TRAVEL DIARY

A weblog regularly updated by Jodi Rose.

  

VIEWING ALL POSTS FOR: JANUARY 2006

Tuesday, January 31, 2006

10:40 PM
Posted by jodi rose

spent most of the day missing trains. woken up early by the two vivacious french girls in my room but then fell asleep again and got to the station in time but was waiting in line to buy my ticket when the 10.06 left. decided to go have breakfast in my favourite lush cafe, the jules verne - which features a magnificent collection of old typewriters radio and photos - then missed a tram and even though the train was late managed to get there just as it was pulling out. again.
this time thought I'd better stay local, so walked around the corner up the hill in the sun - really noticing that extra few degrees colder here, although last week was apparently minus ten to minus fifteen so perfect time to be away in strangely sunny glasgow. Stumbled across the technica museum, went in and found a wonderful collection of vintage cars, motorbikes, railway paraphernalia and pictures. Some great Skoda models - one like the kind mum had in the seventies - and a wild car called the Tatra, very sexy jaguar-like. Also incredibly rare bohnlander (?) motorcycles, czech company only made 700 or so of each. Wonderful pictures of glam slovak girls on scooters in the mountains, and very funky black train with the red star on front.

Finally managed to catch the 13:56 train which turned out to stop at every station, so took two and a half hours instead of one and a half.
Actually a nice chilled out pace, time to look at the villages and scenery - very different to scotland, all the grass burnt by the cold, ponds and streams frozen and snow in the fields, no tea or coffee.
But am exceptionally glad to be home with my bridge, walked along the danube this afternoon in the twilight and admired the reflections.
Invited to Langos party this weekend - mmmm deep fried bread! - and going to talk with another high school class on monday, and warp some more innocent young hungarian minds. Well, open them to the possibilities of a life of.... art.

During my weekend as a stateless person I was a gypsy queen. Now I have this virgin passport with only one stamp, it's quite strange. I really miss my old passport - it had so many fabulous border crossing. Ship from helsinki to stockholm and tallin; car between latvia, estonia and lithuania, and again croatia and slovenia; train and foot from hungary/slovakia and train from hungary/slovenia; plus of course assorted plane landings. The new one has some kind of electronic chip in the middle page - wonder if they will just implant that in me some day. Scary futuristic totalitarian clone/id control scenario. Then they could just stamp me. With indelible ink. Ok, it's getting late. Enough.

Monday, January 30, 2006

10:03 PM
Posted by jodi rose

ohmigod I am so happy to be back in bratislava. had a moment in edinburgh outside the art gallery when I was thinking: I wish I never left Slovakia. Not a sentence you hear everyday. This was after I had asked a random lady on the street: 'is there a cafe in the art gallery?' She just looked at me - which art gallery? Oh, the big main one of course - yes, there is. So I wandered in and availed myself of refreshment and the view, but again didn't look at any art. There is a time and place for that kind of thing :) Sorry if I'm repeating myself and already wrote about that - brain a little fried, and hand-eye spatial coordination totally skewed.
Anyway, got myself on the train sunday morning - hours too early, for some reason I had 10.30 in my head when I had actually sensibly booked the 12.30 one. As it was a first class ticket enjoyed the free tea and pastries to edinburgh, and then about 15 quid worth of tea, coffee, water, oj and biscuits on the way to London. It's amazing what a great buffer money can be against the world sometimes. The view from the train was wonderful, all green rolling hills and sparkling coastline. Passed through Newcastle (?) home of the Gateshead Millennium and many other beautiful bridges - it was spectacular, the river seemed quite deep in a ravine from the train anyway, and all the bridges within a few hundred metres of each other. Definitely have to go back and record there. Going back to glasgow too, it's got under my skin. Like a splinter, some bleeding but ultimately satisfying. Had a fun night in london with philippa and co, met at the marleybone tup then went back and watched dancing on ice at hers, while peter sav did surprise chef and whipped up a great pasta with vege sausage, tuna, blue cheese and tomatoes.
This morning rocked up to the Australian High Commission at ten to nine, found a young man and his dad at the door, they had been there since 6am. The kid had his bag stolen from their hire car in cardiff, with everything in it - clothes, ipod, money, wallet etc - he was quite upset, but the dad was joking that it took care of his excess luggage.
Met back at the counter at 1.30 for an agonising half hour wait not knowing if we would both make our planes, but the wonderful staff came through and we had our new identities by 2. So here I am, a clean slate, a new woman - no trace of that other jodi rose.
It would be an interesting art project to track if anyone does try and create a false identity from my stolen documents, and what exactly they do with it.
But now, time to visit the hotel kiev to change my last 20 pounds into crowns (lucky I left my address book and diary with 60 quid in it on philippa's table last week!) and find a pizza.

