New Years 2011 in Barcelona

After my sailing course, I arrived in Barcelona on the evening of the 31st of December 2010. After taking a shower and a nap, I gathered myself up to go out. I lost track of time and celebrated the New Year in a Kebab restaurant eating a late dinner. And that was my New Year's Eve 2010. The next two days were spent wandering around the city mostly looking at the architecture.

Parc Guell is a nice respite in the city full of wandering paths and Gaudi designed structures.

From Parc Guell you can see down to the flat area of Barcelona and the still unfinished Gaudi designed Sagrada Familia.

This is the "Passion" Facade.

This scene from the "Passion" facade is in start contrast to all the classical sculpture I've been looking at over in Italy.

The interior of the Sagrada Familia

Another Gaudi building is the Casa Batllo on the Passeig de Gracia

With the use of stained glass and nary a single straight wall, he creates the feeling of living underwater.

Up on the roof.

The chimneys!

The reconstructed German Pavilion for the Barcelona 1929 Worlds Fair by Mies van der Rohe.

One of the Barcelona Chairs which were introduced at the fair.

About the most "traditional" looking piece of architecture I saw was the Olympic stadium.

The flame for the 1992 Summer Olympics. Check off visiting another Olympic venue.

One afternoon, I took the train out to the town of Montserrat, located high on a rock outcropping. Yeah, I got up there on one of those yellow cable cars.

I liked the juxtaposition of this church facade, with the more traditional building adjacent to it and the sunlit rocks in the background.

The town is situated amongst boulders like there and there are hiking trails and paths throughout the area which take you to other churches and vistas. I didn't have time to take part but the sunset was great.

Not sure if the people of Montserrat fully thought through their choice of city symbol.

Last stop in my Barcelona whirlwind was a trip to the Picasso Museum. I liked this one specifically because it was drawn on the 5th of January 1970, a mere three weeks before I was born.

Sailing School

I’ve always wanted to sail, but not actual captain a boat, but simply be one of the guys who “knows the ropes” and can be useful on a boat. Turns out there is a course just for someone like me offered by most sailing schools called “COMPETENT CREW.” During the week between Christmas and New Year’s, I found a school on the Costa Brava (between Barcelona and the French border) that offered the course. It’s been a few days since the course ended and I’m still sorting out my feelings about the course. I’m still enthusiastic about sailing that goes without saying.

My newly “earned” Competent Crew certification

Why am I ambivalent about the experience? Let’s start by giving you the schedule of a typical day. Up at 830AM. Prep the boat and get it ready for sailing. Go out and “sail” until about 2:30PM and then come back in. Put the boat to “bed” and then sit in a bar until 6PM with the instructor. The three other guys in the course (they were doing a more advanced course in day skipper certification) along with the instructor, drank so much beer, I was shocked. Perhaps, I just live an adult life that doesn’t revolve around alcohol but this I found excessive.

As luck would have it, the weather was excellent. Not cold, but that also meant NO WIND. We actual put up the main sail twice in five days, of which only one was for real ocean sailing. The second time was simply for practice. It is my hope that had there been more wind, we would actually have done more sailing. Most of what I had to learn as a crewmember had to deal with when the boat was in the marina. How to tie up to a dock. I nicknamed it “boat parking” practice. We did a lot of it. The other guys said that actual sailing is pretty boring for a crewmember. The day there was wind and we went out for a few hours was great and whetted my appetite.

The others in the course, although not guys I would generally hang out with, were an interesting threesome. Egor, 27 year old, was a Russian who works for Deloitte. Derek, 46 years old Scotsman who works for the Foxcomm (yeah, that one) and Marco, 40’s, former trader in Hong Kong, now working on a PHD in History at Cambridge. The day that Egor was supposed to navigate us to a port, he was so hungover, he actually puked over the side of the boat and we called it a day. Marco, I bet spent the entire last 48 inebriated due to a romantic entanglement he had gotten himself into with a local waitress. It was pure soap opera on that boat.

I learned a lot of vocabulary but as an educator, I can see flaws in the way the instructor handled my learning. I think its important that a student is informed of the plan of the day and the expectations for the days learning. I was ALWAYS clueless as to what was happening. Even though we weren’t sailing, I wish we had done a lot more drill and practice. I ended up doing a fair amount on my own. It just didn’t sit right with me the way I was kind of treated like cattle. In addition, the instructor spent most of the week rehashing stories of former students and never took the time to get to know me. I think that’s vital in any learning situation.

