a unique perspective on this crazy world

our girl in havana ;)

May 14, 2016
just step out of the hotel

just step out of the hotel

I am going to try and stay home for more than a couple of weeks and see if I can’t catch up on all my travels… so we will likely be bouncing around the globe as I try to tempt you to explore the world…

Thanks to the internet, globalization and the Americans’ incredible moxie at selling a glamourized version of the American lifestyle to the rest of the world, it’s tough to find places that feel truly unique, let alone part of an entirely different era.  Cuba is one of those incredibly rare and special places.

Contrary to what a lot of people think, there is a little internet in Cuba and you will see smart phones and computers but you will also see chalkboards and people lounging on the sidewalk outside fancy hotels (was guessing they might be using the hotel wi-fi).

If you don’t want to leave your overly engaged modern lifestyle at home, you can stay at the Hotel Parque Central.  Apparently it has the best internet in Cuba and the lobby was constantly full of people on smartphones, tablets and computers and it looked very 2016 despite the colonial architecture.  It’s a great hotel in an excellent setting for being a tourist in Havana and I would highly recommend it.

http://www.hotelparquecentral-cuba.com/

I would also recommend leaving your electronic devices at the hotel, making sure your shoes are comfortable and embracing the past.  It’s not every day you get to go back to 1960 without a time machine.

I tried to explain “trending” to some young guys that I met at my favourite restaurant in Havana.  There is no question Cuba is the hottest travel ticket right now and that’s how it got bumped up the list to 2016.  You don’t need to panic quite yet though.  It will not turn into Las Vegas 2.0 by next year.

There is no question change is underfoot and that something has to give.  What will be interesting is how it all unfolds.  I knew a little about Cuban history before I arrived but learned a lot more during my week in Havana.  It is a fascinating place.  I hadn’t appreciated before I arrived how old Havana was and that it was a strategically important and impressive city during colonial times.  It’s certainly a place deeply scarred by the evils of imperialism.  It’s also marked by the promise of an incredible revolution.

What they have built in Cuba is totally unique.  Not everything works and it’s not an ideal system but there is definitely merit to some of the choices they have made, which is why change will come but I hope it will come with a Cuban flavour.

I did a lot during my six days in Havana so there is much more to tell.  The one thing I wished I had done differently was research!  There are entrepreneurial green shoots in Havana but capitalism is very much in its infancy.  It’s fascinating.  There is very little advertising or marketing.  It’s hard to tell who is running an establishment and almost all the independent restaurants are on an upper level and not very obvious to the uninitiated.

I did buy a Moon guide by Christopher P. Baker, which was very helpful.  I wish I had done more advance planning.  I was a little too arrogant.  I have travelled so much and always seem to find cool stuff to do on the fly that I have stopped being well prepared for arrival.

http://moon.com/books/moon-havana/

Certainly, it’s good to be ready to be spontaneous.  Some of the best moments in Havana happened that way.  But I found the restaurant because Christopher recommended it.

I’ve read a lot of Graham Greene so I am sure I read Our Man in Havana at some point in my youth but I am going to read it again now that I have

a literary setting

a literary setting

experienced the city.  Whether you are a literary fan or not, the Hotel Sevilla is worth a visit.  It was built in 1908 and based on the Alhambra in Spain.  It was the first luxury hotel in Havana.  What makes it unique is the Moorish architecture.  There is a band playing in the lobby bar most of the time so sip a Mojito and soak in the atmosphere.

http://www.hotelsevillacuba.com/the-hotel-history

patio hotel inglaterra

patio hotel inglaterra

Another worthwhile history lesson is the Hotel Inglaterra.  It is the oldest hotel in Havana.  I tried both dinner and a drink on the outdoor patio.  I would recommend having dinner in a Paladare but drinks are cheap ($3 USD for a mojito) and the band was excellent.

