tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-65374862376198785522024-03-18T21:16:49.955-07:00What The Whatever?Bringing you uninformed opinions on music, film, travel and entertainment since 2010.georgie_forgiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03091664460817550955noreply@blogger.comBlogger47125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6537486237619878552.post-23738752409189976062012-04-11T09:00:00.001-07:002012-04-11T09:00:54.642-07:00Interview - Simon AmstellI will stop neglecting this blog soon, I promise! Hopefully next year will bring much more creative and journalistic joy. Until then, check out who I interviewed recently!<br />
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<div><object width="480" height="480"><param name="movie" value="http://www.mixcloud.com/media/swf/player/mixcloudLoader.swf?feed=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mixcloud.com%2FForgeRadio%2Finterview-simon-amstell%2F&embed_uuid=d05a4bf1-a3b0-4b4c-ad16-d755e29159b2&stylecolor=&embed_type=widget_standard"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="wmode" value="opaque"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.mixcloud.com/media/swf/player/mixcloudLoader.swf?feed=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mixcloud.com%2FForgeRadio%2Finterview-simon-amstell%2F&embed_uuid=d05a4bf1-a3b0-4b4c-ad16-d755e29159b2&stylecolor=&embed_type=widget_standard" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="opaque" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="480" height="480"></embed></object><div style="clear:both; height:3px;"></div><p style="display:block; font-size:12px; font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; margin:0; padding: 3px 4px; color:#999;"><a href="http://www.mixcloud.com/ForgeRadio/interview-simon-amstell/?utm_source=widget&utm_medium=web&utm_campaign=base_links&utm_term=resource_link" target="_blank" style="color:#02a0c7; font-weight:bold;">Interview - Simon Amstell </a><span> by </span><a href="http://www.mixcloud.com/ForgeRadio/?utm_source=widget&utm_medium=web&utm_campaign=base_links&utm_term=profile_link" target="_blank" style="color:#02a0c7; font-weight:bold;">Forgeradio</a><span> on </span><a href="http://www.mixcloud.com/?utm_source=widget&utm_medium=web&utm_campaign=base_links&utm_term=homepage_link" target="_blank" style="color:#02a0c7; font-weight:bold;"> Mixcloud</a></p><div style="clear:both; height:3px;"></div></div>georgie_forgiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03091664460817550955noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6537486237619878552.post-68363746844227997522011-12-28T12:56:00.000-08:002011-12-28T15:53:46.049-08:00Radio: A Committee Christmas CarolThis blog has traditionally been for anything I wrote, so I think this counts - it's the Forge Radio Committee Christmas play that I co-wrote and which was broadcast on 25th Dec 2011. That's right, the actual Christmas day. It's a bit silly but it was a good laugh to write and record. Enjoy. <br />
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Based (loosely) on A Christmas Carol and the Nativity 'A Committee Christmas Carol' follows station manager Ebeneezer Whitehouse back in time to the very first Christmas as he attempts to rediscover his long lost Christmas Spirit. <br />
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Written by James Kenny and Georgie Beardmore <br />
Produced by Jack and Sophia <br />
And starring the Forge Radio Committee.<br />
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<div><object width="480" height="480"><param name="movie" value="http://www.mixcloud.com/media/swf/player/mixcloudLoader.swf?feed=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mixcloud.com%2FForgeRadio%2Fa-committee-christmas-carol%2F&embed_uuid=01322db4-8ac6-477d-917a-de776cd7fa5b&stylecolor=&embed_type=widget_standard"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="wmode" value="opaque"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.mixcloud.com/media/swf/player/mixcloudLoader.swf?feed=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mixcloud.com%2FForgeRadio%2Fa-committee-christmas-carol%2F&embed_uuid=01322db4-8ac6-477d-917a-de776cd7fa5b&stylecolor=&embed_type=widget_standard" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="opaque" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="480" height="480"></embed></object><div style="clear:both; height:3px;"></div><p style="display:block; font-size:12px; font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; margin:0; padding: 3px 4px; color:#999;"><a href="http://www.mixcloud.com/ForgeRadio/a-committee-christmas-carol/?utm_source=widget&utm_medium=web&utm_campaign=base_links&utm_term=resource_link" target="_blank" style="color:#02a0c7; font-weight:bold;">A Committee Christmas Carol</a><span> by </span><a href="http://www.mixcloud.com/ForgeRadio/?utm_source=widget&utm_medium=web&utm_campaign=base_links&utm_term=profile_link" target="_blank" style="color:#02a0c7; font-weight:bold;">Forgeradio</a><span> on </span><a href="http://www.mixcloud.com/?utm_source=widget&utm_medium=web&utm_campaign=base_links&utm_term=homepage_link" target="_blank" style="color:#02a0c7; font-weight:bold;"> Mixcloud</a></p><div style="clear:both; height:3px;"></div></div>georgie_forgiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03091664460817550955noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6537486237619878552.post-70763841551203500812011-10-13T11:11:00.000-07:002011-10-13T15:20:54.884-07:00Creative Writing: "Monochrome Dream"<div class="MsoNormal">
This was written to Sorrow - Monochrome Dream for Turnfables (LSRfm Thursday 3-4). It's meant to be a slightly tongue-in-cheek dig at old black and white romantic films. Or romantic films in general, because I am a cynical, cynical woman. Enjoy! </div>
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A ballroom of a past time in an unspecified place. High heels, high fashion, back when smoking cigarettes spoke of sophistication and class and before wearing fur was taboo. A band plays for the benefit of the couples revolving on the dance floor, all executing the perfect waltz, because it is that era, the era when everyone knew the moves. </div>
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He is dressed to the nines. She is dressed to kill. They haven’t seen each other yet. </div>
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She drifts through the smoke like a teenage dream, silk pooling at her feet like an ink spill, skin shining like an August moon. What a leading lady… those lips, those eyes; she’s perfection. How are we supposed to believe that she is still yet to be asked to dance? </div>
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He broods in the shadows, tall and rugged, clutching his whiskey and pondering the frivolity of his friends, stereotype of a moody hero. These dances, hah! You won’t catch him on the dance floor, pointlessly twirling some dull blonde around and around, making small talk for little people. </div>
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She drifts. He broods. She drifts closer. Their eyes meet. </div>
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It’s like his reservations have been swept away with the force of her gaze. He can’t help but reach for her, enclosing her delicately gloved hand inside his strong, masculine paw. She does not resist. Her breath catches. <br />
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Now they are dancing, revolving alongside fifty other couples who think this waltz is love. But for them this <i>is</i> love. Neither knows the other’s name, but they know that this is their happily-ever-after. This moment is the one they have both been waiting for all their lives, it’s the moment they’ll never forget. They’ll tell their grandchildren about this moment, the first time they danced, the first time they kissed. </div>
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She could swoon in his arms, he could drown in her eyes and I could believe it if it wasn’t in monochrome. </div>
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<br /></div>georgie_forgiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03091664460817550955noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6537486237619878552.post-70414846109319074122011-10-10T15:50:00.000-07:002011-10-10T15:50:06.024-07:00Creative Writing "Farsight"Creative writing is back! This time for a shiny new LSR show "Turnfables" - less folk, more low-fi dubstep, Thursdays 3-4pm. Here's my very first piece that I wrote for them - it was inspired by the track "Farsight" from Ghostek & Buck UK.<br />
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<div class="MsoNormal">I am a speck on a deserted beach in winter, all hat and scarf and no umbrella. Up ahead steel grey clouds tumble, pouring fourth not raindrops but sheets of water that fall like perfect panes of glass. They shatter when they hit me and a thousand tiny shards dance around my feet, my shoulders, my wind-scorched face, water droplets tracking my cheeks like tears. The water cascades off my back like a waterfall, my clothes cling to me as ice creeps into my bones. I have a river for a coat and two puddles for shoes, and yet I don’t shudder, I don’t shiver, the cold does not bite. I wrap the rain around me like a shroud and I watch. I watch the waves. I watch them breathe softly over the sand, in and out, in and out. My own breath matches, in and out, in and out. We are one, me and the ocean, we’re in perfect time. Together we are perfectly calm. No rage today, no crashing upon the shore, only gentle drifting under a warring sky. Let the clouds fight, with their thunder and their lightening. Down here all is peaceful. And soon all will be well. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">I am speck on a deserted beach in winter, and as the soft roaring of the waves mingles with the drumming of the raindrops, I wonder if all the water will wash me away. </div>georgie_forgiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03091664460817550955noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6537486237619878552.post-51591484816324787972011-09-06T02:29:00.000-07:002011-09-09T16:10:03.491-07:00Travel: Duisburg MoleThis is the article I wrote for www.thirdyearabroad.com as part of their Mole Dairies (<a href="http://www.thirdyearabroad.com/german/item/957.html">http://www.thirdyearabroad.com/german/item/957.html</a>). It's an ins-and-outs guide to Duisburg - everything you wanted and ever needed to know about Germany's industrial heartland.<br />
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<div class="MsoNormal">So you’ve just found out you’re going to be spending some time in Duisburg, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Germany. Don’t worry, before my year abroad, I hadn’t heard of it either. However, after several months of living local, I’ve managed to collect lots of handy hints and tips that will hopefully help your year abroad in the heart of the Ruhrgebiet run smoothly. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><u>The City and the Sights</u></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><u><br />
</u></b></div><div class="MsoNormal">I’ll level with you. Duisburg is not very pretty. In fact, it’s a bit blockish and industrial. You mustn’t hold that against it though; just because it ain’t good-looking doesn’t mean you can’t have an absolute blast there. <br />
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</div><div class="MsoNormal">The main city centre runs from the Hauptbahnhof up Konigstraße to the Rathouse. It’s this street where you’ll find all the shops and banks, as well as two large shopping centres (the Forum and the City Palais, which is also home to a concert hall, several restaurants and a casino) and the Duisburg Theatre. They also hold the (quite impressive) Christmas Market here: keep your eye out for the full-size sailing boat serving hot Glühwein. There are also at least six fountains of varying sizes, the most famous of these being the Lifesaver Statue, a colourful revolving bird, which is either very artistic or very weird depending on your point of view. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">If you take a left at the Lifesaver Statue and walk to the end of the street, you’ll come to a large park which is ideal in summer for relaxing in the sunshine with a picnic or a beer. Behind it is a large sculpture museum which for the artists among you is an enjoyable way to while away a few hours. There’s another interesting sculpture at the entrance to the park too, which I can’t describe for censorship reasons – but make sure you check it out, it’s a good laugh.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">The other area of town worth a look is the Innenhafen, which is full of lovely bars and restaurants and an excellent place to go for a quiet meal and a few drinks. It’s fairly easy to find: if you continue in a straight line past the Rathaus (pause to look at excavated medieval house here, it’s quite interesting) and turn right just before the bridge, it’s about a ten minute walk along the Ruhr. On the way you’ll pass the Kultur-und Stadthistorisches Museum, which is alright if you’re a fan of industrial history, as well as another nice park and the old city walls. Down here you’ll also find the Legoland Discovery Centre, the entrance of which is dominated by the larger-than-life Lego giraffe that crops up on all the Duisburg postcards. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><u>Student City</u></b> </div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><u><br />
</u></b></div><div class="MsoNormal">The Universität Duisburg-Essen is a large modern university with some 30,000 students, many of whom are international, making the city’s student vibe wonderfully multi-cultural. The university buildings are somewhat dotted about, but the main centre is on Lotharstraße, about a twenty minute walk from the Hauptbahnhof in the opposite direction to the city centre. Here you’ll find the majority of the departments, the Info Centre, the main canteen (Mensa) and the gym (completely unrelated to the University, it’s also around this area that the large and reasonably famous Duisburg Zoo is located). <br />
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</div><div class="MsoNormal">There is a large international students society run by students which runs regular Stammtisches and trips (sometimes even trips abroad – whilst I was there they ran a day trip to Paris for 40Euro). You don’t even have to be a student at the university to be involved; they are happy to welcome any international students and the Stammtisches in particular are an excellent way to meet people in the area whilst practising your language skills. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><u>Finding Accommodation<o:p></o:p></u></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><u><br />
</u></b></div><div class="MsoNormal">Your first and best option for finding accommodation in Duisburg is to apply for the non-university Studentenwohnheim on Dellplatz. This is cheap, sociable and easy walking distance from the city centre and the Hauptbahnhof. It is in the style of a traditional hall of residence, with individual rooms and a large shared kitchen, which is kept meticulously clean. It is popular with a large number of young working Germans and students as well as internationals and there is even a (very cheep) bar downstairs on Wednesday nights. Alternatively, it is possible to apply for university student accommodation. They have a large number of Studentenwohnheims available for students and non students (non students have to pay and additional guest fee of 20Euro per month), usually in the form of shared flats. This is also a very cheap option, but if you want to live with Germans then your chances are slim as the majority of inhabitants will be international students. Most of the Studentenwohnheims are located in Neudorf, just behind the Hauptbahnhof, which is a popular student area. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><u><br />
</u></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><u>Getting Around</u></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><u><br />
</u></b></div><div class="MsoNormal">Duisburg, like the majority of German cities has a very good U-Bahn network. The 901 route is the one you’ll probably use most as a student as it connects the University to the Hauptbahnhof, as well as to the neighbouring city of Mülheim-an-der-Ruhr. In terms of trains, Duisburg is very well connected and it is possible to get a direct regional train to almost anywhere within Nordrhein-Westfalen, as well as to many exciting places further a-field, such as Berlin, Amsterdam and Copenhagen. <br />
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</div><div class="MsoNormal">If you plan to do a lot of travelling within Nordrhein-Westfalen (as I did) and you are not already a student at the university, I highly recommend you enrol. It is 215Euro per semester and for this you will be issued with a Semesterticket entitling you to unlimited travel on regional transport (U-Bahn, busses and RE/RB/ S-Bahn trains). You can even take a friend on your ticket if it is after 7pm. To get one you have to go the AAA Office (located on the ground floor of a large university building on Geibelstraße) where they will make you fill out lots of forms and confuse you with insurance questions (make sure you take your passport and two passport photos with you). If anyone tells you that you are not permitted to enrol (they don’t seem to communicate information too well between staff) then persevere because they are talking nonsense. This may sound like a lot of faff, but it is thoroughly worth it for the amount of money you save on travel. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><u>Eating, Drinking & Dancing<o:p></o:p></u></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><u><br />
</u></b></div><div class="MsoNormal">There are innumerable places to eat, drink and be merry in Duisburg. Here are a few of my favourites.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><i>Restaurants</i></div><ul><li><span style="font: normal normal normal 7pt/normal 'Times New Roman';"> </span>Bodega: Located in the Innenhafen, this place does the best tapas outside of Espania as well as first-rate cocktails. Make sure you try the garlic marinated chicken; you won’t be kissing anyone for a while but it tastes like heaven.</li>
<li>Brauhaus Schacht 4/8: Smack bang in the middle of the city centre, excellent beer and Schnitzel as big as your face.</li>
<li>Nuh’s Thai: Eat in or takeaway, some of the best value and best tasting Thai food in the region.</li>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><i>Bars </i></div><div class="MsoNormal"></div><ul><li>I have no idea what it’s called, but the little bar on the corner off Dellstraße and Krummacherstraße is a really good place to have a quiet beer and hang out.</li>
<li>Pianissimo: A nice pub, often with live music. Generally the location of the International Students’ Stammtisch. </li>
<li>Steinbruch: A café-come-bar which doubles as a gig venue. It’s quite a walk to get to it, so I recommend you get a taxi or use the shuttle bus from the Hauptbahnhof that runs on gig nights.</li>
<li>Golden Grün: You can go early to drink and chat, or late to drink and dance. Tiny and lots of fun.</li>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><i>Clubs </i></div><div class="MsoNormal"></div><ul><li>Pulp: On the 903 traim route and located in an old castle, this is Duisburg’s best club. The nights vary from hard rock to indie to mainstream, but its always got a friendly party atmosphere.</li>
<li>DeJazz: This is a city centre club in a residential area so it tends to close a bit earlier than the standard German 6am. However, it’s a brilliant night with an eclectic mix of music, often live.</li>
<li>Hundertmeister: This is the place to go if you want a nice normal night out with a good mix of music. The monthly Yum-Yum parties are legendary, but the queue to get in will be enormous. Also a nice place to sit outside in the summer with a crafty half of Duisburg’s local König Pilsner.</li>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><i>Hidden Gem</i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">Duisburg does have a normal cinema just next to the Hauptbahnhof, but if you fancy a bit of class to your film viewing, check out the Film Forum just off Dellplatz, an old theatre that’s been converted into a cinema. It’s a fantastic place to enjoy arty and foreign films, as well as more mainstream ones and if you fancy something to eat before hand, there’s a restaurant downstairs that’s always packed.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><u><br />
