Mon Voyage

From Blog to Blog, Musically Speaking

2010-11-01T19:00:00.003-05:00

(I pretty much wrote this article myself, with a few tweaks from the Dallas Symphony Orchestra's Manager of Publications...he told me he had to excise all the "personality of my conversational style", and so removed some lighthearted remarks I had included. Oh, well, still great to be asked and to have the recognition for the organization that sucks the life out of me on a daily basis. JUST KIDDING!)

Here's a link to the actual DSO blog post, though I've copied all but the photos below.

DSO Guild: Fun Insights for Music Lovers

Meet Nicole LeBlanc, president of the Dallas Symphony Orchestra Guild. With these questions-and-answers, LeBlanc introduces the DSO Guild and talks about its membership, social events and support for Performance Preludes, the DSO’s entertaining and informative pre-concert programs. She explains how the Guild lets music lovers meet and hear from DSO conductors and guest artists, and talks about her appreciation for the DSO and its programs.

Who can join the DSO Guild?

DSO Guild members love classical music and love to meet the instrumentalists, composers and conductors who bring that music to life at the Meyerson Symphony Center each week. We are individuals from all backgrounds, men and women of all ages, working and retired, music aficionados all. We are dedicated to deepening our knowledge and appreciation of music. We get to know each other at our member events, making smart new friends and new musical discoveries at the same time.

How is the DSO Guild related to the Dallas Symphony Orchestra?

Since 1968, the DSO Guild has fulfilled its mission of supporting, promoting and funding the adult music education efforts of the DSO. We further that mission by conducting ten Guild meetings during the season, holding an annual fundraising gala dinner and by fully underwriting the DSO’s free pre-concert Performance Preludes series.

What the heck is a Performance Prelude?

Performance Preludes are informative, educational and entertaining lectures, held one hour prior to each DSO classical series concert. Performance Preludes are FREE to all ticketholders. The lectures, which take place in Horchow Hall on the lower level of the Meyerson, last approximately 45 minutes. The presentations are given by some of the most accomplished music scholars in the area and usually include audio-visual components. You’ll laugh, you’ll learn, and you’ll get out in plenty of time to find your seat. Click here for the schedule

What’s special to you personally about the DSO and the DSO Guild?

My world is filled with music of all kinds (from Bartok to Broadway and Baaba Maal to Bollywood) but clearly I do have a special love for classical music. One of the first things on our agenda when my husband Bill and I moved to Dallas in 1992 was to investigate how we could attend Dallas Symphony concerts. Unfortunately for us, the entire season was sold out by subscription! We were placed on a waiting list and we haven’t let our subscription lapse since 1993.

I am an intensely curious person by nature, always seeking more knowledge about the things that interest me—so from the first DSO Guild event I attended in 2005, I was completely hooked. I was so comfortable getting to know the members, almost as though I had discovered a secret society of my own geeky kind--other music and arts lovers who felt just as I did about the fellowship and enrichment opportunities offered by the Guild. There is no other group like it! I genuinely look forward to every one of our meetings and hope to remain involved for many years to come.

What are Guild member events like?

The Guild usually holds ten events throughout the DSO season. Luncheon meetings are held at elegant clubs like the Petroleum Club, Lakewood Country Club and The Tower Club. Evening events take place in some of the most beautiful homes in Dallas and feature wine and hors d’oeuvres. The guest artists at our events are the noted and noteworthy instrumentalists, composers and conductors who are sharing their musical gifts with the DSO at the time.

Past guest artists have included conductors Jaap van Zweden, Andrew Litton and Marin Alsop; composers Jennifer Higdon (winner of the 2010 Pulitzer Prize in Music) and Steven Stucky (August 4, 1964, to be performed by the DSO at Carnegie Hall in May); and stellar soloists such as pianist Steven Hough, violinist Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg, and clarinetist Richard Stoltzman. Although our events are both elegant and educational, lighthearted fun and camaraderie permeate every gathering, thanks to our common love of music. Each meeting seems more enjoyable than the last – they are anything but boring!

What’s going on at the Guild this season?

Thus far in fall 2010, we have been treated to a presentation and duets by DSO principal oboist Erin Hannigan and associate principal bassoonist Scott Walzel; a Q & A with talented and charming violinist Nicola Benedetti; and an intimate evening with cellist Lynn Harrell, who brought his instrument and played it in the unique and spectacular surroundings of a 1910 church-turned-residence where our event was held.

On Wednesday (Nov. 3), Guild members will spend the evening at the high-rise tower The House in Victory Park, site of the Dallas City Living Tour sponsored by our sister support group the Dallas Symphony Orchestra League. We’ll have wine and hors d’oeuvres and hear a presentation by dynamic conductor Alondra de la Parra, who will be leading the DSO in a program of Latin Masterworks Nov. 4-7 at the Meyerson.

In January, we’ll enjoy a luncheon with composer Poul Ruders, who is writing Symphony No. 4, An Organ Symphony, a world premiere organ concerto for the DSO and its principal organist Mary Preston, who will also join us. That will be followed in early February by an evening meeting featuring composer Stewart Copeland, drummer of famed rock trio The Police. Copeland, too, is working on a world premiere, Gamelan D’Drum, for the DSO and D’Drum, a percussion ensemble featuring several members of the DSO’s percussion section. Also in the works is an early-March luncheon meeting with conductor Gunther Herbig who will conduct Mozart and Dvorak with the DSO March 3-6. We’ll also have three more exciting events that are still under wraps.

Is that all that’s going on the DSO Guild?

Why, no. We have just confirmed that local favorite and international piano sensation Olga Kern will perform at our annual Spring Gala on April 3. Kern will be celebrating the tenth anniversary of her winning the Gold Medal at the 2001 Van Cliburn International Piano Competition. Since that time, she has gone on to great acclaim as both recitalist and concert pianist, but has always maintained a special relationship with the Metroplex because it was in Fort Worth that her glamorous, globetrotting career was launched. Our gala is an intimate affair - a cocktail reception and sumptuous dinner in elegant surroundings, followed by a private recital by Kern! Proceeds from the gala help underwrite the Performance Preludes lectures.

Can I join the DSO Guild?

Yes! All are welcome! Memberships are available at a five-event level for $235 and ten-event level for $395. Non-members are also welcome to attend our regular events for $55 before stated RSVP deadlines, $75 after. Non-members and guests are also invited to the Dallas Symphony Guild Spring Gala with Olga Kern, with pricing to be determined. Sponsorships are also available. For more information on the DSO Guild, its events or its gala, please visit our website at www.dsoguild.com, email us at information@dsoguild.com or call 214-821-2428. We look forward to meeting you and sharing our mutual love of music and the Dallas Symphony Orchestra!

Grand Teton & Yellowstone NPs, part 2

2010-08-18T15:57:00.017-05:00

We followed the eastern side of the Grand Loop road as we entered Yellowstone, because this was the easiest day to visit the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone and later in the day would be a good time to drive through the Hayden Valley in hopes of seeing wildlife. We stopped off for a lovely lunch at the Lake Hotel, took in a thermal feature preview at Mud Volcano, then continued on to take in various overlooks of the striking Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone, with both the upper and lower falls. As we made our way through the Hayden valley, we indeed got caught in a bison jam as I had expected...and finally we made it to our Mammoth Hot Springs cabins. This area was the original HQ of the cavalry when it ran the park in the 19th c., and it has its own historic vibe as an encampment/visitor hub. The current hotel and cabin buildings were erected in the 1930's.

While we were based at Mammoth, we had several interesting animal adventures. The first was a horseback ride from the Roosevelt Corral, through the scenic hills of the northeast part of the park. Unfortunately, when a hat blew off the head of the person in front of me on the trail, it spooked the living daylights out of my horse...who then freaked out and threw me! Apparently my flying through the air was "graceful" and I landed with a thud on my rear, surviving with only a few (but impressive) bruises and a sprained (and maybe cracked) pinky finger. While "nursing" my finger with a glass of wine that evening on the front porch of our cabin, I spied a cinnamon black bear sow and her two cubs scampering around on the hill behind the next row of cabins. I grabbed the super-binocs and checked them out as they started to descend. A ranger magically appeared in a vehicle, drove up a gravel road on the hill, bonked the horn or siren and scared the bears back into the treeline. The cubs were surely cute, but I guess they were just about getting close enough to the cabins to become a danger (the sow, anyway, probably not the cubs).

The next morning, we had what many would consider the wildlife highlight of the trip, one I had been looking forward to for months: wolf spotting. This required a 5:30am departure from Mammoth and four people chose not to come (their loss!). But the lighter load meant my father could just ride with me and not drive the second van, a nice break for him. We ventured out to the Slough Creek area, where the newly-designated Lamar Canyon pack had been lately seen. We were not disappointed! We were treated to an amazing display of natural wolf behavior by the seven pack members we saw, several adults and a passel of playful pups. They alternately tore up and consumed the carcass of some animal that they had stored behind a rock outcropping, and when they weren't busy eating, they were quite the frolicking family, both adults and pups running around, jumping on rocks, rolling around wrestling each other. We watched them for at least an hour with extremely powerful Nikon spotting scopes I had rented for the occasion, and everyone who went found it to be a memorable morning, to say the least. For me, it's made even more precious because the wolves are too far away to shoot with anything resembling a normal camera, so you have to capture and hold the pictures in your mind.

After regrouping and checking out, we meandered along the western side of the Grand Loop, stopping at the National Park Ranger Museum at Norris, and then at the Norris Geyser Basin. We arrived at Old Faithful Inn and soon went to join the Geyser Discovery Stroll. Typically, this ranger walk follows an informal path though the Upper Geyser Basin. But a particular geyser erupted as the walk began, and that geyser may indicate an impending eruption of the high-pressure, charming Beehive geyser.

So the ranger changed course, leading us up onto Geyser Hill instead, ad we were lucky enough to see Beehive blow its top. It's one thing to see Old Faithful go off repeatedly and on a schedule, but another thing entirely to see a geyser erupt when it only does so once or twice a day. As they say, timing is everything. We saw about five geysers erupt during that 90-minute stroll, worth the effort we had made to get to Old Faithful Inn with time to catch the stroll.

After dinner, we all met up on the OFI balcony to start our stargazing. Happily, our little crew decided to walk down towards the Upper Geyser basin, where there were no lights nearby to interfere with our night vision adjustment. We lay on the paved path with our blankets and among us we spotted around ten Perseid meteors streaking across the northeastern night sky. Unfortunately, a cold front was making its way through the region, and the sky clouded over after a bit. We played twenty questions to pass the time, and eventually gave up on our big night of stargazing in favor of our beds. It was cold enough that night for snow flurries, and the Inn even turned the heaters on.

We slept in that morning and later followed the Fairy Falls trail to the special off-trail detour one can take to get a bird's eye view of Grand Prismatic Spring--a view which is impossible from the official park boardwalks around the spring, but one which is seen in every book and postcard collection nonetheless. After a short uphill scramble, the Mon Voyage group members appreciated immediately the small effort required to yield such a big payoff! Some folks continued all the way to the charming Fairy Falls, while the rest of us enjoyed a picnic lunch down the road. The afternoon was spent exploring numerous other thermal features like Fountain paint Pots, with an early return to the inn. Dinner at the Obsidian Dining Room (next door at the OF Snow Lodge) was excellent, as always, and we had a delightful chat with the chef after dinner.

Our last day we traveled east, stopping to engage in another close elk encounter...the afternoon was spent near the lake again, this time with lunch at the Lake Lodge cafeteria, followed by a beautiful scenic cruise on Lake Yellowstone. On our way out we made a farewell thermal pass at West Thumb Geyser Basin. It's not the most impressive height-wise, but the thermal features are deep and display a riot of colors, and you can't beat the scenery of those sights right along the shoreline of the lake.We spent our last night in the charming town of Jackson, in order to be near the airport for the early morning departure flights. As dawn broke and I drove myself from the airport back to the Cowboy Village Resort for a day of rest and one more night in the Hole, I spied one last creature that I had failed to spot on my first trip...two trumpeter swans gliding across the blushing sky.

Now that this trip is finding its place in the group's collective memory, I am starting to think about the next Mon Voyage Small Group destination. After ten days communing with nature, I may feel the need for an oenophile adventure!

Grand Teton and Yellowstone National Parks, part 1

2010-08-18T13:12:00.013-05:00

I have just returned from the first "official" Mon Voyage Small Group Trip, whereby I returned to Grand Teton and Yellowstone National Parks after a five-year absence and with a dozen other people in tow. DH Bill was scheduled to be my escort/sidekick but due to illness he was unable to travel, and my father Louie graciously stepped in to assist me. Accompanying us were Joan & Harvey, Karen, Jeanie, Shirley & Ricardo, Jill & Tom with daughters Emma & Anna, and my trusty cousin Sara.

We arrived in Grand Teton NP on Saturday afternoon at Jackson Hole Municipal Airport, and went about getting settled and organized after making the obligatory stop in Moose to stock up at Dornan's grocery/deli, and more importantly, its handy-dandy and very decent wine shop. We checked into Jackson Lake Lodge cottage units and immediately set about enjoying our little patio with a cocktail and a view. Most of us had dinner together that first night at the Mural Room, and enjoyed the sunset vista of Mount Moran. Almost everywhere you go in the park, you are treated to magnificent views.

During our days in GTNP, we explored the peaceful, scenic Swan Lake/Heron Pond loop hike as well as the uphill ranger-led Hidden Falls and Inspiration Point hike on the west side of Jenny Lake. (You've got to get there early to get one of 25 tokens if you want to accompany the ranger--we were first in line, because we needed 13!)
One morning we took a breakfast cruise on Jackson Lake, which included a hot western food spread on Elk Island, again with a dazzling view of the Tetons and Mount Moran to make everything taste even better. We rode a replica pontoon ferry across the Snake River, and repeatedly ate fresh trout farmed in it. Animal sightings included an injured moose ensconced just outside the lodge, a beaver, plenty of bison down in the Antelope Flats area...but the best was following some scuttlebutt up to the northern border of the park, where we were "treated" to a grizzly bear roaming around and eating in the ravine next to the roadside where we parked, and then finally deciding to cross the road about twenty or thirty feet from our car. We had not seen a grizzly on our first trip here in 2005, so this was an exciting sighting for me!

We had excellent food at the Mural Room and Pioneer Grill at JLL, and fine views at Signal Mtn Lodge Trapper Grill, but the highlight was our lunch at Jenny Lake Lodge. I think we all cleaned our plates that day!

On the fourth day we packed up and headed north to neighboring Yellowstone National Park, which is our oldest NP and dates to 1872! Both parks have interesting histories, and I recommend Ken Burns' PBS series on the National Parks for the backstory on how each was created.

Cajun Mardi Gras, at long last

2010-08-18T12:12:00.011-05:00

Well...it was the first but definitely unofficial Mon Voyage Small Group Trip. I coordinated a small group of friends and relatives to go to Cajun Mardi Gras in February and les bons temps, they definitely rolled! I must have had a six-month hangover because I have failed to post anything about that trip. Better late than never, n'est-ce pas?! We were two aunts, an uncle, a cousin, a few friends of said cousin and of an aunt, plus Bill and yours truly.

