The Donkey and the Gremlin

In three words I think I would characterize my current relationship as being humorous, inspirational and affectionate.

We challenge each other on an intellectual level and will leave no stone unturned when we run into a surprising new fact or notion.

I like to go all the way down the rabbit hole with him when confronted with an oddity. We, take our time with our analyses and make sure we understand each other before moving on (as much as our schedules permit).

Also, in the decade I have spent with him, I don’t think we have ever left any uneasy feelings undisclosed nor left to fester into something big and ugly.

Even though communication is super important for us we don’t necessarily have the same approach to it. I guess that might have to do with our upbringing or just simply with the fact that we are different individuals.

The pushy gremlin

If something sparks my curiosity my mind goes into philosopher-mode. I can stare into blank space (or a crackling fire) for hours, drifting off into a maze of thoughts that might take days or weeks to figure out. Blogging helps. So does talking to fellow maze dwellers.

I like to think I always try to understand a puzzling fact by doing my best to approach it from different points of view. I end up making my own opinion but not before giving every idea I come across a fair chance.

G and I have similar ideas about many things. That awesome fact sometimes actually ends up being the problem.

If I notice he is not agreeing with me on something, I tend to think I just haven’t explained my point correctly. An expression of disagreement or confusion turns into a stimulus for me to introduce more ideas and arguments, as I myself have probably also gone through stages of confusion before forming my final opinion.

But as I push my point further to bring him on board I sometimes end up empty handed. My perception of “giving context” ends up tipping the scale towards domineering behavior, resulting in annoyance on both sides.

The ease with which I sometimes dismiss someone’s ideas without giving it a second thought is disrespectful, I see that. I just haven’t figured out how to keep myself from turning into that pushy gremlin yet.

I still need some more time staring into a fire to untangle that one…

The donkey

Geronimo is a self taught intellectual. All though our ideas are often quite similar, he likes to get his information from different sources than I do, which keeps our conversations interesting.

G’s opinions are no less strong or present than mine. However, he does back down from a discussion in cases where I would not. If he feels there is no point to it he shrugs, puts on a certain (slightly dismissive) face and goes on with his day.

To him a discussion is pointless if the other is not listening well enough (up to his standards) or if he senses the other is not prepared to change their opinion.

Also G is very wary for signs of manipulation (some would say he is oversensitive). When a question of mine turns out to be a cloaked demand, he goes into full donkey mode.

And don’t get me wrong… I adore donkeys…

So yes, I don’t always agree with his judgements on these moments and sometimes feel unfairly shut down. And that in turn is something I find wildly interesting and am still in the process of trying to fully grasp.

Luckily, in the end, we always figure out which wrong turn we took and like I said, no hard feelings are ever left to fester, which is so important.

We celebrated our anniversary last month and I expect to celebrate many more!

Advertisement

Lil heartbreakers

The other day I heard the Jason Mraz included below, called Have it All. In this song he expresses his generous wishes for you.

He lays out a rich banquet of positive scenario’s, varying from managing to “keep the chaos and the clutter off your desk” to being awarded “prizes shining like diamonds”.

It’s a sweet song with a carpe diem attitude (which I actually wrote a blog about once).

The line that got my little brain-wheels going into overdrive is the one he casually throws in there at the beginning of the chorus:

Here’s to the hearts that you’re gonna break
Here’s to the lives that you’re gonna change
Here’s to the infinite possible ways to love you
I want you to have it

Should everyone get the chance to break someone’s heart? Does anyone have that on their bucketlist?

I know cute kids are affectionately referred to as “little heart breakers” sometimes. This is meant to be a compliment. I suppose charming girls and boys can’t always help that people fall in love with them and breaking some hearts along the way is inevitable. More even, it may happen without them ever even knowing about it.

But getting back to the song; Is breaking a heart something you want everyone to experience at least once in a lifetime? Does mr Mraz actually mean to say “I hope someone opens their heart to you and loves you intensely (making heartbreak a possible outcome)”?

