Leaving the house early this morning to get my errands done before the temperature climbed I saw the kids leaving for the first day of school. Most had new square book bags on their backs, although some were obviously left over from last year. It is La Rentrée. I know in each of those bookbags there is a rectangle pencil case filled with ink pens and multi-colored inks, a white liquid ink coverer, a ruler and a couple of pencils and erasers.
Notebooks, not blue lined but with quadrangles would be in there too, one for each subject. The kids do all their work in the notebooks and neatness counts. Teachers write notes to parents, and parents have to sign the notes with their own comments.
During the day the quiet is strange after a summer of children’s voices, but once it is five o’clock when school gets out, their voices will once again float through my window from the street below. What a welcome sign of life that is.
In Canton Vaud the kids went back to two weeks ago, forcing some parents to reduce their August holidays. There was no change in the school hours, despite complaints from many parents, who resent that if they have three children in one school the starting hours, coming home for lunch, going back and coming home again can be different for all three meaning 12 separate times. A working mother must have household help to make sure their children have someone to watch them and run back and forth with the many trips. However, as one friend living in St. Cergue found out when she tried to start a school canteen, so her children wouldn’t interrupt her writing day, many mothers want to see their children at noon time and like knowing they are giving them a good meal with quality family time. There is something to be said for both.
Friday, September 02, 2005
Customers Barbara can do without
Although she was attractive in a way that French women are in her black dress that accented her slimness and her long black hair piled carelessly on her head, she walked around Barbara’s store, muttering she wanted something original.
“I don’t like this.”
“This doesn’t please me.”
“This isn’t original.” (Barbara had designed and made the pants herself)
Despite working for Barbara, I said, “Perhaps you would like to try the store up the street.”
She tried on a poncho and as I helped her out of it, I could smell the Banyuls sweating out of her pores. She eyed two necklaces. Both times her hair caught in the clasp and I had to extricate her.
“Your clothes are ugly,” she said.
I didn’t say, “Perhaps you would prefer to wear them inside out like your dress.” I was afraid she would strip. The strap had already slipped once exposing her breast.
“How much for the poncho and two necklaces?”
“45 Euros.”
“I’ll be back tomorrow. The bank is closed. I’ll be back tomorrow.”
I glanced at my watch. The banks would be open for another hour. She floated out of the store. This is now the next day and she didn’t come back.
“I don’t like this.”
“This doesn’t please me.”
“This isn’t original.” (Barbara had designed and made the pants herself)
Despite working for Barbara, I said, “Perhaps you would like to try the store up the street.”
She tried on a poncho and as I helped her out of it, I could smell the Banyuls sweating out of her pores. She eyed two necklaces. Both times her hair caught in the clasp and I had to extricate her.
“Your clothes are ugly,” she said.
I didn’t say, “Perhaps you would prefer to wear them inside out like your dress.” I was afraid she would strip. The strap had already slipped once exposing her breast.
“How much for the poncho and two necklaces?”
“45 Euros.”
“I’ll be back tomorrow. The bank is closed. I’ll be back tomorrow.”
I glanced at my watch. The banks would be open for another hour. She floated out of the store. This is now the next day and she didn’t come back.
Dinner with Danes
The Danes, Froed and Gertrude, invited Barbara and I to dinner. F&G bought the house on rue de l’Egalité that Barbara and I owned years ago, so going to dinner was like going home, despite the renovations they did.
We sat on the stone bench built into the house outside wall and had sangria and blueberry sized olives as Froed told about his winter in Uganda where he is producing a film. Gertrude emerged grey-haired – two years ago she was still dying her hair and the grey looks good – and slim. She is a writer who also does a lot of work nationally and internationally on HIV.
We worked our way inside to the kitchen where I’d played lots of card games, ate many great meals, talked with friends, put down a bowl of steam water mixed with decongestant for my cold-ridden mother and fallen in love with Michel. The table was set next to the window which was filled with flowering plants.
They gave us a grand tour of the place. They’ve removed walls, but kept the original beams. A clay pig head still supported the living room beam. I am glad they kept it. It makes me smile everytime since I was reading under it, and lookedup to really see it for the first time.
A bath and toilet on the third floor would have been appreciated earlier having made my way downstairs more times than I want to count in the middle of the night. There is also the memory of my first night in bed with Michel, a sequence adapted in The Card. I shared this with Gertrude and she said she would buy the book, since her house has been fictionalized in the book.
Froed was the cook, and produced steaks in a nice sauce and to-die-for crisp potatoes baked in oil and spices, and snappable green beans, salad, a selection of cheeses, good wine, mouse/raspberries and ice cream.
The conversation ran a gambit of topics from life in Africa, AIDS, Literature, movies and politics. With all the Danes in town, I try and keep up on their politics so it isn’t only US and EU politics under discussion.
Froed also owns the house directly across the street from me and a grange that he is renovating as well as a place in Barcelona. When he retires he will come back and forth and rent out his misc. places probably to more people in the Danish entertainment industry.
Years ago when I bought my studio in Argelès I thought I would be living in a Catalan community. Instead I have found an artistic community. My friend Bill often accused me of being a cake eater, but in this case, I have my cake and I eat it too. I have a local culture plus an international art community. Life is good.
We sat on the stone bench built into the house outside wall and had sangria and blueberry sized olives as Froed told about his winter in Uganda where he is producing a film. Gertrude emerged grey-haired – two years ago she was still dying her hair and the grey looks good – and slim. She is a writer who also does a lot of work nationally and internationally on HIV.
We worked our way inside to the kitchen where I’d played lots of card games, ate many great meals, talked with friends, put down a bowl of steam water mixed with decongestant for my cold-ridden mother and fallen in love with Michel. The table was set next to the window which was filled with flowering plants.
They gave us a grand tour of the place. They’ve removed walls, but kept the original beams. A clay pig head still supported the living room beam. I am glad they kept it. It makes me smile everytime since I was reading under it, and lookedup to really see it for the first time.
A bath and toilet on the third floor would have been appreciated earlier having made my way downstairs more times than I want to count in the middle of the night. There is also the memory of my first night in bed with Michel, a sequence adapted in The Card. I shared this with Gertrude and she said she would buy the book, since her house has been fictionalized in the book.
Froed was the cook, and produced steaks in a nice sauce and to-die-for crisp potatoes baked in oil and spices, and snappable green beans, salad, a selection of cheeses, good wine, mouse/raspberries and ice cream.
The conversation ran a gambit of topics from life in Africa, AIDS, Literature, movies and politics. With all the Danes in town, I try and keep up on their politics so it isn’t only US and EU politics under discussion.
Froed also owns the house directly across the street from me and a grange that he is renovating as well as a place in Barcelona. When he retires he will come back and forth and rent out his misc. places probably to more people in the Danish entertainment industry.
Years ago when I bought my studio in Argelès I thought I would be living in a Catalan community. Instead I have found an artistic community. My friend Bill often accused me of being a cake eater, but in this case, I have my cake and I eat it too. I have a local culture plus an international art community. Life is good.
Wednesday, August 31, 2005
Another boy in the neighbourhood
Louise has had a three kilo baby boy, but not without drama. The cord was wrapped four times around the baby’s neck and knotted. When the doctor’s realized it, they threw Franck out of the delivery room and jumped on Louise literally to get the baby out.
The baby’s name is most likely Toby.
La Noisette is open. Franck looks shaken. Louise’s mother will carry good wishes to her daughter when she visits her this afternoon.
The baby’s name is most likely Toby.
La Noisette is open. Franck looks shaken. Louise’s mother will carry good wishes to her daughter when she visits her this afternoon.
Tuesday, August 30, 2005
The first review for the Card
The Card
D-L Nelson
Five Star, Oct 2005, $26.95
ISBN: 1594144176
They met at Boston University in the early 1960s sharing a room; yet no two roommates could be as different as Jane Andrews and Diana Bourque are. They are the opposites in physical appearance, emotional outlook, and mental state. Jane’s goal is to become the best mother and wife ever while Diana wants to run her father’s newspaper the Sarasota Journal. Yet the duo becomes more than just friends, they become beloved sisters.
Every year, one of the pair sends the same Christmas card with a new note to the other. This has helped them cope with distance, cheating husband, a dying spouse, near death experiences, childhood, and the conclusion that marriage, motherhood and business entrepreneurship are not anything like they expected. Through the next two decades plus they remain friends symbolized by the loving back and forth card.
THE CARD is an intriguing relationship drama starring two individuals who love each other like soul sisters though they may be continent apart. Once a year they rotate who informs the other that they still live and whether it has been a good year or not via the Christmas card. Fans of deep character studies will appreciate this saga over the years between two women who rely on one another to survive the trials and tribulations of life.
Harriet Klausner
D-L Nelson
Five Star, Oct 2005, $26.95
ISBN: 1594144176
They met at Boston University in the early 1960s sharing a room; yet no two roommates could be as different as Jane Andrews and Diana Bourque are. They are the opposites in physical appearance, emotional outlook, and mental state. Jane’s goal is to become the best mother and wife ever while Diana wants to run her father’s newspaper the Sarasota Journal. Yet the duo becomes more than just friends, they become beloved sisters.
Every year, one of the pair sends the same Christmas card with a new note to the other. This has helped them cope with distance, cheating husband, a dying spouse, near death experiences, childhood, and the conclusion that marriage, motherhood and business entrepreneurship are not anything like they expected. Through the next two decades plus they remain friends symbolized by the loving back and forth card.
THE CARD is an intriguing relationship drama starring two individuals who love each other like soul sisters though they may be continent apart. Once a year they rotate who informs the other that they still live and whether it has been a good year or not via the Christmas card. Fans of deep character studies will appreciate this saga over the years between two women who rely on one another to survive the trials and tribulations of life.
Harriet Klausner
La Noisette was closed
A note from Sophie the waitress is on the door of La Noisette, ‘Franck, m’appelles’ (call me). The tea room is closed. Everyone on the street is wondering if Louise, Frank’s beautiful blond English wife has gone into labour. Nicole the jeweler, Rosella the potter, Dani the fishmonger, Barbara, Babette and Jean-Pierre, the green grocers all are worried, because it is early. Isa was late. There’s can’t be a cosmic balance of baby due dates. Stay tuned.
A blog on blogging
A friend and a daughter both have said I inspired their own blogs. Josh, an expat (and friend) living in
But in exchanging emails with Josh, it hit me the blog serves another purpose. It lets me live experiences twice, one in real time and when I write about it I can recreate the feelings. Although I long ago chose life in the slow lane, it makes me more conscious of the details that bring color and music to my life.
RB2 descends again
I had just settled down with my needlework and waiting for
I showed him property for sale sites in
Years ago when he was working in Frankfurt and I was in
May he always drop in unexpectedly.
A picnic by the lake
The sun on the lake in Le Boulot sparkled with thousands of stars in the middle of the day. Barbara and I were there with P&P, an English/Rhodesian couple, their incredibly beautiful inside and out teenage daughter and her poised and culturally aware friend. Despite one level of maturity they giggled about what to name the gila lizard belly button pin the daughter wore. Gerald was the final decision. In between plans for an art museum there was a discussion on what to wear on their dates with French local boys that night. The dichotomy reminded me of my daughter’s musical taste at their age. I would pass her room and hear first Duran-Duran, then Cats then Bach.
Isa is home and better
Walking slowly from our parking place near the river to our homes (parking on narrow streets built in the 1400s is not possible), Barbara and I wondered if Isa was home from the hospital. She and her husband Greg run a business where he is a technician for stage performances and she had a small elephant, Goran, then promptly ended up back in the hospital with an infection.
This is a lovely young French couple who have the courage to live life on their terms. Because they rennovated a house, I have a great deal of empathy, having done the same with Susan and Bill on Wigglesworth Street, Boston. When she is stronger, we will go see the baby.
Sunday, August 28, 2005
The end of the pan saga and other misc. stuff
The pan saga is over. The copper pots look so beautiful hanging between the baskets and dried plants from my wooden beams means I am going to keep them. Beauty is one of the criteria that I buy things. Sabrina, the antique dealer is on the outlook for someone to reline them and also for tin-lined copper pots.
Cooking strike – despite a surfeit of pots, I have had no desire to cook this weekend. Except for fruit, nothing to eat is in the house – except for fresh fruit. I ate at Les Flowers last night: magret de canard in a Banyuls sauce and resisted licking my plate. La Noisette served me a Scottish breakfast, scrambled eggs with smoked salmon. Pizza tonight. One of the delights of living alone is that meals can be eaten whenever I want with whatever I want. Most of the time when I do cook, I lay the table so it looks wonderful improving my meal. Like my mother, I sometimes read old Gourmet magazines with my meal.
Franck, the owner of La Noisette, is looking frazzled. The end of the season, the end of his wife’s pregnancy, his mother-in-law from India staying and helping are all are taking their toll. If the waitress Sophie can open the next two Mondays, he’ll stay open. If not he’ll begin the off-season schedule of closing Sunday afternoons and all day Monday.
Barbara will be able to walk up the stairs to share a pizza as we watch the Sunday US and British political talk shows. The French ones seem to have been suspended for the summer.
The only thing I want to buy except for food between now and the end of the year is a raincoat, but only if I pass one in a store window.
Isabel is due home tomorrow. She is a French neighbor. Her husband, a historian, gave up teaching to do technical lighting for the theatre. She is the business end. They have renovated a house and she just had a baby or a small elephant. Between the size and the fact he wanted to come out rear end first, they took him by caesarian. Worn out, Isabel fell victim to an infection and spent the last week back in the hospital. Sister-in-law and best friend Valerie who also gave up teaching to start her own business, lives with the couple in the four-story house. Meanwhile Goran is contentedly eating and sleeping. There is something wonderful about seeing young people refusing to do what they dislike for things that they love. They also organize the theatre festival that I wrote about earlier.
The markets are awash in fresh figs that fall apart in sweetness in my mouth. It is hard to believe anything that good was good for you. However I went to my favourite nutrional web site http://www.nal.usda.gov/fnic/cgi-bin/nut_search.pl However, it doesn’t diminish my desire for chocolate.
Speaking of chocolate a truck loaded with chocolate syrup caught fire and the smell of burning chocolate conjured up images of chocolate delights anywhere in the region where the winds carried the smell.
Christina, the hotel and art studio owner, has gone to Denmark for a week. She has given me the key to her house and I have an open invitation to sit on her terrace over the atelier where the artists work anytime I want.
This afternoon I will write. Life is good.
Cooking strike – despite a surfeit of pots, I have had no desire to cook this weekend. Except for fruit, nothing to eat is in the house – except for fresh fruit. I ate at Les Flowers last night: magret de canard in a Banyuls sauce and resisted licking my plate. La Noisette served me a Scottish breakfast, scrambled eggs with smoked salmon. Pizza tonight. One of the delights of living alone is that meals can be eaten whenever I want with whatever I want. Most of the time when I do cook, I lay the table so it looks wonderful improving my meal. Like my mother, I sometimes read old Gourmet magazines with my meal.
Franck, the owner of La Noisette, is looking frazzled. The end of the season, the end of his wife’s pregnancy, his mother-in-law from India staying and helping are all are taking their toll. If the waitress Sophie can open the next two Mondays, he’ll stay open. If not he’ll begin the off-season schedule of closing Sunday afternoons and all day Monday.
Barbara will be able to walk up the stairs to share a pizza as we watch the Sunday US and British political talk shows. The French ones seem to have been suspended for the summer.
The only thing I want to buy except for food between now and the end of the year is a raincoat, but only if I pass one in a store window.
Isabel is due home tomorrow. She is a French neighbor. Her husband, a historian, gave up teaching to do technical lighting for the theatre. She is the business end. They have renovated a house and she just had a baby or a small elephant. Between the size and the fact he wanted to come out rear end first, they took him by caesarian. Worn out, Isabel fell victim to an infection and spent the last week back in the hospital. Sister-in-law and best friend Valerie who also gave up teaching to start her own business, lives with the couple in the four-story house. Meanwhile Goran is contentedly eating and sleeping. There is something wonderful about seeing young people refusing to do what they dislike for things that they love. They also organize the theatre festival that I wrote about earlier.
The markets are awash in fresh figs that fall apart in sweetness in my mouth. It is hard to believe anything that good was good for you. However I went to my favourite nutrional web site http://www.nal.usda.gov/fnic/cgi-bin/nut_search.pl However, it doesn’t diminish my desire for chocolate.
Speaking of chocolate a truck loaded with chocolate syrup caught fire and the smell of burning chocolate conjured up images of chocolate delights anywhere in the region where the winds carried the smell.
