I never fainted.
But, for some reason, I was weirdly obsessed about it as a teenager.
You know how when you're young and wonder with expectation about how your first time having sex will be like? I had that about fainting.

I was eagerly waiting for the special day I would lose my conscience for the first time and fall dramaticly on the floor.
I think what attracted me was the idea of a diferent state of mind. You're not dead, but not sleeping either. That was very seducing to 12 year old me (This was a long time before finding out I could induce a blackout with a few shots tequila. After that my curiosity about the unconsciousness kinda died.)
I knew all the symptoms, and although I had assured my mum I would put my head between my knees if I ever felt dizzy and light headed, deep down I knew I wouldn't. I wanted to try it.
And I was very sure I'd eventually have a chance to do so.

But I didn't.
Nevertheless, I was close to it for 2 occasions,
and both involved getting hit on the head.

First, in a Visual Arts class.
Any of you from portuguese school certainly know how EVT classes were madness. I have never met an EVT teacher that wasn't on a verge of a nervous breakdown.
For those who didn't experience it, imagine  30 hormone-pumped pre-teens, sitting together and making collages.

Bad things happen.

There was always a lot of confusion and very little boundaries. One day, for some reason, students were throwing their backpacks at each other. Zé wasn't even aiming for me, but his Eastpack hit the back of my head and I instantly felt very dizzy and my legs were all mushy. I thought "oh oh it's coming! it's my fainting first time.!!"
Unfortunately, I got so excited about the imminence of a fainting episode I started feeling better.

The teachers rushed me out of the classroom (yes, there's 2 teachers in EVT classes. I'm pretty sure it's for riot control purposes), and I was excused for the rest of the lesson. This would be a good thing if it didn't mean spending 45 minutes sipping tea in the "infirmary".
I'm writting quotation marks on that because in spite of being called an infirmary it was just a little room with a bench and posters about the dangers of alcohol. There wasn't any nurse. Only a cranky cleaning lady who came by occasionally to check on me. She looked me up and down, decided I was too thin and proceded to lecture me on eating disorders and how my present condition (almost fainting from being hit on the head) was solely due to being weak from self-starvation. Little did this lady know that she was preparing me for the following 10 years of people making snap judgements about my eating habits and self-image.

so, thank you fake school nurse. you made me a stronger yet slightly jaded person.


But, back to the story, a year later, something similar happened:
Again, a classic wrong-place-wrong-time situation.

I was standing near the school's footbal field, talking with some friends, when one of the players shoot for the goal, and missed it.
The ball went straight to the back of my head. 

WHAT ARE THE ODDS OF THIS HAPPENING?

Again, I felt everything shaking around me, this time I was one hundred percent sure I was going to collapse! So I declared "I'm FAINTING!" rather loudly, to my girl friends, who promptly picked me up and lay me on a bench, arguing about what to do next.
In retrospective, I doubt a lot of people scream "I'm fainting!" before doing so, but my friends believed. Some were going to call a teacher, another was confronting the footballer guy, and one waved a pack of sugar, in case I was having a hypoglissemic shock "I'm not fainting because of low blood sugar, LUÍSA! I JUST GOT HIT IN THE HEAD BY A PENALTY KICK THATS WHY I'M FAINTING!" I complained, like the ungrateful bitch I am.

I was ready to see my friends preocupied faces go blurry.
Maybe I would wake up in the hospital. Who knows..
Maybe my parents would be there, holding my hand.
It could be all very cinematic.
(this was before I saw the inside of Penafiel's public hospital, thanks to another school-induced-injury. I used to think all hospitals looked like Grey's Anatomy.) 

I waited for a white numbness to lead me to unconsciousness, but it never came.
I was wide awake, my neck hurt and the floor kept spinning.

Then, I started to worry.

For the rest of the morning, I felt like I was standing on a boat and couldn't stop my body from waving from side to side. The teachers noticed I was more discoordinated than usual and sent me home.

I missed school for almost a week (2 months in teenager time), during which I just walked around the house looking permanently tipsy.

Later a doctor told me my spine had suffered a very mild trauma that shook up my inner balance.
And fixed it.
I'm a very balanced person now, to prove so I took a serie of portraits of me equilibrating things on my head:

a wooden duck

a tiny fake lemon tree

a hygrometer + donald the duck VCR tape

Let me take you to a gay bar, gay bar. or not. it's fine. we can just go to hesburger. no problem (part 4 of 4)

Halloween is a very uneventful date here in Penafiel.
My only fear is that kids this days are more americanized and if they come to our door trick or treating I have no candy in the house except for a half-eaten jar of nutella.
But I doubt that will happen. There aren't any children living in my neighbourhood (how creepy is that, huh?).

