Mille miglia race

SL-WEEK 42: Tzars

May 6, 2016gallery, photo challenge, showcased photo2 CV, Capalbio, Citroën, Ferrari, Fiat 500, Jaguar, Mille miglia race, Piombino, Piran, Porsche, Roma, SL-WEEK, Slovenia, TrastevereManja Maksimovič View all 14 comments

In Slovenian, the word car is pronounced “tzar” and this is also what it means. Let’s look at some tzars on Italian streets (and in Piran).

Let’s start with an alien starship. Don’t you agree? It’s too smooth to be of this earth.

Then there is the second most beautiful, spotted in Piombino with an Elba beach in the ad. Povero 2CV, looks a little far away from home. In Italy they can be harsh towards French cars.

But some Italians use Citroens to get married.

In Piran, Slovenia, they are useful for reflecting the sunset…

…and for modelling.

This photo is especially for Sylvain because here are two red cars, from 1000 miglia race last year.

Two cars from Christmas in Roma.

Taken in Trastevere.

And now two from Roma last week. This one is a bit lost.

He, however, looks right at home. (Or better, Italians say it’s a she!)

Time for a trio of Fiats 500. Still immensely popular. First two from Roma.

Door photos are so abundant that I can use them for other challenges, hihi.

Some cars have been taken over by cat population.

A happy trio of neighbours.

And a city one in Capalbio.

But I still prefer our car. It takes us to amazing places.

And gives good perspective.

Even though…

Photo: a © signature mmm production

For Sylvain Landry’s SL-WEEK 42: Car

SL-WEEK 24: Vintage mobile machines

December 16, 2015birthdays, family, gallery, photo challenge, showcased photoAlfa Romeo, BMW, Citroën, Fiat 500, Lotus, Mercedes, Mille miglia race, Porsche, San Quirico d'Orcia, SL-WEEKManja Maksimovič View all 23 comments

This year on my birthday in May my parents took me (or I took them?) to observe the Mille miglia vintage car race as it was passing Tuscany. I took a million photos and yet have not investigated online to see whom of several announced celebrities I might have captured. I was there for the cars. They tend to need a driver though, and here is a selection of machines and their owners. See if you can recognize any. And another thing: colours brought to you by the damned dusk/dawn setting. That will teach me.

First the collection of ruminating red oldies.

Some are deceptively calm.

Some are boisterously joyous.

Some have time to wave.

And one is in love with his blue magic woman.

And then there is the cool and collected Mercedes brigade.

In comparison Porsche peeps have lost their pop. Or have they?

A sinister-seeming Italian job and a French first art contribution.

And to finish it off, a favourite (because I seemed to have missed all the Peugeots). Have 500 baci.

Photo: MM / Mille miglia race, San Quirico d’Orcia, May 16 2015

For Sylvain Landry’s SL-WEEK 24: Machine

Bandiera rossa

September 20, 2015as it happens, showcased photo, slo+yu musicBandiera rossa, Ferrari, Mille miglia race, PankrtiManja Maksimovič One comment

Formula 1. The only thing he still likes to watch on TV.

Italian commentator mentions “bandiera rossa”.

I start to hum this traditional resistance tune, here in the rendition of Slovenian punk band with the name that translates as Bastards:

He says with a smirk:

“I don’t think this is the kind of banner they meant.”

Two images from this year’s Mille miglia race in Val d’Orcia. Proof that you can mess up with a point-and-shoot. I had the unfortunate dusk/dawn setting on throughout the bright day. Photo: MM

Happy seventyeen, dad!

July 3, 2015as it happens, Bestia, birthdays, family, gallery, memories, own words, showcased photo, worldly musicBagno Vignoni, Cat Stevens, Il giardino dei tarocchi, Maribor, Mille miglia race, Orbetello, Piran, Slovenia, Terme SaturniaManja Maksimovič View all 2 comments

Buon anno, e un buon compleanno! In Orbetello. Photo: MM

Today my father celebrates big. I will join the celebrations shortly but for now I’m sending greetings and warm wishes in the shape of selected images taken by you:

Blonde bundle of joy, and this is exactly how I still feel sometimes.

Possibly my favourite photo ever. With your father.

By Burano Lake

In Bagno Vignoni

Bežigrad Challenge

With my new branco in Terme Saturnia

Paparazzo, Mille miglia race

In Val d’Orcia

In Giardino dei tarocchi (featured photo above also from here)

Giardino dei tarocchi selfie

Photo: BM

Portrait of a young photographer

Young writer

Your Maribor. Photo: BM

Your city. It will be forever.

