for the vagrants

Los retratos de una vida.

2011-12-26T00:00:00.000+01:00

“Are we to paint what’s on the face, what’s inside the face, or what’s behind it?”
- Pablo Picasso

Puertecillo

2011-12-18T22:56:00.000+01:00

The In-Between.

2011-11-29T20:46:00.001+01:00

After reaching the two-week mark, I'm starting to notice a slight shift in my perception of life here. While Santiago remains an immense, unconquered maze of new discovery, certain faces, places, and daily habits have started to become much more comfortable and familiar. But while the house has started to feel more like home and certain rituals have become routine, I feel this overwhelming sense that I am somehow living in the present while my heart is still so firmly attached to the past, as though I haven't necessarily embarked upon a new chapter of life here, but rather, that I've left and entire story unfinished and am now scrambling to begin another. I'm sure this is all just part of the process of acclimatization, that eventually things will begin to feel more normal but for now I seem to let my thoughts drift back home just a little too often. And if I try to concentrate on the here and now, I see only an obscure and dauntingly vast expanse of time ahead of me.

This is, of course, not to say that I haven't been enjoying myself here. Quite the contrary, in fact. I fill my days alone here with little excursions into the city, running, writing, reading in the shade of the apricot tree in the garden, working on my CV and drafting motivation letters, experimenting in the kitchen, and loosely sketching out plans for weekend trips to La Serena, Valparaiso, Mendoza and Buenos Aires. G and I also enjoy the occasional dinner out or drinks in the city with Sebastian & Co., have discovered that the best and cheapest coffee to be had is at the literary cafe in Parque Bustamante (definite favorite), and have a whole host of interesting things which we want to check out in the coming weeks, including the largest exhibition of Picasso prints in the world(!) in Providencia.

No, life is certainly good here. It's more than that, really. Maybe it's simply a question of letting my heart catch up, of not expecting too much too fast, of accepting certain inalienable truths. No one ever said this would be easy and the beginning is always the hardest part anyway. I just hope that the amazement and wonder with the new won't eventually wear off and leave me standing there watching my footprints disappearing in the sand behind me without being able to see the path ahead. Only time will tell, but I get the distinct feeling that, more than anything, it's going to be up to me.

Old faces, new places

2011-11-23T16:39:00.001+01:00

I ventured down to Lastarria last night, which is a beautiful neighborhood near Universidad la Católica, to meet up with an old acquaintance from college for drinks. Jillian first came to the city on exchange back in 2008, fell in love with a Chilean boy and eventually made the jump across the Atlantic to start a new life here with him. She now works for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and as I'd hoped, has blossomed in her 2.5 years here into a savvy Santiaguina with lots of tips and insider knowledge on how to find ones way. We grabbed a table on the terrace of Casa Lastarria and poured our hearts out over cocktails, ceviche, empanadas and, in true Dutch style, patat met mayo. It was lovely, not only to see a familiar face here, but also to feel so open and relaxed with someone I'd never really spent all that much time with before. It felt like meeting up with a good friend that I'd simply lost track of for a few years.

Monumento Iglesia de la Vera Cruz (Barrio Lastarria).

It's a wonderful thing to be able to listen to impressions of a place from someone with a shared cultural vantage point. Putting experiences into context becomes a lot easier and it's also vaguely reassuring to know that certain perceptions were actually spot on and not just figments of my imagination borne out of insecurity.

For example, within the first days here I had noticed that Chileans seem to do a lot of staring. Not necessarily in the rude, leering sense of the word, but certainly allowing their gaze to rest upon you for extended (and sometimes uncomfortable) periods of time. Granted, I notice it a lot more when in the company of G, but then again a nearly 2-meter tall, blond, blue-eyed Dutchman seems to attract attention just about anywhere outside of northern Europe. But even without him in tow, I often find myself meeting eyes with someone in the metro or passing by on the street, only to lose the staring contest after a few seconds. I found it all a bit disconcerting in the beginning, as back in Amsterdam you basically have to stand on your head, naked and with a whistle in your mouth to draw even a casual second glance.

Jillian, however, assures me that this is, indeed, very Chilean and simply something I'll have to get used to, much like the hoots, hollers and generous compliments given to all women, but especially lavishly bestowed upon foreigners. Bus drivers, butchers, concierges and random, passing strangers won't hesitate for a second in calling you any number of flattering names or clucking their enthusiastic approval as you hobble down the street lugging a load of grocery bags. It's completely different than anything I'm used to, but always seems warm, casual and genuine, never obscene or laced with any ominous undertone.

Another suspicion which received confirmation was that it will remain quite a task to get by with my Spanish in these first few months. The beautiful, rolling Castellano laced with tinges of Andaluz I worked so hard to perfect back in Spain is met here with blank stares or pained winces of non-comprehension. Chilean Spanish is actually very much like Santiago- fast, a bit rough, and loaded with unfamiliar twists and turns in the form of quirky vocabulary and bizarre colloquialisms. Palta, pololo, carrete, cachai? Err, I suppose. I can't even imagine the mess of accents and slangy jargon I'll be speaking by the end of my time here. But as they say- never a dull moment!

The conversation weaved back and forth between here and Holland, now and then, the plausible and the inconceivable, until before we knew it we'd crept past midnight and it was time to part ways again. It's funny how life brings people and places together, then pulls them apart again, only to reunite them at strange and seemingly random moments in the future. Perhaps its way of letting ou see only fractions of the whole so as not to ruin the surprise of the bigger picture. I hope I'll be seeing a lot more of Jillian in the coming months, but in the meantime, we're off to Tiramisu this evening with Sebastian and a few of G's other colleagues. And as nearly every experience here thus far, I'm sure it will be one to remember.

Las Primeras Impresiones

2011-11-23T14:36:00.001+01:00

It's been just over a week now and we've seen, tasted, and experienced much more than we could have imagined before leaving. In fact, I can hardly believe that just 10 days ago, we were stuffing our belongings into boxes, tugging on our winter coats and running off to the post office in Amsterdam.

We arrived last Friday night after a 28-hour journey through Germany, the Dominican Republic and Panama and were greeted at the airport by Simon, G's new employer and the head of the new project he's going to be working on at OAN (el Observatorio Astronómico Nacional). He drove us right to our new place in Las Condes, which is a posh suburb in the north-east of Santiago. The house is situated at the foot of a hill known as Cerro Calán and hence just a 10 minute walk from the observatory. It's also enormous by any standard and even more so because it's just the two of us here, but we're very comfortable and have quickly gotten used to enjoying the use of our garden, the enormous terrace which gives us a beautiful view of the city, and the spacious living room complete with two big, soft couches which we usually crash onto at the end of the day and heave a sigh of contented exhaustion.

The first night we went out for dinner and drinks with Simon and G's new office-mate Sebastian. They took us to this amazing restaurant called Liguria in the heart of Providencia (where we're going to be searching for an apartment) and tossed us off into the deep end of Chilean cuisine. Tangy, frothy pisco sours and sauteed scallops in white wine butter sauce to start, then hake cheeks with garlic for me and seared steak cubes and sauteed veggies for Gerrit. With red wine, naturally. It was simple yet unspeakable decadent and we both kept flashing looks of bewildered happiness at one another across the table all night.

After our amazing welcome, we spent the first weekend here getting to know our new city a bit. We traveled into the center and got familiar with the bigger landmarks, learned how to use public transport (no easy feat, believe me), went hunting for farmers markets. One thing we noticed very quickly was that Chileans are both exceptionally consumerist and obsessed with all things new and shiny. This means that the parts of the city which we love and gravitate to the most are usually more run-down and neglected, but this only seems to add to their allure. The cost of living is also MUCH higher here than we had anticipated, with some things costing the same or even double the price in Europe! But of course, there are ways around this- mostly by buying local products and simply accepting that some dietary changes are unavoidable (no more import cheese, canned goods, roasted nuts, tofu or homemade thai curries for us). But for every concession we get a lot of new things in return (cheap, high quality sea food, big juicy strawberries & cherries, empanadas of all sorts, and creamy, perfect avocados by the dozen for a euro or two). Chileans are also big on covering their food with heaps of fresh onions and cilantro (salsa verde, as they call it), fresh lemon juice and a tasty red chili sauce called ají chileno, which neither of us can get enough of. The one indulgence neither of us is willing to give up is coffee, but as there isn't really a strong coffee culture in Chile, we've been subjected to some of the most rancid, repulsive, scalding hot, and grossly over-sweetened rubbish of our lives here. And that's not even mentioning the Nescafe! The thought has crossed our minds to switch to tea, but I doubt that will actually happen.

The rest of the week was interesting, and no less vivid than the first few days. We joined Simon one afternoon for a trip to the immigration office downtown to get the documents necessary for G's ID card and RUT (the local variant of a social security number/ burgerservicenummer), which was quite a slap of reality and a wake up call to the incredibly privileged position we enjoy here. To calm our nerves afterward, we enjoyed an extremely Chilean lunch at the local fish market of baked pink clams with parmesan (machas a la parmesana), abalone (locos) and eel stew (caldillo de congrio). We were also treated to a concert on Plaza de Armas, which is one of the most important (and picturesque) squares in central Santiago. It was a tribute concert to Violeta Parra, who is a singer, songwriter & national icon that sang about love, strife and socialism in the 1940's. Thousands of people, young and old had congregated on the square to sing along and dance la Cueca, which is the traditional chilean folkdance and a very beautiful, seductive one at that.

On Friday things reach the peak of intensity when I accompanied Sebastian and his little sister to the student protests near Universidad de Chile (on the grimier side of town). We arrived at around 11 and marched with the group (which was made up of students, teacher, young professionals, veterans, parents and even grandparents) for about 2-3 kilometers until they reached the barricades that had been set up by the police. Riot vans, heavily armed officers and tank-like vehicles armed with water canons and tear gas guns lined the side streets around the square where the students converged and it was striking to see how much of an effect their presence had on the atmosphere. The students were permitted to keep protesting until 2, but (as Sebastian told me is often the case), the police started pushing back the perimeter much earlier. Within a matter of about 20 minutes, things started to get ugly and the students at the front lines, visibly agitated by the provocation of the police, started throwing stones, bashing on their drums and belting out anti-government songs as hard as they could. The situation became so tense that we started to head back down the street to leave, but before we could get very far, a wave of students at the front of the protest started running in our direction, nearly knocking us off our feet, and we flashed a look back at the tanks that had heaved around the corner and started running too. It's a strange sensation that comes over you in a situation like that. With all the side-streets on our right barricaded and nothing but a stone wall with a 7 meter fence above it on our left, we had nowhere to go but straight, and within no time the armored vehicles were whizzing past us and spraying out thick, billowing clouds of tear gas. At one point we reached a tiny enclave in the wall and all huddled there for a second to regain our bearings but within seconds one of the tanks had stopped right in front of us and blasted us with tear gas again. We ran further and I could hear people gagging and retching behind me, but you can't stop to help anyone in a moment like that. You can't see anything, you can hardly breathe. Every inch of exposed skin feels like it's on fire. After what seemed like ages but couldn't have been more than 10 minutes we reached an opening in the gate and crawled through it, tearing open the bags of lemons and cigarettes we'd brought with us and sucking on them like they were a gift from the gods. The adrenaline rush was immense and when Sebastian started apologizing, saying he didn't think things would progress so fast, I just smiled and said "we should do it again next week!".

The protests are on everyone's lips here. Young and old, rich and poor, local and foreign, everyone seems captured by the moment, enthralled with this idea of change, enchanted with the prospect of power to the people. It's an exciting time to have arrived and it feels very different than any change that may be happening back home. There's something dynamic, almost magical in the air that makes you feel like anything is possible. It's incredibly inspiring to say the least.

There was much more talk of the movement when we joined Sebastian for the weekend in Valparaíso, which is a beautiful, grimy, colorful and very lively city on the coast, about 1.5 hours outside of Santiago. His uncle, a local artist there, was throwing a birthday party and we joined in the with the festivities whole-heartedly, drinking local concoctions such as chimbombo (which in Chile is a cocktail of young white wine and juice, but also a word used in other parts of Latin America as a derogatory slur for homosexuals), and trying our best to navigate through the intricacies of chilean Spanish. G held his own extremely well and at one point I walked past him and heard that he was completely engaged in a conversation (entirely in Spanish) about the excessive privileges enjoyed by trans-nationals and inefficient use of natural resources in the country. Go G! It was a legendary night and we partied with the best of them until nearly 5am before succumbing to our exhaustion. The rest stayed up until nearly 8, but by 11 everyone was awake and chipper, sitting around the dining room table for breakfast and mischievous recollections of the night before. After washing up, we all headed into the city to check out the local markets. Valparaíso (Valpo) is absolutely stunning! Pablo Neruda lived there for a number of years and wrote many famous pieces about it. It's also a world heritage site and for good reason. The stacked, colorful houses, curving streets and picturesque seaside setting make it unforgettable. Sort of like Porto, but much noisier, dirtier, more real somehow.

We finished the afternoon with a typical Valpo-style lunch of beer and chorillanas, which are basically huge plates of sauteed meat and onions served over thick fries and and topped off with a fried egg. It's the kind of thing that makes a vegetarian scream and a cardiologist rich. The mouth says yes but heart screams no. Needless to say, it was a good ending for such a glorious weekend, but for the sake of our waistlines and our arteries, I think it will be a few months before we give it another go.

Anyway, this post is quickly becoming quite Tolstoy-esque and there will be much more to tell in the coming weeks, so I'll cut short here and say, in summary, that things are wonderful here. We are enjoying ourselves very much and excited to keep setting forth on this new chapter of our lives. The weather has been beautiful- clear blue skies and 25-30 degrees during the day, with crisp chilly nights of 10-12. The people are amazingly open, helpful and curious about our backgrounds, our reasons for being in Chile and the origin of my apparently very obvious Spanish accent. And above all, we're happy to be able to share all of these new experiences with each other. We're both so acutely aware that we are making memories that will undoubtedly last a lifetime.

Abajo del Cielo Abierto

2011-11-13T22:28:00.001+01:00

This is a city to be taken in sips, rather than the frantic, thirsty gulps it's sprawling massiveness and undeniable liveliness inspire. From the arid vistas and gated villas of Las Condes we wind our way slowly toward her center, stopping frequently for small, exotic treats and long pauses in the sun. Fresh ceviche from the market at Los Dominicos, sticky sweet mote con huesillos in the park near Santa Lucia, unfamiliar tastes that tantalize our tongues and sights that widen our eyes. On la Plaza de Armas it seems that life from all corners has congregated to while away the seemingly endless Saturday hours, to bask with utter reciprocity in the delicious simplicity of doing absolutely nothing. The purple of the flowers on the trees dances vibrantly against a deep azure blue sky while the sounds of music, laughter, clicking chess pieces and scattering pigeons fill the air. And all around it seems as though a thousand stories from either side of the Mapoche spin together to form this colorful, dissoluble tapestry that is Santiago. I close my eyes and inhale deeply, hoping to take even a fraction of this vitality into me, then exhale again and smile at the stunning, nearly inconceivable notion that this is home.

