Sunday 31 January 2010

Run rabbit,run!

A detail from a wall of the Thistle Chapel.

Wednesday 27 January 2010

A day full of


...
blog updates
coffee
high heels
pasta cooking
Florence and the Machine
adverts designing
waiting for Spring
plant watching
^ more of it later...

Tuesday 26 January 2010

Out of the gloom


Today's news is that Britain is officially out of recession and frankly I am already sick with Radio 4 repeating it all day long as well as when they were speading doom and gloom a year ago.

During our casual morning in a local cafe (the one on the other side of the road) while reading their copy of the Guardian I came accross an interview with a theatre director in London who said that one thing he hates about his job is realising that all in all, he earns less than a 19 year old shop assistant.

Ah well, a consolation came from one of my favourite websites (one of the links on the right) with a quote from Christo's biography:

Error: "The easy life of an artist"



Not quite so. Until 2006 Christo was working an average of 17 hours a day – 7 days a week. These days, he works and average of 13 hours a day. Jeanne-Claude is a bit lazier, only 10 hours a day.

They do not take vacations.

More here.

Wednesday 20 January 2010

To cheer us up

Sexy breakfast:























Sexy breakfast after:



Ok, back to work...

In the heights of a winter blues

Yesterday was apparently the most depressing day of Winter. It showed in Edinburgh, with some Dickensian atmosphere courtesy of fog and wet air. We are up to our ears in work though all we want is to stay in bed, wrapped up and reading adventures of Sherlock Holmes which I got from a local second hand bookshop for £6. It has original illustrations from the magazine edition so it is a real treat.




Wednesday 13 January 2010

Saturday 9 January 2010

Christmas in Poland - last leg of the journey - Krakow



To combine the best of both worlds I decided to book my flight back from Krakow, so that I would be able to visit my friends there too. I stayed with my best friend but also one of my favourite cooperators and models - Monika. Of couse we spent the whole time chatting. Unfortunately she was not feeling very well so her husband Piotr went out with me on a walk entitled 'a tourist in your own city'. Well, I haven't been to Krakow for almost a year so some things I did are fully understandable: I took a picture of me next to a monument of Piotr Skrzynecki. In the Vis a Vis bar behind me, there was one of the staff members of the photolab where I was a regular (at least once a week) visitor and who clearly was surprised at my actions - this is a thing only tourists do! Well, I am kind of one now...

I have also realised that I am posing for this picture (courtesy of Piotr) in exactly the same manner as my mum does for her tourist pics...



It was also nice to meet again with Marcin designs for Teatr Stary. We would need you here in Edinburgh too!

Monika and Piotr by me at the airport couple of hours after pictures above were taken. I hope I will be able to see you soon in Scotland. Luckily my flight was only 2 hours late. I was reading Chopin letters so I did not even noticed.

Wednesday 6 January 2010

Ouch, my coat

The only downside of the Polish holidays was a destruction of my favourite winter coat. It burned on a heater in a little shop I went into to say hello to a familiar owner and I ended up chopping off the whole bottom of it so now I just have a not so favourite winter jacket...

Christmas in Lublin - Christmas Eve

Apart from visitng my native city of Lublin (just look at all these huddled pigeons on top of Maresal Pilsudski monument!) I had a lovely time with my family, which I tend not to get very often (as last time we met when they came for the wedding in Oxford) not to mention a very special Polish food prepared especially for the Christmas Eve:

Snowy Christmas in Lublin

I am not a believer in an activity holiday. My ideal is pyjamas, good film on TV (this time it was a biography of Chaplin with Robert Downey Jr) and a perspective of not being obliged to do anything for next several days. Unfortunately I had to take some work with me to Poland but luckily it was not more than for 4 hours a day so the rest of that time I could spend in he way I wished.

Lublin was less cold than Warsaw when on the evening of my return from Dominika's it was -18 degrees! but it had much more snow:




Monday 4 January 2010

Breaking (home) news


Back to our Scottish dwellings for a moment - Simon's sister sent us a pack of absolutely gorgeous Rococco Chocolates in an exqusite box. I am just fighting off Simon before he scoffs it all in 3 sec straight!

Thank you Sarah (+Micheal + Belinda + Honor)!

Sunday 3 January 2010

Christmas in Poland - Warsaw part 2


Warszawa was extremely cold during my visit. I went to visit my nine months pregnant friend Dominika (last time when I was in Warsaw and we arranged to meet all I got was an answering machine as Dominika was already busy with giving birth to her first son! This time I had more luck as Ignacy was born on 27th of December so almost ten days after my visit.) She lives in Saska Kepa so that to meet her I had to cross the river ^
It was not the end of meeting friends with babies as Kasia's sister and my very good friend Joanka brought her son for his visit in Poland too! When I saw her last, Julian was still in her belly!
I was so happy and overwhelmed that I finally MADE IT to Poland after a year of absence that I quickly went to the All Saints church to say a quick prayer and drop a little plea for a saint Juda Tadeusz who as Monika Zeromska claimed is a very special saint specialising in unresolved matters.


I kept myself busy with photographying a Warsaw landmark - Palac Kultury which kept on creeping up on me everytime I have turned around. Here ^ it is just before my visit to Kasia's favourite hairdresser who she very kindly booked for me 3 months in advance! Now I am sporting a crop a la Juliette Binoche in Bleu though I got a parting on the wrong side and I cannot get used to it grrrr....

Friday 1 January 2010

Christmas in Poland - Warsaw

My stay in Warsaw usually starts in Miedzy Nami Cafe where I arrive mid day from the airport (I have to start my journey in the very early hours of the morning as my flight from Glasgow is at 8 am) and immediately plunge into their tasty (and a very reasonably priced!) food, with plenty of black tea which in Poland is served with a slice of lemon, instead of milk.

There was their usual installation (sometimes they use their big central wall this time it was stairs), this time with gnomes. (How sad we had to chuck oaway our Zygmunt when moving out of our Krakow flat), and one of the top Polish photographers, Mr. Swietlik, was taking pictures of some of his friends:

It was so cold outside (reaching  almost - 20 degrees!) that I cancelled all of my plans (even shopping was not going to make me venture outside!) and I decided to wait for my friend Kasia in the cafe. Nobody was bothering me, I kept on ordering more and more coffee and cake while reading all the latest editions of Polish press (this the most apart from family and friends that I miss about Pland) and having an occassional chat with people form a next table.