#ive been thinking too hard about in world cultures too and its ruining me

[motts-fruit-punch]

ive thought unnecessarily hard about their character

flat colors

[du0tine]

well, fuck.

this isn’t great. frankly its horrible.

it’s never fun being suspended so high in the air with the harsh winds blowing roughly in your direction forcing you to seek shelter against the icy and snowy mixture of rock that sits atop the towering mountain.

to be honest, had it been any other day this would’ve been thrilling. being up here in harsh conditions, struggling to hold on and testing my mental and physical capabilities would’ve been so much fucking fun.

but there are days where you just imagine the rope that holds you up so high, snapping and slicing against a sharp piece of rock as you plummet to your death. the sky is the last thing you see, the butterflies in your stomach going mad from the sudden drop and you can’t help but think, “im going to die.”

most people, in this case: climbers that is, don’t want to die. they understand the risks, they know that given what they do things are bound to happen and im someone who understands that concept very well. but some of us are just so desensitized to the point that death feels like nothing, we’re used to losing team mates, friends and lovers. i just didn’t understand why i wanted for it to happen to me so much.

climbing is a large part of my life amongst other things; friends, family and other significant factors. all pieces both large and small that factor into what i call my life, something that i can’t help but be grateful for. but sometimes i realize life is fleeting. i realize just how short it is and sometimes i realize that, you know what? im okay with dying. whether it be today, tomorrow or the day after, i understand that death is inevitable and sometimes i just yearn for it to happen a little faster.

it often comes and goes, starting with tears and ending with cold, blank and rather monotone eyes gazing into the emptiness. i don’t know what it feels like exactly, the physicality is easy to understand but when i have to put into words its too hard. but it feel freezing cold, isolation hurts, solitude is pain. im all alone with nothing and no one and in fact, i do think im alone despite everything.

i just know im alone.

i have so many people in my life but it’s hard for me to understand why they’re here, it becomes difficult for me to keep them in my life. i find it hard to continue to speak with lifelong friends, keep in touch with cousins and other family. my parents and siblings (my brothers only being 3 & 5) being the only people i can speak to without feeling so choked up.

i speak to people ive met here (tumblr) but it never goes past a few conversations that occur from time to time and to those i do talk consistently with i can’t help but feel like i annoy. sometimes people reach out to me for advice, for guidance and of course, i aid them. it only pains me a little to never be asked if im okay in return but whatever right? as long as the people are happy, then im happy.

here in nepal, it’s been nice. people are nice. the way of life is one that no one takes for granted and it makes me feel out of place, like a spoiled brat who just yearns so much to escape but i try my best to just take a deep breath and indulge. the buddhist culture here makes me understand the ways of life, living alongside other climbers and watching sherpas dance to the tune of death, twisting around and just barely sneaking past almost every time.

despite how beautiful it is with the towering peaks, glaciers and fields of luscious green grass. death holds a strong presence here, one that’s covered by the tourism and clusters of climbers. but one that’s never ignored, everything being worshipped. pooja ceremonies being held for safe journeys and honouring the beautiful land, the mother of it all with offerings. mother nature is honoured and yet, she still plucks us one by one.

last year on my winter expedition i met a boy, well a man. someone who was 12 years older than me, someone i grew to have feelings for that in fact were reciprocated. despite seeming inappropriate, it was all consensual, it was positive and perfect. there was no dirty intention behind it and despite the large age gap it quickly flourished into a sweet, relationship but i found myself growing distant.

we were both sponsored by the same company which is how we met, the both of us being skiers and climbers. people who understood the dangers of venturing out into the wild, knowing what it meant to leave it all behind and pursue your wildest dreams.

he was perfect for me and yet, i broke up with him while living in nepal. i didn’t know why i did at first and it took me a lot of thinking. a lot of time being alone and realizing that throughout my whole life id been accustomed to supporting myself, knowing that there was no one else for me but me. perhaps it was the mixture of dreadful trauma id faced when i was younger, things i never told anyone, things that i only now realize just how bad they were.

regardless, the past is the past and i know i can’t let it hold me down and yet it’s just so hard to keep living when you know just how gravely you’ve been damaged. but i always tell myself that there’s someone out there who’s got it worse, someone who hasn’t stopped suffering from the day they’ve been brought into this world and until this very day.

like them i also wander the earth and yet i have an advantage, one that i should never take for granted and that being that everything that had happened, is over. i shouldn’t let it bring me down and ruin all the good things i have now.

so anyways, what lead to me ultimately breaking down was when i found myself like i mentioned before climbing upwards, fifteen pitches ahead in the air with my team around me. belayed upwards as i find myself freezing momentarily when the snow from above comes falling down, raining down on me as the wind whips me in the face.

it felt so cold, i couldn’t help but press my forehead against the wall and look downwards at my dangling feet. my hands were numb, my ice pick wedged into the snow and ice, my toes just barely warm. i just found myself observing how far away the ground was from where i hung. the distance from where i spiralled about to the ground was like how disconnected i felt from the earth. physically i am here but mentally im lost. where am i? i don’t know, maybe ill know someday? but what if i just don’t try anymore and let it all go, the place im in isn’t a bad place to die in fact, it’s beautiful.

but i can’t let myself plummet to the ground in front of people i know, i can’t traumatize them. i can’t be selfish and hurt others, id already done it once and that was to the man i loved.

pushing forwards we finished climbing, taking in the air at the top and looking down at everything. feeling like we were in fact on top of the world when really this was only one of the peaks we decided to acclimatize to in preparation for the everest/lhotse push that would happen in the next two months.

the feeling was the same as always, a feeling of satisfaction. you feel unstoppable at the top of the mountain, like there’s nothing and no one in your path and yet for the first time i felt anxious.

i felt like i was going to throw up. it didn’t feel great to be up here, i didn’t know why at that moment but when we began rappelling downwards i couldn’t help but think about how cold hearted i was for breaking up with him. there was no reason for me to do so and yet, i just did. it wasn’t right and it took me sometime to realize why. i needed to make sure i could at least put in the effort to do something.

the trek back to base camp was agonizing. i felt like i couldn’t breath properly, falling out of tune with my surroundings and just marching forwards. my team looking like blobs of colourful parkas. silently i felt myself weeping and just feeling like shit. i hated this.

it was embarrassing, i always made sure to peel myself apart and cry when there was no one around and yet here i was crying with people i knew and got to know around me. one of my leaders, who was a single mom that was a total badass in the mountains and one of the best ski mountaineer ive met (she’s also my team lead) spotted me falling apart and staggered behind to talk things out with me and i began to find comfort in consolidating in someone.

this was something i never even did with my own mother. this was the first time i looked for guidance in someone who’d lived longer than me and understood how grief, sadness and just a clusterfuck of emotions works.

with every step i took i slowly pieced the answers i needed for my puzzle piece and now here i am sitting inside my tent typing this foolish rant. my fingers lingering over the call button of the contact id for my ex boyfriend.

i think ill call him and apologize.

it’ll be a good first step.

update: things have been solved (relationship wise) but i don’t feel too good mentally nor physically. unfortunately, i received heartbreaking news that my bestfriend passed away and i feel lost. i don’t know what’s going on, what’s going to happen and i just feel guilty and pathetic. despite that comment, the less people see this the better, it’s not good energy and it’s just negatively going to affect others but i can’t dip without an explanation.

things are on a queue.

[transfemininomenon]

Hey, i'm actually a "truscum" i found out recently, but im a little confused on the whole ordeal. Im not even sure if i actually am truscum or not- because some posts seem to tie up with me being one but others dont, but i saw you were really against them, so i wanted to ask if you're okay with a friendly calm conversation about it? I am very confused and i just want to learn a bit more or find out if i'm wrong about the whole ordeal. Are you open to it?

i'll be honest im not sure how friendly i can be with this kind of conversation because i really truly genuinely, and i don't use this word lightly, Hate truscum and its hard for me to really be civil about the discussion. but for the sake of this and me giving you a lot of benefit of the doubt that this ask is in good faith i'll explain why i do not like the entire truscum ideology

1. i guess i'll start off with the Big One - the claim that dysphoria is Required to be trans. i'll preface this by saying that i am someone who has experienced, and currently Experiences in wildly different degrees depending on what is happening in my life, dysphoria throughout my entire life. i had my entire teenage and young adult years stolen from me by it. i won't get into details about it because that is a Very Very Personal subject for me, but needless to say dysphoria is something that was a very prevalent part of my life.

anyway. the notion that dysphoria is a Trans Requirement™ is something that i hugely disagree with. i used to think that me figuring out i was a trans woman was because i experienced dysphoria, but frankly the opposite is true. dysphoria is what made me refuse to believe i was a woman or could ever be one. it made me believe i was a man and that was all i would ever be. it wasn't until i really started experimenting with my gender and unpacking a lot of stuff i felt about myself that i started to finally realize the woman i was. i first started trying our she/her pronouns nearing four years now, and started using the name Alice a few months after that. being referred to as a woman & experimenting with different feminine things gave me such incredible feelings of euphoria that i still experience to this day whenever i discover something new about my identity.

and that is something ive heard from SO many other trans people i know. or different things too - i know people who are completely fine with their bodies, just certain words and terms never felt Right to them. because the thing with dysphoria is that it, like all things gender related, is a product of society. dysphoria only exists because transphobia exists - people are told that there are these two rigid things that you are and HERE is what makes you one of those things, and those things are drilled into you literally since birth. everything from colors to jobs to hobbies to cars to entertainment to clothing to Literally Everything is gendered, and when that happens then of fucking course there are gonna be people who don't fall in line with that, and when it's so instilled into people and seen as such societal norms of COURSE people are going to have trouble with that.

and that's not even getting into the subject of gender on a biological level. the fact of the matter is that the two sex system Isn't True and that biological sex is very complicated. intersex people exist, people with all kinds of different chromosomes exist, people of certain body types that have higher levels of different hormones exist, SO much goes into that subject that frankly narrowing it down to two things just doesn't Work

and that's the real problem at the end of the day. dysphoria only exists because of a fucked up gender binary that clashes with both biology and sociology. people are complicated on both a biological and personal level and having set binaries for things is bound to cause confusion & doubt.

like, people's identities are SUCH personal things in so many different ways. there isn't any Right Way™ to be trans. i know trans women with beards, trans women who have no interest in starting hrt, trans men who wear dresses and makeup, non-binary people who make no effort to be androgynous, i know SO many different identities and different people. because the fact is that there's no right way to be trans because nothing is inherently gendered including people's very bodies. people are themselves and there is no Right way to be themselves.

that's on top of the lack of education when it comes to the subject of gender. such a huge part too of me figuring out i was trans was literally learning that it was even a fucking option. i genuinely didn't know just Being A Girl was an option. reading up on gender stuff and researching the different idea of transitioning was intrinsic in my figuring out who i was because oh shit turns out there are people like me and that is Okay.

like, dysphoria literally could've been a non-issue for me. i could've lived in a world where i could just Exist and enjoy whatever i wanted without it being weird. i could've decided so much sooner that i wasn't happy with the way my body was growing and not spent my entire teen years being so confused why i was so sad seeing my girl peers. i could have from the start just gotten to be a girl and never have had dysphoria be part of the equation.

im not trans being i experience dysphoria. im trans because being a woman is rad as hell and it's what i wanted. im trans because changing my name to Alice was the biggest moment of my entire life. im trans because rebelling against the societal restraints of gender is fucking metal. im trans because my friends can't even remember me ever not being me now. im trans because im a great older sister. im trans because god nerfed me and i said nah thanks man but im not feeling it.

my identity and my gender are very personal and complicated things, and narrowing it down to "i experience dysphoria" is frankly insulting to me.

anyway, that's the big point out of the way, so here's some shorter ones

2. this is kinda expanding on the last point, but truscum both insisting non-binary people aren't a thing and them insisting "transtrenders" exist is hmm Bad

the sheer fact of the matter is the concept of being non-binary has existed from the oldest known records of human history on TOP of that concept being prevalent in many different cultures so what do ya know there's a healthy dose of racism involved in the denial of non-binary people. the gender binary is such a western concept and there are SO many different cultures where different gender identities exist.

and, frankly, going back to the above point that gender is fucking Fake and is a societal concept - again, of fucking course there are going to be people who see a rigid set of rules on gender and are like "well wait that doesn't fit me" so of COURSE non-binary people exist

on the subject of "transtrenders" i feel like i shouldn't even HAVE to get into this subject because of how inherently transphobic it is. the concept doesn't exist. there are people who experiment with their gender and then decide their assigned one is fine. there are people who go through all kinds of different identities. there are people who come out as a different gender and then revert back due to backlash. there are people who get told the way they present their gender is the Wrong Way™ and get branded a trender. it's a dangerous thought process that literally does nothing but serve the cis status quo and make people afraid to experiment and think about their identities.

3. the idea that Those Evil Trenders™ are stealing resources from the Real Trans People™ is, frankly, fucking bullshit. issues when it comes to trans people finding difficulty accessing healthcare comes from a transphobic society hellbent on denying us care on top of fucked up healthcare systems in general. hormones aren't some limited quality hard to acquire thing - when i started hrt transferring my prescription from my clinic to my local pharmacy was a non-issue because it's something basically any pharmacy will have for ALL kinds of different purposes. it's an issue because healthcare in general is a god damn Mess on TOP of inherent transphobia

and, frankly, truscum are directly involved in that transphobia in the medical field. unless you find an informed consent clinic you're going to have to jump through all kinds of hoops to prove you're Actually Trans™ by getting referrals from other (almost always cis) people and then get put on ridiculous waitlists to make sure you're not about to change your mind. that kind of attitude is only encouraged by truscum and it is one of the biggest source of trans people having such difficulty accessing healthcare.

4. truscum as far as im concerned are no different than any other transphobe. two years ago before i started hrt i was harassed by truscum multiple times, each time having them tell me i wasn't trans, that i was just a trender, and it genuinely boggles my mind that anyone thinks misgendering me because i disagreed with their ideology is Woke, actually. I've seen so many fellow trans women getting called men by truscum who disagreed with them. i was actively told i shouldn't start hrt because i "wasn't really trans and was gonna ruin my life"

i really hope all of people live in anger every day knowing ive been on hrt over a year and a half and am fucking Thriving

anyway that's all i got to say on the matter i realize my points became less thought out as it went on but frankly the first point is enough for me to not like truscum

(please refrain from reblogging this i don't want any clowns in my inbox)

[macdvnald]

[ CHRISTIAN SERRATOS ] • [ SHE/HER ] | is that [ MARY MACDONALD ] , the [ NINETEEN ] year/s old [ GRYFFINDOR ] alumnus , walking down diagon alley ? I heard that the last time they had their fortune read, they drew the [ HIEROPHANT REVERSED ] , which seems [ UNLUCKY ] . hopefully they won’t come to any harm, considering their recent choice to ally themselves with [ THE ORDER OF THE PHOENIX ] . they’ll probably be fine - I know they’re [ PERSISTENT ] , though apparently they can also be [ RUTHLESS ] . what’s the worst that could happen ? | 

LINKS: stats, pinboard, playlist PARALLELS: johanna mason ( the hunger games ), jessica jones ( jessica jones ), raven reyes ( the 100 ), ellie ( the last of us ), rosa diaz ( brooklyn 99 ), nancy wheeler ( stranger things ), kat edison ( the bold type ), sarah manning ( orphan black ) HELLO and welcome to the mess that is this intro!! on the bottom are some plot ideas & besides that its a big old mess! but we love disorganisation! hit this up with a like if u want me to hit u up for plots and i sure as hell will <333

history

mary had a little lamb? WRONG. mary had a little calf. because she was born on a dairy farm in the highlands of scotland ( laugh at my joke pls i worked hard on it ). she was born third to two muggles – a scottish father and a mexican mother, who loved each other deeply – and would eventually become their middle child. she could have become overlooked, but mary never felt discounted at home: while her parents were very often busy with the cows, their love ran deep.

her youth consisted of this: running through fields of grass, attending a muggle elementary where people sang songs at her ( old macdonald had a farm and mary had a little lamb ), playing with the animals, building tree houses with her brothers and sister and playing football every spare moment she got. it was good and simple and wholesome.

of course, strange things happened, as they tend to with muggleborns: she’d explode her brother’s toy when she got angry, or let things fly around the room when she was laughing. when she found out she was a witch at age eleven, things fell in its place. and the macdonalds, while traditional catholics, accepted mary, which is the most important thing of it all. her parents were shocked, yes, but they squeezed her shoulder and promised to discover this all together.

which?? very much influenced mary greatly? because it went against a lot of things they – and she, too – believed in? this has allowed her to have a faith in people, and while she may be cynical and bitter at times, that faith is still there.

hogwarts was as chaotic as home, and mary settled in quite nicely. sorted into gryffindor ( she guessed it was for her rambunctious nature, but who knew ), she found herself a second home and loved it. as it turned out, she was rather good with a wand as well – she didn’t do so good at essays, though – and genuinely liked learning ( except for history of magic. fuck that. ).

being a muggleborn had its downsides, of course, but mary never really allowed herself to feel discouraged. hurt? yes, definitely, but never discouraged. she wasn’t going to let it get to her, she told herself, but it did, especially when the harsh words turned into something more. it was during her confrontation with mulciber that mary felt true, harsh fear for the first time. she felt shut down, paralysed, depressed —– but then, after a while, she got up and took some important steps. she reported mulciber, which led to nothing, which caused her to feel angry, which in turn caused her to feel determination. if the system wasn’t going to be on her side, she’d just have to fucking change it, right? mary started throwing herself in her schoolwork, determined to join the dmle – hopefully as an auror, but any position would do. she suppressed her fear and the trauma that was there, and kept her chin up.

