Zapatazo

Living in Spain nowadays is like a breath of fresh air. Yesterday there was the zapatazo, the order to immediately withdraw militaries from Iraq.
Of course, the Spanish government, as all sensible people, care and is worried about the sort of that country, but the military occupation is not a viable solution, and the UN option seems to be still distant.
Myself and the New York Times think that ZP anticipated the decision not to be absorbed during the first months of his government in an endless debate around the choice to withdraw or not, under international pressure and national confusion.
The reaction in Spain is very positive (a part from PP), and abroad, let’s wait some weeks more to see if followers will come forward.

Ready-flawed products

I don’t appreciate the quasi-sacred respect for new possessions.

The fear of scratches on the door of your brand new car and the insistence on putting something below your cup of tea, in order to protect the shiny surface of the tropical timber table. Or the acrobatic way of eating a slice of pizza on the road, to preserve the whiteness of your new silk shirt.

That’s why I’m proposing a new range of products: ready-flawed objects to make your life easier and help you feel comfortable.

Trousers with a little hole near the right pocket, cups freshly spoilt (how to translate ‘sbeccata’, who knows?), myrtle juice stained sofas.

With a 1 year guarantee: if you don’t feel at ease yet, a company’s courier will come at your place ready to ruin your shopping additionally. Free of charge.

Remainder

These two notes were published in March and accidentally erased, I am duplicating them ‘a futura memoria’.

Haiku

postato da mc7858 [mercoledi 31 marzo 2004 ore 16:21:43]

I prepared this haiku for a competition organised by the Japanese Embassy in Roma.
I did not win.
Perhaps, I did not respect carefully the strict rules about Haiku writing.

Please, read:

Swallow in a cage

cat is looking for

wild brawl

feathers for dinner

 

La mala educación

postato da mc7858 [mercoledi 31 marzo 2004 ore 18:14:44]

Barcelona, 31 March 2004

We went to see last Almodóvar’s movie, La mala educación.
I did not like it. I couldn’t find the gracia that was in the previous films, Todo sobre mi madre and Habla con ella. Those ones were also touching sensitive circumstances, but there was space for laugh and emotion.
I would not comment on the plot as I don’t like to know about a movie beforehand.
The main actors are good; one of them is the protagonist of Amores Perros, movie that I could not follow until the end, too violent, too much blood.
La mala educación will open the Cannes Festival, let’s wait for reviews.

Thesaurus

As affirmed from the beginning, writing in English is the main point of this blog.
And Word`s® Thesaurus is one of the tools facilitating that objective.
I placed the option Thesaurus on the heading of the program, next to copy, past and cut, and I use it generously.

Of course, an exaggerated utilization of this facility may bring to incongruous results, but there is where I count on the reaction of the readers (not very frequent, so far).

I also use the interactive dictionary distributed by L’Espresso, and the GuruNet resource, very useful, but needing connection to the Internet (you may find the details below).

The use of the Thesaurus is anyway the option I prefer, as it permits surprise and creativity (and I could have written revelation and imagination, or shock and inspiration, or wonder and resourcefulness ?..)

Riferimenti: GuruNet

Orchids

The purchase of two phalaenopsis in IKEA inaugurated our dealing with orchids.

Soon after that, I travelled to Madagascar and at the Flower’s market I did buy more than 20 little plastic bags with orchid’s seeds, from pleasant and amused sellers. I took note of the different names and colours, and only once back home we discovered from Internet that you do not sow orchids.

The reproduction process of these plants is an odd one, recently defined, that need a germ-free environment and particular conditions.

Not discouraged by the incident, we bought in Thailand some plants and two bottles, where, immersed in a “primordial soup” there were more than 40 little sprouts, Vanda variety, a real orchid champion as the lady-seller said.

We are very proud about our first plant (the IKEA one), which engendered a keiki (new plant coming out from the stem of the “mother” one) that you can admire below.

PS to import those plants from Thailand we went to the local office of CITES (international agreement for the protection of tropical species) to get the official authorization

Travelling through La Mancha

During the Easter holidays we went to Manzanares, at the hearth of the Mancha region, to call on the family.

We visited the mills, bought the cheese, ate any kind of traditional Easter cakes.

The space is huge and boundless, well cultivated, everywhere fields, green or brown, olive trees, vineyards, plough tracks.

We went to Ciudad Real and Toledo, beautiful but wrapped up in pointless shops, and many little pueblos.

We followed the processions, observing the masked cofradias, the crucifix and the sacred images carried on people’s back.

Allusion to Mexico and America, amplitude and traditions, colours and loneliness.

Enough is enough

Patricia de Lille, former leader of the Pan Africanist Congress of Azania in Capetown, launched this slogan in 1994, during the campaign for the first democratic elections in South Africa (tomorrow they vote again, for the third time).

delille

“Enough is enough”, very narrow agenda, anti-political, not the programme you would expect form a credible alternative for government. But a manifesto that I would subscribe for Italy. And that many voters did endorse in Spain, some days ago.

Utility Blog 1

Some of these blog’s notes should be useful for the readers. Therefore, I start today sharing some useful information I have got in my long years of searching.
The first utility blog is the address of a French web site informing about vacancies in the international organizations.
There are many similar web sites, but I consider this one particularly functional, as it gives immediately the indication of the posts available in the different organizations. Afterwards, one can go to the specific web site to get the details.
You can find the address below.

PS regarding the title, I wanted to express the concept blog di servizio, as it is used for trasmissione di servizio, but I couldn’t find a better formula than utility blog. Any suggestion?

Riferimenti: France diplomatie

Ida Margar

Ida Margar didn’t use to work on Mondays. In the last years, she performed only once.

It was the day she had to help an enchanter who needed someone to enchant.

Ida was among the crowd, with the fingers narrowed around her leather belt.

At the moment she had to intervene in the show, she was distracted by a pair of doves that, after being extracted from the top hat, were wondering what to do.

So, it happened that the enchanter had to enchant himself and, for a fate’s joke, he disappeared.

Miss Margar was not disappointed in the role she had played in the departure of the nosed magician and, back home in time for dinner, she thought she would rather prepare a tortilla.

 

London, 1993.