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Yesterday I travelled to
“I am on a bus... again. Heading to two excursions. One for English to see a play, and one for English Language to a university. It’s misty morning, quite early; everybody still has their lights on, that shine off the damp road from the cold morning. I was late, and sent a text to the teacher on the other excursion who would be awake at this time, unlike the school office which I tried first. Then the teacher on the English excursion whom I needed to tell not to leave, called me, I warned him, and it was all good. It turns out it was pure coincidence that the first teacher only got the text at
I mean it was really gallant of them to offer their services as three fully grown men to move a tree. Something to stir the tedium of their lives I guess. They’re reminiscing already, two minutes later. Heh heh. The bus driver insisted we stop for a toilet break straight after, since we stopped in the mouth of the entrance to a rest stop. So we stopped, and the bus driver had a smoke. The excitement was obviously too much for him. And two girls absconded to the toilets to have a smoke also. Just a moment later they came back reeking of it, and everyone asking ‘They were in there for 2 seconds, how did they do it?’ Who cares? If they smoked the cigarette at all. Poseurs.”
The rest of the trip passed without much event. We saw the play, and those who noticed were terribly disappointed that the actress performed only 4 out of 6 parts of the script. But the result was nonetheless excellent, despite the dramatically different spin the ending had. Then my acquaintance from English Language and I caught the tram to the university, where we joined our study groups and commenced our little focus session on the differences between American, British and Australian English. I was really pleased with my group; really friendly, open, not judgemental, one nice looking boy. Everyone had something to contribute, the teacher was approachable, and I got into a great discussion with two of the girls about the difference between bathrobes and dressing gowns.
But the best part of the activities was lunch. I went purposefully downstairs to the second floor to find our teacher, whilst all the other students congregated around her to re-group and form their insecurity-bound clique. This is the reason half of them didn’t even come on this trip “What do you mean we’ll be broken up into groups alone with other schools?” So while they all went off to sit miserably on the grass near the parking lot, I felt it natural to follow the teacher. I waited for her as she ordered her butter chicken from the shop in the cafeteria complex, and we sat down and had lunch together. We were soon joined by the other local English Language teacher whom I had met twice before, and a woman whom my teacher knew and whose name I can’t remember. We all got on famously; and soon there were hilarious tales of excursions and trips being exchanged, in depth discussions of English Language theory, and criticisms of teaching and students from both perspectives; much laughter and food and companionship was had. Whilst the other students sat despondently under the trees. I was having an excellent time, I felt like I really fitted in with them, it was just so natural. I thought I did really well that day for mature engaging conversation with new people. I tried to talk to my English teacher as we waited for the play, too, utter failure on his part. I’m 17, I’m only just getting the hang of this making good conversation with people you don’t know well thing, he’s near 50 and he was completely socially inert when I tried to make conversation. I don’t seem to be doing all that badly. Then afterwards during the lecture the lady and I sat next to one another and exchanged sly comments about the students’ poor presenting just like a couple of bitter teachers, it was great. And for the whole trip home I had both local teachers practically to myself. I also amused myself (and the rest of the bus) by swatting flies with the sports section, and left my mark on the hired bus by smacking one flat into the felt on the roof where it dips for the driver’s compartment. Heh heh.
But I wish I hadn’t turned off my phone for the play without checking whether I had saved the rest of my drafted blog. I had captured this momentous rush of feelings as we entered the city. There shall be a song. It was magic and I will recount it as best as I can.
