30 things to do before you turn 30

I'll be 30 next month. I usually hate these type of things - usually written in the same sort of publications which like to convince you that you're too fat, ugly and poor to be considered a proper human being.

But what the hell, I haven't got much else to do today so I thought I'd make my own list, compiled from other lists.

1) Visit Paris

DONE! (several times - I also lived in Lyon for a year when I was 21-22 - in some ways even better than Paris, more friendly and intimate. One of the best years of my life, partly for meeting my first serious boyfriend. Unfortunately, he wasn't French, but Welsh.)

I think this one should be 'have a romantic kiss in Paris' - haven't done this, yet :(

2) Get a piercing/tattoo

Hate tattoos and will never get one, but I have 3 piercings in my right ear, 2 in my left and my nose pierced. Had wanted to do it for years and finally did when I was 25 and in the Philippines. The guy said there wouldn't be any hurty, but there was. 

3) Learn another language

I speak French... well at least I did. Languages have never come naturally to me, but having spent most childhood holidays in France I was always determined to learn it, and did well enough to study it at university. However I have since forgotten it all. Shamefully.

4) Buy a one-way ticket overseas

Not sure about this one... I've had a round-the-world ticket. Probably bought a single when I went to Lyon, but that's only just across the channel so perhaps doesn't count. Damn it. This is something I'd like to do one day.

5) Have a 3-some

Done! ;)

6) Go on a demonstration

Never chained myself to railings, but I have been to 2 rally's. The first one was when I was living in Lyon, it was the year that the far right leader - Jean-Marie Le Pen, nearly got in. Lots of the students went on a march protesting against him and were setting off just as I was coming out of class. It was good fun, a great atmosphere and felt like I was really shouting for a good cause, even if it wasn't my own country.

The 2nd was in 2003 in London for the anti-Iraq war demo. I took my Mum.

7) Go and see your favourite popstar in concert

Growing up as a true 80s child, Madonna was always my icon and I vowed when I was about 12 that I would go and see her in concert - and I did! O2 arena in 2009.  I was at the back but it was worth everything penny, and even the 4 hours it took to get home on rubbish London transport.

8) Run a marathon

Absolutely not. Nor do I have any intention of ever doing so. I hated sports at school and was crap at them, always the last to be picked.

However I am proud that regularly practice yoga and keep fit this way. I love it and hope I'm still doing it when I'm 80.

9) Have sex in public

Well there was a field, some naughty fumblings on a bus once, and that time - ahem - in the kitchen at work... also nearly got thrown out of a restaurant for something similar (with the same person I should add) 

Oh god, they're all coming back to me now - also a hotel balcony... and a beach in Portugal

Do they count?

10) Get something published

Done! When I left university for a while I wanted to be a travel writer. I took my laptop with me and wrote everyday. When I got back a got a couple of articles published and did some work experience at TNT magazine where I got a couple of things in print.

I'm also on the Rough Guides writer's pool, although they've never asked me to do anything.

11) Do a skydive

NO thanks!

12) Stay in a 5* hotel

Done - The Savoy in London when I was a bridesmaid for a rich friend, and the Oriental in Bangkok. My friends parents were friends of the owners and we got a heavily discounted room. 

Also stayed in a safari lodge in the middle of the Okavango Delta in Botswana. It's not 5* but normally costs about £300 per person and we stayed there for free.

I think the best one though is the Imperial Queens Park. It's rated as 4* but I can't imagine how much better a 5* would be. I've stayed for free (through work) and again have paid to stay there. It's only about £40 a night. Amazing. 

13) Go to a Gay Bar

Hmm. Have been to a sex show in Bangkok's red light district. Never seen ping pong balls used like that before. Surely this trumps a gay bar?

14) Go skinny dipping

Done - Okavango Delta in Botswana - quite brave considering there are hippos and crocodiles 7ft long in there. (We were assured this was a safe bit) I got out and dressed just before my boyfriend got out - a bunch of tourists then turned up and got in - and he was stuck, unable to get out!

I kind of think you're meant to go skinny-dipping at night though, that's what they do in the movies. Haven't done this.

15) Take drugs

I'm a wimp when it comes to drugs. Convinced that if I ever tried E or even coke I'd be the one freak who'd overdose/freak out/have an allergic reaction and end up in hospital.

