Tag Archives: Missouri Botanical Gardens

Humanity, Humidity & Heat

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Anne and I bicycled over to Tower Grove Park to attend the Festival of Nations. We’ve done this for quite a few years running and this weekend in August always seems a bit more sweltering than most. As we passed through Forest Park, the rumbling bass sounds of the Rock n Roll Loufest, could be heard. It was kicking. Fresh from last night’s screening of “Premium Rush”, it was only with some effort that I was able to restrain my red-light running tendencies as well as I did. Others were not so restrained. 🙄

On the way over to the Festival of Nations, we stopped off at the botanical gardens. This summer’s big Chinese Lantern Festival has closed and the remnants of the lantern sculptures were on sale in the parking lot. There were still a few good pieces looking for a good home, but most of the artwork had already been sold off. Interestingly, the pair of porcelain dragons that were set in front of the Climatron were off-limits. I got two conflicting stories about this. The first had them being packed up and shipped back to China for another show. The second story also had them shipped back to China, but because they were all lead based and they were not allowed to remain in the country.

At the festival, we saw Bobbi, who was working one of the charity booths. She was on lunch break when we saw her in the food aisle and so were we. Today’s repast included Malaysian. We had their sweet sesame ‘meatballs’ for an appetizer. Our main course was from Nigeria. It was a spicy beef stew that was served upon this tortilla thin spongy white ‘bread’. It had a rather elastic consistency, which made it excellent for wiping the plate clean of all the beef sauce. We had Iranian for dessert. It was a sweet frozen cup of something with noodles in it. All of these dishes were good, if a bit foreign. 😉

Brett, a friend from work and also a neighbor alerted us to COBU. COBU is the premiere act at the festival. COBU is a Japanese girl band that is one part Taiko drumming and one part punk. They’ve actually transplanted to NYC, where one of their members also performs in Stomp. Their motto is, “Dance like Drumming, Drum like Dancing”. I got enough video of them that a movie is in the offering. It will do more justice to their art than still photography ever could. While we were saving our seats for COBU, we watched Aalim’s Arabian Silk, what I would call belly dancers. They were actually pretty good. I missed the little Polynesian girls in their grass skirts, but that is probably just as well.

Heavenly Temple Closeup

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Heavenly Temple Closeup

I was talking to a friend at work last week. He explained that he was going to take his wife and daughter camping this last weekend. I was confused about his daughter though, because we’re both empty-nesters. He reconfirmed this and said that she was back in town for a little while. She is out of Africa.

His daughter is a Political Science major and had been doing study abroad in Uganda. She had been studying Kony. According to Wiki, Joseph Kony is the head of the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA), a Ugandan guerrilla group. Kony has been accused of ordering the abduction of children to become child-sex slaves and child soldiers. An estimated 66,000 children became soldiers and two million people have been internally displaced. Kony has been indicted for war crimes and crimes against humanity by the International Criminal Court in The Hague, but has so far evaded capture. In my estimation, Kony is a very bad man.

I remember him telling me about her plans when she embarked upon her studies. My friend was noticeably uneasy about this proposition. I think that he had every right to be uneasy. On her return, she jokingly gave her dad an Ebola hug. As part of her studies, she interviewed Kony’s relatives. His uncles recounted stories of little Joe to her.

Her travels across central Africa also included Rwanda. She sang karaoke at the infamous Hotel Rwanda. I couldn’t contain myself at this point and had to ask, “Did she slay the audience, or did she die on stage?” Bum-bump-da

I have to admire her courage for embarking upon this adventure. I imagine that my mind like any parent’s mind could quickly wander to a multitude of worst case situations. I pray that this is only idle fretting. This story puts my friend in a new light. I had always judged him as a mild-mannered man. Then he spawns this heroine and has the fortitude to let her dreams come true. Still waters run deep.

Did You Survive?

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Chinese Fan Lanterns

Yup, but it was dicey when [brother] discovered that the Pretty Ponies were playing in the Hot Wheels cave.