http://www.hotelinglaterra-cuba.com/

Cuba isn’t going to change overnight… but it IS going to change.  The climate is great.  The people are warm and friendly.  The country is full of incredible history and architecture.  And there are gorgeous beaches if the rest is of no interest.  You don’t need to book your ticket tomorrow.  But you SHOULD go.  Don’t wait too long.  A place without a McDonalds or a Starbucks?  That is something worth seeing 😉

 

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super mario :)

April 16, 2016

As already alluded to, I had organized a private day tour with Mario for my first Saturday in Santiago.  It ended up being a lot more eventful than planned and I learned another travel lesson…

Don’t panic or make decisions when you are barely awake…  I had been working every day since I had been in Santiago and it was finally Friday night so, instead of being responsible like I should have been, I kept changing venues and got home at some wee hour of Saturday morning.  I had obviously forgotten to set an alarm or ask for a wake-up call I realized when the phone rang and I scrambled for it, telling the person on the front desk that I would be down as soon as possible.

I am very polite so was going as fast as possible so Mario wouldn’t be stuck in the lobby waiting for me for long.  It’s good to be polite but I definitely learned it’s also good to not rush and really think before making a rash decision.  I looked in my evening purse and couldn’t find my passport.  This has never happened so I went into full blown panic mode in my semi-awake state.

super mario :)

super mario 🙂

You always feel more vulnerable in a foreign country, especially if English is not widely spoken.  So I thought it was brilliant to have Mario help me call the embassy to report my lost passport.  At the time I thought it had been stolen since some people had befriended me in a nightclub and you hear these stories…

In the end, it was all an embarrassing and expensive debacle!  I searched the room when I got back to the hotel at the end of the day and discovered I had just put it in an unusual place but it didn’t matter.  I had already reported it so spent about one and a half days at the Canadian Embassy in Santiago (the staff were amazing!) and freaked out myself and some of my friends… but did learn a few new things, including how to use the metro so I wouldn’t go broke taking taxis back and forth to the Embassy.

The point of this story, though, is that, if you do something really dumb like that, you want to spend the day with Mario 🙂  You want to spend the day with him even if you don’t.  But it felt like an extra gift to have a friend to talk to when you are freaking out in a foreign country.

The forgotten wake-up call and passport debacle meant my day with Mario was cut short a bit so we couldn’t see as much as I had hoped but we had a really nice day all the same.

We started the day with a visit to Emiliana Winery.  It is definitely recommended.  There are quite a few wineries close to Santiago.  I would have liked to visit more but our late start took that opportunity off the table.  Something to do on my next visit to Santiago 🙂

http://www.emiliana.cl/

We then had a great seafood lunch in Miramar at a place Mario obviously frequented regularly.

There were two highlights of the day.  One was our lively conversation about Chile, Canada and our respective lives.  I taught Mario how to pronounce entrepreneur.  He is one of my growing camp of travel industry entrepreneurs I have discovered in emerging markets.  They are the impressive young generation who will help to transform their countries, which you should visit to support them.

The other highlight was Valparaiso.  Today it is one of those cute places that attract flocks of

the streets of valparaiso

the streets of valparaiso

tourists.  Its history though fit in nicely with my Chilean odyssey.  It was focused on the Strait of Magellan and Cape Horn.  Valparaiso is a seaport and is still a major city in Chile but, before the Panama Canal disrupted the passage between the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans, it was a major stopover point on that journey.

street art and view

street art and view

In the 20th century it was able to reinvent itself and emerge as a center for cultural and educational endeavours.  The streets are terraced and there are many colourful houses as well as copious street art so it is a delightful place to wander and get lost. (Mario will have your back and make sure you find your way back to the car 🙂  There is also a funicular that will take you to the top of the hill for the spectacular view of the neighborhood.