We started the festivities by attending super-parade Endymion in New Orleans. With the Saints fresh off their Super Bowl victory, Mardi Gras had turned into Lombardi Gras, and I was not going to be so close to New Orleans without dropping in for a quick visit. The owner of the the Saints, Tom Benson, was the Grand Marshal of the parade, and he brought along with him his daughter Rita (GM), coaches, staff, and a bunch of popular Saints players. Every other parade watcher was garbed in a Saints shirt, and two girls were sporting pig snouts and wings, 'cause pigs flew when the Saints won the Super Bowl!

The next few days were passed cavorting around different towns on the Cajun prairie of South Central Louisiana, from Church Point to Eunice to Mamou to Basile and more. Each town has its own Mardi Gras traditions, variations on a theme. Riders in traditional costumes depart early in the morning, making a circuit around the local homes and farms, collecting the ingredients for a community gumbo (including chasing live chickens). This custom, an ancient European begging and masking tradition, dates at least to the middle ages. If you miss the departure, how do you find them? Just look for the trail of empty beer cans and horse manure. Later in the day--or in some towns, all day long--there's great Cajun music being performed for street dances, because in addition to chasing chickens and drinking, music and dancing are key elements of the celebrations. If you catch the riders while they are out on their run, don't be surprised if one of them starts dancing with you--there's usually a band wagon at the end of the horse assembly.

The whole affair is decidedly unlike Mardi Gras in New Orleans, and must be experienced to be understood. Dr. Barry Ancelet gave an excellent presentation on Cajun Mardi Gras, which only added to one's enjoyment of the trip. Enjoy these few pictures, and if you want to undertake the adventure yourself someday, I can take care of that for you...

Getting with the Program

2009-10-20T13:03:00.005-05:00

Blog needs updating. I have been toying with several topics and questions: Does poking arts administrators in the thigh with a fork produce results? What is the best time of year to travel to Italy? Why should you book one of the two remaining rooms on my Yellowstone & Grand Teton small group trip? Is there a scientific basis for terroir or is it all a myth?

Maybe I should just quit toying and start writing. But not right now. In the meantime, check out my Round-the-World client's online travel journal.

I should add that the luggage has been found and will soon be delivered unto her hands in Namibia.

TTFN.

The National Parks: America's Best Idea

2009-09-28T13:40:00.005-05:00

Fifteen or more years ago, I was planning a trip to California, focused mainly on the Bay Area. A friend suggested that since we'd be a straight shot (ok, five hour straight shot) across the state from Yosemite National Park, that we should try to include it in our itinerary. How prophetic that suggestion was, because once I entered Yosemite, my life was changed forever. I had visited Great Smoky Mountains NP and Hot Springs NP as a kid but didn't appreciate them enough, and had a quickie of Acadia NP when I was at a conference in Maine, but nothing prepared me for this.

Seeing the breathtaking beauty of Yosemite's sweeping vistas and grand glacial granite formations, for the first time and every time, are moments where you feel the wonder of creation; and if you happen to believe in God as I do, it will inspire a deep feeling of gratitude for the creation he has bestowed upon us. Even an atheist or agnostic can easily appreciate the amazing marvels that nature has created, whether you think God had anything to do with it or not!

I have now visited Yosemite at least three times, as well as Mammoth Cave NP, Olympic NP, Yellowstone NP, Grand Teton NP, Zion NP, Bryce Canyon NP, Grand Canyon NP, Hawaii Volcanoes NP, Petrified Forest NP...many National Forests...quite a few National Monuments, including Wupatki, Walnut Canyon, Montezuma Castle, Sunset Crater, El Morro and El Malpais, Bandelier, Pearl Harbor, Fort Sumter, and others.

The first Mon Voyage Small Group Trip to percolate is a nine-day trip to Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks, timed to coincide with the peak of the annual Perseid meteor shower next August. Several people have taken advantage of my early bird discount offer and it looks like I'm down to about three rooms, which means the trip will definitely make!

The new Ken Burns documentary series on the parks is airing this week on most PBS stations and once it's done, all bets are off for 2010 summer accommodations at official park lodges. Below is the extended video preview (go to YouTube for the wider-screen version), and we've got the rooms. Grab 'em while they're hot!

Bollywood Road Trip: Part 3, Postscript

2009-09-06T20:05:00.006-05:00

Just want to also publicly point out the chief offenders in this whole debacle, and that would be promoters Monty Syed and Rajender Singh. Nice going, guys. And a special bonus shout-out is sent to Jinesh Modi and Modi Creations, who spearheaded the souvenir photo effort.

The photos were promised in the hours and days immediately following the fair, once even accompanied by a promise of three hours!

I checked the photo website daily and nothing was there. Finally, attendees were notified at almost 11pm on Sept 5th, three weeks after the event, photos were now available. Instead of the $10 they were charging at the event, they were now listed at $18 (to include shipping, which we are forced to pay because they were not even available for pickup at the event). Just to add insult to injury, sometime between midnight of the 5th/6th and the afternoon of the 6th, they conveniently posted this message at the top of the site:
"Attn Houston carnival photo buyers: Due to high volume of images, we have to remove some images. So buy your photos on & before 5th Sept, 2009. After that each photo will cost $25. Sorry for inconvenience. All shipping will be processed on and after 1st Sept 2009."

Mind you, the photos were not even available for sale until almost midnight of the 5th/6th. So to top it off, they were multiplying the ripoff by implying that the photos had been available earlier.

The aforementioned message has now been removed, but ten days later (16 Sept, as this is finally posted), the PayPal link still doesn't work so you can't even buy the pictures. If you want to see mine, click here and then enter "saif kareena 92" in the search box. Someday i hope to be able to (grudgingly) buy the darn thing.

Bollywood Road Trip: Memorable*, part two

2009-08-18T16:37:00.014-05:00

(read part one first, previous post, below)

Now I high-tailed it back to the line, where Sara and/or Yoori had continued to stake out our spot in the throng. Still waiting. I was losing track of time at this point...do you decide to just blow the whole thing off after 4 1/2 hours or do you remind yourself of the time already invested in waiting? I called my husband and told him how glad he should be that he wasn't there with me. He would have left and come back to pick me up, no doubt. He then told me about the biggest star of the group (Shahrukh Khan, scheduled for Chicago Saturday and Houston Sunday) having been detained at immigration. About 6:15 or 6:30, Saif Ali Khan--a huge star and a good actor, especially when he is working off a decent script like Omkara, Love Aaj Kal or Kal Ho Naa Ho. Tells some tale about late flight and lost luggage. No one believes him. He flashes the million-rupee smile and starts doing his star duty.

At this point the organizers are pretty much rudely grabbing people and shoving them across the stage and have ceased allowing people to take their own pictures or seek autographs as promised. The crowd is getting cranky, and I'm still far enough back that I don't know if I'll ever make it to the stage. Perhaps 20 or 30 minutes later (close to 7:00), Kareena Kapoor, his real-life girlfriend, arrives on stage to join him. She has developed into a good actress, best roles being in Dev, Omkara and Jab We Met. I guess it takes her a long time to get ready--she should have just come out in whatever she wore on the plane, if indeed they had just come from the airport (doubtful). People pass across the stage, no signing, and the only pics are allowed are from their $10 a pop photographer. This after I was told by the producer that there was no extra charge for pictures (I guess that was for taking your own pictures, now verboten).

So now we are closing in on the stage at long last. After waiting in a reasonably orderly line all day, then entering a rope-and-stanchion zigzag configuration, we were then just dumped out into a giant, seething mob situation at the side of the stage. People were pushing and shoving from so far back it was as though the crowd were a living, squirming creature itself. It really was almost like a moving sea of humanity. Parents holding babies were getting smashed, I was about to have a panic attack from the claustrophobia, and it was just turning into a nightmare. Some kindly people let me pass through so that I could be on the edge of the crowd.

When we finally got up on the stage to meet the celebs, we were shoved off there so fast that I think I was facing sideways when the photo was snapped (not available yet, natch). I did manage to foist my Omkara DVD on Saif along with a Sharpie, and while I was hoping he would sign his face on the case, he signed the DVD itself. I wanted Kareena to sign too, since they were in this film together and it really represents their best work, but I took what I could get; and in a blink of an eye, I was shooed (pushed) away by the staff. I took a few pics from the ground, and we high-tailed it out of the center about 7:45. There was no way all those people were going to make it to the stars before security shut down the "festivities", and we did not want to be there when everyone figured this out. It could get ugly.

We had planned to go see acclaimed new Indian flick Kaminey but were too tired. We weren't even up to watching any of the four great Indian DVDs I had in my bag. Thank goodness we had plenty of good wine and Sara's tasty food to comfort us after our dreadful afternoon.

We also had tickets for day two, but our experience on Saturday was so unfortunate (bless Yoori and Sara for sticking with me), we decided to try and sell our tickets the next day. I could not believe I was giving up a chance to meet the King of Bollywood, Shahrukh Khan, and have him sign my 2007 birthday invitation, on which we are pictured dancing together. I may be wistful about it after the fact, but I was DONE. As I mentioned before, we had been unable to pick up our tickets for both days at once, so we arrived at 1:30 to pick up our tickets on Sunday (at least we knew this time not to show up at noon). Again, no one was there with the tickets--only this time they did not show up until 2:40. As fast as I could grab the tickets, I turned to the side and found some teenage boys who would buy them for the $25 I paid rather then the $35 they would pay at the door. We could not get out of there fast enough, even though it had cost is $10 just to park.

Thai lunch in Rice Village, a stop at the chocolate shop and we were on our way back to Dallas. Yoori, now having discovered the deliciousness that are Sam's pies, requested a Sam's break along the way so she could buy some pies (chocolate meringue, pecan, and apple or peach crumb). We arrived home around 9:15, I think, and once the car was unloaded and the road snacks put away, I enjoyed a glass of wine and related this exciting tale to my dear husband, who had sweetly encouraged and supported me in taking such a silly trip in the first place.

I'll definitely never forget the adventure, but I wish it were for more pleasant reasons. So yes, it was memorable, but not in a good way*. Why did I go against my very deliberate nature and do something that spontaneous? Why didn't I just stay in Dallas and go to the Indian Independence Day celebration here (Anand Bazaar) for five bucks? Live and learn!

I'm a devoted fan of Indian movies, but I guess I'm just not quite that kind of fan...unless my radio journalist husband gets to interview one of them someday like he has Oscar-winning composer A.R. Rahman ("the Mozart of Madras")and Sonu Nigam (a top Bollywood playback singer). In that case, I'll be there with bangles on.

Bollywood Road Trip: Memorable*, part one

2009-08-18T08:16:00.013-05:00

I was promised a meet-n-greet and photo op with Bollywood stars, good food, fashion shows, great music, and a huge Indian shopping bazaar. Doesn't it look like fun? Alternating big stars and singers on a whirlwind weekend in Chicago and Houston. Have a gander at the promotional video and website. Girls-only road trip; Houston, here we come!

What I got was a three-second blurry view of two stars as I was essentially shoved across the stage, so-so food at high prices, fashion shows I couldn't see because I was stuck in the meet-n-greet line, and a few shopping booths (which I also didn't get to visit due to the standing in line problem).

Even so, I went with low expectations. What I experienced was probably the most frustrating and poorly-organized event I have ever attended. It makes all my experience living with Mardi Gras look like an annual picnic in the park. And because both Sara and I have long and productive experience in organizing large events, every little thing that went wrong was another stake in the heart of what could have been.

Yoori and I piled into the car late Friday afternoon and headed for I-45. We fought the mixmaster mélée for a few minutes, but soon enough broke free and set out on the open road. Our timing was perfect for a dinner pit stop at Sam's restaurant in Fairfield, home of tender, flavorful barbecue and mouthwatering homemade pies. It's a challenge to drive to Houston without being sucked into the Sam's vortex, something Yoori would unwittingly discover. I had my usual sliced brisket sandwich with a side of black-eyed peas; I didn't know Yoori was such a burger gal until she passed up the succulent barbecue for a cheeseburger. We shared a piece of coconut meringue pie for dessert and, I have to say, the meringue at Sam's is a work of art.

We arrived in Houston without misadventure and settled in at my cousin Sara's townhouse.

I began the day most delightfully by spilling scalding hot coffee on my chest (leaving a smallish, barely-second-degree burn). Slathered in aloe vera gel, I got dressed...which cute outfit should I wear today? I think I'll save the black fedora for Shahrukh, so for today, let's go black/brown and funky. Here are Yoori and I, pretending to have fun.

We arrived at the Reliant center promptly at noon, exactly as we had been told only a few days before by the producer of the event, and exactly as it had been listed in the paper. I had cleverly--or so I thought--bought our tickets online at Sulekha in order to save $10 each over the door ticket price. Now wouldn't you think that the people who had already paid for their tickets should be the first to get in the door at noon and form the line to meet-n-greet? Well, you'd be wrong in so many ways.

First of all, upon our arrival we (and a slew of other people) were informed that the producer had arbitrarily decided that the event would now begin at 1:30. Of course, the Starbucks in the center was closed and you could not exit and re-enter the parking lot, so we were forced to cool our heels (and our stomachs) till then. Well, how about picking up our tickets in the meantime? Nope, the box office wouldn't open till 1:00. When the box office DID open at long last, the employees were not in possession of the tickets for all the people who had purchased them in advance. No one knew where they were or when they would show up. Finally, someone appeared with our tickets and we had to go form yet another line to retrieve them, while everyone else who had purchased them at the door was let into the venue at 1:45. I got my hot little hands on our tickets at nearly 2:00, and of course I could not simultaneously pick up my tickets for the next day (that would have been too efficient). Have these people never heard of e-tickets with a bar code that can be scanned at the door??? The step of having to pick up physical tickets was completely avoidable!

When Yoori, Sara and I gained entrance to the space, I proceeded directly the meet-n-greet line, where there were already hundreds upon hundreds (thousands?) of people ahead of us, thanks to the completely unnecessary delay in claiming our tickets. At this point, we were starving and the first order of business was taking turns getting something to eat. The food variety was not impressive and the prices were high, but it was decent enough. Sara went shopping and found herself some fabulously elaborate ruby and ruby-esque jewelry.

Some Reliant Center security doofus decides she is going to adjust the line, make a snake or something so it will curve back or double up on itself, because it is so long and takes up so much room. She comes up to exactly my point in the line and tells everyone past that point (500 people or more) to move over to form a sideways turn next to a point farther up in the line that she has designated. We go along like sheep. Then it just gets totally screwed up, and she ends up with no plan whatsoever, and has all of us who are facing in one direction turn around and go back to the new end of the line, resulting in the complete reversal in order of half the people in line. Whereas we were formerly close to the halfway point, we're now almost last. Are you following this? It didn't make any sense at the time, either.

Finally, sometime around 3:00, somebody shows up on the stage: it's Katrina Kaif, a stunningly beautiful but relatively talent-free Bollywood star. Line moves imperceptibly for the next hour as she meets, greets, signs and poses for photos with fans. Then she goes to the other stage and has an audience Q & A. Now she comes back to the star stage. Clearly she is starting to fill time for the other expected stars as the day wears on. Shortly after 5:00, she's done.

