Phantom window.
Via Giovanola, Cannobio.
Showing posts with label Cannobio. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Cannobio. Show all posts
Friday, 14 October 2011
Wednesday, 5 October 2011
Translators' gaffes No. 1: Come to Cannobio - where the wildlife is
Sixteen degrees at 8am. They tell me these beautiful, sunny, dry Indian summer days are just about over, and autumn is waiting at the turn of the week.
I idly picked up a Cannobio accommodation brochure the other day, and my editor's eyes alighted on this particular description:
Perhaps visitors might be more than a little wary of this residenza, what with the heating with a mind of its own and something squirmy waiting at the pier...
I idly picked up a Cannobio accommodation brochure the other day, and my editor's eyes alighted on this particular description:
“...The flats are all endowed with equipped kitchen, autonomous heating, ample private balcony or terrace, sat-TV, parking, pier and boas...”
Perhaps visitors might be more than a little wary of this residenza, what with the heating with a mind of its own and something squirmy waiting at the pier...
Thursday, 29 September 2011
Sea pictures in a Cannobio car park
A bright, warm and sunny autumnal day. For two weeks now, no rain. Watering like a mad thing.
This morning in the car, once free of the children and their obsession with 'The Five Findouters' audio mysteries, I'm listening to the immortal Dame Janet Baker sing Elgar's Sea Pictures Op. 37. I pull into the car park as she starts in on the sublime 'Sabbath Morning at Sea', from the poem by Elizabeth Barrett Browning (how much more English can you get?), and I can't tear myself away. I am immobile in the driver's seat, windows open, ancient cassette player vibrating (not quite, but almost) like the drum-&-bass trunk of some city pimp. I am gazing across Lago Maggiore, which glitters in a very Italianate way in the morning sun, and I am dreaming of the sea, as sometimes we English must.
In the parking space beside me I notice with the small part of my being that's not drenched in musical salt spray, a dark blue Twingo has arrived. In the driver's seat is a short man in his mid-60s, who glances at me with a twinkle that gives me to understand he was not always pear-shaped and male-pattern bald. I also shortly become aware that instead of immediately going about his business, he, too, has become caught up in the drama of Dame Janet's ineffable mezzo and is soaring with her across the lake, so to speak.
We reach the climactic "He shall assist me to look higher, he shall assist me to look higher", and now the tears are streaming down my face (note to self - must stop being moved to tears by great art in public car parks). He glances at me, can't fail to see the tears, and smiles a gentle smile. As the moment dies away, we are both still for a moment, and then the man leans slowly across.
"Una meraviglia," he says, quietly, "Una meraviglia!"
He twinkles again, then gets out of his car, and disappears from my day.
And I am left with the strange sensation that something has happened, but I can't quite put my finger on what...
This morning in the car, once free of the children and their obsession with 'The Five Findouters' audio mysteries, I'm listening to the immortal Dame Janet Baker sing Elgar's Sea Pictures Op. 37. I pull into the car park as she starts in on the sublime 'Sabbath Morning at Sea', from the poem by Elizabeth Barrett Browning (how much more English can you get?), and I can't tear myself away. I am immobile in the driver's seat, windows open, ancient cassette player vibrating (not quite, but almost) like the drum-&-bass trunk of some city pimp. I am gazing across Lago Maggiore, which glitters in a very Italianate way in the morning sun, and I am dreaming of the sea, as sometimes we English must.
In the parking space beside me I notice with the small part of my being that's not drenched in musical salt spray, a dark blue Twingo has arrived. In the driver's seat is a short man in his mid-60s, who glances at me with a twinkle that gives me to understand he was not always pear-shaped and male-pattern bald. I also shortly become aware that instead of immediately going about his business, he, too, has become caught up in the drama of Dame Janet's ineffable mezzo and is soaring with her across the lake, so to speak.
We reach the climactic "He shall assist me to look higher, he shall assist me to look higher", and now the tears are streaming down my face (note to self - must stop being moved to tears by great art in public car parks). He glances at me, can't fail to see the tears, and smiles a gentle smile. As the moment dies away, we are both still for a moment, and then the man leans slowly across.
