Take part in a postcard art project!

There are always awesome art projects for postcard fans on the Internet. Postcrossing and Couchsurfing have always some going, but there are some occasional ones organized by artists or bloggers, too. This one I found on the Facebook page of Wort.lu. (By the way, I think they're creating an awesome newsportal.)

My own photo taken in Ettelbruck. Artist: Marie José Kerschen

So what's this project about?

Well, Luxembourgish artist, Gea Casolaro is waiting for your postcards from 15 June, 2013 till 31 January, 2014. But she wants specific postcards, like that featuring a red bridge or the word 'suisse' or a donkey! The art project will be on display at the Luxembourg Centre National de l'Audiovisuel from 26 September, 2013.

Find a detailed description on how to participate and how to get your postcard to Gea here.

And if you have awesome photos, but no postcards, turn them into fabulous ones with the help of Moo!

Are you a Postcrosser? Have you ever participated in an art project organized via the Internet? What kind of postcards do you bring home from your holidays? Let me know in the Comments below. (Mind you, I set all comments to moderate, so it may take a while to appear.)

Mind Mapping Fun!

A few weeks ago, I picked up the book, The Power of Creative Intelligence by Tony Buzan in the library. I've found it very inspiring. At one point, there's a 'workout' where you have to create a mind map based on FUN. You should write down the first 10 words that come to your mind, then write 5 more words to each main word that pop into your mind in relation to that 'concept'. Later, the author suggests that you use images in your mind maps, because they are much more powerful, than simple words.

Source

Since I really enjoyed this little 'workout' - that's the author's concept -  and thought that it would inspire a lot of people, I'll share with you my imperfect version. (I say imperfect, because my mind got stuck in a rut at certain places.)

And, you should definitely read the book. It gives you wings far greater than Red Bull ever could.

Click on the words to see the images I've picked for each. (And Pinterest is even a better friend than Google.)

Source

So, the main concept is FUN.

10 words associated with fun:

Travel
Laughing
Sugar
Sunshine
Sea
Game
Wind
Surprise
Excentric
Cooking

Source

5 more words associated with Travel:

Europe, sandy beach, adventure, glamour, summer

5 more words associated with Laughing:

Lipstick, naughty, rire, teeth, sound

5 more words associated with Sugar:

Pink, cake, patisserie, yellow, vintage

5 more words associated with Sunshine:

Parasol, shades, comics, rays, sand

Source

5 more words associated with Sea:

Breeze, shell, silkie, gulls, pier

5 more words associated with Game:

Playful, seduce, deer, casino, witty

5 more words associated with Wind:

Shawl, tree, grey, green, road

5 more words associated with Surprise:

Gift, joy, box, white, pearl

Source

5 more words associated with Excentric:

Jewellry, aunt, design, icon, peacock

5 more words associated with Cooking:

Christmas pudding, icing, flavours, goddess in the kitchen, entertaining

Have you ever tried mind mapping? If yes, what do you use it for? Have you found any inspiring words or images in the above collection? Let me know in the Comments below. (Mind you, I set all comments to moderate, so it may take a while to appear.)

Try something new!

Do you also feel the urge, not only around New Year's Eve, but during the summer, as well to try something new? Now, that the days are so hot and long, I decided to look for some inspiration for trying new things to spice up my lazy summer days.

That's when I came across the website www.trysomethingnew.com. It looks very much like The Idea Swap, where you don't see a database of ideas, but get a simple page with a simple form that you have to fill out, then hit the Get idea! button and there you are!

You can search for new things to try according to location, or if you're looking for not-location specific ideas, you can pick a category from the drop down menu.

Here are a few I tried:

Making Money: (of course!)

Join an investment club! If you have no idea what's that, read the Wikipedia article!

Creative Endeavour:

Wood carving

Mental Fitness:

Play cribbage! No, I have no idea what that is. I've never been good at card games. But it says: "Cribbage is a great card game for two players. The rules are fairly easy to pick up [...] it combines fun and mental exercise."