</u></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><u>Around Duisburg</u></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><u><br />
</u></b></div><div class="MsoNormal">There may be lots to do in Duisburg, but it would be sad if you spent your entire year without exploring all that NRW has to offer. Here are three of my top places to visit if you fancy travelling a little outside the city limits.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -18.0pt;"></div><ul><li> Centro: Located in Oberhausen’s Neumitte (you can get a bus or tram there from Oberhausen Hauptbahnhof, which itself is only 5 minutes on the train from Duisburg), this is a large out-of-town shopping centre complete with a bar and restaurant promenade. Pretty much every shop you will ever need in Germany under one roof.</li>
<li><span style="font: normal normal normal 7pt/normal 'Times New Roman';"> </span>Düsseldorf: It’s the capital of the region and just 15 minutes away on the train. Good for high-end shopping and full of interesting museums, and also a fantastic place for a night out. The majority of the bars are located in the Altstadt – check out Engelchen on Kurzestraße for a traditional German Kneipe and Zum Goldenen Einhorn on Rattingerstraße (the student street) for some traditional German grub. The cinema next to the Hauptbahnhof often screens new Hollywood releases in English – look out for screenings captioned “OV”. </li>
<li> Münster: Welcome to NRW’s poshest city. It’s a long journey to get there (about an hour and 20 minutes by train), but wandering around its cobbled streets is a very pleasant way to spend a day. The Christmas Market (or should I say markets, as they have six) is probably one of the best in the region.</li>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p>And that’s Duisburg, folks. I wish you all the best with your year abroad; if you enjoy it half as much as I did, you’re in for a real treat. Have fun and good luck! </div>georgie_forgiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03091664460817550955noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6537486237619878552.post-54353635017348846632011-05-31T03:39:00.000-07:002011-05-31T03:39:33.916-07:00YA: The Last Month (Thank You and Goodnight)This is it. My last ever year abroad blog (probably) and certainly the last blog I'll ever write in Germany. I can't quite believe it. All those memories, those tales, those thousands of words... it all comes down to this moment. We've had some times, though, eh? Granted, those times were mostly stories of my inability to hold my alcohol in various parts of Europe, but they were damn good times none the less. I hope you enjoyed reading about them as much as I enjoyed living them. Don't get teary just yet, though., 'cause I've got one last lot of tales to impart before I sign this year abroad off for good. Are you sitting comfortably? Good. Then I'll begin.<br />
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</div><div>We decided that as it was our last month as citizens of Europe we had an obligation to try and see as much of it as physically possible. I'd already done Copenhagen, Amsterdam (x2), Groningen, Paris and virtually the entirety of NRW. It was time to add two more cities to that list: Berlin and Prague. The Deutsche Haupstadt came first, on our first full weekend back after the Easter holidays. We packed our shorts and our sunnies (the weather forecast was good), Kate brushed up on her fun facts about the Brandenburg Gate and we boarded the 7.05 inter-city express out of Duisburg. As soon as we arrived, I remembered all the reasons why Berlin had been my first choice of where to spend my year abroad. It´s certainly not the prettiest city I´ve seen (though some of the buildings are superb), but there´s so much culture and history there, not to mention so much hipster chic, and when I was walking round I really felt at home. It's just one of those cities where you can walk around for hours, content to soak up the atmosphere, which is pretty much exactly what we did; we thoroughly beasted all of Berlin´s famous monuments, walking at least two miles all over the city in the blazing sunshine and taking snapshots (or at least Ally and Kate took snapshots, my camera chose to die, an act I will never forgive it for). It was also lovely to catch up with some Sheffies who I hadn´t seen since we finished second year last June. Big thanks to Alex, Lucas and Rachel for showing us how to rock it up Berlin style. All in all, it was a wonderful weekend and I'm looking forward to getting myself back there sometime soon. <br />
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Prague was a different experience again. We chose to take the over-night train down because it was cheaper than flying, but unlike for my trip to Copenhagen (when I had a carriage to myself), the little compartment was very crammed and uncomfortable and there was very little sleeping achieved. It was worth the difficult journey, though, because Prague is stunning. I could have spent my entire two days there simply taking enough pictures of beautiful buildings to fill the hard-drive on my computer. We walked from architectural masterpiece to architectural masterpiece, mouths hanging open; Charles Bridge, the Astrological Clock, the castle, the palace, the Old Town Square, the museum, the Municipal House... we must have covered them all and all in the sensational Czech sunshine. At nights, true to form, we searched out bars. Recommendations from my home friends Charlie and Tom lead us on the first night first to a reasonable and excellent restaurant called Stoleti and then onwards to a quirky little locals bar (Duende) just up the street where they sell beer for just 20 Czech crowns. That's less than a euro, people. Both places were tucked away down the back streets, representative of what all of Prague must have been like before the stag parties arrived. The second night we tried a bar just behind the church in the Old Town Square where we must have been the only people not to be dressed as zombies (the reason behind the hordes of zombies mooching around the city I still don't know). We did, however, get picked up by a sort-of bar crawl of Canadians, Aussies, New Zealanders and a couple of Brits, who were on a camping tour of Europe's more famous cities. We took a trip to a funky underground bar with them, but opted out of their plans for Prague's star five-story club, which, from the outside, looked liked an over-priced temple to hen-party tourism. Instead we took a short walk and ducked into a likely looking place (actually opposite the bar from the previous evening) where we got chatting to a couple of Czech blokes. We enquired as to traditional Czech alcohol, and they provided us with what can only be described as a strange green herbal concoction smelling of ginger. Apparently there were eighteen different herbs in it, but I can't confirm this. I can confirm, however, that it was pretty strong and pretty horrible. After being plied with a couple more of (different) traditional Czech drinks, and Czech blokes in tow, we muzzily wandered off into the night and ended up in the bar we'd started off in the first place, where we remained until 6am despite the fact it was virtually entirely dead (no zombie pun intended). The journey home the next day (incorporating a three hour bus journey, I might add) was hungover to say the least.<br />
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There have also been some equally enjoyable shenanigans closer to home, specifically an event that took place in the interim weekend between these two excellent trips. Anyone who is anyone knows that the Eurovision song contest was held this year in Düsseldorf and who were we, living a mere fifteen minutes away, not to take advantage of this? I say fifteen minutes, some of my friends travelled much further than that. A lot took the hour trip from Münster, but full commitment points go to Lyndsay for coming all the way from Holland and to Matt for coming all the way from France. Despite the fair amount of embarrassment that ensues from having to support Blue (and, I think in all cases, Jedward) we painted ourselves blue, white and red and waved our union jacks with gusto. It was a great atmosphere, thousands of people gathering in Johannes-Rau Platz for what was essentially a massive outdoor Euro-disco, and is definitely one of my most favourite moments of this year. I think we were all surprised that Europe took Jedward so well (they are now frequent players in the German charts) but there was the little groan of disappointment from the Brits when Germany crept ahead of us at the final hurdle.<br />
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After we got back from Prague, the countdown to the end began. I de-registered as a German citizen, closed my bank account and started packing my life here into suitcases and boxes. Kelsey, Kate and Carol helped me paint my room back into ship-shape condition and I began saying my goodbyes at Heinrich-Heine. On the Thursday, I got given a goodbye gift from the girl I have been taking for Nachhilfe all year and got to play games (and dish out goodies) in my final lesson with 7a. I took sweets for both my Klasse 6 groups (earning myself a round of applause from 6a and a cheer from 6b) and thank you presents for the teachers I've been closest to. I also got thank you presents myself, from Petra and Jan and also from the school, Herr Winkler presenting me with my very own Heinrich-Heine-Gymnasium much in "corporate-friendly blue". Everyone said lovely things and I have to admit I got a bit teary.<br />
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Of course, we wouldn't be being true to form if there wasn't a big ol' piss-up to send us on our way, and boy did we do it in style. We didn't just go out to party; we treated Düsseldorf to a round of pub golf. Beginning (of course) at the Irish pub, we smashed our way through nine holes, including Guinness, Altbeer, Vodka Ahoi and an Irish Car-Bomb to top it all off. There was chugging. There were forfeits. There was extreme bladder control. Our outfits and plastic gold clubs attracted a lot of attention and we ended up picking up a group of Germans around the second hole who, fascinated, followed us from bar to bar so that they could play along. I think we probably covered all the essentials of one of our Germany nights out as well, what with the karaoke, the chatting to strangers, the losing people, the funny looks from passers by and the huge volume of drunken photography. What a perfect night to end on. Or not quite end on, should I say, because the following day we decided to grillen und chillen (chill out with a barbecue) at Carol's. It was a great excuse to have one last relax together with a beer and say goodbye to some of the excellent people we've met over the year. Maxime and Chris departed with promises to come visit and Sheffield and tears were shed when we (after many hugs) said goodbye to Kelsey. We hung out the window and waved her all the way down the street. I spent Sunday gathering up the last remaining items dotted about my room and stuffing them wherever they would fit in my vast amounts of luggage before Mum and Dad arrived on Monday with the car, ready to transport it all. We went out on Monday evening for a slap-up German meal at the Schackt Brauhaus, afterwards taking advantage of the hottest day of the year to sit outside Hundertmeister for a cocktail and one last giggle. Too soon it was time for hugs and bis balds and we all went out separate ways. I took my very last night-time walk home through Duisburg, got five hours sleep and went to teach my final lesson, which happened to be Vertretung. Just goes to show, education doesn't care if it's your last day or not, you still have to preside over an hour and a half of chaos. I then got my lovely goodbye, handed in my keys and left HHG for very last time. I went and met my wonderful parents, got teary again, and went to finish off sorting the last bits of my life into boxes. My room is back to the stark white state I found it in, the car is packed and I'm leaving... now.<br />
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There have been so many points this year when I have had to stop and think "wow, my life is awesome": dancing in Balkan music in a disused candy factory in Copenhagen, singing Karneval songs at the top of my voice at a Düsseldorf street party, lying on my back in a park in Münster listening to acoustic guitar, train-hopping across Holland, waving inflatable microphones and cheering my support at Eurovision, climbing the steps up to Prague castle just to gaze at the view, chatting up Tubelord in an obscure Duisburg bar, fighting dirty for sweets at the Rosenmontag parades, basking in the Berlin sunshine at Alexanderplatz, hanging out in the square late at night to drink beer and swap stories, walking round Paris in winter, roasting Bratwursts on a disposable BBQ behind Carol's building, buying hot Glühwein at a Christmas market in Cologne, feeding penguins at the zoo, playing drinking games in a shabby Amsterdam hotel room with a bunch of random Dutch boys... I could go on. And on and on and on.<br />
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But this year would have been nothing, <i>nothing</i>, without the people. I have made some incredible friends throughout the course of this and I want to thank each and every one of you for making my year abroad something truly special. First, Kelsey. You've been stuck with me ever since I had to steal all your toothpaste when we were room-mates in Altenburg and somehow you're still my friend; thanks for being there through the ups and downs and for putting up with nine months of similarly stupid behaviour. Kate, Carol, Lara, Ally and Jo - my local lovelies, fellow Dortlube members and pub golf partners in crime - thanks for letting me crash your friendship group and stick around. You've given me more giggles and lovely memories than I could possibly shake a stick at. I will see you all again, and soon - this is simply happy bis bald tard! Then my fellow Sheffies... Freebs, thanks for kicking this whole shebang off with me at Manchster airport all those months ago; I probably wouldn't have made it here without you. Soph, thanks for having me to stay and showing me Cologne and for being at the end of a Facebook thread when I needed some contact with home. Lynsday and Matt, I can't believe I wasted two years of my life not being best friends with you. You'd better know that you're both now pretty much indispensable to me and we are most certainly carrying on our Münster shenanigans when we get back in fourth year. And speaking of Münster, I need to thank those Münstites: Cerys, Linz, Sammy, Amy, Jon, Sarah G, Pete, Amelia, Emily, John R, John P, Gina, Lukas, Johan, Sarah H... thank you for letting me (and Kelsey) crash all your parties, for providing beds and floors, for making us feel like part of the posse and for just generally being brilliant. You're the most ramshackle and hilarious bunch of people I've ever had the pleasure to meet. To everyone at Heinrich-Heine, teacher or pupil, but especially to Jan, Petra and Franzi, I want to say thank you for being so supportive and welcoming and making me a part of your world for nine months. I've really enjoyed my job and just hope that I've done it well. Finally, there's everyone else that I've met along the way who have at various points helped me out, partied with me, gave me music, kept me company, invited me to things, lived with me or simply just been my friend: Hanna, Nicola, Hannah, Maxime, Chris, Heather, Sona, Lena, Andrey, Julian, Thomas, Miriam, Nadja... the biggest thanks to all of you, too, for adding your own excellence to an already excellent year.<br />
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When I think about how I felt about my year abroad way back in September, I'm ashamed. I was so negative, so disbelieving of all the people that told me that it would be the best year of my degree. I never would have imagined that I would be sitting here, nine months down the line, teary-eyed because I don't want to leave. This year has changed me, I think. There's something about having to cope entirely on your own in a foreign country and about setting up a life and a network of friends virtually from scratch that makes you a much more confident and flexible person. I don't really have any fears for my future any more; the miscellaneous experiences of this year have taught me that I can pretty much cope with whatever life throws my way, even if it's at 7 o'clock in the morning. I'm proud of myself too, because I think the Georgie of a couple of years back wouldn't have been able to do something like this at all. I consider coping with this year to be one of my greatest achievements; it's testimony that I'm finally independent and, in the majority of respects anyway, an adult. But, life-enhancing rubbish aside, the main thing is that I have enjoyed every single solitary second of this experience. Every last bit of it. The job, the travelling, the parties and especially the people... it's been one hundred percent incredible. I'm going to miss it very, very much.<br />
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And that's it. I have (at last) nothing left to write. But 'WTW?' is by no means dead. The year abroad side of its existence may have drawn to a close but it will still operate, and frequently, with reviews, views and any other rubbish I may need to get off my chest. This is not the end. I'll be back very soon so, as always, stay tuned. In terms of my year abroad, though, I will leave you with one last thought: I thought that this year would be awful. I thought that I would hate it. I thought I would be lonely and friendless and counting down the days until May 31st. Instead, I've ended up loving it more that I could possibly articulate, I've met the most incredible people and these last few days I've wanted time to back-pedal so I can stay here just that little bit longer.<br />
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Isn't it amazing just how wrong a person can be?<br />
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</div>georgie_forgiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03091664460817550955noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6537486237619878552.post-47664834445522262482011-05-09T10:28:00.000-07:002011-05-09T10:28:12.848-07:00YA: To Miss Or Not To Miss...Considering I´ve got less than a month in Germany left to go, I´ve been spending a considerable amount of time thinking about all the things I´m going to miss when I go home and all the other things I won´t be so sad to leave behind. There´s a considerable amount in both catorgories and I thought, mostly because I´ve got vast reserves of time to bun at work today, that I would share these thoughts with you all. <br />
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First, I will be thoroughly glad to get rid of the early mornings. German school starts ludicrously early; the first lesson commences at 8.15, but some clever-dick also invented the 0te Stunde (a lesson ususally used only when the school are unable to fit certain sixth form classes into an ordnary timetable) which begins a whole 50 minutes earlier at 7.25. I´ve just about got used to the 6am wake up calls on ordinary school days but it´s excruitating for my student brain to be forced out of bed at 5.15 every Tuesday and expected to be awake and alert two hours later. It´s especially excruitating when, after two weeks off, you drag yourself into work at this oscenely early hour to find that the teacher you´re supposed to be working with is, in fact, away, and the class is cancelled. Like today. However, I will miss the job itself. I am by no means a natural teacher and I'm fairly confident it will not be a career I will be pursuing once my degree is over, but I can't deny that's it's been fun and there have been moments when I have been immensely proud of the classes I've helped to teach. Then there's the wage, which is bangin'. I will also miss playing my fun game, "Spot The Mini-Versions Of My Friends Among The Kids". A surprising number of you do have miniature HHG counterparts.<br />
