Of Endings And New Beginnings

Wow, there really is a lot of tumbleweed going on on this blog… But I’ve now cleared it from all the dust and spider webs and am fully back to Blog World. I know, I already promised this a while ago, but as you all will read shortly, there’s been all and nothing happening in my life lately.

First things first! Speaking of spider webs and the such – I think I killed the most gigantic spider in the history of our bathroom last night! When all I wanted was just a little late-night wee… Usually, my weapon of preference is the good old vacuum. It’s clean, doesn’t leave any marks, I don’t feel like I’m killing something (I can’t say for sure that it’s painless, right?), it’s gone for sure. The only drawback of using the vacuum is its sound. And because it was way past midnight and I’m not the only person living in this building, I didn’t dare sparking off a fight with the other people here. So I magazined it… (I took a magazine and smashed it) Believe me or not, it was still alive when it landed on the floor – that proves the massiveness of that beast!

But then, this is not a post on how to kill a spider after midnight (don’t feed it, don’t get it wet 😉 ). One reason why I didn’t post anything for this long is because I was preoccupied with my finals. All in all, I passed some, I failed some, and in the end, I don’t really care anymore because I dropped out of university. I figured that I wasn’t so much of a uni person and I wanted to live my creativity. “Why did she even take the finals, then?”, you might ask yourself? Simple as that, I wanted the credit points – just in case if I ever decide to go back and finish my degree. Not very likely, but you never know, right?

Another thing that kept me from writing was not so much a pleasure as studying was.   If you ever had your heart ripped out of your chest, it being bashed onto the floor, stomped on it and then shredded it into tiny little pieces, you can already guess what happened. That was the short version of a chapter in my life that I do not want to ever read again. Fact is, yes, after such a long time (I tried to prevent myself from it because in my book that is called life, this never ended well) I fell in love. With someone I didn’t intend to do so cause it was one of those fun and casual stories. Anyways, he told me that he thinks we shared a connection  and I was someone he really cares for blahblah … That’s it. “Okay”, you might think, “things happen”. I’d use the exact same words, wasn’t this all communicated through a text message. Seriously? That’s how far mankind got? I mean, even if you live far away from each other, there’s always another way to come round this…
I am not at all a person who shouts out loud thins like these and I like to keep my privacy to myself, without letting all the world know. Also, this is in no means meant in a bad way and I don’t want to wear anybody down. Not at all – I think it’s everyone’s own decision how to communicate things, but the whole matter made me think about our society for a while…

Last but not least, I was very much drawn into reading these past three or so weeks. As you can see on the tab above, I took the 50 Book Pledge this year and I’ve got a whole lot to catch up! So all I was doing lately was reading. And the occasional watching TV and drawing.

So that was a lot of explaining, but I promise (again) that I’ll give you all the updates on the juicy (and not so much) stories I encounter. And this time, I hope to keep my promise! 😉

“This is not the beginning of a new chapter in my life; this is the beginning of a new book! That first book is already closed, ended, and tossed into the seas; this new book is newly opened, has just begun! Look, it is the first page! And it is a beautiful one!”
– C. JoyBelle C.

Happy pre-exam weeks!

Shame on me – I’ve been a virtual stranger lately. Tumbleweed has already taken up this blog, it seems. As you will read shortly, there are some (very lame, I’ve to admit) reasons for the absence of my usually energetic and creative typing. As for now, I decided to light a tiny little candle on this page. I dare not be too vigorous and switch on all the lights because I might as well be absent for another few weeks or so. Oh metaphors, how very entertaining you are!

So this is the main reason for my being absent for this long: It’s this time of the year again when so many of those surrounding me are going slightly nuts – myself included in this sad little (or not so little) group. Why? Exams are just around the corner, waiting for us to silently despair. In fact, not only students are suffering from deep-rooted dark circles around the eyes, caffeine overdose, and sleep deprivation, just to name a few side-effects. There are also lots of people going through professional training and stuff right now and all those exams and final papers usually are due some time before the big summer break starts. Can’t wait for this last day of school to finally hit me! Also, as you might have read in one of my previous posts, I’m so fed-up with school – I can’t wait to get outta there and finally be a productive worker again and do what I love.