Christina, the hotel and art studio owner, has gone to Denmark for a week. She has given me the key to her house and I have an open invitation to sit on her terrace over the atelier where the artists work anytime I want.
This afternoon I will write. Life is good.
Saturday, August 27, 2005
The fry pan saga goes on
Walking by the Vieux Cinema Sabrina came out to tell me she has found a set of copper pans. They are beautiful and I bought them even though they are unlined.
A check of the internet on healthy cooking alternatives show that using unlined copper pans is not good. I already knew that Teflon was unhealthy as is aluminum.
http://www.islamonline.net/english/science/2003/09/article18.shtml
Now I need to find a place to reline my pans.
However they look wonderful hanging there. If I can’t find a place to reline them, I will have to return them.
Meanwhile I have given the extra fry pan and pot away.
Somehow I feel a bit ridiculous about this whole thing. Once my mother was playing golf. She was in the middle of a divorce, trying to get a business going, worried about my almost hype active brother and worried about her off and on gall bladder problems. Her partner Marion was in a funk. "What's wrong?"my mother asked.
Marion sighed deeply. "I really can't sleep at night until I solve this."
"Maybe I can help," my mother said.
"I don't know if I should buy a new mink coat or not this year."
There are problems and problems.
A check of the internet on healthy cooking alternatives show that using unlined copper pans is not good. I already knew that Teflon was unhealthy as is aluminum.
http://www.islamonline.net/english/science/2003/09/article18.shtml
Now I need to find a place to reline my pans.
However they look wonderful hanging there. If I can’t find a place to reline them, I will have to return them.
Meanwhile I have given the extra fry pan and pot away.
Somehow I feel a bit ridiculous about this whole thing. Once my mother was playing golf. She was in the middle of a divorce, trying to get a business going, worried about my almost hype active brother and worried about her off and on gall bladder problems. Her partner Marion was in a funk. "What's wrong?"my mother asked.
Marion sighed deeply. "I really can't sleep at night until I solve this."
"Maybe I can help," my mother said.
"I don't know if I should buy a new mink coat or not this year."
There are problems and problems.
Friday, August 26, 2005
Two fry pans
When I wandered into the antique store I found a tin-lined copper fry pan. Having been unhappy with my two enamel lined pots and one enamel fry pan (I only own four cooking vessels, five if you count a pie plate and that serves me to make meals for myself and guests with absolutely no problem whatsoever) for a long time, I grabbed it. It is my goal now to replace each with copper and tin as I come across them. However, I haven’t thrown out the old one. I am 98% sure I will never use the old one again.
Today I went to A 10 BAL, a local store where all items are under 10 Euros (bal) to buy nails so the new and old pan could hang on the beam that runs the length of my flat. The other fry pan is pretty, one of my three criteria on keeping something. Only after I left did I realize that I was short changed 10 Euros.
In the great cosmic universe, I suppose there is nothing wrong with having one extra pan, but I can’t help but believe only half kiddingly that the 10 Euro loss were a punishment for allowing an extra possession to creep into my household.
Then as if the universe was reinforcing the message when I checked alternet.org http://alternet.org/mediaculture/24545/ there was an interview with a psychiatrist who wrote American Mania, that “urges Americans to stop our endless quest of accumulation unless we want to witness a mass psychological and economic meltdown.”
I don’t think I will meltdown because of an extra fry pan. I don’t believe my financial life is threatened, but having that extra fry pan is annoying.
If I haven’t used it by the time I leave for Geneva, it goes out, probably to the kids downstairs who have nothing, not out of philosophical believe, but out of youth and poorness.
Today a fry pan, tomorrow an extra dish, then before I know it, my flat is full. Since I cleaned out my mother’s house after she died, I made the decision that when my daughter has to clean up my possessions, she will be able to do it in a morning with plenty of time to drink tea as she does it. Then again, she may never clean out this place choosing to rent it.
And when there are so many real problems in the world, worrying about an extra fry pan is probably not important, but since I can't stop pollution or the war, a fry pan is controllable.
On verra as they say. On verra with the fry pan too.
Today I went to A 10 BAL, a local store where all items are under 10 Euros (bal) to buy nails so the new and old pan could hang on the beam that runs the length of my flat. The other fry pan is pretty, one of my three criteria on keeping something. Only after I left did I realize that I was short changed 10 Euros.
In the great cosmic universe, I suppose there is nothing wrong with having one extra pan, but I can’t help but believe only half kiddingly that the 10 Euro loss were a punishment for allowing an extra possession to creep into my household.
Then as if the universe was reinforcing the message when I checked alternet.org http://alternet.org/mediaculture/24545/ there was an interview with a psychiatrist who wrote American Mania, that “urges Americans to stop our endless quest of accumulation unless we want to witness a mass psychological and economic meltdown.”
I don’t think I will meltdown because of an extra fry pan. I don’t believe my financial life is threatened, but having that extra fry pan is annoying.
If I haven’t used it by the time I leave for Geneva, it goes out, probably to the kids downstairs who have nothing, not out of philosophical believe, but out of youth and poorness.
Today a fry pan, tomorrow an extra dish, then before I know it, my flat is full. Since I cleaned out my mother’s house after she died, I made the decision that when my daughter has to clean up my possessions, she will be able to do it in a morning with plenty of time to drink tea as she does it. Then again, she may never clean out this place choosing to rent it.
And when there are so many real problems in the world, worrying about an extra fry pan is probably not important, but since I can't stop pollution or the war, a fry pan is controllable.
On verra as they say. On verra with the fry pan too.
Summer is winding down
People are getting in their last beach trip before they leave this weekend.
The merchants are glassy-eyed having been open 7/7 since mid-June. Soon the stores will close Sunday afternoon until Tuesday mornings as well as for their three-hour siesta at noon.
Local children shop for their new book bags, pencil cases, pens and notebooks, which they show to the tourist children. Their voices from the street below float through my window as I write.
The teachers from St. Etienne are packing up, but this year they are leaving their daughter who is “reading” elementary education at Perpignan University. She will live in their house all year. She learned English-English so she reads a subject rather than studies it.
The first squash has appeared in the green grocers, although there are still plenty of summer fruits. I await the walnuts, kaki fruit and pumpkin.
The sun no longer shines from 5:00-22:00 as in June, and the street dances always need the lamplights when they start at 21:00.
The newspaper says the sanglier hunt is about to start. Last year over 7000 boars were shot in the region. The man who sells saucisson will be able to replenish his supply of sanglier saucisson. The year I lived in Toulouse, the butcher at Christmas had a boar hanging from a peg outside his shop. Each day there was less as locals chose the section they wanted for the Christmas dinner.
When the vendage will start is being debated. Some of the smaller green grapes are almost ready, but the red need a couple of more weeks, although when I passed a vineyard they hung heavy on the vine. They looked ripe to me, but what do I know? I am a city girl at heart.
In September there will be another smaller group of tourists, older people, who no longer have children in school.
I am getting calls and emails asking when I’ll be back in Geneva. It depends on my last round of guests. Although I wrote a lot this summer, I find myself thinking of my winter writing schedule, my writing friends, walking along Lake Lehman, filet des perches, and a fondue at the Café du Soleil, the chestnut stand near the Gare Cornavin.
Summer is winding down.
The merchants are glassy-eyed having been open 7/7 since mid-June. Soon the stores will close Sunday afternoon until Tuesday mornings as well as for their three-hour siesta at noon.
Local children shop for their new book bags, pencil cases, pens and notebooks, which they show to the tourist children. Their voices from the street below float through my window as I write.
The teachers from St. Etienne are packing up, but this year they are leaving their daughter who is “reading” elementary education at Perpignan University. She will live in their house all year. She learned English-English so she reads a subject rather than studies it.
The first squash has appeared in the green grocers, although there are still plenty of summer fruits. I await the walnuts, kaki fruit and pumpkin.
The sun no longer shines from 5:00-22:00 as in June, and the street dances always need the lamplights when they start at 21:00.
The newspaper says the sanglier hunt is about to start. Last year over 7000 boars were shot in the region. The man who sells saucisson will be able to replenish his supply of sanglier saucisson. The year I lived in Toulouse, the butcher at Christmas had a boar hanging from a peg outside his shop. Each day there was less as locals chose the section they wanted for the Christmas dinner.
When the vendage will start is being debated. Some of the smaller green grapes are almost ready, but the red need a couple of more weeks, although when I passed a vineyard they hung heavy on the vine. They looked ripe to me, but what do I know? I am a city girl at heart.
In September there will be another smaller group of tourists, older people, who no longer have children in school.
I am getting calls and emails asking when I’ll be back in Geneva. It depends on my last round of guests. Although I wrote a lot this summer, I find myself thinking of my winter writing schedule, my writing friends, walking along Lake Lehman, filet des perches, and a fondue at the Café du Soleil, the chestnut stand near the Gare Cornavin.
Summer is winding down.
Thursday, August 25, 2005
Barbara's back -- a neighborhood affair
Valerie, who sells hand painted T-shirts through Barbara’s shop, shows up to hang some of the higher things, although she is occupied with Isabelle, her sister-in-law and best friend, who has had a hard time delivering her son, Goran. Isabelle has been put back in the hospital and Valerie does what she can to help out running back and forth between the needy women.
Valerie’s father, an osteopath, has come to check her out as a courtesy, not as a fee-paid trip, although doctors do make house calls here for approximately $40.
Chris, the London set-designer, who has his second home (he thinks it is his first) is fixing her mattress with a board under it. He is also there to lift what she can’t or hang things when Valerie can’t show up. Chris is down here on a painting commission.
I have watched the store until boredom has driven Barbara downstairs from where she lives over the shop.
Rosella, the potter, also has offered to help where she can.
Dani, the fishmonger, provides humour. Almost as wide as she is tall, she was convinced that Barbara came back to Argelès late because of a fiancé. She asked if Barbara had been too sexually active with the fiancé that must be hidden away.
Hopefully Barbara's back will be better soon. Meanwhile everyone in the neighborhood is here to do what they can. Afterall we are coming up to the end of the tourist season, and no one can afford to close down.
Valerie’s father, an osteopath, has come to check her out as a courtesy, not as a fee-paid trip, although doctors do make house calls here for approximately $40.
Chris, the London set-designer, who has his second home (he thinks it is his first) is fixing her mattress with a board under it. He is also there to lift what she can’t or hang things when Valerie can’t show up. Chris is down here on a painting commission.
I have watched the store until boredom has driven Barbara downstairs from where she lives over the shop.
Rosella, the potter, also has offered to help where she can.
Dani, the fishmonger, provides humour. Almost as wide as she is tall, she was convinced that Barbara came back to Argelès late because of a fiancé. She asked if Barbara had been too sexually active with the fiancé that must be hidden away.
Hopefully Barbara's back will be better soon. Meanwhile everyone in the neighborhood is here to do what they can. Afterall we are coming up to the end of the tourist season, and no one can afford to close down.
Chavez vs. Robertson
Pat Robertson has apologized to Chavez, who is talking about making oil available to America’s poor, more for the publicity I am sure. Robertson recommended Chavez's assassination.
I have a far greater respect for Chavez than Robertson. Chavez is seen as a threat because he wants his country free of American domination. He professes that the resources of his country should go to his people not stockholders in America. Unlike previous rulers, money does filter down. His poor are now better fed, better educated and have more access to medical care, although their situations are still desperate. He is crawling the walk as well as talking the talk.
CNN International did a program this week on many of America’s covert actions in Latin America, giving credence to our illegal activities. Often when I mention them to Americans they don’t believe me. That they are making their way into mainstream media is optomistic.
As for Robertson, good Christians, don’t push for murder. Religious fanatics do, and I see little difference between Robertson and the clerics who are now being ejected from Britain because they talk about assassinations and murder.
If there is a God or Gods, if they are good and justice, they must smile more on Chavez who actually support the poor as well as the rich than any religious fanatic that condones death and destruction be they Christian, Moslem or Jew.
Meanwhile my daughter buys Citgo as I would if I were in the US. Citgo is the Venezualan oil company.
I have a far greater respect for Chavez than Robertson. Chavez is seen as a threat because he wants his country free of American domination. He professes that the resources of his country should go to his people not stockholders in America. Unlike previous rulers, money does filter down. His poor are now better fed, better educated and have more access to medical care, although their situations are still desperate. He is crawling the walk as well as talking the talk.
CNN International did a program this week on many of America’s covert actions in Latin America, giving credence to our illegal activities. Often when I mention them to Americans they don’t believe me. That they are making their way into mainstream media is optomistic.
As for Robertson, good Christians, don’t push for murder. Religious fanatics do, and I see little difference between Robertson and the clerics who are now being ejected from Britain because they talk about assassinations and murder.
If there is a God or Gods, if they are good and justice, they must smile more on Chavez who actually support the poor as well as the rich than any religious fanatic that condones death and destruction be they Christian, Moslem or Jew.
Meanwhile my daughter buys Citgo as I would if I were in the US. Citgo is the Venezualan oil company.
Monday, August 22, 2005
Dinner at Magali's
Magali, the artist whose work now dominates my flat, included my New York guest Rose along with her dinner invitation to Barbara and me.
She also added her artist/sociologist friend Brigitte and her historian/Cathar/anarchist husband Serge.
We had planned to eat in her garden which overlooks marsh grass leading to sea. The Tramontane put an end to that unless we would have wanted to hold down everything in the gale-force winds.
Her house is tiny and was dominated by the table set with square glass plates. Candles provided the light and African music the background.
The food was Mideastern a tribute to her growing up in Morocco.
Magali’s daughter, Sarah adopts strays. Therefore Hubert, a teenage boy who sleeps in a tent in the garden and his fluffy pup with its patchwork grey and black fur welcomed us. Hubert helped cook. The pup’s responsibility was to sit in laps. Charlotte, the Siamese cat, another foundling, shared that job. Later Miriam, another Sarah adoptee, walked in. She was staying there after yet another fight with her mother.
The conversation was lively. As always politics -- American, French, German, English, the war
--was a major part. Serge told of a vignerons uprising in the early 1900s in nearby Narbonne. They wanted tougher standards for the wine. The government sent in troops, but the troops refused to fire on their fellow countrymen and shot into the air. Other artists’ work was discussed.
After the taboli, salads, spiced meat had disappeared, Brigitte cut the multi-plum tarte she had baked. Magali produced a bowl of fresh figs, picked from her tree that afternoon.
Outside the wind howled. Inside things couldn’t be much better.
She also added her artist/sociologist friend Brigitte and her historian/Cathar/anarchist husband Serge.
We had planned to eat in her garden which overlooks marsh grass leading to sea. The Tramontane put an end to that unless we would have wanted to hold down everything in the gale-force winds.
Her house is tiny and was dominated by the table set with square glass plates. Candles provided the light and African music the background.
The food was Mideastern a tribute to her growing up in Morocco.
Magali’s daughter, Sarah adopts strays. Therefore Hubert, a teenage boy who sleeps in a tent in the garden and his fluffy pup with its patchwork grey and black fur welcomed us. Hubert helped cook. The pup’s responsibility was to sit in laps. Charlotte, the Siamese cat, another foundling, shared that job. Later Miriam, another Sarah adoptee, walked in. She was staying there after yet another fight with her mother.
The conversation was lively. As always politics -- American, French, German, English, the war
--was a major part. Serge told of a vignerons uprising in the early 1900s in nearby Narbonne. They wanted tougher standards for the wine. The government sent in troops, but the troops refused to fire on their fellow countrymen and shot into the air. Other artists’ work was discussed.
After the taboli, salads, spiced meat had disappeared, Brigitte cut the multi-plum tarte she had baked. Magali produced a bowl of fresh figs, picked from her tree that afternoon.
Outside the wind howled. Inside things couldn’t be much better.
Saturday, August 20, 2005
What Makes a Friend
This week a former business acquaintance and current friend has been visiting me in my nest. Now for two women to share a small space should be a challenge, but this certainly isn’t. This woman is a five-star guest in terms of consideration, humor, helpfulness and fun.
As we talk we discover – despite being raised in different places, different religions – our similarities are frightening similar. She describes a poster she has in her kitchen: I had it in my Geneva kitchen. Both our fathers, born around holidays, never had a birthday party except for a surprise given within a short time of their deaths.
For me, it is always a pleasure to share the things I love, so we walk to the beach, visit the goat farm, head for a restaurant in the mountains. We meet up with my friends, do the almost obligatory café sits, check out the marché and just enjoy being. We look at the cemetery, not because we are morbid, but it is one way to look at cultural differences.
