We do, at least I do! I haven't quite caught my nose yet, it's so incredibly fast that could probably win the 100m race and make a fool out of the current champion, Mr. Usain Bolt! No matter, it will come back to me if I think of all the paracetamol and vitamin C I've been ingurgitating on daily basis ever since last Friday...
It's annoying but not tragic...plus...a little bit of fever has always made me such a calm serene person...I do envy all the kids in school who get to stay home cause they're ill! I wish we'd have a system which could allow teachers to just phone the school to say "I'm taking today off cause I'm ill!" Theoretically it's possible and some people do it with a smile on their faces and with no apparent bug in their body either... In reality, there's no substitute teacher to come rescue your classes so you just go to school and teach. So what if I took some extra work this year and today I had 8 (eight!) classes? No sweat!
Ha ha ha! Anyway, will see what tomorrow brings, at least now I can't pass the flu on since the famous 72 hours are gone. Important thing is I'm in good spirits and right after I watch a movie I'll come here again to do some more paper work for school.
In the meantime...if by any chance you get to meet my nose, please send it back home, I promise I'll be really nice to it. Really.
Yes, I only found out the day before yesterday that such a day exists (since 2001) and that there is going to be some kind of a poster contest supervised by the modern languages teachers. I was a bit upset at first that I hadn't been notified in advance like other colleagues had been, but I think that in the two hours 5 kids and I took to create a poster we did a great job. We'd have liked to add some font colour or our fan but we didn't have any time left.
European language diversity was supposed to be celebrated and the only "clue" that these kids study Italian was that we wrote the title in Italian. Then I looked on the internet for how people say "hello" in all European languages and that's what kids wrote on the little stars...The other posters were beautiful, but...different because they posted photos of wonderful monuments and such of the countries they study the language of and quite frankly that would have been much easier...we'd have printed some photos too for that matter...I loved this one on the right, made by the colleagues who teach German, also the "French" ones, similar to this.
The important thing is kids had fun, I had fun and I needed it because I've got such busy days these days... They all won, of course, even though they were highly disappointed that no awards were given, I guess their little competitive sense is not so little anymore...:)
The first photo was supposed to be posted at the bottom of the entry, but oh well, I still haven't got Blogger...It's a funny pic of me and 6th graders who made the poster. We were saying "formaaaaaggiooooo", "cheese" that is in Italian.:)
As for blogging...I moved here because I like this format and because I know that the people I care for from my old blogs will come here to be updated about me...I'm done reposting, I only reposted a few entries from one "challenge" I used to participate in, "Writer's Block". I will probably miss "Picture Perfect", who knows? All the rest will stay on the old blogs, being rather personal, and my friends already read them anyway.
I've been walking straight ahead passing by crossroads my own others' others' and my own...
Crossing woods of words seas of whispers rivers of tears mountains of happiness and valleys of despair...
Taking my time, ignoring time, denying time to time itself and to creation...
Walking slowly and running fast towards...some place, some... place love towards...new crossroads.
And now I'm here. Out of the woods of words Out of the seas of whispers Out of the rivers of tears Down of the mountains of happiness Up from the valleys of despair...
The survey my wonderful friend Tina has just posted gives me the possibility to talk about me and words, words and I...as you know, I teach languages and I work with words at all times...words are my daily bread and I am fully aware of how much power they can be endowed with...I remember having taken a PH-certified test about what is my best skill...and well...it tuned out to be linguistic...what a surprise!
They say I started to talk properly before I even walked and it seems like I only had only one twist of letters which I corrected quickly and which was pretty unusual...of course, we're talking about Romanian here so it will be a little harder to explain...I used to invert the "F" with an "S", rather unusual since these are two wholy different sounds...So instead of saying "cafea" (=coffee) I used to say "casea" and instead of saying "Ce faci?" (=how are you?) I was saying "Ce saci?"...Anyway, it seems that soon I loved to talk all of the time, I was unstoppable, but it seems like I only used to say words the meaning of which I already knew or it was deducible...