Actually, I should be studying for my upcoming exams right now. Well, no, I wasn’t quite honest with you on that… There’s an essay waiting for me, longing to get proofread, and the presentation for Monday won’t magically prepare all by itself. Oh, I totally forgot about those summaries whose word files mysteriously remained empty (unless you want to include the headline and title as being part of the summary? not so much, eh?). And once I’m done with the essay, the presentation, and all the summaries, I can eventually start studying for the finals. I hope I’ll get there before Sunday, cause every day wasted on something else is a day lost on my exam prep, right? Damn right!

Now this is what I did so far:

• I managed to write my handout for the presentation on Monday and sent it out to my class.
• I checked my email account as well as my Facebook like a hundred times. Oh, just realized that I totally forgot about Twitter…
• I just found the most awesome recipe for Strawberry Margarita Jell-O Shots! This is like the most awesome thing ever!! I got so ecstatic over this, I just have to share this moment with you, my dearest reader. Once I move into my new apartment, I’ll totally throw a housewarming BBQ and those little fellas will be THE stars of the night! Little decorating lime triangles included.
• I wrote a to-do list for all the stuff I need to finish this weekend and then ticked off number one: Write handout for presentation on Monday & send it to class.
• Then I decided to check on my blog and write a new post. And here we are…!

Other than the odd “crap, time’s running up” situations, nothing really has happened lately. I’m still looking for an apartment or a room in a shared unit. So if you are looking as well or if you happen to know somebody who’s looking or, you know… Tell me! Actually, I’m not actively looking right now because there’s just so much other stuff to deal with. What was that saying again? There’s no time like the near future? Yeah, that must be it…! 😉
Duh, just realized my life’s become so terribly boring lately. There has to be an end to this soon! (this was a promise, hah!) Also, I’m way behind my reading list (and some reviews) and I most definitely have to work on that soon again. Another promise.

I guess this is it for today, my dear reader. You found out why I’ve been so atypically absent from this page and I promise (uh, another one!) I will get things going again. After a nice little nap.

xoxo

On the first days of classes…

It is Saturday, the second weekend after the new term started. And I already feel like freaking out…

My intention was to read all the books (fiction and plays only, of course) for this semester before my classes start, so it won’t be such a hassle and I could primarily focus on all my assignments and stuff. Unfortunately, nothing ever ends up as we planned it, right? Right! By day one, I have not had read one single book on my list. But then, I still got plenty of time… 😉

My first week started pretty well, actually. Two of my classes got cancelled and most of the rest was just of introductory and organizational matter. Yay! I only have one class on Mondays, which basically means traveling for about 3.5 hours and sitting in class for 90 minutes. Double yay!
On Tuesday, my morning-seminar got cancelled so I took the time to go pick up an essay. They sent me an email during the holidays that I gotta pick it up at the German Department’s secretary. Why the German Department? I don’t know… The secretary didn’t know either… The professor who corrected the essay is lecturing there, but I most certainly did not take any classes there. Anyways, I was there at about 11.30, their office hours are 9 to 12. When I finally found the right door (so many doors!), there was a post-it sticking to it, telling me that whoever will “be right back”. Seriously?! You’re supposed to be there for three hours a day, but you have to leave right then?! I still had like half an hour until I met with some friends for lunch, so I decided on waiting there for another few minutes. When the lady finally got back, she told me that she didn’t have my essay, but she thinks she knows where it was, so “let me just make a phone call”. Okay. Glad that she found the right person responsible for this, she sent me two floors up to another secretary, who actually had it! It took me like two minutes to photocopy the thing, after waiting for almost half an hour…!
Other than that, I started pretty well into the new term and since I know I’ll be going home again in summer makes life much easier these days. I think I already dropped a hint in another post that I applied for a more artsy school back in V, and after two very successful interviews in January, I got accepted! So stoked that I’ll be part of that magical team! But then, that’s another story. 😉

