freda's world adventures

Sochi 2014 February 28, 2014

Posted by freda in Birmingham, Michigan.
6 comments

(Don’t forget, if you click on any of the pictures, you can see them full screen.)

Don and I were fortunate, and very happy, to attend the Winter Olympic Games in Russia, as guests of NBC, as Chevrolet was a major media sponsor. We hosted a number of Chevrolet dealers from across the US, who had earned the trip based on strong sales to close out 2013. There were two sets of winning dealers, going in what NBC termed “waves”, but we were able to get there early enough to host both groups.

We left home on Friday, Feb 7th, and after a very long day of flying, including a 2-hour delay out of NYC because of an extra security check at the gate (a very thorough-ish hand search of all carry on luggage) rather poorly organized, which resulted in us missing our connection from Moscow to Sochi, (though we got on a later flight to Sochi – along with the NBC Today Show team, including Al Roker), we finally got to our hotel on Saturday, about 8:30 p.m. local time.  We were staying at the Radisson in Rosa Khutor, the mountain area for the Olympics.  The whole mountain village was built for the Olympics, and luckily this hotel had been constructed a few years ago, and was complete and lovely: http://www.radisson.ru/en/hotel-rosakhutor 

The hotel was taken over by NBC, with multiple restaurants and bar choices and a large room called the Moscow Room, set up with a bar and many TV screens, for gathering in groups.  After we unpacked, that’s where we headed, to wait for the GM dealer couples already in Sochi, to come back from their evening event.  We had a great visit-meet with them (I’d only met one of them before), and then collapsed in bed.

NBC had organized our days like this: each day we had tickets to a “featured event,” usually in the late afternoon or evening, but they also had limited tickets to many other events, and if we were interested, we had to sign up today for what we wanted to see tomorrow, which meant every morning lining up to sign up, and hope to get tickets.   Don decided to go to Men’s Downhill our first morning, but I knew it was too early for me after our day of flying. So, I slept in a little later, then took a walk around the mountain-village, and then had a nap,

and Don went to the Men’s Downhill –

Back at the hotel, Don had a nap, and then we were herded onto the buses to head to the Olympic Village for our first “featured event” of Team Figure Skating Finals, a new event at these Olympics, and which included Women’s Free Skate, Men’s Free Skate, and Dance Pairs Free Skate, for the final five teams of Japan, Italy, USA, Canada and Russia.

The Olympic Village was a 45-60 minute bus ride from our hotel in the mountain area, depending on traffic, a trip we made every day.  NBC had hired several interns, all university students, at least half of whom spoke Russian, to be our ‘handlers.’  At the hotel they held signs with events on them (e.g. “Speed Skating,” “Hockey,” “Curling,” etc) to make sure we got to the right bus and right event for which we had tickets.   At all times, in the hotel and at the venues, we were required to wear a “spectator pass” around our necks,

and when we were heading to the events, a second lanyard holding our event tickets.

Without those it was impossible to get into the Village.  Once there, we walked from the parking lot to the security check, where we scanned our spectator pass to enter.  Then, just like at an airport, our possessions went through x-ray, and then not quite like at airports, we were thoroughly patted down.  Of course we all appreciated the thoroughness, but it also became a bit of a joke.  The best line was from a woman who said, “well, I feel like a cigarette now!”

Once through security, the NBC interns were placed along a sight-line, holding what they called “lollipops” that led us to the NBC Hospitality Suite, about a 15-minute walk through the village.

The buses were timed so there was always time to relax at the Hospitality Suite and indulge in drinks and  amazing food before heading to our Olympic event.

The Olympic Village was really fabulous; so well designed with all the arena venues in a circle around the flame.  There were Russian volunteers everywhere in their colourful outfits.  Besides the arenas, there were a variety of pavillions and outdoor stages for entertainment, and a number of food kiosks.  The weather was fabulous the whole time we were there – sunny and warm – and it was a delight to walk over the rainbow bridges and people watch.

We saw some wonderful skating in this new Team Event, a hint of what would come in the individual events… The American, Jason Brown, was thoroughly entertaining:

The Canadian, Kevin Reynolds, was excellent:

The Russian Plushenko, strong and perfect, before he had to withdraw from competition:

My favourite thing to watch – the little girls picking up the flowers!

The 15-year old Russian Yulia Lipnitskaya blew us ALL away, and brought me to tears:

Canada’s Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir were beautiful and perfect.  I’m so glad I got to see them live:

The final Team Skating results: Russia Gold, Canada Silver, USA Bronze.  Leaving the arena, the beautiful exterior showed us the current medal standings:

We were back on the bus by 10:30 p.m. and arrived at the hotel for a midnight buffet – a standard night event, it turned out, mostly because we were never eating a real dinner, only ‘grazing’ before the evening event, and then again at midnight.

For our 2nd day, we chose tickets to see Short Track Speed Skating for our ‘optional’ event in the early afternoon, held in the Iceberg Arena, followed in the evening by the ‘featured’ Speed Skating – a longer track in a different arena – The Adler Arena.  Our bus from the hotel left early enough to give us some time to walk around the village and check out a few pavilions.

Short Track Speed Skating may be my favourite event to watch – SO exciting, as they whip around the corners, practically touching the ice, and so easily wiped out.

It was so exciting to be there to see Charles Hamelin win GOLD in the Short Track 1500 metre – especially as he wiped out of his other events.

We stayed to watch the Flower Ceremony…

In between skating events we went to Canada House to buy some Canadian garb.  As grateful as we were to Chevrolet and NBC for the trip, of course we were rooting for Canada!  Don had tried to get into Canada House the previous day, but you could only get in by invitation, (and couldn’t even get into the shop without the pass), so… he emailed a friend, who emailed somebody who emailed somebody and soon  Don had an email to tell us our invitations were waiting at the front desk at Canada House. When we got there we went through the process of accredidation – picture taken, lanyard pass created,

and then we shopped.  I got a great scarf and Don got a toque and tshirt.  Back to the NBC Suite for food and drink, and then on to the Speed Skating event.  This takes place on a bigger course, so it’s less dramatic, I think, and sometimes pretty boring.  It’s also really hard to take pictures as the skaters whizz past.  This is the only one that turned out:

The Dutch dominate in speed skating, taking 24 medals, 23 in long-track speed skating and one in short track – here’s a great article about that: http://www.sbnation.com/2014/2/26/5405120/winter-olympics-2014-netherlands-speed-skating-medals-dominance.  The excitement at our event came with the finals, when Dutch skaters swept the finish, Gold-Silver-Bronze, with twin brothers taking the Gold and Bronze.   Being half Dutch, this was almost as exciting for me as the Canadian win!  🙂

As we exited the arena, Don and I realized the nightly medal ceremony was about to take place, and we could see Charles Hamelin get his medal.  The area for medal presentations was crowded and exciting.  We saw several presentations, waiting for Hamelin, including Ireen Wust of The Netherlands receive Gold for Women’s Speed Skating 3000 metre.

Finally, just as we worried we’d have to leave so we wouldn’t miss our bus, Charles Hamelin, medal ceremony, and then the raising of the Canadian flag and singing of the National Anthem – so moving to be in the centre of that!

Back to the hotel, and it was party time!  The first wave of guests were going home the next day and NBC was sending them off with a bang! First The Swon Brothers (finished third place on the 4th season of NBC’s ‘The Voice’) entertained us, and then it was a DJ playing dance music so loud we yelled the rest of the night away. We were up until past 2:00 and slept until noon the next day!  I had a massage booked that afternoon (bliss!),  and then we were on the bus to the Village, first for drinks and snacks at the Hospitality Suite and then to our evening event – Figure Skating Pairs Short Program.

The Pairs Skate Short Program was a LONG night – 20 pairs skating their short programs, of course to different music, but incorporating the required jumps and moves meant a lot of the same thing.  We watched the Canadians with interest, of course – all 3 Canadian pairs did well enough to advance to the final long program –

This American team was very colourful –

But, our favourite short program, for fun presentation, came from the German team, skating to The Pink Panther -the hot pink catsuit photographs so well!

The audience was almost as interesting as the skaters.  Photo-journalists made their way over to our section during breaks because a few rows behind us: a Russian Cosmonaut and an American Astronaut (does anyone recognize them? We don’t know who they are.)

And in the row Right Behind us, Russian pop singer Oleg Gazmanov, who specializes in patriotic songs and is also a candidate for Master of Sport for Russia for Gymnastics.  (We had to google him to learn this.)  He was interviewed during the first break and from then on THRONGS of Russians made their way over to have their pictures taken with him.  It became a bit of a joke because we were so crowded, and I think we will be in a few of those pictures!

On Wednesday, the 12th, we had signed up for vodka-tasting with international bartender Bek Narzi, but Don found out he could get a ticket for the Canada-USA Women’s Hockey preliminary game, so off he went to that while I sacrificed and stayed for the vodka “drinking,” as it turned out!  😉  We drank a mixed cocktail, sampled shots of three different kinds of vodka, and then had three more cocktails, while learning about the history of vodka in Russia:

It was all great fun!  And then I got on the bus to the Olympic Village, watching the last half of the women’s hockey game on the TV screens, sitting outside in the gorgeous sunshine at the Hospitality Suite, quietly cheering for the Canadians while surrounded by Americans!  Don met me at the suite after the game – Canada won – to eat, and then we were off to the Pairs Long Skate, the final.  The Russians were truly exciting to watch, and got Gold and Silver.  Our favourites from the night before, the German couple, had been in 2nd place, but they both fell during their performance – heartbreaking – and ended up with Bronze.  My favourite from this night was the Gold-medal Russian couple, skating to Jesus Christ Superstar:

Thursday, 13th, first to Short Track Speed Skating and then USA vs Slovakia Hockey Game.  It was *another* gorgeous day!