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Another thing I will not miss is the pedantic fining system employed on German public transport. Buying a train ticket is a complex and confusing process as it is, never mind in another language, and god-forbid you should get it wrong because if you have the wrong ticket, or have forgotten your ticket, or have incorrectly stamped your ticket and you get caught, it means you will have to cough up 40 of your hard-earned Euros. Don´t have 40Euros on you? No problem! We´ll print out a ticket for you and you can pay us later at your convenience, providing your convenience is within fourteen days of issue, of course. And don´t even think about ducking out of paying it, because we´ve got your address now, Sonny Jim, we popped it into our little machine during your humiliating dress-down on the train not moments ago, and we'll be taking further action if you do not GIVE US THE MONEY. Saying that, the German train system, as frustrating as I may find it at times, is actually a vast improvement on the Britsh one (I am aware that this is not a difficult feat to achieve). As a paid-up member of a University, you can enjoy free public transport throughtout your Bundesland, and living on the continent does allow cheap and easy access via train to the rest of Europe. Me and my friends have just scored over-night tickets driect from Duisburg to Prague for 70Euros a piece, a whole 50Euros cheaper than the lowest-priced flight. I will certainly miss these low-cost travelling opportunities when back on my little island. The variety of places that have been so easily within my reach this year continually blows my mind; not only Czechoslovakia, but also Holland, France, Denmark and the east of Germany (which is actually pretty far away). And that´s only the places I´ve decided to visit. It would havebeen abundantly simple to hop on a train to Austira or Italy should the fancy have taken me. Not only that, but I love the fact that I can take a train to visit my friends who live over an hour away in Münster and <i>it´s still free</i>. Getting a train at home always seems like such a hassle, but here it´s a way of life. If I want to go for night out in, say, Leeds, then the trip from Sheffield will require careful planning, estimated arrival times and a place to stay. Here, we go on nighs out to Düsseldorf all the time, because the trains run every fifteen minutes, it´s free for us and, because the trains run through the night, we know there´ll always be a way to get home again later.<br />
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Another area I have mixed feelings towards is the food; I both love and abhor German food in equal measure. The biscuits, for example, are exquisit, as is the abundance of different flavours of Milka and Ritter Sport (though since I found out you can now buy caramel Milka in Sainsburys I´m less distrught about leaving German chocolate behind.) I like that my wages allow me to buy smoked salmon on a regular basis, a product which my expensive tastes have unfotunately contirved to make me addicted to and as a student in Britain I can never afford. I believe Vapiano is the greatest chain restaurant in history and can´t believe we don´t have it at home. I enjoy Bratwurst and Currywurst and revel in the seemingly limitless varities of ice cream availible from the many Eiscafes than adorn Germany´s streets. Seriously, I cannot understand why we have not yet introduced the concept of the ice-cream parlour to Britain - none of you are going to want a Magnum when you can get Nutella, Tirimasu and Biscotti flavour at 80p a scoop. But then, there´s all the things that Germany lacks: marmite, proper tea, good bread, chedder cheese, chocolate digestives, non-processed sandwich meat, fresh milk (don´t give me that, the stuff you guys have is NOT fresh), decent chinese takeaways, fresh soups, baking potatoes, Jazz apples... I could go on. I rarely cook properly here either, due to a dramatic lack of freezer space in my flat, meaning that on the rare occasions I do buy fresh meat I have to have huuuuge meals to get rid of it all before the use-by date. I'm quite looking forward to making real meals again once I am safely ensconced in my new student house. Additionally, I plan to have a very emotional reunion with my toasty-maker. Man, I have missed toasties.<br />
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German alcohol I am going to miss rather less than German eidble delicacies. Here, my usual spirit-tipples are, though not unavailible, ludicrously expensive, so I have trained myself into liking beer. Unfortuantly, I have been rather too successful. I now love all the varities of German beer, from Alt to Weiss and from Kölsch to Pils. I think it´s brilliant that different cities have their own brands of beer, and ordering Kölsch in Düsseldorf will lead you to being shouted down by the barman. However, this new found liking for beer has made me, to quote my mother, "whack it on". So now I am on a stirct diet and exercise regime to try and lose that half-stone before bikini season. Also, it´s difficult to miss it when I know that I will be able to hunt out my favourite varieties back home; other than Düsseldorf Altbeir, I´ve succeed in finding all the best ones on the continental beer shelf at Tesco. So really, I won't be losing out at all on the beer front back in England and therefore I'm just quite excited about being able to get back to nights out when I will not have to expend over a fiver to get a single vodka and lemonade.<br />
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I'm also looking forward to getting back the the British music scene. Germany is OK as far as music goes, but the local radio stations are frankly dire and as a country they are seriously lacking in record shops, even large ones (no HMV equivalent in sight because, no, I'm sorry, Saturn is incomparable). With my limited internet allowance, using Spotify and streaming radio stations has had to be kept to an absolute minimum, and whilst I'm immensely grateful to Charlie for letting me scam her music collection every couple of months, I want to be back in the thick of it, going to gigs, buying albums and discovering new music for myself. And it isn't just music-shopping possibilities that are thin on the ground and generally shopping in Germany is a bit of a chore. It will be nice to be able to go out to buy a new jumper and not know for an absolute certainty that you will buy it from H&M.<br />
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One thing I will certainly not miss is my flat. With it´s cold white walls and grey, dust-collecting lino floor it was always distinctly unloveable, and though I spruced my room up with photos and large amounts of cushions, the fact remains that I don´t really get on with my flatmates. The fault is partly mine, I never really made an effort to get to know them, but if they will persist in speaking Russian to eachother then I´m not really sure how I´m meant to. The new girl that moved in just before I went home for Easter is lovely, but it doesn´t change the fact that I´ve spent the majority of the year risiding with people who I´m fairly convinced don´t like me all that much.<br />
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So, I won´t miss Ruhrorterstrasse, but I certainly will miss Duisburg. I´m not going to lie, it is a bit of a dump. Very industrial, little culture and not much going on. However, I seemed to have developed the same bond with it as I have with my hometown of Nottingham. It´s crap and I know it and I say it a lot, but it´s still mine and if anyone else tried to say anything even remoteoy unflatterng I will defend it to the hilt. I don´t regard it with anywhere near the level of affection that I have for Sheffield, and the list of haunts that I can reel off is comparitively short, but there are still places that I´ve enjoyed visitng and will miss not being within a stones-throw of: Djazz, the bar near Kate´s with the funky toilet walls, the Innenhafen, the park where we had our little barbecue, the amazing tapas place, Carol´s flat (the site of so many laptop parties), Golden Grün, the statue of the naked man dealt a rough hand by Mother Nature... Then there's all the places we've frequented outside of Duisburg, like the Irish pub in Düsseldorf and Piano in Münster. All of these places and the others besides hold a great wealth of happy memories and it will be a shame not to be able to visit them again, at least not for a very long time.<br />
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Most of all, I will miss my way of life here. I've had it extremely cushy. I work for less than twelve hours a week and spend the rest of my time swanning about Europe with my friends, not a bad ol' life. I have met a truly fantastic bunch of people out here and it has been an absolute pleasure to share a year's worth of increible experiences with them. So, I think, it's not hard to see why now, at three weeks before I leave, I am a bit of a conflicted soul. Who wouldn't love my current low work, high play lifestyle? I party, I travel, I have an absolute ball. The amazing stuff about living in Europe and the wonderful people I share it with far outweighs any niggles I have about less-than-enthusiastic flatmates and crumbly bread. But I love my life back in England too, you all know how much. There is so much of me yearning to get back the UK, with my degree and my music and my favourite places, and yet so much of me that wants to stay behind. Because missing my life at home does not mean I don't love my life here. I love them both. And to be honest, right now, I couldn't tell you which one I love more.georgie_forgiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03091664460817550955noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6537486237619878552.post-78580188470847419742011-05-03T13:55:00.000-07:002011-05-03T14:00:23.951-07:00Music: Please Provide Clear Evidence Of Your Knowledge And Passion For MusicI've started applying for work experience for the summer, and as unlikely as getting a place will be, I'm going for a couple of BBC ones. I've just written an answer to a question for a one week placement at Radio 1 (well, you've got to be in it to win it) but I'm actually quite pleased with how it sounds so I thought I'd pop it on here. I'm not sure if it's the kind of answer they were after, but it's how I'm interpreting the question, and as I once told a literature lecturer, an interpretation can never be wrong.<br />
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Question: Please provide clear evidence of your knowledge and passion for music.<br />
<span style="font: normal normal normal 7pt/normal 'Times New Roman';"><br />
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I cannot remember a time when I was not entirely committed to music. Every Christmas present I ever asked for as a child was a device upon which I could play music: a cassette player, a CD walkman, my battered and much used ipod, a digital radio alarm clock so that music could be the first thing I heard when I woke up in the morning. Whilst other students spend a fortune on nights out or expensive vintage clothing, I blow all my spare cash on concerts, CDs and unusual musical merchandise (my favourite piece of merch by far is my Stornoway camping tin water bottle). I am aware that buying CDs may be considered a tad unusual for someone of the internet generation. I know we live in a digital age and I’ll admit that the internet has been a fantastic medium for exposing us to music we may never otherwise have discovered, but I still think there’s something much more magical about popping the hard copy in the hi-fi and settling down and really <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">listening </i>to the music<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">. </i>Or standing up and really dancing to it. When you download an album you get the songs, yes, but with a physical album you can look at the artwork, read the lyrics and the thank yous and feel properly connected to the band and the wonderful sound that they have produced. That’s why I think illegal downloading is so terrible; it’s being unbelievably disrespectful to something so many people have worked so hard to create. I believe anyone who downloads illegally is essentially saying that they aren’t interested in the production of new and exciting music, because without money, how are bands ever going to be able to afford to produce it? Music is beautiful and is thoroughly worth paying for.<br />
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I research music for fun. There’s nothing I like more than delving into soundcloud or last.fm armed with nothing but a cup of tea and a notebook. I get indecently excited when I can recommend new music that I’ve found to friends, even more so when they recommend new stuff to me. I write articles about new music I have discovered, about albums I’ve heard and about gigs I have seen, not because anyone has told me to or because there is a deadline is hanging over my head, but because I simply want to let other people know that I have heard something marvellous and think they should know about it too. I have been lucky enough to have had a little taste of what working with music is like. I have reviewed gigs and albums and had my articles published, I have interviewed reasonably famous bands (the Futureheads and the Holloways included), and every time I get close to the music industry in this way I feel privileged that, even just for a second, I’ve been able to be a part of it. It’s similar every time I watch a band perform; be it the clear, crisp, heartfelt vocals of Emmy The Great or Twin Atlantic smashing out chords until the audience’s ears bleed, I feel inextricably happy to be there, connected to everyone else in the room who feels just like me and knowing that I want to be able to do this every single day of my life.<br />
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I wasn’t quite sure what response was expected for this question. I think perhaps I was supposed to give a bit more of a technical answer. However, I don’t think it’s possible to deny my true and unrelenting passion for music, nor my knowledge and willingness to extend it even further. Everything written above is exactly how I feel about music, and, if you think about it, that’s exactly what music is for: to make you feel.georgie_forgiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03091664460817550955noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6537486237619878552.post-51421481079432679372011-05-01T09:59:00.000-07:002011-05-01T21:40:33.685-07:00YA: Friends > ChocolateI am not religious. You probably know this; I am extremely vocal about this fact, and it means, of course, that at Easter time I'm only in it for the chocolate. Except, this year, I was less about the chocolate* and more about that 18.55 flight out of Cologne, destination England after three month absence. I was so excited I fidgeted and bounced around in my seat for the entire flight and fairly flattened old ladies in my attempts to get through the Manchester arrivals gate first to throw myself on my waiting parents. <br />
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To say I hadn't been in Nottingham for a while, I didn't really hang around. We got back fairly late on the Thursday night, leaving little time for anything other than a quick cuppa before I took an almighty running jump onto my beautiful, soft, squidgy, <i>comfortable</i> mattress. As for Friday, I spent a day catching up with my cousin and my adorable little second-cousin and partaking in a nice meal for my grandma's birthday (a night ever cemented in my mind as the night my eighty-three-year-old grandmother downed a flaming sambucca) before hitting the road for a weekend in Edinburgh early Saturday morning.<br />
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Edinburgh is a city that does know how to blow my mind. I love it there; the buildings, the culture, the abundance of Scottish people.** Katie and myself arrived mid-afternoon which gave us plenty of time to drop our stuff at the hostel (where we were deeply disappointed that we didn't get put in the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles room), grab a meal and wander up the Royal Mile in search of a drink before Charlie rocked up around 11, hyper and over-tired from 13 hours of flying. We tried a bit of a night out, but the club, to coin a popular phrase I believe the kids are using nowadays, blew the big time and we gave it up as a bad job. The next day we sauntered around the sunny streets, lunched in one of mine and Charlie's favourite cafe-discoveries from last summer and caught some rays in the park. Sounds nice enough all by itself, no? Yeah, well, it gets better.<br />
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You see, I didn't decide just to take a trip to Scotland purely to swan about and drink coffee (as much as I enjoy this pastime). Me and Katie had an ultra-awesome reason for being in the 'Burgh that weekend, and that reason was a chap named Tim Minchin. I had been nothing short of gutted that I had missed all his more local dates before Christmas (you guessed it, I was in Germany), especially as this new tour saw Tim sporting a full orchestra and a host of new and remastered songs. I'd been just able to cope with missing hosts of gigs from my other favourite musicians and comedians, but I decided this was one too many, and when I found out that his Scotland dates coincided with my Easter holidays I thought "bugger it" and booked. The fact that Katie came with me only proves her great commitment to comedy. So, we left Charlie (who had already seen Tim's tour) to go and route out a Chinese takeaway and an obscure poetry reading, and went for a night at the theatre. It. Was. Incredible! Minchin was on fantastic form, his old songs sounding unbelievably good in orchestral score and his new material making me laugh until tears rolled down my cheeks. One for my top ten comedy gigs, certainly. Once Tim had performed his second encore (White Wine In The Sun - I cried) and we had purchased our Rock 'N Roll Nerd mugs, we went to meet up with Charlie again, catching a bit of light folk music at Sandy Bell's before turning in. Monday saw yet more coffee and wanderings and also the bizarre occurrence of someone throwing an egg at me our of a car window. It didn't smash, fortunately, but rather bounced off my thigh with some force and cracked when it hit the road. But seriously, a drive by egging? Who does that? After this ridiculous event, me and Katie dropped Charlie at the station for her journey onwards to St Andrews and went and spent silly amounts of money on dresses. Whoops. Then there was just time for a quick baked potato (enormous, it was) before jumping on the train back down south. See you in August, Edinburgh.<br />
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The next few days were indeed Nottingham time. I caught up with Bex and Ruth over lunch on the Tuesday, before Bex dragged us round 'most every shop in town before letting us have a breather in Starbucks. We had a healthy dinner of chicken salad and curled up in Bex's bed to watch Harry Potter. The next few days were devoted family time; my mum and me took a trip to Market Harborough to see our cousin, we went shopping and on Easter Sunday we had a good ol' fashioned slap-up family lunch. Saying that, on the Thursday night I absented myself from relative shindigs to hit up the Rebel and Bar 11 launch night with Becky. There was wine and excellent music and a good time was had by all. I think.<br />
