It is when you call in the lost property of the national rail service to be told that your wallet was handed in with all documents and bank cards that you realize the beauty of living in a flat (in many possible ways) country. I wish I had found it earlier in order to avoid the series of god awful jokes my dad and my boyfriend came up with. At least now I have a brand new wallet complete with carefully deviced chain system which basically doenst allow me to keep my wallet further than 1 meter away than me. A little less high techn then my dad's initial "bleep sensor" initiative.

So apparently tommorow not only will The Hague be hosting the Afghanistan Conference attended by Ban-Ki Moon and Miss Clinton, but the man HIMSELF will be in town for the event. It's pretty shameful I don't actually know what's happening in the next two days other than my route to school being invaded and thus extending my journey by at least half an hour. I googled very quickly today in between scanning one photo and another, and all I picked up on was "WILL OBAMA RECOGNIZE THE INTERNATIONAL COURT OF JUSTICE SO BUSH CAN FINALLY BE CONDEMNED AND THROWN INTO PRISON" but I have the feeling this is not a very accurate re-cap of the situation.

On a more pretentious/I-have-given-up-on-global-affairs-for-the-time-being I went to see Richard Avedon's exhibition in Amsterdam last Friday as I was kindly invited to attend with my boyfriend and his class. Apparently it is one of the last times his work will ever be displayed as he had requested for none of his photos to be printed after his decease. From a technical aspect, although my understanding is quite limited, his photos were astonishing. As the guide emphasized every single detail was very clearly visible. Richard Avedon's most famous portraits are taken on a white background, so to leave a large emphasis on the subject. To be honest I'd never understood (in my artistic ignorance, so to speak) the beauty of a white backdrop but seeing the portraits he took in Western America made me want to definitley give it a shot. I did briefly today for a project and was surpirsed to find that with a slight overexposure a huge sheet of white paper does a decent job. Although I think I left all my subjects half blinded by the sunlight, GOOD STUFF.

I'm off to the UK his weekend. Apparently the revolution has already kicked off in London town, although it doesnt sound like it has a very FUCK YOU I WON'T DO WHAT YOU TELL ME feel to it but rather a WHAT THE FUCK HAVE YOU DONE one. Perhap I willd end up in a crazy riot, but most likely the craziest thing to happen this weekend will be visiting Cambridge University with a professor. Bonus points for having the opportunity to take fake interview picture in the department of Physics and Mathematics.


PS
I feel this post lacks in fun, so have a trailer of Samurai Girl, amazingly awful show whose 3 parts me and Ruben indulged in for the entirety of yesterday evening:

I recieved a new bank card. It's all grown up. It's called "WORLD PASS" instead of the "EURO STYLE" I've had since my 12th. I am terrified of activiting it because I'm set on the idea that, even more than my birthday, this puts an end to my childhood.

19 Days Of School Left

I refuse to do any kind of editorial work after this fucking (excuse the language, but I couldn't think of an equally suitable work) yearbook. It's incredible, I am once again putting my IB diploma at risk by putting a lot of work into something commpletely superficial and still if ind myself wasting half my day running around shouting "BABY PHOTOS GUYS". I feel ridiculous, I hope whatever kind of "journalistic" environment I end up in I don't end up being the little annoying geeky one who runs up and down the stairs gathering all the documents together. My personal page is going to be pretty genius though, I might have to just share it once I'm done.

For the rest, I went to a 90s party last saturday and we went all out on the classic hits. As you must all be curious to my outfit:
A white cut up t-shirt with a print of a photo of my sister and my cat a while ago
Army boots
Golden hoop earings
Stripey socks
Shorts
I think I was half-way through a trucker's daughter and a grunger. Some people went all out and actually attached furbies to themselves. My friend Sofia tried to pull off Cindy Crawford, although I'm not quite so sure about whether her dancing really benefited to the image she was going for.
This one was definitley the hit of the evening/day/week:

I never realized how sweet it was when MTV actually played badly coreographed swedish pop and stuff like Peter Andre. Good times.

My year has been growing strangely attached lately. It might because we realize that after this it's done and we don't really have to see each other so we might as well pretend to all love each other. It's a bit like when you start being nice to your parents the minute you move out, I guess.



Anyway, SPEAKING OF SOMETHING INTERESTING.
Yesterday I watched one of Andrew Marr's (whose son I used to chat with and had no idea who his dad was) "Darwin's Dangerous Idea" documentaries. I was pretty shocked about the fact that Eugenics were taken so seriously even in America. I mean, the whole "Arian Master Race" deal I've read so much about that I have learned to acknowledge the fact it was something only predictable of Hitler to go with - but the whole way it was delt with in the US was surprising to me : 60,000+ people sterlized in order to avoid spreading stupidity, unfitness and any form of handicap. I have joked before about the fact ugly people shouldn't be allowed to give birth, but I never realized soemone else had actually expanded and applied this idea using Darwin's Theory of Evolution as completely misjudged basis for it.

Absolutley insane. I also do not understand how Hitler came down to the conclusions that Arian\s were the master race when they were probably intollerant of both cold and heat, with sensitive skin and eyes and not particularly big builds. The master race would probably be a balanced mix of Oriental and African descendancy but definitley not Northern European?! Go figure.


