#long interview

[dd-is-my-guiltypleasure]

David Duchovny, episode #104 of The Three Questions with Andy Richter on Earwolf

Multi-Hyphenate David Duchovny joins Andy Richter to talk about academia, writing his book Truly Like Lightning, growing up in New York, and

[putschki1969]

Wakana Interview with Natalie.mu ~ Images

Long interview with Natalie.mu (in Japanese)

After going through this, I realise that there is not much new info so I will not be translating it. For insights on the album production, be sure to check out my translation of Wakana’s other interview. Here’s an interesting section though

I've been singing together with other people all my life. I've been singing in a choir, in my gospel group, and of course as member of Kalafina. That's why I feel like I have spent all this time as a singer without really knowing my personality, I have been trying hard to figure that out ever since becoming a solo artist. However, through this experience, through singing songs that I know by heart, that I have loved all of my life, I was able to feel something oozing out of me. I realised, “that’s me, that’s my personality!” At the same time, I also became aware that there are many things that I have a strong commitment to, and as a result, I have found more and more things I want to do. This is a great discovery.

[endlich-allein]

Lindemann for MyRock Mag (I will publish some extracts of the interview this week)

📸 credit photos to Jens Koch

[entertainmentnerdly]

Long interview via /r/DoctorWhumour https://ift.tt/2PBcTQ9

[holdmelikeagrudge]

I did an interview with the sweet people at the New York based music blog Rare Candy.

[aaminahwrites]

15 QUESTIONS WITH: FAISAL HUSSAIN

Faisal Hussain has always been a creative at heart and his love for helping others allows him to use his creativity to spread love and positivity. His landscape paintings bring a sense of peace to his audience while his charity pieces bring a feel of compassion and a cry for help. Following is our ‘question by e-mail’ about his art and charity work, and a little bit about his background.

 Aaminah: How did you get into art? 

Faisal: Art was a hobby initially since childhood, I loved illustration, reading, and learning from childhood. I participated in community creative and youth events and gained 50 hours’ experience in graffiti spraying with a local graffiti artist. I took GCSE and A-level ‘Art and Design’ and eventually became Freelance in first year of A-levels in 2012. I decided to take my art work into the community at various charity events and I focus a lot on marketing my art on social media platforms. I am co-owner of the Freedomline clothing brand @_freedomline_

 A: Tell me about the style of your art, where it started from and how it evolved.

F: Illustration and landscape impressionism are my main areas of focus. I loved painting sceneries with watercolour, acrylic paints and oils and portraying reality through graphite, chalk, spray cans, and various other materials to create texture in my work.

 A: Who is your audience?

F: My audience is mainly the youth, but it’s targeted at anyone who inspires to grow through art.

 A: Tell me about your background. Where did you grow up, what was your childhood like and how was school life?

F: I grew up in the Millfield area of Peterborough which was deprived of government funding; the City Centre where I was born was known for having a working-class population. Due to my granddad’s effort of coming over into the UK as one of the first Pakistani workers, my family became established in Peterborough. As immigrant families like ourselves started saving more, we moved out the central ward due to the lack of services, criminal activity, school-catchment area problems.

 Primary school was a pretty awesome time; it gave me the scope to fairly learn the fundamentals of many subjects. Secondary school was a journey of personal growth, I managed to find myself personally, mentally and socially. 

 A: What is your favourite piece of artwork you’ve done?

F: My Palestine A-level final exam piece. It showed me how much pressure I could put on myself and my creativity to paint a large acrylic art piece.

 A: What are you trying to communicate with your art?

F: That it is a therapeutic medium, and that you can still make a living through art. You can still work in other areas and still be an artist.

 A: Which creative medium would you love to pursue but haven’t yet?

F: Digital design, which I will in a few months’ time.

 A: How was the Radical Love Exhibition at the Crypt Gallery? 

F: It was a heartfelt gallery, words cannot express the emotions, feelings and realities of how the art portrayed female refugee struggles and third world narratives of love.

 A: What’s your biggest fear?

F: Dying knowing I couldn’t achieve everything that I could have potentially achieved in life; personally, spiritually and creatively.

