Living low in the highbrow

I went to a writers festival over the weekend. I always get inspired listening to other writers, hearing about their creative process, their advice, their failures, their characters...It's also surprising how much of creativity and writing is a mystery. For a lot of the questions, the answers the writers were giving were "I don't know" or "I'm not sure" but they ended up having a really personal way of writing. It was quite humbling to think that there is no perfect guide to writing.

The other thing was that my workmate and I ended up having political/life discussions over the weekend. Our main concern was that in our generation we seem to be caught between a world of pop culture and the political/social world. The lowbrow VS highbrow. The mainstream VS the intellectual. It's so strange to think that we have to choose sides, when really pop culture, the Paris Hilton/Britney, branded, capitalist, marketability is unavoidable. Consumerism is what we've been brought up with. It's difficult to fight it. It doesn't mean that we can't both be informed and be consumers, like gossip columns and like world news. As a young person, we feel like we're being pigeonholed. Choose your category and stick to it.

T

P.S. Here is a few of my favourite travel photos.


The Full House terrace houses in San Francisco.


Central Park in December.


Nice, pebbled beaches and laid back French charm.


Venice is a tad smelly but, makes up for it with its romance and the bottled bellini.


Mozart lived here in Vienna.


Mt Pilatus and its mountain goats who appear unaffected by the altitude.


In Lucern the temperature was so cold that I had two hot chocolates in one day.


Book burning memorial in Berlin.


The Vlata River in Prague.