TSARA BE!

Salama from Tananarive, Madagasikara!
(Hello from Antananarivo/Tana, Madagascar)

First off - i want to apologise for it taking me so long to post the promised blog. My time in Madagascar so far has been pretty busy and so much more overwhelming than i anticipated, so it has been quite the challenge to put all my experiences, thoughts, feelings & emotions down in words.

So far this trip has been the most confronting, grounding & life-changing experience of my 25 years. Every single day presents something new. Another blessing for some, another struggle for others. There is poverty EVERYWHERE you look. Doesn't matter which way you turn, there are children chasing cars down the busy street begging for money, mothers sorting through garbage looking for food scraps or empty bottles (they can exchange these for a small amount of money), severely disabled men sitting on street corners begging for money as their disability enables them to work, sick children slowly and painfully deterioating as they are unable to get medical care, the list goes on. Yet these people are some of the most joy filled, FULLfilled people i have ever laid eyes on! These people fight to stay alive every single moment of every single day, they don't have material pleasures like we do, and yet they [seem to] embrace and appreciate life considerably more than we do. Makes you think twice about who's really facing a daily struggle huh?! Them, or us....? These people may not be rich as far as money goes, but wow are they rich where it counts.. in the heart! Its hard to try and fathom how one could prosper in the heart so much when faced with so many continual hardships, but these people encompass admirable qualities  - strength, perserverence, FAITH & unconditional LOVE for God - that not only get them through each and every day, but allow their hearts to swell! Have definitely learned a lot from these amazing people!

Besides being blown away by the hearts & souls of the Malagasy people, i have been keeping pretty busy. For the first two and a half weeks i was blessed to have my vuzza (that's what the Malagasy people call foreigners) wing-woman, Lauren Farleigh, here with me. Lauren is the mastermind behind all the CSM films, so there was a lot of filming done in the first 2 weeks. We filmed around Tana for the first week. Also did a lot of looking/walking around to all the poor communities, stone & bead sourcing, met with the gemologist, visited all the kids and handed out toys and photos taken from last year, and gave some money to the poor.

Then we travelled 3 hours south-east to Soavinandriana for a few days to film the progress of the orphanage, film the stories of the village peoples lives, and to work on a special up-and-coming csm film project.

We were back for a day or two then crammed into a tiny bus for 12 hours which took us north-west to Mahajanga. The trip to Mahajanga was a blessed one! While there Brendan met with two mayors - one the mayor of a town just outside Mahajanga, and the other the mayor of Mahajanga! These two mayors were so excited by Brendan's vision that they donated 5 square kilometres of land to CSM for up-and-coming projects. How good is that! We also got to visit the family Brendan has supported for the last few years. CSM just finished the construction of their new house (the family of 8 used to live more or less under a few pieces of tin) and water well, so it was awesome to finally meet and spend time with them, and their new baby, Brendan (yes, named after CSM Brendan). We also got a whole heap of new footage while there, visited poor communities and gave out health and hygeine packages with toothbrushes, soaps and vitamins, and got to check out the new carpentry business CSM are operating, which is very new, but already generating some good income for the org. Managed to squeeze a little beach time in while there too - soo good!! I got pretty sick on our last day there with flu-like symptoms, fever and all, which was no fun (especially with that gruelling 12 hour trip ahead of us), but besides that, our trip to Mahajanga was extremely successful and i had an amazing time!

Once back in Tana we went and bought a whole bunch of stones and leather to get the jewellery project started. We bought some fossilised wood, jasper, quartz, ruby, agate, amethyst, black tourmaline and white opal - excitement!! I'm inspired by my materials so this shop got the inspiration ball well and truly rolling! Got a couple of designs ready to be sent to the silversmith and gemologist. Was also now time for Lauren to head back to Australia (sad goodbye), and to prepare for the arrival of the 3 Aussie farm boys (Adam, Ben & Brad Grills from Toowoomba) coming the next day.

