Sicily pics, damn near sure

Part of my world graffitti tour. 109 more countries to go.

Map of Catania on a door.

snap snap snap

Last day of a Christmas market

One lane after another. I could snap snap the whole city. 

Sign laying on the ground makes it easier to snap snap.

The Comune di Catania. The stratigraphic elements mesmerized me. Look at all the different materials. One could imagine the workers placing layer by layer, element by element.

Buildings with soul.

The Comune di Catania built the original rock climbing wall.

Look at the layers!

Okay maybe it is just me. 

Entrance to the Comune di Catania. I happened upon it. A sign, in Italian, which I did not snap snap but I got that it warned to not pick the fruit. No worries, I dont want to end up in an Italian jail.

It's the juxtaposition of ancient and recent.

Stairs leading to somewhere.Of course I went up them.

Sicily, maybe in pics

Part of a colossal entryway to nowhere.

The hanging santa pic.

This wasnt just a place to sit in the Comune di Catania. It was another planet. I'm fortunate to have had the pleasure to enjoy it.

"...that old barnacle barge." TV trivas. Who said it, through a clenched post-dental-work mouth?

World sewer grates tour commences after the the graffitti tour.

Fun with photo editor.

For my friend who collects gnomes. Close enough.

Sicily not in pics

Slow wifi. We'll give this a go. One tab over, google photos is trying desperately to load. I'm a maniac taking pictures of everything here. I've a hundred photos. Better to link to an album.

Catania is a magnificent, gritty place. It's been said that Siciliy is Italy on steroids. I believe it, though having not yet visited Italy.

Walked around for seven hours yesterday. Kept meaning to come back. But down one more lane, stop into one more market, turn and head up one last winding road. Take one more picture. Have one more doppio.

(p.s. got about ten more lines written on my paper)

Gave it thirty minutes. 17.5 photos uploaded. 12 minute hang up on the last. I have to get out of this room for a bit. I may ask it to upload thirty, then leave for a couple hours and see how that goes. Kind of like setting a defrag before you go to bed.

If you dont hear from me again I was last seen walking on a beach in Catania at 9:30 p.m.wearing brown kakhis, a pink tee shirt, a black fleece zip-up, a turquoise beanie and a blue parka. You can see why I'll never have a boyfriend. Not a publicly acceptable one anyway. Anyone that dresses like me I wouldn't even consider.

Sicily

Landed in Sicily today. I am here until December 31st. My return flight arrives in A'dam at 23:55. Auld Lang Syne, airport style.

I took over 100 photos during my whirlwind 1.75 days tour of German Christmas markets in Dusseldorf and Koln. I meant to blog about the experience and post photos when I arrived here and coud relax a bit. However, my wifi, while reliable and secure, is very slow. I am certain the page will time out before the end of the first upload. I'll no doubt be far away from the Chritmas magic by the time I return so if anything relating to cold and teutonic Sinter Klaus gets posted it will be purely out of nostalgia and (more likely) a sugar high.

It is good that my internet is slow and dodgy, though, as I do have a term paper to write, which is due on the 5th. Less time carousing websites, more time using this machine for the reason I brought it with me: write that paper.

I was up at 03:30, left at 04:40 to catch a bus to Schiphol. I havent used a bus since I got here, being resistant to the mental work of figuring out new things. In an American town this is not so difficult, but I try to stick with things that I already know even if that means extra labor or walking, as most new things involve using a translator for pages that are not in Engrish. Bear in mind I havent bled since Sept and am relieved that I can use menopause as an excuse for mental fragility.

My hotel is on the outskirts of Catania's center, but my room is 51 steps from the beach, which is why I chose the property. That and it is €30 a night. It is a rather rustic tourist bungalow. The heat works well, the fridge not so much, they serve breakfast, the caretaker (the owners are on break) is an extremely hospitable Sri Lankan fellow. there are six other guests on the entire property. The bar, beach umbrellas, beach everything, lights and dancing apparatus are all put away for winter. In the summer this place is bustling. For the €150/nt summer rate the facilities would warrant complaint, but for a California native twice removed and currently holed up in Holland, this place is fucking HEAVEN.

