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January 30, 2006
Photos from the 5 Tram
Today on my way home after eating breakfast at Tunnel I shot these photos. I often look out the trams and I think about where I am and how I got here. I think sometimes about our purpose here on earth and these kind things. Sorry to be writting about these "heavy" topics. Sometimes people dont talk about these things. Not that I know my purpose or anything. I am just trying to enjoy life and life it to the fullest. Not sure if that means anything. Maybe I've been programed to say that. HaHa. any way, hope someone out there finds this interesting. Saw a nice movie called Rize today about battle dancing in L.A. There has been a lot of hype around this film and althought I think it was a nice movie with a good feel message I can't help but feel the hype was a bit too much. It made me expect more from the film. Sought of unfare to the film. I'm glad for David LaChappelle, not to be mistaken for Dave Chapell. I found it at times humors when references were made to the Clown dancers. I felt like it was a mix of Boyz in da Hood meets in living color. You remember Homie the Clown... Homie don't play that!! It had a good sound track... Ghetto Gospel, Tupak, Elton John written by Marshal Mathers. I found that very interesting. Here is the official movie website -->click here<--
I know you guys have been pissed off because you can not leave a comment but I'm not sure what happened. My friend Martin is looking into it but he's really busy these days so just bare with him. If you really want to leave me a comment then email me at: victor@jouvert.net Thanks!!
Posted by Victor at 11:46 PM | Comments (0)
January 25, 2006
My Comments link isnt working
I know you guys have been pissed off because you can not leave a comment but I'm not sure what happened. My friend Martin is looking into it but he's really busy these days so just bare with him. If you really want to leave me a comment then email me at: victor@jouvert.net Thanks!!
Posted by Victor at 10:29 PM | Comments (0)
Nikon Sucks!!
I had some problems with my camera back in November and then in December. As a result I didnt have my camera for my trip to New York in December. I also had to pay for the first repair out of my pocket for 184 euros (about 220 american dollars) I've been trying to get reimbursed since then and been having no luck what so ever. My warranty is running out in about a week and a half and I'm really not feeling happy with my camera and Nikons customer service. Besides the two problems I was very happy with my camera but now after the poor customer service I feel that I've been let down and I feel at the time when I decided to go with Nikon instead of Canon it was a big mistake. I'm posting this just out of frustration. Lets face it Nikon is a giant and my little problem and me not being treated justly isnt going to affect them. I just wish once that the consumer could win. These big companies get your money and then we have to deal with bad customer service, warranties that are barely worth it. What happened to companies standing by there products. I had a problem a couple of years ago when I bought an MP3 player. It was a Rio Karma and it was hyped at the time to be the best alternative to the expensive IPOD at the time. Needless to say it ended up being a piece of $%#! and their customer service disappeared and eventually the mp3 player stopped functioning with in 2 years of the purchase. So I don't know what is the point of this. Any way Nikon Suck!! I will eventually sell my Nikon online and buy a Canon maybe. Who knows if there are any better. Ha Ha Ha, I know some people who swear by Canon and I've seen some of there really nice Cameras and they just look better built. We'll see what happens...
Posted by Victor at 09:37 PM | Comments (0)
January 19, 2006
Dr. James
After class yesterday a group of us that are taking German courses went to our usual hang out, Tunnel, and had breakfast (FruhStuck). So we talk and get to know about another but we also practice german with eachother because not all of us know a commone language. I get to communicate in English, Spanish, and German. Its an amazing thing. So we talked in german for about 45 minutes. I'm really happy with my new german course and I'm happy the way my german is coming along. Later on in the day after my Wednesday basketball game I went to eat with a couple of friends that play with me and was able to speak some german with them as well. I'm glad that some of my friends that can speak english sometimes speak to me in german and make us have a conversation. Its great and Its good practice. Monika and I have some conversations as well. So this is a picture of Dr. James. He is from Scottland and is here in Vienna working at the university in the math department with another friend of mine, Shantanu. He is here with his wife and two kids.
Posted by Victor at 10:09 PM | Comments (0)
January 18, 2006
Portraits
So, my birthday was last week for those of you who missed the day, but thats not why I mentioned it. I got one of the best two gifts since getting my camera for my birthday last year. That brings up another story I will save for another posting. So this year I got a bottle of wine that is as old as I am. This was amazing and also gave me the belief that I'm not so old because this bottle looked to be in far worse shape as I do. Although I dare not ask which of us would taste better. hee hee. Monika, don't answer that question. Now the second gift was a photography book. Its called Photography and its written by a man named John Ingledew. Its very basic but very informative. I am enjoying very much. I'm not sure but I was thinking maybe as I read the book I could post pictures while I'm in certain chapters that match what I'm reading about. I tend to mostly take portraits so that is easy now. We'll see when I move onto other chapters how I do. So here are two recent portraits that I took.
Posted by Victor at 02:07 PM | Comments (0)
January 13, 2006
David
David is one of my classmates from my first german course. He is the one that convinced me for the second course to take a class that met 3 times a week rather than 2 times a week. Today I thanked him for that. After my first experience of 5 days a week of german, I was tramatized. Not because my previous teacher was a bad teacher, but because 5 days a week was too much for me. I'm a slow learner, a slow going person. I take my time to do things. I rather get it right but take a long time to do it. Any way this is David and he is like 22 years old as are some of the students I encounter. As I tell David, I can live vicariously through him. I encourage him to enjoy life and have fun. I also tell him the joys I have because those crazy times are behind me and I cherish what have and what took me so long to find. David is from Spain so its cool because in addition to learning German, I get to practice Spanish too!! I've been speaking more Spanish in Vienna than I do normally in New York.
Posted by Victor at 11:15 PM | Comments (3)
January 12, 2006
Photoshop
So the other day I met with my friend Martin and we hung out and talked about what was going on in our lives and stuff like that. We used to do this more when he was staying with me in the Bronx back in New York last year. So any way its always fun to hang out with him. He gave me some tips on how to use Photo Shop, a photo editing software,this is an important step among others to help me to become a photographer. There are many things that I need to learn so this photo is a photo that I posted the other day but this time I tried to do what Martin had suggested in a comment on that days post, so lets see how this looks. I will start doing some tutorials that Martin showed me online too. Thanks Martin!!
Posted by Victor at 02:15 PM | Comments (0)
January 11, 2006
Back to Tunnel
Getting back in to the German course groove. After class the cheapest place to eat is Tunnel on Floriangasse. Although some of my old classmates went on to level 2 and and few of us went to 2a we still have breakfast in common. Depending who is present determines how much german we speak. Today was Miro, from Brataslava and when he comes to breakfast we speak more German. As he always says, " nur deutch, bitte." Its kind of cool because then I see how much I can really communicate in german with him. We talked about skiing and maybe he'll come when I set up a ski trip sometime in February. This photo is a guy named Nasser, from Tunisia that also goes to the university. I'm not sure if he is studying german also but he found his way in to our breakfast club last trimester. A new addition was a new classmate from my german 2a class, her name is Jonida and she is from Albania. She is taking german so she can begin studying architecture. I'll be taking more photos of the group on friday. I really enjoy the mix of people from different parts of the world that I encounter at the university. In my class are people from India, Africa, South America, Europe, America and Asia.
Posted by Victor at 02:48 PM | Comments (2)
January 08, 2006
Skiing @ Oetscher
Oh yea!! Monika, Alex and me went skiing this saturday to a place called Oetscher that is about 2 hours away from Vienna. We were there from about 10:30 til about 5:30. I brought my camera along this time on the slopes and even on the black trails. Overall I think I was a bit cautious in the begining but by the last three times coming down I forgot about my camera and was skiing with out hesitation. Alex remains the quickest by far and Monika was practicing something that Babsi and her talked about on our last ski trip and her and Alex talked about this ski trip involving our type of skiis. Our skiis are the short ones also called fun carvers. they allow for easier turning and if you turn at the right intervals you can actually pick up speed in a nice way. So Monika was much quicker than before. I was happy at least once or twice when she complimented me on my speed and control. I did fall about two or three times but really just controlled stops. These slopes were more crowded than the ones I had been on before and due to the beautiful day I'm sure people were not taking much of break. I have to say that on this one day I felt more exhausted than the four days of skiing on our trip a couple of weeks ago. I was able to play around with my jumps and show off a little bit for Monika. hee hee. As I've been saying for about two weeks now, I LOVE SKIING !!! Here you see just some of the photos from that day. Again anyone going skiing or wanting to go skiing don't forget to give me a call!! Thanks to Alex who after an exhausting day on the slope and after driving us there drove us back home while I slept and surely snored. ;-) Oh by the way that last picture isnt Monika and no she didnt fall. If anyone thinks that then I'm deadmeat. I took the picture because I was amazed that someone else had a retro snow suit like hers from the 70's. hee hee. I love you! mwah!!
