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NOVEMBER 2016 (Photo timeline)

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Autumn Holidays!

26.10.2016 Wednesday

Our prom is getting closer and closer. The first ceremony connected to this event was "sealing" of the class book, which we had done that day. We didn't have a cameraman, we didn't do half of the things poeple usually do... but we had it all in such a nice, closed-society atmosphere. After few heart warming words we had a bit of wine and we were remembering the old times, together with our class teacher and other chosen teacher.

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27.10.2016 Thursday

Nothing special was happenning that day. I had my art classes as always (we had massive bursts of laugh that time). In the evening I was unexpectedly seeing my boyfriend before going alone to cinema, watching The Neon Demon. It was a very interesting shot; artistic scenes were amazing, soundtrack was very old-school and fitting the movie perfectly and the story was one of its kind in this genre. I was kind of disappointed there were just 10 people in the cinema.

And yeah, this was the day the autumn holidays started officially. So glad for these few days off!

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28.10.2016 Friday

My boyf came to visit me. It was such a crazy day - I was driving him and his father from the graveyard to the city centre (the first plan). In the end, I had to stop by the school his father works in, because the alarm went on. Then we could finally have lunch together.

The afternoon passed and in the evening we were meeting with Ange and her group of friends in Piešťanský Pivovar, which is a pub belonging to ŽiWell. Why were we going there? A czech singer XindlX was playing there a concert! When we came there, we popped into a small surprise - Ange's boyf claimed the whole week he wouldn't be able to come that night, but he was just hiding it and he booked the table for all of us! Thanks to him, we could switch between standing and sitting, which was very helpful. Finally (after the hosted singer) XindlX went up on the small stage on the ground level! We had quite a good fun listening to his songs and talking all together. Ange's boyf wants to go skiing with us during the winter :D Hopefully we will come back without any major injuries :D

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29.10.2016 Saturday

I decided this day to be my chill-day. Despite being at home the whole day, I was drawing and designing all time long. In the evening I went out with my boyf, who was visiting his grandparents in Malacky with his family. That was the last time we talked face to face, before he left to Pardubice again the next day.

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30.10. - 31.10.2016 Sunday & Monday

I don't clearly remember what I was doing on Sunday, but I know what it was in the evening. We were having an event from Punksteram. It was called "Čajové Podesenie" (Tea haunting). We were screening some horror movies because of the Halloween weekend. Our chosen ones were Shaun of the Dead, The Boy, Grave Encounters, REC and Halloween (2007). People enjoyed it a lot, we had it all done without any major obstructions. It lasted for about 10 hours. That was unbelievable (8PM - 6AM next morning). Participants want another one!

When I came back home at 6.30AM I want straight to bed. But not for too long - I slept just for 3 hours, then I needed to catch a train to Bratislava and visit an exhibition called "Cosmos Discovery Exhibition". That was something amazing. I was kind of disappointed (again) that there weren't many people attending. However, there was more space and it was more chilled out. I spent there just for an hour and half, I expected it to be a bit bigger. My favourites were the original parts of the spaceships and the smaller models of them. My most favourite one was a slovak small satellite //called nanosatelit// called "skCUBE". It is going to be transported to space at the end of this year by an american spaceship. I am so excited that some hardworking slovak scientists made this happen and put it together!

I was so looking forward to going home, but it wasn't an end for me, not for the furthest. While I was walking through the bridge to the city centre in BA, I met two girls (one of them was a metalhead, a bit drunk, and the other one was a casual girl). They started to talk with me and we got on very well (ehm, I mean, the metalhead started to talk with me freely :D) so we were going together almost up to the point of the main statation. Then they decided to go to Eurovea, but they didn't know a way, so I provided myself to guide them there, because I had still a bit of time. We managed to puzzle up the way and then we said goodbye to each other. I managed to get on the train just in the last minute. I was very close to staying in BA for another two hours :P At least I have met some new people, yay!

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01.11.2016 Tuesday

Another day at hooooome. Actually, I was outside as well, having lunch and giving back a notebook to my friend, who left it in the tea-shop for the screening on sunday. For the whole afternoon I was preparing my portfolio and just creating stuff. :3

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02.11.2016 Wednesday

I should go to school, right? But for me this was just another day of adventuring.

This time I was heading once again to Brno - for the Open Day on the art school and to meet a friend from Poprad, who had been a editor for the Punksteram magazine.

After travelling by train and bus I finally came to this time, meeting her up together with her friend. He was leaving quite soon after. We went directly to the school (well, at first we got on the bus for another direction, we got off on the terminal station and we had to come back, that was a bit of a fail :DD), visiting the ateliers for painters mainly. I popped up in one of the ateliers for graphic design, but the one I am applying for was full of current students talking with the main professor so I wasn't bother to go through them. We spent there just about an hour.

We managed to get on an earlier train to BA, giving us a lot of time to take another train, for me to Piešťany and for her to Poprad, we were meeting another friend of her, he was going to travel with her up to Poprad. We had a good talk and I was a bit sad to leave them so early by getting off in Piešťany.

It was such a good day. Despite not talking to the professor I at least checked the new building they moved in last semester.

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  This whole holidays were just so adventurous. After writing this post I fully understood how many things I managed to do in such a short time. It was an amazing break :33

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07.10.2016 Gallery of M. A. Bazovský in Trenčín (Slovakia) //I got a homework from my art teacher to go and visit it.//

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Biela Noc (Bratislava, 08.10.2016)

The night of the lights. The night of the art in the streets. Second year of this spectacular event brought people not only from Slovakia, but also from other countries of EU. First couple of hours I felt that it was not as good as everyone was saying - but the other half of my stay there changed my mind completely.

