Favourite Food Blog

When I was searching  through the Internet for a good food blog, I came across one which is called "bitedelite". It was created by Joanna Siemek who lives in Poland. The blog is in English but there is also an option to switch to the Polish language if you want to. Here is the link in case you want to have a brief glimpse of the blog: http://bitedelite.com 

I really like this particular blog for different reasons:

1.) The whole arrangement of the blog is very eye-catching. The use of bright colours makes reading every recipe very refreshing for the eyes. And apparently, with the colours the creator wanted to indicate that her recipes aren't just ordinary and boring, but lively and fresh. This leads me to the second point.

2.) The recipes in general are all very unique. Joanna tries to abandon doing her recipes the old-fashioned and boring way, in other words, my grandmother’s way of cooking and baking J
J. garnishes every single creation of hers with lovely and innovative decoration. I’m amazed by the fact that she pays so much attention to all the details. Here’s an example: bunny-cupcakes

3.) I'm kind of thankful that she attaches a lot of pictures to her recipes. For a seldom baker like I am it is useful to actually see how every step is being made and how it should look like. When there are no pictures I often do wrong things and the result is far away from "delicious". In the end she always takes pictures from different perspectives so that the reader can admire her creations and probably be motivated to take the cooking spoon and get to work :-)

4.) Joanna does not only post about recipes, but she also gives "Kitchen tips". These are tips which are very useful to improve cooking processes or to preserve food. 

All in all, it is without doubt a very lovely and creative food blog. It seems that she really makes an effort and gives thought to her recipes. I totally recommend trying out some of her recipes :-)

I've recently tried this one out: panna-cotta

I've always wanted to taste a self-made panna cotta and I thought it was a good occasion to do it in connection with the food blog :-)

The only thing I changed was the fruit. I had no pomegranate at home and so I took some strawberries as an alternative. 

I'm a Tubian

You wonder what Tubian actually means? This term was created by Yousef Erakat, who is an Arab living in America. His hobby is to make videos of basically everything in his life :-) So a fouseyTubian is a dedicated fan of his, as I am :-)

1.) FouseyTube
- Here he uploads funny videos dealing mostly with Arab culture.
He runs a video series which is called "Middle Eastern family". He slips into the role of every family member and shows the funny Arab culture. There is baba, mama, his sister, her lover, his grandmother, his uncle - they are all played by him and he does an incredibly good job! He creates so many funny scenes where for example, his parents force him to find a good girl to marry. Additionally he shows how exaggerated his mother is concerning proper clothes or behaviour. It really is worth seeing :-) And I guess everybody can realte to his problems at home :-) And he also covers some cultural prejudices and makes fun of them :-)
2.) FouseyVille
- that's the channel where he uploads videos of his daily life. They are also very humorous. A lot of his friends appear and you really gain an insight into his exciting life!
3.) FouseyFitness
- As he  is on a trip to gain muscles he records himself during his sport activities. I guess that's only interesting for sportive people :-)
He took a brake from filming because he wanted to concentrate more on collage. Only a few weeks ago he made his comeback with a very touching message where he describes how he felt in the time where he had to do life-changing decisions.

Fascinating family

In one of my paragraphs about fascinating people I've written about my host family in Ireland. I'd like you to also know something about this lovely family :-)

It was on my school trip to Ireland a few years ago. The family lived in a residential area named Dún Laoghaire, which was not too far from Dublin. The very first minutes with the lovely mother were really promising as she drove me around and showed me the picturesque parts of the district. We arrived at their house and I was friendly welcomed by the rest of the family members. We got to know each other a little more and I gradually got an insight in their lives and interesting personalities. We mainly talked about the Irish and Bosnian history, which was one of the greatest conversations I have ever had. It was really fascinating to hear each other perspective to the dark history of our countries. We all recognized the connections between our homelands as both of them suffered decades of terror. Despite the fact that the family memebers were very set in their ways, they had very open-minded views to life. And this characteristic impressed me most!

I will definitely go back to Ireland and visit these fascinating people again :-) 

The luck of the Irish (part 3)

In the last part (assumed that I will not come up with another idea) of "The luck of the Irish" I will write about the Murals in Northern Ireland. My goal is one day visiting this place in order to see them in reality. It is such an interesting topic and the historic background makes it even more exciting. As we know already, the Murals are big paintings on buildings which were made by Catholics or Protestants. Both of them tried to express their point of view about different incidents which took place. They often show violence and therfore the government tries step by step to paint them over, which in my opinion is the wrongest thing they could do! Why not just face the bitter truth of the country's history? As a matter of fact, people are really able to learn something about these Murals as they also illustrates real incidents that took place. But generally, Catholics illustrate how they were surpressed and on the other hand, the Protestants glorify Oliver Cromwell and the British invasion in Ireland. 

