I'll live just turning pages

I see my last entry is NZ inspired. Interesting that NZ, or more accurately, the Southern Hemisphere inspires me to report, share, recreate. 

Six60. 

It has a lot of meaning to me, as it was my soundtrack during my days co-living on Snell's Beach aka "Heaven" in a time of needing an island of peace after the hardships of seeing your own will challenged when practising the vulnerable and noble art of living called teaching.

After my teaching week I would move to Heaven for the weekend near Warkworth to, like the song says: "only to be" with my homies, two Kiwi girls, the beach and the silence.

There we would indulge in super foods and endless walks and spotting oysters, even got to go to a concert of Avalanche City.
A special mention to some certain pyramid of energy that developed just there. The same one that created, ended and destroyed my year of Progressive Grey. Pure serendipity but first ever encounter with forces beyond myself. 

I do remember, too, sleeping in a guest room in this heavenly house by the beach on the foam mattress of my camper and waking up covered in sea dampness. 

HEAVEN, our view from the terrace, all I remember is talks about happiness. Best enjoyed with NZ white wine and Six60 sounding from the living room. Soundtrack: "Forever". Because some moments should play on loop for life. 

"Ain't it good to be alive"

So I recently attended my first concert of Six60 in Europe. I missed them when they played in Whangarei back in 2015, so I was almost in debt. I couldn't forgive myself that they played back then quite next to my place in Onerahi (another bit of heaven, but with a cat), so off I went. 

I seemed to be the only non-Kiwi among so many brews. And it went as it does in NZ. 
I must say, if you haven't lived in NZ, you have missed some life experience of humanity at its best side (most of the time and in contrast to some other places in the world).

I showed up alone, knowing the band is not a big thing in Europe. I was spotted by the Kiwis, at that point, lucky me. 
I was on the phone trying to send a some documents for a quotation (for my wee tiny bit of heaven to come).
I can't be grateful enough to the Kiwi who tapped my shoulder and said: "you seem busy, aye!", I explained I was trying to send some documents before the band came out as I didn't know anyone in the room. 
So, off he went and introduced me to all his brews and cuzzes. Then he added: "now you know somebody".
Lucky me and positively surprised to be accompanied for the night by a bunch of big Pasifika men, in my view, the highest expression of male beauty. So I had a tiny piece of heaven then and there. But aside of the greatness of a Polinesian bodybuild, they were, most importantly, beautiul inside. 

For a bit I really felt in NZ. The crowd gathered at the bar, sharing drinks in a vibe of community only comparable to the real Aotearoa. Laughs, but not the loud European ones, the melodic voice of Matiu and the feel of being with the whanau. 

Such a contrast to what I am used to, some sort of harmony reigned, a kind of "sweet as" feel. 
People came with kids, partners and lots of friends. Not a glass was thrown on the floor, no eyes met without a smile.

TUMEKE

AROHA
I sang along to Kia Mau Ki To Ukaipo, because, hell, I had been practising my Te Reo the whole week on the bike, at home and in the shower and wanted to pay my respects to the Maori culture.

 And cried. Because, as usual, I miss being on the right side of the world, down under, while on the wrong side, here, up above.

A post concert snapshot of what connection through music does to you.

I went through part of the soundtrack of my life Down Down Under and left silently after intruding for a short space of time into a piece of Kiwiana. 

If you haven't experienced New Zealand Roots music, your soul is missing a beat. Little is known about NZ and less about the musical abundance that have such a personal, distinctive flair.

And on my way back, on the ferry, still wiping tears, I had to accept I might not be trying hard enough, maybe "This wasn't meant for me". Am I right where I'm supposed to be?

I'll live just turning pages
well, I know it is worth the ride
Ain't it good to be alive.

Revelations from the Luminate tent

Winter 2017, Golden Bay. NZ. 

