An evening amongst wild Sweet Peas, Sunshine and Cherries.
Posted: July 7, 2012 Filed under: Warsaw | Tags: Allotment, blog, blogging, cherry, depot, drink, evening, flower, flowers, Food, fruit, garden, Home & Garden, hungry, juice, juicy, ladybird, mosquito, north, park, photo, photography, pink, purple, Recreation and Sports, sour, sunshine, sweet, Sweet Pea, tea, the great escape, the great tea scape, thegreateascape, tram, travel, tree, wake, west, white, wild flower, Wine tasting descriptors, woke up, yellow Leave a comment
After a day spent indoors avoiding the extreme 35’C heat we headed out in the evening, when the sun was getting low and the temperature a bit more reasonable. Most days all you have to do is walk out of the door and you are soaking in sweat, sorry to be so graphic! This evening, the same one as the Tram evening in the previous post, we headed vaguely North West out of the flat, past the Tram depot and some lovely allotment gardens, then ended up alongside the train track and eventually stumbled upon what must have been allotments in the past. We discovered beautiful pink Sweet Pea flowers growing wild as well as a few old cherry trees that were offering up some lovely ripe fruits, which we gobbled with smiles on our faces. They were juicy and sweet, with just the right amount of sourness in them. We walked a little more, then the Mosquitoes woke up and seemed hungry, so we did an about turn and headed home.
Day 115 – 116, Cologne, May 4th & 5th 2012
Posted: May 6, 2012 Filed under: Cologne | Tags: action, action mike, agfa agnar, AMBER Alert, asparagus, band, bassist, bicycle, bird, camera, carrot cake, coconut, coconut sauce, coffee, cologne, Cursive, dandelion, dinner, DJ, Food, food drink, Fruit and Vegetable, garden, gardening, gig, ginger, mike, music, new old camera, pancake, party, photo, photography, raspberry sauce, Regina, restaurants, robin, rose, rose club, salesmen, silette LK, tea, the great tea scape, thegreatteascape, Thursday, ticket, travel, traveling, worms Leave a comment
Tea 115: Green Yunnan, Regina’s Apartment, Cologne
Thursday promised to rain in the afternoon, and so the morning I went for a short wander up the high street, mostly to see if the photos from my new old camera had been processed yet, they hadn’t so the delights of the Agfa are still a mystery to me. Then whilst it was still sunny I decided to help by starting some gardening, mostly ‘harvesting’ dandelions to try and prevent them from dropping too many seeds onto the ground. The person who had stayed in Regina’s flat whilst she was away was supposed to keep the garden clean and tidy, but it has turned into something of a jungle. So I spent a while doing that before the promised rain did indeed arrive.
That evening a few of Regina’s friends came for dinner, which lasted a good few hours, well past 1a.m. There had been a slight disaster with a savoury pancake mix that resulted in a last minute change of plan and therefore a bit of a delay in the food. But we did eat – Avocado with a raspberry sauce, then sweet potato with a coconut sauce and sesame coated asparagus, then a great ginger carrot cake with more coconut and fresh fruits. Tasty!
Saturday. Today we had a slow morning then headed into town to buy some tickets for a gig that Regina found online that she wanted to go and see. A band called Cursive, I’d never heard of them before, so thought I’d give them a go. We went and bought the tickets, then looked in vain for a particular bicycle shop. Then we stopped for a cup of coffee (sorry, tea sacrilege I know!). We left for the gig later in the evening, around 9 and watched the band play. The gig was kind of short, but the band seemed to be enjoying themselves. The bassist and lead guitar are pretty old and tubby, so I think these guys have been doing the rounds for a few years now. I can’t help imagining they probably work in Estate Agents or as salesmen during normal life!
After the gig we went back to the flat for a little while, I had a ‘power nap‘, then we headed to a club for a bit of a dance. The club was good, though the predominant DJ, (the one we had not gone to listen to) was playing pretty crap stuff. Someone informed us that he had been drinking solid for the past few days. I think he might of noticed my looks of disgust at some of his choices though as I caught him staring at my undoubtedly blank face a couple of times. The guy we had gone to hear ‘DJ Action Mike’ (ironic naming here) played some better stuff and we got some dancing in, though I didn’t manage to break into a sweat…
Day 54, Radom, March 3rd 2012
Posted: March 5, 2012 Filed under: Radom | Tags: benedict, benedictine, birthday, brother, catholic, child prodigy, christian slater, church, coffee, dill, dog, drink, film, Food, galeria, garden, gift, glorious sunshine, Goulash, grounds, hunting, Irish Terrier, kochanowski, krupnik, liquor, Marta, mashed potato, monk, necklace, old town, patricia arquette, Poland, prickly pear, public toilet, quince, Radom, refurbish, renovate, renovation, salad, shopping centre, sister, soup, spirit, sunday, sunshine, table tennis table, tea, tender loving care, the great tea scape, thegreateascape, thegreatteascape, TLC, travel, traveling, true romance, veg, vodka, Warsaw, wild boar, wooden beams 1 Comment
Tea 54, Green tea with prickly pear and lemon, including Krupnik, Marta’s Mum’s House, Radom
Today was a beautiful day, glorious sunshine beaming down, with real warmth in it. The shadows were still cold though, and there was the occasional gust of a chilly wind. We just walked around Radom today, seeing the old town, which is unfortunately in a bit of a state in places, wooden beams literally stopping many buildings from collapsing. I am told that the old town is going to be renovated and repaired this year though, so hopefully that will happen because it is already charming, and with a bit of TLC could be very beautiful.
