L’Odyssée de Cartier

a few facts are always welcome in a world full of uncertainties:

– diamonds are a girl’s best friend

– Cartier makes beautiful things (mainly jewelry)

– Cartier uses a lot of diamonds = Cartier can be one of girl’s best friends

– the following video is beautiful

 

in case you are interested in the video’s details: it took Cartier 2 years and 4 million Euros to complete the work, produced by Marcel agency and film was shot in Prague, Paris, Italy and Spain. The video traces the history of the famous jeweler’s as well as putting an emphasis on its core values of refined and elegant creativity.

Bernard Fournas (Cartier‘s CEO) said about the showreel “we want to portray that we at Cartier are at the opposite of fashion  temporary and disposable, we are timeless. When our teams create, develop and produce they have a unique way of thinking. Our products are conceived for life and not for a few fashion seasons”

In the video you will notice a few iconic Cartier pieces like Cartier’s Panther the house’s icon since 1904  (might be a one for the girls to recognise)

and if you don’t care much for jewels well its a really nice video production from the technical point of view

 

i’m open minded but this is pushing it a little

we have all probably received at least one of these coupon emails offering different discounts in the city you live in or any city you are interested in, it usually has restaurants, SPA/salon, discounts on items that never got sold in stores (remember those products with funky names like the Ab buster 3000…………….man i really want to be a funky product name inventor)

anyhow I as everyone else receive a few of these emails everyday and sometimes check them out there is no shame in a little bargain hunt every now and again, plus sometimes they have good items on discount. and today i received an offer of a different kind……………..get ready, have a seat………to give you all the parameters this particular offer is for Dubai UAE (a supposedly Arab and Muslim state)………………are you ready……………..ok here isa copy paste of the email received from the geniuses at GrouponUAE:

Give Yourself Peace of Mind With an STD Basic or Advanced Test And Consultation from AED555 at XXXX clinic

• Privacy and Confidentiality for every individual is assured.
• This test covers the major STD’s such as : herpes, chlamydia, hepatitis B and C, syphllis and HIV.

STDs are diseases that are mainly passed from one person to another during an intimate relationship. There are at least 25 different STDs with a range of different symptoms. The most common methods for the spread of STDs: 

– Blood Transfusions (Not common in the UAE). 
– Direct contact with blood 
– Intimate Relationship with an infected person 
– Acupuncture with unclean needles 
– Shared personal items (toothbrush, razor, nail clipper, etc.) 
– Non-sterile use of tools for Manicures & Pedicures
– Non-sterile use of tolls in dental procedures

Basic Testing: The determination of current infections for Chlamydia & Herpes (i.e early stages of the infection only) and the detection of Syphilis using the VDRL method (basic method with slight chances of false positives).

Advanced Testing: The determination of both current & previous infections for Chlamydia & Herpes (i.e early & late stages of the infection) and Syphilis screening using the TPHA method (Advanced sensitive method)

Please note that if the infection existed for a long time, the basic testing may not be useful.

Get yourself checked with this deal and stay safe

WOW now just wow, I never thought they would push the discount concept this far

– yes medical treatments are a business in this part of the world but commmoooonnn don’t run “discounts” these tests are to be taken seriously and not as a teeth whitening treatment……….. will the patients also get half services and half testing for paying half price?

– WTF  “are mainly passed from one person to another during an intimate relationship” WTF WTF and again WTF, if you must advertise for an STD test don’t just copy and past the definition of an STD from Wikipedia. did the editor forget this was an email going to residents of the UAE? and that in the UAE intimate relationships between 2 humans (man/woman/woman/man/man) are illegal outside the boundaries of marriage………and if you are married you shouldn’t really be testing yourself for STDs transmitted by your spouse………clearly this is targeted to all those SsssiiiINNEeeRRRzzzz ooooooo :-0………no really no kidding this time, shouldn’t they fire the guy who wrote this and get someone who can write more discrete copy……………………….in reality they should also fire the guy who scored this discount deal

