David and Jodi -- Lost Together

Italy, Part II -- at last!

2010-06-25T20:35:00.000-07:00

Yes, it's been a long time in coming. But between the pregnancy and buying/moving into a house, we've had a lot to occupy ourselves lately. :)

Here are some photos from the second half of our travels through Italy. From our Christmas sojourn in Padova, we scooted down to Napoli, then back up through Siena for New Year's Eve in Bologna, and a final stay in Venezia (with a day trip to Bassano del Grappa).

This slideshow covers these stops. Again, if you want to see captions, make sure you maximize the slideshow to full-screen and adjust the settings (top right-hand corner). Some photos don't have captions -- honestly, there is hardly a more photogenic city in the world than Venice, and I think most of the photos of it speak for themselves.

Enjoy!

Italy Part I, Take 2

2010-04-22T14:46:00.000-07:00

So I posted the photos from the first half of our Italy stay but forgot to caption them. So if you were wondering what you were looking at, going back to the last post and going through the slide show again should now provide captions (in full-screen mode, at top right).

Working on Italy Part II -- about 2/3 done. :)

Photos from Italy -- Part 1

2010-03-27T10:54:00.000-07:00

We spent almost a month in Italy, and, as you can imagine, it is one of the most picturesque places we visited. Definitely a favourite, now on our list of "gotta go back one day" (though we'll spend more time in the countryside if we do).

Our plans for a farmstay in Tuscany fell through because the day we landed in Milan there was a cold snap that dumped tons of snow on much of Europe. Tuscany, which rarely sees any snow, was buried (by their standards) under half a foot, and our hosts, without any heat at their farm, vacated to a friend's for the holidays.

So instead, after having visited Milan, Rome, and Florence, we headed for Padua (Padova) to spend Christmas with my cousin Maya, who is studying there to be a vet. We had a great time shopping in the market to prepare for our all-Jewish Christmas Eve dinner.

The photos in this slideshow are from those four cities. The next album will be the rest of our stay in Italy. :)

Remember to expand the slideshow to full-screen mode for the best viewing options!

Israel

2010-02-28T06:30:00.000-08:00

Israel.

The People of Israel. They're beautiful. All of them. Well, most of them. Israelis themselves are great people. Most of them speak English and contrary to popular belief, they're actually safe and conscientious drivers. They may make quick/abrupt lane changes, but they tend to use their turn signals better than anywhere else I've seen.

The Places of Israel. We went to Tel Aviv (LOVED IT! Like Toronto or New York, or another largest city in a country), Yafo (quiet old part of Tel Aviv that reminded me of Kensington Market in Toronto), Rishon L'Ziyyon (where Anne/Arie, Jodi's aunt/uncle, live, which is a suburb of Tel Aviv and has 4 Flavours Falafel and Melech HaShwarma (King of Shwarma) AND Thailandi Sandwich, which are TOTALLY fantastic street food!!! It's also the home of Carmel Wine, which is what a lot of people think about when they think Israeli wine), Jerusalem (Great for the Old City and the new city too! Yad Vashem is not to be missed, in an attempt to make some sense of the Holocaust and to learn from the mistakes of the time), Haifa (beautiful Ba'hai Gardens), Tiberias (Israel's Atlantic City? Tacky and not the greatest experience), Eilat (Israel's Vegas? Tackier and bigger than Tiberias, but with more things to do.), Masada (a mountain with 900 steps, with significant Jewish/Israeli history attached to it!), the Dead Sea (The Lowest Place on Earth, with lots of salt and sulfur), Neot Hakikar (A fantastic community that's like a kibbutz, and right at the border with Jordan - with the best dates I've ever eaten! - and GREAT people), Metulla, Be'er Sheva and a few other smaller ones along the way.

The Food of Israel. There's more than a few places to get hummus, falafel, shwarma, kebabs, schnitzel and other forms of street food. Minus one tourist cafeteria, they're all good. More often than not they're great. There's more than just that. There's the fusion cuisine. The Thailand(i) sandwiches for Rishon L'Ziyyon, the superb meal/experience to be had at MachaneYehuda (spelling may be off) near the Machane Yehuda Market in Jerusalem, Tmol Shilshom's kosher dairy delights (again in Jerusalem), the breakfast/brunch at Benedict in Tel Aviv, the insanely delicious gelato of Iceberg (Again, Tel Aviv) and the steak of Shmulik on Neot Hakikar, the lentil soup of XX and the great food served by Anne Lamdan in her kitchen in Rishon L'Ziyyon. But you need to make a reservation for THAT table. They're hard to come by.

That said, I suspect that most people wondered about the politics.

What would I say about the politics?

Well, I know more now than I did before I came here.

I know that there is no simple answer to what is happening in the country now, and in the future. I know that people want peace. I know that the Palestineans want peace, but don't seem to have a consistent voice of leadership and direction, and this has hindered the peace process. I know that the Israelis want peace, but don't want to continue to give up land, when surrounded by enemies and not being willing to continue to get smaller and smaller. I know that fundamentalism in any religion is a bad thing. I would like to know that there is a chance for peace for Israel, but I'm not holding out hope for that.

I know that Israel does a s**tty job of PR/explaining what has happened post-"incident" and the Palestineans/Arabs are masterful at it. This results in the world getting a one-sided report of these incidents and not hearing the whole story. Israel would benefit from better PR and talking to the press about what really happens when the world hears from another group/country.

I know that many people (Jews and Christians) refer to Israel as the Holy Land. It is. It's a spiritual haven, to be able to put your hand on the Kotel (Western/Wailing Wall) and touch thousands of years of history. For many, it's the Home Land.

In my mind, it's the Home Land for Israelis, and for any Jew if they need it. That said, my Jewish identity is weak. I thought that going to Israel, climbing Masada, touching the Kotel, going to the Temple Mount/Dome of the Rock, being in the Negev Desert, seeing the Jordan River, walking in the footsteps of Moses, Isaac, Abraham and Jacob, would make me feel more Jewish.

What it's served to do is reinforce that I believe in The Golden Rule. Do unto others, as you have them do unto you. I don't believe in God, because if there was a God there wouldn't be the hatred that exists between Jews and Muslims, Arabs and Palestineans, Palestineans and Jews, Arabs and Jews, Jews and Christians, Israelis and other countries. All over the same piece of land. All in the name of "God".

Their god.

My god.

Good god!

Things wouldn't be happening all over the world, like the slaughter of innocents in Rwanda, the former Yugoslavia, the Holocaust (and if try to deny it, I'll kick you in the teeth before you can think about what to do next!) and all the other natural distasters all over the world like Haiti, and most recently Chile.

There are beautiful elements to religion, as it gives people a base. It grounds people in need of that. For me, it just doesn't feel right.

Like wearing someone else's boots or clothing.

I still identify as a Jew, but culturally. As I did before.

Going to Israel did aid in my sense of Jewishness.

I like me.

I really do.

The very abridged Spain & Portugal

2010-02-25T11:46:00.001-08:00

Some highlights -- for the sake of simplicity I've combined both our passes through Spain (Barcelona and Madrid, then later when we met up with my parents, various places all over Andalucia), and then gone on to Portugal (Lisbon, Porto and Lagos).

There were a LOT of photos in these albums, and I don't necessarily think these are all the best ones, but oh well! I did manage to keep it under 200 images, as per my goal! :)

Reminder that there are some useful viewing tips in previous blog posts.

The photos continue: Low Countries and France

2010-02-20T06:49:00.001-08:00

These are my picks of our pics of Amsterdam, Belgium (Brussels and Bruges), and France (Paris, Lyon, and our HelpX workstay at a climbing gite in the Pyrenees).

A reminder of the USEFUL VIEWING TIPS:

You can wiggle and/or click your mouse over the slideshow for options at the bottom like pausing and restarting the slides (left-hand side), making the slideshow fullscreen (right-hand side), or selecting to view a specific image.

In full-screen mode (recommended), wiggling your mouse over the top right-hand corner gives you Show info (which allows you to see the captions for each photo - strongly recommended) and Options (like choosing the slideshow speed -- recommended: slow).

Some More UK/Ireland/London Pics

2010-02-18T08:41:00.001-08:00

Some that I felt necessary to share.

Just 'cause.

Photos Photos Photos - Part 1

2010-02-17T11:01:00.000-08:00

Well, sooner or later we were going to have to do it.

We took in excess of 25,000 photos during the course of our trip, and now we have to sort through them.

Yes, you read that correctly. I mean, come on, it was five months! And, well, you know what happens when you give David a camera, especially a heavy-duty fun camera like our trusty Canon 40D.

Every day or two, we would offload the most recent photos to our netbook, and then back them up to an external hard drive. During downtime on trains or before bed, we'd sort them into folders, and even occasionally weed out the ones we didn't intend to keep.

Then, we'd store them in hidden folders on our Flickr account, uploading them whenever we had a stable internet connection so that should anything happen to our physical storage, we'd have all our photos. And Flickr is kind enough to keep track of how many photos you have in your account. Including some photos that were there from before, and a bit of duplication when we re-uploaded stuff we'd forgotten we'd already uploaded, our most recent count is 28,722 items. And we haven't finished uploading all our photos from Israel yet. They're chugging along through Paul and Rachel's wireless connection as I type this.

Obviously it will be impossible to share all of these photos with even the most maniacally interested people. And there are tons of photos that aren't worth sharing: photos that didn't turn out or multiple shots of the same thing that we didn't take or have time to edit and delete; photos of things we personally found funny but just won't translate if you weren't there with us; photos that we took only for the benefit of this or that friend.

And it's impossible to narrow down to a "best of" hitlist, because, honestly, when you take that many shots, you get more than the usual quotient of really cool photos, and even those are too many to share. Also, likely David and I have different opinions of what constitutes the "best" photos from our collection.

So I'm trying to create a series of slide shows that will represent the various chunks of our journey -- 5 in all -- and that each contain fewer than 200 shots. Even then, that's still almost 1000 photos. But I think by breaking them up a bit, it'll be less overwhelming.

The first chunk comprises Ireland and the UK. We arrived in London on September 21 and left for the Continent exactly a month later. In between our two stays in London, we visited Ireland (Dublin, Galway, the Burren and the Cliffs of Moher, a farm in Sligo County, Belfast, the Giant's Causeway) and Scotland (Edinburgh, Glasgow, the Highlands, Fort William, and our friends' little town of Carstairs).

I haven't really given the photos any kind of narrative, except to label each one's location. If you're curious about something or want more of the story of a photo, leave a comment here on the blog or on the photo itself, and we'll give more details.

USEFUL VIEWING TIPS (read before starting the slide show):

You can wiggle and/or click your mouse over the slideshow for options at the bottom like pausing and restarting the slides (left-hand side), making the slideshow fullscreen (right-hand side), or selecting to view a specific image.

In full-screen mode (recommended), wiggling your mouse over the top right-hand corner gives you Show info (which allows you to see the captions for each photo - strongly recommended) and Options (like choosing the slideshow speed -- recommended: slow). Unfortunately, I can't set those options on my end -- you have to do it.

Now click on the slideshow picture below and enjoy! More to come when I get around to it.

Jodi, Jodi, Jodi.

2010-02-10T07:55:00.000-08:00

The Europeans and Israelis like to call her Judy, which is of course pronounced Jooooodeeeeee.

How do I write about Jodi? How do I write about the woman that I first saw online in October of 2005 having a shish-kebab duel with her cousin? How do I write about the woman who planned our wedding, with a few little bits of input/assistance from me? How do I write about the woman who is responsible for the 20 weeks of travel we had? How do I write about the woman who seemed to speak Italian, Spanish and Portuguese when we encountered someone who didn't speak English, and who DOES speak French and Hebrew?

How do I write about her?

Well, she's put up with me since our first date. Our first date when I said, "I don't do lines" as it pertained to the wait at "Bella Did You Eat?", and instead went to "Aunties & Uncles".

She's put up with me ever since she realized I love to cook/bake/create more than I do most things (Exceptions include: Eating/tasting, feeling, seeing, hearing and smelling, breathing, talking, walking, interacting with the world.....) and that has its pros and cons.

She puts up with my rants and raves, most of which are nonsensical.

She puts up with me in general.

Truth is, that's what it is. She puts up with me. The good and the bad. I suppose that's what marriage is. For better or worse.

Most of it is better, and there's been some "worse" on this trip.

My sense of alienation when in non-English speaking countries.

My concern about getting lost. After getting lost.

Getting lost. With Jodi and without.

Poorly signed roads while driving in Israel.

Being yelled at in Hebrew for taking pictures in a grocery store.

Being chased by yeshiva guard dogs, outside the Walls of the Old City in Jerusalem.

Not having clean clothes.

Not having our bags.

Not having food in Montmarte.

Jodi being sick. In Galway, Montmarte, Barcelona/Madrid/Lisboa, Jerusalem and Tiberias.

The car not working near Loch Lomond. (Thanks again to the Germans for helping us with that!)

Helping me for hours in the library in Edinburgh and Glasgow, while I chased family ghosts.

My insisting we try different beer in different countries and endeavour to stop in virtually every place we might find said different beer to buy it.

But, all-in-all, it's been magical.

It's been magical thanks to Jodi's patience, linguistic and directional skills and our ability to function as a team.

And for that I'm eternally grateful. As many of you have said along the way, it's a once-in-a-lifetime trip/experience. That remains to be seen, but if this is our trip to "Paradise Falls" (Up reference), then so be it.

It's been a hell of a ride.

What I Miss(ed) About Home

2010-02-09T03:53:00.000-08:00

(Written on a BA767, sitting in First Class, from Tel Aviv to London)

Home. What is home? Is it the city where you live? Where you were born? Where you sleep at night? The question of home has been a recurring theme with me during this time, and something that given me a lot of cause to pause.

Dictionary.com defines home (as a noun) as :

1. a house, apartment, or other shelter that is the usual residence of a person, family, or household.
2. the place in which one's domestic affections are centered.
3. an institution for the homeless, sick, etc.: a nursing home.
4. the dwelling place or retreat of an animal.
5. the place or region where something is native or most common.
6. any place of residence or refuge: a heavenly home.
7. a person's native place or own country.
8. (in games) the destination or goal.
9. a principal base of operations or activities: The new stadium will be the home of the local football team.
10. Baseball. home plate.
11. Lacrosse. one of three attack positions nearest the opposing goal.

Geez, that was a lot of different meanings, but I think you get the idea here when I'm talking about "home".

As a Canadian, my home is Canada. I was born there and I've lived there my whole life.

As the grandson of Agnes Aitken McKintyre, born in Shettleston (Glasgow), Scotland on June 30th, 1909, my home is Scotland.

