Flappie

our dear Second Life friend, Witchy sends along this song, and it's disturbing translation.

Het was kerstochtend 1961, ik weet het nog zo goed
It was christmasmorning 1961, i remember it so well

Mijn konijnehok was leeg
The bunny cage was empty

En moeder zei dat ik niet in de schuur mocht komen
My mother told me i couldn't go in the barn

En als ik lief ging spelen
And if i was sweet and going to play

Dat ik dan wat lekkers kreeg
I get candy

Zij wist ook niet waar Flappie uit kon hangen
She didnt know eigter where Flappie was

Ze zou het papa vragen, maar omdat hij bezig was
She would ask daddy, but because he was busy

In het fietsenschuurtje, moest ik maar een uurtje
In the bikebarn, i had to try to look

Goed naar Flappie zoeken, hij liep vast wel ergens op het gras
Good for Flappie, he nust be walking on the grass

Maar ik had het hok toch goed dichtgedaan
But I closed the cage very good

Zoals ik dat elke avond deed
Like i did everynight

Ik was de vorige avond zelfs nog teruggegaan
I went go back last night to see

Ik weet ook niet waarom ik dat deed
I dont know why i did

Ik had heel lang voor het hok gestaan
I stood a long time before the cage

Alsof ik wist wat ik nu weet
If I knew what i knew now

Het was eerste kerstdag 1961, wij naar Flappie zoekn
It was christmasday 1961, we all went to search for flappie

Vader, die zocht gewoon mee
Dad was searching too

Bij de bomen en het water, maar niet in dat fietsenschuurtje
WiTh the trees and the water, but not in the barn

Want daar kon 'ie toch niet zitten en ik schudde nee
He coulnt go there

We zochten samen, samen tot de koffie, de familie aan de koffie
We looked togheter, then the family drank coffee

Maar ik hoefde niet
But i didnt wanted too

Ik dacht aan Flappie en dat het 's nachts heel koud kon vriezen
I thougth about Flappie and that it was freezing at night

Mijn hoofdje stil gebogen, dikke tranen van verdriet
My head bowed, and cried


Het was eerste kerstdag 1961, er werd luidruchtig gegeten
It was christmasday 1961, and they started toe at

Maar dat deed me niet zoveel
It didnt much to me

Ik dacht aan Flappie, mijn eigen kleine Flappie
I thought about flappie, my own sweet flappie

Waar zou 'ie lopen, geen hap ging door mijn keel
Where could heb e, i couldnt eat

Toen na de soep het hoofdgerecht zou komen
After soup the got the second food JJ


Sprak mij vader uiterst grappig: "kijk Youp daar is Flappie dan"
My father said if he was funny, Look kid there is Flappie

Ik zie de zilveren schaal nog en daar lag hij in drie stukken
I still see the silver plate and there he was in 3 pieces

Voor het eerst zag ik mijn vader als een vreselijke man
For the first time i saw my father as a terrible man

Ik ben gillend en stampend naar bed gegaan
I went yelling to my bed

Heb eerst een uur liggen huilen op de sprei
I cried fora n our on my bed

Nog een keer scheldend boven aan de trap gestaan
Ten went above the stairs and screamed

En geschreeuwd "Flappie was van mij"
Flappy was mine

Ik heb heel lang voor het raam gestaan
I stood for a long time behind the window

Maar het hok stond er maar verlaten bij
And the cage looked very empty

Het was tweede kerstdag 1961, moeder weet dat nog zo goed
Itwas christmasday1961. my mother knows so well

Vaders bed was leeg
Vaders bed was empty

En ik zei dat zij niet in de schuur mocht komen
I said she couldn't go in the barn

En als ze lief ging spelen
And if shesweet and going to play

Dat ze dan wat lekkers kreeg
She got candy


LOL
Witchy

Nothing much interesting about Serenity’s travels #6

Dear All,

Another pre-X-mas episode in our series “Nothing much interesting about Serenity’s travels”. On Sunday, the fourth Advent Sunday, mom and I
went to the city centre to hear Berlin’s Children’s Choir sing X-mas songs in the Konzerthaus Berlin (pics #18 and 19).
The Konzerthaus is one of the many beautiful venues for classical music events in Berlin see the German Wikipedia site for a
couple more pictures, and it is located on one of Berlin’s most beautiful squares, the Gendarmenmarkt.
Currently, the square is taken over by a Weihnachtsmarkt (pics #20 and 21). After the concert, mom and I had planned to visit my sister-in-law at her booth at a different Wihnachtsmarkt.
I tried to persuade mom to start a drinking game; at every Weihnachtsmarkt we pass on the way, we would have had to have a mug of mulled wine (pic #22). Mom did not want to play. :( But I got to make more mulled wine at home later on. :)
Here is my sister-in-law at her booth (pic #23). She makes angel-type creatures. Seriously, that’s the best I can do to translate “Engelsame Wesen”, which is what her enterprise is called. ;)
And here, finally, a photo of our local Weihnachtsmarkt (pic #24) in front of the closed-down cigarette factory. Rather a little bit sad looking, but I had a nice waffle with cream and advokaat. Apparently, Berlin has some 80 christmas markets this year, so with a bit of planning one could have had a pretty good buzz with my drinking game... ;)
Hope you are all well! Merry X-mas and/or Happy Holidays to all of you!!!
Serenity

