Lighting Up the Christmas Tree

On the Saturday after Thanksgiving, Saint Paul lights a Christmas tree in Rice Park. The tree is always a donation, coming from a place where it had to be removed for some reason.

My older daughter and I set out around 3:30 walking up the street, then waiting for a train to cross, and then around the Science Museum and up 5 levels in the elevator there and then out the door to the nearby Central Library where I returned four books, renewed a couple and checked out two more.

We then went across the street into Rice Park. Music attracted us.

We learned later this was the Choo - Choo Bob band, obviously to entertain visitors a bit younger than we are!

Nearby I noticed a toy soldier figure.

 On the right in the photo in front of the toy soldier is a young man dressed in a formal Hmong costume. It is New Year's for the Hmong culture and the nearby Xcel Center was holding that festival. I later learned that about 30,000 Hmong were expected to take part in the New Year's festivities.

And of  course there are some angels heralding a new season.

From here we walked over the skating rink which is opening the first time this season. My daughter loves to watch figure skating so we stood for awhile. The performers were from the Saint Paul Figure Skating Club.

After this we walked into the Landmark Center to see what might be happening there.

We found a toy train exhibit.

 We were enjoying it when a woman standing beside us asked her children to pose for a picture. We stepped aside a bit, and I'm glad we did. One of the children stumbled and fell down backward bringing down the protective ropes around the exhibit and knocking the train off the tracks. The woman never did take a picture; the family just crept away. 

A big chess board took my eye.

Our next stop was the lobby of the Ordway Center where we got a cup of hot cider.

Then we walked over again to Rice Park, thinking the tree lighting was at 5:00. Well, no 5:30. A lot of speeches and some performances promoting various shows at the Ordway.

 I noticed the candle on the side of the Lawson Building was now lighted.

And as it got dark we could see the outline of the Saint Paul Hotel.

It has become a tradition in Saint Paul to outline buildings with the white lights. These stay in place until the end of the Winter Carnival in early February.

At last it came time to throw the switch and 15,000 LED lights glowed and the fire works started going off.

And here's a view of the tree.

A very nice late afternoon up in Rice Park.

Pipedreams at the Science Museum

Today at last I finished a very hard research paper that I'm doing as part of my volunteer research efforts. I decided it would be good for my mental health and physical health to get out for a walk, so decided to return some books to the Saint Paul Public Library. This is about a 10-12 minute walk from my apartment.

The sun was shining, but oh my! It was a wicked wind that was blowing. I should  have worn a hat. I stopped at one of the condo buildings down the street and went inside the entry area to fix the hood on my coat up around my ears. But I made it to the library, picked out some new books and then walked back across the street to the Science Museum and stopped there for coffee.

I was seated by the kinetic sculpture called Pipe Dreams.

 The colors at the top are actually reflections from a nearby exhibit.  And the yellow on the left is a dinosaur foot, part of a huge poster announcing a new exhibit opening in the Science Museum in March.

The information by the sculpture, which has been there since 1999, explains it works off a computer program somewhat analogous to a printer driver.

The above photo is blurry because it is taken through the plexiglass surrounding the lower area of the sculpture area.

The computer program, using the 1 and 0 of all computer programs, opens a valve in each of the pipes and turns water on or off.

The video below shows this just a bit better.

Other interesting designs captured my viewpoint today.

Behind were I having coffee are the ticket booths, with an interesting curved wall over the top. The afternoon sun helped to make the design interesting.

Soon I had to "bite the bullet" and myself walk back home in the cold wind.

The afternoon sun was lighting the housing area in which I live in an interesting manner, too.

The sun was lighting the windows in the historic elevator structure and making the apartment and condo buildings glow. It was quite beautiful. The above photo was taken around 4:30 in the afternoon. By 5 PM it is now dark here this time of the year.

Full-Time Volunteer

On Monday I met another retired colleague for coffee at the Swede Hollow Cafe.

Click on the link above to see the interior of the cafe. As we were walking to our cars at the end of the coffee conversation, I said I didn't miss work a bit, but that I have seemed to have turned into a full-time volunteer.

Last Saturday afternoon I did a two-hour shift at the World Jubilee Sale held at Colonial Church in Edina. That's the experience I wrote about in a previous blog entry.

Meanwhile I'm still working on working on agricultural research for Mano a Mano.

On Tuesday evening I helped make supper at Jeremiah House. Jeremiah House is a large apartment building that provides support for single moms and their children. It provides those with the dream of higher education with the support they need. See the link for way more info.

On Tuesday and Thursday evenings many of the residents must attend a life skills class. Volunteers cook the evening meal, so the moms can come home from school and work and have a good supper with their children and their friends and then make a 7 PM class.

Here is a start -- cheese and crackers and some grapes. There is bread, peanut butter, and jelly in case someone doesn't like the entree which was lasagne.

I brought salad makings. Another volunteer brought pies for dessert.

During the evening I washed a lot of dishes-- not my favorite activity, but this kitchen doesn't have a commercial dishwasher.

