May 23, 2008
Pittsburgh Trip: Lots of family!
Getting into mischief with grandpa...playing with cousin Jessica...fun with Aunt Kim...reading with Aunt Martha...twins with twins...snuggling with Great-Grandma...and the list goes on.
Even though we couldn't fit everyone's picture here, the kids loved spending time with *all* of you!
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April 22, 2008
Pennsylvania, Proust, Polkas & Pierogi
I had some wontons leftover, and was also feeling a little homesick for Western PA. So I decided to try my hand at some pierogi.
The first time I ate pierogi was at a polka festival with my dear old roommate Teresa. She took me to a festival near her family's town. At the festival, there was the two of us, a couple young families, and an abundance of spry octegenarians who could boogie beer barrel style. Proust-like, that experience returns each time I eat a pierogie.
I digress. So, I made a box of instant cheddar mashed potatoes rather on the thickish side. And plopped a pile of potatoes on each wrapper.
I then fried them up in a little margarine (actually, I think a lot of margarine would have been more authentic!) and onions.
Even though they weren't quite authentic (faux pierogi, anyone?), I could've gleefully Pennsylvania Polka'd after the first bite.
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February 27, 2008
Coping without Myron
Joanna: Today, we're both feeling a little homesick for Pittsburgh. It lost one of its most colorful characters today, Myron Cope, the voice of the Steelers, the discordant, beloved bard of Pittsburghese and the inventor of the Terrible Towel.
Okay, so I (Joanna) am not a huge football fan, but a Steelers game in Pittsburgh wasn't just about football, it was a huge cultural, community unifying event. I unfortunately lived in Pittsburgh after the era of Myron Cope, but Tim was there from the early days (check out this ardent little fan!). Even so, I was steeped in stories of Myron Cope, the Immaculate Reception, Franco's Italian Army, and the glory days of the Steel Curtain.
Here are a couple great articles on him. And I think this is a great piece of social history. You learn so much about what it means to be a Pittsburgher from these reactions to his passing.
It may be hard to imagine if you live outside of Pittsburgh, but I'm sure the whole city is in its own special kind of mourning, more black than gold at the moment.
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December 30, 2007
Good Food, Good Beer, Good Kids
Tim: It’s been great having Christmas week off. Sleeping in late, having lots of wife and baby time, watching Frank Capra movies, etc… On Thursday we had an unquenchable taste for fish and chips so we spent almost an hour looking for a place in Athens that had it. We are still adjusting to small town America where everything is not at our finger tips. In Pittsburgh we would have had our choice of a dozen or so establishments that would have fixed us up with our desired Pisces, potatoes and potations. We finally found it at The Globe in downtown Athens. This place may be our substitute for the Sharp Edge in Pittsburgh. An old world pub kind of place with great food and over 80 European beers to choose from. Anyways, the fish and chips were excellent – we felt like Frankie in Angela’s Ashes – if they were wrapped in a newspaper, we would have even licked the grease off the editorial page. We washed it down with a Belhaven and a Highland Oatmeal Stout. The twins snoozed away in the booth seats while we our consumed our vittles.
Tim and Jo: Yesterday we decided to take a trip to Helen for a dose of Georgia-style Bavaria. It’s as close as we’ll get to München in at least the next several years. As soon as we got there, we needed to feed the kids. We provided many passersby with free entertainment as we sat on a bench with bottles and babies in hand. The cats were out of their bags, so to speak.
For lunch we went to Altstädter Weinstube & Biergarten so Tim could get his own bottle. We had an olive and gherkin appetizer and for the main dish, three kinds of wurst –weinwurst, smoked bratwurst and rindswurst.
It came with a gigantic pretzel that was more bread than pretzel and we drank an Aecht Schlenkerla Urbock Rauchbier (smoked beer) which Joanna said was like drinking a stout by the fireside, except the fireside was in the beer! The kids dozed away on a nearby chair. Looks like a nearby gnome wants to wet his whistle...
We strolled through Helen going into shops we hadn’t been in before (like the live tarantula exhibit and the leather store--Das Ist Leather--a mishmash of faux-Bavarian, redneck and biking cultures) and stopped for some apple strudel and funnel cake. There was a big tree decorated for Christmas and a Santa or two leading horse drawn carriages through the streets.
