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the ghosts of New York past…

My recent trip to NYC was especially memorable as I spent time with three different friends, each one from a different decade of my life and each friendship established via totally different circumstances… but all of whom came together – without actually meeting! – back in 1996.

As I mentioned, in 1995 I decided to fly to NYC to meet up with my friend David who was working in Saudi Arabia at the time.  Only scientists knew how to use the internet back then (you actually needed to know things like DOS commands to use computers 🙂 so we arranged the trip via fax.

It was a roaring success so I went back the following year.  In July really cool people are in the Hamptons but I am never going to be cool so was happy just to be there in my cheap sweaty midtown hotel room.  My friend Sarah was working in DC at the time so came up for the weekend and we ran around in NYC imagining what it might be like to live there.

It was how I learned to love Negronis.  I figured it would be fun to play at being cool so I had read about a place called Pravda somewhere.  It was a bar in the emerging Nolita district of Manhattan too hip to actually have a sign so we had to wander around a bit and finally descend down a staircase and open a mysterious black door… but we found it.  And I suggested we order a Negroni since

bar ngorongoro crater lodge

bar ngorongoro crater lodge

said they were the hot drink of summer 1996.  Our cool factor may not have been really high but at least we were trying hard to not just be typical tourists…

And I really liked the Negroni!  In those days, I didn’t drink cocktails so was always stumped when there wasn’t a cocktail list.  So I started ordering a Negroni.  It took me years to remember what was in it.  It was purely accidental that I discovered it was one of those classic cocktails that gets you respect from the bartender.  Ordering a Negroni almost makes me seem cool 🙂

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negroni

There have been lots of memorable Negronis over the years but it will be hard to top the one I taught the bartender how to make at the Ngorongoro Crater Lodge in Tanzania.  The lodge is a bit much but it was my last night in Africa and it was so fancy I could dress up.  I had forgotten though that it would be pitch black when I left the main building to go back to my Versailles-like hut so I freaked out my Masai warrior escort gingerly picking my way along the path in heels.  But I told him I had the balance of an impala – and we made it there without him having to catch me in his arms.  The wood was warped so the door stuck.  His job was to make sure I got into my room so he had to open it – it took some effort!  It had all been a delightful way to end the night – and my Serengeti adventure – so I blew him a kiss.  He blew me one back.  It’s not every day you have a Masai warrior blowing you a kiss 😉

http://www.ngorongorocrater.com/

I haven’t met any Masai warriors in NYC but there has been some kissing there over the years…

Including that week back in 1996… Sarah went back to DC and I was supposed to spend the next Saturday doing a bar crawl on the Upper West Side with my friend Despina.  I had read about all these new bars on the upper West and I had been there before with friends so figured it was a safe neighborhood for us to wander in and maybe have a bit of adventure.  But she had a new job so had to work on Saturday night to meet her Monday deadline.

It was my last night in NYC and it seemed wrong to stay in my hotel room.  At that stage, I hadn’t done much wandering in NYC alone but the neighborhood seemed pretty easy and I figured I would just stay alert – and drink lots of cranberry juice in between cocktails.

It was how I discovered the pleasures of having dinner at the bar.  I bonded with each bartender so I knew they had my back if I needed it.  I chatted with random people who sat next to me.  I eavesdropped on conversations and got a much clearer sense for the culture of the place.  That was also how I met my Mr. Big 🙂

It was the last bar.  I was just having a final cocktail and thought I would likely head home before it got too late.  But a guy came in and sat next to me and we started talking.  He was a junior investment banker.  For the first few years, they work practically around the clock so he was finishing work and having a drink in a local bar before going home to bed.

What really bonded us was that he was Canadian.  It seemed like fate…  going on a random bar crawl alone on your last night in New York and then meeting a fellow Canadian on the Upper West Side far from other tourists just as you were both planning to go home… so we didn’t.  He wondered if I wanted to go to a club in SOHO.  That seemed much more fun than my hotel room and we would be in a taxi so I could just get out if I needed to…

In the end, my attempts at personal safety ended up being quite hilarious.  I thought I shouldn’t let him know where I lived since I didn’t know him very well so I got out of the taxi a couple of blocks before the hotel and walked by myself at 3am on the streets of New York.  At the time, I didn’t realize he had the taxi follow me to make sure I would get to my hotel safely.  And that’s how apparently flowers showed up at my hotel the next day – but I had already checked out.

And – despite evidence to the contrary – he didn’t think I was completely insane and a grand, bi-coastal romance blossomed.  I don’t date people unless I really like them so we have stayed friends and try to meet when I am in NYC to catch up on our lives.  It’s been really wonderful to watch him change over the years.  Even cocky junior investment bankers can mellow into caring dads 🙂  It’s a crazy business with a lot of questionable ethics but that chance night on the upper West has allowed me to see that not all investment bankers are evil 😉nyc 324

I have known Despina the longest.  Our friendship began as pen pals at age 15.  When I was a teenager, I felt closer to her than most of the people in my actual community.  We finally met in person in the early 90s.  She is an artist so our lives have run on very different paths but we both love food and art so we incorporate that into our joint adventures.

