The Week of Cabin Fever: Rain, Photography, and a Little Insanity

With a few key exceptions, the last week has been fairly uneventful: stay at home and write, write, write. Had I had internet at my house, I would have updated earlier and said this just about summed up my life for the last week:

The highlight of my life was when a giant ship went by on the canal outside my window at like 2 in the morning – I got Taryn out of bed to watch it go by with me. These things happen, I guess, when you’re holed up for hours on end and writing long papers.
Honestly though, I’ve never enjoyed the process of writing a paper as much as I have this one. I think it has to do with being 100% passionate about my topic of choice, and also having the freedom of a little creative license with it. Plus Becca keeps me company a lot while I work, and Cinta brings me tea, and I listen to good music, and break up the workdays with episodes of Friday Night Lights and the occasional excursion.

Last Wednesday, Taryn presented her final project as a photo exhibition on the identities of queer people of color. It was held at De Peper, a sort of alternta-hippie squat/bar/co-op, a real artsy place that, complete with awesome lighting, good wine, and delicious vegan sushi, made the perfect environment for her exhibition and discussion of the art afterward.


There was an awesome turnout for it,

including some students from the University of Amsterdam who came because Ruth’s entire sexual studies class got an email from their professor advertising Taryn’s exhibition! I was crazy proud of her.


Over the weekend, I left my house a total of four times: first, on Friday, to bike through insane amounts of rain to chill at Ruth’s dorm with her and Becca. A good time, for sure, and though it took me longer than ever to bike home because the rain was so heavy and the wind so harsh, it was well worth it. This is what I looked like when I got home:


My second time out in the world was to visit the Andy Warhol exhibit at the Stedelijk Museum – a very extensive and generally awesome collection of his work. I have to say, I’m not a huge fan of most of it, particularly the films (eight hours of footage of the Empire State Building at night...really, Andy?), but the biographical stuff was fascinating. And I really loved the “Silver Clouds” installation, an interactive room full of floating mylar pillows pumped full of helium.

My third time out was yesterday morning, to run my first official 10K ever! This was undoubtedly the absolute most exciting part of my weekend, because it felt like such a culminating event of this entire semester that’s been so running-focused. It rained buckets, and I got thoroughly soaked and my poncho-pant-covered legs were coated in mud, but it was a totally invigorating and amazing run – made better by the fact that Cinta, Taryn, and Becca were all there to cheer me on

at the start, the 2K mark, the 8K mark, and the finish! – and I surprised myself by finishing in 53:45...not too shabby for my first race of that distance, I thought :)

Here is a highly unflattering photo of me right before the finish line – I’m posting it only because I think it’s downright hilarious that there are Zwarte Piet in the background...oh, Holland.

And, some better [pirated] photos:


:)

My fourth time out was to see another documentary that’s part of the IDFA – “Shake the Devil Off”, a film about the battle over St. Augustine Parish in Post-Katrina New Orleans...generally a great movie about the racial issues behind Katrina – definitely recommended.

Today, I am putting the finishing touches on my 42-page masterpiece on Dutch women marathoners, and tomorrow, I give a 40-minute presentation on it...very, very exciting!