Nika de Samothrace

S-P-b

Mon, 21 Dec 2009 13:41:23 GMT

Sometimes I think that nothing that happens to me outside of Saint-Petersburg is real.

That it's a mirage, a play, kind of a pretend life.

True story in the style of FML

Tue, 08 Dec 2009 04:51:00 GMT

Today, as I was leaving work, a nice older woman asked me what I was doing there. When I told her I worked here, she refused to believe me, because apparently I look 15. I'm a project manager at a large software company. It turns out she is the CFO. FML

Chemistry

Wed, 25 Nov 2009 05:57:11 GMT

I have a new theory.

I've been thinking a lot lately about what attracts two people.

Is there anyone at school or at work or at your bus stop who you can't help but keep thinking about? Who you want to touch, who will kiss you just right, who looks at you in just the right way? But then you try to date them, and it doesn't necessarily work out. You might not feel entirely comfortable with each other, or maybe you fight all the time, or maybe your priorities are in completely different places.

So, where does that "spark" come from? And why isn't it enough?

My theory is that the spark happens with people who represent past relationship issues we need to work out. If you had a French teacher in middle school who you had a huge crush on and it was never really resolved, you might now fall for a girl who looks exactly like her. Or if someone you were attracted to decided not to see you because they felt it would conflict with work, you will hook up with another co-worker next month. Or, you have always had issues with Capricorns, and now you are falling for the Capricorn next to you in a pottery class.

The problem with this is that we're not really solving past relationship problems but we are just creating new ones. And we should probably run from those people because we're setting ourselves up for heartbreak.

I will expand on this later, but for now - bedtime here in Madison.

Venice

Mon, 16 Nov 2009 00:12:32 GMT

"In Milan, traffic lights are instructions, in Rome they are suggestions, and in Naples they are decorations."

And in Venice, there is no need for traffic lights.

No cars. This is the single biggest difference between Venice and every other city in Italy.

I know, you were waiting for me to tell you about the channels and museums and all that touristy stuff. But for channels, you can go to Saint-Petersburg, and they won't be so smelly. For museums, you can go to Paris, and Louvre will blow you away. But if you want a city that looks the same as it did to your grandparents, if you want polluted water instead of polluted air, and if you want to walk through 2000 years of history in 2 hours, then Venice is your woman.

From Piazza San Marco to Piazzale Roma, through thin tiny streets, Venice is easy to get around and easy to get lost in.

Masks are everywhere. They are sold in small shops and kiosks, on the streets and on bridges. Venice itself wears a mask. On San Marco, you would think it's a tourist's paradise, dynamic and bustling, like the lion - the symbol of the city. But when you walk around for a few days, a little farther away from the main sites, this impression fades and Venice pulls off its smiling mask.

Underneath it all, Venice is still charming. But it has a different feel from most Italian cities - much more melancholic. The "touristy stuff" doesn't really fit with its past glory and aristocratic decay. But Venice is an old, old actress who plays her part very well.

Devil Bridge:

Bad Girls

Wed, 28 Oct 2009 20:22:52 GMT

When I was a little girl, my mother always told me to be modest.

She said that girls are supposed to be quiet and mysterious; if I'm not, boys won't like me.

Actually, I never particularly wanted to catch a boy. So I disregarded my mother's advice on demure behavior and got into all sorts of adventures. I went everywhere where I was not supposed to go.

Recent example. In Madrid, I wanted to see the roses in a garden in the center of the city. The garden was closed. I climbed over the fence, while my friend - a lawyer - was chastising me and telling me to stop. But I got to see pretty flowers, and don't regret it one bit.

Anyway. What I found out is that many more men were attracted to me when I was outspoken, mischievous, and sarcastic than on the rare occasions that I was "quiet and modest".

In fact, many nice boys are attracted to bad girls. Numerous studies have shown that we fall in love with those who are similar to ourselves. But other studies show that this preference is based on self-perception. So, if the nice boys actually think of themselves as "a little bit bad" - even if that little bit only involves eating popcorn in bed - they will tend to go for girls that society perceives as a little bit bad.

Moral of the story: don't listen to your mother. Go out and do something fun.

Who Is It For?

Sat, 17 Oct 2009 07:01:01 GMT

This blog is a really strange way of self-expression.

On one hand, I always thought that I write for myself. I record minute details of my travels. I write poems that are overly metaphoric, disjointed, difficult to decipher. I discuss random stories and overanalyze my feelings. This blog is just a way to put pieces of my thoughts together, so I don't lose them like I would if I wrote them down on a piece of napkin at a coffeeshop (been there, done that).

But apparently there's small audience to this blog. A very tiny one, but yet from time to time a stranger comments on an entry, or a friend refers back to something I've mentioned a few months ago, and I am reminded that this blog is actually read by other people.

And that is good and bad.

