Back in the days when the internet was relatively new, and everything seemed much more innocent.. This is when I stacked a lot of personal interests several layers deep on this blog and several others. The list of blogs that I have started and not always kept up with is longer than my arm. I learnt a lot of lessons in the process, among them that this page just might be too naive
Over the Seven Seas
A blog by Birgit Deubner which began as: ...a journey around Cambodia and India... Today this journey extends through life, exploring the vast range of opportunities, practicing and sharing Yoga and Thai Massage, founding 3 distinctly different businesses, deciding which continent to occupy, where to station love, and what to cook for breakfast, lunch and dinner.
Friday, November 01, 2019
Once upon a time I was pretty green behind the ears...
Back in the days when the internet was relatively new, and everything seemed much more innocent.. This is when I stacked a lot of personal interests several layers deep on this blog and several others. The list of blogs that I have started and not always kept up with is longer than my arm. I learnt a lot of lessons in the process, among them that this page just might be too naive
Journal Entry November 1st - My Life in San Francisco
It is 2019, since we all lat met here there have been illness, loss, surgery, healing, a lot of moving, a lot of uncertainty and instability. In January 2016 I was ready for all of life to change, to resume some old parts of myself in the Arts, to continue dreaming and wandering in a way that is healthy for the soul. The reality was that political shifts took place, causing uncertainty about our options for where home could be.
Writing to you feels like writing to old friends. This blogspot format so familiar, so vintage, comforting.
In parallel to the future UK immigration situation being all of a sudden so uncertain, my health did some weird flips and kicks and I just attributed it to stress. In a way it probably was all down to stress but by December 2017 it became clear this was not stress alone. In early 2018 I had a surgery that in some ways is routine but I challenge anybody experiencing it to be causal about it, to me it was a major gravity life event and it changed things for the better, eventually.
Living in California, while not vibrant and exuberantly healthy also meant that we struggled hard. The cost of housing here was and is and probably will remain to be: horrendous. It is only in the last years that I am realising just how inhibiting housing cost is to ever growing numbers of people. I don't know what is driving the prices up but the average human being does not earn double what they did 10-15-20 years ago, yet their cost of living has easily doubled (again, in many places, I can only generalise using the reference points that I have). HOW are we meant to thrive?
I am honestly bewildered how this can be a functioning economic system. It is throwing me sideways day after day. And yet here we are, still remaining in California and I am ever more unsure what to do. So there really is only ONE single way out: and that is to find a way, fast, to myself become more agile in this economic market and become successful, financially successful not humanly successful because being a good and creative human alone has no value that would pay the cost of living. (Kind of, there is of course the exception that one may get help, but I don't want to count on help as a means for a thriving life)
Maybe I should have used all those countless ideas that I had for new blog & website ideas to channel them into headlines / blog titles / article titles.
Life became fragmented, across oceans , across platforms, across projects, across everything and nothing and maybe that all was too much or maybe that all was inexplicably useful. Yet in all honesty what can be more useful than to be able to afford, financially, to thrive.
It would mean a lot if I could count on your support. What you can do to help people who are trying to turn their life around, without getting all tangled up in the messiness of their lives? Engage with their online content, share it, click the positive buttons, if you can make a Pledge to their patron or Venmo, or to their Paypal or their online shops. Most of all SHARE what they are trying to build. You may not know how important daily, weekly, monthly, regular engagement is. What is engagement? Engagement is all of the above examples and also: commenting positive words (critiques and suggestions are always best for private messages) and subscribing.. Your support makes ALL the difference to all of us who are trying to rebuild our lives.
Wednesday, March 23, 2016
The year that started silently
Considering that finances are tight I will take the safe option and stay at home, focusing on work instead, on teaching German and Yoga, drawing and preparing a few Fine Art project ideas: ready to strike once I reach San Francisco. Yes California ! I'm coming home... to quote Joni Mitchell!
In June we return to the Richmond area of San Francisco, the very end of the peninsula, where only fog horns sound periodically and aside from that there is barely a sound. What a lovely opportunity to be able to come back!
But we managed to plan ahead even more! January & February will most likely see us returning to Thailand! Maybe even India, but probably just Thailand as travel is hard to afford and we are both keen to learn Thai this time.. I am very excited to be able to see my Thai Massage teachers again, further my education, add some new tricks to my repertoire.. Well and I haven't yet told anybody else, but here you can have a secret:
I am working on ideas to propose to some universities for an art research project / teaching curriculum ... shhhh (the cat is still int he bag for now)
Thursday, January 22, 2015
Sometimes it's the little things that make the day good..