My first assignment: I was supposed to write something about British politics. That’s all we got: write two main body paragraphs on any topic concerned British (or American) politics. The paragraphs should each be around 150 words in length. Well, that’s not it, actually, there was some more information about what writing techniques we should use and so on. But seriously, I can not work like this! Gimme a f***ing topic!! So I did some research, found a topic, wrote a few lines. But I still couldn’t find a thesis statement, which is like the most important thing there is when writing stupid shit like this. Excuse my language. After wasting my precious time with writing that assignment (seriously, it took me like half a day – usually, I’m done after an hour or two…), I still had to finish reading Frankenstein. L.O.V.E. that book! And once more I realized how far-fetched some of the interpretations and reviews out there in the wide world web are. (As this is one of my picks for the “50 Book Pledge”, you can read my review on it shortly)
And now here it comes, the worst part of last week: I missed the 85th Academy Awards!! How much more misery do you want to throw in my way, you stupid life?! The reason why I didn’t post anything like I promised in my post on the Golden Globes is simply that I was sound asleep during the Oscars. Friggin’ time difference did not allow me to stay up all night and be all awake and cheerful in class the next day. My apologies for that. Not that I am ever cheerful in class, but still…

Luckily, I got to catch up on everything and I already finished almost all that I’m supposed to hand in or have to have read for next week’s classes. Because I’ve been suffering from terrible headaches all day long, I decided on just reading and enjoy an idle Saturday. Gotta finish Jane Eyre till next Tuesday. Since it’s pretty easy reading and quite catching, I might even manage to finish my readings before the lecture! *wow* (note: this does not happen very often…)

So now I’m being a tiny little bit miserable – mainly just because the world seems to hate me sometimes (and I hate it back, fair ’nuff! 🙂 ). And what do people like me do whenever they’re miserable? Right, they spend hours and hours on youtube (or get a venti something from Starbucks, but there’s no Starbucks anywhere near me). 😉 *Oh sweet procrastination* So far, I’ve been watching like a ton of make up tutorials and now I’m listening to old school rock music. Blame me for my style of music or for my love for the seventies, eighties and nineties rock – I don’t give a shit cuz I was born in the eighties, baby! Additionally, I’m just a small-town girl, living in a lonely world…. You know… 😉

While I was absent from my blog, I have been very productive, believe it or not! 😀 As I was testing the very favored BB Cream, I finally sticked to the product by Garnier, as one of my readers suggested I’d use. And just like my dear reader, I love this product! It produces a fabulous finish and combined with a hint of pressed powder, my skin looks all fresh and (almost) flawless. Plus: it smells really nice!

Now this is pretty much all that I can tell of my first two weeks of classes. I hope for you, my dear reader, that my life will get a little more exciting with the approach of spring!
Until then, happy reading and don’t forget to subscribe! 😉
xoxo

To BB Or Not To BB…

… that’s a question I’ve been asking myself quite a lot over the past few months.

The BB in BB cream stands for “beauty balm” in Western markets (“blemish balm” and so on in Eastern markets). I learned this from my dear friend wikipedia. To all those of you who don’t know what I’m blabbering about and if this sounds like Jabberwocky to you, here’s a little introduction into the subject:

BB cream is a skin care product sold mainly in the Eastern market (I believe it originated in Korea) but has been introduced to the Western beauty market about a year ago. It is one of those magic all-in-one products that’s supposed to replace serum, moisturizer, primer, foundation, and sunblock. One can use it alone as a tinted moisturizer, over your own moisturizer as a sort of foundation, and under powder. It is said that some BB creams have skin-regenerating properties, which I can hardly believe. But you never know what’s in those products concerning weird chemical additives. I’m not a dermatologist but a frequent patient there and I’m sure that you couldn’t sell such a miraculous tincture at the drugstore, without requiring any prescription. Just saying…
BB creams are very popular in Asia, where our Western foundations seem to be too “heavy” for the women’s (and men’s) beautiful white and soft skin; so BB seems to be a great alternative. Because of it being a multi-tasker and its easy way of application, the creams were merchandized with high success in the West and you’ll get low priced drugstore products as well as high-end maniacally overpriced creams. The Ferraris among the BB creams, so to speak of.