Adam, Ben & Brad came specifically to help with the Soavinandriana project, so we spent one day in Tana showing them the sites and visiting the poor communities and then we were back in Soavinandriana to start on the orphanage. When we arrived Orcel (CSM staff) and some volunteers had come as far as, laying some foundations, segmenting the area into rooms and erecting a 1m wall around the perimetre of the orphanage. The boys pulled out their tape-measures and got to work as soon as they got there. As Ben is a plumber Brendan wanted to take full advantage of his trade and build a proper bathroom & toilet there (all other bathrooms there consist of a bucket for a shower and a whole in the ground and two bricks to stand on for a toilet), so that was the priority job while they were here. This toilet will actually flush, and not smell (hhuuggee thing for these people) and the shower will even have hot water, produced by special heat generating coil thingys (noo idea what the proper name is ha) on top of the building. Brad built them a worm farm so they could produce worm juice for fertilising, and Adam designed and layed down the foundations for a revolutionary (for Soav) pig pen! The 3 boys also taught a large gathering of people there about Australian farming on 2 occasions. This helped the people there so much as, as much as their way works, it is a very old way of doing things and they could be doing things much better. While i was there i did a little bit of work on the orphanage with everyone else, dug a little & laid a few bricks. Even got a blister on my hand from shoveling so hard (yeah i was proud of it haha). Oh yeah, i wrote stuff in the concrete too ha. I hurt my knee from digging too much though (ha) and then even got kicked in my sore knee by a cow (ha!) so that stopped me from doing anything too strenuous. I did teach two english lessons at the small Christian school there though. Just taught them some basics that they use everyday; greetings, directions, basic phrases, colours, animals, days etc. Taught them and had them singing along to a song too - so cool! Such beautiful people! Towards the end of our stay in Soav i got sick AGAIN with a throat infection, which again had me feeling feverish. That knocked me about for the last couple of days. All better now though P.T.L.

We got back to Tana on Tuesday afternoon then went out for a nice pizza dinner and a couple of drinks. Then the boys left for South Africa on Wednesday morning. Another sad goodbye! It's so weird to be here and see people come and go. It's beginning to feel like i'm never going home! Today (Thursday) i worked on a photo/video thing i'm putting together for my trip, and then went stone and jewellery tool shopping with Brendan, Lova & Fidelice. Bought some beautiful amethyst and fossilised wood - so excited to see what comes of all these stones!

So that's my trip so far - i'm sure i've left loads out as i've left it so long to write this blog, but they will come back to me and you will hear lots of stories and see tonnes of photos when i get home. I will try and get better at this whole blog posting thing ha.

Hope everyone and everything back home is amazing, missing my near & dears and Encounter Life! Pray for us and all the people and projects over here.

Heaps of love, Sare xxxxx

PS. i tried to add a clip i made onto the end of this but it won't let me :( will post more photos on fb very soon! xo

Obsession; feat. Instagram

So.. I jumped on the Instagram bandwagon a couple of days ago.... and i am officially ADDICTED! Kind of a sad addiction i guess, but i just can't help it! And there i was declaring myself addiction-free a few days ago! So.. to my facebook friends, i apologise in advance for bombing your newsfeed with Instagram posts - it's not me; it's the addiction!

Today i was cleaning a beautiful holiday house right on the beach at North Avoca, and instead of having 'smoko breaks' i had 'instagram breaks'. At least it's a healthier addiction than smoking, right?! There was so much beauty goin' on in that house, and i just couldn't resist taking a few snippets. So, i thought rather than bomb my Facebook wall with these photo's, i'd just dedicate a blog to them :)

So, without further ado, here are a few of today's snap shots ::



Small snippet of ONE of the amazing paintings there



Glass bricks can be cool ;)



Coral's closeup



[teks-cher]



Dom beso



seek and you shall find

I started this blog as an ode to seeking & finding the positive in everything, because i really do believe that, no matter the situation, there IS a positive to be found, and beauty really DOES dwell everywhere. We just have to make the decision to want to see it. I'm forever trying to reinfoce this very point to everyone in my life. And never has there been a more appropriate time for me to 'practice what i preach'.