Good, because who doesn't like feedback? And bad, because I have to carefully censor the subjects of my entries, lest I confess something that I don't want the whole wild world to know. And with that censorship, the blog loses any kind of entertainment quality. After all, the excitement of peeping into the life of a stranger, complete with juicy details, is what makes reality TV so popular. And my blog is not reality TV. If you ever talk to me in real life, you might have a different idea then. But as is, I really do end up writing for myself - and a few friends - if not by conscious choice then by topic selection.

Sevens

Tue, 29 Sep 2009 06:16:36 GMT

I am 7777 days old today!

And you?

http://poplauki.awardspace.com/lifedays/index.php

Cola or Pepsi?

Mon, 14 Sep 2009 04:33:16 GMT

In Copenhagen, I was constantly offered random drugs. Big bars, small clubs, straight restaurants, gay coffeeshops - everywhere I went to, it seems. I wonder if there's just something about me that screams, "heavy drug user"?

Once, I was in the girls' bathroom of Cosy bar, which is a late-night hang out spot for when everything else has closed. I'm coming out of the cubicle, and there's a guy near one of the walls. I am about to scream, and he says, "Oh please don't yell, I am just looking for my coke".

So then I start washing my hands. He's definitely looking for something, searching his pants, jacket.. I'm brushing my hair (which was the real reason I came to the bathroom in the first place, it looked like a dead raven's nest by this time... if that raven was blonde). The guy just keeps looking miserable, pulling all pockets inside out. Suddenly, he pulls down his pants and makes a bright discovery! Well, apparently the coke was in his boxers.

At this point I'm already making my way toward the door, of course. And he calls after me, asking if I'd like some? Of course I say no thanks. He looks genuinely surprised. "But you're so pretty! Why would you not want coke?" This is a lovely way to look at things, but no, definitely not interested in coke from your underwear.

On Choices

Sat, 05 Sep 2009 00:01:44 GMT

I feel happy, stable.

It's difficult to choose a direction in which to go, if you have no idea what lies ahead. In my last couple of months of college, I didn't know what to do with myself. I thought of staying in one place and waiting for a sign. But how could something come to me if I wasn't going anywhere? So instead, i just picked a random direction: up north, to Wisconsin. I'm leaving all the questions be, and I'll go this way until it is clear that I need a new path.

If I find myself in some poisonous woods, I'll turn back and see what lies out east (Madrid? Barcelona?). Either way, if I keep moving, I'll keep yourself from guessing too much, and will try to stick to the "now", rather than past or present.

Catch Me at The Border

Sun, 09 Aug 2009 22:44:53 GMT

We silently danced on this platform
Waiting for two different planes:
Yours to the west and the warm,
Mine to the north, to the rains.

Schedules are lost, yours and mine,
And that scramble of letters you had -
Gone in the smell of mellow wine,
Lost in the latest sepia fad.

You hide from the rain in a drought
And keep chamomiles in disguise!
How'd you expect them to sprout
The kisses that scream battlecries?

Flooding my mouth with cherries
You chose. And I - chased.
I know, in three hundred years
You will forget my taste.

Random

Fri, 07 Aug 2009 05:17:13 GMT

A little while ago, I was talking to a friend who asked me what I thought on sexual attraction, how it's shaped, whether it is biological or societal or whatever. Basically, my answer is, a little bit of both.

I very much think that most of us have a solid hard-wire toward heterosexuality or homosexuality, and the soft-wiring is "imprinted" somewhere along the way with some wiggle room. Some of us are hard-wired more strongly one way than others, and sometimes the soft-wiring can change over time. This allows for the wide range of romantic and sexual behaviors that we see in different people.

Coffee Coffee Random Guys

Thu, 30 Jul 2009 16:44:20 GMT

So right now, I am sitting in a coffeeshop, drinking my big coffee from my big coffeecup.

But a few minutes ago, a guy tried to sit down next to me. "What's your name? Where are you from? Oh, Saint-Petersburg?" And then he asked where Saint-Petersburg is and what it is famous for.

I suggested that he google it. He actually opened his computer and started reading wikipedia articles out loud, trying to enlighten me about Russia. Oh, thank you, kind stranger! I had no idea that the Soviet Union fell apart. Or that Saint-Petersburg used to be the capital of the Russian Empire. Or that it snows in Russia in the winter.

Then he tried to figure out my age, and the spelling of my name. Yes, darling, "Nika" is very difficult to spell. Then he started asking me about my dating preferences.

I suggested that his time would be better spent elsewhere. That's when he asks how I managed to figure out that he was hitting on me, and kindly informs me that he'd like to keep trying. Dude, no. I'm definitely not interested.

Traditional Gender Roles

Sun, 26 Jul 2009 03:09:32 GMT

There are some "classic" marriage conceptions that I hear over and over again. It's considered remarkable when people who are marrying are obviously not in love, or if he is staying home with the kids and she is building her career.