The official start was at 18:30 on Tyršovo Nábrežie between the bridges. I could not get there on time, because at that time I was just getting off the train and I still had to get my wristband. Thanks god I bought it two days ago online, because then I would have to stand in a loooong queue on the Old Market Square in BA, where they were given out. 

Afterwards I walked down to the Main Square, where was the first installation called “The EVENT” by slovak artists Peter Vrábeľ & Braňo Bernár. I do not have a proper photo of this one, but basically there were lights (front, back, and roof) of the police cars, arranged in a sort-of-circle shape. 

When I walked more down to Danube, I had a great view on our monumental UFO on the Bridge of SNP. There were reflectors in the windows, shining lights to every direction. When you got the right moment, you could see all of them lighten. (Lights were set up by BN Label at this installation was called “The Lighthouse”.)

From there I walked down the shore to the other bridge called The Old Bridge. This one was a monument itself that night. Once again, it was a work of a slovak artist Ondrej Maksi & BN Label, called Harmony. It was great passing that bridge lighten that way. It was not just a post-war building anymore, but it looked more modern.

Well, the whole point of walking that way was to get to the park near Aupark. There was supposed to be something superb, and I am making you sure it was. It was, once again, by Braňo Bernár and it was called “The Drops”.

This installation made you watch where you are stepping. :D Because of the water fountains everywhere, there were a lot of muddy places no one wanted to end up in. So what was so special about tens of small water fountains? There was a laser lightening them up in one imaginary plane, so when the drops fell through this lasery surface it looked like there are some sort of red or orange coloured vortexes above the ground. It was very magical.

I walked back to the city via the SNP Bridge, passing below the UFO. There was a great view on The Old Bridge with its “harmony” installation.

Next thing I was about to see was something near the Church of St. Martin. I got there, there was nothing from the front nor from the sides... so I walked to the back and I found the most popular attraction of that year - a bulb cloud. This installation was called just “The Cloud” and it was by canadian artists Caitlind R. C. Brown & Wayne Garrett. It was interactive, because we could switch on and off the bulbs inside to make the cloud lighten or darken. I think this was my third favourite of this festival.

And now I am getting to something that made me feel so weird, so uncomfortable and out of this world like nothing before. It took place in a concert hall Klarisky (an old church redone to a concert hall). I had to queue for about 25 minutes but it was all worth it. 

Basically what was inside was a sheet of black fabric or paper with a little holes in the middle, forming a circle or a square, not sure, but the most probable was the circle. The light behind the sheet lightened the holes in a repetitive manner according to the “music” (or rather sounds) playing from the speakers. The music was played on such a high volume that some of the people needed to go out because they felt sick. It was very hypnotising, like travelling through the time and space, entering another dimensions - especially one moment, when all of the small holes were lighten and we all felt like entering some sort of gate for interdimensional jump. So fucking amazing and unsettling at the same time. This one was called Timeé and it was by a french artist Guillaume Marmin. This was definitelly my second favourite.

Then I realised I did not have enough time until I have to go on my train home, so I went to check the Old Market Square again, now with opened inside to the public. There was just a “levitating” ring inside a big hall. This one was by a french artist Vincent Leroy, but it was not as spectacular as the previous one (Name: Boreal Halo).

While walking to Grassalkovichova Garden I popped up to a small gallery with an installation by Esther Stocker (Austria) called From the Future. There were black frames all of the room, stuck to different parts of the walls and it depended on what direction were you looking at so you could see different things emerging from the (on the first gaze) chaotic black frames.

The penultimate thing I saw was a installation in the previously mentioned garden called Light Sowers by a french and canadian co-production MAOTIK. This was my most favourite one. I stood there about 5-10 minutes, just to take photos, and after that time I finally got what it was all about. Basically, there was a tree and int front of the tree were upside-down bulbs stuck on long and thin metal bars. They were representing soldiers defending the tree. The last aspect, I presume human”s ability to destroy everything, was shown in a very cool way. There were some sort of laser-cannons and they were shooting the laser-bullets on the tree and “soldiers” underneath it. I think it completely got my heart for the sort of computer-game-logic. Just amazing, I want it in my garden.

The last thing I have seen was a balloon-installation on the side of our inverted pyramid building of Slovak National Radio. There was nothing spectacular about it this year. I liked how it looked on the photos from the last year, more vivid and eye-catching. I do not know where were the artists from, but their names were Sabina Lang & Daniel Baumann. This installation was called Comfort  #14.

Overall, I rate this night as a great way how could I spend my time. There were a lot of people and Bratislava looked completely else while having all the nightlife in the streets and art embracing almost all the main places. If I am on Slovakia next year at this time, I will be certainly going. And I hope you will try it out too!

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My last week.

19.09. - 24.09. 2016

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My 9 days (10.09.-18.09.) in a nutshell.

It was like I didn't mind the fact that school had already started - I continued living that kind of lifestyle (unconditionalenjoyment of my life) shown in one of the movies I am gonna mention later (High Rise).

10.09.2016 Scavenger Hunt 2016 (Piešťany)

The Great Week started on 10th of September, when we had an event from Punkstream. This time it was Scavenger Hunt, which we decided to repeat after a great premiere one year ago. From my point of view I think we had better quests last year, but the overall atmosphere was better this year. We had two or three teams more than last year (I think 8 or 9 together). All of them had fun, so did we (and on the top of all that, we orgs had a great pizza from the neighbourhood). People gave us very positive feedback, so it is possible this event will become our annual thing. We don't have any rivals in this type of event so people likes going on it.

