Ticklish Ovaries

One thing that has kept me sane this term (aside from photography and anti-crazy pills!) has been this little volunteering I did. It's not a huge deal, not a big commitment or anything, but I've really enjoyed it. A college-wide e-mail came from the Wadham chaplain that a primary school needed volunteers to read with the kids. As it turns out, it is a two-minute walk from my house. I decided to go for it, just once a week for an hour and a half with some 7-year-olds.

I'm so glad I did. I arranged to do it on my day off, so it was some times the only thing to make me get out of bed. And I felt really good doing it, the kids are generally precious and since I'm only with each of them for 15 minutes or so, they don't have time to act up and aren't exhausting for me. Also, I get to read kids books for an hour and a half and not be embarrassed about it!

Some of these kids are so precious, it hurts. I just wanted to hug or pet some of them, and there was many a time when I wished I had my camera. I thought that if I brought it, though, it would make me seem like a bit of a pervert.

I plan on continuing it next term, and maybe taking on more to do there. One friend I made there won't be working any longer, but it's still a nice environment. And perhaps I could get away with taking photos when I know the kids' parents better and they don't think I'm a paedophile! Don't you just hate that?

Rina esta perdita

I mentioned not too long ago (or rather, a long time ago) that I was going to be doing some traveling over the break. I have begun! I spent four-plus days in Barcelona, and man alive, it was amazing.

I left on the 15th of March and arrived in Barcelona in the evening. I met an American in the airport (um, BA gives free wine. 'Nuff said) who had spent time in the city before and he was nice enough to show me around so I could get my bearings. The rest of the time, though, I was on my own. Each day was spent wandering a different area in the city, just watching people and listening to music and trying to get some good shots off. There was a lot of time spent in bars in the evenings meeting people and practicing my very poor Spanish. I gave up at one point and went to an Irish bar instead.

I got turned around once or twice trying to find my way back to my hostel at night, and that was pretty unnerving. Since the first day I spent a lot of time walking up and down Las Ramblas, this sort of Venice/3rd St. Promenade place, I didn't keep track of which direction was the hostel and which was the marina. Until I got to the marina. *sigh* Anyway, it was fine.

When I need help or directions, people were nice and I was pleased that I felt relatively safe in this strange city all on my own. There was a night or two walking back to my hostel in the dark (I avoided spending money on the Metro when I could) that I was a little nervous, and my first evening walking around on my own there was a creepy guy following me for a little while, but overall it was way cool.

Anyway, so I loved Barcelona and I hope I get to go back soon at some point. Coincidentally, a handful of people I know are going soon or have just gone, so I got to rave about it for a while. For further information: I got a color roll developed and have processed a B&W roll, but have yet to print shots of it. Anyway, the first few photos in this album are from there, but there's not much in the way of tourist-y-ness. (Also, some new B&W shots.)

I was supposed to go to Amsterdam last week, but I decided not to at the last minute (literally 15 minutes before I was going to leave the house for the airport). I think it turned out to be a very, very good idea. I got to catch up on sleep and work, tidy the flat up a bit, and spend time with new and old friends. I vote yes. However, I'm leaving for a week in Florence to-morrow (to-day, actually) and I'm really excited about that. Let's hope my Italian doesn't get me shot.

More upon my return, of course.

Long-Awaited

OK, finally upon finallies, here are the photos that I've taken, developed and printed. They're all from Israel and I hope in the next few weeks to get to work on some that are from this term. They're also just the ones that I could be bothered to print, because I'm a bit shit at it all. Enjoy in good health! (The first 8 are ones from before that I got printed elsewhere.)

Black, White, Turn

Ketchup

Term has been over for a week now -- actually a little over that, as I finished last Wednesday -- and I've alternated between lazing about for days at a time and being moderately productive. Sleep, read, eat, sleep, errands, sleep, drink, library, sleep, drink, eat, errands. That's my last week. With maybe a little more 'sleep' and 'drink.'

On the upside, I've been spending more time with the Sarah Lawrence folk, people on the program with whom I haven't really spent much time, since upon arrival I threw myself into Britishisms or something like that. But now most of them have departed.

I shall be departing soon, myself. To-morrow I leave for Barcelona for 5 days, and later I'll spend a little while in Amsterdam before I spend a week in Florence. Pretty freakin' cool, if you ask me. Anyway, that's the gist of my life right now: sleep, drink, sleep, work, drink, travel.

PS Yes, I finally have printed photos on my own from my time in Israel but I have been quiet slacker-esque in uploading them to the internetz. Maybe when I come back from Barcelona. Maybe. xxx

As the University Turns

OK, so LASERS is no longer a temptation, but someone at this row of study seats smells really, really good. I want find out who it is and make them sit next to me as some sort of aromatherapy.