However, they have nothing for girls, which is kind of sad.

Well, I suggest girls read the book First Comes Love by Katie Kacvinsky and take lots of inspiration from Dylan!

For Guys:

Play a game of darts! Haha! Hmm.

Do you have a favourite experience related to trying new things? Something that was fun or interesting and everyone should try it, too? Have you read a book that inspired you to try out something you read about in it? Let me know in the Comments below. (Mind you, I set all comments to moderate, so it may take a while to appear.)

Boys worth reading

I love boys and over the course of time I have met many intriguing boy characters during my readings. Here are some who you absolutely must meet. (I only picked the unique ones, so no typical characters here. Well, with maybe one or two exceptions.)

Meet Henry!

This is not the best book cover I've ever seen, but the story is pretty animated. I remember I could vividly hear and see Henry while reading his story. Henry's suffering and running from his panic-attacks, but he's also fighting and trying to find himself. Trust me, he's not a sorry loser!

Goodreads

Meet Kyle! 

His story is similar to that of Henry's in the sense that here there's also a 'friend', but as the brilliant cover suggests, it is more violent. This is a book about 'fickle' mind-games that'll keep coming back to you with their cruelty. (And yes, I love cruel books.)

Goodreads

Meet Brodsky!

If I have mentioned cruel, let's get to the core of it. It's a story you shouldn't shy away from. Also, surprisingly, it will be the beautifully written athletic parts that you will remember. It's a story about the question of speaking up or not speaking up and responsibility.

Goodreads

Now, let's get to the exceptions. Lucas and Dash are exceptional examples of 'hot and troubled' and 'geek' characters.

Meet Lucas!

Lucas is the absolutely ideal boyfriend. He's caring, yet, instead of suffocating the girl with his protection, he teaches her to be strong and to stand up for herself. He's also game, which was very sweet. But the book tackles a serious issue: attempted rape of college girls.

Goodreads

Meet Dash!

Dash will appeal to whoever who loves witty-edgy boy characters and has ever wished to fall in love in a bookshop. It's an inspiring game of tag with two very unique and charming characters. It's a perfect Christmas read even in the middle of summer. And a delight to those, who love the perfect words in the perfect order.

Goodreads

And at last, but not the least...

Meet Dante!

You could hardly find a more peculiar and enchanting boy character than Dante. This is a very poetic novel. Dante is like a flicker of light in a dull world, he turns everything into a burst of sunshine. He's original, fearless and comes up with the best questions in the world.

Goodreads

Have you read any of the above books? Who are your favourite boy characters? Do you read 'cruel' books? Let me know in the Comments below. (Mind you, I set all comments to moderate, so it may take a while to appear.)

Make your Facebook an interesting place!

While most people use Facebook to keep in touch with family and friends or absolute strangers, I use it to surround myself with the things I love. Of course, my Newsfeed is pretty interesting in itself, but I want to talk about the List of Interests function here.

The List of Interests function is a pretty good option if you are often annoyed by the posts of your favourite pages not appearing in your Newsfeed. Put that page on a List of Interests and you can be sure that if you open it, it will contain all the posts of your favourite page.

One of the most inspiring creative page on Facebook

Most articles about the List of Interests function will emphasize what a fantastic option it is to collect and arrange pages that are related to your job. And it is, really. I suggest, since most employers will check out your Facebook account, that you make a few professional lists (and remember to make them public, too!) to show that you follow the trends of your profession.

But Facebook should be fun, too, so create some really interesting lists, as well! Here are a few suggestions based on my own (mind private!) lists.

Museums: Well, I'm the artsy type, so no wonder. I especially suggest you follow Villa Vauban, a small, but extraordinary museum in Luxembourg city, that's one of the best museums in my experience. Another museum that has great posts is Musée Carnavalet. Check out some museum pages, you'll be surprised by all the interesting materials they post!