P.S.: No snow for X-mas, that seems to be for sure now. But mom has decided that there will be snow next Sunday. Let’s hope the weather is a good little weather and listens to mom. S.

Walking in a Winter Wonderland

Snowy hilltop.
Biggest snowpeeples in town. At least on the drivable roads.

followed by freezing rain...

When I got up this morning, everything was coated with a rime of ice. Couldn't get a decent picture until after daybreak, when it was already melting.
Thought it would be easy enough to walk across the street and get a picture for you, but one step onto a "wet" looking sidewalk sent me ass over tea kettle, so I hope you really like these two. Only one bruise, we'll see about my back tomorrow.



The car had a lot of snow drifted on the driver's side. The rains formed a crust that remained after the drift melted.
Lacy ice shelf, about 6 inches deep.

The big storm haz hit

Mid-morning snows.









Poor birdies! We'll dust that off tomorrow and put out water. Birds have a hard time finding non-frozen water at these temps.













Rain is freezing on the windows! I have never seen weather like this!
























Update! Car spun out and pedestrians, and other drivers jumped out to help push! I love the friendliest town!

It started snowing at 10:30

Cliff Mass has the best weather blog for daily predictions.

Nothing much interesting about Serenity's travels #5

Dear Friends,

Another entry in my travelogue; hope you will find this one interesting. On Wednesday, my mom and I went to a concert by the Dutch artist Herman van Veen. Mom has been a fan for decades and I quite like a lot of his stuff. He certainly is an amazing singer and songwriter. The concert took place in one of East Berlin’s synagogues. I did not take my camera, so no original photos, sorry; but I found this website about the Synagogue. Shame that the pictures are all so small. It is quite an amazing building.

In case you read the website’s text, I would like to add a personal note.
By the time I came about in the early 70s, official policy in the GDR (East Germany) had changed considerably from that of its very early days. For lack of a better description, Stalin had been turned away from and was as a rule not talked about; kind of like the black sheep in a family. Overt Stalinism was not condoned anymore. Kids in my generation were raised in the spirit of antifascism and antiracism. There was no anti-Semitism in my upbringing, not in my private life nor publically. The Holocaust was portrayed to us (e.g., in school) as the biggest crime against humanity in recent history, one that needed to be remembered in order for it to never happen again. There were memorials to it on the grounds of every school I went to, and every school class would go on field trips to concentration camp sites at least once or twice over the years. I do not mean to downplay the fact that a lot of crap went on in the country I grew up in, but the persecution of Jews was not something that existed in my experience. If anything, all religious institutions suffered from the popular spread of atheism during East German times. This, of course, was consistent with public policy in the GDR and often aggressively so, but was something that obviously stuck with the population, as is demonstrated in the persistently large difference in the statistics on religiosity among East and West Germans today.

Another note of interest is the sad fact that all visitors to the concert had to pass through metal detectors—devices not usually seen in Germany outside airports and other high-security facilities. And, of course, there was the police guard outside the building, which, mom tells me, is a permanent fixture outside all synagogues in Germany these days; a sign of
the growing anti-Semitism and neo-Nazism in Germany and the resulting need to protect Jewish facilities on a day-to-day basis.

On this note (and I want to apologise for the length of this post; I really set out at the start to only report on Herman van Veen’s gig, I swear!), since I arrived the following has been a prevalent item in the news: The police chief of the Bavarian town of Passau was attacked and almost killed at his home by a neo-Nazi. A basic theme in the news reporting on the incident has been that neo-Nazism in Germany has “taken on a new quality”. A leftist satirist on TV the other day commented along the lines of asking whether this was to mean that the numerous attacks and even murders of foreigners, or Germans of non-White background, by Nazis over the past years were therefore considered to be of lesser significance...

Back to Herman van Veen. This website has the booklet for the programme he presented. It includes a mini-biography in English and English translations of some of the poems he transformed into songs.
The theme of the evening were the poems written by Selma Meerbaum-Eisinger, a young Jewish woman who died in a labour camp in 1942. It was a very impressive evening.

Hope you are all well!
Serenity

P.S.: Still no snow. :(