I've always lived within an hour of Cardiff. It was either an hour on the train, or a half-hour drive, and there I'd be, firmly planted in the Big City. Nowadays, I live right in the heart of StudentLand, i.e. Cathays, where the Big City is a stone's throw away, and yet everything I need is on my doorstep.




Food

So, you wake up at the crack of dawn, and you stumble in to lectures. About 10am, you consider your first meal of the day, now that you're fully awake of course. With three hours to kill between Advanced Psychoanalysis A, and Introduction to Eschatology, the world is your oyster. But, do you grab a sandwich and cram some revision time in? Do you grab a flapjack, and head into town for a bit of shopping? Or is it all about the Trevithick Brekkie while spuriously rifling through your notes wondering who the hell Diogenes was, and why he is associated with Sherlock Holmes...?

In fact, it's none of the above. With time to kill, you deserve to treat yourself!


Ramon's

Far from being the best looking venue in all of Cardiff to eat your breakfast, Ramon's offers something that no other place outside of the Uni can: wholesome food at cheap-cheap prices. You can come in and eat whatever, for usually less than £5. The best deal is to come early, undo your belt a couple of notches, and settle in for the £4 Special Breakfast - with two of everything, and a special helping of bread and butter on the side, if you're still hungry afterwards I suggest you step it up to the Super-Mega next time you arrive.


The brilliant thing about this place though isn't just the prices. It's everything. It's your typical 'greasy spoon', so it's filled with workmen, electricians, plumbers, truckers, and every hungover student from here to Roath Park. Getting a seat some days can be a mammoth task, but, the friendly, inviting staff are always happy to have a chat and don't mind throwing extras on your breakfast (at an added cost mind you). And when all's said and done, the only thing you want to do after a Ramon's breakfast is go back to bed, and sleep it off until the next day, when ultimately, you'll return for some more of those perfectly cooked morsels of hearty, homely food.


The Mackintosh

Okay, so your breakfast break has turned into lunch. You've got the afternoon off and you've got a bit of cash to burn. You could go to the Woodville, but, stuff that piece of commercialized, mainstreamery. What you want is some real food, at real student prices, without feeling like you're sitting with the trendy Wendys, who are only in the Woody for its epic hot chocolate and the ability to have a cheeky pint so close to the library... If you've never been to the Mack, there's nothing that can describe what is a jewel in a sea of plastic baubles.


Food-wise, there's naught more satisfying than one of their curries, or even their pasta, in the middle of the day. It's all so cheap you'll consider bolstering up the price with a pint, or even by asking to make the meal that little bit larger - otherwise, it's criminal that you're getting such amazing helpings without breaking the bank. What makes it even better is the fact that once you're sat in the lounge, you don't feel like you're in Cathays, or even Cardiff for that matter; it's high-class pubbery that you don't tend to find - it's not all polished wood and fancy phrases like Gassy Jack's or the aforementioned Woodville. It's a slice of homeliness that is rare, but definitely worth a look-in any day of the week.


The Woodville

I know, I know; I'm a hypocrite. The Woodville, personally, screams (aha, geddit, Scream Pub?) commercialized, mainstream fluff. It's just a tool to drag you away from your studies to sit in a drab, half-assed pub that only does half of what you expect a pub to do - when the milk runs out, they don't get some more, despite your cravings for that epic Hot Chocolate on a rainy day... BUT, what they do is cook bloody amazing food. So they are forgiven.


Say you have a few hours to kill during Freshers' Week, or of an evening, and you don't want to break into that jar of Grossman's pasta sauce, the obvious choice is the Woodville. Nobody in their right mind would pass up a Piri-Piri chicken here; or one of their monstrous burgers. It only gets better on summer nights when you can sit out in the beer garden and while away the hours - eating, or not. A student institution. If you've never been here, you've never been a Cardiff Uni student.


Mango

Rarely has there been a place so overlooked. Mango's is all you could want from an intimate bar. The thing is, it doubles as an eatery, but from looking at it you wouldn't think so. In fact, Mango is one of the premier Tapas institutions in the Cathays area. Snuggled away on Cathays Terrace, opposite The Flora, it provides a hideaway for all those students who want a pint of Peroni in a real Peroni glass; a dish of garlic prawns, tomatoes and feta, or any number of Tapas combinations.


The only downside of Mango is, due to its relatively niche market, it isn't really the cheapest place in Cardiff. I'm sure you could go to La Tasca and get bigger portions for the same price; I'm sure you could go to numerous bars and get Peroni cheaper. But, what you get here is amazing service from the friendliest staff in all of Cardiff - who cook the nicest tapas I've tasted outside of Spain, and who are genuinely pleased to see you giving them custom. Well worth a night-time visit if you feel like splashing out, but, best to take a party of people so you can spread out the cost. (£100 between 20 people on last trip)



Drinks

So, your day is over. You've had a bit of a long one too. That lecture on The God Particle was really too deep, and you weren't in the mood for those two hours of The History of China. So, you slink home, head hurting, and slam your pile of work onto your desk. "Sod that!" you think to yourself. "The seminar isn't until next week." So, you waltz into the kitchen and proudly announce "I'm off out for a drink, who's up for getting lashed?" The only problem is, where do you all go?


Gassy Jack's

Definitely the heart of StudentLand, but maybe not quite the soul of it. Gassy's is amazingly placed, close enough for those on Woodville Road to work up an appetite for one of their amazing cocktail pitchers; but not too far away for the Freshers in Gordon Hall to head on over and whet their whistle either. It's quite the venue, spread over the ground floor and a mezzanine balcony, you get two sides of the same coin here - some nights, you can be the only person there; others (particularly when the footy is on) you can't move for United fans, and Psychology socials.


What makes this place worth a visit though is just how it's not exactly a pub, but not exactly a bar either. It's got that friendly pub atmosphere, with that bar elegance and chic. You can walk past it every day and wonder what's going on in there; but only when you go inside, and sample some of their finest pitchers and pints do you really get a feel for what being a student is all about - cheap, cheerful, and a great place for a full-blown night of drinking or a pre-lash.


