tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-67742732763397518202024-03-14T01:53:06.283-07:00Purple Spider TracksMy Travels with Tyana J LittleStringAnonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17562562571414391716noreply@blogger.comBlogger23125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6774273276339751820.post-62254362390896559132012-01-16T13:20:00.001-08:002012-01-16T13:20:37.461-08:00April RisingIn April Tyana and I will take a trip to Germany, Czech Republic, Hungary, Austria, and Slovakia.<br /><br /><center><a href='http://www.flickr.com/photos/23257801@N08/6710315627/'><img src='http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7001/6710315627_f2ac83747f_b.jpg' border='0' width='210' height='281' style='margin:5px'></a></center><br />- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17562562571414391716noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6774273276339751820.post-63449315692894557372010-11-26T10:34:00.000-08:002010-11-26T10:38:51.031-08:00Passing Ithaka<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/TO_-jPF6VJI/AAAAAAAABeI/pdyPgvhA5as/s1600/ithaka%2Bgisela.JPG"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/TO_-jPF6VJI/AAAAAAAABeI/pdyPgvhA5as/s400/ithaka%2Bgisela.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5543929547616572562" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/TO_-izpGFFI/AAAAAAAABeA/t-tFlicu5lw/s1600/Tyana%2Bonboard.JPG"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/TO_-izpGFFI/AAAAAAAABeA/t-tFlicu5lw/s400/Tyana%2Bonboard.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5543929540247950418" border="0" /></a><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:worddocument> <w:view>Normal</w:View> <w:zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:donotoptimizeforbrowser/> </w:WordDocument> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <o:shapedefaults ext="edit" spidmax="1026"> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <o:shapelayout ext="edit"> <o:idmap ext="edit" data="1"> </o:shapelayout></xml><![endif]--> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><i>As you set out for Ithaka</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><i>hope the voyage is a long one, </i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><i>full of adventure, full of discovery.</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;"><i> </i></p> <p class="MsoBodyTextIndent">Climbing the stairs to Deck Ten I am in deep thought, trying to recollect C. P. Cavafy’s poem.</p> <p class="MsoBodyTextIndent"> </p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><i>May there be many a summer morning when,</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><i>with what pleasure, what joy,</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><i>you come into harbors seen for the first time.</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">Venice, Dobrovnik, Kusadasi, Santorini, Corfu - I say to myself. Harbors seen or to be seen for the first time, either from the balcony of our room or from the top deck. But on this summer morning I am thinking of a special harbor, one of which I have no concrete image. One I will not explore, though its name is quite familiar to me: Ithaka! Abstract thoughts run ahead of me as I reach the exercise deck.<span style=""> </span>I whisper the Greek word <i>nostos.</i><span style=""> </span>I scan the horizon; dark islands appear in the distance. I wonder if I will actually see Ithaka on the trip south. <i>Nostos </i>I repeat – that’s what I have named my travel journal. The Homecoming.<span style=""> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">Whether I am accused of traveling in my mind or whether I am admired for it, Ithaka itself - <i>Ithake</i> as the young Greek waiter pronounces it – is a reality. This island in the Ionian chain occupies an area of 45 square miles and has around three thousand inhabitants. Modern Ithaka is most often identified with Homer’s Ithaka, the home of Odysseus. When Mother introduced me to the most famous poem by one of Greece’s most famous poets, Constantine Petrou Cavafy, I interpreted Ithaka as the ultimate goal of a life-long journey. A place, most desirable, to be saved until one has learned all that is needed to be worthy of final grace: the homecoming. </p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;"> </p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center; text-indent: 0.5in;" align="center"><i>Keep Ithaka always in your mind.</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center; text-indent: 0.5in;" align="center"><i>Arriving there is what you are destined for.</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center; text-indent: 0.5in;" align="center"><i>But do not hurry the journey at all.</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center; text-indent: 0.5in;" align="center"><i>Better if it lasts for years,</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center; text-indent: 0.5in;" align="center"><i>so you are old by the time you reach the island, </i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center; text-indent: 0.5in;" align="center"><i>wealthy with all you have gained on the way,</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center; text-indent: 0.5in;" align="center"><i>not expecting Ithaka to make you rich.</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center; text-indent: 0.5in;" align="center"><i> </i></p> <p class="MsoBodyTextIndent">I already finished my morning mile earlier; now, after breakfast with Pat, I come to Deck 10 to participate in a charity event. By purchasing a “Wishes at Sea” t-shirt and walking a mile I will support the Make-A-Wish Foundation. When I arrive at the Rock Climbing Wall I am the only customer. The young man who sells the shirts lets me know that he has watched several terminally ill<span style=""> </span>children enjoy their Mediterranean cruises. “It gets to you,” he says.</p> <p class="MsoBodyTextIndent">I tell him that I knit teddy bears for sick children in Africa. We talk about the Make-A-Wish Foundation and the Mother Bear Project. I shake his hand, tell him that his enthusiasm touches me. </p> <p class="MsoBodyTextIndent">The still crisp morning air, the blue water, and the thought that I am helping a child fulfill a dream make me giddy. Making my way between runners, joggers, photographers, deck hands, and people chatting with each other, I’ve all but forgotten Homer and Cavafy and Ithaka, when a voice on the loudspeaker announces that we are about to pass between the islands of<span style=""> </span>Kefalonia and Ithaka. I pull the camera from my fanny pack. </p> <p class="MsoBodyTextIndent">When the ship is flanked by the islands on either side the young man at the rock wall offers to take my photograph in front of Ithaka. I am overwhelmed and confide my absolute delight to have this moment on record. For the second time I shake his hand. </p> <p class="MsoBodyTextIndent">“I am passing Ithaka,” I announce. “It is August 9, 2010. 9:45am.” </p> <p class="MsoBodyTextIndent">Of course I don’t tell him that all my photographs so far are of Kefalonia. Only his suggestion to pose at a certain spot<span style=""> </span>– portside he says and points to the left - makes me realize that I have been concentrating on the wrong island. In my eagerness to attribute symbolic value to the German transmission of information I lacked concentration and confused starboard and portside – a subject of endless speculation at our dinner conversations for days to come. I take another twenty pictures, aiming my camera up and down the shoreline of Ithaka, the mountainous interior where a tiny smoke cloud hovers over a divide, the wake our ship creates as we continue our journey.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> </p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><i>Ithaka gave you the marvelous journey.</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><i>Without her you would not have set out.</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><i>She has nothing left to give you now.</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><i> </i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""> </span>I finish my second mile and go to the solarium to write into my journal. “Not much to see since the harbors are located on the east side.” But as I scan the last passage of the poem I grasp and adore its meaning. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"> </p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><i>And if you find her poor, Ithaka won’t have fooled you.</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><i>Wise as you will have become, so full of experience,</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><i>you will have understood by then what these Ithakas mean.</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"> </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""> </span>Reading the poem again – it is attached to the inside of my journal’s front cover – I smile. Tomorrow I will fulfill a few more lines by shopping in Kusadasi and visiting Ephesus.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> </p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><i>May you stop at Phoenician trading stations</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><i>to buy fine things,</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><i>mother of pearl and coral, amber and ebony,</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><i>sensual perfume of every kind-</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><i>as many sensual perfumes as you can;</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><i>and may you visit many Egyptian cities</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><i>to gather stores of knowledge from their scholars.</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"> </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""> </span>My amber and ebony will probably be cloth and stone; my scholars will be past emperors and philosophers and a modern-day tour guide with a list of facts he has committed to memory. </p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">For a moment I feel the need for a witness and try to invoke Dr. Steinfeld, but relaxed silence spreads across my body. “All my corners are rounded,” I write without questioning the metaphor. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"> </p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><i>Laistrygonians and Cyclops,</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><i>Angry Posidon – don’t be afraid of them:</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><i>You’ll never find things like that on your way</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><i>As long as a rare excitement</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><i>Stirs your spirit and your body.</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><i>Laistrygonians and Cyclops,</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><i>Wild Poseidon –you won’t encounter them</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><i>Unless you bring them along inside your soul,</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><i>Unless your soul sets them up in front of you.</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"> </p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">My mind is almost empty now. I close the journal and my eyes. My soul is free of cannibals and monsters as Ithaka glides into past tense. Thank you, Mr. Cavafy. </p>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17562562571414391716noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6774273276339751820.post-22750467489969666182010-01-08T22:59:00.001-08:002010-01-08T23:08:49.601-08:00In Search of Emily Carr<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/S0grFZfWMFI/AAAAAAAABN8/i--t38gTi1U/s1600-h/Emily+27.JPG"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/S0grFZfWMFI/AAAAAAAABN8/i--t38gTi1U/s400/Emily+27.JPG" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5424633122909466706" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/S0grE7u90FI/AAAAAAAABN0/4qGeSJgCwqw/s1600-h/Emily+30.JPG"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/S0grE7u90FI/AAAAAAAABN0/4qGeSJgCwqw/s400/Emily+30.JPG" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5424633114921914450" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/S0grEezl67I/AAAAAAAABNs/V5KpmYwz4X0/s1600-h/Emily+51aa.JPG"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/S0grEezl67I/AAAAAAAABNs/V5KpmYwz4X0/s400/Emily+51aa.JPG" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5424633107156691890" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/S0grD35UQFI/AAAAAAAABNk/6gzWYl3kBPM/s1600-h/Emily+56.JPG"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/S0grD35UQFI/AAAAAAAABNk/6gzWYl3kBPM/s400/Emily+56.JPG" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5424633096711716946" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/S0grDWUaSVI/AAAAAAAABNc/4yIvSNlXbII/s1600-h/Emily+57.JPG"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/S0grDWUaSVI/AAAAAAAABNc/4yIvSNlXbII/s400/Emily+57.JPG" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5424633087698553170" /></a><br /><br /><br />Part I<br /><br /> “Seventy isn’t so frightfully old!” Emily Carr, the Canadian painter, said. But the doctors would not allow her to travel alone in her caravan any longer; and after her first heart attack she had to depend on others to drive it to her favorite locations. <br /><br />I would not know anything about Emily had I not inherited an Alaska Airlines ticket about to expire. For a one hundred dollar transfer fee I would be able to go anywhere with the airline, but if I wanted to stay within the $440.00 value of the original ticket, Victoria in British Columbia was the place to go. I googled “art and museums” and found The Royal B.C. Museum, a Miniature Museum, the Emily Carr House. The Victoria website beamed at me with a beautiful night shot of the Empress Hotel. Tea at the Empress is expensive but glamorous. The famous Butchart Gardens sealed the deal. Soon a three and a half day schedule emerged - a quick romp through Victoria’s highlights. <br /><br />I researched Emily Carr. She was cranky. She never married. She painted most of her life though she had many obstacles to overcome. She began to write in her sixties, when it became too difficult to prepare canvas and too hard to haul around paint supplies. Emily grew up and died in Victoria. I bought her autobiography “Growing Pains,” and immediately related to the words she wrote about her Mother:<br /><br />“Our childhood was ruled by Father’s unbendable iron will, the obeying of which would have been intolerable but for Mother’s patient polishing of its dull metal so that it shone and reflected the beauty of orderliness that was in all Father’s ways, his overbearing omnipotence….” <br /><br />On the evening of July 27, 2009, a Monday, I summed up my first half day in Victoria with overheated disappointment: No air conditioning in my hotel room. No grocery store nearby. No Emily Carr anywhere. Vancouver Island was in the claws of a heat wave. It wasn’t prepared. The Huntingdon Manor in Belleview Park wasn’t prepared. A portable fan failed to reduce the ninety some degrees temperature; I only felt the fan’s power when I aimed it directly at my face. <br /><br />As for healthy eating, buying one of the two bruised apples in a nearby convenience store was the only effort I made on the first day toward my low sodium, low cholesterol, low fat, and low sugar requirements. It seems that for every restriction added to my diet by the doctor, restaurants invent another fatty, well salted, cholesterol spiked meal, and, naturally, their menus brag about yet another super-moussed, extra sweet dessert that I can’t resist. <br /><br />And what about Emily Carr? At home I had imagined myself in her footsteps on the streets of Victoria. By six in the evening I had gotten lost twice, was tired and hot and no longer interested in her. My thoughts dwelled with morose insistence on my failure to locate her home on 207 Government Street. Maybe a GPS device would have alerted me, let me know that I had given up about a block away. But in spite of my “primitive” tracking system – a map, interpreted by me with little regard to north and south – the afternoon had acquainted me with downtown Victoria, its government buildings, the layout of the Royal B.C. Museum, harbour and ferry services, bus depot, Munro Book Store, and the Canadian monetary system. I had spent some of the newly acquired dollars and cents on a little teddy bear, a few bottles of water, a mediocre salmon burger and diet coke without fizz. And, of course, that ninety-nine cent apple from the fruit bin on a street named Menzies. <br /><br />On Tuesday, after a night of restless leg syndrome and an early morning television warning to the “elderly” to stay indoors, I examined my tight schedule. The decision was easy: Butchart Gardens can’t be postponed. Though Emily never mentioned it in her autobiography, it had must see priority in my book, and I had already purchased my bus ticket. At the 110-year old Gatsby Mansion next to the hotel I delighted in three days worth of cholesterol in the disguise of bacon and eggs and hash browns, before I walked to the bus depot. The Grayline Express Shuttle filled quickly with a multi-lingual crowd of garden experts and plain tourists.<br /><br />The Gardens is a 55 acre expanse of flowers, shrubs, and trees, created by the Butcharts a hundred years ago to beautify an old limestone quarry about thirteen miles from Victoria. As soon as I entered the gate I was surrounded by an endless supply of colorful sites to photograph. A sunken garden of annuals with dramatically steep ivy-hung backdrop. A large Japanese garden crouching beneath filtered sunlight. A bright rose garden that stirred the emotions with its perfume. A gay Italian garden, complete with star pond and gelateria. Statues, fountains, green house, waterwheel, and Mrs. Butchart’s teahouse competed for attention. I took pictures until the batteries were dead, ate ice cream, inserted new batteries, took more pictures, leaned against a fence, ate ice cream again, bought a big bottle of water and a t-shirt, slowly moved from one garden to the next, sat under a tree, rested on a rock, congratulated myself that I was one of the many visitors who defied the heat. We exchanged smiles and sighs. Proud. Wilted. Thirsty. <br /><br />Several hundred megabytes and six hours later I collapsed back into the air-conditioned bus. With a frown toward my pedometer I promised myself never to walk six miles in the sun again. Alain de Botton says it well in The Art of Travel: ” …it seems we may best be able to inhabit a place when we are not faced with the additional challenge of having to be there.”<br /><br />I don’t agree with him during my armchair travels, but I remember his words when I have walked in a foreign city until my feet are raw and my brain scrambles to the hum of unfamiliar sounds. That Butchart Gardens made me lightheaded can be attributed to the intense heat – somebody said 39 degrees Celsius – 102 degrees Farenheit - and the clutter of tourists who filled the garden paths or withered on benches, expressing muffled admiration for flowers and extreme joy over ice cream stations. Or maybe my teddy bear is to blame for attracting too much attention. Too much small talk, not enough fluids. <br /><br />But my journey for the day wasn’t over when I arrived back in town. An old lady with long gray hair, dressed in sturdy, warm clothes, the gear of a homeless wanderer, shared my bench at a downtown bus stop. I asked her for the nearest grocery store. She shook her head. “Nothing around here.” <br /><br />For a while we both stared into the street. Suddenly she came to life.<br /><br />“Menzies!” she said. After a few seconds she repeated: “Menzies! There is one on Menzies. <br /><br />“When she got ready to move on and hoisted her backpack into position, I saw that she carried a blue canvas bag, imprinted with the logo “Thrifty Foods.” “Where is Thrifty Foods?” I asked.<br /><br />“Menzies!” She said it with a hint of irritation. “Go over a street and you’ll get to Menzies. You can walk to the corner with me. I’ll show you.”<br /><br />With a tired “thank you” I declined her offer. ”I’ll find it.”<br /><br />Two young German women confirmed its existence. “Ja, ja.” There is one. “An Menzies!”<br /><br />I knew that my happiness would depend on Menzies. I had walked it yesterday, but apparently not far enough. This time I walked in the wrong direction. I walked to the end of the world. A crumbling high-rise apartment building. A dog. A jogger. The ocean. A man bunched up under a blanket on a bench close to the water’s edge. <br /><br />Retracing my steps along Menzies I finally saw the sign. Thrifty Foods. A block from the convenience store with bruised apples. A bin filled with shopping bags. On sale today for forty-nine cents each. I grabbed one. It seemed important to honor the grocery store on Menzies.<br /><br />I filled my new blue bag with Dasani water, a pint of blueberries, hummus, low salt crackers, goat brie, reduced fat herb cheese pâté and a baguette. 28 dollars and 69 cents. <br /><br />When I realized that the Emily Carr’s house must be nearby I walked some more. “Closed Monday and Tuesday,” a cardboard sign announced. I stood for some time, holding on to the gate. Emily, where are you? <br /><br />At the hotel I spread my bounty on the dining table, turned on the news, laid out my knitting, a map, a pen, my journal, the camera, the Netbook. I aimed the fan properly into my face and began my second evening in Victoria. All memory of burning feet and headache vanished in anticipation of my visit to the Royal British Columbia Museum. The goat brie was delicious.Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17562562571414391716noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6774273276339751820.post-934622183748747392009-07-13T09:49:00.000-07:002009-07-13T09:59:31.572-07:00It Snows in Truckee<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SltmIaqCq3I/AAAAAAAAA-8/Q6YqadS0WU4/s1600-h/A+Truckee+River+Wonderland.JPG"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 300px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5357988476467981170" border="0" alt="" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SltmIaqCq3I/AAAAAAAAA-8/Q6YqadS0WU4/s400/A+Truckee+River+Wonderland.JPG" /></a><br /><br /><div><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SltmH0vSrsI/AAAAAAAAA-0/RLLYoj2yDHg/s1600-h/tyana+peeks.JPG"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 300px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 400px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5357988466289454786" border="0" alt="" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SltmH0vSrsI/AAAAAAAAA-0/RLLYoj2yDHg/s400/tyana+peeks.JPG" /></a><br /><br /><br /><div><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SltmHhUouJI/AAAAAAAAA-s/xu6PTOCm9TE/s1600-h/tyana+sleds.JPG"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 300px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5357988461077379218" border="0" alt="" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SltmHhUouJI/AAAAAAAAA-s/xu6PTOCm9TE/s400/tyana+sleds.JPG" /></a><br /><br /><br /><br /><div><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SltmHPI3LSI/AAAAAAAAA-k/NjgNyjMeSDU/s1600-h/tyana+skis.JPG"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 300px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 400px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5357988456196156706" border="0" alt="" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SltmHPI3LSI/AAAAAAAAA-k/NjgNyjMeSDU/s400/tyana+skis.JPG" /></a><br /><br />“Go to Northstar,” my son said, “the snow there is a lot cleaner than in Truckee.”<br /><br />And all but Mother wondered why I would want to take a trip to Truckee, a town everybody else just passes through. Mother understands that I find inspiration in the most unlikely places. She made me laugh on the phone with her prediction that relies on my capability to make a mountain out of a rock garden.<br /><br />“I know you; you’ll put Truckee on the map.”<br /><br />Of course, the ill-fated Donner party had already done that in 1847 and I would only be another curious visitor who would look for extra insight into published material.<br /><br />But my main interest in Truckee was not to revive the Wild West or rumors of flesh-eating survivors, I wanted to see, touch, breathe …..SNOW.<br /> <br />I had tried to feed my craving for snow a few times before and though my family claims that I have tasted plenty, according to my photographs, I did not feel the tiny nip of snow flakes in my face. Not once since childhood. At the end of March 2005 I took a trip to the Alpine foothills near Munich and though I caught patches of snow with my camera, most of it had already melted. In December of 2005 I felt a quick surge of joy over early morning flakes trickling down on the rooftops of Nürnberg, but by the time I finished breakfast they had settled into small picturesque mounds that barely waited long enough to be photographed before they transformed themselves into icy threads between cobblestones.<br /> <br />In 2007 I rode the train to Denver and was rewarded with a snowy landscape along the route of the California Zephyr, but again did not become a part of it. When the train made a brief stop in Truckee I saw, from the warmth of my roomette, the winter wonderland I had imagined and promised myself to return to this town some day to witness the “real thing.”<br /> <br />On Monday, March 2, 2009, I got up at 4:29 in the morning, beating three alarm clocks, only because I hadn’t slept all night. It seems that my pre-trip mental nightlife increases with each year I age. Did I pack the long, purple scarf? The pencil set I never use? Is the suitcase too heavy to carry? Will I get rained on on my one-mile walk to the Light Rail Station? Should I bring the laptop? Do Tyana’s outfits add the right colors to snow photos? Are eight crackers enough of a cushion to absorb the negative effects of my daily pills?<br /> <br />As expected it was dark outside when I left home at 5:30 and the suitcase tipped over twice when I rolled it over a speed bump. By the time I reached the Light Rail I had begun to sweat under three layers of clothes. And the characters who shared my ride to the train station looked sinister, sleepy, unhappy. But eventually I was securely settled into the train that would take me to Emeryville where my real trip into snow country would begin. The California Zephyr runs all the way to Chicago and my five hours to Truckee would be just a small part of its journey, though a much anticipated one of mine.<br /> <br />But it rained all the way to Truckee, and with large drops splashing against the window my mood sank lower and lower. It couldn’t be. Not another failure. On my short walk to the River Street Inn I stared at the slushy ground in total frustration. Not even the sight of my 1885 accommodation with the tall bed, the claw foot tub, and the flat screen TV made me smile.<br />Where was the promised view of the Truckee River? Of course, the Internet “Recession Special” did not include a view. For one hundred and ten dollars a night I would only see the neighbor’s roof top. <br /><br /> Little did I know that this roof top would become a focal point of my evenings. Little did I know about snow, period. I pulled my new red umbrella from the suitcase and shot it open in defiance of superstition. What else could go wrong? My old black one, the one I had relied on for 29 years, had refused to open on the day before my trip and had forced me to drive to Wallgreen’s for a replacement. I bought a loudly advertised four-dollar “automatic” that I dropped into my luggage without much enthusiasm and without testing.<br /> <br />Hiding my face from the icy wind-driven rain under my bright red umbrella I headed across the railroad tracks toward the main street. Donner Pass Road. Downtown Truckee. Half a mile of storefronts. The Wagon Train Coffee Shop. It was on my list of things to do. “Eat at the Wagon Train.” The reviews slanted toward the mediocre, but I don’t always believe people who let out their frustrations on yelp.com and wanted to see for myself. Before I entered the coffee shop the wind blew my new umbrella inside out and several spines separated from the plastic material.<br /> <br />“Easy come, easy go,” I told myself, slightly embarrassed over the mishap, trying to close the contraption and stuffing it in the outer pocket of my backpack.<br /> <br />The coffee shop confirmed its online reputation. Overpriced. Unidentifiable soup. Boring salad bar. Nice waitress. She promised snow by evening. I came back two days later in the afternoon and thanked her for that, ordered a lumberjack breakfast, took her picture with my teddy bear, and chatted with her for a while. She invited me for coffee on the day of my departure<br /> <br />Yes, snow started to fall by seven. I pushed aside the curtain, pulled up the slatted blind, and watched the roof across from my window. By ten I even opened the window and breathed in the clean mountain air. Judging by the accumulation of the white stuff on the sharply slanted roof and the transformation of nearby trees I felt assured that I would get my share of snow the next morning.<br /> <br />When I woke my first look was to the roof. At least a foot of snow. And it was still coming down. As far as I could see everything was covered . I could hardly contain my enthusiasm but forced myself to participate in the Inn’s continental breakfast. Sitting at the communal table I noted the lack of attention the young owners afford their establishment. How easy it would be to polish the image. Fresh rolls in a basket instead of frozen white bread in its plastic sack. Individual packets of jam instead of a Costco sized jar. A toaster without smashed raisins glued to its sides. A stack of napkins. Six napkins, laid out for six guests certainly don’t spell luxury. But then I remembered that Truckee, as my son had said, is only a stopping point for most people. I am one of the odd ones who came to explore the town. So did my neighbors in room 87. He is a railroad buff and would spend a great deal of time reading in the lounge, or filling me in on the history of the area. He and his wife were return visitors.<br /> <br />“Not many old people live here,” he noted after we discussed our backgrounds and our experiences with train trips and cold weather and mountains.<br /> <br />It would take a day of getting reacquainted with snow to make me think about his words. My memories are those of images encountered as a child in the Black Forest. Opening the front door in the morning and being enclosed in a wall of snow. Helping my mother and grandfather shovel a pathway. Later, in the Odenwald, sledding down mountain roads. Building fat snowmen by the fountain on the plaza. Watching snow settle on the tall public Christmas tree in the moonlight. Imprinting my footsteps in a pristine, soft, white carpet. Opening my mouth to the watery remnants of twirling flakes. And always – always – being aware of the deep silence of a freshly powdered winter landscape.<br /><br />Now I am an old California city person; all my childhood memories are vivid, but I lack the practical experience that accumulates with yearly preparations for the cold season. I became aware of this when my hands froze into red and clumsy while I took pictures of Tyana. Posing her in avalanche-size mountains of snow was the highlight of my trip, except that my finger was not able to push the button on the camera. I dug through my backpack for gloves but soon realized that icy hands in gloves don’t instantly regain dexterity. When snowflakes settled on my camera lens I wondered how to shield it without losing light. I should have brought a plastic bag.<br /><br />After I unpacked Tyana’s skis, made from paint stirrers and sprayed purple just a few days ago, I dropped them and they immediately opened their own hole to sink into. And as I was searching for a penny I had intended to use as an eye for a snowman, I learned that wet snow allows objects to slide all the way to the bottom without leaving a trace. Later I stumbled and slipped into a ditch and watched my camera disappear. I dug it out of its wet grave quickly, concerned that it had suffered damage, but so far it still works.<br /> <br />There were other things I learned about snow. It is slippery when it is compacted by tires. It becomes slush when sprinkled with de-icers. I also understand why the snow in Truckee is dirty to those who drive through town. All day it is moved to the side by snow plows and all day cars spray slush against the piles that accumulate next to the road. I tried to walk along Donner Pass because I wanted to visit places on my list that were located a mile out of town. Once the sidewalk ended, I was splashed repeatedly and after a hundred steps I turned around. Walking on the street was annoying; drivers didn’t pay attention to me, but the alternative was to stomp through several feet of snow. I could see the headline in my mind, “Old woman dies of heart attack on her way to Wild Cherries Coffee Shop.”<br /> <br />And so I opted for what would become my favorite indoor spot in Truckee, the “Book and Bean” just across the street from the River Street Inn.<br /> <br />The first time I entered the “Book and Bean” I couldn’t see a thing. Another strike against old people – we will all be snow blind because we forget to wear our goggles. After my eyes had recovered I bought a cappuccino and six books, most about the Donner Party. Until then I hadn’t given the tragedy much thought, except for reading James D. Houston’s “Snow Mountain Passage” in my “Exploring Literature” group. Cannibalism is as difficult a subject as incest, defying imagination, and therefore not something I dwell upon. But Truckee and Donner Lake have played a major part in this story; only half of eighty-some pioneers survived the winter of 1846; traveling past the lake made it impossible not to think about their fate. I wanted to compare Houston’s novel to a historical document and bought the original full account by C. F. McGlashan. Published in 1880, McGlashan consulted 24 of 26 living survivors, cited diary entries, letters and newspapers, to give this tragic episode in California history the respect that is missing from many other accounts by authors who craft their sentences around the consumption of human flesh. <br /><br />I returned twice to the mix of lap top computers, used books, and gourmet coffee at the “Book and Bean” and each time I discovered something else that I liked.