Monday, October 25, 2004
Saturday, October 23, 2004
ESF 4, mobility management and uniting the people
So, my trip to England was very successful on lots for fronts. I found Maureen (who you will remember as my host in Norwich) and we spent a couple very pleasant days together. We successfully met up with Christian (the youngest Poirier) for the protest on Sunday. We successfully attended the protest Sunday and walked its entire route. I think about 60,000 were at each, the conference and the protest. I didn’t know there were so many... idealists out there. (But I hear the last anti-Bush protest in London was much bigger.) These protests always crack me up because they seem to be about every issue under the sun: feed the hungry, be nice, stop destroying the environment, no occupying other people’s countries, provide medical services, stop killing innocent people, hurray for peace and freedom.... I can’t help but wonder if we are more likely to get what we want if we provide a more direct and cohesive request.
A while back, I posted a question on the TDM listserv to see about networking with mobility management professionals here in Europe. I received about 25 replies, including one from a gentleman who works for VIPRE (in Holland), the European branch of VPSI (the vanpool company). He runs (or at least set up) several commuter shops in UK, Ireland, and Holland and helps businesses with various aspects of their employees commutes including predicting attrition associated with relocation. So, we met up on Sunday, and he took me for a lovely Italian dinner.
Monday, we met up again so that he could show me their commuter shops. We took the fast train to Heathrow airport (15 minutes and 15 GBP) and then his car for another half an hour to the Oracle headquarters where he runs a little commuter shop. The shop included bicycle equipment for sale, “talking books” to borrow (for carpoolers), lots of printed literature, ridematching, guarantted ride home, etc. They provide other facilities for bicyclists including bicycles to borrow during the lunch break, and the business park is connected to an adjacent park along the Thames with a path they successfully lobbied the city to install. (I won’t give away too many details since I am planning to compile them in a more official document along with other research I haven’t done yet.) We also visit a commuter store, which Mike described as following the Central Perk (Friends) model, where people can come, enjoy a coffee and read a newspaper at the same location where they receive their commuter services (in a suburban shopping mall surrounded by office parks).
In UK, the government encourages companies to implement agressive environmental programs (including commuter transportion), which they are then given points for when bidding on public contracts. In the case of the shopping center retail commuter center, the developer promised to do it for their building permit, but Mike said that many developers don’t bother and their is no recourse against them if they do not do what their promised for the permit.
The weekend was particularly throught provoking considering that I spent most of it espousing against capitalism, and the other part discussing and examining commuter programs provided by big business in auto-oriented suburban locations. It reminds me of a conversation I had with Maya at the Carfree Conference in July. I said something to the effect of “the people united will never be defeated.” She said “yeah, but do you think there is any chance of uniting the people?”
A while back, I posted a question on the TDM listserv to see about networking with mobility management professionals here in Europe. I received about 25 replies, including one from a gentleman who works for VIPRE (in Holland), the European branch of VPSI (the vanpool company). He runs (or at least set up) several commuter shops in UK, Ireland, and Holland and helps businesses with various aspects of their employees commutes including predicting attrition associated with relocation. So, we met up on Sunday, and he took me for a lovely Italian dinner.
Monday, we met up again so that he could show me their commuter shops. We took the fast train to Heathrow airport (15 minutes and 15 GBP) and then his car for another half an hour to the Oracle headquarters where he runs a little commuter shop. The shop included bicycle equipment for sale, “talking books” to borrow (for carpoolers), lots of printed literature, ridematching, guarantted ride home, etc. They provide other facilities for bicyclists including bicycles to borrow during the lunch break, and the business park is connected to an adjacent park along the Thames with a path they successfully lobbied the city to install. (I won’t give away too many details since I am planning to compile them in a more official document along with other research I haven’t done yet.) We also visit a commuter store, which Mike described as following the Central Perk (Friends) model, where people can come, enjoy a coffee and read a newspaper at the same location where they receive their commuter services (in a suburban shopping mall surrounded by office parks).
In UK, the government encourages companies to implement agressive environmental programs (including commuter transportion), which they are then given points for when bidding on public contracts. In the case of the shopping center retail commuter center, the developer promised to do it for their building permit, but Mike said that many developers don’t bother and their is no recourse against them if they do not do what their promised for the permit.
The weekend was particularly throught provoking considering that I spent most of it espousing against capitalism, and the other part discussing and examining commuter programs provided by big business in auto-oriented suburban locations. It reminds me of a conversation I had with Maya at the Carfree Conference in July. I said something to the effect of “the people united will never be defeated.” She said “yeah, but do you think there is any chance of uniting the people?”
Friday, October 22, 2004
Global Sex Survey
I would have done this much better if it had been my job, but the results are interesting none the less.
http://www.durex.com/cm/GSS2004Results.asp
http://www.durex.com/cm/GSS2004Results.asp
Thursday, October 21, 2004
short film
B says, "I just discovered an amazing animated movie, that you must download
here ; it takes some time (25 MB) but it's definitely worth it."
http://www.knife-party.net/flash/barry.html
here ; it takes some time (25 MB) but it's definitely worth it."
http://www.knife-party.net/flash/barry.html
Wednesday, October 20, 2004
[Paris] ESF 3, babies and England
Liliapilia’s first annual ESF photography award goes to:
• Simon Norfolk for his photos of Afghanistan
Honorable mentions:
• Sebastido Salgado for his photos of Mumbai, and
• Guy Smallman’s photos of Iraq, not because they are gorgeous, but because it was the first time I had seem images like these of the occupation/war
Salgado’s photos of Mumbai included images of a pipeline for drinking water which residents use as a walkway because every other available surface is filled with people living on it. Robert Cervero showed us images of this same situation in our international transportation class at Berkeley. Another notable image was of the dairy farms (buffalo, of course, because the cow is sacred) where the workers live in the barns where they work, above the animals in hammocks.
Why are all the photographers men? Well, here’s my theory: photography is very expensive. Maybe men are more likely to feel their activity is worth spending all that money on. (Women, afterall, can make babies, which puts everything else we do into perspective. And that’s a lot for the men to compete with.)
Speaking of which, I am now in French class with two ladies, one from Norway and one from Turkey. They are both pregnant. In case you are wondering (as my teacher was), I am not.
Other things I learned/noticed/heard people say at ESF:
• The World Bank has put 11 billion GBP towards oil production activity in developing countries (that’s about 20 billion USD).
• Climate change has led to a 20 percent reduction in grain production.
• Entire forest must have been felled for the production of all the flyers handed out at ESF.
• Talks at the ESF took comments alternating by gender. Since about 10 times more men had comments, this just meant ladies first.
• Art plays a role in politics when what you have to say is particularly complicated.
• Capitalism essencially imprisons the imagination with market-driven logic (music as private property, etc.).
• Don’t look at the policies, look at how the money is spent (this applies to every entity – EU, US, the World Bank, me, you....)
• 60,000 people per year die from air-pollution-caused diseases.
• The cost of medical problem associated with air pollution: 10B euros per year
• Half of the EU budget goes towards agriculture, but none of it goes towards sustainable agricultural practices.
• We already knew it: air travel is cheaper in direct cost to the consumer than train travel. Cheap airfare mean that more of the middle class can have multiple homes; sound familiar?
• The EU needs to be the leader in environmental policies, no one else (certainly not the US), is going to do it.
• To keep the English cars on the road with biodiesel would require the entire land are of UK to produce the biodiesel, which means that that land would not be used to grow food.
• Most of the people at the transport talk spoke in Italian.
• Blair’s solution to the problem of climate change: increase emissions trading
• Roads are for freight, not for the transportation of people in private vehicles.
• The roads should be controlled democratically (yeah, right, in the US, let’s start with the government!)
Other observations:
• Double decor buses are totally fun. We should seriously use them in the US. Anyone know what the problem is?
• For all the good things I said about the London public transport system the last time, I saw 7 buses in a row in north London this time.
• In an English pub, if you ask about the beer, they’ll tell you it’s alcohol content.
• English ads are straightforward: “become what you want to be in software engineering” for example. I keep looking for the play on words, the other meaning, the joke – I never found it.
• Simon Norfolk for his photos of Afghanistan
Honorable mentions:
• Sebastido Salgado for his photos of Mumbai, and
• Guy Smallman’s photos of Iraq, not because they are gorgeous, but because it was the first time I had seem images like these of the occupation/war
Salgado’s photos of Mumbai included images of a pipeline for drinking water which residents use as a walkway because every other available surface is filled with people living on it. Robert Cervero showed us images of this same situation in our international transportation class at Berkeley. Another notable image was of the dairy farms (buffalo, of course, because the cow is sacred) where the workers live in the barns where they work, above the animals in hammocks.
Why are all the photographers men? Well, here’s my theory: photography is very expensive. Maybe men are more likely to feel their activity is worth spending all that money on. (Women, afterall, can make babies, which puts everything else we do into perspective. And that’s a lot for the men to compete with.)
Speaking of which, I am now in French class with two ladies, one from Norway and one from Turkey. They are both pregnant. In case you are wondering (as my teacher was), I am not.
Other things I learned/noticed/heard people say at ESF:
• The World Bank has put 11 billion GBP towards oil production activity in developing countries (that’s about 20 billion USD).
• Climate change has led to a 20 percent reduction in grain production.
• Entire forest must have been felled for the production of all the flyers handed out at ESF.
• Talks at the ESF took comments alternating by gender. Since about 10 times more men had comments, this just meant ladies first.
• Art plays a role in politics when what you have to say is particularly complicated.
• Capitalism essencially imprisons the imagination with market-driven logic (music as private property, etc.).
• Don’t look at the policies, look at how the money is spent (this applies to every entity – EU, US, the World Bank, me, you....)
• 60,000 people per year die from air-pollution-caused diseases.
• The cost of medical problem associated with air pollution: 10B euros per year
• Half of the EU budget goes towards agriculture, but none of it goes towards sustainable agricultural practices.
• We already knew it: air travel is cheaper in direct cost to the consumer than train travel. Cheap airfare mean that more of the middle class can have multiple homes; sound familiar?
• The EU needs to be the leader in environmental policies, no one else (certainly not the US), is going to do it.
• To keep the English cars on the road with biodiesel would require the entire land are of UK to produce the biodiesel, which means that that land would not be used to grow food.
• Most of the people at the transport talk spoke in Italian.
• Blair’s solution to the problem of climate change: increase emissions trading
• Roads are for freight, not for the transportation of people in private vehicles.
• The roads should be controlled democratically (yeah, right, in the US, let’s start with the government!)
Other observations:
• Double decor buses are totally fun. We should seriously use them in the US. Anyone know what the problem is?
• For all the good things I said about the London public transport system the last time, I saw 7 buses in a row in north London this time.
• In an English pub, if you ask about the beer, they’ll tell you it’s alcohol content.
• English ads are straightforward: “become what you want to be in software engineering” for example. I keep looking for the play on words, the other meaning, the joke – I never found it.
[Paris] ESF2 and the election
My teacher has me rewriting (French to French, of course) the work of Marguerite DURAS (L’Amant, 1984). I think she has decided to capitalize on that I am always too ambitious in my devoir and I throw in little bits of poetry where I can (my own). The description I wrote of my flying-for-fun dream had a lot of illiteration which reminded her of Duras. I am almost finished but needed a break... always constructive procrastination.
