admin January 8th, 2010
In no particular order:
- Gandria and the pictures of polenta in funghi sauce….>>>
- Polenta in funghi sauce
- USI MIT
- Resega Ice Skating
- Bar OOPs
- Custom salads at Manor Appunti.
- ENTER 2010 E-Tourim and ICT conference, Feb 9-12
- ITALIAN!!!!
admin January 8th, 2010
Unforgettable. Cities. Countrysides. Mountain springs. Hospitality. History. Religion. Folklore and gypsey life. Art and literature. Dancing. Fashion and Beauty. It’s all here.
Disclaimer: In a region where seatbelts are pooh-poohed while cigarettes + meat are compulsory at every meal, you may experience culture shock, especially of the latter category. Even eggs, the lowest form of protein consumable, are pronounced, “Yay-yeah”! Nevertheless, the only way to experience the Balkans is wholeheartedly. Fumble withe the language and you’ll be appreciated. Eat until you’re sick and your vigor will be appreciated. Spend time learning about the culture, and you will be loved.
Starting in Trieste, Italy.
>Sezana, Slovenia. Take the Basquiat train to Ljubliana. >Wander along the river in the most beautiful city in the world. Drink boiled wine or dense hot chocolate. Buy mittens and slippers. Skip this step and regret it.
>Ljubliana>Belgrade by train. Pack water and food. It’s a long journey and no matter what the attendent says, there is no time for Cevap in Zagreb. (hint: do not mouth off to Slovenian customs agents, or you shall be “disappeared”). Offer your seats to a group of teenagers and the rakia will flow all 10 hours long.
>Belgrade. Stay at Skadarska, the Bohemian quarters modeled after Monmarte, but with a style all its own. Eat your heart out at Ima Dana, starting with stuffed peppers and breaking out the antacids around the time the pork chops in mushroon sauce appear. Walk Knez Michailavic. Lunch at Cafe Mosckva. Wish you were a tennis player. Maska Cafe. Uni spot. Gallery cafe.
>Skopje, Macedonia. Sveti Spass Orthodox church. Pantalimon. Old Town turkish quarters. Boiled wine, part 2. Casablanca for upscale but authentic Macedonian food. Visit Ohrid, gem of civilization. Learn the folk dances. Warm yourself by giant bonfires. Try sarma. OD on meat and head East.
>Sofia, Bulgaria. 3 hour winding taxi ride for 50 Euros.
admin January 8th, 2010
List in no particular order.
- Hike Mishe Mokwe trail
- Drink the Rooster at ZenZoo. With Pearls .
- In year one, party your brains out one night in the Hollywood Hills with new “friends”. Year 2, repeat in Malibu with old friends.
- Pilates at Allure Pilates Spa. With Aimee Zanoni.
- Be one of 3 people who live near work. It makes life in LA so much better.
- Kickbox with Paul or Patrick at Sports Club/LA
- Short drive to Santa Barbara. Luxury camp at El Capitan Canyon.
- Drive the 7 with the top down to SF. You’ll have a sunburn, but your spirit will be free.
- Montana Blvd. Walk it. Cafe it.
- Silverlake. Get gritty.
- Los Feliz. Spend a lazy morning at Alcove Cafe and indulge in the curried eggs bennie.
- Adopt a kid. Big Bros and Sisters.
- Movie Colony Hotel in Palm Springs, a short drive away. Get a deep tissue massage there.
- Membership at MOCA.
- Faces ESC. With Shula.
- Hit up the sales at Neiman Marcus. Resist the urge to own 20 trendy things, and get 2 good things for a great deal, and wear them forever.
- Feel no shame asking for free samples at Barney’s makeup counters, and see 30 wrinkle-free.
- Go to 1 premiere and sneak into as many double-features as possible.
- Drive on the 10 at 3AM toward Pacific Coast Highway. It’s like flying.
- And finally, Oaxacan tamales in black mole sauce, steamed in banana leaf, at Guelaquetza.
(- Don’t walk Runyon Canyon. Avoid Urth Caffe. Please don’t buy a Mercedes.)
Above all, make an effort to see the people you love there. It’s a big city, and excuses abound. Commutes are tiring. Fridays are the real day of rest. Drive to those people and spend time and forget about the excuses. Because sooner or later, most of us have to leave LA.
admin January 6th, 2010
admin May 4th, 2009
There’s nothing like a long flight for uninterrupted reading. If you’re like me, you might trip people on the subway each morning because your nose is glued to your book. Today I tripped myself on the stairs, but Tiberius Claudius (of Graves’ I, Claudius) was there to vallantly pad my faceplant. But back to those long stretches, free from cell chatter.