The short track speed skating was as exciting as always, though sadly the Canadian men’s relay team had a wipe out; heartbreaking when they had a chance at gold. Then three women wiped out in the final for the 500 metre event; it was wild.  Ran into these crazy Dutchmen as we exited the arena:

Walking from one arena to the next, passing the flame burning bright on a gorgeous day:

Hockey: USA vs Slovakia, with half the arena cheering for the USA and half for the Slovakians, and six of the seven US goals right in front of us!

The sunset was gorgeous as we exited the arena:

We got back to the hotel relatively early, compared to other nights, with great intentions of going to bed early.  I will blame the dealers for the fact we stayed up partying until 1:30 a.m.  They were a fun group!

Don had a massage in the early afternoon, and then we were back on the bus to first head to the “back stage” of the NBC Today Show taping.  It was actually quite boring, with a lot of standing around in the background, cheering when we were told to, etc.  And it was HOT standing in the direct sunlight (probably our warmest day), so we didn’t stay for the whole show.  But, all the Today Show hosts were very gracious, came over to shake hands with the “audience” and pose for pictures, etc.

Relaxing back at the Hospitality Suite, enjoying food and drink, and suddenly everyone was abuzz with the rumour that Putin was going to show up at the next-door American House, where the athletes and their families hung out, across the outdoor patio area which NBC shared with them.  People were hovering, cameras were set up, and then finally, surrounded by security, he *did* show up!  He sat on the patio, had a glass of wine, and answered interview questions.  We were inside the NBC suite, and the doors had been closed to the patio, for security reasons, but I passed my camera up to one of the NBC interns who was standing on a table, and he took this picture for me:

After that excitement it was time to get to our Figure Skating Men’s Long Program final.  There were some good skates, but none of them were quite as dynamic as they could be.

When we exited the skating arena, the roof of the hockey arena was lit up with the Canadian flag, indicating Canada had won their hockey game – that was cool to see!

Our last day, Saturday 15th, Don participated in a “skate with Tara Lipinski.”  Tara was the Gold-medal Olympian at the 1998 Nagano games, when she was just 15 years old.  At the Sochi games, she and Johnny Weir were the figure skating commentators.  (I listened to them a lot once we were home and I think they did a fabulous job.)  Tara did a bit of a presentation, and allowed for Q&A, before those participating took to the ice.  Don hadn’t put on skates since we left Ontario (8 years ago?), but after a shaky start, he had a blast.

When he got back, we wandered around the mountain village, doing a little souvenir shopping, enjoying the sunshine.

Then, back on the bus for the last time, first to enjoy a little time at the NBC suite with all the GM gang:

And then to the Men’s USA vs Russia hockey game – SUCH an EXCITING and INTENSE game!

It was quite an end to our time at the Sochi 2014 Olympics!  We exuberantly made our way back to the NBC hospitality suite for a celebratory drink before heading to the bus and back to the hotel to pack.  Don and I had to be up SO early, leaving the hotel at 3:30 a.m. for the beginning of our 26 hours in transit.  No matter.  It was worth it – a fantastic experience!

Prague and Vienna – November 2013 January 30, 2014

Posted by freda in Birmingham, Michigan.
2 comments

Don and I left for our annual November holiday the evening of November 19th and arrived in Prague  the afternoon of the 20th.  After checking into our highly recommendable hotel – (if you click on any picture you will see it in full screen; I have also added Don’s name in brackets on any of his pictures)

and unpacking in this room:

our first stop was a late lunch: beer and goulash, of course!

Then, as the light was fading (so early!) we started off for a first look at the city, across the Charles Bridge and into the Old Town square.

We walked and walked the Old Town – a good way to fight jet-lag – until we were ready for dinner.  Back to our hotel side of the bridge, the area called the Little Quarter, or Malá Strana, we wandered, looking at the restaurant choices, getting lost in the meandering streets, and finally chose a  local “Czech” place in the Little Quarter Square, where I had a duck leg and Don had ribs and dumplings – typical local hardy, and tasty, fare.

The next morning, after a great buffet breakfast, we met our tour guide Petr:

We had arranged to take two half-day tours with Petr.  He divided the city in half, by the river, and during our first 3 1/2 hour morning we walked all over the Little Quarter and Castle Quarter.  He likes to start with this side, as there are great views of the city up on the hill where the Castle is situated.   So, up the hill we climbed, to the Prague Castle and St. Vitus Cathedral.   The Castle grounds are huge, pretty much a town unto itself, and for over 1000 years, Czech leaders have ruled from the Castle.  It continues to be the offices of the Czech President.  The Cathedral sits in the middle, an imposing sight:

We walked the grounds, but didn’t go into the buildings.   Then, we meandered along the streets behind the castle…

to get to the Monastery for the gorgeous view of the city…

From the Castle Quarter to the Little Quarter, of which Rick Steves, in his guidebook, says: “This charming neighbourhood, huddled under the castle on the west bank of the river, is low on blockbuster sights but high on ambience.”

One of the “sights” in this area is the Lennon Wall: “John Lennon’s ideas gave many locals hope and a vision. When he was killed in 1980, a large wall was spontaneously covered with memorial graffiti. Night after night, the police would paint over the “All You Need Is Love” and “Imagine” grafitti. Day after day it would reappear. Until independence came in 1989, travelers, freedomlovers and local hippies gather here. Silly as it might seem, this wall is remembered as a place that gave hope to locals craving freedom. Even today, while the tension and danger associated with this wall are gone, people come here to imagine.” (from Rick Steves’ guide to Prague)  This link is from a Prague tourist website, with a little more detail: http://www.prague.net/john-lennon-wall

We crossed a canal that used to be lined with mills, where every mill had its own protective water spirit.  I wonder if this was one:

Also, a sight that has become ubiquitous in Europe, which apparently started in Russia – couples put padlocks on the bridge rails, a symbol of their love:

Three and a half hours of non-stop walking, talking about the country’s history, communism, and Petr’s own history (he defected from the country after completing his university degree in engineering,  and after some struggle, ended up in Calgary, Alberta, Canada for several years, before returning to Prague in 2003), and we were back to our hotel for a much-needed rest and late lunch.

Then, off again for some touring on our own.  My top priority was the Klementinum: The Czech National Library, one of the most beautiful in the world.  The only way to see the library is by a tour, and sadly you can’t take pictures, but there are a number of websites that show what it looks like: http://www.pragueexperience.com/places.asp?PlaceID=844   (You can also google Klementinum Library and click on the images for lots of great pictures.) The tour package includes the Chapel of Mirrors, a lovely room where concerts are held, and the Astronomical Observatory Tower, with several old astronomy apparatases of which the tour guide was quite proud, and a very steep-stepped climb for some great views over the city, worth the climb.

Then, we wandered to find The Family Museum of Postcards inside the Choco Café.  Apparently the Austrian Empire invented the postcard – the walls of the café were covered in framed old postcards, and they had several early-20th-century examples of postcards for sale.  http://www.choco-cafe.cz/house-of-red-chair_p19.html

After we had fortified ourselves with hot mulled wine and a little snack at the café, and I had bought a few postcards,

we walked back to what we affectionately called “our side of the bridge” and checked out Shakespeare and Sons book store with their large selection of books in english… and, well, you know me, I had to buy a few.  🙂

Then, off to find a restaurant recommended to us by friends who had stumbled upon it during their visit to Prague: http://www.ichnusabotegabistro.cz/ This Sardinian restaurant was hard to find, tucked into a quiet neighbourhood, but well worth the search.  There are no menus, just a verbal list of the specials of the day – you know it’s fresh!  Everything was delicious!

Petr was back the next morning at 10:00 for our Old Town, New Town, Jewish Quarter tour, another 3 1/2 hours of walking and talking.  The Old Town Square is the centre of Prague.  “It has been a market square since the 11th century and became the centre of the Old Town when its Town Hall was built in the 13th century.”

Next door to the Town Hall is the famous Astronomical Clock, which was installed in the early 1400s and is a marvel of technology.

It has several revolving discs and (apparently) tells Bohemian time, modern time, the time of sunrise and sunset.  There are four statues beside the clock face that “represent the 15th-century outlook on time and prejudice: a Turk with a mandolin symbolizes hedonism, a Jewish moneylender is greed, the figure stating into a mirror stands for vanity, and Death, with the hourglass, reminds us our time is running out.”

At the top of the hour, Death tips his hourglass and pulls the cord, ringing a bell,

the windows open and the 12 apostles parade by, and then the hour is rung.

It’s all over in 25 seconds.  The crowds gathered for the show, in November, were many.  We can’t imagine how crowded it must be in the summer!

In the centre of the town square is a memorial to Jan Hus.  “Jan Hus (c. 1369-1415) lived and preached a century before Martin Luther. Both were college professors as well as priests. Both condemned Church corruption and promoted a local religious autonomy. Both helped establish their national languages. Hus gave the Czech alphabet its unique accent marks so that the letters could fit the sounds. Both got in big trouble. While Hus was burned at the stake as a heretic, Luther survived. Thanks to the new printing press, invented by Gutenberg, Luther was able to spread his message cheaply and effectively. Since Luther was high-profile and German, killing him would have caused major political complications. While Hus may have loosened Rome’s grip on Christianity, Luther orchestrated the Reformation that finally broke it. Today, both are honoured as national heroes as well as religious reformers.” (Rick Steves guide)

Also in the Town Square, the Týn Church, which for 200 years after Hus’ death, was Prague’s leading Hussite church.  Previous it had been Catholic and after the Hussites were defeated, was returned to Catholicism.

Behind the church is the Ungelt Courtyard, once the commercial nucleus of medieval Prague.