Anyway, the only possible scenario for celebrating Halloween, this year, is to watch Dracula and maybe dress up my cat. (I just googled pet costumes and entered a whole new world of possibilities. look at this! )
I decided that, to be in a more festive spirit, I'll comemorate the day by releasing some pages from my comics project, the-thing-that's-taking-all-my-time-and-keeping-me-stuck-here-in-this-childless-land, more precisely, the pages from 31/10/2012.
Go check it!

Apart from that, here's the last review of gay bars in Vilnius, concluding the series.

SOHO

I think this is considered the best and most popular club.
InYourPocket travel guide describes its decoration as "the style of a vampire’s Council house." and I think it's spot on.
It's not as fun as Men's Factory because, in Soho, it looks like they are actually taking themselves seriously and trying to be elegant and refined. And failing. There's a lot of corners divided by red curtains, a very polished and classy bar, fancy seats and a fake fireplace. But a TV screen with phone numbers and videos of naked men clashes with the atmosphere they might be trying to achieve.

Most of the times I've been there, I felt like I was crashing a party full of gay guys accompained by their straight girl friends, who wanted to get very drunk and rowdy and dance flirtly but in a totally platonic way.
One of those nights, I was in the bathroom calmly washing my hands, minding my own business and the girl next to me felt the need to tell me, a perfect stranger that didn't even look at her twice, that "she's sorry to disappoint me, but she's not a lesbian"
I'm rarely perceived as gay so my brain went from being slightly surprised "she thinks I'm a lesbian?" to "SHE THINKS I'M HITTING ON HER JUST BECAUSE WE'RE WASHING HANDS NEXT TO EACH OTHER???!"
I wish I could tell you I had an awesome answer to that and the girl felt really stupid afterwards, but I was really embarrassed and furious and stormed out of the bathroom mumbling "dont worry, i'm not interested!"

I found it odd and a bit insulting that this girl would go so much out of her way to inform the world (in this case, me) she's not gay even though she is in a gay bar. This is not like I offered her a drink or asked her to dance. I was just standing there washing my hands!
I want to believe this was a very specific thing and not make any bigger conclusion about the club based on it, but, let's be honest, I'm not trying to make a scientific research here, the point of this review is to give my opinion of the places based on the one or 2 nights I've been there. And, based on that, plus the accounts of some of my friends, Soho didn't seem to be a very welcoming place for gay women. Not only from the attitude of the people there, but also because the club is completly oriented to men.

To which you're going to say: "Well Joana, what were you expecting? All the events in Soho are marketed for men. The entrance as semi-nude dudes in the walls and one of their logos is a penis!  Besides, you've been to Men's factory and loved it, what's the difference now?"
So, here's the difference:
Mybar had nights for women, Men's factory has another branch, Girl's Factory (I didn't visit it, but if the decoration follows the Men's Factory taste I imagine boob-shaped bean bags and a clitoris-rodeo like the one Sophia Wallace did.), but Soho, in spite of being the most popular bar, the one that appeared on the march and has good connections with the Gay League, is the only one not having an alternative night or events directed to women.
And that's sad. Specially because girls go there all the time, and if theres gay women wanting to go to Soho, they should welcome diversity.


Rating: ***
I'm giving it 3 starts. Because they seriously need to get something going on for the ladies. And because I the mirroed walls in the dance floor are kind of strange.

 

 

Let me take you to a gay bar, gay bar. or not. it's fine. we can just go to hesburger. no problem (part 3 of 4)

hi readers!

How are you all?

Since my last post, Summer as pretty much ended. Or at least, I started wearing socks to bed, which, in my book, is the definition of Winter.

I'm in Penafiel full time, and very short on interaction with other human beings. I even started refering to other people as human beings, that's how creepy and asocial I'm becoming.

My comic project is building up in the living room wall and my cat will ocasionally roll around the sheets of paper in a desperate call for attention. 
 

I know, it's adorable.

 Apart from that, I started driving again!

After a initial "which one is the break?" moment I'm actually doing well and have droven around town, wearing sweatpants and a pyjama sweater, at the extreme velocity of 30km/h. I'm officially an old lady, now.

One of this days I'll let you in on my the whole trauma with cars and screaming driving instructors, but right now we'll go back to wilder times in Vilnius and I'll write you my review of the third gay bar:

MEN'S FACTORY

Me and Ceren went to Men's Factory for a Drag Queens Night. 

First, we got lost. 

We were in the right street but couldn't find it! After walking back and forth like crazy, we finally tried entering in an area that looked like it was only for industrial warehouses and had a "you're-gonna-get-raped-here" vibe to it.

