Entries from July 2008 ↓

When Manu and I where in Munich in June, we dedicated a part of our visit also to art.
You know, we are not the kind of art addicted that stop at every church and monument visiting every single room of any museum listed in the guide. We prefer selecting few things that we think could be interesting for us and then walking around getting first of all the spirit of a place, the mood of the people, trying to figure out how it feels living in that place.
Anyhow, for our artistic tour of Munich we selected for Saturday the “Haus der Kunst” (the House of Art), which is a severe neoclassical building built beginning of the 20th century in the southern side of the Englischer Garten (the wonderful park that covers a big part of the city center). Here there are usually exhibitions of contemporary art and in fact when we arrived we had the choice of four exhibitions. We chose the one of Robert Rauschenberg, because he is well-known and passed away few months ago.
When we arrived in the halls dedicated to his works, we realized that yes, Rauschenberg is well-known, but in fact we didn’t know anything about him! His works where there, made with materials like cardboard boxes or fabrics, or an old bike, a bath-tub… but we felt disoriented in front of these works. We stood there, in the center of the hall, just turning around and I said: “In this case, I wish we had a guide to explain all this”.
And… you won’t believe it! right when I finished that sentence a young woman appeared in front of us like a fairy and said: “Hi, if you wish I could guide you through this exhibition. It’s for free, it’s offered by the house”. Imagine our astonishment! Of course we said yes and then also two other women joined us and so we got a concise but very clear and passionate description of the works and life of Robert Rauschenberg. Everything seemed so different thanks to her explanation!
After more or less twenty minutes, as quick as she had appeared, she also disappeared. She asked if we had any question, we said no, she wished us a good visit and walked away very quickly.
We were astounded and so happy! We were laughing like two kids that had received an unexpected present in an ordinary day.
After the visit we were still commenting our “museum fairy” and Manu stopped walking and said: “Illy, maybe you have supernatural powers… now, could you please try with « we would need one million euro on our bank account » ?”

Verona is a wonderful town between Venice and Milan, it’s situated on the Adige river, the second longest river in Italy. Verona is wonderful in each period of the year but during the summer there is too much umidity. The best time to choose for a visit in Verona depends on your interests and, surely, your holiday period. If you are in love you can visit it on February 14th, St. Valentine’s day. During those days Verona is a lovely environement to enjoy your love like Romeo and Juliet! You can visit Jiuliet’s house in every time during the year but in those days it’s unique.

Romeo and Juliet are one of the best attractions for visitors, however Verona has many other interesting attractions. The Arena, the ancient roman amphitheatre, hosts lyric operas, rock concerts and many other shows.

In Verona the landscape is fantastic with hills all around it. Illy and I would like to show you some parts of this wonderful territory, expecially Valpolicella, famous for its wines (the most famous is Amarone), and Lake Garda, the biggest lake in Italy and a nice place for holyday.

Has anyone of you visited these places yet?

Few weeks ago we were for three days in Munich. It was warm and sunny and at night the temperature was still delicious. We decided we wanted to have dinner somewhere on a terrace in Schwabing, but the whole district was overwhelmed by supporters of Turkey, that was playing against Russia in the quarter-finals of the European Football Championship. As you probably know, there is a very large Turkish community in Germany, so imagine streets, bars, restaurants (all with TV screens showing the match) invaded by a big crowd of enthusiastic and noisy supporters with flags and trumpets, singing and jumping in loud ovations… Not really the ideal situation for a romantic candle-light dinner, right?
So we left Schwabing and, from Odeonsplatz, walked through the gardens of the Residenz (where we saw through the big windows that a wonderful party was having place, gentlemen in black tie and ladies in long evening-dress) and passing behind the palace we reached a place called Marstallplatz. This is a typical German pedestrian square, where contemporary architecture lives harmoniously together with classical buildings, big trees all around and soft lighting : the ideal location for a modern bistrot like Eisbach.
Many tables on the terrace, candlelight, white sunshade umbrellas with built-in lighting, a quite and sophisticated atmosphere, but still very casual. We ordered delicious meat dishes (rib eye steak for Manu and lamb for me) and a bottle of Shiraz La Motte 2005.
Well, this South African wine was for us surprisingly good, so intense and spicy, it accompanied perfectly our first evening in Munich, we relaxed and totally enjoyed our romantic candle-light dinner.

I’m sure everyone of you have seen or read something regarding Romeo and Juliet at least once in life!
I think this is one of the most famous tragedies that has ever been written in literature and then so often represented in theatre and movies.
The most famous version was the one written by William Shakespeare around 1560, that was inspired by an ancient Italian tale.
It’s a tragic and troubled love story between two teenagers, descendants from two noble families of Verona that hated each other. Their love ended with the death of both.
There must have been something true in this ancient tale and – most significant of all – there is in Verona still a house with a balcony, which is considered to be the original balcony of Romeo and Juliet!
Have you aver visited Verona and the balcony of Romeo and Juliet? I’m also curious to know if you saw and touched… the statue of Juliet…
For those of you who don’t know: there is a tradition saying that if you touch the breast of Juliet (on the statue, I mean!) this will bring luck. There is usually a huge amount of tourists visiting the balcony, touching the statue of Juliet, taking pictures and… signing the wall.
We, the people of Verona, usually complain about all these signatures on the wall, it’s really dirty!
But this is apparently the power of love, and the power of a place that talks about love.