Koko Gorillaz

Just across the road from Gassy's is the real Institution of Cathays. This place is on every student's lips when they finally get their bearings. "Where are we going tonight?" "Oh, I don't know...I was thinking maybe start in Koko's..." And that is the phrase that is heard year-in, year-out, in houses across Cathays and Roath. Every pub crawl, social, and night-out worth its salt takes a detour via Koko's hallowed halls and flagstone floors.


A brilliant place for a pre-lash, what with their 2-4-1 cocktail deals, and the finest array of simple-yet-elegant mixed drinks around - white russians, Long Island iced teas, and the ever-popular Purple Rain. With band nights and the infamous C-Y-N-T occurring here every so often, Koko's passes the boundary of being a pub-bar and enters into the word of being a pub-club at the top of every student's drinks list.


Buffalo

Venturing outside of Cathays briefly, we find ourselves on the fringes of town. We're not quite in the Centre, but, we're happy enough. A visit to Buffalo is not for the faint of heart or shallow of wallet. It's an experience - people go there for the pre-lash, but end up staying for the night. With their range of exotic beers (such as Finland's Lapin Kulta), and their free-entry-before-11pm policy, Buffalo attracts a fairly open-minded crowd. It covers business-types and student-types; all-in-all, it's one hell of a place.


Buffalo also puts on bands, to rival its sister club 10 Feet Tall, and its nearest competitor Clwb Ifor Bach. With not-so-big names playing regularly as part of Bethan Elfyn and Friends, it really is a place of discovery where you can settle down with the finest beers, the finest of company, and while away your night without worrying about where you're going to go next.


Gwdihw

A real diamond in the rough is usually a grain of sand that sparkles more than the others do. That's exactly what this place does. It's nothing special when you first get there - in fact, it's like entering someone's lounge and finding out their kitchen has a fully-working bar inside. The seats are pretty much average-couches, and there isn't room to swing a feline (should-you-so-wish). But that's where the downsides end...


Gwdihw, Welsh for Owl, is a pretty, unique, inviting venue. Nobody cares about standing up for most of the night; nobody cares about the flailing people on the floor, rocking out in their own way to ambient reggae; that's just it - nobody cares. It's laid back. It's not a place you go for a student-piss-up. It's a place you go to escape the students, to escape the norms of "Let's get f****d uuuuuup!" - in essence, it's Nirvana. Plus, it does Peroni on tap (which is a 10/10 for me...)


Clubbing

So, you've decided to make a night of it. You're out, you're tipsy, you've got £20 left in your wallet, and you're in the mood to dance like a lunatic and get hammered. Who cares about that 9am lecture, or that presentation that you have to give on Plutarch? What matters is that you're out having fun and enjoying your degree, right? But, where do you go at this hour of the night when all the pubs are kicking out - well, you go into town and start clubbing!


Clwb Ifor Bach

The mainstay of every Cardiff student's life is Clwb Ifor Bach, aka Welsh Club (for all those too ignorant to learn to pronounce the only 3 Welsh words they will ever need to use in their time here). Catering for all walks of life - from the fans of cheese, to the indie cindies, and even the grime-lovers - this is a place that doesn't only begin nights, it becomes the night. If you're not still in Clwb trying to dance when the lights come on at 3am, wanting one more Prodigy remix before dragging yourself back to your room, head-spinning from the £1 Fosters, you're not really a true Clwbber.


Occasionally sporting a line-up of bands, the general consensus is that Clwb is amongst the places to be. It's up there with the best, if not topping the list at least vying for pole position. With a loyalty card, it's cheap and cheerful, but, even without, one can get amazingly smashed to good music for little over a tenner. Personally, I recommend Thursday's C-Y-N-T, the infamous DnB/Grime/Breakbeat night; but Wednesday's are also worth a look in for your Indie and Motown fans, with Bethan Elfyn and the Vinyl Vendettas rocking it up on Fridays with their own mixes and choons to get the weekend started.


The Normal Clubs

Every big town has one of these places, so I don't need to go into detail about them. If you're more of a mainstream clubber, who likes their tunes to come from Radio One or the general Chart area, then you're obviously going to be more at home in the comfortable surrounds of places like Walkabout, Oceana, Tiger Tiger and Revolution. Each place has its own charm, and personally I'm more of an Oceana fan because at least I can move/breathe in there.


Usually the end to a good, long Lash, each place has their own student nights with special offers and so forth. If I remember rightly it's: Oceana/Tiger Tiger Mondays, Revolution Tuesday AND Wednesdays, and Walkabout on Thursdays. It all depends, therefore, on who you're out with, when you're out, and how much money you want to save/how much you think you can drink. Recommended, however, is Rev's own Chili Vodka.

Reflex and Flares

Essentially one and the same, Reflex and Flares offer a slice of the past that you can't exactly find in "normal" establishments. Whilst Reflex offers music strictly from the 1980s (including regular Rick Astley moments), Flares harks back to the Disco days of the 60s and 70s, including having its own dance floor, lit with those garish multi-coloured squares. Expect cheap drinks, bad music, and plenty of women aged 40+ in both venues.

The good thing about these two, however, is that you can essentially get an extra pre-lash on your way to Walkabout, and if you send someone down to check on the queues while you go in, you know that you have a club to stay in if it ends up being too-long (by that I mean "one-in-one-out"). Just think, though, that this is not one for the people who don't like cheesy music; who don't like older people in the same clubs as them; and who generally want to get pished to Taio Cruz. Still, worth a giggle, right?


The Morning After - Parks

So, you've survived to the weekend, but you're really putting off that work. What can you do? It's a sunny day, and you need to escape that essay on Alessandro Manzoni, but you just can't bring yourself to walk through the concrete jungle; not the way your head is feeling. You need peace, tranquility...what you need is a park!

Bute Park and Pontcanna Field

One of Cardiff's largest open, green spaces, Bute Park holds sway over much of the land next to the University campus and behind the castle. If you throw in Pontcanna Field, you have a good few miles of pathways, gardens, open spaces, and general fresh-air to run, walk, jog, and laze around in. Generally best visited in the summer, when the cold doesn't make you want to leave it; or towards sunset in winter when a walk along the river banks is just what the doctor ordered.


