Identitiy Crisis?

Hej everybody!
Sorry for the lack of posts...Actually I started writing a loooong post about current affairs (the death of a famous politician [Haider] in my homecountry and other stuff like that) but somehow I never finished it...
Anyway, here's a fresh new post...Actually I can't write much, because there's not much to tell.
I feel a bit weird at the moment...I got up quite early today to get started with my master thesis. My goal for today was to find the topic I want to write about and after some thinking and researching I found the topic I really want to do. Now I have to write an Exposé to give to the professor...I started writing it, but I need to do some more research, especially about literature. And I have some more questions about all the stuff, so I need to contact the university this week... Anyway, I also did a timetable with deadlines...I want to be finished with all the annoying bureaucracy in late november, which means that I could start working on my thesis in december..if everything goes well.
Sounds fine, doesn't it? But it's also scary, because I really don't know what I want to do with my life. Until now I always had a "plan" for some years. Back at school I wanted to succeed at the A-Levels and go studying...After I had achieved that, I wanted to be a good student and go abroad for 1 or 2 semesters. Well, as most of you know, I did that. After coming back from Sweden my planning started to get a bit "dizzy". Of course the goal for the next few months is writing my master thesis, but afterwards? I have no idea.
Right now I'm doing an internship, which means I work a lot and I have my daily routines. But when I think of doing that/living like that for the rest of my live I get scared. I'm 22, in my mid-late-early 20s, which means I have (hopefully) many many maaaany years to look forward to. But do I really want to sit in the office from 10-6 for the rest of my life? This is what makes me scared. On the one hand I'm the kind of person who feels better if everything's planned and secured. I want a job, I don't want to live day by day and see what's going to happen. On the other hand, the thought of doing what I do now for the rest of my life, makes me scared. By saying "doing what I'm doing now" I certainly know that I will change work. I won't stay in the company I'm doing my internship - but who knows what will happen next. Maybe I will write my master thesis in munich, working part time for the company...but I really don't know what I should do afterwards.
So, you see, I'm missing a plan. :P

Other than that and the master thesis, my life is OK right now. Munich is OK, I got used to it and the bavarians, but I still don't enjoy it that much. Munich is really not my favourite place to be, but maybe this will change some day. I don't have enough time to really hang out with people and I guess that's an important reason for feeling uncomfortable in munich.
Anyway, that's it for now...
bye
m.

Springtime for ....

Hello everybody!

Just came back from a wonderful weekend in Vienna... I went to the zoo, went to see "The Producers" and to some museums...It was a really nice weekend, I enjoyed it a lot. My personal Highlight was the Musical "The Producers" - it's so damn funny! The songs are OK, there's no real hook-line, but the lyrics are really funny, the actors were great, the set was amazing and the choreography was great too!
As I said, it's really funny...and it makes fun of nearly everbody - gays, men, women,... Some of the jokes were a bit tough (a gay hitler in a musical called "springtime for hitler"...) and I guess not everybody feels like laughing about it...but me and my boyfriend, we had a blast in the theater :)

The zoo was nice too...I've uploaded some pictures of cute animals ;)

Anyway...tomorrow I will go to the Amanda Palmer concert in munich - I'm so looking forward to that! She's amazing and I've heard that she's an amazing live artist, I can't wait to see her..and probably meet her, because apparently she likes to take pictures with fans...who knows ;) However, I hope there's some nice Merchandising stuff to buy ;)

Bye,
m.

a cool Amanda Palmer song:

Music :)

I thought it's time for some new songs...

Let's start with Frankmusik, an english producer. He made a lot of Remixes (most recently for Radiohead...) and he will release an album in november. "3 Little Words" is the first single (produced by Stuart Price) - and it's so much fun! So is the video too - I want to dance on a piano-thing like that too!!
Frankmusik - 3 Little words


next, let's listen to a band whose album will be among my Top5 albums of the year - TV on the Radio. Very groovy, very nice production...perfect :)

TV on the Radio - Golden Age
(the audio quality isn't that good :-/ )


one of my favourite US-Indie Bands are going to release their new album soon...and that's their first single, enjoy :)
of Montreal - Id Engager


Let's get a bit calmer...with this beautiful piece of music. I discovered Ólafur Arnalds last year, when I was in Sweden. I think I read about him somewhere... Anyway, I ordered his CD and fell in love with his beautiful arrangements. And the video to this song is very beautiful...
Òlafur Arnalds - 3055


Last but not least, some german music. Rosenstolz, one of my guilty pleasures ;) It's from their new album...the album is a bit boring, in my opinion, but that's one of my favourite songs of it.
Rosenstolz - Wie weit ist vorbei

Hej :)

Hello everybody!

