I've been blessed travel probably way too much in my short life. I enjoy sharing my adventures with the world and thank those who have helped me do it. :)
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Well, I guess I’m back to blogging-
Today was my first real day in London thus I found it extremely appropriate to get lost. As normal I only get lost in the best parts of the world and this afternoon I found myself very underdressed and strolling through the streets of Westminster looking for a tube stop and my future place of employment! After finding my place of employment I decided that finding a tube stop wasn’t actually that necessary and I decided to walk home. I found my way safely, looking at park maps along the way for landmarks and street names and once I was home I decided that my first 1.5 days in London had in fact been a success.
Last night after arriving I went to see a friends band play on Brick Lane at a venue/café called Café 1001. I had no idea it would be so hip. I felt like I was walking down an alley in Santa Monica where people were pretending to have British accents.
Oh and I know that people say food in London sucks, so I’ve made it my goal to only find good food and coffee. So far I think I’ve done well! Enjoy!
Life Under Water- Submergence in Our Surroundings
I know that I frequently fall victim to my surroundings. Whether its friends, lovers, engagements, affairs etc, it’s easy to underestimate what you’re capable of and go with the flow. Recently I have been letting “life” happen as it should and as a result I have realized that life doesn’t happen if you don’t make it. Not in terms of success or prosperity but in terms of disciple, fulfillment and happiness. All of the above are a conscious choice that each one of us have the ability to make.
I remember as a child, my Hawaiian family nicknamed me “fish”: I was always swimming. In water one has freedom of movement and seemingly unlimited opportunity for movement. But in reality in water there is much more pressure and resistance to movement. I seek limitless opportunity and beauty. I seek a life worth living and a potential incomparable. But I wonder why we feel so much more free under pressure.
Reid Haithcock Photography and Mono Cases!
Here are some fun pictures from a shoot I did recently! If you get a chance, check out mono cases, my newest sponsor!
(Source: monocases.com)
NAMM and California After a month in California it was finally time to come back to Boston and start life at Berklee again. Luckily for me the week before I started school again I got the pleasure of going to NAMM for Bass Musician Magazine. My good friend andcompadre at BMM got to wander the halls of the Anaheim Convention Center interviewing the likes of Stu Hamm, Hadrien Feraud, and Victor Wooten. Interviewing the cats was pretty fun, and so was being able to see the “demos” for the big companies like EMG, Yamaha, Gibson, Hartke and Fodera. However my favorite event was a jam session called the Bass Bash that went down at a bar a few miles away from the NAMM-proper. It was a four jam sponsored by Lo-Phat amps, needless to say it was four hours of killin’ gospel. Definitely couldn’t have asked for more.
But now I’m back in boring Boston going to school and dealing with the temperature of -2. Going from 80 degrees and margaritas in California is brutal but god what a change of pace from Greece……
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Week Sixteen: Home is Where the Heart Is.
The last week of my Semester in Athens was a whirlwind. Even though I was only there for just about four months I made some seriously deep connections with people. My private instructor on bass was the best teacher I have ever had and I really grew to love the guy as a great friend and mentor. Even though there were some rough times in Greek class, my Greek teacher ended up being a very nice lady. We had a concert at the school or a “recital” if you will, we got to drink beers and play. KILLIN. Then the next day Kostas (my teacher) took me and Rick out for souvlaki and beer after we just went to smoke hookah with Effi, our greek teacher. The day before I left John, my ancient civilization teacher took us to the Athenian Agora and we did a walking tour of all that is left of Ancient Athens. The last night was hard, but almost everyone I met in Greece accidently ended up arriving at the Craft Brewery for a farewell with the group.
My first experience with Mediterranean Culture was when I was 14 and staying with a family in France. Since then I’ve had a special place in my heart for the café and coffee lovers.
After the passed four months in Greece, I have learned how valuable and beautiful life really is. Especially in American culture it is far too easy to get overwhelmed by the daily grind and pressures of social expectations. For some reason I found these concepts to be almost non existent in the life style of the Greeks. Sure, they want their kids to go to college, get good jobs and participate in society but on a daily basis they just want to enjoy the short time we are given here. To an outsider the riots, and social/economic unrest in Greece appears dangerous and reckless yet once I was there I saw a completely different side of it. About half of the United States is completely opposed to the “War on Terrorism” yet are completely unwilling to do anything about it. Where as I may not agree with the problems that the Greek people have with their government I have tremendous respect for the passion demonstrated in these protests.
Earlier today at the Athens airport I was joking with my friend Ioanna about being Greek. We were laughing because I am not a passive aggressive person at ALL but I don’t like arguing either, especially with men. Where as she, being a Greek women, not only loves arguing with men but she looks for ways to insinuate arguments. Clearly, I find this hilarious in practice but the best part about all of it is how the men react and how it’s so easy for everyone to move on from an argument. It’s an expectation that people argue but its also an expectation that they move on and continue life as normal.
I’m so disheartened about leaving and in few words I cant explain how Greece changed my life but it did. I have been infected with love for Athens, and Greece in general.
Week Fifteen in Athens: Snow!?!?
What an interesting week to be in Greece. Lets start with Monday, for the passed two years December 6th has been a national day of protest as they remember the day an innocent 15 year old boy was shot by Police Officers in the area of Exarchia. Naturally my school is about two blocks away from where the boy was murdered so I got an up-close and personal view of what was going on. Early in the day I had decided I would stay at school and practice until it became unsafe (if it became unsafe). My teacher and I were standing outside watching just in time for people to start setting trees on fire, hear trash can bombs explode and not be able to breathe from tear gas. I’m making sound bad but it was actually really, really, really cool. Then I walked home. Good times!