The Dichotomy of Time

2011-11-09T01:14:00.000+01:00

Forty-eight hours and it will all be over. Forty-eight hours until this waiting game that has lasted into the 6+ months becomes reality and ceases to be just simple speculation. The house is empty, the bags are packed, and yet the gravity of the situation simply won't seem to sink in as it should. I'm beginning to get the impression that the process of acceptance, mourning, rejoicing, or whatever one may call it, will only truly begin once I touch down in Santiago. My heart is racing, my palms are sweaty. I am filled with a thousand yards of apprehension and an overwhelming sense of calm at the same time. And I can't seem to figure out if what I should feel just now is fear, elation, or some incandescently sweet mixture of the two. I'd give anything at all to be there already, to know what lay in store and be able to brace accordingly, yet at the same time I welcome this sense of indecision as if I know that the hours, weeks, and months ahead will be so all-revealing that I will need every speck of energy to get through them. I have dreamed of this period, played out this scenario so often in my head that it already seems like a broken record, yet every thought, every fleeting emotion feels like such new territory, that I can't help but retract, retrace and rethink the entire process with every passing second. I suppose I will get there in time, but time seems so relative when it's being counted down as such.

Time present and time past
Are both perhaps present in time future,
And time future contained in time past.
If all time is eternally present
All time is unredeemable.
What might have been is an abstraction
Remaining a perpetual possibility
Only in a world of speculation.
What might have been and what has been
Point to one end, which is always present.
Footfalls echo in the memory
Down the passage which we did not take
Towards the door we never opened [...]

- T.S. Eliot

Until we meet again, my dearest Amsterdam. Time be damned, I am sure as one could be that I will simply love you forever.

Por Casualidad

2011-09-14T13:27:00.002+02:00

"I began to fantasize, once again, about this utopian era. I thought, without fully believing it, that everything must have been more beautiful and more intense, that it was worth it to live one's youth burning the candle at both ends, under a heavy sun that turned everything erotic, even the petrified rocks on the seaside." Ibiza. Henry Roy (Hobo Magazine).

Reminds me of Hawai'i. Or Camus's Nuptials in Tipasa. Great piece, excellent find!

Twenty-four.

2011-09-04T02:20:00.018+02:00

Sometimes it seems that the most tragic thing in life is to miss someone that no longer is. Until you realize that the person may actually never have been at all.

Elskede København.

2011-08-29T18:41:00.003+02:00

Pienso en aquel día.

2011-06-13T15:44:00.004+02:00

I am moving to Santiago de Chile. In October. For three years. Wow. Leaving the Netherlands had been part of the plan for some time now, but somehow it feels different to say so now that it's ceased to be a vague goal and become, rather, a concrete course of action. There is much to be done, many aspects to be arranged, many promised visits to be made good on. Nearly a decade after crossing the world to begin a new adventure here in Europe, I am packing my bags and heading off for undiscovered territory once again. It's enthralling, inspiring and just a tad frightening. But it is an adventure I cannot wait to set out on!

Daytrip to Zeeland.

2011-04-17T02:30:00.008+02:00

An unforgettable afternoon with my favorite girl.

Tag der Einheit

2010-10-03T13:04:00.003+02:00

When a political party loses half of its seats in a parliamentary election, another handful in opinion polls in the months following, then almost a third of the support of its own members for a morally deplorable agreement that will keep them only clutching at the straws of power, perhaps it's time to sit a round out to rethink, regroup and revise.

Is this the superior western democracy that we're forsaking our integrity, our ethical cognizance and our personal freedom to protect from some ambiguous and misconstrued threat? And are we truly willing to give all that up for the mere illusion of security? Do we really want to live in a society that is characterized by fear, rooted in dissociation and further polarized by the insatiable political aspirations of those that are supposed to unite us?

All eyes are on Berlin today, where the Wall came tumbling down twenty years ago. Yet here we are, starting down the same path that led to its construction in the first place. And apparently any lesson that this dark chapter in history might have had to offer has been lost on us. Wir sind ein Volk sagen sie dann. Immer und ewig.

Ja. Natuurlijk.

When the autumn wind came blowing in.

2010-09-05T12:13:00.004+02:00

“There are still a few men who love desperately.” - J.D. Salinger

Office life.

2010-08-19T15:46:00.004+02:00

Home. Waar legt dat dan?

2010-07-15T11:29:00.002+02:00

"This must be what I wanted to be doing,
walking at night between the two deserts,
singing."

- Air, W.S. Merwin

Oh, Serendipity!

2010-05-30T22:04:00.004+02:00

"Et des que je l'apercois, alors je sens en moi. Mon coeur qui bat."
Je vois la vie en rose.

The orange months.

2010-05-26T17:53:00.005+02:00

Orange. Everywhere I look, I see orange. It's the color of the chairs, the signs, the posters lining the walls. It feels as though it is seeping into my skin, permeating my thoughts, chasing me through the building. I don't know why I never noticed before, but my entire existence as an intern in this company is defined by this color. And I loathe it.

The Dutch have a penchant for these glaringly bright, nauseating colors. I once sub-let the apartment of a friend who had purposely and consciously painted his living room wall lime green. The place was otherwise beautiful and couldn't have been better located, but I spent my entire six months there avoiding it like the plague because of this wall. Anyone who ever said that color is a minor factor in determining your well-being never spent a moment in that apartment or worked in this building. If I suffered from epilepsy, Tourette's or homicidal mania, this place would send me into a fit in a heartbeat.

Life is Beautiful.

2010-05-18T16:39:00.009+02:00

Vondelpark, Amsterdam

Bad Homburg, Germany

Laan van Spartaan, Amsterdam

A Few of My Favorite Things: Random

2010-03-10T18:19:00.006+01:00

Photo credits: allyhay,BlogsPix, espressoDOM, RasMarley at0m, marianoelbon & respectively.

A Few of My Favorite Things: Cafés

2010-02-23T15:55:00.006+01:00

Gartine (Amsterdam)

De Eeuwige Jachtvelden (Den Haag)

Café De Jaren (Amsterdam)

Juni (Den Haag)

Baklust (Den Haag)

Photo credits: SeeHolland, haikud'état, Claudio.Ar, hazer2006, olivegreen, respectively.

Singel

2010-02-23T14:19:00.003+01:00

A late breakfast of baked egg with parmesan, sun-dried tomatoes and parsley with a soy cappuccino. What a great way to begin another week in my dreamhouse!

Thoughts on the State of the Union.

2010-02-18T13:52:00.005+01:00

The images glaring from the television, the words of the newspaper headlines, the general buzz on the street, all suggest that the way of life across the Atlantic, life as I had always known there, is crumbling, disintegrating, changing in a way that few had ever anticipated. As I watch interest rates sky-rocket, politicians bicker, jobs disappear and the national deficit continue to expand at the same rate as the waistlines of my gluttonous, sedentary, blindly consumerist compatriots, there is a thought that comes to mind:

All the better.

Now I know that this may be interpreted by many as a distinctly un-American sentiment, that most would find it inconceivable that I should bear my fellow citizens such ill will that I would welcome the prospect of America's dethronement, of her ousting from the position of world superpower. But to these interpretations, I turn an ear of disaccord and reply simply that to truly love a nation and her people, to sincerely wish the best for her future is perhaps not to condone her continued accumulation of wealth and power through iniquitous means, nor her demonstrations of military strength through the provocation of unjust, ambiguous wars, nor her sustainment of an insatiable dominant streak, manifesting itself in the form of global cultural contamination. No, true patriotism cannot be measured in numbers. It is not necessarily the desire to see ones country be the richest, but much more to see her maintain her integrity.

Bobby Kennedy said it best, over half a century ago, when noting that:

"The gross national product does not allow for the health of our children, the quality of their education, or the joy of their play. It does not include the beauty of our poetry or the strength of our marriages; the intelligence of our public debate or the integrity of our public officials. It measures neither our wit nor our courage; neither our wisdom nor our learning; neither our compassion nor our devotion to our country; it measures everything, in short, except that which makes life worthwhile. And it tells us everything about America except why we are proud that we are Americans."

The road on which the United States has found herself for the past fifty years is not that on upon which I want to hold my childrens' hands and lead them down in the future. When they eat with their hands, I do not want it to be because an unseen corporate villain has determined this to be the most convenient way for them to consume their fat and salt-laden, nutrient deficient cheeseburger, but so that they can touch and feel that which nourishes them, so that they can grasp the concept of where their food comes from. When they run and play, as children do, I do not want them to feel that they always have to win, have to stamp out their competition, have to be the very best because that is the American way. I want to hear their laughter fill the air around them, see the smiles that light up their faces, watch them submit, completely, to the act of play without winners or losers. I do not want them to watch their friends' fathers, brothers, and uncles come home from senseless, soulless, oil-hungry wars in body bags and regard them as heroes, but know to that true heroism is demonstrated in simple, everyday acts, that the tenacity, patience, love and steadfastness required to help them mature are the characteristics of a true role model. I do not want to drive them to school in our SUV, nor reward their achievements with materialistic possessions, nor teach them that they are better or more worthy than anyone else because of the color of their skin, their passport, or their father's collar. I do not want them to be ignorant of the world around them, to turn a blind eye to injustice or suffering, to pledge their allegiance to a flag, a god or a political party. I do not want them to identify their country's cultural contributions in terms like Nike, Starbucks, Apple or Hollywood.

I do not want them to fear their government, but for their government to fear them. I want to hear their voices rise, in unison with that of their brothers and sisters, in song that transcends territorial, political, racial and socio-economic lines. I want them to know that once upon a time their country was the richest, the most powerful, the hand that pushed down all the rest, and that this position served only to rob their countrymen of insight, of prospect, of righteousness. Out of many, one? Oh yes. But not the one that terrorized, tyrannized and persecuted. Not the one that bullied, scratched and fought her way to the top, but whose inevitable fall from grace marked the beginning of a new era and ushered in a better life for one and for all.

I want them to walk down a new road, one they themselves will fashion and pave.

And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave.
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave.

In Da House

2010-02-10T13:45:00.008+01:00

This is amazing. A peek into someone's abode is truly a glimpse into their soul.

A New Year & All That Jazz.

2009-12-30T20:00:00.012+01:00

Is it already that time again? Let's have a quick recap.

2009 was the year I took G to Hawai'i, moved to the Bagijnhof, travelled through Morocco and Portugal, joined a mass pillow fight on the Dam, Vondelparked the summer away, celebrated my 7th year in Europe, MCed a wedding, danced my ass off at Dour & then the Gentse Feesten, lived like a vagabond between Delft & Amsterdam, celebrated a wild and very intoxicated Thanksgiving with my favorite group of Eurotrash, rang in my 26th year, spent a wonderful Christmas in Poland with my best friend and her lovely family, sang, laughed, lived, and never stopped wanting more.

2010 will be the year I finish my degree, spend an entire summer in the islands, pass the DELE, learn to sail, finally get my hands on the Digi SLR camera I've been drooling over for ages, gain at least a basic level of Polish, say goodbye to The Netherlands (at least for now), finish War & Peace, get published, and write, write, write my heart out.

Tomorrow Kasia and I are off to Berlin to spend New Years Eve there with a good friend of ours and her boyfriend. What a lovely way to say goodbye to one year and welcome the arrival of the next. It's going to be a good- no, a phenomenal year! I can feel it already. Kerouac said “I was going to be left alone on my butt at the other end of the continent. But why think about that when all the golden land's ahead of you and all kinds of unforseen events wait lurking to surprise you and make you glad you're alive to see?”. I am glad indeed. Here's to unforseen events and a prosperous, happy and eternally adventurous 2010 to everyone! See you on the other side!

As always,

J.

المملكة المغربية

2009-07-06T18:40:00.009+02:00

We will never again feel like we did under the skies of North Africa.

Found in the songs we sing & lost in your eyes.

2009-07-06T18:31:00.012+02:00

Wednesday.

2009-06-17T12:52:00.008+02:00

The sun is shining in Amsterdam and a cool breeze blows steadily through the windows of the apartment. It is Wednesday.
The days are running short, hours flying by, bringing me ever closer to the 23rd and my departure to Marrakech. It is Wednesday.
In the other room, G's newest couchsurfer is sleeping soundly, after arriving from Atlanta, GA just over an hour ago. It is Wednesday.
I haven't written in so long- and the more time goes by, the more I have to say but the fewer words to adequately do so. It is Wednesday.
I think of life, I think of love, I think of the lines of my favorite poem ever, and just for the moment I feel completely at peace:

Writing Lives
Out of a life it is done
and without ever knowing
how things will turn out

or what a life is for that matter
any life at all
the leaf in the sunlight the voice in the day
the author in the words

and the invisible
words themselves
in whose lives we appear
and learn to speak
until what is said seems
to be almost everything
that can be known

one way with the words is to tell
the lives of others
using the distance as a lens

and another way
is when there is no distance
so that the water
is looking at water

as when on a winter morning
as early as you can remember
while the plains were whitening
in the light before dawn
you saw your uncle- was it
your uncle?- reach
from the shadow and wash his face

to us it is clear
that if a single moment could be seen
complete it would disclose the whole

there is still that light in the water
before sunrise
the untold day

- W.S. Merwin

It is Wednesday.

Awesome Ways to Spend a Spring Afternoon: #1

2009-03-31T15:34:00.009+02:00

Coffee, cheesecake & photographs with my roommate at a random little cafe in Delft.

Domestics

2009-03-26T14:40:00.005+01:00

Random shots from the lovely room I share with Mel in Delft.

Things I Love

2009-03-25T11:55:00.006+01:00

Watching him sleep.

Lazy Tuesday

2009-03-24T15:37:00.015+01:00

It's been a good day.

A Space of One's Own

2009-03-24T13:44:00.010+01:00

Until about a year ago, I never fully realized the importance of having a space of my own. Not necessarily an entire apartment or even the absence of roommates, but a space in which to stretch out, leave a mark, close the door and leave the world behind- a place which mirrors my own personality and makes me want to be there.

When I loved to The Hague four years ago, I lived in a small studio apartment complete with my own kitchen and beautiful french doors leading to a private little balcony where I could spend hours, and sometimes days, in complete and blissful solitude or with friends drinking tea and smoking clove cigarettes. Everything from the dark wood furniture and cream colored carpeting, to the deep red wall and huge windows in this place screamed 'me' and I felt extremely lucky to have found such a gem among the sea of student flats and sorely modern rooms the city had to offer.

In my third year at uni, I finally came to terms with the fact that, while I loved my place and detested the idea of living it, the rent was simply too high for a student struggling to make ends meet. And so, when my best friend Kasia left for six weeks for a trip to southeast Asia, I packed up my things and moved into her room on the other side of the city. While our tastes are quite different (in many areas), I've always thought her place was lovely. With its high ceilings, bay windows and minimalist decoration, it was easy to feel comfortable there, but even after moving a few things around and lining the shelves with my books and pictures, it was still very much her room. Probably better, in hindsight, because as I said, I was only there for six weeks and it would have been a shame to become attached to such a place and then have had to leave.