11.09. - 18.09.2016 Cinematik 2016 (Piešťany)

This great movie festival took place for the whole week. Me and my boyf had press cards for this festival, so we tried to get out the most of it. We genuinely went to see at least one movie every day and there were few days that can be considered to be days of a movie marathon. I am going to list you movies that we had seen and I will try to write a short review too.

So, Tuesday:

14:00 Saulov Syn (Saul Fia; director: László Nemes): Movie about a prisioner of Auschwitz camp, founding his son in the gas chamber getting chocked. He kidnapps his dead son from the morguery and he want him to burry in a proper funeral. During his personal mission (to find a rabi), he lost a pack of gun-powder needed to be delivered to his friends in order to make the gas chambers explode. After a riot of sonderkommando he manages to escape, together with his dead son and new-found rabi. Soon he discovers that the “rabi” just said to him he is a rabi in order to survive. They all die in the end. Very strong movie for the beginning of the festival.

17:00 Nikdy nebudeš sám (Nunca vas a estar solo; director: Alex Anwandter): Very weird movie about a manequinne maker and his son, who is gay. He wants to start a singing carier, but for his orientation he is beaten and later he is laying in the hospital with very bad injuries of face. His father wants to help him out, so he steals his boss car after a tough row and sells it, giving money to a doctor for the face surgery. The father leaves in bus and end scene tells us that the son stays with his best (girl)friend. Not sure about the message of this movie.

Wednesday:

14:00 Izba (Room; director: Lenny Abrahamson): I do not think I have to introduce this movie in the detail. This well-known story has been a great deal recently. All in all, I was feeling like in the boy”s skin when he was imagining that his whole world is just one room. When they got out, he was smart enough to comprehend the REAL world, the infinite world full of options and space, but LESS time, how he stated later in the movie. I think it was epic for the way it made us think about the world like about a giant space to make things, not just sit and wait, like the small boy in the room together with his mother.

17:00 Tu žije diabol (O Diabo More Aqui; director: Rodrigo Gasparini, Dante Vescio): Quite a classy horror movie. The main villain had a great mask, check it out:

Basically a group of young people stays in a house that is hounted the night they should not stay there. And everything get screws up. You have everything there: paranoia, killing, violence, a bit scary moments, sex´and quite interesting legend about the area the horror takes place in.

23:00 High-Rise (High-Rise; director: Ben Wheatley): The best movie of this festival for me; something you have to see. It had a very confusing story, like when I looked on the other people in the cinema, they genuinely did not know what was going on either. It was a great surprise for me that Tom Hiddleston played in it, making it more attractive and weird-side of silly than it should be. It shows how a house with all layers of society cannot stay functional, because there are too big differencies. And that the thing that connects everyone is a party and competition.

Thursday:

11:00 Victoria (Victoria; director: Sebastian Schipper): A movie my boyf had been talking about for ages. Basically is a one-shot movie in Berlin streets. They managed to get it all done on the third time, first two times were interupted by some unexpected events. The movie itself was interesting but it was even more fascinating if you keep thinking about how it was filmed. It was a story of a young spanich girl, who works in Berlin and one night she met up with these four guys from Berlin. At the dusk they had to go to rob a bank, they succeded, but then it went all wrong. I am not going to ruin it for you (even now I think I said too much), in case you want to watch it. I recommened it.

20:00 My, netvori (Wir Monster; director: Sebastian Ko): Serious movie which ends up to be very funny :DD The parents of the girl were doomed to get fucked up since the middle of the movie. It was very funny for the audience in the end, but NO ONE would laugh if the were on the places of her parents :DD Just watch it.

Friday:

NO MOVIES :O (I am ashamed to write this) :/

Saturday:

9:00 Môj sused Totoro (Tonari no Totoro; director: Hayao Miyazaki): First Miyazaki movie I have seen. I thought it was going to be more deep, so it dissappointed me from this point of view. On the other hand, the illustration and story overall was great. So 7 stars out of 10.

Sunday:

9:00 Muno: strážca mesiaca (Mune, le gardien de la lune; director: Alexandre Heboyan, Benoit Philippon): French animated tale about a cute guardian of the moon called Mune. I loved the animation in it. They combined the 3D graphics (in their real world) with traditional 2D animation (in the dream world). The night world reminded me a lot about Avatar and the guardians animal was so amazing (not like the stone-creature of the day-guardian):

20:30 Ex Machina (Ex Machina; director: Alex Garland): Great sci-fi movie to finish this festival. In the comparison to 2,5 or almost 3 hours long Victoria was this one a very fast movie. I liked the question about the consciousness of the machines and the Turings Test. The ending was a bit shocking, because I thought it is not going to end that way. 

If you are interested, you can view the whole program by clicking here.

IN THE MEANWHILE...

16.09. - 18.09.2016 Comics SALÓN & IstroCON 2016 (Bratislava)

It has to look like me and my boyf have a time-machine in our pocket, but yeah, we managed to be visiting the movie festival and AT THE SAME time thic comic-con in Bratislava. Incredible... I feel like I have exprienced one month of time in one week. :D

Well, we went to Bratislava at 3pm on Friday (I was going there right after I came back from school), BUT we arrived on the con about 5.30pm because our train had a delay and we had this european summit in Bratislava so the MHD (town buses) were a mess etc... not on our way TO the con, but on our way BACK the bus suddenly didn't go, so we had to walk on the station, catch a train which went two hours later than we planned and then go straight home. Because of this accident we didn't manage to see a movie on Cinematik for that evening :/ Neverming, we went in the morning.

Anyway, next two days were the buses in twon free for everyone who has a driving-license ID card, so I had all my travelling completely free.

Overall, the con was a bit worse than the one in March. I was trying to go on this con for two years! I wasn't disappointed, but the people around me were for very good reasons so I began to be too.

