Monthly Archives: September 2015

Roanoke, USA, Virginia

Words of wisdom from our friend Heidi Trautmann

1058 Old Country Club Road

Roanoke, VA  24017

USA

Hi All,

    I add the USA because we still have many friends around the world.  And because we have traveled we know the world is the people we met and not what we see on the news. 

I recently received an email from our friend Heidi Trautmann.  We met her and Kalle, her husband while we were in North Cyprus.  Heidi is an artist and writer and very wise woman.  I asked if I could share some of her email to me about the release of her most recent book about the arts of North Cyprus. 

Ru

Terra Firma

PRESS RELEASE :

If you want to paint a chair, you must become one …….

Heidi Trautmann’s new book: ‘Art and Creativity in North Cyprus,  Volume II’

Presentation of the book and Exhibition at the National Archive and Research Centre in Kyrenia on September 29 at 17.30 hrs.

“If you want to paint a chair, you must become one or if you want to paint and describe a tree in a painting or in a poem, you must become a tree to know its roots, to feel its skin with scars and knots and to know why the branches reach high to learn the rules of the kingdom of the winds….and if you want to know a people you have to become one of them.

You have to sit with them and talk, see their eyes change colour when you ask questions; you have to visit their homes and drink their coffee and see their souvenirs on shelves in their home; you need to know the games they played as children and the books they have read and the hopes they had from the very beginning till now, the tears they spent on mishaps in life, the anger or pride they have felt when things went wrong.

I learnt to read their paintings and their poetry, in them I found their ways of judging the situations they live in.  I went to see their theatre plays over many years. ……”

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Heidi with her newest book ready for distribution.

http://www.heiditrautmann.com/paintings_2011_2014.aspx is Heidi’s website which is filled with art and wisdom.

“You will live among so many beautiful trees. I love trees, they were my first friends and I hid all my treasures among their roots.”    Heidi Trautmann in a recent  email to me.

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Heidi’s lino cuts of her trees. 

Roanoke, Virginia 24012

AN UPDATE

1058 Old Country Club Rd

Roanoke, VA 24017

L’shana Tova to all of our Jewish friends. It’s the Jewish New Year which ended tonight at sunset. Hopefully by next Rosh Hashanah our house will be underway. Beginning this week there’s lots of activity at the site. Yippee. And Randal and I have moved into our temporary home which is lovely and roomy. We had cruising pals come visit for several days. All in all, it has been a really good week.

Ru

Terra Firma

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I’m lying in bed reading. The painting on the wall is by Byron Dickson who with his wife Edwina are our landlords and neighbors. I’ve set up my art table by the window which overlooks the golf course. Very very comfortable here while we build our home. Byron is both artist and architect and will design our home.

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The drive up to the house site is being cleared.

Trees are taken down and then fed into the chipper. The chips will be hauled to Westvaco where they will become fuel. We have over 100 acres most of which will remain forested. These machines will be leaving when the project is complete so we’ll only have a big and little dozer and not enough equipment to start our own tree removal service.

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Bear cub tracks. I am definitely looking forward to wildlife watching .

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Lunch break during Old Salem Days

Long-time cruising pals Linda and Michael were our first visitors! On their way from Oshkosh to Florida they stopped to visit a few days. We were together in Johor, Malaysia, Cochin India. The Maldives, and then Turkey. Away from cruising for family issues, they hope to return to the sea and continue their travels.