Harry Potter and the Cursed Child NYC

Dave always struggles with gift-giving. I’m bad about buying myself what I like (within reason and budget, of course), and that can make gifting a little challenging. For the last two Christmases, Dave has focused his gifts on experiences instead of things, and I’m cool with that!

This year, Dave tried to surprise me with Broadway tickets, but Harry Potter and the Cursed Child was a tough ticket to get. Dave had not been drawn for the October ticket lottery, so no tickets before Christmas. Ever optimistic, he planned to gift me the trip to New York and hope we could secure tickets in the February ticket lottery. He wrapped a Time-Turner necklace and a flight itinerary, and we waited. 

When the time came, we registered four emails for the ticket lottery and crossed our fingers. Luckily, Dave received a presale code! The day tickets went on sale was stressful. He could not try for tickets until the third purchasing window opened, and he only had a small window of time to purchase. The two weekends we had hoped for were already sold out, and the site kept pushing him all the way to 2019. On a whim, he clicked on a Wednesday, and there they were! Tickets in June for both Part 1 and 2 on the same day! As a bonus, the trip would fall just days after our fourth anniversary. We have always used the “traditional” gift list for our anniversaries, and the fourth anniversary is “fruit and flowers.” A trip to the Big Apple fell right into place. 

It would be a quick trip, so we booked two nights at the Casablanca Hotel in Times Square, just around the corner from the Lyric Theatre. They had a great staff AND a  free wine and cheese reception every day from 5-8pm! After checking in, we walked down 5th Avenue and did a little window shopping. We popped into Tiffany & Co to get my wedding rings cleaned, grabbed a small Disney/Snow White goodie at the Coach flagship store, and browsed stuff we can’t afford in Saks. After that, we grabbed the subway down to the East Village to check out Please Don’t Tell, a fun little speakeasy hidden inside a hotdog shop and  behind a phone booth wall - how very Harry Potter! After dinner and drinks at PDT, we popped into Stillwater Bar just a couple of blocks over. This bar is owned by an OSU Alumni member. 

The next day was Play Day! Cursed Child is told in two parts with a couple of hours for dinner between Part 1 and Part 2. I know Harry Potter fans have polarized feelings about the script, but this play was an AMAZING production. I still don’t know how some of those things happened on a stage. Magic is the only way. I purposely avoided reading the script, and I’m glad I went into the show fully able to experience it without the nitpicking I’m prone to do. I think it is meant to be performed, not read as “Book 8,” and the script format does not play to Rowling’s strengths of amazing written description and character development. The actors, instead, are the ones who bring it to life. Like all fans, I have a few niggles about the storyline, but I otherwise thoroughly enjoyed the experience and would not hesitate to see it again. No spoilers as I must #keepthesecrets. 

El Dorado Royale, Mexico

In May, Dave and I made a quick 3-night trip to El Dorado Royale in Riviera Maya, Mexico, to celebrate the Cinco de Mayo  wedding of Sarah and Eric. We were part of a group of 40+, and the adults-only, all-inclusive resort was a great choice! Just a few highlights:

The Lobby area

Our suite - Swim-Up Jacuzzi Jr. Suite 

In our excitement to get the party started (we were among the last to arrive), I failed to get any in-room pictures! The room was depicted honestly on the El Dorado Royale site, so I guess I didn’t think about taking my own photos. We had a king size bed, a loveseat, and a small dining table in the main room, and a jacuzzi bath, double sinks, a separate shower, and a separate toilet in the bathroom. There were robes, slippers, and a safe in the large closet. The fridge was stocked with beer and soda once a day, and we had 24 hour room service. We also had a concierge office just outside our block of rooms. Our room was connected to our friends’ rooms via the swim-up pool. We all basically swam off our patios and found each other in the water! It was such a great arrangement for a big group.

Food!
El Dorado Royale has several options for food 24/7. Since we had wedding activities for two of the three nights we were there, we didn’t even make a dent in the offerings. Upon arrival, we had burgers at JoJo’s Caribbean Seaside Grill while we waited for our room to be ready. That night, we had an arrival dinner scheduled by the bride and groom at Cocotal that was very good. On Saturday, we had breakfast at The Spot followed by room service quesadillas in the pool for lunch. The private wedding dinner that evening was a family-style Mexican fiesta at The Spot, complete with churro cake!

On Sunday, Dave and I visited Cocotal for a breakfast buffet and La Isla for a yummy lunch. That night, we followed the beach over to the Casitas side of the resort and enjoyed D’Italia and the Bellini bar. 

