Serendipity

douze.

... Listening to a lot of Kings of Convenience, while admiring the theatrical effect evoked by the album artwork. Simple images, with a lot of stories to be told.

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Serendipity

onze.

i.

Les chaussures bleues. Have never been so bold before but I am loving the colour, an electrifying blue.

ii.

Watched La danse - Le ballet de l'Opéra de Paris which was very long but nonetheless exquisite. With no narration or interviews, I found those long shots of dancers rehearsing and performing mesmerising and strangely comforting. To be able to glimpse and gaze at the creative process behind the magnificent performances at Opera Garnier and Bastille is such a rare treat - I wouldn't agree with the Guardian who said that this film is a merely an elegant CCTV footage!

Serendipity

dix.

Happiness is...

A bouquet of Sweet Williams ('tis the summer season, theoretically) and a free Penguin mug courtesy of London Review Cake Shop (the best tea place in Bloomsbury with rose and pistachio cake) on my bedside table;

Learning all sorts of big words and ideas from medical anthropology: hegemony, liminality, subjunctivising elements, 'what is the meaning of meaning?' - and the very fact that however potent it is, biomedicine is nonetheless a dominant culture that can be oppressive and manipulated by the rich and powerful;

Remembering this quote:

Medicine always claims the experience is the test of its operations. Plato therefore was right in saying that to become a true doctor, a man must have experienced all the illnesses he hopes to cure and all the accidents and circumstances he is to diagnose... Such a man I would trust. For the rest guide us like the person who paints seas, rocks and harbours while sitting at his table and sails his model of a ship in perfect safety. Throw him into the real thing, and he does not know where to begin.

- Montaigne, Essays 3.13

Serendipity

neuf.

All university works are handed in; now revision can finally start! Will be finishing exams on the 26th - and we are going to pop open that bottle of Sofia Blanc de Blancs, then head for a short trip.

Recently,

The carefully planned Woolf collection (I am very picky about book covers)//Lunch with sandwich and Pimm's lemonade//Regent Street prior to the Wedding//English strawberries//what is in my bag

I am going to use the ruled le petit prince moleskine as a weekly planner, like this.

So adieu readers old and new, see you soonish - hopefully later this month!

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Serendipity

huit.

A valentine's day present from krisatomic. Thanks hun (:

A pair of cat print satin heels from miu miu would be too decadent and too delicate to be worn; but a beautiful watercolour print of it is just right. It sits quietly by the corner surrounded by real shoes - real shoes wear and tear and eventually perish, these miu miu heels would be immortal.

serendipity

sept.

After a whole year of frantic hunt I am now finally wearing the dream black scallop shorts (with concealed buttons and pockets, high waisted) - and believe it or not, they are from this season's asos!

Serendipity

six.

Ad-hoc visits to:

The Table (Southwark) for brunch - excellent eggs benedict and buttermilk pancake // Sunflower Seeds by Ai Weiwei revisited - the video documenting the process of how they produced 100 million procelain seeds in a small town in China is illuminating // Oh Rothko // Surrealism is always a good idea // Miró in April at Tate (squealing in excitement!)

London: a feast to the mouth and to the eye (when you know where to go!)

Serendipity

cinq.

Finding a really good spot in the library to work (:

Serendipity

quatre.

Thank you Shuen-Yi for the restored edition of Sylvia Plath's Ariel - reading the collection in its original order and manuscript sheds light on Plath's creative process, techniques and more powerfully, how she painfully battled with the inner demon and transcended it all.

My all time favourite is the Morning Song, written when her second son Nicholas was just born.

Love set you going like a fat gold watch.

The midwife slapped your footsoles, and your bald cry

Took its place among the elements.

Our voices echo, magnifying your arrival. New statue.

In a drafty museum, your nakedness

Shadows our safety. We stand round blankly as walls.

I'm no more your mother

Than the cloud that distills a mirror to reflect its own slow

Effacement at the wind's hand.

All night your moth-breath

Flickers among the flat pink roses. I wake to listen:

A far sea moves in my ear.

One cry, and I stumble from bed, cow-heavy and floral

In my Victorian nightgown.

Your mouth opens clean as a cat's. The window square

Whitens and swallows its dull stars. And now you try

Your handful of notes;

The clear vowels rise like balloons.

Serendipity

trois.

Looking at simple things that I cannot live without - usually inside my bag (from left to right):

*my old phone who is now 5 1/2 years old - Who would need a smart phone if all you want to do is call and text occasionally?

*Schedule for 2011

*Body Shop Shea body butter

*a good ball pen (0.38mm) - my handwriting is small!

*and a book on the go. The one I am reading now is written by my favourite neurologist/storyteller Oliver Sacks, given to me on my birthday by bf :)

Serendipity

deux.

I tidied up my room today - wiped everything, bought holders for my files and magazines, rearranged the flowers. It is nice to find peace in everyday entropy.

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Serendipity

*Inspired by Christine and thought it would be a fun project to embark on - I will go on to list one thing that makes me really happy starting from today, every day.

un.

Decided to pop by the National Portrait Gallery and looked at the exhibition 'An Englishman in New York' by Jason Bell. The portraits are good themselves but the stories behind the English expats are infinitely more interesting. Here is one of my favourite.

Simon Doonan, creative director, Barneys

"There’s a tremendous sense of freedom living in Manhattan. I remember when we were opening a small Barney’s outpost in Soho; in a cavalier way I told everyone that I would get a Queen Elizabeth II lookalike to come and cut the ribbon. We didn’t have a huge budget and I couldn’t find one so I decided to do it myself. I dressed up with butt pads, crown, sash, gloves, purse and jewels. I braced myself for the catcalls and the insults, and as I exited the lift into the lobby of my building the doorman said, “Mr Doonan, do you want your mail now or when you come back?” I often think what would I be doing if I’d stayed in England? I’m sure I’d still be on the scarf counter at John Lewis where I started. I failed the eleven plus in England and I always thought of myself as really stupid. Nobody knows that here, so I’ve written four books and a column for the New York Observer."

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