I was tagged by an old friend who has been very patient with me - not that she had any choice in the matter. In short, I have to post a baby photo of myself, one of Jorge and one of Tatiana (she's gonna love me for this!)

I don't have baby photos of me. Some of you may already have seen this photo or at least another version of it. It is the closest I have to a baby photo. This is me, being strangled by my brother, Hamish. Poor guy was probably told to give me a hug.


Jorge has never been one for smiling in photos. I can't think why. It is a habit that started very early on. Every photo of his from babyhood is ultra-serious. I am deliberately posting a slightly older photo of him, as there is no true baby photo of me. Got to love that hair!


And now, ladies and gentlemen.... the pièce de résistance. Tatiana, comfortable as ever. We still harp at her about slouching ; )


Omg... I just noticed the similarity in the photos...... I'll say no more. Let the viewers decide and it has nothing to do with the peculiar fashions haha!

Oh wait... I have to tag some people... hm... who do I tag? Keep an eye out on your guestbooks *chuckles*

First, a note... Welcome to the Seffie Club, Tat! She's finally legally a South African, having received her South African ID book yesterday :)

My own identity crisis started at birth. Good time to start this sort of thing. Gives you plenty of time to get used to it ;) My paternal grandmother wanted me named after her and my maternal grandmother wanted her to disappear off the face of the earth, preferably. My mother was a weak thing back then. Crafty tendencies only developed later in life... or maybe she was aware of what she was doing. She ended up combining the two grandmothers' names to make up my name. My gran always assumed that my name was hyphenated. After all, her daughter could surely not combine the two women who had no time for each other!

At the age of 3, after the debacle that caused me to spend time in hospital, my gran took me to live with her. I went from being a van der Merwe to a Miller. What a change.... pure Afrikaner to Scot? Miller was, Jim, my step-grandad's surname. I was happy. I adored my grandfather. I went to primary school under the name Corri-Anne Miller. I was fairly used to the horrid first part and got became adept at getting people not to call me Corri. If there was one thing that brought the monster out in me, it was someone calling me Corri.

Fast forward to high school. My gran went to register me and was told to supply my birth certificate. Then came the shock. She had never paid attention to my birth certificate. She was told that I had to go to school using the name on the birth certificate. I had to switch back to being a van der Merwe. As a teenager, you could imagine me trying to explain this to my peers. Not only that, but we discovered that my name had been spelt wrong all those years. I was Corrianne, not Corri-Anne. Funny that my mother never once mentioned it!

And so life continued. I got used to my new identity. The first name was definitely easier on the eyes and less effort to write and I really don't mind being a van der Merwe. To this day, I go as van der Merwe a lot.

Along came Jorge. We got married and I had to get used to his highly complicated surname. Wow... now there was a humdinger to spell, not to mention trying to pronounce it! Lasevičius. Needless to say, everyone gets it wrong. I learnt to live with it though, but avoided saying it at all costs. What a tongue twister. When Tat was born, we had fun (not) teaching her to say her name. Naturally, she got a simple first name and no middle name. No one in our small family has middle names, thank goodness. When it was time for her to start writing her name, the fun really began. Being really clever, she got the hang of it quickly enough, so it was just a case of training everyone at her school to cope with it.

Brazil began a brand new era for me with identity. The Brazilian consulate in South Africa licked and stamped my passport and said I should apply for immigration once landing in Brazil, on the grounds of family reunification. Jorge had been in Brazil for 10 months already by then. I came over and became nothing... quite literally. From being a highly independant woman in SA, here I couldn't open a bank account. I couldn't legally work. I could do nothing. Jorge was meant to sort out my residency, but it was complicated. The consulate in SA had messed up big time. Now, I could only get residency if Tatiana applied and said she wanted me to stay. She was a naturalised Brazilian due to her relationship with Jorge. The fact that we had been married for 13 years at that point meant nothing. They wouldn't recognise a South African marriage at first, as marriages in churches aren't considered legal.