As a Jew, regardless of the level of my level of observancy, my home is Israel.

I have always said I feel at home in New York City. That it was the city that made me feel most alive. I still feel that way. I feel at home there. That said, it is not my home.

I don't identify as a Canadian, since for me being Canadian so often means finding difference between other countries and how we do things in Canada.

I felt at home, and connected to the past, in Glasgow, and Scotland and general. I felt welcomed and alive. Invigorated. Like voices and spirits from the past were talking to me.

In Italy, I felt like I was welcome and connected to the way Italians lived their lives. In fact, my Italian accent is far better than my French, and I've never taken any Italian language classes. It just feels right.

In Portugal, I also felt connected to the country and the people, in large part owing to my close ties to the country through my friends Marcos and James.

I can say that Israel can be my home any time I want, but it is not my home.

Toronto is my home.

I am a Torontonian. In the good way, not in the Toronto-is-the-centre-of-the-world/Canada way.

Here is what I missed about home.

Having the chance to tell Jodi about my day, and listen to what happened in her day. Cooking/baking for her while she's working, watching TV and/or I'm listening/watching TV and/or listening to music that makes me vibrant and vital.

Black Camel sandwiches (had one yesterday!), Burrito Boyz Halibut burrito, Mill Street beer, Beau's beer, The Globe & Mail, my dear friends/family (Remember you choose your friends, but not your family), my parents, working/earning a cheque, grocery shopping, cooking and baking in my own kitchen (and with my own utensils/appliances/pots/pans), Friday dinners with Wally & Gitta, access to my clothes/not living out a rucksack, wearing any/all of my Nikes, listening to any music I want to, watching TV in English, not having to figure out what people are saying to me and being able to ask/answer questions without difficulty, reading eye/NOW/fab and Xtra! weekly, free events around town, green spaces, the Distillery District, Church Street, Queen Street, my slow cooker, having a fridge and freezer, the wine/chocolate fridge, drag queens, Halloween on Church Street, working out, wandering aimlessly along a street just because I can and knowing where I am/was, admiring how areas have changed while at the same time being horrified at what happens to others, the revitalization of Regent Park and being close enough to my nephews, niece and new little cousins that I can see if so inclined.

The TTC. I love their simple, yet woefully under-developed subway system.

Our bed. Our bed is a beautiful thing. Right now it's in storage, but it's there and closer as we travel from Tel Aviv to London, and then London to Toronto. Mind you, until we have our own mailing address, it's going to stay in storage. This makes me sad.

Irn-Bru and San Benedetto iced tea. These are things that I can get in Toronto. I could get Irn-Bru in the UK and San Benedetto iced tea in Italy. I could not get both of them in one place. Except Toronto.

Our scotch collection. Also, the tequila.

I'm sure there's more, but that's what comes to mind.

Home.

It's a state of mind.

Electronic Carpet Bombing

2010-02-02T21:53:00.000-08:00

Most of you know that Jodi and I had our bags lost in transit while flying from Milano to London to Tel Aviv. Jodi thought it would be a good blog post to share the emails that we sent them.

I agree. Very little information has been changed.

Email #1 - Subject: British Airways Customer Relations Nightmare

Wednesday January 13th, 2010.

Re: British Airways File Reference #ABC123

Gentlemen and Ladies:

I know you're busy people, but I think this is something that needs to be brought to your attention.

You currently have two very unhappy customers. Our names are David Kruger and Jodi Rice, we are on our honeymoon, and we have spent about $2000 (CDN) with your airline and are sorely disappointed with the misinformation provided by British Airways following the delay of our bags this past week during the snowstorms in London. This misinformation has led us to make purchases that we have now been told may not be covered by your liability policy.

First, some background: We booked a flight with your airline in August from Toronto to Tel Aviv because we knew we would be treated the way we expected to be treated, and also because we knew that we wouldn't have to worry about anything. For the most part, we have been very pleased with the level of service offered by British Airways in flight and on the ground.

We booked a flight from Milano (MXP) to Heathrow (LHR) on January 7, 2010 in order to continue on with our flight to Tel Aviv. Our flight was meant to leave MXP at 19:45, but with the bad weather was delayed. We were told by the British Airways (BA) representative to take our bags to “Bulky Bags” at MXP at 17:45 – two hours beforehand. In the meantime, we diligently checked online (at our own expense) to see if the flight (BA 581) would be canceled, or when it was scheduled to depart.

My wife and I are both school-teachers, on a sabbatical year, and we're conscientious people. We didn't want to put anyone, including ourselves, in a precarious position by checking in our luggage too soon, so we didn't do so until 20:30, when we wanted to make sure our bags would be on our flight, which was pushed back until 22:30.

Let me now tell you about our luggage, and why it mattered so much to us. We left Toronto on September 20, 2009 and have travelled through Scotland, Ireland, North Ireland, London, Amsterdam, Belgium, France, Spain, Portugal and Italy. These bags have all our “worldly belongings” on this side of the Atlantic Ocean, as well as several important gifts. Because of flight restrictions, our toiletries and bottled souvenirs (alcohol and olive oil) are in the checked luggage as well.

Our carry-on luggage has our important medications, electronics, books, some fragile souvenirs and some snacks.

We got on the plane and it took off. The flight was great. The aircrew was fantastic, as to be expected, and the captain informative and charming. We landed in Heathrow without incident at about 23:30. However, the airplane couldn't get a stand, which delayed things, and we then had to stand in line at Customs for an hour or so.

Upon entering the Baggage Hall sometime after 1am, we didn't see our luggage. In fact, we heard an announcement saying that there would be no more baggage delivered and we were to leave the Baggage Hall. Amidst the understandable chaos, we found a BA employee and he gave us a form to fill out. We also realized that the Tube wasn't running and we wouldn't be able to get to our hotel. He said that BA would pay for the cab ride, and gave us a card with a number to call about our baggage, saying that they would be delivered to us, probably the next day.

So, without our baggage, on our honeymoon, with no toiletries and no clothes but those we were wearing – which thankfully/luckily were hiking boots and a few layers of jackets, we waited for 30 minutes in the freezing cold to get a cab to our hotel.

We got to our hotel about about 3 AM, and stumbled into bed. In the morning my wife started calling BA in an attempt to find out where our bags where. The number on the card didn't seem to be active, or was overloaded with callers. A friend in London also tried to call various BA numbers and got a number different from the one we had. The following are in fact snippets of the friend's online chat with Jodi while the friend tried to call:

Jodi: i'm worried that a) our bags didn't even get on in Italy (things were pretty lackadaisacal there) and b) our form might get lost in the shuffle from last night, or not processed in time to get our bags to us before we leave

at this stage i'd just be happy being reassured that they actually know where our bags are and are processing them

between not having eaten since lunch yesterday, being up all night and all this stress, i'm sick and am trying to force down corn flakes like one corn flake at a time and of course all my drugs are in my bag

[and, after we finally got hold of a BA representative:]

we got her [the British Airways rep] to have the bags sent on to israel asap and we will buy stuff to keep us tided over here and get it reimbursed

So, as you can see, we were deeply concerned about our luggage and took many steps in order to speak with someone at BA about what we could/should do. We were prepared to go to Heathrow to pick up our baggage if need be. We were told by a woman (with an Irish accent?) with the initials of “X” not to go to Heathrow because it would be a waste of time, but instead to go and buy what we needed for two days in London. Jodi asked about what the upper limit was, and she was told to get what we needed and BA would be very reasonable in reimbursing us. Understandably, the BA representative told us to buy just a couple of days' worth of clothes, and to stay away from the designer shops.

Fair enough! This is what we did.

We've kept all our receipts, and I won't itemize them here, but in a nutshell they include:

Toiletries (such as shampoo, deodorant, contact lens solution, toothbrushes and paste, razors), winter hat/scarf, underwear, socks, shirts, pants, a guide book (we had one in our luggage, but needed to plan for a month in Israel), and a small backpack to put this new clothing in, as we already had a full carry-on each. Nothing extravagant. No designer shops. Just two adults who needed to make sure they could function appropriately in London. Mind you, we didn't buy shoes, although our hiking boots were inappropriate for city walking and led to back, foot and knee soreness after three straight days in Italy and London. The total of these expenditures is 333.43 GBP + 88.40 GBP for the cab from Heathrow, for a total thus far of 421.83 GBP.

So our intrepid honeymooners leave London's Heathrow Airport Sunday January 10th in the morning, on a flight to Tel Aviv. We're leaving without our luggage – our luggage that was meant to fly with us Thursday January 7th. That's 2 ½ days without our luggage. We understand the logistical problems involved in directing thousands of pieces of delayed and lost luggage following the unexpected weather and flight cancellations, but at this stage we're not even sure our bags have made it to Heathrow in the first place, and no one can seem to enlighten us.

Going on faith, we get on the flight, assuming that our bags are going to be at Ben Gurion Airport. I bet you're on the edge of your seat wondering if they were there. Well, to save you the anticipation, sadly, they weren't.

We've gone from Milano to London to Tel Aviv without the comfort of our own underwear, socks, anti-perspirants, contact lens solution, pants, shirts, shoes, and without knowing if three very important gifts were going to ever make it to the intended recipients. Jodi now has a cold and those cold medications we had are in our lost bags.

Once again, we enter another country without our bags. Instead of snow and freezing temperatures, we now have sun and temperatures in the 20s Celsius, but no shoes, shorts, or sunscreen. And once again, we need to make some purchases in order to live with some degree of comfort.

So we buy shoes suitable for the weather and for walking long distances in the city, and a couple of short-sleeved shirts each. We need more toiletries, since we don't have several things we need, and which are in our toiletry bags, wherever they are. The total for these purchases is 1171.88 NIS (or 195.64 GBP).

We still have not purchased shorts.

Monday, we continue to check on things online. Our bags have not been found. We check the BA website and see that you deal with a company in Israel for your luggage. We called QAS (http://www.qasisrael.co.il/) and are told that someone would call us back the next day (Tuesday, January 12th) but no one does.

On Tuesday, we call the number again at the end of the day, and speak to Y, who tells us that one bag has been found and will be delivered by the end of the next day (Wednesday, January 13th).

He also tells us that passengers travelling “Tourist Class” (we flew “Euro Traveller” from Milano to London and “World Traveller” from London to Tel Aviv) are allowed 25-75 GBP, after 24 hours, to spend on necessities. I don't know if Euro Traveller and/or World Traveller are the same as Tourist Class, but this was not information we were given by “X” in London.

This bombshell is unacceptable. Having been told by two people (one at the airport, another on the BA Customer Service line) not to worry about any kind of limit but to make reasonable purchases, which we did, and being reassured that they would be reimbursed, and then being told by another that we exceeded more than half our limit simply by taking a taxi – our only option at 2am – is misleading, upsetting, and downright ridiculous.

Appalled, we asked to speak to someone with more authority than Y to discuss our concerns, but were told no such person was available, but that someone could call us back. We never received such a call. We were growing increasingly disappointed, having hoped for much better from BA, given its reputation for customer relations.

So we now sit and wait., unable to carry on with our planned travel in Israel, unable to book hotels, B&Bs, tour companies and operators, and putting friends and family who are expecting us into difficult positions, because we are not able to travel. We had planned to go to Petra, Jordan, but our sleeping bags are in our baggage, and you can no doubt appreciate that we have been reluctant to make any more purchases, particularly any that might be deemed “unnecessary”.

As of this morning, it would seem that both our bags had been found and were expected in Tel Aviv from Heathrow on a flight today. Were our bags not to show up today, we would be forced to buy shorts. Again, a necessary expenditure. If we are without our bags tomorrow, we will need to buy “nicer” clothing, since it is my 40th birthday and we have reservations at a restaurant that will not allow us to show up in jeans. Jodi will need to buy a skirt to attend any religious services and to visit several conservative religious sites in Jerusalem.

These expenditures are not our responsibility, since they would not be a problem if we had our baggage.

Since the first part of this letter was written, we have encountered further carelessness from British Airways and their agents.

Upon checking online today (Wednesday), we learned that one bag was delivered to Tel Aviv on a flight that landed at 16:19 today, but as of this writing, at 22:50, it still had yet to be delivered. This is hardly prompt and expedient customer service! We have been without this bag for six days, and it seemingly won't be delivered until tomorrow.

You may be wondering where the other bag is. Apparently, it is at Chicago O'Hare (ORD). How this bag ended up in Chicago is beyond all comprehension and is tearing the last strands of stretched patience we have remaining. The complete and utter incompetent, negligent illiteracy is unbelievable!

Immediately, we called QAS back. Our record now showed that only one bag was missing, not two – they knew where the bag was in Tel Aviv, but were apparently unaware that they had sent the other bag to a completely different and unaccountably absurd second destination. Aside from re-labeling that bag for proper forwarding to Israel, Z at QAS wasn't able to help us beyond supplying two numbers for BA customer service here in Israel. At the first, A at BA's offices in Tel Aviv was sympathetic to our plight, but couldn't help us, and she gave us a number to call for BA at the Tel Aviv airport. This number didn't work, so I tried the other number from Z and at that point I got a number that wasn't answered. At this point we were so frustrated we called it a night.

So, here we sit with no baggage for six days.

We expect to hear back from someone at British Airways tomorrow. My 40th birthday. I have had better birthdays and, frankly, better moments on my honeymoon. 967-1111.

We also expect full compensation for our expenditures, and at this point, we think it appropriate to be compensated above and beyond that for the time required to deal with the ineptitude of British Airways and its agents, and the pain and suffering we have had to endure because of time lost on our honeymoon.

Yours truly, and none too happily,

David Kruger & Jodi Rice.

P.S. This has been sent to the entire list of Directors available to me at reuters.com. If I have excluded the relevant and responsible person to deal with this, I will expect someone to forward this along. Many thanks.

Email #2

Thursday January 14th, 2010.

Mr. Walsh, (President/CEO BA)

Since several of these email addresses "bounced back", and company.secretary@ba.com is out of the office until 1/18/10, I figured I would try your email address directly.

Mr. Lord (Director of Operations), I apologize for the duplication, but I wanted both of you to know that I had sent this email to each of you.

I expect to hear back from someone at BA today.

Yours truly,

David Kruger.

Surprise Email

They didn't realize that I had Cc'ed Jodi on the initial email, and I didn't do it to be nefarious or anything, but it meant that when they passed around information internally, she got a couple of emails. Like this:

"Another one for your team please. Many thanks. I will follow process on Nirvana." P to K.

"I've read through the customer's email and passed this one on to be prioritised this morning."
K.

