Women of the world, untie!

I went to see Videocracy last night at Hagabion and I really feel that it's raised more questions than were answered. So the situation is this: 80% of Italians rely on TV as their single news source. Italy ranked 77th in terms of freedom of the press. The masses are being subjugated by nubile woman in various states of undress parading on game shows.

I wish the documentary had given a more rounded view of Italy's media scene, I mean, where was the opposition? Surely it wouldn't have hurt to end on a positive note of some description? The spectators in the cinema (me included) were all aghast. I feel like a whole nation has been dragged in the mud. Not saying that the picture painted is not the case, but if a film were being made depicting France as a den of iniquity, I would be quite upset.

Late last night, I read the Wikipedia entry on Silvio Berlusconi which made for highly enternaining if very alarming reading. The man is a walking gaffe! I still don't really understand how he gets away with it, although it doesn't look like anybody can come down on him like a ton of bricks when he argues that he's just a full-blooded Italian who is interested in pretty women and football.
I thought that in this day and age, I wouldn't have to be confronted with such crass chauvinism by someone who thinks that just because I have a pair of ovaries I need to be talked down to and the only thing that matters is whether I am pretty or not.

I say the audience was aghast, and they were too, but I don't want to be deluded into thinking that Sweden is a paradise of gender equality. Relatively speaking it probably is, but having lived here for a bit I can say that there is still a long way to go in terms of gender conditioning. More on that subject another time

Ah yes, I remember now

See? This is what happens when you try to combine too many things at the same time: one of those things is always going to be the loser, and in this case turns ut it was the blog... Pesky things, like work and sleep generally get in the way of providing quality content on every weekday.

Ok, but I will give a little summary of what I've been up to: carrying boxes up and down stairs, running 12km on a beautiful autumn afternoon, getting ready for a meeting, translating a hotel website (and wanting to be a guest), teaching English and French, successfully avoiding the rain (though I think this is going to come to a sudden stop in approx 15 mins), making fantastic pie pastry (if I do say so myself), baking not so fantastic muffins (a case of over-stiring I believe), reading one million other blogs and forgetting to do one million other things.

You?

Göteborg, you continue to tease

I know it must be some kind of proven fact, but simple pleasures are really the best and Gbg is a town that lets you enjoy them to their full extent. There can be nothing more relaxing and exalting at the same time as running errands in town on my bike with very few time pressures: you cycle around, you stop to admire a building you hadn't noticed before, you park with ease, you visit the library, you feel the wind blowing through your hair and life feels good.

Then you go home and try and have in important conversation in Swedish where you grasp about 65% of what was said.

Life in a foreign country, it's a roller coaster man.

unwelcome revelations

I was in the audience for this program yesterday, and though the subjects debated were all very interesting in their own right (communication monitoring to ward off terrorist threats, male/female equality and the effects of the tourist industry on third world countries), the most important thing I learned last night had nothing to do with any of it. It's much, much more mundane than that. As I sat listening, straining my every nerve and sinew to understand the gist of what was going on, it dawned on me: my Swedish, functions perfectly well in day to day situations and I can deal with most stuff, both listening and speaking, but here, I was totally out of my league. My Swedish just doesn't cut the mustard, pal. However, that doesn't mean I'm currently wallowing in a pit of self-despair, far from it (ok, well just a little bit then). No, I now feel that I have the motivation to improve my Swedish so that I can become a fully functioning member of its society, one that understands!

I know what this means though: I'll actually have to do some language work, and I am quite literally the worst student in the world (I know what they are like, I am after all a teacher), no self-discipline whatsoever. So I guess I'm setting myself up for another fall! Go me.





Sigh

Sensommar

One day I'll get around to explaining the title of this blog, but not today.

Göteborg, you tease, first you rain on my parade and my new haircut, and then you make sunshine pour through the windows while I'm baking, causing me to overheat. There is a touch of late summer in the air for sure.

I've been lazy today, but that's ok because tomorrow I start work again *mixed feelings*

An exercise in futility

I am about to attend a meeting on bike and rubbish issues for this building and I think I can safely say that I have strictly nothing to contribute. So I feel a wave of quietness coming on which I stare silently as the others rattle off jolly good solutions for our new recycling facilities, probably using words I have never heard before. I think I will probably spend the time to daydream about new cute outfits I can put together - a regular passtime of mine.

I would so much rather stay at home and bake a cake.