From the Old Town Square we wandered through the Jewish Quarter. “Of the 120,000 Jews living in the area in 1939, just 10,000 survived the Holocaust. Today there are only 3,000 ‘registered’ Jews in the Czech Republic, 1,700 of whom are in Prague.”

The oldest synagogue in Eastern Europe is here, built in 1270:

The history of the cemetery is interesting: between 1439 and 1787, this was the only burial ground allowed for the Jews of Prague. It is claimed the tombs are layered seven or eight deep, and that there are close to 100,000 tombs here. The tombs were piled atop each other because of limited space, and the Jewish belief that the body should not be moved once buried. With its many layers, the cemetery became a small plateau.  This picture, from the street behind the cemetery, illustrates how high the ground now is with those layers:

As we made our way from the Jewish Quarter to the New Town, we passed this statue, a tribute to author Franz Kafka, born in 1883 to a German-speaking Jewish family in Prague, and probably Prague’s most famous author.  The sculptor is by Jaroslav Róna, and the work is “inspired by events in Kafka’s story, Description of a Struggle.”  (I’ve never read Kafka.)

Leaving the medieval Prague of Old Town and heading into the modern New Town, one of our first sights is the Powder Tower, “the Gothic gate of the town wall, built to house the city’s gunpowder. This is the only surviving bit of the wall that was built to defend the city in the 1400s.”

Next door to the Powder Tower is the Municipal House, built in 1911, housing Prague’s largest concert hall and a few restaurants. The building is “Neo-Baroque, with a dusting of Art Nouveau.”

Stepping inside Municipal House, the interior is “arguably Europe’s finest Art Nouveau.”

Nearby is the Estates Theatre, built in the late 18th-century, and where Mozart conducted the world premiere of his opera Don Giovanni in 1787. It is the only theatre left standing where Mozart performed.

Wenceslas Square, is really a very wide boulevard rather than a square, and is the main part of New Town.  It is named for King Wenceslas, “the wise and benevolent 10th-century Duke of Bohemia.”

Close to the statue of King Wenceslas is an important memorial, almost hidden in the garden.  “It commemorates victims of communism such as Jan Palach, a philosophy student who loved life, but wanted to live in freedom, and who in 1969 set himself on fire on the steps of the National Museum for the cause of Czech independence. He died a few days later. On the 20th anniversary of his death, huge demonstrations swept the city, leading …after more demonstrations… 10 months later, to the overthrow of the Czech communist government in 1989.”

On November 17, 1989, 30,000 students began a series of demonstrations that eventually resulted, on December 29, with the end of the communist regime and the election of Václav Havel as the president of a free Czech Republic.   On Národní Trída (National Street) there is a memorial to the event, and because we were in Prague just shortly after this anniversary date, we saw the remnants of this year’s remembrance:

During both days with Petr, he very cleverly walked us on a route that took us right back to where we started in 3 1/2 hours.  We said thank you and good-bye on the Old Town side of the Charles Bridge, right under the statue of Charles IV, the Holy Roman Emperor who ruled his vast empire from Prague in the 14th century. The statue was erected in 1848 to celebrate the 500th anniversary of Prague’s Charles University.  In the statue, Charles is holding a contract establishing the university, which was the first in Northern Europe. The women around the pedestal symbolize the school’s four subjects: the arts, medicine, law and theology.

We walked back over the Charles Bridge (something we did once or twice a day!) ate lunch, and then went to our hotel for a much-needed rest.  In the early evening, we walked back over the Charles Bridge and bought tickets for a classical performance at the Municipal House later that evening, then had a light meal at the Grand Café Orient, in the Cubist House of the Black Madonna, a building designed and built in 1911-1912 as the first example of cubist architecture in Prague: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_the_Black_Madonna

Then, off to the Municipal House for a 12-string ensemble presentation of Dvořák’s Serenade in E Major for Strings, Op.22 and Vivaldi’s Four Seasons.

The concert was just over an hour long – a perfect amount of time.  We walked back to our hotel, got a bottle of wine and took it up to the small roof-top patio to enjoy the night views of the city.  (Yes, it was chilly – we wore our coats – but not too cold to enjoy the wine or the view.)

This gothic gate (above, at night) was just steps from our hotel:

I can’t believe we didn’t take any pictures of the Charles Bridge, since we walked it at least twice a day, but here’s some information about it: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Bridge

The next day, Saturday, we toured a few museums.  First to the Museum of Communism, which tells the history of communism in Prague quite thoroughly, and with all information in English. It also includes a short video of the protests in 1989 which culminated in the end of communist rule.  It was very worthwhile.

A stop for coffee and strudel recharged us before we went to the Mucha Museum, dedicated to the work of Czech Art Nouveau artist Alfons Mucha, of which Rick Steves says, “This is one of Europe’s most enjoyable little museums.  …With the help of an abundant supply of sultry models, Mucha became a founding father of the Art Nouveau movement.”  He is perhaps most famous for the many Sarah Bernhardt posters she commissioned him to create.  We recognized his work immediately, and I’m sure you will too: http://www.alfonsmucha.org/

Afterwards we went walking, first heading to Charles Square, of which Rick Steves said, “Prague’s largest square is covered by lawns, trees and statues of Czech writers. It’s a quiet antidote to the bustling Wenceslas and Old Town squares.”  You know the mention of statues of writers intrigued me.  Well, we walked pretty much the whole square and huge park and all we found was one statue!  I think I need to have a talk with Mr. Rick Steves!

From the park we headed towards the river, and came upon this intriguing street art along the way:

And then at the river’s edge, what is called “Dancing House” and nicknamed ‘Fred and Ginger’ – designed by Frank Gehry of Toronto, Canada:

It was past time for a very late-lunch.  We stopped at Cafe Louvre http://www.cafelouvre.cz/en/ where Franz Kafka and Einstein, among others, liked to spend time, and had a delicious meal:

Then, back to the hotel for a rest before an evening out.  We love jazz and earlier in the day had walked past a few different clubs to decide on a place for our evening. By chance we picked the Agharta Jazz Club http://www.agharta.cz/ and had the BEST night of our trip, actually the HIGHLIGHT of our trip!  We got to the club an hour before the show started, luckily, because it turned out all but three of the tables in this small club (seats about 60) were reserved.  (Reservations hadn’t occured to us.)  As the club began to fill up we ordered a bottle of wine and waited for the show.  It turned out the place was full because the Czech’s top jazzman was performing!!  Jiří Stivin & Co Jazz Quartet blew us away!!

We stayed until the very last note, at midnight, and loved every single moment.  Their CD has been my soundtrack while I write this blog.

Wandering home, we passed this bakery for the umpteenth time and this time bought a treat to eat as we walked.

The next day was our last in Prague.  We wanted only to take a few pictures and buy “Bohemian garnets,” mined from a mountainous area of Bohemia and, (according to Rick Steves), the major source of garnets from the Renaissance through Victorian age.

We mostly had the wonderful architecture in our camera focus:

We had a great day of walking, eating, and shopping – I got a pair of earrings and Don got a pair of cuff links.  Our last dinner was at Klub Architektů, a kind of modern vibe in a medieval cellar, with very good local white wine.  And then, to the Hemingway Bar for an evening cocktail.  (Well, two.)  http://www.hemingwaybar.cz/bar-prague/ The bar was another highlight, recommended to us by friends.  Hemingway never drank there, but they are dedicated to cocktails in a way Hemingway would approve.  We sat at the bar watching the expert bartender shake and stir.  It was great fun!

One last walk home across the Charles Bridge…

And that was the end of our wonderful time in Prague. The next morning we were up and out, on the train to Vienna.  We left Prague at 9:45,  made one connection, and at 2:20 arrived in Vienna.  We got a taxi to the hotel,  checked in and unpacked.  It wasn’t such an atmospheric hotel as the one in Prague, but in a convenient location, fairly modern, very clean, and the breakfast buffet was good.

Having missed lunch (just snacks on the train), we looked to Rick Steves’ book for local restaurant recommendations and walked just a short distance for a typical German meal of schnitzel, potato salad (very different, but delicious) and beer, and the only picture of the two of us together on the whole trip:

And then, as it started to get dark, off we headed to the centre of Vienna – St. Stephen’s Cathedral square, where we were surprised, but very happy, to find a Christmas market.

We walked and walked, past many high end shops, more churches, up to the palace gates, and then back towards our hotel, stopping at the Marriott’s bar for a glass of wine before heading to our hotel and bed.

The next day, after breakfast, we started our sight-seeing with a tour of St. Stephen’s Cathedral, the heart of Old Vienna.  There was a sign inside to tell us of a tour in english, and the fellow’s detail was good.  Then we remembered that Rick Steves has podcast tours (which I’d very cleverly downloaded for our iPods before we’d left home) and one of his podcasts is a tour of St. Stephen’s, so we listened to his version as we wandered through the cathedral taking pictures.  I won’t go into all his detail, but a few highlights include:

the old pulpit – a Gothic sandstone pulpit, c.1500 –

a carved statue of the Madonna of the Servants (from 1330), a favourite of working people –

and the tomb of Frederick III (1415-1493), “who is considered the ‘father’ of Vienna for turning the small village into a royal town with a cosmopolitan feel. Frederick secured a bishopric, turning the newly completed St. Stephen’s church into a cathedral. The emperor’s major contribution to Austria, however, was in fathering Maximilian I and marrying him off to Mary of Burgundy, instantly making the Habsburg Empire a major player in European politics. The lavish tomb (made of marble from Salzburg) is as long-lasting as Frederick’s legacy. To make sure it stayed that way, locals saved his tomb from damage during WWII by encasing it (as well as the pulpit) in a shell of brick” –

As we walked out of St. Stephen’s we were hit with snow flurries.  We felt terribly sorry for the horses waiting in the cold.

