Soft and bouncy landing bubble

Dear sisters,

One good friend gave me the following advice: whatever you do, don't complain about the weather.

Most other repatriates said: be prepared, your friends are not particularly interested in your adventures in Bali/San Francisco..where were you again during the last five years? You were really away that long?

And. They continued. Maybe good friends will tolerate one evening of reminiscing: listening, smiling and saying, that sounds great, but when it comes down to it, it is your experience to keep and treasure. This may be hard.

I don't blame them, who wants to hear too much about someone else's sabbatical in the tropics?

I have therefore wrapped Bali up carefully in hand-pressed-batiked tissue paper and slipped it under my bed, to take out when needed.

For now, we are still in a rainbow coated bubble, filled with happy gas, which is rolling us through the streets of Amsterdam.

The kids both had a huge grin on their faces coming from the airport as they looked out of the taxi at the snow lined tree tops. They skated on natural ice at Christmas. At this point, this is what we call exotic. They got presents.





We have all been gorging ourselves on fresh brown bread from the bakery around the corner, sticky on the inside and crunchy on the outside, spreading it with hagelslag (chocolate bits) or smeerworst (sorry foodies, it is animal unfriendly and maximally processed - I will not translate). We have been eating cheese and chocolate and drinking red wine daily. It is Christmas after all.



This will have to stop soon, we have good food intentions, but we have to get it out of our system.

Before we left, I was reading some Dutch opinion magazines that guests had left behind, and every article seemed to have a negative and/or sarcastic slant to it. Oh no, I thought. I have either been in America too long or, I am now seeing the Dutch nature as it truly is.

But so far the "I smile, you smile back" principle" generously applied in San Francisco is working here too, and even the Amsterdam taxi drivers appear to be happy people, just to confuse us.

It is sale time, and we need winter clothes, so there has been some that.

Housing? We still have a whole week to get that organized. Schools? I think they start tomorrow. Income? Lovely winter weather out there.



I realize we are still in vacation mode. Real life hasn't started yet, and I will do some grumbling next post, but for now, just letting you know: this city girl is happy to be back in town.

Happy New Year to all. May you be healthy, happy and free.

How many more days?

That is what Rosie asks. How many more days before we go? The day after the day after tomorrow. She is excited but I doubt she realizes what awaits her. How long are we staying in Holland? She then asks. For a long time, I say.

My last havianas have snapped with a dramatic flip and a flop. This is a sign, I think.

I am making a list of things to look forward to: drinking water out of the tap, cheese and red wine, clear thoughts in crisp cold air, while savoring the things we will miss: the green, green, the tri-weekly massage, and being able to text with my doctor.

There are other things: certain yoga teachers, the Greenschool and Bali friends. But no time to be sentimental. We have some last minute nasi campur to eat, photos of palm trees to take and gekko/frog symphonies to listen to.




How is it in the real world?

S1

jumping gymnastics and the view from my windowsill when it was not snowing

Dear all,
Greetings from the deep middle european continent, again. Its 4 p.m. and it is dark blue outside. It is snowing. A lot. It's cold. VERY. The predicted minus ten has been reached.

So here I present you with a little guide on how to keep warm :
wear lots of woolly jumpers, if you can wear a pair of tights under your trousers then do so, two pairs of socks , fleece jumpers and lithuanian hanknitted mittens, a woolly hat and hood on coat and wrap a woolly scarf around the half of your face. Then waddle out of the house, catch a tram and woddle to school. Whilst waiting for the tram , which can take a long time due to the snow delays then I strongly reccomend jumping about on two legs. Basically , when it is this cold you should try to adapt gymnastics to your everyday life where ever you are.

Here is a french man demonstrating the possibilities of gymnastics in everyday life. Its a little bit silly but it made me laugh , which is also a great way of keeping warm :) I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.
How to keep the cold out !

Its funny , but did I mention that my most important subject for the first three years in the Fine Arts Academy of Prague was gymastics ? If I was to fail this subject I would have been kicked out of school, so it's a good thing I quite enjoy a bit of excercise.

Anyway, long live gymnastics and keeping warm and happy ! All my love and I'm very much looking forward to christmas and seeing you all ! Here is a little song to get you into the mood for our festive family reunion.
Happy song

Happy Sinterklaas,
Take care and have a peaceful end of year.
S3

relax your inner ear and pictures of organic bali chicks

Dear sisters,

If I say, I have been taking the first steps towards skillfully creating banks around a pool of internal energy, in order to make a river of Consciousness, that flows back into the ocean of supreme bliss, what would you say?

You might say it is time for me to return to a continent with four seasons.

