see you in 2013

my dear readers,

this is my the last post in 2012. today i was doing my last minute shopping for new year's eve, bought remaining presents, sent greeting cards, which my friends will be receiving all over the world, gave presents to my favourite people and bought some wrapping paper for the final gifts. the weather was sunny and beautiful, people in the stores and streets were running around with happy faces. i think this is the only period when at least tiny happiness is in every person. everyone expects something for the new year and everyone will make a wish to come true in the next year.

this year has not been an easy one, and i have heard it from probably every person around me. but personally to me this year has given the biggest and best present - my son, only for which i will be grateful to 2012.

in the new year i wish you all exciting moments, great emotions, warm people, big love, happiness in your eyes, kindness in your hearts and all this in big big amounts.

holly jolly christmas

my dear readers, 
do the following now - 
play this video:

than have a look at those pictures:

And sing: 
Have a holly jolly Christmas
It's the best time of the year
Well I don't know if there'll be snow
But have a cup of cheer

Have a holly jolly Christmas
And when you walk down the street
Say hello to friends you know
And everyone you meet

Ho ho the mistletoe
Is hung where you can see
Somebody waits for you
Kiss her once for me


Have a holly jolly Christmas
And in case you didn't hear
Oh, by golly have a holly jolly Christmas this year

Ho ho the mistletoe
Is hung where you can see
Somebody waits for you
Kiss her once for me

Have a holly jolly Christmas
And in case you didn't hear
Oh, by golly have a holly jolly Christmas this year
And everyone you meet

love sweet love

i woke up today, got dressed, said bye to ilia and went out into a snowy street. my car started with the song 'what the word needs now is love sweet love..' and it went on an on with dozen of variations of that song. i have forgotten to press 'shuffle' and it turned out that my ipod had a minimum of 20 versions of that wonderful music. but i didn't feel like skipping any of them. this song has made that morning look so much brighter and warmer than it actually was.

the reason of wonderful morning was not only the snow and the song, but also a birthday of my very very close friend, whom by the state of circumstances i know only two years, but who is one of the closest people to my heart now. mancho, i want to wish you a very happy birthday, with all the wishes that you have in mind coming true. but the most important wish i have to make is what i was writing about before. because the only thing that really means anything in life is love - love of your friends, your son and someone special in your heart. may these loves grow bigger and bigger making you happier and happier with every coming day.

observation #3: men and women

i have never been a relationship expert or psychologist, but i want to share one observation with you, which i made yesterday. actually i have made this observation quite a few times, but yesterday's episode made me smile and think that men really don't know what women want.

i was in a shopping mall in an accessory store, when i overheard a conversation between a wife and a husband. the girl was pregnant, walking around the store and looking at wallets and bags. her husband was also flipping through different wallets. the girl noticed that he was doing that and with a smile walked away from the wallet section, thinking (and i am hundred percent sure about that) that her husband has noticed her interest in wallets, and left in anticipation of a surprise, that he would go and buy one of them for her. but, suddenly he calls her back with a text, 'what do you think, after i have sold the car, would it be a nice idea to buy one of those wallets for the lady who is helping me with the documents for it'? ta dam. boom.

and the face of the girl, full of disappointment and sadness. and her words 'oh, i'm sure she doesn't need one, she must have loads of them'.

i am in no way being a feminist, saying that this guy wanted to hurt his wife. i am sure he didn't even realize that his wife would like to have one of those wallets. because we, girls, pay so much attention to little things, we notice every word, every gesture and make up our own fantasies and when they don't come true we get that awful disappointment feeling. the sad truth is that boys are just less attentive (with exceptions, of course). but that doesn't mean they love us less. probably we just have to learn to make expectations equal reality.

walnut eyes

you already know one of my favourite georgian artists - nino chakvetadze. i am not sure if you have seen all her paintings, i will post some of them here.

one common thing her characters have - are walnut eyes. fantastic, amazing, beautiful eyes. just like the eyes of my son. ilia has walnut eyes. they are so beautiful, that i look into them and cannot look away. big, shining and full of life. full of interest, happiness, love and kindness. when i look in his eyes, i am absolutely sure that he will grow up into a kind and amazing person.