Saturday, January 28, 2006

11:25 PM
Posted by jodi rose

adjusting to life as a stateless person. very strange not being able to get on a plane, or prove my identity. jam telling me that idenity theft is big here -great. well, it won't do them much good pretending to be me!

had a fab time at the burns night - haggis, neeps and tatties for sixty at the beasties studio. wonderful stories, poetry, singing - gorgeous night. will told me that glasgow was the only place in western europe to have a communist uprising - pictures of tanks rolling into george square.

had a meltdown in edinburgh when the consulate told me I have to go to london for a new passport quickly - so taking the train sunday. have nothing else to do, and after tonights party will sleeeep.
burning king, queen and peasant music for the event tonight - maxwell house is a hive of activity, visual fx, decorations, all the kids dressing up - it promises to be a wild night. thinking I really have to take a long hard look at my priorities in life - then someone pointed out that's the joy of being a fabulously insane artstar - sure everything has gone totally haywire but goddammit I'm gonna stay for the party. well, there was no point leaving earlier. and I had the artists networking day too in stirling - lovely train ride, some interesting talks but was completely beyond networking or discussion.

disco nap and back on form now, finishing my outfit of purple silk skirt with a black and purple wig. must go and photograph the people.

Thursday, January 26, 2006

11:43 PM
Posted by jodi rose

it all started so well... another lovely walk along the river kelvin, with frequent stops to listen to the scottish birds singing and watch the bridges. then found myself in the botanic gardens, sauna-like greenhouse admiring orchids, ferns, palms and cacti.
moved to the south side today, went for a trip to some charity shops with the girls from maxwell house, and had my damn wallet stolen. including passport which is beyond annoying. so now am forced to make that trip to edinburgh first thing in the morning, to implore the high commissioner to grant me an emergency travel document so I can be back in slovakia on monday. ah well, life goes on.

Tuesday, January 24, 2006

12:45 AM
Posted by jodi rose

'home is just a river of goodbyes', sang keren ann to me on the stansted express this morning, where I was overcome by inexplicable sadness. leaving again.

london a blur of markets, seething humanity and gleaming shops.
walked across the millennium bridge to tate modern on sunday, enjoyed the white boxes and peoples responses 'this is modern art?!?!.. it's a pile of boxes' ahh whatever gets the kids thinking. I actually liked the work, rising like an iceberg above the walkway, and even more when guyan tells me this evening it was a response to the death of her mother (being surrounded by boxes, the detritus of a life) followed by a time in the arctic circle and all that whiteness. Something resonant in the piece for me, and I guess being nomadic and constantly dealing with stuff in boxes, I liked their sheer scale.
that was the only art I saw, philippa and I recovered from trips to portobello rd and spitalfields market with a coffee in the members lounge, and then crossed the bridge again and went home.

Maintaining my guard duty on various rivers and bridges, it's metaphysical protection, and my thoughts are with maria valeria.
Today arrived Glasgow and left my bags with the lovely boys at 55 degrees, then wandered across to the south side of the clyde. A vastly different river scape, abandoned piers and towering motorway, stark contrast to the gorgeous green basilica and bridge of my small town.
Friday's guarding took place via Novy Most in bratislava, still on the Danube. Sat next to a group of young men on ryan air flight, going to work in the UK from the town of Orava, it was their first trip in a plane, one spoke no english - wished them luck. Found it a little sad to see the other side, where I have been talking to people in their home environment about these experiences in the UK, seeing them setting out in a brave new world. English TV a strange mix of biting political satire 'in the thick of it' followed by news of lib-dem candidates dirt-digging profiles that seemed like parody.
Invited to a Burns night this week, and hopefully Australia day party.
Excellent meeting with key creative team about bridge project here, need to be flexible and adapt to new possibilities.
Guyan suggested creating a steering committee as a possible strategy to structure the ongoing project management, and also pin me down to a place. I just love the idea of having someone steering.

Thursday, January 19, 2006

1:18 PM
Posted by jodi rose

day before yesterday
walking along the danube.. thinking 'and the unlived life is not worth examining'
immersion almost complete
finished writing the article for gyuri's newspaper, now he will edit and translate into hungarian and slovak.

yesterday started snowing again
so calm and quiet under the bridge
all my thoughts from that moment have drifted away

today started with a visit to the slovak ministry of foreign affairs, met with the under secretary of state, and various ambassadors and consuls in a series of state rooms furnished with ornate glossy teak tables.
the very urbane ambassador came in and chatted to me about a wim wenders film 'lisbon lisbon', made to celebrate the city for its expo a few years ago
he said it's about a man who goes to record sounds
and is a very beautiful film, especially the soundtrack. He was ambassador in Portugal for 4 years, and then the Arab Emirates - passed a few minutes talking with me about poetry - the famous portuguese poet who wrote 'I don't know what will happen tomorrow', put on his best pyjamas and died the next day. They will talk with the ministry of the interior, and inshallah it will be ok.

Decided to drop into the slovak national radio, as it's an extraordinary building - inverted pyramid. It's the upside down city, the castle too is like a table with legs in the air. Called up the director of the experimental radio studio, and he very graciously showed me all around the studios, concert hall, met some people - I will go back for an interview in Feb.
Wonderful photos from electroacoustic music happenings in bratislava since the 60's, including a visit from john cage in 1992 (? soon before he died).
Sadly I missed art's birthday party on tuesday, which featured an experimental music concert linked to stockholm and vienna - sounded like quite a party!

now following up a few loose threads and decompressing from life in sturovo, good to have this buffer in bratislava before london tomorrow.

