This is Abdelkader Benali telling us enthusiastically about his reading 1q84, the new Murakami. He did this during (and in fact sort of opening) Murakami Night at Selexyz Scheltema in Amsterdam.

I am an unwilling Murakami fan. After reading the first book I just thought: well… , but in the weeks (!) after finishing the book the characters and the story kept haunting me. It ended up in buying a next Murakami. This happened about 4 times and after that I reconciled myself to the situation: I am a fan. So on hearing about the night about his new book I  put down my name immediately.

It was fun. Benali was infectiously, Christine Otten told us about the music in 1q84 together with Booktunes. We saw beautiful stills from the film Norwegian Wood, which we can see from 9 December 2010 (both main characters beautiful young people with handknitted scarves and hat (!)).

But Luk van Haute, one of the 3 Murakami translators, made me come up against hard facts. This was really, really informative and made me eat my humble pie. I used to say that you could better read the English Murakami translations, being much more readable and swinging than the Dutch translations. Well, Van Haute made his case clear: this is certainly true if you want to read adaptions instead of translations. Do read the English books if you want to read a Murakami in which translators decided to leave out things as: young girls drinking pina coladas, song titles, even whole parts of stories (in English it is the Wind Up Bird Chronicle and not Chronicles like the Dutch title). In short: do read the English versions if you are afraid of sex, drugs and rock & roll. And he gave many, many examples. So I will buy and reread the Dutch translations of Kafka on the Shore, the Wind Up Bird Chronicles, Blind Willow Sleeping Woman, After Dark. Of course, not a real trial. Wish I could read and knit at the same time…

Selexyz: well done! Do it more often!

This was KIP (Knitting in Public) weekend for me and I probably knitted less than not KIP weekends. But I had so much fun.

Saturday I made my contribution to make the city more beautiful with knit work: call it urban knitting. The cycle racks (fietsnietjes) were dressed in tight dresses, making a colorful picture in area of the Westergasfabriek. It was organized by BreiWerkWest and to be honest I really did like the result.

The weather was no fun at all and we finished during the first half of the football match. Tried to watch somewhere inside of the several cafes in the Westerpark but every place was crowded and noisy. I went home and managed to make such a weird movement that I heard my back snap. It hurts.

Aching back or not, nothing could withheld me from seeing ‘Nijinsky’, Cédric Ygnace really gave a masterful performance of the life of this dancer,of whom very little film images are saved.

The European Fiber Network (EFN) organized a wild hunt through Amsterdam. An act for 3 women, 3 wip’s, one camera and lots of creativity. Not particularly knitting creativity. We had to take pictures of several very Amsterdam things with a WIP, like endangered species, non knitters, animals, draw bridges, museums, trams, coffee shops, etc. We were so lucky to find an endangered species that was a non knitter and an animal at the same time that was willing to knit for us. I managed to fall again and also managed to take a pictures of that. Not for the competition, alas, falling knitters didn’t get you points.

Afterward we gathered in the OBA restaurant on the 7th floor. It would be nice to make OBA our regular knitting place for the Mondays. Enough light and big tables. Cassandra and Miranda added up our points and yeah…. Nancy, Jacky and I were the winning team. But in fact, everybody was a winner. It was a lovely afternoon, ladies. Thank you for organizing it!

It’s my birthday (thank you!) and look what my DH bought me for a present! I can’t stop looking at them. They are superb. Mara Skujeniece designed them. She takes much inspiration from her Latvian origins. Only Latvian origins could think about using cones of yarn as a source for art. I don’t think I will ever use these two as vases, they are much too beautiful.

If I ever win the lottery, I would buy time… new approach… photo, short text. Tell me if it works (well, it doesn’t, so it seems - troubles with the lay out).

This is the reason for not blogging so much. I started a study for translator English. Long story short: want to work more in the peace and quiet of my own thoughts without bureaucracy.

She gave me the Kreativ Blogger Award. Thank you so much, I feel quite honored. I know I should pick out 8 or so other Creative Bloggers. Of course, all of you earn this award. Take it if you want it.

I did a workshop Twined Knitting with the Dutch Knitters in De Afstap. It was fun (all the workshops with TDK are fun by the way) and I love this technique. This winter I’ll have nice mittens. See! De Afstap is my LYS nowadays. Five minutes cycling. Dangerously near.

Finally. I had a beautiful interview with a nice dancer… no, a nice interview with a beautiful dancer, in fact a handsome dancer. Yes. Well, let’s be honest, I could be his mother. I wish I was his mother. Wouldn’t I be proud! Go read about Peter Leung, follow the links and see his own pieces, or, go to the Muziektheater for the new programma of the Nationaal Ballet: 4 Temperamenten (4 Temperaments) and see Peter dance in the challinging Woolf by Dominique Dumais (I interviewed her too).

It was in the late seventees that I heard David Murray’s Flowers For Albert for the first time. On the first note and on the spot I loved it. I bought the record and listened and listened.
Records became cd’s. Record players became cd players and somewhere in between I lost my Flowers for Albert. That didn’t matter for a while, most of the music was still in my head. But after some years it disappeared and what stayed was only a good remembrance of music I loved.
After twenty years I started to look for the cd to replace my record, but it was never released. People who were very into jazz but a bit younger than me didn’t know ‘Flowers for Albert’.
Tonight, well technically yesterday ’cause I write this a bit late, David Murray and his Black Saint Quartet played in the Bim House. Oh, yes, he lost some of his freaky hairs, but it was a very good concert. He has a wonderful and original pianist - Lafayette Gilchrist - and a very lyrical baseplayer, Jaribu Shahid. Didn’t like the drummer Malik Washington. And you know what I did after the concert? Mr. Murray was in the BimBar and I dared to ask him this question: Mr. Murray, is there a chance that Flowers for Albert will be reissued? And he said, yes, in fact I just have to watch his website to see when and where and very soon I will be able to listen to ‘Flowers for Albert’ again. One happy woman!