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With my holidays ticking away, it was time to hit my favourite city of the them all, my uni-town, my <i>place: </i>SHEFFIELD, BABY! I tell you, it felt so good to be back after such a long absence. Speshy met me at the station on Monday night and we dragged all my bags up the hill to the house that will be mine in less than two months. We had long over-due tea and chats which went on far too late considering we had to get up super-early the next day and travel to Manchester. Spesh had somehow managed to get herself conned into booking a fancy photo-shoot and we had to go and partake in order to get her deposit back. With a pact to buy no photos in place, we enjoyed having our hair and make-up done and stocking up on free snacks before being be shepherded into the studio where we were ordered to pose in various positions that made us look like wanky twats. When it came to the photo viewing, the girl was very much on the hard-sell and we struggled to stick to our pact just because of all the pressure. However, then we remembered that they wanted to charge SEVENTY POUNDS PER PRINT, stuck to our guns and legged it.<br />
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Back in Sheffield, I picked up my stuff and headed down the hill again to Rosie's where I was stopping the next two nights with Charlie. There was time for a quick cup of tea and a catch up before we headed out for the Folk Train. If you live in Sheffield and you've never been on the Folk Train, then I heartily recommend it. The last Tuesday of every month, lovers of folk board the 7.14 from Sheffield to Edale to enjoy three hours of beautiful music and scenery. The band play on the train, in the pub upon arrival at Edale and all the way on the train back again. A different band every month, April's was Happy Red Tractors and they were superb, playing a mix of traditional English, Greek and Russian folk. As the train arrived back into Sheffield just after 10, we considered the night to be still young and nipped into the Lescar on Sharrowvale Road for a cider. We got slightly more tipsy than we intended, danced New York, New York all the way back to Rosie's after last orders and when me, Charlie and Katie all tried to cram into Richie's already very broken bed we made it collapse and had to drunkenly try and piece it back together again.<br />
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Wednesday was a celebration of my second year haunts. First, Katie in tow, I went and got my hair cut and picked up my new Ucard (I can get into the IC again - hooray?) and then went and met Rosie, Charlie and Louise in town. We took a slow stroll down Division Street visiting all the little boutiques before grabbing lunch from Zooby's (the fairtrade cafe in the Winter Gardens), dodging the snooker commentators as we went. The afternoon saw sunbathing in the Peace Gardens and coffee at Bungalows and Bears, the evening dinner at the Old House and cocktails at the Wick At Both Ends and I spent the whole time wishing I was back for good already instead of having to wait another six or seven weeks.<br />
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I hit the road home on Thursday afternoon for one last evening with my parents, an evening which seem to flash by, and all too soon I was pulling my suitcase through the arrivals gate at Cologne airport. Three and a half hours of frustrating train journeys later I was pulling that same case through my front door in Duisburg. It's hard to believe that I've come back for my final four weeks. In some ways my wonderful Easter trip to the UK has made me long to be back there more than ever; I miss my life in Sheffield, and even these few short weeks seem to be too long to wait before I can get back to it. I miss my family and my friends, and would once again like to thank them for being so brilliant and for giving me yet another wonderful holiday to remember. That said, I've have such a fantastic time here that I'm not sure I can quite face the idea of it being over so soon. But it's not over quite yet; I've got exactly one month to tear up Germany and make the end of my year abroad as epic as the preceding seven or so months. There's Berlin. There's Eurovision. There's (hopefully) Prague. So all in all, it looks set to be a bit of a corker. And, as always, I'll be sure to let you know all about it.<br />
<br />
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* Not least because my mother has now decided that after the age of eighteen all Easter gifts should come in the form of nightwear; this year, a dressing gown.<br />
** That accent. Hommanaah.georgie_forgiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03091664460817550955noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6537486237619878552.post-30016084957821283102011-04-14T02:23:00.000-07:002011-04-15T15:27:59.495-07:00Music (Live): Stornoway @ Gebäude 9 (Cologne)There are moments in life that remind you why we, all of us, hold that special place in our hearts just for music. Watching Stornoway's lead singer and guitarist Brian Briggs, without amps or microphones or any other technical wizardry, hold a room of hundreds of people completely spellbound using nothing but an acoustic guitar and his voice was exactly one of those moments.<br />
<div><br />
</div><div>From the sheer numbers that packed the venue, it was clear that Stornoway have quite the German following. After a short but electric set from local Cologne group Lingby, who give traditional indie music a kick by incorporating mellow brass-tones alongside their harmonised male and female vocals, the band took to the stage. The round of whoops and claps that greeted them was almost deafening. </div><div><br />
</div><div>Straight down to business, Stornoway launched into their first number, their upbeat and first-released demo track 'I Saw You Blink'. However, not that it was possible to notice as a member of the audience, it soon became clear that the band were experiencing some slight technical difficulties. Briggs complained (in the politest English tones imaginable) of "ghosts in the machines" and there was some technical faffing and much swapping of leads in the intervals between their next two numbers, 'The Coldharbour Road' and 'Boats and Trains'<i>, </i>before he announced that they had finally been "banished". </div><div><br />
</div><div>The rest of the gig went without hitch, despite a brief reappearance of the ghosts, causing Briggs to throw away the lead connecting his guitar to his amp for his truly stunning solo performance of 'November Song', joking that if he unplugged everything then nothing could go wrong. Every single number they played was exquisite, with the multi-instrumental group dashing between keyboards, trumpet, glock, banjo, double bass and various percussion instruments (including, at one point, a saw and a block of wood) as Briggs' clear, crisp, beautiful vocals rang out over a crowd in rapture. </div><div><br />
</div><div>Stornoway played a long and varied set, mixing the new with the old and their faster, guitar heavy tracks with their more melodious ballad-like songs. High points in particular were the heart-wrenching 'Long Distance Lullaby' and the seamless transition from soft and gentle "On The Rocks" to the much more up-tempo and danceable "Watching Birds". Unsurprisingly and to much delight they finished up their set with their first single "Zorbing" before departing the stage with big smiles and many words of thanks and to tumultuous applause. </div><div><br />
</div><div>Of course, there had to be an encore. But it was an encore like no other; upon request of the crowd they once again set aside technology and played the whole thing acoustic, first a captivating rendition of old song, 'Gondwanaland' and then their protest anthem against the modern, drudging lifestyle 'We Are The Battery Human'. It was breathtaking. </div><div><br />
</div><div>Beautiful is perhaps an over-used term when it comes to describing music. But if there is contemporary band that ever deserved that title then it is Stornoway. Their music soars, with and without the aid of modern technology, and if you ever get the chance to see them live, take it. You'll be blown away. </div>georgie_forgiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03091664460817550955noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6537486237619878552.post-7537565273744375022011-04-11T08:15:00.000-07:002011-04-11T08:25:43.862-07:00YA: ProcrastobloggingHello, folks of the internet! Guess who should be planning a lesson right now but instead is going to write a super-smashing round-up of their life over the past few weeks in the hope that someone will read it and say nice things? If you said answered anything other than "erm, you, Georgie?" then I'm sorry but you're wrong. No celebratory chocolate digestives for you.<br />
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To business. This time round, I essentially have the stories of four weekends to impart, as I have once again not updated this page for a disgustingly long time. Let us start, sensibly, with the first weekend: The One Where Georgie Drank A Leetle Too Many Milk-Based Cocktails And Ended Up With A Rotten Hangover. It occurred, as all great weekends seem to, in Münster. Cerys' friends from uni had travelled from Rheinland-Pfalz to visit her and of course a night-out had to be had. We pre-lashed in typical fashion by playing "Most Likely To..." (for those of you who don't know, this is a variant on "I've Never..." but instead of drinking if you've done something, everyone in the circle has to point at the person they consider to be the person most likely to do the named thing, and the person with the most fingers pointed their way has to drink) in which I learnt that, out of all my friends, I am the one considered most likely to be eaten by a penguin. I cannot imagine when this situation would arise, but apparently if a carnivorous penguin with a taste for human flesh is ever bred, I'm the one it's going to go for. But anyway, I digress. After prinks, we went off to Piano Bar for karaoke and cocktails and it was here that I discovered the Milchbar 45. Now, after the White Russian Experience of last summer (a story for another time) I should have known to stay away from milk cocktails, but oh no. The taste of liquid Milky Bar was too tempting for me and I guzzled at least three before we moved onto Go Go Lounge for some dancin' and, from what I remember, a really fun evening which climaxed with me eating an entire pizza on my own. Don't worry, I disgust myself as well. The next morning I was not a pretty sight. Unable to eat for queasiness, I lay around feeling sorry for myself and generally giving a terrible impression of myself to strangers whilst Cerys fretted and Kelsey laughed at me. I'll say this for the whole experience though, it did result in the discovery of the world's best hangover cure: Toy Story.<br />
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On to weekend two: The One Where We Watched A Lot Of Films And Ate A Lot Of Biscuits (And Also Went To The Zoo). Don't faint, right, but I actually didn't touch alcohol this weekend at all. Instead, me and Kelsey went to stay with Cerys for some baking and a Disney fest, the plan for which was hatched during the watching of Toy Story/ The Emperor's New Groove the weekend before. We arrived fairly late on Friday armed with Cathedral City cheese, with which Cerys later made scrummy cheese and potato pie (potatoes which I totally peeled despite the presence of potato eyes, which, as several of my friends know - and delight in laughing about - I have a slight irrational fear of. I only made a mild fuss. Yeah, I'd be the first to call me a freak, too). Before this, though, we took a wee trip to the Aasee (the park near the lake in Münster) where some of the others were finishing up a picnic. I lay in the grass as it got darker, listening to the acoustic guitar which another group of people had had the presence of mind to bring with them and occasionally joining in the American English vs British English debate which is ever present among my friends. It was one of those moments when you realise just how good you've got it. Then we went back to Cerys' for pie and Toy Story 2. Bliss. The next day we made use of some of the good weather in Germany recently and went to the zoo. I've been to Münster Zoo three times, but never before have I had chance to feed the penguins. Rest assured, none of them tried to eat me. The penguins are still on our side. That evening was all about baking and shameless Glee binge-watching. My cookies were slightly disappointing, but the crispy cakes went well and I am now fully up to date with the hormonal song-and-dance ridden New Directions. Oh, and then we watched Toy Story 3. We had to complete the set, no?<br />
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In total contrast to this relaxing detox weekend, I bring you speedily on to weekend number three: The One Where We All Went To Amsterdam For The Birthdays Of Lyndsay And Kelsey (Alternatively Known As "Der Kater" And "The Funniest Weekend Of All Time"). Oh, man, where do I begin? What can I divulge? After all, what happened in Amsterdam is supposed to stay in Amsterdam. Well, first of all I should say that it was amazing to see Lyndsay and Matt again after so long. I'd really missed them both and had forgotten how much they both make me laugh. Secondly, I feel I should describe the "hotel" where we stayed, except that I don't think anything I say will quite be able to do it justice. So I say this instead: watch the following video. <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GKA0EqVZu_o&feature=channel_video_title">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GKA0EqVZu_o&feature=channel_video_title</a>. It sums it up perfectly. Then there was everything we did. I realise that Amsterdam is one of the most cultural and beautiful cities in Europe, a fact which I have truly experienced on my last two visits. However, this time, we set out to have a weekend like "The Hangover", so I'm afraid I treated it like many the British tourist and just got pissed and ogled at hookers. There was Waldgeist, there was Nuwang, there was Vodka Ahoi. There were things done and things said that will never be known except by those who already know about them. There were two collapsed beds. There was a creepy man called Rick who followed our group to a bar and whom I rightly (and tipsily) told off for being a weird stalker. There was a trip to the Vondelpark with a picnic and talking to real-life Dutch people. There was a points-based kissing game. There was "Truth Or Dare" in pyjamas. There was ice cream in the sun and a great appreciation of the variety of Dutch fast-food. There were mice. There was frankly more fun and more giggles than you could shake a stick at, and once again I was struck by how lucky I have been this year to meet so many lovely, hilarious, downright wonderfully mental people.<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgRut-yVi_gJhTMwK5isJgNOSwiZgf7lR2Sc0-L1Mx4LiHSCTJHhXgrRmUTzUllEz9X8HwVJOAHWF56A2oI9BOHV7bYeRQ_gYHTrFFoq8jkz8toC8kWbGKCvEQcgZcVlUFJ0xFLZXHrdtsO/s1600/205766_10150506245340307_521490306_17603810_3268953_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgRut-yVi_gJhTMwK5isJgNOSwiZgf7lR2Sc0-L1Mx4LiHSCTJHhXgrRmUTzUllEz9X8HwVJOAHWF56A2oI9BOHV7bYeRQ_gYHTrFFoq8jkz8toC8kWbGKCvEQcgZcVlUFJ0xFLZXHrdtsO/s400/205766_10150506245340307_521490306_17603810_3268953_n.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br />
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Last one now, let's keep the ball rolling! Weekend four: The One Of Barbecues In The Park And Mini-Laptop Parties. Now, you mustn't think I'm a piss-head (I am) but this is yet another recount of drunken escapades. I promise I do other things and have many non-alcoholic strings to my bow, it's just been a heavy couple of months, yeah? Friday started off in somewhat classy style; Carol, Kelsey and I went to enjoy some of the new-found German sunshine by getting obscenely large ice creams in the centre of town. We then went home, got changed, reconvened for a couple of glasses of wine and headed up to Düsseldorf to meet Kate and her two friends from Wales. We continued to keep it light with just three Vodka Ahois (I'm being sarcastic - a Vodka Ahoi is a shot of vodka drank through sherbet and is a sure fire way of killing several of your most precious brain cells) before going to Stone on Rattingerstrasse, an indie club which I loved though I'm not sure everyone else was as impressed as I was. We got back to Duisburg about 3.30am, early by German standards, but not before I broke my lent in spectacular fashion by inhaling a McDonalds. We slept in late on Saturday and me and Kelsey headed back to mine for a bit of Russell Howard's Good News (it's my only connection to the world of current affairs) and some better-than-sex cheese on toast. We met up with Carol later, hit up Kaufland for sausages, buns and a disposable BBQ and headed off to the Innenhafen for the very first barbecue of 2011. Unfortunately, we forgot to pick up and knives or forks, so our sole cooking utensil was my keys (FYI: my staff-room key makes an excellent bread knife). That aside, our little outdoor feast was a grand success and the charcoal-smoked bratwursts were nothing short of heavenly. We then headed on back to Carol's for a little pre-lashing (into which we somehow managed to incorporate Vodka Ahoi AGAIN) complete with the flashing fairy lights and cheesy dance music that must accompany any of out laptop parties. What followed was a standard night in Duisburg: Golden Grün and Hundertmeister. Who says there are no good clubs in Duisburg?<br />
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So far, I've limited myself to recounting the only the partying. To avoid making this post too much longer (I know you're all busy people), I shall cover everything else in the briefest possible fashion and bullet point it.<br />
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- My Kl. 6 cover-class last week went extremely well. They're a really nice group and got on with the work well, and one girl looked really sad when I said I wasn't covering their English classes for the whole week that Herr Wüsthoff was in London.<br />
- I also had surprise Vertretung with Kl. 5 on Tuesday (the actual Vertretung didn't turn up) which also went really well, even if I did only have to give them the exercises as written down in the Klassenbuch. It made me realise I really miss teaching Jahrgangstufe 5, and I've made the executive decision to try and get another group for my last four weeks after the Easter holidays.<br />
- At the beginning of April I got myself elected as Forge Radio Secretary/ Inclusions Officer for the coming academic year. I'm immensely excited about this and can't wait to get back to the society that was such an enjoyable part of my second year in Sheffield.<br />
- The first pictures from the English-Abend and Grundschultheatertag are now on the school website: <a href="http://www.hhg-ob.de/">http://www.hhg-ob.de/</a> (the link to the album is on the home page). There is unfortunately only one of the Robin Hood play, but there are lots of the others, and you can get a good idea of what good events they both were.<br />
- I've hooked this blog up to my twitter feed (see? -->). If you have twitter and fancy boosting my follower quota, I'd be most grateful. I'll endeavour to be amusing.<br />
- It's currently Motto-Woche at HHG. It's the last week for Kl. 13 and they're using their time, most wisely in my opinion, for dressing up, drinking beer in class and not playing the blindest bit of attention to school rules. I think this is brilliant and deeply regret not having had something similar when I left school. I am also having to fight my deeply-inbuilt student nature so as I don't ask to join in.<br />
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And that's it for now, I think. I am heading home for the Easter holidays this coming Thursday (though not before taking in Stornoway in Cologne on Wednesday night) and I am ludicrously excited about it. It feels like such a long time since I have seen my lovely family and friends back in England and I cannot wait to throw my arms around you all. Expect a blog in a couple of weeks detailing what is sure to be a fantastic couple of weeks, complete with a trip to Edinburgh, crashing in Sheffield and many, many catch-up cups of tea. Till then, ma homies. Happy blogging.georgie_forgiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03091664460817550955noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6537486237619878552.post-23784674572583311292011-04-05T09:59:00.000-07:002011-04-05T12:58:34.021-07:00YA: Party Machen? (The German Party Playlist)It's occurred to me that we've all come to appreciate many wonderful pieces of German music since being here, and yet they've never been put down together all in one place. Well, THAT TIME IS NOW. Here, for your listening pleasure, is the German Party Playlist, a comprehensive list of all the badass tunes we've got our groove on to over the past few months. Hit it!<br />