Meanwhile, on the other stage there has been a fashion show, one or two actually talented and quasi-famous singers, and some questionable other "talent" essentially performing karoake. Now I took a turn to go shopping. I found two gorgeous 3-piece churidar suits, one of a kind and hand made by a Desi designer in Atlanta. They were so much more creative and interesting than the usual suits (although there are many beautiful items even in the world of the usual suits) and I was really excited about buying them after I had tried the long tops on. Typically you can skip even trying the pants because they are loose at the top with a drawstring or elastic, and the long, skinny calf sections are meant to slouch and gather at the ankles so length is not an issue. But I thought that these pants looked awfully skinny all the way up the thighs, so I went to try them on just before handing over my money. Good thing, because they were too tight!! So I saved myself a few bucks there, but then again, since she makes everything herself I have a feeling I'll be looking her up in Atlanta the next time I go to visit my sister. I feel a custom-made churidar suit coming on.

At another booth, I found a cute Anarkali kameez instead and didn't have to worry about pants because it was only the tunic, not a suit. So now I had a sparkly tunic, but still no glittering stars.

end of part one

Baby Scarlett's tips for Hot-lanta

2009-07-02T11:51:00.016-05:00

This is yours truly with Scarlett, the aforementioned niece. She says that Atlanta is full of good food, history and southern charm. Her advice for your next trip to her stomping grounds, although she can't actually stomp yet:

Places to visit:
Carter Center
Martin Luther King Memorial and Historic Site
High Museum
Carlos Museum at Emory
CNN Center

Her dining recommendations:

Swan Coach House:
This joint is dripping with gentility, and a lovely place for a ladies' lunch. I mean, it's been featured in Southern Lady magazine, for heaven's sake. Order the famous chicken salad and have a mint julep for Scarlett because she's underage.

Rathbun's:
Scarlett can't say enough good things about this place, even though she did not get to enjoy it herself. Her mother and Aunt Nicole went there all alone (well, them and the crutches...they left the wheelchair at home) to live it up on their night out. Mom had just gotten a new, slightly smaller and considerably lighter weight cast on her calf and foot and they desperately needed to celebrate.

The menu at Rathbun's is extensive and enticing, and everything is quite reasonably priced. There's an accent on Southern foods with locally-obtained fresh products but with a much wider frame of interesting ingredients under consideration. I had to satisfy a craving for shrimp and grits, and these were probably the best I've had anywhere, rich and flavorful enough to moan about but not crossing the line into heaviness. Texture was perfect. Desserts were human-sized portions and all priced at $3.95; we had a scrumptious white chocolate banana bread pudding, along with a glass of sauternes and a glass of Quady Elysium, which is like liquid heaven (guess that's why it's called Elysium).

Which brings me to the wine list: the offerings at Rathbun's are exceedingly thoughtfully chosen and well-priced. The list itself was wonderfully varied (I hate places that have a zillion chards, a pinot grigio from Italy and a sauvignon blanc, poof, that's it). There were many of my favorite regions and varietals from Oregon pinot gris and pinot blanc to multiple viognier, gewurtztraminer, and white burgundy selections like a true chablis, to interesting chards and sauvignon blancs. On the red side things were just as wide-ranging, with both classic and adventurous selections from the old and new worlds. Prices were arranged at $24, $34, $44, $54 and $64, with glasses starting at a friendly $6.50. And lest you fear that you won't consume a whole bottle and will be stuck with limited by-the-glass options, good news: there are at least thirty wines available by the glass. We drank a bottle of rich and aromatic 2007 Miner viognier from CA, which I would compare favorably to a fine Condrieu in pure sipping pleasure, and it was enjoyable alone as well as with my entrée.

Nothing can ruin a delicious meal like bad wait staff; no matter how memorable the dishes may be, they are blotted out by inferior service. Had you going, didn't I? To top off our fully fabulous experience at Rathbun's, all the service was top-notch. From beginning to end, top to bottom, stem to stern, it was a wonderful dinner.

My only complaint would be that in the converted warehouse that now serves as Rathbun HQ, the surfaces are hard--brick, cement, etc--and thus conversations at the closely-spaced tables in a room with no sound absorption yield a medium-level background rumble and roar. But it's not enough to keep me from going back as soon as humanly possible.

Hot-lanta?

2009-06-23T20:41:00.005-05:00

I am at present in the semi-sweltering Southern metropolis of Atlanta, helping my sister--who has a broken foot, crutches, a three-story house, and a four-month old baby named Scarlett (I swear, it had nothing to do with GWTW). Being chauffeur, cook, personal assistant and babysitter doesn't leave a lot of time for socializing or getting out and about on the town. I do hope to at least make it up to visit my friend Grace and her family at some point. But I feel that I should impart some suggestions for almost any place I might visit, so I'll post a few notes once I figure out all the fun things I could be doing if I were actually here on vacation.

13th Van Cliburn as Travel Experience

2009-06-04T10:59:00.048-05:00

The Van Cliburn International Piano Competition is a three week geek-fest for the music lover, and I mean that in the most loving and devoted way possible. If you have enough vacation time, or even able to make it down to Fort Worth for even one or two rounds, you should mark your calendar now for late May/early June 2013. This is my fifth Cliburn; once you've gone, you're hooked. It's like meth or heroin (or porn?) to a classical music junkie. And yes, Van Cliburn is actually in attendance (left, signing autographs for fans).

After a round-the-world search and live screening jury auditions, thirty of the best young pianists from countries near and far descend on Fort Worth for an intensive three weeks of piano music-making. If a pianist makes it to the finals, s/he will have performed three recitals, each close to an hour; a quintet in collaboration with the Takaçs String Quartet; a chamber concerto; and a large orchestra concerto. And throw in a lot of practice and rehearsals to boot. It's enough to separate the wheat from the chaff, and the concert-career-ready players from the need-to-percolate pretenders.

Because the New Orleans Wine & Food Experience overlapped with the first days of the Cliburn, we missed some of the preliminary-round recitals. We did catch the final few competitors, but our experience and judgment this time was based mainly on the semifinal round. At this point we've just begun the final round, with the second session tonight. Opinions in the press room coalesced around four players (Bozhanov, Son, Wu and H. Zhang), and those four advanced to the finals. But the remaining two finalist spots were a crapshoot. We ourselves predicted the judges would take those four, but our last two picks did not make it; we liked Dank & and chose Deljavan (right) as our "jury wild card"...and I do mean wild. The other two chosen by the jury were Vacatello & Tsujii, the first sightless pianist to advance this far.

But guess what? I'm neither musician nor music critic, just a woman who has been an avid classical music lover and regular concertgoer (both at home and on my travels) for 30+ years. So I won't try to rate the performances. I simply want to create a picture of what it's like to BE at the Cliburn, and leave you with no doubt that it's worth a special trip to Fort Worth for as long as you can be present, be that three days or three weeks.

The music speaks for itself. All in all there are about two dozen three-and-a-half hour sessions of music over two and a half weeks. The caliber of performers gets better with every competition, and the Fort Worth Symphony has significantly matured under its usual guidance of its music director Miguel Harth-Bedoya (though the competition conductor is the distinguished James Conlon).

The music brings out all the geeky marvellousness of the Cliburn and it atomizes into a general atmosphere of camaraderie and shared interest among everyone in attendance, from competitors to volunteers to staff to press to every audience member. It's impossible to put into words, but it's palpable and pervasive. The idea that you all have something so meaningful and deeply enjoyable in common simply bonds everyone, friend and stranger alike, for the duration of the event.

That bond extends to previous gold medalists Stanislav Ioudenitch (pictured with me, left) and José Feghali, 2005 silver medalist Joyce Yang, and former competitors like Frederic Chiu, our favorite from the 1993 Cliburn (he was robbed of a finalist spot). It's nothing short of delightful to see these talented folks again, chat and catch up on their careers. Frederic, the press darling of 1993, always makes sure to visit the press room ;-) We talked again at a party (photo, below right: Frederic with Yoori Marti of Steinway, at the Cliburn's Zoo party) and he told us that, having completed his ten-year recording cycle of Prokofiev's complete piano works (highly recommended, and in my humble opinion, he is the foremost Prokofiev interpreter of his generation), he has undertaken a new challenge. This time he aims to record Lizst's transcriptions of Ludwig van Beethoven's nine symphonies. The first one in the series (Beethoven's Fifth) has been released and is available at his website. My dream is that when he gets around to scaling the the mountaintop that is the Ninth and one that probably requires four hands for a live performance, that he come to Fort Worth and play it together with some other Cliburn laureate (so what if Chiu didn't "win", laureate-schmaureate) on the Cliburn's excellent concert series.

But wait, there's more! Besides all the terrific music and the great vibe, the Cliburn makes sure there is plenty to entertain you when there's no competitive playing. This year there is a symposium series on music and its connection to diplomacy in the 21st century as well as a huge series of films by award-winning documentarian Peter Rosen, covering everything from composers to facilities to the competition to even architecture. Not enough to fill the time of those very few days away from the competition sessions? How about two more sessions of unofficial recitals? On the two "off" days before the finals commenced, there were at least six recitals by competitors who did not advance but who agreed to play some of their remaining recital repertoire for a couple hundred fans, while the finalists rehearsed with Conlon and the Fort Worth Symphony. (Below, finalists with Van. L to R: Yeol Eum Son, Haochen Zhang, Mariangela Vacatello, Nobuyuki Tsujii, Van Cliburn, Di Wu, and Evgeni Bozhanov.)

If you need a break from the competition on those days off, Fort Worth is home to some small museums with impressive collections, each a jewel in its own right: the Kimbell, the Amon Carter, the Modern, the Sid Richardson...it's more than enough to satisfy your craving for visual art along with your more-than-adequate performing arts fix at the Cliburn. In Dallas you can visit the Dallas Museum of Art, the Nasher Sculpture Center, the Crow Collection, Fair Park...and endless shopping, if you see fashion as the perfect souvenir. There's excellent community theater all over the Dallas-Fort Worth area as well. As an aside, the Texas Rangers play in nearby Arlington, and the Colonial golf tournament also overlaps with part of the Cliburn, so if one of you is a golfer or baseball fan, there are also those diversions for the more sportif among you.

There are plenty of convenient and delicious restaurants in downtown Fort Worth to satisfy your baser needs as well (bars, too). The Cliburn is so utterly all-encompassing, though, that you may sit down to dinner and discover that your waiter was a vocal performance major and that the restaurant's cool new piece of art has donated parts from Steinway and was unveiled for the competition (The Vault, quite good food and excellent service), or that the kitchen staff is listening intently to every note live on the radio, as we found at Riscky's BBQ a few years back.

Love the idea of following the entire competition note-for-note on the radio? This year, it's a whole new world (-wide web) and almost everything, including rehearsals, is being streamed live on the internet. Most of it is also being archived (at least everything the Cliburn could get the rights to) and is available at the same site, so if you're not here in Bass Hall, you can catch up anytime. You'll feel like you are right there in the moment, with a backstage pass. Above left, Haochen Zhang and right, Yeol Eum Son, after their final concerto performances. Both played Prokofiev's #2, as did silver medalist Joyce Yang in 2005.

You can read all about the competition at the Cliburn's website.

View blog posts here, here, here, here and here. Pictured at right are two of the Cliburn's "official" bloggers, Ken Iisaka of California and Mike Winter of Idaho.

Look through print and radio news archives here, here and here.

Have fun with the virtual experience, and please contact me to plan your 2013 Cliburn extravaganza! My sixth competition could be your first. If you can't wait that long, ask me about the International Piano Competition for Outstanding Amateurs that will take place in May 2011.

NOWFE, digested

2009-06-04T10:09:00.012-05:00

If only wine had no calories! I stepped on the scale and was so frightened that I just fell off without looking. OK, I looked. And I had to avert my eyes. I really should exercise something besides my fingers and my mouth. I was on a walking program with a friend but I think she chose the gym in the end because, unlike walking, it produces measurable effects...

The first day in New Orleans, we shopped. We went to Orleans Coffee Exchange to pick up a grocery bag full of fresh roasted coffee. I always got my coffee from OCE when I lived in N.O.--I was actually one of their early customers back in the old Sandy & Grandma Ruth days. Now Bob runs the place, and the offerings are as delicious, aromatic and diverse as you could wish or dream. I can only drink decaf, and no one else has anything even remotely close to the large selection of decaf coffees that OCE does. We get our coffee via the OCE mail-order program now, but when we are in N.O., we like to make a pilgrimage to their place to get it ourselves.

Our other main shopping goal was seafood. We ended up getting 12 pounds of shrimp and nothing else. And we paid about $35 for them. Fresh (no IQF) shrimp in Dallas--especially shrimp that large--would have cost us 3 to 5 times what we paid. We will be having shrimp for dinner next week, natch.

We didn't attend the Royal Street Stroll this year, because we were sharing dinner with our old Dallas next-door neighbors Leo & Bret, who have moved back to New Orleans. They have bought the most incredible 1960's house with a view onto Lake Pontchartrain (ok, onto the levee) and are restoring it to its mod glamor. It's huge--our whole house could fit into the "great room", which is more like the "party room", with Herman Miller built-ins, a wet bar and a koi pond (no new fish yet, but there will be)!! Each bedroom is like a master suite, with a giant bathroom attached. One bathroom has a tub with three steps down into it, my favorite. They even have some of the home's original super-cool HM furniture that was made for the house, and in fact took possession of the home when it was still chock-full of the original residents' belongings. There are so many stories that this house can tell, and it has definitely fallen into the hands of the right couple.

Friday and Saturday we immersed ourselves in the seminars and the Grand tastings of NOWFE. Between us, we heard seminars about 1999 Cabernet Sauvignon, the French bistro craze, Women in the Wine industry, Louisiana-Italian cooking and wine, cooking a whole pig with Donald Link, sustainable production and cooking jambalaya with John Besh, and tête de cuvée champagnes led by Ziggy "The Wine Gal" Eschleman.

A full day of seminars on Friday was followed immediately by the first Grand Tasting, where we had plenty to eat and not too much to drink. Saturday brought two more seminars and another Grand Tasting. We normally only attend one Grand Tasting but our host and friend Julian decided not to use his own tickets and very generously bestowed them on us. Again, we tried to focus on eating first and drinking second. We have learned from bitter experience that if you don't make sure you get to certain food offerings in the first two (of three) hours, you may just be s.o.l. when you belly up to the booth and there's nothing there but empty pots and pans, and maybe a little pot liquor. Plus it's good to fill up a little bit with food before you dive into the wines, no!? This strategy worked very well for us. I did not feel even tipsy after either tasting, a thing of beauty. It takes discipline to come out standing and smiling rather than staggering and stuffed when there are 75 restaurants dishing up and something like a thousand wines being poured. At this point I have it down to a science.

If you've never been to New Orleans, or you have and you are enamored with the fine local cuisine and hedonistic aspect of life there, NOWFE is not to be missed. Of course, it's really a must-do event for wine lovers everywhere. But there are lots of other ways to fill your time there, even if you can't time your trip with NOWFE.

Sunday we crammed in visits with three friends and finally landed at my aunt's house in Baton Rouge, where we spent the last night. It shaves off a bit of the long drive home...

And as soon as we got back, we were in DEEP CLIBURN COMPETITION (see above) with no break in our momentum.

NOWFE, cont'd

2009-05-26T17:55:00.002-05:00

When I finish digesting all the food and wine, I'll get back to you...I'm afraid to step on a scale...

New Orleans Wine & Food Experience, cont'd.