She has said if the space gets too tight she will be happy to go to the hotel down the street, but I doubt that it will be needed. Instead we’re having a prolonged pajama party interspersed with daily activities that I find much more fun than any sleep over I experienced as a kid. Maybe because over the years we’ve developed so much more to share than we had as teenagers.
As we talk we discover – despite being raised in different places, different religions – our similarities are frightening similar. She describes a poster she has in her kitchen: I had it in my Geneva kitchen. Both our fathers, born around holidays, never had a birthday party except for a surprise given within a short time of their deaths.
For me, it is always a pleasure to share the things I love, so we walk to the beach, visit the goat farm, head for a restaurant in the mountains. We meet up with my friends, do the almost obligatory café sits, check out the marché and just enjoy being. We look at the cemetery, not because we are morbid, but it is one way to look at cultural differences.
She has said if the space gets too tight she will be happy to go to the hotel down the street, but I doubt that it will be needed. Instead we’re having a prolonged pajama party interspersed with daily activities that I find much more fun than any sleep over I experienced as a kid. Maybe because over the years we’ve developed so much more to share than we had as teenagers.
Monday, August 15, 2005
Jazz on a summer evening
« Je ne veux pas travailler. Je ne veux pas déjenuer » the jazz singer sang as she and her key board accompanist entertained the small group at La Noisette. Franck had added tables across the street going up to the church door. He wove in between the tables on both sides delivering sangria, kir royals and beer. In between orders he sat on the church steps and listened.
Usually he closes at night, but decided to try this out. It was informal. There was a breeze that broke the heat of the day. People came and listened for a while, and left. More people arrived.
Franck’s very pregnant wife and partner, Louise, arrived. Her mother has come from England to help out until and after the baby is born. Even if we hadn’t been introduced we would know they were mother and daughter.
It was nothing major, just a pleasant couple of hours with good music and good neighbors.
Usually he closes at night, but decided to try this out. It was informal. There was a breeze that broke the heat of the day. People came and listened for a while, and left. More people arrived.
Franck’s very pregnant wife and partner, Louise, arrived. Her mother has come from England to help out until and after the baby is born. Even if we hadn’t been introduced we would know they were mother and daughter.
It was nothing major, just a pleasant couple of hours with good music and good neighbors.
The smell of bean
The refrigerators were defrosted leaving room for more goat. Barbara and I headed for the goat cheese farm run by the Dutch couple. We sat under the trees at their trees-shaded wooden table drinking a beer. Their two cats and dog waiting to be patted.
“Do you want some legumes too?” the wife asked. We often speak in franglais.
We walked to the back land where a small farm of vegetables stood in weedless dirt and perfectly lined up by catagory. With a knife we hacked Swiss chard and a cabbage that filled one basket. We picked beans, carrots, tomatoes and onions.
The only garden I’ve had in the past three decades has been a small box with herbs on my Swiss balcony (I called it my “back forty”—forty inches not acres), but this French garden brought back the pleasure of our Victory Garden on the Fenway. After work (when the Red Sox weren’t playing because parking was impossible on those nights) we would go over, weed and admire our growing crops. My daughter was still little and we would play games like “I packed a trunk and in it was an apple.”
When I was at Glamorgan University doing my masters in creative writing, Lynne Reese, a poet wrote about the smell of bean on a hot day. The Dutch woman broke off two extra long beans from Indonesian seeds, she said. Barbara and I each inhaled the warm bean smell, broke it in half and bit into it.
Simple foods, simple pleasures.
“Do you want some legumes too?” the wife asked. We often speak in franglais.
We walked to the back land where a small farm of vegetables stood in weedless dirt and perfectly lined up by catagory. With a knife we hacked Swiss chard and a cabbage that filled one basket. We picked beans, carrots, tomatoes and onions.
The only garden I’ve had in the past three decades has been a small box with herbs on my Swiss balcony (I called it my “back forty”—forty inches not acres), but this French garden brought back the pleasure of our Victory Garden on the Fenway. After work (when the Red Sox weren’t playing because parking was impossible on those nights) we would go over, weed and admire our growing crops. My daughter was still little and we would play games like “I packed a trunk and in it was an apple.”
When I was at Glamorgan University doing my masters in creative writing, Lynne Reese, a poet wrote about the smell of bean on a hot day. The Dutch woman broke off two extra long beans from Indonesian seeds, she said. Barbara and I each inhaled the warm bean smell, broke it in half and bit into it.
Simple foods, simple pleasures.
Sunday, August 14, 2005
Cindy Sheehan Bless You
In Texas a woman is saying what our alleged national leaders on both sides of the aisle should have been saying for years. Cindy Sheehan questions an illegal, immoral war. Bush drove by her to meet donors, but she is donor. She donated her son.
It is refreshing to see guts shown by someone. Now it it were only from our mealy mouthed leaders, Cindy Sheehan could go home.
It is refreshing to see guts shown by someone. Now it it were only from our mealy mouthed leaders, Cindy Sheehan could go home.
Gas Guzzling Tirade
From Will Lester of AP
‘WASHINGTON More people are feeling record-high gas prices soon will have their wallets running on empty.Almost two-thirds of those surveyed for an AP-AOL poll expect fuel costs will cause them financial hardship in coming months. That’s sharply higher than in April, when about half felt that way.
“I filled up last Monday and it cost me $53,” said Gary Spaulding of Fulton, N.Y., referring to his Ford Explorer. “One of the cars, we’re going to get rid of. We can’t afford both of them.”’
_________________________________________________________________
Suffer baby suffer. Everyone driving a big car that isn’t as fuel efficient as they possibly can afford is killing the planet and is contributing to the deaths of those in Iraq on both sides. Let ‘em go bankrupt.
Yes I am angry. Yes I am not nice about this. People with gas guzzling cars are being irresponsible to their planet and to every living thing on this planet. Sadly, this includes some of my friends who I still love, but I still think of anyone with an SUV or a fuel inefficient automobile as aiding and abetting death. If each of us does not take responsibility for what we do and thus set examples to others, we are doomed as a species. Maybe this is a good thing. Humans have not been good for planet earth. Humans have not been good for other humans.
‘WASHINGTON More people are feeling record-high gas prices soon will have their wallets running on empty.Almost two-thirds of those surveyed for an AP-AOL poll expect fuel costs will cause them financial hardship in coming months. That’s sharply higher than in April, when about half felt that way.
“I filled up last Monday and it cost me $53,” said Gary Spaulding of Fulton, N.Y., referring to his Ford Explorer. “One of the cars, we’re going to get rid of. We can’t afford both of them.”’
_________________________________________________________________
Suffer baby suffer. Everyone driving a big car that isn’t as fuel efficient as they possibly can afford is killing the planet and is contributing to the deaths of those in Iraq on both sides. Let ‘em go bankrupt.
Yes I am angry. Yes I am not nice about this. People with gas guzzling cars are being irresponsible to their planet and to every living thing on this planet. Sadly, this includes some of my friends who I still love, but I still think of anyone with an SUV or a fuel inefficient automobile as aiding and abetting death. If each of us does not take responsibility for what we do and thus set examples to others, we are doomed as a species. Maybe this is a good thing. Humans have not been good for planet earth. Humans have not been good for other humans.
Friday, August 12, 2005
Marilyn, the moose and other TV observations
When I was five, the smell of popcorn woke me and I toddled downstairs. As usual our living room was full of people watching a flickering black and white television screen, one of the first in my childhood town of Reading.
I had my favorite program, Big Brother Bob Emery http://www.bostonradio.org/essays/big-brother.html where we patriotically toasted the president with a glass of milk, part of the propaganda that I didn’t realize was propaganda until years later when at a Rotary meeting in Boston with my Swiss boyfriend, we started with the pledge of allegiance. Rituals leading to blind patriotism.
When I Love Lucy became popular if I were in my pajamas and all ready to go to bed, I could stay up that extra half hour on Monday night to watch her.
I like TV, especially overseas where I can watch news from several countries. I find it interesting that CNN international has the dramatic sign LONDON ON ALERT when it reports on the fall out while the BBC gives it far less emphasis in its matter-of-fact style. France covers it with a mention of the expulsion of some of the radicals, one of whom was interviewed the other night on BBC's Hardtalk.
American series can dominate. There was a period that almost every country was showing Friends. However, Mash was never shown.
I had left the states when Northern Exposure became popular. Visiting Boston I saw it, loved it, and my friend Bill taped many episodes for my next trip. (He and I indulged in mega marathons of West Wing on my last two visits.) Since I thought NE was one of the better series that the US had produced I never understood why it wasn’t picked up by the international networks.
My daughter bought be a NE DVD. However, I have discovered that the series channel shows three NE episodes back to back in English on Thursdays nights and even better than the original the only commercial interruption is between episodes. So now I can watch Marilyn and the Moose.
I had my favorite program, Big Brother Bob Emery http://www.bostonradio.org/essays/big-brother.html where we patriotically toasted the president with a glass of milk, part of the propaganda that I didn’t realize was propaganda until years later when at a Rotary meeting in Boston with my Swiss boyfriend, we started with the pledge of allegiance. Rituals leading to blind patriotism.
When I Love Lucy became popular if I were in my pajamas and all ready to go to bed, I could stay up that extra half hour on Monday night to watch her.
I like TV, especially overseas where I can watch news from several countries. I find it interesting that CNN international has the dramatic sign LONDON ON ALERT when it reports on the fall out while the BBC gives it far less emphasis in its matter-of-fact style. France covers it with a mention of the expulsion of some of the radicals, one of whom was interviewed the other night on BBC's Hardtalk.
American series can dominate. There was a period that almost every country was showing Friends. However, Mash was never shown.
I had left the states when Northern Exposure became popular. Visiting Boston I saw it, loved it, and my friend Bill taped many episodes for my next trip. (He and I indulged in mega marathons of West Wing on my last two visits.) Since I thought NE was one of the better series that the US had produced I never understood why it wasn’t picked up by the international networks.
My daughter bought be a NE DVD. However, I have discovered that the series channel shows three NE episodes back to back in English on Thursdays nights and even better than the original the only commercial interruption is between episodes. So now I can watch Marilyn and the Moose.
Tuesday, August 09, 2005
Monbiot says it for me
“I don't hate Britain, and I am not ashamed of my nationality, but I have no idea why I should love this country more than any other. There are some things I like about it and some things I don't, and the same goes for everywhere else I've visited. To become a patriot is to lie to yourself, to tell yourself that whatever good you might perceive abroad, your own country is, on balance, better than the others. It is impossible to reconcile this with either the evidence of your own eyes or a belief in the equality of humankind. Patriotism of the kind Orwell demanded in 1940 is necessary only to confront the patriotism of other people: the second world war, which demanded that the British close ranks, could not have happened if Hitler hadn't exploited the national allegiance of the Germans. The world will be a happier and safer place when we stop putting our own countries first.”
George Monbiot summed it up well. Blind patriotism is dangerous. I am about to become a Swiss national because I want to be full participant in a country that has done well by me. My roots will always be traditional American or maybe mythic American because more and more I uncover the lies I was taught over the years. However, that does not negate the value of the principles spoken if not lived up to. In many ways I see myself as an international at home more in Switzerland or France than the country of my birth for many reasons, one of the largest being quality of life issues and social responsibilities felt by the society for others. I have equally discovered no place is perfect but it is part of my responsibility to not make it worse.
George Monbiot summed it up well. Blind patriotism is dangerous. I am about to become a Swiss national because I want to be full participant in a country that has done well by me. My roots will always be traditional American or maybe mythic American because more and more I uncover the lies I was taught over the years. However, that does not negate the value of the principles spoken if not lived up to. In many ways I see myself as an international at home more in Switzerland or France than the country of my birth for many reasons, one of the largest being quality of life issues and social responsibilities felt by the society for others. I have equally discovered no place is perfect but it is part of my responsibility to not make it worse.
Monday, August 08, 2005
Another way to have a quiet evening
My needlework was ready. Two good mysteries were on BBC. I settled myself on the couch.
The phone rang.
“It’s Fanny.”
This is the young woman who I consider a French daughter. I first met her when she was an olive-eating three year old. We first communicated in German as she told me her feelings about her parents’ divorce. She tried to teach me French. We’ve shared time in Boston, Payerne CH, Conway NH, Toulouse, Môtiers CH, Geneva, Aix-en-Province, Neuchâtel, Carcassonne and Argelès
Fanny now works in Holland where she lives with her Dutch boyfriend. Besides being a Jacqueline-Kennedy-type beauty she speaks French, Dutch, English, German and has some Italian. She is a whiz in creating web pages.
“I am waiting for a UN contract, I’m going to New York,” she said. We talked for almost an hour of new times ahead for her, of old times.
“I’ll be thirty,” she said, reminding me that twenty-seven years had passed since I met her and over six since she, Robbert and I sat in an Argelès café after she graduated from university and was not having much luck in finding work. “With your languages, you can go anywhere,” he told her and within a month she was working Germany.
We hung up after catching up on our mutual acquaintances. I settled down with my needlework and the next mystery.
“Donna.” Robbert (RB2)’s voice drifted in my window. Auditory hallucination. He was back in Switzerland.
“Donna!”
I looked down the three flights to the street. The auditory hallucination was accompanied by a visual one.
Rb2 had stayed another day. The 23:02 train connecting to the overnight one to Zurich that he took Sunday nights didn’t run Monday nights, a factg he had learned about ten minutes before.
Of course I would drive him to Perpignan to catch his train. We set out for Barbara’s car, only I remembered I didn’t know where it was parked. A quick lap to her house and we found out.
Rb2 made his train with a half hour to spare, although his learning that Fanny was thirty caused him to stop walking. “That was your age when I met you. In fact I gave you a Tex-Mex birthday party shortly after.” Rb2 will be 45 this year.
My quiet evening was different than planned, although it was still quiet. It had a quiet of the soul that only exists when people you love share a bit of themselves.
The phone rang.
“It’s Fanny.”
This is the young woman who I consider a French daughter. I first met her when she was an olive-eating three year old. We first communicated in German as she told me her feelings about her parents’ divorce. She tried to teach me French. We’ve shared time in Boston, Payerne CH, Conway NH, Toulouse, Môtiers CH, Geneva, Aix-en-Province, Neuchâtel, Carcassonne and Argelès
Fanny now works in Holland where she lives with her Dutch boyfriend. Besides being a Jacqueline-Kennedy-type beauty she speaks French, Dutch, English, German and has some Italian. She is a whiz in creating web pages.
“I am waiting for a UN contract, I’m going to New York,” she said. We talked for almost an hour of new times ahead for her, of old times.
“I’ll be thirty,” she said, reminding me that twenty-seven years had passed since I met her and over six since she, Robbert and I sat in an Argelès café after she graduated from university and was not having much luck in finding work. “With your languages, you can go anywhere,” he told her and within a month she was working Germany.
We hung up after catching up on our mutual acquaintances. I settled down with my needlework and the next mystery.
“Donna.” Robbert (RB2)’s voice drifted in my window. Auditory hallucination. He was back in Switzerland.
“Donna!”
I looked down the three flights to the street. The auditory hallucination was accompanied by a visual one.
Rb2 had stayed another day. The 23:02 train connecting to the overnight one to Zurich that he took Sunday nights didn’t run Monday nights, a factg he had learned about ten minutes before.
Of course I would drive him to Perpignan to catch his train. We set out for Barbara’s car, only I remembered I didn’t know where it was parked. A quick lap to her house and we found out.
Rb2 made his train with a half hour to spare, although his learning that Fanny was thirty caused him to stop walking. “That was your age when I met you. In fact I gave you a Tex-Mex birthday party shortly after.” Rb2 will be 45 this year.
My quiet evening was different than planned, although it was still quiet. It had a quiet of the soul that only exists when people you love share a bit of themselves.
The new fan
The fan had appeared in my studio sometime in 1993. People who I loan the flat to often leave me things they think I need in place of the rent I refuse to accept. A place that nourishes my soul should not be a profit base.
The fan stood about as high as I am. This year it became too noisy, and its head drooped like sunflowers that have gone too long between rains. Those who know me understand that I don’t replace or buy easily. I really, really, really need to want something before I buy.
Thus when I passed a new fan on sale for €29.30 while doing errands with Barbara it went into the shopping cart faster than Superman leaping buildings in a single bound (only the direction was down not up).
Some assembly was required. When the talent to put things together was being handed out, I was in the elbow line. After only three attempts, the fan was standing upright and working. I emailed my daughter, who usually gets a list of things to fix when she visits me. She told me to pat myself on the back, but I suspect she figures she will need to do some adjustments next time she is here. She won’t.
