December 30, 2012

Montana Fashion Escape



We arrived in Montana-Crans yesterday for a few sunny days with family.
Today is gorgeous, though the once gorgeous snow rushes down in sun-sparkled rivulets.
Of course one of the first things I do on my morning off, because I don’t do downhill skiing anymore, is shop-drifting through elegant streets looking at elegant clothes with and without name brands, and wondering who could use that Desigual T –shirt with printed charcoal-drawing kids and color swatches, or the soberly elegant Gant shirt that whispers ‘I’m way casual but guess how much you’d have to pay for me?’

Tourist boutiques are filled with ugly cows leering from linen towels (made in China?), 200 Swiss franc kiddie Moonboot knock-offs (idem), fur jackets for many thousands, and the surfboarder’s dream jacket for 800, on sale from its original 1,200 francs, not counting matching trousers and the silk shirt on your back.
As if you cared enough to turn a tag around and take a look (with discretion), and you do and the price is….oh no, don’t tell me…..

Ah yes, pre-scuffed boots are in vogue, though they look even more tired than they did last July: you know, boots that have lived, boots with a history, for heaven’s sake Eloise.
What I would call Let’s Look @ My Vintage,  old hippie knock-arounds….hey, peace and love……I’m wearing boots that waded through monsoon and mud-slides in Bangladesh when I was a stringer for Bareback Outback…..when in fact the wearer is the daughter of a Valaisan banker….

Meanwhile of course this materialist loitering transports me to the land of Glamor and the Unnecessary Accessory, far away from news of the tragic death, following a series of brutal rapes, of a young woman in Ambedkar Nagar, Uttar Pradesh.
And the terrible events in Syria.
And my conflicting views on Israeli policy and policies, while loving Israel.

I can look at the fur of a wild animal killed for fashion, and feel the guilty pleasure of running my fingers through it, and the (supposed) moral superiority of someone who wouldn’t buy fur even if she could afford it.
Animals suffer at the hands of people, people suffer at the hands of people, and I am distracted by fur and fashion, the color and flow of textiles that are this year’s answer to what was happening last year.
We’ll see if 2013 will see its share of camouflage prints to honor Syria and perhaps as a tribute to repression, the rise of the hijab as the dernier cri in fashion.

December 9, 2012

ALPINE AIRHEAD

Ok, so I'd like to have a different identity, profile.
Something.....young, fresh, different.
An alter-ego to Bicontinental Blogger, who lingers over what she hopes is wise & witty, waits until a blog is ripe before allowing it out to pasture, and wouldn't mix a metaphor......

Yes, a new profile:  Alpine Airhead?
The world is absurd and strange, and full of people reacting to it. TV announcers become pundits, pundits become overblown with their own wisdom, the masses are ignorant or under-informed, but anyone is good for an interview by someone toting a microphone.

Alpine Airhead reminds me of Bécassine, Amelia Bedelia and Ugly Betty:
goofy, sweet, original, and occasionally intelligent.
 http://www.librairie-gaia.com/dossiers/becassine/Becassine%20Historique.htm
http://www.mentalfloss.com/blogs/archives/52753



She wanted to  be interviewed, as she hadn't had a chance to express herself---she is a modest unknown. So allow me to introduce her.

She's an expat (so what's new?) who tries to keep her nose clean, and even though she occasionally reads a journal and absorbs the newspapers in homeopathic doses, no one cares,  No one listens to her wisdom on whatever it is, the European economy, genetically modified food, post-feminism, fracking,  domestic cats, not so domestic cats, etc. even when she has nothing to say. I didn't want her to feel invisible.

I decided to give her a special moment in the sun before it disappeared at 4 pm, and promised I'd publish her interview here this evening.

Bicontinental Blogger (BB): So welcome to the Blog Alpine Airhead! Please feel free to express yourself. Just to let you know, we don't use really strong language on the blog. We beat around the bush, so to speak. May I call you Airhead? 

Alpine Airhead (AA): Natch!


BB:  So Airhead, what are your thoughts on the economy?


AA: Now I'm glad you asked me that. I have feelings about it, lots of feelings, but no thoughts. I really know so little about economics.....my feelings are.....what can I say...um....you know.....not so good, in fact rather bad, like......


BB: ....but surely....you're being too modest....


AA: no really, I don't know a thing. In the good old days there were experts, right and left, I mean left-wing and right-wing, but now the sleeves of competence are unravelling and left is no longer right, I'm so lost. I miss that old binary system, but when they dropped the Iron Curtain, everyone was dying to become Westernized. See where that's brought us!!


BB:  Ah.....where?


AA:  People scrambling to get into the Euro, out of the Euro, back to the drachma, into bed with underage teenagers, who knows, pesetas and lira and we'll have to break out our old piggy banks.  I mean poor Angela, she's got Europe on her shoulders and it's giving her very bad posture.


BB:  Ha ha, thank you Airhead. I feel for Ms Merkel too.

So how about genetically modified products? The French are battling it out right now, the US has developed an impressive array of them and has used them for years. What's the solution? Are they dangerous?  Where does it all end?

AA: You're asking me? Fish cell carrots? Insectide corn? Talking soy beans? Bleuuuuch. 

When I was young we were just working out how you glued together a model of the double-helix. You expect me to keep up with this? 
I tuned out after we learned about arginine, glycosylene, thyrosamine and cyclosporin.

BB:  I believe you mean adenine, guanine, thymine and cytosine.


AA:  Yeah, whatever. Fill in the blanks. Show you know your way round the internet. Make me look stupid.


BB:  Oh, I didn't mean to do that! Forgive me if....


AA:  It's OK, I'm used to it.  It's because I'm a woman.


BB:  Well in fact I am too, but that doesn't mean....


AA: There we go, where's your feminist loyalty?

Oh,  I'll tell you a joke I heard thirty years ago:  two feminists go into a bar, and the first feminist says to the second......

BB:  Yes??


AA:  Oh hell, I forgot the punchline.


BB:  Hmm. Let's see. Um, fracking? Fracking and the environment?


AA:  I'm glad you asked me that BB. Fracking is an interesting word:  like  cracking and fracturing, which is what it sounds like, hacking, tracking, trucking, fuc......


BB: Excuse: me, we have to keep it clean.


AA: Ah, but that's the whole point. It's an onomatopeia, or onomatopoeia, if you have to be British. 

It sounds like what it is. You know, it's fracking the earth.

BB:  Well, I guess so. Let's end on a lighter note.

We've heard about your passion for cats. You're a cat-lover and cat-collector it seems!
You have, what is it, twelve cats?

AA: (Modestly) well right now it's eleven, but if you count the occasional dinner-guest, as many as fourteen step up to the trough in a day.


BB: Impressive. And what, er, what do you get from having so many cats?


AA: Well no-one has cats. Cats have you, clearly. But I enjoy watching them clean the bowl and chase spiders. They have their own language and are wise and beautiful.


BB:  But some cats seem to have some personality disorder, possibly borderline, as they don't relate to humans well. They can be very reactive, seem preoccupied only with themselves,  groom obssessively....


AA:  You of all people! Haven't you heard that Borderline Personality Disorder is no longer a proper diagnosis according to the new DSM V?.....You disappoint me. I thought you really kept up to date. I mean, I'm the dumb-cluck here.


BB: Yes, of course.  I mean I'm sorry. I mean thank you so much for your time Airhead. It's been.....


AA: ........and tell all your people out there that I'm for real.



End of Interview