Final Travel Blog

I know that some of you probably wonder if Donald and I fell off the face of the earth. We have been home for 2 and a half weeks, but have been, of course, pretty busy. We left Orebro, where it turns out that we did our Centigrade- Fahrenheit math wrong: when it is -25 Centigrade, it is about minus 10, Fahrenheit. So THAT is how cold it was, and must have gotten up to just above about 0 Fahrenheit during the day. So when I last wrote, it was NOT 19 F; it was probably about 3 or 4 degrees, F. Since then, they have only had MORE snow and cold, with trains once again shutting down due to frozen switches, etc. Since so many people travel by train in Europe, this creates huge problems for everyone. The predictions by climatologists that global climate change was going to cause increased temperature extremes and variance, with temperatures both much warmer and much colder (depending on where you are), along with more intense storms, are being confirmed last winter and this winter. Since we arrived home 3 weeks ago, Europe has been hit by at least two more big snow storms that I know of, shutting down airports, trapping motorists on the Swiss and Italian autobahns, and causing the Italian trains to bypass Florence, where the train station was snowed in!

After Orebro, we flew to Dublin, where we encountered 3 inches of solid ice on most sidewalks and some roads. It was treacherous all over Ireland to drive, as places that LOOKED clear often had black ice, and there were many accidents. It was even worse for walking, and hospitals were filled with people who had fallen on the ice. The newspapers and television stations were warning older people to not go outside at all, and younger people to check on older people to make sure they were okay. This meant that it was difficult to be tourists, as, for example, Trinity College was closed due to the weather and cold, over the weekend, and no one could see the Book of Kells. It took a while to get anywhere, as we minced steps and tried not to fall. Flying over the North Sea, which was loaded with icebergs and almost solid ice in some places, Scotland and northern England, which were covered with snow, including the roads (I read newspaper articles about people in Yorkshire getting snowed in, with 16-foot snowdrifts against their homes, cars buried under 9 feet of snow, etc; last winter was similar in these same places, with hard freezes in southern Ireland, snow, etc), and then the northern Irish coast being snowbound, was a shocking experience, especially for early December. What will the North Sea look like by January? Meanwhile, the glaciers in Greenland are melting at an even faster pace, dumping all that icy water into the sea, and changing the Gulf Stream flow which has kept northern Europe warmer than it ought to be for centuries. Additionally, there is a massive Low Pressure system stuck over Iceland, keeping normally warm air from flowing to Europe, and also keeping OUR east coast winter storms from reaching us here inland in Western Massachusetts (our storms, just like last winter's, are sticking to the coast and going out to sea. Cape Cod got over a half foot of snow the other day, while we got none!)

But the worst part of our Dublin experience was the cold. We were dressed fine for it, but the many beggars—drunken older men and the many, many Roma and the Eastern European teenagers—were not. They huddled, shivering, on the ice, perched as best as they could on top of a blanket or a bag, and held out a paper cup for coins. I know that there are begging scams, with organized groups putting out the most pitiful members to collect money, but it’s still an awfully hard way to make a living. And it is still heart-breaking to see really OLD women, and younger women with babies (I SAW the babies; they are real), huddled on the sidewalks, up against a phone booth or on a step, begging and clearly cold. I was once told by a priest that it doesn’t matter who the person is who receives the money, or what they are going to in fact do with it; the central thing going on when I see a beggar is in my own soul. Do I see a person who needs my help and turn away, cynically believing in what may be their own cynicism, or do I help, regardless of who they are or what they MIGHT do with the money (give it to a boss, buy a drink or drugs)? The thing is, I can’t live with myself if I don’t help, and I sure can’t eat supper if I know that someone is shivering and hungry outside the window. Again, those old women and women with babies may be out there because some criminal boss decided they would earn the most money from suckers like me, but regardless, it is awfully cold, and it’s horrible to be out there, an old person or a baby, shivering on the ice, with the wind blowing on you, no matter who you are. And if my giving them money means that an old woman or a baby can get out of the cold sooner, then it is MY sin if I don’t give them that money, if I have any in my pocket.