Unlike the old fan which took up a lot of space, this one stands hip height, is rectangle and is about six inches square resembling a modern piece of sculpture, far less intrusive in a small space than the old one, which was happily accepted by the young kids living under me. Droopy fans are better than no fans. It works as well. I hope it lasts as long.
The fan stood about as high as I am. This year it became too noisy, and its head drooped like sunflowers that have gone too long between rains. Those who know me understand that I don’t replace or buy easily. I really, really, really need to want something before I buy.
Thus when I passed a new fan on sale for €29.30 while doing errands with Barbara it went into the shopping cart faster than Superman leaping buildings in a single bound (only the direction was down not up).
Some assembly was required. When the talent to put things together was being handed out, I was in the elbow line. After only three attempts, the fan was standing upright and working. I emailed my daughter, who usually gets a list of things to fix when she visits me. She told me to pat myself on the back, but I suspect she figures she will need to do some adjustments next time she is here. She won’t.
Unlike the old fan which took up a lot of space, this one stands hip height, is rectangle and is about six inches square resembling a modern piece of sculpture, far less intrusive in a small space than the old one, which was happily accepted by the young kids living under me. Droopy fans are better than no fans. It works as well. I hope it lasts as long.
Sunday, August 07, 2005
“Billet?” the conductrice demanded in her thick Spanish accent. She stood in front of the steps of car 43 of the Spanish night train to Barcelona and clutched her clipboard.
I knew my print out wouldn’t cut it.
Robbert, RB2, had bought the ticket for me and he still had it with him. He got on in Zurich where he is working and I would get on in Geneva and we would travel together to Perpignan. That was the plan.
Before I could answer or look for RB2 an arm came down over her shoulder. It was Rb2’s and his hand held my ticket.
He showed me my room. Second class sleepers on Spanish trains unlike French have better linen, mattress and limit the number of people to four rather than six. Men and women are separated. RB2 said he was in the next compartment.
“Are you tired?” he asked.
“Not terribly,” I said even if it was 23:30.
“Let’s celebrate your birthday. Late,”
He led me down the ultra clean and carpeted corridors to the dining car and bar. We split a split of Spanish champagne and got caught up on our news only tiptoeing into our compartments when we had exhausted the information we wanted to share.
At 6 we got off in Perpignan, headed for the café across the street for petit dejeuner until the train for Argelès arrived. We found new topics, but why should I be surprised after 15 years of friendship should I ever wonder if we would run out of something to share. As my girl friend says, RB2 is the brother I always wanted to have.
I knew my print out wouldn’t cut it.
Robbert, RB2, had bought the ticket for me and he still had it with him. He got on in Zurich where he is working and I would get on in Geneva and we would travel together to Perpignan. That was the plan.
Before I could answer or look for RB2 an arm came down over her shoulder. It was Rb2’s and his hand held my ticket.
He showed me my room. Second class sleepers on Spanish trains unlike French have better linen, mattress and limit the number of people to four rather than six. Men and women are separated. RB2 said he was in the next compartment.
“Are you tired?” he asked.
“Not terribly,” I said even if it was 23:30.
“Let’s celebrate your birthday. Late,”
He led me down the ultra clean and carpeted corridors to the dining car and bar. We split a split of Spanish champagne and got caught up on our news only tiptoeing into our compartments when we had exhausted the information we wanted to share.
At 6 we got off in Perpignan, headed for the café across the street for petit dejeuner until the train for Argelès arrived. We found new topics, but why should I be surprised after 15 years of friendship should I ever wonder if we would run out of something to share. As my girl friend says, RB2 is the brother I always wanted to have.
Friday, August 05, 2005
The Sunflower
There is a field of some kind of grain near my home in Corsier. Maybe not a grain, but a small beige knob. The plants stand about 18 inches high. Next to the field on one side is cow corna nd on the other are grape vines. In the middle of the field is one very tall sunflower, supervising everything.
Does it feel lonely, being away from other sunflowers, or is it proud to be different? Does it feel rich that when it turns in one direction it has a clear view of the lake, that it could never have if it were stranded in among the millions of sunflowers? Did it bribe the wind last year to carry its seed away from its sisters and brothers? And will it escape being harvested and turned into oil by daring to be different?
Does it feel lonely, being away from other sunflowers, or is it proud to be different? Does it feel rich that when it turns in one direction it has a clear view of the lake, that it could never have if it were stranded in among the millions of sunflowers? Did it bribe the wind last year to carry its seed away from its sisters and brothers? And will it escape being harvested and turned into oil by daring to be different?
Cow update
Earlier I wrote about the cow statues all over Geneva. Now I see a pattern. The cow with the glasses is outside the optomitrists. The silver cow is outside the UBS bank office and the cow with the parts of meat is outside the butcher's. Not all are aligned, but what we have here is corporate cow sponsorship.
Thursday, August 04, 2005
This and That
Today was a mythical day…perfect temperatures, a light breeze…for doing errands around Geneva: insurance, library books, buying new lingerie at H&M at 70% off, walking along the lake, having a hot chocolate Café Auer, dropping a book off for Dennis, etc. Walking along the lakeside, tents are going up for the fête. The water smelled fresh as it raced by.
Fête de Genève…starts tonight. I bet if I walk out my door and look at the lake I will have a great view of the fireworks.
Music camp…coming back from Paris on the TGV train I sat with a group of kids 9-16 going to a holiday camp where they would learn English and Math while doing camp-like things. I sat with two of the teachers. One is a young woman who wants to open a special cultural guided tour business starting with the 100 anniversary celebrations of Cezanne’s birthday in Aix next year. The other was from Uruguay, had lived in the US and was now a Paris art student. Amazingly how fast three hours go when talking with intelligent people. Only once did any of the teachers have to calm the 25 kids on the train.
Terrorist warnings…Last month one group gave us a warning that Denmark, Italy, the UK and Holland would be hit if they didn’t withdraw their troops by August 15th. Today another group warned the US that something big and bad was coming. It will come. There is a feeling that our leaders are doing exactly the wrong things for the wrong reasons. I just hope those I love will not be among the victims. Sadly, everything I predicted would happen in Iraq has happened. To be wrong at times is better than to be right. The fear of things to come hangs heavily.
Cartoon of Uncle Sam with bombs strapped to his body. Each is labelled fossil fuels. The caption is suicide bomber.
New idea…there was an advert in the paper for a flat that I could afford both the down payment and the monthly payment. The flat was huge and the result of a bankruptcy. Although the agent didn’t call me back, it got me thinking that I might be able to buy a studio in Geneva, rent it out part of the year and live in it the rest. Certainly worth looking into after the summer. If it is meant to work, it will. As my daughter said she wouldn’t mind inheriting property in Geneva.
Scare…When Susie and Bill visited Llara there was a mixup on pick ups and S&B were convinced something happened to her. Although it was cleared up Susan wasn’t sure which would be the worse – the pain of losing Llara or having to tell me. Fortunately it was a mixup. When Llara was a kid the only time I was really worried was when there was a misunderstanding of where she was going to be at a certain time. The panic is unbelievable. May all the scares be only misunderstandings.
Lunch...Chitra and I ate at Sagano, a Japanese restaurant we both love. There is a feeling of sneaking away for nice girl talk. She was the one who directed me to the advantages of a Geneva studio as a possible purchase. One of the wonderful thing about friends is throwing ideas around. It stretches the possibilities, dreams shared, examined, etc.
Fête de Genève…starts tonight. I bet if I walk out my door and look at the lake I will have a great view of the fireworks.
Music camp…coming back from Paris on the TGV train I sat with a group of kids 9-16 going to a holiday camp where they would learn English and Math while doing camp-like things. I sat with two of the teachers. One is a young woman who wants to open a special cultural guided tour business starting with the 100 anniversary celebrations of Cezanne’s birthday in Aix next year. The other was from Uruguay, had lived in the US and was now a Paris art student. Amazingly how fast three hours go when talking with intelligent people. Only once did any of the teachers have to calm the 25 kids on the train.
Terrorist warnings…Last month one group gave us a warning that Denmark, Italy, the UK and Holland would be hit if they didn’t withdraw their troops by August 15th. Today another group warned the US that something big and bad was coming. It will come. There is a feeling that our leaders are doing exactly the wrong things for the wrong reasons. I just hope those I love will not be among the victims. Sadly, everything I predicted would happen in Iraq has happened. To be wrong at times is better than to be right. The fear of things to come hangs heavily.
Cartoon of Uncle Sam with bombs strapped to his body. Each is labelled fossil fuels. The caption is suicide bomber.
New idea…there was an advert in the paper for a flat that I could afford both the down payment and the monthly payment. The flat was huge and the result of a bankruptcy. Although the agent didn’t call me back, it got me thinking that I might be able to buy a studio in Geneva, rent it out part of the year and live in it the rest. Certainly worth looking into after the summer. If it is meant to work, it will. As my daughter said she wouldn’t mind inheriting property in Geneva.
Scare…When Susie and Bill visited Llara there was a mixup on pick ups and S&B were convinced something happened to her. Although it was cleared up Susan wasn’t sure which would be the worse – the pain of losing Llara or having to tell me. Fortunately it was a mixup. When Llara was a kid the only time I was really worried was when there was a misunderstanding of where she was going to be at a certain time. The panic is unbelievable. May all the scares be only misunderstandings.
Lunch...Chitra and I ate at Sagano, a Japanese restaurant we both love. There is a feeling of sneaking away for nice girl talk. She was the one who directed me to the advantages of a Geneva studio as a possible purchase. One of the wonderful thing about friends is throwing ideas around. It stretches the possibilities, dreams shared, examined, etc.
Friday, July 29, 2005
Things You Can't Get From A Book
My mother used to say she didn’t need to travel. She could see every thing in a book. She was wrong.
She could have looked at pictures of the Vatican in a book, but she wouldn’t have seen the relation of the tiny country to the rest of the city, felt the texture of the small grey-brown rectangle bricks of its walls, realised that stepping into St. Peter’s Square that it was a circle not a square. Nor would she have had small purple flowers drop into her hair when a gust of wind rippled the trees on a Roman Street outside the Vatican.
Because I was covering a conference, I could only get a smattering of Rome, but that smattering was wonderful. I had wanted to see St. Peter’s and the Sistine Chapel leaving the rest of this city that makes me want to sing as I walk down the street to another time. Where else can you take a walk and come across a 2000 year old cistern for a villa, or a gate that Julius Cesar could have walked through near a modern office building? The new buildings, the flowering trees all gave an ambience not possible to feel, touch, smell and hear from a book.
The sun was blistering, relentless, hot, sizzling…writers are told to not use adjectives and to show not tell. Let me show you about about the heat -- a cherry Popsicle would have had about 1.5 nano seconds of life before being turned into pink steam.
The lines were long going into St. Peter’s. The basilica was impressive, imposing and oppressive all at the same time. The art showed the greatest talents of centuries (I wonder where art would be without the Christian Church). The feeling of power, perhaps more of man than God, was overwhelming.
I was a bit disgruntled to realise that there is €4 Euro charge to enter the church and another €3 to use the elevator. I pictured any pope meeting St. Peter at the gate and charging the newly deceased four euros to enter heaven and another 3 to use the elevator to God’s office or be made to walk up 320 steps. I can see charging for audios, souvenirs, toilets and even non Catholics. I can see asking for a donation forcefully, but if I were Catholic I would resent paying to enter the seat of my religion. I guess I’ve read too much about the humble Cathar Good Men and Good Women roaming the Pyrenees preaching goodness and forsaking all worldly wealth or the Gnostic gospels.
By the time I got to the Sistine Chapel the line was approximately two hours long, at least 75% in the sun. I am not a cherry Popsicle but I pictured myself vanishing in steam. Another trip, off tourist season in cooler weather, I said to myself. Guaranteed. But if I never set foot in that city again, being there was truly a treat that I could never capture in a book. I am truly blessed to have had the experience.
She could have looked at pictures of the Vatican in a book, but she wouldn’t have seen the relation of the tiny country to the rest of the city, felt the texture of the small grey-brown rectangle bricks of its walls, realised that stepping into St. Peter’s Square that it was a circle not a square. Nor would she have had small purple flowers drop into her hair when a gust of wind rippled the trees on a Roman Street outside the Vatican.
Because I was covering a conference, I could only get a smattering of Rome, but that smattering was wonderful. I had wanted to see St. Peter’s and the Sistine Chapel leaving the rest of this city that makes me want to sing as I walk down the street to another time. Where else can you take a walk and come across a 2000 year old cistern for a villa, or a gate that Julius Cesar could have walked through near a modern office building? The new buildings, the flowering trees all gave an ambience not possible to feel, touch, smell and hear from a book.
The sun was blistering, relentless, hot, sizzling…writers are told to not use adjectives and to show not tell. Let me show you about about the heat -- a cherry Popsicle would have had about 1.5 nano seconds of life before being turned into pink steam.
The lines were long going into St. Peter’s. The basilica was impressive, imposing and oppressive all at the same time. The art showed the greatest talents of centuries (I wonder where art would be without the Christian Church). The feeling of power, perhaps more of man than God, was overwhelming.
I was a bit disgruntled to realise that there is €4 Euro charge to enter the church and another €3 to use the elevator. I pictured any pope meeting St. Peter at the gate and charging the newly deceased four euros to enter heaven and another 3 to use the elevator to God’s office or be made to walk up 320 steps. I can see charging for audios, souvenirs, toilets and even non Catholics. I can see asking for a donation forcefully, but if I were Catholic I would resent paying to enter the seat of my religion. I guess I’ve read too much about the humble Cathar Good Men and Good Women roaming the Pyrenees preaching goodness and forsaking all worldly wealth or the Gnostic gospels.
By the time I got to the Sistine Chapel the line was approximately two hours long, at least 75% in the sun. I am not a cherry Popsicle but I pictured myself vanishing in steam. Another trip, off tourist season in cooler weather, I said to myself. Guaranteed. But if I never set foot in that city again, being there was truly a treat that I could never capture in a book. I am truly blessed to have had the experience.
The Professor, The Archeologist and Me
Serendipity…
When I was in Syria, my guide to the ancient city of Ebla was Mohammed Ali (not the fighter). I want to use Ebla as part of a future novel. http://ragz-international.com/ebla.htm Ali put me in touch with the Italian professor who translated most of the cuneiform letters found there. As luck would have it he was spending one day back in Rome between a trip to Chicago to give a paper and his summer holiday at his Sicilian holiday home.
I spent Saturday morning doing pre conference stuff then waited for his phone call. “Can you come to me?” he asked. Of course, I could. I would have walked or crawled for this short cut in my research. However, the taxi ride through flower-decked streets deposited me in front of his home.
He offered me orange juice, moved a fan so I would be cooled and preceded to give me more information that I dreamed possible. I know the names of kings, ministers, intrigues, what people ate, supposition on gender roles. I can now build a plot.
His wife who has her own dig near Ebla, stopped in and we started talking about career choices, passion in work and what we feel we accomplish. The translating professor even though he knows Sumerian, Eblabite, Hittite and other ancient languages, can translate cuneiform etc. does not feel he has accomplished much. Accomplishment, I told him, is often not considered important by those doing it. We think if we can do it, everyone can. It is a trait I find more common in women than in men. His wife agreed with me.
Their flat was huge, large rooms, book-filled of course, antiques, high windows, but the warmth came not from the heat, but their generosity in sharing their knowledge with me, a fiction writer not a scholar, when they were both jet lagged and preparing for a holiday.
When I was in Syria, my guide to the ancient city of Ebla was Mohammed Ali (not the fighter). I want to use Ebla as part of a future novel. http://ragz-international.com/ebla.htm Ali put me in touch with the Italian professor who translated most of the cuneiform letters found there. As luck would have it he was spending one day back in Rome between a trip to Chicago to give a paper and his summer holiday at his Sicilian holiday home.
I spent Saturday morning doing pre conference stuff then waited for his phone call. “Can you come to me?” he asked. Of course, I could. I would have walked or crawled for this short cut in my research. However, the taxi ride through flower-decked streets deposited me in front of his home.
He offered me orange juice, moved a fan so I would be cooled and preceded to give me more information that I dreamed possible. I know the names of kings, ministers, intrigues, what people ate, supposition on gender roles. I can now build a plot.
His wife who has her own dig near Ebla, stopped in and we started talking about career choices, passion in work and what we feel we accomplish. The translating professor even though he knows Sumerian, Eblabite, Hittite and other ancient languages, can translate cuneiform etc. does not feel he has accomplished much. Accomplishment, I told him, is often not considered important by those doing it. We think if we can do it, everyone can. It is a trait I find more common in women than in men. His wife agreed with me.