Sunday, September 21, 2014
Tuesday, September 16, 2014
Sunday, August 17, 2014
This post is for Maria in Liverpool - I will keep adding to this for you
I think you feel that going away is a huge gigantic step into the unknown and something about it is perhaps quite scary at this moment. So I will slowly compile a list of links and suggestions of women traveling alone or with family, people reporting from their unusual lives as well as a few practicalities that you could take note of.
I will add more links to this list below whenever I remember more or stumble on more good connections. I will highlight the key ones in bold for you.
The travel insurance company whom I use, you can always ask me why I prefer them to STA travel or many others:
www.worldnomads.com
good resource of all kinds of information on travel in Asia (from vias, visa runs, routes and recommendations for short and longer term stays, both cover information for tourism and some for staying to live, work, volunteer or study) - always check the date of forum posts and be mindful that rules and regulations on visas for example change frequently.
http://www.talesofasia.com/
specifically for Thailand and a lot of teaching information:
http://www.ajarnforum.net/
specifically about India:
http://www.indiamike.com/
A Variety of good Women Travel Writing:
http://wanderlustandlipstick.com/wander-tales/asia/
http://canwelivehere.com/want-to-do-the-same/
I haven't fully explored this list but found a good blog in the line-up:
http://traveljunkette.com/best-female-travel-blogs-2014/
For Thailand:
actually this particular blog is for a whole range of countries but the link is to a post about Tiger Sanctuaries and everybody should take note and consider before going on elephant rides, snuggling with tigers, visiting human zoos... It is all ok, but be mindful that the place you visit REALLY is acting in the interest of it's inhabitants or else we perpetuate abuse.
http://www.angloitalianfollowus.com/2013/09/the-terrible-truths-from-thailands-tiger-temples/
Volunteering possibilities that benefit but don't require competing with native English speakers:
http://www.wwoofthailand.com/hosts/ (I think this is a fantastic program, haven't tried it myself, always search for reviews and have back-up plan ideas, too)
http://www.workaway.info A friend used WorkAway for about 18 months of time spent in France.
I have not checked MOST of the links provided in this list but Workaway & Wwoof are both represented as are about 20 more:
http://www.womentravel.info/html/volunteer-networks.htm
VERY YOGA:
one of the oldest blogs about visiting Mysore for Ashtanga Yoga (I include this because it is a little piece of history):
http://www.alanlittle.org/yoga/mysorediary.html
A more recent blog about Mysore and Yoga and how it all works, written by a woman, I refer to this from time to time. Keep an eye on her other recommendations, she might recommend links and blogs and resources.:
http://earthyogi.blogspot.com/2011/01/claudias-guide-to-mysore-india.html
In fact here is a major long list of Mysore Ashtanga Blogs (I obviously have NOT checked them all out, so use your own judgement about what's worth spending time researching there, some VERY good blogs among this list):
http://elephantbeans.wordpress.com/2011/10/12/ashtanga-blogs-live-from-mysore/
links that I have NOT yet checked out, so I am not recommending them but sharing them for your own investigations:
http://www.journeywoman.com/
Thursday, August 14, 2014
Bear with my inconsistent appearances...
Bear with me, I am overwhelmed with too many open-ended blog-projects (with this being the oldest one and I thought this would be the best place for the next post, which will be for Maria), too much life-uncertainty, too many life options even and not enough resources to grasp the options that lay in front of me. This leaves me very frustrated and almost tearful as I have to say 'No thank you' to so many good things that I might never have the opportunity again to touch, join, work with or learn from. Right now is perhaps the most uncertain time that I have ever experienced and the time in which I feel most powerless of any time in my life.
However I am not entirely despondent either, instead I sit and watch everything that passes me by and wonder how to actually see the silver lining to this situation, how to make something of it without missing it's possibilities entirely. Maybe we can't always have everything and have to find the treasure in a fraction of a thing. I have some ideas about this but this ultimately is material for another post of thoughts.
Wednesday, June 18, 2014
My American Workpermit came in the Post - I am ready to launch
Normally travel permits come as part of the Green Card and it is less common for people to be allowed to travel while the Green card application process is still pending.
The photograph is of my friend Noungh in Cambodia, standing on top of the small boat that we took to spend a day together around the Floating village and Flooded Forest. We caught snails that day and Noungh's contacts cooked them for everybody. I as a vegetarian had a hard time with that and didn't eat these, but there were plenty of other tasty snacks available for us. We had a feast of Cambodian delicacies.
I post this photograph of Noungh here because she appears so celebratory and victorious as she stands atop the roof of our boat, at sunset on lake Tonle Sap. And while only knowing her for a short intensive time I think her victories are fragile and for that reason ought to be celebrated all the more.
