when the secret language is not so secret....

People, including myself, tend to think that being in another country means that you can speak your language and tell what ever you feel like loudly - forgetting that many people around can actually understand. Foreigners are almost shouting in their "secret" language thinking that as they cannot understand people - people cannot understand them.. I've seen (heard) it so many times already, but this weekend a girl really made me laugh!

Saturday we were selling bio - sandwiches at a Climate - party, most people really liked them and I must say myself that they were really tasty! We had prepared around 600 of them that we sold for 350 forint for 2 - great success!

Scandinavian guest workers in Hungary - sandwich experts (Foto: Marta)

Skitsmörgasar..
The story goes: I recommend a guy an eggplant-cream sandwich and he grabs one for him and one for his girlfriend. She gets the sandwich and tells really loudly with strong Stockholm accent: "Haaar du beeeetalat for den haaar jaaaakla skitsmörgasen????" (translation: "Did you pay for this fucking shitty sandwich") I was so surprised - by hearing Swedish and by what she told so I couldn't say anything, I just stared at her, so the guy said "hmm, it seems like someone understands Swedish...". My Finnish friend who was next to me answered him something in Swedish and he was so surprised, that he could only say "ööhhh, du ar fran Finland!" ("ööhhh you are from Finland"). The girl who still didn't try the sandwich started to tell how great the sandwich was and how much she liked it blabla..before she quickly disappeared

It was really funny to see how embarrassed she was when she realised that the two sandwich sellers were both Scandinavian, that's probably not what she expected at a pool-party in Hungary.

I don't like to see people embarrassed but this time she deserved it - we should all think before telling so negative things about good things or about any things...

special things are made with love

Today one of my mittens decided to not to come with me so it jumped out from my pocket just outside the office entrance. It didn't care that it was little wet and cold on the ground, or maybe it didn't know before jumping. Anyway, I guess it wanted a little adventure on its own, it's normal as since it was born it was always together with its sister left-hand mitten.

the adventurous right hand mitten on its own

special mittens

Loosing my mitten for half an hour made me think of the value of/in different things. This pair of mitten is special to me, special because it was the first pair I made on my own (ok, with kind support of my mother.. but still). I invented the pattern, I made it all even the mistakes I made them myself. I remember how I patiently (more or less atleast...) knitted them, and how proud I was when they were finally ready.

So the value of those mitten is much higher than any mittens I could ever buy anywhere. Handmade personalised things have a meaning that mass produced goods can never get.

why handmade things feels better
To use handmade things feels good for many reasons. It is unique. It is selected and not bought as a dozen-thing. It was made by someone and not by a machine, so it has its own charm. It carries love from the person who made it. Normally it is not replaced that hastily which is good also from an environmental point of view. It looks pretty. The soul and body feel better wearing something handmade; cold hands and fingers in handmade mittens will not only be warm but also happy hands and fingers.

Luckily the adventurous glove didn't go much further, so we (me and the left hand mitten) found it again on our way back! I think also the wild mitten was happy to be found again, it seemed a bit lonely there all alone. From now on I will pay much more attention to not to loose it again, mittens are happier when they are two...:)

two happy mittens together again

the dancing tree

In a few days the temperature decreased with some 15 degrees and it is now autumn here; windy, a bit rainy and quite cold. Somehow it makes me feel like at home.

The big tree outside my balcony is dancing in the strong wind. It is shaking its branches, like telling to the leaves; thanks a lot for decorating me so nicely during the spring and summer, let’s have a goodbye party with lots of fun as it’s time for you to leave soon"

a dancing tree

Leaving party

Still the leaves are green and strong, enjoying the party and managing to stay dancing to the rhythms of the wind and rain. People in the neighborhood fall asleep and also wake up to the sound of their party, Nobody tell it to calm down, as we all know that a few nights of noise is the price to pay for having a nice green tree around for several months. And the music they play is loud and wild but not aggressive. Soon the leaves will get beautiful yellow and weaker and weaker before they one day will give up one by one and fly down to the ground. The leaves at my tree are a bit unlucky because they will fall on asphalt and not softly on a field, that's the price they pay to live in the city center. Hopefully somebody will collect them and bring them to the leaf - cemetery, more known under the name compost.

The wind is not only fun for the tree and the leaves, it is also good for people. My mind and body are completely windy, light and free after some biking in the morning in the wind. I imagine that the leaves feel the same after dancing in the wind the whole night... little tired but happy!

How trees and people are different but still alike

Trees unlike people prefer fewer clothes during wintertime and gets nicely dressed only for spring and summer time. Trees unlike people follow the same fashion every year, so I already know which green color my tree will choose for next year. Trees unlike people stay where they are.