Their flat was huge, large rooms, book-filled of course, antiques, high windows, but the warmth came not from the heat, but their generosity in sharing their knowledge with me, a fiction writer not a scholar, when they were both jet lagged and preparing for a holiday.
Finding a Photographer in Rome
“You want a photographer?” As I hung up the phone from talking to my editor, I wondered how the hell was I going to pull that off. It was Friday night, later, in July and in Italy where people are at the seaside leaving Rome to the tourists and people like me who cover conferences.
Early Saturday one of the desk staff at my hotel handed me a phone book and told me the word for photographer. I called and called and left messages on answering machines in English. No one called back. I doubt if anyone understood me.
At the conference hotel, different from where I was staying, I asked Markus one of the concierges for help. He was young, his scalp covered in light red stubble similar to a five o’clock shadow in the wrong place. I watched him sort out lost luggage, booking for a guided tour, a doctor with nary a blink of his grey eyes which crossed when I told him what I wanted. But only for a second. "We will try madame, but..."
"I understand."
“How many of the requirements can we be flexible on?” he asked.
“The credit card and English.” I knew I could go to the ATM machine (I was wrong because for some reason my card didn’t work, although it did when I get back leaving me almost cashless for the remainder of the trip).
After close to 22 calls he found my guy, but not for Sunday night but Monday, when Luigi, the photograph (LEP) returned to the city from the beach. He said he was going back after he finished with me.
I met him at 11:30 Monday. He was a short man, grey-haired, dressed in a black suit that did not look as if he had been outside in the heat (maybe he changed in the men’s room). He reminded me of Allan, a man I almost married years ago. Allan was a good man. LEP was a good photographer and maybe a good man.
He had bustle down to a science.
We rushed around taking as many people as possible. I wanted both the names and the non-names among the attendees. LEP knew the hotel back and forward and we took so many shortcuts through the bowels of the building that I was almost on a first name basis with the cooks and laundress. I wore a pedometer that day and before I gave it back to the owner, I had logged just over 7 miles.
I gave my initial instructions using Markus as a translator. From then on we resorted to hand motions. I learned melori (better, but don’t count on my spelling). He learned closer. “Perfecto” worked for both of us. He laughed each time he called me Signora Donna, which is a little like saying Lady, Lady or Mrs. Lady. His eye was that of an artist, and many of the shots weren’t news worthy but were beautiful.
We finished and he took my hand, not to kiss, but to point out that he would be back in half an hour with my CD-ROM. He was. A half an hour after that photos were at my paper.
I walked upstairs, wrote a note to the Markus' manager that I thought Markus walked on water. Whether there are stones under the surface for his feet didn't matter.
Early Saturday one of the desk staff at my hotel handed me a phone book and told me the word for photographer. I called and called and left messages on answering machines in English. No one called back. I doubt if anyone understood me.
At the conference hotel, different from where I was staying, I asked Markus one of the concierges for help. He was young, his scalp covered in light red stubble similar to a five o’clock shadow in the wrong place. I watched him sort out lost luggage, booking for a guided tour, a doctor with nary a blink of his grey eyes which crossed when I told him what I wanted. But only for a second. "We will try madame, but..."
"I understand."
“How many of the requirements can we be flexible on?” he asked.
“The credit card and English.” I knew I could go to the ATM machine (I was wrong because for some reason my card didn’t work, although it did when I get back leaving me almost cashless for the remainder of the trip).
After close to 22 calls he found my guy, but not for Sunday night but Monday, when Luigi, the photograph (LEP) returned to the city from the beach. He said he was going back after he finished with me.
I met him at 11:30 Monday. He was a short man, grey-haired, dressed in a black suit that did not look as if he had been outside in the heat (maybe he changed in the men’s room). He reminded me of Allan, a man I almost married years ago. Allan was a good man. LEP was a good photographer and maybe a good man.
He had bustle down to a science.
We rushed around taking as many people as possible. I wanted both the names and the non-names among the attendees. LEP knew the hotel back and forward and we took so many shortcuts through the bowels of the building that I was almost on a first name basis with the cooks and laundress. I wore a pedometer that day and before I gave it back to the owner, I had logged just over 7 miles.
I gave my initial instructions using Markus as a translator. From then on we resorted to hand motions. I learned melori (better, but don’t count on my spelling). He learned closer. “Perfecto” worked for both of us. He laughed each time he called me Signora Donna, which is a little like saying Lady, Lady or Mrs. Lady. His eye was that of an artist, and many of the shots weren’t news worthy but were beautiful.
We finished and he took my hand, not to kiss, but to point out that he would be back in half an hour with my CD-ROM. He was. A half an hour after that photos were at my paper.
I walked upstairs, wrote a note to the Markus' manager that I thought Markus walked on water. Whether there are stones under the surface for his feet didn't matter.
Carlo the Driver
Carl strutted into the hotel lobby to whisk me to the airport. He looked like a refuge from the French image of an Italian in a film. Slim but with well-shaped body and butt in jeans, a blue shirt opened to reveal a gold medal nestled in manly chest hair. Black hair, slicked back from his chiselled cheek bones ended in curls around his collar.
Because it was fixed price and I wasn’t rushed, he undertook a mini tour of the city showing me the catacombs, different ruins and famous streets. In his broken English I learned he was from the heel of Italy, he works seven days a week ten months a year, pays €600 for his room, is self-taught in English. He gave me cards for other trips and to give to my friends. This is his business and he opens a shop at night.
When he wrote out the receipt he offered to double the amount. I said no. “You are different,” he said. I don’t want to think dishonesty is different even if they are two “d” words.
Because it was fixed price and I wasn’t rushed, he undertook a mini tour of the city showing me the catacombs, different ruins and famous streets. In his broken English I learned he was from the heel of Italy, he works seven days a week ten months a year, pays €600 for his room, is self-taught in English. He gave me cards for other trips and to give to my friends. This is his business and he opens a shop at night.
When he wrote out the receipt he offered to double the amount. I said no. “You are different,” he said. I don’t want to think dishonesty is different even if they are two “d” words.
Accents
In Rome I experimented with simple Italian phrases. I was repeatedly told I had a great accent. ???????
My French accent sucks out loud, a former favourite expression of my daughter.
French people hearing me speak for the first time say, “You’re American aren’t you?”
The only Italian phrase book I could find was French/Italian which meant the pronunciation was French letter cued.
I am still trying to decide if the Italians were polite or if Italian is easier and I will find a language someday that I can speak well? I would like to think the later, and have a modicum of hope only because I didn’t hear them saying to others that they had a great accent. Or maybe I wasn't listening closely.
My French accent sucks out loud, a former favourite expression of my daughter.
French people hearing me speak for the first time say, “You’re American aren’t you?”
The only Italian phrase book I could find was French/Italian which meant the pronunciation was French letter cued.
I am still trying to decide if the Italians were polite or if Italian is easier and I will find a language someday that I can speak well? I would like to think the later, and have a modicum of hope only because I didn’t hear them saying to others that they had a great accent. Or maybe I wasn't listening closely.
Thursday, July 21, 2005
The blueberry muffin
I thought I might apologise to Starbucks, which as anyone who knows me understands I DO NOT LIKE, especially outside the US in countries where the coffee and tea are superior and tea rooms or coffee shops are a way of life. However, while waiting for a friend the other night I wandered into one in Geneva and I saw -- drum roll, trumpets, singers going Hallelujah -- blueberry muffins.
Blueberry muffins and rasin cinnamon bagels are things that I constantly miss. Well maybe not constantly, but the memory of them tiptoes over my tastebuds at least once a week. My daughter when she visits always brings some from Dunkin Donuts and more than once she has been teased as she entered the plane about taking her own food on board when attendants have spied the pink and white Dunkin Donuts boxes.
I will say the Starbucks clerk was nice and friendly and I do not expect the same family feel I get at the tea rooms that I frequent regularly from a corporate chain. He came back to me in English as many people do as soon as they pick up on my accent that screams ENGLISH SPEAKER ENGLISH SPEAKER. His accent was adorable.
I bought the muffin. and even ate more circumspectly at dinner so I would be able to treat myself to the muffin for dessert. No way did I fool myself that I would be able to wait until morning.
At home I carefully unwrapped the muffin and put it on a pretty plate to increase my enjoyment. I cut it in four pieces so I would eat it slowly, savouring every mouthful. I lifted it to my lips, felt it on my tongue, swallowed.
It was too sweet and stale. Even an hour later there was an unpleasant chemically aftertaste.
I wonder where I can find a good blueberry muffin recipe so I can make them for myself during the blueberry season here. Then again maybe the joy when my daughter brings them leaves blueberry muffins as a treat to be treasured rather than taken for granted.
Blueberry muffins and rasin cinnamon bagels are things that I constantly miss. Well maybe not constantly, but the memory of them tiptoes over my tastebuds at least once a week. My daughter when she visits always brings some from Dunkin Donuts and more than once she has been teased as she entered the plane about taking her own food on board when attendants have spied the pink and white Dunkin Donuts boxes.
I will say the Starbucks clerk was nice and friendly and I do not expect the same family feel I get at the tea rooms that I frequent regularly from a corporate chain. He came back to me in English as many people do as soon as they pick up on my accent that screams ENGLISH SPEAKER ENGLISH SPEAKER. His accent was adorable.
I bought the muffin. and even ate more circumspectly at dinner so I would be able to treat myself to the muffin for dessert. No way did I fool myself that I would be able to wait until morning.
At home I carefully unwrapped the muffin and put it on a pretty plate to increase my enjoyment. I cut it in four pieces so I would eat it slowly, savouring every mouthful. I lifted it to my lips, felt it on my tongue, swallowed.
It was too sweet and stale. Even an hour later there was an unpleasant chemically aftertaste.
I wonder where I can find a good blueberry muffin recipe so I can make them for myself during the blueberry season here. Then again maybe the joy when my daughter brings them leaves blueberry muffins as a treat to be treasured rather than taken for granted.
Wednesday, July 20, 2005
One Perfect Spaghetti Strand
“You can buy beautiful scarves in Rome,” Florian said.
I looked at him. I am going to Rome on Friday to cover a conference. I will have one extra day there and will divide that on a quickie tour of the city and with a meeting with a Professor who has translated cuneiform letters dating back to 3000 b.c., research for a book I want to write. Once the conference begins, I will be working hard, but happily. This is fun work.
It had never entered my head that I would enter a store while in Rome. Even if I were not attending a conference, I couldn’t imagine wasting a precious second in one. Now if some of the merchandise arrived miraculously in my home that would be okay.
In a way I feel as if the Rome part of this trip is like being led into a Roman feast and being offered one perfectly sauced strand of freshly made spaghetti. I will savour that one strand and I know that by looking at the feast, I will know what to eat on my next trip to the Roman table of historical delights.
I looked at him. I am going to Rome on Friday to cover a conference. I will have one extra day there and will divide that on a quickie tour of the city and with a meeting with a Professor who has translated cuneiform letters dating back to 3000 b.c., research for a book I want to write. Once the conference begins, I will be working hard, but happily. This is fun work.
It had never entered my head that I would enter a store while in Rome. Even if I were not attending a conference, I couldn’t imagine wasting a precious second in one. Now if some of the merchandise arrived miraculously in my home that would be okay.
In a way I feel as if the Rome part of this trip is like being led into a Roman feast and being offered one perfectly sauced strand of freshly made spaghetti. I will savour that one strand and I know that by looking at the feast, I will know what to eat on my next trip to the Roman table of historical delights.
Being Right is Fun
I said last year I paid too much tax. I know everyone says it, but I did. When I went to get my final she-has-paid-all-her-taxes form stamped for my Swiss citizenship dossier in fall 2004, they told me I owed mega-francs more. This surprised me because my income in my alleged retirement had taken such a nose dive, but I paid it and got the form stamped and signed.
Now, I don’t mind paying Swiss taxes. I live in a country with safe, clean streets, a good education system, an excellent public transportation system, etc.etc.etc. I never considered the taxes exorbitant. The infrastructure has to be paid for and I feel my taxes are going for a good use for my benefit and for the benefit of everyone around me. However in 2004 my taxes almost exceeded my annual income.
Imagine my pleasure to open an envelope from the tax people to find repayment for my overpayment to the amount of the equivalent of almost a year’s living expenses if I am frugal and nine months if I am not. I am a happy, happy puppy.
Now, I don’t mind paying Swiss taxes. I live in a country with safe, clean streets, a good education system, an excellent public transportation system, etc.etc.etc. I never considered the taxes exorbitant. The infrastructure has to be paid for and I feel my taxes are going for a good use for my benefit and for the benefit of everyone around me. However in 2004 my taxes almost exceeded my annual income.
Imagine my pleasure to open an envelope from the tax people to find repayment for my overpayment to the amount of the equivalent of almost a year’s living expenses if I am frugal and nine months if I am not. I am a happy, happy puppy.
Monday, July 18, 2005
The Bus Ride from Hell
The temperature dropped in seconds as I sat on the bench at Rive waiting for the E Bus to take me to Corsier. The sensation would be the same if you jumped into the North Atlantic off the Maine Coast on a hot August day turning your skin icy blue to match the water in a matter of seconds. The bus arrived five footsteps before it started to pour.
This wasn’t raining cats and dogs, but cats, dogs, geese, ponies, giraffes and an elephant or two. We could not see the mountains, the lake or the walk in front of the lake which is no further than a traffic lane away.
When people jumped onto the bus, the water came in after them in grey sheets of water drenching those unlucky enough to sit near the doors. The new passengers were soaked to the skin. Surprisingly enough many had towels with them (the ultimate of preparedness) that they used for their hair and then threw them over the shoulders.
To make matters worse a skinny drunk Arab, his shoes untied, walked up and down the aisle berating every one. An Arab woman in a head-to-toe sopping burka yelled at him, telling him in French and Arabic that he was a disgrace to his mother, his father, his country and his religion. He became so obnoxious that the bus driver and two other men decided he needed to leave at the Arrêt Ruth. However, he refused to let the bus go blocking it in front in a game of I’ll-Out-Wait-You. The bus won, and at the last blurry site of him he was walking down the centre of the highway.
The rain let up enough to see the good surfing-level waves on the lake that had been floor-flat two hours before. We past the giant posters from the Cinelac Theatre, the outdoors summer movie theatre over the lake, just as wind ripped them from the wall and blew them along next to us before being skidded over by cars.
The rain slowed slightly, although the side windows were covered with water washed up from the street. Then the bus stopped all together. “Everyone out,” we were told.
The passengers obeyed. A pine tree lay toppled across the road. The air smelled like a home when a newly cut Christmas tree is brought in. A man in an official jacket decided we could go no further.
There was a bus on the other side of the tree its destination opposite of ours. The old managerial me who looks for solutions thought it would be smart for the passengers in each bus swap places, the buses turn around and retrace their routes getting everyone to their destinations, but I was told that wasn’t possible without directions from headquarters.
The rain had let up, but we got back on the bus until we were told we couldn’t stay there any longer, but must make our own way to wherever. On a sunny day, an approximately three-mile walk would be nothing. Even today with a raincoat and boots it could be interesting if I didn’t try to do a kite imitation. However, in my flapper style dress and ballet style shoes, it did not seem appealing.
A car stopped. Two teenage boys started to get in then looked at me and another woman. They exchanged glances and with a Sir William Raleigh sweep of their hands gave up their place. The driver took us each to our own door. By now it was hailing, half golf ball sized stones.
Jean Calvin preached the hell, fire and damnation, a cruel God that throws unexpected horrors in front of people. I am convinced, although there is no documentation to prove it, that it is the Geneva weather that helped shaped his philosophy. Today’s storm was exceptional only in that it isn’t that exceptional.
The Bluewin web site says that vineyards all over the region were destroyed by 100 MPH winds (actually they reported in Kilometers) and the hail.
This wasn’t raining cats and dogs, but cats, dogs, geese, ponies, giraffes and an elephant or two. We could not see the mountains, the lake or the walk in front of the lake which is no further than a traffic lane away.
When people jumped onto the bus, the water came in after them in grey sheets of water drenching those unlucky enough to sit near the doors. The new passengers were soaked to the skin. Surprisingly enough many had towels with them (the ultimate of preparedness) that they used for their hair and then threw them over the shoulders.
To make matters worse a skinny drunk Arab, his shoes untied, walked up and down the aisle berating every one. An Arab woman in a head-to-toe sopping burka yelled at him, telling him in French and Arabic that he was a disgrace to his mother, his father, his country and his religion. He became so obnoxious that the bus driver and two other men decided he needed to leave at the Arrêt Ruth. However, he refused to let the bus go blocking it in front in a game of I’ll-Out-Wait-You. The bus won, and at the last blurry site of him he was walking down the centre of the highway.