(The job title KILLS ME!!!)
Third Party and Continuous Improvement Manager
Customer Relations

Email #3 - Subject: British Airways Customer Relations Nightmare - Continued

Monday January 18, 2010.

Good evening Mr. H.

I unfortunately find it necessary to contact British Airways once again, since we're continuing to suffer as a result of the incidents associated with the misplacement and painfully inappropriate shipping of my wife's bag to Chicago. Rehashing the content of my previous email would seem unnceccessary, as I'm sure you're well aware of what happened to our bags.

I do however find it necessary to point out a few dates. We flew from Milano to London on January 7th and from London to Tel Aviv on January 10th. We received my bag on January 14th. We still have yet to receive my wife's bag, which presumably is on its way from Chicago to Israel. Supposedly it was sent two days ago from Chicago, and last I checked it's not that long to fly from the U.S. to Israel.

We had planned to go walking/hiking at Masada and swimming in the Dead Sea. We've postponed the trip waiting for my wife's bag, which has our hiking pants and bathing suits. We have now had to cancel that trip and are hoping to be able to find the time before we leave the country, since a) hiking pants here are too expensive, and b) we have one pair of hiking pants and swimsuits and don't need another pair.

My wife's travel pillow and sleeping bag are in her bag, so she's without those, and again, we don't need to buy another one to have two of these.

I'd throw in the fact that her umbrella is in her checked luggage (fear of it being considered a weapon), and it poured today, but that just seems to be adding something in to have you feel sorry for us.

Then again, I guess that's what I'm trying to get across here. British Airways has misplaced our bags, caused us to buy clothing we didn't want to buy in the first place, spend hours of our time while on vacation to find/buy these things, and still we don't have my wife's bag.

We're now hoping to find out that the bag will be in Rishon L'Ziyyon when we get back there tomorrow - which is an unplanned trip - as we need the sleeping bag to continue on with our travels to Eilat and Petra, Jordan.

I do want to thank you for the debit card with 620 GBP on it. That was great, but truth be told, and a welcome surprise. But we're unsure of what role it serves. When told about the debit card's existence, my wife asked if it was instead of the compensation, in addition to the compensation or a part of the compensation. She didn't get an answer from the BA rep she asked.

As well, my wife was really pleased with the way that A.H. approached the situation when she was on the phone with him. She felt reassured that things would be handled the way we expected them to be when we booked with British Airways in the first place, and after her conversation with your rep in London.

Thanks so much for taking the time to deal with our issues/concerns, which I know aren't the biggest problem your airline has to deal with, but for us they're a huge problem and I suspect you realize that.

Yours truly,

David Kruger & Jodi Rice

P.S. We received an email from M @ BA Israel, and his reference number
(ABC123) is different from our BA case reference number (XYZ987). I have Cc'ed him (the email address I have for him) and the two email addresses I have for QAS, so they know about our desire to have the bag in Rishon L'Ziyyon tomorrow.

Email #4 - Subject: British Airways Customer Relations Nightmare - Part III

Tuesday January 19, 2010.

Mr. H.

This is starting to get ridiculous.

We have received two phone calls from QAS using words like, "maybe", "hopefully" and other non-committal terminology as it pertains to a bag that was supposed to be in Tel Aviv on Sunday.

Apparently it's in London.

This is unacceptable, and while I appreciate that Mssrs. H., Walsh, Lord and B. have more important things to do than receive emails from a Kindergarten teacher from Toronto, my time is worth money as well. A lot of my time has been wasted with this. My wife's too. Our energy. Our happiness.

Our honeymoon.

This has been a huge source of stress for us, and on that note I'm including a little reading for you folks, which I hope you'll take the few minutes to read. And just before the link I ask this question:

How much is my time worth?

http://www.marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2010/01/whats-the-value-of-your-time.html

I know for me, this isn't my job. I'm not getting paid to try and get back our bag, that contains gifts, souvenirs and things that frankly we don't want to replace. Truth be told, I have close to 900 friends on Facebook who are expecting to hear a happy outcome from this, so that they continue to have confidence in British Airways.

I just want the damn bag returned to us tomorrow, so that we can attempt to salvage some of our time in Israel, where we have been for 9 days without feeling grounded and happy. We have been without our bag for 12 days now.

T-W-E-L-V-E D-A-Y-S!!!

Yours truly,

David Kruger.

The Conclusion

We got our bags back. Mine took a week and Jodi's took two weeks.

We got fed up and considering we were told to replace what was in the bags, and we were covered by the Montreal Convention for up to 1900 GBP, we went to the Israeli version of MEC (Mountain Equipment Co-op), LeMaytayel, in the Dizengoff Centre and spent 5600 skekels (about $1600 CDN) doing just that.

Jodi's bag got here the next day.

How and why her bag went from MXP to LHR to ORD, instead of TLV, we'll never know.

To be honest, we're sick of telling the story, but we're REALLY good at tag-teaming it and could probably be convinced to pull it out at some point. For a meal or a place to sleep (Yes Dawn/Dee/Ro, we know you're going to have something to say about this! Heh.)

I thought it would be nice to include the two emails from our new best friend at BA, A.H. to finish it up.

Thank you very much for your email addressed to our senior management team. I was delighted to hear that you have received both of your bags. I would like this opportunity to thank you again for taking the time to speak to me on the telephone. It was very nice speaking to you and your new wife.

The baggage problems you experienced on your flight from Milan must have been extremely frustrating, particularly as it took two weeks to return both pieces of luggage. I am very sorry that your birthday and honeymoon were affected by the delay. Clearly we let you and Mrs Rice down.

We know that getting our customers’ bags to the right place is a critical part of our operation. That’s why we worked so hard to improve the baggage system at Terminal 5, and it is now one of the most advanced systems in the world. However, during the disruption period we recently experienced, we did face problems with the system. This resulted in your bag being incorrectly rerouted and prevented an earlier delivery. Please accept my apologies.

I do appreciate the efforts you made to keep your essential purchases to a minimum. We have altered the standard procedure to enable myself to deal with your baggage claim. This should improve the efficiency and resolution of your claim.

I would be grateful if you could send an itemised list, including the dates of purchase, values and receipt of the essential items you and Mrs Rice were required to buy throughout the affected period. Our address is:

(We know what it is)

Alternatively, you may fax the claim directly to me on #. Please mark the documents for my attention and reference your case number, ABC123.

To make some amends for the baggage failures, I would like to offer you and your wife a complimentary space-available one-way upgrade for your return to Toronto. This will include both flights from Tel Aviv and London Heathrow.

I must emphasise that it will depend on the availability of seats on the day, so I’m afraid we will only be able to confirm that you have in fact been upgraded when you get to the departure gates just before your flights leave.

As long as there is space in the next highest cabin to the one you booked, we'll be happy to upgrade you. If you have prepaid for your seating and your upgrade is successful, we will not be able to refund the seating fee.

If we find we can't upgrade you for either one of your flights, you will be considered for an upgrade the next time you travel with us - though again, it will have to depend on the higher class seats being available on the day. If this is necessary, please reply using the link below, and provide me with your new booking details.

Thank you again for your time and your patience. We look forward to welcoming you and Mrs Rice on board for your return to Canada, and hope you enjoy the remainder of your holiday.

Best regards

And then,

Dear Mr Kruger

Thank you for your email regarding your upcoming return to Canada and for providing me with your booking details.

I can confirm that I have added the upgrade requests into your booking. I will also send messages to both airports the day before your departure to ensure they are aware of the requests.

Should you need to make a claim for any additional essential expenses that we are unable to cover, I will be able to provide any relevant baggage information to support a claim on your travel insurance.

I look forward to receiving your baggage claim and hope that you and Mrs Rice are offered the space available upgrades on your return to Toronto in February.

Best regards

Israel -- as tourist, not visitor

2010-02-02T00:56:00.000-08:00

"How many times have you been in Israel?"

"This is my fifth."

Suspicious glance from the Israeli border guard between Aqaba, Jordan and Eilat. "Fifth?"

"Yesh li mishpachah be'Rishon LeZion." ("I have family in Rishon LeZion.")

So, yes, this is now my fifth time coming to Israel. But in a certain way, it's the first.

I've been meaning to write this post for a long time, now, but it's been hard to really crystallize and put into words the difference between my previous visits and this one. "Visit" is a key word -- when it comes down to it, it's the difference between being a visitor and being a tourist. But how to define and illustrate that difference?

The difference itself struck me while David and I were wandering through a part of Jerusalem that I really hadn't seen before. Four previous visits to Israel and I felt like I was seeing the city for the first time.

"You know, in all the times I've been to the Old City, I really haven't been anywhere but the Jewish Quarter?" I told him, faintly wonderous at the revelation.

David was more than faintly wonderous; he was incredulous. "Really??"

It was true. I had been to all the important landmarks of the Old City -- at least, important in terms of Jewish national and historic identity. Other parts of the city were incidental to those visits: you might make a pass through the Arab part of the shouk on your way to the Kotel, for example, or glance at severely-clad Armenian priests walking along the Via Dolorosa as curiosities. Once, when it was still open to tourists, I walked barefoot into the Dome of the Rock and touched the cool, perfumed stone where the world is said to have begun.

But being a visitor meant that our itinerary and experiences were usually tied to whatever it was that brought us to Israel in the first place, usually a family event like a Bar Mitzvah or a wedding. Our "home base" would be my aunt and uncle's home in Rishon, and most sightseeing would be confined to day-trips when there was time in between celebrations, family get-togethers, hanging-out-with-cousins time.

Only one time before had I come to Israel without a celebration, a simchah, at the centre of our trip: when I graduated from university in 1995 and I travelled just with my Dad. The most memorable part of that trip was a two-day trip to Jordan to see Petra and Wadi Rum. In fact, I don't really remember much else from that trip at all, though we probably stayed here for at least 10 days, if not longer, so we must have done other things.

So in planning Israel as our last stop on this trip, I sort of had the idea that it would be a lot like every other time I had come here, but with a month to spend rather than just a couple of weeks. Two weeks always went by so quickly; when I was last here, for my cousin Nadav's wedding, I cursed myself for spending only two weeks, as my flight took me home just as the other cousins were gearing up for a weekend trip to the Sinai for some serious beach time.

But this visit has been almost entirely different in an almost undefinable way -- I can only again point to the difference between being a visitor and being a tourist.

A visitor comes to hang out with her hosts; a tourist comes to see something.

Throughout almost our whole trip, we have been tourists. The only time seeing something wasn't our priority was when we HelpX'ed in France.

I suspect that for David, the expectations about coming to Israel were not that different than those about going to any other country: there were things to see and do, cultures to experience, foods and drinks to taste. Technically, I had already ticked the major sights in Israel off my list: the beaches and markets of Tel Aviv, the Wailing Wall, Yad VaShem, Masada, the Dead Sea, even the Baha'i Gardens in Haifa.

So it was weird being here with a guidebook in hand. Suddenly, I felt bewildered, even unprepared. I wasn't relying on someone else to plan my route, and yet I didn't have a clue where I wanted to go, what I wanted to see. People had sent us literally dozens of suggestions in response to David's canvassing them for opinions of what to do while in Israel, and they all sounded good -- but shouldn't we start with the big, important ones, even if I'd seen them before? Could we even fit the off-the-beaten-path destinations in once we'd filled exhausting days with the usual sightseeing ones?

And how would we get to them? Suddenly I had to learn to negotiate the public transit system. I'd never done that before, and I didn't have a clue. Certainly it was no different than doing so in all the other countries we'd been in... but I'd never been a visitor in those countries, only a tourist, so I was used to looking up schedules and routes, asking drivers and other passengers. It felt weird to be doing so in Israel.

And I could speak the language... sort of. I mean, I was in Hebrew immersion school until I was 12. If someone speaks slowly, uses language no more sophisticated than a Grade 6 vocabulary, and gives me enough context, I can figure out what's being said. I can pick out a few words at a time on a sign. But deciphering more than that is as much an exercise in frustration for me as for anyone else trying to deal with Hebrew -- maybe more so, since it defies the expectation that I should be able to get by. (I'm being a bit dramatic here -- most of the time I can get by, because most Israelis both speak English and are very forgiving to people making an earnest attempt to speak Hebrew. But the reading is still a word-at-a-time pain in the @$$.)

OK, you must be thinking by now, what a rotten time she seems to be having in Israel. She's missing the comforts of being there with Mummy and Daddy, of being chauffeured everywhere, of having a personal translator, of sticking within familiar boundaries.

Of course not! I'm having a great time... it's just taken a little while to get adjusted to being a tourist here, and now that I feel as though I'm quite adjusted, it's almost time to go. Typical! No matter how much time I book myself in this country, it's never quite enough!

I loved, of course, hanging out with my aunt and uncle in their crazy, funky, art-gallery-cum-#1-guesthouse-in-Israel.

I loved walking aimlessly around the streets of Tel Aviv, even if half our time there seemed to be devoted to trying to find clothing to replace the stuff that was in my 2-weeks'-late backpack.

Jerusalem was fascinating, as ever, though even with 4 days there we felt we left it only half explored.

Tiberias was less than inspiring, and we left the north too early because my stomach once again rebelled, but the time we spent in the Galilee and the Golan revealed a startlingly green, mountainous expanse I didn't really fully appreciate before now.

Eilat was as tacky as I remembered -- tackier -- but offered one of the absolute best relaxation experiences ever and was our gateway to Petra.

I had never before climbed Masada at 5:30am to witness dawn breaking over the Jordanian mountains, and it was at once gruelling and exhilarating, and I'm glad we did it.

And, believe it or not, although I had visited the Dead Sea before, I had never floated on it or rubbed its black mineral mud all over myself. Now I have photos of both -- an absolutely essential Israeli tourist cliche.
We're now spending a few days on a moshav just south of the Dead Sea, on the border with Jordan, called Neot HaKikar. Although initially our intention was to work with/for the farmers here, it's been tough finding something to do, in part because the farmer our host intended to hook us up with is on vacation in Germany, in part because the farms are largely staffed already by a very industrious and amusingly incongruous workforce of Thais, and, not insignificantly, because the farmers don't understand why we want to be anything but tourists here.

I think normally I would object to their way of thinking, but, after all my time here, I just can't find it in me to do so.

An Unexpected Travel Advisory

2010-01-08T23:11:00.000-08:00

Hello there Fearless Readers (or Dawn, Ray, Andrea and our parents!)

I wasn't planning on writing this blog post, but then again, I wasn't planning on doing a lot of things in the past couple of days.

The travel advisory isn't about drinking the water in some country, or not traveling to some country because of disease or war. Nope, it's about knowing that in some countries, or some restaurants in some countries you need to prepared for free food.

