Absolute last event of EURO 2015 : Russian Folk Dance Show at the Nikolaevskiy Palace....one of dozens of sumptuous palaces of the wealthy and the noble (sometimes the same people, sometimes not) which sprouted up around the city in the latter part of the 19th century....and miraculously survived Nazi artillery fire in WWII. The palaces were financed by the rapid industrialization of the country, the territorial expansion of the Czars.....and, of course, the... relentless oppression of the serfs and industrial workers...which would have made even Dickens blanch. The performance itself was uniformly excellent, a bit of festive regional dances here, a story-telling duet there. Audience members invited to participate in a couple numbers. All dancers train in a school dedicated to folk dancing...as prestigious as the better-known ballet schools. Costumes putting anything in Las Vegas to shame, performers young and enthusiastic...all accompanied by live music including the classical male quartet. And I had long thought that the "barbershop quartet" was vocal ensemble unique to the United States.
Sunday, March 5, 2017
CRS 2016 - Falklands, Malvinas February
Port stop on cruise. Unusually bright, sunny day... no wind. Went where the tourist bus took us...a peninsula where, in season ( we just missed it), the beaches are swarming with penguins. Stanley, the "capital', quaint enough with a "High" church and "Protestant" church to serve the 2,000 inhabitants. Museum displays the rather harsh living conditions for the first (English) colonists.....huge (stuffed) Southern Royal Albatross hanging from the ceiling....they... fly from New Zealand to the Falklands and back in seasonal migrations. Some memorials to the 1982 conflict with Argentina. Lesser known was a WW I sea battle between the German Pacific fleet making a run for home....deciding to re-coal in Stanley... and the next morning finding themselves trapped in port by the Royal Navy which happened to be heading to Stanley with a need to re-coal itself. The subsequent battle destroyed the German fleet ending any German sea presence in the high seas for the rest of the war. That important...but who knew?
Saturday, March 4, 2017
USA - New Hampshire, A Mt. Washington High
Orlando explorers ascending Mt. Washington. Being Floridians, they still held on --- even in the face of such compelling evidence --- to the flat-earth theory of the world they had grown up with..in pan-flat Florida.
Note: this photo shoot was more than forty years ago. Recently, the same cast of characters reunited in the Piedmont region of Georgia (chez nous), elevation adjustment still an issue. This time though they intimated that oneself being high was no longer problematic...a point I failed to understand. They suggested I read some Carl Hiassen to enlighten myself.
September 1973
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New Hampshire - A Mt. Washington High
Australia - Sydney, Ferry Race
An annual Sydney Harbor event. Ferries ....which ordinarily take people to/from the north and south of the harbor to the other side and Sydney Center...race against each other from the Bridge to a tiny island guard post and back. Set off by released balloons, the ferries dash off accompanied by dozens of smaller craft cheering them on...all animated by Fosters and company.
February 1988
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February 1988
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Australia - Sydney Harbor Ferry Race
Portugal - Fatima
Visiting the place where the Virgin Mary appeared to three shepherd children in the early part to the twentieth century. The way this miracle goes... only the three children could actually "see" the apparition....others who went back to the site with the excitable children only saw a bright light. And only the eldest of the three could actually hear what the apparition had to say. This child, when mature, became a nun and remained inaccessible to outside interviews until she went to her heavenly reward. Ganga, a Hindu who accompanied us to site, was perfectly at ease with the miraculous tale...as there were hundreds of such tales in the Hindi tradition and certainly many more "Gods", all of whom are manifestations of the same Creator. And the difference is...?
January 1993
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Portugal - Fatima
Brazil - Manaus, Rios Solimoes e Negro
Manaus, the city in the jungle that rubber built, now almost 2 million inhabitants serving as the commercial hub of the vast Amazon forest. First day, the Opera House then a boat trip to the "other side" (9 miles across!) of the Rio Negro (...just upstream of where it joins the Salimoes to become the Amazon River...) to hug some trees. Next day, all-day excursion .....crocodile pen, river boats cruising by; lunch stop-over at a "jungle" resort.....invited to jump... in the river for an afternoon swim.....which instantly became the existential moment clearly dividing my life between willing taking risks because I thought I was almighty and would live forever and realizing what a deadly delusion that notion could easily become. Lastly, the most amazing natural phenomenon: where the Rio Negro (waters tinted by the leeching of millions of upstream riverside tree roots) joined the muddy Salimoes to become the Amazon.....where massive rivers become an inland sea. Nothing else like it on earth!
June 1999
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Brazil - Manaus, Solimoes e Rio Negro
China - Beijing, Great Wall
Just a very small portion of the Great Wall....meant to keep out the northern hordes, Mongols and Manchus...who, of course, both invaded and conquered China, anyway. ( Why did the Chinese keep their capital, Beijing, so close to their marauding neighbors....could have stayed in traditional Xian, hundreds of kilometers to the south east and deep in Han country?)
Anyway, the deliberately serpentine and undulating "Wall" not for the feint of heart...Westerners, that... is. Chinese of all ages scampering about with no hesitation!
Anyway, the deliberately serpentine and undulating "Wall" not for the feint of heart...Westerners, that... is. Chinese of all ages scampering about with no hesitation!
Overcast skies which, I was told, would only get worse as winter progressed.....industrial pollution and fine desert dust from the West. Not unlike Delhi..in the Summer, though. Uhmmm..
At Vase and Jade Shop....very large jade stone sculptures. Bought a small meta- on-the-inside, ceramic- on-the-outside jar. Still with us.
October 2006
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China - Beijing, Great Wall
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