Pixie visits

Off we go again!

2009-04-09T04:06:00.000-07:00

Leaving Malmö as usual when the Malmö Tango Festival begins, strangely enough. Belgrade is waiting, just lite Croatia and Bosnia. See if any pictures will come soon...

VISA and new year´s eve

2008-01-02T04:16:00.001-08:00

Lost my VISA in this cash despenser. another guy lost it just before me so I knew it was a strange machine, but i decided to try it anyway.....living on the edge you know.

And spent new year´s eve with my argentinian family and special guest ehsan from uppsala, champagne, lovely PAN DULCE and show with 12 year old Cecilia who lives here. then for some tango at la VIRUTA and some argentinian pop music a la 80´s and 90´s. argentinian GYLLENE TIDER and all Swedes, and one Englishman, will know what i am talking about. by the way, heard this story of an Englishman travelling around south america, with kind of crappy spanish, thinking that the word for "the bill please" was "una cervez por favor", which means "a beer please"... took some time for him to find out why they brought him so many beers insted of the bills...

the nicest place to be in a hot day like new year's eve was the freezer.

simon´s shoes

2007-12-31T07:09:00.000-08:00

he wanted to see them, so here they come!

Gardel ladies

2007-12-30T09:32:00.001-08:00

Yes, Maria confirmed that the custom is to throw all good old papers and not needed documents out in the streets the last day of the year. People even collect things they know they can throw away on that particular day! So the streets are white and the cleaners hope for no rain...

Went to the cementery of Chacarita, where the famous tango singer Carlos Gardel is buried. A wonderful calm awaited me there. I like cementeries! To escape from the chaos in the city. And I had this nice, really nice talk with an older lady that came to "my" bench to have her Sunday chat with a foreigner. That is the best, meeting Argentinians and asking them stuff about life here.

Wishing you all a Happy New Year and myself a couple of comments on this blog! :)

2007-12-28T16:18:00.000-08:00

my new favourite teachers. they re cool

loads of paper in the street. will ask maria what it is for. heard on the bus: something like "cleaning the old year out" custom. weird?

a house in la boca. the most touristic part o town!

by the way: my new favourt restaurant in the world: artemisia. veggie and fish. situated cabrera/a de figueroa. go there.

Vos, de donde sos?

2007-12-28T15:52:00.000-08:00

That is the most usual question you will get her. And you, were are you from? I even got it over the phone, when I answered at Maria´s.... Why did he want to know that? He called from a phone company... What you see here are fotos from San Telmo, a changing room in the middle of the street. And then the fotos from Christmas Nochebuena! First 4 of the 10 girls that came to say hello the first thing when I came in through the door. Hola, and kiss on every cheek. Then a foto of Cecilia, that was the host (well, in the house of her brother Guillermo´s and his wife´s). And of the great grand mother that is 94 years old... Still going strong and as happy as the girls for her Christmas presents! And of te earound 25 people kissing each other a Merry Christmas at midnight, just before opening the presents. And of me in the school tango brujo (bewitched tango?) class. Before it started today.

Oh, home is getting closer. I actually, believe it or not, feel like changing my quite monotonous days of shopping, restaurants, dancing, staying out late, sleeping til late, for something more cosy and personal... But do not want to change the weather to the one that is waiting for me in Malmo!!!!!

2007-12-17T08:21:00.000-08:00

Hello everyone. A bit chillier here, around 15 degrees in the night!

Some new pictures. Cinthya came knocking on the door one day. It showed we live close here as well as we did an Malmo. Around the corner!

And then I went to see Maria's frame shop. We also went to the Comme il Faut shoe shop and to her surprise, Maria saw one of her frames around a huge shoe there! She remembers thinking that she was doing the frame to somebody who was as crazy for shoes as she is (she did not know it was for this in the tango world very famous shop). Maria has around 100 pairs of shoes in different colours at home. I have seen them myself...

and a picture of me in from of the museum of bellas artes.

and of me and Anibal, that I met with Sofia in Stockholm i november!

And of my new Delie favourites. :)

and of me and Malin sunbathing on the terrace...

Miss you all

SHOES

2007-12-11T11:58:00.000-08:00

I bought shoes for myself!!!!! And for my borhter and his wife!!!! Have to go home and take some pictures, so that you can see the beautiful ones.