We had to start collecting documents from here and from South Africa. All our documents, mine, Jorge's and Tatiana's. This took ages. Two departments come to mind that all expat SAn's will recognise - home affairs and foreign affairs! Let me not forget to mention that I developed a rather close relationship with the local Feds here. For the time that I was collecting all our paperwork and spending a lot of quality time at the Feds with them picking at the documents and finding fault with the tiniest of details (requiring more visits to the SA consulate here - thank goodness for Anne, who was Administrative Consul at the time. She saved my sanity!) and more documents ordered from SA and translated. Are you getting the picture yet? One of the details that was 'wrong' was the fact that Tatiana's grandparents aren't mentioned on her birth certificate. Here, your parents, grandparents and their dogs are all mentioned on all documents. Another 'minor detail' we overlooked when registering Tat back home was that her birth certificate listed her as Lasevičius, while mine listed me as van der Merwe, so we couldn't possibly be related *insert sarcastic tone*

Two years ago, I finally got the visit from the Feds, complete with their impressive black cars, black uniforms and armoured to the eyeballs, just in case I was an assylum escapee, to check that I was who I was and that my neighbours could confirm that I lived where I said I lived. Luckily the chap who interviewed me was nice enough. I got the precious letter telling me to collect my protocol, a tiny slip of paper with my future RNE number on it. No, I still had no ID, but I was one step closer.

Would I sound odd if I said that last year when I finally got the magic card, it was a total letdown? I guess that might have been because I'd waited so long for it, that I was fully expecting a gold-plated card with Her Royal Highness the Now Legal Corrianne Lasevičius engraved on it? Or perhaps I expected to be collected by limo and taken to the highest office at the Feds. I don't know. It came so unceremoniously, it almost snuck in at the door.

So... I'm legal. I have an identity card too. I still can't open a bank account, but I can sign my name away on Jorge's credit cards or open a clothing account... basically, I have the license to blow money instead of saving it. I find that rather amusing. Of course, I'll never be allowed to vote here, being an alien, but I can and do have to pay taxes. How sweet they are :)

*note* The scrap of paper at the top was what I had to carry around here as identity for well on 2 years. It was only valid for 180 days, but they kept having delays (strikes) in producing the final document. Luckily no one questioned that scrap of paper, as it had magic stamps on it ;) I have become a great believer in magic stamps!

I have an identity. I am Tint.

I am rather busy - with the photos and presentation. I am rather sorry - for not visiting. I am frustrated - that I glued the wedding card skew. I am reading a book - albeit only a chapter a night. I am...

The photos are almost done, then I'll put the whole lot together. The photos are looking good :) I'm not going to dwell on the fact that I haven't blogged or been visiting. I'm taking the rest of today off, or at least a few hours, to spend time in here with my friends. I was making a wedding card for Jorge's one Lithuanian cousin... expensive paper, expensive ink, expensive lesson... I glued it skew and have to start over... ugh!

I'm reading "I am David" by Anne Holm. I ordered it specially towards the end of last year. It's also published under the name "North to Freedom", a title which appealed to me. I've read the book before, as a school reader, I think from Std 6 (Grade 8). It made a huge impression on me then, though now that I'm reading it as an adult, I'm noticing different parts that I either didn't notice then or can't remember (probably the latter). I highly recommend this book if you want to see the world through new eyes.

David is a boy who is helped to escape a concentration camp. He leaves that grey, dead, troublesome world and for the first time in his life, sees flowers and trees. He has to learn all about 'normal' life, but clings to the lessons learnt in the camp, as they mean his survival. He has to learn who he can trust, though is often held back by his mistrust of people and his fears. Through it all, he holds on to who he is, not who the world wants him to be. "I am David. Accept me as I am. I will not change to suit you." His belief in who he is, despite not knowing his identity is vital to his life and his freedom.

One of my favourite passages... David had, since his escape, been travelling at night and sleeping during the day. His first day awake in his freedom brought new discoveries...

"For a long time David continued to sit and gaze upon the lovely scenery that lay before him. He knew he had much to do, but just then he was too preoccupied to think about it; his resolve to go on living seemed to have pushed everything else out of his mind. And he could not take his eyes off what he was looking at... Surely this was what one had eyes for - not for the ugly dark gray, oppressive buildings of the camp or the endless flat, bare ground that stretched away, dull brown and empty, as far as the eye could reach... One had eyes to gaze on beauty, and David looked again upon the blueness of the sea, upon the coastline curving along its shore. He saw the bright colors of the landscape, its variegated greens intermingled with gold and read, fade into one another toward the horizon until everything melted into the blue of the sea and sky far away over the mountains."

I like Barbara Streisand. Ok, as with all singers, I don't like all her songs, but I have a few firm favourites. Without further ado... "Send in the clowns"

Every time I go through a period of happiness, I learn something about myself. The same goes for times when I am depressed. As always, I have learnt things about myself... not all bad.

