Life and its little pleasures

Meneer T.

Yesterday, I went to see the graduation show of the Royal College of Arts. My very good friend Tuur finished his Master in Design Interactions and I really was excited to see his work. His project "My city = My body" looked at future biological interactions with the city. As he is much better at explaining the ideas behind the projects, check out more information on his site here.

I'm still quite proud that I could offer a tiny bit of help to the London Biotopes part of his work. Capco tap water has never been this valuable :-) But Antibodyman is my favorite! I want a costume like that for the next Halloween.

Congratulations Tuur, you have undoubtedly a bright and very interesting future ahead of you. I will miss you so much when I leave this city. But before that: Les Trois Garcons!

Also kuddos to Revital, Steve and Ivo; I'm so impressed with all of your creativity, brains and hard work.

Radiohead

So good. Summer has officially started now.

one busy week... euh month

It's going to be over quickly this week... I don't have a spare moment. While working every day, I have dinner tonight, Radiohead tomorrow, Tuur's graduation show on Thursday, Capco's summer ball on Friday, flying to New York on Saturday, 3 days to find a place to live in New York, flying to Belgium on Tuesday night, Werchter in Belgium on Thursday, Friday ,Saturday, a wedding on Saturday night in Belgium, werchter on Sunday, flying back to London on Monay, appointment in the American Embassy on Tuesday where they will take away my passport for a few weeks so no more travel... And then 3 weeks to get everything packed up and shipped out of the apartment, hopefully with an address to go to in New York. Then Lollapalooza on July 31st and the first weekend of August. after that... rest... All the while working during most days...

Am already tired...

Politiek

Ik ben de laatste om te zeggen dat ik veel van de politiek weet in Belgie, zeker nu dat ik alweer twee jaar niet meer in het land woon. Maar toch blijf ik het allemaal een beetje volgen van op afstand zodat ik toch niet helemaal achter blijf. Maar ik moet zeggen, hoe meer ik erover lees, hoe triester ik er van word.

Waarom is het dat altijd de mensen die de grootste bakkes hebben en die de grootste onzin verkondigen , altijd zoveel ruimte in de media krijgen? Zo lees ik vandaag in de Standaard online dat De Wever Le Soir wilt aanklagen voor racisme tegen hem en zijn partij. Is die vent nu helemaal van god verlaten? (ok, vreemde uitdrukking voor een atheist als ik, but you get my point...). Wat een ongelooflijke idioot is dat toch?

Nu, ik heb helemaal geen sympathie voor de Vlaamse beweging. Het zal ooit wel zijn nut gehad hebben vroeger, maar vandaag vind ik de Vlaamsgezinde ideologie achterhaald en onnozel in een Europese unie. Zoals mijn schoonbroer onlangs nog zei, "wij zijn ondertussen wel ontvoogd".

Racisme? Neen Mr. De Wever, dat is geen racisme van Le Soir, dat is kritiek. En een beetje humor. Denkt u nu echt dat Le Soir een oproep doet tot geweld? Dat ze u en uw partij echt willen verdrinken? Leer er nu toch eens mee leven dat niet iedereen u en uw partij even geweldig vindt als u dat blijkbaar doet. En door een klacht in te dienen, brengt u alles nog eens extra onder de aandacht. Of is dat misschien net wat u wilde doen?

Doe alle Belgen, de Vlamingen en de Walen, een plezier en ga ergens anders keet schoppen. U heeft Belgie ondertussen lang genoeg in een houtgreep gehad. Misschien moet u dat idee van die boot toch eens overwegen. Voor een lange cruise of zo. Oppassen voor de ijsbergen.

Last man standing

On BBC3, for the last 8 weeks a show called "Last man standing" has been running. (Or Last One Standing on the Discovery Channel) Six men from around the western world, athletes, particpated in 8 grueling competitions from the most remote tribes of the world. I saw them wrestle in Mongolia, canoe racing for 2 days straight in Papua New Guinea, kickboxing with only the soles of their feet in India and trying to excel in 5 other extraordinary competitions. Always fighting against the locals. My favorite was Rajko from the UK, but the American BMX racer Jason in the end took home the title of the last man standing. He won the same amount of events as Rajko and Brad, but was voted by his fellow athletes as the best.