i was thinking about what he is to me and came to a conclusion - he is my walnut jam. i am not sure that walnut jam is made anywhere else but in georgia, but believe me it is the sweetest and tastiest thing in the world. just as my son.

goodsnowymorning!

i rarely start my day with writing a post, usually i get inspired for it when something great and unusual happens in the morning, something that i cannot keep inside.

today the first reason was snow, which was waiting for me on the windshield of my car and which was so frozen that i spent 20 minutes cleaning my car from it. as the car was unfreezing, my hands and feet were freezing in geometrical progression. snow in tbilisi. in december. i cannot believe my happiness.

the second thing was a very nice surprise that was waiting for me on my email. i love mornings which start with good news and good emotions. wishing you a very nice and snowy and happy day, my dear readers. with rod stewart on the background.

good morning

i was supposed to post this video in the morning, but didn't find the time for it. i was driving the car today with the sun shining and realized that everything will be fine.

no matter what

night lights

i want to share my childhood memories with you. you know how there are moments when you're little which you remember even when you grow up? when you suddenly feel something that you felt in childhood and the warm feeling spreads through your body?

i have this feeling when i lay at night and see the shadows from the car lights on the walls and ceiling of my room. then, in childhood, i spent my summers in tbilisi and telavi:  july at my first grandma, august at my second. in tbilisi we used to live on the 5th floor on one of the biggest and busiest streets. at nights i would lay down and watch those lights from cars passing by playing on the walls. it was always warm and the windows were open. big beautiful trees in front of the windows were waving with their leaves. and their sounds together with the sounds of the street were the best lullaby for me. even now, writing about it, i close my eyes and remember that feeling. in telavi, our house was situated on the main square of the town. the sounds there were a little bit different. there were less cars, because of the difference in the sizes of the cities, of course. in telavi at nights there were more people walking than driving cars. they were often coming back from a birthday party or a wedding, singing songs and laughing. i loved those sounds - i was always so curious to look out of the window and see those happy people, but when your bed is already warm, it was too hard to leave it even for several minutes. so i stayed there looking at the walls and lights from cars on them.

now i live on the 12th floor. the lights from the cars don't always reach my room but i still leave the curtains open so that i can see the lights of the city at night. honestly speaking, i hate curtains, i think they steal the beauty of the views. and yes, i am hundred percent a city person. i cannot see myself living outside it in a house with no street lights and noises around me.

the art of presents

before reading this post, i suggest you all have a look at this wonderful john lewis ad, which has been my favourite since the time it has been released. 


today's topic is directly connected with the main message of the ad. 
'for gifts you can't wait to give'.  
some time ago i read this nice quote, talking about the difference between a gift and a present. it was saying that a gift is something you give a person, knowing he or she wants it and will be happy to have it. a present was said to be something you give a person because you want him or her to have it. it might not be the grammatical and correct meaning, but i like it very much.

i am the person who likes giving gifts. and christmas time is the time when all my imagination and energy is put into thinking about gifts and people who will be receiving them. remembering everything they like, everything they dream of or don't have. and then i put whole internet upside down, walk all the shops back and forth and find everything with what i want to make people around me happy. you know why i like that ad? because it says something that is absolutely true - the happiness of giving presents is so much bigger than the one of receiving them!

i love christmas and new year because of that time spend together opening the presents - the sounds of wrapping paper tearing apart, happy comments and excited faces. with some nice music on the background. what else can one need for happiness? maybe just snow - which is something you rarely get in tbilisi on the new years. unfortunately.

if we said everything we thought, did everything we wanted and found fun in everything..

i believe so many problems in this world would have disappeared if we only behaved like we did in our childhood.

if we said everything we thought, did everything we wanted and found fun in everything.

yesterday i was having a talk with my little niece elene, whom you know very well.  she was telling me stories from her school life, which made me smile and think that we would all be so happy if we behaved like those children from 2nd grade.