2007-12-09T08:57:00.000-08:00

left: teacher pablo inza, right: canadian jean-pierre

nice resto

my new infinit glasses... gorgeous, huh?

an old famous cafe. tortoni

sweetcorn mix in sweetcorn

Want to tell you some funny stories again. My fellow dancer Sebastian told me that he can be here for three months and then he can renew his visa. After six months he has to get out of the country and come back again. But he was also told by the office that he could also just get back after six months and then receive an argentinan citizenship! Which means it takes six months to become a citizen in this country. And I also found out that my hosts friends, who most of them are jews, also celebrate the holidays for christmas! My host to be, Luba (where Simon stayed last year) is also Jewish, but she left (and that is why I got another host) to celebrate Christmas in Europe!

And in big crossings there are policemen telling people how to drive. I heard one tell a driver "and do not forget to put the blinkers (?) on when you are turning left!"...

And f you call from a public phone it is always partly a collect calle. Which means that when I called Sebastian and we were just about to decide where and wen to meet, the conversation was over, cause apparently my call finished Sebastian´s card. Not very practical, is it?

Hasta luego. and write more!

2007-12-04T12:07:00.000-08:00

AH, so a few days have passed since I came. I am getting used to the Argentinian city bus that sounds like 10 Swedish buses passing at the same time. I am also getting used to the noise and the BENOS aires from the traffic... And to getting lost more or less all the time. The tango map is strange cause it is uspide down compared to the one that shows how the buses go! And then all streets are in quadratic blocks, like in New York, so it should basically be impossible to get lost. But yesterday, when I was looking for the three tango shoe shops that are in the same area, I managed to get lost three times... My feet are not in the best condition, as you may understand, after getting lost and after dancing until 4 in the morning. So today I took my trainers to go to the private class for the second time. But my fellow partner didn't come! He showed up 20 minutes late and he had been just across the street, eating, and had got confused with his and the waiters watch/time... Funny, these Canadians. And their accent in French. Instead of understanding a hundred, 100, "cent", I understand "seins" (breasts).... :) Which can be very funny in a conversation.
Also I got invited to a dinner with my host lady. She came home by taxi, while being in the restaurant (!) and invited me saying: I am having dinner right noow wanna come?... And I had the huuugest FLAN ever. Ate half of it. My flatmate the american brought her half back in a doggy bag!
Danced later yesterday night with a Belgian guy called Bart with a moustache going backwards. Imagine. Some good dances there. Out now to see if there is some Tango fashin shops in the neighbourhood, cause it said so on the tango map.

Hasta later

I am here!

2007-12-02T08:17:00.000-08:00

Try the Serbocroatian pronunciation...
door to the bathroom
the kitchen "schrank"
the living room

Meeting with friends at Madrid airport, Biba and Sol

Just had a long morning chat with Maria, the woman who lives in the apartment in Palermo Viejo, the bohemian part of Buenos Aires, that I am renting a room in. What a woman, and what stories she has to tell (and she tells them as well)! And what an apartment (she is an architect and she has done remarkable things to this flat without changing the feeling of its 100 ears of age)! She lives her with two of her three daughters. Now she is upstairs at the terrace, watering all the plants she has grown there for years. Wondering how they manage to stay alive in this sun and heat. Well, it is around 25-30 degrees so it is quite ok both for tango and for shopping. I can inform you I have done bot since I arrived. Dancing outside yesterday evening was nice. Went to a private party with one of my fellow tangueras from the class, which was nice. The first day I slept the whole evening and missed the Friday dance... Taking classes for Swiss, Argentinian and Swedish (!) young teachers has been ok but nothing "halucinante" (tremendusly special). Still I got to know some people and will be the help dancer of a Canadian man who will take three classes with one of the best, and most expensive Argentinians at the moment. And I will accopany him.. for free! :) The plan for today is to check out the area a bit more, maybe to take a class, but most importantly, to go to the milonga of Sunday nights - el beso!

Resfeber

2007-11-29T00:10:00.000-08:00

Soon: off we go! To madrid, first stop, to meet good old Madrid period friends Biba and Sol at the airport. If I am OK enough to pass the security gates once inside the system.

Full of expectations. Knees trembling a bit. Taking my camera, so I hope you will get some fotos too, while I'm there.

Malmö autumn again

2007-08-31T06:23:00.000-07:00

De gifter sig
Pixie gratulerar
Geten på Symi
JUUUULIE
mon amour....

