Applepie for Ecas

Brian came up with the idea of each one of us in the group bringing something nice to eat + preferably connected with the country of our origin for our college meetings on Thursdays.

Tomorrow is my turn.

I gave up on idea of preparing pierogis as they need to be eaten warm and we do not have this kind of facilities available in the college. So it had to be something edible and tasty when cold so I baked a szarlotka today.

Our kitchen is of a size of an hankerchief, the oven does not have a light inside and the previous tenant inspired by Carrie Bradsaw probably used it for storage, but if managed to churn out the required dish. It looks all right though I do not dare to cut it as it looks so nice! I just hope it is tasty as well...

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Co tydzien, ktos z naszego studenckiego grona przynosi cos do spozycia podczas cotygodniowego spotkania na uczelni. Zalozylismy, ze danie powinno wywodzic sie z kraju gotujacego i na pierwszy ogien poszedl Brian ze szkockim shortbread em (ogolnie mowiac, polaczenie herbatnika z ciastem kruszonym, maslane, slodkie i ponoc latwe w przygotowaniu) a jutro moja kolej.

Co prawda planowalam pierogi ale musialam zmodyfikowac swoj plan ze wzgledu na to, ze one nie najlepiej smakuja na zimno.

W planie byla tez herbata z dopalaczem i nawet nabylam w tym celu termos ale nigdzie w okolicy nie bylo do kupienia jednorazowych kubkow - Hindus na rogu proponowal, zebym kupila jego tekturowe kubki do automatu z kawa, ktory ma za kontuarem ale nawet przy mojej desperacji, okazalo sie, ze sa tylko 3 na stanie).

Trudno, wódzia bedzie innym razem.

Dam znac, czy danie bylo zjadliwe, bo nasz piekarnik jest z tych podejrzanych - np. nie ma swiatla. Tymczasem niczego nie napoczynam, bo to ciasto tak ladnie wyglada w formie do pieczenia...

Puzzle has been cracked

Simon did the puzzle! I was really nice to watch him working on it and to relax finally a bit.

Haddington weekend is over, back to work

We had some wonderful time in Haddington this weekend. We have even ventured for a walk, even though Scotland is at the moment under a winter spell, so I have almost freezed my butt off. Woolly hat was absolutely necessary.

I am not a Scottish winter person, I much prefer to snuggle up with the Sunday editions of newspapers, preferably next to a dog or a warm radiator. We watched the whole 'Star Wars' trilogy and later a thriller with H.Ford where surprise surprise, he plays a baaaaddieeee (next to a very well preserved Michelle Pfeiffer) - now we are too scared to go to a bathroom even though the force is with us...

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Wreszcie dotarlismy do domu po przemilym weekendzie u rodzicow Simona. Nawet wypuscilismy sie na spacer, chociaz niedzielne gazety pialy o meteorologicznej katastrofie czyli opadach sniegu (owszem, widzielismy kilka bialych plackow na zboczach wzgorz Lammmermuir ale to by bylo na tyle z zapowiadanej zamieci). Obijalismy sie przy calej trylogii Gwiezdnych Wojen a kiedy dzieci poszly spac, telewizja pokazala zameckisowska wersje Harrisona F. jako psychopatycznego mordercy (malo prawdopodobne, ale niech bedzie). Dlaczego ludzie kupuja sobie domy oddalone od najblizszej cywilizacji o pare dobrych godzin jazdy pick upem?

Edinburgh for locals

This morning Simon was catching a 6 am train to London so he had to go through the city at dawn to the train station. In the Royal Mile a big, fat fox came towards him.

The Royal Mile is as central in Edinburgh as one can get - and we are now living just minutes from it.

To illustrate some November views of the city I am enclosing an image I took yesterday from my college window - our street is the one on the left.

The main plan is get out there in a woolly hat and keep taking some pictures, fox or not fox.

