Italy trip

Dolomites from Passo Rolle, in the Valle del Vanoi near S. Martino di Castrozza.

Trento

Asolo, where Freya Stark lived, wrote her travel books, and died in 1993.

Treviso, by night

Above and bottom left, Mantua; bottom right, Milan

Christmas in Feltre

Dalla mia finestra

I sometimes wonder why I live in Belgium "le plat pays", where you could never have a view like this from your window! Above is Lake Maggiore, with the Alps behind, as seen from the terrace of a friend's house. Below, the Dolomites behind the town of Feltre (50 km North of Treviso, in the Veneto), as seen from the topmost casement window of another friend's house. Ah, la bella Italia!

Happy Christmas!!

Wish everyone a wonderful Christmas or whatever else you celebrate at this time of the year!
Hope you have a wonderful time, I'll be away till New Year's Eve.

Christmas lights IV

Christmas markets

Anderlecht

Place St. Lambert

Trio con brio

Wheeeee

I believe I can fly, or I could if I went to Châtel, which is near Evian/Thonon-les-Bains on the French side of Lake Geneva. You will too if you click on the FANTASTICABLE video, to view select the first item - sensations virtuelles - under "visionneuse". Thanks to the Flying Non-Dutchman for sharing!

Eating baby Jesus

Climbing Santas

When I was 12, I wrote a "book" about Christmas customs and imagery, illustrated with Christmas cards from a collection amassed by family and school. I was therefore very interested in this comment on the Christmas story itself, although I won't be going to see the movie.







It's interesting to see how some ideas and customs develop over time, for example when I was a child, Father Christmas was supposed to come down the chimney, but in these days of central heating it would appear he climbs up a rope, to judge by the decorations we see all over town.







And for some reason, this is sometimes in threes! The Wiz thinks they look like burglars..

Beau show

Brussels' Winter Fun (Plaisirs d'Hiver/Winterpret) festival is in full swing, with a son-et-lumière show in the Grand' Place that runs more-or-less continuously from dusk to midnight. It's great fun but I think somewhat over-sold here - what are "integrated urban markings", and do they know what "peculiar" means, I wonder?!

Stop stopless signs

Without punctuation, I cannot possibly agree with the sentiment expressed in this sign outside Wittamer, a first-class pâtisserie and chocolaterie.
With punctuation, on the other hand, I am always delighted to stop! for a cup of their excellent hot chocolate.

Wired bananas

First Stu gives us a lesson in fruit bowl management, but neglects to mention that if you put bananas in with other fruit, the gases will (over-)ripen your apples and oranges. And now, my breakfast banana not only tells me that it likes to mix with other fruit (presumably after peeling), but also that it even has its own website.

Christmas lights III (Place Louise)

Un Hongrois chez les Gaulois

I had dinner the other day with an Irish and an Italian friend in a Turkish restaurant and S. subsequently sent me this clip of a song about French Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy. The son of a Hungarian immigrant, he is currently taking a tough stance on immigration, at least from Africa. It's in French but with French sub-titles, which is nice for (French-) language-learners!

Hinglish, ulta pulta

I might have enjoyed this story (from the lingnews site) about Indian English as used in England more if the American commentator hadn't claimed that in the BBC TV series Goodness Gracious Me, AMERICAN Asians poked fun at the British relationship with India...!! I think Sanjay and Meera might be a little surprised. The BBC also covered the publication of the book concerned, by Bajlinder Mahal, last month.
"Ulta pulta" means upside down or topsy turvy; I presume that the titles of previous collections of Indian words in English, Hobson Jobson and Hanklyn Janklin, were referring indirectly to this liking Hindi has for what I call "echo" words. Also mentioned is "tuta futa", meaning broken, which reminds me that we used to say things were (or "had gone") "phut" when I was at school in India. I can't find a derivation for it, but wonder whether it could be a contraction of "faire capot" which according to the Online Etymology Dictionary is where we - or rather, the Germans - get "kaputt" from.

Christmas lights II (Sablon)

Christmas lights I

The very best thing about Christmas, for me, is the lights, here in my local shopping street (left) and in Place/Avenue Louise (below).

I'm not lovin' it

Baabul must be one of the silliest Hindi movies I have ever seen (OK, half of one of the silliest movies, I left at the interval), but it pales beside one of the ads that preceded it. A woman gives Santa - whose appearance in red-and-white outfit was promoted by Coke commercials in the first place - a bottle of the eponymous beverage and the slogan appears: "Taste the Coke side of Christmas". What the heck does that mean??!

Autumn leaves (Winter arrives)

Apparently Winter doesn't begin officially until the winter solstice on 22/12: but to me, December, January and February are winter months, therefore it ought to begin on 1 December - which happens also to be the date on which Brussels' "winter market" opens. So, I thought I had better post the last of the Autumn photos, especially as the trees reflected here in a Commission office building on Square de Meeûs don't look like this any more but are now almost bare.

Parc de Bruxelles

Strange statue (1782) is one of several dotted around the central pond, I have no idea what they are about but always feel their feet must be cold (rather than wondering what happened to their arms..)!

Breton week

Cashier wearing a Breton "coif", for Breton week in the Commission canteen.