My mind wanders to the dreams yet unrealized by myself and those whom I have met around the world. These days everybody is a traveler, or it appears that way when I open up the internet and open any of many endless blogs. What I valued on my journeys were the extended periods of stay in places where most people fly in and out of with only a few days sandwiched between. So I think of those dreams, and also wonder about their shelf life.. I am nearing 40, I am! And need to explore what the real dreams are, it is so easy to get tangled in attempting to fit into the more 'normal' realm of social norms. And there is actually no guarantee that this would yield in any way greater success..
Bear with me as I try and figure it out, as I try and map my way around too many life options as opposed to maybe to few as it might have been the case (in some cases I know it was) for some of my friends, whom I found along the way in Cambodia, Thailand and India in particular.
*
For now I am getting ready to take some fresh photographs of Jason doing Yoga & Tai Chi for his portfolio and of the Gay Pride Parade in San Francisco at the end of the month.
*
In fact let me be wild for a moment and share a possible plan with you: I found a 7 month long Massage Program in Hawaii / Kauai for approximately $7500; totaling 700 hours of training. I had never ever considered Kauai but now I think: why not? It sounds like the perfect healing and learning experience! The teacher and director of the program, Lee Joseph, has been teaching for 30 years and the way the courses are described they sounds positively grounding. The price is amazing, of course I don't know what being in Kauai would be like, at all... NO idea.
Photographing and Massaging as a life practice.. Perhaps a reality?
Don't even ask how I think that I could fit Academic plans into this.. I just don't know.
Friday, June 13, 2014
We are house sitting in San Francisco
Friday, May 16, 2014
I re-emerge from the wormhole
I am working on getting a new batch of business cards printed ready in time for what I hope will be the arrival of my American Green Card sometime soon. It's tricky knowing when to begin advertising but if I don't do it about 4-8 weeks before my work permit comes then I will lose time when it finally gets here. (if it ever will)
I use Moo Cards because I like them. There should be a 10% discount link to the right in my wide selection of favoured links.. Check them out. They are a bit pricy but I have found the quality really good (they print a little darker than your screen might show you) and the service so far (6 years and counting) very responsive. By all means carry on photocopying your cards though, in the end we all know that nobody, except your mum, ever looks at your card to look up your number or email address anyway..
So here I am: in California, Jason pays for everything, I can't get my wordpress website to look even remotely professional, my photo portfolio site is a mess and I do need all that to start coming together a bit more if I want to ever start selling. You would think a woman approaching 40 would have it figured out by now.. No, not so..
I really wouldn't mind returning to depressing England and getting some work so I can stand on my own feet a bit more but at the same time I am hatching these crazy ideas about re-inventing the wheel and make a living photographing on the road, making friends and connections, sharing massage treatments and small yoga classes, writing for food journals and photographing anything from yogis to raw vegan cakes, social documentary to special events in the lives of well earning humans..
So here is the not so perfect photo portfolio website that I am working on:
http://over-seven-seas.smugmug.com/
I appreciate any feedback you are happy to share. But bear in mind that the website is somewhat out of my control, I just appear to not have any say in spacing between sections for example and lots of design issues have a mind of their own.
If you like anything: please buy it.
Seriously: it would be a big help.
Especially if you are not in America. It is better for me if my customers are from anywhere else until my Green Card arrives. But what the hell, I can't stop you, can I?
Friday, September 27, 2013
Over 7 seas goes to market this Sunday !
NEWS: I will be at the Lark Lane Fleamarket this Sunday between 11:00 and 15:00. Hopefully selling a suitcase full of handmade scarves. Craft and handmade prices, but priced in poor wool lover's & surviving artist's categories... I won't be here in November so this is a great chance to stash a few presents for friends and family and yourself!
preview items here: www.etsy.com/shop/over7seas
Wednesday, September 25, 2013
Archive of Drawings
Not all have sold. #37 for example is still here in my storage box...
Tuesday, September 24, 2013
Stockpiling my own Art work while my bank account is so empty that it is forming a vacuum ..
And I don't quite understand what I was thinking all this time. I have worked so hard on big Art projects and have spent endless hours drawing huge numbers of drawings. A lot of this is process work, which means drawings that were made and lead to a project and where the drawing wasn't originally intended to be the project. However there are a lot of drawings that WERE intended to be the project and while I love some of them so much that I just can't imagine selling them there are also many very, very good drawings that are worth a lot and that shouldn't still be in my chests, stored for the days that will never come.