2009-05-14T23:11:00.004-05:00

I frequently surf over to the website of the New Orleans Times-Picayune when I'm feeling the pull of the Crescent City. In addition to the truly mind-boggling level of political ridiculousness, there are a couple of pithy columnists over there, one of whom is Chris Rose (author of the moving post-Katrina essay collection One Dead in Attic). Today he's got another one of his pleasant dashes of local color in the form of an interview with the king of the Krewe of Corks and maître d'about town Patrick Van Hoorebeek. This is a French-Quarter-based marching krewe of oenophiles and one of their regular activities is to "parade" during next Thursday's Royal Street Stroll, part of NOWFE. Check it out here. See you on the rebound.

À la recherche du temps perdu

2009-05-13T17:57:00.029-05:00

I've been planning a trip to France for a client...name of Marcel Proust. Something about a madeleine... Just kidding. But as I was organizing this client's chateau-based accommodations for a side trip away from Paris down to the Loire Valley, I discovered some sad news that made me relive some of the favorite moments from our last trip to France.

That winter, we made an almost-complete route along the Loire, beginning at St-Benoît and Sancerre at the eastern end, going as far as the suburbs of Nantes, on the western end. We began and ended the trip in Paris, but the focus was assuredly vins et chateaux. We did justice to both.

The first lodging we chose to stay was a farmhouse in St. Benoît. Its owner was most hospitable but her English was limited. That just meant I had a great opportunity to dust off my French. Bill undertook his morning runs around her fields, and one evening we shared the family table and enjoyed a delicious dinner of fresh trout from the local river. While we were in that area we visited one of the smaller chateaux, complete with moat if I remember correctly, and discovered some excellent Sancerre and Pouilly-Fumé wines made from the sauvignon blanc grape that dominates vineyards at that end of the river.

My memory is foggy on the exact delineation of the days that followed...apologies to Marcel. But let's just say for the sake of moving the story along that we then traveled to the other end of the Loire. Along the way, as we were driving through a village between there and here, we happened upon an interesting-looking small family winery. We pulled in; before I could achieve the mental calculation that the sign said "closed for winter", the owner appeared right there in the driveway inviting us in. We stayed there for at least an hour, learning about his family history (again, a chance to dust off the French), and he opened a bottle of literally every wine he had bottled there, including many that were still aging, not labeled or released just yet. To top it off, we had the pleasure of using a fresh glass for every wine (photo of us on my website footer). We bought several bottles...you're shocked, I know.

Other end of the river? Crazy logistics? Not in the least. I had discovered a few weeks before our departure that my favorite French musical artist, Sanseverino, was performing near Nantes. Since it was only an extra 110km out of our way, we rearranged our itinerary to accommodate his concert. It was a blast! Just the kind of thing that makes a trip more memorable. We spent that night in the middle of a muscat vineyard.

After that we traveled to Poitou, a bit south of the major chateau zone, because I had ancestors who lived in the region. Our room there was in the turret of an incredibly old and fortified chateau (it's the one on my website's home page), whose proprietress was a chef. Naturally, we consumed a fabulous dinner with fine--and affordable--local wine.

We went to visit some distant LeBlanc cousins who lived near Poitiers, and they took us to see one of the remaining Acadian homes there. My own ancestors, who had gone to Nova Scotia in the early 1600's from a nearby Poitou village (Martaizé), were later deported by the English from Nova Scotia in the Grand Dérangement of 1755, and sent on a boat to Virginia, which refused the Acadians. At that point the English turned the ship around and sent more than 1100 Acadians to England as prisoners of war, and my ancestors, both father and son, were held in Liverpool for almost eight years. France secured their release with a treaty in 1763, and the surviving 800 or so were repatriated to France. Some of them returned to Poitou and it was one of their homes that we were able to check out. My own people, instead, took advantage of the king's offer of free land to farm on the lovely--but very rocky--Belle-Île-en-Mer. Needless to say, planting crops in the rocks did not yield any, uh, bountiful harvests, so after that struggle and a few more years in France, they finally decided to go back to the New World on one of the seven famous Acadian Voyages that took place in 1785 or so. That's how they finally ended up in Louisiana.

So back to France...after Poitou, we headed back to the heart of the chateau country, just across the river from Villandry and its rightfully famous gardens (not quite as impressive in the dead of winter, alas). This time we were at a beautiful French country home, complete with horses, chickens, cats and a dog. The family who welcomed us into its home (B & B) could not have been warmer or more charming, just entirely down to earth. When we took two evening meals with them en famille, it was in the centuries old huge kitchen with a massive fireplace that was clearly used for cooking in its former life. When I say "with them" that would include Anne and Eric, their four kids, one daughter's boyfriend, another guest couple with their baby, and us--all arranged at an endlessly long wooden table in front of that amazing fireplace. Many courses, real home-cooking, great local wine, intelligent conversation (and more French practice)!

There were so many wonderful aspects to the trip, but Bill and I both have especially fond memories of staying with this family and sharing two evening meals with them. Eric was an oenophile and turned us on to a gifted winemaker by the name of Jacky Blot. His labels are Domaine de la Taille aux Loups (whites, Montlouis-sur-Loire and Vouvray) and Domaine de la Butte (reds, Bourgueil). Everything we tasted was excellent, and of course we went home loaded up with wine. One of my clients also went to visit M. Blot and very kindly transported to me another bottle of his wonderful late-harvest Montlouis (chenin blanc) Cuvée des Loups 2003, which I am hoarding for a special occasion. It should keep nicely.

I do believe that it snowed every single day we were in the Valley and Poitou, which is highly unusual in their moderate climate. Here's a picture of the magnificent, river-straddling Chateau de Chenonceau, which I rechristened as ChenonSnow.

And that brings me back to the sad news I have just discovered. I wrote to Anne and Eric this week to inquire about a guest room for my client. Eric wrote me back and said that Anne had died two years ago of cancer, at only 50 years old. She was such a lively, warm person who clearly gave as much pleasure to her guests as they got from her. I am sure she had brought light to the many lives she touched, both in her own family and community as well as through her B & B business. Eric said he has recently started taking guests again (but not having dinners for them), and believes that is what Anne would have wanted.

I know he is right.

New Orleans Two-Fer

2009-05-04T16:42:00.012-05:00

We're between May trips to the Crescent City. Last weekend we headed down to relax with friends and attend Jazz Fest. We were chatting about our Fest experiences over the years, 'cause I've been a regular since about 1982. (I think I went once as a teenager with my mother before that.) I remember in college it always fell at precisely the same moment as final exams and due dates for major papers. Yet somehow I always managed to get there for a day, at least. Granted, when I lived in NOLA it was a tad easier to get there, though wrangling that day off work was a challenge sometimes. I've missed it twice: in 1987, when I was living in Europe, and 2008. That year we returned from Istanbul on the first weekend of Fest and my husband could not disappear from work again so soon for us to catch the second weekend...

So this year we went on the second Friday with our friend Anne and saw The Chilluns, Beausoleil , The Revealers, The Iguanas, Doc Watson, Dirty Dozen & Rebirth Brass Bands, Pinettes (all-girl!) Brass Band, John Scofield and the Piety Street Band, Bonnie Raitt, 101 Runners, and interviews with members of the Fi Yi Yi Mardi Gras Indians and also with Chris Owens (one of my old hat customers).

The other main activity of Jazz fest is EATING. This year we ate crabcakes, crawfish sacks, crawfish etouffée, banana bread pudding, and a most refreshing mango freeze when we were burning up in the sun. Also had a caffeine-laden 24oz frozen café au lait later in the day when again, we were feeling a bit piqued from the heat and humidity. The upside is that it didn't rain.

The third thing on a Jazz fest agenda is crafts. There are multiple crafts areas featuring all kinds of artists and artisans. I have two favorites: Robbiewear leather pouches and bags and Diane Harty hats. Thomas Mann was there the first weekend and we were there for the second, so we made what is now a habitual pilgrimage to his gallery on Magazine St.

One cannot fail to run into people one knows, or people one hasn't seen in ages, at Jazz Fest. This year we (deliberately) met up with a few and then ran into a bunch more as we were leaving.

I said we were between trips to New Orleans, didn't I? The next one is another annual event for us and a lot of other folks, the New Orleans Wine and Food Experience. This year's festivities look as enticing as the ones I mentioned last year, so we are certainly looking forward to the extended "weekend" of indulgence. This year's events will be May 19th to 23rd. Famous chefs, endless delicious food, noted winemakers, hundreds and hundreds of wines, seminars, dinners, on and on...NOWFE has matured into one of the premier wine and food events in the country, if not the world; and like I wrote last year: New Orleans...Wine...Food...Enough said!

Though we flew last weekend, thanks to some great fares on Southwest, we'll be driving to NOWFE. Why? Because we need to bring home a chest full of fresh Gulf seafood from the seafood market in Westwego! Last year we brought home flounder, lump crabmeat, huge shrimp (at $3.25/lb), and crawfish tail meat. We ate like the king and queen for the next ten days, at pauper prices. Mmmmmm, I will have to think about what to cook! Crabmeat stuffed rolled flounder...crab and yellow tomato salad...crawfish pie...shrimp creole...gumbo...good old boiled shrimp...or maybe some of that shrimp will go into a recipe from my new Indian cookbook...

Long time, no blog...DC!

2009-05-04T13:25:00.009-05:00

This spring we dashed off to DC to visit some friends (who are also clients) during the National Cherry Blossom Festival. As always, there's a longer list of places we'd like to visit than time allows, but this year we managed to hit a few choice spots.

National Museum of Women in the Arts--great photography exhibits, the best of which was by Louise Dahl-Wolfe. She was one of the main fashion photographers used by Harper's Bazaar from the 1930's through 1950's. She took fashion photography out into the world, shooting at exotic locales and using the shapes, light and textures of the settings as inseparable parts of the fashion image, and these backdrops took on a new importance n because of their visual or symbolic relationship with the fashion being presented. Also saw an exhibit of Mary McFadden designs, alongside some of her own textile and jewelry collection. Some of the pieces are thousands of years old and when the items are viewed with her clothes, you can clearly see the dialogue of inspiration.

Renwick Gallery--This one's near the White House and is part of the Smithsonian. It houses American art and often has a particular focus on American craft, decorative arts and design. This spring we saw a beautiful exhibit about Greene & Greene, the architects who designed the arts and crafts jewel known as the Gamble House, in Pasadena CA. The details are just amazing, and they often worked with furniture craftspeople to create pieces for the interiors of their structures. The resulting harmonious effect is something to behold. We also caught a recital of the Washington national Opera's Young Artists in Residence. They performed excerpts from American operas in various solos and ensembles. All were excellent, and the head of the WNO and the program, Placido Domingo, was there. We got to hear him speak, but not sing!

Library of Congress--one of the grandest and most beautiful buildings in DC, and the things it contains are precious to our culture and intellectual life. Take the docent-guided tour.

Smithsonian American Art Gallery & National Portrait Gallery--great WPA exhibit at the former and thought-provoking portraiture at the other. I'm sure the WPA exhibit was curated at least a year ago, but seeing it during these troubled economic times makes me wonder if the government "stimulating" some public art might be a good idea again...

Freer Gallery--Asian art, along with Whistler's art inspired by Asia. The Peacock Room is jaw-droppingly elaborate, worth a stop in itself.

Our government in action--We waited in a very loooooong line at the Supreme Court, in a cold and blistering March wind, only to find that there were no more places available for the full argument and we could only go sit in the three-minute seats. I've seen a full argument and it's fascinating, but Bill and Marla had not seen it at all; for them, three minutes was better than nothing!

We also went to a Congressional hearing, a House hearing on Afghanistan and Pakistan (Understanding and Engaging Regional Actors). You would think that with Pakistan in its current highly unstable state, nukes, Taliban in the Swat Valley...and with Afghanistan boiling up again...that the hearing would have been informative and interesting. Alas, it was rather dull! Oh, well!

Lastly, the the new Capitol Visitor Center is very nice but the standard tour is pretty short and not that sweet. I'd recommend arranging your tour through your congressperson's office several months prior to your trip. They are more personalized and more interesting.

Folger Shakespeare Library--nifty exhibit of books and writings on sleep and dreams. Beliefs in Elizabethan times were quite interesting, given what we know now about the subject. Recreated Globe Theatre inside is way cool. Would love to see a performance there...

Cherry Blossom time--we strolled all around the Tidal basin and finally took in the beauty of the annual bloom of these non-fruit-bearing ornamental cherry trees. There is usually various festival entertainment in front of the Jefferson Memorial, but technical difficulties reduced our entertainment to people-watching. The blossoms are as beautiful in person--more so--than in photos. I've got one on my desktop screen now, to keep the lovely memory fresh.

Yes, that is me with Rick Steves

2008-12-23T20:57:00.008-06:00

Last month I attended a talk by Rick Steves and got to meet him afterwards. He has some unusual opinions but an open mind, both of which probably contribute to his enjoyment of travel. I'll bet he loves that Mark Twain quote I posted a couple of days ago! As you probably know, he's built himself into quite the one-man (not really, I think he has at least 50 employees by now) travel industry. My ambitions are not quite that expansive but it's always good to grow, isn't it? Onward and upward with the Mon Voyage "brand", then.

Mark Twain et Moi

2008-12-19T14:42:00.011-06:00

Mark Twain and I share a birthday (along with David Mamet, Dick Clark and Winston Churchill, G. Gordon Liddy, Shirley Chisholm, Abbie Hoffman and Jonathan Swift, to name a few). I was recently reminded of a favorite quote from Twain, which I wear emblazoned on a T-shirt featuring a map on the front and these sage words on the back:

"Travel is fatal to bigotry, prejudice, and narrow-mindedness"

The t-shirt stops there, but the entire quote reads as follows:

"Travel is fatal to bigotry, prejudice, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime."

Truer words could not be said.

That latter sentence actually reminds me that Roman Catholic social teaching tells us that we have a moral obligation to participate in public life, i.e. to be active members of our civic community, to the extent that we are able. This might range from voting to volunteering, and from lobbying those who are in public office to running to serve as elected officials ourselves. It all boils down to loving our neighbors. If we seal ourselves off from our community or from fellow human beings, both nearby and far away, it's almost impossible to put that commandment into action.

That's a good New Year's resolution: not to vegetate in one's own little corner of the earth (or the town), and to try and develop broad, wholesome charitable views of our fellow man.

Road Trip!??

2008-12-13T15:03:00.004-06:00

It's looking like we'll hop in the car and drive about 250 miles to be with a favorite cousin for Christmas. I thought this would be the perfect excuse to share a peek into what makes a road trip more tolerable for me.

If I'm already on a vacation and driving between various destinations is part of the plan, that's one thing. Say, for example, driving Route 66, or hitting several national parks and monuments in one week-long or ten-day stretch. Or spending a week and a half snaking up the unforgettable California coast with several days of winery visits interspersed. On those occasions the scenery makes it more enjoyable, without a doubt. But I'm not the kind of gal who wants to take off on a three-week road trip to the west coast...let me fly out there and THEN we can drive. (Of course, my own lack of enthusiasm for such does not prevent me from designing a humdinger of a road trip for a client.)

So, anyway, we're talking a four and a half hour trip, really not bad in the scheme of things. What are the things that go with us inside the cabin of our auto?