A lot has happened since my last entry...so it's time for an update.

Last weekend many people from Karlstad/former exchange students came to Munich for our "reunion". In Karlstad we planned that we will meet again at the Oktoberfest and somehow we decided to meet on the last weekend of it.
Hong and Sina arrived on Thursday evening, we had dinner together and had a really nice evening in our kitchen. It was almost like it used to be. It was weird, because I realised that I haven't had such a nice evening since I'm back from Sweden. Of course I had nice/funny evenings with my friends back home, but it's different. We don't cook together, we don't sit on a table and just talk - we go out, have a blast...which is nice, of course, but different. Anyway, on friday we strolled around Munich, met Lena and picked up Elisabeth from the station. It was sooooo nice to see her again!
We went back to my place, had a small pre-party and went back to the city center to meet the rest of the group. It was so cool, Lucia booked a table in an Irish Pub and we were around 20 people...it was so great to see them again! We had a funny evening at the Pub...but we didn't stay for too long, since we had to get up early for the Oktoberfest.
So on Saturday morning, 8.15, we were at the Oktoberfest, in front of the Schützenfestzelt. It was crazy how the people tried to get into the tent. They were pushing and yelling, it was worse than on a Robbie Williams concert. Anyway, we managed to get in and got a table.
Honestly, the mood inside the tent was really good. I don't drink beer, so I drank "Spezi" but I had a good time anyway. People were standing on the benches, singing to stupid german songs and just having a good time, it was really nice. The fun ended when the securities came to throw us out of the tent - our table was booked at 1 o'clock and at 12.15 they started to throw us out. They didn't give us a chance to get to another table, they just pushed us to the exit. Very harsh and very unfriendly. Most of us still had their glasses in their hands - including me.
So there we were, standing in front of the tent, in the rain..freezing and wet. After some hours of looking around and discussing we ended up in a Bar in the city center, where we had something to eat and drink. And in the evening we went back to the Oktoberfest were we sat in a beer-garden :)
So that's a summary of the Oktoberfest... on Sunday morning we took Elisabeth to the station and in the afternoon Hong met a chinese friend - and I went to the Premier of HIGH SCHOOL MUSICAL 3. It's quite complicated to explain, but an editor from BUNTE offered me to go there. So I went there, saw all the screaming teenagers standing next to the red carpet and thought that I should turn around and go back home... Instead, I tried to call the editor, but she didn't answer the phone. Helpless I wandered around and thought about what to do. I didn't have my ticket, because she told me that I should call her. I wasn't standing on the guestlist either...so I went to the press-counter and asked them if my name is on the list. Nope. So I explained them that the Bunte-editor is waiting for me but that I can't get in touch with her - and they gave me a press-card so I could get into the press-area next to the red carpet. I was standing there with my small digital camera, next to all the journalists with the huge cameras..and took some pictures of the celebrities that walked past us. Kai Pflaume, someone from Topmodels, and the actors of HSM 3 of course.
Afterwards I tried to call her again, no luck again...so when the people went into the cinema I left - because I didn't have a ticket (just the press-card, which wasn't valid as a ticket). It was a weird afternoon...I felt a bit like a cheater because I managed to get into the press-corner without actually doing something press-related :P

Soooo, that was my exciting weekend. Exciting, but not very relaxing, that's why I'm quite tired today...
good night ;)
M.
PICTURES OF THE OKTOBERFEST

:)

Just a very quick update... I drove home for the weekend, to meet some friends and...get away from munich *lol* (no, it's not that bad ;) ).
Anyway, tonight we will watch some movies on DVD, eat an unhealthy amount of crisps and popcorn, drink coke, lemonade and juice until we get a sugar rush and watch kitschy german chick flicks and bland american comedies...I'm looking forward to it - I haven't done anything like that since I'm back from Sweden. Oh how I miss the cosy evenings (or Sundays) with Sofia, TV and popcorn..and Melodifestivalen or a DVD.

However...what else is there to say...not much, to be honest. I work...a lot.
Next weekend we have our "Karlstad-Reunion" which will be nice, hopefully. I'm really looking forward to see everyone again..especially Elisabeth, Hong, Sofia, Eva, Sina...and maybe even Jonathan! :)
So, I will write more on monday...If my fingers aren't too fat and greasy after the crisps-overdose tonight ;)
manuel

Take my shoes off...