From the cathedral we walked over to the Opera House to check on tour times, and felt sorry for the pigeons, too!

Having ascertained the english tour times, we went to the near-by Tirolerhof Café for lunch.

I had soup, Don had a salad and then we shared this amazing apfelstrudel with our coffees.

We had discovered the “café culture” of Vienna as Rick Steves describes: ” In Vienna, the living room is down the street at the neighbourhood coffeehouse. This tradition is just another example of the Viennese expertise in good living. Each of Vienna’s many long-established (and sometimes even legendary) coffeehouses has its individual character (and characters). These classic cafés can be a bit tired, with a shabby patina and famously grumpy waiters who treat you like an uninvited guest invading their living room. Yet these spaces somehow also feel welcoming, offering newspapers, pastries, sofas, quick and light workers’ lunches, elegant ambience, and “take all the time you want” charm for the price of a cup of coffee.”

After our lunch we still had some time before the tour of the Opera House started, so we wandered over to the Naschtmarkt, which “roughly translates to ‘Munchies Market.'”  This would be a great place in the summer.

Back to the Opera House for our tour.

Interestingly, the architect of the building received a great deal of criticism for his design, mostly because he failed to create a grand entrance, which led him to commit suicide.  (We actually walked most of the way around the building looking for the entrance.)  It was also destroyed by bombs during WWII and has been rebuilt.  It’s still beautiful, though, especially inside.

We were lucky to get to see backstage, work in progress.  Unbelievably, every night is a different production at the Opera House in Vienna – which, I guess, keeps hundreds of people employed.

The tour was worthwhile, the only way to see the building unless you’re attending an opera – which we weren’t.

From the Opera House we walked just a short distance to the Kunsthistoriches Museum, built in 1888 as a showcase for the Habsburgs’ collected artwork, collected between 1450-1650 approximately.  For the two hours before it closed, we saw just a tiny sample of what’s on display,

including many Dutch and Flemish painters – Rubens, Vermeer, Rembrandt, Pieter Bruegel the Elder…

Exiting the museum at closing time (6 pm), we were confronted by snow flurries, Vienna’s biggest monument- the Maria Theresa Monument, and a lovely Christmas market.

First up, “glühwein!” and a wander through the market…

and then Don found chips!

From this market, we market-hopped: food at one  – (sausages for Don, a gyro for me) – and then hot wine wine at another, where we also bought advent calendars, and finally at the St. Stephen’s market (so close to our hotel) for one last hot wine before retiring for the night, exhausted and foot sore!

The next morning, clear skies, and we discovered the view from our hotel balcony:

After breakfast, we started our day by following Rick Steves’ city walk tour on our iPods.  Following his directions while listening to his descriptions was like having our own personal tour guide – we can’t recommend his podcasts enough!!   He starts his walk at the Opera House (because “if Vienna is the world capital of classical music, this building is its throne room”).  Behind the Opera House, the famous Café Sacher, at the Hotel Sacher –

home of the world famous Sacher-Torte – two layers of cake separated by apricot jam and covered in dark chocolate icing.  (We didn’t indulge. )  To the horror of Viennese purists, Starbucks (with chutzpah) opened a branch right across the street from this most famous of cafés.  In Don’s picture you can see the Starbucks logo in the ground-floor window:

In the Albertinaplatz, this “Neoclassical building marks the tip of the Hofburg Palace (a sprawling complex of buildings that was long the seat of Habsburg power); today it is the Albertina Museum” –

Within the ‘platz’ are several statues that make up a Monument Against War and Fascism, commemorting the years when Austria came under Nazi rule (1938-1945). This piece is called The Gates of Violence, to remember victims of all wars and violence.

On we wandered, up and down winding streets, listening to history and architectural detail, admiring the beautiful buildings…

and the prepartion for Christmas…

The Graben (which means ‘ditch’) was originally the moat for the Roman military camp, then it was a busy street of traffic, until the 1970s, when it was turned into one of Europe’s first pedestrian-only streets. (The statue-column at the far left of this picture is called the Holy Trinity Plague Column: 60 feet tall, erected by Emperor Leopold I, in gratitude to God after saving Vienna from total devestation, after the Plague hit in 1679, wiping out 75,000 Viennese, a 1/3 of the city at that time.) Note the Christmas decorations hung, but not lit.  Every evening we hoped they would be…

We stopped for lunch at another atmospheric café, Café Hawelka; and then drooled over the window display at Demel, one of Vienna’s famous chocolate shops –

before venturing inside to see the bakery in action –

Back outside, we came to Michaelerplatz and the Neo-Baroque facade of the Hofburg Palace, where the Habsburg emperors lived (except in the summer).

We went in to tour the Imperial apartments, home to Emperor Franz Josef I (the last of the Habsburg monarchs) and his reclussive, eccentric empress, Elisabeth, known as “Sisi.”  The tour included the Sisi Museum.  The apartments (which you can not photograph) are as lavish as you would expect.  More interesting was the museum dedicated to the life and death of “Sisi.”  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empress_Elisabeth_of_Austria    We knew nothing of Sisi prior to visiting this museum, whose “beauty, bittersweet life and tragic death helped create a larger-than-life legacy” and found the details quite fascinating.

Next, we went to the Austrian National Library, actually part of the Hofburg Palace, and another one of the most beautiful libraries in the world.  This was once the library of the Habsburgs. Construction of this beautiful room began in 1722 under the authority of Charles VI, whose statue is in the middle.  Here we were allowed to take photos; please forgive the many that follow!

And from an exhibit in the library on children in Austria over the years, a sign I couldn’t resist –

We went back to the hotel to relax, and then out to an intriguing little Italian restaurant for dinner, Cantinetta La Norma, rustic, artistic, and great food – an Italian restaurant run by Arabs, with much coming and going, and maybe more going on than meets the eye.  If only they didn’t allow smoking inside!

One last mug of glühwein at the St. Stephen’s market and back to our hotel and bed.

Thursday morning was crystal clear, sunny and cold. We started the day by walking across the Ringstrasse from our hotel to Stadtpark (City Park), Vienna’s major park, honouring many Viennese musicians and composers with statues.  Most beautiful in the sunshine, the golden Johann Strauss, “waltz king.”

We were heading for the Belvedere, but saw a few sights along the way.  First, this Russian Monument, built in 1945 as a forced thank you to the Soviets for liberating Austria from the Nazis: formerly a sore point and now just ignored (Rick Steves) –

Next we came upon Karlskirche (St. Charles’ Church) and discovered it was being “yarn-bombed:” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yarn_bombing

Onward to the Belvedere Palace – “the elegant palace of Prince Eugene of Savoy (1663-1736), the still-much-appreciated conqueror of the Ottomans. Eugene, a Frenchman considered too short and too ugly to be in the service of Louis XIV offered his services to the Habsburgs. While he was indeed short and ugly, he became the greatest military genius of his age, the savior of Austria, and the toast of Viennese society. When you conquer cities, as Eugene did, you get really rich. With his wealth he built this palace. Only Eugene had the cash to compete with the Habsburgs, and from his new palace he looked down on the Hofburg, both literally and figuratively. Prince Eugene had no heirs, so the state got his property, and Emperor Joseph II established the Belvedere as Austria’s first great public art gallery.”

The Belvedere (beautiful inside and out) has Vienna’s best collection of local artists, including several Gustav Klimt: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gustav_Klimt

After wandering through the Belvedere, we took the tram to see the Parliament buildings and City Hall.

At City Hall we found another Christmas market.

It was the biggest Christmas market we’d seen, so we decided we’d come back when it was dark and enjoy the sparkling atmosphere. We headed back to the hotel to rest our feet.  When it was dark, we returned to the City Hall market.  It was lovely.

We were also very happy that, on our last night, the city had finally turned on the power to light up the Graben street decorations we’d seen every day, but never  lit:

After enjoying the beautifully lit up night, we went out for a last dinner, at an Italian place we had passed a few times, and which looked inviting:

We had a last full morning in the city before taking the train back to Prague, so we decided to take a long walk, across the Danube Canal (not the river), to the north corner of the city, to see the Prater Amusement Park, with the famous ferris wheel.  In 1766, Emperor Josef II gave his imperial hunting grounds to the people of Vienna for a public park.  In 1896, English engineer Walter B. Basset submitted the idea to construct a Giant Ferris Wheel (something his company had already done in other locations), and in 1897 construction was complete – 30 cabins with 20 seats each. During WWII the ferris wheel was damaged when a fire destroyed all 30 cabins and the operational facilities, but it was reconstructed in record time and re-opened in May 1947.  It features in such famous films as James Bond’s The Living Daylights and 1950’s The Third Man, based on a novel by Graham Greene, set in bombed-out, post-war Vienna, starring Orson Welles and Joseph Cotton (which we had watched before we left on this trip).

Walking back to the hotel, we passed this statue of Dr. Karl Lueger, the influential mayor of Vienna, from 1897-1910, who together with architect Otto Wagner, helped to shape modern Vienna.

It was time to say goodbye to Vienna.  We took the train back to Prague, arriving in the evening, and stayed at the Airport Courtyard Marriott, an excellent hotel with a great restaurant, and just steps away from airport check-in the next morning.

We had a wonderful trip, with Prague being our favourite – a city to which we’d be very happy to return.  Vienna was lovely too – we especially enjoyed the cafés and Christmas markets – but we didn’t have the same feel for it as we did for Prague.   It was all fun, though.

Next up – Winter Olympics in Sochi!  Stay tuned….