But a lot of things we take for granted about marriage and family life are relatively recent changes. Of course, even several hundred years ago, few people married someone they detested outright. But, love was not considered a good reason to get wed. If it happened to grow during a marriage, love was a nice fringe benefit, but up until 100 years ago, it definitely wasn't a necessity. Rather people looked for someone who would be a good and steady spouse, a good worker, and so on, to partner with in their journey through life and raise a family with.

A major reason why love was not part of the marriage equation is that men and women both looked for someone who could handle his or her share of work. Throughout history many men were self-employed, had their own trade or a farm, and commonly worked at home alongside their wives - and kids - in whatever trade they were engaged in.

The "traditional gender roles" with the manly male who goes out to work and comes home to eat, discipline and make more kids, and his wife is at home taking care of the house and offspring, are quite a new social construct. This model only appeared after the Industrial Revolution, with the rise of the middle class and of men's employment in industry/manufacture.

And now that the share of workforce engaged in industry and manufacture has dramatically decreased, "the man as breadwinner" model is getting outdated. The biggest share of the workforce is now in the service industry, where neither gender has an advantage over the other. In that way, the greater gender equality in the workforce is driven by purely economic reasons.

Friends

Mon, 13 Jul 2009 05:30:24 GMT

It's totally vital to surround self with spontaneous people as opposed to fickle ones.

Spontaneous is "hey, let's go ice-skating!" and you pack up and go five minutes later. Fickle is getting to the rink and saying, "wait, I don't want to skate anymore." Spontaneity enriches your senses without necessarily being a burden. Fickleness constantly throws you off-balance and creates more fickleness.

Uncertainty and brooding = boring...
Swimming in the fountain at 3 am = fun!

Road Taken

Thu, 09 Jul 2009 05:09:16 GMT

When Chen was teaching me how to drive, he kept asking if I enjoyed it.

Once, it was in the middle of a heavy rain. The road was narrow, the windshield wipers were not working, and I felt like I was about to crush. Anxious and panicky, I said that I'd be glad if I never had to drive again.

Back then, I was so worried about what might happen: that the car would slid, that another driver would not see me, that the rain would never stop. After driving in all sorts of conditions, though, I learned one thing. I can't control anything besides my own driving.

I can choose what route I take, which lane I'm in, what speed I'm driving with. The traffic and weather I have to accept as given: there is no point in trying to predict them. At a red light, I stop. At a green, I go. So I try to go with the flow, and that's why I now enjoy driving.

What You Were Born Into

Mon, 06 Jul 2009 05:06:29 GMT

A few years ago A-s left his Latin American country to live in a Scandinavian one. He prefers the Scandinavian way of life. When he visits his home country, he complains about its backwardness. He is sure he will never go back, and doesn't understand why anyone would choose to stay there.

To me, the country you were born in is like a mother. There's nothing wrong with the decision to leave your country, just like there is nothing wrong with moving out of your parents' home. You can disagree with her actions, beliefs, and plans. But you can never change that she raised you, even if your upbringing was messed up. You are part of her.

Scandinavia is A-s's hot new lover. It might eventually become a long-term spouse, but it's all up in the air. He can switch Scandinavia for the Mediterranean, North America, or the snow of Eastern Russia. But no one can get a new mother, so A-s will always be a Latin American.

Glossary Expansion

Thu, 25 Jun 2009 04:03:08 GMT

Third edition of the niktionary (nika + nic dictionary). This glossary is of absolute importance to anyone conducting any sort of business with bunnies** or wolves**. The niktionary brings you the real definitions of words that you accepted as given, such as coffee**, dinner**, and carrots**.

From the previous edition, you learned of carrots. Many like these stout, hard vegetables; sharing your carrot might be appropriate after a proper dinner, if your dinner guest has a taste for them. Let's go on...

Desserts = A nice alternative to carrots. Like a carrot, a dessert can be eaten in a variety of different ways. Some enjoy the rough, hard, thick carrot roots; and some like the sweet, strong flavor of a fruity, mushy dessert. Yet others combine the two foods.

Quick lunch = When bunny girls get a bit bored with their boy bunnies, they tend to escape for a quick lunch to try carrots from other gardens.

Eating jalapeños = Obliviousness to the business going on in nearby closed spaces.

Damage control = When you wake up and think, what fun things did I do yesterday and how do I undo them?

Studying = Be sure that if someone is telling you that he is engaging in this activity, he is definitely not.

Queen project = Successful management of many coffees and dinners.

**explanations found at http://diverges.livejournal.com/8068.html

Balance

Tue, 23 Jun 2009 07:10:22 GMT

It is hard to let go of the familiar and the secure. Who knows if the new thing will be half as good as the old one? But there is no real safety in what has lost its meaning. The only way to gain confidence is through battling your own fears, one by one.

