back from away!
Nov. 13th, 2013 02:06 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
heliopausaI've been leading a most disrupted life, travelling and doing complex family stuff. (Not all that complex, but my family has the ability to make the easiest things the subject of high drama. Or the luxury of doing so, I guess; if one of us was really in trouble, I know all this unnecessary tumult would just fade, leaving only plain family solidarity.)
But essentially there's three weeks' worth of jumbled life and non-writing behind me, and now I'm trying to pick up the threads.
One tiny thing from my travels: I was in Adelaide, and by accident caught a most wonderful and generous exhibition at the the Art Gallery there, with Jain, Hindu and Islamic art from the sub-continent of India/Pakistan/Bangladesh. Carved doors from wealthy houses, and silver-embroidered banners, and an astonishing ten-metre-long scroll inviting a Jain master-monk to Gujarat, and exquisite miniatures, and...I thought of Susan... a couple of archer's rings, smoothly gold on the string side, but richly set with emeralds and other jewels on the other side, and much, much more! (I had never even heard of archer's rings,and was fascinated.)
The whole exhibition, anyway, was brilliant; it felt such a privilege to be able to enjoy it, and so much was so generously offered by the Gallery and by private collectors - and by the Adelaide Jain, Hindu and Muslim communities, too, who were offering talks and workshops, and who (especially the Jains, it seemed but I expect it changed from day to day) were involved as a devotional matter, as well as sharing culture, with scattered offerings of flowers, sweets, money - even earrings, I saw - put on the plinths before certain statues. And lots of joyous family-friendly extras - for example, the game of Snakes and Ladders turns out to have begun as a Jain teaching device, and out in the courtyard there was a big game drawn in some kind of semi-permanent chalk (?) to be played on in the glorious sunshine. (well, the day I was there, it was glorious sunshine. :) ) Oh, happy Adelaide, to have such an art gallery!
And I will be throwing myself back into writing, to get that next chapter of Ivory up - my mind is bursting with all the thoughts I have about that - but also, I'm offering stories as part of fandomaid for the Philippines - my offer here, and the whole project here. :)
But essentially there's three weeks' worth of jumbled life and non-writing behind me, and now I'm trying to pick up the threads.
One tiny thing from my travels: I was in Adelaide, and by accident caught a most wonderful and generous exhibition at the the Art Gallery there, with Jain, Hindu and Islamic art from the sub-continent of India/Pakistan/Bangladesh. Carved doors from wealthy houses, and silver-embroidered banners, and an astonishing ten-metre-long scroll inviting a Jain master-monk to Gujarat, and exquisite miniatures, and...I thought of Susan... a couple of archer's rings, smoothly gold on the string side, but richly set with emeralds and other jewels on the other side, and much, much more! (I had never even heard of archer's rings,and was fascinated.)
The whole exhibition, anyway, was brilliant; it felt such a privilege to be able to enjoy it, and so much was so generously offered by the Gallery and by private collectors - and by the Adelaide Jain, Hindu and Muslim communities, too, who were offering talks and workshops, and who (especially the Jains, it seemed but I expect it changed from day to day) were involved as a devotional matter, as well as sharing culture, with scattered offerings of flowers, sweets, money - even earrings, I saw - put on the plinths before certain statues. And lots of joyous family-friendly extras - for example, the game of Snakes and Ladders turns out to have begun as a Jain teaching device, and out in the courtyard there was a big game drawn in some kind of semi-permanent chalk (?) to be played on in the glorious sunshine. (well, the day I was there, it was glorious sunshine. :) ) Oh, happy Adelaide, to have such an art gallery!
And I will be throwing myself back into writing, to get that next chapter of Ivory up - my mind is bursting with all the thoughts I have about that - but also, I'm offering stories as part of fandomaid for the Philippines - my offer here, and the whole project here. :)
no subject
Date: 2013-11-13 04:43 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-11-13 11:59 pm (UTC)Now is probably the time to out myself as pretty much totally ignorant of all archery - one session at a high-school try-different-sports day is all I can claim as background knowledge. But I can see if I'm going to have archery in fic ever, I'd better get myself more knowledgable than that. I'll have to look for videos showing the different bow techniques.
no subject
Date: 2013-11-14 02:27 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-11-17 03:23 am (UTC)