Interrail, #5: Nice

Hello, thar, I thought it was about time to continue the endless project of Interrail picture posts, and thus we timetravel back to July and arrive in Nice - with a set of pictures that are, from a meteorological standpoint, highly inappropriate for the Christmas season. But let’s have them anyways.

Hanna.

Very intriguing. I think I will want to watch this.

(Haven’t we always somehow known that Briony would turn out like this? She’s fierce.)

Snow - Snow - Snow

New and unheard Pallettiana ... listenable here ...! Squee! (No. 6!)
(I kind of love how on Soundcloud you can comment on any single second of a recording.)

The well known view from my bedroom window, on Saturday.

And the view from the tram on the Ringstraße on Sunday morning

Schnee-Burg

My parents’ back garden looked like this today, at dawn.
There’s a yet naked, yet chilled christmas tree, also.

I’m loving the cold weather and snow, but I’m disconcerted by its effect on air traffic (of course not quite unselfishly). My fingers are therefore crossed for friends and lovers trying to return to their homes from abroad before Christmas - can you imagine the horror of spending your Christmas separated from loved ones, warmth, food and presents, but surrounded by hundreds of grumpy strangers, camping in an airport?

Experiments with Beetroot ...

In an attempt to buy most of my food as locally as possible, I’ve been using more winter vegetables than ever before this year. As I don’t have much experience with them, a good deal of experimenting and exploring is going on. One example: beetroot.

I’m not really sure if I like them in savory dishes but their wonderful sweetness makes them the perfect ingredient for cakes, as a possible, equally juicy replacement for courgettes, carrots or the like. Here, I tried beetroot cupcakes (using this recipe) with walnuts and cream cheese frosting and their aroma was really quite fascinating. Very earthy, almost a bit like forest soil ... but in a good way, if that’s imaginable? It worked really well with the nuts and the cheesy, creamy sweetness of the frosting.

Nom.

Activism.

I finally came round to downloading a couple of ancient photos from my camera. Here’s some from the demonstration against the government’s planned cut of child benefit on October 28th in Vienna. As you can see, due to the rather more complacent and laid back (and probably timid) mentality of The Austrian People (as well as our police), this demonstration (as well as the many others that have been happening during the last 12 months) was considerably less riot-y and violent than what is going on in the UK at the moment.
It seems the world is hardly doing anything but protesting these days. I wonder if this means anything, at all, to the people it is actually addressed to (politicians). The answer is potentially very depressing, so let’s just leave the question standing there.
And photos.

Partners in crime. Morale: high!

Augustin is Vienna’s Big Issue. Demonstrations = Hordes of politically aware and predominantly socialist/left wing people in one place = Great business for this guy. (Or so I assume!)

Instruments of protest

This photo was an accident, but I really like it.

...

Whoops, anonymity.

Will we still be able to afford books next year?

Heading towards the crime site ...

Darkness falls over Austria. You may read this in a figurative sense.