am often traveling with other people for whom I am responsible.....not that easy, not always. For the last two weeks, I mostly moved here in France and I got to see some nice place and I got to have some very nice experience.
Next stop: Hungary. I am looking forward to that. We will go by car and our plan includes one day stop in Italy and one or two days stop in Slovenia (I love Slovenia!!!), all this to sample different animals. Then 4-5 days in Hungary and then back.
After that (4 days later), I will be on my way to Italy for a couple of days.
Then to Spain and I still don't know when.....
In less than a year I crossed Europe by train mostly I have no idea how many times....one days I should write all these adventures down. Everything happens so fast! Last sunday, even if the weather was very nice, I just got on my bike, visited a friend and had a long afternoon of tea, a bit of cake (a lot of it actually) and a lot of nice chat...I really needed to do something that would not have required too much moving.
I can't say that my life is boring...On the contrary, actually. But I do have a lot of responsibilities and sometimes (like yesterday for example), I feel overwhelmed.
Friday, January 8, 2010
Heading to Oregon
Italy, afternoonIf these holidays brought me something good (except the forced rest due to being sick for over a week), for sure it is a much nicer relationship with my mom. The relationship that I have with my mom is characterized by a lot of ups and downs over the years, depending on the reciprocal level of stress due to other things and regularly taken on each other when we end up in the same place.
This time, independently of the stress and of other things that may have happened, so far we had a great time (and I need to knock on wood at this point, since I will spend some more days here in Italy). I am appreciating the quality time spent with her so much, that it will be hard to leave and being far again. We went to see a ballet, we took long walks, we went to the movie theater (a few days ago to see Sherlock Holmes, which we loved!!! I really enjoyed the way the movie was directed), we improvised a lunch out, we talked a lot, we took a lot of rain, we laughed. It was just very, very nice as it hasn't been in a long time. It felt like we were again on the same wave length again.
So, as since a while I am thinking that I would like to spend some time visiting Oregon, and especially Portland (and this may be due to two bloggers (MissB and Piccola) that I follow who live in Oregon), I was thinking that I may start to plan a couple of weeks visit with my mom. I like traveling with her. We both love walking around, and she is very open in terms of food, things to see, experiences to have....I know that a couple of weeks would probably not be enough, but I don't think that I could take more time away (nor my mom could)....I don't even know if it could happen this year, but it is already nice to start to think about it, read about it and make some ideal plan!!!
Of course, Oregon bloggers, any input about best season to go there, what to see in two weeks, etc, is very welcomed!!!
Sunday, October 4, 2009
men for sale
France, lunch time
I am back to France. I have been traveling so much for work in the last weeks (and I will have to travel more in the coming weeks) that I feel a bit lost and very very tired. In any case, I enjoyed any place I have been and I met a lot of cool people. So, overall, beside the time spent on the train, on the plane and at various airport, I am happy.
I also had a chance to dance a lot, so this was even more positive.
My plan of the day is to answer to as many emails as I can. My email inbox is more than full....
Last trip was to Turkey. I got back here in France last night. I liked what I saw of Turkey...I actually saw very little, but for what I saw, I liked it. Except one thing. I was in a tourist locality, Kusadasi, where many many tourists from the UK, Germany and Holland go as soon as it starts to get colder in their countries. Among these tourists, some are groups of women in search of some tenderness and attention....I saw something similar in Madagascar. Men and women moving around desperately searching for company. And men and women from these countries offering themselves just as whatever object.
I am not living out of this world. Prostitution always existed. But one thing is to see the women in the windows in places like the Netherlands, where actually prostitution is under rules and everything at least from the outside looks controlled and more like a job than as human exploitation. Another thing is to see desperate human who look from anyone who could give them any attention.
I am especially sad when I see women who seems to not know any limit to get into bed with someone. One thing is playing and joking and flirting, another thing is to get on the knee to convince a man to spend some time with you. I am wondering if getting someone at these conditions would actually help to feel less lonely, if it is filling their loneliness what they are actually looking for. Wouldn't make it feel even more lonely to know that this person is willing to give you exactly what you want just to get something from you? It is too commercial. And so sad to see it.
We went dancing one evening and there was a group of women just looking for men there. And looking for men with such a desperate attitude to be scary. One of them actually decided that one of the guy of our group was very interesting for her and that she should have tried to have it at any cost. It was very sad to watch.
I am for the "case chiuse" as they were called in Italy, for the red light districts like in Holland, for anything where this kind of sexual exchange doesn't drive to exploitation of people who don't have enough money to live. In Madagascar, depending on the places, you can even find teenagers who offer themselves to you....a sign that they know that foreigners come there and look for them.
I don't care if people need sex and love and they are willing to pay for it. But when this drives human exploitation, this is something that I can't stand to see. I wonder if there is any way to stop this trend.
I am back to France. I have been traveling so much for work in the last weeks (and I will have to travel more in the coming weeks) that I feel a bit lost and very very tired. In any case, I enjoyed any place I have been and I met a lot of cool people. So, overall, beside the time spent on the train, on the plane and at various airport, I am happy.
I also had a chance to dance a lot, so this was even more positive.
My plan of the day is to answer to as many emails as I can. My email inbox is more than full....
