Moules frites.

And Hecule Poirot, my travelling companion. All is well.

- E

Francia

I am here and I am happy. My feet are bare and I feel they are getting numb. Just the way summer and sand make them. I am eating pain au chocolat for breakfast and gaining 0. I am paddling and paddling and my love yells paddle harder take the bigger one take it. And I paddle more.When I can not paddle anumore we sit in bookstores and rummage. Speak in French in words I never knew I even could, read books that make my melt inside. Truly here I am happy. Just Like This.

- E

Amazon's Kindle e-book reader

Amid reports that Amazon is working on new models of its e-book reader, the Kindle, one analyst says the online titan has an academic spin in mind.

Amazon sees a chance to cash in by marketing the Kindle to college students, according to McAdams Wright Ragen analyst Tim Bueneman, by way of Seattlepi.com reporter Andrea James.

A collegiate version could be just one of a number of potential Kindles-to-be, apparently. "There are already several new, improved versions of the Kindle in the works," Bueneman wrote in a note Friday, per James.

In July, the site Crunchgear reported that two new Kindles were in the offing: One would have the same dimensions as the existing device, along with an improved interface, and could arrive this fall, while the second would be larger and would come next year. The current 10-ounce Kindle, priced at $359, measures 7.5 inches tall by 5.3 inches wide and 0.7 inch deep.

Bueneman reported that one new version could well feature "improved interface operating controls. This has been an issue with some buyers."

Amazon reportedly is also downplaying some "extremely high estimates" on Kindle sales, according to Bueneman. The company is apparently referring to the likes of CitiGroup analyst Mark Mahaney, who earlier this month upped his estimate and pegged the Kindle to sell about 380,000 units in 2008. Mahaney said the Amazon gadget could be one of the hottest gifts of holiday season.

******************

It would be amazing! I'd totally get one, it would be so convenient. I'd rather have this than carrying loads of books. =)

Lovely

Isn't it...

I heart Louis A.

Imagine

Sunscreens

*I know most of you like the Sun. Better to take precautions now than be sorry later on.

About 85 percent of the sunscreens on the market are not good enough to protect against skin damage from ultraviolet rays, according to a new report.

The new report, by the nonprofit Environmental Working Group, says that 85% of sunscreen either inadequately protect against the damage caused by the sun's rays or contain chemicals that pose excess hazard.

Here are some recommended sunscreens:

Keys Soap Solar Rx Therapeutic Sunblock, SPF 30
Trukid Sunny Days Facestick Mineral Sunscreen UVA/UVB Broad Spectrum, SPF 30+
California Baby Sunblock Stick Everyday/year-Round, SPF 30+
California Baby Sunblock Stick No Fragrance, SPF 30+
Badger Sunscreen, SPF 30
Marie Veronique Skin Therapy Sun Serum
Lavera Sunscreen Neutral, SPF 40
Vanicream Sunscreen, SPF 35
Vanicream Sunscreen Sport, SPF 35
California Baby Sunscreen Lotion No Fragrance, SPF 30+
California Baby Sunscreen Lotion Everyday/year-Round, SPF 30+
UV Natural Sunscreen, SPF 30+
Sun Science Sport Formula, SPF 30
California Baby Sunscreen Lotion Natural Bug Blend, SPF 30+
UV Natural Sunscreen, Sport, SPF 30+
UV Natural Sunscreen, UV Golf / Ultra
Soleo Organics Sunscreen all natural Sunscreen, SPF 30+
Lotus Moon Sage Sun Protective Creme -, SPF 25
Healing-Scents Live Long Sunscreen, SPF 25-30
Caribbean Sol Solguard, SPF 25
Kabana Skin Care Green Screen Organic Sunscreen - Skin Tone Tinted, SPF 22
B. Glen Natural Clay Sunscreen 25
Kabana Skin Care Green Screen Organic Sunscreen - Fragrance Free, SPF 20
Cosmesis Dermatologist Sunblock, SPF 30
Arcona Reozone, Protect, SPF 20
Arcona Tinted Reozone, Protect, SPF 20
L'uvalla Certified Organic L'UVAlla Certified Organic Sunscreen Face/body, SPF 20
Sun Science Hydrating Sun Mist, SPF 30

China 'blocks' iTunes music store

Apple iTunes customers in China fear the online store has been blocked after a pro-Tibet album featured on the site became a hit.

The site has been unavailable inside China for the past week.

An Apple spokeswoman said the firm was currently investigating what lay behind the problem.