Then it seemed to me that foreign languages weren't that foreign and I chose to study those cause it was not a great effort at all...Then I started writing things, for myself, but never using meaningless words, just trying to respect them at all times...No form without meaning for me, it's too easy the other way around...
Anyway, I'd like to write more but before I'll get to bore you good people to death I'll just take this survey...my answers won't be that spectacular...first because I'll have to adapt them for English...and second, because there are so many words spinning around in my head all the time...sometimes mixing the languages...which is so funny and which is why my friends say that I'm like a TV aerial antenna reproducing foreign channels...
Oh, I watched a documentary once and they were saying that for each language that a person learns a new centre for speaking is developed by the brain and they proved it while operating on a lady's brain...and she was awake so they won't damage some important centres...That lady could speak English and Spanish and the moment they touched her speaking centre for Spanish and asked her a question in Spanish she answered in English that she couldn't understand that language...wow!
I also talk very fast but I keep that under surveillance (which is an effort) and some people might say that sometimes I talk very slow! It's just when I happen to be an interpreter...with the headphones on...you really have to be fast!
OK, my survey answers:
1. What word (or expression) do you use far too frequently? In English it would be "just"...since I often tell people what I was "just" doing or...to soften things a bit I use expressions like...I "just" want to know..., I was "just" wondering, that's all...etc...etc...etc...Of course, being a word that I use too often, I hate it.
In Italian I use too often "allora" and my friend Sonja knows what I'm talking about here...People just (!!!!) use it all the time when they start saying something, anything...ot when they just (again!) want to inquire about everything and nothing..."Allora?"...
In Romanian...is just... "Ce faci?" (see translation above)
2. What word do you use not frequently enough? Ah, that's an easy one...I don't use frequently enough the expression... "Sorry, can't help you" and sometimes I wished I would have.
3. What word do you use when swearing is not appropriate? When swearing is not appropriate I don't swear...I rarely do and most often...when I drive.
4. What's the most recent new word you learned? I'm not really aware of what exact word I've recently learnt...
5. What's a word you've invented? (alternate question: What needs a word but doesn't have one?) In Romanian when it's a hailstorm and there are all those little ice pieces around...we don't have a word for it...we say "It's raining with hailstones"...and because in Italian one can say it with one word ("Grandina") I say "grindineste" in Romanian and people always laugh at that.
6. List five favorite words!: In English I love all those adverbials ending in a "-ly"....really really truthfully loving them, the sound of them...then...I like the word "marvel"/"marvelous", then..."Supercalifragilisticespialidocious"...I totally adore this one...then..."espresso" pronounced by the English speakers....well...I like all words, really...
My heart was wide open when I was born, like anyone else's
It didn't want to beat at first, but the care and love of doctor and nurses made it work in a heartbeat
And it stayed that way
expanding and exploring new horizons
'cause this is only natural for a heart to do.
It had no shape.
Or more likely its shape used to change...all the time...from butterfly to cloud
to wind
to fire
to earth
to all those small and great things around
seeking love, demanding love,
offering itself.
Unselfishly.
Then the natural course of life made it withdraw and close.
Its twin heart stopped beating,
'cause that's what hearts do when they're tired.
They rest
for eternity.
My heartbeat carried on, took over,
and my heart finally found a shape:
a pond lily at sunset.
And it was only a perpetual sunset my heart lived for.
It occasionally reopened.
Again and again...
But being a pond lily was so convenient...
And then it was aware that dawn had come for it too.
It opened, streched and perfumed the morning air with its new passion.
And then it expanded...all over...again...
It had no shape again and yet it could take any shape...
...any shape but the pond lily's...
My heart has no shape.
And it's scared
Wish I didn't look back but I do. Wish I didn't have regrets, it's not fashionable. But I do. Wish I could love less but I can't. Wish life had been more fair to me but this is life. Wish I could take back things I said without meaning them, but they were said and sometimes we stumble into words. Wish I could fight less and surrender more but it's not easy to lose battles. Wish you were here.
