Vermeer's Milk Maid

14/08/06

I watched the movie "Girl with a Pearl Earring" last night. It is a very moving story; yet another complicated love story; but it ends fairly well.
One thing I particularly notice is that the pretty Scarlett Johansen is very good at making quiet characters interesting.

What I liked best is that I always remembered the painting of the milk maid, and I did not know Vermeer painted it, but I recognised his style instantly. That's the talent of a true artist, that prooves his style was unique to his hand. A brush genius.

Saturday Night Out

12/08/06
We had dinner with Alex ex-colleague from Malaysia Edmund and a few other lawyer friends of theirs. I remember Edmund vaguely from the KL wedding photos. Alex made arrangements for dinner at the Four Seasons Chinese restaurant in Bayswater. It was nice meeting most of them; but Edmund pissed me off within 5 minutes, I could hardly believe it, it's a record for me not liking someone (made some comments about westerners knowing nothing about Chinese food; and having lived most of my life in Asia and married to a Chinese; I got pretty mad); I turned to Alex and said I don't like him loud enough for the moron to hear. Then Alex leaned over and whispered something that soothed me instantly. He asked me "Why do you think Kevin beat him up?". Weirdly, I found it reassuring that Kevin had beat Edmund up. I like Kevin, he is cool, very nice and smart but as long as you are on his good side, I could swear he is a big guy in the Chinese mafia, but I've got no proof. Thereafter I did not pay Edmund any more attention.

I quite liked Natasha, a very sweet girl of Malay origin and another Chinese girl but I did not catch her name. I also had a heated discussion with Michael on French and Malaysian policians. I did not agree on everything, but it is madness to try and argue with a barister - arguing is his full time job and he is much better at it than I am. Soon I was a bit annoyed but he is a Chelsea fan like Alex and a member and he invited Alex to the next Chelsea game, which is cool for Alex.

Jacques' 6 Birthday

10/08/06
It's Thursday, Jacques is 6 today. On Monday I took the time to send him a birthday present, a card and money. To my surprise by 9.30 AM I received a text message from Maman saying "I spoke to Jacques and he said Tata Helene gave me money!", she also gave me Julien's new telephone number, so I called and managed to speak to Jacques. He was delighted with the money, I assumed his parents had kept the present aside for the birthday party; Jacques did not know what he was going to buy with the money. I also spoke to Nicolas who can speak much better now, he said "My name is Nicolas and I am two years old", he is turning three on the 29th, I'd better start find a toy. Then he went on saying repeatedly "I am too small". The cutie was referring to the fact that he was not allowed to play with his brother's lego toys. Brilliant day, last time I managed to speak to them was over two months ago. I miss them so much.

Something about love

09/08/06
On Wednesday I as on my own and there was nothing on tele, so I lay down on my luxurious pillow stack with a cup of tea and watched Kindergarden Cop. It was funny how simple the relationship develops, good cop and nice lady go on two dates and at the end of the film they are in love and it looks like they'd be ready to spend the rest of their lives happily together. And not so long ago, it was not that complicated, i.e. grandpa meets grandma in train, ask for address, exchange letters for a year, go on two dates, get married, have three kids and live happily ever after. Or again, grandma moves from Paris to small town to live with Aunt, meets charming young man who lives on ground floor, get married have three kids and live happily ever after. So simple.

Nowadays, it s a total contrast, on the way back from Bradford (same day) I was reading this article where men stated all the reasons which made them not proceed in a relationship even if they were attracted to the girl; in summary everything. If she's too straightfroward or too nice, she must be desperate; if she's too shy or too cool, she must be not interested, they also assume very quickly that she's too needy, she's too high maintenance, she's too independant, she's not pretty enough and she tries too hard. Oooh sounds like something is seriously wrong. And most of all, Whatever happened to I like you, you like me let's get together and see what happens next? Why do they make it so complicated? Because if they want complications, I can think of half a dozen valid reasons why a relationship can be complicated - on top of my head: distance, religion, values, politics, sexual orientation, social background, upbringing, health; these people are bored and just creating modern pub dramas. I wonder what happened between my grandparents stories and today?

Leceister City Vs Burnley

08/08/06
On Tuesday night, Martin and I were up in Leceister to visit Anand. I saw the warehouse, which never fails to impress me when I see how many Verbatim products are on shelves and the volume of products moved every day. I met Preety, Jay's wife, she's lovely, must be about my age and we chatted about her holiday being spoiled by her second-month pregnancy all-day sickness. In the evening, Martin and I were very disappointed that they did not want to go for the nice Chinese dinner Martin had planned. We were both hungry and sandwich at a football game was not up to our stomach's posh expectations. We met Vic at the Walkers' stadium and enjoyed the game; the corporate lodge is brilliant, nice view on the pitch and the Leceister crowd was exhilarated, singing, stomping their feet, clapping. The game was definitely not Premiership quality, even I could tell, but it was very entertaining (more than Italy Vs Germany game in the world cup, that was dead boring), Leicester controlled the game up to the 30th minutes, then Burnley became a bit more aggressive and scored at the 45th minute. The second half Leicester did not show any sign of equalising, Burnley played well.