We likely know more about each other’s romantic adventures than anyone else in our lives as we have been talking about boys since the point at which we were lamenting no one would ever ask us out on a date 🙂  What has been most interesting is the strange parallels in our intercontinental criss-crossing.  We have both lived in Australia.  When she was living in Paris, I was in Germany so could hop on a train and come to visit.  Now she is back in New Jersey so getting together in person is easier but she is an incredible writer so we still have letters travelling back and forth – they are just electronic now.  I cherish them.  They are full of newsy detail and personal thoughts – far removed from a tweet – and my life is so much richer for it.

And Sarah now lives in NYC!  She has made good on our wild imaginings about what it might be like to live in NYC.  It’s not what we would have imagined back then.  She is married with children now – and the cool factor has migrated beyond Nolita to the Lower East Side.  She’s brilliant and insightful so it was fascinating to hear her initial impressions of life in one of the most famous cities on earth.

And it will make it easier to visit her!  As I’ve mentioned in previous posts, most of my friendships have an unusual genesis.  Sarah and I became friends because she was my roommate for 6 weeks in Calgary during the summer of 1983.  I was living in the University of Calgary student dorm so the facilities were pretty limited and her sister lived in town so I barely saw her but our few chats really intrigued me so I made sure we exchanged contact information.  Neither of us has ever had much free time and it’s a bit incredible our paper correspondence survived before the internet.  She is a scientist so she was my first email!  There have been many since.  And some live encounters to supplement the flow of bytes.

The message?  You never know what life has in store for you.  And how random people in your life might align and create new adventures.  If you meet someone you find interesting, be sure to get some contact info – and then just see what happens…  All three of them opened up my world and changed my life – for the better.

 

p.s. one final restaurant recommendation that didn’t fit into the stream of consciousness…  Nomad (from the brilliant guys at Eleven Madison Park)

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eating & drinking - well, life philosophy, travel stories

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Thanks, Mayor Bloomberg! :)

It certainly seems like Michael Bloomberg has done a lot of good things for New York City.  And the world at large.  But I also owe him personally since my friend Sarah’s Bloomberg connections got us free access to some wonderful art exhibitions on this trip.

I am a big fan – and small supporter – of the arts.  But Bloomberg sponsorship of the arts – and the vision of making the arts more accessible to a wider audience – is definitely something to celebrate.  You may not realize but your free audio guides at the Guggenheim are courtesy of his generosity.

You will likely have to pay for the shows but I do think they are worth the price of admission.  To make sure my visit involved more than shoe shopping and gluttony, Sarah and I went to a couple of current shows at some of the temples to art that are a large part of the New York experience.

chrysler building on a sunny day!

chrysler building on a sunny day!

I know I think I slagged Picasso a little bit in an earlier post.  And he apparently produced 50,000 art works.  He didn’t seem to be a particularly great guy to have a relationship with.  And I’m not quite sure he didn’t court fame a little more than a proper Englishman would consider dignified… but, hey, the dude was a great artist.

I’m not convinced everything Picasso signed his name to is a masterpiece but he certainly produced a lot of them.  And this show was fascinating as it is only works in black and white.  Apparently Picasso did not believe colour was fundamental to the art.

My friend Sarah said I had to see it as lots of these works are privately held and this was a once in a lifetime chance to see them.  As a huge fan of Kandinsky – who thought colour evokes moods and used it as symbolism – I wasn’t quite sure what I was going to think about black and white…

But it likely won me over as a much greater fan of Picasso.  Not all the works really “spoke” to me but many did.  And it was incredible to see what he could do with such a limited palette.  It was also interesting to see how he used that limited palette to create many different types of work as he was influenced by the world events of which he was part and the women he decided to sleep with…

If you can, definitely go and check it out.

http://www.guggenheim.org/new-york/exhibitions/on-view/picasso-black-and-white

mom at the guggenheim

mom at the guggenheim

We also went to the Met to see the current Matisse exhibit.  Sarah is a big fan of Matisse.  I wasn’t so sure.  I think I saw too many Matisse posters in dorm rooms in my youth.  But he is an important artist.  And I love art.  And am always open minded 🙂

And it was a great exhibit, even if you aren’t a huge fan.  It is focused on Matisse’s love of drawing – and his penchant for reworking the same motif in different ways.  They have gathered multiple works of art for many of the famous pieces you might have seen in a major gallery somewhere in the world.