First, a supply of snacks: I need something sweet and something savory. That usually means box of crackers, a couple of granola bars, a bag of roasted cashews, a bag of dried pineapple. We also carry a loaf of some kind of hearty bread. If I'm feeling like a real adult I might take a couple of bananas, too.

Beverages: I wish I could say that wine makes a great road trip sipper, but, alas, that is not legal in most states, and besides, it would make me too sleepy. Instead we'll take a Thermos of strong, hot coffee (decaf, doctor's orders), a few diet Dr. Peppers and some juice boxes. That Thermos full of coffee is not sweetened because darling hubby likes it bitter, so this means that I also carry some sugar packets or a baggie with cubes, plus a spoon, so I can doctor mine.

Music: I must have a supply of music, whether that be on my iPod or in a thick folder of CDs. Nothing too quiet for me on a road trip, as the music is meant to help keep me alert. Our musical tastes run far and wide, so I've got to pack a little bit of everything because I never know what kind of musical mood I might be in from one hour to the next. And you've gotta have music that both driver and passenger(s) can live with. It'll just make people cranky to have to sit through an hour of music they hate when they are cooped up in a car all day long.

Comfort: Gotta wear shoes that slip off and on. And a sweater in case my husband wants more A.C. (or less heat) than I do. Speaking of which, I really should get my car heater fixed at some point...it just doesn't get that cold where I live, so I keep putting it off. Say, the next two or three people who hire me to plan a trip can consider themselves my heater saviors.

Maps: Being a travel geek, I love me some maps. So the car will always contain every map we might need along the way and then some. I've never used a GPS because I dig the folding and unfolding of the paper (ok, maybe more the unfolding than the refolding) and being able to see the big picture of what lies ahead.

It doesn't hurt to make a list of the things you'll need, and then to position those things in the car so that they are easily accessible to the driver and/or navigator.

Have a great trip this holiday season, get there safely, enjoy the company, and hurry home only if necessary!

Mumbai Madness

2008-11-28T11:38:00.008-06:00

In the past two days, terrorists have made a ten-point coordinated attack on significant landmarks in Mumbai, Maharashtra, India. Estimates at this hour indicate that upwards of 160 people have been killed and several hundred wounded. I'm not going to post news here, as you can get that at http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com

Usually I visit The Times of India for a snapshot of a country I very much want to visit and to check out Hindi film reviews at both incarnations of the entertainment section, each with their own staffs, the Times of India AND IndiaTimes.com . This week it's been invaluable as a source of information in the crisis, with regular updates from the field.

But this age of instant news has presented a problem: conflicting information. In one article I have read about the attackers NOT knowing their way around the Taj Hotel. Yet in another posted at a similar hour, I read that it was believed that the terrorists had studied the plans of the hotel and prepared well to have more than just a working knowledge of the ins and outs of the hotel's floor plan. One article might say that a target has been cleared of terrorists, and then another moments later saying that there have been more flashes or explosions. Not to mention the conflicting reports of any background info on the terrorists themselves or their connections to other groups. The mere volume and rate of the information stream is bound to lead to new insights as well as problematic inaccuracies. One can only hope that in the coming days a clearer picture will be drawn of the terrorists, their plan of action, their motives, and more importantly, how the Indian government can better protect its citizens (and visitors).
I am not dissuaded from my strong desire to travel to India, including some days in Mumbai, but the attack does render me doubtful as to whether I might choose to stay in hotels widely known to cater to Americans. I typically choose other accommodations anyway, wanting to have a less sanitized experience, so I suppose it just reinforces my existing instincts.

I haven't let terror scare me away from London and Istanbul, and these attackers have not scared me away from Mumbai.

Someday I will go...and when I am in front of the Taj Hotel or the Gateway of India or the Victoria Terminus I will think of those who lost their lives to this insanity.

That Italy trip: fantastico, but...

2008-11-22T22:07:00.005-06:00

The folks I mentioned in the previous post had a great trip to Tuscany and Rome. They spent a few days at a top Florence hotel and from there took a docent-led walking tour of ancient Florence one day and on another they enjoyed a full-day wine tour accompanied by two certified sommeliers. They had a special lunch at a biodynamic goat cheese farm along with an array of Tuscan wines, as an introduction. Then they went to some of the finest chianti classico wineries for extensive private tastings. After their brief stay in Florence, they stayed at a huge organic farm estate with a castle. On the property the staff and interns raise heirloom produce and animals, cured meats are made, art and lifestyle workshops are held...what a special experience is available to guests there! From the estate they visited Siena and also took another wine tour, this one highlighting the famous Super Tuscans as well as some of the amazing wines coming from the Tuscan coast, believe it or not. Finally, they went to Rome, where in addition to all the usual Roman delights, they took docent-guided tours of ancient Rome and the Vatican. Every day I wished I was with them, especially for the wine tours!!
The only day I might have passed on was their day of arrival...I found out a few days before their departure that there was going to be a nationwide transportation strike. Yikes! But hey, this is Europe, and labor strikes are part of life, just like those four weeks of average vacation they get. I prepared the travelers as best I could with back-up plans on how to get where they needed to go, and advised them to pack a suitcase full of patience. When you are traveling and faced with a situation you can't control, but which does have a foreseeable conclusion and does not physically threaten you, sometimes it's best to just take a deep breath and have a cocktail or glass of wine if you can find one! I myself can get too stressed out if things do not appear to be unfolding as planned when I travel, so I probably need to heed my own advice more often. But I am usually armed with information and can find a way to remedy any problem that may arise, and that is what I try to do for my clients. I say this all the time when I'm researching health issues, but KNOWLEDGE IS POWER. That applies to travel, too.

La Bella Italia

2008-09-10T12:53:00.006-05:00

It's another one of those trips I'd like to be on myself...I could use an Italian food infusion, that is, an Italian food infusion IN Italy. I am sending clients to Florence, Sorrento and Rome next month and I am really excited about the way things are shaping up. The hotels that I've proposed are all so appealing I'd have a hard time deciding myself which ones to choose. OK, maybe not that hard because I do definitely have my own opinions. But I don't let my personal preferences crowd out those of a client.

I tell the truth--why I'd choose one place over another--but without the expectation that another individual would come to the same conclusion. People have different priorities when it comes to all aspects of travel; in selection of accommodation, you must weigh the price as well as what's on the inside (cleanliness, decor, service, square footage, bathroom, hipness, etc) and what's on the outside (a quiet neighborhood vs. lively one, safety, convenience to transportation and attractions, etc). And then you want to avoid things like, oh, ripoffs, overcharges, lost reservations bedbugs, rude staff, rodents...all the usual (and unusual) horror stories that will crush any potential for repeat business. With so many variables and factors to consider for any trip, I try to present a handful of options in each case that are selected based on exhaustive research and client preferences I have learned from the Mon Voyage Travel Style Questionnaire and conversations with clients. Fortunately, I seem to be doing just fine in pairing people with plans.

Soon I should know what choices this client prefers in terms of lodgings...can't wait to find out. Then I'll make arrangements for some guided walking tours, a wine tasting day trip in Tuscany, secure a rental car, find some great restaurants and lesser-known museums that suit them, make their driving maps and travel packet...soon I can have another vicarious travel experience...

Everyone always asks where we'll be traveling next and I have to say I honestly do not know!!! The list is endless but the pocketbook is not bottomless.

"Unforgettable" trip to India, er, Houston

2008-08-06T10:57:00.027-05:00

I am a real aficionado of Hindi films, along with the music that enhances them. Half the music on my iPod is probably Indian tracks, and I own 50+ Indian films on DVD. I call myself the Texas Bollywood Evangelist (even though Bollywood only refers to Mumbai-industry, Hindi-language films, or no more than a quarter of the films that are made in India). I've even given talks at my local school as well as a community college to help enlighten and expose other people to the fascinating world of Indian film.

My dream trip is to spend a couple of months in India, soaking up the culture, sights and sounds of the subcontinent. But since that's not in the stars right now, I decided that the stars and India would just have to come to me. Only they could not get closer than 250 miles away.

Last weekend we drove to Houston to see The Unforgettable Tour, a three and a half hour Indian movie and music stage extravaganza headlined by some of the biggest movie stars in India. Make that the world, since India has practically a billion people watching movies, plus all the diaspora Indians living around the world. I was so excited about it that I got an awesome new salwar-kameez suit and dupatta for the occasion at one of our local Indian shops (such affordable prices!).

So who was in this show?

Amitabh Bachchan, the most celebrated Indian actor in the world...

Madhuri Dixit, uncontestedly the best dancer and one of the best actresses of Indian cinema...

Abhishek Bachchan, son of Amitabh and a good actor himself; with his wife, actress Aishwarya Rai, called the most beautiful woman in the world and a fine dancer also...

Preity Zinta, dimpled popular actress and star of many hit movies geared to the NRI (non-resident Indian, i.e. those of Indian origin or background living abroad) audience...

Riteish Deshmukh, a younger actor (and son of prominent politician) who excels at comedic roles...

Music director duo Vishal and Shekhar, creators of the infectious music for the film Om Shanti Om and many other hits

And not to be forgotten, Choreographer Shiamak Davan and his troupe of energetic, graceful dancers did an amazing job and were really the basis for a great show!

The stars tried to invite me up onto the stage to dance with them, but they could not reach me in the top of the arena in the cheaper seats...

Besides all the spectacular dancing, I enjoyed Amitabh's recitation of some of his famous dialogues even though I don't speak a word of Hindi--that's how good an actor he is. (He did summarize in English before speaking in Hindi.) He also recited of one of his poet father's famous works, Agneepath. If I can find a good English translation I'll post it.

The far-away pictures were taken by me, and the extreme closeups are provided by the production company WizCraft. Whoever designed the staging and sets, lighting, etc, also achieved a beautiful result. Here is a video of one of the undisputed high points, when Madhuri and Aishwarya danced together on the song "Dola Re Dola" from the movie Devdas.

Also attended the press conference with the stars. The "press" consisted of mostly entertainment or popular Desi media, even a couple of starstruck types, and only a few serious journos (like my husband) who wanted a deeper, more intellectually sophisticated story; and the whole lot of them were treated...not so accommodatingly...by the producers and organizers.

***

There's another world tour in the works, "Temptations Reloaded" starring Shah Rukh Khan, the "King of Bollywood". I'd love to see that one as well if they manage to get to Texas. Maybe a Dallas promoter will be able to afford it since the "Unforgettables" went to Houston...it's only fair, right? Barring that, a promoter in Atlanta is hinting at it, and I could stay at my sister's house...

I have to paste this amusing article that appeared at the time of SRK's new tour "kickoff" in Rotterdam...I have to say that show was obviously timed to take attention away from the Bachchans' tour, because there are only two other "Temptations" dates announced...anyway, here's the article from IANS, which conveys the fun of Bollywood:

Rotterdam, June 22 (IANS) Screaming fans from across Europe showered flowers, notes and trinkets as Bollywood superstar Shah Rukh Khan performed at Ahoy, Rotterdam's large cultural and sports complex, to launch the world premiere of Temptations Reloaded, a live song and dance show that saw a number of Indian stars descend on the city Saturday night.

Shah Rukh performed on stage with Bollywood favourites like Arjun Rampal, Katrina Kaif and Kareena Kapoor in an auditorium with a capacity of 25,000 before a mixed audience of Asians and Europeans.

In between the two-and-half-hour long show, Shah Rukh and Arjun Rampal drove through the aisles of the auditorium in light vehicles and the venue echoed with the adoring screams of fans, some of whom showered them with trinkets, flowers and notes.

Some European fans were dressed in Indian clothes and referred to the Bollywood superstar as the 'Saudagar of Sunshine'. And Dutch fans preferred to watch Shah Rukh instead of the Euro 2008 football champion semi-finals between Holland and Russia played around the same time.

In a continent starved of warmth for most parts of the year, King Khan is called 'sunshine' by his fans here.

Ignoring weather forecasts that had predicted clouds and rainfall, fans travelled from all over Europe to witness the live performance.

With stars in their eyes, cine buffs arrived here under clear blue skies to watch the midsummer night performance and to sigh that the mere presence of Shah Rukh Khan makes clouds part.

'Shah Rukh Khan is our sunshine! When he is close to us, the worst day becomes bright. He fills my life with light and warmth,' an Indian female fan said rubbishing weather forecasts.

'Bollywood makes you happy' is the slogan for marketing popular Indian cinema in Europe, suggestive of the fact that Hindi movies create a state of emotional well-being that goes far beyond mere entertainment.

This is the reason for a dramatic increase in Bollywood fan communities on this continent whose activities revolve mostly around Shah Rukh Khan and his work.

'Bollywood makes European audiences happy because the films are like life seen in dreams,' Segolene Roudot, a French fan who is researching fans of Indian cinema in France, told IANS.

Colours, costumes, music, dance and Shah Rukh's charismatic screen presence have brought much joy into many lives here.

An online Swiss fan forum has a special web page filled with thank you notes to Shah Rukh for coming to Europe. The notes thank the superstar for the colour that he brings into lives and for being the light for fans in the dark.

'Such feelings become stronger at the possibility of a meeting with Shah Rukh Khan. The desire is to touch him in an attempt to experience some more of the joy and happiness that he radiates,' Elke Mader, a professor of Vienna University who monitors the behaviour of non-South Asian fans of Shah Rukh Khan for Bollyglobal, a research project, told IANS.

Mader gives the example of Christina Zuck, a Berlin-based artist who has publicly confessed that her life was magically transformed after she touched Shah Rukh at the Berlin Film Fesival of 'Om Shanti Om' earlier this year.

'The experience of fans like Christina goes beyond admiring Shah Rukh Khan as a movie star. Shah Rukh is seen much more than just an entertainer here. He is happiness and love personified. Fans want to touch him and to talk to him because he is able to transfer a lot of joy to those who are lucky enough to cross his path,' Mader said

Hosted by Netherland's Sekier Entertainment Service, the next European stop of Temptations Reloaded, a sequel to the 'Temptations' tour Shah Rukh started in 2004, is Berlin.

Founded in 1999 by Ishaq Sekier, a Dutchman originally from an Indian family from Surinam, with an evening of songs by Manna Dey, the entertainment service has since sponsored Sonu Nigam, Udit Narayan, Alka Yagnik, Sunidhi Chauhan, Shaan, Shreya Ghosal, Kavita Krishnamurti, KK and Jagjit Singh here.

'We would like to see Bollywood activities increase around continental Europe,' Monique Dabloe, a Sekier staff member, told IANS.

Domestic and intergalactic travel roundup...

2008-06-26T22:04:00.011-05:00

My RV client family leaves next weekend for the big Black Hills extravaganza. They'll be in a 31 foot class C rig with one slide (I sound like an old hand now, don't I?) as they make their way to Mount Rushmore, Badlands National Park, Devil's Tower, and finally Rocky Mountain National Park...and all kinds of spots in between. They'll park overnight at a variety of campgrounds, from official National Parks sites to family-owned spreads in the hills. Their Devil's Tower campsite even shows "Close Encounters of the Third Kind" every night. How cool is that? Devil's Tower on the movie screen with the actual thing looming right in front of you? I wonder if they get any special visitors out there...their RV is kind of big and flattish with a million lights...and it's like a giant synthesizer...

I've been to quite a few National Parks and Monuments but never to these, so naturally I want to visit these places myself now that I've put in the research time. It's just par for the course in this business, I reckon; I can't help traveling vicariously through my clients and in the end their trips just serve to lengthen my own to-go list.