The rain let up enough to see the good surfing-level waves on the lake that had been floor-flat two hours before. We past the giant posters from the Cinelac Theatre, the outdoors summer movie theatre over the lake, just as wind ripped them from the wall and blew them along next to us before being skidded over by cars.
The rain slowed slightly, although the side windows were covered with water washed up from the street. Then the bus stopped all together. “Everyone out,” we were told.
The passengers obeyed. A pine tree lay toppled across the road. The air smelled like a home when a newly cut Christmas tree is brought in. A man in an official jacket decided we could go no further.
There was a bus on the other side of the tree its destination opposite of ours. The old managerial me who looks for solutions thought it would be smart for the passengers in each bus swap places, the buses turn around and retrace their routes getting everyone to their destinations, but I was told that wasn’t possible without directions from headquarters.
The rain had let up, but we got back on the bus until we were told we couldn’t stay there any longer, but must make our own way to wherever. On a sunny day, an approximately three-mile walk would be nothing. Even today with a raincoat and boots it could be interesting if I didn’t try to do a kite imitation. However, in my flapper style dress and ballet style shoes, it did not seem appealing.
A car stopped. Two teenage boys started to get in then looked at me and another woman. They exchanged glances and with a Sir William Raleigh sweep of their hands gave up their place. The driver took us each to our own door. By now it was hailing, half golf ball sized stones.
Jean Calvin preached the hell, fire and damnation, a cruel God that throws unexpected horrors in front of people. I am convinced, although there is no documentation to prove it, that it is the Geneva weather that helped shaped his philosophy. Today’s storm was exceptional only in that it isn’t that exceptional.
The Bluewin web site says that vineyards all over the region were destroyed by 100 MPH winds (actually they reported in Kilometers) and the hail.
Sunday, July 17, 2005
The Magical Visit
I expected three days with an American couple showing them the sites of the Argelès area to be fun. I wasn’t prepared for the magic.
The man is the son of a friend who died too soon. When I first heard about the son he was in his teens. He is now in his forties. His wife and I met a few years back at dinners when I was in Boston catching up with old friends. I found both a delight to be with. They are intelligent, creative, insightful, kind, funny and courageous in their life choices.
Thus I offered them my studio for a week, but moved to a friend’s place for part of that time so I could share some of the things I love in the area with them before going home to Geneva.
Reality exceeded expectations. I have never grown tired of the street dances, the fireworks shot off the hotel, the crêperie up in the mountains with its tables on different level terraces shaded by cork and olive trees, the café-sits, the friendly people. They took to them as fast as I had.
A trip to Collioure was a second visit for the man. He had been there in another lifetime. He wanted to show his wife the site, where under an upturned boat on the beach he had found the cat they now have, one he saved from a life as a wild cat. Sauvage is that black cat’s name and in the bar a few steps from the location of the saving a woman had on a T-shirt with a black cat and the word Sauvage.
When it was time to leave for Geneva, they walked me to the train. Considering Argelès is my place, it is an amusing role reversal that the non-residents saw the resident off. Once on the train I tried to figure out why the visit seemed so magical to me.
It was only as I rode the bus between Geneva and Corsier where I live did I figure it out. I passed a field of sunflowers, destined to become oil. The field runs as far as the eye can see. The flowers faced the bus and in the early morning sun the brightness made me wish I owned a pair of sunglasses. Later in the day going the opposite way, instead of the flowers facing me, their backs were to me, once again facing the sun. I understand why the French call them tournesols which means turning toward the sun.
The flowers follow the warmth, the light, the nourishment. It was then that I realised why the three days had been so magic, although we did nothing out of the ordinary. The couple was light, warm, nourishing of each other and also nourishing to me. There is something ordinary that a sunflower turns to the sun. There is something ordinary about sitting in a café sharing ideas. But sometimes the ordinary carries the magic of the extraordinary when there is so much warmth, light and nourishment.
The man is the son of a friend who died too soon. When I first heard about the son he was in his teens. He is now in his forties. His wife and I met a few years back at dinners when I was in Boston catching up with old friends. I found both a delight to be with. They are intelligent, creative, insightful, kind, funny and courageous in their life choices.
Thus I offered them my studio for a week, but moved to a friend’s place for part of that time so I could share some of the things I love in the area with them before going home to Geneva.
Reality exceeded expectations. I have never grown tired of the street dances, the fireworks shot off the hotel, the crêperie up in the mountains with its tables on different level terraces shaded by cork and olive trees, the café-sits, the friendly people. They took to them as fast as I had.
A trip to Collioure was a second visit for the man. He had been there in another lifetime. He wanted to show his wife the site, where under an upturned boat on the beach he had found the cat they now have, one he saved from a life as a wild cat. Sauvage is that black cat’s name and in the bar a few steps from the location of the saving a woman had on a T-shirt with a black cat and the word Sauvage.
When it was time to leave for Geneva, they walked me to the train. Considering Argelès is my place, it is an amusing role reversal that the non-residents saw the resident off. Once on the train I tried to figure out why the visit seemed so magical to me.
It was only as I rode the bus between Geneva and Corsier where I live did I figure it out. I passed a field of sunflowers, destined to become oil. The field runs as far as the eye can see. The flowers faced the bus and in the early morning sun the brightness made me wish I owned a pair of sunglasses. Later in the day going the opposite way, instead of the flowers facing me, their backs were to me, once again facing the sun. I understand why the French call them tournesols which means turning toward the sun.
The flowers follow the warmth, the light, the nourishment. It was then that I realised why the three days had been so magic, although we did nothing out of the ordinary. The couple was light, warm, nourishing of each other and also nourishing to me. There is something ordinary that a sunflower turns to the sun. There is something ordinary about sitting in a café sharing ideas. But sometimes the ordinary carries the magic of the extraordinary when there is so much warmth, light and nourishment.
The Geneva Cow Herd
The first cow was outside UBS, a white life-sized plastic statue covered in tiny red hearts. I had just gotten off the night train. It was not quite seven on a Saturday morning. A publicity thing by the bank, I thought, as I went in to get money from my account via the ATM.
But then on the trolley, I passed another life-sized cow and another and another and another and…
Each was decorated differently. One black cow had golden horns, tail, and feet. One had a map of Carouge, the arty-farty section of Geneva. The hide of a rhino decorated a cow. Some were in psychedelic colors. Cow after original cow turned up all over the city.
I know Switzerland is known for its cows. I learned this on my first Saturday living in the tiny Jura town of Môtiers where the cows outnumber the residents ten to one. That morning I woke to a clanging of cow bells. It was so loud my two Japanese chins (now gone to the great dog biscuit factory in the sky) dived under my bed. I was braver and went to look. About thirty cows marched down the street, some veering off to drink out of the fountain in front of my house. That night they marched back. It was a daily occurrence in the spring and fall. In the winter they stayed in the barns.
I love the Alpinage, the cow parade where the flowers are wound around the cows’ horns. The Queen cow, the cow the other cows look up to, has the most elaborate bouquet – a table top sized Christmas tree of flowers. She wears the largest bell, another status symbol. I have wondered if the position is worth the extra weight of the bell, but maybe that just shows that if I were a cow, my leadership qualities would not be sufficient to qualify for queen cowdom. Cow herders follow dressed in native costumes; there is music as the cows are put on trucks for their trek up into the mountains for a summer grazing on sweet grass. The grass in the villages below is cut for hay for winter eating.
I have not yet found out why there are plaster cows all over Geneva. I think it is one of those things that I prefer not to know. It is more fun just looking.
But then on the trolley, I passed another life-sized cow and another and another and another and…
Each was decorated differently. One black cow had golden horns, tail, and feet. One had a map of Carouge, the arty-farty section of Geneva. The hide of a rhino decorated a cow. Some were in psychedelic colors. Cow after original cow turned up all over the city.
I know Switzerland is known for its cows. I learned this on my first Saturday living in the tiny Jura town of Môtiers where the cows outnumber the residents ten to one. That morning I woke to a clanging of cow bells. It was so loud my two Japanese chins (now gone to the great dog biscuit factory in the sky) dived under my bed. I was braver and went to look. About thirty cows marched down the street, some veering off to drink out of the fountain in front of my house. That night they marched back. It was a daily occurrence in the spring and fall. In the winter they stayed in the barns.
I love the Alpinage, the cow parade where the flowers are wound around the cows’ horns. The Queen cow, the cow the other cows look up to, has the most elaborate bouquet – a table top sized Christmas tree of flowers. She wears the largest bell, another status symbol. I have wondered if the position is worth the extra weight of the bell, but maybe that just shows that if I were a cow, my leadership qualities would not be sufficient to qualify for queen cowdom. Cow herders follow dressed in native costumes; there is music as the cows are put on trucks for their trek up into the mountains for a summer grazing on sweet grass. The grass in the villages below is cut for hay for winter eating.
I have not yet found out why there are plaster cows all over Geneva. I think it is one of those things that I prefer not to know. It is more fun just looking.
Fish, fields and foreign languages
Florian and I ate filet de perches with a bear garlic sauce under the grape vine awning. I’ve been told that the garlic comes from the Jura mountains and once was a favourite of the bears that lived there, thus the name, although ail d'ours sounds nicer than bear garlic. The grapes were still two months away from being pick-ready. The terrace of the restaurant was close enough to the lake that we could hear the water lapping along with the murmurings of the other eaters.
After we ate we drove through Canton Fribourg. The sun did not set until 9:58 letting us enjoy the summer-lush fields covered in wheat, cow corn, fruit trees and grape vines. A few fields were left fallow and were filled with buttercups and Queen Anne’s Lace.
The signs changed from French to German depending on the section we were riding through. Zu Verkaufen or Vendre. Buy a house in German or French. Vermitten or Louer. Rent a house in German or French. There is something about changing languages that gives the sensation of being on holiday rather than just going out for a good fish dinner.
After we ate we drove through Canton Fribourg. The sun did not set until 9:58 letting us enjoy the summer-lush fields covered in wheat, cow corn, fruit trees and grape vines. A few fields were left fallow and were filled with buttercups and Queen Anne’s Lace.
The signs changed from French to German depending on the section we were riding through. Zu Verkaufen or Vendre. Buy a house in German or French. Vermitten or Louer. Rent a house in German or French. There is something about changing languages that gives the sensation of being on holiday rather than just going out for a good fish dinner.
My Daughter and Prince Albert
One Swiss Sunday paper carried an article on who Prince Albert of Monaco should marry.
I have a candidate -- My daughter.
She is a beautiful blond, who when her hair is in a chignon could carry the same icy elegance that Princess Grace did. Her tiger tattoo, would keep the press happy with articles about its significance.
One of the writers thought he should marry a businesswoman. My daughter has a degree in business and is working for an international headhunter. A few summers ago she thought if she were tanned enough, she would resemble a goddess. “A goddess of what,” I asked?
“Goddess of Management,” she said. Certainly a goddess matches any royaltyness or celebrityness, the prince might require.
And although she does not speak French, she does speak German, and has spent enough time in Francophone countries to know she could add a third language without much difficulty if it were a job requirement.
Certainly the chores would be interesting, running balls, overseeing a château, doing charitable work, producing an heir or two.
I have not proposed the idea to either Prince Albert or my daughter. Some things need to happen on their own. I wouldn’t want to be considered an interfering mother-in-law so early in the game.
I have a candidate -- My daughter.
She is a beautiful blond, who when her hair is in a chignon could carry the same icy elegance that Princess Grace did. Her tiger tattoo, would keep the press happy with articles about its significance.
One of the writers thought he should marry a businesswoman. My daughter has a degree in business and is working for an international headhunter. A few summers ago she thought if she were tanned enough, she would resemble a goddess. “A goddess of what,” I asked?
“Goddess of Management,” she said. Certainly a goddess matches any royaltyness or celebrityness, the prince might require.
And although she does not speak French, she does speak German, and has spent enough time in Francophone countries to know she could add a third language without much difficulty if it were a job requirement.
Certainly the chores would be interesting, running balls, overseeing a château, doing charitable work, producing an heir or two.
I have not proposed the idea to either Prince Albert or my daughter. Some things need to happen on their own. I wouldn’t want to be considered an interfering mother-in-law so early in the game.
Monday, July 11, 2005
Early morning smells and memories
As I sit at my computer the sun is coming up over the tiled roofs. The cock has crowed, the garbage men have rattled down the street, and I can hear my neighbor’s alarm tingle its soft melody. I have been emailing with my friend Susan in the States who is up late playing Spider solitaire. There are birds calling to each other. The breeze is carrying the smell of fresh-baked bread from the bakery around the corner. The last is Pavolian in its results. I must get dressed and go buy the bread that I know is warm to the touch.
When we lived in Boston and there was good baguettes sold at the Spanish grocery store, they never arrived home without a chewed heel. The joke became that a big mouse named Pedro, attacked the carrier of the bread, grabbed it, and ate the crunchy end. There are a series of bread-attacking mice wherever we go. If we bought bread in the Italian North End it was Luigi Mouse, and if the purchase was in Yuppified Harvard Square it would be Biff Mouse.
I could say that in Argelès it is Pierre Mouse, but I have to admit that I would pummel any mouse that comes between me and my morning French bread.
When we lived in Boston and there was good baguettes sold at the Spanish grocery store, they never arrived home without a chewed heel. The joke became that a big mouse named Pedro, attacked the carrier of the bread, grabbed it, and ate the crunchy end. There are a series of bread-attacking mice wherever we go. If we bought bread in the Italian North End it was Luigi Mouse, and if the purchase was in Yuppified Harvard Square it would be Biff Mouse.
I could say that in Argelès it is Pierre Mouse, but I have to admit that I would pummel any mouse that comes between me and my morning French bread.
Paintings and ports
Magali’s vernissage (French for the opening night of an art exhibition) was in the ancient Roman village of Port Vendre, although village is maybe a misnomer for a port that can hold shopping mall-sized ships. Fishermen bring in their catches and there are a few pleasure boats dwarfed by the working boats.
Magali is a painter, one of those women who came into her own in her 40s. Her paintings have an oriental feel and there was one of a seated Indian woman that belongs over my computer and between my two windows. I bought it, but will leave it there for the rest of the exhibition.
Afterwards we stopped at one of the little restaurants overlooking the port. I had the esclavide, the local grilled vegetable dish of courgettes, eggplant, tomatoes and onions with a glass of sangria. Barbara opted for calamar, and Elaine, who had eaten, had chocolate cake with chocolate sauce and whipped cream. The bill came. Barbara looked at it to find an extra coffee and my sangria was billed as something else. The waiter corrected the bill, but we all decided that they took us as tourists not locals. Annoying but not enough to diminish the pleasure of the setting sun over the water.
Magali is a painter, one of those women who came into her own in her 40s. Her paintings have an oriental feel and there was one of a seated Indian woman that belongs over my computer and between my two windows. I bought it, but will leave it there for the rest of the exhibition.
Afterwards we stopped at one of the little restaurants overlooking the port. I had the esclavide, the local grilled vegetable dish of courgettes, eggplant, tomatoes and onions with a glass of sangria. Barbara opted for calamar, and Elaine, who had eaten, had chocolate cake with chocolate sauce and whipped cream. The bill came. Barbara looked at it to find an extra coffee and my sangria was billed as something else. The waiter corrected the bill, but we all decided that they took us as tourists not locals. Annoying but not enough to diminish the pleasure of the setting sun over the water.
Sunday, July 10, 2005
The face in the pan
Sven, Winde and Barbara came to lunch. We were engaged in our usual conversations over dahl and basmati rice when Sven looked up at my fry pan hanging from a beam. “There’s a woman face in it.”
Closer observation showed he was indeed right.
“We’ll say it’s the Virgin Mary and I’ll sell it on Ebay,” I said.
“No, no, charge a 10 Euro admission,” Winde suggested. “She is about to start her own business and thought an ongoing source of income might be better than a one-time payment.
We even decided that she should touch it and claim her sore back was healed. She said she could pretend to be a stranger, which in a village this small is hard to do.
By the time I dished out the strawberry dessert, I decided to just keep the fry pan where it was. I can always contact Ebay if things get rough.
Closer observation showed he was indeed right.
“We’ll say it’s the Virgin Mary and I’ll sell it on Ebay,” I said.
“No, no, charge a 10 Euro admission,” Winde suggested. “She is about to start her own business and thought an ongoing source of income might be better than a one-time payment.
