Disturbed

I saw two of the most disturbing things tonight. I’ll explain when I get to that part of the day…but to start....


Slept fairly well after going to sleep at 10pm! Up at 4:30 and tossed and turned until about 8:30. I’ve learned that nothing opens in Europe during the winter until at least 10 (if at all) so no need to get up and get going before then. I walked to the Tourist Information again and bought myself a Museum Card (9 euro for 7 museums) and I asked if there was anything going on in the evening. She said there was a ballet so I bought myself a ticket! 20 Euros, Row 2, Center Stage. The day was fairly nice at this point – it looked like the sun was attempting to come out! First, I headed to the National Museum of Art History (Musee national d’historie et d’art Luxembourg).

It went from floor -5 to floor +5. Either I didn’t listen to instruction very well or they didn’t explain very well (I choose option 2) but I started at the top (it’s always easier to walk down then up, right?) So I started randomly in contemporary art on floor +4. I couldn’t figure out how to get to +5 and parts of the museum were blocked off – so whatever – I guess I just missed the “Fine Art – Luxembourg Art”. Headed down to +3 and saw the Ancient Art and Modern Art. According to the brochure I also saw the “jewel in the crown” of this section, Rosso’s Bacchus, Venus and Amor (painted around 1530-1531). I don’t know who Rosso is but maybe Kat can fill us in ;)

There was also a Picasso

and Magritte in this area.

Headed down to +2 where there was a special exhibit. I don’t remember who it was but he drew people and scary looking clowns. The employee in this section basically followed me around (I was one of about 3 people in the museum and yet he still felt the need. Basically there was a room on the left and a room on the right with a door in the back connecting the two rooms. He stood at the door, watched me walk around the room and look at the paintings/drawings, stepped back so I could go through the door and then continued to watch me walk around the second room. It freaked me out. I didn’t look at those paintings too long (which was alright cause they were of scary looking clowns. The rest of the rooms I breezed through as I stopped caring +1: Middle Ages (mainly coins and weaponry and random ceramic vessels), -1: Gallo-Roman Period/Middle Ages (more of the same but this time a lot of carved stone that used to be part of buildings), -2: Roman Mosaic (floor they had found under layers in an Old Roman house or castle or something), -3: Gallo Romn Period (more statues, carved stone, ceramic/glass vessels, etc etc etc), -4 and -5: Protohistory and Prehistory. Time to leave this museum. And by the way…no English.  On the way out I ran across two bears in the street (a passing dog went CRAZY!)

It was also snowing....here's my attitude:

I did some more random walking – ended up by the Bock Casemates which are a UNESCO World Heritage Site

 – sadly they are only open May-October so I didn’t get to go in them. Very disappointing. I was hoping that the Petrusse Casemates would maybe be open but they were closed as well.


More pictures along the Bock Casemates and Corniche:

By this point I was hungry. I hadn’t eaten lunch so I went back to the hotel, asked if there were any restaurant recommendations, he had none – seriously how can you be a receptionist/concierge at a hotel and not have restaurant recommendations?!? So I wandered around and finally found Le Cap – I ordered a Battin beer (Luxembourgish) and a Prosciutto e Fughi Pizza. It was tasty!

Wandered around some more (here's a random street)

and then went to the Museum of Luxembourg History.

This time they told me how to do it so I did it correctly (the entrance I went in was on Floor 3 so I had to take an elevator down to floor 0 – how does that work!?!) This museum is housed in 4 real houses although most of the time you can’t really tell. Pretty good museum. The permanent collection was on 0-2. Interesting and in this museum was English captions so I got more out of it. The temporary exhibit they had was called “Mord und Totschlag: Eine Ausstellung uber das Leben” (Murder and Manslaughter: An Exhibition about Life). Interesting. Asked a lot of interesting questions in each room “Can political murder be justified?” (artifacts from 9/11 including a piece of the airplane), “Is killing sanctioned by God?”, “Soldiers – heroes or murderers?”, etc. It was interesting – although the piped in noises were really getting to me – it was staic-y sounding and then random music would play. Weird. After the museum wandered back through the hotel through Williams Square (where there was a LITTLE big of sun!!!)

and headed back to the hotel for some rest and relaxation aka I needed to sit and not carry my bag around. 


Left the hotel at 5:30ish to find dinner and stopped at the Golden Lady and overlook over Petrusse Valley once again

Adophe Bridge:

did some more aimless wandering and attempted to find a menu that I could find SOMETHING to eat that wouldn’t be too expensive. Settled on Italian where you could get an entrée, drink and dessert for a certain price. I went for Tagliatelle Pasta with Chicken

and a 33cl Bofferding Luxembourgish beer.