 A: How do you work?

F: I use my experience and skill set from in academia, volunteering, work and creativity, and try to apply and improvise it in every situation I’m in. I like to learn from every situation that I’m in, whether I’m successful or not in the task. 

 A: What other artists have been inspirational to you?

F: Muhammad Ali (Aerosol Arabic), Banksy, Claudio Monet, Van Gogh and Andy Warhol.

 A: Tell me about the projects you’ve done with the BBC.

F: My recent project was to do with working with the BBC 5 Radio Live project on immigration, communities, Brexit and the city of Peterborough. Working withtwo well-known artists PositiveArtsUK and Tizer enabled me to refresh and develop my creative skill set. We aimed to work with other community members to portray our views and experiences of Britain on the wall mural, on BBC East and BBC 5 Live Radio.

 A: Tell me about your previous charity projects.

F: I have mentored ‘troubled youths’ in a voluntary capacity within a school environment and the local youth club to help them achieve goals and proactive within society. I have also had my own youth hour on the local radio station as a host for Salaam Radio in the summer of 2016. I have been involved in various charities such as Children of Adam and Islamic Relief by fundraising through radio shows, social media management and street collections. 

 I have also managed to help feed 5000 meals to the needy in Peterborough throughout 2015. I have worked with the Student Schooling Association (SSA) within the university to campaign for January exams and the Campus Awareness programme, and organised events specifically for the students such as the culture festival and the Eid festival. I have been volunteering for Peace Child International by participating in a drama project, and participated in a community graffiti project to paint a mural on a local underpass in 2010.

 A: Are there any charity projects you’re currently working on? 

F: I am still currently volunteering with the charity Children of Adam in Peterborough. I’m looking forward to participating with them on the radio programmes in Ramadan, feeding the local homeless and participating in their national and international projects.

 A: Tell me about ‘Official KNOW.’ How did it start and what direction is it heading in? 

F: Founded in 2012, KNOW is a trusted community education platform for people who love to learn. We believe that everyone has something to teach, and everyone has something to learn. Harnessing the power of the sharing economy, KNOW brings together students, experts, teachers, leaders and scientists from around the world to bring you bitesize, digestible knowledge delivered in a modern, engaging way and to the point of understanding.

 Knowledge is not ‘one-size fits all’. We all have different interests, different ways of understanding, and different attention spans. We all have such different backgrounds, experience and expertise. Our strength lies in our diversity as a community. We can learn something from everyone.

 Whether you want to learn about history, politics, health, science or nature, KNOW connects you with those that are in the know - and allows you to become one of them. We’ve just released our new website www.kn-ow.com, so look out for more info! 

 You can find Faisal on Instagram @art.by.faisal and be sure to visit his event page on Facebook at Facebook.com/ArtByFaisal to stay updated with his work.

[aaminahwrites]

The Beauty Behind the Struggle: Drugs and Hijabs

Young Muslims open up about their life struggles and discuss how it changed them

 Drugs and alcohol is such a taboo topic in Islam. Islam teaches Muslims to stay away from alcohol because when you are intoxicated, a person cannot control his or her actions, leading them to possibly make a very big mistake. Although it is haram, or not permissible, many young Muslims seem to turn to alcohol when faced with difficulties, rather than lay out a prayer mat and ask Allah for guidance. 21-year-old Aisha from Leicester tells her story of her struggle with alcohol and drugs.

 “In early 2015 I became very depressed and I was on a lot of medication. It was my 19th birthday my friends convinced me to go out to the club and it didn’t seem like a big deal but from that night on things just started getting worse. I drank a lot that night and when I got home my mum was pissed. The first thing she said to me was ‘what the fuck is wrong with you?’ but she didn’t realise, she just thought I was getting up to other stupid shit. After that, it was once in a while. I stopped speaking to the friend who took me out a lot and I was fine, but when we started talking a while later, that’s when it got worse. 

 “In the Summer of 2015, it got to a point where it became an everyday thing. My depression got worse and it was my way of temporarily forgetting everything that was going on in my life, but it just made everything a whole lot worse. I would even go to work drunk. My grandparents came back from Pakistan one day and I was quite drunk. We were on our way home and it was such a bad experience, we nearly got into a really bad car crash! Then I realised there’s no point in keeping people around like that, that aren’t good for me and that’s when I decided I wasn’t going to drink anymore. 