I had signed up to volunteer for a team of healers to find my call. As a healer myself I regret not really believing in less empirical or more spiritual forms of healing in order to make it an extra salary of something different and less physically demanding. 
 What I encountered there was the very face of my esceptic nature and a lot more vanity around than I could handle. 
If days were hard to ignore, nights were the worst. I'd sleep in a tent, and mind you, to have a bit of insulation I had bought an air mattress. I was sleeping in a second hand bag, old school made of wool, all my clothing on top, a blanket from a neighbour and the cape of the tarot reading witch who slept in a caravan. Still, the temperature would drop to under 5 degrees and I couldn't handle the cold, that was numbing my legs. I had pitched next to a bunch of Kiwis, who seemed nice enough. I had made friends with a guy in his 40s, with whom i could take walks in the woods instead of taking drugs, dancing to electro ear-raping noise or spending the night howling (must have been the drugs, people howled all night). During the day I would be, as usual, the responsible adult covering shifts for my "I'm so high this is awesome" co-volunteers, running around to make sure everyone had coffee and slowly dreading a vibe everyone loved but me. 
Moved from the Kiwis when a German pitched two days later in the middle of our tents with his car and his smelly joint smoking self. I had to go. 
I moved to the spot where the sun would hit last, to suffer the least during the night, when I would get muscle cramps and feel rusty, in pain, uneasy. I cried so many nights, while the vanity-ridden crowd howled and all I wanted was that it all ended.

Quan penses que el viatge ha valgut la pena, per aprendre,
la nit escup gel i  tremolor.

And when the noise, the smells and the sensations were unbearable, I would take my notebook and write mantras like:

What doesn't make you better doesn't serve you.
Aquest es llença, no es recicla.
Indiference will be your condemnation.

Damn! I really couldn't wait for it to end...

I was approached by many people daily, since I was there, arranging appointments for the healers, and the common question was: how are you enjoying this festival? My answer was: I can't wait for it to end. 
Nobody understood. 
In the meantime I attended a lot of workshops and made great contacts in the hopes to build an Earthship to raise a commune.  

Time went and possibilities dropped, contacts faded. 
I realise where I am now and how much distance you take from dreams, when you are struggling with reality. 

Sydney

Sydney, Sydney, Sydney, Sydney, Sydney, Sydney, Sydney, Sydney...
your name like a person, like it is alive.
And I feel for you like Neruda did in his poem 20. I don't love you any more, but when I loved you, my face searched every night the harbour sunset to tell you, each night, before the stars started to tremble above the harbour bridge, before the moon painted Diamond Bay silver, down the hill on Clairvaux road: this is the life I want.
I don't love you any more, true, but maybe I still love you. Love is so short, forgetting eternal.
Eternity. The word that shone on the bridge in 2000, at the change of millennial. I repeated that to myself: ETERNITY. This is where I want to be, each day, every day. Forever.

I landed in Australia in 1998, after a more than a 24 hour flight, sitting with eager people, checking facts, getting excited each mile.
I moved in Vicar Street, coackroach paradise, memory lane. My days were lazy, dragging on after alcohol abuse, party, lust in easy prays and poor sleep from loud roommates. I couldn't drag myself to uni, all I wanted was to go down the beach, feel the sand soft like flour. Run, drink pineaple with ginger, run some more. Swim. Love. Dance.
I found the love twice in Sydney, the life changing one. And I chose Sydney above them each time. But you are there, and I am here and I would choose you every time above anything, anyone.
I came back in 99, in 2000, in 2002 and in 2010 I had decided to stay. But I wasn't a good fit, you had better plans than me.
If I have been able to accept my life without you, everything else doesn't matter much.

Matrimoni

In the wake of a hope for a situation in my country of origin, any post of personal nature has been substituted by reflections on identity. 
I miss the emotional writer. I write constantly, and I don't seem to be able to publish one final cut. 

This post is per request. I started it one year ago and found it on the drafts. I hope I can convey the same that made my friend laugh about it. She asked me to write something about it.

This post is inspired by a friend of mine, Sílvia, who found hilarious a serious point of view I made about getting married.

Situation: I was hosting a heterosexual couple in the attic upstairs. The attic has a toilet attached, but the space is so little that you can really hear and smell what the other is doing there. I let them know that the door is only for decoration, but they will maybe have to tell each other to leave when it's time to do nr 2. 
They look understanding and with a broad smile tell me that they have known each other for ages. 
- "In fact, we are getting married next month!" they say, silly smile to each other, broad eyes towards me. I am all for enthusiasm for a new love, but marriage is an optional transaction to register it, an inexplicable excitement to sign a contract when the love has been there all along...

So I asked them out of curiosity if there were so long together why they had the need to get married. I understand gays doing it to make a statement on equality, but, isn't being happily together enough? What do they expect to change?

