Marc Chagall: Life Is a Dream

When I visited Nice, I listed Musee National Marc Chagall as a must-go place. I first encountered with Marc Chagall’s painting in the film Notting Hill.

I was totally attracted by the painting when Hugh Grant and Julia Roberts are dining at the table in the former’s house in Notting Hill and a poster of the painting is visible in the background wall.

I searched online to see what meaning the painting delivers and who is the creator of this legendary painting. Below is the information I find on the Internet:

The painting is named as La Mariee (‘The Bride’ in English) and it was painted in 1950. The screenwriter of the movie and also a huge fan of Marc Chagall’s work, the painting depicts a yearning for something that is lost, which is why it fits perfectly with that scene in the movie. Also, later on in the movie Robert’s character presents what is presumably the original painting to Grant’s character as a gift.

The ‘bride’ in question here is dressed in a vibrant red gown with a virginal white long veil and holding a bouquet of flowers, the quasi-wedding attire. Marc Chagall managed to create such remarkable images with a use of only 3 to 4 colours.

It is since then that I develop great interests in Marc Chagall. According to Cogniat, there are certain elements in his art that have remained permanent and seen throughout his career. One of those was his choice of subjects and the way they were portrayed. “The most obviously constant element is his gift for happiness and his instinctive compassion, which even in the most serious subjects prevents him from dramatisation…”. Musicians have been a constant during all stages of his work. After he first got married, “lovers have sought each other, embraced, caressed, floated through the air, met in wreaths of flowers, stretched, and swooped like the melodious passage of their vivid day-dreams. Acrobats contort themselves with the grace of exotic flowers on the end of their stems; flowers and foliage abound everywhere.” (Source: wikipedia)

In Musee National Marc Chagall, I gain deeper insights into Marc Chagall’s masterpieces. I rent the audio tour guide at the museum and got to have a knowledge of the religious themes in his paintings. The Musee National Marc Chagall displays a series of large paintings illustrating the first two chapters of the Bible, Genesis and Exodus; and Solomon’s Song of Songs or Canticles, which is a biblical meditation on sexual, spiritual and sensual love.

After returning home, I searched online and found that Judaism is a prevalent theme in his paintings. Lewis writes that Chagall “remains the most important visual artist to have borne witness to the world of East European Jewry… and inadvertently became the public witness of a now vanished civilisation. Although Judaism has religious inhibitions about pictorial art of many religious subjects, Chagall managed to use his fantasy images as a form of visual metaphor combined with folk imagery. (Source from: wikipedia)

Solo Female Travel — Is it safe?

After three nights in Finnish log house, my friends all filed back to London because they had class the next day. I stayed alone in Helsinki for another two days. Before leaving, they asked me to take care of myself, given that I am a solo female traveler. 

During that two days, even though I bore their words in mind, I made friends with three Chinese girls on my way to Kamome shokudo and we shared our lunch in the restaurant. Since my personality is quite straightforward and extrovert, it is rather common for me to make friends with other tourists and end up my solo travel within a limited time. I wonder, is it truely unsafe for a girl to travel alone?

When you enter key words including “female travel” on google, it comes up with loads of information such as “Solo Female Travel Advice”, “27 Best Places For Solo Female Travel “, “Solo Female Travel: The Ultimate Girl’s Guide”. Universally, people worry out the issue of solo female travel. Indeed, when it was first time for me to travel alone, I was afraid that I might catch much unwanted attention or even sexual harassment. And it is just blind to ignore all the crime statistics to say that traveling alone is as safe as travel with friends or in groups. However, does it mean that girls should no longer travel alone and limit themselves to a confined space?

With the concern, I continued my journey, which was filled with fun. On the flight back to London, a Londoner who has been working in Thailand for five years chatted with me. When he asked me what was the worst part I found out about London, I said safety issues. I was in the oxford circus station when it was reported to have gun shootings in the station, and there were two times when motorists tried to snatch my phone, and I saw people’s bags were robbed away in person, ……. He was quite surprised when he heard of my answer. He told me his experience after hearing my words. Here I summarise his words into two main points, one is that he truly believes that a person only lives once and should try to make the most out of our life. Another is his pride in London and being a Londoner, I have to say lol.