Or you could say, wow, how was your yoga retreat? That sounds amaaazing.

It was very nice in fact, thank you for asking.

Learning about the tantric, non dualistic principles underlying anusara yoga, in which I was being immersed for five days at Desa Seni village resort, I found I could say yes, okay, uh, huh, to most things. The inflated language occasionally made my big body shudder, as it sometimes does when the G.- word is used a lot, but once we got past the definition obstacles, I was encouraged by it all.

Encouraged to learn more, dipping my toe into the swamp of eastern spiritual literature, which you could say is a little late, two and a half weeks before returning to the northern hemisphere. A. jumped into the swamp many months before me and has already pulled himself out by his tanned yogic arms, to embrace other focused books like "Crucibles of leadership", "Crossing the Chasm: marketing and selling technology", "The Facebook Effect" and similar page turners.

So, as I sit on my meditation cushion overlooking the green, green, frogs croaking, bells tinkling in my ear, my husband is making excel sheets for a new internet start- up idea, that he is tossing around.

We are being Bali about our departure, or return, depending on how you look at it. Hopefully with less suitcases than with which we came, we will arrive in Amsterdam with our lives wide open once more: housing, schooling and income all yet to be decided.

Maybe I will take a few more massages before we get on the plane then.

Love S1

Estrahno forma de vida

Dear sisters ,
I am in the mood for songs about destiny.With the night falling at five i get quite nostalgic and i feel like wrapping myself up in a warm melancholic duvet blanket.
Please listen to this beautiful song by AMALIA RODRIGUEZ
, the icon portuguese Fado singer. So you can get into the mood of my tales to come.
And here is a visual helper of how i was feeling a few weeks ago.




By the way, November isn't my best month. Last week i woke up with a blocked nerve in my back and i couldnt move my neck in any direction,I felt like a cardboard theatre prop with a cupboard painted on it. You can imagine its not easy for a cupboard to go the cinema, but that is exactly what i did as i couldnt do anything else, even lying down was painful. The latest Woody Allen film cheered me up , even though laughing was painful , it helped me forget feeling sorry for myself. After the film I went a bit wild and bought myself a hot water bottle and a fleece jumper with a hood.
I also bought myself a bottle of whiskey to reduce the pain. i told you November is not my best month but there are some high lights. I can assure you I only drink a little whiskey with hot tea and lots of honey. This , as you might know , is our Nanna's recipe for any kind of malaise or illness. I am happy to confirm my back has been completely cured. i wore my fleece jumper with a hot water bottle in the back for about four days. i think the Nostrodamus look is back , seen in Prague first !

But I have another brilliant cure which is to go to Lisbon for five days for a drawing conference, which funnily enough is exactly what i did last week.
I have fallen inlove with Lisbon , i felt like i went up in a balloon and floated there looking at all the beauty for five days.







It is like a city of faded chandelier glass and colour. A prism of different shades of blue and broken painted tiles. The churches are filled with paintings on tiles from top to ceiling.





Breathtaking and an overwhelming feeling of being blessed.
I saw a double rainbow , what more can i say ?


Now im back in Prague again and i have crashed, fallen from my portuguese balloon.
But all in good spirit. My ring finger nail of my left hand has been surgically removed by one third ,
because of a very heavy ceramic boot that fell on it in the summer. The new nail remembered the bump and was starting to grow into my skin which was quite painful,
so i went to a doctor and she said i had to get it removed as soon as possible.
So the next day I went to the hospital and an hour later i walked out with a huge bandage round my finger. I wont give you too many details , it didnt hurt , I got two anesthetic injections in my finger, it blew up like a balloon, and then i had to lie down and the doctor asked the assistent to get the finest scissors from the draw. He lifted a long metallic tool about the size of a shoebox from the draw, saying , Are these the finest we have ?
At that point i turned my head to the right, squinshed my eyes and refused to look. He kept tugging at my hand and asking if it hurt, i mumpled not really. But the worst of all were the noises, like he was cutting into thick cardboard.
Hence again my cardboard prop feeling coming back to me.
Afterwards i went for a strong coffee and serious dark chocolate cake with A. It helped.
I am not able to do any washing up of dishes to my great dissapointment and to that of A's. I am also not able to wash any clothes with our prehistoric washing machine , which deserves a post of it's own.
A. is very helpful and patient with me.
Im just taking it easy and pondering about how i will create art work for the next five months until the nail grows back. I have tried drawing with my right hand but it looks like a three year old has been scribbling in a book which could be quite interesting for a while. Maybe i can draw with my feet , or my mouth? The time has come for a change in my art style.
Lets just hope for the best. This is me pondering :



Here are a few songs that make me feel nice and warm. The first one is by SADE,called
Bring me home

And here is a song that cheers me up , its a song about the sea

All my love and good luck with the move over there in Bali ! I would take as little as possible. And take care !
Bon voyage !
Peace
S3

Only 27 days.