The six weeks flew by and after Kasia returned home, I gathered my things once again and moved into yet another apartment. This time, that of another friend who was moving to Paris for six months. Here I once again had my own kitchen, a view of the lovely courtyard outside, three enormous windows to perch next to and read, and a beautiful little park just outside the front door. But even after Kasia came over and helped me to rearrange furniture and unpack my things, I couldn't seem to make the place mine. The lime green wall and oppressive black carpeting made me long for the bright airiness of my old place, the lack of natural sunlight left me feeling lethargic and lifeless and in the end, I spent probably no more than six weeks of my time there actually living in this apartment. I opted, instead, to pack a bag and live a quasi nomadic lifestyle, sleeping at friends' houses in The Hague and Delft and spending weekends in Amsterdam with my boyfriend.

I suppose a valuable lesson I learned during this time was about the profound unimportance of stuff. I'd never given it too much serious thought before, but somehow just assumed that I really needed all of the things I had been accumulating over the years. There's little that can show you just how false of an assumption that is like living out of a a single weekend bag for nearly half a year. Still, while my material possessions were far from my thought during that time, the aching for my own little spot was more accute than ever. I dreamed of my old room, of a new one in which smelled and felt and even tasted like home.

As the six months drew to its end, I was warmly invited by a very good friend of mine, to come share a room with her in the huge student apartment where she was living in Delft and use that as a home base until I could find another, more suitable place after returning from Hawaii. I hesitated for a moment because sharing a room with someone, no matter how close you are to them, doesn't come without it's drawbacks. Furthermore, my friend is known for beinga bit overly generous at times, a fact which I certainly didn't want to exploit. After weighing scenarios in my head, however, I decided it was a lovely plan and hence I packed up once again and moved to Delft.

For just over a month now I've been sharing a gorgeous split-level room with Mel, who has proven to be an amazing roommate. The apartment is complete with seven kitchens, a balcony terrace and about forty housemates. An eclectic mix of architects, designers, musicians, artists and students, they have been astoundingly hospitable, open and overall a great bunch to know, much less live with. My days there are filled with laughter and spontaneous get togethers, and the nights with huge dinners, wine and endless chatter. Every person in the house is unique, creative and adds a slightly different flavor to the mix, making the whole experience of living there a profoundly new and exciting one. As expected, sharing a room can be a bit inconvenient at times, but it's brought Mel and I closer than ever and I can't deny that I've gotten quite accustomed to always having someone around to share a silly joke, moan to about this or that, or just spend a few hours in silence with. It's like having a sister after 25 years as an only child. I absolutely love it!

There is a room freeing up in the apartment at the beginning of April and I would like nothing more than to claim it. The idea of remaining a part of this awesome jumble, of Mel being just down the hall, and of finally having a space which I can, once again, make completely and utterly my own, makes my heart skip a beat. The vote-in is on the 9th. Keep your fingers crossed for me. 'Til then..

Somewhere In Between

2009-03-11T14:50:00.011+01:00

Our last day in Hawaii was spent lounging on the sand and swimming in the pale turquoise waters of Waikiki. After a spectacular sunset, a meal of laulau and poi and a bus ride back to the hotel, we closed our eyes and said goodbye to this beautiful place where we had spent the last three weeks. As we boarded the plane the next morning, I could feel that something inside of me had changed, a slight and barely perceptible shift of the way in which I had regarded and remembered this tiny piece of paradise on the other side of the world. I didn't want to go back; no, not this time. I peered out the window and felt my heart surge in protest, my eyes fill with tears. I closed them tightly and leaned back into my chair, biting my tongue to keep a cry of protest from escaping my lips.

Thirty hours, ten thousand miles, two books, countless naps, and a few silent tears later, I am back here once again, back in that place between two places, to my home between two homes, somewhere between happiness and utter despair.

"I didn't want to go back. Not the first time, I didn't think my heart could stand it. But the airplane is a wonderful thing. You are still in one place when you arrive at the other. The airplane is faster than the heart. You arrive quickly and you leave quickly. You don't grieve too much. And there is something else about the airplane. You can go back many times to the same place. And something strange happens if you go back often enough. You stop grieving for the past. You see that the past is something in your mind alone, that it doesn't exist in real life. You trample on the past, you crush it. In the beginning it is like trampling on a garden. In the end you are just walking on ground. That is the way we have to learn to live now. The past is here." He touched his heart. "It isn't there." And he pointed at the dusty road.

- A Bend In The River;
V.S. Naipaul

The year of certain uncertainty.

2009-01-07T13:10:00.001+01:00

A little more than a week into the new year and I find myself at a precarious crossroad of sorts. With three major exams, a long overdue trip to Hawai'i, and an imminent change of apartments just days away, I seem to be dancing along a a thin line of actions and reactions that could take me in any number of directions. Admittedly, the lack of insight as to how things will pan out is both thrilling and terrifying at the same time, yet I'm trying my best to stay focused and to remember that it is this very uncertainty that used to be such a source of inspiration. There is, after all, nothing sure in life, nothing but the constant change that pulls us through one phase of life and into the next- an infinite cycle which many take far too little notice of.

It feels as though I have been running for the past six months- avoiding my new apartment for a lack of feeling at home there, neglecting to keep in touch with my loved ones, pushing away the questions of where I am going and why. Until now, I have never quite realized the importance of having my own little corner in the world in which I feel at peace and am able to process and reflect upon the occurrences of everyday life, but there is nothing that instills an appreciation for this place and this state of mind like a half year of quasi-nomadic existence. From today on, I will spend every day studying, writing exams, packing, moving my things into storage, and preparing myself mentally for the transitions which lie ahead.

I leave for Hawai'i on the 17th, where I'll be spending three glorious weeks with G on the island of my childhood. I'm sure that this time will be filled with sunshine, delicious food, good conversations, back-breaking hikes and many lazy hours at the beach. After returning to Holland in early February, I'll be faced immediately with a new semester of juggling work, school, and the task of finding a new apartment. My dear friend Melati has offered to let me store all my things at her place and use her room as a home base until she returns from her trip Indonesia at the end of the month, something that I am eternally grateful for, though the thought of returning here to find myself essentially homeless is more than slightly unnerving.

The rest of the year will see me through my internship, graduation and many other transitions which I am very eager to experience. What I want, more than anything, is for this to be a year of both progress and regression. By progress I mean by finishing this step of my education and finally making time for all the other things I want to be doing, and regression in the sense that I will push myself to see the world around me with the same wonder and awe that I once did and document it with the same fervor that used to come so effortlessly.

2008 was a difficult year, but it was not without its moments of pure bliss, nor lessons of incalculable value. Through all the leaps forward and crippling stumbles back, the one thing which I have always known, but not been able to see clearly is that life is to be lived without reservation or preconceived expectations. It is the very certain uncertainty of it that makes it so beautiful and so misunderstood, this breathtaking unpredictability which is the key to its allure.

Eia Au, Eia 'Oe.

2008-10-15T13:08:00.001+02:00

It's really happening! Two nights ago G and I booked our tickets to Hawaii. We'll be there for three weeks, a time frame which I can already tell will be far too short to do and see everything I'd like to there, but at least it is something.

My mother, of course, is ecstatic about us coming. As are Barb and Doug, her best friends who are like my second parents and have seen me through every period and development in my life until this point. I already envision the long and dirty hikes we'll take through the mountains, rivers and forests that I learned to appreciate the beauty of far too late. I know that we will keep to the tradition of having sunset picnics at the beach where I took my first steps, looking out on the rock where we scattered Doug's father's ashes so many years ago. I know that everything and everyone around us will slow down to adjust to Hawaii Time while we are there, that we will stuff ourselves with fresh raw fish and tropical delicacies unheard of anywhere else in the world, that the air will smell like salt and rain and overripe mangoes hanging from the trees. But aside from all that, I wonder if I will be going back to the same little island that I left behind over six years ago, if two years has been long enough to change it as much as the two years therefore.

I've never had a problem with change. If anything, I've embraced it, excited to see where it would take me, how it would shape me as a person. But I think I owe this openness, in part, to the fact that deep down I've known that this little island paradise I called home for the first eighteen years of my life was always there, always ready to welcome me back with open arms, and remaining, for the most part, the same place that it always was. This time around, however, I have no way of knowing what to expect when I arrive. I know, for example, that Barb and Doug have spent the last few years making renovations in the house that I spent a huge part of my childhood in. I know that many of the people I knew there have moved on, like me, leaving that little piece of paradise in the middle of the Pacific behind in search of new adventures. I know that the development of the island has continued, that the secluded and secret little beaches of my youth have long since been raved about in the travel guides and opened to the public by means of paved roads and showering facilities. So the question that keeps nagging at me now, despite my excitement and my longing to be back there, is whether or not I'll be returning to my Hawaii or to a place that bears only a faint resemblance to it.

Either way, I'm so happy that I will be able to introduce G to my mom and allow him to see yet another tiny piece of myself. I'm happy that he will get to see Barb and Doug again and spend time getting to know them better. He is the third person that I have taken home with me to meet my family and see my home since moving away. The first was Q, even before I had decided to pack my bags and hop on a plane to Europe to start a new life here. He stayed for two weeks, charmed the pants off of everyone and everything around him and left a permanent impression that would follow him through his several other visits over the next few years. Then there was a boyfriend in my second year at uni that, despite my better judgement, I took home with me for the summer. This visit, in contrast, turned into a complete disaster which resulted in us breaking up before we even set foot on my island and fighting viciously until he got sent home just a few days after our arrival. My relationship with my mother is still recovering from this nightmarish experience, which is why I completely understand her mix of excitement and apprehension about this visit. Luckily, I was able to introduce G to Barb and Doug a few months ago when they were here on vacation and despite the fact that they only spent a few days with him, they left singing his praises and reassuring my mother with their approval.

It is interesting to me how allowing someone to become a part of your life includes showing them all the things which make you the person you are. Not just the good, the happy, and the beautiful aspects, but also the difficult, complex and harshly real elements as well. I know that G will fall in love with my island, with the traditions, customs, and sheer aesthetic beauty of it all. But I also wonder how he will react to what lies beneath all that. Will he understand my difficult and turbulent relationship with my mother? Will he be able to appreciate that the beauty of everything there is lined with undertones of astonishing poverty? Will he realize how difficult it is for me to accept that tourism is a vital economic element there, yet that I sometimes have to resist the urge to tell the odd tourist how I despise him and his bloated, pale, spoiled children for littering on our beaches, tearing up our protected roads with his rented SUV, for his thinly-veiled pretense of superiority and grating mainland accent that incite pure contempt and hate that I never knew I had inside me? I think he will. Because I will take the time to explain these things to him, to show him how even these things are vital elements which make up my past, my present and, undoubtedly, my future. Because he is open, flexible and understanding, which are some of the things which made me fall in love with him in the first place.

I am going home! And I am taking with me an important piece of my new home, connecting one part of my life and myself to another. I have no way of knowing what exactly lies in store for me when I get there. But I am looking forward to it more than I ever could have imagined. Mahalo E Ke Akua No Keia La!

Transitions.

2008-10-13T15:10:00.001+02:00

It´s been quite awhile since I´ve posted about what´s been going on in my little corner of the world and so much has happened in the past few months that I don´t know exactly where to begin.

Since August, I´ve moved, once again. My new apartment is situated in the heart of The Hague, just a few minutes from school and work and right next to a beautiful little park. G also moved home at the beginning of August, giving us all the time in the world to get to know one another in ways that we were never able to when he was still living in Munich. Its been an interesting transition, one that´s introduced an entirely new element to the relationship and to daily life in general. It´s also given me a chance to start getting to know his family better and I´m absolutely ecstatic (though not very surprised) to find that they are wonderful and very interesting people. As of yesterday we now have a montly dinner date with his mother, stepdad, sister and her boyfriend, and are even planning on celebrating Thanksgiving together! It will be intriguing to celebrate my first Thanksgiving in 6 years with them, though the thought of producing a traditional turkey dinner with all the trimmings for the first time is quite intimidating. Luckily, G´s neighbor upstairs is armed with bundles of good American cookbooks to steer me in the right direction.

In other news, since the last time I posted, I´ve turned 25, made plans to visit Hawaií with G for three weeks in January, and have gotten a second job as a TA for one of my old professors at school. I´ll be helping her one or two days a week with grading, paperwork and planning a conference in December for an international conference on Diversity Through Art. She was one of my favorite teachers in my second year and is a truly dynamic woman who seems to have a hand in absolutely everything. In fact, we´re going to see Al Gore at conference in Aalsmeer tomorrow night before going for drinks to talk about the details of my new position and a blog that we are working on together for the showcasing of art, poetry and prose. Fun stuff! I´m really looking forward to it, even though I´m already wondering where I´m going to find the time for it all.

It´s strange how quickly the time has gone by and how much change it´s brought with it. Makes me wish I´d been a bit more diligent about jotting it all down here. There´s something strangely therapeutic about keeping a blog and actually updating it regularly. This is definitely something I have to work on. For the time being, I´m really enjoying the way things are, the way they look for the future, and the way that I am constantly reminded how lucky I am for it all. Here´s to happiness, to change, to love and trying harder to stop and reflect on it once in awhile.

Look how far the light came.

2008-09-21T10:00:00.001+02:00

"Clarity of mind means clarity of passion too; this is why a great and clear mind loves ardently and sees distinctly what he loves."

- Blaise Pascal

While time may not necessarily heal all, it certainly allows one to gradually obtain a certain sense of clarity, an ability to create a more complete picture from the tiny fragments and clouded details that once seemed unrelated. The confusion is still there, compounded by the pain and humiliation of betrayal, but somehow things seem to fit together differently now. My emotions change with the moment and range from desperate attempts at rationalization to indifference, from bouts of seething anger to tears of utter defeat and surrender. I see now what I could not, would not see all along. And while the truth hurts more than I ever could have imagined possible, I can't help but think that it's better for me to realize it now, rather than continue down a path that was doomed to fail from the very beginning.

Love is a beautiful thing, a passionate dance in an empty street, a delicate intertwining of fingers, hearts and dreams. But all too often I find myself standing alone in that street, clutching at thin air when I reach for your hand. I can see your love glimmering in the distance, but like a star that's simply too far away, its light must travel too long, must shine upon so many others before reaching me that by the time it does, so little of it remains.

There seems to be so much that I cannot give you, because you simply do not need it from me. In words and photographs and scraps of poetry in a box, one holds your thoughts and your dreams, in memories and old love and secretive morning embraces, another holds your heart and your past. And even to those that with tales and laughter and amusement hold your friendship and your loyalty, you will not let me get closer. Your whole life, mind, body and spirit are like a fortress to which you will not grant me passage and I have been standing outside alone, pulling and pounding at the walls with my small hands for far too long. I cannot compete with the beauty of stolen words and the thrill of the unknown, nor with the ties of history and poorly veiled residual emotions. I will not swallow my pride and stand aside as you decide that everywhere and everyone and everything is more important to you than I am. I realize that pride has no place in love, but just as your light, my humility only goes so far.