A word of advice, however: Bute Park covers only half of the area. If you enter from the Museum-side, you can cross the river and carry on into Pontcanna Field; a space which is generally what it says on the tin - a field, rather than a park. Still, it's good for dog walking, or general escapism, because as soon as you're behind those trees the idea of Cardiff as a city disappears, and you're left to your own devices. Sit back, relax, and enjoy the breeze.

Cathays Park

For those not brave enough to venture into the wilds of Bute Park, or who just don't have the time between lectures or general lazing around, there's always Cathays Park. While the University and Civic Centre take up a lot of space within Cathays Park, the greenery that shows through is just beautiful. With the choice of Alexandra Gardens, wedged neatly between the University buildings, and Gorsedd Gardens in front of the Museum, there's a slice of relaxation within the confines of the city that doesn't take you too far from reality, but, just far enough so that you can sit, and take the weight off while the cars pass you buy and the bees bumble in the bushes.


Alexandra Gardens is particularly worth a visit, since it's only behind Main Building. On a nice day, it's a great place to sit and watch the people go about their daily business. For history buffs, and general patriots, it's also home to a war memorial. Some days you'll find people who stop and pay their respects near it - so far, in the last two years,  I've seen quite a few security guards and general pedestrians stop on their way from one place to another and take a minute or two to themselves.  But, if that's not your cup of tea, sitting out in Gorsedd Gardens, with a nice cold drink on a summer's day isn't to be missed either - especially if you can grab a bench by the Gorsedd stones themselves.


The Morning After - Education

Education, education, education. Why, that's what you're here for right? A bit of stimulation for the old gray matter? Of course that's what you're here for! So, when it all gets a bit much, and that thesis on Stravinsky is getting you down, why not go to Cardiff's premier educational institute: The Museum!


With everything from dinosaurs and butterflies, to a room filled with baroque depictions of Jesus, the National Museum of Wales pulls off the role of both Natural History Museum and Art Gallery. With regular exhibitions all year round, and no entry fee, it's well worth a look. From Graecian pottery to South American beetles, it has anything and everything to tempt you into staying that little bit longer. When you're on your way out, why not pop to the gift shop and buy mum that teatowl of Welsh Heraldry you know she'll love?



And even if you've done all of this, you've not really scratched the surface of Cardiff as a city. There's only so much a 'rough guide' can give you, so, from here out it's up to you to discover new things!

The Universal question at this moment in time is "Where am I going in Italy!?", for you see my Easter Break has begun, so I can't do anything about sorting it until I get back in. I can't sort my funding, I can't sort anything until that point, which is a total pain, but there we go really - story of life and such.

The year seems to have wound down now, and that's probably for the best. Nothing exciting will be occurring anytime soon, though I'd like to hope that everything will go just right and I'll end up in Parma next year too - I've already started thinking, if I get the job I've applied for over the summer, I'll maybe do a few vlogs instead of typing out all nonsense about how lovely it is out there.

I've actually got very little to fill in on this blog - I gave up Icelandic after less than 3 weeks. Declensions got the better of me. I start revision in earnest tomorrow morning, writing out verbs, learning rules, all that nonsense. I have a million novels to read over the next three weeks - Seta, Una Relazione, and I Viceré - for Italian. I have work coming out of my ears, and yet I still have to find time to revise and perfect my languages down to an artform so I can pass with an amazing mark, and spend the summer doing something that means I can keep on-par.

However, the most interesting news is: If you hop over to my music blog, there's a little Easter egg there!

I have not posted here in what seems like an age. It's only, apparently, been three weeks. I feel like it has been a lot longer than that. Surprisingly, however, there have been very few revelations or things of note going on in my mediocre life, it seems.

I have, however, taken to Icelandic. Ég er að lœra íslensku. I actually don't know what possessed me to learn this language, but, one day I was sat in my room and I thought "You know what, I'd like to learn Icelandic." I also have taken out a book on Finnish, but that looks far too difficult for words so I'm probably going to return it tomorrow along with my mountain of books on the Renaixença Catalana which I had to specially order from the Library Store facility.

Aside from pushing myself to learn new languages, I'm pretty much living the boring student life of "Get up, shower, go to lectures, come home, grab a bite to eat, go back to lectures, come home, read/work til 8, eat, sleep". I actually need to escape from here, to be honest. As the Italians say "Non vedo l'ora in cui posso andare da qui!"

However, on a positive note, I finally know where I am going in Spain should I pass this year. I get to go to sunny Lleida, or Lerida if you prefer not to be all Catalan. In fact, I don't see the difficulty in pronounciation - Lleida - "Yay-ee-da", much the same as it would be in Spanish - but our Mexican course coordinator insisted on saying "I cannot speak Catalan, so I do not even want to attempt to say it." Still, I get to go there, and will be there roughly from February of next year. HUZZAH!

And so, I'll leave it at that for now. It's not like there's anything else worth mentioning.

It's been a fair while without a blog, and instead of spouting about my irrational hatred of Valentine's Day, I've got another annoyance that I've got to vent about: The Robin Hood Tax.

[Before I start, I would like to point out that my mathematical skills are terrible, especially when numbers get into the billions...and since we're talking in billions there are some points at which 1x10^12 will sometimes confuse. Eventually we reach 1x10^15 and that's where it gets very confusing. So, bear with me if my numbers don't quite add up...]


Now, on the surface, this tax to take money from the rich and give it to the needy is a brilliant bit of philanthropy; a marvellous piece of thinking; a really good idea from a really good egg. The basis of it is that the financial sector will be taxed up to (key phrase) 0.05% on every non-public transaction or piece of business they do - so basically stocks, dividends, currency, and all that malarky. Sounds good, no? Taxing the banks! Raising money! Up to (key phrase) $400billion per year. Wow!

Where will it be spent? It'll go both inwards and outwards. Its aim is to fund the ailing budgets of big countries, as well as to shore up the Aid and Green budgets worldwide. Brilliant, eh? We're not only saving the West, we're saving the World and keeping our hands in the "poverty pie". What more could we want from it. I mean, $400billion US is a bigggg figure - I couldn't even count to 400 billion without getting bored, or lost in the hundreds-of-millions.