Somehow, I’ve always been suspicious about BB creams and even after my little “Magic Monday Experiment” I still don’t expect unicorns exploding from it. So on Monday I started using a BB cream by one of my favorite makeup brands (I won’t name any products here – not quite sure if I can do this on the web without getting into any trouble). I only used this because I got a free sample when I last hit 500 points with my “beauty insider”-card. Love free samples, especially if they are by high-end names thats products I use anyways! 😉 So here’s a little description of how my experiment worked out and my findings:

• I decided to wear the BB cream over my moisturizer to even out my skin tone and used compact powder on top of it.
• Moisturizer first. Afterwards, I put on the BB cream with my plain fingers. YES, with my fingers! Just like using any other moisturizer. It’s supposed to be a replacement, right? So why not using it just like the product it replaces.
• At first, the cream kind of looked like as if I’d put on a foundation (using my fingers), with streaks all over the place. So I slightly tried to even out everything by “massaging” the cream into my skin. Et voilà! It worked!
• To my surprise (as I still am suspicious), my skin looked GREAT! Great in capital letters indeed! Skin tone and texture were completely evened out. Pretty cool! And all in just a mere seconds and without using any foundation. Which means no cleaning brushes afterwards. 😉 Also, the version for “light” colored skin, which to be honest looked really dark when I squeezed it out of the little pack, actually matched my skin tone. Little drawback: you could actually see that I’m wearing some sort of product. Because I expect my foundation to look natural, I was a teenytiny bet disappointed.
• To get the right amount of coverage and to avoid shiny spots, I put on regular compact powder. The same stuff I use on top of my foundation. And so I could “hide” the other product somehow.
• Looks great, really! I felt like I’m gonna buy and start using this! However, my skin does not feel regenerated, but I guess I’d have to use the cream for more than just half a week to see any changes. IF there will be any changes at all…
• After about half a day of wearing the product, I looked at my face in the mirror. And – oh dear shocked me – my skin looked all dry, drier, sandpaper. This might not be entirely the cream’s fault because I tend to get dry skin, especially during winter. Which is quite normal. But I was very surprised to see my skin basically peeling off on some spots. However, my skin didn’t feel dry, which is a good thing, I guess.
• I decided to hang in there and used the product again the next day. And hey, it started getting better. My skin looked still very dry, but not as bad as on Monday. So I guess it’s all to do with how I’m using my moisturizer along with the BB cream, the humidity of the room I’m spending the most of my day in and of course the amount of water I drink.
• Today, on the fourth day of using the brand-named BB cream, my sample unfortunately is used up. However, I decided on giving it a chance and I’ll head to the store next week to buy myself some of this mixture of magic. Maybe not the super expensive version, but a drugstore brand for a legitimate price so I won’t regret spending my money on a product I might not like anymore after using it for a few days.

This was quite a long post just for saying that I used some BB cream, didn’t like it at first but then started liking it and will used it again…!! 😀
So this was my “Magic Monday Experiment” and I hope you liked what I had to say about one of the up-and-coming beauty and skin care products of the present time.

Stay beautiful, my dear readers, and share your own experience with me!
xoxo

Struggling with Everyday Life… Part IV

Not every day is unicorns and rainbows. Today is one of these days in J-ville. Even if it’s a very glamorous and successful day because I had a great interview this morning that went just perfect, I got to meet a great artist AND I had my makeup done. And all of this in under two hours! What should have made my day perfect was that two pretty young homeless guys told me that I looked like a young Catherine Zeta-Jones. Right.