First thing, cosplayers were fed up with the orgs' attitued to updating their website. They claimed that the cosplay contest will move the winner to the Eurocosplay Contest on MCM Comic Con in London, BUT that already happened on the comic-con (AnimeSHOW & GameEXPO) in March... so cosplayers thought they would have an another chance to get on the great Eurocosplay but in the end that was just a disinformation. I understand their anger and I am on their side, because things like this should not happen.

Second thing: Food. Please, there was nothing but two food shops for the whole comic-con. The shop with Ramen was incredibly full all the time, and the other shop was just fast-food. If I hadn't be on the last comic-con, I would be (possibly) satisfied with this, but last time they had much better meals than this.

On the other hand, I really enjoyed the cosplay contest (Saturday Program), we saw some great cosplayers like Hong-chan, Wryxinka and Calipso (with the last one we had an interview few issues back :33). Calipso had unbeatable cosplay, Wryxinka got my heart for her wings and Hong-chan is an amazing role-player - her Harley Queen cosplay in wedding dress and metal-core song fit her play perfectly. No wonder she has so many followers and fans. There were about 14 contestants, few of them with great cosplays too, but unfortunately they all stayed in the shadow of these three.

Another thing I enjoyed was the dancing performances on Sunday. Basically, that part of the event was a highlight of that day and I would say everybody who came was about to see this amazing dancers and go awaya. There were some great groups I had seen for the first time on AnimeSHOW this year, and it was completely worth it.

Rasti needed to leave a bit earlier because his family was visiting his grandpa in the hospital. We meeted up again on the train station and went back home together.

These days were so amazing. I can't believe that all of this happened just last week.

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Farewell to Summer Holidays 2016

You have been the craziest ones!

I have travelled unbelievable 21 729km (19 819km by planes, 1 910km by trains). I can't get myself any rest :3

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Trip to Cracow with Rasti

Hi! The last trip of this summer happened between 31.08.-03.09.2016. We all are so lucky we got such a long summer holidays as we did! I have travelled unbelievable amount of km in 9 weeks!

Anyway, back to this amazing trip. Our journey started in the evening of the last day of August, changing our trains in Žilina and Bohumín. We came to our first stop /Oswiecim/ the morning of the first day of September. After three hours of sleep we were like walking zombies, so we decided to have a hot chocolate in McDonald. Before we did so, we also walked to the second camp, Auschwitz-Birkeau II, 20 minutes by walk far from the train station.

Our guided tour in Auschwitz camps was supposed to start at 10AM, so we still had quite a time to wait (we came to Oswiecim about 5.30AM). We crossed a bridge, separating the part of Auschwitz-Oswiecim with the centre of the town. I always thought this town is more like a village - now my opinion changed. After seeing a small park and a square we started walking back. To find the first camp wasn't as hard. We met some other people, who were leaving the train with us in the morning, so we weren't the only ones crazy enouch to travel whole night and then undergo 3,5 hours tour.

Because of the earlier time we chosed a guided tour in czech language. The guy talking was good, we were around 15-18 people in the group. He showed us the whole area with detailed oral presentation, so me and my boyf were satisfied enough. He was taking photos most of the time, because he hadn't been there before unlike me. I remembered it to be a bit larger/longer when I was there first time with my school.

Right after the guided tour and sighseeing both of the camps we went to the train station to catch a fast train to Krakow. My boyf took a nap because he slept much less than me during the night.

When we finally got to the majestic city it was already evening. We took the shortest route to get to the hostel, checked-in (with a small problem - they couldn't use my debet card for the payment, so we needed to find a cash-mashine...) and walked to the highest level in the hostel. The accomodation was very nice, considering the price.

We couldn't wait so we left the rooms almost instantly. My boyf has been in Cracow two years ago through a summer Erazmus+ project. He fell in love with this city and since then he promises me to show me around in it.

Cracow is a beautiful city. It is historic, but still different from other historic cities in Europe. It is not as giant as Prague and it is not as modern as Vienna... something in between. The historic centre is surrounded by a ring of park, so any time you cross this park you know you leave the centre.Most of the trip we spent just in the historical part unfortunately. The last day we were telling each other off why we didn't book one day more.

Anyway, while we were walking to the centre we came across few interesting places in Cracow: The Barbican, Florianska street, Rynek Glowny (Main Market Square), St. Mary's Church... I could name at least another ten places. We were about to see them all deeply in the next two days, so I will talk later about them. We walked down the whole centre, leaving the park and heading to Wawel, a castle in the middle of Cracow. It was really huge, I didn't expect it to be that size.

We had a nice walk through the night Krakow and stopped at KFC to have a dinner. Then we finally managed to get to the hostel and get some decent sleep.

The next day we stood up quite early and ran to withdraw our Cracow City Card. With this card (only 25€ for 2 days) we could visit about 40 attractions like galleries and museums "for free". At the end of the trip (next day's evening) we realised it wasn't that small amount- we barely made about 16 places.

The first place was a gallery or a Museum of Jan Matejko, a Polish well-known artist. He did a lot things, as an artist he was pretty flexible - he was a painted, drawer, designer,... The museum is inside his house. I liked the detail of his work. He even designed the interior of St. Mary Church in this city! I don't have any photos from that place, google it - the ceiling and colourfullness of this place is just amazing. :3

Another place we visited was The Barbican. It was a part of city walls in the medieval ages. It is a circular building with passageways in the walls. Now it is used just as a museum.

Then we continued to the the City Defence Walls, or at least what stayed out of them. We could enter a small tower at the beginning, where we found a TV playing some sort of documentary, but we weren't interested in it. We had to walk all the way back, because the gate at the end was closed.

