France Day 21 Where’s Henco?

June 2, 2013 Timothy Price2 Comments

We went to an organ recital at Notre Dame by Henco De Berg last night. Notre Dame’s organ is the most famous pipe organ in the world, according to the handout. Mr. De Berg played pieces by Charles -Marie Widor (1844-1937), François Couperin (1668-1733), Olivier Messiaen (1908-1992) and then he played an improvisation on 2 gregorian themes. Several people in the audience couldn’t take the heavy, modern pieces and improvisation, but I found them interesting a quite fun to listen to. There were a lot of sustained, very low and dissonant chords, but when I closed my eyes, I could hear the other notes played under the sustained cords and there was a slight stereo effect as the higher notes swept back and from one side of the pipes to the other. Since the organ sits about 30 feet about the floor, the organist is quite anonymous. Even when he stood to acknowledge the applause, you could hardly see him in the low light against the background of the organ.

Before we went into the recital, I got a photo of one of the roses blooming behind Notre Dame.

On our way back to the apartment,the sun was low and very orange over the Seine, and it cast a soft orange light on the town hall that complemented the orange turf they had in front of the building. The bicycles in the fifth photo are all over Paris in what they call “Stations Velib'”. The city is promoting use of these bikes to help reduce pollution. There is a central pay station that allows you to get a bike. The first 1/2 hour is free, then it costs 1 Euro per 1/2 hour with a max of 4 Euros for 4 hours or more. There are 24 Stations Velib’ in our arrondissement.

Laurie wanted to take a different route home, so we walked up to the Pompidou center and headed west towards Opera. We walked by some modern buildings and a site where a giant shopping center is under construction. There were a lot of young people getting ready to party, others were just hanging around, while others were skateboarding at a fountain. Among the many activities along the way police argued with a group of young men, people who looked down and out walked around collecting stuff off the street, other groups of people off in doorways argued and yelled at each other — activities that made it seem like it wasn’t the safest area to be in at 10:00 pm — so we dropped down to a main street that took us back by the Louvre and connected with Opera.

We got out first thing this morning and walked back to Notre Dame to attend the 8:30 service. On the way back the apartment we popped into a couple of churches and listened to the music for a few minutes. We dropped into Eglise Saint Germain l’Auxerrois during the offertory, and the organist played a fantastic piece that sounded heavenly. Then we stopped in L’Oratoire du Louvre, which turned out to be a Protestant church that goes back to 1611. They were finishing a baptism and then a guy sang a solo accompanied by the organ.

France Day 7 Aix Art in the Rain

May 19, 2013May 19, 2013 Timothy Price21 Comments

We left the house at 9:00 am in pouring rain, walked around Aix all day in the pouring rain, visited a museum, a couple of artists, a bridge, a garden, a spa built over old Roman baths, photographed Death at a wedding, and got food and coffee in the pouring rain. We went to a Mass with confirmation of adults by the Archbishop at the Aix Cathedral the evening, and finally got home at 11:00 pm, cold and wet. The photos are in order of the day, with the exception of the Tapestry Museum where I couldn’t take photos.

The tapestries were of scenes from Don Quijote, and they had a show of photographs by Roland Leboye, a French photographer who has taken Cartier Bresson’s “the decisive moment” to the extreme! Leboye’s street photography was wonderful and often very funny.

The giant insects are by a local artist from Aix.

The piles of paper and paper skull are part of a Paper Art installation we ran across by chance, and the arch Laurie is standing under is at the end of the courtyard were the Paper Art was.

We stayed in the tapestry museum until around noon, so by the time we got done looking at the insects and paper art, we got some food and hung out and ate and drank coffee until it was time to go to the art installation to meet the artist.

We got to the studio and installation of artwork by Nicole Catannéo about 2:15, met Nicole and Laurie discussed art and life with her and another older woman, in French, for over an hour. Nicole has quite a story as she had an illness when she was in her 40’s which left her partially paralyzed, and then her husband died when she was in her 50’s. She got herself together and went to art classes, and now creates wonderful paintings. She and Laurie really hit it off.

