EXIT Festival 2011

Just back from the 4 day festival of Exit, held in the Petrovaradin Fortress of Novi Sad, Serbia…

Sorry Seth, I had to show the world you’re wonderful dancing!

“The EXIT festival came into being in the year 2000 as an act of rebellion against the regime of Slobodan Milosevic, that had for years been keeping Serbia out of touch with the outside world. That summer thousands of young people from Novi Sad gathered in the campus park by the Danube River where concerts, parties and art performances took place.  There were also discussions and debates where the young were able to express their opposition to the imposed nationalism, xenophobia, censorship and repression. The event lasted for 100 days and its grand finale was the ‘Get out to Vote’ party, which was held one day before the elections that saw the downfall of Milosevic.”

For more go here

We are meant to read EXIT!

aahhhhh, weep.

The Dance stage positioned in the moat of the fortress.

I think from now on I’ll be a fair weather festival goer, to my delight there wasn’t a drop of mud in sight!!

Image Via the BBC

Check out their website,  Exit.

Thankyou to all you lovely people that made it such a hoot, I’m looking forward to doing it all over again soon.xx

Lixa

From Space To The Sea

What a journey that would be…

credits. Hubble Telescope, Ansel Adams, Julian de Armas, Hengki Koentjoro and here, Joseph Szabo and National Geographic.

Lixa

National Geographic’s Ultimate Adventure List

National Geographic compiled a list of the top 20 adventures on the planet. Here’s a few of them…

Dive the Blue Holes, Photograph by Wes Skiles, National Geographic

Descend Into an Active Volcano, Photograph by Bradley Ambrose

Climb, Swim, or Surf the Poles, Photograph by Yassine Ouhilal

Cross the Sahara Desert, Photograph by Joerg Modrow, laif/Redux

Megatransect the Amazon, Photograph by Peter McBride

Wingsuit Fly off the Eiger , Photograph by Corey Rich, Aurora

Swim with Great Whites – South Africa Photograph by Jeb Corliss

Ski K2, Photograph by Dave Watson

Free Climb Yosemite’s El Capitan, Photography by Jimmy Chin

For the rest of the list and info (definitely worth a read) on each adventure click here.

Lixa

 

Arcade Fire, The Wilderness Downtown

Arcade Fire’s  interactive video The Wilderness Downtown by Chris Milk is amazin’! The video, used in Google Chrome, is a combination of animation, video and google earth/ street view all shown in multiple windows in your screen. You write in where you grew up and then a personalised video of that area is generated. Half way through the song We Used To Wait a screen pops up asking you to draw or write a message on a postcard to the younger you that lived there. It makes a pretty sweet watch, (I am a bit of a geek for maps)  if anything it’s a new way of looking at music videos which is always a good thing… Go do yours HERE!!

Below are some screen shots from my journey, the bottom image is my postcard…

 

 

http://www.thewildernessdowntown.com/

http://www.chromeexperiments.com/arcadefire/

Lixa

 

 

Japan

Sweet time lapse from Japan

via www.dtail.com/

Lixa

Josef Hoflehner and My Annoying Phobia.

I’m scared of planes. When I’m on a plane I am convinced something will go horribly wrong and I am going to plunged to my death helplessly from 35 thousand feet, so I spend much of the flight feeling anxious, this anxiety grows when we are over the sea. It’s not much fun. I have been hypnotised twice, which has taken the edge off my fear and I’m not hysterical any more (!!!), but still something is at the back of my head stressing me out. But what annoys me is that when I’m not on a plane or know I’m not going on one for a while they totally fascinate me. Concorde, Jumbo, Fighter, sea planes, that big ass air bus that frankly shouldn’t stay in the sky but does. See below…

People constantly tell me how safe they are, they say planes don’t just fall out the sky, (this one did), and say how much fun they can be. I just can’t get to that place. Every crash in the news I have to know every detail, where, why, what was the weather like at the time, if it was at day or night. Some might say I’m unhealthily obsessed and this interest probably just feeds my anxiety. I can’t help it though. I’m in awe of their capabilities and engineering when im on the ground but once I book that ticket a sense of dread sets in and I think way too much about my impending time at 35 thousand feet. Maybe it’s my brain telling me that flying is my calling in life, Captain Lixa…! Nahhhhh. A plane spotter more like it! GEEK

So when I saw these photos by Austrian photographer Josef Hoflehner the two conflicting sides of my fear kicked in, the anxious side and the part of me that is completely enthralled by them. Hoflehner’s photographs of low flying airliners might be a little dull to some but I love these wide-angle ,high contrasting, black and white beauties! It’s 2 months and 25 days until my next flight…and relax. To see more go here

If you too have got some annoying fear go see Dawn Flockhart at Brain Train Academy in Hill Street Edinburgh. She was brilliant. dawn@braintrainacademy.co.uk

Lixa

Airspace Re-Booted

Northern Europe’s airspace getting back to its normal pattern after the Eyjafjallajokull volcanos ash cloud chaos. Watch it, its brilliant.