Touring the stalls at the ESF conference on the first day made me feel depressed. Maybe they reminded me of the oppression of growing up in Berkeley (where everyone is a hypocrit and a “genius” and you are a bad person if you question the politically correct dogma regardless of your final conclusion on the subject or how you got there) or if the aesthetics of the far left (which means what? People who care about fish and people they don’t know or would prefer that government fed the hungry and treated the sick rather they murdering them and spending tax revenues to subsidize a destructive lifestyle?) is ugly to me. I came across a group of middle-eastern-looking people who were yelling something at each other that sounded like “nuclear testing” but was probably not English. The building is beautiful but only one table is dedicated to transport issues. It was a UK organization that lobbies for public transportation, multi-modal roadways, and maintenance of the country’s rail system. (However, the gentleman manning the table was administrative staff and didn’t know much of the intricacies of the issues.) I needed a mood elevater (coffee).
The first talk I attended was on oil addiction. The speakers seemed more interested in pointing their fingers at government than examining what they called consumer behavior. Sure, policy is designed to foster “oil addiction”, but we do have some choice in where and how we live and work. I refuse to think of myself as the victom of public policy, while I will be the first to admit inconsistency. I live a car-free lifestyle but I still fly in airplanes all over creation and, yes, I shop at Old Navy. I will try to be better, and I hope you will too. But I am just as complicit in the mess of the world as our government officials and their desctructive policies. OK, I know, chances are I am preaching to the choir on this one....
I am in Europe as a political refuge (says Juliette and I agree), trying to avoid exposure to the election, the war, and the many other autricities committed by the US government in- and outside of its land. That said, I have read some of the coverage of the debates. Did anyone else notice that in every picture of Bush, he is facing the camera and smiling pleasantly, and in every picture of Kerry, he is looking away or you can only see the side of his face? In one photo of Kerry looking away you could even see Bush facing the camera and smiling pleasantly. Meanwhile, you still read about the “swing voters” saying they just aren’t sure they know what Kerry is all about.... If anyone ever beleived we had an impartial media, this should be enough to convince them otherwise. (It is a matter of the Associated Press, since even UK’s the Guardian had these photos.) So, if the media is reporting a close race, that means to me that Kerry has a clear majority. However, this also means that the folks who run the elections (ie, the Republicans owning the voting machines) will see to it that we have a repeat of 2000.
In fact, I read an entire newspaper on Saturday (the Guardian, UK) for the first time in several years (yes, I hate the news; it’s depressing). Get this kids, they did a poll of 10 countries and how they would vote in the US election (France, Spain, Mexico, Japan, S. Korea, Canada, UK, Australia, Israel and Russia). Now, maybe they should be allowed to vote, since US imperialism is so prevasive. Eight of these countries would elect Kerry. Those that would elect Bush were Israel (by a large margin) and Russia (by a very small margin). Likewise, I heard in a talk on US imperialism (during which I cried my eyes out twice, and yes, I think they got pictures of me doing it), I heard that if Europe were to elect the next US president (again, maybe they should), only 4.5 percent would vote for Bush. This seems high.
I also read that the world’s frog population is on the decline – a canary in our coal mine? So, yes, I read the paper, and strangely, I didn’t want to kill myself afterwards.
Touring the stalls at the ESF conference on the first day made me feel depressed. Maybe they reminded me of the oppression of growing up in Berkeley (where everyone is a hypocrit and a “genius” and you are a bad person if you question the politically correct dogma regardless of your final conclusion on the subject or how you got there) or if the aesthetics of the far left (which means what? People who care about fish and people they don’t know or would prefer that government fed the hungry and treated the sick rather they murdering them and spending tax revenues to subsidize a destructive lifestyle?) is ugly to me. I came across a group of middle-eastern-looking people who were yelling something at each other that sounded like “nuclear testing” but was probably not English. The building is beautiful but only one table is dedicated to transport issues. It was a UK organization that lobbies for public transportation, multi-modal roadways, and maintenance of the country’s rail system. (However, the gentleman manning the table was administrative staff and didn’t know much of the intricacies of the issues.) I needed a mood elevater (coffee).
The first talk I attended was on oil addiction. The speakers seemed more interested in pointing their fingers at government than examining what they called consumer behavior. Sure, policy is designed to foster “oil addiction”, but we do have some choice in where and how we live and work. I refuse to think of myself as the victom of public policy, while I will be the first to admit inconsistency. I live a car-free lifestyle but I still fly in airplanes all over creation and, yes, I shop at Old Navy. I will try to be better, and I hope you will too. But I am just as complicit in the mess of the world as our government officials and their desctructive policies. OK, I know, chances are I am preaching to the choir on this one....
I am in Europe as a political refuge (says Juliette and I agree), trying to avoid exposure to the election, the war, and the many other autricities committed by the US government in- and outside of its land. That said, I have read some of the coverage of the debates. Did anyone else notice that in every picture of Bush, he is facing the camera and smiling pleasantly, and in every picture of Kerry, he is looking away or you can only see the side of his face? In one photo of Kerry looking away you could even see Bush facing the camera and smiling pleasantly. Meanwhile, you still read about the “swing voters” saying they just aren’t sure they know what Kerry is all about.... If anyone ever beleived we had an impartial media, this should be enough to convince them otherwise. (It is a matter of the Associated Press, since even UK’s the Guardian had these photos.) So, if the media is reporting a close race, that means to me that Kerry has a clear majority. However, this also means that the folks who run the elections (ie, the Republicans owning the voting machines) will see to it that we have a repeat of 2000.
In fact, I read an entire newspaper on Saturday (the Guardian, UK) for the first time in several years (yes, I hate the news; it’s depressing). Get this kids, they did a poll of 10 countries and how they would vote in the US election (France, Spain, Mexico, Japan, S. Korea, Canada, UK, Australia, Israel and Russia). Now, maybe they should be allowed to vote, since US imperialism is so prevasive. Eight of these countries would elect Kerry. Those that would elect Bush were Israel (by a large margin) and Russia (by a very small margin). Likewise, I heard in a talk on US imperialism (during which I cried my eyes out twice, and yes, I think they got pictures of me doing it), I heard that if Europe were to elect the next US president (again, maybe they should), only 4.5 percent would vote for Bush. This seems high.
I also read that the world’s frog population is on the decline – a canary in our coal mine? So, yes, I read the paper, and strangely, I didn’t want to kill myself afterwards.
Thursday, October 14, 2004
[London] European Social Forum
I arrived by eurostar this afternoon back to the land where everyone speaks English but the shops and even the dumps still have funny names. The queue to register for the conference went all the way around Red Lion Square, but it moved relatively quickly. On either side of me were people speaking other languages (just French and Spanish -- nothing too exotic) and while the proportion of "stinking hippies" (forgive me) was high, it was not overwhelming. I collected my arm band, transit pass, and conference program with no trouble and headed north to Kirsty's.
The problem turned out to be the conference program, which has about 100 different sessions at any given hour throughout the City of London (hence our transit passes). With Kirsty's help, I have managed to narrow my obligations for tomorrow down to being in only a few places at any given moment. Topics range from palestine/bangladesh/ireland/cuba to sustainability to feminism to war prevention to democracy to racism to housing to goddess only knows what else because I can't keep that many issues in my simple little brain. To be completely honest with you, I am most looking forward to the cuban and irish music performances.
Hanging here with Kirsty and the family, we have watched the final episode of Friends twice, not to mention some Engish soap opera and the Simpsoms. The dog is whining and the children and fighting and trying to avoid doing their homework. This is a family. It's nice.
The problem turned out to be the conference program, which has about 100 different sessions at any given hour throughout the City of London (hence our transit passes). With Kirsty's help, I have managed to narrow my obligations for tomorrow down to being in only a few places at any given moment. Topics range from palestine/bangladesh/ireland/cuba to sustainability to feminism to war prevention to democracy to racism to housing to goddess only knows what else because I can't keep that many issues in my simple little brain. To be completely honest with you, I am most looking forward to the cuban and irish music performances.
Hanging here with Kirsty and the family, we have watched the final episode of Friends twice, not to mention some Engish soap opera and the Simpsoms. The dog is whining and the children and fighting and trying to avoid doing their homework. This is a family. It's nice.
Sunday, October 10, 2004
[La Vienne] La douceur et la lumiere
The question was "Quelle est la chose la plus importante du mode?" Of course, we all agreed it is "l'amour" mais I also have to be true to my own stated philosophy. Hence, the subject line of this blog (as translated to French by my teacher).
My mother's dog Bella, who I loved dearly and knew best when she was a puppy in California, was killed by a car this week in St. Pierre. We are all devistated, especially little dog. On the one hand, I keep seeing the movie-style flash backs of when she was small (she grew up to be a huge yellow lab), but on the other hand, she is just gone. It is an almost palpable absence.
Alogny is breaktakingly beautiful, but I feel like I am going to lose my credibility for saying that about everything. I stayed in the tower room, painfully romantic for a lone occupant. The air has gone cold, but the flowers are still in bloom and the trees not quite turned to fall colors. The fields are mostly reaped and brown exposted earth in clean gently curving lines.
Here, we walk, eat, sleep, drink, and talk all the while enjoying the views in all directions. If it were a little warmer we would probably also swim in the pool. Nothing about this life is hard. But we discuss the homeless in San Francisco, American politics (when we can stand to), racism, substance abuse and mental illness, not to mention the various interpersonal betrayals and heartbreaks that each of us has endured.
My teacher in Paris sings in clubs. I have enjoyed having some contact with the alternative music scene there (which I am sure is very well developed but I might not have otherwise learned about right away). I didn't understand the words, but I think it is sort of standard acoustic rock with goofy lyrics.
Last weekend was the nuit blanche when everything stays open all night and artists put installations throughout the city. After a mojito at Place des Vosges, we began to wander the streets with hundreds of other people. It reminded me of a kind of pedestrian critical mass. People flowed like water from one installation to another. First we saw a huge turning pink tea cup in the courtyard of a traditional parisien building. It glowed under the lights.
Long lines of people waited to see the other exhibits, and finally we waited in one. The courtyard had steel drummers playing classical music, a quote shown in light on the pavement, and two different exhibits to enter. One was a little movie, with Parisiens being asked to say various silly things mostly in English. The second was about a dozen TVs set up to play video montages in loops. One was a cartoon, a guy morphing into other things and back to a guy again. In another, someone (anyone who wanted to) moved around a city with a mouse, through the streets, up and down the buildings, etc. Yet another clipped together images from TV commericals of flowers blooming, women eating, whatever (by activity). It made me feel all sorts of strange things including hungry. The Metro stopped running at 1, so we caught it and got a good nights sleep despite the exciting alternatives (that is, to stay up all night and see more art).
Last Sunday, we saw an exhibit of clothes made out of bread. There was also a bakery, and the designer had designed the clothes for people working there -- ladies had exposed midrifts and exterior corsettes made of basket reeds. We were most excited by the window blinds made out of baguettes.