Just ask at the Hotel Ismael 312 to arrange a tour with Mario.  You don’t need to follow my itinerary but I would definitely recommend considering Valparaiso.

http://www.hotelismael312.com/site/es/

Leave your passport in the hotel safe 😉

 

 

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Houston, we have landed :)

April 3, 2016

I still have some nice things to say about Bucharest and had some other fun travels in Europe in 2015 so we will get to them over time.  First, though, I have decided to dabble in a more recent adventure…

A really long time ago I read a very well-written travel piece about a trip to Cape Horn around New Year’s Eve on a small ship.  It sounded like an adventure and I knew that someday I wanted to complete the same voyage.

Luckily, the internet came along between the time when I read the article and now.  I may still have it somewhere in my house.  I have folders of travel dreams that I used to rip out of magazines when I was younger and had the desire – but not the funds – so folders full of dreams were all I could afford.

I figured out that the company that runs the ship he was talking about is called Australis.  They now operate two vessels custom-built to explore Tierra del Fuego where the climatic conditions are not for the timid.  It is one of those trips of a lifetime things as the price tag is steep but it’s not too often you really feel that you are at the end of the world and can see some of the same sights as Charles Darwin.

http://www.australis.com/site/en-us/

Of course, getting to the end of the world takes some planning…

First you have to get to Santiago.  From there, you likely want to fly to Punta Arenas where you will board the ship.  You can then decide if you will get off the ship in Ushuaia, Argentina or if you will stay on board and return to Chile.

The only thing I had seen of Chile was a short passage through Santiago airport on my way to Buenos Aires so I was anxious to spend some time in Santiago and Punta Arenas in addition to the journey on the ship.  Most people just use Santiago as a point to connect with flights to other parts of Chile but I wanted to spend at least a couple of days there.

I managed to find a great deal using airline points to fly business class all the way to Santiago and back.  It meant a little more time in airports most likely but the price was amazing and I rarely get to fly business class so I decided I would just spend a few extra days in Santiago to get the deal.

One of the parts of travel that I love the most is the mystery of what will happen… hopefully good things… but often the bad things make the best stories… and you need to be prepared for uncertainty as soon as you leave the confines of your own home where you have more control over what will happen.

Of course, flying on points means you are more of a second class citizen to the airlines so it’s best if nothing goes wrong.  I have been incredibly lucky and that has normally been the case.  This time my luck looked in jeopardy…  The first flight was fine.  I got to Toronto with plenty of time to clear US customs and get on the next plane without stressing out.

But then the stress began as the plane’s departure time kept getting delayed.  On the plus side, at least I would be the first person off the plane if and when we got to Houston.

I was pretty sure I would be in Houston for a night if I couldn’t make the connection.  The challenge was more that I might lose my business class status on the long, important leg of my journey and I might be paying for a hotel room in Santiago I wouldn’t be using.

I have not yet set foot in Houston but I have been through the airport a few times and have been really impressed.  Luckily, I had already cleared US customs and didn’t have to switch terminals so would just have to run fast with my bags, something I have experience with 😉  The flight attendant was especially wonderful so it was a delightful experience despite the stress.

And I got on the flight to Santiago!  And finally got proper business class service.  Booking on points can mean you don’t get the best flight or plane… Santiago airport was a total gong show.  I think Chile hasn’t quite adapted yet to its economic success.

To its credit, there are strict agricultural controls.  They just need some better procedures to enforce them.  I breezed through passport control and got my special paper that I knew I had to keep and present back when I left Chile.  Luggage wasn’t as efficient but it wasn’t until I finally discovered the end of the gigantic line to deal with customs, present my declaration and have all my bags scanned that the time really dragged.

Thank god Mario hadn’t abandoned me.  He did consider it and I couldn’t blame him as it was well over an hour from my arrival to my scrutinizing the ginormous crowd for a sign with my name on it (or at least an approximation… )  They really could do some work on scheduling flight arrivals.  It was insane.  I found Mario but then had to search for him again as we both disappeared into the crowd and I couldn’t track his movements.

a true room with a view!

a true room with a view!

