The inspirational Oscar Niemeyer has passed on at the splendid age of 104…

The occasion presented itself to take Evelin to my old haunts this past weekend — we spent a day each in the Black Forest (Germany), Basel (Switzerland), and Strasbourg (Alsace, France). Ev’s admittedly a bigger fan than I of Christmas celebrations; I’d been feeling a bit of Heimatschmerz (homesickness) of late — this quick romantic sortie to the Weinländer of my youth fit the bill for both of us, providing reminiscent sights, sounds, smells, and tastes (replete of course with raclette, Heisse Maroni, cheese crêpes, local Gebäck and gateau, chocolates, marzipan delicacies, and Glühwein galore).

Our 77 remedial hours in “the old country” included some speedy Autobahn travel back and forth across Southern Germany, ambling through outdoor Christmas markets in Basel and Strasbourg, a museum visit in each of the three adjacent countries, and some time with my kid brother Phil, his lovely wife Tammy, and their two boys (who live in the quaint old village of Holzen in the Kanderntal).

Below are a few pics from the weekend outing. You can view more on my Facebook page here.

Basel, Switzerland, is a humanist city on Rhine located where the Swiss, French and German borders meet. Its famous Christmas market was our destination on Saturday (Ev and I were accompanied by my brother Phil and his wife Tammy); the market now includes the area around Basel’s 1000-year-old Münster (cathedral) as well as the traditional Barfüsserplatz, where we also visited the Historisches Museum (which houses the Upper Rhine’s most comprehensive cultural history collection).

Holzen (bei Kandern) is the quaint old village in the Black Forest where my brother Phil and his family live. We stayed with them for two nights, during which the seasons changed dramatically. We felt fortunate to be able to take in the exhibition “Pop Art Design” and view the showrooms at the Vitra Design Museum in nearby Weil am Rhein (designed by Frank Gehry, the museum is somewhat of a ‘Mecca’ for the worldwide design and architectural community; creations of Charles and Ray Eames such as their famous ‘Lounge Chair’ feature prominently).

Straßburg (aka Strasbourg) is the capital and principal city of the Alsace region in eastern France, and is the official seat of the European Parliament. Dating back over 3500 years, the city has held Christmas markets since 1570. Strasbourg’s famous cathedral, the world’s highest still-standing structure built entirely in the Middle Ages, was visible from our charming attic room at the Hotel Gutenberg (Strasbourg was also where Johannes Gutenberg created the first European moveable type printing press in the 1400s).

Strikes across the frontier and strikes for higher wage

Planet lurches to the right as ideologies engage

Suddenly it’s repression, moratorium on rights

What did they think the politics of panic would invite?

Person in the street shrugs— “Security comes first”

But the trouble with normal is it always gets worse

Callous men in business costume speak computerese

Play pinball with the Third World trying to keep it on its knees

Their single crop starvation plans put sugar in your tea

And the local Third World’s kept on reservations you don’t see

“It’ll all go back to normal if we put our nation first”

But the trouble with normal is it always gets worse

Fashionable fascism dominates the scene

When ends don’t meet it’s easier to justify the means

Tenants get the dregs and landlords get the cream

As the grinding devolution of the democratic dream

Brings us men in gas masks dancing while the shells burst

The trouble with normal is it always gets worse

—Bruce Cockburn, 30 June 1981, Toronto

—Robert Louis Stevenson

Moscow, Russia

Best wishes and congratulations(!) to my longtime friend — Александра Санькова (Alexandra Sankova), Director of the new Moscow Design Museum — re: the opening on Thursday, 29 November 2012, of their first exhibition: SOVIET DESIGN 1950 – 1980

The Moscow Design Museum is the first and only museum institution dedicated to the discipline of design in Rusia—a “live, changing, mobile space… to collect, promote, popularise, classify, and initiate.”

Learn more here.

—Robert Louis Stevenson (1850-1894)

.

There’s less than a week left in Movember!

And Canada is once again leading the world in this awesome, quirky, follicly-driven global fundraiser to fight prostate cancer… with over $24 million raised so far this month.

I have grown one hell of a lot of facial hair over the past four-plus decades (as anyone who knows me can attest to) and this year I’m once again doing my “stiff-upper-lip” bit for this very important cause… please consider making a donation through me or one of over a million fellow Mo-Bros or Mo-Sistas around the world…

Thanks in advance…
here’s a big hug, along with
a big old scratchy smooch!

.

Barbara Kruger‘s Op-Art piece in today’s New York Times is very apropos.

(aka ‘Black Friday’ in the USA)

Buy Nothing Day — participate by not participating.