Studio l'italiano!

Dear You,
I did it - for the fourth week now each Monday evening you find me sitting on one of the dwarf-chairs of an Italian-German primary school in Berlin, trying to "parlare - parlo, parlai, parla" in that beautiful language, Italian.
I have to confess that I always looked with a sort of prejudice at women who started to learn Italian when advancing in life and years - those that I know were always at the shady side of forty
(hopefully reading books like "The Tao of Turning Fifty" or "Younger by the Day" - the latter an excellent book by the way, written by Victoria Moran). They were always members of a posh tennis or golf club, flirting somehow desperately with their coaches (insegnante for tennis or Italian - it was the same to them - only young he had to be, and beautiful).
Of course now, when I signed in at the Italian cultural institute, one of my acquaintances thought it illuminating and helpful to remind me of my beautiful Italian massage therapist.
'Innocent until proven guilty' will hopefully apply to me, too (and by the way: he speaks German, so why bother?)
Why bother indeed? 
(It is not that I have a trauma as the photo above might indicate, taken at one of my youthful stays in Italy, entitled : "All dressed up and nowhere to go" - in German we say "booked and unclaimed", which doesn't sound better). 

My reasons: 
- I love the language
- I want to train my brain, yep
- maybe we will at one stage of our life live in Munich, and then Italy is oh so near
- I want to read Fruttero & Lucentini in Italian

Those of you who know my deep passion for E.F.Benson might fear of having a "déjà-vu", entering my salotto:

'Georgie found Britta Lucia very full of talk that day at luncheon, and was markedly more Italian than usual. Indeed she put down an Italian grammar when he entered the drawing room, and covered it up with the essays of Antonio Caporelli. (...) 
"Ben arrivato, Georgio," she said. "Ho finito il libro di Antonio Caporelli quanto momento. E magnifico!" 
Georgi thought that she had finished it long ago, but perhaps he was mistaken. The sentence flew off Lucia's tongue as if it was perched there all quite ready. 
"Sono un poco fatigata dopo il - dear me how rusty I am getting in Italian, for I can't remember the word," she went on. 
(from: Make Way For Lucia)  

If you think, as many of my friends do, that it must be EASY- PEASY for me to learn Italian, because I'm quite fit in French, and less fit in Latin, and know those beautiful English words that have Latin roots, you are wrong. It isn't.
Take the word: "to repeat". In French: répéter. In Italian: ripetere.
See it at one glance? "ripetere" - but the French é instead of the Italian i is not easily erased from my mind.
But though I have to cram hard, it is fun - our (female!) teacher is an Italian who writes her dissertation on Kierkegaard here at Berlin's university, and she and my classmates are very interesting and funny.

Excuse me, Mr. Wordsworth - today it's Albert Bridge.

I do love bridges oh so much - and when I am in London I have the chance to really indulge myself. And always - always! - I walk over this bridge. Of course that means a lot of walking - but who will complain on a day like this?

Will you join me? You are welcome! And don't be a coward when you see this sign: all that walking has kept us fit and slim.

And the beautiful painted bridge pillars look quite solid to me.

But of course I must ask you to put your sneakers on, as so many of you want to march across my absolute favourite bridge. Ah, and please remember: break step!

 Glorius sight!

 I LOVE when engineers start to become poetic! (I once even loved... - but that's another history).

 So this is Albert Bridge. (A German friend of mine thought it necessary to correct my pronunciation of "Albert" - there are two versions, I know - but as my dear late father's name was Albert, too, I pronounce him with the German accent, and 'Albert Bridge' stubbornly with an English accent - correct or not. ..)

You feel a bit tired? Oh no - just think of what I plan to do with you in my next post - we'll walk through Battersea Park, Oh yes, we'll do... 

What does a blogger think about?

Dear You, 

I was so glad that the little exhibition about my very beloved illustrator, Quentin Blake, was still there when I arrived in London. (If you never have: please read "The Hermit and the Bear" by John Yeoman, illustrated by Quentin Blake; hilarious and wise - only second-hand available).  

You see one of his other drawings above: "What does an Illustrator think about?" 

Good question. Leading me to another one: 

What does a blogger think about? 

At the moment I am thinking hard. 

See: I was only 12 days in England - but took 1292 photos. For me: interesting. For you: maybe not. So I have to choose wisely if I do not want to lose you. Or hear deafeningly snoring. Skip our trip to Newbury and Hungerford. 