R & R in Mexico March 7, 2013

Posted by freda in Birmingham, Michigan.
2 comments

In November, during American Thanksgiving week, we went to Mexico with good friends.  Sharon and Fred (currently living in Shanghai) have a time share with Intrawest, which includes a property in Zihuatanejo, on the west coast of Mexico.  They booked a three-bedroom, three-bathroom condo and we, and Diane and Julio (currently living in Mexico City),  joined in for 6 glorious nights.  It was a perfect relaxing week in a gorgeous location.

We spent the days walking the beach, dozing in the sun, reading and swimming, and Don and Diane had two great days of scuba diving.  We had fantastic meals and many margaritas  in a variety of local restaurants…

But the highlight may have been releasing one-day-old sea turtles back to the sea…

After six wonderful and relaxing days in Zihuatanejo, we all flew to Mexico City for two days, where Diane and Julio hosted us and we did some touring.

Our first stop from the airport was the Basilica de Guadalupe, in the north of the city, the most important Roman Catholic site in Mexico and, indeed, the Americas.  Every year on December 12, the day of the festival of the Virgin of Guadalupe, hundreds of thousands of people make the pilgrimage to the Basilica, to pay homage to the Virgin Mary, who, it is said, appeared to farmer Juan Diego in 1531. As well as being a Catholic icon of exceptional importance, the Dark-Skinned Virgin is also a symbol of Mexican Independence, since her image was on the standards carried by the rebel armies in the struggle for independence from Spain.  The site of the Basilica consists of the original 18th Century building with its baroque facade,

as well as a modern circular basilica. The two basilicas stand perpendicular to each other in starkly contrasting styles, deliberately constructed close to the site of Juan Diego’s vision.  The original basilica is built on the spot of the Virgin’s fourth and last appearance to Juan Diego, at which time, it is said, she emblazoned the famous image of the Virgin of Guadalope on to his cloak so that he could prove to the local bishop that he encountered the Holy Mother.  The cloak is on show inside the new basilica, the ancient icon being Mexico’s most sacred symbol.

We stopped for a quick lunch….

And then to the Palacio National de Mexico to see Diego Rivera’s murals depicting the history of Mexico.  This link gives a brief overview.   Having read “The Lacuna” by Barbara Kingsolver (I think her best novel) prior to our trip, I was most anxious to see the murals.  They did not disappoint.

When we exited the Palacio National, we encountered these life-sized, kind of creepy, “Catrinas”..   The “Catrina” has become an icon of the Mexican Day of the Dead, and was introduced by Mexican artist, Jose Guadalupe Posada, in a zinc drawing from the early 1900’s, showing a female skeleton wearing only a hat.  She was later popularized by Diego Rivera.  We saw many examples later, mostly in gift shops.

It was time to unload at Diane and Julio’s lovely apartment, freshen up, enjoy a glass of wine, and then have dinner at Diane and Julio’s favourite Spanish restaurant in their neighbourhood, —, where we had an excellent dinner.

On Saturday morning we were up early, to grab coffee and food at the local Starbucks (where the special drinks had different flavours from ours…)

and then an hour-long drive to Teotihuacan, an “enormous archaeological site  30 miles northeast of Mexico City, containing some of the largest Mesoamerican Pyramids built in the pre-Columbian Americas. The name means “where man met the gods.” Apart from the pyramids, Teotihuacan is also known for its large residential complexes, the Avenue of the Dead, and numerous colorful, well-preserved murals. Additionally, Teotihuacan produced a thin orange pottery style that spread through Mesoamerica” (from Wikipedia).   The weather was perfect (sunny, cool) for the walking (and walking) and climbing (and climbing) we did here.

First we climbed the Pyramid of the Sun, though we weren’t allowed to go to the top because the winds were too strong this day (!)  The climbing was pretty strenuous, so I was okay with that.  🙂

And as we exited the site, there was a row of tshirt and trinket shops, many featuring the “catrinas”- well-dressed, but still creepy.

After a long morning at this wonderful site, we returned to the apartment to clean up and get ready for a very late (Spanish-time) lunch at the home of the head of General Motors Mexico.  Yes, tequila was involved!  Also a most delicious paella made by his wife, who teaches cooking.

On Sunday, Sharon and Fred left really really early for the airport and their long trip home.  Don and I had time on Sunday morning for a walk around Diane and Julio’s lovely neighbourhood before we had to leave.

After walking the neighbourhood, we went back to the apartment to finish packing up, then said good bye and thank you to Diane and Julio and were off to the airport.   We had a great time on our first visit to Mexico.

Istanbul January 2, 2012

Posted by freda in Birmingham, Michigan.
2 comments

Happy New Year!!

I know you’re saying “finally, the promised post on Istanbul.”  Yes, this has taken longer than I expected or planned.  Seems December is a busy month (!) with things to do that can’t wait, so this blog has been sacrificed.  We had a wonderful Christmas, with both boys with us for about 10 days.  The four of us went to Chicago for two nights right after Christmas – the first time for all of us, though Don has been on business.  We had a great time and realized we need several more days to see that lovely city properly.  We enjoyed our time together, as always, ate and drank too much, saw a few movies, visited with good friends – everything that is wonderful about the holiday season.  Now, back to reality.  And without further ado…. Istanbul.  I hope you enjoy the trip.

Don and I had an amazing 8 days in Istanbul – one of our favourite trips!  It was a l-o-n-g haul to get there, though.  We drove to Windsor, flew from Windsor to Toronto, then Toronto to Munich, and finally Munich to Istanbul.  About 20 hours later we were at our lovely hotel, the family-run Hotel Kari Sonak, in the old city area of Sultanahmet.   http://www.istanbulhotelsarikonak.com/

After unpacking, we headed out for a long walk around the area, to keep awake and get our first look at the city.  Just up the street from our hotel, practically in our back yard, the Blue Mosque…

Then we meandered along winding, hilly, cobblestoned streets, past more carpet shops than you can imagine, and even carpets being sold right on the street!

Don was starving as he hadn’t eaten on the last plane, so he decided to try the street-seller’s bagel or pretzel-like fare, which we learned is called simit, a “crisp, ring-shaped savoury loaf.”

After more than an hour of wandering, I was dying for a ‘cuppa’ and we headed back to our hotel for complimentary tea-time.  After a reviving cup of tea, we asked Hasan (the bartender) for a beverage – beer for Don and hot mulled wine for me – and chatted with him for awhile.  This became our evening routine before dinner, though we skipped the tea from then on out.  (Turned out we had more tea during most days than we’ve ever had in our lives! … But those stories are still to come.)  And then, from a recommendation from Hasan, we made our way to the “restaurant street” just a few metres up the hill and around the corner from our hotel, to a fantastic place, Magnaura Cafe Restaurant, where we ended up having dinner three times during our stay!   They had a mix of Turkish and Ottoman cuisine, plus some western dishes we didn’t even look at, and lovely Turkish wine.  We had no idea Turkey had such a good wine industry, but they do.  The food was great, service was great, and after dinner, thanks to the suggestion from Hasan, our waiter gave us a tour of their underground ancient Roman-time caves.

We were back to our hotel and asleep by 8:30 after a very long overnight day of travel.

The next morning, after the delicious buffet breakfast put out daily at our hotel – excellent yogurt, dried fruit and fresh orange slices, hard-boiled eggs, tomatoes and cucumbers, feta cheese, olives, and breads – we met our personal tour guide in the lobby at 9:30.  How we came to hire Gamze is a bit of a story….  When I ordered the Istanbul Eyewitness Travel Guide (my favourite guide, because of the addition of pictures to the information) from amazon (our local book store didn’t have a guide for Istanbul!), in the way that amazon does, they said, “people who buy… also buy….” and so of course I clicked on some of those suggested books to see what might interest me, and I ended up also ordering “Istanbul: The Collected Traveler: An Inspired Companion Guide” edited by Barrie Kerper.  It’s an anthology of articles written by a variety of writers on all aspects of Istanbul, and I’ve only dipped into it so far.  But, one thing I did read was an interview of tour guide Gamze Artaman conducted by author Tom Brosnahan, and based on that interview, I emailed her!   Her detailed response, and then a few more back-and-forth emails inspired us to hire her for our first two days, plus a third day later in the week.  She turned out to be the best tour guide we’ve ever had!

We started our day with history as we walked up the hill to stand in the area that was once the Hippodrome, the centre of the Byzantine city of Constantinople.  Not much is left now from the once-upon-a-time stadium, which is now a public garden, except an Egyptian Obelisk (built in 1500 BC, it once stood outside Luxor, where Don and I have also been) and Constantine’s Column (built in 330 AD, part of the celebrations to inaugurate the Byzantine capital), and I’m sorry I don’t have pictures of them.  It was easy to get an idea of the size, though, as the road that runs around the garden square is what used to be the chariot racing track, chariot racing being, apparently, the most popular pastime of the Byzantines.  The Hippodrome fell into ruin after the Ottoman conquest of Istanbul in 1453.

According to the Eyewitness Guide (where all my serious information will come from, and will be in italics): For almost a thousand years Constantinople was the richest city in Christendom. It radiated out from three great buildings: the Hippodrome, the Great Palace and the church of Haghia Sophia.   Nothing is left of the Great Palace, but the Haghai Sophia is stunning.

The “church of holy wisdom,” Haghia Sophia is among the world’s greatest architectural achievements.  More than 1400 years old, it stands as a testament to the sophistication of the 6th-century Byzantine capital.  The vast edifice was built over two earlier churches and inaugurated by Emperor Justinian in 537.  In the 15th century the Ottomans converted it into a mosque: the minarets, tombs and fountains date from this period.   But, what might be the most amazing, is the open-mindedness of “the Conquerer” Sultan Mehmet II, because he allowed the Christian-themed mosaics to remain after the conversion to a mosque, side-by-side with the eight wooden plaques bearing calligraphic inscriptions, bearing the names of Allah, the Prophet Mohammed, the first four caliphs and Hasan and Hussein, two of the Prophet’s grandsons who are revered as martyrs.

