English Language Challenges

This semester has generally been a bit tricky:
I believe that I never before had so many activities and responsibilities together.
Under this paradigm, English has became a patch subject, especially because of the time (but that's my fault because I work very bad in the mornings).
I think my career has a big problem of workload: it is intended to do much in a short time, and we get stressed and frustrated.
Actually, English has, in this scenario, a very low priority for me.

But hey, let's focus in the area:

The Blog system is good, but the issues should be a little more varied and perhaps be aborded after a conversation: a good way to do the course would be, for example, develop a debate about an issue, then, the next class, exposing conclusions and develop a thesis on the blogs.

This would position us against an issue, and we should habe to develop more complex ideas.

This is English four, and we should be talking about more concrete and real issues.

Another thing I miss a lot in our English classes (and I am grateful that this semester this has been tried in a class), is to address vocabulary and concepts in our area; theater and design.

I think our future work is quite clear, and the nature of it (tours, postgraduate, interacting with people of other contries), English is a vital tool, but you need specificity.

But I insist on the issue of the times: our ability is limited, and between classes, external works and trying to have some life, you begin to prioritized.

Thanks so much for reading!

Some Reflections..

This has been a very moving, changing and transfiguring year.

I think it was the year that I've had more personal learning (especially now at the end), seasoned with travel, experiences and a lot of new people.

In June I had the opportunity to travel to Europe to the "Stage Design Quadrennial" in Prague, Czech Republic (PQ2015). The experience was unique and unrepeatable (at least for 4 years), and I habe meet many wonderful people and amazing places; I take the chance, and I visit several cities (Berlin, Oslo, Amsterdam, Etc)

I participated in four plays as a designer and as a helper.

It was definitely a busy year.

But not everything was nice:

I lost an aunt and my dogs. The first was because a disease (She had a bad alimentation!), and my pets because someone poisoned them. It was very difficult when I heard about this because It was very sudden and violent.

about college, I think it has been my most dispersed year, because I was having a lot of activity outside, I've been removing priority. A bouquet I loved was the workshop of this semester, because it is focused on street theater.

This year I worked in four plays as designer and in one as a helper; one was in one stadium and about torture, two were for University Festivals (in this university and in the Catholic), and other was with my class, for a subject. Although it was difficult and tiring , I learned a lot .

Im thankfully for This Year, but I want it to pass fast!

SUMMER PLANS

This summer will be very short : because of student demonstrations , our second semester half lasted until mid-January, leaving us only one and a half month of holiday.
This is not terrible, but leave a bad taste when you think about it.

In this short period I have two major plans :

* Stay in Talca (my original city ) resting and eating a lot , going out with friends that I haven't seen in a lot and going camping to the mountains in the Vilches reservation. I think I will stay there the rest of January after the exams.

* Travel south to visit some friends (to Concepcion and Valdivia , if I can). There I want to visit some forest and historical places, and do a lot of activities with my friends. I hope it will be like two weeks of February.

*After that, I Wanna stay the rest of February in Talca, and return to Santiago like the weekend before enter to classes.

Because this is my last summer before I left college, I had not planned to work like other summers; This was a very intensive and hard year and I need a relief.
Maybe chocolate and procastination will help. Like a lot.

Another activity that I would like to do this summer is learn to drive and get the license: although I have no car, I think it is very useful in many circumstances, and my family always is asking me for do it.

In conclusion, this summer will be like a flash, but I want to make it a great and joyful flash, with new experiences and with all the energies concentrated in myself.

An influential artist in my field:François Delarozière

  

François Delarozière is an artists , director of La Machine, a very famous street theater and instalation french company. He was born in 1963 and I Studied at the Ecole des Beaux Arts. After That, he worked as a stage designer and interior designer for 20 years, and in 1987, he meet Jean-Luc Courcoult, the director of the street theater company Royal de Luxe.

They worked together from 1991 to 2008. At this time, Delarozière had  developed an own style and interest, and he created ¨La Machine¨.

His first and most famous work was La Princesse, a huge mechanical spider that walks around streets.

                                                           

This is notorious in ¨Les Machines de l'Ile of Nantes¨, an island in the Loire river, where ¨La Machine¨ creations live.

Delarozière said that Jules Vernes, Leonardo Da Vinci and Gustave Eiffel are his influences. In his works The unveiling of materials and Mechanisms is Very Important, and too a methodical study of nature.