Monday, we went to the Cite Universitaire, where dozens of buildings each representing a different country (US, Holland, Cuba, Greece, Cambodia were a few) gather around a central pedestrian roadway, each with a unique architectural style. There was an exhibit on Le Corbusier... buildings designed like bottle racks for apartments to be inserted according to the needs of its residents. Of course, he designed the units to be inserted, which included loft beds for the parents above the common space, and we argued about the desirability of that arrangement (I think lofts are silly and impractical unless they can be made completely private, though I admit they seem fun). The common space has huge glass doors that open onto a large balcony so that in summer the family can feel like they are living out of doors. The children's bedrooms were long and narrow. Each unit had 2 floors and overlapped in the middle.
I return to Paris tonight, arriving around midnight. I am sorry to be leaving here already. I am sorry that the summer is gone and the leaves are falling off. I am sorry for the chill in the air and that everyone is going back to the states. In San Francisco, I love the fall, but here it makes me a feel a little sad. Maybe I just don't know what's going to happen next.
My mother's dog Bella, who I loved dearly and knew best when she was a puppy in California, was killed by a car this week in St. Pierre. We are all devistated, especially little dog. On the one hand, I keep seeing the movie-style flash backs of when she was small (she grew up to be a huge yellow lab), but on the other hand, she is just gone. It is an almost palpable absence.
Alogny is breaktakingly beautiful, but I feel like I am going to lose my credibility for saying that about everything. I stayed in the tower room, painfully romantic for a lone occupant. The air has gone cold, but the flowers are still in bloom and the trees not quite turned to fall colors. The fields are mostly reaped and brown exposted earth in clean gently curving lines.
Here, we walk, eat, sleep, drink, and talk all the while enjoying the views in all directions. If it were a little warmer we would probably also swim in the pool. Nothing about this life is hard. But we discuss the homeless in San Francisco, American politics (when we can stand to), racism, substance abuse and mental illness, not to mention the various interpersonal betrayals and heartbreaks that each of us has endured.
My teacher in Paris sings in clubs. I have enjoyed having some contact with the alternative music scene there (which I am sure is very well developed but I might not have otherwise learned about right away). I didn't understand the words, but I think it is sort of standard acoustic rock with goofy lyrics.
Last weekend was the nuit blanche when everything stays open all night and artists put installations throughout the city. After a mojito at Place des Vosges, we began to wander the streets with hundreds of other people. It reminded me of a kind of pedestrian critical mass. People flowed like water from one installation to another. First we saw a huge turning pink tea cup in the courtyard of a traditional parisien building. It glowed under the lights.
Long lines of people waited to see the other exhibits, and finally we waited in one. The courtyard had steel drummers playing classical music, a quote shown in light on the pavement, and two different exhibits to enter. One was a little movie, with Parisiens being asked to say various silly things mostly in English. The second was about a dozen TVs set up to play video montages in loops. One was a cartoon, a guy morphing into other things and back to a guy again. In another, someone (anyone who wanted to) moved around a city with a mouse, through the streets, up and down the buildings, etc. Yet another clipped together images from TV commericals of flowers blooming, women eating, whatever (by activity). It made me feel all sorts of strange things including hungry. The Metro stopped running at 1, so we caught it and got a good nights sleep despite the exciting alternatives (that is, to stay up all night and see more art).
Last Sunday, we saw an exhibit of clothes made out of bread. There was also a bakery, and the designer had designed the clothes for people working there -- ladies had exposed midrifts and exterior corsettes made of basket reeds. We were most excited by the window blinds made out of baguettes.
Monday, we went to the Cite Universitaire, where dozens of buildings each representing a different country (US, Holland, Cuba, Greece, Cambodia were a few) gather around a central pedestrian roadway, each with a unique architectural style. There was an exhibit on Le Corbusier... buildings designed like bottle racks for apartments to be inserted according to the needs of its residents. Of course, he designed the units to be inserted, which included loft beds for the parents above the common space, and we argued about the desirability of that arrangement (I think lofts are silly and impractical unless they can be made completely private, though I admit they seem fun). The common space has huge glass doors that open onto a large balcony so that in summer the family can feel like they are living out of doors. The children's bedrooms were long and narrow. Each unit had 2 floors and overlapped in the middle.
I return to Paris tonight, arriving around midnight. I am sorry to be leaving here already. I am sorry that the summer is gone and the leaves are falling off. I am sorry for the chill in the air and that everyone is going back to the states. In San Francisco, I love the fall, but here it makes me a feel a little sad. Maybe I just don't know what's going to happen next.
Saturday, October 09, 2004
[La Vienne] Switzerland 3
The spa in Suisse was quite something. The night before last I stayed in (I am now living alone in Muriel’s apartment in Paris while she is in Venezuela on vacation windsurfing) and organized my postcard collection gathered so far this trip. I came across the images of the spa: it is simple, clean modern lines, organic imprints (the lines that water leaves on the wall from continual flow, wet foot prints), skylights design to let the sunlight in in rays like the hand of God. Squares, rectangles, water, light… The stone is dark gray with horizontal lines. Well, it is better if you look at pictures of it (there are lots of photos online, but these images were biggest that I found after a brief search. I know the spa has its own web site with photos, but I will have to tell you it later. For now, here are someone’s photos): http://radio.cbc.ca/programs/global/scrapbook.html.
There was a warm indoor central bath, an outdoor pool with fantastic views and water pouring down so that you can give yourself a back massage with it and places to sunbath, a hot pool (not quite big enough or hot enough in my opinion, but very nice), a warm pool with flower petals in it, numerous other warm, cool, and cold pools, steam rooms, showers that started several meters above you, a place to drink the water, a quiet room for a rest, etc.
We were there for several hours, and finally left to return to the hotel (which was completely adorable and on the town square). That night all of us were famished and exhausted. It was Isabelle’s birthday. We had a nice meal of hunting game in another restaurant on the square. They brought us cakes with sparklers for Isabelle’s birthday, but getting people to sing was a challenge. The (maybe) Italian migrant workers at the next table were more excited about singing than my group. It must be cultural.
The next day we hiked the nearby mountains. They were unbelievably beautiful, but I already described them to you in an earlier posting. I would like to add a few highlights… Along the path, we stopped to pick wild blueberries. That has never happened to me before, and it was the best thing ever. Wild blueberries. We enjoyed this activity for a very long time, and then we noticed huge frogs (about the size of my fist) hopping through the blueberry patch. (Anyone know where there are big impressive frogs in the states?). I thought I saw a row of bicycles available for free or hire (? but we were dedicated to walking).
We reached a huge, cold-looking lake which reflected the pristine blue sky and green mountainsides, and crossed a damn to the other side where we stopped for a beer. Other activities in Vals are skiing in winter and mountain biking. I could easily be persuaded to return there any time (it might be amazing in winter for skiing with the spa and everything). The walk back to the village and car was an old roadway with long creepy tunnels through the rock. Their air was cool and water dripped through the rock. I’ve read a few books lately where the main character goes into another world (death or drug induced) and relives moments in their lives, and, well, if that had to happen to me and I could choose, I would certainly pick this day.
We drove back to France from there, stopping briefly for a dinner of pumpkin soup and chocolate cake. I think I slept most of the way.
There was a warm indoor central bath, an outdoor pool with fantastic views and water pouring down so that you can give yourself a back massage with it and places to sunbath, a hot pool (not quite big enough or hot enough in my opinion, but very nice), a warm pool with flower petals in it, numerous other warm, cool, and cold pools, steam rooms, showers that started several meters above you, a place to drink the water, a quiet room for a rest, etc.
We were there for several hours, and finally left to return to the hotel (which was completely adorable and on the town square). That night all of us were famished and exhausted. It was Isabelle’s birthday. We had a nice meal of hunting game in another restaurant on the square. They brought us cakes with sparklers for Isabelle’s birthday, but getting people to sing was a challenge. The (maybe) Italian migrant workers at the next table were more excited about singing than my group. It must be cultural.
The next day we hiked the nearby mountains. They were unbelievably beautiful, but I already described them to you in an earlier posting. I would like to add a few highlights… Along the path, we stopped to pick wild blueberries. That has never happened to me before, and it was the best thing ever. Wild blueberries. We enjoyed this activity for a very long time, and then we noticed huge frogs (about the size of my fist) hopping through the blueberry patch. (Anyone know where there are big impressive frogs in the states?). I thought I saw a row of bicycles available for free or hire (? but we were dedicated to walking).
We reached a huge, cold-looking lake which reflected the pristine blue sky and green mountainsides, and crossed a damn to the other side where we stopped for a beer. Other activities in Vals are skiing in winter and mountain biking. I could easily be persuaded to return there any time (it might be amazing in winter for skiing with the spa and everything). The walk back to the village and car was an old roadway with long creepy tunnels through the rock. Their air was cool and water dripped through the rock. I’ve read a few books lately where the main character goes into another world (death or drug induced) and relives moments in their lives, and, well, if that had to happen to me and I could choose, I would certainly pick this day.
We drove back to France from there, stopping briefly for a dinner of pumpkin soup and chocolate cake. I think I slept most of the way.
Saturday, October 02, 2004
[Paris] Talking in public
I have a small physical defect which occasionally requires treatment. When my usual home treatment doesn’t work, I am forced to get a perscription in the states. This happened earlier this week. At home, I give my doctor a call, she calls in my perscription, and I pick it up – very simple. Since this is a civilized country with a medical system (unlike the US), I hoped I could get the treatment over the counter. I asked Juliette to take me to a pharmacy and act as my translator. The pharmasist was sorry but, I did in fact need a doctor’s perscription for my usual treatment. However, because this is a civilized country where the pharmacutical industry is not running the government, there is an herbal remedy they recommend I try before seeing a doctor. Well, it worked, and I am cured.
J&G just bought their apartment earlier this year. Since I am pondering the idea myself, and I already know how it works in the US but not in France, I asked Juliette about it. Get this, kids: in France you do not put any money down. You spend 5 percent on the realtor and a whopping 10 percent on the title change – this is the money you have to produce up front. The bank loan is for the total purchase price of the apartment. If you change your mind after you make an offer (for example because the unit has structual problems and its value is far less than what you offered), well, you lose the 15 percent. You can imagine that this can be quite a lot of money to lose!
A young man started talking to me on the street this afternoon. He seemed harmless enough, so I did not ignore him. First, he asked (in Spanish) if I was Spanish. I thought I looked French, darn it! Then, adding insult to injury (kidding), he asked if I was Austrialian! Actually, I think he misread my accent.
Here’s another cultural observation: most French people don’t understand the way we use the words “offer” and “invite”. They use them often when speaking English, but they use “offer” to mean “give” as in a gift and “invite” assumes the subject’s treat. On the other hand, there are lots of French words that I may know the definition of but not completely comprehend the use of, the most basic I can think of right now is “excusez-moi” which is a much more serious thing to say than the English “excuse me” as far as I can tell.
To complete the story of the earlier paragraph, I decided not to let the young man buy me a beer/coffee today or at some undefined future date. I just didn’t think we had a future together considering that he could not guess my nationality. :-)
I don’t want to mention it too soon and jinx it, but I can read the signs on the Metro now and easedrop on basic conversations. The world is nice and quiet when you don’t understand what anyone is saying. I think I have clung to it for longer than necessary. Now I hear all the pointless things that everyone is saying, and I sort of wish they would be quiet. Do you think it is possible to get everyone to agree not to talk in public?
That was going to be my transition to more description of the weekend in Switzerland, but I’m afraid, once again, it will have to wait for another day. I have "promises to keep and miles to go before I sleep"....