Turns out it was there.

Men's Factory is one of the oldest gay clubs in the city and it had recently reopened. Someone told me it was built in a soviet bomb shelter, and that's why it's so underground and has tiny claustrophobic stairs. The entrance was an antique looking door protected by a hiron cage and muscly guards.

Past the guards, you come into a little hall where a entrance control system contrasted with vintage mirrors, red curtains and walls, and a big and phallic copper statue. This was a good preview of what you would find inside. Men's factory did feel like a theme park atraction with a pornographic twist. Pirates of Caribean Sex Dungeon or something of that sort. The bartenders dressed as sexy sailors and there were penises everywhere, the lamps, the statues, the coat hangers, the chair feet. Everywhere. It was so odd, so over the top, I loved it.

Even though the place was obviously for men (just in case you didn't notice it in the name..) and even had areas restricted for me, I didn't feel completly unwelcomed, or like I was crashing some gay men's party. The bartenders, the men drinking at the bar and even the guards outside were nice to us (They called us a taxi. With their own phone.)

The Drag show was awfull, but entertaining. I don't think it was supposed to be funny, but I laughed, a lot. One of the drag queens  was too tall for the stage and tried lip-synching while clumpsily dancing and avoiding hitting her head in the stage illumination. It was terrible. 

But that sort of terrible that goes around and gets to be good again.

There were very few people there, but the tiny crowd was in a very drunk and sexy-party-hard mode. As we left, a lady licked salt out of a bartender's belly for a shot of tequila. This is the kind of thing that looks sort of cool if you're surrounded by party people, in a festive setting, and looks super strange if you're the only person in an almost empty bar. Which was the case.

rating ****

It's hard to find, but totally worth seeing. The only drawback for me was that the music was terrible.

Also, as reference, there's a pizza place right in front of it that happens to be the best place to eat pizza in town. I would highly recommend it, too.
 

Let me take you to a gay bar, gay bar. or not. it's fine. we can just go to hesburger. no problem (part 2 of 4)

Hey! Today I'm in Lisbon. It's 28Cº and my sister lives up the hill. I came back from the supermarket and completly colapsed in the sofa for 3 hours.

Apart from that pointless information, I'm also here to share my opinions on the second gay bar! YEY!
 

MYBAR:

Generally speaking, Mybar is a terrible place unless you're a 40-something gay man who loves Eurovision.
If that's the case, go for it.

(ahah is she patting her boobs?)

The problem is that the bar isn't popular at all. I followed them on facebook, and everytime they invited me for an event the only two people who checked attendance were part of the staff. Which is sad, because they do make an effort to have different events. There was even a Electro Swing night!

The space itself isn't bad. It's small and cozy and they have plenty of really comfortable sofas and beanbags. It's a nice place to be either dancing or sitting down for a drink in the upper floor.
The most stricking characteristic about Mybar is that it's the only club on the list that isn't underground. It has windows, it's very central and inviting (you still have to ring a doorbell, though) From outside, it looks like any other bar, which for me it's a positive thing, but it actually may not be: If it doesn't look like a gay bar, how do you keep away homophobes?

In spite of starting this review saying it's a terrible place, I'll make amends and admit I actually had a great night there. The first time I've been at MyBar was for a 90's party and,  proving my theory that gay girls in Vilnius love decade thematic nights, there was a lot more people than usual and the music was good. (I mean, if you like Spice Girls and Madonna. I do.)
Unfortunately, after that, everytime I went there it looked like a house party that is reaching its end: only a few drunk people slouching on the sofa and not much going on.

  Rating *
I really think it could be a cool place, if only people went there. But then again, that goes for almost anything, even a warehouse in the middle of the forest would be cool if it had a lot of fun people and good music.
If you want to check it out, I would reccommend going on a themed night, since more people may come. And the good thing is: in case it sucks, you're still in the city center and in a walking distance to a lot of bars and clubs - it's easy to make a plan B and not have you're night ruined.

Let me take you to a gay bar, gay bar. or not. it's fine. we can just go to hesburger. no problem (part 1 of 4)

While in Vilnius I had a personal goal of going to each and every gay bar and write a review on it, to make a sort of LGBT NIGHTLIFE GUIDE.
I was almost sucessfull, and missed only one. ("Girl's Factory".. I'll be back.)

Before you read them, I must warn you that overall I'm not very picky with the places I go out to. I think that even if you're in a lame club you would never choose to go to in a million years (and that goes for a lot of nightclubs in Vilnius), sometimes it just takes the right company to make the most of it. And luckily, I had that. So I would really advise anyone eager to venture the gay clubs in Vilnius to get themselves someone fun to embark that magic-rainbow journey with you.