I have dabbled a bit with Marijuana. Two quite amusing incidents... 

First was in India aged about 19 - I was in a town where alcohol was forbidden but you could buy 'special' lassi's (green with weed). I had had delhi belly and hadn't eaten anything for days, but didn't hesitate to down this in one. I was hallucinating monkeys for the rest of the evening and convinced that one of the guys in the group I was travelling with was planning on raping me. Neither were true, very embarrassing the next day. Also thought I was about to have a heart attack as I had the WEIRDEST pins and needles going up and down my left arm. 

The 2nd was at university. My housemate had made some hash brownies and left me in the house on my own with them. I can never eat just one cake/brownie and devoured the lot. I then spent an hour trying to get a giant centipede out of my hair before being violently sick.

16) Swim with dolphins

I kayaked with some in Namibia... I have swam with a whale shark though, twice in fact, once in the Philippines and once in Mozambique.

17) Climb a mountain

Hmm, no :( I've looked at Mount Everest but that probably doesn't count.

I have been high enough to experience altitude sickness though - not seriously, I just got the giggles and felt a bit weird. That was in Hawaii, we were filming at the top of Mauna Kea (extinct) volcano where there are some of the best telescopes in the world. That was a truly amazing experience.

18) Sail on the Nile

Did a Nile trip when I was 8, I still remember it in bits...

19) Kiss a random stranger

Think the quickest meeting - kiss was about 5 hours, guess could be better...

20) See the Northern Lights

Nearly! I was meant to film in Alaska a couple of years ago where I would have had a really good chance, but plans changed at the last minute and we went to Iceland instead. (Not a bad alternative!)

21) Win a competition

Done! This month! My first short film won a FilmLondon short film competition and will be shown at Bafta next month. 

22) Sunbathe Naked

Only topless :( I would though... tried to find the nude beach in Noosa, Australia once but couldn't find it...

23) Give £10 to a homeless person

Will do it today!

24) Slept under the stars

Lots of times in tents :( Done this in Morocco, India and Namibia and Botswana, and once properly in India. Awoke to a horse nibbling on my ear.

25) Been to as many countries as your age

Done! 34 at the moment.

26) Changed someone's life

Apparently, yes...

27) Move out of home

I am ashamed to say I am living with my Mum and her partner at the moment - but I haven't always... I went to boarding school, university, lived in France and done lots of travelling. I'm back with Mum whilst saving for a flat which I really hoped would happen before the big 30 but looks like I'm just going to miss it.

28) Made a film

Yup! 

29) Ride a Harley Davidson

Yes in the French countryside - although I wasn't driving and I wanted him to go faster! 

30) Volunteered

Nope... can't I do this before I'm 60? I have just made a charity film for free though, that sort of counts right?

There are a few achievements not on any lists I found but which I think deserve a mention:

1) Go out with a famous person

Possibly... sort of...

2) Go holidating

I think I'm fairly spontaneous - none more than a couple of years ago when I went to Africa with a guy I met on an internet dating site. It was our 7th date I think, and we went travelling together for 9 weeks. Although it didn't have a happy ending I did have an amazing time.

3) Art scholarship

I won an art scholarship for my A-levels and went to art college which had been my dream. (The dream changed once I got there, but it was still an achievement) 

4) Taken a cheetah for a walk

Yes - In Africa, one of the most amazing experiences ever.

Norfolk - Northfork

I was filming in Norfolk recently and we spent the night on the north coast next to these huge mudflats by the Sea. It was bloody freezing but beautiful.
We stayed in a little B&B, with all the English chintz that you'd expect.
Behind the house was a boat in a field. It belonged to the couple's son and I thought 'how cool to live in a houseboat in a field' - but apparently, and to my disappointment, it's not a houseboat but just a regular boat he's renovating and no one lives there.

Reminded me though of the crazy 2003 film Northfork (note similarities of name with Norfolk!) Has anyone seen it? I still have no idea what to make of it. I think it probably had amazing potential which it didn't quite meet unfortunately. A modern day Noah's Ark? Maybe that's what the son was really building...

  

   

I like the loneliness in it though, and that's what the Norfolk boat reminded me of. Poetic.

