Half-Locked Journal!

- I´ve got a new resolution for the year to come. I´ll make the non-personal entries open to new potential friends for them to get the idea of my blog and of who I am. From January 2010, my blog is going to be 50% public and 50% friends-only. I´ve been blogging since 2005 and all of the entries (the personal or non-personal entries) since then are locked. So, if you´d like to read the old entries, you´ll have to add me and be added in order to read them.

- I´ve decided to lock my entries cause I´d like to have a closer amity with my LJ friends. I don´t have of so much spare time, but the little time I´ve got to check my LJ is going to be more useful. I want to be able to read most of my friends entries and of course, be also able to comment more often. 

- If you want to be added, please first comment here why you would like to be added or what we´ve got in common (likes, dislikes or something like that).

- I´ve got the right to not add you back if I feel like to. I´ll just add the journal that in the end, I´d read the entries and also want the person as a friend.

- I won´t add you back if I just notice that you added me without leaving a few words in here.

Credits

The Banner is by visionsbeyond 

  

I can hardly wait for January to be over. I hate January to be honest. It started good though, in cold Stockholm, where I was in the middle of the street wearing a mini-dress and waiting to get into the club to celebrate New Year´s Eve. That trip to Stockholm was priceless, but as good things also come to end, I had to come to Germany. January is a month that reminds us students to start to get ready for the upcoming exams in the end of the month. Some will write exams till the middle of February, but I´ll be over with them by the first week of February. Most likely February will be my favourite month of the year. I cannot imagine a better time for me to spread my wings and fly, and I´ll literally fly. I got tickets to go to New York, and from New York, I´ll be going home in Brazil. I´m very excited to go to NY, but even more to go home. It should be the other way around, taking into account I spent my first 22 years in Brazil and was praying to get out of there. Now all I want is the feeling to be back home again, where I´ll play with my cats, feel the sun on my skin and have coconut water for breakfast. It´s as they say: there´s no place like home. Sometimes I feel as if I didn´t have home, cause I love to travel so much, and cannot myself living in a place for an undetermined period. I think, that what makes Tübingen so especial to me. I know, it´s home, but just for the present time. One day I´ll move out and explore a new place. Hopefully it won´t be any of the places where I already lived. It´s going to be a new place to discover and call for the time while I´m there, my little home. 

Coming back to the New York subject, I actually cannot believe I managed to go there. It wasn´t at all planned and I didn´tknow I was going there till I bought the tickets in the end of December. It all started after a friend told me about an open-jaw ticket from opodo. Randomly he showed me the ticket and on the next day I decided to buy it. I didn´t even think so much about it. My first plan was to travel a little bit in South-America and I was checking how to go by bus from Sao Paulo, to Argentina and Chile. My plan was pretty much to go to some places there and also come back by bus. Another possibility was to spend Carnival in Rio, but hostels were so expensive, that I decided to give a chance to NY. I´ve already booked a hostel in Brooklyn through hostelworld, as I always do, and I hope to make lots of new friends while I´m there. It´s going to be my very first trip all by myself. Totally lost in a new continent, in the concrete jungle, where dream are made of. I´m fantasizing about this trip when I go to bed and during the day. I´m not going to plan every single step, but of course, I´ve written down some things I want to do and see. I´ve got some nice apps on my iPhone, that will help me to get around in the city and I plan to get in touch with the locals through couchsurfing. 

I get myself thinking how much I´m already used to Europe. It´s definitely going to be a new experience to me, but my good Brazilian friend, who grew up in US and now lives in Germany, tells me that Americans are something between Brazilians and Germans, when it comes to kindness and personality. They´re neither so outgoing like Brazilians, but neither so cold as Germans. I kind of like this description, of something in between. I don´t think NY can surprise me that much, cause I already come from a big city, and taking into account that I´m totally relaxed about the whole thing, it cannot be such a big deal. It´s just like the day I left family, friends and home behind to come to Germany. I love this feeling of not knowing what to expect and what´s going to happen. The first hours in a new place is always like open your mind to a new world. I particularly like more the time when I need to depart, cause I´m already feeling totally as if I belonged there somehow. It´s always the same when I travel. You feel as if you were leaving some part of you behind, you don´t want to leave in the end cause you don´t know when you´re coming back, and if you´re coming back. You feel as home had become a place where you cannot be anymore, as if it had become smaller. But it´s just the world that became smaller. You fall in love and is obligated to get unattached so easily. I´ve been leaving pieces of my heart, each time I go somewhere. In February I´ll need a big heart cause Munich, NY, SP and Rio are going to show me how big and small the world is at the same time. I´ll learn so much and experience what I never thought I could. It´s going to be a defining month in 2012 and in my life. So, February...bring it on. I´m ready for you. 

