Irina draws Bulgaria

The end of me asking Europeans to 'draw-your-country' is inching ever closer. Only 15 countries remain and, although they're elusive, I'm as keen as ever.

Excitingly, at a party this weekend, I met two Bulgarians, Elena and Irina. I asked Irina, an architect, to draw Bulgaria.

Irina, who has lived in London for thirteen years, thought it could be difficult to draw as the borders had often changed.


By coincidence, she had been having a conversation about maps with a map-maker just before I asked her to draw. This, she said, was probably the first map of Bulgaria she's drawn since school. Amazing!

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So now, I've 15 countries left to find, and I'm getting a bit more proactive. So if you know someone from any of the these places, let me know: Albania, Andorra, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Cyprus, Czech Republic , Latvia, Luxembourg, Macedonia, Malta, Moldova, Monaco, Montenegro, San Marino, Slovakia, Turkey.

A Trip to Tallinn

I recently went to Tallinn, capital of Estonia, for a weekend. This year, Tallinn, along with Turku in Finland, is European Capital of Culture.

So I went there to see lovely medieval streets and cultural what-nots. Here's what I saw...

• Cute, winding old streets and soaring spires on churches, towers and the city walls.
  
  
• The first thing I saw as I wandered down the street was a display of old maps of Tallinn through time. Amazing!
  
  
• The streets were alive with the sound of music. Singing has a politically and culturally significant in Estonia (they had a singing revolution) so street corners had stages and impromptu choir gatherings.
  
  
• To that end, I also heard Eric Saade's Popular played 7 times in the one night. Now, that's popular.
  
  
• A dank pedestrian tunnel turned into an art gallery.
  
  
• An old lady who was very proud of herself for wearing blue, black and white (the colours of the Estonian flag.)
  
  
• A international parade of nations during a medieval jousting display, with by Koreans, Japanese and Georgians (amongst others) living in Estonia.
  
  
• My favourite sight was the town's old pharmacy, which is the world's oldest continuously-running pharmacy. Displays showed lotions and potions from the past few centuries, including sun-bleached dog faeces, parched bees and dried toads.

One to One Hundred

There's a group on flickr called The Design Disease. I'm a member. The name's not the most pleasant, but it refers to how design runs through your veins.

On the group founder's blog, he gives an idea about taking photos of numbers from 1 to 100. That was enough to give me an idea, so I set about finding numbers.

It's taken about 4 years, off and on, but here we are.

Norway by Isaak, Belarus by Natalia

I've had a map of Norway in my 'drawing Europe's countries' project for a few years. But I'm not quite sure that it's Norway (it could be an upside down Finland...). This is it:

So, in Norway, I decided to ask someone to draw another map. Isak - who works in a theatre - drew a map of Norway - very accurately - pointing out Tromso, Kirkenes and Oslo, the place where all the money is.

Recently, out of the blue, through the postcrossing site, I received a postcard from Natalia in Minsk on which she'd drawn a map of Belarus.

This was fantastic. I'm not sure whether I'd ever meet someone from Belarus so I'm very pleased that Natalia sent me her map, which shows Belarus' biggest cities and towns.

Experimental travel

I've had The Lonely Planet Guide to Experimental Travel on my bookshelf for about 7 years. It's one of those books you read with lots of things to do, but that you never actually get around to doing.

Well, no more. I took it from the shelf, perused it and found the following ideas which I'm going to  try out in London.

A-Z TRAVEL

• Choose a town to visit from A to Z. Find the first road beginning with A and the last beginning with Z, and draw a line between the two. Walk the length of this line and discover the city alphabetically.

ALTERNATING TRAVEL

• Leave your home. Take the first road on the right, then the next on the left, then the next on the right, then the next on the left, etc. Carry on until something blocks your path and you can't carry on.

CHANCE TRAVEL

• Insert the name of your home town into the index of a world atlas (if it's not there already). Throw a dice then count that number of lines down from your town. The one your finger lands on is the destination of your trip.
  
