The Buena Vista Social Club

31 December 2018 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General Reading Time:  7 minutes

Orquesta Buena Vista Social Club in Lorient/France © XIIIfromTOKYO/cc-by-sa-3.0

Orquesta Buena Vista Social Club in Lorient/France © XIIIfromTOKYO/cc-by-sa-3.0

Buena Vista Social Club is an ensemble of Cuban musicians established in 1996 to revive the music of pre-revolutionary Cuba. The project was organized by World Circuit executive Nick Gold, produced by American guitarist Ry Cooder and directed by Juan de Marcos González. They named the group after the homonymous members’ club in the Buenavista quarter of Havana, a popular music venue in the 1940s. To showcase the popular styles of the time, such as son, bolero and danzón, they recruited a dozen veteran musicians, many of whom had been retired for years.   read more…

Delray Beach in Florida, America’s Most Fun Small Town

31 December 2018 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Miami / South Florida Reading Time:  11 minutes

Delray Beach © D Ramey Logan/cc-by-sa-4.0

Delray Beach © D Ramey Logan/cc-by-sa-4.0

Delray Beach is a coastal city in Palm Beach County, Florida, United States. The population of Delray Beach is estimated at 67,000. Delray Beach is a principal city of the Miami metropolitan area, which is home to an estimated 6.2 million people. The city’s eastern boundary includes 3 miles (4.8 km) of beachfront along the Atlantic Ocean. Delray Beach is one of South Florida’s most popular beach destinations. The area is noted for its restaurants, retail shops, nightclubs, art galleries, and hotels. Directly to the south, the city is bordered by Boca Raton. To the south and southeast, the city is bordered by Highland Beach on the same barrier island east of the Intracoastal Waterway. Directly to the north, the city is bordered by Boynton Beach. To the north and northeast, the city is bordered by Gulf Stream on the barrier island and along a section of mainland east of U.S. Route 1.   read more…

Theme Week Vatican City – St. Peter’s Basilica

29 December 2018 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Architecture, UNESCO World Heritage Reading Time:  18 minutes

Tiber, Ponte Sant'Angelo and St. Peter's Basilica © Rabax63/cc-by-sa-4.0

Tiber, Ponte Sant’Angelo and St. Peter’s Basilica © Rabax63/cc-by-sa-4.0

The Papal Basilica of St. Peter in the Vatican, or simply St. Peter’s Basilica, is an Italian Renaissance church in Vatican City, the papal enclave within the city of Rome. Designed principally by Donato Bramante, Michelangelo, Carlo Maderno and Gian Lorenzo Bernini, St. Peter’s is the most renowned work of Renaissance architecture and the largest church in the world. While it is neither the mother church of the Catholic Church nor the cathedral of the Diocese of Rome, St. Peter’s is regarded as one of the holiest Catholic shrines. It has been described as “holding a unique position in the Christian world” and as “the greatest of all churches of Christendom“.   read more…

Theme Week Vatican City – Vatican Museums

28 December 2018 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Architecture, Palaces, Castles, Manors, Parks, UNESCO World Heritage Reading Time:  27 minutes

Main complex of the Vatican Museums © F. Bucher/cc-by-2.5

Main complex of the Vatican Museums © F. Bucher/cc-by-2.5

The Vatican Museums (Italian: Musei Vaticani; Latin: Musea Vaticana) are Christian and art museums located within the city boundaries of the Vatican City. They display works from the immense collection amassed by popes throughout the centuries including several of the most renowned Roman sculptures and most important masterpieces of Renaissance art in the world. The museums contain roughly 70,000 works, of which 20,000 are on display, and currently employ 640 people who work in 40 different administrative, scholarly, and restoration departments. Pope Julius II founded the museums in the early 16th century. The Sistine Chapel, with its ceiling decorated by Michelangelo and the Stanze di Raffaello decorated by Raphael, are on the visitor route through the Vatican Museums. In 2017, they were visited by 6 million people, which combined makes it the 5th most visited art museum in the world. There are 54 galleries, or sale, in total, with the Sistine Chapel, notably, being the very last sala within the Museum. It is one of the largest museums in the world. In 2017, the Museum’s official website and social media presence was completely redone, in accord with current standards and appearances for modern websites. The Museums had 6,427,277 visitors in 2017, making them the fourth-most-visited art museum in the world.   read more…

Harlem in New York

28 December 2018 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, New York City Reading Time:  20 minutes

Cotton Club © Gotanero/cc-by-sa-3.0

Cotton Club © Gotanero/cc-by-sa-3.0

Harlem is a large neighborhood in the northern section of the New York City borough of Manhattan. Since the 1920s, Harlem has been known as a major African American residential, cultural and business center. Originally a Dutch village, formally organized in 1658, it is named after the city of Haarlem in the Netherlands. Harlem’s history has been defined by a series of economic boom-and-bust cycles, with significant population shifts accompanying each cycle. Since New York City’s revival in the late 20th century, Harlem has been experiencing the effects of gentrification and new wealth.   read more…