Here is the link feast your eyes on their amazing copywriting skills

http://www.groupon.ae/deals/dubai/scientific-clinical-laboratories/2629725

very appropriate

after a full long, very long, very very long day of ad agency presentation the below is very appropriate.

an ad agency presentation day is when a bunch of ad agencies come to see you and sell themselves, most of them believe in ruling by numbers (only 2or 3 people are needed, but usually 8 or 10 come along to fill your eyeballs)…………they try to explain your job to you and they apparently know more about your product than yourself, I mean off course they know you only created it and own it what do you know about it………now these guys with their Google stats fresh off the web that obviously no one would know how to get (especially not you the client) should be paid millions to run things for you while you stupidly continue on with your void of knowledge work life. One of them was arrogant enough/ or was it confident enough to try and give us a lesson in Facebook and Twitter…………..the room’s age group barely went over 35 so it was a bit like trying to give a teenage boy a lesson in Playstation 3

 

anyhow i leave you with this

so meli tried kick boxing

truth be told i haven’t been very proud of myself the past few months, it has been almost 4 months now since i have been able to sustain a good exercise routine….after the little kilos i managed to gain during the Ramadan lull my slightly larger ass experienced a strange case of couch sticking

whatever i did i never managed to get my ass unctuck from my very comfy couch, off course my cute ass expanded a little more, then a little more and again some more….etc etc etc. when some of my fave clothes started to feel tight i decided it was enough. i have decided to go back to my old exercising self and kick those few kilos away

anyhooooww, since i am allergic to the gym (i get a bad rash on my face just thinking about it) i had to find something exciting and preferably outdorsy….thus started my quest for a new hobby, a new sport. well i have 2 that i enjoy and would practice religiously but circumstances made them both not practicable since july (heat, humidity, partner not available, travel, bad schedule….etc etc etc).

meli got convinced by a friend that she should try kick boxing, that my fiery temper would suit it very well and that i would love it…….eeerrrrrr some friend that is

i was a bit reluctant, the thought of being in a dojo filled with buffed men and women all tight bodied and tight clothed and me feeling a little “big” and rusty……..i was told i dont have to wear anything special so i wore a pair of longish black leggings and a generic white T that was 3 sizes too big (just making sure i cover my assets) .

so we arrive, i give my details at the entrance a whole list of stuff……….then i had the image of horror…..what if i get knocked out by someone is this why they need so much information so that the hospital staff know what im allergic to when im out

my friend was eager to show off in front of me although she’s not a biff tight bodied super model…..shes just a girl and girls like to be mean and they like to show off, and she did so brilliantly…..she even kept hissing “don’t forget to breath” “breath properly” “see your not fit anymore” “wow you are rusty” allllll through the crapping warm up………and OH MY GOD what a warm up it lasted about 45 minutes out of the whole 1hr30 class. started by small running around the boxing ring (yaaaa there was a ring, this was probably the most exciting part of it all), then entered a series of torture exercises – situps, pushups, lie-down-then-fast-standup thingies….etc all rhythm-ed to more running around the ring

did i say there was an ugly asian buffed up tiny dude yelling at us boot camp style?

then we stop, i think yaaaayyyy thats it finished now they will split us in skill groups (noobs, less noobs, not so noob anymore)….. but noooooo everyone’s in one big awkward group. men, women (yeah that includes some very tall men and some very short women) noobs like me, wannabees (there were lots of those), actually good boxers. they made us do a series of awkwards and to me pointless exercises using gloves this time……so we got split into 2groups, a receiving group and a hitting one. the receivers stood in a huge circle  around the ring and each got given a punch combination, when a hitter got to a receiver the receiver would tell him what combination he had to do…..then you had to punch some random stranger for about 2 minutes. when the circle was finished the roles got switched around so we all had a go.