J&G just bought their apartment earlier this year. Since I am pondering the idea myself, and I already know how it works in the US but not in France, I asked Juliette about it. Get this, kids: in France you do not put any money down. You spend 5 percent on the realtor and a whopping 10 percent on the title change – this is the money you have to produce up front. The bank loan is for the total purchase price of the apartment. If you change your mind after you make an offer (for example because the unit has structual problems and its value is far less than what you offered), well, you lose the 15 percent. You can imagine that this can be quite a lot of money to lose!
A young man started talking to me on the street this afternoon. He seemed harmless enough, so I did not ignore him. First, he asked (in Spanish) if I was Spanish. I thought I looked French, darn it! Then, adding insult to injury (kidding), he asked if I was Austrialian! Actually, I think he misread my accent.
Here’s another cultural observation: most French people don’t understand the way we use the words “offer” and “invite”. They use them often when speaking English, but they use “offer” to mean “give” as in a gift and “invite” assumes the subject’s treat. On the other hand, there are lots of French words that I may know the definition of but not completely comprehend the use of, the most basic I can think of right now is “excusez-moi” which is a much more serious thing to say than the English “excuse me” as far as I can tell.
To complete the story of the earlier paragraph, I decided not to let the young man buy me a beer/coffee today or at some undefined future date. I just didn’t think we had a future together considering that he could not guess my nationality. :-)
I don’t want to mention it too soon and jinx it, but I can read the signs on the Metro now and easedrop on basic conversations. The world is nice and quiet when you don’t understand what anyone is saying. I think I have clung to it for longer than necessary. Now I hear all the pointless things that everyone is saying, and I sort of wish they would be quiet. Do you think it is possible to get everyone to agree not to talk in public?
That was going to be my transition to more description of the weekend in Switzerland, but I’m afraid, once again, it will have to wait for another day. I have "promises to keep and miles to go before I sleep"....
Friday, October 01, 2004
[Paris] Colors, real estate, and Switzerland 2
The soil in Paris is black. I saw them digging a whole, and what came out was black sand like coal.
The colors for the fall are purple and pink. There is not a shop in Paris without a purple and pink window dressing.
Parisiens will not tolerate the sight of laundry hung out to dry, but no one has a dryer and everyone a balcony. They hang their clothing indoors. At the same time, the sidewalks are riddled with dog shit. I don’t understand this.
Prices to rent here appear to be the same or more than SF, but the price to buy an apartment is significantly less. At the moment, I have no desire to go home (except when I try to buy a book that is not a classic or a best seller here or in UK). So, well, you can hear the wheels turning. On the other hand, by the time I have completed this adventure, I will be broke again. And there is the small matter of feeding myself if I lived here without a work permit.... I am working on the solution. Maybe it will come to me in a dream.
But I left you, dear readers, just over the border in Basel, Switerland. Once our group assembled itself, we headed towards the small spa town of Vals in the mountains. When I agreed to this adventure, I was interested in the spa and the company, but I never gave a thought to the Swiss countryside. Boy Howdy. It is something else!
(I feel that my tone is not appropriate to describe the pristine beauty of this place....)
Val is located at the bottom of a V-shaped landscape along a small river. The land rises steaply on either side of a perfect little european village. Half-timbered houses (is that what that’s called?), a church, town square. The houses each have a yard, sheep, geraniums pouring from the window boxes. The hillsides have little structures at regular but not too close intervals, presumably for hay (no one knew for sure) with natural paths between like terracing (but not). Deep, rich green grass covers the slopes. Rocks occasionally protrude upward, giving the mountain a boost.
The colors for the fall are purple and pink. There is not a shop in Paris without a purple and pink window dressing.
Parisiens will not tolerate the sight of laundry hung out to dry, but no one has a dryer and everyone a balcony. They hang their clothing indoors. At the same time, the sidewalks are riddled with dog shit. I don’t understand this.
Prices to rent here appear to be the same or more than SF, but the price to buy an apartment is significantly less. At the moment, I have no desire to go home (except when I try to buy a book that is not a classic or a best seller here or in UK). So, well, you can hear the wheels turning. On the other hand, by the time I have completed this adventure, I will be broke again. And there is the small matter of feeding myself if I lived here without a work permit.... I am working on the solution. Maybe it will come to me in a dream.
But I left you, dear readers, just over the border in Basel, Switerland. Once our group assembled itself, we headed towards the small spa town of Vals in the mountains. When I agreed to this adventure, I was interested in the spa and the company, but I never gave a thought to the Swiss countryside. Boy Howdy. It is something else!
(I feel that my tone is not appropriate to describe the pristine beauty of this place....)
Val is located at the bottom of a V-shaped landscape along a small river. The land rises steaply on either side of a perfect little european village. Half-timbered houses (is that what that’s called?), a church, town square. The houses each have a yard, sheep, geraniums pouring from the window boxes. The hillsides have little structures at regular but not too close intervals, presumably for hay (no one knew for sure) with natural paths between like terracing (but not). Deep, rich green grass covers the slopes. Rocks occasionally protrude upward, giving the mountain a boost.
Monday, September 27, 2004
[Paris] Autumn, going native, and Switzerland
Pretty soon I won’t speak any language. I am loosing my facility with English now. And after only 4 days of classes!
The air is surprizingly cool and crisp with fall much sooner than I am used to. I feels like late October to me.
Going native:
As I hoped, Muriel, Juliette and I went shopping on Saturday. We each bought a top. Sunday, Juliette and I went with Mido to the flea market, but only Mido was successful (getting things for her grandchildren; she’s due to have another one on Friday). Juliette went home because her back was hurting, but I went back to Mido’s to visit more. I didn’t mean for it to happen, but she ended up giving me a bunch of clothes she says she doesn’t wear anymore. So, I have a new parisien wardrobe afterall.
I’m a little sick this afternoon, but I have had lots of water and herbal remedies and should be cured (fingers crossed).
Ten days ago, I was in Basel, Switzerland. I went, again, to see some sustainable housing developments. We saw 2. All information on the tour was in French, and I didn’t try to understand it; so, this description is based strictly on my observations.
I liked the first better, maybe just because we got to see the interior of one unit, but it isn’t particularly transit accessible. In general, it is very simple and rectangular in form. Windows have big gray sliding shutters. Porches surrounded both the front and back of building’s long side with full-length glass doors along their entire length. At the front, there is essecially an ordinary-looking apartment building. Behind it, there are 2 rows of townhouses with flat rooves divided by lush beautiful gardens. Cars park in front of most units. The interior is open and spacious. Front doors openned onto the driveway and backdoors the garden. Again, windows are full-length and porches surround the second floors. Like the apartment building, they are charcole gray and rectangular.
The second development is the color of pine wood. Like the first, it is strictly rectangular. Closely lined townhouses open onto the lane (where no parking is provided, not sure where the cars live). Behind the units are small green yards. They form a small grid. Children and their equipment (strollers, bicycles, toys) punctuate each lane throughout. This development seemed to be in a closer suburb, near a tram and a train station. I left the group here to see Basel.
Actually, first, I took the tram to the other side of town for the art museum, Foundation Beyeler. It’s the collection of modern art formerly owned by the Beyelers. (The price was a bit of a shock after London’s free museums.) They have several nice pieces, my favorites were a small pink Paul Klee nude (I don’t normally like him in particular, but this piece was an exception) and Giacometti (my boyfriend at Hampshire had a print of one of his paintings on his wall, and despite the fact that that was my worst relationship, I like Giacometti). The museum’s garden is beautiful and cows grazed with their compulsary bells in an orchard on the other side of the fense surrounding the modern yard. Returning to the city center, the tram driver waited for me as I bought a ticket.
What do you expect of a city by a river in Switzerland? Well, Basel won’t disappoint. It is very pretty. The old part of the city is on a rise above the river with winding medeavel streets, a cathedral, town square, etc. The river has a really pleasant prominade and appears remarkably clean and clear. I was trying to take a picture of myself with some stuff in the background (the cathedal, a boat, a bridge) when an old man walking with his wife came over and demanded something of me (my german does not exist yet). He repeated himself several times, finally grabbing my camera from me abruptly. Now, I thought for a moment he might run with it, but he was very old, walking on his wifes arm for stability as much as affection, so I decided not to wrestle him for the camera and instead let him take my picture with it. I saw them several more times during my walk and each time he spoke to me kindly; I have no idea what he said on any occasion.
We dined in the hostel kitchen with some Scots who came to Basel for a kickboxing match. They told stories of a guy they knew who was kicked out of the hostel and arrested by the police for being too noisy. “That’s Switzerland for you.”
Well, I have worn myself out already, and Juliette has started cooking (so, I should help). I’ll finish these tales later.
The air is surprizingly cool and crisp with fall much sooner than I am used to. I feels like late October to me.
Going native:
As I hoped, Muriel, Juliette and I went shopping on Saturday. We each bought a top. Sunday, Juliette and I went with Mido to the flea market, but only Mido was successful (getting things for her grandchildren; she’s due to have another one on Friday). Juliette went home because her back was hurting, but I went back to Mido’s to visit more. I didn’t mean for it to happen, but she ended up giving me a bunch of clothes she says she doesn’t wear anymore. So, I have a new parisien wardrobe afterall.
I’m a little sick this afternoon, but I have had lots of water and herbal remedies and should be cured (fingers crossed).
Ten days ago, I was in Basel, Switzerland. I went, again, to see some sustainable housing developments. We saw 2. All information on the tour was in French, and I didn’t try to understand it; so, this description is based strictly on my observations.
I liked the first better, maybe just because we got to see the interior of one unit, but it isn’t particularly transit accessible. In general, it is very simple and rectangular in form. Windows have big gray sliding shutters. Porches surrounded both the front and back of building’s long side with full-length glass doors along their entire length. At the front, there is essecially an ordinary-looking apartment building. Behind it, there are 2 rows of townhouses with flat rooves divided by lush beautiful gardens. Cars park in front of most units. The interior is open and spacious. Front doors openned onto the driveway and backdoors the garden. Again, windows are full-length and porches surround the second floors. Like the apartment building, they are charcole gray and rectangular.
The second development is the color of pine wood. Like the first, it is strictly rectangular. Closely lined townhouses open onto the lane (where no parking is provided, not sure where the cars live). Behind the units are small green yards. They form a small grid. Children and their equipment (strollers, bicycles, toys) punctuate each lane throughout. This development seemed to be in a closer suburb, near a tram and a train station. I left the group here to see Basel.
Actually, first, I took the tram to the other side of town for the art museum, Foundation Beyeler. It’s the collection of modern art formerly owned by the Beyelers. (The price was a bit of a shock after London’s free museums.) They have several nice pieces, my favorites were a small pink Paul Klee nude (I don’t normally like him in particular, but this piece was an exception) and Giacometti (my boyfriend at Hampshire had a print of one of his paintings on his wall, and despite the fact that that was my worst relationship, I like Giacometti). The museum’s garden is beautiful and cows grazed with their compulsary bells in an orchard on the other side of the fense surrounding the modern yard. Returning to the city center, the tram driver waited for me as I bought a ticket.