I was sitting up the front of the bus, behind the driver and my English teacher, whom I thought would be good conversation, boy was I wrong. And we were driving along this unremarkable stretch of highway entering the city from the south, when I suddenly realised that we were now listening to
That was it. The city broke upon me in waves, and filled me with its power, its immensity, its opportunity and love. It’s big, it’s bright, it’s loud, it’s busy, it’s perfect. There was nothing before, no thought for it, there was only that moment and the feeling, how I felt right up until we lost sight of the sky scrapers. This place has a magic that my mother will never understand, it has an existence, an aura. There are proper, working 1920s smoke stacks; standing what must be over 30 stories high in the distance near the harbour, and a solitary perfect sleek brick smoke stack was determinedly billowing steam into the clouds with the shape of a gas burner’s flame dissolving into story book swirls. There was a singular six storey antique brick teahouse with a garden and a huge poplar, overlooked by the freeway in the middle of a triangle of 40 storey glass and aluminium apartment buildings; there are streets upon streets of fully restored classic doubled-windowed business downstairs, living up stairs Victorian shops; glowing neon plastic panelled McDonalds down below, beautiful pastel heritage shop with lace curtains above. Even some that have been left exactly as they were, the beautiful frescos and original peeling paint. The energy, the warmth, the opportunity… We walked over the same place where I saw Amanda at the Spiegeltent, and where the tent always sets up, and it smelt exactly as that part of the city does at that time; the smell of stone, cars, people and poplars. I remembered the nights, the perfect balminess still radiating off the pavement, the people, the people still up and living.
I just wanted to throw my arms out and exclaim “Ah this is my city. I will live here and I shall not need leave. I will be proud to call this home. And every day the city will feed me as I feed it.” This is a city where I could sit on a balcony and drink coffee with some artist I just met, I could be anywhere, any famous city in the world, but I am simultaneously so definitely here. Each visit I have to this city just re-affirms this feeling. This inexplicable fondness for a city, for this city. I could never understand how all these cities had songs written about them, New York, London, Paris, Boston, and I couldn’t imagine how anyone would want to write anything about the city I go to school in. But that’s not like
I leave you with these cursory pictures I took, not of the things I described, as that would ruin the magic, but something to give you the feeling of it. The 
☆Anika☆
between 'Select' and 'Name' to play the file, or 
at the end to download, then wait for your link to appear.
not exactly commenting per se, but I think the internet god is still taking a delighted pleasure in driving you crazy : I can't listen to the songs (though i can see and action the player, but they don't load) and the podcasts don't work (either if i try to play them streaming or download them... if i do they just end up being 12Ko empty files)
ReplyDeletesorry darling !
it's working, woohoo !!!
ReplyDeleteI'll listen to them while sorting my incredible mess in my room... and fortunately will bring you back some comments in not too long (i know you're waiting).
^^ see you
First thing about podcasting : I had listened to it all while cleaning out my room (one of the very convenient aspect of podcasting, allowing me to be a blog addict geek AND to get on with my life at the same time ! magic..), and it had felt not much more than reading you, at its best, and at a faster pace than how i read it.
ReplyDeleteAnd then, after the last pile sorted, I lay on my bed and listened to the 2nd repetition of it resonating in my room, and it struck me. I was in my room in France, in summer, listening to the inner meandering of a girl in Australia, as clear and loud as if she had been in my room, though in some aspects we could be considered total strangers. I suddenly realized how incredible this was, something we don't really realize when reading arial or tahoma fonts that have no face or no nationalities : someone from the other end of the world is talking her heart out and i can hear her, and even more surprising, yes, she's talking to me, between other listeners. Isn't that a wonderful, wonderful thing of new technology ? It's something that never happened in the history of humanity...
I'm generally quite impatient too to know how you are going to respond to my comments ! ohh the glowing glory of comments..
so now everything works. I love the audiotape player, it's the cutest thing ! And now there is the wallpaper... which is litterally a wallpaper ! it's really fitting with the tone of your blog (and with the semi english semi drunk Claire Hoover (which for an non english speaker lacking some basic english culture as I am, sounded more like clay hooper, which I wondered what it meant..)
And effectively the sound quality is better for the songs, and pays much more justice to your voice, which can be identified more easily from the background and has less "grain". You have a nice quality of voice, and can gather a good voice power at some points (and thinking of how you said you sang more easily with someone else singing : it'd be great if you recorded songs with a singer-included version of the song in a headset for you, but adding afterwards a no-singer version of the songs on your recording program.)
