Sunday, March 02, 2008
A special prize for the weekend!
It's been a while since I 'reported' my weekend activities on my blog... but this one, I feel, deserves special mention... Well, the 'weekend' started on Thursday, somehow...
So, the fact that my internet at home as been forcing me to be a little more social, starting from Thursday night. The connection died on Wednesday night, in fact, but late enough that it didn't really bother me.... and Thursday was a bit nuts, anyhow... Thursday = Class -> Teach -> Teach more -> Moroccan immigrant event -> Jazz concert -> Party -> Home.
The Moroccan immigrant was especially fruitful, as I seem to be getting an idea of what is going to happening for my thesis. Namely, I started thinking about social responsibility, following on from a conversation with Mikko on Wednesday night. And slowly a question has begun to emerge... What does it mean to be the 'original' population? Why does this population have 'rights' over the 'newcomers'... and why should they, if they do? Assuming that everyone, as a person, has equal rights to human dignity and other basic necessities, shouldn't 'integration' be more of a cultural exchange, rather than forced assimilation into majority?
Well, that's the seed of it, anyhow... I'm going to pay their office a visit on Tuesday and see if there is any volunteering I can do for them, like on a Saturday or Sunday morning, for example, like I did for SAIL in Australia.
But now... my favourite part of last week/this weekend: The Heckler and La Bilbaina. The basement of La Bilbaina, where there is live jazz every Thursday, has one of the best sound systems I've ever heard! And the quality of the act... Incredible! It was quite the fusion of different styles, getting together to form what was, simply, great jazz! The man in the neighbouring seat told me that they were all from bands of different styles, except for the Columbian bass cellist, who was, indeed a jazz musician. The saxophone, electric guitar and drum were from different acts. Incredible, I'm going again next Thursday, even if it was 12 Euros... They have a different act every week, so I'm really looking forward to the next one!
The Erasmus party after the concert went by without anything incredible to note....
Friday, however, was quite the night. Ironically I was meant to stay in. Or, well, stay until midnight or so at Marta, Tessa and Stijn's house, and use the internet... but well, a few glasses of wine turned to a few more people over, which in turn led to Tessa, Francois and me not getting home until 8.15 in the morning... (oops.) If it's the thought that count we did TRY to head in the direction of Deusto at around 5 a.m. for an 'early' night....
But it was super nice chilling with the girls the next day, eating pasta, looking at photo, downloading academic texts for my thesis proposal. And ending the day by seeing "The Gift" (a portuguese rock group). Highly recommended!
fon @ 8:51 PM link to post * *