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Nein Mann - Lazerkraft 3D<br />
<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vcPXVPXAA-8">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vcPXVPXAA-8</a><br />
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Viva Colonia -<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"> <span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;">De Höhner</span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;"><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=37RPcWyHxLE">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=37RPcWyHxLE</a></span></span><br />
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Schenk Mir Dein Herz - De <span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;">Höhner (we like them.) </span><br />
<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TTjlw_8gGLU">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TTjlw_8gGLU</a><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;"></span>Das Geht Ab (Wir Feiern Die Ganze Nacht) - Frauenartz & Manny Marc<br />
<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZulHCr1o5XA">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZulHCr1o5XA</a><br />
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<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZulHCr1o5XA"></a>Traum Von Amsterdam [Party Version] - Axel Fischer<br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3aZcZ2Um2Yg">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3aZcZ2Um2Yg</a></span><br />
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Ich Bin Ein D<span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;">öner - Tim Toupet </span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;"><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=taUfZRsZ0qU">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=taUfZRsZ0qU</a></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;">(Yes - this is a song about kebabs, and the chorus does indeed translate as "I have onions on my head, I am a donner [kebab]")</span><br />
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Tears Don't Lie - Mark'Oh<br />
<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ChPV9ua6HII">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ChPV9ua6HII</a><br />
(This was a 90s German pop hit and is essentially a techno remix of "When A Child Is Born". No, really.)<br />
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Danke - Die Fantastischen Vier<br />
<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ChLtLzZBYrY">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ChLtLzZBYrY</a><br />
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Fluch Der Karibik [Remix] - DJ Tiesto<br />
<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eBckj_Wkc0w">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eBckj_Wkc0w</a><br />
(I think this is the right version)<br />
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Remmidemmi - Deichkind<br />
<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ch2GgrfSblQ&feature=related">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ch2GgrfSblQ&feature=related</a><br />
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I hope you enjoyed the German pop party. Same time next week?georgie_forgiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03091664460817550955noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6537486237619878552.post-2355498581485383772011-03-16T08:59:00.000-07:002011-03-16T12:10:46.232-07:00YA: More Civilised PursuitsYou've heard the tales of the most recent debauchery, but I feel it's only right to inform you of all the stuff I've been doing that didn't involve alcohol, just to prove that they did, in fact, happen.<br />
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So, first things first, the Cambridge Exams have now been and gone. The speaking exams came first, with two pairs of very British examiners setting up camp at HHG a couple of Saturdays ago and ploughing through seventeen or so groups. I spent the first half of my day delivering plates of sandwiches and bottles of juice, the middle part trying to warm up the kids with English conversation and the final part taking away the now-empty platters and coffee pots. The feedback was positive; everyone was apparently of a very high standard, and I breathed a sigh of relief. My doubts, by the way, were by no means with the students - in my opinion they're all brilliant English speakers, they knock spots off my German. However, I was full of niggling doubts that I wouldn't have prepared them properly and if something went wrong it would be my fault.<br />
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The written exams followed the weekend after, with the higher level CAE taking place on the Friday and the FCE on the Saturday. Both these days were long and exhausting. There are four papers to the written part of a Cambridge English Award: reading, writing, use of English, and listening. In total and with breaks in between, the time taken to write all four papers was about five hours for FCE and six for CAE. And it wasn't only exhausting for the students; I was personally knackered by the time it got to Saturday night and ended up crashing out at quarter past eight. How very rock and roll. Additionally, I have new sympathies with exam invigilators around with the world for the hours of boredom they must endure plodding up and down the rows of desks. At least I could do the exam papers to pass the time and hence provide a bit of feedback to the students during the breaks, but I also spent a lot of my time doodling, wandering aimlessly around and watching the clock. And if I wasn't entirely sure I was integrated into the school, I am now, because after the last exam I was entrusted with the school keys to look after over the weekend (my mentor teacher joking that I wasn't to hold any parties before Monday morning). It felt very similar to being asked to take care of the class hamster over the holidays. Now everything is over completely, with no lessons to plan or papers to mark, I'm at a bit of a loss of what to do with myself. No fear though, I have Abi-Vorbereitung (A Level preparation) starting with the Klasse 13 Grundkurs next week, so I'll be back to planning and panicking in no time.<br />
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The play I was working on with Klasse 6 has also been and gone. Final rehearsals came together, people finally learnt their lines and the six small boys playing Robin Hood and his Merry Men were talked into wearing their costumes. If you ever want to make a ten year old boy furious with you tell him that a) he's got to wear tights and b) he has to do a dance whilst wearing those tights (yes, you guessed it, the dance was indeed to "Men In Tights"). The conversation shouted through the door of the boys toilets whilst they were changing into the dreaded tights went something like this:<br />
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Boy: We can't wear these!<br />
Franzi (the teacher): Why?<br />
Boy: Well, they're very tight!<br />
Franzi. Yes. They're tights...<br />
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It was thunderous expressions all round and I'm not sure Franzi and myself will ever be forgiven. Still, the play itself went down an absolute storm, both at the Bilingual Night and and the Grundschultheatertag (the day(s) when the pupils from the nearby primary schools are invited into their prospective "big school" to watch a few plays, in both English and German). With the set, the lighting and the music everything came together nicely, and I barely had to say "sssssh!" at all when I was hovering around behind the scenes. The other plays were very enjoyable too. I'd helped a little with the other Klasse 6 production, one they had written themselves of the 'Hound Of the Baskervilles', but no where near as much as with 'Robin Hood', so I could sit in the audience and watch that one with little idea beforehand of how the finished version would look. The other play at the Bilingual Night, 'The Hysterical History Of The Trojan War', in which some of my FCE students were participating, had me in absolute stitches. Once they included the subtle Star Wars joke I was sold, but casting half of Kl 5d (my former Klasse 5 group who I miss teaching terribly) as the entire Spartan army, having the Greek gods chat to each other on their mobiles and wheeling the tiny toy rocking horse onto the stage to represent the gigantic wooden structure of folklore were stokes of genius.<br />
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In terms of the more classy social activities, there have been a couple, mostly involving food. A couple of weeks ago we went out for Thai food as a sort of unofficial goodbye meal for Lara and a few nights ago I went to the cinema to see my second non-subtitled film in German; "Unknown Identity", set in Berlin and starring Liam Neeson. There were a lot of German actors in it, and I would be interested in seeing it in English to see which bits were spoken in German originally and which bits weren't. The night before the CAE written exams, Petra took me to the Scottish restaurant in Mülheim to watch a gig by The Paul McKenna Band, a traditional Scottish folk group who are just embarking on a European tour. The music was right up my street and the first lot of live folk I've seen in a long time, so I had a fantastic evening enjoying beautiful food whilst listening to beautiful melodies, and have a new folk CD to boot. I then stopped the night at her flat before the exams the next day. We slept in, had a very nice breakfast and were late. Ah, well. Petra also took me to another quirky little restaurant (apparently Germany is full of them) the next day after the CAE exams were over. It serves schnitzel and pancakes and is called "Hexenhaus". Hex means 'witch' in German and the entire place is decked out in little models of witches, whilst your drinks are brought to you by a little model train that travels around the room. I'm a big kid at heart and I thought this was brilliant. Especially the train. <br />
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Phew! What a month it's been. What with Cambridge, the play(s), Karneval and all my other crazy commitments now in the past, I feel at a bit of a loose end. Saying that, it has been nice to get some sleep and to enjoy the goodies that seem to be being sent to me unceasingly at the moment by my wonderful friends and family. I've actually sat down and watched some TV, cooked meals in my flat, and I've been getting a regular eight hours a night again. I might even actually now be able to find the time to send another batch of letters out.<br />
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You know it's going to get hectic again soon. But, just for now, I'm enjoying my couple of days off.georgie_forgiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03091664460817550955noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6537486237619878552.post-27925182449603338402011-03-13T09:10:00.000-07:002011-03-19T03:00:55.773-07:00YA: Rated 18+ (Do Not Read If You Are Of A Sensitive Disposition)I've decided to split my blog this time round, writing a nice one about work and classy social commitments which I will be able to show to my grandmother, and this one which will be about, erm... none of that. Brace yourself, readers, for scenes of pillage, plunder and parrot costumes. Let the debauchery commence!<br />
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The first tale of alcohol-fuelled frolics I feel I should impart is that of the fateful trip to Djazz about a month ago. Except I can't impart too much because I don't remember too much. I'll tell you about what I do recall. We pre-lashed at Kate's on a dangerous mix of vodka and Nuwang* before tottering off to the club around 11.30. Upon arriving at the club, we went to dump our stuff in the unmanned cloakroom, where there was a piano that I drunkenly attempted to play, and a tambourine, which I stole.** I believe some dancing may have followed this, though what we were dancing to I cannot say. Then came the clincher, the point of the evening from which all that follows has been entirely wiped from my knoweldge; somebody, and I name no names (Kate), got the shots in. That one drop of sambucca destroyed whatever chance any of us had of knowing what the hell happened that night, and between that point and finding Kelsey at 7am sat in Starbucks (drinking a frappé and babbling about some bloke named Samsung), I only recall a total five minutes worth of events. The rest of the night we have subsequently attempted to piece together through photographic evidence, but that in itself is so bizarre that it hasn't helped much: photos in front of the Naked Man statue, photos outside Kate's building, photos outside Kate's school... they track our drunken trail across Duisburg and still we have no recollection of any of it. I guess we'll never know.<br />
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You would have thought that after that little escapade I would have left it at least a week before daring to touch the Devil Drink again. Not a bit of it. Try less than 24 hours. For it was the good Matthew Endersby's leaving party and there was no way he was going to let us get away with spending the night on only lemonade and water. The night kicked off in very British style with a wonderful traditional roast dinner courtesy of Cerys. Yum. Then there were cornflake crispy cakes for dessert courtesy of Sammy. Double yum. Then, after a handing over of pressies and cards, not to mention a speech written by Lyndsay which, in her absence, I attempted to deliver with a straight face, we just got smashed. I'm pleased to say I curbed myself on the previous night and just got moderately merry, but not so Kelsey, who somehow acquired an odd mix of a someone else's wine and cherry liquor, before bumbling off out the flat in search of God knows what and causing a full-scale panic among the rest of us who had no idea where she'd gone. Apparently she'd been talking to some people from Manchester, but whatever, she gave me a heart-attack. When we did eventually decide to go out, we left one of our number, a little worse-for-wear, behind and set about buying cocktails-to-go from a nearby bar to get us through the oh-so-arduous walk to the club. Which we reached, eventually, in varying degrees of a state. I think the rest of the night passed without drama (except a truly foul cheeseburger at 4am) and, needless to say, my body was not thanking me for that weekend for some days to come.<br />
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You'll be pleased to know that I take a break from heavy drinking for a couple of weeks after this. My ravaged liver needed a bit of a holiday in order to prepare itself for the party-highlight of the Germany calender: Karneval.<br />
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Yes, Karneval. Commencing at 11.11 on the Thursday before the start of Lent, it lasts until the wee hours of Tuesday morning, with everybody wearing crazy costumes and boozing considerably throughout. Each day has a different significance, with the most important being the Thursday, Wieberfastnacht (which has something to do with female empowerment and means women can chop off men's ties and kiss whoever they want) and Rosenmontag (which features great big parades of thousands of people in all the major cities with floats and throwing goodies to the crowds). In NRW, the best place to go to party is definitely Cologne, although having sampled Düsseldorf I can tell you that that's pretty damn awesome as well. This is my Karneval story...<br />
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Thursday: Due to having to work until 3pm on Thursday I was unable to attend the big celebration kick-off. However, I raced over to Kelsey's after work to transform myself into a parrot*** and we managed to make it to Cologne for around 7. We even made sure we caught the others up on the train, snaffling on a couple of bottles of (awful) wine and playing the best (or most stupid) drinking game even invented: Drink Whenever You See Somebody In A Costume. We then found Kate and Lara somewhere around Clodwigplatz and proceeded to have a good ol' party. And it really was lots of fun for a while. A generous man kept buying all four of us drinks, Lara found a tambourine, we drew face-paint flags on each other and we sang riotously to the German Karneval tunes. When Kate and Lara, who after all had been on it far longer than Kelsey and myself decided to head home, we kept the party going, following two blokes dressed as pigs to some scrappy little club in Barbarossaplatz. Fun was still being had. In fact, fun was had right up until around 2.30am, whereupon fun very rapidly stopped being had because I discovered the absence of my purse; it had been stolen out of my bag. The rest of the night was given over to a trip to the police station, my hysterical tears and a prolonged sit in McDonalds until we could get the first train home on Friday morning. I got home at 7am, showered and went straight out again to the bank to cancel my cards and generally fix my life. I think I finally got to bed at bout 11.30am, after having been up for 26 hours.<br />
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Saturday: Saturday was Düsseldorf day. Well, night, really as we didn't get there until gone 9pm. I'm in love with Düsseldorf Altstadt normally, but that night it was magical. They'd rigged up a speaker system all down the main streets playing out a truly eclectic mix of tunes (The Killers, Status Quo, Viva Colonia, Whitney Huston...) and there were stalls every few meters supplying all your Karneval needs, from funny hats to beer, from Kanye sunglasses to "Karneval Kocktail". The atmosphere was infectious. We hit out favourite Irish pub before partying in the streets and then headed to Ratingerstrasse to dance the rest of the night away in Goldener Einhorn, where we met some true legends, baffled at the fact that "When A Child Is Born" is apparently a party tune in this country, and I stole a builder's hat.<br />
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Monday: 22 whole hours of party time. Everything commenced at 8.42 when, armed with a bottle of wine and dressed like twats, we grabbed the 8.42 to Cologne. We stocked up with more beer on arrival and, avoiding the attentions of an extremely pissed bloke dressed as pink bunny rabbit, we headed off to the... well, we headed off somewhere and found ourselves a good spot to watch the parade. By this time, however, I was experiencing a call of nature and all the toilets seemed to be some kind of VIP only affair. So, Kelsey, master of crime, busted me into a locked set using her own house key. Amazing. Until, that is, we got shouted at and had to run away (fortunately, I'd already made use of the facilities, so this wasn't too much of a problem). The parade itself was crackers; hours and hours of people and floats trooping by, pelting the baying crowds with biscuits, chocolate and sweeties. As Ally was dressed as a racial-stereotype Mexican, we used his hat as a container and got down to some dirty fighting in a quest to amass as much Haribo as we could. We were so good we decided to form a band of Superhero crime fighters called the "Süssigkeiten Ninjas, and then pigged out on all our spoils until we felt sick.<br />
