In The Desert

If you can cast your mind back to a couple of posts ago you may remember I was in Dubai briefly, where these photos were taken. Whilst in the desert we got caught in a sandstorm. I’ve never seen a sandstorm before and it was incredible. It looked like swirls of red cartoon smoke rising off the dunes, except very heavy smoke that moved more like a cloth in water.

We travelled through the dunes by camel, and later I tried quad bikes. Both were brilliant! I love camels; they’re very intelligent animals who always look like they’re smiling. They are also incredibly well adapted to survive in the desert; they can walk continuously for 18 hours and smell water from over 2km away. I was given this headscarf by our camel guide to stop the sand from destroying my face (sandstorms look cool but are quite painful). Between the headscarf and the fact that my camel seemed equally as taken with me as I was with him, the rest of our group kept joking about me having secret Bedouin roots.

The Bedouin seem a really interesting people despite the fact that the 20th century has seen huge changes to their culture. Traditionally the Bedouin love good deeds and followed a strict code of ethics in which everybody in the tribe needed to learn a craft (women trained alongside men). They are incredibly generous hosts, giving up their most prized possessions in order to be deemed hospitable. Despite the hardships desert life must bring there is something remarkable when you think about people living amongst the dunes, following the stars and trusting your camel to lead you to water.

P.S. If you’re thinking, “I thought she was pro-animal rights? What is she doing riding a camel?” then my thoughts have been previously documented here.

These Streets Are Made For Blogging

 I met up with fellow blog people Bel and Jess all the way back in October, so these have been sitting around for about 6 weeks now! I quite often feel like the old woman of the hills when we all hang out as I’m so old (Bel is actually the same year group as the first class I taught through to A-Level… which is bizarre) but whatever, we have fun!

I’m not actually sure what we were doing in South Kensington as it’s one of my least favourite areas of London; apart from the obvious draw of MUSEUMS it’s mostly just overpriced aesthetics. I have a feeling this is the day my boy was lecturing at the V&A and we were contemplating going… but got too busy drinking hot chocolates…? Or maybe we went solely for the pretty streets…?! I don’t know, it was so long ago! I’ve never blogged about something so far in the past!

 

I do know we went for tapas and then wandered around the residential area (or “pretty blog streets” as Jess described them) with about 20 minutes of sunlight left; talk about forward-planning. I’m wearing an ensemble from my “maybe keep, maybe chuck” pile, (does anybody else have one of these?) so a lot less put-together than the others!

 

After taking photos we went and sat in a cafe for about 2 hours and talked about appearance, the media and confidence issues (or lack of) whilst drafting out future blog posts. I’ve got about two female friends outside of blogging and never read any “female” media apart from a few blogs, so this sort of girl chat is very novel for me! I’ve now got a whole series of posts planned out (thrillingly titled “longer life-ish posts and stuff”) which is entirely based on suggestions from Bel and Jess. Thanks guys!

It’s so great having new blog friends! Please go and check out their blogs, they are both far more consistent and stylish then I’ll ever be. And if you have any suggestions for posts to toss into the mix then let me know!
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Stables Market

When you live in the same place your whole life you start to build long and lengthy relationships with certain places; so it is for me and Camden. It’s one of the areas of London I know best having lived and worked there in the past. These days I’m there at least once a week and I never get bored!

Danilo and I were in Camden for a meeting on this occasion; happily the end of the meeting coincided with our lunch-hour so we used it as an excuse to briefly run round the markets and admire the relatively new Amy Winehouse statue. I’ve not discussed it much before, but I’m a huge, huge Amy Winehouse fan; I think the statue is beautiful and it’s a wonderful way to commemorate her spirit. She really was such a part of the local community and Camden really felt her loss personally when she died. I like that she’s back and watching over all of us there.

My outfit is very standard “Laila”; short skirt, white shoes, colourful shirt, bag (my one bag…) and winter coat. Danilo (who took these photos) and James are always saying how difficult it is to take photos for me as I never shut up and lose interest after about 10 seconds, maybe you can tell..!

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Lower East Side

These photos were taken in a small park down in the Lower East Side. My first stop on the Lower East Side was the Bowery Ballroom, where my beloved Amy had her first ever US show (I share an office with the man who organised it so I know all the details!). Speaking of which, guess which fellow North Londoner might be following in her footsteps this time next year?

realising myself.

These photos were taken in Exmouth Market a couple of weeks ago one lunchtime when the WP team headed out for lunch. It was just before Danilo left for a 3 month trip. I miss him hugely; it’s the worst aspect of my life at the moment which says a lot about my current life state.

Lots of good things are happening to me at the moment. Quizney, an idea I had in March, was successfully mounted last Sunday and attended by a sell-out crowd. I’m touring the USA in July with my own long-neglected songs. I’m going to Egypt, I’m going to Russia, I’m going to Cardiff. I’m writing a show with my creative soul mate. I’m working on a Wikipedia project, a way to say thank you to my favourite website. My favourite magical person returns at the end of this week. We will meet again.

