The golden nights of the radio

This story has a beginning in the rain. One of my friends recently told me that rain has a special meaning for our senses. Because in the rain, we listen. We don't want to feel neither smell and we rather close our eyes. There is just a calm coming down to our eyelids and the tone in a background, the sound of the rain. This is the moment when time stops, and the radio begins. 

 This exact moment all of a sudden broke the reality on one usual day on a usual gas station somewhere in between nowhere and East Berlin. I was sitting in a car with Pattie, and she had just released her seatbelts to go out. 

- I'll be back in a minute- said she, hastily jumping out of a car. I remained alone, in a cozy box of sedan. The rain was falling above my head, stopping and rumbling on my metal protection of a roof. Then I noticed the radio. It was there waiting for me to allow my mind to sink in muffled tones once I get a chance to stop the time. There were some adverts recommending various medicines for cough and fever, as usually in winter and supplements of a diet for those who continously endure in their personal improvement. Sometimes the adverts were stopping to take a breath and get replaced for a moment by cheesy songs from eighties, so-called 'greates hits'. I was always wondering who is responsible for this choice and who the heck gets paid for composing a 'greatest hits' playlist for a radio. In the age of persistent unemployment, that person is certainly born on Sunday. But then the adverts came back, and back again, and I thought about Mia Farrow, recording a radio advert in Woody Allen's movie. In 'Radio Days' the radio is not really a window to the world. It's a companion. It's a witness of a general activity called life, with all its' upside-downs, all what changes and all what remains, still there, waiting for a moment. You can laugh but there, in the car, I thought that there used to be a time when adverts about cough medicines meant something. Such a thought can change a perspective of miles, and how about a simple reality of a locked car?

 In 'Some Like It Hot' Tony Curtis tells Marylin Monroe that radio is like taking a deaf man to a concert. It took me years to understand what he means, coming back to this scene on and on, even though it was just a cinical line without any deeper conclusions. Today I would say that listening to the radio is like watching only one side of your hand. And so on, watching only one side while forgetting about the second one can be much more exciting.

Confessions from Ines' hairdressing salon

 If you walk for around two minutes from the junction, you will see a printing shop. The next road turns down to a train station. Behind it, there is a park, and literally two turns after my cousin Ines runs her hairdressing salon. Everyone in the town knows this way, even though Ines' salon is not the best, nor the most expensive salon in the neighbourhood. 

 It was just a week ago, when I was passing the junction towards her shop as I used to do often just a couple of years ago. Now, I don't see Ines that often. Not even because I live in another country, but specifically because the reality had grown a wall between us, making our conversations just a shallow weather news exchange. Nevertheless, I was heading to her salon, hoping that Ines will understand how tired I am after a long journey back home and how I don't feel very talkative. Once I pushed the door, I got hit by a sweet smell of hair conditioners, bringing back a relaxing memory of my teenage times. The place was tiny and cozy, with yellow and green walls and posters presenting skinny models with modern and courageous hairstyles no one in the town would never dare to wear. Inside there were only two young students, both around fifteen years old, greeting me with a half respectful, half reserved gaze you can give only to somebody you see for the first time in your life. 

- Good morning- said both of them at the same time, concentrating both pair of eyes on my face. 

- Hey- Ines appeared all of a sudden in the doorway from a back room with a big, welcoming smile. This big smile as well as her plump shape, widening slightly at the level of her belly was a significant feauture of our whole family. -Welcome back home- said she with a tone like we'd just have met a day before. 

- You lost a lot of weight- I smiled back knowing well that this was exactly what she wanted to hear. 

- Oh no!- protested Ines the way she always did.- I am trying so much and nothing works! I joined a gym, tried every diet and still nothing. Well, probably because I don't cycle much these days. The weather is terrible and all paths are frozen, impossible to cycle to work, plus I have to watch over this place all the time! Not much time left for myself- she smiled but she couldn't hide a shadow of sadness in her eyes.- Look, these are only two of my students, I have three, but one of them just got pregnant. Believe me, it's a madness to look after all this!

There was no need for me to reply as after that Ines got straight to my hair.

The World Famous Trash Collector

 I love having a day off. I wish I could have a day off everyday, of course with keeping the same tiredness of a busy schedule which makes it just so great. Nevertheless it is a shame that usually during these amazing days I don't really do much. Especially with the helpful voices of my creatures saying: 'Come on, you have such a lot of stress these days, relax, have a coffee, let your mind do a trip away!' So this is a statistical result of my days off: thousands of randomly watched bad movies, Spanish crime stories red one by one, stories written in my diary meant for no one but myself about how much I hate my neighbours and how little time I have to save the world. 

-Now, there was a fifteen minutes break for me to get a coffee. But you didn't notice that, you just continue reading. This is why I can also pretend that time has stopped for me in that moment and fold these fifteen minutes in between my daytime's pieces. I always knew that there is a possibility of getting more time out of a certain period, and this is how I manage to hang in my reality when it's needed. Just take a look:

 http://vimeo.com/81905498

 I would like to propose a simple idea how to use that knowledge in practice. Hold in to gravity. And you can guess that gravity means something certainly different for me. 

