Cybertron Flower

I've had a lot of good experience of asking your folks for recs in the past, so here we go again: recommendation for Basque Country and Thailand?

I am especially looking for things that are not obvious - although if you feel that something is obvious and either absolutely amazing or a waste of time, please say so, too :)

I also know that those are two vastly different places. But well, it's the places we are going to :D

Almost burnout is not a reason to cook less. Either the opposite, since cooking is mediation and good food essential. So ...

This is also not everything I cooked, but I switched to making photos with my phone so you only get the phone ones. (Part of my quest of being less perfectionist and letting things go and posting this without waiting until I gt the photos from the proper camera.)

I am trying to tilt my eating habits even more towards fresh vegs and legumes, trying to stick to meat just once (or in one dish I cook) a week and make myself eat fish once a week, too (this one is harder because my fish-cooking skills lack the variety and it's actually really hard to get good fish in my area). Anyway, here we go - as usual, just ask for recipe or details if something seems especially interesting!



Fried rice. I usually prefer to make mine with snow peas, not with normal peas, but my supermarket did not have any. I added some broccoli to veggie it up a bit more then. Anyway, always easy, always yum.


( 24 more dishes )

I guess this (short glimpses of my life via commented photos) seems to be my new post format? I'll just roll with it. We'll see how long it stays that way.

So let's go back to the last two weeks of August and the USA (August 17-25) & Austria (August 26 - September 3) trip.

( food, museums, geeky stuff, etc. )

( ... continue here )

So I am back from a conference where I did hang out not with my usual crowd (since none of them were around) and I am taking bets that most of the "new" people think me social and outgoing and somebody you can have a good conversation with. I see how this happens: I try talking to people and to include everyone at the table in conversations, and I make stupid jokes when chairing a session that ends up starting 10 minutes too late because people are late coming back from lunch. I am not perfect, of course - this was a conference without my usual crowd, so long coffee breaks are sometimes hard to fill and I ended up fleeing to play Pokémon Go a few times ("so how is your science going?" only brings you so far with senior people of whom I know that they are hating everything me and my collaborators are doing). But this is not what this is about - it's just a catalyst for a few thoughts about small talk and (dinner) conversations.

I.
USA taught small talk. I think I haven't been the worst before, but now I am definitely much better at it. Mind it, I'm still awful at the high art of the fast American small talk at parties, the one where people jump topics and where nobody waits for the other to finish their story before picking up a new thread. But I can hold and often even enjoy a random conversation as long as there is some sense to it (the sense may be to make someone feel good by giving them a bit of attention or smooth over an awkward situation).

II.
J., my dinner buddy and I, are not friends. Our meetings are fancy dinners that we spend having enjoyable conversations about travel, being a woman in male dominated fields, East-European heritage, food in general, the perils of living in the Netherlands and whatever other random stuff comes up.
I don't think we could be friends, we do not click on that level, but we are perfect dinner buddies - she is one of few people who have seen me drunk (more about that another time, it's somewhat embarassing) and I would offer her my couch any time (and she would have offered me hers). We may have a different outlook on life, thus the no friends thing, but I also deeply enjoy her insights into corporate world and her travel recommendations. We also started our dinners cleverly: with a less fancy place (a French bistro that taught me to like Weißburgunder), to try out how things work out between us. We knew each other fleetingly from conferences since she did her PhD in astrophysics, too - but was she someone I want to spend five hours over amazing food with? A nice dinner is far more than just the food. And it was relaxing to acknowledge that this was a trial run - if it had not worked, well ... a pity, but so be it. Four Michelin star dinners and perhaps more in the future tell you that it did. And most things we talk about are not small talk though we may be employing the techniques that I do associate with it.