So I basically woke up this morning and I was just feeling terribly sad. Everybody, even the most cheerful cheerleader has days like these and it is perfectly normal. If not, I’d say there’s something wrong with this person.
For me, there are several reasons to feel like shit right now. I’ll be off to Europe again tomorrow night. School’s calling again. Additionally, I don’t really know where I’m heading at career-wise and there are some tough decisions ahead of me. Worst things last: I am a sailor with only one port. Unfortunately, mentioned port won’t let me anchor there, but only lets me linger around in its shallow waters, if you know what I mean. If you don’t know what I’m talking about right now, well, poor you! 🙂 [yay for metaphors – I am the queen of metaphors!]

And now I’m watching “Long Island Medium” and there’s some really creepy stuff going on! And some very sad stuff as well. Almost making me cry. Aaaawww, now “Say Yes to he Dress” is on! Okay, this will most certainly make me cry! All those gorgeous dresses! Okay, how awesome is this: this girl picked the greatest location EVER! The aquarium! And they’re getting married in front of the floor to ceiling shark tank! *wow-di-wow* Alright, I guess this last statement just yelled “turn off the TV and get ready!!” 🙂

So before my inner sadness starts randomly shooting people, I will get my lazy ass off the sofa and get myself ready for a great girls’ night out!
Keep your fingers crossed for the happy princess to break out of me again. :*

La vita è bella! – Parte VI

Home, Sweet Home!
Unfortunately, not for long because I have to head back over the pond; university is awaiting my brain filled with… well, not with what it’s supposed to be filled with. But I’m sure good old Mister Willie Shakespeare will find his way into my brain again. Until then, I’m fine with catching up with all my peeps and working on my “50 Book Pledge”, which I very much enjoy doing! I already got so many great suggestions and good feedback that I guess I have to repeat that in 2014. By the way, I will update my review page as soon as I get hands on my computer again. The set up on my iPad looks kind of funny, so I thought I’d better leave it as it is.

So I spent some very busy two weeks, handing in my last paper for this term, packing, buying new glasses (yes, I know I shouldn’t have done that, because I really haven’t got the money, but they’re just so pretty), and finally getting on a plane. What a relief! 🙂
Except for going out for food, we also met at a dear friend’s house for game-night! Gawd, I love game-night! Everybody who hasn’t done this in a while (like myself), or even worse, never: do it! But be prepared, people change during game-night! People you think you know turn into a half drunk, cursing Grinch-like something. But it’s fine, because in the end, everybody is cursing everybody else and it’s just too funny! Just watch the drinking, I guess. But we are all girls who know how to behave well, right?! 🙂
Also, I finally made it out for a night of great partying last Friday! I got to meet some new, very nice and really fun people and I got to see a very dear friend I haven’t seen in like half a year, so that was fun. I also got to meet up with somebody I am very fond of and who is just a great person in general. Anyways, we had a great time (at least I did). Unfortunately, I can’t tell you more, my dear reader, because everything further would be rated NC-17 by the MPAA.;)

While I’m typing away, I’m enjoying my Sunday night off watching “Julie & Julia”. I think this is a very entertaining movie and Meryl Streep is doing a great job playing Julia Child. Also, I can feel with what Amy Adams’ character is going through.

Oh yes, I almost forgot: I got accepted at a high-end school. I won’t tell what school it is, neither will I tell you what I will be doing there. However, it will be a complete change in career! And I will keep you posted as soon as I make a decision. It will be a hard decision to make and I have to talk this over with my parents as well. I am quite indecisive about this, but I’ll figure it out 🙂

And now my nails really need some new polish. I feel very distracted today and I can’t think about of much to writ about, even if there are plenty of entertaining stories to tell.

So, fare well my dear reader-friends, I’ll be back soon again! Until then: keep on reading and sharing!
xxx

And the Golden Globe Goes to…

It’s this time of the year again! We all feel with the actors, creators and all the other people involved in television and movie making as they are hoping to receive one of these treasured awards. Today, it’s not the Oscars but the 70th Golden Globe Awards.

And just like last year when I wrote about the Oscars, I confess that I shed the one or the other tear. Okay, I cried silent tears. More than once. So I decided to just type along while I’m watching and comment on whatever I feel like commenting about. So this post might either end up ginormous or … brief.

