Sunday, August 30, 2009
I've Moved
Thank you for visiting my blog! I've moved to a somewhat easier to remember (and say) location. http://LifeIsGoodOTB.blogspot.com. See you there.
Wednesday, August 26, 2009
Meet the Family
[Excerpt from travel log, an account of my summer of meeting the in-law's from Lyon to Buffalo]
We took the TGV from Paris to Lyon. For two hours I looked out the window at rolling fields of golden wheat and barley, at green patches of corn leaves, and at the intensely white and fluffy clouds floating against an azure sky.
...
When Uncle Paul finally emerged from the crowd at the train station, he wasn’t quite “a dude who looked like Sue” (my mother-in-law), as Geoff had foretold. There was some Prozeller family resemblance in the face and he shared Sue's coloring, but mostly I was just surprised to see a man who had chosen to make his life in France dressed exactly like a summering American tourist. Tevas, a t-shirt with some kind of cowboy logo, jean shorts, and a hat advertising his favorite sports team. I had expected him to be more assimilated to France’s style of dress, as he had married a French woman and settled down in a small rural town.
In the car, Paul and Geoff talked like a pair of business associates about jobs, property prices, and tax regimes. I shared the backseat with the smiling and lanky Matt, Paul’s middle child. Matt was at first shy, hiding behind his dad’s broad frame at the train station. But in the car he soon opened up. He offered me sour candies and we chatted in French about subjects that I hoped were of interest to eleven-year-olds. When I was at a loss for French teenage words I would throw in some English, which he mostly understood but couldn’t speak as well.
It was a half hour drive, past Lyon and into an area of interconnected villages. We drove through a village called Frontonas in a matter of minutes and I remarked at its small size. Matt informed me that Veysillieu, where they lived, was even more cozy. And true enough, it was.
Once in Veyssillieu, we first stopped at the town square where Paul ran an errand. There, I took photos of the mayor’s office (a two-storey house), the town’s WWII memorial (honoring its ten or so sons who had gone off to the war), and the modest schoolhouse (where Matt sits in a 24-student class that covers all the primary school levels). In front of the church I snapped a photo of Geoff with his little cousin. Neither of the boys took to each other immediately and in the viewfinder of the camera I saw two people behaving like strangers awkwardly shoved together. When I pressed the button, Matt was still standing shyly off to the side and Geoff was making little effort to bring him closer with a hug or gesture.
The mile of road from “downtown” to the Prozeller home was lined with quite a few sunflower fields. The family lives in a typical old French stone house. Paul had lovingly restored and expanded their home over the years. Now, it sports spring green shutters, a sprawling yard filled with boys’ toys and gadgets, a swing fashioned to hang from a tree branch, and a work shed where Paul once brewed his own beer. The house faces a neighbor’s large sunflower field in the front and the back yard opens up to a sloping hilltop. It was a beautiful home, made more beautiful by the bright Provencal sun and the fields of yellow all around.
Once we stepped out of the car and into the home, a frenzy of domestic activity burst forth. Paul was in and out, driving off again with a carload of things he had to drop off somewhere. Matt, in a flash, had shimmied into his swimming trunks and invited me to the blow-up pool. While we were splashing around, Brian, the eldest boy, arrived home and immediately started stomping around the yard doing maintenance work like a real man of the house. Though only two years older than Matt, Brian was a full-fledged teenager, looking and acting like a grown-up. Around the house he adopted a serious, occupied manner and ordered his little brothers around to their chores rather authoritatively. (Here he called Matt out of the pool to hose off some floating toys that had rolled out onto the grass). Soon, Paul’s wife Nadia also arrived home with their youngest boy, Maury. Nadia had been out all day painting their new apartment, which was to be rented the following week. As she walked into the yard she still had a spot of white paint on her nose. Maury wore only his usual sweet smile on his small face.
After a bit, I got used to the household bustle and began to notice the subtle gestures and warm sentiments being exchanged around me. What struck me most was how very in love Paul and Nadia looked, even as they cooked, cleaned, and scolded their three children. As soon as Nadia had come home bearing an armload of apartment paperwork Paul set down his beer and rose up to relieve her of this small burden. He pulled up a chair in the yard for her and asked if he could make her a drink. Later, during dinner, Nadia congratulated me on my marriage and in very simple English toasted, “I hope you will be as happy as me.” Over the course of the long dinner I saw more and more of Nadia and Paul’s care for each other: a Valentine’s Day t-shirt with “I love you” written in fifteen different languages with colorful pens, which Paul proudly wears; the pet names they use on each other (“chou chou”); and how they each claim the other was responsible for the good genes that gave the boys their handsome looks.
Much later, as we got into a heavy discussion about the long Prozeller family history, Nadia tells me that at one point she and Paul were on the verge of breaking up because of Paul’s reluctance to have children. I couldn’t believe that from those days they had moved on to build this incredible familial atmosphere.
We had a jovial dinner. Paul had marinated Jamaican jerk chicken the night before and while he prepared drinks, Geoff and I tried to barbeque. We were such city slickers and when the chicken began to burn we had to ask for help from Brian. He wielded the pitchfork expertly and with somber attention. Everyone pitched in to set the table, cut the bread, lay out the excessively generous spread of desserts and cheese. Even little Maury, with childish concentration on his face, contributed by bringing out the plates.
After much eating and drinking, Paul began to tell me the Prozeller family history. Like Sue and Grandpa Paul, whom I’ll meet later in the summer, Paul junior is fond of storytelling. The story began in 1949...
...
Paul was a detailed narrator and by the time he arrived at the 1970’s the sleepy bug had hit me. Even the après-repas tea couldn’t make me stay up any longer. We called it a night and promised to take up the family story again the next time we meet.
Early the next day, Geoff and I left to catch the train for Avignon where our friends would soon arrive from Singapore. With the hurried goodbyes I felt a real sense of regret, as if I were leaving my own family. In the short time we had spent together, I had grown attached to the happy clan. I loved the children for their easy manners and for behaving like little French gentlemen. I adored Nadia for making her home so warm, often without the help her traveling husband, and for doing it uncomplainingly. And I admired Paul, this man who looks and acts so much like my husband, for overcoming the confusion of his early childhood years and growing up to build a beautiful family of his own.
After we left Veyssilieu, we would eventually make our way to Grand Island in West New York where I would meet Uncle Dave and his wife Anne. We would stay in their stylish home, enjoy their tremendous hospitality, and have similarly long and elucidating conversations about the Prozeller history...Even later, I would meet the family patriarch, Grandpa Paul, and sit in his old living room going over ancient family portraits...
...
I felt an incredible sense of comfort meeting each of the Prozeller men this summer...I took delight in identifying the family traits, which were as evident in the 1900’s sepia-toned photographs in Grandpa Paul’s sitting room as on the aging faces of Sue and Paul, and in the still youthful face of Geoff. The slightly protruding nose, mouth, and chin area that gives Geoff the look of an affectionate small animal comes from this line of German blood. I was glad to know that Geoff’s tendency to scratch his head and start looking for displaced items just as he is headed out the door is also a source of amused annoyance for Nadia. I had a chuckle at learning that the men also shared a stubborn preference for sleeping with the shutters open, forcing their wives to wear eye shades...
It was a wonderful summer as we trailed from Europe to the US and back to Asia. Along the way we got to know ourselves and we also got to know our now shared family much, much better.
We took the TGV from Paris to Lyon. For two hours I looked out the window at rolling fields of golden wheat and barley, at green patches of corn leaves, and at the intensely white and fluffy clouds floating against an azure sky.
...
When Uncle Paul finally emerged from the crowd at the train station, he wasn’t quite “a dude who looked like Sue” (my mother-in-law), as Geoff had foretold. There was some Prozeller family resemblance in the face and he shared Sue's coloring, but mostly I was just surprised to see a man who had chosen to make his life in France dressed exactly like a summering American tourist. Tevas, a t-shirt with some kind of cowboy logo, jean shorts, and a hat advertising his favorite sports team. I had expected him to be more assimilated to France’s style of dress, as he had married a French woman and settled down in a small rural town.
In the car, Paul and Geoff talked like a pair of business associates about jobs, property prices, and tax regimes. I shared the backseat with the smiling and lanky Matt, Paul’s middle child. Matt was at first shy, hiding behind his dad’s broad frame at the train station. But in the car he soon opened up. He offered me sour candies and we chatted in French about subjects that I hoped were of interest to eleven-year-olds. When I was at a loss for French teenage words I would throw in some English, which he mostly understood but couldn’t speak as well.
It was a half hour drive, past Lyon and into an area of interconnected villages. We drove through a village called Frontonas in a matter of minutes and I remarked at its small size. Matt informed me that Veysillieu, where they lived, was even more cozy. And true enough, it was.
Once in Veyssillieu, we first stopped at the town square where Paul ran an errand. There, I took photos of the mayor’s office (a two-storey house), the town’s WWII memorial (honoring its ten or so sons who had gone off to the war), and the modest schoolhouse (where Matt sits in a 24-student class that covers all the primary school levels). In front of the church I snapped a photo of Geoff with his little cousin. Neither of the boys took to each other immediately and in the viewfinder of the camera I saw two people behaving like strangers awkwardly shoved together. When I pressed the button, Matt was still standing shyly off to the side and Geoff was making little effort to bring him closer with a hug or gesture.
The mile of road from “downtown” to the Prozeller home was lined with quite a few sunflower fields. The family lives in a typical old French stone house. Paul had lovingly restored and expanded their home over the years. Now, it sports spring green shutters, a sprawling yard filled with boys’ toys and gadgets, a swing fashioned to hang from a tree branch, and a work shed where Paul once brewed his own beer. The house faces a neighbor’s large sunflower field in the front and the back yard opens up to a sloping hilltop. It was a beautiful home, made more beautiful by the bright Provencal sun and the fields of yellow all around.
Once we stepped out of the car and into the home, a frenzy of domestic activity burst forth. Paul was in and out, driving off again with a carload of things he had to drop off somewhere. Matt, in a flash, had shimmied into his swimming trunks and invited me to the blow-up pool. While we were splashing around, Brian, the eldest boy, arrived home and immediately started stomping around the yard doing maintenance work like a real man of the house. Though only two years older than Matt, Brian was a full-fledged teenager, looking and acting like a grown-up. Around the house he adopted a serious, occupied manner and ordered his little brothers around to their chores rather authoritatively. (Here he called Matt out of the pool to hose off some floating toys that had rolled out onto the grass). Soon, Paul’s wife Nadia also arrived home with their youngest boy, Maury. Nadia had been out all day painting their new apartment, which was to be rented the following week. As she walked into the yard she still had a spot of white paint on her nose. Maury wore only his usual sweet smile on his small face.
After a bit, I got used to the household bustle and began to notice the subtle gestures and warm sentiments being exchanged around me. What struck me most was how very in love Paul and Nadia looked, even as they cooked, cleaned, and scolded their three children. As soon as Nadia had come home bearing an armload of apartment paperwork Paul set down his beer and rose up to relieve her of this small burden. He pulled up a chair in the yard for her and asked if he could make her a drink. Later, during dinner, Nadia congratulated me on my marriage and in very simple English toasted, “I hope you will be as happy as me.” Over the course of the long dinner I saw more and more of Nadia and Paul’s care for each other: a Valentine’s Day t-shirt with “I love you” written in fifteen different languages with colorful pens, which Paul proudly wears; the pet names they use on each other (“chou chou”); and how they each claim the other was responsible for the good genes that gave the boys their handsome looks.
Much later, as we got into a heavy discussion about the long Prozeller family history, Nadia tells me that at one point she and Paul were on the verge of breaking up because of Paul’s reluctance to have children. I couldn’t believe that from those days they had moved on to build this incredible familial atmosphere.
We had a jovial dinner. Paul had marinated Jamaican jerk chicken the night before and while he prepared drinks, Geoff and I tried to barbeque. We were such city slickers and when the chicken began to burn we had to ask for help from Brian. He wielded the pitchfork expertly and with somber attention. Everyone pitched in to set the table, cut the bread, lay out the excessively generous spread of desserts and cheese. Even little Maury, with childish concentration on his face, contributed by bringing out the plates.
After much eating and drinking, Paul began to tell me the Prozeller family history. Like Sue and Grandpa Paul, whom I’ll meet later in the summer, Paul junior is fond of storytelling. The story began in 1949...
...
Paul was a detailed narrator and by the time he arrived at the 1970’s the sleepy bug had hit me. Even the après-repas tea couldn’t make me stay up any longer. We called it a night and promised to take up the family story again the next time we meet.
Early the next day, Geoff and I left to catch the train for Avignon where our friends would soon arrive from Singapore. With the hurried goodbyes I felt a real sense of regret, as if I were leaving my own family. In the short time we had spent together, I had grown attached to the happy clan. I loved the children for their easy manners and for behaving like little French gentlemen. I adored Nadia for making her home so warm, often without the help her traveling husband, and for doing it uncomplainingly. And I admired Paul, this man who looks and acts so much like my husband, for overcoming the confusion of his early childhood years and growing up to build a beautiful family of his own.
After we left Veyssilieu, we would eventually make our way to Grand Island in West New York where I would meet Uncle Dave and his wife Anne. We would stay in their stylish home, enjoy their tremendous hospitality, and have similarly long and elucidating conversations about the Prozeller history...Even later, I would meet the family patriarch, Grandpa Paul, and sit in his old living room going over ancient family portraits...
...
I felt an incredible sense of comfort meeting each of the Prozeller men this summer...I took delight in identifying the family traits, which were as evident in the 1900’s sepia-toned photographs in Grandpa Paul’s sitting room as on the aging faces of Sue and Paul, and in the still youthful face of Geoff. The slightly protruding nose, mouth, and chin area that gives Geoff the look of an affectionate small animal comes from this line of German blood. I was glad to know that Geoff’s tendency to scratch his head and start looking for displaced items just as he is headed out the door is also a source of amused annoyance for Nadia. I had a chuckle at learning that the men also shared a stubborn preference for sleeping with the shutters open, forcing their wives to wear eye shades...
It was a wonderful summer as we trailed from Europe to the US and back to Asia. Along the way we got to know ourselves and we also got to know our now shared family much, much better.
Saturday, August 22, 2009
Saturday Night Fear Factor
Last night, in between imbibing pretty cocktails at Q-bar and thumping to the DJ’s European beats at Punk, I scored a major gastronomical triumph. I managed to persuade some very foreign friends to sample that “frightening but irresistible” stew I mentioned in my previous post.
“Mao Xue Wang” quite literally means “hair, blood, vigorous,” a rather precise description of this spicy, oily concoction of tripe (I think that’s what the “hair” refers to, cilia), blood tofu (just like blood sausage, but square-shaped), intestines, arterial walls (or is it esophagus?), spam, and some harmless vegetables (wood ears, or in last night’s case, thick vermicelli noodles).
