Sketches of a Life: August 2015

Something Old, Something New

I have weird daily routines, to say the least. Sometimes I literary work 24/7, forget to eat or sleep, and can't even remember which day it is. Other times, I have so much free time that I often decide to stay in bed and spend the day in front of my laptop. The trouble is, no matter how bored or exhausted I might be, I can't seem to fall asleep at night easily. Night is when my mind starts racing frantically, and I get ideas. Zillions of ideas. Of course, in the morning I completely forget about most of them, or deem them unrealizable, but every now and then something comes to my mind worth tackling with.

Recently my mother made me come by and take away all the belongings I had left in my old bedroom when I moved out. This included everything from my old drawings, primary and high school diaries (reading these was just hilarious!), letters (yes, the actual, hand-written letters!), to a pile of old jewellery. Going through all these made me think about how creative I used to be before; as I child, I was great in painting, clothes making, and in other areas that required some creativity. And I couldn’t remember when or how exactly I had discarded, disregarded, or lost it.

Anyway, looking at the jewellery pile, obviously unfashionable these days, made me believe that I might do something with it to make it stylish, instead of just throwing it away. Long story short, it was 2 a.m. when I started dismantling the old pieces, separating beads and pendants from chains, using tweezers as my main tool, as it was impossible to find anything such as pliers at the time. I would hardly recommend this to anyone, unless you are a self-destructive masochist craving to lose your mind. If so, knock yourself out!

After a number of finger cuts, broken nails, and some blood, I ended up with what I think is a lovely statement necklace. Maybe it's nothing special, but I am proud of the way it turned out, particularly because it was my first attempt at doing anything as such. And I am surely going to wear the hell out of it. Moreover, in the heat of the moment (a.k.a. the 5 a.m. madness) I even bought some DIY jewellery supplies online, determined to pursue my latest passion. But I tend to act hastily like that when I get excited about something, so I can’t promise I will still be interested in making jewellery after the supplies will have arrived. I guess it depends on whether you’ll like my pilot project! :)

To wrap everything up: my point is that we should start looking at our old jewellery and clothing in a new light, and always take into account recycling before throwing things away. Easy on our budget and environment, redoing old jewellery is a great way to reduce, reuse, and recycle old bits and turn them into beautiful DIY pieces. All you need is some will, skill, and time. Maybe you’ll even discover a hidden talent, who knows?

Also, I would like to express my newly discovered appreciation for all the women selling hand-made jewellery. I know now this is a hard work that calls for loads of talent, dedication, time, and love. My respect for all of you out there!

I am so impatient to hear your thoughts! What do you think of my "firstborn"? :)

Thank you for reading, wishing you an awesome day!

9:16 pm
2 Comments

300 Moustache and Braids

travel and events

Being from Sinj and not writing about Alka, particularly about the 300^th Alka, would just be unpardonable. Still, I am going to keep the story of Alka as short as possible, because there is something else related to the number of 300 that I actually want to write about.

For those who do not know anything about Alka: it’s an annual knights' tournament commemorating a victory of only 700 inhabitants of Sinj over more than 60.000 Ottoman soldiers. The siege of the city took place in 1715, which means that this year we’re proudly celebrating its 300^th anniversary. Roughly, the tournament consists of 11-17 horsemen (Alkars), wearing traditional garnments, and attempting to aim the center of a hanging metal ring (alka) with their spears, at full gallop. The ring consists of 4 parts of different values, and the contestant who earns most points after three rounds, wins the tournament. In 2010, the Alka of Sinj was inscribed in the UNESCO Intengible Cultural Heritage List. You can read more about the rules, participants, history, children's version of the tournament, etc. here.

Still, what amazed me most related to this year's great celebration are the following two stories about the people of Sinj:

In an attempt to further revive the memory of what the town of Sinj and its inhabitants used to look like in the past, someone came up with the idea of the men of Sinj growing moustache, the trademark of historical Alkars. The idea met with an enormous success, and many local men have actually been growing moustache for months now. The climax of these attempts was the gathering of 300 mustachioed man at the town’s main square for the purpose of taking a photo together, lined up in a way that their bodies form an image of a moustache, the Alka ring, and the number 300 (below).

As a response to this initiative, the women of Sinj came up with the idea of wearing braids during the days of Alka, just like their grandmothers and great grandmothers used to. Some diligent hairdressers even put up a stand at the main square and spent days braiding the hair of all the interested women, free of charge. And really, in my estimation, every 1 in 3 women was wearing braids during the last several days. Even I have managed to pull one off despite my short hair :) Moreover, we have just started an initiative for taking a photo similar to the one the men took, and hopefully we will find a volunteer photographer, the firemen to lift him up, and enough women with braids to participate in this action. I will surely add our photo to this post later on if we manage to carry out our idea!

Words can't express how proud I am of my fellow citizens right now!

Ever seen anything alike? All the men and women in a town doing something completely out of the ordinary to celebrate an important event in the history of their hometown? Do let me know!