What do you expect of a city by a river in Switzerland? Well, Basel won’t disappoint. It is very pretty. The old part of the city is on a rise above the river with winding medeavel streets, a cathedral, town square, etc. The river has a really pleasant prominade and appears remarkably clean and clear. I was trying to take a picture of myself with some stuff in the background (the cathedal, a boat, a bridge) when an old man walking with his wife came over and demanded something of me (my german does not exist yet). He repeated himself several times, finally grabbing my camera from me abruptly. Now, I thought for a moment he might run with it, but he was very old, walking on his wifes arm for stability as much as affection, so I decided not to wrestle him for the camera and instead let him take my picture with it. I saw them several more times during my walk and each time he spoke to me kindly; I have no idea what he said on any occasion.
We dined in the hostel kitchen with some Scots who came to Basel for a kickboxing match. They told stories of a guy they knew who was kicked out of the hostel and arrested by the police for being too noisy. “That’s Switzerland for you.”
Well, I have worn myself out already, and Juliette has started cooking (so, I should help). I’ll finish these tales later.
Friday, September 24, 2004
[Paris] Dagnabit
I put aside this afternoon to catch up on my blog, but instead I have spent it on personal email. If you didn't receive one in the last few days, you have only yourself to blame (or maybe it got lost in delivery...). I really need to make the blog a priority one of these days, since I definitely won't have time to catch up today. Meanwhile it is finally a beautiful day, and I am spending it at the computer! grrr
I started my language class on Wednesday. The school is very pretty and comfortable. Everyone has been incredibly nice. I think i will just stay there instead of switching to the more well-known Alliance later. It's cheaper too. My teacher is incredibly sweet and only speaks French to us. This works fine except when I get tired and it is hard for me even to comprehend English. The level of the other students is well matched (despite that i never took the test). I find that more often than not I know (inside) how to put the sentences together, but the words come out all wrong anyway. I'm incredibly tired and I think I have been grinding my teeth. This too will pass.
My hosts, J&G, are great fun. G (who asked that his name be left out of the blog) has been creating a database of every train ride he has ever taken -- yes, he has kept all the tickets! In a few minutes, I am going to meet J for what at home we call "happy hour" with the girls. Then there is a small dinner party here also including Muriel (whom you will remember from my tales of Mallorca). Muriel loves to shop, so I think I can get her to take me shopping this weekend, since I plan to start trying to dress less like a mission hipster and more like a native. If I can handle it. So far, I have been wearing makeup. Don't worry. It's still me.
The school is also a good resource for social activity. This weekend, there's a party one night, and folks might be going to a club another night. I also read on tribe about open studios in a near suburb; I'd like to see what the artists are going here. I'm not sure what I will make it to, however.
Enjoying being in Paris is difficult because I am so knackered from my studies (and there is homework nearly every night). But yesterday we had a guided walking tour (in French) of some lovely parts of the city (Palais Royal, Jardin du Louvre, St. Germain, Ecole Nat. des Beaux Arts). I bought some flash cards afterwards bc I really need to get serious about my vocabulary.
The teaching philosophy seems to be very organic: we sing songs, we have exercizes and attempt conversation. However, I am approaching it rigorously; I have 3 books in front of me at all times (dictionary, book of verbs, and phrase book) and refer to them constantly. I give the teacher a wink bc I know she doesn't want me to be using them, but instead to be listening to her and learning organically. At least maybe she believes I'm highly motivated.
There's one guy in the class and at one point I asked him why he decided to learn French now. He said that it was always his worst subject in school and he wanted to figure out why. Me too! I can't understand why I am so naturally bad at this! But here I am....
I had an incredibly beautiful weekend in Switzerland (it looks like a green Kings Canyon without all the trees and with European villages!), but you will hear about that in another entry.
I started my language class on Wednesday. The school is very pretty and comfortable. Everyone has been incredibly nice. I think i will just stay there instead of switching to the more well-known Alliance later. It's cheaper too. My teacher is incredibly sweet and only speaks French to us. This works fine except when I get tired and it is hard for me even to comprehend English. The level of the other students is well matched (despite that i never took the test). I find that more often than not I know (inside) how to put the sentences together, but the words come out all wrong anyway. I'm incredibly tired and I think I have been grinding my teeth. This too will pass.
My hosts, J&G, are great fun. G (who asked that his name be left out of the blog) has been creating a database of every train ride he has ever taken -- yes, he has kept all the tickets! In a few minutes, I am going to meet J for what at home we call "happy hour" with the girls. Then there is a small dinner party here also including Muriel (whom you will remember from my tales of Mallorca). Muriel loves to shop, so I think I can get her to take me shopping this weekend, since I plan to start trying to dress less like a mission hipster and more like a native. If I can handle it. So far, I have been wearing makeup. Don't worry. It's still me.
The school is also a good resource for social activity. This weekend, there's a party one night, and folks might be going to a club another night. I also read on tribe about open studios in a near suburb; I'd like to see what the artists are going here. I'm not sure what I will make it to, however.
Enjoying being in Paris is difficult because I am so knackered from my studies (and there is homework nearly every night). But yesterday we had a guided walking tour (in French) of some lovely parts of the city (Palais Royal, Jardin du Louvre, St. Germain, Ecole Nat. des Beaux Arts). I bought some flash cards afterwards bc I really need to get serious about my vocabulary.
The teaching philosophy seems to be very organic: we sing songs, we have exercizes and attempt conversation. However, I am approaching it rigorously; I have 3 books in front of me at all times (dictionary, book of verbs, and phrase book) and refer to them constantly. I give the teacher a wink bc I know she doesn't want me to be using them, but instead to be listening to her and learning organically. At least maybe she believes I'm highly motivated.
There's one guy in the class and at one point I asked him why he decided to learn French now. He said that it was always his worst subject in school and he wanted to figure out why. Me too! I can't understand why I am so naturally bad at this! But here I am....
I had an incredibly beautiful weekend in Switzerland (it looks like a green Kings Canyon without all the trees and with European villages!), but you will hear about that in another entry.
Tuesday, September 14, 2004
[not at] Burning Man
Obviously, I wasn't there this year, but here are the picture's Cecile (my campmate from last year) took of 2004's Camp Hootchie (or whatever they called it this year). I am looking forward to being there with all the hootchies next year.
delorme.cecile.free.fr/
I also always enjoy the sfgate photos:
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/gate/archive/2004/09/02/burningman2004.DTL&type=gallerypage
delorme.cecile.free.fr/
I also always enjoy the sfgate photos:
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/gate/archive/2004/09/02/burningman2004.DTL&type=gallerypage
[London] A few more words
The pound seems to buy you about as much as the dollar. But for some reason it is worth twice as much.
I went for a walk after blogging most of the day. The sun began to set and the sky turned warm and sharp. The buildings and leaves came alive with color. It was both startling and familiar, and I realized that I have seen it before in English landscape paintings. The English sky is something altogether different.
I walked across Hampstead Heath. It isn't a normal park -- the swaths of lawn are so huge they dwarf the people who enjoy it. Life changes scale, and I become disoriented and awed.
Simon (Natasha's, the 22 year old's, boyfriend) recommended I go to Hampstead High Street for its cute shops and pleasant atmosphere. There I found 2 GAP stores, a Body Shop, Crab Tree and Evelynn, Monsoon, a bookstore chain I recognised from Norwich, a French Connection, etc. Maybe 10% of stores did not have names I recognised.
London has good pedestrian and bicycle wayfinding signage. The bicycle facilities are OK -- better than in the US but not as good as Germany. There are lots of cyclists, but unlike on the continent, they are all wearing helmets and reflective jackets.
Music is everywhere. The boys at the next table are discussing it. It pours from houses and cars. It's no wonder this is the birthplace of The Beattles....
This business about the cars driving on the opposite side of the road has been a very difficult transition. I think it indicates that my brain is getting old and less agile. It didn't confuse me when I was here 10 years ago (of course I was coming from a year of travel at the time).
I often have dreams where I can fly, but only when I am running away from something scary that's chasing me. Well, in Mallorca, I had a break through: I chose to run away in order to fly because it was fun, and it turned out that what I was running from was just some people trying to spray me with water. I made it to "base" safely and won either a vacation bungalow or a lifetime supply of toilet paper (housed in a tower), I am not sure which.
I went for a walk after blogging most of the day. The sun began to set and the sky turned warm and sharp. The buildings and leaves came alive with color. It was both startling and familiar, and I realized that I have seen it before in English landscape paintings. The English sky is something altogether different.
I walked across Hampstead Heath. It isn't a normal park -- the swaths of lawn are so huge they dwarf the people who enjoy it. Life changes scale, and I become disoriented and awed.
Simon (Natasha's, the 22 year old's, boyfriend) recommended I go to Hampstead High Street for its cute shops and pleasant atmosphere. There I found 2 GAP stores, a Body Shop, Crab Tree and Evelynn, Monsoon, a bookstore chain I recognised from Norwich, a French Connection, etc. Maybe 10% of stores did not have names I recognised.
London has good pedestrian and bicycle wayfinding signage. The bicycle facilities are OK -- better than in the US but not as good as Germany. There are lots of cyclists, but unlike on the continent, they are all wearing helmets and reflective jackets.
Music is everywhere. The boys at the next table are discussing it. It pours from houses and cars. It's no wonder this is the birthplace of The Beattles....
This business about the cars driving on the opposite side of the road has been a very difficult transition. I think it indicates that my brain is getting old and less agile. It didn't confuse me when I was here 10 years ago (of course I was coming from a year of travel at the time).
I often have dreams where I can fly, but only when I am running away from something scary that's chasing me. Well, in Mallorca, I had a break through: I chose to run away in order to fly because it was fun, and it turned out that what I was running from was just some people trying to spray me with water. I made it to "base" safely and won either a vacation bungalow or a lifetime supply of toilet paper (housed in a tower), I am not sure which.
London/Norwich: catching up
Katriona lives in west Kensington, and I stayed with her for 2 nights before I went to Norwich. She met my mother and John in New Zealand, and I also stayed in her apartment in Rome a few years ago. She has a UK passport, but she grew up in Italy and went to grad school in Paris. In addition to her husband Oly (who is American and was in the states when I visited), she lives with 2 film makers, Alex (from Mexico) and Nick (from Italy). Katriona has written books (in Italian) on meditation, the psychological meaning of masks and performance, and what sounds like a kind of a Joseph Cambell type of thing about archtypes and psychology (what her degree is in).
We went to see My Architect (for her second time) the first night. (she is thinking about making a similar film about her Grandfather who was a famous Swedish doctor.) I didn't care much for the guy's architecture (except the building in medical research center in SoCal and the one in Bangladesh), but the son's effort to get to know his dead father was deeply moving. And it also made me uncomfortable. Maybe this is my own issue, but I didn't think this father, who was really not a very nice person (he had 3 families simultaniously, never publically acknowledged the filmmaker as his son or married the mother, and only very occasionally made time for any of them bc he was always working), deserved for his son to dedicate years of his life and make a film about him. I felt like the son gave more than his father deserved.
But upon further reflection, maybe the film (which has received critical acclaim, giving the son a name in the industry) is actually something that the dead father has given back to his son. Maybe we don't do things for each other. Maybe we do everything for ourselves, and in the end, we are the only ones who benefit or suffer for it.
