The administrator of NaBloPoMo encourages “wordless weekends” to help ease the burden of posting daily. So in that vein (O.K. so not totally wordless) here is my post of artwork by Annie.
The first 2 shots are during an annual event called Long Night at the Museum, where about 50 local museums are open from 7:00 p.m. to about 2:00 a.m. Entry is free and there are lots of children’s activities. Our favourite was outside the main Tiroler Landesmuseum Ferdinandeum, where they allowed children to paint large canvasses and then displayed them.
Annie's final creation
The rest of the images are Annie photographic originals, either taken with her toy camera or with my not-so-toy camera.
(I had to look it up to make sure I was spelling “Best-laid” properly. It looks weird.)
There are lots of advantages to being self-employed. Both Markus and I have worked as employees and as our own bosses. Markus, in particular, seems to be much happier when he isn’t answering to someone else, whereas I can see the advantages of a contained job description that comes from working for someone else’s company. (Because when you work for yourself in a small business, your job is “everything that needs to be done at all times”.)
Markus has been working 6 days a week, almost every week, for the past 3 months. Today he had structured the work schedule to have tonight off. His friend from Canada, Mara, and her son, Julian, are here for one night on a stop-over during a European trip. We invited some local friends over to have dinner with us as well. So you can see where this is going……..
Due to a problem with staff, Markus had to jump in and work tonight. We canceled the Innsbruck friends, I’m picking up Mara and Julian at the train station and then we are going to go to visit with Markus at the cafe. I’m sure it will still be nice, just different than planned.
I’ve always been someone who is good at embracing change on the big scale, but have difficulty being flexible on the fly. (Unless plans are completely canceled and I get to stay home and do my own thing; I’m almost always up for that.) I guess life never fails to give us the opportunity to learn the things we need to learn. Sigh.
Yesterday was the first session of a writers group here in Innsbruck for native English speakers. It was really interesting!
One of the members who is friends with the teacher offered her home, blood-orange tea and a big pot of soup. It was a comfortable, warm environment perfect for getting creative.
Linda, the teacher, is a retired professor from the American Studies program at the University of Innsbruck. She believes that writing is about accessing deep within yourself to discover interesting and charged energy. Totally non-linear, so right up my alley of course. We started with a relaxation exercise and then memory recollection. She took us through exercises to draw out works and emotions, and then made us do “free” writing where you set a time limit and are not allowed to stop writing. No editing, reading what you wrote, picking up your pen, lifting your head.
It was a frustrating and also weird experience at times, but overall I can see where it is going and think that some good writing can come out of this process. We’ll see over time.We are meeting once a month, and as the group is only going to be about 7 people, there should be lots of great writing, reading of work and discussion.
As well, this Sunday I’m going to see what the local International Choir is all about. Just really pushing my creative boundaries!! Although if I don’t start channeling and seriously focusing some of that energy, my 60+ Christmas cards are never going to get out the door in time for the holidays. Wish me luck.
O.K., this is going to be what I imagine is not the last of the lame posts this NaBloPoMo. A creative writing professor at the University is holding a series of classes for native English speakers. I just found out yesterday that it was tonight, and the day was already quite booked.
So, I’m running out the door with a pen and notebook in hand, hoping to learn something and be motivated to write more. And meet more English speakers. (I’m feeling very defeated by German lately and not particularly encouraged to widen my circle of locals.)
Hopefully tomorrow will be something more interesting. But hey, day four and still going.
I’ve had a blog post request. For bread. Good friends Ryan and Renate will be making it three years in a row by celebrating New Year’s in Innsbruck with us again this December 31st. It is so special for Markus and I. (And Annie has fun with them too, of course.)
Ryan and Renata work very, very hard, living in Victoria and flying to Winnipeg to work on a contract every week. Every week! One of the upsides to this, though, is airmiles. So they travel. And this year they are off to Kenya with stops in Switzerland and then Innsbruck. (Markus and I are hoping to join them in Montreux if we can work it out with the cafe and Annie.)