For the moment.

2008-09-19T11:22:00.001+02:00

Songs I'm all about this week:

C-mon & Kypski - Circus
The Moldy Peaches - Anyone Else But You
Jarabe de Palo - Dos Dias En La Vida
The Kooks - Naive
Snow Patrol - You Could Be Happy
The Whitest Boy Alive - Burning
Imogen Heap - The Walk
Jose Gonzalez - Down The Line

Other things I'm all about this week:

dichotomies
Turkish bread
cherry tomatoes
hanging my feet out of a moving car
the chill of the autumn air
singing out of tune on purpose
Chinese cough syrup
bear hugs
extra shots of espresso
the word 'fortuitous'
tram rides
black & white photographs
road trips with no set destination
realizing over and over how amazing my friends are
sun in the weather forecast
Christian the Lion
thick sweaters & slippers
my mom's laugh
clarity

Cycles.

2008-06-20T16:16:00.001+02:00

I look out the window and feel homesick.

And the homesickness turns my thoughts to the places and the people and the things that I miss.

And the thoughts of the places and the people and the things that I miss turn into fond memories and the knowledge that these things will always be there, one way or another, always close to my heart.

And the knowledge that these things will always be there, one way or another, always close to my heart makes me close my eyes and let the nostalgia wash over me like the waves of the Pacific that I can feel so distinctly even now.

And closing my eyes and the letting the nostalgia wash over me like the waves of the Pacific that I can feel so distinctly even now fills me with so much happiness and rush of pure adrenaline so intense that my eyes burst open again.

And I look out the window and feel homesick.

The ex-factor.

2008-06-11T16:56:00.001+02:00

Something that seems to be a recurring theme of conversation recently is the subject of exes. Or rather, bad experiences with, or feelings about, exes. This is something I have never quite understood, or perhaps an area that I have just been extremely lucky in. For one, I am on good terms with all but two of the boys I have ever dated. In fact, I still consider one of them to be one of my closest friends. We meet up for coffee, dinners, photography excursions, speak every couple of days on the phone, and are generally very present in eachothers' lives. We love one another very much, but in a way that is so platonic that the fact that we used to be a couple is all but a technicality at this point. Of course, I realize that this is somewhat of a exception, but even with the exes I have much less contact with, every chat or birthday card is still pleasant and very welcomed. Obviously, these relationships didn't work out romantically, but for me this doesn't, at all, detract from the fact that we share beautiful memories and that there was something special and irreplicable that distinguishes each of them.

There is, of course, the other side of the ex-factor, which is the problems that people encounter with their partners' exes. This is also something I have never seemed to have a problem with. My contact with my exes' exes has always been minimal, but even on the odd occasion that there was contact, it was always pleasant and usually initiated from their side out of what seemed like pure curiosity. The one exception to this is G's ex-girlfriend, who I have not only met, but also emailed with occasionally. Many of the girls I know either despise or simply mistrust their partners' exes. Whether this is symptomatic of a problematic past or just pure insecurity is irrelevant. The point is, the ex is off-limits- a closed chapter which warrants little to no discussion, and certainly no amount of sustained contact or social interaction beyond simple cordiality. In many circumstances, I can imagine that this is warranted, but with G's ex-girlfriend, this is not the case at all. When the subject of partners' exes is laid on the table, I am always happy to exclaim that I have absolutely no complaints, that I think his ex is cute, smart, driven, funny, and generally an awesome girl. Naturally, the element of curiosity is there, but I feel absolutely no need to delve into the specifics of their relationship. In my mind, meeting his ex was a huge compliment to me and an undeniable testament to what an awesome boy I have found. She sets the standard high, and I can feel only happiness and relief knowing that G has such good taste in women.

The concept of an "ex" is quite an intriguing one. I have always found it such a great measure of character to see how one speaks about his or her past loves. I must admit, of course, that love is a tricky thing, and that not all experiences can end on such sweet notes. I have also been witness to the opposite side of the spectrum, to the hate and resentment that can be born as a result of an amorous encounter turned sour. I know I've experienced these emotions at one time or another, but as time passes and I begin to understand the concept of love a bit better, the bad memories seem, somehow, to fade away almost completely, and what I am left with is a smile on my face and a knowledge that the pain or disappointment of failed romance is quite meaningless in the bigger picture. Hate poisons and love sustains. Why hold on to what can no longer be changed and what no longer makes any real difference anyway? If you look deep enough, you will always be able to find something tangible, something lovable about a person, no matter what the history or circumstances surrounding your exchange with them. And in the end, really, you are never better than the sum of those you have loved and of those who have loved you.

Summer has arrived.

2008-04-21T13:25:00.001+02:00

Or, at least, it certainly feels like it.

Scheveningen, The Netherlands
20 April, 2008
+

Alledags.

2008-04-15T15:30:00.001+02:00

Singel, Amsterdam

(more?)

3:30pm, Tuesday afternoon. I'm sitting here in Cafe van Zuylen, across the street from G's mother's house enjoying a cup of coffee and glass of fresh squeezed orange juice. The girls to my right smoke Gauloises blues from the same pack, one after another, as they slurp their cappuccinos loudly and twitter on about their hectic schedules and a shared hate for Freudian theory. I'm with you, girls. To my left, three unshaven yet well-dressed boys discuss their plans for the evening. There's mention of a girl named Angela and the fact that she won't be taking part in the pending festivities. Each time her name is spoken, one of the boys seems to grow more and more quiet, his eyes darting from the ground to the window to his gray sweater and the tiny spot on it's sleeve. Catching wind of this detail, I do my best to observe the boy further without making it too obvious that I am doing so. I wonder who this Angela is and what this boy's relation to her might be. Is she an estranged lover, a mere acquaintance, or is there something more to his seemingly misplaced discomfort at her mention? Is he harboring a secret affection for her? Did they share in intimate moment unknown to the other two boys at the table? Or is it that he simply doesn't get along with Angela that well, that he finds her boring or arrogant or completely unremarkable whatsoever?

It's a fascinating thing how every city seems to have its own charm, its own way of pulling you in or pushing you away, how every place, no mater how similar at first glance, always reveals, with time, the tiniest of elements and intricate quirks that make it unique and that make you appreciate it in a fundamentally different way. Amsterdam is a city with many of these quirks. Around every corner and gently twisting alleyway there seems to be a plethora of peculiar characteristics that are both unmistakable and easily lost on the untrained eye. The way that the city seems to live and breathe in leaps and bounds, yet how time unfolds on a tempo all its own is mystifying, and the ease with which everything and everyone around you seem to melt together to create the bigger picture is undeniably extraordinary. If nothing else, Amsterdam is a paradise for the silent observer, a seemingly endless playground of people watching and voyeur. It is, quite literally, a place to lose yourself completely in the conversation fragments and curious behavior of every passing stranger, allowing you access to a whole new world of cautious speculations and clever deductions. After only a few hours here, it's impossible to deny the growing feeling that you've managed to become as much a part of the passing flurry of activity as those you observe. Your inquisitive glances are either matched or shrugged off impassively, as though this mutual observation is all part of the process of everyday life here. An everyday life that feels just about everything but everyday.

Awhile.

2008-04-10T01:09:00.001+02:00

Don't go.
I didn't know you'd be here, and I wasn't meant to come.
I'd be sitting watching TV if there was anything decent on,
if I'd missed the taxi or found nothing good to wear.
But for some uncertain reason, some strange uncertain reason,
this is how it all,
it all began.

Why go, when you could stay awhile?
Why go, when you could stay awhile?

If I made some coffee, would you sit and talk some more?
I know words are usually pointless when you've used them all before.
The way your smile fills the room --
Stay awhile. Kick off your shoes. Don't go. Please stay. --
It always happened this way.

Why go, when you could stay awhile?
Why go, when you could stay awhile?
The way your smile fills the room --
Stay awhile. What's there to lose? --
The way you laugh, when I say, Don't go. Please stay.
Why go? Why go, when you could stay awhile?
Why go? Why go, when you could stay awhile,
when you could stay with me tonight?

I came home tonight and wrote you a letter. A love letter. I was more honest in that letter that I have probably ever been and as I wrote it I was overwhelmed by a sense of euphoria and melancholy at the same time. My hands were trembling and my breaths were short and heavy, pulling me deeper into this utterly confusing state through which I could not see at all, yet where everything was more clear to me, more real to me than I had ever though possible. I wrote until I could write no more, clicked the send button at the bottom of the window, then heaved a final sigh of relief and laid back as a feeling of complete serenity came over me. Today was beautiful. Every tiny detail and fleeting moment. And now I'm laying here, listening to this song over and over again, and counting down the hours. 48...47..46...

I miss you already. But I will see you again so very soon. Why go, when you could stay awhile? Because we both know that it's only temporary, that one day you won't have to go anymore. And I won't have to go anymore. And that thought draws a smile on my face that I'm sure I'll still be wearing for much longer than just awhile.

That time when.

2008-04-06T02:19:00.003+02:00

Hey Grace, remember that night at the residence when we stayed up for hous whispering to each other in the dark, giggling at our own silly stories and random commentary until Floortje burst in the room furiously demanding we pipe down, and we hid under the covers from her?

Hey Jeff, remember that time when we went spear fishing and I stepped on that sea urchin and you had to pee on my foot to neutralize the venom? When I looked up at you mid-pee to see your lips curled into a creepy little smile of satisfaction and said to you "You're enjoying this aren't you?", to which you laughed devilishly and responded "Yeah, a little bit."?

Hey Gareth, remember that night in Prague when I was so sick and couldn't sleep because I could barely breathe and the snow outside just kept falling and falling and falling? When I laid my head on your lap and you told me stories until I finally lost consciousness and you stayed there sitting with your back pressed against the headboard all night? When I asked you the next morning why and you told me that you didn't have the heart to move and wake me up, knowing I'd be plagued by sleeplessness again and that all you wanted was for me to feel better?

Hey Sanoe, remember that day when we skipped school and drove to Waimea to do the White Road hike and then made up wild stories to tell our parents the whole drive home which would explain why we were soaking wet and covered in mud and slime from crawling through the aqueducts when we should have been in Algebra class slaving over Inverse Functions?

Hey Hayley, remember that time when we stole Ingolf's car and took Cody for one of our stalker drives past Danny's house? When we drove back to the village afterward complaining the entire way that the car was going so slow and smelled like burning rubber, only to discover when we'd already reached the house that we'd been driving the whole time with the emergency brake on?

Hey Jose, remember that afternoon when the heat in Granada got so unbearable that we put on our swimsuits and marched down the the water fountain near my apartment? When we hopped in without a moment's hesitation and screamed random and ridiculous things at the passing cars about how we wanted social change, international nuclear arms bans, and most importantly, mas piscinas en la ciudad?

Hey Orkun, remember that morning when we went to the park in Tilburg and spent hours walking around, taking pictures, and playing in the huge piles of leaves under the trees? When we went back a few weeks later at nighttime for round two, then sat for hours in the car afterward talking about life, love, and everything in between while listening to that Jill Scott song over and over and over again?

Hey Su, remember that time when we got caught in that giant snowstorm on the ride home? When it took us so long to get to Queens Park that we eventually just got off the bus and walked the rest of the way home, playing in the snow and asking random strangers to take pictures of us? When we finally arrived and stayed outside playing until our fingers froze and we couldn't get the front door open anymore and were afraid we'd die of frostbite standing in my front yard?

I miss these things. I miss these people. I miss being close to them, being able to reach out and touch them, hear them laugh, and exchange with them the seemingly insignificant details of everyday life. I do not regret any of the experiences I've had, nor choices that I have made, but I do regret that I've managed to stay so far from some of the people that I love the most in the entire world. This is something that's been bothering me a lot lately. More and more with each passing day. And sometimes if I stop and dwell on that thought, I'm overwhelmed by a wave of almost paralyzing melancholy.

"I'm lonely. The loneliness is palpable."

I hear that.

Best friends.

2008-03-16T14:40:00.001+01:00

"Wait for meeeeee!" the little girl screeches as she runs toward the door. Her blond hair, secured tightly in pigtails on the sides of her head, bounces wildly with each clumsy step she takes, and her blue eyes filling with tears are the last thing I see before her sister slams the door shut with a chuckle. "That wasn't very nice, Corey," I say disappointedly as the sound of the little girl howling fills the corridor outside. "Ugh," she scoffs, as she walks casually toward the middle of the room, "you really want to play with that baby?" The last word rolls off her tongue with such distaste that I realize discussion is not an option. I glance back at the door with a pang of remorse. "Sorry Casey," I think to myself "I guess that's life."

I'm five years old and spending the afternoon at my best friend Corey's house. Corey is my age, and seems to take an almost sadistic pleasure out of torturing her little sister. It's a blatant display of sibling malice that I neither share the joy of, nor truly understand. In all honesty, I kind of like Casey, despite the fact that she's two years my junior, thus deeming her an baby unsuitable for social interaction among the big girls. But I go along with it, simply because Corey is my best friend and I, as an only child, figure there are factors involved in having a sister that I can't even begin to comprehend.

Other than the daily routine of provoking her sister to tears, there's very little that I remember about Corey. Our friendship was one born out of convenience after our mothers met in an aerobics class at the local gym and decided to get the two of us together. The simple fact that we were the same age and liked the same brand of cereal was enough to forge a friendship. When I look back now at the old photo albums that my mom has, I see pictures of us standing in our bathing suits by the pool, dripping wet and grinning cheekily, sitting next to each other while my mom carves up my birthday cake, rolling around in the grass on the front lawn and laughing. They're pretty standard run-of-the-mill childhood pictures, except for one thing. In almost every picture, Casey is sitting off to the side and watching her sister and me, her face set in either a sad little frown or a scowl of contempt.

My mom and I moved away when I was six and I said goodbye to Corey and started the next chapter of my young life. A string of best friends would follow in those years. There was Nellie, was the little blond girl who moved into the yellow house next door next door just weeks before my seventh birthday. Like myself, Nellie was the only child of a single mother, no doubt wary of the prospect of moving to a new neighborhood where she knew no one. The very first day I saw their car pull up the driveway, I walked over and introduced myself. From that moment on we became inseparable, spending the next two years climbing trees, plotting elaborate schemes to run away together and secretly pouring over her mother's collection of erotic art books in a mix of fascination and disgust. We shared absolutely everything, including moments reminiscent of the sisterly hate I'd first witnessed with Corey, and while there seemed to be a lot that we had in common, our friendship was still based mostly on sheer convenience. Nellie moved away again when I was eight and my mother and I followed suit shortly thereafter.

During my two years of junior high, my friend group consisted of five girls who I'd known for quite awhile but had never spent much time with. We banded together in that first year mostly out of necessity. It was social suicide, at that age, to not have a group with which to associate oneself. Conveniently, we were a group of six, which meant that even though the group was kept intact, we were able to split off comfortably in pairs. It was Jennifer and Deborah, Hayley and Leah, Sanoe and me. We managed to bring those two years through together, fiercely loyal to one another and chillingly backstabbing at the same time. All fair game in the ripe and awkward stage of preadolescence, I suppose. Still, when our last year rounded to a close, we found ourselves mourning the end of our era and fearing the next step that would come. Jennifer, Deborah, Hayley and I would continue on, the following semester, to our freshman year of high school, but Leah and her family would move away and Sanoe would have to stay behind. We weren't sure how this loss would affect the workings of our little group, but we had no say in the matter.