I like when I get surprised by a film or an actor. It´s been exactly ten years since the first movie I saw with Ryan Gosling. I don´t remember if I rented a VCR tape  or if it passed on TV, but I remember I didn´t find him so attractive, but I thought and still think it was his best performance ever. I remember thinking he was going to win an Oscar someday and was going to continue to do good movies, and my prediction come true. Year after year, I´ve been following what he´s been doing on the big screen and he never let me down. He´s probably on my top list of favourite actors. You know, it´s a hard job to choose between all of them James Franco, Jake Gyllenhaal and Heath Ledger. 

It was a accident how I came to see "Drive" in the cinema. It was January 1st and I was all by myself in Stockholm. The girls didn´t want to go out with me, and neither did I want to spend the day in bed. So, I was having one of those nice drinks you get at a coffee shop and surfing on my iphone when the idea to go to the cinema crossed my mind. It was like 3 pm, already dark and raining. Everything was closed and I don´t like to go sightseeing under rain. A good friend of mine recommended me a cinema in Stockholm and that´s what I did. It was the best choice. The cinema was incredible! Really gorgeous. At first sight, I wanted to see "The girl with the Dragon Tattoo", but I´d have to wait like 2 hours in order see the movie. "Drive" was the only option left and I couldn´t be more thankful. I had seen the trailer and wasn´t so excited to go see it, but it blew me away!!! I thought the movie to be a bit too violet, but it had some film-noir aspect going on, besides of a beautiful love-story to make everything softer.  I didn´t like the soundtrack right away, but I downloaded it and now I love it, but the film would be nothing without Ryan´s fearless performance. Ryan is the kind of actor that can act, express whatever he wants, just by looking at the camera. He´s so subtle, and yet so direct. In this movie particularly, Ryan almost doesn´t talk, his acting is done through his eyes. I found him particularly more beautiful in the movie than in any other. I don´t like his appearance and six-pack in "Crazy,Stupid,Love". I prefer the normal Ryan, exactly because of his normal look. He hasn´t got that stunning beauty like Jake Gyllenhaal for instance, nor Ryan Reynolds body, but I love him more for what he can do on the screen. He´s always changing, picking up independent projects, reinventing himself. Ryan is the greatest. He was since "The Believer" and keeps showing it. He starred two of my favourite movies in 2011. "Drive" and "Idles of March"...it couldn´t get better. 

“Te amo sin saber como, ni cuando, ni de donde. te amo directamente sin problemas ni orgullo: asi te amo porque no se amar de otra manera, sino asi de este modo en que no soy ni eres...”
― Pablo Neruda

Konzept: Das Konzept meines Artikels ist, wie international Tübingen sein kann. Die internationalen Studenten bringen die Stadt nach vorne, wenn man an Integration denkt, und die Deutschen scheinen diesen neuen Zustand zu befürworten.Weil die internationalen Studenten große Verantwortung an dieser Integration haben, würde ich gerne die Meinungen von verschiedenen Studenten (Deutsche und Ausländer) hören, um herauszufinden, wie sie miteinander umgehen und ob sie denken, dass die Integration leichter ist, weil Tübingen eine offene Stadt ist und so viele internationale Studenten hat. Natürlich gehört auch dazu wie sie sich in Tübingen anpassen, dazugehören und wie sie sich in Tübingen fühlen. 
 
Titel: „Der Melting Pot“ ist genau vor unseren Augen, in der kleinen Universitätstadt Tübingen.
 