after this came the kicks, at this point i knew i wasn’t coming back so i wasn’t interested in inflicting so much pain to my joints and sat this part out (oh don’t worry i will enumerate  why i decided i wasn’t going back before it ended)

then we had a series of stretching (about 15minutes) and done

what i thought of the whole experience……glad i did it, never doing it again, its confirmed i don’t like being hit in the face or anywhere else, i don’t particularly like hitting people either, and no it wasn’t relaxing after a stressful work day to punch and kick

now for the real deal, why i would tell my friends DON’T DO IT:

– the wannabees……..waaaay more wannabees in a boxing dojo than a gym. go figure, at least in the gym they look good in spandex. man this place was full of fat bellied balding 30 something men thinking they will miraculously turn into some boxing champion and be discovered one day on a beach by an agent then hollywood decides to turn him into a movie, then a franchise . then he gets alll da gurlz

– the teachers (there were about 4 for 25 people), i was expecting some sexy group of either European, Arab or even Thai oiled tanned chiseled muscle bodies and all…….instead poooof the buble burst, a group of small (one was shorter than me) crooked toothed Thai men who barely spoke understandable English, for some reason they all thought you should know the stuff they’re asking you to do even on your first time……whenever i asked them to explain the instructions because its my fist time and the terminology was alien to me i got a cranky toothed, creepy smile with glossy eyes saying “waadoiioouuu men exxprain agiin, dis iz beesik”……………….to explain

i thought i would be taught by this

or this

instead i was introduced to the sport by this

commmooooonnnnn they must’ve heard of marketing and brand image

– the floor and the sweat……i never experienced this before. i am happy i discovered a new sensation that went straight to my top 5 hate sensations. let me explain,the dojo’s floor was made of soft foam similar to yoga mats…..during the 45 minute exercise all those hairy fat men started sweating….sweating a lot….hell some were soaked…..and when running around the ring you end up in a pool of sweat and usually that pool isn’t YOUR sweat eeewwwwwwwww. yeah while running (barefoot) as the training goes on you start noticing wet patches on the floor……i didn’t realise what it was till i saw most men (and women) were drenched in sweat and that some people’s sweat is so bad that it drops to the floor while they run around or do pushups and all………….eeeewwwwwwww maaaannn i steped with my pretty feet into someone else’s sweat

– the gloves and those stretchy bandages you have to wear for the 1hr30 to “protect” your knuckles and wrists…….those shitty things itched all the way especially the bandages. the gloves made it sweaty and hot and uncomfortable

– the wannabees….yeeehhh those again, in their belief of new boxing/kick boxing champion star they believed it was ok to send out hard punches when playing the receiver/hitter routine. they didn’t seem to understand that the whole point of this was to practice punches and their routine not to try to show off to the girl next to you what you can punch hard…..DUDE CAREFUL YOU ALMOST MISSED AND HIT MY FACE, you are meant to punch my hands

– since there were no particular groups or splitting of levels or anything it seemed to me that it was all pointless. a group of people who think they are catching a “thing” and that they are part of the “in-crowed” because they are doing some exotic sport once a month or whenever they remember that place existed. the whole thing was chaos…………all those instructors were interested in were the entrance fees everyone paid to take part in that circus…….even if that sport isn’t my thing i could have at least enjoyed the teaching method or teacher passion…etc anything, nope saw none of that

– all the girls were actually chubby…..wwwoaaaaaa that actually made me happy i felt all slim and petite again, yeah this item shouldnt be in this list but since i don’t have a “like” list to this post then it shall stay here

– the dojo, i am sure there are some amazing ones, but that particular one was awful dark small no windows stuffy messy

– i failed to see even one poster of JC Van Daaaiiimmm……not one, whaaaat i mean hello he’s da bomb, isn’t he? (this one’s a joke)

that’s it i guess, i am even considering a gym now after kick boxing flop a gym sounds like a nice place…..naaahhhh just kidding ill try a few more new sports before i give up and become a gym junky, for now i am trying to commit to 3 days a week gym until i find something i like

kick boxing DON’T DO IT