Within a matter of weeks after starting our high school careers, the group would all but completely disperse. Jennifer and Deborah went about their own business and Hayley and I found ourselves together on the bottom of the pecking order that is the American high school experience. In the four years that followed, whether out of convenience, familiarity or a mix of the two, we stuck together, completely inseparable, two peas in a pod. Ironically, Hayley was the one girl of the group who I'd truly disliked during our years in junior high. The very fact that we'd ended up in the same social circle to begin with was rather comical, as our relationship had been born out of a seething hate for one another. That aside, the years we passed together took us deep into an entire new dimension of friendship that we'd never experienced before. Despite the fact that we had much in common, we were essential polar opposites. Hayley was breathtakingly gorgeous. An early bloomer with the fully developed body of a woman at the tender age of thirteen, she seemed to transcend the limits of her years and attract all the drama and complications that are coupled with sexual maturity. I, on the other hand, was struggling through the awkwardness of my early teenage years, trying desperately to find peace with my chubby cheeks, braces and frizzy hair. Beyond the beauty of her dazzling green eyes and enchanting smile, however, Hayley was a troubled girl. Reckless and unpredictable one moment, then sweet and childlike the next, she became steadily more plagued by uncontrollable outbursts of anger, managing quickly to push almost everyone around her away. She'd pick fights with all the wrong people, argue viciously with her mother, and generally leave a path of chaos in her wake, but I stayed by her side through all of it, because I loved her, because I wanted to help her, because I was convinced I was the only one who truly understood her.

Despite this rollercoaster of experience and a fight that once ensured we didn't exchange a word for three months, she was truly my best friend all throughout high school and into the years that would follow. I knew all her secrets and she knew mine, and no matter how out of control she would sometimes get, I always knew she would be there for me if I needed her, and vice versa. This friendship had bloomed out of the same convenience of all my previous ones, but through the years it had taken on a new element. The convenience disappeared and became replaced by determination, the expectation turned slowly into acceptance. Yet if I look back now, years later, I realize that the one necessary element missing was respect. We loved each other, yes, but much more than that we needed each other. I was the one that would never turn my back to her, and she was the one who I was sure I could fix, thus binding us in a sick and strangely unique web of affection laced with poisoning co-dependence.

When I was eighteen and left Hawaii for good, I wondered if I would ever find a friend like her again, if any of the friendships I would forge in the future could ever be like the one we had shared. I wasn't aware at the time, of the way that I would eventually look back on these years we'd spent together, the way that my love for her would remain the same but that my entire perspective on what constitutes true friendship would change. I suppose one's idea of this gentle order evolves, just as they do, with the passing of time. I remember the look on my mother's face throughout the best and worst of my ordeals with Hayley, our violent arguments and glorious reconciliations. She'd listen to what I had to say, feigning outrage, relief and understanding brilliantly, but never losing this knowing gleam in her eyes that betrayed her knowledge of how, one day, it would all be different.

Five years down the road, my best friend is someone with whom I have learned what, perhaps, the true meaning of friendship is. She is someone I love and trust, but above all, respect and admire. We are there for one another through the good times and the bad, but there is no co-dependence, no crippling need to play victim and rescuer. Ours is a relationship based on understanding, of giving and taking in measured amounts, of trying our best to understand one another but accepting, on the odd occasion, that we simply cannot. She's a lot like me, but also unique and special in her very own way. And it's this contrast that makes the time we spend together so interesting. As is natural in any friendship, we sometimes disagree and lose our tempers with one another, but at the end of the day, we both know how to cool down and admit to our own faults. I look back on my previous friendships now and am grateful for the things I have learned from each and every one of them, because they have all, in some way, been instrumental in teaching me to understand the true concept. I suppose, in a way, I'm even grateful for the friendships I never did forge, for the people that crossed my path silently, yet still managed to leave a mark on my memory.

I think about Casey now and what she'd be doing these days. I wonder if she'd remember the way that I used to go along with her sister's cruel bullying tactics or if she'd remember me at all. I wonder if she and Corey, now both in their early twenties, have reconciled and enjoy a healthy sibling friendship. I think of her bopping blond pigtails and tearful big blue eyes behind an abruptly slammed door and feel sorry for the way I didn't stand up for her all those years ago. It's all part of the process of growing up, but I still wish I had known how differently I'd feel about it one day.

I'm sorry, Casey. Wherever you are, I hope you're happy.

The good, the bad & the quirky.

2008-03-04T13:50:00.001+01:00

Things I love:
- kimono
- pomegranates
- the smell of saltwater
- masala chai
- Monica Bellucci
- Jack Russell terriers
- polaroids
- pinot noir
- bubblebaths
- handwritten letters
- green tea ice cream
- sashimi & inari
- Adbusters
- people watching
- Pedro Almodóvar
- Christiane Amanpour
- The New Yorker
- old analog cameras
- fresh basil
- Calvin & Hobbes
- San Francisco
- satire
- wasabi
- Bill Hicks
- loud dinners with friends
- cat naps
- paper diaries
- teterías (shisha lounges)
- wasting hours browsing on Flickr
- green mango & shoyu
- Mumia Abu-Jamal
- Mesoamerican culture
- Olive oil on bread

Things I loathe:
- Starbucks
- Chick Lit.
- Clint Eastwood
- celery
- Valentine's Day
- most types of liquorice
- the word "diva"
- cigars
- the smell of wool
- fishbowls
- greeting cards
- Freud
- the smell of vanilla
- chianti
- Louis Vuitton
- incorrect use of the word "addicting"
- crows
- artificial beaches
- cotton balls
- Oprah Winfrey
- turtlenecks
- dill
- Los Angeles
- political correctness
- New Years Resolutions

Things I'm not embarrassed to admit I love:
- old Friends reruns
- McDonald's french fries with sweet & sour sauce
- tapping beer
- singing Madonna songs in the shower
- hail storms
- cheesy fashion magazines
- making sushi that resembles small animals
- southern drawls
- Lindsay Lohan
- lying about my age just for the hell of it
- Dance Dance Revolution
- gratuitous use of the words "flabbergasted", "preposterous", and "inaniloquent"
- gratuitous use of the word "gratuitous"
- drinking on airplanes
- putting olives on my fingers and eating them off one by one
- celebrities as humanitarians/philanthropists
- spotting bad translations in subtitles
- quoting movies
- laughing at my own jokes
- fighting the urge to laugh at inappropriate times
- Imagining what I would do if I had a penis
- eating sunflower seeds whole (hull & kernel)

To the men I have loved.

2008-03-04T13:07:00.001+01:00

It is strange to think back over the past few years and realize, not only how fast they've gone by, but the way in which they seem to blend together in an indistinguishable blur of events, trips, places, and above all, faces. It would almost seem as though the mind creates a subconscious timeline, marking the passing of months and years, not with numbers, but with the beginnings, durations, and sometimes endings of ones relationships. I have heard it said that every instance of human interaction leaves an effect more profound than is ever truly realized, much less fully appreciated, that the sights and sounds and smells which we associate with a certain time or place are more often simply mementos which we take with us in remembrance of someone who has touched our lives irreversibly. And if this be true for every type of human interaction, then it would seem to me also likely that the effect be twice as powerful when remembering our amorous exchanges, the precious collection of romantic liaisons which mark, not only, our never ending passage into adulthood, but the very image of the people which we become.

When posed the question "have you ever been in love?", I often find myself at a loss for words. I am aware, of course, of the connotations implied by the term in love, yet find it very difficult to distinguish the plethora of varied emotions which I have associated with this sentiment and determine what it truly constitutes and how or why it is felt. Is being in love that feeling of weakness which seems to quiver through ones body when in the presence of another? Is it the desire to share oneself in all entirety, to be a better person, or to protect another from all that which can be perceived as a threat from the outside world? If I think back for a moment and focus on the face of each of the men which I have ever claimed to care for, I am confronted by a wave of distinctly unique feelings, memories, circumstances and outcomes. I realize, almost immediately, that while these elements may have varied greatly, the very essence of the sentiment which I associate them with remains the same. Each encounter was, of course, unique, and I can say in all honesty, that I cared for some more than others, but where does that golden line lie between caring about someone and truly being in love with them? Is it true that we are lucky if, in an entire lifetime, we find even a single person to fall in love with, a person which shakes us to the core and changes us in ways which ensure we are never quite the same again?

I was sixteen when I became convinced for the first time that I was in love. It began with an adoration of the way in which his soft brown hair would fall into his eyes when he spoke to me, the way it seemed as though my hand was made to fit into his, and grew slowly into an insatiable desire to pass every waking hour in his presence, a mutual addiction laced with the innocence of inexperience and an affection which made the entire world seem to stop. As time passed, however, this feeling of security and resolve became slowly replaced by a hunger for new experience, a desire to explore the world outside that which I had always known, and more so, the one inside of me of which I had so little understanding. It was in my quest to discover this new world that I found myself in love again, this time with a boy seven years my senior who I spent all of four weeks with before deciding to pack my bags and travel oceans away for. The thrill of being only eighteen and standing on the edge of an adventure so profound filled me with enthusiasm, a desire to throw myself into this new existence and let the sensation of this new love, so unfamiliar and overwhelming, wash over me completely.

We learned everything together in the years that would follow, the complexities of building a home, a routine, an entire web of life which both thrilled and terrified us. It was during this time that I became convinced that this was what true love felt like. Not the obsessive, needy puppy love I'd known before, but something much more certain, more lasting, the bud of a blooming flower that required patience, a soft hand, and dedication which was sometimes difficult to summon, but which ultimately made our love stronger. With him, I could spend hours talking, laughing, sharing with one another the similar and distinct ways in which we interpreted the world around us. We would take spontaneous trips all over the country, document what we saw and lived in photographs, and grow together as family, as lovers, and above all, as friends who knew one another inside and out, could recite each others' stories from memory and who sometimes needed no words at all to express the most complex of emotions. Yet while we learned to allow our roots to twist and bend and become evermore entwined, neither of us ever stopped growing and changing individually. What we had together was beautiful, yet the desire to discover the things which cannot be shared with another person, but must be experienced alone, became greater and greater and we began to pull apart from one another until all that remained were the delicate threads of the one thing that would bind us together forever- our friendship.

My second long term relationship behind me, I left my life under the Low Sky and traveled to Barcelona to, once again, start anew. I arrived intent on spending the next few months focusing on myself, on finding a balance on the line between adolescence and womanhood which seemed so hopelessly ambiguous then. Little did I know, of course, that this would be just the first in a series of actions which would mark the beginning of my next chapter, one in which I would encounter a whole new rush of emotions, of love and lust, pleasure and pain that would change me forever. And how I did love in those months that passed by so quickly on the shores of the Mediterranean, and deep into the years which would follow. I loved fiercely and selfishly, whimsically and unknowingly, taking, giving, building and crushing with no rhyme or reason at all. I loved the Swedish boy with his chilling green eyes and heart-crushing sincerity, the way he would watch me while I slept and tell me he would love me forever. I loved the sarcastic and charming filmmaker with whom I spent years weaving a web of trust and familiarity, with whom I could share my most fleeting of thoughts and darkest of secrets, with whom making love seemed like a game between two children and an earthshaking shudder of passion at the same time. I loved the days and nights in which the tension was so thick that I could feel it in my lungs with every breath I drew, yet where no more than a betraying glance or casual brush of skin would be exchanged. I loved the walks along the water, the nights of chess and poetry and jazz music, the mornings of bare feet and whispered melodies, the laughs which I elicited with silly faces or games played in my childhood, and the tears which I provoked sometimes out of sheer cruelty. In my mind, there was no limit on the number of ways in which this love could be felt or expressed and I reveled in the complexity yet utter simplicity of it all. I loved the entire process of falling in love, then out again, a fascinating act which seemed as colorful and beautiful as a dance of abandon or carefully penned poem.

In my mind, this flurry of passion could have continued forever, until I fell in love with the one who would commit an act of betrayal so profound that it seemed surreal, who would make me taste the bitterness of heartbreak for the very first time, and who would leave me completely shattered and unable to remember, in even the faintest of detail, the way in which I had once been able to love. My sadness, however, would soon turn into anger, then hate, then ever so slowly, indifference, which is perhaps the truest form of hate there is. I would nurse this feeling grudgingly until I returned to Spain once again, this time to the heart of Andalusia. It was there, so far from the piercing reality of these memories that I would forge a friendship which peeled back the layers of protection I had built up around myself and allowed me to once more catch a glimpse of the breathtaking descent into the depths of adoration. With the utmost of patience and care, we fashioned a love not experienced in the same reckless and selfish way I had known it before, and not fueled by the same motives. It was not so much romantic love as it was a process of learning and understanding. In pure innocence and fascination, we spent these months coming closer and closer together until it seemed, at times, that we were two parts of a single person, two elements necessary in the existence of one picture. And yes, in the end I loved him too, his dark brown eyes and intoxicating laugh, his incessantly churning thoughts and the life which seemed to radiate from his every movement. I loved him as a friend, as a brother, as someone who would change me forever and make me forget that bittersweet taste in my mouth, that cold feeling which I thought I'd never be free of.

Have you ever been in love? I hear the question and can only smile, because I know that I have. Perhaps not in a way which can be defined in any set terms or numbers, nor in a manner which can be described in any song or film or dream. I see it more as the culmination of several moments, places, occurrences and emotions, the sum of all parts melting together into a state of mind, a memory, an ability to recall each face individually and remember something about it that filled you with hope. As I said before, there will always be those that you will remember more fondly, more vividly, the few stars which shine just a bit brighter than the others, but this is only natural. What these experiences have taught me, above all, is how to find beauty in the process of allowing yourself to care for someone, to not take any of it for granted because every step changes you in one way or another.

These days I find myself, once again, dancing on the line of a blooming affection, treading carefully into the pages of another new chapter. It reminds me of my past yet is undeniably distinct and I am so fascinated by the feeling of it, that I approach the whole thing with a lighter hand and a softer voice. I want to savor the experience, let every thought and feeling wash over me slowly, resist the urge to allow myself to succumb to it all too quickly. It feels like holding a candle in my hands, sensing the warmth of the flame against my palms and fingertips and watching it grow brighter, like peeling back the skin of a pomegranate to expose the delicate red fruit beneath. It is frightening and thrilling in way I can't truly describe and it makes me feel nothing but gratitude for the luck which I have had and the sequence of events which have brought me to this point. It makes me want to close my eyes and dedicate a single heartbeat to all my previous experiences, to the adventures which I have already had and the ones I am just beginning, to my thoughts and fondest of memories... to the men I have loved.