When Ryan read that I was posting every day, he must have been thinking about his upcoming visit because his request was for a post about bread. Because really, the bread here is something to look forward to. It is fantastic. And it is everywhere. I’ve found good bread in Victoria and Winnipeg and London (Wildfire, Tall Grass Prairie and the Portuguese Bakery respectively), but you have to look for it and sometimes go out of your way for it. Bread here is very important and very available. There are bakeries every few blocks. (They are like 7-Elevens in Winnipeg.) Even in the airport they have mini-ovens so that the bread can come out fresh for the tired travelers. It matters here. (I’ve never heard an Austrian talk about a low-carb diet.) This isn’t true everywhere in Europe either. Italy, home of fantastic food, serves mostly white bread. Tasty, but white.
When Ryan and Renata come, they slip out to the bakery every morning and pick up a warm loaf. One of Ryan’s favourites is a sunflower bread called Sonnenkraftbrot (sun-strength bread). It has a chewy crust and a soft but dense center.
Sonnenkraftbrot
We’ve also tried, and like, potato bread, walnut bread and even the Bauernbrot (farmer’s bread) is great with cheese and cold cuts.
Although I’ve branched out more lately, the first year I was here I was addicted to Wurzelbrot (“root bread” because of the shape), which I guess technically is a white bread but tastes so lovely. And it even tastes great toasted the next day, as bakery-fresh bread here does not stay fresh very long. No preservatives.
Wurzelbrot
Often times Austrians (including this little family) will have a simple dinner of good bread, cheese, and cold cuts. Delicious.
So we are looking forward to your visit Ryan and Renata. Your bread awaits.
Instead I saw this: “What is more important: peace or freedom?” This is a question that nations have been founded on and millions of words have been written discussing this topic. It is also a topic that I consider much more American than Canadian for some reason.
So what can I say about it in a short blog post? Well, that I am deeply, vastly grateful, that I have never been in a position in my life where I have had to chose, to give up one for the other. Because as left wing and peace-loving as I am, if I had to live in a world where I wasn’t basically free to wear or say or write what I wanted, I wouldn’t value my life very much anymore. For me, just being alive isn’t enough.
Of course, there isn’t such a thing as total freedom, and more than of course, even if I say or do or wear what I want, it isn’t consequence free. But I get to examine those consequences before I take action and mostly decide for myself if I can live with them. I’ve met and studied with people who have lost literally everything because they weren’t so lucky to be born in a country that values freedom. So I feel closer to this subject than I did a few years ago.
And still I have no idea what I would do if I was faced with the direct choice of peace or freedom. Could I kill someone else to keep my freedom? Or my family’s freedom? Would I risk my life or the life of my children to fight oppression? I now have people in my family history who fought for Hitler and who fought against Hitler. I have voted for people who had to make the choice between peace or freedom…or at least between peace or war. And they believed freedom was at stake, and maybe it was. I’ll never know. It is all so not black and white to me.
It certainly could be argued that I’m just passing on the decision, the choice, the battle to someone else. And that is probably correct.
So I am just going to thank every God imagined that I have been blessed with a peaceful life in a free society. And pray that Annie is given the same gift in her life. It is perhaps the greatest gift of all.
My friend, Maria, lives in Antwerp and plans to take her daughter back home to Canada to celebrate a real Halloween some year. I’m imagining her daughter (and Annie) discovering at an older age that there is this place where you are allowed to dress up, walk house to house and then people give you a pillowcase full of candy. It is going to seem like Nirvana.
In the meantime, we do the best we can.
For our Halloween there was pumpkin carving…
And dressing up in costumes…
And the traditional Halloween donkey ride…??
The restaurant where we met, Nattererboden, is a favourite for parties as it is quite rural (although only 15 minutes from town) and has an outdoor playground, indoor play area, petting zoo and occasionally the donky riding. All in a large traditional restaurant setting with fantastic food. (I know I’ve questioned this before, and I know there are exceptions, but why do restaurateurs in Canada so often think that “family-friendly” means lots of plastic furniture and processed food??)
The kids played in the playground despite it being rather crisp outside, carved pumpkins, made Halloween baskets from a pattern I found on a craft site, and ate candy. The trick or treating aspect wasn’t there, but the kids still had fun.
There are oodles of fun events throughout the winter in Austria, but I’m still glad I’m introducing Annie to my childhood traditions. I’m going with the belief that Annie will be an international child, instead of just confused. And of course for my girl, anything where there is sugar involved is a great event.