Here are my very favorite books. Pack one on your next trip.
Shantaram Roberts
Ada, or Ardor Nabokov
London Fields Amis
The Possibility of an Island Huellbecq
Old Filth Gardham
Shalimar the Clown Rushdie
The Line of Beauty Hollinghurst
Tess of the D’Urbervilles Hardy
The Picture of Dorian Gray Wilde
The Brothers Karamazov Dostoevsky
Rememberance of Things Past Proust
The Ministry of Special Cases Englander
The Heart is a Lonely Hunter McCullers
Ecuador and Toronto Top Experience posts coming soon!!
admin April 27th, 2009
Today, I bet more people are paying attention to Tamiflu than to the genocide of Tamils in Sri Lanka
Does the WHO not have enough to do since Ebola broke out in Reston, VA and M.I.A stole the “Bird Flu” spotlight? Is the US State Department going to start selling, “Keep Mexico Poor” t-shirts? Clearly that’s the intent of the wheezing media frenzy.
Take your vitamins, kids, and go to San Miguel de Allende for your pork tamales in mole sauce.
Skeptical about swine:
.
admin April 3rd, 2009
I can’t seem to find the environment featured prominently on the G20 agenda. How drastically short-sighted.
Looks like capitalist euphoria for the good old boys once again. When will they ever learn?
admin February 13th, 2009
This post is dedicated to Leora, Kelly W, to Tyson, and to anyone who’s ever overcome trouble at Gatwick border control!! Despite being rejected by the London business community, I loved every bit o my summer there. It took a few seasons to get over the fact that not even Google was willing to overlook my lack of a working Visa (such a small slip of paper, no?) there. But here it is, mellowed down and fact-checked. To that city that’s reinventing itself as fluidly as the price of oil.
The Tube (pron. “tschooooob”). Oyster Card in hand, this is your ticket to discovering all of London. The above ground parts are cool too. You’ll hear anything but English being spoken. Your eyes will open to the diversity, to the street funk, the working class and all other things London.
The Tate Modern. The cavernous monumentality of it. The nod to factory days. How little I felt inside of it. And the members’ tea bar above.
Primrose Hill. Exactly. How. It. Sounds. To appreciate fully, walk through hectic Camden Town up, up, over the bridge, through the corridor of bookshops and cafes where hippie and upper crust weave together. Up to the park, where the hill is dotted with Thames-gazing tetherball players. Lie in the grass and feel, truly, at the center of the universe. Nothing, nothing is better than moments on Primrose Hill.
Hoxton Square. Like walking through a portal into your own private social life (makes sense when you see it). After exiting Angel tube stop, take a 10 minute stroll like hip ants marching to Hoxton Square. Hidden but bustling– 4 walls contain the artsiest people, the best of tapas and small plates restaurants, the most buzzing bars, and the filthiest park you ever did see. The epicenter of London nightlife is only a wrinkle in time away.
Regent’s Park. Where my fiancee proposed. Like a Seurat painting in the summer. Delicate wind. Perfect paddleboating pond where I, for once, could show my rowing prowess, maybe at the expense of ducks. Willow trees. Benches. Herons. Peace. Enveloped in manicured labyrinths. Beats Hyde Park by a mile.
James Street at Picton Place. After finding an engagement ring at Selfridge’s, it was more than a post-engagement glow that lit up these tiny sidestreets. Lined with Lebanese and French streetside restaurants, it’s only blocks from throngs of tourists, but on a summer night, who cares? The ubiquitous awnings, the warm accordian and guitar music– wanted to stay here forever. Meandered through the streets of Marylebone after dinner just loving life.
Islington. If I could live in London again, this would be homebase. Everything about this neighborhood is built for life– the parks, the cafes, the Masala Zone (hello, Thali!), the boutiques, the Space NK. And don’t you know, they had to go plant gorgeous fucia flowers along the slate-lined streets, delightful against the big red buses. Brings an aspirational tear to my eye.
Loungelover + Les Trois Garcons. If a decadence overdose could kill…then this tiny corner of Shoreditch/Bethnal Green would be fatal. Those streets are rough, all right, but going from aperitifs at Loungelover (the bizzarly wonderful assinged seating and taxonomy-rife wall fixtures) to LTG was nothing short of smooth and sexy. For a real crawl, start at Bed Bar off Brick Lane (closest stop Liverpool station) and end at Light.
