SWEET AND SOUR CHINESE

Now back to my travel build up. If you remember I was telling you about where I hoped to travel, God (and authorities) willing, when I get to the other side of the world. This week I thought I would begin to give a very brief overview of each country to compare and contrast each week. As I am starting with China, obviously it makes sense to start there. In China, the communist party remains solidly entrenched and unchallenged. In 2003 a new president and Premier took charge, but any illusions that this would herald a move towards political liberalisation were dashed when the National Peoples Congress denied Hong Kong the hope of choosing its next leader, flying in the face of the Chinese-British deal. State censorship of everything from Shakespeare to Rolling Stones lyrics continues and Internet access remains rigorously monitored, with a firewall ‘protecting China’s citizens from BBC news in Chinese and other foreign pollutants. In Beijing a heavy police presence saw the 15th anniversary of the 1989 Tiananmen massacre pass with little incident. There are still other problems for the authorities to contend with - China has the largest disparity between urban rich and rural poor in the world. Considering the 750-million-strong peasantry it is no surprise that so many illegal Chinese immigrants still turn up on European shores. Nonetheless, big changes are afoot. You can rocket from shanghai’s Pudong airport into town at 430km/hr on China’s first Maglev train (though your hair can turn grey waiting for your rush hour bus to move on Beijing’s congested streets). The Bejing Olympics in 2008 was the culmination of a move towards acceptance of the regime into the world outside (albeit tentatively). China is a vast country with a culture still shrouded in mystery to most Westerners, and the differences are what I hope to experience and record in both written word and artworks in the coming weeks. Finally - some etiquette in case you ever find yourself there and don’t know how to behave.

Chinese Etiquette

When beckoning to someone, wave them over to you with your palm down, motioning to yourself.
If someone gives you a gift, put it aside to open later to avoid appearing greedy.
Always take off your shoes when entering a Chinese home.
When meeting a Chinese family, greet the eldest person first, as a sign of respect.
Always present things to people with both hands, showing that what you are offering is the fullest extent of yourself.

SOME EXERPTS FROM FUTURE ARTICLES

I thought I would take the opportunity to release some excerpts of the future articles for the newspaper while I still have access to the internet. I may not have access in a few days so I will include overviews of each country in a few quick blog entries now. Here is the first...... but no photographs yet of course.

Over the last few months I have been planning an extended train journey that will shortly see me fly to Beijing and take the Trans-Mongolian Express through China and on to Ulaanbaatar, the capital of Mongolia. My journey continues onwards to Irkutsk and Lake Baikal in Russia and right across the vastness of the Russian Steppes to Moscow and St. Petersburg before ending in Copenhagen in Denmark in August. The trip shall take approximately five to six weeks and cover eight time zones, and I have agreed with the CoastRider to publish a weekly article on my experiences while making the journey for you all to read about. The first leg of the journey will have already started by now with a trip back to Ireland initially, but in the coming weeks I hope to give you an insight into countries and cultures quite alien to most westerners. Sometime towards the end of the year, in conjunction with fellow artist and travelling companion Rita Hee, we intend to put all our experiences together to create an exhibition of images, words and sketches based on the trip, so watch this space.

THE 'TRANS-MONGOLIAN EXPRESS' BEGINS SHORTLY!!

Hello to all

This is the first entry I have made in a long time on this blog. Mainly because I have been writing a weekly blog for an expat magazine in Spain about, strangely enough, the expat life in Spain. I have also been writing a weekly arts based article for a leading English expat newspaper on the Costa Blanca. With all these things going on as well as my normal work of painting and more recently, teaching art to adult students, coupled with the fact that I have been involved with international exhibitions in different countries, my life has been a bit hectic to say the least.

My next project is a major one. I am off to China, Mongolia and Russia in a few days and travelling by train with the Trans-Mongolian Railway across all three countries over the period of around 5 to 6 weeks to do a bit of research for an art exhibition around the end of the year. During the trip I shall be hand writing a daily blog which I shall upload whenever I have an opportunity en route, and have agreed with the newspaper to write a weekly article about the trip on my experiences and adventures.

