Whatever I want. | amymaybe

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Home away from home

I had a rough couple of months leading up to my last holiday.

General home sickness, family news making me want to move home accompanied by overworking and general lack of inspiration and creative expression was a recipe for a miserable/panicked Amy.

Only when I go on holiday do I realise how much I need it. Just a few days away from the rat race, into the sun & Mediterranean sea and I was on top of the misery.

tough times.

I came back feeling so rejuvenated and also, dare I say, grateful for what is, my home away from home.

I spend a lot of time in Canary Wharf – if anyone reading this lives or has lived in London and has spent any time in Canary Wharf, you may agree that it borders on being the worst place to work – only cement and ants. Very little soul or character. Most people in the area are angry and robotic ( how can you blame them when they work in banking) Sorry bankers, judgey I know.

I work in the only creative agency in the area – stand out like a sore thumb on the tube. I had a conversation with my colleagues on the weekend ( cus we dont spend enough time together during the week) about the fact that we don’t look like we work in the wharf. How the bankers must think we’re on our way to Stratford, but are then horrified when they see us get off at Canary Wharf, “She must work at Tesco’s”, they assure themselves.

Don’t get me wrong – we look great. We just don’t wear suits. We just don’t belong in Canary Wharf. Feeling like oil in water when on the jubilee line travelling underground in armpit hell, doesn’t stop me from going in every day. The moral of this story? My crazy group of colleagues make it all worthwhile. Lets calculate.

8:30am – 6pm every day 5 days a week. that’s 9.5 hours x 5 – a total of 47.5 hours a week. That’s 28% of my life.

It’s important for that 28% to be a source of happiness & inspiration.

Meet some of these sources of daily joy:

Emily

Budgie.

Ezra: our token musician, what a hottie.

: Yasir /Yaris

Tim, with child.

Natasha

Unick.

Brozhan

AND LAST BUT NOT LEAST, The Romanians: Daniela & Livia

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Categories Life in London, Play, Whatever I want.

Video

Many Ogilvy Hands: 2012

16 Jul

In March 2012, I traveled to Uganda with other volunteers from Ogilvy London to help build and teach in a rural community, Buikwe.

Each of us had to raise over £1, 200 which funded our trip and went towards the cause.

A few years ago, Ogilvy teamed up with International Needs on a project whereby the agency would send volunteers to the village 3 times a year to help build a secondary school. The village at that time only had a primary school where education for the children stopped at 14. The secondary school, which is now almost complete, brings education, and therefore, freedom to many young talented people in the community. Whilst there, we are introduced to the sponsorship program which exists to aid those who have no funds to attend the school being built. In all honesty, this is most families.

By donating £20 a month, a child at the junior school is able to move on to the secondary school and further their education.
It is also worth mentioning you will never come across a more enthusiastic group of kids, desperate to learn and willing to walk up to 3km a day to get to and from school.

I sponsor a 7 year old boy named Brian who now has a chance to fulfill his dream. In reality, without an education in this part of Uganda, a girl will most likely get pregnant, with no money to support a family, never mind herself. £20 is what I would spend on a shop at Tesco’s for a night’s dinner and perhaps some chocolate and a magazine. Perspective much?

I feel so honoured to have been given this opportunity and would encourage anyone and everyone to explore what you can do to help your community, a community, if everyone did, I’m sure life would be better for more people, including yourself.

I filmed this with an iphone and my a+ boyfriend, partner, companion, helped me edit this to a point where it could be enjoyable despite my shaky hand…

Hope you enjoy, and please visit http://www.manyogilvyhands.com/ if you’d like to know more or get involved in some way.

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Categories Doing good, Life in London, Play, Travel, Whatever I want., Work

tadaa

25 Aug

I’ve been meaning to post about this app I’ve been using recently and am finally finding time to give it the attention it deserves.

I like taking photos, a lot. I like looking for beauty, and capturing it. I’m by no means a photographer. In fact, I’m very lazy, as the only camera I use theses day is my I phone 4. But how can I not, when there are so many photo apps out there with all these different tricks? I am never bored on the train! For a long time, I was using instagram, and I still do every now and then, but I’m a bit bored of the filters now. I’m kinda over the fact that even if i took a photo of a big pooh, instagram would make it look awesome. The thing is with tadaa, the filters feel more genuine and I don’t feel like they completely transform the photo like the instagram filters do. It’s more subtle and each filter has a name, I like that too. I dont feel like I’m cheating as much. And it takes a little more effort and skill to pick the filter and decide which one is best for what you’re capturing. Another bonus with tadaa is that you are given that option, to look through each filter before taking the photo, whereas with instagram, you cant. You have to take the picture first and then choose the filter – lame guys.