I had chosen to stay in two different neighborhoods in Santiago pre and post ship so my first day in Chile would be spent in LaStarria using the Ismael Hotel 312 as a starting point.  I had found them on the internet and it was a risk but, now that you don’t have to take that risk, it is definitely where you should stay in Santiago!

http://www.hotelismael312.com/site/es/

It was one of the best hotel experiences of my life.  It’s a small boutique hotel with lots of modern design and creature comforts.  There is a park across the street.  LaStarria is a delightful neighborhood full of cafes, restaurants and bars.  It’s only a few minutes from the metro, which is a cheap and efficient way to get around.  I didn’t figure it out until my last morning but they will also make you all sorts of items for breakfast in addition to what you see on the buffet table.

gorgeous lastarria

gorgeous lastarria

They were also the ones who sent Mario to pick me up at the airport.  Since I travel alone most of the time, I normally have the hotel organize an airport transfer so I don’t have to navigate the myriad systems in foreign countries.  It’s more expensive but I am a fan of reducing my risk.  It’s also proven to occasionally be delightful.  This has been especially true in Latin countries.

If you haven’t spent time in South America, you should really correct that 🙂  It would also be really helpful to learn some Spanish… but there are enough people who speak some English that you will still have a good time.  If you’re really lucky, you will meet someone like Mario.  He had worked in California so has really good English.

There was enough time between the airport and the hotel for us to have a great conversation and I booked a private tour for Saturday so there will be more of my adventures with Mario… stay tuned…

 

 

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la belle époque

February 7, 2016

Marion Cotillard’s character in Midnight in Paris would love Bucharest 🙂  I first saw the film on a flight to Paris so it will always be a little extra special.  It’s about our nostalgia for the past and how we often imagine it as better – and more romantic – than the present.  I definitely think the 21st century has done a lot to kill romance but I am not a believer in trying to relive the past.  The film is brilliant as the main character, Gil, actually gets to time travel and cavort with Hemingway and Dali in the period he believes to be the most golden, Paris in the 1920s.  Marion’s character is living in the 1920s but pining for La Belle Époque.

I’m listening to Leonard Cohen as I write this, just a random choice, but the perfect accompaniment to writing about nostalgia.  When I was younger, I tried the usual things – drinking at Café de Flore in Paris pretending I was Simone de Beauvoir, drinking a wildly overpriced Bellini at Harry’s Bar in Venice imagining I was getting soused with Hemingway, enjoying a nightcap with a friend at the Algonquin Hotel in New York wishing I was as witty at Dorothy Parker.  But I always felt like a tourist trying to channel a ghost that wasn’t present.

in the zeitgeist :)

in the zeitgeist 🙂

It was in Shanghai that I had my real epiphany.    It was 2008, just as the world was melting into financial chaos, but it was National Day Golden Week in China.  Everybody in China gets the same days off and, during this week, people flood the roads and airports.  Shanghai already had over 16 million people but Golden Week meant there were a few million more!  The biggest highlight was having a five course tasting menu in a fancy French restaurant in my hotel served mostly by an enterprising young French chef who had come to China to further his career.

It’s impossible to describe what it was like to be in Shanghai at that moment.  It was like being part of a party attended by 20 million people.  The west was predicting the next great depression.  I saw it on CNN and wondered if I should do something… but then I stepped out of the hotel and the party was in full swing so I just embraced it.  The reason we are nostalgic about de Beauvoir, Hemingway and Parker is that they were living in the Zeitgeist of their time – they were at the pulse of history.  That’s also why trying to duplicate their actions feels so empty.  Paris in 2016 is nothing like Paris in the 1920s.  The Zeitgeist is constantly in motion.  If you want to feel like Hemingway did in 1920s Paris, you need to find the future, not the past.