The night had started out with very tame food and beverage choices. A large group assembled at Q-bar for a friend’s going away party. After two years in Beijing as a sometimes-frustrated journalist, A was headed to London for a coveted internship with the Financial Times and gathered her friends for one last shebang.
Having been away for a few years I was a complete nightlife newbie. I had no idea what the visually arresting array of new mega-malls, glitzy restaurants, and darkly promising clubs had to offer. I looked up Q-bar on the internet before I set out and was pleased to find it had its own website, but then promptly displeased (yet not at all surprised) to find the web link broken. Google Maps told me it was in the middle of the San Li Tun bar district and I copied down the phone number, which saved me from giving bad directions to our cabby.
Q-bar was a bit of a hidden gem. To get to the rooftop spread we had to enter through the sparse- and stern-looking reception area of a 1980’s state-run hotel, take the lift to the top, then walk past rooms 502 and 503 and go up a flight of stairs. I was surprised to find such a budget and thoroughly Chinese-looking hotel set in the epicenter of Western activity in Beijing. San Li Tun has many retail and entertainment outlets that don’t even have Chinese names. The bar was impressive – large, faintly glowing red from beneath the floorboards, and partitioned into cozy lounging areas.
The weather, either as a result of the day’s rain or as an early harbinger of the cool autumn that’s to come (oh how I’ve waited for it), was perfect for a few drinks en plein-air. I ordered a ginger martini, which sounded promising but was actually exceptionally spicy and low-grade alcohol tasting.
The friends arrived. I had invited T, my new Swedish friend whose buxom blond good looks unfortunately get her confused for a high-class Russian escort sometimes. P was my husband’s friend from Boston, with an accent so thick that I feel like I’m on the set of “Good Will Hunting” if I close my eyes and listen.
After a few rounds of drinks – I later went with safer choices, like chardonnay – and amusedly flipping through P’s pocket phrasebook, a small laminated filofax that allows him to point to the address of any destination in Beijing, I got the late night hunger bug. I started raving to my friends about Mao Xue Wang, half joking that it’d be the perfect grub to warm me up pre-clubbing, but not believing for a second that anyone would join me in partaking of this “blood stew.”
T, bless her heart and palate, was game for it, as long as I promised I’d go dancing afterwards. The rest of our group took some persuading, but soon I was out on the street dialing directory assistance on 114 to find out if two of the posher spicy food restaurant chains had an outlet nearby. Neither one answered and we gave up on the idea, taking to the street to search for anything to fill us up. We stopped at the closest open restaurant, sat down, and voila! There it was - Mao Xue Wang -prominently advertised on menu page one.
With this stroke of luck it seemed we were destined to have a bit of organ soup. The waitress gave me a strange look when, without looking through the menu, I straight up ordered one Mao Xue Wang, a beer, and a few bottles of water.
When the stew was brought out it was in one of those oversized serving bowls and just looked like a big vessel of chilies and oil. I prefaced to my friends that this was not the best-looking Mao Xue Wang I’ve seen, maybe a bit too oily and lacking fresh chilies.
We picked up our chopsticks, or at least T and I did, and I pointed out the various constituents of this murky stew much as a weatherman would indicate oncoming storms on a blue screen. I served each a piece of spam, the least suspicious “meat” in this dish, to my Caucasian friends and husband.
T took a bite and proclaimed it good, then plunged her chopsticks to get at the better stuff. Apparently in Sweden there is a similarly frightening dish – large chunks of fried blood – so she was no novice at eating hemoglobin. P looked at his spam disinterestedly, but after seeing the girls heartily partake he asked me one more time whether it was “really just spam” and proceeded to eat. Meanwhile, T was going in for a sampling of each of the parts, affirming that the arterial walls (or was it esophagus?) were indeed “crunchy.” P got increasingly adventurous as he downed his Yanjing Pure beer and even snipped a small corner off a piece of blood tofu and popped it into his mouth. Only G remained unmoved by the spicy bits I laid on his plate.
I’m happy to report that the stew was generally a hit and it did power us “vigorously” to 4am as we danced to creative mixes at Punk (a small club located in a very high-ceilinged, glass-paneled, airy building). As I teeter tottered across the cobbled pavement on my way home I teased G gently about his refusal to try the blood stew to which I am so partial. He promised he’d try a “very small” piece next time, and we shook pinkies on it.
“Mao Xue Wang” quite literally means “hair, blood, vigorous,” a rather precise description of this spicy, oily concoction of tripe (I think that’s what the “hair” refers to, cilia), blood tofu (just like blood sausage, but square-shaped), intestines, arterial walls (or is it esophagus?), spam, and some harmless vegetables (wood ears, or in last night’s case, thick vermicelli noodles).
The night had started out with very tame food and beverage choices. A large group assembled at Q-bar for a friend’s going away party. After two years in Beijing as a sometimes-frustrated journalist, A was headed to London for a coveted internship with the Financial Times and gathered her friends for one last shebang.
Having been away for a few years I was a complete nightlife newbie. I had no idea what the visually arresting array of new mega-malls, glitzy restaurants, and darkly promising clubs had to offer. I looked up Q-bar on the internet before I set out and was pleased to find it had its own website, but then promptly displeased (yet not at all surprised) to find the web link broken. Google Maps told me it was in the middle of the San Li Tun bar district and I copied down the phone number, which saved me from giving bad directions to our cabby.
Q-bar was a bit of a hidden gem. To get to the rooftop spread we had to enter through the sparse- and stern-looking reception area of a 1980’s state-run hotel, take the lift to the top, then walk past rooms 502 and 503 and go up a flight of stairs. I was surprised to find such a budget and thoroughly Chinese-looking hotel set in the epicenter of Western activity in Beijing. San Li Tun has many retail and entertainment outlets that don’t even have Chinese names. The bar was impressive – large, faintly glowing red from beneath the floorboards, and partitioned into cozy lounging areas.
The weather, either as a result of the day’s rain or as an early harbinger of the cool autumn that’s to come (oh how I’ve waited for it), was perfect for a few drinks en plein-air. I ordered a ginger martini, which sounded promising but was actually exceptionally spicy and low-grade alcohol tasting.
The friends arrived. I had invited T, my new Swedish friend whose buxom blond good looks unfortunately get her confused for a high-class Russian escort sometimes. P was my husband’s friend from Boston, with an accent so thick that I feel like I’m on the set of “Good Will Hunting” if I close my eyes and listen.
After a few rounds of drinks – I later went with safer choices, like chardonnay – and amusedly flipping through P’s pocket phrasebook, a small laminated filofax that allows him to point to the address of any destination in Beijing, I got the late night hunger bug. I started raving to my friends about Mao Xue Wang, half joking that it’d be the perfect grub to warm me up pre-clubbing, but not believing for a second that anyone would join me in partaking of this “blood stew.”
T, bless her heart and palate, was game for it, as long as I promised I’d go dancing afterwards. The rest of our group took some persuading, but soon I was out on the street dialing directory assistance on 114 to find out if two of the posher spicy food restaurant chains had an outlet nearby. Neither one answered and we gave up on the idea, taking to the street to search for anything to fill us up. We stopped at the closest open restaurant, sat down, and voila! There it was - Mao Xue Wang -prominently advertised on menu page one.
With this stroke of luck it seemed we were destined to have a bit of organ soup. The waitress gave me a strange look when, without looking through the menu, I straight up ordered one Mao Xue Wang, a beer, and a few bottles of water.
When the stew was brought out it was in one of those oversized serving bowls and just looked like a big vessel of chilies and oil. I prefaced to my friends that this was not the best-looking Mao Xue Wang I’ve seen, maybe a bit too oily and lacking fresh chilies.
We picked up our chopsticks, or at least T and I did, and I pointed out the various constituents of this murky stew much as a weatherman would indicate oncoming storms on a blue screen. I served each a piece of spam, the least suspicious “meat” in this dish, to my Caucasian friends and husband.
T took a bite and proclaimed it good, then plunged her chopsticks to get at the better stuff. Apparently in Sweden there is a similarly frightening dish – large chunks of fried blood – so she was no novice at eating hemoglobin. P looked at his spam disinterestedly, but after seeing the girls heartily partake he asked me one more time whether it was “really just spam” and proceeded to eat. Meanwhile, T was going in for a sampling of each of the parts, affirming that the arterial walls (or was it esophagus?) were indeed “crunchy.” P got increasingly adventurous as he downed his Yanjing Pure beer and even snipped a small corner off a piece of blood tofu and popped it into his mouth. Only G remained unmoved by the spicy bits I laid on his plate.
I’m happy to report that the stew was generally a hit and it did power us “vigorously” to 4am as we danced to creative mixes at Punk (a small club located in a very high-ceilinged, glass-paneled, airy building). As I teeter tottered across the cobbled pavement on my way home I teased G gently about his refusal to try the blood stew to which I am so partial. He promised he’d try a “very small” piece next time, and we shook pinkies on it.
Sunday, August 16, 2009
Beijing, As I Like It
Sunday to Sunday, it’s been a week since I arrived. It’s been a happy time, a busy time, and a reflective time.
Every time I come to Beijing after being away it takes me a while to get my bearings. Fresh off the plane, I never know where to eat, how to meet up with friends, or navigate my way to the best quality fake DVDs. Life in China happens at a 100-meter dash pace. It's a big change from my recent life in Paris where, twelve years after my first visit, my pocket maps are still current and my favorite restaurants haven’t even changed the upholstery on their chairs.
At the start of this week, I had no idea where to go to eat mao xue wang (a frightening but irresistible spicy stew of tripe, blood, and other animal parts), how to buy a new SIM card for my phone, or what price to pay for a good foot rub. With a bit of help from friends, old and new, I’ve now worked out my basic needs. I’ve managed to overcome internet censorship (thanks to Witopia), settle into a comfy couch to read and drink smoothies (Bookworm), and get my daily dose of yoga (Yoga Yard).
Basics aside, on the whole I find Beijing a much more pleasant (and more foreign-husband-friendly) city this time around. The infrastructure that was built up to welcome millions of Olympics tourists in 2008 still functions and now serves the needs of Beijingers well. Instead of rickety and sweltering hot 1980’s era buses I can hop onto a still-shiny vehicle, swipe my city transportation card, and sit in relatively cool comfort to wait for my stop.
Even more significant than the physical infrastructure is the “cultural infrastructure.” Leading up to the Olympics I saw the impressive public campaign to make Beijingers tourist-ready – at every bus station government workers wearing the ubiquitous and authoritative red armbands waved small flags to herd commuters into queues. Everywhere I turned, some celebrity was smiling from a TV screen or colored poster and reminding people not to spit in public or push in a crowd. A year after the Olympics, people are still lining up, of their own accord and without the aid of armbanded enforcers. It’s easier than ever to love Beijing.
In my week here I’ve also been reminded of the vibrancy of the city. China is really its own universe. From London to New York, everywhere I went this summer my acquaintances were talking in dull tones about the recession, losing their jobs, or cutting back on shopping. Here, locals and expats alike are optimistic about the opportunities out there.
It’s not that they’ve all drunk the government Cool-Aid and believe in the mighty Chinese foreign reserves. It’s just that people who have chosen to make their life here seem to be bigger risk-takers, more creative, and somewhat relaxed about what shape their “success” can take. Instead of the usual two-year stint at an investment bank or consultancy, followed by business school, then followed by I-don’t-know-what (eternal happiness?), the people I meet here mostly got here by packing a bag and getting on a plane. Many arrived without significant Chinese language skills nor a job lined up. But over time they’ve found interesting gigs, started small companies, and developed amazing fluency in Mandarin.
I’m a believer in “do what makes you happy” and can’t judge anyone’s life choices beyond my own (HBS friends should take no offence at my above observation). All I want to say is that being here has made me extremely happy and wonderfully inspired. For now, it’s the perfect place to reconnect with my past and think about my choices for the future.
Every time I come to Beijing after being away it takes me a while to get my bearings. Fresh off the plane, I never know where to eat, how to meet up with friends, or navigate my way to the best quality fake DVDs. Life in China happens at a 100-meter dash pace. It's a big change from my recent life in Paris where, twelve years after my first visit, my pocket maps are still current and my favorite restaurants haven’t even changed the upholstery on their chairs.
At the start of this week, I had no idea where to go to eat mao xue wang (a frightening but irresistible spicy stew of tripe, blood, and other animal parts), how to buy a new SIM card for my phone, or what price to pay for a good foot rub. With a bit of help from friends, old and new, I’ve now worked out my basic needs. I’ve managed to overcome internet censorship (thanks to Witopia), settle into a comfy couch to read and drink smoothies (Bookworm), and get my daily dose of yoga (Yoga Yard).
Basics aside, on the whole I find Beijing a much more pleasant (and more foreign-husband-friendly) city this time around. The infrastructure that was built up to welcome millions of Olympics tourists in 2008 still functions and now serves the needs of Beijingers well. Instead of rickety and sweltering hot 1980’s era buses I can hop onto a still-shiny vehicle, swipe my city transportation card, and sit in relatively cool comfort to wait for my stop.
Even more significant than the physical infrastructure is the “cultural infrastructure.” Leading up to the Olympics I saw the impressive public campaign to make Beijingers tourist-ready – at every bus station government workers wearing the ubiquitous and authoritative red armbands waved small flags to herd commuters into queues. Everywhere I turned, some celebrity was smiling from a TV screen or colored poster and reminding people not to spit in public or push in a crowd. A year after the Olympics, people are still lining up, of their own accord and without the aid of armbanded enforcers. It’s easier than ever to love Beijing.
In my week here I’ve also been reminded of the vibrancy of the city. China is really its own universe. From London to New York, everywhere I went this summer my acquaintances were talking in dull tones about the recession, losing their jobs, or cutting back on shopping. Here, locals and expats alike are optimistic about the opportunities out there.
It’s not that they’ve all drunk the government Cool-Aid and believe in the mighty Chinese foreign reserves. It’s just that people who have chosen to make their life here seem to be bigger risk-takers, more creative, and somewhat relaxed about what shape their “success” can take. Instead of the usual two-year stint at an investment bank or consultancy, followed by business school, then followed by I-don’t-know-what (eternal happiness?), the people I meet here mostly got here by packing a bag and getting on a plane. Many arrived without significant Chinese language skills nor a job lined up. But over time they’ve found interesting gigs, started small companies, and developed amazing fluency in Mandarin.
I’m a believer in “do what makes you happy” and can’t judge anyone’s life choices beyond my own (HBS friends should take no offence at my above observation). All I want to say is that being here has made me extremely happy and wonderfully inspired. For now, it’s the perfect place to reconnect with my past and think about my choices for the future.