~ First things first: don’t you think that Sam Michael Fox looks exactly like his father?! The resemblance is just incredible.
~ One reason that so very often makes me cry are the short amazing and very touching stories all the winners tell and ever so often are choked up, just like Kevin Costner is right now.
~ Oh hey, Bill Clinton! “That was Hillary Clinton’s husband!” 🙂
~ Will Ferrell, what’s that funny furry thing doing in your face? 😀 He kind of looks like some East European president. “When the bad guy comes, and the salmon goes like…” Kristen and Will, you people are awesome! And I swear, nobody realized that you didn’t watch the movies 😉
~ Katniss, I mean, Jennifer Lawrence, you look stunning! L.O.V.E. that dress! [note to self: find out who designed it. Maybe one of you dear readers can fill me in on that?]
~ I know there’s things one should not make fun of, but I really start wondering how many different possible kinds of pronunciations for “Les Misérables” there are… 😉 Now we at least know why everybody keeps referring to it as “Les Mis”!
~ Congratulations on “Best Screenplay”, Quentin Tarantino!! You are my personal superhero! (Along with Beckham and after Batman, of course)
~ Again, so many stunning dresses! Very 50’s, actually; slim busts, big skirts.
~ Close-up on Leonardo DiCaprio: When I was a teenager, I had a huge crush on this man. He’s still eye-candy, right? Right! 🙂
~ To all my Facebook buddies: you’ve already read this and Mr Stallone must have read my comment as well (because he totally just repeated what I’d written two nights ago!). Dear Arnie, you’ve been living in the US for decades now, but you still couldn’t get rid of your terrible horrible accent? He actually refuses to speak German whenever he’s in a German speaking country! I think he’s actually doing this on purpose, just as Swiss celebs do when they’re on German TV ( I could name a world famous DJ here now who used to speak German almost accent-less and is now sooooo overdoing it, but I won’t). And he just said something in German, putting on an incredible strong American accent.
~ Congratulations to Michael Haneke for best foreign language film!! Well done, Austria!
~ I guess I really have to go see “Life of Pi”. Or read the book at least.
~ Lena Dunham is great. I think this is all that needs to be said! She outbeat all the big ones, yesss!
~ Robert Downey Jr. – just about one of the greatest men out there.
~ Jodie Foster, you are my queen, my hero and I take my hat off to you! You are gorgeous, intelligent, talented and one of those people one can only look up to. Jodie Foster is a true and real woman and I hope to look as gorgeous as she does at the age of fifty. 😉 And she is the one who made me cry because she’s such an amazing person (and I just saw Mel Gibson and Jennifer Lopez and probably everybody else in that room tearing up).
~ “Argo” is definitely on my list of movies to watch. Saying that it’s an honor to be in the same breath as all those big people nominated is a very grand gesture of Ben Affleck, isn’t it?
~ I just realized that one can almost not tell who the hosts are because there are so many announcers.
~ Oh my, Christian Bale! 🙂 Oh the hair! And oh the accent! Could I get this wrapped for my birthday, please? 😀
~ Heheh, Jennifer Garner and Ben Affleck are such a great team!
[Little side note: why are neighbors so friggin loud? I mean, can’t you just go inside to talk, rather than shouting around in he hallway? *duh*]
~ I looove Jessica Chastain’s hair! Soooo beautiful!
~ There you go Daniel Day-Lewis, making me tear up again.
~ Best Motion Picture Drama – And the Golden Globe goes to “Argo”! Well done again, Mr Affleck! 😉 Suppose it’s worth watching this. 😉
[Seriously neighbors, are you elephants?]

My dear readers, I hope you had as much fun watching the 70th Golden Globe Awards as I and I also hope I was not the only viewer in the home-audience to get all emotional. But then, isn’t this what television and the movies are made for? To create emotions, no matter of what kind they are?

Care to share your emotions and thoughts concerning the 2013 Globes? I’d like to hear them!

I’m not going home with Jodie Foster, but I would still like to say good night, my dear readers! Let us all be excited for the Oscars!
J.

Happy Holidays, world!

