Wednesday, June 12, 2002
London, England/Athens, Greece:
Rivalries
For our last full night in London, I suggested to my students that we meet for a drink in the pub where we started, in the center of Hammersmith.
I didn't count on the juggernaut that was the England win over Argentina in the World Cup. The game was over by 2 PM; at 6 you still couldn't move through the crowd and they were just beginning to sweep the broken glass off the floor, so no last drink together after all.
The next morning the students were off to the second half of their course, in Berlin, and I am in London for two days before leaving for the next phase of my trip on Semester at Sea, beginning in Athens. What to do? All the things I hadn't had a chance to do over the past two weeks? Or laundry? Why not go early to the Tate Modern and get tickets for the Matisse Picasso exhibit?
Part of my academic research was on the writer Gertrude Stein and the American ex-patriates in Paris in the 1920s who visited her salon. Through this I learned a lot about her earlier years supporting painters such as Matisse and Picasso and found their relationships fascinating.
Along with the other tourists I indulged myself in the recorded audio tour. We all lined up with long gray plastic sticks up to our ears, taking in the British interpretation of the complex relationship between these two giants of early 20th century art.
A huge brown-gray Picasso of a boy and a pony hung in the first room. The description next to it said that it was one of the first paintings Gertrude and her brother Leo Stein bought from the struggling Spaniard. In those days, he couldn't give them away; now people pay ₤10 just to walk by.
It's not one of my favorite Picassos. But it occurs to me that Gertrude probably loved the joke of a having a young male’s exposed genitalia hanging in her salon.
And the frame. This is probably the original frame. Her partner Alice B. Toklas said she learned about the paintings by dusting them. She dusted this frame. I'm close enough to touch their Left Bank salon at 27 rue de Fleurus. But in a 21st century museum—no touching. Alice got to touch them every day.
In the second room, there is Picasso's 1906 portrait of Gertrude Stein. Almost 100 years later, she is once again at the center of things, the way she was in her salon. The people buzz around her, looking at the paintings, waiting for a word of wisdom, some insight into the craft of writing, the creative process. Now there is no Alice to decide who will be allowed into the inner circle and who will be kept away. No Alice to sit with the wives. Anyone can come; anyone with ₤10. They circle her, then move on. But I linger.
In the painting, her red brooch is nestled in her white scarf; a gesture to femininity. Her brown hair is piled high on her head, When their friends first saw the painting and claimed it didn't look like her, Picasso said, “It will.” And it does.
I tear myself away and continue with the audio tape, wallowing in the early 20th century, the birth of modernism, the tension between two great talents trying to outdo each other. Matisse paints a nude. Picasso paints a bigger nude. Touché!.
Through the First Great War, through rooms of Matisse's models and Picasso's mistresses. Then the occupation of Paris in the Second World War. Picasso stayed; Matisse went to the south of France, Gertrude and Alice to the west.
By then they had become great friends. When Matisse died, he left behind his odalisques for Picasso to paint. The last room is full of Picasso's acrobats, performing feats not possible in nature, juxtaposed against Matisse's cut outs, blue shapes floating off the white pages. It is like entering the rehearsal room for a circus.
How can you top that for an afternoon? My time in London is done. Back to the room, pack, have dinner, get ready for departure.
In a blink of an eye I'm in Athens. The original anxieties about the trip—Will I have enough cash for the taxi? How will I maneuver my luggage? Where do I exchange money?—all have faded away, and there I am in the Athens airport. Old men are smoking under the no smoking signs.
In a strange city for the first time, I'm now facing the anxieties of this part of the trip: Will I have enough cash for the taxi? How will I maneuver my luggage? Where do I exchange money?
The cab driver is the perfect tour guide, and I have enough euros for him with five leftover. My roommate, Sandra, assigned by Semester at Sea, is from Dublin and now lives near us in Florida—how perfect is that? Outside our room we can see the Acropolis, towering over the city, with a Nokia billboard underneath it.