• So for example if you live in Melbourne, Australia:

• One will take you to Melbourne, USA
• Two will take you to Mele, Cap, Italy
• Three will take you to Melekess, Russian Federation
• Four will take you to Melenki, Russian Federation
• Five will take you to Mélèzes, Rivière aux, Canada
• Six will take you to Melfi, Chad

END OF THE LINE TRAVEL

• Take a bus, tube or train out of a city and travel until the end of the line. Find accommodation to stay the night and explore the suburb that you find yourself in.

EXPEDITON TO K2

• Explore the area on a town plan or map that sits in the square marked K2. Take full advantage of all cultural attractions, gastronomic delights and watering holes in that area.

BARMAN'S KNOCK

• Go to your favourite pub and order your favourite drink. Ask the barperson where their favourite pub is and what they drink there. Go there and order their recommended drink, and then repeat the exercise with whoever serves you, and so on. 

SYNCHRONISED TRAVEL

• Travel a synchronised path with your friends and discover whether parallel lines ever meet.
• Participants travel around a chosen location using a 10-stage set of common directions, taking notes and photographs to record their experiences at each stage. Where directions don't match the environs, improvise.
  
• The first stage is your starting point.
• Walk in any direction for 50 to 100 paces, and then turn 180 degrees.
• Continue walking in that direction until you see something blue.
• Make a left turn and walk 50 to 70 paces.
• Walk in any direction until you see something that either is or looks like the number 7 or 11.
• Take the first left, and continue walking until you find somewhere to sit.
• Choose any direction and walk for 25 to 50 paces.
• Continue walking until you see an unusual colour, shape or texture. Turn 180 degrees.
• Keep walking in any direction until you see an archway or an unusual architectural feature.
• Head for home, but continue looking for something that catches your eye. 

TAKING A LINE FOR A WALK

• Create an itinerary by drawing on a map.
• Using a pencil or GPS, super-impose a drawing on a map, which will then form your itinerary.

There are lots more ideas on the Lonely Planet's Experimental Travel page.

In fact, the book was so good, I was inspired to make my own experiment:

ALPHABET SOUP

• Each person writes a letter on a sheet. These are organised to create name of place (or nearest place in index). Go there.

So, I'm going to try out some of these in London (and maybe elsewhere!). I'll let you know how I get on.

Nordkapp - Europe's most northern point

I've just spent a week or so in Norway. I had decided to go all the way to the top, to Nordkapp. That's considered to be Norway's most northerly point and also Europe's northernmost point (sort of... everyone seems to just plain ignore the fact that there are other headlands further north).

Sadly, I didn't quite make it. I got 34 kms away, a small village called Honningsvåg. The road further north was closed because of strong winds. So I went as far north as possible.

I took great comfort in an exhibit in the town's museum which noted that, in 1905, Queen Maud of Norway didn't make it either. Bad weather also stopped her journey northwards.

So instead of photographs of the real thing, here are a few arty views from the Nordkapp Museum.

The real Nordkapp may have looked like these - lots of icy, snowy mountains in the north of Norway, taken during my two 17-hour  trips on the Norwegian ferry Hurtigruten.

By happy coincidence, in February, when I travelled from Gibraltar to Seville, I passed through Tarifa, mainland Europe's most southern point. It's fair to say, it was warmer.

I've also been to mainland Europe's most westerly point, but the most eastern may elude me (because there is no exact location), but I'll console myself with the staggering fact that Honningsvåg is further east than Athens, Belgrade, Riga and Tallinn. Wow.

Name the Olympic neighbourhoods

I like placenames, and I particularly like knowing why somewhere is named how it is named. I like that Argentina is named after silver, that Pakistan is an acronym and that Elephant & Castle has lots of stories to its name.

So I was excited to discover that the London 2012 Olympic Park Legacy Company have launched a competition to name the five Olympic neighbourhoods which remain once the games have ended.

They are inviting the public to suggesting names for the five new neighbourhoods in Tower Hamlets, Hackey and Newham. You can enter until May 18.

My suggestions were:

• Neighbourhood 1: Previously, this are was used for potting sheds; during the Olympics this will be the site of the basketball arena. I went for Hoopshed.
  
