in between

2007-05-31T13:06:00.000-11:00

even with all the time lapses, multiple time zones and being mobile, the flow, it's something that remains, that gives the possibility for a connection. I feel our global lives or art work are all about the in between. That undefined subliminal zone of movement. that is the zone where we can truly create.

the poetic of space

2007-04-11T18:40:00.000-11:00

I worked in a film where we traveled all over Portugal up north. After that, we traveled South: Portugal, Spain, Marroc, we went until Fes. By car. He went back Brazil, I stayed in Lisbon and I am now considering to move to London.

How poetic can be space: the geographic space, the one we see, the one we can touch, but also all the imaginary space, all the in betweens, all the shades and nuances of spaces.

How many kind of spaces can we cross? How does space influence the way we live in our body, in our minds, in our joys, in our freedom?

To travel to Marroc, to travel by land, feeling all the way, touching all the colors was a spiritual journey, a learning experience of freedom. I traveled just for fun, to enjoy, to relax on the way. Usually I travel for work, to shoot, to go to festivals... Now, that I am in Lisbon, without finding a job, with no money at all, I really feel I am in a sort of jail somehow. And I don't know what to do with my life... I feel arrested in this place without options or money, a place of solitude, very much alike an island. I am seeing London as an option to be able to find work. I don't see it as a poetic space, but more as an effective place where I can keep working doing what I do, being who I am...

INTRANSIT

2007-03-02T09:16:00.000-11:00

1st take of a very in progress of project that deals with living in two cities at once: nyc+ phlly

the spine of time

2007-01-16T07:33:00.000-11:00

time is a difficult element to deal with. sometimes a rigid structure, sometimes a blurry fog... where's the spine of time?

in the period I was living in philadelphia my time was structured around my creative work, creating art was the spine of my time. As I had a grant, I could wake up in the morning to work in my projects and be working all day, without the worries of finding money to pay the rent. That peace of mind, gave me also an availability to be with people in a different way. I had time to make friends, just TO BE. Here in Lisbon, my time has no structure right now, I haven't found work until today. So last days were lasy, just feeling lost, without being able to concentrate myself in any creative work... I was still moving some stuff to my new place, dealing with some practical things like going to the bank, insurence, and also to try to read, organize ideas but... Without any particular objectif besides the one of finding work, I found myself walking around the city, without any particular direction, sometimes it was nice, lisbon is a beautiful city.

I feel tired and I am sleeping a lot. I guess this city makes you like that... I know I have to find a new spine of time everyday, but sometimes it happens that I loose its track...

Tomorrow I'll start a new job, a short one, just 3 intense weeks working in a documentary. My time will be totally different from these last days. I will be working with a brasilian crew and we'll be shooting in Lisbon and other places around the city I really like, also places where I lived before or where I shot some of my films. Later we'll go to the north of Portugal for a week or two. I think that will be very nice, to travel in Portugal, in the countryside.

en transito

2007-01-11T17:54:00.000-11:00

hola amigas
hola claudia

te leo ...
a~noro sentirme como tu ...
sabes, la gente puede estar deprimida y triste en cualquier parte del mundo ...
claro, la novedad de salir de casa siempre es un factor que impulsa y lleva a unas fuerzas mas alla

y la realidad es que aqui en america nueva hay tanto: tanta tecnologia y facilidad para todo!
es verda hay mucho que aprender de aqui ... y mucho mucho que desaprender tambien!

tambien hay mucho que aprender de estar alla donde no se quiere estar! es balance...
entiendo que no quieras perder tu momentum ... eso es aterrorizante.

pero observa mira tu casa alla = espectacular!

por eso es que compartimos este blog por estar en el in bituin
ni aqui ni alla

yo conozco muy bien de esto

la verda es que por tres a~nos no he estado casi en ningun lugar
si no mas bien en un in bituin total
y ahora que voy a pronto aterrizar en un lugar = nueva york a fines de abril, me esta dando un panico!!!!

se dice que se quiere lo que no se tiene ...
pajaro en mano mas que ciento volando

o que sera que sera?

cuantas preguntas y vueltas da el mundo

la vida es una tombola tom tom tombola de luz y de color!!!!!

one step at a time forevermore

i trust you.

i am trying to trust me ...

love and good things

be were you're at that is all that matters for now.