Next up is a Paris-Brussels-London family jaunt with a side trip to Normandy...I've got these folks booked into all their top accommodations choices in areas I love, so I am particularly worked up about preparing this trip. We are on the same wavelength about most aspects of the trip, so it's almost like planning my own vacation. And we know how expert I am at THAT!

My own plans are rather tame for the near future, at least in terms of distance to be traveled: first up, a road trip to Houston to see a star-studded live Bollywood extravaganza. (Actually the first "journey" will be a root canal--I will SO need to have a dose of Bollywood after the dental horror.) Then my sister will apparently be getting married sometime in the next couple of months, so it looks like I'll be using that airline certificate I bought in the charity auction to fly to exciting Atlanta--oops, I mean HOT-LANTA.

Other than that, my DH and I hope to venture up to Washington, DC, before the end of the year to visit with several of his former colleagues, who for some reason have all independently moved there as though drawn by some...humongous pied piper spaceship playing a five-note tune. We look forward to witnessing some sort of gripping congressional hearing and/or a Supreme Court argument while in our nation's capital.

Seriously. I mean it.

It has a name: jilbab.

2008-06-11T22:11:00.008-05:00

If you have read the previous Istanbul posts, you know I have been pining for one of those "Islamic style" long coats I saw on so many women in Turkey. Well, now I now the name of that obscure object of desire: a jilbab. The term is actually one of several used somewhat interchangeably to describe Islamic women's outer garments.

Apparently the most attractive and highest quality jilbab(s?) come from...Turkey. No wonder I thought some of those sistahs looked fabulous, with their color coordinated scarves, clothes, jilbabs made of every fabric under the sun, from denim to shiny. Just 'cause they were covered didn't stop them from being fashionable. I even saw some women in the totally baggy black abayas that were trimmed with rhinestones (and a big honkin' sparkly buckle) or jet beading.

I also saw some younger women that were wearing funky dresses over jeans...I know this had gotten to be a trend in the northwestern US as of late, but I can't help wondering if it started over here as another, semi-rebellious, youthful way to cover up...it seems perfectly natural to see it in Istanbul, but goofy in Seattle or Dallas.

I still want one of those coats. A denim one.

And now maybe I can find one online, since I can't dash back to Turkey for it...

http://picasaweb.google.com/bailey80/ISLAMICCLOTHING/photo#5083150637811934514

(too large for me but it's a start)

17th Annual New Orleans Wine and Food Experience

2008-05-29T18:34:00.008-05:00

Now that I've more or less finished my Istanbul posts, I need to jump back to the US and give a shout out to the New Orleans Wine and Food Experience! It's held every year around Memorial Day weekend and a fantastic way to enjoy one of my favorite cities (and my hometown, in essence). I could go the shorthand route: New Orleans...Wine...Food...enough said!!!

But seriously, it's five days of indulgence in one of the epicurean capitals of the western hemisphere. What's not to like?

75 Chefs
175 Wineries
5 Days
1000 Wines

Are you getting the vapors just thinking about it?

Tuesday: Premium Fine Wine Dinner with celebrity Louisiana chef.

Wednesday: Start off with a bang, or a pop! Vintner dinners are held at scores of the city's top restaurants. Many courses, many wines.

Thursday: Vinola premium Tasting and Auction...taste the super-duper wines, the secret reserves, the stuff that you can barely get your hands on, and bid on coveted collectible wines and exclusive (that means really cool) wine or food-related auction packages. After that...Royal Street Stroll...cocktail hour(s) winding your way in and out of the superb galleries and shops of Royal Street, inside which you will discover not only appealing art but wineries pouring their latest offerings...and of course, delicious food along the way.

Friday: Seminars all day long, some serious, some lighter, covering all aspects of food and wine...probably the only time I will ever get to even taste a $500 wine...followed by the first of the Grand Tastings, an evening where you can barely make a dent in the 50 or 60 restaurants serving scrumptious yummies to at least 150 wineries, each of whom is presenting several wines. I feel decadent and satisfied just thinking about what I consumed in those short three hours (and I was not even tipsy, in case you are wondering!)

Saturday: more seminars till lunchtime, and then when it's time to eat it's off to Grand Tasting, Round Two, this time with different restaurants.

Yes, it costs money but it goes to good causes. You can pick and choose your event(s) or buy the whole schmeer if you figure you can keep up. I promise you, it's a tough row to hoe to really accomplish and attend everything you might have on that list. NOWFE makes generous donations to New Orleans and Louisiana charities from culinary scholarships to helping firemen rebuild their homes post-Katrina. There are about 250 volunteers who really make the whole Experience complete!

If you enjoy New Orleans, if you are an oenophile even in the most casual sense, if you appreciate fine cuisine...mark your calendar for May 19-23, 2009. And if you can't wait that long, try Tales of the Cocktail, July 16-20, 2008.

Our corner of Istanbul

2008-05-29T10:53:00.023-05:00

When we stay for a week or more in one place, or want a "base camp" for day excursions, we look towards apartment rental rather than hotels. Holiday lettings are usually the same price as a moderate hotel or even less, and we like to have the convenience of spreading out in our own temporary space. If you're traveling with a few other people or your family, a flat or cottage that sleeps all of you is almost always less than multiple hotel rooms. People think of taking a villa for a week when they travel to more rural locales, but why not a flat in the city? Besides having the extra square footage--and a kitchen if you are inclined to cook local produce for yourself, linger over coffee in the morning, or at least keep snacks and drinks handy--staying in a flat is the best way to get to see native life close-up. You'll walk the same paths to the tram as the locals, you'll shop where they shop, get bread at the neighborhood bakery...a much more intense experience of the sense of place than you can sometimes get from a hotel. If you need room service or a concierge, a rental is probably not for you; but if you are more independent, give it a try sometime. Over the years I have developed some great resources and have always been satisfied with the places we've rented, and have researched the various neighborhoods' characteristics in advance (which allows us to choose wisely).

In Istanbul we chose the other side of the Golden Horn--lively Beyoglu. It's more modern (that term being relative, in that modern means sometime after the 13th c.) and definitely more European in feel. Some of the early settlers were Roman Catholic Genovese traders, who were trying to steer clear of the Eastern Orthodox church. (They're responsible for the tower that dominates that peninsula.) After the Ottoman conquest, Beyoglu became the home of European ambassadors and such, and the merchants with foreign roots wanted to be near their embassies, so this "side across" became quite prosperous and genteel. Later, other non-Muslim groups drifted over from the older Istanbul as well--Greeks, Armenians, and Jews all made their homes here in the 18th and 19th centuries. As a result, Beyoglu looks and feels very European; there were many times I felt I could just as easily have been walking around Paris (but with hills). Buskers and street vendors abound (you're never far from a simit or roasted chestnuts).

Our apartment was along the back side of the Galatasaray Lisesi (high school), whose elaborate gates dominate the peak of Istiklal Caddesi, the 24/7 throbbing main artery of Beyoglu that runs from the charming Galata end up to bustling Taksim.

Istiklal and its side streets are lined with first floor shops, cafes, restaurants, banks, etc; in short, everything you would need; and on the upper floors are flats (or in some cases, on Istiklal itself, probably offices). In the narrow streets behind the Çiçek Pasaji you will find a small market with fresh seafood, meat, spice and produce stalls lining the way. We shopped here for dinners sometimes. I chose this neighborhood--as opposed to the area closer to some of the major historic and tourist attractions--because it would have good options for dining and we'd be close to home in the evening. It's very easy to hop the Tünel and Tramway to get to those places, as well as to the various ferry docks, or even to walk across the Galata bridge with its hundreds of fisherfolk.

At the Galata end you'll find a street full of music shops (Galip Dede) and another lined with electrical shops. This kind of organizations makes an urban dweller's life easy: you need a lamp, you go to that street; you need a faucet, you go to the street with all the plumbing supply shops. You want antiques or second-hand furniture and chatchkes, you go to Cukurcuma behind the Galatasaray Lisesi.

Attractions on this side include the Pera Museum and the Mevlevi Lodge, where, on the right day, you may be able to get into see the dervishes do their thing--and this is the only REAL dervish session in Istanbul, the others are not really religious in nature. There's also a small and informative Jewish Museum near the Karaköy end of the Tünel.

I'm posting some "street life" pictures today, like the cobblestone repairmen in front of our building...and this fellow at the Hippodrome with his scale. I saw another man with a scale in Galip Dede St. and then this second one across the Golden Horn. Maybe lots of folks don't have scales at home? Seemingly there is some market, no matter how small, for people to pay a few pennies to weigh themselves??? Anyway, I had to take a picture of this scale man because he was so friendly. I was at quite a distance, using a 10x zoom lens on my digicam and he still figured out I was shooting him...unless he was waving at someone else!? Fortunately I could be more circumspect when I captured the street workers resetting the cobblestones of Turnaçibasi Sokak.

Istanbul's Big Three, and then some...

2008-05-28T19:50:00.023-05:00

Finally, I'm back and have some catching up to do! I was reminded this week that I haven't even mentioned (or at best have done ONLY that) several of the landmark sights of Istanbul: Hagia Sofia, the Blue (Sultanahmnet) Mosque, and Topkapi Palace.

I'll start with Topkapi Palace because it alone can easily occupy you for the entire day. The palace is constructed around several parklike courtyards which were lined with peonies in one case (the last courtyard) and tulips in another (the second), and large trees gracefully shade the crisscrossing walkways of the grounds. The harem quarters require a separate entrance fee, well worth it.

Touring the harem gives you an inkling of court life under the Ottoman sultans--it's really more like the private quarters of the family: different areas were reserved for different members of the household. This could include housing for the eunuchs, the sultan's mother's apartment, the sultan's own rooms; and quarters for the women of his harem, assigned according to rank. He was allowed four wives PLUS four "favorites" chosen from the hundreds of female house servants or slaves, and only with those designated wives or favorites was he involved sexually. Indeed the "harem" consisted of all those women mentioned, but as you can see, relatively few of these concubines were anything but domestic slaves. The decor and detail of these rooms--especially those of the sultan (pic) and his mother--are pretty incredible. There are intricately painted tiles and stained glass to match, often with the ubiquitous tulip motif.

The kitchen display is a sight to see if you like cooking. When you see the sizes of the pots involved you realize why the kitchen staff had to be huge, the kitchen had to be huge, everything here (like much of the palace) is over-the-top. If you want to see a kitchen like the sultan's in action, I recommend the Hindi film "Jodhaa Akbar" (2008). The emperor Akbar's new wife Jodhaa decides to cook a feast herself (!) and you get a short but great display of all those gigantic vessels being put to use, and the film is set in a similar era and depicts the life of a Muslim ruler.

Other rooms at the palace house some of the sultan's clothing (my favorite being the fur-lined caftans) as well as the incredible jeweled objects displayed in the treasury, from swords to headgear to an 86-carat diamond to thrones. Lots of sparkling goodies.
My other favorite splendor of Topkapi was the Hall of Holy Relics. I don't know how the sultans came to possess these relics but it is surely an indication of the breadth of the Ottoman conquest in Europe and especially the Middle East. From their previous homes in places like Mecca, Medina, and Egypt some of the most important religious relics in the Muslim (and Judeo-Christian) world were brought to the sultan's compound in Istanbul. in those days only the family and very special guests got to see them; today we are all so lucky. Among them: the staff with which Moses' parted the Red Sea; a cooking pot of Abraham; David's sword; John the Baptist's arm and a piece of his skull; Muhammed's sandals and many other of his personal effects, plus a lock of his beard, I think. The atmosphere in these rooms is very sacred and it is obvious that many of the Muslim visitors were praying as they made their way through. The fact that there is a quiet background constant of an imam reciting Koran verses adds to the effect, and this is done 24 hours a day (you can see him near the end of this section of the palace).

Once you make your way to the fourth courtyard, you'll have commanding views of the Golden Horn and the Bosphorus, a lovely spot for a little sit-down, because by the time you get back there you'll surely be tired! If your feet and back are still in good shape, stroll through the nearby Gülhane Park, full of shade and tulips in the springtime. If you're exhausted, go to the park and stretch out on the grass!

The other two biggies, which you should save for another day, are Hagia Sofia and the Blue Mosque. We visited those in succession and could have also added the Museum of Turkish and Islamic Arts as well, but visited it on a different day. Just off the tram stop there is the ancient Hippodrome, now a small park with the remaining ruins--a lovely and lively spot for a picnic lunch.

Across the street you will enter the Blue (Sultanahment) Mosque complex. It's chock full of people just about all the time. Along one wall are small fountains and spigots for the Muslim men to perform their ablutions (a bit of ritual washing off) before entering. Of course, like visiting any mosque, shoes must be removed and it would be appropriate for women to have their shoulders and head covered, as well as skirt or pants that end below the knee. Once you're inside, you'll get a neck-ache marveling at the painted dome and really nifty, low-hanging chandeliers.

When you exit the mosque complex, head across another park to Hagia Sofia. This is the granddaddy of European domes, being the first example of such a thing--a giant central dome supported by pillars. Although it partially failed on several occasions and had to be restructured somewhat, it was the largest dome in Europe until Brunelleschi built the Duomo in Florence almost a thousand years later. This Byzantine architectural jewel and landmark inspires architects still today.

It began as a church or basilica -being the seat of the Eastern Christian Church in the 500's, the "Vatican of the East". And what a showpiece it was! People came from far and wide to see its fine marble work and especially the stunning mosaics which graced it for a thousand years. Unfortunately, three days after the Ottoman conquest of Istanbul, it was turned into a mosque; and because Islam does not permit depictions of humans, over those centuries it was used as a mosque, the mosaics were plastered over. A few have survived, and now that Hagia Sofia does not function in any religious way, only as a museum, there are small areas where you can see some of the recovered and salvaged mosaics.

The last thing I might add to this day is the nearby Museum of Turkish and Islamic Arts, where you can see fine examples of Ottoman calligraphy, plus loads of antique Turkish and Persian carpets, among other things.
It's housed in another former palace with a leafy courtyard.

Next time, I'll acquaint you with our little corner of Istanbul, the Galatasaray section of Beyoglu, our home from home for those nine days.

Dept. of You Learn Something New Every Day

2008-05-14T22:39:00.003-05:00

I am currently working on the first RV trip I have ever been asked to coordinate. Thus I am learning all about the fascinating and complicated world of RV rental...RV driving...and RV camping. (Thank goodness one of my favorite clients used to sell RVs and helped me out with the basic lingo!) They have a wonderful plan to go to some National Parks and Monuments in the Great Plains states. It will likely include Mount Rushmore, Custer State Park, Devil's Tower, Wind Cave NP, Little Big Horn, Wounded Knee, Deadwood, Rocky Mountain NP, Pikes Peak, and others, a super family trip for children and parental history buffs alike. I wonder if the little girls know about the Prairie Dog towns yet!

To Market, To Market!

2008-05-14T18:10:00.015-05:00

All right, I was really going to try and NOT go shopping...but I now admit that no trip to Istanbul is complete without visits to the Grand Bazaar and the Spice Bazaar. Whether you seek food, clothing, home textiles, lanterns, jewelry, small souvenirs, a nargile (water pipe), a kilim or carpet, a million other things...you will enjoy spending time in these bustling, kaleidoscopic surroundings.

