Vienna -- Sunday February 19th, 2012

The Augustiner Church, part of the Hapsburg Hofburg Palace Complex, is where royal weddings (and many modern ones too) take place.

On Sundays, an amazing service takes place with a live orchestra and choir.

Added bonus.....Antonio Canova's Tomb for Archduchess Maria Christina

From this angle, you can see the immense sorrow of the procession.

Walking around town, it took me a while to figure out this was Vienna's equivalent of a newspaper box.

And this AWESOME clock where each hour a different historical figure marches across the clock face.  Look closely and you can see the figure that has already passed and is about to enter.

Ever heard of the Sacher Torte?  Invented right here in Vienna.

Sacher torte.....dry (VERY) chocolate cake, with a layer of marmalade and crusted with sweet chocolate.  The original recipe is under lock and key and seen by fewer than 50 people ever.

Vienna claims to be the classical music capital of the world, and one reason is that you can go to a public bathroom and do your business while listening to the Blue Danube Waltz!

Around the turn of the last century, a few Viennese artists (the most famous being Gustav Klimt) resigned from the Vienna Kunsthaus and created the "Secession" movement.  They built this "modern" building.  It's affectionately called the "Golden Cabbage" after the gold dome on top.

"To Every Age Its Art, To Every Art Its Freedom"

The contrast between the classical architecture and the Secession kind of lets you know how "radical" this building must have been when it was built.

Walking through an underground passage, you can only imagine how excited I was to see this as one of the displays.

The number of digits of Pi spanned 50 feet!!

Next stop....The Wien Kunsthistoriches Museum!!

First thing you see ascending the stairs.....ANOTHER Canova.  This time "Theseus Defeating the Centaur"

That's me staring in AWE!

Raphael's "Madonna in the Meadow"  I recognized this from Art History.  I didn't realize Vienna was so full of famous art!

This one I just liked....it's titled "Summer." I guess you are what you eat.

This hits JUST KEEP ON COMING, this is Caravaggio's "David With the Head of Goliath"

Why so many pictures........

.....of the same girl?

These portraits, by Diego Velazquez, were painted of Maria Teresa of Spain, who was to be married to a Hapsburg in Vienna.  These were paintings sent every few years as documentation of how she was growing up.  Life before digital photos and email!

The Kunsthistoriches has a large number of paintings by Flemish painter Bruegel.  This one is "Children's Games"

I need to learn about the Northern Renaissance...of which I know nothing.  But I do know the Northern painters had fewer religious subjects and painted landscape and scenes of life, like this one, another Bruegel titled "The Hunters in the Snow"

Vermeer's "The Art of Painting"  In a quick Google search, apparently the painting is one of the last paintings of disputed ownership.  Apparently Hitler purchased the painting from a family.  It was rescued by Americans and presented back to Austria.  The family is now in litigation.

Rembrandt...a man known for portraits.  I particularly liked this one.

Another one that caught my fancy.

Venice's Dogana....been there!

St. Peters....live there!

For some reason, whenever I see and Adam and Eve of this style...I think Cranach...and I'm always right.

After three hours of museum, D and I took a tram out of town about a half hour to a "Heuriger".  There are many vineyards near Vienna and many of them bottle their own wine and set up little restaurants.

Festive and simple.

Wienerschnitzel!!!

Wien Staatsoper

"Settimana Bianca" literally translates to "White Week" or as everyone knows "Ski Week."  D and I are off to Vienna and Hungary for the week.  Arriving Saturday afternoon in Vienna, we go directly to the opera.

The Vienna State Opera House

"The Elixir of Love" by Donizetti was the opera for Saturday February 18th, 2012

The opera offers 550 or so standing room only tickets (stehplatz) for only 3 Euro!!!

To the opera!!

The grand entrance staircase.  Turns out that we arrived in Vienna during the "ball season".....

...and two nights before, on the 16th, the seats of the opera house were taken out and the largest, most glamorous ball of the year took place right here in the opera house.

Ahh, this is why one only pays 3 Euro!!  Here's the view we had.  The way it works is that there are bars behind the seats that have obstructed views, these are the ones that are inexpensive.  But you're here for the music right?!?

Intermission?  Head across the street for some wieners at the many stands throughout Vienna!

