tea sugar and a dream

first of all, it is covered in blue eyes. everywhere. they are like freckles. blue freckles. the evil eye for protection. maybe this is why istanbul felt so calming. there was nothing to worry about. the train in from the outskirts of the airport into to the neighborhood sultanahmet where meredith and i stayed was the first indicator of what the city holds. it holds and offers a little bit of everything. we passed high-rise apartment buildings that were all painted different colors. and i don't mean all different types of blue or beige. i mean, blues, greens, pinks, yellows, reds, purples, and so on. but they weren't obnoxious about their color. they just were. we passed parts of town that could compete with new york city. and when we pulled into our part of town, standing there in the night sky, bold and beautiful in her age and wisdom, the Hagia Sophia. and i think it was that moment, that something in me either switched on, or switched off. i can't tell which one it was, but it was amazing.
it has been interesting to be in italy and realize that people think i am italian, or spanish, and i was even more surprised to find that in turkey everyone thought i was turkish. and when they found out i was american they didn't believe me. but about being american in turkey. i wasn't nervous, but i did have a little caution in how people would react to me. but it was amazing. everyday i found myself in numerous conversations with strangers about politics and life and culture and art and everything. and no one, and i mean no one held me responsible for anything. thank god. but i was so in love with how people talked to each other, and listened, and were interested, and offered tea... hmm... oh i drank so much tea, and so much of it was free. perfect. what more do i want from life than to live some place beautiful in an open and interested community? i don't know... not much. it was wonderful. in the turkish bath house (thats right. turkish bath house. i almost didn't leave...) it was perfect. the women in istanbul seem to disappear a little if not only because the men in istanbul are insanely prominent. (if you think italian guys are bad, they ain't got shit on the turks... ain't. got. nothin.) but in the bath house, you walk in and there are just women. no one has an age, no one has a race. it was beautiful. i was on the verge of tears multiple times in there. especially when i met two women from israel and two from Lebanon. we all noticed each other because we all looked the same. the two from Lebanon were a little more milky in their skin tone, and the Israelis a little darker. and i was just in the middle. it was the most beautiful conversation. they just wanted to know what people thought of the other, and wanted people to know that not everyone in any country likes what is going on. i can't even describe...
and the call to prayer, a couple times a day. i could lsiten to that for the rest of my life.
anyway. istanbul is amazing. and i met the most amazing people. not just people from istanbul, but people traveling through. i really think i might try to live there for a little bit of my life. some time. at least, i need to go back.
oh, and tea, sugar and a dream. that is how they say to pronounce thank you in turkish. tesekkür ederim.
yeah. the city just got more beautiful ever day and night.
any questions? that might be easier.
oh, and also, i will post some pictures of some doodles i made in instanbul later. my camera is tired.

i know this isn't monday

ok. busy busy busy. i finished my midterms. at least i know the art one's went well. :) so, tomorrow morning i leave for ISTANBUL!!!!! FOR A WEEEEEKKKK!!!! i am so excited. so so excited. so yeah, if yall don't hear from me for a week, it is because i am there. but i may try to check in. we'll see. but yes. i promise a big juicy post when i get back. but until then. last weekend i was in siena and florence. amazing trip. it was so heavy with art and information. it was basically three days of nothing but walking all over the place and seeing so much art and listening and trying to take in so much information.
this is a picture of siena. siena felt so sweet. lots of steep hills and they do the horse thing there which means that each neighborhood is decked out with their team "logo" (as it were) i wish i could have spent more time there, and i think i will go back. but from what i heard the city has such an interesting history. aside from duke-ing it out with florence all the time, they some interesting social medical economic... stuff. well said, i know. i'm always good wish the specific information...

moving on! florence.

well. the amount of art is saw in florence.... man. i felt like i was drunk on it. and len! as the bus pulled into florence i saw one of those vampire-like graffiti figures! now, i am not posting any pictures of art because.. well... i can't decide what to put up. it was so exciting! florence, while beautiful, and so much cleaner than rome didn't appeal to me as a place to want to stay for a long period of time. there was this feeling of impermanence... which may sound odd considering all of the history that creates such a rooted story for the city. but it felt like everyone there was only there in passing. now, while some of you may be thinking, oh yeah, and rome isn't full of people in passing? i say to you, yes of course rome has some of that... but, but. everyone in rome comes and goes while being surrounded by actually romans. like... people live here. roman people. and they all speak italian, rather than english. i was surprised at how annoyed i got at all the english in florence. i don't know. i can't speak that well, but i like the try damn it. and also, it is in italy! own it! but anyway...
i have to finish my laundry, and finish packing. and then! a fun night in rome before meredith and my flight bright and early in the morning!
anything anyone wants from istanbul? cause i'm planning on coming back to rome with at least one extra suitcase.
let me know before tomorrow morning!

p.s.
i stared at the statue of david for more than 2 hours. i think he breathes....
but a lot of the sculptures seemed to breathe.