As tired as I was when  arrived at 10:00,  I had to walk on this beach. Well, I had to go to the store to stock up on provisions. When I found I could get to the store using the beach mainly before crossing into civilization I was thrilled.

Tonight I did manage to cut into said term paper. The hardest part is completed: revising my central topic in light of the professor's review of my rough draft. I have whittled out all confusing elements and narrowed it down into the kind of microscopic focus that typifies academic papers. Fine by me. You want simple? Good. Easier on my brain.

Tomorrow I'll head into town, do some exploring, see some cathedrals, hiostoric stuff, wander aimlessly...as I do. At night, nice and tired, I'll lay here on the bed-desk and work on my paper. that is the general plan for the next five days. I will see the entire island on my next trip.

A loose plan is forming for post-graduation in July: tour for a month or so on my bike all the places in southern Europe, north Africa and Turkey that I am itching to see.

No links or pics. I'm afraid the page load time will kill the entire blog. I'll see if I can upload via my phone, which, my wifi seems to work a bit faster on it then this machine.

Ciao!

Exam, Bricks, German Xmasing

I have an exam tomorrow. I have written the re-take date into my calendar. It's not that I think I will fail. I just dont want any stress. Between aiming for the middle and planning for a retake my stress is remaining low. After the exam I have plans to walk around town with a fine lady who will show me some of the buildings of the Amsterdamse School of architecture. The brickwork here floors me. No, serious. Sounds boring but get this - where I live is SE of the city center. There is construction going on everywhere. You know what I see when I walk past a building site? Bricks being laid, one by fucking one. Yup. My source tells me that the brickwork covers the cement or standard cheap ugly building material found in mass housing construction, but I have yet to see it. Even so, why bother with the bricks then? And not just red bricks - terra cotta, amber, sandstone, dark gray, nearly white, earth tones. Building A is gold, building C is nearly blue and the elevator portal that divides them is olive green. All brick.

Two things stand out here. First, if you are a bricklayer and want social protection -- thats what we in COLS call a welfare state (employement protection, unions to a degree, hardship benefits) -- then learn some basic Dutch and maybe come on over. Second, look at how many industries stay vital due to this commitment to brickery - ya gotta get the sand for the bricks, pound it, churn it, dry it, mix it, transport it. Someone has to make it available, promote it. Someones gotta sell it. And then...all those hands gotta turn it into a building.

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I leave for Dusseldorf tommorow morning, swayed by this article that promises a christmas hard-on. The top two are beyond my r€ach at the moment, but D'dorf is fifty euros for a train and fifteen for a hostel bed. I'll take the train to Koln on Thursday to check out their Christmas magic. Just gotta get away for a spell.

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My term paper is due on the 5th. Have hardly touched it since the peer review on the 12th. The review made it easier rather than harder, as all the advice was: omit. Omit, omit, omit. "Very ambitious" is how they say it when they think you are out of your mind. Thanks for making my job easier, guys. Funny how people inclusing my professor seem to think that 6000 words cannot fit into three weeks. Christ I've done it in days. Was it any good? I dunno. I got straight 4.0's. I wont get that here. I am not aiming for it. I want to learn something more than achieve something. There is a difference. Ere, I read to test. I studied to test. I bypassed reading beyond the required no matter how much I wanted to read more of the story. Now,  read all I like, and barely give time to what is required. But I am learning. I am just learning my way.

Somehow I have decent grades.

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I must go do a last minute study for my exam tomorrow. I completed my spring cleaning, after the gym and laundry. I turned on the machine to do exam prep. So far I have left a review for a business, checked out the remaining time on my AV license and reformatted my passwords sheet.

Intl Doc Film Fest A'dam

I think that is what IDFA stands for. Stand for something or you aill fall for anything, eh?
I saw six films in four visits. Gosh I heart film. I have a few dvds but its no fun on the laptop.

