training

delivered my third training in 3 weeks this afternoon. it's funny how different each group was. the first one was receptive, the second one wasn't. today's was participative. they asked loads of questions. and they did really well.

also, i was left alone (meaning, the only trainer there - we're normally at least two, if not three, even if only one is presenting something) for a big part of it, which made me feel good and empowered.

so good one.

millionaires

apparently, there are over 9.5 million millionaires in the world. knowing how many people have less than nothing to live on, i feel it should be made illegal...

voices

at a gathering with friends last night, i met an Italian guy. i wasn't really paying attention at first, but he had no Italian accent when he spoke. actually, he had a very British one. when i asked him where he'd learnt English, he replied he'd learnt it at school, in Italy. i was impressed. he was in his forties and he spoke like he'd spent half his life in the UK, where he apparently never lived. not only that, he spoke exactly the same way as my best friend does (pronunciation and intonation), which is funny, as he's half Italian himself...

La Fete de la Musique

about 20 years ago, the then minister for culture (i think) 'implemented' La Fete de la Musique in France: every 21st of June, the whole country would be able to listen to lots of different types of music for free, on the streets of all cities, towns, villages. whilst it's still only the one evening (if it's a working day) in France, the French speaking part of Switzerland has made it much more useful by celebrating music all weekend, from the Friday night to Sunday night. that includes all day Saturday and Sunday. so really LOTS of opportunities to hear lots of music!

yesterday, i was there from 1pm till 12.30am. in that time, i heard 2 classical concerts, 2 jazz concerts, some Argentinian tango, an organ concert in the cathedral, a brass band, and more. it was mostly really good. in between, there was lots of walking, quite a bit of eating and some resting (3 full hours without music). we were two for most of the afternoon, but then joined a group of friends and became about 15 for the rest of the evening, and let me tell you, it's hellish trying to cross the old town at 15 when there are thousands of people around you!

how does a lake disappear?

apparently, an entire lake has disappeared in Chile, and not a small one. according to the article i read, they think it happened overnight, which sounds a little improbable to me, but then again i'm not an expert on lake disappearances. the scientists were doing some stuff around the Tempanos Fjord when they made the gruesome discovery. plus, as it was the source of a river that was providing water further down the valley, it's a bit of a problem...

adopting in France

three single women who wanted to adopt a child, got 99% of the way through French admin in their local area before the last guy said no because there would be a 'lack of a father figure in the child's life'. which is stupid, as lots people who have kids nowadays are not married/together, and sometimes not even fit to be parents. where is gets weirder is that one of these women successfully adopted a girl a few years back, and apart from now having a daughter, nothing has changed in her life: same place, same job, same status, etc. some things just don't make sense...

new local celebrity: aka me

here's a conversation that took place at the 10k-member party we were having last night. i was watching my friends play some frisbee before eating (probably working up an appetite). then i heard someone call my name behind me.

me: (turning around) yes?
her: hi, i'm A.
me: hi. nice to meet you.
her: you organise the [name of event], don't you?
me: yes.
her: wow, i'm so glad to finally meet you!
me: ... (don't know what to say as i still don't actually know who this is, apart from her name)
her: i haven't been able to make it to your event yet, as it's ping-pong night. i sent you an email about this.
me: (recollecting an email 5 months ago) that's right, i remember.
her: yes, it's been annoying, but if you keep it up, i won't play ping-pong next year, so i can finally join you!
me: cool. that'd be nice.
(conversation continues...)

two other people, when i introduced myself to them, also said 'oh, it's you who organises [name of event]!' and so it is. i know the regulars love the event (or so a few have told me). one always tell me mine is the only event he will never miss (which is funny, cos he's missed 3 this year), and one showed up last week when she was supposed to be on holiday and told me that she'd cut her holiday short just to join us. i really hope her holiday was crap to start off with! i mean, while it's fun, i don't think it warrants cutting a holiday short... but i didn't expect to become famous because of that...

the stag night

i went to my first stag night yesterday. not your typical night, obviously, as they're normally reserved to men! but my friend wanted to organise something funky for his friend, which for him obviously included lots of girls being there too. our instructions were to dress 'glamourously', which meant i finally got to wear that great top i bought last year. yeah! on top of that, i got specific instructions to ask the bridegroom to talk to me, because apparently, he had a great, deep voice.

it was such a great night! the company was good. the nine guys who came all the way from Paris for the night were nice and obviously had fun, which was the point and i danced even though i was wearing heels (i hadn't realised there'd be dancing before the club, which i wasn't going to). altogether i had a fab time!

the cost of the last G8

can't remember the exact details, but i saw in the news that someone had actually calculated the cost of the latest G8 summit. they added up the cost of the transport (for Bush, that was not only Air Force One but also 2 jets to act as 'bodyguards'), accommodation (for everyone, that was many more than one person per country!), the 'security wall' that was set up for the occasion, etc. the wall itself cost 12.5 million euros! think about what that money could have been used for instead...

for those who know me...

i've just found out that my name means 'knowledge' in Hindi. do you think that counts even if my name is not Hindi? and would that, then, explain why my head is filled with the most irrelevant details and why i can remember how long ago i met someone off the top of my head or what their phone number was 20 year ago?

breaking out

i bumped into some friends on my way to a beach party last night. i remembered from last year that the entrance to the place we were going to was hellish to find, that i'd wandered around quite a bit trying to figure out how to get in and finally following some people through the bicycle parking. so i thought we'd save ourselves lots of hassle by getting in that way.