It's NOT FREE!!!

(Truth be told, this wasn't the blog post I was referring to when I said I wasn't planning to write it. Truth is that it's just after 8:00 AM in London, and I'm hungry and I'm thinking about food. It's something I do a lot. Think about food. I love to think about food. Meals past, meals present, fantasy meals, ideal meals, best meals.....)

Well, the "free" food I'm referring to is the food you get at the start of a meal in Spain, Portugal, Italy and also Indian/South Asian restaurants. In Spain, you might get olives and something else. Ask how much they are, as they're rarely free. In Portugal, again, it's olives, cheese and something else. Again, rarely free. In Italy it's bread. Bread at the start or bread during the meal.

Folks, READ the menu! Look for couvert/cover/service/bread/pain/pane on the menu and it will often tell you how much things are. If you're not sure, ask.\

"How much is this?"

Last night was the three lovely sauces we got upon sitting down at a GREAT Indian restaurant near Whitechapel Station on the Tube in London. Whitechapel of course makes me think of the line from the Beastie Boys "Slow and Low" and "White Castle fries only come in one size". And also "Harold & Kumar go to White Castle". But that's me. So the three sauces came and so did four popppadoms.

The poppadoms were on the bill.

No biggie. But ask so you aren't surprised when the bill comes. And the food at Tayyabs was REALLY good and REALLY reasonable. Not cheap. Reasonable.

Back to the unexpected blog post.

As you may have figured out, we're in London. It seems our bags will meet us in Tel Aviv at Anne/Arie's. Jodi's aunt/uncle and two AMAZING people. If you were at the wedding Arie is the mastermind/creator of our ketubah (wedding document or Jewish pre-nuptial agreement).

We were supposed to fly easyjet to London's Gatwick from Milano's Malpensa at 4:25 Thursday afternoon. When we checked just before leaving our hotel, our flight was set to go. Upon arriving at the airport, we found it was cancelled.

Our choices were to change our flight or cancel our flight. Both options were to be done online. No other way to do it. To say that travel has changed in the electronic age is an understatement.

So we pulled out the netbook, paid 10 euros and tried to change our flight to later in the day. No luck. Only chance to fly on easyjet from Milan to London, where we had a room booked, was to fly out Friday night. We really wanted to be in London (as we are meant to fly to Tel Aviv early Sunday morning) to meet friends, do some things in the "English" world and enjoy a city we've been in twice already on this trip. Still, no guarantee that the easyjet Friday night flight would go from Milan to Gatwick.

We searched a site that we've looked at before (edreams.com) and found a relatively cheap flight on British Airways from Milan Malpensa (Terminal 1 versus 2) and Heathrow versus Gatwick (more runways and therefore a better chance of flying, PLUS if we were cancelled with BA, we'd get put up in a hotel and fly out the next day, versus being stuck with no options.) But we didn't want to book with them, because if the flight didn't go, we weren't sure if we would have any "standing" with British Airways.

So, we cancelled our easyjet flight, but we're not 100% sure we're going to be get our refund because we first tried to change our flight and didn't just cancel it. We looked on BA's website and found the same flight that we found on edreams.com for a little less, and we booked it.

We then moved all our worldly belongings from Terminal 2 to Terminal 1, and looked for the British Airways counter. After walking all around, we finally found it. Now when I say walking around, I mean walking around. It's a fair-sized terminal, and we walked up and down it twice. With our rucksacks (mine is just over 20 kilos (45 pounds for you Imperial folks - and while I'm at it...if the Americans were so pissed off with the British that the American Revolution happened, when are you still using their units of measure?!?!?! Just asking yo! And Jodi's is a few kilos less.) and we each have a carry-on bag.

The British Airways counter was near the guys with guns. We found out later that El Al was near the BA counter, and that means there's heightened security. So there are guns. I should be more used to guns, since I've seen assault rifles of differing forms in Gatwick when flying to Amsterdam and all over Italy. Guns, guns, guns. Tonnes of guns. And let's remember that I'm heading to Israel, where I will see more....anybody? GUNS!

Back to the counter. We picked a good time to stand in the VERY short line, because ten minutes later it was a VERY long line. About 40 people long in fact. There was one guy sitting at the desk/counter. One guy and a lot of people. He got heckled a little bit, and BOY did he ever shoot back a long and deadly stare. He could have been a teacher. Or a librarian.

We got our boarding pass and our luggage was tagged, but couldn't check it in because it was too early. We were then meant to fly out at 7:45. So, we sat down and had our lunch. Yep, we made a lunch. Buns we bought in Venezia, with basil olive oil we bought in Siena (?), with cheese we bought in Siena, with prosciutto we bought in Milano. I also found it necessary to buy a 500 mL bottle of peach San Benedetto iced tea, a 500 mL bottle of Chino from San Pellegrino, a 660 mL bottle of Nastro Azzuro beer, a 660 mL bottle of Moretti beer and a litre bottle of milk (lactose-free milk it turns out, since I only was able to make out "milk" and "partially skimmed" in my not-so-good Italian).

We still had our rucksacks, so I was able to use Jodi's Swiss Army knife to open the beer instead of having to use my teeth (which I wouldn't) or try to find a counter-top to do the macho/cool guy bottle opening trick that I'm not too good at, for obvious reasons. I usually break the bottle neck, and that's really wrong at the best of times, but especially when you're in an airport and there are guys with guns nearby.

Long and short of it, we ate our lunch, drank some beer, drank some chino (Keeno, for those of you following along at home!), ate some yummy cookies that Jodi wanted. Nutella filled chocolate chip nuggets of goodness, checked the web/email/British Airways and Heathrow sites, and checked in our luggage around 8:30, and FINALLY flew out at about 10:20.

We landed in London around 11:30 local time and waited a bit to be granted a stand to be let off the plane. They've been backlogged because of the awful cold, snow and ice in London/England, and it's been devilishly awful. The captain was AMAZING, as he chatted along the flight, telling us if he was going to go right or left at certain points, and informing us a lot while on the ground about the situation we were in. Truth is, we were some of the lucky ones, as we were ACTUALLY able to fly in to Heathrow/London! We were off the plane after midnight, I do believe.

We then had the pleasure of standing in the customs line at Terminal 5 for well over an hour. I don't know if you've been in this line, but about 1/4 of the way along there's a sign that reads, (something along the lines of) "You're 45 minutes away from the front of the line". We finally got through around 1:30, and headed to the baggage area.

Which is when we found out that the bags weren't coming off the plane, and had to leave the baggage area. There were cops with guns. I thought the Brits didn't have cops with guns. As with so many other times on this trip, I thought wrong.

So, there we are. Our carry-on luggage - which doesn't have our toiletries! - and the clothing we've been wearing all day. In both our cases, the clothing we were wearing wouldn't quite qualify as "spring-time" fresh, and was washed using soap. As in handsoap, not laundry detergent.

At the best of times, to get from Heathrow's Terminal 5 to Bow Road Station would be a long trek. Jodi figures about 90 minutes to 2 hours. But, the Tube (subway) stops running at 11:30 pm.

We then waited in line for a taxi. A long line. In the cold.

Around 2:00 or so.

The cost of the cab from Heathrow to our hotel near Bow Road Station?

90 pounds, or about 150 dollars CDN.

So, no bags but a bed.

Thanks to my friend from Toronto (Mariza), who lives in London (until the end of the month, when she moves to Athens, Greece with her fiancee), and Skype and the British Airways customer service woman from Ireland, and the front desk fella at the hotel.....we were able to figure out that we would/should go shopping for clothing/toiletries while in London.

UNIQLO (Japanese clothing store we love) and BOOTS (formerly in Canada, for those of you old enough to remember)!!!

Yay.

So, we had super duper South Asian lunch down the street from the hotel (Bengali "fast food" heaven!!!) and super duper South Asian dinner (with Mariza and Ilias) at Tayyabs near Whitechapel Station. So we've been well fed. In fact, the leftovers from lunch are going to go well with some green onions and mushrooms for breakfast.

We went shopping and I got new socks, underwear, jeans (Jodi likes 'em!), shirts and a hoodie from UNIQLO, and new toiletries from Boots. I certainly got things I wanted/needed and in some cases, things that I needed and would have bought in London regardless.

Still need to get a few more things, like another bag to travel with, since we have lots of liquids that can't go on the plane, but we're doing well. Mind you, I wouldn't normally be walking around in a city in my hiking boots, but....can't win 'em ALL!

So, that's our story from here.

Oh ya. I've been craving GOOD beer since we were in Belgium and wanted to get a pint or two of real ale from The Little Driver, across the street from our hotel. Jodi wanted to get home, so we popped into the Co-operative (one of my FAVE stores!) and got some bits and pieces for breakfast, licorice allsorts, gum and two bottles of beer. SO GOOD!!! I can't wait for the real ale tonight, PLUS we're going to Vinopolis (Mark, we're actually going!) on Jodi's brother's suggestion, and I'm psyched for that too.

Borough Market is something that's been suggested by quite a few people, so it's on tap for today. We fly out STUPIDLY early tomorrow, so we're not going to be doing much, other than dragging our asses out of bed and getting to the airport.

THOUGH, with the snow that's expected today/tomorrow, we may not be flying out tomorrow.

ARGH!!!

It could be worse. We could be on easyjet.

"Sorry. Your flight has been cancelled. You have to rebook or get a refund. Online."

To think how f**ked we would have been without the netbook.

Thanks again Joe and Alessandra!

Things I've learned/realized/appreciated in 3+ months away

2010-01-04T00:13:00.000-08:00

Things I've learned/realized/appreciated thus far, while away for three-plus months.

The best licorice allsorts and wine gums are in the UK.

Getting socks on a British Airways flight is a good thing when you're in Bologna, Italy three months later and need socks. Navy blue or otherwise.

You appreciate a good meal, whether it's unexpectedly on an airplane, train, you make it, it's made for you, or in a restaurant that you didn't expect to enjoy so much.

Good airplane landings should not be taken for granted.

The UK has some REALLY good food. Marks & Spencer has good deals on lunches (sandwiches, crisps/chips and drinks) but their drinks have "nasties" - artificial sweeteners that make them taste....nasty. Pret a Manger (now in NYC) and Wagamama come to mind has SUPERFLY! Pret's drinks don't have "nasties", and it's where I got the term "nasties" from!

Russell Peters may joke about the Indians running after the English when they left (wanting to feed them!), but some of the best curry I've had has been in England (Shampan in Brick Lane, The Wee Curry Shop in Glasgow and Melati in London come to mind), though it was top-notch in Lagos, Portugal too. Probably 'cause there are so many Brits there!

I like Uniqlo best in NYC. The Paris store was expensive and PACKED, and the London store wasn't as big and fabulous.

I don't like bunk beds and I don't like dorm rooms.

I like museums that aren't in the "salon style" (Louvre!) and LOVE free ones (London in general).

I love Robert Mapplethorpe and am thankful to have seen his work side-by-side with Michaelangelo's, as I found it inspiring and life affirming.

I appreciate well-dressed people, especially when I'm carting around a rucksack!

I appreciate good/sexy beer, since I haven't had any since Belgium - which seems like a lifetime ago!

I appreciate cheap flights from Ryanair and Easyjet, and CERTAINLY appreciate the more lax weight restrictions on Easyjet (20 kg for checked luggage, versus Ryanair's 15) and British Airways (20 kg as well).

I appreciate having brainstorms (I've had one or two while away) like buying a bag in Gatwick in order to meet the weight restrictions imposed by Ryanair.

I have a new appreciation for football. Not American football, but "soccer". I want to play when we're back at home. Great game. No, I don't have a favourite team. I suspect my favourite team will always be the Pittsburgh Steelers.

I appreciate a Netbook, Flickr and an external hard-drive, in order to hold the thousands of pictures that we (me) have taken while away, and Facebook to share them with friends/family easily.

I appreciate good tours. Walking tour in Edinburgh ("free" - pay what you think the guide is worth. GREAT idea!), Belfast Black Cab tour, distillery tour at Glenmorangie, Porto port tours, a good sherry tour at Tio Pepe (Uncle Joe) in Jerez (versus the interesting tour at Sandeman's that was...interesting) and a fantastic tour of a Brunello winery in Italy.

I appreciate the work that Stonewall UK is doing for gay/same-sex rights in the UK and LOVE my new t-shirt.

I appreciate the opportunity to learn more about mom's mom's family ancestry and the chance to see where my grandmother grew up in Shettleston, (Glasgow) Scotland.

I appreciate that all we've used McDonald's for while away is a bathroom and photo ops.

I appreciate a good clean room and a good bed.

I appreciate Jodi being healthy.

I appreciate a good cup of tea. BOIL THE FREAKIN' WATER IF YOU'RE GOING TO CALL IT TEA!!!

I appreciate an "Irish Shopper" recycled plastic/reusable shopping bag that we've had since Enniskillen, Northern Ireland.

I appreciate my hate/distrust for industrial meat, produce and Wal-mart more and more every day.

I appreciate a good meal, but not paying a lot for it is even better.

I appreciate things of beauty, but a) I want to be able to photograph them (Michaelangelo's "David" and The Sistine Chapel come to mind - and I did photgraph both of them!), and b) am getting sick of churches, but still think they're beautiful.

I appreciate being on a farm, but think that being on a farm should mean that you're not burning plastic period, let alone for your family/children to breathe in. That is, instead of paying to have it picked up with the garbage.

I appreciate children that aren't annoying, parents that parent when necessary and people who aren't obnoxious when drunk in public. "VIVA JOE!!!"

I appreciate good transportation, that runs on time (Italy!) with informative signage (every country except Italy).

I appreciate, for whatever reason, that the UK drives on the left side of the road while the driver is on the right side of the car, but think the car rental agency should inform you what to do if you can't get the ignition to turnover. THANK YOU to the Germans for the assistance at Loch Lomond. And for those of you reading this, it's the "other" side of the road, not the "wrong" side of the road. Mind you, it's not the "right" side of the road either, and that's a pun. I try not to be punny. That's dad humour.

I appreciate good food prices.

I REALLY appreciate good wine prices - Spain, Portugal, France (Pyrenees mainly) and Italy.

I also really appreciate good scotch prices in France and Spain. Well, almost everywhere except....Scotland.

I appreciate the good coffee we've had in Spain, Portugal and Italy, but especially Italy.

I appreciate Starbucks, but mainly for their WiFi in the UK and Northern Ireland.

I appreciate farmers' markets and so should you. If you don't already.

I appreciate that I didn't have my credit cards and/or cash in my wallet when I lost it, or was pickpocketed, in Milano.