The first doc listed is relevant to my coursework. The Scandinavian countries come up a lot in discussions of well-functioing social benefits systems. So imagine my intrigue when I read the film's premise. Went with a classmate who it turns out is doing her term paper on Sweden's welfare system.

If you get a chance to see a film, anywhere about anything, do it for me.

As We're Told  Any story told through gigantic cardboard heads is good enough for me.

The Poetess  Boy this was something. I could not locate a banana (what a weird way to start a film description) during the walk from one cine to this one so halfway through this film I started seeing voices. There may have been a q & a afterward (as with many of the IDFA screenings, which was an unexpected treat!) but I lit out as soon as the credits rolled.

Rezo  This was paired with the big fat Swedes up top. Another unexpected gem. The filmmaker came out afterward and talked about the challenges of making a film about a family member. Rezo is his father, an illustrator, who did all the drawings for the film, I believe.

When You Look Away  Things were heating up in my class assignments book. I needed, desperately so, a metaphysical getaway. Research is so linear. Bring me back home to chaos, filmmonster. Dooooo it.

See You Tomorrow, God Willing!  This was adorable. Watch the trailer.

Roosenberg  Quiet and beautiful. An 18-minute short about the last of the aged nuns at a closing abbey in Belgium. I think my cousin was a nun for a while. She was also the president of the Beatles fan club in the late 60s. It's an honest segue.



UPDATE

And one I really want to see, though I'd like meet the players myself in Istanbul-

Kedi

4540

From 06:30 yesterday to 15:00 today I wrote 4,540 words among three separate assignments.

I left the apartment last night for an hour walk.

I left today at noon to go up and down the stairs three times, then to the bike shop and mailbox below.

I have one more assignment due tomorrow by midnight. It's the rough final copy of our term paper. I hear it is supposed to be 6,000 words. I told one classmate that I have a title.

Then they asked how many words I have on it. I repeated, I have a title.

Let's see if I get another four thousand five hundred and forty words submitted by tomorrow midnight.

I am not terribly stressed about it. The rough is 15% of our grade but to me that still leaves me 85%. It will most likely be a substantial number of words, not 6000 and probably a day late. That is OK too. I will live.

It doesn't make much sense to me, really. The finished version is due on January 5th. That is a month away. More than a month. The prof says it is to have something substantial to offer during peer review which is most of December. That is when, you guessed it, we review each other's rough drafts. That is also of little value to me, really. In my experience people end up saying the stupidest shit just becuase they think if they dont offer criticism then they wont appear intelligent. I usually just go for syntax. Who am I to judge.

I'm hard to intimidate. I have nothing to lose. I do my best and I work to the whip of my anxiety. If the whip aint cracking then aint a human on the planet going to make me work any harder than I feel like. I woke up rigid with anxiety yesterday. Actually it was more like surrender. I didnt even go for a morning walk. Just coffee, stretches and turning on the machine.

I'll nap for a bit (it is nearing 5pm here now), get up around 19:00. Go for a short walk or maybe even bike ride, start writing around 21:00 probably til 01:00. Class tomorrow from 15:00-17:00, home by 6pm and write til I feel like I am done.

That is the plan anyway. Not even sure if I'll get the nap in. Though it is much easier as I have no tv or facebook or friends or drugs or food or shopping or car or job or cat (oh, btw it occurred to me today that cats are so good at looking innocent), or lovers or movie passes or discretionary income or political views or weather or anything to distract me from living the monastic life that I do.

Excluding the sentence you are reading right now, that was another 400 words.

Seeing how tall these people are I dont think ''big'' is being used in a complimentary way.

 I cant read Dutch but judging by the suspension rope, the tighty-whiteys and the business heels it must be saying this way to a damn good party.

So only gays and straights get fucked and the rest get loved? 

      

 I havent seen these amber-eyed ducks before.

Sometimes you are quite pretty Amsterdam.

Then, three metro stops down the line. Cranes follow me everywhere.