So please keep an eye on this blog address for more entries in the following weeks.
Here is a link to my weekly article in the newspaper for you to keep up to date with my progress as well.
The CoastRider Newspaper

PAINTING WEEKENDS AND HOLIDAYS

Just a reminder that the painting weekends to the cave houses of Galera, Andalucia are now operational. If anyone is interested in finding out more just click on the link here -

http://paintingweekends.blogspot.com/

Also if anyone is interested in week long painting holidays on the Costa Blanca please get in touch by email as the website is still under construction. When the website is complete you can visit it at this link -

http://www.artinspain.eu/

In the meantime click on it and store the address for your future reference.

Hope to hear from you soon.

EXHIBITIONS BEGIN THIS WEEKEND!!!

I have finally made it back to Ireland with my new paintings for the exhibitions in Dublin and subsequently Cyprus in the following days. Sorry for not updating this blog, but I now write a weekly blog for an ex-pat magazine called, strangely enough, The Xpat Magazine.

Here is a link - http://www.thexpat.com/blog/

Hope you like my meanderings, around Spain, and my head.

Here are some images - one from the exhibition, one of my life drawings and one of me posing for a magazine article at my studio. I know, I know - all the world's a stage etc. etc.

NEW WORKS FOR UP-COMING EXHIBITIONS

' Deflated Dreams' - 8"x 24" SOLD

I have been working on new paintings for my up-coming exhibitions in Dublin and Cyprus in October. Haven't finalised what is going where yet, but I thought I would let you see a couple of them anyway.
Hope you enjoy.

The Gilded Cage - 8"x 24" SOLD

'Almost No Limit' - 18"x 24" SOLD

'PINK LAKE BLUES'

I finally took time out of my busy schedule to visit the salt lake in Torrevieja this week. Just a short stroll from my studio, and visible from the top of the house. Down by the waters edge a crowd of mud people gathered like extras from a Star Wars movie. Everyone was caked in the stuff. Some with mud around their swollen joints, some from throat to gusset, while one lady of former Soviet states origin - going by the accent - had the novel idea to take all her clothes off, slap on a thick oozing organic bikini and proceeded to stand with her arm and legs flung to the four corners of the earth seemingly to offer an all encompassing bear hug to anyone walking within her grab range.

This was all very well until - a) she stood still until the mud dried and she tried to move, creating fissures between north and south that would have made the ‘Rift Valley Conservation Team’ proud, or - b) she waded wide legged into the water and the twin muddy peaks of Kilimanjaro slowly slid down her navel to join the now equally viscous map of Eurasia working its way towards her kneecaps. A sight imprinted on my memory forever.

If you have never been to the salt lake, I would recommend it thoroughly. Accessible through various holes in the fence around its perimeter, make your way to the waters edge, and make sure you have tie on shoes as they tend to float away otherwise. I don’t recommend trying to stand up on the salt crystals without them. Feels like walking on broken glass - I wonder is that where Annie Lennox got the idea for the song…..?

Anyway, back to the instructions - place a blow up air travel cushion around your neck, inflated of course, and slowly lie back in the water. The lake is so full of salt and minerals that you float without effort and can let the stresses and strains of the day disappear along with all the money you forgot to take out of your pockets before you got in. By all means take a book, but I-pods are not advised as you may inadvertently create a circuit between you, your batteries and the salts, and slowly fry your grey matter while listening to the mating calls of south Pacific whales. Who needs all this expensive, alternative dark tank therapy when you have everything right here on your doorstep? If you want the dark part just use the old blackout eye mask that probably came in the same package as the blow up air travel cushion. See? Easy peasy!

Word of warning though! Make sure you check wind direction before you lie down or you may end up at San Miguel de Salinas or, worse still, sucked up into one of the barges scraping the salt from the lake bed to send to those poor people in northern Europe to put on their roads in the winter. I didn’t check the wind direction of course, and ended up with a three kilometre hike back home with a deflated cushion round my neck, an eye patch skewed over one eye and an ear, a talcum powder coating of salt covering me from head to toe and strange but enticing looks from the girls on the roundabouts. Not recommended, but friends said my skin glowed beautifully for days afterwards.

The only downside to lake bathing? Shaving. If you have had a shave within twenty four hours of going in, by God you’ll know about it! It’s like dipping you head in a bucket of Fahrenheit aftershave. Your skin starts to turn the same colour as the water and feels like you have just applied a fresh lava facemask. It’s no wonder the flamingos are the shade they are!
God help ladies who depilate!