experientialism

Classical music at St Nicholas in Brighton for Valentines

2011-01-17T10:42:00.003Z

Here is a nice thing to do on the Sunday before Valentines -

Go to St Nicholas on Sunday 13th at 3PM to listen to a duet of soprano and piano performing Love Songs from Quilter and Rachmaninov, and Britih folk songs,

Tickets in advance or on the door - £12 (£10 concessions).

More information here Romance Valentines Concert in Brighton

In March, take the seagulls out!

2010-03-23T17:35:00.001Z

Hi hi http://ow.ly/1pVLP

True genius in Fashion - Grace Coddington

2010-02-18T21:55:00.005Z

Ah, I discovered Grace Coddington yesterday when I was watching "the September issue", the documentary about the epic production process of Vogue US September issue, every year. Showing the difficult collaboration between the businesslike and bossy, Anna Wintour, boss of Vogue and her senior Fashion editor, Grace Coddington, former model herself, the documentary brings to light all the efforts and invention put into this issue of the magazine, and the war of egos that sometime goes with it.

I literally fell in love with Grace Coddington, this 68 year old lady, full of talent, inspiration, artistry. Amazing. I have never really been a fashionista, although I like buying Vogue once in a while because precisely, the publication is superb, but I would think that Grace could and should become a real role model for younger generation of women. At least, she would be a very good one for me!

And, she's now working on a new film with the movie maker who shot The September Issue, based on a book she wrote with her partner, about....cats. I love her even more!

The Guardian sur l'daptation d'une serie TV anglaise par TF1

2010-01-10T21:32:00.002Z

Je continue sur ma lancee de collecter les articles parus dans la presse anglaise sur la France. Aujourd'hui The Guardian rapporte la rivalite de Collioure et d'un village breton pour etre le lieu d'adaptation d'une serie TV anglaise. J'ai vaguement regarde un episode une fois, ca a l'air moins con et moins complaisant que beaucoup de series TV francaises, esperons que quelque soit le lieu ou elle sera finalement situee, TF1 en respectera l'esprit, sinon la lettre...

Lire l'article

The Telegraph about a squat on Place des Vosges (Paris)

2010-01-07T19:01:00.003Z

J'ai decide de "collectioner" les articles parus en Grande Bretagne qui concerneraient la France. Celui ci est le premier et concerne un squat de gens eduques et bien eleves sur la place des Vosges.

Lire l'article

But what are or is social media?

2009-12-21T12:17:00.002Z

Reading some presentations right now, just investigating what is social media, what are the principles at the basis of it, is fascinating.

Randomly:

- People listen to what they circles say, not to what you want them to think

- Social media: It’s not a new message channel – Social media is different from PR

- Social media is a Change of paradigm in marketing: Monologue and messages are dead, welcome Word of Mouth Marketing

- Give people something of interest to THEM to talk about your products / services / brand

- If you are open they will love you, if you try to control the conversation and / or cheat them, they will find out and this will be the end of you (word of mouth negative slope).

Anything else you can think of?

let it snow in Brighton

2009-12-18T13:32:00.003Z

It has been snowing lots last night (at least 10cm). Am having a good cold, but everything is so beautiful, that it does not matter.

This is it? The End of the Line

2009-11-17T23:03:00.004Z

I finished watching The End of The Line a documentary on overfishing (worldwide) and how this has affected fish stock to the extent that some species are on the verge of going extinct: Cod, Blue Fin (tuna), and many others.

You have to watch it urgently it is an absolute eye opener. I was already aware that we should be eating sustainably sourced fish, but it is not just a good option any longer, it is the ONLY option we have.

The EC is quite useless as it is 1/ not making strict enough decisions to ensure live stock can even be maintained at the level they are now, but they are not enforcing their won decision as in effect, European waters are fished 3 times as much as voted by the EC, and it just goes worse year on year because the demand is rising.

Wake up call. Wake up call.

1. only buy sustainably sourced fish
2. ask where the fish comes from and if it sustainably sourced when dining out
3. put pressure on politicians.
4. Boycott Norbu, they still sell blue fin.