When I told my boyfriend, G, about this conundrum, he said something to confuse me even further. He said he didn’t believe that heartbreak could ever be the outcome of love… I asked him to explain it to me again just now and to be honest I still don’t understand it enough to be able to put it into words of my own.

His exact words were:

You are responsible for the condition of your heart. If your heart gets broken this means you have allowed it to be in a position where it could be broken.

I mean… yeah… I guess… but… wait… whut?

So then… we had to talk about what “being broken hearted” or “having your heart broken” really means.

Acoording to G, a broken hearted person is beyond despair. Lost, adrift and beyond reason. Inconsolable.

If I understand correctly, what G was trying to tell me (but I’ll check with him later) is that it has to do with caring for yourself enough to no be reckless with your heart. You can’t truly love someone else if you don’t love yourself first… That sort of thing(?).

I’ve actually never had it happen to me. I’ve been sad, but never heartbroken. I guess I’ve also never been that deeply in love (before my current relationship) and also… well… I was never actually on the receiving end of a breakup…

Did I ever break someone’s heart? Eummm… hard to say… but quite possibly…

Am I glad I got to go through that experience? No, most definitely not.

It was something I learned from though!

Zombie apocalypse

This is Blog 26 in my A-Z Blogseries:
Zombie Apocalypse

Zombies are beings that continue to “be”, despite being dead.

You become a zombie if you get bitten by one, or if you get infected with the zombification virus in some other way or –according to some accounts-, by looking at them.

Zombies supposedly feed on brains.

… And that is all I want to say about that…

This blog is not about zombies.

This blog is about Zeef.

Zeef is my friend.

If grown-ups are still allowed to speak in these terms, I dare say she may even be my best friend.

I know she reads my blog (hai Zeefje!).

She reads it partly because she is interested in my musings, but I think a big part of why she reads it is because she knows it is important to me. That’s Z.

Anytime I find myself facing some odd conundrum, I can’t wait to throw it at her and listen to her beautiful gentle heart and shrewd mind give it a spin.

Her words are always carefully chosen without ever compromising on the message she wants to deliver.

I wish everyone could have a friend like her. As a matter of fact, I wish everybody WAS her, or at the very least had a little version of her on their shoulder to guide them through life.

I tell her this often which she tends to dismiss. She usually does this by pointing out she didn’t go through years of therapy for nothing and that the world doesn’t need more of that…

And that is true. After three decades of life, she has gone through a lot, both physically as mentally.

She is so incredibly receptive that, at times, it hurts her. It’s the fact that others are not so sensitive (and therefore unclear about their own feelings, intentions and actions both to themselves as those around them) that makes living in this world difficult for her sometimes.

All though I think she is one of the best things that ever happened to this planet, her feeling of self-worth is not always on the same level.

So, when a couple of weeks ago she boldly said she was expecting the Z-blog to be about her, my heart made a little leap for joy.

It means she is ready to be put in a tiny (anonymous) spotlight.

It also implies she trusts me enough to bring an ode to her.

Better even, she is ok with the image I have of her and maybe… only maybe… she is starting to believe she is as much of a rockstar as I give her credit for.

With Zeef by my side, I wouldn’t be afraid of the zombie apocalypse. She’d reason a heartbeat back into each and every one of those brain-eaters.

So dearest Z, I’m sorry for not being able to resist the urge to tease you by not naming the blog after you and giving you the impression I had ignored (or forgotten) your request.

I also realize the sudden switch from Zombies to Zeefjes may have caught you off guard. So, take a breath and let your racing heart take it in. You are awesome and I am so grateful that I can call you my friend!

Twitter pup

This is Blog 20 in my A-Z Blogseries:
Twitter pup

The other day, my friend Z asked what I was doing with my T.

It took me a second to figure out what she was asking me.

Was she asking me about the way I pronounce my “t”? My tea? My tee?

She quickly explained that she wanted to know what I was planning to write for the letter T. She was particularly interested to know if I was planning on dedicating the T-blog to the current POTUS, so that she could mentally prepare…

I must admit the letter T was indeed reserved for a blond wavy haired Twitter fanatic. Luckily the twitter-feed I have decided to focus on, only spreads messages that mend the soul (and not… you know… the opposite of that).