Lixa

Budapest Kerts

I have just got back from a trip to Hungary and Serbia. Before going to a wedding in Serbia we had a few days exploring Budapest. We stayed on the Pest side of the River Danube, there were far more sights, bars and we could easily walk everywhere so no need to figure out the tram or underground system. If you ever go you must search out the bars located in kerts (courtyards and gardens) which are dotted around the city in old run down buildings. These bars are hidden gems and when you do finally find them they are well worth the effort.

Szimpla is in Budapest’s Jewish Quarter and is one of the longest running kerts, as development has forced many of the  kerts to close. The owners have developed it into an outdoor cinema, bar and cafe with music events and film festivals. I loved this place, there was no pretence in the styling of it unlike many of the bars here in Edinburgh and the atmosphere had a relaxing midweek tone about it. Each room had its own theme and decked out with quirky chairs, baths made into sofas, old computers and radios hanging off walls, gymnastic horse blocks and most importantly drinks were cheap! The courtyard was buzzing with all sorts of people, although you could spot the Brits a mile off and in the winter months a roof covers the area so that the outdoor space can be used all year round.

Yes it may not be everyones taste but coming from a world of monotonous so-called ‘trendy’ bars it was very welcomed site to visit these eclectic kerts and definitely a highlight of the trip.www.szimpla.hu/

Another must is a bar on the roof of an old Communist department store called Corvintető. To get up to the club you can take a lift up with a guy wearing a tuxedo who sells miniature bottles of jagermeister and other spirits which I thought was a nice wee touch. The lift was decked out with chairs and benches to sit on while you are taken skywards to the busy club. Unfortunately we went on a really quiet night so can’t really say what it was like but I imagine sitting out on the roof terrace in the evening sun is bliss…

www.corvinteto.com/english.php

Finally Instant Kert should definatly be visited, its very similar to Szimpla with various rooms leading off the main court yard and a number of bars around the buldings over looking the kert.

Instant, Nagymező utca 38, district 6, 1065 Budapest.

Lady Lixa

Nouvelle Nouvelle

On my trip to Vancouver in Febuary I stumbled across a really sweet shop Nouvelle Nouvelle in Gas Town, by far my favorite district in Vancouver. The shop had a good mix of clothing, accessories and art work each laid out in an understated way. The atmosphere was casual, relaxed and creative and the woman behind the desk was browsing her computer with a lovable dog by her side. The bulldog, Lily, was very sweet wearing a funny wee knitted jumper, and in regards to my earlier post about dog clothing, Lily looked so very comfy in her trendy knit!

(if anything go check out the bulldog Lily!!)

American labels Dolce Vita, Quail, Yokoo, Vancouver designer Genevieve Graham and Swedish clothing group Perminant Vacation are all labels that the store carries. I loved finding new labels that aren’t in the shops over here and particularly liked Quail and Yokoo, the latter based in Atlanta has an Etsy page displaying her cool chunky knit designs.

Yokoo, sweet chunky scarf

Cute Permanent Vacation dress (for any of you Twilight fans out there, i reckon the model could totally be a Vampire!Victoria’s little sister maybe! Bit me, RAAHHH)

Quail, I tried on the blue dress, it was gourgeous…….ahhhh

Vancouver based Genevieve Graham

From the creative director behind Insight clothing Natalie Wood has created Something Else. (Sweet tattoos)

So if you are going to Vancouver get over to Gas Town pronto… I ended up visiting this shop a couple of times on my visit and will definetly be back. Recently I recieved a lovely necklace from my brother in the post which he bought at Nouvelle Nouvelle, what a nice surprise, so thankyou again for it! Their blog based website always a pleasure to browse so have a peek, also, I was assured by the owner that they ship overseas. Yipee!

So pleased I found this wee gem of a shop!

Lady Lixa