long holliday absence...

dear m.,
time is rushing by...
just 2 month to go and i will leave uni behind me. and still so much to do.
besides this some canges happend in my private life, and i 'm really happy. but also have to get uesed to it.

so here are the last 2 weeks in pictures.
i was in genk ( an old mine city on the german-belgium border) to attend my masterclass. It was so nice to have a project and to give one week everything for it so it#s ready by frieday for visitors. much more my way of working.

one week of stiching, hammering, glueing... at the end i looked like a mine worker, all black from the coal dust...




from genk i directly went to the opsssit border of elgium. the coast. one weekend with my dear one in an appartement just at the beach. one weekend without stress, befor we both rush into the countdown. so we tried to get everything out of it because we'll won't see each other so much for a while ( especially not relaxed).
it was full of good food (incl. self made mayonaise on this very blurry pic), lazynes,fireworks, kites and beach walks.







monday we really went early to gent to get is eye checked ( he had an operation a week before, but all went good) , but had to wait there for ages, so like a soap bubbel the relaxation was gone. so the last week was buzzy buzzy again. i try to take my time to vistit people. and get everything done which needs to be done. to-do list are an illness from which there is no cure, i guess.

and my plants are growing. i try to take good care of them. i took them inside because it gets pretty cold at night, and i don't want them to freez. so now i water them and even talk to them so they will becaome beautyfull flowers and give me a bit of a nture feeling in summer.( by the way the grass in your garden is doing great )
and isn't it funny that there hide their heads still in their seedcaps when they come out of the ground...



kisses
and how are the mountains
s.

green...

Dear S.,

a double post. just to create some colour-based order :)

Saturday I spent a day in Brussels. I really needed to get out of Antwerp and be on my own for a while. As usual, I had to convince myself to get my behind out of my chair and leave school work and mainly thoughts about school work behind.
Oh, it was such a good day!
As you know, my feelings about Brussels are rather negative. I have lived in Brussels for 4 months when I was 18, and I didn't have a very good time then. My life as au-pair was horrible, and I was so drenched with all my sorrow that even the city could not take off my mind. Since then, every time I go to Brussels I have a weird feeling in my stomach. But the beautiful thing is, that every single time I discor new, fantastic things in this city, and every time I seem to like it a little more. When I was 18, I just didn't know where even to start to look for good things. I was too upset to go to a museum, too shy to find good places for going out on my own and too dependent on my au-pair families and L., I didn't earn enough money to buy books, clothes, tickets or cake.
Can you imagine, I didn't even know that the Bozar existed, while I was living in Brussels! Or the beautiful German bookstore in the Leuvensesteenweg! Or the Magritte museum. Or Botanique.
And when I finally moved to the second au-pair family, I lived quite far outside of Brussels, I only had enough time to go to my French lessons twice a week in the city center.
So, after 4 months I ended my nanny experience and left Brussels, for good. Let me tell you, I was not the only au-pair that left after only a few months ;)

I still remember this feeling every monday morning, waking up in Antwerp with terrible panic inside of me, short of breath, sick to my stomach. Knowing that I had to get on the train and would arrive at Brussel Centraal 45 minutes later- the most uninviting trainstation I know. Then walking up the kunstberg, follow the Regentschapslaan, passing by the Kleine Zavel, with my heart beating in my throat. Opening the door to this cold, unwelcoming house, saying hi to "my" children and their mother, who didn't trust me a bit.... brrrrr

Ok, I think you get the impression.
I really enjoy it, that I can get to know Brussels again, with some distance to all these intense moments!

So, to return to the beginning of my story: I went to Brussels. It was the most beautiful day, t-shirt and sunglasses-weather! I strolled around a bit in the Kunstberg area. (One thing I like about Brussels: its hills! unique in Belgium :)
Then I went to the Magritte museum. Only that I didn't see anything of Magritte but one really disturbing work between Baroque-artists... I spent some hours admiring Old Masters- a first time in my life, really. Until now, I never had the patience to find beauty in these old works... weird, I know. I still don't like Rubens, but Bruegel, Cranach and Co really impressed me!



I spent a lot of time in front of this one:
De val van de opstandige engelen by Bruegel de Oude from (!) 1562.
(image borrowed from historiek.net)

It is mesmerizing. These figures are so surrealistic, you can look at it for hours and find still new things. I even started to talk about it with a stranger who also kept standing and staring in the Bruegel chamber..





2 more artworks: A globe by Jan Fabre. Look it what it is made of! He is really a master of fascination and repulsion at the same time.
And, a very philanthropic piece of art in the middle: A sereneda of green of myself ;)
I just liked the idea of putting the spectator in the center of a work.

So much for the green, and now comes....

palm reading (without words)