Last trip was to Turkey. I got back here in France last night. I liked what I saw of Turkey...I actually saw very little, but for what I saw, I liked it. Except one thing. I was in a tourist locality, Kusadasi, where many many tourists from the UK, Germany and Holland go as soon as it starts to get colder in their countries. Among these tourists, some are groups of women in search of some tenderness and attention....I saw something similar in Madagascar. Men and women moving around desperately searching for company. And men and women from these countries offering themselves just as whatever object.
I am not living out of this world. Prostitution always existed. But one thing is to see the women in the windows in places like the Netherlands, where actually prostitution is under rules and everything at least from the outside looks controlled and more like a job than as human exploitation. Another thing is to see desperate human who look from anyone who could give them any attention.
I am especially sad when I see women who seems to not know any limit to get into bed with someone. One thing is playing and joking and flirting, another thing is to get on the knee to convince a man to spend some time with you. I am wondering if getting someone at these conditions would actually help to feel less lonely, if it is filling their loneliness what they are actually looking for. Wouldn't make it feel even more lonely to know that this person is willing to give you exactly what you want just to get something from you? It is too commercial. And so sad to see it.
We went dancing one evening and there was a group of women just looking for men there. And looking for men with such a desperate attitude to be scary. One of them actually decided that one of the guy of our group was very interesting for her and that she should have tried to have it at any cost. It was very sad to watch.
I am for the "case chiuse" as they were called in Italy, for the red light districts like in Holland, for anything where this kind of sexual exchange doesn't drive to exploitation of people who don't have enough money to live. In Madagascar, depending on the places, you can even find teenagers who offer themselves to you....a sign that they know that foreigners come there and look for them.
I don't care if people need sex and love and they are willing to pay for it. But when this drives human exploitation, this is something that I can't stand to see. I wonder if there is any way to stop this trend.
Tuesday, September 8, 2009
let's control the weather
France, morning
This is the most absurd thing that I have read in weeks and probably months.....I was just reading the news like every morning and so I came across this news of the mayor of Moscow who wants to "keep Moscow with less snow"....and how to do that? I copy the explanation directly from the article because it is absolutely unbelievable "As many as a dozen cargo aircraft are sent into the skies over Moscow before major public events, scattering silver iodide, liquid nitrogen and cement powder into rain clouds to encourage precipitation"....
I wonder, aren't we changing the climate already bad enough to keep wanting to go more and more against nature? did the mayor of Moscow considered the consequences of doing that????
This is the most absurd thing that I have read in weeks and probably months.....I was just reading the news like every morning and so I came across this news of the mayor of Moscow who wants to "keep Moscow with less snow"....and how to do that? I copy the explanation directly from the article because it is absolutely unbelievable "As many as a dozen cargo aircraft are sent into the skies over Moscow before major public events, scattering silver iodide, liquid nitrogen and cement powder into rain clouds to encourage precipitation"....
I wonder, aren't we changing the climate already bad enough to keep wanting to go more and more against nature? did the mayor of Moscow considered the consequences of doing that????
Sunday, August 30, 2009
The second choice
France, morning
I went out with three girls yesterday. Very nice people, I never met two of them before. Of course, one is leaving next week, one in a week and one at the end of the month. Our lives of people moving continuously around the world..... when you find someone with whom you would get along well, they are moving to another place.
And this goes for romantic relationships too. It takes sometimes to build something and then with the gypsy kind of life that we have, when the relationship gets strong enough and you are deeply in love for each other Puff! it is time to move. And distance relationships are painful. I don't know how people manage them. I had a relationship when I moved to Germany and it soon became a distance relationship and the distance was killing me and it was very painful. It was not fun for anyone at the end.
Then I had a very long distance relationship with the olandesino. We managed for very long time, across the world, even with an Ocean in between. But I don't know how many times in the relationship I felt heart broken, I felt that I couldn't take anymore, I felt that I would leave my job, my dreams just to be with him. I don't know how many hours I spent on skype just to talk to him and see him with the web cam. I don't know how many hours I stared at the computer screen wondering why I had to be so far from him, why we couldn't find a job in the same place, why we had to keep moving all the time, why we have to have only short contracts or short-term fellowships that wouldn't allow us to make any plan.
Distance relationships for me could work only if they are limited in time and if the distance is not so much to allow to see each other often enough. Often enough being for me at least once or twice a month. Otherwise, it will just became a growing pain and a struggling.
How did I get in this status of mind? Because one of the things I talked about last night with these girls was exactly this, how to deal with distance relationships. And the positions were pretty much clear:
- You block yourself, avoid to fall in love for anyone and get attached
- You keep having "fun" relationship with people who are ok but for whom you don't feel that much, so that when you will leave there will be not pain and something to carry on with a distance
- You try anyway, even knowing that probably will hurt you like hell at the moment that you will be apart
If you didn't try a distance relationship, you can't understand what I am talking about. And I am not writing this out of arrogance. But because I heard so many times from my friends and family things like: you have to be strong, it is not so bad, at least you have each others, I think I could do it, I think I could manage, you suffer only because you are too needy....and things like this.
I may be needy and probably I am. But meeting more and more people with a life-style similar to mine, you understand that it is not just you who can't deal well with distance in a romantic relationship. They are just hard to deal with if you love someone very deeply. Someone manages them (and they have all my admiration).
Someone decides that she/he can't take it anymore. And if this goes with the thought that the person you leave was the "person you wanted to spend your life with" then you will keep loving this person for very long time.
