Journal pages
Until I’ve recovered from my amazing African adventure long enough to write something more coherent, here are a couple of pages from my journal. Enjoy. I’ll post photos later.
Category Daily
We arrive in Gabon!
I am writing this entry while my students are working on writing a part of a scientific paper. This way I can upload (I hope) this document at the next break. There are computers here at the Albert Schweitzer hospital…
A melancholy moment
After work yesterday, I stopped in at a jewelry shop on a big shopping street, to inspect their collection of gold charms. Although I do this on every trip to Vienna, I can never remember the word for charms. And…
The case of the jay-walking nun
Yesterday I was waiting for the streetcar at a busy intersection, on my way to work. It was cold and rainy, and the streets and sidewalks were slick. Some background: Austria is about 99.9% Roman Catholic, and you see a…
Was that dinner, or a vaudeville routine?
Alas, dinner at Meinl was a bust. The food was mediocre, but the service was appalling. And this, at one of the top restaurants in Vienna! It’s a lovely place that looks out down the Graben (“moat” in German, not…
Beautiful Wien
I arrived in Vienna this afternoon (that’s the Stephansdom on the right), after a wonderful day driving along the Danube, stopping in to explore a few little villages. One was Durnstein (near left), where I stopped in at the church…
Hotel mysteries
When I first checked in to this hotel, I was given the curse of all lone travelers: the tiny room, with a single bed, and a bathroom with no tub. Boldly, I marched back downstairs and said, auf Deutsch, naturlich,…
My tour of psychiatric hospitals, part 2
Today’s main destination: Maria-Gugging, home of the Donauklinikum, which is a psychiatric hospital where lots of artists happen to be. They have a workshop there called Haus der Kunstler, which is decorated in a kind of outsider art/art brut style,…
Ok, so agriculture was never my strong point
When I arrived in Krems yesterday, I noticed lots of fields full of what appeared to be tobacco on its last legs. You know, most of the leaves had been pulled, but there were a few yellowing ones left. The…
In Austria!
Arrived this morning in London and then went on to Vienna and then to rural Austria, (via rental car–ah, but it’s been a long time since I’ve driven a stick!), where I am presently enjoying the view (hills, vineyards, the…