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</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">The only way to combat the excess of chocolate was Bratwurst and beer, which is what we did. The next few hours were a mixture of singing loudly to German anthems, pratting about in a shopping trolley in front of the Cologne Cathedral and showcasing dance moves from Jersey Shore. By 11.30 we were getting bored of staying down by the river and headed off to another part of town, eventually ending up in the same place I had been on Thursday when I got robbed. However, far from resenting that crappy little bar, I'm actually a little bit in love with it. They played some banging records (including "Torn" by Natalie Imbruglia, allowing Ally and myself to whack out the David Armand dance routine) and I'm sure I danced solidly and with gutso for at least three hours. Around 3am we decided it would be an idea to hit the road but then accidentally found ourselves in another bar, dancing around behind the full length glass windows and waving to the people outside. I'm not quite sure how this happened, and as Kate pointed out, we must have looked just like prostitutes in Amsterdam, prostitutes in Amsterdam dressed as red indians, cave girls or parrots. We ended up eventually leaving around 5 and getting back to Duisburg around 6.30 on Tuesday morning, staggering blearily through the crowds of commuters now on the their way work. A terrible sight indeed. I fell in my front door at seven and crashed out till lunch, when I got up again, washed the gunk from my face and hair and headed over to Carol's for hangover pancakes**** and to say bye to Lara, whose sadly now left us for the sunnier climes of Madrid. Personally, I'd have chosen Duisburg myself. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
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</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">I loved Karneval, but I've been glad of the few days normality that have followed it's dramatic climax. I'm not sure I could have handled another weekend quite like that one, though it was brilliant to watch this normally conservative region well and truly let its hair down. It was an unforgettable experience to say the very least!</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">And that, folks, is the cumulation of my most recent drunken escapades. I'm sure there will be new ones to add to the record very soon. There always are. However, with my next post I promise you something a little more civilised and so, as always, stay tuned. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
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*It's ALWAYS the Nuwang. For those of you that don't know, it's a cheep pear-favoured wine coloured nuclear-green. At 10% volume, you'd wonder how it manages to do such terrible things to people, but it does.<br />
** I still have it. It's on my desk right now. You know when you wake up alongside a tambourine that it's been a good night.<br />
*** I made my own costume and it was pretty damn amazing, even if I do say so myself.<br />
**** It was Pancake Day back home after all. The Germans don't celebrate Pancake Day, the poor bastards. The again, they have Karneval, so swings and roundabouts, I guess.georgie_forgiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03091664460817550955noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6537486237619878552.post-14629972909710352011-03-06T09:56:00.000-08:002011-03-06T09:57:41.106-08:00Creative Writing: "Planning A Journey"<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;">This is the final piece I wrote for Folktales following it's sad ending earlier today. I will miss writing for it greatly and have enjoyed every show I ever listened to immensely. Let's hope it's simply only in hiatus, eh?</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;">This is the first poem I have written in earnest since the age of ten, so be gentle in your judgement. I should say also that the element of sadness is only due to me missing home, and not to the fact that I don't enjoy my life over in Germany. It was inspired by "Planning A Journey" by Leeds local folk band Whiter Than. </span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;">---------------------------</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;"><br />
Take me back to those northern towns,<br />
I miss the wind and the rain.<br />
Those people I know, those places I go,<br />
Here’s hoping that nothing has changed.<br />
<br />
It feels like I’ve been here too long now,<br />
Across the channel, far from home.<br />
I’m calling family and friends, trying to pretend,<br />
That I’m happy, that I don’t feel alone.<br />
<br />
Because there’s something not quite right here,<br />
I feel somehow that I don’t quite belong.<br />
Six months passed away and there isn’t a day,<br />
When everything fits and nothing goes wrong.<br />
<br />
I long for a place, not exciting, not pretty,<br />
Rather grimy, not special, a typical city,<br />
But a place that is, for one person at least,<br />
Completely and utterly beautiful.<br />
I want to breathe in concrete and smoke,<br />
Fill my lungs with memories and choke,<br />
With laughter as I recall every time,<br />
We did something incredibly stupid.<br />
Let’s go to the places we said that we would,<br />
Visit again if only we could,<br />
Find the money or the time to spend,<br />
On such fun and triviality.<br />
We can walk together down old streets in old shoes,<br />
Sit in the park at night and listen to blues.<br />
We’ll drink coffee in that place we went every day,<br />
And I’ll feel comfortable in my own skin.<br />
We’ll shop for niche clothing and second hand books,<br />
In tiny hidden shops, and get funny looks,<br />
For giggling loudly at some silly joke<br />
That no one else will find funny.<br />
<br />
I’ll do everything I always did,<br />
With the people I always did them with,<br />
And I’ll love every second,<br />
Because I know that this is my place, and these are my people.<br />
<br />
So, then, I’m planning a journey,<br />
For a time not so far away.<br />
And then I won’t need to reminisce about everything I miss,<br />
I can live it; I’ll be home, to stay.<br />
<br />
I’m counting down the days until June.<br />
Get the kettle on, love, I’ll see you soon.</span>georgie_forgiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03091664460817550955noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6537486237619878552.post-74716583785124066652011-02-28T13:50:00.000-08:002011-02-28T13:54:22.378-08:00Creative Writing: "Arguments"You know the drill by now. Folktales (3pm every Sunday, LSRfm.com) gave me a song. I wrote to it. This week it was "Arguments" by Handmade Hands and here is the result. Incidentally, the story in the first paragraph is entirely true, given a touch of artistic license.<br />
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<br />
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;">When I was small, the biggest argument I ever had was over a backwards roll. I was six and my best friend, a budding gymnast, thought I was silly for not being able to do one. I remember the day clearly. We were playing in her back garden in the beating sun, barefooted and barelegged. The sprinklers were on and there had just been ice-cream. She was performing a series of perfect gymnastic manoeuvres, cartwheels and handstands and, of course, backwards rolls. I whooped and clapped like the perfect audience, in awe of my talented friend until she, flushed with her success, suggested I join in. I was less than keen. This was not my forte and I was scared of hurting myself. Undeterred and ignoring my protests, she gave me an almighty shove and my feet went up over my head and the world was turned upside down. I had, unwillingly, executed a perfect backwards roll, and I was not happy about it. Furious and teary with shock, I stomped off to find my Wellington boots, threatening to go home. It wasn’t until my friend, distraught that I was leaving, burst into tears too that everything was reconciled. We went back outside into the garden and began a new game, tears </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;">and trauma all forgotten.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;">Now I’m older, I often wish that all arguments could be solved so simply. But adults don’t care when you </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;">threaten to leave, and children are too carefree to hold grudges.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;">Life is circular these days, isn’t it? There’ll be something tedious little incident, something so unimportant and insignificant that we’ll wonder, later on, why we even noticed. But it’ll cause grinding nerves and grinding teeth and suddenly we’ll be red in the face and screaming blue murder. Every past wrong will be dredged up and wrung out over and over again. Every little thing that you do that infuriates me I will throw in your face with relish and you’ll delight in informing me of all the little things that I do that make your skin crawl. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;">I'm</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 115%;"> sure I’ve said these things before. Why aren’t you listening? Why aren’t you listening??<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;">Listen to me!<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;">And then you snap. And then I snap. And then there’s a resounding crack and this relationship is held together by splinters. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;">No one will speak now for a while now. We’re too busy listening to the harsh words still ringing in our ears. We’ll say later that we didn’t mean them, but we did, and we know we’ll say them all again and mean them just as much. Words don’t just cut, they pierce and burrow and crawl under your skin, burning and sniping and etching themselves on your memory for ever. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;">Soon, we’ll kiss and make up. Everything will be peaches and cream. Until the next time, that is, because we’re repeating ourselves, repeating ourselves. And, when the shouting begins once more, when we say those things we’ve said a million times over, I will sigh and wish I was six years old again when it was so easy to forgive and forget. <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>georgie_forgiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03091664460817550955noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6537486237619878552.post-7548655366153025262011-02-21T08:49:00.000-08:002011-02-21T08:52:37.642-08:00Creative Writing: "Sorry"Inspired by "Sorry" by Karine Polwart (a beautiful track and proper folk, check it out) and written for Folktales, LSRfm.com's answer to soothing Sunday storytime.<br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;">Dear Liar,<br />
<br />
I’m writing to tell you that you’ve really done it this time. I’ve taken a lot over the past few months, years, but this… this is the final straw.<br />
<br />
You have, frankly, been a consistently awful boyfriend. My mum hates you. My friends hate you. You’re rude and obnoxious and last year you forgot my birthday. You spend your week nights in the pub and you weekends watching football and you certainly don’t give a damn about anything I’ve got to say. You never clean the flat or offer to cook dinner and the last time you did something remotely nice it was to erect that shelving unit that collapsed three weeks later anyway. I’ve thought of leaving you a million times, but then you’d say something nice or tell me I looked pretty and I’d convince myself that the man I fell in love with must still be in there somewhere, hiding, and one day he’d come back to me. So I’d stay, all for that one, flimsy hope.<br />
<br />
A shame, then, that when I was able to overlook all your faults, you ruined it all by being an underhanded, cheating scumbag. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #660000;">You thought you’d covered your tracks nicely, didn’t you, with all those tall stories and all that deceit? Well, let me tell you that those stories won’t wash any more. You’ve been caught red-handed. You’re busted.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;"> <br />
I won’t say I wasn’t suspicious before. There’s only so much overtime one person can do. But I bit my tongue because I trusted you. I overlooked the late nights when you stumbled in drunk, lipstick on your cheek, the smell of perfume on your skin. I gave you the benefit of the doubt, didn’t make a big thing of it. After all, I know what a lad’s night out is like and no one likes a jealous girlfriend. But when the weekend “courses” started, the “business trips” abroad, I knew that trusting you any longer would only make me look like the idiot. So, I read your emails. I opened your credit card bills. One night I even followed you out. I wanted to see your treachery with my own eyes so I could stop loving you and start hating you instead.<br />
<br />
I saw you hold that tramp’s hand in the restaurant where we had out first date. I saw you stoke her cheek, kiss her goodnight. And it did make me hate you, but it hurt me too.<br />
<br />
Does she know about me, I wonder?<br />
<br />
Don’t bother to try and fix it this time. Don’t bother with the over blown romantic gestures. Don’t call. Don’t send me flowers. Don’t come around to my house to stand and plead forgiveness under my bedroom window. This isn’t like the other times, you know. “Sorry” isn’t going to cut it. How could you possibly think that a mere apology would give me back the dignity you stole so unthinkingly from me? You’ve broken my heart and demolished my pride. “Sorry” isn’t good enough and it’s never going to be good enough, ever again.<br />
<br />
I hate you for making a fool of me. I hate you for taking the best years of my life and not even making it worth it. I will never forgive you for this.<br />
<br />
Please find all you possessions on the front lawn.<br />
<br />
Regards,<br />
<br />
A Better Person Than You.</span>georgie_forgiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03091664460817550955noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6537486237619878552.post-80362804083501901542011-02-15T13:55:00.000-08:002011-02-16T10:30:17.129-08:00YA: Being Just As Busy As A Bee Can Be.<div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Look, OK, I really do have an excuse for my absence this time. In fact I have several. Would you like to hear about them?</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Firstly, there's my stonking social life - prepare to be utterly overwhelmed by jealousy as I launch into a detailed and adjectivally-stuffed description of my fabulous existence!</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">....................</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">You're right, that is going too far (and erring on the arrogant). Saying that, I can't deny that recent times have been pretty damn good. I've had a guest to stay in the form of a certain Miss Pearson and I had a great time giving her a wee tour of my adoptive Bundesland. The long anticipated Fort Day took place, though with considerably less fort building than face-packs (which Matt refused to partake in) and bacon sandwiches. We had an en masse trip to Ikea and Gelsenkirchen's new Primark in order to stock up on cheep accessories and household furnishings. I also went to a tip top gig, my first proper small gig since being in Germany; Tubelord and Shoes And Socks Off were brilliant, and hopefully there'll be a somewhat belated live review on this very blog soon. Then, on top of all that, there's been the numerous trips to the ol' Kneipe and various nights out in different cities (M<span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;"><em style="font-style: normal;">ünster, D</em></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;"><em style="font-style: normal;">üsseldorf, Essen, Duisburg) not to mention the past three weekends spent outside of Germany...</em></span></span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;"><em style="font-style: normal;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></em></span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit; line-height: 15px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: normal;">N</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">o, actually, let's mention those. First, there was Amsterdam. Oh, my beloved Amsterdam, how I had missed thee! We only went for a short time, taking advantage of Deutsche Bahn's cheapy-cheap saving train fares and for 38Euro there and back it was thoroughly worth it. I mean, it wasn't an entirely hitch-free trip; the hostel we wanted to stay in ran out of walk-in rooms (they wouldn't take a phone reservation) and we had a nerve wracking couple of hours where we all tried to put a brave face on the fact that we could possibly be sleeping rough in the Dutch capital. Fortunately, a very lovely woman (whom I want to adopt as a member of my family) in the tourist information centre hooked us up with a three-star hotel at 33Euro each for the night and we were saved. Other than me dropping my chips, everything else went swimmingly. We took in the delights of the flower market and the sex museum, got some Dutch food and wandered off into the night. Obviously, we took a turn down the red light district, though the prostitutes weren't nearly as </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit; line-height: 15px;">interesting</span><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;"> as all the ducks and swans lining the canal which Carol decided to feed. Then it was pub time. Several long strolls and numerous beers later, it was suddenly 4am in we were in a jazz bar and Kelsey was falling asleep against the wall. We decided it was probably time to hit the sheets. The next morning we stocked up (and I mean stocked up) on the hotel's free breakfast before heading to the Anne Frank House. I'd been before, but I didn't find it any the less moving and I </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;">thoroughly</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;"> recommend going if you haven't yet had the chance to visit. Finally, there was time for a quick photo-shoot on the I Amsterdam sign before boarding the train back to Duisburg, and frankly, crashing right out. </span></span></span></span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;"><br />
</span></span></span></span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;">The weekend after I hit up another European </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;">capital</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;">: Copenhagen. Since my oldest friend in the world, Jennie, currently resides there I thought it only right and proper that I should pay her a visit. She was a tremendous host, talking me drinking at cool bars and for dinner at a restaurant </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;">shaped</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;"> like an old-fashioned tram (and I can still taste the awesome-osity of that burger). I took the night train up on the Thursday night, arriving in the middle of Friday, the rest of which was pretty much taken up with the aforementioned burger and a Hoegarden in a tumbler that must have previously belonged to a giant it was so big. On Saturday we were tourists, heading out to the Little Mermaid statue and then into Christiania, the crazy hippy commune in the middle of town with it's own a rules and a bar with a fish-tank celling in the toilets. Then, after fabulous home cooked lasagne (thanks, Jennie's flatmate) we got changed and went to the most </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;">international</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;"> flat party I've ever had the privilege to attend. There was only about eleven people but we spanned six different nationalities: British, Turkish, Danish, Norwegian, American and Polish. Crazy. Even crazier, then, that I spent the rest of my night getting well and truly trollied on </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;">extremely</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;"> cheap Turborg at a Balkan Music night in a disused factory turned club. Needless to say, the hangover the next day was considerable and the ten hours of training back to Germany unwelcome, but I had a completely awesome weekend and I'd do it all again tomorrow if not sooner. </span></span></span></span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;"><br />
</span></span></span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi8wFySL_ulKfs3dVyvu5b2MPlCo8A4B6kS5wccZLGmCpP-CivoeFNi1MiFX2cIpk7wF_EnDdQFZ6fAP0CYUgxLwlqgMm8AJfnBmafNXeFaMTBqGxYRpgcvWQvbzK_JWUqeAvA4TZxpVqlB/s1600/CIMG6529.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi8wFySL_ulKfs3dVyvu5b2MPlCo8A4B6kS5wccZLGmCpP-CivoeFNi1MiFX2cIpk7wF_EnDdQFZ6fAP0CYUgxLwlqgMm8AJfnBmafNXeFaMTBqGxYRpgcvWQvbzK_JWUqeAvA4TZxpVqlB/s320/CIMG6529.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;"><br />
