Vivo en Bizkaia (y otros sitios tambien)

Having not entered anything in here for a while i thought i better had, just in case you are relying on this to find out what I am up to!

Well the reason I have not made any entries here are because not a huge amount has been going on. This blog is primarily for my travels, and i think if i started adding blog entries for my day to day life in Brighton it would become pretty dull pretty quickly.

Anyway....

I am now renting a lovely flat in West Hill Road, just near the station which is ideal for commuting (see below). I never thought I would find anywhere in Brighton better to live than Hanover but I have! Although it is uphill from Sainsbury's unfortunately.

For the moment I am mainly earning pennies as a freelance Information Architect, usually for companies in London. The money is good (providing the economy doesn't implode) and i can just about bear the early morning commutes and the routine because it will not be forever. To me it is a means to an end. Some contracts are for a few weeks, others for a few months and i try and have breaks in between.

But for me the photography is still the thing. When I had my little trip, now four and a half years ago, I had just returned to photography after an interval of 16 years and my first question my first morning in hospital was "Will I be able to take photographs again?" The answer was yes, although i didnt realise how much it would hurt at times, but i have adapted to that and am even investing in a different lighter camera system to relieve the strain on my wrist.

Of course the problem with the photography is that it is not easy to make money out of it. I do, but not a huge amount, but that is the path i have chosen and so that's the deal. If i don't like it i can always go and stack shelves in Sainsbury's.

Since returning from Bilbao my medium term goal has been to get to a stage where i can afford to go and shoot in different places in between contracts, and i am nearly there now. Once i can start doing that then I can, slowly and surely, increase my income from photography and one day stop doing web work altogether.

I have no idea how long this will take me, but after all, I haven't got anything else to do :)

Short trip. Details later.

Just for a change I am moving again.

This time to just around the corner.

But still with the intention of moving much further away soon... 

Why does this country have to be so grey all the time?

Here are some Basque words for storms. Anyone who has lived in Euskadi will know why these words are very handy!

Ortzantz - 'thunder'

Hortzgorri - 'a red cloud'

Ortzi - 'sky' or 'rain cloud'

Ortizkara - 'time when a storm is brewing'

Orzoski - 'calm air'

I cannot claim to have diligently researched these words of Euskara myself but found them in a very interesting book called "Mother Tongues, travels through tribal Europe" [Amazon link] by Helena Drysdale.

The book covers many of the more interesting languages in Europe and I found the chapter about Euskal Herria very interesting.

There is also a mention of zirrimirri (aka sirrimirri) which has been mentioned in this blog before. Although looking back 'milli chilli' was quite a good one too!

I did not get on a plane!

My route was:

Walk to Brighton station at 6 am.

Get the 6.24 to London Victoria.

Get the Circle Line from Victoria to South Kensington.

Get the Piccadilly Line to Heathrow Terminal 1,2,3

Get the A10 bus from just next to the tube (yes you can pay by Oyster, 90p!) to Stockley Park.

Did some work.

Came back. Three and a half hours there, three hours back. 

If I have another weekend as boring and humdrum and tedious as this one then.... I don't know! The monotony was only broken by a wander over to Hove Actually to see Yoga Chica for a coffee.

The trouble is whenever I have a coffee here, even with a mate I have not seen for a while, I always compare it to the experience of having a coffee in Bilbo. And it just isn't the same.

Of course the reality is that you could substitute Bilbo in the previous sentence with a lot of other places in Europe. Or just generally not here.

I know for the moment I need to be here to earn pennies, but I seriously wonder how long I can stand it before something interesting / different / fundamental happens which will make life more fun!

All of this is not made any better by the idea of a super commute to Heathrow tomorrow.

Anyone who wants to flee the tedium and general lack of energy in this country please apply within.

And no I am not apologising anymore. 

PS If you do not / can not flee the country but still want to explore a better way to live then get in touch too! 

But the next time i spend a day in the sun photographing a fiesta I will enjoy it soooooooooo much more.

Went for a wander between the two piers early this afternoon. Unlike Boxing Day (see previous entry) the sky was a typical English gray :(

Walking back through the Laines I heard some music which I at first thought was one of the dreaded horrendous samba bands demonstrating how even a lot of enthusiasm cannot overcome musical incompetence but in fact it was some Morris dancers!

They were doing their thing for a very appreciative crowd and it was good to see some traditional English dance culture. There are some vague similarities between the costumes of Morris dancers and Basque dancers (if anyone has done a proper study of these please let me know).

Anyway despite the light being lousy I decided to take some shots, and of necessity these had to be with the camera in my phone, a Nokia E90. Two shots are shown below.

The quality of these images (JPEG originals of course) were pretty good in terms of sharpness and colour. The main problem with using a phone for taking photos is the delay between pressing the button and capturing the image. So you end up pretty much shooting at random.

However if you don't have anything else to hand the phone will do.