So our 24 hours in Dublin became a process of us shivering as we picked our way on the ice, from beggar to beggar, digging into our pockets over and over, and buying hot food for some. Ireland is experiencing an ever-worsening economic crisis, with increasing numbers of impoverished and homeless. It was worse than sad to walk down Grafton Street, with glitzy shops and a consumerist-Christmas being marketed, and to encounter dozens of beggars in front of those shops. As we ended our European trip, it was the worst experience of the human costs of capitalism that we had encountered. And yet the World Bank asks for more austerity from them, when they’ve already launched severe austerity measures that have only further scared away the international banks, rather than attracting them. It’s clear that more austerity won’t work; probably only unhitching from the Euro and letting their own currency crash would help (Iceland has survived its own severe crisis by letting its currency sink, which made its exports and labor more attractive again), but obviously that is not going to happen. With the Euro as its currency, the Irish now have nothing to lure international business with.

In Dublin we had one very good meal, and then some absolutely TERRIBLE food (Donald insisted we eat supper in a pub that also advertised live Irish music, which was also terrible. Note to travelers: if in Dublin, eat somewhere else first, THEN go out for the music). Thankfully the Book of Kells exhibition was open the morning before we had to leave, and it was wonderful, and worth the treacherous sidewalks to get there. We then flew home, meeting—what else?—very cold temperatures here in Western Massachusetts! We began unpacking and grocery shopping, and drove to NY, where we visited both sets of parents. Unfortunately, we forgot both our laptops behind my mother’s front door! So then we had to wait another week, during which I went to a half-dozen doctor appointments, until Donald could once again make the drive to NY and pick up the computers (don’t feel TOO sorry for him: while there, he also attended his brother Pete’s infamous annual Christmas party). He—and the laptops—arrived home and then we hosted a belated Thanksgiving dinner for some of Anna’s friends.

One thing that has been on my mind since coming home is the bombing in Stockholm two weekends ago, near a major pedestrian shopping street that I visited a couple of times per week on my daily walks. While no one died other than the bomber himself, thank God, it has shaken up that normally peaceful country. I feel for my Swedish friends and wish them all well.

I miss Sweden (though not the frighteningly high prices), and especially loved our short time in Orebro, with its town hall turned into an enormous Advent calendar and with its gorgeous Christmas lights shining through the falling snow and cold dark. I imagine that my Swedish friends are still riding their bikes despite the minus-zero F temperatures and snow (they are hardy souls; during the summer and autumn, after all, we saw VERY old people biking a few kilometers in order to go to the grocery store, out in the countryside). In Orebro, people were still bicycling even though it was below 0 F and ALL of the roads were covered in packed-down snow. Are you still bicycling, Anna? I miss my new friends in Sweden and Ireland and Italy. I miss the beauty of Bellagio and being able, in Italy and Stockholm, to walk anywhere I needed to be. I miss the amazing European pastries and whipped cream, but am already losing weight rapidly, despite it being the Christmas season and having made--and eaten--tons of tasty cookies! And I miss waking each morning with the knowledge that I could work on my OWN work that day, all day, and not have to grade papers, prepare quizzes or lectures, or answer emails for 2 hours each day. It turns out that I am a very disciplined worker even when it’s my own work, and I really enjoyed the freedom to read, take notes, and write each day. I know that I would not have gotten as much done if I had stayed home; being away from my normal comfort zone, routines, and responsibilities was an enormous gift that few people are privileged to experience in their lifetimes. While it may be too much to ask for, I hope I get to do it again!

I will post some final photos on this blog soon, but this is the last real travel blog I will write for this trip. I have enjoyed writing it (mostly at 10 or 11:00 at night!), and have loved sharing with all of you. I wish all of you some slice of the joy of traveling and experiencing new places and people, and I hope you all have or receive the gift of finding beauty in small things (I also wish you the joy of finding history fascinating, but that might be too much to ask for!). And in this seemingly dark time of year, I wish all of you the blessings of both the darkness and the light, the joy of knowing that, one way or another, God-is-With-Us, and the inner peace that comes with living in harmony with those around you. Good Yule, Happy Chanukah, and, to paraphrase one of my favorite Immortal Beings, “Merry Christmas to all, and to all, a Goodbye.”

Weather, weather everywhere...........

Oh the weather outside is frightful…

Currently the temperature is 19 F today's high. Today's low was 11, better than when we arrived, when we longed for 10.

In Bellagio, the weather almost every day was very foggy and rainy, with some days the wind blowing so hard we lost our internet connections and hats. The local olive harvest was delayed due to the wet weather.