Monday, January 16, 2006

11:27 AM
Posted by jodi rose

still pervaded by this mood of peace and calm.
woke up early after staying up until 2.30am booking flights for glasgow, bangkok and new zealand - all this travel is doing my head in. no wonder I'm enjoying being here so much at this particular moment. It's an incredible relief to see the same people every day and to be a regular somewhere. Even if they do laugh when I walk in. But that seems to be a universal effect, from Hanoi to Newtown and now Sturovo.

Walked down to the bridge at 8.30am, fleeting glimpse of nostalgia for the summer when I visit here and remember visiting the bridge every day. I love that it's still standing, it's the most satisfying job I've ever had too! Mostly I keep watch on the foundations - really not drawn to cross it that often. Recreating the past, or maybe it's my deep psychological need to be grouned somewhere. Not in between all the time. Followed my whim to go into the bufet cafe which always looks empty but has a secret back room, cosy blue and yellow walls, inevitably packed with men smoking and talking. Acclimatising to the local customs, took a presso kava with sugar and milk - strong macchiato in australian terms - real heartstarter.

Strolled through the pesia zona, came home and baked banana bread which is starting to smell fantastic. Think I'm suffering from an image problem. People seem to think I'm flighty, crazy, intimidating and elitist. When I'll confess, for years now I have been dreaming of a quiet stable life with a family to take care of, stay home with and be nourished by without feeling the need to listen to experimental sound art or see intellectual films. Maybe this isn't the way to go about it! But staying in one place never worked for me either.

Oh well, throwing my plans to the winds this year, the projects I thought were going to happen seems to be vanishing in the mist of 'market forces', leaving a gaping empty patch in my future. Which is a worry, as I'm pretty much unemployable for anything else now - have to get that highly paid art consultancy going.

Sunday, January 15, 2006

11:54 PM
Posted by jodi rose

attempting to be a responsible medical consumer and check out the effects of the drugs I've been given - most of the info in russian and slovak! but managed to find a brief description of them both on www.medical-conditions.org

Mydocalm: A centrally acting muscle relaxant that has been used for the symptomatic treatment of spasticity and muscle spasm. (From Martindale, The Extra Pharmacopoeia, 30th ed, p1211)

anti-inflammatory drug [flugalin] [Article in Russian] Murav'ev IuV.
Publication Types Clinical Conference Clinical Trial Multicenter Study ...
An anti-inflammatory analgesic and antipyretic of the phenylalkynoic acid series. It has been shown to reduce bone resorption in periodontal disease by inhibiting carbonic anhydrase.

aha. it's all hungarian to me. not ingesting them currently.

Every day I walk along the river to check on the bridge, the icicles are still clinging to each bare branch up the hill in esztergom, although most have disappeared on this side. Yesterday the Asterix boat was back in place - the day before a couple of men wandering around the empty barge where it's usually moored - couldn't work out if they were tourists, officials or troublemakers. Ah well, the bridge is still there.

Today the river was especially calm and relaxing, gave me access to an almost meditative state, hanging out for ages watching the reflections. can't remember what I was thinking, if anything, but it felt good.
Something deeply calming about not having anywhere to be on a sunday afternoon - just chilling out by the river. Read 'interview' magazine with a glass of wine and some of the twisty smoked mozzarella syr, then floated in the baths for an hour with all the families until the twlight deepened and I came home to tidy up.
ran into a friend from the other night, was going to meet for a drink later but we missed each other. oh well, if it's meant to be it will be.

A little melancholy and unfocused - hmm previous diagnosis would suggest that means I'm not gettng much work done - having an existential moment wondering what on earth all this is about. And why do I continue to torture myself attempting to write and make art?
Dreaming of giving it all up for a normal life. But I don't know if you can ever go back, and last time I tried it was a disaster. Ah well, monday at least I will start with a clean house and maybe some new ideas. The part I love is collecting all the material, but trying to make sense or order out of it is a nightmare. Need a structure. In all ways.

Sunday, January 15, 2006

1:34 PM
Posted by jodi rose

am having a very lazy morning, lounging in bed while I type, reading the guardian from last weekend, contemplating making scrambled eggs and smoked salmon, and wishing I could just walk up to satellite for them.

The Winter Ball is fabulous - very high society, Gyuri made the introductions, members of parliament from hungary and slovakia, also included yours truly from australia in the speech, I don't know how I'm going to cope with going back to australia and being an ordinary person and scumbag artist again. Albrecht Durer talks about this in a letter during his time in Italy, here I am a gentleman, he says, while at home I'm a parasite and freak (or something like that).

Andrea and Robert organised a lovely group, Mikey from the vadas thermal baths and his wife malinda, a biology teacher who invited us for a lagnos party soon; the headmistress of the elementary school and her husband, and another couple whose names and jobs I don't remember but won twice in the tombola. I scored the silver earrings hidden inside chocolate truffles - eat safely - the girls selling them giggled with me. Andrea gave us instructions and Robert waltzed with me, he said we were the best dancers but I'm not so sure...

The Honorary Consular General for Hungary from Colarado introduced himself, saying we had travelled the furthest to be there, and that he visited sydney in 1970 on r&r from the military. His parents had escaped Hungary with him in 1956 after the revolution, in a midnight flight, they thought about going to australia but it was too far away.