Near the city walls was a gallery (The Princes Czartoryski Museum & Library. The Arsenal Gallery of Ancient Art.) where they were supposed to show some work of Rembrandt. When we entered via our City Cards (btw, the polish women at the desks didn't hide their hate to the cards... they know they will get less money out of it) and got on the first floor, there was just ome painting by this painter. I smiled about it and then we explored the gallery in the size of one room. They had some greek ceramics and egyptian sarcophagi, together with some nude sculptures from these ancient civilizations.

There was nothing else in the area, so we walked down the Florianska street to the Rynek Glowny. Rynek Glowny, or The Main Market Square, was full of stuff we could visit. We all made it. Here are the names: Town Hall Tower (Me and my boyf really need to work on our stamina. The view was amazing, shame we couldn't walk on the balconies, the best photos could be made one floor beneath, where the windows were opened and without bars.), St. Albert's Church Underground (The smallest underground I have ever seen :DD Nothing special, only one plus is the skeleton of a person from 11th century.), Museum of Medieval Cracow (Main Market Square Underground - one of the best exhibitions/attractions in this place. The medieval walls are connected with the technology on this century, I just loved it. A lot of projections and interactive features.), The Gallery of 19th Century Polish Art in Sukiennice (Medium size, but interesting paintings. The view from the terrace we had an entrance on was great as well.) and The Krzysztofory Palace (two or three different exhibitions - first about the rising of Cracow city throughout the centuries, then an intercative exhibition with steampunk features in the last room /Cyberteka/ and in the end a small exhibition about saving animals, especially dogs in the city.).

That was basically the end of the first day. We wanted to visit The Hipolit House (Bourgeois house from XVII century) or Museum Art of Stanislaw Wyspianski and Feliks Jasinski "Szolayski House", but in the first one was the last entrance in minimum of 30 minutes before closing time and in the second one they were preparing an upcoming exhibition. Me and Rasti had a nice time out in the evening, walking through the park and then wandering around the streets. We explored one very busy street leading to our hostel, not realising there were about two or three places we could visit with our card (they were closed anyway).

The second day in Cracow, practically the last one, was the first part of the day a bit of a fail and then everything was so perfect. We wanted to visit few things in the morning - we skipped an exhibition called History of the Academy of Mining and Metallurgy, because it was part of the academy and the school year was already on. Our next stop was Europeum The European Culture Centre. Cracow became two years ago the Capital city of Culture within EU. That's why they have built this building. It was basically a gallery with two floors, once again with some statues and paintings. I have found the most magnificent sculture I have ever seen - which is called "Portrait of a Woman in a Hat with Veil" by unknown Italian artist. Such a beautiful piece:

We spent there about half an hour and then we had to go on a bus to see another interesting museum on the list - Museum of the History of Occupation "Pomorska street". It was basically one room with all the infos about the occupation of Poland in Nazi's era. The museum is built on a place where the gestapo used to live and command. As a part of the exhibition we could see the prison cells where they kept the "suspicious", and sometimes innocent, people. There are still carvings and messages on the walls of these five cells.

After this dark museum we wanted to visit Museum of History of Photography few streets by the Pomorska street, but it was closed exactly that day because of some preparations for an upcoming exhibition with openning that evening.

So once again we took tram this time (black line, hih) and pass around half of the historic centre. We got off on Sw. Wawrzynca station and walked to the Galicja Jewish Museum. It was basically a gallery with photos by a person from social studies academy and an american photographer. The guy from the academy had been asigned to do this as his project - it took him few years to finish it. His mission was to commemorate and jewish places that had stayed the same in Poland, changed during WWII and places which has been completely demolished. It was a great exhibition with a small painting gallery by Jewish artists at the end.

Near this museum was The Old Synagogue, which was destroyed during the WWII. Nowadays, they have a museum inside. I was kind of looking forward to seeing an old synagogue design inside, so I was a bit disappointed about the fact it is just a normal museum. Stupid Nazi's. They had to destroy the beautiful thing.

I was so hungry so we needed to take a little break and LUCKILY there was a shopping centre behind a corner so we could get food easily.

Afterwards, we crossed a bridge to other side of Cracow and we found our penultimate attraction for this trip - The Museum of Contemporary Art in Cracow. That was one of the best exhibition I have seen there, partially for the reason of it being the modern art. The gallery was giant with practically two floors. First exhibition was about paintings with medical surgeries, weird embryo sculpture and the usage of some medieval equipment for surgeries and I don't want to know what else.

Second exhibition showed small paintings in sequence, which couldn't have anything in common by the first glance. That was exactly the point. We should think about them and put them in some sort of context so it all makes sense.

The third exhibition was a bit of every taste - Andy Warhel, Kunst Macht Frei (as a parody of the title on the Auschwitz camp "Arbeit Macht Frei"), cube with crosswords inside and much more. We left about after an hour.

The last place we visited as an atraction was Schindler's Factory. It reminded me of the museum I visited with my father and Carola in Februrary - when you step into the rooms, you are changing the worlds, entering other ones. Basically this museum told the Schindler's story, since the very beginning of the war up to the end, when Stalin came to Poland and claimed it to be his... It was all very interesting and we both enjoyed it. There was one place we were a bit scared about - suddenly in the corridor there were stairs down, but you could continue straight in the way all of the people were walking. But we were like let's look what is below. So we did, and a door was there. It wouldn't be anything strange about it if there weren't hellish sounds coming out of it. The door looked dark and when we peeked through the hole in the door there was darkness. So we went back up. There were two men going down after us, so we stayed above and conspicuously watched them. They stood a bit in front of the door and then they opened them - a movie was being screened at the wall. We were laughing on us so hard. :DD But it was seriously creepy.