<br /> . <br />On my second day in Truckee I examined some of the back roads. Jiboom, where the brothels used to line up, East River Street where Chinese railroad workers lived, West River Street that ends somewhere half a mile from the River Street Inn, according to the sign. I walked my boot prints into the new snow, posed Tyana on a mountain of snow across the street from the Chinese Herb Shop, and watched the crows play near the “Totally Board” which, I assumed, is a bar. After eating a Kilimanjaro Ken that included avocado slices, spinach and cheese at the “Squeeze Inn,” possibly the most bizarrely decorated restaurant I have ever seen – a graffiti artist’s heaven – I took a local bus to Northstar Resort and Crystal Bay, Lake Tahoe. I laughed when I read the bus schedule at the Visitor Center in the train depot: Dallas has DART; San Francisco has BART; Truckee has TART; it seems fitting for the remnants of a bawdy, rowdy, tough Old West town. TART (Tahoe Area Regional Transit) took me to the winter wonderland of the young and restless: a ski resort 7,350 feet above sea level, with 39 shops and restaurants, and a golf club. What else could one want?<br /><br />“The snow is beautiful, but what about history?” I asked.<br /><br />I got a look of pity from two young men in designer boots and wraparound sunshades. The narrow-shouldered girl with long blond hair, a British accent, and a huge backpack talked about a dip in the hot tub after a morning of running the slopes. The bus driver tilted his head; I imagined his eyes looking at me from behind reflective sunglasses. At the end of the route, at the north shore of Lake Tahoe, he turned on his radio and paused for a few minutes. He clearly was not in a talking mood and while I didn’t make real contact with anyone, this two-hour roundtrip provided me with the answer I needed: Truckee is the right place for me. Northstar is somebody else’s dream.<br /><br />On my way back to the River Street Inn the mini-mart at the corner gas station winked at me with dinner to go: mozzarella cheese, low salt crackers, a diet coke. Add to this the cookie and apple sauce left over from the train ride, and I would be happy for the evening. Though I had planned on Moody’s, probably Truckee’s best restaurant, I suddenly felt the need to protect my pocket book from “haute cuisine” and my heart from cholesterol and salt. With great delight I sat on the bed, surrounded by books, snacks, a pleasant décor, and a most interesting view of snow sliding off the neighboring roof. I watched for almost two hours. Sheets, sprinkles, dust, rolls, drips. It was an ever-changing spectacle of movement. McGlashan is credited with designing the perfect roof slant for Truckee, which I, a child observer of the German roof avalanche, can appreciate. We used to hear it all the time, “Be careful; the roofs are full of snow.” Sloped not quite at the right angle, I assume, they would suddenly rid themselves of a ton of snow that could bury you alive. On my trip through the foothills of the Alps I saw the warning signs on many houses “Danger. Roof Avalanche.” But here it was a gradual process, releasing only portions of snow, and when I woke in the morning the roof glistened in the early morning sun. Warmed from the inside and from the outside it was bare except for a couple of small patches.<br /><br />The town, too, shimmered under a blue sky when I took my last lap around the main strip. The sidewalk was empty of snow. Stores were still closed; only breakfast places were open. I wanted to say goodbye to Rose the waitress at the Wagon Train but she hadn’t come in yet. As I was walking through town I read the advertisements. Snowboard Rentals. Dog Biscuits. Massages. Beads. Everything except fresh bread I thought.<br /><br />And everybody except old women, I added after I carefully tested the hard-packed, smoothly shiny, trampled path between sidewalk and street. Place your foot firmly, I told myself; you don’t want to slip and fall. Only a few feet from the train station.<br /><br />Old women lived here a century ago; I read about them in the books I bought yesterday and the day before. They probably didn’t have much of a choice. Nona McGlashan who wrote the memoir about her grandfather grew up here, but the book jacket says she retired in Auburn.<br /><br />As I picked my seat for the trip home I wondered how much time she spent in Truckee after her grandfather’s death in 1911. I wondered if she is still alive at 98.<br /><br />Auburn, hmmm? Maybe when it gets a little warmer.<br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><div></div></div></div></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17562562571414391716noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6774273276339751820.post-49870197849672565822009-07-13T09:18:00.000-07:002009-07-13T09:48:37.940-07:00The Bailiwick of Guernsey<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/Sltk_rW0_FI/AAAAAAAAA-c/ikrGAvLUXH0/s1600-h/Guernsey+Lihou+Island+Causeway.jpg"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 299px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5357987226820344914" border="0" alt="" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/Sltk_rW0_FI/AAAAAAAAA-c/ikrGAvLUXH0/s400/Guernsey+Lihou+Island+Causeway.jpg" /></a><br /><br /><div><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/Sltk_VaGg8I/AAAAAAAAA-U/XetVYEMZlto/s1600-h/Ty+and+the+fort.JPG"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 300px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 400px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5357987220928496578" border="0" alt="" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/Sltk_VaGg8I/AAAAAAAAA-U/XetVYEMZlto/s400/Ty+and+the+fort.JPG" /></a><br /><br /><div><div>In my worst nightmares I run through tangled streets and dark alleyways, desperately trying to catch a train, rapidly losing my connection to anything familiar. In my best daydreams I amble across sunny market squares and shaded avenues, happily following a well-marked path, confidently climbing toward a spectacular mountain retreat.<br /><br />In reality travel shuffles relaxed and anxious moments in random games of hide and seek. But almost ten years of retirement, ten years of foreign shores, line up on my living room wall, and all look like happy memories to me now. Does my mind only store the daydreams? What about my trip to Guernsey? The experience was difficult enough to make me say “never again,” yet filled with spectacular sights and memorable thoughts. How will I remember Guernsey? Maybe this journey too will eventually simmer gently into the melting pot of “once upon a time,” no longer scorching the bottom, no longer boiling over the edge, but for now, as I begin to write, Guernsey stands out, shouting “dangerous” and “divine” simultaneously.<br /><br />Three months earlier I would have placed Guernsey up north near Shetland and Fair Isle. I would have imagined a cabled sweater. Ponies. Then I received a postcard of Guernsey’s St. Peter Port Harbor from a friend and traced the island to thirty miles west of the Normandy coast, the Bay of St. Malo to be exact. When I googled the island I was directed to “The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society,” a brand new book by Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows. I bought the book and while I read it I made notes and returned to google at frequent intervals. Though it is much closer to France, Guernsey is a dependency of the British Crown. I bookmarked websites, sorted through history, printed a map, downloaded a walking brochure. Twenty-four square miles of cliff paths and sandy beaches and museums, the best weather England has to offer. Sixty thousand inhabitants, a unique kind of government, “The States of Deliberation,” not represented in the UK Parliament, yet the responsibility of the UK Government for its international representation.<br /><br />I bought a second novel, “The Book of Ebenezer Le Page,” written by G. B. Edwards, a Guernseyman. The book, first published in 1981, five years after Edwards’ death, is an account of one man’s eighty years on the island. A fictional account that has the texture of a true memoir. After reading this book I searched, tentatively, flight schedules, bus routes, ferry service, hotels. A few days later I announced, “I’m going to Guernsey!”<br /><br />“Guernsey?”<br /><br />“Why Guernsey?”<br /><br />It was clear that receiving a postcard and reading a couple of books didn’t impress my friends as a good enough reason for going anywhere.<br /><br />“I like the word Bailiwick.”<br /><br />The word was attached to Guernsey on several websites; I didn’t know what it meant, but “the Bailiwick of Guernsey” fascinated me.<br /><br />“My IRA is going down the drain, so I might as well spend what I will lose anyway.”<br /><br />It was a better reason than the others, but still, you’re supposed to save not spend when the economy crashes. Oh well, I just didn’t have a good reason.<br /><br />Nevertheless, I got up at five on the morning of October 10, 2008, a Thursday, took a shower, ate my oatmeal, swallowed eight pills, rolled my small suitcase to the door, and waited for the shuttle driver to pick me up. He arrived forty minutes late, late enough to make my blood pressure outperform the medication. And though I was whisked through inspection at San Jose’s Norman Minetta Airport in record time, American Airlines soon forced me to take repeated deep breaths. I heard my doctor’s voice, “we’ve got to get your high blood pressure under control,” and automatically slowed down my apprehensions with a series of deep breaths and even deeper ohhhms. Flight 1588 has been delayed,” …ohhhhhm…. “We are awaiting the delivery of a rear slide”….ohhhm…”the part will be arriving from San Francisco by courier soon”….ohhhm…. “You might want to rebook on another flight”… ohhhm…”unfortunately we have received the wrong part”……the longest and deepest ohhmmmm ever. Unfortunately it drained the last breath of hope from the pit of my stomach. At three in the afternoon it became clear that the plane would have to be replaced. By then I had been rebooked twice, the last flight from Dulles to London had left, and I was quite tired. At 5:00pm they sent me to Los Angeles. Eventually I made it to London, seven hours late. It was Friday, the afternoon of October 11. I changed the time on my watch, changed dollars into pounds, took a National Express bus from Heathrow to Gatwick, flew on to Guernsey via Flybe, and landed just in time for dinner. I hadn’t closed my eyes in 28 hours. You don’t have to be asleep to experience a nightmare.<br /><br />The location of my hotel: St. Peter Port, 5, Constitution Steps. The Sunnycroft Hotel website had intrigued me. “Uniquely situated on an old stepped street above the St. Peter Port town center, it occupies a peaceful crow’s nest position with spectacular views across the picturesque harbour to Guernsey’s neighboring islands of Herm, Sark, Little Sark and Jethou.”<br /><br />What’s a few steps if the view is great and the price is half that of the Yacht Inn across the street from the harbor? At least I wouldn’t have to be evacuated if the seawall broke and the Esplanade became flooded. Clearly I had watched too many weather related disasters on CNN in recent months.<br /><br />“I’ll drop you above the hotel,” the cabdriver said, “it’s easier to walk down than up. He turned<br />into a narrow street and continued his explanation. “Especially with a suitcase.”<br />“How many steps down?” I asked.<br /><br />“Around forty.”<br /><br />“How many up?”<br /><br />“At least a hundred.”<br /><br />I hobbled my suitcase down the steps to the Sunnycroft.<br /><br />Mrs. Pestana, the manageress, was perfectly blond, with pale blue eyes and an efficient set of instructions. She looked twenty-something. I was elated to have reached my destination. Too talkative maybe? With a few words of polite welcome she deflated my overly sensitized system. No old world charm here, I thought. I suddenly felt abused. Later I found out that many in the hotel industry are either Latvian or Portuguese nationals on a nine months working visa. I decided that Mary Pestana must have come from Latvia; it’s quite cold there I think, maybe her lips had frozen into a thin line at an early age.<br /><br />“The view is fabulous from the top of the steps,” I offered in defiance.<br /><br />“You’ll have to let us know in the morning if you want dinner tomorrow,” she countered.<br /><br />I dragged my suitcase down a narrow, white-spackled hallway, past rooms one through six, all the way to the end. Room seven. My home for the next ten days. When I opened the door I knew I had arrived at a place of character. I saw an oddly shaped, sparkling clean room. White sheets, white walls, white washbasin. A windowed door opened to the stone wall veranda, connecting me to the guests in rooms one through six via a view of the harbour and the other islands. In the bathroom, the shower had a mind of its own. No matter how I adjusted its temperature, it produced scalding water first, then followed up with an icy trickle. When I brushed my teeth at the sink, the hot water faucet ignored me. Before I went to bed I learned to pump the handle on the toilet tank to produce enough water for a flush. Just like Paris in the old days, I thought. I loved it.<br /><br />Crackers and chocolate for dinner, I realized after I had unpacked. I didn’t feel brave enough to meet an unfamiliar downtown on a Friday night. Not when a hundred steps separated me from it. The porch was a wonderful place to end the day, and while my dinner might have been meager, the lights of the port below, echoed by the sea and domed by a darkening, cloud-clustered sky, were as inviting as I had hoped.<br /><br />I returned to the veranda several times during the night. As the voices from nearby pubs grew drunker and my bed grew lumpier, I sat, my left hand pressed over my chest. Pain?<br />Why? What did it mean? I didn’t sleep that night. I coughed more than usual. In my travel journal I wrote, “I hope this trip isn’t shortened by an emergency exit!”<br /><br />On Saturday morning, after I suffered through a few bites of a bland English breakfast that was too greasy and carelessly prepared to describe, I began my exploration of the island. I counted one hundred and five stairs down to the market place, and 500-some steps to the bus terminal. Sixty pence would get me a ninety minute introduction to the island. Three stops into the trip the chest pains came back. I count when I am scared. I count everything. It is a mindless recording of numbers to drown out fear. Crawling through the green countryside along the top of the south cliffs, I must have been on my sixth or seventh greenhouse, when Ebenezer Le Page became part of the landscape. Ebenezer, the old, quarrelsome fisherman who grew tomatoes at Le Moulin, his granite cottage by the sea. Though he had lived on the north side of Guernsey, in the Parish of Vale, he had left his footprint all over the island. As more and more greenhouses flew by, I imagined him sitting on a stone bench, casting a frown at the intruders.<br /><br />Later I would buy “The Review” printed by the Guernsey Society. In the spring edition British writer and long time Ebenezer fan, Richard Platt wrote:<br /><br />“This is not a work of literature. It is a thing of flesh and bone. Ebenezer and I had often journeyed together in imagination, and shared our tea in front of a coal fire, but now I had come to Guernsey in body as well as spirit, to walk the streets he walked and follow the path of his life.”<br /><br />If Ebenezer Le Page is the main fictional character of the island, the German Occupation lends its ghostly remnants as main tourist attraction. I made a mental note to investigate, when I saw the sign “German Occupation Museum.” In the historic tug of war between countries Guernsey seems to have two very important dates: 1066 when the Duke of Normandy, William the Bastard, defeated King Harold and the Duchy of Normandy and England became one. 1940 when the Germans invaded the Channel Islands and stayed for five years. Guernsey became part of Hitler’s Atlantic Wall. Bunkers and other fortifications still spread, like milestones, along the coastline, and clubs like the “Vintage & Military Amateur Radio Society,” the “Guernsey Military Vehicle Group,” and the “Channel Islands Occupation Society,” are dedicated to keeping history alive.<br /><br />Guernsey, I told a lady at Buttons Bookshop later, seems like a war chest for memoir writers. The Channel Islands were bombed after they had been demilitarized and the islanders were more or less deserted by England. They suffered air raids, occupation, starvation, deportation to concentration camps, and all the other atrocities of war. Twenty-one thousand were evacuated; Rumors and confusion and fear kept another twenty-thousand on the island. I think that most who stayed wrote memoirs. I bought ten of them. At various bookstores around the island I scanned another twenty or twenty-five.<br /><br />Not to forget one of the reasons for visiting, I also inquired about “The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society” everywhere and was assured that the book was a success with the locals. The exception was a guard at Castle Cornet. He shook his head and said, “Imagine, an American lady writing about WWII in Guernsey.” I countered with my best smile, informing him that it is a fictional story, written in letters, and that it is quite good.<br /><br />Mary Ann Shaffer, a San Francisco Bay Area librarian, wrote the Literary Society twenty some years after she had spent a night at the Guernsey airport. Her niece, Annie Barrows, finished the book because her aunt was too ill to work with the editors. Annie had never been to Guernsey. But it doesn’t matter because the landscape is not a major part of the story; the characters are developed well enough to support the heroine, Juliet Ashton, in her quest to find material for her next book. I love the Guernsey Literary Society for its quirky characters and for its epistolary format that allows for time lapses and shortcuts in background material, yet gives plenty of room to spontaneity in plot resolution.<br /><br />But no matter how hard I tried to concentrate on the Shaffer novel, G. B. Edward’s book about Ebenezer had imbedded itself into my memory, had become a part of me; the old man popped up everywhere. On the Pier Steps, for instance, the steps he climbed looking for the lawyer’s office to make out his will. His words warned me:<br /><br />“I went to Town and after I came out of the States Offices nearly killed myself, by being fool enough to climb up the Pier Steps. I thought it would save time. I got to the top puffing and blowing, and my old heart going like a hammer; and saw myself dropping dead in the middle of the High Street. I must never do that again.”<br /><br />I laughed at myself after I took the shortcut; Ebenezer was almost eighty when he decided to leave all his money and the memoir he was writing to Neville Falla, a young man from London. I laughed again when I bought a notepad at the Press Shop. Ebenezer had been there, too, and had complained:<br /><br />“The girl was in no hurry to serve me; and I sat thinking how I had lost my knack with girls. That was brought home to me the day I went to the Press Shop in Smith Street to buy this book I am writing in. When I walked in the shop there was three or four girls who was supposed to be serving, but they was standing in a bunch nattering and took no more notice of me than if I was the Invisible Man.”<br /><br />They don’t pay attention to old women, either, I wanted to tell him. Again I had to remind myself that he is not real. And yet, as Richard Platt points out:<br /><br />“Ebenezer is so real that the grave digger at the Vale Church, which is surrounded by a graveyard displaying many graves with family names from the story, has grown weary from alienating two and a half decades of incredulous visitors, to whom he has had to explain, having read the book twice himself, that Ebenezer is in fact a fictional character and was neither baptized nor buried there. Their disbelief is easily explained. To accept this book as a work of fiction requires an act of will.”<br /><br />I ate dinner in my room that evening, a baguette, brie, a tomato, an apple. I had stocked my refrigerator with foods that came closest to the diet I have to follow, though it was impossible to find sodium-free anything and just as hard to buy reduced fat items. The co-op on Market Square was the closest I would come to healthy food. And diet Pepsi, of course.<br /><br />Fifty-two hours without sleep. I coughed all night even though I sucked on cough drops most of the time. The pain behind my chest bone came every half hour; it was a faint pain but it kept me unsure, worried. But not until I walked along the harbour, on my way to Cornet Castle on Sunday morning, did I seriously consider cutting my trip short. I suffered a sudden, sharp pain, right in the middle of the chest, exactly where I imagined a heart problem could have developed. Ever since my angioplasty and stent procedure, I had panicked with every thought of a reclosing of the coronary artery. What had gone wrong? I sat down on a stone bench, breathing deeply, mentally listing my options. A visit to a doctor here would cost around two-hundred dollars, and what could he tell me? Only tests can give answers. Expensive tests. What if I needed re-stenting? I would have to fly home for that. What if the chest pains increased? I could die right now, right here, on a bench in the harbor of St. Peter Port. Patricia would have to take off from work to collect my body and take it home.<br /><br />After a while I walked again. As a matter of fact, just like the day before, I covered more than four miles, visited three museums at Cornet Castle, took a hundred pictures. I chatted with the lady at the cash register about the layout of the castle and gardens and with the museum guard, about history. She pointed out important spots of interest; he gave me insight into Guernsey’s past, offering well-rehearsed vignettes about the liberation and an unmistakable hand signal that showed little faith in Churchill. Every once in a while I indulged in a moment of self-pity. Privately. In silence. Weighing vulnerability against endurance.<br /><br />I spent the evening eating my cheese and tomato baguette, clutching my chest, watching silly TV shows, bouncing between “This will go away,” and “I’ll have to do something.”<br /><br />At three o’clock on Monday morning, October 13, I packed my belongings. I had gone without sleep for 85 hours, that’s three days and thirteen hours. I had decided to go home.<br /><br />The confusing voices in my head made me want to go home.<br />“If you don’t hurt, you didn’t work hard enough.” The collective wisdom and abuse of my parents’ generation.<br /><br />“Pain? What pain? Just slow down a little.” My old self, ignoring all but the most obvious signals.<br /><br />“Call your doctor immediately if you have a chest pain.” The sentence I had picked up from a physician on TV the day after Tim Russert died. The day the cable guy crawled under my house to fix a faulty connection and I ended up at the Kaiser emergency room.<br /><br />None of these voices played a leading role; none of them was clear enough to gain my vote of confidence. I would go home as soon as daylight arrived. Daylight! I would see the fiery rise of the sun one more time. But I would miss out on cliff walks, on Brother Déodat’s Little Chapel, on Lihou Island where Ebenezer and his best friend Jim Mahy got stranded, on the Parish of St. Martin where hungry Will Thisbee invented his potato peel pie. It would cost me dearly to rebook flights and I would definitely have to deal with another nightmare. And yet, all I wanted was to go home. To be near a Kaiser Hospital. Fully dressed I laid down on my bed to formulate a plan of action. I closed my eyes.<br /><br />Five hours later I woke. Sunshine in my face. Cautiously optimistic I sat up, looked around, saw the suitcase leaning against the wall, changed my mind about flying home. If I didn’t suffer chest pains climbing hundreds of stairs, I couldn’t have a heart condition. It had to be something else. Pleurisy? Deep breathing seemed to increase the pain. Soreness from the lumpy bed? A combination of jetlag and reaction to medication? A cold? I still coughed, still felt the stab behind the chest bone, but I was much calmer. Later I reasoned that keeping my suitcase packed and being prepared to throw all my plans overboard at any time had restored my confidence in myself. A few hours of sleep might have helped. Or … maybe this was all a hoax. Maybe my body had tricked me into being scared. For years it had tricked me into believing that I was healthy, pretending to be perfectly capable of pushing blood around my arteries. And it had tricked me after the coronary procedure with the globus histericus affair, the lump in my throat that made me afraid I couldn’t swallow food. Malade Imaginaire? I had never thought of myself as hypochondriac before, but during the past five months I had made more trips to medical facilities than during the previous nine years of retirement.<br /><br />Though I rearranged the list of possible reasons for chest pains again and again, slowing my step when I felt the slightest pinch, I explored Victor Hugo’s part of town. He had written “Les Miserables” while in exile on Guernsey, had written “The Toilers of the Sea” about Guernsey, and was probably the most famous person ever to live on the island. His fifteen-year stay had inspired a trail map that I had hoped to pick up after inspecting his elaborately decorated home. But the house was closed for renovation and I had to be content with a few photos of the exterior. I wasn’t a huge Victor Hugo fan anyway, I consoled myself. Besides, I already trailed two other authors’ imagination.<br /><br />Around noon I bought a cup of potato leek soup and a baguette at the bottom of Constitution Steps and stuffed my pockets with several kinds of cough drops from the pharmacy on Market Square. By three I had paged my way through several bookshops and needed a cup of coffee. The Dix Neuf in the Arcade was on my “must do” list. Dix Neuf is a hip coffee shop where all the young black-suited bankers seemed to have congregated to discuss the financial crisis. I never found out why the downtown afternoon crowd looked like a batch of cloned undertakers, but it seemed appropriate at the time. In the Guernsey Press I read that no bailout was offered here since Guernsey is an offshore financial center without safeguards. The managers of Iceland’s Landsbanki Guernsey had transferred most of the bank’s funds to a sister institution in England; there was nothing left for Channel Island customers who had entrusted Landsbanki with their savings. Only the sister bank in England would receive bailout moneys. Papers, airwaves, and internet forums denounced the way the Guernsey government, the States of Deliberation, handled the crisis. The quickly formed Depositors Action Group on its website “I want my Money from Landsbanki” reported heartbreaking pleas from retirees who had lost their life savings, and working couples whose children were suddenly deprived of their college funds.<br /><br />Late in the afternoon I climbed the stairs to my hotel with only two pauses to catch my breath. I felt pleasantly tired and only vaguely annoyed by the discomfort deep breathing produced. After teasing my ration of hot water from the showerhead and raiding the refrigerator for calorie wise baguette toppings, I settled on the communal veranda to listen to the evening sounds of the harbor. After dark BBC1 entertained me with “Panorama” in which the commentator Matt Frei examined the rise of Barack Obama and Sarah Palin. The segment was advertised as “Obama and the Pitbull.” I had already heard several Brits complain about increased coverage of news from across the pond rather than European politics, but I appreciated the show. I’ve always been a BBC fan and it certainly was more informative than the Snooker Championship and two silly game shows on the other channels.<br /><br />On Tuesday I explored The Guernsey Museum, smiling, remembering my childhood at the exhibit of “Childhood Memories” and giving the Museum’s Victoria Café a chance to woo me with its Guernsey gâche, the island “signature treat.” So much for culinary artistry; this was just plain raisin bread.<br /><br />After getting lost in a tangle of unfamiliar streets I hopped on a bus, not sure where to go next and was immediately drawn into a conversation with two German ladies. For the next half hour they pointed at their island map at each turn, arguing our position, but they nodded in agreement when we discussed our WWII experiences. All three of us had just turned 70; we had been children during the war; we thought war was a terrible thing to inflict on the young.<br /><br />Soothed by our common past I disclosed my chest pains for the first time to somebody other than my self-absorbed inner watchdog. Even now I can hear myself whine, “It’s the same kind of pain I had when the advice nurse made me call an ambulance. And I was just sitting at my desk when it started. My blood pressure was 217 over 112 when they carried me out of my house.”<br /><br />“You should get that checked” was the polite response before we continued to exchange air raid and bomb shelter stories. What was I thinking? You don’t talk to other travelers about your ailments. Was I that desperate? Annoyed with myself I stepped off the bus at St. Sampson while the two women continued their roundtrip back to the cruise terminal. St. Sampson Harbor, I remembered, was close to Bordeaux Harbor which Ebenezer had called “Birdo,” but my lapse in proper etiquette irritated me enough to spoil my walk through Ebby’s neighborhood. Not even a stop at the local knit shop or bookstore revived my enthusiasm. Why is it, I wondered, that after living a whole life on my own, I still get trapped into the expectations that had been inflicted upon me in my childhood?<br /><br /><br />“Be polite,” had trumped honesty.<br />“Don’t impose,” had veiled fear and forbidden the right to confide.<br /><br />My feet drudged through the back streets of St. Sampson without establishing a connection to the history around me, because I was absorbed in a list of complaints against my own history. The sunny, white-washed face of isolated communities often hides unpleasant, even deadly secrets. Who demands loyalty of a child without providing it with the safety it deserves? I dug deeper into old wounds with each thought. Began to sort blame. When I caught myself counting my steps from one block to the next, I knew it was time to stop my detour into the past. Time to catch the bus back to St. Peter Port.<br /><br />A trip to the German Occupation Museum on Wednesday left its imprint on me for the rest of my stay, its emotional impact far greater than I had expected. I suspect that the presence of World War II made my chest pains that day seem less pronounced. Never had I seen so many weapons in one place, and such detailed documentation of wartime rules and regulations. Do the soldiers of one nation really use such a variety of helmets and caps and hats? How much communications equipment did it take to control the islands? How many warning signs and official orders? Along one length of the building a street had been set up, a replica of a Guernsey street during the Occupation. Complete with banged up bicycles and old brooms leaning against storefronts. Even the “Liberation Tearoom” was filled with evidence of Hitler’s destructive powers. I was disturbed by the canon in the corner, while I forced a cup of Nescafé down and tried to joke with the old man who was as somber as his museum. I suddenly yearned to see a young person bobbing his head to a rap song. Please! Somebody slouch in a chair! No more German soldiers fixing their lifeless mannequin eyes on distant goals. I couldn’t wait to escape.<br /><br />That evening, sitting on my bed, spreading brochures splashed with German soldiers and swastikas, I thought how the islanders must have felt deserted and trapped in those five years. They often battled equally hungry German soldiers and foreign slave workers for stray potatoes and old cabbage stalks. Their rations were often cut to almost nothing. Bread became a luxury. Only during the final months did the Red Cross ship Vega bring relief to the starving islanders.<br /><br />Being totally isolated must have been just as bad as being hungry. Radios had been confiscated and anybody caught hiding one was punished. Dorothy Pickard Higgs wrote:<br /><br />“We have had our wireless sets removed again and are almost without news. We can read the German version on the front page of the local paper if we want to (!) and occasionally someone who has Jerries in the house, can hear something when they are out. But we hear so little that it isn’t possible to follow the course of the war at all. The fierceness of “their punishments for even minor offences has made Guernsey afraid to take risks, so we are all being fairly law abiding. But things are getting very difficult, because they are stealing so much of our stuff and even our police daren’t lay a hand on a uniform, no matter how mean the theft they catch it perpetrating. The meanest of all is the way they are taking food from the men’s allotments, so that they can’t have any store for the winter. How can we help hating the sight of them?”<br /><br />Sometimes neighbor turned against neighbor, desperate for even the smallest favor from the enemy, but most of the time families shared their hidden food stash. Higgs, who was one of the lucky ones, raising hens and growing vegetables, wrote:<br /><br />“We had a dinner party today – quite an event. Tomato soup and eggs baked in potato nests, with lots of green peas, and sweet corn pudding. I am sick to death of the last, but the visitors loved it, and Frank never gets tired of anything.”<br /><br />Mary Ann Shaffer used rationing in her novel to highlight togetherness. Dawsey Adams tells Juliet of the death of a diseased pig:<br /><br />“I remembered my mother making soap from fat, so I thought I could try it. It came out looking like frozen dishwater and smelling worse. So I melted it all down and started again. Booker, who had come over to help, suggested paprika for color and cinnamon for scent. Amelia let us have some of each, and we put it in the mix. When the soap had hardened enough, we cut it into circles with Amelia’s biscuit cutter. I wrapped the soap in cheesecloth, Elizabeth tied bows of red yarn, and we gave them as presents to all the ladies at the society’s next meeting. For a week or two, anyway, we looked like respectable folks.”<br /><br />I reread a few pages of Ebenezer Le Page before I turned off the light. My fictional hero, too, made me feel the weariness of the islanders, the energy it took to stay alive, and the emotions that held together families. Old Ebenezer had walked across the island from his home in Vale in the northeast to his one-time girlfriend’s house in Plainmont, the very tip of the south west coast, to find his cousin Raymond. He had risked his life by walking all night, defying the curfew, and when he stumbled back into his living room he found his sister waiting up for him.<br /><br />“She was sitting by one candle, sewing a patch on the seat of a pair of my old pants from some of the rags Raymond had left behind. ‘ I thought I would wait up for you,’ she said. I saw how grey her hair was, and how thin her face and her body; and she had been a well-made little woman. I was overcome by a feeling of homage for my sister. I knelt in front of her: and she is the only woman I have ever knelt to; and I bowed my head in her lap. She didn’t know why I did it; for Tabitha, of all people, would have been the last to imagine anybody could ever pay her homage. She stroked my neck, as once my mother had done. ‘Are you hurt;’ she said. I said, ‘Raymond and Horace are killed, and my lovely Lisa is a jerry-bag.’”<br /><br />With so much emphasis on World War II in the tourist industry and so many signs of the occupation still visible all over the island, I had braced myself for at least a few hostile remarks. “You are German?” asked with raised eyebrows. Or maybe a simple factual statement thrown in my direction: “The Germans inflicted so much pain on our island.” At least a general sentiment like, “It was a bad time.” Instead, I encountered many smiles from older islanders. For some the past had become a means to earn a few Guernsey pounds, and for others preservation of history had turned into a hobby. Apologies, floating to the surface of my mind occasionally, were not needed, not expected, but I was quite sure that nobody forgets air raids and starvation and mine fields and deportation to concentration camps. And I, would I ever overcome the shiver that seizes me when I hear the sound of a siren?<br /><br />I made plans for Thursday before I opened my eyes. Breathing slowly, evenly, I was grateful for a full night’s sleep and decided to ignore chest pains, if they came during the day. “I’m fine,” I told myself. I would walk the west coast, from the Shipwreck Museum at Fort Grey to Lihou Island. “There is really nothing wrong with me. All I needed was enough sleep.”<br /><br />My self-examination continued while I was getting ready for the day. “Am I a hypochondriac?” I asked my frown in the mirror while I brushed my teeth under a trickle of cold water. After I dabbed my face with a washcloth I stood up straight, rubbed my chest, probing, trying to locate the spot where the pain had been. “Right there! I can feel it.” Dismissing the sore spot as a trick of my anxiety producing imagination I covered it with a t-shirt and grabbed my camera. Fog hung over the harbor and the morning air was cool and misty.<br /><br />Tyana had been sitting on a little table next to the bed for five days and nights; I had barely looked at her. I have to be in the right frame of mind to carry her around and to answer questions from onlookers to our photo expeditions. Today would be the day.<br /><br />I took her outside. Three or four rooms down an army of black socks hung over a chair and a pair of naked legs extended from the doorstep, wiggling toes on the tiled floor. Every once in a while a puff of smoke shot into the air from just beyond the doorframe. A tightly constructed answer to the “No smoking in the room” sign. After several minutes a pale young man in gray briefs emerged. He seemed to be talking to a roommate while he touched one of the socks. I wondered if he knew about the switch that would heat the towel rack and dry his socks. “He looks like a Brit; he should know,” I told myself and smiled when he gave me a quick wave before he went back inside. Twisting and turning the teddy bear, propping her onto the low stonewall, leaning her against the doorframe, balancing her on the winding staircase to the upper deck I thought about the postcards I had bought at the bus terminal. Postcards of teddy bears. A local woman had posed bears in front of various tourist attractions, the Little Chapel, Cobo Beach, Cornet Castle. She sold calendars, cups, towels, showing off her “Guernsey Teddy.” I had seen the bears in all sizes in several of the local stores.<br /><br />Excitement had crept back into my agenda. I would buy Tyana a friend and take pictures of them together<br /><br />As it happened, I made a friend that day. It began on the bus. A middle-aged gentleman sat down, a seat ahead, across the aisle. I wouldn’t have paid attention except that he carried a dog, a terrier, who shivered with fear. The man talked to him, stroking him, lifting him closer to the window until the fear subsided and he was content to watch the landscape fly by. The man held on to him tightly halfway around the island. Dogs, I read later, are allowed on Guernsey buses, but they may not occupy a seat. I pulled my camera from the daypack and took a picture, trying not to attract attention to myself by disarming the flash and holding the camera low. While the man didn’t seem to notice, the dog did. After two shots he sat up straight, his ears tilted forward. He stared at me. As if caught in a forbidden act, I grinned apologetically and stuck my camera back into the bag; after all it isn’t polite to take a picture without consent. When they exited the bus the man and I nodded at each other, the way travelers often do. I smiled and said, “Bye, doggie!”<br /><br />Half an hour later I saw the dog run toward me. On the causeway to Fort Grey and its Shipwreck Museum I was taking my first shots of Tyana and was exchanging small talk with a couple from England. The dog greeted me like an old friend, wagging his stumpy tail, jumping back and forth.<br /><br />“May I take a few pictures of your dog?” I asked after we all had agreed that the weather was nice for a walk along the coast and that the exhibits at the museum were not to be missed.<br /><br />The man gave his approval but added, “Benji is the boss of me.”<br /><br />I twittered like a mother,“ Is that all right with you, Benji? Hi, Benji. Come here, Benji!”<br /><br /><br />While the others continued to examine the horizon for clouds I played with Benji. After ten minutes they all took off toward the museum and I returned to Tyana. Benji stood still occasionally, looked back. I waved and posed my bear against the backdrop of the historic site.<br /><br />Sometimes a stranger becomes indelibly connected to the memories of a place, a time, an event. If it is another adult I encounter, the anonymous familiarity means a break in the stress of travel. There is no relationship, only momentary understanding. If I connect with a child, I feel a motherly responsibility to add a pleasant memory to the young one’s store of experiences. With animals I sometimes share a sense of community. An unspoken, playful acknowledgement of shared space. This has happened with cats and dogs, sheep, cows, and large birds, but I sometimes wonder how a bear would react to my presence. Or a wolf. I imagine that my fear would prevent communication of any kind should I ever get close enough to a really wild animal. But I remember the storks of Marrakech and their welcoming chatter. I remember the lone sheep near Humsaugh along Hadrian’s Wall. A golden retriever, twenty-five years ago, at the Esalen Institute. They understood. Benji understood too.<br /><br />When a sharp chest pain hit me later, in front of the HMS Boreas, Benji was close by, looking over his friend’s shoulder. I kept on reading about the 120 lives that were lost on the Hanois Reef in 1807. Outwardly I pretended nothing had happened even though my mind had by now included lung cancer in its dark anticipations. Persistent coughing. Sharp chest pain when breathing deeply. Typical symptoms. For a while Benji’s little face calmed me. Knowing that I was not alone calmed me. But I nearly panicked when the British couple and Benji and his friend disappeared. Even the kindly shopkeepers who insisted on taking a picture of me and Tyana, could not give me my balance back. I walked out, like a zombie, onto what seemed like enemy territory - a place without my doctor, my lifeline. Lacking enthusiasm I sat Tyana on top of the George III cannon that points towards the Hanois reef. More than one hundred ships have sunk near the lighthouse in the last two centuries. A depressing thought. An ominous symbol of nature’s superiority, even on a calm day when neither sea nor sky threatened to destroy lives.<br /><br />A quarter mile down the main road I hoped that the lemon drizzle cake at Le Sablones Teagarden, behind the L’Eree Hotel would get me out of my slump. Two elderly ladies, friends meeting for lunch, the only customers, were inclusive in their conversation with me, yet exclusive in their understanding of each other. To them I probably was the slightly annoying stranger with her unconventional prop, a child’s teddy. To my own reasoning I was the bore who could not get her act together, could not enjoy the moment. It wasn’t until I had walked up a hill, around Fort Saumarez, and across L’Erée headleand to the causeway that connects Guernsey and Lihou Island, that I finally regained my composure.<br /><br />Lihou Island was the place where a young Ebenezer Le Page and his friend Jim Mahy spent the night after the incoming tide prevented them from leaving. I would have crossed had I remembered to check the tide table in the morning. I saw several people, all quite young, on the island and eventually I made it across half the causeway. Two-hundred and fifty feet from either shore. The rocky path was littered with shells and seaweed. Tidal pools filled the crevices and I had to jump over puddles that were too deep to wade through. In the distance I saw the big grey-shingled farmhouse that is run by the Lihou Charitable Trust, mainly to benefit school children. Tyana fell face forward into a trickle of seawater. I had forgotten to bring the chopsticks that I normally slide into the back of her clothing to make her stand up. After staring at the island for several minutes I wished I had brought a pair of binoculars to be able to see the ruins of the Priory up close. I also wished I were a few years younger, less conservative in my decision making. Not scared to be swept away by the incoming tide or halted in mid-journey by an unreliable heart or lungs that refused to respond kindly to blasts of fresh air.<br /><br />Before the trip I had read a number of websites and knew that the Priory had been established in the twelfth century by Benedictine monks from Mont Saint Michel in Normandy. The official Guernsey Government Website informed that according to legend, witches found the Priory a great source of irritation. I imagined frantic witches’ high-pitched voices slicing the misty night, clashing with faithful whispers from monastic stonewalls. I really should have checked the tide table.<br /><br />Lihou Island had shaped Ebenezer’s life, had made him deeply aware of love and friendship, but at the same time had conditioned him to miss out on future pleasures. One night of closeness had taught him to reject lesser relationships. There seems to be a hint at homosexual desires according to some scholars, especially since Ebenezer never married, but I think his love for Jim was a matter of trust and understanding. Jim gave his unconditional attention to his friend, and when he was involved in an unhappy marriage later on, Ebenezer learned to be accepting toward Jim’s wife, because his friend needed his strength. Of Jim’s thoughts on Lihou, where they had been stranded as teens on a late Sunday afternoon, G. B. Edwards wrote:<br /><br />“By the time we got back to the L’Erée end again, the sea was over the causeway. He couldn’t swim and nor could I, and to get back up to our waists in the water it was hopeless to try because the current is very strong there, and we would have only been swept out to sea…..I wasn’t worried, though. I’d never felt so happy. I wish I could remember what we said to each other that night. I know we sat down on the grass and talked more friendly than we ever had before. Jim was always open with me, and said anything that came into his head; but I wasn’t so open with him, as a rule. That night I was. I could say anything to Jim.”<br /><br />Lihou Island, more than any other place on Guernsey, made me wish I had more time to explore. The bright yellow shells I brought home have paled; the wispy seaweed that had clung to the rocks I collected has dried. Books and maps and brochures are stuffed in a shoebox. But Lihou lingers. When I saw Benji and the man again a couple of days later, they both recognized me. The man and I had a casual shout across the street, about the beauty of the cliff walk and about teatime at Fermain. The dog gave a quick stubby wag and a pull on his leash. “Bye, Benji” I waved. Then we moved on.<br /><br />I think that silly laughter, wafting on a cloud of cigarette smoke, was the answer to my next chest pain. Almost two in the morning. Am I needy again? Is it possible that a crude joke; a joke I hadn’t even heard, could give me enough of a connection with the world around me to fight the nighttime blues? I draped my coat over my pajamas and opened the door to the patio. The twenty-somethings were topping off their irreverent salutations to the gods of beer. Light split the night in half in front of room three; shadowy torsos leaned from the door frame at intervals, aiming the glowing heads of cigarettes towards an ashtray I couldn’t see. I shivered, felt awkward in my makeshift garb, stood ready to withdraw, an unwanted intruder into the night-time pleasures of young working men, away from home. I don’t know whether it was the fresh air rising from the harbor or the waves of nicotine and slightly slurred blissed-out voices of my neighbors that settled my uneasiness, after a while I returned to my bed and slept soundly toward the rise of the morning sun.<br /><br />My visit to the Little Chapel on Friday afternoon was not so much a result of a desire to see Brother Deodat’s miniature version of the Lourds Basilica as it was a photo opportunity for Tyana and her new friend “Guernsey Bear.” I bought him at Garnhams Gift Shop, right after eating a full English breakfast at Christie’s. Friday was a day split in half. The morning was filled with housekeeping, organizing, shopping, and my first really good breakfast since my arrival. And, because it was so good, I returned to Christie’s for lunch and ate the most delicious salad, made of rocket (a kind of lettuce) sun-blushed tomatoes, avocado slices, and mozzarella chunks.<br /><br />I realized that my time on the island would come to an end in a couple of days and that there was still so much more to see and do. The Little Chapel was called “a work of art and a labour of love” on the official website; I had read that it had been torn down and recreated several times and was now billed as possibly the smallest chapel in the world.<br /><br />“Bears, get ready,” I said and stuffed both of them into a shopping bag. When I arrived at the chapel I was surprised by its small size and found it to be excellent as background for bear portraits. The walls were studded with seashells, pebbles, and pieces of broken china; the entrance was narrow, and the altar filled with gifts and flowers from visitors. It was, I decided, not at all a Guernsey-like serious work of architecture, but a rather gaudy, idiosyncratic piece of personal ambition. Brother Deodat must have been terribly bored with his daily prayers to embark on this project. The bears loved it; they posed freely on the steps, by the entrance, next to a window.<br /><br />On the way back to the Sunnycroft I couldn’t find a bus stop and finally did what the locals do, I stood by the roadside and waved. The first bus went past me and the driver didn’t even look apologetic. It wasn’t until a half mile or so later that I realized I had been walking on the wrong side of the street. It was then, close to four in the afternoon, that I had another chest pain, probably because I was angry with myself for forgetting the British traffic pattern. A snippy voice of righteousness whispered in my ear.<br /><br />“Serves you right. You could be sitting in a comfortable bus if you paid attention.”<br /><br />“Spot on,” I answered my voice of punishment with a hint of defiance and almost tripped over a hump in the street. “Spot on” must have been the phrase of the day; I had heard it several times on television during the past few evenings. And the hump? It’s the British equivalent to our bump. I faced a couple more before the next bus picked me up and took me back to town. By then I had forgotten about the pain, concentrating instead on a strategy for dinner since Saturday closes the doors on all shops by five. Without much complaint I resigned myself to a stale baguette, the last of the brie, a pear, and a syrupy semblance of black currant juice. Nobody expects three good meals in one day.<br /><br />On Saturday I visited another war museum, this one near Cornet Castle, built into a bunker, again filled with more German war artifacts than I was expecting. I also visited, just a few hundred meters away, an Aquarium – an old Aquarium – that seemed to be run by one man who also sold fish food, soft drinks, and sandwiches. This place too, was housed in a bunker, at the bottom of the “Clarence Battery” another reminder of past wars.<br /><br />On my last day, Sunday, I finally climbed the stairs to “Clarence Battery,” viewed Guernsey from above, and walked the cliffs. Though I had to stop occasionally, out of breath, up and down this rocky terrain, I noticed that I was not afraid of a heart attack, maybe because I was surrounded by many other walkers who seemed to sprint the ascends and descends with ease. On their way to afternoon tea they were chatting with companions, nodding a friendly hello, enjoying the landscape.<br /><br />Maybe because Ebenezer was missing from this last outing before I returned to California, or maybe because I usually disconnect from my foreign adventure on the day before I leave it behind, I remember little of my last evening. On Monday I rode the bus to the airport, conquering the stairs down to the street one final time. My flights were uneventful, and I arrived home late, unpacked, and settled into my regular life without delay.<br /><br />I had no chest pains when I came home, but wanted to be “on the safe side” - as if a safe side exists – and made an appointment with my doctor. After I responded with a whispered “ouch” to the push of her two fingers on my blouse-covered upper torso, she speculated that a virus might have attacked my chest wall.<br /><br />I still don’t know what Bailiwick really means (or how to pronounce it properly) but it doesn’t matter; I love the word. Not everybody vacations in a Bailiwick.<br /><br />I have read all the books I bought on the island. My snapshots of Guernsey have entered the halls of glossy symbols. Trimmed, grouped, labeled, the island’s bunkers, staircases, greenhouses, and harbor sunrises habe been locked into an album. My regrets over not having walked across Lihou are buried alongside the regrets of prior journeys. The bears are still friends and greet me each morning from their seat by the window. Tyana has loaned the Guernsey Teddy a pair of her jeans to go with his jumper.<br /><br />It seems, once again, nightmares have been banned from my memories, only daydreams answer when I look at the clouds over Fort Hommet on my living room wall. While I sit at my desk I imagine Benji cocking his little wiry head, dark-suited bankers agonizing over the Guernsey Press, the manageress of the Sunnycroft finally pulling her lips into a faint smile. My young neighbor in room three, the one with bare pale torso and wet black socks, puffs smoky circles into the morning sky. Juliet Ashton of the Guernsey Literary Society has married Dawsey Adams and has learned to talk to pigs. Ebenezer? Ebby didn’t really die. He went back to the Press Shop and bought another journal.<br /><br />“I want to write down in it all the good thoughts I have left out in this,” he had told Neville when he had handed over his book.<br /><br />It seems only fair that Ebenezer le Page should be allowed the time to count his blessings. I praise my Guernsey companion, thank him for his guidance, and admit in a whispered aside that already my attention is straying onto a new map of adventures. </div><br /><br /><br /><div><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SltiT8zVY8I/AAAAAAAAA-E/Czu8CkiIJqs/s1600-h/Ty+and+the+fort.JPG"></a><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><div><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SltiTWje4oI/AAAAAAAAA98/7yFsg6EiXR0/s1600-h/ty+at+little+chapel.JPG"></a><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><div><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SltiS0Hm_vI/AAAAAAAAA90/zE0fdUL0xV4/s1600-h/Tyana+and+Guernsey+Teddy+explore.JPG"></a><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><div></div></div></div></div></div></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17562562571414391716noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6774273276339751820.post-88789091530908361162009-07-13T09:09:00.000-07:002009-07-13T13:16:13.113-07:00Sleeping in a Suitcase<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SluV_k2aHaI/AAAAAAAABGY/fkJsPBXhYHE/s1600-h/Sleeping+in+a+suitcase.jpg"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 300px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5358041101143514530" border="0" alt="" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SluV_k2aHaI/AAAAAAAABGY/fkJsPBXhYHE/s400/Sleeping+in+a+suitcase.jpg" /></a><br /><div>It was curiosity about the former DDR – the German Democratic Republic - as well as a wish for an unusual adventure, that took me cross-country to the other side of Germany. I wanted to see the poverty I had read about, the frustration, the exodus, and I wanted to sleep in the suitcase that was advertised as the smallest hotel in the world. Hindsight tells me that it was crazy to expect a meaningful experience within a twenty-two hour time span, but by a stroke of luck I encountered the most outgoing, ambitious and open-minded person who would guide me with enthusiasm into both, a political discussion and a night in a wooden box by the Zwickauer Mulde at the far end of Saxony. Herr Lehmann, the owner of the suitcase, is an extraordinary man.<br /><br />I had cut out an article about “Sleeping in a Suitcase” a few years ago, eventually researched it on the Internet and put it on my list of things to do someday. A month before my trip to Dilsberg I emailed Herr Lehmann and we set my date of arrival for September 21. He seemed thrilled, offered to give me a ride in his boat and a tour of his museum, even said he would pick me up from the nearest train station if I told him my arrival time. While I lived in Dilsberg I received a “Welcome to Germany” note from him. All that, I thought, for a ten Euro stay.<br /><br />Thirteen dollars to spend the night and one hundred and sixty dollars for the roundtrip. Though I left my rented house at five thirty in the morning, I didn’t get to Lunzenau until three in the afternoon. Five transfers – three trains and two buses, increasingly more graffiti and broken glass, less flowerpots, dilapidated communist blockhouses, long red lights and detours because of highway construction – and then I stepped out of the bus into bright sunshine onto a deserted street. Nobody to ask directions, no signs, few houses, fewer cars, not even a cat. A far cry from my fortress Dilsberg where people sat on benches in front of the town gate tower and directed strangers to the castle. I should have taken Herr Lehmann up on his offer to meet me at the train station, but it had seemed like such an imposition to make him drive forty-five minutes to pick up one person.<br /><br />As soon as I walked a few feet to the right I saw the restaurant “Zum Prellbock,” a white three story stucco with its own parking lot. And then I saw the Suitcase, a few feet back, separated from the street by a fence, surrounded by flowers. It was exactly as it was described and pictured online. A large wooden crate that was painted brown and embellished with the attributes of a suitcase. Not much taller than I; probably not even two feet longer, and definitely very narrow.<br /><br />“I’m going to sleep in that?”<br /><br />I’m not sure if I said it out loud or if I thought it. Slowly I walked alongside the restaurant, on one hand excited about having made it so far but also wondering if I would be able to find alternative sleeping arrangements if I became claustrophobic. I reached the locomotive and the restored train station that Herr Lehmann had hauled in and made into a museum. Down the stairs stretched a beer garden with wooden tables and chairs, shaded by large trees, edged by the river. Inside the dark interior of the restaurant I spotted Herr Lehmann in the middle of his kingdom. Station master hats hung everywhere, signs, posters, rail artifacts, souvenirs. We shook hands like long lost friends; his wife welcomed me with a glass of sparkling water and I was urged to sit and relax.<br /><br />We talked for half an hour before Herr Lehmann suggested I take a walk to the tall rail bridge a mile and a half away. He would get the boat ready and later his wife would prepare dinner. The boat, I realized as we toured the grounds, was the dinghy tied to a tree and it had taken on some water. My host gave me an introduction to the history of the suitcase and his passion for the railroad. He works for the Deutsche Bundesbahn, the German Rail system; he is a collector of rail art and anything else that is connected to trains. His restaurant is a meeting place for cultural events like poetry readings and art exhibits and the display of unusual hobbies. He built the suitcase a few years ago because he constantly had requests from visitors who wanted to spend a night in his train station. Together he and his wife manage the restaurant, the museum, the gift shop, the suitcase and an upstairs vacation home. Tourism has declined since the younger generation migrates west, hardly any requests for the furnished apartment that he rents out for twenty-five dollars a night. He gets up at three in the morning and drives seventy kilometers to his job in Leipzig. But he never quit smiling, and with great enthusiasm he told me about his plans for the future, a suitcase on wheels to take to exhibits and to travel the continent or at least visit the children.<br /><br />I had brought a present for Herr Lehmann, an American magazine about rail travel and a small figurine of a stationmaster. When he flipped through the pages aimlessly I realized that he did not understand English and suggested that he might like the photography. It was the only time I saw him reticent.<br /><br />“We learned Russian in school.”<br /><br />This simply had not occurred to me. Everybody else I knew in Germany had some basic knowledge of English. It was the curtain – the iron curtain - that had left its marks. The division I had read about, the uneasy readjustment of two halves that had for so long gone in their own opposing directions.<br /><br />Finally Herr Lehmann took me to my “room.” He unlocked the narrow door to the suitcase and the first things I saw were the tiny sink and the toilet. The rest of the interior was filled with the wooden bunks and an old metal locker. The walls of unpainted pressed wood were almost totally covered by black felt pen writing. The ceiling was batted with a dark blue fabric on which somebody had sewn yellow felt stars.<br /><br />“Make sure you leave a message too,” I was told as I read some of the poems and thank yous on the walls.<br /><br />Since there was no room to move around inside we stood in front. Soon Herr Lehmann left to get the boat ready for the promised ride on the river. For the first time I noticed the mosquitoes that swarmed around the waterfront and I regretted not having brought repellent. I posed Tyana on the top bunk and took a few pictures before I closed the door to freshen up a bit. If I moved very slowly I avoided banging into the walls. A small window at the top allowed for some light but I also located the switch for a lamp by the bed. On top of the locker I saw the bible, an old book of regulations for rail travel and a Japanese adventure story. Something to read for all occasions.<br /><br />After my limited cleanup session I took the camera and began the prescribed walk. It was easy to follow the river but too far to the bridge. Germans describe every stretch as being two kilometers but somehow it is always twice as long. The landscape was beautiful though it seemed neglected. Throughout my short stay in Saxony I had the feeling that two forces were at work, the fast pace of reconstruction but also a slow decline based on lethargy. I tried to sort out my impressions on a bench by the Mulde, tried to keep my expectations separate from reality, but I couldn’t. Every time I focused on the natural beauty in front of me, I remembered the face of a station attendant I had asked for directions. He didn’t move, barely opened his thin-lipped mouth, his eyes were hidden behind sunglasses. He looked cruel, like the East German policemen who shot at their brothers when they tried to climb the wall or escaped through underground tunnels. Like the villains on a movie set.<br /><br />Five minutes after six I showed up for dinner and excused myself from the boat ride. I didn’t want to hurt Herr Lehmann’s feelings, but the boat looked small, the mosquitoes threatening, I was hungry, and I began to feel the effects of the seven-hour train trip.<br /><br />The family sat under a tree with their evening meal. I apologized for being early. No problem, the menu would entertain me for half an hour. It not only detailed the food choices, all associated with the glory days of trains, but was also loaded with old ticket stubs, advertising, and historical facts. A clever way to involve the tourist with the concept of past rail travel and a tribute to the Lehmann’s creativity and commitment.<br /><br />I ordered potato dumplings, red cabbage, and sauerbraten. And of course my daily Cola light. I am not a beer drinker and I don’t remember how many times I had to point that out during my trip. I was one of six guests and the only one who remained until it got dark. We moved inside and after a quick phone conversation Herr Lehmann asked if I minded being interviewed and photographed. He would do the interview and the Free Press would send a photographer the next morning. I had suddenly become a celebrity because I had traveled so far to sleep in the suitcase. Most visitors were young cyclists who used it because it was cheap or because it was an oddity. There were occasional travelers from other German states, quite a few Berliners, some newlyweds, an oldster who hadn’t lost his sense of adventure yet, but nobody from the US had ever slept in the suitcase.<br /><br />A gentleman named Gert Flessing introduced himself and moved over on the bench so I could sit next to him. I recognized him from the website as the writer who would recite his poems the next evening.<br /><br />I was surprised when he smiled and explained, “Normally I am a pastor.”<br />“You are allowed to drink?” I said it without thinking and was reassured that beer consumption was not sinful. We both laughed. I apologized and told him that I was not used to socializing with a pastor. Then we discussed the recent elections and the fact that the right wing, the Neo Nazis had garnered a spot on the ticket. Her Flessing explained the peculiar kind of poverty the eastern states are facing.<br /><br />“Different from real poverty,” he claimed. “Our poor are demanding; they won’t make do with used things. They expect to be taken care of. We subsidize their children’s education and their heating bills in winter. But it never seems enough.”<br /><br />After a while I became a bit uneasy with the conversation. The “Wende” (the change or the turning point) as they call the fall of the Berlin Wall seems to have caused many problems. Unemployment (East Germany has 19 percent, twice that of the west), the exodus of the young (more than a million people have moved to the west since 1989), the closing of factories and the decay of the cement block communist houses. My question about Neo Nazi influence on the young provoked Herr Flessing to say that, “the left is just as dangerous.”<br /><br />Whatever it was that I detected in his voice, I didn’t want to explore further. I gave him my email address and promised to keep in touch. Herr Lehmann finished his interview with me and around ten his wife brought in my comforter, which he carried as he escorted me to the suitcase. It was totally dark outside. Dark, silent and thrillingly refreshing. After the door closed I brushed my teeth, slipped into my sweats and went to sleep.<br /><br />Why was I surprised the next morning that my sleep was so sound? It really makes no difference how big a place is once you close your eyes. I didn’t wake until my cell phone alarm went off at eight. Extricating myself from the lower bunk, looking into the mirror above the sink, I had the urge to rip open the door and dressed quickly. With the turn of the key I was part of the real world again. I wiped the dew from a chair and sat down to enjoy the morning, realizing that the thrill of this adventure was not in sleeping in a box; it was in the effects of the total package. The cats around my legs, the deep colors of fall flowers, the bright blue sky, the mumbling of the river, Frau Lehmann’s smile as she came with a covered basket and set the breakfast table for me. Cheeses and lunchmeats, yogurt, a boiled egg, fresh rolls, jam, coffee. She sat down with me while we waited for the photographer. And he, a typical German in my eyes, immediately argued about the expectations of the newspaper.<br /><br />“I am supposed to photograph an arrival.”<br /><br />Well, Frau Lehmann expected to be photographed having breakfast with me. It’s what Herr Lehmann had suggested, I guess. The photographer won. We were told to stand in the parking lot, by the rail art statue, the suitcase in the background, Frau Lehmann explaining its history, the sun shining brightly into our faces. I insisted on holding Tyana the bear. A young man without a sense of humor I thought when he frowned. But this time I won. I’m German, too, you know.<br /><br />The rest of the morning was that of a regular traveler. I packed, moved my belongings into the restaurant so Frau Lehmann could get the suitcase ready for the next inhabitant. On Herr Lehmann’s recommendation I took off toward the castle.<br /><br />“Rochsburg is only two kilometers away. You have to see it.”<br /><br />Either I got lost or the distance doubled and though I had a wonderful walk up and down mountains in the deep shadow and silence of old trees, I was glad to finally arrive at a plateau and see the castle in the distance. I knew I would miss my one o’clock bus – 13:10 to be precise – if I walked much farther. When I reached the main road, I located the sign that pointed back to Lunzenau and marched nonstop past windmills and smoke stacks – the dichotomy of old and new again – right back to the Prellbock. A quick Cola drink and a hearty handshake later I stood at the bus stop, ready for the long trip back to Dilsberg. As I had promised myself some time ago, I had slept in a suitcase, advertised as the smallest hotel in the world.