Another woman Judy comes up and she's from Melbourne, her family also escaped after the '56 revolution - in the night, middle of winter through the forest, when she was a baby, and now lives in esztergom now with her husband and daughters. They come to Sturovo for a drink every weekend, so we will catch up and I find out more. Fascinating life-stories all around, and Terry invites me to interview people at the kappa paper factory on the hill, which i look forward to.

My very favourite moment was dancing the csardas (hungarian gypsy dance) in a big circle with all of our group, Gyuri and Sofie, a nice woman from san andras whose name I don't know but was very friendly and fun - round and round one way, gyuri would make us change direction, then all meeting in the middle - fabulous. Although my hips are killing me now - glad of those painkillers the lovely dr gave me. wouldn't normally take such things, but it's all part of the feral weekend I'm having.

Sunday, January 15, 2006

1:13 PM
Posted by jodi rose

it's been a few days, I'll try and retrace my steps chronologically.
thursday night accidentally drank the pain away - just dropped in for a quick g&t but then all these irish people turned up and the lure of sardonic witty conversation was too good to ignore. there are a few foreign business interests emerging - the danish plastic extruding company whose rep is moving here for two years to oversee the operation and irish blacksmith who makes curling sticks also moved production here. they and the visiting hungarian boy home from working in a hotel in ireland gave me a fabulous ego-boost, all vying for attention, while I finally got over my winter crush.

Friday morning was distinctly through-the-looking-glass. Unfortunately started at 7.30am with appointment for the specialist at polyklinik. Luckily a friend of Audrey, she picked me up and whisked me through the slovak medical system in under an hour and a half, including x-rays. Impressive. Could have been lost there for weeks.
Endless blue-tiled corridors and dark wooden doors, dingy rooms full of older people in dark colours and fur hats waiting waiting waiting.. the x-rady lady spoke german to me, don't move! she would shout and then disappear while the light flashed, lying there on the hard cold plastic bench listening to an old typewriter clacking away, felt I had wandered into lars von trier's 'the kingdom' and was extraordinarily grateful to have someone navigating me back out into the feeble sunshine. 7 kinds of hell, the intial pain, hangover, guilt from being queue-jumped relentlessly and having special treatment because of being a foreigner, remorse at my idiotic behaviour hours earlier...

11am hairdresser. that was also bizarre and entertaining, she spoke no english or german, so I pointed to the picture and we both smiled a lot while she did her thing, and I closed my eyes and let the soothing hungarian chatter wash over me. Quite happy with the result, it's a bladerunner - meets milly-molly-mandy blunt fringe with choppy layers. fabulous styling though, straightened and moussed and hairsprayed into immovable perfection.

Equipped with my new local hair-style, Audrey picked me up to speak with two of her english classes at the hungarian secondary school. The first group very shy, only two girls spoke at all, but they were fun and one wants to be a journalist, asked me what my favourite places are in sturovo - thermal baths and green pub - and a bit about australia.
The second class included some of the boys from my previous talk, who I mainly see at the aforementioned green, so we all burst out laughing when I walked in. They gave me a harder time, but again very entertaining, someone asked me if I like my job as bridge guard, and i thought about it - actually, it's the best job I have ever had!

Ran into the gorgeous mary, who is very busy studying for exams and english competitions, so it was lovely to see her, went for coffee and chat. Wish I could be more helpful on all sorts of levels, but she is a smart girl and will do fine.

Terry knocked on the window as I got home to relax, and invited me to the biker bar with the irish contingent, so I wandered across the road for a quick sprite and some blarney with the boys. Then drifted through the green pub, mainly to show off my new hair - which all the bartenders noticed and commented on immediately, they're good lads - caught up with matthew looking stylin' with his fidel castro hat and beard, who told me that was the best english class they'd had, we raved about 'the motorcycle diaries', then danny arrived with effusive greetings in spanish and showed me the excellent photo-file magazine with the work of local photographers, had another brief chat with Mary, and then left for an early night of trashy dvd and sleep. (really trashy - freddie prinze jr in she's all that - love a cinderalla story.)

Thursday, January 12, 2006

5:49 PM
Posted by jodi rose

today is difficult
woke up to find the crazy science experiment icicles had blossomed again, spent the morning trying to thrash my words about this place into some semblance of order and coherence.
went for a massage as my bicycle injury just flared up - and ohmigod she brought back all the pain. feel sick dizzy nauseous. but the wonderful audrey has arranged to pick me up and take me to the dr at 8am tomorrow, and also tracked down a decent tailor for my uniform.

days like this I am struggling to find joy in anything, but it passes.
had this lovely whimsical message a while ago from the next bridge guards, who are coming from canada:

"Your blog opens a funny little window on the project for us, like a retablillo, You know those, from Peru? they might be in the shape of an altar with double doors closing the interior, when you open the doors, you see a scene, maybe of a shoe shop in full production.. Or in Mexico, it might be, a bar room with skeletons drinking Mezcal"

perfect. skeletons drinking fernet in bars is about right.
signing off now can't type think concentrate ouch

Wednesday, January 11, 2006

11:37 PM
Posted by jodi rose

accompanied by audrey on my trip to the bridge this morning
two men fishing underneath it
she told me that she has never heard this hungarian tune which is played daily, and has lived here all her life
now I have to check if it really has been played every day since 1918
or is that another myth I have invented?
we made a time for me to speak with her two english classes at the gimnazium (high school) on friday after my haircut.
Cornelia came to visit this afternoon, she was going to her flute lesson yesterday at the music school. Told me she had wanted her daughter to learn but she wasn't interested, so Cornelia realised that it was her dream and started lessons herself. Her physics class will visit me in the residency studio as part of their seminar in February.
Checked some Australian blogs for news and got very depressed about politics and power - still trying to make sense of the various layers of history in this one small town - connecting to the world outside again is a shock. I guess you can pick anywhere and once you look below the surface there will always be intrigue and interesting characters - but I am happy with my moment in the bubble of sturovo.