After the studio, we got another coffee for some warmth and energy, and headed toward the gardens at the northwestern edge of Aix. We walked through the modern shopping area on the western side of Aix, but when we got to the planted bridge, we were too far west and had to backtrack. We finally got to the gardens and found a bathroom on the grounds which had one of the “hole in the floor” fixtures. The garden was formal with mostly grass, but it had a nice rose garden behind the main garden. It also has a mansion with a museum, but they were closing when we got up to it. The mansion has a interesting entrance.

We stopped by a spa the is built over some old Roman baths to see what it cost to do the spa and get a message — about 100€ for both and 60€ for a 30 minute message.

On our way back to the center of Aix to find some food before we went to Mass, we walked by the cathedral and there was a VW and an Audi decorated for a wedding. Sophie told me that the Saturday before Pentecost was a big day for weddings in Aix, and we saw cars from 3 different weddings. While we waited for the bride and groom to come out, death walked by the VW.

After getting a bite to eat, we got to the cathedral at 7:30, an hour before the service to get good seats. We ended up siting more in the middle because the seats in front were occupied by the folks being confirmed, which looked to be well over 100 people plus their parents, bothers, sisters, husbands, wives; whoever was presenting them to the priest and Archbishop. The service was good, and the music was fantastic with the pipe organ and choral music. Laurie and I saw Matilda, the Brasilian who told us about it after the service, and we shook hands with the Archbishop on the way out. The boy in the last photo was cutting up during most of the service with a couple other boys. He looked quite shocked when the Archbishop stopped, put his hand on the boy’s shoulder, and blessed him at the end of the service.

France Day 4 Paris Free Day

May 16, 2013May 15, 2013 Timothy Price12 Comments

We had a free day today, which means we didn’t do anything as a class, so everyone was on their own to do whatever they desired. Laurie and I walked over to Norte Dame and sat in the garden behind the cathedral. There was free Paris WIFI available so I was able to finish placing a photo order that I got right before we left for France, and Laurie worked on an ad to try a get people to meet with us and exchange French conversation for English conversation. The interchange was called an intercambio when we were in Spain, and we would hang ads on public bulletin boards where we lived, at language academies and Irish pubs in Spain. So we figured we could do the same in Paris, except, once we got everything prepared and started walking the streets, we noticed that there were no public bulletin boards or kiosks around.

The University of Paris, Sorbonne is very near our Hotel, so we asked the guards at the front door if there were any public bulletin boards at the university to hang notices. They told us to go up the side of the building to 17. We asked the guard at entrance 17 and he said yes, up by the next entrance. The next three guards at the next three entrances looked confused at our request and said we had to have university IDs to get in. We walked the rest of the way around the building, which is huge, taking up several blocks, but there were no entrances on the west side of the building. We asked a student if he knew where any bulletin boards were, but he wasn’t from Paris, so he didn’t know. He said they had them in Lyons, but he hadn’t seen them in Paris. I looked on line and found a language interchange website that’s kind of like a Craig’s List for finding people to exchange languages with, which might be our best option.

In the late afternoon we dropped by a little grocery store and bought some food, then we walked back to Notre Dame and sat on the bleachers facing the façade, looked at the church and watched other tourists while we ate dinner. I had photographed a lot of the gargoyles with a telephoto lens when we were there in the morning, but then after we ate, we walked all the way around the cathedral, and I took more photos of gargoyles. The sunset was brilliant as we crossed the bridge on our way back to the hotel. When I turned back to look at Notre Dame from the other side of the bridge, the light was perfect, but I had a telephoto lens on the camera so I couldn’t get the whole church in a single frame. I didn’t have time to change lenses because I’d lose the light, so I took 9 quick shots in a grid and stitched them together. I got the color and feeling of the light, and the building is straight, except for the towers ended up leaning back in the finished photo.

Drive by Volcano

April 24, 2013 Timothy Price5 Comments

A drive by of one of the volcanos through a dirty window.

The Matrix

April 12, 2013 Timothy Price8 Comments

The water droplets on a spider web reminded me of a matrix. Patti came back to my office this afternoon and said there was a good photo op on Gold in front of Cafe Giuseppe. So I grabbed my camera and went to the front of the building and got the photo of the scooter and the police motorcycle. If I worked at the front front desk in the office instead of the “meat locker” in the back, I would get endless photo ops — but then I probably wouldn’t get much else done. I got another drive by with the low sun behind the Old Town sculptured tower landmark at westbound I-40 and Rio Grande Blvd.