RELAX:

I went there for its closing party. I've been told they had had a few of them that turned out to be false alarm but, from the look of it, this one was the for once and for all. The place didn't open up again for the rest of my stay in Vilnius. Nevertheless, I chose to include it in the guide because
a) it was the only lesbian club I went to 
b) you never know, it may re-open one day...

It was in Jaksto Gatve, the same street where I worked, and though I passed it everyday I had never noticed the corner with a sign saying KLUBAS. That was Relax.

To get in, you rang the dorbell, a man would open the door for you and LOCK IT AGAIN ONCE YOU'RE INSIDE.

The place vaguely reminded me of the shopping centers they built in Portugal in the late 80's: Mirror walls, glass counter, ugly tiles... Now add to that a disco ball, spray-painted palm trees and a really huge sofa corner that looked like it was stolen from a high school theater production of Dracula.
On top of this.. Christmas decorations! It was December.

 My friend Kathi asked for a gin and tonic and was handed a misterious blue drink that seemed to glow in the dark. You could also ask for tea, and I saw a coffee machine there. Lithuanians aren't that into coffee so spotting an expresso machine, speciallly in a club, was very out of ordinary.

As strange as it may sound, the weirdest thing about that night in Relax, wasn't the place: it was the people.
There were 20 women there, maximum. And they were all couples. Me and Anna were the only single ladies (fact that we celebrated by dancing to Beyonce's hit  in a completly empty dancefloor).

It's not strange that everyone was paired up. The thing is, they LOOKED paired up. They were wearing matching clothes. All of them!
There were two girls in a dark blazer, with long hair. Two with checkered shirts, a beanie and piercings. Two wearing jeans and a hoddie, two with hiking shoes and messenger bags, for God's sake there was even a couple with the exact same tshirt, and it was pretty obvious, it had huge Mickey Mouse printed on it!!



This was really bothering me. Maybe because I have a sister and somehow connect dressing alike to something siblings do, so when I see it in a couple it feels incestuously creepy.
Apparently I was the only one being disturbed by it, when I wispered to my friend Kathi "Have you noticed the couples? They all match" and she shrugged "oh, yeah, that's why I changed my tshirt before coming, I had one like Elena's".

 Rating: **
 I'm giving it two stars because it was the only lesbian place in town (except Girl's Factory, but that's not always open) Also, for the coffee machine and Beyoncé.

Tiny Furniture

I wanted to write something full of bright shiny feelings about being back, summing up Vilnius and celebrating new beginnings. The kind of thing one would want to read in that voice-over tone they always do in the end of a Grey's Anatomy episode.

Turns out I can't.
I'm thrilled about being back, but at the same time not at all.
I've been struggling with this midterm of, not completly here, but not there anymore, and feeling kind of lonely and weird.

On top of that,
It seems like everyone else has plan, and a job, and a house, and a cat.
I only have the latter, and it doesn't even care for me all that much.

"so,
what are you going to do now?" 

I've been asked by everyone about what I'll do next, and am trying to convince myself that saying "I'm taking a month or two, to focus on my art" doesn't make me sound like a complete slacker.

In a moment of panicky ansiety about the future I wrote to Anna explaining "it's like this weird moment that feels like everything is possible and I don't even know where to start looking." I'm perplexed with all the sides this could take, and scared of failing. Right now, stoping for a bit and watching the entire first season of Orange Is the New Black, on my pyjamas, seems like it's the only sane decision I can make.



BUT, moving on to people that are actually making tremendous changes,
João is leaving to Switzerland, today!
We met for 2 days, in Porto, and he's going for 2 years.

This sucks,
it's no fun to come back and have to do goodbyes again. I'll miss him more, now I'm here.
but I know he's going to have a great time in his fancy master studies, and I'm super-excited to hear about the apartment-search adventures, in Luzern!




à bientôt!

BuzzFeed was looking for editors to write articles in Portuguese. I wrote one before re-checking the job requirements and realising I would need a work permit for the US, to apply. 

It's a shame to waste it, but I really can't be bothered to translate it right now. (maybe later?) So, for the portuguese speakers, go ahead and give it a read:
http://www.buzzfeed.com/joanaestrela/os-10-momentos-mais-estranhos-dos-protestos-anti-g-dmo4

Also,
Yey! I'm Back!
Feel like I'm going through a weird i-have-so-much-to-do-i-feel-like-doing-nothing-oh-let-me-eat-another-piece-of-gluten-free-carrot-cake-while-i-stress-about-it phase and it's hard to focus on anything, blogging included. But I'll write more, soon.

Until then, look at this cat: