This time I am taking real books on tour with me. Peter Hoeg’s “Das Stille Mädchen” – I already read the book in English a couple of years ago. Jorge Luis Borges’ “Spiegel und Maske” (Mirror and Mask) – I read another book of his in English, on tour in Germany in March, and kept thinking that German might suit his writing, since I can’t read the original Spanish. “The Quantum Universe” by Brian Cox and “A Short History of Nearly Everything” by Bill Bryson.
I finished reading Diamond Age by Neal Stephenson a couple of days ago and started on the newest Inspector Shan book, The Lord of Death.
Slept longer than usual and awoke feeling incrementally better than yesterday. Will take it easy today and cleared my schedule, except for a phone interview with Germany this afternoon.
Received a note from John Diliberto that Echoes will transmit today the recording we made at their studio at the beginning of the month. I haven’t heard it yet. Click here to find a radio station near you.
Dezeen » Blog Archive » Proposals for Florence by Gruppo Giovani Architetti Firenze
A new inhabited bridge over the River Arno in Florence is among proposals by Gruppo Giovani Architetti Firenze (Young Achitect Group of Florence) designed to provoke debate about architecture in the historic city.
Find more photos here. Wouldn’t that bridge be an amazing place to live! Anybody remember the William Gibson novel in which the Oakland Bridge had been transformed by squatters?
Rode the Mariachi Bullitt, loaded with my guitar and a bag, to Atlas for a workout and then to Jon’s studio for a rehearsal with the quintet. Band sounded great, a very nice step forward from the last tour. Now that everyone knows the music well, we can work on improving the arrangements and that’s what we did.
Rode home in the afternoon and did a phone interview with the Easthampton Press for our concert at the Westhampton PAC in May.
The dates for Autumn in Germany are firm now – all solo:
Oct 03 – München, Germany – Carl Orff Saal
Oct 04 – Leipzig, Germany – Spiegelpalast
Oct 06 – Berlin, Germany – Kleine Arena Tempodrom
Oct 07 – Hamburg, Germany – Stage Club
Oct 08 – Hanover, Germany – Markuskirche
Oct 09 – Köln, Germany – Kulturkirche
Go here to see links to the venues. There will be three to four shows in Italy and Austria before Jon and I roll into Munich.
Current reading: The Janissary Tree by Jason Goodwin. After reading about Inspector Shan in Tibet (here, here, here and here) and Detective Sonchai Jitpleecheep in Bangkok (here), I am now reading about the eunuch Yashim Togalu investigating crime in Istanbul in 1836. Lovely, to be entertained while learning something about foreign places. At one point Yashim makes a paste out of walnuts and garlic that he puts on fish. I want to try that with tofu or grilled chicken.
If you have to push helmets for bicyclists… at least do it like this. :-)
Please remember to add friends@ottmarliebert.com to your email-address book as I will be sending out a new password for May this week. Wouldn’t want to lose the password in your spam filter.
I am already on the third installment of John Burdett’s Bangkok series, a book called Bangkok Haunts – I am reading the Kindle version on the free Kindle for iPhone application. In what seems to me typical Thai fashion the book is able to move effortlessly between violence, sex and spirituality. Here is a snippet from a conversation between the main character of the book, a cop in Krung Thep, and a monk:
Saved? There is nothing to save, my friend. You cannot caste yourself into the Unknowable in the hope that gesture will buy you salvation – you have to jump for the hell of it. In a nirvanic universe there can be no salvation because we are never really lost – or found. The choice is simply between nirvana and ignorance. That is the adult truh the Buddha urges upon us. We are the sum of our burning. No burning, no being.
When I traveled in Asia for a year, a long time ago, I was constantly amazed and delighted by the ability of so many people (((seemed like everybody was able to do that))) to switch from the mundane to the spiritual and back in no time at all. Spirituality is not reserved for a fixed hour per week, but is constantly present and referenced.
I am currently reading Bangkok 8 by author John Burdett. Page-turner!!
Like Eliot Pattison, who writes the wonderful Inspector Shan series, he was a lawyer in Asia before writing novels, and while Pattison writes well about the Tibetan culture, John Burdett is very knowledgable about the Thai culture. Fascinating stuff. I am reading the Kindle Edition on my iPhone.
The Bangkok series was recommended to me by the same friend who recommended Inspector Shan.