One of these girls yesterday told me that his ex- was the person she thought just right for him. But it didn't work because they were apart for so long that it was hard to keep a healthy relationship. So, finally she realized that she had to give herself a chance and move on and try to find someone else, even if this person would probably ends up to be a second choice. Even if she will never stop to love her ex-. Even if she will miss him. Even if she will have moments in which she will thinks "why?".
Until one day in which she will find someone that from just being a second choice will became so important in her life that she will not want to be with anyone else but him.
I went out with three girls yesterday. Very nice people, I never met two of them before. Of course, one is leaving next week, one in a week and one at the end of the month. Our lives of people moving continuously around the world..... when you find someone with whom you would get along well, they are moving to another place.
And this goes for romantic relationships too. It takes sometimes to build something and then with the gypsy kind of life that we have, when the relationship gets strong enough and you are deeply in love for each other Puff! it is time to move. And distance relationships are painful. I don't know how people manage them. I had a relationship when I moved to Germany and it soon became a distance relationship and the distance was killing me and it was very painful. It was not fun for anyone at the end.
Then I had a very long distance relationship with the olandesino. We managed for very long time, across the world, even with an Ocean in between. But I don't know how many times in the relationship I felt heart broken, I felt that I couldn't take anymore, I felt that I would leave my job, my dreams just to be with him. I don't know how many hours I spent on skype just to talk to him and see him with the web cam. I don't know how many hours I stared at the computer screen wondering why I had to be so far from him, why we couldn't find a job in the same place, why we had to keep moving all the time, why we have to have only short contracts or short-term fellowships that wouldn't allow us to make any plan.
Distance relationships for me could work only if they are limited in time and if the distance is not so much to allow to see each other often enough. Often enough being for me at least once or twice a month. Otherwise, it will just became a growing pain and a struggling.
How did I get in this status of mind? Because one of the things I talked about last night with these girls was exactly this, how to deal with distance relationships. And the positions were pretty much clear:
- You block yourself, avoid to fall in love for anyone and get attached
- You keep having "fun" relationship with people who are ok but for whom you don't feel that much, so that when you will leave there will be not pain and something to carry on with a distance
- You try anyway, even knowing that probably will hurt you like hell at the moment that you will be apart
If you didn't try a distance relationship, you can't understand what I am talking about. And I am not writing this out of arrogance. But because I heard so many times from my friends and family things like: you have to be strong, it is not so bad, at least you have each others, I think I could do it, I think I could manage, you suffer only because you are too needy....and things like this.
I may be needy and probably I am. But meeting more and more people with a life-style similar to mine, you understand that it is not just you who can't deal well with distance in a romantic relationship. They are just hard to deal with if you love someone very deeply. Someone manages them (and they have all my admiration).
Someone decides that she/he can't take it anymore. And if this goes with the thought that the person you leave was the "person you wanted to spend your life with" then you will keep loving this person for very long time.
One of these girls yesterday told me that his ex- was the person she thought just right for him. But it didn't work because they were apart for so long that it was hard to keep a healthy relationship. So, finally she realized that she had to give herself a chance and move on and try to find someone else, even if this person would probably ends up to be a second choice. Even if she will never stop to love her ex-. Even if she will miss him. Even if she will have moments in which she will thinks "why?".
Until one day in which she will find someone that from just being a second choice will became so important in her life that she will not want to be with anyone else but him.
Thursday, August 20, 2009
My head and the planes
France, afternoon
I still have to have lunch today. It is so hot that I could fry an egg on my head....I am surprised that I don't see smoke coming out of my ears yet.
I got back from Germany. By the end of my first day there, I started to like the place where I was. Nice people, a lot of green spaces, clean, cheap and good food (I managed to also get something without any milk product!!!)....so, not bad overall.
I don't think I will get the job...unfortunately...they were looking for someone like me but also with more experience in another field...and they also got a lot of good candidates for the position...we will see...
Anyway, I got back by plane. The plane trip cost me more than going to Thailand probably and back. Europe in the summer...crazy expensive! I was also so lucky that I had to spend 6 hours at the Charles de Gaulle airport in Paris to wait for my connection. CDG airport is probably one of the worst big airport of the world....badly designed, uncomfortable chairs, not enough things to do.....By the end of the second hours there I was getting in the status of mind of leaving and probably losing my suitcase and got on a train to get back home...Fortunately I had a good book with me and so at the end I made it.
At the interview they asked me if I was married. I got very uncomfortable with such a personal question....but after that, as I new other people there and they also knew the olandesino, they asked me how he was doing....Delicate topic. I am still not able to talk about it, and just a simple question makes me get tears in my eyes and of course when you are among colleagues, you don't want to look over-sensitive....pfffffffffffffffffff......
Today I am in a day of total frenzy to avoid to think.....
So, I got back by plane and I managed to hit my head badly in parts of the planes multiple times. I don't know if this happens frequently also to other people. But for how much I like planes and flying (and I do like both things a lot), my head can always find some extremities on which to bump into very strongly. Yesterday was not so bad. But I should learn to be more carefull, after that I already experienced a bad head concussion for a similar accident on my way back from South Africa some years ago.
Because of the concussion, not only I had terrible headake and problems with body balance, but I also had days of bad nausea. I got quite scared. I had to spend a few days in bed, without any kind of stress. Of course that was not my first head concussion and it will be not probably the last one. It seems that I have a great talent in badly bumping my head against walls, plane parts, and any solid structure that happens to cross my way............