The Beijing authorities have not commented on the issue, but activists claim it is connected to the recent release of "Songs for Tibet". <===== What else could it be right... They can't suppresse this basic human rights... People will rebel esp. at this time and age, where everyone has got a cellphone and people are travelling all over - absurd.

Millions of Chinese citizens use the internet for education and business, but the government sometimes tries to block access to sites run by dissidents and human rights and Tibet activists.

Popular download

Users of iTunes in China have complained that they have been unable to download music since Monday - a day after the Art of Peace Foundation announced the release of the pro-Tibet album.

BBC staff in Beijing confirmed on Friday that the site was still not working.

The album has been a popular download across the world, and has featured on the front pages of the iTunes stores.

A review page for the album attracted a strong exchange of views between pro-Tibet campaigners and Chinese nationalists.

Michael Wohl, the Art of Peace Foundation's executive, said he believed the album was the reason for the disruption to iTunes, although he had no proof.

Those who contributed to the album include artists Alanis Morissette and Underworld, and there is also a 15-minute talk by the Dalai Lama, the exiled Tibetan leader.

********* that's my rant this morning. *wink*

Movin' Out

The process of moving out and finding a new place to live is not a piece of cake. Freakin' tons of work to do! Although, I'm having fun =))) Yippie! I'll miss our amazing view, big space, arts hanging on the wall, etc...

Greetings from Lovely San Francisco

So the other day we went to this Filipino Restaurant in the Castro District, called Palencia. Gut feeling when I walked in, I knew it was going to be iffy. And sure enough...

I asked our host to sit us by the window... Mike-Ikey is 6'3", he gets claustrophobic in tight places. That was a plop. Where we were seated, flies were buzzing around us. It was disgusting. I spent part of my childhood in the Philippines and I still visit there once in a while. I'm not so disgusted by it, as long as they don't land on my food - but it did! Grosss... Of course, it's a whole another story for Mike, he totally lost his apetite, I felt so bad for him. We got through it though, despite the obstacles.

If it wasn't for the cramped space and the flies hovering all over us (I killed 2 of them!); the food was good. We had the ginataang jackfruit, which is sort of like the Filipino version of curry - not sweet, a bit tangy and definitely coconuty. It reminded me of my Mum's version. Also, we had bistek, marinated pork. I wanted to taste this b/c my auntie makes the best Bistek (craving for it); the Bistek at Palencia did not come close, uberly disappointed.

I am off.

And I am not keeping a travel-log!

I will only be surfing my little heart out and probably paddling for the same amount as well. Bay of Biscay on the French side is pushing 4 m and I have fear in my bikini bottoms. My beloved ocean, let us be friends this time! Let me ride on your beautiful swell formations and feel the wind in my hair. Let me love you like only I can. Anyway I shall be free. Free of work, times of the day, dates, bills, phones, internet, blogs.

Let me hear yeeeehaaaaa and amen!

- E

Ayaan Hirsi Ali

Just finished reading the Infidel by Ms. Ayaan Hirsi Ali. She is one courageous woman. Unbelievably smart and just full of motivation and the will to voice our her concerns about her fellow Muslim women. Infidel is a must read. It's not dry and dull. There were many moments where I wanted to scream (my heart out) justice for women! I could never ever take advantage of being a women where I am oppressed (I can still argue with that but least I'm nowhere near where most of these Muslim/non-Muslim women are); I am beyond priviledge.

Great read =)

And God Created Woman.

I just finished watching Et Dieu...crea la femme (1956) by Roger Vadim. Brigitte Bardot plays a crazy temptress who men just find impossibly lovable. She dances like a madwoman on tables, drinks double cognacs, loves and teases.





Oh and she also has a little rabbit called Sokrates.
And a bed full of kittens!
My heart broke a little even if I am so terribly hung over.

- E

Home is where the heart is.

Every now and again one of my friends will ask me
'Elena, why do you never come to town'
'Why you never come and have a drink'

How do you explain to someone that leaving is impossible when your home is your haven?

- E

I am currently crazy busy. We are off to France nad Spain in a tick and there is so much to do. Spare with me. Oh and enjoy any of the summer that is left. Soon our bones will fell cold yet again.

Summer school Over...

This was last day of class =). Relieved and happy.

Then...

I have a week off. Then back to school again =). Yippie... Not really, more like - wahhhh... Lol.

Anyway, last night we went to see Tropic Thunder. It's a hilarious satire of different movies put in together. The cameo's of certain individuals (i'm not going to name who, b/c you might not consider it at all) are freakin hilarious.

I hope things are well with you... How was sailing =)

I am wasting no more time.