III.
Why do these conversations between J. and I. work?
Let me take a step back and start from further away. Showing that I am interested and asking questions does not come to me naturally. Sometimes I realize in the middle of conversation how good the other person is at it and pause internally, admiring them and how interesting they make me feel, how they make the conversation flow. I, on the other hand (or perhaps it's the same for them and I just can't tell), have to force myself to do so. Until it becomes almost natural, admittedly; fake it till you make it. But then I encounter someone who is perfectly socially elegant and I have to pause and admire them and try to learn from them. And since elegant is a word often reserved for looks, let me emphasize: this has nothing to do with appearances but with the ease with which people move through conversations.
This meta-cognition of the conversation, the fact that I have to make myself ask and follow up and nod along, do not mean that I am not intrinsically interested, that I am just playing, offering a facade. I deeply believe that being interested is more often than mot a conscious decision. And if there is something that my conversation partner is enthusiastic about and wants to talk about, it's easy to be interested in it. (Assuming that this is someone I want to spend time with or at least made a conscious decision to spend time with; let's not talk about the forced hours spend with someone in a car or alike, that's a different story.)

IV.
I do, however, expect reciprocation (assuming that this is not someone I asked to have a coffee with me because I wanted to pick their brains about something ).
There is nothing more frustrating than someone who shows zero interest in me or what I have to say. If no questions, not a single sigh of being curious about me comes, I start laying tracks, casually mentioning things. "Yes, I lived in Boston, which has amazing museums, a great chocolate factory, but the transatlantic flights there are atrocious" easily opens a way for the other person to talk about our mutual love for museums, likes or dislikes of different kinds of chocolate or the trials of long flights. But some people just don't take this up, ignore any track I lay out. If we are stuck together over a meal (a thing that happens often at conferences), why not try to make it enjoyable for both sides? Except if you want it to be quiet - which is sad (and terribly frustrating, in case they were the one who suggested to do something together) but fine, I can do that, please just ...

V.
... don't keep talking.
I am far too polite to not ask questions (smoothing social awkwardness is really important to me, even though I am shit at it most of the time) but at some point, when people keep on talking and talking and ignore my own contributions (you mention that one book? Cool! Here are some thoughts about books, how about we talk about books now? How about me mentioning another book that is similar? No? You really just want to keep telling me about that one? Well, OK, then you'll get a few "hmmmms ..." and nods since you seem not interested in a conversation).
It's just - next time, I'm going with someone who else. I can also have a nice half an hour with my book or my phone. Or you know, just me; being an introvert, I really like being alone with my thoughts.

VI.
There are, of course, people, who can keep talking and talking and talking at me when they need it and where I don't mind. But those are close friends and I know that they will listen to me in the same way. N. is one. There are few others.
(And there is, of course, LJ, where you can nothing but listen. But even here, it's more about the conversation to me that about reading.)

VII.
There are other ways of conversations breaking down: people killing them with answers that do not allow any follow up (there is just so much of one-word or one-sentence answers that I can stand until I give up on asking and quietly suffer through the following social awkwardness). People being assholes and idiots and bigots (but this one is a different failure, the other ones are all about the how of communicating not the what).

VIII.
And there are moments when things break together, when conversation just does not happen even if it did before. A bad day? A bad mood? Something like it (I'm thinking back to the last dinner with a two friends of mine that just felt terribly long although it was not ). But even then one can tell whether the other side is at least trying.

I'm back from Madeira - which also explains why I was not around and commenting for the last 10 days. Sorry about that.

It was great to disengage for 10 days: hiking, food, sleep, a new landscape, lizards everywhere, puffy Madeira finks almost eating from your hands, roads to steep for my comfort (and in one case also for ♥'s), the sticky feeling of sunscreen on the skin - photos to follow, I need to sort through them. Unfortunately, life did not solve itself in the meantime, so I'm still in what feels an endless waiting loop. I guess there is nothing but to deal. So, plans for this coming week, at least until Friday:

• Start eating my way through the contents of my freezer. There may be a chance that I don't need to yet, but the one that I need to is much higher. Also salads. I've missed them on Madeira.
• Wash and iron and sort through some of my clothes, think about what is really worth transporting again and what may be not.
• Medical paperwork. Nothing serious, just getting money back.
• A dinner out with friends. Maybe also meet other two friends, but there may have been a misunderstanding in terms of dates, need to clear that.
• Write that public talk for Dortmund. How comes it's almost time to give it? In general: organize Dortmund. Get in touch with everyone. Finally get a timeline for the panel + talks that I need to attend.
• Be really nice to my feet. (I needed eight band aids at once at a point during the Madeira trip. Ouch.)
• Break in new shoes. I really want to take them with me on that crazy trip in May (well, in less than two weeks ...), but I should not without being sure that I can walk in them for a whole day.
• Wash my rainjacket.
• Work on color-color paper. That thing needs to happen this summer, no matter what.
• Visit Amsterdam on Monday.
• Do the Madeira finances. (We've been keeping a spreadsheet with all our spendings, so this should be easy. Just need to remember to do it.)
• Travel requests for Tübingen and London. Accommodation Tübingen.

