Mar 26, 2012
Mar 13, 2012
A Busking We Will Go.
We strolling down La Rambla toward Barcelona's harbor where Christorpher Columbus watches over the harbor from atop his lofty pedestal, and bouys look like little boys, when I clutched Claudette's arm in disbelief. On the sidewalk was a huge creature with wings and golden horns. Except for his horns and the whites of his eyes, he was completely black. There was a forked tail and boney fingers with long nails. The muscular black arms held a pretty English girl in shorts and halter top, while her boyfriend took their picture with an iPhone. This demon was one of many street performers on the street that day. We enjoy the street performers where ever we encounter them. There are a variety of acts. Perhaps the newest is the person representing a statue. One of the first I saw was a trumpet player in silver. Every inch of him was covered in silver paint. He sat motionless in front of his tip box. We've seen many different "statues", but the most interesting was in New Orleans on Royal Street. He was unpainted, looked like a regular construction worker climbing a ladder with a six-foot length of wood on his shoulder. He was motionless, balanced on his latter about three rungs off the pavement. I did hear of a "statue" that was not a "statue". It seems a clever young man posed a well dressed and made-up manikin in front of a tip jar. He would place the manikin on the street in the morning and check the tip jar during the day. At the end of the day he would collect his earnings and manikin. Probably one of the most famous street entertainers is the naked cowboy of Times Square. Although not quite naked, he wears a cowboy hat, boots, BVDs, and plays a guitar, he his quite entertaining. There are quite a variety of performers on the street. We've seen opera singers, string quartets, folk dancers, performing marionettes, glass players, fire eaters, and musicians of all kinds. Another memorable sight was the fire eater near the Eiffel Tower in the early evening. I've always been fond of fire eaters ever since a shipmate filled his mouth with lighter fluid and ignited the stream he squirted from between his two front teeth. The event took place in a berthing compartment, after taps, aboard the USS Intrepid while steaming in the South China Sea. He was reluctant to repeat the performance. We were on the train from Paris to Vernon when we were entertained by an impromptu performance in our car. At one of the stops a man with an accordion boarded the train and began playing standing just inside the entrance door. At the next stop he was joined by a sax player, and at a later stop a clarinetist joined the group. We enjoyed some great music until they disembarked before Vernon. The pretty girl sitting across from us never woke up. Must have had a late night.
It seems to be a romantic lifestyle: performing whenever and getting paid for it. But not necessarily so. I recently talked with a busker on New Orlean's Royal Street.
 |
| Street musician who wished to remain anonymous. |
"Playing on the street must be the life," I said.
"Not really," the bearded musician said.
"What could happen?"
"Lots of things. Well," he added with a sigh,"there's the weather. If it's raining, you can't work"
"But you get a lot of sunshine here."
"Yeah, but there's other things." He seemed reluctant to continue. "You have to claim your spot."
"Oh, yeah?"
"Sure, sometimes I have to get up and be here at 5 a.m. just be sure we have a place to play. Location is everything. This is a numbers game; the more people that see you the bigger chance someone will put something in the tip jar."
"Do you need a permit?"
"Not here. The cops don't bother you here. Of course, New Orleans has the reputation for having the most corrupt police department in the country. I don't care though, so long as they don't bother me. Some places the cops do hassle you though. They claim you're panhandlin' or just any thing to run you out of town."
But I noticed that his eyes were always moving from left to right behind the wire-rimmed glasses.
"Been doing this long?" I was curious.
"A few years in a lot of different cities. We took a bicycle road trip last year from New Orleans to Woodstock, NY and earned our way busking. So, I guess we did alright."
"I don't think I could handle this kind of lifestyle," I said.
"It takes a certain kind of person, I guess. I gotta be free!" he said as he picked up his instrument and walked away down Royal Street toward a string band beginning to set up.
Mar 7, 2012
Sal's Place
We took the road out of Cadaquez where we had spent the night on the Mediterranean coast of Spain. As we drove through the hills we were searching for the fishing village of Port Lligat. Driving down from the hills we welcomed the sight of the beautiful Mediterranean and found a place to park the car near the house owned by the famous artist Salvador Domingo Felipe Jacinto Dalí i Domènech, better known as Salvador Dali. Dali, who lived between 1904 and 1989 had bought the small fisherman's house about 1920 and continuously modified it for more than twenty years. We were anxious to see it. Claudette had made reservations for a tour at 4P.M. The only way to see the house is by guided tour. We don't care much guided tours much, but that was the only way to see this house. It was about ten minutes before the tour was to begin when we reached the location. I let Claudette out of the car to insure our place in the tour while i parked the car. A sign in the car park area announced that the parking fee was three euros but the man at the open air bar said it was free. I did not question his authority and hastened to catch up with Claudette.
The house was a unique looking structure just a few meters from the gravel beach. We were asked to leave any bags in a locker area nearby before going up the entrance stairs to the house. The female tour guide quickly ascertained how many languages were spoken by her charges before beginning her descriptions of what we were seeing. She was quite efficient and we only heard the same description three times. Or, at least I presume it was the same. We were entering the place of artistic genius and, perhaps, a bit of his aura lingered. You kind of get that feeling you get when you are in those places the famous have been. Places like where Ann Bolin lost her head or Joan d'Arc was burned at the stake or Elvis recorded "That's Alright Mama". It was that kind of place. This house is a happy place, very colorful. It consists of a labyrinth of hallways connecting rooms on three different levels. My favorite room in the house is the studio/workshop. The big windows face the sea and it has a very interesting easel. Dali preferred to work on his paintings sitting and therefore had an easel which moved the canvas up and down into an opening in the floor via a system of pulleys and weights. Fascinating. Also in nooks and crannies around the studio were props from his works. Many objects that a Dali fan would recognize from his paintings but we were unsuccessful in finding a melting pocket watch. There was an exquisite puppet theatre.The bedroom was interesting in that it had two double beds and was oriented so that the rising sun illuminated the room at dawn. The house has objects d'arte everywhere but there wasn't time to examine many things closely, the guides hurried us along. (We were the last tour of the day!) In one corner of a room there was a large container of walking canes. I recall seeing quite a few photographs of Dali with a cane. Throughout the house are many paintings of Gala, Dali's Russian born wife. in various stages of undress. There is a circular room and other rooms including one small room dedicated to newspaper clippings and photographs of the famous people photographed with Dali.
You exit the house onto a terrace which overlooks a garden. Immediately outside the door to the right is a narrow opening in the wall lake a narrow shallow tunnel. Claudette was able to squeeze through the opening and discovered a full length mirror. The house continued to surprise. On the terrace is a sculpture of a giant egg big enough for a person to get inside and a view of Dali's abstract image of Christ made of trash and refuse. As you continue around to the right you enter the area of the swimming pool. The area is like an outdoor room. The most notable feature of this room is the sofa which appears as a giant set of lips. Actually, sensuous female lips in brilliant red.
Dali spent some of his time in New York and Paris but did a lot of work in Port Lligat. He and Gala were happy here but after her death in 1982, he never returned.
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