Thursday, August 13, 2009
A True Family Story
I'd like to share a piece of writing that's not mine. I had been looking for a copy of a short story my mom wrote about her younger brother more than ten years ago during an English writing course. Here in Beijing, in boxes upon boxes of old things (my notebooks from 1st grade, my high school graduation speech, my parents' wedding photo), I found a hard copy this morning. I've typed it up to share here, keeping mom's original grammatical errors but omitting a small paragraph about the political environment in the 1950's.
This story always made me tear up, even more so reading it today because my uncle passed away in the summer of 2007.
My Younger Brother
By Li Gui Rong
I was six years old by the Chinese way. When we Chinese count ages, we always include the year when we were in our mothers’ womb. I remember, it was an early summer morning. My brothers and I woke up and found a mid-wife in my mother’s room. My father was not home on that day. In those days, he always attended those useless and endless political meetings somewhere outside our town. But my father, a fervent communist, always thought the meetings were very important. The mid-wife told us to prepare some hot water. We knew a younger brother or sister would come to the world soon.
That year was the year my country just experienced “Da Yue Jin”, a big, senseless political movement started by Mao Ze Dong. Western society translated the term “Da Yue Jin” into “A Great Leap Forward!” Before people could take a breath from this, the natural disaster followed right away. Some places had drought and some places were flooded all over China...[xxx]...
My hometown is located in Northeast China; across the border is Russia. People even saw trains and trains loaded with pig's tails going to the other side, too. But inside our country there was a big shortage of everything. The famine already started and soon spread across our country. Many of my countrymen sacrificed their lives because of “Da Yue Jin.” ...[xxx]...My younger brother decided to come to the world and join us now.
My mother called me to her room. She was pale, weak and sweating all over. She was struggling with the pain about to give birth. Mom told me to go to Uncle Li’s place to get some rice (food distribution at the time was controlled by the street committee). Uncle Li was the person who was in charge of all the food distribution. I left my house with a little cotton bag in my hand. It was still very dark outside because the sky was covered by clouds. The thunder and flash of lightning was on and off. I was so scared. All the ghost stories came to my mind. I wished I could go home. I did not want to go to Uncle Li’s place any more. But mom’s pale face also came to my mind. My family was waiting for whatever I could get back for breakfast and my mother needed to eat something so she could give the new baby some milk. I had no choice but to go.
I knocked on the door hard. It took very long before Uncle Li answered the door. He came, opened the door without scything anything. I tried so hard to collect all the sweet words to please Uncle Li. Uncle Li, the whole time he even did not look at me, he slowly walked to the yellow rice counter, picked up a container, gathered some rice and put it on the scale. Still no words. I opened my bag and he poured the rice into it and said in a hardly heard voice, “Be careful, not to spill it.”
I carried the rice on my back. I moved it to my front; I put it on my shoulder. I kept changing my posture for carrying it. The rice was so heavy for me. I also stopped a couple of times to take a deep breath. Finally I got home. I was so delighted and ran to my mom’s room. “Mom! I got a lot of rice back!” My mom closed her eyes and answered nothing. I did not figure out until years later, when I was bigger, why my mom did not say anything to praise me. It was not because she did not appreciate what I had accomplished. Mom didn’t say anything because she knew the rice I brought home would not last for very long. How could a six-year-old child know that?
My little brother, the new baby, was born already. He was on the side of the “kang.” “Kang” is a unique thing in northern China, centuries old. It is normally built of bricks with holes under the surface. The holes were connected to the stove. You burned the wood inside the stove. The fire in the stove traveled around the holes. The bricks on the surface become hot. The brick also preserved the heat for quite a few hours, so you could sleep on a warm place.
I did not think so much about my mother’s reaction toward my trip back with the rice. My focus turned to my younger brother right away. Wow! The baby, he was so thin, I could see the bones, the veins. Because he was still adjusting to the temperature, he was cold. His body was a deep, dark purple color, as if his blood was freezing. “He is cold mom,” I said. “Never mind,” Mom answered. Mom was so tired and depressed by the hardship we had. It was very difficult already for Mom and Dad to raise five of us. Now, another one.
“Even if he is going to survive today, how about tomorrow?,” Mom continued to murmur to herself. I quickly gathered some clothes around the room and put them on his body. He was so quiet, he didn’t even cry, as if he knew he came to us at the wrong time. Days went on so slow. We all tried our best to manage some special food for my little brother. We were always looking forward to the next day, hoping we could get more and better food.
My little brother was growing. He was quiet, humble, sensitive, and seldom asked for anything, even if he was hungry. Everybody in my family tried our best to protect him. The way he reacted to our help made us feel we never did enough for him. One picture about him when he was two and a half years old has been in my mind ever since. My eldest brother went to a school, which was fifty kilometers away; he came home only on Sundays. One Sunday he came back with some sausages as a gift for my little brother. My little brother got a piece of sausage in his hand, but he didn’t eat. He walked slowly to everybody in the family, insisting on each of us having a bite. At first we all pretended to bite the sausage, but we could not fool him. He was still very quiet, but stubborn. He wouldn’t move until we really took a little bite of the sausage. This was my little brother. More than thirty years have gone by. He has married, has two children, and he remains the same as when he was first born. He is quiet, humble, sensitive, and cares about others. He will never asks for anything.
He is the brother I miss a lot no matter where I go. He is the brother I am happy and anxious to meet no matter how many thousands of miles I have to fly. He is the brother, one day I will tell him, that he didn’t need to be so humble, so sensitive. He didn’t do anything wrong. I am so happy to be his sister in this life. I am willing to be his sister in our next life. I promise I’ll be a better sister; I will do a better job to protect him.
This story always made me tear up, even more so reading it today because my uncle passed away in the summer of 2007.
My Younger Brother
By Li Gui Rong
I was six years old by the Chinese way. When we Chinese count ages, we always include the year when we were in our mothers’ womb. I remember, it was an early summer morning. My brothers and I woke up and found a mid-wife in my mother’s room. My father was not home on that day. In those days, he always attended those useless and endless political meetings somewhere outside our town. But my father, a fervent communist, always thought the meetings were very important. The mid-wife told us to prepare some hot water. We knew a younger brother or sister would come to the world soon.
That year was the year my country just experienced “Da Yue Jin”, a big, senseless political movement started by Mao Ze Dong. Western society translated the term “Da Yue Jin” into “A Great Leap Forward!” Before people could take a breath from this, the natural disaster followed right away. Some places had drought and some places were flooded all over China...[xxx]...
My hometown is located in Northeast China; across the border is Russia. People even saw trains and trains loaded with pig's tails going to the other side, too. But inside our country there was a big shortage of everything. The famine already started and soon spread across our country. Many of my countrymen sacrificed their lives because of “Da Yue Jin.” ...[xxx]...My younger brother decided to come to the world and join us now.
My mother called me to her room. She was pale, weak and sweating all over. She was struggling with the pain about to give birth. Mom told me to go to Uncle Li’s place to get some rice (food distribution at the time was controlled by the street committee). Uncle Li was the person who was in charge of all the food distribution. I left my house with a little cotton bag in my hand. It was still very dark outside because the sky was covered by clouds. The thunder and flash of lightning was on and off. I was so scared. All the ghost stories came to my mind. I wished I could go home. I did not want to go to Uncle Li’s place any more. But mom’s pale face also came to my mind. My family was waiting for whatever I could get back for breakfast and my mother needed to eat something so she could give the new baby some milk. I had no choice but to go.
I knocked on the door hard. It took very long before Uncle Li answered the door. He came, opened the door without scything anything. I tried so hard to collect all the sweet words to please Uncle Li. Uncle Li, the whole time he even did not look at me, he slowly walked to the yellow rice counter, picked up a container, gathered some rice and put it on the scale. Still no words. I opened my bag and he poured the rice into it and said in a hardly heard voice, “Be careful, not to spill it.”
I carried the rice on my back. I moved it to my front; I put it on my shoulder. I kept changing my posture for carrying it. The rice was so heavy for me. I also stopped a couple of times to take a deep breath. Finally I got home. I was so delighted and ran to my mom’s room. “Mom! I got a lot of rice back!” My mom closed her eyes and answered nothing. I did not figure out until years later, when I was bigger, why my mom did not say anything to praise me. It was not because she did not appreciate what I had accomplished. Mom didn’t say anything because she knew the rice I brought home would not last for very long. How could a six-year-old child know that?
My little brother, the new baby, was born already. He was on the side of the “kang.” “Kang” is a unique thing in northern China, centuries old. It is normally built of bricks with holes under the surface. The holes were connected to the stove. You burned the wood inside the stove. The fire in the stove traveled around the holes. The bricks on the surface become hot. The brick also preserved the heat for quite a few hours, so you could sleep on a warm place.
I did not think so much about my mother’s reaction toward my trip back with the rice. My focus turned to my younger brother right away. Wow! The baby, he was so thin, I could see the bones, the veins. Because he was still adjusting to the temperature, he was cold. His body was a deep, dark purple color, as if his blood was freezing. “He is cold mom,” I said. “Never mind,” Mom answered. Mom was so tired and depressed by the hardship we had. It was very difficult already for Mom and Dad to raise five of us. Now, another one.
“Even if he is going to survive today, how about tomorrow?,” Mom continued to murmur to herself. I quickly gathered some clothes around the room and put them on his body. He was so quiet, he didn’t even cry, as if he knew he came to us at the wrong time. Days went on so slow. We all tried our best to manage some special food for my little brother. We were always looking forward to the next day, hoping we could get more and better food.
My little brother was growing. He was quiet, humble, sensitive, and seldom asked for anything, even if he was hungry. Everybody in my family tried our best to protect him. The way he reacted to our help made us feel we never did enough for him. One picture about him when he was two and a half years old has been in my mind ever since. My eldest brother went to a school, which was fifty kilometers away; he came home only on Sundays. One Sunday he came back with some sausages as a gift for my little brother. My little brother got a piece of sausage in his hand, but he didn’t eat. He walked slowly to everybody in the family, insisting on each of us having a bite. At first we all pretended to bite the sausage, but we could not fool him. He was still very quiet, but stubborn. He wouldn’t move until we really took a little bite of the sausage. This was my little brother. More than thirty years have gone by. He has married, has two children, and he remains the same as when he was first born. He is quiet, humble, sensitive, and cares about others. He will never asks for anything.
He is the brother I miss a lot no matter where I go. He is the brother I am happy and anxious to meet no matter how many thousands of miles I have to fly. He is the brother, one day I will tell him, that he didn’t need to be so humble, so sensitive. He didn’t do anything wrong. I am so happy to be his sister in this life. I am willing to be his sister in our next life. I promise I’ll be a better sister; I will do a better job to protect him.
Old Luxury: Vintage Shopping in Paris
When I think of “vintage” my nose crinkles at the remembrance of musty smells and my arms itch as if I’ve already dug through piles of fraying fabric. I’m a city girl, I like a polished look, and quite simply, I don’t “do” vintage.
But there was something irresistible about vintage in Paris. Here “vintage” doesn’t mean overpriced Salvation Army goods or your grandmother’s discarded house dress. In Paris, vintage is for real collectors and for those who want haute couture at bargain prices.
Many times on random walks through the neighborhoods I came upon little stalls, shops, and even sprawling markets that sell everything old. In this vintage enthusiast’s dream world I’ve seen and petted a real stuffed zebra (for taxidermy fans), I’ve touched lace so old and airy that I feared it would dissolve in a puff of magic dust on my fingertip, and I’ve tried carrying many, MANY crocodile frame handbags in the crook of my arm.
After a few fun but accidental drop-in’s at Parisian “friperies,” I decided to do a proper vintage (window-) shopping excursion. First, I had to do my research. I went to WH Smith, one of the biggest English bookstores in Paris, and shamelessly copied pages of a vintage shopping guidebook into my Moleskin. I then circled each of the stores I wanted to check out in my pocket city map-book. Lastly, I talked G into navigating me around the city to find these stores on bikes (easier than the Metro for some of the locations and far faster than walking).
The tony neighborhoods had plenty of ultra high-end vintage stores that required appointments. I skipped these and concentrated my fieldtrip around the younger, hipper, and cheaper neighborhoods in the Marais and Bastille areas. My favorite shopping experience was at Come On Eileen, which has turned me onto vintage for life.
Come On Eileen sits on a quiet side street off Rue de la Roquette. Outside, a pair of plastic mannequins stands underneath a pink neon sign (very 80’s) spelling out the store name. Once inside, shoppers immediately see just how deceptive the narrow storefront is – this is a three-level emporium stacked floor-to-ceiling with old fashion fare.
On the first floor is an impressive collection of dresses, handbags, eyewear, and shoes. I had to contain my excitement -- genuine crocodile leather handbags from the 1960’s on sale for as little as 50 euros (compare to the thousands you’d have to spend on this season’s styles)! One floor down is a denim haven stocked with jeans of every age and variety. Most of these Levi’s are easily older than I am. Finally, in the lowest basement level, also the biggest showroom in the store, is a wild collection of outer wear (Burberry trench coats), boots, and the requisite wigs and knick knacks.
The abundance of goods is enough to make any fashionista drool, but what most appeals to me about Come On Eileen is how organized it is. The décor is bohemian and goods are carelessly draped on a chair here, a table there, but over all everything is accessible. No rifling through boxes of callously tossed clothing or wrestling with five hangers tangled together. Everything is also impeccably clean – the buyers have obviously taken the time to pick their goods and restore them to useable condition before putting them on the racks.
I chatted with the salesgirls a bit, Fabienne and Silvia, and learn from them that the owner, Daniel, has been a serious collector for decades. The store has been around for ten years, before “friperies” became all the rage in Paris, or New York and London for that matter. Daniel picks his pieces carefully and prices for what he thinks the goods are worth, not more, not less. Having visited the store, I now shared some kind of tenuous connection with a host of celebrities who are regular customers – Lou Doillon, Kylie Minogue, Chloe Sevigny, Tory Burch, to name a few. Wow, seems I randomly found the cream of the “brocante” crop here at Come On Eileen!
Being a total novice at vintage, I wanted to see what a seasoned eye would pick out of the store. I asked Silvia to show me a few of her favorite pieces. She protests a little, in her charming Slovakian accented French, but then obliges. Silva shows me a grey wool Hermes jacket from the 1960’s, trimmed with tan leather and in almost-new condition (500 euros); a Courreges ivory dress from the 1950’s, which also looks hardly worn (1300 euros); and a signature Pucci print dress.
Despite promising to myself in advance that I wouldn’t buy anything, I couldn’t resist taking just a small souvenir away with me. I focused on accessories for their generally smaller price tags. I spent a long time choosing from a few favorites – brown / orange python Mary Janes from Prada 2007 (150 euros); glossy black croc purse (100 euros); brown knee high boots (painfully chic and so very Parisian, 70 euros). With a little help from G, I finally settled on a deep scarlet leather sling-across purse from Cartier. It had a classic pillbox shape and looks new, probably easier to fit into my as yet non-vintage wardrobe back in Singapore. And it was only 30 euros! I’d recommend anyone lucky enough to find themselves in Paris next to swing by this amazing treasure trove.