In 2016, Shanghai looks a lot shakier than it did in 2008 and the Zeitgeist may have passed it by.  You never know if you were in a place at exactly the right moment until you are looking at it years later (unless, of course, you were in Berlin in 1989 when the wall started to come down – YOU KNEW you were in the Zeitgeist that week).  The point is – try new places, don’t copy, be original, be curious, search for the future and enjoy the contradictions that over 2,000 years of human history have imbued.

One great place to do all of that is Bucharest!  While Dracula hunting is very popular with tourists to Romania, there is lots to see in Bucharest.  Even better, you will be visiting a very interesting city at a very interesting time in its history (and, if channelling Hemingway really is your thing, you can drink cheaply pretty much 24/7 it seems… I am sure Hemingway would have moved on from Paris 😉  It seems the glory period for much of Bucharest was La Belle Époque.  As already noted, there is a magpie quality to Bucharest architecture, but there is also significant 19th century French influence.

I never even managed to see all the attractions in Bucharest but the ones I did see were very worthwhile.  I normally start my day in a new city by walking the streets and trying to suss out its character.  In that regard, Bucharest is very intriguing.  There are beautiful 19th century buildings in the same block as Pizza Hut and KFC.  Beautiful architecture is mixed with graffiti.  It’s clear this is a complicated place.  I knew a little of Romanian history before I got to Bucharest but my knowledge was very shallow.  I still have much to learn but what is most impressive about Bucharest – and Romanians – is how they have survived and thrived given all the crap thrown at them in the 20th century.

Bucharest in 2016 feels more like Prague in 1999 (my first visit).  It’s why you should go now.  I absolutely want the Romanian economy to improve and for Romanians to enjoy a better standard of living but that will mean Bucharest will start to look more like other cities.  With luck, the beautiful old buildings will be restored, rather than replaced, but there is no guarantee – so go now while they are still there.

One of the most beautiful is the Romanian Athenaeum.  It was completed in 1888, astonishingly financed almost entirely by money donated by the

easily rivals paris!

easily rivals paris!

general public.  Europeans love classical music, especially in the middle where most of the dudes were born hundreds of years ago.  I haven’t been to Greece yet but this is a little slice of Athens.  Marble, gold leaf, all that gorgeous over-the-top decoration so popular in the past.  The building is stunning and apparently the acoustics are also outstanding.  I wasn’t fortunate enough to hear an actual concert but did get to witness some musicians practicing.

http://fge.org.ro/en/romanian-atheneum.html

perfect for lovers :)

perfect for lovers 🙂

Another attraction I discovered by accident on my random walk the first morning was the Cișmigiu Gardens.  It is the oldest and largest park in Bucharest and a beautiful place to stroll, partly because it is actually a gigantic garden, rather than a park, so much thought was put into the design.

http://www.tourism-bucharest.com/bucharest-attractions/parks-and-gardens-in-bucharest/cismigiu-park.html

It would have been a perfect place for Marion Cotillard’s character in Midnight in Paris to stroll with a lover.  Bucharest evokes La Belle Époque more than Paris.  That era was the height of its 20th century glory.  A manicured garden, rather than a wild park, is very Parisian.  This is the city nicknamed “Little Paris”.  So, if your budget is tight, skip Paris and come to Bucharest 😉  Big spenders can compare and contrast…

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the Habsburgs make the Khardasians look like amateurs ;)

January 31, 2016

If you have travelled in Europe, you have no doubt encountered remnants of the House of Habsburg.  It was one of the most important royal houses in Europe and the throne of the Holy Roman Empire was occupied by the House of Habsburg from 1438 until 1740.  Like all the royals, they made marriage for alliance and power, not love, so they controlled most of Europe until the late 18th century.  They are especially in evidence in middle Europe.