What engages you is that you see the same painting essentially from multiple points of view and it helps the non-artist to better understand the choices that the artist makes in composing the final product.

http://www.metmuseum.org/exhibitions/listings/2012/Matisse

It also helps to see the process of modern abstract art, where the artist might start with a composition that is quite realistic and almost photographic.  But then they will distort details – or apply unnatural colours – or just simplify lines to create an essence of the subject matter rather than a true representation.  We weren’t always sure we would have chosen the final product based on the options, which made us wonder what the artist was thinking and how his process worked.

Art is meant to provoke us.  To make us question things.  To make us see the world in a new way.  To make us question ourselves and maybe evolve in new ways.  As a very analytical person, I am attracted to art for its fluid and non-linear qualities.

Humans seem to need to make art.  It happens in the poorest and most primitive societies.  I am a big advocate of science and the scientific method.  But I think really great societies engage their citizens in all ways and encourage them to work both sides of their brain.

Art has always offered me an emotional connection even my super analytical brain could not properly explain.  Art has provoked me and expanded my questioning and understanding of the society in which I live.  Art has disturbed me.  Art has made me smile.

It’s important.  It is one of the elements that create a civilization – and civil citizens.  So I salute Mayor Bloomberg and the efforts he has made to make art available to all.

I also have to thank him for the wonderful profile I saw on Bloomberg TV while I was in New York.  I am watching The Daily Show as I type this – and it is reminding me of the segment they did on Jon Stewart.  Given my mega-crush, it was fascinating to have more information on his early career and the genesis of The Daily Show.  They just talked to the cast of The Newsroom in their sketch, questioning whether the only investigative journalism on the air anymore is fictional…  It’s like Stephen Colbert singing with Harry Belafonte.  Some moments in life are just pure gold 😉

http://www.thedailyshow.com/full-episodes/mon-january-14-2013-roger-waters

http://www.thecomedynetwork.ca/Shows/TheDailyShow?videoPackage=129456 (for Canadians – Jan 14, 2013 episode)

http://www.hbo.com/the-newsroom/index.html

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artsy stuff, shining examples, social commentary, travel stories

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how the alphabet has changed!

Technically I am home now but I have a series of posts that developed in my head while I was in New York City so we will continue the travelogue for the next few posts…

Almost twenty years ago I made my first visit to Alphabet City.  Alphabet City refers to the avenues in the Lower East Side named by alphabet (i.e. Avenue A, B, C…).  Not that many years before I had seen a movie (Mixed Blood) about the rampant drug dealing in Alphabet City and how they used underage kids because they couldn’t be prosecuted.  But, by the mid 90s, Alphabet City was being gentrified and it was the latest cool place to hang out.

I wouldn’t have been brave enough to venture down there on my own with the images in my head of packages of drugs being lowered on ropes out of tenement windows but I was hanging out with my friend David from Australia who was fearless.  We connected with my friend Despina and then met up with her sister on Avenue B.  Her sister lived in the neighbourhood so knew what was OK for tourists.

It was still pretty edgy at that time, though, and gave me a little bit of street cred.  Or so I thought, possibly delusionally 🙂   It definitely inspired me to continue further exploration in that part of the city.

nyc 192Each time I come to New York I try to stay somewhere different.  I started doing this years ago because it just seemed the right approach to the city.  I go to Paris to escape into the past and explore history.  I go to New York to see what all the rest of us will be doing next 😉

A couple of visits ago I decided to up the ante a little and not just stay in a new hotel but also start staying in new neighbourhoods so that I could expand my knowledge and experience of the city.  My friend Sarah has recently moved to New York and is living in the Lower East Side. I had already thought I would likely stay there on my next visit so that sealed the deal.

I stayed at the Thompson LES and would definitely give it a thumbs up.  The price was really reasonable for New York, I wasn’t looking into a wall, a parking lot or someone else’s room, and there were some great amenities inside and right outside the hotel.

http://www.thompsonhotels.com/hotels/nyc/thompson-les

The trip started off on a great note.  I got some sage advice from Daniel and got a drink and some excellent food at the Stanton Social Club.  My server was wonderful – and remembered me when I took Sarah back there the next night.

http://thestantonsocial.com/

I was planning to just go back to the hotel and get some sleep after that but I was intrigued by a venue right next to the hotel where a live band was playing to an enthusiastic crowd.  The bouncer seemed not so enthusiastic but consented to let me in.  The band on stage was really good and I was disappointed to learn that they had almost finished their set.

Because I had only caught a couple of songs, I went up to the lead singer and asked if I could buy a CD.  I figured I could at least listen to their music even if it wasn’t the same as a live show.  He didn’t have any change so I got 2 CDs – and an invitation to join them for a drink in the backstage lounge.