And as an amusing side remark: when I left Madeira today morning - or rather noon, since my flight was almost two hours late because the incoming flight had to land on the neighboring island due to winds (turns out, Funchal is one of the most dangerous airports in the world where pilots need extra training) - it was plus ten and raining. It's plus 22 and sunny in the Netherlands, everyone is wearing summer dresses ...

I hate it when I manage to maneuver myself into one of those emotional downs. I see them coming and sometimes just can't stop myself digging myself in deeper.

Case in point today - everything feels as if it does not make any sense and I should just give up. I was unproductive and went home early (thanks to overtime I've done last week I could) and instead of trying to turn things around, here I am online, googling stuff up and realizing that I should have submitted that giant proposal last year (no matter that I could not have had for reasons of both mental health and research status) instead of waiting for this, because of course I have a year less than I thought (and thus a try less) because they count years in that strange way of theirs and no matter how long I stare at the document, the 2011 is not going to turn into 2010. Ugh, ugh.

Anyway, objectively this all is not a problem and I have a great job lined up (while several amazing people I know do not), it's just:

• I did not get enough sleep last night. By own fault, I was reading on my phone instead of reading my book and then, you know, turning the light off at some point. Instead there I was, at 2 AM, wide awake.
• I had a full weekend: which was amazing with visiting an LJ friend in Utrecht and a game night before that, but I also did not have time to relax and my kitchen still is a mess.
• I'm somewhere around ovulation which usually makes me feel bloated. And right now I feel the 1-1.5 kg fluctuation I have during the cycle dearly both in how my body feels and in how it looks.
• I've changed shampoos and my hair needs time to get used to it, so today, while it still looked OK, it just felt awful and did not bring out that (expensive but very good) haircut I got last week at all.
• I spent too much time on social media. As usual: everybody else is successful and I am not. (I mean, no matter that they are freaking in a different subject and I could not have even applied for that stuff they got? Or that I would not even want their jobs?)
• ♥ got a rejection for one of his application. (Yes, for this particular ones it was to be expected but ugh ... Why can't it just fall together perfectly?)
• My friends are going to that amazing conference but I can't because I am not part of the team (wrong country, pax, wrong county, you cannot be part of this collab, no mattr how good you are ...).
• I went to lunch with colleagues whom I do not especially like. And who. Did. Not. Vote. AAARGH. (Local elections in the Netherlands, EU citizens can vote on the local level in the municipality of their residence.)
• I misjudged some cooking times (and the size of my pan) and now the curry I made to eat for lunch during the week is less than perfect and I keep thinking back to the perfect one I made the week before the last week but I still have two portions left.
• I realized I sent the people in T. who are preparing my contract for the job there the wrong tax number. I can still rectify it, but ARGH. Also reminds me of the apartment search (which cannot commence until I know whether I am moving alone or with ♥).
• I missed pilates today, see the lack of sleep, but now it makes me feel even more like a failure, see also the feeling bloated, especially given how this resulted in the less than fun lunch and did not result in much more progress done on the current project that would have happened if I went.
• I offered a friend to stay in my place while we are in Madeira and am now having waves of "what if she now has the worst ever impression of me because there is dust in the corners and it's generally just a shitty rental place?".
• There are another two proposals coming up and then the Spanish PhD candidate is coming and in between we are hiring the student for the next year and I need to do things for colleagues I promised ages ago ... And when I am supposed to work on my own science projects? You know, the ones that are the only thing that matters for evaluations?
• Oh, and it looks like I forgot to submit the abstract for that one conference I changed the mind about going to. Fuck. (Still have time to submit a late poster and I did not expect to get a talk anyway ...)
• And my left upper tooth hurts. It's likely some annoying bit of gingivitis that is going to go away in a few days (and I've just been to the dentist last months and had X-rays done less than a year ago and everything was fine) but anything teeth-related sends me into panic-mode.
• And don't forget that allergic reaction I got at the moment on my stomach. It itches.

