Life of Pi **********

Amazon.com says: Yann Martel's imaginative and unforgettable Life of Pi is a magical reading experience, an endless blue expanse of storytelling about adventure, survival, and ultimately, faith. The precocious son of a zookeeper, 16-year-old Pi Patel is raised in Pondicherry, India, where he tries on various faiths for size, attracting "religions the way a dog attracts fleas." Planning a move to Canada, his father packs up the family and their menagerie and they hitch a ride on an enormous freighter. After a harrowing shipwreck, Pi finds himself adrift in the Pacific Ocean, trapped on a 26-foot lifeboat with a wounded zebra, a spotted hyena, a seasick orangutan, and a 450-pound Bengal tiger named Richard Parker ("His head was the size and color of the lifebuoy, with teeth"). It sounds like a colorful setup, but these wild beasts don't burst into song as if co-starring in an anthropomorphized Disney feature. After much gore and infighting, Pi and Richard Parker remain the boat's sole passengers, drifting for 227 days through shark-infested waters while fighting hunger, the elements, and an overactive imagination. In rich, hallucinatory passages, Pi recounts the harrowing journey as the days blur together, elegantly cataloging the endless passage of time and his struggles to survive: "It is pointless to say that this or that night was the worst of my life. I have so many bad nights to choose from that I've made none the champion."
I say: After reading a book like this, I feel inadequate even trying to find the words to review it! Life of Pi will no doubt be in my Top 10 books of All Time... In fact, it might very well be in the Top 5. I'm one of those people who could NEVER read a book more than once, - unless it's for study purposes and I really really really I HAVE TO. I've always admired(?) people who can read a book over and over again. It's a special gift to be able to be "surprised" again and again by the same words on the same page. (It's different with movies, - they're no-brainers anyway...) I could enjoy reading a passage over and over again while I'm in the process of reading a book for the first (and only!) time, and I often do when I find something particularly poignant / meaningful / skillfully written. SO, for ME to say that I would go back to this book and re-read it, is a MAJOR thing. There's nothing particulary clever about Martel's vocabulary - I find Big Words incredibly boring anyway. But the storytelling is something else. Wow, what a story. I'm a big cat lover (as you know by now!) so there were times when I didn't know WHOSE side I was on, but what I do know is that it was physically painful at times to hold my breath until I knew everything was going to be okay. I think I was expecting a Disney Fairytale when I heard about it? Maybe it's the cover that misleads you, so the first 2 chapters kinda threw me. But once I got into it, I was hooked. I could taste/hear/see/feel/smell every change in the weather/water/sky/sun that Pi experienced in his 227 days on the water.
If there's one book you read this holiday, make it Life of Pi. The story is meant to be a sad one, but there is so much hope, strength, resilience and beauty in it, it has to be one of most uplifting books I've ever read! Ten out of five, Martel. Ten out of five!
(Thanks, Noodle, for lending me your copy. I think I just might buy one of my own soon!)

Jorling LATE on a Saturday night...

So Brendan and I ditched the dumb concert and went off to Suncoast Casino. My mom wanted to try her hand at some gambling and we offered to give her a lift home after the concert. Little did we know that we'd leave the concert so early. But I'm really glad we did. Brendan, my mom and I ended up having the time of our lives!!
We started out by losing a bunch of cash on the slot machines. (When we lose, we lose with STYLE! Everytime the machine made a noise - any noise - we'd do a little dance, much to the amusement / confusion of the serious gamblers.) Then a drunk guy walked up to me and slurred a "Hello. I love you...", to which I responded, "Oh. Thanks, hey." Brendan laughed about that all night long. And nows he's starting a vicious rumour that the only reason I'm still single, is because I'm too picky. In his version of the story, the drunk guy was a perfectly presentable young man who cared about me very deeply. Hmff!
We ended the night off with a bottle of wine and a seafood dinner at the John Dory's, at the casino. It was wonderful! The food and service were great, even at that time of the night.
By the time Brendan drove mom and I home, we were pretty wasted and were falling apart in a fit of giggles everytime we thought about the drunk-guy-in-love...
All-in-all a great day/evening/night out!!

Jorling on a Saturday night...

