The Crow Bar Celebrates!

The Crow Bar is celebrating its 4th birthday today, and this was celebrated last night alongside a clutch of rez-days (Gizmo, Blowie, Connie and me!) and St Andrew’s Day.  Lyndy’s choice of music reflected all the themes, one of which was ‘pink’!  (I wonder why?!) and the décor was highly appropriate (dominated by an enormous clump of pink hair .. how Clive could bring himself to prepare this, I just do not know!)

It was lovely to see so many friends from across the world ‘pop in’ and I have captured some of them in pictures and the occasional video clip which survived my many crashes!  I have uploaded pics to Flickr (and I don’t know why it will not embed the slide show, so click here for the link) and the  video to Youtube:

Thank you to Lyndy and Clive for  providing the most comfortable retreat in Second Life, and especially for tolerating me and my pinkness!  I look forward to many more Crow Bar evenings!

Passegitaliano!

PinkSamurai, Karelia, Loris, Gizmo and SilentA converse amongst the flowers

I was delighted to meet with Gizmo Latte, Lluis Pignol and Anna Begonia in RL Barcelona last May. We decided that we wanted to have a regular ‘Italian chat’ on Tuesday evenings as in the good old days of Italianiamo!

We have now had four such evenings, and the following formula seems to be working very well:

ACTIVITY: General chat then an exploration of an environment which stimulates conversation.  Planned to run for an hour.

TEACHING: (1) Bossy teacher who knows about methodology of teachng and learning languages and can ‘lead’ the language (Kareilia / Gizmo)
+ (2) Willing, kind Italian native speakers who turn up on time and are willing to be bossed about by said teachers (e.g. the ever-reliable Loris and SilentA!)
LEARNERS : Anyone who happens to be around at the time and is willing to be directed!

Week 1: Burn2 (collecting tutus!)
Week 2: Burn2 again (balloon tour wearing our tutus + visit to 2 art installations, including a fascinating talk with Xaan/Merlino about their Burn2 build and its inspiration)
Week 3: Edunation Plot and games (Guess who won?!)
Week 4: Dabici’s fantastic Halloween Build.

See Helen’s Flickr streams for photos.

Anyone is welcome to join us … please spread the word .. just turn up on our plot any Tuesday at 9 pm UK time.

Ciao for now!

Happy Birthday, Dear Crow Bar, Happy Birthday 2 You

Chilling at the crow bar

My absolute favourite haunt for music and off-beat, random humour, is C&L’s ‘Crow Bar’. As it gets ready to celebrate its second birthday this evening, I thought I’d write a little tribute post to its owners and regulars, fully expecting to get serious backlash over being such a creepy, goody-goody. This is, after all, the role I assume at the Crow Bar, where my innocent, positive and pink demeanour rather stands out against the backcloth of knowing, cynical and dark humour!

So …

Karelia looks up to Lyndy

Thank you Lyndy .. you are so generous in the time you give to make sure that there is always a welcome for everyone at the bar .. . you have a real gift for witty repartee .. … you are calm and measured in times of stress (like when I didn’t have any music at the start of a party, and you just sorted everything out and instructed me to be calm) .. you are the perfect reliable and trusty ‘listener’ (I cannot help but confide in you!) .. and you continue to accept me, even though I have habits which irritate you intensley .. (like saying ‘sorry’ all the time!). Quite simply the best ‘hostess’ in the whole of SL (and you’ll probably kill me for saying this).

Karelia looks up to Clive (a bit)

Thank you Clive … I’m just amazed that I have survived this long on your friends list, knowing your antipathy for things pink. I used to change my hair or wear a hat, but now I boldy continue to flout my pinkness, and you continue to tolerate me. I was so grateful for all the time you spent sorting out my internet radio and channels, and I love the spinning globe you gave me. May you enjoy many more years and gadgets in SL!

Karelia admires Ooj from a distance

Lyndy and Clive do great DJ-ing, but thanks also to the other regular DJs who produce such great play lists … Shell & Ronni (great, loud sets!) …Oojali (such an enigmatic, distant yet compelling man!) … Doc Bunyip (a real eye opener to folk music) … Kev (such a sweet man!) .. June (a great international mix and a very talented artist) .. and the rest!