when mariam likes sandro, she goes and tells him that straight away. in adult world, how many times we were afraid to tell someone we loved them? when nutsa is jealous that elene is not holding hands with her - she goes and tells her. yes, elene listens, and holds hands with nutsa, because she wants to make nutsa happy. how many times we, adults, have quarrelled with someone and didn't put any efforts to find the main reason, go and tell the person all our thoughts and feelings? or, having found out what makes other people happy, we just ignored it? elene and her classamates had a teacher, who sometimes was too strict with them, but elene never said that at home. why can't we, people so much older and wiser than those children, have our mouth shut, if we know that our complaints and rumours can ruin other people's lives? when elene has cookies with her, she splits them all up, so that the whole class can have them. she puts those cookies on the desks, and then her classmates find the cookies after the break and eat with pleasure. that we should do as well - we all know what makes our friends happy, so why not think about making them actually happy - with attention and surprises?

all those things are so easy when you are 8, but why do they become so difficult when we grow up?

comparison & joy

the other day a good friend of mine posted this photo. when i read the message, i remembered a part from one of my favourite books - hector and the search for happiness. hector (main character) was travelling all around the world in search for happiness and writing down the rules of achieving it. one of them he wrote down during his plane trip. on that trip instead of economy class he was updated to business class for free. he sat in his new chair full of happiness drinking free champaign. next to him was a very sad man. when they began talking, hector found out that that guy was once updated to the first class for free and now was very sad to be sitting in the business class again. that story suddenly made hector's free-champaign-happiness much smaller. and the rule he wrote down was:

making comparisons can spoil your happiness.

oh how i agree with hector. but i also think that if you love making comparisons, you should make the right comparisons. what i mean with that is not to compare yourself to someone who has bigger house/better boyfriend/more interesting job, but to those who are homeless, alone and unhappy. i myself am struggling with that. and i myself know how hard is to be satisfied with your life and not complain. but i also know many people, who can only dream of the life many of us are having. for example, an old lady, whom i am visiting every thursday, who was raised in an orphanage, grew up alone, never got married and has noone to care for her.

these thoughts keep occupying my head the whole day and probably the best thing to do is be thankful for what we have. i don't urge you to stop dreaming of better life, never would i wish anyone to stop dreaming. but let those dreams be positive dreams, without comparison and envy.

live the language

i'm in love. with the video i saw today. i am not sure if i have anything to add to those videos. i just want to say that i adore beautiful ads. everything shot in such beautiful colours, with nice music and in nice cities makes me happy.

i want my student years back!

christmas mood

christmas mood reaches tbilisi very late. while the whole world is decorated with lights, all the stores are filled with christmas toys and streets are singing christmas songs from every corner, tbilisi is still saying  goodbye to summer.

but today on my way to work i saw that workers began constructing huge light trees, which made me extremely happy. tbilisi is amazing in december. all the streets have beautiful lighting, you walk around the city and feel the spirit of christmas and new year.

another great way of getting into christmas mood is listening to christmas songs. have you noticed how rare you want to hear jingle bells in summer? but how great it is to listen to them when new year is near. i start listening to christmas songs in november, in beginning of december i set up christmas tree, starting from mid december i spend every weekend cooking some christmas dishes. ginger cookies, cinnamon cakes, chocolate chippies, waffles, apple pies ... 

i am a true child and believer that christmas is the best day of the whole year. this year i will be waiting for miracle more than ever in my life.


here is a song for you to get in my mood.

sun valley serenade. glenn miller. love.

the classics of black and white cinema. sun valley serenade. one of my favourites. because of unbelievably amazing glenn miller, whose music i just adore. there is no other melody that can put you in such a great mood as his orchestra playing 'in the mood'.

i'm on the wave of 1940-50s these days. i have been listening to music, watching movies and remembering greatest artists, composers and singers of that period.

sun valley serenade is probably the only movie featuring glenn miller and his music. you don't even have to care about the plot of the movie when you have such an accompaniment. why did hollywood stop filming such kind and nice movies? why do we go to the premiers of scary movies with shootings and vampires, when sometime ago people were dressing up in long dresses and enjoyed movies in cinemas, the attendance of which equaled to the attendance of a nice concerts.