Talking about loneliness, here's 10 words a Twitter friend just used to describe me:

Beautiful, intelligent, sullen, travelled, protective, sculptural, simpatica, graceful, lost, tierna

Tierna is Spanish - Literally, it means "tender" but the connotation is sweet, loveable, innocent, heart-warming, etc.

Northfork at IMDB

On falling in love

I recently met Diana Athill.

She was born inconceivably long ago, at the end of the First World War; and now at 92 is still sharp as a knife and loving life more than ever. Her rather unusual life, can I think be said to be a product of her own ‘self’ more than anything else.

Born into an upper class family, she spent most of her childhood on an enormous estate in rural Norfolk, and although she never inherited any of the wealth, she has kept her Queen’s English accent. She went to Oxford and then helped set up and run the publishing firm, Andre Deutsch, for 50 years, publishing VS Naipaul, Molly Keane, John Updike and Jean Rhys among others.

She is known for her daring and racy love life, she has had many lovers over the years, including younger black men and married men – all of which she documents with astounding candour in the books she wrote, primarily in her 80s. And some of her own accounts paint her far from the sweet old woman she looks like today. She has never been sweet.

There are several quotes and excerpts from her books which I love, because they ring so true, either with some of my own experiences or philosophies.


It all started for Diana when her fiancé jilted her for another woman, which she says took her 20 years to fully recover from.
On falling in love:
The sensations involved are after all undeniably delicious: not least the sensations of danger, of being aware of risk and of a sudden release from ones inhibitions against embracing risk.
Intoxication is what it is: it is as seductive and dangerous as alcohol, and should be handled as cautiously. How generations of romanticising Romance can be counter-balanced is hard to see, but it ought to be done.
In old age I can still remember the matchless intoxication of falling in love...and the more common but no less delicious sensations of a powerful physical attraction...I wonder what took me into such affairs, and what held me in them, almost always, until the man moved on.

When I did fall in love again after the war, it didn’t work either, that was very sad. He wasn’t eligible – would have been a good match, nice and rich but he never fell in love with me, thought he might be but he didn’t. He was a nice brave man and was brave enough to say it’s not going to work, I’m not falling in love with you.


Result was pretty shattering but got over it quite fast, no false hopes, cry cry, finish. That was much better.

When you fall in love, you’re not in a normal state – mad as a hatter. You know less about that person at that stage than you ever will again, you’re not seeing that person, you’re seeing your need.

 One of her criticisms is for being cold at times…

I am one of those people who are hardly ever totally involved in an emotion. Always a beady-eyed watcher at back of my mind.

I try to be truthful, everyone always goes on about this honesty, even if sometimes uncomfortable.


That suggests a kind of coldness in me. Not that involved emotionally, more curious, watching it, like reading an interesting book. Not as kindly involved as I appear to be – more distanced – a beady eye.


A lot of writers say they can sit and watch their parents die, they mind, but still observing it and watching my own reactions all the time.


Loneliness and heartbreak

During that time my soul shrank to the size of a pea. It had never been very large or succulent but now it had almost withered away. I escaped emptiness through sleep - dormouse, hibernation.


I wish now that in my youth I had loved my family less....I might have had the courage for revolt, instead of going quietly underground.

Did I once, long before I can remember, want to fall in love with my father as little girls as supposed to do, and was I chilled by an indifference that left me with a tendancy to expect rejection? It would make sense, it is the sort of explanation offered by convincing textbooks, but it seems a bit too simple for me.

If I fell seriously in love it was with a fatalistic expectation of disaster, and disaster followed. By the time I reached my thirties I was convinced that I lacked some vital quality necessary to inspire love, and it was not until my forties were approaching that I began to see the possibility that instead of lacking it, I might have been suppressing it; that my profound 'misfortune', of being unable to make the men I loved love me in return, might be the result of an attitude of my own which came from a subconsious equating of love with pain.


I did not fall in love with him, but might have been jumping off a cliff?

On life:

I was fairly optimistic and resilient, when I came across story of 103 year old lady who had an infinitely more frightful life than me and still think life is wonderful and plays the piano 3 hours a day. Her sister, she said, was always unhappy – what you’re born with – either being unhappy or able to be resilient.


On marriage:

I’ve seen enough happy and successful marriages to know you can really have hardly anything better when it works.