And thanks to the regulars who entertain me with their comments .. amongst them, Socrates (the wise good-looking blond who introduced me to the club in the first place and did GREAT DJ-ing at a language event)

Hope, the Queen of Dances

 ..… Hope (who generously shares her dances via the huddles hud!)  …Blowie (my long lost brother .. so proud to be your big sis!) … Bozo (introduced me to some great dances ..) … Fabilène (my style guru and great French friend) … Duke & Ivanava (thanks for giving me a glimpse into the amazing dragon world!) Gia & Eddy, Fawn & Don (thanks for inviting me to your weddings!) …Lophius & Verena (thanks for the German poetry!) Dubble, John, Penfold and Brevis (great to see you at the start of this evening!)

Off to party now … watch this space for a birthday photo!

Karelia looks into Duke

And here are some piccies o fthe LOVELY evening .. we all dressed up beautifully I think!  More photos will be on Flickr soon …

John

Shell & Ronni

Socrates

Karelia (on the left)

Duke as a tree

The Jelly Bean Girls

The Jelly Bean Girls return ...

Happy 3rd Rezzday to us!

MORE PICTURES ON FLICKR! See Carol’s stream and  Helen’s stream.

Reception at Learn4Life

Meditation at Aeonia

Gizmo Latte and I would like to say THANK YOU / GRAZIE / MERCI / VIELEN DANK to friends who joined us on our ‘Island Crawl’ to celebrate our 3rd ‘Rezzday’ on Friday October 29th 2010, whether as fellow travellers, or tolerant hosts!  We passed out a notecard with times and landmarks and we had GREAT company all the way.

Playing at Arcachon

Royally waving at Crossworlds

We were really privileged to be able to showcase Solkide Auer’s wonderful 3D art work which he allowed us to place at the starting point of Learn4Life.  Thanks also to Wlodek, Flopsy and Graham who entertained us with rocket launchers, atom globes, dancing frogs and stilts.  (And thanks especially to Wlodek for the lovely chocolates!)

Bantering at The Crow Bar

We then lost ourselves literally in more of Solkide’s work displayed at Aeonia Arts before moving on to Arcachon, where we climbed the dune and did some paragliding.  I also learnt how to greet people

Chilling at Lunamaruna

in the authentic French way using the object which CathyChou Boa generously gave me for my birthday!  The next stop was Crossworld’s Gallery, lovingly curated by Fabilène Cortes.  We especially enjoyed taking photos

Floating in Costa Rica

Falling in love

of ourselves on the insect exhibits at Lollito’s Parade.  Time for a quick dance and exchange of playful (?) insults  at The Crow Bar (I love the music there, and Lyndy and Clive are great regular hosts!) … then we made for Lunamaruna- (click on the lunamodule) – a magical pink world of giant fish, crooked dwellings and trampolines devised by Scottius Polke.  We skilfully (!) made our way down the river in Costa Rica with two

boats and a paddle before witnessing the touching bonding between Claudio and Dev as they transformed their avatars and embraced!  There were audible gasps of delight at the beauty of the Tree of Trees installation

Breathtaking Tree of Trees

where we just enjoyed ‘chilling’ before we enjoyed Barisone’s welcome and  some more loud music in the warm company of our great friends in Sardinia.  We ended the evening back home in Edunation where we

Dancing in Sardinia

admired again Mary Roussel’s lovely disco build. 

Again .. THANK YOU to all who joined us!  To be honest, it was hardly an ‘Island Crawl’ .. more an ‘Island Race’!  We look

Reflecting on a happy 3 years!

forward to another year of friends and fun at a more moderate pace!

I’ve found my twin!

Imagine my amazement when I discovered two days ago that my best Second Life friend, Gizmo Latte, shares my rezz-day! We have decided to celebrate by visiting some of our favourite places and people on Friday 29th October during the evening. Feel free to IM us to get a notecard with times and landmarks… we’d love you to join us at any time! Watch this space for a report!

I want to go to Sardigna for real!