Well, I’m going to try, again, to post every day in November for NaBloPoMo (National Blog Posting Month.) I’m needing more structure in my life, so thought I could manufacture a bit through this system. I have a feeling these daily posts will be short, but as good friend Sue says…it’s MY blog!
It was a busy week this week so yesterday I ended up conking out when I put Annie to bed. I actually started to get sleepy while reading to her, so she turned on the bedside lamp and read to herself (and me) while I nodded off. That child can be so independent already. So here I am at 5 in the morning (which is actually 4 in the morning due to daylight savings time) wide awake and ready to go.
The grand opening of the square in front of the cafe on Tuesday went well. I was there for 13 hours helping out but that was nothing compared to Markus who ran around working and organizing from 8:00 a.m. to 1:00 a.m. We were very worried about the weather, as the day before we had quite a bit of snow in Innsbruck. But the sun came out in the afternoon and, although cold, a few thousand people did show up. And most importantly many people came into the cafe who didn’t realize that it was there. Hopefully that will help business over the next few weeks.
Today a few expat families are forcing a Halloween celebration in this land where it doesn’t exist. We are meeting at a restaurant and carving some pumpkins and, most importantly, letting the kids dress up in costumes. Annie is pretty excited, as she wasn’t going to be allowed to wear the Ariel mermaid costume Mom brought her until Fasching, which is next February. When I told her it was only one sleep until she was able to dress up in it, there was a very big smile.
I’ll post some pictures tomorrow for your enjoyment…and so that I have a topic for Day 1 of NaBloPoMo!
Mom was here for a wonderful three week visit! This trip Mom and I decided to travel on our own for a couple of days and explore Venice. Neither of us had ever been there, and as it is only a 5-hour train ride from Innsbruck, it seemed like a great idea.
And was it ever! Venice is nothing like anywhere else I have been in the world. We had a spectacular time and can’t believe we packed so much into two days.
After the train arrived we walked through the station direct to the Grand Canal, which is the main water artery that snakes through Venice feeding into the smaller canals throughout the city. Here were our first visuals:
We managed to hop onto the correct ferry and made our way to the stop nearest our hotel.
Here you can see the ferry that is Venice's main transportation
Most of the sidewalks are narrow and windy, (does one call them “streets” if it is a city without cars?) but luckily we had a good map and a fairly straight-forward route to our hotel. The family-run hotel we had booked over the Internet worked out well. (Thank you Trip Advisor guest reviews!) I think due to our very last-minute booking, we were upgraded to an apartment that was in another building overlooking the canal. We didn’t spend much time in our spacious room, but it was fun to peer down on the gondolas and wake up in the morning to the chatter of boat operators as they hauled luggage and laundry and groceries throughout the city.
Love the high arched bridgesGondola passing under our windowIt amazes me that all of the necessary business of a bustling city is accomplished on these narrow waterways
As we were in the city for exactly 48 hours, we spent our first lunch going through brochures to plan our itinerary. Mom and I thankfully were completely of the same mind in terms of what we wanted to see and do. Touristy gondola ride? Absolutely! World famous cathedral? Only if we have time. (We have both been lucky enough in our lives to already have toured about 8 zillion historical churches and cathedrals.)
So after a walk through the main tourist plaza, St. Mark’s, we took a 30-min gondola ride. It was fantastic. The gondoliers are all male, dressed as you would expect in striped shirts, and exceptionally skilled. They can pass within millimeters of another boat or a wall without hitting anything.
Mom and I in head out in a 6-person gondolaView from the waterCreative marketing to the tourists floating by
From the gondola it is apparent how dilapidated the outside of the buildings are, wearing away from the constant movement of the water. It must be a huge adventure to even paint these buildings, never mind repair them.
We had been traveling since 5 a.m. (in order to take the more direct train), so after our ride we poked around the shops, had dinner and returned to our room.
The central city of Venice has a population of 60,000 people and I would guess 98.7% of them are affected in some way by tourism. I almost exclusively heard English during our stay here. Even our first night of meals in the touristy area was merely O.K., which surprised me because I’ve been to highway stops in Italy that produced tasty pasta and pizza. I guess when you know almost no-one is returning, you don’t try very hard.