After the game, I chatted with Mr. Anand (Jay's father) he came from India in 1962, he is from the Penjab. I told him about my years in Utah Pradesh, and how strange and wonderful the experience was. I told him about being schooled in the Maharaja's palace stables, which had been restaured into classrooms just for us, and how the Maharaja had put his summer palace at our disposal, and build a swimming pool just for us, and that some days, it was so hot, that we could not get in the water (it must have been 40 degrees). I also told him that although in my eyes it was great, it was not so easy, having barely any food to eat and no elecricity or water most days. But it is an extra-ordinary experience that teaches one to appreciate everything thereafter. Such experience is very humbling.

Moving in

29/07/06
Collected the van on Saturday morning, it was surprisingly easy to drive the large van. The first trip was easy enough. We picked up the keys and moved in to see a real mess, every single kitchen cupboards and drawers were filled with mismatched cookery, pots, pans; the living room had a collection of not-my-taste antiques, the mattress was all bumpy and worst of all, the toilet was black with limescale. Before we continued with the move, I went into waitrose to buy the strongest cleaners I could find; (I'm going to do a-minute promo here) Harpic worked, I used the whole bloody box and half the spray, but the toilet looks brand new.

Back to the old flat for the supposedly final ride, I could not lift the tele off the floor. In my best attempt Ilifted it one millimeter, and there was no way Alex could move it on his own. So we called Dan for help. Sunday morning, Dan came over to help carry the TV set instead of preparing for the BBQ he invited us to two weeks ago. Thank God for the extra help, or I was about to leave the TV behind and buy a new smaller flatter one. The BBQ was a welcomed break, it was great lovely to see Dan, Julie, James, Seema and baby Jaya as well. We took a walk in Battersea Park before lunch, which dragged on to start at 5.30 PM but we spent 6 great hours altogether.

Moving out (Back to work)

17/07/06
We're back from holiday more tired than before we left and we have twelve days to plan our move. It should have been plenty of time but an unexpected work project was waiting around the corner. Not only was it educating, interesting and challenging but it also took me to Oslo! Ok, not that cool since we only saw it from the plane, but still :P). And a week later I was going up North to Manchester with Martin to meet with our customers. So it left me little time to pack. I did everything just 3 days before the move.

'I do'

13/07/06

They did it; Ben and Emma are man and wife. Congrats guys!
Maryse (Ben's mom) is the assistant mayor of the town, so she married her son, which is very cool. Once the contract signed, we were greeted out of the mairie (city hall) by a raging hail storm (huge ice cubes falling down the sky); so the ceremony had to be moved to a hall. They had a lovely pagan ceremony conducted by a 'made-do Guru' friend and taking for witness their best friends. Alex fueled up on champagne, and could miraculously speak french fluently to the delight of my non-english speaking friends. Dinner was white sandy beach themed and soaking wet; but that did not stop us from having fun and dancing the night away.

The Wild River Adventure

14/07/06
29 years later and 24 summer holidays in Labastide de Virac and not once did I canoe down the Ardeche river; so this year I had to try it; not only because Alex would love it, but also because I have outgrown the fear of embarrassing myself. It was much easier than I expected to stay upright on the canoe; it was however more difficult to stir the canoe, especially past a rapid. I was glad Nicolas came with us, as he had a one-time experience, he could impart with his little knowledge.
We did capsize in one rapid, the current was so strong that although we thought we were doing well, we suddenly were dragged completely off our track and into a tall rock in the middle of the river, our canoe went straight into it, slammed sideways and up and back down again upside down! It was exhilarating and fun and a little scary all at once. Nicolas who had come through dry, picked up our floating slippers, and items. Alex lost his wedding ring in the incident. Mireille said she will look for it; she finds hundreds of rings in the river at the end of every summer.

The Underground Adventure

I took Alex to the Aven d'Orgnac. It is a cave formed by a river that must have ran through over 2 million years ago and shows the passage of the ice age. It's mostly a forest of stalagmites (which pile up from the ground); but it also has some natural red drapes hanging from the ceiling. The red colour is caused by the minerals in the water. The cave is still alive and growing, meaning that we can see the water dripping down and you can't actually see the stalagmite going up but you know it continues growing.

The best bit is that we found out we can do speleology which would enable us to explore further into the cave galleries. That's a great plan for next year.