I know most of the above things are untrue or no matter for worries or or or or. But right now, it all just feels too much.

It all just needs to get out.

And now that it is, I guess I will put my big girl pants on and go and make myself feel better. I did already make a herbal tea (cacao husk tea - and of course I freaked out because this was the last cup but made myself search and actually found another package, neatly stashed away from my last big tea buying spread; enough for until T.) instead of a coffee (re:sleep or the lack thereof) and washed my hair. It's not as if there is someone else who can pull me out if it but me myself.

And perhaps I leave you with this essay here: This Is What ‘Self-Care’ REALLY Means, Because It’s Not All Salt Baths And Chocolate Cake - which is not always right (and I am generally very tongue in cheek about motivational speakers and their writing) but an interesting point to start thinking and also very quotable.

I was supposed to give a talk tomorrow - kind of lucky now that I planned to make the slides (or adapt the ones I had from a similar one) tomorrow on the train, since it just got cancelled. And by just, I do mean at half past ten at night. They've been nice about it and I could still have given it, but people would not have had the time to chat afterwards, at it is mainly about that scientific discussion that I care most. Oh well, trying again some time in March.

(Btw., I am moving in June/July, not April. Which is a big relief. Also means that we don't have to cancel our Madeira trip. And we may have just booked Crete. Well, it's a holidays for ♥ and half-holiday half-conference for me, but so is life. At least he get to snorkel without me getting bored or him feeling guilty for leaving me alone.)

What else? I did run this weekend. Actually, I was so upset on Friday night, when it looked like all my carefully laid travel plans for Tübingen, London and Crete would fall together because of a stupid thing I cannot not move if I want to keep my job (offer), that I went out and, for the first time in my whole life, perhaps, and definitely for the first time in my adult life did run five minutes non-stop and 16 minutes overall. Yeah, week four of C25K. Building stamina for hiking. And once I got home ♥ helped me to unravel my appointment knot. I still spend three weeks traveling somewhere every second day, partly getting up at 5 AM and partly getting home after midnight and still end up missing some of my favorite people visiting Germany, but there was no way around it ...

Otherwise this Sunday was a lot of work and procrastinating over work and being upset about people not being reliable or at least not admitting that they don't have time to do something (I mean, I offered to take over that job on Friday - but you told me that you can do it! So don't waste the whole Saturday with having done it half-heartedly in a way that made me repeat everything D:).

OK, OK, enough about being upset. You know what helps me when I am? Repetitive movements and Terry Pratchett audiobooks. Cue this:



Yes, those are Pokémon cross stitches. I'm going to buy smaller embroidery hoops and use them as frames and give those as presents to my two Pokémon-playing friends, who like this kind of crafty stuff themselves.

And if any of you - there is always a chance, right? - wants any, let me know! Preferably with a choice of a few of your favorite pokemon. Or even just one if you feel strongly about it. A group (say all evolution steps or all eevolution or ...) would also be cool, albeit it may be hard to find the right pattern. I'm dreading the moment the Articuno is done and it is definitely going to happen before the current book, "A Hat Full of Sky" is finished.

I've been to Potsdam (3 days for work) and Berlin (4 days for fun) but then I brought back a cold and all my plans to post about the trip disappeared into bouts of coughing and trying to force myself to get out and do stuff while absolutely not feeling like this. Anyway: this was a good trip, I'd be glad to repeat it (and chances are good that more in the same format to the same places are upcoming). Some random, somewhat illustrated impressions:

** Potsdam **


( photo )

Isn't this what people imagine science to look like? (Admittedly, I took the photo to be able to refer back to it later and to ask more questions.)
Potsdam was good. Several hour-long discussions. Good general conversations. Good vibes. A talk that was supposed to be 45 minutes (and I've given a somewhat longer version of it in 45 minutes), but took almost two hours because people kept asking questions. Got answers to some questions that I did not have.
I will be coming for more work in the next years.


