Old-fashioned me...

I often wish that I could travel back in time...the 1800s, 1920s (flappers!!), 1960s, 1980s...basically any time before now. I think it would be quite lovely. And not like Pleasantville at all, of course not! More like Midnight in Paris - definitely!

When I think of the rich culture, traditions, slower pace of everyday life, face to face relationships and vibrant conversations, textural music (textural is a word right?), less screen time, and obviously higher quality of life back in those days (yes, I tend to exaggerate and romanticize), boy do I ever want to go there :-)

Of course many would argue that now is the best time of all. Smart phones + the internet + digital everything are so incredible, groundbreaking and communication is so astounding, soon people will be bionic and Monsanto will own all our food so on and so forth but I think my energy just doesn't quite fit with modern energy.

I greatly enjoy walking, the sound of turning pages, writing things by hand, mix tapes, lady-like things of various kinds, cooking and eating real food, things that have shape and weight, eating meals with my family, discussing all sorts of things with a sense of romanticism rather than cynicism, fresh air, green spaces, taking time rather than instant everything, unique textures + designs + places, and just the sense that my life is associated with a certain time and influenced by the unique colours, smells, feelings, pictures, things of that time rather than being suspended in a digital, shapeless, ageless, black and white plastic nothingness. Oops, am I exaggerating again?

So another one of my goals for 2012 will be to add texture, colour, and shape to my everyday life rather than whining about this. It's up to us to make our lives into whatever we want them to be and, really, what is there to stop me? No one is saying I have to live a certain way. I can light candles, read musty old books, play board games, and listen to records if I want to and there's nothing wrong with that. Gwa ha ha! :-)

I'd like to say more about how fascinating it is to live in Korea - a land of the latest technology (home of Samsung and LG! and soooo many cell phones!) as well as being a land of tradition and Confucianism...but I will save that post for another time methinks :-)

Have a marvelous day :-)

Summer Hotness

I'm back! My internet connection has been very wonky and frustratingly inconsistent and slow lately, but only on my main computer, my laptop works fine. Technology continues to perplex me :) Yesterday I was walking around in Vancouver and I saw a store selling beautiful old typewriters - now that's more like it :) I stopped and admired them for a full minute :)

In other news, Vancouver is experiencing a heatwave - I guess the weather has to balance itself out :) I'm enjoying it - being able to wear sandals, flowy skirts, and tank tops after months spent bundled up in jackets and scarves is sooo liberating and wonderful! I can finally feel the sunshine on my skin :)

As for food, I recently tried some delicious Korean tea. There are many interesting flavours but so far my favourite is a nut blend. It comes as a powder packaged in individual little pouches. Just add hot water and you get a rich, creamy, nutty, extremely tasty cup of tea, mmmm. This particular tea was given to me so now I'll definitely have to go and try to find a place in Vancouver that sells it.

Have a wonderful weekend! Happy middle of July (aghhh!)!!

An addition has been made...

...and it happens to be a gorgeous new computer! It was definitely time for the old one to gracefully retire (before exploding completely...or just crawling to a permanent stop). Now I have a lovely Mac with a ginormous screen (and it's the smaller of the two options!!) and way more desk space.

This weekend was chock full of chores. Mostly shopping-type chores. And hopping on over to the bakery :) I got more ESL books so now my resource collection is almost completely complete. Oh, and I indulged and got the first volume of the Glee soundtrack. Not the kind of music I normally listen to but, kind of surprisingly, I've really been enjoying the show and I like all the theatricality and modern choir sounds. Plus, it's just oodles of fun and I can use it in class. Yup, for educational purposes.

It was quite sunny and warm today, so I strolled around admiring all the flowers that are blooming so beautifully right now. My neighbourhood is bursting with gorgeous colours - it's such a treat!

Well, hopefully I can figure out a lot of the fantastic features on this lovely computer. I'm sure it's very useful in addition to being pretty :)

Cheerio!

It's Friday?!

Wowza, time has flown by like a hummingbird this week!! It was a really fun week, filled with laughs and surprises and (hopefully) some learning and a field trip to Whole Foods :) The students seemed to like it and they completed their shopping list + write down some new foods you'd like to try assignments but they agreed that it's uber expensive (as everything tends to be in Vancouver). I also showed a couple of DVDs at the end of the week - one class watched a hilarious episode of Fawlty Towers (such a great show! John Cleese always makes me laugh with enthusiasm :) ) and another class watched a bit of Wallace and Gromit and the Curse of the Were-Rabbit, a lovely and also hilarious film.