Maybe this can explain why lately I can't remember things anymore and I feel that my intelligence is rapidly decreasing :-(
I still have to have lunch today. It is so hot that I could fry an egg on my head....I am surprised that I don't see smoke coming out of my ears yet.
I got back from Germany. By the end of my first day there, I started to like the place where I was. Nice people, a lot of green spaces, clean, cheap and good food (I managed to also get something without any milk product!!!)....so, not bad overall.
I don't think I will get the job...unfortunately...they were looking for someone like me but also with more experience in another field...and they also got a lot of good candidates for the position...we will see...
Anyway, I got back by plane. The plane trip cost me more than going to Thailand probably and back. Europe in the summer...crazy expensive! I was also so lucky that I had to spend 6 hours at the Charles de Gaulle airport in Paris to wait for my connection. CDG airport is probably one of the worst big airport of the world....badly designed, uncomfortable chairs, not enough things to do.....By the end of the second hours there I was getting in the status of mind of leaving and probably losing my suitcase and got on a train to get back home...Fortunately I had a good book with me and so at the end I made it.
At the interview they asked me if I was married. I got very uncomfortable with such a personal question....but after that, as I new other people there and they also knew the olandesino, they asked me how he was doing....Delicate topic. I am still not able to talk about it, and just a simple question makes me get tears in my eyes and of course when you are among colleagues, you don't want to look over-sensitive....pfffffffffffffffffff......
Today I am in a day of total frenzy to avoid to think.....
So, I got back by plane and I managed to hit my head badly in parts of the planes multiple times. I don't know if this happens frequently also to other people. But for how much I like planes and flying (and I do like both things a lot), my head can always find some extremities on which to bump into very strongly. Yesterday was not so bad. But I should learn to be more carefull, after that I already experienced a bad head concussion for a similar accident on my way back from South Africa some years ago.
Because of the concussion, not only I had terrible headake and problems with body balance, but I also had days of bad nausea. I got quite scared. I had to spend a few days in bed, without any kind of stress. Of course that was not my first head concussion and it will be not probably the last one. It seems that I have a great talent in badly bumping my head against walls, plane parts, and any solid structure that happens to cross my way............
Maybe this can explain why lately I can't remember things anymore and I feel that my intelligence is rapidly decreasing :-(
Tuesday, August 18, 2009
ohne butter, ohne kase
Germany, lunch time
When you are allergic to something and you have to travel to a country where you don't speak the language, where they don't speak any of the language that you know and where they put this "something" everywhere, eating can became quite a challenge.
I don't speak German. I just know a few words here and there. And as it is lunch time, I was trying to get a sandwich without butter and cheese. It turned out, this is a very complicated task. Much more of a challenge than doing the same thing in France, where at least I speak the language.
I ended up buying just some plain bread and water, after getting something that I thought to be harmless (I asked "was is das?" what is that?, and then "mit or ohne butter und kase?" thinking that they could understand that I was asking if it was with or without butter or cheese) and intead turned out to be made with butter or containing milk....because, and here my mistake, asking if it is with or without butter or cheese doesn't
1) include milk in the list and
2) mean that I am also asking if it is made with some of these ingredients....
So, I got sick....a few hours before my job interview....not too bad, not too bad....
If I will have to move here, I will definitively learn German as quickly as possible if I don't want to spend every day sick.
In any case, being in Germany again after many years and being in another part of Germany, made me realize what it makes me easily sad here. Everything is, or looks, perfect. Well organized, functional, clean. It crushes against the messiness of my life. This country would work perfectly for my mom. But I am more of a far from perfection person and being here just makes me feel even more out of place than I normally feel. My Italianiness doesn't fit with this perfection. Of course, when I lived in Germany I loved the fact that things were working the way you hope they would. That people are professional, that things are clean, that there are plenty of green spaces and bike roads....but when in a country everything seems to work so well, what is it left to complain about? sure it makes your daily life easier, not always worrying about a possible coming strike that would paralyze the entire country for months (like in France) or not being able to see a dentist for weeks because in August nobody works, but still....I need a bit of "out of perfection"....
I guess that this is one of things I loved most about living in Holland. Things work and yet, you also get the feeling that the rules are not so strict and feel a bit free to be messy or different in your own way....
In any case, in France I always tell everyone how great was to live in Germany where daily things actually work. And here, I feel that I miss the messiness of France....I guess that this says a lot about me.....
When you are allergic to something and you have to travel to a country where you don't speak the language, where they don't speak any of the language that you know and where they put this "something" everywhere, eating can became quite a challenge.
I don't speak German. I just know a few words here and there. And as it is lunch time, I was trying to get a sandwich without butter and cheese. It turned out, this is a very complicated task. Much more of a challenge than doing the same thing in France, where at least I speak the language.
I ended up buying just some plain bread and water, after getting something that I thought to be harmless (I asked "was is das?" what is that?, and then "mit or ohne butter und kase?" thinking that they could understand that I was asking if it was with or without butter or cheese) and intead turned out to be made with butter or containing milk....because, and here my mistake, asking if it is with or without butter or cheese doesn't
1) include milk in the list and
2) mean that I am also asking if it is made with some of these ingredients....
So, I got sick....a few hours before my job interview....not too bad, not too bad....
If I will have to move here, I will definitively learn German as quickly as possible if I don't want to spend every day sick.