I appreciate home cooked meals. Thanks to Alex, Jon, Deb and Maya!

I apprecite unexpected coffee and pastry - thanks Andrea in Naples (which our server in Siena called "Nipples", and it was his hometown. This made me giggle.) for that.

I appreciate the sane driving in Toronto after being in Naples and seeing the insanity that is the norm.

I appreciate being a pedestrian in any city except Amsterdam.

I appreciate modern art and don't like boring old s**t.

I appreciate that the Glasgow city council has hired translators to aid in interpreting what Glaswegians are saying. In English apparently. Which is sad, since it's the language I speak. Mind you, my Italian accent is pretty good.

I appreciate all the places we've been, but wonder what some of them are like in the summer/good weather. Some I don't ever want to see in the summer with the insanity that I'm sure runs amok.

I appreciate/expect free WiFi if there's WiFi in a hotel. Sorry, that's just me.

I appreciate English language TV and am amused (and frustrated at times) when I see English language TV shows dubbed into the local language. I ESPECIALLY appreciate when they're closed captioned with the local language and I get to hear the English.

I appreciate when I don't have to listen to the f**kin' accordion, which has been pretty much every city/country we've been in.

I appreciate a lack of exposure to lousy street performers, especially the "statues" who expect to be paid for standing still.

I appreciate that beggars in Toronto don't approach you with a cup and expect to be given money for no reason at all. Begging in the name of a saint is even worse. In my eyes.

I appreciate HelpX and Jon/Deb for potentially saving our time away.

I appreciate the doctor in ER in Barcelona who gave us Valium. Not that I've used it, but to have it was reassuring.

I appreciate Corinne in Lyon for being so generous and potentially saving our time away.

I appreciate the generosity of Pedro, who just reinforced how beautiful the Portuguese are. Or maybe it's just the Portuguese I know, and/or Marcos' family!

I appreciate our e-doctor panel of Rachel, Brigit and Zarya for saving us for good, while in Spain.

I appreciate that Jodi likes overnight trains, but the coffee served with breakfast is not enough to overcome the bunkbeds, narrow aisles and constant freakin' jostling. THOUGH, I'm sure the people standing on lonely small-town platforms in Lisboa and Madrid appreciated my mooning them!

I appreciate guide books, but hate when restaurants/bars I REALLY want to go to don't exist. Or, when the really well-reviewed places are impressive to high-school/college students who think having access to a microwave is a chance for some "fine dining".

I appreciate Jodi's sense of direction, since I'm a wee bit spatially/directionally (NOT like Emily's issues with left & right though!) and it's been a saviour. Not to mention her already existing ability to speak French and newfound ability to speak Portuguese, Italian and Spanish. Oh, and she speaks Hebrew too, which will come in Handy in Israel!

I appreciate grocery stores, but farmers' markets make me much happier. THOUGH, farmers' markets rarely, if ever, have wine for between 1 and 5 euros that is some seriously good s**t.

I appreciate small towns. I appreciate big cities. I appreciate places in-between. I'm a big-city kinda guy though. I love to people watch, and that's hard to do when there aren't any....PEOPLE!!!

I appreciate family and families. I also appreciate parenting when done right/appropriately. I can't begin to count how many times I've said, "If I would have done that when I was a child...." while away.

I appreciate all the churches we've seen (this is my second time sitting down to write this, so there may be some repetition. Deal with it!) but the Gaudi was my fave - though we only saw it from the outside. Jodi was sick in Barcelona, and I didn't want to pay and then leave. Kinda like Eddie Murphy in "Delirious" when he's talking about the black family and the haunted house. "Okay, gotta go!"

I appreciate that people are willing to try and communicate with an Anglophone, through whatever means they have readily available. This has been a delight. That and the fact that Jodi seems to understand every freakin' language under the sun.

I have enjoyed listening to all the native languages being spoken while away, but Portuguese makes me giggle and Glaswegian is just "royally" messed up! I like to pretend to talk most of the languages we've heard while away, but by far Italian is my best accent, Portuguese is my favourite to pretend I know (well, next to Italian!) and while I'm not good in Spanish, I think I'm better in Spanish than French. Which I took from grade 4 - 10. Go figure.

I appreciate that every freakin' town/city has had an Irish pub and Chinese restaurant. We've even had Chinese in Sintra, Portugal and Bologna, Italia.

I appreciate that people like fried food, and we've had some, but generally speaking not too much. The Spanish seem to like to fry a lot, as do the Portuguese. Oddly though, we didn't have much fried stuff in the UK, where they'll fry a lawn chair or hammer if someone will eat it and/or pay money for it.

I appreciate a good sandwich, and ANYONE who knows me knows this. I've had packaged sandwiches in London, Scotland and Northern Ireland, bocadillos in Spain and panini in Italy.

I miss my bed at home.

I miss my slow cooker. (Thanks again Mark & Ray!)

I've appreciated all the native alcoholic beverages, but especially port in Portugal.

I've appreciated passion for food and drink, much like I have, and I firmly believe it's contagious and that food should be more than merely a means to cease your hunger or enable you to continue on with whatever activity requires calories/nutrition. Food is life, life should be passionate, and therefore, food should be passionate.

I appreciate books and magazines in English, even if I end up finding them in a pile near a garbage dumpster in Firenze, Italia. It's great when you can get UK Cosmo, Elle, Penthouse (a few good stories/articles - pig hunting (feral (wild) pigs (not sexual at all, though he was REALLY into it!), the real Sopranos from New Jersey and some other little blurbs of interest, National Geographic (no nudity) and Stars & Astrology (or some other goofy title like that).

I appreciate free publications. In English. I will read just about any free publication that has news and other stuff in it. I don't read free classifieds though. UNLESS they have Companions/Singles Ads in 'em. Then, I'll read those. I suppose that's about where I draw the line.

I appreciate public transit that alerts you to the next stop. There have been lots of examples of this, and a few where we had to scurry off at the last second. "And don't you do that again!" Like I'm going to miss the stop again? Well, I might, but Jodi wouldn't!

Every city's cathedral/basilica/duomo was the first/biggest/tallest/longest/best at something. Just look around or ask someone, and they'll be more than willing to tell you why it's best. It's like local cooking in Italia or football (the real deal!) anywhere (A-N-Y-W-H-E-R-E!!! in the UK and/or Europe!).

I appreciate "free" breakfast. We paid for the room, it's not "free", it's INCLUDED!!!!

I appreciate good Indian food. Lagos, Portugal and Mijas, Spain come to mind. Probably the large numbers of Brits that are there.

I appreciate public nudity. I haven't seen any as of yet. Other than inappropriate butt cracks on women bending over, or homeless men that is.

I appreciate tasty food, but can do without some of the salt that seems to be so prevalent in Portugal and Spain.

I appreciate a good movie, whether in English or not. "Scarface" (Pacino) was great in Italian, and "Cobra" (NOT Stallone) was funny and all in Spanish.

I appreciate a good trivia night, ESPECIALLY when the questions can be answered by non-Europeans/Brits.

What the F**K is up with gypsies?!?!? They were camped, YES CAMPED, on the platform in Tunes, Portugal for a few hours. I just don't get it. I appreciate nothing about gypsies. Except that this culture seems to have given us "Snatch", and I loved Brad Pitt in that.

I appreciate Wally & Gitta Rice. They're great people, and I wouldn't "have" Jodi if not for them. I appreciate that they put up with me. I think they appreciate that I put up with them. (Kidding!)

I appreciate that I have a spatial issue, which tends to rear it's ugly head when I'm driving (I also have a habit of walking into door frames, but usually with my right shoulder. Mind you, that's not the shoulder that's giving me issues right now. That's the other one, the left one (for those of you playing at home. I think it has to do with the pickaxe work in the Pyrenees. I suspect some physio is in my future!). Not really just driving, but turning/parking/reversing in tight situations. My brother knows this from 1987 when I scraped up Plymouth Scamp in the Branson parking lot. The Rices know this from the Alhambra parking lot. Goldcar in Malaga, Spain knows this as well, but really didn't seem to care about it. As long as the under-carriage, windows and roof were fine, they were fine with whatever other body damage occured. If renting a car, try to see if there is a "GOLDCAR" in business there. That's G-O-L-D-C-A-R!!!

I appreciate a shower with warm/hot water. There seemed to be a shortage at times in Mijas and Roma. Oh well. I ended up cutting my head in Mijas, and used the sink in Roma for my audience with Benny.

I appreciate when people aren't drunk and yelling "Viva Joe!", when I'm out to dinner in a "nice" restaurant. Though, to be honest, it was amusing to see the drunk dude, who looked like a cross between Roberto Benigni and Gilbert Gottfried, toast the newly 25 year old Joe. SEVERAL TIMES!!! It ceased to be as amusing as eat toast went on.

I appreciate it when Jodi understands that we don't have to do all the same things together. UNLESS I don't speak the language or will get lost. Then we do.

I appreciate that every language/culture seems to have a version of John or Joe.

I appreciate that people consider it cold in Italia when it's not. But the herd of fur coats isn't necessary. No matter what the temperature is.

I appreciate that people consider the Pope to be an important figure, but the high school football pep rally atmosphere at the weekly Wednesday papal audience was SUPER DUPER weird. The Mexican high school boys biting each other was entertaining though. The girl beside us writing in her dictionary about hating traveling with her parents and that she was broken was sad. But entertaining nonetheless.

I appreciate/love good gelato, and there's been tonnes in Italia. I'm psyched to go home, since I know there are some really great spots in Toronto. Though it's not the same.

I would GREATLY appreciate it if people would learn how to use their (digital) cameras, since EVERYONE seems to have one now, so that they DO NOT use their F**KIN' flash when taking pictures in musuems/churches where it says "NO FLASH" and even shows a picture of a camera, with a BIG BOLD "X" through the flash part of the camera if you do not read the language, or the four others posted. In case you didn't know this, you are destroying the artwork of the world with your reckless and inappropriate use of THE FLASH! YES, YOU!!!! YOU!!!! YOU!!!! (Can you tell this pisses me off more than a little bit?)

I appreciate Maya for saving us in the awful weather that messed up our HelpX and miss how much Sarah enjoyed the attention she got from me. If only more women were like Sarah (the German Shepherd)....well, I won't finish that sentence.

Why is it so hard to find dill and/or cilantro in Italia and/or France?!?!?! ARGH!!!

If I see one more Nativity scene AKA presepe I'm going to scream!!!

A Product of My Environment

2010-01-02T12:36:00.000-08:00

(A tip of the cap to MC Serch and PM Pete Nice AKA 3rd Bass, for the post title)

I feel like this is a relevant/necessary post.

January 14, 1970 will be my 40th birthday.

My father was 40 when I was born.

I have always had an issue (resented is too harsh a word) with my father's age, but I'm not sure if it's his mental or physical age that I've had the issue with.

Obviously, I didn't know my dad when he was 20 or 30 or 40. From what people tell me he was a little bit wild 'n crazy and a whole lot of smart. As everyone reading this knows, we all make decisions in life that affect us later on. In my dad's case, he chose to dropout of high school and never went back. I suspect there have been times when he looked back, but that really hasn't been a conversation we've had. I'd like to have it in person when we're back in February. I even tried to convince him to go back to school (high school or university) when he was in his early 60s, but he declined.

Those of you that know me, and I mean KNOW me, know that I can be a "boy". I giggle in staff meetings when people bring up having "yard duty, stair duty, basement duty" because they usually say "doodie" instead of "duty". I think it's funny when people burp or "bum burp" (fart, and one of my new fave expressions thanks to Martin and Tamara!), though I think it's all about time and place really. Mind you, I seem to do it everywhere. Just ask Jodi. I have been inappropriate my whole life, and sometimes it's not having the editing function needed, while others it's just about doing what I want to do, when I want to do it. As I've gotten older, I've aged more like a (fine?) wine (whine?) versus a vinegar. Or at least I think this to be the case. But for those of you who may find my behaviour sour, I'd like to think of myself as a well aged balsamic, in that there's some sweet in the taste, and it's not all acidic/sour.

Oh, and I love naked women. I think they're GREAT! But as my friend James says, "EVERYONE loves breasts!"

I have never played catch with my father. I've played catch with my mom a few times. I've played catch with Jodi's dad, and Wally is in his 70s. I've heard that my dad rode his bicycle to Hamilton from Toronto one day, but I don't remember seeing him on a bicycle.

Don't get my wrong, my dad has given me a lot. Maybe more than he'll ever know. He has been a kind, loving father and husband. A man who made sure his children and wife were provided for, no matter what he needed to do. We never went hungry, always had a roof over our heads and clothes on our backs. We were taught right from wrong, and whether or not we chose to follow this was not his (or my mother's fault)!

My father has always had a love for music. Opera and classical often filled the house on the weekends when we were cleaning or lazing around. The blues and jazz were a close second. Without these things, I would be sorely lacking in culture. This was the base for me to fill in the blanks on where rap/hip-hop came from, and to know who Howling Wolf and Muddy Waters were, when I stumbled across their London Sessions with The Stones and Clapton, among others.

I know that my s**t disturbing side is thanks to my dad. For better or worse I suppose. For those of you that like this about me, it's him. For those of you that don't, it's him. Deal with it. He's got a sense of humour too, in a "dad" sorta way.

My dad grew up in Toronto's Kensington Market, the son of Polish immigrants and his first language was Yiddish, or Jewish. (Not Hebrew, for those of you unsure of this distinction.) As a child, I fondly remember going downtown with my dad to Chinatown for lunch or dinner. Sometimes we'd even have the pleasure of going to Sam The Record Man, where my dad would seek out Sid Sniderman (Sam's brother), who he knew from "the 'hood" and they'd kibbitz and we'd get a discount. (Yes, my desire/ability to score a bargain also comes from Stan The Man AKA my dad!)

I've always eaten Szechuwan or Cantonese "authentic" food because of my dad. It was never "gwai lo" Chinese for us, and I have always (ALWAYS!!!) turned my nose up (yep, I'm a snob and damn proud of it!) at Ho Lee Chow (now out of business on Davenport!!!!) or food court Chinese. Unless it's been in Markham, where it's heavenly. I learned how to cross the street "Stan Style" in Chinatown. It involves sticking out your arm like you're at a crosswalk, and walking. No, there isn't a crosswalk, but like my friend Saul says, "If you go, they have to stop."

In theory this works, and thus far in practice as well.