The rear of the Staatsoper from our wiener stand.  Not a bad view to dine by.

Applause!!  What was great and frustrating was that the opera was sung in Italian and both D and I could make out some of the words.  However, the electronic libretto was only scripted in English and German.  SO FRUSTRATING...

The encore.....lasted 20 minutes.  This opera was light hearted and comedic.  The music was catchy and accessible.  If all operas were like this one, I'd be a convert.

Pictures From My Camera

A few weeks ago, at bridge class, my partner and I won our section of the end of class bridge tournament!!

Chinese New Years!!!  The school mensa is to be applauded for expanding their culinary menu by offering POT STICKERS.  They get points for trying....

February 11th.....Roma snowpocalyse round 2.  This time, it didn't stick.  But the flakes were big and fluffy.

So of course, I venture out with friend Brian B. and we have tartufo nero!!!

42nd Birthday and Snow Day in Rome

January 29th is always a special day......and they say that everyone should spend time on their birthday with their loved ones, and that's exactly what I did.  I spent the day with my loved ones here in Italy, my friends and family in Viterbo.  On the 28th, I got in a good workout at the pool and then headed up on the train to Viterbo.  I was met at the train station by the Giuliano family.  Their girls went ice skating, while Giusy, Raf and "il bambino, Luciano" went for a walk.  It was nice to catch up with them.  In the evening, Mario and I went out to dinner to watch the Juve-Udinese game. The ONLY downer of the weekend was Udinese's loss to the evil empire that is Juventus.  On my birthday itself, Mario and I went to the hot springs in the morning.  Yvonne's mother took us all out to lunch.  Afterwards I went up to Anna's and lo and behold, Charles (her host student from four years ago and just graduated from college in Rome), Anne (her current host student), Sophie (Miria's host student this year who lives next door) and I were all in the house at the same time.  Anna was in HEAVEN.  As per Sunday afternoon tradition, Anna was treated to a movie....and of course, she chose Mission:Impossible 4.  Afterwards, we all had dinner back at the house.  What a wonderful day.

That brings us to Rome's snow day, today February 3rd.  Yesterday, the mayor of Rome declared all schools closed.  I got up this morning and saw just rain and was a bit annoyed at the cancellation of school (now that I'm a teacher, I get upset at missing school!) but then around 11AM.....

Big fluffy, and they were FLUFFY, flakes of snow began to fall.

And just like clockwork, right around 2PM, I put on my longjohns to go for a walk and D calls to ask if I wanted to join her and her roommate on a walk.

My commitment to gelato.....never ending.

Our goal was the Pantheon!

I still need to work on my "Augustus of Prima Porta" pose

We all wanted to see SNOW falling through the oculus.

We weren't disappointed...however, the snowflakes had shrunk by the time we got there.

The walk between Piazza della Rotunda (the Pantheon) and Piazza Navona takes one right by San Luigi dei Francesi (this picture from an earlier, non snowy walk)

 

 

Inside the church is a chapel with, not one, but THREE Caravaggio paintings.  This one is the "Inspiration of St. Matthew"

The west wall has the "Martyrdom of St. Matthew"

But it is the East wall, that has my favorite, and most people's favorite, "The Calling of St Matthew."

It's the light source from an imaginary window.....

And the light shining right on the bearded man's face....who is to become St. Matthew.  Idiot me, for a long time thought that St. Matthew was the kid with the feather in his hat.

Finishing up our walk.....here we are at the snow covered Fountain of Four Rivers in Piazza Navona.

Capodanno Cinese, 2012 Anno del Drago

This past week was QUITE a social one, I'll just say that two consecutive nights of "Circle of Death" were tough on the body.  So, this Saturday, I awoke at 1230PM, went to lunch at 1530PM and then walked up the Corso to Piazza del Popolo to observe the Chinese New Year's festivities.  First off, I LOVE how in Rome, and in most cities in Italy, there is a public space almost every huge gathering takes place.  In Rome, when something big is happening, it's almost always at Piazza del Popolo (Piazza of the People).  You can pretty much assume that it is.  When I heard about the Chinese New Year's festivities...I knew where to head.