Places: You have a favourite place or you are planning a holiday? Make a list for that place and collect pages that are connected to that place. I have a list for Luxembourg, because I really enjoyed my holidays there. To help myself keep my memories vivid, I added to this list a newspage, so I always know what's going on there, a photo page, so I can see other people's photos of the places I've visited or close to my heart, and I even added a bakery. I also have lists for places I want to visit so that I can get a feel of the place and learn about events that'll take place during my visit, so that I can attend them.

One of my favourite pages on my Luxembourg list

Movie: Are you surprised? Well, movie related pages often organize sweepstakes where you can win free tickets. Make a list for those pages, so you never miss a sweepstake and you can be one of those lucky few who can see the next big hit before the premiere. Comes handy if you are broke most of the time.

Language: I decided to become just as good in French as I am in English. And since in English it happened via lots and lots of reading, I made a list of interesting French pages to compile myself an interesting French reading material. The greatest thing about it is that I'm learning the living language, not outdated phrases I would from a course book. To make it more interesting, I chose pages related to my hobbies. Here are some of my favourites: Côté Maison (of course), Marie Claire and Elle, and at last, but not the least, Learn French with French Today.

One of my favourite art periodicals in print

Do you know any interesting Facebook pages I should add to my lists? Do you have an interesting list I should follow or create for myself? What's your favourite Facebook page? Let me know in the Comments below. (Mind you, I set all comments to moderate, so it may take a while to appear.)

Sunday Poetry - Benjamin Alire Sáenz

Currently, I'm reading Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe by Benjamin Alire Sáenz. It is a very special book. If you enjoy the novels of David Levithan, you should definitely check it out! Or if you haven't read anything by David Levithan yet, but you love poetic, intelligent YA books, Aristotle and Dante is for you. (In case you should have anything against it, it's an LGBT novel.)

Usually, I don't check out authors. Not even if their books become a favourite of mine, unless - of course - if I feel compelled to let the author know how much I enjoyed his or her book. This time, I checked out the author, because both Aristotle and Dante enjoy the poetry of William Carlos Williams (I've mentioned my connection with him in this post.) and Dante mentions the painting Nighthawks by Edward Hopper to Aristotle, which I love at least as much as WCW's poetry.

Found it here.

So, I decided to look up the author and it turned out, that he's also a poet. It was quite obvious that I must include him in my author a-z challenge. I picked his poem, To the Desert from his 1995 collection, Dark and Perfect. The desert of course has also a significant role in the novel.

Here are my favourite lines:

"...You blow a breeze and brand

Your breath into my mouth. You reach—then bend

Your force, to break, blow, burn, and make me new"

However, if you read the novel, you'll see that these initial lines are the most closely related to the book:

"I came to you one rainless August night.

You taught me how to live without the rain.

You are thirst and thirst is all I know.

You are sand, wind, sun, and burning sky," 

Do you enjoy poetic novels? Does your favourite art or artist get mentioned in books you read? Do you love poems about the desert? Let me know in the Comments below. (Mind you, I set all comments to moderate, so it may take a while to appear.)

Quote #4

"I love rainy countries. They do wonders to my skin."

Source

Do you love rainy countries? Have you ever been to Scotland? What's your favourite country? Let me know in the Comments below. (Mind you, I set all comments to moderate, so it may take a while to appear.)

Quote #3

"Never abandon your hobbies, for you can never know when one of your hobbies will turn into your job."

Source

Is your hobby your job? Which of your hobbies would you rather it was your job? What is your latest hobby? Let me know in the Comments below. (Mind you, I set all comments to moderate, so it may take a while to appear.)

Quote #2

"You only understand the importance of education, when you meet ignorance."

Source

This came to me when reading an article about Olga Sviblova in Côté Est, this morning. She told about valuable photographs left to rot and disintegrate. Ignorance is one of those things that make me furious. And I mean furious, enraged, mad. Ignorance can cause so much pain!