"Una meraviglia," he says, quietly, "Una meraviglia!"
He twinkles again, then gets out of his car, and disappears from my day.
And I am left with the strange sensation that something has happened, but I can't quite put my finger on what...
Thursday, 15 September 2011
Sunday, 12 June 2011
Thursday, 9 June 2011
Monday, 7 March 2011
Monday, 14 February 2011
Valentine graffiti
Mild, damp and misty this February 14th.
I hate graffiti. It intimidates me. In underpasses, on abandoned factories and houses, in railway yards, in impossible spots. Graffiti artists mark out their territory in places a woman alone perhaps shouldn't be. Perhaps will regret being. Perhaps goes there anyway.
This place is other. This is not-you. This is us. We are brutal, virile, dangerous. We oppose you. This is our war-paint. Enter at your own risk.
In London, that is.
In Cannobio, jewel of Lago Maggiore, the graffiti on the underpass walls tell a different story.
A love story. A love story all hearts and flowers, and ti amo 4 ever. A love story full of adolescent insecurity, longing and bravado. Strangely, while the anglophone world looks to Italian as the language of passion, these youngsters pepper their pantings with English.
Back in Cannobio, another kind of amorous declaration has appeared. The practice of sealing a relationship with a padlock and throwing the key into a river, down a sheer mountainside or into some other unreachable location, has reached us all the way from China, where it was originally used to seal a bargain made with the ineffable. Step out onto Cannobio's Ponte Ballerino, the footbridge that crosses the Cannobino river and connects Cannobio with Traffiume, and one is greeted by lock after lock, many etched with the stock phrases of eternal love in Italian, German and English. All winking in the sunshine. All, we have to assume, unassailable.
I hate graffiti. It intimidates me. In underpasses, on abandoned factories and houses, in railway yards, in impossible spots. Graffiti artists mark out their territory in places a woman alone perhaps shouldn't be. Perhaps will regret being. Perhaps goes there anyway.
This place is other. This is not-you. This is us. We are brutal, virile, dangerous. We oppose you. This is our war-paint. Enter at your own risk.
In London, that is.
In Cannobio, jewel of Lago Maggiore, the graffiti on the underpass walls tell a different story.
A love story. A love story all hearts and flowers, and ti amo 4 ever. A love story full of adolescent insecurity, longing and bravado. Strangely, while the anglophone world looks to Italian as the language of passion, these youngsters pepper their pantings with English.
Five minutes away in Switzerland, however, the authorities are one step ahead of the graffiti artists. Here, the public loos in Ascona's lakeside playground are pre-graffitified, not with the stutterings of juveniles but with whimsical poetry in French and Italian. Still, even the Municipio has a heart: the theme, as ever, is l'amour.
Back in Cannobio, another kind of amorous declaration has appeared. The practice of sealing a relationship with a padlock and throwing the key into a river, down a sheer mountainside or into some other unreachable location, has reached us all the way from China, where it was originally used to seal a bargain made with the ineffable. Step out onto Cannobio's Ponte Ballerino, the footbridge that crosses the Cannobino river and connects Cannobio with Traffiume, and one is greeted by lock after lock, many etched with the stock phrases of eternal love in Italian, German and English. All winking in the sunshine. All, we have to assume, unassailable.
Happy San Valentino, however you choose to express yourself...
And if you're the architect responsible for the Ponte Ballerino, perhaps you might like to rework your sums for the extra weight...how much love can one bridge take?
Saturday, 29 January 2011
The lion in winter
Snowing. Big, fluffy flakes. All over the place.
Cannobio's lion rock roars in the snow.
Wednesday, 19 January 2011
Jonathan Livingston Seagull loves...
And so do I...thanks to Sindaco Albertella and Vice-Sindaco Cattaneo for despatching workmen to Carmine with such speed - in Carmine, small improvements make a big difference! Vi ringraziamo molto.
Picture: Cannobio embarcadero.
Lago Maggiore on a beautiful winter's day.
Weather report: a thrilling 14°C at midday today, with clear blue skies.
Monday, 27 December 2010
Luce scribimus
A bright, sunshiney day. A bit parky, though.
Scribbling with light.
