I'm in Anaheim for OOPSLA 2003. Forgive my pidgin Deutsch, but I've found myself thinking about the lingusitic hybrid that names my destination. It's a peculiar locution. The suffix "-heim" in German mean "home", and is usually, I think, associated with something bigger than a "-dorf" (village, I think), but smaller than a "-stadt". Then again, size is relative, I suppose. The Ana is the same Santa Ana (Saint Anne) that gave the winds that are whipping those incredible brush fires down there their names. The marriage of the German -suffix with the Mex-American saints seems oddly charming. Only in Die Vereinigen Staaten...
Some of the long-in-the-tooth hotels sport what was supposed to pass for a Bavarian theme three or four decades ago. Like the name itself, this motif contrasts a little uncomfortably with the omnipresent palm trees. And like all of the Post War construction in Southern California, much of it hasn't aged all that well...
Posted by foote at October 27, 2003 01:32 PM