In this place we can find amazing machines, like a huge Elephant and a Marine Carrousel of three levels, Where you can ride an ocean creature.

Delarozière Has Been Described as an "engineering genius, and is obious why.

I admire in his work the way he and his team give life to their creations , combining magically matter and technique.

And too, his draws are something amazing.

The Chilean street theater is very fruitful , but unknown . Obviously , we can not compare the technical and economic possibilities offered by French and Chilean cultural policies ; our theater tends to self-management , so that recycling is the mainstay .

Another important difference is the importance of political and social message in our theater ; estrus only talks about the large number of "loose ends" of our society. Street theater has a wider arrival and shocking the public , so it is an effective tool for change.

Hopefully someday this theater is so valued and supported in Chile as it is in France.

How Green Are u?

I have tried to be green. I think it is something I have lost a lot since I arrived santiago. Im not saying that the people of santiago have the problem, but the speed of the capital´s life sometimes makes us forget the things that  we believe.
I think I want to recover some "green attitudes" in my life, like recycling, cycling, compost and trying to always think the best form of doing regular things.

some other habits we can adopt are:

*using our own fabric bags when we buy food, instead of plastic bags

*Carrying our garbage to recycling points, and cheking they go in the correct group; sometimes, details (like unclean garbage) make this a pointless action

*trying to walk or use public transport instead of driving a car

*using parks and green areas

*putting the lights and electronic devices off when they are not occupied

*Cleaning our Houses regulary

*using only the necesary water

This requires time and patience: our society is always trying to do things more confortable and fast, and this is the reason why our economy and life style system is not ready for a green way. But change is real, and it starts with you!

Our world need our change of mentality and a better way to do things: the prove of that is the huges movement and strange things that are happening all around the world.

My Future Job

I dont really know what I want to do with my profesional life in the future.

Sometimes I think in studying another thing that could be addressed from my area: I have said other times that maybe I want to study anthropology after finish this major; I know a lot about religions and folklore, and I would like to study the world from this point of view.

But, in direct relation to my career, I think I want to work in art direction in some tv serie or movie:

I like to work in outdoors and too stay in an office or studio. Is a great opportunity to travel a lot, and meet interesting people.

I think that the work in a office is important (understanding that it is not always what is conventionally understood as an office, because it could we a space of conversation and organization).

Other thing related to my career that I like is the realization: I would like to have a workshop where I could create masks, marionettes, toys, prosthesis for special effects, costumes, forniture, etc. Make things with my hands is something that I love, and I try to put a lot of love on it.

Well, I dont know what more to do, because sometimes is better wait that life gives you oportunities that chase something  that we dont really understand.

Career Related Post

I love my work. I love craft work, make maps and desing in general. I thing realisation is the most beautiful part of it: the concrete thing is what i like.

I chose this major because of the breadth of the study areas:with the tools that it gives me, I can work in multiple spaces (like theater, television, cinema, etc)

I wanted to learn a lot of things, and be able to give solution for each problem.

But, of course, the major has its problems: you need a lot of time for create and work , and is very difficult If you want to have projects apart of the studies. The levels of pressure in the university are very high: we habe a lot of theorical classes, were we study everytime the same things.

Is true that the basic thing the university gave to me are very usefull, but in this time of my university life, I only want to get out and star to work, because I habe learned much more in the practical space that in the classroom.

If you ask me what I wanna do in the future, I think I want to study another thing (like antropology, or a specialty), or to began to work in a production, maybe with a television serie (but not a soap opera)

Experiences with Food

My Worst experience with food was four years ago:

One night of study (I was in another career), I was very tired and I wanted to sleep, but, also, I was starving.

 I asked myself: "what could I cook in a very short time so I could go to sleep soon?". In the fridge I found cheese, macarronis and mayonaise, so I put them all in a cup in the microwave and I cooked  them for a few minutes.

The chesse melted and with the mayonaisse it was like a cream.

It was delicious. Maybe it was because of my hunger, but I remember it like "A manjarsh".

  

After finished that gift from the gods, I went to sleep. 

A half hour after I wake up with the worst and powerfull wadding pain ever: my stomach was three times its size, and I couldnt move. 

I dragged myself to the kitchen and there, remembering the teachings of my naturalist mother, I  prepared myself an oregano infusion. The solution was immediately: I felt how my stomach was contracted and I went then to sleep again. I didnt eat mayonaise again in three months.