We also went into the Blue Mosque, Istanbul’s most famous landmark. The blue mosque, which takes its name from the mainly blue Iznik tilework decorating its interior, is one of the most famous religious buildings in the world. Serene at any time, it is at its most magical when floodlit at night, its minarets circled by keening seagulls.  Sultan Ahmet I (1603-17) commissioned the mosque during a period of declining Ottoman fortunes, and it was built between 1609-16 by Mehmet Aga, the imperial architect.  The splendor of the plans provoked great hostility at the time, especially because a mosque with six minarets was considered a sacrilegious attempt to rival the architecture of Mecca itself.

Our next stop was the Grand Bazaar, first to eat lunch and then to explore…

They have a website you can check out, with pictures of the restaurant, and the menu:  http://www.havuzlurestaurant.com

The Eyewitness Guide says about the Bazaar: nothing can prepare you for the Grand Bazaar.  (They’re right!)  This labyrinth of streets covered by painted vaults is lined with hundreds of booth-like shops….  The bazaar was established by Mehmet II shortly after his conquest of the city in 1453.  It is easy to get lost in the bazaar in spite of the signposting…. which is why Gamze gave us a tour, stopping by a few of her favourite shops.

Even with a map it was easy to get confused in this place!

Back to the hotel for a drink at the bar, and then we went out for an excellent dinner at a near-by seafood restaurant Gamze recommended called Balikgi Sabahattin.

The next day Gamze was back at 9:30 and off we went to Topkapi Palace, where we spent over 3 hours touring the huge grounds and buildings.  Between 1459 and 1465, shortly after his conquest of the city, Mehmet II built Topkapi Palace as his main residence.  Rather than a single building, it was conceived as a series of pavilions contained by four enormous courtyards, a stone version of the tented encampments from which the nomadic Ottomans had emerged.  Initially the palace served as the seat of government and housed a school in which civil servants and soldiers were trained.  In the 18th century the government was moved to another location, and in 1853 the current sultan, Sultan Abdul Mecit I abandoned Topkapi in favour of Dolmabahce Palace.  In 1924 Topkapi was opened to the public as a museum.  (Side note: in 1964 a movie called Topkapi was released, starring Maximilian Schell and Melina Mercouri, and co-starring Peter Ustinov – a comedy-thriller of 2 thieves out to steal the jewelry-encrusted dagger that is actually on display in the palace treasury; some of the scenes of the movie were filmed on the palace grounds.)

We wandered through the grounds, through the Harem – the labyrinth of rooms where the sultan’s wives and concubines lived – and through the treasury.

After a thorough visit at the palace, we moved on to the Basilica Cistern, (to me perhaps the most amazing and eerily beautiful thing we saw): a vast underground water cistern, a beautiful piece of Byzantine engineering. Although there may have been an earlier, smaller cistern here, this cavernous vault was laid out under Justinian in 532, mainly to satisfy the growing demands of the Great Palace on the other side of the Hippodrome. For a century after the conquest, the Ottomans did not know of the cistern’s existence. It was rediscovered after people were found to be collecting water, and even fish, by lowering buckets through holes in their basements.  Today visitors tread walkways, to the mixed sounds of classical music and dripping water.  The cistern’s roof is held up by 336 columns, each over 8 metres high.  The original structure covered a total area of 9800 square metres, but today only about 2/3 of it is visible, the rest having been bricked up in the 19th century.  Water reached the cistern, which held about 100 million litres, from the Belgrade Forest, 20 km north of Istanbul, via the Valens Aqueduct. 

From here, Gamze taught us how to take the tram, and off we went to the Spice Market area, first to have lunch at Hamdi Restaurant – turkish pizza and the BEST baclava we’ve ever had!

After lunch we wandered through the Spice Market, and bought pistachios, turkish delight and saffron to bring home.  And took lots of pictures – such a picturesque area!

I TOLD you there were great photo opportunities!!

Our final activity for the day was to walk across the Galata Bridge, which spans the mouth of the Golden Horn, a flooded river valley which flows into the Bosphorous.  This bridge is great fun, tightly lined with fishermen on the top level, cafes and bars on the lower level, and affording great views of the city.

We took a taxi from here back to the hotel for our now-customary happy hour and then out for a small bite to eat at a very forgetable restaurant.

On Monday we were on our own, with a challenge from Gamze to “see how well we can manage without our tour guide!”  Well, we managed wonderfully, thank you very much.  😀  After breakfast we made our way towards the tram station, our plan being to get back to the Galata Bridge area, where we could take a boat tour up the Bosphorus.  We were delayed along the way.  As we were walking and talking, a man and woman walking past us stopped us to talk.  The man speaking excellent english asked us where we’re from, and it went from there…. Turns out that though he’s from Istanbul, he lives in Florida, has visited B.C. on a fishing trip, etc, etc.  Of course it turns out he’s in the carpet business.  (See previous note about carpet shops everywhere.)  He’s a wholesaler, he doesn’t have a “shop,” but he does have a place very nearby where we has rooms-full of carpets, and his collegue would be delighted to give us a lesson on what to look for when buying carpets so as not to be taken in by fakes.  He’s on his way to a meeting, but his cousin (the woman with him) can show us the place – there’s no sign on the door because he doesn’t sell to the public – and we can make an appointment to return for our lesson.  (We were a little leery about all of this and had already said we had an engagement and didn’t have time for the lesson right now.)  So, we went with the woman, met the collegue, said we’d be back later.  And off we went to the tram, not sure quite what to make of it all.

Down to the port to buy our tickets for a short boat tour up the Bosphorus.  There are many tours, and you could be on the water for a full day, going right to the Black Sea, but that would be a better trip in warmer weather.  While we had beautiful sunny days in Istanbul, the temperature was cool (between 5 and 8 degrees) and a 1 1/2 hour trip was as much time as we wanted to spend.  It was a picturesque trip, and definitely a little chilly.

This palace is the one I mentioned earlier, which Sultan Abdul Mecit built and moved to (abandoning Topkapi) in 1856, interestingly at a time when the Ottoman Empire was in decline.  It is the only one of the “Top 10 Istanbul Sights” that we didn’t tour.

Don does love his boat pictures!

The Bosphorous bridge was the first bridge to be built across the straits that divide Istanbul.  Construction began in 1970 and finished on 29 October 1973, the 50th anniversary of the inauguration of the Turkish Republic.  It is the world’s 9th longest suspension bridge.

The Fortress is “situated at the narrowest point on teh Bosphorus, and was built by Mehmet II in 1452, as a prelud to his invasion (and subsequent conquest) of Costantinople.”

After the boat trip we needed to eat and warm up, so back to the delicious restaurant from the day before for pizza and that wondrous baclava.  And then we walked, and walked, meandering up winding hills, and through market areas…

past the Suleymaniye Mosque, the largest one in the city, and onto the outer grounds…

back to the street and past the university grounds…

and then found the book bazaar (you knew I’d want to see that!)

Then we went back to the Grand Bazaar to wander the maze, and check out a few products we might want to buy, including a carpet shop, where we chatted with the owner about the kilims, one of the two main kinds of rugs made in Turkey.  We told him we had to think about it, and homeward we went, for happy hour with Hasan, and then back to the first restaurant for mezes (appetizers) and wine.   It was an excellent day on our own, and I bragged about our success to Gamze in an email before we went to bed!!

On Tuesday we were happily anticipating the arrival of my cousin and her husband.  Edith is the daughter of my father’s oldest brother, and she and Leo had visited us several years ago in Whitby.  They retired to the south-west coast of Turkey, where Leo sails most days.  They flew to Istanbul to stay overnight one night at the same hotel and tour with us. They were expected to arrive by noon, so in the morning, after breakfast, we set off to visit the Museum of Turkish and Islamic Arts.  You can’t take any pictures inside, but if you google the museum, I suggest clicking the the google Images and check out the excellent collection, especially their carpet collection.

Back to the hotel to find Edith and Leo just arrived, and their room not quite ready, so we all walked up the street to have a coffee – my first and only Turkish coffee, which is like sludge.  Then, back to the hotel for their check-in, and then off we went to take the tram to the Galata Bridge.  We walked across the bridge, climbed up a steep and winding hill to the Galata Tower, and then up the steep and winding stairs of the tower for a magnificent view of the city.

Back down on the ground, we had a light lunch at a small cafe, and then wandered along the main street of this area of the city, called Istiklal Caddesi (Caddesi means “street”), though it was once known as The Grande Rue de Pera.  The street is lined with stores (chain stores like you can see everywhere in the world now), European embassy buildings, and just off the main street, lots of trendy bars and restaurants.  The street was VERY busy with local people.

We walked the full length of the street to Taksim Square, where stands the 1928 Monument of Independence, which shows Ataturk and the other founding fathers of the modern Turkish Republic.

Then, all the way back down the street, much to Leo’s dismay (and tired feet) to the Pera Palas Hotel for tea.  This “atmospheric period piece” opened in 1892, “mainly to cater for travellers on the Orient Express.”  Famous guests include Agatha Christie (she wrote much of Murder on the Orient Express here), Ernest Hemingway, Alfred Hitchcock, Mata Hari, Greta Gardo… etc.  The lobby is magnificent.

After a reviving cup of tea we wandered some more to find a bar, where we enjoyed a few drinks, and then on to find a restaurant, where we had a fabulous meal.  We took a taxi back to the hotel.