The thing is though, we're not talking about Alan Sugar's back pocket, or Donald Trump's retirement fund. We're not talking winning the lottery, or paying off a mortgage. We're talking about changing the world. We're talking international scales. We're talking deficits, and in terms of those bad-boys, we're talking small potatoes with $400billion per year. I mean, America's deficit alone is $1.75trillion (give or take). It's going to take 50 years to pay it off, while hoping to God they don't keep spending...and ignoring all other countries...using this 'Robin Hood Tax' idea.

Why can't the banks be coerced into a little bit more? What's wrong with "up to 0.5%" which surely, by the logic of "up to 0.05%" would yield up to 10 times as much, so, up to $4000billion a year? Since the banking sector apparently makes $3000billion a day, it's really no big issue that they give up $4000billion a year, now is it? I mean, think of the things that could be spent on! Heck, a 1% tax would make a huge difference. Maybe up to $8000billion a year. The banks wouldn't lose their massive bonuses; the sector would still be profitable and strong, but the world would gain so much from it.

Split $8000billion between the roughly 200 countries in the UN (and I'm thereby assuming "in the world"), and you still get $40billion a year being sent to each country. Places in the 'third world' could shore up their economies off $40billion, free, every year, guaranteed.

Make it 5%, a reasonable figure for a tax, and you're looking at roughly $40trillion floating around the world every year. You can split that 200 ways again, and each country gets $200billion free, guaranteed, per year. You could say "Okay, so only the known UN states get it". That's still $208billion. So, you can add in Charities - Amnesty, Oxfam, Médicins sans Frontières; humanitarian organisations, educational programs in the third world; and give them all a share of the $8billion so that all countries get $200billion each.


It's not difficult. I know the banks don't want to give up their hard earned cash, and be taxed. But, if the banking industry is worth $3000billion a day they make roughly 1,095,000,000,000,000 per year. So what's $40trillion a year? That leaves them with a worldwide sum of 1,055,000,000,000,000. I'd be happy with that, across the entire banking sector. Obviously we can't do that, and I'm being far too ambitious, but just think of the huge amounts of cash that would be able to be sent to places to sort out deficits, economies, humanitarian crises; money that could be invested in new technologies, new sources of energy, better education, better public services. We'd be talking about advancement on a global scale, not just limited to the West vs the East.

While $400billion a year is a nice happy number, and it does make a slight difference to the balance of things in the world, it's not good enough. We're floating around on a ball, in space, with the ability to take the world forward; to expand, to learn, to grow, to reach beyond our current primitive levels. Within 50 years we'd have amassed $4quadrillion and sent it around the world, giving each country $20trillion and sharing out $800billion to charities over the course of a century!

Obviously, with this amount of money floating round you'd expect inflation, but, if the banks are making $1.095x10^15 every year, logic says we should be spiralling into inflation anyway. We're not adding to the pool. We're just taking from it, and spreading it to other areas. We're watering the lawn, if you like. You take a chunk, you spread it equally across 192 nations and multiple charities, and as Commie as this idea seems, eventually "Make Poverty History" will become a redundant phrase.

$200billion per year would shave 10% off America's deficit, annually. Within a decade, permitting that America didn't go nuts and spend, spend, spend, it'd be in the black. It'd probably go a long way to solving Zimbabwe's inflation problem and allow them to improve services without having to print more money.

Although, on the downside, the ideas of class and such would change. With that much money freely available to improve the country, certain unscrupulous people could feasibly charge more for their services to improve our services. There's a lot more to it, but, suffice it to say people have to be less human around it all.



I'm all for this Robin Hood Tax, but, I just think it's not pushing hard enough to get the world back on its feet...




[Please feel free to correct me if you feel I am at all wrong]

I'm noticing a lot lately. I'm noticing that I am far from 'as emotionally strong as I thought I was'. I'm noticing my idea of poetry doesn't conform to my ideal of poetry. I'm noticing couples more and more, and feeling horrid about it all, in a Helter-Skelter kind of way - I climb to the top, I slide back down, repeat to fade. It's not a very good start to a year where I thought that shaving my head and getting fitter would be enough of a culture shock to make me stop pining for the things I miss. Seems not.

I've had a few realisations over the last 48 hours or so:

• I am not the nicest of people. I really am quite a bastard, for want of a better word. Actually em trobo malament lately about the way I treated my mate's girlfriend. He probably won't read thi, but, there we go; it's out there. I am actually feeling crummy about it.
• I read a blog belonging to a girl I've pretty much lost touch with. We had a moment of brief passion over a year ago, and then drifted away from each other. She never really entered back into my life, but, she's still on my Facebook friends list. At one point, I thought I could have loved her. Now, on reading her blog I find out that she's spent the last few months on the verge of the abyss, as it were, staring down as it stared back. And it hit me. I'm not one who's afraid of death; in fact, my only absurd fear (beyond Moths) is to die alone... back to the point ... I'm not one who's afraid of death, but, the thought of her almost dying actually broke some of the concrete off my Grinch's heart. Maybe I care?
• My grasp for languages is slowly going out the window as everyone I talk to, even the languages students, insist on using English. I wrote down donchisciottesco on Facebook last night, with a pronunciation guide...but could I figure out how to say it? No. I'm sure I wrote "Don-key-schee-o-tesco" before I checked my Paravia and found it to be "Don-key-shot-tesco". Lovely grasp of the not-so-phonetic alphabet right there. On top of that, I've looked at my pile of work, and the chances of it diminishing before Monday are slim to none. I am procrastinating like a fool.
  