He had a whole entourage so I wasn’t expecting him to remember me but I know it’s always fun to have a little adventure when one travels… He was a really gracious guy so I met some members of the band, some of his friends, his girlfriend… and the chance to say I hung out with the band after the show 🙂

Just in case anyone is coming to New York, the venue is called the Rockwood Music Hall.  I ended up there every night for a short while after my friends had gone home.  There was an eclectic line up of musical talent but universally talented musicians.  And I didn’t even need to take a coat with me!

http://www.rockwoodmusichall.com/

You might also want to check out the Jamie McLean Band.  He is apparently from Connecticut but spent lots of time in New Orleans so his accent and his music have a definite southern flair.  And we agreed – as a musician, it just sounds better if you come from New Orleans…

http://jamiemcleanband.com/

The neighbourhood offered lots of opportunities for distraction 🙂   Saturday night I also hit the nightclub on the 7th floor of the hotel and proved I could actually dance in my new 5 inch heels!  You definitely want to stay pretty sober though when you are walking in shoes like that.  But 60% off at the temple to shoes that is the Saks Fifth Avenue shoe department is pretty hard to resist… it is so large it has its own zipcode!  And the shoes are Nicolas Kirkwood red sequined platform heels so I am sure I will get lots of Wizard of Oz references from strangers…

http://www.saksfifthavenue.com

http://www.nicholaskirkwood.com/

The coolest part of buying the shoes was the chat Sarah and I had with the shoe salesman.  I am of course a little shoe obsessed so chatting with shoes salesmen about how Nicolas Kirkwood shoes are better designed than Jimmy Choos… and how Christain Louboutins used to better… and my addiction to Rodolphe Menudier…  it’s just natural but it started a lovely conversation about the effects of Hurricane Sandy, some restaurant recommendations for my friend Sarah… He said we’d made his day.  He certainly made ours.  I am always energized by random conversations with strangers in this impersonal, wireless world of ours.

Another note-worthy adventure – which also involved talking to a lot of random strangers – was our dinner at WD-50.  I told Sarah I wanted to take her out for a special dinner and she wanted to support the neighbourhood, which had been through a lot of rough days thanks to Sandy.  I had always wanted to go to WD-50 so it wasn’t hard to convince me 🙂

http://wd-50.com/

We drank a bottle of fabulous champagne and worked our way through the giant tasting menu.  As part of their tenth’s anniversary, the chef changed the menu and it is now two tasting menus – a giant one full of mad scientist culinary creations dreamed up by Wylie or a smaller one that is comprised of some of the greatest hits from the restaurant’s last ten years.

This isn’t really an official foodie blog and I wasn’t taking notes while we dined because I wanted to catch up with Sarah so I would recommend you go yourself to really understand the experience.  But how can you not love a meal that involves three desserts? 🙂  And includes pine needles that they made in the kitchen.  Like the potato that looks like bone marrow.  I didn’t hear the description properly so left it on my plate as I don’t typically chew on bones… but the servers are as fantastic as the food so he wondered why I wasn’t eating my potato… which looked exactly like the bone in bone marrow…

Those of you who know me are familiar with my issues with funghi.  So you will understand how wowed I was that they didn’t just leave the mushrooms off my steak; they made me an entirely different – funghi free – dish!  As you can tell, I am saying that you should definitely check it out on your next trip to NYC 🙂

Another place to check out is Torrisi Italian Specialities.  No molecular gastronomy but the kind of vibe that I think WD-50 had when it first opened.  If I have the story straight, it started more as a deli-great-sandwich kind of place (called Parm and now next door) but it was so popular they now have a teeny tiny wonderfully unique experience restaurant.

http://www.torrisinyc.com/

If you book on-line and have a party under 4, they say they may seat you at the counter.  But, since I was booking long distance, I figured I would take the chance.  And, having done it, Despina and I would say you might want to sit at the counter!  We got to watch the chef and entourage working the magic.

Like WD-50, it’s a very limited menu.  It’s written on a chalkboard so I think it changes every day with the whims of the chef and the fresh produce available.  You get four compulsory appetizers.  Then you get to choose from two pastas and two mains.  Since nothing involved mushrooms, we decided to do everything on the menu and divide the two choices down the middle.

It was a fantastic meal!  Everything was fresh and wonderfully prepared.  The mad scientist element was quite subdued but it was inventive Italian cuisine… not your grandmother’s spaghetti 🙂   And at the end they gave us a box of treats to take home!  All wildly delicious.  I was really impressed because they actually gave us a second box since we were going to different homes in different countries.  The most exotic was a rainbow cake.  I’m not even sure how they got all the colours but I am sure no toxic red dye was involved.