That is why it should not have been such a surprise to find a lot of German influence in Peles Castle.  The building of the castle began in 1873 under Viennese architect Wilhem Doferer and continued in 1876 under his assistant.  Work was abandoned during the war and the castle wasn’t completed until 1883.  It was built for King Carol I, who became the first king of an independent Romania.  The general style is German Renaissance but, like most buildings in Romania, it is a magpie construction that includes Italian Renaissance, Gothic, German Baroque and French Rococo.

http://pelescastle.blogspot.ca/

It is situated in the gorgeous Carpathian Mountains near Sinaia.  It is not as over-the-top as Versailles but it is a very impressive building in a spectacular setting and well worth the visit.

I would also highly recommend the hotel I stayed at in Bucharest.  It’s the K+K Hotel Elisabeta.  It’s in a great location close to the Old Town, the city centre and the metro.  The staff and service is outstanding.  It has an exceptional breakfast.  One of the other great perks was that they organized tours for me so I just had to show up.  Of course, that also meant I was already scheduled to go on a gigantic tour of the Romanian countryside even though I had only had a couple of hours of sleep.  There are a lot of mountains and trees – I did sleep through some of the scenery 🙂

http://www.kkhotels.com/en/hotel-elisabeta

I had a very friendly driver named Marco who was a James Blunt fan.  American media has taken over the entire world but the Brits still hold their own when it comes to music.  It was a big day but very worthwhile.  First, we had to get out of Bucharest.  Our first official stop was the Sinaia Monastery.  There was an Orthodox Church with a separate bell tower.  Like Poland, church is important in Romania, but the vast majority are not Roman Catholic but, rather, Eastern Orthodox.

http://www.welcometoromania.ro/Sinaia/Sinaia_Manastirea_e.htm

byzantine magic

byzantine magic

The monastery and church were first built in 1695 to commemorate a religious pilgrimage to Mount Sinai made by Mikhail Cantacuzino. The church is old Orthodox so there is no organ and no seats.

We then headed to the main attraction for the day, Peles Castle.  We actually also saw Bran Castle that day, so, that statement might seem surprising but Peles Castle is absolutely the star.

Romania is still fairly new at the tourism game – and capitalism’s penchant that the customer is always right – so the organization part was a total gong show.  Marco got my ticket organized and put me in the right place but then I was on my own.  There was a long wait as the room filled with a large crowd of Romanian speakers.  I had understood I was joining an English tour but they forced me in with the Romanians.  I think they likely enjoyed the tour.  Our guide was a mumbling robot with a Romanian accent, so technically things were repeated in English but I only managed to understand random

worth the hassle ;)

worth the hassle 😉

sentences.

Nevertheless, the place was fascinating.  Full of wood, crystal and weapons!  The wood carving was especially over the top, gorgeous and ornate.  No surface was left without ornamentation.  There was beautiful stained glass and many chandeliers.  It was tough to photograph with all the dark, heavy wood and shining, glittering objects.

There are also lovely gardens and it was a perfect blue sky day so it was a spectacular sight.

would fit right in at disneyland :)

would fit right in at disneyland 🙂

From the castle, we headed on to Brasov.  It started medieval but added on some gothic, baroque and renaissance architecture, making it another super cute town that looks as though Disney came to town with some pixie dust.  I only had a fleeting visit but you can take the train from Bucharest and spend more time.  I did get to check out the Black Church, the largest gothic church in Romania, so named due to the damage sustained from the Great Fire of 1689.

http://romaniatourism.com/brasov.html

The city was at the intersection of the trade routes linking the Ottoman Empire to western Europe and allowed pre-Communist Saxon merchants to make fortunes and meddle in politics.  Once you have some money, you need a gated community to keep out the riff-raff so some serious city walls were erected along with several towers maintained by the different craft guilds, as was the real estate development custom in medieval times.