2007-01-10T05:01:00.000-11:00

this is my house in lisbon...

It's funny that since I arrived I am much more in touch with my friends from philly than from here. I mean I am meeting people here, but they seem so far away from me the way I am now, as I changed a lot but they cannot see it and it is very difficult to explain how people change deeply. Of course they want to know how was it, but what I can tell them it's just so poor... that's why I feel my friendships in philly are so important to me now and I wish I could be staying, because I really feel my life is there at this moment, I was feeling happy there, maybe for the first time, at least in such a continuous way, being able to integrate myself with my art and others, without limitations or boundaries... just experiencing that flow was amazing for me.

You say about "the ballad..." that is "simple, direct and human", nice choice of words because it's how I feel myself and I am happy that I could put that in my work. When I started making films I was very concerned about the form, not exactly the technique but how to put things, ideas, feelings into film form, how to create beyond the rules, how to make something new... I discovered the pleasure of the camera and editing and I found I was talented for that and found out that film was the way for me to expresse myself and the world around me. My master - an old film director who lived in Japan for 10 years - used to say I was TOO talented... For a long time I thought how is it possible to be too talented with the camera or whatever?

doing films I realized - and even more in my creative time in philly - that I was forgetting a bit the content, my feelings were not clear or direct or simple... my ideas were blured, poetic, but with my camera I could give some beauty to things, I could trick myself or my subject, give them the tension and mistery I was feeling. I was abstract and the communication with the public was possibly also not very clear, I was not trying to send any particular message or make a statement, I was just creating atmospheres, sensations, forms (narative forms, editing experiences and so on). And I still think there is a lot of beauty in my first films and I like them and it is interesting for me to watch them and see who I was, who I am now. I think that is one of the big reasons for me to do films: to understand myself better and the world around me and people and relationships and human condition... yes, the human aspect became more and more important and now I think I can create many different levels of experience in my films, one is more direct and others underneath, like layers - I guess I could finally do that with my new script (Mobile) and it was very important to do it in a script / written form because forced me to really think very carefully in every single detail and in the orquestration of the whole. it took me around 3 years to be able to do so. and that is what interests me right now, to be able to talk with people, to portray their lives I must get close and understand them, so I need to be simple and direct, that is the key I was looking for. America taught me that, not in the sense of the "story / plot" and the "message" but even by my understanding of english language, so clear and direct... that made me think in a different way, also the computers, which made me think more logically... which for me was good!

and now here I am, in a place where people get sad and depressed because they cannot do their art and because they have to wait so long... and I'm afraid to loose the energy I had in philly where I was feeling so inspired from everything and all the friends I got and all the environment was giving me that dynamic... being displaced there, without roots or attachments made me look at myself and all around me in a very different way and I got deep inside to search for new things also outside of me. Being displaced, at first, was kind of painful, then was an inspiration and lately I was feeling part of the place (I remember walking on the streets smiling, just because I was feeling so happy!) and now, it is here in lisbon that I feel like a stranger...

claudia

en sandwich [ed]

2007-01-09T16:50:00.000-11:00

estoy aqui en la filadelfia [con la que suen~a claudia]
yo teniendo leves pesadillas de una tesis a la vuelta de la esquina

i am here in a sandwich of immediate past and up and close future
here in philadelphia [place claudia dreams of re turn ing]

all com press ed in the pre sent
voila here i am!

no place to turn to hide
in a sandwich in which the only thing i see is being here very present

with all that is as is.

i wrote this tuesday nite [saved it as a draft]
publish it tonite = thursday
and yesterday, the day in between it finally snowed- lightly flurries- [t]here: philadelphia
now here = NY
it is very cold now. actual winter here now.

In Between ... past and future.

2007-01-08T15:51:00.000-11:00

In Between ... past and future.
I finally graduated from college here Philadelphia, the city Claudia misses and the city misses Claudia. I'm in between past and future, difficult past in Tokyo, great past in Philadelphia, and unknown future that I wish to be full of joy and discovery, even with some pains, I'd want to take it.

Where I'm going to be?

I've been in Philadelphia since summer 2005, came here to just finish my undergraduate degree. It was simple. I was planning to hate America, finish school, and go home where all my friends are.

then what happened?