“Maybe Christmas,” he [the Grinch] thought, “doesn’t come from a store.
“Maybe Christmas…perhaps…means a little bit more!”

Neither am I the Grinch, not even Grinch-like, nor do I despise the Holiday Season, just to make it clear! But I love Dr Seuss and I thought those lines are quite appropriate.

My intention was to post this way earlier (during Christmas time, actually), but then I got slapped right in the face by a stomach bug. 😦 I am seriously considering naming that bastard, cause that’s been the third time since March (you might remember, I already whined about it before). Unfortunately, I got hit by it while I was away at a friends house and we had to drive through half the country yesterday. I am very thankful that N agreed to drive my car so I could stay in the same position for like two hours. Not moving really helps! I am also very thankful for the existence of the pharmaceutical industry for providing us with such splendid little colorful pills. 😉 Now back to the holiday season!

Happy Holidays, indeed. Why not Merry Christmas? Well, to include people of all origins and religious backgrounds, no matter what holiday they are celebrating, we in retail wish people Happy Holidays. It’d be rather awkward to ask of the customer’s religion first, and then wishing them Happy Hanukkah or Merry Christmas, or whatever other festivities there are… What about New Year’s then…? I mean, everybody automatically wishes everybody else a Happy New Year pretty much right after Christmas, but what about the Chinese New Year? I guess, nobody really feels offended because one wishes him a Happy New Year, even though their new year only starts in February. But in the western world, it is still holidays, cause all the schools are closed and many people get a few days off, right? Right!

So what is it all about the Holidays? What’s all the fuss about? I mean, not all the stressed-out people who were violently running around the city last week, looking for last minute presents and over-stuffing their fridge with food celebrate the birth of Christ or some other religious happening. Those people going nuts at the grocery store reminded me of the time in the early ’90’s when people were filling their cabinets with essentials because of the Gulf War. No kidding, my granny was one of them.
In my family, we don’t do the big gift-giving thing anymore. We have dinner (actually, it was lunch this year) with my granddad. We have a tree and some candles and vague decoration. Not forgetting the Christmas cookies. But that’s it. We give the money to those who really need it, because it is not only the people in the third world who don’t get enough food, but also those among us. I realized that if you’re not in that hassle, one can enjoy the season of lights much more.

It has been snowing like crazy for the last, dunno, three weeks or so. And guess what: a week before Christmas it started raining and on Christmas Eve we had like 20°C! So much for White Christmas… There’s still hope for next year, though, since we all survived the apocalypse of December 21, 2012. Sorry, I just couldn’t help it… 😀

I wish everybody a very Merry Christmas (since I’m Christian bred) and a most prosperous Happy New Year.
Also, I want to thank all my readers for reading and coming back to ginatravelstheworld and I hope you’ll do this as well in 2013. My virtual door is always open for suggestions and comments!
xoxo, J

Fashion faux-pas and environmentalism

“How on earth will she get those two topics into one post?!” It’s easier than you think! Read and be surprised – or not 😉

Last year, Vancouverites have won the bronze medal for being one of the world’s worst dressed cities and apparently have to thank yoga pants for this classification (google it!). Well, thank fashiongoddess that this is not true anymore! (Maybe it still is, but what I observed changed at least my mind)
So this is what happened last week: Me, currently living in Europe, walking down the street and – spotting various girls wearing yoga pants! I seriously could not believe my eyes! Another no-go apparently is wearing leggings without a skirt or shorts to cover your bum. Totally had uncovered legging-asses in my face all afternoon long! I mean, wasn’t Europe supposed to be the fashionista-continent?
After the yoga pant incident, I swapped into fashion-police-mode and started observing people at our University. Like everywhere, there’s all sorts of followers there: the “normalos” who just wear whatever they feel up to and don’t really care because they’re only at school anyways (like me), the hard rockers, the hipsters, the business people (probably all lawyers or economists to-be) and the dressed-up people that look like if they’re just on their way to some posh event rather than the next lecture… I have to admit, I missed sporty-spice… 🙂 All in all, people here don’t really look much different than anywhere else – there’s good and terrible dressed people everywhere 😉