Their smile faded. They said: "guess it is an important stepping stone in our relationship" I said "I guess in the US you still do make a big deal out of proms, dating, the whole engagement stuff and marrying and it is has a social weight". Should be good to keep a consumers' economy going, it generates revenue. I didn't add the latter, but I thought so, I have always thought that the nuclear family is a Judeochristian invention with marriage as a pillar to create an economy based on blood ties instead of promoting a widen community, a whanau. 
I guess it works because it is easier to trust the people you create. 

I then had a time to ponder on it. And had Sílvia to be my interlocutor. I never understood forced commitment. My longest relationship was strongly based on individual freedom and communal sharing. And I am not talking about open relationships, here. I feel polyamory is the future of loving, balanced relationships and living arrangements. I am able to love two people with the same intensity, but only able to go to bed with one. Maybe catholic upbringing, but my good poly friend Mama J told me that I shouldn't be ashamed of being monogamous and heterosexual. It is an option like any other. 

I often wonder if marrying comes from a heteropatriarcal need of control and hence keeping the women as a possession rather than a companion or from a realistic need of control from the matriarchy to make sure the male doesn't sleep around as a warrant to the security of potential offsprings in the economy system or, a rational approach from a more biological drive that says out loud you want to perpetuate the species. Or a combination of all, or none. A statement for sure, nevertheless.

I don't criticise the contract, I just don't understand the hype. I would use the contract at any point for visa reasons, tax rebates or to make a close person your chaperon, to give legal powers on my patrimony (patrimony-matrimony???). But then it would have to be a right for all, and not only for couples, ceremony optional. What surprises me is that the Judeochristian background of exclusivity by right of sex has prevailed. 

However. And that was the silver lining of my reflection to Sílvia, maybe for some people it is a ceremony of leaving behind past sufferings, leaving a past behind and starting afresh with a (temporary or permanent) suitable partner, like a public "mise en scène" of a change of life, a public presentation of the 2.0 version. The ceremony is usually not of my taste, but I totally understand the intention. 

I sometimes hit myself in the head to try to understand what is that drives people to lock themselves in 4 walls to a coordinated co-living in Zweisamkeit. I did suffer a dip when trying to embrace it, because it seems a goal on itself for others, like the ultimate goal. Frustrated because I don't understand the dynamics and it turns into a big question mark in my head in loop until it makes no sense.

As an example, it comes to mind the very first time a guy asked me out, after 5 years of hanging out as friends, days after our first kiss. I didn't understand what he meant when he said: "do you want to go out with me?" "we are neighbours, we see each other everyday, we walk to class together, we play football together we can talk for hours and we've kissed, so if I say yes, what changes? Do I have to hold your hand? Go out only with you now and then to a stroll or to the cinema? pretend to be jealous if you look at other girls? Or make extra time to kiss some more?" 
We actually ended up having a physical fight. I kicked him in the balls, he hunched, I remember how he ran to his parents' house cursing at me. End of our affair. 
It took a while until we talked to each other again. 

I have been popped the  marriage question twice, and the one question that came right after, each time, was: 
What for?
I loved the honesty of one of them: "I want that it becomes illegal for you to sleep with other men", we were in a car, I was driving, and I almost cause an accident. Note he had been sleeping around, and I knew it, so hence the shock. The other, on his very knees, didn't come up with such a good answer to "what for?", he actually thought he was doing me a favour in a quite literal attempt to magically convert me into a breeder, his own agenda, not mine. 
There was a third time, historically and histrionically in love for 10 years and reunited, when the prospect of getting a resident visa became unclear, he said: "if you can't get one, we marry and that's it". 
-"cool", I said. 
Two weeks later I was running away with all my possessions, as I saw I was getting to the core of a rotten apple. But that is another chapter of the progressive grey/progressive pink book. I still don't know what title works better.

Last Christmas I had a deep conversation with my sister about the unquestionable nature of tradition. We question it, it is a convention that has no logical explanation, but people follow like gospel. We thought we maybe we were programmed in a different way. 

Día de la lengua materna en lengua co-materna

Querido/a monolingüe. 

No suelo escribir en castellano. Ni en mi blog ni, de momento, en mi territorio lingüístico. Lo uso por escrito en situaciones internacionales, cuando estoy en Latinoamérica o si tengo que escribir alguna cosa a alguna instancia en España, pero en general me alegro de poder usar mi lengua para expresarme.