the entire mulciber situation is up for change, should we get a mulciber, or if it doesn’t correspondent with the plot/rp canon! 

graduation rolled around and mary got the five required NEWTs to even apply. it was a nervewracking process, but once she got into auror training, she cried. like. for a year. she was so proud of herself and she felt so determined and !! man. it was such a good, defining moment. around the same time, mary joined the order; she knew the ministry was corrupt, and that it’d not allow her to do everything she wanted to, when the order DID. mary had too much anger, too much determination to fight this bullshit to just stick with the ministry, and so the order seemed like the right place.

right now, she’s fighting. she’s gritting her teeth and keeping her goals in the back in her mind and is focusing. and she does not always feel brave or confident or self assured, but that does not matter: mary macdonald always gets the fuck back up, and that’s what she will keep doing until she’s completely knocked down.

personality & tidbits

mary is a human espresso. she’s so. damn. bitter?? despite the fact that she keeps on going and that she’s fighting her ass off, she’s tired and angry that things don’t seem to be moving in the right direction, she’s feeling bitter about the fact that this kind of discrimination is happening right in front of her eyes and that she does not have enough power to stop it. she feels powerless, which makes her feel bitter, which makes her cynical.

still! mary is not necessarily a debbie downer to be around. she keeps her bitterness ( and hopelessness, even ) carefully hidden in boxes in her mind. on the outside, she’s filled with quips and smiles and quick comments! just a sociable bean, but just a bitter one.

is a dog person and will fight anyone who prefers cats. has a cairn terrier called bowie. she loves him more than anyone.

obsessed with tea, tbh. her ma always said that ‘there’s nothing a cuppa can’t fix’ and mary definitely agrees with this statement.

though is also a ‘whiskey in a teacup’ kinda gal

can be spotted wearing either a rly nice ass blazer or a jean jacket, no inbetween. either office-fancy or farmer-chique

fucking loves muggle culture and loves fellow muggleborns and !!!!!! she loves it!!!

very much in a take-no-prisoners mindset at this point re: death eaters. it kind of scares her, tbh, but mary is very much capable of murdering a death eater, even if she could stun them — she’s just done. she’s very. done. with them. and this whole shbang? will only feed into this.

mary is ruthless, that’s what it boils down to. she’s a lot more than that, of course, but i chose that trait for her app because she is --- in small things ( football matches & boardgames ) but also in bigger ones, and of course the war is the main way it shows. mary is so angry. she’s so angry and scared and tired of feeling that way and tired of being scared to lose people and herself and of death and she’s so angry that people really are this way and that they really do these things --- she wants it to stop. she wants the world to be right. and sometimes she thinks the ends do justify the means. 

this is why she’s chaotic neutral and not chaotic good.

like ive had her turned to dark arts before just bc she’s so desperate to. fucking win.

and she’s also like --- mary doesnt care if she ruins herself? if she becomes a bad person who’s unable to live with the shit she’s done? as long as the world is better for it, as long as kids can go to hogwarts and feel safe and the world is a safe place for everyone. what does her soul matter in the grand scheme of things? she’d burn in hell forever if it meant the rest of the world changed for the better.

emotionally driven mess of a being

is catholic but struggles a lot with religion and feeling faithful, but she does still identify is a catholic, it’s just? complicated. it’s rly complicated and she hates it.

is a bit flighty when it comes to romance, def has a lot of one night stands/fwb situations though??? she’s just like??? i dont have time for romance its a WAR

has been trying to stop smoking for five years, but alas

mary also works part time at quality quidditch supplies because the girl loves quidditch ---- though not as much as she loves football.

a proud scot. probably lives in scotland, but i’m ... going to keep her living situaiton open and segue into Wanted Plots!

plot ideas

roomies ----- so mary is not Earning A Whole Lot Right Now but does not want to live at home any more because 1. its in the middle of nowhere and 2. most importantly, she’s afraid of endangering her family. she needs roomies! i’d love for her to live in glasgow/edinburgh/london/idk a city!!!

hook ups/fwb’s/etc ----- mary is what the old ppl call promiscuous and she sleeps around. so ! let’s talk! former hook ups! booty calls! friends with benefits! etc etc etc! 

party pals ---- mary likes going to pubs and clubs in the muggle part of town bc it is a LIT way to escape the reality of the wizarding world and also, muggle clubs have better music. come party w her!!!!

in the dragon’s den together ---- fellow ministry employees who side eye the ministry and whom mary can sip tea and judge their colleagues with

mudbloods club ---- mary loves her fellow muggleborns and i would love some muggleborn friends that she can be buds with. ranting about dumb pureblood names and traditions and the fact that wizards dont have movies

general friendship ideas ---- im just going to a bunch of ideas here: hogwarts friends, ride or dies, order pals, friendly exes, fellow tea drinkers that she can go on coffee/tea dates with, friends who are growing apart bc of the war (my fave), etc.

etc ---- some other ideas i want to spitball: purists who h8 on mary’s life, fellow diagon alley employees, fellow order members, Annoyances, there is solidarity in being scottish, ministry connections, etc etc etc HIT ME UP

[filmista]

Retrospective: Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope (1977)

🤖“A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away…” 🚀

A lot of us either are a Star Wars fan, or we know someone that’s a huge fan. Either way, there’s no real way to avoid coming across it; it’s so ingrained in the collective conscience of the entire cinema frequenting world, that we all are familiar with the basics of its universe. 

I’ve managed to avoid it until now during my 20 years on this planet, but I have a friend whose brother was an enormous fan of the franchise and owned multiple Star Wars sweatshirts that his sister would “borrow” but watch it she never could, because she found the whole world so far out there, that she thought it was hilarious. 

But alas, one day her brother convinced her and she decided to just give it a watch and actually ended up liking it. Ever since she’s been trying to get me to watch it, without much success in her endeavor. 

Until I recently got me curious about it myself, I thought if so many people love it there has to be a reason for it. And my experience was a huge success, I loved it on the second watch that is. 

The very first time, I actually ruined my experience. By really not paying too much attention to it and even talk during…

My problem was the attitude with which I approached it, I was expecting to not connect to it beforehand, I had a preconceived of what Star Wars was, which is a silly blockbuster that later became a money-making machine. 

Alas, I was wrong, and I deprived myself of a fantastically fun experience, because of my own preexisting conceptions. 

I admit to most of the time being inclined towards and maybe respecting, so-called deeper and intellectual films more, films that I can really sink my teeth into. 

I wouldn’t say I had a contempt for blockbusters and big studio films, I just generally don’t like them as much, I tend to find them over the top, too dramatic and sometimes a bit lacking in the emotional department. 

But the longer I’ve been watching films, and my recent experience with Star Wars, really has taught me something, there’s nothing with a film being innocent fun and just an adventure throughout. 

Afterward, I realized how ridiculous it is that I do value Jurrasic Park, which is also a huge blockbuster, but looked down on Star Wars, just because it all overall seems more plausible and is set in a world that’s still recognizable. 

There’s merit in building an engaging fantasy world, and in creating characters that are instantly likable and that the audience can care about. 

Star Wars (the whole franchise) has now become a piece of pop culture, and especially that first film, allows us to travel back in time, to the 70’s a particular period in cinema history, to the time of the first so-called blockbuster. 

My main beef with “blockbusters” is that I’m not talking about each and every single one, there are ones that I enjoy. 

But they’re often so formulaic and so played into what people will automatically like and be attracted to, and sometimes that results in something that I find lackluster, not spontaneous enough and without a fun, beating heart though.

And while Star Wars is the so-called first blockbuster, one of the films that changed film history. My dislike of it was completely unjustified. And the joke was on me because I missed out all those years. 

Whilst it is a big film and expanded into something even bigger over the years: a franchise. No one really knew whether there would be sequels, but George Lucas did set up the possibility for them. 

It really made marketing for these big films into a huge thing, the company in charge of making the action figures for Star Wars (Kenner) initially was unable to keep up with the demand, every kid that saw this at the time wanted one. 

Now that’s something normal, but Star Wars was really the first film to start that. and it’s mostly relatively unknown cast at the time, apart from Harrison Ford (who had previously starred in the George Lucas directed, American Graffiti) were propelled into superstardom and into 70’s icons. 

Everyone knows names like Carrie Fisher and Mark Hamill, even if they’ve never seen a single Star Wars film. And everyone knows terms from the film, everyone knows what a lightsaber is and has a vague idea of what a Jedi is. 

So aside from all of its technical merits, and there’s quite a few, it’s above all else a historical document almost as well as a darn good piece of entertainment, and that’s more than enough in a film sometimes. 

And unlike some later blockbusters, Star Wars really is a charming and fun film, with a beating heart. You can see and feel the love that went into them, and the fun people involved were having. 

Its dialogue is super cheesy even corny, but it works because of the way the actors deliver them and their enjoyable chemistry with one another, also the cheesy dialogue is quite charming in its own right. 

The film is obviously more about what’s happening visually on screen, than any dialogue. And I think that was my problem initially, I always took it way too seriously… the terms didn’t make sense to me and annoyed me, and the world with all its creatures felt perplexing. 

This time I decided to just sit back, watch and not think too much and allow myself to be absorbed by it, really allow myself to be swept into the world. And it was a radically different experience. 

There are still terms of which I thought wait what is that, or what is that thing supposed to be? The truth is that doesn’t matter for one’s enjoyment of the film at all, once you stop trying to make too much sense of it, and look at it too rationally it becomes incredibly rewarding. It’s not about being realistic. the whole thing takes place in a fantasy world, Star Wars is like a surreal dream come to life. And it’s really a matter of suspending any disbelief and logical questioning and just accept that stuff is called the way it is, looks the way it is, and that it’s a world with giant slugs and rats that look tiny kangaroos. 

I was never before able to just let that element of it slide, and once you do start analyzing it, it can almost become funny. This time I set to myself: you’re gonna watch this, you’re not gonna question anything or laugh at anything. And I’m certainly glad me, myself and I had a stern talk. 

I generally don’t dig stuff set in space all that much or with intricate fantasy worlds. But Star Wars felt different, yes it’s in space. But it doesn’t feel confined to one space, nor does too outrageous… 

There’s something so familiar about that world, something we all instinctively know of how it works and that’s almost comforting and cozy to disappear in. 

It reminded me of when I would dive into comic books when I was younger, and just disappear into them an entire afternoon, Star Wars really brings back some of that childlike wonder and awe, and in that sense, it really is a purely magical film. 

I watched A New Hope, whilst feeling a little under the weather, and the afternoon passed incredibly quickly, which is what good films do: they make you unaware of time and space. It’s over two hours run time, actually felt quite short this time. And I can’t wait to check out the other ones as well. 

But to return to my previous point, part of why it’s so fun to disappear in and probably part of its enduring appeal and popularity is its coziness, the really lived in vibe of it all. The title also helps in this, by adding Episode to its title, it feels like being into introduced to a world that has always been there and that we’re just stumbling into it. 

It also doesn’t present us with any storylines, or conventions that are hard to grasp. You get an instinctive feel of the world and its rules and conventions. When it comes down to it, it really is a simple story of good vs evil, with the classical plot point of saving a princess thrown into the mix. 

The fun thing is that it does subvert some of these classical conventions, in any other story princess Leia would have waited passively for her rescue, whilst here she actually consciously chose to fight and resists until the end. At least in the first one, you don’t exactly find out why the empire is precisely so evil and why they want to rebel against it, but I figured it was just some sort of space equivalent to a fascist regime that wants to rule each and every one of the territories around it. Imperialism in space, heavy… 

The first time watching this, I questioned all of that too much, but this time I was like, okay the empire is run by some evil bastards in space, there are rebels fighting against them and they’ve got plans laid to destroy their massive weapon of mega-destruction. Which is what the empire wants to recover from the rebels, but of course, we all know Leia hid them in R2D2. 

Speaking of the robots, aside from their designs being super cute, as well as all the bleeps and blips. I loved how positively they were portrayed, no the robots are gonna take over and destroy all of us! 

That kind of film can be good, but it would be way too negative for Star Wars. Here they’re really seen as equals by the characters, and even worthy of being friends with. As well as having a personality as defined as the humans, the whole dynamic between R2D2 and 3CPO is both hilarious and heartwarming. 

And that’s again why it works so well, the lightness even the humor and all. There are moments of light bullshit almost that defy logic, like R2D2 and 3CPO talking the stormtrooper into letting them go, with the excuse of R2D2 having to go to maintenance, it’s like an almost ridiculously simple solution to the situation at hand. Lucas knows it’s nonsense, but just doesn’t care. After all, it’s part of the genre. 

If you really want to dig deep (well actually not that deep) but if you insist on an intellectual side to cinema, you’ll have realized that the force is actually one big metaphor for religion, a higher power. And that some believe in it and others don’t. Han Solo literally talks about the force in terms of: “I don’t believe in any of that hokey religious stuff”. 

But essentially it’s a metaphor for believing, for believing in something bigger than ourselves, that helps us overcome obstacles along our way. 

The whole given of The Force is actually incredibly well handled. At first sight, it seems like mumbo-jumbo - "The Force is an energy field that flows everywhere, you have to become passive and let yourself be led by it." In other words: relax and just watch what happens. 

That’s not exactly a very profound philosophy, given that it was apparently used for hundreds of years as a basis for peace and quiet in the Milky Way.

Yet it’s not bad that Lucas keeps it simple (and purposefully vague, you can see whatever you want in it) The Force is just The Force and no further bullshit. Everyone has an instinctive sense of what it is, but there are no long, pretentious monologues needed to make it work and have people grasp the concept. 

Seventies icons Mark Hamill and Carrie Fisher have the nominal main roles, and don’t do a bad job at all, their friendship comes across as believable and is very enjoyable to watch.

The chemistry between Harrison Ford and Carrie Fisher, also reveals hints of what’s to pass between the two later on in the story. The whole cast overall has fantastic chemistry with each other, you can’t really imagine that any of them got along badly in real life, they seem to be having too much genuine fun. But it is Harrison Ford who steals the show as Han Solo. It is only with his entry into the film, 45 minutes after the beginning, that everything really comes to life. All other characters are quite serious and have serious motivations. 

Princess Leia tries to save her people (although Leia is a really enjoyable character because of her boldness and sassiness), only to see her entire planet explode before her eyes. Heavy. Luke Skywalker, in turn, grew up without parents, with his uncle and aunt, who are also murdered at the beginning of the film. 

And Obi-Wan is of course little more than a wisdom-spouting old man who must stay serene at all times while scratching his beard. Han Solo, on the other hand, has absolutely no melancholy background. 

He is a mercenary, who is only out for money, and that gives him the freedom to spit out one-liners as much as he wants, to put his crooked grin on display and insult the other characters whenever he feels like it. 'Star Wars' is a series that keeps going in the direction of the bombastic.

Perhaps that is inevitable considering the genre film. The function of Han Solo's character is that he pierces through that bombast. Whenever it threatens to go all over the top, you just have to give him a scene, and immediately the atmosphere becomes lighter, more pleasant and enjoyable.

Another thing that can’t be avoided when talking about Star Wars, is just how beautifully worked out and brought onto the screen the whole universe is. While it’s all undeniably a product of its time and feels decidedly 70’s, it still holds up incredibly well and feels really realistic for its time. 

The different locations are all incredibly gorgeous to look at, and the special effects absolutely splendid. The colors and lights of some scenes is an absolute joy.  Whilst John William’s beautiful score, adds grandiosity and epicness as well as emotionally complementing certain scenes. 

Star Wars is undeniably a piece of film history that can’t really be avoided.  I wouldn’t have called it a masterpiece before, rather a very well made piece of entertainment. But now I’d have to change my view: a film can be a masterpiece, precisely for being an incredible piece of entertainment. 

"Someone Has To Save Our Skins. Into The Garbage Chute, Fly Boy."

[wanderingaxiety]

Peasant Quotes

Popular Topics

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He is happiest, be he king or peasant, who finds peace in his home.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Peace

Home

King

All men are by nature equal, made all of the same earth by one Workman; and however we deceive ourselves, as dear unto God is the poor peasant as the mighty prince.

Plato

Nature

God

Men

Every marriage tends to consist of an aristocrat and a peasant. Of a teacher and a learner.

John Updike

Teacher

Marriage

Aristocrat

A peasant becomes fond of his pig and is glad to salt away its pork. What is significant, and is so difficult for the urban stranger to understand, is that the two statements are connected by an and not by a but.

John Berger

Difficult

Stranger

Pig

I want there to be no peasant in my kingdom so poor that he cannot have a chicken in his pot every Sunday.

Henry IV

Chicken

Poor

Kingdom

Scratch a Russian, and you'll find a peasant.

Milla Jovovich

Find

Scratch

Russian

They're thinking of turning the peasant into an educated man. Why, first of all they should make him a good and prosperous farmer and then he'll learn all that is necessary for him to know.

Nikolai Gogol

Good

Man

Thinking

I mean, my people were very, very simple. They were peasant people, you know?

James Earl Jones

Simple

People

Know

I believe in reincarnation. In my last life I was a peasant. Next time around, I'd like to be an eagle. Who hasn't dreamed they could fly? They're a protected species, too.