 “I stopped for a while but in Summer 2016 I was going through a really bad phase again. Not with friends or anything, I had stopped going out but I would just be drinking alone in my room and it had got back to the point where I was doing it every single day and it made me think to myself, ‘what the hell am I doing?’ 

“Now I’ m trying to be good and help myself, I haven’t touched it in a while. I’m trying really hard to be careful because it is something that can get addicting, you just need to get through it. I just used to go out to the corner shop and grab a bottle of vodka then finish it in one night and it’s just such a big waste of money too! It doesn’t even help; it was like a temporary fix for five minutes then I’d call up my friends and just cry to them. It’s just a pattern of moods, you think it would help but it really doesn’t. I used to keep drinking for two to three months straight when things got really bad but since New Year’s, I haven’t gotten completely wasted. 

 “I remember one night in Summer, it was around 5am and I got really bad chest pains, I fell asleep and when I woke up again they just got worse and I just ended up collapsing. My mum took me to A&E and the doctors started asking me really personal questions and their questions were just directing towards drinking alcohol and I just thought ‘oh my God, I’m never doing this again.’

 “My sister came into A&E with me and I was afraid to say anything in front of her but once she was sent out the room, the doctors sat me down and told me I had to tell them what was really going on. They concluded that I had alcohol poisoning because I was just puking up everywhere. After that I’ve been very careful with the amount I take and it’s not an everyday thing anymore. You just think it will make things better but it always just makes things a lot worse. The last time I drank was two weeks ago when I was out with my friends but I made sure I wasn’t drinking too much. I don’t use it as a coping mechanism anymore I just casually drink.

 “When I was 19, my circle of friends at university used to smoke weed a lot, too. It was just a casual thing and I didn’t do it to distract myself from what was happening in my life, it doesn’t really help but it just makes you feel funny for a while. Everything around you is just so funny! But it’s not something that helps with depression. It actually makes you so hungry, at 3 or 4am I used to just get the munchies and raid my kitchen for random snacks. When you have lots of alcohol and weed it trips you out so much, you just feel like you’re going to die. 

 “Weed made me so paranoid. When I used to smoke it a lot I would always think ‘oh my God, can you smell it on me?’ and just silly things like that. I would never do hard drugs like cocaine and I’m definitely not planning to. I have family members who have struggled with addiction and have ended up in jail, but weed is just a minor thing. One thing I hate is when people pretend they’re high to just fit in! Weed is just a once in a while thing, I only do it when I’m stressed with university because it relaxes me. 

 “I live in a family of 6, my dad passed away when I was 15 years old. It wasn’t really a reason to start drinking, I could have easily started drinking then but I was using other ways like self-harm to cope and I eventually stopped because nothing was helping. Everything I tried, I had all these bad coping mechanisms and none of them helped, I just thought to myself ‘I really need to grow out of everything.’ 

 “You go through rough things and you realise not everything you do is right and sometimes you have to let things be. I grew up with 4 sisters and a brother and after my dad passed away, my brother wasn’t very helpful. I didn’t have a father figure in my life and I just felt like I could do whatever I wanted and no one was going to say anything to me. I became really rebellious especially when I was 19 and I felt like my mum couldn’t control me. I knew there was going to be a time when I was going to get the biggest slap on my face and from that, I knew I was going to have to stop what I was doing. 

 “I keep myself to myself. I don’t open up to people easily and during college, I made a friend in sixth form who actually wasn’t that much of a good friend to me. My mum knew from the beginning that she was a snake but I didn’t believe her which caused arguments at home. When I left school, I left with a lot of friends but now I only have one really good friend who I go to university with. I didn’t gel with the people at university, I spend most of my time in the library just working. I have just become closed off and I’m trying to better myself and stay on the right track.”

 Whether you are going through depression or a traumatising event in your life, please remember you have so many people around you to talk to you and help you through things. Alcohol and drugs are never the answer; they only seem to make things worse. For more information on drug and alcohol abuse, call your local drug and alcohol helpline to get the help you need.