Tuesday, January 10, 2006

10:21 PM
Posted by jodi rose

the celestial border guards
age old question - is what I'm doing enough?
it seems like too much fun to be real work
thinking about protection, thinking about love
require attention, focus, care, someone else's needs above your own
morning walk along the danube, it's so beautiful here
another clear sparkling day, imagine summer will be gorgeous
I have to come back
thinking about Rilke and what survives - as magris says, it is not victory that is important, but survival. all those conflicts over thousands of years, battles for control of the border, waves of civilisation and conquest - what survives from all this?
are there any turkish or mongol traits in the culture or peoples, how does the music of one time shift and play into another?
what survives is the river. always flowing

I have a taste of some of the Hungarian band on the jukebox. Why do you like this music, I ask? 'It is difficult to play, but simple to listen to.' Excellent answer - and good writing should be like that too. Sorry!

I invited a friend to come with me to the winter ball, he laughed - don't joke with me. I said; I want to dance with you.
I will dance with you here, now, he replied - so we waltzed around the bar. It seems that class consciousness is alive and flourishing - someone told me last week that this is the big fancy ball which all the politicians and leaders go to. and it lasts until 6am - they know how to have a good time! there's a tombola and surprise entertainment.

I mention to Gyuri that I would like to see the documentary about the bridge 'Collect the ruins' which the local photographer worked on as cameraman - I see him around and say hi, but we haven't met. So a few minutes later he appears, promises to drop in the dvd tomorrow and tells me he is also interested in making a piece about my project and the bridge guarding for the local tv station where he works. So there it all flows today.

Earlier I dropped in to see Andrea and deliver the results of my baking, and she introduced me to a colleague who composes - he made an impromoptu concert in the music school hall - fabulous with chandeliers and grand piano - of his latest piano work. It has an optimistic feel, he tells me, with a star shining. Yes, I can hear that.
I sit in on her two piano students, which brings on incredible nostalgia, fingers stumbling through a syncopated rag, not enough practice at home. Then outside a colleague of Gyuri's accosts me on the street and introduces herself, Cornelia, the physics teacher. She will also drop by tomorrow to make a program with me for her students.

Just give it up, stop trying to organise anything is the message I'm getting here. Let it happen.

I have a fascinating conversation with a friend who led the student protests against the regime in the late 80's - 'we didn't know that it was all about to change', he tells me - 'that was very brave,' I comment, 'you could have been arrested' - 'yes, I was shaking', he says. But he got up at the school assembly, in front of 1000 students and all the teachers, and told them what people had been saying privately but were too scared to say in public - that this is wrong, many other people think so too, we have to stand up for ourselves.

What were you fighting for specifically? I ask - of course I know the broad outline, but the detail of lived experience isn't something you can imagine from afar - well, he tells me, 'we couldn't say what we think, it is like this' (hands outstretched as if handcuffed together) and you just have a number and stay in your box until someone decides to move you here and here - most people were brought up not to question, not to have their own opinion. (sorry I'm paraphrasing this from memory and my english is getting very bad too!)
And was it worth it, have things changed for the better? I ask.
Yes, definitely. It would be very interesting for you to be here twenty years ago, there is hardly anybody on the streets - maybe 20 at most.

So, again I am aware of all the options and choices that I take completely for granted, being a citizen of the decadent affluent 'West'. However we have been complacent about our freedom of speech for so long now that it appears to have been eroded beneath us, and as the anarchists say, freedom to consume isn't really freedom at all. Although Zoli tells me when they started the pub, and offered a choice of four beers, people said he was crazy - indeed, why would you want four when two is plenty! But now they have 13, and it really is the best pub in town, possibly in Slovakia (that's what the locals say anyway, even the ones who go away to live in Bratislava or the czech republic come back here for weekends!)

ah hell enough random political philosophising - that's what the kids are doing on my side of the globe and border - what's going on in your town these days?

Monday, January 9, 2006

11:00 PM
Posted by jodi rose

I walk down to the river and the bridge twice today. First thing this morning, as the sunshine and blue sky are irresistible, thinking about guarding and love and fear and borders. Happy to be able to wander along the banks of the Danube and reflect on life.

Although of course it will fade and I will become restless again.
Immersed myself in Magris' Danube tome again, who says:
"The traveller is fleeing from the restrictions of reality, that trap him in repetition after repetition, and seeks for freedom and the future. Or rather, the possibility of a future that is still open, and subject to choice..."