This morning I was back at Bancroft School in Minneapolis for my first try as a math tutor. I had only one student this morning, and probably good thing for the online math program, Xtramath, we use wasn't behaving very well. When we get organized I'll have two for sure and perhaps a third one.

This school building is over 100 years old with a "new" addition that is 50 years old!

When I walk on the stairs I can see the footprints from the last 100 years.

Notice the hallway is named Integrity. Values such as Compassion, Cooperation, and Communication are all over this school.

One thing I've never before seen in a school building is a mailbox.

This is no longer in use. I wonder if once upon a time it was a community mail box.

Maybe these aren't the most exciting pictures but I wanted to protect everyone's privacy and not have pictures of others in the photos.

For my international readers--I would love to receive comments about what volunteers do in your countries. 

Retirement is Tiring!

What does a retired Minnesota woman do on a November Saturday? Well, first of all I woke up at 6:30 ready to get back at doing some of the volunteer research that's on my plate. Read a couple of articles with a cup of coffee along side.

Then a few minutes after 8:30 I left for church and a pancake breakfast. I sat down at empty table and was soon joined by a couple that I have seen many times but never talked with. They turned out to be so interesting and we spent a good half hour talking about our various travels, our former careers. I really enjoyed myself.

This all preceded the annual meeting of the church. And this meeting didn't have anything that was contentious -- a lot of celebration actually at what has been accomplished over the past year.

When done, I headed for Baker's Square for lunch. Then off to the Colonial Church of Edina which was hosting the World Jubilee Sale. I was asked to be a 2 PM volunteer for  the Mano a Mano sales table. I got there about 1:15 actually and helped those volunteers so they could have a bit of break. Then it was all mine from 2:00 - 4:00.

 On the table there were table coverings, finger puppets, sweaters, scarves, coin purses, all sort of things, all from Bolivia.

A few minutes before 4:00 another volunteer arrived. When the sale was officially over, we packed up what wasn't sold and then had to carry one tote box after the other through a long hallway and then out the door.

On my way home I stopped at the airport post office and sent off a package to friend in Atlanta.

I got home ready to put my feet up. This was a great day, but I'm tired!

Remember readers -- it says at the top of the blog things can be mundane adventures, too. And I decided to write this because I have so many international readers -- thank you, thank you. Just wanted you to know how we live -- at least in Minnesota.

Music From Peru

The Friends of the Saint Paul Library sponsored a program by the Rose Ensemble called the Portraits of Peru. I like the Rose Ensemble very much and was excited to find a performance for free at a library.

When the program began, the master of ceremonies told us none of them were with the Rose Ensemble. Well, we should have figured that out because the Rose Ensemble is a choir group. We learned these were the instrumental musicians helping the Rose Ensemble with the programs they are doing in the next few days. As the program developed we learned the musicians specialized in music from Spain and Latin America. They come from Pittsburgh, New York City, Atlanta, Boston, and Melbourne, Australia.

We learned the Peru program is based on the Trujillo Journals. These journals come from 1780. At this time the bishop in Trujillo, Peru was ordered to do a "visita" around Peru. Among the people who traveled with him was an artist who did 7 watercolor journals.

The master of ceremonies, who is a faculty member at Wellesely College, showed pictures from the journals to help us understand a bit about the culture of that time, but primarily to help us see musical instruments from that time. The particular scene below was something about devils trying to scare a saint, and is only one piece of a much larger picture. Primarily the speaker wanted us to see the instruments.

Most of the musical instruments of this time came from Europe and primarily Spain. But each musician took the time to explain how their 18th century instrument was different from the modern one we would see in an orchestra today. 

The instruments that didn't come from Europe were primarily percussion. These came from the indigenous people -- for example, a shaker or what we call a maraca in Mexican music. Peru had African slaves, and, just like in North America, the drums which had become important in many African cultures were forbidden. So the African slaves made percussion instruments out of other things. In the watercolor above the musician on the right is tapping rhythm on a small wooden box.

An unusual way to do percussion is to use the harp.

In the photo above the harpist is playing the melody by plucking the strings, and the percussionist makes a rhythm by tapping on the wooden base of the harp with his knuckles.This is not made-up in the 21st century. Indeed the watercolor journals of 1780 show someone doing this exact same thing.


Below is a video of one musical selection. It features only two members. The flute type instrument is played by the master of ceremonies/professor. He explained that while traveling in Peru a couple years ago he recorded the song on his I-phone and then came back to the United States and transcribed it.

The video below shows the entire group playing together.

What a lovely splendid time we had!

Celebrating St.Martin's Day in Saint Paul

I happened to check the web site for the Landmark Center this past week and learned that there was to be a St. Martin's Day celebration there on Sunday. I've been curious about St. Martin's Day's for two reason. First, people I know in western Poland talk about this celebration and people in eastern Poland tell me they've never heard of it.