Vorspann: Tübingen ist die genaue Vorstellung, die jeder hat von einer typisch deutschen Stadt. Sie presentiert alles was man im Kopf hat, wenn man an Deutschland denkt:  mittelalterliche Häuser, die berühmten schwäbischen Spätzle und die faszininierenden Studentenverbindungen, aber in diesem Umwelt ist es, wo die so genannte Integration, über die so oft in Deutschland gesprochen wird, stattfindet. Der Multikulturalismus macht aus Tübingen eine kleine kosmopolitsche Stadt in der Mitte von Schwaben.
 
Es hängt nicht von der Uhrzeit her, oder in welche Richtung man in Tübingen fährt. Man muss einfach nur ein paar Meter in der Stadt laufen zu merken, dass ­­Tübingen gleichtzeitig anders und aber auch nicht ganz im Vergleich zu anderen typischen deutschen Städte ist. Einerseits hat Tübingen alles anzubieten, was man von einer typisch deutschen Stadt erwartet. Die Architektur vom Fachwerkhaus, der starke Schwäbische Akzent und Käsespätzle, die so berühmt sind, machen von Tübingen ein gutes Beispiel für Stadt, die man sich als typische deutsch vorstellt. Tübingen hat 3.224 ausländische Studenten, die eingeschrieben sind und jedes Semester bekommt die Stadt Tausende von neuen junge Leute, die zusammen mit ihre Erwartungen und Vorstellungen, die Koffer voll von Stereotypen nach Deutschland ankommen.
 
Neville Smith, 21 aus Australien wollte schon seit am Anfang die Möglichkeit benutzen um sich mit den Deutschen zu integrieren. Deshalb wohnt er in einer Studentenverbindung, wo er dann nur Kontakt mit Deutschen hat. Gleichzeitig gibt es Kurse, wie den Startkurs (ein Vorbereitungskurs für Austausch-und Erasmus-Studierende), der jedes Semester den internationalen Studenten bei den ersten Schritten hilft. Obwohl die meisten von den Studenten, wie Neville sind, die sich sehr gerne integrieren wollen und gute Freundschaft mit den deutschen Studenten schließen, ist es nicht jeder, der zurück nach Hause geht, und denkt dass er erfolgreich dabei war.
 
Die Tübinge Universität hat einen sehr gute Ruf und Partnerschaft mit verschiedenen Universitäten in der ganzen Welt, aber trotzdem was man in der Mensa oder in den Vorlesung Hörsaal sieht, ist etwas ganz anderes. Der Sogenannte „Melting Pot“ kann deutlich in der Mensa gesehen werden, genau da werden die Studenten sich unter einander unternehmen. Obwohl Kartoffel und Maultauschen angeboten werden, wird die kulturelle Integration da lebendig.  
Es scheint als ob sich langsam das Deutsche Szenario ändert. Mit den internationalen Studenten, neue Verbindungen sind geschaffen, die vielleicht für immer da sein werden. Wenn ein ausländischer Student sich entscheidet nach Deutschland zu kommen, hat er schon eine gute Vorstellung von dem Land, aber die meisten sind begeistert davon, wie man sich wohl hier fühlen kann. Hélida Melo, eine Brasilianerin, die Au-Pair in Konstanz gemacht hat, auch eine Universitätstadt wie Tübingen und heutzutage in Köln wohnt, sagt dass sie nie eine schlechte Erfahrung gehabt hat, und obwohl Deutschland nicht die schönen Strände und das tolle Wetter wie aus ihrer Heimatstadt Rio hat, hat Deutschland sie nicht enttäuscht und anderseits viel mehr angeboten wie Arbeitsmöglichkeiten und kostenlosen Elite-Universitäten .
 
Wenn man auf der Straße läuft, merkt man gar nichts, dass Deutschland vor 60 Jahren eine totale andere Situation erlebt hat, wo das Ziel war, nur eine Rasse zu schaffen. Nicht nur Hitler hat den Krieg verloren, seine Vorstellung klingt heute unvorstellbar. Deutschland präsentiert sich als ein offenes Land, viel mehr als man denkt. Viele von den Studenten bleiben noch im Kontakt mit dem Land, wenn sie in ihre Heimatländer zurück gehen. Es kann durch die Sprache, oder die Arbeit, aber das Land profitiert genauso wenn es seine Türen für die anderen öffnet.
 