So I've been teaching for a month now! Crazy! It feels good, I'm really loving it. And I haven't laughed quite this hard in a long time - it's beautiful how even when a bunch of people come from different places and don't really understand each other easily they can come together and bond and laugh...a lot :) Hooray :) Seriously, the students in my classes are so sweet and funny and wonderful it makes it seem like this isn't really work at all - it's too fun to be work :)

In other news, I might buy a new desktop computer this weekend. The one I have now is, oh, a decade old. It's pretty ancient and getting to be completely un-usable. So I want to buy a nice Mac :) I've done some research on the internet and will head on over to an Apple store tomorrow. Eek.

Do you enjoy buying technological gadgets and things or is it something that you avoid?

Happy weekend!!

Dozy Dreams

As I was dozing off to sleep last night, for some reason I started imagining what kind of music I would play if I did indeed some day own a little bookstore (offering nutritional consultations in the back room of course!). This is what I came up with:

She & Him
Cat Power
Beach House
The Magic Numbers
Simon and Garfunkel
Bat for Lashes
Feist
My Morning Jacket
Devendra Banhart
Belle & Sebastian

And thrown in for good measure: Debussy, Chopin, Vivaldi, and various jazz and opera music (depending on the time of day).

There would be dark wooden shelves, a little tea bar serving loose leaf tea, little round tables scattered throughout the shop, and an upstairs level that feels like a cozy loft.

In this age of kindles and iPhones and iPads and digital everything, I think the people who have always loved holding a book in their hands and turning the textured pages and enjoying the fragrance of a new book will keep on doing so, thus keeping real live books alive (even if they become endangered). I don't understand how the beauty, character, uniqueness, and solidity of any one book can be thrown away for a generic digital version. Sigh.

It seems like all the old things are being processed into a high-tech, modern version, soulless and fragmented and unhealthy. This even happened with food - whole, natural, wholesome food replaced with boxed, mass-produced, chemical-laden mysteries.

Okay, rant over. It's always important to stay positive, have hope, and create positive change by taking conscious action and making healthy, happy choices :)

Awaiting Avatar 3-D

And then seeing it! Over the holiday weekend, I went to watch Avatar on a big giant screen in 3-D. The fancy 3-D glasses were very stylish :) Geek chic all the way :) The film itself, I must confess, took my breath away. The reviews I had seen mentioned that the 3-D technology and visual spectacle were absolutely amazing, but that the story was weak and really nothing new or meaningful. I ended up disagreeing.

First, the effects. Yes, this brand new 3-D technology is groundbreaking. Much as I dislike a lot of tech toys and gadgets these days, when it comes to creating a fully immersive, enriched, magical experience different from normal movie-watching, I do embrace this new stuff. While so much technology these days takes us away from the present moment and has people trying to juggle ten things at once (all on a tiny little screen), this foray was all about getting completely absorbed in an extraordinary experience. You forget that you're sitting in a movie theatre and feel like you're actually in the movie, experiencing everything that the characters do. There was a real sense of wonder and discovery and excitement in the air, and afterwards I felt like watching the movie again on IMAX because it was just that great and completely new of an experience.

Second, the story. Reviewers are discussing and analyzing political, environmental, anthropological, etc. themes all with a good dose of cynicism and intellectual superiority. I was expecting not to care much about the story based on what I had heard, but instead I found it quite compelling and I really embraced the themes and characters. There are very explicit environmental and political messages that have been accused of being too left-wing, which I didn't mind as they pretty much reflected my own views. The Na'vi live in harmony with their planet and are deeply spiritual and completely in touch with nature. Cynics say this is boring, unrealistic, idealized, etc. I honestly believe this is how it is meant to be. The way we live now is no more "realistic". All other creatures, plants, even the weather live in balance, following the cycles of life and maintaining delicately balanced ecosystems. This is life, and it's very real. Human beings brandishing money, guns, technology, and caring more about these things than about the planet that gives them life is definitely not more "realistic" and meaningful to me. So yes, it saddens me a bit that people don't wish to connect with themes about respecting nature and living in community with each other. Apparently only 6 year old girls would wish to live in this kind of magical world.

Aaanyways, this is not about disagreeing with critics or defining what constitutes a great film. This is about experiencing something new, beautiful, possibly thought-provoking, and really fun. Through this new technology, you can discover a beautiful new planet, fly, run through a colourful rainforest, and see through someone else's eyes. Soon many films will be shown in 3-D, and I think this is a great one to start with. Beautiful, colourful, hopeful, and encompassing themes that really do mean something :)