 Both my mother and The Guy I Lived With called me a World Famous Trash Collector. The idea indeed is to gather as many items as possible which can turn back some particular moment. While hanging, I am polishing my little precious treasures with care. These ca be any items which in a possible future might help you tripping: whether it's the past itself, some certain feeling or moment, you can recall it all. Usually for the people we live with, it's just a bunch of trash. Which is why I live alone. 

Sometimes they are just totally random things I find in my house, which are simply great. Old boxesjust like the one above, so ugly that even beautiful, or a Collins English dictionary which is actually a box itself (or rather a box looking just like a perfect book). In more extreme situations, well things which indeed can be trash for somebody. Let me name several examples.

Blue Blue Blue Canary- Slava's Snow Show

I have something to admit- I am a terrible reviewer. But I have something amazing over here to review and since all of the good reviewers I know are on holidays, I do not have any other option like take over this role. I am not doing it for Slava Polunin (even his ethnic origin makes me squeeking with pride) neither for Southbank Centre who offered Londoners an opportunity to join this miracle on stage. I am doing it for everybody who would love to become a part of magic but doesn't have money for that. Exactly, as I said, I am a terrible reviewer. 

 In his Snow Show Slava Polunin takes us to the Winter Wonderland. The real one, not the one in Hyde Park.
 The whole idea bought me completely in the first minute: it started with 'La petite fille de la mere' of Vangelis- enough to amaze me. Because indeed, Slava's Snowshow is nothing like a feast of great music, picturesque sceneries and experience of a touchable magic. It moves all the senses delivering a sudden step to another side of the mirror. It is a show for everybody- but mostly for those who like to immerse, those who like to read a book feeling how does it sound and smell, for those who while being kids used to dream about entering into the earth. At once, it gives you all that.

Christmas Tree DIY

 Christmas Tree is probably the most widely recognized symbol in the world (maybe alongside with the Eiffel Tower, which is quite funny since they are of similar shape; I always wanted to place an Eiffel Tower in my house instead of a Christmas Tree). 

 Whether we want it or not, without a Christmas Tree in a house the Christmas atmosphere can slip out through our fingers. From my childhood I remember the smell of a tree all around the house, and peeping through the branches at the garden hidden under the coat of snow. The Christmas Tree that we used once was coming from our own garden. Of course, it's unlikely going to happen in London, so this year we decided to listen to the ecologists and use a replacement. Here is an inspiration:

Speaking clearly- a thing about urban poetry

 I always tend to rather dislike questions about music. Maybe it's the inner concern,there's not really for me something like bad music. Music, apart from it's kind, always seemed to me to have a power, not only to create some certain types of emotions but sometimes to literally make things happen. I know that it all sounds like a bunch of cliches as far, but don't worry, this is not what I'm going to write about. Let me explain.

This question came into my mind all of a sudden at a party while I was dancing with A Great Guy. The club had a southamerican flavour and so did A Great Guy's origin. Suddenly, in the middle of a party this delightful balance got interrupted by a bizarre rhythm, blowing up the floor. I saw a consternation on A Great Guy's face (and when I say 'A Great Guy' I mean it!). It was then when this question came up. And yes, speaking regarding to the just-heard rhythm we both said we didn't like rap. But later on, I thought it was clearly too much to say, even though I never really was a fan of rap. But also it's not necessarily true I don't like it. And I thought about The Guy I Was (Not That Recently Anymore) Dating. He did like rap.

 My love affair with rap music was short and had pretty much a lot out of a one night stand. It started when I was still very young and fed up with christian-associated rock music, mostly because rap music in it's definition was always, if I can say it, rebelious. But the only CD which stayed with me for long was the one of a young, charismatic poet, not very popular in a 'rap' world and gathering rather a small, but faithful group of fans. He recited his own poetry with his calm, low voice with a slow and melancholic music in a background. I lived in a small eastern european city where the devil seemed to have said goodnight long time before, on a fifth floor of a hundred-years-old apartment. There was no elevator and wooden stairs were squeaking with my every single step, leading me to a dark courtyard to later enter a busy street in a centre. This CD was my only company in this walk through the forgotten world I didn't know yet I was supposed to leave one day, filled with crowded trams and sad, post-soviet architecture. I forgot about these moments afterwards, the moments with a rhythm. Only to remind it years later, at the party in London.

Birthweek- Day 2: Drinks at The Shard and Miracle Monday

 It's been a long time as I knew that today was going to be a Miracle Monday. It had to be as it's the last day when I'm 26. I'm really sorry I couldn't spend it with more of my friends as my phone died (as usual). But Miracle Monday today didn't let me down. 

 We went down to Tate Modern from St. Paul's, through my favorite bridge leading you to the museum with a posture of the cdathedral in the background. Today it was cool and misty, creating a magical postcard from a place I've never been yet, right around me. We went to see Paul Klee exhibition at Tate, and while we were queing to buy tickets the first miracle showed up. It was a lady with sincere brown eyes, asking us for a minute and apologizing for interrupting our conversation. Her name was Christine and she was French, as after living in London for over ten years her accent was still ringing at the end of the lines. She told me she had a membership pass and she can invite one person for an exhibition as a guest. 'It's amazing- said I. Tomorrow is my Birthday'.