• Every day I stand in the shower and go through the same routine. I stare in the mirror, pulling down my eyelids and inspecting myself. I hop in, think the water is tepid, don't change the temperature, scrub down, and go through the same thought process: "Why aren't I over her?" "Do I genuinely still love her?" "It's been two months; surely I'd be over her by now?" "Why doesn't she talk to me?" "Is she enjoying her time without me?" "Does she feel like this every morning when she wakes up?" "Will I actually make it through my Year Abroad without going stir-crazy thing about her?" - two months, four days, and I'm still going nuts over my break-up. So nuts, I end up staying up til 3am thinking it over, sleeping til 8, then starting my day again feeling like this.
  It's really not on, but I don't even think there's any other way for me to tackle it. After my dream yesterday, I went for a walk; a nice half-hour trek around the streets, wandering, head down, listening to Sneaker Pimps. I felt content with the world and the beauty in it, as I walked down old side-streets, and over railway bridges. Then I got home, I ate some cake; I had no complaints. Today, I wake up, and the pangs start again. That boy needs therapy, said The Avalanches, and I think they were right.

It's rare I use a blog as a journal, what with the possibilities of it being read all over the internet. I mean, I can rant and rave here, and post my Word of the Day no trouble, because my opinions aren't that important, and everyone should have the option to look at words in other languages; but, posting about Dreams, is a new one for me, sort of.

I awoke today, late, at 12, instead of my planned hour of 8am sharp. It was one of those moments, which didn't really work out as planned, but I'll make up for lost time, I suppose. The problem wasn't getting up late, or getting 10 hours sleep, it was the fact that I dreamt about my ex-girlfriend.

It started out fine, running through a tunnel, and she was walking in the opposite direction, back to my house. She said "Hey." I answered "No." I assumed this was to do with my trying to get over her (in fact, I assumed it in the dream, rather than out of it).
After a momentary argument with a man on a coastal path similar to one featured in Final Fantasy X, I end up back in my house, which was like a cross between my actual home, and the room I'm renting out now.  From then on, it was just a game of cat and mouse; I'd try to avoid her, she'd be trying to make me fall for her again.
In short, the dream went on for ages like that, until I said, "I'm going for a shower". I did my usual routine - put some clothes on the radiator, walked away for a second, and then returned to find the clothes gone, and hers in their place.
I turned to find her semi-clothed, sitting in a cupboard, beckoning me. I went for the bait; my brother turned up, so I had to distract him, make her go elsewhere, so she swapped to the bathroom, and he was distracted. But, then she changed her disposition totally, and got fed up, and decided she was going to leave because I didn't like her or some such excuse....and so I spent the rest of my dream going "Don't go...don't go...I do...just don't go..."

And then I woke up, with the worst feeling in the world. How lame.

I really think, "dear Diary", that I shouldn't be like this two months after a break-up. I should be over her; enjoying my life; not thinking about her whenever the opportunity arises. I shouldn't be so down-in-the-dumps. And what's worse, I can't talk it out with her, because she never seems to walk to talk - it's like all of a sudden, everything we had has gone all Book of Job on us, and turned to pillars of salt.

What would Jesus do?

Dear Alex,

Keep your eyes open.

Dive at every chance you're given. Don't be a fool and think you're better than everything; or that everything is out of your grasp. Don't work to your potential, let your potential work for you. Remember what you will be told Age 16 - "The World is your Oyster". Remember that. Cherish it, because it's the only advice that will matter in your life.

Don't give up on books. Don't lose your love for them. Don't tire of their effortless, boundless wisdom. They are the be-all and end-all of humankind, and without them, you'd be left with nothing. Pick them up, caress them, feel their pages, read them. Grow.

Don't be a hopeless romantic. When love comes your way, and it will, work on it. Don't just think because it's in your hands that it's there forever. It's like oil; precious, but slippery. You'll find love, and it'll drive you mad if you lose it. Just don't go hunting everywhere for it, because in the end it'll find you - just enjoy yourself up to that point.

Remember that music is the voice of people who need to be heard. Don't just shut out one genre because you think it's not cool to listen to it. Expand your horizons, open your mind; be worldly. Listen to the sonatas, the swing musicians, the slam poets; some with a message, some without. Just listen more.

And finally, don't expect to get everything. Unless you put the work in, everything will slip away from you. So, it's your choice - work until you're driven insane; or lose out on certain things. Find the happy medium, because that's the only way to live life to the full.

Just open your eyes to everything around you.

Yours,

Alex

Inspired by To My Younger Self by =KneelingGlory on DeviantART.

Today was exam day. I'd spent no time revising for it, really. I knew enough to bullshit my way through it, in the hope that my Italian was better than my knowledge of the books we had to discuss. Either way, that's not what I'm going to write about because that would be boring. Instead, I had the best experience ever.

I've already said about audiobooks and listening to them non-stop and so on so forth, but, I've found one better. The half-hour route from where I live in Cathays to the All Nations Centre in Whitchurch is perhaps a million times prettier than the walk from Talybont halls to Cathays, or even the walk from Cathays into town. It's beautiful, in a strange way - maybe it's because I've never seen it before. I mean, I did think City Road at night was really quite nice; and the same for Crwys Road, when it hits The George and Varsity at the top end of Richmond Road/Albany Road.

Anyhow, it's a walk I'd recommend to any student who is bored out of their mind with the constant walk between Talybont and Cathays, or thinks they've seen all Cardiff has to offer.

I wish I'd had my camera, to be touristy and uber-lame. Once you hit the top of Cathays Terrace and end up out on the junction between Crwys and Whitchurch roads, there are two choices really - either go straight on, following Fairoak Road along the border of Cathays Cemetery, and the outcome here is that you end up in Roath Park, a place I've yet to visit.
The other option is to take a left at the crossroads, and follow the road past Maindy Barracks, Allensbank Road, and along the little 'shopping district' that has sprung up along Whitchurch Road. It's really something I've not given much thought to before, when driving in, but, walking along it in the cold listening to King Lear there and Paradise Lost on the way back was one of the more surreal-and-beautiful things I've done in my life so far.

Obviously, that's nothing noteworthy. Still, I figured I'd record it for posterity. That, and the fact that the South Wales Echo believes that Wales will have glaciers by 2050 (I'm guessing because of the snow we've had for the last week...); and Ron Jeremy has decried the internet for ruining the Porno industry. What the frack like? Is everyone becoming a bit of a fool? Or am I reading things wrong lately?

On that odd note, I'm going to settle into my new-found freedom and wonder where I can explore in Cardiff next.