In any case, being in Germany again after many years and being in another part of Germany, made me realize what it makes me easily sad here. Everything is, or looks, perfect. Well organized, functional, clean. It crushes against the messiness of my life. This country would work perfectly for my mom. But I am more of a far from perfection person and being here just makes me feel even more out of place than I normally feel. My Italianiness doesn't fit with this perfection. Of course, when I lived in Germany I loved the fact that things were working the way you hope they would. That people are professional, that things are clean, that there are plenty of green spaces and bike roads....but when in a country everything seems to work so well, what is it left to complain about? sure it makes your daily life easier, not always worrying about a possible coming strike that would paralyze the entire country for months (like in France) or not being able to see a dentist for weeks because in August nobody works, but still....I need a bit of "out of perfection"....
I guess that this is one of things I loved most about living in Holland. Things work and yet, you also get the feeling that the rules are not so strict and feel a bit free to be messy or different in your own way....
In any case, in France I always tell everyone how great was to live in Germany where daily things actually work. And here, I feel that I miss the messiness of France....I guess that this says a lot about me.....
Friday, July 24, 2009
My ideal daily escape
Italy, morning
Last time I had some holidays, some real holidays, meaning some full days in a row without working, without checking emails, without thinking about work, it was June 2006. I went to Lanzarote with the olandesino and I loved everything of it: the place, the holidays, being there with the olandesino.
So, last time I had some days of relax one after the other was three years ago. After that, the instability of my job and the large amount of work things that I had and have to do to make sure to keep having some kind of job made impossible any kind of relaxing fairly long (which means at least a week) holidays.
Not being able to have that, I am now enjoying and fully absorb any sunday or any single moment or half day in which I don't have to work. It is not the same of course, but it helps to not get completely crazy. In these days that I am in Italy, working from morning to evening, I try to make sure that every day I have at least an hour to go to the outdoor swimming pool or to read a good book (I love the books of Carofiglio), or to chat with my friends or to go to the sea. It makes a difference in my day and it gives me the energy to face the next day of crazy work again....
I wish I could take a holidays again in South Africa. I often think about when we were there, the olandesino and I. I loved it. Some areas are very dangerous, but the ones that are not, are just simply amazing.
Last time I had some holidays, some real holidays, meaning some full days in a row without working, without checking emails, without thinking about work, it was June 2006. I went to Lanzarote with the olandesino and I loved everything of it: the place, the holidays, being there with the olandesino.
So, last time I had some days of relax one after the other was three years ago. After that, the instability of my job and the large amount of work things that I had and have to do to make sure to keep having some kind of job made impossible any kind of relaxing fairly long (which means at least a week) holidays.
Not being able to have that, I am now enjoying and fully absorb any sunday or any single moment or half day in which I don't have to work. It is not the same of course, but it helps to not get completely crazy. In these days that I am in Italy, working from morning to evening, I try to make sure that every day I have at least an hour to go to the outdoor swimming pool or to read a good book (I love the books of Carofiglio), or to chat with my friends or to go to the sea. It makes a difference in my day and it gives me the energy to face the next day of crazy work again....
I wish I could take a holidays again in South Africa. I often think about when we were there, the olandesino and I. I loved it. Some areas are very dangerous, but the ones that are not, are just simply amazing.
Sunday, June 21, 2009
The best excuses for not needing to shower
France, night
A lot of people seem to arrive on my blog typing "why French don't shower" and then they end up on my post.
Because we are now in the best season to fully appreciate the mixture of natural body odors of whom doesn't shower since days, I decided to list here the best excuses I heard for not showering (and not only from the French):
1) (Currently very common) It is hot outside, so if I shower and go out I will sweat again. I may just not shower till I don't need to go out.
2) (following the previous one) I stay at home, I don't need to shower.
3) (for the winter) It is cold outside, I don't sweat, so I don't need to shower.
4) (the ecologist) Water is a resource to not be wasted. I like to think that if I don't shower, I will help the planet. (this excuse was particularly disappointing as I heard it from a very cute German guy....who unfortunately stank like a goat!)
5) (the self-convinced) I don't sweat. Taking one shower a week is enough for me. The rest of the days I just use deodorant/perfume.
6) (the scientist) Body odors are part of us. They are natural. Humans are the only ones in the animal kingdom who try to cover body odors with artificial things.
7) (for the night people) I like to shower in the morning, it helps me to wake up. Unfortunately, I am always running late, so I don't have enough time to shower most of the days.
8) (for the morning people) I like to shower before bed, so I go to bed clean. Unfortunately, often it is so late by the time that I go to bed, that I just don't shower.
9) (reason for not loving to shower suggested by Nicole in the comment to this post) Not being a big shower-fan because after we have to do the hair.
These are the best excuses for not showering that came up to my mind just now. I will update this post if I will hear or remember new excuses. If you know any good one, please let me know!
I thought of this topic for my night post, as today in France it is the "fete de la musique" day. Basically a day of the music. Very cool. But also an occasion to come very close to a lot of very smelly people.
A lot of people seem to arrive on my blog typing "why French don't shower" and then they end up on my post.
Because we are now in the best season to fully appreciate the mixture of natural body odors of whom doesn't shower since days, I decided to list here the best excuses I heard for not showering (and not only from the French):
1) (Currently very common) It is hot outside, so if I shower and go out I will sweat again. I may just not shower till I don't need to go out.
2) (following the previous one) I stay at home, I don't need to shower.