  
• Neighbourhood 2: Previously, White Post Lane ran through here; during the Olympics it will be the Media and Broadcast Centre. I chose Broadpost.
  
  
• Neighbourhood 3: Previously, this area housed confectionery factories and timber yards. After the Olympics, it'll have lots of leisure facilities. I decided on Sweetwood.
  
  
• Neighbourhood 4: This is the site of the Olympic arenas. And as Temple signifies the site of a temple, and Bank is where the banks are, I thought Arena should be where the arenas were.
  
  
• Neighbourhood 5: An area which will be mainly residential, bordered and crossed by canals and the Bow Back River, I chose Bow Waters as the name.

What do you think? Are you entering? What are your suggestions?

About notebooks

About 18 months ago, I realised that I was recycling a lot of envelopes.  I was about to start working at Waste Watch, a charity that encourage people to think about their waste. Most of those envelopes I was recycling were blank bits of paper.

It was good, of course, that they were being recycled, but they actually could be used again.

So I decided to keep them, and convinced colleagues to keep their envelopes. When I gathered them all together, I bound them into notepads. So I got busy with a letter opener, slicing every envelope apart.

At that time, Borders bookshop was going out of business. They had ridiculously low liquidation sales, with maps of all types selling for very little money.  Thinking "I'll find a use for them!", I bought some (well, lots actually).

Those two ideas came together: the maps could be nifty covers for my envelope notebooks.

And since then, I've gone through a series of different versions (proper designers might use the terms 'iterations' or 'prototypes').

The first type was very basic, still showing the ragged, cut edges from the letter opener.

So I brought the notebooks to a printing company, who nicely trimmed the edges. Lovely.

Later, having given some to friends and colleagues, I realised that a different type of binding would be better. So I brought some new notebooks to a binder, and had them ring bound. And they're lovely.

And so now, my staple-bound map notebooks are on sale on folksy, and I have a decision to make.

I'd like to keep this idea alive, but I don't really want to spend hours and hours making these notebooks. A lot of the stationery that sells online are luxury, high-end, artisan notebooks, but, to me, these notebooks are just notebooks. They're to be used and not treasured.

So I'm looking for ideas, inspiration, a partner, a way forward. Your suggestions are welcome.

The End of the World

The five drawings above are the final five maps I've collected for my My World project, where I ask people to draw the world.

Nuala, Louise, Eleanor, David O and Daniel drew their worlds last year. With their drawings, I had reached a total of 80. That seemed like a good number to bring collecting to a close. I had collected drawings of The World in 80 ways.

Also, in my poster design below, 80 allows for a blank space, recognising that this kind of endeavour could run and run on to infinity. (Click on it to see it bigger)

Thank you to all those who drew pictures, responding to my perplexing request with creativity, practicality and flair.

All 80 images - the world in 80 ways - are on flickr here.

Eurovision heats in London

I hit on a notion this year to try to watch Eurovision selections from around Europe in bars in London, in much the same way that I watch football.

But whereas football is popular with pub-goers, Eurovision, it seems, is not. There was nothing on show at Norwegian, Danish and Finnish venues. Similarly, an Armenian cultural centre was all closed up, and the Greeks and Portuguese preferred football.

A Bulgarian bar was playing Balkan music on its TV, but videos not Eurovision.

My one happy constant was the Swedish Church in Marylebone which week after week showed Melodifestivalen heats. Even the priest there got in on the excitement! If only every other nation could be the same...

What's in Gibraltar?

Continuing my posts on curious places (previously: Albania, San Marino), I recently flew to Gibraltar.

Gibraltar occupies a dramatic peninsula jutting into the sea, the majority of which is taken up by a whopping big rock.

The sights of Gibraltar are the mountain, the cheeky monkeys up on the mountain, the caves within the mountain, and the view of the Strait of Gibraltar from the mountain.

The rest is a town which looks a bit Spanish, but feels a bit English. New Look, Marks & Spencer and other British shops line the streets, along with duty free alcohol and perfume shops.

Unlike in Spain, the streets clear come sundown. "We live indoors like the English, not outdoors like the Spanish," one man said to me.