His words are subjective to some extent but YES! I have to say that we only live once. It is too coward stop doing something just because there might be a risk, a one that can even be avoided if you have awareness and pay much attention to. 

Though I never made it clear to myself before, I believe that the reason why I have the courage to keep traveling solo is that I pay very much attention to my surroundings during my travel. Even though I make friends with us on travel occasions, I do not lower my vigilance and always am judgemental towards strangers at the first glance.

SO! What I want to say is that: Never give up possibilities easily and also! never give away your vigilance.

Life in a Finnish Log House

Chinese New Year 2018 is the very first New Year in my life that I spent with a few friends, my ideal way of celebration of a coming year.

According to Chinese New Year customs, people visit friends and relatives during the first few days of New Year. A new year without meet-ups with a pool of relatives you have not met for a long time is incomplete. I have to admit that these gatherings when younger generations can get lucky red envelops brought great happiness to me when I was a child. However, after I grow up, I wish there could be a quite and peaceful period during the Spring Festival that I only spend with my parents, without questions concerning your study, job or even marriage raised by these caring but gossip relatives. In the past few years, whenever I brought up the idea of spending next new year abroad to my parents, they refused it without hesitation, for the reason that my grandparents are getting too old and spending time with them is the priority.

So…… Traditional celebration continues every year. It was not until this year that I finally have the opportunity to spend the New Year according to my will, because I am studying in the UK and far away from home. I booked a holiday to Finland and had three gorgeous nights in a Finland log house with three friends.

During the vacation, I slept until I woke up naturally, made handcrafts, encountered with Northern Lights, played cards, built snowmen and skied. I enjoyed every simple beauty of everyday life and was under no pressure to behave myself.

In memory of a beautiful Chinese New Year and wish all of you every success in 2018.

Magical Night: Chasing the Northern Lights

During the CNY, my friend and I booked a trip to Finland, mainly for Northern Lights. Therefore, our iteanrry idea was that we spent one night in Rovaniemi to see Santa Claus and Arctic Circle in the Santa Claus village and three nights in Inari (norther part of Finland) , to increase the opportunity to see Northern Lights.

As a matter of fact, Rovaniemi is already a place where Northern Lights are likely to be seen. Before the departure in London, my friends and I all believed that we would definitely see Northern Lights since the aurora forecast indicated that the northern lights activity were very high at that time. When we walked out of the Rovaniemi airport, we were a bit upset because it was snowing heavily, which means the heavy cloud would conceal the northern lights and made it impossible to view northern lights. We comforted ourselves: It’s alright, the weather changes a lot, we might still be able to see it. The accommodation we booked in Rovaniemi is a glass igloo, which is perfect for northern lights viewing. When we booked it, the scene we imagined was like this shown in the picture below.

However, things do not always work out as you planned. It continued to snow that night, even till 3:00am (Yes, we stayed up that late to wait for Northern Lights which did not appear. What we see actually in the room was just glass and cloudy sky.

The second day, we took a eight-hour bus journey heading to Inari, to see if we can capture Northern Lights here or not. When we arrived at the wooden house we booked, it was already 7 o’clock in the evening. It was not snowing, though the sky seemed to be somber still. After the tedious long bus journey, we decided to take a good rest after dinner and sign up for the next day’s Northern Lights chasing tour.

The place we stayed was a resort and had its own restaurant in a separate log house. When had our dinner, the hostess came to us.

She said that the Northern Lights activity was very high and recommended us to sign up for the tour immediately, one heading out at 9:00 o’clock. We were so excited that we signed up without hesitation. We rushed out to our own wooden house and prepared everything: cameras, chocolate, water, scarves and gloves.