Que vale, que quizás soy una de esas privilegiadas que habla varias lenguas con fluidez. Te voy a decir, en confidencia, que no gracias a la escuela. Y no porque no me enseñaran allí inglés o alemán. Si no porque factualmente es muy difícil asimilar una lengua si sólo la practicas 5 horas semanales y no está viva en la calle. Más si, en el caso de Europa, vives en un país grande que no tiene que adaptar su lengua a otros países, como España o Francia. Todavía peor si eres inglés. Tiene que ser difícil. 

Hasta aquí una reflexión sobre el aprendizaje de lenguas extranjeras. Por muchas que te pongan en el cole no vas a salir hablándolas y si lo tuyo no es la lingüística quizás ni llegues a entender su estructura. Te lo digo yo, que no sé ni hacer raíces cuadradas, divido con calculadora y sobrevivo sin apenas saber álgebra. Pero cualquier lengua te va a abrir la mente, te va a acercar a culturas, te va a estimular a querer conocerlas.

Dear monolingual, como catalana catalanoparlante, en el caso de la enseñanza o los servicios públicos no se trata de imponer ninguna lengua. Se trata de usarla con normalidad. Y aunque me parezca anacrónico (que nos pase esto a estas alturas en una España que en realidad debería ser plurilingüe) se trata de defenderla, sobre todo, de personas como tú. 

Catalunya ha luchado años por recuperar su lengua en ámbitos públicos. Yo, aún en los 80, en primaria, aprendía que en mi territorio lingüístico los catalanoparlantes éramos diglósicos. 
Usábamos el castellano para el ámbito público y el catalán para el privado. Cuántas veces he oídi a la señora catalana ir a la panadería y pedir en castellano. Resquicios...

En mis años de primaria quedaba rastro del Quico, las clases se daban mayoritariamente en castellano aunque algunas de mis profes tenían un acento catalán que tiraba p'atrás. Pero es que a ellas se lo prohibieron en la escuela, y les costaba escribirlo. Como a mis padres, o a mi abuela. Recuerdo cómo le enviaba postales a mi abuela de mis viajes por el mundo y ella me respondía cartas en castellano, disculpándose de que no pudo aprender a escribir catalán en la escuela. Mis padres se esfuerzan mucho en escribirlo, tampoco lo aprendieron. 
Como lingüista lo encuentro un robo a la cultura y a la identidad. Pero todas las regiones del Estado Español sufrieron las consecuencias post guerra civil. Cerremos capítulo. Pasemos página.

Liebe(r) Einsprachige. Desde su última prohibición se ha ido recuperando la lengua catalana en un proceso de normalización. Normalizar quiere decir "dejar ser", que forme parte de la vida pública también. A ver si ser competente en una lengua para atender a los hablantes de su territorio va a ser opcional. Hace poco me pidieron alemán para trabajar en el sector privado en Barcelona. Pero a mis compis de trabajo alemanes no les pidieron ni español (inglés sí). No trabajan cara al público. Impensable si tienen que atender a gente en un territorio donde se hablan otras lenguas aparte del alemán, ¿no? 'Pos' eso. 

Me acuerdo que hace unos años fui de vacaciones a las Canarias, al Sur, y entré a buscar postales en una tiendecilla de playa. La chica que me atendió sólo sabía inglés, no me entendía. Me quedé estupefacta y me fui. Que conste que hablo inglés perfectamente. Fue una cuestión de ética lingüística, porque patriotismo español, poco... 

Si me centro en Catalunya, en su ciudad más popular, Barcelona, ésta atrae a muchas personas por motivos laborales, pero también culturales; gente que se enamora de la ciudad, del Mediterráneo o de algun(a) residente y se aventura. Entiendo que haya personas que por proyecto, prioridades o trabajo estén de paso. Entiendo que si a algunos extranjeros ya les cuesta aprender castellano, el catalán les de bastante igual. Tema práctico. 
En Amsterdam, donde tengo la residencia base, sin ir más lejos, somos tantos los de fuera que no hace ni falta aprender neerlandés, con el inglés basta. Es más, por ser una ciudad internacional, los nativos se molestan poco en hablar holandés a los no nativos. Mucha gente como yo que se esfuerza en comunicarse en neerlandés lamentan el poco esfuerzo que hacen los nativos. A otros les parece fantástico. Los nativos me dicen que si hablan en inglés se ahorran tiempo y esfuerzo. Mira tú. El efecto Amsterdam. Pero la escuela pública es en neerlandés, en Amsterdam también, no te flipes.