Ok, the following text will be about an artist. Some of you may know the artist, and some of you won't. It's Kate Bush.
Why?
Well, on friday evening I took the train home to Austria..it was dark, raining and cold. The raindrops hit the train window and it was a quite scary and strange feeling, sitting there in the moving train rushing through the dark night. As always I was listening to my iPod and for some reason I turned on Kate Bush' CD "Hounds of Love" from 1985. I bought it some years ago when I finally decided to check out Kate's music, but I haven't listened to the cd for ages. Actually I just wanted to listen to track 1, "Running up that hill", but I kept on listening. I was in awe. I was amazed. For the first time, I really seemed to understand that whole album. Do you know that feeling?

For your information, "Hounds of Love" is considered to be Kate's best work. It includes "Running up the hill" which was voted to be one of the best pop songs of all time (the lyrics, the beat [for that time],...amazing!) and many bands covered the song (Placebo, Within Temptation,...).

It's a concept album, which means that she tells a story on the album; It's divided into two parts - the first 5 songs belong to the "Hounds of love" part, the other 7 songs belong to the "The Ninth Wave" chapter and this chapter is about a woman who is drowning.. Sounds scary, eh? And oh yes, it is... I really had goosebumps during some songs (I hope the guy next to me didn't realize it :P )

Anyway, as I said, for the first time I really understood the album and its full beauty. Before that I listened to it, liked some songs (especially the first half of the album) and never really thought about the story. Which is a shame, because that's a big part of the album. Maybe it was because I was still in awe of Kate Bush' "The Dreaming" when I bought Hounds of Love (The Dreaming is still my favourite cd...even if most people think it's too weird..I just love how she used samples and backward vocals -> check out "leave it open" for a good example..the last minute is just...wow). However, this time it was different and I could focus on the lyrics, the great production (she really used all the technologies that were available at that time...and her way of working with the panning is really cool - in this song, for example - but the youtube audio conversion destroys it :( ).

Ah, well...I guess you get my point *lol* If you're not afraid of some music from the 80s that, obviously, sounds like 80s music, go and check out Kate Bush ;)
I will end this post with the video to "Cloudbusting", another great song of that album...notice how the beat gets faster

Sorry if this posting bored you, the next one will be more exciting, I hope/promise ;)
m.

back to (blogging)life

Hej!!

Quite a while has passed since my last post...sorry for that. But I was too exhausted/uncreative/sluggish for writing a new entry...Finally, here it is ;)

Sooo, where to begin...
Work is fun, but it has been quite busy for the last few weeks, but I won't bore you with that. What's more important - some quite important decisions concerning my future have to be made in the next few weeks. It's not fun at all, since I hade making decisions ;) I don't want to write too much about it, since everything is just developing and nothing has been settled yet.

Anyway, last weekend I (finally) drove to Frankfurt to visit a good friend from my university. It was a really cool weekend and it was soooo good to see him again :)
And Frankfurt is a really nice city. Smaller than Munich, but so much cooler, imo. I don't know why, but I felt much better there than in Munich. The thing with munich is, that the city itself is quite nice. The buildings are old and nice, the streets are old and nice, the traditions are old and...well, nice...but the people are old (or young) and not so nice. And the whole atmosphere in munich is a bit weird. It's really hard to find the right words for it, but every city has a special atmosphere for me. Salzburg, for example, had a nice atmosphere, I was very comfortable there. London or Vienna, two totally different cities, have a good atmosphere too (at least for me). Ancona (Italy) was the first city I visited where I thought "oh, I want to get out of here". I don't know why, because the city is really nice and sunny...but I had such a strange feeling the whole time I was staying there. It's similar with Munich. I don't hate the city, it's just that I don't feel too comfortable here.
2 weeks ago I went downtown after work to meet a friend. I was too early (as always) so I strolled around the meeting point and that was the point when I realized that I don't want to spend the rest of my life in munich (not that I was considering it anyway, but you know...it was just one of those enlightening moments). The people that passed me, small things like the silly newspaper headlines on the newspaper stands, the terrible supermarkets, the chaotic street system, unfriendly people who shouted at passing cars...everything happened around me, and I felt like screaming. That was the point where I made the decision - I don't want to stay in Munich longer than necessary. It's just not my town.
But who knows, maybe I will change my mind. Of course, munich has some really lovely places. The "Gärtnerplatz" or the area around the Sendlinger Tor are really nice parts of Munich...but it's still Munich, even if it tries to look like some italian city.

Another thing I was thinking about on my way home today - all the people who I met in life so far. Especially old school mates. It's shocking how I lost touch with most of them. Even some really close friends from elementary school, which I considered to be my "childhood friends" - no contact at all. It's sad, but that's how life goes, I guess. There are just a few people from my school time that I'm still in touch with, but they are really good and close friends...which is good, I guess.

However, it's getting quite late and before I bore you to death with more of my "thoughts"...I better go to bed now ;)

Here are some pictures from Frankfurt/Mainhattan :)
m.