International Art Fair

This was my first visit to an art fair and I liked it! To be honest I didn't really know what to expect when I signed up.  I just saw the words 'free' and 'international' and found myself signing up for a voucher.  The normal price is £8.  More information here: www.20-21intartfair.com

The fair was divided into areas that were each run by an individual gallery.  So it was a bit like visiting 50 galleries one after another, which was a bit overwhelming.

As we saw a lot of art, I'll split them by country:

1) China

My Daughter by Zhang Xiaogang, a symbolist and surrealist painter.

 Shanghai Girl by Cheung Xiangming

 

Terracotta Warriors by Liu Fenghua and Liu Yong

 Mao 11 by Zuosi Jiang

Church of the Holy Sepulchre

The British Museum currently has on special exhibition a detailed model of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, a church built on the site of what is thought to be the place where Jesus was crucified and buried.

The model was made in Bethlehem in the 17th Century.  There is also some information in the exhibition about what you might call the religious souvenirs industry in Israel.

The Afana brothers from Bethlehem, makers and traders of religious souvenirs.

Seven branches of Christianity share the space of the church: Eastern Orthodox, Armenian Apostolic, Roman Catholic, Greek Orthodox, Coptic Orthodox, Ethiopian Orthodox and Syriac Orthodox.

I was surprised to read that back in 2002 a monk moved his chair from one area to another in the church, which was perceived to be the Coptic area to the Ethiopian area of the church and the reaction of the monks in one of Christianity's most holy sites was to descend into a bit of an orgy of violence involving punches, chairs and even metal bars at the end of which some the monks were so badly injured they required hospital treatment.  In a way, it's quite comforting really to see that people are people no matter where they are or how they are supposed to be acting.

www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2002/julyweb-only/7-29-52.0.html

Thai Tho

Thai Tho is a small chain of 12 restaurants in London who offer Karaoke as well as Thai food.

I went on a Thursday evening and it was very relaxed and quiet in their upstairs area.  I had Pad Thai but my friend's red curry was much tastier.

A quick geography lesson

Microtravelling takes a surprising amount of organisation (well surprising to me, but then I could just be easily surprised).

I have all my outstanding countries in lists by continent but for one reason or another there are 3 that are all by themselves.  So it's finally time to put them where they should be:

- Dominica is in the Caribbean
- Equatorial Guinea is in Africa (as are Guinea and Guinea-Bissau).
- The Seychelles are off the East coast of Africa.

'Popstars' from around Europe

I completely forgot that I have actually visited more of Europe than I realised via the Eurovision preview parties!

In 2008 I saw quite a few acts live at Scala in Kings Cross and my favourites were:

Ruslen Aleho from Belarus singing 'Hasta La Vista'

Sirusho from Armenia singing 'Qele Qele'

Ani Lorak from Ukraine singing 'Shady Lady'

Laka from Bosnia & Hertzegovina singing Pokusaj

Chilean Concrete Chic

El Vergel in Borough - a trendy South American eaterie is doing the whole concrete chic thing as my friend calls it.  It was full of little moppet haired boys and their mums whilst we were there.

It seemed a bit more hipster than Latin American but it was still a nice place to have a late lunch and the decor is great.

 Churrasco queso (traditional Chilean steak sandwich)

Everyone's Climbing Tree

Everyone's Climbing Tree is an inspiring community centre in Alexandra Palace, run principally by one family. They run events for children as well as organising life drawing, drumming workshops, art classes and yoga sessions.

I went along to an African drumming workshop where we learned some simple rhythms on djembe drums. It was a fun and different way to start a Friday evening.

You can find more information about Everyone's Climbing Tree here: http://everyonesclimbingtree.tumblr.com/

Create and Inspire: Youth Hajj exhibition

An exhibition of work by young Saudi artists at the British Museum inspired by the Islamic pilgrimage Hajj.

The artists:
- Tahana Al Bikri
- Nouf Al Himray
- Nahla Khogger
- Salwar Ali
- Basmah Falembam
- Mohammed Ashoor
- Sara Al Abdali

Modern Japanese Art

It's not just the Africa Gallery that exhibits modern art at the British Museum. You can also see some Japanese from the last 50 years.

My favourite pieces:

 Great Tree Binding the World by  Kiyota Yuji

Rainbow Hokusai by Ay-O

 A print from the Astro Boy manga series by Osamu Tezuka

 Eligy for a new recruit: Sentinel by Hamada Chimei

There is also currently an exhibition by manga artist Hoshino Yukinobu.

Back at the British Museum

I'm down to the last 50 or so countries and it's starting to get a bit tricky to find things for some of them so I headed back to the British Museum in the hope I might uncover some new countries there.

I was quite surprised to find that the Americas galleries consist of North America and Mexico only. I think South America could be the continent that I struggle with the most at the end of the journey round the world.

I did have some luck though with a pot from Togo I also saw some work by a Togolese artist at the design festival but some of the artists were in the gallery so I got intimidated and didn't make any notes (artists can be quite intimidating in their own arty way!).

Anyway back to the British Museum for the next few posts...

Pot from Togo( (the top right one according to the sign)

Cloths from Comoros.