I've found some youtube videos which show some of these Murals (the first one is a song from "In the name of the father")

Easter Egg in Lord of the Rings

Good morning :-)

As I'm a huge fan of the movie series Lord of the Rings I've done a lot of research about them. I've came across an interview between two cast members, Elijah Wood (Frodo) and Dominic Monaghan (Merry). The last one actually played a trick on Elijah Wood and pretended to be a German journalist. He succeeded to make a fool out of Elijah because they could't see each other, the interview was held via satellit. Elijah, sitting in New York, couldn't imagine being tricked by his friend and this makes the interview so hilarious. Dominic used this oppurtunity and asked him the most stupid questions ever!!!! :D With his German accent and his incorrect English Elijah couldn't believe it was him in the end. Simply great :D Have a look at it!

 

One funny question:
Dominic pointed out that Elijah's hair changed in big photoshoots he did for several magazines (He obviously changed wigs many times)

Dominic: In the photoshoots you do (!!!) with Vogue magazine and Cosmopolitan and Entertainment Weeky Timemagazine your hair changes dramatically from short to long. Do you wear wigs?

Elijah: No I do not.

Dominic: Have you worn wigs?

Elijah: No I have not.

Dominic: Will you were wigs?

Elijah: Maybe.

Dominic: When will you wear wigs?

Elijah: Laughs :D 

 

Hilarious! :D
The name "easter egg" was a project by the Lord of the Rings producers. Only few people were able to "find" this interview or other things which they prepared. But this super funny interview spread and now we are all able to see it :-) 

I can't help but show you more funny videos of the LOTR cast and crew, they really had fun on set and everytime I see these videos I laugh as they make fun of each other :D

 

B.A.N.K.S.Y

Those of you who have visited London have surely seen the murals of the streetartist Bansky!?
As far as I'm concerned, I've never been there and seen them in reality, but when I first saw the pictures in google I was overwhelmed!! Every single mural of him has a deep significance and wants us to think! They often reveal his personal opinions about politics and wants us to be aware how the society "rules" affect our lives. One theme often appears in his art work: Murals which illustrate that we're constantly observed by the government. 

Nobody really knows how Banksy looks like because he obviously wants to be anonymous. In his movie "Exit through the gift shop" (I will not write about it...now! :D) he also doesn't show his face. 

Have a look at some of his murals, they are really meaningful and great! Even so, I often question myself if the things he's illustrating are too exaggerated? Or is it really that way in our society and we simply are not aware of it as it seems normal for us? I can't answer it, but I see what he's trying to tell us and the more I think about it, the more I believe it!
 

See the full gallery on Posterous

He is one of the artists who has done a lot of work on the Israeli West Bank Barrier, you know the wall which seperates Palistianian and Israeli territory (I've already mentioned this in a blog). That's his way to express his feelings about this issue!

See the full gallery on Posterous

There are so many other great murals but I think these above have given you an idea of his art work. :-)

 

13th Amendment - Aaaaaj!

I'm sure you've noticed all these posters of Steven Spielberg's new movie "Lincoln". As the title indicates, the movie is about the 16th president of America Abraham Lincoln, more precisely it is only about his last years of presidency during the American Civil War and it also shows the struggle Lincoln had to go through to pass the 13th Amendment, which meant the abolishment of slavery in the 19th cenutry.                

I will not write about the plot now because I've covered the topic above. It is more important to talk about his major role in establishing a law, which changed the entire America at that time. We have to consider that people at these days couldn't imagine a society where coloured people could vote or do other things except being slaves. If we keep this in mind, it is very beneficial for us to understand the whole situation. So, there was a president with a great vision, to preserve the Union and to give every citizen of America the right to live freely, so he basically wanted to bring out the best in the people of his country. But there were some difficult problems he had to face while being determined to reach his goal. All the Republicans didn't fully agreed with him and the Democrats as well wanted slavery to be kept as it was an economic and crucial help for them. However, the very human Lincoln managed to persuade the people of his idea and finally he reached the vote majority and the 13th Amendment was passed - Aaaaaj!
You wonder why I write Aaaaj? At the elections for the Amendment, the members of the House of Represantatives could either vote  "No" (Naaaaaaaaaj) or "Yes" (Aaaaaaaaaj). 

But the most interesting part of the whole story is the fact that Lincoln had to do some life-changing decisions and sometimes he was caught between what is good for the nation (make peace with the South) and what should be done (abolish slavery). So he basically suffered from moral doubt. And this dilemma is perfectly conveyed in the movie. 

One thing I found out is that Daniel Day-Lewis (plays Lincoln and is the protagonist of my previous blog "In the name of the Father") refused to play this role for 8 years!! Can you imagine that? He didn't want to put himslef under pressure and portray the most beloved president of America, but luckily, in the end he agreed. Day-Lewis adopted the American accent and obviously proved again his excellent ability to play the part of another person so well! 

I guess if you are not well informed about Lincoln and the whole slavery issue of that time, I wouldn't recomment to watch the movie. I myself watched the great movie but sometimes it was really hard to catch up, although I felt pretty confident in American history. 
Anyway, there are also some funny scenes in the movie because Abraham Lincoln used to tell crazy stories which didn't have any relation to the issue of a situation :-)

Go and watch the movie, it is absolutely worth seeing! :-)
Here's an interview of Dany Day-Lewis where he speaks of his experience acting Lincoln:

 

Ps: I'll try hard not to write too many blogs  about movies anymorein the future ;-)