Yes, indeed, that is the heart of the matter - subject to choice.
I have the sense that life is putting on the brakes for a while, after hurtling along at top speed maybe I do need to slow down and arrive.
Somewhere. Anywhere? Could this be simply the right time for me to be more at home in the world, and the actual location is irrelevant?
Or is there something particular and special about this place, these people? The spirit of the world, of the river, of the Magyar tradition.

Visit the bridge again at sunset. She is cool, calm and green in the fading pink-orange hues, and suddenly my face is freezing. Repair to the Green Pub for a warming tonic, where a few of my teenage acqaintances are recovering from their first day back at school, and Zoli comes in for a flying visit, tells me he is getting the Hungarian music he promised me for the sonic intervention and radio program.

Back home to write and read more, bake a batch of nigella's blueberry muffins - delicious if I do say so myself - I call Andrea to arrange our next meeting, so she can taste them. You're a better housewife than I am, she laughs - well, it's easy for me, I don't actually have a husband or child to look after! She tells me she misses me, as does Mary - I find this openness incredibly charming. And unusual.

A little more from Magris, on Lukacs, writer and philosopher whose young love of the woman Irma "had represented his yearning to live, the figure which symbolised the impossibility of reconciling existence with the work of art, genuine living with everyday banality."

Sometimes, everyday banality isn't so bad ;)
And it's a good thing I made it back from Bratislava when I did, or this strange fate could easily befall me: "Ladislav Novomesky, the greatest 19th Century Slovak poet, has a poem about a year he lost in a cafe, just like leaving behind an old umbrella. But things turn up again, and the umbrellas of our lives, left here and there over the years, one time or another end up in our hands again."

ahhh yes, I can't really tell you what I'm thinking right now, but am sure the umbrella of my life will continue to unfurl and provide shelter from the winds of uncertainty and misdirection.

Sunday, January 8, 2006

9:38 PM
Posted by jodi rose

the end of the weekend.
trip to vienna brief, satisfying my consumer urges
yet ultimately unfilliling. clothes, books, magazines all that crap
in all those shops just made me feel emptier.
but then, am no lonelier here than in sydney or melbourne or helsinki or berlin. had a wonderful sunday in bratislava, elisabeth cooked pancakes for breakfast, we walked to the castle, read in the chocolate shop, and then jurjai met me and walked across the bridge to petrzalka, found those elusive high-heeled boots I've been searching for, had lunch, went to the railway station.
I still find catching the trains here a surreal, spooky experience - especially at night - feel like I'm living in 'the zone' in a Tarkovsky film. Although to be geographically correct that would actually place me in Estonia - which those who have been reading awhile will know is one of my least favourite places. don't know why, we've just never clicked.
Unlike Sturovo. I should leave more often, it's so comforting coming back. Even though the train was on the platform saying 'sturovo', my ticket says 'sturovo' and the guard checked it; I always have this irrational fear that I will end up somewhere else entirely, with no idea how to get back here - so am inordinately happy to see the basilica lit up in the distance, and arrive at the 155 year old pink railway station.
No qualms about getting back late at night, just call the taxi and he finds me. Listening to PJ Harvey as the train pulled in, 'we'll float, take life as it comes'. I guess that 'home' is many places. I need to get used to it, not keep searching for absolutes.
Time to go out for a wander in the fresh clear night air.

Friday, January 6, 2006

3:04 PM
Posted by jodi rose

Decided to take a later train, as it's a bank holiday and everything is closed anyway. Checked on the bridge, can see the different colour on the closest arch which I believe is the only one still standing from the original reconstruction. The middles arches are lighter and fresher.
Wondering about the tides - is the river actual tidal, or does it swell and ebb with the melting snow? Was guessing the moon had an effect, but the water is high up on the beach now and it's still only a fairly new moon. Soon spring will come and then the waters rise even higher. But for now, I am here for only one season, watching the winter pass. Spring will come without me.

Thinking about the importance of dreams, for this piece in the local newspaper. It doesn't matter what your circumstances or situation, if you can imagine something else then you can change them. But once you lose your dreams, you are lost. This life doesn't just happen to me, you know. It takes a lot of work, courage and dreaming to keep on spinning more golden threads into the air.

Friday, January 6, 2006

12:56 PM
Posted by jodi rose

oh dear.
I've discovered the joys of ubiquitious cream-in-a-can. Great on coffee. And am sure there is no dairy or actual food in it - the label says 99% cholesterol free, not sure what it's made from - foaming polystrene and sugar perhaps?

Got stood up this morning by a radio journalist, ah well wasn't really awake enough to be coherent anyway.

In a tangentially related interesting development on the personal front, I seem to have inadvertently become aloof and mysterious, and it's working!

Finally had my Sandra fix - was waiting to get thru all my european region dvd's before switching back to au, if anyone knows another program to use for laptop dvd players, I've only got two region code changes left - how are you meant to be nomadic and watch movies?
Anyway, the wonderful Audrey has not only booked me an appointment with her hairdresser next week before the winter ball; but is also my dvd fairy godmother, keeping me supplied with new trashy comedy flicks every few days. Had the joy of Sandra in 'two weeks notice' with Hugh Grant playing his one foppish yet sensitive character, while she struggles to maintain integrity and independence - something about her face is just so watchable, incredibly beautiful from some angles, and reassuringly ordinary from others - and so sweet and goodnatured. But not cloying or annoying.