Skip photos of my solo travel to London: for example the beautiful huge soap bubbles over the Thames. Glorious architecture. Interesting people I met. And will give you only a few photos and short texts in small doses (reaching the Zen-cherished 'present moment' assumingly in 2017, hahaha). Will skip interesting exhibitions I visited ("Virginia Woolf: Art, Life and Vision", "Horst: Photographer of Style", "Bond in Motion" --ah, those beautiful cars!! -  only to name a few). I even stop now reciting the many, many events I've seen (whizzing through London like a bee) - though in my next blog I will show a few.

See: as a blogger I think that it is very difficult to keep the golden mean. 

(I have a learned Facebook friend who complained bitterly that not everybody was constantly 'liking' his texts - completely forgetting that HE never ever likes texts of other people (or were it just mine?) - however, as I quoted to husband LK 6:41; NIV (you know: about the speck of sawdust and the plank in one's own eye) it gave husband the chance to pour some Latin over me in form of "Do ut des". Think I digress? Oh no: if I don't comment your blogs, sweetie, you will - after a short while, I don't have illusions about human nature - rightly stop to comment mine - which heaven forbid, I would miss you! So I read a lot of very interesting posts. Do it with pleasure. But - as I said somewhat complaingly to my new fitness trainer, who named many wonderful exercises I could add to my extensive routine: "Sir, I have a life beside the fitness room!" (He looked interested...)

Will say: 

- a blog mustn't be too long - you, my dear followers also have a vivid life of your own, and work hard, panting to comment on oh so many interesting blogs 

- of course I could write every day - but ... see above... 

So I will not slay you with texts and photos. 

Maybe we both will feel like that, then (Quentin again): 

"Why You Need to Brag More...",

...and 3 Ways to Do It" is the title of a recent article by Peggy Drexler, Ph.D.

I know more than three ways, and entirely without the help of a Ph.D. -
After reading year after year the hymn of praise on my modesty in my school reports (believe it or not!) at the working place I woke up, decided not to be overlooked anymore and trained myself hard to change - with success.
(Nowadays I am trying to become mellow and modest again).
Will you think it is bragging when I show you of a link at The Londonist:

http://londonist.com/2014/09/surprising-photos-of-st-pauls-revealed.php

and then murmur under my breath: "I love the two photos I shot from St. Paul's this year, - may I add them?"

PS: The title of Drexler's article reminds me of the (still) hilarious first film I ever (!) saw in a cinema: "The Knack... And how to Get It" by Richard Lester, with Rita Tushingham. (I was a tall girl and thus could add a few years to my tender age - now I do the opposite :-)  

Downton Abbey or Highclere Castle: the Seeming and the Real

"As Hamish talked, it all seemed very far away - the image of the castle (...) like something remembered from a film at the cinema."
"Death of a Gentle Lady"  M.C.Beaton

Dear You, 
maybe you know the book "Frederick" by Leo Lionni (published in 1967, which I discovered only in 1986 when I read it to our son). It is for very young children and tells the story of some field mice, who work hard to collect hoards for winter, and the mouse Frederick, who doesn't - he collects sun rays, colours and words - "because winter is grey", and he uses them, when the provisions are eaten up, and the mice become discouraged, to give them hope.
It is a wonderful parabel about the insight that not only practicality is useful.

So: Anne and I collected sun rays (and were lucky to find so many) and colours and words.
I will show you a few photos, speaking for themselves:

Three nights at Marco Pierre White's The Carnavon Arms (grade II listed), the former coach house to Highclere Castle:

Beautiful landscape: 

The vast gardens of Highclere (The Secret Garden, The Walled Garden, The White Garden etc):

Long, long walks (we were the only ones who walked - everybody else came by car or by bus). Surprises: three times - at different occasions - English women talked to us in German! (Always excited about lovely Munich). We were not allowed to take photos of the rooms in Highclere Castle - but those interested will have seen them in full splendour in 'Downton Abbey'. 

Here you see Anne, who is a teacher at a grammar school (English and French): she has four lovely daughters, renovated a huge mill, where she lives with her husband, created a beautiful garden, has now written her thesis on a German poet, owns a marmelade cat - and: 4 sheep! (That was my first idea, as 'Highclere' also found on Rosemary's blog  http://wherefivevalleysmeet.blogspot.de/: I really tried to buy a special English sheep for her - but that was too difficult). Anne and I are often taken as sisters - here she is looking at a piece of art, the sculpture of a sheep's head (one item in The Carnavon Arms). 