So Tomorrow morning I will begin photographing them and listing them. I have already made stacks of drawings to sell, to finish and to keep (very few for sentimental reasons)
I estimate that most of them are worth a minimum of £25 to £75 each.
I already started photographing drawings of flowers that are more beautiful and less kitsch than you might think hearing the words "flower drawings".. I have previously sold a set of 20 of these for £50 each! Yes indeed.. So I am now in a dilemma of 'should I lower the price or try my luck at this price'.. ? Ultimately I just wish to clear my Art Studio and make space. I will mix my favorite drawings into the batches that I will list on Ebay and Etsy in the coming 10 days.
My target is to list a minimum of 20-25 per day. And then call some press to ask them to cover this Studio Clearance Sale. ..
Sunday, September 08, 2013
Guided Meditation: Finding Equillibrium
Friday, August 23, 2013
Preparing Drawings to Post
I have a new plan, which is to list half of my drawings from this still ongoing series on ebay and make the other half available on Etsy. It is a way of allowing people to buy 'now' instead of waiting for the ebay bids to conclude and at the same time will help me get feedback on Etsy, I hope.
I really love Ebay. It has been fantastic to get such a positive response from Ebay bidders and buyers.
If you are reading this and would like a drawing, too then just click on the tab on the top right {100 drawings sale} or follow one of my Etsy tabs and see what I have there. (You can reach my Etsy shops by clicking on the tabs on the top left).
Wednesday, August 21, 2013
Quantities and Qualities
This is very simply and almost beautifully filmed. No lecturing, no gore, no sensationalism, just a document of chicken, beef, piggy to tummy...
Thought provoking I think.
I imagine that most of us have food spoils from time to time (or shockingly weekly). Just stopping our own waste of food, any food, including vegetables, that alone would make things so MUCh easier on our ecosystem (and wallets and bodies)
I know some of you waste food, I've seen it.
Couldn't we begin at that place to make a change?
I also know that you all speak or think about positive changes, too.
Let's do it them.
I'll race you to the finish line. xxx
ready, steady, go... !
La surconsommation from Lasurconsommation on Vimeo.
Sunday, August 18, 2013
Back to the Drawing Board
Saturday, August 03, 2013
Get ready for when the sun goes on holiday!
Thursday, August 01, 2013
New fun project: Penny Drawings Sale
As promised yesterday on my blog 'Surplus Possessions Sales" I have now started to list the first penny drawings on Ebay. In order to get going to a good start I went wild and listed a whole 17 of them.
This means that you can buy original drawings for 1 penny to 17 pence on Ebay.
The idea is that with each subsequent drawing that I list I will add a penny to the cost. I would love it if you took a look and let me know what you think.
http://www.ebay.co.uk/sch/birgit_75/m.html?item=251313532590&ViewItem=&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2562
(I haven't had time yet to make new listings over in Etsy, but you can drop by anyway and take a look at what is already there. Some real bargains, too! http://www.etsy.com/shop/over7seas)
Wednesday, July 24, 2013
Considering real changes - boring post
I mistook the cracking of the crown as a split tooth and pictured yesterday as the milestone marker for the decay of my soon to be toothless mouth. Luckily my dentist isn't in his profession solely for the money and told me that all is not lost and that I qualify for a free replacement. Hurrah to that. Kind of.
It's a funny time when birthdays remind us of the speedy passing of time and life. And once past 30 a birthday just isn't filled with the same anticipation of things to come. This could just be me. But if I am honest with you I fear the passing of life but have spent the past 4 years often waiting for time to pass so that I could be in this place or that place; while dismissing the place that I actually was at..
It can be tricky to maximize one's potential and engagement in places that one intends to only pass through. But unless I manage to do this better I will miss a lot of valuable time and I suspect a lot of joy, too.
Here are some life plans for the coming year:
- more (a LOT more) crochet projects - I live onwards with the dream that a huge big Wintersale will come and line my treasure trunks with golden coins...
- more photography and more captializing on the photography
- more art - more selling
- more yoga and Thai Massage practicing
- filming and photographing a set of recipe and life tips for friends and family. For fun and if the project is any good for a little blog, too.
- taming my wild blogging explosion (I don't even know how many live blogs I have right now! + 2 website domains that I pay for!)
- beginning a second postgraduate degree, ideally soon, but I haven't been good in beginning.
Wouldn't you think that if I really wanted to begin something that I would just do it?
Tuesday, July 09, 2013
more travel is on the horizon... / my improvised life
The comforts or being in a place where people know my face from almost two decades of living my improvised life.. Having a history is soothing. People remembering my name and face makes me feel at home. To most people this likely is normal, to me it is extraordinary. But .. yes there always is a but...