The evening we spent once again in the city. I wanted to breathe the atmosphere of this city for the last time in deep inhales. It is special in some respect, I am not surprised it was the Capital city of Culture in EU two years ago. It was always alive, full of people, but my boyf kept telling me that in July two years ago there was like three times more people - I can imagine why.

If anyone will be out of ideas where to travel, go to Cracow - the way there is a bit of a mess if you go by train, but in the end it will be wort

h it. That day we were leaving Cracow at 9.43PM. I so didn't want to go, keeping in mind that this was the last trip of this summer holiday, spent with the person I love the most :3 It couldn't end up better.

P.S.: Another reason to visit Cracow is to experience the pigeon invasions - this is just a fraction of the pigeons which were there.

[alexdawnblog]

Poster: Scavenger Hunt 2016

Punkstream Event 10.09.2016

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19.08.2016 - Trip with my mum to Martin and Sklené

It was so nice to go somewhere just with my mother, at least once during these summer holidays. That day we were visiting the land of our ancestors - we were coming back to the village where my grandma lived for some time, after they migrated from Ukraine with other families.

However, before we got there, we had a small stop in Martin. I was driving our car all the way to Zilina, but then my mum was scared to let me drive, so she did the last half an hour to Martin. She used to live in Martin all her childhood, and I lived there few years two, after my mum came back from Germany (I lived in Berlin just for one year).

We parked the car on the park place in front of the block of flats my mum used to live with her brother her parents. Then we walked for half an hour to the city centre, we had a small lunch on a place where my mum used to eat during noons. I wanted to visit the national cemetery, which is located in this very slovak city - there are few buildings that had their role during the revolutionary era in Slovakia.

The cemeteray wasn't far from the centre, so we walked to it but we got lost inside. The funny part was, we didn't want to go around the whole fence, so we just jumped over it :D my mum couldn't believe what she was doing in her forties. :DD

After half an hour of searching we finally found the graves of our national heroes (writers, editors,...) and i  of the tombs were breathtaking (e.g. I can't remember his name).

Then we set off on another 40 minutes long journey to Sklene, which is a small village out of the all modern rush. Houses there became vacationb resorts over the years and the core of the village is still inhabited by few families of old people. We visted the cemetery where my grandma and my great-grandparents are buried. We got some work done around their graves, changed flowers and digged out the unnecesary grass.

We surprised one of my grandma's old friends - she didn't know we were coming. My mum wanted to pay her a visit and talk about grandma and their history. It was actually interesting, I got to know how did they get from Ukraine to Sklene and how come my grandma had a husband with german roots (I had never quite understood that). We spent there about two hours, talking also about our lives and her life. They had quite a loss few years ago as well, old woman's granddaughter died in a care accident and no one could ever explain how did it happen. I felt the sadness of this story bit too much, but for a very simple reason - her granddaughter was in my age.

Well, after this little reunion we started our way back. We changed once again in Zilina, from where I was driving to Piestany for one hour. Between Sklene and Zilina I was taking photos of the nature around us, which you can see in this post.

This was such a random trip. We hadn't planned it, it just suddenly happened to be agreed on during Tuesday. My mum had a day off and me too. I couldn't design anything, but I didn't mind. I need to spend some time with my family as well.

[alexdawnblog]

17.08.2016

The Unearth, Bullet for my Valentine, Slayer

Bratislava - Aegon Arena

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15.08.2016 First Official Illustration

[done with Wacom Intuos Pro]

Mage (Illustration inspired by a book “Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke)

My artwork/portfolio can be found here. [official website for Alex Dawn Design]

[alexdawnblog]

This weekend was one of the most chilling days out of the whole summer. We had a fair in my village with food market, roller-coaster and carousel. My boyfriend came over for Friday and Saturday - we had such a nice time together.

On Friday, I drove us to Nitra to get the new issues of Punkstream. For the first time ever I took my car and got with my boyf somewhere by it, just for a trip. :3 It was a great feeling.

The weekend fleeted as it never existed, but I still remember the feeling of satisfaction I got. My last 6 weeks were more than packed with action and trips, and I needed to stay home and do nothing for some time. Past three days were exactly this case.

Thanks, Rasti, for the great time with you! (We will see each other soon) ;)

[alexdawnblog]

Small Japanese Summer Evenings (Part 4.)

Part 4. of our amazing events took place on 3rd of August! This time we had a cosplayer from Bratislava, Emmie. She had a great presentation about 2D and 4D graphic design and what programs is she using and how it can improve the cosplay-making.

Do you want to find out more about our summer otaku meetings?  Click here and support us by buying our magazine.

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Coming back to my lovely country (and second home)...

Heeey everyone, I feel like writing a post on my old blog... the one which began all of this - LittleBigAdventure. I came back to the country I have lived for one year. Despite all the political situation I still love this place.

Welcome back to Great Britain.  To England. To London. To Hailsham.

My third trip for this summer began on 6th of August. Me and my sister decided to go together somewhere - we had never been out like this before. Our flight was at 6am in the morning, we got to London by 10am. We left our luggage on the hostel (we still could not check in at that time) and went exploring the streets. We visited Soho and China Town, because these were parts of the London my sister had not seen yet. Afterwards we made our way to the London Dungeon where we realised it was already booked out up to 4pm - so our experience could start at 5.30pm soonest. I bought the tickets right away. Afterwards, we went to hostel and get into our beds (I paid half the price the Booking.com told me to pay! That was such a great surprise!) :D Other people were all right in our room, most of them left in the morning the next day.