Alan challenged us for a little literary contest...and I love these little things...and I've come home from school, got a free hour and wrote this...The short story was supposed to start with "It was a dark and stormy night..." I'm sorry if my English is not as good as the native speakers', but it's only for fun! Here it is:
It was a dark and stormy night...but only because the guys at the electrical company really had messed up, so they announced on the radio...Well, at least the storm wasn't their fault...so half of the frustration and impotence Alice was experiencing was all nature's playing tricks on her...Oh, yes, she could have bet her life on that one, she was thinking, while contemplating the new dress and shoes she was supposed to wear at her company's cocktail party that evening...an outdoor cocktail party...which got canceled irrevocably..."Damn this storm, I can't hear myself thinking"...She was really counting on this opportunity as she was going to approach the boss of all bosses and present her new idea of a project she had been working on for the last few weeks...and which didn't seem to appeal to her direct boss...so much like the one in that movie..."The office"...
She had lit some candles and she was preparing to go to bed...at 9pm!...as she couldn't really stand all her thoughts roaring in her head, leaving blood stains on her tremendous ego...
Apparently Buck, her friend's dog she had had in care for the last few days, wasn't of the same opinion...as he was desperately grating the entrance door in the obvious attempt of freeing himself...on every possible level, if you know what I mean...Only that Alice had no intention to get outside in the storm for a bear necessity she didn't have any understanding for..."I'll just let the dog out and I'll stand in front of the door while he finishes", she thought and she put on her raincoat over her silk orange bed gown. She unlocked the door, got out and watched the dog who was happily running in circles, without seeming to be really bothered by the rain, thunder and lightening show...
"It's really chilly and windy, I should go back inside now", she said to herself and turned back to the half-open door...only to watch it slam in her face!..."Damn it! Damn it!" she screamed while hitting in vain her forehead against the door...Needless to say...she didn't have the keys...and Buck...oh, well, was nowhere to be found...She got out in the rain, calling the dog and thinking she should go and ask some neighbours for help. She really didn't know anyone in that neighbourhood but she was sure someone would do something on a dark and stormy night for a young, attractive and obviously intelligent soaked woman...She was standing on the sidewalk cursing the storm, the perfect darkness, Buck, her boss, but mostly her towel orange slippers!
Right at the moment she was thinking there is no God whatsoever a Rolls pulled over, the right back door opened and she heard a voice asking: "Is that you, Miss Carmichael? From the Marketing?"..."Er...yes, it's me...er...yeah...who...who's asking?" Useless to tell you, dear readers, it was the boss of all bosses...oh, well, the happy ending is near and then you can all sleep tight...she got invited in the car, she presented her project, a locksmith was sent for, the electricity came back, she was promoted at work, Buck was safely deposited in his owner's arms and house provided with an entrance door designed for dogs...And of course Alice changed her mind about dark and stormy nights...
Are you comfortable? Come on, now, get cozy and forget about whatever important things you have to do for the next minutes...you'll get there anyhow and the sun will still be up even if you're late, the stars will still shine as any other night...there you are... listen to this story...hush now...and don't you dare touch that little plastic instrument called mouse...
Once upon a time...well, it was more like 1944...in an Eastern european capital, Bucharest, people were having the blast of their lives, even among and under the most fierceful American bombardaments like they'd had for the last twenty years...From the Opera House to the most humble pub in the slums...Take a look...The song was aso very famous... My grandfather used to sing it sometimes...
Food was cheap, hotels hospitable and summer restaurants were the main attraction with their jazz bands or the local folk bands...The clients were always happy to party, and very often you could see German officers accompanied by "luxury women"..."boneless women", as someone called them...
One of these women was Zaraza, precisely Zarada, a traditional gipsy name. It means The Wonderful.
The story starts now, when this young woman enters The Red Fox, a restaurant on the Selari street, arm in arm with some insignificant man, part of a jolly bunch of people. She was indeed a gipsy, her face looked rough, her lips seemed those of a sensual man and her hair was so black and shiny that she must have poured lots of nut oil on it.
At some point of the show presented in the restaurant, here he was, the most applauded singer of the city, Cristian Vasile. The audience was delirious. Everybody was coming there for him...though there was another band with another singer in some other restaurant...Zavaidoc...Both Zavaidoc and Cristian used to pay low life gangs for protection and sometimes there were fights with knives and swords for artistic supremacy...But that night they were at peace...