Why do robins sing in December?
Long before the Springtime is due?
And even though it's snowing, violets are growing
I Know Why and so do you

disney princesses

every girl has her favourite disney princess. my two little nieces - elene and ani have divided princesses among each other. elene is jasmin and ani is snowhite. i myself was a jasmine when i was little. not just because of my hair colour, but because alladin was probably my favourite disney cartoon and it stays like that even now. i can't even call them cartoons, they are real movies. i am not quite sure how cartoons are made now, probably just with the use of computers and technology, but in 1950s, time when cinderella was made, artists drew scenes from real life. each princess had two prototypes - first one, a live action model, who posed for all the scenes and acted in front of the painters, and the second one - singing and speaking voice, who recorded the dialogs and songs.

my favourite voice is cinderella's voice - ilene woods. i honestly believe that such types of voices don't exist anymore. you know that warm, old-style voices that we used to hear in old movies and cartoons. in that category i put judy garland, one of my favourite voices, which i will talk about some other time, since the topic of this post is cartoons and its princesses.

you can watch the video i posted below and have a look at all the princesses, their models and their voices. and you will see how the style of princess singing has changed as time passed. now old-fashioned cinderella and belle are replaced by modern soul and pop singers - in 'princess and the frog' and 'rapunzel'. i may be subjective, but those old voices i loved more, just as i still do love old cartoons more.

love measurement unit

my dad said such a wonderful thing today, that i cannot help sharing it with you.

everything is measured in units - distance in kilometres, weight in kilograms, volume in litres. but what about love? love should be measured in ilukas.

what a perfect measurement unit it would be! one million ilukas, two million ilukas...

бибикните, если вы влюблены

сегодня мне вспомнилось одно очень замечательное видео, которое я видела пару лет назад и которое меня так вдохновило, что я хотела проделать то же самое в тбилиси. мой друг вызвался помочь, и мы были близки от выполнения этой идеи, но что-то помешало: то ли дела, то ли времени не было. вообщем, так и не вышло.

но я считаю, что это так мило! особенно конец, счастливый трактор и счастливый камаз. доброго вам утра, друзья!

la finestra di fronte

i was introduced to ferzan ozpetek's movies by my good friends nato and fran, who sang a soundtrack from 'mine vaganti' (loose cannons) to me and insisted that i should watch it for sure. and so i did. in that movie, i just loved the main character riccardo scamarcio, believing him to be one of the handsomest men in the world. the scenery was amazing - true italy - with beautiful colours, beautiful people, big and emotional families and fantastic music.


the next ozpetek's movie i saw was 'la finestra di fronte' (facing windows), which i loved even more. the plot had great sense, introducing two love stories impossible on the one hand due to moral issues, but nevertheless beautiful and worth having. the movie had so many beautiful people in it, that it was a true pleasure watching it.

i think that ferzan ozpetek is one of the greatest turkish directors ever, though people who are more familiar with turkish cinema may name other great directors as well, but for me personally ozpetek is amazing because of his ability to  make good films with beautiful cast, fantastic soundtracks and cleverly knit stories.

viewaddict

tbilisi is rich in restaurants with great views and i am an often visitor of them because of my beautiful-view-addiction. probably i have been to every place in tbilisi that has a breathtaking scenery opening from its terrace or window.

yesterday i had a dinner in a place with amazing view. 'narikala hills' restaurant was a discovery for me. probably it is best for romantic dinners with candles and soul talks, but i didn't have any chance of this atmosphere because of my friends jokes and funny stories. probably, they will never let us in again, but i highly recommend it to those of you, who love romantic views, nice music and cozy places, which are not full of people.

and here is a cover of my favourite 'let's stay together' by maroon 5. i think such songs are perfect for such views.

siesta

i have a nice app on my iphone. it keeps sending me words of the day every evening and thanks to it my english vocabulary has grown substantially. mostly i have no idea of the definition of the words dictionary.com is sending me, but the word i got today i knew for sure.


