Amber

Photographic Evidence: 30-August-2010

Oh, hello! I haven’t done a week in review for a while, I guess I overload with the photos when I’m traveling and when I’m back I just want to leave the camera at home for a while… I can’t believe how much has happened, Europe feels like so long ago.

Let’s start with evidence that Auckland does have some secret architectural gems. Also, I took this photo from a lane… Durham Lane! Lanes, alleys and little nooks are what maketh a city.

gothic

The Auckland Zinefest a couple of weekends ago was a pretty fun day of small press, bigger and better than last year. {Ooh, look what I was doing in August 09}

Zinefest 2010

It was the lovely Meg’s birthday on Tuesday night, so we ate lots of yummy Japanese and drank from a large can of beer at Tanuki’s. The tofu steak there is delicious!

Beer!

Wrapping presents with tissue paper printed with a small mouthless cat.

hello present

A present for me! My friend Tessa gave me this cute narwhal badge. I offered to give everyone stick tattoos with it. Thankfully, they all declined. Easier to wear it, right?

narwhal badge

I have been going to Revel a lot. I really like their bagels with pesto, and their dinosaur table numbers. I always feel like a winner every time I get it! They also have Space Invaders, which is a nice way to while away a Monday morning with a cute boy.

Dino 16

pesto bagel
tea

And finally, from Saturday night: me before a wonderful party, and my friend Mon in situ at the party-  hanging out on an awning!

hi

Mon

❤

{ 3 comments }

Disposable Memories

down & out paris

coffee

london

underground

deluxe bike

copenhagen park

swan

tivoli

Why 35mm? The thrill of opening up that packet. Finding out what worked, a few visual surprises and a reminder to use-the-flash-goddamn; it gets me every time.

{ 1 comment }

Cool Brittania

meow

Doesn’t it look just like a kitten’s ear? But nay, it’s a SEAT. I popped down to Sheffield on the train to see my dear friend Richie and meet his family. After 5 years of hanging out all over the globe (we met in NZ, then took on Bangkok, Tokyo & New York), it was so nice to meet them – and for I hope for them to meet the girl who’s always hogging the middle of the holiday snaps.

reflection

rock sugar

lace curtain

And now for a few more London snapshots:

from the tate balcony

hydrangeas

laundrette

carousel

gloucester road

I’m now home, ensconced in the chilly arms of Auckland. Thanks for having me Europe – you’re so cool. Can’t wait to develop my disposable camera pictures (yow). See you again soon!

{ 0 comments }

London Makes You Look

made you look

pendants

M is for Malice

breakfast-club

crosshatch

your scales

dressesthe 5'oclock shadow

London in the summer and everyone looks good. Boys on bikes, strappy sandals, street parties. Vintage dress stores crammed full of wonder and people keeling over under the weight of Primark bags. Newspapers flapping to quell the heat of the tube. Holding two pints of beer, dripping with condensation, and watching London Pride celebrations. Dancing to incessant samba. Cooling down with cups of homemade lemonade with mint, rosé and a splash of Pimms. Good friends, new friends, adventures. I love this city.

A-mazing

PS. Best of luck to my amazing friends/hot babes Lissa & Mikey & Felicity who are all moving to London. RIGHT NOW. I’m simultaneously jealous & misty-eyed…

{ 3 comments }

Back To The City Of Lights

back to paris

After 4 amazing nights in Copenhagen, I went back to Paris for the day, minus my luggage. It was kind of romantic to have all of one’s belongings in a Marché Franprix bag. Well, that’s what I kept telling myself – liberation!

metro

it's art

i'll-be-lightening

colourwheel

That circle is freshly painted! I watched the artist finish his work, pack up his stencil and scurry away. I also witnessed the gallery owner arrive back from lunch and stamp her feet at the new addition to the pavement. There’s quite a few colour wheels around Paris.

back again

birds

garedunord

Finally it was time to jump on the Eurostar and chug through the Chunnel back to London. For more travel photographs, check out my ’10 Euro’ set on Flickr.