The hostess’s son was our driver and he said, we would drive all the way north to see the Northern Lights, to safari parks or even norther. We headed out at 9:00 pm and we sang all along the journey for the first 3 hours until midnight. We were so fatigue and started to worry that we may just need to come back home in vain. He was very humorous and asked, where is the music? I was driving and need music. We laughed. He added, it is not suitable to see Northern Lights here, so we drive to Norway now to chase Northern Lights. We were so amazed because we did not expect to visit any other nordic country this time. His words totally fuelled us and we started to sing joyfully again. He parked in a petrol station in Norway for a 15-minute toilet break. To prove I have been to Norway, I took a picture of magazines in the station‘s convenience store.

Finally, around 1:00 am, we arrived in a middle of safari park and he asked us to get off. Although is was very weak at the beginning, it was enough to make us scream and jump up with excitement.  We did not realize at that time that Northern Lights change very quickly and it could become very strong within a limited time. In the following five minutes, the Northern Lights broke out in the whole sky and I could see Northern Light basically from every angle. Our driver took photos for us, individually and also in groups.

(Our hostess, my friend and me)

(Me)

We spent 20 minutes in this safari park and headed to second destination to see Northern Lights in a different surrounding. And we saw it! Trees together with the green Northern Lights rendered the place even more magical than the land of Oz.

After spending 15 minutes in the second destination, all of us were trembling because of the freezing temperature. We came back to our car. The hostess had already prepared sandwiches, cinnamon rolls and hot tea. She also brought us a furry reindeer hide to keep us warm.

Ecstatically and thrilled, we headed back home. During the back home journey, everyone except the driver, were sleeping. It was 4:00 o’clock in the morning. What a experience!

 

 

 

A GLANCE AT HELSINKI：FROM KAMOME SHOKUDO TO EVERYTHING

Before I come to Finland, I watched a movie named Kamome Shokudo. It is a Japanese movie shot in Helsinki, Finland, in cooperation between Japanese and Finnish crews.

The movie’s plot is quite simple: Sachie is a Japanese woman living alone in Helsinki, who is trying single-handedly to establish a new cafe serving Japanese-style food. However, it has no customers. Eventually a young Finnish animation enthusiast comes for coffee and becomes the cafe’s first regular, though as her first customer he gets to eat and drink there for free.

Midori is a Japanese woman who has just arrived in Finland for an indefinite time and without any definite plans. She and Sachie happen to meet in a bookstore and she starts to help out in the cafe. Later, Masako, another Japanese woman on her own, turns up. Her baggage has been lost by an airline, and before long she too starts to work in the cafe. Over the course of the film, the cafe gradually gains more customers, and the Japanese women make more friends with the local people.

Simply put, the movie is about the insignificant but warm and sweet moments in one’s kitchen, or even life in a broader sense.  The story has no dramatic turn of events but rather a series of small episodes of interaction between and among Japanese and Finns. One of the reasons why such a little movie can win popularity in both counties is that Finns share some common characteristics with Japanese. For example, they are both known to be introvert.

Interestingly enough, I found out taht the film was filmed in a real cafe in downtown Helsinki, at the address Pursimiehenkatu 12, its real name was Kahvila Suomi (Finland Cafe), which resembles the fictional cafe, and is a popular destination for Japanese tourists visiting Helsinki.

So I decided to visit the restaurant to seek for ambience created by the movie.

And I did.

It was not difficult to find the right way to the restaurant if you already had the address in your mind. However, if you never watch the movie before, you may easily pass by the restaurant without noticing it. It is a small and exquisite Japanese cafe boutique. I came inside and ordered the most popular dish in the movie: rice balls.           

I took pictures of rice balls I ordered and also the interior design, just like many tourists in the restaurant did. The rice balls just look similar to those in the movie, and the interior design resembles that in the movie. However, I did not feel the aura created by the movie at all.  Of course, one of the reasons is that the cafe has already become a tourist attraction and for sure everyday crowds in the restaurant spoil its atmosphere in the movie to some extent. I got that. However, what I mean is that: I feel something different than that. At that time, I could not tell exactly what it is.

During my journey home, I met a gentleman on the train to the airport. He was the founder of a Finland company with over 200 employees. He asked me about my impression on Finland and I mentioned this movie. He laughed and said, yea, people used to think Finns are shy and introvert, but things changed, you know, Finns also changed. They become more and more extrovert and willing to share with travellers. His words blurts out the truth and I sort of realised why I could not trace back that feelings in the movie. Interestingly, that morning I went to the Design Museum, Helsinki. It was displaying the exhibition California: Designing Freedom.