                                     

i know its not midday or afternoon or anything like that, but i'm pretty sleepy and instead of going to my bed, would love to find myself on the picture above, with summer, sun and a river/sea noise on the background. goodnight my dear readers!

decisions

decisions

always hard to make, but so worth the effort. my good friend told me that in every moment in your life you should decide - you go one way or another. you may have doubts, you may have thoughts and they all will be eating you from inside, but once the decision is made - you are free. you have already decided and you know the path you are taking.

this applies to everything - new job, new haircut, new road you take from home to work, new book you start, new people you meet...

so wish me luck. today i made probably the biggest decision in my life. life-changing and promising better future and lots of positive things.

for so long

for so long..you and me been finding each other for so long

tiko and i met in summer 2008, in a dining room of one of the hotels in turkey. we met thanks to my dearest lako and this encounter is probably the biggest present that i got from lako, after her friendship with me of course.

and the feeling that i feel for you is more then strong , girl

if in this world we can talk about soulmates and soulfriends, tiko is probably the best description for that word to me. though raised in two absolutely different countries, absolutely different schools, among absolutely different people, we were raised in very similar families, with principles that are so alike, that sometimes i cannot believe it. but all those things are nothing in comparison to what kind of friends we are now. i have a friend who gets me with half a phrase, half a word, half a letter. and i feel that i often don't even have to say anything, she just gets everything rightaway. during the hardest periods in my life she has been so there for me with all her heart, that i will never ever in my life forget that. she was my mind, my eyes and my heart and she stays there forever in spite of the fact that she lives 1500 kilometers away from me. those 1500 kilometers are absolutely nothing when it comes to our friendship. and all my life i will be learning from tiko how to be such a great person and all my life will be trying to be at least a little bit of such a great friend as she is.

autumn

autumn came to tbilisi only yesterday. i was driving with my girls in the evening when i realized that. it was pretty dark and windy, when i stopped the car and let them go out to buy some pastries. and suddenly it felt so cozy. so cozy, that for the first time i felt that i wanted to save this emotion in my head in order to share it with you in my blog later. i managed that with the help of the music that was playing in the car.

the wind was blowing, it was warm inside, cars were driving like crazy, like they always do in tbilisi, the lights were appearing/disappearing and then suddenly a yellow leaf fell on my front window. i looked outside and leaves were flying all over me. they were flying and dancing to the music. to marvin gaye. of course.

changes

why is everybody so afraid of changes? i absolutely have no idea for that. i personally love them.

lullaby music

me and my son are music fans. crazy music fans. we've been listening to music non stop since we were both born. and music is the only thing that makes us happy when we are crying, and which makes us calm down when we are worried.

iluka has his own favourites, of course, like we all do. his personal favourite is barry white and he just adores funk. some of the artists he is not yet familiar with, because they are hard to listen to. the main reason for that is that iluka is only 4 months old. but the solution came to us itself. ilu will be listening to all great rock bands, but in a lullaby rendition. we discovered rockabye baby cd's, which are on their way to tbilisi. from now on beatles, bob marley, u2, coldplay, madonna, eagles and many others will be singing to iluka in a sweet, lullaby voice.



voila!

observation #2. books and reading

i get so much inspiration from the everyday scenes that i observe in the streets. i can issue a huge book of all my various observations and thoughts that i get from them.

this time, my observation is the following - the richest people are those not with the biggest houses but those with the biggest libraries. today, it rained in tbilisi. i went out for the lunch and this is what i saw - a lady, with bags covered for them not to get wet, was sitting with an umbrella, reading a book with such interest, that i am absolutely sure she didn't, even for a second, care about the rain, cold, uncomfortable seat, things to do and problems she had. she was just sitting there, enjoying something she was reading so much: probably in her thoughts she was on another continent, on a ball in 17th century, in a forest running, in cuba dancing, on a meeting talking, writing a love letter, receiving a love letter, happy, worried and in anticipation of what happens next.

books give us everything. they open all the boarders, all the windows and make us think about things we have never thought before. you know what my biggest dream is? one day to be able to write something worth reading with such interest as this lady in the street was having.