That night he sang a brand new song...no, his voice was just beautiful, not like on those old Pathe disks we all know...The audience was fascinated, many of them didn't dare breathing and they all had long forgotten all about their food and drink...Most women were crying...Zaraza felt very surprised feeling tears coming out of her eyes and she couldn't remember the last time she had felt a tear finding its way down on her face...
She followed him in the back, she sat in front of him and they had a drink and talked for hours and hours and late in the night they left together and for the next two years they were inseparable. He used to call her "his adored lunatic"...He wrote a song about her...
When you come, senorita, in the evening in the park With lilly petals all around you, You have sweet passions in your eyes and sinful sparks and your body is that of a feline snake. Your mouth is a poem of crazy desires, your breast a sublime treasure You're a daemon from my dreams, who torments me and lie to me But you have the smile of an angel.
Here's the song and his voice recorded back then....
This song was on everyone's lips and Zaraza was now as famous as her "celeberrimo" lover...But...the other singer, Zavaidoc, was losing clients...He tried to beat Cristian at his own game by fair methods, spending hours and hours in front of his piano...He even stole one of Sinatra's songs and got blamed for it. The boss of the gang he was paying for protection came out with a plan...He said Cristian had an angel's voice so he couldn't kill him...but an artist without his muse is nothing...
So the next evening, when Zaraza went out to buy cigarettes for her lover she was attacked and killed...They cut her throat...She was found in the morning, after a night of search with her dress soaked in blood...The police said Cristian had a mad look in his eyes...She was incinerated and he took her ashes home with him...and that very evening he started a ritual who would last for the next four months and which is difficult to be described...and understood...every evening he used to eat one teaspoon of her ashes...until they were gone...
Then he poured turpentine down his throat, burning his throat and never being able to sing again...and then he vanished from the real Bucharest as well as from people's memory... They say that in 1959 there was this man, looking like a homeless man, who was working at the theatre in Piatra Neamt as a machinist and everyone was saying his name was Cristian Vasile and that he was famous once...
I want you to tell me, beautiful Zaraza, Who loved you before, How many have cried for you like mad men And how many have died for you. I want your sweet mouth, Zaraza, To always get me drunk By your kisses, Zaraza, I want to die too...
This blog entry has been written as a result of an interesting challenge Matriculus set for us, weird sweet people on yahoo360...I actually wrote a blog entry a while ago by the title of "I've killed my little devil", in which I was "describing" the way my little voice works for me. Anyway, just when I thought this topic is dead and done with, it won in Matriculus's poll...ah, I'm not entitled to complain, I voted for it too, so...Problem is...I don't feel very creative right now...so let's just all see what happens...
One thing is certain. Little voices do exist. For real. It's not us, as psychologists want us to believe. Nooo, no, no, no!...They have a life of their own. Mine is pretty much on vacation all the time, getting a tan for all I know or catching flies or something...I guess "THEY" don't pay it enough. Hell, I'd do the same thing if I were IT. So, you see, my little voice has a pretty laid back life...maybe I'll trade with IT...hmm... But...when IT is needed there's another tiiiiiiny little voice (they come in all shapes and colours, mine is red) that is sent to get into the head of MY little voice and whisper to it (I haven't heard of a yelling little voice yet): "Go get her! Make it a mess this time! You'll even get a raise!" And then...then, dear readers...disasters, apocalyptical cataclysms happen...I'll always get burnt, scalded, injured...but that's nothing...sometimes I hurt people and hurt myself in the process...and my little voice says "I WAS ONLY MAKING A SUGGESTION..." So...theoretically...we are the voices in our little voices' heads...I think...What? (Wait, I'm having a conversation with my little voice...back from the Bahamas...) ADVICE: 1. Don't send the tiiiiiiiiiiny little voice to get YOUR little voice to get you! 2. Don't ever listen to IT, Ignore IT!