I'll start by going way back... i essentially started this blog as a way to keep me passionate about all the delightfully simple things in life... to remind me to keep looking, to keep embracing, to keep appreciating. But then i got so caught up in the emotional roller-coaster ride that was a long distance relationship, that i became more selfish, caught the 'woe is me' fever, and pretty much just put all my energy into enjoying feeling sorry for myself (i know, what a contradiction!). This ate away at me so much, that i lost the desire to seek and enjoy the simple pleasures of life, and in-turn, lost a big part of myself. no bueno!


Anyway, i have come to the point where enough is enough. It's time to be true to myself. But more importantly, be true to God, and be the person He created. Time to embrace God's beautiful creation. 

The last two days have more or less been spent entirely with God. Reading, praying, writing, rewind, repeat. It has brought so much needed clarity and inner peace, it really is amazing what our God is capable of doing. He revealed Himself to me in such a beautiful way tonight, a way that i will never forget. I was crying out for Him, and He answered. i'll keep the way in which He answered private, but all i want to say is... seek and you SHALL find!! God is so good!

To conclude this post [that probably doesn't make sense to anyone but me], i want to remind everyone that being happy is a conscious decision made by you, but made easier by God. And i encourage everyone to open your heart and look to God for peace and happiness, for He loves you so much and desires only the best for you. Everything beautiful is God, and you are only able to live the life you live because Jesus sacrificed his - just remember that, and give Him thanks.

PS. Sorry if this post doesn't read well... for some reason i am more inspired at night, but the left side of my brain doesn't agree with the right side once its past midnight :P

Shout out!

I was looking at my good friend, Tong's new website... And i came to realise, i have some REALLY artistically talented people in my life - that i am privileged enough to call friends!! So i thought i'd use this space to show-off some of my friends amazing artistic endeavours [click on their names to be taken to their site] ♥

I'll start off with the one who inspired this post...

Ladies & Gentlemen...

TONG ZHOU

Chinese born & raised, Tong has to be one of the most amazing free-hand artists i have ever met. I stayed with Tong for 2 weeks while in Vancouver, and was lucky enough to witness his talent first-hand. We'd be sitting there talking, laughing & being silly, and Tong would have a sketch-pad in front of him just drawing away like its no big deal. And these were no sketches... these were incredible works-of-art! And he just pulled them straight from his imagination. He didn't have to copy from anything... every crease and wrinkle on an old ladies face, every twist & curl in a poodle's coat - straight from his imagination! INSANE! I stole these images from his website http://www.tong-zhou.com/. OH, his website is 100% Tong-made too. ANDDD he's an origami expert!! Talent seeping out of his pores!

Love how these 3 beauties show his diversity as an artist. Check out his website (noted above) for more. He is drawing everyday, so keep your eyes peeled for new Tong!

KARYNN BROWN

Ahh i adore the guts out of this girl!!

Karynn Brown - creative mind behind 'Karynn's Keepsakes & Kupkakes' - is possibly one of the most genuinely sweetest people you will EVER meet! Even sweeter than her gorgeous 'Kupkakes' ^.^ (that's a Karynn smiley). Her kupkakes are so exquisitely beautiful, that i don't know how one can bare to eat them. In fact, my friend Michael just said to me, after i showed him her page "wow, do you get to eat those or do you have have to keep them?!...seriously, because i'm not sure" I guess they just smell so scrum-didli-umptious, that they just magically make their way into your mouth (yes, i'm speaking from experience) whether you want to part with them, or not!

Not only is Karynn THE cupcake MASTER, she also has mean photography and photo-editing skills! This is where 'Keepsakes' comes into play! Her shots all have a romantic and whimsical feel to them. Now since a picture is worth a thousand words, I'm going let her photo's do the rest of the talking...