Helmet and Shield, made from palm fibre, cane and hide by the Musuyum people from Chad

Lightning Languages

My other project at the moment: Speedy Spanish - a Spanish/English language exchange using speed dating as a format.  Speak as much Spanish and English as possible in 2 hours with lots of native speakers!

More info and sign up for next event here:
www.meetup.com/LightningLanguages

No Lone Zone

No Lone Zone is a miliary term which means an area which is unathorised to enter if you are alone. It is also the name of an exhibition in the Level 2 Gallery at the Tate Modern by the following Latin American artists:

- Cinthia Marcelle from Brazil
- Teresa Margolles from Mexico
- Terecerunquinto, A Mexican collective
- David Zink Yi from Peru

Teresa Morgolles's work ´Score Settling´ takes fragments of glass from drive by shooting sites and use it to create jewellery resembling the style worn by the narcos who organised the murders.

Flag by Teresa Morgolle. For this work the artist took the flag in the centre of the photograph around several sites in Mexico where people had been executed and soaked the material in the blood that was left at the scene.

Russian Dolls

A parade of Russian dolls are peering out the window of this shop in Elephant and Castle shopping centre waiting for someone to buy them.  There´s a childrens TV programme to be made out of this somehow - maybe they run around the empty shopping centre at night and have adventures.

¡ Mucho mejor si es hecho en Ecuador !

The guy working in this South American shop in Elephant and Castle shopping centre was very patient with me practising Spanish with him.  When I told him I wanted to learn more about the kind of products they sold he went round some of the shelves explaining which countries things were from.

 Argentinian tea

Peruvian soft drink

Ecuadorian biscuits

Tiroler Hut

Tiroler Hut is an Austrian restaurant over in Bayswater has been runnning since 1967.

If I had to sum up Tiroler Hut in a few words they would be:

 Wienerschnitzel von schweim

Kassler/smoked port with sauteed potatoes and mild sauerkraut (how it should be in my non-German opinion)

A wide range of live music including (but not limited to) schlager and yodelling music.  The best part of the evening was when one of the guys came over and did a saxophone solo to 'La Vie en Rose' for the birthday girl at the table next to us.  There was also cowbell music scheduled for later that evening, although I didn't stay late enough to see it.

 Kitch! There were lots of photos all over the walls of people who have visited the restaurant in the past, including some celebrities.

I am now a little bit of a fan of very romantic schlager music from the 1970s.  And it's all thanks to the Tiroler Hut that I now have stuff like this on my playlist:

And the whole evening was rounded off by a shot of strong obstler.

Cendol Ice!!

I have been eating out a lot again recently and this evening was no exception.  Rasa Sayang is a restaurant that serves Singaporean and Malaysian food.  I was very excited to see Cendol Ice on their menu.  They very helpfully had a photo otherwise I wouldn't have recognised it as the snack that I had with my Couchsurfing tour guide Hong when I was visiting Georgetown in Malaysia back in 2009.

Nasi Lamak

Cendol Ice

It's a shame that the restaurant has a minimum spend of £6 per person as it's the first place I've been to that serves Teh Tarik.  I did try to make some myself last year but it turned into a bit of a disaster.

Iraqi and Kurdish food on Edgware Road

I tried going to Slemani back in the summer, but when we got there at about 9pm on a Saturday there was quite a queue.  I can now say from experience that you've got a much better chance of getting a table if you go on a Wednesday at 7.30pm.

The food was really tasty and there was a nice, relaxed atmosphere in the restaurant.  Both Slemani and the Queen of Sheba were playing Arabic pop music and had TVs so you could also see the music videos.  I don't currently know that much Arabic pop but I am sure this is something that I can work on :)

 Chicken shawarma

Queen of Sheba

Well after visiting so many different restaurants it was bound to happen at some point that I would end up with a stomach ache after a meal out.  And this was that time.  About an hour and a half after eating at the Queen of Sheba in Paddington I had quite a bit of pain in my stomach.  It could have just been a coincidence though.

Oh well.

It took a long time for the waiters to take our order so at least the food arrived quickly.

Mixed starter

Mandi Laham (lamb)

Yemen's version of Vimto (or you could say Vimto is the UK's version of Shani)

Kaieteur Kitchen

I arrived at Kaieteur Kitchen in Elephant and Castle in a bit of a state: hungry, shivery and generally hungover from way too much partying at Momo's the night before.  So I went up to the Guyanan food stall and stood there generally looking a bit pale and pathetic until the lady behind the counter took pity on me.

She asked me if I wanted a snack or a meal to which I replied 'A meal, I'M SO HUNGRYYYY!' She told me about all the food I could choose from and I decided on chicken curry.  She served a big portion of spinach rice and then showed me and asked if I wanted a bit more.  And then asked if I was sure when I said the portion size looked ok which resulted in a Oliver Twist style moment and a big portion of lunch which perked me right up.

I also bought a coconut bun to take home as a snack.

Medellin Y Su Moda

I have to be honest, a lot of the clothes in Medellin Y Su Moda look to me like the clothes in all the other shops in Elephant and Castle shopping centre.  They also look like a lot of the clothes in the Queensmere shopping centre in Slough.

Just saying....