ok ok

sorry to have kept yall waiting (xiomara....) things have gotten, well... i feel like i can't say busy... it's just plain un-italian... but well... i have had much to do. not complaining. i've been very happy. so no worries. midterms are next week (yeah, i don't know how that is possible either) but because of this there has been some more time consuming things to take care of.

but yes. also! i leave bright and early (possibly a little too bright and early) tomorrw morning for Siena and Florence for three days with my art history class. i am very very very excited, but also a little anxious due to all the work that is due as soon as i get back. but honestly, in comparison to what i'm used too it is nothing. but still....
so yes, when i get back i will post pictures, words of the trip, and also some pictures of the stuff i've been making.
cause, it is all at school now for midterms, and i haven't taken pictures yet. so you all will have to wait a little bit longer. (xiomara... hehe sorry, i tease you)


but in the mean time, some light reading.

carlos making a face while making Tostones!!!! which he calls patacones. shrug. at this point, my mind is such a mess of sounds and pieces of things that might be words to someone, and half understood grammer...
don't get me started...



playing with meredith. good times. i know this really convinces everyone that i've been busy....
oh yeah, i saw the pope the other day... yeah. dude causes such a freakin riff in my mornings. every wed. god damn. and this time he even had an orchestra. maybe it was a special day.. who knows. people had more flags than usual...
i'm walking around - i repeat - around san pietro because shit's all crazy inside for pope's weekly ordeal, and you have to wait in lines and go through metal deterctors just to walk through the damn place, which you honestly couldn't do due to how many people are in there, but anyway, back to the fact that i'm walking around san pietro. i realize that people are all swarming to the gates in a more... needy way than i usually witness, and since i was a little later than usual i just so happened to glance over and then, oh hey. there's the pope. i guess i should take a picture or something. it's really blurry cause it was zoomed in. but here... enjoy... or something. he's that blurry white thing.


i'll post again when i get back sunday or monday.

peace yall

doodles? (sketches?) whatever.

these are from those hill towns. i never put them up, so, here ya go.



these are just little river/bridge studies



and this is from the pantheon


more later.

last night with len for some time

sorry the picture quality ain't so hot.
maybe i'll replace it later.
we'll see.
anyway.
len, on cardboard....

blah blah

somehow it became saturday, and even more surprising, somehow it became saturday the 22nd. not so sure how that happened, but i'm here. time seems to move so fast here, which is an interesting concept for a place that has so much time. (time in various forms... but time all the same)
classes took off at about a million miles an hour. i suppose mostly because the semesters here are so short. i keep finding myself in moments of looking around and thinking "wait.. what? when? oh good god..." midterms are in about 3 weeks or so.
(let me reiterate: "wait.. what? when? oh good god...")
it is slowly getting colder here, but is still rather beautiful out... most of the time.
first of all, this is for gianna. this is that guy that sing that really... odd.... music video you made me watch. remember? dutchland? take me to dutchland? that guy. yeah. this is by him. he scares me.

len and his feelings about the vatican. "the place of evil" - jan (the most best awesome art history man in the world)

a little more roman art

around the corner from my apartment, they put up lights... don't know why... but it is pretty.

and, len and i at the "colosseo"

and we're walkin'/some things about feet/a very scattered mentioning of things

so, i took an art history trip to a Musei Capitolini and saw one of constantine's feet. such a pretty foot. he has a hand, a knee, a face, some other things too, but feet are important to me right now, so here is the foot.
i really like my teacher. he gives a whole other better possibility of what art history could be.
the guy on the horse, Marcus Aurelius, was an interesting stop on our tour. first of all, a word about bronze.
if you ever see art that is bronze, take a moment and realize that something fortunate happened for it to still be with us.
bronze, a re-meltable/re-usable material. a whole lot of art/artifacts were melted down and used for... you know... military shit, and of course some other things too.
so anyway, good old Marcus over here is only with us because when he was found people thought he was Constantine and saved him. if they had known, he would have been melted away into other various shapes and uses.

so, about feet,
len and i went with a nice big handful of temple rome students on the FAMOUS WALL WALK.
this ment meeting at 8:30am and walking around the city via the path of The Aurelian Wall. this wall which makes its way around the city of rome, dissapearing into the ground and then seems to pop right back where it first and always was. i believe it was started in the 270's? or something. anyway, it was a nice 13 mile walk. with little pauses for information by one of my new favorite people in the world. in. the. world. Jan (said like "yaan") Gadeyne (said like "gah-dine"). i am not sure if that is how he spells his name. but he is the meaning of the phrase "the shit"
this is one of the many, many portals in the wall.


so, as a final note, after this walk, i took what was possibly the most enjoyed shower of my entire life.
and here are a couple pictures of me trying to get my used-for-making-things gears oiled and back in motion.
these are two quick little landscape thingies. yeah, they're on cardboard.


these are a couple of blind contour drawings. just in case anyone does not know what that is - just in case! - that means you are doing a drawing with line only to describe whatever it is you are drawing (i could go into contours, but i will leave it at this... for now) and not looking at the paper while you do this. no looking allowed. (also, that last one has some bad lighting, and you can see some stuff from the paper under it. my bad)





ok,
my feet are the best ever because they hold me up and i love them for it.