We went back to the London Dungeon and dived into the history. I had already been there but I was excited even more than the first time. The whole thing I was waiting for the Jack the Ripper scene, which will give me goosebumps forever - the game of light and sounds is amazing and so vivid! Another great thing was they added a new play (The Great Fire of London) and you could get a free drink in a new build tavern at the end of this journey! They made it so victorianish, you could live through the moment how in the old times - the atmosphere was so strong. When we stepped out the building next to the London Eye, I could not believe the world we live in - I wanted to go back.

After this great experience (my sister liked it as well) we went to have pizza to Pizza Hut. We had not eaten it all so we had lunch for the next day as well. Last thing we visited that day was giant M&M shop and then we were glad we can tak a looong nap in our beds.

Second day in London was the most randomest day during these whole holidays. We went to visit Brick Lane in the morning. We explored the street art in the side aisles and my sister bought a cap and a jumper in the street markets, I bought myself a t-shirt in undergorund vintage market. This place has such magic in it, I spoke with two sellers, one of them was an illustrator and we had such a nice talk. I did not experience this sort of communication nowhere else but in London.

We were hungry so we came back to our hostel to eat the rest of the pizza. Then the random stuff begins - sisters friend wanted us to visit her, it was planned for the evening, but all of sudden she came home early from the work so she had the whole afternoon free. I had to book the earliest train to Dartford (40mins from London) and set off on journey as soon as possible, because my sister was ultra-impatient. Her friend, Vikina, was working in the largest shopping centre in the UK, second largest in the world - Bluewater Shopping Centre. Having a great job in KFC, she was getting chicken popcorn for free (so jealous!).

We accidentally meeted up in the bus heading to the shopping centre, then my sister wanted me to vanish into the thin air as fast as possible so I left them and went exploring the shopping labyrinth. It was big, but still not as bad - I had it all seen in 45 minutes of fast walk. Then I went for a dinner to running-sushi restaurant, something I always wanted to try :3 (another tick on Bucket List). 

After fur hours we meeted up again, going back home. She left us earlier, we were getting off much later. She was a nice girl, it was very easy to talk with her, such an opened and happy mind.

The third day was the last day in London - we had to fulfill one other point in our program - shopping :D Yes, you are reading it right. (I got my stuff sent from Amazon to Hailsham, so no shopping for me). My sister was enjoying it to the fullest. She bought quite a few stuff (Joker t-shirt from Primark as well! Sometimes I wish I was not so tiny as I am and could wear boy clothes!) 

We spent the whole morning + 3 hours in the afternoon on Oxford Street, then we just went to chill in Green Park. Our bus to Hailsham was leaving at 7pm so we had about two hours free time. While waiting on the bas station (just about 30mins before the departure) we sat in Starbucks and Jess had her coffee. 

The journey to Hailsham was not as long as I thought it was gonna be. We were getting off on a very strange place - a bridge :D Jason was thinking strange things about the driver when he came for us :D 

Meeting my host family again was so amazing. I was looking forward to this trip for almost a half a year and I was even more excited than the first time I went there. It is so peaceful in that house, in my memories their house is a place for chilling and not worrying about stuff, that is why I like coming back. I feel so calm while being there.

Vanessa seemed to be happier than I remembered her and Jason was as he used to be :D Kids got bigger though. Anya was less crazier and Ethan was more normal as well (he had a bit longer hair, looking as an emo child, but it suited him so well).

So, anyway, what were our actions in the south part of this sunny England? The first day we went to have a walk in Hailsham and then we took bus to Eastbourne (before we took our bus, Jess needed to buy the smallest mik bottle you will ever encounter.. she was so obssesed with it :D).

So in Eastbourne we visted the Arndale centre, the beach, the pier, walked down the seafront to a small hill with stone fortress on the top, came back to the centre, eat everything in Buffet Time (a restaurant, where you pay one price and eat how much you are capable to... something I really needed). 

In the evening we chilled with my host family, had a dinner and then we watched a movie (The Warrior). It felt like the times two years ago. I was so happy. :3 

My sister even dared to speak a bit of english, which was quite challenging for her, but most of the time she was doing well :D

The next day (and practically last day of our trip) Jason took day-off, so he could go with me and my sister, taking Ethan and Anya, to Brighton. Jess had not seen this great city before so we decided to take here there.

The way to Brighton took ages, back to Eastbourne as well - we went by bus, because trains were on a strike these days (they went really readily with no fixed timetable, we were so lucky on our way to London on Thursday), so Jason rejected to go by train. We came there around noon, visiting first the pier and the small lunapark they have there. We spent quite few pieces of money in there but it was worth it. Afterwards we were trying to find the Pavillion. It was not that hard, the middle dome is quite high to see it clearly. My sister liked it, but we were not keen to go inside, so we headed to the lanes. I remembered them to be more labyrintish and vast, but maybe I was just used to them. Jess got confused few times though, making the point of being first time in there.

Next stop was a random buffet with fish&chips (this time a tick was added to the bucket list of my sister). Last stop in Brighton was the new British Airways i360, which we could not miss out. 163m high, it was incredible view on this coast english city.

After loooong way home my host family took us to a pub/restaurant we used to visit when I was living there. I got my panini (as usually in that restaurant). I felt so nostalgic - this feeling got stronger when Vanessa told me she was glad we came, that it was very nice to see me again (and that meeting my sister was great as well). I SO DID NOT WANT TO LEAVE THAT COUNTRY, knowing it was my last evening in there for I do not know how long.

I enjoyed it to the fullest. We watched another movie that night, also we said goodbye to each other (because host parents were working since morning). I still remember the great feeling which I felt in my heart, mind and body while being there. I spent way too much time not to be sad about leaving back home.