Both were good. For dessert I picked the chocolate cake/vanilla ice cream option (mainly because when she brought back the menu she didn’t bring me the English version so I didn’t really know what is said and chocolate cake was the only thing I could remember). It was good.

I had enough time to walk back to the hotel after dinner for a bathroom break but then I immediately turned around and headed to the Grand Theatre for the Ballet I had bought a ticket for.

And inside on the mezzanie level (taken in the lobby secretly - that's why it's kinda crappy)

Apparently I was really early. I didn’t leave the hotel until 7:15 and it was about a 15 minute walk. I didn’t think getting there at 7:30 for an 8:00 performance was that big of a deal but the place was deserted!! There were a couple of employees standing by the doors. The first ones I went to said they didn’t speak English (or rather they motioned no and said something in some other language). I tried another door, the guy still didn’t speak English but at least I was able to get across that I wanted to know if I was in the right place. I managed to understand that yes, I was in the right place and they would start seating in awhile. I wandered around the building a tiny bit, went up a level and stood by a table and read my book (gotta love the Sony e-Reader). Finally went in to sit (the program was in English and French! YEAH!!) I’m going to attempt to explain the 4 pieces in badly worded description….


#1 – Dyad 1909 – I don’t know – I didn’t understand it. They danced crazy-like wearing weird outfits and there were images projected behind them occasionally (Vampire Squid footage??!?!). Weird. But whatever – it was dancing. Oh, and there were 7 dancers. 5 of them had on Hannibal Lecter looking mouth coverings – but with glitter! Didn’t understand that part. Interlude.

#2 – Afterlight Part One – Solo, the guy turns in circles a lot. Apparently someone special designed the lighting feature. The soloist never steps out of the light – but the light keeps moving beneath him. At first boring, got a little more interesting once he removed his jacket (still had a shirt on).

#3 – Faun – This one was my favorite of the night. Apparently the choreographer “examines the animalistic nature of human movement and the power of mythology”. It was a duet, each of the dancers was some kind of woodland creature. The girl was CRAZY flexible – it seemed like she was double-jointed in many parts of her body. Sort of a love story (I think). I liked it. And apparently there was some famous costume designer...the girls costume was nice but I didn't get what she did to the guys costume - to me it just looks like underwear.  Interlude.

#4 – Eternal Damnation to Sancho and Sanchez – And this is where I became VERY disturbed. First, I should tell you there was a warning at the beginning of the program stating “The last choreography…contains scenes of a sexual and violent nature that may offend certain viewers (especially children).” I figured it would be a sex scene or something. Well the curtain pulls up and the outside scenery is just a bunch of naked people. Okay. Whatever. Description in the program: “Darkly humourous and deliberately provocative….cautionary fable set within a Catholic church”. There are 6 dancers sitting on chairs with scary makeup. They all are holding signs and flip them over as they walk to the sides of the stage. All 3 of the girls are pregnant. There are 3 guys, the scariest one is “the priest”. Some of them dance, the others watch while “praying rosaries” and whatnot. Then the priest starts molesting one of the guy dancers (the "good" one). This one gets away. Then the priest molests the other guy dancer who becomes bad (see program cover below). He fights but can’t get away. Then this one starts molesting the female dancers. So crazy bizarre, meanwhile there is one crazy girl that keeps touching the priest and vice versa. They go on with this back and forth molesting/trying to get away. Then the “good” guy dancer who escaped the molestation and the 2 “good” girl dancers capture the “bad” girl who they strangle with rosary beads and by smashing her head against the chair (fake blood all over her mouth and everything!). Then they capture the “priest” and put him in an electrical chair and electrocute him. And then it was over and we had to clap for them.

It was the most bizarre and disturbing things I have ever seen in my life. Oh – and twice during the last performance a sign came down from the ceiling that said “Amuse Me”. Apparently the sexual assaults and being electrocuted are supposed to be amusing?! After every performance the clapping went on forever (sort of forced clapping) while the dancers did about 10 bows a piece. A little ridiculously over the top.


So back to the hotel – wanted to make it lickety-split as I was walking from the middle of nowhere to my hotel by myself. The street I was walking on cuts in the middle of a park. I swear. As I was walking, a fox ran across the street. I’m not joking. It was some kind of fox-like animal. It was NOT a dog, and it was way bigger than a cat. It had to be something like a fox. I was disturbed and in shock yet again. Made it back to the hotel and instead of sleeping like originally planned I had to write about my disturbing night! Now it’s midnight. A little more reading and then time for bed and 7 hours of training tomorrow – maybe an extended stop in Brussels to see what kind of chocolates I can find :)


Night!