</div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17562562571414391716noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6774273276339751820.post-28324588485068418802009-07-13T08:59:00.000-07:002009-07-13T09:08:50.095-07:00Heidelberg. Again.What my prior trips to Germany were unable to accomplish, this one delivered. My attachments – the monsters - slipped into history. Right from the beginning I was determined to explore a different Heidelberg. From my house in Dilsberg I took a bus into the city several times a week; I got off at different stops on a whim; I didn’t follow a pattern; I didn’t secretly listen to the echo of fifty-year old footsteps.<br /><br />One day the tower of the Church of the Holy Spirit forced its 200 steps on me but after some leg-numbing footwork I was rewarded with a spectacular view. Three hundred and sixty degrees of rooftops and woods, a glistening river and the castle so close I could pinpoint the spots where I had stood in December. Along the street and in the market place tourists scrambled from museum visits to postcard shopping to afternoon coffee like actors on a giant movie screen. Though their conversations were muted by the wind whistling around the tower, my connection to the image below was so intense that I couldn’t judge the speed of my observations. Did I watch slow motion or fast forward? I felt both, the lingering appreciation that comes with distance and the revved up process of multiple activities. <br /><br />A week later I took the cable car to the Königstuhl, the highest mountain overlooking Heidelberg. I was crammed into the funicular’s steep ascent with many other travelers, foreign and local - a loud, appreciative throng of digital image obsessed wanderers. I felt present, my senses unobstructed by the search for old feelings. We stared into the dark depth of the tunnel from where we had emerged and wondered what would happen if a cable snapped. And then, suddenly, we paid close attention to the oncoming car that waited on its sharp descent to witness us pass. At the very top where a trail cuts through the forest I found quite a different view from that of the church tower. The city was too distant for detail. The static symbols of mass population lost themselves in the haze of the horizon. Had it not been for a single fir tree that cut into the image, therefore demanding attention, I would have stayed disconnected from my surroundings. We all took photos of each other – proof that we had witnessed the existence of man’s vast empire – and then we sorted ourselves back into our particular groups or, as in my case, into solitude. Solitude with Bratwurst and Diet Coke. <br /><br />On two consecutive visits to Heidelberg I did nothing but take pictures of bicycles. I can’t imagine the city without bicycles but I had never paid much attention to their parking spaces. There were of course the regular areas at the train station, around the university, by the Karlstor, places where one could get lost in a sea of wheels. But then there were bicycles standing alone. In the middle of foot traffic. Secured to a fence. Leaning against advertising pillars. Used for shopping or to transport a pet dog through the rainy morning, or pulling a zipped up stroller with two small children. When I looked for riders, I saw an old man push his bike cautiously; it was overloaded with shopping bags and threatened to tip over any second. Another one shot pictures with his cell phone while he pedaled through the city. In a park I watched a mother teach her young daughter to ride in a straight line. As I got into a streetcar a young man dropped his bike against a lantern post and ran to catch a bus.<br /><br />Between advertising pillars and graffiti and flowers Heidelberg is awash in color. The mountain cemetery took my breath away with its dedication to the remains of the famed as well as the obscure. I walked past a thousand graves that bloomed like miniature gardens, gravestones that looked like sculptures, and benches that invited me to sit and meditate. In the oldest part, the Jewish cemetery, tall, rugged monuments with Hebrew inscriptions were shaded by ancient trees. Hours flew by while I read, sat, photographed, and mused. <br /><br />Another afternoon I stumbled into the stunning accomplishment of a group of local high schools. Close to twenty thousand small wooden blocks, decorated and linked together into a long wall, tell the result of an Internet letter begging to preserve peace and international law. Each block symbolizes one signature. One call to end human suffering. I had a quick relapse into my personal history when the display filled me with pride because I once belonged to one of those schools. <br /><br />My last weekend was dedicated to the Autumn Festival. I listened to the mayor of Heidelberg Germany give a speech and the mayor of Heidelberg South Africa respond. A Latin band competed with an oompah band. Knights and musicians paraded through Main Street and the biggest flea market I’ve ever seen spread over Old Town. The narrower the street the bigger the displays. Clothes hung from windows, dolls hid under tables, dishes, jewelry, old toys, books, LPs, CDs, shoes, sabers, handbags tossed on tables, chairs, and boxes. It took me hours to squeeze through the crowds.<br /><br />The next day I wandered through the medieval market around the university. I listened attentively to the humor of the big bad wolf as he forced the audience to pay attention to his side of the fairy tale. I watched little girls and their mothers dunk yarn into vats to form felted balls and I saw little boys swing ancient weapons over their heads. Fathers drank hot mead or lukewarm beer and ate staples of the twelfth century - flat breads topped with bacon grease and herbs, roasted pig, sausage.<br /><br />My last evening in Heidelberg exposed me to another first. In December I had been overwhelmed by the sounds of an organ concert at the Church of the Holy Spirit. This time I attended a trumpet performance in the church, baroque trumpet to be exact. Mozart, Vivaldi, Neruda, Bärenz. But a trumpet in a church? Two young men behind me told me proudly that the soloist had once been their teacher. What I didn’t know then, I found later, on the Internet at home. Edward Tarr, the man who performed the solos, is one of the world’s leading musicologists and a foremost authority on baroque and romantic instruments. It was all so unpretentious. So beautiful. A perfect ending for a perfect month.<br /><br />For my final night I took a room at the Holländer Hof. Last December, on the same spot, in room 225, I had said goodbye to Heidelberg with nagging regret. I had stood by the window – sad – as if I had carelessly packed an unfinished task into my suitcase. Though I had woven many errant strands of emotions into the quilt of my past, sliding in and out of remembrances, pacing back and forth through narrow streets, the farewell was difficult.<br /><br />This time I just wanted to gaze at the street where I had lived when I was a young woman. And I gazed. Several times during the night. Early in the morning. Minutes before the shuttle was due to pick me up. I felt myself being drawn into a meditative state as I breathed deeply in front of the open window. The lights on the Old Bridge glimmered through the mist. The castle was, as usual so early in the morning, shrouded in fog. A pride of lions – my thoughts – slinked down the cobblestone street and disappeared around the bend. The phone rang.<br /><br />“Good morning! Are you ready?”Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17562562571414391716noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6774273276339751820.post-69899478757059235162009-07-13T08:58:00.000-07:002009-07-13T13:19:54.878-07:00Dilsberg<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SluW2UhAPHI/AAAAAAAABGo/EgFo_HBk1dc/s1600-h/Dilsberg+entrance.jpg"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 300px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5358042041651575922" border="0" alt="" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SluW2UhAPHI/AAAAAAAABGo/EgFo_HBk1dc/s400/Dilsberg+entrance.jpg" /></a><br /><div>In Europe the Middle Ages were dominated by the Church and ravaged by aristocracy, war, famine, and plague. Much purgatory and penance and little paradise for serfs. And yet, every September Germany goes into a frenzy of festivals that not only celebrate the harvest but also the Middle Ages. Many castles rose to fame in those years, and now the inhabitants of surrounding cities, towns, and villages offer their crumbling ancient remains to strengthen their modern economies. Tourists beware – the knights are rising.<br /><br />I lived in a small German town when I was a child. Our house, begun in 1588 on the foundation of a monastery, was under national monument code and could only be altered with permission from the authorities. The walls were three feet thick, the windows tiny, and none of the little rooms along the long stone hallway were draft-free. As the last nail smith in the state of Baden my great-grandfather had once been an important craftsman in his village, but after his death my mother and I played only bit parts in an impoverished post-war town of three thousand. In an effort to make a living locals began to entertain out-of-towners. Dressed in historical costumes they performed publicly, tapping and stomping for summer guests, singing and performing skits for fall travelers. Other tourist events centered around spinning and dying yarn, singing old songs, and of course cooking and eating and drinking. In September we harvested apples, pressed them, and allowed the juice to ferment in big barrels. New wine and onion cake was a local tradition.<br /><br />Though I really prefer my California not so mobile mobile home to my grandmother’s half-timbered ancient house, I must have been bitten by a medieval bug in recent months. I suddenly craved small town life in Germany. But instead of the monastic history of Schoenau I wanted to experience the walled separation of a fortress. Dilsberg, only a few miles away, fit the description. I had visited it once, when I was twelve; I vaguely remember the town wall and the barns built against it. I must have climbed the castle tower too, with a gaggle of girls from my class. And I must have shouted cautious obscenities into the depth of the fountain. It was a long time ago.<br /><br />On September fifth 2006, surrounded by my large suitcase, my bulging backpack, a friendly village dog and a curious neighborhood preschooler, I stood in front of my rented house, just about 25 yards inside the fortress wall. Only 250 people live in the old Dilsberg; the rest of the population is spread over many neighborhoods up and down the surrounding mountains and valleys.<br /><br />I became resident number 251 for a month. After my landlady unlocked the front door and helped me inside, I immediately felt at home. Though the interior had been completely renovated, the obvious signs of 200-year old construction had not been eliminated. From the dark wood floor to the timbered walls to the crooked doorframes to the rusty hardware, rustic flavor prevailed. It prevailed in spite of modern appliances in the kitchen, comfortable bench and chairs around a dining table, a large bathroom with shower and double sink and separate toilet, and a cozy bedroom with satellite TV and double bed.<br /><br />When I climbed the eleven steps to the bedroom for the first time, I felt my left calf cramping. This would happen every time I went upstairs – for three days – then my legs must have accepted the unusually high risers. The ascent was steep and narrow, the way it used to be to my bedroom in the attic at my great-grandfather’s house. And just like then I could now hear history creaking in certain spots.<br /><br />I thought about the house, inside and out, as I had seen it on the Internet. I was not disappointed. If anything, the real ambiance outshone the virtual image. And outside, the main street, the access to the castle, added its particular sights and sounds to give me a true picture of the medieval German town as tourist attraction. Every half hour the clock in the bell tower chimed to make me aware of time. And when I pushed back my red and white striped curtains in the morning I was awarded with entertainment. Dilsberg has only three streets; Upper and Lower Street which meet at the Catholic Church at the end of town and Castle Street which branches off Upper Street. The front of my house faced Upper Street and the back looked down on Lower Street.<br />After a few days I knew the town rhythm. When I sat over my first cup of coffee, the woman across the street, the famous TV personality who owned the chocolate factory, watered her window boxes and swept debris from her cellar door. Food and beverage trucks crawled through the narrow opening in the gate tower and rattled up the street to service the two restaurants. Later my neighbor to the right arrived to open her gift shop. While she anchored ceramic ducks and clay frogs on an outside display table she greeted my neighbor to the left who stood on his balcony to check the weather.<br /><br />The gate to the castle opened at ten. Predictably tourists began to pass by my window on their uphill strolls to the ruins. Some stood to catch their breath or to admire the sunflowers that divided my front yard from the street. Some came closer and talked about the roof over my door and wondered about the flowerpots that were built into the shingles. Some peeked into my window only to pull back apologetically when they realized that they were inspecting a private residence. I often giggled when I saw them trying to open the door to my landlord’s wine cellar or when I listened to their conversations on the bench outside my window.<br /><br />Afternoons brought children to my doorstep. They bought ice cream next door and played with one of the dogs that always seemed to run away from somebody. Most of the children were staying at the youth hostel around the corner, and late into the evening they told ghost stories and shrieked with delight. Just before midnight they were treated to a flashlight tour by the famous night watchmen who entertained them with historical anecdotes and the deep sound of a horn.<br /><br />On the weekends beer-filled revelers stumbled and mumbled their way home or to their cars that were parked outside the town wall. But only once, on the night of the harvest festival, did I fear for my safety when I heard the loud voices of young men engaged in a fistfight. The next morning volunteers gathered the remains of broken beer bottles along the street and when I later sipped my latte at the gift shop next door, I was introduced to the gory details of the brawl. It seems I was the only one who hadn’t witnessed the 4 am struggle. I forgot to ask who hauled the young men away; during my whole stay I never once saw a policeman in town.<br /><br />I realized quickly that even if all my observations were confined to my view from the kitchen table I would be able to learn much about the town. But I had come to do more. I wanted to walk the castle, the gardens, the churches, the wall, the surrounding villages. I wanted to know why the fortress that had withstood more than five hundred years of alien invaders, was plundered into ruins by locals after 1826 and how, after 1950, the barns that had been built into the wall on Lower Street, had been replaced by beautiful homes with elaborate front gardens. But most of all I looked forward to the fall festival with strolling maidens and jousting knights and medieval market atmosphere.</div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17562562571414391716noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6774273276339751820.post-3701682722727779982009-07-12T01:06:00.000-07:002009-07-13T13:17:36.596-07:00Midnight Chocolate<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SluWR6pEV2I/AAAAAAAABGg/9Xi-RbTdAZM/s1600-h/Midnight+Chocolate+2.jpg"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 214px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5358041416230786914" border="0" alt="" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SluWR6pEV2I/AAAAAAAABGg/9Xi-RbTdAZM/s400/Midnight+Chocolate+2.jpg" /></a><br /><div align="center"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SlmaI-JtIQI/AAAAAAAAA9I/b8go8za3sA4/s1600-h/P4190018.JPG"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 300px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5357482710647251202" border="0" alt="" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SlmaI-JtIQI/AAAAAAAAA9I/b8go8za3sA4/s400/P4190018.JPG" /></a> Midnight Chocolate on the Monarch of the Seas</div><br /><br /><div align="center"><br /></div><br /><br /><div align="center"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SlmaIoVEC9I/AAAAAAAAA9A/y5RNSxOIPMw/s1600-h/P4180058.JPG"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 300px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 400px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5357482704789310418" border="0" alt="" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SlmaIoVEC9I/AAAAAAAAA9A/y5RNSxOIPMw/s400/P4180058.JPG" /></a>Tyana befriends the towel critter<br /><br /><br /><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SlmaIBGUDPI/AAAAAAAAA84/3KVEWR2jcg0/s1600-h/P4180053.JPG"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 300px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 400px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5357482694258461938" border="0" alt="" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SlmaIBGUDPI/AAAAAAAAA84/3KVEWR2jcg0/s400/P4180053.JPG" /></a>Sunbathing deck<br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><div align="center"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SlmaHwtrnzI/AAAAAAAAA8w/sxcWsg7oDt0/s1600-h/P4190066.JPG"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 300px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5357482689860181810" border="0" alt="" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SlmaHwtrnzI/AAAAAAAAA8w/sxcWsg7oDt0/s400/P4190066.JPG" /></a>Tyana on Catalina Island<br /></div><br /><br /><div align="left"></div><br /><div align="left">Most of my journeys start with a mission and end with an insight - a measure of success. The word Dachlawine (roof avalanche) for instance was the accomplishment of last year’s Munich trip. Dachlawine became the marching song for the exploration of childhood experiences and old fears. And it became the cornerstone for a newfound sense of humor about the “things your mother warned you about.”<br /><br />Baksheesh, the Arabic expression for a well-deserved tip, a handout, a bribe, cast shadows over my wish to embrace the ancient culture of Cairo a few years ago. Baksheesh, baksheesh, backsheesh rang in my ears for weeks after my return home. The mantra was a result of my exposure to the agonizing truths of poverty and exploitation and made me appreciate my luck of being born into an affluent society.<br /><br />My latest excursion was the fulfillment of a promise. I had told my friend Margie that I would take a cruise with her as soon as she retired. She knows my aversion to group vacations; I understand her hesitations about travel in general. We settled on a short trip to explore the much talked about pampering and abundance that seem to be an intricate part of cruising. A four-day Los Angeles to Ensenada voyage with Royal Caribbean.<br /><br />My mission statement was: “This is not a real mission. This is only a test run. Lets just have fun.” After several hours of waiting, after luggage checks, security procedures, and other formalities, we walked onto the ship. And the instant I set foot onto the Monarch of the Seas a word pressed itself into my mind. The word was opulence. It pulsed through me for hours and demanded to be thought about.<br /><br />We arrived on Deck 4, at the center of the Monarch, appropriately called Centrum, surrounded by circling staircases, shiny brass railings, glittering lights, and seductively understated guitar music. The musician, perfectly groomed into white shirt and black trousers, sat on a white bench on a raised, inlaid wooden platform, adjacent to a glass elevator, surrounded by tall green plants. I tried to absorb the images of a white piano on the far side, the flow of cocktails in front of me, the movement of people in and out of elevators, up and down the stairs all around, and I was reminded of the glamour of a shopping mall in Saudi Arabia. I had seen it on television. Of course most of the shoppers there had been covered from head to toe; here, on the Monarch of the Seas, the dress code seemed to say anything goes.<br /><br />Though we circled for half an hour, took pictures, familiarized ourselves with the layout, my mind could not assimilate and compare the scene to anything real. I have seen castles, mosques, golden shrines and other historical riches, but that’s what they all were, historical riches. Places one viewed with respect, with disbelief, or even irreverence. Places of the past. Places unrelated to my life. This ship would be at the center of my life for the next few days and I had to give it a space in my head. That’s when the word formed on my lips.<br /><br />I looked at Margie and said it out loud, “Opulence. This is opulence. I’ve never seen anything like it.”<br /><br />Then we went to lunch on Deck 11 at the Windjammer Café. Unbelievable! Tables filled with salads. Tables filled with fruits. Tables with entrees. Breads. Desserts. A lemonade and ice-tea stand. A coffee corner. An army of waiters. A full house of patrons. I tasted an array of exotic dishes, one better than the last. Though my perception had shifted slightly and had settled on abundance for a while, I returned to opulence by the end of lunch. Abundance would fit a pizza parlor with boxes piled high; this was an extremely well prepared feast of diversity, from Asian meat pockets and vegetable salads to pasta creations and, amid pies, cakes, cookies, a lovely bread pudding that spoke my language and topped my grandmother’s wartime dessert in taste.<br /><br />After lunch we settled into our room, number 3610, aft, portside. I photographed the floor plan and hoped I would not get lost. But I did. Almost every time I left a staircase or elevator I took a wrong turn and had to backtrack. I think it’s my lot in life to get lost on foreign streets, in large hotels, and now on Deck 3 between Vincent’s dining room, the photo gallery and the long rows of cabins that crawled along 880 feet of ship. No matter how many times I repeated “portside is on the left,” trying to establish a sense of direction, the square between elevators and staircases was daunting and I just followed whatever exercise fanatics, sun bathers, fortune hunters, food addicts, and drink seekers spilled into the open. After a few steps, usually in the wrong direction, I’d organize my mind around the arrowed numbers and find my way.<br /><br />Our room was small. The promised window was a porthole; the two single beds stood at right angles to each other; the bathroom was carefully designed for optimum use at minimum space. But everything we needed was available. The watchful attendant always knew when we left the room. This was his signal to make beds or turn down beds, decorate the room with a towel folded into a swan or a dog, leave a piece of chocolate on the pillow, and replenish the bottled water and soft drink supply. The first day I bought one small bottle of water for $2.90. After that I climbed the stairs to refill my bottle at the watering hole on Deck 11. I realized quickly that all drinks except coffee, lemonade, and ice water required a signature, which meant that they were added up on the all-in-one charge card/room key/identification tool – the SeaPass.<br /><br />Our first dinner, at eight on the dot, at Vincent’s dining room, Deck 3, table 393, introduced us to our waiter from Yugoslavia, Milos, the headwaiter Romeo, and the assistant waiter Rosemary. We sat with Carol and Erv, who celebrated their 47th wedding anniversary, and two younger women, Emilia and Janet. After tasting a few appetizers like onion pie with Gruyere cheese, salmon tempanada, escargot, a melon slice with ginger sauce, prosciutto and mozzarella antipasti, I was ready for the main course, which was lamb shank. White chocolate truffle with strawberry sauce was my choice of dessert. When Milos tempted me with a pastry swan, filled with whip cream, I only took one bite. Others were offered Grand Marnier crème or tiramisu, whatever they hadn’t tried yet. I added the word waste to my mantra when Rosemary collected all the leftover desserts. Opulence and waste.<br /><br />Margie and I live on different schedules and favor different entertainment and so we played on opposite decks, opposite ends of ship culture. She went to bed early. I stayed up late. She is an indoor person and avoids water and heights. I spent my mornings walking the track on Deck 12. When she gambled at the casino in the evenings, I gazed at the stars from the very top of the ship. I took a tour to the Botanical Garden on Catalina Island while Margie attended a wine tasting seminar at Claude’s dining room. But we found time to do things together too; we shared a tram ride safari at San Diego’s Wild Animal Park and a bus trip through Ensenada to La Bufadora, a tourist attraction twenty-five miles away. When I didn’t feel like one more lavish dinner, accompanied by singing and dancing waiters, Margie went alone and brought back key lime pie for me. I picked up a banana for her at breakfast because she doesn’t usually eat until later in the day. I enjoyed coffee and croissants outdoors, with the wind blowing in my face and the subdued noises of morning chores like window washing and deck sweeping around me.<br /><br />Nothing stopped me from allowing my inner wild child to listen to the reggae band or peek in at the karaoke bar. I had a dragon airbrushed on my arm and befriended a young boy named Christian, who offered to pose for me. I chased the sunshine eight flights of stairs to the upper deck and watched wine-fortified men twist and twirl their bare legs in an effort to win the sexiest legs contest.<br /><br />And one evening, after walking in the cool night air for an hour, I crowded into the midnight chocolate bar with all the other chocoholics. I speculate that 2,500 of the 2,700 guests on board attended the half hour event. Avoiding the wait for jam-packed elevators I had squeezed onto the stairs and eventually arrived at Deck 3, where the atrium and the photo gallery were filled with fabulous creations. The table by the entrance was decorated with a huge carved ice fish, turning slowly, lit from below in blue, and a life-size white chocolate unicorn head. Rows and rows of pastry were dominated by a chocolate dragon, a chocolate eagle, a chocolate guitar. For those who didn’t care for midnight chocolate – and there were very few of those– carved watermelons, veggie flower bouquets, and fruit kabobs offered alternatives. Vincent’s dining room was open but almost everybody piled tarts, torts, teacakes and chocolate-moussed dream puffs onto their plates and disappeared into their cabins.<br /><br />On my way back to my room I thought about the orderly progress of activities. How well organized the Monarch was. Sure, on Deck 11, by the pool, a few heat-stroked and liquor-infused guests had gotten into arguments earlier. A teen-aged girl cried because her mother didn’t allow her to be with certain new friends, and the mother, waving a cocktail into the air, threatened her with “room arrest.” An oversized man who was covered with tattoos seemed to stagger just a bit on his way to the bar. A young couple discussed their money situation loudly, shouting accusatory obscenities at each other while waiting for the elevator. But then, in the morning, all would be quiet, sober, washed clean, and sparkling in the rising sun.<br /><br />It had been difficult to ignore the word decadence while filling my plate with black forest cake, strawberries dipped in chocolate sauce, and some other cream-filled concoction, but my sense of humor won as I sat in the tiny bathroom, guiding the fork into my chocolate loving mouth. I grinned at my mirrored image, sitting on the toilet seat under the fluorescent light, reading Mark Twain’s “A Tramp Abroad,” while Margie was sound asleep in her narrow bed. It was my first cruise, probably also my last, but I would never forget the midnight chocolate buffet. Though I had written very little in my journal on this trip, this spectacular world of cruising in a bizarre way taught me that every trip has a real mission and that there is no such thing as a test run.<br /><br /></div><br /><br /><div align="left"><br /><br /><br /><br /></div><br /><br /><div align="left"></div></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17562562571414391716noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6774273276339751820.post-28314126371470604352009-07-12T00:43:00.000-07:002009-07-13T08:54:06.526-07:00Gluestick - Never Leave Home Without It<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SltYcCwkO5I/AAAAAAAAA9s/DM1Wo4tn65E/s1600-h/Glue+Stick.JPG"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 346px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5357973420487490450" border="0" alt="" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SltYcCwkO5I/AAAAAAAAA9s/DM1Wo4tn65E/s400/Glue+Stick.JPG" /></a><br /><div></div><br /><div>German born storks do indeed spend the winter in Marrakech.<br />The Chinese have no word for no. Bu shi – not so.<br />Beef Tartar is a French specialty and among my favorite meat dishes.<br /><br />There you have it. My world of travel. Whether nature, culture, or artery clogging dining is one’s priority, wandering on foreign soil is an exciting quest. Sure, not everybody is interested in bird migration. Sorting out language variations and their effect on daily lives can be boring. And I assume that raw beef does not make most other people’s haute cuisine list.<br /><br />But in spite of my idiosyncrasies, I consider myself an average traveler. So I love to travel alone and carry a teddy bear on my backpack. So I watch television in languages I don’t understand. But I do, like everybody else, enjoy room service, exceed my daily budget, and I get lost in big cities.<br /><br />Because I have taken several trips since I retired – trips to China, Morocco, Egypt, Jamaica, Canada, England, and Germany – I am sometimes asked how I prepare for travel and how I organize my notes for writing later on.<br /><br />The easy answer would be that I research, execute, review. The long version includes many separate steps, beginning with the purchases of a travel guide, a binder, a journal, a photo box, a glue stick. I never leave home without a glue stick. While I have sung the glory of the clothespin before, as placeholder for random thoughts on yellow stickers, when it comes to collecting travel memorabilia nothing but a glue stick will do.<br /><br />Over the years I have refined my search for a travel journal. Spiral binding for easy opening. No smaller than five by seven, to accommodate the average postcard. No bigger than the purse or daypack I carry at the time. Short trips require less pages than long trips, so do excursions with friends. Alone-time is important for writing down impressions and gathering fly-by information; being with family or other close companions tends to reduce the amount of left over energy for writing.<br /><br />One of the solutions is to set aside a certain hour each day, as I did when my granddaughter and I traveled together. We both glued mementos and captured important items each evening while we watched home news on CNN. Our observations were quite different from each other. She wrote about the presents she bought for her friends, the new foods she tried, and the napkins she collected at each restaurant. She wrote with gel pen in tiny print on a tiny notepad on one side only. She used red, blue, and green glitter glue. I slapped news articles and restaurant bills onto one page with my acid free Glue Stic™ and described the gathering of gnats on a mountaintop on the opposite page with a black ballpoint pen. Later, at home, we laughed when we discovered each other’s major events.<br /><br />******<br /><br />My trips start months before I set foot on an airplane, with a binder filled with computer printouts of maps, history, accommodations, sights, train and bus schedules. How to overcome the cultural divide. What not to eat.<br />Once I have decided on an itinerary I print out a calendar of events. I own an all-in-one printer, which makes it easy to copy and reduce information to journal size. Consequently I glue in a lot of information before I leave. This fits my motto:<br /><br />“Be prepared enough to assure comfort and flexible enough to accept discomfort.”<br /><br />Before I leave home I add a copy of the airline receipt from their website. Copies of hotel reservations. Mapquest directions. A few words of the language spoken at my destination. Since I love to buy books I always take along a few book reviews or recommendations. And because my luggage was delayed and could have been lost on my last trip I might now add a “laundry list” in anticipation of claim forms that have to be filled out. I didn’t realize until I began to write an estimate of loss that my suitcase, the one that Air Canada left behind in Toronto, held 550 dollars worth of my life. Well, fifty dollars of that covered Tyana’s wardrobe – the poor bear wore the same outfit for four days.<br /><br />******<br /><br />On location I never throw anything written away. I check my purse or backpack for receipts, business cards, brochures, and stray notes every evening. During the day I might have jotted somebody’s address on a napkin. The lady at the market might have mentioned the name of a fruit I had never heard of before. In China I collected business cards since I couldn’t explain to the taxi driver where I stayed. In Egypt I retained sales slips from grocery stores to get an idea of the pricing. On several occasions I ripped labels from water bottles to compare content. When I don’t have my camera with me I buy postcards. ATM receipts keep track of my spending and currency conversions offer comparisons. A quarantine declaration reminds me later that I was one of the people who didn’t let SARS stop them from visiting China.<br /><br />I buy a newspaper wherever I go but seldom read it when I get home. Why do I insist on loading my suitcase with the opinions of foreign government officials? Why do I think that insight into local real estate and the price of lettuce will give flavor to my writing? I really don’t know. But someday there might be a need for it.