Yes, I am talking about Thoughts of Dog.

This twitter account is dedicated to the thoughts, feelings and adventures of a golden retriever.

This dog, who I will referring to as a “he” in spite of not actually knowing if he is male or female, wishes me a gooooob morning on a regular basis.

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

As you can see, he doesn’t entirely understand punctuation. But then again, why would he? He’s a golden retriever!

Another thing they don’t teach at the puppy academy is the human numeral system. He does however enjoy making lists, so he just improvises:

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

One of his greatest passions is monitoring the skittle under the fridge. Sadly I wasn’t able to trace the origins of the skittle or why it needs monitoring. That might actually be the point. Because what is more mysterious than an out-of-reach skittle that just appeared out of no where? I’m thankful he’s keeping an eye on that little bugger on behalf of the world…

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

Besides his beloved humans, the human’s frens and neighbors, my canine guru also has a companion of his own that he shares all his adventures with. It’s his “stuffed fren sebastian”.

For a long time I thought he was a crab… like the Little Mermaid’s conscientious friend Sebastian, you know?

A tweet that I came across recently (but dates back to Dec 2017) taught me Sebastian has floppy ears, so now I don’t really know what Sebastian looks like. But it doesn’t matter, as long as he’s there for this good boy.

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

Sweet as he is, he still feels very much responsible for the security of the household. To keeps everybody safe and secure, he upholds a clear scale of alert levels. A factor that does complicate things is the fact that, like all dogs, he is colorblind…

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

His main purpose in life is however, to give and receive love and joy.

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

I could go on and on forever and never get bored. I could tell you about his philosophical moods and about his love for zooming. I could tell you about his small neighbor human and his car rides.

So there you have it.

I have now let the world know (quite anonymously, but still) that I am not only a big fan of a comic book series written by a grown man in which a child has all sorts of crazy adventures with his stuffed tiger. I am also a huge fan of a twitter feed, written from the point of view of a dog who talks to his stuffed animal, which I now imagine to be crustacean with floppy ears…

And somehow, I still function.

As a matter of fact, escaping from reality is probably the best thing you can do, to maintain your sanity these days!

Crying

This is Blog 3 in my A-Z Blogseries:
Crying

My great aunt passed away last August and my mother still calls me every Sunday (the day they would always chat for hours on the phone) to tell me how much she misses her. I miss her too.

My dear aunt D was a tough cookie who battled cancer like a champ, until there was no more fight left in her.

Needless to say, I cried like a baby at her funeral. All though this is pretty normal behavior for me in funeral-settings it is something people do not expect of me, as I am usually very reserved with my feelings.

As I was one of the people that had volunteered to speak at my aunt’s funeral, I could feel my mother’s slight panic when she saw me go into a full shoulder shaking sob. I felt her (clumsily) trying to comfort me and I heard her whispering a confused “do something!” at my boyfriend.

In hindsight, it was all actually quite funny.

At the time though, it annoyed the hell out of me. I was feeling deep pain for the loss of a wonderfully loving human being. She is gone from this earth and atheist as I am, I do not believe we will ever see each other again.

That shit’s heart breaking!

She deserves my tears and it was a wonderfully appropriate place to do so. One might argue that is precisely what the whole get together was about. She was worthy of the ache in my (hypothetical) soul and if I could do it again, I would cry more, not less.

Last weekend, when visiting my parents my mom put on some music and told me this was a song she wanted to be played at her funeral. We spoke about this for a bit and enjoyed the music.

She then put on a French chanson that, according to her accounts, used to soothe me as a baby.

She then said: “Oh, you might as well play this one as well, so it stops you from crying too hard”.

We laughed, but I was fascinated once more at how uncomfortable my tears apparently make her. I asked her if she would prefer me not to cry when she dies and she said she would consider it an honor…

Isn’t that odd…?

