movie post: Mad Max: Fury Road

Oh, what a Fury Road it was, indeed! I was beyond impressed; a film about oppressed women reclaiming their right to bodily autonomy and self-determination without colouring every single male character as the enemy while still keeping its validity as an entertaining (and totally deranged) action flick (yes, there are still some issues, but humour me)! And as a balance to the female rights talk: Nicholas Hoult <3 (and Tom Hardy :3).

I liked the character of Nux, who - starting out as a firm believer in the system - began to question it the more he learned about the fate of the wives, and especially after realising they were actual people, persons. Charline Theron as Furiosa was a hero. More so than the movie's name sake Max. She was a loyal ally to the women who needed her. The wives fighting for their freedom and their right of self-determination, but also being afraid of the unknown future ahead and the old women who helped Furiosa, Max, Nux and the wives to reclaim what was rightfully theirs. Women in this movie are shown as nurturing (the seeds they carry with them will help regrow the plants), but fierce. Men are mostly displayed as a destructive force of nature, but Max and Nux are both shown as caring. Max is driven mad by visions of people he could not help. He is being dehumanized and used as a human blood bag against his will, only to reclaim his bodily autonomy, too, and deciding to sacrifice his blood to save Furiosa. Nux, first to be conceived as a headless, mindless follower, is being shown as cunning and clever. They are all great role models in one way or another. Multi-layered characters going through character developement (also note that the further the wives get from their oppressor (physically and psychologically) the more clothes they are wearing) are one of the many things that make this film entertaining. Also, to me one of the main points was the thing Max said when they want to run away as far as possible, something along the lines of "you can run a hundred days in this direction and will achieve nothing, or you can go back to where we came from and fight through one day. It will be hard, but at least that way we'll be able to... together... come across some kind of redemption." and "Hope is a mistake. If you don't fix what's broke, you'll go insane." I love how he is a "Face your problems and do something about them even if it's hard and will probably break you"-kind of guy.
The fact that it also has more epic car chases and action sequences than a "Fast and Furious"-flick and is more disturbed in some ways than a Tim Burton movie, make it interesting and entertaining to the last second. A unique blend of sometimes blunt, sometimes subtle social commentary and action that's really worth watching. Plus some really great actors and actresses. Loved it.

If I said I needed a break, would that suffice? Roadmap to what happened and what's next

Uff. It's been almost a year since I've last posted here and a lot has changed happened.

Last summer is a blur. I remember doing the math afterwards and my summer job amounted to twelve weeks, during which I had 10 days off, four of those I had on-call duty, though. In addition to that, I completed four summer tests for uni, so I would not have to take a jackload of courses come autumn. No wonder I felt so drained all the time.

Autumn brought with it the return to uni after my BA-degree and the immediate start of my MA-thesis. Since I don't do cliffhangers: I did it. With flying colours. Well, actually, I spent autumn taking about 15h worth of courses at uni, doing a 20h/week internship, working 10-15h/week and training for my first MMA competition between 10-15h/week (morning conditioning, evening technique). In hindsight, I don't know how I did it. Also, I moved to a new flat in September. I really don't know how I did not go totally bonkers last fall. Every minute of my day was planned. I'm not kidding you here, my time management game was up to par and well, the glorification of busy was just my thing.
My internship ended in December. I spent most of Christmas on my own and then flew to Frankfurt to see me mum. And after Christmas the real work began. I went to our gym's member/birthday party and off I was to Berlin to collect material for my MA-thesis. Because... I had not done anything for it all autumn, but told my professor I was making great progress (yeah, don't do that, I got my presentation date in early February thanks to that). So, Berlin. Back there, meeting friends and family, I realised how much I actually missed that overpopulated pit of a metropolis. And I made the mistake/great decision to train at a JiuJitsu/MMA/other martial arts gym there. And... I just clicked with some of the people. I mean, MMA Team 300 is family, nothing is ever going to change that, MMA Team 300 has been the only reason I've been hesitating with this decision to be honest. And now I know, if I go back to Berlin, there's people who would welcome me with open arms into their midst.
So, I'm probably headed back to Berlin in September, thus setting an end to my life as an ex-pat.
But back to my MA-thesis. Well, I went to Berlin to get material and hit the ground running with the writing part of the thesis. Thank goodness I knew exactly which theories and books I wanted to use for my theory part, thanks to my Communication Science studies. So, I got the first presentational version ready in two weeks. The result was not as great and world-changing as I would have wanted it to be, but tough luck, I should have started earlier - months earlier. And from there on out I spent every single minute of my spare time either writing or thinking through problems I'd encountered. Twelve weeks of work went into my MA-thesis, the better part of spring. But. I wouldn't be me if I did not do something stupid to make life just this little bit harder on me now, would I? First, I decided to take a road trip through Romania this year or the next (peering at my financial situation, it'll be next year) and for that - of course - someone like me who taught themselves basic Italian for a week-long trip to Rosetto, has to be fluent in conversational Romanian. So, I took up a totally unnecessary Romanian course at uni. Because I wanted to. It just meant a whole lot of work more than actually necessary. Second, flicking through the study guide, my eyes also fell upon a literature course in our English department (I already had done five literary courses on the master level, so it was absolutely unnecessary to go for another one) and thus I was doing even more work for a class called "Psychoanalysis and Literature", which was the most gruesome tour de force and the most interesting course I've ever done. I found out a lot about myself during those long hours reading through Freud, Lacan and other theories, ready to lose my mind at any point because some of it went so far over my head it was almost painful to make myself understand it, but on the other hand incredibly enthusiastic anytime I found out something about the way my mind works. And third: I started actually training in our competitors' group and logged even more time doing MMA preparing for my first fight in March. Then April. Then May. But that's a whole other story and has to be told another day. But bottom line is: there's a reason most people choose to do their MA-thesis far from any other studies and concentrate wholly on writing. But I have never been most people and common sense has always been a thing I've liked laughing at in the rear-view mirror.
In the end, I made it. I even finished a week before the deadest deadline. And here we are again. I got time on my hands. This year's summer job seems to be pretty easy-going, predictable and I don't have to be anybody's boss. For the first time in my work life, I don't have to spend my summer glued to a work phone, worrying about shift lists and paycheck gone wrong or people calling in sick. All I have to do is show up. Do my work. Go home. I could get used to this. Everyday life, they call it. :)

But what's ahead blog-wise?

Well, I've been fighting with a light eating disorder (I'm even hesitant to call it that, but...face the music and dance) and body image issues for quite some time now and it really reared its head when I started to think about competing in Grappling/JiuJitsu and MMA competitions (weight-class sports are great breeding ground when you're already an easy victim). It's not that serious, but I have to be aware of it and not slip back into these kinds of behaviours. I'd like to write a post or two on that and how it relates to sports/fitness.
I still love working out and I'll be writing on that, too.
I have been preparing to compete in MMA (oh, what a rocky road it has been and I'm not talking about the cookies), that's worth a post. And I actually have been competing in grappling competitions. Also worth a post.
Pain and sports/fitness. It is an issue. Ignoring injuries, playing them down, making light of them and sports. Also an issue. An issue I know far too well.
Nutrition. I love to eat. I love to cook. I made the perfect protein pancake last week. Have to tell you about that, too.
And... one of my older passions that has come back with a vengeance now that I have time; books and movies!!! I've read four books within the last seven days (one of them over 600 pages, another one more than 90 chapters). And... since this blog is called welcome to my life and not some kind of training blog per se, you'll have to suffer through those posts as well.
Oh, and I got a new tattoo. Only a little one...

And this is where I leave you for today, my friends. Have a great one xX