</span></span></span></span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;"><br />
</span></span></span></span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;">Then (last one now) last weekend Kelsey and I made another trip to Holland in order to help Lyndsay move her shed-loads of stuff across to Groningen. </span></span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;">We had said goodbye the night before in typical student style, with a meal and a bout of karaoke and several well-liquored cocktails (also, me and Kelsey, having accidentally bought the same outfit without knowing a few weeks previously decided it would be the perfect farewell gift to go out dressed completely identically, an act which inspired great hilarity). Therefore, the next day </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;">should have been a </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;">gruelling</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;"> and grumble-filled trip consisting of crap food and five trains and a hangover to boot, but was actually just one big laugh. We played "That's What She Said" relentlessly for seven hours without getting bored and filmed our adventure. We even wrote a soundtrack and any second now I expect a phone call from Simon Cowell offering us a six-figure advance on a record deal. The only rubbish aspect of the whole thing was that we had to leave Lyndsay behind when we left. I will miss her very much; Germany won't quite be the same and I'm already very much looking forward to fourth year cups of tea and the promise of being introduced to Dempsy's. </span></span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;"><br />
</span></span></span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhL3k4GNoCv8o6K6I_aliUkno6LgCLOrMeRFHjlaCK8ipkWCntElGw7pIN4MdmsC24oROpGJz1hpwR72t3BsyBep-Cv45c-CNgdwx-f_FycYJ2iMXPah9zFxoknZPIKAtRQYBqw9SYaEb7y/s1600/CIMG6574.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhL3k4GNoCv8o6K6I_aliUkno6LgCLOrMeRFHjlaCK8ipkWCntElGw7pIN4MdmsC24oROpGJz1hpwR72t3BsyBep-Cv45c-CNgdwx-f_FycYJ2iMXPah9zFxoknZPIKAtRQYBqw9SYaEb7y/s320/CIMG6574.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;"><br />
</span></span></span></span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;"><br />
</span></span></span></span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;">I should say at this point that it hasn't been all play and no work. In fact, it's been very much the opposite, in that work's gone equally crackers and I've found my weeks just as jam-packed as the weekends. This is largely because two of the projects I've been working on at school are coming to a close soon. The first, a play about Robin Hood with Klasse 6, is in full </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;">rehearsal</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;"> mode, with lines to be learnt, costumes to be found and sets to be made. Everything has to be done and dusted by opening night next Thursday; the pupils are performing at the bilingual night as well as to the </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;">visiting</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;"> Grundschule kids who are considering HHG as their Gymnasium of choice for the next nine years of their </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;">academic</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;"> </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;">existence</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;">. The other is the FCE and CAE voluntary English exams that I have been tutoring for. With less than three weeks until the speaking exams and the written papers the week after that (both events, I might add, which will demand my </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;">attendance</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;"> at school at 8am on a SATURDAY), I've found myself trying to cram even more </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;">activities</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;"> into my thrice weekly lessons as well as spending my evenings trawling the internet and trying to knock together revision packs. This Thursday I have to go </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;">additional</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;"> training of some description in the next town, though I have no idea what that will entail. In addition to this, the Klasse 7 </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;">bilingual</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;">-</span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;">politics</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;"> class that I assist in have just started work on their final courtroom role-play project and my level of Nachhilfestunden has increased to three per week with the promise of one more should I choose to call the number given to me today. </span></span></span></span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;"><br />
</span></span></span></span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;">So, you see, I haven't been ignoring my blogging duties on purpose! I really have been a very busy bumble bee. I've succeeded in filling my weeks so well that I've barely noticed I've been back six weeks already. Christ, there's only eight weeks to go and it's Easter, and then when that's done I've only got four more weeks before I'm done for good.</span></span></span></span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;"><br />
</span></span></span></span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 15px;">Shucks. Just when I was starting to get into it. </span></span></span></span></div>georgie_forgiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03091664460817550955noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6537486237619878552.post-72786773838272137192011-02-15T12:15:00.000-08:002011-02-15T12:15:44.905-08:00Creative Writing: "We Are The Battery Human"<div class="MsoNormal">This piece was written for "Folktales", LSR.fm's very own slice of folky story time goodness every Sunday at 3pm. It was inspired by one of my ultimate favourite songs, "We Are The Battery Human" by Stornoway. If you do not have Stornoway's spectacular album "Beachcomber's Windowsill" in you life, what the hell are you playing at? Get on that album, get on this song, listen and fall in love. </div><div class="MsoNormal">-----------------------------</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">Listen up. I’ve got an idea and I think you’ll like it. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">I don’t know about you, but I don’t think I can take any more of these power suits or that insipid water-cooler small talk. My life has become all meetings and meaningless figures, stocks, shares and staplers, scraps of information fastened together with paper clips, and I’m working though my lunch break again. I feel trapped, trapped inside a six-billion air-conditioned prison, barricading myself further inside my paper dungeon with every passing memo. It’s an origami Fort Knox in here and every time I move I hear the clanking of the shackles that chain me to this desk. This is a world of straight lines and square corners: square envelopes, square windows, square people, desks sitting in neat little rows, symmetrical beige carpet tiles stretching from here to infinity. Neat and ordered and dull and suffocating and… I want out. I want outside. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">So let’s bunk off. Think about it. We could leave our suits in the wardrobe and our briefcases on the kitchen table, skip the bus journey and that lead-stomach Monday morning feeling. Let’s instead dig out our comfy old jeans and warmest woolly jumpers, don our sturdiest boots; wrap a picnic in that red-check table cloth and take to the hills. We’ll drive for miles and miles, away from the city and the smoke and then just stop, somewhere, anywhere. It’ll be deserted. And then we’ll walk. Walk and walk and walk until our feet hurt and our muscles ache and we feel alive. We can cross valleys, ford rivers, climb to the highest peak where the wind blisters faces and lungs fill with the freshest of air. We’ll bask in the glory of ancient oaks, the mothers of that paper fortress we’ve been building and as we feel the rough bark beneath our finger tips we’ll appreciate that the original is always better than the cover version. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">Look at the sky today. Just look at it. Aquamarine and not a cloud, nothing but a pure bottomless blue. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I want to float with the dandelion puffs on the breeze, drift like an autumn leaf on a mountain stream. I want to lie flat on my back in the long grass and feel like I’m the only person in the whole world. I want to scramble up muddy banks and then roll down them again on my side, just like we did when we were kids. I want to eat lunch sat on a rock, not sat at desk and afterwards I want to feed the ducks and marvel at nature’s clumsy and chaotic grace. There’s the lark, ascending, soaring through the blue and I want to soar with him, up and away from this stale, concrete life. I want to simply sit and watch the birds. It’s time to break out and immerse ourselves in all of this. The Great Outdoors. It’s not right that a picture on a screen should be the closest we ever get…</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">So what do you say? Are you in? Here’s the phone, call work and say you’re sick. Sick of drowning. And then, when that’s done, we’ll go see the world. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">Let’s cut those shackles and feel the sun on our skin. Let’s be free.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>georgie_forgiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03091664460817550955noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6537486237619878552.post-79791543481587584532011-02-15T12:06:00.000-08:002011-02-15T12:11:37.614-08:00Creative Writing: "Films"<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;">Needless to say, this was written for Folktales, broadcast 3-4.30pm on LSRfm.com every Sunday. It was written to "Films" by Pengilly's.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;">-----------------------------</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;">It’s dark in here, all black walls and dim lighting but for the silver story sheet that hangs, semi-concealed, behind swathes of red velvet. The floor is sticky from generations of spilt drinks and dropped popcorn, the carpet worn through by the tramping feet of a million clumsy fantasists. Tiny pinpricks guide our way into the rafters towards the formerly plush cushioned seats; they’re now threadbare through years of hard labour, though the rows remain as neat. Soft, unrecognisable music drifts from a hidden speaker, murmuring words we can almost catch from songs we almost remember. We are quiet; something in the air demands hushed tones.</span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;"><o:p></o:p><span class="Apple-style-span">Amongst this we huddle, we dreamers and escape artists. Waiting, waiting. Those romantics and realists, sceptics and visionaries united in one, dramatic, over-reaching desire: </span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;">“Hope it’s a good film.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;">It feels good to be here, in this room, amongst stifled giggles and the covert holding of hands. It’s cosy. Safe. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;">Suddenly, the cessation of noise. Music stops, lights doused, the curtains drawn back. Hushed voices die in throats and silence descends, punctuated only by the odd cough or low whisper. We rustle our expensive sweet papers and think that that’s what anticipation must sound like. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;">Waiting, still waiting. Any second now...<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;">A burst of sound, a stream of light. Gems flood the silver, creating pictures from jewels: rubies, emeralds, sapphires - all spiralling into each other with blinding clarity. Is there anything more beautiful than this? <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;">"Please remember to turn off your mobile phone."<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;">Oh. Well, that killed the mood a little bit. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;">Advertisements drip on and unrelentingly on. Cars, sofas, energy drinks - all troop depressingly by in a haze of high definition colour. We dreamers all agree that this was not what we had in mind. We were promised another world, and not one sold to us at half-price. Where is the adventure, the soul scorching emotion, that bit that makes everyone cry? Our rubies and emeralds are being transformed into something plastic and worthless. What a tragic waste of magic. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;">We’ll just have to wait a bit longer, that’s all. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;">Look! The director’s signature, in all it’s six-foot scrawled glory, signalling the end of this hellish corporate interlude. Signalling the beginning of something wonderful. Something bright and perfect and alive. It’s the one we’ve all been waiting for. Let’s give those gem-stones back their value. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;">Cue music. Marker. Places, people!<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;">Are we rolling? Good. Ok, then. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;">Lights. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;">Camera. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="color: #660000; font-family: inherit;">Action.</span><span style="color: black;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>georgie_forgiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03091664460817550955noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6537486237619878552.post-16149550474269635702011-01-08T04:44:00.000-08:002011-01-08T05:02:09.560-08:00YA: Well, That Went Too Quickly...I'm not entirely sure writing a blog when I've just arrived back in Germany, not yet unpacked and have nothing but dry cereal and tinned tomatoes in my cupboard is a good idea, because the likelihood is that it will be chock-full of misery and woe. No, do keep reading! I'll try my best to keep it light and not short-out my keyboard halfway through by crying all over it.*<br />
<br />
I think part of the reason I really didn't want to come back this time is that the holidays simply weren't long enough. Or, at least, what with all the dashing around and being festive, they didn't feel long enough. I mean, I basically got home on Christmas Eve and after that it was a non-stop whirl of get-togethers with family and friends, which, lovely as they were, caused the time to slip away faster than you could say "wait, wasn't it only just Boxing Day?" I didn't even get the chance to see everybody I wanted to before I found myself sat at a fog-bound East Midlands airport sneakily hoping my flight would be cancelled.<br />
<br />
The second reason is that, this time round, the bout of time spent solidly in Germany is a long one. Three whole months. Fourteen weeks to be precise (I worked it out). I love Britain and all it represents, and I'm not sure how well I will cope being separated from Marmite and real tea for such a concentrated period of time, never mind everybody I know and love. Don't get me wrong, I have lots of lovely friends out here who I am extremely excited to be seeing again, but as they're all British, I can't shake off the feeling that we could be doing pretty much exactly the same things we do here back home across the channel (though, admittedly, the train fare would cost a hell of a lot more money).<br />
<br />
Jesus, I said I'd try and be jolly and my first two paragraphs are as miserable as a wet weekend in August. I'll try harder. Perhaps I should talk about the nice things I got up to in the holidays? Yes, let's try that.<br />
<br />
Christmas was, of course, an absolute food-fest. It is after all the cardinal rule to eat until you explode, and who am I to break such a rule? Not only was there Christmas dinner at home but also the Boxing Day buffet, two additional family lunches (one at my Auntie and Uncle's on New Year's Day and one the day after courtesy of Zizzi in Market Harborough where I played children's entertainer to my three small cousins for the afternoon) and a dinner party thrown at Charlie's where we cooked for ten people. I say "we", I mostly did faffy decorative bits like make chocolate bird wings and avoided anything of real substance at all. I somehow also managed to participate in no less than four pizza-based meals and cooked an enormous vegetable curry on New Year's Eve for Katie, Rosie and Andrew. I think they're still alive.<br />
<br />
Oh dear, I think all that's had the opposite of the desired effect. I miss you all a bit more now. Don't worry though , in a couple of days I'll give myself a slap and tell myself to pull myself together. I'll make plans, buy food, see people, have a laugh. There may even be beer. The semi-enjoyment stage of the Germany cycle will begin and all will be well. Still, until then, I think I need to find somebody to give me a hug.<br />
<br />
------------------------------<br />
<br />
*My friend has pointed out to me that my year abroad blogs run in a kind of cycle. Initial misery fades into semi-enjoyment fades into enjoyment fades into excitement about going home. Unfortunately, as the home period just ended, we are currently situated in the first stage of the cycle, that of bitching and moaning. Bad times for all concerned, I feel.georgie_forgiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03091664460817550955noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6537486237619878552.post-81146654763673696142010-12-23T04:28:00.000-08:002010-12-23T04:28:17.311-08:00YA: Sadly, Dat Really Is Duisburg.As a follow up to yesterday's post, the reason I'm sad that the markets will soon be leaving is that Duisburg will once again be like this:<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3tMwRiqKGpM">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3tMwRiqKGpM</a><br />
<br />
This music video was made by a local band and basically explains about how crap Duisburg really is (thanks to the other Duisburg girls for introducing me to it). Keep your eyes peeled for the colourful vulture (which, during the summer months, revolves and shoots water out of its wings) and the aforementioned boat bar, which, to be fair, is pretty damn cool.<br />
<br />
For a translation of lyrics for you English bods, another Duisburg blogger has helpfully provided them. Here's the link.:<br />
<br />
<a href="http://duisburgbunny.blogspot.com/2008/03/dat-is-duisburg.html">http://duisburgbunny.blogspot.com/2008/03/dat-is-duisburg.html</a><br />
<br />
