Jill Bolte Taylor - My stroke of insight - a neuroanatomist experiences her own stroke from the inside

"we have the power to choose moment by moment who and how we wanna be in the world"

I'm home. I'm well. I'm disconnecting and I'm taking my time =)

I'm ready to go

Soundtrack: Chantal Kreviazuk - I'm Leaving On A Jet Plane

so its been a hell of a year...

and it's over.
and I'm way too busy making the best out of my last few days in Spain together with my brotherheart to sit down and think and write. everything else can wait while I'm living my life.

words

sentimental, reflective, content, curious
dancing, talking, sunbathing, wrapping up
chocolate con churros, skype, café con hielo, art and design books
Plaza Mayor, Retiro, Palos de la Frontera, Madrid

I can't be bothered to put the words in sentences, I just remember the feeling of walking home at 7am after having had a very good night with people I had just known (thanks Nadine and Mirjam to invite me :)) and after having eaten chocolate con churros at 6am. Plaza Mayor is extremely beautiful at that hour of the day, and even Lavapies has that early morning peace to it. The fountain at Embajadores was shining in the light of the sun not yet up and I know I'll never forget the colour of the sky, just enjoying the magical moment.

mucha gente me hacen falta

one experience ends and another will start soon, people I have come to love leave my life and new ones enter, and with them a new sound =)

update: I just realized, they are definitely NOT leaving my life, I'm just not gonna share the microwave, the metro ride to work, the random office moments (toni-awards and other things), the oscars con pollo, the mmm's, coffee at lizarran, the walk back home to lavapies, the red wine somewhere in a bodega, the chick flicks, the shoe shopping, ahem watching, the fajitas con pollo, the chile de arbol and whatever else that defined our life in the last 12 months - I'm not gonna share it with them anymore. But now I have friends in Mexico =) that means I know what I'm earning my money for ;-)
AND, since Madrid is just not the same anymore, I'll just enjoy what's there for the moment, and look forward to going back home where I'll finally get to meet those people that I'm missing right now... so all is good :)

Living life in the here and now.

La Contra - daily interview with people from all kind of backgrounds and life stories in the spanish newspaper La Vanguardia, mostly an inspiration, always bringing into spotlight a hidden world.

Percibimos el tiempo como algo que ya pasó o que tiene que suceder, sobre todo algo que tiene que suceder mañana (cuando me jubile, cuando me enamore...), y esa percepción nos impide vivir el presente como gerundio simple, es decir: comiendo, durmiendo, viviendo. Creo que de eso se trata, de que el presente tenga contenido. "Sí, el hombre moderno padece la enfermedad del futuro como única experiencia del tiempo, que no es algo que pueda o no suceder; el futuro lo es todo, es la felicidad, el amor, el dinero, la promesa... Vivimos atrapados en la inmediatez y la uniformidad. Recuperar el sentido del tiempo oportuno no es otra cosa que luchar por retomar el hilo del sentido de la vida".
Giacomo Marramao, filósofo, reflexiona sobre la condición temporal del ser humano

one week of June 2008 left...

rollercoaster ride

is it possible to be making the most out of every single minute in one place while feeling like all you're doing is waiting for the days to go by so you can go home...? I guess it is...

pobre cenicienta...

le haremos un vestido a cenicienta...
si que podía ir al baile! =)

sometimes it's difficult... but I'm advancing :)

Non! Rien de rien
Non! Je ne regrette rien
Ni le bien qu'on m'a fait
Ni le mal tout ça m'est bien égal!

Non! Rien de rien
Non! Je ne regrette rien
C'est payé, balayé, oublié
Je me fous du passé!

Avec mes souvenirs
J'ai allumé le feu
Mes chagrins, mes plaisirs
Je n'ai plus besoin d'eux!