I’m new

On day two of the lyrics challenge, I might as well name the Rules that go with the Three day Lyric challenge:

1. Thank the person who nominated you.
   I actually wasn’t nominated, but felt free to invite myself to the party, as Melanie from Sparks from a Combustible Mind kind of gave me permission to.
2. Share one of your favorite song/lyrics one at a time for three days.
   On day two I will be sharing Stevie Wonder’s song “I’m new”, which should be a mandatory addition to everyone’s lives.
   Yesterday I wrote about the lyrics of two songs, which (imo) could be seen as two sides of the same story.
   Tomorrow’s post will be about Silence, pero en español.
   
3. Nominate three other bloggers each day.
   I will follow in Melanie’s footsteps and skip this rule, partially because I don’t really have a following and partially because I think it’s nicer this way (because it paved the way for me to join in).

So have a listen if you don’t know this Stevie Wonder song already and let the lyrics quench your soul’s thirst like a big glass of freshly squeezed orange juice.

 

Try to envision you as the oldest living someone, being every night and day all alone
Going through ages and ages, places and spaces with never finding that someone to call your own.

Like a treasure chest of dreams long forgotten, hidden for good in a stolen lost and found
But just when fate was calling quits, love appeared in the midst of despair, came and turned your life around

I’m new.

New like the first day of spring
New like a nightingale that’s just learned to sing
I’m new, new like the very start of dawn
Like a child that’s first born with your love.

I’m new.

You’re standing among a crowd of six billion people, crying out for help, but no one understands
‘Cause much to your dismay, you’ve been taken far away to a land where joy is pain and sorrow’s a happy man

Where an aching heart’s the sign of the mighty and a love-filled heart looks down upon with fault and shame
But at the very instant all was through, lady luck appears, says “love can do” and changed you like a Christian who’s been born again

I’m new.

New like the fresh morning dew
New like a work of art that’s finally through
I’m new, new like a first flight of a dove
So safe and secure with your love.

I’m new.

Love took a long time coming to me
But I’ve gotta say I owe my thanks to him for sending you my way.

‘Cause I’m new.

New, like the first winter snow.
Like the start of forever, with infinity to go .

I’m new.

New, like the birth of the sun
Forever young I will be, ’cause with your love;

I’m new

New, like from a restful night of sleep
New like a starving man that’s had food to eat

I’m new, nothing compares nor can compete
Sharing with you the sweetness of your love,

I’m new.

Firing up my soul force

You know how festive days such as mother’s day and valentine’s day always get responses along the lines of “What’s the point of being nice to your mother / lover once a year? It should be done each and every day or not at all.”?

All though a tad cynical, these people are right, in a way. So are the people that say that emphasizing or reinforcing their love on this given day is an important reminder to not take such a beautiful thing for granted.

A national holiday we have in the Netherlands and that I write a blog about almost every year (see here and here) is our World War II remembrance day (4th of May), followed by Liberation Day (5th of May).

All though I have always payed my respects (two minutes of silence at 8PM) and always did my best to celebrate my freedom consciously, I must admit that lately, I feel like the previously mentioned cynics when it comes to remembrance day…

Every year I make an effort to ask my friends and co-workers what they will do when the clock hits 8 PM on the 4th of May. I always try to remind them that it is not just 2 minutes of “having to be quiet” but that these 2 minutes can be used to explore our own thoughts on the current state of the world and honor those who have died for the freedom we now so easily take for granted.

I always feel fired up and ready to act after liberation day. And then… NOTHING. Maybe I write a blog about my white privilege and dive into a couple of Facebook discussions and call my friends out on their inherent racism… But that’s it.

I feel icky just admitting that. I feel useless and I feel hypocritical. If only the world wasn’t collapsing under the weight of all the racism, bigotry and hate mongering, then I could act as if my help wasn’t needed.

But it is, and so is yours.

It seems the Dutch committee for 4th and 5th of May celebrations agrees that we all need a kick up the ass, and therefore decided the theme of this year’s WWII remembrance should be RESISTANCE. Even more, it has been decided it should be the theme of the whole 2018 calendar year…

Museums are adapting their exhibitions to this year’s theme and special education series are being compiled at schools, where WWII veterans and war heroes are stopping by to tell their stories.