Lee Trevino

Life

Time

Fly

The peasant must always be helped technically, economically, morally and culturally. The guerrilla fighter will be a sort of guiding angel who has fallen into the zone, helping the poor always and bothering the rich as little as possible in the first phases of the war.

Che Guevara

War

Angel

Rich

My wife was the first art collector in the family, and I didn't become interested until around 1973. The first important artwork we bought was a Van Gogh drawing of two peasant houses in Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer.

Eli Broad

Family

Art

Wife

They eat the dainty food of famous chefs with the same pleasure with which they devour gross peasant dishes, mostly composed of garlic and tomatoes, or fisherman's octopus and shrimps, fried in heavily scented olive oil on a little deserted beach.

Luigi Barzini

Food

Famous

Pleasure

What motivated me? My mother. My mother was an immigrant woman, a peasant woman, struggled all her life, worked in the garment center.

Al Lewis

Life

Mom

Me

I cook a little bit. I make a Hungarian dish called chicken paprikash that's out of this world. I'll give a heads-up to all of your readers that it doesn't have to be between Thai and Mexican every night. Toss some Hungarian in every once in a while. You will not be sorry. Good, solid peasant food.

Adam Carolla

Good

Food

Night

You know most of the food that Americans hold so dear - things like hamburgers and hot dogs - were road food, but even before they were road food, they were peasant food.

Alton Brown

Food

Hot

Road

We must always remember that the Chinese revolution was not a peasant's revolution, but one of the extreme Right.

Salvador Dali

Remember

Always

Revolution

We want to overthrow the imperial power not because it is Manchurian but because we want republicanism... We republican revolutionaries can never have the notion of becoming emperors after the revolution, like all the peasant rebels did in the past.

Sun Yat-sen

Power

Past

Never

There is but one stage for the peasant and the actor.

Henry David Thoreau

Stage

Actor

I don't ever want to be like a peasant. I want to always be all right. But motivation is fans - not your kids, your mum, none of that. All of that matters, but number one is your fans.

Young Thug

Fans

Always

Right

That a peasant may become king does not render the kingdom democratic.

Woodrow Wilson

King

Kingdom

Become

I am an African-American woman of dark skin tone, and there are very specific roles that are usually given to African-American women of a darker hue. Let's start with 'Once on This Island': peasant girl. Let's go to 'The Color Purple': young girl, beaten. Let's go to 'Ragtime': Her baby's taken.

LaChanze

Women

I Am

Skin

The earth is the earth as a peasant sees it, the world is the world as a duchess sees it, and anyway a duchess would be nothing if the earth was not there as the peasant sees it.

Gertrude Stein

World

Earth

Nothing

For an Italian peasant a telegram from anywhere is a wondrous thing; and a cable from the terrestrial paradise of America is not lightly to be disregarded.

Howard K. Smith

Paradise

America

Anywhere

I come from a long line of below-stairs maids and gardeners. Good ol' peasant stock. My mother and her sister made a quantum leap out of that life. Then I made another quantum leap.

Julie Andrews

Life

Good

Long

Remember the valiant Iraqi peasant and how he shot down an American Apache with an old weapon.

Saddam Hussein

Remember

American

Down

I am a peasant from the Auvergne. I want to keep my farm, and I want to keep France. Nothing else matters now.

Pierre Laval

I Am

Nothing

Want

The poor peasant here hives under conditions quite different from those of Russia. Though often terrible, they are not as appalling as they were there.

Herman Gorter

Poor

Russia

Terrible

If ever there was a slamming of the door in the face of constructive investigation, it is the word miracle. To a medieval peasant, a radio would have seemed like a miracle.

Richard Dawkins

Face

Door

Radio

I like army boots, I like peasant skirts - sometimes together! So I do know that I have odd taste.

Mayim Bialik

Together

Sometimes

Know

I like Sicilian food. It's real peasant food.

Raymond Kelly

Food

Real

Like

I do not have voice for Russian music; I cannot be cute little peasant like in operas of Glinka or Rimsky-Korsakov. I am now never in Russia; I am Austrian citizen. But definitely I am Latin!

Anna Netrebko

Music

I Am

Cute

There aren't many great passages written about food, but I love one by George Millar, who worked for the SOE in the second world war and wrote a book called 'Horned Pigeon.' He had been on the run and hadn't eaten for a week, and his description of the cheese fondue he smells in the peasant kitchen of a house in eastern France is unbelievable.

Sebastian Faulks

Love

War

Food

I am for poetry that is admired by peasant and aristocrat alike.

F. Sionil Jose

Poetry

I Am

Aristocrat

To me, the most critical thing in agriculture is investing in the peasant agriculture, transforming peasant agriculture.

Jakaya Kikwete

Me

Agriculture

Critical

The whole world feels that it knows Francis, not so much because he follows Francis of Assisi but because he is always himself. We have seen him pay his own hotel bill and heard that Francis called Buenos Aires for a pair of ordinary black shoes, like John XXIII, who preferred stout peasant shoes to the traditional papal footwear.

Eugene Kennedy

Black

World

Shoes

The Breton peasant is said to have a hard head. He is obstinate and resists outside pressure to alter his creed or his customs.

Sabine Baring-Gould

Pressure

Hard

Outside

I remember I once went to a nutritionist who said I come from good Russian-Jewish peasant stock, which means I can hold a potato in my body for a week, if need be.

Jennifer Jason Leigh

Good

Remember

Body

Border collies predate the British Kennel Club. They've been bred consistently for 100 years. They're the last working dogs in the world, with some minor exceptions. Bench shows, dog shows have ruined the other breeds, like the hunting dogs. Border collies are peasant dogs, and that's protected them.

Donald McCaig

World

Dog

Bench

The knish is a classic example of peasant food evolving into comfort food and even sophisticated fare.

Gil Marks

Food

Comfort

Comfort Food

You go to Europe, and they have their very wealthy elites, and then everybody else is, you know, a couple of steps above a peasant, basically.

Ann Coulter

Know

Go

Europe

There are two classes of women in Soviet Russia. There is the professional class, which has taken the place of the nobility and includes government officials, artists, doctors, composers and writers as well as former members of the old nobility whose sympathy is with the Soviets, and also the peasant class.

Elsa Schiaparelli

Women

Government

Sympathy

Tolstoy didn't know about steampunk or cyborgs, but he did know about the nightmarishness of steam power, unruly machines, and the creepy half-human status of the Russian peasant classes. In 'Anna Karenina,' nineteenth-century life itself is a relentless, relentlessly modern machine, flattening those who oppose it.

Elif Batuman

Life

Power

Know

Most people, throughout history, haven't learned one language to the exclusion of another. You learn to speak differently to a peasant and to a shoemaker. You speak differently to your mother, who comes from Burgundy, and to your father, who comes from Swabia.

[fandomiseverything]

Pros and Con of Countries - Written by two Americans (Who both live in Minnesota)

Canadia

Pros:

Marriage equality (the gays can get married!) (SINCE 2005!!!!) (YEAH!!!!!)

Free healthcare :0

People are truly friendly

Politics are lighthearted and easily run

Higher wages

They have a town called Regina

Money has little windows that when a laser pointer is shined through it, it shows the value on the wall

They hate Justin Bieber

I’m pretty sure Justin Bieber can’t go into Canada? So that’s good (that is good)

Avril Lavigne

AVRIL LAVIGNE (yeah shes great but why is she a pro 2 times) (cuz she’s a clone) (ohyea)

Its a themepark (what) (their money projects the amount on the wall, its monopoly money, its waterproof, and its a scratch and sniff….. Its a themepark)

GingerPale

Rei & Shane (and Rei’s cats)

Canada is one of the most gay-friendly countries in the world

Change of legal sex available in all provinces and territories

under varying rules without sexual reassignment surgery

Tim Horton’s (YEEEEE, now i want tim hortons, ive heard of it never had it, and now i want it) (it’s gooooood. One day we could drive down to Brainerd and get some) (THEY HAVE TIM HORTONS IN BRAINERD????/!111/1/1?1/1?!?!?!?) (ye) (WEEEENEEEEEDDDTTOOOOOGGOOOGOGOOO!!!!11!!!1!11!!!!!, LEAVE IT TO MINNESOTA OR AS WE KNOW IT, SOUTH CANADA, TO HAVE A TIM HORTONS)

Cons:

Higher cost of living

Snow. lots of fucking snow.

Their money??? Is weird???

Consumer choice is low (especially with Netflix. The Canadian library is half the size of America’s)

Environmental impact (they’re one of the top oil producers in the world)

They spell Canadien with an “e” (its Canadian you matherfeker)

Its kinda hard to get into Canada

*Chloe voice* they are not French they just PRETEND to be for ATTENTION. (wow)

A lot of people only speak French (thats pretty much the same for any country, they speak a different language)

How do you speak French (very difficultly, lots of vowels, slightly similar to italian and spanish)

Its a themepark

It doesn’t exist (vtru)

COLD

Sweden

Pros:

It’s very clean. Like, seriously.

Most attractive people in the world

The locals are anti-social

The Gay has been legal since 1944

Right to change legal gender since 1972,

No sterilization required since 2013

Sexual orientation and gender identity/expression protections

Gays can adopt

Gay marriage legal since 2009

the first country in the world to allow transgender people to legally correct their gender

HomO, was the Swedish office of the ombudsman against discrimination on grounds of sexual orientation (i think its a funny name)

after one year of abstaining from sex, gay and bi men can donate blood

Sweden is Europe's most gay-friendly country

Cons

Very high taxes

Can’t ask for directions no one will talk to you :(

The locals are anti-social (so am i)

Germnay

Pros:

Central hub makes it easy to travel to other european countries

Good healthcare

Very active, with fairs and parties

Oktoberfest is pretty lit i guess (you guess?) (I’ve never been to Oktoberfest but my friend from Germnay - fuck you - says it’s great)

Legal drinking age is 16

Rammstein

Furries (i’m not a furry i sWEAR) (are you sure about that??) (i dOnT kNoW)

Legal to be gay  since 1968 East Germany and 1969 West Germany

Gay marriage legal since 2017

Transgender persons allowed to change legal gender without required sterilisation and surgery

Sexual orientation and gender identity protection nationwide; some protections vary by region

Full adoption rights since 2017

gay and bisexual men have been allowed to donate blood, provided they haven't had sex for twelve months

83% of Germans support same-sex marriage

Cons:

Nearly everything is closed on sunday

Legal drinking age is 16

Germans dont get sarcasm

Finland

Pros:

They, unlike the Germans LOVE sarcasm

Very clean air

walk anywhere in nature at anytime

SEALS they have a special breed of seal native to finland

Very clear northern lights

They’re modest?

Extremists

Good heavy metal music apparently

People say they’re kind

Some of the most progressive lgbt laws in the world

Transgender people allowed to change legal gender, but only after sterilization

Sexual orientation and gender identity protections

Gay marriage is legal

Legal to be gay since 1971

one of the most LGBT-friendly countries in the world and public acceptance of LGBT people and same-sex relationships is high (lots of gays!!)

Cons:

CANCELLED, THEY HAVE FAT RARE SEALS

Norway (Richie’s fave country besides Canada)

Pros:

Snow is wet so you can actually do stuff with it (unlike MINNESOTA) (you CAN do stuff with minnesota snow!) (NO YOU CAN’T IT’S POWDERY AND WEIRD) (swhy you wait for wet snow or wait till it melts slightly, cause then its warm and thereswet snow) (NO) (yEEE) >:(

Norwegian elkhounds :0

People seem friendly?

Transgender persons allowed to change legal gender

Sexual orientation, gender identity/expression, intersex status protections

Gay marriage legal since 2009, Gender-neutral marriage has been legally recognized since 1 January 2009

Married and committed same-sex couples allowed to adopt

Gay is legal since 1972

1 year deferral period was implemented, gay and bisexual men can donate blood

generally gay-friendly

Cons:

Shrugs

COLD (VERY COLD)

Russia

Pros:

Furry coats are nice

Furry hats called ushanka

Babushka means grandma but buska means bitch

Vodka

The GayTM, Decriminalised in 1917; Re-criminalised in 1933; Legal since 1993

Legal gender change since 1997

But only after what they call ‘medical procedures’ (idk what they mean by that but i suspect surgERY)

Cons:

No gays allowed

Religion is bAD

Religion is GOOD

THEY CAN’T DECIDE???

ALSO COLD (SO COLD)

Too much snow

They like to destroy things? I saw two Russian guys put a stick of dynamite in the sewer and explode the road? Why? (BAD but thins going boom is fun, but not important things)

Vladimir Putin (yee, but we have sarah palin to watch him) (o shid u right)

Government is weird? You can get killed if you say you don’t like the tsar?

If you gay and live in ‘Murica you can’t adopt from Russia (fuck russia)

Communism I guess (thought you liked communism?) (to a degree. I like the idea of it but it’s also bad? Like you can’t/don’t own anything? Your dog is not your dog it is everyone’s dog? I do not like that my dog is mINE)

No discrimination protections

No recognition of gay relationships

tends to be among the most hostile toward homosexuality

Japan

Pros:

SHIBES!!!!! AKITAS!!!! FLUFFY DOGGIES!!!

Sakura trees :0

Pretty colors

Gay is legal, it was legalized in 1880

Very strict gun laws

Never had a school shooting EVER

2015 opinion poll found that a majority of Japanese support the legalisation of same-sex marriage

sex among consenting adults, in private, regardless of sexual orientation and/or gender, is legal under Japanese law

Cons:

Killer bees (we dont like killer beeeees, NOT THEEEE BEEEEEEEEEESSSS!!!) (the killer bees will kill you in a heartbeat)(bad bees…. , NONONONONONNOTJAPAN) (they only live in the forests tho. I think)(ILIKEFORESTS!!) (me too)

No nationwide recognition of same-sex relationships

No gay marriage

Gay and Lesbian Kingdom of the Coral Sea Islands

Pros:

All the gay is allowed

They have their own website you know it’s legit when they have their own website

Government is gay (everything there is gay) (shhhhhhhhhggSTOPITgggg)(NO)

Dingos

Cons:

Im pretty sure you cant permanently live there

It was technically at war with Australia for a while

Dingos (I want,,, to pet them,,, but they will bite me,,,)(i was gonna put them in the cons too if you didnt)

Kangaroos (vdangerous) (they scare me) (THEY SHOULD)

Greece (i like greece)

Pros:

Ruins

Anti-lgbt discrimination explicitly banned (ooo nice)

Food

Ocean!!!!!!! Ocean ocean ocean ocean ocean ocean ocean!!!!!!!!! (SaME)

Goats :0

Male homosexuality has been legal since 1951, female homosexuality has always been legal (nICE)

Hate crimes laws covering all areas incl. sexual orientation, gender identity and sex characteristics

school  sex ed classes include segments on sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, homophobia and transphobia (NICE!!!!!)

Pride has been held since 2005, and has been held in most other moderate sized cities since 2010

Trans people's can legally change their gender without having to undergo sex reassignment surgery (NICE!!!!!!)

GAY CULTURE IS VERY VIBRANT

a 1982 law that legalized civil marriage between "persons", without specifying gender, acted as a test-case for same sex marriage

Since 2005, discrimination based on sexual orientation in the workplace is prohibited.

A lot of boat traveling

Cons:

Quality of life is kind of falling apart

A lot of animals roam freely, which means LOTS of poop

Goat farmers (whats wrong with goat farmers) (they won’t let me pet their goats :( ) (really…. Thats why this is a con?) (yes. I’m a petty bich) (......) (i like goats. And i want to pet them. If you do not let me pet your goats I will be sad [and kinda mad because I want to love them])

Lots of fucking goat cheese

Too close to Italy (whats wrong with italy???) (too friendly. It’s suspicious) (OMFG SERIOUSLY???) (YOU PUT THE FACT THAT CANADA SPELLS CANADIAN WITH AN “E” IN THE CONS) (thats because it iS A CON!!!!! CANADIAN IS SPEELED WITH AN “A”) (NOT IN CANADA)

The Netherlands

Pros:

quite strict gun laws, not seen as a right, but a privilege (????) (you wanted strict gun laws, they have really strict gun laws, its a privilege to have guns, and only for hunting and target shooting, not for self defence, or for other things at all) (nice!)

Homosexuality legalized in 1811 (holy shid)(yeeee)

Gay marriage legal since 2001 (i was born in 2001, they knew i was coming) (I was born in 2000)

The first country to legalize gay marriage (I approve)

banned discrimination on sexual orientation on the grounds of employment, housing, public accommodations, and more.

Lesbians can get IFV (???)(in vitro fertilization, they implant a fertilized egg so they can carry their own child, instead of just adopting)

Transgender persons allowed to change legal gender, only after a diagnosis but without surgery or hormone therapy

. Amsterdam has frequently been named one of the most LGBT friendly cities in the world

Homomonument, was the first monument in the world to commemorate homosexuals who were persecuted and killed during World War II (this is so cool)

85% of the Dutch population supported same-sex marriage and adoption as of 2013

Cons:

Cold? I think?

Republic of Ireland

Pros:

Ireland (nice pro) (thanks)

first country to legalise same-sex marriage on a national level by popular vote

Affordable for any budget

Entitled to 20 days of leave

Yes, transgender people can change legal gender by self-declaration since 2015

Safe, with few guns

Less police

Lots of pubs

Speak English (this was a pro on a website) (IT IS A PRO I ONLY SPEAK SPANGLISH) (Spanglish) (YES SPANGLISH , DONT BE A DIC) (I can’t be what I don’t have)

Fear nothing and no one

Gay marriage legal since 2015

Low crime rate

Cons:

In a fight with Northern Ireland because they don’t want to be ruled by England but Northern Ireland does. Now Northern Ireland is a separate country.