Then when I was in Hungary, I was asked to attend a scientific conference in Sombathely. We arrived there in the late afternoon and by the time the evening meal was done, darkness had fallen. The university staff took me to my "accommodation" Walking inside it appeared to be a small hotel. But as I walked to the hallways, I noticed all the pictures were religious. When I opened my door I found only a small bed and crucifix on the wall. I thought I had landed in a convent! The next morning, in daylight, I got out for walk and discovered I was in a hostel used for the St. Martin's pilgrimage tour that wanders through Germany, the Czech Republic, Austria, and Hungary -- and maybe some places I don't know about.

Sunday started out beautiful.

 This lovely view from my living room window on Sunday morning.


So I was off to the Landmark Center in the late afternoon. By then the clouds had rolled in along with some wind. This was my first trip for this approaching winter season with a winter coat, and I was glad I had chosen to wear that. I stopped first at the public library by Rice Park and checked out some paperbacks. Then I walked across Rice Park and into the Landmark Center. I found everyone scurrying to get things set up-- the gift shop tables and the food booths.

The space, even though very large, got crowded very quickly. I think most in the audience were the proud parents or grandparents of students who attend the Twin Cities German Immersion School. This school, along with the Germanic-American Institute, were the day's sponsors.

The mistress of ceremonies explained she came to the United States from Dusseldorf and was determined to get a St. Martin's Day celebration started here. She went on to say that in Dusseldorf about 50,000 people would be expected in the city center for the celebration. And that this celebration was now being held at Landmark because the previous celebrations had now outgrown the school building.

I saw dancing.

The one immediately above involved dancing with some wooden swords. Then the group made a square with the wooden sword and one girl climbed up and stood upon the structure. It made me think of a Finnish dance that I had seen while living in Pecs.

The second graders sang some songs and acted out two legends about St. Martin. The first was based on the story of his sharing half his clock with a beggar. The second is about St. Martin hiding in a goose coop to avoid being found and declared a bishop. Certainly second graders can make a lot of noise when they are supposed to be geese!

Lanterns seem to be a prominent part of a St. Martin's Day celebration in Germany. Some older girls did a lantern dance.

 This dance featured the music of John Lennon's, "Imagine." Thought that a wonderful choice for a cultural celebration.

 The program closed with an adult choir singing some songs. Then everyone was preparing for a lantern parade. That sounded great until I went outdoors and met the stiff north wind. It was cold! I started to walk back home, stopping first at Caribou along the Mississippi River to warm up with a cup of coffee.

Recently I had visited my younger daughter's family and my son-in-law was talking about going sledding soon. My younger granddaughter said to me, "You have to get me a new snow suit. I got too big for my pink snow suit." I thought it was funny how she said it, because usually we say the clothing got too small. But she was absolutely right, it is the humans who change size, not the clothing!

So I shopped and was delighted to find something perfect, first on a 50% price reduction sale, and then I applied a 30% coupon and got a good deal. I had planned this for a Christmas present, but my daughter said it would be probably be needed sooner.

This morning I checked the Weather Channel on my phone and found it was 24(-4 C). Brrr! And a few minutes later a text message arrived saying they all would like to pick up the coat today. So they arrived soon. Perfect! A new warm coat for St. Martin's Day.

Background is messy because I'm still working on a paper that I'm writing as a volunteer researcher. And starting to sort and pack to move at the same time.

My daughter asked me about a storage container that I don't want to move. She took it along with her, and then a few minutes later came a text message saying she had loaded the kids into the van and was in hurry and left the container sitting on the grass. I went downstairs and looked both along the front and side streets, not knowing where she had parked, and it was gone already. I hope in the spirit of St Martin's Day it has found a good home.

So that's St. Martin's Day in Saint Paul. 

And now I'm off to donate 5 pairs of eyeglasses that "don't fit me" anymore. Amazing how things pile up. Moving it good!

It's Beginning to Look Like Christmas

During one of the recent warm November days I was driving down Summit Avenue here in Saint Paul and noticed people and equipment for holiday decorating in a yard. I thought that the warm November would probably produce a lot of holiday lights this year. It's much more fun to decorate outdoors when it's 45 (7C) than when the temperature is 0 (-17C) and one is wading in snowbanks!  But I was even prepared for this when driving down the same street after an evening meeting.

Took a video too. Watch the tree.

Continued on to the grocery store and discovered the area that a few days before that was decorated with gourds and pumpkins now featured pine boughs.

When one enters this store, the first things seen is a florist area and then sort of a gift shop area. The gift shop had certainly turned over from Halloween to Christmas. Good luck finding anything decorative for Thanksgiving!

While thinking about all this, I ran across a story on the internet about how people is London began complaining that the Christmas decorations were coming out too early -- in 1912! So I guess this is nothing new.

Yesterday I made a trip to Target and yes, it's Christmas there too.

But I must confess I've been waiting for Target to change over from Halloween from Christmas. In preparation for my move next month, I've been wanting to get a storage contained for Christmas things, in Christmas colors, so that when I arrive at the new place, I'll know immediately which box to look in for decorations or gifts. And I got it.

But this morning I did some preparations for Thanksgiving pies!