School officially started on Wednesday, but Anne got her feet wet on Monday. Our neighbors had simultaneous work commitments and this time of year has a paucity of baby-sitters. In desperation they asked Anne if she could watch the children. She of course said yes.  Older brother and younger sister, Anne has substitute taught both of them. Plus she has lived next to them for all of their lives. Hot Wheels and Pretty Ponies aside, Anne was the center of attention.

The bus! The bus! The B-U-S!

On my way into work this morning, I passed the elementary school kids lined up at the corner, with a few of their mothers, all awaiting the imminent arrival of the school bus. Today was their first day of school for the new school year. Passing by, I could see that the excitement was palpable. 

The tans will fade, but the memories will last forever.

School didn’t start today for Anne. Even though she is a most excellent teacher, it would be a bit of a let down to draw a substitute teacher on the first day of school. Have no fear though, in just a few days the early morning call from the sub-scheduler will come. Anne has already lined up a long-term substitute job, starting in October. She is excited about this challenge.

The Ah, summer, what power you have to make us suffer and like it. ~Russel Baker.

Vacation leave has all been spent and school has restarted, heralding the return of Fall. This summer was a hot one. Fortunately, for this last week the heat has relented. There is rain predicted for tomorrow and the forecast for this weekend looks positively cool, highs only in the seventies. It sounds like Fall. It sounds positively lovely.

When summer gathers up her robes of glory,
And, like a dream, glides away.
~ Sarah Helen Whitman

That’s Buddha He’s sorta like Jesus

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Chinese Lanterns

In Saint Louis children learn the word arch earlier than anywhere else in the country. It helps to have a cultural icon downtown. This post’s title is kid talk overheard. One older boy explaining things to a younger one. We were all touring the Chinese Lantern Festival at the Missouri Botanical Gardens. In Saint Louis this was the biggest cultural event of the summer. We reprised visited the exhibit last night.

In a multi-cultural sense, I don’t know who should be more offended by this kid’s statement, the Buddhist or the Christians. I hope neither. Here is a young boy that is able to draw a line between his Christian upbringing and other people’s beliefs. Twenty years from now, when he is a functioning adult, he has the Gardens to thank for this.

Thirty plus years ago, when I first landed in the Lou, my engineer brethren bemoaned the Garden’s multiculturalism. Back then they railed against the then new Japanese Gardens. In hindsight these recriminations and the original five-million dollar civic outlay seem puny.

Through plant science and market economics , the Gardens and their partners have spearheaded agriculture growth. This festival builds a new bridge with an important new trading partner. It is all good for Saint Louis.

Chinese Lantern Festival (Redux)

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Chinese Lantern Festival

Anne, Joan and I finally managed to make it into the Lantern Festival at the Missouri Botanical Gardens tonight. I brought my Canon SX40, my medium grade camera, but I also brought along a tripod.  Anne and I had fervently tracked the progress of this show through its construction phase. We had seen it many times since during the day and saw it at night during its opening week. This is the festival’s final week, so we were pleased to finally get in to see it again in the dark. Folks, there are only six days left. 

It was sold out again tonight and before nine the crowd was rather annoying, but after nine there was a magic hour. Most of the people had left and the sky was fully dark. I plucked one promising photo from tonight’s treasure trove for this post. I can’t wait to fully delve into tonight’s haul.

A shoutout to James and his lovely bride, Sara, who happened to be in the gardens tonight too. Hauling about this tripod must have put me in the 1% of tonight’s camera hauling crowd, because a woman with a Verizon tablet device asked me, “Do you know anything about cameras?”

I didn’t even know that Verizon sold a tablet and for my money a tablet is not a ‘camera’. You all know how I feel about the iPhone as a camera. At least the iPhone has a better camera than the iPad. God knows what a Verizon tablet’s photographic capabilities might be. Anyway, she had inadvertently locked the camera App so that she couldn’t take anymore pictures.

I poked at her screen. Don’t try this at home folks, because I am a trained Computer Scientist. Anyway, I got no more joy poking at her screen then she did, so I fell back upon that tried and true IT technique, reboot. She liked the idea and I took that opportunity to escape into the crowd. I saw her later in the night and ask if that suggestion had worked and it had. Take that you retiring Car Talk guys.