Philadelphia has became my central place of creation, where I can come up with ideas, work on stop-motion animation, and getting support for it from people. It has grew in my heart so much.
I discovered the strongest passion for stop-motion animation production with great creative partner.
If I go back to Tokyo, I won't have space and film equipments to shoot animation, and people who support me and encourage my creative activity, and no more collaborative work with my partner!
Yes, I'm really afraid to lose all that. Tokyo is full of reality that hurts me.

Nothing goes as I plan or expect. In another word, I think there is no connection between past and future. You can't cling to either of them. We all have to live in this moment, even though sometimes we become ghosts and lost in past and future of ours, with sentiment, sadness, happiness, and dreams...

Oh Claudia, Mr.Consumption has accepted to one of the small film festival!

THE BARDO OF IN BETWEEN

2007-01-04T13:53:00.000-11:00

For Claudia, who is just back in Lisbon, so happy to see you...soul 2 soul

Life is a flow and in this flow we construct and disconstruct our identity at every moment with every new experience. Like everything , identity is impermanent, just take a closer look, we are changing with every breath and step we take.
Who am I ? who is this I actually ? where is it ? it is forming and unforming, in evolution, in revolution, like a spiral. I is just a reference for organising experience, some kind of harbour for consciousness in our dual world. My body is the home for that no-body, for the I is like the waving of a tepistry. like Penelope, I undo it a night, because of the pretendants...
Identity is wild as the elements, under special circumstances it dilutes, dissolves, cristalises, evaporates, like water it is flexible and can can adapt to all lanscapes but it can also grow to a flood and kill you. We all know some people kill others in name of identity and pertenecy to an identity.
Identity is always in transit. it is THE place in between, but we don´t even notice it...
Life goes through it for there are no bounderies for the life flow, no borders, no countries, no you and no me and that is what we have to learn here, to love without obstacles.
In the west, through the speed of technology and material life, people are getting to discover they are in between. In between countries, places, homes, cultures, constructing identities that are so complex a patchwork that their original idea of identity crasches, often toguether with their sense of security ( the purpose of all this identity stuff anyway). It is an irony that in the material , highly technological and scientific part of the world, this fact is just beeing discoverded now, unfortunately, toguether with the collapse of anthropological diversity, through globalisation and speed of life.
In tibet ( or what is left of the tibetan culture) , we are entering now Loosar, tibetan New Year, and it will be the year 2133. Tibetans have always had a word for describing in between . It is called the Bardo. Everything is a bardo, we are always in transition between a state and a new state. So life itself is a bardo. Death is a bardo. Becoming is a Bardo. That is why all is a flow. That is why I do Taiji. To express that flow. In Taiji, I discovered, in the beginning you pay attention to perfection of postures. Then you start realising the transitions are important. Then transitions get more important. In the end, the posture stops existing, because there is no more, beginning or end posture. That is when you transcend the form. Stillness in motion, the motion of stillness.
that is where west met east inside of me.
Gabriela

limbo in NYC

2007-01-03T11:28:00.000-11:00

New York is my limbo now. an empty zone to rest and think about the past year living in the states.
a space of transition between Philadelphia and Lisbon, literally in between.
a time for friendship - thanks Noemi! do nothing, just to be...

a space in between
to rest, to sleep, to be overwelmed, to be afraid... to be sad... so many things happened... I feel confused, I want to come back... I don't want to go home... what will happen?

no words, just silence...

in New York I discovered a
super silent land!

on the streets

2007-01-03T08:26:00.000-11:00

I was downtown to buy the device to be able to have wireless internet. Since I arrived I am disconnected and I feel kind of detached, almost isolated in this new reality. I need to start working and for that I need to be online.