Theme Week Vatican City – Apostolic Palace

27 December 2018 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Architecture, Palaces, Castles, Manors, Parks, UNESCO World Heritage Reading Time:  12 minutes

Pope Benedict XVI during the traditional weekly mess © Oliver-Bonjoch/cc-by-sa-3.0

Pope Benedict XVI during the traditional weekly mess © Oliver-Bonjoch/cc-by-sa-3.0

The Apostolic Palace (Latin: Palatium Apostolicum; Italian: Palazzo Apostolico) is the official residence of the Roman Catholic Pope and Bishop of Rome, which is located in Vatican City. It is also known as the Papal Palace, Palace of the Vatican and Vatican Palace. The Vatican itself refers to the building as the Palace of Sixtus V in honor of Pope Sixtus V. The building contains the Papal Apartments, various offices of the Catholic Church and the Holy See, private and public chapels, Vatican Museums, and the Vatican Library, including the Sistine Chapel, Raphael Rooms, and Borgia Apartment. The modern tourist can see these last and other parts of the palace, but other parts, such as the Sala Regia and Cappella Paolina, are closed to tourists. The Scala Regia can be seen into from one end but not entered.   read more…

Theme Week Vatican City – St. Peter’s Square

26 December 2018 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Architecture, UNESCO World Heritage Reading Time:  15 minutes

© Greudin

© Greudin

St. Peter’s Square (Italian: Piazza San Pietro) is a large plaza located directly in front of St. Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican City, the papal enclave inside Rome, directly west of the neighbourhood or rione of Borgo. Both the square and the basilica are named after Saint Peter, an apostle of Jesus and the first Catholic Pope. At the centre of the square is an ancient Egyptian obelisk, erected at the current site in 1586. Gian Lorenzo Bernini designed the square almost 100 years later, including the massive Doric colonnades, four columns deep, which embrace visitors in “the maternal arms of Mother Church”. A granite fountain constructed by Bernini in 1675 matches another fountain designed by Carlo Maderno in 1613.   read more…

Portrait: Harry S. Truman, 33rd President of the United States of America

26 December 2018 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: Portrait Reading Time:  10 minutes

Offical portrait of Harry S. Truman at White House © Greta Kempton - Harry S. Truman Library

Offical portrait of Harry S. Truman at White House © Greta Kempton – Harry S. Truman Library

Harry S. Truman was the 33rd President of the United States (1945–1953), taking office upon the death of Franklin D. Roosevelt. A World War I veteran, he assumed the presidency during the waning months of World War II and the beginning of the Cold War. He is known for implementing the Marshall Plan to rebuild the economy of Western Europe, for establishing the Truman Doctrine and NATO against Soviet and Chinese Communism, and for intervening in the Korean War. In domestic affairs, he was a moderate Democrat whose liberal proposals were a continuation of Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal, but the conservative-dominated Congress blocked most of them. He used the veto power 180 times, more than any president since, and saw 12 overridden by Congress; only Grover Cleveland and Franklin D. Roosevelt used the veto more often, and only Gerald Ford and Andrew Johnson saw so many veto overrides. He is the only world leader to have used nuclear weapons in war. He desegregated the U.S. Armed Forces, supported a independent Israel and was a founder of the United Nations.   read more…

Theme Week Vatican City – Vatican Gardens

25 December 2018 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Architecture, Palaces, Castles, Manors, Parks, UNESCO World Heritage Reading Time:  12 minutes

© Marek.69/cc-by-sa-3.0

© Marek.69/cc-by-sa-3.0

The Gardens of Vatican City (Latin: Horti Civitatis Vaticanae), also informally known as the Vatican Gardens (Italian: Giardini Vaticani) in Vatican City, are private urban gardens and parks which cover more than half of the country, located in the west of the territory and owned by the Pope. There are some buildings, such as Radio Vatican and the Governor’s Palace, within the gardens. The gardens cover approximately 23 hectares (57 acres) which is most of the Vatican Hill. The highest point is 60 metres (200 ft) above mean sea level. Stone walls bound the area in the North, South and West. The gardens and parks were established during the Renaissance and Baroque era and are decorated with fountains and sculptures. There is no general public access, but guided tours are available to limited numbers. The gardens also enshrine 16 Marian images venerated worldwide at the designation of the Roman Pontiff, who is the owner of the gardens.   read more…

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