So, lets talk about tadaa. It’s a photo app, but also a social network, like instagram, but way cooler. The design is better, slick, and it feels more intimate. Created by this rad dude in Hamburg I have never met, but feel like I know, the app allows for users to like each others photos and if your photos get a heck load of likes, it makes it to the awesome tab. The more likes and followers you get the more points/money you make – not real money obviously, but still cool. What I like most about it? I don’t know anyone on it, and users are scattered all around the world. Most of the captions are written in foreign languages, when I have time, I end up Google translating, but most times I just make up my own story about the photo. I feel like i know these people!

Not many Brits using it yet to my knowledge. I have recruited my house mate, who is now addicted. You should try it, really. Follow me, amymaybe and see who I’m following. They’re all rad.

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Categories Play, Uncategorized, Whatever I want.

Got inked.

14 Aug

The seed has been planted. The first domino has fallen.

They say very few people only have one tattoo because after the first, you always want to go back for more.

Getting a tattoo was never anything I would have imagined I would do. I had kind of thought about it, like, ‘ya that would be nice’ – but nothing had happened, or meant enough to me, that inspired me to want to ink it onto my body forever. Until I got to London, and went to Norway. Until my life transformed. Until I felt a transformation occurring inside me. A transformation that spurred on a sequence of events that led me to go to Angel in North London on Friday afternoon, 12 August 2011, a celebratory day already for me, to get a tattoo of the words Jeg elsker deg on my wrist.

The tattoo is for me. To remind me that if i love me, no matter what, everything will always fall into place. To remind me of this time. To remind me that in fear, i must look to love. It’s written in Norwegian for many reasons, because of my soul sister, Nosizwe Baqwa who taught me Jeg elsker deg when we were ten years old in junior school – and i have never forgotten those words, because my magical trip to Oslo this year reconnected me with myself. And whats coincidental, is that a week after i returned from Oslo, they experienced their worst massacre in history. And i watched, online, all the Norwegians come together in love. Not war. But love. And that, my friends, is inspiring and something we can all learn from.

I feel amazing. Doing something for me, like this, has made me feel more IN myself than ever before.

Life is good. Just for today.

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Categories Love, My life, Whatever I want.

Oslo magic

20 Jul

magic.

Oh if I could describe it in words I could. Pictures dont even do it justice. And it wasn’t only the city, but the people i was with. The energy. The warmth, the vibe. My oldest friend Nosizwe. The only friend who truly liberates me, reaches inside my soul and reveals my truth. That explosive Amy who believed in everything, in herself, in the world, who slowly over time became corrupted by society and all the disappointments and expectations. Who lost faith. Its always been there. And I’m slowly finding it again.

Singing in the streets, taking over the dance floors. Nosizwe attracts love and vibrancy. Together we create magic. And now she has given the world a gift of a child. A warrior, Aaella.

warrior.

I feel so calm, free.

Cautiously happy. But not cautious. Wondering, should I be cautious?

Communitcaing with love on an entirely new level. The love I have inside for me, and for others.

I have love scattered all over Germany, London, and now Norway. I need to see more, meet more, feel more. There is so much. This is what it is all about people. This is why I came here. Not to live some structured planned-out life thats fits into a box. Not to control my destiny, but rather to live it. Let it be. Let it unfold organically. I choose to not live the life my conditioning tells me I ‘should’ live. Screw the ‘shoulds’

This post takes emo to an entirely new level. But i dont care! Your opinion of me is none of my business anyway.

: babymama

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Categories Love, My life, Play, Whatever I want.

Speechless.

17 Jun

I have been so useless re: blogging etc since my ‘ground-breaking revamp’. But I can forgive myself because have been through life-crises type event since my return from Germany, so have literally been speechless. I am not really keen on getting into much detail around life-crises right now as am uncertain myself whether it is crises or not. Is a crises, ever really a crises? Currently feeling like superwoman – when I go through these life-crises thingymagiggy’s I become superwoman. Like, seriously. I also cry a lot, and talk , and write, in a diary, or in a sticky note, not online for ya’ll to see.

Today, to my horror, I suddenly remembered, I have a blog! Now that’s a crises. Need to say something. Don’t I?

Some people say, that if you have nothing to say, then don’t say anything at all. I say, um ya whatever bru, I can say nothing if I want to.

So here I am saying something – which some of you may interpret as saying nothing. But underneath all this abstract cryptic-ness, is something profound!

Taking most recent life-crises into consideration – how’s THIS for profound?