Entertainment
Obviously, Saturday’s wedding was the main attraction for our group.

 We also enjoyed Guacamaya’s in the evenings, complete with bar swings!

We had a great time during our brief stay. Storms at sea had blown up a TON of seaweed, so beach time was really not possible. If we were to make it back, I would look forward to more time in the sand. It’s a beautiful resort with tons of options for everyone.

EF Tours Summer 2017 Photo Link

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Dachau - May We Never Forget

WARNING: Photos may be inappropriate for young children. 

I've admittedly struggled to put this experience into words, so my blog entries have fallen behind. A long bus ride today means I finally have a moment to process the visit. 

At 22, I was hired as an 8th grade reading teacher. The position was newly created, and there really wasn't a set curriculum except that I was to focus on tolerance of other cultures. I had 120 students for 12 weeks in an elective rotation. (I had 360 students as a first year teacher!) One book, Until We Meet Again by Michael Korenblit and Kathleen Janger, was the only required text. Mike is the son of two Polish survivors, and he wrote the story of their experiences. Meyer and Manya Korenblit immigrated to the US and settled in Ponca City after the war. 

Since that first year of teaching now 16 years ago, I have changed grade levels and teaching assignments multiple times, but units about the Holocaust abound in middle school curriculum. In an age group that struggles with identity and acceptance among their peers, books about World War II, and the Holocaust in particular, have always resonated with them. They question how this happened, and why certain groups were persecuted just for being different. They worry that it could happen again. 

It was important for me to see this place I had taught about for so many years. But, it was hard. I knew it would be. When I visited Germany in 2011, we had the opportunity to visit the camp then, but it would have been our last day. We couldn't end our trip on that note. At least this visit was coming at the beginning of the trip. 

Dachau was the first camp opened by Heinrich Himmler in 1933. It was designated as a "work camp" on a former munitions site to house political prisoners. It was not classified as an "extermination camp". There was a gas chamber and two crematoria on site, however, so one must judge for his or herself about Nazi intent and whether or not the intent changed as the war raged on and numbers of prisoners increased. The official claim is that the gas chamber, added in 1942-43 was never used for mass killings because those living in the village of Dachau would have surely noticed. There were 32,000 documented deaths and likely thousands of undocumented deaths. Sickness was a major issue due to the overcrowded bunkers, with multiple prisoners sleeping in one bunk. When American forces liberated the camp on April 29, 1945, one-third of the prisoners were ill. 

Arbeit Macht Frei gets me every time. These people, upon arrival, had to pass through a gate that translates as "work sets you free." In no way was this true. Hard work killed these people, and those too old or too young or too feeble to work never had a chance. 

The original bunkers are gone, but two have been reconstructed to show what the interiors looked like. There would not have been any mattresses. 

There would have been several bunkers. Each empty foundation represents one bunker, and there is another row on the other side of a center aisle. 

Memorials for the Jewish, Catholic, and Protestant faiths have also been erected on site. 

This was a heavy afternoon. Students and adults on our trip were asked take a small white stone with them to the memorial site. We were asked to place the stones in a place that spoke to us during our visit, in memory of the atrocities that occurred on site. The bus ride back to Munich was quiet, and though Dachau was difficult to see, I am glad to have had the opportunity to remember the victims in person. 

Composed on my iPhone. Please excuse the inevitable spelling/typing errors. 

Munich City Tour

Day four began with a city tour with local guide Collette. We met up with Collette at BMW World, and our first stop was Nymphenburg Palace, the birthplace of Ludwig II. Since we saw Ludwig's Neuschwanstein the day before, this was fitting. Collette gave us more information about Ludwig II and the royal family, and she discussed that Nymphenburg was a summer palace modeled after Versailles in Paris (which we'll see later in the trip). We had a few moments to walk in the gardens, which are quite beautiful. 

From the palace, Collette drove us past many buildings of historical significance, mostly pertaining to Hitler and World War II. Hitler's former office, for example, is now a music school, and the art museum that used to feature classic art, Hitler's favorite, now is a modern art museum, which Hitler would despise. In one of the squares there is a monument to the victims of the Nazi party. The buildings surrounding this square used to occupy Nazi offices. We even saw Germans surfing in a river!  

After saying auf wiedersehen to Collette, we had some free time for lunch. We had sandwiches and dessert on Marienplatz just in time to watch the glockenspiel. After lunch we headed to Dachau Concentration Camp, which deserves its own post.