I had one free day in London that time, and Alex created the itinerary. I walked along the south side of the Thames between Westminster and Tower Bridge, stopping off here and there, but mostly at the Tate Modern. Performance artists in crazy costumes stand still along the walkway until someone gives them money. This is common throughout the western world actually, but never have I seen them in such high concentrations and in such crazy costumes.
Katriona kindly offered to drive me, pick up my mother at Stanstead Airport, and take us both to Norwich. Crossing London was absolute gridlock -- it took hours -- this was not in the congestion pricing zone. There was also a lot of traffic around Cambridge. Once we arrived in Norwich, we toured the cathedral before it closed and then had some beer at the oldest pub in Norfolk, the Adam and Eve. Flowers poured out of the every available receptical. Maureen met us there.
I've already told you about NVC, which was how we spent that weekend. I only want to add that the class included lots of interesting characters.
My mother and I spent the rest of the week at Maureen's place outside Norwich (drinking all of her wine and trying to make a dent in the food in her freezer). She lives with her 18 year old son, Robert, and her 94-year-old maiden aunt, Bebe. There is a rail-to-trail pathway nearby which we took almost every day. My mother wakes up early, but strangly she seems to need to go back to bed around 9, which meant that we never got out of the house before noon. I noticed this when I visited them in La Vienne as well.
We biked to nearby towns to see churches and town squares, Blickling Hall (where Anne Bolynn was born), Norwich, etc. These trips usually involved a stop at a local pub for some excellent beer. We also took a day trip to Cambridge, where we did not make it through all the main sites, but we did have some excellent fish and chips.
I am sure I have a lot more to say about this, but I am all blogged out at the moment. Thanks for listening.
We went to see My Architect (for her second time) the first night. (she is thinking about making a similar film about her Grandfather who was a famous Swedish doctor.) I didn't care much for the guy's architecture (except the building in medical research center in SoCal and the one in Bangladesh), but the son's effort to get to know his dead father was deeply moving. And it also made me uncomfortable. Maybe this is my own issue, but I didn't think this father, who was really not a very nice person (he had 3 families simultaniously, never publically acknowledged the filmmaker as his son or married the mother, and only very occasionally made time for any of them bc he was always working), deserved for his son to dedicate years of his life and make a film about him. I felt like the son gave more than his father deserved.
But upon further reflection, maybe the film (which has received critical acclaim, giving the son a name in the industry) is actually something that the dead father has given back to his son. Maybe we don't do things for each other. Maybe we do everything for ourselves, and in the end, we are the only ones who benefit or suffer for it.
I had one free day in London that time, and Alex created the itinerary. I walked along the south side of the Thames between Westminster and Tower Bridge, stopping off here and there, but mostly at the Tate Modern. Performance artists in crazy costumes stand still along the walkway until someone gives them money. This is common throughout the western world actually, but never have I seen them in such high concentrations and in such crazy costumes.
Katriona kindly offered to drive me, pick up my mother at Stanstead Airport, and take us both to Norwich. Crossing London was absolute gridlock -- it took hours -- this was not in the congestion pricing zone. There was also a lot of traffic around Cambridge. Once we arrived in Norwich, we toured the cathedral before it closed and then had some beer at the oldest pub in Norfolk, the Adam and Eve. Flowers poured out of the every available receptical. Maureen met us there.
I've already told you about NVC, which was how we spent that weekend. I only want to add that the class included lots of interesting characters.
My mother and I spent the rest of the week at Maureen's place outside Norwich (drinking all of her wine and trying to make a dent in the food in her freezer). She lives with her 18 year old son, Robert, and her 94-year-old maiden aunt, Bebe. There is a rail-to-trail pathway nearby which we took almost every day. My mother wakes up early, but strangly she seems to need to go back to bed around 9, which meant that we never got out of the house before noon. I noticed this when I visited them in La Vienne as well.
We biked to nearby towns to see churches and town squares, Blickling Hall (where Anne Bolynn was born), Norwich, etc. These trips usually involved a stop at a local pub for some excellent beer. We also took a day trip to Cambridge, where we did not make it through all the main sites, but we did have some excellent fish and chips.
I am sure I have a lot more to say about this, but I am all blogged out at the moment. Thanks for listening.
[London] Lovely. Cheers.
It's my last day in London, so I figured I would squander it catching up on the blog. Maybe not the best use of my time, but the best use of it I can think of for now.
I'm here at Kirsty's, Wendy's neice and Elizabeth's cousin, in north London... I think they said it was called Highgate, but I know it is near Hampstead Heath, in case that means anything to you. They just returned from the summer in Greece where they run a restaurant during the high season. They have 3 children (approx ages: 22, 14, and 10?) and usually also let a room out to a foreign student, but for now I am in that room.
Yesterday I went to Bedzed, a zero energy development in south London. Their website doesn't provide much information on their location, which kind of freaked me out -- I wondered if it was even in London. But getting there was actually a breeze. I took the tube to Victoria and then a regional train for about 15 minutes. It's in zone 4 of the public transportation system (I am staying in zone 2, just outside the center). I bought a day pass for 4.40 GBP, only a few pence
more than a day pass for only zones 1 and 2, which makes me think that, if the housing prices decline as you get further from the center, London's public transportation system is creating a perverse incentive to locate further out, ie encouraging sprawl.
This is consistent with my observations about much of England. Maureen (Norwich) and Nick & Morag (near Stanstead Airport) both live deep in the suburbs in completely auto-oriented locations (unless you bike, but they wouldn't consider it, at least, Maureen thought my mother and I were crazy to bike into central Norwich, 6 miles away). Even my London friends all still have cars, but Katriona says she might start leaving hers in Italy bc she lives very close to the center and the congestion charge can be hard to avoid. She said since they implemented the congestion charge, she doesn't even consider driving around town anymore, even at night when the congestion charge is not in effect.
At the station, the attendant knew exactly where Bedzed is (I asked using the wrong name at first, not realizing that everyone calls this place Bedzed). A couple blocks later, the postman (not the usual one for this area) also knew where it was based on my description (he didn't know the name). Bedzed involves a series of buildings with yards and roof decks, plants grow on the roof area. They are highly insulated and the rooms are small for more efficient heating. The south side of each building is comprised of windows to provide heat and light to the units. Obviously, the units are attached, but they have separate roofs. They are equipt with low energy use appliances, shower heads, etc. Much of the building material is reclaimed.
The marketing literature claims that Bedzed is a pedestrian-oriented development, but I found the environment overwhelmed with roads and parking spaces. There were a number of outlets for eletric cars, but none of them were in use and some had been vandalized. I read that there is a carshare pod at Bedzed, but I didn't see it (hopefully bc the carshare cars were in use).
All of the units appear to be occupied, but a few were for sale. The neighborhood has a central park area with benches made of reclaimed wood. I sat on one and ate my lunch, and it got my butt wet. There are live-work units and a few storefronts with offices in them (mostly sustainable development companies involved in the construction of this one). A childcare center is at one end, but I didn't see any activity there. Maybe it was nap time or they haven't started taking students yet. There is a "clubhouse", and I saw flyers for a Friday evening BYOB happy hour. I also saw flyers for book clubs and cooking classes. The game field was wet and therefor closed (fenced off!). I am not sure who is responsible but there is definitely a lot of effort put into building community here. I toured the area before entering the office, taking lots of pictures, only to learn when I entered the office that they ask people not to do that in order to respect the privacy of the residents. Oops! A resident also yelled at me for entering someone's roof garden (oops twice), but I thought this boded well for their community engagement. Jane Jacobs would be pleased.
I did not see a corner store in the immediate vicinity. However there were a few small businesses on the short hike in from the train station. The project provides delivery of organic veggies from a local farm to residents who choose to subscribe to this service, but I wonder if there is a good place to get other food stuffs. I was disappointed by the lack of connectivity between the development and adjacent neighborhoods -- there was a small path leading in from the main road towards the train station, but a fence between Bedzed and the neighborhoods on the other 3 sides and the childcare center yard blocked access to the main road at the other end, so if you were going to/coming from that way you have to take the main road.
I saw Bedzed at midday on a Monday (they told me they do tours on Wednesday and Thursday) and I saw 2 large groups (one from France) and a number of other random visitors meandering around. Odd that this development has attracted so much attention while the rest of the English are driving all around for no apparent reason and not sorting their trash (Bedzed has 4 different bins).
Afterwards I went to the Tate and breezed through their perminant exhibit. We had dinner last night at Linda (Kirsty's mother) and David's.
My plan on Sunday was to see the National Gallery and the British Museum. Silly me -- in 4 hours I made it from 1500 to 1600 in the National Gallery (about 2/5 of the museum). Most of the work was Italian but a few were German or Dutch. The reading materials mentioned that the people in the Italian pieces conform with their ideal of beauty at the time. I concur; the people in the Italian paintings were much better looking than the Dutch and German. That's my deep thought for Sunday.
Afterwards I went to the Transportation Museum shop and bought one of everything.
Sunday night Kirsty had her family over for dinner. I spent most of the evening talking with her Communist Astrologer grandmother Ruth (Linda and Wendy's mom). She moved to England from Hollywood because her husband was blacklisted during the McCarthy era. We spoke mostly about her writing and how easy she finds dialog to write. She was shocked that I had been biking on Friday because I could have been killed given the alignment of the stars. She said I will be moving house
in the next year (my and Kirsty's interpretation: or just spending 6 months abroad), and I should have had a love affair in the past year.
"I haven't met anyone like you in a while." Ruth told me.
"What do you mean?"
"You know what I mean.... You must be upper class." It was very sweet, but I had to laugh.
I woke up Saturday morning in Norwich. We stopped off at Nick and Morag's (the people I stayed with one night on my way to Berlin in July) on the way to Stanstead Airport where my mother and Maureen flew to Pisa for a vacation and I took the train (very fast and efficient) to London. The airport is expanding, and the residents are up in arms about all the sprawl in the community as a result. The town of Stanstead is actually incredibly cute. Nick and Morag used to drive to London for work, but now they both work in Cambridge which is a little closer and doesn't have congestion pricing.
Both at Maureen's and Nick and Morag's you have to drive on roads that have only one lane shared by cars going in both directions to get there. My New Deal American roadway expectations were shocked! That would never go over the our traffic engineers.
London is huge, and it seems quite spread out. The place is lousy with parks, which is nice but also makes me feel like things are even more spread out. Everyone I have met complains bitterly about the public transportation system, but I have
never waited for more than 5 minutes for a subway, bus or tram. Even when I have to transfer multiple times, it has never taken more than 30 minutes to get anywhere. I asked Harry, the 14 year old, to explain why the public transportation system is so bad, and he said the bus never comes and when it does there are 3 of them (sound familar, San Franciscans?). While this may be true, it has not been my experience. I can't help but wonder how often these people use public transit anymore. Maybe it has improved since they last used it, but its bad reputation persists.
It's great to talk with native speakers again. I don't worry that they understand the layers of what I am saying or if I am using a word that is too obscure. However, we are also divided by our common language. It took quite some time to ask for dish soap, for example. Not sure what they call it or why my name for it would have been confusing. "Cheers" is another oddity; why do people keep saying it when they don't have a drink in their hand? (It seems to mean something like "Thanks", but its very confusing. Maybe it actually means you have ink on your face. I wish I knew.) "Lovely" is another: they say it all the time. I figure the appropriate reply to "lovely" is "lovely", but half the time I try to say it it comes out "I love you" (always inappropriately).