It used to be so far. Traffic jams, fog, snow, heat – things needed to be endured.

And then finally Maribor, and most often sunny. Main square. Those four floors – sometimes it seemed even higher, depending on form.

View of green Pohorje. The scent of the kitchen. Cheerful baca.

This is your courtyard. High school. Basketball court. Drava river. “Don’t let NATO see your bridges,” Balašević said during his concert on the raft.

Impressions from my last visit? Pretty, quiet, friendly. Romantic, yet rainy on this occasion. Just where there used to be the marketplace, little chicks can no longer be bought.

And then, in Piran, the exact same number of stairs?

In Piran. Photo: MM

You always love to surprise and please.

The age is right for me to like Shakin’ Stevens. He is a regular in Bravo. His posters look down from the wall.

When you go abroad once again, you return with cassettes. A bunch of them. I look at them in awe. Names I have never heard before. And then one that I know. Stevens! Shaky! But no. The name on the tape is Cat Stevens. Disappointment lasts several years until I realise that Cat is a hundred times better.

In the same bunch of tapes there is also one of Buddy Miles, Jimi Hendrix drummer.

Many years later I will be at his concert in Vienna. The name will ring a bell from somewhere.

Father, not really son, but the year is right (1970). Tanti auguri e grazie per tutto!

≈ Manja Maksimovič ≈

Edit: P.S.: By going away he means visit me in Tuscany.

Keeping the ROY G. BIV order (rainbow colours: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, violet) but why this would be easier to remember than BIG VORY, for example, is beyond me to be investigated. Thank you for teaching me something new.

This was Mille miglia race in Tuscany this year. See if you can spot a celebrity. Will have to make several more posts from this race when the subjects are “black” or “silver” or “white” or “shiny” or “cars”.

Photo: MM

: Mille miglia race in Tuscany

In response to The Daily Post’s weekly photo challenge: “ROY G. BIV.”

Maybe it will all be okay

June 10, 2015as it happens, Bestia, birthdays, family, gallery, own translation, showcased photo, worldly musicBagno Vignoni, Il giardino dei tarocchi, Lidija Dimkovska, Melanie, Meta Maksimovič, Mille miglia race, Mina Fina, Monticiano, Orbetello, Orvieto, Pienza, Poems for children, San Galgano Abbey, Slovenian poetryManja Maksimovič View all 19 comments

Today celebrates my mother. You really should get to know her.

People say that we grow to become our parents, boys grow into fathers, daughters grow into moms. Am I lucky in that regard! This is what awaits me:

In Orvieto

In Il giardino dei tarocchi

In Pienza

She loves bestia, to read and to make others happy (that car race must have been really the last thing she wished to see but it was my birthday).

In Orbetello

In Bagno Vignone

Mom reading Lidija Dimkovska

Mille miglia race

There is much more about her, though. Not only she must be the oldest Slovenian rapper (here in my old, “skater” shirt),

she also writes poems. Here is one from her first collection of poems for children, illustrated by Mina Fina and published in Slovenian:

Kaj delajo fantje v vrtcu
by Meta Maksimovič

Tine mi meče drobtine
iz bližine,
Vito me vleče za kito
kadar jem pito.
Zvone mi krade bonbone
in skriva balone.
Samo me suva v ramo,
ko se igramo,
Rok me spravi v jok
ko mi vzame sok.
Le Dado ima lepo navado,
da nosi mi čokolado.

Illustrated by: Mina Fina

I translated it into English because I would really like for the whole world to enjoy her poems (another one is here, soon the translations will make a book as well). Now it sounds like this:

What boys do in preschool
Translated by Manja Maksimovič

Fred, you throw pieces of bread
On top of my head
Nate, you’re pulling my braid
When the table is laid
Boon, you hide my cartoon
And blow my balloon
Zak, you push me in the back
When we play in the shack
Sly, you make me cry
When you steal my pie
Just Clyde is so very polite
He gives me chocolate, I bite.

And this is what I could add (hippies, like partisans, will NEVER die out, no matter how others count on old age to do them in):

Maybe it will all really be okay, mom. Imagine that! I’m happy that you like what I did to your poem. Wishing you a happy heart (and many more heart-shaped stones that you collect and can be seen on the top photo), a peaceful soul and calm sea. Happy birthday!