So this morning I woke up and went out by car. It was humid and foggy. When I went down the hill I couldn’t even see the river. I parked the car in my old neighborhood, I got my usual spot (where there’s no need to pay) and I could see the windows of my old house, the one I lived in before I left. The curtains have flowers now. I walked down the street and everything seemed very familiar. But it was not a particular happy feeling, just a dry memory. It’s interesting how there are so many little memories that were lost for so long and then appear, so vivid. That is happening to me a lot, not just on the streets but when I open a box and find some object that remind me a story, a relationship with someone, pasted moments… But this time I feel very distant of all that. I see the city and people walking in it in a different way. I can’t really identify myself here. And now that feeling is much more clear than before. Even if there I felt like a foreigner almost of the time, I know now that I do prefer that feeling than to be a stranger in my own town. I was having these kind of thoughts while I was walking and looking at people on the streets

It seems to me they are rude and disrespectful. I hate the way men look at women on the streets. I really get mad! I have forgotten about that too. It’s also amazing how many older people I see on the streets, it’s like there’s no youth in here, that’s kind of frightening, how is it possible to look at the future without young people? That feels sad, as the time has stopped here. And people walk so slowly and they look so alienated and sad. Their bodies are rigid, self-contained, self-repressed… I spend all day trying to connect me to the internet and it didn’t work. An entire day and I couldn’t had the internet hooked up, it is so frustrating…

new year

2007-01-03T08:24:00.000-11:00

I started moving into the new place yesterday. It’s such a beautiful house, very good energy, very quiet, it’s feels like countryside not the city; the air is fresh, super-silent! :) I still feel tired from the trip, I still can’t sleep well, still lost in time and space difference... I am landing, first the body, then all the rest… I feel I needed to create my own space after more than a year abroad living in rooms in a foreign city. This house is perfect for my actual state of mind: it doesn’t have any doors or walls as boundaries, it’s all connected. It’s not exactly an open space but all the spaces communicate between themselves in a very organic manner. I feel I’ll read much more here…

Last year I spend the New year’s eve in New York City in a nice party with people I didn’t really know. This year I’m home, a new one, once again. The weather is warm and the river was beautiful today, a little bit foggy in the morning, silver when the sun was shinning. Even that seems out of reality. I mean… for some things is like I’ve never left, but doesn’t sound like real, it’s strange, like I am living in a dream… it seems all my feelings here are activated by subliminal memories, things that I’ve never thought about it for a long time but they are the ones which give me a sense of belonging. I can’t even think about any example to make you (me) understand that, it’s just a general sense. With friends as well, it’s seems we saw each other just yesterday and that is a very good feeling, is the proof that friendship can remain...

About work I don’t have any idea what is going to happen. This week was just to land, spend some time with my family, to move in… I am still trying to understand what I feel – still feeling overwhelmed! It makes more sense I guess. And it’s strange that I am not connected, I mean, online. It will be a delay between my writing and the time you’ll read this. It’s more like a letter, which is not bad necessarily.

As I told you there’s no wireless in Portugal, I mean, not like America – everything is so slow here --today was the second time people thought I was a foreigner, which is funny… and looking at people on the street I think I can kind of understand why. People here look so constrained, so passive, so slow and afraid... I think now my body language expresses a certain awareness that people here find like foreigner. Maybe that’s why I feel I don’t fit here…

air

2007-01-03T08:20:00.000-11:00

I am in the airplane, somewhere in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. It’s night outside and I am a little bit confused with the time. It will be 5 hours difference. I am seating in the middle of a boing 747, listening to Suzanne in my laptop. Finally I am crying. I can’t help it… Around me people are sleeping, others watching films in little screens. Lonely and bitter this feeling of being crying in the middle of strangers.

I am in the plane to Lisbon now. I got a seat by the window. In London they are in the terror craziness! Just a bag allowed (impossible!), people walking in the airport without shoes, laptop in my hand… London is foggy and cold. It’s dawn. The plane just crossed the clouds line. Surprisingly the sun is shinning and the clouds bellow reminds a land of ice. By the window it’s warm and that feels so good…

hmmm. Just fall asleep for a bit… We are getting down to Lisbon already. The plane makes an unusual direction and crosses the river, goes until the beginning of the ocean and crosses the river again. It’s all so blue! The airport is in the city, so we flight very close to the buildings. The structures are not very aligned, but the new highways create a new landscape, things I had forgotten about Lisbon and all that is beautiful.