Before I left I had just one question, what’s with the name? Turns out Daniel doesn’t only know his fashion well, he also is a fan of 80’s pop. He named his store after the British hit song and his daughter, Eileen.
But there was something irresistible about vintage in Paris. Here “vintage” doesn’t mean overpriced Salvation Army goods or your grandmother’s discarded house dress. In Paris, vintage is for real collectors and for those who want haute couture at bargain prices.
Many times on random walks through the neighborhoods I came upon little stalls, shops, and even sprawling markets that sell everything old. In this vintage enthusiast’s dream world I’ve seen and petted a real stuffed zebra (for taxidermy fans), I’ve touched lace so old and airy that I feared it would dissolve in a puff of magic dust on my fingertip, and I’ve tried carrying many, MANY crocodile frame handbags in the crook of my arm.
After a few fun but accidental drop-in’s at Parisian “friperies,” I decided to do a proper vintage (window-) shopping excursion. First, I had to do my research. I went to WH Smith, one of the biggest English bookstores in Paris, and shamelessly copied pages of a vintage shopping guidebook into my Moleskin. I then circled each of the stores I wanted to check out in my pocket city map-book. Lastly, I talked G into navigating me around the city to find these stores on bikes (easier than the Metro for some of the locations and far faster than walking).
The tony neighborhoods had plenty of ultra high-end vintage stores that required appointments. I skipped these and concentrated my fieldtrip around the younger, hipper, and cheaper neighborhoods in the Marais and Bastille areas. My favorite shopping experience was at Come On Eileen, which has turned me onto vintage for life.
Come On Eileen sits on a quiet side street off Rue de la Roquette. Outside, a pair of plastic mannequins stands underneath a pink neon sign (very 80’s) spelling out the store name. Once inside, shoppers immediately see just how deceptive the narrow storefront is – this is a three-level emporium stacked floor-to-ceiling with old fashion fare.
On the first floor is an impressive collection of dresses, handbags, eyewear, and shoes. I had to contain my excitement -- genuine crocodile leather handbags from the 1960’s on sale for as little as 50 euros (compare to the thousands you’d have to spend on this season’s styles)! One floor down is a denim haven stocked with jeans of every age and variety. Most of these Levi’s are easily older than I am. Finally, in the lowest basement level, also the biggest showroom in the store, is a wild collection of outer wear (Burberry trench coats), boots, and the requisite wigs and knick knacks.
The abundance of goods is enough to make any fashionista drool, but what most appeals to me about Come On Eileen is how organized it is. The décor is bohemian and goods are carelessly draped on a chair here, a table there, but over all everything is accessible. No rifling through boxes of callously tossed clothing or wrestling with five hangers tangled together. Everything is also impeccably clean – the buyers have obviously taken the time to pick their goods and restore them to useable condition before putting them on the racks.
I chatted with the salesgirls a bit, Fabienne and Silvia, and learn from them that the owner, Daniel, has been a serious collector for decades. The store has been around for ten years, before “friperies” became all the rage in Paris, or New York and London for that matter. Daniel picks his pieces carefully and prices for what he thinks the goods are worth, not more, not less. Having visited the store, I now shared some kind of tenuous connection with a host of celebrities who are regular customers – Lou Doillon, Kylie Minogue, Chloe Sevigny, Tory Burch, to name a few. Wow, seems I randomly found the cream of the “brocante” crop here at Come On Eileen!
Being a total novice at vintage, I wanted to see what a seasoned eye would pick out of the store. I asked Silvia to show me a few of her favorite pieces. She protests a little, in her charming Slovakian accented French, but then obliges. Silva shows me a grey wool Hermes jacket from the 1960’s, trimmed with tan leather and in almost-new condition (500 euros); a Courreges ivory dress from the 1950’s, which also looks hardly worn (1300 euros); and a signature Pucci print dress.
Despite promising to myself in advance that I wouldn’t buy anything, I couldn’t resist taking just a small souvenir away with me. I focused on accessories for their generally smaller price tags. I spent a long time choosing from a few favorites – brown / orange python Mary Janes from Prada 2007 (150 euros); glossy black croc purse (100 euros); brown knee high boots (painfully chic and so very Parisian, 70 euros). With a little help from G, I finally settled on a deep scarlet leather sling-across purse from Cartier. It had a classic pillbox shape and looks new, probably easier to fit into my as yet non-vintage wardrobe back in Singapore. And it was only 30 euros! I’d recommend anyone lucky enough to find themselves in Paris next to swing by this amazing treasure trove.
Before I left I had just one question, what’s with the name? Turns out Daniel doesn’t only know his fashion well, he also is a fan of 80’s pop. He named his store after the British hit song and his daughter, Eileen.
Tuesday, August 11, 2009
The Things I Love Most About Unemployment
Here I am in Beijing! My feet have been amply massaged, I’m extravagantly fed in mom’s kitchen, and I’ve started committing the daily acts of small subversion that seem to define life in China.
Arriving two days ago I was devastated to find that the omnipotent web censors in China have blocked access to Blogspot and Facebook, the two things I rely on to distribute my quotidian post. I sent a few email to friends and quickly learned that everyone who has chosen to make their life here has at least one favorite proxy server for accessing forbidden Western websites. This is the Chinese way – rules are made, rules are broken, life goes on.
So, my problem is solved, life is perfect again. Life on my unemployment holiday is mostly pretty perfect, but what do I love the most about it? (I say this with all the respect due to people who are involuntarily jobless and in need). Beyond the trifling luxuries of sleeping in and going out on “school nights”, I love my unemployment most for giving me time to learn about myself. Three big lessons from the last three months:
1. I have everything I need, not everything I want. This is a good thing.
In May I forced myself to pack light for the nomadic life, and through the summer I have had to stay light. Before I set out, I repacked my suitcase three times, trying to pick only a few outfits from four full closets. Once I hit the road I became perfectly content with having only fifteen articles of clothing.
I brought mostly basics – black and white tank tops that were in the “hardly ever wear” pile at home, a navy cardigan that saw the light of day only once after I bought it two years ago, a pair of skinny jeans, and a few dresses for special occasions (like my college roommate’s wedding in Florence).
Instead of tedium, I found daily enjoyment in my small trousseau. I took the pains to wash these simple garments by hand, fold them with care each time I packed my bags again, and I really felt clever if I managed to create a new look by adding an accessory.
The point I’m trying to make here isn’t about my creativity with fashion. It’s about the fact that I didn’t miss my Gucci bag or long for my crystal-studded heels or feel compelled to shop, all summer long.
Away from the daily stresses of corporate life and the barrage of consumer products that pave the way from the subway to the office, I found out that I don’t need many material things. My attitude of “I work so hard I deserve to buy these shoes” went flying out the window, along with the trappings of having too many possessions. Never once on holiday did I get annoyed about not finding the right top or losing a rhinestone in my earring.
I understand what Kenny Chesney’s cheesy song is trying to get at now – “no shirt, no shoes, no problems.”
2. If you had to go live on a deserted island, who would you take with you?
I not only found out which of my things I most love, I also found out who the people are that I really love. I mean REALLY love.
Yes, I love my friends dearly, and my cousin’s two-year old son, and maybe I even love an old workmate once a year on her birthday (when I send a card casually signed “Love, Qi”). But who are the indispensable ones that bring me happiness in life?
Far away from my usual company of coworkers, clients, acquaintances, and friends to party with, I gravitated towards just a handful of people. I emailed them whenever and from wherever to report my latest adventure, I called them to let them know I was happy and well, and I had to find a way to meet up with them on my travels even if it was just for an afternoon of fervent chatting.
Not surprisingly, my husband and my mom grew bigger and bigger on the distilled list of “people I really love.” My husband I began to love again in the way that I loved him when we first started dating. With fewer people and events competing for my free time I forgot that I had known him for almost five years and for most of that time had been nagging him to put up the toilet seat. It was special to discover that I enjoyed myself with him as much, if not more, catching the budget bus to Amsterdam as I did lounging poolside at the Four Seasons.
My mother, although I didn’t see her during my travels, was constantly on my mind. Every time I tasted a new dish, came upon a row of charming houses, or encountered some exotic flowers I took a picture and wished that I could email all the other senses to her as well. And so it naturally developed that after months of traveling far away from home, I had to come to Beijing to complete my holiday.
If I had to go away forever I would miss many people, but I wouldn’t leave for the life of me without my husband and my mom.
3. I am good for my mind and good for my body
When I was working I could’ve started the Perezhilton.com and Us Weekly Addicts Anonymous clubs. My precious weekends flew by in a flurry of social events and grand plans to “hunker down and read a good book,” which quickly gave way to the much easier non-activity in front of my favorite celebrity gossip outlet.
When I quit my job a big part of me worried that even with endless free time I would not get around to doing any of the mini projects I set. Would I end up surfing the web all day, filling my head with Hollywood trivia?
Luckily, when free time became abundant I spent more and more of it reading books (classics that I never wanted to pick up on a Saturday off work because they were too “heavy”), writing in my journal, and doing yoga. When leisurely activity didn’t have to fit into a 48-hour time frame I didn’t need the instantly gratifying “Jon & Kate Plus Eight” photo update. With every passing day, I remember more books I’ve been wanting to read, jot down more writing ideas to develop, and dream up more difficult yoga postures to master.
It’s a relief of sorts to find out that, left to my own devices, my mind seeks improvement, as does my body.
These three things may be commonplace to some, but to me they are profound learning’s about myself. Some people have good perspective and they gain it early, and manage to hang onto it even as they tread on the hamster wheel of working life. But me, I needed to take drastic action before I could see the elements essential to my happiness.
Getting out of the job, ridding myself of the apartment, and leaving behind most of the accessories of a “successful” life gave me the physical and metaphorical space to see what makes me happy. This period of unemployment is a blank sheet of paper onto which I can draw anew. If, at the end of this long holiday, nothing grand emerges (no life-changing epiphany, no novels published, no business to start), at least I will be resuming “normal” life with a better understanding of myself. And that, to me, is worth all the while.
Arriving two days ago I was devastated to find that the omnipotent web censors in China have blocked access to Blogspot and Facebook, the two things I rely on to distribute my quotidian post. I sent a few email to friends and quickly learned that everyone who has chosen to make their life here has at least one favorite proxy server for accessing forbidden Western websites. This is the Chinese way – rules are made, rules are broken, life goes on.
So, my problem is solved, life is perfect again. Life on my unemployment holiday is mostly pretty perfect, but what do I love the most about it? (I say this with all the respect due to people who are involuntarily jobless and in need). Beyond the trifling luxuries of sleeping in and going out on “school nights”, I love my unemployment most for giving me time to learn about myself. Three big lessons from the last three months:
1. I have everything I need, not everything I want. This is a good thing.
In May I forced myself to pack light for the nomadic life, and through the summer I have had to stay light. Before I set out, I repacked my suitcase three times, trying to pick only a few outfits from four full closets. Once I hit the road I became perfectly content with having only fifteen articles of clothing.
I brought mostly basics – black and white tank tops that were in the “hardly ever wear” pile at home, a navy cardigan that saw the light of day only once after I bought it two years ago, a pair of skinny jeans, and a few dresses for special occasions (like my college roommate’s wedding in Florence).
Instead of tedium, I found daily enjoyment in my small trousseau. I took the pains to wash these simple garments by hand, fold them with care each time I packed my bags again, and I really felt clever if I managed to create a new look by adding an accessory.
The point I’m trying to make here isn’t about my creativity with fashion. It’s about the fact that I didn’t miss my Gucci bag or long for my crystal-studded heels or feel compelled to shop, all summer long.
Away from the daily stresses of corporate life and the barrage of consumer products that pave the way from the subway to the office, I found out that I don’t need many material things. My attitude of “I work so hard I deserve to buy these shoes” went flying out the window, along with the trappings of having too many possessions. Never once on holiday did I get annoyed about not finding the right top or losing a rhinestone in my earring.
I understand what Kenny Chesney’s cheesy song is trying to get at now – “no shirt, no shoes, no problems.”
2. If you had to go live on a deserted island, who would you take with you?
I not only found out which of my things I most love, I also found out who the people are that I really love. I mean REALLY love.
Yes, I love my friends dearly, and my cousin’s two-year old son, and maybe I even love an old workmate once a year on her birthday (when I send a card casually signed “Love, Qi”). But who are the indispensable ones that bring me happiness in life?
Far away from my usual company of coworkers, clients, acquaintances, and friends to party with, I gravitated towards just a handful of people. I emailed them whenever and from wherever to report my latest adventure, I called them to let them know I was happy and well, and I had to find a way to meet up with them on my travels even if it was just for an afternoon of fervent chatting.
Not surprisingly, my husband and my mom grew bigger and bigger on the distilled list of “people I really love.” My husband I began to love again in the way that I loved him when we first started dating. With fewer people and events competing for my free time I forgot that I had known him for almost five years and for most of that time had been nagging him to put up the toilet seat. It was special to discover that I enjoyed myself with him as much, if not more, catching the budget bus to Amsterdam as I did lounging poolside at the Four Seasons.
My mother, although I didn’t see her during my travels, was constantly on my mind. Every time I tasted a new dish, came upon a row of charming houses, or encountered some exotic flowers I took a picture and wished that I could email all the other senses to her as well. And so it naturally developed that after months of traveling far away from home, I had to come to Beijing to complete my holiday.
If I had to go away forever I would miss many people, but I wouldn’t leave for the life of me without my husband and my mom.
3. I am good for my mind and good for my body
When I was working I could’ve started the Perezhilton.com and Us Weekly Addicts Anonymous clubs. My precious weekends flew by in a flurry of social events and grand plans to “hunker down and read a good book,” which quickly gave way to the much easier non-activity in front of my favorite celebrity gossip outlet.
When I quit my job a big part of me worried that even with endless free time I would not get around to doing any of the mini projects I set. Would I end up surfing the web all day, filling my head with Hollywood trivia?
Luckily, when free time became abundant I spent more and more of it reading books (classics that I never wanted to pick up on a Saturday off work because they were too “heavy”), writing in my journal, and doing yoga. When leisurely activity didn’t have to fit into a 48-hour time frame I didn’t need the instantly gratifying “Jon & Kate Plus Eight” photo update. With every passing day, I remember more books I’ve been wanting to read, jot down more writing ideas to develop, and dream up more difficult yoga postures to master.
It’s a relief of sorts to find out that, left to my own devices, my mind seeks improvement, as does my body.
These three things may be commonplace to some, but to me they are profound learning’s about myself. Some people have good perspective and they gain it early, and manage to hang onto it even as they tread on the hamster wheel of working life. But me, I needed to take drastic action before I could see the elements essential to my happiness.
