summertime

I'm at the moment sunbathing on the balcony of Belvedere hotel in Ohrid. Just opened the swimming season this year. Lake Ohrid, quite chilly, but feels good :)

manic monday and tuesday, too

It turned out to be a fantastic weekend. From the Balkans to the South Caucasus. But now need to forget about fun and get back to work. And the weather is shit at the moment. I should got to a lecture soon, on Armenian genocide but outside is a big wind and some hail..even... though there are brief moments of sun. It looks like the war between winter and spring is approaching it's culmination :P
Hmm.. I was thinking that writing reports could be fun, maybe. It's not that I hate it all the time. Sometimes I develop and interesting thought or find the right word to put in the right place and then I feel happy. But I like to do things fast and writing reports takes so long time. I cannot just sit and think for so long...so then I always start cooking, cleaning, doing laundry, making teas and coffees and maybe finding something else to clean. And I justify myself that I need some action to make my brain work and digest all the readings I have done. At the end I will still write it.

Hijazz - one more +

Yesterday, I was to a Kvartet Traktör concert in Hijazz. It was my second time there and the first time was Balkan too - a band which was playing Macedonian music. Maybe the Balkan connection, maybe 8% Efes extra, but I really enjoyed myself both times. We had a preparty with a great thick home made pizza, french sausage and wine before, so in the beginning I could not really start to jump in the fast beats of Balkan gypsy music, they should have started with something slower. The guys were good, but still a real thing is a real thing. Sorry to say but I enjoyed the records after the live music more :) I really danced myself off... We also had taken some great drum bangers with us so at the end it resulted in an exceptionally great evening! Thank you guys!

It's another beautiful day here. It is so hard to stay inside and study. While making my Swedish coffee Balkan way and sipping it from my nationalistic Macedonian cups, I was looking down on the crocuses and just feeling very very happy! The spring is here! But it is a bit weird in these moments, when there is no snow and +5 so far to the north where I am now and only +1 and snow in Macedonia. I hope the spring wins there before I come.

Talking about Macedonia... the things seem to be getting worse and worse there with liberties and democracy. Students are organizing protests because they feel much more censorship in the universities and a stress on discipline. The student newspaper and radio is closed and saying something, which is outside the accepted lines, can mean different repressions - as failed exams and exclusion from the university...

Happy Spring! Happy Norouz!

The spring will come in around an hour. The days start to get longer than the nights. The dark times are over. We had a couple of very nice sunny days this week when I was just walking around listening to my Balkan pop and catching some vitamin D. Now it got cold again and I heard that it is even snowing in Macedonia where the trees are in full bloom already. But the spring will win. Vinter, ge upp!

It is also the new year for the Kurds, Iranians, Tajiks, and Afgans as I found out. There is a lot of Kurds and Iranians in Sweden and it seems this weekend is full of parties. Straight from the St. Patrick's Weekend into Norouz weekend! La viva la internationalisme!

To be a man

I don't understand if the Swedish feminists understand what they have done to their men. This is outrageous. This morning I was taking down the garbage (as I always do because the Swedish man I live with piles it till it all starts to fall over and maybe when it is hard to see where was the garbage bin, he takes it out... but probably lately he has started to believe that it takes out itself when it is full enough). Outside the door were 4 big Swedish men, looking a bit like construction workers, plumbers or like. They did not get the idea that they could let a single girl with 3 big bags first, instead they started to pour in while I was holding the door (and the 3 big bags). I really felt like kicking their balls, but then I thought maybe I should kick the Swedish feminists' balls, because they have already kicked the balls of their men and they don't have any left.