I kept trying to image what this amazing place must have been like 150 years ago…or 500 years ago for that matter. A major center for trade and commerce and culture, filled with the riches of the world. A harsh life too at times, no doubt, subject to the weather in unique and challenging ways.
Our second day’s planned walking tour was flooded out. We were very lucky in that the day before we came there was over a meter of water covering the square. We just had a fairly shallow layer that only lasted until noon. There are table-like pathways set up to get through the plaza, staff wear rubber boots and some brave tourists even take their shoes off and wade through the murky water.
Waiting in line to see the BasilicaWaiters in tuxes and waders
Instead of our tour we spent a couple of hours taking the audio tour of the Doge’s Palace, which we were very impressed with. The Gothic architecture is awe-inspiring and the artwork is brilliant. Our only problem was as we were ready to leave, I took a wrong turn and we was sucked down into the labyrinth of prison cells that span the cellars of the building. A bit disturbing. My photos weren’t great of the Palace, so here are a few images from the official website:
This room was full of historic globes and mapsCourtyard
After a tasty pizza lunch we walked towards another area of the city where the Accedamia is located. The museum itself wasn’t our favourite, although of course interesting, as it housed almost exclusively large religious paintings. We were, however, happy to see a bit more of a residential area of the city with school children and babies in strollers walking by.
Then more shopping, buying Murano glass jewelry and embroidered linen, two things Venice is famous for. The next time I go back I’m going to take a tour of the Murano glass factory. I’m sure I’ll find it fascinating.
Before dinner we went up the bell tower in St. Mark’s Square, which at the time I thought was too expensive and something we probably could have passed on. However, now that I’m home I’m happy to have the pictures of the spectacular view.
Bell tower
All that and not a single car!Beautiful panoramaOne of the Venitian Islands
After a rest at the hotel we found a very tasty restaurant to make up for the night before and then talked and walked down by the water. Beautiful with all the lights.
Friday morning we didn’t leave until noon, so we actually decided to check out St. Mark’s Basilica and I’m sure glad we did! It, like so much else in Venice, was different than anything I’ve seen. There is tile everywhere and the religious depictions are all made from mosaic glass. Stunningly beautiful.
Then back on the train through the pretty Italian countryside and home to recover from our adventure. What a great time! And Mom and I travelled really well together, which is important since we are hoping to spend a week in Scotland to check out our family roots sometime in the next year.
For all the ups and downs of the last two years, I won’t ever regret this time living in Europe because of the travelling I’ve done. I feel blessed and enlightened and a better person for it. And I also know that even if we return to Canada, I’ll be brave enough to keep experiencing more of the world and be able to show it off to Annie as she gets older. And that is a real gift.
It was a rainy/overcast day on Sunday, and we seemed to just meld into the mood and had a very laid-back time. (This was probably a good thing, as two days later I was still recovering from my night out dancing, where I arrived home at 4:30. In the morning. I haven’t seen that side of 4:30 in, hmmmm, decades?)
We all cleaned and tided up the house and then Annie watched some TV while Markus and I tapped away on our computers and napped. Someone recommended a fun website to learn letters, so Annie and I spent some time with that as well.
In the afternoon the rain stopped so we hopped in the car and drove to Hall. Hall is a little town about 15 minutes away from where we live. It has a lovely old city center, which has been building up since the 1300’s. We walked around a bit until Annie pulled us emphatically to one of our favourite pizza places, Geisterberg. It is a really charming restaurant with thick walls and beamed ceiling. One of the things I love about this part of the world is that there are several “family friendly” restaurant that don’t sacrifice atmosphere to the children. Annie gets her own menu with a Memory game, which we play for a few rounds, and then she can go to the second floor where there is a small but well-equipped play room. Markus and I sit at the front of the restaurant to see if she comes down the stairs, but otherwise can enjoy at least half an hour of uninterrupted adult time. Plus the pizza is super.
We drove around a bit on the way home and then the evening was more of the same. I’m so glad that Markus has decided to keep the cafe closed on Sundays. Whether we have grand plans or a quiet day, it is so wonderful to know that we have this time together each week as a family.
