Travel
Castle Quest
After some weeks of being sequestered indoors in front of my laptop, and Marcela at the UN, we rented a Škoda Fabia and drove along the highways of western Bohemia toward Plzen.
It was very cold and snowed all weekend.
The roads that connect sleepy Czech villages were empty.
Except for this red car.
But that was it.
Be very [...]
A Night on the Town
The streets of Vienna were awash with footsteps and cosmopolitan echos. We entered a wine store – make that a wine bar. Hoighty-Toighty. Blazers and ascots. Connoisseurs in their realm.
Blair handed me a bottle of red for five euro off the shelf. I approached the counter.
“Can you open this?” I handed the bottle to [...]
Grace and Austria
Swiftly now, gracefully we slide upon rails of iron and rust. The train trembles lightly and Blair shakes his postcard, coaxing the ink to dry. Massive windmills twist softly, perched upon the undulating grasslands. Songs from the past and fields of umber and raw sienna are smeared across a hundred kilometers. The stalks of crops [...]
The City Vienna
The City…my God! With towers as grand and boulevards as wide as the majestic Danube River. The City sings! Glory!
Each footstep, every glance, each revealing frames like sonnets. The garden of Austria. The garden of the civilized.
I saw Schiele and Klimt, and Christian Schad with volume and vibrant clashing hues and the feast [...]
Auf Wiedersehen
I washed my clothes and hung them on the line to dry above the bathtub. I neatly folded my t-shirts using the method I learned on the internet last Wednesday.
Then I carefully added items to my suitcase, a small plaid number with rollers and a compass in the handle that I purchased at the [...]
Death is Recognized as a Friend
After Käthe Kollwitz.
A sketch that I rendered at the Käthe Kollwitz Museum in Berlin. The museum of her work is perhaps the most marvelous institution in a city of marvels.
Mechanical Pencil on Moleskin paper
Return
Has it been a month already since my last post? Excuse me; I’ve been away from my desk. I am back from a short summer tour of Germany and Poland. In a couple days I hope to have some thoughtful updates and photos to share.
Venezia
Venice appears to float atop an impossibly vast lagoon, drenched in salty air and gelato. The city is a maze of cobblestone corridors and foot bridges, utterly unnavigable in the late evening after the crowds have returned to their hotel rooms and the storefronts are secured with heavy metal shutters.
On the banks of the [...]
Vienna Graffiti
The Donaukanal channels some of the waters of the Danube River south and through the center of Vienna. The banks of the wide canal offer a pleasant walk along a boardwalk several meters below the bustle of the city. Many residents walk their dogs or ride bicycles along this route. A few creative entrepreneurs have [...]
A Walk in the Woods
The city of Prague ends abruptly on a wooden hillside about a mile north of here. Strangely, in this city without suburban sprawl, it is the same distance to the edge of town as it is to the center. The storied center of Prague is where the tourist herd snakes its way though the narrow [...]