My Best experience with food is (And I say Is, because It occurs a few times in the year) are the pancakes with spinach that my mother cooks. 

She cant cook them always, because the recipe is whit butter, and my father (I dont know why) get very angry when He smells butter. But, when He is traveling, my mother take the chance for cook them. I think Is something psicological, but is the best meal I ever eaten. 

The best Concert ever

My very best concert was the last summer. I was working as a light technician in GAM, for the Santiago a Mil Festival.
One day, I had an all day turn in the concert room. and, SURPRISE! that day "The tiger Lillies", one of my favorites bands, was playing.

They are a Dark Cabaret/Folk British band; they mix music with theater and black humor, all with a gypsy/clown aesthetics. they're perfect.
They have more than twenty albums, a puppet opera called "Struwwelpeter" (based on an old german Child book)  and have worked in the film "Plunkett and Macleane".

The experience was amazing; I had to speak with the musicians about the atmosphere they wanted in each song. They were great and funny (in their particular way).

The only sad thing was that i could not see them from the stands , because i was in the light balcony , operating lights, and that's a difficult vantage point. But not all people can say they have worked for the band they admire.

A COUNTRY I'D LIKE TO VISIT

If I could go anywhere in this moment (if time and the money don't matter) I think I would chose Mexico. 

I dont know a lot about it, but I think that is a very large, colorfull and traditional country. I would love to be there for the saint day of the deads (the mexican Halloween), and eat a sugar skull (It supposed to be for the deads, but it seems delicious).

I too wanna visit the ancient cities, and travel a bit through the forest. Beside that, I wanna meet the mexican people and try their food.  I love spicy food, and the exotic convinations that they mix (like rice with chocolate). But sure, maybe the original mexican food It's too much for me; they add chili even to candies.

I think I wanna stay there only for a pair of months, maybe three, and work in something relative to my studies. Not longer, because there are a lot of countries for visit after Mexico!

Final

This was a very good semester in all the not-university aspects: I have made an amazing travel that I will never forget, and I have met a lot of interesting people. Also, I participated in a couple of projects related to my career, and I think these were occasions for a real learning; In university, we work in a bubble, and we not had to “fight” with others when we produce a project. This semester I realised that I'm really good in what I'm doing, but I need to see real results to have a motivation. English was a good, quite funny, subject, but I hate to wake up early. That's my only complaint. I wish there were more practical work, because I think that's the real way for learning. Respect to the blog sessions, I find them a bit forced and naive… sure this is because of our level, but maybe, next time we could practice with topics more important (like, actual topics). I think It will be very useful to learn technical language, specifically (in my case) theatrical terms. We were supposed to work in the future with people from around the world, and this will be necessary. Well, that was… See ya!

Movies!

My favorite movie of the whole world is "The Cook, the Thief, His Wife & Her Lover," directed by Peter Greenaway in 1989. This is a black comedy film, beauty and very visual, with a great art and photography direction. Is a bit too crude (with violence, nudity and cannibalism).

The movie tells the story About a gangster that had dinner all days in a elegant restaurant with his gang and his wife. She meet a guy there and the chef help the couple to keep a romance in secret in the kitchen. 

Finally, the Gangster find out the situation, and ... You should watch it.

Beside That, my favorite genre is fantasy, science fiction and horror; I love aliens, monsters and special effects, and maybe that's one reason I began to study my career. My favorite director is Guillermo del Toro,not for the movies itself (the stories aren't so good), but for the visual imaginary.

I love to watch movies in the cinema, but the true and sad thing is the prices are a bit expensive; for that, and for comfy, I use to download movies a pair of months after the release. And, this is better, because i like to comment the whole thing while i watch it (even if a lot of people hate me for that).

Músic

 Since childhood, music has been an important life companion. My parents influenced my taste with two great styles they listening while driving the car: my father, classic rok (Queen and The Beatles) and my mother classical music (Vivaldi and Mozart, among others).

Possibly by mixing these two styles I was then started to enjoy greatly metal music, mainly symphonic and epic.

Later, when I amplied my visual knowing, I began to broaden my musical spectrum: I started listening to Dark Cabaret (very theatrical), Psychobilly, Klezmer, electronic (when I dance) and the very diverse range of genres of metal.

My favorite band is Diablo Swing Orchestra. They have a very particular style, which mixes different styles of music (swing, jazz, European and Latin American folk, opera, klezmer, blues, and even Disco), using metal as base.