Dear sisters,

Last Thursday was the day puppies were offered to the demons. I mentioned this practice on the blog before.

All over Bali, puppies were killed and skinned. Sate sticks were made of puppy meat, to offer with the skin. During a ceremony, a pig was slaughtered by piercing a knife into its throat, collecting the blood that ran clear, and finally, the blood spilled at the traditional cockfight was also added to the mix: a mighty potion to appease the demons coming from the sea, at this halfway point of the Balinese calendar. It is a bad month.

In the evening the villagers walked in procession to the village borders, dressed in finery, carrying the symbols of their temples, in an attempt to keep the demons out for another year. I saw the processions, but got the gory bits from my main source, Nyoman, of course.

In the week that this was happening, I was practising yoga twice a day on a marble balcony, overlooking the green, green, as my yoga teacher from San Francisco felt inspired by the gentle nature of the Balinese.



It is my yoga time. I am cramming it in before we return. Two days of rest after a week’s retreat, before I dive into a five-day immersion in the South. Will I be able to do a handstand, before we go? I dream about flying up lightly, my legs straight and elegant, but it proves a deception once I awaken. My body is still a bulging sack of potatoes, unsuccessfully attempting to defy gravity.

We had an unexpected house-guest, who came for dinner and did not leave for two weeks. We met before, during a yoga retreat in Greece, and she turned up in Ubud, we ran into her, and so she came and provided all members of the family with stories to entertain. We expect to see her again.

Today, Sinterklaas came to Bali. It was a very hot day and the parents sweat a lot, as they waited for it to end. The children sang song after song in utter confusion and eventually lined up for a bag of sweets with a notebook. Kroketten and friet on presentation of the coupon. Rosie had been up before six, showering in our bathroom to get ready for the man. I find it hard to get into that Sint Nicholas feeling in the tropics.



And now? We count down. Less than four weeks to go, before we return to the European lowlands: a bit more than a month before we meet again, elastic baby and sock sister.

With love,

S1

Fresh Enough: doing things by halves first.

Dear Sisters,

Greetings from Villa...Smog! If I were to take a picture out of my window there wouldn't be much on it. I can measure the density of fog by looking at the clock on the old district town hall. If I can't see it, it is foggy today. It was. The whole town seems wrapped in a damp blanket, as if the whole place were the inside of a steamed up car window. It confers a certain atmosphere on the city, not altogether unpleasant. On the whole it is one of those late (late, already) autumn days that tell you winter is coming. Soon, all will have changed forever. Until next season. Time is definitely churning.

I know "no one cares what you had for lunch" but I do have some very ordinary things to talk about.

I am sitting here at the kitchen table, listening to Italian renaissance music on the radio, after finishing a delicious bowl of Thai chicken soup; it came out of a tetrapak, of which the writing printed on its side assures me it is fresh, and then I have augmented it with some fresh ginger (also great as tea), some browned pine nuts, a branch or two of chopped, organic celery; and some wild mushrooms...out of the deep freeze. Methinks my culinary art of living has gone up a notch, but even if it be just half a notch, by adding the fresh to the fresh enough, that already seems a great place to start. It has something of an elegant compromise.

So too my best intentions floundered; a perfect practice of yoga, to which I cannot yet seem to commit, is seconded by an occasional centering session on the floor of my amazing living room tatami platform with the breathtaking view. I learn to take breaths again, and to stretch in a way that has me discovering my body's hinges as if it were the very first time, and as if I was not once - allegedly - also an elastic baby. The lessons of breathing really open up something amazing and beautiful.

The website that is helping me do this is one that S1 recommended to me: Yogaglo I also cannot recommend it warmly enough. For a start, its design and usability is one of the most beautiful things you will encounter on the web. You can choose the style and duration of your lesson, including all kinds of wonderful meditation, and as it plays on your computer you can keep your mind on the lesson and not let it wander off (as it might). What's more, the screen is each time full of positive people saying nice things to you as you try something new. It has all the love of a San Francisco Yoga Tree, or even an Ubud Yoga Barn lesson, streaming through the internet and coming into your home. Wherever you might be. It always has you coming back for more. Which reminds me of my soup of which there is a bit left...it would be such a shame to let it go to waste!

love to you both!
S2