3) (for the winter) It is cold outside, I don't sweat, so I don't need to shower.
4) (the ecologist) Water is a resource to not be wasted. I like to think that if I don't shower, I will help the planet. (this excuse was particularly disappointing as I heard it from a very cute German guy....who unfortunately stank like a goat!)
5) (the self-convinced) I don't sweat. Taking one shower a week is enough for me. The rest of the days I just use deodorant/perfume.
6) (the scientist) Body odors are part of us. They are natural. Humans are the only ones in the animal kingdom who try to cover body odors with artificial things.
7) (for the night people) I like to shower in the morning, it helps me to wake up. Unfortunately, I am always running late, so I don't have enough time to shower most of the days.
8) (for the morning people) I like to shower before bed, so I go to bed clean. Unfortunately, often it is so late by the time that I go to bed, that I just don't shower.
9) (reason for not loving to shower suggested by Nicole in the comment to this post) Not being a big shower-fan because after we have to do the hair.
These are the best excuses for not showering that came up to my mind just now. I will update this post if I will hear or remember new excuses. If you know any good one, please let me know!
I thought of this topic for my night post, as today in France it is the "fete de la musique" day. Basically a day of the music. Very cool. But also an occasion to come very close to a lot of very smelly people.
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
summer feeling
France, evening
I didn't get too much sleep lately, I am running around all the time, I am very very busy, a lot of difficult/annoying/problematic things happened in the last days and yet, except for a short moment yesterday, my mood didn't collapse yet.
I guess I just love this weather. I guess I am a very Mediterranean person. Give me some sun and a bit of wind and I am totally happy. I am going everywhere by walk in these days, even if this means, like this morning, having to wake up an hour earlier than if I would have taken the tram. But I love to walk in this weather. I enjoy the sun on my skin. I feel that my skin even smells different (well, beside when I am totally sweaty of course). The olandesino always made fun of me, because as a truly Mediterranean person, who is not used to very cold weather, I never know how to dress in a cold winter day. It doesn't matter if I experienced -30 C when I was living in Germany, if I experienced a very cold winter in the USA. I am just clueless on what to wear when it comes to face a cold winter day. I just normally pile up a lot of different clothes, which at the end make me look more like the Michelin man than like a woman.
But put me in a sunny place, like whatever spot close to the Mediterranean coast and I know exactly how to dress, what to wear and look nice in a simple, comfortable way. It is amazing. I always thought for example that Dutch girls dress very well in the winter, but then they have no style at all when it gets warmer. I guess they are used to live with a wet, cold weather. Me, instead, I am used to a nice, warm, windy weather and feel totally at my place with it.
I remember that one day I got to the office in the USA and Scott told me (very openly) that I was looking awful. I still remember that it was cold and wet and so my goal was to feel warm and not get soaked and not necessarily to look good. I guess that I reached my point in terms of feeling warm. But I probably also looked awful as he said.
I applied for a job in Germany. In the North of Germany to be exact. The job sounds quite good and I would have to work with some nice people there....but the weather....oh, gosh.....If I could chose, I want with all my heart to just stay here!!! I am even close to the sea here!!!
All this can help me in facing the every day problems in a much better way, believe me!
I didn't get too much sleep lately, I am running around all the time, I am very very busy, a lot of difficult/annoying/problematic things happened in the last days and yet, except for a short moment yesterday, my mood didn't collapse yet.
I guess I just love this weather. I guess I am a very Mediterranean person. Give me some sun and a bit of wind and I am totally happy. I am going everywhere by walk in these days, even if this means, like this morning, having to wake up an hour earlier than if I would have taken the tram. But I love to walk in this weather. I enjoy the sun on my skin. I feel that my skin even smells different (well, beside when I am totally sweaty of course). The olandesino always made fun of me, because as a truly Mediterranean person, who is not used to very cold weather, I never know how to dress in a cold winter day. It doesn't matter if I experienced -30 C when I was living in Germany, if I experienced a very cold winter in the USA. I am just clueless on what to wear when it comes to face a cold winter day. I just normally pile up a lot of different clothes, which at the end make me look more like the Michelin man than like a woman.
But put me in a sunny place, like whatever spot close to the Mediterranean coast and I know exactly how to dress, what to wear and look nice in a simple, comfortable way. It is amazing. I always thought for example that Dutch girls dress very well in the winter, but then they have no style at all when it gets warmer. I guess they are used to live with a wet, cold weather. Me, instead, I am used to a nice, warm, windy weather and feel totally at my place with it.
I remember that one day I got to the office in the USA and Scott told me (very openly) that I was looking awful. I still remember that it was cold and wet and so my goal was to feel warm and not get soaked and not necessarily to look good. I guess that I reached my point in terms of feeling warm. But I probably also looked awful as he said.
I applied for a job in Germany. In the North of Germany to be exact. The job sounds quite good and I would have to work with some nice people there....but the weather....oh, gosh.....If I could chose, I want with all my heart to just stay here!!! I am even close to the sea here!!!
All this can help me in facing the every day problems in a much better way, believe me!
Sunday, April 26, 2009
this is crazy
France, evening
I am sure that tomorrow when I will go to the toxicology lab to get some test for the arsenic contamination, because I don't feel well and I have weird symptoms, they will also test me for this new wave of flue who killed already a lot of people in Mexico.
