What a day,

It didn't start out eventful, but I really had an interesting finish to the work day. After some meetings and class, I went back to my friends' for lunch and some studying. Following that., my friend Renee and I were biking home, and we kept getting cut off by a Volvo on a canal road. Canal Roads, like Prinscengracht, Keizersgracht etc. that ring around Amsterdam are narrow, and if a car is meandering through them, bikes can't get past. We were baffled why this car kept stopping and starting - it almost even stopped on a tee and I was two feet from smacking into the back of this car (don't worry mom, I'm fine). So we went around the car finally on the sidewalk, and we found out why this car was driving so erratically.

In the car was SINTERKLAAS and ZWARTE PIETE. For the uneducated, Sinterklaas is a religious, Dutch version of Santa Claus who represents a different holiday altogether, Sinterklaas on Dec 5. There is only one Sinterklass; the same man plays him every year, and there he was, waving to us in the car, staff in hand and sidekick, Zwarte Piete (Black Pete) beside him. It's a rarity to ever see Sinterklaas live, and Renee and I almost got run over my him. I'm still laughing. Even Zwarte Piete was all decked out in blackface (google it if you are curious) and big hoop earrings. It was surreal. We couldn't stop laughing in amazement as we biked past the Volvo. So there you have it Dutch kids, Sinterklaas doesn't ride a white horse, he drives a Volvo.

After criss-crossing through rush hour and taking the usual route home, I biked over a broken bottle and a piece of glass, about 1cm thick got lodged in my front tire, flattening it. I ended up walking home - about 2 miles - and dropped the bike off at the shop. It needed oil anyways.

There you have it. Happy Sinterklaas,

Tot Ziens!

Meneer Shain Shapiro

Sweet Adeline...

I love Phish. I hadn't listened to them in a while and after 15 minutes into "David Bowie," I am hooked again. They remain the best band ever. hands down. The Beatles are up there too.

Okay, I realized something yesterday after my program. Throughout our four year journey into undergraduate academic trancendence, we are just climbing up a mountain - and at the top of the mountain is a great wall. Once you graduate, you have reached the wall, but have yet to scale it. This Cultural Analysis program is pretty much just us flinging ourselves at the wall consistently, bruising our shoulders and frustrating our minds. We seem to keep trying to find a way to scale it, theorize the right way to get over the wall, but every time we try, it fortifies itself and becomes that much more impenetrable. Then, once we graduate and move onto PhD work, we don't climb over the wall, we just become the wall.

So here I am, drowning in essays, trying to become a small brick on a wall that no one has ever climbed over. It makes me feel like I may be that missing piece that meets the Big O, or that the big O is doomed to never finding that missing piece, because it never existed in the first place.

I'm off to read. love you.

Saturday,

What a lazy day. All I've done is written a paper, poorly I might add, and now Im exhausted. I'm thinking I'm going to go out for dinner for once, as I never, almost never do that. Yesterday, in a a rare with being a normal person, I went to Wagamama with my friend Gail and her sister and it was lovely. People actually eat out; who da thunk it?

Turns out I am moving. Not right now, but in January. I love my flat (and those who have been here can attest); it was amazing. It's just a bit too expensive for me right now, and I need to downsize. Turns out the first place I look at is perfect. Big, sunny, a great neighbourhood despite being a little further south - meaning out of town - then where I am, and my roomate/landlord seems to be lovely as well. I'm going to accept the deal next week and pack before I head off to Switzerland.

Now I have to find someone to rent this room by Jan 1. Drew up an ad today and will have it posted next week, so hopefully we'll get someone relatively normal, as Alex deserves someone as fantastic as me! Just kidding. Better than me I hope. No new news other than that. Tour promotion starts next week. fun fun fun.

my 100th post!

It'll be short. Here's a review of a Cat Power show in Amsterdam on 11.3

Hope You Enjoy It - Click Here.

-Love Ya

More immigration woes...

Looks like I'm back to square one mississauga with my immigration paperwork, as my residence permit was rejected because of an oversight and a typo. My Uni is helping me with another application, which will be accepted because it going directly through them. 5 months now and I'm still in limbo. I hate limbo-ing; don't have the knees for it.

Other than that, it's rain rain rain and work work work. Have lofty aspirations for tonight, and this is the last thing I'm doing that isn't academic before I buckle down and giv'r. Went to the market today and saw two litres of mustard for 1 euro. I was curious. Very curious. I didn't buy it.

Listening to Sufjan Stevens and John Coltrane tonite. Should be relaxing. Oh, and I'm playing a show tomorrow at Bitterzoet in Amsterdam with my friends, The Show, from Toronto. They are here because of the Cannabis Cup, and I'm sitting in on percussion. At least methinks that is what is happening. Come one, come all. No cover.

Lazy Sunday;

Lots and lots and lots to do... little motivation to do it.. or a lot of motivation and just plain lazy. I have gotten some work done, but need to do more. It never ends. Gonna try and watch The Grey Cup tonite because I'm Canadian.