We have driven from Yonge/Steeles (AKA Home) to Finch/Weston Road for a hamburger. (Really only relevant for Torontonians, and even then, most wouldn't know how far that is. Trust me, it's far to go for a hamburger.) We have gone from Home to Knob Hill (R.I.P.) at #7/Woodbine because mushrooms were on sale. Now some of you might better understand why I go to T&T in Thornhill or Trader Joe's in the U.S.!

One major thing that I have to give my dad props for was his analysis of Wal-mart. When they announced they were coming to Canada, he said that they come to a city/town, set up outside of the city centre and one-by-one the local shops go out of business. I argued with him (as I was much more conservative/pro-unfettered capitalism and consumerism) and told him how wrong he was.

He was right.

I was wrong.

Wal-mart sucks ass.

I have "kitchen talents" because of my father. He would do one of two things. The usual was to take what was around in the fridge, pantry and freezer and make something. This "something" was usually good, rarely bad ands sometimes GREAT!!! But he never remembered how he made it, so subsequent attempts to recreate it would usually far short. Or, the second, was to find a recipe and make it. He wouldn't always follow the recipe, and the deviations would often result in HEAVEN!!! Refer to the first one for what would often happen when he tried to recreate them.

I'm not so good at following recipes, but thanks to Jodi getting on my case about it, I now try to write stuff down when I'm creating things, or what changes I've made to a recipe, that in theory I'm following.

These are things that I would consider to be mainly positives.

Ah, the other side.

My father is a quiet, conservative man who has watched the past twenty years sorta pass by. In the early 90s, he was working at Pascal Furniture, selling....furniture. They went out of business, and he was suddenly out of work. He worked at a few places for a couple more years, but the momentum/way of life that he had when at Pascal - the routine, the people, getting out of the house - was gone.

He started watching "The Fresh Prince of Bel Air", "Family Matters" and "Oprah", and spent more time on the couch or in "his" chair, than anywhere else. He had dealt with physical issues - his back, hips and legs - for a few years, and this started to get worse. In large part probably owing to his not being overly active, but his diet being that of an active man, his weight didn't help, as he began to be less able to get up and go, and do things.

For a man who could do the "muscle dance" (I can do it. In fact, pretty much anyone with a bicep can do it. Ask me, and I'll show you how!), who painted/wallpapered the whole house, did the hardwood floors when the carpet was torn up (I helped!), and any manner of other super duper handy things, it's hard not to be able to do what you once could.

The work room has gone "dark" as the handy items don't get used any more.

My dad and I agree on less and less as we both get older. I suppose it's natural/normal, but I also think it's part and parcel of who he is, as to who I am.

I have consciously spent the last half of my life trying not to be my father. I have become outspoken on issues that I consider to be important for me, and "my world". I want to be an agent of change, and don't tend to accept status quo as good enough on several levels. Whereas my dad would shrug his shoulders if encountering something, I speak up. I yell. I try to rally the troops. I live my life with some sense of righteous indignation and look to smote "evil" with wrath. (Now I'm channeling Samuel L. Jackson in "Pulp Fiction".)

I purposely try to stay connected to my friends. The people who augment my existence, complete me on several levels and make my life better. Like the fresh ground peppercorns (change your peppercorns/spices every year at the very least for a better "spice" experience!) I want to be connected to them. Being away from home for three-plus months hasn't meant being away from them, thanks to Facebook, email and Skype. Oh, and thanks to Joe and Alessandra for the great Netbook wedding gift, it's been even easier! Sure, I miss getting together with my folks, Saul, James, Marcos, Emily, Steven/Noam, Jen/Noam, Martin/Tamara, Jean, Daniel, Meredith/Asa, the Montreal, Ottawa and NYC crews - to name but a few, and time with my siblings, Julie and the nephews/niece.

I am passionate about life and living, because I have seen my dad seem to lack the passion that he once had. The passion for life that I've heard about from people who knew him "back when". I suspect this is normal for many as they age, to lose aspects of their life that they consider important, as other things become more important. Or when you're just not able to do what you once could. I can't see that happening with/to me. I sense that I'm too connected to the things that make up who/what I am to lose that grasp on them.

I don't know what lays ahead for me. No one ever really does. Life has a habit of throwing some unexpected curveballs, or high-inside fastballs. Not to mention that when you try to throw that heater down the middle, sometimes it's "just a bit outside".

In twelve days I turn 40. Jodi and I are talking about having children. There's a possibility that I could become a dad at the same age my dad was when I was born. This does not scare me in the least. Only death scares me. Heights freak me out, but only death has the ability to put it's cold, harsh hands on my psyche and make me sweat. It's not all that much different from the kids in "Fame".

"I want to live forever....."

But I know I won't.

I do know that when I lay my head to rest, and they put me six feet under, I don't want to "go" with regrets about what I could have said, could have done, could have been.

I was concerned that my dad was going to die the weekend of our wedding. Truth is, I was more than concerned. I was fairly certain of it. I had a sobbing phone conversation with my brother, while driving home from seeing my mom in the emergency room in the hospital when my dad was taken in by ambulance. I was concerned that my dad would not see one of the most important days of my life. For those you that were there, you know that it wouldn't be an easily explained day/experience, and I'm thankful beyond words for the sacrifices that my mom and other people made in order for my dad to be there.

Like many people I went to junior high and high school with, I'm an under-achiever. I'm okay with that. As Jake Duncan says, "I'm a classic gifted under-achiever." I enjoy life, I enjoy living, I enjoy the people in my life (generally speaking, but we can't always remedy ALL the people we don't want around - after all, that's called homocide, and illegal pretty much everywhere!) and most of all I can look in the mirror and like the person I see.

All-in-all that's because of my dad. I've both embraced and rejected who my dad is. Thanks Stanley (no middle name - he was the oldest and said his parents couldn't afford a middle name!) Kruger.

Buon Anno a Tutti!

2009-12-31T16:59:00.000-08:00

Buon Anno from Bologna's Piazza Maggiore!

Some Thoughts

2009-12-29T08:43:00.000-08:00

Okay, to refresh, we're in Italy AKA Italia, and we've been away from our fair Toronto for more than three months. It seemed like it was time for reflection on things we've encountered in different cities/countries and what I felt about them. You know me, I don't have too many opinions.

To recap, we've stayed in London (twice), Dublin, Galway, Tubercurry, Bundoran, Belfast, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Carstairs, Amsterdam, Brussels, Brugge, Paris, Lyon, Bedheilac, Barcelona, Madrid, Lisboa, Porto, Lagos, Mijas, Sevilla, Milano, Roma, Firenze, Padova, Napoli and we're (currently) on the train to Siena, then Bologna for New Years, Venezia, maybe Verona, back to London, Tel Aviv, maybe Greece, probably Amman (going to Petra) and back in February. Not that you asked, but I do like to share. I'm good that way.

So, let's see. First? Alcohol. We haven't had any real ale in London yet. That's on "tap" for our next go-through in a couple of weeks. Ireland? we went on a tour of the Guinness brewery at St. James' Gate, and the beer isn't going to get any fresher than that! But, beer in Ireland, along with a lot of others things is expensive. Five euros a pint easily. Beer was less expensive in Northern Ireland, but the selection was somewhat lacking. We also didn't find that Irish whiskey was as challenging/interesting as Scotch whisky. (Note the "e" in whiskey is dropped from Irish to Scotch, which could be part of the reason why Glaswegian is such a hard "dialect" of English to understand)

Scotland? WOW!!! The beer was cheap as borscht and DEE-LISH! Sadly, we couldn't get to BrewDog, but we did have some super sexy microbrews that were DYNO-MITE! For about two pounds ($4) a pint. The scotch? YUMMERS!!! Great tour at Glenmorangie, where we bought some wee bottles that were gone by Paris, but the tour at The Macallan wasn't quite as stellar. I think it had to do with the woman at Glenmorangie really enjoying what she did, and she fed off the interest and passion of the people on the tour, and the woman at The Macallan just doing a job. The scotch at The Macallan is worth going for, as they really do have some of the world's best. That we missed our appointment for the tutored tasting is one of the disappointments of our trip. But hey, s**t happens!

There is some great bottled beer to be had in the UK, Amsterdam and Belgium, but the quality drops off quite a bit in France, Spain, Portugal and Italy. It's not to say that you can't get some "good" beer, but there's not much GREAT beer to be had. The beer in Amsterdam was good, but nothing really stands out like Deuchars IPA or Belhaven's Best in Scotland. The France beer was particularly lacking in quality, but the inexpensive wine in the Pyrenees from Aldi (the German supermarket chain that owns Trader Joe's in the U.S.) is not to be scoffed at. VERY drinkable wine for one-to-two euros a bottle. 750 mL and sometimes 1 litre! Red was the preference, and has been along most of the trip.

The wine in Portugal was inexpensive, as it has been in Spain and Italy, and the port in Porto was HEAVENLY!!! Again, the tour at Taylor's was better than Calem, but one tour did a good job of filling in the blanks, or reinforcing a point/concept that was said at the first. The port/chocolate tasting at Kopke was really nice, and inspired more of the same back at our hotel.

Sherry in Jerez, Spain was an experience, as the Sandeman tour was a bit of a farce, and the Pepe Tio one was an adventure, but much better. Still, I'm not much of a fan of sherry, and wasn't much of a fan of French brandy (I prefer cognac) and Spanish brandy didn't move any more than the French has.

We haven't done a grappa or wine tour, though we're hoping to do both before we leave the country, but the wine has been PHENOMENAL!!! Again, red, but the prosecco has been very nice. ESPECIALLY in/on the first class cars while riding on our (now expired Eurail pass). FREE wine/prosecco is a perk that makes the ride that much better. Then again, so does the two or three euro bottle that gets opened with the Swiss Army "jack" knife, that has come in handy in the hostels we've been in. More on that later.

We hope to do some form of a wine tour in Israel, but we'll see about that.

So that's alcohol. I've been drinking a lot, that's for sure. But because it's not cheap to drink "out" in most places, we've been doing more buying of bottles (beer and wine) and having our drinks that way. I don't know that I've been "drunk" once. I've been legally intoxicated, but haven't been driving (other than the adventure(s) in Scotland and Spain), so I haven't had to worry about that.

Food. London: SPECTACULAR Bengali/Indian at Shampan (Thanks John Arvanitis!!!) and Jodi already knew about Wagamama, but HOLY COW! What a great place. Not to be missed. "Fast food", Asian fusion, relatively inexpensive and fun. 'Nuff said. The food in Dublin was pretty good, but not great. Galwasy was the Oyster Festival, and otherwise we ate a MASSIVE baked potato that was quite over-priced. But remember, everything in Ireland is expensive! Tubercurry was our WWOOF experience, and an "experience" it was. The food wasn't great, but hey, we didn't go hungry. LOTS of tea. If there's something we've learned, the English know how to make tea! For starters they boil the friggin' water, which my mom has always done. She probably learned from her Scotland-born mom.

Bundoran was an out-of-season seaside town, and I made some mean pan-fried trout on Jodi's suggestion. Belfast was a mish-mash of things, which included me making a pasta/salad that i didn't much like. Jodi said it was good, but maybe it's because we were sleeping in twin beds that she was feeling overly generous with compliments. I wonder if she was afraid of this becoming a sleeping habit, since she does dig the cuddling (WHO DOESN'T!?!?!) but doesn't dig the snoring.

Edinburgh was SUPERB fish 'n chips, but painfully disappointing salads, which is a theme that seemed to continue through much of the UK. They don't seem to place much emphasis on good raw veggies. Oh well. Live 'n learn. While the Scottish will (and do!) fry anything/everything, they do make some good food otherwise. Another GREAT curry experience in Glasgow at The Wee Curry Shop. So good, that I went twice. Once with Jodi, and once on my own, after the Hajj to Granny Grey Goose's (AKA Aggie Baggie AKA Grandma AKA Agnes Balfour nee McIntyre) first home. Which I'm not 100% sure I found, but the car was stolen/graffiteed and I wasn't jacked for my camera. So it was an overall success. Not to mention that I navigated from Carstairs to Shettlestone to Glasgow. On my own. (I'm currently patting myself on the back, with my damaged (?) left arm. I think it's from pickaxing in the Pyrenees. More on that later.)

Carstairs was Jamie...errr.....Alex's fine food. He made a tasty haggis and neeps, and I'm psyched to try to make haggis from scratch. When we're in our own place. Which we need to find, since we sold our place in Toronto. Alex & Zoe's place in Carstairs was fantastic. Great people, good fun, and they just got engaged. It's about time she made an honest man out of him. He loves Jamie Oliver (and even though a certain Brit living in the Pyrenees calls him a fat tongued f**ker, Jodi and I dig his style too!) and has some "fun" hair likes Mr. Oliver's.

Amsterdam and Paris were two cities were we didn't eat out much, but instead put the money into "culture". Museums and metro passes mainly. In fact, we didn't eat out in Paris, but for the baguettes we got daily around the corner from our apartment in Montmartre.

I don't remember much fantastic food-wise from Brussels and Brugge, but I do remember the tourist-trap restaurants in Brussels, pushing their mussels. The mussels in Brussels were good, but not great. Better than a Jean-Claude van Damme movie, that's fer sure!

Lyon was SPECTACULAR, thanks to Corinne, who took us out to dinner at a fantastic place called Les Olivier. SO GOOD! This was also when Jodi was recuperating from a bout of stomach issues, which started up again in Barcelona. Speaking of Barca, we didn't each much in Spain other than bocadillos (sandwiches) as we were trying to balance Jodi's stomach unhappiness with my need/desire for food. MUCH jamon and queso, AKA ham 'n cheese. BUT GOOD!!!! SOOOOOO VERY GOOD!!!

In Bedheilac, at the gite/B&B, we ate well. Lots of homemade yummy food. Between Jon, Deb, Joe (Joe's WORLD FAMOUS pasta!) and myself, there was no one going hungry. We were cooking and baking and eating dark chocolate and drinking red wine and working hard (sometimes) and having fun (most of the time).

In Portugal and Spain, there is a lot of fish to be had - well in the south of Spain - and we ate a lot of fish in Lagos and some in Porto and Lisboa. It's salty, but tasty. REALLY tasty. Simply prepared and inexpensive - along with the wine - at just about every restaurant we were in. The salads weren't much better in Portugal, but at least they were larger. MUCH larger, but with iceberg lettuce, tomato, onion, carrots and sometimes egg and tuna. Ugh with the egg and tuna, but hey, it's food. So I ate it. Canned corn too!