I just read this article in the NewScientist. Ok that being prepared is always better than being unprepared, but isn't this article contributing to create panic? and isn't more difficult to keep a situation under control when people are in panic?
I am sure that tomorrow when I will go to the toxicology lab to get some test for the arsenic contamination, because I don't feel well and I have weird symptoms, they will also test me for this new wave of flue who killed already a lot of people in Mexico.
I just read this article in the NewScientist. Ok that being prepared is always better than being unprepared, but isn't this article contributing to create panic? and isn't more difficult to keep a situation under control when people are in panic?
Wednesday, April 22, 2009
SF
Usa, evening
Getting closer and closer to my departure from San Francisco. I will miss here. A lot. I like San Francisco. I like to walk on the beach along the Ocean. I like the weather. I like the possibility to do many outdoor activities. I like the calm that you can breath here as soon as you leave the downtown area (where you actually don't even need to go).
I feel home here. And I don't even know why since I never lived here.
I understand why the olandesino always tried to convince me to both get a job here and move here together. It is a wonderful city and a very beautiful area.
I am happy to go back to my things, my apartment, familiar things. But I am really sad about leaving here. Very sad already. I enjoyed being here a lot.
Getting closer and closer to my departure from San Francisco. I will miss here. A lot. I like San Francisco. I like to walk on the beach along the Ocean. I like the weather. I like the possibility to do many outdoor activities. I like the calm that you can breath here as soon as you leave the downtown area (where you actually don't even need to go).
I feel home here. And I don't even know why since I never lived here.
I understand why the olandesino always tried to convince me to both get a job here and move here together. It is a wonderful city and a very beautiful area.
I am happy to go back to my things, my apartment, familiar things. But I am really sad about leaving here. Very sad already. I enjoyed being here a lot.
Sunday, January 18, 2009
the drunk man and the Romanian
France, morning
If there is one thing I really love here, it is the possibility of getting fresh bread every morning on every day of the week. I really like that. I wish anyway to have a working oven, so that sometimes I could bake my own bread or a bit of corn bread.
Last night I went for a dinner to a friend place. We were about 10 people, most of them working together and me and the boyfriend of one of these girls doing something else. I really like this friend of mine. I think she is really cool. However, after about 1 hour and half I got bored and I didn't leave just because I thought that a) it would have been not polite b) the plan was to go dancing after dinner and I really needed some dancing to release too much energy. After three hours, I was extremely bored. They all drunk a lot of wine and the conversation turned into something not minimally interesting. And I started to wonder, how can we talk so much about absolutely nothing? and how can people talk so much and don't actually listen to what other people say? I more and more get the impression that a lot of people just look at life passing by, finding a way to get to the next day, without actually living that much.
As I said in one of my previous blog, I include myself among those people. The thing is, they seem happy living in this way. Which is fine for me. Anyone has to live his life the way he likes it. But I honestly would like something more than that for myself. At about past midnight, when I was ready to call it a night, they decided to go dancing. Ok, why not? we walked to this cool place and we started dancing. Fifteen minutes after we got in, my friend was terribly sick for having drunk too much and so we left the place pretty soon, which was fine for me, since I was anyway tired.
During this evening a few things happened and I realized that:
1) I was so bored during the dinner that I got to think that if people are fine just hanging in there, working, eating and sleeping (and drinking a lot of alcohol). I don't want that to be my life, even if right now it is.
2) the thing that everyone is interesting and unique in his own way is not something I agree on. Yes, I am generally interested in people and in knowing more about them and listening to what they do, they think, they are. But I also think that not too many people are so unique or interesting, because they often just hang in there without actually living.
3) If you don't drink alcohol and smoke you are considered a-social and boring. From this assumptions, there are other similar ones that follow. This means, that people look at me in this case with prejudices in their head already.
4) I am wasting a lot of time in my life that I could spend in a much better way.
5) I don't have that much fun.
I guess that when you are extremely down like I am lately and I have been even more in the past days, either you sink or you start to re-think about your life. And I am going for the second one so far, fortunately. I am an outdoor, amazingly energetic person and instead all what I do is eat, work, sleep, go for a tea with friends, sport. Which is fine, but I keep missing something and this makes me extremely nervous and agitated. The something I miss is not only to have someone special in my life, but also that I am not following my real nature that much. And I keep postponing and postponing things to when I will have this or that.
Which means, I just hang on and pass from one day to the other without actually living that much. If I was happy with that, then no problem, but I am not. Instead I am always agitated, feeling I have to move, I have to escape, dreaming all the time of what I could do if.........
A friend of mine the other day told me that I invest so much in my future happiness, that I actually don't care that much about being happy and enjoy the present. Which is absolutely true.
I am not sure in what all this thinking will be translated. I am really good in the theory, much worst in the practice. We will see.
Last thing. One the way back from this dancing place my friends and I met a drunk man. He came to us to ask for some money to pay his drug addiction. He had probably three teeth left in his mouth. He was probably around 40, if not younger. One of us thought that he was funny and he gave him 2 euros. Then this drunk man started to chat with us and asked to the guy who gave him the money where he was from. He said Romania. Then the drunk man gave him back the 2 euros saying that he got plenty of money during the day already (shaking his pocket while saying this and he probably really had quite some money in there judging from the noise of the coins) and that Romanian need those money more then he did. And he left. We stand in there speechless. Few minutes later, the drunk man came back to give to the Romanian guy other 2 euros. When we said that we didn't want to accept his money and that it was fine and good night, he got really angry, put the 2 euro coin in the pocket of my girl friend and started to say things like "fuck you" "au cul" and insulting us. I was actually a bit scared by his nonsense behavior and I happily went home and hide in bed.
