Comes winter time, Santa Anita Park, the oldest horse track in California, opens. The track is considered to hold the best racing in the country during the Winter-Spring Meeting. Even without knowing that, any trip to Santa Anita is fun and highly entertaining.
On driving in one can see people like this – these guys are serious about horse races:
The buildings still retain their Art Déco motif:
And when finally the horse one has bet on has won – then it was indeed a fun afternoon at the races:
It is quite amazing how the felines in this house react to being photographed; Julchen poses to no end, she loves having her picture taken, she could be a regular Marilyn Monroe, making love to the camera. Well, at least she always adopts the role of sweet kittie, harmless, gentle and subdued:
Which she is not, actually (at least not very often).
Iko-Chan hates the camera as an intrusion into her privacy. She regards the flash as a personal insult, the very thought of being frozen in any moment of time on a hard drive annoys her. Most of the time she adopts the role of the very angry diva, ready for a hissy fit:
Which she is not, actually (at least not all of the time).
…then see what happens. This applies to all sports, but for Rugby in SoCal this formula has shown amazing results. In 29 youth clubs located between San Diego and San Luis Obispo more than 2,000 players aged between 5 and 18 are active. They love the sport, the camaraderie, the ability to get involved in a game which is very physical and at the same time based on respect for the rules and the opponent.
One opportunity to see the results of the careful nurturing of young players is the FYR High School Rugby International Invitational in Fullerton. This year the tournament was held during the Easter weekend and it was truly an international event:
Teams from California, Utah, Oregon, Wisconsin, Australia and Canada took part in two days of exceptionally good rugby. More than 700 young players were present to play and to pit their strength against each other.
Quite remarkable was the fact that so many girls teams took part in the tournament; even more so, that five female teams from Canada were present. Apparently this was a first in the history of High School Rugby tournaments in all of the US.
In the finals the Boys Cup went to the LA Cougars, the Girls Cup to the Columneetza Team from British Columbia.
They all started young and now they are the new breed helping to build the presence of Rugby in the US.
Pretty, isn’t it?
Take a step or two back.
Griffith Park will need more than one Spring to recover from last year’s fire.
The scars are too deep.
„You see, the final result is going to stand on that hill a hundred years or more. Long after we are gone it will be pointed out as the Ennis House and pilgrimages will be made to it by lovers of the beautiful from everywhere.”
(Frank Lloyd Wright in a letter to Mr. & Mrs. Charles Ennis 1924)
Yes, pilgrimages are being made there. Ennis House, the largest of the four residential houses F L Wright built in the Los Angeles region, is beautiful and awe-inspiring by its sheer volume, sitting there on its ridge, overlooking the city below.
Thanks to the Ennis House Foundation, which came into being in 2005, the building will hopefully still be around once the “hundred years or more” mentioned above have passed. The ravages of time have not treated the building well; after the Northridge earthquake and water damage during the winter of 2005 the house was in danger of collapse. The worst damage to the façade, the foundation and the retaining wall has been repaired. Missing concrete blocks have been reproduced and replaced.
It will take many years to restore Ennis House to its full splendor and glory inside and out. But then even more lovers of the beautiful will come to see what F L Wright in 1924 was rightly so proud about.
Corned Beef is virtually unknown in Germany, at least boiled with potatoes and cabbage in the proper Irish way. Corned Beef in Germany is generally understood to be something in a tin – bits of meat and fat and gelatin. Some people cut it into slices and eat it on bread. Others – like me – avoid it as the devil avoids holy water; or a vampire garlic; or a cat water. Unless it is a Turkish Van cat, they like to swim. Maybe they would even eat Corned Beef out of a tin. I wouldn’t. I also do not like to swim.
Anyway, every time I heard about Corned Beef & Cabbage in the US, I had a vision of this … stuff … out of a tin being cooked up. Not a very appetizing thought. On the other hand one does try to stay polite and tries to refrain from bursting out in a loud “but that is so, so, so utterly disgusting.”
Had I only burst out earlier. It took nearly a year for this misunderstanding to clear up, simply because nobody knew that I didn’t know. Then finally I learned that Corned Beef sans tin can be quite a lovely dish, when prepared properly, and is the perfect food for St. Patrick’s Day. Voila:
And the leftovers are just great on a sandwich.
A rather rare sight – the temporarily drained Silver Lake Reservoir – reminded me once again how important water is to Los Angeles.
It is true that water is important to all regions and everyone, but Los Angeles could only become what it is today because of an engineering feat: The 233 m long Los Angeles Aqueduct, projected and overseen by William Mulholland (1855 – 1935).
Once the water came to the city, from 1913 on, the city started to grow at a fast pace. So fast, that Owens Lake, where the water came from, was completely drained by 1928. This fact led to the legendary Los Angeles Water Wars, upon which the movie “Chinatown” is based.
Mr. Mulholland continued on to find new sources for water to bring to the city. He was a highly esteemed and revered character, who once was even considered to become the mayor of Los Angeles. However, when asked whether he would run for office, he reportedly said: “I’d rather give birth to a porcupine backward.” Smart guy.
Sadly his career ended rather abruptly with the tragedy of the St. Francis Dam. After this catastrophe he lived the few remaining years of his life in self-imposed isolation.
Today Mulholland Drive and the fountain at the corner of Los Feliz Boulevard and Riverside serve as a reminder of the man who played a major part in shaping the city of Los Angeles.
One parking lot.
Three amusing license plates.
Squirrels eat fruit. That’s something I never knew.
Or is this only a very health-conscious SoCal squirrel?