What kind of behaviour or characteristics make you furious? Do you fight against ignorance? What was the last thing that inspired you? Let me know in the Comments below. (Mind you, I set all comments to moderate, so it may take a while to appear.)

Warm Bodies - the movie

According to my friend, it was about a year ago that I discovered Isaac Marion's Warm Bodies on Goodreads. The jacket copy sounded hilarious and absurd, but back then I did no zombies. (This year I'm actually doing a lot of stuff I wouldn't for the life of me before. Like reading Scott Westerfeld's Leviathan (I do no books that feature a Hungarian character but are not written by a Hungarian author. We are always mixed up with Russian people and I hate that.) or Marissa Meyer's Cinder, whose cover instantly captivated me, but I do no non-human characters, either.)

So I had no choice, but to recommend the book to my friend, who has nothing against zombies. Then I learnt that there would be a movie and after watching the trailer I didn't care about the gory bits, I knew I must see the film. It was a scream.

And the movie itself was a scream! The experience was the same as watching The Hunger Games. There, everyone hated Jennifer Lawrence and no one could imagine why she was picked for the role. Here, you heard disappointed reviews, but actually, it was way better than what you'd expected.

As for Nicholas Hoult, I was looking forward to watching him. I saw About a boy, of course, but I haven't seen Skins. And just like with Jennifer Lawrence I haven't expected him to be this great.

As for Theresa Palmer, no one mentioned before, but I think she was deliberately styled and photographed to resemble Kristen Stewart in her role of Bella Swan. It's funny, I haven't heard anyone comment on this so far, but I'm sure it's not only me.

And the scripts! It was amazing, the way words were picked so that the zombie actors could utter them practically without moving their lips.

And at last, but not at least I loved the promotional campaign. Here's the official Facebook page. I especially enjoyed the zombie pick-up lines set, but who didn't, right?

To sum it up: it was a warm, lively, funny movie everyone should watch.

Have you seen Warm Bodies? Warm Bodies or Twilight Saga? Do you watch movies that you'd never read in book format? Let me know in the Comments below. (Mind you, I set all comments to moderate, so it may take a while to appear.)

Perfect Morning - Pinterest, Güd

I still have yet to come up with my perfect morning routine, but now, I sure won't have a problem with finding inspiration for it! Have you seen this video?

The cosmetics brand, Güd decided to promote their latest product Red Ruby Groovy shampoo by realizing your perfect morning (as long as you are in the US, unfortunately) based on your Perfect Morning Pinterest board.

I instantly got hooked, even though I'm definitely not in the US. I spend quite a lot of time on Pinterest, but so far I haven't seen any perfect morning related boards. How is that possible?! (The article I read claims that ad people saw the morning boards and that's how they came up with the idea for the promotions campaign.) Anyway, I decided to check some out as I think, they're much more intriguing than wedding boards.

Here are some random favourites:

Jan Henry must LOVE blueberries as there are lots of pins of them on her Morning board.

Fashion and Movies urges you to start your day like a Hollywood star. That's what I call a five-star morning!

Ellen Amarnek's Morning looks yummy.

And on that note, here's a list of the best breakfasts in the world. Have you tried any besides your own?

Do you have a morning board on Pinterest? What's the best part of your morning routine? Where would you like to wake up tomorrow? Let me know in the Comments below. (Mind you, I set all comments to moderate, so it may take a while to appear.)

Budapest 100 2013 - Photographing old buildings Part One

This weekend, I'd been traipsing around the city photographing old buildings. This was the third occasion that the 100 year-old buildings of Budapest (houses and institutions alike) had opened their gates to the grande public.

I'd spent a lot of time poring over the various programmes at the Budapest100 website before I was able to settle for the perfect ones for me.

