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I’ve just stumbled upon a cool art blog with an emphasis on street art. It’s a good idea to have a look at what they’ve covered for a city you’re visiting, and I’ll probably search their archives for anything interesting on Barcelona, Madrid and London. The fascinating thing is I love the layout and all the art that they’ve covered so far, with very few exceptions. The annoying thing is most of it is insitu on the side of a building or down a hard-to-find alleyway. Oh well, I’ll just have to live vicariously through the site’s excellent photos.
Please check it out, and tell me what you think!
Random art in Fed Square. I also had a cool encounter with the artist.
More cool photos on this Flickr set:
Typical…
Australian driver buckles a case of beer (not a 5-year-old child) – Gadling
An Australian has been fined after buckling in a case of beer with a seat belt but leaving a 5-year-old child to sit on the car’s floor.
Why am I not surprised???
The La Mirada film festival opened this week. I missed out last year, and as a fluent Spanish speaker, I like watching Spanish films and keeping up my langauge skills as much as possible. This year, I emailed C & M so we could go watch a movie or two together.
We passed on Thieves, as it was opening night and tickets were a horrifying $45 each! We ended up choosing Death of a Cyclist and I bought our tickets the same day. Funny enough, I ended up winning tickets to Thieves and the opening night gala the next day!
I’d never been to a premiere before. It was quite exciting, with paparazzi and beautiful people working the room. Other than waiting 1 hour for invited VIPs to show up, and the cost, it was quite enjoyable. Best of all was the jamon iberico.. yum!!
The next day, we met C & M for Death of a Cyclist. The film has been hailed as a masterpiece:
photo via The Criterion CollectionSpanish cinema under Franco was a stifled and sterile industry, kept under strict government control. Bardem, the film’s director, was one of the few brave filmmakers to question the psychological and political oppression of the day and deal with the realities of contemporary life.
When watching a “foreign language” film, I’m always fascinated at what amuses the native speakers vs. the non-native speakers. I remember laughing inanely to The World’s Fastest Indian in Mexico City while the Mexicans were silent. Something is always lost in translation. This film was the same, and it was a privilege sitting with C & M and getting a unique perspective from them, even though we were sushed very loudly by the person sitting in front of us! C’s stories of his family during in Franco’s era deepened my understanding of the film, which I’d found merely good (rather than great) at first glimpse. Unlike many others, I didn’t mind the ending too much.
After a very yummy dinner with C & M’s friends at Chocolate Buddha, we walked 30mins back to the car. The irony is that the car was parked further away than home, thanks to the bloody footy and rugby games nearby. Thankfully it was a beautiful night, and a very pleasant walk back.
Sometimes I love living in Melbourne!
This is a continuation of our NZ trip in December 2007. For previous posts about the trip check out the December archive.
I swam with dolphins in New Zealand!! Yayyy.
I had booked a dolphin swim with Dolphin Encounter. It cost $150NZ BUT if you are lazy or disorganised like me and book LESS than a week ahead, you will have to swim at the ungodly hour of 5.30 am!! Thankfully, it’s also the best time for dolphin spotting: there’s less wind + the water is calmer = less seasickness & more dolphins. And believe me, you wake up very fast when you hit the cold water!
I honestly didn’t know what to expect. I’d heard complaints of seasickness and very little time on the water, it wasn’t worth the price, etc. from other travellers, but for me, it was a dream come true and I just had to pray for a calm, beautiful day. I was so excited I only got about 2 hours sleep, and I kept waking up because I was so worried I would sleep through my alarm.
There was a large bus-load of people swimming, and we all had to queue up for our gear: they supply a thick full-length wetsuit, a head cover thing, fins, mask & snorkel. The company was very well-equipped and made sure everyone’s stuff fit well and was comfortable. Then it was off to a state-of the art auditorium for a safety video before we hopped onto a bus. It was a short drive to another part of the bay where 3 boats awaited to take us out. A smooth, half hour ride later, they spotted the dolphins!
We were in luck!