But trees like people need fresh air, light, water and proper nutrition to feel good.

to have or not to have a guidebook ??

I love books, but there is one type of book that I cannot decide if I like or not; guidebooks.

I think that reading in a guidebook while traveling easily takes away to much attention from the experience. Surely its nice to get to know things about the place but there are so many ways. It is of course very nice to know someone on the spot and this way of discovering is not possible when going alone, with or without guidebook. Internet offers lots of information and once there the locals and the tourist office will give good information.

Last year when we went to India, we brought a Lonely planet but actually we hardly didn’t open it. India was so overwhelming itself that I couldn’t also read about it, I was so busy just being there.

Even if I’m sure it will be the same this year, I feel more prepared as I know what is waiting for us there. I wanted to read a bit before and as I’m going once more in a few months, I thought I would get a guidebook.

I went to a second hand shop for books in English and I found a Rough Guide to India. It’s from 2003 but the stuff I’m interested in cannot have changed since then. The book is really detailed and I hesitated quite a lot; do I want or not a guidebook?? - I almost read the whole guidebook while deciding :) Finally I bought it, I decided I can always give it back to the secondhand shop when I don’t want it anymore.

Somehow, those kind of guidebooks is a bit too much for me. They give such detailed information that the traveler will know exactly what will appear around the next corner and then the pleasure and excitement with traveling is going I must say. It feels like they already did the travel for you and you just have to repeat. And it must be better to look at place in real life as it is there in front of us instead of in the book...

Anyway, I now I have my Indian guidebook, it has its temporary place at the table next to my bed and it did already offer some interesting reading. And the more I read, the more I realise that I want to learn about this crazy country and it seems like the guidebook is a good start.

So, maybe I can say that I like guidebooks before and maybe after traveling but not during...

one picture says more than...

Saturday I went with some friends to see the World Press Exhibition and we spent a very nice afternoon traveling in mind visiting different places and people all over the world. The photos were all so different with one common characteristic - they were great, catching precise moments and all the feelings involved!

I think I liked some of the sport photos the most, there were some really cool ones. There were also many great but really scary photos reminding how cruel this world can be and the exhibition also offered some amazing nature photos showing the beauty which is all around us.

It is fascinating how those artists can catch moments so well and make the pictures talk to so many people around the world. If this visit was a scientific experiment, one conclusion could be that Russian, Swedish, Canadian and French people have the same taste when it comes to photos - a clear sign of globalisation even in this matter :) and more or less the same understanding of the world. But to be honest, the test group did not include a fair representative group, (four expat well-educated girls just below the age of 30), so maybe a better conclusion is that we are likely to choose to hang out with people similar to us no matter where they are from...

Anyway, the saying one picture says more than a thousands words proved to be true...

Even if I recommend to see this live instead of on the computer screen, the pictures can be seen at: http://www.worldpressphoto.org/index.php?option=com_photogallery&task=blogsection&id=19&Itemid=223&bandwidth=high

The photos I liked the most for different reasons includes the 1st and the 3rd one in the sport for expressing the exact moments with emotions and action, the 1st in the general news with the Brazilian women with the naked resisting against the police, the 3rd one in the Sport stories for its preciseness. The 1st in Daily Life is a really scary photo with the children watching the killed women.

There are many many more great ones, and I could go on telling about witch ones I liked but check them out your self! and have a look at the schedule if the exhibitions comes close to where you are... Tips, the exhibition is also right now in Copenhagen until 1 November...

musical energies

Earlier this week I went by metro to work, and the man next to me was listening to some very loud aggressive hard rock which I must say disturbed my morning peace at least partly, hehe I'm realising when writing this that I sound a bit old but that is not the point I wanted to make here not now..:)

Instead I wanted to write about how it made me think of how much music is a part of our identity or how we express our identity, how much it influence us and affects our mood and well being and is full of messages. Music is a carrier of memories like a box of forgotten or hidden feelings that appears with the tunes of a special melody. And it is also interesting how music can speak to us even when when we don't know the language of the lyrics

I wonder how this man felt taking out the earplugs.. but maybe it was still better than the other noise pollution in a big city. I don't know. I also wonder what that music told him, what added value it gave him but these are secrets I will not get to know. His facial expression didn't help me to guess

At my yoga I discovered so much beautiful music, perfect for meditation but not only, it's good for almost any occasion (ok, reservation for wild parties..:) and especially for mornings and evenings and stressful moments at work.

To bring some of the peace I found at the yoga with me home I decided to buy a special CD that I learnt to like a lot at the course and at the English part of the website http://www.satnam-versand.de I discovered some other nice sound samples with musical energies that I am enjoying since then. Maybe you will like it too