The potato famine (I like potatos) (exactly)

Bad weather

Less police

Not much of a non-alcohol social scene

Fear nothing and no one

The Philippines

Pros:

Have to be at least 21, and pass a background check to be issued a Possession License for guns

If you’re a foreigner and you have a gun, you’re going to go to prison.

They are poised to make stricter gun laws

LGB allowed in the military

Low cost of living

GORGEOUS!!! IT’S GORGEOUS!!!

The Family Code of the Philippines says that marriage is “a special contract of permanent union between a man and a woman,” but The Constitution does not prohibit same-sex marriage

One of the most gay-friendly countries in the world

Is the most gay-friendly country in Asia

Cons:

Can’t donate blood if you gay. You will give them The GayTM. (don’t drink the tap water)

Drug problems

Healthcare problems in some areas

Tagalog is very complicated to learn

Malta

Pros:

Transgender people can change gender with or without surgery

Homosexuality legal since 1973

Gay marriage legal since 2017

ban on anti-gay discrimination in employment

sexual orientation and gender identity protections

the first country in the European Union to prohibit the use of conversion therapy

Cons:

Gay and bi men in Malta are not allowed to donate blood

Though there’s talk to change that law

Poland

Pros:

In Warsaw they have a Hatsune Miku statue

Never illegal to be gay

Transgender persons allowed to change legal gender.

one of few countries where sexually active gay and bisexual men are not legally restricted from donating blood. (give them The GayTM, drink that dam tap water)

Cons:

Apply to high schools

School is weird

Gay marriage is banned (wHAT) (I KNOW! Im sad too) (what if you’re gay married BEFORE moving to Poland) (idk are you planning to get gay married?, also … i dont remember waht i was gonna say) (no i’m just thinking about all the other gays who might move to Poland)

United Kingdom

Pros:

The Queen (YEEEE!!!)

Always legal for women to be gay; decriminalised for men in: 1967 England and Wales, 1981 Scotland, 1982 Northern Ireland

Right to change legal gender since 2005

Gay marriage since 2014, not in northern ireland

All discrimination protections since 2010; some existed since 2003 for sexual orientation and 1999 for gender identity

Tea

Crumpets

Cons:

Under the Gender Recognition Act 2004, transgender people who are married have been required to divorce or annul their marriage in order for them to be issued with a GRC. (??????? wtf????) (ikr, its kind of very mean)

The legislation of gay marriage also does not restore any of the marriages of transgender people that were forcibly annulled as a precondition for them securing a GRC

What time is it? ...ITS SEVEN BONG!! (you know they don’t actually tell time like this, right?) (IDONTCARE)

Still #salty about the Revolution (VERY)

BISCUITS (NO!!) (aka cookies in America) (FUCK BISCUITS)

conversion therapy remains legal in the UK (NONONONONONONONONONONONONONONONONONONONONONONONONONONO) (IKR LIKE FUCK THAT)

Rains a lot

France

Pros:

Baguette (noice)

DEPENDING ON THE TIME OF DAY THE FRENCH GO EITHER WAY

Legal to be gay since 1791 (no wonder Lafayette was like how he was)

Transgender people allowed to change legal gender without surgery

Sexual orientation and gender identity protections

Gay marriage legal since 2013

amendment to existing anti-discrimination legislation, making homophobic, sexist, racist, xenophobic etc. comments illegal.

gay and bisexual men in France can donate blood after 1 year of abstinence

Transsexuality declassified as an illness

Cons:

Lots of crime? (from what I’ve heard)

Denmark

Pros:

Gay is legal since 1933

Transgender persons allowed to change legal gender without a diagnosis, hormone therapy, surgery or sterilization

Sexual orientation and gender identity/expression protections

Full adoption since 2010

Gay marriage legal since 2012

Gays in military since 1978

Lesbians can get IFV

Laws against hate speech for seual orientation

Lgbt sex ed and relationships taught in schools

Cons:

Iceland

Pros:

Legal to be gay since 1940

Transgender people allowed to change gender without surgery

Gay marriage since 2010

No standing army

Sexual orientation protections

Both full joint and stepchild adoption allowed

2016, Icelandic President participated in the Reykjavik Pride Parade

the first Icelandic President to attend a gay pride parade

Cons:

No standing army

currently unable to donate blood in Iceland

Though they are wanting to remove the ban

Greenland

Pros:

The GayTM has been legal since 1933

Sexual orientation protection laws

outlawed hate speech on the basis of sexual orientation

Gay marriage and full adoption rights since 2016

Cons:

Cant donate blood

trans people cant legally change gender (fACK YA GENDA RULES)

This is all we got for now, but if anyone has any input or tidbits about these countries that wasn’t listed, that you think is important (especially if you live in said countries, send one of us a message, we’ll add it asap! (most likely me, because im on more often and as such am more likely to check my messages) Sorry for the extremely long post!

[samosoapsoup]

POINT OF NO RETURN

ART FORUM

Alex Kitnick on the discontent with museums

“WHEN DISCONTENT WITH MUSEUMS is strong enough to provoke the attempt to exhibit paintings in their original surroundings or in ones similar, in baroque or rococo castles, for instance, the result is even more distressing than when the works are wrenched from their original surroundings and then brought together.” This is Theodor Adorno in his great essay “Valéry Proust Museum,” first published in German in 1955, a moment of reckoning and reconstruction. Though Adorno doesn’t specify why the attempt to return and repatriate is more upsetting than the original rift and reassembling of modernity, it is clear that we are in a similar moment of discontent again today—and that we, too, must consider our desires and the effects they might produce.

In May this past year, the director of Florence’s Uffizi, Eike Schmidt, announced a proposal to return a number of the museum’s religious paintings to churches (if not to the exact ones the paintings came from, then at least to similarly Christian places of worship). At first glance, this seemed like a not-terrible idea; after all, I have seen Caravaggio’s Inspiration of Saint Matthew, 1602, tucked into its nook in San Luigi dei Francesi in Rome and felt that awed feeling of witnessing a thing where it was meant to be seen, in situ. Schmidt had apparently absorbed all the postmodern lessons of site specificity, about what is lost when something is picked, pried, or stolen from its original context. (“To remove the work is to destroy the work,” I could almost hear Richard Serra say.) But as I thought more about his proposal, the deep anti-modernism of the gesture struck me: The idea, after all, is not simply to relocate the paintings but to change their natures, transforming them from secular things worthy of contemplation into devotional images deserving of worship. Even if Schmidt is somehow historically right—in other words, even if he is being faithful to how artists intended their work to be seen—he is nevertheless revoking the experience of modernity that has descended upon these paintings.

When a painting was taken off the wall of the church and brought into the gallery of the museum, we were asked to look at it differently than the artist intended. Broken out of its original lifeworld and turned into a fragment (this is the original crime Adorno speaks of), the artwork became secular, a relic of another time and place, patched together with relics from other times and places. (“It would be an act of madness to enter a museum, kneel down before a painting of the virgin to pray for a soldier missing in battle, lighting a candle and leaving an offering on the floor near the picture before leaving,” Philip Fisher noted in 1975.) It is lost and adrift, yes, but it is also transformed, and here we find the other edge of the sword: One begins to draw connections the artist never imagined. That is the quixotic, heady power of the museum, the birth of which, one might go so far as to say, demands the death of the author. No works made before 1860 were meant to be contemplated in quite the same way—as Foucault reminds us, Manet was the first painter to imagine his paintings in the museum—but nothing that goes into it can resist its power. In this sense the museum is akin to the commodity system, another modern invention: Artworks confront all other artworks within its space. Inside, they change orientation, speak differently, take on new lives, assume new values. The viewer is charged with wondering about their potential, purchase, and power.

To describe the Uffizi plan as anti-secular and anti-modern is not to say that every repatriation shares these characteristics. In general, stolen things should be given back, and the past few years have seen many struggles for restitution that are undeniably just. In 2018, scholars Felwine Sarr and Bénédicte Savoy of the Collège de France released a brilliant report, commissioned by President Emmanuel Macron, urging the return of plundered African objects to their native lands: “African cultural heritage can no longer remain a prisoner of European Museums,” Macron’s Twitter account proclaimed. It is hard to argue against this move even if the proposed return is to some extent symbolic, and one might ask if European museums are not also attempting to divest themselves of a troubling colonial history: While France is much less likely to give back all the resources it plundered over the longue durée of colonialism, the return of objects might still pave the way for other forms of remuneration and justice; in their report, Sarr and Savoy note that restitution opens the “question of building bridges for future equitable relations.” Importantly, they are just as invested in the experience of confronting the objects themselves. As Sarr and Savoy put it, “To fall under the spell of an object, to be touched by it, moved emotionally by a piece of art in a museum, brought to tears of joy, to admire its forms of ingenuity, to like the artworks’ colors, to take a photo of it, to let oneself be transformed by it: All these experiences—which are also forms of access to knowledge—cannot simply be reserved to the inheritors of an asymmetrical history, to the benefactors of an excess of privilege and mobility.” If repatriated objects are unlikely to return to their original contexts, Sarr and Savoy insist, they must be displayed in necessarily “unoriginal” ways—in other words, in a museum.

The museum reveals the artwork’s potential precisely by negating it.

A LOT HAS CHANGED in the past forty or so years. If the postmodernism of the 1980s considered the museum to be in crisis and contemplated its “ruins,” today many see these same institutions as frustratingly intact, as bulwarks against change, citadels to be stormed. (Even ten years ago, the Left’s critique of museums was simply that they had transformed from civic sites to experiential fun houses. “The late-capitalist museum” was understood to be a space of spectacle, not BlackRock lucre.) Where an earlier generation of artists associated with institutional critique pointed to the museum’s genetic incoherence, as well as to the incursion of corporate interests, today the museum itself stands as a purveyor of systemic and symbolic violence. “The very foundation of the museum is carceral and colonial, and thus ableist,” artist Carolyn Lazard claimed in a recent interview. “Once we abandon the solidity of the museums’ justifications for existing, we might be able to invent new forms and new models of making.” Lazard is not alone in their thinking, but plans of attack have taken different approaches. In a recent exhibition detailing the role of slavery in the British empire and its afterlife in institutions of contemporary art, artist Cameron Rowland mortgaged the mahogany doors and handrails at the Institute of Contemporary Arts, London, installed by the extravagant George IV—thus making a strike against the host institution, while at the same time acknowledging, by staging the exhibition, that the artist is bound to it. (Even as the institution’s hardware remains intact, its value is drained—the site becomes indebted.) And many others, artists and art workers alike, have occupied the museum in similar ways, sometimes to drain it but just as often to reenergize it. One of the most affirming aspects of the protests against Warren Kanders’s trusteeship of New York’s Whitney Museum of American Art, which sprang up around the 2019 Biennial, was how many people claimed the institution as their own and insisted that their voices be heard there too. While the ultimately successful campaign to oust Kanders from the board neither erased his tear gas from the world nor purified the institution, it did mark an ethical position that had potentially political effects: For who, more people might ask, would want to break bread with a person like this?

Needless to say, we cannot undo the history of the museum, but neither should we invest blindly in its current state of affairs; we have to recognize it for what it has done, what it is capable of, and what it might do. Contra Adorno, the museum is no longer a mausoleum: His claim that the museum only exists out of “historical respect” has ceased to be the case. Indeed, the museum today is expected to be a center of attention and an active agent in culture to satisfy the “needs of the present,” but as much as it tries to stay up-to-date, it cannot help but deploy its age-old techniques—and this is not wholly a bad thing. After all, the museum is one of the few devices that can make the royal democratic, the private public, the sacred profane. It can switch contexts and create distance. It can bring things to light.

I am trying to argue here for the possibility of a productive alienation, a salutary anti-immediacy. In a sense, the museum reveals the artwork’s potential precisely by negating it: “Works of art,” Adorno insists, “can fully embody the promesse du bonheur only when they have been uprooted from their native soil and have set out along the path to their own destruction.” This is not quite as perverse as it sounds. Art is different than reality; it is one way of thinking about it and contemplating it. In his 1917 essay “Art as Device,” Viktor Shklovsky noted art’s strange-making powers, its ostranenie, its ability to defamiliarize. The device of art, however, resides not only in its objects but in its institutions—in other words, the artmaking, strange-making device par excellence may be the museum itself. And this strangeness, my substitute word for autonomy, is what grants the museum its privileged position not outside, but adjacent to, life—a place where life might be seen, queried, and discussed.

But must modern museums sit on endlessly growing piles of capital in order to do this work? Each expansion the museum makes not only creates room for more art but also builds a structure ever more costly to maintain—indeed, its incessant territorial expansionism might be one of its most colonial traits, apart, of course, from the encyclopedic museum’s mission to universalize (and centralize) by plunder. Hito Steyerl has written powerfully of what she calls the “poor image”—a digital file that is circulated, amended, shared, and cared for by many. What it loses in quality, in resolution, she claims, it gains in history. Now might be the time to imagine a “poor institution,” a place infiltrated by many that values community over control. What would a “poor” Whitney look like? A “poor” Guggenheim? A “poor” MoMA? Might they keep exhibitions up longer and dig more deeply into their permanent collections, enfranchise educators and dock executive pay? In other words, change structurally instead of signify differently? This is not a plea for populism, to pander to the people, but rather a call to recognize the many invested in, and identified with, institutions. Discontent with museums is productive. Unless we reimagine them radically, they may well become the baroque and rococo castles in which much art was first housed.

https://www.artforum.com/print/202101/alex-kitnick-on-the-discontent-with-museums-84657

[bites-kms]

Once upon a time in Greece

Land of philosophers, birthplace of Western world, history can be breath in every corner you pass by. Athens, by excellence, is the center of this action and a compulsory stop while in Greece. Welcome to an epic journey to the past, you won’t regret it. 

After 9 hours and 15 minutes, in a direct flight from JFK I arrived at the Eleftherios Venizelos International Airport. You can already feel the language challenge bursting by trying to pronounce its name, but nothing easier than to get to the city center with the metro pass by 10 euros. And we were staying meters, I mean, literally 37 steps away from the Acropolis. My friend Mau was waiting for me, and as crazy as it sounds, I guess we’ve seen more of each other during this year in NY, Macau, Hong Kong and now Greece than what we actually hanged out in Singapore - what a beautiful turn of events ♥!

Pomegranate and lemon trees, fake jazmin scent, tons of adventurous and cute, street cats as well as few tortoises, and chirping birds are the beautiful scenery that frames your strolls by Athens. But of course, the beauty highlights are found in the absolute exquisite merge between all of the above with the IV century columns, archeological sites and historic details embedded in every single house at sight.  

It’s a great place to think - if you don’t believe me, then ask Aristotles, but jokes aside, each and every time that I sat down to eat by myself, the writer muse decided to join over for a drink or too, and she hardly ever missed the point. I actually told her “come, stay, make yourself comfortable and talk to me” as per Neil Gaiman’s recommendation. 9 double-sized notebook pages later, I think it worked.

We decided to have a powerful breakfast at Everest, a cute local chain with tons of flavor and delicious coffee and orange juice. Man, if there’s something that I truly miss about living in Asia and Europe is the facility and access one has to delicious organic freshly squeezed juices at an affordable price. They are sweet, tasty and thirst quenching perfect! And I must say, coffee in Greece was an absolute delight as well. Same as in Turkey, their beans are strong yet never burnt, with subtle flavor hints depending on your roast. They were, undoubtedly, a compulsory yet perfect way to start each morning. 

We kicked it off towards Aristotle’s Lyceum. It was quite striking to witness, live and walk around the same inspiration field where major World Philosophers established the Western way of thought. Being Peripatetic for a while - or walking around while wondering about the meaning of things, was quite strange. I had a Philosophy professor that said “the art of wondering is where the questions matter more than the actual answers, and it serves as a sieve for our thoughts” and right there, at the Lyceum, walking around practicing the togetherness of body, mind and soul, with the Greek sun bathing our cheeks, there was absolutely no doubt that this is a magnificent way to create. Surrounding by olive trees and training arenas, contemplation was a must during our stay. We later walked back via the Zappeion or Convention Center, the Olympic Stadium, the National Garden and ended up visiting the Olympion or Zeus Temple, complex which contains the Roman Baths and our beloved Hadrian’s Arch. 

It’s also impressive to acknowledge how long these stone pieces have been standing, and the crazy value they own for thousands of years until today. The same thing happens to me each time I go to a temple, monument or to a very iconic sight. Regardless of the culture or the place where it’s located, these “rocks” contain so much energy, people’s faith, wishes and wonder that is hard not to feel them and truly understand the symbolic attachment and meaning, transforming them into way more than just plain rocks. 

Mau got this amazing tip: checking out the Guard Change on Sundays, when the officials wear their festivity outfits, so beautiful and traditional. Luckily for us, it was Sunday and it was almost 11 am. So it happened that our walk by the National Gardens suddenly became decorated by the Greek Anthem chords, and that was when we knew it was time to approach the Parliament. We found a perfect spot, in the middle of the street, where to witness all the Guard Change and its following parade with the National Marching Band. 