The rest of the week was nice, nothing too excited until Thursday. The whole week there was a Berklee faculty visiting Nakas. He is now my favorite because he rules that hard! His name is Rob and he works in the Office of Communications, he has a travel blog through Berklee he wrote some wonderful things about me and took some rather hilarious pics. If you’re curious you can check it out here “http://www.berklee-blogs.com/2010/12/8477/#more-8477”. Then of course there was a feast fest and I ate alot. No Biggie times ten.
The weekend came and since it was my last weekend in Athens it was a party, not too big of a party but when is my life not a party?! The first snow in Athens since 2004 fell Saturday and in celebration Jen, Katerina and I got grilled cheese and cappucinos! As if the day couldn’t get any better already Ben, one of the guys in our group, had a gig in Gazi (basically the SoHo of Athens) so we went out, drank too much, and then ate souvlaki and returned actually not that late. The next morning Jen called me and asked if I wanted to go souvenir shopping at the Flea Market of Monastiraki so we went but OF COURSE the public transportation people are on strike… So if you look at the last two pictures you can see the Riot Police and the people protesting at Parliament.
WORD! Until next week. <3
(Source: berklee-blogs.com)
Week Fourteen in Athens
As my time here starts to wrap up, I’m reminded that this is still school…. Finals. UGHHHHH. Not nearly as stressful as Boston, because I’m of course not in Boston!
I have tried to be pretty tame the past couple of weeks so I can save up my strength for the pre-LA parties. This weekend my roommate and a couple of the other girls went to Ireland and Rick and I were a bit jealous of their adventures so we decided to go to an Irish bar and show the Greeks a good time. Naturally we picked Irish Car Bombs as our drink of choice…. things didn’t get too crazy unfortunately but wild dancing and the practice of “signoming” one was exercised.
To Signomi: verb……CLEARLY OF GREEK ORIGIN. The word Signomi in Greek means “Excuse Me” but Rick and I made up a little game to keep us entertained on the walk home. Basically you just walk up to a random person and ask them what their name is (in Greek). Hopefully you get a response, 1 point if they respond. If there is a group of people and you get an answer from each person it’s 2 points for each person, but you must ALWAYS address the person with “Signomi” first. So if you get a name from everyone in the group and you don’t say “Signomi” to each person, its still only 1 point per person :(. Last but not least, if after you get a name from the individual you scream “WHHHYYYY!?!” then you get triple points. :)
Week Thirteen in Athens! (London)
This week was my good friend Katerina’s birthday and name day. Because she is named after a Saint she actually gets to celebrate two birthdays! We celebrated by going to a really nice restaurant near to our houses, it was a really good time. Wednesday night the hotel staff made Rick, Jen and I a Turkey in celebration of Thanksgiving…also lovely! Unfortunately none of us knew how to carve it so the poor bird ended up getting minced :( Thursday after a long day of class I flew to London to stay the weekend with my good friend Julien Baraness, whom I also played in a band with his last year at Berklee.
Friday was lovely, we went to visit the Royal Academy of Music and accidently walked into a Performance Art piece with a painter and two oboes… biggest mistake of my life. But its okay because afterwards we got the best cookies ever in SoHo at Ben’s cookies. The flavors we chose were Chocolate Ginger and Milky Chocolate. <33!!! Later I met up with my step mom and her cousin and we went to get Indian food…. I instantly made friends with the waiters and they decided that I was in charge. aka I chose the wines, ordered the food and of course when the bill came they handed it to me. Carol wanted to take a picture of me with the bill and the waiters jumped in on it! Then when we were leaving they handed me a business card and said, “Send us a copy of the photo!” I died!
After leaving the Indian food place we went to a little desert bar and got Champagne and red velvet cake. It was here that I accidently offended a very gay (and really amazing) Albanian man by telling him that his country was full of gypsies. Sorryyyy :( Its a long story, I’m not a jerk. Turns out the story I was referencing was supposed to be Romania…. Apparently Romania is actually full of gypsies not Albania. Endax!
Saturday was Londons equivalent of Black Friday and I spent most the day wandering around London, you know going to Buckingham Palace, Westminster Abbey, Oxford Circus, SoHo and then I saw Harry Potter because the temperature that night was -6 Celsius. WORD. Sunday started out kind of rough: I was supposed to meet up with Julien early but due to train cancellations and strikes I couldn’t get to him until the afternoon…. So Carol and I went on a walk and discovered the Royal College of Music (which looks promising) as well as Harrods and a few different Top Shops! It ruled.
To sum up my weekend in London, Sunday night I went to a wonderful Thanksgiving feast thrown by Julien’s girlfriend and a bunch of her friends. Props to them, the food was killin! <3
Thanksgiving in Athens!
Extremely successful Thanksgiving dinner here in Athens tonight. Jen and Rick and I were discussing what we were thankful for and this is what I came up with:
I am thankful for my family Kate Peters, Douglas Simao, Eric Futterer, Carol Futterer, all my brothers and sisters, cousins, relatives etc. My best friends Rocky Morgan, Nate Mead, Sabrina Oldham, Becca Scammon, Greg Chaplin and my new family here in Athens. The hotel I live at, my school, being blessed enough that I can actually attempt to do the things I love in life. Also I am thankful for my friends in London that I get to see tomorrow and all the people who I have ever met. I am also thankful for Greece, Dimello Espresso, various clothing companies, music, Freddo Cappucino’s (medrios), Katerina Moschou and the world for exposing me to ridiculous experiences. <3
Oh and last but not least I am thankful for Turkey, Spiked Nog, Stuffing, Pumpkin Pie and not being able to fit into my pants right now because I have officially eaten too much. Heck yes.
<3