Getting out of the job, ridding myself of the apartment, and leaving behind most of the accessories of a “successful” life gave me the physical and metaphorical space to see what makes me happy. This period of unemployment is a blank sheet of paper onto which I can draw anew. If, at the end of this long holiday, nothing grand emerges (no life-changing epiphany, no novels published, no business to start), at least I will be resuming “normal” life with a better understanding of myself. And that, to me, is worth all the while.
Friday, August 7, 2009
Beijing Homecoming
I remember the day I left. It was February time in 1990 and the schoolyard was still covered in whitish patches where the snow hadn't thawed.
That morning I went to school and emptied out my cubby desk. I don't know what the teacher, my favorite Teacher Wu, told my classmates about me. I myself didn't exactly know what was happening, having only vague notions of this "overseas" place where dad had gone off to work and where mom and I were now heading to join him.
In my third-grade universe, the outside world was so remote that I never even wondered about it. Apart from my father, I didn't know anyone who had left China. In fact, very few people had left in those days (the borders weren't open for average citizens), save for the refugee exodus following the democracy debacle in the summer of 1989.
After I collected my things I walked out of the low building and stared into the bright eastern sun shining over the small yard. It was strange standing there alone under such bright sunlight. I had never left school to go home so early in the day and I had never been outside of the classroom while all of my friends were still in it. A voice called out behind me,
"Zhai Qi, where are you going?"
It was a girl from my class. She had run after me into the yard.
"I'm going overseas," I answered, pretending to know what this meant.
She looked puzzled for a minute and then asked, "But why? Why leave now when you're class monitor? Next year you'll be grade monitor." At the time it seemed like a good question.
"I'm going to go live with my dad."
She was satisfied with this answer and turned around to go back to the classroom. We didn't say goodbye -- no one in our small world had ever left for anywhere so we simply didn't know we should’ve bid farewell.
I walked towards the school gates and turned around to take another look at the school. It was here that I had read my lessons from paperback texts, books which my father meticulously wrapped in old glossy calendar paper (to prevent damage to the covers) at the start of every school term. Here, I had admired the neat type-print handwriting of my classmate Yan and practiced to write like her. Here, too, I had had a small crush on a boy named Jing who played soccer at recess. Twice a day, everyday, my friends and I had walked into the gates in the morning, adjusting our "class monitor" badges if we were privileged to have them, and left at noon to race home for lunch. Along the way we often stopped to pluck little red flowers out of a neighbor's garden to suck on the candy-like syrup inside. This tiny piece of Beijing was my entire world.
After leaving Beijing that year I often went back. All the way through university I went back at least once, most times twice, a year to see the city I grew up in. But as I got older and responsibilities piled up, especially after starting work, vacations were harder to plan and I began to see less of Beijing. The city began to feel less and less like home.
Meeting my boyfriend (now husband) in the US made Beijing even more foreign to me. I started seeing the city through Geoff's American eyes. Little inconveniences that never bothered me became pronounced -- whenever we visited I had to translate all the menus for him; we could only eat in proper restaurants (no roadside stalls for the unaccustomed foreign stomach); the lack of Western toilets irked me; I lost my patience for pushy people who refuse to queue up. Little by little, Beijing became a place I "visited" instead of "went back" to.
But now I’m about to go on my Beijing homecoming. I’m going with Geoff, as a continuation of our long honeymoon, our recession travels, our "finding ourselves" journey, or whatever you want to call it. We are both gainfully unemployed and staying with my mom in a rent-free apartment seemed like a good way to pass time and figure out the future.
This time we have time on our hands. I hope that without the rush to “get things done” I’ll get to know the city and fall in love with it again. I hope to find that feeling of coming home to Beijing once more. And I hope for Geoff this strange, foreign place, which holds so many happy memories for me, will start to feel like home.
That morning I went to school and emptied out my cubby desk. I don't know what the teacher, my favorite Teacher Wu, told my classmates about me. I myself didn't exactly know what was happening, having only vague notions of this "overseas" place where dad had gone off to work and where mom and I were now heading to join him.
In my third-grade universe, the outside world was so remote that I never even wondered about it. Apart from my father, I didn't know anyone who had left China. In fact, very few people had left in those days (the borders weren't open for average citizens), save for the refugee exodus following the democracy debacle in the summer of 1989.
After I collected my things I walked out of the low building and stared into the bright eastern sun shining over the small yard. It was strange standing there alone under such bright sunlight. I had never left school to go home so early in the day and I had never been outside of the classroom while all of my friends were still in it. A voice called out behind me,
"Zhai Qi, where are you going?"
It was a girl from my class. She had run after me into the yard.
"I'm going overseas," I answered, pretending to know what this meant.
She looked puzzled for a minute and then asked, "But why? Why leave now when you're class monitor? Next year you'll be grade monitor." At the time it seemed like a good question.
"I'm going to go live with my dad."
She was satisfied with this answer and turned around to go back to the classroom. We didn't say goodbye -- no one in our small world had ever left for anywhere so we simply didn't know we should’ve bid farewell.
I walked towards the school gates and turned around to take another look at the school. It was here that I had read my lessons from paperback texts, books which my father meticulously wrapped in old glossy calendar paper (to prevent damage to the covers) at the start of every school term. Here, I had admired the neat type-print handwriting of my classmate Yan and practiced to write like her. Here, too, I had had a small crush on a boy named Jing who played soccer at recess. Twice a day, everyday, my friends and I had walked into the gates in the morning, adjusting our "class monitor" badges if we were privileged to have them, and left at noon to race home for lunch. Along the way we often stopped to pluck little red flowers out of a neighbor's garden to suck on the candy-like syrup inside. This tiny piece of Beijing was my entire world.
After leaving Beijing that year I often went back. All the way through university I went back at least once, most times twice, a year to see the city I grew up in. But as I got older and responsibilities piled up, especially after starting work, vacations were harder to plan and I began to see less of Beijing. The city began to feel less and less like home.
Meeting my boyfriend (now husband) in the US made Beijing even more foreign to me. I started seeing the city through Geoff's American eyes. Little inconveniences that never bothered me became pronounced -- whenever we visited I had to translate all the menus for him; we could only eat in proper restaurants (no roadside stalls for the unaccustomed foreign stomach); the lack of Western toilets irked me; I lost my patience for pushy people who refuse to queue up. Little by little, Beijing became a place I "visited" instead of "went back" to.
But now I’m about to go on my Beijing homecoming. I’m going with Geoff, as a continuation of our long honeymoon, our recession travels, our "finding ourselves" journey, or whatever you want to call it. We are both gainfully unemployed and staying with my mom in a rent-free apartment seemed like a good way to pass time and figure out the future.
This time we have time on our hands. I hope that without the rush to “get things done” I’ll get to know the city and fall in love with it again. I hope to find that feeling of coming home to Beijing once more. And I hope for Geoff this strange, foreign place, which holds so many happy memories for me, will start to feel like home.
Monday, August 3, 2009
I'll Have the Wolf, Medium Rare
Our week-long double date road trip in Provence with D&G went smashingly. Though we saw the most adventure on our first day, my favorite moments from the trip took place at a dining table (as always).
On Day 1, my G and I arrived first at the Avignon train station. We found a grassy patch outside, spread out my sarong (now in daily use as a picnic blanket), sank our teeth into hot sandwiches, and happily waited for D&G to get in. When they did, they looked fresh as daisies and bore no signs of the long flight they had just taken from Singapore to Paris, followed by a delayed train ride. The quartet complete, the men were dispatched to pick up the rental car while the women continued to soak up the brilliant Provencal sun.
When D pulled up and honked I was pleased to find the car was an Opel, a roomier vehicle than the Fiat Panda, Europe’s cheapest rental car. The Opel was still compact, but at least there was trunk space for the collective luggage. We set up the Tom Tom GPS device and were off to see the ancient Roman aqueducts, the Pont du Gard.
The drive was easy, enabled by the soothing voice of the GPS lady. The highways of Provence reminded me more of Florida than of France – sprawling depot stores (Ikea, Carrefour), abundant McDo’s, and “Formule1” motels. But interspersed with these drab, geographically indistinct roadside features were patches of deep violet (lavender fields) and profound green (grape vines and olive plants). These colorful splashes on the landscape and their aromatic emanations made it clear that we were in fact in Provence.
At any moment we expected to see our final destination rise out of the horizon, perhaps a pile of yellowing stones, a piece of old Italy in modern France. But the GPS announced in elegant British English, “You have arrived at your destination,” in front of a large medical complex. The Polyclinique du Grand Sud looked like an abode for the elderly, with not a Roman waterway in sight. We realized we must’ve made a mistake when plugging in the coordinates for the aqueducts and couldn’t blame the innocent Tom Tom for dutifully bringing us here.
Some fiddling with the GPS device, a quick change of drivers, and we were on our way, determined to find the Pont du Gard. We arrived twenty minutes later and bounded out of the car, our excitement compounded by the earlier disappointment. The parking lot of the aqueduct, set in the middle of a large forested park, was no place for modesty. Each of us deftly changed into swimming gear behind the doors of the Opel. We grabbed the bottle of wine G and I had brought from Paris and set off for the main attraction.
The Pont (“bridge”) stood majestically high and wide in the middle of a deep valley. It was a singular flat pane of ancient stones and archways – imagine if you unwound the circular Coliseum and laid it across a rapid river. Delighted, we ran towards the shallow banks of the river where canopied four-poster tanning beds lay waiting. A quick swig of red wine and we were down by the water in no time.
The water was divine, the best swim I’ve ever had. When we dipped our toes we found it chilled and crisp, too cold to swim in. But as we waded deeper and saw the other visitors completely submerged in almost-frigid waters, we decided to brave it. The ensuing submersions were hilarious. We each stuck to our preferred method: my G liked to dunk without hesitation, the girls favored a long exposition of nervous giggles and an anxious countdown, and D had to be dragged in. Despite the cold, once we were in the water it was heavenly and refreshing. I wouldn’t have gotten out till nightfall if not for the grey clouds that suddenly drifted our way. Raindrops turned to heavy rainfall, which then developed into an immense hailstorm.
We made it to the car before the hail hit but the drive to our hotel was hair-raising. The windshield wipers worked overtime but, still, we could hardly see. Most of the cars on the road pulled over to wait out the storm, but we forged on, eager to settle into cozy rooms and dry clothes. The final mile was especially stressful as we were in the historical center of Avignon. These medieval alleys were not built to accommodate cars and at every turn we wondered if we would have to get out and heave the vehicle onto our shoulders to be carried out. If we took a wrong turn, we would’ve had to choose between calling a forklift to the rescue or to mercilessly scraping the paint off the sides of the car.
But we managed to get there, and cleaned ourselves up, and set out on foot to find dinner. We passed by some restaurants advertising exotic fare like lapin (rabbit) and loup (which we decided was wolf and not fox, remembering the French title of the movie “Dances with the Wolves”). After a day of incessant snacking we were in the mood for a light dinner, so we agreed to save the loup for another day.
The opportunity to eat loup presented itself after we left Avignon and arrived in Arles. We had endured another frightening drive through even narrower alleys and our appetites were sufficiently worked up by the time we sat down at Le Galoubet, a restaurant G had researched before hand.
The vine-canopied terrace was fully booked so we sat down in the air-conditioned interior. Our corner table was flanked by one wall decorated with a large painting of a wolf striding along and another wall covered with bronze sculptures of heads of bull. This seemed to hint that gamey meats were part of the menu here and, sure enough, midway down the page we saw oven-roasted “loup” seasoned with some kind of special salt none of us recognized.
D, in an especially adventurous food mood, ordered the loup. I noticed the waitress didn’t ask “Quelle cuisson?" (“how would you like it cooked?”). Maybe loup was such an exotic meat that the average diner can’t be trusted to decide on its rareness?
All through the appetizers we discussed the loup. How it might be presented, what kind of seasoning and preparation, and whether it would taste like boar or beef. We rubbed our palms in anticipation when the main courses were brought out. Here was a roast vegetable salad, a pappardelle mixed with shreds of duck meat, a roasted chicken leg, and in front of D, the waitress set down the most awaited platter.
But the bright white ceramic vessel held at its center a slab of fish. It was a beautiful slab of fish, perfectly deboned down the center and the two halves artfully arranged upon a bedding of crisply roasted skin, yet this was no wolf!
Gingerly, I asked the waitress, “Ca, c’est le loup”?
“Oui, c’est le loup.” Affirmative, this is the “loup.”
“Mais, c’est une poisson.” I protested that this was fish, not mammal.
“Oui, le loup est c’est du poisson.”
What? Of all the non-sensical double entendres in foreign languages I had never before encountered one word that described two animals as distinct as fish and wolf.
Not wanting to accept the reality of this dish, I pointed to the painting on the wall and asked, “Mais le loup, c’est comme ca.”
Here she laughed and understood the confusion. “Ah, oui, c’est aussi le loup mais on ne mange jamais le loup comme ca.”
And there we had it, a real culinary coup de quirk. In the land where snails are salted and doused in pesto, where ducks are forced fed so their over-nourished livers can be fried, and where the smellier and moldier the better the cheese, our waitress was laughing at our ludicrous notion that a restaurant would ever serve wolf!
On Day 1, my G and I arrived first at the Avignon train station. We found a grassy patch outside, spread out my sarong (now in daily use as a picnic blanket), sank our teeth into hot sandwiches, and happily waited for D&G to get in. When they did, they looked fresh as daisies and bore no signs of the long flight they had just taken from Singapore to Paris, followed by a delayed train ride. The quartet complete, the men were dispatched to pick up the rental car while the women continued to soak up the brilliant Provencal sun.
When D pulled up and honked I was pleased to find the car was an Opel, a roomier vehicle than the Fiat Panda, Europe’s cheapest rental car. The Opel was still compact, but at least there was trunk space for the collective luggage. We set up the Tom Tom GPS device and were off to see the ancient Roman aqueducts, the Pont du Gard.
The drive was easy, enabled by the soothing voice of the GPS lady. The highways of Provence reminded me more of Florida than of France – sprawling depot stores (Ikea, Carrefour), abundant McDo’s, and “Formule1” motels. But interspersed with these drab, geographically indistinct roadside features were patches of deep violet (lavender fields) and profound green (grape vines and olive plants). These colorful splashes on the landscape and their aromatic emanations made it clear that we were in fact in Provence.
At any moment we expected to see our final destination rise out of the horizon, perhaps a pile of yellowing stones, a piece of old Italy in modern France. But the GPS announced in elegant British English, “You have arrived at your destination,” in front of a large medical complex. The Polyclinique du Grand Sud looked like an abode for the elderly, with not a Roman waterway in sight. We realized we must’ve made a mistake when plugging in the coordinates for the aqueducts and couldn’t blame the innocent Tom Tom for dutifully bringing us here.