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Dzisiaj rano, kiedy Simon szedl przez miasto na stacje, zeby zlapac pierwszy poranny pociag do Londynu wielki, tlusty lis przecial mu droge. Simon schodzil wlasnie w dol Royal Mile, w samym centrum miasta. Lis nawet sie nie obejrzal.

Dolaczam zdjecie zrobione z okna uczelni zeby ziulstrowac listopadowo-piktorialne widoki na jakie napotykam teraz w miescie, do ktorego musze sie wybrac wreszcie z normalnym aparatem a nie moim 'pikusiem' na 7 megapixeli. Aha, oprocz aparatu konieczna bedzie tez welniana czapka.

In town

So we have finally moved in into our flat!

Now I am just MINUTES (and I mean that, not 90 minutes but 5 minutes) from college, city center and Filmhouse in Lothian Road, where we have celebrated our more permanent arrival with afternoon screening of 'Der Baader-Meinhoff Komplex' with extremely charismatic Johanna Wokalek as Gudrun Ensslin (ah, this trendy smokey eye makeup of hers, unfortunately not designed for my type of face).


We were almost alone in the cinema, except a group of girls from a language school, who later comented joyfully on how many new German swearwords they just became familiar with (my favourite was 'kwatch' - Monica, please correct me on spelling of this one if I am wrong!)

Official website: http://www.bmk.film.de/

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Wreszcie sie sprowadzilismy 'na powaznie' do naszego edynburskiego mieszknia - kilka minut (a nie 1,5 h w autobusie...) od centrum, mojej uczelni i roznych atrakcji typu Film House przy Lothian Road gdzie swietowalismy wczoraj na popoludniowym seansie 'Der Baader-Meinhoff Komplex'. Charyzmatyczna Johanna Wokalek prawie zmusila mnie, nie nie do terroryzmu (chociaz kilka napadow na banki by sie przydalo hihi) ale do zrobienia sobie oczu na granatowo, mimo, ze to styl kompletnie nie zgodny z moim typem urody - mam wtedy oczy jak jalowka!

Oczywiscie stresuje sie tym, czy w obecnym klimacie ekonomicznym bedzie nas stac na takie mieszkanie w centrum (na razie nas stac ale tez nie widac kolenych wiekszych zlecen) i utrzymanie naszego krakowskiego mieszkania...

Work a little

I deliberately decided to create this blog as a place about my personal life but as I spend 95% of my time thinking, dreaming, wondering about my work aka something I am very passionate about, so why not to boast a little?

Here is a part of campaign for promoting a new edition of Paddington Bear adventures in Polish.There are posters all over Warsaw (including a 40 meters long one in the main train station hall), these ones in Warsaw's metro and a new website which I have also illustrated http://www.paddington.com.pl/ (all images are made by me, except the bear itself, of course by R.W. Alley).

Workspace takes shape

Our flat starts to take shape: Simon installed our workspace yesterday. We have also bought our first decent storage for prints and various bits of paper that should not be stored vertically but flat (fellow photographers know what I am talking about) - we should have owned one years ago, really.
I am going to add a nice rug for under the table now so we do not get cold feet while working, but also to inject some color into the space and to make it less officy.

Dispatched some more presents today for friends (Kasia is having her B day this Monday!) and we are busy with creating some promotional materials for our bussiness (have a look at www.seeingdubble.com). We are going to make a tour around Edinburgh agencies so it would be great to leave them some promos about all that brilliant work we are doing!

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Nasza przestrzen mieszkalna wreszcie zaczyna jakos wygladac: Simon zmontowal wczoraj nasz nowy, wielki stol do pracy. Kupilismy tez pojemnik z szufladami do przechowywania ogromnej ilosci przeroznych papierow w ktorych toniemy a ktore powinny lezec plasko - marzylismy o czyms takim od lat i wreszcie jest z nami.
Mam tez juz kolorowy chodnik w sympatycznych kolorach, ktory ma sprawic, ze caly pokoj przestanie wygladac jak biuro i bedzie tez przyjemnym pomieszczeniem do po prostu przebywania.

