Of course, what I want to remark here at Simple Common Sense is today’s discovering of the fake singer, fireworks and cheer squads at the Olympic games in China. Yes, the country where some people actually think a computer can translate the name of their restaurant rightly.

Well, not all of them are that stupid of course. But this place, where I’ve for as long as I can remember have wanted to go, is somewhat rotten. Terribly wrong policies on Tibet, forbidden websites such as the one of Amnesty International, and the highest death penalty rate in the world is to name a few of the horrible things that are happening in the country with the quite unsuitable name of the ‘People’s Republic’ of China.
But sticking to my point, they now - finally - try to work out a better image; re-branding themselves as flawless:
-They can’t have an ugly looking child (ugly here means crooked teeth) singing at the opening ceremony, so instead they get a cute little girl to lip-sync the song, and act as if it was her singing.
-They can’t have empty stadiums, so instead they import and hire cheer squads to create atmosphere and disguise the unfilled blocks of seats.
-They can’t just have normal fireworks. Although the fireworks actually took place, they found out it was too difficult and dangerous to film, so they decided to make and show everybody around the world a computer-generated film of what the ‘real’ fireworks might look like.

But someone should have reminded them of journalists amazing eye for cheating. And with this in my mind, I am tempted to quote Orwell’s 1984, where the Party’s (with Big Brother as their leader) three repulsive slogans might as well be the ones of China:
WAR IS PEACE / FREEDOM IS SLAVERY / IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH

All pictures and illustrations above are taken or made and copyrighted by Christian Halsted ®

My biggest annoyance is probably not that The Times chooses to publish a story like this. Nor is it that Katie Price is so extraordinarily ludicrous. No, I think my major frustration is me spending 2 minutes actually reading it. But I really had to, though. It’s scary, but even though you know how dull the thing you are about to read is, sometimes you must. Just like bill-boards with an alluring picture on it. Or even sometimes gossip magazines.

The Cartier Polo International is held at the Guards Polo Club, associated with the royal family. The Duke of Edinburgh is the President for Christ’s sake. And still, Mrs. Price says: “More than 35,000 people came to the polo match last weekend but I was excluded.
Why? I’m a successful author and businesswoman, a rider, I am learning to play polo and I compete in dressage events”. Nude glamour modeling is first of all not the most admired career path. Second of all; is success necessarily invites to royal happenings? At next year’s noble or royalty-associated Cartier Polo International gathering, I believe is would be on it’s place if they invited Pete Doherty. Maybe also Amy Winehouse. (If any of them is still alive at that time of course). That would suit the purple drapes and large jewels.

Katie: There are no common people except in the highest spheres of society. (Thank you Mr. Twain).

All pictures and illustrations above are taken or made and copyrighted by Christian Halsted ®

Anyhow; set aside my title as a student. Friday day and night I helped out my old employer, Vs. Magazine, with setting up their launch party celebrating their 6th magazine and their, now, annual photography exhibition.
The new edition is much better than the previous ones, with 4 different covers and some great pictures and editorials. My only drag was the name of the photographic exhibition: Keep it Fashion (But Keep it Real). I mean, that would be like saying ‘Be Vegetarian (Eat Chicken)’. Keeping something fashion is to me a quite illusory as the fashion realm is somewhat superficial, which makes me unsure what to keep real? Your own fashion? Who then knows it’s fashion? Hmm… Maybe I’m just a little ignorant. Please help me out?

Yesterday’s event was an exhibition in partnership with WWF and RFC (Forest Stewardship Council) as Vs. Magazine is now ‘green certified’, which is really great i think. It was held at 5 star Hotel Skt. Petri, in the center of Copenhagen.

All pictures and illustrations above are taken or made and copyrighted by Christian Halsted ®

End of July is also a sign of the annual soon-to-come Copenhagen Fashion Week where my good friend and fellow CP’er, Jakob, dragged me to Amager in Copenhagen to help out an amateur wake-boarder build and paint some small Gaudi’ish houses for Stine Goya’a fashion show in two weeks time. Totally Art Nouveau, as the clever ones would say. I wouldn’t.

I have uploaded some pictures as a little teaser, and if you are lucky you’ll get to see some pictures from the show. Wow! A real fashion show, man. That’s just so awesome. Even mind-boggling – with real models and all that! Maybe even some drinks.
Sometime in the 19th century, Oscar Wilde was aware that ‘fashion is a form of ugliness so intolerable that we have to alter it every six months’. See that’s clever said. If only…

Stine Goya is good, though. Very good actually – if you ask me at least (which for most probably isn’t assurance enough; especially when talking about something as momentous as fashion).

Fuck. This could be Carrie Bradshaw from Sex and The City writing this. Guess I better stop now. I am daft today. Very much actually. It’s probably the sun.