Some fiddling with the GPS device, a quick change of drivers, and we were on our way, determined to find the Pont du Gard. We arrived twenty minutes later and bounded out of the car, our excitement compounded by the earlier disappointment. The parking lot of the aqueduct, set in the middle of a large forested park, was no place for modesty. Each of us deftly changed into swimming gear behind the doors of the Opel. We grabbed the bottle of wine G and I had brought from Paris and set off for the main attraction.
The Pont (“bridge”) stood majestically high and wide in the middle of a deep valley. It was a singular flat pane of ancient stones and archways – imagine if you unwound the circular Coliseum and laid it across a rapid river. Delighted, we ran towards the shallow banks of the river where canopied four-poster tanning beds lay waiting. A quick swig of red wine and we were down by the water in no time.
The water was divine, the best swim I’ve ever had. When we dipped our toes we found it chilled and crisp, too cold to swim in. But as we waded deeper and saw the other visitors completely submerged in almost-frigid waters, we decided to brave it. The ensuing submersions were hilarious. We each stuck to our preferred method: my G liked to dunk without hesitation, the girls favored a long exposition of nervous giggles and an anxious countdown, and D had to be dragged in. Despite the cold, once we were in the water it was heavenly and refreshing. I wouldn’t have gotten out till nightfall if not for the grey clouds that suddenly drifted our way. Raindrops turned to heavy rainfall, which then developed into an immense hailstorm.
We made it to the car before the hail hit but the drive to our hotel was hair-raising. The windshield wipers worked overtime but, still, we could hardly see. Most of the cars on the road pulled over to wait out the storm, but we forged on, eager to settle into cozy rooms and dry clothes. The final mile was especially stressful as we were in the historical center of Avignon. These medieval alleys were not built to accommodate cars and at every turn we wondered if we would have to get out and heave the vehicle onto our shoulders to be carried out. If we took a wrong turn, we would’ve had to choose between calling a forklift to the rescue or to mercilessly scraping the paint off the sides of the car.
But we managed to get there, and cleaned ourselves up, and set out on foot to find dinner. We passed by some restaurants advertising exotic fare like lapin (rabbit) and loup (which we decided was wolf and not fox, remembering the French title of the movie “Dances with the Wolves”). After a day of incessant snacking we were in the mood for a light dinner, so we agreed to save the loup for another day.
The opportunity to eat loup presented itself after we left Avignon and arrived in Arles. We had endured another frightening drive through even narrower alleys and our appetites were sufficiently worked up by the time we sat down at Le Galoubet, a restaurant G had researched before hand.
The vine-canopied terrace was fully booked so we sat down in the air-conditioned interior. Our corner table was flanked by one wall decorated with a large painting of a wolf striding along and another wall covered with bronze sculptures of heads of bull. This seemed to hint that gamey meats were part of the menu here and, sure enough, midway down the page we saw oven-roasted “loup” seasoned with some kind of special salt none of us recognized.
D, in an especially adventurous food mood, ordered the loup. I noticed the waitress didn’t ask “Quelle cuisson?" (“how would you like it cooked?”). Maybe loup was such an exotic meat that the average diner can’t be trusted to decide on its rareness?
All through the appetizers we discussed the loup. How it might be presented, what kind of seasoning and preparation, and whether it would taste like boar or beef. We rubbed our palms in anticipation when the main courses were brought out. Here was a roast vegetable salad, a pappardelle mixed with shreds of duck meat, a roasted chicken leg, and in front of D, the waitress set down the most awaited platter.
But the bright white ceramic vessel held at its center a slab of fish. It was a beautiful slab of fish, perfectly deboned down the center and the two halves artfully arranged upon a bedding of crisply roasted skin, yet this was no wolf!
Gingerly, I asked the waitress, “Ca, c’est le loup”?
“Oui, c’est le loup.” Affirmative, this is the “loup.”
“Mais, c’est une poisson.” I protested that this was fish, not mammal.
“Oui, le loup est c’est du poisson.”
What? Of all the non-sensical double entendres in foreign languages I had never before encountered one word that described two animals as distinct as fish and wolf.
Not wanting to accept the reality of this dish, I pointed to the painting on the wall and asked, “Mais le loup, c’est comme ca.”
Here she laughed and understood the confusion. “Ah, oui, c’est aussi le loup mais on ne mange jamais le loup comme ca.”
And there we had it, a real culinary coup de quirk. In the land where snails are salted and doused in pesto, where ducks are forced fed so their over-nourished livers can be fried, and where the smellier and moldier the better the cheese, our waitress was laughing at our ludicrous notion that a restaurant would ever serve wolf!
Saturday, August 1, 2009
Eating in France: wine, cheese...and tagine?
This time around, I realized that on all my previous trips to France I had been making a regrettable gastronomical omission. In my determination to eat through all the brasseries and patisseries, to sample and record as many wines, cheeses, meats, and sweets as possible, I had entirely forgotten about the ethnic foods. In fact, France is teeming with North African and Middle Eastern fare. Moroccan, Tunisian, Algerian, kosher, hallal – it’s all here. I rectified my error with a few tasty samples this summer.
Chez Younice, 13 rue d’Avron, Paris 75020
This unassuming family-run Moroccan restaurant in the unglamorous 20th arrondissement is charming in every way. From the moment you walk in and get in line, for there is almost always a wait for a table at this popular neighborhood joint, Younice makes sure you’re well taken care of. He’s the thirty-something owner / waiter / all around busboy who greets you and offers mint tea on the house as an apology for the wait time. His friend and co-waiter, Yassine, stops to chat with regular diners as he darts in and out of the kitchen carrying dishes that leave clouds of spices lingering in the air. Fatouma, mother to Younice, is the unseen doyenne of the kitchen. There’s nothing amiss here – the price is right (11 euros for a piping hot mutton tagine served with heapfuls of couscous), the service warm (somewhat rare in Parisian eateries), and if you stay beyond the regular dining hours you’re likely to have the company of the two waiters. As the restaurant quiets down, Younice and Yassine engage in pleasantries that, if you’re lucky, include offering you free sample-size dishes to further your education in Moroccan cuisine and drawing napkin maps of the best surfing spots in their native country. Oh, and did I mention they’re both dashingly handsome?
http://chezyounice.fr
La Ruche au Miel, 19 rue d'Aligre, Paris 75012
I came upon this ambient and ornate Algerian cafe by accident one Sunday while browsing the flea market, Marche d'Aligres. After looking at all manner of knick knacks at the lowbrow antiques section I needed to find a bathroom and ducked into the nearest cafe, La Ruche au Miel. Bladder emergency resolved, I orderd a drink out of a sense of obligation for having used the facilities. Two euros for a bronzed pot of mint tea and another two euros for baclava served me just fine. As I sipped the aromatic tea and delectable sweet I browsed the large selection coffee table books on Algeria and photographs of the desert that Habib, the friendly owner, had laid out. After we chatted a while Habib tells me that the "waiter" I had asked to point me to the bathroom upon entering was actually a celebrity. Rachid Djaidani, a curly-haired man with a friendly manner (who did not at all mind that I had assumed he was restaurant staff), is a published author with three novels under his belt and a series of mini-documentaries showing on French national TV. Between greeting regular customers and drop-ins who come by to say hello to the author/film-maker, Rachid and Habib show me videoclips from Rachid's latest documentary, which features him riding a motorcycle across Texas to hilarious effect. (Imagine French-accented "howdy" and Texans figuring out whether Rachid is "French or Muslim?"). Definitely worth a visit here for a leisurely afternoon of reading. You're likely to run into Rachid at his usual table out front!
Falafel King, rue des Rosiers, Paris 75004
The hip Marais area is filled with fashion boutiques, art galleries, and beautiful people. Surprisingly, in the midst of all this chicness is a street lined with quality cheap eats - rue des Rosiers. The sounds and sights on this stretch of road seem to me more akin to a lively hawker center in Singapore than the epicenter of cool in the world’s capital city of cool. Young Jewish and Arab men stand outside their respective eateries loudly advertising their goods, mostly falafel, hummus, and the like. After trying a few places on repeated walks down rue des Rosiers, I decided I like Falafel King (near the rue Pavee end of the street) the best. The “hawkers” out front aren’t too aggressive, the Indian chefs give you a pleased and knowing look if you ask for an extra dollop of chili, and the falafel is simply heavenly. Until I tried Falafel King I never knew falafel could be so soft, moist, and flavorful to every bite.
Marseille area
If you find yourself traipsing around Marseille it is imperative that you pop into one of the many Tunisian eateries in town. These are easy to spot – the window displays are usually piled high with honey-glazed desserts and groups of old Tunisian men are likely to be found chatting leisurely inside or outside. In my two days in Marseille I tried three of these eateries, for lunch, dinner, and late night desserts. None of them disappointed and it seemed that the more sparse the décor – to the extent I’d almost call these eateries “canteens” instead of restaurants – the better the food. If you’re following the red walking trail around the old city, the “Panier” walk, check out Chez Erouel at 29 rue Vincent Scotto. My favorites: mutton and vegetable couscous.
Chez Younice, 13 rue d’Avron, Paris 75020
This unassuming family-run Moroccan restaurant in the unglamorous 20th arrondissement is charming in every way. From the moment you walk in and get in line, for there is almost always a wait for a table at this popular neighborhood joint, Younice makes sure you’re well taken care of. He’s the thirty-something owner / waiter / all around busboy who greets you and offers mint tea on the house as an apology for the wait time. His friend and co-waiter, Yassine, stops to chat with regular diners as he darts in and out of the kitchen carrying dishes that leave clouds of spices lingering in the air. Fatouma, mother to Younice, is the unseen doyenne of the kitchen. There’s nothing amiss here – the price is right (11 euros for a piping hot mutton tagine served with heapfuls of couscous), the service warm (somewhat rare in Parisian eateries), and if you stay beyond the regular dining hours you’re likely to have the company of the two waiters. As the restaurant quiets down, Younice and Yassine engage in pleasantries that, if you’re lucky, include offering you free sample-size dishes to further your education in Moroccan cuisine and drawing napkin maps of the best surfing spots in their native country. Oh, and did I mention they’re both dashingly handsome?
http://chezyounice.fr
La Ruche au Miel, 19 rue d'Aligre, Paris 75012
I came upon this ambient and ornate Algerian cafe by accident one Sunday while browsing the flea market, Marche d'Aligres. After looking at all manner of knick knacks at the lowbrow antiques section I needed to find a bathroom and ducked into the nearest cafe, La Ruche au Miel. Bladder emergency resolved, I orderd a drink out of a sense of obligation for having used the facilities. Two euros for a bronzed pot of mint tea and another two euros for baclava served me just fine. As I sipped the aromatic tea and delectable sweet I browsed the large selection coffee table books on Algeria and photographs of the desert that Habib, the friendly owner, had laid out. After we chatted a while Habib tells me that the "waiter" I had asked to point me to the bathroom upon entering was actually a celebrity. Rachid Djaidani, a curly-haired man with a friendly manner (who did not at all mind that I had assumed he was restaurant staff), is a published author with three novels under his belt and a series of mini-documentaries showing on French national TV. Between greeting regular customers and drop-ins who come by to say hello to the author/film-maker, Rachid and Habib show me videoclips from Rachid's latest documentary, which features him riding a motorcycle across Texas to hilarious effect. (Imagine French-accented "howdy" and Texans figuring out whether Rachid is "French or Muslim?"). Definitely worth a visit here for a leisurely afternoon of reading. You're likely to run into Rachid at his usual table out front!
Falafel King, rue des Rosiers, Paris 75004
The hip Marais area is filled with fashion boutiques, art galleries, and beautiful people. Surprisingly, in the midst of all this chicness is a street lined with quality cheap eats - rue des Rosiers. The sounds and sights on this stretch of road seem to me more akin to a lively hawker center in Singapore than the epicenter of cool in the world’s capital city of cool. Young Jewish and Arab men stand outside their respective eateries loudly advertising their goods, mostly falafel, hummus, and the like. After trying a few places on repeated walks down rue des Rosiers, I decided I like Falafel King (near the rue Pavee end of the street) the best. The “hawkers” out front aren’t too aggressive, the Indian chefs give you a pleased and knowing look if you ask for an extra dollop of chili, and the falafel is simply heavenly. Until I tried Falafel King I never knew falafel could be so soft, moist, and flavorful to every bite.
Marseille area
If you find yourself traipsing around Marseille it is imperative that you pop into one of the many Tunisian eateries in town. These are easy to spot – the window displays are usually piled high with honey-glazed desserts and groups of old Tunisian men are likely to be found chatting leisurely inside or outside. In my two days in Marseille I tried three of these eateries, for lunch, dinner, and late night desserts. None of them disappointed and it seemed that the more sparse the décor – to the extent I’d almost call these eateries “canteens” instead of restaurants – the better the food. If you’re following the red walking trail around the old city, the “Panier” walk, check out Chez Erouel at 29 rue Vincent Scotto. My favorites: mutton and vegetable couscous.
Thursday, July 30, 2009
The Dreadful FFP's
Since I touched on the subject of a fashion faux pas in yesterday's post, why not just share the whole lot? Here are the top six FFP's, frequently spotted in the tropics, that make me cringe!
1. The “tunic or dress” question
There is a fine line between a tunic (a long loose top meant to be worn with a bottom) and a dress, but my daily commute up and down Orchard Road tells me that this line is habitually blurred. So let me draw that line again – right at the tip of the second knuckle on your middle finger. If you have to ask yourself the “tunic or dress” question, go with the former and put on a bottom. You want to be well-dressed, not half-dressed.
2. I see London, I see France…
The temperature here gives girls good reason to embrace camisoles, sheer tops, and skirts of the short and tight variety. Without good reason, however, some ladies forget that outerwear should dictate the underwear. If clothes could speak: the white summer top would beg not to be outshone by the black bra underneath; the spaghetti strap would shudder to share a shoulder with unsightly bra straps; and the hip-hugging skirt would cry for the help of a thong underwear to rid it of panty lines. Bottom line (no pun intended): your underwear should be visible to your boyfriend in your bedroom, not to hapless uncles sharing your subway car.
3. The difference between night and day
Unless you work in a fashion boutique or tend bars for a living, you should be acquainted with a class of clothing known as office wear. I work(ed) in an investment bank, a real button-up institution occupying the “business formal” end of the office wear spectrum. Yet still, I spy girls drifting in and out of the office wearing colors, shapes, and fabrics belonging to the night. Strappy dresses, stiletto sandals, satin, and sequins belong in Attica, not in Accounting.
4. Nailing down the problem
As a life-long nail biter I’m fully sympathetic of the female yearning for long, lean, and polished nails. Make that REAL nails. All grace is lost when acrylic nails, super glue, and paste-on flowers enter the picture. Not only do fake gems on plastic tips spell “trashy” faster than you can point a finger, they also ruin the sheen of your natural nails and can cause fungal infections. Next time you’re at the salon, opt for a buff color or a French. That spells “classy” to me.
