Ridiculous.

P4180055
Originally uploaded by Nomad Kat

Kat On Tour

So this Sunday my summer starts. A little earlier than for most people, but hey, who ever said my life was normal.

So, because I keep finding myself explaining it, here is The Summer Plan:

On Sunday, May 3, I leave Zagreb. I pick up a hire car, drive to Sarajevo, pick up my parents from the airport.

The next few days I spend travelling in Bosnia with them, and then return to Zagreb for One Night Only on Thursday May 7.

May 8 we catch a train to Budapest to join this cruise-tour thing that leaves us in Istanbul 15 days later. My parents leave from there on May 24.

I'm thinking I will leave about the same time, and make my way back to Zagreb, probably detouring through Macedonia and Serbia on the way. I'll onlyl have a few day in Zagreb though (the beginning of June) because then I'm booked for a workshop in Zurich for the OFF_PRIDE festival (the alternative to Europride).

As soon as I can, though, I'll be back in Zagreb, and be here for at least a week - by no small coincidence, it will be the week of ZG Pride... but then, no doubt all too soon, I will have to leave again to get to another festival and another workshop, this time in Tabor in Czechy.

After that, I have 10 days or so to make my way towards the UK in time to start my regular summer job at the beginning of July. I'll be working until mid-august.

At the end of August, just a few days after I finish being professional me (ha) and revert to regular old anarchist-queer me, Oslo queer festival is on, and I'll be workshopping at that as well.

And then, well, I'll be in Scandinavia, a part of the world I haven't seen much of, so I hope to do a few weeks of travelling, maybe get to the arctic circle and iceland, see more of Sweden than Malmo airport, that sort of thing.

And *then*, I have to decide what I'm doing with the rest of the year. Current plans involve travelling overland to Australia, moving back to Montreal (visa willing) or coming back to live in Zagreb.

And right now, Zagreb is winning...

Sunday on Saturday at Medika

Lat night was a fun night, with lots of friends and acquaintances (everyone who's ANYone was there, dahling!) and many little entertaining moments. And a few crazy ones: I am used to meeting the occasional Aussiophile here, who gets unreasonably excited when they find out my country of origin, but I've never made anyone cry before...

Worst case of the affliction that I had seen, really. I'm glad she had a good time while she was in Aus, and I'm sorry her visa ran out and she had to leave, but I haven't really lived in Australia for long enough now that I almost feel weird saying I'm from there, and I always have to admit at some point that I'm quite happy not living there, even though it's their life-long dream to be able to do so.

When I made my escape (the interestingness of the aussiophile girl being finally outweighed by the annoyingness of the drunk guy hoping to to kiss us) I heard her say in a very disappointed whine "See, now you've frightened her away!". And I did indeed feel like some small furry animal scurrying off to safety (but still did not feel at all like the kangaroo that Drunk Guy kept wanting me to be "Are you a kangaroo?" "No, do I look like a kangaroo?")

Definitely an entertaining night!

Another Random Night

17/04/2009
Originally uploaded by Nomad Kat

Last night I ended up being in a music video, quite randomly. This was part of the set. And I was already in costume for the party I thought we were going to (we got there by about 3am...)

There are definitely moments when I look at my crazy life, and think something very much like this, and the randomness of last night was one of those times, so this pic feels very representative of the evening!

I will, of course, post a link to the vid just as soon as I'm told it's finished! In the meantime, here's another vid from the same artist (though the vid from last night will be more like this one):

More Rubber

Here are more photos of last week's rubber workshop from a friend's camera. They are, of course, superior to mine!

I've been making more cuffs and things this week, and working on another rubber bowtie to recreate something like the costume I wore to a party in Montreal. (There's another party, you see, here, in Zagreb! I really didn't expect this city to compare to my beloved Montreal...)