The local gay bar was empty, with the owner wistfully lamenting the departure of the sailors at the naval base.

Gibraltar airport brings a giddy thrill, as you can walk across the runway. The main road into the city crosses the runway which has had to be fitted into an awkward space. Sadly this thrill won't last for much longer as a road's being built under the runway.

And that is Gibraltar.

Robyn at Roundhouse

Last night, I saw Robyn at Roundhouse.

I've seen Robyn live quite a few times now, from one of her earliest UK gigs to the heights of Heaven.

She always delivers.

I can totally see why she called her last album Body Talk; she really does channel her lyrics through her dancing. Such as:

• Simulating putting a calculator in her pocket during Fembot
• Thumping a heartbeat on her chest during With Every Heartbeat
• Simulating kissing and embracing herself during Dancing on my Own
• Throwing herself around the stage in unabashed, uncoordinated dance fever during nearly everything.

In short, and, as always: amazing.

UK to Spain, from above

I took these great aerial photos on a flight from London to Gibraltar, and then the return flight from Seville to London.

The Gearagh

I grew up near The Gearagh, a unique part of County Cork, although I never really knew much about it. My teachers never talked about it in school, odd when you consider it was a mere mile from the school.

The Gearagh gets its name from An Gaorthadh, the wooded river. It is what remains of a submerged forest and community.

In the 1950s, to facilitate the building of two hydroelectric dams, the trees in the eastern part of Gearagh were cut down, and the area was flooded with around 60% of  woodland lost. Tree stumps remain, sometimes submerged, sometimes above the water line.

In addition to my photography, take a look at this great aerial photograph of the Gearagh.

2010

2010 is over: here's what I did in 2010.

• Saw: Grace Jones, Hurts (twice), Lady Gaga, Marina & the Diamonds (twice), Mini Viva & Girls Can't Catch, O'Spada, Paloma Faith, Robyn, Saint Saviour, Scissor Sisters, The Reason, Vania Fernandes.
  
• Went to Albania, Berlin, Corfu, Dingle, Essen, Gothenburg, Liechtenstein, Suffolk, the Swiss Alps, Vienna.
  
• Visited: Armenian Church, Ashmolean Museum, Bevis Marks Synagogue, British Museum, Buckingham Palace, Croydon Airport, Design Museum, German Lutheran Church, Knole House, Leighton House Museum, RCA, Tate Modern, V&A, V&A Museum of Childhood.
  
  
• Met Dannii Minogue
• Did 7 job interviews
• Watched 10 football matches
• Won and lost a holiday to South Korea
• 30 classes of German. Jetzt kann ich auf Deutsche sprechen.
• Had a picture in a Guardian gallery
• Became a Friend of London Zoo

Tune of 2010

10 tweets from 2010

• I made the Polish ladies in Old Street station sandwich shop smile by speaking Polish to them.
• Reading about pubs in Ireland opening on Good Friday. 'tis a landmark
• Fascinating fact: Switzerland has won more Nobel Prizes (per capita) than any other nation.
• WEIRD. I've just read an email written by me in 2000, talking about having set up a Eurovision website. I have no memory of that.
• My friend Vandana and I are setting up a stall at a flea market. We're going to be the V&A Flea-seum.
• Love Spotify. Search Ellie Goulding. Get "Do you mean Elsie Goulding?" I wish I did.
• Saw a geography teacher doing his marking on the tube earlier. Was quite excited.
• Going to see Grace Jones tonight. Amazing seats, actually sitting in one of her hats.
• I managed to use the word outré and metaphor in my leaving speech at work. Brilliant.
• Received spam from Airline Adriana. How wonderful. I'd fly with them.