My but involves the calling of dreams and far away places but also the necessary manouvering and relocating to be with my partner who needs to return to San Francisco. America and it's GM foods.. A woman of many principles is finding this a hard decision.
Have you ever tried to leave behind your library of books? Your kitchen (I love food), your comfortable 100% cotton bedding? You will appreciate these things beyond bounds once you have spent months or years missing them.. The main glitch is that the city that houses my comforts distinctly does not house the culture and opportunities that the rest of me needs.
Where next?! Will I join my soulshine and fly to San Francisco? I am distinctly past my mid-30's now, will I manage to make a life for myself that offers security in the future? I am beginning to sweat a little.
While contemplating the location of my bookshelf and the option of earthquake prone San Francisco I am also beginning to stretch out my feelers for a potential Phd. I have an idea now of how to proceed to try and change paths from Fine Art Focus to possibly Sociology. The route may take me via religion, ritual and dance.. Bear with me here or visit my Artist blog over on www.blogger.com/birgitdeubner
I will try and formulate my thoughts over the coming months..
Leading a uniquely individual life is a challenge sometimes... maybe it is not entirely unlike being an explorer and I do enjoy reading about those early day women travelers who made their way across deserts and mountains, far away places.....
Thursday, July 04, 2013
over7seas goes to the craft market ...
There is even a money saving code... If you find the coupon code box and type
'friendspayless' then you can save 20% until the end of July!
See you over at Etsy soon. xxx
p.s. I will be at Camp and Furnace in Liverpool this weekend, to sell some crochet items and photographic prints, come on by if you have time.
Tuesday, June 11, 2013
Living in Italy
I miss the choice of vegan friendly products that I know from London and in limited range also in Liverpool. Ultimately nothing beats the organic supermarket in San Francisco. But when I think of the foods that I have had the opportunity to eat in the past year, the mango and mini bananas in Thailand, the freshness of the vegetables and fruit from the markets there, the amazing range of delicious oranges in San Francisco, the coffees, the vegetables here, the nuts there, the dates in San Francisco, the coconuts, the melons... Each place has had a richness to offer. It is hard to select the best place for food. I think San Francisco allowed for the widest variety in diet, while Italy strikes me as probably the most natural and the freshest and in season, yet frustrating when the season is taking it's time to arrive.
If it was for food where would I live?
My vote would actually be with San Francisco - IF I could be certain that GMO products could be completely avoided. Unfortunately GM is such a huge business you just can't tell for certain if it will be possible to evade them entirely. Just think of groundwater affected and one way or another I can not imagine that one can get away from GM if one lived in America. What do you think?
Saturday, March 30, 2013
From the outer journeys back to the inner ones / Rebooting life, starting as fresh and as nutritious as possible
This means that I won't have my Omega 8004 juicer with me or my citrus press, But I think I will buy a citrus press, it is just so handy to speed squeeze lemons and limes and with this inflammation the alkalizing effect of these citrus fruits will really be helpful. I will be without my little library of useful books that I usually like to consult when I feel out of sorts.
It is really worrying that my joints flared up again, but not surprising. I have just spent 5 weeks in the most polluted environment that I have ever voluntarily subjected myself to. Each breath was a reminder of what toxins taste like. Never will I ever allow my body to be subjected to smog. I should have drawn my conclusions and left but the reasons for staying are for another blog post.
For now I just wanted to announce that some of my joints are in pain and that I want to do this properly this time. 'This' being a real adaptation of diet and lifestyle, with clarity and precision. This time I would like to get behind the curtains to learn why exactly my body is so weak. Is the food I eat becoming poorer in quality or is my immune system losing strength? Probably it is a combined matter, but while I know this makes me sound like a nut, I need to get to the bottom of this and source food that maintains a high nutrient content to support my body, which is clearly overladen with the negative environmental impact of the smog filled city that I have just spent 5 weeks in.
Points that I would like to keep an eye on
- cost / how to finance a healthy lifestyle
- nutrient content
- noticeable benefits
- how to choose healthy while not at home (in transit, in commute, on a journey)
- discipline / is it difficult to have the discipline to chose what my body needs to heal and stay healthy?
- discipline / general lifestyle changes, are they going to be hard to maintain? Will I manage to self-practice Yoga several times a week and remember to find the focus to meditate? (When I know how supportive these practices are to my body!)
- does all this have to become my life or can it be a supporting element in my life?
- do I have to give up life content to make time and room for complicated food sourcing and preparing strategies?
I am starting a video blog to keep track of myself and how it will all work. It is far from professional, but if you would like to check in then you can do it here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zb9rxo5RVa8