The central idea of the California exhibition is that California has always pioneered tools of personal liberation, from LSD to surfboards and iPhones. This ambitious survey brings together political posters, personal computers but also looks beyond hardware to explore how user interface designers in the Bay Area are shaping some of our most common daily experiences and expanding what we think of as design.

Very True! I am learning digital media and I have to admit that technology somehow changes the whole landscape and how human beings behave themselves.

What an inspiring trip! Isn’t it!

(Finally got this blog done! The system seemed to break down a thousand times!!!)

A Glance at Paris: journey inspired by movies

“If you are lucky enough to have lived in Paris as a young man, then wherever you go for the rest of your life, it stays with you, for Paris is a movable feast.”

— Ernest Hemingway, to a friend, 1950, epigraph on title page of A Moveable Feast

As far as people are concerned, Paris is firstly associated with romance. Before I came to Paris, what’s exactly what I thought. All about ROMANCE. Among numerous romance movies shot in Paris, Midnight in Paris and series of Before Sunrise/Before Sunset/Before Midnight impress me the most.

When I made the itinerary plan for my first trip in Paris, I designed it right according to protagonists’ travel route. I went to Musée de l’Orangerie and Shakespeare and Company.

I firstly went to Musée de l’Orangerie, which is an art gallery of impressionist and post-impressionist paintings located in the west corner of the Tuileries Gardens. It becomes one of the most famous museums in Paris for eight Water Lilies murals by Claude Monet. 

▲In the movie: This museum appeared in the movie Midnight in Paris. Gil and Inez visited the museum with Inez’s friend Paul. Gil is disgustful of Paul’s pedantic and pseudo-intellectual personalities. 

Midnight in Paris

Midnight in Paris

▲ My visit:  Seeing the Water Lilies in an immersive environment like this, I am pretty sure  I would never wish the “Inez” in the movie was around me! 

My second stop was Shakespeare and Company. The independent book store features in Richard Linklater’s film Before Sunset and in Woody Allen’s Midnight in Paris. 

Writers and artists of the Lost Generation, such as Ernest Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald, as well as Ezra Pound, Gertrude Stein, George Antheil, Djuna Barnes, Mina Loy, and Man Ray, among others, spent a great deal of time there.

▲In the movie: 

▲ My visit:  

After my trip, I think Paris is not only about ROMANCE, but also about LIFE and ART.

Stories Under the Sahara Desert

I went to Sahara desert during the Christmas vacation. It was a three-day tour package and I only spent 12 hours in Sahara desert, but this experience became the most impressive and mind-blowing part of the eight-day Morocco journey.

When I arrived at the camp in Sahara, it was already 6:00 pm. Two Berbers – our tour guides – prepared dinner for us in a camp while we rested and had casual talks with other tourists.  At first, I just found that everything we did or we experienced was a part of their routine work and it was just like one of the very normal trips in a grandeur environment I had before. But I was TOTALLY wrong! After dinner, these two berber boys took us to the top of a dune. There, I had a three-hour long chat with these two lovely people and during this time I saw five shooting stars.

After around 30 minutes, our tourists all went back to our sleeping camps for a good rest after a tiresome day. My friend and I decided to talk with Berbers for a longer time, so we stayed. Their names are Omar and Hassan. We – four people – lied on the desert and watched the stars, talking.

Even till today, I still think it is better to just record our conversations directly instead of talking too much about how I feel. In a desert setting, even these casual talks become mysterious and divine. And this is the reason why I fall in love with Sahara desert.

 

—Me: Have you ever been to any other places apart from Sahara?

—Omar: Never, only my town and Sahara.

—Me: What animals have you seen?

—Omar: Camels, cats, rats and foxes.

—Me: Are you afraid of foxes?

—Omar: Not at all.

 

—Me: Have you ever been to school?

—Omar: Never.

—Me: What did you begin to enter Sahara?