We stopped at Nora Mills and got some stone-ground buckwheat pancake mix, pickled okra and berry preserves. The kids were getting a little restless being in the slings all day long to so we left for home. When we got there they were really cranky! They must have realized we were having all this fun and leaving them out!
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October 02, 2007
Old rivalries
I can't wait for Tim to come home and see what I found for our little boy (btw, I found a great thrift shop with baby clothes for an unbelievable price)...
For some reason, Pittsburghers have never forgiven the Braves for knocking the Pirates out of the pennant race so many times (especially in the '80s), hehehe....
At the same time, I do have a fondness in my heart for the Pirates, and have unforgettable memories of attending their games. Like the first time I heard fans booing their own team, even tossing a sneaker out onto the field, I suppose to see if the outfielder did any better catching that than the balls coming to him. And the first time someone threatened to toss me over the side for cheering the wrong team (see above photo!) too loudly...
But there was so much more than the game to experience...
It was taking a ferry over
to get to a stadium almost at the apex of three rivers (see the bright lights on the left),
hanging out with friends afterwards
and sometimes fireworks over the riverfront.
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August 30, 2007
Bruce Springsteen and Western PA
I really do think that the kiddos like Bruce Springsteen. I won't be feeling any movement, and then I turn on the greatest hits CD I have, and a dance party will get started. One side of me feels like I should be teaching them to like Beethoven and Bach, rather than Springsteen, and the other side of me wonders if they'll like Bob Dylan, too.
I've been musing why I have such a thing for Bruce Springsteen right now. I never really got into him before now. And then I realized...
His songs are incredibly Western Pennsylvanian. "Johnstown company store," "Grove City bus," "textile mill closing down," etc. He even played in a band called "Steel Mill"! Wikipedia talks about him as having blue collar New Jersey roots, which I guess is close enough for me to feel a Western PA flavor to his music.
I love Pittsburgh and the surrounding Western PA area. I love the fact that the immigrants worked so hard to survive in a new place and to preserve their cultural heritage. I love the hills and the rivers, and the urban-yet-still-country flavor. I love the toughly-independent yet community centered approach to life that people have. I love the fact that Pittsburgh has reshaped itself into an incredibly attractive city, yet fiercely preserves the immigrant cultures that helped to create it.
Springsteen's song "My Hometown" captures the incredible love that people have for their own places in Western, PA, a loyalty not based on the perfection of the city or town, but on something deeper, I'm not sure exactly what.
The Deer Hunter really captures some of this. A very disturbing movie during the Vietnam parts, but it captures this feeling of Western PA in its portrayal of life in Clairton, PA--close to the Johnstown/Altoona area where Tim grew up. The deerhunting, the beer drinking, the Steelers, the steel mill, the Orthodox wedding, the unbelievable loyalty to friends.
I suddenly realized that this is going to be part of our kids' heritage. They'll have the blood of immigrants and coal miners and steel workers flowing through their veins. I hope they have the strength and independence of spirit that I've seen in Tim's family. It just struck me that the heritage of two families will blend in these two children--it's not just my history that they'll inherit, it's Tim's history as well.
And then another insight dawned on me--I have a little of this blood running through my veins as well, maybe that's why Pittsburgh felt like home to me in such a deep way. My mother's mother is a second generation Polish immigrant who grew up--at least for part of her childhood--in Western PA. She and her family were rescued in the 1936 Johnstown Flood. She (as a small child) was pictured in the local newspaper because she refused to climb out the second story window into the rescue boat until the rescuers agreed to take her cat as well.
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June 08, 2007
Our pretty city
And some people still think that Pittsburgh is dirty and smoky and ugly...
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January 25, 2007
ancient odds and ends
No fair! When we clean the church, all we find are last week's bulletins and ladybug carcasses.*
Church's Kneeler yields a trove of artifacts
Tim chuckled at the bit about the gum wrappers hastily hidden from the "patrolling nuns." It brought back his own childhood memories of nuns: "Stop slouching and sit up straight young man!"