I also spent a small amount of time wandering the streets near the hotel and popping into a few shops.  They have a Maje and Sandro, faves from Europe.  And Sigerson Morrison is still alive and kicking, in a slightly different location.  The aesthetic looks the same though and the shoes look like they would be comfortable (I had already bought too many at Saks).  When Sigerson Morrison was brand new, I actually got photographed as part of a journalist report on the new brand so have been following them since the beginning…

While the Lower East Side is likely not as squeaky Disney clean as the cleaned up Times Square, I had no problems and saw no heroin being lowered in a basket from a window.  It feels fresh and exciting and I would encourage everyone to check it out.  I know I will be back for further exploration…

I read on the plane that there is a Standard Hotel Lower East Side in the works… on the site of the old CBGB.  As one of the disciples of David Byrne and the Talking Heads, when my friend David excitedly told me his favourite band from Sydney was playing at our first night in New York, there was no question that we would go!  And they were awesome.  I bought the CD and promoted The Cruel Sea in Canada.  One of the tracks even made it onto my iconic 50th birthday soundtrack…

And I had a lot of adventures when I stayed at the Standard in the Meatpacking District.  You may well hear about them at some point… but right now we are trying to get you to check out the Lower East Side – and witness the transformation of New York City for yourself…

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artsy stuff, eating & drinking - well, travel stories

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soaring like an eagle :)

The flight to Chicago had a lot of turbulence so when we landed safely on the ground it felt like more of an accomplishment.  It got me thinking about other flights.

I’ve been to over 50 countries so I have no idea how many flights I’ve taken.  I’ve definitely been in some interesting airports – from rustic and remote to high tech and glamorous.

I am definitely at the point where getting on a plane is no big deal but I always try not to take it for granted.  When I was in London in September I went to the Science Museum for possibly the first time.  It was a rushed visit and I will definitely be back.  But one of the fascinating exhibits was a history of air travel, complete with some actual aircraft parts.

It helped me to remember what an extraordinary feat, showcasing the ingenuity of mankind, every single flight really is.  I don’t remember all the history but, not only was the science of air travel impressive, so were the crazy guys who made it all possible, the intercontinental rivalry and the role of the military to do good (they invented the internet too!  Without them, google would not have become a verb).

My grandfather was one of the early crazy guys.  We know so little about him but some things seem clear – he was handsome, charismatic and prone to thrive on risk.  Supposedly, one of his “careers” was to have people pay him to ride in an air balloon while they watched.  I smiled in London when I saw the photos of the crazy dudes willing to go up into the sky in a potentially combustible air balloon to prove men could fly like birds.

This airbus 320 is a long way from an air balloon and feels a bit like sitting in a cramped living room in the sky.  Not too thrilling.  The bumpy flight reminded me of how much I enjoy actually feeling the flight.

That is best done via helicopter.  I’ve only been in one – and it was now over 30 years ago – but I can still remember almost every detail.

It was my first job, waitressing the summer before university in the only nice hotel in town in a remote community on the Canadian prairie.

That summer there were lots of forest fires so there was a steady stream of strangers in town staying at the hotel as part of the forest fighting team.

Two members of the various crews were young helicopter pilots.  Needless to say, they were very popular among the young servers.  I heard they were sometimes taking girls on a short trip to refuel the helicopter if the timing coincided with them coming off shift.  So I made sure they knew I was interested 🙂

I had developed a good rapport with – and a bit of a crush on – one of the pilots.  He would come down for coffee when the dinner shift was over and it was quiet so we would chat.  I can’t remember his real first name.  His given name didn’t matter as he was by then firmly established to the world as Bud Cave.  A very cinematic name for a pilot 😉

One day when I had just left the restaurant I got a call from Bud.  If I could get back there in 20 minutes he would take me up in the helicopter.  I didn’t have a car so pedalled furiously on my bike, arriving a little breathless.  But it was totally worth the effort!

All the other girls had gotten maybe a fifteen minute round trip.  Today Bud was going to pick up some guys in the bush – an hour each direction!

And, because I was the only girl in the helicopter, I got to sit in the front in the co-pilot seat and wear the headphones so I could communicate with the pilot.  So I had the bird’s eye view of the prairie and the forest as we flew over…. And got to experience the rush of landing a helicopter in the middle of the bush.

I had not appreciated the air velocity of a helicopter descending straight into the middle of the forest.  Things fly everywhere.  There is no landing strip and graduated descent to the ground.  It’s pure drama.  And, because I was a young girl, supposedly fearless, the pilot did some tricks for me as well.  It seemed like we were flipping upside down but I am not sure it’s even scientifically possible – but when there is an open door beside you and a glass bubble surrounding you, it’s pretty easy to feel like you are already on a roller coaster without the pilot doing tricks 🙂the view from the plane :)

A couple of years on, I became friends with a guy named Paul who was getting his pilot’s license.  We were both poor students so I had to pitch in for our time in the air but he took me up a couple of times in a small plane.  Some of the best money I ever spent in my early twenties 🙂

landing in the serengetiI’ve been in a few small planes since.  And have never lost the joy of seeing the world from only a few thousand feet.  Landing in the middle of the migration and trying not to descend directly onto a wildebeest lurking on the runway in the Serengeti has to be the most spectacular but a trip in a small plane trumps an Airbus any day.