<br /><br />Though I usually write in the evening, I take the journal with me to coffee shops. Sometimes I meet other travelers or curious locals. We talk. Exchange stories. The stranger shows me a picture of his family. I open my journal and point to a photo of my daughter or son. I glued snapshots into the back for just that reason. Something else is usually tucked away in the back – a copy of my passport and driver’s license. I haven’t quite figured out yet why I do that. Possibly a slight neurosis. There are two scenarios in which this overkill might come in handy though. One, I lose my purse or get robbed and need proof of identity. Two, I get abducted and murdered and the only evidence of my existence would be the journal. Both assume that I left it in the hotel room.<br /><br />As for the kinds of things I actually write about – it all depends. Some days I barely manage to name the places I have visited. On other occasions I pour my heart out over the sighting of the morning sun. I invent stories too, capture dreams, exploit chance meetings. In China I spent much time copying strange and sloppy translations and threatening dos and don’ts. One of the don’ts was the reason for copying since I would have been charged a hefty price for removing anything from the room including signs with strange and sloppy translations. The “Green Initiative” folder for instance that praised: “The economy is a virtue.” And the booklet that called upon me to visit all the beautiful bars in the Zhejiang Intercontinental Hotel. Take “Club Egypt” for instance, of which it bragged: “The whole decoration is possessed with the ancient Egyptical feature.”<br /><br />On the inside of the back cover of most travel journals I attach a pouch to hold “undecideds” and things that can’t be glued permanently like receipts for credit card purchases and two-sided brochures. The pouch usually gets overstuffed and explodes. Some day I will come up with a better idea than cardboard and tape<br />.<br />******<br /><br />The last third of my travels, the reviewing part, pulls everything together. Soon after I get home I line up the books I have purchased, the binder with the information from the internet, my journal, the photographs – there might be hundreds of them – and the photo box in which I store parts of newspapers and magazines and other oversized documents. Images catch my eye as I pass the line-up of material on the kitchen table. Sentences follow me around. Stories begin to simmer.<br /><br />In a Gotham online course on the basics of travel writing I learned about the narrative art and structure of travel pieces. Not only are practical information and a sense of place necessary; I have to include people, dialogue, episodes, and opinions. The lead is very important; according to John Gottberg who writes for Frommer’s and Lonely Planet. He insists on “alluring, alarming, mysterious, or action-oriented.” The body, he says, has to have focus and the ending should capture the essence of this focus.<br /><br />I seldom write chronological trip reports, instead I work around an incident or thought or person. In Marrakech I was thrilled by the presence of storks. My childhood memories of them nesting on the church steeple became the focus of a story. Jamaica stands out because of Bob Marley. The bus ride to his birthplace Nine Mile made an interesting piece. China intrigued me with its hunger for capitalism. My writing centered on Lucy the travel guide and her references to the changing cityscape.<br /><br />A month after my last trip to Germany I tested my memory by trying to recollect the events of one single day. I failed. As soon as I opened my journal and saw the receipt from the coffee shop, the bill from the University bookstore, and the church music sheet, I pieced together the rest of the afternoon. Then I read about the day I spent looking for my parents’ graveside. A story yet untold.<br /><br />With my first cruise coming up in April, I am well into the binder phase. Tomorrow will also be my first face-to-face experience with a travel agent. I will be able to consult printouts of all twelve decks of the “Monarch of the Sea,” and I will confirm my preferred excursions in San Diego, Catalina Island and Ensenada. I am ready for a preliminary glue stick session.</div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17562562571414391716noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6774273276339751820.post-34735965989653230782009-07-12T00:19:00.000-07:002009-07-12T00:42:31.951-07:00My Travels into the Past<div align="center"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SlmSII6pPzI/AAAAAAAAA8g/bQ6iYtm0Zsc/s1600-h/P1010015.JPG"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 300px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5357473900263980850" border="0" alt="" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SlmSII6pPzI/AAAAAAAAA8g/bQ6iYtm0Zsc/s400/P1010015.JPG" /></a> Tyana on the "Old Bridge" in Heidelberg</div><br /><div align="center"><br /><br /><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SlmSHloX8_I/AAAAAAAAA8Y/7WqkLWwnBKA/s1600-h/P1010104.JPG"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 300px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5357473890792109042" border="0" alt="" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SlmSHloX8_I/AAAAAAAAA8Y/7WqkLWwnBKA/s400/P1010104.JPG" /></a>My Christmas Dinner at the "Ritter"<br /><br /><br /><div><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SlmSHUOeooI/AAAAAAAAA8Q/SpyWIO0CWO8/s1600-h/P1010049.JPG"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 300px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5357473886120092290" border="0" alt="" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SlmSHUOeooI/AAAAAAAAA8Q/SpyWIO0CWO8/s400/P1010049.JPG" /></a>The Street where I lived</div><br /><div></div><br /><div align="left">I led a purpose-driven life while I traveled. I explored. I read. I wrote. I took pictures. Now, home again, I wander aimlessly among German verbs, CNN news reports, and the rising waters of the Los Gatos Creek. I sleep only two hours at a stretch; at four in the morning I print glossy eight by tens of foreign affairs; at seven, when a Waste Management employee empties my trashcan, I struggle to express my general sadness in terms other than the German ‘trauern.’ What is the word I try to remember? Mourning. That’s it. I’m mourning my lost options. Matching sock to boot to distance of walking. Weighing the probability of rainfall against wearing hat, scarf, and gloves. Selecting the tastiest meats, cheeses, rolls, and fruits from the hotel breakfast buffet. While I stir my bland prepackaged oatmeal, while I battle to regain the rhythm of my previous life, I yawn. Not enough sleep? Boredom? Lack of oxygen? This is my third morning back from the trip to Nürnberg and Heidelberg, but still, snowflakes sliver through the air in front of my eyes; my feet navigate the cobblestones of twelfth century alleyways; my eyes see gold plated fountains and fortified bell towers.<br /></div><br /><div align="left">Soon the mind will reverse its aim again. I know from experience that images fade, that English will replace my mother tongue once more, and that castles will be things I fabricate in my dreams and hide from the sunny California sky. Retrieval of the trashcan will be an automatic part of Wednesday morning; oatmeal will be standard fare; sitting at my computer will neither induce a yawn nor will it make me sad.<br /></div><br /><div align="left">This last trip was born from a desire to touch snow. A desire to connect with the feelings that once were part of me on German streets, under gray skies, and in the shivering light of Christmas candles. But were these feelings really induced by an ancient cityscape? I used to think so. But then I walked for hours without being able to reclaim the breathless excitement of my school years. I touched sandstone walls and peeked into dark doorways. I sampled stores, cafés churches, castles. When I gazed into the window of a yarn shop, the same shop I used to enter 50 years ago, I saw my reflection; I did not see the eager seventeen-year old student who spent her allowance on knitting patterns. When I halted in front of a cigar store I was not amused by the life-size Negro statue donning a red Santa hat. He’s been part of the display as long as I can remember. We used to giggle and nod hello to him on our way to school.<br /></div><br /><div align="left">Maybe I finally have to admit that one can’t go home again. It seems my memories are most alive when I sit at my computer at home. But wait; this isn’t completely true. There were flickers of recognition. Small excitements. Things that made me hold my breath. In hindsight I realize that it isn’t a rediscovery of emotions but a distinct awareness of specific sensations. On my first full day in Germany, after de-icing had delayed my plane in Toronto for two hours, after the airline left my suitcase behind, after my train was an hour late and filled to capacity, and after I arrived in a gray, damp, yet snow-less Nürnberg, after a few hours of restless sleep, I woke at four in the morning, jumped out of bed and stood in awe in front of the open dormer window until my legs were numb from the icy wind that blew into the room.<br /></div><br /><div align="left">What I saw might not have excited anybody else, but for me it was an image I had longed for. The roofs across the street were white with snow; only a few red shingles peeked through. The sky loomed in darkness but the air seemed crowded with swirling white dots. When did I last stand at a window, watching snowflakes land on rooftops? Later, in bed again, I let my thoughts visit all the places I had once called home and the only one high up enough and close enough to other buildings of that height, was the hotel my mother, father, and I lived in during the war. It was in Velbert, in the industrial north of Germany. I was four years old at the time. When air raids forced us into nightly evacuations to the basement, I would sometimes stand in the middle of our dark bedroom; I would look at the sky and the silent world of dancing snowflakes as they settled on the roofs across the street. Then a siren would wail and my mother would grab me and we’d run five or six flights of stairs down to the shelter.<br />There were other occasions in Nürnberg that suddenly aroused one of my senses. The smell of potato pancakes at the Christmas market was so strong that I returned every evening for a late meal. The woman who scooped them from the hot oil barely nodded when I told her that they tasted like the ones my grandmother used to fry.<br /></div><br /><div align="left">And one morning, at an open-air market, I was reminded of my grandmother again. I had taken a picture of the colorful display and was drawn to a group of apples. They looked leathery. I let my hand glide over the rough surface of the biggest one and searched for a name, when the owner rushed to the front to be of assistance. I suppose Oma would have scolded me if I had violated a rule; the man just shot me a disapproving glance. I should have remembered, one must only point to the fruit, the vendor will pick it up, weigh it and hand it to the customer.<br /></div><br /><div align="left">“We heisst der Apfel?” I asked. What is the name of this apple?<br /></div><br /><div align="left">“Boskopf.” He frowned and asked me how many I wanted.<br /></div><br /><div align="left">I couldn’t contain the thrill he had incited in me with the word “Boskopf,” and told him that I hadn’t seen one in over forty years, that we used to store them in our basement, and that I knew exactly what they would look like in the spring.<br /></div><br /><div align="left">“Wie ein altes Weib,” I said. Like an old woman. “All shriveled up.”<br /></div><br /><div align="left">The man stood patiently when I explained that I lived in America and that we didn’t have Boskopf there. Then he handed me the one apple I wanted and counted the change I gave him.<br /></div><br /><div align="left">When I came to Heidelberg I realized, again, how easy it is to bring back the sensations foods produce. How the mealy flesh of chestnuts moistens in the mouth. How the pungent smell of herring sandwiches lingers. How peasoup ladles slowly and begs for the companionship of smoked ham.<br /></div><br /><div align="left">Ok, so food is a quickstep into the past. What I didn’t expect was the effect of sound. After a lengthy trek through Oldtown, following the steps I would have taken on my way to school or work in the 1950s, I was tired. It rained heavily all day, my left hip ached, I had not connected with any of the sites I had visited. Neither old teachers’ voices nor the taste of a first kiss, nor the pain over a lover’s infidelity came to life. Most of the several-hundred-year old buildings were unchanged and cars and bicycles still clung to the sidewalks of narrow alleys, and I strode like a zombie, driven forward by the need to experience something. Yet my mind stayed uninvolved. Curious and appreciative but uninvolved. I might as well have walked through old Cairo or the back streets of Beijing. Antiquity? Yes. Familiarity? No. Then bells rang. An Advent evening service at the Church of the Holy Spirit. I entered the wooden portal, was handed a sheet of paper with a song, sat, and waited. While I admired hundreds of flickering candles the organist began to pump the pedals of the organ. I watched her body move, watched her solemn face come alive, and slowly the gray city washed away, floated into the candle light, rose into the music that surrounded me. I was transported to the small church of my hometown where, at the age of seven, I was an angel, proclaiming the arrival of the Christ Child. Later I shook hands with the pastor, a woman of about forty, and told her that my son had been baptized in the Church of the Holy Spirit, that I hadn’t been inside for more than forty years.<br /></div><br /><div align="left">“Frohe Weihnachten.” Merry Christmas. She nodded and smiled. Then she held her hand out to the person behind me.<br /></div><br /><div align="left">As soon as I left the church I lost the magic. Organ music proved to be a fleeting sensation, strong enough to soothe but not strong enough to bring back religious devotion. A haunting experience.<br /></div><br /><div align="left">Probably the most intense feelings came to me each evening when I was safely tucked into the comfort of the Hotel Holländer Hof. I was sure they had given me the best room in the building. Two windows. One facing the Old Bridge and the Neckar River, the other facing Obere Neckarstrasse, where I had lived in three different houses from the age of nineteen to twenty-three. I could see all three of them and spent several hours by the window at various times of day and night. However, this was not what brought me closer to remembering the winters of my past. For one thing, it only snowed once while I was there and the snow soon disappeared into the wet cobblestones. What made me remember Christmas the way it used to be was television.<br /></div><br /><div align="left">Almost uninterruptedly through the night a Bavarian station put on an impressive array of old-time craftsmen, musicians, storytellers, cooks, and artisans of every kind. Nativity Scene collectors and carvers followed men in traditional costumes who sawed logs, and women with angelic faces who sang familiar songs. Grandmothers baked gingerbread and brewed hot wine and cider. There was Father Time from Russia handing out small presents. A marathon to aid poor children showcased major figures of European politics and entertainment, all of them in storybook settings of alpine splendor and festive décor.<br /></div><br /><div align="left">I didn’t want to go to sleep because I didn’t want to miss any of it. Whatever eluded me on the streets came to me in my hotel bed late at night in the form of televised romantic retrospectives. I even saw one of the favorite films of my teen years on Christmas Eve. “Sissi,” a historical romance about Franz Josef, the young emperor of Austria and his love for one of his cousins. The film was released just before Christmas 1955 and now celebrated its fiftieth year. There were write-ups in the newspapers and though I fell asleep halfway through, I was thrilled to watch Romy Schneider who would be my age had she survived her fame. She could never rid herself of the saccharin image of innocence and romance and committed suicide at the age of forty-three. She is said to have died of a broken heart.<br /></div><br /><div align="left">I think that I have learned several lessons on this trip. The journey back to one’s youth is a solitary journey, tolerated by others, but not shared. Deep emotions come from interactions with people and are tethered to the time of their occurrence. They can’t be recreated by a walk in the footsteps of the past. As I found out, walls do not speak. And though it would be nice to belong, the spiritual flood of organ music does not bring back religion.<br /></div><br /><div align="left">All this is actually a good thing, I believe. How confused would the mind become if it had to produce two experiences simultaneously? A lifetime of impressions has altered my responses; while I can taste, hear, feel, touch, and smell the past occasionally, I no longer react to it. My mind lives in the now. It has enough to deal with when it is suddenly transported from one country to the other, when it can’t quite keep pace with the landscape, the language, the images. As I am writing this, I can feel the immediate past fading. But serendipitous moments – the sound of the organ, swirling snow, an apple – they are like bright stars on the night sky; they can be connected, like dots, to form the life that is uniquely mine across decades and across oceans.<br /><br /><br /><br /></div><br /><div></div><br /></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17562562571414391716noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6774273276339751820.post-84174788818791183662009-07-11T23:52:00.000-07:002009-07-12T00:10:05.422-07:00Getting to Know Nürnberg<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SlmLNc2ULLI/AAAAAAAAA8I/4EV6AsHPvtI/s1600-h/P1010008.JPG"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 300px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 400px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5357466294932483250" border="0" alt="" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SlmLNc2ULLI/AAAAAAAAA8I/4EV6AsHPvtI/s400/P1010008.JPG" /></a><br /><br /><div><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SlmLM98g8VI/AAAAAAAAA8A/SZLbV8KkIKY/s1600-h/P1010083.JPG"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 300px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 400px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5357466286636986706" border="0" alt="" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SlmLM98g8VI/AAAAAAAAA8A/SZLbV8KkIKY/s400/P1010083.JPG" /></a><br /><br /><br /><div><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SlmLMu6A9ZI/AAAAAAAAA74/6Zk0ajz5AS8/s1600-h/P1010096.JPG"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 300px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 400px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5357466282599970194" border="0" alt="" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SlmLMu6A9ZI/AAAAAAAAA74/6Zk0ajz5AS8/s400/P1010096.JPG" /></a><br /><br /><br /><br /><div><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SlmLMev9QPI/AAAAAAAAA7w/YMXHiAqY3x4/s1600-h/P1010081.JPG"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 300px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 400px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5357466278262817010" border="0" alt="" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SlmLMev9QPI/AAAAAAAAA7w/YMXHiAqY3x4/s400/P1010081.JPG" /></a><br /><br />Every big city deserves at least three days. One for an introductory bus tour, one for walking, and one for detailed examination of selected treasures. Four days allows me to include nearby attractions. Devoting a full week would be ideal; it would compensate for Saturday afternoon shutdowns, Sundays’ limited options, and Monday museum rest days.<br /><br />Nürnberg was a three-day city, December 17, 18, 19. I had it all worked out: historic information, city plans, fun places, shopping. But I missed a few sites. Now that I’m home again, well rested and critical, I wonder why I didn’t visit the Dürer Haus as planned? Why did I neglect the underground bunker that held important artwork during WWII?<br /><br />I think it had to do with exhaustion. I had spent 36 hours awake on planes and trains, in shuttles and taxis. I am sure the uphill location of the hotel could be blamed; the quarter mile to the market place was quite steep. Maybe it was my fear of slipping on icy cobblestones. Early darkness was certainly a factor. But whatever kept me from exploring more ground, now seems unwarranted. I could have done it all.<br /><br />What I did do was worth the delays and setbacks I experienced; my journal is proof of that. The very first entry after my complaint about the lack of snow on the evening of my arrival shows definite approval. It says, “But all this was forgotten when I ate three potato pancakes with applesauce. The Church of our Lady, the Beautiful Fountain, the market, the stalls, the decorations, the gold-winged angels for sale, everything is splendid.”<br /><br />And then of course it snowed early in the morning and all was well with the world. For a little while at least, until I looked into the mirror and saw that my right eye was bright red with blood. I whined. I thought that it took a lot of stamina to travel alone, to have to handle each incident with the same focus as the one before. I am always just a bit flustered when my schedule is offset by something unexpected.<br /><br />I began my three-day stay with a trip to the nearest drugstore and was told where to find an emergency doctor. Kesslerplatz 5. In the suburbs. Definitely not on my list of things to see. After I walked three miles into the cold wind, I sat for an hour in the midst of coughing, sneezing, bewildered paupers. That’s what they looked like to me at that point, though the room probably resembled a Kaiser hospital emergency room rather closely. An ambulance took away the visiting father of the young man who sat next to me. I was convinced that my blood pumped into my heart at record speeds; that I would be whisked to an overcrowded gray building and spend the remainder of my holiday in a narrow bed with rows upon rows of dying people in tattered clothes. I think this idea took shape because I remembered an old movie with nuns and medieval poverty. It might have been about the plague.<br /><br />The young doctor was quick. He rose behind his desk, bent forward, shook my hand, examined my eye, and pronounced me well.<br /><br />“Harmless,” he said.<br />“Just a bruise,” he said.<br />“Did you hurt yourself?”<br /><br />I didn’t. He prescribed eye drops. I concluded that he was either a real good doctor or a total quack. Should I be alarmed? At home a nurse would at least have taken my blood pressure. But I decided to trust him. It was easier this way. The world suddenly looked wonderful. Snow collected on my shoulders as I walked back to the walled Old town. I strolled through the Christkindlmarket, stopping in front of every stand, counting varieties of gingerbread, inhaling bratwurst smells, inspecting some of the famous little Zwetschgemännle, tiny dolls made from prunes, with nuts as heads, each dressed differently in a medieval costume. I bought a knit hat, one of those gray beanies with earflaps that we wore as children. This one had black tassels that hit my cheeks every time I turned around. I looked ridiculous. I asked somebody to take my picture so I could proof my point. I was very happy.<br /><br />My first day in Nürnberg, though not the way I had planned it, was a very full day. After a three-hour nap in the late afternoon I made a list of all the things I had possibly lost along with the suitcase. I wanted to be prepared for an insurance claim. When I called the airline at 20:23, which is shortly before 8:30pm, I was told that the suitcase was on its way from Toronto and would be sent to Nuernberg by plane and to my hotel by taxi. I simply had to go out and celebrate, eat potato pancakes again, walk the streets in the dark, drink hot punch, buy something cute.<br /><br />My second day in Nürnberg began with a long photo shoot in the snow. After breakfast of course. At seven I was the only one in the room, surrounded by swords and Rembrandt and Dürer portraits. The lamps were made of helmets. I had to remind myself that I sat in the Burghotel, just a few steps away from the castle, though the platters of hams, cheeses, jams, and fruits were definitely not medieval. Snow had gathered on the topiary in the courtyard; I was excited. Camera, Tyana the bear, hat and scarf. One more cup of coffee and I was on my way. Only briefly did I acknowledge the fact that I wore the same clothes for the fourth day in a row.<br /><br />Before I left home I had printed out a map. The medieval inner city, enclosed by a wall, was 90 percent destroyed during WWII but rebuilt according to old plans. I had asked the taxi driver on my way to the hotel where I would find the Historical Mile.<br /><br />“Alles hier ist historisch,” was his flippant answer. Everything here is historical. And given Nuremberg’s 950-year history, its reputation as most significant city of the Middle Ages, he is right.<br /><br />I reasoned later that the one-sentence cold shoulder might have had to do with the reluctance of locals to invite even more foreigners into their crowded living arrangements. While their existence depends on tourism, the older ones often wish for “the way it was.”<br /><br />The Historical Mile involves 35 places of interest; only now do I realize that I saw at least twenty of them on my unscheduled, unorganized, and unscientific strolls through the heart of the city. I probably passed the rest without paying attention. It was the snow that intrigued me. And Hans Sachs, the poet, and Albrecht Dürer, the painter, both native sons, both famous. I posed Tyana in front of their statues. I had the time of my life.<br /></div><div>When I came back to the hotel in the evening my luggage had arrived. I had thought that I would be happy, but to my surprise seeing the suitcase proved to be a letdown. It had been kind of nice not to have choices. There must be a lesson for future travels in here somewhere<br /><br />I did on the third day what I normally do on the first - I took a bus tour. Complete with old German lady as guide. Knowledgeable and rigid.<br /></div><div>“Watch your step.”<br />“Pay attention.”<br /></div><div>In typical tour guide fashion her occasional humor was measured to produce maximum effects. Her historical information was well rehearsed. She was clearly in total command of her flock of fourteen ignorant tourists. When I took my scarf off during the steep walk to the castle terrace she looked at me with disapproval. “Are you not cold madam?’<br /></div><div>The tour touched on rather difficult subjects. Hitler. Nazis. The Nürnberg trials. At times I could feel her discomfort. I noticed slight changes in her voice when she translated for the two English couples. Was it my imagination or was her explanation a bit apologetic?<br /></div><div>We passed the Reichstag building, the one that should have become larger than the coliseum in Rome, but was not finished. A Leni Riefenstahl exhibit was in progress. Frau Walther, our guide, commented on what she called “Grössenwahn,” Hitler’s obsession with everything bigger, better, more extreme. When we reached the Stadium where he gave speeches, she told us that a Rabbi held a service there for seven Jewish soldiers on April 4th 1945. He stood exactly where Hitler used to stand.<br /></div><div>It is hard to explain what all these sites looked like. Abandoned and yet still mighty in their spaciousness. If they are meant to intimidate, to warn, to remind us of human arrogance, they did a good job on me. Passing the building where the Nazi trials were held was in contrast, almost uplifting. Apparently the four windows are always unshuttered; the light in the rooms is always on. I vowed to someday take a closer look at the national disgrace. That flaw of human nature that allowed the holocaust.<br /></div><div>When we got off the bus at the castle I saw the kernels of answers in front of me. Centuries of power enveloped me. Barons, emperors, princes, kings, knights. This is where the thirst for power began. I had entered a most impressive fortress and to its feet I pictured the hovels of medieval peasants. My mind turned to scenes from epic movies to visualize battles in which brightly armored horsemen with bows and arrows dragged pick-fork wielding ragged peons through the mud and slush of the countryside. Then the robber barons rode through the gates of the city and turned their greedy faces toward the maidens who fed them grapes and showered them with ale.<br /></div><div>To break the depressing bond with historical injustice I turned to the pale yellow rays of sunshine breaking through a thick layer of clouds. Imagine – for nearly a thousand winters this gray landscape has gone unchanged. A Japanese woman held her cell phone into the air and clicked. Minutes later, a continent away, somebody would look at the same snow-covered walls and lemon colored trails of light. My mind was fascinated. I had strayed from the group and was admonished by the stern words of our guide.<br /></div><div>“Are you ready to leave madam?”<br /></div><div>We walked, downhill, downhill, downhill, to the Christmas Market to attend the noon spectacle of the clock tower. Separation of church and state is a recent addition to our cultural sensitivities; on the richly ornamented gothic front of the fourteenth century Church of our Lady seven princes circle the enthroned emperor Karl the Fourth, bowing to the sounds of lunchtime bells. Never mind that this took place on the same spot where in 1349 a Synagogue had been torn down to disperse Jewish worshippers.<br /></div><div>We said our goodbyes and everybody quickly disappeared into the golden paradise of Christmas shopping. I rushed to the Starbucks across the street; it was the closest coffee shop, the only place that did not sell hot wine and cold beer.<br /></div><div>In the afternoon I took a long rest and now I remember why I forfeited a tour through Albrecht Dürer’s house and why I ignored the bunker on the way back to the hotel. Too many thoughts, too many German words tumbled through my head – something that always happens after a day or two – I needed to rein them in and put them on paper. It seemed that my brain had collected enough impressions to work on for some time. During the tour the words “Fascination and Terror” had come up in connection with Hitler’s architectural plans. Much like “Shock and Awe,” I thought and made a note to look up Albert Spears later. Then I noted that Schmidt is the biggest gingerbread baker in Nürnberg, producing three million pieces a day during the season. That too had to be fact-checked later.<br /></div><div>When the streetlights came on I took one more trip to the market to buy marzipan sausages and potatoes to take home as presents. I ate my last potato pancakes and discovered something that made me giggle all the way back to the hotel.<br /></div><div>While I stood at a tall table, watching snow flakes melt into my applesauce, I discovered just how dedicated the city of Nürnberg is to recycling. I was done and just about ready to toss the piece of cardboard that held the pancakes into the trash bin when I observed a woman eating her cardboard. I couldn’t stop myself from staring at her. Then I took a second look at mine, cautiously bit into it and realized that it was a bland wafer, the kind I seem to remember from long ago church services. Now all that was left for the trash was a tiny one-layer napkin.<br /></div><div>Before I boarded the train the next morning I battled one more German word pair. It had attacked me at two in the morning while I watched the biography of an entertainer turned author. The famous Didi had left his homeland for the silence of an island in France. When asked about the worst noises he answered: “Heckenscheren und Handyclingeln.” Hedge trimmers and cell phone ring tones. Luckily somewhere during my three hour speed tour of snow-covered flatland I lost the jarring images of those words and began to shift into anticipation of a rain-soaked, lovely Heidelberg afternoon.<br /><br /><br /><br /><br /></div><div></div></div></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17562562571414391716noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6774273276339751820.post-25851161449192190572009-07-11T23:42:00.000-07:002009-07-11T23:52:22.567-07:00Defying Tradition<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SlmH7ci5NWI/AAAAAAAAA7o/1FYHz2H-MxE/s1600-h/P1010015.JPG"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 300px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5357462687078495586" border="0" alt="" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SlmH7ci5NWI/AAAAAAAAA7o/1FYHz2H-MxE/s400/P1010015.JPG" /></a><br /><div>I want my own Christmas this year. It hadn’t occurred to me until now how hard it can be to break with tradition. My daughter, my very busy two job, always on the go, forty-one year old child is concerned about dwindling family togetherness. But this story isn’t about her. It’s about her mother. ME. The one who dares to take off on an airplane to fly to her fields of dreams during the holidays. The only one who will not be at Pat’s on Christmas Eve. Be it my own feelings of guilt or the perceived resistance to my plan, I must say it again, out loud this time.<br /><br />“I want my own Christmas this year.”<br /><br />But before I go on, I have to report that Pat and Mother and Peter, the main traditionalists in this family, have given me a thumbs up.<br /><br />“How brave of you,” Pat said on the phone the other day.<br /><br />Mother told me to have a wonderful time; we decided on January 3rd for a lunch date during which I would tell her all about my trip.<br /><br />Peter’s blessing showed in his silent acceptance of the travel brochure I printed for him. Not a single snappy – or snapping – remark about missing the reading of his memoirs. Of course I have read all the stories he included in his calendar – his gift to everybody – three times already; I’m his sometime editor and consultant, probably because I started on the road back a few years before him. <br /> <br />The road back. That’s what it’s all about. Memories. Recapturing the images of my teen years. Taking photographs of places that were battlegrounds or love nests or maybe just steps into the future. Leaning against old walls that witnessed my dreams and disappointments. Walking in the footsteps of playmates. Listening to the echoes of familiar songs.