Balayées les amours
Et tous leurs trémolos
Balayés pour toujours
Je repars à zéro

Non! Rien de rien
Non! Je ne regrette rien
Ni le bien, qu'on m'a fait
Ni le mal, tout ça m'est bien égal!

Non! Rien de rien
Non! Je ne regrette rien
Car ma vie, car mes joies
Aujourd'hui, ça commence avec toi!

Sountrack: Edith Piaf - Non, je ne regrette rien

some good advice

Relax! (and shine :))
Don't close any doors. (as in, don't give up any opportunity just because on first sight it might not fit exactly with what you're looking for)
Forgive yourself.

Today I'm glad that my path crosses with the one of people who can give me this kind of advice.

hot herbal tea.
yoga.
fresh fruit smoothie (banana, mango, kiwi).

one perfect tuesday evening.

LoveStorm

it just kinda fit.

take one step, one little, tiny step...

See the book bigger on the original website here.

Getting used to strikes

I've never really been affected by strikes so far, either because they just didn't happen or because even if they would, in Switzerland even though there's a strike people outside that industry aren't really affected by it.
After the cleaning personnel of the metro in Madrid was on strike in December, now it's the truck drivers that are protesting against the high fuel prices (such as in other european countries). The problem is that not all the drivers are supporting the strike so there have been some nasty scenes when "piquetes" - representatives of the striking drivers - have tried to "inform" the others what the strike is all about. As I've been told their ways of convincing everybody to participate are usually quite violent, involving for example to stab the tires of the trucks to prevent them from delivering their goods.
And here we come to how we get affected by the strike, the other day a whole shelf of meat was empty, there were no packed fruits or vegetables available and some of the other shelves also start showing empty spots. Combined with some farmers in Almeria as well protesting it looks like there might not be any fresh tomatoes next week, but as we discussed, the empty spots might also be caused because people go out panic-buying whatever there is. So for the moment we're not starving and since some kind of agreement was signed it looks like there's not gonna be any big problems for us to get some food.

let it go

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

and then letting it go... Yoga at 8am helps.

you were always there for me...

Soundtrack: Sugar Ray - Someday

Spain and Immigration - or walking through Lavapies

"No country has run more legalization programs than Spain, which has carried out six since 1985. As recently as a decade ago, immigrants made up less than 2 percent of the population. Now they are more than 10 percent. About 40 percent come from eastern and northern Europe; 38 percent come from Latin America; and 20 percent from Africa.

Despite the rapid change, until recently there was little political conflict, with legalizations occurring under both conservative and socialist governments. Spain even offers immigrants free health insurance, whether they are legal or not.

“The attitude toward unauthorized migrants is much more relaxed than in the United States,” said Joaquín Arango, a sociologist at Complutense University in Madrid.

The acceptance has been attributed to newfound prosperity, the need for workers, the progressive culture of post-Franco Spain and the shared language with Latin Americans, which spares Spain a major source of tension in the United States."

The New York Times - Spain, Like U.S., Grapples With Immigration

Lavapies is one of these multicultural neighbourhoods that I loved from the beginning, despite the high police-presence there and the sexist comments a woman walking through it is sometimes exposed to.
The only thing that disturbs me is that this "multicultural" society keeps being segregated in most aspects, a group of men with one skin colour playing football, a group of differently coloured men watching them, the restaurants predominantly offering South Asian Food and spanish people almost absent from the neighbourhood except the "alternative" kind.
There's only very limited spaces where cultures start mixing, watching kids from all parts of the world playing together, the little shops stacking both corn tortillas and garam masala, people enjoying food, dance and movies at the recent "Bollymadrid" Festival. Then again, it's always easy to critize others, how much contact do I have in Switzerland with the different immigrant groups there? and no, not contact in the sense of "oh you're so different and exciting", but everyday interaction, just like with swiss people... yep, food for thought...

ps: If I have an idea for a book, kind of photoreportage-style, whom do I have to talk to to find out how to publish it? :)

T-25

yep, I'm counting =)