Here's a photo summary (click on the photos to make them bigger) of my past few weeks spent witnessing the arrival of springtime in three countries. My apologies to those in the Midwest who are still snowbound!
Clare Hall celebrated the End of Term with a concert by college members- 8 performers from 8 countries! I played 5 minutes' worth of jazz and Mozart (badly). Luckily it was a laid-back crowd and inexpert musicians... there were a lot of false starts and some cursing (Really! A professor stopped in the middle of his piano performance and said "bollocks"! HILARIOUS.). Note my music thrown on the floor. Classy.
The River Cam with WILDFLOWERS EVERYWHERE. In an institution where it is forbidden to walk on the grass unless you are a professor (really!), the uncontrollable growth of wildflowers all over the perfect college lawns must be so irritating. Serves Cambridge right for restricting grass access!
More wildflowers and a sleeping pair of duck-mates. It is that season, you know.
My parents and I spent a fantastic weekend appreciating the springtime beauty of the Acropolis in Athens. The place is SO GREEN. Even the ancient columns had plants growing on them!
My mom being a professor in the birthplace of modern education- the ancient marketplace where Socrates taught! The original "spring" of the Socratic Method?
My mom and me with the founder of modern biology- Darwin! This new statue is in honor of Darwin's 200th birthday this year. Isn't he cute?
A budding tree branch in front of the Charles Bridge (on the left) over the Vltava River in Prague. This beautiful city in my first post-Communism country has an amazing history going all the way back to 200 BC, which includes 2 castles, 2 ancient cemeteries, and countless governments. Also, "Prague Spring", funny enough, was a brief reform movement calling for better civil rights under communism in 1968, which the Soviet Union squashed by invading Prague.
This is my childhood friend and Prague host, Sonja, a Czech-American who is going to film school and plays ice hockey for the Czech national team. WOW. She is also a fantastic tour guide, and while strolling around Prague we went to castles, churches, cemeteries, old buildings, new buildings, cafes (one where Einstein hung out!), jazz clubs, museums, AND a free concert held in "garaz" which we assumed was a club but was literally a parking garage!! (See red road sign in Czech.) The garage was TRICKED OUT with a beer tent, hookah area, fantastic lights and sound system, and lots of people who looked much less surprised than we did to be partying four stories underground!
Another (more airy) music location- on the Charles Bridge! These musicians played fantastic jazz to an audience of passerbys. Notice the violin player's homemade "amplifier" (giant gold horn!), the banjo's broken strings, and the two rockin' clarinetists! All performing on Prague's most pictoresque bridge! I would have happily paid a lot more than my donation of 20 Czech crowns ($1) for the fun of that concert.And to think- only 2 more weeks til term starts!! I have so much to learn before then...
Enjoy your own springs, wherever you see them!
3 comments:
AMAZING - a post well worth the long wait!
What an amazing couple of spring times in such neat cities. Keep up the great 'studying' around Europe!
Oh and speaking of a good looking Darwin... do you know why Darwin was chosen to ride on the Beagle? The captain wanted a well-born cleric as a dinner companion and picked Darwin because he liked the shape of his Nose!
- Source Bill Bryson 'A Short History of Nearly Everything'
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