I've been in countries where I didn't speak the language—but here I don't even know the alphabet. However, our orientation keeps us in the hotel all day. An “Intercontinental,” it lives up to its name, reflecting that pan-European culture that seems to spring from no ethnic roots, but caters to the globalized business person who adapts anywhere.
The World Cup is still the buzz. A separate room is set aside in the hotel with a large screen TV to view all the games; probably to keep the more emotional fans out of the upscale bars.
At the introductory meeting for faculty and staff, I explain that My Irish Husband will be joining us in Dublin. I add that, although Tony and I are both excited about this trip, right now, Ireland is up one nil over Saudi Arabia at the half, and not much is more exciting than that.
As soon as the meeting is over, Sandra and I find out the results—They won three nil? They won? The Irish? By three? There's no chance Tony will call me tonight—he and the rest of Dublin are on the biggest spree they've had in years. Next, Argentina and France are both out—no one is crying for them. The American team has amazed the whole world—except America, where no one seems to care. And they played so well!
Match ups such as England vs. Nigeria, Paraguay vs. Slovenia, illustrate why Europeans have always been so much more international than Americans. They grew up watching athletes from Cameroon and Thailand and Pakistan playing football on television. Back in the 50s, when I was growing up in the richest country in the world, just reading about other cultures, over in poor Ireland Tony was watching the political and economic conflicts of the globe being fought on the fields of World Cup soccer.
By watching these complex rivalries we learn so much about the unique talents involved.
At dinner, I look around the room at the faculty, staff and crew that I will be sharing a ship with for the next 65 days. Who will I become close to? Who will get on my nerves? What rivalries will be fought and won over the next two and a half months at sea? What lifelong friendships will develop?
This weekend Ireland will move through to the next phase of the Cup and will be playing Spain while we are watching on board, sailing to Cadiz on the Spanish coast. And for the Final we will all be watching, with My Irish Husband Tony, in a pub in Dublin.
For the WLRN Radio Reading Service, this is Kathleen Dixon Donnelly—soon to be “at Sea.”
Rivalries
For our last full night in London, I suggested to my students that we meet for a drink in the pub where we started, in the center of Hammersmith.
I didn't count on the juggernaut that was the England win over Argentina in the World Cup. The game was over by 2 PM; at 6 you still couldn't move through the crowd and they were just beginning to sweep the broken glass off the floor, so no last drink together after all.
The next morning the students were off to the second half of their course, in Berlin, and I am in London for two days before leaving for the next phase of my trip on Semester at Sea, beginning in Athens. What to do? All the things I hadn't had a chance to do over the past two weeks? Or laundry? Why not go early to the Tate Modern and get tickets for the Matisse Picasso exhibit?
Part of my academic research was on the writer Gertrude Stein and the American ex-patriates in Paris in the 1920s who visited her salon. Through this I learned a lot about her earlier years supporting painters such as Matisse and Picasso and found their relationships fascinating.
Along with the other tourists I indulged myself in the recorded audio tour. We all lined up with long gray plastic sticks up to our ears, taking in the British interpretation of the complex relationship between these two giants of early 20th century art.
A huge brown-gray Picasso of a boy and a pony hung in the first room. The description next to it said that it was one of the first paintings Gertrude and her brother Leo Stein bought from the struggling Spaniard. In those days, he couldn't give them away; now people pay ₤10 just to walk by.
It's not one of my favorite Picassos. But it occurs to me that Gertrude probably loved the joke of a having a young male’s exposed genitalia hanging in her salon.
And the frame. This is probably the original frame. Her partner Alice B. Toklas said she learned about the paintings by dusting them. She dusted this frame. I'm close enough to touch their Left Bank salon at 27 rue de Fleurus. But in a 21st century museum—no touching. Alice got to touch them every day.
In the second room, there is Picasso's 1906 portrait of Gertrude Stein. Almost 100 years later, she is once again at the center of things, the way she was in her salon. The people buzz around her, looking at the paintings, waiting for a word of wisdom, some insight into the craft of writing, the creative process. Now there is no Alice to decide who will be allowed into the inner circle and who will be kept away. No Alice to sit with the wives. Anyone can come; anyone with ₤10. They circle her, then move on. But I linger.
