After years of healing, why does the body remember a painful day before the mind catches up?
Tag Archive: Spain
In the “Nought”ies I:
Many of the things that I did in the Naughts Decade. I probably left out a bunch, but anyway.
The Local Expat
When I was a single twenty-something living in Spain it upset me to no end how difficult it was to make and integrate with a group of Spanish locals. I couldn’t understand why locals wouldn’t want to make a foreign friend and learn about someone’s life outside of Spain, in the same way that I…
Rachel Tension
Regardless of whether or not a nation or people think they have racial tension within their borders or society, they do. Many nations (and people) will say that they don’t have problems of race, but rather problems of culture, or foreigners or socio-economic status. However this is far from true and racism exists on so…
Nibble Nibble Here, Nibble Nibble There
A strange local phenomenon: Czech people eat in public all the time. Not just normal eat-on-the-go types of foods like gyros, ice cream or pizza. You see them at tram and metro stops nibbling on peices of bread. Not French bread, or croissants, or even decent healthy-looking bread. It’s always the cheap, nasty Czech bread…
To Be Or Not To Be A Vampire
Prague is a demanding city. It gives so much, but it also takes a lot. Energy, life, money. These things exist in abundance here, but they also flow away so quickly. Prague is a vampire’s city. Shrouded in gray for more than three-quarters of the year, it is the perfect place for those who really…
Signs And Wondering
Since Wendy passed away, I have lived my life following signs from the Spirits. Especially during my time at the UN and in Spain it seemed as if every decision I made, the course of each of my days was defined by signs. Signs were everywhere. It got to the point that even people who…
Good Omens, Bad Omens
The year 2008, and so far six months living in Prague. Today is the first day the Sun has broken through the cloud cover and pierced the shield of this vampire city. I haven’t written for ages, and I think it was because my last blog incarnation of The TripWire went stale and my ideas…
A New Woman
Most people after they move into a new flat and area will explore and wander around to get their bearings. What did I do? I went and got tattooed. Twice. It was a bit nervewracking, going to get inked on a public transportation system I have but a fragile grasp of. But I did it…
Turkish Delight Volume 9: It’s All the Same
After a lifetime of travelling, I am starting to notice that every place is more or less the same. Each place, albeit with a different culture and different lifestyles, has its positives and its negatives. Some wonderful things and some horrible things. In this way, all places begin to blend together and the aspects that…
Spain: Not Many Reasons To Smile
After so many years of travelling and living around the world, I have finally learned that there is a huge difference between spending a couple weeks somewhere on holiday and living there full time. When I first went to Spain it was indeed on holiday to Barcelona and I was enchanted. I had always wanted…
La Comunidad
If ever there were an accurate portrait of Spain, La Comunidad is it. Did you ever see “The ‘Burbs”? Well, this is the Spanish version but far more accurate. Nosy neighbors, nice only to bide the time whilst they wile away your demise to get what they want from your remains. The unveiled hatred of…
The Fortune-Telling Rabbit and Other Turkish Delights
The Fortune-Telling Rabbit Not just any rabbit, mind you, a White Rabbit with blue eyes brimming with wisdom. The wrinkled old keeper of the Rabbit told her my name, she looked me over and chose my fortune. It was on a piece of cream colored paper and outlined the very problems I had been experiencing…
early morning missings
i had a nightmare a couple hours ago and couldn’t get back to sleep. it’s 630AM and still dark outside. they just called the prayers a little while ago. steve is snoring away. what is it about browsing through myspace that can be so comforting? looking at friends pages and their friend’s pages, finding people…
how to spot a princess (or what happens if you piss me off)
a princess is someone, no matter how unreasonable a request, assumes that their smallest desire and off-the-cuff whim should be administered to by whomsoever they in their twisted minds think owes them. in fact, princesses think that the world owes them. that their ex-boyfriends owe them. that everyone who spends a minute with them owes…
the illusionist in istanbul
we went to see ‘the illusionist’ today. wow. just, wow. go see it! i love watching movies in their original language. there was just not enough of this in spain and here it is more common than not that films in the theatre are in their original version. blessed be the Cinema Gods. after many…
pirates, princesas, and we are not in kansas anymore
