Skazki Studio

Teaching - Learning - Living - Loving 

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Have you ever spent a day without having a real conversation?

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Winter Palace, Saint Petersburg, Russia

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My favorite place on earth

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When you don't know where on earth you want to be. Anywhere feels wrong. Everywhere is just flat dry land. Self-groundless.

When neither you know who you want to be nor who you are, reality is a heavy stone over your shoulders. Self-heaviness.

[skazkistudio]

Tales of Suspense

You and I might be a horror movie.

I am –deep down rooted to the color of your weariness. 

The sky is not always blue. A thunderstorm bounds up more strongly with a rainbow than a drizzling could do. 

Titans Escape Restlessly Renouncing  Organically to  Ridiculous cheesiness 

No running away. 

I, herby declare you are the star of my horror movie. 

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Word by Word

Language learning is a translocation of meanings to narrate experiences

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Why am I a teacher? 

When I was little becoming a teacher never crossed my mind. Although, I used to explain my classmates whenever they did not understand what the teacher said. I helped them at final exams, especially those mates who were about to repeat the scholar year. 

Teaching came to my life a few months before I turned 20, right when I decided to major in Fine Arts instead of Biology. This decision made me save as much money as possible in order to move out from my parents’ in case they didn’t get divorced. My life sucked. Fortunately, they did. I promised my father not to be constantly asking for money to pay my studies so for 2 years I kept teaching chemistry, biology and physics since I was good at them –in fact, excellent.

In 2015, I started teaching English as a foreign language and 6 months later I taught my first Spanish lesson to a Korean guy named Jae who suddenly went back to South Korea taking with him one of my favorite books. Ceramics is the latest in my resume but it is amazing an even “easier” to teach than chemistry or heavy Spanish grammar. 

One of my tattoos says “to share is to care” and I truly believe that I am a teacher because I love sharing knowledge and experiences. However, it makes me be one or two steps ahead of students, otherwise I would be one –though, teaching is always a learning activity– being in front of a class requires more than mere enthusiasm and patience. 

I am a teacher because I love the feeling of being a provider and I love the face people make when they are learning something new even if it is somewhat insignificant for others like a new word or shaping something with clay. Teaching reminds of the people who taught me. It is like an ancestral activity that keeps humanity going on. 

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Unattractive

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Love dwells at home 

After yesterday's writing workshop, I realized how afraid I am of dwelling at a broken miserable home again, where "love" is supposed to mean something beyond duties and attachments.   Fortunately, I am not scared of writing nor illustrating anymore. Though a bigger fear came out from inside my wardrobe. 

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Leftovers

Two days ago one of my dearest friends and I said goodbye. We had dinner and I took away our leftovers altogether. When the time arrived I hugged her and for the very first time in my life –yeah! first time– my lips whispered “I love you” without double thinking, without fearing losing something, without feeling that my own attachments were going to lock me down. 

The following day I heated our leftovers in the microwave. Then the meaning of leftover started bugging me while the spicy smell of our Bibimbaps was making my mouth water. I did not eat everything. Let’s say, I left leftovers. 

Surprisingly, my heart and soul were not sad. These leftovers represented all the memories and experiences we had together and instead of making me feel down, they cheered me up because without our friendship Spanish lessons would not have happened, hiking and yoga wouldn't have a place in my life, applying to master’s in Digital Art & Humanities with a teaching Eng - Sp project would not be taking place either.

Sometimes when we think of leftovers, it comes to our mind the image of small unwanted pieces. Though they are what makes us move forward. 

                                                 [to be continued] 

[skazkistudio]

Anchors 

When you are a runner reaching stability turns almost impossible –especially when you are one of those who constantly escape from captivity– you are always moving, sometimes back and forth. Though, the ground you stepping on it’s never the same. Your best stabilizer is your inner strength. Leaving is a default in your set. 

Runners are scared of remaining in one place, of not being able to sprint or slow down whenever they want to, of not feeling fresh air filling up their lungs, of not feeling their body sore after 45 mins of constant move, of not having a moment of deep concentration. Runners are terrified by back holds. They do not carry deadweight with themselves. They do not wear protective gear, such as kneepads, gloves, helmets, etc.  

What runners need are anchors. 

                                       [to be continued]      

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Visit Original Link

Spanish Lessons 

Yesterday, after posting the first part of what Spanish lessons mean to me, one of my friends sent me the screenshot of a comment on English. It said that English was an identity stealer, an ideological colonizer and in between the lines it suggested decolonizing our minds by going back to Spanish. Moreover, it openly asked people writing in English what kind of writers we were. 

Firstly, I do not consider myself a writer. I am a visual artists. It took me 2 years to make the final decision of expressing myself in other languages rather than in Spanish. Before coming to a decision, I explored intensively what the limits of my mother tongue were and what sociocultural implications are involved when writing in English, Spanish or Spanglish. Furthermore, I questioned myself ‘why not in Spanish?’ the answer was ‘because it’s a locked language itself, and it has never allowed you openness’. 

Secondly, my target audience are the bilingual and the multilingual. If we consider languages as territories I firmly choose to stand right in the middle of the crossfire among many countries, populations, traditions, rules... Neither I am teaching nor writing to colonize someone else’s mind even less to decolonize it. This is not about subverting power. Living in a crossfire is about surviving and finding the best unharmful ways out.      

Thirdly, English is not taking my identity away. It is part of it. Being a bilingual or a multilingual is as worthy of acknowledgment as a native speaker. We do see life different, inside us there is more than one common sense of the world –like I explained on my previous post. All lives matter, all identities matter.

Lastly, I do deeply apologize to whomever is reading this for not choosing my mother tongue, for acknowledging my position of a nonnative and finding within it a happier place than the one provided by my first or second language. I am sorry native speakers for letting you down, for not achieving your high standards. Sorry!  

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Spanish Lessons 

Ever since I changed my degree to Visual Arts the idea of teaching my mother tongue to people –either kids or adults– from other countries got stuck in my head. I must admit it came out of nowhere. Although, the idea of speaking many languages was introduced to me by my mother at a very young age. 

Sometimes when I reflect on the social and political meaning of ‘mother tongue’ I conclude that languages are one of the many social backgrounds required for establishing a community and its interactions. In fact, it is the first way we learn to interact or behave within our surroundings –we cannot understand the rules of society if there is no way to transmit them. A spoken language represents a common sense of the world. 

Fortunately, my mom gave me English which at times contradicts Spanish. In my mind English is like my mother, expressive, open, apprehensive, straightforward and Spanish is just like my father, sketchy, meek, silent, shy. Whenever I teach Spanish through English which is 95% of the times, my parents happen to have an imaginary conversation and they both try to agree on the meaning of things. Occasionally they do agree, especially when Latin is around. I definitely avoid translation because it is some sort overlapping. Acquiring a language is more about finding the common sense carried within itself than plainly learning words by heart.     

                                                                                                                           To be continued  [...]          

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Bibimbap 

What has saved your life? What has kept you standing tall when everything around you was falling apart? Once not so long ago, a Korean meal given to me by an old Japanese woman saved my stubborn self. 

The night before I had bibimbap for the first time in my life, I knew that there was nothing else to fight for, that all I tried to keep alive during 6 months was completely unworthy, and that any kind of relationship has two ends. It was the night of September 16th. I recall the date because I drew on a paper sheet –of a little sketchbook I bought near Kazan Cathedral– how the kitchen looked like and what my breakfast was, on the right side below my blini, I wrote ‘16/Sep/17′. However, that night I thought that maybe after having some fun and enjoying some adventurous company there would be hope again in my heart.

It was lunch time and it was raining. Hopes and dreams were torn apart into little pieces. There was no love, no interest, no common goals, no eroticism, no fun, no communication, no care. At night, my body was invaded by a gigantic void which was filled up by the most respectful and tender person that could have had appeared in front of me, her name was Katzuko and she gave me a plate of bibimbap. I guess she saw sadness pouring off my eyes. We had late dinner together. It was the comfort I needed. Every bite of bibimbap gave me the strength I required to keep going for the next 3 weeks until I came back home, afterwards my plans were ongoing.   

Months later, bibimbaps appeared again in my life accompanied by a routine: Spanish lesson + yoga lesson + Korean brunch. Every single time I have a first bite of my favorite Korean meal, comfort from very deep inside me covers up my body and my mind. It neutralizes my emotions and my stubborn self rests because it knows that in the end even the worst decision ever made will bring a different perspective of life and growing up is about knowledge and perspectives. 

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Umbrella vs Paraguas 

The definition of umbrella according to Google: ‘a device consisting of a circular canopy of cloth on a folding metal frame supported by a central rod, used as protection against rain or sometimes sun’. This word comes from the Italian ombrella, diminutive of ombra ‘shade’. However, paraguas –the Spanish word for umbrella– is a compound word formed by para which could mean ‘to stop’ and ‘aguas’ that literally means water(s). So basically if we play a little with logic, paraguas could be interpreted as a sign saying STOP to water(s) and obediently rain would not approach it.  

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Body Goals 

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The Lazy Guys Inside Me

Have you ever felt like not moving away from your couch? If you said yes, then you would probably understand how I feel every time these two fat guys from the picture show up inside my head. 

On the left we got Chad and on the right Michael. They are twins, glued to each other since they were born by an invisible magic tape –because who wants a pair of deadbeats hanging separately around one’s head? They love beer especially Pale Ale, onion chips with cheese dip, black coffee, croissants and obviously chocolate. They neither shower nor dress up and it seems they constantly declare war against any thought related to working out that passes by them. Chad enjoys taking naps every 4 hours while Michael plays Scrabble on his phone. They watch TV series on Netflix like Breaking Bad.  

When they visit me, sometimes their stay lasts weeks and they usually call friends –the worst are Katherine and her bestie Anne–, with them around my ‘to do list’ literally gets fucked, my goals are never achieved and I feel miserably stuck laying on my couch because all I do is what they like. Somehow I stop being me and I become a lazybones. Personally, I hate when Mike chats with Kathy because they often bring up depressive thoughts from which self-doubt feeds itself up. 

The lazy guys inside me are a pain the neck. But I am glad that after a while they leave and my life goes back to normal.

 Katherine, Anne and Tom