Today I should be revising. I should be in a state of panic. I should, if I were at all worried about my education, be poring through the dictionary looking up words I don't understand, but, ciononostante I'm doing very little. In fact, I'm listening to a man from Florida reading Washington Irving's The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, his dulcet tones echoing through my headphones and bringing some form of unexpected peace into my chaotic life.

Beside me sits an empty mug of what was once Earl Grey; to my left, piled on my bed are tomes of grammar - L'Italiano Più Corretto, Upgrade Your Italian, A Comprehensive Catalan Grammar, Upgrade Your Spanish, Para Practicar Los Pasados, El Subjuntivo - and yet, instead of reading any of these, I'm just lazing around. I could look at Giuseppe Berto's Anonimo Veneziano in preparation for the upcoming exam, or I could look at my list of conjunctions. Forse I'm just a little bit cocky, a little bit too-sure of my ability or lack thereof. Chissà the ultimate result of not having a last bit of panicky revision?

I know my grammar - I know adjectival agreements, subjunctives, passives, imperatives, progressive and prospective phrases. I feel I know enough to get by, and as much as it's an exam that could spell disaster for me, I know how to bullshit in Italian (for want of a better word) so I can get by fairly well.

So, for the rest of the day, I'm going to enjoy listening to the best of the literary world as taken from OpenCulture's links to Librivox. If you're ever bored, it has everything you could want - from Chaucer and Dante, to Dickens and Dumas, to name but a few. What more could a procrastinator want from his week? To pass the exam, perhaps...

It's come to my attention that Celebrity Big Brother is fairly 'hot' in this house. Everyone seems to watch it. I caved yesterday and watched Jonas 'Basshunter' Altberg get locked into a room, to the sound of 'All I Ever Wanted', with Lady Sovereign, aka Sov.

The thing is though, I don't like Big Brother. It annoys me. It's a house full of mental people. It honestly is. The only difference this time is that the people are either mental or mental, and lacking in any real fame to warrant being called celebrities. I suppose it's a bit of false advertising saying 'Celebrity' Big Brother, when your biggest celebrity is Vinnie Jones, and at least two of the housemates are in there by virtue of who they have had relations with.

There's a saving grace though. Ashamed as I am to admit it, I enjoy watching it for Lady Sovereign. Is it wrong to watch such dull, uninteresting television for the hopes that something interesting will happen involving the cutest member of the house. Sure, there's Katya Ivanova who's your average indie cindy, and every time I see her I imagine my best friend drooling over her as she seems to fit into the 'pretty indescribable indie chick' mould.

Sov, though, is indescribably alluring to me. I don't know what it is. Either way, I plan on tuning in at least once a week, maybe more, just to catch a glimpse of her. It's just a shame that all the media has her branded as a lesbian. Not that I care; I'm never going to meet her to profess my strange attraction to her. So, I suppose it's for the best.

Yesterday, it was widely announced by every media outlet under the sun that Jonathon Ross, or Wossy as he is known affectionately on Twitter, has finally reached the end of his time with the BBC, with the Director General apparently refusing to sign him back up. A bit of a silly decision, if you ask me.

It's obviously a good move for Mr Ross, who can go on and expand his career and live his life beyond the confines of BBC Radio Two, Film 20_ , and Friday Night With... , all of which have brought him considerable fame in the years he's been doing them. His slip-up with Russell Brand may have cost him dearly.

Admittedly, at first I thought he was a bit of a dick for the phonecalls, but, then it suddenly became apparent that it was just a little something that got out of hand. Ross and Brand aren't exactly known for being straight as arrows; Brand is an edgy comedian, and Ross is a...well...he's Jonathon Ross. It's sort-of tarnished his career, but only because the BBC chose to rein him in and make such a big deal out of it. (I suppose insulting a 'legendary actor' like Andrew Sachs is a bit of a big deal, but it's nothing an apology couldn't have ironed out).

This all made me wonder: Are we going backwards? We had that age of liberation, of freedom, in the 70s and 80s. There are always the idealised views of those decades. Every show that involves 'alternative' comedians and the 'alternative' scene always shows us that boundaries were being pushed and sensibilities were being tested. And we lived through it, and people shot to stardom because of it.

Nowadays, we're all too scared to speak our minds because it might not be P.C. to say something; it might offend someone else; it might be a pejorative or a put-down; it might be something absolutely hilarious, but a little taboo. All in all, we're basically erasing that boundary-pushing few years, and going back to an era where one dare not speak out of turn. It's times like this, I actually dread to think where we'll end up in the future.

Musically, we're declining back into the realms of soft-pop, content in the knowledge that there's nothing edgy out there to offend our sensibilities. Politically, we're content with centrists. Visually, we're happy with our inoffensive news readers and talk shows. Where's the buzz? Where's the pizzazz; the oomph; the shock value!? Honestly, if life keeps putting restraints on what is and isn't right, I think we're in for a pretty boring rest-of-our-lives.

Long live Jonathon Ross! Long live the moments where he was entertaining, and allowed to be so! Long live living on the edge; long live freedom of speech!

It's official. We can't cope with a bit of snow. There were a few centimetres (it doesn't even warrant being counted in inches to be fair) on Monday or Tuesday, and suddenly, the country came to a complete and utter stop.

I've had friends in University end up staying home because their lecturers can't go in, or their Uni is on top of a hill, or something silly like that. I've seen Amazon uk tell customers that everything will take twice as long to deliver. I've seen the weathermen and women on all the channels say how 'dangerous' it is to even consider going outside right now, as if there are Yetis in the snow somewhere. In essence, the country is just up for one big snow-day whenever the tiniest flake falls on the ground.

It's almost pathetic, you might say. The American news media are using the phrase crippled to describe our situation and I think I have to agree with them. Railways shut down entirely, motorways come to standstills, places of learning close, and the only thing to do is sit indoors watching reruns of Friends or Midsomer Murders. Where, oh where, is the sense of adventure - going to work and sliding all the way; cars revving intensely in the drifts. Gone!

I really think we should hijack some Scandinavian architects and engineers to tell us where we're going wrong with our country. Either that, or invest in some underfloor heating for this rundown little place...

