Hello friends,

With the start of a new job, a two-week-long exhaustion cold (in which I nearly passed out cold on a train home), cleaning up the house (as everything I owned from Hong Kong had arrived), getting my partner’s birthday celebrations in order, and dealing with several issues and stresses that life likes to throw at you (doesn’t it always, at the most inconvenient times) — I had to skip out on writing up an August and (early) September newsletter. But I hope these two months have been good to you.

 UPDATES

• I’ll be showing two new paintings (one shown above, in progress), with Alisan Fine Arts for their fall show at Cromwell Place, London — in other words, I’ll be making my London debut!
  
  The dates are 27 October - 5 November, but I will definitely share the news on social media when the copy and publicity materials are available.
  
  These two works are part of a series in progress, of an exploration of intimacy in friendships, familial, platonic, and romantic relationships.

 ***

After three months, and with its ups and downs, I’ve found a rhythm to living here; working at an organisation that not only feels familiar, but has a mission and purpose that aligned with mine; making homemade meals that allow me to experiment with ingredients I’m not used to (I’ve never made couscous or even know what a zhoug is until last week); and when I feel a bit off, I can just run to the theatre, a museum, or just a park and somehow feel better again.

Speaking of things that make me feel better…

 OBSESSIONS

• Oklahoma! West End: I’ve been so obsessed with this show throughout August and September that my partner had banned it when I visited him in Dublin. This is the only show so far that I’ve seen twice, and also the first one that I didn’t read the synopsis of before going to see it the first time. The show was shocking, fascinating and so bloody disturbing (pun intended). I found myself thinking about the show for days, and mulling over every detail I could remember and every expression and blocking of the actors. I’ve actually considered writing something about this and I’ve started it but evidently, my interest in writing will never be as great as drawing — instead, I made doodles to get it out of my system (barely worked though). The show sadly closed on 2 September, but I’m so glad I managed to catch it and that for the first watch, we managed to get front-row seats and Stavros Demetriaki poured fake beer on me. It was also watching this show twice that made me realise I had forgotten how much I loved the theatre.

• Dungeons and Dragons: We set up a campaign with my housemates and their friends and our party of 6 now meets once or twice a month to play. It’s kind of amazing to just have a night of story-building and storytelling and not know where things might be headed. Currently, I’m playing a middle-aged purple tiefling who has a chicken tied to her as she tries to find her dead daughter and time-and-plane-travelling lover.

• Hot Mulligan: I never thought I would enjoy a pop punk gig but I did. This is actually one of my partner’s favourite bands and we went to their gig in London for his birthday week. It was there that I jumped in my first circle pit, got beer spilt on me (this now seems to be a recurring theme), danced and didn’t care what I looked like, was sweaty as heck but I loved every second of it. My favourite song from that night was How Do You Know It’s Not Armadillo Shells?

• Elemental: I kept crying during this very cute, very well-executed Pixar movie about the immigrant experience, and interracial dating. There’s a scene where the guy’s uncle comments on how well the girl speaks — I screenshotted it and sent it to my partner because I had a similar well-intentioned but still strange comment made to me the first time I met his family and relatives as well.

• I’ve also been obsessively making Chinese steamed eggs whenever I am upset or tired, and I’ve been following the Made with Lau recipe!

TAROT READINGS

Rather than doing monthly readings for the zodiac signs, I’ve decided to do biweekly ones on the night of the New Moon and the Full Moon each month instead, just to align myself more with the phases (which I found very useful and less exhausting). My tarot Instagram has not changed: @cmui.tarot

You may have noticed that I’ve pulled my tarot reading services from the shop — but you can still book a reading by contacting me directly via email or phone.

There’s a lot more I’d like to share, but I can’t seem to find the energy or the time to really sit down and write.

Anyway, I hope you have a good rest of September, and I’ll be back soon.

Lots of love,
Charlotte