I’m not sure if it’s a coincidence, but the Dutch year of resistance happens to coincide with the 20th anniversary of Martin Luther King’s assassination. The exact date of his murder was the 4th of April and on this day last week I watched the movie Selma.

The general story line and historical context were not new to me, as I hope it isn’t for anyone else. The film did however contribute to a better understanding on my side about what resistance entails.

It requires courage. It requires perseverance. It requires not taking “no” (or “wait” or “I can’t” or “It’s too hard”) for an answer. It requires caring more about the cause than your own well being.

As Dr King said in his legendary “I have a dream”-speech (which does not feature in the film, btw):

Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred. We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence. Again and again, we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force.

So yes; SOUL FORCE!! And now that I come to think about it, I actually wrote a blog about it just last week, only in the version of super woman Valarie Kaur. She didn’t call it Soul Force though. She called it revolutionary love.

And then former American president Jimmy Carter showed up at Stephen Colbert’s late show. Such a sweet and wise man; I had no idea! He reminded me of the willpower it takes to love those that seem undeserving of that love but the importance of doing it anyhow.

It seems my generation’s greatest purpose in life is to achieve inner peace or “zen” or a perpetual state of “Netflix & chill”. These are actually all thing I excel at, but I suddenly realize that being relaxed is making me complacent and -oh the horror-, indifferent.

I need to refuel my inner rage and channel it into something productive and less egocentrical.

Pff… I think I’ve even written about this before… What do I do to get out of this cycle?

I need to start planning some field trips.

Goals for the month of May:

• Visit at least one exhibition, museum or lecture that fits the “resistance” theme.
• Make a grumpy looking stranger smile.
• Think of a good present for my bf’s birthday.
• Bake a cake and eat it too, but with friends (especially the undeserving ones?). Or maybe it should be humble pie.

To be continued!

No Golden Cage for Aicha

A fun fact that I learnt recently is that Raï means “opinion”.

One of the legends of the genre is Cheb Khaled, now considered to be the king of Raï music.

Cheb Khaled’s song Aicha rose in the global charts when I was about 12 and it was absolutely love at first listen. I loved this song so much that I even added it to the soundtracks of my life-post I wrote many years ago.

I love the song for its catchy melody and general atmosphere but I think its meaning was kind of lost to me. I may have understood that it was about a lady named Aicha and maybe even that the singer though she was beautiful and desirable. The gifts and praise he was raining down on Aicha, just to earn himself a glance, may have started to make sense as I learned French at school.

But it wasn’t until I really looked into the lyrics, many years later, that I saw that, in the bridge of the song, Aicha herself speaks up and says she will have none of it.

Khaled’s powerful voice never fails to sends chills down my spine when he wails out her only true desire:

Equal rights, respect every day and love!

You tell them, Aicha!

Each time I hear it, I realize how powerful this interlude in the song still is. Love it to bits. I’d name my daughter Aicha, just for those three lines.

 

Surprise! I don’t like surprises.

A couple of weeks ago my boyfriend, G, came home after work and told me he had found out about something really cool that I was going to love and that I needed to ask such-and-such Friday off from work.

I asked him what this cool thing was, where it was, why I would love it, if I needed to take my bathing suit with me or hiking shoes, if we were going by train or bus or bike… and guess what; he just smiled and told me “wait and see”.

So I did… and then completely forgot to ask the Friday off. (In my defence; I did tell him he should remind me again; maybe text me or something…) When we woke up on Saturday morning and I told him I needed to work that day, he looked really disappointed.

I realized I had forgotten to not-work on Friday and even added an extra day to the workweek… Wupps…

And then, on Saturday evening his frown (luckily) turned upside down when he found out the super-special-special-mystery-thingamajig-I-shouldn’t-ask-about-but-would-totally-love would also be available for us on Sunday… which was today…

 

I have to admit, I had the hardest time convincing myself to not tie him to a chair and force more information out of him somehow. Admission number two: I was kind of surprised (and taken aback) by my reaction to all of this… and I think G was too…

After a truly lovely day (that I will tell you more about in a blog later in the week) we got home and twisted comfortably back into our evening routines. I was exhausted though, which had very little to do with the actual physical strain of the day.