We even decided that she should touch it and claim her sore back was healed. She said she could pretend to be a stranger, which in a village this small is hard to do.
By the time I dished out the strawberry dessert, I decided to just keep the fry pan where it was. I can always contact Ebay if things get rough.
Saturday, July 09, 2005
Beverly Gray and Me
I am living the life I wanted to live from the time I was four when I decided to be a writer. My desire was only enforced by the Beverly Gray mystery series. No Nancy Drew for me. I wanted to be like Beverly, who not only went to college, she became a journalist and traveled the world.
The first time I set foot in Europe as a new bride of twenty, I felt as if I had come home. Home turned out to be Stuttgart, where my husband was in an Army band. I never wanted to leave. My husband couldn’t wait to come home.
I spent the rest of my adult life trying to get back here, although I had a wonderful time in the process, raising my daughter, building a career, etc. And if I didn't really like the business world, it did provide a good living.
But these days, waking up in either Geneva or Southern France and knowing my day can be spent writing be it on a journalistic article or my anti-war novel as I research my next novel is how I pictured myself spending my life way back when I was curled up under the eaves at 200 Grove Street in Reading. It took me a long time to get here, but at least I did.
This month I will cover a conference in Rome, a city I have never been to. Once the conference starts it won’t matter where I am because I will be busy from morning to night, but this is not a complaint. I love meeting the people, listening to their stories, writing them under pressure and transferring them back to the paper.
I am also scheduled to meet with a professor who has translated cuneiform letters found in Syria. The letters go back to 3000 b.c. and the professor has agreed to meet with me. It was total serendipity that we would be there at the same time, although I would have happily traveled to Rome to meet him at anytime. I even suspect I will get a chance to do a quick tour of Rome that will make me hungry to go back on my own. From Geneva this is neither hard nor expensive, thank you Easy Jet Airlines.
In that way, I am living the life of Beverly Gray, journalist and writer, a dream fulfilled.
The first time I set foot in Europe as a new bride of twenty, I felt as if I had come home. Home turned out to be Stuttgart, where my husband was in an Army band. I never wanted to leave. My husband couldn’t wait to come home.
I spent the rest of my adult life trying to get back here, although I had a wonderful time in the process, raising my daughter, building a career, etc. And if I didn't really like the business world, it did provide a good living.
But these days, waking up in either Geneva or Southern France and knowing my day can be spent writing be it on a journalistic article or my anti-war novel as I research my next novel is how I pictured myself spending my life way back when I was curled up under the eaves at 200 Grove Street in Reading. It took me a long time to get here, but at least I did.
This month I will cover a conference in Rome, a city I have never been to. Once the conference starts it won’t matter where I am because I will be busy from morning to night, but this is not a complaint. I love meeting the people, listening to their stories, writing them under pressure and transferring them back to the paper.
I am also scheduled to meet with a professor who has translated cuneiform letters found in Syria. The letters go back to 3000 b.c. and the professor has agreed to meet with me. It was total serendipity that we would be there at the same time, although I would have happily traveled to Rome to meet him at anytime. I even suspect I will get a chance to do a quick tour of Rome that will make me hungry to go back on my own. From Geneva this is neither hard nor expensive, thank you Easy Jet Airlines.
In that way, I am living the life of Beverly Gray, journalist and writer, a dream fulfilled.
Thursday, July 07, 2005
Vengeance begats vengeance
I would say that the bombers are sharing our values. The US and the UK shocked and awed Baghdad not in four sites but night after night after night after night killing thousands of Iraqis. If Tony Blair considers the attack yesterday “barbaric” what we did to Iraq is what then????
In both cases innocent people lost their lives. Vengeance begats vengeance and disgusting rhetoric and righteousness.
I guess it is a double standard, we can bomb them but they can't bomb us.
In both cases innocent people lost their lives. Vengeance begats vengeance and disgusting rhetoric and righteousness.
I guess it is a double standard, we can bomb them but they can't bomb us.
Wednesday, July 06, 2005
The theatre festival at St. Andre
One thing I love about summer in Europe is there are so many cultural festivals, week long celebrations of different arts. And although it is possible to enjoy one during a vacation trip away, there are so many local ones it is not necessary to leave home. Some are major productions bringing in large amounts of money while others are locally produced. I’ve never been to one that wasn’t fun.
In Switzerland there is the famous Montreux Jazz http://www.montreuxjazz.com/index_en.aspx festival. I will never forget my first festival listening to African music with my buddy Robbert until the middle of the night.
There is the less well know Avenches http://www.avenches.ch/ota/page.php?id=45&lang=eng opera festival. This is the first time in seven years that I will miss sitting in a Roman amphitheatre watching the birds swoop into their nighttime nests and then listening to the music under the stars. The only reason is that I have seen the opera that they are showing this year and it is not one of my favorites. Avenches was the Roman capital in Helvetica.
Then there is Paleo in Nyon nearby to Geneva. Nyon is also where Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor fought their way through their marriage. Paleo is more pop and international music. Two years ago Llara, Marina and I went to celebrate my birthday, wandering through different tents listening to different types of music, buying a meal from the many stands and eating on the grass. Being with both these people and having music too, what could be a better way to celebrate a birthday?
Last night I went to the Theatre Festival at St. Andre. There are two plays a night with a chance to eat a good French meal in between. The stage was outside. It is run by Argelés neighbors. He is a lighting engineer for the Royal French Academy. His brother teaches theatre arts. They bring amateur theatre groups from the region together. Last night’s group came from Narbonne.
Different characters recited letters to their children, parents, lovers, grandchildren. An official talked through bureaucraticeese so identifiable by the audience that the laughter had to have been heard in the next village. A grandfather wrote to his daughter in the hospital where she was recovering from accident. In sixty-five letters all the disparate elements came together.
In Avenches Florian and I always run into people we know, but in St. Andre it was more intimate and more like sitting in a local café, an interesting combination of a very professional performance with the intimacy of village life.
There are far more festivals than I can attend, but at least one a summer is as traditional as turkey at Thanksgiving or eggs at Easter something to be savoured for its specialness
In Switzerland there is the famous Montreux Jazz http://www.montreuxjazz.com/index_en.aspx festival. I will never forget my first festival listening to African music with my buddy Robbert until the middle of the night.
There is the less well know Avenches http://www.avenches.ch/ota/page.php?id=45&lang=eng opera festival. This is the first time in seven years that I will miss sitting in a Roman amphitheatre watching the birds swoop into their nighttime nests and then listening to the music under the stars. The only reason is that I have seen the opera that they are showing this year and it is not one of my favorites. Avenches was the Roman capital in Helvetica.
Then there is Paleo in Nyon nearby to Geneva. Nyon is also where Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor fought their way through their marriage. Paleo is more pop and international music. Two years ago Llara, Marina and I went to celebrate my birthday, wandering through different tents listening to different types of music, buying a meal from the many stands and eating on the grass. Being with both these people and having music too, what could be a better way to celebrate a birthday?
Last night I went to the Theatre Festival at St. Andre. There are two plays a night with a chance to eat a good French meal in between. The stage was outside. It is run by Argelés neighbors. He is a lighting engineer for the Royal French Academy. His brother teaches theatre arts. They bring amateur theatre groups from the region together. Last night’s group came from Narbonne.
Different characters recited letters to their children, parents, lovers, grandchildren. An official talked through bureaucraticeese so identifiable by the audience that the laughter had to have been heard in the next village. A grandfather wrote to his daughter in the hospital where she was recovering from accident. In sixty-five letters all the disparate elements came together.
In Avenches Florian and I always run into people we know, but in St. Andre it was more intimate and more like sitting in a local café, an interesting combination of a very professional performance with the intimacy of village life.
There are far more festivals than I can attend, but at least one a summer is as traditional as turkey at Thanksgiving or eggs at Easter something to be savoured for its specialness
Tuesday, July 05, 2005
The Happy Artist
Chris stood outside his gallery, with his pipe in his hand. He wore his white and black striped jersey and looked more French than English. Chris designs sets for the London stage, but his heart belongs in Argelès where he spends as much time as possible. His grin made me think he had sold another painting. His water colors of the area capture its full ambience. No, it was better. The head of the Argelès Art Association has asked him to go to the port with other local painters to sit and paint one evening a week.
When the Hirondelles come back to Capistrano
Under the eaves of the third stories of Barbara’s house regularly at each point where a tile juts out is a hirondelle’s* nest with two exceptions where nests have fallen to the ground. Each spring the birds raise their babies.
Babies are almost grown and their heads stick out as they call to their parents. Some are already taking their first flights. Meanwhile the parents seem to have gone into repair mode bringing bits of sting and gluing them to their old nest.
Although there is something charming about having a bird apartment house in a village to take Barbara back to nature, another aspect is less appealing. Two of the nests are directly above plant-filled windows that need to be cleaned of bird offerings.
Today when the plumber visited to restore cold water to her bathroom, I suggested he add miniature toilets into each nests. Miniature toilet paper rolls are available from doll house stores. Training might be difficult, he pointed out.
*Sparrow
Babies are almost grown and their heads stick out as they call to their parents. Some are already taking their first flights. Meanwhile the parents seem to have gone into repair mode bringing bits of sting and gluing them to their old nest.
Although there is something charming about having a bird apartment house in a village to take Barbara back to nature, another aspect is less appealing. Two of the nests are directly above plant-filled windows that need to be cleaned of bird offerings.
Today when the plumber visited to restore cold water to her bathroom, I suggested he add miniature toilets into each nests. Miniature toilet paper rolls are available from doll house stores. Training might be difficult, he pointed out.
*Sparrow
Monday, July 04, 2005
Fly your way home
After a week of solid writing, both on the novel and on articles, today is a total day off. I decided to get up early and go to the beach before the sun was too high. My neighbor, Kay, regularly heads for an early morning swim so I rode with her. By 8:30 we were installed on the sand, almost alone, except for the gulls and mountains and the medieval towers on top of the mountains protecting us if Spain ever decides to invade again.
Kay swims. I could be an Olympic gold medalists in wading. The water was warm, but then I am used to the blue-skin creating New England seas.
I finished my wade, she finished her swim and we stretched out on our blankets for a good jaw before heading back to really start our days.
We were not alone. Lady bugs joined us, not one or two, but hundreds. They were not put off by warnings of houses on fire.
The vinters import them each year to protect their grapes, ladybugs being far more eco friendly than pesticides, but I wonder, if like Kay and I who want a quick trip to the beach before starting our day, if these lady bugs were doing the same thing. “Let’s go to the sea, then’ll we get down to work protecting these bloody grape vines.”
Kay swims. I could be an Olympic gold medalists in wading. The water was warm, but then I am used to the blue-skin creating New England seas.
I finished my wade, she finished her swim and we stretched out on our blankets for a good jaw before heading back to really start our days.
We were not alone. Lady bugs joined us, not one or two, but hundreds. They were not put off by warnings of houses on fire.
The vinters import them each year to protect their grapes, ladybugs being far more eco friendly than pesticides, but I wonder, if like Kay and I who want a quick trip to the beach before starting our day, if these lady bugs were doing the same thing. “Let’s go to the sea, then’ll we get down to work protecting these bloody grape vines.”
If Argelès were a sit com
If Argelès were a sit com, there would have to be a recurring role for Patrick, who runs around the village wearing boxers in place of shorts and a clashing shirt. There’s always a smile on his face and a willingness to lend a hand.
If he asks, the only smart thing to do is say, NO! Although he buys and renovates houses for a living his tenants mention things like no hot water or hot and cold water faucet reversals. Toilet flushing can be a luxury and no one wants to even think about the wiring.
He went into one neighbor’s house to help with the gas. The green grocer Jean-Pierre saw it and rushed in, but too late. Fortunately the explosion was only a little one and there was not even enough damage to submit a claim.
Then when a potted tree on the sidewalk became root bound, Patrick was more than happy to help dig through the sidewalk to replant the tree. The water department was not sure where the water main had been laid perhaps six decades ago, but they didn’t thank Patrick for finding it. In summer sun, flooded streets dry quickly.
If he asks, the only smart thing to do is say, NO! Although he buys and renovates houses for a living his tenants mention things like no hot water or hot and cold water faucet reversals. Toilet flushing can be a luxury and no one wants to even think about the wiring.
He went into one neighbor’s house to help with the gas. The green grocer Jean-Pierre saw it and rushed in, but too late. Fortunately the explosion was only a little one and there was not even enough damage to submit a claim.
Then when a potted tree on the sidewalk became root bound, Patrick was more than happy to help dig through the sidewalk to replant the tree. The water department was not sure where the water main had been laid perhaps six decades ago, but they didn’t thank Patrick for finding it. In summer sun, flooded streets dry quickly.
Sunday, July 03, 2005
Live Aid/Live 8
When Live Aid played I was living in a condo that I adored on The Riverway in Boston. My daughter was a teenager and we lived in amazing harmony considering our various hormonal stages of puberty and menopause. I dreamed of living in Europe. I wanted to be a published fiction writer. It was hot.
Live 8 was on yesterday. The lack of progress is sad. Even with the forgiving of debt, there are so many issues not talked about enough if at all – arms sales, affordable drugs, and reaching the corporate paymasters of our politicians, micro finance. My daughter is grown. I live in Europe. My novels are being published. It was hot.
Will Smith and the cross continental finger snapping every three seconds indicating the death of a child. One finger snap is worth a million words made and I wanted to cry at so much pain that exists needlessly out of greed.
I hear so many people complain about wanting this or that, but I never forget the fact that I am richer than most of the people who live or have ever lived in the world. At one time owning a needle made a woman wealthy. Even with a studio and a small place in Geneva that those with McMansions would turn up their noses at, I feel truly, truly, truly blessed. Sadly, there are those that have not fulfilled their dreams because of poverty.
Live 8 was on yesterday. The lack of progress is sad. Even with the forgiving of debt, there are so many issues not talked about enough if at all – arms sales, affordable drugs, and reaching the corporate paymasters of our politicians, micro finance. My daughter is grown. I live in Europe. My novels are being published. It was hot.
Will Smith and the cross continental finger snapping every three seconds indicating the death of a child. One finger snap is worth a million words made and I wanted to cry at so much pain that exists needlessly out of greed.
I hear so many people complain about wanting this or that, but I never forget the fact that I am richer than most of the people who live or have ever lived in the world. At one time owning a needle made a woman wealthy. Even with a studio and a small place in Geneva that those with McMansions would turn up their noses at, I feel truly, truly, truly blessed. Sadly, there are those that have not fulfilled their dreams because of poverty.
Friday, July 01, 2005
Traffic jams
On my list of things I never, ever want to do, right up there with appearing on Fear Factor, bungee jumping and hari kari, is traveling in France on July 1st. Half the country goes on holiday for their annual four-weeks and traffic jams miles and miles or kilometers and kilometers long clog the roads. The French call them bucherons.
The only day that is worse is August 1st when the half that weren’t on holiday in July also take to the road changing places almost doubling the lines waiting at tool booths and cars filled with youngsters. Est-ce que nous sommes là déjà the French version of are we there yet is no more pleasant in French than English. Meanwhile I can smugly sit anywhere in my village knowing I am already here. Not nice maybe...but certainly sincere.
The only day that is worse is August 1st when the half that weren’t on holiday in July also take to the road changing places almost doubling the lines waiting at tool booths and cars filled with youngsters. Est-ce que nous sommes là déjà the French version of are we there yet is no more pleasant in French than English. Meanwhile I can smugly sit anywhere in my village knowing I am already here. Not nice maybe...but certainly sincere.
Cool not canicule
Out with the canicule in with the cool. The weather changed about 3 a.m. I know because I was on the phone to New Zealand on a story I was writing. I woke up hot and sweaty and the sudden drop made me get out covers before I went back to bed. Today, the same people that ran around yesterday in sleeveless tops have at least partial sleeves if not cloth to their wrists. However, the sky has the brilliant blue that is normal when the wind is high. It left me the energy to run around and get my ticket for my return to Geneva and do several other things I have been postponing. Coming from New England with its “if-you-don’t-like-the-weather-wait-a-minute life style, I am content to ride out the changes.
Thursday, June 30, 2005
Flower Showers
The canicule is still on, but a sudden wind came up late in the afternoon causing the wires to dance.
Rue Vermeille, my street is the prettiest street in the village. Flowers and plants are everywhere along the narrow sidewalks that separate the houses from the street. The street itself is not much wider than an SUV.
Hanging from the roofs of the three and four story attached stucco houses are huge flowering plants, some as much as twelve feet across creating a sea of purple flowers.