Merchants will offer you tea to entice you to stay in their stalls and shops, hoping you'll be more inclined to part with some of your funds before moving on. As with every other busy street or enclave in Istanbul, there are tea boys (and men) skittering all around, balancing their trays of steaming tulip glasses as they race from stall to stall to tea counter and back again.

I enjoyed a glass of apple tea at a textile shop (and eventually came away with a couple of pillow covers and a tulip-stitched velvet throw for a love seat) in the Grand Bazaar and Turkish tea at a carpet dealer in the Spice Bazaar (where we decided on two small soumaks, a kind of embroidered kilim from the far Eastern reaches of Turkey, Persian/Kurdish area). Naturally you must negotiate for a better price than you are first offered. I am pretty firm when it comes to this kind of deal-making (I buy the cars in my family :0) so I felt comfortable with the prices we eventually paid for the things we bought. We decided to spend our money on things that will give us pleasure and memories every day at home rather than on expensive meals or Turkish baths.

There were also informal stalls set up all over the place, wherever people gathered...near mosques, in the underground passageways that crisscrossed some of the busiest intersections around Karaköy and Eminönü...one of the more unusual sights was the gun shops--yes, you read correctly--in one of the subterranean "malls" beneath the major roadway junction at Karaköy.

One other note about bargaining--in cases where I felt I was getting a good price, and I truly could afford it--I actually paid the price being asked. I bought 6 large scarfs/wraps/shawls from a woman along the subway steps for about $2.50 each. I figured this woman, all covered up in her black abaya, selling scarves and baby clothes for next to nothing, was trying to feed her family and I did not feel like nickel-and-diming her over something that was already so inexpensive and so lovely.
The other shopping we did was in the large Koska candy shop on Istiklal...if you love halva like we do, you've gotta load up. Turkish delight we can take or leave, but don't get between me and my Turkish halva. We got plain, cocoa, caramel, pistachio...also the most delicious walnut nougat I have ever tasted in my life (also considered a kind of halva but vastly different from the sesame varieties).

The day we cruised the Grand Bazaar was a national holiday, so there were Turkish flags and banners hung all around the place. It was April 23rd, which is celebrated both as Children's Day and as National Sovereignty Day, which commemorates the anniversary of the first meeting of the Turkish parliament.

Last boat ride

2008-05-13T14:12:00.006-05:00

The third and last day we spent using ferry transport was to travel up the Golden Horn. In this case, the boat zigzags from the "old" side of the Golden Horn to the "new" (time being relative).

We got off at Hasköy to visit the Rahmi Koç Industrial Museum, which is just next to the ferry landing. The museum contains everything you can imagine that is powered by any kind of motor or engine (from a dishwasher to transportation), machinery used in industrial applications, communications devices, a giant (working) olive press, a submarine (photo), planes, bikes, buggies...for the "how does it work?" geek in the family to the engineers, this place is an unusual spot to kill a few hours. It's quite large, sprawling along the banks of the Golden Horn and into another splendidly restored Byzantine foundry building across the street. There are two delicious-sounding restaurants that are part of the complex but we did not take any meals there. Maybe next time...
At the appointed time (the boats do tend to run on schedule) we went back out to the landing and hopped the ferry to go up to the final stop at Eyüp. There's a famous cafe called Pierre Loti with a lovely view of the city, recommended both by friends and guidebooks.
At Eyüp you will also discover a beautiful and solemn mosque. It is surrounded by a small market area, no doubt part of the official compound and with rentals from vendors used to support the mosque. Its courtyard is beautiful, with benches and trees and incredible tiles on the walls, and filled with quietly praying Muslims that have perhaps even made a pilgrimage to be there. The mosque complex contains the tomb of Ayub Ansari, Mohammed's standard-bearer, and is the fourth-holiest place in Islam (after Mecca, Medina and Jerusalem). This mosque had a much more prayerful atmosphere than some others we had entered, because it was not full of tourists. It's so much more conservative that I, as a woman, was "invited" to go upstairs.
That's ok, I want to respect the traditions of the place of worship. Despite the fact that virtually all my hair was covered with a hat, I still tucked a silk scarf I was wearing under the hat to cover what little bit of hair still exposed. I do want to add that every Muslim I had asked in conversation whether a hat was sufficient head covering for a non-Muslim visitor in a mosque agreed that it was fine. There is an ongoing debate at Trip Advisor on whether a woman should scarf up completely upon entry or if there are reasonable alternatives. Frankly, I have mixed feelings on whether the covering should be necessary or expected of non-Muslims when in a mosque for only minutes. I don't expect non-Catholics to dip into the holy water or genuflect when they visit a Catholic church. I expect people to comport themselves respectfully but not to feign adherence to the religion of the premises.

But I was so taken with the often cute and stylish long coats worn by many Turkish women as a covering that I actually thought about buying one in denim. And of course, the headscarf is practically ubiquitous; but that too is put on a fashionable plane, with many women obviously having taken care to coordinate their scarves with any clothing that was visible. I tried on a couple of jean coats that didn't fit quite right, but had no trouble communicating in sign language with the devout Muslim lady who owned the shop. I shouldn't have waited till our last day, because then I had no time to shop around for a better fit or price...that, too, maybe next time.

What would Bob Barker say?

2008-05-13T13:40:00.007-05:00

Everywhere we went, there were stray dogs and cats. Some of the cats behaved as you would expect feral cats to, but others were quite assertive and friendly. In many cities around the world there are large stray populations. I haven't done any research as to why this might be but several things come to mind. First and foremost, animals are not commonly sterilized and there may be no large, organized public or private spay/neuter campaign. Second, people may not keep pets inside their homes in some other countries as much as we do here. Maybe you "own" and feed a pet cat that hangs around your stoop. Third, maybe there are some other religious or cultural reasons that don't occur to me.

On the one hand, as an animal lover, one delights in making friends with any four-legged critter one comes across...on the other hand, as an animal lover, it's distressing to see all the haggard or wormed-up or pregnant dogs and cats all over the place, without proper care.

From Istanbul, boat excursions: part II

2008-05-12T12:26:00.008-05:00

One of the other delightful boat excursions we took was the IDO (public ferry) Bosphorus cruise. There are private Bosphorus cruises as well, but I recommend IDO for two reasons: one, it's a larger boat and better if you are subject to any hint of seasickness like yours truly; and two, the private boats don't go all the way up to the northern end, turning around about 2/3 of the way up, and don't let you off to explore.

We started out at Eminönü, quite the boat transit hubbub, at the mouth of the Golden Horn. Once again we had terrific views of the city from the boat as we forged up the Bosphorus, beginning with the Galata Bridge and its hordes of fishermen. The first major site as we cruised along were the Dolmabahçe Mosque and Dolmabahçe Palace on the European side. We had visited the Mosque the day we went to Büyükada; that ferry departs from the Besiktas landing, next to Dolmabahçe, and we had a half hour to kill. Here's a picture of the chandelier in the mosque.

As we made our way northward, the boat more or less zigzagged back and forth between the European and Asian sides. Note to humanity: the sides look an awful lot alike. There are some amazing homes along the water's edge, many being summer residences of the elites, I gathered. A presidential palace here, a fortress there, a palace-turned-hotel here, a mansion with pool and gazebo over there.

There are two bridges spanning the strait, from continent to continent. Adjacent to the second one (Fatih) there are fortresses on either side. Why this spot? The fortress on the Asian side (Anadolu Hisari) was built in 1391. In 1452 Mehmet the Conqueror had the European one (Rumeli Hisari) built directly across the strait. It's the narrowest point along the Bosphorus, and the pair of fortresses allowed him to control its traffic, and therefore to cut off supply shipments from the Black Sea as part of his planned siege of Constantinople. Clever, huh?

It's still a major shipping lane of the world, connecting the Sea of Marmara and the Mediterranean with the Black Sea.

There is apparently some extra-delish yogurt made in Kanlica, so at that particular stop your onboard treat-sellers start appearing with the yogurt they pick up there, probably made that same day. Most folks have it with a large dollop of powdered sugar on top, but Bill took his straight. Let's just say it was taaaaangy.

The farther up you travel, the thinner the population gets. At the southern end the development is solid as far as the eye can see to house some of the 17 million metro Istanbullus. But by the time you reach Rumeli Kavagi (European side) and Anadolu Kavagi (Asian side), which are almost at the Black Sea, the ferry landings are probably the most exciting places in the tiny villages that poke out from the thickly-forested areas on both sides of the Bosphorus.

The final stop is on the Asian side, where we disembarked for the afternoon (which turned out to be pretty darn hot). I am quite sure that most of the merchants--especially those selling food and drink--absolutely live for the once a day (twice in summer) that the ferry comes calling with all its tourists and daytrippers.

We walked around the tiny village for a bit, then hiked up the very steep hill to the ruins of a Byzantine fortress. The area is still strategically important so there is a military base taking up much of the local land. As you walk past it much of the way up to the castle, you'll need to keep that camera packed away in your bag; for security reasons no photos are allowed. When you get near the top of the hill, there is a cluster of small restaurants, most of which don't open till summer. We did see one or two that seemed to be operating but most were in some state of hibernation. The chairs and tables were still accessible so we stopped to eat our picnic lunch in the shade of an unused café area...after the respite we contuned to the castle (another 5 minutes or so). We were rewarded with a stupendous 360 degree panorama of distant Istanbul, the Bosphorus and the Black Sea. There's not much left of the castle, but we did step inside the two rooms that still stood independently. I don't think the property is "kept" in any way, because there was quite a lot of litter both inside and out. (In Istanbul itself, it seemd that the streets were constantly being cleaned in some manner or other). And nowhere in the area seems complete without a stray animal or three, so here we have a black mutt enjoying the sea breeze.

More on the strays in another post!

Buying on boats

2008-05-08T11:15:00.004-05:00

There are snack bars on the ferries, not surprisingly, but "Turkishness" presented itself regularly as emissaries from said snack bars were constantly circulating around the various sections of the boat with typical Turkish offerings to assuage your hunger or thirst. One go-round would see a tray of the traditional tulip-shaped glasses of hot Turkish tea; the next might be fresh-squeezed orange juice or bottled water. Then a few minutes later you might have the opportunity to grab a simit, a fragrant golden brown bread ring covered in sesame seeds, one of the more prominient street foods of Istanbul.

In addition to these "official" roving sellers, on the longer trips there were additional items that appeared as if by magic, from fellow passengers. One fellow had sets of fruit knives he was selling, and did his schtick before the captive audience; the knives' sharpness impressed sufficient passengers to evidently make this variation on the "traveling salesman" method worthwhile. At other times we saw abaya-clad Muslim women selling garments which they toted in giant nylon carrier bags; one appeared to be plying the ladies with various sorts of muumuu type loungewear or nighties. One Turkish woman sitting across from us bought not only two nightgowns, but succumbed to the knife-hawker as well.

From Istanbul, boat excursions: part I

2008-05-06T12:48:00.011-05:00

I couldn't figure out how to divide up our stay in Istanbul for blogging purposes. One recurring and relaxing theme was trips on public ferries, so I'll start with those.

The weather was lovely almost every day and thus perfect for a boat ride, short or long. The IDO ferry system is extensive, and we used the very low priced services to go to the enchanting Prince's Island of Büyükada in the Sea of Marmara, a zigzag cruise up the Bosphorus, all the way to the edge of the Black Sea (the private boats don't go as far), and as a restful way to get to the top of the Golden Horn.

The trip to Büyükada on the regular ferry takes about an hour and a half, with intermediate stops at three smaller islands. We first chose seats outside but it turned out to be a smoking area, so we retreated indoors. Before doing so I took advantage of the great views of Istanbul as we sailed away from the city and also shot some pics of folks on the boat. There were some foreigners like us, but for the most part it was jam-packed with local daytrippers armed with picnic goods, all destined to enjoy a beautiful Saturday afternoon in the sun.

People continuously threw bread to the seagulls, who seemed to follow the ferry for most of the distance between stops to take advantage of the free lunch.

When we arrived on the island near lunchtime, we first strolled around the village, trying to decide where to eat.
We finally settled on Milto, one of the oldest restaurants on the island, a family business dating to the 1930's, if I remember correctly. The food was good but the setting was decidedly the appeal, being right at the edge of the water. It was still cool enough that we wanted to sit in the sun as opposed to under the covered area closer to the water.

After lunch we strolled up the island's picturesque streets, marveling at the gorgeous mansions that lined them. This island was once the summer retreat of many prosperous non-Muslims and non-Turks--Greeks, Armenians, etc.
The population balance has changed but our friend Sevan's parents (Armenians raised in Istanbul) tell us that the winter population is around 10,000 but in the summer it can apparently swell to 200,000. They themselves make up part of that seasonal boom, as they spend four months there every year themselves, but live the rest of the year in Nice. Maybe next trip we can visit them when they are on the island!

There are no cars allowed on the island, so bikes and carts prevail, along with carriages. The carriages can be hired to take you anywhere you like to go or on a standard tour of the island. Deliveries are made not by truck but by bicycle, hand cart, horse cart or even on a person's back.

If you only have a couple of days in Istanbul, there may be other items on your see-and-do list that would rank higher than Büyükada; but if you have a week or so, you should definitely reserve a day for such a delightful excursion.

England

2008-05-03T17:04:00.014-05:00

The first part of our trip was spent in the London 'burbs with our friends Bill and Wendy and their extremely pleasant and well-behaved children Matthew and Dana. It's a running joke that we'll visit them anywhere in the world, based on the fact that we have already traveled to see them in Houston, Bangkok, Wassenar (near The Hague), and now in Weybridge, Surrey, just southwest of London.

The trip into London from their neighborhood is a 25 minute train ride to Waterloo. We made that journey several times during the week.Instead of doing the things I had imagined doing in London, we found ourselves choosing other options.

The National Portrait Gallery always has fascinating art on display and gives over a fair amount of space to photography as a medium for portraiture. While quite a few of the works are renderings of the famous, infamous and illustrious, others are of unfamiliar subjects. We also spent a little while in the National Gallery as well, concentrating on a few particular rooms and artists in whom we bore the most interest. Between the two we took in a lunchtime concert at the church next door, that being St. Martin-in-the-Fields. We had expected an English song recital, appealing to me as a lover of the voice, but what we got instead was a ten-piece brass ensemble! Fortunately, the program was composed of three twentieth century pieces which we enjoyed very much. I had saved the program but now cannot locate it...if it turns up I'll edit this post to include the composers' names. To top it off, all of these things were free, or by voluntary donation of whatever you can afford.

Another day we whiled away the hours at the British Museum. The collection there is pretty incredible, largely thanks to Britain's Imperial years. Today we would think differently about all the items that were brought there from other cultures with no compensation--dozens of Egyptian sarcophagi and mummies, the Rosetta stone, the Parthenon statues and sculpted friezes (aka Elgin marbles)--and in fact there are now ongoing disputes with other countries about the possession of these items. We are privileged to be able to see them but like a lot of great art and historical artifacts, the provenance is somewhat "stained", shall we say. Napoleon made off with quite a bit that's now in the Louvre and Paris, and Hitler had unbelievable troves of art and artifacts that were plundered by the Nazis. Some of the art plundered by the Nazis ended up being captured by the Soviet Union, and Russia to this day refuses to return it to the countries from which it was taken. I recommend the documentary "The Rape of Europa" and the book "Rescuing DaVinci" http://www.rescuingdavinci.com/ for an amazing account of how much of the art looted by Nazis was saved and returned to its owners or their heirs by a specially skilled group of our own soldiers.