Just got to my parents house a few hours ago. Just eat and talk after driving by the river and ocean. I missed that blue…There’s no wireless internet in Portugal ☹ and I can’t configure my computer to their internet, I don’t know why… anyway I’m too tired to try, I’m using their computer, like that I don’t think I can use Skype... I’ll try tomorrow again. The fireplace is working in the living room by the Christmas tree and that feels comforting, but the house is very cold. Here houses are not prepared for cold… people thinks it’s always sunny and warm but inside it feels colder than Philadelphia. My sister will come soon with the kids, it will be nice to see them, I’m sure they grew up in the last 6 months. That’s so much one misses when being away… My nephew started primary school last october, he’s now 6. She’s 3.

I came to rest in bed but can’t sleep. Listening to Suzanne again… I have a lot to do tomorrow… have to buy the car insurance so I can drive to the city, see the house to rent, see some friends… I feel I need to make a lot of decisions and I’m afraid I can’t find work easily… I just don’t feel prepared to be here…

en blanco

2006-12-28T12:44:00.000-11:00

acaso en blanco es casi como entre medio?
con puntos suspensivos, rayas entrecortadas, con la palabra en la boca, todo torcido,
erijido en el pensamiento? arquitectura movil que cambia subitamente: entreteniendo o estremeciendo la mente en todo cuerpo y alma -
ay caramba!

puro sentimeinto [y no te miento]

and so i post my first entry in this blog.
i want to thank claudia for her visit and stay home this past weekend. it was great to have you here right before your huge transition and big in between ... a really huge reminder = con tan solo tu presencia... you about to fly back home

but... where is home?

[gasps anxiety more questions tangles in da gut ????? unresolved stuff...this is another entry ...]

you about to fly back home

lisbon, decided to spend a few days in NY right before you took off. we received you en nuestra casa - nueva york.

yes, i now have a home - it feels like. i have finally parked my smiling/barking pelvis here in flushing, queens at least for a week or two. then back to philadelphia for my last and final semester, which means i will finally move and land in NY after may 2007!

it feels SOOOOOO good to do nothing NOW. to slow down. to be in one place at least for a little while ... for it will all begin again very soon, but this time for a last semester - which means a bigger transition > in between is around the corner ... post grad school = what? life!?!?!?!?! where? how? why? what? how much? why? with? ...

so my in between-ness is lost amongst languages and virtual spaces - more than just two...
as well as very real places spaces realities.

belive me it is quite messy flighty chaotic exotic intoxicatingly anarchic
instantaneoulsy gratifying [ i would not have it any other way!]
a structured improv that has no beginning middle or end >>>> the only end i can think of is death,
and i am not quite ready for 'it' ...

so very work in progress here
all about evolution in motion with passion action and devotion.

for me it is all about trusting the not knowing > trusting the mysterious.
this is why i am an improviser. this is my profession.

this is why i practice / teach yoga.

these choices continually remind me how to see-ing how i/me is part of a way way bigger all ...
[i get lost often & w/ pleasure = all these planes to navigate / negotiate ... i call it inhabiting the forgotten space ...]

yes i am definitely a non linear thinker or person
i am ok w/o strucuture.

often i go in circles or spirals of emotion
round and round [when not beating around the bush ... ] i move slowly but surely

i am ok w/ getting lost and losing things

non attachment!

the unbearable lightness of being!

constant balancing and rearranging act

ah the pics that got erased remind me of the impermanence of everything
or how even what we think might not be threatened or tampered w/ so easily does not mean any thing is secure or stable. all but an illusion.

memory how it plays tricks constantly!

la mente
de mente
a mente ...

to be continued ...

noemi
actual mente en nueva york
proxima semana or so en filadelfia

siempre con el corazon en puerto rico.

IN BETWEEN??? what does that mean?

2006-11-24T16:21:00.000-11:00

What does it mean to be in between? In between what? 2 lines? 2 places? 2 homes? 2 languages? language and silence? nature and culture? is it just 2 different things?

From how many things are we in between? how many things are between us? how big is our world? I mean, our personal world, but also the universe... micro and macro tend to look the same to me. Stars and molecules, all the same. Part of the same flux. I can't isolate a wave from the next one, not from the previous one either... they are all part of the same movement.

If I can not isolate a wave, can I isolate this 'In between feeling' from all the rest around me? The physical world, the sun, the moon, the wind, my life, my experience, my memories, here and there, everywhere, my time, the linear time and my inner time...

where am I?... How can I describe this strange feeling of being out of the map... in between?