Tübingen ist das beste Beispiel in Deutschland zu zeigen was das Land heute erlebt. Leider kann man nicht die Integration mit dem Multiculturalism in der U.S.A oder Brasilien vergleichen, aber Deutschland ist seit dem 60er auf den Weg zu einer „Melting Pot“ Nation, wo man mit Sicherheit eine gute Ausbildung, gute Arbeitsmöglichkeiten und warum nicht, ganz viele verschiedenen Farben und Kulturen auf der Straßen finden kann. Vorstellungen gehören zu Erwartungen und Träume. Jeder Student lasst sich beeinflusst von was man über Deutschland im Fernsehen hört oder in der Zeitungen liest. Trotzdem jede Ecke der Welt hat ein Platzt in Tübingen. Die Stadt bietet nicht nur Schwäbisches Essen, sonder auch Afrikanische, Arabische und Spanische Stimmung . Verschiedenen Sprachen sind auf der Straße gehört und obwohl im Winter echt kalt ist, bringen die Afrikaner, Südamerikaner und Australier die Sonne mit nach Tübingen. Es kann schon schwer sein für die ausländischen Studenten die Sprache zu lernen und sich an das System der Universität anzupassen, aber eine gute Ausbildung, wie die Dozentin, oder die meinsten Einwohnen in Tübingen haben, hat es schon beweist, dass kein Zufall ist, dass man offener für Ausländer ist, deswegen profitieren beiden Seiten dieser großen „Melting Pot“.
 

It´s official, another page in my story has been written and turned. Like seasons change, people also change and seem to forget what they had said, making me realize how inconstant life is. Now comes the time when after the dissolution, you try to adjust yourself to the new situation, and in my case, it means trying first of all to believe all of this is actually happening. It all seems like in a nightmare, or a story I´m listening to, but which doesn´t seem to be mine. All the pain, the indignation and anger will give place to comprehension, I hope at least. I don ´t think I´ll ever understand him, or the situation or his reasons, but I hope one day I can look back and realize the dots connected down the road, like Steve Jobs once said. I hope I can get over all of this as soon as possible, cause the pain is something indescribable. The pain is not on your body, you can be talktive, and laughing out loud, but even though, it seems it´s not going away. It hurts inside, as nothing in the world could improve it. Did this guy or this story shape my life? Did I learn something with it? Do I need to change in order to get less hurt next time? Seasons change, as well as people do, but one thing is quite impossible to change. I am me. I´m a hopeless romantic, who even though knows for sure, out there someone is waiting to be found. Perhaps it won´t turn down to be perfect, romantic and what I expected, but connections happen every day, every minute. I was thinking early this morning how bizarre the concept that one person has the key to your heart is. I get to know interesting people and the world presents us new opportunities every day. How can it be that one single person among so many is the one? I guess that´s it. I´m the especial person after all, and all of the rest of people in the world are out there to help me on the way, but not necessarily to save me. After all, wouldn´t it be better if I had the credits for having saved myself? So, I know it´s difficult to understand now, and perhaps I never will, but my friends told me so, and I want to believe in them. Perhaps we need to go through dark times, in order to see the ones that really stand by your side. I can say I´m truly blessed for having the best people around me, who care for me and know I´m capable of going through this phase by myself. So, even if I don´t believe I´m strong enough to go on, I´ll do it for them, for the confidence they had on me. 

