Badezimmertürschloss

The lock of our bathroom door had not been functioning since December or so. We had told our landlord, Studentenwerk, and they had promised to send someone. And so they did, in February. Someone came, inspected our door, and concluded that the lock didn't function, probably on account of the door being bent. They said someone else would come, at some later date, and fix it.
When I came back, mid April, nothing had changed yet. Then, a month later, a note appeared on our door, saying that on the 25th of May, someone would come and actually fix the lock. Interestingly, by this time, the lock was functioning again. We attributed this to the warm weather, and decided to wait for the promised handyman nonetheless. And on the 25th, someone came, with a ruler, a screwdriver, and a new door. After some measuring and investigating of hinges, the problem turned out to be that our door was simply too small, so the lock just didn't hold.¹ Some more measuring and investigating of other hinges revealed that the new door he had been given was exactly the same size as the old one, but with different hinges. Mist.
The handyman implemented a temporary solution by putting some pieces of wood between the wall and the doorpost, and now the lock works. Studentenwerk promised that, at some later time, someone would come to replace this temporary solution with a more final one (silicone instead of bits of wood), which, to my surprise, happened the very next day (I wasn't there, but the silicone is there now).

The Hausmeister told me that some other people in this building, who had had similar complaints, had been much more insistent on seeing repairs done than we. He had, unfortunately, not been able to help them directly, because Studentenwerk doesn't own the building, but rents it. With a limited guarantee period, after the end of which Studentenwerk will be responsible for the state of the building. So they actually want us to complain when something is wrong, in order to be able to tell the owner of the building to do something about it, but not too much, since they ultimately can't do that much, either. Simplicity is still not the Germans' strongest point...

¹ The weather explanation was probably correct after all ;).

Impressions of an untrained opera visitor

In another attempt at getting cultured, I've recently seen performances of Puccini's Madama Butterfly and Donizetti's Lucia di Lammermoor.

Random impressions:

I kept thinking that Cio-Cio-San's husband was Italian, given the facts that he sung in Italian, looked like an Italian, and at least behaved like a stereotypical one. But he was supposed to be an American naval officer visiting Japan.
After the bonze's scene, where he casts Cio-Cio-San out of the family, I kept hoping to see him back; his anger was impressive. He didn't come back, though; she remained outcast until she committed harakiri, which was the natural end of the opera.

Before going to Lucia di Lammermoor, I had been warned that bel canto opera could be a bit kitschy at times. And so it was. The story was of the calibre of The Castle of Otranto, but without the ghosts, and many of the arias seemed to be written solely for the purpose of showing off how high the sopranos and tenors could come. The phrase 'Disney for grown-ups' came to my mind a few times.¹ However, the nice thing about Disney is that the songs are usually well-written, especially if one ignores the lyrics; this held for the opera as well. At times, five soloists, the orchestra and the choir were all singing or playing simultaneously, but in such a way that the sound still made sense to me, and that I even liked it.
Lucia sang so well, that despite the fact that she was obviously showing off, I actually felt pity for her. I suppose that also says something about me², and perhaps about Donizetti's composing³. Enrico also sang very well, and he looked like an interesting combination of a Scottish laird and a grown-up former punk youth.
The staging showed a combination of technique and minimalism: on the one hand, there was a rotating stage with a pond that rose out of and sunk back into the floor, and on the other, the backsides of stage screens were used to symbolise what I interpreted as the walls of primitive Scottish castle chambers.

In general, I was surprised every time the audience started applauding in the middle of an act, but apparently this is common practice after well-known arias. I feel excused, since I neither knew those well-known arias, nor the opera visitors' etiquette. To me, it just looked like an interruption of the story; I would not start applauding in the middle of a play after a well-known monologue, either. Then again, in these operas, the drama often came second in the order of importance, at a safe distance behind the music. And the arias were impressive.
I have the idea that I'm slowly getting used to hearing operatic singing, in the sense that lots of vibrato does not disturb me like it used to anymore. It's nice: now I can devote my attention to other aspects of the performance, and those turn out to be generally pleasant :).

¹Of course, this was immediately followed by mental apologies to Donizetti for historical incorrectness: Disney is perhaps like modern bel canto opera for children.
²What it says about me is left as an exercise for the reader :p.
³Quasi quantum-physically, one could say that it says something about the entangled system consisting of Lucia's singing, Donizetti's composing, and me, but that the information about the individual constituting components cannot be retrieved...

Internet in Germany (3)

Last week Friday, the wireless network part of my modem stopped working. I didn't notice, since I use a cable, but the people I'm sharing my connection with did notice. After having tried out everything that came to mind, I just went to my ISP, and told them what was wrong: internet access via cable was fine, but wireless just wouldn't work. They said 'the wireless part of your modem must be broken; you'll get a new one. It should be there in three days.' I was slightly surprised, given my earlier experiences in trying to get something done by them, but happily accepted.
I was even more surprised when indeed after three working days, but on a Saturday, I actually got my new modem. And when it turned out to work, and not take hours to get the network running again, I could hardly believe what was happening.
Apparently, their service just takes some time to get warmed up.

P.S.: Half an hour later, I already found myself getting used to the idea that these things run smoothly here as well. I'll just hope nothing will happen until August...