All pictures and illustrations above are taken or made and copyrighted by Christian Halsted ®

In my pessimistic and relatively aggressive mode, I am currently finding comfort in reading Carlos Ruiz Zafon’s novel called The Shadow of The Wind. A very interesting, and well written book about a young boy from Barcelona who gets his fingers in a very special book. Many of the scenarios from the book, reminds me of Malaga which I visited for half a day last week (see last post - underneath). I’ve never been to Barcelona, but it seems like many of the old areas of the two cities are very much alike. The size is of course a bit different from each other, but they share beautiful cathedrals and many beige coloured houses and buildings. Also the many small streets and squares made of bricks, seems to pride each city.
Both cities are well-known seaports, and famous for having especially one famed artist each: Pablo Picasso in Malaga, and Salvador Dali in Barcelona. Malaga also has Antonio Banderas to brag with, while Barcelona’s football team is an inch better than their southern counterparts.

Anyhow, I have uploaded some pictures from Malaga. They all seem to capture some of the atmosphere around the andalusian coast, and especially this famous southern seaport.

All pictures and illustrations above are taken or made and copyrighted by Christian Halsted ®

But during the last couple of years some things in Andalusia have changed. With a great deal of books starting with either ‘A Locals Insight To…’ or ‘An Insiders Guide To…’, a lot of people are starting to move from porky Fuengirola in West to the more unspoiled villages such as Nerja and Torre Del Mar, East of Malaga. This is mainly because you won’t sit at the Irish Pub next to your neighbour, Joe, from back home in Chesire. Or will you?

I am pretty sure you can’t escape tourism or the before mentioned clichés when going to South Spain. And that I understand. With cheap accommodation, nice affordable restaurants and great wine, the sunny Costa Del Sol is a perfect choice for retired couples, teenagers in party mode or simply just the regular family next door.

I’ve just spent a week in a country-house between Sayalonga and Competa, an hours drive east of Malaga. Competa, which I’ve been coming to regularly the last 6 years, has become more touristed than earlier, which is quite a shame. Sayalonga is still more local though, and has a very charming street life in the evenings, and no British Pubs where Cruz Campo or San Miguel is substituted with John Smith’s or Strongbow.

All pictures and illustrations above are taken or made and copyrighted by Christian Halsted ®

I went to Roskilde in 2004 - one of the many years where it rained cats and dogs nearly 6 out of 6 days. I mean, not that watching Iggy Pop while water from the heavy rain was diluting my beer wasn’t cool enough in itself, but still, the mud is generally pretty annoying in the long run. Last year was even worse as far as I’ve heard. Hippies almost drowned in rain and mud, and a lot of people headed early home because of the terrible weather. This year seems to run into the same problem. But, what is really dense in my opinion, is to keep running the festivals in these specific last week of June/ first week of July. For as long as I’ve lived the two weeks of Wimbledon, which is pretty much the same, have been a combination of washouts and extreme heat-waves, so why is it that late July or early August isn’t the festival weeks? I really can’t figure it out…

But maybe I’m being this negative only because I’m not going. Neil Young is there, Radiohead will be playing and then of course Mike Skinner as The Streets. Even Slayer, Cat Power and Jay-Z will be rocking up the crowd… So why am I not a proud Roskilde festivalgoer this year? Well first of all, I haven’t got a ticket and don’t really want to pay 1800 DKK for one (call me niggardly). It might also be Platon and Aristotle’s idea of the human nature as reacting on background of prudence.

But then again; prudence my ass… - I fear that I’ve turned boring and old before time…

All pictures and illustrations above are taken or made and copyrighted by Christian Halsted ®

Now what is really strange, is the classification of Asians. People from Korea, Taiwan and Japan were categorized as ‘White’. But, no no, Chinese are ‘Black’. Weird? Then think about it again, and correct your impulse to ‘extremely lame’! Might even ferocious, I could argue.

Marcel Berlins, from Guardian, recalls a trip to South Africa in the 1960s, where the Chinese were still under very strict restrictions, but the Japanese were seen as ‘white’: “Hardly anyone at the time had the faintest idea how to distinguish between Chinese and Japanese people, even supposing they were aware that the latter, legally speaking, were now Caucasians. But what if a newly whitened Japanese person was treated as though they were Chinese? A team of government officials was sent out to explain to puzzled restaurant owners and other service providers that the east Asian-looking gentlemen soon to enter their premises were to be served politely rather than turfed out unceremoniously. It caused great confusion at the time, but was clearly successful in business terms.”

My first thought was, how does this benefit the Chinese, does it make any difference, and hpw does this shit work? Well, apparently, the motive was financial. By being part of the (’luda’cris) black label, the Chinese gets access to various black economic empowerment schemes available to the victims of apartheid. Great life.