{ 1 comment }

København

nyhavn

beach

Lending library

i scream, you scream

Living building

Copenhagen is ‘pretty awesome’. I’ve spent three really beautiful days here. Let me paint you a picture: it’s hot-hot-hot, there are no clouds, and there are lots of fluffy cygnets swimming around the lakes (swans are the national bird). I hired a bike to get around on; it’s a city bike,
big and plush. Young is the most gracious host and her apartment is a pocket-sized delight.

On Sunday night we watched the soccer (great game Germany, schnell!) then went to a local park for an outdoor grill. You can buy little portable charcoal burners at the supermarket, take them down to your local patch of grass and burn baby burn. So much fun! Also, the sun doesn’t go down till 2 am and comes up at 3. The birds get up then too.

sunset

{ 4 comments }

One Day We’re Going To Live In Paris

one day we're going to live in paris

heineken

baguette

My first glimpse of that tower

salade

Untitled

gargoylecarousel

Croissants, space invaders, marvelling at the Lourve, remembering Amélie, cute puppies, giant salades at bistros, eating cheese on bread (and using my student ID card as a knife), spending hours people watching at Sacré-Cœur, the Dreamlands exhibition at Pompidou, descending into the catacombs, Palais de Tokyo, skinny pants/big hair, more falafel, a sun that never goes down.

{ 5 comments }

Markt In Berlin

On Sunday morning I cruised around a few of the markets in Mitte; U8 Bernauer Str. if you’re ever in the ‘hood. I drank fresh orange juice, fingered florid cable-knit cardigans, inspected Aha records, and wished I could lug a whole bunch of the crockery home with me. Somewhat thankfully, I don’t have a kitchen, let alone a shelf to put these dream teapots on, so the idea was quickly dismissed (yeah, we will see how “But you don’t have a wardrobe works”). Photographs however, I can take away and give to you:

juice

to market

boxes-of-all-sorts

Paloma

frames

chairs

Markets explored and desires conquered, I popped into Bonanza Coffee. To my delight I was able to order a flat white; the perfect end to a morning’s exploration.

{ 3 comments }

My Beating Heart In Berlin

the red flowers

Berlin is ace. I’m having a blast here, doing decidedly non touristy things. I started off with one of those fantastic Continental breakfasts in a cafe. This little coffee tray made me very happy. Aesthetically pleasing, heart wrenching coffee for only 1.5 Euros…

1.50 euro

My friend Tana took me on a blazing saddles bike tour of the city on Saturday afternoon, which turned into drinking bier on a pontoon. (Tana is one of those awesome friends who will drink with you from Auckland to NYC to Berlin… where next?)

pontoon

tana
dane

lagerbierhell

The merrymaking went on till dusk. After another wee bike ride I wandered home past some magnificent architecture, bought myself some falafel and fell asleep for 12 hours…

Berlin at dusk

(PS. Totally cute, the wifi connection I’m on is called Knut, like the polar bear. They really do love him!)

{ 2 comments }

Amsterdam

Oh, Amsterdam, what can I say? As you know I caught the overnight ferry from England, then a train to Amsterdam Centraal. It was a couple of days filled with sunshine, canals and so much good art; Vermeer, Rembrandt, Van Gogh.

amsterdam

straight on

Water reflected like graffiti on the belly of a bridge…

reflections

I took the opportunity to eat cheese for breakfast…

dutch cheeses

roses

This reminded me of the Kew Garden glasshouses…

glasshouses

xxx elephant

Some moments I couldn’t visually capture: A Brazilian family jamming at a restaurant while crowd gathered round to watch the football – the proprietor ended up sending them a round of cigars. Scratching my head outside a coffee-shop while contemplating at which velocity liberalism hits tourism. Phenomenal break dancing street performers. Seeing the hottest dude (ever?) then noticing his Bon Jovi tour t-shirt and track pants. Gazing at the wonderful doll houses of Rijksmuseum. Sitting and reading on the edge of a canal, then losing my shoe to said canal, after taking my dangling a bit too casually!

canal

I liked Amsterdam a lot (and hope to visit again soon, scratching more than the surface), but after 3 days it was time for me to head east to Berlin.

{ 3 comments }

All At Sea

Recalling the days of epic sea voyages, I spurned the Eurostar and decided to make my first foray to the Continent via boat. It was the most modern, well managed and comfortable travel experience I’ve had, and I saved the price of a night’s accommodation too. It was fun to go to sleep, wake up, and disembark in another country straight after breakfast.

at sea

coffee

When I emailed my parents about the trip, Mum replied “We sailed from Hoek Van Holland to UK 29 years ago with our shiny new bike!”

The thought of blazing a similar trail to my parents makes me really happy. It will be fun to compare snaps when I get home… Although I bet Parkin takes on Europe will be much more stylish circa 1981.

{ 1 comment }

Kew Gardens, London

One morning I took the tube to the very quaint and leafy suburb of Kew, home to the Royal Botanic Gardens. I had a splendid time exploring the grounds, reveling in nature and chasing squirrels (they never fail to elicit excited flailing from me).

garden path

Near Queen Charlotte's Cottage

Squirrel

fluffy

waterlily

Everything was orderly, the water lilies were blooming, and you could walk for hours and still find more vistas to marvel at.

Palm

Constructed between 1844 and 1848, the Palm House is considered an icon of Kew, along with the boxier Temperate House. The glasshouses are home to a selection of ‘exotic’ plants, like creepers and the palms of South America. The Temperate House even has a big, graceful pohutukawa from New Zealand.

Temperate

lake

kew door

It was the architecture that struck me the most, especially that of the Palm House. It’s said to be one of the world’s most impressive Victorian glass and iron structures. It felt like a gigantic bird cage, with ornate spiral staircases so you can flit to the roof and look down on the jungle below.

Kew Gardens

iron ribs

Iron Maiden

{ 2 comments }

Block Rockin’ Beats From Korea

You’re my sweet people.

{ 0 comments }

I Got Glassehs

It was the little things that bothered me… Not being able to read the drinks board at bars(!), a few headaches, catching the wrong bus, and once, mistaking a bicycle for a very short person. Everyday my eyes were deceiving me in new and shameful manners. Time to get my sight checked.

(Yes, admire my poor edit of this ad)

I tottered up the road to my local optometrist, which by sheer good luck happened to be Occhiali, a store known for its fashion forward approach to eyewear. I went through a barrage of fascinating tests, confirmed shortsightedness and then moved on to the fun part – choosing frames.

LA Eyeworks: They design fun plastic frames in a huge range of colours. I like the owl-like look of these Pip frames but they would make my face super-duper round.

Ksubi: I thought about going brand-matchy-matchy with my sunnies, by getting the most extreme pair of eighties jammers out there. They certainly made a statement, but would I want to make that statement every time I went out to dinner with my parents? That said, they also had some sweet fawny glasses.

Colab: I adored the round glasses with the keyhole bridge, and earnestly considered the very serious two tone frames from Colab’s range of optical eyewear…

The grand winner however, is a pair of gorgeous Chloé spectacles:

As Occhiali mention on their cute blog, oversized frames in neutral hues are big right now; plus they suited my (apparently very symmetrical) moonface.

Branding wise, Chloé is a class act; from the letter pressed box to little touches like a branded cleaning cloth and the tiny envelope with the warranty tucked away inside.

Despite the unexpected expense, I’m a very happy girl. Tip for pros: Occhiali offers a tax free service if you’re travelling internationally. As you might have noted, I’m in a hotel room in (South Korea), so they sorted me out a pick-up service at the airport. If you need prescription lenses and are going abroad soon, see if your optometrist offers this. It let me afford the cuter pair of frames, a sound investment! Alright, I’m off to sight-see now… literally.

{ 8 comments }

← Previous Entries

Next Entries →