Growing up I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life. Not a clue; no job I wanted to do, no place I wanted to live, no person I wanted to emulate, nothing. I think I just wanted to continue being the same person. I wanted to be able to research the things I was interested in, geek out with the musical theatre I liked, travel, learn, play lots of strange music, write my weird songs, wear my weird clothes, create big stage shows and crazy dances and just generally run around making stuff up. I wanted to do all the things I was already doing but on a bigger scale and without barriers. And that’s what I’ve ended up doing. Call it luck or call it being headstrong or call it grateful or call it arrogant. I wouldn’t change a thing.

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On Miro & Barceloneta

Let’s talk about clothes! Joan Miro was undoubtedly a hugely important artist but to borrow the words of my friend Christina “I understand it enough to know that I don’t understand it.” There are a few certain key topics I took away from the Fundacio Joan Miro (where all the above photos were taken) but ultimately it didn’t spark my imagination in any significant way. What I most appreciated was the level of discipline he had in so many different mediums. A lot of people have written about the cheerful atmosphere created by the abundance of colour, and that’s true enough and I certainly enjoyed his work on that very basic level, but to distill his art to a refrain of “I like the bright colours” does him a disservice, as it would any artist. So instead of discussing him in depth I’m basically showing you my clothes and a few completely out of context sculptures.

These bottom photos are from Barceloneta, the area of Barcelona where we stayed. It was wonderful; we stayed in an apartment and wandered out every morning to pick up breakfast items from the local market. We were about five minutes walk from the beach and even closer to the market square pictured below. There were a lot of small and cheap restaurants near us which were filled with locals and were a lot cheaper than their Ramblas counterparts!

I bought this shirt full price about 2 years ago (one of about 3 full-price things I own) and the extremely boring skirt is a recent purchase from Urban Outfitters. I’m now in my mid-twenties with my own office, PA and business, so I’m vaguely making an effort to ditch the Pokemon print skirts and excessive hair ribbons and go for something more “mature”. Although obviously pairing it with sailor cardigan, vintage rainbow bag and plastic plimsolls takes the maturity level down a bit…

Rehearsals

I absolutely love rehearsals. Orchestral rehearsals, where you can go and sit in a room with 30 other people and forget everything outside the room in order to focus purely on the music in front of you. Band rehearsals, where I know James will be able to translate the inarticulate jumble of notes I can already hear in my own brain. WOLF PACK rehearsals, where not only do I get to air all my ideas about staging and music but I get to do it with a group of people who love and understand me and will therefore keep me in check from becoming a tidal wave of confusion. Theatre rehearsals, where I get to learn so much about another art form that so interests me from people whose knowledge of an audience and communication far surpasses my own. Dress rehearsals, the final pitstop before the event where you can start to anticipate how the whole performance will feel once you’ve added an audience and a ton of adrenaline into the mix.

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I’m lucky that most of the time I’m rehearsing with like-minded people who end up becoming close friends. It makes such a difference to collaborate creatively with people who you know and trust. The saying goes that “life is not a dress rehearsal” but I disagree; you could argue that our whole lives act as a rehearsal for what comes next. We are all constantly learning and progressing: finding out how things work, how things feel, how we react to certain things and how to communicate and present ourselves to the world.

Winter Wonderland

 I don’t like Christmas. There, I said it! It’s strange as I love cheesy tack and pointless schmaltz, but from the age of 7 the only feeling I can remember having towards Christmas is one of resigned boredom. The idea of owning a Christmas jumper in a non-ironic way or eating a mince pie whilst wearing tinsel just makes me want to cringe in a corner for several hours. Add to that the fact that London seems to grind to a halt and you’ve got my least favourite time of year!

However, in an effort to reverse my usual yuletide gloom, I’ve made a list of the most festive experiences I can think of (chestnuts, ice-skating… baubles) and with James on hand to supply childlike enthusiasm and glad tidings, I’m attempting to overcome my inner Scrooge. I donned my snow-queen headdress (actually an untwisted candleholder) and we headed to Winter Wonderland to crank up the merriness. In between cracking up over some of the weirder animatronics and screaming my lungs out on the Ice Mountain roller-coaster, I did genuinely feel a (small) festive glow wandering through the market area and looking at the pretty fairground attractions. The fact that it’s free to walk around the whole place is impressive, and if you’re in London I’d recommend it for a seasonal stroll even if you’re festively-challenged like I am. I’m glad we decided to go on a school day as I imagine it could get pretty rammed once the school holidays are here!

If you have any recommendations for quintessential Christmas activities then let me know and follow here for part 2 soon.

Coat – Urban Outfitters, £60 (sale plus 20% off!). Brogues – James’. Tights – Forever 21, £3, sale. Scarf – Marks & Spencers, gift (years ago). Bear ears bag – Urban Outfitters, £10 (sale). Thing in hair (DIY destroyed candleholder) – charity shop, 50p.