Routines

It occurs to me that I've posted relatively little, in my almost-concluded time here, about the days which are relatively normal. Partly, this is because these are the days I don't take time to photograph. Mostly, though, it's because I spend much of my days inside the archive, where I have lovely chats, share mild academic humor, and look through vast quantities of medieval documents, the transcriptions of no-longer-extant medieval documents by 18th- and 19th-century antiquarians, and various obscure modern publications. It's not terribly photogenic, though it's often enjoyable. But here is one of my favorite everyday views: my bike parked in front of the 1912 building housing the archives and city library:

Kitchen conversation or absurdist play? Round 1

When my study-abroad pal Michelle visited in November, she said kitchen conversations with my landlord and his girlfriend were like a sitcom. When Micaela, who speaks more German, visited in January, she offered a corrective: indie comedy-drama (more awkward silences than a sitcom.) After this morning's interaction with the housemate-who-is-the-landlord's-girlfriend, I have another suggestion: symbolist theater.

Belated Budapest Blogpost

Arriving at Budapest Keleti

My trip to Budapest was already a month ago, undertaken with my mother and sister. And (obviously) I haven't written about it yet. It's not just that I don't feel I really got to know the city; it's that, more strongly than in any other place I've visited, I was acutely conscious of being an outsider in it. It trumpets its history everywhere, in architecture stately and extravagant, in statues of sentimental 19th-century curves and starkly aspiring Soviet lines. And in a city with a history as long, as complicated, as laden with conflict and oppression and resistance as that of Budapest, that made my historian's hairs stand on end; Shakespeare's fretful porcupine came to mind. This was all complicated by the fact that, as a tourist, I found myself thoroughly seduced. The city is beautiful, Buda on its fortified and palace-crowned hill, Pest spreading elegantly out on the edge of unending plains. Narrow lanes and elegant boulevards, the vast Danube, decaying apartment blocks and well-kept parks; all these I loved. And yet.

But where are the bodegas? An ode to NYC

I try not to indulge feelings of homesickness too much, but as the days lengthen (northern sun pouring in my window at 6) and my time here lengthens, I find myself more than usually missing New York. Or perhaps it's just the cumulative missing of things that's catching up with me. But as weekend festivals open up here, I miss being in a city where I have people to go to such things with. Here, brass bands are present (hooray) but marginalized by globalization in the form of American pop. I miss the street festivals with Sicilian and Calabrian standards mixing with jitterbug, and people dancing to them, or sitting back and chatting with their neighbors; the festivals with salsa and bachata and merengue pulsing joyously from enormous speakers. I love Bischofsheim's vegetable stand, but I miss the Arthur Avenue Covered Market, where I get to stop for a chat with Mr. Liberatore, the florist, and where the most gregarious of the Boiano brothers, who run the largest fruit-and-veg stall, showed me his knack for sautéing artichokes.

Non-liturgical observances of a national holiday

One of the curious-to-me things about Germany is that, while census-tallied identification with Christianity is much lower than in the U.S., major liturgical holidays remain red-letter days on the calendar. For those of you who aren't high-churchy or medievalists, Ascension Day was this past Thursday, so I sought out some pleasantly open-air, heathenish way of observing it. And so (along with groups of mostly middle-aged Germans) I decided to take this all-archives-closed opportunity to fulfill a long-cherished ambition: taking a long bike ride along the Rhine. This plan was nearly scuppered before it started, as my hastily-packed pullover slipped down into the bike gears (!) and stopped the back wheel in its tracks. I angrily schlepped the thing into the bike compartment of the regional train I was bound for, received the sympathy of fellow-cyclists, and received gratefully the offer of a pair of scissors from another woman's kit. With the help of that scissors, and the helpful kibitzing of the rest of the cyclists, I had the thing in working order again just as we reached Bingen. Several had opined that, even if I got the fabric free, I wouldn't be able to fix the gears because of their age, but: 'Kann nicht' geht nicht; I was not going to be done out of my excursion. A park guard who saw me cautiously testing the gears volunteered a reassuring confirmation that everything looked secure, and a very welcome opportunity to wash my grease-covered hands. And so… I was off!

This crane, in Bingen, dates to the 18th century… but as early as the 15th, Mainz's cathedral chapter controlled one here.

This region has been designated as a UNESCO World Heritage site. For fairly obvious reasons, as well as less obvious ones. Look at those vineyards!

And castles! (Burg Pfalzgrafenstein on the island, and, I think, Burg Katz.) This barge was called the Stella Maris.

The Loreley! Although the Gipfel des Berges was obviously not doing any sparkling in this weather, I sang at it ceremonially.

By this point in the journey, I was feeling that my exertions deserved some photographing of mile-markers. 

This charming house...

It's a truism that seeing a place through someone else's eyes can help you see it more clearly. But I found this proved again last month. It helps that the refreshing vision belonged to one of my dearest friends, whose perspective I value in any case. (Left: a stop on our Easter Sunday stroll.) We had a lovely almost-two-weeks exploring the Rheinland and beyond. I was honored and touched to be the recipient of a visit, delighted to serve as semi-cicciarone. On our first day, as we stood in the rose garden, she said "I'd like to take a picture of this charming house!" I craned my neck, gazing up and down the street. "Which charming house?" "This one. The one you live in." Oh. I'm guilty of more often seeing its lack of lightbulbs, or cobweb-collecting corners, than its charm. But I was chastened and encouraged simultaneously, and was inspired to taking the following photos while on walks through Bischofsheim in subsequent days. It may be only a Schlafdorf, but it is, after all, my Schlafdorf.

Aber Unwissen schützt vor Strafe nicht...

I've had a lovely month, but an unusually busy and varied one, with one conference, two visits, and several concerts. All of this deserves to be blogged about. And it might be! But what's keeping me up right now (after a long day of travel and archival work) is what I'm going to write about. Today I rose early and got myself on a series of trains to Würzburg, to look at more of the Mainz-relevant holdings there. I spent a productive day in the archives, and then headed home, armed with end-of-day bakery-special-priced pretzels for dinner. And my evening lassitude was interrupted by the Schaffner. The ritual of displaying my Semesterticket regional train pass along with my German photo ID did not meet with the collector's approval. "That's no good," he said; "you can buy a ticket, or you can get off." I queried, with genuine surprise and some defensiveness, this judgment. I had looked up the information on the card online; Würzburg was on the map as an Übergangsgebiet. No, this was not good enough, and I should be grateful he wasn't fining me 40€. I bit my tongue, deeming it more prudent not to mention that I had traveled this line with this ticket before, and that several of his colleagues--including one no later ago than that morning!--had seen my trustingly, confidently displayed ticket and ID, and had passed on, without so much as a "Next time, young lady…" warning. Eventually, after some further conversation determining my route and destination, I was issued a ticket, which I paid for not quite meekly. "And next time," said the Schaffner, "you might look up the information on what ticket you need before you board, if you please." This was too much. "But I did look it up!" I protested. "And I thought Würzburg was…" "That's as may be," he replied, "but ignorance doesn't protect from punishment."