See the trailer of The End of the line, and then see the whole movie on Youtube

The decisive moment

2009-10-23T12:09:00.006+01:00

Hi there,

Just wanted to point out I wrote an article (post) on my company's blog about the importance of good timing in online marketing campaigns. I make a parallel between photography as Henri Cartier-Bresson viewed it and marketing. There are decisive moment in everything, including in online marketing.

Read Online marketing campaigns, getting the timing right

Berlin CSD day 2009

2009-07-23T08:17:00.007+01:00

If you visit my page on Flick you'll see all my Berlin CSD 2009 photos..:-)

taking liberties with civil liberties

2009-07-22T23:10:00.004+01:00

A while ago I taped a documentary that was commissioned by Channel 4, called Taking Liberties .

It's pretty long, so I started to watch tonight but will continue it another time. Anyway, this is really enlightening stuff and really scary. It shows how recent laws (all passed by the Labour party) one by one stripped down the constitution of Britain of fundamental civil rights such as the right of protest, innocent until proven guilty and so on.... I highly recommend viewing this film. it's an eye opener to anyone.

More info here: Taking Liberties

There is nothing like spending time cooking some great food

2009-06-13T21:41:00.006+01:00

Hi there,

A few days ago I was told that the MD of my former company, the very guy who thanked me for my good services, stepped down from his MD position, life is funy sometimes, isn't it?? Well, at least he still has a job. Well, what can I say? Good luck everybody.

Anyway, that was just en passant... I am cooking for the first time a chicken tagine. My girlfriend and I went to Morocco in April and loved those tagines so much. It's all in the spices as usual: lots of ground cumin, paprika, ground ginger, garlic... hmmm...
Already, I am making my own variation of it, adding some courgettes and carottes.

If somebody reads this, am happy to give the recipe...

Love all around.

Green, utopias? No, mainstream thinking.

2009-06-02T23:37:00.004+01:00

Hi there,

Ok so, every day we have more bad news about the environment. And it's not just a vague idea, it's what we eat, what we breath, what we drink.... Not for the first time I'll vote Green on Thursday. It will be my first time vote in the UK though.

Today I received this video link from a French green environmental foundation (https://secure.fondation-nicolas-hulot.org/13juin/).

I think this is exciting: they are talking about a new project of development for our society based on new values, respectful of mankind and the environment. 30 years ago this was described as utopias' , today everybody knows that it's should be mandatory policy. Although there are still lots of resistance...time has come? Maybe? I hope.

Brick lane restaurant

2009-05-21T17:31:00.003+01:00

Yesterday we went with a friend on the traces of Jack the ripper in and around Whitechapel. Why there? Well, it's one of the London walks suggested by the AA guide, and it was s a chance to see petticoat lane and brick lane.

Off we go from Brighton via Victoria and on the tube to Aldgate. The guide's map and explanations were a bit unclear but we found our way around. And passed that close to the Gurkin. quite impressive. The guide book recommended the curry restaurants of Brick lane so we decided to have lunch there.

Although very tired, the restaurant was decently clean and the food very good. And also very hot. I had a lamb dansak and my friend a chicken masala which caused him to sweat profusely, I did not but my throat, and ears felt it.

The funny thing is that the guy at the table behind me, an Indian, complained the food was not hot enough, and the guy at the table behind my friend, a Brit, complained that the food was too hot.

We, the French, did not complain, and heroically finished our delicious but burning food.

So there are two lessons to this story:

1. No, the French don't always complain in restaurants
2. It's hard to please all your customers, what ever your business is.

Morroco again

2009-05-13T23:07:00.003+01:00

I wish I was there again..

Seiki?

2009-05-13T21:06:00.003+01:00

Do you know about Seiki? I had a treatment today. Amazing. I had been warned but indeed for a brief moment during the treatment old and current pains manifested themselves. Here and there. At the end I was totally knocked out and so relaxed. Amazing to see that my body talks to me even without me being very conscious.. I say me, but it's the same for everyone... I find this a deeper work than acupuncture which is great to address precise ailments but this really just engages an energetic process, like a therapy would do but through the body.