None of us were overly impressed with the food in the south of Spain, but this could have to do with the English and Germans who seem to own a lot of real estate. Hipercor, the grocery arm of El Corte Ingles (just for you Gitta!!!) is HUGE and tonnes of fun. If you like to grocery shop. Their Scotch was cheap too. Oh ya. If you're going to buy Scotch in Europe, go to Spain. For some reason it's cheaper than France, which is MUCH cheaper than Scotland. Taxes are the issue. A bottle of $200 Cardhu in Ontario is $50 (30 euros) in France and $35 (22 euros) in Barcelona. Generally speaking though, the selection is lacking.

Also, duty-free in Gatwick and Malaga weren't very good. Duty-free between Canada and the U.S. is VERY good, and I'm hoping that Heathrow's is as good as advertised by others. That said, because of the European Union, you can only buy duty free in Europe when leaving the E.U. Just an FYI.

The food in Sevilla wasn't super as Spanish cuisine, but we did have a very tasty (and annoyingly entertaining) meal with Wally & Gitta. We had some really good tapas in Marbella , disappointing tapas in Fuengirola and so-so tapas at El Plaza Mayor (an outlet mall with an enh Nike outlet).

Italia. Well....we've had SUPER pizza in Milano, ORGASMIC pizza in Napoli (we went back again because it was so good! 'A Pizzettata di Sandro e Peppe) and so-so pizza in Napoli. We've had feh risotto in Roma, and SPECTACULAR pasta in Roma (Ditirambo) and at 'A Pizzettata in Napoli (Gnocchi in a rose sauce). We haven't been looking much for salads, but their side veggies have been YUMMERS!!! Spinach, eggplant and escarole to name a few that come to mind.

Maya made a yummy Israeli curry in Padova, and I have now made my brownies in two countries on the trip. I think Israel is next. It's amazing how difficult/stressful it is to bake in someone else's kitchen. Corn syrup, cocoa, demerara brown sugar and baking powder are four ingredients I take for granted at home. Also, salted butter isn't always easy to find and not everyone has a Kitchen-Aid "mixmaster".

There has been a lot of panini (sandwiches) being eaten in Italy to go along with the pig 'n cheese theme established in Spain. In fact, it's very easy to eat carbs 'n meat 'n cheese with every meal here.

Speaking of meals, I would be remiss if I didn't mention coffee. The coffee, of which I am a big fan, has been REALLY wide in quality spectrum while away. Starbuck is a fave at home, but I do love to make a pot of drip coffee (I miss our old coffeemaker, but we'll get a new one when we're back. I hope that Em has been using it!) and enjoy it while doing whatever at home. Starbucks was a bit of a godsend in the UK, as BT (British Telecom) has a deal with them, that if you have a Starbucks card in good standing, that your WiFi is free at their locations. So, we bought one in the UK and one in Ireland, and we had WiFi if it wasn't where we were staying.

I don't miss the fact that I haven't had Starbucks in months. The coffee otherwise has been great. When it's percolated/brewed and not made with hot water and instant coffee. Homey don't play that!!! Caffe con leche in Spain is great, since they heat the milk, and I do love espresso, thanks to Sheila getting me on to it years ago at her parents' place in Bolton.

Sleeping. Hmmmm....there have been good and bad experiences, and just because hostelworld.com or booking.com says one thing, doesn't always mean it's the case. We have had better than expected experiences, like fresh/yummy pastries and coffee made for us in Napoli, great breakfasts and large rooms with great showers and bathrooms, and less-than-stellar experiences - musty rooms, noisy beds, tiny rooms, construction dust coming in, shared bathrooms, no toilet seats, flooding showers....

It's to be expected when you're traveling on a tight budget for 20 weeks.

People. If you're able to handle/enjoy Toronto, Montreal, Chicago, L.A., New York, you'll be fine in London and Paris. The only thing is that speaking (some) French comes in handy in Paris. Just as an FYI. Dublin and Galway had genuinely nice and helpful people, and what they say about the Irish and their charm and talking the craic ("crack") is VERY true. Belfast, because of it's long history of violence and religious/political issues was a place we were warned about, but it was GREAT! We met some great people and it was delighful. In a big city way.

I was psyched about Scotland and I wasn't let down. My enthusiasm for the country was evident/obvious and people picked up on it, which helped a ton. I loved Edinburgh and Glasgow, even if Glaswegian might as well be Swedish or Dutch as far as understanding what people are saying. The city is now employing translators to help native English speakers to understand what Glaswegians are saying. Now that's funny!

Amsterdam and Belgium were great, and the people were people. Not much to say. One thing I've discovered is that if you try to speak a few words in someone's native tongue, and ask if they speak English, you can usually figure out what you need to know. Even if it involves drawing pictures, writing down numbers/letters or miming.

Barcelona was a city that had us paranoid, as Jodi was robbed of her day bag 15 years ago, but like Madrid, it's a big city with charm. Like Paris or London I suppose, but with the edge of the fear of being pickpocketed.

The biggest surprise for me was how much I loved Portugal. I'm planning on going back there, as I consider it a "home", the way I do Toronto, Montreal, L.A., Chicago, New York and Scotland. I just belong there, because it feels "right". The people are fantastic! So helpful.

Italy's been interesting. GREAT people everywhere, especially the warm hospitality in Napoli with Andrea, and the way that people walk arm-in-arm and kiss like crazy. Guys, girls, men, women, kissing cheeks and making out like mad ALL OVER NAPOLI!!!! Napoli's a bit rough around the edges and chaotic, but an adventure.

I guess that's about it. I've been at this for an hour and I figure it's time to edit some photos. OH YA!!! Pictures. THOUSANDS of pictures. Some experimental, some planned. Some where I missed the shot(s) and some where I nailed it. Jodi's been doing a great job of finding more of a "photographer's eye" as the trip has gone along, probably having to do with spending more time with the D-SLR/Canon. She shot well before, but having more time, desire and better subject matter would seem to bring out the intangibles in most of us.

I've been shooting reflections, shadows, low-light for "movement" in the shot, urinals, bathroom signs and any manner of other nonsense that amuses me.

Transportation. Italians don't sign their Metro or train stations well. Ryanair was a rougher landing than Easyjet (but we still have an Easyjet flight to go!). Second-class trains in most countries are better than most Portuguese trains. Overnight trains aren't all their cracked up to be - EXCEPT for the breakfast coffee between Madrid and Lisboa. Don't automatically buy city passes for transit and museums until you're sure you're going to go to the sights AND they're open the days you want to go. Some countries aren't very diligent in checking tickets on the trains (Italy) or Metro (Napoli - open gates are GREAT, but the station employees who just wave you through and/or open closed gates for you when you either don't have a ticket or your ticket expired, are even better!) but it's a good idea to have them. Also, in Napoli, say you have the "Arte Card" but forget it in your room and you'll probably be able to travel for free.

Photos. No flash means no flash. That is unless you're everyone else who doesn't seem to know how to turn their flash off, or use their camera without a flash, in which case they just ignore the signs. No museum/gallery/church/sight seems willing to do anything about it, other than say, "No flash" or better yet (Sistine Chapel, are you reading this?) "NO PHOTO!!!" ('cause they want to sell postcards) UNLESS (that is UNLESS UNLESS UNLESS) the guard knows you, in which case you not only take a picture, but with flash no less. F**KIN' hypocrite jackasses.

Some people (Pompeii) thought it was a good idea to enter "NO ENTRY" zones to pretend they were back in ancient times. This is not only a foul idea, but a bad picture. Wearing modern clothes doesn't make you look like you're back in 79 AD. Maybe if you strip naked in the brothel and simulate a position shown on the wall. That might be a good shot! Otherwise, just stay on the "right" side of the barriers. After all, it's people like you that are destroying the art/monuments of the world.

It's not people like me, who take no flash shots of the Sistine Chapel, David and probably a few other famous things. Things that need to be shot and shared, so that people will continue to visit them and be in SHEER and UTTER AWE OF THEIR MAJESTY!!! Oh well, they probably need Saul Colt (AKA The World's Smartest Man - which isn't saying much since men are dumb!) to help them word of mouth marketing. http://wwww.saulcolt.com. Enh. Who am I kidding? The whole world knows about the Sistine Chapel and Michaelangelo's David. But the whole world doesn't know about the Cappuchin Crypt, so it's a good thing I shot that when i wasn't supposed to!

Right?

:)

Oh ya, LET THE INGREDIENTS SPEAK FOR THEMSELVES! This is something I've learned in Italy, and will practice when the ingredients are good enough to stand up on their own. Otherwise, they'll need layering of flavours.

That's it for now.

La Dolce Vita or Living La Vida Loca

2009-12-26T15:30:00.000-08:00

First off, I left off on the way to Roma.

Roma, Roma, Roma.

The land of the Pope. By the time you're reading this, you will have heard for sure that the Pope was knocked down by a woman during Christmas services. It wasn't Jodi!

Our place in Roma was quite nice. The staff were great, and it was a few blocks from a Metro station, and around the corner from the Vatican. We did spend some good quality time at the Vatican, with Benny - who we had an audience with. It was kind of surreal to be there. Not just because I'm Jewish, but because I haven't experienced a high school pep rally religious event.

The Pope held court, well....as only the Pope or Queen (or a queen!) really could. He sat in his seat/throne, and there was cheering, signs (B-E-N-E-D-I-C-T-E!!!), balloons, flags and the like - much like you'd expect before an American high school football game. He read his shpiel in Italian, and then it was translated/synopsized by him into French, English, German, and then some other fellas did Polish and Portuguese. It's great that's he's able to do so many languages, but I wonder if people that speak Portuguese and Polish feel that he's giving them the shaft. And no, that's not a slam at the pedophile Roman Catholic priests.

Honest.

Getting the tickets, which were free, was an adventure. Jodi said that we should see about getting tickets, on the Monday before the Papal address. I went online and found a website that said you should order them a few weeks before. Minimum. WELL...I played the newlywed card, and emailed them in the hopes of getting the tickets. Not that I'm religious, let alone Catholic or a believer that Jesus Christ was anything more than a Jewish fella who had a following. Much like me. I'm a Jewish fella that has a following, but I'm not able to walk on water, turn water into wine, or any of those other miracles Jesus is purported to have done, but I have some crazy mad skills in the kitchen.

But enough about me, my delusions/visions of grandeur, and sugar plum fairies dancing in my head.

They emailed me back and congratulated us on our wedding (I left out the Jewish part!) and told us that we could indeed come to the church and pick up the tickets. Which is great, except for the fact that we went to the Vatican to pick up our tickets. We spent some good quality time going through security checks and talking to several groups/pairings of Swiss Guards (Nice outfits fellas!!!) who had no idea what we were talking about.

We knew that we had to get the tickets before 6:00 or so, and it was almost 5:00. (That's 18:00 and 17:00 in European time, which they're fond of over on this side of the Atlantic!) So, frustrated, we went back to our B&B to check and see if I could find the website again, to see what we needed to do to pick up the tickets.

Not only had they sent us an email that had the address for the church (Santa Susanna), we also had until 6:45 to go find the church and Father Tom, who had the tickets. With Jodi's superb navigating skills (and I may give her the gears about getting us lost from time-to-time, she's got a REALLY good sense of direction, reads maps really well and dammit, is nowhere near as geographically challenged as I am!) we got there, found Father Tom, made a 5 euro donation to the church for the tickets - that and the money for the Vatican Museums and climb up the dome at St. Peter's Basilica is the last money the Roman Catholic church is getting from me until they realize that abortion and homosexuality are not wrong/sins, and that they need to enter the modern era.

Quick, fast and in a hurry. No worries. Flavor Vision ain't blurry. (This Public Enemy break has been brought to you by the word "Gay", the concept "Womens' Right to Control What Happens to their Body", and enough with the church not dealing with the problem of pedophile priests. There's obviously something wrong with the "system" if priests are molesting children/boys. Fix it, or perish in a fiery inferno of wrath and righteousness. But that's just my two cents worth.)

The audience was weird, in that I don't attend services as a Jew. Though, I have been going to Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur services with Jodi and her parents the last couple of years. It's interesting, in that I don't pray (I can read Hebrew, but I don't know what I'm reading!), but end up looking around and sort of spending time thinking about me and my life. That reflection is good and healthy, but I've been doing a fair bit of that while away on this trip and suspect that I'll be doing more of it when we return from our travels. It's part and parcel of being an educator, to be a reflective practitioner, and something that I spent a lot of time doing last year while in a difficult spot of having a tough class, in a different division (4/5 (junior) versus kindergarten) and obviously new curriculum, and teaching styles needed as a result.

I don't know that I have much place for religion in my life. I know that I was born Jewish, and that my grandmother was born Scottish Presbyterian. I know that I have cousins who are observant Jews and cousins who are living with non-Jews. I have a Jewish brother-in-law and a non-Jewish sister-in-law, and those of you who know me and my life, know that Jewish doesn't make anyone better or worse in my life.

So, me and religion are currently on the outs.

I think that churchs displays of ostentatious wealth - the gold, silver, marble, statues, paintings and the like - is disgusting. Don't stand up on the pulpit and preach charity when the killings and starvation that have occured (and continue to occur) in the name of relgion have left our world in a sad state of affairs. The wealth of the Roman Catholic Church (and the monarchies of several countries - England namely) would go a long, long, LONG way to help developing countries and continents, and aid with global warming.

It's beautiful, and nauseating, pretty much simultaneously.

The churches/basilicas/duomos are huge, yet barely get used. I'm not suggested tearing them down, but perhaps it's time to re-evaluate the role of religion in the world. I'm just throwing it out there. Believe me, I know that I'm not expecting people to jump up and applaud, but I think it's a dialogue worth having.

Roma was also the continuation of my leather bag quest. A satchel. A man bag. A murse. We had been looking at several places while in Milano, but they were either too expensive or not what I was looking for. It was the same in Roma. Except far too often we'd chance on a store with leather bags that looked like they might do the trick, but the store was closed, and we weren't returning to that neck of the woods again.

The showers at our place weren't great. They APPARENTLY had 50 litres of hot water, but there only seemed to be about 2 or 3 by the time I got in the shower. Morning, afternoon or night. So, shaving for my Papal audience involved a lot of cold water. Thankfully, I didn't cut my head, like I did in Malaga. Jodi made us some MEAN cappuchino. I didn't know she had the crazy mad barista skills, until she reminded me that she worked at Second Cup about 20 years ago. We had some yummy wafers from their "breakfast bar" - chocolate and vanilla - that I kept putting into a sandwich bag and we'd eat them through the day. And night!