<br /> <br />When I narrow it down I realize that I am driven by one main desire this season: I want snow. Lots of snow. Snow as far as I can see. I want to taste snowflakes, throw snowballs, listen to the crunching of my boots on a tight snow pack, smell a freshly cut snow-dusted fir tree, sit on a bench in the silence of a gray, snow-heavy winter morning. In a way, I think I want to snow over all my California Christmases. Sunshine, palm trees, artificial wreaths, snow from a spray can, Silent Night over loudspeakers, multi-colored lights that chase each other around store fronts to be swallowed by cavernous interiors of Westfield Malls.<br /> <br />Yes, I desire snow. And it looks like only German snow will do. That’s why my first stop is Nünberg, the city of toys, the biggest Christmas Market in Europe. Nürnberg guarantees snow, and the city makes an effort to keep its holiday village of 200 vendors traditional. Plastic garlands and canned music are not allowed, neither are amusement park rides or war toys or Styrofoam cups. The first evidence of this “little town of Christmas” is preserved in the Germanic National Museum on an oval wooden box, bought at the Christmas Market and inscribed with the year 1628. Today the wooden stalls with red and white striped canvass roofs are filled with toys, tree decorations, candles, foods and souvenirs. While the promise of roasted chestnuts, sugared almonds, fresh gingerbread, hot cider, and mulled wine linger in the air, the “Christ Child” appears on the balcony of the 600-year old Church of our Lady. And from the white roofs in the brochure I understand that snow is ever-present during the holidays.<br /> <br />A three-hour train ride whisks me away from Bavaria to Heidelberg. I’m told that I might have to be content with old snow and slush, so I’ll have fun slipping and sliding through Old Town. I used to do that 50 years ago when I went to school there.<br /><br />Heidelberg, too, has a Christmas Market; 140 stalls are distributed over five different locations along the mile long Main Street. No cars allowed, only scarf-wrapped, steam-breathing shoppers, slush-defying window gazers and frozen-toed chestnut poppers.<br /><br />Heidelberg is the city in which I first saw James Dean in “East of Eden.” It is the city where I watched Dizzie Gillespie blow out his cheeks and where I kissed the trumpeter Don Ellis by the river on a frozen December night. I fell in love in Heidelberg and I gave birth to my son there.<br />My first Christmas Eve away from home was a crazy beer and pizza frenzy in the Sole D’Oro across the street from the Church of the Holy Spirit. I was a wild child then and I suspect that I miss that part of me now, too, along with my youth. Along with snow-capped old walls.<br /><br />I remember one of my most embarrassing winter moments. Shivering in a short, bright red, fake fur coat I walked home from Cave 54, a jazz cellar, in the early morning hours. I stalked through icy streets on high heels, shaking my head now and then to rid my long blond hair of melting snowflakes. Realizing that I had forgotten my house key I threw stones against my landlady’s bedroom window until she woke up. She climbed down three dimly lit flights of stairs in her nightgown to open the door for me. In her anger she mumbled that I was dressed like a hooker. Looking back I cringe; Frau Gehrig was right.<br /><br />The third city I am going to visit is Saarbrücken. I’m not familiar with it, the way I am familiar with Heidelberg; I don’t look forward to it, the way I look forward to Nürnberg. I’m just going to pay a debt. My parents are buried in Saarbrücken; I wasn’t there; my stepfather’s granddaughter made all the arrangements. I don’t know her and don’t know where she lives. I have only seen her as small child when she came to visit us with her mother. I imagine that I will study the map of the cemetery, find grave number 021 and lay a small bouquet of hothouse flowers into the snow in front of the gravestone. I’ll say goodbye and ride the train back to Heidelberg to celebrate Christmas Eve with a five-course dinner at the Hotel Ritter, the most romantic and one of the oldest hotels in the city. Afterwards I’ll walk across the street to the Church of the Holy Spirit. I’m hoping for new snow and an organ concert.<br /><br />On Sunday I’ll fly home. My head will be filled with antiquity and my suitcase will be overflowing with trinkets and books and yarn and chocolate. When I land I’ll step into that no-man’s land where the mind struggles with the concept of past and present. A giddy disorientation that follows long flights. German words might crowd my lips, but I’ll smile at the traffic on 101 and say, “It’s great to be home.”<br /><br /> I’ve already asked my daughter to pick me up. A compromise of sorts. Ten o’clock at night. A late Christmas gift exchange while I pull my feet out of the heavy boots and give a condensed account of my trip. I’ll promise to be at Pat’s next year for the traditional Christmas Eve family get-together. I’ll be forgiven. Or maybe there is nothing to forgive.<br /> </div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17562562571414391716noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6774273276339751820.post-27715379979192857182009-07-11T23:35:00.000-07:002009-07-11T23:41:06.410-07:00Nine Mile, Jamaica, WI<div align="center"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SlmEiaUm8tI/AAAAAAAAA7Y/_rW_nlgIsLs/s1600-h/P1010093.JPG"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 300px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5357458958450094802" border="0" alt="" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SlmEiaUm8tI/AAAAAAAAA7Y/_rW_nlgIsLs/s400/P1010093.JPG" /></a> On Bob Marley's Bed</div><div align="center"><br /><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SlmEh-Qc2bI/AAAAAAAAA7Q/W_cIUtLH3ak/s1600-h/P1010109.JPG"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 300px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5357458950916463026" border="0" alt="" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SlmEh-Qc2bI/AAAAAAAAA7Q/W_cIUtLH3ak/s400/P1010109.JPG" /></a> Bob Marley's Village "Nine Mile"<br /><br /><div align="left"><br />“Where the Legend was born,” it says in the brochure. “Come see, come be…with Bob Marley at Nine Mile.”<br /><br />We left my hotel in Montego Bay at seven in the morning but soon I shared the air-conditioned tour bus with a bunch of arrogant Brits and a few other grouchy early risers. Most of them only had a general idea who Bob Marley was. They took the tour as a last minute alternate instead of the trip to Kingston which was canceled because parts of the Blue Mountain road had been washed out by hurricanes Dennis and Emily. Jamaica is too poor for inland repairs; only famed international hotel chains along the white sand beaches seem to be cleared after disasters.<br /><br />Bob Marley is one of my heroes. A symbol of freedom from oppression, an international music legend, a believer in world peace. He was born in Nine Mile on February 6, 1945 and laid to rest there in a state funeral in 1981. Though during his lifetime reggae and Bob’s message attracted more whites than blacks in the US, he is now well known all over the world.<br /><br />This was my first trip into a rainforest, a trip I had planned in front of my computer, far from tropical humidity and mosquitoes. The printed version of my dream did not address inherent difficulties with the system. “No problem, mon.” I had wanted to take public transportation and had carefully mapped my destination. But once I arrived in Montego Bay I reconsidered quickly as I listened to accounts of other travelers. When I saw the crowds that had gathered around stops in the market towns I considered myself lucky that I had abandoned the idea if taking a local bus or squeezing into a route taxi, the unlicensed and cheap counterpart of the licensed taxi, which seem to carry twice as many passengers as there are seats available. And then, all along the winding, rutted roads I saw people standing, two women here, a young boy there, three men in an argument; all waiting for the bus that would eventually come through and pick them up.<br /><br />The Lonely Planet guidebook calls Jamaica’s public bus system “the epitome of chaos.” “Soon come” is the answer to all things Jamaican, though soon has no expiration date. And all the time I had the vision that the dense forest would swallow its people if they stood too long in one spot.<br /><br />We rode along the A1, the main thoroughfare, for the first part of our excursion. Over the microphone our guide gave a running account of landscape and history. Before we turned toward the mountains, the bus driver warned us of “situations,” minor details that don’t have the significance of problems in the view of Jamaicans but which might upset those who take efficiency and order for granted. Oberiah Malcolm, Bob Marley’s grandfather, is supposed to have remarked that a straight line is impossible in his country because of spirits and magic and spells. “The Land of Look Behind” he called it.<a style="mso-footnote-id: ftn1" title="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.g?blogID=6774273276339751820#_ftn1" name="_ftnref1">[1]</a> I thought of Oberiah Malcolm, trying to remember his remedy against duppies, the ghosts of the dead.<br /><br />As we left the highway and zigzagged into the mountains, we all kept our eyes glued to the road in anticipation of the next obstacle. We had to stop alongside a ravine when one of the British boys’ stomach revolted. We bounced through a lake of muddy water, left behind by a recent hurricane. We dodged tree branches, other buses, coasters, route taxis, street vendors and stray goats. Only once did our Rasta guide raise his voice.<br /><br />“Fuck you,” he shook his fist and yelled at a young man who aimed to stop our bus with one hand while he waved a bundle of fruit in his other.<br /><br />The guide apologized to us with a courteous “I am sorry for my outburst.” No explanation, no comment on the unrest of the crowd, no smile. Tourists are his business, but the street vendors of the small market towns are his brothers and sisters. Many women sat in doorways of ramshackle houses, their fruits laid out on colorful cloths or displayed in baskets. They out-yelled each other to interest visitors in local produce. Children ran between cars to sell their mothers’ wares. When our bus slowed down to a crawl we were surrounded by impatient men whose income depends on tourists. I could see the driver’s face from my seat in the third row; not a muscle moved as he maneuvered us through Main Street of downtown Brown’s Town. Our bus resembled a silver metal fish, loaded with mostly pink faces, slicing through a wave of dark arms and hands.<br /><br />When we arrived in the parking lot at Nine Mile we needed to get our land legs back quickly as we were led up the steep stairs to the Marley compound. The air was less humid here and fragrant with tropical flowers. All around us we saw tiny cement block houses clinging to the edge of the mountainside. Though these homes looked much sturdier than the rusted metal sheds in shanty towns, they seemed to get swallowed up on all sides by trees and underbrush.<br /><br />Once inside the heavily guarded, gated Marley Estate, we were handed off to another guide. His dreads were concealed by a Rastafarian cap crocheted of black, red, yellow, and green yarn, symbolizing the hardship of the people, blood, sun, and nature. These colors are repeated throughout the grounds, painted on rocks and buildings, hung in flags, and painted as frames for Bob Marley’s images.<br /><br />After we walked through the museum store we had a brief waiting period in the I-tal bar. I suppose this was to let another group pass, as well as give us time to buy a few drinks. The men took advantage of the Red Stripe, the local beer; I tried to watch the screen that flashed Bob’s life in front of us. I looked around to familiarize myself a bit more with the group. Besides the English tourists we had also picked up a few people from other All-Inclusive Resorts like Breezes and Sandals. Whenever I travel alone I search for women who might eventually be my lunch companions. Usually I pick two women who look like friends and seem to be getting along well with each other. This system works well; the women are glad to get a fresh face to talk to and I am happy not to sit by myself at a table or with a couple that is complaining about the weather or bickering over the food.<br /><br /> As we were led up a steep hill to Bob Marley’s two-room home, I connected with an African American woman from Los Angeles and her daughter. I asked the mother to take my picture in front of the gate; it is not often that I appear in the photographs of my travels, but this was one time I didn’t want to miss. Though I am partially hidden by three young women who refused to move, I am there beneath a Marley portrait.<br /><br />For a while we walked through the garden and crowded around the soft-spoken guide, then we were asked to take our shoes off to enter the small house. I saw the question marks on the faces of some of the men, faces that seemed to get redder and redder under the influence of the Red Stripe. Some were puffing on large spliffs, the kind Bob Marley used to smoke. Though ganja or weed is illegal in Jamaica, the Marley Experience must have promised them “the herb” as an extra bonus for taking the trip.<br /><br />Until I entered the small cabin that housed Bob’s bed, I had concentrated on taking photographs, on observing the surroundings, on the tourist aspect of Nine Mile. Now for the first time I felt the presence. We took turns sitting on his bed and somebody offered to take my picture. I remembered the song “Is this Love:”<br /><br />“ I wanna love you, every day and every night<br />We’ll be together, with a roof right over our heads<br />We’ll share the shelter of my single bed.”<br /><br />Poverty, struggle, love, hope, all that surrounded the young singer, surrounded me for an instance. This moment reminded me of the power Bob had over everybody he came into contact with.<br /><br />I felt it again, later, in the small chapel, when I walked around the eight-foot tall marble mausoleum that holds his body, his guitar, his bible, and a spliff. On the backside is an inscription on a quilt: “I asked God to bring me a friend; he brought me you.” Tears welled up in my eyes when I touched it. I would have liked to spend more than five minutes in the chapel but the impatient group couldn’t wait to escape its heat. I thought of Bob Marley’s grace, his strength, his convictions. I remembered the words to “Buffalo Soldier” and begun to sing the words:<br />“Fighting on arrival, fighting for survival.” It’s my all time favorite.<br /><br />Outside again, the guide laid down on Mt. Zion, Bob’s meditation spot, and demonstrated how the artist would use the rock as a pillow. Though he had left Nine Mile with his mother when he was still a child, he often came back to his roots to compose songs.<br /><br />By the time we slipped back into our shoes, I saw others who were impacted by the experience. An older black man nodded to himself. A woman sang “No woman no cry.” Bob had always cast a spell over women. He loved women, a lot of them, and he loved all the children they gave him. The family tree suggests eleven, one of them with a broken line, suggesting his wife Rita’s infidelity. Shortly before his death of brain cancer he asked Rita to make sure the children were taken care of. All the children. She honored his wish, though it took many years before the estate was sorted out, before Rita Marley and his mother Cedella Marley Booker settled their differences. It must have been difficult for Rita to accept the children he had fathered with other women, but she took them in and raised them along with her own. Today most of them are musicians, following in their father’s footsteps.<br /><br />After the tour we spent fifteen minutes shopping in the museum store. It was an overwhelming task. I picked one of at least fifty different t-shirts. Bob’s message is imprinted on the back:<br />“Until the philosophy which holds one race superior and another inferior is finally and permanently discredited and abandoned everywhere is war, me say war.”<br /><br />Back on the bus our guide handed out beer, soda, and water and a few more remarks about the Bob Marley Estate and the legacy. I heard the reverence in his voice when he spoke of “Mr. Marley,” and I detected, too, the slightest bit of arrogance that happens when you are forced to defend your world to an alien audience. How difficult it must have been for him to lay out a history of slavery, atrocities, and injustice to an audience that seemed more concerned with getting back on the road to the next stop, lunch and another round of beer.<br /><br />Jamaica is a very poor country, suffering under political and gang warfare, economic strangulation, and exploitation by international companies. There is no running water in tiny Nine Mile. The village clings to the mountainside with tenacity. Begging hands reach through the padlocked gates of the Marley compound. And though Bob’s Mother built a school and seems to donate on a regular bases to the surrounding population, the need is overwhelming. When I offered a few coins in exchange for a photograph I felt cheap. What price do you pay for a look at the real Jamaica?<br /><br />When Bob left Nine Mile and moved to Trenchtown, the ghetto of Kingston, he began his war on poverty. He declared war on racism everywhere. His songs were his weapons and he never lost sight of his roots, never compromised his commitment, and never gave up. I have always admired him for his courage and thought I would see an echo of this sentiment in the faces of our group. A few minutes into the downhill trip I looked around and saw that almost everybody was asleep. For a while I tried to follow the guide’s conversation with the driver, but only understood every tenth word. They had fallen into the island patois, a mix of English, African, Portuguese, Spanish and Rastafarian slang. I felt isolated in my desire for discussion. Disappointed in the lack of communication between two opposing worlds. Politely I closed my eyes and pretended the day was over. Bob Marley was humming the Redemption Song.<br /><br /> <a style="mso-footnote-id: ftn1" title="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.g?blogID=6774273276339751820#_ftnref1" name="_ftn1">[1]</a> From the book Catch a Fire by Timothy White</div><br /><br /><br /><br /></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17562562571414391716noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6774273276339751820.post-56718659513034654712009-07-11T23:20:00.000-07:002009-07-11T23:30:24.240-07:00Bonding with Sheep<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SlmBuuYfYJI/AAAAAAAAA7I/iHo3jgqLFW8/s1600-h/P1010050.JPG"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 300px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5357455871458631826" border="0" alt="" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SlmBuuYfYJI/AAAAAAAAA7I/iHo3jgqLFW8/s400/P1010050.JPG" /></a><br /><br />Between Humsaugh and Housesteads I forget what attracted me to the adventure of a long distance walk. I have plodded on for hours without connecting to my surroundings, mechanically conquering crag after crag. Though my feet register the changing landscape, I observe little of the rugged terrain I read about earlier. The comfortably soft, red velvet image of the Crown Inn has long vanished, only the young men’s breakfast chatter of blisters and misty hilltops stays with me.<br /><br />“Breezy and bleak!” said the New Zealander.<br /><br />“Barren but beautiful!” nodded his British friend.<br /><br />They are walking in the opposite direction - Bowness to Wallsend – they tramped through these stony outcrops yesterday. The younger one, the Brit, left traces of blood on a towel in our shared bathroom. This morning the wastebasket revealed remnants of crumpled surgical tape and pieces of gauze.<br /><br />“Moleskin.” I heard somebody say. “Use Moleskin.”<br /><br />The steady drizzle has become a wind-driven rain that is strong enough to blow me sideways. My knees are shaking. Is that what Roman legionnaires endured two centuries ago when they built their forts and milecastles and turrets? I keep my eyes to the ground but finally stop to pull on my poncho. Facing the field wall, leaning toward it, trying to shield the inside of my daypack from the rain, I dig for today’s section of the guidebook. Through foggy glasses I read a few sentences:<br /><br />“The walk is now going steadily uphill, with an ever-steeper drop falling away to the north.” And then, “Here is one of the most spectacular views of the Wall, snaking away into the distance, following the high ground to take advantage of the natural defences of this dramatic landscape.”<br /><br />I am, so the map tells me, in the midst of Northumberland National Park and have just left the rocky slopes of Sewingshields Crags. I must have missed Milecastle 35.<br /><br />The supersized green poncho, hidden away in an emergency pack in the trunk of my car for more than 20 years, turns out to be an indictment on modern plastics, at least plastics of the early1980s. As I unfold it from its sealed bag it feels limp; while I pull it over my head it tears in several places. Without a sound it falls apart under my fingers. When I continue to walk a gust rips the front apart, from my neck down, and I have to stop again to find something to hold it together. The clothespins are in my suitcase and all I can retrieve from the bottom of my daypack are two paper clips.<br /><br />Shreds of plastic flutter in the wind like flags as I stomp along the border of the ancient Roman empire. A tired old soldier on his way to Housesteads. My silhouette must be that of a dark green tent, backpack and teddy bear bulging under the rear wall, the front pinched into a makeshift seam by purple pieces of bent wire. The wind whips the hood against my ears. For a while I hold it tight under my chin, but my fingers become so cold and wet that I can’t resist the temptation to slip my hand into the pocket of my coat underneath the rain gear.<br /><br />A group of men catches up with me at the bottom of a sharp rise and I stop to let them pass. Without slowing down they inquire, ”Having a good walk? The oldest one of the six – probably in his fifties - hesitates for a second, just long enough to let me know that he understands my forced smile.<br /><br />“A bit windy today.”<br /><br />I assure him that I am fine, “just catching my breath.” I zoom my camera for a quick shot and watch until they disappear over the top of the crag. They wore shorts and short-sleeved shirts and their muscular legs didn’t seem to mind the steep hill. Even after all of them have disappeared their laughter echoes in my mind. It is the first time since I started this hike five days ago that I feel sorry for myself. All alone in the middle of nowhere. Something I had looked forward to. Something I thought I liked. What happened?<br /><br />I hope that my mantra for the “sleepless-midnight-blues” works on “stormy daytime greys” too, and I whisper Om Mani Padme Hum. I repeat the Tibetan prayer several times, take a few deep breaths, and a long 360 degree look around.<br /><br />To my surprise I am being observed at close range. A sheep stares at me. Her long, cream-colored coat is blown into a neatly combed shag rug; brown eyes are bulging from her black face; dark-veined ears move just slightly, as if she is trying to pick up clues about me. She stands on thin, mottled, black and white, legs. I untangle my camera underneath the poncho, wipe raindrops off the lens with the edge of my coat sleeve, and capture her image. She isn’t the first sheep I encounter on my walk, but the only one I see in this area. It is, as some gates point out, lambing season along Hadrian’s Wall and special care is expected so mothers and babies are not disturbed. Yesterday I watched some of them walk in unison, stare at me in unison, run away in unison. Occasionally a lamb drifted too far away from its mother and when it saw me it tumbled toward her and sucked onto one of her teats. Some mothers turned their heads, alarmed by my approach; others ignored my presence. This one, I decide, must be a grandmother like me.<br /><br />For a while we just stand there, eyeing each other. I have the silly urge to explain myself to her. Tell her about this mountain of green plastic that hovers on the narrow path. Apologize for ignoring her homeland. And thank her for visiting with me.<br /><br />“You’re not the first person to get depressed out here,” she says. “But look on the bright side, you’re almost at the Fort. And don’t you people get food and showers and beds when you finish your day’s walk?”<br /><br />She doesn’t take her eyes off me while she shakes her head. “You look silly.”<br />“I feel better now,” I hear myself say, rubbing the camera dry before I slip it under my coat. I lift my face and let the rain run down my cheeks. For the first time today I smell the damp soil mixed with a hint of grass. With both hands I rake through my wet hair.<br /><br />“Hello world,” I say out loud, “I’m talking to a sheep.”<br />Then I laugh.<br />“Good bye sheep. Thank you.”<br /><br />The imagined exchange fills me with exuberance. I feel the ewe’s compassion even as I understand the silliness of this thought. A sense of belonging, that’s all I needed. I gaze far into the distance of the open countryside now, across fields, strips of shrubs, roads, woods. Ridges and furrows where the Wall rises and disappears into the distance. For the next mile I climb and descend at a faster pace. Just before I arrive at Housesteads I take off the poncho, wad it into a small wet clump and stuff it into a ziplock bag. Housesteads is one of the most popular places along the Wall, the most complete example of a Roman Fort in Britain; I don’t want to arrive in rags like a beggar. What would the young legionnaires think of me?<br /><br /><div></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17562562571414391716noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6774273276339751820.post-30764659439812030092009-07-11T23:18:00.000-07:002009-07-11T23:20:35.919-07:00These Boots Are Made For Walking<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SlmAgzZYyRI/AAAAAAAAA7A/kWoIpS8wFU0/s1600-h/P1010091.JPG"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 300px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 400px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5357454532774775058" border="0" alt="" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/SlmAgzZYyRI/AAAAAAAAA7A/kWoIpS8wFU0/s400/P1010091.JPG" /></a><br />On my walk across England my feet are my most important assets. I pamper them – a preoccupation I have never indulged before. Not that I look at them as beauty objects; they are the tools that march me from the North Sea to the Irish Sea and they deserve attention. Every morning, after breakfast, I rub lotion into them, check for bumps, bruises, sore spots, redness. Then I pull on my sock liners, smoothing out and tugging until they are ready to be covered by wool socks. Then the boots, oh my lovely boots. Lowa, Lady’s Renegade GTX, brown and black Nubuk leather, climate controlled with Gortex. Made in Germany. Every time I slip into them I am instantly surrounded by comfort and protection.<br /><br />I had tried on several boots at Mel Cotton’s when I first hatched the dream of walking Hadrian’s Wall. I had never bought boots before and all of them felt stiff and confining. I almost gave up on the purchase for the day, when the clerk brought me another pair with the comment, “these here are a little more expensive.”<br /><br />I slid my left foot into the boot in front of me. As I settled into it I felt nothing but happiness. This boot fit like a soft glove. While the girl laced the shoestrings I could barely stand still. I wanted to walk up and down the little incline the store provides to check traction. I was thrilled with the result. The waffle pattern on the sole prevented my foot from slipping backwards. The one hundred and fifty dollar price tag didn’t bother me until I got home and realized that my most expensive shoe purchase until then had been thirty-nine dollar Reeboks, bought on sale. <br /><br />Of course boots complicate airline safety procedures. If I forget to take them off when I go through a checkpoint, the metal hooks set off an alarm. An alarm means that somebody frowns and makes me lift my arms while she outlines my body with a wand. After the search I stand amongst my belongings, bent over, teetering back and forth, winding the laces back up. When I left home I had no specific way of tying my boots but after a couple of days I become alert to a boot that is too tightly laced or not laced evenly. A loose fit makes the heel ride up and down until the skin is irritated; a tight fit presses against the arch, making it sore to the touch. <br /><br /> Everybody is supposed to carry a medical kit, a guidebook and maps on this cross-country trek; whistle and compass are expected; boots and socks are a given. But since walking gear sometimes falls short in quality, it is always a serious topic for discussion. I meet a group of young people, sitting on the bank of the Tyne River, only a day into the 84-mile trek from Wallsend to Bowness-on-Solway. They sit with their boots off, rubbing their naked feet, covering their blisters with Band-Aids. It is my first look at bloody heels though later I meet more people, mostly young men, whose feet bear witness to the record speeds they accomplish. The sight of abused feet makes me even more determined to walk up hills and down into canyons at a slower pace. A Hadrian’s Wall mile can be three times as long as a California mile, especially in the rain.<br /><br />My general education about walking is gradual – my vocabulary and knowledge of products increase throughout my trip – but I learn about boot etiquette quickly. At my first farmhouse, The Belvedere,“ I am advised, “Please take off the boots and leave them by the door.”<br /><br />I have to admit that I am not happy with the idea of leaving hundred and fifty dollar boots unattended, but assume that from now on this procedure will be repeated at all other accommodations. With a smile on my face I walk in my socks behind my hostess, Pat Carr, as she shows me the kitchen and the breakfast and television lounge and leads me to my room for the night.<br /><br />At the Crown Inn in Humshaugh, the most lavish of all my accommodations, where all three eating rooms are decorated in red velvet, I am allowed to carry my boots to my room. Of course Judy, the owner, first takes a look at their condition. Upstairs I line them up by the window in the shared bathroom, hang my wool socks over a chair by my bed, and wash the thin liners in the sink and roll them in a towel until they are almost dry.<br /><br />At Beggar Bog Farmhouse, by the side of the Military Road near Housesteads, Brenda Huddleston proudly shows me the shoe rack her husband built just outside the letting rooms. A tactful reminder, I think, as I put down my backpack and unlace my boots before accepting the cup of tea she offers.<br /><br />The Abbey Bridge Hotel in Lanercost has three separate eating areas, one for walkers, one for locals, one for houseguests and other serious diners. Sue Hatt takes my boots out of my hands and tells me that I will get them back when I leave. What if I didn’t have any other shoes with me, I wonder, but feel a little silly to make an issue over this. Their brochure advertises a drying room. I imagine my boots are resting in the drying room during the night.<br /><br />At the Four Wynds Bed and Breakfast near Haltwhistle, over black pudding, fried tomatoes and fried eggs, I have a lovely conversation with two gentlemen from Denmark. Eventually they ask what kind of socks I wear. We discuss the Cool Max effect. Though I don’t understand were the water goes after it is wicked away from my skin, I am in favor of the material. And I explain proudly about the attention I give to my liners, smoothing them from toe to heel to avoid even the tiniest wrinkle. The older one of the “Great Danes” (my secret nickname for the pair) tells me about the best shop for walking socks in Carlisle. “You can’t miss it,” he says. The Four Wynds is the only place where I see boots walking across the living room carpet. Two pairs of very confident boots that lead the best-socked Danish feet back home.<br /><br />During my three-day stay in Carlisle I carry my footwear up and down three flights every day. I do it gladly because Eric Dawes and his wife Marjory are a very sweet couple and I am in awe of the antiques that line the staircase. I would feel like the proverbial elephant in a china shop, would I step on the Persian rugs of the Courtfield Guest House in my boots.<br /><br />During ten walking days and several days of sightseeing I occasionally switch to tennis shoes, in town, at dinner, and on the final flat stretch along the Solway Firth. I arrive early at the King’s Arms, which is a restaurant at the end of the journey for those who walk east to west. Assuming that my host at the Hesket House does not expect me for another hour I join a couple as they celebrate their trip with ale and pea soup in the beer garden. Since I am wearing my tennis shoes I feel like a novice when the man and woman lift their beer glasses and salute their boots. I keep my NB walkers hidden under the table and wait until the couple leaves before I go over to the bar and request my Award of Completion from the bartender.<br /><br />On my last night in Port Carlisle at the Hesket House I find no clue to boot rules. It is a brand new place, no numbers on the doors, no room keys. The owner, David Hutton, a young man whose wife left him a few weeks ago, is preoccupied with his grief. The place is so new that I couldn’t find it online and have no idea what to expect. The stairs are not carpeted. Just to be on the safe side I take off my boots while I talk to him in the hallway. Late at night I hear more guests arrive. I jump out of bed and press my body against the unlocked door. Heavy boots cross the hall. Two men discuss the soccer game. They laugh; one slams the door to a room the other one lingers in the bathroom. Too much beer. After all is quiet again I sneak to the bathroom, leaving my door open for light. Next to the claw-footed bathtub sits a pair of worn hiking boots, stuffed with dirty white socks.<br /><br />The next day, back in London, at The Renaissance Hotel, there is no rack, no shelf, no bench, no one spot to put the boots. I get in an elevator and walk the long carpeted hallway of the second floor, getting lost in search of room 2028, aware of the boots that don’t seem to belong on my feet. I wear them until I find my sweats and take a long, hot, shower in my own private bathroom. I swish the liners back and forth in the water that accumulates at the bottom of the tub. Tomorrow they will get a proper washing in my machine at home.<br /><br />Though there is no need for boots in the city I have to wear them again in the morning. I don’t have enough room in my suitcase to pack them.