After this dose of Greek nationalism, we decided to go where the action happens: Plaka & Monasteraki. These two are the neighborhoods that surround the Acropolis and where the majority of restaurants and stores are located. Highly touristy, yet beautiful, so it’s well worth to put your “I’m-a-traveler-not-a-tourist” pride inside your pocket, and wonder the streets of Plaka guilt free. The delicious Greek treats you find your way will confirm your decision.

We had a highly Greek traditional lunch by the ladder of the Acropolis, sigh-seeing all Athens at the Klepsydra Tavern. Our first (out of maaaany) delicious Greek Salad with feta cheese, cucumber, peppers, onions and tomatoes, some tzatziki, the delicious yogurt, cucumber, garlic and herbs dip and a spanakopita, the very best spinach pie. 

We had to make a decision: tackling the Acropolis and the Parthenon on the very first day, or leave it for the first thing for the following morning. We decided to go with the second option, having the whole morning to explore and to avoid the crowds - which so far, we’ve been tackling like pros. Hence, we went on and explored Anafiotika, the picturesque and artistic tiny neighborhood full of hidden alley and old houses around Plaka, by the northerneast side of the Acropolis hill.

I loved this house: on the background, a window to the past, where the Parthenon with its Greek and West heritage lays. Inside, the secret and the intimacy of a Greek family, with family portraits, Orthodox crosses, a coffee set and an old TV. And on the same window that allows you a glimpse of this family lifestyle, you can see the reflection of the “outside”, of us, of where we were standing, of today’s Athens, today’s possibilities and tomorrow’s chances in Europe and in the World. I absolutely felt for it.  

The good thing about this area, (not so much Monasteraki) is that no matter which or how many turns you take, you’ll always find your way back. It’s confusing at first, but later you’ll discover its actual pocket size, and start enjoying the joy of being lost, not depending on your map nor phone to figure out where you are (again, another philosophical question to occupy your -un-worried mind while strolling the streets of Athens). 

I don’t know if you had noticed it, but let me call your attention to the sky on all the pictures featured above and on absolutely most of the pictures taken during this trip. There was not a single day where the sky wasn’t entirely blue and without clouds in Athens. It was gorgeous and quite stricken. It’s a Greek clear sky, what I like call the “Gods’ Exodus” - they left their Olympus comfort to wonder around the street of Greece among us mortals, leaving the sky completely clean. Homer already wrote about it on the Odyssey and highlighted a concept that I truly like: the terrenal god, of divine dust and magic that blends, interacts and lives between men. I believe this is the way religion should be lived, felt and practiced, since when the encounter with one another and with oneself happens, it reflects that divinity spark that is walking around, ingrained in us, no doubt about it. 

After more food, learning the Greek traditional dance, having a drink in Athens’ oldest bar and a deserved night full of jet-lag yet some sleep, we woke up with one objective in mind: having a tet-a-tet encounter with the Acropolis. The Acropolis is the name of the ancient citadel and complex group of historic buildings and remains located on one of Athens highest points, hence its name. The most iconic one of all is the Parthenon, but there are a bunch of other meaningful and equally astonishing buildings around worth to check out.  First, the Parthenon is the “newest” temple dedicated to Athena, patron of Athens. It’s the biggest structure on site that remains standing and constant efforts to preserve it are done by the Greek Government and EU institutions. It’s formed by 17 standing columns (weird number, I know) and a smaller and smaller complex done inside with less and less number of them. Right next to it, with incredible goddess-like or nymphs style columns, is the Old Temple of Athena. The Erechtheum is on its right, dedicated to Athena and Poseidon. Then, there’s the famous Temple of Athena Nike, the one that served as an inspiration for the legendary sports brand since Nike is the Victory Goddess in battle and in friendly and athletic encounters. It’s a smaller and secluded temple, yet it’s wonderful and inspiring. The halo of “just do it” spreads around the whole Acropolis complex and inspires its visitor to accomplish and to dare every single desire they have on their bucket lists During sunset, in my mind the only song that was playing in loop while watching the shape of the Acropolis fade to black was “All the things I’ve done” by The Killers, since it played on a Nike commercial a while ago, stating that “All you need is already inside (you)”. Cliche? Maybe. Yet, empowering as hell.

Continuing the exploration of the Acropolis, there’s the Dionysus Theater as well as the Odeon of Herodes Atticus. The first one is small and a little bit ruined down in comparison to the magnitude and the preservation of the second one. Yet, the first one has a deeper and more meaningful connection with me. I used to have a literature teacher that went nuts about Greek Mythology and while teaching us Homer songs, he displayed his beloved fandom towards the Ancient World. We learned about the dithyramb, an ancient Greek hymn and feast dedicated in honor of Dionysus, the God of wine and fertility (my favorite kind of god ;) - so, what happened here, was a kind of old-style, all-in semi orgy with divine purposes where poetry, performances, dances, songs and goat sacrifices were done. Imagine my enthusiasm while witnessing the place my professor was so passionate about, describing it with high-pitched voice, almost like a politician, with emphasis and devotion, as trying to gain the Gods’ approval and grace with his lectures. Those classes were amazing, almost as good as walking and sitting on that same place IRL where comedy and tragedy, with often divine offerings happened.  

Many, many, and some more wines, cafe stops and dishes later, we needed to say goodbye to Athens, at least for now, in order to embark towards Santorini. Mau had left to the airport, and I had yet a night to go. I wasn’t going to bed, regardless of my early flight, at least not before enjoying my last night in Athens, where the sky was clear, the stars were shining and the streets of Plaka were bursting with delicious food and activities to mesmerize me one more time. What happened? I was walking searching for a nice rooftop to have a drink or two and I found Cine Paris - this al fresco cinema, where Joker was playing, right next to the Acropolis. It was a sign: few minutes after its starting time, I walked in, grabbed a blanket, a drink and a pizza -  yet traditional popcorn was available. I just came from experiencing all the tragedy and comedy offered to the Gods, and now I had the opportunity to watch this contemporary masterpiece in which these two elements are being portrait exquisitely by Joaquin Phoenix. It felt I was at the orchestra section while Athena, Dionysus and Poseidon where watching it from the main box. Loved it.  Taking the early train towards the airport the following morning, was also something God-worth it. October 15, 6:56 AM, with the moon setting on my left and the sun rising on my right, in between the Athens hills and the high tension cables, it felt like Apolo was driving his carriage, chasing the moon, bringing the sun. 

So now you know it, when in doubt about Greek plans, or for that sake, with everything you are questioning yourself to do, buy, travel or say, go with Victory’s Goddess wisdom and just do it, Niké already foresees your success ahead. 

[hobis-halo]

personally i dont think bts is trying to roast us all through “pied piper”... after all, why would they roast their fanbase when all theyve done in the past is show thanks for their dedicated fans?

i think the lyrics of the song, rather than trying to roast fans for their behavior, show a certain degree of self awareness about fandom culture in general and their fanbase. so many kpop fans that ive seen become seemingly immersed in this little world, where streaming and sales and chart rankings and awards are the only thing that matters. and i think that because of the more “personal” image that many idols express, people become absorbed in their lives and careers in a way that doesn’t happen as often with non-idol artists. people feel as though they know these idols, and start to regard them warmly and in a friendly way. and while that can be good for an artist, as it basically guarantees a fanbase, if it goes too far it certainly isnt good for an individual.

ive been involved in fandom culture for a long time, not just kpop, and this thing is common. people find something or someone that they love, and they latch onto it to the exclusion of everything else. they use it to block out everything they hate or dislike about life, and if they do it enough, they can completely coast along on these things without ever truly living their own life. and they dont want to live their own life, thats why they do this. eventually, it become habit. its a form of escapism taken too far. i did this for quite a long time, and still to an extent do it now, so i am speaking from experience here. eventually, if you go really far, you can forget who you were before you discovered this thing, this thing that has come to define you and how you regard the world/yourself.

obviously its not bad to enjoy something, and its not bad for something to change the way you view the world. but if you lose track of who you were, and you dont know who youd be without this thing, thats when i think it can be dangerous.

because of the personal image idols project, many of us feel like we know them or that they understand us somehow, and these artists mean a lot to us. in many cases, they have helped us through a hard time, and we become attached to them. but when you become attached to a person who you dont know and will never know on a personal level, and when you remove all boundaries between what you think and what is real, thats when it goes too far. 

thats what bts is speaking of in this song. they are trying to tell us that its unhealthy for bts fans to devote their lives to bts, to constantly be immersed in whatever they do to the point of ignoring our own lives. so rather than roasting us, i think they are trying to warn us. thats why they use the image of the “pied piper” who enchants people with a song.

particularly i think these lines fit in with this message:

“You have so many pictures of me in your room anyway It’s not just one hour, it’s a whole year that’ll disappear.” - this is from namjoons verse, which is the most detailed in imagery and really emphasizes that hes talking about bts fans here. he says how fans are losing their lives in little pieces, in hours, until their entire year has gone by and they dont even realize it.

“Follow the sound of the pipe, follow this song It’s a bit dangerous but I’m so sweet I’m here to save you, I’m here to ruin you.” -this is from the chorus, and it is about how something can both help people deal with situations in their life and eventually absorb them and become their life, changing their personality.

“If I’m Ruining you right now Please forgive me Because you can’t live without me Because you know all of this

I’m takin’ over you.” -this is from the end of the song. this section in particular (along with namjoons verse) shows how bts is aware of how dedicated their fans are, to the point of ignoring or forgetting their own lives. the lines “please forgive me” and “you cant live without me” are particularly reminiscent of this idea. 

tldr; basically, bts is aware that many people are obsessed with them in way that only someone who is trying to escape life can be obsessed with something. obsessed to the point in which ones personality is almost completely absorbed or touched by them. and they don’t want this. they recognize that this is in many cases hurting people, and not just bts fans, but all kpop fans and all people who think this way. its a lot bigger problem than just bts fans, let me be honest. it has to do with the way kpop fandoms and band fandoms in general regard the artists they are centered around. what makes this song unique is that its not an attempt to roast armys for being bad fans or being obsessed or whatever, but instead it shows how much bts cares for their fans, because they pay attention and recognize this aspect of being a fan. they dont want us to become absorbed in bts to the point of forgetting to live our own lives, so of course, they write a song about it. it almost hearkens back to bts’s old days, the morality songs, like “could you please turn off your cell phone”. those songs were meant to give advice and challenge people to go against mainstream society, not demean people. thats why i like this song, and thats why i think that the interpretation that they are trying to demean or roast us is wrong.

[transhumanitynet]

The Future You That You Least Suspect

The other night my teenage boys asked me what was on my mind (likely looking for material to make fun of me. Just kidding, they’re thoughtful kids).

Instead of trying to “kid proof” my thoughts or rush the conversation, I wrote them this letter. First, to explain that I’m consumed by how we think about and where we look for answers to the biggest questions of our time (listed below), and second, to propose an alternative way of finding answers (hint: I found inspiration in an amoeba).

How are we going to address climate change before it creates global chaos?

What jobs will be available for my kids when they finish school? What should they study?

Over the next few decades, how will we re-train ourselves fast enough — again and again — to remain employed and useful as technology becomes more capable?

Can the human race cooperate well enough to solve our biggest problems or will the future simply overwhelm us?

Most importantly, where do we look to find answers to these questions?

Hopefully I didn’t ruin the possibility that my kids will ever again ask me what’s on my mind 🙂

##

Boys,

There is an old joke where a man is looking for his keys under a street light. Another person walks by and inquires, “Sir, are you certain you lost your keys here?”

“No” the man replies, “I lost them across the street.”

Confused, the stranger says, “Then why are you looking here?”

The man responded, “The light is much brighter here!”

Credit

This comic is as humorous as it is true. All too often, we each do this when we’re trying to solve something. It’s where our brains naturally take us first.

Our imaginations are constrained to the familiar (under the light), so we have a hard time finding answers to difficult questions and problems because the answers often lie in the unknown (or in the comic above, the darkness). Staying in the light is natural, easy, and intuitive, but this limits our discovery potential.

I. How to look in the dark?

History can give us some hints about how others found interesting things in the dark. For example, we discovered that:

the sun is the center of our planetary swarm

the earth is round

the physical world is a bunch of tiny, uncertain pieces governed by quantum physics

Before these became accepted truths, they were very difficult to imagine. This is part because they are non-obvious and also counter-intuitive to our everyday experience.

It’s also because we can’t know what is not known, which means we’re blind to what is yet to be discovered. Don’t believe me? Try to think of something you don’t already know. It’s impossible! That is, until you know it, and then it’s obvious.

Going back to the 5th question, how and where can we look today to find new unknowns (the dark) that help us solve our biggest problems? Where are today’s insights that are equivalent to the sun is the center of our planetary swarm?

I think the most exciting and consequential place to explore is not looking outside ourselves, but looking inside; in our own minds. This is where I see the most fruitful answers to the questions about your future and mine.

What if the next reality busting revolution happened to our very reality and consciousness? And if that happened, could the future of being human be entirely unrecognizable from our vantage point today? I hope so, because the answers to our challenges don’t appear under the lights we have turned on so far.

You’re probably thinking, c’mon Dad, this is crazy talk.

Well, it’s happened before.

II. Thanks Homo Erectus, We’ll Take it From Here

Our ancestor Homo erectus lived two million years ago and wasn’t equipped with our kinds of languages, abstractions, or technology. Homo erectus was possibly an inflexible learner as evidenced by the fact that they made the same axe for over 1 million years.

Imagine trying to explain to Homo erectus a complex phenomena of our modern day society, such as the stock market. You’d have to explain capitalism, economics, math, money, computers, and corporations — after extensive language training and the inevitable discussion of new axe design possibilities (of course, trying not to offend).

The supporting technological, cultural, and legal layers that enable the stock market to exist are the engines and evidence of our prosperity. It’s taken us thousands of years to develop this collective intellectual complexity. The point is, our brains are incredibly capable of evolving and adapting to new and more complicated things.

That our cognition evolved from Homo erectus demonstrates that we have radically evolved before.

III. Amoeba, You’re So Smart!

A few months ago, Japanese researchers demonstrated that an amoeba, a single-celled organism, was able to find near optimal solutions to the following question:

Given a list of cities and the distances between each pair of cities, what is the shortest possible route a salesperson could take that visits each city only once and returns to the origin city? (image credit)

This is known as the Traveling Salesman Problem (TSP), and classified as an NP-hard problem because the time needed to solve it grows exponentially as the number of cities increases.

Humans can come up with near optimal solutions using various heuristics and computers can execute algorithms to solve the problem using their processing power.

However, what’s unique is that Masashi Aono and his team demonstrated that the amoeba’s solution to the TSP is completely different than the way humans or computers have traditionally solved it.

That’s right, this amoeba is flexing on us.

(Note: it’s worth reading about the clever way they set up the experiment to allow the amoeba to solve the problem.)

This got me thinking: when we’re confronted with a problem, we use the tools at our disposal. For example, we can think, do math, or program a computer to solve it.

Professor Aono found a different tool for problem solving: a single-celled organism.

I know what you’re thinking, can the amoeba do my homework or take tests for me? It’s a good question!

Also, kudos to Aono and his team for searching in the dark — this experiment is non-obvious.

IV. Why Am I Telling You About Amoebas?

I strongly believe that we need a major cognitive revolution if we are to solve the global challenges we face. Our species evolved before and we can do it again, but we can’t wait a million years; we must accelerate this evolution.

What I’m saying is very hard to understand and imagine, because it’s in the dark. But bare with me.

The amoeba gives me hope because it didn’t evolve to solve the TSP. We augmented it with technology to accomplish something pretty amazing. Similarly, we haven’t evolved to deal with cooperating on a global scale, battle an invisible gas that warms our planet or retraining our brains every few years as AI takes over more of our work. How can we augment our own minds to allow us to take on these challenges?

Imagine a scenario where you are dressed head-to-toe in haptics (think Ready Player One) that allow you to experience and understand things by feeling changes in vibrations, temperature, and pressure.

Also imagine that you have a brain interface capable of both reading out neural activity and “writing” to your brain — meaning that certain communications can be sent directly into to your brain — the kind of stuff I’m building at Kernel.

Let’s call this a mind/body/machine interface (MBMI). It would basically wire you up to be like the amoeba in the experiment.

Now, what if you were given certain problems, such as the TSP, that your conscious and subconscious mind started working to solve? Imagine that instead of “thinking” about the problem, you just let your brain figure things out on it’s own — like riding a bike.

Would you come up with novel solutions not previously identified by any other person, computer or amoeba?

If we actually had the technology to reimagine how our brains work, over time, I bet that we’d get really good at it and be surprised with all the new things we can do and come up with. To be clear, this is not just “getting smarter” by today’s standards, this is about using our brains in entirely new ways.

Maybe that means that your school today would be in the museum of the future.

People would likely use these MBMIs to invent and discover, solve disagreements, create new art and music, learn new skills, improve themselves in surprising ways and dozens of other things we can’t imagine now.

When thinking about the possibilities, hundreds of questions come to my mind. For example, could we:

minimize many of our less desirable proclivities, individually and collectively?

become more wise as a species?

come up with original solutions to climate change and other pressing problems?

accelerate the speed someone learns (i.e. you get a new kind of PhD at age 12 versus the average of 31 today)

I wonder, is this what you will do at your job in 20 years? Would your mind change so much that it would be hard to recognize your 15 year old self?