I was just reading about some entrepreneur in Ecuador trying to develop a bicycle that would allow one to pedal like ET and fly like a toucan to check out the rainforest.  Maybe even cooler than a helicopter or a small plane?  But a prototype at this stage…  so, for now, I suggest you try the helicopter or the small plane.  I haven’t been up in a hot air balloon yet.  But it must be done.  And I will drink a toast to my mysterious grandfather as part of the experience…

p.s.  I am typing this in the mighty land of the eagle… the New York stories to come…

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life philosophy, travel stories

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beware of Japanese girls armed with credit cards!

I am still alive!  And hoping to add some new thoughts over the next week and in the year ahead.  I thought 2012 might be a little easier… but apparently not 🙂  And November through February always the scary part of my work year where extracurricular fun like writing gets punted in favour of client needs.

But it’s Christmas Eve so I get a couple of days off.  First, we will journey back to Paris as the tale was never completed.  The great thing with Paris is that everything is a bit larger than life so the memories stay in one’s imagination.

Where Paris really excels is in all matters related to art – that word applied in a very broad way.  And, in Paris, food is art.  I caught the end of some BBC or CNN program while I was in Germany and learned that apparently cheesecake is all the rage in Paris.  Unfortunately details were sketchy because the program was essentially over – but I was intrigued by the shop in the television images…

So did quite a bit of googling to see if I could figure out where I was supposed to go once I got to Paris… I wasn’t sure if I had it right but once I arrived I knew I had hit pay dirt.  And it was well worth the effort.  The bakery is called She’s Cake and is run by a charming woman named Sephora.  I had the fleur d’oranger – amande.  It was delicious and it felt like you had stumbled upon a special neighbourhood secret.

http://www.shescake.fr/

I also discovered I had come during the annual Paris Photo exhibition (mid November).  It required some waiting in line in the cold – but was worth the wait.  It is a show for galleries and collectors that is also open to the public so it is a little overwhelming but a great way to get an overview of world photography in a couple of hours and discover some new talent and be inspired.

Next door there was a fascinating exhibit called Bohemes at the Grand Palais.  The concept of Bohemia, gypsies and their role in art and European history.  Romantic, tragic, dramatic…

Normally the airport is not part of the story.  But the French have a flair for the dramatic… and a crazy love for bureaucracy.  And my Scottish genes make me cheap…

There is a wonderful VAT (value added tax) recovery scheme all over Europe called “tax-free”.  It’s not really true but you do get a decent amount of tax back so it’s hard to pass up.  When I got to Charles de Gaulle, I thought I was really clever popping into the first VAT-recovery station I found with my stack of forms, all completed and signed, my passport ready for a quick stamping procedure and on to my gate.

But NO…  every gate has its own VAT-recovery station apparently.  Seriously, France, do you think this might be why your economy is in the toilet?

At that moment I didn’t realize I had been condemned to hell by some random French customs officials.  I found the station that matched to my gate… but I also found a gigantic snaking line of beautiful young Asian girls clutching tax-free forms and giggling.  There was no choice but to succumb.

I was in line for a long time so was determined to figure out what the hell was going down.  I have never been in such a ridiculous line so my curiosity was peaked.  With enough time and careful peeking at passports, I discovered they were Japanese.  Apparently the Japanese still travel in packs.  I don’t know the connection between all the girls – other than a devotion to expensive shopping 🙂 – but they obviously had a handler and were all going through customs as the equivalent of a gigantic tax-free-form-stamping boa constrictor… better to stay on the sidelines than get eaten by it 🙂

And there was a small reward… when I finally got to the end of the line the customs officials were very happy to see me – mostly because I represented the end of the line – so they just grinned and stamped all my forms as quickly as they could 🙂

Travel is always full of new experiences and adventures.  An open mind, a sense of curiosity – and lots of patience – will make any travel experience an entertaining memory 🙂

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eating & drinking - well, travel stories

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who is “that girl?” ;)

I am really dating myself with this reference but since I have put my age into the public record, no secrets will be revealed 🙂  A few weeks ago I stumbled by accident on TV reruns of “That Girl”.  It had a fairly short run – but obviously long enough to be in syndication 🙂

http://www.tv.com/shows/that-girl-1966/

“That Girl” never had the power or cultural prominence of “Mary Tyler Moore” but they both informed my childhood view of women – and reinforced the idea that women could be strong and independent that I was so lucky to have as my childhood motif courtesy of my crazy, think-outside-the box family 🙂

“That Girl” was a little extra special for me because the actress featured was named “Marlo”.  Obviously my great uncle Elmo must have been a secret fan of the show because he never got that my name ended in an “a”, not an “o”.  But “Marla” was a strange Martian name in the small towns of my childhood and “Marlo” was so much closer than all the other “M” names I got called because I was shy and soft spoken so I was grateful 🙂

No doubt Zooey Deschanel is referencing “That Girl” in “The New Girl”.  Almost nothing in the 21st century is as “new” as advertised – it’s most often just an update.

