i like to talk a lot. some might say that i like to hear the sound of my own voice.
i’m in the process of transcribing about 8 hours of interviews i’ve just done. and while it’s mostly the other person talking, listening to the sound of my own voice makes my skin crawl. i sound like that?! and i laugh all the time when i ask questions? like a nervous tic?!
never speaking again. okay, that’s a lie. speaking lots in the future, but will be constantly paranoid about the sound of my voice.
8 days until i turn in my monstrosity of a paper.
16 days until i return to the lovely US of A.
expect lots of blog posts as i procrastinate the paper writing process.
READERS POLL: there are way more of you reading this than i thought there were. so i’m going to poll you on what i should do. i have a large sum of money sitting in my irish bank account. is the euro-dollar exchange rate going to get better or worse in the next 16 days? as in, should i take my money out NOW before it gets any worse? or should i wait as long as possible in hopes that it will improve? respond in the comments! or when you talk to me on gchat! or email me! emily’s financial future depends on it!
okay so i’m trying to get in contact with another super famous artist (twice nominated for the turner prize, the nobel prize of modern art, and went to the venice biennale!) and i’m having no luck.
i find out that he lives ACROSS THE STREET from the family i’m living with in derry. WHAT?! you WILL talk to me super famous artist from derry! you WILL!
today, an art gallery dude made some lovely sweeping generalizations. he said that he thinks northern irish contemporary art and southern irish contemporary art are quite different. if you’re going to say something like that, i’m obviously going to ask you, “how?” his response: “well, i think that northern art is more bleak and gray and sad. southern art is more colorful.” REALLY??? ARE YOU 9?! clearly, this is the stuff that great papers are made of…
most of these posts are me complaining. sorry about that. today was a GREAT day though. so no complaining this time.
for my independent study project (ISP in SIT lingo…oh wait, i used lingo to describe lingo….welcome to SIT), i went to the studio of a super famous irish artist and got to talk to him for about 45 minutes. not going to use his name because i feel weird about it.
a gallery owner who has shown his work gave me the artist’s direct studio line. i was amazed. too amazed to call it for at least 24 hours.
called it, left a message with my request for an interview. went back to researching. then, while i’m in the archives, my phone rings with HIS name on it! super famous irish artist is calling MY cell phone!
“happy to meet with you! come down to my studio! here’s my address! see you then!”
despite having worked for an artist before, i have never been to an artist’s studio. i took it all in. there were 2 unfinished works on easels (ahhh i’m seeing his new works before other people!). he had stacks of books on the EU constitution and the lisbon treaty (smart man). lots of cheesy irish music. about 8 dead plants in the back of the room. and then a giant tool cabinet (that messy, dirty, work-with-your-hands part of art that i tend to forget about).
the interview itself was rather disappointing. i tried to indicate that i had done significant research on him and my topic beforehand, but he still insisted on repeating things i had already read in interviews or quoting from essays written about him. i’ve read those. i did my homework. i’m here for more than that man!
his work uses a lot of appropriation (borrows or quotes from other images/famous art), so his stuff is like an art history major’s fantasy.
anyway, i had a productive day. i met a super famous irish artist. and it didn’t rain. today was a GREAT day.
i just spent 3 hours in the immigration office and i have nothing to show for it. passport problem still exists. (if i don’t figure out how to fix it…i’m never allowed in ireland again.)
and the heating is broken in my house.
and my curtains fell down on top of me in the middle of the night.
this post is meant to counter the “i’m the happiest girl in ireland!” post…but i hesitate to say that i’m really the unhappiest girl in all of ireland right now.
this has been said before by many other inhabitants of ireland, but i really feel like there is a permanent cloud/angry celtic god hovering over this green island and permanently spewing rain and wind and blusteriness on us. this is why they drink tea so much. bc it’s permanently gloomy and dark and wet and cold. tea cures all. tea and uggs anyway.
whenever someone learns that i’m american here (usually when i open my big fat mouth), they immediately ask me about the election. cab drivers, sales people, strangers. they are absolutely obsessed with american politics. the election dominated the front page of the irish times nearly everyday. and then they ask me if i voted for o-BAM-a. bam like ham. not bam like bomb. am i allowed to compare the pronunciation of obama’s name to a bomb? is that okay? i don’t know. but they say it like like BAM!
nothing will really change tomorrow. when people figure out that i’m american, they will still say, “oh how about that oBAMa?”
the idiot’s guide to irish-american relations:
lots of irish people live in america. the famine. lots went before the famine too. but there are lots in the US. most people i’ve met have at least one family member living in ireland.
we helped them with the Troubles (yeah that doesn’t sound condescending, does it? gimme a break. i’ve been PC for too long). we sent them us senator george mitchell to help sort things out. bill clinton helped them negotiate the good friday agreement.
we gave them the celtic tiger. there’s tons of foreign investment in ireland because they have nice tax laws and they speak english. what happens in the american economy very directly affects their jobs here (if they work for an american company….etc).