So yeah, what the hell, right?

G told me he thought this was an important lesson for me and that he would continue to organize little surprise outings for me every now and then until I learnt to deal with them properly…

My first thought:

Pfff… Thanks for making me feel like a five year old, dude….

And immediately after that:

OMFG, why can’t I just be grateful and trust that he knows and loves me enough to only take me to awesome places?!

He said I surprised him with little thoughtful gifts and gestures all the time and that he wanted to be able to return the favor, which… yah… is a sweet thought (all though I don’t recall being such a tease with anything I ever gave him, but hey…).

I told him I would prefer he would just tell me he was taking me somewhere on the day of the actual outing and not leave me in the dark for a whole week first.
He said that this method was necessary so that I could ask a day off from work.

I told him I didn’t get the point of being so secretive about it. If he would tell me he had found out about a super special place and would describe it then and there, I would be super excited to go with him. Why build the anticipation like that?
He said he wanted it to be special. He felt talking about it beforehand would ruin the magic and might even make it disappointing.

I told him keeping expectations low was actually one of my specialties; keeping my cool while handing over all control to someone else was not.
He said “trust me”.

 

 

But I do trust him.

 

Just not as much as I trust myself.

 

 

I’m working on it.

 

Mind Cleanup – RF16 edition

A year and a half ago, while traveling, I met the most wonderful couple from Denmark. I only spoke to them briefly but you know how it goes, sometimes you just need 5 seconds with someone to know you have a click.

Our friendship was sealed after their visit to my hometown some months later, and now it was our turn to visit them. And besides just being great friends, they also gave our trip a major upgrade by giving my boyfriend and me super-special wristbands, granting us access to some behind-the-scenes action (and above average toilets).

It was an amazing week. Let me talk you through some of it!

Music

First of all, there was the music. It’s worth mentioning that the festival gates may have opened on Saturday, but it wasn’t until Wednesday that the music terrain opened (for the masses) and the big names starred. The first part of the week was primarily camping ground partying (not to be underestimated). There were also some smaller stages and performances in the so called “warm up”-days. The bands named below are some I feel are worth mentioning as most other reviews don’t seem to take them into account.

Warm-up

One of the bands I saw during the warm up days was M.I.L.K. Kind of an akward looking dude with a bit of a seventies look and a chilled out vibe.

Wednesday

• And then, when the gates to the musical grounds opened (and the camping grounds were starting to look and smell increasingly troubling), the first performance to kick the whole spectacle off hit me like a bucket of ice cold water on a hot summer day. It was refreshing and energetic, as well as confronting and slightly uncomfortable. It was filled with love, hope and forgiveness. In all honesty at some point I had to sit down because I was too emotional to stand on my feet any longer.It was the Orchestra of Syrian Musicians, with Damon Albarn.

  It wasn’t so much the songs themselves, but what they stood for that brought me to my knees. Just imagine dedicating your life to music and finally being able to play in a major orchestra in Damascus and then seeing everything around you being destroyed. Many of the musicians fled the country, some stayed. In short, the orchestra fell apart. And even at Roskilde festival, some members could not be present because of visa problems or other complications due to their status as refugees.

  These incredibly strong people, with their very Arabic rhythms and melodies, did not sing of their suffering (as far as I could understand from their comments in between songs). They played and sang with joy and gratitude for being alive and well, inviting the (incredibly white) audience to join in. THEY were welcoming US… It was as much beautiful as it was painful…

 

• My personal highlight of the week was a performance we hadn’t even really planned to go to. It was Pat Thomas and the Kwashibu area band, that lured us in when we walked past their stage (after watching Slayer).

Their connection with the audience was so energetic that the whole tent was pretty much bouncing up and down. They themselves seemed to be surprised by the love they were getting from the crowd, as some of the musicians took out their phones at some point to film what was going on in front of the stage. Pretty bloody awesome.