Only thing though.. what is the introduction ? It's.. quite weird a melody. A bit quirky, so it kind of fits. But weird sound and rhythm...
My first comment.. Billion years ago ! haha I almost jumped being adressed by a voice on the computer. Funny how i happened to be right on spot without much knowing you. Well, like being right on with the not finishing and cerebral girl. Not that i think of it as a talent of mine of seeing through people. I can be quite far from truth many many times. But I see many things in you I can see in me, so maybe I'm faster at making sense of the ... "symptoms", we will say... But anyway, I'm glad you see some of you friends now with the glow that before went with Amanda. I hope you'll find back your friend soon.
Podcasts ..I love your exploration of what podcasting is as a medium. I wouldn't have thought of it all (and i love the way you "and even in the dark !", which somehow could sound a bit kinky haha). I think it'd be great if you got to explore this combining all your interests in one : with words, with the vocal interpretation of words, with music (it could be a whole broadway meets radio show !), with, like a radio, including tidbits of music / sounds / extracts you like (i really liked how you talked over the Coldplay song on the last podcast, it really created an ambient, I could see it and feel it). Including a bit of the musician in promo and the aspiring writer in you to the raving ufo fan you seem to be in the end ^^...
Blogging : you really summed it up. It helps developping someone's inner capacities and world, and creating YOUR place, instead of just answering to what the world expects of you.. It can be so much of .. anything one's want. Total Freedom ! how exciting.. If i wasn't that lazy and defeatist I would try such a thing but I just can't.. how disappointing.
sad surrendering acceptance... I'm on the "there is a solution" and "this is a unique perspective" side. I'm pretty opposed to that kind of acceptance, or at least to the idea of considering it normal that one should only have one true calling and all the rest was a delusion from teenage years... We're always being told that we have to be unidimensional, or that you can only do things, when you're adult, if you succeed greatly at it. But nothing forces you to choose between passions, to fit exactly in one of the many molds of society and either be a singer or a writer or a teacher or god knows who .. Of course, if you want to earn a lot of money or be recognized or be famous, then you have to fit, because you will be asked for the right path, for the right references, the right resume to get to the top, if you except obvious genius or genuine and strong fanbase support (ie Amanda and the "teacher who told her she can't sing"). But nothing stops you from having part of your mind still dwelling in music, and try and do some shows from time to time, maybe aside another job. Being more of a rational person, in itself, shouldn't be a consideration to make you stop. I also said that some person made great music by acting more with their brains than heart, by experimenting, and playing with words could be a great, innovative path to music. Take Camille for instance ! her music is more about playing with words and using them to build a music than the contrary ! But it's a less travelled road and not knowing any other person travelling through it you might think you'll never get to a satisfying end.. But it being difficult doesn't mean it being impossible. If you're dissatisfied with something you created, ask yourself the question why, on a listener point of view, and think of songs that would have succeeded where you failed, and try to understand why .. and get inspired by them ! If you have texts screaming for music, it's not nothing, it is significant and you have to keep on, for them, because there is a part of you that is dying to know how it would be to make a real song out of your words and imagination and that is the unique, the only thing you need to feel granted the right to keep on working on your music. That's your creation, your thing, you don't have to push it in a closet and, how they say, "grow up".
BUT I understand what you say about having your throat and fingers working in the wrong direction.. You might never get to be an acclaimed musician/singer because of that, and that's immensely frustrating. You might have greater difficulties getting the sound you WANT and can hear in your mind because of that and that's EVEN MORE frustrating... But none hear what you hear in your mind. It's unique and even if it won't be performed or arranged to it's best, it won't exist at all if you don't make them and sing them.. ^^
And if you feel you have a talent for lyrics but not music (which i think you have, what you describe about all the lyrics you write is telling of something i don't have and know many people not to have), you could try and get along with someone who can write music but not lyrics (and they are plenty). It's actually even a real job in itself, lyricist, and it's very specific. You could very well succeed happily in that ! Or just writing/performing your songs along with a musician/composer with no talent for words !