Jestesmy zajeci tez promowaniem naszego biznesu www.seeingdubble.com i wkrotce czeka nas stresujace ale niezbedne zajecie prezentowania portfolia w roznych agencjach reklamowych. Oby przy obecnym klimacie ekonomicznym mieli wieksza ochote zatrudniac wolnych strzelcow wykonujacych swietna robote za umiarkowanie duze pieniadze.

If only we were not rentin'

Our flat starts to take necessary shape but a girl still can dream, right?

This is a toilet at the resto - bar Le Kong * designed by Philippe Starck, images of sumo children by Charles Fréger.
For those living in Paris (hint, hint) the address is > Kong, 1, rue du Pont-Neuf, 75001, Paris, 01 40 39 09 00

via www.marieclairemaison.com

Simon Superhero

On Sunday my fantastic boyfriend stepped in and after a couple of hours our locomotive looks like THAT!
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W niedziele Simon wkroczyl do akcji i nasza ciuchcia zaczela wreszcie nabierac ksztaltow!

Flat files

(please click on the image to enlarge it/ kliknij na obrazek to zobaczysz go w powiekszeniu)

^ There are some items I could do with in our new flat (I would really need a dog, but it is out of the question with our current lifestyle).
Hopefully we will be able to move in sometimes next week!

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Kilka rzeczy, ktorymi nie pogardzilabym , gdyby zagoscily w naszym nowym mieszkaniu ( tak na prawde, to najbardziej brakuje mi psa ale to w obecnej sytuacji marzenie scietej glowy)

Material zdjeciowy pochodzi z calkowicie obslinionej przeze mnie strony/ Currently I am drulling over this website :
http://www.style-files.com/

Fascinating work of other people, part 1

My parents are or rather were a very special mix: mum concentrated on movement (she is a choreographer with her own ballet school), father dealing with geometry and construction (engineer specialising in tarmacs and motorways) .
These completely different fields of interest helped in creating me as a designer (a degree in graphic design) but also as a curious personality, curious especially about other ways of expressing one's abilities.
I have an interest in dancers - people who able to be absolutely in control of their body -while I can only ride a bike and swim a little + I have never danced .
A fact that fascinates me the most is that they are able to remember complicated arrangements of movements, minute after minute, bar after bar - I seem to have a completely different kind of memory.
Thanks to my mum's professional contacts I had a chance to observe how choreographers work, though I have observed their cooperation with professional ballet dancers.

This time it was cooperation with somebody who also works with body as she is an actress (one of my favourite ones, I must admit) but does not think as a dancer/choreographer. I am talking about a work of dance theatre 'In-i' by Juliette Binoche and Akram Khan (with visual design by Anish Kapoor and music composition by Philip Sheppard).

Constantly reinventing herself French actress, trained as as hard as GI Jane to be able 'to keep up with the golden spitfire that is Khan' as Jenny Gilbert from Independent summed brutally these litres of sweat by describing months of hard work as 'mildly clumsy kinetic efforts of La Binoche' .
Ms Gilbert should have watched the documentary about the whole preparation process of this performance, recently shown on British tv, to be able to take into consideration her harsh oppinion. As it maybe sells the papers but does not do the justice to the performers.
Critics might be judgemental, that is their job, but I have watched the whole broadcast nevertheless, simply glued to the tv screen.

Especially fascinating moment comes 'when Khan takes the stand to tell his story, about when he was 10, and at the mosque, and owned up to the mullah about being enamoured of a non-Muslim girl at school. There is violence in his story, both implied and shockingly actual, and Khan transmits it grippingly. For a few minutes you forget the other soggy drivel, as Khan ricochets between voicing the fierce mullah and the terrified boy, then explodes in an angry rant, spitting out syllables – perhaps from the Koran, but perplexingly we're not told'

Khan is a fascinating performer, just type his name into Youtube to get a glimpse of his work as the show at the London National Theatre finished on 20 October 2008, way before I have planned my trip to London.