So this is really just a filler post, to get some of the noise out of my head before I catch the train to bratislava and then vienna in the morning. A flying visit to check out the January sales at H&m, C&A and other european chain store delights, due to my drastically increased solvency - thanks smartyhost, thanks mum for putting it in the bank! - but it's ok, I have a very strict budget as it's not cleared yet, the card on my other account is out of date, and I forgot to transfer more cash in time. C&A has a fab looking rita hayworth range - give me strength.
My ultimate dream look of all time is 30's Parisian Cabaret Artiste mixed with Katherine Hepburn and a dash of Rita H as Gilda.

Just have to shout out to the joyous 'danubius' radio station, which so far this morning has brought me 'let's get the party started', 'eye of the tiger' and 'jenny from the block'. golden.

Friday, January 6, 2006

1:37 AM
Posted by jodi rose

you know what?
I AM making this up as I go along.

...and despite all the concerned friends teling me to start thinking about a financial plan, property, superannuation and what-am-I-doing-with-my-life? unspoken fears that I can hear in my mothers voice, it's ok. No, I don't know where I will be in a year.

And maybe I won't get everything I plan to done.
There are worse things.
I seem to be doing just fine this far.
Not that I've given up but hey, sometimes life has other priorities. They seem to be shifting just now. The value of being a kind, loving person with a sense of connection and responsibility to the world you're living in can be a little lost amongst all this striving for achievement and sucess. One of my good friends here was apologetic when I showed her photos of my friends in other places - 'I'm sorry, I'm just a housewife' she said - having baked the walnut-filled puff pastries she knew I liked - please. don't say that. you're wonderful. No-one is 'just' anything.
We are all exactly what we are, no more and certainly no less.

I have that Nelson Mandela quote on a card from my long-suffering mother (who tells me that actually he is quoting a female playwright) about being less than we are: "Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, and not our darkness that frightens us. We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented and fabulous?
Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small doesn't serve the world. There's nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around us.
We were born to make manifest the glory of God within us. It is not just in some of us, it's in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fears, our presence automatically liberates others."

for whatever 'God' means to you, it is your responsibility to make the most of your own life - no-one else will do it for you. and however much people might hate to see you wasting your talent and potential, fritter away your time and energy - no-one else has the power to focus you on the right path, it's something you have to find yourself. which took me a while to figure out, that my being unhappy and unsatisfied with life was only hurting me, everyone else is just getting on with it.

And there is consistency in this at least. Charting moments as they flash by and hoping to see their interconnectedness sometime later. The feeling you get sometimes: everything in my life has led to this.

Sorry to come over all vague and philosophical like this, it's just that I have that kaleidoscope feeling again - you know when you can feel the patterns shifting and your world rearranging around you but don't quite know how the shapes will turn out - maybe it will keep drifting into the next thing, or maybe this is a significant change. Whatever it is, feels good - in a soft, calm, grounded way. Which, believe me, is a welcome change from the intense, chaotic turbulence I'm used to.

Saw 'The Island' tonight - surprisingly good sci-fi movie, futurist dystopia with ewan macgregor and scarlett johanson - both fine actors and eye candy - who undergo the classic realisation of the robot/clone/ 'not human' and in their discovery develop human emotions and desires while managing to save the world using only their wits against the might and weapons of the corporation and mercenaries.

Not that I want to give away the ending, but it reminded me very much of Plato's cave - again. Walked out of the cinema a little shaken, had to regroup at the pub with some humanity around me.

A little more human, a little less driven. That's the balance I'm striving for this year.

Wednesday, January 4, 2006

8:30 PM
Posted by jodi rose

bridge watch
thinking this morning as I walked along towards the popeye restaurant, that however arbitrary this guarding process may be - have still not quite managed to develop consistent habits in any form - that my intentions are whole-hearted and this I think contributes a lot of protection.

Still working on crystallising form and content for this exhibition.
Realising - yet again - my failings as an artist, writer and communicator - all the things you can't put into words or express through other means; and yet still trying to distill something from an experience to convey at least a rough shadow of the lucidity and passion that flits across the cave. Thwarted again by the post-modern education, which teaches that there is no 'essential' being or essence and definitely no absolutes, maybe this series of random chaotic impressions juxtaposed and rubbing up against each other in bizarre combinations will be ennough.

On the bright (automatically wrote 'bridge') side, all this year I've woken up feeling an incredible surge of self-confidence and faith. It's like being eighteen again, but without the teenage hormones. Angst optional. Playing with ideas for costumes befitting an international art star. Strangely enough, high heels play a part - I've detested them for years, feel like a drag queen in them - but some echo of my fourteen year old self in red stilettos and 50's cocktail frocks is telling me it can be fun. So. yoox look out!