Yo por esta razón siempre intento hablar a alguien de fuera en mi idioma: para darles la oportunidad. En Catalunya me dirijo a todo el mundo que trabaja cara al público en catalán. Si no me entienden lo explico. Ayudo. Si me lo piden cambio de lengua. He vivido en diferentes países. Sé que no hablar la lengua de un país te priva de oprtunidades. Sé que en Catalunya podrían pasar con castellano, pero les va a cerrar acceso a otras oportunidades y sobre todo, a conocer e integrarse a la cultura de otra región. Ahora viene lo de "¡es que estamos en España!", pues entonces, si ese es un argumento, no te extrañes que algunos queramos salir a crear uno nuevo donde el catalán (y algunas cositas más) tengan derechos por el hecho de ser "país"... 

Lieve eentalig(e), en general a los catalanoparlantes nos da igual si nos hablas en castellano. Te entendemos y como bilingües, te lo hablamos también. Pero si has traído a tus hijos, o los has concebido aquí, privarles del catalán en la escuela es privarles de riqueza cultural, de oportunidades, de que sus jóvenes cerebros aprendan a reproducir fonemas que no existen en castellano y sí en otras lenguas, a entender una gramática que no sólo les armará de capacidad lingüística si  no que les proporcionará apertura de cerebro, les abrirá la mente para aprender otras lenguas con más facilidad. Para muestra, un botón: cuando estudiaba en Barcelona, teníamos estudiantes que venían de regiones del Estado Español. Se les facilitaba el aprendizaje en catalán, uni pública. En el 95% de los casos acabábamos echándonos cañas en el bar con los estudiantes vascos, que al mes se animaban a participar en conversaciones en catalán. Parece que a los de otras regiones les costaba más. No era cuestión de aptitud, si no de mentalidad.

No se impone la enseñanza del catalán en las escuelas. Se usa con normalidad. El castellano ocupa el 80% del día a día de un catalanoparlante, de un castellanoparlante el 99%. No se va a perder nunca.
Cuando un padre quiere que un hijo estudie en una escuela con otro idioma no-vehicular (escuela inglesa, alemana, internacional), paga por el servicio. Lo paga porque es un "extra". Seguro que hay escuelas en Cataluña donde impartan en castellano si no te interesa la realidad o la inmersión lingüística. Con suerte hasta concertadas. Padres monolingües: estáis pidiendo un servicio privado en la escuela pública. La de los recortes... Profes de catalunya: es como si os dijeran que vuestras opos les importa un mojón.

Mon cher/ ma chère monolingue, give it up, nos ha costado demasiado recuperar una lengua para que ahora nos la arrebaten de la vida pública y nos la vengas a ningunear tú con tu lengua megamasiva internacional.
Sólo tengo que abrir Twitter para leer a personas que quieren privar a sus hijos de ese derecho. Me pregunto si somos dueños del destino de nuestros hijos. Si cuando decides vivir con ellos en otro país o territorio querrás que vivan conforme a la realidad que les quieres crear. No tengas miedo, la cultura no hace daño. Obre els ulls. El régimen ya acabó. Parece que vuelva con el 155. Est-ce que ce monde est sérieux? chacho, ¡ya! 

Estimat/Estimada monolingüe. A aquestes alçades de la civilització, si us plau, deixem ja la intolerància, obrim els ulls i respectem la realitat lingüística i cultural. Si no t'hi vols integrar, les teves raons tindràs. Però ja ha patit prou l'educació perquè encara la baixem més de nivell. Defenso tota llegua, minoritària o no. Resulta que en parlo una de minoritària i dia a dia veig com un govern monocultural la vol reduir a un nivell anecdòtic. Em toca d'aprop. Per a mi és un atac als drets humans.

I a tots aquells, parleu la que parleu, to all, whichever language you might speak: 

https://en.unesco.org/international-days/international-mother-language-day

Feliç dia de la llengua materna a tothom! 

me too

Often, when I am asked if I am a feminist, I don't quite know how to take it, I am a woman. Being a feminist comes as a default.

However, I don't like being expected to consider myself one as an external characteristic, not only because in my view it seems to accentuate the gap, but also, because from a linguistic point of view and in contraposition to chauvinism, it unconsciously designates the other extreme, which is not the case. 