St. Pancras Station and the Eurostar to Paris. I’ve never felt so inspired and luxuriant riding coach. From glorious station to station without a hiccup, the journey felt like flying from Brighton, through the French courtyside, to Gare du Nord. With novel in hand and my roller at my side, getting to SPS was also a breeze. The Euros have really got trains down to a science…and an art.
St. John’s Wood. My favorite High Street just makes me feel bright and happy!
Song Que. No matter how badly your currency is trading, this is the ultimate cheap eat, flavorful vietnamese near all the hotspots.
My not-favorites: Kilburn tube stop manhandling, Willesden Green internet cafe with sticky keys and overt drug deals involving backpacks, Cankle-hags and slags, and my # 1 NOT favorite that is still a MUST DO:
Chocolate Bar at Harrod’s. You’ve been warned about this Dodi-mecca, and everything you’ve heard it is right. But if you really want a paradign shift, you really want to know how it feels to be poor, go here. Unless you’re wearing a head to toe birkia, you’re not getting servish. Beautiful Polish teens cater, literally hand and foot, to Pasha imitators with huge glasses to hide their hangovers. That’s right, you don’t own oil. And now you know how it feels to want a chocolate milk with a marzipan on the side, and to be seen right through. An epiphany in discrimination.
admin February 4th, 2009
Hate the metal-y smell of coins that have passed through thousands of fingers? Get used to sniffing your hands if you’re on your lunch break downtown.
Under our very own Bank of Montreal tower, don’t expect food court stalls to accept credit cards. Apparently plastic is good only above ground, while underground we’re stuck in the dark ages. At a perky burrito bar, I created a mango-shrimp-medium-salsa-dressing-on-the-side-salad with a dexterous assembly line of avocado-wielding employees behind the glass. I marveled at the efficiency until I reached the cashier. Flashing my BMO check card, poised for PIN-entry, the cashier scoffed, her braces gleaming: “Cash only.”
Me: “Um, aren’t we underneath the biggest BANK in Canada??”
Cashier: “It’s faster this way. You can see the line”.
Indeed, the line of salivating suits was about 20 deep, snaking past tables.
But picture this: her statement is like a University professor telling his students he doesn’t accept essays that have been composed on a word processor, because it takes longer to type on a keyboard than to use a pencil.
At that moment, I pictured a soft spot in the flooring above, an ATM crashing through the ceiling, strategically placed.
In 2008, Canada was rated the “world’s soundest bank system” by the World Economic Forum. Yet why is the real estate under the world’s most scrupulous banks a cesspool of human error? Cash tendering raises employee management, accounting and hygiene considerations.
Think BMO stands for Backwards Money Operations? Well it’s not alone—every food court on the PATH is lacking in modern payment options. If you ask me, these banks should be the leaders in efficient credit or debit card payments. Every lunch break should create a symphony of swiping.
Yesterday, I voted by walking away.
Like my belly, my Comme des Garcon wallet shall not be stretched with extra coinage nor poundage. Plastic will do just fine.
admin December 3rd, 2008
In the wake of last week’s events, I nod to an author who tells the story of the real Mumbai. Oddly, several of the hang-outs in the book, such as Leopold’s, were targeted.
Shantaram is the reinvention of a life– about a city’s reluctant, then desperate embrace. That city is Mumbai, and the life is that of Gregory David Roberts, a former Aussie criminal crafty enough to break jail and get the heck out of dodge. From the slums to behind the screens of the city’s evil madame, Afghanistan to Breach Candy, this novel is all-encompassing. Humility, bravely, love…and more humility. In prose, it captures the ornate relationships and dark, rancid corners of this city. It captivated me for one month, and I recommend it to anyone who will give me a chance.
On his blog he urges: “I want to plead with you, to keep the faith with India and the city I love, Bombay. If we continue to visit the country and meet the people, if we spend our time in the beautiful chaos and chaotic beauty, if we spend our money in the bazaars and hotels, if we buy the books by great Indian writers, listen to the music by brilliant Indian composers and musicians, marvel at the splendour of Indian dancers, watch the captivating movies, wonder at the art galleries – in other words, if we go on opening our hearts to the best that India teaches us, the people who did this violence can never win.”
Johny Depp purchased the rights to produce the film. If anyone can do it, he can. Does anyone know whether his production crew were harmed during the events?
READ THIS BOOK. On a lighter note, see “Slumdog Millionaire”.
A traveler’s modest recollections and sometimes outrage
lMy cities, my life = VA>NYC>SF>LA>LDN>TO>LU (Lugano, Switzerland).
There are 18 Posts and 30 Comments so far.