We spent a good deal of time walking around London, and one day walked all the way from Trafalgar Square to the Tate Modern on the South Bank. It was a lovely stroll along the Thames on a brilliantly sunny day. Along the walking path on the north side of the river, you can see the Victorian penchant for the exotic played out in the charming but occasionally bizarre details of lampposts, benches, statues, etc. We walked across the Millennium (pedestrian) Bridge, which, after some scary tales of movement at its opening, is now strengthened and perfectly stable. The Tate Modern has a fine collection, some of which I dug and some of which bothered, confused or bored me! Sadly we hit the gallery in between installations in the huge entry area, so it was essentially a repair site rather than some cool monumental-scale experiential work. Oh, well!!

We went to visit Windsor Castle as well. I'd seen it before and it was just as grand as ever, and the towns of Windsor and Eton, flanking the River Thames were as charming as I had remembered.

Another day out took us to Stonehenge and Salisbury. It was pretty nifty to finally see Stonehenge in person--but I must say it does look just like the pictures you have seen, nothing more, nothing less. You know how some places you've seen in pictures are just that much more incredible when you see them with your own two eyes? Stonehenge is not one of them. Don't get me wrong--it was really satisfying to see it in person but that extra bonus of "Wow, it's so much more amazing in person" wasn't there for me. But at the same time, I loved listening to the audio tour and all the educational information about what Stonehenge MAY have been about. And I don't regret going there for a second. The same day we stopped in Salisbury, had lunch, took a walk around its medieval center and visited its Cathedral. The Cathedral was built in the 13th century and completed in only 37 years. if you've visited other European churches and cathedrals, you will know that 37 years is practically overnight. many took hundreds of years but because this one went up so "fast" it is unusually harmonious in architectural terms, reflecting only one period or style, early English Gothic. There is also one of the four original copies of the Magna Carta held there, and I felt like I had made a little pilgrimage as an American who values the freedoms we have, for that document was the forefather of many others that guarantee our freedoms today.

Most of the time we had dinner en famille and appreciated the chance to unwind after long days on our feet, and to chat over delicious and leisurely home-cooked dinners with a glass of wine. of course, we did make an exception because we had to have Indian takeout, as it is the national food of Britain, right?

The one dinner we had out was at a small Italian restaurant near Waterloo, fairly tasty and reasonably priced for London. Why there? We were going to the Old Vic to see a revival of David Mamet's play "Speed-the-Plow" starring Kevin Spacey (I think he's the artistic director there) and Jeff Goldblum. It was stupendous, of course, and I am grateful to Wendy and her eagle eye. The entire run was sold out quickly and she spotted the announcement in time to snag tickets for us. Of all the theater in London that week, that's probably what I would have wanted to see most, and we were lucky to have been there.

The last day before we continued on to Istanbul was spent out in the south England countryside at an antiques fair in Ardingly. It was one of those typically cool and dampish English spring days so we were happier inside the various sheds than trolling the outdoor stalls. It was a gigantic affair with a thousand stalls or more. We hardly made a dent in the few hours we were there, and sadly Bill did not find his dream fountain pen at a steal of a price. The ones we did see were generally overpriced or at least no bargains were to be found, so instead I used our last few pounds to buy antique buttons.

The only major downside to the time in England was the 20 pounds I wasted on a SIM card from Orange that was supposed to work in my phone in Turkey. It worked in England but in Istanbul my phone would not pick up either of the two networks the card was supposed to carry. I guess I will probably try to find out if it would work over a year from now (doubtful, as these pay-as-you-go cards generally last only a year if you don't reload) or whenever we'd be back in Europe. Failing that I'll mail the SIM to Wendy to stick in her own phone!

OK, so now we've been to England. On to Istanbul, but that will have to wait...

Regrouping...

2008-05-02T21:23:00.007-05:00

We've just returned from our 17 day trip to London and Istanbul and boy, are our arms tired!

Seriously, we were exhausted when we returned. We flew home on a Turkish Airlines flight from IST to ORD (Chicago) and then connected there for Dallas (on American). Everything went great till we got to ORD! We had flown Turkish from LHR (Heathrow) to IST in the middle of the trip, and although our flight was late, it was otherwise harmless. The 12 hour flight from IST to ORD was a pleasant surprise. Turkish Airlines has a looooong list of special menu choices that you can order in advance, and we asked for seafood (what the heck!) meals. We had a reasonable tasty baked (?) fish filet and some veggies sauteed in olive oil and for our "main" meal we even had the added "luxury" of another seafood item, that being a salad of shrimp, smoked fish, lox and roasted peppers, rather tasty for economy class. In addition to the very decent food we were served, Turkish also still gives us coach folk an amenities kit with socks, toothbrush, comb, eye mask, etc. The seats were comfortable and the personal screen movie selection was broad, even including a Bollywood flick (brownie points for that).

Anyway, once we got off that flight, the fun began. Our connection from ORD to DFW was delayed--not so bad, but about 45 minutes. ORD--or at least all the AA flights--seemed to be plagued with delays. And when we got to DFW, 2 of our 3 bags had not arrived with us. We knew they had come from IST as we had brought them through customs at ORD...anyway, by the time we made our mishandled baggage reports and got home, we had been up 24 hours straight. And then about 7 hours later--at 5:50 a.m.--our phone rang with the news that the baggage delivery van was outside our house with the bags. So much for a good night's sleep but we were glad to have our stuff!

So that's just the boring air transport stuff...more details to come, and I swear I will figure out how to post photos on here!

It's supposed to be about travel, right?

2008-04-07T18:52:00.002-05:00

So very soon we will be off to visit friends who are now living in Surrey (SW London 'burbs). My old college friend and former flatmate Wendy grew up all over the world, with a father working for an international corporation. For the past 6 years or so, she and her own family have been doing the same. Her husband works for a company with offices all over the world, and prior to their living in London he was posted to Bangkok, Thailand and then The Hague, Netherlands. We've made it a happy practice to accept their open invitations to visit them everywhere they've lived, so when they found out they'd be moving to London, Wendy told me they were moving just so I'd have a different place to visit.

Having lived in London briefly in the mid-80's, it's not a new place to visit, but a perennial favorite. There is just an endless amount to do and see. My favorite museum has to be the Wallace Collection, an oasis of serenity and beauty (and arms) just a few blocks off the commotion of Oxford Street. I also love Kenwood and wandering around Hampstead Heath (Freud Museum is neat)...the food halls at Harrods...theatre scene (this time it's David Mamet's "Speed-the-Plow" at the Old Vic with Kevin Spacey and Jeff Goldblum, thanks to Wendy's eagle eye and fast ordering fingers--it sold out right away for the entire run). And of course given my millinery background for a quarter century I am crazy for the textiles and costume collections at the V & A!

After that we'll be going to Istanbul, where we don't know anyone; one of our good friends grew up there and still visits family in the summers but that's as close as it gets. In this case we'll be renting a flat in Beyoglu, the lively heart of "modern" (mostly less than 200 years old) Istanbul. We'll certainly spend a couple of days across the Golden Horn in the old part of the city, seeing Hagia Sofia, the Blue Mosque, maybe the Grand Bazaar, but I feel the pain of the weak dollar so intensely that I don't want to go where I might be tempted to buy something! Then one day we'll spend on the Bosphorus ferry, another on Buyukada, one of the Prince's Islands, and the locale where our friend spends his time in Istanbul when he visits. I don't think we'll be in town for the right day for a whirling dervish session (twice a month in the off-season) but we should be there at exactly the right time for a splendiferous display of blooming tulips all over town. Did you know tulips are actually Turkish, not Dutch? Of course, there will be time spent in the Beyoglu area where we'll be headquartered, and we'll be near a large market where we hope to shop and do some of our own cooking with fresh local seafood and produce.

My ever-lengthening to-do list includes the following thus far:
*order & pick up GB pounds, euros and Turkish liras
*find out the details of using my phone in UK and Turkey
*investigate weather--monthly averages for the times we'll be there
*find out what American groceries we need to bring to Wendy (for the kids, mostly)
*finish client trip plans for those folks who will be leaving while I'm away
*laundry!
*pay bills
*return library books!
*finalize arrangements for pets
*decide what hats to take *{:-)

and on and on...

Grassroots Politics in TX: Senate District Conventions 3/29/08

2008-04-02T17:36:00.000-05:00

Hey y'all,

I have been involved pretty much all my life in Democratic politics. This year at our precinct conventions (the night of the primary) we had TWENTY-FIVE times the usual number of attendees. Then as a result of the huge attendance at the first phase, our state senate district conventions, held yesterday, were also unprecedented in size. There was no way to know before the precinct conventions how many people to expect then or yesterday-- which gave 3 1/2 weeks for officials and volunteers to get a grip. We had to find a new venue to accommodate the 4000-5000 we expected and that was not secured until about 10 days ago at best. We would never fit into the 1000 seat high school auditorium that we had originally reserved. We ended up at SMU's basketball coliseum!

The day itself was long but lively, also boring and frustrating on occasion. It took almost 4 hours (8 till noon) to get everyone checked in, and for the remaining credential problems and challenges to be resolved by the credentials committee (they had met the day before for 8 hours in order to get as much done in advance as possible). But in the 23rd, they did not finish those things until 5pm or so ('cuz they apparently did not meet the day before)! At least by that time we in the 16th had elected our delegates and concluded a lot of our business. All the stuff we have to do just takes time, period, and we were overwhelmed.

I would say that 75% of the delegates and alternates at ours were first-timers. And also for the first time I had to actually "campaign" for a state delegate slot, which I lost. Previously, there were so few who wanted to go, almost anyone who wanted at least got an alternate slot. I did apply for an at-large position but don't know about that yet (see below in the message I sent to my fellow precinct delegates). The at-large list was approved by what was left of the convention last night after I had left (we left at 7:45pm). If I am not selected I may attend as a volunteer.

Despite what you may have seen or heard in the news about some of these gatherings, our convention was relatively orderly though long; and I am glad I was there and not at some of the others. The ones with the outlandish reports are not representative of the over 100 conventions that took place.

Please read below for what was really the best part of my day.

Nicole

________________________________
Dear Fellow Precinct 1230, 16th Senate District Convention participants and
others,

I thought I would share the experience that 3 of us had after our precinct
had caucused at Saturday's 16th Senate District Convention. It was enriching
in that it provided us a real backstage and inspiring view of how our
"Democratic democratic" process operates.

Late in the afternoon, several 1230 delegates who were still just hanging
around the coliseum made their way downstairs to the practice court, where
the nominations committee was meeting. After we had been waiting and
chatting for a considerable amount of time with some of our other M streets
neighbors, committee co-chair David Bradley asked that some of those present
consider working with the tabulations folks to speed up the process and let
the nominations committee get to its task asap. There had been only two
people remaining who were attempting to tabulate those many thousands of
presidential preferences; and alone, they'd be there all night. At least
three folks from 1230 (Tina Aguilar, Steven Hartsell and I) were accepted
as ad hoc members of the tabulations committee (9 Obama and 9 Clinton
delegates).

As many probably know, no delegates are officially assigned from senate
district convention precinct caucus results until the tabulations of
presidential preference sign-in sheets are complete. In addition, the
nominations committee cannot assign at-large delegates until it knows the
exact percentage of Clinton and Obama delegate sign-ins on the polls. Then
the delegates must be split by candidate in the same percentages as
the preferences. The at-large delegate (60) and alternate (60)
positions are used to send other party and campaign participants and to
balance the delegation according to presidential preference percentages,
gender, orientation, ethnicity, the physically challenged, and under-35/over 35.
(Hey, we are the Democrats.)

This was a very large convention (estimates put it at 4000+), five times
larger than usual. There was a long delay after we all held our precinct
caucuses until the nominations committee had those results, so that they
could begin the at-large selection process. (They had already sorted the
applications by candidiate, then had to wait for tabulations.)

All the presidential preference sign-in sheets from the convention were
reviewed by nine pairs of people working on the tabulations committee--each
precinct's sheets is reviewed by one Obama and one Clinton delegate
together, double checking each others' counts, making sure that only actual
delegates' preference votes are counted and not those of alternates (unless
they were elevated to delegate status...which must be marked on the precinct
paperwork or we don't know that they were elevated), whether the precinct
had too many delegates voting, that if a person did not put their
presidential preference on the sheet we can't count it because we don't know
their intention, etc, etc. This is like counting 4000 paper ballots by hand
because we had to review EVERY signature and make sure that all the sign-ins
were legit. And we DID have to reject some. But because we were working in
balanced pairs, every rule was applied equally and fairly across the board.
For example, I can tell you that a longtime convention participant and
former elected official neglected to indicate alternate or delegate status,
and actually forgot to list a presidential preference so there was no way we
could count that as a preference vote for a candidate. And with thousands of
delegates--most of whom disappear after the precincts elect their state
delegates--we can't go out to the floor and page everybody that made a
mistake and ask them what they meant, or track them down after they have
left. It has to be done correctly in the first place.

As we learned, those kinds of silly mistakes are the reason that precincts
are not supposed to circulate the sign-in sheets before being specifically
instructed to do so--to avoid those very kinds of careless mistakes and
oversights that cost people their votes, and make to sure all t's are
crossed and i's are dotted. I guess the best way to do that is to be
systematic and organized about the sign-in process. Our precinct started
early, I admit, which to me had seemed like no big deal at the time.
Fortunately, we did not have errors...but I can tell you from now on, I'd be
fine with waiting because of the messes I saw from other precincts. A real
eye-opener!!

It takes a LOOOOOng time to double check that many signatures but it must be
done to get an accurate percentage for the delegate count as we move forward
to select our national delegates in Austin. I thank the District 16
delegates for their patience, especially those waiting to find out if they
have been selected as at-large delegates or alternates (that includes me,
and I still don't know).

We were only working with several thousand sign-ins. I now have even greater
sympathy for all the county Democratic officials all over the state who had
to go through the poll sheets from the precinct conventions.

And I want to point out to those who might think that some of these party
processes are carried out unfairly or recklessly, that great efforts were
made to ensure fairness and accuracy. Both candidates were exactly equally
represented in the tabulations committee. We took our job very seriously.

In addition, I would say that our precinct 1230 always carries out its business fairly,
and that our 16th district convention appears to have been orderly compared to many
others around the D/FW metroplex and the state.

I may volunteer in advance for this committee next time as a result of my
experience Saturday!

And if any of my narrative seems weird or wrong, all I can say is that I initially
wrote it still exhausted from the convention--a lot of adrenalin, the crash, and
then the "hangover"!!

Jumping off a cliff

2007-09-21T16:20:00.001-05:00

I've jumped off a cliff and I'm still falling, trying to enjoy the scenery on the way down while I wait to see if I land on my feet. I recently quit my job of 24 years to pursue my passion: travel planning. Yes, I have turned my obsessive itinerary planning into a career, or at least I'm trying to. Friends and acquaintances have been asking me to help them with their trips for a while now, and I decided that it sounded like a business...

Check out my website for an explanation of what the heck it is that I'm doing:

http://www.monvoyagetravel.com