Posts Tagged by Places
The Georgian Hotel
| November 25, 2009 | Filled under Photo Album |
This is where I’m staying in L.A. (well, Santa Monica) right now. Built in 1933. Walking distance from everything. Right across from the beach. In short, AWESOME.
More tales from the Wall
| November 10, 2009 | Filled under Internerd |
Der Spiegel has an excellent account of the events of the Berlin Wall’s destruction.
The wall comes tumbling down
| November 9, 2009 | Filled under Blog, Photo Album |
A year ago I met CLH in Germany and proceeded to spend five days and four nights in Berlin, a city I knew nothing about and was only minutely interested in. It ended up being one of my favorite places in the world.
I wish I could say I remember watching The Wall fall on television but the truth is that I’ve seen those images so many times I have a hard time distinguishing from what is remembered and what is filling in the gaps. But I was nine years old, and the fall would be an event that would go on to shape the rest of my childhood, it shaped everyone who grew up in the ’80s childhood, and that still affects me today.
Berlin is an amazing city that has had the chance, over the last 20 years, to create it’s own identity from scratch. I would love to live there. I wish I was there now.
Malm whale
| August 19, 2009 | Filled under Blog |
Post-lunch, I googled the Malm whale, the world’s only stuffed blue whale.
It stranded an unfortunate afternoon back in 1865. You had that civil war thing going on, we had eternal cold and famine. A stuffed whale was big news. Especially since the whale was eventually touched by the gifted hands of interior decorators, spiffing up the whale interior with wall papper and a little cafe.Little did the stuffers know that a long dead whale cafe can be a turn on to some people. The cafe was shut down after an amorous couple got caught going at it inside the whale.
You think I’m making this up?
I saw this, at the Naturhistoriska Museet in Goteborg, Sweden, last weekend. If the Houston Museum of Natural Science is a modern technicolor wonder, the Goteborg Natural History Museum is a homage to the Victorian era and bad (or primitive) taxidermy skills. The room with the whale (which also had a narwhal skeleton!) smelled like decomposition. Many of the rest of the animals, mounted over 100 years ago, had shrunk so badly on their frames that they had wicked smiles and grimaces. In short, it was awesome.
The museum also has a curio cabinet featuring a set of (human) Siamese twins in a pickle jar. I’m telling you this so you can get a feel for the place.
Room 396
| August 9, 2009 | Filled under Blog |
For our kronor, this inn has more old-fashioned charm and authentic character than any other hotel in town. The third-oldest hotel in Gothenburg was built in 1859, predating the Swedish use of the word to describe a building with rooms for travelers. Many emigrants to the New World spent their last night in the old country at the Hotel Eggers, ad during World War II, the Germans and the Allies met here for secret negotiations. Today it’s just as good as or better than ever, with stained-glass windows, ornate staircases, wood paneling, and a distinct sense of history. (If you ask, one of the older staff members here will discuss the role of the hotel as a trysting spot, many decades ago, for Prince Albert, a member os Sweden’s Royal Family, and his long-time (the-secret) companion, Lillian.) — Frommer’s Scandinavia
CLH booked this hotel because it is within walking distance to his offices here. It’s also right smack in the middle of Drottningtorget Square, next to the train station and a major tram intersection. Outside I have heard football fans singing all day long, the squeal of tram brakes on the cobblestoned rails, the intermittent splatter of rain.
My room key is a real key, not a plastic card with a magnetic stripe. It is attached to a heavy keychain, metal, like a fancy nametag, with the room number in the slot where the name should be. The spiral staircase is covered with red paisley carpet. The hallways are decorated with old photographs showing the square in simpler times, with horse-drawn carriages and much fewer buildings. My comforter and pillow are both stuffed with down.
Things I learned about Gothenburg on my flight: in addition to being the birthplace of Hasselblad, it is also the home of Volvo. Locals call it “the biggest small town in Sweden.”
Also, did you know that Pippi Longstocking was a Swedish invention?
Meatballs!
| August 7, 2009 | Filled under Blog, Photo Album |
I am headed to Gothenburg, the home of Hasselblad, tomorrow. I know nothing about Sweden (I have never been there) except Ikea and meatballs. Gothenburg is supposed to have the highest student population in all of Europe though, so I am looking forward to wandering its canal-lined streets.
I discovered Tacita Dean in Norway and Seydou Keita in London. I wonder what I’ll discover on this trip.
Photo by Yvan Rodic, a.k.a. The FaceHunter.
Seydou Keita
| August 5, 2009 | Filled under Internerd, Photo Album |
Last fall, when CLH and I were traveling through Europe, we visited the Tate Modern in London. Eight years before, when I was in London studying abroad, the Tate Modern had it’s grand opening on the week of my birthday. I had always wanted to take CLH there.
We saw lots of exhibitions of modern arts from famous painters (Mondrian is always a favorite) and we rented these crazy iPod-like AV devices that go into so much detail it would be impossible to tour the whole museum in a single day.
But the exhibit that stuck with me most was the photography of Seydou Keita. Keita photographed ordinary Malians, his own neighbors, who would come to them in their finest clothes and with their favorite props. Sunglasses, hats, musical instruments, jewelry and other notions of wealth factor heavily in the charm of the images. Usually Keita just posed his subjects in from of a sheet of fabric, sometimes ornate woven weavings, other times a simple white cloth. It was street photography before there were streets to photograph.
Here is an interview with him and here is a NYT audio slideshow about him that is very, very worth listening to.
Singin’ fa fa fa fa fa fa
| July 9, 2009 | Filled under Blog, Video |
Falling in love all over again with the Stax/Volt catalog after re-watching the Stax/Volt Revue from 1967, filmed in Norway. We bought the DVD on our trip to Memphis last year. BTW, the Stax Museum is one of the best museums I’ve ever visited, literally.
The Wikipedia page for Otis Redding is full of delicious nuggets I never knew before.
- Redding was only 26 when he died
- Bob Dylan wrote the song Just Like A Woman with Otis in mind to sing it
- (Sittin’ On) The Dock of the Bay was recorded only three days before Redding’s death. Redding considered the song unfinished, having whistled the tune of one verse for which he intended to compose lyrics later
- Barry Gibb has stated in numerous interviews that the song To Love Somebody was written for Otis Redding, who died before he was able to record it
The Stax/Volt Revue is viewable on Youtube in six parts, but some performances on my DVD are missing from the Youtube version.
Intoxicated
| July 8, 2009 | Filled under Photo Album, Video |
These are my friends The Intoxicators. I met them last year at Hukilau and they are the most rockin-est group of fine Southern gentlemen you ever will meet. I was super excited to see them play again at Hukilau 2009, especially in the mysterious Polynesia darkness of the Mai Kai…
Picture courtesy KoiTiki
Food that moves
| June 6, 2009 | Filled under Shorts |
I’m on my annual vacation to Florida, and it’s rained every day since we’ve been here. Next weekend, Hukilau weekend, should be nicer, and I’m looking forward to seeing friends old and new, including a few I’ve never met in real life before. I’m volunteering on Thursday at the Bahia Cabana check-in, so if you’re gonna be there stop by and see me.
I got another freelance gig. My first post at The Daily Fork is about all the weird food I ate while living in Korea. It includes the video of CLH eating live octopus.