It's true what they say, that money can't buy you love and happiness, but, it can damned well fill the void. I've spent the day parting with my student loan, so I can have a few luxuries to help me get through my days this semester, and to help me keep my resolutions. Lovely, no?

So, aside from a new pair of trainers and an iPod clock, I've also invested in some sports gear, some new headphones, lots of ink for my printer, and plenty of things that are too fiddly and insignificant to warrant mentioning in a blog post. What I should have bought though, and refuse to buy, is something to keep me warm in this ice-house. It's -2°C outside right now, according to my wonderful Ubuntu weather app, and I guess it's about 5°C in here now, even with all the radiators on full, and the heating turned up. I think when it goes off, I'm going to die of pneumonia in my sleep.

If I don't live through the long, cold night, I have to say I died happy...ish.

Finally, we reach the end of the 'noughties', and what do I have to show for it? I was going to exit the decade in the same old fashion, being the same old me, with the same old outlook and same old appearance; boring, boring, boring. Instead, I took up my dad's clippers, while the family were out for the day, and shaved my hair off. New Year, new me.

Next up, after passing the nadir that was midnight, I came against the wondrous realisation that I had no resolutions; I had genuinely not sat down and thought of a single thing I could do to enforce the new me, and stop me spiralling back into boredom. I suppose that was a bad start; consider it like tripping over the welcome mat on your way out the door - it was going so well, up to that point.

Inevitably, I sat down, and I thought and pondered, and I reached the verdict that I would stick by resolutions that weren't impossible (like spending less, and cutting back on alcohol). In the end, I came up with this list:

1. Make the most of your days - as of January 4th, no more sleeping in til ungodly hours and staying up until the crack of dawn. Be adult, be sensible. Up at 7, work to your potential, bed at 10.30 (unless something riveting is on the telly, in which case, bed straight after it).
2. Actually learn to play bass. Stop messing around with "Oh, I can read tabs", and doing shoddy covers, and actually learn to play the instrument you set out to learn!
3. Be healthy. For pity's sake, put aside some time to exercise; change your diet a bit; make an effort for once!
4. Actually read more! Look outside your subject - read philosophy, history, literature, newspapers, whatever! Just read, for crying out loud!
5. Learn basic Portuguese. You've sat down with it on your laptop for a while, so, get to it. It can't be that hard, can it?
   
   

And that was it. Nothing about saving money, nothing about alcohol, nothing of any value beyond self-improvement, mentally, physically, and who knows, maybe spiritually.

It's easily achievable, if one puts in the effort. And the first effort will be to buy an alarm clock that is actually going to wake me up so I can make the most of my days! From there, things should flow a little more easily. Let's get off to a good start in this decade, eh? No more messing about; time for a change of pace.

Yesterday I upped sticks from this sleepy little village, and headed East, to the West Country. Due to my love for Cathedral Architecture it was kind of obvious that I'd have to head to Wells Cathedral, having already seen all of Exeter Cathedral earlier this year.

Leaving the light snowfall of Wales behind, the three amigos on this journey ended up in the dull drizzle of Bristol-and-Avon, passing by places with absurdly Olde England names, and villages spread so far apart they may as well have been a single detached house. After a brief stop-off in the Oldfield area of Bath, and lunching in that fine establishment Burger King, I decided it would be prudent to invest in an umbrella. Lo-and-behold, on moving on to Wells, the rain ceased.

Wells itself is so much more than Bath. It's worlds apart from the commercialised Bath Stone city on the Cotswolds, which bustles with life no matter what the weather, and seems very impersonal and tourism-oriented. As much as I love the Georgian architecture of Bath, I much prefer the semi-rural idyll of Wells, which, in spite of being a City, with its hotchpotch of architectural styles, from the early Georgian fronts of many of the shops on the High Street; to the 14th century row houses at Vicars' Close.

The jewel in the Crown, and the reason I went, is obviously Wells Cathedral, an imposing early Gothic building, with its blended architecture. I'm no expert, far from it, but until I saw the dates I was convinced it was one big late Romanesque building, as the pointed arches seem to round off; there seems to be a distinct lack of pomp and circumstance; and the overall feeling it gives off is one of a Cathedral on the verge of being Gothic. But, on actually taking the time to look at the dates, it's practically Gothic through and through, built in the Early English style, one which (being taught about Italian church architecture) I'm unfamiliar with. Still, it's beautiful, and, in my eyes, actually more wondrous than Exeter with its vaulted ceiling - the Inverse Arch and the Chapter House are more than enough to make this a diamond in the rough; and it keeps topping it with the astronomical clock, and the pristine nature of all its tombs and memorials.

All in all, it was a catharsis. I love wandering round being in awe of the architecture, and reading the tombs (even with my lack of Latin I can still guesstimate a lot based off Italian and Spanish knowledge). It makes me think how small and insignificant we are; it's a memento mori, a giant memorial to the fact that we will all die one day, and how we leave our mark is up to us; whether we will be remembered as a wooden cross in a courtyard, a traditionalist tombstone in a communal graveyard, or buried beneath the floor of one of the most beautiful things to come from religion.

Next time, however, I will know to take spare batteries for my camera so it doesn't cut out when I'm taking photos of the outer architecture, leaving me no way to take any photos of the inside. It really is something that sits deep in me as a love, dins el cor, and yet I can't fathom it, com el fons del mar.

There's really not much worth documenting here: it was an 'adult' Christmas with few presents and a smidgen of money. The presents received were a pack of amaretti biscuits, for my coffee habit; two pairs of nicely lined gloves, for the cold weather; and some chocolates for my sugar cravings. Pretty sparse really, but, that's the recession for you.

Still, I'm not complaining. Roll on next year, I suppose, when it's Christmas in Italy...or, Christmas-on-return-from-Italy.

Over, and out.

It's that time of the year again. It's officially almost Christmas. I think this is the one time of the year, as in the next two days, in which I'm generally quite festive. The other 362 days, I couldn't care less. So, for a bit of festive cheer, I've had a certain song on repeat.



