Facebook: Filter!

Alright, so I was going through all sorts of subjects for new blogposts and doing some research, when all of a sudden I bumped into a humungous amount of "fanpages" titled "Artist X sucks", "F*&# off Artist Y", "Artist Z, you're a f***" on Facebook.
Seriously. What the heck is wrong with these people?
Okay, so you might not like a certain artist. Tell me, what do you get from calling him a something something on a worldwide communication page? Is it going to make your day and enlighten yourself? If so, it sounds like you might need to sort yourself out and start looking for some useful occupations.
I go gaga when people start dissing eachother like it's the most common thing to do. Seriously, it's not. That's your imagination. Or maybe you just have some mental disorder you need to deal with. Especially when it comes to music.

Music goes back to the Paleolithic era when humans began to produce the earliest works of art. Who are you to destroy a monkey's work of art? That monkey being your forefather, hanging around with the forefather of the one you just dissed.

Seriously though, music is one of the few things we do not engage in war for. It's a universal language that everybody speaks, no matter what your cultural background is. You get it and you appreciate it, even if it's not your own.

Music expresses feeling and thought, without language. It was below and before speech, and it is above and beyond all words.  - Robert G. Ingersoll

Get the message? Exactly. Shhhhh...


Dear Facebook,
You're a wonderful invention for communication. And I'm all for free speech, otherwise I wouldn't have this blog. But filter your shizzang, will you?
Sincerely
J.

Supermodels Supernatural

German photographer Peter Lindbergh is tired of subjects in fashion magazines looking like overly-Photoshopped "objects from Mars". “My feeling is that for years now it has taken a much too big part in how women are being visually defined today. Heartless retouching should not be the chosen tool to represent women in the beginning of this century.”, he told the New York Times.
For Harper's Bazaar's September 2009 issue he captured supermodels such as Amber Valletta, Helena Christensen, Claudia Schiffer and Cindy Crawford without make-up or excessive retouching.
I love black and white photography, and have always admired 30-40 something women with long hair, minimal make-up and a natural glow. The two combined are devine.
Natural all the way baby, let's start capturing beauty as it is.

Off to an exhibition of Belgian photographer Stephan Vanfleteren now. He specializes in B&W's too and portrays artists, actors, writers, directors, musicians and other people who express themselves through their profession. He also captures events from world conflict zones as well as every day life around the world. Check out his work here

Little Girl, Big Blog: Tavi "Style Rookie" Gevinson

Meet Tavi Gevinson. A 13-year-old fashion blogger from Chicago who started "Style Rookie" about a year and a half ago and has had over 4 million readers since then. She has become a popular guest at fashion shows, and posed on pictures with designers as Yohji Yamamoto and Marc Jacobs. A lot of people praise her talent and look at her as if she were some kind of wonderchild. Others are sceptical and question her credibility. Why is this kid so articulate for her age? And how does she know so much about fashion and designers at such a young age?

I'm not going to butt in on the pros and cons, I'm just sharing something I think is quite remarkable.

I can say this though: as a kid, I was really curious too. And pretty smart. Always getting straight A's, provoking jealousy from peers and receiving kudos from adults who thought I had an amazing brain for my age. To me, I was just normal. As the years go by and you experience life, certain things change. And certain things just stick to your core. A gift, as this little girl has in writing, should be admired. But she's still a kid. And fashion can be a harsh world. Let's hope she stays true to who she is and what she loves to do, without losing her innocence.

In addition to this, an article appeared in Eosmagazine.eu today saying most children who were born in prosperous countries after the year 2000 will probably live up to be a hundred years old. If that's true, lots of remarkable things are headed our way if you ask me. Tavi won't be the last.

"It's a new day"

The first thing I think about when the month October knocks on our earth's door is my birthday. Not for presents, or parties or even celebration. I try to celebrate me being here every day.

My birthday to me, is a time of standing still and reflecting on who I am . Your birthdaymonth defines a huge part of your personality without you even controlling it in the first place. Astrology, exactly.