<br /><br />At the airport, as I place my boots into the plastic pan, I notice a few pebbles, a piece of wood, dried mud filling the crevices. Looking down at my unfashionably blue and gray wool socks, I realize that they have not been washed once in two weeks. Only the liners were soaped every evening. My other four pairs of walking socks are still rolled up in my suitcase, untouched. Later, on the plane, I unlace again, stretch my legs, and salute my walking gear. One hundred and thirty-eight miles in fifteen days. On happy feet.<br /><div></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17562562571414391716noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6774273276339751820.post-13677476487335233902009-07-11T22:37:00.000-07:002009-07-11T22:47:41.554-07:00Stiles and Gates Along Hadrian's Wall<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/Sll3ZJ8s3eI/AAAAAAAAA6o/sumkMbGWTXo/s1600-h/P1010015.JPG"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 320px; FLOAT: left; HEIGHT: 240px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5357444505784868322" border="0" alt="" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/Sll3ZJ8s3eI/AAAAAAAAA6o/sumkMbGWTXo/s320/P1010015.JPG" /></a><br /><br /><div><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/Sll3Y0zxHyI/AAAAAAAAA6g/7W1evrWaIPM/s1600-h/P1010077.JPG"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 240px; FLOAT: left; HEIGHT: 320px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5357444500110253858" border="0" alt="" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/Sll3Y0zxHyI/AAAAAAAAA6g/7W1evrWaIPM/s320/P1010077.JPG" /></a> <a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/Sll3YQYOhlI/AAAAAAAAA6Y/n7e9Vcf165c/s1600-h/P1010044.JPG"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 240px; FLOAT: left; HEIGHT: 320px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5357444490331063890" border="0" alt="" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/Sll3YQYOhlI/AAAAAAAAA6Y/n7e9Vcf165c/s320/P1010044.JPG" /></a> Tyana and I at the Wall<br /><br /><br /><br /><div><br /><div></div><br /><div></div><br /><div></div><br /><div></div><br /><div></div><br /><div></div><br /><div></div><br /><div></div><br /><div></div><br /><div></div><br /><div></div><br /><div></div><br /><div><br />On my 84-mile walk across England stiles and gates are the dots that connect individual properties to each other and the real world to all the twists and turns in my guidebook. Before setting out on a path I follow it with my eyes, searching for a possible exit then I read the next few sentences which go something like this: “”A ladder stile to the left of the Errington Arms leads back into the fields and the walk heads off to follow the prominent earthworks of theVallum. The next stile takes you to the far side of the fence, away from the Vallum. This is a pleasant walk through the fields, which leads to a conifer plantation. Go through the gate and turn right, then left on the path running beside the wall next to the road.”<br /><br />Sometimes I scribble a comment into the sidelines, or I nod; occasionally I laugh, straighten my back and express a soulful YES to the landscape around me. When I am confused, I put my finger on the line in question and try to follow the rights and lefts in my mind before I look again into the unknown territory ahead of me. When all else fails to convince me that I am going in the right direction, I give the teddy bear on my back a pat and tell him that we are not lost.<br /><br />Before I read ‘Hadrian’s Wall Path’ I didn’t know that stiles are just steps or stairs. I had never heard of kissing gates. It was explained to me that they are gates swinging back and forth between two fence posts. This prevents them from flying wide open. A narrow triangular space allows the walker to squeeze between the posts while shifting the gate from one side to the other. Occasionally the squeeze space is invaded by stinging nettles and it takes rather inelegant twists and turns to dodge the infiltrators.<br /><br />Most gates are well taken care of. I only see one in need of attention, a metal gate tied temporarily to a metal fence with rope, rusted and leaning in a not so straight line against a wooden fence post. Once I encounter a metal gate that stays closed by pulling a weight, attached to a chain, toward the ground. It isn’t until past Carlisle – way west – that I see my first metal kissing gate and I am thrilled to add its photograph to my collection.<br /><br />While gates offer rather easy access to the beyond, stiles vary from field to field. The easiest ones are made of stone flags, leading to a hole in the wall. The majority of stiles resemble ladders that take me four or five steps into the air where I hesitate for an instance, shifting the weight of my backpack and occasionally I turn around, facing the ladder on my descend into the next field.<br /><br />It is easy to see from one pasture to the next when only barbed wire separates them but when they were divided by dry stone walls I never know what to expect, especially when roughly hewn steps in the dirt lead to a tall stile. Sometimes all I can see is the sky. To my surprise one of my pictures shows a parked car very close to my picnic spot in the wind-sheltered corner of a five- step stile. I had no idea that I was so close to other humans at the time.<br /><br />Another time it isn’t an unexpected human presence; it is a sheep that surprises me. It must be deaf or maybe she – assuming it is a she – ponders her own barrenness while being absorbed in the lively bleating all around her. She has settled next to a kissing gate and doesn’t move until I emerge right by her side.<br /><br />Two gates boast stern warnings for the timid walker or maybe they are only meant for the ignorant. The first time I see the sign “Warning. Bull in Field,” I avoid the treacherous playing field of the non-castrated enemy. It is easy because I am next to a frequently traveled road. But the second time I have no choice but to cross into dangerous territory. What do bulls do when they see an old lady with a teddy bear on her back? How do I spot a bull? The difference between a steer and a bull? What to do if the bull attacks me? I have no idea. Nobody told me about the possibility of being confronted with one. And indeed, nobody expects to see one, as I am later told. The sign was probably posted by a disgruntled farmer whose patience with stampedes of walkers has grown thin. It is a fact that bulls are not allowed in any field, which includes a public path. It is also a fact that some walkers stray from the public path and hike diagonally through the field if the path is not the shortest line between two gates.<br /><br />All gates and stiles are properly marked with the white on black acorn of the National Trail. Hadrian’s Wall Path is the thirteenth in the family of England’s national trails and its completion in 2003 allows walkers to follow for the first time since the fifth century the historic line of the Wall on a specified path. Every few miles I meet travelers: families, friends, couples, lone men – men in shorts – men of all ages marching in the shadow of history.<br /><br />Every stile, every gate gives me a new perspective. A castle in front of me, a golf course I have to cross, a herd of raggedy cows that won’t move over, a mother sheep protecting her lambs. Once I am surprised by a mountain biker who peddles uphill. Another time a man in his seventies crosses my path – he is walking west to east – somewhere behind him his friend and doctor has hurt his ankle and spends the day recuperating in a hotel room. It doesn’t take long for me to learn the etiquette of the road. Most of us nod, smile, take inventory of the other’s well-being and then we pass. Occasionally, in the openness of a meadow, we ask each other about our home bases or we comment on the weather, spend a few minutes with pleasantries. Those who pass me, walking in the same direction, comment on my teddy bear companion. We laugh.<br /><br />Once I enter the garden of an elderly woman and admire her poppies. I tell her I grew up in Germany, surrounded by poppy and rape fields. She asks if I have enough water for my journey to the next town. As I climb across the stile that leads out of her backyard I encounter a couple sitting in the sun against the stonewall; they are eating their bag lunch. The man says the words I hear most these days, “Walking the walk?”<br /><br />“Yes,” I answer, “nice day isn’t it?” Then I pull the guidebook from my coat pocket and mark the map with a star. The private garden is something I want to write about in my journal tonight.<br /><br /></div></div></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17562562571414391716noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6774273276339751820.post-88410753845946223972009-07-11T22:11:00.000-07:002009-07-11T22:29:44.548-07:00San Francisco to Newcastle (England 2004)<div align="center"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/Sllz9CXW_BI/AAAAAAAAA6Q/CTjswRE3fjw/s1600-h/P1010011.JPG"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 300px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5357440724177976338" border="0" alt="" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/Sllz9CXW_BI/AAAAAAAAA6Q/CTjswRE3fjw/s400/P1010011.JPG" /></a> Samy and Tyana</div><br /><div align="center"></div><p> </p><p>An airplane is an island in the sky. It can be a stressful place, or a boring one. Seasoned travelers are used to its engine hum and recycled airflow and quietly adjust their seats, their activities, and their moods to the journey above the clouds. Occasional flyers linger in grieving farewell to the events left behind or eagerly prepare for things to come. Surrounded by laptops, MP3 players, coloring books and baby pacifiers I store my airplane travel necessities in front of me in the pouch. Book, crossword puzzle, journal, chocolate bar and water bottle. Though boredom has never been a problem for me, I wish my mind would let me nap every now and then to shorten the leap from here to there.<br /><br />It is one in the afternoon; I am flying from San Francisco to London and turn off the past as soon as I wind my watch eight hours forward. At midnight London time I enjoy a dinner of beef, potatoes, carrots, salad, and spice cake. At 2:30am I muse about the backpack content of the twelve year old across the aisle. A mix of little girl and woman. A pink lip balm ball, stickers and sticker book, fingernail file. Candy and toothbrush. 2:35am. Groundspeed 575 mph, outside temperature minus 49 degrees Farenheit, altitude 3,500 feet, time to destination 4 ½ hours.<br />We are over Iquafut near Kuwguag. So the monitor tells me.<br /><br />Shortly before the end of the flight – eight hours and thirty minutes – I finish my book, eat a ham and egg croissant and drink orange juice and two cups of coffee. After deplaning, crawling through passport control and customs I am eager to immerse myself into the alien space that confronts me at the exit sign.<br /><br />Touchdown in England is only mildly shocking. Same language, comparable culture, temperate climate, though I decide that 12 degrees centigrade is a bit chilly. In Morocco the difference in dress first caught my attention. In Egypt it was the police presence. In China the absence of blond hair. In Britain – oh no – they drive on the wrong side of the street. This is the first revelation when I emerge from the long tunnel leading to the bus station. I later change the words to ‘the other side of the street’ but my reflexes never quite cope with the reality. I am always half a thought behind.<br /><br />When I show my National Express ticket to one of the drivers – I printed it at home on my computer - he points to the far end of the transit area. My reservation is for June 3, 2004 at fifteen hundred hours. What I had thought of as ample fidgeting time when I made the schedule, now turns out to be a seven-hour wait. I had miscalculated. Nobody fidgets for seven hours. Too much time allotted for mechanical difficulties and other delays. There is absolutely nothing to do at the bus terminal except to eat, read, and study the monetary system.<br /><br />As I walk toward the only eatery, the first of the ‘I should haves’ pokes at me. I should have reserved a seat on an earlier bus. I should have stayed inside the terminal for a few hours. I should have saved my chocolate bar for this part of the journey.<br /><br />The moment I slide my backpack off I remember the duo attached to it. Samy the frog in the net side pocket along with my water bottle. Tyana the bear, held to the back by crisscrossing cord and a shoelace tied around her neck. I smile. People must think I am weird. My enthusiasm comes right back. I buy a bottle of orange juice and a Danish for 2.24. My first purchase with British pounds. Earlier, while still in the terminal area, I had bought 141 pound sterling for 280 dollars so now I remember to double the cost of my snack to gain a sense of its ‘real value.’<br /><br />All my travel starts out with comparisons. How much would this cost at home? Does it taste like the juice I am used to? Nice counter person. She looks at me when she gives me change. People don’t look at each other in California. Too busy. Frumpy dress. We are much more stylish. I look at the people who wipe the table next to me, clean the bathroom, take out the trash. I think of the stooped Mexican field workers who pick strawberries in the Salinas valley. Turkish women who scrub floors in Germany. Moroccans picking olives in the South of France. I give the woman who hands me the paper towel more than she had expected. New money – it doesn’t mean much to me yet. She nods a silent thank you. Without smiling.<br /><br />After a good half hour of philosophical thought dangling between past experiences and newly acquired knowledge I begin to sort out the immediate future. I negotiate a seat on an earlier bus to Victoria Coach Station. Thinking that there might be more activity at another site guides me to the next level. I perform the baggage check. I call it my four-point reality check. First I glance at the suitcase – all the comforts of home on wheels – if I lost it I would continue to function but I would miss the daily change of clothes, the extras, luxury. Then I touch the bottom of my backpack – the serious ingredients of my walking persona – without compass and whistle, without maps and guidebook, without water and medical kit, without fine woolen socks and perfect liners, without Tyana and Samy, who would I be? The third point brings together my hands over the camera that hangs from a strap around my neck. Seriously, if the camera were gone, I would miss out on a major part of my experience. The afterlife of a trip is very important to me. The long hours of printing out proof of having been there. The gathering of images of walking, climbing, struggling, and enjoying the journey. Finally, in the fourth reality check, I cup the fanny pack. My tightly cinched black box of ultimate necessity. Identification, money, connections, ticket home. Life would turn difficult if I lost the fanny pack. For the whole trip I repeat this baggage check several times a day, always aware of the consequences of loss.<br /><br />As I plop down in the coach opposite an old woman who is huddled in the corner of a front row seat I read the sign posted next to me, “You may be requested to vacate these seats if they are needed by a less able person.” I dwell briefly on this statement but dismiss its relevancy. Plenty of room for many more passengers. Besides, I am 65; this fact alone entitles me to consider myself as ‘less able.’ Less able than who? Not exactly the image I had in mind for my 84 mile walk across England, but for the time being as good an excuse as any to be close to an exit. Isn’t the human mind a wonderful instrument? Manipulative, accommodating, definitely user-friendly.<br /><br />Victoria Coach Station in greater downtown London looks as ugly as my hometown Greyhound Station, just bigger and more crowded. But we aren’t all just poor devils on the way to grandma’s house; there is an international component to this accumulation of humanity. A sense of migration. Some people have traveled far to reach this walled-in melting pot. Some are overloaded with taped and strung together parcels that defy the word luggage. Some sag with weariness and perspiring anxiety. The odors of garlic chicken and fried fish compete for dominance. At regular intervals a young man comes around asking a question in a dialect I can’t understand. He reaches into the trashcan next to my seat. I assume he is looking for a transfer ticket just like the homeless in my town who take a bus uptown during the day and return downtown in the evening.<br /><br />The British make a distinction between coach and bus. Buses are for short rides, coaches for long ones. Victoria is a central coach station and I guess that long rides mean long waits. After five hours we are informed that the coach has encountered heavy traffic and will be an hour late. When it finally arrives at 5:30pm I climb in and make myself comfortable in a double seat in the second row. On the right hand side of the bus. This is my preferred side at home in the US since it gives me access to a view of the scenery rather than the close encounters of traffic. But of course I have not taken into consideration the patterns of English traffic. I am reminded of my mistake constantly during the next seven hours as we make our way under an overcast sky into a rainy Thursday late afternoon along the east coast toward Newcastle.<br /><br />Beautiful yellow fields of rapeseed along the motorway catch my attention. Then a long white board propped up in the middle of nowhere. It says: ‘Inaction is weapon of mass destruction.’ The driver announces that he won’t vote for Tony Blair again. I don’t understand him well enough to follow his conversation with the co-driver in the front row but I hear his loud ‘shit’ when he almost hits something. Hits what? I must have dozed off.<br /><br />I spend 4.19 that is 8 dollars and 38 cents in real money, on a McChicken Sandwich with chips and vanilla shake at our first rest stop. After tossing the awful sandwich and gulping down the milkshake I take a picture of a Harry Potter movie sign. Back on the bus, finishing my fries, I count 38 passengers. The old lady across the aisle is talking loudly into her tiny cell phone. By the time we stop in Feetham to let her off, she must have received at least ten calls. Mobiles, it seems to me, are even more prominent in England than in the US. As we leave Feetham, a wonderful town with long rows of stone houses and an old town center, I close my eyes. It is dark outside. An hour and a half to Newcastle where the walk begins.<br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /></p><div align="center"></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17562562571414391716noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6774273276339751820.post-85991663307787572792009-07-11T21:51:00.000-07:002009-07-11T22:10:47.522-07:00In the Beginning<div align="center"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/Sllv03BTZqI/AAAAAAAAA6I/z3WSkdPpiEM/s1600-h/String+at+EBAY.JPG"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 300px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5357436185647212194" border="0" alt="" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_h2SgTB542mE/Sllv03BTZqI/AAAAAAAAA6I/z3WSkdPpiEM/s400/String+at+EBAY.JPG" /></a> Tyana at ebay park<br /><br /><div align="left">An early morning wind. Fertile soil. Untamed growth. That’s my field of dreams at the beginning of a story.<br /><br />Tentative, like a weekend gardener, I walk the perimeter. I drag out a hoe, a shovel, pruning shears. A deep breath, a few cautious steps into the tangle of weeds and then a peek at the blue eye of a cornflower. I am ready to plant my story.<br /><br />My writing includes a lot of dishwashing, walking, piddling, CNN background noise, and to stay with the garden metaphor, a lot of manure. All this and hours in front of the computer screen.<br /><br />I want be a travel writer. I imagine I have to be a mobile gardener. Not only will I have to be proficient with the tools and terms of the essay, I have to be alert on the road. Observe things. Write them down. Elicit responses from deep down and from around me. I have devised a set of lists that need to accompany my first steps into the field.<br /><br />Before any trip my foremost concerns are with factual, physical, and emotional preparedness. Travel demands plans and the willingness to throw them overboard. Writing demands structure and the boldness to ignore it. I am excited to embark on this double adventure. I am thrilled that my first attempt will be the exploration of Hadrian’s Wall – a long distance walk through Roman past and British modernity. Bed and Breakfast near the Vallum. A hop, skip, and jump past hedgerows and dry stone walls. A longing look into pastoral distances. Museums, forts, and of course the WALL. I will follow in the footsteps of a second century world power. In case my feet don’t work out as planned, there is always line AD122, public transportation along the path.<br /><br />AD122 is one of the things I discovered during extensive web searches. Another is the BBC weather forecast. The bus schedule makes me happy. The weather is unpredictable. Both components are important to the success of my journey; the first as alternate transportation the second as wayfarer warning. I found out that Wiliam Hutton, one of the 19th century walkers we know about, seems to have speculated a lot about the history of the wall; he seems to have made mistakes in his assumptions. My trip would depend on the most up to date guide book – the official “Hadrian’s Wall Path’ by Anthony Burton. I have read it once already; now I am making notes, print out parts, construct a continuous picture in my mind. In the late hours, just before falling asleep, I wander on my imaginary path, happily marching to the literary voice of my leader.<br /><br />Hadrian’s Wall Path is a National Trail and according to the preface to the guidebook walking the whole length along a ‘specified route’ has not been possible since the fifth century when Roman occupation ended. With the opening of the National Trail in 2003 I now will be able to walk from Wallsend – between Tynemouth and Newcastle close to the North Sea – all the way to Bowness-on-Solway by the Irish Sea – 84 miles of ever changing terrain over flatland, near rivers, through fields, woods, towns and villages and over crags.<br /><br />Travel accounts confirm the fact that anticipation and reality of travel are usually far apart. We formulate an ideal picture or we might even, in a regretful hour, envision disaster. All in all it is rare that the preview our thoughts speculate on are in unison with the experience that awaits us.<br /> <br />For the writer this might even be impossible. Not a day goes by without imagination’s wildest input. I have read books, studied maps, consulted the Internet. I have bought a compass, a whistle, walking sox, and a blister kit. I should, I think, be prepared for anything.<br /> <br />Anything the 84-mile hike along an ancient Roman fortification might present me with. I am ready for Hadrian’s Wall.<br /> <br />Though I carefully planned my wardrobe to take up the least amount of space, and I have made copies of travel papers and have envisioned a plan B for most occasions, the major amount of my time has gone into dialog with potential companions.<br /><br />I am quite serious about this. I am contemplating as much a literary device as a conversation piece. Last but not least I need an uncommon companion as teacher. Let me explain.<br /><br />When I was young I wandered through life uninstructed. My real education didn’t begin until I was forty-five - after a sad divorce - during a complicated love affair. I began to sort through the ruins of my self-esteem. Somebody had to tell me who I was. Somebody who would correct my thinking but wouldn’t punish me for past mistakes.<br /><br />I invented Dr. Steinfeld. My imaginary shrink was the first of several guardians I made up over the years. Dr. Steinfeld educated me from the inside out by allowing me to accept some questions as unanswerable. I imagine we all have teachers in us – roles we explore as we go along – in order to survive. I just happen to give mine names. Bring them to life. Like some files on my computer, the psychiatrist’s teaching role was hidden and only surfaced when a serious attempt was made to destroy my mental well-being. Suddenly I was drawn into a crash course of identifying and locating the tools that would free me. At my computer I never fail to be impressed with the results of explorations into unfamiliar software. In my personal confrontation with impending doom, at forty-five, I accepted the notion of an invisible psychiatrist with some reservations. Now, at 65, I am no longer surprised by the arrival of new teachers.<br /><br />Dr. Steinfeld served as my mentor for almost twenty years. I wrote to him, talked to him, frowned at him in the mirror, and at least once I dreamt of him as if he were a real person. He had two helpers – Madam X, a mannequin, whom I call my immortal sister and Laura Spencer, my more carefree, spirited alter ego. Madam X became the center of essays and poems I wrote. At a time when I questioned the sagging and wrinkling of my own body, she stood in as a shining example of perfection. Now I no longer depend on her beauty for consolation. She stands silently in my spare room, still wearing her mysterious look, yet no longer endowed with special qualities. And Laura Spencer – figment of my literary imagination – kept track of all the secrets I was not able to write about in my own journal. A third person account of first person remembrances.<br /><br />One day my imaginary shrink suggested an imaginary island community. I invented Easter Island as home for a band of stuffed rabbits. I sewed day and night to fulfill their group experience. They were a self-reliant and ambitious bunch of furry friends who taught me to accept their varied characters and appearances. They insisted on a history and a scrapbook full of photographs. Alfie, Oliver, Kate, Cocoapuff, Grandpa Woodie, Uncle Elmo, Morgan Cloud, Jason Rocky and all the others. When they had given me all that I needed, they walked off into a homeless shelter to amuse a group of lonely children.<br /><br />After Easter Island I made up Tiny Trina – the child of the sacred mountains – a spiritual guide surrounded by night shadows and flaming candles. Though I tried very hard to breathe her into reality, Trina never quite materialized into a full being – she stayed on the sidelines of my life. Dr. Steinfeld told me that Trina was premature. Which made me, again, question the difference between waiting for the right time and procrastination. Unfortunately, I still don’t know the answer.<br /><br />When I retired, Steinfeld retired too. He sent me a young friend whom I named Isabelle. She is a real doll with an imagined life. Blond hair and gray eyes. Thirty six inches tall. While Steinfeld answered serious questions, Isabelle only discusses fun things like button collections and pets and the color of cornflowers. Sometimes, when I force her to think like an adult, she gets upset and tells me to leave her alone. She is, so I tell everybody, my inner child. Her role is to let me remember the curiosity of my childhood. Her teaching is laughter.<br /><br />I love all the imagined roles I play. I know they are temporary; new ones come up when it is time to move on. Which seemed to happen just a few months ago when I first contemplated a trip to England and Hadrian’s Wall. I found a new friend. His name is Barnsie the Noble Bear. Though he has the body of a teddy bear, he too is a fictional teacher. He insisted that he would replace my travel companion, Sami Lucius Putnam, the stuffed frog. Sami is a timid traveler, hiding in my luggage, leaving me to fend for myself in strange cities. Most of the photographs I have of him are poses in hotel rooms, overlooking room service orders, guarding my keys, maps, and watch. Then he decided to stay home. He said he is going to play the violin instead of traveling with me. Apparently I insulted him with my remarks about his size. Really. He is too small to pose in front of a museum. His eyes bulge. He doesn’t own any clothes except his dining suit.<br /><br />Barnsie the Noble Bear is a literary agent and an editor of sorts. He is definitely very outgoing. Almost pushy. I assumed he would teach me the art of travel writing. Barnsie promised to give me a well-rounded approach to walking the countryside and reporting on it. He would ride on my backpack and watch the scenery as it passes.<br /><br />“Hindsight,” he insisted, “lasts longer than foresight.”<br /><br />I told him that I prefer to see new faces approaching me. I don’t want to watch people fade into the vanishing point. I realized there would be some battles. He shortens my sentences. Already he asked me to set up a file folder for him on my laptop computer. “Simultaneous entries,” he hinted. And he chuckled when I told him I hate editors.<br /><br />“You’ll love the changes I am going to make,” he promised. “You’ll be glad when strangers come up to us and take our picture. We’ll be digitized. We’ll be famous.”<br /><br />“Oh yes, we’ll be famous.” I quipped. “Barnsie and Cloud dined at Milecastle Inn last night.”<br /><br />Pretending to read a newspaper he responded, “ Barnsie the Noble Bear and his companion were sighted at Chesters Roman Fort. He rode in comfort while she limped into the Passport Stamping Station, where she applied moleskin to a blister on her left heel.” <br /><br />We both laughed. Dr. Steinfeld wrote about him last Christmas from his retreat in the small Bavarian town of Kochel. Yes, he still gives advice, though he insists that I no longer need his guidance. “Dear Gisela,” he said in his letter, “Maybe now is the right time for you to take a look at the humorous side of life. Hire my friend Barnsie as guide on your next trip. He boasts and shows off his cleverness at every opportunity he gets. I know you hate this kind of arrogance but look at it as a challenge. A timed experiment. The two of you face life from different angles. Is that so unusual? Just promise to think about it for now. When you return I’d love to know how it worked out.”<br /> <br />Well, Doctor, it didn’t work out. My initial idea of taking along the Barnes and Noble Bear was abandoned after a while. First, he is way too big. He doesn’t fit into my suitcase and he adds two pounds to my backpack. The second reason is his arrogance. I thought I could develop him into a somewhat petulant overly sensitive, intelligent character who would stimulate my senses. I found him overbearing and excused my change of heart with his business association. I didn’t really want to walk alongside history, advertising America’s #1 bookseller.<br /> <br />Finally I met a cute little bear at a local yardage shop. A narrow ribbon around the neck was her only adornment. I paid for her, tied her to my backpack and walked home. On the way we passed Ebay Park where I named her and took the first photographs of her. I called her Tyana (she is a Ty bear) J (Java is her Ty name) LittleString. She is what I needed at the time, a companion who had no prior attachments to my household. She is also very limber and though she is 14 inches tall she weighs only one pound fully dressed.<br /> <br />As any artist can tell you, wild images roam through our minds especially in the dawn hours. Sometimes I can barely stand it, this delicious tension just before daylight forces me to open my eyes. I have to slow down the film rolling past my eyes, slow down the urge to create whatever the night has planted in my heart, slow down the swing that bounces my body out of bed. I am possessed. I can see this little bear as the next literary character of note.<br /> <br />Tyana’s first week with me transformed her into a well-dressed young lady, ready to travel the world. She took on a personality that is totally opposite the one I had given Barnsie. My guess is that I am not ready for arrogance. Will I ever be? <br /> <br />I knitted, crochet, and sewed six outfits for her. Gave her a portfolio of eight by tens. Wrote her into my journal. I adopted Tyana J LittleString. Then a funny thing happened. Samy the frog became jealous. Suddenly he decided he would join us in our walk. He had an alley in my daughter who is anything but a friend of my menagerie. Sometimes I think my daughter hesitates to bring friends into my house because of my obsessions; exactly the way I felt about my mother until I slid down the forty something ladder and became – who else – my mother. My daughter was surprised that Samy would have to stay home.<br /><br />“But Mom” she said, “he has gone everywhere with you. Morocco, Egypt, China. You don’t want to leave him home, do you?”<br /><br />“Well, I guess not.” The problem is space, in my backpack and in my mind. Can I deal with two voices at the same time? But then, his voice might be helpful in overcoming the hesitations I hear from friends.<br /><br />“You are walking by yourself? Aren’t you afraid? What if something happens to you?”<br /><br />No, I wasn’t afraid. I have thought this out carefully. Countours Walking, a travel company in England, provided me with all the necessary details. We added three museum days to the original ten walking days. I had reservations for 13 nights; they sent a guidebook – the same one I had already read twice – a detailed map, and a folder full of information and instructions. My suitcase would be transported from one place to the next each morning. Somebody would search for me should I get lost and be late. I have a whistle and a compass.<br /><br /><br /> </div></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17562562571414391716noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6774273276339751820.post-59547870133713345742009-07-11T21:45:00.000-07:002009-07-11T21:51:21.979-07:00Sluggish MemoryMy goals for our twelve-day stay in Schönau are simple. Climb three mountains. Visit my grandmother’s house. Search the cemetery for family names. Get a glimpse of my teen idol. Take tons of pictures. Eat pastries.<br /> <br />The love interest glimpse is scratched immediately. He is out of town. With his wife. We pass my grandmother’s house three times and each time I bore Stephanie with a few historical facts. My granddaughter accompanies me in my quest to retrace 50- year old childhood footprints. We make good travel companions; I initiate day tours and speak to strangers. She remembers how to get back to the hotel, what time the stores close, and where I hide the extra money.<br /><br /> In the cemetery she is the name-calling forerunner. In front of each grave she practices her German pronunciation and I tell her what I know about the person buried there. But we cannot find my great-grandparents or my grandparents.