Usually the wind blows down the street, but for some reason, this time it blew into my open windows carrying purple petals that swirled around my studio. They danced across my computer, settled on my table, landed on my fireplace and kitchen counter.
Two days later I am still finding petals I missed. This is NOT a complaint. The world would be better if the only attacks were by flowers.
Rue Vermeille, my street is the prettiest street in the village. Flowers and plants are everywhere along the narrow sidewalks that separate the houses from the street. The street itself is not much wider than an SUV.
Hanging from the roofs of the three and four story attached stucco houses are huge flowering plants, some as much as twelve feet across creating a sea of purple flowers.
Usually the wind blows down the street, but for some reason, this time it blew into my open windows carrying purple petals that swirled around my studio. They danced across my computer, settled on my table, landed on my fireplace and kitchen counter.
Two days later I am still finding petals I missed. This is NOT a complaint. The world would be better if the only attacks were by flowers.
The English Lesson
“How about an ice cream and an English conversation...” Barbara asked.
I hung up the phone, shut off my computer, and headed to La Noisette to meet Barbara and Marina.
This is not my Syrian friend Marina, but a gite-owning Catalan who has a new job with a Swiss company. The young woman, although she took seven years of English, is afraid that her English won’t be good enough to meet the daily requirements of the job.
Franck brought us pistachio, mango and peach wine ice cream served in Manhattan type cocktail glasses with twisted blue stems.
For the next hour we talked, correcting her where necessary, building her confidence when it became obvious she understood most of what we were saying. Being in the opposite position with French, we understood what she was going through. Unlike us she is still translating rather than thinking in the language. But there are times when we're tired both Barbara and I switch off from thinking into translating.
Chris, the owner of the house across from the end of our street joined us. He is on holiday from London where he designs stage sets. He has painted the front of the house with a mural of plants. He joined us and Marina now had three different accents to listen to.
Kay his wife came along, as did Hannah, a Danish woman fluent in English.
An hour and a half later, Marina’s eyes were glazing over from the concentration. Franck was clearing away our dishes. “C’est difficile,” Marina said.
“It’s difficult,” Barbara corrected.
“It’s difficult,” Marina said.
I hung up the phone, shut off my computer, and headed to La Noisette to meet Barbara and Marina.
This is not my Syrian friend Marina, but a gite-owning Catalan who has a new job with a Swiss company. The young woman, although she took seven years of English, is afraid that her English won’t be good enough to meet the daily requirements of the job.
Franck brought us pistachio, mango and peach wine ice cream served in Manhattan type cocktail glasses with twisted blue stems.
For the next hour we talked, correcting her where necessary, building her confidence when it became obvious she understood most of what we were saying. Being in the opposite position with French, we understood what she was going through. Unlike us she is still translating rather than thinking in the language. But there are times when we're tired both Barbara and I switch off from thinking into translating.
Chris, the owner of the house across from the end of our street joined us. He is on holiday from London where he designs stage sets. He has painted the front of the house with a mural of plants. He joined us and Marina now had three different accents to listen to.
Kay his wife came along, as did Hannah, a Danish woman fluent in English.
An hour and a half later, Marina’s eyes were glazing over from the concentration. Franck was clearing away our dishes. “C’est difficile,” Marina said.
“It’s difficult,” Barbara corrected.
“It’s difficult,” Marina said.
Lola is in disgrace
Lola is a three-month old very black kitten that Jean-Pierre and Babette took as a replacement for their beloved Max, a very serious and stalwart cat that died at the age of three from kidney failure. Winde from the cheese shop gave the kitten to them.
Jean-Pierre and Babette live in the three floors over their green grocers at the end of my street. Each window is flower-laden. Lola spends her days in the window box directly over the shop complaining to every one of the injustices of being left alone. No matter that the shop closes for three hours at lunch each day where the kitten is no longer “abandoned”.
Cats in window boxes aren’t uncommon. Ptah II, a pure white cat, sits in Barbara’s window box over her shop, contrasting to her red and pink flowers. What he thinks of his small, noisy counterpart, kitty corner to his place, he doesn’t say. He is the wise man of the street.
Babette, tired of hearing the meows that cast doubt on her cat kindness, although she is known to take store inventory to feed strays, decided that Lola could spend the day in their bedroom at the top of the stairs. With the canicule forcing temperatures up, up, up and the room being air conditioned, no animal humane society official would declare her an unfit cat mother.
Their bedroom is at the top of a staircase. At the bottom is a folding door. To give Lola more room, Babette chose to close the door at the bottom of the stairs.
Lola was not going to take this lying down. Or rather she was going to take it lying down. She tried to slither under the door trapping her head.
When Jean-Pierre returned home for dinner, the cat’s head was wedged under the door, her tongue was hanging out, but she was breathing. Afraid that by opening the door, they would behead the kitten, they cut her out.
Within a very short time, she was back to her tricks.
Jean-Pierre and Babette are looking for a new door.
“And a new kitten?” I asked.
“Non,” Babette said. The voice was firm. The expression was of a mother who loved their bad child.
Jean-Pierre and Babette live in the three floors over their green grocers at the end of my street. Each window is flower-laden. Lola spends her days in the window box directly over the shop complaining to every one of the injustices of being left alone. No matter that the shop closes for three hours at lunch each day where the kitten is no longer “abandoned”.
Cats in window boxes aren’t uncommon. Ptah II, a pure white cat, sits in Barbara’s window box over her shop, contrasting to her red and pink flowers. What he thinks of his small, noisy counterpart, kitty corner to his place, he doesn’t say. He is the wise man of the street.
Babette, tired of hearing the meows that cast doubt on her cat kindness, although she is known to take store inventory to feed strays, decided that Lola could spend the day in their bedroom at the top of the stairs. With the canicule forcing temperatures up, up, up and the room being air conditioned, no animal humane society official would declare her an unfit cat mother.
Their bedroom is at the top of a staircase. At the bottom is a folding door. To give Lola more room, Babette chose to close the door at the bottom of the stairs.
Lola was not going to take this lying down. Or rather she was going to take it lying down. She tried to slither under the door trapping her head.
When Jean-Pierre returned home for dinner, the cat’s head was wedged under the door, her tongue was hanging out, but she was breathing. Afraid that by opening the door, they would behead the kitten, they cut her out.
Within a very short time, she was back to her tricks.
Jean-Pierre and Babette are looking for a new door.
“And a new kitten?” I asked.
“Non,” Babette said. The voice was firm. The expression was of a mother who loved their bad child.
Wednesday, June 29, 2005
The Score: May 1, Building Codes 0
Argelès building requirements for the old town used to require that the facades and roofs not be modified. To preserve the front of buildings that are anything from 500 to 200 years old makes good sense, but to preserve roofs so that birds and anyone in an airplane could see how Argelès looked in 1505 seemed a bit over-the-top. Thus the roof restriction was lifted.
After a day so hot and humid that water fell from the air, Barbara and I went to dinner at May’s. Before her retirement she was a Scottish midwyfe. The French call them sage-femme, wise women, and May is wise not just in her profession, but in her solution to building codes.
The other guest was Morgana, an American/English woman, who is fascinated by the Cathars. When Barbara and I first started researching the Cathars and the Rennes-le-Château mystery years and years ago, we received mainly a ho-hum reaction from most people. Thanks to Dan Brown and his Da Vinci Code people are now telling us about their great new discovery. However, we were more than happy to share our knowledge with Morgana. She never ho-hummed us, although that is not a criteria for our knowledge sharing.
May has a three-story house overlooking the Place de La Republique and has spent well over a year rebuilding and redecorating. We decided to risk eating on her terrace despite forecasts for rain.
Since building regulations would have prohibited her building a terrace, she simply took the one room that overlooked the street and removed the roof. The terrace is enclosed by the original walls and still has the original window. We talked, ate and drank the local wine as birds swept under the feather of clouds that gave way to a star-lit night.
After a day so hot and humid that water fell from the air, Barbara and I went to dinner at May’s. Before her retirement she was a Scottish midwyfe. The French call them sage-femme, wise women, and May is wise not just in her profession, but in her solution to building codes.
The other guest was Morgana, an American/English woman, who is fascinated by the Cathars. When Barbara and I first started researching the Cathars and the Rennes-le-Château mystery years and years ago, we received mainly a ho-hum reaction from most people. Thanks to Dan Brown and his Da Vinci Code people are now telling us about their great new discovery. However, we were more than happy to share our knowledge with Morgana. She never ho-hummed us, although that is not a criteria for our knowledge sharing.
May has a three-story house overlooking the Place de La Republique and has spent well over a year rebuilding and redecorating. We decided to risk eating on her terrace despite forecasts for rain.
Since building regulations would have prohibited her building a terrace, she simply took the one room that overlooked the street and removed the roof. The terrace is enclosed by the original walls and still has the original window. We talked, ate and drank the local wine as birds swept under the feather of clouds that gave way to a star-lit night.
Tuesday, June 28, 2005
The Garbage Wars
Poubelle is the French word for garbage, far prettier sounding than what the word represents.
Years ago, Friday was garbage soup day, when all the leftovers were blended in an onion broth and flavoured with cream. If we had guests it became a first course and was renamed Soupe La Poubelle. They loved it, and I was only in trouble if they asked for the recipe.
Here in Argelès, especially during the season, garbage is picked up daily. Around 5 a.m. the trucks rattle down the narrow streets. We have bins divided into paper/glass/tins/plastic and food garbage. Our address is printed on the bin.
During the summer, people spend a lot of time on the street, setting up tables, eating, having wine, inviting passer-bys to join them. Native Catalonians meld with French and people whose homes are secondary residents.
Last night there was high drama when two strange women walked by and dropped their garbage in one of the Catalonian’s bins. “I knew it,” M. Garcia said. “I have garbage in my bin that isn’t mine.” He went on to separate out the woman’s garbage and his. He was determined. She was embarrassed as she slunk away with her black plastic sack.
M. Fernendez checked through his garbage to make sure it was truly his. There were things that weren’t his. I had noticed British papers and beer bottles in mine, things I never read or drank, but my reaction was so what?
The Danes watched open-mouthed. “Isn’t it better to share a garbage bin than have someone throw it on the street?” one asked but the Catalonian’s didn’t understand English.
Humans tend to be territorial. The joke is my daughter marks her territory by dropping her possessions all over her house (and mine). I am very territorial myself. However, protecting garbage is so low on my priority list, that it isn’t visible after 2,900,972 listings.
Years ago, Friday was garbage soup day, when all the leftovers were blended in an onion broth and flavoured with cream. If we had guests it became a first course and was renamed Soupe La Poubelle. They loved it, and I was only in trouble if they asked for the recipe.
Here in Argelès, especially during the season, garbage is picked up daily. Around 5 a.m. the trucks rattle down the narrow streets. We have bins divided into paper/glass/tins/plastic and food garbage. Our address is printed on the bin.
During the summer, people spend a lot of time on the street, setting up tables, eating, having wine, inviting passer-bys to join them. Native Catalonians meld with French and people whose homes are secondary residents.
Last night there was high drama when two strange women walked by and dropped their garbage in one of the Catalonian’s bins. “I knew it,” M. Garcia said. “I have garbage in my bin that isn’t mine.” He went on to separate out the woman’s garbage and his. He was determined. She was embarrassed as she slunk away with her black plastic sack.
M. Fernendez checked through his garbage to make sure it was truly his. There were things that weren’t his. I had noticed British papers and beer bottles in mine, things I never read or drank, but my reaction was so what?
The Danes watched open-mouthed. “Isn’t it better to share a garbage bin than have someone throw it on the street?” one asked but the Catalonian’s didn’t understand English.
Humans tend to be territorial. The joke is my daughter marks her territory by dropping her possessions all over her house (and mine). I am very territorial myself. However, protecting garbage is so low on my priority list, that it isn’t visible after 2,900,972 listings.
Sunday, June 26, 2005
The C word
C is for Canicule, French for heat wave. This year’s canicule has begun. No one knows if it will be as bad as 2003 when 30,000 died, ten times the number of people that died in 9/11. It is why I lose patience with Americans who drive SUVs and tell me that 3000 people were killed in the WTC collapse. In fact every time I see someone in anything but a gas efficient car, anytime someone drives unnecessarily say from one store to another in the same shopping center or to a neighbors three houses away, I want to yell, “Murderer!!!!!!!!!! Stop your climate-changing behavior now.” I won’t even mention the desire to trash any SUV that sports a support-our-troops sticker. Fortunately I don't see many in Geneva or Argelès.
A lot of those 30,000 deaths were older people and the fact that air conditioning is not as prevalent in Europe as it is the States did contribute, but until 2003 extended heat waves were never a problem. Buildings with thick walls and shutters keep temperatures comfortable. My first Swiss home in a tiny valley was need-a-sweater-inside cool even when temperatures outside soared.
In Argelès, although my flat is in the grenier (the attic where grain was once stored), my curtains are quilted on the sun side and the thick wall do leave it relatively cool aided by a fan. Llara, my daughter, insisted I buy air-conditioning, and I did, although I hope she won't expect obedience in all matters. At night, I run it if necessary to take the temperature down. Although it is in the 90s now as I write this, the flat is comfortable with a fan and natural air.
My flat in Geneva caught a cross breeze. I kept the shutters closed during the day with the windows open and raised the shutters after dark. With the exception of the 2003 canicule only on a couple of nights was it unbearably hot and those nights I slept on the balcony.
Nothing, however, can match the 100+°F temperatures my office reached in 2003. This was with the shutters closed and the lights off. We were sent home early. Water was distributed during the day. I debated sitting nude, except I figured somewhere there was a rule against that. There were less workers around. All employees had a minimum of four weeks holiday (two by law had to be taken together) and many chose to take them to escape the heat, although they would have had to go to Northern Sweden or Norway to do so.
I will be spending the summer months in Argelès, Geneva and Rome. In Geneva, the house is near a lake and the finished basement offers refuge from the heat. In Rome I will spend five-days inside a hotel at the conference I am attending. I doubt it will be air conditioned to US standards (I hope not like the conference I went to in NY when the room temperature even with 100 bodies never reached 60°, certainly extreme and environmentally hostile.)
In Argelès in the late afternoon when it is the hottest, there’s the beach or a café. One place in Village has a breeze even on the worse days. There is nothing like sitting there with a cold beer and listening to the rustle of the wind in the trees overhead.
My biggest resentment toward heat is the lack of energy, but this year I have decided that heat is time to read another book, go to the beach and not try and get through my to-do list that would be too long even on a high-energy cold day. Am I getting smarter in my old age as the world gets hotter????
A lot of those 30,000 deaths were older people and the fact that air conditioning is not as prevalent in Europe as it is the States did contribute, but until 2003 extended heat waves were never a problem. Buildings with thick walls and shutters keep temperatures comfortable. My first Swiss home in a tiny valley was need-a-sweater-inside cool even when temperatures outside soared.
In Argelès, although my flat is in the grenier (the attic where grain was once stored), my curtains are quilted on the sun side and the thick wall do leave it relatively cool aided by a fan. Llara, my daughter, insisted I buy air-conditioning, and I did, although I hope she won't expect obedience in all matters. At night, I run it if necessary to take the temperature down. Although it is in the 90s now as I write this, the flat is comfortable with a fan and natural air.
My flat in Geneva caught a cross breeze. I kept the shutters closed during the day with the windows open and raised the shutters after dark. With the exception of the 2003 canicule only on a couple of nights was it unbearably hot and those nights I slept on the balcony.
Nothing, however, can match the 100+°F temperatures my office reached in 2003. This was with the shutters closed and the lights off. We were sent home early. Water was distributed during the day. I debated sitting nude, except I figured somewhere there was a rule against that. There were less workers around. All employees had a minimum of four weeks holiday (two by law had to be taken together) and many chose to take them to escape the heat, although they would have had to go to Northern Sweden or Norway to do so.
I will be spending the summer months in Argelès, Geneva and Rome. In Geneva, the house is near a lake and the finished basement offers refuge from the heat. In Rome I will spend five-days inside a hotel at the conference I am attending. I doubt it will be air conditioned to US standards (I hope not like the conference I went to in NY when the room temperature even with 100 bodies never reached 60°, certainly extreme and environmentally hostile.)
In Argelès in the late afternoon when it is the hottest, there’s the beach or a café. One place in Village has a breeze even on the worse days. There is nothing like sitting there with a cold beer and listening to the rustle of the wind in the trees overhead.
My biggest resentment toward heat is the lack of energy, but this year I have decided that heat is time to read another book, go to the beach and not try and get through my to-do list that would be too long even on a high-energy cold day. Am I getting smarter in my old age as the world gets hotter????
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