Two and a half octave is good ! I don't know how much i can do myself .. Have not tried in a long time..
no doctors "partly because of family beliefs" hahaha, i can imagine the "sick is in your mind" or "if it doesn't kill you, it makes you stronger" :P I also loved the
" My mother was too busy harassing me to do the dishes, hang out the washing, clean up the table, and just generally stop resting, to have the for me to tell her they said that.". I think it was one of those moments when i actually laughed out all ^^ same for "Of course it was too much to ask that he have his hearing and luscious porcelain skin." In a less intened way i guess, i also laughe dhearing you saying Fuck yes. with the semi english semi drunk clair hoover serious voice. It was pretty much unexpected ^^
And the "goldfish and ozzy osborne" is gold, such as the rest of the extract of this article. It's a very true point this author makes.. I see it now, sometimes I use one of my old school cameras and have to have it developped.. and it's such a different relationship to the image, to the event photographed and how you look at the pictures afterwards.. fescinating O_O
sandwich with spaghetti in it ? what is THAT ?? oh my goodness that sounds .. weird... Ahaha you're almost a teacher yourself yet !
Yup I know Ani Di Franco... What a woman ! she's a kind of an Amanda Palmer, in her own Folky/Punky/hippie wa, quite a personality and show woman not afraid of saying what she wants and being who she wants .. I quite like her ^^
About what it is we get out of your blog. (yes i guess i already answered that before but with the evolution of the blog i might as well explain what i think now). It's both for the person and for the content. It's both wanting to know how you are getting on with your life, and advancing in your projects, and developping your personality, getting lessons out of life events -like following characters from a tv series like six feet under or such( ican think of Daria, especially.. know the animated series ?), but for real, real time, real persons, and interaction (and i wrote that before i heard again your soap opera remark :P)- and both because i like the way you write, think and eventually "gets it". You have a refreshing way of telling it all and scrutinizing it all, any little thought you may have, any event for lessons, and analyze it, put it into perspective,
make fun of it, form it in a slightly distant, elaborate and sarcastic way with your words, that each time refresh my views about the world, life, and my life. I could say I generally feel more sane after reading your blog, because i get into your steady, argumentative mindset. Didn't i tell you so many times commenting you that it made me want to blog myself, to get through this process of "digestion" of things lived ? And well, I love your style of writing, so even though generally painfully long (the podcast will help greatly with reducing that), i'm ready each time to read it.
I love the dullness threshold explanation :D. But at least your self indulgence is well written and full of insights. Maybe you can be rambling on a new pair of shoes, but instead of going "oh my gawdd, LOoK aT mY New shOes LOOOL!!1!1 so greaaat aren't they ! i luv them " with picture included, you more likely explain the whole process of choosing them and what went in your mind and how this all connects with the greater question or "shoe or not to shoe" and such.
Melbourne. As I said i love how you conveyed the arriving to the city on the music. I could totally feel it. Love it.
"insecurity bound clique" haha spot ON!
haha you really seem to be getting along better with teachers than with students.. Maybe linked to the role you seem to have yourself assigned (and satisfied with) with your mother. You prefer having to deal with adults, having your own share of childhood to deal with at home ? or just an intellectual hunger not satisfied at home either? .. hah I'm also trying to cheaply psychoanalyse you i guess !
I could even feel shiver in my back during your description of your arriving to Melbourne. It has such a powerful rhythm and right on words that makes it as eloquent as a great, flamboyant public speech. And I find you back on it. I love Melbourne. I love every bit of it. I have never felt this love for any other city, this vibrance, this indeed feeling that it was home, that here everything could be. I could appropriate your words for myself, and wish for the city to "feed me and i will feed it". Really loved it. That's "IT".
Oh and finally... I loved the last minute reference joke on bugs. Didn't quite worked as i was alone in my room at that time and the closer thing to a man with light hair was my siamese cat -which i wouldn't eliminate under a million threats-. Goodbye psycho imaginary friend !