  “WEAR YOUR HIJAB PROPERLY”

 A hijab may seem like ‘just a scarf on your head’ to some, but for some Muslim women, it is a sign of independence, freedom and the ability to be totally themselves. Thousands of Muslim girls and women all around the world wear their hijabs proudly but some struggle more than others. I sat down with 20-year-old Ghayda Javed from South London to discuss her experience and she revealed why wearing the hijab was a struggle for her.

Ghayda was born and raised in London, England in a middle-class family of five. She started wearing her hijab in secondary school because she went to an Islamic school, so it became a uniform requirement. “My mum wears it and so does everyone around me it so I thought okay, I’d better start wearing it too” she says. Because it was a requirement to wear it every day at school, it didn’t make a lot of difference between her school life and her home life. She then carried on wearing it in sixth form and university. “I never saw it as a sort of ‘oh men can see my hair’ thing, I never understood that sort of aspect of it but I just wore it because everyone around me was wearing it. It was like a symbol of my independence, I’m in control of my actions now and I can do what I want, at least that’s what I thought at the time. It came to point where I did like wearing it, I’d think to myself ‘I’ll wear my scarf to weddings, I don’t feel ugly wearing it, it’s just nice. I think it came to summer 2015 when I went to Canada and I remember my dad specifically telling me ‘wear your hijab properly’ and this led me to think ‘hold on, I’m not wearing my hijab for someone else, I’m wearing it for myself, not for someone else’s opinions.” 

 This interaction with her dad caused Ghayda to rethink why she was wearing her hijab in the first place. “I realised I wasn’t wearing it for myself, I was wearing it for the people around me. I thought to myself, I will wear it the way I want to.” Slowly, she started taking off her hijab and it became less of a priority to her. “I started seeing the hijab as just a part of my religion. When you’re out in public, the first thing people think when they see a girl in hijab is ‘she’s a Muslim and probably a very strict one.’ As a Muslim, you do need to act a certain way because that’s your job to represent it in ‘the right way’. I didn’t like being outside and wearing a hijab and suppose, doing shisha because I just don’t think that’s right in my opinion, which is why when I’m out and about having fun I just take it off. I don’t want to send the wrong message about Islam.” 

 Ghayda struggled with keeping her hijab on, mainly because she was afraid of what people in the community would think of her. “I was scared to fully stop wearing it because I thought everyone in the community is going to think ‘she’s going to turn into a hoe’ so I only took it off after leaving the house or when I was far enough from home.”

 Wearing her hijab to university and to work put things into perspective for her. “I thought to myself I’m here to get my money, I’m here to get my education. I’m not here to mess about. I’m here to make something of myself and that goes back to why I started wearing it in the first place, it was a sign of independence for me.” 

 Reflecting on her journey, Ghayda discusses why she took it off. “There is something so beautiful about wearing the hijab and I want to learn it rather than putting it on because I want to wear it and that’s what I realised overtime when I took it off, that it’s a process of learning it again and the actual reasons for wearing it. It takes time and you can’t really expect someone to take this big step, just like that. But I did it in the wrong way and it took me a long time to realise that.

 Even after wearing it for the last 9 years, Ghayda still struggles with her hijab and wants to take the time to learn about the reasoning behind it, rather than wearing it for the sake of her family. “Even now I still struggle with it. It’s difficult, it’s really difficult.”

[aaminahwrites]

Exclusive Interview with Valenci UK

The young modest fashion designer discusses education, family and inspiration.

Sana Zinga, an up-and-coming fashion designer based in London has been making waves in the modest fashion industry with her stunning line, Valenci. She creates some of the most unique clothing pieces I’ve seen, ranging from floor length capes to simple jumpsuits. Her creations are the perfect mix of modern day fashion and modest fashion, allowing young girls and women to be creative in their fashion choices but still stay true to their modest roots. It is refreshing to find a brand that caters to the modest fashion world while still being fresh and trendy. Established in 2016, Sana’s brand has really taken off in the modest world, especially on Instagram (@valenci.uk) and has received a lot of support from popular beauty and modest fashion bloggers like Dina Tokio. I got in touch with Sana to find out a bit more about her and her creative process. 