We first wandered through a little park, with a sculpture of Chopin and a funny little castle that is now a public toilet in the middle of it. Next to it is a bizarre little sight, rather than a play ground for kids they have an exercise ground, with a cross trainer / stepper type thing, a bench and chest press thing, all sorts of stuff, including a table tennis table. It’s quite nice because the kids still have fun playing around and climbing all ovet the stuff, whilst the adults can probably have a good time too, if they aren’t too shy to exercise in front of the whole town, which is small enough for everyone to probably know everyone… There is also a rather large and unusually sculpture of a guy called Kochanowski, I can’t remember exactly what he is famous for, but I think he was a poet, and has a bit of a sad history concerning his daughter, who was apparently some sort of child prodigy but died very young. The sculpture is good, but the figure is adopting the most bizarre pose I think I’ve ever seen!
Out of the park and down the high street, looking at the people, the entrance ways and arches to some of the old buildings. We accidently locked ourselves into one of the little courtyards but were rescued a little while later when a lady wanted to come in at the time we were trying to get out! More explorations found us a little old building that was once a printers shop. This old brick building had a thing over the door stating 1818, which I presume to be it’s original building date, and it looks it. It is in semi ruins now, but is a very interesting building and I hope it gets saved by someone.
In to the old town, we wandered into the grounds of a Benedictine church, a few brown robed monks milling about, the sun shining down on the well kept lawn and shrubs. More meandering brought us past another church, the original church of the old town, and then into the old town square, a vast, empty space, in need of a bit of life and improvement, which will undoubtedly arrive at some point. At the moment it is a minimalist’s dream.
We then wandered out of the old town, to the Galeria (shopping centre) which has pretty much singlehandedly brought the blight that the town centre is suffering into being. Despite this we were on a hunt for a gift for Marta’s Mum, for her birthday, which is on Sunday. We found what she was after, or had been instructed to get by her sister and brother and then wandered back in the sunshine towards home.
We had intended to pop home and then go out again, but when we got back Marta’s Mum had prepared a huge spread of salad and soup and chicken and her Dad had made a wild boar goulash! He is a hunter, and despite my reservations to this fact and my preference to veg over meat, the goulash was very good. Mashed Potatoes with Dill, Carrot and Sauerkraut. It was a proper feast, and for this reason we did not make it back out into the town, the food was so non-stop that we spent the whole afternoon eating and drinking! The drinking went a fair way, starting with a local (ish) beer and then wine and then onto the spirits…! Krupnik is a honey liquor, pretty strong and fragrant, but good. There was also a vodka that Marta’s Dad had infused with quince. Basically there was A LOT! To freshen up a little Marta and I took her dog Etna for a walk around the park, then we came home and watched a film, one of my favourites ‘True Romance’, with Christian Slater and Patricia Arquette.
Day 30, Tartu – Pärnu, February 8th 2012
Posted: February 9, 2012 Filed under: Parnu | Tags: apple, bus, chocolate pancakes, cold, cramped bus, dense forest, dinner party, drink, energy, energy fields, estonia, field, film, Food, garden, information exchange, Latvia, leg room, lemon balm, lovely, matrix, meliss, memory, orchard, Pärnu, photography, riga, snow, Sweet Potato, Tallinn, tartu, tea, the living matrix, ticket, toastie, vegetarian, winter Leave a comment
Tea 30: Meliss (Lemon Balm), Liis & Ivo’s loft, Parnu
Two belated posts in a row… oops. Yesterday was another travel day mostly. I spent the morning packing and relaxing on the sofa in Tartu, trying to gather a bit of energy back. A huge breakfast of chocolate pancakes and toastie sandwiches was made for me so that was really good. So after a little bit of zombifying in front of the TV I went down to Tartu bus station bought my ticket for Parnu and left. The bus was really full and possibly the least leg room I have ever experienced. Luckily the bus had quite an early stop and a large chunk of the people got off at that first stop, so that was a bit better, but i still had my legs stuck out into the aisle, wedged between my rucksack and the armrest. Traveling by bus shows you just how much of Estonia is covered by thick dense forest. 60% apparentely, it’s no wonder they burn so much of it to heat their homes. But I am assured it is all sustainably done. Arriving in Parnu at about 5:30pm, I was met at the bus station by Liis, who is kindly putting me up for two nights before I make for the border and into Latvia.
We went straight away to her husband’s car and the three of us drove, picked a fourth person up, and headed out into the countryside, to one of their friends houses. I had been kindly invited to join their dinner party. A weekly occurance they pick a ‘theme’, or vegetable, that will be cooked into as many different options as possible. Last night was one of my favourites, Sweet Potato. We had it as salad, baked, and ‘caramelised’ crisp/chip style. It was good food, and followed by a documentary film, The Living Matrix. Basically this is about energy fields that may, or may not, exist around the human body, and how holistic medicine can engage with these fields to heal. It was very interesting, though the characters and scientists were all quite extreme and intense, which can be a little off putting for some people. If you are into, or just curious about the ideas of holistic medication, healing, acupuncture, the placebo effect, and such things it is worth a look.
We all left after the film, and headed to Liis and Ivo’s apartment, which is a roof space apartment near the centre of Parnu. They keep insisting it is unfinished, but it is a really lovely space, nice decor, nice environment, really lovely. I am certainly jealous, it is one of those places you always wish you could live in, and the decor you always strive for but never feel you achieve. I’m pretty sure these two have achieved it. It is really lovely, especially the ‘rocket stove’, which I am currently sitting on typing this. We drank tea, ate apples from Liis’ Gran’s Garden, and chatted for a while about what I am ‘planning’ and where the two of them have travelled and what their plans are. They seem very happy here.
So, no Parnu photos yet, but here are some more of Tartu, including the rather dazed looking face of the pig sculpture that stands outside of the Tartu meat market…
A Travel and Tea Diary 