Just had to share this wonderful pic with you all!

Isn't this pic fantastic?! Oh my gosh, I really do find this one fascinating. Gives a whole new perspective to the idea of music spreading out. Besides, the piano itself is one of the most beautiful instruments in the world, in my own humble opinion. This pic kinda reminds me of some of Salvador Dalí's work. Surreal, yet really eye-catching. Luv it!

Elise

Ps: Finally a shorter blog this time! :-D

Yaaaaawn...

O crap.

Yet another long one. Geez, when is this gonna stop??? Guess I've got a lot on my mind.

Querida familia... Out there in the cyberworld of the internet...

La gente se tiran pollos en las calles...

Not exactly a very faithful account of what happens at the Spanish fiesta of La Tomatina... (Hm, I thought they threw tomatoes in the street instead of chickens... I could be wrong, of course...) My excuse for this insanely strange sentence is that we were discussing about La Tomatina in class a few weeks ago and on my way to the train (i.e. one step closer to dinner and toilet at home that evening) I was - yet again, alack - rambling about with Spanish words, terms and sentences. Especially sentences. Don't do it with terms as much.

If there really is anyone out there reeeeeeaaaally interested in my vida muy pequeña, I'm-a just gonna write some stuff about the things that have been going on lately.

Well, I've got to say that lately my Spanish has been quite well-received. Every Thursday the class is split into two groups wherein we just write in Spanish about topics that we're supposed to talk about (or ramble about, if you will) during our oral exams in May/June. We're also practicing with our teacher on how to express ourselves well enough to get the grades we want. It's a real benefit for all of us, I think, even though we do have the choice of declining the offer if we absolutely cannot talk in Spanish for any reason at all.

Ugh, Spanish class on Wednesday was a real surprise for all of us. Suddenly our teacher seemed to turn completely bonkers/mental/psycho. :-S He asked us to write something about tourism in Spain in two minutes before we were to sit in a circle. We then read what we'd written to one of our neighbors and after 2 minutes more he took our notes away and made us talk about what we'd written. Mind you, it was just a few of us who'd actually gotten the unpalatable privilege to talk - and yes, I was one of them, sadly. He pointed on one of the students in the class and made her talk, then she was given the privilege to point at someone else to make them talk (that someone being one of my limited amount of friends at school, Line) and then she -the next person who was given the duty to talk - pointed at me. *sigh* I won't say anything else. Well, I can, and I don't really think I did too bad... But still...

Hehe, but what was rather funny was that after I'd finished - relieved, mind you - talking about the information I'd prepared, I was then to point at someone, so I pointed at one of my neighbors, Eilen, who called me (spontaneously, of course) a "bitch". The class burst out into laughter - including me -but she apologized and explained that it was just at the spur of the moment and that she really didn't mean it. Really. Guess someone didn't want to speak Spanish in front of the rest of the class. But my principle at that time was that if Line picked me, then I'd pick Eilen. If two of us were going down, the third would have to follow! That's just fair, innit?

Oh yeah. Finally I have the opportunity to take the theoretical exam for my driver's license! Weeeey! At this point I just want to get the whole friggin' thing over with. I'm tired of having to attend driving lessons all the time and reading in that wrinkly old book that I've got for studying the signs, rules for driving, etc. I just wanna get it over with and not have to care about it anymore! Don't care if I get my driver's license; I'm getting tired of catalytic converters, duty of yielding, window wipers, car tyres, acceleration etc., etc.

Ugh.

And I've only had 20 or so driving lessons... May seem a lot, but apparetly this amount is quite minute... Alas, we must proceed with the utmost discretion and patience. I won't nag about this anymore. Well, at least not for now...

Ugh.

That was for the fact that I'm going to have a mock exam in Spanish tomorrow, despite the fact that it is a Saturday. The party people in my class were objecting quite a bit yesterday when the teacher announced that tomorrow was going to be the day. (Not that we weren't informed about this before... We were, really.) I'm studying right now, but I don't know if it'll turn out the way I want it to... Thank God it's only a mock one, though!

Well, better get back to studying for tomorrow's exam... Or grab myself some grub... Have some dinner? Hm... Feeling kinda peckish... Actually more than peckish, but still... I'm hungry either way.

More later about my ridiculously monotonous life...

Elise

Ah, well...

Alas, another utterly long entry.

How fortunate for the reader.

Raindrops keep falling on my head. Not.

I feel as if I'm rambling about again. Yep, got one of those days again.

Yesterday I had Spanish and our writing session. Well, I should say, writing-slash-preparation for oral exams this May (for those with Spanish B; yet for those with Spanish C, their exam isn't until... err... June, or so). If there's anyone out there actually reading the stuff I'm writing, you can perhaps tell that I am an intellectual. And I should inform you that I actually affirm that statement. Yes, I am an intellectual - and darn proud of it as well. :-D

But anyways, yesterday I was walking on sunshine ever since I went from school at the end of the day. I was so extremely happy, 'cause I just found out from my teacher (who by the way is one of the most fantastic teachers that ever was!) that I am well on the way to actually ace my exams! Straight after I'd heard about this, all I could think of was simply:

"Weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeehiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii!"

For the rest of the day I had "Walking on Sunshine" by Katrina & the Waves in my head. Even when I watched the BBC version of "Pride & Prejudice" again I couldn't keep myself from thinking that I actually can get good grades in Spanish. Even though I've only been taking classes for about 4 months (going on 5)...