Porto Lido Cannobio.
Wednesday, 15 December 2010
Good luck!
Zero degrees at 8am. Blue skies. Foot-stamping cold.
Today, I would like to wish good luck to all my kind friends and colleagues at the Cannobio branch of the Italian Red Cross. This evening, after almost a year's study, they take the exam that qualifies them to answer medical emergencies of all kinds.
Cannobio, the Valle Cannobina and the whole area to the Swiss border, has no professional ambulance service. We rely on the volunteers of the Red Cross and the Mountain Rescue Service (often the same people) for medical emergency cover. Last year the call went out for new volunteers - the service was so stretched that it had come to the point that the Cannobio branch could no longer guarantee 24/7 service - at certain times emergency calls would have to be answered exclusively by ambulance crews from Verbania, 30 minutes away.
And if you're dying of a heart attack, 30 minutes is - literally - a lifetime.
If all of tonight's volunteers pass - and the exam is pretty exacting - the new blood will help to rejuvenate the service so that the Red Cross can continue to save lives in this area.
And I have to say, having studied the 'First Step' with this group earlier this year, I have no problem trusting my life to any one of them.
In bocca al lupo!
Today, I would like to wish good luck to all my kind friends and colleagues at the Cannobio branch of the Italian Red Cross. This evening, after almost a year's study, they take the exam that qualifies them to answer medical emergencies of all kinds.
Cannobio, the Valle Cannobina and the whole area to the Swiss border, has no professional ambulance service. We rely on the volunteers of the Red Cross and the Mountain Rescue Service (often the same people) for medical emergency cover. Last year the call went out for new volunteers - the service was so stretched that it had come to the point that the Cannobio branch could no longer guarantee 24/7 service - at certain times emergency calls would have to be answered exclusively by ambulance crews from Verbania, 30 minutes away.
And if you're dying of a heart attack, 30 minutes is - literally - a lifetime.
If all of tonight's volunteers pass - and the exam is pretty exacting - the new blood will help to rejuvenate the service so that the Red Cross can continue to save lives in this area.
And I have to say, having studied the 'First Step' with this group earlier this year, I have no problem trusting my life to any one of them.
In bocca al lupo!
Wednesday, 8 December 2010
Jonathan Stylites
A tropical eight degrees at 2pm this Immaculate Conception. If you could walk in mist like fallen autumn leaves, today you'd be knee deep in it. The clouds hang so low over the lake you feel you have to duck in case you bang your head. In certain places and at certain times the mist dissolves into rain.
This Jonathan picture is posted today to remind me of the last day of pure, bright sunshine, when I tool a seat on Cannobio's lungolago, next to the ferry port and read my book in the sun.
This Jonathan picture is posted today to remind me of the last day of pure, bright sunshine, when I tool a seat on Cannobio's lungolago, next to the ferry port and read my book in the sun.
Ferry lookout, Cannobio.
Saturday, 27 November 2010
Jonathan and friends...
The day started bright and sunny, sending broad shafts of light bouncing off interior white walls and the honey-coloured woodwork. Warm enough in the sun for breakfast outdoors, but with the ground frozen solid and the broccoli wilting. By midday, snow clouds gathering.
...waiting for the Lago Maggiore ferry.
Tuesday, 2 November 2010
Monday, 26 July 2010
Lighting the way to Love Beach
With thanks to M & G for a very enjoyable evening on Saturday,
in deeply romantic surroundings.
in deeply romantic surroundings.
Weather cooler. And without the wind. Now I have no excuse to do something - perhaps even something useful...
Wednesday, 30 June 2010
Sunday, 27 June 2010
Pietà
Hot, hot hot.
A day for a shady spot among the lavender, a picnic, a snooze, hide-and-seek, ice-lollies and cats lolling in the undergrowth. In the meantime, here's another Madonna for Sunday...
One third of a very moving pietà,
Chiesa della Purificazione di Maria Vergine, Traffiume (Cannobio).
Chiesa della Purificazione di Maria Vergine, Traffiume (Cannobio).
Friday, 25 June 2010
The holidays start here!
Twenty-eight degrees and a sunny day today as we came home from the Scuola Materna A. Zaccheo, Cannobio for the last time.