After lunch, we strolled through the town square (full of completely adorable buildings just dying to be photographed) and then took a walk around the remains of the city walls.  Marco convinced me I should climb to the top of one of the towers to get a view over the town.  It was a serious workout and the view was a bit hazy but it was good exercise 🙂  Of course, I have climbed to the top of a lot of towers in Europe and seen a lot of terracotta roofs but – if you haven’t – you may be more impressed…

The terracotta roofs of Brasov may have been underwhelming but the other sights were anything but and – not only should you check out Romania while it is still under the radar – you should get out of Bucharest and see the bucolic countryside.  You can always pretend to be a Habsburg checking out your territory 😉  They apparently died out due to in-breeding… there is a mini-series here…

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my date with dracula ;)

January 17, 2016

Be gentle with the Romanians when you start talking about Dracula.  Evidence suggests Vlad was really just a man of his times.  Gruesome torture was kind of the standard in the 15th century. He spent his adolescence as a hostage in the Ottoman Empire court of Sultan Murad II to keep his father, Vlad II Dracul, in line and allow him to rule Walachia in favour of the Ottomans and neglect the Hungarian court.  Not exactly the ideal way to spend your teenage years.  Although he was like a prince, so he was educated rather than beaten.  The 1% has always been with us.  They used to be princes rather than billionaires.

And we’ve always been tribal.  Luckily, some parts of the world are making tribes get along better and not feel so compelled to fight each other over turf but that lesson took at least five hundred more years in the part of the world into which Vlad III was born.  Vlad III’s father was vested into the Order of the Dragon, a fellowship of knights sworn to defend Christianity against the competing choices, especially the conquering Ottoman Empire.  As part of this ritual, he was given the epithet Dracul or dragon by the Holy Roman Emperor.

Dracula’s dad was the Voivode of Transylvania, which meant he wasn’t the king.  The king was in Hungary – but he was the most powerful person in Transylvania.  Transylvania is sexy 🙂 but, at the time, there were two other regions in Romania – Walachia and Moldova.  Despite Transylvania being associated with Romania, at the time it belonged to the kingdom of Hungary.  Walachia was the rebel state.  Dracula’s grandfather (Mircea I) was the ruler of Walachia but Dracula’s dad was the illegitimate son he sent to the Hungarian court, which was how he got put in charge of Transylvania.

While Dracula (son of Dracul) gets all the attention thanks to Bram Stoker, his family tree would make an excellent telenovela 😉  His grandfather Mircea the Elder was a good guy apparently.  Mircea’s dad was the Voivode of Walachia but he defected and won against the Hungarian crown, creating the first real Romanian state.  You should look him up on Wikipedia.  The Republican presidential candidates might want to do the same 🙂  Mircea was a true leader who brought peace, prosperity and progress to his people.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mircea_I_of_Wallachia

not too scary in bright sunshine :)

not too scary in bright sunshine 🙂

That’s why you need to put down your copy of Dracula for a minute and learn a bit about Romanian history.  To the Romanians, Mircea the Elder is like Thomas Jefferson or Winston Churchill… and, if you check, Mircea might have the better morals… The dude you think of as Dracula thanks to an Irishman who never set foot in Romania is the grandson of a founding father.  This was the 15th century.  The printing press was just being developed.  Factual information was hard to come by so a lot of the Dracula stuff may be legend rather than reality.

That’s the point of fiction.  Why let the truth get in the way of a great narrative 😉  What’s not clear is whether Vlad III was more blood-thirsty than his compatriots in a century that included the Spanish Inquisition.  What is clear is that he had a tough upbringing and he worked tirelessly trying to keep Walachia free from the Ottoman Empire, so, be sensitive.  He is a kind of folk hero too.  It’s possible he used some of the drastic tactics because he had a small army and his grandfather had used guerilla warfare against the Ottoman Empire to keep the region stable and prosperous in a time when that was hardly the norm.  Remember, Thomas Jefferson owned slaves.  Power and heroism are tough to reconcile.

