ANOTHER TYPE OF GERMAN TOWN

August 2015

After working in the archive in the town of Kempen, our next stop was Blomberg.  It's another darling town in a completely different style from Kempen.  It has Fachwerk buildings galore (we sometimes call this style Tudor in the U.S.).  Sometimes archive work is hard and tedious but the villages are charming.  If we finish our work early we can walk around and enjoy them.

Our archive was in a former Jewish Synagogue (used before the Jews were evicted from town).  They left the Torah cupboard and you can see it on the wall in front of Roger. 

The Blomberg city archive

Roger is hard at work

Jeanne scanning a very old document

The women's loft in the synagogue

The Fachwerk houses are gorgeous

And you meet interesting people....

 School was starting soon.  The cones on the right of this store

window are filled with candy by the parents

and given to their children on the first day of school.

We love Blomberg!

ART NOUVEAU VIENNA STYLE

October 26, 2015

 

A new and exciting style of art and décor began at the turn of the century (1890's to around 1910) called Art Nouveau.  In Austria it's called Jugendstil.  One of my favorite uses of this style is in architecture.  It's characterized by lots of green painted wrought iron and gold.  One of my favorite places to see this style is in Viennese public transportation stations and on bridge and balcony railings.  Gustav Klimt is the favorite Viennese Jugendstil artist.  The famous revolutionary Secession Art Gallery is designed in Jugendstil.

 

 

The Josefstaedter Station

 

 

Railings

 

 

Karlsplatz Station

 

Close-up

 

 

The Majolica House on Linke Wienzeile

 

 

Close-up

 

The famous Anker Clock on Hoher Markt

 

Strudelhofstiege (stairway) very near to our apartment

 

Close-up of the fountain

 

Secession Gallery at Karlsplatz....

......with its leafy gold dome

 

One of my favorite buildings

 

And last, but not least: all the Klimt art you could ever hope to see.

 

Klimt's "The Kiss"

 

Klimt's "Tree of Life"

 

 

 

RESARCH TRIP TRAVELS -- TRIP # 1

 KEMPEN, GERMANY

        August 2015

Our main purpose for coming to Austria is for Roger to do research on German census records.  This means we will make three research trips to Germany.  On each trip we will visit city and state archives in many different towns and cities. We began by renting a car and driving across Germany.

The first town we visited was a pleasant surprise for me.  It's called Kempen and is near The Netherlands, one of my favorite countries.  It looks quite Dutch, don't you think?  We learned that many Germans are choosing to retire near this town because they love the small village ambience.  I'm with them on that!

 

Bikes are the main mode of transportation in this flat part of Germany, just as they are in Holland.
You have to watch out for them or you'll be run down or cause a terrible bike wreck.

 

Some charming street scenes...........



 

         

WE ARRIVE IN VIENNA -- 15 July 2015

                              We flew from France to Vienna and took a taxi to the vacation
                                                 apartment we have rented for two weeks.

                                          We have a lot of luggage -- over 100 pounds each.
                                    And we had to pay $100 for the 3rd suitcase we checked.

.

                                       Here is the front door of our apartment on the 3rd floor. 
                                                  We're glad the building has an elevator.

                                                          You enter through the kitchen.
                               It's furnished and has most everything we need to make our meals.

                                   Off the kitchen is the bathroom.  It's a strange arrangement.
.

 

We're very lucky to have a little washing machine....

 

 

                                    
                                                                        and a dryer. 

                                               The next room is a nice living/dining room...

                                                                        and cable TV.

                             Through the dining room is the bedroom.  Don't you love the art?
                                             It's Klimt.  I should appreciate it more, I guess.

It has been 100 degrees for days and days.  We have no air conditioning and neither do the streetcars and subways.  Occasionally we get into a bus and are surprised it is air-conditioned.  But it's only a 5 or 10 minute respite from the heat.  Most days I only go out for short trips unless I want to risk heat exhaustion.  I came close a couple of times so I have been waiting until late afternoon to venture out.  Thankfully our landlady sent over  two large fans so we can sleep a bit better.

After about 10 days of this heat wave it has now cooled down to the perfect weather.  You don't feel hot or cold, but just right.  So now I'm starting to enjoy being in Vienna.

2015 A New Adventure -- We set off for 6 months in Vienna

 

OUR ADVENTURE BEGINS IN FRANCE!

7 July 2015

Roger is taking a sabbatical leave from BYU to compile an index of German census records.

This has apparently never been done before because it is such a complex issue.  Each province made its own rules about when and how to do its census -- nothing is standardized.  He has spent months making initial contact with archives all over Germany to get as much information as he can via mail and e-mail to eliminate the need to travel to every area.  We decided to make Vienna our home  base and rent the BYU Study Abroad apartment for 6 months and make trips to Germany as needed.  There is a Study Abroad program in progress until mid-August so we have rented a vacation apartment until then. It comes with maid service!

.



Here we are in Aix en Provence.  Aix is pronounced "X".

 

We started our adventure by flying into Marseille, France. Our former American neighbors,

the Francoms, have moved with their 4 children to a small village about an hour from there.

Meredith picked us and our 200 + pounds of luggage at the airport and drove us to their home.

They have rented a nice house with a pool in the village of Greoux les Bains.

The Francoms and Minerts in the Provence lavender fields.

 

We stopped at a local honey producing market to buy honey made by bees who feed on lavender. They had many other types depending on where the hives are placed.  Honey = Miel in French.

Meredith and daughter Sophie with Roger in Greoux les Bains on the main street.

Their pool was a life-saver in the very hot weather.

They took us to a beautiful lake...

                                                  and to a museum in Aix en Provence.

Then there was the unfortunate incident of the bee.  We were on our way back to our car from our visit to Aix when I felt something crawling under my clothing.  I sneaked into a stairway to look and couldn't see anything.  But I kept feeling the crawling feeling so I pounded on my chest to smash whatever it was.  I felt a terrible pain and smashed some more.  I still could see nothing so thought I must be imagining things.  It wasn't until an hour later when we were home and changing into our swimsuits that I discovered that I certainly hadn't imagined anything.  I found this bee with its stinger still in me!  The bee was dead, fortunately, so I pulled out the stinger.  I have been suffering the terrible itching after-effect ever since.  Thankfully I brought along some essential oils.  Lavender and peppermint are very helpful for reducing the pain and itching of a bee sting!