Arms full of the year's labours, dirty aprons, sand-full pumps and unidentifiable objects in various stages of decay from the darkest recesses of the locker.
Eyes full of tears.
Friends, teachers, co-parents, we are forever in your debt. You have shown us kindness and consideration. You have offered your help when we faltered. You have taught me and my children Italian and you haven't laughed (too much) at the mistakes we made. You have entrusted to me your children and together with me they have taken their first steps into the bright world of foreign languages and cultures. I guess one's first class is an experience never to forget. And their affection I return with all my heart.
So one door closes, and we wait in the shining corridor of summer as the door to our new life slowly opens...
The holidays start here!
Arms full of the year's labours, dirty aprons, sand-full pumps and unidentifiable objects in various stages of decay from the darkest recesses of the locker.
Eyes full of tears.
Friends, teachers, co-parents, we are forever in your debt. You have shown us kindness and consideration. You have offered your help when we faltered. You have taught me and my children Italian and you haven't laughed (too much) at the mistakes we made. You have entrusted to me your children and together with me they have taken their first steps into the bright world of foreign languages and cultures. I guess one's first class is an experience never to forget. And their affection I return with all my heart.
So one door closes, and we wait in the shining corridor of summer as the door to our new life slowly opens...
The holidays start here!
Monday, 7 June 2010
A gift from God
In this part of the world, Jasminum officinale thrives. Gardeners here frequently use it to make impenetrable hedges and areas of deep, cool shade. During the rest of the year its glossy dark green leaves go almost unnoticed as we rush about our business, but in early June suddenly the little white star-shaped flowers open and we come under their perfumed sway. Suddenly the world with its cars and tarmac, its noise and its hardness, becomes an altogether more sensuous place: women seem more elegant, men more dignified, the sky a more pleasing shade of blue and the lake depths more profound. In the morning, with the scent of dew-laden jasmine to carry me down the hill, the day seems more approachable.
The word 'jasmine' comes from the Persian via Old French. In Persian it originally meant 'gift from God'. Truly, it is so! (As the Poet might have said.)
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Showing posts with label Cannobio. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Cannobio. Show all posts
Friday, 14 October 2011
Wednesday, 5 October 2011
Translators' gaffes No. 1: Come to Cannobio - where the wildlife is
Sixteen degrees at 8am. They tell me these beautiful, sunny, dry Indian summer days are just about over, and autumn is waiting at the turn of the week.
I idly picked up a Cannobio accommodation brochure the other day, and my editor's eyes alighted on this particular description:
Perhaps visitors might be more than a little wary of this residenza, what with the heating with a mind of its own and something squirmy waiting at the pier...
I idly picked up a Cannobio accommodation brochure the other day, and my editor's eyes alighted on this particular description:
“...The flats are all endowed with equipped kitchen, autonomous heating, ample private balcony or terrace, sat-TV, parking, pier and boas...”
Perhaps visitors might be more than a little wary of this residenza, what with the heating with a mind of its own and something squirmy waiting at the pier...
Thursday, 29 September 2011
Sea pictures in a Cannobio car park
A bright, warm and sunny autumnal day. For two weeks now, no rain. Watering like a mad thing.
This morning in the car, once free of the children and their obsession with 'The Five Findouters' audio mysteries, I'm listening to the immortal Dame Janet Baker sing Elgar's Sea Pictures Op. 37. I pull into the car park as she starts in on the sublime 'Sabbath Morning at Sea', from the poem by Elizabeth Barrett Browning (how much more English can you get?), and I can't tear myself away. I am immobile in the driver's seat, windows open, ancient cassette player vibrating (not quite, but almost) like the drum-&-bass trunk of some city pimp. I am gazing across Lago Maggiore, which glitters in a very Italianate way in the morning sun, and I am dreaming of the sea, as sometimes we English must.
In the parking space beside me I notice with the small part of my being that's not drenched in musical salt spray, a dark blue Twingo has arrived. In the driver's seat is a short man in his mid-60s, who glances at me with a twinkle that gives me to understand he was not always pear-shaped and male-pattern bald. I also shortly become aware that instead of immediately going about his business, he, too, has become caught up in the drama of Dame Janet's ineffable mezzo and is soaring with her across the lake, so to speak.