I know you understand it, because you feel it too. But I'd like to be able to write down a definition, to put that emotional state in words, even then I know words won't be accurate, they won't sound right. And why do I need a definition anyway?...

My brain wants answers. A life padron commands me and tells me to slow down. Words, answers, stability... is that what I really need? I already know I won't get it anyway. Everything is always changing and yet... this desire to understand and give sense to all these things that cross my mind, my way, my life, my space... as you can see, I'm feeling a bit overwhelmed.

In one month I will be back to my home country and the feeling of uncertainty grows. At the same time there's also something reasuring about going back. I start to think about the things, persons, places I like there and that feels confortable.

what about you girls? send me words,
how is it for you to be In between?

claudia

encontros virtuais

2006-11-20T06:55:00.000-11:00

dear claudia,
thanks a lot for your invitation! i love to participate and hope i can get familiar with the 'blogging'- it is a new subject to me, but which i am keen to learn more about . though i have a question ;who is reading the blogspot, just the people you invite or anyone from the entire web? i think that makes a difference- at least to me. how are you- i was always wondering if you'd still be living in philadelphia or back in lisbon and what you are doing? just shortly; i finished an MA in choreography at the laban centre, here in london. throughout that year i involved a work that combined live performance and video projection- that was followed by a masterclass for 'dance on screen' . we, six participants, produced 2 minute films which were screened at the place, in the beginning of the festival .
i haven't done a lot of shiatsu; i had difficulties with the nerves of my hands- and then how many things can you do all at once??? so after this extremly intensive year i am now wondering what comes next; curiosity mixed with a certain tireness of restarting again- third time that i have moved and live now in a different country - wondering about how to construct something valuable in this quickly changing, overwhelming stimulating world, and long term questions of where i belong to.. i am curious about this project IN BETWEEN and you reached me in a time where these questions related to the project are actual and relevant to me. hope to hear from you and all the rest of the group- so will i try to post' a blog' soon!
muitos, muitos beijinhos claudia & e até muito breve nos encontros virtuais. jiska

Where did October and Claudia go?

2006-11-20T04:26:00.000-11:00

What happened to October?
I think last time I saw you was in Octorber, in the tech center, you were trying to make a doctor's appointment. Then, you kind of disappeared! I never see you anymore.
And now, it's already past mid-November... I don't know what happened to October.
My memories about October are all so ambiguous and like stranger to me every year,
I can't remember anything valid, I don't know why.

Where is Claudia?

I've been working on the animation project (based on Grimm Brothers' fairly tale "The Sausage, the Bird, and the Mouse") 24-7, all the time. Making animation takes forever.
I only slept for 2 hours today... finally finished shooting. So tired.
I wanna go home and sleep immediately! We are getting our films developed tomorrow and digital transfer on Wed! Can't wait to see the footage!

My mother is coming to visit me from Japan, she's arriving tomorrow.
She doesn't speak English and she does not travel by herself so much, so it'll be a lot of work to have her here for 9 days (she didn't even know how to buy an airline ticket!).
It's so strange now that a story of my recent animation project is more real to me than my mother coming to Philadelphia all the way from Japan.

The mouse chopping vegetables, the bird walking in a forest, the Sausage cooking soup....

My consciousness and unconsciousness begin to fully move to Philadelphia from Tokyo, so I dream less about Japan and my friends from Japan. It surprises me when I wake up and realize I saw my family or Japanese friends in my dreams.
I'm too busy with my fantasy world that I have no time to write email to stay in touch with my people in Japan...

I always wish I can spontaneously exist in different places at the same time.
Don't you sometime feel that way, girls?

Claudia, did you decide or find a way to stay in Philadelphia?
I really want to stay...

Naoko
p.s My birthday is on this coming Saturday, I'll be 24 years old.

from Tibet

2006-11-16T07:11:00.000-11:00

Dear Claudia,

Hello my beautiful sister. Just came back from Taiji training and thenTibet 5 days ago. it was very hard coming back this time for Tibet is pure magic

Getting your mail was making me feel... home for home is feeling there are some people you just belong with and I thank you for beeing there and so alive.