Girls, Queens & Very Strange Dreams

2008-02-22T13:13:00.002+01:00

What a strange past couple of hours. Yesterday I met up with Kasia and Gerald in the city to properly celebrate Kasia's birthday. We quickly grabbed some kibbeling (battered fried fish) and then headed to the cinema to watch Love In The Time of Cholera. Having read the book years ago, I was really looking forward to it, but was extremely disappointed by the bad casting/acting/makeup. Great cinematography and soundtrack, though. Go Shakira!

After the movie, we headed to the station and caught the train to Amsterdam. We met Wilco at the Dam Square and headed toward the Leidseplein, where we spent a few hours having drinks and chatting away at De Balie. As to be expected on such a quintessential Queens & Girls night out, the conversation quickly turned to sex and we spent a majority of our time there swapping silly stories and information about our personal preferences. After my second drink, the conversation was getting me all hot and bothered, so I whipped out my mobile and, with the help of the boys (who are experts in the field), composed an absolutely filthy text message to G. We sent it off and all waited excitedly for his response, ordering another round of drinks and continuing with our raunchy banter, which solicited strange looks from the people around us. After a few more rounds and a lot of good laughs, we headed off to grab a bite to eat and catch the tram back to the station. Our endless chatter and giggling was interrupted only by the much-anticipated (yet distinctly tame) response to the text I'd sent earlier, and a phone call from G to see what we were up to.

Once safely in the train, we snuggled into our seats and quieted down a bit, the food in our tummies lessening the effects of the alcohol in our systems. We exchanged silly faces and a few more stories until we reached Leiden, where we said goodbye to Wilco and continued on to The Hague. I was looking forward to cup of tea and a good night's sleep when I arrived home, but ended up having a wild and extremely vivid dream about a plane crash and frantic trek through the wilderness to escape from mystery soldiers speaking in a strange and unrecognizable language.

Normally speaking, I'm never able to wake up and then fall back to sleep and resume the same dream I was having, but this morning I was. I hit my snooze button twice and, both times, found myself right back in the same scene. The dream seemed to go on forever and ended with me opening my eyes and clenching my fist so tightly that it felt as though it hadn't been a dream at all. With the entire sequence of events still fresh in mind, I immediately began writing it all down. They say that dreams have a deeper significance, that they can reveal unconscious thoughts or even events which have not yet taken place. I don't know how much I believe that, but this one certainly left me with a feeling that I wanted to hold on to for as long as I could.

It's late now and I have to get ready for work. I'll try to write more when I get home. Naturally, there's still much more to tell and not enough time to do so. Story of my life.

Twenty-five.

2008-02-20T18:30:00.001+01:00

It's 6:30pm on a Wednesday night and I'm home. Today is my best friend's 25th birthday and as tradition would have it, we should be out with more friends spilling cocktails and birthday banter at some little cafe in the city, but the reality is that most of our friends are out of the country or writing their theses, or simply too caught up in the chaos of their post-study/pre-graduation lives to meet up for the occasion. Not to mention the fact that the birthday girl, herself, has to work tonight.

So here I am, contemplating the prospect of turning twenty-five myself within the year and trying, unsuccessfully, to compose a to-do list of tasks to complete, assignments to hand in, and appointments to make over the next few weeks. I reason that if everyone else is so absorbed in sorting their affairs that we can't get together to celebrate one of us taking another step closer to the scary age line, that I might as well use my free time just as efficiently as well. The longer I sit here, however, the more off-track I seem to get. Perhaps I set myself up for failure on my way home from the city today. After meeting with the birthday girl and a good friend of hers for lunch this afternoon, I decided to stop and pick up a few things to make my productive evening flow more smoothly. I made my way through the city center to my favorite little bookstore and silently vowed to spend no more than 15 minutes inside picking up the gift I'd already decided on for the birthday girl, and perhaps a copy of The Economist, which is one of the few sinful indulgences I allow myself on my students' budget these days. Once inside, however, I reasoned that I hadn't been there in quite some time and that it couldn't hurt to peruse the new titles in stock for a few minutes. I started in the travel literature section, made my way to the poetry racks, then lingered at the classic fiction table just long enough to strike up a conversation with a distinctly nerdy-looking (yet undeniably cute) boy holding a copy of de Beauvoir's "Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter" in his hand (bastard, I'd been looking for that for months!). I made some cheesy comment about how secure he must be in his manhood to buy such a flamboyant piece of feminist literature, and he smiled sheepishly and said it was for his sister.

"Good excuse", I laughed.

"Actually" he responded cheekily "it's just a ploy to pick up chicks."

"Nice." I said, "obviously a good technique."

"I found it quite brilliant myself, but in all honesty, I'm much more into solid works. You know, Tolstoy, D.H. Lawrence."

"Drama queen" I shot back.

"I suppose."

"Yeah, easy call."

We exchanged a few more witty remarks before it suddenly dawned on me that I was technically on a tight time schedule there. I smiled politely and wished Mystery Boy a good afternoon, then headed to the cash register to pay for the birthday girl's gift and my copy of The Economist. When I got there, however, I was greeted by a huge queue that seemed to be going nowhere fast, and allowed myself a few more minutes to check out the magazine racks. Twenty minutes and fifty-seven euros later, I left the store with my initially planned purchase in hand, and copies of The New Yorker, Poets & Writers, Brilliant Corners (A Journal of Jazz and Literature) and the latest edition of Political Science Quarterly. I zipped my sweater up, pulled my gloves on, and told myself confidently that I would stop quickly at the supermarket to buy some things for breakfast the next morning, then go home and start my night of productivity.

I only made it a few steps, however, before turning the corner and (literally) running into my friends Jorge and Natasha from university. I hadn't seen them for months and figured I couldn't squander such an opportunity to catch up with them, so we stood there for awhile swapping updates and stories about what we'd been up to lately, and before I knew it, another half an hour had passed. Realizing it was much too cold to be standing outside talking, we exchanged goodbyes and promises to keep in better touch, and I continued on to the supermarket. I poked around the fruit & veg section, grabbed a box of muesli and some yogurt from the dairy aisle, then passed by a huge shelf advertising artesan prosecco on sale for just 9 euros. "Prosecco will not help you be productive, whatsoever" I reasoned. "But on the other hand", I thought, "how long has it been since you've treated yourself to a nice glass of prosecco? You love prosecco" (which I used to sip casually in the sun with a roommate of mine on the balcony of our apartment in Granada until we were both so sunburnt and tipsy that we could do little more than retreat to our rooms and indulge in long and decadent siestas). I hesitated for a few more seconds, then grabbed a bottle and headed to the check out. Now I sit here, my second glass of the infamous prosecco in hand, and am finding it harder and harder to concentrate or be, in the least bit, productive at all.

The greatest problem with being an undergrad student in the last study phase before graduation is the complete absence of pressure. I work well under pressure. At times it seems to be the only thing which motivates me enough to lift a single finger, and now suddenly, in the middle of my third year of uni, it's all but completely dissipated. I'm now suddenly left with 1,001 options, opportunities and ideas and no real vision or guidance, nor any sense of urgency to make a choice. I need to finish up a few loose-ended assignments and grab a few credits with some elective courses, find a decent internship and write my thesis, and I'm done- the world is my oyster. So why is it so bloody difficult all of the sudden? My mind is swimming with thoughts of pursuing the PoliSci track and applying for MA programs in International Relations, European Law or something of the like, yet my heart screams for consideration of other tracks which will keep me writing, writing, writing. My biggest source of doubt with the writing track comes from the fact that it is simply such a hard business to penetrate. I've written since I was a child out of enthusiasm, desperation, complete and utter release, but never with the idea that I would ever be able to turn it into a career. Yet sitting here now, contemplating the overwhelming advantages and pitfalls of turning twenty-five, I'm suddenly wondering how I could ever be truly be happy doing something else.

Twenty-five. The idea alone simply boggles the mind. Twenty-five. This is only the beginning. Twenty-five. Get it together. Twenty-five. Enjoy another glass of prosecco, dabble at your little list, and enjoy the fact that, no matter how scary it sounds, twenty-five is just a number, and one that still gives you plenty of time to figure out where you are, what you're doing, and, most importantly, where you will go from here.

Twenty-five.

Boa Sorte

2008-02-18T18:43:00.001+01:00

The transition to spring is arriving much too early this year. With every passing day, the signs become more visible and more plentiful- the tiny yellow blossoms dotting the fields, the pale green buds on the trees, and the chilly yet blindingly sunny days that draw the city from its winter sleep and onto the streets and slowly-filling terraces. These days I also feel as though I'm awakening from a semi-comatose state induced by a lack of sunlight and far too much time spent alone.

After more than five years here, it amazes me, still, the devastating effects the winter months have on me and my ability to function as a human being. Every year, no matter how well I think I'm prepared, I always find myself slipping back into this lethargic existence that leaves me but a mere shell of the person which I normally am. This year has been an exceptionally difficult one, despite the fact that the winter was relatively mild for Dutch standards, perhaps because I spent last winter in Granada and quickly became accustomed to the climate standard there, which by comparison, is like night and day. In any case, the onset of spring couldn't arrive soon enough, as far as I'm concerned, and in just two short weeks, I already feel a thousand times more active, social, and alive in general.

The week before last I left The Hague again to spend five lovely days with G in Munich. I arrived early on Friday morning and pranced through the airport to the arrivals hall to find him there waiting for me with a beautiful smile and a long-stemmed red rose wrapped in pink paper. We caught the train back into the city and spent a few hours in his apartment, then headed to a little Indian restaurant around the corner for lunch before he jetted off for a meeting with his supervisor. I spent the rest of my afternoon exploring the city and marveling at the way in which the sun and beautiful blue sky overhead seemed to transform the city into a completely different place than it had seemed during my first visit. My first night back with G was intoxicating, beautiful, and laced with just a tinge of awkwardness as we both became reaccustomed to one another, a feeling that I savored until it dissipated in the early morning hours and was replaced by an overwhelming sense of comfort, familiarity and content.

We woke up rather early and forced ourselves to abandon the sheets curled at our feet to catch a train to Tegernsee, a village about an hour south of Munich, where we walked along the bank of the lake, to Rottach-Egern, the place where Bob Marley apparently spent the last months of his life. Armed with towels , a picnic lunch and a decent number of his tracks, we climbed up a hill overlooking the lake to spend a few hours paying tribute as we sat, talked, and enjoyed the breathtaking tranquility of our surroundings. When the sun began to dip below the mountains on the east bank, we headed back toward Tegernsee to meet with Tim (a friend of G's) and his girlfriend, Karoline for a drink. We ended up staying with them until the last train, with promises we'd return the next morning to accompany them on a hike into the mountains and spend a night in one of the cabins there (which are quite basic, but notoriously difficult to acquire). The next day, however, we decided that we'd both rather stay in the city and, instead, spent the morning on a free tour of the center given by an awesome Canadian guy with a mustache à la Salvador Dali.

We got to the Marienplatz a little before noon and spent the next two hours on the tour before heading back to the starting point for a typical Bavarian breakfast of weißwurst and beer and continuing on to one of the the art museums in the city center. Every moment that went by made me feel more and more attached the the city I was experiencing somehow, as though I was not only passing a few hours in her streets, but taking in the sights, smells, and emotions I felt and creating a memory in my heart and mind that would last forever. It's funny how a city can do that to you, can make you feel, even momentarily, that your life becomes intertwined with hers, that you can become completely lost in her web of history and mystery and want to savor that moment until it simply isn't there anymore, and you've somehow managed to become just as much a part of her as the very things that made you fall in love with her in the first place.

On our last entire day together, G and I went to the Englischer Garten to play catch, take pictures, and spend a few hours in the sun before heading to a training session at his Muay Thai school (an incredibly sweaty and exhausting hour-long class which I absolutely loved), then returned home to shower, change, have dinner and go out with two of his rugby friends for some pool. As fun as the evening was, however, I was filled with a growing sentiment of sadness, knowing that the next day would be my last, and that I would have to return to The Hague, which is about as far removed from the tranquility and surreality of my second visit to Munich as it gets. The next morning was a blur of a lazy awakening, slightly rushed breakfast and a packing session in which few words were exchanged. By the time we arrived at the airport I'd convinced myself I'd get through our goodbye without crying, yet while standing at the security check before my gate, still had to force myself to hold it together and not succumb to the tears which were threatening to spill down my cheeks, to the words, so delicate, which were forming on my lips. Once inside the plane, I spent the next hour trying desperately to distract myself, a task which proved easier than I'd hoped because of the beautiful view of my last Bavarian sunset which I was treated to through the window at my side. A perfect ending to a perfect visit.

Since I've been back, I've spent two nights at Melati's house in Delft, an evening out on the town with a colleague of mine from Cape Verde, a 6-hour long afternoon with a group of friends from uni at a coffeeshop in the city centre, and a day of cappuccino and chit-chat with Kasia. In the coming week, I have a trial lesson at a Muay Thai school here in The Hague, a load of work nights and essays to write for uni, and lunch with a friend whom I haven't seen in ages. In stark contrast to the winter months, the days are getting longer, yet still feel much too short to cram everything into them that I'd like to. I simply love how this time of year brings about so many changes, such a clear and obvious shift of emotions and undeniable boost of energy. Spring is on its way. And I can't think of a better time for it to arrive, nor a better shift in mood to greet it.

Then & Now

2008-01-28T21:58:00.001+01:00

The emptiness which I feel upon waking
is mine as well as it is yours
but you will never feel it as I do
nor suffer it exactly the same way
because for you it is an element of creation
a space filling the space of your lacking
exposed in the breaking light of day.

The sorrow which I know in my heart
is mine as well as it is yours
but you will never know it as I have
nor understand it in a similar form
because for you it is a faint sense of loss
regret spun on regret for the wrong things
and silenced as soon as it is born.

The hate which I kindle in my being
is mine as well as it is yours
but you will never control it as I can
nor embrace it as I do so now
because for you it is an element of substitution
a misuse of a useless emotion
that poisons as only it knows how.

The blood which I have on my hands
is mine as well as it is yours
but you will never carry it as I must
nor mourn it as I have for so long
because for me it is a stain of injustice
of innocence killing innocence, unblinking
and the desolation of an unfinished song.

- 20 March, 2007
Granada, Spain

I scribbled these words on a napkin in an obscure little cafe between lectures less than a year ago. Reading back on them, I find it hard to believe that they're my own, that the way I felt then could contrast so vividly with the state of mind I find myself in now. It's funny where just a few short months can take you, how the passing of time can erase and create so much simultaneously. Nothing remains the same forever, and it's the transition between stages which somehow makes life so beautiful. Perhaps, in the end, that's the true lesson of it all.

Bilingual Love

2008-01-24T21:39:00.003+01:00

It is said that travel and change of place impart new vigor to the mind, that there is no challenge truly parallel to that of finding one's place in unfamiliar surroundings and forging the bonds necessary to call a new place home. After years of drifting from one place to the next here, far from all that was once so warmly familiar and safe, the one experience which continues to inspire and frustrate me simultaneously is the formation and maintaining of relationships, whether amicable or amorous, based on communication in a language which is not my own.