We reach the climactic "He shall assist me to look higher, he shall assist me to look higher", and now the tears are streaming down my face (note to self - must stop being moved to tears by great art in public car parks). He glances at me, can't fail to see the tears, and smiles a gentle smile. As the moment dies away, we are both still for a moment, and then the man leans slowly across.
"Una meraviglia," he says, quietly, "Una meraviglia!"
He twinkles again, then gets out of his car, and disappears from my day.
And I am left with the strange sensation that something has happened, but I can't quite put my finger on what...
This morning in the car, once free of the children and their obsession with 'The Five Findouters' audio mysteries, I'm listening to the immortal Dame Janet Baker sing Elgar's Sea Pictures Op. 37. I pull into the car park as she starts in on the sublime 'Sabbath Morning at Sea', from the poem by Elizabeth Barrett Browning (how much more English can you get?), and I can't tear myself away. I am immobile in the driver's seat, windows open, ancient cassette player vibrating (not quite, but almost) like the drum-&-bass trunk of some city pimp. I am gazing across Lago Maggiore, which glitters in a very Italianate way in the morning sun, and I am dreaming of the sea, as sometimes we English must.
In the parking space beside me I notice with the small part of my being that's not drenched in musical salt spray, a dark blue Twingo has arrived. In the driver's seat is a short man in his mid-60s, who glances at me with a twinkle that gives me to understand he was not always pear-shaped and male-pattern bald. I also shortly become aware that instead of immediately going about his business, he, too, has become caught up in the drama of Dame Janet's ineffable mezzo and is soaring with her across the lake, so to speak.
We reach the climactic "He shall assist me to look higher, he shall assist me to look higher", and now the tears are streaming down my face (note to self - must stop being moved to tears by great art in public car parks). He glances at me, can't fail to see the tears, and smiles a gentle smile. As the moment dies away, we are both still for a moment, and then the man leans slowly across.
"Una meraviglia," he says, quietly, "Una meraviglia!"
He twinkles again, then gets out of his car, and disappears from my day.
And I am left with the strange sensation that something has happened, but I can't quite put my finger on what...
Thursday, 15 September 2011
Sunday, 12 June 2011
Thursday, 9 June 2011
Monday, 7 March 2011
Monday, 14 February 2011
Valentine graffiti
Mild, damp and misty this February 14th.
I hate graffiti. It intimidates me. In underpasses, on abandoned factories and houses, in railway yards, in impossible spots. Graffiti artists mark out their territory in places a woman alone perhaps shouldn't be. Perhaps will regret being. Perhaps goes there anyway.
This place is other. This is not-you. This is us. We are brutal, virile, dangerous. We oppose you. This is our war-paint. Enter at your own risk.
In London, that is.
In Cannobio, jewel of Lago Maggiore, the graffiti on the underpass walls tell a different story.
A love story. A love story all hearts and flowers, and ti amo 4 ever. A love story full of adolescent insecurity, longing and bravado. Strangely, while the anglophone world looks to Italian as the language of passion, these youngsters pepper their pantings with English.
Back in Cannobio, another kind of amorous declaration has appeared. The practice of sealing a relationship with a padlock and throwing the key into a river, down a sheer mountainside or into some other unreachable location, has reached us all the way from China, where it was originally used to seal a bargain made with the ineffable. Step out onto Cannobio's Ponte Ballerino, the footbridge that crosses the Cannobino river and connects Cannobio with Traffiume, and one is greeted by lock after lock, many etched with the stock phrases of eternal love in Italian, German and English. All winking in the sunshine. All, we have to assume, unassailable.
I hate graffiti. It intimidates me. In underpasses, on abandoned factories and houses, in railway yards, in impossible spots. Graffiti artists mark out their territory in places a woman alone perhaps shouldn't be. Perhaps will regret being. Perhaps goes there anyway.
This place is other. This is not-you. This is us. We are brutal, virile, dangerous. We oppose you. This is our war-paint. Enter at your own risk.
In London, that is.