While you should be sensitive in your chat about Dracula or Vlad while you are in Romania, by all means, go and see Bran Castle!  The Romanians will forgive you.  Bram’s fantasy was good for their economy 😉

the gorgeous romanian countryside

the gorgeous romanian countryside

Bran Castle itself is a little underwhelming but the countryside of the Carpathian Mountains is gorgeous and well worth the journey.  Be prepared to

you will not be facing dracula alone!

you will not be facing dracula alone!

queue and it will be tough to get a photo without heads in it.  As is no doubt obvious, I enjoyed the history more than the castle itself.  There is more history to learn too.  Bran Castle was used by the royal family of Romania, expropriated by the Communists and then returned to one of the Habsburg clan (even more ubiquitous than the Khardasians).

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There are other Dracula sites in Romania as well if you are a fan of Bram Stoker.  It would appear that he wrote it more based on the mythology and superstitions that arose from living in a densely forested and hostile environment back in the days before we started to conquer nature and see how fast we could make species extinct like it was some kind of demented video game.  So, be open-minded about Vlad the Impaler, but you need to admire Bram Stoker.  The book was published in 1897 and has never been out of print.  He was born in the wrong decade… he coulda been a billionaire…

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bram_Stoker

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travel stories

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changes…

January 11, 2016

Not all are good!  Changes are kind of my thing and the number of figurative cliffs I have jumped off might number in the hundreds.  Some of it is attributable to David Bowie, even though I never met him.

The closest I ever got was possibly his best ever tour…1983… we got old Bowie plus brand new MTV “Let’s Dance” Bowie with a white-face Peter Gabriel as a Powerball bonus.

The best concert of my life.  We had to take a bus to Edmonton and I slept in a cheap hotel room with two other guys, neither of whom considered sleeping in the same bed as me to be a win…  I think in the end someone might have slept on the floor.  We didn’t have enough money for more than one room and back pain was decades off.

I was raised in that ultra-religious good girl kind of environment so the boys blew my world apart.  They insisted we needed to be as close to the stage as possible rather than sitting in the safe assigned seats.  It wasn’t really mosh pit days yet but it was not entirely safe. The benefit was that I really saw Bowie – and Peter – up close and almost personal.

What is more important at a concert though is that you are connecting with the other fans – and being close enough to touch the stage enhances your experience.

That memory involves the guy who eventually did become comfortable with me in his bed and became my first serious boyfriend.  There is no question Bowie played a role 😉

What he might not have appreciated is that Bowie was the first artist I ever liked that I didn’t need to feel guilty about – or just outright lie that I actually liked 🙂

For that, I have to thank Kevin.  He was my sorta-not-really junior high boyfriend.  It was a relationship that presented to me at such a young age that I never appreciated at the time how important it was and could have done so much better a couple of decades on.

In the old days when there was no social media our connections were very different so I should likely find him and express how important he was to my life and how much I learned from him even though we never even properly dated.

Right now what matters is that he was a drummer (the kind who did drum solos and everyone listened) and had musical taste… so he made me listen to Changes... and other stuff…  but Changes was always Kevin’s song.

Then I fell in love with Mike who was my musical guru – and a huge Bowie fan.  My musical choices improved.  Eventually I became someone with eclectic and great musical taste…

but it all started with Bowie… and my great choice in boyfriends 🙂

It is such a tragedy.  It is one of the few times I have felt bereft about someone I didn’t actually know.  He was an important guy.  The music was fantastic but what was more important is that he pushed the envelope and used his celebrity to promote social justice along with musical innovation.

I felt privileged to have seen The Serious Moonlight Tour.  I also got to see the Bowie spectacular at the Philharmonie in Paris last year.  I hope it’s still touring – would be a great tribute to a man who put a mark on our society that will be his legacy…

have checked since and it is… called, a bit weirdly, David Bowie Is… you might have to travel… but just pack your tunes 😉

http://www.vam.ac.uk/content/articles/t/touring-exhibition-david-bowie-is/

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artsy stuff, shining examples

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