Wie bindet ihr eigentlich eure Schuhe? Ich habe es so gelernt, als Ausgangsposition eine Schlaufe zu haben, mit dem losen Ende rundherum zu fahren und dann die zweite Schleife zu bilden. Ihr nicht?

Gestern sah ich im Fernsehen "Raising Helen" (deutscher Titel: "Liebe auf Umwegen"). Dort wurde es so erklärt, dass man zuerst zwei Schleifen (= ein Bunny mit zwei süßen Hasenohren) macht und man dann mit der einen um die andere herumfährt. Leif hat es genau so gelernt.

Bisher hätte ich eigentlich keinen Zweifel gehabt, dass unsere Methode des Schuhe Zubindens international wäre..

Und noch eine inhaltliche Bemerkung, zum Film die ich mir nicht verkneifen kann. Demnach ist die abschließende Lektion, welche die Adoptivmutter erst zur Vollblutmama macht, jene, dem 15(!) jährigen Mädchen auf die Frage "Why?" (warum sie nicht mit ihrem Freund schlafen dürfe), bestimmt "Because I said so!" (Punktum.) zu antworten. Ja genau, so wird's gemacht! Pfff...

Actually I wanted to tell you my story about yesterdays little trip downtown. I love those adventures! Kinga called me (in fact she called Leif who woke me up) because she planned to go to Chinatown to experience Chinese New Year. As this was a spontaneous decision she had no idea when it actually started in China and when or where any festivities would be going on here. So we arrived at Chinatown at about noontime and there was: Nothing. Nobody. The streets were as dead as any other part of central Edmonton any other day.

So we walked back towards Canada place had a quick look into St. Barbara Russian Orthodox church with it’s colourful icons and arrived at Jasper Avenue. We were about to walk on to the LRT station when we suddenly spotted sculptures on the opposite side of the street, which we were sure hadn’t been there the day of our visit to Sacred Heart (of story which, it’s a disgrace, I still haven’t told you). So we crossed the street. And thus started what could have been a page long story about art, culture, religion.. I tried it yesterday and today but I failed miserably. It seems these days my mind and my muse are not very productive.

So I just leave it for now, wait whether I manage to make something out of it or not. But to leave you at least with a bit more than nothing I give you the pictures of the four statues: Do they look familiar or not? If the former, any idea why? By which country or culture was the artist inspired? Is there any logical connection between the different statues? Is it just variations of a theme or a whole story? Such were the questions we asked ourselves on the spot and if you want to you could now walk a bit in my shoes. Look and feel and think. And write. What do you see? Real knowledge or pure guesses it doesn't matter. Or if you're not sure but curious enough to use the art of googling - tell me how you suceeded..

Just a couple of pictures from yesterday's little walk with the international centre. We visited the Silver Skate festival in Hawrelak park (which in summer was the location of the Heritage festival I failed to report on).

They had sculptures, but in contrast to Ice on Whyte they looked more like made of snow than of ice. I really liked this one, a combination of a female dancer and an eagle.

Then we also had a version of bannock, a traditional food of the natives. A dough of flour and water (ours was sweetened with cinnamon or sugar) is wrapped around a stick and cooked over open fire.

Actually I had planned to return today evening to see the sculptures in the dark but dismissed the plan because I caught a little cough. I'm sure it was the skating. Yep, skating. For the first time since more than ten years I stood on skates. Terrible. Well, I managed to survive the whole hour without falling a single time but I was close quite often. I'm sure you can see on my posethat I was not very stable. It definitely was an experience for Ali, who arrived here from Iran only a couple of weeks ago. For the first time he did a good job and at least he tried unlike his countryman didn't dare. Despite my insecurity I enjoyed it very much. I really should go again - preferably earlier than in 10 years time...

For technical reasons I couldn't use a slide-show.. sorry you have to click on each photo separately..