In other news, when did college become the new high school? This weekend has been so much drama. Just among my few close friends here (6 or 7 people) there are: fights over friends, competition over boys (spurred by the fight over friends), 'I can't be friends with you because you like some other boy more than me,' snapped tendons, grandparents going into a home, crazy-emotional family problems, an eating disorder or two, excessive drinking, debt, depression, drug abuse, leading on boyfriends/girlfriends, sex, lack of sex, roommate drama, unrequited love, and epileptic fits. (And no, most of the above do not apply to me.) And these are the nice, sane kids. I chose friends who weren't crazy for a reason!

It's not usually like this; it's just the last week or so has been outrageous. The library is a good escape, as is laughter. Nothing like saying, 'hey, you want to go where those flashing lights are and have a fit?' to an epileptic to cheer you up.

Alright, two papers for Wednesday, so I get to ignore that craziness for a few days while I live in the library and drink cartons of orange juice.

N.B. Reading is hard.

It is difficult to concentrate on 19th century scientific ideology, no matter how interesting it might be, when there is a book on a shelf just nearby entitled LASERS. Powell, Wallace, and Darwin would up their appeal if they talked about lasers and explosions more and old fish bones less.

PS I'm actually enjoying the reading this week. Weird, I know. And I've resisted LASERS for now.

Home Away from Home

A month later and I'm still not writing much. I made any number of excuses as I pushed it off, particularly utilizing the one about printing my own film. 'See, I want to write about my time in Israel, but I want to do it with the accompanying photos, and since I'm developing and printing them myself, it will just have to wait. What a shame.'

So yes, I've been doing the developing and printing and it's been really fun and rewarding. And we all know there's nothing lovelier than a girl all bleary-eyed from hours in the darkroom smelling like chemicals. When I come up with something good, I'll put it on Flickr and mention it here. It is good fun. Also, in the 'how to do this and not die' sessions (hint: don't drink the chemicals and don't light anything on fire), I made good friends with Dom/Crocodile Boy (I know way too many people named Dom here, so Croc-Boy will have to do). It's nice having company in the darkroom; it makes it harder to accidentally lock yourself out and there's someone else to blame if your prints come out wonky.

Aside from printing, my excuse as been work. Lots of it. Lots of reading and writing and skimming and scribbling and obsessive FaceBook checking and god knows how many bathroom breaks because man, that is one tough chapter, I'D BETTER GO PEE. I have yet to break my 15-hours-straight record, but I had 16 1/2 earlier this week. There was an hour and a half when I had to go to a meeting, seeing as I'm technically secretary of one of the Jewish organizations on campus. Or something.

What I noticed at that meeting is when I spend so much time on my own in the library, I forget how to interact with people. I make jokes about John Ruskin's architectural views and Baden Powell's religious dynamism, but nobody gets them. So I resort to the lowest common denominator for a college student -- stupid, childish, dirty jokes, or ones about drugs or alcohol. Um, don't say them in front of the rabbi. So then I feel even sillier. Even when I'm with close friends, it takes me a good half hour to really feel at ease again.

What I need to do is make more friends at the library. I'm already on the way: one librarian in the Lower RadCam told me I ought to just bring a sleeping bag and save myself the trouble of going home. OK, when a Bod librarian knows you by name, you have a problem.

Just going to have to be a better balance some time. Not to-day though; my books are all in the 24-hour library as I type.

With love and voices.

Began Begun Beginning

I keep waiting to post more about Israel until I develop the rest of my photos from there to illustrate the posts a bit. However, since I'm planning on developing the film myself (maybe even printing it! Who knows?), I have to wait till I can get a tutorial in the darkroom and actually do that. So. Patience. There will be talk of Hebron, talk of a lovely Israeli boy, talk of strangers on buses, perhaps.

In the meantime, I'm sitting in the RadCam (Radcliffe Camera for all you non-Oxonians; one of the numerous buildings of the Bodleian Library) working hard. Well, working hard at avoiding work. It's actually pretty difficult to do that in this library because especially in the LCam (Lower Camera) everyone is really dedicated and conscientious. Which, really, is why I work here a lot, so I am encouraged by all these studious Oxford people.

Term just began yesterday, but I've been work-pressured since Wednesday when I received my first assignment and reading list. As it happened, that was also the first day my mother was in town for a visit -- good timing! She was very understanding and had her own things to do as well, but I wish I could have spent more time with her around Oxford. As it was, we spent a lot of the weekend together, Shabbat at Chabad and all that. She left early Sunday morning, a few hours before my ex-boyfriend arrived. With me still having lots of work to do. (These visits had been arranged a while beforehand, because I figured my workload wouldn't have begun yet. Um, wrong.)