In Cannobio, jewel of Lago Maggiore, the graffiti on the underpass walls tell a different story.
A love story. A love story all hearts and flowers, and ti amo 4 ever. A love story full of adolescent insecurity, longing and bravado. Strangely, while the anglophone world looks to Italian as the language of passion, these youngsters pepper their pantings with English.
Five minutes away in Switzerland, however, the authorities are one step ahead of the graffiti artists. Here, the public loos in Ascona's lakeside playground are pre-graffitified, not with the stutterings of juveniles but with whimsical poetry in French and Italian. Still, even the Municipio has a heart: the theme, as ever, is l'amour.
Back in Cannobio, another kind of amorous declaration has appeared. The practice of sealing a relationship with a padlock and throwing the key into a river, down a sheer mountainside or into some other unreachable location, has reached us all the way from China, where it was originally used to seal a bargain made with the ineffable. Step out onto Cannobio's Ponte Ballerino, the footbridge that crosses the Cannobino river and connects Cannobio with Traffiume, and one is greeted by lock after lock, many etched with the stock phrases of eternal love in Italian, German and English. All winking in the sunshine. All, we have to assume, unassailable.
Happy San Valentino, however you choose to express yourself...
And if you're the architect responsible for the Ponte Ballerino, perhaps you might like to rework your sums for the extra weight...how much love can one bridge take?
Saturday, 29 January 2011
The lion in winter
Snowing. Big, fluffy flakes. All over the place.
Cannobio's lion rock roars in the snow.
Wednesday, 19 January 2011
Jonathan Livingston Seagull loves...
And so do I...thanks to Sindaco Albertella and Vice-Sindaco Cattaneo for despatching workmen to Carmine with such speed - in Carmine, small improvements make a big difference! Vi ringraziamo molto.
Picture: Cannobio embarcadero.
Lago Maggiore on a beautiful winter's day.
Weather report: a thrilling 14°C at midday today, with clear blue skies.
Monday, 27 December 2010
Luce scribimus
A bright, sunshiney day. A bit parky, though.
Scribbling with light.
Porto Lido Cannobio.
Wednesday, 15 December 2010
Good luck!
Zero degrees at 8am. Blue skies. Foot-stamping cold.
Today, I would like to wish good luck to all my kind friends and colleagues at the Cannobio branch of the Italian Red Cross. This evening, after almost a year's study, they take the exam that qualifies them to answer medical emergencies of all kinds.
Cannobio, the Valle Cannobina and the whole area to the Swiss border, has no professional ambulance service. We rely on the volunteers of the Red Cross and the Mountain Rescue Service (often the same people) for medical emergency cover. Last year the call went out for new volunteers - the service was so stretched that it had come to the point that the Cannobio branch could no longer guarantee 24/7 service - at certain times emergency calls would have to be answered exclusively by ambulance crews from Verbania, 30 minutes away.
And if you're dying of a heart attack, 30 minutes is - literally - a lifetime.
If all of tonight's volunteers pass - and the exam is pretty exacting - the new blood will help to rejuvenate the service so that the Red Cross can continue to save lives in this area.
And I have to say, having studied the 'First Step' with this group earlier this year, I have no problem trusting my life to any one of them.
In bocca al lupo!
Today, I would like to wish good luck to all my kind friends and colleagues at the Cannobio branch of the Italian Red Cross. This evening, after almost a year's study, they take the exam that qualifies them to answer medical emergencies of all kinds.
Cannobio, the Valle Cannobina and the whole area to the Swiss border, has no professional ambulance service. We rely on the volunteers of the Red Cross and the Mountain Rescue Service (often the same people) for medical emergency cover. Last year the call went out for new volunteers - the service was so stretched that it had come to the point that the Cannobio branch could no longer guarantee 24/7 service - at certain times emergency calls would have to be answered exclusively by ambulance crews from Verbania, 30 minutes away.
And if you're dying of a heart attack, 30 minutes is - literally - a lifetime.
If all of tonight's volunteers pass - and the exam is pretty exacting - the new blood will help to rejuvenate the service so that the Red Cross can continue to save lives in this area.
And I have to say, having studied the 'First Step' with this group earlier this year, I have no problem trusting my life to any one of them.