5. The sin of maximization
I adore the busy, bright sartorial trimmings that mark the boho-chic era, but when I’m visually assaulted by “trend overload” (which is often) I get nostalgic for the minimalist aesthetic of the 1990s. I can compromise -- a single oversized silk flower atop a blouse or a seemingly effortless draping of necklaces each makes for a fashion statement in its own right. A fashion disaster in its own right is a ruffled cardi over a floral-print top, paired with a pleated skirt, topped off by a wide belt and bangles that can build biceps. There are no hard and fast rules in fashion, but please, one trend at a time.
6. Human tights abuse
While I’m traveling down memory lane I might as well rewind to the 1980s, a time when leotard-and-tights aerobics instructors epitomized fashion. In recent years, a flock of starlets (Lindsay, Mischa, and the Olsen Trolls) has very publicly campaigned for a revival of leggings. Though spandex can be comfortable and chic when it hugs the well-proportioned thighs and calves of Hollywood, it’s a deeply unflattering look for 80% of the general female population. I’m by no means large, but every time I consider encasing my legs in a pair of tights for purposes not related to sports or thermoregulation, I remind myself that only DuPont benefits from this display of misplaced confidence. Read my lips: spare tires belong in car trunks and camel toes, well, on camels.
1. The “tunic or dress” question
There is a fine line between a tunic (a long loose top meant to be worn with a bottom) and a dress, but my daily commute up and down Orchard Road tells me that this line is habitually blurred. So let me draw that line again – right at the tip of the second knuckle on your middle finger. If you have to ask yourself the “tunic or dress” question, go with the former and put on a bottom. You want to be well-dressed, not half-dressed.
2. I see London, I see France…
The temperature here gives girls good reason to embrace camisoles, sheer tops, and skirts of the short and tight variety. Without good reason, however, some ladies forget that outerwear should dictate the underwear. If clothes could speak: the white summer top would beg not to be outshone by the black bra underneath; the spaghetti strap would shudder to share a shoulder with unsightly bra straps; and the hip-hugging skirt would cry for the help of a thong underwear to rid it of panty lines. Bottom line (no pun intended): your underwear should be visible to your boyfriend in your bedroom, not to hapless uncles sharing your subway car.
3. The difference between night and day
Unless you work in a fashion boutique or tend bars for a living, you should be acquainted with a class of clothing known as office wear. I work(ed) in an investment bank, a real button-up institution occupying the “business formal” end of the office wear spectrum. Yet still, I spy girls drifting in and out of the office wearing colors, shapes, and fabrics belonging to the night. Strappy dresses, stiletto sandals, satin, and sequins belong in Attica, not in Accounting.
4. Nailing down the problem
As a life-long nail biter I’m fully sympathetic of the female yearning for long, lean, and polished nails. Make that REAL nails. All grace is lost when acrylic nails, super glue, and paste-on flowers enter the picture. Not only do fake gems on plastic tips spell “trashy” faster than you can point a finger, they also ruin the sheen of your natural nails and can cause fungal infections. Next time you’re at the salon, opt for a buff color or a French. That spells “classy” to me.
5. The sin of maximization
I adore the busy, bright sartorial trimmings that mark the boho-chic era, but when I’m visually assaulted by “trend overload” (which is often) I get nostalgic for the minimalist aesthetic of the 1990s. I can compromise -- a single oversized silk flower atop a blouse or a seemingly effortless draping of necklaces each makes for a fashion statement in its own right. A fashion disaster in its own right is a ruffled cardi over a floral-print top, paired with a pleated skirt, topped off by a wide belt and bangles that can build biceps. There are no hard and fast rules in fashion, but please, one trend at a time.
6. Human tights abuse
While I’m traveling down memory lane I might as well rewind to the 1980s, a time when leotard-and-tights aerobics instructors epitomized fashion. In recent years, a flock of starlets (Lindsay, Mischa, and the Olsen Trolls) has very publicly campaigned for a revival of leggings. Though spandex can be comfortable and chic when it hugs the well-proportioned thighs and calves of Hollywood, it’s a deeply unflattering look for 80% of the general female population. I’m by no means large, but every time I consider encasing my legs in a pair of tights for purposes not related to sports or thermoregulation, I remind myself that only DuPont benefits from this display of misplaced confidence. Read my lips: spare tires belong in car trunks and camel toes, well, on camels.
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
Singapore: my loves and peeves
Part I of my extravagantly long honeymoon slash recession holiday came to an end last night. My husband and I just spent two months in France, Italy, and the US. We came back to our adoptive home country, Singapore, for a week of errands before heading onto Part II.
We tried to prepare ourselves for this brief return to reality with a few last indulgences. On our last day in Paris we took a four-hour nap in the morning, spent two hours at lunch where we ordered enough to feed ourselves plus a pair of twins, read leisurely in the Luxembourg gardens, and had two rounds of Amarino gelato, before boarding the plane at Charles de Gaulle.
A wave of sweetly humid air embraced us as we stepped off the plane at Changi Airport. Thirty steps later we were greeted with that syncopated form of spoken English known as Singlish. Ah, we knew we were home.
I had mixed feelings about coming back. There were the things I missed while I was away - the efficiency, the cleanliness, the perpetual summer, my daily yoga classes, never stepping on errant pieces of gum and finding my shoes ruined (which I did in New York), and of course, my friends. But most prominent on my mind was how much I missed the food! After two months of constant enjoyment in wines, cheeses, meats, and other Western fare, I was really beginning to salivate in my sleep over the prospect of bee hoon. During the long flight back I began plotting my meals. Yong tau foo for breakfast, fried bee hoon for lunch, maybe some chili crab for dinner. Oh it's good to be home.
But then, there are also the things GET to me when I'm here, my pet peeves. Most of them are petty and can be blamed on my personal quirks. For example, most people wouldn't be bothered by what I call the "long shirt or dress?" fashion question. It's a hot country, people are built petitely, it's not a HUGE crime for some girls to wear dresses of questionable length while shopping on Orchard Road. (Ok fine, it IS kind of huge, but that's just my own sartorial opinion). And after two years in Singapore I've learned to decipher, and when required, actually speak Singlish, that interesting melange of Chinese and British English. Really, it doesn't bother me much to say "we'll alight here" when trying to "get off" a taxi; it just gives me the giggles.
So, small things aside, what is my biggest pet peeve? I was reminded of it this morning while hauling home some Carrefour goods in a taxi. I get in the cab and give the driver the address in English, because that's the language I speak with my husband and with most of my friends. Immediately the driver starts throwing curious stares my way in the rear-view mirror. I know what he's thinking after hearing my American English, and I just hope that he'll let his curiosity simmer in silence.
But he does not.
"Miss, are you a Singaporean?"
Oh boy, here we go again.
"No, I'm not Singaporean," I reply. "But I'm a permanent resident," I add, hoping this draws us closer somehow and puts an end to the questioning before it goes down an unpleasant path.
"Oh, what country are you from?", he persists.
"I'm from China."
And here comes the punch line. "Did you marry a Singaporean?", he asks, all too predictably.
There you have it, my biggest pet peeve in Singapore is that despite all the Chinese college graduates and working professionals who now live here, a lot of locals still seem to think that the only way we get here is by marrying, or worse yet, by engaging in nocturnal professions.
I don't think I'm being over-sensitive here. Many, many, many times I've sat in the back of a taxi and had this exact same conversation. The drivers are polite to varying degrees (some openly suggesting that the only Chinese girls here are those you find in Geylang, others kindly stopping at admiring my English skills), but not polite enough to hide that slightly deprecatory curiosity about how it is that mainland Chinese manage to live in this country.
Since I had just spent two weeks on the East Coast in the US, my "political correctness" meter was unusually high, and I decide to engage. Quietly I tell my taxi driver that I went to college in the US, married an American, and moved here to work at a bank. Quietly also, I add that I don't think the majority of Chinese women living here managed to do so by "marrying up" to Singaporeans. He accepts my explanation warmly, hurrying to add that he himself married a "foreigner" and that he meant no harm by his questions. We part amicably when he drops me off at my destination.
I love Singapore and I hope to live here for a long time. In that time, I hope this slight unease and suspicion about "my people" goes away. I don't blame people for harboring their doubts -- after all, there ARE 1.4 billion of us poised to threaten the world with our low wage expectations, lax environmental standards, and whatever else attracts capitalists to shift commerce our way. We also leave our homeland in droves every year to seek new opportunities in every country that'll allow us in (and even those that don't!).
Attitudes WILL change, but until they do, dear taxi driver friends, can we all just keep our un-PC thoughts to ourselves?
We tried to prepare ourselves for this brief return to reality with a few last indulgences. On our last day in Paris we took a four-hour nap in the morning, spent two hours at lunch where we ordered enough to feed ourselves plus a pair of twins, read leisurely in the Luxembourg gardens, and had two rounds of Amarino gelato, before boarding the plane at Charles de Gaulle.
A wave of sweetly humid air embraced us as we stepped off the plane at Changi Airport. Thirty steps later we were greeted with that syncopated form of spoken English known as Singlish. Ah, we knew we were home.
I had mixed feelings about coming back. There were the things I missed while I was away - the efficiency, the cleanliness, the perpetual summer, my daily yoga classes, never stepping on errant pieces of gum and finding my shoes ruined (which I did in New York), and of course, my friends. But most prominent on my mind was how much I missed the food! After two months of constant enjoyment in wines, cheeses, meats, and other Western fare, I was really beginning to salivate in my sleep over the prospect of bee hoon. During the long flight back I began plotting my meals. Yong tau foo for breakfast, fried bee hoon for lunch, maybe some chili crab for dinner. Oh it's good to be home.
But then, there are also the things GET to me when I'm here, my pet peeves. Most of them are petty and can be blamed on my personal quirks. For example, most people wouldn't be bothered by what I call the "long shirt or dress?" fashion question. It's a hot country, people are built petitely, it's not a HUGE crime for some girls to wear dresses of questionable length while shopping on Orchard Road. (Ok fine, it IS kind of huge, but that's just my own sartorial opinion). And after two years in Singapore I've learned to decipher, and when required, actually speak Singlish, that interesting melange of Chinese and British English. Really, it doesn't bother me much to say "we'll alight here" when trying to "get off" a taxi; it just gives me the giggles.
So, small things aside, what is my biggest pet peeve? I was reminded of it this morning while hauling home some Carrefour goods in a taxi. I get in the cab and give the driver the address in English, because that's the language I speak with my husband and with most of my friends. Immediately the driver starts throwing curious stares my way in the rear-view mirror. I know what he's thinking after hearing my American English, and I just hope that he'll let his curiosity simmer in silence.
But he does not.
"Miss, are you a Singaporean?"
Oh boy, here we go again.
"No, I'm not Singaporean," I reply. "But I'm a permanent resident," I add, hoping this draws us closer somehow and puts an end to the questioning before it goes down an unpleasant path.
"Oh, what country are you from?", he persists.
"I'm from China."
And here comes the punch line. "Did you marry a Singaporean?", he asks, all too predictably.
There you have it, my biggest pet peeve in Singapore is that despite all the Chinese college graduates and working professionals who now live here, a lot of locals still seem to think that the only way we get here is by marrying, or worse yet, by engaging in nocturnal professions.
I don't think I'm being over-sensitive here. Many, many, many times I've sat in the back of a taxi and had this exact same conversation. The drivers are polite to varying degrees (some openly suggesting that the only Chinese girls here are those you find in Geylang, others kindly stopping at admiring my English skills), but not polite enough to hide that slightly deprecatory curiosity about how it is that mainland Chinese manage to live in this country.
Since I had just spent two weeks on the East Coast in the US, my "political correctness" meter was unusually high, and I decide to engage. Quietly I tell my taxi driver that I went to college in the US, married an American, and moved here to work at a bank. Quietly also, I add that I don't think the majority of Chinese women living here managed to do so by "marrying up" to Singaporeans. He accepts my explanation warmly, hurrying to add that he himself married a "foreigner" and that he meant no harm by his questions. We part amicably when he drops me off at my destination.
I love Singapore and I hope to live here for a long time. In that time, I hope this slight unease and suspicion about "my people" goes away. I don't blame people for harboring their doubts -- after all, there ARE 1.4 billion of us poised to threaten the world with our low wage expectations, lax environmental standards, and whatever else attracts capitalists to shift commerce our way. We also leave our homeland in droves every year to seek new opportunities in every country that'll allow us in (and even those that don't!).
Attitudes WILL change, but until they do, dear taxi driver friends, can we all just keep our un-PC thoughts to ourselves?
Tuesday, July 7, 2009
What a way to start!
Within an hour of D&G's arrival in Provence we had:
1. Hit a backpacker with our trusty little rental car, the Opel. Luckily, the scruffy lad's pack was large enough to shield his spine from suffering mortal damage from our collective inexperience with manual transmission.
2. Driven 30 kilometers to arrive at the Polyclinique du Grand Sud,and NOT the Roman Aqueducts. The neighborhood looked like a retirement community in Florida, far from the rolling fields of lavender and Gallo-Roman ruins we had so long looked forward to. Apparently GPS is imperfect.
3. Found the Roman Aqueducts (the Pont du Gard), drank a bottle of red wine, sunned ourselves brown(well, not all of us, D was still a little pale), swam under a 2000 year old bridge in refreshingly chill water, and had our toes nibbled by tiny fish. These were good things.
4. Driven through a hailstorm. Yes, HAIL.
Welcome to France, D&G!
1. Hit a backpacker with our trusty little rental car, the Opel. Luckily, the scruffy lad's pack was large enough to shield his spine from suffering mortal damage from our collective inexperience with manual transmission.
2. Driven 30 kilometers to arrive at the Polyclinique du Grand Sud,and NOT the Roman Aqueducts. The neighborhood looked like a retirement community in Florida, far from the rolling fields of lavender and Gallo-Roman ruins we had so long looked forward to. Apparently GPS is imperfect.
3. Found the Roman Aqueducts (the Pont du Gard), drank a bottle of red wine, sunned ourselves brown(well, not all of us, D was still a little pale), swam under a 2000 year old bridge in refreshingly chill water, and had our toes nibbled by tiny fish. These were good things.
4. Driven through a hailstorm. Yes, HAIL.
Welcome to France, D&G!
Small Delights: Luxembourg
Excerpt from travel log...
When it comes to Europe our thoughts jump firstly to the grand adventures it has to offer. The great romance of Paris. The blazing Tuscan sun. The imperious castles of Germany. But there are good reasons to make a holiday of a daintier place, such as that bite-sized delight called Luxembourg. You can take your time and savor the local flavors (gastronomic and otherwise) without rushing around worrying about missing out on the Sistine Chapel or the Louvre. You can see (and taste) it all in one amazing weekend.
...