I have learnt that I have a deep-seated fear I need to overcome. I am terrified of tests. I am terrified of having to prove myself. I can talk about it. I know the theory. I know what it takes to be what I have to be. I know how to do it, but CAN I do it?? This fear often paralyses me. I am in a testing period now. If I can prove myself now - more to myself than anyone else - then I'll be fine. Then I'll have beaten this particular demon down just that bit more.

Another thing I learnt about myself is that I respect, but don't fear authority. Put me face to face with power and authority and I'll hold my own, knowing that the authority in question will come off respecting me or at least not looking down on me. Given the right circumstances, I will even stand up to authority and stand a good chance of winning my case. But... put me in front of my peers and I turn into a jibbering mess. I am constantly afraid of doing or saying the wrong thing, of making a fool of myself or embarassing myself. A bit like the teenager desperately wanting to impress a crush... she will fall over her feet, drop books, stutter, stammer. Yep.... I'm the same. What is it? Is it because I have no desire to impress authority or feel I have no need to? Perhaps its because I was raised among older adults, only seeing other kids really at school. An interesting thought, to be sure.

The weather here is great. Its fresh, almost chilly, somewhat overcast... weather one can work in, if so inclined or snuggle with a hot drink and a book. We were just chuckling at Specs who was playing with her ball. She flew into her scratchpad with her tail puffed out to the same width as her head and sat there looking around her with the tail still puffy, almost as though she'd forgotten she'd puffed it out. I think we're all like that sometimes, carrying our puffy tails around long after the reason for the drama has gone..... *looks around at her puffy tail*

Today's photo is one I took some time back. I was fascinated by this young tree making a good go of growing on top of the overhang over the doorway of this building. Wonder if its still there.

Yeah, yeah... I'm no oil painting, but this is me.... because this post is about me. Harieta had a blog post where you type your name into Google image search and see what images come up. Well, Tint brought the obvious colour-related images, but my real name was the interesting one. The first image was of a hand. There is a woman with my name in Pretoria and she does 'hand therapy'. I gather she is a neurologist or something.

Anyhow, I found that my name has a meaning besides the split up meanings (my name is a combination of the names of my two grandmothers). And I found out that my name is Irish... what's with that?? Both grandmothers were Dutch. Hm... and Irish van der Merwe?? hahaha!

Corrianne is a very rare girl's name. The name Corrianne is a baby girl name. The name Corrianne comes from the Irish origin. In Irish The meaning of the name Corrianne is: Variant of Cory meaning variously: from the round hill; seething pool; ravine. Numerology meaning: People with this name tend to be very spiritually involved. They are often found lost in thought, philosophizing and can be quite eccentric. They can be quite successful in an analytical field, or as a business owner.

More about me if you're bored ;) This ABC quiz is from Libby's blog...

A is for age: 40

B is for beer of choice: Hunter's Gold! The only beer I'll touch. The rest is awwwwwwwful

C is for career right now: Graphic designer. Restoring photos is my work and my love.

D is for your dog's name: Romany (Dingo is Tat's)

E is for essential item you use everyday: My down pillow. It was made by my great gran (feathers plucked by her too) according to my gran. The only times I've ever been without it have been when its being laundered.

F is for favorite TV show at the moment: We don't have a TV, so no show

G is for favorite game: Tickle Tat

H is for birth Home town: Port Elizabeth, South Africa

I is for instruments you play: Uh... I can bang on pots and pans... ? I do play the tambourine, but I don't think that's quite what they had in mind with this. Oh, and I did trumpet for a while. Didn't get very far. That was hard work and rather a breathtaking exercise.

J is for favorite juice: Pineapple

K is for whose butt you'd like to kick: Want a list?

L is for the last place you ate: at my desk

M is for marriage: The question is? Yes, I am married and yes, I do believe marriage can work and no, I don't believe it is essential to existance

N is for your full name: Hm... following Harrieta's blog, I did some research on my name, Corrianne... see above.

O is for overnight hospital stay: Age 3 for tonsilectomy. Twice for child birth/cesarean. Overnight after our car wreck. That's about it.