The parade took place up the Corso around 2 (they had to be finished with it before the evening Passiagiata).  And then there were a few hours of exhibitions, etc.  I arrived around 5, only getting to see the last hour, and then the pretty impressive fireworks.

These daylight pictures are pilfered from the "Browsing Rome" website, but I just wanted to show some of what it looked like with light.

Here's the stage, facing the Pincio gardens.

The emcees for the festivities.  What was awesome was that everything was in both Mandarin AND Italian, and when I didn't understand one language, I could use the other.

Of course there were different martial arts exhibitions, but I was surprised (not sure why) to see non-Chinese involved.  I guess I would see that in the United States, but I've always thought the Italians to be less interested in non-Italian activities.  In addition, the Piazza was FULL to the brim and almost the entire audience was Italian.  I was impressed....which is probably me being a bit hard on the Italian people to begin with.

My favorite, of course, were the acrobats.  Amazing!  But the hour and a half I spent at the festivities only made me MORE excited to head to Beijing this fall.  Looking forward to it more and more each day.

Technology Resolution

Not REVOLUTION but RESOLUTION, this being the first post of the 2012 year and all. The genesis of this post comes from installing a fax machine for my grandparents. Back story....

My 92 and 94 year old grandparents still lived independently, much to my mother's dismay and a total test to her patience. To compound the situation, my grandmother is essentially deaf, can not hear the phone ring, but does not acknowledge her hearing difficulties. Communication with her is TOUGH. My grandfather who can hear, but has lost a great deal of mobility, has become so incredibly passive, that getting him to do things is in itself a challenge. I could go on about the difficulties of elder care, but you get the drift.

My aunt in San Diego has taken on the responsibilities of bill paying, insurance and paperwork. Much thanks to her for that. However, this requires sharing of documents and information, which in our modern day, one just says to oneself, PDF's and email. Done! But this is my grandparents you are talking about, and the only computer in their lives is the early 1980's vintage Apple IIC sitting in their basement. So, let us move down the technology ladder, to the fax machine, which is our chosen solution to communicate and transfer information back and forth.

On New Year's Day, I installed a fax machine at my grandparents' house. I pulled it outside of the box and the immediate reaction was, "Take it away, we do not need that". After it was installed, the next step was to teach my grandfather how to use it. Lesson 1, how to receive a fax. Dedicated land line for the fax? You have got to be kidding. We have to teach him how to switch between fax and telephone mode. Sending faxes, actually a bit easier, but still requires calling my aunt and having her turn on her fax machine. I could see in his face HOW foreign this contraption was, but he did it. Now he just needs practice.

Then, this morning, in a total surprise, my grandfather called and was going over the instructions I left for him and wanted to go over them with me. As a teacher, I could totally hear in his voice when something made sense to him. He understood that the receive button was the long oval black one (It is also the only function button showing as I taped over all the over ones). Anyone up for faxing with my grandfather and grandmother?

So back to the issue of resolution. I have been accused, and rightly slow, of being slow to adopt new technology. No iPhone for this boy. Twitter? I have an account but I never use it. Updating this blog to having RSS feed or searchable index? You think I would tackle it, but it has not happened yet. But watching my 94 year old grandfather take on a fax machine? Inspiring. Perhaps it is time to switch from my hotmail account to actually using my gmail account. Ok, maybe this is too radical a step.....

Galleria Spada

Right around the corner from my morning bus stop is Palazzo Spada, so on this lazy Sunday morning, I went out for pizza at my favorite place in Trastevere and then wandered over to Palazzo Spada to see Borromini's famous "forced perspective" colonnade.

Palazzo Spada, right around the corner from my Ponte Sisto bus stop.

The famed "forced perspective" colonnade by Borromini.  The statue appears to be 60 feet away......

....but is actually only about 25 feet away.  The docent standing at the statue is NOW taller than the columns.  It's all about perspective and Geometry.

I didn't really understand it until I went upstairs into the actual gallery and looked out the window.  Turns out Cardinal Spada, the owner, had the opportunity to purchase the strip of land next to his palazzo, extending his property by the width of one house, or in our case, the length of the colonnade.

Here's another look at the "width" of the added strip of land. 

If you want to see a video clip of the basics of the Geometry of the colonnade, check out this video clip.