Ultimately, for our own survival, we are in a race against time. We need to identify the problems that pose the greatest risks and respond fast enough so that we avoid a zombie apocalypse situation. The most important variable to avoid that: we need to be able to adapt fast enough.

I’m sure at this moment you’re thinking, woah, Dad, calm down!!

V. Your New Job — Being Really Weird (in a good way)

You’re right in wondering what jobs computers will take — if not all of them. They’ll do the boring things that adults do to make money, except far better and for far less money. But imagine a scenario where AI relieves you of 75% of your current day-to-day responsibilities, and is much better at doing those things than you. (I imagined what this world could look like)

A lot has been written, even movies made, about this scenario (e.g.Wall-E). If this happened, would you play fully immersive video games all day? Or live a life of pleasure and be work-free? Certainly possible, although those are linear extrapolations of what we are familiar with today — meaning that’s simply taking what we know today and mapping it into the future. The same thing as looking in the light.

What if millions or even billions of people could build careers by exploring new frontiers of reality and consciousness powered by MBMIs? These types of “weird” thought exercises may be breadcrumbs that extend the considerations we’re willing to make when thinking about our collective cognitive future.

These may be the starter tools that empower us to become Old Worldexplorers setting out for the New World, and journeying on the most exciting and consequential endeavor in human history — an expedition, inward, to discover ourselves.

Dad

  orginally posted here:

https://medium.com/future-literacy/the-future-you-that-you-least-suspect-18cf63bd0061 

The Future You That You Least Suspect was originally published on transhumanity.net

[disableddisaster]

All of them again

1. have you ever been in love?

idk i guess!!

2. what are your favourite colours and why?

yellow because its bright and cheerful and pink bc its FUN!

3. who was the last person you held hands with?

big secret cant tell shh

4. what is your zodiac sign?

libra!!!!!

5. how many times have you read your favourite book?

ive read all the hp books like 7 times and ive read twilight a fuck ton of times too idk

6. what are your favourite films?

twilight........... princess bride.. tfa.. idk

7. what kind of weather do you like?

cloudy but warm!!!

8. do you prefer sunrises or sunsets?

sunrise! 

9. what kind of weather represents who you are as a person?

cloudy but warm.....!

10. what’s your favourite animal?

i LOVE cats and goats and sheep and giraffes

11. what is your favourite song right now?

smth from alt js new album or halseys new album or paramores new album idk man so much new music!!!!!!!!

12. what is your favourite song of all time?

i dont have one......... my interests change every 5 seconds...... who do u think i am.

13. do you like sunny days or rainy days better?

rainy.....

14. have you ever been heartbroken?

i mean like yeah i guess

15. what does the perfect kiss feel like?

this is weird...... uhhh? its gay?

16. what is your favourite poem?

u think im cultured enough to read poems. ur funny

17. who are you most inspired by?

my mom......... i lov her

18. are you spiritual?

i guess so!!!

19. what is your favourite plant?

i really love lilac trees theyre blooming rn and smell so lovely!

20. what is your favourite feeling?

u kno when ur anxiety disorder leaves u for like 5 seconds and u feel at peace. ya

21. what is your favourite word?

Shy bc its my name and i like how it sounds

22. are you an artist?

i wish i had talent sfgadghgh

23. what is your favourite flower?

LILACS!!!!!!!! the purple ones in particular

24. are you happy?

i think so :-)

25. what are you thinking about right now?

going to the fair later and eating more mini doughnuts

26. what emotion do you feel most often?

stress lol

27. what is your favourite season?

spring i think

28. are you in a relationship?

nope

29. are you an introvert or extrovert?

extrovert i think!

30. do you prefer the moon or the stars?

stars are soooo pretty :’)

31. what is your favourite scent?

it used to be freshly baked bread but working in a bakery ruined that lol. probably the smell of rain or the smell of summer

32. where do you feel most at home?

idk! not here thats for sure

33. what scares you the most?

BEETLES

34. do you believe in soulmates?

idk?? not really tbh

35. what is your favourite thing about yourself?

i rly just dont know !!!!!!!!!!!

36. what is the nicest compliment you’ve received?

someone told me once that im a very sunny person and that made me happy

37. who is your favourite music artist?

ill give u a list: alt j, panic, halsey, paramore, lykke li, uhhhh........

38. what was your first kiss like?

i think it was good and nice but it rly shouldnt have happened when it did

39. are you a sensitive person?

oh boy,,,,,,,,, yea

40. when was the last time you cried?

a while ago ! prozac dries up my tear ducts i swear

41. do you believe that love can last forever?

yeah!!!!!!!

42. what do you think happens to us when we die?

i really dont know!!!

43. have you ever broken someone’s heart?

i mean i cant say for sure but probably

44. what do you think about when you can’t fall asleep at night?

everything that has ever made me anxious in my entire life

45. do you believe in aliens?

they just make sense think abt how big the world is!!

46. what is the nicest thing anyone’s ever done for you?

one time i was trying to buy a 2 dollar water and my card got declined and the cashier bought it for me liek if u crie d

47. do you find it hard to trust?

thats rly complicated tbh. i think so

48. are you secretive?

gfsdfg NO

49. what colour are your eyes?

blue!

50. do you have a nickname?

shy!!!!

[swearronchanel]

Who let me watch 5.06?

I should be doing an assignment that’s due tomorrow but ya know due tomorrow means do tomorrow. Lol I know I should be ashamed to be a procrastinator but university has ruined me anyway. I’m tired from literally going to one lecture haha, but in any event I’ve been rewatching mad men for the who knows what time but I thought I’d take a break from all that and watch an episode of CtM & @flyingnonny inspired me to do a reaction post so why not? I decided on 5.06 since last Sunday’s episode reminded us of that camping trip 😂😂  here goes nothing.. 

*skips intro bc I’m impatient*

Cute community moment ☺️

TRIXIE😍 slaying my life

Shelagh looks so good too 😍 and Angela melting my heart!

Why is shelagh forever wearing cardigans? I like cardigans every now and then but all the time, really?

Everyone is sitting outside, Trixie is in a sleeveless dress, as is Barbara, so it has to be warm?? take it off Shelagh

She’s still my bby though even if I don’t always agree with her fashion choices

what gross vejo pinching Trixie’s ass? That’s not ok

And Babs too lmao, creepy old man, die

Shelagh saying “hello dear” aw

But this is like the only interaction between Shelagh and Trixie & that does not suffice !!

ALL I WANT IS FOR THEM TO HAVE AN ACTUAL FRIENDSHIP IDC HOW MANY TIMES IVE SAID IT I REALLY Want it😭😭💕💕 my two fav bbys

I HAVE EVEN GIVEN REASONS WHY & I CAN GIVE THEM AGAIN ***        1) Why not?? Shelagh has like no real friends besides her husband and sort of Sister Julienne?                                                 

 2) just please, because I’m asking nicely                                                     3) When Shelagh was Sister Bernadette she was often friendly/ in the gossip and conversation with the nurses & remember that one time Trixie grabbed her to come listen to Jenny’s phone conversation?               

4) Trixie was the only one besides Sister Julienne to visit her in the sanatorium. That has to count for something!                                             5) They’ve both been on the show since day 1 & have known each other the longest (besides the nuns) why wouldn’t they be friends or least actually speak to each other?

Aye this is the lady who’s fake pregnant

Shelagh wearing earrings though >> here for it

Sorry there will be a lot of gushing over Shelagh and Trixie

And also I WANT TRIXIE’S HOOP EARRINGS SO BAD, where can I find them??

And how do I get her clothes and figure and her everything lol?

PHYLLIS ! My champion

“Would it have killed you to sit down for five minutes and eat the whole thing!” I LOVE HER, SHE IS A GEM, A HERO, A BADASS & IM NOT READY FOR SUNDAY. IM GOING TO BAWL WITH AND FOR HER

she deserves the best

I think this is the only time I’ve ever heard Trixie address Shelagh by her first name?? a prob.

They need to interact more 😭💔💕😍 I will stop saying it when I’m dead even then I’ll prob say it

Actually when I think of it no one ever calls Shelagh by her first name besides obviously Patrick? And Sister Julienne

#MoreShelaghAndTheOtherNursesInteracting2k17aka1962

And I need at least two seconds of them dotting on pregnant Shelagh

Helen looks so good like goals

“I threatened to put one man over my knee but that only encouraged him” HA IM DEAD NO KINK SHAME

I think there’s been a similar joke before but fuck it it’s still funny to me

But seriously everyone loves Trixie lol how could you not though?

Hey Pats, it’s been a while

Lol omg Tim in that uniform.. Not the best costume 😂😂

Never seen Whistle Down the Wind

But you see, Tom and Babs making out as usual, I’m not knocking it lol but this is why Sister J told her to chill when they went to South Africa😂

also lowkey jealous bc Jack Ashton is handsome af and that could’ve been me but it’s all good. He and Helen are adorable together and I’m here for it x10000

Omg I forgot this lady got assaulted

Oh shit I just remembered this is the episode where sister MC is attacked FUCK WHY DID I WATCH THIS

she can’t report it bc she’d get arrested for soliciting wtf

But remember Shelagh wore the headbands in like series 3 (so glad she stopped I was not here for it)? They must’ve gave them to Babs lol

I forgot Trixie didn’t tell the nurses about AA yet

But she looks gorgeous as ever, even with her mascara running

Lowkey nauseas looking at all that fish ugh. Funny becuase they put a grocery store that has a fish market on the block up from where I live in NYC and I hate it  

I forgot about Peter lol and he was in an episode this series whoops

LIKE WHERE’S YOUR WIFE LOL, *I know, too busy for this, I don’t think she’d fit in the series anymore anyway*

Sister Mary Cynthia 😰❣️

Lol she doesn’t sing loud enough ??

Sister Julienne is so cute when she smiles but don’t forget she’s a badass

REMEMBER THE AGGRESSIVE JACKET FLAP BC OF THE IRRITATING SISTER URSULA

How did this girl hide her pregnancy though?

And did her brothers just not realize she was pregnant and the mother wasn’t?

Oh jeez my cousin was a colic-y baby and my parents kept him like 3 days a week when I was in high school & it was a nightmare. I didn’t sleep for so long

Dont get me wrong I love babies. But when they scream when I’m trying to sleep, nope. Return to sender.

Shelagh is so excited about camping it’s the purest and most adorable thing 😭😭And I like her shirt  

Shelagh made Tim copy the napkin folding from a magazine, SHE IS A GEM

“We never have serviettes on a weeknight” wtf did they just not use napkins every day? I’m confused Lmaoo. What am I missing here 😂omg that reminds me of one of the times my family and I went on a cruise (2006, hella long time ago already wow?? 11 yrs yikes) and my brother & cousin were late to dinner and lied to my mom & aunt saying they were at a “napkin folding class” & my family deadass believed it up until 2 years ago😂

Shelagh’s accent is so cute. I’ve said that many times but it’s so sweet. But again why do we just have to accept she’s Scottish with no context as to how/why she came to England? Like I’m sure there were convents in Scotland. I dont even care that much I just will forever be curious as to why it seems she had no life before she got married lol? Like they don’t ever bring up the fact she was a nun, but ok maybe she feels awkward talking about it but what about before? 

They’re so excited it’s so precious, protect this family 😂😭💕💕

Sister MJ is fasting lol I should try it😂

Omg another dumb story, I didn’t realize today is Ash Wednesday and was hella confused seeing some people with ash on their forehead 😂😂 I should give up something for lent but idk what, we shall see. My mom gave up carbs last year & I died bc I lived at home and ate what she cooked and almost all my fav foods are carbs😂

Shelagh referred to Patsy as Patsy, I’ve only ever heard her say Nurse Mount??

lol Tim you’re what 14? you know damn well those arent* bullet holes

at least he has some of his innocence still. I didn’t @ 14

Sometimes I forget I’m gonna be 19 this year wtf. I’ve accidentally told people I’m 16 before and had to correct myself 😂😂

Patrick is excited about this holiday, boy you don’t know what’s coming 😂

HE’S GONNA ATTACK THE LADY WITH A BABY I FORGOT THAT TOO WTF

I wanna fight him

Diane’s anemic ? Or her mum is just assuming

SHELAGH IN HER CAMPING OUTFIT!! The hair scarf and trousers !! I’m so here for it 😍😭

I want to see her in another pair!! yes lets get it 1962. Probably not likely this series but hopefully next series!! Ah can’t wait

Shit this series is almost over 💔💔 but omg 1963 gonna be lit as well?!

Like the space race started/orbiting the earth, Kennedy’s assassination .. wait never mind lol I’m thinking of American History moments. but still a lot of it was crazy world news so maybe it’s mentioned?? first bond film came out in'63, petition for Tim to go take Susan whatever from around the corner to see it since we know he liked the novels

Lots of famous films came out in ‘63 so there’s gotta be some reference.

Fun fact: I love pop culture references in period drama bc I’m lame jk I’m majoring in education (to teach history)

Old news but still relevant: Phyllis’s turn on: Rolodex systems 📇

“CRANE, as in the wading bird or industry lifting equipment, whichever you prefer” LOVE U PHYLLIS, YOU CORRECT HIM

PHYLLIS’S FACE WHEN GODFREY SUGGESTS SHE CAME OUT OF RETIREMENT, IM DEAD

“I shall consider retirement when I’m at the appropriate age”  IM LAUGHING SO HARD, FUCK YEA PHYLLIS. I LOVE HER SO MUCH, LINDA BASSET IS ON THE LIST WITH LAURA AND HELEN OF PEOPLE WHO COULD PUCH ME IN THE FACE AND I’D THANK

LOL SHELAGH JUST STANDING AWKWARDLY LISTENING TO THIS CONVERSATION

“Buenos vacaciones”  I NEED MORE PHYLLIS WORKING ON HER SPANISH I LOVE IT, Ella es oro.

lol the roof rack, bet it was Phyllis’s they borrowed when they moved

PHYLLIS’S FACE OF DISGUST WHEN DR GODFREY SMILES AT HER IS ME ALWAYS

LOL THE THE NURSES & SISTER WINIFRED DYING OVER PATRICK’S SHORTS (EVen though sister W “swears she’s not looking”)

I THINK THE SOCKS AND WHITE DAD SANDALS ARE MORE AMUSING 😂😂

Poor Judith💔

It’s a vicious attack Sister J! But you don’t know it yet so I get u

Here comes summer..😂

SETTING UP IN THE POURING RAIN LOL

Shelagh and Angela being adorable !!

Tim and Patrick proud that  they set the tents up & boom it falls 😂 which is symbolic for me taking exams, I think I did well or at least decent on them and then I find out I failed by like 5 points

Nonnatus table scenes <3 😭

”I’ve seen more dangerous marshmallow bunnies“ lmao Pats this is a serious moment I shouldn’t laugh

Shelagh took off her glasses 😉😏 but fr how is Laura Main so perfect

Patrick put scotch in its lit, pass it over😏

Lol Shelagh drinking is a strange thought but I’m so here for it. Nuns can’t drink right? Idk. Imagine her drinking alcohol for the first time and just getting drunk 😂 we know Patrick and Tim are lightweights getting drunk off one beer so I assume shelagh would too😂

Damn it Patrick, you spilled your cup. Furthermore proving you’re a disaster 😭

LMAO SHELAGH’s “WTF” FACE WHEN SHE ASKS PATRICK WHAT HE’S THINKING ABOUT AND HE SAID THE ULCER CLINIC

LIKE C'MON PATRICK YOU KNOW WHERE SHELAGH WAS TRYNA GO WITH THAT😂

“And if you don’t mind my saying so, you’re not exactly Cliff Richards yourself” SHELAGH 😂😂 another great line of hers, love it

I love their playful banter lol we need more of that 😂 but lets be real series 6 has had some of the greatest Shelagh and Patrick moments so I can’t complain 😭😍

Peter and Barbara is such a unusual dynamic haha

“How is chummy?” Wait does Babs even know Chummy? I don’t even remember if they met tbh

But for real Shelagh did you really think Patrick would just forget about work completely ??

Lol Angela crying because she is petrified of squirrels😂😂and Shelagh running to her is so cute.

Why didn’t she just get rid of the *creepy* squirrel nutkin book? it seemed like they still had it in series 6 haha

rice pudding is I think the same as aroz con leche, lol it’s gross sorry

Diane’s water broke oh shit

the Turners all in the tent playing I spy bc it’s raining haha

I went camping for the first and last time this past summer w/ my sister in laws & her friends, it was awful 😂😂 I got like 100 mosquito bites that became welts, i literally slept in the car the second night & it was mid July fairly south of east coast aka it was humid and sticky af , there were wild horses that walked around..Thank God they brought alcohol cause it was a nightmare I don’t wanna remember 😂😂

ANGELA IS SO CUTE UGH & ANOTHER GREAT SHELAGH FACE😂

lol yes go to a hotel, should’ve done that from the get

So what exactly does Fred run? some civil defense thing?

She’s in labor and can’t even scream omg, I’m screaming

“They are often incorrect in their opinion” Sister MJ is a gem. I want someone to look at me the way Sister MJ looks at cake and the television

Phyllis yelling at Dr Godfrey😂

PATS’S FACE OF DISGUST IS ALSO ME

HOW DO THESE WOMEN GIVE BIRTH STANDING/SITTING UP?? AHHHH

There you are Beatrix, it’s been a while

Patsy being suspicious with the card game line lol. but when is Trixie going to find out about Patsy and Delia?