** Berlin **

Berlin was also surprisingly lovely - that the first time I did not think "this is not a city I could live in". Well, maybe also because we stayed in the inner parts, but even those I did not like as much before. But then again, the first time I've been to Berlin was in 1999. The city changed a lot since then (and got more expensive).

It felt as if we had a rather lazy holidays - we ended up with a very nice hotel next to Alexanderplatz (if you ever want a recommendation) that just invited one to sleep in. It looked good on the photos when I booked, but I did no expect it to be that big or that modern. And I just love places that have a kitchenette - several rounds of Moscow Mules may have happened. And I am now seriously considering a Nespresso machine.

*~*~*


( photo )

Two dinners with shiny_crystal, once of them in a really cozy coffee house - I really hope we'll manage to see each other more often. Twice Korean food (bibimbap; spicy soup and sushi-like rice rolls and fried dumplings). I just love it. And there is no Korean place in Leiden D: Very good Syrian fast food. Oh, and mocca coffees. One of them - at the Syrian place - very stylish.

*~*~*

The Jewish museum is, in a way, even more impressive at the moment, when the upper two levels of the Libeskind building are closed. The last time I've been there I've been too busy with the permanent exhibition there to fully appreciate the building itself; it did pack a punch this time, with me standing there, gasping.

But also the condensed exhibition on the lower level, nothing but a few exemplary last letters, a sewing machine whose owner will not return to pick it up again because he was murdered in Auschwitz. The list of things Jewish refugees were allowed to take with them, even before the world war started (one set of silverware - a spoon, a knife, a fork - per person; nothing they bough after a certain date years ago; nothing of special value which did include things like, say, a photo camera ...). And of course it ended with me standing there, crying.

(But seriously, if you have any chance to visit any of Libeskind's buildings, even if it is not the Jewish Museum in Berlin or the Bundeswehr Military history museum in Dresden, do so - they did not disappoint yet.)

*~*~*

And the next day we went down, into the documentation center at the Holocaust monument. I avoided this one very much on purpose before.


( photo )

There was this entry in the short timeline they presented there, that scarily resonated with this article [in German, about mass accommodation for refugees, to be the new normal soon]: Neue Härte: Geht es nach den Sondierern, wohnen Asylbewerber künftig in Massenunterkünften – abgeschnitten vom Rest der Bevölkerung that I read on the very same day :( [eda: in case you are interested - the actual text of this disgraceful decision is in the "Koalitionsvereinbarung" on page 107/line 4994]
(It did very much through me back here, to my own refugee experience and what they suggest sounds a lot worse than even that was ...)
And there was another that I pointed out to ♥ that this was the point where my grandparents on both sides just god evacuated on time. A few days (hours?) later and there would be no me.


( photos )

Oh, and than the first room and ... and ... Just read the above, OK? Just read it. I could not make it past this room, but I had to read every single of the entries. Some several times, in the different languages. Trying to understand, unable to.

*~*~*

What else? A visit to the Bundestag. German history museum, which was rather meh to me but ♥ liked it quiet a bit. Pergamon museum, which is still and again amazing. We spent most time in the Islamic arts section upstairs this time - they do have a very nice project in the different museums where they build connections: here is an albarello found in Germany and the other museum has some from the Arabic world which likely influenced the European ones. This was the first time I've seen this kind of network being build and I loved it (and had I had more time, it would also led me to explore more).

*~*~*

( photo )

And last but not least (never least) books. Some random ones, some long thought after, some inspiration from shiny_crystal.

As usual: ratings are out of a max of 5 (but the least possible one is 0, not 1), R stands for Russian, G for German, E for English. Recommendations in purple, this year with a few words about each of them.

Books:

( table with 60 books )

Absolute recommendations of this year:

"С неба упали три яблока" by Narine Abgaryan
-- this was a recommendation by fikuz. It such a warm book ... I don't have other words for it. It's sad and hard and terrible in parts but still warm and full of hope and just wonderful. Right now only available in Russian but in the process of being translated into English - I will so remind you of it.

"The Power" by Naomi Alderman (recommended to me by luna_puella), "Die Leichtigkeit / La légèreté" by Catherine Meurisse and "Das große Heft / The Notebook / Le grand cahier"" by Ágota Kristóf I have already recommended here.