Shockingly to me, this is my 100th post!  So I thought it should be personal and introspective.  I am not Marlo – or Zooey – but I like to think I have updated my own version of “That Girl.”

The show was a cheesy trifle so I suspect my version of “That Girl” is a little deeper than the producers of the 60s would have been envisioning…

I think I am better at the “that” part than the “girl” part.  In my family, there were only two offspring.  Whether nature, nurture or divine intervention, I was happy to be the substitute son while my sister revelled in everything girlie.

paris early days

She embraced pink, skirts, jewelry… I refused to wear pink on principle.  I drove my mother to the edge of madness by wearing the same pair of brown sweatpants during high school so many times they started to disintegrate.  Finally, at age 31, when the man I wanted to be perfect enough to marry proved to be a bit more challenging, I finally succumbed to my mother’s pressure to pierce my ears…  I think it was my first girlie moment – changing my appearance to mark frustration with a relationship milestone…

The years go by… and all of us grow up… even if it takes a while… so I am scribbling this wearing a skirt, fuschia tights and special edition 007 Swarovski earrings cool enough to get a thumbs up from the gorgeous Parisian hostess at the restaurant.

It took over three decades but I eventually figured the “that” part of “that girl” was the most interesting part.  A four-letter word with all kinds of meaning attached.

I only saw one re-run but I think the concept is “That Girl” is memorable.  She is not lost in the crowd.  So, if you aspire to be “That Girl” you are going to have to be interesting…

I’m not sure I have totally achieved that goal yet.  But I am making progress!

As part of my spectacular 50th year (only a few months left), I relived my Hermes experience.  In the strange loop that is my life, my first Hermes visit happened when I ran off to Paris for the first time on my own just as I about to embark on a surreal love affair that would result in my European marriage.

In those days I had a regular job – or the kind of irregular permanent job that meant I worked at least 60 hours a week every week so taking vacation time was practically impossible and my best hope was over the Christmas holidays.  I had just met the German guy and we were trading emails… back in the old days when we had to write them at work on our lunch break… but it made the communication more exciting.  He had just bought an apartment and, being a practical German engineer, wasn’t ready for me to descend on the exact dates I could convince my boss to sign off on.  So I went to Paris first.

Paris in January with a strong umbrella and a good sense of humour when the umbrella just ended up in knots in the wind.  Don’t go to Paris in January!  But it was the only chance I had.  And the Australian had made me take the metro all the time while we sat underground and he dissed Paris the entire time so I knew I had to take the city back on my own terms…

I live in a city where it is famous for rain so I will always have fond memories of walking the streets of Paris in the rain with my broken umbrella…   No Aussie jackass to spoil my love of the city of light and a budding romance a few days away in Deutschland.  It could have been a film 😉

And in the photo montage, no doubt I would have been buying my first Hermes scarf.  When I was traveling with the Aussie dude on my very first trip to Paris, I was traveling on $50 a day and there wasn’t really money for postcards…  so it was a promise to myself… someday… I would return to Paris and buy a real Hermes scarf… at the shop on Faubourg St Honore.

The first experience was just OK.  I was easily intimidated by the sales associate and walked away with something… but the true satisfaction  that should have come from such an expensive purchase had always eluded me… so, in the end, my second Hermes scarf not only marked my 50th year but also bookended my European marriage – and highlighted how far I had come in the past 15 years.

This time I was confident and in charge of the sales associate, rather than vice versa, and walked away with a gorgeous scarf that should end up bequeathed in my will.

I’m not sure if I am “that girl”, “the new girl” or simply “this girl”.  But, what is clear to me is the journey I have already undertaken and the confidence the “current girl” has.

It is the confidence of age and experience, worn lightly, making an Hermes scarf seem heavy by comparison.

This trip was practical.  I wasn’t a tourist.  There was no requirement for stories or adventures.  And – compared to most of my travels – it was pretty low-key.  But, in an effort to stay awake and combat jet lag on Friday night, I wandered into one of those bar-lounge-bistro-etc type places that only exist in France and was rewarded with more than just a 3 euro glass of great Cote du Rhone.

They had seemed determined I should sit… so ended up at a table almost in the lap of the guy strumming guitar and singing the kind of French chansons you would normally hear on the soundtrack of a film festival selection at Cannes.

I was happy to just listen but he kept smiling at me… in that come hither way that Latin guys have that is deadly… and he was a shaggy haired piece of French manhood with a great voice and a seductive delivery…

I gathered the table next to me was composed of his close friends, who spoke almost no English.  I really need to work on my language skills!   It was all not very clear… but it seemed I might be being set up with one of their friends who spoke English… Chanteur guy seemed sad I was leaving… and there may have been an interesting story there if I had stayed but sometimes you have to be the girl who knows what she really needs is some sleep!

