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Dubai -Feb/March
2006
Smell the sheesha!!
Doobie Dubai is full of half built skyscrapers, frenetic energy and
the wonderful sheesha. You'll either love or absolutely hate this
place. I loved it, however I was only there for 7 nights so
totally doable. If you like me like to drink champagne and good
wines you will be up for some steep prices...but if spirits and beers
will do they are pretty much similar prices to what we pay here.
If you love shopping you are going to be booking a ticket
sometime pretty soon after reading this. My personal
favourite is Mall of the Emirates, it has it's own ski field inside the
complex, top designers as well as the ususal suspects...plus they
have just opened or about to open Harvey Nichols within the
mall...apparently bigger & better than the original London store.
London & Berlin
October/November 2004
Touched down in
London to be greeted by the cooler weather of chilly autumn, however we
all know that we don’t go to London for the weather.
This time around was a little different as my normal haunt, North
London was not my place of abode but this time, East London (which I
hadn’t really explored much of).
East
London really needs no introduction but just in case you are planning on
discovering it, here are a few of my highlights:
Whitechapel Gallery
– Tobias Rehberger & Paul Noble.
You missed out if you didn’t get along to this amazing
exhibition, Paul Noble’ s work is something out of this world.
Wonderful to catch a glimpse inside his mind, such detail and
patience.
White
Cube –
Hoxton Square, Sam Taylor Wood – Photographs of celebs (male)
crying..whatever, I personally found her self portraits more
interesting…go see for yourself.
Rove Gallery –
Hoxton Square – NY based artists collection, well worth a visit.
There are loads of independent galleries all dotted around East London,
check out a map of East End galleries put out by TimeOut London. (sorry
can’t tell you a website for this map, but really helpful if you are
into checking out the local talent.)
There are quite a few galleries around Commercial Street,
Whitechapel Road, Bethnal Green Road, Redchurch Street, Great Eastern
Streets to name but a few.
Spitafields
Markets,Commercial Street, Old Street or should I say Hoxton
Square, Bricklane,
Sunday Up
Markets (just recently started in Bricklane), Shoreditch
are great for getting something a little different – jewellery, retro
gear, upcoming designers, clothing stores, etc all here.
For instance, I picked up some awesome long boots for 4 quid at
the Sunday Up Market!
Modern Tate
is a favourite so always check myself in for a day or at least a half
day there to see any special exhibitions that they have there, plus just
revisit oldies but goodies.
The main exhibition on while I was there was Robert Frank –
Storylines. I had no idea
who this artist/photographer was, so un-cultured of me! Apparently he is
one of the world’s most important living photographers.
He hails originally from Zurich, Switzerland but as a young man
emigrated to New York ….as you do.
He then landed himself an awesome job as photographer for
Harper’s Bazaar….and then traveled extensively throughout world.
His photographs are magical and nostalgic.
Go see it if you can and watch the video on him and his eccentric
wife at the end of the exhibition.
Also try and catch Paula
Rego at the Tate (I think) amazing exhibition of a woman who is so
passionate about her work and politics, very pro woman.
I had never been in London while Turner
Prize was on, but this year decided since it coincided with my trip
why not…sorry to say but very disappointing, not worth the 4 quid I
paid to get in.
Bars that I had the pleasure of visiting were Tea Bar in Shoreditch,
Lounge Lover, Zigfreids in Hoxton Square, Medicine Bar (Angel
Islington), Salmon & Compass (Angel), and more that a much of a
blur.
Highlights for night out for birthday bash at Tea Bar was seeing and
meeting Queer Eye guy – interiors Thom!
What a thrill.
Saatchi
Gallery was new to me this time around as I had always side stepped
that Gallery. It’s a
really diverse and constantly changing collection of contemporary art. A large part of the collection is English Artists such as
Sarah Lucas, Tracey Emin, Damien Hirst, Gavin Turk, and the most
provocative Jake & Dinos Chapman.
Some I had a complete aversion to and others I was completely
intrigued by, mainly the Jake and Dinos Chapmans pieces.
Music that I was listening to - Loving Scissor Sisters, Kings of
Leon….
Berlin –
ahhhhhhhhh what a wonderful relaxed and cool city...boy do they LOVE
sausage!
Well for a start we landed ourselves in the cool quarters of East
Berlin, Fredrichstein..finding ourselves staying at the most relaxed and
chilled hostel of all time…Odyssee
Hostel on Grunburger. I
haven’t stayed in a hostel for some years.. this place was a dream,
chilled people managing it, groovy,
clean and spacious rooms…cheap drinks! And the most friendly staff
ever.
Where do I start. Berlin is
amazing, such a diverse place, the architecture, the people, the
culture. If you are an
aspiring rock star, artist, musician, poet, designer, anything at all
creative, you are going to love this place,
or may even consider moving to Berlin.
Everywhere you look there is inspiration.
The bars, the cafes, restaurants, galleries and even the shopping
there is awesome.
Some of the highlights were, Café
Zapata a venue which has much history.
It apparently used to be a squatters abode and has been converted
into a music venue, art spaces, café/restaurant.
We stumbled upon this venue one night after being at a semi okay
place called Silberfich (DJ sucked, wouldn’t play Prince) both located
in Oranienburger St. We
had just missed the band of the night, UK’s Colour
of Fire, which possibly could have been a good gig!