The first building I visited was Belgrád rakpart (quay or docks) at the (Pest) foot of Liberty Bridge. (If you ask any residents they'll most likely claim that it is their favourite bridge. No wonder, as it offers the most beautiful view on the Danube.)

Here, in the 100 year-old house on Belgrád rakpart visitors were first taken up to the attic.

After the attic tour, I attended a special history 'class' in one of the flats and learnt many interesting things about the area and the house. Which means, I'll later look up more info on it.

Next, I went to the 'residence' of a very famous Hungarian actress, Katalin Karády. Even you might have heard her name, as she fled to the US and died there. She was also famous for hiding Jewish people during WWII. Here, visitors could take a tour of the cellars where she hid children. It was a very special experience.

Before the next programme, I had a few idle hours, so I photographed a few beautiful, old buildings.

Then, I went to a renowned hotel where visitors were taught to dance the Charleston. Unfortunately, I have no photo of that, but I had a great time.

Before returning home, I took a photo of my favourite bridge, Margaret Bridge. The flags are promoting the Budapest Spring Festival or BTF.

To be continued...

Hairdo Inspiration from Knitting and Crocheting

I can hear you say: Wow! This girl certainly knows how to pick unusual sources for inspiration! Before you think I'm even more special than I actually am, I'd like to point out that I do not knit or crochet. Yet! Anyway, because my friend is pretty intent on charming me into both.

Today, I accompanied said friend to a yarn shop where I was more interested in the various knitting and crocheting books and mags than in the yarns themselves. That's how I discovered one on crochet headwear whose title of course I forgot and haven't managed to find since on the Internet by simply browsing. But it featured a model with a very chic and boho short hairdo that could be styled in a million different ways. And there was another book (title fallen into oblivion, too) that featured three models with very sexy long hairdos.

You see, my problem is: I'd love to go short, but at the moment my hair is so long, that I'm sure I'd regret the moment I got it cut short. The solution: find a great layered hairdo for long hair. After failing miserably browsing hairdo sites and Pinterest, I decided to change my tactics. I went for pins featuring knitwear and crochetwear.

That's how I stumbled upon Rowan Yarns.

Inspiration for long layered hairdo

And if you're yarning (sic!) for more Rowan models, here's a collection. Here you'll find every single pin that has ever been pinned from the site www.knitrowan.com.

Do you knit or crochet or both? Where did you find inspiration for your latest hairdo? Do you prefer vintage or modern hairdos? Let me know in the Comments below. (Mind you, I set all comments to moderate, so it may take a while to appear.)

Inspiration for Banners

I'm working as a marketing assistant and now that Easter is over, it's time to come up with some new banners for the webshop. I don't know about you, but in my humble experience you often find inspiration for banners in a different field of interest. Maybe the only exception is gastronomy.

This time, I was looking for inspiration for some gardening themed banners. And here are some (and also some sites) that I discovered on the way.

I really loved the idea behind this one.

I discovered http://meetyourneighbours.net via one of their amazing banners that I didn't bookmark (big mistake!) nor could I find again. So here's a picture from their site to illustrate.

How charming! from Royal Apothic

I must read this blog thoroughly sometime soon!

In the end, I came up with a totally different design.

What are your favourite banner designs? Where do you look for inspiration? Have you ever discovered an interesting site or blog through browsing banner images? Let me know in the Comments below. (Mind you, I set all comments to moderate, so it may take a while to appear.)

Food and Drink - Places to Explore

On Friday, I'm meeting friends and as usual we tried to decide where to go. We are all eager to explore new places, somewhat less eager to travel far after a long day at work and most often we just end up at a favourite spot we've already grown fond of. Not this time, though!

This time, we'll try Púder in Budapest's famous 'Restaurant Street', that is Ráday u. Have you ever heard of Ráday utca? I understand your scepticism. Yes, it's full of tourists, but it holds such an abundance of unique places that you simply must forget about your prejudices and just try one of them. Believe me, you'll return to try the rest, too!