 

love sundays

yesterday was a wonderful day. you know, one of those sunny sundays when you are out of the house the whole day. and i'm so glad my son is growing the same type of person that i am. the type that never sits home and loves communication.

we went for a walk in mtskheta, georgia's old capital, and then we had lunch in a restaurant over the river. the weather was just perfect, it was sunny and full of people having walks and lunches and picnics all around us. and there were so many weddings! one of them even took place in the banquet hall of the restaurant we were having lunch in. a child was a great excuse for walking around, so i saw everything - the bride, tables, cakes, guests, musicians :) when we asked for dessert, the waitress told us she would bring us the cake from the wedding if we wished. only then i realized why on my wedding half of the guests didn't get to taste the cake - cakes tend to disappear mysteriously. having refused the waitress, we went for a dessert to my cousins place, where we ate my favourite tatara - georgian dessert made from grape juice - sort of grape pudding. and the best ending of the day was at my place with my dearest friends over drinking my uncle's tasty wine and remembering funny university stories.

i love sundays. those are the best days of the week.

carnival

i want this post to be the happiest and warmest of all the posts i have written before. you can scroll down and see the reason for that or you can first read the post and then have a look at something that makes me so happy and warm.

on 13th of october my son turned 4 months. i was thinking about a present for him, which would be the first present i gave him and which he would keep forever. about my huge love for art you already know, but i haven't told you anything about my huge love for an amazing artist, nino chakvetadze yet.

i first saw her paintings when i was pregnant. looking through her albums on facebook, i promised myself to get my child one of them once i am back in georgia. then lots of things happened in my life and i was totally busy dealing with them. though i never forgot about my promise.

so the other day i called nino and asked if she could draw a special painting for my special son. and some time later (yesterday) she called me back saying it was ready. i couldn't wait till i got home finally and walked down to nino's house which is very close to mine. and when i entered her house with wonderful paintings on the walls and when she showed me ilu's painting my heart filled with such warmth, i am not sure i will ever be able to express it with words.

when i walked back home holding the painting, everyone was looking at it (or maybe me, who was sooo happy to hold it). i hung 'carnival' on the wall in front of my son's bed and imagined that when he grows up he will give names to all of the characters on it, but one thing i know for sure - iluka is that little boy on the right with sombrero.

fromge.com

my dear friends,

fashion is not quite the subject of my blog, but i cannot resist sharing a wonderful website with you. www.fromge.com. this is a unique website featuring and selling georgian designers' clothes with delivery all over the world.

this personally makes me so proud because i really adore those wonderful dresses and beautiful shoes, skirts and tops. not to say anything about the fact that i personally know the designers and models displaying their great pieces.

and oh! all the orders made till 24th of october have a free delivery!!

dancing

yesterday my friend literally forced me to join her on her r'n'b dancing glass. and i'm so glad she did, because it was a huge pleasure to dance.

i should tell you that dancing is probably second best thing i love (after my son). and being restricted to dancing only in clubs is so awful. you remember that video by faithless with the girl dancing all over? i loved this video because i get her so well. of course i don't dance in the streets like she does, but i do dance in the car, at home, in the kitchen, with karaoke, without karaoke :) this all led to my huge happiness when yesterday i realized i will have a great chance to dance after work several times per week.





and i think r'n'b is so cool for the start.

the secret

the other day when i called my cousin she was watching a documentary called 'the secret'. she told me it was worth seeing and that i should definitely see it myself. i downloaded it and watched first 12 minutes of the movie. then i stopped, and maybe i will continue watching it later, right now i don't really feel like it. but the main message gave me things to think about. it says that power of attraction makes all our thoughts come true and that we attract those things that are in our head.

but when we think about something we should always think positive. because according to this theory, the thoughts are materialized, no matter if we want them or not. so if we don't want something to happen the universe gets only the message of our thought, not our attitude towards it - and it will happen for sure, just in some period of time.

honestly speaking, this theory frightened me a lot. not that i am always thinking about bad things, no. i consider myself to be pretty optimistic. but in life you always have moments when you think about negative things and oh, i don't want them to come true!

have anyone of you practiced this theory?

rain in tbilisi

today is rainy in tbilisi.