Last day, Thursday, went without any complications. I bought some magazines in WHSmith on London Victoria and got my last KFC in England. My sister was a bit healthier that day. We got to airport about 4 hours before our flight, so we had a hot chocolate and muffin in the coffee shop on the airport. That day passed incredibly fast as well - we appeared in Bratislava at 11pm. 

I am so glad I managed to visit England again this summer holidays. It is a place I will always want to visit, no matter how many times I have been there before. You know that moment when you kind of think about all the things that you went through somewhere you love, while you had this sort of sad smile on your face? That it how I have been writing this whole post, feeling there is something missing in me, what will always stay behind the sea waves, in that small island, about one thousand kilometres away. 

It will always be my special place.

[alexdawnblog]

Trip to Prague (27.07.2016-31.07.2016)

Hai everyone, five days late, one day before another trip, I am writing this post to memorate another great experience of these holidays - trip to Prague with my boyf, attending a czech comic-con ADVIK and the town from the last year.

First of all, we travelled by RegioJet again. These trains are amazing for their technologies, they are comfortable and if you reserve a seat for a couple, you will get a screen each on the seats in front of you, having the opportunity to watch movies or listen to music or play games (after launching any game, the screen get frozen, so don't make the same mistake as we did). On the way there we weren't that lucky to get these sort of seats, so we sat in around small table with two other people in front of us. I had my tablet with me and got some movies, so we decided to watch Skyfall - I didn't expect it to be that good.

Sushi in da train :3

After four hours we finally arrived to... errr. where? It was not Prague. This town is called Pardubice. It is going to be a university town for my boyf for another three years. He wanted to show me the area and we reserved a room in the dorms he was about to stay. 

The town has a small, cozy centre with a shopping centre in the middle and historical buildings around it, but mostly to the direction to the castle. Castle in Pardubice is located in a small park, which looks quite usual on the first gaze, but while getting deeper we found some great architectural designs from wood, metal and ropes. We especially liked benches during the night, because street lights were missing and the benches shone light from underneath them.

We explored the castle for two times - always from the outside - the first day (when we arrived) and the next day (when we were leaving to Prague). Worth mentioning, the shopping centre canteen place is chaotic, but it has beautiful balloon-shape lights hanging from the ceiling. 

On the next day we checked out from the dorms, left our luggage there and went to walk through the city again. The historical centre is very nice and the aisles are sometimes very weird - very wide or very narrow, or the ceilings of the arches are incredibly small or high. The other thing what was weird were small doors used during the middle ages on almost every house - they couldn't be higher than 1,2m!

Pardubice is a city of cyclists. They have a special calculator-machine, which counts up every cyclist who passes this machine. It has a graph who shows how many cyclists has passsed there since the beginning of this year!

Well, that would be our almost-a-day stay in Pardubice. The university campus looks very nice, I think my boyf will be satisfied and he will enjoy the student life there. ;) Hopefully I will visit him as much as I will be able to :3

Our journey continued to the city which is mentioned in the title - Prague. It is just about 40 minutes from Pardubice, so if I manage to get to university there, seeing each other wouldn't be that big problem. We arrived during the afternoon, checking into our hostel and running to get entrance wristbands to the comic-con ADVIK. We lived on the other side of the Prague, so we had to travel every day for half an hour by metro to get there. But we didn't have to change our train on any stop, at least it was a direct way.

Well, after seeing (now) two czech comic-cons and one (big) slovak one I can proudly say: slovak cosplayers are better. I know I mention it every time I go to a con, but it is such a true fact that it can't be unsaid. So the cosplay-part of the con wasn't that good (even the competition of the cosplayers was a bit too poor), but on the other hand they had great presentations and for example a great competition with some good AMVs. Shame there were just few of them.

By not going from Punkstream, we could enjoy the con more. We weren't even staying there for the whole time, I picked some presentations we might be interested in and came there just for them. We were present on a presentation in ecchi salon, but also we visited a presentation about animation studios in Japan, their origins and “life-stories”. The con lasted from thursday to Sunday, so we practically attended the whole of it.

So what did we do during our free time in Prague? The first day we went for a nice walk through the centre, getting to the river and we also got to the Carol's Bridge. From there we were trying to find Palladium, and some people would laugh, but it took some time :D (We weren't there for a year all right?!) :D

The second day we stayed sleeping a bit longer, because all other days we had to either travel or check-out from the hostels. Around the noon we went to the con and in the evening we walked around a pub called “U Flekú”, we visited the centre again and also Island of the Birds and “Strelecký Ostrov” (Shooting Island sounds ultra-weird, so I don't want to translate it directly).

The third day (Saturday) I chose to see the cosplayer competition and also AMVs competition, but it all was during the afternoon. In the morning we checked-out and left our luggage on the train station. Then we agreed to go on Stalin (a thingy on a hill) [then we walked down, crossed a bridge, walked few streets to the centre, encountering a folclor festival], then have some lunch in shopping centre Flora, then go to con and afterwards just have a nice chilling evening in Palladium before we had to leave this wonderfull city. 

Interesting thing we did right after lunch that day - we attended a flea fair, but we didn't buy anything. What was special about it, it took place on railways of an old train station and that was cool.

We went back by a night RegioJet, exactly how we did last year. This time we had the special screens in front of us! Having “slept” a bit in the train, we needed to stay awake afterwards on the Žilina station at 3am (or something) and get a train at 5:16. It was a long night, but this type of travelling has its magic as well. :3

This trip passed incredibly fast, I was shouting at myself for leaving the TARDIS in my room instead of creating a paradox right away and stay in that moment :3 Hopefully it will not be that fast in Krakow as well, where me and my boyf are about to go at the end of the holidays!

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My first piercing - INDUSTRIAL /26.07.2016//