*Ladybugs are apparently quite a fertile--and short-living--species, as we discover several times a year.
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August 04, 2006
Riding on a Streetcar Named Desire
Last weekend, we took a trip the Pennsylvania Trolley Museum in Washington, Pa.
We saw a little film on the history of trolleys and streetcars and then got to see seven or eight streetcars from the early 20th century. The tour guide was really funny. He told us that streetcars used to take people to Kennywood Park in the 30s and 40s. So the kids would stuff their gobs with candy, pop and popcorn in the park all day and then all clamor onto the streetcar for the ride home. Now, a ride in a streetcar back then was not the smoothest ride you ever had. After the bumping and the swaying and the rocking, well…. you can imagine the scene!
Joanna got a real kick out of the vintage advertisements in the trolleys: from WWII time, Cold War time, and the good old days when Victrola made childhood happier.
Then we got to take a ride on the actual Streetcar Named Desire from New Orleans! It was a whistle blowing, bell clanging, Stella-yelling good time.
After we left the museum we found some blackberry patches along the road. We parked the car and picked some and got in touch with nature. Joanna was a bit more nostalgic for tramps through the woods and other suburbian "wish we lived in the country" almost redneck childhood outings, so she didn't mind the brambles quite as much. The shiny blackberries were merged with peaches and ice cream to form a reward for the scratched-up, weary adventurers.
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July 22, 2006
Clash of Culture or Amish in the Inner City
The hospital that Tim works at is in a rather poverty stricken section of Pittsburgh.
Someone had the bright idea of starting a farmer's market in the park right in front of the hospital, meeting every Friday afternoon. At first, I just thought it was really fun--I love farmer's markets and street markets!
Then I realized the genius of the idea economically.
I don't think Western PA farmers tend to be that prosperous, so it probably helps them to sell without a middleman.
And the people living in the area can get fresh produce and other nutritious foods for an extraordinarily reasonable price.
Score on both sides!
And on the fun side, Tim and I have been hanging out there after work on Fridays, picking up produce (fresh basil, lettuce, and corn), Amish cheese, Greek foods, and the best kalamata olive bread we've ever had.
Posted by Tim and Jo at 09:31 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
June 02, 2006
Folk Festival
Phew, it's been too hot to sit in our computer room and blog for the past couple of days. Pittsburgh's felt like 'way down south in Dixie land. However, blazing heat doesn't make me overly nostalgic for my lovely birthplace (though there are many other fine things about it).
Anyway, last weekend was packed full of fun. On Friday night, we went to the annual Pittsburgh Folk Festival, a highlight of our summer. Pittsburgh is amazingly diverse! This was the fiftieth anniversary of the folk festival. It began in the 1950s. Ooooo! Dissertation connect to real-life: the outburst of interest in folk music/cultures that I've researched in connection with my topic is the same outburst that initiated this gorgeous festival. History that I can touch and taste and hear. Here are a few favorite pictures from last year, and then I'll let Tim tell this year's story in his own words. Actually, I feel the need to add my own comments as well.
Indian hip-hoppin' kids--too cute! The girl in the very front had such a cute attitude, not shy at all.
I don't remember which Eastern European country this was--there were tons of them, with lots of fun dancing.
China was terrific, with a huge variety of props--dragons, ribbons, fancy costumes.
I think this is still China. So pretty and symmetrical!
Onto this year...
Tim and Joanna: Tonight we went to the Folk Fest with Rachel. Lots of great music, food and crafts. We started our culinary tour with Hawaii (Lau-lau: chicken cooked in banana leaves), Greece (Pastitsio: like a Greek shepherd’s pie), and Scotland (Finnan Haddock, a smoked fish dish). We washed it all down with a Mango Iced Tea. Joanna valiantly attempted to stir up some Slovakian nostalgia in me but, alas, I didn’t eat any cabbage-based food, nor did I dance the polka. I did have some of the chicken paprikas and mushroom soup that Joanna got from the Slovak booth; both were excellent. (See!!)
Rachel found some Irish crème fudge from the Ireland booth and it was sublime. The Kona coffee from the Hawaiian booth was also amazing.