after quite a grueling two days in madrid in which my ear infection compounded by a hundred after the freezing cold ride on the granada-madrid bus, we have made it to istanbul. madrid would have been a nice layover if i had not been so wretchedly ill, but we did get to see two very…
finally some real movies and saying goodbye to granada
in previous blogs i have discussed a two types of travellers phenomenon (The Questing Traveler and the Runaway Traveler) along with my discontent at the cowardice demonstrated in films these days in telling the easiest parts of stories and leaving the most interesting and complicated parts alone. because i have been surrounded by Runaway Travelers…
the rose, what next?, and the brenda chenowith syndrome
‘the rose’ and the three people in the world for whom i can sing after years of wanting to see ‘the rose,’ i stayed up till almost the crack of dawn the other night and watched it. what a beautiful film, and bette midler has one of the most powerful voices in the history of…
two types of travelers and how film versions of books can be amazing
two types of travelers there are two types of people who travel. the first group is the Questing Travelers, those who travel because they are in search of something. spiritual awakenings, daily epiphanies, random fated connections with strangers that may only be fleeting but end up lasting a lifetime. they are the type who travel…
‘lost in la mancha’ or goodbye to accursed spain
i think spain exists in a black hole. like los angeles, an accursed place where nothing goes right and madness is sanity. don’t get me wrong, i am all about madness, but more that creative madness that is healthy, not the drug-addled-brain madness that seems to infect the denizens of this sweltering land. case in…
my first myspace hate email and other news
*received my first random myspace hate mail! woo hoo! it’s been months since i’ve been out of writing so this to me is a sign that i am back to my old pot-stirring self. one is not a writer until someone cries and someone calls you an asshole. back on track once again. thank you…
in search of the perfect butterfly and other things
*my wrist is still sprained but cannot resist the writer’s urge to write. *i have been searching for the perfect butterfly tattoo, which will be imprinted in the weeks to come before we leave granada. i have learned that the cooler the name of the butterfly, the more plain the creature. swallowtails and metalmarks are…
randomness, i herald thee of importance
*we have some freaky crazy addam’s family neighbors. gomez and morticia’s ghetto spanish cousins, but these guys are rather frightening. they have about 5 teeth between the two of them, as well as a german shepard who is heard but never seen. they don’t even take him out of the apartment to go for walks…
random, not
*his evilness the pope was here in spain last week for a promotional visit about the importance of family, the irony of which was not lost on this humble observer. firstly, how does a celibate man preach to the importance of family and matrimony between a man and a woman specifically? secondly, the current pope…
not so random thoughts
*teaching english sucks ass *why do ex-girlfriends/boyfriends write slanderous meanness on webpages or in emails, then when something real or imaginary (as the case may be)happens the first person they think to call crying to is the one they have been trying to convince themselves they cannot live without by being an asshole? is this…
on real estate agents and pure evil
i am pissed. steve and i found the perfect little apartment, but of course things can’t be that easy. we make an appointment on monday to see it with the landlord, and on tuesday during the day we decided to go to a real estate agency just to see what they have. they ended up…
O Husband, My Husband
written on a postcard of the Alhambra lit up at night looking like a magic fairyland on the blank space that sparkles: i can’t wait to feel your arms around mesurrounding me like your love that i feel from here. where the stamp could go it says instead:thoiry, francemay 9, 2006so soon, my love.i can’t…
a love letter to Panic Attacks
written within the inlaid carving of a confessional just below the window: you remind me that Fear’s hold on me has not been relinquished.above the window where a stamp would look very small:granada, spainapril 16, 2006i spent all day yesterday in your vicious grip.Creator, help me to let go.
a love letter to Asshole Barbie
written on an oh so pink postcard with sickening little pink hearts all over it in the blank space that is another and more sickening shade of pink: life is not plastic like you where i used vomit to stick the stamp on:april 14, 2006granada, spainblondes don’t always get what they want,although you certainly tried.pink…
a love letter to the Full Moon over the Alhambra
written in the smoke of a tobacco offering where the tendrils curl around my words: you remind me of the simple magnificence of lifewhere a stamp would fall to the floor:april 13, 2003granada, spaineverything is happening for a reasonthere is so much happiness around
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