I am a woman, I am aware of the differences between the two sexes, but I am also aware, that it is a men's world in general and we lack some privileges men don't need to fight for. 
I am a woman, hence, a feminist, as, with my existence I will do all I can possibly do to shorten the gap within the obvious differences.

Generational unawareness...
I found myself the other day watching this video in my parents' company. I mentioned the last statement made in the video hit me very hard and had me crying of anger for over a week. While trying to control my sobbing, my mum missed out that last bit I asked her to pay attention to, because in her attention span, she had moved to playing Candy Crush. I saw myself explaining to them that he was making a methaphore to "la manada", the Whatsapp name of 5 young men who went to the Sanfermines and who clearly stated on their whatsapp conversations that they wanted to get loaded, buy rape pills and with zero shame but proud proclaimed: rape someone. They succeeded and raped an 18 year old within the 5 of them. Brutally and mercilessly. I won't get into the court case details, but they are now free.

I did got to the Sanfermines once, too, when I was 22, with my older 27 year old friend. Two girls. I was more the party and drinking type, and she was more a seducer. None of us had booked any accommodation trusting we could pass out somewhere on the public spaces, common practice that day of the year.
Turned out we met some young men very late, when the sun was coming up, and with my seducer's friend help we were invited to crash with them. Them and some other very drunken guys in mattresses spread in a living room.
My friend did get laid on some mattress spread in the living room with the guy she had been exchanging looks with. I didn't. I don't see any added bonus to a one-night-trophy-shag. I slept. Her actions were consensual at every point. Had she felt uncomfortable we would have left the place. At no point I made a move to any of the guys there, but we were all laughs and giggles for sure. It was summer and we were wearing short sleeves. She might have had a skirt on. I am sure I didn't because I never wore skirts in my 20s. The bottom point was, that we could have been that girl, maybe even with more aggravating factors. We felt at ease with our hosts, and I am sure neither of us would have ever imagined any of the guys to have done something inappropriate. I have traveled alone for years and that is how I have always felt. And it's the way it should be, but it unfortunately isn't. I am sure our experience still is the rule, but there shouldn't be an exception. And in that case, it should be punished hard. There is nothing more sacred than your body.

SOLAS

https://www.elpais.cr/2016/03/08/noticias-del-asesinato-de-turistas-argentinas-exponen-costado-machista/

"Las dos chicas argentinas violadas que viajaban solas Marina Mengazzo, de 21 años y María José Coni, de 22, circulando por las redes sociales".

If you don't see the blatant chauvinism, let me ask how many women/girls does it take not to travel alone?

This case took place while I was travelling South America. Of all the places I have traveled to, it was the one where I felt more objectified, where I unfortunately, more often than not, felt men as predators. Like that time I interrupted a stay with an otherwise nice host, because he would suggest to f*ck per direct or in every other remark. It was very unpleasant and it spoiled nice moments, as I felt I had to go on defensive, on victim mode. 

María and Marina were invited to stay the night by two guys. They accepted since they were quite low on budget. They got raped and murdered, one of the guys said he accidentally killed them because they were too loud. It almost implies he has done something of the like before. 

These things still happen. They shouldn't happen. Men should be educated in consent. Kids in empathy.

The press discriminates us more when, in the headlines, they mention they travel alone. I doubt that would have been formulated this way if it was two men. I doubt, leave rape aside, the press would have said two young men travelling alone were robbed and murdered.

Let's see: 

El juicio a La Manada —el grupo de cinco hombres que formaban parte de un chat de Whatsapp con esa denominación— por la supuesta violación a una joven de 18 años en los Sanfermines de 2016 entra en su recta final. 

Supuesta violación, see what happens to a man:

http://www.primerahora.com/noticias/estados-unidos/nota/felicesyjuntosexmaestrayalumnoviolado-1076108/

Violado= when they went on to have kids and have a family- A happy end?... Glorification of the use of rape?

#metoo

In May of 1998 I gave myself a trip to Prag, on my own. Alone. I booked a hostel behind the central station. I had been told the station was an unsafe area at night. It really looked like a dodgy area I avoided. 

Turns out after going out for beers and jazz with some newly acquaintances (silver lining: I met my bestest Luxemburger friend for years to come), I had to leave the metro before reaching my station, on the central station exchange, because of curfew. 