<br /> <br />“What are their names again?” <br /> <br />“Hölzer and Heer. They must have been moved. I think there is a time limit on cemetery stays.” <br />Stephanie suddenly jumps on a bench and pulls her sweatshirt over her face. Bugs. Mosquitoes. Spiders. Etc. etc. etc. We have to end the search for the dead relatives and reward ourselves with some Kirscheplotza (cherry bread pudding.) <br /><br /> <br /> Today we are climbing mountain number one. The walkway is now terraced, complete with guardrails and paved steps. Halfway up I rest against the metal rail while Stephanie poses for her first picture of the day. Suddenly she shudders a subdued shriek of disbelief.<br /> <br />“Grandma, come here. This is the biggest banana slug I have ever seen in my whole life.”<br /> <br />“Yeah, and he has lots of friends. Look! There are more of them.”<br /><br />I aim the camera at him. “We need something to compare him to.”<br /><br />I pull out a two pfennig piece and lay it on the ground. While I dial the menu on my digital camera to macro I find myself smiling at the slug. I know him. His kind was around when I hunted for snails with beautiful houses. We ignored him then, because the value of snails was in the spiral design and variety of color on their piggyback homes. He was the homeless one. Naked. Unwanted. I feel pity for him now.<br /> <br />We watch him cross the paved walk and disappear into the underbrush. Then we continue our climb. Higher and higher, until we reach a kind of platform, a flat area protruding to the right side of the walkway. Though it is totally overgrown, I remember it very well.<br /> <br />“This is where we used to play and climb trees. We’d stay up here all day eating green apples, laying in the sun, telling stories.”<br /><br />Before we continue our walk I select a rock for my collection.<br /> <br />When we reach the top of the mountain we are amazed at the houses all around. I know my friend Hans was the first one to build one for his mother years ago, but this looks like a mountain retreat village. On the other side though, there is nothing but forest. The valley far below is a narrow band of road zigzagging towards the next town, where my family used to picnic after a long Sunday walk.<br /><br />Stephanie and I rest on a bench with a perfect view, pull out some candy, drink bottled water, take pictures, and make plans for later. I think we both need a nap.<br /><br /><br /> My past and I are at odds with each other. Mountain number two disappoints me. Oh, it is beautiful. Its trees are majestic, the vegetation lush and varied. I hear a woodpecker knock beetles lose from behind crusty bark and bees hum as they flit from flower to flower.<br /><br />I am told that memory is selective and colored by sentiment, but how can a sunny primeval forest be anything but a sunny primeval forest? Why don’t I smell the heat? The blueberries must be right over there where pine trees tower over the slope, and where stinging nettles band together in tight formation against the intruding hand of a thirteen-year-old child.<br /> <br />“Ah, but you are no longer thirteen!”<br /> <br />That was the voice of Dr. Steinfeld, my shrink. My imaginary shrink.<br /><br />I climb past the nettles, taking care not to let them touch me. Away from the compacted dirt road the soil is soft. Ferns break through a thick layer of pine needles and unfurl their tendrils into the warmth of the summer sun. I look down to Stephanie. I wave. I giggle and point uphill. But my granddaughter, who has not moved from the path, signals a concerned frown in my direction.<br /><br />“Be careful, Grandma.”<br /><br />She isn’t used to the noises of the woods or to its silences. She hates bugs, and there are plenty of them in Schönau. I linger, look around for a minute or so, and then I climb back down to the road. Stephanie takes a picture of me; I take one of her. We have documented the excursion into the past. But why don’t I feel it? Why doesn’t this forest connect me to the long hours spent playing, roaming, hiding?<br /><br />When I sit at my desk at home, I see myself run up and down the mountain, skip behind bushes, dig into thick moss, rest between broken tree limbs and weathered stones. When I sit at my desk at home, I am close to the mountain, breathing in its humid decomposing odors.<br /><br />“The past is a movie in your memory bank. But this is now.”<br /><br />“I don’t know what you are talking about, Doctor. When I returned to the Black Forest after 45 years, I was immediately drawn into the past. It was like coming home, even though nobody knew me.”<br /><br />“Serendipity.”<br /><br />“What?”<br /><br />“Serendipity. It was an unexpected find. Remember how you suddenly recognized what happiness felt like, how it washed over you? You said in your journal, ‘I floated in a sea of undulating yellow.’ You set out to find lavender bushes and poppy pods and wheat, but when you were surrounded by rape fields you reentered your own innocence.”<br /><br />“So? I was happy in these woods, too.”<br /><br />“Then I’m sure you will find something to take home with you.”<br /><br />I am not really satisfied with his answer. While I pick a small rock to add to my collection, I tell Stephanie about the games we used to play up and down the mountain.<br /><br />When we exit the forest I leave Dr. Steinfeld behind. Let him sort out my sentiments. I vow to spend more time making new memories rather than chasing old ones. At least for the rest of the day.<br /><br />We take a few pictures of Schönau from the Bergstrasse. I pose Samy, my frog, on one of the stones that line the street. I used to stand on them and pretend to take off in flight when I was a child. Oops. Don’t look back.<br /><br />The third mountain does not bring back many pleasant memories. A German shepherd bit me when I delivered passport photos to one of the houses at the beginning of the steep street. My stepfather carried my little brother up the hill when his asthma made breathing difficult in the humidity of the valley. It was up here that I told my mother I hated my life and would move to the city.<br /><br />Stephanie and I are now almost at the top. A dog suddenly barks from the front garden of a beautifully landscaped home. We freeze in our tracks. Nobody ties down dogs around here and he looks ferocious. But soon somebody calls him and he disappears into the house. I realize that Stephanie is frightened and without her sweatshirt she is being “bugged” by zillions of flying things. We will make this a short trip.<br /><br />“Grandma, what do I do if you had a heart attack or something? How do I say help in German?”<br /><br />“Well,” I hedge, catching my breath and trying to sound even-winded. It is humid today and my walks along the creek in Campbell have not really prepared me for our daily mountain climbing activities in Schönau. I hope I sound unconcerned and very healthy when I suggest, “How about ‘Hilfe, meine Oma ist kaputt.’ That would work.”<br /><br />“What does it mean?”<br /><br />“It means, ‘help, my grandmother is broken.”<br /><br />We both laugh. The spell of dog-induced fear seems to be broken. I think of a good memory to talk about, “When I was ten I used to come up here to collect May bugs in glass jars. They are big and brown and I think they make buzzing sounds when they fly away.”<br /><br />Stephanie, who now wears her sunglasses to keep flying insects out of her eyes, is not amused. I see her arms flailing around in defense. But then we both automatically pull our cameras out. A beautiful meadow, horses, evening sunshine. Country peace and tranquility. Picture number 555. I aim the lens at a large snail wedged between two rocks in a low fence. The stone fence trails the road like an old relative who remembers everything but keeps his distance, nodding occasionally in approval, or shaking his head when ancient sins are revealed. I have the feeling that I would remember much more about my childhood if I sat on the stonewall for a few hours and meditated.<br /><br />As long as Stephanie is happy with the horses I wallow in sinister thoughts of the past, “Doctor, I don’t like this mountain.”<br /><br />“Well, you have to admit that you are connecting.”<br /><br />“Connecting to what? Slimy snail trails?”<br /><br />“Connecting to undercurrents. This is a beautiful valley, but you see the undercurrents. Isolation. Inbreeding. Gossip. Resistance to change. Don’t you see? You left all this behind when you moved away. Now, do you still want to look into buying property here?”<br /><br />“Oh, no, Doctor. I understand what you are telling me. I was a slug here. Unprotected. Not even the new friends I have made on this trip can make up for old pain. And guess what? I am looking forward to slipping back into my little piggyback house in California in a few days.”<br /><br />“Good. Now make sure that the child eats a spectacular dessert tonight. One more thing to add to her new foods list. And get a good night’s sleep. You are off to Berlin tomorrow, aren’t you?”Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17562562571414391716noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6774273276339751820.post-67176393484132430422009-07-11T21:41:00.000-07:002009-07-11T21:45:23.940-07:00Shanta Bär, Hostess ExtraordinaireWe wait between stacked plastic chairs and our luggage for somebody to let us in. A hotel guest explains that the owners do not live here and she offers to contact them on her cell phone. A handy, (cell phone) I think, is really handy in this town with its noon to three naptime. But before I can dwell on my irritation, a station wagon stops a few inches from the steps to the hotel. The driver introduces herself as Shanta Bär, owner of the Pfälzer Hof, and while she quickly arranges chairs and tables on the deck, she engages us in a fast paced conversation. A cup of coffee for me and a Fanta for Stephanie, on the house, before we are escorted to our room.<br /><br />That evening I get to know Shanta as the cook of exotic dishes for hotel guests who come from all over Europe. Hotel guests who, so I am told, on occasion include the Indian National Soccer Team. Shanta’s brother is their manager.<br /><br />Our hostess was born in India; she grew up in England, and eventually met and married my grade school principal’s son, Theo Bär.<br /><br />She was a singer once, and a dancer. Now she teaches ballet to the granddaughters of my former classmates. A flyer at the front desk says that she is also a belly dance and yoga instructor. Two days a week, upstairs, (in the old ballroom.)<br /><br />One morning Theo introduces Stephanie and me as his girlfriend and her daughter from America to two Pakistani businessmen.<br /><br />“Imagine!” I whisper to Stephanie after the gentlemen have left, “India and Pakistan are always at odds with each other. I like the Bärs.”<br /> <br />As is the custom in small restaurants, Shanta welcomes her guests personally at dinnertime. She sits with us too, for a while, gently extracting our story and building up her knowledge of our preferences.<br /><br />“Stephanie, was the ‘Chicken Tandoori’ too spicy? Maybe tomorrow you will eat lamb with basmati rice?”<br /><br />After a few days she prides herself in having gauged exactly the amount of curry my granddaughter can handle. For dessert she delights Stephanie with plain vanilla ice cream.<br /><br />“Ohne Mango Soße und ohne Sahne,” she smiles at me. “Ohne Alles.”<br />Patting Stephanie on her back she repeats in English, “Without mango sauce and without whip cream. Without everything.”<br /><br />One evening, almost ten o’clock, she puts her feet up on an empty chair. Would I mind, she asks, it’s been a long day. Though she employs a neighbor to help with the rooms and another neighbor to cook some of the meals, she spends most of her waking hours here. Her children are of great assistance, of course, and Theo too, when he is in town.<br /><br />Several times during our stay we find different napkins with our breakfast. Shanta has observed how Stephanie selects and marks each new one with the name of the hotel and the date she has added it to her collection. <br /><br />On Monday, the day the restaurant is closed, she sends her daughter Anna to put together a platter of leftovers for us. Cold meats, cheese, sliced cucumber, shredded carrot salad, and olives. Her son Pascal entertains us by telling stories and trying his hand at mixing a tequila sunrise. We are the only guests tonight.<br /><br /> Even Theo is enlisted to take care of us sometimes. Though he is clumsy in the restaurant, spilling soda when he tries to draw it from the tap, he loves to joke and entertain. Stephanie giggles when she spots him with his crooked, old-fashioned bowtie. He tells her that he remembers me from long ago.<br /><br />“Your grandma didn’t talk to me because I was just a little kid. Her brother’s age.”<br /><br />Halfway through our stay Shanta brings together ten of my old classmates for an evening of loud stories and old songs. She and Theo add their voices to our sing-along, and when she sees that Stephanie is getting bored with our “remember when” stories, she introduces her to a Russian gentleman who speaks English. Later she takes her into another room to play the piano. <br /> <br />On Sunday Theo walks us back from a town festival. He has bought Stephanie a wind-up Santa Claus and a furry stuffed animal and has filled a small basket with other flea-market finds for his wife. It is their twenty-sixth wedding anniversary. When we reach the bridge, just before we cross the street to the hotel, Stephanie picks a few blossoms off the shrubbery and slips them into the basket.<br /><br />“It looked kind of plain,” she tells me later. “It’s their anniversary.”<br /><br />I wonder how an extremely talented woman survives in this town. Maybe the answer is in the way she smiles at her husband. Another answer comes a day later, when the couple returns from a shopping trip to Frankfurt. The city has a large Indian population and Shanta who looked tired last night, seems rejuvenated. She tells me about the Indian movies she has bought and the beautiful sari material she has seen. While she rushes into the kitchen, Theo and I discuss culture shock, his frequent travels as computer consultant, and the Internet café the children promote as a sideline to the hotel. I don’t mention to him that Anna and Pascal are the only ones I see on the computers in the lobby. I don’t tell him what I think about the ambitions of this town, which time seems to have left behind. When I was a child we had several hotels. The Pfälzer Hof, then owned by my mother’s best friend, is now the only hotel in town.<br /> <br />When we leave Schönau, after almost two weeks, Shanta takes us to the train in Heidelberg. She speeds her ancient station wagon artfully through the narrow streets of several towns. Stephanie sits in back on a pillow between tutus, boxes, and canned goods. At the station, while we get our luggage together, Shanta ties ribbons around two small gifts for us. We hug. She is in a hurry. New guests arrive in an hour, she says. The neighbor woman who makes up the beds is sick. Anna is off with friends. It’s Pascal’s day to sleep in and Theo left for a computer conference this morning.<br /><br />“See you later,” she smiles. “Tschüss.”<br /><br />Before we enter the building I turn around to wave, but the spot by the curb is already occupied by another car and Shanta Bär has disappeared into the traffic.Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17562562571414391716noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6774273276339751820.post-77089255947159970262009-07-11T21:38:00.000-07:002009-07-11T21:40:56.953-07:00German CuisineGermans don’t give you simple answers, nor do they give you simple desserts. Directions to historical sites are adorned with detailed buts; ice cream makes a fashion statement, strutting an umbrella, a coat of whip cream, or a veil of chocolate dust. For my plain-food-loving granddaughter this is quite an experience. The first word I teach her before leaving for our trip is “ohne” (without.)<br /><br />When we arrive at our first stop in Urbar, a tiny town above the Rhine River, we start our “Foods we tasted” list. Partly this is an excuse to educate her taste buds and give our journals a sense of accomplishment. And partly, I have to admit, it has to do with my desire to pass on some of my childhood food memories.<br /><br />Take gooseberries for instance. I eat almost the whole pound of my favorite fruit, while Stephanie only sucks the sweet flesh from the tart skin of three berries. Or consider my mother’s old standby späzle (hand made noodles.) Since they don’t come ohne cheese at our hotel, Stephanie sticks her fork into the last survivor on my plate with obvious apprehension. But at least both of these delicacies are tried and listed.<br /><br />We eat our way through whipped, flaked, fruit jelled, chocolate creamed, and cherry liqueur infused layers of variations on Black Forest cake on two Rhine River cruises. Delicious. Our lunches in Boppard and Rüdesheim bring potato pancakes with applesauce and German sausage for Stephanie. She even dips her spoon into my goulash soup. During dinner at the farmhouse inn in Urbar, she stays with familiar rice and chicken but stabs at a slice of my sauerbraten (marinated beef roast.) A crumb size piece of potato dumpling and a shred of pickled red cabbage crown the taste test for the day. I am proud to be the grandmother of such an adventurous traveler.<br /><br />All through our trip I say “Hurray for Nutella™.” It is a hazelnut/chocolate spread, which I have banned from my life in California. But during our travels we carry a jar of this high calorie delight from place to place, along with crackers, because German store hours are capricious, especially in small towns. “Closed between twelve and two” or “we will be right back” or even “Ruhetag,” (day of rest) are common signs plaguing our “open 24 hours” mentality.<br /><br />In Schönau, when we lay out our assortment of fresh fruit in front of the cashier, she gives us a nasty look, takes in a short distasteful breath, and marches over to a scale. Then she informs us that next time we have to weigh the fruit and attach the price tag. We remember. Number four – apples. Number sixteen – peaches. Another customer explains the numbers on the fruit bins and the correlated buttons on the scale. Next time I expect a smile from the clerk because I have placed the properly marked bag in front of her. But after she drops the money in her cash register, she impatiently pushes our groceries out of the way to help the next customer. While we fill our shopping bag – yes, we remember to bring our own shopping bag – I decide that older German women don’t like their jobs. By forgetting to speak German, I learn that explanations are given freely and with a smile to foreigners. I understand that using my mother tongue results in reprimands.<br />“Das müssten Sie doch wissen.” (This is something you should know.)<br /><br />Sometimes I want to scream, “Hey, loosen up. Get a grip. Gimme a break.” But the only time I respond is when they criticize Stephanie for a harmless culture gap mistake. In my own typically German stance with both fists dug into my side, elbows in chicken wing position and chest pumped up with an indignant deep breath, I counter, “Lassen Sie die Kleine bitte in Ruhe. Sie ist doch ein Kind.” (Leave the little one alone, please. She is a child.)<br /><br />After such small town displeasures the city brings relief. Heidelberg with its international flavor is just right for touching bases with the familiar. Stephanie buys our lunch and we stuff ourselves with pizza Margherita at the Ristorante Milano on Main Street. Bills now come in German marks and Euros. Our two individual pizzas, a black currant juice and a Sprite cost DM28.50 or €14.57, roughly $14.00. We leave a tip, though none is expected beyond the rounding up to the next full mark. The waiter is charming and remembers us with a smiling hello when we pass by again.<br /><br />Our next big, and I mean big, purchase is a bratwurst with pommes, a giant smoked sausage with fries. The name of the place is simply “Pommes.” (Potatoes) but means “French Fries.” You ask for your condiments, anything from ketchup to cheese, to peppers, to mustard. The sausage way exceeds the measurements of the bun. We are in heaven. Actually though, we sit on the steps of the next-door store, because the food stand has no seating. We watch what we both call “ugly shoes” walk by. Lots of ugly health shoes, sandals on men, platforms on women, bright reds and deep purples. <br /><br />During our two days in Heidelberg we take many snack breaks. “Zwetchgenkuchen,” (plum cake) calls us from every bakery until we finally sit down at an outdoor café and taste it. Stephanie thinks that her mother’s is better. I know why. Her mother uses baking soda and sweetens the dough. The base of this one is yeast and the plums are tart. I recognize the flavor of this childhood Sunday morning luxury. Absolutely delicious.<br /><br />To Stephanie’s slight embarrassment, I pull my frog Samy out of the bag and take a picture of him surrounded by cake. Samy is a good conversation starter. The girl at the table next to us tells us her life story. Listening to her I look up to the world famous Castle and remember my high school years spent in other outdoor cafés nearby. I remember the ice cream place behind Holy Ghost Church. We must go there later.<br /><br />For now we take another walk up Main Street and spend some time and money at the Galeria shopping complex. Everybody back home loves Ritter chocolate and though we can buy it at Cost Plus, it seems so much better coming directly from Germany. I buy a loaf of marzipan for myself. We find small gifts like pens, glassware, books, notepaper.<br /><br />One more stop, a juice bar. My Jamba Juice™ imagination is terribly disappointed with the taste of my mango yogurt drink. I think this is what lukewarm spoiled yak butter tea with lemon juice must be like. When I look into Stephanie’s wide eyes I toss my full container into the trash bin right outside the store. She follows suite, but more discreetly than I, not wanting to hurt the shopkeepers feelings. She says hers is disgusting too. My sweet granddaughter feels bad about wasting my money. I tell her I feel nothing but relief and we walk quickly to the nearest pretzel stand.<br /><br />Of course there are places we don’t get around to visit. The “North Sea” for instance where I used to buy herring sandwiches after school. Sole D’Oro, where I spent Christmas Eve one year, with plates full of spaghetti and lonely students who had no place else to go for the holiday. We have no time to check out the ice-cream parlor around the corner from “Cave 54” and I don’t tell Stephanie about the political discussions my friends and I had there over tomato salad and Italian Zitroneneis. But I am comforted by the fact that these old hangouts have survived. Maybe next time. And maybe next time Stephanie will try blood sausage, her only absolute, predetermined reject on our food list.Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17562562571414391716noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6774273276339751820.post-40537604863502511302009-07-11T21:34:00.000-07:002009-07-11T21:37:30.995-07:00BaksheeshBaksheesh<br />Culture clash: Bring respect, practice tolerance, learn acceptance, and end up in total confusion.<br /><br />“Marrakech is not for the fainthearted,” I read somewhere before I flew to Morocco. I also read that its people are kind, that the cuisine is a mix of French, Berber, and Bedouin, that it would be in my best interest to cover arms and legs, and that I should not use my left hand in public.<br />Tourists, of course, are always allowed a few slips in etiquette as long as they are trying to do the right thing, but I learned soon that it was difficult to do the right thing and relax at the same time. A phrase in the Lonely Planet guidebook should have warned me. “The combination of hustlers and heavy sell has had an adverse effect on the city’s tourism. According to a government study, 94% of first-time visitors never come back for seconds! This is one of the lowest rates for a city in the entire world.”<br />I was well informed, I thought, but I was not prepared for the contrasts that forced me to pay attention with all my senses. Car horns, donkeys, overloaded mopeds, women covered from head to toe in black, palm trees, litter, stray dogs, spicy street foods, beggars, the call to prayer, and then the cool trickle of a waterfall in the elegant Imperial Borj Hotel atrium and the spotless, soundproof luxury of my room. On the street everybody wanted something from me; upstairs I was totally alone with overwhelming thoughts about poverty and culture clash.<br />It was my first trip since I retired, my first trip ever into a non-western country. I saw it as romantic homage to my mother and my early childhood preoccupation with the storks on our church steeple. Long ago my mother had announced my September birthday with a frown and a hint of sadness in her voice, “It must be getting cold soon; the storks are getting ready to leave for Marrakech.”<br />Even at the age of six I had felt a vague urge to follow them into a land of sunshine and date palms and desert sand. The adults shook their heads when I ran across the stubbly wheat field in back of our house in an attempt to fly; when I leapt from the garden shed and sprained my ankle they shook their fingers at me. “No more of that nonsense.”<br />It took almost 60 years before I flew to Marrakech - on the wings of Royal Air Maroc. On a sunny May morning my guide in white djellaba and pointed slippers stood across from me on the grounds of the El-Badi Palace when I heard the sound of clapping beaks from above the ruins.<br />El Bissouri Moulay Hachem smiled and placed a hand over his heart, “Madame, the storks of Marrakech welcome you.”<br />Because I didn’t want to eat lunch by myself I invited Moulay to join me, an offer he reluctantly accepted. The tour company didn’t pay for his lunch and he usually went home to his wife and little daughter at noon. The restaurant was located in the newer part of town and was run by two sisters. I wondered if this was a compromise to soothe a westerner’s disdain over the machismo of a male dominated society. Or were they the sisters of the head of the travel agency?<br /> I handed my prepaid coupon and an extra twenty-four dollars for Moulay’s meal to the beautiful middle-aged woman who wore Western style clothing. Later, after lunch, after she had sprinkled rosewater on our hands and my guide had discreetly withdrawn to the street, I slipped a ten- dollar bill under the lamb stew tajine. <br />I wasn’t sure if this was appropriate. In the West we don’t tip proprietors. I had already spent quite a few single dollar bills on men who opened the elevator door for me, men who turned the light on in my room, men who pointed me in the right direction toward the pool, men who told me where to buy bottled water. Men who stared at me until I realized that they expected to be reimbursed for efforts that I had mistaken for courtesies. I was confused by the constant demand for baksheesh - alms to insistent beggars - tips for minor unsolicited services – outright bribery with the promise of better service. But I was also aware of well-heeled tourists’ arrogant expectations. I had been told of tight-fisted Germans who angrily turned away from outstretched hands. “Let their government feed them.” This woman, I decided, was kind and patient with a newcomer to local customs and dishes. She had accommodated the unexpected pair, the young local guide and the foreign gray-haired lady, politely. She deserved a reward. <br />These two hours at Al Fassia, on Avenue Mohammed V, were the most intimate time I would spend with a Moroccan during my three days in Marrakech. Moulay came from Rabat where he had studied at the university and where his mother still lived. He was a linguist. He was working on a paper about Moroccan Arabic, about schwa, the unstressed vowel. He was a devout Muslim. A Sunni Muslim, like 99 percent of Moroccans. He spoke fluent French and broken English. Drinking too much soda pop had given him an ulcer, that’s why he refused the dessert of cinnamon sprinkled orange slices. The Qur’an allowed him four wives but he could only afford one for now. He thought I must be rich to be able to come to Marrakech. Did I inherit money from my husband? Certainly my husband must be dead, why else would I travel alone?<br />Moulay’s eyes opened wide when I told him that I had been married three times, and even wider when I said I didn’t have a god to guide me in my daily life.<br />“No, I’m not rich. No, I didn’t get money from my ex-husbands. I worked for a water company for the last nineteen years, because I wanted to be independent. This is my first trip abroad except for visiting my homeland, Germany. Yes, most Americans believe in God. Yes, I think Morocco is beautiful. Tell me more about schwa.”<br />After a day of horse-carriage rides to palaces, mosques, the famous Djemaa El Fna, and a walk through the labyrinthine alleys of the souq, I said good night to my guide. Au revoir Msr. Moulay. A domain. Until tomorrow. I gave him a ten-dollar tip and my apologies to his wife and daughter for stealing him away from them at lunchtime. I thanked him for helping me buy a CD and for keeping close watch over me in the souq.<br />I took a short nap and bathed in my spacious tub. I guess I did travel in style. Travel in Style was the name of the San Francisco based agency that had arranged this trip for me. Azza Hussayin had put together the package. It was supposed to have been a group of ten people, but the number shrunk as the date of departure came closer. Political unrest in Morocco. Sickness in the family. Other problems. Mohamed alias KingTut916 had emailed me emergency contacts, mobile phone numbers, and a reassuring promise of greeters, guides, drivers, and of course the website of the fabulous “Imperial Borj International Hotel” in Marrakech. One day before I left home he offered the option to cancel. When I arrived in Casablanca I found out I was the only member of the tour group. I knew that drivers and guides expected ten tips of five and ten dollar bills at the end of each day. They were visibly disappointed. “Where are the others?” Moulay had asked. I wasn’t happy either about the extra pressure of being the only guest. Usually I hang back, take pictures, pay selective attention.<br />At five I opened the door to my patio and listened to the call to prayer from the nearby medina, the old town. It was an eerie sound, unfamiliar to my ears and, as I would find out, hauntingly unforgettable. I walked out on my fourth floor observation deck to watch the local life that goes on without my participation. I had the full view of the intersection, the back of my hotel and the front of the hotel across the street. Cabs were lined up on both sides of the street and the drivers got out of their vehicles to pray. Some kneeled on cardboard pieces, some on handcrafted carpets. A white-bearded old man, dressed in dark long-sleeved jacket and knit cap, stepped off his horse-carriage, unfolded a mat, took off his shoes and laid them in front of the mat. He washed his hands in a small bucket before he began the ritual of bowing, praying, kissing the ground. I was amazed at his agility and wondered why, in spite of yoga classes, I was not able to get up and down with the same speed and grace.<br />As commuter traffic increased, the speed and aggressive attitude of drivers became more frantic. Nobody stopped; it was a challenge to see how far one could get into the intersection before hitting another driver. Small beige hatchbacks, the local petite taxis, competed with the Mercedes grande taxis that take passengers from town to town. A woman, in black robe and headscarf sped her moped with gloved hands into the middle of the intersection until she was forced aside by a donkey-cart filled with hay.<br />Later that evening – it was getting dark – I watched three men load a truck with close to a hundred large trash bags. We tourists enjoy our packaged snacks and bottled juices; we create a lot of garbage that has to be hauled away daily. The men were joined by two teens who left their load of old tires across the street. A man and woman on a donkey cart stopped around the corner. While the old woman whipped the donkey every time it tried to move, the man picked up twenty bags of water bottles and strapped them onto the cart. Finally all six men sat down on the ground next to the hotel wall and talked. A waiter came up the walkway from the kitchen and placed a large pot of stew between them. Then a platter of rolls. Two scrawny cats circled the men, one cautiously, the other attempting bold attacks; eventually pieces of food were tossed in their directions. After half an hour of dipping and slurping and finger licking the old man with the donkey cart hollowed out a roll and filled it with stew. His wife had waited patiently with the donkey; I imagined a glint of happiness in her eyes when she tilted her head to let the thick soup run into her mouth. Within minutes the empty pot and platter were deposited at the kitchen door and all the men drove or rode off. One of the cats licked a few leftover traces from the sidewalk. Two policemen stood in the intersection talking to each other while traffic continued around them. As starlight began to glitter on the fronds of palm trees, traffic died down.<br />I closed the patio door to the echo of clip clopping hoof sounds and thought that this had been a good lesson in Moroccan culture. A lesson about working together for the common good. My upbringing under the Benedictine motto Ora et Labora – pray and work – was not so different from the Arab Ensha’llah – God willing. We work, we hope for a better life, and we cling together for comfort. As luck had it, I was born into a society where existential problems were less pressing than in Morocco. Even though war had robbed many of us of family members and homes, reconstruction was unstoppable. Bribery has, in general, been replaced by deal making in Western business situations. Alms are reserved for those without protective networks. With the luxury of being a modern woman I inherited the luxury of free thought and dependence on organized contracts. I live on social security payments and a pension and in an emergency I could request food stamps, Medical, public assistance. Public assistance? Isn’t that a kind of collective baksheesh?<br />Before I went to bed I counted my dollar bills and Dirhams. Maybe I was rich. I fell asleep with the smug intent to spread my insight and newfound wealth the next day. Of course it all fell apart when a horde of taxi drivers mobbed me in front of the hotel in the morning. Some followed me around the corner and offered to be my protectors, “Not good to walk alone.”<br />I smiled, “No thank you. Non, merci. Shukran. I’m not going very far. Just a few pictures.” I pointed at my camera and walked faster.Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17562562571414391716noreply@blogger.com0