Met young Owen anyways, lovely chap.
Other bars that are worth a look-in are Habermeyer,
Pirate Socks (love a bit of Rammstein, Death metal…awesome crew behind
the bar), Lee Harvey Oswald (I think that’s what it was
called…bizarre anyway)…they are really into themed bars....those
were just a few that were in our local area.
Then there are the galleries, OMG, you must try to get along to
the Hamburger
Bahnhof (Contemporary Art Museum), this was amazing, including works
by Bruce Nauman, Jeff Koons, Cindy Sherman, Marlene Dumas, Thomas Ruff,
and whilst I was there the "Flick Collection" was on.
Catch it if you can. If you have limited time in Berlin, try to go
to Hamburger Bahnhof, Jewish Museum, Topography of Terror, The Reichstag
(German Parliament), and Pergamon Museum...those are some of the
highlights. You can not do it all in a few days like I had planned...so
I'll be back BERLIN watch out!!
New York City / Los Angeles - June/July 2004
I recently just got back from one of the most exciting and exhilarating
cities in the world. Yes you guessed it, NY. You hear all
the clichés and see the classic tourist t-shirts and memorabilia with
"I Love NY" on them....but it's so true. What's not to
love about NY. There is no place quite like it....This was my
first time to NY so I was a virgin to all the sights, looking at
everything through fresh eyes and awe. Just feeling the amazing
energy of the city alone was awesome! I think for me anyway, the
closest city that comes to NY for the energy level is possibly London,
one of my other favourite cities.
I could go on for hours about all that I did and saw, but I won't.
I will let you know some of the highlights and places that you will
probably want to check out if you go to NY.
First off you need plenty of time in this city. Forget sleeping if you
want to take it all in. My first port of call was actually Los Angeles,
which I have been to quite a few times but this time it felt a bit more
local than it had previously. I guess because I kinda new my way
around and having friends in the city always helps. I didn't have
much time, a couple of days so I decided to concentrate on a couple of
things, restaurants, gigs and Art. Just for a change! Headed
up to the LACMA
(which BTW is pretty impressive). Don't underestimate the art
& culture in LA, its up there with the best as far as museums and
galleries. Don't forget to check out all the buildings,
especially the Latin American section...which contains some Diego Rivera
and
Frida Kahlo's artwork.
So go check it out for yourself. Its pretty easy to get to as
well, its on Wilshire Blvd. Went along to the Whisky,
to check out some real Rock'n'Roll but was sadly disappointed as I had
just missed the band that I had wanted to see... not really the REAL
grungy LA Rock that I had wanted to see but hey you get that.
Okay, NYC Rocks!!! Get yourself a Metro ticket (then you're mobile), you
can get a day pass $7.00US or a 7day pass for $21.00US. The Metro
(underground) is fantastic, and very fast and pretty
reliable.
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First stop
was along "museum mile" which encapsulates some of the most
prestigious museums in the world. Since I had limited time there I
decided to concentrate on a couple of the museums which I had always
wanted to go to, namely, the Metropolitan
Museum of Art, The
Guggenheim Museum, and the Frick
Museum. They all proved rather overwhelming especially the
Metropolitan due to the size of the museum and the collections.
The Guggenheim for the building alone is worth the visit. The
frame is Frank Lloyd Wright's masterpiece of modern architecture.
There is also a permanent collection of works by Chagall, Kandinsky,
Picasso, Van Gogh, and many other modern masters.
The Frick museum was
actually one of the museums that I was not planning on visiting but came
highly recommended by an acquaintance that I met through art circles.
What a surprise, it is a small but exquisite collection. If you
are into art and want to see some of the best examples of use of light
and depicting light some of the best in the business are on show
-Turner, Velázquez, Vermeer, Whistler. My personal favs, the two
V's, Velazquez and Vermeer. Worth a trek up to the Frick.
Central park
is an absolute must whilst visiting NY, its sheer size will however take
you a few days to get around. Perhaps invest in a book on Central
Park or a map at least to tell you what you've missed out on.
Central Park have several Summertime activities available. Shakespeare
in the Park is something worth going along to and its FREE!! Yes
some things in life are FREE! and they actually have very high calibre
actors in these series. Central Park SummerStage
lists events in the park over the summer months. I think the Yeah,
Yeah, Yeahs and Devo are playing soon, so pretty awesome upcoming
events.
New York Metro
mag & also Time
Out NY will give you all the low down on where to go for gigs,
clubs, bars, restaurants, shows etc. Speaking of shows on and off
Broadway, caught the most amazing show "Wicked".
And lastly the restaurants. I found myself there while it was
Restaurant week in NY. By accident really discovered that this was
on and coincidently walked into a couple of the restaurants
participating in Restaurant week. One of those restaurants was rmseafood
which was fabulous and also another couple of restaurants that proved to
be exceptional were; Aquagrill in Spring Street and Jack's
Luxury Oyster Bar in the East Village. Fabo!!
On that note, NY was all that I had dreamed of and more. All that
I had heard about the rudeness of the people was completely incorrect. I
found the people friendly and very helpful. NY RoCks!!!
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