We saw Newbury and Hungerford (I spare you lots of photos from there) - then back to London, where Anne left for Germany - and I stayed another 9 days. 

The Surprise is: Downton Abbey!

Dear You, 
friendship is about trust. And Anne trusted me blindly when she came from Darmstadt to London, waiting for me at the feet of St. Paul's, not knowing what would happen, or which destination was waiting for us. 
I arrived in time - though in Berlin it seemed that circumstances had plotted against me: 
first the alarm-clock of my cellphone didn't work (and husband lectured in Hildesheim). Luckily I had packed everything the evening before, and as I am an early riser, I got wary in the early morning and looked at the clock in the kitchen. Crumbs! Crumbs of time left, to be precise - only half an hour instead of a leisurely one... 
So my eyeliner wasn't quite as perfect as usually, but RyanAir was gracious (yes - it can be!)  and took me nevertheless - when I finally arrived. Which was at the last moment: having fetched the right underground and changed into the right overground (which needs about fifty minutes to go to the airport) - I relaxed. Looked dreamily out of the window. Suddenly I  wondered: 'Hermannstraße' was announced. 'Hermannstraße???' I hurried out of the overground - got a train back: I had forgotten to change at Südstern!  
There the next train to the airport was announced (and innerly I apologised to husband, who had advised me to arrive 90 minutes before the flight-departure at the airport - I had laughed a bit condescendingly at this proposal - but followed, and boy: was I happy that for once I had listened to the voice of reason!)
Imagine my horror when suddenly the plate announced: "The next overground to the Airport is cancelled". 
WHAT? WHAT? 
I hurried to the information desk. Yes, there was an alternative: a real train, coming in ten minutes. 
Well: "All's well that ends well" as your dear William S. remarked so wisely. 
From the moment I sat in the airplane (10 Euro more to be RyanAir's special guest - hahaha - meaning: you get in first, and have a seat with a little more room for long legs) everything was OK. 

And there she was, in London: my friend Anne. My friend since the time we studied together in Mainz. Who had now written her thesis on a German poet and had earned a doctor's degree. 
Such a joy! 
I wanted to give her something special for that. 
Only when we sat in a restaurant and I gave Anne a pair of long golden earrings with a (fake) emerald, she guessed our destination: 

Highclere Castle, belonging to the Earl and Countess of Carnarvon - to most of us better known as "Downton Abbey". 

Enough for today (Now I will dip into your blogs, so I will write the sequel later).  
  

Will we bloggers meet in London - spontaneously?

Dear You, 
Double surprise:
- one for my friend Anne, whom I will soon meet in London - she comes from Darmstadt, I from Berlin. Difference: I know where we will go then - she doesn't. (She finished her dissertation this year, and as a present I booked the ???.in ???? for 3 nights. Ha: I will not tell you now, because she or her husband, who will stay at home, might read this blog).
- second: surprise for me, because after that I will stay in London for more than a week. Surprise - because I had already booked the return flight... Now I have a second return ticket with a more generous airline than Ryanair. The first flight is my problem: I am stubborn and will - for the first time in my life - use only one boardcase and a handbag. Ryanair allows only a boardcase with 10 kilogramm, so I went and found a light boardcase from Bric, (only 1,92 kg - my other - loved one - has over 3kg) and a handbag from the same inventive Italian manufactorers which has exactly the allowed measurements. Now I weigh my clothes, I weigh my cosmetics (oh my, oh my - that's the tough part).
I feel as if I am a 7 year old child again: then I drew lots and lots of caves which I decorated in the most fashionable way with sophisticated - cardboxes. Why? I don't know - I was on the Minimalist's trip very early (in theory). I'll have to be a minimalist with my clothes now - in practice.
Though maybe Ryanair will think I am the Marshmallow Man -once in London I will become instantly slim again. .

Now two questions: 

- Any suggestions what I can/must/should see in London in the next weeks? IThank you!

- Is anybody interested to come to a spontaneous blogger-meeting in London? We can meet in a café. If you are interested - best days for me: Saturday 6th September or Sunday 7th September - then please write it quickly into your comment - and I will see it till Monday, after that I'm off.

PS: Burglars: No chance: Husband and a bunch of well-trained visitors stay at home :-)