Posted by Victor at 06:39 PM | Comments (1)
January 07, 2006
Monika's Picture of Me
This is a picture that Monika took of me on the way to go skiing. I really like. I like that I was asleep and she wanted to capture me in this state. I didnt know about these photos until I was going through my photos of that day. I like little surprises like this.
Posted by Victor at 06:58 PM | Comments (0)
January 05, 2006
Me
So today I browsed a few photoblogs and a few websites of friends of mine and strangers alike. It seems this time of year many people are in a self examining mode, looking for the answer of life or just searching for something. Any how i decided to go with the crowd and post some photos of my self that I took last November when I was sporting a beard. I might let it grow again for the winter but I heard it might slow me down on the slopes. Any how I wouldn't mind getting you guys to post some comments from time to time but its alright I get enought feedback in person when I see people and I know you are reading from time to time. C'mon click on that little comment button below. Just write BOO! or something. BOO HOO! GRRR! AHHH! what ever your choice. You could also tell me something about your New Year Reflections. You can click -->Here<-- to see the rest of this series of self portrait photos.
Posted by Victor at 03:30 PM | Comments (0)
January 02, 2006
Now that all the hype is over...
Now that all the hype is over, all the holidays past lets talk about resolutions. New Year's Resolutions. A year ago I had a conversation or conversations and I came up with an idea that I will try again this year. I decided not to have any resolutions except one of course. I named the year 2005 the year of MODERATION. I have to say it worked. It means that I didn't say no to anything or rule out anything. A little bit of this and a little bit of that. I came up with this idea because I saw that with me and with many people there is this tug of war or see saw of life decisions where people say I won't eat this any more or I won't drink this anymore only to be met with set back after set back and followed by binge eating or drinking so I realized or I theorized that if you dont put so much pressure on yourself by depriving yourself of the normal wants and desires that come everyday then you won't have this pressure building up and eventually do more harm to your self mentally and physically. Maybe a bit dramtic but there is some sense in there some how, I promise you. So now I name the year 2006 the year of gluttony. haha. Just kidding, I name it the year of Moderation 2. How original? What can I say I'm american some of our greatest movie titles are sequels, The GodFather 2, Star Wars: Episode II, Gremlins II, Reanimator II, Rambo II, Jaws 2 uh, ok maybe not but anyway its the year of Moderation 2 which just might be an excuse not to make silly resolutions where I won't do this or eat this or drink that. blah blah blah. Its also a way to poke fun at the millions that bought excersise bikes this winter that will just become places to hang your dirty laundry. Oh by the way I just told Monika that I havent bathed this year, haha. How is that for Moderation. Maybe I'm trying to do things the European way. ;-) The pictures below are from our New Year's Party. It's my 5th year straight of having a New Year's Party and obviously my first in Europe, in Vienna, or anywhere else than New York. It was really great and we had a great time. I will put the complete photos on my website tomorrow along with the ones from Christmas. Ok Gute Nacht! Bis Morgan!
Posted by Victor at 09:21 PM | Comments (2)
January 01, 2006
Happy New Year !
As hard as I tried not to write a sappy entry this holiday season I can't help it. New Year's Day for me as for many is a time of reflection and contemplation. I think for me with a year that has had so many changes and has brought me half away across the globe to live and experience a life that is entirely different than I have ever known. That in itself enough to have me in deep thought but added to that I am happily engaged to be married and in an amazing relationship ( I didnt think this would ever be possible, I had given up on the idea of finding the special person that was out there for me.) Monika and I are experiencing a new life together. Living together and learning more and more about one another as well as about us as a one together. I am learning german, enough said there. I also find myself working as a photographer for the first time in my life. There are so many new things that are happening. I'm just learning that I love skiing. I am playing basketball every week with a group of guys and girls that are Austrians. Monika and me work out 4 days a week and try to keep in shape and eat healthy (most of the time, hee hee. My friends and family here are growing to be just as many as I have back in New York and my friends and family in New York are in touch with me and doing mostly well. Who knows what tomorrow holds for me but I feel one thing is sure, there are many new things for me to see and do and I want to live my life to the fullest. I want to do it all see it all. I love life and more so I am happy with my life. With my decisions and very happy that I changed my life about 7 years ago and back then it was so scary but things since then just kept getting better and better. I am so fortunate and thankful to everyone that has helped me and everyone that I love. You all know who you are. So this is the end of a sappy posting but what the hell. I hope all of you have started out this year in good health and good spirits!! See you soon and keep in touch!
Posted by Victor at 08:03 PM | Comments (2)