technicolor

the evening began with me starting to bother birgit with caps from starsky&hutch. she didn't complain. or, if she did, she didn't present a convincing front to the world in general and me in particular. and before you know it, one thing lead to another and we started fiddling around with the stills, tapping into each our creative sides.

in honour of today's storm, i composed an ode upon a brave pigeon digging its little claws into a trusty birch twig and swaying with the whole tree against the stiff breeze.

ode (in german), moving pigeon and music behind the cut.

shoes are a girl's best friend!

observing the mid-winter growth of my potplants, i was delighted to see that the hibiscus is in bloom again. which never happened before during this time of year simply because our flat is a bit colder than average. so i'm rather delighted that the plant surprised me with an open blossom this morning.

edit: and thus, silliness ensued...

shoetossing doesn't stop. not for the die-hards. not even in winter. not in adverse conditions, like snow. so here's the latest sighting of shoefiti in leipzig.

sorry for the lack of colour. it's winter, as i would like to have you know.

here's a lovely toy to play around with on rainy or snowy days. (in other words: it's perfect for the next week or two!) it's a virtual polaroid camera tool invented by the crafty devils over at the Poladroid project site. it's a fun little gadget to pimp your holiday pictures that need just a little touch of off-colour.

five days away from christmas, in christian parley on the fourth sunday in advent, i thought i should finally get into the spirit of the season and make a day of it. so in the order of appearance, here's what i did today.

monday just after i had finished teaching the second round of shakespeare's lusty world of sonnets, i was on my way to berlin to celebrate 20 years of the opening of the iron curtain together with birgit and christoph. at first it was wet. and then there were lots of people. and then we had a hunch that the people in front of their tellies saw much much much more and also heard what was being said. but still it was great fun! it's not every day that a nation gets to celebrate its freedom and invite the whole world to the party.

and then, shortly after midnight, christoph found himself in the arms of two obliging ladies who wished him a happy birthday.

before you continue with the content behind the cut, please, take the time to re-watch the original broadcast of the tagesschau with a very happy anchorman announcing the opening of the east-german borders.

walking home from the leuschnerplatz after midnight last friday, the official lichtfest was already over and the nearly 100,000 leipziger had already gone home to sleep. the city was empty and quiet again. but unlike twenty years ago this was not a quietness of dread, but of calm and peace. there's a unique spirit in this city which you can encounter every day. it's got nothing to do with being showy or over the top. it's being content with what's here and taking pride in what has been achieved. it's a marvelous little place.

on 9 october, 1989, the prayers for peace began in the nikolaikirche in leipzig. thousands of leipzigers had begun gathering each monday to pray for a peaceful solution to the bubbling conflicts in what was to become the final year of the GDR. for his level-headed guidance and the repeated call for, 'keine gewalt!' (no violence!), the reverend christian führer was later awarded the augsburger peace prize. yesterday, twenty years after the first monday prayers, he repeated the reading of the sermon on the mount. guests of honour were the german president, horst köhler, saxony's prime minister, stanislaw tillich, leipzig's mayor, burkhard jung. but no one received a greater cheer of welcome than germany's former foreign minister, hans-dietrich genscher. the people of leipzig welcomed him with standing ovations.

following the shapes of autumn, here are the colours that go along with them. please keep in mind that these pictures were taken with a hand-held camera whilst creeping and crawling through the underbrush in one of the largest, uninterrupted woods in germany. there was just no way i would have managed to log a tripod through these woods. except for hurling it at wild boars, it wouldn't have helped much anyway, as i was nearly lying on my stomach during most of these pictures.

s. and i went exploring the city on foot yesterday. why? because it was sunny and because it was open house/construction site/tunnel day. at the future tube stop 'bayrischer bahnhof', the construction site opened their gates to the public so that people could get a first look. s. and i climbed down a couple of steep steps into the deep bowels of leipzig (cue: inevitable comment about the föhrer-bonker) and walk back out in what will eventually become the tracks. naturally, all above and below ground was documented by my trusty camera.

edit: now complete with video

with the help of a diagramme and a photograph of the surrounding area provided by maria a., i tried to find the stolperstein dedicated to the memory of susanne aizen in löhrs carree last week. on that occassion, i literally stumbled across a new block located directly in front of the entrance to the sparkasse. it's really odd. when i started looking out for stolpersteine last year, it was really difficult spotting them. now it appears that i have acquired a certain 'eye' for them. i remember looking for the stolperstein for dr. cohn at the nordplatz and walking by it again and again and again until i found it. this time, i spotted the bronze stone for menni buchsbaum already from far away. (walking through london is rather irritating for that matter, because much of the pavement is littered with yellow plastic plaques every couple of metres.)

so i decided to play a bit with a couple of pictures i took at the zoo last weekend and give them a bit of a vintage colouring. and then i got a bit carried away. thus, silliness ensued...

edit: now featuring tiger #2 and #3.

on a recent trip to halle, maria a. found the following three stolpersteine in commemoration of the frankenthals and provided the photos. thank you very much for your contribution!