Things I learned how to do: fenders, genoa sail lines, KMT, reef ropes, sail bag, sail flaking, WOBLE, bowlines, change springs to slip lines, electric line set-up, mid boat slips, lassos, knots, tying up to a buoy, raising a halyard and more…..

Christmas in Viterbo

Christmas Eve dinner with the family of Anna's two daughters. Dinner started with homemade Gnocchi with a scampi cream sauce. As is tradition for Italians, a fish main course (tuna), deep fried vegetables and fresh garbanzo beans.

Then came dessert. This was essentially a lasagna, but instead of tomato sauce and cheese, it was baked with ground up hazelnuts and chocolate. I had leftovers for Christmas morning breakfast.

I got gloves and a scarf from Anna. I gave her a DVD player, which brought the technology in her house from the 1980's (VCR) into the 1990's. The Internet will never happen.

Christmas Eve dinner was only the first of two feasts. Here is Anna roasting potatoes and lamb for Christmas day lunch.

Christmas day lunch started with homemade tortellini soup, roasted lamb and potatoes, salad and dessert.

On Christmas Eve, my friends the Giuliano's had a Christmas present of their own as their first son (third child) Luciano "The Prince" Giuliano was born. Here he is with his grandmother Rita.

Antonio Di Natale

My favorite Italian soccer player is Antonio di Natale, the attaccante or cannoniere for the Serie A team, Udinese. For some reason, because di Natale (which translates of "of Christmas") is the type of player that runs hard and is small and quick. They say, we can't choose who we fall in love with, we just do. In soccer, you can't know why you like a certain player, you just do. And di Natale is my guy. Because of him, my Italian team, is Udinese. Udine, the city of 100,000 up in the northeastern corner of Italy, right near Slovenia, is a strange pick for a person from central Italy. For you MLB fans, it's like being from Chicago and having your favorite team be Tampa Bay. This past weekend, Udinese was in Rome to play one of the two Roma teams, Lazio. For Italian soccer, it was a "goal fest", with Lazio coming out on top 3-2. Lazio, tied with Roma, for my second Italian team, is having an awesome season, and are in second place for the "scudetto." So, I sat in the Lazio section, secretly rooting for Udinese. At least I didn't wear Udinese colors.

Antonio di Natale, taken with my new camera with 12X zoom!

Florence for a day, just because I can

Free weekend, so off to Florence for a day. Last spring, when we went to Florence as a school, I simply didn't have enough time to see all the great art, so this time, I headed back and hit three big ones.

First things first, though, food. This sandwich is the best in Italy. Hot tripe on fresh bread. Off the train and directly to the Mercato Nuovo to get it. Ate it on a crisp winter afternoon on a bridge over the Arno.....Italian life is good.

Site one, the Branccaci Chapel. This was commissioned by a wealthy Florentine in the early 1400's (Michelangelo was the early 1500's).

It tells the story of St. Peter and is in registers similar to Giotto's Scrovegni Chapel in Padua and his other work in Assisi. This one panel, the temptation of Adam and Eve is by Masolino.

His student, Masaccio (a nickname that means "fat/clumsy Tommaso" painted this AMAZING panel, the expulsion. It's a step forward from Giotto with its linear perspective and single point source of light.

The top is Masaccio's rendering of "The Tribute Money." He employs story telling by having the same character in the same clothes in different scenes in time by going from left to right. The scene on the bottom is by Fra Lippi, completed about 50 years after Masaccio passed away.

Second stop museum, the museum of the Duomo. At the entrance, a bust of Cosimo di Medici, of Cosimo the Great, the leader of the family that provided the support for the advancement of the Renaissance.

Another "Pieta" by Michelangelo. This one appears to have his face as the character being carried.

The highlight for me are the models of the Duomo by Brunelleschi himself.

This original choir is by Andrea Pisano.

I like the playful children.

The other one, also now in the museum, is by Donatello. Donatello is a big player in the next museum.....

The Bargello, which translates to "constable's office" or prison. This museum, I visited on Sunday morning at 830AM. I had it ALL TO MYSELF. A tip for all you museum goers.

The highlight is Donatello's "David". Donatello, a sculptor of the mid 1400's created his "David", the first male nude since classical times.

It's the allegory of civic virtue overcoming irrationality and brutality (hello ideas of the Renaissance) and came to be the way Florentines viewed themselves.