I was truely impressed by the struggles these men went through in a year. Each time learning a new "sport" in a week and competing against local people who grew up living and breathing these ancient sporting events. They traveled the whole world together and I can only imagine what an impact this must have had on their lives. If you can catch this anywhere, try to see it. It's worth it. Trust me ;-)

Facebook friends

I really love the finding people on facebook. I recently found two people I studied in Barcelona with in 1997 and the son of my old pre-school teacher who is now a diving instructor in the Dutch Antilles! I don't think I would ever have spoken to them again if not for facebook. Out of side out of mind, you know.

But I've had it a bit with all the facebook friend requests of almost complete strangers. If I have never met you, never spoken to you, never called you, never touched you, never did whatever with you, I'm not your friend (yet). So no, I'm not going to approve you as my facebook friend. I use facebook to share stuff with my real friends. Ok, some cases are borderline, but then you get to be my friend on facebook with a limited profile, meaning you can't see any of the good stuff.

I'm even cleaning up my current full friends list. I just realised, I don't really know a lot of them. So if I have removed you, don't take it personally. It just means I don't really have a clue who you are and you probably don't know me either. If you think I never should have removed you, then apply for my friendship again :-) I'll give it another thought! Hehe, I quite like this... a bit too much actually...

Doop

The last (for now) kid of my sister, Filip, was baptised this weekend (poor boy, scarred already :-) ). As you can notice, I'm not the world's most religious person (or even supportive when it comes to it). My mum and I have had plenty of arguments on this, while my dad wisely stays out of this discussion.

Anyway, not a big fan of these "events" in church, but a huge fan of the family get togethers and the food involved. Carpaccio, steak, frites, sauces (peppercorn, bearnaise, provencale and mushroom), chocomousse, eclairs, oysters, scampi... This is one thing my family is always, ALWAYS good at! We love our food and will never ever let anyone go home hungry!

My mum had the honor this time to be the little one's godmother. The other kids are proud big sisters!

Great seeing you all again!

En Marie, mijn allerbeste vriendinnetje, uw haartjes zijn zooooo mooi!

Back in the UK

Yes, I know. It's been a bit quiet here in the last week. Miami was a stressful but very fun week that left no time to amuse you with my ramblings. The one and a half day of vacation that I added to the work week there were in the "no laptop, no blackberry" policy. That 1.5 day mostly consisted of swimming, sunbathing and eating. But since Tuesday, I'm back in London and although the weather is not too bad right now, what a difference...

Only two more months to go in this city. I have to start deciding whether I will leave here the first of September or the first of August. The first option would probably be the more sensible one, but I have this fire burning that is just screaming "go, go, go". Finding a place in Manhattan might not be so easy either. There is no use in looking for something right now for August as that is way too early, The apartments hit the market on the first of the month for moving in dates on the first of the next month.

On top of that, you need all the paper work to get approved. Good credit history for example. But I have no credit history... Unfortunately that is the same as having bad credit history. I still don't understand that train of thought. It's actually better in the US to buy something on credit and then pay your debt monthly on time than to buy something by paying for it in full immediately. In the second case, no credit history...
Oh, and to get a credit card, you need credit history. Probably to even open a bank account, you need credit history. This should all be good fun to get everything organised. Maybe September is the better date...

SATC: The movie

So I saw it twice last weekend :-) And I don't care at all what the critics say, I absolutely loved it. Especially Samantha's story line (or the end of it)! All that criticism about"nobody has free time like that" or "they all wear too much label". It's a film for fuck's sake, not reality!

If you liked the series, you will love this movie!

Bienvenido

I've made it to Miami again! 4.5 days of stress, hard work, babysitting, late nights, early mornings, fun and frustrations to look forward to now. And after that, 2 days of vacation! Or burning on the beach as some may call it and getting some rest.

The hotel is gorgious, the food already good and the mood is high. This is going to be a good week! Now let's just hope everyone who is supposed to get here, gets here as scheduled... We seem to have a curse on Capco with this since I joined...

Today is all about setting up the office, making sure the speeches all get submitted and make sense, welcoming the management committee, finalising all the lunch/coffee breaks locations and making sure the electrical equipment works. Should be all going smoothly...

Btw, I'm typing this as I'm sitting on my hotel balcony, overlooking the ocean with the sun blaring down on me.