SHE RIPPED OUT HER WOMB?! WTF OMG IM SCREAMING

THIS HURTS TO WATCH AHH

Trixie and Sister MC to the rescue but omg this is wild I forgot

Fred wtf you can’t be sneaking up like that

DONT LEAVE SISTER MC ALONE TRIXIE

NOO, IM NOT PREPARED FOR THIS

“There are flowers on the table, and feathers in these pillows, that’s all the nature I need to get back to” I feel you Patrick lol, I like nature but not camping

Lol remember Shelagh’s old nightgown? ah I don’t miss it. The bri nylon is such a look™ & obviously has magically powers i.e this miraculous conception.

“..or they’ve been mulled to death by squirrels” IM DEAD HAHA THAT WAS A GOOD DAD JOKE, NICE ONE PATRICK

aw the baby is so precious

Why is the operating room/being in surgery called theatre in the U.K.?? and why is the doctor’s office/practice called the surgery? so many questions from a confused American..

Sister MC by the docks😭💔 she was just chillin with God and THIS HORRIBLE MAN RUINS EVERYTHING WTF UGH

Oh no

SISTER MC JUST UNCONSCIOUS ON THE DOCKS WTF IM CRYING WHY WOULD HURT HER

Patrick even if you were there she wouldn’t have called you, don’t blame urself

it’s not your arrogance sister MC!!

“don’t you even say the word fault, do you hear me, I won’t allow it” 😭💔 it’s NOT your fault sister MC 😰

I forgot how upset/hurt this episode makes me

“The worst thing is that I actually stopped to pray…” my heart hurts

You can’t even blame her for being angry😪

Judith you’re not a bad mother!! This isn’t your fault either

Sister MJ IN THE BATHROOM WITH HER😢😢💔💔 I’m c r y i n

I SAID PROTECT THEM AT ALL COSTS WHY DID THEY HURT ME LIKE THIS

Everyone so quiet at the table..

ILL FOREVER BE PROUD OF HOW BRAVE SISTER MC IS FOR SPEAKING UP FOR HER AND THE OTHER VICTIMS💖😭💔

Russian prison tats??

“I thought at first it was a test of faith, but it was a test of strength. I can bear more than I ever though I could and I can bear it for others because my strength is a gift, from him..” brb sobbing

I feel so bad for Mrs Hills bc I understand she thought she was doing the right thing and was trying to protect her daughter from the stigma & judgment from having a baby born outta wedlock 😭

But damn she almost killed her & now she can’t have any more kids

“I’m a mum, mum” Aw

lol I want children (obviously not anytime soon) but if I do Ima be shook for the rest of my life. Like my kids will  be like grown & I’ll still wake up like wtf I had them?  Lmaoo

SHELAGH’S GREY DRESS >>😍

Patrick jumping on the bed was cute lol

The Turners being cute and an unrealistically perfect family together as usual

Trixie 😍off to her AA💕

“I think it’s about time I came clean..”

Im so proud of her omg. She’s come so far in 6 series 😭💖💖😭

And Patsy and Delia are supportive yess👏🏼

“New truths were being spoken at Nonnatus house, but some remained concealed. While one voice rose, striving to erase its agony in song.”

Thanks Vanessa,, The End 😭

[recentanimenews]

Review: Pokémon Sword and Shield

Pokémon has moved forward several half-assed steps at a time, and that’s not a criticism. The series has existed comfortably in its own bubble and where other games would get lambasted for looking inward, Pokémon has thrived on reiteration and the slow crawl of minor innovations to the template. Pokémon games primarily get compared to other Pokémon games and no one expects the series to change drastically from its rock-solid fundamentals after so many years. Even as people forget weird features like poffins and Pokémon Musicals, they can take solace in the notion that even the jankiest gimmicks all work towards crafting the definitive Pokémon game, whatever that might look like in the future. Well, that future died with the announcement that Sword and Shield would mark the end of the full Pokémon roster and we would all need to leave the old “gotta catch ‘em all” mantra in the past.

I.

Pokémon Sword and Shield is the eighth generation in the mainline series of games and the first to appear on home console. It’s set in the Galar region, a place inspired by the art director’s experiences as a youth growing up in the United Kingdom. Players assume the role of a silent protagonist chasing the dream to become the Pokémon Champion, a lofty goal that is pursued with much more fervor by the player’s rival, a perennial loser named Hop who is also the current champion’s younger brother. In my mind, the player character I created, a young Pokémon trainer named Tomoyo, has lived the entirety of her life stuck in this one-Pokémon Center town knowing nothing more about the world other than what’s filtered down to her through Hop’s experiences in the comforting shade of the champion’s cape. Her growth into a person with her own story to tell spurred me on to leave home but unfortunately Hop won’t be shaken off so easily.

Even as Hop is vaunted as a formidable rival, he crumbles within seconds of any given Pokémon match against the player character and typically loses to other mid-card trainers off-camera. Loser rivals have become a staple of the series ever since Game Freak decided to let players hold type advantage over the rival’s starter Pokémon a few generations ago. For the most part, this hasn’t been a problem as balanced team-building has to grow from the initial Grass-Fire-Water triangle of effectiveness. The purpose of the rival has always been to test the player’s progress against what’s to come, gating off high-level areas until the player proves they’re capable. Hop’s path toward the Gym Challenge Finals is tightly woven with the player’s own journey and while I welcome the idea of a rival/ally having greater involvement in the storyline, Hop simply sucks at Pokémon for the longest time. And here’s the kicker to all this: everyone in Galar sucks at Pokémon.

II.

When people claim that Pokémon is “easy” and offers “zero challenge,” they tend to forget that they come in armed with a huge advantage of prior knowledge of the mechanics. By design, the player is meant to become the Pokémon Champion and there are no alternate routes to some other final destiny. That said, Sword and Shield puts up a considerably weaker fight than its predecessors. You never get the impression that the trainers are trying at all to compete and the Routes between towns are now more than ever a vestige of environment design better suited to the capabilities of the classic Game Boy. Galar’s layout evokes memories of theme parks and my quick, unimpeded dominance of the region made me feel less like a champion and more like an asshole ruining the illusion for the rest of the patrons.

Separate from Galar’s underwhelming Routes, the Wild Area received a lot of buzz when it was first unveiled and to be fair, it’s the most exciting part of the game despite its flaws. The diversity of the wild Pokémon encounters more than makes up for lame trainer battles. It’s never more apparent that certain conventions are dead and gone than when running into high-level final evolutions of Pokémon that have never appeared in the wild before. In the past, wild Pokémon were more of a nuisance than anything, hardly worth the time spent inputting the commands for an easy one-hit knockout. Along with the variety present from field to field, many of Sword and Shield’s wild Pokémon also give juicy experience points, frequently outleveling the trainers present in the immediate area. The delicate level curve of the game is easily broken as a result of meandering through the Wild Area for too long but it’s still a welcome change of pace to decades of grinding trash mobs.

Players that think too hard will look at the Routes, then at the Wild Area, and will then ask themselves why the developers didn’t just design travel around the more gratifying open world environment. The issue is that the Wild Area doesn’t have that Breath of the Wild butteriness to it, perhaps an unfair comparison considering BotW wasn’t connecting to hundreds of other players at all times. Wild Area performance takes a huge blow while online even with the console docked and although chop is reduced if a player disconnects from the internet, that defeats the purpose of the lively community feel of the Wild Area. Given how erratic the Wild Area renders under the strain of weather conditions and online connectivity, I see it more as a fun experiment than the cornerstone of Sword and Shield’s design. It shows that Game Freak is at least attempting to evolve and it’s unfortunate that the shrinking Pokédex became the symbol of change when the Wild Area is the best new idea the studio has had in years.

III.

The region of Galar is dominated by the influence of one benevolent businessman named Chairman Rose who has sculpted the culture of competitive Pokémon battles around Dynamax, a Galar exclusive phenomenon in which Pokémon get really, really big. Stadiums are built on top of “power spots” that allow Pokémon to Dynamax for the entertainment of the crowds, building up matches as a festival occasion on top of being a legitimate sport. As nice as it is to have the gyms back, this aspect of the game hasn’t grown much at all despite how they dress it up.

Even once you catch a whiff of the true nature of Dynamaxing and strange instances of Pokémon going berserk, the game is dismissively patronizing about keeping players focused on their regular journey, with characters insisting that the Gym Challenge is more important than giant Pokémon running amok in the stadiums. This subplot eventually does come to the forefront at the worst possible moment and by this point, solving the crisis that’s about to unfold has zero momentum compared to the Pokémon League. The whole farce regarding the dark omen threatening Galar wraps up as soon as it’s introduced, making me wonder why the game even bothers raising the stakes to some world-ending catastrophe if it’s compressed into a handful of battles.

For all the emphasis placed on Dynamax, the battle feature is one of the more underwhelming gimmicks in a series that’s full of them. The story explains that its use is anchored to locations featuring power spots, isolating it to stadiums and raids in the Wild Area. Despite the showy nature of the effect, it’s never utilized in any meaningful way in battle and it only takes a couple of fights to see the full extent of what the system has to offer. So long as a player can survive three Dynamax moves, the threat of actually wiping out in a Gym Leader match will have more to do with type disadvantages than the power of Dynamax. The max raids against wild Dynamax Pokémon are far more challenging than what you’ll see against trainers and the rewards from the raids are stupid good, so the gimmick isn’t entirely a worthless feature. Still, it doesn’t clear the air of this idea that Dynamax wasn’t worth the trouble.

IV.

Held up to the light at any angle, Sword and Shield is marred with flaws, but I still wouldn’t want to go back to the early generations after experiencing Pokémon on the Switch. The story is an absolute shambles but if your game is to raise, train, and tinker for the perfect critter, Sword and Shield is a considerable step up from the 3DS era’s mature metagame functionality. Untold millions of hours will be saved as a result of cutting out so much of the bullshit regarding stats, natures, and leveling. The interface is clean and responsive, controls can be set to play with a single joy-con, and the decision to give players almost-unlimited access to their Box storage is a lifesaver when it comes to breeding and farming Pokémon eggs. People that approach Pokémon at the surface level will see the same game they’ve been playing for years but the maniacs that put in the time and effort to hunt for shiny Pokémon or train for competitions will be grateful at how much the process has been streamlined.

I finished the main story at about 30 hours with a third of that time spent either going out for detours or idling to prepare coffee. The main game isn’t much longer or shorter than the past couple of Pokémon games but the scarcity of unique things to do after the credits roll is somewhat insulting. “No postgame” is an exaggeration but “minimal postgame” would be hard to argue. I can’t blame people for feeling cheated with the first $60 console Pokémon game having a single post-game quest to capture the box art legendary and no other high-priority content outside of the meta. Going back to pick up missed items and face trainers in rematches isn’t nearly as compelling as uncovering secrets after becoming Champion, especially if you have no interest in playing past catching rare Pokémon. I took myself past the 75-hour mark to complete my Pokédex and as fulfilling as it was for me, I wouldn’t claim that it’s a significantly worthwhile endeavor for the average player. By comparison, Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon had its own post-game quest, an extensive roster of legendaries to hunt down, and yeah, full support of all Pokémon going back to Ruby and Sapphire for GBA. Whatever the reasons might be, Sword and Shield has a very definitive end to its adventure that comes all too soon.

V.

For all the controversy in the lead-up, Sword and Shield ended up being more than a little OK, if not a messy success that could still be better. The future of the series will be challenging as long as Game Freak commits to the idea of rotating Pokémon in and out of the main games, guaranteeing that the next game will have limited compatibility with this generation out of the box. Nintendo and co. took a calculated risk with Sword and Shield and now that the games have sold a verified and very real One Billion copies at retail, they can reasonably infer that they won’t have to bend to the will of a few thousand rowdy fans clamoring for a return to the old ways. They have a healthy base of players comprised of casuals who don’t give a shit about Dexit, newer fans that aren’t too miffed about leaving the 3DS games behind, and folks who just like Pokémon too much to complain too loudly. I found my own enjoyment in Sword and Shield, but I’m also not rushing to post #thankyougamefreak without seeing the shape of Pokémon to come. You don’t have to like it, but odds are you already paid for it.

Pokémon Sword and Shield originally appeared on Ani-Gamers on December 21, 2019 at 6:17 PM.

By: David Estrella

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My secret hideaway: foreign correspondents reveal all

Foreign correspondents know how to get under the skin of a country. But where do they go when they want to get away from it all? Here, well-travelled journalists reveal their ultimate holiday escapes

Afua Hirsch on São Tomé e Principe, Africa

At first I felt critical of the many Africans I spoke to who had never heard of São Tomé e Principe. It is after all an African country, albeit one of the smallest (population 194,000) and remotest an archipelago of tiny islands nestled in the watery armpit of west and central Africa, deep in the Atlantic, with Gabon to the east and Nigeria to the north.

Then I realised how difficult it was to get there. Back then, in 2002, there was one flight a week from Gabon, and one from Lisbon which ferried the children of Portuguese aristocrats to secretive resorts in pristine bays at the foot of volcanos carpeted in the countrys endless virgin rainforest.

I had graduated from university just months before and in my shiny new NGO job chose São Tomé as the location for an international conference I was organising. But getting hundreds of dignitaries there meant chartering planes, training hotel staff and even having new phone cables laid. I arrived exhausted. My VIP guests were in a strop, not because the plane Id chartered looked ripe for the scrap heap, but because it had no business class seats. I was not in the mood to fall in love.

But I did. Id never seen volcanoes so alive with forest or the Atlantic such a seductive, sleepy blue. Ive never felt so close to a history I thought much older no African language is spoken in São Tomé, but, rather a creole version of Portuguese. The inhabitants are all descended from slaves, Portuguese outcasts and Jewish children dumped on the islands hundreds of years ago.

People lived in the ruins of decayed colonial palaces as if the plantation had collapsed the day before. It felt separated at birth from another part of the world the Caribbean or South America with its palatial palms and crumbling façades, ridgeback mountains and Portuguese towns.

But its Africa all right. Billions of barrels of oil have achieved what natural beauty and human charm never did and placed it firmly on the map. The oil workers have been streaming in since São Tomé and I had our first encounter: I hope people seeking Africas greatest beauty will, too.

Fly to São Tomé e Principe from London via Lisbon with TAP Portugal from £457 (flytap.com). Stay at Omali Lodge, doubles from £106 (omalilodge.com) Afua Hirsch is the former West Africa correspondent for the Guardian

Lyse Doucet on New Brunswick, Canada

Good old times: the Acadian historic village of Caraquet in New Brunswick, Canada. Photograph: Philippe Renault/Hemis/Corbis

Ive heard it time and time again. New Brunswick? Oh, I drove through it to get to Nova Scotia. Acadians? Hmm Cajuns? Oh Cajun cooking Music Louisiana!

But New Brunswick in eastern Canada is much more than a place to drive through. And its northeastern coast will not just delight but enlighten you about a people who survived a British colonial expulsion from here in 1755 and returned to establish a vibrant culture and proud sense of self.

The Acadians are the descendants of the French who colonised the region from the 17th century, and if you visit on 15 August, Acadian national day, youll be loudly reminded of that by the tintamarre. At 17.55, on the dot, people dance in the streets, beating pans and blowing horns, to make as much noise as possible to let the world know theyre still here. A dark day in imperial history, when thousands were forced to flee south including to Louisiana, where the term Acadian became Cajun is now a vibrant celebration of survival.

A drive along the winding shore takes you through a picturesque landscape of simple cottages hugging the coastline and rambling farmhouses set back on rolling green fields (except in the freezing depths of winter, when all is snowy white).

Lobster traps and the Acadian flag are ubiquitous a tricolour to honour French ancestry, with a bright yellow star, representing the Stella Maris, the star of the sea, that guides sailors in storms.

To know even more about this charming corner on the sea, visit the Acadian village, a functioning replica of life through the late 18th to the mid-20th centuries. Inside the original wooden houses of the first Acadian families they are carrying on with daily chores, but are never too busy to warmly welcome visitors.

History comes alive in the evening at the elegant LHôtel Château Albert, where you can tuck into an old- fashioned meal while being entertained by a trio of traditional fiddlers. On my last visit there, a female fiddler recounted how she had to practise in secret as a young girl. Fiddling was only for men then.

And do drop by the Doucet farm in the historical village, where you may find them baking bread.

Fly to Moncton from London via Toronto or Montreal with Air Canada from £532 (aircanada.com). Stay at LHôtel Château Albert, doubles from £70 (villagehistoriqueacadien.com) Lyse Doucet is the BBCs chief international correspondent

Ed Vulliamy on Sfântu Gheorghe, Romania

Rowing home: fisherman on the Danube. Photograph: Alamy

The Sfântu Gheorghe arm of the Danube Delta is gratifyingly hard to reach: by ferry from the river port of Mahmudia, which departs between two and five hours late, laden with essential goods that folk in Sfântu Gheorghe on the Black Sea shore cannot buy in their village shop. The boat navigates bends in Europes mightiest river, past oxbow lakes and through newly dug channels. A small crowd makes its way through the mud to the jetty with donkeys to collect the shopping.

There are two cars in Sfântu Gheorghe: one belongs to the policeman, the other to the government environmental officer. During my first visit in 1995, they had crashed and were being repaired.