I miss you, there is so much I want to tell you about. I´ll be very very happy to take part in this project, thanks for inviting me

I can not wait to meet other global sisters and make some Art with the joy and the pain of beeing global and talking about these important issues that are identity, home, and what travelling is really about...In Between is where I am

I send you lots of lots of love and a himalayan hug and some pics from Tibet

your Gabriela

dear friends

2006-11-15T17:14:00.000-11:00

dear friends,

this e-letter is to invite you to participate in the project IN BETWEEN - a collective blog art piece. Even if we are all different, living different lives in different countries, we have this feeling of displacement in common. You don't know each other, but I have a friendship with each one of you. Many times I think about you, but there is a physical distance between us. When we are living in the same town, well, there's always things going on, life nowadays is fast... Some of you are mothers, there's work, husbands, boyfriends... and our arts that we all try to pursuit, to improve, to struggle to make our best.

Noemi, we got this idea together: to make a blog to write about the IN BETWEEN of our lives, in a time where we need to make important decisions in our lives. The idea just grew up and I like it a lot. You, that are doing a dance and video piece called 'In transit'. We met recently but we are already friends. I think the feeling of displacement we both feel got us together, also a sense of critic, barking, creating. I am glad we met. We always runned into each other at tech center, without really talking, changing numbers and email addresses every time, without really writing or call... We share pertinent thoughts, we think a lot about our mobile world, we feel cultural contradictions in our bodies. Having yoga with you in a skyscraper in the middle of downtown is an amazing experience, with you I am learning how to stop, slow down. Sometimes we talk in Spanish, not often though, we are already thinking in English... You are from Puerto Rico and you live in transit between Philadelphia and New York, working here, having your shows and your husband there, traveling between 2 Chinatowns, dancing in that line in between...

Jiska, I think you are in London now. When we met in Portugal you were an actress and dancer in my film, then you were my shiatsu masseuse, when I was close to a breakdown, then we became friends. Because of you I decided to study massage as well. You were about to leave to Berlin and you told me you would work there as a masseuse for awhile. I thought that was so wonderful, to need just your hands and body as tools of work, being so free to travel...

Gabriela, I don't know where you are now, are you back from China? maybe you are in Brazil... but I know your root now is Lisbon because of your son and I also know how displaced you feel when you are in Portugal, you're home. You lived most of your life abroad, France, Germany and lately you found your 'home' in your trips to Asia where you go practice tai chi with your master every year. I miss having tai chi classes in the park with you. Last time we met you told me about the idea of staying a few months in Sikkim and write a book. It sounds like a plan. You invited me to go with you and I haven't forgot it...

Celine, we always met between Lisbon and the ocean. I won't forget that week in your place when you let me stay to write my script. It was wonderful and then I got sick... it was so windy at the beach... Last time we talked you were back from Greece where you bought a house and you were coming back from Switzerland as well, your country, where you went to film your video project with your grand-mothers. I hope you are working on that editing, I want to see it. Remember that last day of the workshop, in the park? Yes, you were first my student, then my friend. I always found interesting how you were between 3 languages, the french, your own, english, the language of your husband and portuguese the language of the country you live in, it was nice to see how you shift between them.

Naoko, my Japanese friend in America! You are the youngest of this group of women. I know you are trying to stay longer. You came to America very young, 17, right? Then you were back and forward to Tokyo, you lived some time in Toronto... You too, you have a global soul. Have you found a way to get a visa? any luck with work? We are living in the same city and even though... we should meet more often. You have to show me your new animations.

You are my first 5 guests for this blog. If you like the idea and want to do this, write me an email. I have to send you the passwords so you can have access and post IN BETWEEN. If you have other friends that you think might be interested, let me know. Remember that this is a work in progress and it is supposed to last for 1 year. It would be great if we could get in touch every week or every two weeks...

best,
claudia

IN BETWEEN

2006-11-15T07:11:00.000-11:00

IN BETWEEN is a collective writing and sharing experience using a blog. I invited about 10 friends, all women displaced in different parts of the world, with different experiences of living abroad. We are friends but we live in different countries, displaced around the world... this blog will be our place. A place IN BETWEEN, for dialogue, to change ideas, share experiences, explore new things... it can be a journal, a change of letters, images, words, feelings, daily life events... Even if we are in between, we need to feel connected.