Last night I had some Mexican din din with my good friends. It was average. Or a bit gross as you can see in the picture. We then went on to play some pool at my old job haunt Corona.
I think I need to introduce you to Corona.
It is my little haven here in Helsinki.
Full of drunken artists and people from the country side who think the epitome of cool is to be mean. So they are and I bet inside they are swetting their little insecure souls off.
But anyway yeah my old boss Hate has got new glasses and he looks like Samuel Beckett or something. Hate is a drummer.
Once in an airplane a male flight attendant asked him if he would like to have 'coffee-tea-or me'. I thought that was funny. Then every time when Hate travels he gets 'jet flag'.And somehow with him that actually makes sense that little jet flag.


See? Even Donald knows how to rock it.

Now I am eating breakfast. Then some work followed by fun.
Today my friends I have decided to take on to another pretty challenge, SAILING!
Yey. I shall wear a hat and my anchor scarf.
I hope all the other ladies in the course also understand the crucial importance of wearing your best at seas.
I believe it keeps the troubles at bay!

- E

Disappointed.

Made me cry a little. It has been an emotional evening for me.

***************************************************************************

Yao has delivered, now it’s China’s turn
By Adrian Wojnarowski, Yahoo! Sports
Aug 10, 5:01 pm EDT

BEIJING – On his way out of the game, Yao Ming thrust his fist through the air, and soon made that long, wobbly walk to the Chinese bench. The end of a brilliant and historic night for basketball, the end of responsibility for Yao. His work is done. Let him rest.

“The game was a treasure,” Yao said, “and it will be a treasure for the rest of my life.”

Here was a surreal sight on Sunday night in these Olympic Games. Here was the embodiment of Yao Ming’s legacy: His heart, his determination, his immensity. He made possible a billion people worldwide watching a basketball game on television. He made possible these blistering ovations and rock-star treatment the U.S. players receive here. He made possible the hundreds of millions of dollars that David Stern can generate here.

And above all, Yao gave China its Olympic flag-bearer and iconic athlete to frame the most important engagement it’s ever had with the world.

“Yao built the bridge for all of us,” Kobe Bryant said.

To watch Yao limp and flail and double over to breathe was to understand the reasons with which his sense of obligation brought him back so soon from another broken foot, another surgery. For Yao, this is his life’s lot. For his own preservation, his own crack at a career undiminished, he needs to tell a most unrelenting Chinese sports machine that its days of running him into the ground are gone.

No more summers with the national team in non-Olympic years, no more of the treatment that’s breaking down his body. The sport’s never seen an athlete of his size who is so skilled, so agile. His lower body has crumbled under the burden, with two broken feet, a broken leg and an infected toe. It breaks your heart to watch what has happened to him. As much as anyone, his body needs rest and recovery. The pounding has taken a terrible toll on him.

“They will continue to pressure him,” one high-ranking international basketball official said of Chinese officials. “The one thing they do with all of their athletes is drive them into the ground with training. The strongest survive. If you don’t, they’ll find another to come and do it.

“I mean, they don’t do little things like block out good airline seats for them when they travel. They can all be in middle seats in coach for all they care, and that’s how Yao travels with them. Whatever happens with his injuries, they’re going to insist that he keeps playing for them.”

The Chinese government had monitored his birth because of the perfect physical and athletic genes of his parents, forever treating him as something of a science project. Yet there’s nothing robotic, nothing programmed, about him. He has such humanity, such a sense of grace and honor. Over time, you can slowly see him assimilating into more of a Western mindset. He has things on his mind. Yes, he has plenty of opinions. It just isn’t his culture’s way to share them.

Poor Yao. The Rockets traded for the tempestuous Ron Artest and Yao’s reaction was perfectly appropriate. What he wanted to know, he said, was if Artest was done pummeling fans in the stands. Essentially, it was his way of asking: Will this clown ever get it right? Fair question, but the surprising bite to his words created a reaction that immediately sent Yao scurrying to make public and private apologies.

Yao showed a little edge, and he needs to do it again. After these Games, he needs to use the leverage of his popularity, his earning power in China and tell the regime that he’s done with the grinding national team calendar. Tell them that they’ll see him in 2012 in London, and that if they leave him alone, maybe he’ll make it there as an elite player.

When Yao crumbled with a stress fracture, necessitating the fourth surgery on his lower body in the past two years, his old Houston Rockets coach Jeff Van Gundy pleaded that Yao – or someone close with a willingness to be the bad guy – has to learn the word “No.”

