Wintervonken; Winter Sparks

I think this versatile performer was the 

baritone previously entertaining us

from the earth-bound stage!

As I suggested, I investigated Wintervonken with Edmond who was staying briefly last weekend and we arrived in the Burg to find a huge crowd milling around despite the damp, cold weather. I don’t remember what I expected but it was certainly not the serious delight of romantic solos and duets from befrilled and becostumed excellent classical singers on the small outdoor stage. From her heart-shaped red parasol to the tips of her red-stockinged and red-booted feet, the soprano was every inch the Romantic Heroine. Her consort too was dressed chiefly in white to complement her white crinoline, but with touches of red on his white top hat and tails. The many, many children in the audience seemed bewitched but more was to come. More, indeed, to enchant the adults too.

I had noticed a long, long slender crane at one end of the Burg, and soundlessly and unnoticed at first, it, the crane, moved slowly into action providing the power for a gorgeous aerial ballet to begin above our heads. Just before, several red and white crinolined girls had pirouetted, weaving through the audience, mounted somehow on tiny platforms powered by bicycles to which each individual girl’s stage was mysteriously joined. The entire concept was so disconnected from an everyday way of doing things, that the audience seemed entirely happy captives, happy to believe in, and become lost in, everything it was witnessing. But when the aerial ballet began, time really stood still with children and adults alike gazing in wonder at the pirouetting performances so high in the sky. Magical was the word. I think the children in

particular will not forget the spinning ballet on a level with the bare treetops in the Burg and the scattering of tiny pieces of tinsel and white feathers by the duvet-full over the expectant faces below.

Theater Tol, the magicians involved, were spectacular in both performance and concept.

 Close-up of the fiery blooms around

Les Amoureux

As we left in search of warmth, on another stage beneath the trees, four rather fierce-looking men were tuning up to what might well have been full-on Heavy Metal while the bar was doing brisk business. The range and quality of the free entertainment during the year, available to the citizens of Brugge plus the tourists, continue to amaze and impress me. But the red and white pied aerial roundabout with its smiling, posing, trapeze performers who appeared to enjoy it all, takes, if not the biscuit, certainly the waffle!

I quite forgot to describe how fantastic the Burg-beneath-the-trees looked with many artfully-arranged small fires and a huge cauldron of flames with wooden benches and chairs provided for the lucky few; a fiery winter terrace indeed provided by De Vuurmeesters. I should add too that the Burg itself, with its beautiful building and gilded statues provided a majestic setting in which to stage a special event.

Hello to 2018

Oops, a blog laguna during which I went to the UK, principally for the annual family lunch and theatre trip but also to catch up with the Suffolk branch of the family.

The actual lunch was simply superb; at Kricket, an Indian restaurant with a difference in Soho, on Denman Street to be precise. As we were sixteen in number, we naturally chose the sharing option and were rewarded with multiple offerings of four sets of trio platters containing food of a positively Paradisal nature, Cannot identify any single dish but all were spicey and full of taste. Our two junior members, Nicholas age 4 and his sister Eloise age 2, behaved impeccably and the other fourteen members of the party made up for the little ones’ good behaviour by being very noisy, full of shouted and shared news and

An unlikely scene from a delightful farce!

memories. A splendid start to the New Year indeed, followed immediately by a trip to the Criterion nearby to enjoy a farce, The Comedy About A Bank Robbery which fulfilled all expectations aroused by its predecessor two years ago, The Play That Went Wrong. It was ridiculously silly, full of intentional mishaps, occasional double entendres, convoluted plot and inventive stage business that had the audience convulsed with laughter and gasping with admiration. The actual plot involved a priceless diamond, an escaped convict, mistaken identities, love triangles and hidden agendas. In fact the Mischief Theatre Company did the audience proud!

The day after was quiet! I was exhausted and I simply read the paper, drank occasional coffees and juices while my eldest grand-daughter and her good friend nobly produced a marvellous roast dinner, something I now never have in Bruges. Eventually, my daughter drove me to my sister's to be in place for our trip together to Brugge the next day. And so another week since then has sped past, with no blog as my computer inexplicably would not fire up! But my sister and I were busy putting the world to rights, occasionally remembering childhood incidents while I tried to persuade her to think of downsizing while she can. Since my sister’s departure two days ago, I have managed to take my end of third level Dutch exam; meet up with friends and importantly register my Euthanasia application at the Town Hall, now named the Huis op Bruggelingen. On the whole, quite a productive period!!

Gary Oldman as Churchill in an amazing performance

The real Winston and Clemmie

My sister and I really enjoyed Darkest Hour at the Lumiere [still under massive renovation]. Top flight performances came from Gary Oldman and Kristin Scott Thomas and the film looked terrific and generated an uncanny air of authenticity. The film claims to give an authentic account of how Churchill and the freshly-formed coalition government responded to the very real prospect of
imminent invasion. It also painted a tumultuous picture of the unwillingness of the Conservative Party and the Tory grandees, plus KIng George V1, to accept Churchill instead of the universally-preferred Lord Halifax as Prime Minister. I had never realised the depths of opposition faced by Churchill nor the Machiavellian manoeuvres to depose him. The only unequivocal support came from his darling Clemmie and Attlee and the Labour Party though the latter is hardly highlighted in the film. I was surprised to see the Groene Zaal in the Lumiere was absolutely full for the showing we attended. I had not expected such interest in a British film about WW2 though, of course, both World Wars were experienced in such first-hand, immediate and often calamitous ways in Belgium.

And now, back to my usual routines of early swimming and fixed points like the coffee with the girls in the Hotel Martin's and Mah Jong on Thursday mornings plus my favourite evening activity of meeting up with my conversation group in the Oud Huis Amsterdam. I have a whole week off from Dutch but Niveau Vier looms from Tuesday next with an 8.30 start in St Kruis, a half hour's bus ride away. Phew! This coming weekend I must investigate Wintervonken in the Burg, a free event

involving lots of beer with the looks of the waiting bar waggons loitering in the Burg this morning!