Turns out I had to walk to the hostel from that station. It was hard to talk to people, I tried to get help from the police but they were only interested in controlling my passport. I had no money left. The only way to my hostel was through the station. I found a coat on the street I put on, because it was getting cold. The coat was 2 sizes bigger and made me look like a dark mass of fabric. I did manage to cross the very dodgy park at the station unnoticed. There were mainly drunks and some drug dealing and prostitution from the other side of the steel curtain. 

I reached a street. I only had to cross and walk up the hill. Relieved I didn't get in any trouble, nobody cared about me. And then I heard this voice. A male. He was calling me, but as we women do when guys cat calls us, I ignored him. But he ran after me. There I was face to face with this man. All I remember was his very dirty nails, he didn't give me a nice first impression and there was nowhere to go. 

He kept me on conversation for nearly 30 minutes, trying to invite me to the casino. Me, pretending I was late to meet my friends and telling him I was going towards the opposite direction, so he wouldn't know where I was staying, in case he'd follow me there (all of these techniques are applied after real experiences, I wonder if men would ever had to). 

I politely rejected all his offers to accompany me, to join him in the Casino, to have a drink and so forth. I nicely said bye and walked to my pretend direction. 

I didn't refuse to shake hands as a good-bye. He grabbed my hand hard, pulled me towards him aggressively, grabbed my face and licked it from bottom to top. I turned around, slowly, mute and started walking, my back to him. He started to shout: run! run now! and came after me, so I ran. I followed a street and saw a small alley where I could cut back and reverse direction,  to get closer to the hostel again. When I did reach the main street, like in the movies, I saw a cab and took it. 

I don't know what he had in mind, but he had already managed to place himself in a spot to run directly from the other side (a very sick game of hide and seek).

My cabby didn't speak German, or English or Spanish or French and I didn't speak Czeck. But he could feel what was going on, he could see me pointing, shouting, making gestures to that man. He empathised.

He dropped me at the hostel and refused to charge me the fare.

That night it could have been me. Travelling alone version.

And as I was still working on this writing I found out about Diana Quer, new sick rape case in Spain. It makes me feel so responsible to work toward a change. 

As usual education is key, but can we reach out to all those abused/neglected kids? 
Is justice going to modify the condemns, in order to address the magnitude of the issue?

So don't call me a feminist. It's common sense.

do normal

Doe normaal!

a Dutch expression that parents typically tell their kids when they are behaving obnoxiously. 

In my circle of friends in Amsterdam we overuse it in irony mode, mocking the undescribable concept of "normal". Because maybe you can try to do normal, but being normal is a more complex thing.

I think am doing normal these last weeks. It is interesting, here some normal doings:

I wake up in the morning Monday to Friday. I commute in public transport. I overuse senseless sentences that have morning, weather, Mondays, Fridays or weekends as a subject. On the weekends I feel I have to go out and drink (something I haven't craved since last time I did normal back in 2015). I do hang out at parks with kids at times. We do sand castles. Life is normal.

The most normal thing I am doing is spectacular: I have incorporated an activity I have refused to undertake in my 20 years of very active lifestyle:
I go to the gym.
Well, I found a discount on a site to join the barrio's gym, because of its swimming pool (a place I like to go in winter).
Since I was going to do normal for a while, I thought I would blend in beautifully if I also did the dreaded indoor exercises.
It was a very interesting experience and I am sure it will still providea lot of anthropologic material.
I was late to one of these group classes and I had a 40 minute gap to fill, sporty dressed and all. I thought I'd go to the fitness room and see what goes on in there.
I am no stranger to weight exercises, but I am to machine-filled rooms.

 I do regularly follow very primitive exercises on vintage videos in my laptop and they help me start the day. I split the screen between a muted 80's exercise video, with John Oliver or Late Motiv volume on. The habbit has gotten to a point that I can't see Buenafuente, Broncano or Berto Romero without lifting dumbells or doing donkey kicks. Pavlov's bitch big time! 

But that was before doing normal. It was when I didn't know the day of the week, when I woke up when my body felt like it, where I could take 20 minutes to have a coffee, and a smoothie, hang around and wait for the first bowel moves and then set myself in the living room to watch videos of the School of Life while wearing ankle weights in my pajamas.

I knew doing normal would help me appreciate my life much more. Thank you, normalcy.

Today the experience is called: "normal things that happen in a gym".

