December 29, 2010

This morning I went to school and had some private lessons before my group lessons, which were fantastic. When I told my new teacher my name was Dominika, he said that it reminded him of the French euro-pop star Dominique A., who is apparently 'not bad' as far as French pop goes. Here’s a song of his

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WJYg04-goLs . I was heartened by this and really applied myself during my lessons. I learned all sorts of vocabulary, the verb 'to lie' (as in telling lies), the words for cloud and courtyard as well as the simple past and simple present tense. If I ever find myself needing tell someone about my compulsive fibbing in courtyards, I can do so in several languages now. Useful, I hope. Sadly, all of my enthusiasm faded after I spent an hour and a half listening to my classmates mispronounce 'est'. Just drop the 't', ladies! No seriously, pronunciation can be tough, I'm lucky that mine is fairly fine.

After lunch we set off to see a fine art show at the BOZAR (which is a form of Beaux-Arts). We went to see pictures by a 16th century painter names Lucas Cranach, who painted and did a great deal of graphic work. Mostly religious themes, some portraits too. He has a very dynamic and luminescent style that suits his subject matter, mostly naked ladies with apple shaped breasts and sweet little double chins. You know the type. Here’s the link http://www.bozar.be/activity.php?id=9136&

There was also some really, really cool work by a contemporary artist names Wim Delvoye. I don't know if you've ever heard of him, but he is famous for making the poo machine. It's a machine that 'transforms' food into shit, as close to it as possible, I guess. It's a pretty complicated machine. Anyway, he also does these incredible sculptural works with religious themes. One sculpture was a dozen or so statues of Christ on the cross, arranged in the shape of a double helix. He also does these amazing laser cu

cut steel models of buildings and objects in the Gothic style. Check him out on the internet, here http://www.wimdelvoye.be/

Later, my cousin Janko and I did a mean moonwalk routine in the smooth marble foyer of the Benneton store while my mother bought cardigans.

We went out for dinner. Moules et Frites (Mussels and Fries). There's one street in Brussels that is exclusively populated with restaurants that serve this dish to tourists, and despite my repeated protests, we ended up going there anyway. After, we went for a drink and I almost fell asleep at the table.