I'm here at Kirsty's, Wendy's neice and Elizabeth's cousin, in north London... I think they said it was called Highgate, but I know it is near Hampstead Heath, in case that means anything to you. They just returned from the summer in Greece where they run a restaurant during the high season. They have 3 children (approx ages: 22, 14, and 10?) and usually also let a room out to a foreign student, but for now I am in that room.
Yesterday I went to Bedzed, a zero energy development in south London. Their website doesn't provide much information on their location, which kind of freaked me out -- I wondered if it was even in London. But getting there was actually a breeze. I took the tube to Victoria and then a regional train for about 15 minutes. It's in zone 4 of the public transportation system (I am staying in zone 2, just outside the center). I bought a day pass for 4.40 GBP, only a few pence
more than a day pass for only zones 1 and 2, which makes me think that, if the housing prices decline as you get further from the center, London's public transportation system is creating a perverse incentive to locate further out, ie encouraging sprawl.
This is consistent with my observations about much of England. Maureen (Norwich) and Nick & Morag (near Stanstead Airport) both live deep in the suburbs in completely auto-oriented locations (unless you bike, but they wouldn't consider it, at least, Maureen thought my mother and I were crazy to bike into central Norwich, 6 miles away). Even my London friends all still have cars, but Katriona says she might start leaving hers in Italy bc she lives very close to the center and the congestion charge can be hard to avoid. She said since they implemented the congestion charge, she doesn't even consider driving around town anymore, even at night when the congestion charge is not in effect.
At the station, the attendant knew exactly where Bedzed is (I asked using the wrong name at first, not realizing that everyone calls this place Bedzed). A couple blocks later, the postman (not the usual one for this area) also knew where it was based on my description (he didn't know the name). Bedzed involves a series of buildings with yards and roof decks, plants grow on the roof area. They are highly insulated and the rooms are small for more efficient heating. The south side of each building is comprised of windows to provide heat and light to the units. Obviously, the units are attached, but they have separate roofs. They are equipt with low energy use appliances, shower heads, etc. Much of the building material is reclaimed.
The marketing literature claims that Bedzed is a pedestrian-oriented development, but I found the environment overwhelmed with roads and parking spaces. There were a number of outlets for eletric cars, but none of them were in use and some had been vandalized. I read that there is a carshare pod at Bedzed, but I didn't see it (hopefully bc the carshare cars were in use).
All of the units appear to be occupied, but a few were for sale. The neighborhood has a central park area with benches made of reclaimed wood. I sat on one and ate my lunch, and it got my butt wet. There are live-work units and a few storefronts with offices in them (mostly sustainable development companies involved in the construction of this one). A childcare center is at one end, but I didn't see any activity there. Maybe it was nap time or they haven't started taking students yet. There is a "clubhouse", and I saw flyers for a Friday evening BYOB happy hour. I also saw flyers for book clubs and cooking classes. The game field was wet and therefor closed (fenced off!). I am not sure who is responsible but there is definitely a lot of effort put into building community here. I toured the area before entering the office, taking lots of pictures, only to learn when I entered the office that they ask people not to do that in order to respect the privacy of the residents. Oops! A resident also yelled at me for entering someone's roof garden (oops twice), but I thought this boded well for their community engagement. Jane Jacobs would be pleased.
I did not see a corner store in the immediate vicinity. However there were a few small businesses on the short hike in from the train station. The project provides delivery of organic veggies from a local farm to residents who choose to subscribe to this service, but I wonder if there is a good place to get other food stuffs. I was disappointed by the lack of connectivity between the development and adjacent neighborhoods -- there was a small path leading in from the main road towards the train station, but a fence between Bedzed and the neighborhoods on the other 3 sides and the childcare center yard blocked access to the main road at the other end, so if you were going to/coming from that way you have to take the main road.
I saw Bedzed at midday on a Monday (they told me they do tours on Wednesday and Thursday) and I saw 2 large groups (one from France) and a number of other random visitors meandering around. Odd that this development has attracted so much attention while the rest of the English are driving all around for no apparent reason and not sorting their trash (Bedzed has 4 different bins).
Afterwards I went to the Tate and breezed through their perminant exhibit. We had dinner last night at Linda (Kirsty's mother) and David's.
My plan on Sunday was to see the National Gallery and the British Museum. Silly me -- in 4 hours I made it from 1500 to 1600 in the National Gallery (about 2/5 of the museum). Most of the work was Italian but a few were German or Dutch. The reading materials mentioned that the people in the Italian pieces conform with their ideal of beauty at the time. I concur; the people in the Italian paintings were much better looking than the Dutch and German. That's my deep thought for Sunday.
Afterwards I went to the Transportation Museum shop and bought one of everything.
Sunday night Kirsty had her family over for dinner. I spent most of the evening talking with her Communist Astrologer grandmother Ruth (Linda and Wendy's mom). She moved to England from Hollywood because her husband was blacklisted during the McCarthy era. We spoke mostly about her writing and how easy she finds dialog to write. She was shocked that I had been biking on Friday because I could have been killed given the alignment of the stars. She said I will be moving house
in the next year (my and Kirsty's interpretation: or just spending 6 months abroad), and I should have had a love affair in the past year.
"I haven't met anyone like you in a while." Ruth told me.
"What do you mean?"
"You know what I mean.... You must be upper class." It was very sweet, but I had to laugh.
I woke up Saturday morning in Norwich. We stopped off at Nick and Morag's (the people I stayed with one night on my way to Berlin in July) on the way to Stanstead Airport where my mother and Maureen flew to Pisa for a vacation and I took the train (very fast and efficient) to London. The airport is expanding, and the residents are up in arms about all the sprawl in the community as a result. The town of Stanstead is actually incredibly cute. Nick and Morag used to drive to London for work, but now they both work in Cambridge which is a little closer and doesn't have congestion pricing.
Both at Maureen's and Nick and Morag's you have to drive on roads that have only one lane shared by cars going in both directions to get there. My New Deal American roadway expectations were shocked! That would never go over the our traffic engineers.
London is huge, and it seems quite spread out. The place is lousy with parks, which is nice but also makes me feel like things are even more spread out. Everyone I have met complains bitterly about the public transportation system, but I have
never waited for more than 5 minutes for a subway, bus or tram. Even when I have to transfer multiple times, it has never taken more than 30 minutes to get anywhere. I asked Harry, the 14 year old, to explain why the public transportation system is so bad, and he said the bus never comes and when it does there are 3 of them (sound familar, San Franciscans?). While this may be true, it has not been my experience. I can't help but wonder how often these people use public transit anymore. Maybe it has improved since they last used it, but its bad reputation persists.
It's great to talk with native speakers again. I don't worry that they understand the layers of what I am saying or if I am using a word that is too obscure. However, we are also divided by our common language. It took quite some time to ask for dish soap, for example. Not sure what they call it or why my name for it would have been confusing. "Cheers" is another oddity; why do people keep saying it when they don't have a drink in their hand? (It seems to mean something like "Thanks", but its very confusing. Maybe it actually means you have ink on your face. I wish I knew.) "Lovely" is another: they say it all the time. I figure the appropriate reply to "lovely" is "lovely", but half the time I try to say it it comes out "I love you" (always inappropriately).
Wednesday, September 08, 2004
Monday, September 06, 2004
[Norwich]Nonviolent Communication (NVC)
I must admit, when my mother asked me to come with her to this workshop and I agreed (in my usual way – “let me think about it…. OK, I guess,” which is code for “yes”), I didn’t have any idea what I was getting myself into. I think I imagined something slightly more global. Of course, NVC has been used in Israel, North Ireland, the former Yugoslavia, but in practice it is something you do everyday. “Let us become the change we seek in the world.” (Mahatma Gandhi) The personal is, after all, the political. But I experienced a certain initial fear when I walked in the room Saturday morning that the workshop would require we bear all (and in front of my mother!) in order to learn this skill.
To live an ethical life I must bike, walk and ride public transportation to get around, sort my trash into compost and recycling (yes, this has been a struggle), do my shopping at small locally-owned businesses, buy organic, etc., but it hadn’t really occurred to me until now that they way I communicated with my friends and family might in impact, as the proverbial butterfly flaps its wings (sure, I can be a butterfly in my own metaphor, it doesn’t mean I am flighty), the possibility for world peace.
Nonviolent Communication entails “learning a new language” to connect with people from the heart. It involves the following components: observation (without evaluation), feelings, needs, and request (not demand). The premise is that universal human needs (food, fun, fairness, etc.) are never in conflict, but strategies for meeting those needs can be. The most basic human need is to “contribute to life.” Feelings happen in response to needs being met or not met. Another critical component is empathy, because it takes a lot of practice to effectively identify ones own feelings and needs, sometimes people need help. The program includes a comprehensive list of feelings and needs for you to choose among. Feelings are your own, not reflective (used, misunderstood, abandoned) of anything outside yourself; they should also be feelings that are life connecting (hurt, upset, scared) and not disconnected from life (anger, guilt, shame, depression). So, a NVC statement might be “I feel _____ because I need _____. Would you be willing to ____ to help meet that need?” Once feelings and needs are processed on both sides, it becomes time to discuss requests or solutions to meeting those needs.
Once these observations, feelings and needs are expressed and heard, it is only a matter of identifying a strategy to meet those needs that works for all involved. As Marshall Rosenberg (the author of NVC) says “Please only do what I have requested if you can do so with the joy of little children feeding hungry ducks. Please do not do as I have requested if there is the slightest bit of fear, resentment, guilt or shame motivating you – that would be too costly to us both.” But more importantly, do not get too fixated on one solution to meeting your needs, because another one might be acceptable to the others involved.
In practice, people express themselves in four ways based on the combination of head/heart, inward/outward. They call head and heart the jackal and the giraffe. Yes, it is a bit silly, but it can act as a nice code. For example, when I say to my mother “you look like a duck; how cute you are,” and she responds with “why do you always have to be so critical of me,” I believe that I am creatively admiring her, but she is hearing my statement with jackal outward ears. Yes, it is a strange example, but it keeps coming up with her. All four ways of thinking have a role, but you have to move through the heart (giraffe) in order to connect with other people.
That pretty much describes it. Here are a few other notes I took at the workshop:
• “You can never get enough of what you don’t really need.”
• Imaginings can trigger feelings – be sure you are responding to something real.
• People can only hear 40 words at a time. When you bring up an issue, use fewer than 40 words before you ask for their response. If you aren’t done yet, continue only after you have received feedback.
• Observations are most effectively expressed in the present tense. Do not talk about how you felt about what happened yesterday, talk about how you feel about it today.
Requests should be:
• Concise
• Specific
• Realistic/doable
• Not a demand, you must be able to accept if the person says no
• In positive language; it is much harder to NOT do something than to do it
• Linked to your need
• Remember: your request is a gift. It can make a person very happy to be able to fulfill your need.
NVC says that people are only really saying 2 things: please and thank you. They just don’t always have the right vocabulary to say it. Everyone just wants you to see how beautiful they are (there is a song). Expressing met needs it just as important as expressing unmet needs. It is called gratitude. On the other hand, positive judgments can be just as damaging as negative ones.
www.cnvc.org
Normally, I would wait to post this, but Alison says she can’t wait for my next entry, and I want to meet her need for fun and connection. She says there is a heat wave in the SF, and I am jealous since today in Norwich was rather cold and overcast. Anyway, more soon….