The crowning glory of my trip to Luxembourg was the last dinner at Il Fragolino, a restaurant at the foot of the Petrusse Valley. I had just learned that the largest immigrant populations in the Grand Duchy are Italians and Portuguese and had had good reason to drool over the prospect of an authentic Italian dinner with my Italian family and friends. This bit of imagination-induced salivation was nothing compared to what came after the waiter brought out the “degustazione pasta”, a pasta sampler.
The four of us at one end of the table who ordered this behemoth platter of carbs had to move our plates and glasses into a position of delicate balance (between the edge of the table and our laps) to make way for the long silver vessel. The “plate”, quotation marks necessary here for it was more like a little boat set afloat on the table, was filled to the brim with generously-sized and colorful pastas. From my vantage point I looked down th table at one delectable row of penne arrabiata, ricotta ravioli (each one almost the size of cha siu bao), prosciutto ravioli, spinach ravioli, and mushroom fusili. From this point on I lost coherence and cognition and could only engage in a primal feeding frenzy. But I do remember that it was here, at this sumptuous table, that I raised my glass and drank to the health of my companions, to the best Italian food I’ve ever tasted, and to a small gem tourists often neglect on their grand forays intoEurope – to Luxembourg!
When it comes to Europe our thoughts jump firstly to the grand adventures it has to offer. The great romance of Paris. The blazing Tuscan sun. The imperious castles of Germany. But there are good reasons to make a holiday of a daintier place, such as that bite-sized delight called Luxembourg. You can take your time and savor the local flavors (gastronomic and otherwise) without rushing around worrying about missing out on the Sistine Chapel or the Louvre. You can see (and taste) it all in one amazing weekend.
...
The crowning glory of my trip to Luxembourg was the last dinner at Il Fragolino, a restaurant at the foot of the Petrusse Valley. I had just learned that the largest immigrant populations in the Grand Duchy are Italians and Portuguese and had had good reason to drool over the prospect of an authentic Italian dinner with my Italian family and friends. This bit of imagination-induced salivation was nothing compared to what came after the waiter brought out the “degustazione pasta”, a pasta sampler.
The four of us at one end of the table who ordered this behemoth platter of carbs had to move our plates and glasses into a position of delicate balance (between the edge of the table and our laps) to make way for the long silver vessel. The “plate”, quotation marks necessary here for it was more like a little boat set afloat on the table, was filled to the brim with generously-sized and colorful pastas. From my vantage point I looked down th table at one delectable row of penne arrabiata, ricotta ravioli (each one almost the size of cha siu bao), prosciutto ravioli, spinach ravioli, and mushroom fusili. From this point on I lost coherence and cognition and could only engage in a primal feeding frenzy. But I do remember that it was here, at this sumptuous table, that I raised my glass and drank to the health of my companions, to the best Italian food I’ve ever tasted, and to a small gem tourists often neglect on their grand forays intoEurope – to Luxembourg!
Wednesday, July 1, 2009
Au marche!
Excerpt from travel log...
The mention of a Sunday market excited me. I expected to find some food stalls selling sandwiches and Orangina, maybe some trinket vendors, like the ones around Centre Pompidou and other popular hangouts. What I found at the far end of Blvd Richard Lenoir, close to the Bastille, wasn’t just a “market.” It was…heaven. Beginning as abruptly as the neighborhood park where a few homeless men loitered ended, the magnificent marche began and extended out for at least a mile.
And what a mile it was! Row upon row of green awnings barely concealing the surfeit of fresh produce and cooked delicacies spilling over underneath. I entered the market at a seafood stall and my eyes widened to take in the sheer quantity and variety of oceanic fare. There were generously sliced filets of salmon, haddock, mackerel, and many more kinds of fish I couldn’t even name heaped on ice-topped crates. After walking around the fish crates with my jaw hanging down to my chest I moved stations into the merchant’s crustacean section. Atlantic crayfish, crab, and lobsters, which looked like they had swallowed ten of their smaller Pacific cousins before being poached by the fisherman lay about slowly moving their claws. Monstrously large scallops and shells, the size of saucers, strewn about half open and revealing sumptuous tender flesh inside. This was just the first stall!
I peeled my person and jaw away from the seafood. Enticing as it all was it wouldn’t give my belly immediate gratification. I walked a few more stalls and came upon a cheese counter, which put the fromagerie section at Cold Storage Gourmet to mortal shame. Cheese wheels the size of my head! Really stinky Brie! Bluey moldy Roquefort!
Here I began my consumption, not just ogling, of foods. I was excited but also timid, not knowing which variety to buy and budgeting in my head how much I could justify splurging on my first meal during this summer of unemployment. I asked the girl behind the counter if I could try some and she obligingly sliced me pieces of the Tomme de Savoie (a hard cheese), which I deemed not hard or salty enough. She then handed me another one and proceeded to explain the nuances in the four different families of blue cheeses, where my eyes had already roamed. After the tutorial I asked for three chunks of cheeses I had sampled, simultaneously salivating and fretting over how much this breakfast extravaganza would cost.
The girl wrapped up my purchases in wax paper (old school! No plastic wrappers!) and reported, “Trois euros et quarante-cinq centimes.”
Did I hear correctly? Had my French eroded beyond hope in the years of non-usage? Three euros and forty-five cents!? I verified the amount on the printed receipt. I couldn’t have bought one sixth of this much wonderful dairy moldiness for so little money back in Singapore!
I was floored, and done for. This delightful surprise at the cheese counter unleashed the food monster within and I threw caution and budget to the wind. I left the cheese angel at her station of duty and bounded down the street, trying to find other foods to go with my purchases while biting into a hunk of blue...
The mention of a Sunday market excited me. I expected to find some food stalls selling sandwiches and Orangina, maybe some trinket vendors, like the ones around Centre Pompidou and other popular hangouts. What I found at the far end of Blvd Richard Lenoir, close to the Bastille, wasn’t just a “market.” It was…heaven. Beginning as abruptly as the neighborhood park where a few homeless men loitered ended, the magnificent marche began and extended out for at least a mile.
And what a mile it was! Row upon row of green awnings barely concealing the surfeit of fresh produce and cooked delicacies spilling over underneath. I entered the market at a seafood stall and my eyes widened to take in the sheer quantity and variety of oceanic fare. There were generously sliced filets of salmon, haddock, mackerel, and many more kinds of fish I couldn’t even name heaped on ice-topped crates. After walking around the fish crates with my jaw hanging down to my chest I moved stations into the merchant’s crustacean section. Atlantic crayfish, crab, and lobsters, which looked like they had swallowed ten of their smaller Pacific cousins before being poached by the fisherman lay about slowly moving their claws. Monstrously large scallops and shells, the size of saucers, strewn about half open and revealing sumptuous tender flesh inside. This was just the first stall!
I peeled my person and jaw away from the seafood. Enticing as it all was it wouldn’t give my belly immediate gratification. I walked a few more stalls and came upon a cheese counter, which put the fromagerie section at Cold Storage Gourmet to mortal shame. Cheese wheels the size of my head! Really stinky Brie! Bluey moldy Roquefort!
Here I began my consumption, not just ogling, of foods. I was excited but also timid, not knowing which variety to buy and budgeting in my head how much I could justify splurging on my first meal during this summer of unemployment. I asked the girl behind the counter if I could try some and she obligingly sliced me pieces of the Tomme de Savoie (a hard cheese), which I deemed not hard or salty enough. She then handed me another one and proceeded to explain the nuances in the four different families of blue cheeses, where my eyes had already roamed. After the tutorial I asked for three chunks of cheeses I had sampled, simultaneously salivating and fretting over how much this breakfast extravaganza would cost.
The girl wrapped up my purchases in wax paper (old school! No plastic wrappers!) and reported, “Trois euros et quarante-cinq centimes.”
Did I hear correctly? Had my French eroded beyond hope in the years of non-usage? Three euros and forty-five cents!? I verified the amount on the printed receipt. I couldn’t have bought one sixth of this much wonderful dairy moldiness for so little money back in Singapore!
I was floored, and done for. This delightful surprise at the cheese counter unleashed the food monster within and I threw caution and budget to the wind. I left the cheese angel at her station of duty and bounded down the street, trying to find other foods to go with my purchases while biting into a hunk of blue...
Bienvenue a Paris
Excerpt from my travel log...
Today Paris welcomed me with open arms and a kiss on each cheek. At 5.30am, thirty minutes ahead of schedule, we touched down at Charles de Gaulle just as the sun began its glowing ascent from the eastern sky. There was no time left for hesitation or panic. I was already here.
A month earlier I had resigned from an admittedly good job (which looked relatively better and better as the recession got deeper and deeper) in Singapore to now come to Paris to “find myself.” Cold feet didn’t plague me at my spring-time wedding but here I was getting cold feet on the plane ride to my summer adventure! What was I thinking leaving a well-paying job in the middle of a recession when everyone in their sane mind was hanging onto their jobs for dear life? What could I possibly accomplish living for five weeks in an expensive European capital except deplete my savings further? Had I made a monumental mistake running away from reality to an idealized memory of Paris that I’ve been building since my first visit in the summer of sixteen? And what happens if I don’t discover anything new here – hang my head low and pray to heavens my old firm would have me back?
This chain of self-interrogation came to an abrupt end as the travelers of Air France 257 jumped up to jostle for their bags. The flux of impatient voyagers eager to leave their seats for the last thirteen hours overpowered me, propelling me towards the exit...
Today Paris welcomed me with open arms and a kiss on each cheek. At 5.30am, thirty minutes ahead of schedule, we touched down at Charles de Gaulle just as the sun began its glowing ascent from the eastern sky. There was no time left for hesitation or panic. I was already here.
A month earlier I had resigned from an admittedly good job (which looked relatively better and better as the recession got deeper and deeper) in Singapore to now come to Paris to “find myself.” Cold feet didn’t plague me at my spring-time wedding but here I was getting cold feet on the plane ride to my summer adventure! What was I thinking leaving a well-paying job in the middle of a recession when everyone in their sane mind was hanging onto their jobs for dear life? What could I possibly accomplish living for five weeks in an expensive European capital except deplete my savings further? Had I made a monumental mistake running away from reality to an idealized memory of Paris that I’ve been building since my first visit in the summer of sixteen? And what happens if I don’t discover anything new here – hang my head low and pray to heavens my old firm would have me back?
This chain of self-interrogation came to an abrupt end as the travelers of Air France 257 jumped up to jostle for their bags. The flux of impatient voyagers eager to leave their seats for the last thirteen hours overpowered me, propelling me towards the exit...
Oohlala, how very onomatopoeic!
While scratching my head for an un-lofty name for this humble blog I got side-tracked into making a list of my favorite "words that sound like what they describe" (i.e. onomatopoeia) in French. A little Googling and dictionary-flipping added further to my glee. I hereby reaffirm that French is a delightful language with many many more auditory possibilities than English.
Some of my favorites:
froufrou ("froo froo") - just sounds frilly doesn't it?
chouchou ("shoe shoe") - teacher's pet
miam miam ("myahm myahm") - they're French, they subsist on carbs and fats daily and stay thin, seems appropriate that their word for "yum yum" is somehow the opposite of what we'd expect too
brouhaha ("brew ha ha") - a noisy hubbub
bric-a-brac - my very favorite
scrogneugneu ("scroh new new") - an old grouch, can't you just see the surly grimace?
glou glou ("glue glue") - glug glug
nunuche ("noo noosh") - silly
truc ("trook") - the all purpose word, literally "thingie"
rigolo - means funny, not related to gigolo
boum ("boom") - a party
and some verbs....
chuchoter ("shoe show tay") - to whisper
ronronner ("roo rong nay") - to purr
grignoter ("gree nio tay") - to nibble
and lastly...
patati et patata - so on and so forth
Some of my favorites:
froufrou ("froo froo") - just sounds frilly doesn't it?
chouchou ("shoe shoe") - teacher's pet
miam miam ("myahm myahm") - they're French, they subsist on carbs and fats daily and stay thin, seems appropriate that their word for "yum yum" is somehow the opposite of what we'd expect too
brouhaha ("brew ha ha") - a noisy hubbub
bric-a-brac - my very favorite
scrogneugneu ("scroh new new") - an old grouch, can't you just see the surly grimace?
glou glou ("glue glue") - glug glug
nunuche ("noo noosh") - silly
truc ("trook") - the all purpose word, literally "thingie"
rigolo - means funny, not related to gigolo
boum ("boom") - a party
and some verbs....
chuchoter ("shoe show tay") - to whisper
ronronner ("roo rong nay") - to purr
grignoter ("gree nio tay") - to nibble
and lastly...
patati et patata - so on and so forth
The First Post
Well, what do you know, after years of eyeing blogs with curiosity and mild disdain (who are these people with idle time and a willingness to overshare?), I've set up a blog.
Maybe the first post calls for a well-thought introduction and some kind of enticement for you to keep reading over the long life of this blog. But, I don't have anything big to declare today and my stomach has been grumbling its discontent in the twenty minutes it took me to find a blog name that wasn't already taken. I don't think well on an empty stomach, so, hurry I must.
Dear readers, you are my friends and my family, you know who I am (former corporate slave, current nascent "writer"), you know what I usually get up to (eat, drink, shop, get over-excited or over-angry, rant and rave, douse everything in sarcasm), and you'll probably keep coming back to this blog because you're bound by kinship or social obligation to supply me with an audience and feedback.
My five-week escape to Paris is coming to an end soon so you can expect to see a flurry of postings on how to enjoy this city on a budget!
Up next on this recession holiday / honeymoon / "finding myself" odyssey is a night in Lyon with some Prozellers, four days in Avignon and Arles with D and GW, two days in Marseille with my faithful pet G, a wedding to attend in Florence, and an overdue revisit to the USA (this time as spouse of a citizen, take that immigration-checkpoint-officer!).
Thanks for reading and check back soon!
Maybe the first post calls for a well-thought introduction and some kind of enticement for you to keep reading over the long life of this blog. But, I don't have anything big to declare today and my stomach has been grumbling its discontent in the twenty minutes it took me to find a blog name that wasn't already taken. I don't think well on an empty stomach, so, hurry I must.
Dear readers, you are my friends and my family, you know who I am (former corporate slave, current nascent "writer"), you know what I usually get up to (eat, drink, shop, get over-excited or over-angry, rant and rave, douse everything in sarcasm), and you'll probably keep coming back to this blog because you're bound by kinship or social obligation to supply me with an audience and feedback.
My five-week escape to Paris is coming to an end soon so you can expect to see a flurry of postings on how to enjoy this city on a budget!
Up next on this recession holiday / honeymoon / "finding myself" odyssey is a night in Lyon with some Prozellers, four days in Avignon and Arles with D and GW, two days in Marseille with my faithful pet G, a wedding to attend in Florence, and an overdue revisit to the USA (this time as spouse of a citizen, take that immigration-checkpoint-officer!).
Thanks for reading and check back soon!
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