It's interesting how the simple act of self expression can sometimes be so devastatingly impeded by a either a lack of appropriate words or an absence of emotional connection to them. I've always attached an immeasurable amount of importance to my ability to communicate well, to capture the sentiment of a moment by weaving my words together, playing and twisting with sentence structures carefully to say exactly what is it I'm thinking or feeling. More often than not, however, this becomes infinitely more difficult when speaking in your second, or even third, language.

The first relationship I ever built based entirely on a foreign language was with Jose, my best friend from Granada. I met him through a mutual friend from the Czech Republic one afternoon, after a lecture, when we all went for drinks at a little cafe near school. Within moments of being introduced, we found ourselves deep in a discussion about nationalist movements in Spain and the concept of European identity in general. He fascinated me with his strong opinions and open nature, but as I'd only been in Granada for a few weeks at the time, I struggled to keep up with him, tripping clumsily over my sentence constructions and becoming ever-more frustrated by the fact that I couldn't get my point across properly.

After that conversation, Jose and I saw each other more and more often, until we were spending practically every waking moment with one another. My Spanish improved radically in those months, helped greatly by the fact that my new friend was so patient with me and my linguistic re-acclimation. We would spend hours, sometimes, swapping silly stories, locked head-to-head in fierce debates, or even just sitting in silence, enjoying one another's company. In addition to my ability to communicate with him in Spanish, something which came more easily with each passing day was the appreciation of expression which did not necessitate the use of words at all. By the time my semester in Granada ended, I could speak to Jose about anything and everything. While occasionally confronted with a temporary loss of words or improperly conjugated verb, I felt that I was really able to express myself in such a way that he, at least to a certain extent, could really understand me, that he could see beyond the words I spoke and into the source of where they came from.

With my experience in the shadow of the Alhambra behind me, I returned to Holland to find, much to my horror, that my Dutch was in shambles. Long after my first weeks of readjustment here, the fluency with which I spoke the language before leaving continued to elude me. Another thing which caught my attention was the way in which I just didn't seem to feel Dutch in the same way I did either English or Spanish. With a bit of effort, I could communicate sufficiently, but never felt that anything I said truly caught the sentiment in which it was intended, nor allowed the person I was speaking with to get an accurate image of what kind of person I was.

It was in the peak of my frustration with Dutch, a few months after returning to The Hague, that I started speaking regularly with G. We'd swapped a few sporadic emails throughout the previous year, usually composed of a strange mix of Dutch, German and English, but had never had any type of regular or continuous contact. Somehow during those first exchanges, we settled into speaking to one another almost exclusively in Dutch and writing emails to each other in English. Speaking to him felt a bit unnatural at first because of my lingering uncertainty about the use of the language, but G was really great at making me forget all that. He'd tell me wild stories about his trips through Africa and South America, make me laugh with his corny jokes and silly wordplay, and bring an enormous grin to my face with his deep and intoxicating laugh. At some point, however, my lack of emotional connection with the language we used as our primary means of communication really began to bother me. There were so many things I wanted to tell him, ask him, teach him, that I simply wasn't able to. At times, sensing my frustration, he'd suggest that we just speak in English, but the problem therein was my stubbornness and the knowledge that it's hard to switch methods of communication once one has already firmly been established.

As time passed, my contact with G became a daily thing and I found myself wishing more and more that I could find a way to crack through that barrier that was left between us. Then, out of nowhere, we decided spontaneously to spend a long weekend together in Dublin. The moment I arrived there, all the uncertainty and doubt of the previous weeks just faded away. My language skills were, by no means, any better during the four days we spent together, but somehow I was, once again, confronted by the significance of the unsaid and the ecstacy of moments passed in voluntary silence that I had learned to appreciate with Jose. Our days in Dublin flew by in the blink of an eye, as did my time in Munich with him a few weeks later, and his trip home to Holland shortly thereafter. And while the occasional moment would still arise in which I felt that there were things I simply could not say properly, my anxiety about speaking in Dutch began to ease more and more. I'll be back in Munich in two weeks now, and instead of dreading the confrontation, am starting to see it more as a challenge, an exciting way to push myself to regain all that I lost during my time in Spain and come up with new ways to express things which used to strike me as commonplace, yet now seem absolutely paramount.

I've wondered, sometimes, if it's possible to love someone when it can seem like such an insurmountable obstacle stands between you, if it's possible to reach past that which has always come so naturally and find other ways to show another person all the beautiful, ugly, and silent things which make you who you are. Something tells me now that it is, and that perhaps the key is just a bit more effort, patience, or even a slightly different way of perceiving things. A smile, a look, a touch or caress- there are an infinite number of ways to communicate just as high a number of emotions. And at the end of the day, there are some things that speak much louder than words ever could, things that you simply know and which need no further explanation. Love, in essence, is a language itself, one that we are all truly fluent in. For some, it just takes practice to get it right.

Clarity.

2008-01-17T18:13:00.001+01:00

It's been my experience that inspiration is such, that it hits you when you are least expecting it. I spent yesterday evening in Amsterdam with Ruud, Sandra, Melati, Uta, Kasia, and Andrew (her boyfriend), who is here for a visit from Salamanca. We met up at Centraal and headed to a little italian restaurant close by. The wine was plentiful and the conversation lovely as always, flittering from swingers parties and unconventional sex practices, to EU policy and possible outcomes of the primaries in The States. As I looked around the table at these faces, which have become so familiar to me over the past few years, I was suddenly struck with the realization that our time together at university has come to an end, and that we have all reached the point in which taking that next step is imminent. In the larger scope of things, the changes about to take place are neither drastic nor permanent, yet something about the undertones of the friendship we've forged during the time we've had together has shifted slightly and we all know that our days of wild parties, crazy stories and hour upon hour spent curled up in a dark little corner of Siezo have reached an end.

Everywhere around me, people seem to be moving forward with their lives. We sit around the table together now, still, in essence, the same people we were when we did so for the first time. Yet somehow it's not just our circumstances which have changed, but something else, something much more profound and fundamentally long-lasting. Where we used to dream of love and experience, trips abroad and success in every aspect of life, we now suddenly seem to be getting it. The unmistakable spark of innocence in our eyes has polished into a glimmer of content, traced with tiny swirls of desire and anticipation for the next adventure. Yet somehow, I can't help but feel like I have lost sight of what I'd always thought was so clearly in focus, like my grip is somehow loosening around that which my fingers used to cling to so tightly. I used to always know exactly what I wanted, and run after it without a moment's hesitation or regret. But lately, I feel as though I spend more time doubting everything than simply allowing myself to live it. I loathe this feeling.

This morning I awoke with a certain listlessness that I couldn't understand. After a cup of tea and a bit of an agitated pace around my flat, I suddenly threw my trainers on and headed to the forest nearby for what was meant to be a short run. I broke out into a controlled pace at the foot of the woods and continued as such for about 10 minutes. With every step in that short span of time, my thoughts seemed to become more and more clear, until they began to dissipate altogether and be replaced by an indescribable clarity and emptiness. Caught up in the ecstacy of such a feeling, I quickened my step and jolted ahead. The only thing I can remember distinctly after that was the feeling of the raindrops on my face and the searing sensation in my legs. Before I knew it, more than an hour had passed, and I suddenly found myself on the edge of a small creek that I didn't recognize. I stood there panting for a few minutes, not once taking my eyes off the water until it seemed as though my mind rejoined my body, then said to myself, out loud "what are you doing?".

Exactly. What am I doing? This is not me. This is not who I was ever meant to be. But all of that ends here. This will be my year.

Babylon.

2007-10-13T14:43:00.001+02:00

Third year into the mix and time is flying by quicker than ever. One crisis has followed another since the start of the term, but this weekend it would seem that things are looking up. I'll knee-deep in a million things at the moment- huge projects, pending visits, hospital calls and a possible move within the next few weeks. It would truly seem now that life keeps charging forward, whether I'm ready for the ride and can manage to keep up or not. Yet somehow, from one day to the next, the shades in which I observe it all flush dramatically from drab grays to brilliant hues of pink and red and purple.

I had a moment yesterday on the trip home from a friend's house where I'd spent the night before. The sun was shining, the city buzzing, and I felt as though I was standing still for just a moment and watching it all transpire around me. The music in the streets and leaves dancing on the wind made it all seem like a musical, in which I had no role except that of a silent observer, an audience of one in a spectacle that only I could see. I rode the wave of euphoria that washed over me all afternoon, then finished off the day with a tour of the city by night to take pictures of all the beautiful places that I see every day but have somehow ceased to fully see the beauty of. Camera in hands, Quintijn at my side, we scoured the city for good angles, perfect lighting, priceless moments unfolding to catch and store on film. At one point, while crawling around on our hands and knees through the fallen leaves scattered across the cobblestoned walkways, I felt a fit of silent laugher rise to my lips, the spontaneity and casual beauty of it all making me realize, somehow, that my thoughts of places far and moments past are trite and unnecessary. Because despite it all, when I stop to think about it, to let the essence of the place I call home truly sink in, that I love it here and that I actually always have.

Sometimes there's nothing that can make you realize how much you love a person, a place, a laugh or a smile until you almost lose it, the feeling of that which you hold so dear slipping slowly from your fingers as you clench your fist around it, not willing to let it go. This is where I am now, holding on with everything that I have, determined not to lose what I have fought so hard to create. Yet it's comforting to know that I don't stand clinging to these things alone. In the moments when I feel my weakest, when the strength in my fingers is draining, that there are other hands to take the burden from me, hands to hold me steady through my darkest of hours, hands that soothe and heal and let me know that at the end of the day, I have managed to make it home.

Mejor me quedo aquí.

2007-09-14T15:04:00.001+02:00

As much as it pains me to say it, I'm thinking about postponing my internship period and sticking out another semester here in The Hague. There's a really interesting minor at uni that I'd like to do and putting off the internship would also mean that I would finish up everything here just in time for the next opening of the position in Israel that I originally turned down because of time constraints.

I went to Kasia's last night after getting off work. Jair and Gerald stopped by as well and we sat around for a few hours drinking coffee and catching up before walking over to the Welcome Back Party being thrown by the student association I used to sit on the board of. I don't know if it was the fact that I was tired, utterly sober or just not in the party mood, but I could not, for the life of me, force myself into the spirit necessary to tolerate such gatherings. I walked around a bit, talked to a few friends, had a mineral water, then split. Kasia, G and Jair didn't seem like they were enjoying themselves much either so they came with me and we headed across the street to get some greasy fries and Fanta. Standing out in the cold, shivering our asses off and talking nonsense was probably the highlight of the whole evening, and on my ride home all I could do was think of Granada and how much I truly do miss it.

I wish so much I could just snap my fingers and be back there again, far from all the stress and mundaneness of routine here. Speaking of blasts from the past, however, I'm meeting up with Bertrand for coffee tomorrow. I haven't seen him since he was here on his exchange in my first year. I'm excited to see him, yet slightly nervous and strangely unsettled. It's weird, sometimes, to stop for a moment and take a look behind you, to return to old places and glimpse old faces long after certain events and changes have transpired. Tomorrow will certainly be one of these instances. I'm sure we'll have a great time, though.

Gotta run now, late for work.

Fast Forward

2007-09-03T15:48:00.001+02:00

In exactly 3 weeks, Jose and Juan Diego will be here. They'll be staying for 8 days, a visit which will coincide perfectly with my 24th birthday. I'm planning on showing them around The Hague, Utrecht and Amsterdam, and taking them to a football game with Quint on the 26th. We'll probably stay at his place that night and spend my birthday in Rotterdam as well before heading back here for my birthday party on the 28th. I'm so excited for them to get here, I can hardly keep still. It's only been a little over a month since the last time I saw them, but it certainly feels like much longer. Not that there has been particularly much going on since I got home, but juggling work, studying and getting reacquainted with old faces as well as getting to know several new ones has been more of a job than I thought it would be. I still have an entire week left of summer holiday before classes start next Monday, but at best I'm just feeling exhausted and not completely up to the task of plunging back into my old routine.

This Thursday I will reach the 5-year mark of my time in Europe and somehow I'm feeling this itch to continue moving forward. I used to associate this unquenchable wanderlust with being in Holland, but after a few months in London, a half year in Barcelona, another in Granada and countless other trips all over the continent, I'm realizing that perhaps it has nothing to do with that. I know that Europe is a place I would love to settle into one day, but somehow I don't think that time has arrived just yet. Something that scares me, of course, is the possibility of becoming a sort of rootless vagabond, wandering aimlessly in search of a place, a feeling, an anchoring point which simply doesn't exist. In just five years, I've already seem to become a foreigner just about everywhere I go, whether it be Hawai'i, Holland, Spain or otherwise.

Perhaps I'm simply finding myself in a sort of premature quarter-life crisis, where all the things I used to accept as universal truths and constants are suddenly coming under scrutiny. I don't want to pass any more time cruising through life with a cocktail in my hand, spending hours sitting and discussing empty and idealistic changes which never materialize. I look around my flat and see the hoard of books I've collected throughout the years, the books I've devoured like a starving child and which have filled me with an arsenal of ideas and a desire to change things, but absolutely no motivation to actually do so. I wonder if for some, this is the crucial point which determines the choice for a life of action or simply one of indifference.

There was a day in Granada when we gathered as a group at the cafe near the faculty, then moved on to the fountain in Plaza Trinidad, and by the time the sun had set, were sitting along the wall at the Mirador de San Nicolas in the Albaicin. As the day had progressed, the group had become smaller and more intimate and the conversation more somber and profound. At some point, while engaged in one of our thousands of fierce arguments about western politics, my friend Kyriakos, the ultimate revolutionary, looked at me and said "You have such a beautiful mind and so many amazing ideas, Joey. But you sit there with your Macbook and your pretty little shoes and I wonder if you'd really be able to accept the sacrifices you would have to make in order to see these ideas truly materialize." I was more shocked than offended by what he said, and spent a majority of the rest of that night thinking about it. Would I be able to? It's a difficult question to ask yourself. In any case, I don't want to keep wondering, but would rather simply find out. Students of politics spend so much time talking, it may be one of the things that we do best; talking to postpone actually having to act, talking to justify things to others and maybe even more to ourselves, talking to chide away our guilt for our good fortune and reluctance to surrender it to the benefit of another.

I don't want to talk anymore. It's all become so trite and contradictory. I came this close to landing an internship in Israel where I would actually have to shut up for once and do something, then turned it down because it would have postponed my graduating for a mere 3 or 4 months. Maybe the time has finally come for me to decide the next step and stop hiding behind transparent excuses and imagined inconveniences. I hope these next few months will tell.

Entre Amigas

2007-08-24T13:32:00.001+02:00

"I´m in love with a preppy boy from my class. He has gorgeous green eyes and a lovely tan (like me, muahahaha). Only problem is, I saw him at the meeting of el Partido Popular we went to last friday, which means he´s a filthy conservative hijo de puta. Oh, and he wears pink shirts. And everyone knows that men and pink shirts don´t mix.