This mixture is what I like: the versatility of its members and the sounds they achieve with their work.

The band was born in Sweden in 2003, and defined themselves as avant-garde metal.

The trouble is that I doubt someday come to Chile; hehco they have two, "Latin American" tour, playing only in Mexico.

Food, everybody loves food

I love Pastas.
I eat Pastas.
All the time.
As if my life depended on it.
Pasta Is a religion. Pasta is Love. Pasta is Life.


Pastas with vegetables, pasta with chesse, pasta with cream, pasta alone... possibilities are limitless

I didn't discriminated beetwen spaghetti, gnocchi or lasagna.

But I prefer Traditional: Spaghetti, tomato Sauce (with basil and dried tomatoes) and a lot of  grated cheese.

Today I will tell you a recipe for "oriental noodles"

You will need:

* noodles (I recomend spirals) *

* soy sauce *

* Curry*

* Pepper *

* Olive Oil *

* Vegetables like brocoli, zanahoria, zapallito, coliflor, pimentòn, garlic, etc *

* almonds *

* Mushrooms *

Cut all the vegetables, the mushrooms and the almonds in little pieces.

Put them in a pan with the olive oil. 

As they cooked, add soy, curry, pepper and salt (only a bit).

Prepare noodles "al dente" (not totally cooked)

Add the noodles to the vegetables. Add more soy and a bit of oil.

Fry for a while.

Enjoy.

It's the perfect plate for a dinner in a balcony with candles. 

If you can't eat without meat, you should fry the vegetables with pieces of chiken. 

You can try it also adding white wine in the pan. In this case, I recomend to serve the same wine to your partner.

If you try it, let me know!

What will you choose?

  François Delarozière is an artists , director of La Machine, a very famous street theater and instalation french company. He was born in 1963 and I Studied at the Ecole des Beaux Arts. After That, he worked as a stage designer and interior designer for 20 years, and in 1987, he meet Jean-Luc Courcoult, the director of the street theater company Royal de Luxe (The Little Giant, performed two times in Santiago).

They worked together from 1991 to 2008. At this time, Delarozière had  developed an own style and interest, and he created ¨La Machine¨.

His first and most famous work was La Princesse, a huge mechanical spider that walks around streets.

This is notorious in ¨Les Machines de l'Ile of Nantes¨, an island in the Loire river, where ¨La Machine¨ creations live.

Delarozière said that Jules Vernes, Leonardo Da Vinci and Gustave Eiffel are his influences. In his works The unveiling of materials and Mechanisms is Very Important, and too a methodical study of nature.

In this place we can find amazing machines, like a huge Elephant and a Marine Carrousel of three levels, Where you can ride an ocean creature.

Delarozière Has Been Described as an "engineering genius, and is obious why.

I admire in his work the way he and his team give life to their creations , combining magically matter and technique.

And too, his draws are something amazing.

Photographs!

Sorry for the self-reference. This photo was taked the day that rained the summer of 2014 (I don’t remember the exact date), at the "Vegetal Expedition", a French installation, part of the 2014 Santiago a Mil festival. 

It was taken by Julio Salas, a Photographer I meet at there.

I like it because that was a very happy moment in my life; I was working in a very convenient place, I had just started my current relationship, and It was raining (I love rain, especially in summer). 

It has a lot of me: my love for science fiction (Old fashioned Science Fiction; Steampunk), my adventure spirit, and my artistic preferences.

And, Of course, because it’s a very professional photo: the quality is amazing, the framing is perfect (somehow like a comic panel or a socialist propaganda).

I used It like my profile photo in facebook for a long time, and I think I will put it again sometime. I want to print it and put it in the wall of my own home when i have one.

Pets!

 

Yes, I have. I have three beauty dogs:

This is Ivo. I found he under my classroom 7 or 8 years ago, when I was in the school. He is a medium dog, half-breed, Kinda wolf. I love him, because we have live many things and play a lot.

This other is Fidel, the youngest one. He lives in my house in Talca two years ago. He’s still a baby, but he’s mamut size. I like to sleep on it, because he is warm and soft (his fur is like a carpet).

The last one is Zenda. I don’t know her so much, because she have lived whit us for a year. She comes from a dog orphanage, and she is a very educated girl, but a bit jealous of his brothers.

I am very lucky to have grown up with dogs. Well, actually, any dog always cheer me up; I think they are angels in the earth.