P is for people you were with today/recently: Tat, Jorge

Q is for recent quote: "You cannot have the peace you seek until you let go of what is taking its place." Beth Johnson

R is for Biggest Regret: Not realising my value earlier in life. Going through life as a wishy washy excuse

S is for status: Alive ;)

T is for time you woke up today: Uh... very very late. I was up till 3:30am

U is for underwear: Make sure you're wearing clean underwear in case there's an accident ;)

V is for vegetable that you love: All veggies, except okra. I love veggies... brussel sprouts, broccoli, spinach, pumpkin, the list goes on and on and on and...

W is for worst habit: procrastination *looks over at the pile of photos STILL waiting to be scanned*

X is for x-rays you've had: a few

Y is for yummy food you ate today: nothing so far. Yes, I'm bad :P

Z is for zodiac sign: Pisces

I started my day today with this song. What a great way to start the day! It definitely got me going

The title is all wrong, I know, but honestly, I did start with a fairy tale, but as my thoughts wandered, I ended up with a few. I suppose the title should have been "Alice in Wonderland and other tales", as it was Alice who got me going.

One thing we brought with us to Brazil is my upside-down book. Holding it one way, I had the stories of "Alice in Wonderland" and "Through the looking glass" and flipping it over, I had "The five little Peppers and how they grew". I loved that book, not for the stories inside (confession... I never did read "The five little Peppers"), but for its upside-downness. I never could do handstands, so I would often find myself hanging off the edge of my bed, surveying my world from a different angle.

I got to thinking this morning that I am much like Alice... often bewildered at the oddities that life tosses my way. Some days, I eat my slice of mushroom for breakfast and I grow. For the day, I feel big and capable and sometimes, even powerful. Though sometimes, the bigness makes me uncomfortable and clumsy and not fitting in anywhere. Other times, I take a sip of what is meant to be my coffee and I shrink. I would feel so small and easily trodden on. It has its advantages though in that I often fit into places and situations then that I wouldn't otherwise fit into as me, but then, who is me... and how big is me?

Then I got to thinking about the creatures... sorry... people we meet. A couple of days ago, the doorbell rang. At the gate was a youngster of around school-leaving age. Tea cosy pulled down over his ears, random piercings, baggy clothes... Yep, you guessed it. My instinct was to shake my head at a distance and tell him 'no' without finding out what mischief he was up to. I went to talk to him though. He carefully showed me his student ID card and then proceeded to tell me how they were on a drive to collect clothing and such for charity. Well, I never... Then there's the lady I met a little while back. She was determined to be friendly. I said to Tat, "but I have absolutely nothing in common with her!" This lady has taught me a few things, indirectly, of course, one of them being that there's room in my life for all kinds of people and I don't have to have anything in common with them. Heck, I may just discover something new, such as how much fun Mad Hatter's tea parties can be!

Some days, I'm a lion, desperately needing courage. Other days, I need a brain (actually, most days), then there are days, to my shame, when I need a heart. Tat will tell you that I'm quite capable of being the Wicked Witch of the West, when all I want to do is click my heals and go home, but home is so very far away. So in the meantime, I spend my days running away from the evil stepmother who is determined to feed me the poisoned apple or playing with the little children in Never Never Land. I live with Peter Pan, y'know ;)

The photo is of me, my doll, Fifi and Ouma, my grandmother somewhere in Cape Town, South Africa. She raised me and was a mother to me. I miss her. I wish I had listend more carefully to her stories when I was young. Now I want those stories, but they are gone.

I spent a lot of the day thinking that no one had visited my blog, but it was Yahoo... there were no alerts. I have Yahoo set to alert me if someone sends me a message, or comments on my page or my blog. Nothing came through. I have reset the alerts and they're back. I hope no one thought I was ignoring them.

Laura had this quiz on her blog. I have removed a couple of the more pointless questions, such as "What are you doing right now?" I thought it was rather obvious what I am doing right now. I have a couple of new blog friends and figured this was a way they could get to know a little about me. Blog friends, to me, are like any other friends. I like to get to know them, I visit them, I chat with them. My online friends mean a lot to me, but before I get all sappy, here's the quiz....

*What does your 360 name mean? Tint doesn't mean anything really. It comes from Tintalasia. The full story is here.

*Elaborate on your profile photo. My current photo is a wallpaper I made with Maluco's photo. Maluco was my baby. I was there at his birth and helped his mother, Polly, all the way through. To him, my scent was as familiar as his mother's was. When we came to Brazil, we came with just our clothes - and Maluco. One day, I may just blog about him. He was an extraordinary cat.