I have always said I dislike gyms, a lot. I couldn't provide empirical information, it was just a gut feeling from past experiences. I never quite embraced the idea of groupalry doing exercises going nowhere like hamsters in a mill. In my beloved Sydney, for instance there is 1 fitness trainer every 2 citizens. In a city you can actually run on the beach sand as soft as flour or do outdoors exercises with views of the whales in the horizon. True story Christiansen Park!

Anyway, with the experience fresh in my senses I can  state from a non-empirical point of view why I dislike gyms:

It has a lot of the things hypersensitive beeings find gross combined:

- Smelly people - check!
- annoying music - check!
- excessive vanity - check!
- television screens - check!
- superficial interactions - check!
- scarce intellect - check!
- unnatural bodies - check!

I started feeling a bit visually disturbed by those guys so pumped they can't hang their arms on both sides of their body. I call it the inverted croissant effect.

To me, muscly guys are unsexy, because they use their biceps to lift a lot of weight, but they don't seem to have lifted a book (and/or read it). 
As I came closer to them the initial assumtion confirmed itself when I accidentally eavesdropped the guys on my left: they were talking passionately about the great atmosphere at Pacha and who could get them cheap tickets. They were in their 30's, mind you, I would turn a blind eye on 15 year olds. Don't judge. Dios los cría y ellos entran gratis en Pachá.

I suddenly had the impulse of running out of the room in sheer confusion and convinced that it couldn't be possible I shared DNA with those walking croissants of muscle, product of hamster-like exercise, that tissue-damaging protein powder that reeks of turtle guano and perhaps good old steroids, steroids+testosterone: the rapist-maker.
As my mind wandered to the view of bumpy bodies, I thought, as I always think: "if you saw yourselves in my eyes..." All to the rythm of repetitive boom boom music, that was really fogging my mind. 

And I also though, as I always think, if any female in the world finds that pumped, ballooned, shaved, shiny, smelly, bumpy, veiny body sexually appealing. 
In order to escape the horror in front of me my mind needed to fantasise with chubby guys, not the flubby ones, the naturally "big boned", with arms like my legs, a protubering tummy to lay on, some body hair, those you can fall on to and never hurt yourself, sinking a bit in a feast of warm flesh (hmmm)
I was so horrified by the scenario and my thoughts that I started to fancy the idea of getting out of the building and join the parents outside watching the swimmers for the 30 minutes I had left until the yoga class.

But, oh serendipity made a plot twist, as I put my hand in my pocket and I found I had my mp3 inside. Block my ears, hit play... and suddenly the idea of listening to "Flashback" from Fat Freddy's Drop calmed me down (that intro...) and gave me strength to resist.

I had an atypical rush of courage, of positivity, thinking: "I paid for this, and I will use these machines to get the hardest, roundest, slap-a-best 40-year old-arse in the district of Horta-Guinardó and maybe even Nou Barris."
The music in my player continued to "Over and Over" from Morcheeba and it gave me new energy to look forward to coming back home and practising the picking on the guitar. Awwwww
The idea of coming home to my guitar cheered me up a bit. And then I remembered a dear friend who once confessed she liked working out because she gets micro orgasms when she hangs from a bar and does sit ups.
Slightly panty-moisted by the idea of coming home to the guitar, I remembered that doing butt-exercises does not exactly make me calieeeente, but the moves have a positive effect on my crotch. Maybe if I work on it I can manage to reach a few microorgasms and get something out of the situation other than sore muscles. Challenge accepted, purrr.

I went to talk to the monitor. My first question was, in Catalan: "haig de portar la meva pròpia màrfega?" Em contesta: "l'alfumbrilla? No, no la tens que portar, hi han aquí"
Penso en el Yeral i l'Àfrica. Sona Eurythmics: "there must be an angel (playing with my heart)" I laugh like a mad woman at the randomness of my playlist.

I don't know if I'll follow on. I have thought that I can load the mp3 player with audiobooks while working out and focusing on reaching some sort of a similar climax to my friend's while working on my abductors, glutes, adductors, hamstrings... I can bypass the odd smell by focusing on familiar scents. The perks of looking into the bright side, woohoo!

I'll keep track of changes and maybe get over the idea that uploading pictures is vain and just try to make something out of being a work in progress in the oh-not-so-fresh years and my normal doing stage.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vkn_P73N9-A

I've never had a gym-butt. 
Say hello to the yummiest gym-butt to be, yeaaaahh, yessss, yessss, YEEEAAAAAAHHH

Ik ga normaal doen, hurra!