It was good to see Dan again (we went out for two-plus years, had a somewhat difficult break-up this summer) and to know that we can still be friends and be comfortable together. I had to do a lot of work, but we could sit in the same room in silence and not feel awkward. A part of me thought that after the stupid things we did to each other, we probably couldn't be friends again. But that's not the case, which is reassuring. Also, he has a new girl, which makes him happy and I'm pleased to say makes me happy. Anyway, it was a generally pleasant weekend (although I missed the Zoo Bop and the next night I missed seeing my friend get so plastered that he had to be carried back to his room! haha). (Oh, also: We had a go at my bottle of absinthe while watching Eddie Izzard on Sunday night, but no hallucinations, sadly.)

Anyway, it seems like most of my break-side fun is coming to a quiet end. It also turns out that this term both of my tutorials are going to be on the same day. Whee. So. Back to this essay (on Christian intellectuals in 19th century England) and translating Mesechta Brachos of the Mishnayos.

People, Faces, Things

Among the things I really enjoyed in Israel were the people. Not getting run over by the cab drivers or pushed around the bus by rushed masses, but the individual faces. I spent a large part of my time out people-watching.

All those 18- and 19-year-old soldiers drew my eyes to them in their olive green and khaki uniforms and the rifles swinging alongside their legs. The juxtaposition of the weapons and the youthful faces was alarming at first, but in time I think I got somewhat used to it, or as much as you can.

Once I got past the big guns, I payed more attentions to the faces and builds and walks of the young men and women wandering the streets of Jerusalem in uniform. I think my interest in portraiture has given me a different sort of appreciation for "looks" in general. I have a tendency now to frame people's faces in a mental lens, imagine a snapshots. The snapshots are also little bits of stories that I get to explore in my own time, as well. It makes more sense 65-year-old woman surrounding by grocery bags on a bus to be "beautiful" when thought about as such.

Actually, I realized that most of the shots I took of people in Israel (see links on the side, especially "Black, White, and Turn"), aside from family, were of people at least a little older than I am. There's just so much more interesting in creases and folds and eyebrows and anger, so much more to tell.

Anyway, this has grown to be a bit of a ramble. All I meant to say is that Israel is a country choc full of beautiful people, conventionally so and otherwise. I hope I have the same sort of opportunities for portraiture here as I did on those crazy freakin' buses.

Back in Action

It's 2008 already; I haven't updated around here in over a month. That's OK, since this blog is mostly to keep family up-to-date with my goings-on in Oxford, and I spent the last month WITH my family.

A few days after winter break began, I flew out to Israel to visit my with brother and sister and their respective spouses in Jerusalem. It was difficult for me to go, as I was just beginning to enjoy vacation in Oxford -- friends, drinks, sillyness, no stress. The first week there was a challenge, too, mostly because I was hung up on Oxford. Plus, not being as comfortable with the language as I would have liked, I didn't explore freely on my own the way I usually do in a new city. While I wandered occasionally and did some of the main tourist things (such as the Wailing Wall and the Old City of Jerusalem and the Jewish shuk, the open market), I also spent some days in bed or in my brother's flat, reading, sleeping, and watching DVDs.

The next week was a bit better, mostly because I was becoming acclimated. And I was seeing lots of gorgeous soldiers. (I'm against war, but all for the physical beauty of such a great number of the Israeli people.) I made my own way to a few museums and some times just wandered the area near my sister's house, the downtown sort of place. My sister (Chava), my sister-in-law (Shira), some of Shira's family and I took a bit of a day trip to Amuka to visit the tomb of a rabbi. I found myself miserable on that day more than I can remember -- three hours in a stuffy car each way, hungry, craving Oxford, going to some place where people prayed to find their future spouses ...

The good parts of that trip are 1) I met a bull and gave him water when he was thirsty and 2) most days seemed much better in comparison. All the same, I still wasn't happy and eventually changed my ticket to come back to England a week early, at which point I felt a great sense of relief and I was able to enjoy myself more. This was followed by a greater understanding of conversational Hebrew, visits to museums, meeting a wonderful Israeli guy, my mother's arrival, another day trip up north (to Haifa), as well as one south (to Hebron). I hope to detail more of these in the coming week or two, as quite a few things struck me about the people and the culture and how I relate to the land that is supposed to be that of my forefathers.

But for now, I'm resting up from a long, long trip.

(By the way, I've put new photos on Flickr -- see the links on the left -- including a new category: black and white shots.)