Bio note: Akram Khan was born in London in 1974 to Bangladeshi parents. As a child, he studied kathak, the north Indian classical dance form, won competitions and was cast in Peter Brook's 'Mahabharata' at the age of 14. After a dance degree, Khan began developing a highly personal style, mixing kathak with western contemporary dance. Multiculturalism being the buzzword everywhere in the arts, he couldn't have timed his arrival better. Yet his success is just as much due to a staggering technique, his charisma on stage, and a fierce intelligence that makes him a setter rather than a follower of fashion. Artists as diverse as the writer Hanif Kureishi, sculptor Antony Gormley, and even the ballerina Sylvie Guillem, have queued up to work with him.

full review here: http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/theatre-dance/reviews/ini-lyttelton-theatre-london-936691.html

Even better

Via www.ffffound.com

Cool

http://webwithoutsense.com/

The first ... caramel president of The United States of America

Excellent portfolio of images by Callie Shell:
http://digitaljournalist.org/issue0810/callie-bp.html

Title of this post courtesy of Simon.

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No i mamy pierwszego karmelowego, jak go okreslil Simon, prezydenta Stanow Zjednoczonych!
Powyzej link do swietnego portfolio dokumentujacego kampanie.
Znaleziony przez http://www.itsnicethat.com/

Puzzle inside a riddle wrapped in an enigma

Hours of fun...

Jigsaw plot

In 1605 The Gunpowder Plot was established, with Guy Fawkes as the most anonymous of it's conspirators and attempted to commit the infamous act of terror of blowing up King James I and the Houses of Parliament. Fawkes was found on top of 20 gunpowder barrels when unsuccessfully trying to light a match , tortured and then executed as the remaining conspirators were hanged, drawn and quartered.
Jolly times. Especially for catholics.

So we celebrated with flapcjacks and sparklers (we did not have anything to create a bonfire of as I refused to get rid of my collection of old French Vogue issues), especially that we successfully managed to buy a biiiiig working table and hopefully comfortable bed on our yesterday's trip to local Ikea store.
To let some steam off the family started assembling a jigsaw puzzle - it is going to be a looong night...

Some other news : Philip is celebrating his birthday in Paris - Happy Birthday Phil! So that all your coming ventures are successfull!
Hopefully our present managed to reach him by now.
If you would like to visit his blog, just click on the title Home on the bloggroll on your right.

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W 1605 katolicy zawiazali spisek majacy na celu obalenie krola za pomoca wysadzenia budynku Parlamentu, w ktorym ten mial goscic wraz z cala rodzina. Osoba odpowiedzialna za odpalenie ladunku uczyniono pewnego zolnierza o nazwisku Fawks (a imieniem Guy). Jeden z uczestnikow spisku ostrzegl jednak swojego brata, zeby danego dnia nie uczestniczyl w obradach Parlamentu i tak metoda gluchego telefonu, cala sprawa sie rypla. Uczestnikow spisku przepuszczono przez narzedzia tortur, skazano a nastepnie w zaleznosci od wyroku, pocwiartowano, spalono lub powieszono.
Na pamiatke wykrycia spiskowcow, cala Wyspa, zapala ogniska i strzela petardami, chociaz my, z braku materialow nadajacych sie do puszczenia z dymem, odpalilismy tylko zimne ognie.

Po tak ekscytujacych wydarzeniach, rodzina rozpoczela medytacyjne rozpracowywanie ukladanki z 1000 elementow. Mam nadzieje tylko, ze nie robia tego na czas...