I´m still trying to fig it out what to do with this feeling that burns inside. First, we try to understand what it is, then we try to explain and describe it, but in my case, there´s no way I can understand what is going on inside of me. It feels good to be in love again, but of course along with this new exciting feeling, the problems come to remind me of how good it was to have one-night stand and not get attached. Now it´s too late. I´m totally in love with a beautiful boy, who at the same time is complicated as a good German boy always is. I wonder if I´m compatible with Germans, and although my emotional side say I am not, what can I do if I´m not able to choose with whom I fall in love. To fall in love is an easy thing for me. I´m falling in love with guys in the bus, each five-minutes of my day, but all of sudden there´s that person, who stands out from the majority and captures your heart, in a way the others didn´t. I wish he could think less about us, love and the situation, but I´m to be blamed to have pushed him to define what we had. What can I do? Who is going to blame me for being in love and doing stupid things while being under the influence of crazy hormones? I just know it was beautiful, like in the most romantic film you ever saw. It was so intense that it knocked me down to the point of feeling on drugs. It made me feel as if I was capable of anything. And feeling like a superwoman made me do the stupidity of saying: "I´m in love with you". Now it´s the rational and cold me talking to you, the emotional and hopeless-romantic me doesn´t regret anything and is even proud to say she said it first, without expecting him to say the same. He got everything backwards and the situation got out of our hands. In the end, I just wanted him to know I wasn´t trying to push him into something he didn´t want to have, but I wanted to play fair with my heart and just express my love as if that was going to be my last day on earth. Actually, that´s the thought that crossed my mind before I had my verbal romantic diarrhea, what if there´s no tomorrow? I didn´t want to leave this world without saying to whoever it was, that held the key to my heart, that I was pleased I was in love again, after such a painful break-up, that almost ruined my whole perspective on love. I stopped trying to understand him, me, the situation or what we had. All I want is to have him back, his hugs and his presence in my life. I´m willing to shut my mouth up and swallow my pride, I´m willing to show my weak side and let love rule (or stupidity if you´re not such a romantic as I am). I wasn´t playing any role, any love game or pretending to be who I am not. Even not playing any games, I lost, but I hope he gives me the chance for us to have a second try. What we had was so precious to me, that I cannot let it go. I don´t want to actually.  

October is a dividing month, it is when university starts, when the leafs start to fall and the temperature cools down. I hate and love this time of the year. I like the different colours and shades of yellow and orange that Autumn brings, but I also hate that summer is gone and soon winter is coming to steal the charm of the sun. This October is more messy than any other time of this year. I´m totally lost when it comes to university life and my private life is going the same way. I like that even now, when everything is falling apart, I don´t loose the hope of better days to come. I laugh with myself walking on the street and seeing how gorgeous Tübingen looks. I laugh cause even though things can go wrong, but my friends still manage to make me laugh over the phone. I don´t even get angry with life or with whatever is that plays a part in our destiny. I know it was all of my fault, and the problems I´ve got now are results of my lack of perspective and patience. I wish I was more patient, but I´m not and never will be, so all I can do is try better and harder the next time. I´ve been learning so much in the past months, but all in all whenever life gets boring or challenging, I get to miss home. It´s the time when just Brazil can solve my problems. It´s the time when I need to sit down in the sand, listening to the see and experience the most wonderful sunset ever. It´s the time to come back home. I don´t know if things can be solved, where my problems will lead me and what´s going to happen, but I know for sure February and March are going to save me. Remember when we were children and couldn´t understand why grown-ups complicate things so much? Well, now it´s the time when I DO understand how we can complicate things that are not to so complicated, but even though I cannot complicate less *lol*. Why can´t we be with whom we want? Why does love have to come in a simpler form? In times like this, I always remember that Coldplay song that says: "nobody said it was easy", and even though I won´t allow life to bring me down. The sun is shining outside, perhaps predicting best days to come. The following pictures put me in a better mood, knowing that it´s not everybody who is lucky to really see the colours Autums presents us. 

Small notes:

* I´ve been to the "Cine Espanol" and saw "La piel que habito", the latest Almodóvar film. Again lots of drama, colours, tears and sex. I loved it! Now there´s the "French Festival" going on in Tübingen and for sure I´m going see a movie. 
* I take my mug with me every morning to university, but not with tea anmore, but white chocolate cappucino. Yes, I´ve started to drink coffee, cannot believe it, but with a lot of sweetener coffee becomes even drinkable. 
*Halloween was celebrated at a student dormitory with some friends. We don´t dress up like in U.S., but it was fun even though. 

Into the pictures:



( Read more... )