—Omar: 13 years old.

—Me: How can you memorise the route to our camp?

—Omar: I have GPS in my mind.

—Me: come on. Thats bullshit for tourists.

—Omar: After 13 years old, I came to Sahara everyday and I went to different places in the desert. Each time, I learnt to memorise the different route.

—Me: When did you begin to become a tour guide and bring tourists into desert?

—Omar: When I was 17, and now I am 21.

 

—Me: If you have the choice, which place would you rather stay? A big city or desert?

—Omar: Desert for sure.

—Me: If you have to chance to visit other places, where would you rather go?

—Omar: Germany. German is a beautiful language.

 

—Me: If you earn a great fortune in the future, what would you do?

—Hassan: I gonna build lots of luxury camps. Different from the normal ones we stay now, they will have water and electricity.

—Omar: I will travel around, and my first stop is Germany.

 

—Hassan: Be quite! Listen! How quiet is the desert! I love this silence so much!

—My friend: Exactly, it feels like yourself and the desert are the whole world, nothing else.

—Hassan: and other people.

(everyone burst into laughter)

 

—Me: So many stars in the sky. I have not seen a sky like this for years.

—Hassan: When there are many stars, you cannot see the moon.

—Omar: Where there is a clear moon, then you can only see one star left in the sky. Look, that one, the brightest one. Stars and moon are just like cat and rat in the desert.

 

—Omar: which names do you like best? Aisha, Marilyn and Fatima?

—Me: Fatima.

 

(…….)

 

These are just a part of the talks we had that day.  During the talk, I felt like characters from the The Alchemist have come to the reality. Touching, inspiring, magical…

It has nothing to do with the academic knowledge we learnt at school. Just like the back cover of the book says, “it is all about the essential wisdom of listening to our hearts, learning to read the omens strewn along life’s path, and, above all, following our dreams.”

May we all have dreams and can always follow our heart, because “the fear of suffering is worse than the suffering itself”. 

 

Traveller or Tourist?

It is very interesting that when you ask someone else: what is your dream? A dramatic increasing number of Chinese millennials would say: travelling around the world. This can be a result of economic prosperity, globalisation and easy access to the rest of the world.

When it comes to travelling, there is a super prevalent classification: traveller and tourist. I even remember that in the first class of last term’s core module a girl says that she is not into typical tourism, and she is more willing to be a backpacker. Again, we are into this inescapable loop, aren’t we?

When I searched words “tourist” and “traveller” on google, I found a couple of interesting contrasts of these so-called two types of people who are on the way. Below are some of interesting these pictures.

I found these comparisons so funny because it literally creates another stereotype: tourists takes photos instead of memorizing by heart. What’s more, they spend a lot of money! They sleep in comfortable or even luxury hotels. By contrast, travellers are more fond of activities such as hiking, camping and free rides.

These kinds of pictures, no doubt, acclaim great popularity. Numerous repost them to show that they are no typical tourists. Instead, they are so-called travellers. It seems that travellers are a group of people who master the real art of travelling and are “superior” to those who are regarded as tourists. Here, I want to raise a question that haunts me for a long time: Is saving money (free rides) necessarily better than saving time (grabbing a taxi)? Is it possible that people who take a taxi have a deep and thoughtful conversation with the taxi driver, therefore they get to know much about destination’s local life? Isn’t this kind of categorization another stereotype?

When I was touring around in York two years’ ago, I suddenly came up with a comparison by myself. On that day, I was suggested to buy a one-day tour pass to see everything. If I buy the travel pass and manage to include as much as possible for my sightseeing schedule, I am believed to save a lot of money and a lot of time! I asked myself: do I need to be in such a hurry? What was the point of seeing everything in this city? Don’t I look like a tourist who wants to see as much as possible even if I don’t travel in a large group or take photos all the time? So at that very moment, I sort of realize that the real difference lies between a tourist and traveller can be your state of mind. Do you just want to see everything or you want to perceive something that’s is new or even unique?  Stronger perceived power is the real thing that a journey can provide you with, that adds incentive and beauty to your life, that drives people to always stay On the Way!