PS I suggest you all download/buy the new Bat For Lashes. It's pretty mind blowing:

I find the concept of autobiographies absolutley insane. I am currently reading a book for school entitled "I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings". I am not such a big fan of the book, but I find it absolutley stunning how vividly Maya Angelou manages to describe her experience as a four year old. All I seem to remember vividly is people, but never situations. There is something utterly terrifying about reading into someone's life the way you do when you read an autobiography. Having said that, you'll never know how much of it is fictional really.

So moving on, today I picked up my one and only roll I ever shot with the Lubitel (Russian totally manual old school Twins-Reflex camera) leant to me by my dear friend Luuk. I wasnt expecting 12 perfect shots, but takin a look at the film I gather only one photo even came out. Balls, I guess my "guess the metering" tactic didn't work out the way I hoped it would. I should've definitley kept in mind that it's always a better idea to over-expose. Also I forgot to turn the film quite a few times in between taking photos, so if anything came out on the others it is likely to be something along the lines of my Grandfather with 58 eyes.

Here's the first result (of the one that looked liek the only distinguishable photo on the roll), slightly sharpened:

HOORAY. It's only good because it's my grandad. Anyway, I might have had a better result by placing the camera on a steady surface but overall I think it may technically impossible to focus with a lubitel unless you are lucky or something. I'll post more results if I find anything decent.

Edit
Another AMAZING PIECE OF ART:

If I were Belgian...

I would definitley put a concise effort into speaking half-french half-dutch constantly. I swear that is the entire purpose of coming from a bilingual country. Go Jacques, you've got it down to a T and a half.
I cannot cease to listen to only french music and jazz pianists. Today I pushed myself to listen to a new (new meaning 2008) release for the first time in ages. Marnie Stern's latest release was definitley not a dissapointment, but the minute I had finished with it I still felt like going back to Serge or Jacques. WHY IS THIS SO. I have never even been one of those wannabe from Paris hipsters. Damnit.

Speaking of French, after dinner to day my dad decided to recite 20 minutes of French poetry to me. Poetry which he learned in High School, IE over 30 years ago. I am pretty certain he is the only Italian who speaks a second language he learnt in high school fluently. As if that weren't enough he then decided he would reminisce on some Greek theatrical piece which he had to learn when he was 10. He did start struggling after about 8 minutes, I was quiet dissapointed. He then bragged to me about Leopardi, a note italian poet, who had always been counter the church. My dad always feels the need to put an emphasis on whether someone is atheist. He also seems to never brag about anyone who is not atheist. It may just be a conincidence that he also only reads book by middle aged atheist man, it may also not be.

Enough about my dad. The clue moment of my day definitley ecompasses my mother, who confessed that on rainy days she likes to sit and re-read through poems. It's not very nice that I always find it humorous when my mum tries to be deep, but to be quite frank it's hard to take her seriously when she's the human version of the non-existant "I am growing old yet my drama is still the same as it was back when I was 15" call center who puts a lot of effort into matching her necklaces with her boots. Having said that she's not stupid at all or anything, let's just say I never pictured her as a "poetry kind of person". Maybe because I only associate poetry to pretentious young adults, thing which I really should stop doing in order to take my English exams seriously.

Todays entry is not very fun. That is because I don't feel very fun after having spent an entire afternoon/evening chasing people for their baby photos. I am definitley never going to run anything in my future which involves chasing after people to ask them for their baby photos. EVER.

I am currently working on my art "exhbition" that I have to put on for my IB "art exam" (notice the use of speach marks emphasizing the unserious feeling I have about all of this). You'd think that after you've spent all your money on a scanner your photos would require no photoshopping or fixing up whatsoever - WRONG. This is not the case, especially when your room is infested with anal dust (not as in dust deriving from the anus) .

Today I had to do this to two photos in order to make them look at least mildly presentable:


It really hurts to over-contrast analogue photos, but sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do. Having said that it is not like they are exactly poster-quality. Let's hope the printing them does some crazy magic.

Other than that I have devoted my week to the following:
http://www.youshouldhaveseenthis.com/
In fear of being a "loser or old or something". Admittedly I do kind of wish I was a techno viking myself, especially after seeing a montage of my hero dancing to my all-time favourite hit "Push Up":


There has been a cultural side to my day. I promise. I learnt that Hitler failed at war because he did not listen to people who were actually tactual and he did not give his soldiers warm clothing for the deadly Russian winter, not realizing that the Mongols were actual badass motherfuckers when it came to sleeping in snow. I also speant quite a lot of time thinking about whether lifting the American embargo on Cuba would bring more drama or lots of good things. Fidel, he who never dies, has decided to hate Obama based on the he did not donate Gauntanamo Bay back to his legitimate owner (Fidel). I'm happy Raoul isn't letting big bro bully him anymore because it's about time someone realized Cuba can no longer be ran by cavemen. Let's hope anything happens, for the time being.


Lastly, the big dillema of the week has been: can Muumi (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moomin) be considered Finnish when both the books and the cartoon were originally published in Swedish? The writer has a Swedish name as she was part of the Swedish-speakign Finnish minority.
My answer is: Swedes don't you dare take away Finlands pride and joy. DON'T YOU DARE.
You can all make up your own mind but I'd watch out if I were you... I've heard some crazy shit about the Finns.