Unwanted Legacies

Even though WWII is long over there still are legacies that remind us of that time. In Munich they found an old bomb and had to detonate it. Several houses burned and many more are uninhabitable now.

Here in Münster the legacies are not that spectacular. Like in many other towns in Germany streets and places were named after "heroes" of WWI and the German Empire. During the last decades historical research has looked more critically into these persons which caused towns to rename many streets and squares. Münster was a bit on the slower side in this topic but this year the city council decided to rename the largest square in town from "Hindenburgplatz" to "Schlossplatz" (palace square).

Hindenburg was Chief of the General Staff of the German Reich in WWI and became President of Germany in 1925. It was him who appointed Adolf Hitler Chancellor of Germany. Hence he was not the kind of person a modern city wants its main square to be named after. So far so good. 

Unfortunately there are still many people around who are ignorant of the past. For reasons incomprehensible to me it are the young and ambitious (young politicians of the JU) who put a lot of effort into campaigning for the old name. At the end of the day we are having a vote on the name. I could think of a lot of better ways to spend tax money. 

You can read a good summary why you should vote NEIN-NO on "Hindenburgplatz" by Carsten Keßler here.

 

PS: I'm still waiting for the day the city will rename the "Lüderitzweg".

Sewing for birthdays I

Uh, it seems I have neglected my blog a bit. But good news: I got a lot of sewing done!

Let's start with sewn birthday presents:

This blanket and bag were for Caro respectively her dog Punk. Punk used to be true to his name but Caro and Marc started intense training a few months ago and now he behaves very well. 

I used a cute fabric by Stenzo with poodle ladies. For the blanket I sewed the fabric as if I were making a simple pillow case. Then I stuffed it with batting leftovers and closed it. For the quilting I tried to fmq bones. All in all I'm pleased about how it turned out although some of the bones are a bit wonky. 

Punk seems to like it anyhow: 

Space

It's August and here in Germany that's the best time of the year to see falling stars. 

I don't know how you feel about this, but I have the feeling that today's people are not as interested in space as they used to be. Whenever I read/ listen to/ watch a science fiction story from the 1950's or 1960's, I envy the people of that age their enthusiasm and their positive thinking about the future of mankind.

Nevertheless there have been two major breakthroughs in space technology in the last two weeks: The landing of NASA's Mars Science Laboratory: Curiosity and the Russians completed successfully a new manoeuvre to fly to the ISS in less than 6 hours (that's less than from Düsseldorf to New York!).

If you want to celebrate this with some space related crafting, here are a few suggestions for you:

Crochet a diskworld

Bake a space-shuttle-cake

Sew a Space Invaders Quilt

Build R2D2 from wood

Get yourself a retro space desktop

 I suggest you start with David Bowie's Space Oddity.

Don't forget to make a wish if you see a falling star!

Andalusia - The Conclusion

I've been at home for more than a week now, but somehow I forgot to write about the last days in Andalusia - shame on me.
Therefore - to correct this flaw - here comes the conclusion:

Leaving Ronda we drove through beautiful mountains to Gibraltar - that little rock of Great Britain in Spain.

We had to pay our fish and chips in Pounds.

Gibraltar proved to be more british than expected. Even though in Gibraltar is right hand traffic, there are british phone boxes and letter boxes. I also went to Marc's and Spencer's and bought some nail polish. However the most british in Gibraltar during our stay was the fog.

Hence we had to bury our dreams to see Africa.

That evening we headed on to Tarifa - surfer's paradise - where we only stayed for one night. We still were very close to Africa which prompted my mobile to change into West African Time.

We spend the last few days in Cadiz. I have very few photos of Cadiz because garbage collection was on strike and the garbage piles were accumulating in the streets. This also had the unfortunate sideeffect of unpleasant aromas in the air. Thankfully Cadiz is surrounded by the sea with kilometers of the best beaches I have ever been to.

And being surrounded by the sea, Cadiz is also one of the best places in Europe to eat fish. You could get yummy seafood at the beach...

... and buy superfresh fish and seafood at the market on good terms. We bought a thuna steak, shells, gambas, some other fish and vegetables for 10 € total.

These were definitely one of the best holidays I've ever had (although it would have been better if I went with Tino ;) ). With this crappy weather in Germany I wish I could go there again next week!
Well, now I have more time for sewing, hang on for updates!

Ronda

Hola!

The trip from Granada to Ronda was our longest so far. We mostly used the smaller roads along the cost "Costa del Sol". Our lunch break was at the fishing harbour of Marbella where we had wonderful seafood.

Than we came into mountains again and to Ronda.

The view from the terrace of our backpackers is spectacular.

 One day we went into the gorge. From down there the depth of the cut is more obvious.

There were only three meters like this  but it looks so professional I had to post it.

The shower is just vacant, I have to grab it before it is occupied again.
Adios!

Granada

Today I'm really tired from hiking in the Sierra Nevada, so I will give you only a few pics from our stay at Granada. Tomorrow we will drive along the Costa del Sol (Malaga and Marbella) to Ronda.

Alhambra

View over Granada

In the Sierra Nevada

Sierra Nevada

Sierra Nevada

Sierra Nevada

Cordoba

We are on the road!
Our trip through Andalusia started with Cordoba.

 On the way to Cordoba we visited the beautiful village of Carmona.

Cordoba is an amazing town. There are still many roman artefacts and even more arabic ones. Expecially the Mezquita Cathedral is outstanding. Several arabic caliphs built a huge mosque (and included roman pillars).  When Cordoba was christian again, the spanish rulers built a rather ugly renaissance church inside the mosque. Hence the building is nowadays a grotesque mixture of different building styles.

 

Citylife is also very nice here, though more touristic than in Sevilla. 

Everywhere we have been so far the people are very nice and helpful. Communication is difficult though, since most spanish people speak neither English nor French. So we have to work with hand and feet which doesn't always lead to the results wished for. Two days ago we wanted to eat some tapas, looking forward fresh vegetables and ended up with this:

 It still was yummy. Guess next time we have to take our heavy tourist guides along. 

Today we are heading off for Granada.