so whatever happens in the us greatly impacts ireland. that can be said for any country really, but those were very ireland-specific reasons i gave.
the new york times had a great video looking at the 1972 film the candidate, pointing out how it predicted politics today. west wing fans should see the movie. or settle for the nyt video about the movie.
today, i spent too much money on food and on clothes. i also discovered google reader, which aggregates all of the blogs you read. none of these things helped to get my final paper done started.
what is this final paper i speak of? for the next 3 weeks, i am supposed to be researching art and politics in ireland– specifically contemporary irish art about the Troubles. so i’m supposed to go to archives with artist files and email art galleries and talk to art history professors and read reviews of exhibitions and go to museums.
what will i actually do? read the news. sleep in. shop. wander in parks. meet people for drinks. take my host dog for a walk. make quiches. attempt to learn how to make something besides quiche. agonize over having nowhere to live next semester due to the housing shortage.
KIDDING. i will be in cold cold libraries and archives pouring over artist files and writing countless emails begging people to let me interview them. lots of work to do.
okay enough rambling. time to waste more time on google reader and compulsively check election results.
dublin bus has the COOLEST LOGO EVER….baby castle!
i spend a minimum of 10 hours a week on the bus here. so i thought an entry completely devoted to my dublin bus experience was legit.
you’ve already heard my gripes about the route– they don’t publish the routes online OR at bus stops, so it’s almost impossible to know where the bus goes and what stops it might make unless you ask the driver or someone who has lived here a long time. not very tourist friendly, hm?
seating arrangement. each time i mount the steps of those formidable blue and yellow monsters of transport, it is my sole aim to secure one of the first four seat on the second level. my stop is relatively early in the route, so i don’t usually have to fight anyone. but let me tell you, if i don’t get one of those seats, it is a ROUGH start to the day. because they’re the first four, you don’t have to look at anyone else. you can pretty much ignore anyone and anything. perfect for the morning commute (and evening, now that i think of it). the bus has huge panoramic windows and sitting in the first four seats affords the best views– uncluttered by other people’s heads and conversations. and for a control freak like myself, you know that i enjoy being able to see exactly where we are at all times….why traffic isn’t moving……etc.
traffic. dublin doesn’t know how to do bus lanes. they stop and start at all the wrong places. once the bus lane disappears, all hell breaks loose on the road. by that, i mean we DON’T MOVE. i have sat at an intersection and watched the light change FIVE TIMES and still not made it through the intersection. distance-wise, my trip should take about 25 minutes without traffic. instead, it takes an hour!
consequences of long and painful bus rides:
i have time to think of ridiculous blog posting topics, like this one
my ipod is my bff and for the first time in its 4 years of life, actually needs to be recharged everyday
podcasts are suddenly infinitely cooler than they were before
i inevitably end up falling asleep….my head snaps forward (or into the bus window, depending on which way my heavy brain sways) and i wake up
less than treasured moments on the dublin bus? sharing a seat with anyone. ever. yeah, i’m fat and i DO need that extra space on the seat to put my bags down. no i will not move them. share a seat with someone else.
the time that i left the bars after getting really mad at someone….only to sit on a bus on which someone had spilled an entire bottle of soda which swished and swayed on the floor of the bus for an entire hour. like a boat. at sea. all the liquid to the front of the bus…….anddddd all the liquid to the back.
i eagerly await the day when i can return to my normal commute: a two minute walk on the sunshine-laden, over-watered sidewalks of claremont.
was very happy to get back to my dublin family. the little boy (scott, the one that some of you may have heard singing in the background while we skype) thought that i went home to the US and was like “oh…i thought you had gone for good and i was sad because i liked you!”
conclusions from my trip to northern ireland:
i really really really really don’t want to work at a nonprofit. ever again. (remind me of this when i’m searching for internships please)
belfast is ROUGH
thinking about the graffiti and murals all over: in the US, i notice graffiti, but i don’t give it much thought because i don’t understand it. in northern ireland, you see “RIRA (real irish republican army) or “free derry 4″ ALL OVER etc and i understand what it’s about so i pay more attention to it?
we have two more weeks of classes in dublin and SO MUCH work to do. for the first time since i’ve arrived, i am legit stressed about all the work i have. not fun.
rashi, my friend from CMC who is studying in italy, is coming to visit this weekend. we will ride bikes (cuz i can do that now) and drink wine and run around temple bar and it will be GREAT. here’s rashi seducing sam with her wild dance moves…for loyal readers, sam is the lovely fool who comments on nearly every post.
and courtesy of a friend who sends me links like it’s his job:
i can’t believe her peeps let her do this. the alec baldwin part is my fave. and srsly, WHY DOES SHE HAVE A WISCONSIN ACCENT? i really don’t think the accent just affects anyone who snowmobiles and has hick tendencies…
follow-up on my last post which mentioned a conflict mediation workshop: our group was so uncooperative that the dude running the workshop gave up and ended early. we are terrible people. fecking college kids. so disrespectful.