Z innych newsow - dotarlismy wreszcie do Ikea (zdjecia zakupow wkrotce) a Philip w Paryzu obchodzi dzisiaj czterdzieste urodziny! Wszystkiego najlepszego, Phil! (namiar na jego 'elektroniczny pamietnik' znalezc mozna po prawej stronie, pod haslem HOME)

Mississippi Monday

My favourite show in British TV at the moment is a documentary by Stephen Fry about his journey across United States of America in a black London cab. He is now riding along Mississippi river hence a chocolate mud pie, courtesy of my 11 years old stepson. Fingerslickin' good, yeah!

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Moj ulubiony teraz program w brytyjskiej telewizji, na ktory staram sie wyskrobac godzine co poniedzialek (powtorka z niedzieli) jest dokument Stephena Fry (niezapomniany, dystyngowany lokaj Jeeves i partner Rowana Atkinsona w podrozy przez wieki z Czarnym Zmija).

Moj przybrany syn , zainspirowany odcinkiem o Mississipi, wyprodukowal blotne ciasto czekoladowe. Zniknelo z talerzy w takim tempie, ze ledwie mialam czas zrobic zdjecie!

Home, sweet home

Our flat seems to take shape finally as we start to unpack our stuff.
All the boxes have arrived, intact and even not too much squashed which still baffles me after that journey they have been through.
Now we just need to get a bed, a working table and some chairs. Ebay seems to be suprisingly devoid of the reasonably sized tables to pick up in our area, so I am affraid we will have to find solace in the scandinavian empire of flat packed furniture. However, anything I would like to get there, seems to be out of stock on their website. Even loobrushes!
Have you ever seen an empty Ikea?

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Powoli zaczynamy rozpakowywanie naszego emigracyjnego dobytku. O dziwo wszystkie pudelka przyjechaly cale i zdrowe, z zadowoleniem odfajkowywalam kolejne pozycje na liscie w miare jak panowie przewoznicy wnosili je na nasze trzecie pietro.
Nadal poszukujemy stolu do pracy na Ebayu ale po wygodne lozko udamy sie na wyprawe do IKEA, mimo, ze wszystkie interesujace nas obiekty, na ich stronie internetowej, maja zaznaczony znaczek 'wyprzedane'. Nawet zwykla szczotka kibelkowa jest dla nas niedostepna!

Might need botox soon

Could anybody explain please, why do they look in separate directions? That is very awkward.
Who chooses these promotional images? On what basis?
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Czy ktos moglby mi wytlumaczyc, dlaczego oni patrza w przeciwnych kierunkach? Czy doprawdy nie bylo lepszego zdjecia? I ta naburmuszona Bond Girl na dokladke.

Pumpkins and ghosts

I did not take much interest in Halloween, which was celebrated here day before yesterday. I cannot actually understand the whole hype, though it was interesting to see girls with drawn fangs on the night bus home.

Celebrations are definitely more sombre in Poland, with people visiting their family graves in quiet and remembering their passed away parents or friends.On the other hand, our neighbours celebrated in style, Mark wearing a bedsheet and running around the house with hoo-hoo sounds. His children instead running away in fraight, started to punch him, which says a lot about modern seven year olds.

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Jakos nie specjalnie dotarlo do mnie, ze mamy Helloween, zupelnie nie rozumiem calego zamieszania z dyniami, kupowaniem gadzetow w ksztalcie duchow oraz dorysowywaniem sobie klow, co czynily z zapalem dziewczeta w autobusie, ktorym wracalam akurat do domu.Cale to anglosaskie zamieszanie komercyjne jeszcze nie dotarlo do Polski z pelna sila, my jestesmy zdecydowanie bardziej powazni we wspominaniu naszych bliskich i przyjaciol, ktorzy odeszli. Nasi sasiedzi swietowali natomiast z rozmachem, Mark biegal po domu przykryty przescieradlem wydajac 'uduchowione' dzwieki. Synowie jednak zamiast uciekac w poplochu, spuscili mu manto, co mowi wiele o dzisiejszych siedmiolatkach.

Na pocieszenie zdjecie dyni, ktora chlopcy wycieli z okazji swieta.