My last comment won’t be any anthropological nonsense on why this is normal in South Africa, or why this is even possible to take place now-a-days. No, I want to quote The Yardbirds’s song called ‘Mister, You’re a better Man than I’, as I believe it’s more clever than what I can come up with right now: Could you condemn a man, If your faith he doesn’t hold? Say the colour of his skin, Is the colour of his soul? Or could you say if men, For king and country all must die? Then Mister you’re a better man than I, Yeah You’re a better man than I

All pictures and illustrations above are taken or made and copyrighted by Christian Halsted ®

But! The inescapable ‘but’! Away from the political speeches and Republican newspaper’s headlines he’s an anti-abortion Creationist who surrounds himself with religious extremists. No matter how hard he tries to disguise it, the fact that McCain believe Islam is evil and gays are immoral is difficult to oversee. Sure, gays probably aren’t the ones helping to rid of Aids and Hiv, but I mean, isn’t it natural now-a-days that people have the possibility to be respected no matter what sex they prefer? Maybe not, but the sad thing is, that the dark sides of McCain’s primeval ideas doesn’t stop here. My beloved friend, John McCain, wants to appoint extreme conservatives to the Supreme Court and see abortion banned, just like his late ancestors would have it. Anachronism if you like - either way disastrous. But then again, could we expect something else from a man who was born on a military base, in Panama?

As young Americans return in bodybags from Iraq - and probably Iran too before long - an old soldier like McCain, who is from a family of warriors, seems a natural choice as the superpower-leader in this dangerous world. In my world John McCain seems to be a little bit like the new disability dolls: either he is a sick joke or a blessing - of course this depends on what mask you see him wearing. But, as Oscar Wilde pointed out in his ‘Truth of Masks’ : the usage of masks are very important in all games. Masks, he argued, has a double function as they are both picturesque and dramatic - just like McCain (patriot vs. creationist) can be argued to be.

All pictures and illustrations above are taken or made and copyrighted by Christian Halsted ®

When I saw the British classic Blow Up some years ago I forgot about quite quickly. Seeing it again some months ago made my mind curious to discover the places, the lines and the true meaning of the almost quintessential message of curiosity and meta-interest (as it is called in the academic milieux, I’ve been told). What seems to happen is apparently that human curiosity about curiosity itself combined with abstract thinking sometimes lead to mimesis and imagination. Probably a bit like the situation I often take myself in, where I think somebody walk in the hall outside the bathroom while I am showering. After 10 minutes of nervous searching around the flat I realize it was my own mirror-image that reflected a shadow. Really annoying, actually.

Another weird kind of curiosity is the interest of morbidity. This cathartic form of behaviour when seeing something disastrous is pretty bizarre, but I reckon everybody knows the feeling of curiosity when one sees a damaged car, a wrecked train or whatever Aristotle meant when saying ‘people enjoy contemplating the most precise images of things whose sight is painful to us’. It’s weird that such an unpleasant sight gives a kind of natural feeling of disgust that might even pleases you in other aspects of innate human emotions - and animalistic for that matter.

But to be honest; the reason why I’m writing this is because of some weird notions I’ve taken the last couple of months. First of all, why is it people always touch were a sign says ‘newly painted’? And why is people sniff when they are told that the person sitting next to them just farted? I mean, it’s just weird that this disgust needs to be verified isn’t it? It might just be that ‘People are Strange’ as Jim Morrison titled one of his songs. Maybe its because of the extreme curiosity that people suffer from (or benefit from, of course). Sometimes I think it is because people don’t trust each other, and want to confirm the warnings themselves! Either way, it is uncanny and even eerie, especially as I am curious to know why we are curious…

All pictures above are taken and copyrighted by Christian Halsted ®

After all, when it’s summer and you are in safe and quite little Denmark you can’t complain that much. I read the other day in Monocle that Copenhagen was named the best city to live, and especially praised for its ‘cutting edge design, great transport system, restaurants and environmental credentials’. Although, taken into account that the population of Denmark is half the size London, and the population of Copenhagen is about the same as Borough of Chelsea (only far more Jean Marie Le Pen’ish), the whole transport system and environmental applauds needs to be taken into perspective. But still pretty wicked stuff!

Copenhagen has been called a rife full of liberal lefties - nonetheless, Copenhagen is as every other city a somewhat Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, I reckon. Some parts are great, others aren’t. And while talking of Copenhagen and Denmark, I will lay it on thick by asking you to consider this BBC link (poor Burundi)!

Personally, my favourite place in Denmark is a small place called Rørvig. During winter a lot of the regular residents are a bit chowderheaded, drink Wiibroe beer and eat pork cracklings, although during the summer, the village is quite different. I went there during the weekend with Charlotte, and I might as well go there for the rest of the summer as it is really ‘wunderbar’.

All the pictures above are taken and copyrighted by Christian Halsted ®

Enough about the weather though. Copenhagen is red hot these days as the city has its annual Distortion Festival where the trendy youth of Copenhagen gets very drunk 5 days in a row and listen to electronic music (not that there’s anything special in that, really). The distortion festival is the Danish proud answer to Sonar Festival in Barcelona, only a bit smaller and less respected (pathetic might be the right word, but I’m not gonna use it, as it actually is great fun). No matter what, it is a good excuse to go out and enjoy the summer nights, meet a lot of old friends as well as stand next to some bald, big and asinine Hell Angels rockers (and other Yobs). For some it is also a perfect way to check out the sultry unclad Scandinavian birds that makes your saliva run wild.

All pictures above are taken and copyrighted by Christian Halsted ®