 The 21-year-old designer who was born and raised in North West England has always had a true love for designing and styling clothes. Her passion comes from her mum, who loved to sew and make elaborate garments for her and her family. “From such a young age, I was always very particular about what I liked and disliked” she says. She took a fashion design course at high school but went on to study biology, chemistry, maths and business for her A-Levels, then taking pharmacy for her degree. “I always saw fashion as a hobby but never a career. I went on to university to study pharmacy and that’s where it all changed, I literally woke up one morning and decided to change my career path.” Sana decided to fulfil her dreams and study fashion design, something that truly made her happy. “I called the University of Central Lancashire and I was adamant on joining the BA (Hons) Fashion Design course the same year but one semester late. I think the head of school saw a true passion in me and gave me a chance. I can’t thank her enough.” This just goes to show that there is no harm in changing your career path and not taking on the degree that is thought to be ‘practical’ or ‘something you can make more money from.’ 

 Sana’s own personal style is quite similar to the garments she designs. On a casual day, you’ll find her in sporty or casual looks but her ‘going out’ look is always simplistic and classy. Her OOTD is always dependant on her mood. “I design garments that I personally LOVE and would wear myself. I could never be passionate about my brand if I personally wouldn’t wear the garments I sell.”

 Her inspiration can come from anywhere. “It could be a door handle, it could be a building.” It isn’t surprising that she finds inspiration in something so simple but so structured, her garments have a really unique architectural feel to them. Historical costumes with lots of layering is another source of design inspiration and she loves taking classic cultural garments and giving them a contemporary twist. Sana designs for both younger and older women and creates versatile designs which can be styled by both generations. “My mum and I can both wear my designs in completely different ways, versatility is very important when I design.” This is clear in her current collection; her designs are so timeless and a simple piece can be styled several ways. Sana’s designs cater to older women who have always made modesty a priority when putting together an outfit and younger women who now make modesty a priority in theirs. 

 “I love having a theme for my collections, it creates a story and mood at the starting point.” Always making it a point to theme her collections, Sana believes themes provides a lot if information about what she wants to create and having a theme allows her ideas to flow. “One thing leads to another and you end up with a beautiful product that wouldn’t have been made possible unless a concept was used.” Sana urges designers, both established and up-and-coming, to use themes when designing a collection, exploring and researching a specific topic unveils very interesting details that can help create silhouettes and shapes.

 The modest fashion industry is on its way to becoming mainstream, designers have taken inspiration from the modest fashion world and applied it to their collections like Dolce and Gabbana’s Autumn/Winter 2016 collection which featured a range of abayas and hijabs. Sana believes modest fashion designers can quickly become recognised in the mainstream fashion world if they create garments that are on trend and add a modest twist while keeping their designs unique. “I think big things will happen for the modest industry and big things are already happening.” Designers like Oscar de la Renta and high street brands like H&M are almost giving validity to the modest fashion community by designing clothes that can be worn by modest women worldwide. Popular fashion blogger Mariah Idrissi was recently featured in a worldwide campaign for H&M, proving that Muslim women and the modest fashion world are making waves in the fashion industry.

 After some thorough research on current catwalk shows, Sana predicts different pattern cutting techniques will be big for next season. “There has also been lots of ruffles and balloon sleeves, which I love!” she explains. In her very rare spare time, Sana loves to lounge in front of the TV with a nice cuppa. She also loves a good Italian dinner on the weekends.

 10 years from now, Sana would love to expand her brand into a wider market. “I want my brand to be noticed within the modest community and be recognised outside of the modest market.” Although she designs modest clothing, her designs can easily be worn by people of all ages, races, sexes and beliefs because of how versatile her creations are. “I would love to see my brand in high street stores” she continues.

To see more of her stunning collection, follow Sana on Instagram @Valenci.UK or visit her website www.valenci.uk

(This article was written before her label name was changed from Sana Zinga to Valenci UK so I wasn’t able to ask about the inspiration behind the new name and where it came from).