J.S. leaves tomorrow.. ce la vie.. It's been great having him around. Also, I have decided that the Netherlands needs to enact no smoking legislation, simply because I am doing way too much fucking laundry. Anytime I go anywhere, I smell like an ashtray. Ashtrays ain't sexy.

Listening to the Burt Neilson Band, feeling slightly nostalgic. I'm also just sitting on MSN, ignoring my work as per usual and waiting for the start of the week... I did get a lot done today, but not enough. fun fun fun.

Dave Matthews,

Well, I got to the ticket shop at 10AM and counted eight people ahead of me. After six of them, the show was Uitverkocht, or SOLD OUT. Gail is going to kill me.

Also, on another note, J.S. and I saw some riot police in full gear in Amsterdam a few ays ago. Fun!

Africa,

Howdy. Quick Post.

Here's a piece that I worked on for ages and have finally been published. It's about African Hip-Hop. Best-

African Hip-Hop Piece

Also, Musical Recommendation. The Slip's new album, Eisenhower is quite possibly the best album I've heard this fall. Every song is gorgeous... Ah, just for the hell of it, here is a top 12 - in no particular order - of fantastic albums released in 2006. Hit up iTunes and get these!

1. The Slip - Eisenhower
2. Guster - Ganging up on the Sun
   
3. Jenny Lewis and the Watson Twins - Rabbit Fur Coat
4. Pilate - Sell Control for Life's Speed
5. Patrick Watson - Weight of the World
6. Islands - Return to the Sea
7. K'Naan - The Dusty Foot Philsopher
8. Sigur Ros - TAKK
9. Magic Numbers - Those The Brokes
10. Two Gallants - What The Toll Tells
11. My Brightest Diamond - Bring me the Workhorse
12. (bonus) - Hidden Cameras - Awoo

Howdy;

For some reason, I can't get the Full House theme song out of my head. But I digress...

Things are well, the same really. I am currently booking a January tour for my band, Kae Sun, which is slowly but surely coming together. Here are the cities we're playing, but nothing is 100% confirmed so I cannot divulge anything else; Ottawa, Kingston, Montreal, Toronto, Hamilton, Guelph and London. Toronto will be extremely special as Shad K will be joining us, while other special guests are almost confirmed for other dates. I'll be promoting heavily, as I always do, so keep an ear out for that and I'll see you at the shows.

School is chugging along as well; I am beginning my final semester essays and formulating my senior thesis project, which begins in the Spring. I'm also writing the odd article when I have time, controversial and not. I just interviewed Bruce Hornsby, a legend in his own right, so check that out HERE.

I've also changed the colour of my blog, just for shits and giggles. I like to keep things relatively fresh and interesting, and new colour is a great way to change without actually changing anything. Oh no, I've let you in on my secret. Expect some more 'changes' soon, hehe.

Finally, I'm quite busy with reviews, as I have Two Gallants (11.18), Sarah Harmer (11.23 - Jordan's Birthday) and Minus The Bear (11.30) coming up this month. I'm also seeing The Roots with my lovely friend Gail on 11.22, which is a week yesterday, or next Wednesday.

So life swims and flutters along... My friend J.S. is staying with me till Monday and turning my new MAC into a super-duper-ultra-mega-techno-star machine, as he is a Mac wiz. The things you can do with it are hyperbolic; amazing, awesome! He also fixed a problem with my Ipod and may have recovered all my music from my external HD. He is the wind beneath my wings.

That's all... Love ya in green.

Howdy,

I just wrote an article about Panic! at the Disco for JamBase, a website that focuses on music that almost paradoxically, by mainstream standards, differentiates from the band in question. Pushing buttons is good though, and good music is good music, so we went ahead with it. Check out the article and comments here, as I feel like the Danish newspaper after they published cartoons of Muhammed. Alright, not that bad. Here's the piece.

Other than that, I learned how to moderate comments today and saw that I had a bunch. Wow, I can be an idiot sometimes. I'll respond to them now.

"When you do things right, people won't be sure you've done anything at all" - Futurama

How True. I realize this more and more...

Rememberance Day...

RIP Alli, Stan, Scott, Florence, Oscar, Sam, Celia and everyone else I've lost in the last few years. Love you all.

Bedouin Soundclash and Airports...

I am sick of Airports. I have been in so many I can't even count, and I have experienced the whole gamut of services, annoyances, time-delays and such. I've decided that airports enrage me so much that I'm going to devote my thesis to exploring how airports and the culture they engender affect us, the travellers. Think about it, in airports you can get drunk at 6AM, are encouraged to buy smokes, booze and perfume, pay ghastly amounts of money for basics and have to be poked and prodded just to be given the privilege to be in them. They are unique places, places of another world, and I'm interested. My brain is ticking.

