Travelling and Unravelling

The Oxonian Review Short Story Competition, 2011

mizimoo — Mon, 07 Nov 2011 19:47:42 +0000

Submission Deadline: November 11th 2011

Prize: A book! (and some good networking opportunities!)

What you need to do:

[Taken from the Oxonian Website...]
Entries should be emailed to oxonianwriters[at]gmail[dot]com, with “Short Story Competition Entry” clearly marked in the subject line.

Competition Rules

The competition is open to anyone. Entrants are not required to hold any affiliation to the University of Oxford.

Entries must be in English.

Entries must be the author’s own work entirely.

Entrants may submit no more than two stories.

Entries must be page-numbered and include a word count.

Entries should not exceed 2,000 words.

Each entry must be a complete story.

Entrants must not include their name in the document they wish to be considered. Judges will consider anonymous entries only.

http://www.oxonianreview.org/wp/oxonian-review-short-story-competition/

Snow, piano and the habits of birds.

mizimoo — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 21:52:23 +0000

It snowed. In Barcelona.

I move here to escape the bloody cold and this is what I get:

I’ve not been posting much because I’ve been really busy studying Spanish – it’s tough but the pay off is good. I was amazed to understand a bit of the lyrics to Caldestino by Manu Chao – This song is looping like crazy in my brain right now … On the bus, on the train, on foot, by the ocean, by the mountains, in the sunshine and under the mimosa trees. I’m wandering and I’m lost and in fact I have no idea what I’m doing or how I ended up in Barcelona falling in love with Castilliano. But here I am.

Wish I had this album :) Video is shite but the song is really, really good.

Also been listening to this. A lot.

Odd and Even

mizimoo — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 22:39:06 +0000

Sabina is my favorite character in The Unbearable Lightness of Being … I feel/worry/hope I may be living out her story as I move from city to city, country to country, life to life. I think a lot of us women – the ones who move around, are unlovable(unlivable), frustrated, artistic and curious are bound to her fate. Quietly noting the lack of insight of our lover has as he fails to see the irony of our tipped bowler hat. Bowler hats always mean more. In equal measures knowing my life is playing out like this makes me smile and deepens the sense of loneliness I feel momentarily as I get ready to board the next airplane, take a solo seat in a coffee shop where everyone turns to stare, in lecture theatres, in my published writing.

The quite in question starts at “Betrayal”…

If I had to narrow down what this blog is about, I would have to say it’s about inhabiting the life that so many young women, so many of my friends, are now living. Breaking ranks, quietly betraying home for a lonely but wholly satisfying life.

I don’t know. Barcelona is still amazing, back at Uni today to buy books and study Spanish under the same orange trees. Tomorrow is sightseeing with my host family and then a squat gig in the evening.

Love

Mizi xo

I accidentaly moved to Barcelona…

mizimoo — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 22:44:41 +0000

Bear with me…

I’m writing, just doing so with a pen and a Cafe Solo under the branches of the Orange Trees outside the Cathedral Gothic… Untill then …

Walking, again.

mizimoo — Sat, 23 Jan 2010 15:10:08 +0000

I went for a walk, from my house out across the fields and back again. Past all the snow melt and confused looking cows standing on the edges of the huge puddles, the ones that are now spread out over the low-lying water meadows.

I found this wooden palette next to the allotments that lie on the other side of the new ring road. They were full of brussels sprouts and winter peas and hard compacted mounds of earth protecting some kind of other root crop deep inside. I would love an allotment, the waiting list for a piece of land is now about 15 years! Can you believe it?

Where I live is so flat. It could not be more different from Hiroshima, which is ringed by mountains and spills out onto the ocean. I really love mountains - I am missing them.

The path I took goes through Witches Wood and across Troll Bridge. My Dad and I named these when I was little and we used to ride our bikes along the pathway. When we took my nephews to Troll bridge, Dad pretended the troll had gotten his leg and it was pulling him down. They ran screeeeeeeeeeeaming across the fields!

