30 July 2009

Hola! Habla ingles?

Lex & Lauch at Cartejima, Spain

Lauch, Cartejima, Spain

Hi! These photos were taken in Cartejima, a tiny white town in the south of Spain. White as in ALL the buildings are white! There are lots of these in the south of Spain but this one was particularly cute. We stayed in a little old building run by an Englishman who is very welcoming and enthusiastic and enjoys a few drinks on the roof terrace.

These photos were taken at 7am in the morning. Mmm. Because in this heat, 6.30am seems like quite a reasonable time to be awake. Niiiice and cool. It is hard work putting up photos on the tiny laptop so there will only be a photo every now and then.

The last week has been full of swimming on the roof terrace in Granada, white mountain towns in Cartejima, staying on a little farm with some lovely ex-hippies in Tarifa. And swims in the sea which was WARM. Now Lauch and I are in Seville and will be flying into the madness of Marrakesh in two days.

Lexonline, alive and well in Seville, signing off.
x

19 July 2009

It's Official

Vintage Clothing Shop, Portobello Road

Lauch and I are hitting the road! We fly out of London this Friday 24th July and will be somewhere between London and Istanbul for the next four or five weeks. Lauch's bringing his mini laptop so I hope to be able to put a few photos up while we're away in the heat of Spain, Morocco, Italy, Greece and Turkey.
x Lex

How to Say Goodbye

Leaving means:

The end of
arthouse movies at the Barbican,
the kind that never make it to Australia.

The end of
wandering through the centre of London, that gorgeous bit
with neon lights and bookshops and that incredible feeling of age.
London is hard to describe
feels like Chatuchak market in Thailand - endless and maze-like
and you never know what magic you might find.

This is the end of the best teaching job I ever had
and the most amazing five-year-olds I ever met.

This is the end of lazy weekends
frittered away in Lantana
and idle conversations with Frank and Andrew and Sid and Chetna.

A few friendships finishing,
you know the ones that were just beginning,
with people you think are cool
but you didn't have quite enough time to work up the courage
to tell them so.

And leaving means the beginning of something new
and shiny and good.

16 July 2009

Late Wednesday Night

walking home from Putney
across a bridge, the river was the colour of indigo with a moon shining on it
bright white mixed with royal blue.

there were party boats turning wide uturns in the river
ripples of waves sinking outwards.

somewhere near ten, light just fading
people walking like shadows across the bridge.
an american with a giant beard and a bottle in his hand
asks us if the party boats go to Oxford
but suddenly the 220 bus pulls up and we run to get on it.

tonight, bellies full of thai food
and good conversation
and goodbyes, a little awkward
but promising:
new friends we might see again soon
on the other side of the world.

4 July 2009

Heat

Path, Dover
White Cliffs, Dover

It has been about 30 degrees for the past two weeks. In the two and a half years I've lived here it has never been so hot. There is of course no air conditioning at work. All the teachers have been wearing shorts. The kids have turned into bedraggled creatures with bright pink patches on their cheeks and sweat dampened hair. The dinner ladies bring them inside early at lunch time, into the classrooms with all the lights turned off to feed them iced water and let them cool down.

This week there was a "weather warning" from the government to tell everyone how to deal with the heat. We were not to do PE outside. (The PE teacher took the kids out and they were only allowed to run in the shade of a building). Actually what you don't know is that there is no grass for our kids to run on in the playground - it is entirely made of bitumen. Which is hotter than grass I expect. We were not to have any electrical equipment turned on. No lights. No computers.

It takes me forty five minutes to walk home rather than thirty, my feet drag and shuffle and sometimes I'm eating icecream. It is wonderful, apart from all the sweat. Steamy and thundery and wonderful. All this heat and only three weeks left in London.

2 July 2009

Headlines

Headlines, Sunday

These were the headlines on Sunday. According to the Evening Standard, anyway. I love how sensationalist they are. Seriously, it's like they've predicted the end of the world already, several times this year.

But this time London is responsible for the death of Michael Jackson! Really! Since when do entire cities take responsibility for the death of one person?

I got to school on Monday expecting my class to be in blissful ignorance but no. They ALL knew who he was! They were all astounded that he was dead. One of them told me one of MJ's songs is "scary." (He was referring to 'Thriller.') I said to them solemnly "Yes everybody, Michael Jackson has died and now he will go to Heaven."

"No he won't!" said one bright boy. "Right now he's in the body room, and then he'll be in the one of those boxes in the ground... and THEN he'll be in Heaven."