I frequent Sfântu Gheorghe thanks to an ornithologist friend from Bucharest. His metier along with caviar from local sturgeon is the ostensible reason to be there: a wonder of eagles, egrets, vultures, cranes, ibises, cormorants and pelicans. Fishermen weigh their wares on iron scales in a market that has not changed for centuries. They say that when the sea howls it means a life lost in revenge for mans abuse of the oceans. Sure enough, last time it howled, the bodies of a father and son washed ashore.

One day the ornithologist took me out on the river in his little boat. And there it was: the howl, a heart-stopping scream, and the river heaved. The ornithologists jovial face was suddenly terrified and intense as he gripped the outboard motor to carve a way through the current and driving rain. After 50 minutes of thinking that any of them could be my last, we made it to the bank.

On the night they return, the fishermen gather, after a brief visit home, at the only bar in town: a window cut into a brickwork house. Outside which they sit to drink vodka that comes in bottles the size of a standard beer thats the unit per round, and I confess its tough going.

In keeping with the vulgarisation and invasion by tourism of anything authentic in Romania (as everywhere else), there is now a Green Village Resort in Sfântu Gheorghe: some people on TripAdvisor seem to have had horrendous experiences there, which can only be a good thing.

On one final night in Sfântu Gheorghe, the ornithologist and I were supposed to have gone to bed early, to catch the dawn boat back to Mahmudia, but the captain was dancing on the table, drinking vodka, so there didnt seem to be much hurry.

When the ferry did leave, I was as ever sad to leave with it, into the quickening eastern sky and the brave dawn of newly capitalist, tourist-friendly Romania.

Fly to Bucharest from London with Ryanair from £22.99 (ryanair.com). Mahmudia port is roughly four hours drive, then take the ferry to Sfântu Gheorghe. Stay at the Green Village, doubles from £40 (greenvillage.ro) Ed Vulliamy is a writer for the Guardian and Observer and was was New York correspondent for the Observer and Rome correspondent for the Guardian

Kate Connolly on Hiddensee, Germany

Artists escape: a lighthouse at the Dornbusch on Hiddensee island. Photograph: Heinz Wohner/Getty Images

As a hideaway it could hardly be better named. The island of Hiddensee sits on Germanys north-eastern tip and is one of the countrys sunniest, windiest locations. Despite being just under 11 miles long and, at its broadest point, only two miles wide, even in the height of summer it is surprisingly easy to find a spot in the dunes or in its expansive heathland to escape the daytrippers who arrive en masse from neighbouring Rügen. While to English ears at least its name sounds like a clever reference to its remoteness, it is in fact a nod to the legendary Norwegian king, Hedin, who is believed to have fought here. Whether for a love interest or for gold, opinions are divided, but in any case Hedins Oe or Hedins Island as it was named while under Danish rule has more or less stuck.

In the 1920s the Baltic island was a magnet for intellects and artists. The families of writers Thomas and Heinrich Mann, Günter Grass (whose wife was a Hiddenseer), sculptor Käthe Kollwitz and the Freuds were among the regulars, as was Danish film star Asta Nielsen, who had a playful circular holiday home, the karusel. The Freud connection endures to this day thanks to Esther Freuds 2003 novel The Sea House, which recalls the holidays her great-grandfather Sigmund and his family enjoyed on the island before they and many Hiddensee residents were banned by the Nazis. The family found some sort of solace in the village of Walberswick on the Suffolk coast which, with its grassy sand dunes, large skies and a home they called Hidden House, reminded them of the beloved Baltic island they were forced to forsake.

Ive been coming here regularly for more than a decade, and it has never lost its appeal as an ideal place for escape. It is car-free, with no golf courses and, at around six hours by train and ferry from Berlin, close enough for a long weekend. Aside from swimming, walking and biking, there are three bookshops, a theatre, some pubs and a tent cinema. Otherwise theres little more to do than ask locals to teach you how to fish for pieces of amber after a storm, or literally milk the bright-orange buckthorn berries for their vitamin C-rich juice.

It continues to be a draw for writers and artists, too. Lutz Seilers 2014 novel Kruso, which won the German Book Prize (out in English this year), is set in Hiddensee during the heady days before the fall of the Berlin Wall. Its a poetic tribute to the island as well as offering an insight into life here during the East German dictatorship for those wanting to flee to the west (Denmark is hardly more than an energetic swim away) as well as those who simply sought internal exile amid the wind and the waves from the every day strains of the GDR. Hiddensee has never lost its appeal as an ideal place for escape.

Fly to Berlin from London with EasyJet from £29.49 (easyjet.com). Regular trains are 44 from Berlin (bahn.com) to Stralsund, from there take a ferry to Hiddensee (reederei-hiddensee.de). Stay at Hotel Godewind, doubles from £92 (hotelgodewind.de) Kate Connolly is the Guardian and Observers Berlin correspondent

Peter Beaumont on Hosh Jasmin, West Bank

A table with a view: the patio at Hosh Jasmin overlooking the hills. Photograph: Luke Pyenson

The hills just beyond the outskirts of the Palestinian town of Beit Jala Bethlehems other half, though never say that to a native are a special place. Ancient limestone terraces descend towards Battir and the cool valley of Wadi Refaim, with its fig trees and gazelles. Small apricot orchards hem in the old stone farms that dot the slopes. Just outside the town is where you find Hosh Jasmin, an organic farm and restaurant opened in 2012 by filmmaker, sculptor and restaurateur Mazen Saadeh.

Fifteen minutes drive from the western edge of Jerusalem, Hosh Jasmin is both circumscribed by and defies Israels continuing occupation of the West Bank. Located in Area C, under Israeli security and administrative control, it is reached for us at least through the Walajah checkpoint, passing the Israeli settlement of Har Gilo. The Israeli separation wall is visible from Hosh Jasmin in the distance, a snaking line of grey concrete.

Despite the reminders, it is a place to escape for a while from the continuing violence and tensions, popular with Palestinians from the neighbouring town, Jerusalemites and internationals. Visiting on a blue moon last year, a group of musicians had been assembled. The waiters, encouraging us to stay, suggested if everyone was drunk enough a midnight walk would be initiated. Named for the Syrian-style hosh compounds, tables are set on rough-hewn wooden platforms under the trees, areas designed for sprawling on cushions, although there is a small indoor area for when it rains and a fire pit for the winter chill of the Jerusalem hills. Elsewhere there are hammocks and swing seats.

Below is Saadehs farm, including olives that Hosh Jasmin presses for oil, fruit trees, hives and rabbit runs and the restaurants arak distillery. Its location is a double-edged sword. The lack of building permits for Palestinians in Area C has preserved the areas rustic feel, and it also means that the accommodation Saadeh provides for those who stay beyond when the fire burns down is a treehouse and several tents.

This Christmas those of us in the press corps celebrated lunch outdoors with turkey and Palestinian starters and Taybeh, the Palestinian beer. On other days the food is dictated by the seasons, although there are no actual menus. Specialities include rabbit zarb, a tagine-like dish cooked in an underground oven, Palestinian dumplings and chicken musakhan with flatbread in its rich sauce of onions and sumac served on a flat bread.

For me, the best time is the late afternoon and evening, watching the hills bruise purple into night as the fire starts. Then, Hosh Jasmin is a place to forget for a while at least all of the areas troubles.

Fly to Tel Aviv from London with British Airways from £304 return (ba.com). Eat and camp at Hosh Jasmin organic farm (facebook.com/HoshJas; +972(0)599 868 914), which can be reached from Jerusalem by taxi or hire car (europcar.co.uk). You will need your passport to cross the Walajah checkpoint Peter Beaumont is the Guardians Jerusalem correspondent

Emma Graham-Harrison on the Jalori Pass, India

Touching the sky: a distant view of the mountains from the Jalori Pass near Kullu. Photograph: Getty Images

The sound of cymbals, drums and song followed us the whole morning, across hillsides of wild iris and through deodar forests, the musicians hidden and the music sometimes thinning to silence but always returning again when mountain paths brought us and the mysterious band back within earshot.

We met them at last outside a tea shack on the Jalori Pass, more than 3,000m high, villagers escorting a goddess swathed in gold and scarlet to the Dussehra festival in Kullu town, two days walk away.

She would be jostled and photographed there by thousands of tourists, but we met her almost alone, our paths crossing at just the right moment.

It seemed like serendipity but our guide, Prem Singh Bodh, had known more or less when the group would arrive, after decades hiking trails in this corner of north India.

Friends got to know him while living in Delhi, and had invited me to join them on a 10-day trip to an area that is little visited by tourists, but full of life and natural beauty.

We met pilgrims at ruined hilltop forts that have become windswept temples. Kids raced up to one campsite from the nearest village and convinced us to lose a game of cricket on an impossible slope.

Their teacher was a postgraduate with a taste for Victorian literature Thackeray, Kipling, Dickens who grew up the other side of a nearby peak. We asked why he turned down the chance of a more lucrative city life after graduating. I missed these mountains, he said simply.

Between those meetings, we had the forests, fields and temples to ourselves for hours at a time. We slept in tents on high meadows beside a woodland lake and spent a couple of nights in spartan but charming lodges built for colonial administrators more than a century ago.

We were camping, but it felt luxurious, with air mattresses, ponies to carry gear so we travelled with just a small day pack, and even a cook.

A few bars of coverage would occasionally appear on the phones of people trying to keep in touch with home. But most of us were happy to be out of contact and suspended in time.

It was often surprising, always beautiful and entirely special, and because we arranged the trip directly with Bodhs company, Zingaro, it was a relatively affordable £50 per person per day including tents and lodges, food and guides. We spent nothing else because there was nothing we needed and nothing to buy. Zingaro also arranges trips to higher altitude areas, for those seeking an even more remote getaway.

Fly to Dharamsala (aka Kangra or Gaggal) from London via Delhi with Air India from £495 (airindia.in). Zingaro treks can organise treks across northern India (zingarotreks.com). Ask Zingaro for advice, but they will usually meet you with a 4×4 or minibus at the edge of the mountains Emma Graham-Harrison is international affairs correspondent for the Guardian and Observer and was Afghanistan bureau chief for Thomson Reuters

Matilda Temperley on Kaokoland, Namibia

Under African skies: a young Himba woman. Photograph: Matilda Temperley

Five hundred miles north-east of Windhoek, the dusty town of Opuwo is nestled into the edge of Kaokolands arid hills. The local inhabitants are bare-breasted, clad in goatskin and covered in ochre. These are the Himba. They live alongside Herero women wearing dresses reminiscent of 19th-century German colonialists with hats shaped to resemble cow horns. Unusual characters arrive in this small trading hub to replenish their supplies at the areas only garage and supermarket before disappearing back into the surrounding desert.

Opuwo is the entrance to the remarkable Kaokoland that lies to the east. This is an area so empty and vast you can drive for days without seeing another soul. I picked up a local guide in Opuwo and set off in the 4×4 (complete with camping gear and roof tents) I had rented in Windhoek. Within an hour, a sandy riverbed stalled our progress and throughout the day the roads became ever more dubious. It doesnt take long until you are obliged to stop being precious about your vehicle and surrender to the inevitable punctures, scrapes and scratches and the hundreds of kilometres of unknown terrain that stretch before you. As you drive, red rocks give way to white deserts, plains become mountains and colours evolve with the day.

After two days of driving, we came across the first sign of human habitation and were surprised to see a rusty petrol drum on a rocky outcrop with signs advertising cold drinks and fuel. It turned out the attendant Himba women had nothing to sell and were rather hoping we could give them some food. It was undoubtedly the oddest petrol station Ive ever seen. The occasional villages we then passed were welcoming, perhaps because the Himbas ancestral land rights and autonomy are well recognised and the increasing cultural tourism in the area is largely on their terms.

When I visited last February, the villages were mainly populated with women and children as the men were with the herds looking for pasture. The villages were full of laughter, most of which was at my expense. The fact that I was childless at 33 never failed to cause mirth. In the first village I camped in, I was given a live chicken that they insisted I leave with. At the next village, I was made to dance out stories. There was something magical in being innocently teased in this matriarchal society.

Kaokoland stretches for many hundreds of kilometres from the Hoanib river north to the Kunene river, which is the border with Angola, and one of the least-populated places on earth. In Kaokoland, you cannot fail to marvel at your insignificance. Kaokoland stole my heart on my first foray and I have been looking for an excuse to return ever since.

Fly to Windhoek from London with South African Airways from £615 (flysaa.com). Car rentals from Camping Car Hire (camping-carhire.com). A 4×4 with full camping equipment is available from £45 a day Matilda Temperley is a photographer and writer

Helena Smith on Koufonisia, Greece

Open water: an empty beach on the islands of Koufonisia. Photograph: Alamy

Greece has always been about the light. The shadows lie in its luminosity. For years I have tried to swim into the sun, a days fading rays made sweeter still by waters brush. The quest for light can take you places that you might otherwise never know; beaches you might never see. In the summer of 1984, on a whim propelled by adventure, I holidayed on Naxos, crossed it by bike and got into a little cargo ship that took me to a place that at the time seemed so ethereal, so elemental, so remote, it has remained with me ever since.

That place was Koufonisia, an isle made up of parts upper Koufonisi and lower Koufonisi and over the course of a spring and summer I would come to know both. Before the internet, before mass travel, before Greeks got fat on EU funds, upper Koufonisi had a smattering of white, flat-roofed houses, one fish tavern, one meat tavern, one tourist (a French painter), one road and a girdle of virgin beaches, ornamented by turquoise sea. In the spring its was carpeted with poppies just as Naxos to its west and Amorgos to its east; and in summer covered by herbs carried on a breeze. But although perfect, it was to be trumped by the discovery of lower Koufonisi: uninhabited (bar the odd shepherd), with even bluer seas, better shorelines and a pure light that I swam into with the passing of each day.

Several years later I returned to upper Koufonisi, this time making my home a rented villa looking out to sea on the isles southern extremity. The water was aquamarine, as seductively translucent as it had been all those summers ago, but it was a world away a world discovered by Greeks who had built second homes, Italians who went for the tourist season and beach bars that served cocktails to the dulcet tones of Icelandic composers.

Lower Koufonisi had changed, too: its cave no more (thanks to a landslide), its beaches the preserve of the droves who descended from fishing boats now busily crossing the 200m channel that separated the isle from upper Koufonisi. But the light was still there, the sky and sea co-joined by a brilliance that was unbeatable and blue. And, as I had done all those years before, I swam into the sun at the end of the day, backstroking through the flat blue, eyes fixed on the brilliant skies and the rocks they framed, knowing I had arrived where I had begun, in the magic of Greece.

Fly to Athens from London with British Airways from £104 (ba.com). Blue Star Ferries on the (Athens) Piraeus Amorgos route stop at Koufonisia three times a week (euroferries.com). Sea jets also makes the trip in summer (seajets.gr). Travellers passing through Athens can also book tickets through Grecian travel (grecian.gr) Helena Smith is the Guardians correspondent in Greece, Turkey and Cyprus

Stephen Gibbs on Playa Bacunayagua, Cuba

Crossing the divide: the Puente de Bacunayagua, completed in 1959, takes you to the beaches of Bacunayagua. Photograph: Buena Vista Images/Getty Images

Go to that bar that serves the piña coladas, cross the bridge, then the road to Bacunayagua is on the left. Those were typical driving directions in Cuba in the early 2000s. Then, it was a country without road signs. The reason was never clear. One theory was that every time a sign was put up it was stolen so that its metal could be turned into car parts. Another was that Fidel Castro, determined that the nation remain on a constant military footing, was convinced that road signage would help invaders. It made travelling a challenge. And arriving especially rewarding.

The directions were good enough the first time I went to Bacunayagua in 2005. There were three of us: two Cuban friends, one of whom was a scuba dive instructor, and me. The piña colada stop was memorable. Alongside the road Marco, in a crisp white guayabera shirt, prepared cocktails for thirsty motorists from palm-fresh coconuts, cream and pineapple. He agreed, reluctantly, to go easy on the rum.

After that we crossed the spectacular Puente de Bacunayagua, the tallest bridge in Cuba, completed in 1959. A couple of kilometres later, almost hidden by trees, there on the left was an unmarked, steep concrete road. It dived through a forest towards the sea, bringing us to a complex of run-down 1970s bungalows. In front was the clearest water, framed by an elegant peninsula, and a perfect little hidden beach.

This particular stretch of coastline was also a notorious pick-up point for the cigarette boats that come from Florida and smuggle Cubans back to the US. A few bored young soldiers were there on watch; they were surprised to see us. The offer of a cold drink turned their frowns into smiles. They kept an eye on the car while we explored the pristine waters below.

I returned to Bacunayagua a few weeks ago. A gleaming blue sign now clearly marks that turnoff to the bay. It is as beautiful as ever, but a little noisier. A Cuban family, complete with relatives from Miami, had rented the house the military once occupied. Silence has been replaced by reggaeton.

On the way back to Havana, I stopped at the roadside bar. Marco was still there. Estás perdido, he said to me. That delightful Cuban greeting perhaps best translated as: Where have you been?, offered with equal feeling whether someone hasnt been seen for a few days or a few years. Cuba may be changing, but it still moves at its own pace.

Fly to Havana from London with Virgin Atlantic from £559 (virginatlantic.com). Hire a car using the concierge at one of the bigger hotels, or contact Cuba Diving Now (cubadivingnow.com) to be guided Stephen Gibbs covers Venezuela for Chinese TV and The Economist

from All Of Beer http://allofbeer.com/my-secret-hideaway-foreign-correspondents-reveal-all/ from All of Beer https://allofbeercom.tumblr.com/post/173213707402