I assure you, every word is true.georgie_forgiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03091664460817550955noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6537486237619878552.post-20788209872129325262010-12-22T10:55:00.000-08:002010-12-22T10:55:05.403-08:00YA: Weihnachtswunderland<div class="MsoNormal">Well, hasn’t it been a disgustingly long time since I posted anything? The reason for this is simple: I’ve been having far too much fun. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">From my repeated whinging you might be wondering how I’ve achieved this. Again, the answer is a straightforward one: GERMANY AT CHRISTMAS ROCKS! You may think we go to town at home, but you’d be wrong. We have nothing, NOTHING, on the Germans. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">Germany, much the same as the Brits, starts getting into the spirit of Christmas round about mid-late November. But rather than installing garish Santa Clauses in shopping centres and putting Slade on repeat in every shop, bar and club, Germany begins to whack out their infamous Christmas markets. I’m lucky enough that my walk to and from the station every day takes me right through the centre of Duisburg so I could bear witness to the gradual construction of the Weihnachtsmarkt, from erecting the stalls to the building of the ice rink to wrapping every lamppost with a real Christmas tree. I have to say, for all my complaining about Duisburg and its (at best) mediocrity, the result was stunning. Trees strewn with lights, German delicacies galore and a full size sailing boat in the centre, the sides of which open out to turn it into one of the many bars serving hot and scrumptious mulled wine. And that’s just Duisburg, a city considered overly-industrial (ugly) even by Ruhrgebiet standards. Can you imagine Düsseldorf, Cologne, Münster, Dortmund, Bonn and all of the other wonderful cities NRW has to offer? The result is breath-taking; even the most committed Scrooge couldn’t fail to enjoy the festive atmosphere.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">I’ve visited a fair few markets in the last few weeks and I won’t bore you with my rapturous details of them all. My favourites were definitely Cologne Heumarkt, a gnome-themed (??) market much less crowded and much more traditional than the one offered near the Cathedral, and also the various markets of Münster, which set amongst scenery of stone buildings and cobbled streets can almost fool you into thinking you’d stepped right into the pages of Dickens. I've eaten Bratwurst upon Bratwurst, crepe upon crepe and drank a vast quantity of Glühwein* (and one Feuerzangenbowle - Glühwein served with a sugar cube and doused in a shot of unspecified alcohol, which they then set on fire). I've sampled traditional German Stollen cake, listened to carollers and brass bands and purchased a lot of hand-carved wooden decorations. And all of this under the bright German stars. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">Even though I've been enjoying the Christmas season almost throughout, there are definitely some highlights which I think deserve a mentioning. First and foremost is the weekend my mum came to stay. It started of badly to say the least, with her plane having to return to East Midlands due to cabin pressure failure. However, she arrived in one piece only two hours late, and one sleepy train journey later we were tucked up in my little flat drinking tea and having a good old catch up. To say I had missed her would be a vast understatement. The next three days were just brilliant. I took her around Dusiburg and Düsseldorf, and we visited Münster and Cologne. We ate lots of lovely meals, purchased lots of lovely things and she developed a distinct liking for Glühwein. It was a wrench to say goodbye again at the airport, even though I knew I would be seeing her again for the Christmas holidays in less than a fortnight. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">Another highlight was Christmas dinner at Carol's. For someone who hadn't eaten a roast dinner since sometime in September, it was an absolute dream and I fell on those carrots with all the decorum of Keira Knightly when she's told to eat the chicken in Pirates Of The Caribbean (ie. none). We had crackers and cake for Ally's birthday, and then we proceeded to drink our way through a copious amount of alcohol whilst simultaneous creating a small club in Carol's room with fairy lights and a laptop. It was a great night and I had a most jolly walk home (sloshed, head phones in) at 4am through a deserted and snow-sodden Duisburg city centre.<br />
<br />
Oh, dear, this is turning out to be lengthy post again, isn't it? In this case, I'll name one more highlight: Cologne last night. This isn't to say there aren't many more I could pick (seeing a Christmas Carol, present shopping in Münster with Lyndsay - an event which gave rise to the knowledge of the Christmas Cucumber - and a truly bizarre night out in Oberhausen to name but a few) but I feel I should give this one a bit more credit because it was my last proper time at the markets that have made me so happy these past few weeks. It was fairly standard really; I met Sophie and we went to Heumarkt to enjoy bratwurst and Swiss cheese and Glühwein (there's always Glühwein). However, it was especially lovely because, as I wandered around, I realised how comfortable I felt; it was nice to discover that it is possible for me to feel at home here and not just like a confused tourist. The markets will be gone in a few days, but I hope that the homely feeling I felt last night remains. I will miss Christmas Germany very much and I feel so glad that I have been able to live here and enjoy it.<br />
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Look at me, getting all sentimental. I should be worrying about packing and flights and snow and other such nonsense. I'm heading home tomorrow and I can't wait! Don't expect any blogs in the near future, I'll be too busy having a bloody brilliant British time with my friends and family, something which I can barely contain my excitement for. So, until next time, I hope you enjoy the festive season - remember to laugh, get pissed and eat until you explode. Merry Christmas!<br />
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</div><div class="MsoNormal">* A fact proven by how many mugs I've stolen. Each market has it's own Glühwein mug (and sometimes more than one) and because you pay a 2Euro deposit on each one you don't necessarily have to give it back. I have a grand total of eleven. Heaven only knows how I will get them home. </div>georgie_forgiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03091664460817550955noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6537486237619878552.post-38789635711330358272010-12-05T08:13:00.000-08:002010-12-05T08:16:09.615-08:00Creative Writing: "Carry You Home"<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;">This was written for the Folktales Christmas Special (3-4pm every Sunday on LSRfm.com). It's written to "Carry You Home" by the Lancashire Hotpots, which is the best Christmas song of all time, no contest. It's the first piece I've written in ages with dialogue, and I'm crap with dialogue, so go easy on me. Merry Christmas, everyone. </span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;">----------------</span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;">“I’m back!” I shouted as I came through the front door, stamping snow off my boots. No answer. It was the night before Christmas and all through the house, no creature was stirring, not even Jessie. I pushed the door shut and shouted again.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> “Jessie! Where are you?” I paused, waiting for her to shout back. When there was nothing, I tried again. “I have pizza!"</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> “I’m in the living room!” came the muffled reply. Pizza always gets a response.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> I kicked off my shoes and padded down the hall. Sure enough, there she was, huddled next to the radiator by the window and wearing one of the hideous jumpers her grandma knits to keep warm. She’d been looking at the old photographs again; there were piles of them surrounding her feet and she clutched an empty wine glass between icy fingers. I didn’t need to look at her rid-rimed eyes to know that she’d been crying.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;">I disentangled the wine glass from her grip and replaced it with a pizza box. “You look like you need something stronger than Chardonnay,” I told her.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> “Mmmm.” She looked at me blearily. “What’re you offering?”</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> I opened my jacket to show her what I had picked up from the off-licence on my way back to the house. “Why if it isn’t our good friends Mr Rum and the good Lord Whiskey, come to warm our cockles this cold winter’s night!” I sounded like a reject from a Dickens novel, but it made her smile all the same. “Which one do you want?”</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> Jessie raised a weary arm. “Eenie, meenie, minie, mo, catch a – no, you know what, just give me the whiskey.”</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> I handed her the bottle and watched as she took a good long swig. “That’s the spirit,” I said cheerfully as she grimaced, the alcoholic burn obviously hitting her throat.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> “Spirit?” Jessie grimaced again, but with humour this time. “That’s a terrible pun, even for you, Mickey.”</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> “Ah well, it’s Christmas Eve, you can let me off my lack of wit and charm just for one night.” I plonked myself on the floor opposite her and helped myself to some pizza. For a while we both chewed out slices in silence, listening to the distant rumble of traffic from the street outside. I stared at the photos that littered the floor, all those smiling faces looking up at me, frozen in time. God, we were beautiful.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> There’d been a whole bunch of us in the beginning. It was going to be fantastic, the best idea we ever had, heading south to live the dream. But they’d all slowly fallen away, some more tragically than others, and now it was just me and Jessie, alone in the Big Smoke and far from home. James, four months back, had been a terrible shock. When I close my eyes I can still see his face, pale on the crisp white hospital pillow, looking strange behind an alien mass of tubes and scars. We watched him slip away without saying another word. I often wonder if he felt it or if he heard the bang when the lorry hit. We’ll never know.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> A picture caught my eye; a picture of myself, head down and looking terrible, being supported by two laughing girls. Beth and Katy: both brilliant, both gone. Beth had simply been in the wrong place at the wrong time that fateful July when the terrorists had hit the Underground, and Katy… well, who knows where Katy was now. She was never the same after Beth died and one day we came home to find her stuff gone and a note on the kitchen table that simply read “love you guys.” She’d never got back in touch. I hoped that wherever she was this Christmas, she was happy.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> I waved the photograph at Jessie. “Remember this?” I asked. “God, what a night!”</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;">Jessie took the photo and laughed, igniting for a moment that spark of joy that had always been alight in those blue eyes before it was doused by too much sadness and loss. “Do I! Man, you were so wasted! We had to drag you out that club, you kept trying to dance with the bouncer!”</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;">I took a gulp of whiskey and shook my head. “I think you made that up. I don’t remember that happening.”</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;">Jessie rolled her eyes. “Of course you don’t remember it, drunkard. You’d had at least twelve JD and cokes.”</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> “Alright, alright,” I conceded. “But people have done worse things under the influence. I remember when a certain someone got too happy with the Lambrini and ended up half naked in the fountain in the middle of the village…” Jessie tried to protest but her mouth was too full of pepperoni, extra cheese. “You know,” I continued with mock seriousness, “you could have been arrested…”</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;">Jessie swallowed her mouthful. “Whatever, Mickey…” We lapsed into silence again, occasionally passing the whiskey bottle back and forth. After a while, Jessie gave a dry little sob. I took her hand.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> “I know, Jess, I know…” I couldn’t think of anything to say, any new words of comfort. I’d said them all before. “I miss them too…” I held her close as she cried, her tears flowing down her face onto my shoulder; I’d lost count of the amount of times we’d sat in the same place recently, doing the same thing. I felt so damn helpless…</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> Wait, I could do better than this. I could take her mind of this empty house that was too full of memories. I leapt to my feet.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> Jessie looked up at me. “Mickey, what is it? Did you hear a burglar?” Her tone suggested that she thought that would just be typical.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> “I’ve had an amazing idea,” I said excitedly. Why hadn’t I thought of this before? It made so much sense! “Come one, grab your stuff, let’s go.” I began pulling her to her feet.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> “What are we doing?” Jess asked bewilderedly, allowing me to drag her from the room and upstairs. “What’s your amazing idea?” I didn’t answer until I managed to pull her all the way onto the landing and had started to root through the piles of stuff, looking for my rucksack.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> “Why is it,” I said, abandoning my search and running into the bathroom instead to seize both our toothbrushes, “that at Christmas, at this supposedly festive and joyous time of year, we’ve confined ourselves to this miserable house with its miserable memories and committed ourselves to having a miserable time?”</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> “Because we’ve got no where else to go?”</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> Time for the big reveal. “But we do, don’t we!” I said triumphantly. “We can go home!”</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> I saw the realisation dawn behind Jessie’s eyes. “But home’s miles away! Hours and hours! It’ll be Boxing Day before we get there!”</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> “Not if we drive all night. We’ll get coffee and take it in turns driving.” I thought about the battered old Ford that stood on the driveway. “The car’ll probably make it. And if it breaks down, well… I’ll carry you home this Christmas! Because there’s no way we’re spending it here, not like this.”</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> Jessie was laughing now, for the first real time since James’ accident. “You’re mental. You realise how angry my mum will be when I turn up on the doorstep and she realises she hasn’t cooked enough potatoes?”</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;">I thought of my own mother’s hysteria when it came to orchestrating Christmas dinner. My sudden arrival would put a real spanner in the works. She’d be furious. I couldn’t wait.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> “She’ll get over it,” I said. “Jess, it’s been a crappy year, but by God it’s not going to be a crappy Christmas too. Christmas isn’t a time for being sad and alone. It’s a time for laughter and getting drunk and eating till you explode. And I don’t know about you, but I don’t think either of us are going to get all that from a bag of crisps for lunch and watching re-runs of Only Fools and Horses on TV.”</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> I could see in her eyes that I’d convinced her. She didn’t want to be sad this Christmas any more than I did. I’d won. We were going home. Jessie grabbed my hand and squeezed it tight.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> “Alright, crazy Mickey. You’re on. I’ll meet you by the car in five minutes.”</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"> “Five minutes,” I repeated. And, grinning like a loon, I ran into my room to pack for what was hopefully going to be an unexpectedly very merry Christmas.</span></span>georgie_forgiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03091664460817550955noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6537486237619878552.post-18670944062553575612010-11-29T02:39:00.000-08:002010-11-30T00:17:56.859-08:00Film: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1I'm sure I'm not the only ardent Potter fan who found the screen adaptation of the sixth instalment a horrendous disappointment. After a roaring and action packed fifth film, the sixth seemed sloppy, with a story-board that was apparently hastily hacked together, an infuriating and nonsensical fight half-way through and an ending in the form of one fat anti-climax which screamed "we ran out of money!" In short, they ruined what is, in my opinion anyway, the best book of the series.<br />
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In light of this, it was with trepidation that I set out to watch Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. You may wonder why I bothered, what with holding the preceding film in such contempt, but the truth is I sobbed like a baby when I closed the seventh book some twenty-four hours after its release in 2007, and I'm not ready to let my favourite franchise go just yet. In any case, I am happy to report that the penultimate Potter is well and truly a return to fifth-film form, and my doubts evaporated almost as soon as Bill Nighy in his role as Minister for Magic uttered his opening lines.<br />
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This is the only story in the Harry Potter series that is not set within the confines of Hogwarts. Instead Harry, along with his unshakeable best friends Ron and Hermione are on a quest, a quest to capture the Horcruxes, scattered pieces of evil Lord Voldemort´s soul, in order to destroy them and ultimately bring about an end to him and his reign of terror. That is, if the Death Eaters, Dementors, rogue bands of "Snatchers" and the enormous snake don't manage to kill them first. Armed with nothing except their wits, wands and some cryptic gifts left to them by the deceased Albus Dumbledore, Harry and his two friends set about discovering not only the whereabouts of the Horcruxes, but also a new mystery in the form of the tale of the Deathly Hallows, undertaking the most important and terrifying adventure of their lives. <br />
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And it is terrifying. This film is much darker and more brutal than any of those that have predeeded it, scenes of torture and death pushing the young actors to new emotional depths. There are scenes when even the most unshockable adult will jump backwards in their seat. However, that isn't to say that there is none of the usual trade-mark Potter joviality in places; Ron still has his humorous moments, whilst the return of Dobby the house elf should raise a smile or two. The Deathly Hollows is also particularly moving in parts, most noteably when Harry and Hermione, alone in the wilderness, share a dance to Nick Cave´s "O' Children", finding a brief moment of happiness amongst a world of fear and hurt.<br />
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Whilst the focus of the film is undobtedly on the main three characters and their battle against their nemesis, there is, as ever, a great network of supporting actors, with the likes of Robbie Coltrane as Hagrid, Helena Bonham-Carter as evil and twisted Bellatrix Lestrange and Rhys Ifans as the eccentric Xenophilius Lovegood adding a vibrancy to an already excellent film. <br />
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For once, the people responsible for whittling down over 600 pages of novel into two two-and-a-half-hour cinematic chunks have turned in a stunning performance. They've succeeded in cutting down dramatically the vast expanse of plot given over in the book to Harry, Ron and Hermione sitting around the countryside whinging, and concentrate instead on the action scenes, allowing the film to roll along at such a pace that you'll be wondering how the end managed to come around so soon. There are perhaps a few too many scenes involving Daniel Radcliffe sitting moodily about in forests, but not so many as to make the audience switch off. In any case, there's always another battle just around the corner and the action never stays dormant for long. <br />
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Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows is undoubtedly the best film in the series so far and for the first time, I can say that avid fans such as myself will be able to feel that the book has been done justice. It just seems a shame to have to wait until next year before finding out if Part 2 is just as good as its predecessor.georgie_forgiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03091664460817550955noreply@blogger.com5