Another interesting thing I observed was that there is only a handful of people bringing their own travel mug or tumbler. I never really realized until lately that I’m the only one with a tumbler sitting before me in the study area – I wouldn’t be “ginatravelstheworld” without a travel mug, right? And the ones who are actually carrying a travel mug own one that says “S-bux New Zealand” or something like that. So they basically imported the idea of not using paper cups or are international students. What I like about the cafeterias here is that you can choose between a real cup and a paper cup. Since you’ll hardly find any S-bux or other coffee shops here, one might think people bring their coffee or tea from home (because everything’s so friggin expensive here), but nope, apparently nobody’s doing that. Unless they’re all hiding their travel mugs in their bags, of course.

Even though I’m on break now and I’m going back to good old Canada in a couple weeks time, I won’t stop eavesdropping and secretly observing the human being’s behavior in 2013. 😉

I’ll be back for a Christmas-special so I won’t wish you happy holidays yet. Until then: stay well-dressed and be friendly to the environment by using re-usable mugs you guys!
xoxo

Generation Smartphone?

Today, I thought I’d start with the very end of this post. Why should we accurately follow chronology, anyways? And this is the reason why I’m doing this:

My head is a box filled with nothing…
                   Ben Lee, “Catch my Disease”

I had this song stuck in my head for days now… Why? It couldn’t be less obvious: I was basically forced to listen to it! Recently, Catch my Disease became my favorite song. What I call “my favorite song” changes almost weekly. I mean, there’s always this one song that you reallyreally like and you keep listening to it until you can’t hear it anymore, right? What makes this song so striking is it’s first line and the main reason why I was listening to music rather than reading…
So last week I was sitting in the train and the same thing happened to me every single day! I’m taking out the text that I want to read, get a marker and a pen and basically start reading before the train even leaves the station. Last week, however, there was always something interrupting me. Fortunately, there were no ladies sitting right behind me and talking for an hour. This time, it was much worse…

At first, there was this woman who got phone calls every two minutes. I am not exaggerating! Side note: I’m riding first class so I can study because it usually is super quiet in there. Back to the busy lady: One could observe that she was not one of the business people who travel first. Not only did her appearance tell me, but also the phone calls she made. Like many people, she apparently did not get that you don’t have to speak up while talking on the phone. Seriously, the guy at the other end can hear you perfectly fine even if you keep it down. First, she was talking to her son; afterwards, she was fixing appointments for her son; and then there was either a co-worker calling her or somebody who had to fix something in her house. It was more than just three calls, of course.
Pretty much the same happened on all the other rides I was taking. People were either talking super loud or their phones were ringing like crazy.

I am in my mid-twenties and the papers and TV refer to my generation and the one after us as “Generation Smartphone”. Yes, we basically were born holding a cell phone. We know how to handle those things and couldn’t possibly live without them (even if we won’t admit it). But then there are the others: those who just don’t know how to handle a cell but own one because everybody else has one and they have to be connected because of work.
I think there should be certain rules when it comes to smartphone-handling so we can live in a world that’s a little more quiet:

1. When in a public building, bus, train, metro, etc. set your phone on “silent”. Nobody wants to hear your cell ringing all the time. There is a reason why they invented “vibrate”.
2. Turn off the audible touch tones. Really annoying if one’s typing a whole email on the phone.
3. Talk in regular voice. You don’t have to speak up when you’re talking on the phone. Even if the person at the other end of the line is miles away, the can hear you just fine. You might have observed cab drivers whispering into their phone. I bet whoever’s on the line can hear him. (I always wonder what they’re saying…)

That were my three golden rules when it comes to using a cell phone in public. I should add the one that says “Don’t use your cell while I’m talking to you”. I think all of those rules should be part of one’s manners, but apparently not everybody has adapted them so far. Until then, I’ll put on my earphones and listen to Ben Lee, ’cause that’s the way I like it.

Am I the only one who’s disturbed by people who use cell phones all the time? And are there any rules one could add? Do you have a similar story to share?