The brilliant thing is, I actually appreciate the way the Spaniards, and particularly Catalans, approach this festive time of year. We have our Christmas tree and the odd nativity scene here and there. They have the caganer, and all the little things which are associated with the verb 'cagar' or 'to shit'. So, while we're celebrating with fairy lights and turkey, they're hunting for a shitting gnome (as that's the best way I can describe it) in a full-size model of Bethlehem! And then, to make things better, they take a hollow trunk filled with sweets, and beat it like a piñata in a game called "fer cagar el tío" or "making the log shit". Honestly, that sounds like more fun than pulling crackers!

The only thing that sounds like a bit of a bother is that the Spanish celebrate Christmas, but on top of that they also celebrate Epiphany as a sort of 'mini-Christmas'. So, while we've all taken down our decorations to avoid the bad luck of 12th night, they're putting out their shoes ready for the Reyes Magos to leave them presents and sweets. And then it all ends on a high-note of a month that counts as celebratory - from December 8th, when Catalans begin filling up their Tío, to January 6th when the Reyes arrive, it's one big fiesta. And how do we spend it? Buying crap we don't need, and listening to Coleen Nolan on the idiot box trying to sell us "rasberry...tart" from Iceland.


Can't we just have a nice Christmas, where we either celebrate the important days for us (24th, 25th, 26th); or, can we do it right, so we're not giving away the significance and importance (religious or otherwise) to the mass-market monopolies around the world. Yeesh.


And with that said, and a little lesson on Catalan Christmas, I bid you all a Bon Nadal.

I've never been one to understand fully the sentiments of the average Welsh Nationalist. Admittedly, I vote Plaid Cymru with all the fervour of a Welsh Nationalist, and I vote on lines of linguistic heritage, rather than ideological bullshit about an independent Wales, devolved from the Big English Westminster system. Still, I can't help but feel a pang of Nationalistic pride when I listen to Radio Luxembourg, now dubbed Race Horses.

I know very little about this group, save that they seem to be pretty big on S4C's Bandit programme, and they seem to be a little more eclectic than your average Welsh rock outfit (see Funeral for a Friend; Lost Prophets; The Poppies; etc. for comparison). And so, two days before Christmas I say: "You know what, as much as it's silly to be patriotic because it's only dumb luck that I was born Welsh instead of Argentine, I'm proud to come from a country with such a lovely language."




Nadolig llawen, bobl y byd!

It snowed last night, and you know what, for the first time in 20 years I haven't thought "Oh my! Snow! How happy I am!" My initial thought was, in fact, to tell all the people who are far too excited or stressed about the snow to move to another country and quit hogging my air with their festive cheer. Yes, I'm a scrooge, but, you know what, I could care less.

In more heartwarming news, I finished up my two album lists for the year. I should really do an 'album of the year' sort of malarky, but I've really not listened to enough new music this year to warrant it. Instead, I gave the accolades of "Album of the Decade" and "Underrated Album of the Decade" to Daft Punk's Discovery and Venetian Snares' Detrimentalist. Somehow, I've boiled down an entire decade of indie pop and 'emo' into French techno, and an American having an electronic seizure. And frankly, I don't care if it's not what the NME, Rolling Stone, Q, or Pitchfork had as their album of the decade; I feel I have captured the spirit of the noughties in the fact that it was a time of general happiness. As the Catalans would put it, it was a time of rauxa.

Continuing with the trend of the moan today, it seems like sanity is rushing out of the room very quickly in Britain, to be replaced with one heck of a white elephant in the corner. Basically, we've gone from having the good sense to know when everything is screwed beyond repair, to having to argue till we're blue in the face. What am I talking about? Well:

1. Eurostar has decided to cancel its services, whilst it works out how to improve them in order to stop breakdowns in the tunnels over this snowy, cold period. How do we react? We don't say "Oh, thank you Mr Eurotunnels." No. We queue in St Pancras in the hopes that, magically, someone will say "You know what, get on this non-existent train, and it'll all be fine". Moral of the story: Grow up, and get some common sense. If they say it's not running...it's damned well not running!

2. Copenhagen basically devolved into an average political discussion on climate change. The Americans don't want to concede to China; China can make as many demands as it likes because it's unaffected by the Kyoto agreement (being a developing nation); countries like Tuvalu and the Maldives shouted to no avail; and in the end, our great idiot-in-chief and his second-in-command for this weekend jolly said "It was bureaucratic chaos!" In short, we lost the game of marbles and came back crying to mother.

Perhaps the better solution to climate change is for discussions to go into sub-discussions. Europe, the Arabian Peninsula, South Asia, North Asia, Australasia, South America, Central America, North America, Sub-Saharan Africa, Northern Africa, and the Island Confederations. Then, when they all agree on 75% of the policy, they come together and make demands. Don't try to get 192 member states to 'discuss' when each wants a voice as big as China and America. Honestly...


And on that depressing note. I'm going to settle in for a week of drinking glasses of red wine, cider, and doing no work. Living a la rauxa, in a world that is slowly forgetting how to be al seny.

I decided it would be a good idea yesterday to buy some Columbian coffee in Tesco. I was wrong. It was possibly the worst idea I've had since coming to University. I drank two cups yesterday, and then two cups today. I then followed up my two cups of coffee today with a large soup-bowl of Cappuccino from Costa Coffee and a "solo Macchiato" which was probably the worst idea ever.

Now, why have I been drinking so much coffee? Is it because I have an essay due and I don't want to sleep, so I can get it done in a rush? Heck no. It's because I want to be more worldly in what I drink, coffee-wise. I mean, everyone has had their fair share of Nescafe Gold Blend, right? I feel like I need to branch out. I drink multiple flavours of tea, from the traditional English Breakfast (which despite my disdain for it, is far too common to avoid) to the more eccentric Chai or Lady Gray.

I started 'experimenting' with what coffees I like and don't like by ordering a Cafe Cortado in La Tasca one day. That I can admit to liking. Shots of Espresso, solo, without a main coffee, go down a treat if I feel I need perking up, but taste foul much like the Macchiato I ordered today. Cappuccinos are slowly working their way to being my 'favourite', though I have a soft spot for the Mocha and its variants. Some day, I'll stop drinking all this crap, and live off water I suppose.