In 19 days, I'm turning 20. From then on I'll have number 2 in my age for the next ten years at least. Bye bye teen years. Officially.

The past month has been incredibly intense, and some things haven't been properly digested yet. See: no blog entries.

One thing I want to hold on to though, is this: do what you feel you want or need to do. Things won't ever fall into place entirely if you don't. And why wouldn't you anyway? Don't set yourself boundaries that aren't real. Anything is possible. So sing, dance, go bungee jumping, visit Machu Picchu, climb Mount Everest if you want to. Live.

I'll be trying to share a lot more on this blog. More fun stuff, stories I find are incredible, things that cross my mind.
Music. Art. Fashion. Design. Trends. Projects. Green.

I'll be trying to evoke awareness about everything that surrounds us, aswell as things that don't cross our worried minds. Occassional fortune cookie messages will still hit this blog though.

With that being said, I'm off to a concert by a local band called Kartasan. They bring you a Jazzy, Indie sound from Belgian bottom. Check them out on their Myspace page here.

Love

J

"All the world may not love a lover, but they'll be watching him"

Translation:

Replace lover by ink and it makes sence. Hu?

Cause I finally got past the being a chicken-fase and gave birth to my first tattoo yesterday!

The contractions were complicated - read: being a busy-scheduled tattoocologist, Jean from Harai Tattoo forgot to write down my appointment, but made up for it by taking me in yesterday, which here in Belgium was a holiday, so kudos for that. The discount was a sweet cherry on top of the inky icecream aswell.

The labor lasted for half an hour, it's a quick little sexless rascal, and giving birth to it wasn't painfull at all thanks to the Holy Emla, which is the abbreviation of 'Eutectic Mixture of Local Anesthetic'. Yeah, I'm not a die hard.. So sue me.

It has all its fingers and toes and although the world may not love the ink, they'll be watching it, because...





I am grateful for the day I was put into this world. It defined a part of my personality and the path that I'm taking.

Let's talk horoscopes: October 20th makes me a Libra, which gives me the characteristics of being a lover of beauty & harmony, in all aspects of life and an impartial judge, always looking for balance in everything, trying to resolve any differences by compromise. The Libran can also be changeable and indecisive, impatient of routine, which to me, makes me weigh off everything, always looking for the greater good. Let me quote the Serenity Prayer here:

God grant me the serenity
To accept the things I cannot change;
Courage to change the things I can;
And wisdom to know the difference.

In Chinese horoscope, I'm a snake. Earth Snake to be precise, because I was born in 1989. This contains the following:

"Possessing tremendous wisdom, they are deep, quiet thinkers, calm by nature, but most intense. Being citizens of the world, they often get involved in great causes, bigger than life, and often serve as mentors to the young. To paraphrase Confucius, they have a kind of inner beauty that arises, hovers, then comes to nest."

Known snake people include Mahatma & Indira Gandhi, Abraham Lincoln, Martin Luther King, Grace Kelly, Jacqueline Kennedy, Edgar Allen Poe and Bob Dylan. And as I just found out... Jason Mraz...

This all isn't coming out of my mouth, I'm quoting Tuvy, a website that provides resources such as Asian literature, recipes and horoscopes. I can only take peace in believing this is all true. And hope I can live up to the toes of great men as Ghandi, Lincoln and M.L. King.

This tattoo isn't just an ink blot engraved in my skin for life. It's my way to celebrate my life on earth and show gratitude towards the universe, my parents and the gift they have created for me. Therefore, I thank you.

Always yours

Jolene

"Next time you have the opportunity, go on a rollercoaster"

Wauw. Just when I was thinking that maybe I should start writing without the fortune cookie messages, this one pops up. "Next time you have the opportunity, go on a rollercoaster."

Ever since I got back from Amsterdam I've been reflecting on whether or not I should go and make this worldtrip. It's something I really want to do, but have been a bit "hmmm" about, because I have no plan what so ever, no one to join me, it scares the heck out of me to be honest, and if I wanna be able to buy a few plane tickets to God knows where, I'll have to start working for a while and drop out of college.

Almost everyone who I tell my plan to -without a plan, really-, looks at me as if I were this crazy chick who has no idea what she's doing and isn't making a smart choice by not studying her ass off for the next 3 years, because "you can always take the trip after you get your degree."
Well, you know what? I'm not the kind that shares my thoughts and spreads out messages and gives advice, not to follow it myself. And yes, I am this crazy chick that has no idea what she's doing. But who does?

So here it goes: I am making this trip. I am leaving everything and everyone I know behind and I am pursuing what I truly want to do. Where it will take me, I don't know. What's going to happen to me, I have no clue. All I know is there's this voice in my head that's been talking to me for over a year now, and I don't want to ignore it any longer. This is what I need to do. I am boarding on this gigantic rollercoaster and am going to live and enjoy every single second of it. Like I said before, you only have one life and it's the one you're living right now.

Greeting you with a mind that's going a thousand miles an hour

J.

PS: Try getting away from the concrete jungle from time to time. Nature will treat you kindly.
PS II: Don't rely on technology and electronic items too much, they have no mind of their own and will leave you when you think you need them the most. So don't get attached and try going back to the basics.

"Open up your heart - it can always be closed again"

It's been a little while since I haven't written anything, mainly because I was on a citytrip to Amsterdam, but I've been back for two days now and decided it was best for me to reflect on everything and let it all sink in, rather than just blabla'ing about it without thinking it through. Because believe me, there was a lot of material to think about.

To start off me and my friend Sara didn't have any plans what so ever. We just bought a busticket with a return dated 4 days later and the only thing we knew was that we were going to the Jason Mraz concert in Westerpark the first night.
Like I mentioned in the blog below he's an amazing person and artist, and that feeling has been confirmed even more now that I've seen him live. If there's one thing you need to do if you ever get the opportunity is go to a Jason Mraz concert.

It will change your life, I'm not kidding.

So, I went to Amsterdam with the intention of finding Jason - which I did, too bad I had no clue how to get to him and see him face to face. On the other hand what would I have said anyway besides "uuuuuh"? - and what I found was something way bigger than anything I could ever imagine.

It started with two guys asking us for directions at a crossroad and ended up shifting my whole perspective on who we are and what it is we're doing here. My main inspiration was one of the crossroadguys who - strangely enough - practically has the same name as the person I look up to, being the magnificent Jason Mraz.
Same vowels, same consonants, other order.

What I found on this trip was love. Not in a cheesy, highschoolmovie-way, but the learnings of genuine love. Not only for a person, but for everything around you. I learned that what we really need to do is open up our hearts, and just let the love in. It's so easy.
Situations of not being yourself, being scared or worried, is just because you don't open up to that - yet - unknown love. And to my opinion it can never be closed again, you leave bits and pieces of your heart spreaded all over.


I'm not going to get into all the details - I could probably write pages about what I've experienced - but I'll tell you this: because of opening up for just one second, and agreeing to go and have a drink at some bar in a strange city with two complete strangers, I slept on docks, partied on a boat and met the most amazing people. Most of them have almost travelled across the entire globe, and are living my dream, which is to travel and see the world, getting to know people all over the planet, spreading peace and love, doing what it is you want to do and attend the university of life. Because that's all that matters really.

And what I've fully and consciously realized is that you really only have one life on this earth, it's the one you are living right now.

So stop worrying about the future. Stop living in the past. Live here and now. Today is a gift, that's why they call it the present.

What I'm writing here, are things we already know. But do we follow it? Do we really live it? There are so many expectations you have to live up to, so many rules, so many boundaries, and for what? Get my drift? Exactly.
Live your dream, enjoy and respect your surroundings, be aware, show your gratitude, and most of all.. don't be afraid to love and let love in.

Namaste

A new Jolene