Gamze met us in the morning, after breakfast, for a full day of touring.  We started the day by driving to Eyup, a village area in “greater Istanbul,” a little outside the downtown core.  Eyup is “the burial place of Eyup Ensari, the standard bearer of the prophet Mohammed, and is a place of pilgrimage for Muslims from all over the world. Its sacrosanct status has kept it a peaceful place of contemplation.  The wealthy elite established mosques and street fountains in the village but, above all, they chose Eyup as a place of burial….”  We first visited the Eyup Sultan Mosque.  “Mehmet the Conquerer built the original mosque in 1458, five years after his conquest of Istanbul, in honour of Eyup Ensari.  That building fell into ruins, probably as a result of an earthquake, and the present mosque was completed in 1800 by Selim III.”

Much of it was under renovation, but we wandered through what areas we could.

After visiting the mosque, we climbed the hill of the Eyup Cemetery to the Pierre Loti Cafe that stands at the top of the hill.  The path is lined with tombstones, most dating from the Ottoman era.  The gravestone decorations indicate sex, occupation, rank and number of children.

Pierre Loti was a French navel officer and novelist who frequented this cafe during his stay in 1876, when he supposedly fell in love with a harem girl and wrote an autobiographical novel about their affair.  Regardless of the history of the cafe, it is a delightful spot with a gorgeous view.

We walked back down the hill, returned to the car, and drove to the Fatih, Fener and Balat neighbourhoods.  From the book: “A visit to these neighbourhoods is a reminder that for centuries after the Muslim conquest, Jews and Christians made up around 40 per cent of Istanbul’s population. Balat was home to Greek-speaking Jews from the Byzantine era onwards; Sephardic Jews from Spain joined thme in the 15th century. Fener became a Greek enclave in the early 16th century and many wealthy residents rose to positions of prominence in the Ottoman Empire. Hilltop Fatih is linked to the city’s radical Islamic tradition and you will see far more devout Muslims here than anywhere else in Istanbul. All three areas are residential, their maze of streets the preserve of washing lines and children playing.”

Gamze grew up in the neighbourhood of Fener, so knew the area well.  She took us to see the Church of St. Mary of the Mongols, for which you usually need an appointment, but she knows the caretaker, who would let us in for a small fee.  We parked and Gamze rang the bell for the caretaker, but there was no answer.  She called someone, to be reminded it was market day, and the woman would likely be out for awhile.  We walked the winding, hilly streets for a look at the neighbourhood…

Because the caretaker of the church would likely be away for awhile, we decided to have lunch, and off we drove to a restaurant Gamze knew and liked…

After lunch we went to the largest mosque in the city, the Suleymaniye Mosque, where Don and I had wandered a few days earlier.  This time we went inside.  “Istanbul’s most important mosque is both a tribute to its architect, the great Sinan (the Michaelangelo of Istanbul), and a fitting memorial to its founder, Suleyman the Magnificent.  It was built above the Golden Horn between 1550-57.  Like the city’s other imperial mosques, the Suleymaniye Mosque was not only a place of worship, but also a charitable foundation.  The mosque is surrounded by its former hospital, soup kitchen, schools, and bath house.  This complex provided a welfare system which fed over 1000 of the city’s poor – Muslims, Christians and Jews alike – every day.”

We then went back to Fener to see if the caretaker was back, and she was, so we entered the Church of St. Mary of the Mongols.  “Consecrated in the late 13th century, the Church of St. Mary of the Mongols is the only Greek Orthodox church in Istanbul to have remained continuously in the hands of the Greek community since the Byzantine era. Its immunity from conversion into a mosque was decreed in an order signed by Mehmet the Conqueror. A copy of this is kept by the church to this day. The church gets its name from the woman who founded it, Maria Palaeologina, an illegitimate Byzantine princess who was married off to a Mongol khan.  Upon his assassination, she returned to Constantinople, built this church and lived out her days in it as a nun.”

It was time to say goodbye to my cousins as they had to catch their plane back home.  We dropped them at the bus station to get back to the airport.   It was so wonderful sharing time with Leo and Edith in Istanbul, and next time we will visit them in their home and go sailing!  (And see what the rest of the country has to offer.)

Back to our hotel for a drink in the bar with Hasan, and dinner at a different restaurant on the restaurant street, the Albura Kathisma Cafe, another excellent and highly-recommended spot.  We ate outside, under heat lamps, and chatted with an Australian couple who were eating at this same place every night of their stay in the city, that’s how good the food and service was!

Thursday was carpet-buying day!  We had gone to Turkey with plans to buy a carpet, and took an extra suitcase in which to bring it home.  Leo and Edith had introduced us to the owners of the carpet shop up the street from our hotel, and we started our day there by asking them to teach us about carpets.  They brought us to an upstairs showroom, served us tea, and commenced a lesson on carpets (which are knotted) and kilims (which are flat-woven), the differences between handmade and machine-made carpets, and natural dyes vs. synthetics.  They laid out carpet and kilim after carpet and kilim, looking for our preferences.  The large floor was soon covered and piled with samples, and they were all lovely.  We spent almost three hours there.  And then said we had to think about it, talk it over, thanked them and left.

Our second stop was that little house we’d been taken to a few days back, owned by the fellow we ‘met’ on the street.  We rang the bell, and not-surprisingly, they were delighted to see us.  Again we sat down, again tea was brought, and again we had a lesson on carpets and kilims, knots and weaves, and dyes.  And again, carpet after carpet was piled up in front of us.  Turns out there are approximately 67,000 carpets stored in this ‘little’ house!!

Again, after a few hours of talking and viewing carpets, we said we had to talk it over.  Also, we were starving!  Off we went to the Grand Bazaar, first for lunch and discussion.  With a “plan” in place, we wandered the labyrinth of streets and found our carpet man in the bazaar.  Here we again had tea, but we didn’t have to have the long lesson because we’d already had that from him a few days earlier.  We had decided we really liked a kilim in this shop in the bazaar – naturally dyed, newly made – and so only what was left was the bargaining.  We came to a mutually-accepted price and our 4 foot x 6 foot carpet was folded and packaged up and stuffed into Don’s backpack.   Yes, stuffed into his backpack, because we had also decided to buy a 2nd carpet from the ‘house’ of carpets, and we didn’t want them to know we’d first bought elsewhere!   Back to the house, and agreed on an older carpet we really liked, probably between 80-100 years old, and not very big, about 3 feet x 4 feet.   We love them both, they fit into our suitcase with room to spare (oooh, should’ve bought a third!), and no problem at customs.  Our only problem was the feelings of guilt about not buying from the first shop, where they’d spent so much time with us, so we “snuck home” by a back road so we didn’t have to walk past their shop and fend off enquiries!   And here’s what we bought:

All that carpet buying was exhausting.  We literally spent 8 hours on carpets!!  Definitely time for a glass of wine, or two, with Hasan, and then out for dinner.

Friday was our last day in Istanbul.  Our first stop was the Archaeological Museum, where we spent a few hours, impossible to see everything in one visit.

The Alexander Sarcophagus is a “fabulously” carved marble tomb from the late 4th century BC, thought to have been built for King Abdalonymos of Sidon.  It is called the Alexander Sarcophogus because Alexander the Great is depicted on it winning a victory over the Persians. 

In the Ancient Orient section of the museum, these glazed friezes are the star attraction.  “The monumental glaed brick friezes from Babylon’s main entrance, the Ishtar Gate, date from the reign of Nebuchadnessar II (605-562 BC), when the capital of Babylon experienced its final flowering.”

From the museum we took a taxi to an area along the old city walls, to see the Church of St. Saviour in Chora, also known as the Mosaic Church.  Gamze had wanted to take us here on Wednesday, but it is closed on Wednesdays.   According to the guide book, “some of the very finest Byzantine mosaics and frescoes are found in this church.  Little is known of the early history of the church, although its name, “in Chora,” which means “in the country,” suggests that the church originally stood in a rural setting.  The present church dates from the 11th century.  Between 1315-21 it was remodelled and the mosaics and frescoes added….”   The mosaics were amazing.

From the church we walked, and walked, and walked.  First to lunch, and then to find a small grocery store where we’d been told we could find wine for sale (yes, the wine produced in Turkey is quite fine and we brought home two bottles), and then back to the spice market to buy a few gifts, and then a final trip to the Grand Bazaar for a few gifts.  Oh… and a stop here, because they are almost everywhere in the world,  for a chai latte for me…

Somewhere along the way, we saw these women through the shop window, busy making the teeny-tiniest of some kind of dumpling.  They were stuffing a mixture, probably minced meat, inside dough, and piling them on their tables, and their hands were a whirlwind of activity – pinch meat, enclose in dough with a pinch or two, move on to the next one, and creating each one much faster than it took me to explain.

Back to the hotel to pack, and then to the bar for our last glass of wine with Hasan.

While we’re at the hotel, here are a few more pictures…

And then we went out for our last dinner, back to the very first restaurant again.

We had to be up before 4 a.m. as we left the hotel at 4:15 to get to the airport for our first flight from Istanbul to Frankfurt.  It was a L-O-N-G trip back, even longer than getting there, but the our time in Istanbul was worth it.   Istanbul was cleaner and more organized than we had expected, and the people were some of the friendliest people we’ve encountered in our travels.  The history is like no other city, the food was great, and it was very easy to spend a week.  But, my favourite thing of all was listening to the call to prayer five times a day.  The first one woke us up, of course (though we always went back to sleep), and sometimes we didn’t even hear it, but when we did, it was always mysterious, eerie and beautiful.

Where did the summer go (and autumn, for that matter)… a few highlights… November 16, 2011

Posted by freda in Birmingham, Michigan.
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Yes, (eep), I’m deliquent – summer is long gone, autumn is fast fading, and Don and I are now getting ready for an exciting trip to Istanbul, which means I need to hurry and get a few pictures from this summer posted before it’s time to blog about this new trip.  So, here are the highlights….