just as we walked into the parking, a guy was closing up the swimming pool centre it was part of. he saw us go in but didn't say a word. which i took as meaning it would be open on the other side. we were halfway between the gates when i heard the guy locking behind us. and then i thought: what if it isn't open on the other side? i remembered people had tried to get out that way last year, but by then it had been locked. and as fate would have it, it was locked already. and that gate did not look like one people should climb over, what with all the spikes it had.

the 'corridor' we were in was open air, with people walking up 'above' us. all we had to do was get up there. i'd seen some containers on the way, that we could maybe use to climb up the ledge. but my nice and innocent looking Australian friend didn't even look that far. she saw what was right in front of us: layers of logs hanging off the wall. she started climbing up them and she was out, climbing over the fence, in less than a minute. well, if she could do it, so could we. the tall guy gallantly helped the diminutive Japanese girl halfway up, while i nearly fell off when i lost my balance on the rolling logs. but i got up, and over the fence, while the people walking along were wondering what the hell we were doing. what an adventure!

which is better?

seeing or not seeing one of your parents die?

i was about 10,000 km away when my mother died. i called her nearly every day those last 6 weeks. well, i called home. she wasn't always in the mood for talking, depending on whether it was treatment day or not. but she'd listen to me talk about my life, trying not to sound worried about her cos i knew she didn't want me to be. in the last few days she was so upbeat i nearly forgot she was sick. which made her death even more unexpected. i couldn't understand why a friend of the family was telling me my father didn't want me to do anything rash, like fly home, when she'd been talking about having a party for all the people who were working on her experimental treatment. she didn't even like parties.

my sister, who was there, tells me it was horrible. seeing my mother become thinner and thinner. seeing her throw tantrums because she did not want to eat. she was not hungry and she was not a child. she could make her own decisions and she'd decided not to eat. why couldn't everyone just leave her alone? in the last few days, she was mostly delirious. talking about boats. and on her last night, she said goodbye. she actually did. my father and my sister thought it was the delirium. turns out she knew more than she was letting on. but she never said goodbye to me. she didn't want to talk on the phone that day, and as i didn't want to push her, i didn't actually say goodbye to her either. in fact, i wasn't really talking to her. i was just talking. i thought things were getting better.

my sister is 'glad' that i didn't see my mother in her last state. she says it's good i was spared. i believe she wishes she hadn't seen her that way. i wish i had. isn't it ironic?

the white shirt effect

my coworker was wearing a white shirt today, so i told him he looked nice. because he did. like he was going somewhere or meeting someone special. apparently, i wasn't the first one to tell him, cos he rolled his eyes and said 'gosh, all it takes to impress a woman is to wear a white shirt, that's just too easy.'

i'd never thought about it but yes, i guess men look nice in a white shirt. i'd probably never notice a coloured one, unless it was starched or very good quality. and i was secretly impressed when my best friend wore a white shirt when he came to see me in my new flat last year. so yes, i guess it doesn't take much, sometimes. that must be some consolation to some guys... ;)

the very best

like most girls, i love pretty much every kind of dessert that's out there. but the very best dessert is simply vanilla ice cream with mango and raspberries. it's just delicious!

BBQ on the lake

off we went to St Prex, a lovely little town on the 'coast'. the sun played hide and seek for a while, but soon it was simply there, which was nice, seen as we'd postponed the BBQ from last week. 25 people signed up but over 40 showed up. after eating, we played frisbee (with 6 people and 4 frisbees, we were kept on our toes), then we dozed a bit, talked, ate some more... it was a wonderful afternoon, and i'll say it again: it really kills you to do nothing in the sun!

and the really adventurous part in all this was that after driving all the way up there, my car suddenly stopped working. i was just going to move it closer to where we were, but not a thing happened. i put the key in the contact, but no sound, nothing. not even a dead battery sound. luckily, this was shorter after we'd arrived, so i didn't worry too much about it: there was bound to be someone who'd know what to do, and if not, the insurance could always be called. but just as i thought, someone knew all about cars, so after ascertaining that there was nothing wrong with the battery, he tapped on the starter with a piece of metal and the car was back up and running. my saviour! and now, i know what to do if that problem ever reoccurs...

farewell party

i only met the guy 2 years ago, and haven't seen him all that much compared to how often i see other people, but i'm really going to miss him. sadly, more than i miss some other people who've recently left. he and his wife have decided to move to Hawaii, so i won't be seeing them anytime soon...

but the party was great. as they rent a flat in a vineyard (and yes, that does pretty much mean there's wine on tap - they just pay the owner for whatever they've used), the party was in the middle of the vines, albeit a little further away up the road, an area i only recently discovered, really. it's just the shame it was so cold, it would have been amazing if we'd been outdoors.

it was a lovely evening, filled with real people. half our original CELTA group was there, which is pretty good considering how spread out we are. some of these people i hadn't seen in absolute ages! it was great catching up. as if we'd never been apart, really, except for all the news to share.

my 80's evening

when i got home yesterday, i was too tired to do anything productive, so i ended up watching a rerun of Magnum, which was quite hilarious. that guy has some legs!! and as there was nothing good on later on, i decided to stay with the theme and watched The Abyss, which i used to really love. it hasn't aged very well, although the end part is just as great as i remembered it to be. but now, i think i can definitely wait a while before watching either again...