• Another unexpected surprise was Odesza. All though the duo had already made their appearance in my playlists before the festival, I had absolutely not expected their performance to be as vibrant as it was. It wasn’t just the fact that they were switching back and forth from drum kit to mixing board that made it entertaining, both to the eye as to the ear. It was also the colors and lighting they were using on the very cool cube shaped Apollo stage. It was truly mesmerizing.

Thursday

All though we had had quite wonderful weather during the warm up days (which turned out to be a truly appropriate name) by Thursday, everyone was wearing their rubber boots and fashionable ponchos. Luckily we had managed to find a dry spot when the heavens truly started to pour down on us.

• As it turned out, our place of dry refuge gave us an audio image (we couldn’ t see her, only hear her) of a very entertaining performance by Elle King. She switched effortlessly between country, blues, reggae and pop. And she turns out to be very funny as well!

If you only know her song Ex’s and Oh’s, as I did before hearing her at Roskilde, do check out her other stuff. She rocks.

• Our next show of the day made us feel like uninvited guests at a Norwegian private party at first, but the atmosphere was pretty contagious and the songs turned out to be pretty easy to sing a long to; it was (pardon my French) Kakkmaddafakka. These extremely Northern-European looking guys really made me smile, as they sang “I wanna be a gangsta. An original G. So come on, please give me your money”. I loved how they were being so polite about it, hahaha!

 

• All though I did not stay to watch the whole performance, I was dealt a small slice of “what the fuck”-ness as I walked past Grimes‘ performance. Besides not being particularly good, imho, it had the same weird alien vibe that K-Pop artists have going on these days, only… weirder? Thanks Grimes, you really made me feel old…

Friday

• Luckily Calypso Rose showed up on Friday to save me from that Grimesy feeling. It was the performance we had been looking forward to all week and boy did she deliver! The 76 year old bootyshakin’ queen of calypso knocked my hat off as she sang: I am the daughter of a warrior. No time to rest or retire. Others have come and gone but Calypso Rose is still singing on.

Even after she had left the stage and the lights were switched back on, the audience was still chanting her name. I swear, she must have put a spell on us! Hail Calypso Rose!

Saturday

On the final day of Roskilde Festival 2016 the camping grounds started to empty out pretty quickly. One of the final big performances on the iconic big orange stage was primarily a big feast of recognition for all the Danish visitors, as Dizzy Mizz Lizzy rocked the podium. All though I had never heard of them before, I think they would do very well in the Dutch charts as well. In the video below they play a medley of three of their most popular songs (I think). If you’re into drums and raging guitars, give ’em a go!

Food

Roskilde Festival prides itself in being a non-profit event, providing really cool projects in Denmark and abroad with funds to make the world a better place. Also, their is a strong focus on sustainability and social awareness during the festival itself (all though the enormous amounts of beer and liquor do make it challenging to stay focused on these topics at times). When it comes to the restaurants and food stalls at Roskilde Festival, only proprietors were invited that could demonstrate that at least 80% of their ingredients were of eco-friendly origin. Pretty cool!

My culinary highlights were:

• The most commonly served lemonade :  hyldeblomst, aka elderflower!
• Polish sausages, that didn’t turn out to be Polish
  (the Danish word for sausage is actually pølse, so I have learned)
• Best falafel I’ve ever had
• ginger shots
• Danish pastry

People

I am not quite sure how to sum up all the lovely encounters I had during my week at Roskilde Festival, but it was truly heart warming. I don’t know how the rest of Denmark really is (or how many of the great talks I had with Scandinavian looking peeps may actually have been with Norwegians or Swedes) but from the bottom of my heart I want to thank you for making me feel so welcome. Or as one of the Kakkmaddafakkas said:

Thank you for reminding me what normal is

As my blog only covers a tiny slice of what the festival had to offer, I added some other reviews of the festival below:

• Mutkus.com – From Russia with Love: Snowden addresses Roskilde | 28-06-216
• Huffington Post – Culture Of Kindness | 07/07/2016
• Consequence of Sound – Roskilde 2016 Festival Review | 05/07/2016
• Photographic impression by Mariana Gil | 06/07/2016
• Tuk20s review of RF 16 | 07/07/2016