Do I sound arrogant and pretentious now? If I do, let me apologize, as I am just so happy at the moment! :-D So you can perhaps see clearly that my... err... what was that term again? Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs... *thinking hard, searching desperately on the internet on stuff about Maslow's Hierarchy*... Self esteem! There we go! So the sentence becomes thus: "So you can perhaps see clearly that my self esteem has sky-rocketed!" Hehe! Nothing beats getting positive feedback from a teacher! Well, that really depends on your own circumstances in life, but when you're me, this is as good as it gets!

Yes, I am a nerd.

Hear me roar.

Grr.

When it comes to my driving... well, I think my instructor is simply waiting for me to take my theoretical exam. After about 20 sessions with him and my lousy driving (believe me, it really isn't marvellous at all!) he seems to cut me some slack at the moment to enable the police to finish up their check on my conduct (just a formality, according to the people at the road and traffic agency... this was by the way the closest I could come to a translation of the Norwegian term of Vegvesenet! I will close this parenthesis now...) and wait for me to take that test - and hopefully pass it - before we embark on another great adventure with his car. A great and presumably panicky adventure according to myself, as I consider myself as being one of the worst drivers that ever walked on the face of the Earth.

And would probably prefer to walk on the face of the Earth if given the option.

I mean, I can deal with the theoretical stuff, but when it comes to actually putting this information into practice... that's a different story. I'm not exactly a very practical person, I dare say. As Mary Bennet in "Pride & Prejudice" said at one point in the series: "I should infinitely prefer a book." Tragic, but unfortunately true. Yet I just have to continue with my practicing and stuff. Apparently this is supposed to give me a great deal of freedom; more so than if I didn't drive at all. I therefore have to persist and not give up.

As three famous philosophers once said a few years ago:
"I'm a surva-vuh! I'm not gon' give up! I'm not gon' stop! I'm gon' work har-duh!"

"Philosophers"? Cringe.

Long posts...

Hehe... The posts I've been writing have been really long! :-D Teehee.. I guess I have lots of things in my mind these days...

;-D

Elise

Humph. And I'm not alluding to a BEP song.

Why is the world the way it is? (Rhetorical question)

Tragic, really.

Sorry if I'm speaking in codes at the moment; it's just that this whole business about the Muhammad caricatures have gone way out of line. Not that one can expect another reaction from the Muslims in the Middle East. I mean, I can only imagine that they've had these tensions and frustrations building up within themselves due to their circumstances in life, and this series of caricatures was just the final drop of water to the cup which clearly overflowed. I can understand their reaction - just as the Norwegian gov't seems to do at the moment as well. I fully support their judgement in handling the case as they do.

However, the slightly scary - yet inevitable - thing that's happening is that information and images of the caricatures are spreading all across the Muslim world. Demonstrations have spread to Asia, including the Philippines (though the demonstrations there are perhaps not as serious as those in countries such as Indonesia; only 5% of the pop'n are Muslims, whereas there is a considerably larger percentage in Indonesia and perhaps also Thailand.) I've got a friend staying in Thailand at the moment, so I can't help but wonder if she's in any way affected by the instabilities in her country.

I also can't help wonder how my family is doing, since their island is kinda close to Mindanao (the largest island in the south) where most of the Muslims live. Not that there has been any problem elsewhere in the country aside from that particular island... But you never know...

Nah, nothing will happen. The Muslims there tend to keep their "activities" in Mindanao, and it really hasn't spread, so there's nothing to fear, really. Still, I wonder how they're coping with all these happenings.

Hm, now it seems as if I'm holding a grudge against Muslims... Which I am NOT at all! The people I refer to are - of course, if you're enlightened enough in this issue - the extremists. Mind you, I consider myself as a tolerant person, yet when it comes to behavior such as this... I dunno, that just seems to cross one of my limits. As I said, I understand their behavior, yet if they are in such a need for democracy and freedom, they are moving in the wrong direction. But of course, even though they're aware of this, they have to relieve their frustrations one way or another.

What I don't understand about this case is that the original drawings were published by the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten in September 2005... WHY ARE THEY REACTING NOW?!?!?!? It seems a bit strange that the newspaper published it 5 months ago, and that the reactions towards those drawings appear now. Of all times. I mean, it would seem more logical that the reaction came, like, a few weeks after the publishing, but NOW?!?!?!?!?!?!? The Norwegian publishing of it (in the Christian periodical Magazinet, FYI) could not have sparked the debate, now could it? Seems a bit unreal to me that even though we're known around the world as being a pacifistic nation (and perhaps nothing more than that...), we could have the power to actually cause this debate.

The Danes are equally as pacifistic as us, in my opinion. Besides, our influence in the world can hardly be as grand as we suppose it to be; as we all know, Norway tends to regard itself as the center of the world at times...

But maybe it's just my ignorance of the matter... I'm not an expert on these issues.

But still, the pace of the spreading of the drawings around the world shows how scarily fast news can travel. Just in a matter of days the French, Spanish, New Zealand, German, Indonesian, Afghan, Thai, Palestinian and Israeli press got their hands on the caricatures. And the spreading continues. As well as the demonstrations. It really is terrifying.

What I also fear is that this issue will turn out to be a battle between the two extremes. I hope and pray that my fears won't turn out to be a fact in the future.

But the most immediate consequence is perhaps that disturbances between e.g. the Israelis and the Palestinians might escalate to new hights. Ever so slightly, at the very least. On the other hand, if these people are sensible enough (which I'm willing to think), they won't use these drawings as a foundation for more violence.

Never mind.

Enough of these gloomy contemplations already.

Stay tuned for more...



Elise