Also at the Bargello, are the two panels that are shown side by side that were the finalists to determine who would design the panels of the door of the Baptistry. Here is the one by Brunelleschi.

And the winner, Ghiberti. Ghiberti's is less "rigid" in the flow of the story of the sacrifice of Isaac.

Many of the statues are from a sculptor, Giambologna, that my Art History class didn't get to last year. But there is amazing sense of movement, here we have Firenze defeating Pisa.

The next three pictures are by Giambologna.

I love these "dying" heros, this reminiscent of the "Dying Gaul"

There is also great humor as well. A fun weekend, full of art!

Egypt

Alas, it has happened again (remember Panama?) but I lost my camera. Sadly, this time the chances of it being returned are slim, and slim is pushing it. I left it in the taxi I took to the airport.

People are asking me, how was Egypt? I have to say, that the Pyramids were wonderful, Alexandria and visiting Sam M. was awesome, but the the traveling was exhausting and challenging, more challenging than any other place I have traveled since coming to Europe. Mostly, it comes from the fact that most Egyptians see me as a big walking dollar sign and hassle me for tips at every corner, not speaking or even being able to read the language was more challenging than I imagined and just not feeling like I had much control of my situation (and it mostly went well) was really hard.

I landed in Cairo at 3AM and waited in the airport for the first bus to Alexandria, which departed at 530AM. All went smoothly and I arrived in Alexandria at the "new" bus station, which was a big dirt lot and luckily, Sam was right there to meet me. We spent an AWESOME day, drinking tea, catching up, walking along the water and seeing the new Alexandria library (which is a big modern building) with some cool art and a great retrospective on Anwar Sadat's life. The highlight of the day for me was drinking mint tea and playing backgammon with Sam (oh there was a great picture of this) at his local tea house. His favorite server probably had never seen an Asian before and asked if I did karate! It was great. I really felt that, with Sam and his Arabic skills in Alexandria, I got a true taste of modern Islamic city life.

On Saturday morning, Sam returned to class, and I hopped on a first class train (35 L.E. (7 US Dollars) watch out because the numbers are going to start getting big) to Cairo. I get off the train in Cairo and get immediately accosted by taxi drivers. I am a bit overwhelmed and perhaps I didn't do my homework, but there was no public transportation system in Cairo (or at least none that I knew of) and I picked a taxi driver for a ride to Giza and the pyramids.

Now things get interesting. The taxi driver, speaking no English, knows I want to go to the pyramids. I want to go to my hotel. We can't communicate, the traffic is CRAZY and I end up being taken to a camel stall near the pyramids. I am offered a camel ride tour of the pyramids. At the time, I felt like I was being hijacked and had no real choice, but in retrospect everything was on the up and up. The camel ride through the pyramids was AMAZING. The weather was perfect, not hot at all, no wind and it was around sunset. WOW. Now comes the part where I am single-handedly supporting the Egyptian economy. I have to pay the camel owner, pay the entrance fee, pay the camel guide, tip the camel guide, tip my actual guide and pay the taxi driver for the ride and his two hours of waiting. I think I spent a total of 800 L.E.. Money is money, yeah? So, I'll have the wonderful memories and pictures in my mind.

That night, I haggled a taxi ride back to the pyramids for the light show, which was kind of cheesy, but a chance to see the pyramids again was worth it. Dinner? On the street for a total of 5 L.E.. Now sure what I ate. It was edible but nothing to really that memorable, other than trying to communicate with the guy at the stall who was enjoying watching this Asian guy eat.

Sunday morning, I got up and was planning on going to Islamic Cairo, but my taxi driver, better English this time, told me about another set of pyramids at a place called Saqqara. I went for it and this was the highlight. My driver got me a one-on-one guided tour. The guide took me into the funerary tombs of the manicurist and butcher of one of the fifth dynasty kings. I had a fantastic time and learned a ton about Egyptian views on the afterlife. The hour and a half I had with this guide brought Egyptian art and funerary ideas to life.

Afterwards, the haggling for the tips, the drive to the airport ended with a haggling for the fare and tips and here's where I must have left my camera in the taxi.

Now that I'm reliving the experience in my mind, I am really more sad about losing the pictures than the pain of the travel and feeling like I was being ripped off the entire time. As they say, time heals all the pain and hard parts and it's true, I'll just remember how great the good parts of the trip were.