I am just bursting to tell everyone about the fantastic evening/ early morning I spent in SL’s Sardigna.   I had visited it some time  ago with Italianiamo (thanks Anna Begonia!), and remembered how much I had appreciated the place and the people … and I was even more impressed on my return.  A lovely group of generous, friendly, informative people looked after me .. proudly showing me around the sites and giving me the historical background, taking me on a magical air-borne boat trip around the island, telling me about the 5 different languages spoken there and – most importantly- being extremely patient with my halting Italian!  It was a special treat at the end to be shown the scene of a wedding feast and given and dressed in  a typical costume.  (See the family photo attached!)  Thanks SO much to you all for your time and your friendship! (Gavino Flores – Iceman Kaestner – Mysotis Flores -Blasco Draconia-  Pellegrina Nicoletti – Hilary Skizm – Roby Lenroy -  Ygerne Fenwitch – and many others!)

  I’ll definitely back .. and Helen has said she will definitely visit in real life… she even had the historical atlas out at tea time to understand more. 

The group has its own blog here.  Special thanks to Blasco Draconia for the language help (and incidentally he has created an ironic guide to avatar types on his blog here).

Anyone want a dance?

Karelia discovers her dream

Thanks to some lovely Italian friends who invited me to join them in a beautiful ballet studio last night… Gizmo and Fabilène joined us later too! Here I am practising my newly-bought ‘pas-de-deux’ animation, hoping that some famous, cultured, entertaining person might accept my invitation to dance in honour of his birthday. Who knows? Can I take rejection? Watch this space …!!

Season’s Greetings!

Well, it’s just turned Christmas Day, so I had better let Helen get some sleep!  I have been talking with some really good friends today .. a cool musician who thinks deeply and has interesting contacts and a wonderful shock of blond hair (I’ll check on whether he is willing to be named!) .. René, who teaches me the nuances of the French language (what’s the difference between en fait, et au fait?  well *I* know!!) .. Scottius Polke, an incredibly imaginative artist who has sent me a really fun card … my Italian friends at Grillo in Testa … MilesDavis, whose English is improving daily (just ask him to say ‘hang on  a minute’, and wait to be dead impressed!!) …. Marisolde, who always encourages me to have fun and enjoy the whole sartorial side of this life … Gizmo and Carol who patiently sort out all my techie problems and queries, and gently tell me when it is time to go to pack presents and go to bed .. and just past midnight, I made friends with a new Italian artist who is keen to share with me how she has learnt English entirely through Second Life.  And all this has been done during the time when Helen was meant to be tidying her house ….poor thing .. must be terrible not to have a neat little inventory where you can shove everything when you have visitors!  Anyway, feel free to drop in any time and admire my greetings cards and listen to my radio which I have now tuned to an Italian station.  And do try out the scrambler even if you don’t know any Italian!  You could get the top score and win … an email from me saying congratulations!

Live music from Claudio Rau!

Just had a lovely couple of hours with three enagaging Italians, listening to Claudio’s beautiful guitar playing …. a wide range of music from Elvis to Francis Cutting. Helen failed to impress anyone with her ‘cello playing. Must practise!! She also failed to impress MilesDavis with her Italian (come se dice ‘against all odds’?!!) Must get a good dictionary!! Morevover, she failed to impress MilesDavis with her film knowledge! Must watch more films!! I do hope they all return one day despite her failures as I so enjoyed their company! Soon was very forgiving and kind! At least Helen knew the names of the seven dwarves .. though I was extremely impressed that Claudio knew them in both Italian and French. These things are important.

October’s resolution

I’m determined to use this blog more to make quick notes about what I get up to .. I’ve been learning so much recently! To remind myself what  I’m going to blog about, here’s a list (and in no particular order) – Burning Life – my new hair style – changing the colour of objects I buy – installing an internet radio on the plot – being politically and ideologically stretched by Italians and French – seeing amazing works of art and meeting an extremely talented, cloaked Italian artist  - visiting a magnificent, romantic sim – thoroughly enjoying Italianiamo – introducing butterflies and a variety of static but intelligent birds onto the plot – wearing high heeled boots (and the consequences of doing this) – changing clothes and avatars without getting embarrassed – using camera controls more effectively – dancing to a wide range of music at a very special bar where my resilience and sense of self esteem have been sorely tested by a special group of people (don’t worry, I won’t let on who or where you are!!)  

Karelia shows off toned-down hair colour!

 - having – having my heart in my mouth as I watched one of my best friends undergoing various transformations (but I think she pulled through!) …better stop there for now!  I’m really looking forward to meeting Helen’s friends at the London Language Show on Saturday and Sunday.  I hope she can persuade you to come to my world to meet me and my friends!