As children, we learn defensive mechanisms that are needed to cope with the environment that we are in; when we are adults, these mechanisms can turn destructive. In Jeux D'Enfants, Julien and Sophie kept playing a children's game well into their adulthood because it used to be a safety net for them. The game protected them from life's problems and from their own feelings, which were scary and difficult to deal with. The more Julien and Sophie tried to escape their feelings with the help of the game, the more it destroyed their lives - and the lives of those around them.

The more you are afraid to do something, the more you have to do it. If you hide away in your protective bubble, you are separating yourself from everything around you. And the key to being whole, I think, is to connect yourself with world, find a balance between the inner and the outer.

Wien

Sat, 20 Jun 2009 01:28:06 GMT

Vienna is an uptight, cocky girl who was spoiled rotten by her rich parents.

Nic and I went there last July. We got there in the morning, and joined Austrian kids in running around the curved mazes of the pretty gardens in Schönnbrunn.

But the grown-up Austrians are as stuck-up and serious as they are clean-cut and well-dressed. At a concert in Palais Palffy, we had front row seats. Frenchies with VIP passes in line ahead of us were getting upset that they had to wait to be seated. Austrians were absolutely oblivious to the Frenchies' complaints: "You will seat where we will tell you, and we will tell you whenever we feel like it."

However, the concert itself was amazing. The main violinist played with a feeling I didn't expect from this cold, arrogant city. He was in tune with every single player in his orchestra. In the middle, he let the flutist to take over the lead over the orchestra for a breathtaking thirty seconds.

In the collected and cautious Vienna, I did not expect to see a dance imitating a girl getting intoxicated on a picnic with her boyfriend. That part of the concert was called "Don't drink and dance". But I thought a drunk picnic was a great idea, and the male dancer, who winked at me, probably thought so as well ;).

Because of the UEFA cup, we couldn't get into the center of the city and didn't see much nightlife. But the city was so empty at night that we got the large straight streets and the huge cubic buildings all to ourselves.

After all the sharp and clean lines of downtown, we went to the Hunderwasser's museum. Everything you heard about his architectural style is true. Twisted floors, houses under meadows, pool-shaped windows, pictures of bleeding cities. Hunderwasser was right - it is so much easier to walk on curved surfaces!

Wed, 17 Jun 2009 14:32:29 GMT

I found a rather nice translation of my favorite poem by Pushkin. His love life was uneasy: he wasn't happy with his wife and even less happy apart from her.

I loved you; and perhaps I love you still,
The flame, perhaps, is not extinguished; yet
It burns so quietly within my soul,
No longer should you feel distressed by it.
Silently and hopelessly I loved you,
At times too jealous and at times too shy.
God grant you find another who will love you
As tenderly and truthfully as I.

Hay besos que no dicen nada y hay besos que lo dicen todo.

Fri, 05 Jun 2009 04:47:46 GMT

There are kisses that say nothing and there are kisses that say everything.

Discuss?

As a side note - I'm getting totally addicted to Los Hombres de Paco.

I wonder if it's possible to learn a foreign language just through watching a lot of television in it?

In Nine Slides

Thu, 16 Apr 2009 17:12:03 GMT

Representation of you - in nine images. This is cool. Do it.

Rules:
a) Type your answer to each of the questions below into Flickr Search (http://www.flickr.com/).
b) Using ONLY the first page, pick an image.
c) Copy and paste each of the URLs for the images into Mosaic Maker. Change rows to 3 and columns to 3 (http://bighugelabs.com/flickr/mosaic.php).
d) Save the image and post it as a reply to this entry or your own journal!

The Questions:
1. What is your first name?
2. What is your favorite food?
3. What is your favorite color?
4. Favorite band?
5. Dream vacation?
6. Favorite hobby?
7. What you want to be when you grow up?
8. What do you love?
9. One word to describe you?

Work Addiction

Tue, 14 Apr 2009 03:11:02 GMT

How workaholics are born:

Take ingredient a) addictive personality.

Coat it with ingredient b) demanding job.

Mix it all together: convince the potential addicts they HAVE to do demanding job. (To have money to pay for food, to get college credit, whatever. Any semi-logical explanation will do.)
Add in a little spice: make their home situation a bit complicated so they don't feel like staying at their houses 24/7.

And behold: after a few months, the workaholic says hi to the world.

Random Mood Reflection

Mon, 06 Apr 2009 00:18:26 GMT

I played around with Photoshop while taking a five-minute break from Economics today.

It's the Fisherman's Bastion, in Budapest:

Family Times

Sat, 04 Apr 2009 05:06:20 GMT

Just got off the phone with my grandmother.
Lately, she switched her number one question from, "Do you have a boyfriend yet?" to "Do you have a job yet?"
Times are changing.