Love

Mizi xo

Happy Birthday to me

mizimoo — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 23:45:50 +0000

Snow, positivity and CAKE!

mizimoo — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 12:23:11 +0000

So, my nose stud fell out and I, like the child I am, had a mega strop. I sat on the edge of my bath and cried and cried because the whole sky was falling down – my nose had broken (clearly.) My acne is of course irreparably awful, India is postponed until next year and I am clearly a terrible mess of a person destined to live in Thame forever.
So, to cheer myself up – I made cakes, took photographs and generally had a wonderful time covered in icing sugar, soy cream and listening to beautiful music.

Tday I re-pierced my nose and have begun to get myself organised. Photography, writing, drawing, reading – It feels a little directionless which is killing me (I like direction, or an excuse to be directionless, such as living in Japan! That was a bloody good reason to be directionless!)

So, floating on a sea of notknowingwhereI’mgoingness I made an egg and milk free cake and spent half the morning photographing the lovely thing.

It was yum.

Taking pictures, baking, drawing. It’s a pretty sweet life and I’m really, really enjoying it. I keep wanting to peer around the corner to see what is coming next but right now, It feels right to be patient (and positive).

Love

Mizi

Creativity, Piercings and Malaise.

mizimoo — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 14:27:48 +0000

I chose to begin this very new decade by going backwards. Back to Edinburgh and back into the company of some old friends. A little ironic, I thought to myself, as my coach crawled through snow-bound traffic jams up towards Newcastle and then on to Edinburgh. After 2 years away, here I am heading backwards. Sat in the same coach seat (probably) going to the same cities to see the same people and perform the same, now almost ritualistic, act of piercing my nose.

This was my third time, I felt time looping backwards – playing back the colours, feelings and sense of the past in tandem with the fresh quality of this visit. Time played tricks on me, but contrast – bright, knife-like contrast was cutting through each reminiscence. Our lives are themed, motifs play out and certain things tie up our lives in loops; music, people, a certain smell or even the piercing of one’s nose bind our lives into chapters and tie neat but connected ribbons around the pages. But although a sense of the past is retained, we can never occupy or inhabit the physical space again.

Friendship shifts, cities move on and above all else the very faculties we use to experience situation are fundamentally changed.

That became quite apparent to me, when she, the piercing lady, pushed a bright needle through my left nostril. The pain was even different, blunt-er, less acute. Timely I thought because life has a tendency to blunt a little with age. I worry sometimes that I’ve lived the most exciting part of my life already. I know I’ve certainly broken with my time of unbridled revelry and ass-hat hedonism, I left that behind when I moved to Japan but what if the highs and lows and the intrigue of romance and friendship have been extinguished too?

Hm, I sound like a wounded returnee of course. A girl who spending too much time abroad, is now stuck back in her childhood bedroom writing up blog posts. Unravelling but not travelling.

Yesterday I wrote a blogpost for yearof52adventures, wrote out 9 beautiful quotes (beautifully) because my New Year’s Resolution is to write out one per day, took photos and went to the gym. I’m being really productive. I’m also reading the Unbearable Lightness of Being which I have totally and completely fallen in love with (deeply and forever I think).

Love, Mizi xoxoxoxo

New Years Resolutions!!!!!

mizimoo — Thu, 31 Dec 2009 03:09:41 +0000

Of course, its that time of year again – New Year Resolution Time and like many others I am going to keep to my mantra of try, fail, try again, fail better. Only this year is actually going to be fantastic and wonderful and utterly revolutionary comapred to the past 23 :) I can feel it in my waters. Funnily enough tonight (the 30th) I can’t sleep. My mind is full up of many, many, many things and I’m having a dark night of the soul. A night where each side of the pillow is loaded with memories and anxiety. But its the last one. I had a really really really really really really rough year this year. But Now … its a whole new decade.

1) Enrol and complete writing course at the London School of Journalism. Actually, fuck completing it – thats a shite goal! Completely blow everyon I come in contact with away.

2) Move to M***** or B******** (still top secret because moving to one or two of these cities is going to change the world :)

3) Read 26 book (1/week)

4) Get excited and make things! All the time!

5) Get at least one photograph published because they really are very good.

6) Take a photography Course

7) Make a whole bunch of awesome new friends.

8) Learn Spanish so in 2011 I can

9) Couchsurf my way across South America!

10) Fall in love.

Love Mizi xoxoxoxo

mizimoo — Tue, 29 Dec 2009 13:37:48 +0000

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