Well!!
Let's just say that my brother and I should have stayed at jorl number ONE (the BBB picnic).
We managed to score comps to the East Coast Radio Birthday Concert so even though we had no idea who was performing, we thought we'd go. (Everyone else was raving about the line up... So what the hell, right?)
WELL!!
The first sign that things weren't going to go so well was when we were still queueing to go in. Let's just say that there were far too many 16 year old girls in cropped jeans, knee high stilettos and poor-boy hats for my goddam liking. (GROSS! I'd like to bitch slap the person who invented the poor-boy hat. I think it might have been those losers from Oliver Twist. The Artful Dodger, my freakin' butt! He won't be able to dodge one of MY klaps!) And the REALLY worrying part was... most of these 16-year olds were with their parents! Sadly Brendan and I were clean that night, otherwise anykind of hard dwelms might have helped... a little!
So we eventually got in and decided to make the best of it... SOBER! They were only selling soft drinks and beer - neither of which we drink. (Groan.)
And then the music started...
Followed by the rain.
By the time Bananarama started (yes... BANANARAMA!!) Brendan and I had had ENOUGH! I was really looking forward to yelling "Sing, little leprechaun man, SING!!!" to Ronan Keating, but alas, he was coming on far too late and we were ready for the next jorl!
So we got in the car in the poring rain and drove off to jorl number three... or "jorling LATE on a Saturday night"!

Jorling on a Saturday afternoon...

So I managed to crack the nod to the Bean Bag Bohemia picnic this year, thanks to my friend Gail. The theme was Black and Bling, so I pretty much wore all black and every piece of jewelery that I own... Oh! And I made sure that I had the biggest hair there! The girls and I got there on time (ie. TOO EARLY) and ended up getting completely wasted in vodka and red bull (FREE!) before the food even got there... Nice. The food was really awesome, though. It always is at BBB. Lovely sushi, pizza, chicken/beef rolls... and the dolmades were to die for!
I think it would have been a really late night for me if the NEXT party for the evening wasn't waiting for me! So off I went to party number two, or "jorling on a Saturday night".

Like Water for Chocolate *** (for STYLE not CONTENT)

Here's what the reviewers say: Like Water For Chocolate is a deceptively simple book - a love story set in Mexico, interspersed with recipes, related in unadorned, uncomplicated language. Yet when the ingredients are combined and simmer, subtle and unusual flavors emerge. On one level, this is the story of Tita, youngest daughter of the formidable matriarch Mama Elena who forbids Tita to marry her true love Pedro because tradition says that the youngest daughter must care for her mother until her death. When Pedro marries Tita's oldest sister in order to be near Tita, it begins a life-long conflict filled with passion, deception, anger, and pure love. Interwoven throughout the narrative are the recipes, which, like an ancient Greek chorus, provide an ongoing metaphorical commentary on the characters and their culture. Finally, there is the food itself that Tita creates as head cook on the family ranch, food so vibrant and sensual, so imbued with her feelings of longing, frustration, rebellion, or love, that it affects everyone who eats it. The combination of all these elements, with a good measure of the supernatural thrown in, makes for an earthy, quirky book, sad and funny, passionate, and direct, told by Tita's grand-niece who follows in her footsteps, using her cookbook and continuing a tradition quite different from the one her great-grandmother tried to impose. (From 500 Great Books by Women; review by Erica Bauermeister)
Here's what I say: GIMME A GODDAM BREAK!! How any woman can love a man who marries and makes babies with her SISTER just to get close to HER is beyond me! Laura gets 3 stars for style. (I like the way she paints a picture, and the recipes are a nice touch even though it's highly HIGHLY unlikely that all of them work. I do a lot of baking and cooking, and some of those recipes looked VERY strange to me.) But she gets a big fat ZERO for content. I have no patience for people who feel they have to be stuck in a shitty situation forever, just because that's their lot in life. Bollocks. I found the protagonist irritating and furstrating... And as for the love of her life??!! He's lucky he died when he did. I wanted to kill him myself! All I can say is, THANK GOODNESS it wasn't a long read. i don't know if I could put up with the whining for another 50 pages!!!

The sun is shining!

I wish I could send you a pic of how beautiful it is today. The sun is shining; the sky is the bluest it's ever been; and I'm working outside on the deck, with the sunshine sparkling off the pool... WHAT A DAY!
That's one of the great things about being a free agent. While all the other boring, old stiffs are working indoors in the sterile air-conditioning, I get to work with the sun on my shoulders, while I sip on something cool. It's nice.
It's not going to last very long... But it's still nice while I can enjoy it.
There are so many things going on in my life right now, but I'm not gonna zap them with bad mojo by talking about them before they come to fruition, Just bear with me, but DON'T STRESS! I'm doing well.
Even though my cousin Lyn isn't going to be with us and I'm going to miss her very VERY much, I think this is going to be one of the most amazing summers for me... EVER!
So... back to your dumb desk you go!
I'm going to take the laptop into the shade, poor myself another fruit juice, and watch the trees swaying in the afternoon breeze. Ah! What bliss.

Man. What a crazy world we live in...

If you scroll down this page, you'll see some pics of my cousin Lynette and me on the "Wow! I'm getting really nifty with the ol' flat irons" blog from a few weeks back.
Well... Lynette died in a car crash a week ago and I'm devastated. She was 35, married and on her way to work.
I wish I could say more, but it's too hard to get anything out.
I'm angry.
I'm sad.

I'm just over bad news and funerals.

I'll be posting some nice pics of the two of us growing up together, just as soon as I can bring myself to look for/at them.

Anyway. Peace.

Here's to new beginnings!

Hey friends!

What a crazy couple of weeks this has been...

I've quit my job and I'm officially on The Adventure Of A Lifetime.
I'm sorry that I haven't updated my blog over the past couple of weeks, but let's just say... I've been MORE than a little distracted.
I can't give you all the details about my new venture just yet, seeing as I'm still fine-tuning the details, but it is going to be SO cool when it all comes together! (Why did that sound like something out of the A-Team?)

Please bear with me while I sort out my internet at home.
I'll be able to blog more often once that's done... Promise!

You can mail me on: carmen.gabriel@gmail.com

Later! xox

HAH!!!

I knew it.

Ponies are cool.

Here's my brother, Brendan, with my little cousing Tatum at the birthday party. They were keeping the ponies company while I was attacking the trifle at the buffet table. Trifle is even cooler than ponies. It's a close one? But the trifle wins.

Barney is the devil.

Can somebody please explain the Barney phenomenon to me?
I guess kids dig him, so that's all that counts. He does make me really nervous though. It's like I gotta wonder about the freak INSIDE the costumer. And those songs... Crikey.
These are some pics from my cousin's kid's (Kelcey) first birthday party a couple of weeks ago. There is Barney stuff EVERYWHERE and the kids went completely ape.
There were no major casualties so I guess all's well that ends well.
Except... well... I'm still seeing purple wherever I look.

The Ranting Bruino - “Lies”

You know what really grinds my beans?
Lies.
Boy, the thing that really gets me is, the that lie itself (that one little moment of untrue stuff that’s said/done) is not the beginning and the end of the lie. Oh no! There’s all the sniveling, spinelessness, cowering, ducking and diving, fake smiling, alibi-ing, whispering, cowering, pretending, … the amoeba-ing that goes on before and after the lie.
Lies! LIES! It’s all lies, I tell you.
And for somebody who really tries every freakin’ day to keep it real? The lies stink.
Why waste all that brain space on remembering The Lie and all the padding that comes with it? - who to talk to, who not to talk to, what did I say to whom and when, what to say to say-and-so and who to leave out completely.
Just be honest and you don’t have to take up all those brain cells remembering a whole lot of kak.
Maybe some people get off on lying?
Maybe it’s an illness?
Maybe some people can’t tell the difference between fact and fiction.
Maybe it’s pure laziness to do the right thing?
Maybe some people don’t give a rat’s hiney about anyone but themselves and lying is the only way they can feed their own selfishness while saving face at the same time?
… But I think that most lies are born out of cowardice. It takes a lot to face yourself and tell the truth – especially if you know that you’ve done something really un-cool. Trust me! I know. I’m Catholic and there’s no bigger fear than going into confession and telling someone face-to-face with a total scumbag you’ve been. And whatever you may feel about Catholics / Catholicism / confession, it’s GREAT practice for Real Life… Examining your conscience, seeing where you’re wrong, apologizing and asking for forgiveness. (Shiver!) And the biggest thing about confession is that you can NEVER do that bad thing again… Ever. (Double shiver!)
Man! You think you know people, but don’t. You actually really don’t.
So cover your back and safe-guard your heart.
You never know when some sucker might come along, lull you into a false sense of security and then whip the rug out from under your feet with a few well-chosen half-truths.

Phew! That felt nice.
Enjoyed it? Well then look out for the next installment of The Ranting Bruino, where nobody is safe.
Are you the taxi driver who tried to push me off the road this morning? Look out! The next episode might just be about you and the state of our South African roads! Argh!

Lifestyles of the not-so-rich and moderately-famous (in Durban)

Hey bloggers!
If you've already had a gatvol of popping into Carmen's World to see what I'm up to, and all you get greeted with (AGAIN!) is a picture of me with my silky hair, I DO APOLOGISE!
I've been in Cape Town for a week on a tv shoot. And I'll be going back for another week on the edit.
So this is really just a little "Howzit!" to let you know that I haven't forgotten you. I've thought about you all everyday. And I'll be using up all my weekend-minutes calling you this weekend to see how you're doing.
Watch this space for pics of the shoot and my recording with... wait for it... SOUTH AFRICA'S TOP ROCK BAND, PRIME CIRCLE!
How friggin' cool is that?
I flew up to Johannesburg last week to sit in on the recording of their latest track, and the next thing I know, I'm getting dragged into the recording booth to sing back-up vocals!! "No way!" I hear you shout... Well! YES way!
Those of you who have heard me sing will know that I don't exactly have a "hard rock" type of voice. James Hetfield's job is not in Kak Straat if you know what I mean? So it sounded a lot like "Marry Poppins does Prime Circle". (Hey! Wait a minute. That sounded well porno! Anyway.) But after the band stopped laughing so hard that they were CRYING (:-() they ASSURED me that I'd be "in there somewhere"... Poison!
I was also doing some crazy-mad flirting with Marco (the bass guitarist). He nearly signed my boobs, but I chickened out... Argh!
Next time, I suppose.
I might be seeing them again sometime soon, but I'm not holding my breath. Who knows where I'll be jet-setting off to tomorrow, hey? Sigh.
Anyway! Be cool, Durban. And don't break anything while I'm gone!

Wow. I'm getting quite nifty with the ol' flat irons, hey?

Here I am on Saturday with my shiny straight hair, sitting next to my fave cousin, Lynette at her niece's 1st birthday party. What did we ever do without flat irons, hey girls?
I tell you what I'd be doing... I'd be sitting there on that sofa with a fuzzy hairline and more hair gel than N'Sync went through in the early years... or later years, for that matter.
GHD for president!!
GHD FOR PRESIDENT!!
VIVA GHD, VIVA!!

Sorry for ignoring all THREE of you, my dedicated followers...

... But things have been a little wierd in my world over the past few days? Weeks? Months?
I dunno.
Know how people say they're having a kak day?
Well I'm having a kak life!
And so to put it all in words, I've decided to create a little blog alter ego, - an Eminem to my Marshal Mathers, if you will.
And I'd like to call her The Ranting Bruino.
Those of you who watch the cartoon network as religiously as I do would know that on Sheep In The Big City there's a character called The Ranting Swede, who basically takes a spot on a stage and mouths off on the totally unrelated, arb sh1t that hacks him off. See him in the pic? Cute, hey?
WELL!
I wrote my first Ranting Bruino "rant" a few days ago, but I haven't published it. I'm one of those people who's always thinking about the consequences of my actions... The ramifications! The ripple effect! I gotta consider my conscience. Will I be able to sleep at night? Will I be able to look myself in the mirror tomorrow? Or will I have to avoid all reflective surfaces until I get distracted and I forget?
Typical libran, I guess. (Scales of Justice, Do unto others, etc etc etc.)
Not everyone is made that way, I guess. And those are the people who are giving me all the ammo I need to hop on my ranting soap box and give it hell, lately.
I'm not going to publish the first one that I've written just yet. I might write a bunch, jumble them up and print them randomly, - purely to protect the identity of the so-called "innocent". (Snort!)
And here comes the best part! To all my fabulous design types out there... I'm looking for a cute cartoon illustration for my Ranting Bruino! It's gotta have elements of me in it, and preferably in a ranting pose, like that of the Swede herewith. I'd like to post the cartoon along with my rants everytime I have one. So GET DESIGNING when you can (*giggle*). Best one wins a bottle of cheap wine, but all will be published for all the world to see!

Ain't it great to be a lady?!

I've just spent some time checking out the new Gucci, Oscar de la Renta, Chanel, Dior and Zac Posen collections on style.com. Do take a look if you're into fashion. The Oscar de le Renta collection is just so feminine and elegant. I love it!
Here's a taste...

Boy!

The chinese really will eat just about everything!
After living in Taiwan for a year, I can honestly testify to the fact...

I blinked! AAARGH!!

... Which means I not only look a little "chunky" in this shot, but totally drunk too!
This is Carla, Tracey, Helen and myself at The July. It was fairly early on, and I was absolutely sober at this point, which is why you can imagine how upset I am at looking totally wasted.
Pfff.
I give up.

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time *****

Amazon.com says: Mark Haddon's bitterly funny debut novel, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, is a murder mystery of sorts. Fifteen-year-old Christopher John Francis Boone is mathematically gifted and socially hopeless (diagnosed with Asperger’s Syndrome), raised in a working-class home by parents who can barely cope with their child's quirks. He takes everything that he sees (or is told) at face value, and is unable to sort out the strange behavior of his elders and peers.
Late one night, Christopher comes across his neighbor's poodle, Wellington, impaled on a garden fork. Wellington's owner finds him cradling her dead dog in his arms, and has him arrested. After spending a night in jail, Christopher resolves--against the objection of his father and neighbors--to discover just who has murdered Wellington. He is encouraged by Siobhan, a social worker at his school, to write a book about his investigations, and the result--quirkily illustrated, with each chapter given its own prime number--is The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time.
Haddon's novel is a startling performance. This is the sort of book that could turn condescending, or exploitative, or overly sentimental, or grossly tasteless very easily, but Haddon navigates those dangers with a sureness of touch that is extremely rare among first-time novelists. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time is original, clever, and genuinely moving: this one is a must-read. --Jack Illingworth, Amazon.ca --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
I say: If there’s one book you read this year, make it this one! I found it strange to get into at first, almost like you’re reading a doctor’s report on someone, but once I understood it, I couldn’t help but lose myself in the story. The Curious Incident shows us how weird it is to be us, “normal”, when you look at our behavior through the eyes of someone who everyone else would consider to be “weird”.

My horse finally won!

Three cheers for number 9, “Eye of the Tiger”, the winning horse in the 2006 Vodacom Durban July! I couldn’t believe it! I never have any luck with gambling, so when I placed my bets on number 9 (because that’s my lucky number and my cat, Beena is part tiger) I never thought I’d see any money from it. In fact, my horse from the year before might still be running the 2005 race as I write this! I put about R30 on him and made R164... YAY!
A great big THANK YOU goes out to my mom for getting us the outstanding tickets to the SABC tent. And thanks, SABC, for getting me totally trashed on Johnnie Walker, stuffing me full of chocolate mousse, and playing the most ROCKING tunes around. I felt no guilt scoffing all that chow and knocking back the Johnnies when all I did was dance, dance, dance! What a great workout.
On the down side, The July was so packed (±50 000 people!) that I couldn’t get to my friends scattered all over the place. I stepped out of the tent at one point to move around and check out the fashion, and couldn’t get back in for almost half an hour! People were pushing and shoving. Argh! I hate crowds.
My dress was a success. No wardrobe malfunctions, thank goodness. And I even managed to get the odd glance from a couple of hotties in the tent – BONUS!
Mom and I were pretty wasted by the time we got home. All in all, a wonderful time at a wonderful event.