When it was sunny, it was so gorgeous it was breathtaking. The snow pack on the mountains around us grew bigger every day, inching down the sides of the mountains, and the temperatures on the lake very quickly became quite cold. On one of our last days there, we went across the lake to try to walk--as much as we could--to San Martino, a gorgeously-situated old church perched on a mountainside. The way is a pilgrimage of sorts. However, it was rainy and cold, and the little stones that form the path are EXTREMELY slippery when wet, so it was exhausting. We gave up and ended in an local bar for lunch!

Once in the beautiful walled small city of Lucca, about 2-3 hours south of Bellagio, we encountered the same cold, wet, rainy weather, with snow pack on the local mountains! Lucca was just dressing up for Christmas, and the Christmas lights got turned on during our second evening. Local people were out in a shopping frenzy; one would never guess that Italy is experiencing a severe economic crisis. The narrow medieval streets were crowded with people, though perhaps most of them were doing what we were doing: window shopping. The restaurants were mostly empty, although they were serving terrific Tuscan peasant dishes and local red wines. Our bed and breakfast was in a 13^th century merchant’s tower-home, a type of Tuscan housing that was surprisingly common in that period: a bottom floor that was a shop, a floor above to house the work-shop, another one above that to provide general living space for the family, with the upper floors for sleeping chambers, and wooden stairways or ladders on the outside in order to reach them all. The roofs held gardens for the family, including vegetables and small fruit trees! And when the merchants (including whoever owned “ours”) got more prosperous, they built villas onto the towers. Some of these towers still rise above the other buildings. Ours no longer was visible from the outside as a tower, but had long ago blended into the main room of the villa (part of the B&B) and other buildings around it.

We went to Florence on the train, from Lucca, one day, in order to see a wonderful art exhibit (Bronzino), and thank heavens it was terrific, because it poured so hard that we could not see anything else of Florence due to our umbrellas in front of our faces. It is good we had seen Florence before. We discovered the holes in our shoes that day.

And then we took to train north again to Milan and a bus, in the cold rain, out to the airport. By the time we got there, it was snowing, and we realized that Europe as a whole had turned into a frigid, snowy land where few planes or trains were moving. Our plane got off the next morning, despite the local snow and the dire predictions of the desk clerk. We arrived at Munich Airport, to a snowstorm that was paralyzing much of Germany. After an hour’s delay in boarding, we sat on the runway for 3 hours (they fed and “watered” us a number of times), while one runway after another closed, we got de-iced 3 times, and our pilot kept telling us that we were “first in line’ on one or the other runway when it reopened (we went to the head of the line quickly as many other flights were simply canceled). He also informed us that he had to rev the engines before flight to get the ice out of them. I kept wondering if there was something crazy about taking off in that kind of weather (by the way, the UK and the rest of Northern Europe have also had remarkable amounts of snow recently).

We arrived in a Sweden that is experiencing the coldest October, November, and early December months in 100 years. It was below 0 F the night we arrived, and had to catch a 2-hour train to Orebro (where the conference I am attending is being held). We kept being warned that the trains might be delayed as the switches kept freezing and entire lines kept having to be shut down. We made it and found Orebro, a lovely university town in central Sweden, to be covered in snow and ice, with more falling. Snow has not stopped falling since we arrived two nights ago. Don says that maybe there is some sort of re-circulation system, like a fountain, where the snow hits the ground, evaporates in the extreme dryness, and goes back up in the sky, from where it is recycled as snow again. Amazingly, Swedes of all ages continue to bicycle in this weather and, of course, many are walking.

We have also learned what the winter darkness means. Only in the far north does the sun not rise at all in winter; here in the first week of December it begins to grow light at about 7:30 am, but the sun does not actually rise above the horizon until about 10:00 or 10:30 am. It then does not make it above a two-story building, on the horizon, until it sets again, fully, by 3:30 (but of course dusk is earlier). Don has not seen the sun since we got here, as he is in the downtown, and the low buildings block the horizon. I have glimpsed it from the café in the campus center, at about noon, as it is dark when I go to and from the campus.

The day after tomorrow, we go to Dublin on our way home, just for one day. After a month of mostly wet, cold weather, I have chosen my warmest sweater, socks, and pants to wear there, as it is undoubtedly cold and wet there, but hopefully not as cold as here. As one walks along the street here, it is easy to imagine that one’s cheeks are cracking with the cold. And yet, the candle-culture we had loved so much in October is still in full swing, the Yule decorations are everywhere, our B&B served us hot glog tonight, and the town has set up, outside the big church at the top of the town square, an outdoor stage for the Yule concert and sing-along that will take place Sunday night (after we have left).