Now for the music. We heard a men’s choir of Ukrainian descent that had us transfixed. Between numbers, the leader gave us some of the history of the Ukraine – fighting to retain the customs and heritage under the oppression of the Czars and the Soviets. They also had several men playing banduras, lute type instruments that go back to medieval times. Ukrainian minstrels would play them and bring the latest news to the villages they would visit.
Several of the other musical groups had kids singing and dancing, like the Italians, the Germans and the Serbians. They were really talented. The Lithuanians played pan pipes that had a really sweet timbre. As the sweet sounds and rhythms poured out, Pittsburghers impulsively began dancing.
The costumes of all the groups were so colorful and vibrant. A feast for the eyes. We talked for a while to a lady born and raised in Iran. She told how the media greatly misrepresents the people of Iran and focuses only on the negative. She also went into raptures about the beautiful architecture in her country. She said that she had never truly appreciated it until she went away from it, studying in Paris (mutual drooling from the co-chroniclers) and London (more drool). Now we want to visit Iran (and Paris and London)!!
That's the only problem with the folk festival. It makes you want to throw all budgets to the wind and travel the world.
Our souvenir of the evening was a cookbook featuring foods and histories of the many ethnicities that have settled over the years. Mmm! Wanna know what to eat as a Pittsburgher during WWII food rationing? How to pack a lunch pail for your steel mill bound husband? How to make your own Piroshki? It's all here! Joanna's professor we ran into gave us a copy of a tour guide to Pittsburgh and its surrounding area, Routes to Roots. We're already planning out new places to explore and summer festivals to visit. Woohoo!
Posted by Tim and Jo at 08:51 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
May 28, 2006
Bayernhof Music Museum
Last week, we visited an odd little museum. Here's our trip from Tim's perspective!
The Bayernhof Music Museum. Now here is a small museum that has as many surprises as most large museums. An eccentric chap named Charles Brown III, who had a lot of money and time on his hands, built a mansion and housed it with himself, over 150 mechanical instruments, and an odd assortment of collectable items. From the website:
“His collection is displayed in almost every room in the house. There are many antique music boxes, “monkey” organs, a Wurlitzer carousel organ, a Reproduco Piano-Pipe organ used in funeral homes and theaters, an Encore Automatic Banjo. There is also a Mills Deluxe Violano Virtuoso player violin and piano combination, a Knabe Ampico reproducing grand piano that faithfully “reproduces” the playing of the artist who originally recorded the roll and a huge Seeburg Pipe Organ Orchestra that was once used to accompany silent films to name just a few. In his will, Charles Brown III directed that his instruments be restored and his house opened to the public as a museum. Charles was the founder and chief executive officer of Gas-Lite Manufacturing, he died in 1999.”
Joanna thought our tour guide looked like Charles Laughton. Here he is with a player organ, and a funeral hall player piano.
Here are a couple carousel organs. They were bombastically loud! I loved it. Joanna cringed.
There were over 15 little bars (almost one in every major room) stocked to the gills with expensive liquor. There were secret passageways, doors in odd places, spiral staircases, etc... The bathroom off the master bedroom had a big Jacuzzi and a shower with 14 shower heads shooting water from every possible angle except from the floor up! Another little oddity was this bird cage, featuring a taxidermied bird that chirped and moved its head. Somebody's hobby was stuffing things (a la Norman Bates). Cute and creepy (just liked Norman Bates).
The strangest thing in the house was a passageway that was like an underground cave. It took you from the lower level to the main floor and was accessed by turning a little sword on a wall. Also in the cave were stalactites, stalagmites, a small waterfall, a bat, a scary troll, and a wooden door leading to a wine cellar.
The cellar had an authentic moonshine still (coming from Joanna's neck of the woods)! Eek! The devil's brew!
The pathway through the cave finally opened into the swimming pool room with a 10 foot waterfall. An expansive wall mural surrounded you. It depicted popular scenes from Germany (Sound of Music, Neuschwanstein Castle, etc...) There were surprises waiting around every corner. What a cool place!
Continue reading "Bayernhof Music Museum"
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