Vegan food for old Pixie
Comme il faut shoe from Buenos Aires...
Attic flat in Berlin, Bergmann strasse 100
Teresa and Phil at Bergmann strasse 100
Dangerous Pälsis moving furniture to Sturegatan 18b

So, autumn is coming, fast and surely. Another spring and long awaited for summer are already gone. A lot has happened since. Pixie turned 30! She has visited Berlin for some tango, to see friend Teresa. She moved to a new flat.. In the meantime Teresa got married and moved to Sweden. And Pixie went to the fantastic Greek island of Symi with her Danish smartest archeologist on earth friend Julie. To see if she could spend a few days away from the biggest news... her new AMOUR... And brother Goran married his Maria. And they managed to get Maria pregnant quite quickly after the wedding, and a romantic trip to a beautiful French Island - Corse.

Deadbeat in Malmö

2006-12-31T06:29:00.000-08:00

Hej Tatjana and everybody else!
Anna-Mary is well safe and sound... I´ve already eaten the chrismas barszcz left over from christmas with some uszkas(ears but not really ears more some sort of tortellini). Sule the nicest Sremcica fellow drove me to the airport at 6 o´clock inte morning. We saw the Avalan mountain drenched in sunrise listening to accordeon music... Tatjana! Poppel tree is topola in serbian!!! The same in polish. So Sule and me spotted trees along the way... . Islept all through the flight. Surprise. Wish you all a very very very very Happy New Year!!! May the force be with you!

nanoo nanoo

another belgrade day

2006-12-28T05:46:00.000-08:00

IVA didn't take us out for cocktails. she will today cause it's her birthday. we went for cocktails ourselves in a cafe club called radovan. the best name ever. and nevena came later. she had been working. she's a dog nanny. not for any kind of dogs, but POODLES! she takes care of three little poodles. one is called masha, like the cat in croatia.

yesterday we went to dule's place. he's great at people's movements and motion when it comes to computers and graphics. 3D animator. the landscape architect and computer nerd in annamary got some food there. and luckily the bed didn't break as the last time i brought swedish friends to dule's...

left sremcica, our village, today with one necessaire more than i had before i came. directly from istambul, man! the materialist in me was happy, as i saw my things again. there were also some dried mushrooms from hassleholm's forests that i should have given to the relatives in croatia, but that now are mushrooming themselves in our house in sremcica. left sremcica with some red liqeur with red berries that neither of us had ever seen before. i fell asleep in the japanese bus. the score is still 5-1 to annamary who always falls asleep. a bit everywhere. partout. she will not tonight though. which will be THE night out. we already went to the place and checked the chairs and the floors. to feel more at home when entering the tango scene. the liquer drinking people in our house are convinced annamary will find herself a nice serb in the bar, while i'm dancing around. we will see what happens!

some christmas cookies later....

2006-12-26T09:30:00.000-08:00

we found out that internet works better in serbia than in croatia. the cookies are better home made. and that uncles have funny hot lamps to cure our sore knees. and that you can have six different kinds of meat in one meal. and 9 different cookies for christmas (the christmas cake excluded). and the anguish of my aunt when she visited the neighbour that had made 15 kinds of cookies...

i wish we brought a nice camera cable to send you some photos of the santa claus look a like uncle (with accompanying santa claus laughter). or of ladies suddenly appearing behind trees with a strange look on their faces and oddly blue gloves on their hands. spooky. or gypsie orchestras annoying the christmas shopping serbs (since christmas is in two weeks). and buses donated from japan (!), and bus drivers that don't listen or don't bother when you ask them kindly for a ticket for the ride. and jumping over fences because of a low quality gate a la father bogdanovic (that showed later was a wrong choice of kee from the kee holder...). Photos can't be taken of the absence of heating in the pretty pittoresque house, but you literally freeze your butt off when you take a nice seat to make the 1st, or the 2nd "thing". or the smoke in our new favourite cafe caffe la revolucion where you learn all about che gue.

tonight IVA will bring us to a cocktail place. we suspect her being the child of an oligarch, since she spent her last 12 years in moscow. she's got a flat in the centre. very unusual for unmarried young women. we will slepp there tomorrow.

to be continued.

nobody knows about this blog!

2006-12-22T04:26:00.000-08:00

Not even my fellow traveller, Annamary. gotta tell her before I tell all the others.

So: we are off to Belgrade tomorrow for some touristing in Belgrade, some tango in Belgrade, and some Christmas in Osijek, Croatia.

Tell you more later...