In the painting, her red brooch is nestled in her white scarf; a gesture to femininity. Her brown hair is piled high on her head, When their friends first saw the painting and claimed it didn't look like her, Picasso said, “It will.” And it does.
I tear myself away and continue with the audio tape, wallowing in the early 20th century, the birth of modernism, the tension between two great talents trying to outdo each other. Matisse paints a nude. Picasso paints a bigger nude. Touché!.
Through the First Great War, through rooms of Matisse's models and Picasso's mistresses. Then the occupation of Paris in the Second World War. Picasso stayed; Matisse went to the south of France, Gertrude and Alice to the west.
By then they had become great friends. When Matisse died, he left behind his odalisques for Picasso to paint. The last room is full of Picasso's acrobats, performing feats not possible in nature, juxtaposed against Matisse's cut outs, blue shapes floating off the white pages. It is like entering the rehearsal room for a circus.
How can you top that for an afternoon? My time in London is done. Back to the room, pack, have dinner, get ready for departure.
In a blink of an eye I'm in Athens. The original anxieties about the trip—Will I have enough cash for the taxi? How will I maneuver my luggage? Where do I exchange money?—all have faded away, and there I am in the Athens airport. Old men are smoking under the no smoking signs.
In a strange city for the first time, I'm now facing the anxieties of this part of the trip: Will I have enough cash for the taxi? How will I maneuver my luggage? Where do I exchange money?
The cab driver is the perfect tour guide, and I have enough euros for him with five leftover. My roommate, Sandra, assigned by Semester at Sea, is from Dublin and now lives near us in Florida—how perfect is that? Outside our room we can see the Acropolis, towering over the city, with a Nokia billboard underneath it.
I've been in countries where I didn't speak the language—but here I don't even know the alphabet. However, our orientation keeps us in the hotel all day. An “Intercontinental,” it lives up to its name, reflecting that pan-European culture that seems to spring from no ethnic roots, but caters to the globalized business person who adapts anywhere.
The World Cup is still the buzz. A separate room is set aside in the hotel with a large screen TV to view all the games; probably to keep the more emotional fans out of the upscale bars.
At the introductory meeting for faculty and staff, I explain that My Irish Husband will be joining us in Dublin. I add that, although Tony and I are both excited about this trip, right now, Ireland is up one nil over Saudi Arabia at the half, and not much is more exciting than that.
As soon as the meeting is over, Sandra and I find out the results—They won three nil? They won? The Irish? By three? There's no chance Tony will call me tonight—he and the rest of Dublin are on the biggest spree they've had in years. Next, Argentina and France are both out—no one is crying for them. The American team has amazed the whole world—except America, where no one seems to care. And they played so well!
Match ups such as England vs. Nigeria, Paraguay vs. Slovenia, illustrate why Europeans have always been so much more international than Americans. They grew up watching athletes from Cameroon and Thailand and Pakistan playing football on television. Back in the 50s, when I was growing up in the richest country in the world, just reading about other cultures, over in poor Ireland Tony was watching the political and economic conflicts of the globe being fought on the fields of World Cup soccer.
By watching these complex rivalries we learn so much about the unique talents involved.
At dinner, I look around the room at the faculty, staff and crew that I will be sharing a ship with for the next 65 days. Who will I become close to? Who will get on my nerves? What rivalries will be fought and won over the next two and a half months at sea? What lifelong friendships will develop?
This weekend Ireland will move through to the next phase of the Cup and will be playing Spain while we are watching on board, sailing to Cadiz on the Spanish coast. And for the Final we will all be watching, with My Irish Husband Tony, in a pub in Dublin.
For the WLRN Radio Reading Service, this is Kathleen Dixon Donnelly—soon to be “at Sea.”
posted by Kathleen at 12:55 PM
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