Want to know more about Seiki? Check the url http://www.lifehealingarts.org/html/Seiki.htm

Contemplating the M'Goun mountain ridge in Morroco...This was real and experiential

2009-05-12T15:04:00.006+01:00

Actually...

2009-05-12T12:52:00.002+01:00

I have been sitting in front of my computer since 9.45 this morning and worked non stop since then, that's 3 hours. Feeling hungry..

And now we know where the swine flu pandemic comes from

2009-05-05T18:06:00.005+01:00

Hi there,

My goodness, my pigness.. swine flu is US pig factory born and bread. Read more here and SIGN up the petition.
https://secure.avaaz.org/en/swine_flu_pandemic/

These aren't straws

2009-04-29T17:35:00.000+01:00

taboo - tabu - you have to see this

2009-04-28T22:50:00.001+01:00

We are just coming back from a performance of a British circus group called Tabu (they are playing as part of the Brighton Fringe). A-MA-ZIN-G. Beautiful, moving, acrobatic (very), funny also, being ever so critical I'd say the music could be subject to improvement..but for just these 2 pieces (explained below) it was worth going:

1- a duet of a man hanging, dangling down a rope, and a woman counter-balancing each of his movements as she was going up and down the stairs of a ladder of metal. The guy wrapped himself in / around the rope, climbed up to the ceiling and she would, with the sheer power of her weight, make him fall towards the floor or go up fast. A very beautiful and very erotic part.

2 - a solo from a stunning female trapezist, so light, so balanced, so on the edge as well. All this with a female voice speaking spanish in the background, gosh that was experiential. And as the Guardian put it - it's like Cirque du Soleil, less the Disney influences, and without disinfectant..

I won't say more - you can find out about them here: http://www.nofitstate.org.

The thing about social media - 1

2009-04-24T21:45:00.000+01:00

Hey.

Before internet, we would phone our friends and family. With emails we started emailing instead of calling. One of the results of this I noticed was that we would be in touch more often, but see each other less, and because email is easy and cheap, we would also contact people we would less care about in the past. Growing our reach sort of - you know these emails and jokes that we used to send to all our contacts...

Now, we have social media. What is this about? Spending even more time on our computers to be constantly in contact with even more people we know? Creating fake identities or persona with which we're allowing ourselves to play with others who, also are hiding behind pseudos, and who we don't know? Or growing our reach again? Nothing gets on my nerves more than people I have not seen in years, we never cared to know what was becoming of each others, but then suddenly they notice I exist and send me invitations to join their circle of friends on a social website, like facebook? Once we're connected though nothing really happens. It's as if people are just sitting like some sort of trophies on other people's shelves. And what about staging ourselves so more people actually know us and start to follow us, as if we really had something to say that was so interesting. I am sure some do, but how many, who, how can we find them, recognise them?

And when you think of it, how many people are actually right now blogging, twittering or facebooking alone in their room, without having directly engaged with a human being for the whole day?

About First post

2009-04-22T23:18:00.000+01:00

Apologies in advance for my comments, current and future, on the local culture. I will try as much as I can not to be offensive.

Mind you, when I think of this huge Kellogs poster advert in the changing room at the gym showing Chris Hoy saying "the French must be eating pastry for breakfast"... I am not sure I should be feeling so apologetic.

To be or not to be redundant

2009-04-22T22:21:00.000+01:00

Hi there.

Last week, I was made redundant. Or actually, I don't know what it was about. All sorts of things came up in the meeting where I was told the company thinks it's best we part with you. It was not said if money was a problem, and nothing was actually reproached to me in terms of work. The company just changed ownership - and in the process they decided to re-organise things, and to make my job disappear. I was not given any warning, and they actually left it to me to organise a meeting in which I thought we would be talking work progress, to spill me the news. My final letter was not saying anything on the reason for the company to decide to thank and good bye me.

Professional-ism, is something that had been forgotten along the way. But I heard it's nothing unusual in this bizarre country. And this was an interesting experience indeed.