I went to Tilburg on Tuesday (southwestern NL for the geographically challenged) to see friends of mine, The Bedouin Soundclash. It was their first ever continental European show as part of the Vans Antidote tour with Gogol Bordello, Disco Ensemble and Danko Jones, and even though they are huge in the UK, no one knows them in Europe. Ended up hanging out with them all day, had a blast and then endured a three stopover, 3 hour train-ride at 1AM back from Tilburg to Amsterdam. They only have 'local' trains that late, and Amsterdam Centraal was 14 stops from Rotterdam, which was 8 stops from Den Bosch, which was 4 stops from Tilburg. Tilburg is quite pretty though; like a tiny Amsterdam without all the problems.

So now I am sitting in the computer lab at school waiting for a friend to get off of work. I've gone out every night this week, despite my lack of funds and un-lack of work, and tonight is the same. I've yet to see Borat, so tomorrow I may give him a watch at home and relax. I have a massive presentation on Susan Sontag due Monday, so that's my weekend. Yee-haw.

I'm quite proud of the Iceland piece, and I have a few more in the works for the next few weeks. I just interviewed Bruce Hornsby today and wrote an article, and have pieces on Panic at the Disco, Mala Jube and Cat Power in the pipelines. I'm also looking for more higher profile work, so if anyone knows anyone.. hehe.

Other than that, things are relatively hunky dory. I feel directed and directionless at the same time... ambitious and lazy... paradoxical. I want to do everything, but I know it's impossible. Still, things are chugging along; Kae Sun has some shows in January and I'm going to rejoin the band on stage for a few of them, and we're going to start making the new album in January. Also, logo design and company stuff is in the works, and I'm reworking all our promotional material. I'm also slowly redesigning my website, with the help of my friend Kevin, and writing the odd paper now and then.

So there you have it. comprehensive and fresh.. toodle-oo.

ICELAND AIRWAVES FESTIAL REVIEW... ON JAMBASE

That is all.

Sunday,

My camera is giving me fits with my new computer and I cannot seem to get the pictures from Prague off it right now. The new MAC is fantastic, but I do have three growing pains that need sorting out, so off to the Mac store I will go this week to see if they can't use their expertise to assuage my idiocy.

Well, Prague Prague Prague... Forgive me blog and the 4 readers who check it out for not updating while I was there, but Internet was limited and I was not there to check my e-mail. I will try below to give some sort of a synopsis of my traversing in Prague. It wasn't all that entertaining, so it shouldn't take too long.

I arrived in Prague at the airport on Monday afternoon, after a wretched experience at Schipol, which is Amsterdam's airport. Everywhere, and I mean EVERYWHERE was there a line, and I think I waited for atleast 3 hours just going through the motions. Fun. I met my mom at the hotel in Central Prague after meandering through their public transport system from the airport. It was lovely to see my mom after all these months, and we ended up having a lovely time.

For the most part, Prague was spent walking around. Minus a bit of sightseeing, some shopping, lots of eating, some drinking and a few other surprises, we walked, walked and walked. My mom surprised me by the amount she could walk. She's a tough cookie, lemme tell you.

Prague is gorgeous, like most medieval European cities. A main square in the old town, a great Bridge called 'Charles' Bridge' that snakes across the river, a massive castle at the top of a hill, lots of exploratory alleyways and plenty of breathtaking facades. It was overly touristic, like almost to the point where it is a caricature of itself in some ways, but beautiful regardless. We walked around the Jewish Quarter and explored the city's Jewish heritage, including venturing inside one of the oldest synagogues. We counteracted that by hitting up an amazing church that was as otentatious as Versailles. It was amazing. The effort people go into to please God. If God was an interior designer, he'd (or she'd) ask people to probably tone it down a bit, as these houses of worship were as colourful as the remnants of a Saturday night on a Leeds' sidewalk. I couldn't live in those churches/synagogues. God needs sunglasses 24/7. Beautiful regardless.

The Prague Castle is immense and built on top of a huge hill that I walked up at 9PM. There were guards outside standing still and when I went, it was quiet. My mom didn't come with me as she was usually tuckered out after dinner. Another gospelized, middle century triumph, lemme tell you.

Eating in Prague was lovely too. We tried to maximize the Czech food, and found some fantastic restaurants along the way. 'pravda' was one I distinctly remember, and I had one meal where the wine list was encyclopaedic. Also, there was a bar around the corner from our hotel that served traditional czech beer (and food) including Pilzen, Kozel and Budvar for 30 krowns (about $1.25 CDN)! I studied there everyday, lemme tell you. The beer was so cheap, after 3 or pints, studying became facetious.

One night got crazy. I went to an Irish Pub to study (stupid move) and met these two Glaswegians who were watching football. After the game and some drinks, we went to this nightclub that was four stories high, and inside was a Contiki Tour. Needless to say, the reasonably priced White Russians make the rest of the story short. It was fun. I stumbled home in the freezing cold at 5AM.

I was fucking freezing, by the way. Noticeably freezing. Oh, we also did a horse and buggie ride and walked along the river for a while. It was lovely. So there you have it. Prague. Done by Shain.

Back home to real life now. More later.