Source

 After settling on Púder, I kept exploring the We Love Budapest site that should be your primary source if you are planning a visit to Budapest or just looking for places to go. Here's a list of articles I checked out.

The best ruin pubs. I've never been to any, but I'm really curious.

The best soup places. Another thing I've never tried, but I'm very eager. Soon. 

Breakfast all day. As I'm still dreaming of having my breakfast in a café. But so far I've been too lazy to go.

The best burger places. Because sometimes that's all you want.

Where to find love. Because you just never know. 

After a while I also opened my Foursquare account and started to save places to explore. I love Foursquare and I love Lists and I especially love collecting Badges!

Where do you like meeting friends? What are your favourite places in your town? Have you ever been to Budapest? Let me know in the Comments below. (Mind you, I set all comments to moderate, so it may take a while to appear.)

Birdwatching online

In 2009, somehow I came across an osprey nest cam situated in Lapland. Since then, evey year near April I return to check in on my favourite birds. (At the mo the ospreys are not back yet, so bookmark the site and keep returning.) That year I got my whole family hooked on animal webcams. We watched owls (that's when I learnt the name of 5 different kinda owls in English that I wouldn't be able to name in my mother tongue), squirrels, otters in a zoo, peregrin falcons and bald eagles. We had sites bookmarked for daytime watching and others from the other side of the world for nighttime watching. 

This is an older photo of the nest in Lapland. Source here.

Unfortunately, these sites are lost now as we have since replaced our old, broken PCs and never memorized the urls or the names of the wildlife organizations running the cams. But the number of nest cams and people watching birds and other animals online has since increased, so we have plenty to choose new favourites from. And I will! I decided that this year, besides keeping an eye on my beloved ospreys, I'll collect a few other sites, both for daytime and nighttime watching. Perhaps I'll even include a few species I've never paid attention to before. (Though, I guess I'll still stick with birds.)

At last, but not at least I would like to include here the links to Hungarian nest cams. They're all supposed to be running already. If not, keep checking. They're all worth watching.

The white-tailed eagles of our most famous national park, Hortobágy are here.

The saker falcon nest cam is here.

The black storks of Gemenc, another national park and special region, are here.

The world famous white storks of Nagyhalászi and Darány (on the roof of a school building) are here and here. (For Darány, you have to click on the image of the stork!)

Are you also a fan of nest cams? What birds do you follow? You follow nest cams from which countries? Let me know in the Comments below. (Mind you, I set all comments to moderate, so it may take a while to appear.)

Self-portraits and playing with Light

Yesterday, browsing Pinterest, I stumbled upon (sic!) a great photo, that led me to a great photography tutorial site, phototuts+. After reading the article on awesome selfies, I moved on and read a couple of more. Since I love myself, like any true exhibitionist and am totally fascinated by the various ways light can transform a human face, no wonder that this article spurred me into action.

How to Shoot a Professional, Creative Low-Key Self Portrait. It all seemed so easy. I truly believed I could do it. Hah!

"Set your camera to black-and-white-mode." Seriously, you just don't want to know how long I looked for that aspect on my Samsung PL210 digital camera. I found it. Only to discover that it was not an option with the rest of my settings. So I had to apply a black-and-white effect on my photos in the photo editing programme. (I used picmonkey. I love it.) And it turned out that most of my photos sucked in black-and-white-mode. Haha!

Though, I managed to create one photo that came out fantastically dramatic in black-and-white.

"Illuminate the subject and allow the background to remain unlit and black." Nope! That didn't work out for me either. 

"Keep ISO at the lowest level! Hurray! At last! Some success!

"Set the camera to 'Manual' mode, all the settings must be under control." Again, haha!

"Tripod." I have no tripod, I used an old cupboard door and books.

"Reading lamp." Well, when I screwed in the Osram bulb I should have known I was in for some trouble.