*Who introduced you to 360? Hm... I do believe it might have been Kim or Miks, but I never actually blogged until Carol got me back in here.

*How many comments do you have? 614 in quick comments and 1039 in blog comments. What is this.... a competition?? Perhaps I should erase the question. Nah... it can stay. Perhaps I can look back in a few months and see where I was at this point.

*What's your current relationship status? Married. Next month it will be 21 years. Does that mean we come of age???

*What are you wearing right now? My pajama outfit. No, its just a pants suit I made once that is so comfy, it can pass as pj's.

*What is your current problem? Dealing with someone's quick temper and subsequent pity party. No, not Tatiana's.

*Can you dance? Yes.... my way! Oh, I can do the waltz and two-step and a bit of ballet (they pulled me out of ballet because I was a klutz and got too big). Other than that, put some music on and empty the room of inhabitants... then I'll dance!

*What makes you most happy? When my family laughs together

*Are you musical? I love music. I can sing passably and I sing to most music I listen to (when I'm alone). In that sense, I'm musical ;)

*What would you do if you woke up one morning and found out you were out of coffee? Quietly freak for a few minutes then reach for the tea or some water (depending on how hot the day is)

*If you could go back in time, and change something, what would it be? Half of me wants to go back and change a bunch of things. The other half says 'no' because the things I have in my past have made me what I am today and I'm not entirely unhappy with that :)

*If you MUST be an animal for ONE day, what would it be? A cat... not just any cat, but my cat. Sadly, too many cats are abused or neglected, so I'd want to be a cat raised by someone like myself who loves them. Much as I love wild cats, I doubt I'd want to be one. The idea of hunting for my food doesn't appeal.

*Name one obvious quality you have? Tatiana says I'm caring. That works :)

*What's the name of the song that's stuck in your head right now? I had a song stuck in my head right up to the moment that I read this question. At the thought, it was gone! Magic! haha!

*Have you ever vandalized someone's private property? I have an extremely low opinion of vandals.... extremely low...

*Have you ever sung in front of a large audience? Yes and no, Carol, that does not mean I'm going to sing in front of a 360° audience

*What's the first thing you notice about the opposite sex? Same as in my own sex.... their eyes and if that isn't available, their hands.

*What is your biggest mistake this year? The year is somewhat young still. There have been a myriad small mistakes, but none that stand out as 'big'.

*Say something totally random about you? I tend to be playful and have a really wacky sense of humour. I never compliment unless I mean it. I mean what I say.

*Has anyone ever said you looked like a celebrity? Pft... with my looks? Unless you count that celebrity look-alike quiz I did where I was (among others) likened to Mik Jagger

*Do you still watch kid's movies or TV shows? I don't have a TV, but will watch kids' movies or TV shows any day :D

*Did you have braces? No and the dentist who once suggested it regretted his suggestion in view of my reaction

*Are you comfortable with your height? Yep.

*When do you know its love? Love is when two people not only feel romantically towards each other, but after getting to know each other's faults, can still unconditionally accept each other.

*Do you speak any other languages? Yes. British English, American English, South African English (yes, there are differences), Afrikaans and a reasonable amount of Portuguese, though whenever I really need it, the Portuguese flees from my mind.

*What is your favorite smell? approaching rain, cut grass, lemon balm, lavender, jasmine, etc, etc.... oh... we only had to choose one? Impossible!

*Has anyone you were really close with passed away? My daughter and the grandmother who raised me as her daughter and my grandad

*What's something that really bugs you? Inconsiderate people, which includes people who lie, litter, have bad manners, crass, pushy people... I can go on.

*What's something you really like? Sharing good times with the people I love

*Do you give random hugs and kisses? Yes, though a few years ago, I didn't. I'm finally learning to give and receive affection. That is good :)

*What's the latest you have ever stayed up? All night. I am known to regularly be up still at 2 or 3am. I work at my best after midnight

*Have you ever thought that you were honestly going to die? When your car has been hit by a 22-wheeler refrigeration truck and you're spinning out of control, death does come to mind.

*Have you ever been rushed by an ambulance into the hospital? I have been in an 'ambulance' once, here in Brazil. Rushing is something that does not happen here... even in ambulances.

*What are you thinking right now? That there are a few blog subjects within this quiz

*What are you gonna do today? The day is past. What will I do next? Visit my blog friends :)