First up, at the end of May, we attended Lucas’s graduation ceremony at UBC.  He received  a BFA with honours, in creative writing, and we couldn’t be more proud! 🙂

After the ceremony, Don and I took the available family out for a celebratory dinner.  In attendance, besides the four of us, Don’s mother Elsie and her husband Bill, Don’s sister Janet, her husband Lex, and son Keeghan.   We had a lovely evening and an excellent meal at the Salmon House in North Vancouver.

Unfortunately my mother couldn’t be there because she was in Calgary witnessing my younger niece, Brianna, graduate from high school and give the valedictorian address.  We’re so proud of her, too, and wish we could have been there!

Don and I were back in Vancouver in July – Don for the first two weeks, and I stayed the whole month.  We visited family and friends and enjoyed time with the boys.  We also went to the interior of B.C., to Peachland, where Don’s father and his wife live, and spent a day touring and tasting at a few of the local wineries.

The last day of July was my last day in Vancouver, and also Gay Pride Parade day.  The night before, Lucas held his annual Pre-Pride-Party and I made rainbow jello shots!

The weather was perfect for the parade.

August was busy with weekend events.  On the first weekend we headed to our good friends’ cottage in the Muskoka Lakes, Ontario for a long weekend.  Warren and Maureen were celebrating their 30th wedding anniversary and decided the theme of their party would be “Across the Universe/Beatles/60s.”  Don and I took the theme to heart and became John and Yoko during their Bed-In for Peace:

The second August weekend, we flew to Boston for two nights….  Our first night we were guests of Bobby and Peggy Orr, and Don was able to pay off his lost Stanley Cup bet to Bobby.

Our second night we stayed in a hotel on the Long Wharf in Boston and packed in as much touring as we could in 24 hours.  We walked the Freedom Trail, wandered through Boston Common, went on a Duck tour, had a drink at the Quincy market and a fantastic seafood dinner at one of the Legal Seafood locations.

Highlights along the Freedom Trail walk:

Of course we stopped by the TD Gardens….

and from the Duck tour:

And more walking, first past Trinity Church and the (closed) library, and on to fashionable Newbury Street, where we had lunch at Trident Bookstore and Cafe, because you know I’d have to check out a local bookstore!

All too quickly it was time to head to the airport.  We had a wonderful overview of a lovely city full of history.

The third weekend of August was the famous “Woodward Dream Cruise.”  You can look it up on wikipedia:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woodward_Dream_Cruise  It’s a one-day extravaganza, but all week leading up to the event, the cars are on parade.  Here’s a sampling of  what we saw….

And there you have it, the summer “highlights.”

Next up: Istanbul!!

Reading Challenges June 27, 2011

Posted by freda in Birmingham, Michigan.
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I’ve been meaning to blog about my Reading Challenges for a while now, and then just today (June 27th) I read this article in The Globe and Mail about the very same topic:

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/arts/books/reading-challenges-like-a-triathlon-but-with-books/article2074383/

Read the article first, or read me and then go to the article.

I decided I should put my ‘challenges’ in print, creating a public record, because I think that will cement the deal: I am going to want to complete the reading because I’ve pledged to do so.  (Though, being an avid reader, I guess you know I would most likely complete the challenges, whether I blogged about them or not :))  I first learned about ‘reading challenges’ from a couple of blogs by avid readers that I somehow started following (who knows where the links begin and end..), and as I’ve always loved reading books about books, following readers’ blogs seems a natural extension of that.  Besides, you can get all kinds of great recommendations that way – books you’d never have heard of otherwise.   One  blogger was participating in a few interesting challenges and I decided (once I checked out the details) they would be fun to try.  In telling Barb (avid reader friend living in Windsor) about them, she decided to join me, and then we could discuss what we were reading, as well, which always increases book enjoyment.  I decided I wasn’t going to ‘officially’ sign up for these challenges (which is encouraged), and because of that, I can not ‘officially’ display on my blog the reading challenge logos, though I can obviously tell you the names of the challenges.   In addition, Barb and I decided we wanted to read all of this year’s short-listed Orange Prize nominees, so we’ve made that our own personal ‘challenge.’  And of course I’m in a book club here in Michigan, as well as participating-from-afar in my Ontario book club (we are just about to celebrate our 20th anniversary of being a book club!!), which you could consider a version of a reading challenge, so I’m going to list those books here, too.

Here, therefore, is my ‘planned’ reading for 2011, and if I’ve read the book already, I’ve included that detail (I will edit the list to tell you when I’ve completed the other so-far-unread books:

Michigan Book Club reading list:

The Cellist of Sarajevo by Steven Galloway – read in January
Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet – Jamie Ford – read in February
The Lotus Eaters – Tatjana Soli – read in March
The Good Earth – Pearl S. Buck – read in May
The Shadow of the Wind – Carlos Ruiz Zafon – read in June
Cutting for Stone – Abraham Verghase – read in Sept 2011
One Thousand White Women: The Journals of May Dodd – Jim Fergus – read in Oct 2011
The Camel Bookmobile – Masha Hamilton – read in Oct 2011

Ontario “Third Thursday” Book Club reading list:

The Secret Daughter – Shilpi Gowda – read in January
The Secret River – Kate Grenville – I didn’t read this again as I’d read it a few years ago
The Englishman’s Boy – Guy Vanderhaeghe (haven’t read it yet, but I will…) – read (finally) in Oct 2012
The Promise of Rain – Donna Milner – read in April
Cool Water – Dianne Warren – read in May
Little Bee – Chris Cleave – read in June
The Help – Kathryn Stockett – read in Aug 2011
The Other Wes Moore – Wes Moore – read in Sept 2011
Moll Flanders – Daniel Defoe – not read

Orange Prize Short List:

Room – Emma Donaghue – read in January
The Memory of Love – Aminata Forna – read Dec 2011
Grace Williams Says It Loud – Emma Henderson – read Nov 2011
The Tiger’s Wife – Tea Orbrecht – read Nov 2011
Annabel – Kathleen Winter – read in June
Great House – Nicole Krauss – not read

What’s In A Name 4 Reading Challenge:

Here I’m going to first list the challenge category descriptions, then the book I’ve picked to fit the category, and then when I’ve read it….

1. Book with a number in the title: Sizzling Sixteen – by Janet Evanovich – read in June
2. Book with jewelry or gem in the title: The Silver Swan – Benjamin Black – read in Nov 2011
3. book with size in the title: Little Bee – Chris Cleave – read in June (hope you don’t think it’s cheating that I’ve used a book  I read for book club here!)
4. book with travel or movement in the title: Lost on Planet China – Maarten Troost – read in May
5. book with evil in the title: Evil Genius – Catherine Jinks – not read
6. book with life stage in the title: Secret Daughter – Shilpi Gowda – read in January (again, book club book used twice)

Criminal Plots Reading Challenge:

1. Book by a new-to-me author who’s blurbed a book I enjoyed: (thought I had one, but what I picked was a new-to-me author who had been blurbed by an author I like, so that’s wrong… so, still looking for a book in this category… if you have ideas, let me know..)
2. Book made into a movie: The Feather Men – Ranulph Fiennes (movie in production)
3. Book with protagonist that is opposite to me: Motor City Blue – Loren D. Estleman – read in February (I’ve read so many mysteries with male protagonists)
4. Book set outside country in which I live: Random Violence (it takes place in S. Africa) – Jassy Mackenzie
5. Book that is first in a new-to-me series: Her Royal Spyness – Rhys Bowen – read in July
6. Book by 2011 debut author: Before I Go To Sleep – S. J. Watson – read August 2011

And that’s it.  As I mentioned, I’ll update this post whenever I read another book in any of the challenges.   And I’ll continue to list books as I read them on the little side bar to this blog, because of course I’m reading books other than required for these reading challenges.  I’m also thinking I should add a rating system (my rating out of 5 stars) to that side bar list, but I’m not sure how to go about that yet, so we’ll see.

This blog was inspired by that newspaper article I read today, but I will now get back to working on my blog post about my trip to Shanghai in May.  It should be done by the end of the week.  Cheers!

Happy year of the Rabbit February 18, 2011

Posted by freda in Birmingham, Michigan.
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Well, actually, Happy belated year of the Rabbit!!  Yesterday was the Lantern Festival, which signals the end of the Chinese New Year celebrations.  But, better late than never, right?!?  I wish all of you a wonderful year.  🙂

I am sadly behind in blogging.  January turned out to be rather a full month, and I’ve been “frittering-and-wasting the hours of the days in various and sundry offhand ways” (to paraphrase the great Pink Floyd song, Time) during these weeks of February.  I promise to get back to it, with a post about my trip with Lucas to NYC for 6 days in January coming to you shortly.   Until then, a few statistics …  At the beginning of the New Year (our New Year, that is), I received an email from wordpress, the site which houses my blog, to tell me how well I’m doing with my blog.  They tell me my blog was viewed 1400 times in the last year; I wrote 20 new posts; I uploaded 773 pictures; and the most popular post was the one entitled “Kindergarten – Keeping Warm – Fish – Mahjong.”   They also tell me the “about” page of my blog was the second most popular – which makes me feel bad, since I haven’t put any information there.  So, I promise to revise that this year.

New to my blog, some of you may already have noticed, is a side bar that lists the books I’ve read, as I read them.   I’ve listed all the books starting in January 2010, since that’s when I, effectively, started this blog.  As I finish a book, I will post the title and author.  A caveat, though: I’m just listing the books I read – a record for me, a reference for you – but not saying if I thought they were worth reading, or not.  If you’re interested in what I thought about a particular book, send me an email.

I’ll be back soon with pictures from New York City.   Until then, keep warm.