"A dark room." It was pitch black. Yet, I managed to light it up like a Christmas tree with a single bulb.

"Self-timer and burst-mode". Well, my camera does not allow the two together. So I went for the self-timer.

I set up everything like you can see in the original article. Then I switched the place of the lamp and the camera.

Here are some of my favourite photos.

This is the original background. I didn't apply any effects here. Though you can't see much of me in this photo, it says a lot about me.

This one is actually my mother's favourite. You can see that I'm not afraid of harsh lights and I absolutely love my nose.

The effect here is called 'tranquile' and I've never heard of it before, but it seemed to work well for this photo.

The experience was both exhausting and exhilarating. I'm sure to repeat it. Hopefully with better results.

Do you shoot self-portraits? Black and white or colour? Do you try out things you read in tutorials or you just go after your own head? Let me know in the Comments below. (Mind you, I set all comments to moderate, so it may take a while to appear.)

Sunday Poetry - Lawrence Ferlinghetti

It's amazing how poets whose work I'd enjoy find me. Yes, I've already stated it in my Kenneth Koch post, yet I still can't get over the fact. It's like some great puzzle with the pieces falling into place. Maybe, I should even put it into some kind of visual form. A huge poster on my bedroom wall, it'd certainly make an interesting map! Who knows?

I discovered Lawrence Ferlinghetti via the Random House Facebook page. It's his birthday. Seeing his photo, he reminded me of both Walt Whitman and Ernest Hemingway. It turns out he enjoyed reading both. He even included the former in his poem, Poetry as Insurgent Art that I read for this week's challenge. And also, the opening line "I am signaling you through the flames." sounds very Whitmanesque to my ears.

Source

But he was also the publisher of William Carlos Williams, an odd favourite, whose poetry ended up being the focus and theme of my dissertation.

Tell me, your heart does not beat faster reading these lines:

"You are Whitman, you are Poe, you are Mark Twain, you are Emily Dickinson and Edna St. Vincent Millay, you are Neruda and Mayakovsky and Pasolini, you are an American or a non-American, you can conquer the conquerors with words...."

Do you enjoy American poetry? Are you familiar with the poetry of WCW? What kind of poems do you like? Let me know in the Comments below. (Mind you, I set all comments to moderate, so it may take a while to appear.)

You are Whitman, you are Poe, you are Mark Twain, you are Emily Dickinson and Edna St. Vincent Millay, you are Neruda and Mayakovsky and Pasolini, you are an American or a non-American, you can conquer the conquerors with words.... - See more at: http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/20643#sthash.8FP0fdm3.dpuf

Scottish accent

I'm greatly enamored with Scotland and Scots. It started with the student exchange programme during my high school years. But my love is thoroughly strengthened by the music of the old Runrig and Donnie Munro's voice.

On one occasion my friend mentioned that she had watched a film with Scottish actors and that she could hardly understand a word despite the fact that she's very proficient in English. Back then I told her that I could easily understand "the" Scottish accent. (There's no such as the Scottish accent, there are several Scottish accents.)

Tonight, I decided to test myself, as ever since my haughty declaration I've been wondering if I only bluffed. I started with this video, that explains you the basics. Then, I moved on to this one. And I must proudly admit that yes, I do understand "the" Scottish accent.

And though I'm not a native speaker of English, I always find it shocking when people don't get jokes that include a pun with a Scottish accent, like the one that goes: There are 8 cows out in the fields, which one is the closes to oil (or something like that) and the answer is Coo 8 (pronounce Kuwait). I mean, I'm not a native speaker, you are and it's you who don't get the pun?!

I also immensely enjoy Diana Gabaldon's Outlander series.

And let me finish with a favourite song of mine, though not from Runrig.

Are you also a Scotland fan? Have you ever been to Scotland? Can you understand Scottish accents? Let me know in the Comments below. (Mind you, I set all comments to moderate, so it may take a while to appear.)