The first snowfall

It's snowing! I can't help but feel all excited and I'm sure I have a silly childish grin on my face at the first snowfall of the season. I waited half an hour in the cold, my feet are numb and the bus ended up getting stuck in the snow for a while. I would normally be in London by now but have only just boarded the train. I'm rather impressed that the trains still run pretty much on time though. I'm travelling right through the snowy untouched white fields where the snow has left its mark with a frosting just enough to coat the bare branches of the trees. It's so beautiful. But all I can hear around me are workers calling their bosses telling them they'll be late or people rather absorbed in their usual morning busying.

It's snowing! And I feel like I'm the only one who is excited.

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Back to the bubble

I went up to visit Warwick this weekend. In the midst of the lead up to exams (2 weeks now!), it was a much needed break from the city. I needed to go back to Warwick as the place where I learnt to find my own way, fend for myself and where I had made a home for myself for three years. I wanted to see how it had changed, how I'd changed since entering the working world.

And so there was no place better than my favourite haunt by Jack Martin lake. I'm pretty sure its not called Jack Martin lake but that's what it will always be known as to me. Its a place I used to visit often just to let my thoughts simmer, take in the fresh air or even attempt to study (though somehow everything around was always far too distracting). Its not the greatest of natural wonders; a murky lake, the contents of which are somewhat debatable, a few bare trees in the winter and only a badelynge of ducks sauntering around hoping to poach food from the few visitors that pass. But netherless being around nature allows me to breathe and inspires the belief of something greater.

On that cold winter weekend- early Sunday morning, there was hardly a soul wandering the land which gave me the perfect opportunity to claim the lake as my own and snap away with my new camera. It was more of a trial and error effort in an attempt to stay away from the cheat's auto mode and learn for myself. As such, I adjusted far from enough settings and so a lot of the photos from my shooting frenzy were out of focus and somewhat blurry. The playback screen had deceived me into thinking they were not so blurry! But as this is my first attempt at shooting from my new toy, it can only get better. I have to admit I enjoyed a good hour in the cold, snapping away in all manner of positions until my fingers were so frozen they might have dropped off. Anyways, just a few of my newbie shots from the weekend:

"People sketching"

I glance around the crowded carriage in an attempt to pick my first victim. There's the lady with the large Louis Vuitton bag in front of me, make up and nails immaculate plugged into her iPhone whilst simultaneously tapping away at it. There's the lady right next to her- tight pencil skirt reading the metro with her hands dressed in pink leather gloves. For now, I can only define them by their objects, the key pieces they carry or wear that sets them apart from this suited up crowd.

My eyes fall upon man just across from me. His business attire would not warrant a second glance, indeed he blends in with everyone else. Black tailored suit, white shirt, pink tie and polished leather shoes. He reads the Times, again standard for this working class, flicking between the pages and pausing every so often to read an article of interest. He hasn't any defining features, one could quickly pass him by unknowingly in a crowd but something brings him to my attention nevertheless. He has the air of being good looking in his younger days but the signs of the years passing are evident in the faint lines on his forehead. He's so absorbed in his paper, in his own world that he doesn't even glance up to have a nose around every so often. He doesn't even notice the train pull into the final station and when he does look up his forehead wrinkles up and the lines deepen. As the mass of people rush off the train, he takes the time to dress himself, to slowly put on his coat and reach for his bag on the overhead shelf. He is the last in the carriage, still on the train as I finally get off, as if this morning ritual, this five minute ritual helps to prepare him for the day ahead.

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Brewing beneath the surface

These nights I have trouble falling asleep. It's the worse feeling being tucked in underneath the covers, all ready for a good nights sleep then finding yourself still awake after an hour. Then as you get more desperate, checking the clock to watch the minutes change into hours and the darkness turning to light before its time to get up again.

I never usually have trouble sleeping, I can sleep through almost anything...even the sound of cy snoring isn't enough to stir me when I'm in my deep sleep. It's only when I'm troubled that thoughts start to brew in the recesses of my mind. But until they bubble up to the surface, I'm not sure what has provoked them.

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The London commute

As I sit here tapping away on my phone (I say tapping but my fingers still haven't quite grasped the concept of a touchscreen phone yet), I am outnumbered by iPhone users. Seriously with so many other phones on the market, why does everyone seem to have iphone? I feel somewhat special with my HTC and smile proudly whenever a fellow HTCer should whip out their phone.