Tuesday, January 3, 2006

10:27 PM
Posted by jodi rose

the bridge stands, the river flows.
fog has descended again, obscuring the basilica.
time passes very slowly.

in the next chapter, Magris writes: 'the happ do best to stay at home'
Domi manere convenit felicibus - one of the latin mottoes adorning the castle of sigmaringen, celebrating the love of one's native place, the residing spirit, settled in its own dwelling and free from the craving to leave it.' (Claudio Magris, Danube p 48) To the writer Celine, the Danube seemed 'the putrid river of history... of universal flith and violence,' while Enrst Neweklowsky attempts to catalogue and classify the entire upper danube in three volumes examining the 'history of navigation from pre-roman to the present day - 1962 - the routes used and types of vessel, pirogues and steamships, propellors and floor plates, parts and gear of the vessels and the characteristics and differences of the various tributaries, the whirlpools and shallows, the innumerable types of raft and barge, the pros and cons of kinds of wood employed, the convoys, fjords and crossing places, the rafting of timber, the composition and customs of the boatmen, the sagas and superstitions of the river, the levying rights, voyages of sovereigns and ambassadors, the poems, the songs, the plays and novels born of the river waters....' A universal danube, a system of total knowledge.

which only serves to remind me of how random, fleeting and incomplete my own writing and experiences are - although there is room for this also in his great work, 'the achievement of totality which is attained only when the disorder of the world is assembled in a book and arranged in categories... he tames phenomena and makes them stand in line, but he devotes animated attention also to sensitive, ephemeral details, to unique occurences. His work also deals with changes of weather, the wind, unpredictable mishaps, a list of accidents (mortal or otherwise) taking place on board, the suicides and the murders, the divinities of the river, busts of the 132 boat masters of Ulm and the verses devoted to each of them... the heads of patron saints of the bridges, penalty laid down for the ship's cook who puts too much salt in the soup, and lists the names of the boatmen who were also innkeepers on the side, together with their inns.'

so there you go, maybe there is a place for this meandering, subjective collection of impressions and reflections, somewhere in the vast literature on the subject and location. It helps to have a wider perspective - thinking about the simon and judas festival, which has been going since 1400 and something, a friend tells me that she and her boyfriend had their first kiss at that fair this year, giving a wonderful sense of the personal intimate connection between history and 'life as it is lived'. And indeed maybe it's a mistake to attempt a total system, leading as it can to dicatators and fascisti. So in the name of anarchy and subversion, I will continue meandering.

Still a little lonely, a little alienated - accidentally read all of cold comfort farm today - briliant and hilarious, the perfect tonic for all these slovakian and hungarian starkadders who glare at me in the street, (gawping at me, wondering if I'm a virgin -says fran in black books about her visit to a village in cornwall) although I wish for a dashing young man to swoop by in his plane and pick me up for a trip to paris. sadly the crush has faded, in the face of lack of response - decided not to waste my time on people who aren't interested any more!

Making a list of things I'm greatful for, one of them is, well you people on the street might look at me as if I'm a freak - but I can leave!

Ah well, listening to the radio which gives a strangely comforting sense of being connected to the outside world. Thinking about how to make a radio bridge, through time and place.

Monday, January 2, 2006

9:03 PM
Posted by jodi rose

Happy Slovak Independence Day!

Slovak Constitution Day, September 1 (1992) Independence Day from Czechoslovakia, January 1, 1993 (Velvet Revolution)

Celebrated the extra second by staying in bed. Very lazy Jan 1st, read all of friends, lovers, chocolate, attempted to walk up to the bridge but foiled by revolting slush all over the road and heavy rain.

Saturday after midnight wandered back to find half the town had been partying out front of my house - damn, missed the streets full of revellers. Oh well, also missed being sprayed with champagne and hand-held rockets. Checked up on the bridge, showed no ill effects of all those explosions in close proximity - although may have brought back traumatic memories, who can tell what goes through the consciousness of a bridge. Cellular memory, perhaps? There's a short Kafka story told from the point of view of a bridge, which twists and buckles throwing the people over it walking down into the ravine.

This morning made it out close to midday, after pancakes for breakfast, and the conditions had greatly improved. Light rain, and more solid patches to walk on. Discovered a new boat 'Obelix' anchored next to the 'Asterix' which has been there since I arrived.
Dull grey skies, snowy patches on the hills, broken bottles sticking up and melted firework cardboard colouring the icy grit.

Watched the Countess from Hong Kong, Sophia Loren opposite Marlon Brando, most of the action on board a ship where she has stowed away in his cabin - escaping from a life of misery, hopelessness and prostitution as a gangsters moll - and wears only three outfits for most of the film - a white evening gown, marlon's pyjamas and dressing gown, and then for her dive over the side in Waikiki, a Hawaiin dress. Still very glamorous, and highly moralistic.

Not sure what that relates to, if anything, other than I was thinking about how to describe the social world here and the image of a new zealand town in the 60's came to mind. Christchurch, probably.

Received latest fab care package from the divine Julaine, with vegemite, koala hugging boomerang, trashy magazines (who and new weekly - love you forever honey!!) and all my mail. none of it exciting. a rejection letter from residency application, various bank statements, art school graduate newsletter - must remember to tell them what I'm up to one of these days, having been one of the students least likely to succeed!! Had a shock when I looked up from the Who's 'Most Intriguing People 2005' issue and realised I was still in Slovakia - for a moment there I was back in Darlington.

There's something about this experience of small town life which is making me realise how much I really do have a place in people's lives, and hopefully will remember to appreciate that when I get home.