Sights in Sweden

I went to Gothenburg in Sweden a few weekends. It was very nice, here's what I saw:

• Elegant, solid architecture. Built to withstand cold, snow, time.
• Festive fare at Haga Christmas market
• A tree at Liseberg completely covered in Christmas lights. Every branch had a twinkle.
• A lake shaped like a guitar
• Nanne Gronvall-esque climbing frame in the airport
• A portly chap doing a stumbly samba to You're making me hot hot hot
• Elks and reindeers in Slottskogen park
• Homeware shops on every street. There are loads.
• Adventstjarna - a lovely star in every window

Our Saint Saviour

illustration by Genie Espinosa

I went to see Hurts play at Union Chapel last week, as part of Mencap's Little Noise sessions. They were wonderful: haunting, elegant, emotional - as arresting now as the first time I saw them.

I really enjoyed the support act Saint Saviour.

We described Saint Saviour as:

• Kate Bush meets Liza Minelli
• Marcella Detroit meets Robyn
• Enya meets Roisin Murphy
• Dolores O'Riordan meets Enya
• Enya goes to Florence (with the Machine)

Ergo: amazing.

Maybe the church setting set me to thinking more than usual, but the lyrics Saint Saviour sang really stood out: "don't shine the spotlight on me, I'm already bright enough". Profound, no?

Adrian, USA

Friday, November 05, 2010

Whilst reading the article on the nomenclature of American towns, I got to wondering about places with my name. It turns out there's quite a few Adrians in America, stretching all the way from New York to Washington. 

The majority of American Adrians are quite small, with no more than a couple of hundred people in each. Some are named after settlers, with one, Adrian, Oregon, named after another Adrian: Adrian, Illinois.

Adrian Minesota, one of the larger Adrians, with more than a thousand inhabitants, was named after the mother of the local railway's directors. She was called Mrs Adrian Iselin, and he was Adrian C. Iselin. So really he named it after himself. The locals, apparently, prefer to believe the town was named after St Adrian.

Adrian, Michigan is perhaps the most exciting of all, with a plentiful 21,000 inhabitants. During the late 19th century and early 20th century, it was known as the "fence capital of the world," as it was where the first successful wire fence was invented. Fancy that. 

On the nomenclature of cities and towns in the United States

Monday, October 18, 2010

I recently found an article from 1885 on JStor with the exciting title On the nomenclature of cities and towns in the United States. It sounded fascinating - I've always wondered why certain cities in the USA were so named.

I was thinking about places I've seen on maps, places like Malta, New York, Zurich, Kansas or Lebanon, Oregon. I imagined fledgling Maltese, Swiss or Lebanese immigrant communities founding new towns and making new lives in a new land.

The actual reason is much more prosaic. Early railway companies and postal companies basically picked names at random or from long lists of places (maybe listed in almanacs)

The article speaks of certain parts of New York state with classic names like Ithaca, Syracuse, or Troy, so named as "a pedantic surveyor-general of the last century took ancient names, at random, out of a classical dictionary to scatter broadcast over this new land".

Years ago, I read Sweet Liberty by Irish writer Joseph O'Connor (brother of Sinead). In it, he travelled around the US, visiting nine towns and cities called Dublin. But despite finding something to write about in each place, he found very little connection to Ireland.

Practically all of Europe is accounted for: from Armenia, Wisconsin to Lisbon, Ohio, from Athens, Georgia, via Vienna, Missouri to Oslo, Minnesota.

These places are not named in the ways we might first think... but they could be, and that's what's brilliant.

What is in Albania

Thursday, October 07, 2010

A few weeks ago, during a holiday in Corfu, I went on a day trip to Albania. We took a ferry to a town called Sarandë and a bus to UNESCO archaeological site called Butrint.

Butrint was very interesting - a huge site, dating from Roman, Greek, Venetian and Ottoman times.

Sarande surprised me - it was a new town, built in the early 20th century. The town was very modern - lots of art-deco-ish architecture. It was quite Miami. The bars and restaurants seemed modern and new - a very different place to how I expected.

What was odd, however, was that this town with nice buildings and a long, lovely seafront promenade was empty. It was 4pm on a Wednesday - there was hardly a soul to be seen. Perhaps it was an Albanian version of siesta?

I particularly enjoyed seeing Albanian folk-pop videos on a screen in a café. I can't decide who my favourite performer was: the woman called PONI or the woman bottom right below: she certainly was her own biggest fan.