Commuting takes up a huge chunk of my day. My friend and I once sat on the bus on the way to school calculating how much of our lives we had given to travelling the bus day in, day out. But I'm not alone, the trains into London are always crowded with people who live outside the city despite the inconvenience. Perhaps it gives them space to breathe away from the towering office blocks and transports them back to their own lives, outside of work- to their kids, partners, pets, friends and loved ones.

I too have disappeared into the commute; I grab the Metro on the way to work and hastily pick up the evening standard on the mad dash home. I've mastered the art of balancing it when I'm crammed onto a crowded tube but haven't quite got to doing the crosswords at the back yet. I tut as people cross my path or stop abruptly when I'm dashing and weaving in and out to catch the next train when I know I've probably done the same thing to others. I get annoyed when people don't stop to let others off the train despite the reminder we get from posters and the lady with the megaphone to mind our manners. I feel secretly pleased when I manage to score a seat on a crowded tube during rush hour and cringe at the mention of a tube strike though it somehow works out fine in the end. I now know that the beeping sound before the tube doors close is not to warn us to step away but rather to make a James Bond like dive for the doors for the sake of saving a whole 2 minutes of waiting. I watch others as they tap away on their blackberries, are plugged into their music, doze off to sleep, read their books, newspapers or catch up on their knitting. Perhaps I should start knitting, think I could probably finish a scarf by the end of this year. Though it seems like an odd thing to do on a train, I guess it makes good use of all the time spent travelling. Maybe I could start selling my creations too.

It's hard to imagine sometimes these people are all individuals with their own lives, thoughts and emotions. It's all too easy to lump them into the mass of commuters floating in and out of London day by day, staring lifelessly out into the distance, marching from place to place as they get to their workplaces.

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A childhood memory

It is early November, around the time of bonfire night when the anticipation builds u as you hear the odd cackle from the neighbour's garden and rush to the window in excitement. I'm dressed head to toe in winter woolies wrapped up tightly by my mum. We are all stood outside in a small field behind the infant block of my primary school; me, my mum, dad and little brother who sits snuggly in my mum's arms. We only had one field for school events which used to transform itself during our school's sports days and summer fetes. There was always a good turn out, people left their busy lives to revel in the simple pleasure of fireworks and as such there was always a strong sense of community and school spirit, or so it felt like back then. We waited eagerly with our jacket potatoes and hot dogs warming up our insides awaiting those magical bursts in the sky. It was all about the jacket potatoes back then, especially as the fireworks always seemed to start late.

15 years on, I'm standing in another field at Blackheath. The winter chill is ever present and I'm bundled up in my scarf and gloves. The field is larger by a long shot and filled with a throng of people who have trekked from all ends of London. I crane my neck to get a better view and as I do sparks fly and illuminate the sky. The fireworks are no doubt bigger and more expensive than my school's own production but the feeling is just the same. Despite the cold, the crowd ooh and aah in all the right places. Our eyes shine brightly and inside that coldlike wonderment is ignited. There are the ones that glow coming in an array of colours, those that fizzle out into the darkness, ones that seem to take on a life of their own and the ones that are launched into the sky with a piercing cry. It takes me back to 15 years ago when I would crane my neck in awe but with my hands laced firmly over my ears to block out the sound. The only thing missing now is the jacket potatoes.

Fireworks at Blackheath

I've lost my blogging mojo

If there is such a thing, I appear to have lost it. It's not that u haven't started writing anything, they just never made their way to be posted. I just can't seem to string my thoughts together and that worries me. It's almost as off Im unsure of who I am anymore, unsure of the thoughts I want to pen down, unsure of myself. People retreat to all parts of the globe, take gap years, travel to cultures different from their own all in an effort to discover themselves as if we are lost souls waiting for that turning point to reveal whatever it is we hope to see.

I'm so bogged down in trying to find out where I'm going, what I'm doing, thinking for the future; my future, our future that I've forgotten about the now. I've forgotten what its like to feel truly excited by something, to have that adrenaline pumping through my veins, to feel so eager to finish something I don't mind staying up all night. I hope this is not what it means to be working as I am, sucked into an endless cycle of work and exams.

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