Don’t worry… it doesn’t happen very often 🙂  My goal is to make my real life surpass all the treacly TV episodes and prove that real people are cooler than anyone on TV – fiction or reality TV fact…

Stay tuned! 😉

 

 

 

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artsy stuff, life philosophy, travel stories

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let them eat cake! :)

I am typing this from the land of Marie Antoinette!  Sometimes one’s life really exceeds one’s expectations.  I am back in Paris – for the SECOND time in a single year.  The stuff of dreams in my childhood.

Back when I was climbing trees and hiding in wheat fields I ferociously hoped my adult life would be more dramatic and interesting.  But none of those prairie girl dreams could have ever prepared me for the astonishing reality it would become.

I will have to finish this after my late night Thursday shopping romp at Galeries Lafayette… but I am drinking free champagne as I type… apparently joining I Prefer is a great idea.  I highly recommend it!  And thus far, the Hotel Original Paris has exceeded my expectations.  I definitely recommend it.  Especially if you are traveling by train, as I was.  A few steps from the métro at Bastille.  From Gare L’Est or Gare du Nord, a piece of cake 🙂

http://www.hoteloriginalparis.com/

And, since we did reference cake, I guess I should provide the explanation…

It is one of those stories that did not have the happy ending I anticipated… but, maybe more importantly, really taught me about the complexities of life and how to embrace it and enjoy it.  As I think Joni Mitchell said, very poignantly, I’ve looked at love from both sides now.”

I think she said “life” but this story is about “love”… in all its complexity and messiness…

How we all take our weaknesses – and our strengths – and combine them with others into a mischung that is at all junctures part success and part failure but always human and engaging.

Yes, a bit philosophical… blame the free champagne the hotel supplied.  You gotta love it when someone knocks after check-in and you hesitantly open the door and he has an ice bucket and a small bottle of Lanson Rosé.  This is serious champagne!  Absolutely delicious 🙂

But the champagne is only a small part of the equation.  It is mostly fueled

my days in Deutschland

by the days I recently spent in Stuttgart.

Unless you are into Mercedes or Porsche, Stuttgart is likely not at the top of your list for a tourist destination.  But it is an industrial metropolis and part of the great Deutsch economic machinery.  Most people come to Stuttgart for work… but I was there for something more complicated.

The entire story is a bit too long and complicated for a blog post so we will cut to the chase and just say that the Germans are wonderfully hospitable and some German guy named Wolfgang wanted to repay my hospitality in Vancouver so I ended up on the Ammersee in Bavaria where I was reacquainted with the cute guy I had admired from afar at a company event earlier in the week… and – unlike normal people – I ended up marrying him and moving to Germany.

It’s a long and complicated story that may find its way into the blog at a later date.  But the purpose of my recent trip to Germany was to finalize our divorce.

There are not a lot of great divorce stories out there.  But not that many

it all started on a beach in Antigua…

people marry German engineers 😉

So very few people are trying to follow a conversation in a foreign language while joking with the lawyer just prior to going into a court room to get divorced.  It was ridiculously bureaucratic and very German.  Some lady named Doris is going to officially receive my divorce decree so it can be mailed to Canada without going through some complicated, expensive process.  The system isn’t designed for you to have it sent to your ex so he can pass it on to you…

The lawyer was highly entertaining.  Once we had finished in the court, he shook each of our hands and said, “you are free!”  And then we had to decide what to do.  We had already wandered the streets as I took photos of some of the cute German buildings before our court hearing.  So we had our plan set.

We went for cake!  If you have never been to Germany (or Austria) for cake, you should really put it on your bucket list.  It was one of my favourite parts of living in Germany.  Hot chocolate (a wonderful bitter version completely different to its North American cousin) and Eierlikor cream cake.  Like egg nog in a solid form.  Delicious.

It wasn’t really a celebration.  Just us hanging out and doing things that we knew worked.  Later that evening I took him for dinner at Olivo.  I am pretty sure the chef has at least one Michelin star.  It was one of those meals that will definitely make my top ten list.  Technically six courses… but with two pre-courses (the first with six separate little bites) and then a petit four course AND a truffle course.  We emerged feeling like the foie gras duck that had been part of our meal.

http://www.steigenberger.com/Stuttgart/restaurants/

And now I am in Paris.  With no regrets.  We both agreed a few months ago as we were working through the details that we would both do it all again – even knowing how it would turn out.

I’m not sure I’m made for marriage.  But getting married – and moving to a foreign country where I spoke possibly five words of the local language – added many wonderful dimensions to my life.  And completely changed its direction in countless ways.

It is impossible to know what would have happened had I not said “yes.”  But I know my life would have been a lot less inspired… and I would not have learned about kaffee und kuchen.  I didn’t get married for the cake… but there was a lot of sugar and cream in the whole adventure… literal and figurative…

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life philosophy, travel stories

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