To live an ethical life I must bike, walk and ride public transportation to get around, sort my trash into compost and recycling (yes, this has been a struggle), do my shopping at small locally-owned businesses, buy organic, etc., but it hadn’t really occurred to me until now that they way I communicated with my friends and family might in impact, as the proverbial butterfly flaps its wings (sure, I can be a butterfly in my own metaphor, it doesn’t mean I am flighty), the possibility for world peace.
Nonviolent Communication entails “learning a new language” to connect with people from the heart. It involves the following components: observation (without evaluation), feelings, needs, and request (not demand). The premise is that universal human needs (food, fun, fairness, etc.) are never in conflict, but strategies for meeting those needs can be. The most basic human need is to “contribute to life.” Feelings happen in response to needs being met or not met. Another critical component is empathy, because it takes a lot of practice to effectively identify ones own feelings and needs, sometimes people need help. The program includes a comprehensive list of feelings and needs for you to choose among. Feelings are your own, not reflective (used, misunderstood, abandoned) of anything outside yourself; they should also be feelings that are life connecting (hurt, upset, scared) and not disconnected from life (anger, guilt, shame, depression). So, a NVC statement might be “I feel _____ because I need _____. Would you be willing to ____ to help meet that need?” Once feelings and needs are processed on both sides, it becomes time to discuss requests or solutions to meeting those needs.
Once these observations, feelings and needs are expressed and heard, it is only a matter of identifying a strategy to meet those needs that works for all involved. As Marshall Rosenberg (the author of NVC) says “Please only do what I have requested if you can do so with the joy of little children feeding hungry ducks. Please do not do as I have requested if there is the slightest bit of fear, resentment, guilt or shame motivating you – that would be too costly to us both.” But more importantly, do not get too fixated on one solution to meeting your needs, because another one might be acceptable to the others involved.
In practice, people express themselves in four ways based on the combination of head/heart, inward/outward. They call head and heart the jackal and the giraffe. Yes, it is a bit silly, but it can act as a nice code. For example, when I say to my mother “you look like a duck; how cute you are,” and she responds with “why do you always have to be so critical of me,” I believe that I am creatively admiring her, but she is hearing my statement with jackal outward ears. Yes, it is a strange example, but it keeps coming up with her. All four ways of thinking have a role, but you have to move through the heart (giraffe) in order to connect with other people.
That pretty much describes it. Here are a few other notes I took at the workshop:
• “You can never get enough of what you don’t really need.”
• Imaginings can trigger feelings – be sure you are responding to something real.
• People can only hear 40 words at a time. When you bring up an issue, use fewer than 40 words before you ask for their response. If you aren’t done yet, continue only after you have received feedback.
• Observations are most effectively expressed in the present tense. Do not talk about how you felt about what happened yesterday, talk about how you feel about it today.
Requests should be:
• Concise
• Specific
• Realistic/doable
• Not a demand, you must be able to accept if the person says no
• In positive language; it is much harder to NOT do something than to do it
• Linked to your need
• Remember: your request is a gift. It can make a person very happy to be able to fulfill your need.
NVC says that people are only really saying 2 things: please and thank you. They just don’t always have the right vocabulary to say it. Everyone just wants you to see how beautiful they are (there is a song). Expressing met needs it just as important as expressing unmet needs. It is called gratitude. On the other hand, positive judgments can be just as damaging as negative ones.
www.cnvc.org
Normally, I would wait to post this, but Alison says she can’t wait for my next entry, and I want to meet her need for fun and connection. She says there is a heat wave in the SF, and I am jealous since today in Norwich was rather cold and overcast. Anyway, more soon….
Wednesday, September 01, 2004
Mallorca etc.
Tha landscape of Mallorca looks just like southern California. The rocks are scraggly and gray, the earth ranges from warm beige to red, depending on your location. The buildings mirror the earth in color. The land is dry. Their main agricultural product is almonds, and they have wonderful almond deserts as a result, but they also have an abundance of citrus, olive, and pine trees. Now, of course, the main product is tourism.
The Bousseau/Colon house is in Soller, on the north side of the island in the mountains. Like the main city, Palma, Soller is a tradition European city with a pedestrianized (mostly car-free) center. Truly lovely. The Cathedral and a bank along the main square were both designed after Gaudi.
Our days followed a certain pattern with some exceptions. After a light breakfast, we would walk around the town or something. Lunch was long and involved wine. Then we took a siesta until about 5, at which time we headed to the harbor for a swim until 8 when we returned to the house for dinner. The girls (including myself) walked to the port for the swim and took the tram back while the others would drive in a full car. Not a bad life really.
The whole group included Mido and Jean Pierre and their daughter Juliette, her friend Muriel, Mido’s mother, and Juliette’s sister’s 2 children, Axel (4) and Annabelle (2). When I first arrived everyone was sitting down for lunch, but Axel jumped up and threw himself into my arms (I had never met him before). Juliette warned me, “He’s very sticky” by which she meant that he sticks to you, not that he is covered in juice.
Axel became my best French teacher, although it was a little frustrating because he doesn’t yet read. He liked to torcher ants, snuggle, and he is a wiz with puzzles (up to 200 pieces). I read him French story books, and he corrected my pronunciation.
The house is in a citrus grove next to the main road near the town center. There is a train that connects Soller to Palma a few times a day. There is also a tunnel that just openned up about 5 years ago (4 euro for a car to pass through) which shortens the drive from 1 hour to about 10 minutes. As a result, Soller has remained relatively unspoiled by the tourism that has invaded the rest of the island(s).
Fortunately, we were there for the festival of devils (not sure what it is actually called) that happens every year in Soller, where people dress up as devils and run around holding fire works over their heads while others, soaking wet and wearing headscarves, run around beneath the fire. It was really something, and I took some good pictures of it.
We took several excellent hikes through the scrabbly mountain sides, up stairs and paths over to the sea. Except for in the port, the water is incredibly clear and beautiful, and much of the coastline comprised of volcanic rocks. Twice we went to very nice restaurants for elaborate meals which I can’t describe because a different wine came with every course. I know it was good, however.
Part of Mido’s family is actually from Soller. I think it was her great grandfather who used to take the bank deposits from Soller to Palma on foot with a donkey 3 times a week (about 25 km each way) by himself. The port is now lined with European-style shops with apartments above them, but they have pictures from when the only building there was the military base (now closed) and it was just a sandy cove.
I ended up staying 2 days longer than the rest, except JP who was staying to paint the interior of the house. He took great care to show me around, and did not only speak French to me as he had threatened.
Nicely tanned but covered with more than 25 mosquito bites, I’ve been in Paris for about 36 hours and I am headed to London in a few hours (for no apparent reason at this point). Yesterday I visited 4 French language schools and selected one to attend when I return mid-month. Considering the final break up with Kevin, all these new and beautiful things, and so many decisions to be made all the time, my mood swings between despare and elation. I am very pleased to learn that Jane and Calla had their baby girl, Lulu, a few days ago. There is a little more light in the world.
Ladies beware, it turns out Kevin not only hacked my blog to tell all my friends what an evil person I am (which hopefully I deleted before any of you saw it), he has also been reading my email (I changed the password, so it should be OK now). He chose to interpret what he read a certain way, and that determined our destiny (hence believing that I broke up with him when in fact I was very passive in the matter, maybe I should have let one of the 4 other breakups stick a long time ago). I just kept hoping this would turn into something that felt like an adult relationship, and look what I got. In truth, I can only blame myself for participating. Anyway, I mention this in case any of you noticed anything strange in my email over the past month -- that would be the reason.
The Bousseau/Colon house is in Soller, on the north side of the island in the mountains. Like the main city, Palma, Soller is a tradition European city with a pedestrianized (mostly car-free) center. Truly lovely. The Cathedral and a bank along the main square were both designed after Gaudi.
Our days followed a certain pattern with some exceptions. After a light breakfast, we would walk around the town or something. Lunch was long and involved wine. Then we took a siesta until about 5, at which time we headed to the harbor for a swim until 8 when we returned to the house for dinner. The girls (including myself) walked to the port for the swim and took the tram back while the others would drive in a full car. Not a bad life really.
The whole group included Mido and Jean Pierre and their daughter Juliette, her friend Muriel, Mido’s mother, and Juliette’s sister’s 2 children, Axel (4) and Annabelle (2). When I first arrived everyone was sitting down for lunch, but Axel jumped up and threw himself into my arms (I had never met him before). Juliette warned me, “He’s very sticky” by which she meant that he sticks to you, not that he is covered in juice.
Axel became my best French teacher, although it was a little frustrating because he doesn’t yet read. He liked to torcher ants, snuggle, and he is a wiz with puzzles (up to 200 pieces). I read him French story books, and he corrected my pronunciation.
The house is in a citrus grove next to the main road near the town center. There is a train that connects Soller to Palma a few times a day. There is also a tunnel that just openned up about 5 years ago (4 euro for a car to pass through) which shortens the drive from 1 hour to about 10 minutes. As a result, Soller has remained relatively unspoiled by the tourism that has invaded the rest of the island(s).
Fortunately, we were there for the festival of devils (not sure what it is actually called) that happens every year in Soller, where people dress up as devils and run around holding fire works over their heads while others, soaking wet and wearing headscarves, run around beneath the fire. It was really something, and I took some good pictures of it.
We took several excellent hikes through the scrabbly mountain sides, up stairs and paths over to the sea. Except for in the port, the water is incredibly clear and beautiful, and much of the coastline comprised of volcanic rocks. Twice we went to very nice restaurants for elaborate meals which I can’t describe because a different wine came with every course. I know it was good, however.
Part of Mido’s family is actually from Soller. I think it was her great grandfather who used to take the bank deposits from Soller to Palma on foot with a donkey 3 times a week (about 25 km each way) by himself. The port is now lined with European-style shops with apartments above them, but they have pictures from when the only building there was the military base (now closed) and it was just a sandy cove.
I ended up staying 2 days longer than the rest, except JP who was staying to paint the interior of the house. He took great care to show me around, and did not only speak French to me as he had threatened.
Nicely tanned but covered with more than 25 mosquito bites, I’ve been in Paris for about 36 hours and I am headed to London in a few hours (for no apparent reason at this point). Yesterday I visited 4 French language schools and selected one to attend when I return mid-month. Considering the final break up with Kevin, all these new and beautiful things, and so many decisions to be made all the time, my mood swings between despare and elation. I am very pleased to learn that Jane and Calla had their baby girl, Lulu, a few days ago. There is a little more light in the world.
Ladies beware, it turns out Kevin not only hacked my blog to tell all my friends what an evil person I am (which hopefully I deleted before any of you saw it), he has also been reading my email (I changed the password, so it should be OK now). He chose to interpret what he read a certain way, and that determined our destiny (hence believing that I broke up with him when in fact I was very passive in the matter, maybe I should have let one of the 4 other breakups stick a long time ago). I just kept hoping this would turn into something that felt like an adult relationship, and look what I got. In truth, I can only blame myself for participating. Anyway, I mention this in case any of you noticed anything strange in my email over the past month -- that would be the reason.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