Cuatro Gotas

April 10, 2013 Timothy Price10 Comments

We got a lot of wind and dust on Monday, and sporadic rain, wind, snow, and hail yesterday, making the light really strange at sunrise and sunset. I think some places in the metro area might of got measurable precipitation, but it didn’t register on our rain gage. “¡Cuatro gotas!” (not much rain) as the Spaniards would say — just enough to leave muddy rain drops all over our cars.

Downtown Drive-by

April 9, 2013 Timothy Price3 Comments

A costumed crowd was gathered outside the Kimo Theater. I wanted to park and get photos but there were no parking spots available, so I swung around the block and did a drive-by photo at about 10 mph. The sunset was beautiful, but my best opportunity of getting a photo of it was a drive-by at 80 mph on I-40.

Dog & Pony…

March 3, 2013 Timothy Price8 Comments

On my way back from photographing the sunset in the bosque, I stopped to photograph the horses in the soft light at dusk. My buddy, Turbo, came out to say hi, and wanted to be included in the photo session as well.

The Eagle & The Crows

February 24, 2013 Timothy Price9 Comments

While I was out at the river at sunset, the bald eagle flew by high along the opposite bank of the river. As it passed the face of the Sandias, it caught up with a flock of crows. A few crows fell in behind the eagle at first, then the crows’ flight became more chaotic as the eagle flew through them. Five cranes flew close to me at dusk, they probably couldn’t see me in the low light, and the high ISO produced interesting images. The Sandias turned a nice “watermelon” pink tonight.

Little Drops of Rain

January 27, 2013 Timothy Price11 Comments

I spent most of the day putting together my presentation on Troubadour poetry and music for French 385: Travels in Provence. It rained most of the day, and during a break in the weather I went out and photographed the storm passing over the Sandias. On my way out to the river, I noticed there were still a few drops of rain the wind had not blown off a rose bush — it reminded me of Led Zeppelin’s “Thank You”, which has a verse that begins “Little drops of rain…” I had been reading medieval poetry all day and started thinking that “Thank You” could be modern Troubadour poetry.

Troubadours originally wrote their poetry in Occitan, the language of Provence, France, also called Provançal. I don’t understand Occitan, so I’ve been reading the poetry translated into English by William and Frances Paden in their book Troubadour Poems from the South of France. Women Troubadours where called trobairitz, and the most famous trobairitz is La Comtessa de Dia. After reading many troubadour poems, La Comtessa de Dia is one of my favorites. Here is one of her poems named Estat ai en greu cossirier / I have been in heavy grief circa 1169:

I have been in heavy grief
for a knight who once was mine,
And I want it to be forever known
That I loved him too much,
I see now that I’m betrayed
For not giving him my love
Bemused, I lie in bed awake;
Bemused, I dress and pass the day.

If only I could hold him
Naked in my arms one night!
He would feel ecstatic
Were I to be his pillow.
Since I desire him more
Than Floris did Blanchefleur,
I give him my heart and my love,
My wit, my eyes, for as long as I live.

Splendid lover, charming and good,
When shall I hold you in my power?
If only I could lie with you one night
And give you a loving kiss!
Know that I’d like
To hold you as my husband,
As long as you’d promise
To do what I desired.

Here are the lyrics to Robert Plan’s Thank You, 1969:

If the sun refused to shine, I would still be loving you.
When mountains crumble to the sea, there will still be you and me.

Kind woman, I give you my all, Kind woman, nothing more.

Little drops of rain whisper of the pain, tears of loves lost in the days gone by.
My love is strong, with you there is no wrong,
together we shall go until we die. My, my, my.
An inspiration is what you are to me, inspiration, look… see.

And so today, my world it smiles, your hand in mine, we walk the miles,
Thanks to you it will be done, for you to me are the only one.
Happiness, no more be sad, happiness….I’m glad.
If the sun refused to shine, I would still be loving you.
When mountains crumble to the sea, there will still be you and me.