A relationship can start being romantic and end being very good all round.


Or can be romantic to start with and end up being hell – my 2nd great love – who I would have gone through fire for, I knew nothing about him at all – I understood Tony quite well, but not the 2nd, we only met about 10 times.


Sex:

Men feel differently about sex – varieties about how people feel about sex are very great. On the whole, I think there is a difference – based purely and simply on biology.


After all every time a woman fucks, she could get pregnant, could be about to change the whole nature of her life. Completely. Not true of a man, he’s much freer.


To say the pill ended that is not true, it’s quite a drastic interference with your nature. A long time before women can feel as free about sex as men can, not sure they ever will be able to.


When I was young I thought about men all the time and about love. One was mixed up about sex and love, thought they were thinking about love on the whole. Think I always thought I was thinking about love.


When I was sexually attracted to someone but didn’t love them I never thought that I loved them. What I really wanted was love, not sex, well sex with it. It is for a good many men too I think isn’t it.


Click here for more on Diana

Beautiful World Map

I have just finished working on a series about cartography.

One of my favourite maps was the one below by al-Idrisi from 1154. Idrisi was an Arab geographer from Morocco who went to Sicily to help the Norman King Roger II expand his kingdom by finding about more about the world beyond that which was already known.
Contrary to popular rumour, people knew that the world was round, but were ignorant to what lay beyond the Mediterranean region, they thought the rest of the world was all ocean.
Idrisi and Roger would quiz sailors and fishermen as they arrived into the port at Palermo each day, where had they been? What had they seen? How did they get there? How long did it take to get there?

In this map the world is upside down. Why? Well why do we put north at the top other than it's what we're used to doing?

hiroshima mon amour

Hiroshima Mon Amour was another film I studied in my French Cinema course as part of my degree in French.

Parts of it annoy me (like the woman's voice and her repetition of Nevers) but I straightaway recognised its significance, both culturally and cinematically.
Despite finding a few bits teeth-gnawing, it is undoubtedly an amazingly powerful and beautiful film.

This film from 1959 by aclaimed director, Alain Resnais, and screenwritten by Marguerite Dumas (who wrote L'amant - one of my favourite films) looks at the relationship between a French woman and a Japanese man and was one of the first films to use flashbacks as a story-telling tool.

Elle (she) plays an actress playing a nurse in post-war Hiroshima. She meets a Japanse architect, Lui (him), and both separated from their spouses they become lovers.

The early part of the film recounts the effects of the Hiroshima bomb, in particular, the loss of hair and anonymity of the remains of some of the victims. The film does this in a documentary style and the keeps the narrators unidentified.

The flashbacks are intercut with the lovers story in the present day, which takes place in hotels and restaurants in Hiroshima. Elle starts to tell, for the first time, her experiences during World War II in Nevers, France, where she was involved with a German soldier during the occupation.

Like many other women who associated with the enemy, she was made to suffer the humiliation of having her head shaven in public. By the time she left for Paris, and then Japan, her hair had regrown and her anonymity regained. Lui wants her to stay with him but she won't.

The film was a co-pro and it was stipulated by both Japanese and French production companies that one character must be French and one must be Japanese and that it should be shot in both countries.

Jean-Luc Godard called it the first film without any cinematic references. It's also been called the most important war film ever made.

le mepris

Le Mepris (Contempt) is a fantastic film from 1960 directed by Jean-Luc Godard, starring Brigitte Bardot.

I read the book and studied the film at University a few moons ago now.

Apart from being amazingly cool to look at, it has many depths and parallels with both real life and Homer's Odyssey, as well as the process of filmmaking itself. A must see.

American film producer (Paul) hires respected Austrian director Fritz Lang (played by himself) to direct a film adaptation of Homer's Odyssey. But he soon becomes disillusioned with Lang's treatment of it as an art film and hires a novelist/playwright to re-work the script.

The conflict between artistic expression and commerical gain parallels Paul's sudden estrangement from his wife (Camille - Bardot) following time she spends with a playboy millionaire.

Godard's film mirrors both the book its based on by Italian writer, Alberto Moravia and his own real life - to the relationship with his own wife (Anna Karina) and his film distributor. The 3 main characters also resemble Odysseus, Penelope and Poseidon.