American Views Abroad

 
On New Year's Eve we had tickets for the last performance of Die Dreigroschenoper by Bertolt Brecht/Kurt Weil based on The Beggar's Opera by John Gay. Unfortunately that performance wasn't at the St. Pauli Theater in the heart of Hamburg's famous red-light district and in its original building which remained unscathed by the bombings of World War II. It's an intimate theater with plush and rather small seats and a bar next door where in nicer weather one can sit outside. (It's also the only theater I know of that receives no subsidies from the government.) Instead it was in the huge Congress Center. The music, singing, acting and the lyrics were great and the play seems to fit right into our times. The characters are so totally egocentric and engrossed in their own survival in rough times.

New Year's Day usually starts off with the Vienna Philharmonic's New Year's Concert on TV which features the music of Strauss, the most beautiful scenes of Vienna and this year the accent was on the horrible catastrophe in Asia - the orchester contributed 150,000 euros to WHO for water and decided not to end the concert with its traditional and joyful Radesky March. It also asked all viewers to please contribute to show solidarity in these times.

An old tradition in Hamburg is for neighbors to come visiting on New Year and the one couple we are particularly close to came around at 5 pm. It was more an embracing in hard times than anything else. First the events in Asia which has everyone here numb were talked about and, of course, since here people have a tendency not to want to invade anyone's privacy in bad times, I was now consoled about Bush's re-election. 'We kept thinking about you, but didn't want to bother you at such a time.' However, we didn't dwell on Bush or US politics. They talked a lot about their past and history, Asia, trying to get meaning out of it, the future of our children and how times have changed...... We also managed to polish off a couple of bottles of red wine (French) and a bottle of Cremant.

- posted by Gloria @ 6:53 PM