Paws up front, galloping ahead Almost by themselves, head in the clouds Tick-tack of a clock racing like a heart, had it little hands! Responding, replying, relying, rejoicing, recrying, rejumping… Instantly creating a balance between paws, gallops, pauses and hands! Cause what would a P be without an A, T, R, I, C, I, A? I guess it would be just a P…J A puzzle to dazzle a B, M or J!
This is not me here. This is not a gun in my hands. These are not bombs exploding. These are not my mates bleeding around me. This is not my war. I need a way out. I need a door to wide open for me. The door out of Hell.
This is a shred of me here. This is a tool like any other to help the shred survive the nothingness. These are reminders of my life being wasted. These are talking stains of blood on the carpet of silence. This is the repeated suicidal attempt of humans. This is a door. Wide open. The Heaven's door.
“I can mash potatoes...I can mash potatoes....I can do the twist....I can do the twist...so...tell me baby! Do you like it like this?”...She was bouncing around the room totally delirious...”Now...tell me...”...she couldn't even be fully aware of her reflection in the mirror for the frightfully excitement she was feeling...”Do you love me? Do you love me? Now...do you love me?...nooooooow that I can dance...” Her hips were going as higher as she could lift them, the hair was wildly covering her face and “torrential” would be a poor word to describe it...and she was just happy! So what the place looked like a damp? It could be turned into a cozy place...She had been finally set free and that was all that mattered to her... She was walking away...away from what she used to believe she was...no more...and she was spinning, ignoring the unpacking...the mess, the dust on the floor, the cobwebs...ignoring the past...in the middle of that present she was beginning to feel so alive...round and round and round....all the way....then the music stopped just as a clock struck ...and she froze there, like a statue, as if awoken...and she looked around...”What a mess!” she thought and she started picking up things from the floor...She raised her head then and she saw her own reflection in the mirror. She looked at it for a few seconds, timeless seconds...and then she just looked away. “I'd better find my shoes now...”, she thought and walked away.
No air...For so many years, no air...Trapped inside his own illusions, his own expectations, others' expectations, fooling himself every time...Always in search of a new life, always in search of the right choice, running away from home, from a world he thought was a traitor to him, running away from people, running away...Always changing his mind, always making plans, always starting something new, in the exaltation of a prison-breaker...only to find out it was a bad new start, a bad new plan, a bad everything...and falling, falling into the dark depth of his desert, angry as Hell, blaming himself, blaming the others, hurting himself...hurting the others...Always looking back...
And then he came back home...He was missing it so much he couldn't function anymore, he came back alone, no one followed him, no one... He was telling himself “I am OK with that, I am, the sea is all that I need”...He went to the beach wearing this really old pair of sneackers he had found in his mother's basement...He sat there for hours, contemplating the waves, thinking back on his life, wishing he could erase memories of the past forever, looking straight ahead, telling himself peace is everything that he wanted...He had his family, his old friends, all people who mattered to him so much and whom he had neglected all these years...They had always been there for him, cheering at all his new beginning, cheering at this new beginning...Cheering... A little foam wave touched his feet...and he suddenly felt that those snickers were burning him, he just couldn't wear them anymore...He took them off and hanged them to the nearest lodge...What else was there left for him? The whole and the nothing...Barefoot...
Tell me...my mirror, hanging here, in the open, for everyone to see... Tell me, my one way mirror... Through all the perfect things you see... witness... embrace... protect... reflect... abuse... accuse... cocoon... bim bam boom... aren't I the prettiest from here to the moon
It's time to wake up and give my eyes my nose my ears my hands my mouth A new life.
This is my latest entry for Writer's block group which I enjoy very much. This photo is very generous as a theme and this is what I've come up with and I'm posting it before I change my mind. - october 15, 2007
I can see the whole world from up here this is my dungeon my tower of faith and disbelief my altar and my pulpit the safest place someone can have... my dragon's asleep...
What's out there? some other dungeons towers altars and pulpits ...hosting dragons... standing solitary in this seemingly tidy chaos we call life...
Some deserted some populated some over populated some near some far...
Mine is the safest... and I'll gladly surrender to its fierce eyes and its fierce smile... ...all dragons need their rest...