The Canadian Keepsake & Kupkake Kween conducts her magic in Vancouver, BC. She bakes Kupkakes and makes Keepsakes for all occasions. Check her facebook fanpage for deets.

HENRY MURPHY

One of my favourite quotes is "Beauty dwells and is awake in each thing... we must look for it." by Rainer Maria Rilke, and i think you can apply this quote to many of Henry's photographs. That's one of the things i think seems so romantic about being a photographer, that seeing and living life through the eyes of a photographer must be beautiful. Beauty truly IS everywhere! You just need to open your eyes, put on your rose-coloured glasses and look for it! Or, if that's too hard... just head to Henry's website and let him show you how it's done.

This is probably my favourite Henry Murphy photograph. I can't put my finger on why, but I can just stare at it forever!

I feel the same about this one.

"Beauty dwells and is awake in each thing... we must look everywhere." - Rainer Maria Rilke

LOVE the contrast in this one!

Dreamy

SITJI CHOU

Sitji, like Tong, is an absolutely amazing artist! I've never had the privilege of watching Sitji at work with my own eyes, but i can only hope that one day i will, and in the meantime lose myself in his masterpieces. Sitji encompasses an imagination that most people, even artists only dream of having, and it shows through in his works. Check it.

Self Portrait

LLLOOOVVVEEE

This is all i can get my hands on for now, so will have to suffice. But as soon as i can get more, they'll be up! Isn't he brilliant?!!!

Now I do have many other amazingly talented friends, but i've been working on this blog for wayyy too long now due to super duper slow internet. So how about i do a 'Part 2' with everyone else on it?! Cool? Cool!

Well I'm finally tired enough to go back to sleep now (I had a 'nap' from 4p-9p this evening, that was full of nightmares and has kept me up til now - 3:40a) so i'm going to peace out & pass out!

I hope you've enjoyed my friends artworks, and have been inspired by them just as much as i have been :)

We live in a beautiful world, all. Take a minute to stop, and smell the roses!

Nighty night

♥

Implode.

Someone dear challenged me to conquer the world today, and to me that translated to 'pull your finger out and get crack-a-lackin with E L I X I R (my forever 'up & coming' jewellery line for those of you who don't know)'. It could have meant a number of things, but me being right-brained, opted to take the colourful & dreamy route. Now you're probably thinking, 'that doesn't sound like a challenge at all', but when your creative juices are involuntarily set to 'overflow' mode, and you feel like you're about to implode, you're suddenly faced with a new challenge - where do I start?!?

My brain.

Now, I originally started by flicking through over 30 fashion magazines (Russh, Oyster, Vogue, Frankie, In Style and Yen just to name a few) and throwing together an inspiration board. And inspire me it did. Not only do I want to be a jewellery designer. I now want to be a painter, swimwear designer, furniture designer, interior designer, landscape designer, AND I want to add a second line to my jewellery endeavour, 'ROSCO'. BAH! If only I could be/do all of the above... Don't want to be a 'jack of all trades, master of none' though!

I need some of this!

So now I'm trying to steer all my artistic energy into one direction, but it seems to want to veer off every time I get it on the straight & narrow. I know my main focus should be Elixir, and I want my main focus to be Elixir, but something in the back of my mind is nigling at me, telling me not to ignore all the other ideas protruding my brain just because they bare little, if no, relevance to Elixir. So what do I do?! Do I allow a little left-over juice for these other concepts (which may in-turn generate more creativity/inspiration), or do I just solely concentrate on Elixir and give time to these other ideas when I've made substantial progress with my number one endeavour?!

E L I X I R

E L I X I R

Ohh I don't know!!!

I think this little pickle calls for bed time. I'm tired, and I'm sure being this sleepy can't be good for such important decision making :P Ahhh you know life is good when something like this is your biggest problem (if you can even call it that)!

Nighty night all!

To the one that challenged me.

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Do it.

You know you want to..
♥

Nuff said.