it is one of those days when you don't want to go out, you want to stay at home with nice music and a blanket. and a day when you still have to go to work and you force yourself to stand up, get dressed, grab a tea and umbrella, put yourself in a car and start the engine and music.

and suddenly curtis mayfield goes 'other guys try to hold her hand, other guys want a one night stand, they all stare when she's around, i'm so proud how she puts them down'. and you drive your car on a wet highway and see a funny guy with a dog doing his early morning jog without being interrupted by the rain, then a woman with her son running without umbrella to the schooldoors, a parking man with a bag on his head helping a car to park and a couple of students hugging and kissing under the rain... and curtis goes on 'she don't let nobody, she don't let nobody, nobody but me'.

observation #1. kindness and care

i like to notice different things when i walk in the streets. i have a big collection of things that i have realized about people while watching them act in different types of situations. some of them make me smile, some make me sad, some happy and some proud. i will be writing down all my findings and share them with you.

today i will start with my observation which makes me proud. and this observation proves the fact that people are kind and caring. even regarding those people, who they don't even know.

when i lock my car, its headlights keep shining for some time. i guess it is designed so in order for the car to light your way till you get to the destination, and then they switch off.

but you know every time i park my car, there has never ever been a day, when somebody hasn't noticed that i forgot to switch off my headlights. be it an old man, young lady, children, policeman, cleaner, students, a common passer-by. yesterday, on my way from the car to my house's front door i was caught up by two boys who have been running after me just to say that the headlights were still on. i found this fact so sweet, the fact that people care about you, even if they don't know. and those pleasant things work like a circle. next time i will want to care about other people, whom i don't even know and the kindness and care will go on and on an on.

childfriendhood

there are people who are as cozy as a home. you hug them and realize that you are at home. to such category of people in my life i want to add four friends of my childhood. one of them, katya, is my first classmate and our friendship will reach twenty years in 2013. my friendship with yakki and zi is one year younger and my friendship with elya is 15 years old, which honestly is a lifetime to me.

the most amazing fact about our friendship is that we are each others reflection. no matter the years, different universities, different countries we live in, we are still those 5 friends who listened to east 17's 'thunder', danced to spice girls, read catcher in the rye and played twister on the picnic in kolomenskoe. who dreamt that in future we would be great businesswomen (at the age of 20, which seemed very old to us), who had a pact 'of never liking boys of each other', which meant the boys that one of us liked, who sent valentine cards to and stole the notebooks of older boys, who hang on telephone lines for 5 hours every evening, who wrote each other big notebooks with all the news from the school, when one of us was sick at home, and who wrote down the summary of the episodes of our favourite series, when the others were on a vacation.


and yes, we are still those five girls, but listen to slightly 'older' music, watch 'older' movies and dance to slightly different songs, but we still write each other cards, tell each other how much we love and are there for each other when those boys hurt us.

my dear katez, yakki, zika and elechka, if you only knew how much i love you!

windows

i love windows.
especially at night: when they are full of light, warmth and families. i got the habit of looking at the windows and imagining the life of people living in them when i was working in diageo. i had a new product test running in samara - a city on volga river - and thus had to spend quite a lot of time in this city. i usually flew to samara on fridays and sometimes stayed there overnight. when after a hard day my colleagues were taking me to the hotel or airport, i was staring at the houses from the car. some of them had red lights in them - and i was sure it was kitchen with round table and granma's pie. we had a red chandelier in the kitchen in my childhood, and since then everytime i see a red window i associate it with warmth of family dinners. some of them had tv blinking, some had a small twinkling light, probably with a child sleeping in there. in winter i often saw fir trees with beautiful lights, colourful stickers on the windows, very often some festive lights. some windows had dark curtains, some of them didn't have curtains at all, but all of them had a great story, which i used to imagine everytime i passed them by.

oh and there was a house in london, which i used to pass by on weekends when i studied there. it was hidden somewhere between the knightsbridge and ennismore gardens, it was white with blue shutters and it had no curtains. everytime i walked by i saw a big sofa with flowers on it which was so cozy. the funny thing is i remember all those houses and windows.

and i'm pretty sure that windows are the face of every city.

right now i would love to find myself in one of the windows from the picture on the left.