Still, Yao gives China its biggest star in these Olympics. Here, everything is about saving face, and the under-manned Chinese did that with a respectable showing. Yao missed seven of 10 shots and spent so much of his night crumpled over, holding his shorts, gasping for breath. He gave them one moment, though. Before the U.S. turned its Pool B game into a dunking line, Yao started it all. Of all things, he backed behind the three-point line and delivered the game’s first basket. Such a roar in this jammed building, such a poetic moment. After all, Yao has always defied range and reach.

“I felt honored to be there watching that,” U.S. point guard Chris Paul said. “It felt like a storybook when he hit that shot.’

So yes, everybody has made a killing on Yao Ming and he is tired and beaten and owed something here. Owed big. No one ever came to the NBA with his hype and pressure, with so many people openly pulling for him to be a flop. He was a mysterious figure out of the Far East and he felt like a threat. Now, everyone understands: The NBA needs Yao, the way China does. Only, he counted on them looking out for his best interests. They’ve bled him dry. His time, his turn now.

For once in his life, Yao needs it to be about him. He’s never going to lose face, but he could have his career cut far too short. Whatever’s happened, Yao must tell China’s government: Enough is enough – we’re even.

Tita (auntie)

Marthy's Mum passed away earlier. She was a great mother and an amazing woman.

Great cook, she made me love and crave Filipino food.

We'll all miss her terribly. She'll never be forgotten.

Helan går.

Our, I believe, sole active reader told me this morning that our blog was getting too political. I said thanks dad and decided to take up our last weeks crayfish party.

'Minne har jag tappat mitt minne,
är jag svensk eller finne,
kommer int' ihåg...'


Asta was best dressed. Yet again. I sucked.

See, my boi was there too.

Our table.

Some of my best friends.

And I must say that Hanna has the best summer hair.

Wawawiiwa!

Us girls crashed in constant intervals from 12 am to 3 am whereas the bois decided to leave the sleepy party at 4 am only to return at 8 am after crashing some spooky old abandoned houses. Oh bois.

Phew.
How easy was that huh?
Back from the slippery slope of modern international politics and onto the good ol' light subjects.
Cheers to that and helan går!

- E

Peace & Love

I really like this one... Especially the painting on the right.

Once again, the Russians - back to history. I have been following this and I can only imagine of what you're feeling right now. My thoughts and prayers...

As for the Chinese...
I've been so hard with the Chinese and how they are with their ways, the hate was blinding me. Every country when they were starting to boom, they all went through some phase where China is at right now - some human rights issues, environment issues, etc... If in the future, they're still ignoring their responsibility, all hell will definitely break lose. All country has its own flaws, only now that China is in the center stage b/c countries like the USA feels threatened with their growing power. God only knows what will the Chinese become of once they're on top, let's all hope for the best. They have been brutal in the past but also they've beaten so many times b/c of their stance in politics (communism). I think like everyone else, they are just trying to survive esp with their growing population. If the Chinese gov't don't do anything on how its people will survive (self-sufficient), difficulties and problems will just keep on mounting.

My point is... I'm giving the Chinese a chance but that doesn't mean I'm refusing to acknowledge the fact that they are aiding Mugabe and the rebels in Sudan, the One-Child policy, and trampling Tibet's freedom, etc...

080808

Where I live is the most beautiful in the world.
To me it is so safe.
I have my family and my friends and my loves and my losses.


My home.

Last night I was watching my parents sitting on their porch enjoying a glass of rose and discussing life. There was something so very touching about the connection they share.
Then I thought of the military coming with their tanks, their bombs and their guns. How we would run to get away. Maybe loose each other on the way and possibly for forever. How they would burn down the house that to me feels so safe.
How our lives would get demolished. It felt so horrendous.

My heart goes to all the people in South Ossetia who are being bombarded by the Russian and the Georgian troops. It seems like we learned nothing from the Cold War and that the only way to change things would be to....you know.The thing everyone knows. Take them down. Force them to start acting like the rest of us. Respecting each other.
And the same goes with the Olympics.
Without respect for humans rights the good spirits of the Olympic sports can not live on.

So I am sorry. I will not be watching the Olympics. I will not be cheering for the world as we know it.
I will be praying for world peace. As cliched as it may sound.

- E

8.8.08 (Girls night out)

Cut this out from a magazine. Thought it was pretty.

This is Madonna. You'd like her, she's our ghetto fabulous girlfriend =). She's freakin hilarious, a bit picky but awesome.

Yes... I cut my hair again - gettin' shorter and shorter.

This was taken in Union Square - gettin' ready to start our night.

Not sure if she was drunk here. Just goofin' around.

This is Marthy. She's one of the few dear friends that are left.

Good times!

She's our Adriana Lima =)

They're beautiful girls - inside and out =).

Laughter and Friendship.