An hour and a half walking through shopping streets, museums, historical buildings, Picadilly Circus and Buckingham Palace ended in no other place but Waterstones. What better place than a giant bookshop which design and organization is just alluring? (at least for a books lover like me). Afterwards, an attempt to read a 500 pages novel in three hours, requires some page skipping and fast, extremely focused reading, but it was accomplished. Then an ensalatta italiana in a basement restaurant, with a "nona" cake for dessert while reading Harry Potter (still refused to finish it completely). Then, a corny love story, or better to say musical in the theatre district (not so much about the story, definitely worth the music). And after, another hour and a half walking just because the city is lovely at night and after a while you stopped feeling the cold at all. This is what I call a londonian day, or at least from now on... :)
P.S: About the picture of me hitting my head in the pole, well is just a reenactment of a past experience my last time in London. I found the same pole!. Or as Olga said in facebook: problem solving skills 101.
It is unbelievable still to think that I am in London. The certainty that I had of my love for this city has just been confirmed. I love this. Every building, sight, person, food, defect, controversy. I feel alive, inspired, challenged and strong in London. A desire of staying here forever have overwhelmed me a little. But I am ecstatic. I love to walk around and I am taking things slow, enjoying every second of it. Orientation has been long but productive and I am taking a contemporary theater class that has me extremely excited :). What better that spend my nights exploring theaters and studying plays in no other but Shakespeare's City. Hopefully, this time around I will keep up with this blog more often ;).
I was walking through the Royal Botanic Gardens the other day, and a sudden thought hit me. In the past two years I have visited, enjoyed and/or lived in five of the most beautiful cities in the world: Boston, London, Paris, Montreal and Sydney. Going through the pictures I realized that I have been all the way half-around the world, and well, I have 13 more destinations to get to in the upcoming six months. It is surprising and exciting, because these seems more like a dream than any reality. These cities are beautiful, complex and so different but still in each of them I have learn so much about human nature and about how no matter where you are we all share characteristics that are undeniable. I just wanted to share this extreme happiness of knowing how many opportunities I have had and how thankful I am for them :)
Every time I get to a new city, there are certain things I automatically start looking for. I like to discover hidden spots, that provide me with a quiet, intellectual, inspirational moment, and off course two of these essential places are a libraryand a coffee shop. The coffee shop: Sappho Books, includes a bookstore and a beautiful backyard with walls covered by modern graffitis.It is warm and cozy, with great classic and rare books and great tea pots. I wrote part of my first creative story there, but it is becoming an addictive pastime to go there and see the hours pass by in such an amazing place.
I never completely realized the power of food in our lives. We spend a considerably amount of time thinking about it, making preparations for it (supermarket visits, city convenience trips at two in the morning, cravings, late night in the dining hall, and so many others). There was a time in my life where I didn't eat very well. Somehow, my levels of stress were correlated to eating, and if I was stressed I could not eat well. I learned how to manage that and now I am a food fanatic. In this trip, specifically I have paid special attention to the tastes, the dishes and everything else. Even in the picture is possible to see a simple dinner that we cooked one of these nights, when a warm cooked meal was imperative. It is just chicken breasts with a touch of garlic, mash potatoes and an avocado salad with olive oil and salt. It sounds extremely simple, but the feeling that I got from that dinner was amazing. Food introduces inspiration in our life, we can play with the tastes and the colors to have our senses explode every time we try something new. Fish and chips by the beach, a classical italian antipasto, a chicken noodle soup, a tuna salad, sushi, an arab plate with hummus, chicken and rice.... All these are just some of the dishes that has grown to be my favorites here in Sydney. With food, I feel I am beginning a new journey that has many roads to explore.
We were in the bathroom the other day, and in our normal state of rush (that is hopefully beginning to change) I turned on the hand-dryer and it was the slower, softer warm air I have ever encounter in my life. It may sound irrelevant, I know, but it occurred to me that the hand-dryer has an australian personality. Why does a hand-dryer has to shoot a violent burst of hot air in your hands in order to maximize those 30 seconds of your life?. So, I decided that the next time I will wait for the aussie hand-dryer to dry my hands in its own time... in the end, it is just a part of cultural adaptation, even in the smallest details, right? ;).
There are no words to describe the beauty of this area. We went through the cliff in an hour walk (that extended due to our numerous stops to just sit and watch the scenery) that took us to several surfer beaches with high waves and a wild essence on them. We even saw a whale two meters away from the surfers doing its afternoon swim (It looks quite a lot like Willy), There were a lot of puppies in the way too, And I just remember that maybe, at some far point in my life I will stay in a place long enough as to have a Golden Retriever puppy (that will just be a dream come true), I hope Sam and Potter don't get jealous. Then we ate fish and chips in the last beach, and we sat by the sea in the sand to read, write and just breathe.... It was absolutely fantastic. Again the same themes recur, people here is just peaceful. It must be the nature effect, that when you are so close to this kind of wild beauty it gets contagious to your soul and emotions and it is inspiring to relate life and emotions to a simple hit of waves in the rocks.
An hour and a half walking through shopping streets, museums, historical buildings, Picadilly Circus and Buckingham Palace ended in no other place but Waterstones. What better place than a giant bookshop which design and organization is just alluring? (at least for a books lover like me). Afterwards, an attempt to read a 500 pages novel in three hours, requires some page skipping and fast, extremely focused reading, but it was accomplished. Then an ensalatta italiana in a basement restaurant, with a "nona" cake for dessert while reading Harry Potter (still refused to finish it completely). Then, a corny love story, or better to say musical in the theatre district (not so much about the story, definitely worth the music). And after, another hour and a half walking just because the city is lovely at night and after a while you stopped feeling the cold at all. This is what I call a londonian day, or at least from now on... :)
