Caffe Avec

December 4th. Tenerife

@brittarnhild

I just got a phone call from Tenerife, one of the Canary Islands. A friend is there on honeymoon, and as he knows we have been there, he wanted ideas for a roundtrip.

Almost three years ago, the first week of January 2011, Terje and I fled a heavy blizzard in Norway and flew south to this paradise island. And fell in love. Not with each other, that happened in 1978 and will last as long as we live, these January days we fell in love with Tenerife.

 

 A week with sun, warmth, colours, long meals, bottles of wine.....and each other.

A week with hikes, botanical gardens, mountains....

a week where Christmas was still celebrated in January.....

.....a week for The Magi.

And a week for a queen.

As we strolled around in a little village north on the island, the most beautiful nativity scene of the holy family caught my interest.

"Oh, Terje, look! This is a must have!"
Poor Terje, rolled his eyes, shaked his head, muttered "don´t you have enough nativities", and walked over to the counter to pay.

We are going back to Tenerife in January 2014,
and if I find another creche.......

...well, of course I will buy it :-)

 

Café con leche

@brittarnhild

The year is 1912. Antoni Gaudí has just finished the magic house which is today known as La Pedrera, (The Stone Quarry), and before giving the key to the Milá family, he has invited me in for a cup of café con leche. 

Over the coffee Gaudí talks. Words create images in my mind. A boy loving nature, wanting to recreate the forest, the trees, the stone structures, the light. Most of all the light.

"to understand my art you need to understand nature, pure nature like God created it"

After I have admired the house from the pavement for a long time now, too overwhelmed to go too close, Gaudí has today taken me on an indoor tour. La Pedrera feels different inside. The lines are softer. I look up on the ceilings and get a strong feeling that I am at a remote sand beach, where the lines have been combed day after day by the wind. On the other hand, up on the roof, where the master took be before serving the coffee, it felt like we were floating among etheral clouds on top of a stone mountain.

I bend down to get my camera, but Gaudí stops me. "I have given you my thoughts today" he says, "I can not give you myself"

The coffee has long been cold when I say goodbye.

:::::::::::::::::::::::::

I had heard of Antoni Gaudí before I came to Barcelona, well, at least I had heard of Sagrada Familia. But I was unprepared of what met me. At first sight I found the cathedral to look more like a monster than a church. Then, slowly, slowly I started to see the art created by this genious.
From the fountain in Parc de la Ciutadella, till a day in Parc Güell and the highlight, a tour in Casa Milá.
Sagrada Familia will have to wait till next time.
I was not ready for it yet. 

:::::::::::::

The first photo is from inside La Pedrera.
I would love a coffee set like this :-)