But you know what? Love conquers all. I´m sure we can work through these tiny obstacles. We shall not be swayed by the challenges that strike fear in the eyes of normal men, nor shall we let the flame of our love be extinguished by the social pressures which drive the wedges of malice and disaccord between us! But rather, we shall use our passion and love as a tool to demonstrate to the world the possibilities of unity and harmony in a time of misplaced allegiance and chaos! Yes we, the postmodernist Romeo and Juliet, the preppy pink shirt-wearing Spaniard and the leftist liberal Hawaiian surfer girl, we shall be the ones to lead the way into a new era of forged connections, forgotten past wrongs and, above all, a burning and unmistakeable love that will change the world as we know it forevermore!

God, I'm insane. This library is tweaking me out."

- Excerpt from an email I sent Kasia this last semester.

I miss Spain.

Big City Life

2007-08-21T14:11:00.001+02:00

I could spend hours snooping around on The New Yorker. This website is better than porn and cotton candy. Especially the abundance of articles about Simone de Beavoir, Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg, which are basically like literary porn in themselves.

On another note, Quintus Maximus came by for a visit the other day and directed me to the portfolio of Estevan Oriol, an incredible photographer from Los Angeles who's done a lot of documentation of gang culture in East LA, where my mom grew up. Looking through his work, I'm absolutely overwhelmed with nostalgia of the semi-yearly trips I would make with her to visit my grandparents in Boyle Heights. I remember when my grandma would send me down to the bakery on Broadway St. (which has since been renamed Cesar Chavez Ave.) to buy Mexican sweet rolls, with explicit instructions to avoid the alleyways and not speak to cholos, a word which used to roll off her tongue with such obvious distaste that I never dared to ask why. It's interesting to see that while I think I know my mother inside and out, her experiences have contrasted so sharply with my own. I'm a first generation Mexican-American, yet there's a good chance that if I ever have children, they'll be first generation Europeans. Bizarre.

More work from this set can be found here.

Apartment 44

2007-08-18T12:49:00.001+02:00

The Hague, Netherlands.

15 August, 2007
+

You and me, and the Devil makes three.

2007-08-18T12:47:00.001+02:00

I've been back in The Hague for about a month now, though if I stop think about it, it might as well be just a few days. In truly typical fashion, my suitcase is still unpacked and tucked away into a dark corner of my flat, and I've yet to see a majority of the friends that I actually quite missed while I was away.

I had assumed that leaving Spain to return to the daily hum-drum of life under the Low Sky would be torturous, but surprisingly the transition has been pretty routine and uneventful. About a week after my arrival, Kasia popped in one Saturday night and announced that I started at the restaurant where she works that Wednesday. I'd been by there a few times last semester before leaving for exchange and gotten to know the owner and several of her co-workers, so when she told her boss I was looking (read: contemplating the eventual uninterested dabbling) for a job, he immediately suggested I work there. No interview, no trial period, nada. Until now it's been a nice experience. The people I work with are an interesting, international bunch of eccentrics and flat-out weirdos, but the banter and abundance of extremely inappropriate jokes never fail to bring a smile to my face. Also interesting is my newly-acquired appreciation of cash and understanding of what it means not to really have any. This is the first (payed) job I've held down since 2002 and after just a few weeks of working, I can't imagine that I'd gone so long without doing so.

In addition to my new work routine, I've noticed that a lot of other things have changed since I got back. Primarily, my attitude toward uni and what I'd like to do after it's over. I remember sitting in a café in Utrecht a few years ago with my friend Jogchum, discussing life plans and the infinity of options available to young college graduates. He had graduated from Emory the year before with a double major in Biology and Chemistry and was about to return to Atlanta to pack up his things and move to Amsterdam to start medical school. He said to me that as long as he could remember, he'd wanted to be a doctor, but that sitting there on the verge of realizing his dream, he was suddenly filled with doubt and wasn't sure anymore if that's what he really wanted. I remember many conversations that I had with Jogchum. Some of them I could still recite word for word. But I will never remember anything more than that day when he looked at me, solemn and serious, without a shred of hesitation, and said "there is nothing that emphasizes uncertainty and indecision like graduating from college". Of course, at that time I had yet to even begin my adventures in higher education and took what he said with a grain of salt the size of Mount Everest, but now, years later, his words come rushing back to me with such clarity that I actually find it somewhat disturbing.

Until now, I had always assumed that I would follow graduation with immediate enrollment in a Masters program in International Relations or something of the like, that I would find a job at a relatively unknown NGO or, by some stroke of luck, work in a branch of the American Embassy somewhere in Europe or Latin America. In all honesty, I hadn't given it too much thought. Now, however, I find myself questioning all my old plans and ideals, wondering if I would really be able to subject myself to a life of service in a mediocre institution that had little to effect on the world or the issues which I care about. I wonder if passion could be a sustainable substitute for a feeling of fulfillment, or more importantly, if International Relations is a field which I am even remotely interested in.

I can definitely feel that my time in The Netherlands is coming to an end. I've stuck things out here for close to five years, a time span which has been highlighted by extreme moments satisfaction. But after these past six months in Spain, I've realized once and for all that while I will always love this country, there is so much more to explore and experience. I'm contemplating a return to Spain next year after graduation to teach English and study up for the DELE Superior exam. After that I'd like to think about doing my masters, most likely in journalism or something similar. I'd also like to finally realize my plan to travel through South America for awhile, documenting my travels and assembling the material into a book. Not necessarily with the intention of getting it published, but to have something concrete to remind me of the entire ordeal.

It's funny how much can change so drastically with time. A year ago today, I found myself in an immensely precarious situation and faced with the most difficult decision I'd ever had to make. Things changed in a way that I never though I would be able to come to terms with, but strangely that all seems so distant now, like a faint memory of a dream or glimpse into the life of a complete stranger. I suppose in the end these things happen with good reason, but while I still don't know exactly what that reason was, it doesn't bother me anymore like it used to. Sadness and resentment are elements every bit as fundamental to life as are love and happiness. In the past year I've experienced both extremes and come out somewhere in the middle. I no longer see the world in beautiful shades of pink nor simply shut my eyes in stubborn cynicism. Somehow, in the end, the luck that has gotten me this far has also shown me that things are never truly black and white, but that the beauty of life is to be found somewhere in the gray.

Oud Amsterdam

2007-08-10T14:08:00.001+02:00

Yesterday Kasia and I took a trip to Amsterdam to get some business taken care of at the Consulate. In true airhead fashion, of course, I hadn't bothered to check the Citizen Service Hours before heading up, so by the time we arrived it was too late to get anything productive done. Instead we decided to spend the afternoon walking around and exploring the city a bit. We started at Museumplein and made our way randomly through Oud Zuid and the Jordaan, ending up at the train station sometime in the early evening. We stopped along the way for a drink or two and a bowl of heavenly tomato soup at a café that I'm sure neither of us would ever be able to find again. That's usually how it works, isn't it?

No matter how many times I visit Amsterdam, the city always seems to withhold a certain element of mystery. It is truly a place where candid moments and fascinating spectacles transpire on every street corner, where life seems to unfold on a time schedule all it's own, and where there is no better way to spend an afternoon than lost among the maze of endless cobblestoned streets and silently majestic canals.

Kasia outside Sarphati Park.

Amsterdam, The Netherlands
09 August 2007
+

Spanish Vintage

2007-08-08T23:05:00.001+02:00

Today, while digging around my flat in a seemingly hopeless attempt to get reorganized, I happened upon a stash of photographs from my first study-stint in Barcelona over two years ago. I don't know why I never got around to uploading these sooner. By now, I'd forgotten about half of them. My cheeks still ache from the doofy grin that plastered itself on my face while I sat and reminisced about all the wonderful people I met and shared so many beautiful memories with there. The concept of "a thousand words" has definitely never rung more true.

Raffaela, Alejandro, Andreas & Claire.

Valencia, Spain
March 2005
(more?)

In the shadown of the Alhambra.

2007-08-02T23:09:00.001+02:00

Near the Facultad de Ciencias Políticas y Sociología.

Granada, Spain

June 2006

(more?)

En la tierra dura.

2007-08-01T14:20:00.001+02:00

In stark contrast to all past experiences, my last days in Granada passed slowly, each seemingly more prolonged and uneventful than the last. Such was it that on the morning of our departure, I was shocked by the distinct abruptness of its arrival. The faces of those who had become so familiar began to disappear slowly in the weeks preceding, but their memory lingered with such tenacity that their presence was hardly missed when we would gather around the table at Escuelas as we always did. Our refusal to forget them was so determined, in fact, that in our infrequent pauses in conversation, we could almost still hear their laughter echoing through the street. It was in this state of mind that we left the city, torn between our reluctance to move on from the memories we had made and experiences we'd shared under the shadow of the Alhambra, yet eager to reach our next destination. We drove away from your apartment with dry eyes, knowing already that our time to cry had not yet arrived, allowing our thirst for new adventures and the bitterness of our nostalgia mix in our mouths. And as we approached the city limits, you slipped your hand in mine and held it tightly, undoubtedly aware of the profound sadness stunning me into melancholic silence. Your eyes caught mine in the rear view mirror and I knew, without uttering a single word, that you felt in this moment exactly as I did.

We arrived in Extremadura after a seemingly uneventful drive from the foot of the Sierra Nevada to the expanse of fields of sunflowers and olive trees surrounding the village. I hung my hand from the window, letting the wind play between my fingers, intoxicated by the smell of the sun-scorched red earth which filled the air and feeling as though we had somehow traveled at a velocity which ensured that my heart had not been able to keep up. This feeling ebbed away slowly, however, as we exited the vast emptiness of the freeway and passed slowly through the outskirts and into the heart of Almendralejo, where your mother's kind eyes and father's open arms welcomed us with a touching familiarity and warmth. We passed our first afternoon there in a traditional manner, which would become routine in the coming days, but never suggest the slightest tinge of mundanity. Gathered in the kitchen we seemed to lose ourselves in the effervescent conversation and innumerous exquisite dishes prepared by your mother's loving hands. Any shyness or reserve I may have felt upon arriving dissolved within the first few minutes there, lost somewhere in the sweetness of her chiding and caresses and your brother's smile radiating at me from across the table. We retired to your bedroom to sleep the siesta, but despite the suffocating and stagnant heat, were unable to pass more than a few minutes in separate beds. As had long before become custom, I abandoned the bundle of sheets at my feet and climbed next to you to sleep with my head on your chest and the melody of your short and measured breaths in my ear. Our proximity only seemed to accentuate the heat, making it almost unbearable at times, but despite our own discomfort we lay there like children, tangled in a slumberous and unyielding embrace that would characterize the entirety of the coming days.

In hindsight, probably nothing could have prepared me for all that would transpire during my short but unnervingly intense stay in the village. Every day seemed to bring with it a swirl of emotions and experiences both new, old, and some strange mix of the two. The incessant presence of your family in the house, for instance, the melody of speech patterns and manner of interaction which I had not witnessed since the childhood visits to my grandmother's house, where love and hate, anger and joy, would blend together in the contradiction of gestures and tones that would climax and silence in a way which must have seemed hopelessly inexplicable to the outside eye and ear. Our rare and fleeting moments alone also perplexed me, such that I could no longer completely understand them, nor was certain that I had the desire to. We continued, essentially, as we always had, discussing politics, art, beauty and social revolution as only our youth and naiveté would allow us to, dancing and bursting into song at random intervals in a similarly identical fashion, but something about the context of this interaction began to change and neither of us seemed able to impede it. The transition, almost imperceptible to us at first, became evermore apparent as the hours and days passed by, the comfort of our familiarity growing slowly into a newly discovered intrigue and hesitation which both terrified and perplexed us until the temptation simply became too great.

We lost ourselves under a flawless sky of cobalt blue one afternoon when the entirety of the world seemed to sleep around us, our kisses of friendship and whispered words of affection escalating into passionate and insatiable desperation, blurring our perception of love into an exquisite abandon. These encounters continued, uninterrupted, deep into the endless nights and morning which followed, the taste of our kisses mixing with the salt of the tears we cried, lamenting the inevitability of our separation. At times we could do little more to remedy our sadness than cling to one another helplessly, the silence between us broken only by our lips murmuring nearly inaudible 'i-love-yous'.

If those around us could see this change in our demeanor, they never betrayed it. We passed our afternoons as we normally would, taking your cousin to the park to watch her brown curls blow in the wind as she ran and played in childish disregard, taking trips to nearby cities and visiting the local wineries and vineyards with your mother. In the evenings we would all gather on the balcony to take advantage of the breeze blowing in from the countryside, our only relief from the relentless sun which shone down on us with a fury I had never before known. We spoke of love, loss and suffering, concepts of family and urban life. Your father would scoff openly at our declarations, dismissing us with seasoned skepticism as children and romantics, but not without a sparkle of pride in his deep, sad brown eyes. Your brother, unfailingly, would grace us with his infectious smile and a laugh that would resonate throughout the house, only heightening our sense of togetherness and intimacy. I cherished all of these moments equally, trying to record every detail of them in my memory, knowing that they were numbered and that no future visit to this place would ever be as distinct as this one.

My last morning arrived as we knew it would, bringing with it the first drop in temperature for weeks. The dry and dusty African winds which had been blowing in steadily since the beginning of summer had shifted and arrived now from the north, carrying the smell of the flower fields of Cáseres and a remembrance of home which I could almost taste. I packed my bags carefully as you sat on your bed and watched me, your eyes speaking volumes but your lips remaining silent. The recollection of the past months had culminated into these final few hours and there was simply nothing left to say, nothing that could change the fact that the beautiful dream we had shared was coming to an end and that we were completely helpless to stop it. We all gathered one last time on the balcony to exchange goodbyes and promises to write, call, visit as often and as long as possible, and then drove away from the house slowly, just as we had in Granada, to the bus station on the edge of town. We stood on the platform together, still dumbfounded and unable to grasp the situation entirely. You wrapped me in your arms one final time and held me tightly, kissing my face and cheeks and singing to me softly, as if to quell your own grief as much as mine.

When the bus arrived your mother appeared behind us and pulled me gently from your embrace to wrap me in hers, kissing me profusely and wishing me a safe journey. I thanked her one more time and placed my hand on her cheek, then was pushed into the small mob of boarding passengers. I reached for your hand but felt only your fingertips slip quickly through mine, and for just a moment, felt my heart seize in panic as your face disappeared in the crowd. In that moment, I realized that there was still so much left unsaid, so many things that I simply hadn't been able to find the words for. The unmistakable sting of tears sprang to my eyes, then as suddenly as you had vanished, you reappeared. You pulled me to you and uttered a single question. "Me querrás para siempre?" you asked. "Si, te querré para siempre.", I responded. And you were gone once again.

As the bus rolled away from the station, I watched you stand with your mother and cousin on the platform. I pressed my hand against the window and let a single tear spill onto my cheek. I felt neither the need to wipe it away, nor the desire to hide it from the woman sitting next to me. Instead, I let it sit there, glistening in the sun and reminding me of the promise I had just made you.

Si, te querré para siempre.