So I've improved the bowtie design, I think. And I've come up with some more (adjustable!) cuff designs. I'm thinking I should actually try selling them. That would be interesting. And maybe make me some pocket money, though not an actual living. I've ordered better plier-style tools on ebay, so hopefully I can make them without the hammering that my current tools require (which annoys neighbours, and is generally a pain).

I've also got some proofreading work this week, and maybe some busking, and that, plus my sadly swollen leprous lip that is going to mean I spend a lot of time hiding (or going out with a bag over my head) means I might actually break even for the week!

And I wasn't even looking for work...

The Fragility of my Zagreb Queer Bubble.

I've had such a wonderful life lately, abandoning myself complately to hedonistic persuits, such as perfecting the art of spending all day in cafes hanging out with one friend after another. The sun is shining, we've had 3 t-shirt-weather days in a row, everyone is beautiful and life is generally brilliant.

I have been feeling a little guilty about this high in the last few days, though, as the same spring-fever that is causing my high has also caused nearly everyone I know to break up with their partners. Which is sad. But it does mean there are even more people than usual looking for distraction, company, and a friendly ear, which increases my time spent sitting outside in cafes, which I am not complaining about.

Some are also looking for a friendly liver to destroy along with their own, of course, and it's possible I should work on drinking less. But we know that friends shouldn't let friends drink alone, so what can I do?

Tonight though, while drinking in an alternative sort of punk-ish bar here, I had my lovely little queerspace bubble invaded by a mild homophobe.

A friend of a friend joined us at our table, and, if we had stuck to discussing languages and music, I'm sure i would have thought he was alright. But somehow the subject of feminism came up, and suddenly he was saying "There is no point to feminism these days. Maybe it was useful in the 50s and 60s, but it's not needed now". My argument to this somehow got cut off before I had finished it, but before I knew it he was saying "Gay people shouldn't march in the street, because it holds up the trams and makes people late for work". He apparently thought this meant that the pride parade each year only hurts the gay cause, rather than helping it.

The last straw, however, was: "Gay people in Croatia should have some rights, but not others". Stupidly, of course, I asked which ones we shouldn't have. Adoption was first on his list.

At this point, I flipped out slightly. I realised that this was not a conversation I could have at 1 in the morning in a mildly inebriated state, and I just wanted to get far away from this person who was happily insulting me as part of a friendly discussion. I stood up and apologised way too much while saying I couldn't continue this, and that I had to leave. He (at least) said that he would leave instead, so I was able to stay with my friends. But I was left somewhat shaky, and rather disturbed. I'm also a little disappointed that I failed to argue effectively and make him think about what he was actually saying, but I doubt it would have done any good, and I would have just ended up angry. 

Before he left he said "I'm sorry. I thought we were just having a conversation". I replied "Yes, it was great until you started insulting me".

I know that I live in a very special world here in Zagreb. Having met nearly everyone I know here through queer/friendly events and people, and as I am not working, I almost never have to interact with anyone that isn't queer-friendly. I have the luxury of living in queer space in a country where I would have thought it impossible. This encounter made me realise how lucky I am to be able to do that. And how close the non-friendly world can get.

When I got home a couple of hours later (half an hour ago), I found he had sent me a friend request on facebook. I considered friending him long enough for him to see my status, which referred to him as a homophobe, and the activist in me wanted to continue the argument until he saw the error of his ways, but in the end I decided it just wasn't worth the pain, and clicked 'ignore'.

But maybe the reaction I had was enough. Perhaps seeing someone being visibly affected like that by something he had said will make him start thinking about his own views about gay people and slowly, eventually, change them.

Well, we can hope, can't we?

Found the quote

An update to this recent post:

"Traveling carries with it the curse of being
at home everywhere and yet
nowhere, for wherever one is some part
of oneself remains on another continent."

Source: Dame Margot Fonteyn

Thanks to an unknown visitor to my blog from Saskatchewan, Canada, for using a search string in google that turned up both my blog AND the original quote.