There was a large pod of about 300 dolphins frolicking, flipping and fornicating (YES!!) right in front of me. It was 50mins of pure mammal bliss! These gorgeous, graceful creatures were a joy to hang out with.
I drained both my rechargable batteries trying to capture their exuberance but I didn’t do it justice. Hey, at least I tried!
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| Kaikoura dolphins photo album |
I don’t like the commercialism of Valentine’s Day, but I love the sentiment of enjoying a romantic time with your partner or expressing appreciation for your loved ones. Peter and I never go out for dinner, or buy flowers or have a romantic getaway. We save that for our anniversary, when it’s cheaper!
Here’s my 5 Valentine’s ideas that are cheap, but not cheapskate!
- Bake some yummy cookies. We first baked these with Lizzie. It would be better if they were heart shaped, but these were so good we didn’t care! Besides, they’re too sticky to make into any shape: You’re lucky if they’re round. But they taste so goooood it won’t matter. Or check out these ideas from Epicurious.
- Have a romantic picnic. Find a nice patch of sand or grass, and grab some supplies. Peter and I used to lay the blanket outside on the back lawn and have a breakky fry up. It was alot of fun, and very relaxing and pleasant.
- Send an e-card. Hallmark has some good ones that are free, and you save paper (and trees) too.
- Decorate the house. Light some candles and scatter rose petals to create a romantic atmosphere. Petals are cheaper than flowers, and cheap candles are everywhere.
- Buy a nice pot plant, instead of expensive flowers. P and I have a tradition of buying a shared rose plant every year. It’s cheaper than a bouquet (that dies anyway) and we get tons of flowers over the years. This year, we bought a Delbard “Sister Emanuelle“. It’s got beautiful pink-purple flowers and smells wonderful!
Have a great Valentine’s Day!
I hosted some CouchSurfers a while back, and showed them around the CBD. We wandered around the famous laneways, and took lots of photos of the graffiti. Check out my dphoto album.
Also, a quick Google Search found these graffiti links:
- SHIFT | PLACE | MELBOURNE – GRAFFITI ART, an excellent summary of the scene, with some great photos.
- There are also some photo examples in this photo gallery on About.com
- The writing on the wall | Guardian Unlimited Arts has scathing political commentary about the state of the art.
Enjoy!
Talk about a wonderful Christmas present!
We discovered that SBS was going a Miyazaki special, and we’ve seen 2 of his wonderful animated movies so far. We caught the tail end of Howl’s Moving Castle yesterday (thank goodness we’ve seen it about 5 times!!) and tomorrow Laputa: Castle in the Sky, is on. (Carlos, I can tell what you’re thinking, please don’t laugh…)
Anyway, if you’ve been living under a rock, read my post about Miyazaki (and other yummy things to watch). And check out the preview videos on SBS.
If not, stay tuned! I know I will!
There I was, innocently searching for a recipe for my all time fave dessert tiramisu, and I found this blog via PheistyBlog.
Oh.. My.. God!!!
Talk about major food porn – her photos are amazing! This woman writes excellent prose too, very Southern tongue-in-cheek (my old boss J. is a Southern belle with a sweet-as accent, so I know a Southern accent). I couldn’t stop surfing and drooling.
We’ll see what I end up cooking in the next couple days, I’m thinking about trying the tiramisu recipe… and I still have to work on my NZ trip photos for you guys!
And it’s Christmas and I have a whole bloody house to clean, presents to wrap, food to eat, more food to eat, arghhhh.
Stay tuned.
I hit a curb on the way to work and blew the tyre out:
Yup, that is a very BIG HOLE!
Anyway, I had to change the tyre. Unlike most girls I like being self-sufficient, so I was fully planning to change the tyre. But I called work to let them know, and J was kind enough to come over and give me a hand.
It was quite fun, and here’s the tyre next to our collapsible traffic cone. J thought it was a joke, and I was a dag, but out came the cone (we had never used it since we bought it in Mexico) and off came the tyre.
Anyway, even if I didn’t manage to change the tyre on my own this time, I think every girl should know how to change a tyre! So come on girls, go learn!!
Here, there, nowhere. 
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