In bocca al lupo!
Wednesday, 8 December 2010
Jonathan Stylites
A tropical eight degrees at 2pm this Immaculate Conception. If you could walk in mist like fallen autumn leaves, today you'd be knee deep in it. The clouds hang so low over the lake you feel you have to duck in case you bang your head. In certain places and at certain times the mist dissolves into rain.
This Jonathan picture is posted today to remind me of the last day of pure, bright sunshine, when I tool a seat on Cannobio's lungolago, next to the ferry port and read my book in the sun.
This Jonathan picture is posted today to remind me of the last day of pure, bright sunshine, when I tool a seat on Cannobio's lungolago, next to the ferry port and read my book in the sun.
Ferry lookout, Cannobio.
Saturday, 27 November 2010
Jonathan and friends...
The day started bright and sunny, sending broad shafts of light bouncing off interior white walls and the honey-coloured woodwork. Warm enough in the sun for breakfast outdoors, but with the ground frozen solid and the broccoli wilting. By midday, snow clouds gathering.
...waiting for the Lago Maggiore ferry.
Tuesday, 2 November 2010
Monday, 26 July 2010
Lighting the way to Love Beach
With thanks to M & G for a very enjoyable evening on Saturday,
in deeply romantic surroundings.
in deeply romantic surroundings.
Weather cooler. And without the wind. Now I have no excuse to do something - perhaps even something useful...
Wednesday, 30 June 2010
Sunday, 27 June 2010
Pietà
Hot, hot hot.
A day for a shady spot among the lavender, a picnic, a snooze, hide-and-seek, ice-lollies and cats lolling in the undergrowth. In the meantime, here's another Madonna for Sunday...
One third of a very moving pietà,
Chiesa della Purificazione di Maria Vergine, Traffiume (Cannobio).
Chiesa della Purificazione di Maria Vergine, Traffiume (Cannobio).
Friday, 25 June 2010
The holidays start here!
Twenty-eight degrees and a sunny day today as we came home from the Scuola Materna A. Zaccheo, Cannobio for the last time.
Arms full of the year's labours, dirty aprons, sand-full pumps and unidentifiable objects in various stages of decay from the darkest recesses of the locker.
Eyes full of tears.
Friends, teachers, co-parents, we are forever in your debt. You have shown us kindness and consideration. You have offered your help when we faltered. You have taught me and my children Italian and you haven't laughed (too much) at the mistakes we made. You have entrusted to me your children and together with me they have taken their first steps into the bright world of foreign languages and cultures. I guess one's first class is an experience never to forget. And their affection I return with all my heart.
So one door closes, and we wait in the shining corridor of summer as the door to our new life slowly opens...
The holidays start here!
Arms full of the year's labours, dirty aprons, sand-full pumps and unidentifiable objects in various stages of decay from the darkest recesses of the locker.
Eyes full of tears.
Friends, teachers, co-parents, we are forever in your debt. You have shown us kindness and consideration. You have offered your help when we faltered. You have taught me and my children Italian and you haven't laughed (too much) at the mistakes we made. You have entrusted to me your children and together with me they have taken their first steps into the bright world of foreign languages and cultures. I guess one's first class is an experience never to forget. And their affection I return with all my heart.
So one door closes, and we wait in the shining corridor of summer as the door to our new life slowly opens...
The holidays start here!
Monday, 7 June 2010
A gift from God
In this part of the world, Jasminum officinale thrives. Gardeners here frequently use it to make impenetrable hedges and areas of deep, cool shade. During the rest of the year its glossy dark green leaves go almost unnoticed as we rush about our business, but in early June suddenly the little white star-shaped flowers open and we come under their perfumed sway. Suddenly the world with its cars and tarmac, its noise and its hardness, becomes an altogether more sensuous place: women seem more elegant, men more dignified, the sky a more pleasing shade of blue and the lake depths more profound. In the morning, with the scent of dew-laden jasmine to carry me down the hill, the day seems more approachable.
The word 'jasmine' comes from the Persian via Old French. In Persian it originally meant 'gift from God'. Truly, it is so! (As the Poet might have said.)
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