keith birthday

linguist/musician/writer/translator/educator
expert in reverse culture shock

keithbirthday@gmail.com

Posts

Played some ‘songs’ on the ‘radio’ recently. Actually it was a real radio broadcast. I chopped out the annoying bits where I talk too much and put the bare bones songs online. All mistakes were unintentional. Click the picture to subject your ears to some audio.

it’s such a shame that when we meet how we’re no longer strangers or independent selves.

Run! Ran! Run! Rah! Live at Kung Fu Necktie 1/28/2012

practice makes perfect.

I just want to be a ball
that means dying

not really

I just want to be a thing
that is treated
as a thing
and/or like
other things

I just want forty-six thousand pieces of sushi
to enter my mouth with considerable force
and be a spectacle at the sushi bar
the guy with the sushi flying in his mouth
at considerable rates of speed
and everybody looks and reacts like; 
‘oh what a weirdo with all that sushi’
or others
saying things like ‘I wish I was that guy
with all the sushi’. 

‘зажигаем красный свет’

Soviet Photoshop


Russian Words I Think Are Beautiful 27: The glow on the horizon that comes before dawn and after dusk (zar-YAH)

someone watched this video of us and wrote:

wish there was a non-awkward way to inform him of incorrect plural form.

Sorry for that deluge of phishery - guess we all have to 'be hacked' sometimes

Macintosh Plus - ライブラリ

Listen on Bandcamp

Russian Words I Think Are Beautiful 26: a really bad person [gahd]

Recent Memory #3

I am in my bed because I have started going up but I’m not sure exactly how many mushrooms I have eaten but all I know is that I ‘don’t like things anymore’. I try to read a book by Chris Ware, but all the comics are sad and I feel the sadness too much and everything is moving too much. 

I text Vika that everything is crazy and I feel uncomfortable even though I’m in bed and that doesn’t make any sense. I text that the light being emitted from my phone is intense and it looks/feels evil. I apologize for not liking my phone anymore. 

I put the book down and put the covers over my head and I close my eyes and a million thoughts and audio bites and sounds and memories wash over me on a neon grid. The neon grid keeps changing shape and color and sometimes it is a hole, sometimes the exterior of a massive digital worm, sometimes a gate. I am perpetuated through all of these things as I have no control over my motion.

I open my eyes a crack and I notice that everything goes away. I close them and everything starts. At some point Greg comes in and he is still laughing and makes sure I am okay and I say I am cause I am but only when everyone goes away and I just go back to the perpetual tube inside my head. Then Vincent comes in and he is laughing cause he is normal and I am being silly but I know I am silly so I don’t find it offensive. 

Recent Memory #2

I went into the girl’s bathroom at the bar because no one was there yet and she needed the mirror and told me to come with her. I noticed the girl’s bathroom has more sinks than the boy’s.

I was at the bar and I was sitting at a table and my friend was DJing but you couldn’t see them because they were around the corner against a different wall and the seat faced towards the bar. I had a free drink in my hand. Toto’s ‘Africa’ began to play but I didn’t know what Toto’s ‘Africa’ was yet. I drank my drink really fast cause they weren’t going to be free in a few minutes. 

Wolf Like A Stray Dog 2011.

Recent Memory #1

I went to a diner in Moscow, by diner I mean ‘diner’ I mean ‘a russian interpretation of an american diner’.

The booze is free, courtesy US Dept of State, so I get a tiny sandwich and then I spend the rest of the money on ‘giant’ frozen margaritas with a few friends but they run out of the giant glasses and I have to wait or just get them in tiny glasses. We waited and drank our giant margaritas but they’re skimpy on the booze so we don’t feel anything.

Then we go back and think about going to the hotel banya but it was closed for another hour or so and we are going to stay up and wait but I decide to fall asleep.

Statement of Purpose - Recent Memory Series

A new project I’ve decided to undertake, focusing on the randomness of memory through experience and association. Everything is true (or as true as I can remember it) and focuses on memories as they appear and the impressions they leave. As soon as the impression appears, I immediately begin to record the sequence of thoughts and events that occur, and continue to write until the thought is finished. Then I go back, edit for consistency, and post. I’m interested to see where this project goes.

That Man and the Unlocked Stall Door.

I walked into the bathroom and tested to make sure that the stall door was unlocked before entering. I opened the door and a man sat, looked up at me, incredulous, said ‘thanks’.

Russian Words I Think Are Beautiful 25: Arctic Fox [pesets]

Profile

Writer/Translator/Media Specialist/Musician
Translation and Localization | Greater Philadelphia Area, US

Experience

  • Dec 2011 - Present
    Assistant to Talent Buyer / Johnny Brenda's
  • Feb 2011 - Present
    Contributor / JUMP Philly
    Freelance contributor to JUMP Philly Magazine, specializing in cultural exchange and music
  • Mar 2009 - Present
    Singer/Songwriter / Norwegian Arms
    Event planning/booking,promotional material design and execute promotional campaigns,
  • Jan 2009 - Present
    Freelance Translator / Freelance Translation
    Translator from German/Russian into American English.
    Specialist in Literature/Journalism
    Editor in German/Russian/English
    Typesetting/Desktop Publishing
  • Jan 2009 - Present
    Freelance Writer / Freelance Writer
    Writing columns and feature articles for various Philadelphia-based publications
  • Oct 2011 - Dec 2011
    Creative Associate / Digital Pigeon
  • Jan 2011 - Dec 2011
    Assistant to the Project Managers / Magnum Group
  • Jan 2010 - Oct 2010
    Freelance Writer / Rub Paw Press
    Contribute short essays, poems, reviews, and thoughts in blog format.
  • Sept 2009 - Jun 2010
    English Professor / Tomsk Polytechnic University
  • Sept 2009 - Jun 2010
    English Teaching Assistant Fellow / Fulbright
  • Sept 2008 - May 2009
    German Teacher / Immanuel German School
    Taught upper level German language classes to students aged 12-16. Planned and executed lessons, created multimedia projects
  • Jan 2008 - Apr 2009
    ESL Teacher / The Harvest Institute
    English as a Second Language teacher to recent immigrants from various parts of the world. Conducted classes twice a week in conversation, grammar, reading and listening
  • Jan 2008 - May 2008
    Diamond Peer Teacher/German TA / Temple University
    Assisted in the instruction of a first semester German language class at Temple University. Worked in conjunction with Dr. Anthony Waskie.

Education

  • 2008 - 2009
    Temple University
    M.Ed in Foreign Language Education
  • 2008 - 2008
    Beloit College
    none in Russian Language
  • 2004 - 2008
    Temple University
    B.A. in German Language and Literature
    Activities: German Society, Delta Phi Alpha,
  • 2007 - 2007
    Eberhard-Karls-Universität Tübingen
    Germanistik

Additional Information

Websites:
Honors:
Fulbright Fellowship Recipient 2009-2010 German Professors' Prize 2008 Member of Delta Phi Alpha German Honorary Society 2006-Present
Interests:
guerilla marketing, design, translation, linguistics, composing, branding, DIY concerts, promotion, booking, event planning
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