"Vita Nostra" by Marina & Sergey Dyachenko
-- I haven't had a book pull me in that badly for a while. Just wow. I've read comparison to Harry Potter, but given all my love for HP (which was the series that made me start reading English in my time) - this one is darker and freakishly inventive (language, it's all about language and metaphors and metamorphosis). Another one to be translated soon - I'll remind you when it comes out, emphatically.

"Aller Tage Abend /The End of Days" by Jenny Erpenbeck's
-- where "Heimsuchung/Visitation" was about a place and it's place in history this is about a person and her place in history. A life and five deaths and German/East-German/Jewish history through 80 years, in all its ugliness. Not a word too much, not a thought wasted, and several absolute perfect sentences or paragraphs.

"Karte und Gebiet / The Map and the Territory" by Michel Houellebecq - a deep rumination on art and on the very purpose of existence, a slow book that required to be read slowly. In my goodreads review, in German, I called it a "ein verletzliches Buch, im Gegenteil zu Houellebecqs vielen anderen verletzenden" - a vulnerable book, as opposed to Houllebecqs other books, that aim to offend and transgress (but are not less good). It does not quiet mean the same in English, without the play of words that German allows here, but oh well, I don't know how to express it better.
A lot of the reviews concentrate on the fact that Houllebecq kills himself in the books rather horrifically. But it's not at the heart of the book; at the heart of the book is art and Houellebecq has shown already in "Rester vivant" that he has a lot of important things to say about art.

"Katharsis" by Luz
-- a sibling to Catherine Meurisse's book: another survivor of the Charlie Hebdo massacre talking about the life afterwards. Very differently but not less a punch to the guts. And of course another one that is not translated into English - if you know either German or French, read it. It will not let you go.
(I don't remember whether this one was a recommendation by soeinnarr or whether we "merely" talked about it *sighs*)

"Schuld / Guilt" by Ferdinand von Schirach
-- I do not often enjoy bestsellers, but some books have a reason to become some. Von Schirach's stories are lurid, but also full of a dark humor and of a certain kind of compassion. And moral dilemmas, of course moral dilemmas. Each story is more of a short sketch, leaving the reader to fill in the details, forcing to keep thinking about it.

"Amatka"" by Karin Tidbeck
-- I had great expectations for Tidbeck's novel after I finally managed to get hold of a paper copy of her short story collection, "Jagannath", last year and having loved it (the short story collection is being re-issued by a much bugger publishing house, by the way, - get it, it's amazing!). And Amatka lives up to the expectation. The language and the voice of the narrator first seems bland until you understand that the language that the story is told in is an intrinsic component of the story being told. And now that I think about it, it's the second of my recommendation this year that is, at its core, about the power of language.


Some statistics:
( break down of the reading list by language, internationality, new to me authors, author gender )

Lists from previous years are here: 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016.

There is a passage by Christa Wolf (one that I highlighted, alas my books are some 900 kilometers away from where I live - and some 400 from where I am right now) where she talks about how she could not live in the vicinity of the Alps, how their greatness is too much, how their presence would be a constant pressure. How the vastness and emptiness of the Brandenburg landscape is preferable for everyday life.

While the passage itself impressed me, it's not a feeling I do usually share. Landscapes impress me and leave me speechless: the power of the Niagara Falls. The size and vastness of the Isle in the Skye viewpoint of the Canyonlands. But they hardly ever make me feel as if I could not live in their presence. Except two of them: Eyjafjallajökull glacier as seen from the Dyrhólaey peninsula in Iceland, a giant presence peeking through the clouds - the only thing I could think of is a giant alien ship descending onto the Earth, the end of the world imminent. Having that in my back - I don't think I could live with that. And more immediately: and the sheer walls of the Soca valley in Slovenia on the very Southern edge of the Alps, a giant rock slide and in front of it, going on as if nothing a full farm. The rockslide is likely old, much older than the farm. And yet, and yet … And it's not about any real danger; it's about the sheer power, the sheer possibility of unstoppable power they represent.

(At some point of my life, I need to see red lava. It will likely be alike.)

((The photo is not of this particular hike. There is no way to take a photo that would express what those places make me feel.))