Smoelenboeken

They seem to be popping up everywhere... Even without a strong innate tendency to sign up to this type of thing, my count is at three so far (the UC (alumni) version, the original, and the one for German university students), as many as I have e-mailaddresses¹, for example. And although I am not collecting e-mailaddresses, either, I do think having a few different ones can be very useful. Judging by the average content of, say, a wall post² on one of these things, their main purpose seems to be keeping people off their work, studies, or whatever other ostensibly useful activity they might undertake in their absence. They of course also serve their originally intended purpose (keeping track of/contact with geographically distant people), but as with many inventions, the intended and actual use seem to be two different, quite unrelated things.
However, being as I am caught in their webs now, I will just have to live with another continuous good resolution: not to waste too much time on them :). Always look on the bright side of life...

In any case: you know where to find me.

¹I must be honest here: I have more than three e-mailadresses. But only three which I check with a measure of regularity, and that is a better secundum comparationis here, I think.
²Loesje, if you're reading this: yours were brilliant :).

The Crüxshadows

...are known for their interactive and lively shows. I had seen one, in Utrecht, two years ago, where the singer came to the stage through the crowd. Later, he sang standing on a barstool somewhere on the dancefloor, danced with people from the audience, and walked around the floor while singing. They also had two dancers (one of which was the tour manager) on stage, presenting a danced interpretation of the music.
Tonight, they were playing a club in Heidelberg, which had a rather small stage. This didn't turn out to be much of a problem: the singer just spent half of the time off-stage, in the crowd. At the end, he invited all those near the stage (including yours truly) to come on-stage and dance, and then the stage turned out to be bigger than thought :).
Apart from the singer and dancers, they have a Keyboardspielerin, a guitarist, and a violinist. The latter held her facial expression constant, neutral and concentrated during the entire show. This had a rather funny effect when the entire band was synchronously jumping up and down to the rhythm of the music: imagine a small girl, in an even smaller gothic outfit, with a minimalist electric violin, playing, with a concentrated look on her face, and jumping up and down.
Although the band is American, the singer, having lived in Germany for some time, bravely tried to do the presentation in German. With moderate success: the people definitely understood him, and appreciated the attempt. And didn't need much presentation: the show was good enough. This time, the dancers had made themselves to look quite alike: apart from wearing the same costume, the normally black-haired one was blonde as well today...
And then, of course, as is always the case with goth concerts, the audience itself was nice to look at as well :).

Studiengebühren

This term, students at Heidelberg University have to pay tuition fees for the first time in history. Last term, this caused numerous protest actions, calls for boycotting, and other signs of discontentment. Apparently, the university administration did take these seriously to some degree: now, whenever a library extends its opening hours or some similar improvement is mentioned, it is phrased as 'thanks to the tuition fees you are paying, we can now offer you this service'.

Of course, students are still complaining, since the main problem area (shortage of teaching staff, especially in the humanities) has not yet seen any improvement. This is in part due to an interesting law, which says that the universities, being state-funded institutions, have to admit a certain number of students, based on their estimated capacity. So hiring extra staff means having to admit more students. I'm curious how and when this problem is going to be solved...

Concerts Capella Carolina

For those who are planning to be around Heidelberg at the time: this semester, my choir's concerts will be:

• on the 8th of July, in the Peterskirche, Heidelberg
  
• on the 15th of July, in the Eglise Abbiatale, Ebersmunster (yes, France)
  

We will sing Mendelssohn's oratorio Paulus. Although it was written in the first half of the 19^th century, it often sounds quite Baroque to my unschooled ears. Fugues, relatively limited use of dynamics (at least in comparison to last semester's Rachmaninov), fairly fixed and standard ranges for the various voices, and accidentals only in places where they make for interesting chord progressions.
Still, it probably is relatively Romantic Baroque music; at one point, the conductor, dissatisfied with our timing of a fermata, told us: "That is a Romantic fermata, not a Baroque one!" meaning it should be longer...
At any rate, it's nice music. You're all warmly recommended to come and listen: I believe these concerts are actually going to be good. There is more attention for details than last semester, since the music is simpler and easier to sing (hardly any voice divisions, and an orchestra to keep the pitch for us). And it's going to be recorded, there is going to be an actual CD, which the choir board actually intend to sell to people :).

P.S.: To UC people: sorry for the pun in the title, but I just wanted Heidelberg to have a CCC as well :p.

Walpurgisnacht

The night on which the witches celebrate the coming of the horned God with a dance on the Blocksberg. Closely related to the Celtic Beltane, the welcoming of the summer. In Heidelberg, it is celebrated in the Thingstätte on the Heiligenberg, with a huge night-long picnic party adorned by fire artists and folky music.
According to the local wiki, up to 15 000 people walk up the mountain every year. Most of those 15 000 bring things, to eat and drink, to sit on, to perform with or to put on if it gets cold, which makes it a very rich terrain for pickpockets and other small independent entrepreneurs. Again according to local statistics, about one in three people has something stolen.
Historically, it was a very interesting occasion. Beltane was clearly present, in the fire and the music and the night-long celebration. There is a Christian saint, Valpurga, who gave her name to the night, which fortuitously coincides with the Hexennacht, the night of the witches' dance on Blocksberg. On the modern side, the Thingstätte was built in the 1930s by the Nazis, with some supposedly old and pagan, Germanic, ideas and ideals. But best of all: it is the night before Labour Day, May 1, which is an official holiday in Germany, enabling people to suspend sleep and spend the night on the mountain. A combination of pagan summer-welcoming rituals, a Christian saint, a medieval witch-dance, a Nazi amphitheatre and a socialist holiday! Apparently, appropriation of holidays is not purely a thing of the missionary past...