If there is one thing I really love here, it is the possibility of getting fresh bread every morning on every day of the week. I really like that. I wish anyway to have a working oven, so that sometimes I could bake my own bread or a bit of corn bread.
Last night I went for a dinner to a friend place. We were about 10 people, most of them working together and me and the boyfriend of one of these girls doing something else. I really like this friend of mine. I think she is really cool. However, after about 1 hour and half I got bored and I didn't leave just because I thought that a) it would have been not polite b) the plan was to go dancing after dinner and I really needed some dancing to release too much energy. After three hours, I was extremely bored. They all drunk a lot of wine and the conversation turned into something not minimally interesting. And I started to wonder, how can we talk so much about absolutely nothing? and how can people talk so much and don't actually listen to what other people say? I more and more get the impression that a lot of people just look at life passing by, finding a way to get to the next day, without actually living that much.
As I said in one of my previous blog, I include myself among those people. The thing is, they seem happy living in this way. Which is fine for me. Anyone has to live his life the way he likes it. But I honestly would like something more than that for myself. At about past midnight, when I was ready to call it a night, they decided to go dancing. Ok, why not? we walked to this cool place and we started dancing. Fifteen minutes after we got in, my friend was terribly sick for having drunk too much and so we left the place pretty soon, which was fine for me, since I was anyway tired.
During this evening a few things happened and I realized that:
1) I was so bored during the dinner that I got to think that if people are fine just hanging in there, working, eating and sleeping (and drinking a lot of alcohol). I don't want that to be my life, even if right now it is.
2) the thing that everyone is interesting and unique in his own way is not something I agree on. Yes, I am generally interested in people and in knowing more about them and listening to what they do, they think, they are. But I also think that not too many people are so unique or interesting, because they often just hang in there without actually living.
3) If you don't drink alcohol and smoke you are considered a-social and boring. From this assumptions, there are other similar ones that follow. This means, that people look at me in this case with prejudices in their head already.
4) I am wasting a lot of time in my life that I could spend in a much better way.
5) I don't have that much fun.
I guess that when you are extremely down like I am lately and I have been even more in the past days, either you sink or you start to re-think about your life. And I am going for the second one so far, fortunately. I am an outdoor, amazingly energetic person and instead all what I do is eat, work, sleep, go for a tea with friends, sport. Which is fine, but I keep missing something and this makes me extremely nervous and agitated. The something I miss is not only to have someone special in my life, but also that I am not following my real nature that much. And I keep postponing and postponing things to when I will have this or that.
Which means, I just hang on and pass from one day to the other without actually living that much. If I was happy with that, then no problem, but I am not. Instead I am always agitated, feeling I have to move, I have to escape, dreaming all the time of what I could do if.........
A friend of mine the other day told me that I invest so much in my future happiness, that I actually don't care that much about being happy and enjoy the present. Which is absolutely true.
I am not sure in what all this thinking will be translated. I am really good in the theory, much worst in the practice. We will see.
Last thing. One the way back from this dancing place my friends and I met a drunk man. He came to us to ask for some money to pay his drug addiction. He had probably three teeth left in his mouth. He was probably around 40, if not younger. One of us thought that he was funny and he gave him 2 euros. Then this drunk man started to chat with us and asked to the guy who gave him the money where he was from. He said Romania. Then the drunk man gave him back the 2 euros saying that he got plenty of money during the day already (shaking his pocket while saying this and he probably really had quite some money in there judging from the noise of the coins) and that Romanian need those money more then he did. And he left. We stand in there speechless. Few minutes later, the drunk man came back to give to the Romanian guy other 2 euros. When we said that we didn't want to accept his money and that it was fine and good night, he got really angry, put the 2 euro coin in the pocket of my girl friend and started to say things like "fuck you" "au cul" and insulting us. I was actually a bit scared by his nonsense behavior and I happily went home and hide in bed.
Tuesday, December 30, 2008
traveling
Italy, morningThis morning my mom's cat, Camilla, is really agitated...maybe she feels my mood...she just climbed from inside my mom Christmas tree and now she is playing with any pen or paper on the table where I am working (and also with my cellphone).
I keep feeling lost, I keep feeling empty and I hate the New Year Eve coming closer. I am not ready. I will miss someone special tomorrow night. At the end I will spend the evening with my sister, her husband, my mom and other couples friend of my sister. Lots of couples. I didn't find a better option. Fortunately, my mom and a friend of her will be there too and they are both single, so I will be not the only one....even if of course, it is different..
I decided that to push away this feeling of loneliness and emptiness, I will take a long d-tour to come back home to France. I will spend some days traveling a bit around here in Europe. Not that traveling will allow me to escape my feelings, but maybe it will distract me. Even if loneliness normally travels faster than I do and follow me wherever I go...
Monday, December 8, 2008
flight
France, night
at least today, even if the day turned out to be quite crappy, I concluded it finally buying the flight ticket for San Francisco. Which is something good!
Now I will go to read a bit of my book and then to sleep!
at least today, even if the day turned out to be quite crappy, I concluded it finally buying the flight ticket for San Francisco. Which is something good!
Now I will go to read a bit of my book and then to sleep!
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