We ate some enh to REALLY good food in Roma. We were looking for a place in our book that gave free wine with dinner. Maybe they went out of business for giving away the free wine, but we ate at the place that replaced them. This place was owned by the same people that had the place across AND down the street. In fact, Jodi had to go down the street to use the loo. In any event, there was us and an Asian guy in there. The food was enh. We at a super yummy place called Dititrambo (no connection to Sly Stallone so far as I can tell!), and started with our pattern of sharing a salad, and having a pasta/primi each. In Italy they serve a primi (starter) and secondi (entree). Some places have larger primis and secondis, much like you'd find places all over that serve larger portions. It was really hit and miss, and no matter what your guidebook(s) say, you only learn by experience.

TV in our room was an adventure. Once we figured out how to turn on the TV/satellite, we had about 1000 channels, of which about ten were in English. EVERY language under the sun, including a myriad of Arabic/Middle Eastern channels. We watched WAY too much BBC World News, but their programming is pretty good. Some good interview shows. A WWII POW who is 93 and a great interview (done by a new fave: Steve Sackur (sic), who also did the next one), and a chippy chap with a bunch of people involved with the Copenhagen talks - the head of the Maldives, the South African Environmental Minister, the Swedish (?) leader and Mexico's leader. I can never remember who has a PM and who has a President, so we'll go with leader and head. REALLY interesting panel discussion. My bottomline on the environment is that everyone needs to get their S**T together before we really destroy the Earth. We're certainly well on our way to do that. Those of you that know my love for Joe Rogan standup have heard my sandwich/bacteria analogy, and I stick to it. We're bacteria and the Earth is a sandwich. All we're doing is eating it up.

We're eating the freakin' sandwich!

There was also entertaining porn ad channels, that rotated between women talking on the phone (or pretending to talk on the phone) or women slowly taking their clothes/bikinis off. The latter was FAR superior to the former, but still painfully inferior and lacking in quality. In any event, if the BBC World News was something I'd seen - they also had a great piece on athletes and depression - then I'd flip channels. Oh, and the women talking/pretending to talk on the phone would often have pretty good music in the background, frequently from the 80s and 90s, which made the channels somewhat (SOMEWHAT!!!) more compelling.

We ate some good pizza in Roma - Hostaria Da Dino and Bafletto come to mind - and some KILLER gelato. San Crispino for sure.

We went to the Colisseum (the outside) and couldn't quite figure out how to get into the Forum or Palatine Hill - which is just as good, since I probably would have found them PAINFULLY boring. I'm not too good with "old stuff" that isn't overly interesting. Seeing something because it's old and famous is like going to see that older relative who smells like rose water or moth balls. Except you have to go see that older relative and that old thing while away isn't mandatory/the "right" thing to do.

But that's just me.

In Firenze (Florence, not to beconfused with "Mel, KISS MY GRITS!!!" Flo, from "Alice") we wandered around, and found THE LEATHER MARKET!!! But we didn't have any money. Which is where the adventure began, since I didn't want to find the bag, AKA THE BAG!!!!!, only to find that we couldn't pay for it.

Both our cards were not accepted in any bank machine. We probably tried a half-dozen, until we were outside the Duomo and found a bank machine that would allow us to withdraw money. Maybe it was divine intervention, or maybe it was just a good connection with our bank. Regardless, we had euros and went off in search of dead animal skin.

After looking at about 50 booths, Jodi bought a purple purse (the "in" colour in Europe this season, and both of our fave colour, along with green. Go figure, they were our wedding colours!) and I got a black satchel/man bag. (Thanks to Carly and Lavinia for suggesting Firenze's leather market on market day!)

It seems that Italy has a thing for toilets with no seats, in restaurants. It may have to do with men peeing on the seats, or something else, but it's something we saw quite a few times.

It was cold and snowy in Firenze. Even by Canadian/Toronto standards. Not quite by Montreal or Winnipeg standards mind you, which is why it's called Winterpeg by so many. And to think that we're possibly going to be house-sitting in Montreal in February! Since we sold our place in Toronto, we're homeless. YAY!!! We're not stuck with our place anymore. Mind you, we also have no place to go back to AND we're also going to need to go house shopping in a reviving market. Ugh and yay, I suppose.

We went to go see my namesake in Firenze. At the Academie is the original. There was also a Robert Mapplethorpe exhibition, which I really enjoyed. I've always admired his work, and to see his work compared to Michaelangelo's (side-by-side) was really cool and quite a highlight. Yes, I took a shot of David, as we were on our way out. It's strictly forbidden, but I still took one! That's how I role. Then we saw a copy in Pizzale Michaelangelo and also in Piazza Della Signoria. THREE DAVIDS IN ONE DAY!!! I had a lot of fun snapping all three of them, and got several shots of the copies, all in different light.
On our way up to the Pizzale Michaelangelo, the steps were SUPER icy, and that's when I found out that Jodi is afraid of walking/falling on ice!!! A Canadian woman who goes skiing, but is afraid of ice. Sure, none of us want to fall, but after a life in Toronto and Montreal I'm surprised by this.

Piazza Della Signoria was fun, as the Italian art seemed to be just as much art as porn. Well, in my mind at least. I tend to view things just a wee bit different from others. Those reading this should know this by now.

We had planned to go to Camucia, and another HelpX/farmstay, but unfortunately owing to the snow/ice they couldn't get the gas delivery through. That meant to hot water or cooking fuel, and not much by way of quality of life. So, we got in touch with Jodi's cousin Maya, who is studying vet meds in Padova (Padua), and she told us we could come to stay with her - which we were going to do anyway, after our farmstay.

So, we had a good time with Maya. Had a Jewish/Israeli Christmas dinner, which was interesting and fun, to say the least. We wandered around. Lazed around. Grocery shopped in the market - not cheap, but hopefully local - and like other markets, it was very tasty and fresh. The peppers liked delicious, the cabbage was crisp and yummy, the onions were ONIONY! Yum.

In Italy they have their own version of "Deal or No Deal", which is SUPER WEIRD, but it's weirder not knowing the language. In HD it's even more weird, as you see all the bad makeup jobs that the people did themselves.

And so now, we're on the train from Padova to Napoli. Going for pizza. 6.5 hours for pizza. Okay, maybe more than just pizza. We're hoping to get a HelpX with a couple in the south. REALLY in the south. If they're not interested in taking us, then we'll probably head to the Amalfi coast and figure our time out from there. We've been looking to head to Venezia (Venice) and maybe Verona, but that might be on the way back to Milano.

Who knows where the wind will blow us.

Me and Spain, Spain and Me

2009-12-22T04:59:00.000-08:00

Spain and I have a complicated relationship.

It started back when I first traveled there with my friend Rachel, in the heyday of our youth. We took an overnight train from Paris, and spent a sleepless night in upright seats, punctuated with a stopover in the Basque Pyrenees, on a tiny, freezing train platform waiting for a midnight connection – we did not know that France and Spain do not share train systems (still true).

When we arrived in Madrid, we experienced the culture shock inherent in moving from a country where you do speak the language to one where you start to rely largely on sign language. I still retain strong – and highly amusing – memories of a very helpful tapas bar employee who signed “pollo” (chicken) and “pescado” (fish) for us quite graphically. We stumbled around in the heat of siesta looking for a laundromat that was open; we stumbled upon a free open-air pop concert by a local star. We visited museums and I tried in vain to get a glimpse of the Guernica past a wall of oblivious Israelis on a guided tour they were paying absolutely no attention to. So Madrid was a bit of a mixed bag.

Seville was definitely a highlight, full of ochre-coloured winding streets flanked by romantic balconies and filled with patios of students enjoying glasses of tinto de verrano and sangria. Our little pension was adorable, and lively with like-minded budget travellers with whom we sought out, and found, small bars with spontaneous flamenco performances.

We spent only enough time in Granada to visit the Alhambra, which was magnificent, and my only other memory of that city was that they wouldn't let us sit on the grass in the parks; the police were very vigilant, but there weren't many benches as alternatives.

Then we hit Barcelona. The morning of our arrival from Granada, on an overnight train via Madrid, my daypack and all its contents were stolen from beside me as I sat on a bench eating, distracted by some gypsies playing with a newborn kitten in the square (yes, it's an old trick, but I was a new traveller). We had to leave ASAP to get my passport reissued, and we didn't return.

So I have mixed feelings about Spain. On the one hand, I know there are all sorts of things to love about it. On the other, it just doesn't seem to want me get too close.

This time, we arrived in Barcelona after an awesome stay in the Pyrenees. I was looking forward to giving Barcelona a second chance, but when I woke up our first morning with a crippling nausea that soon became a full-fledged bout with gastroenteritis, I came to the sad realization that Barcelona and I just aren't meant to be.

Sick throughout our short stay in Madrid, too, I was pretty glad to head to Portugal and give Spain a rest for a bit. We'd be heading back, with a focus on the southern area of Andalusia, when my parents joined us at the beginning of December.

David's recapped most of Portugal and some of Spain. I'll add some of the videos we took in Spain for some additional highlights. Fortunately, Spain mostly redeemed itself in those two weeks we spent with my parents, though I have to agree with Dad in that southern Spain's cuisine just doesn't really do it for me in the way that some other local cuisines do. But the weather was great, the scenery spectacular, and the cities definitely worth visiting. Just take our advice: don't try to drive there.

We stayed in a town called Mijas, about a 20 minute drive from Malaga, in a little place called Casita Janine. It was a cute little guesthouse up a very steep hill above the town, and the view was unreal – on a clear day you could see as far as the mountains of the Moroccan coastline. It also had its own little olive and orange trees. David tried the olives without realizing that they're not usually very good unless they've been brined. But he also decided to try the oranges, despite a disappointing encounter with the oranges free for the picking all over Lisbon, which were VERY sour (I kept telling him they were ornamental only, but he didn't believe me).

Among the things we did that I hadn't done on my last trip to Spain, we decided to go to Gibraltar, just for the novelty of it, and it is indeed a pretty odd experience to walk across a border where the guards basically just glance at your passport as you hold it up. It really is just a rock jutting up out of the ocean off the coast, and absolutely packed from stem to stern with people trying to take advantage of the shopping there. Truth be told, we didn't see much in the way of bargains, plus they give an awful exchange on the Euro and none of us had brought any pounds sterling.

The other main thing to see on Gibraltar is the “colony” of Barbary apes, which are really a species of tailless monkey. While signs all over the place warn you that they are wild animals, they're pretty tame, and wander past tourists nonchalantly, doing their own thing (much to the amusement of said tourists).

They play

and groom one another

and just generally frolic and are cute. And that was Gibraltar.

Seville lent itself most to video, although sadly there's none of the flamenco show we saw because we were specifically asked not to take video (though we were encouraged to photograph).

We had arrived in time for a major festival day – the Feast of the Immaculate Conception. I'm not really sure why it's an important festival, or why the Virgin Mary's lack of original sin would be cause for all the kids to be out of school, and all shops closed, but the major street was closed off for endless processions of marching bands!

The band that was playing when I took out my camera had a Mary Poppins repertoire, but they didn't oblige while I was filming, so you can kind of ignore the latter part of this first clip:

Check out the guys salsa dancing in the background in this one (starting at about 0:45):

And, just one more, cause marching bands are fun:

Seville also has the stunning Alcazar, a royal residence that's still in use. Its gardens sport one of two surviving hydraulic “singing” fountains in Europe. We were in time for a performance of that, too!

Our second night in Seville we went to a restaurant recommended by the clerk at our hotel. The restaurant itself was very nice, and the food quite good, the service attentive; however, the space was largely taken up by a family celebrating a birthday, and one of the family members was obnoxiously drunk. We gathered the birthday boy's name was Joe, and that he had turned 25, mainly because Drunken Lout Family Member kept toasting him with barely-decipherable but obtrusively loud cheers of "Viva Joe!" I tried to get some discreet video/audio, but he wasn't obligingly obnoxious during the few seconds I was filming. You can hear how loud he is, still.

At one point, he was so bad that I think the maitre d' went over to their table to express his concern, possibly about his getting home ok.

After they cleared out, the restaurant staff were very apologetic. But they didn't realize that, in fact, we'd been provided with some prime entertainment! Nothing like drunken locals for your local colour of the night.

Our local colour the next day came unexpectedly in the form of some UK football fans who had come down to Seville for a match that afternoon or evening. We could hear their chanting in the streets even from inside the Cathedral (which I'm sure thrilled the folks who like to keep their cathedrals nice and quiet and, you know, sacred).

On further investigation, we discovered that they were, to be precise, Glasgow fans, and David shared a bonding moment with them, revealing to one that he had Glaswegian ancestral roots.

I would have liked to get video of the dancing Andalusian horses we saw in Jerez, but they were very vigilant about cameras. I would also have liked to get video of our tour guide at the Sandeman sherry winery, but our tour guide was awful and self-conscious enough with her English already, I think, that to subject her to filming might have made her thoroughly unintelligible instead of just moderately so.

Cordoba didn't have much to film, though I bet the lady who had the grilled chicken stand would gladly have obliged, since she was very happy to give us an impromptu Spanish lesson with our order!

So anyway, our second (third?) go at Spain was clearly much better, but I still wonder if another try someday might improve my overall appreciation, or if, really, I should just let it lie and stick to other countries.

Like Italy! (Which is where we are now.)

P.S. - I've added a map to our blog so you can track all the places we've been to since the beginning of our trip. I'll try to update it each time we update the blog.

Portugal & Spain

2009-12-15T12:59:00.000-08:00

It's been a long time.

When last we "saw" our hero, he was fighting off death in Lisboa. A lot has happened in the life of our fearless and intrepid protagonist. (Who the f**k am I talking about?!?!?!)

I can only describe Portugal as a must see for EVERYONE!!! What a great place with GREAT people. After I wandered around and almost died the day before (okay, GROSS EXAGGERATION!!!) I decided to try it again. I tried to find the Castelo. I'd read about the Castelo. I'd seen the Castelo. Could I find the Castelo? NOT A CHANCE!!! I wandered and wandered and circled and wandered. Up and down hills. Up and down different hills. Great exercise but PAINFULLY frustrating. Not to mention that I was walking some pretty seedy parts of town. But I did get a bottle of Super Bock and that made things MUCH better. I think it took about 15 seconds for me to drink it, and doing it while walking along a street made it that much more refreshing. Being from the prohibition-type state that is Toronto, Ontario, Canada.

SOOOO, after not being able to find the Castelo (more on that later!), I decided to find a lovely sounding African restaurant called Ginvinga. I looked at the guide book pages and saw that it was #14, and looked at the guide book map and found #14 and set off in search of it.

Now let's backtrack a bit. This is my first time being in a country where English is not the first language and without Jodi to guide me. I'm like a blind man without their guide dog (sorry Jodi, but that's the best analogy I could come up with!) or Chris O'Donnell to Al Pacino in "Scent of Woman" (Better?!?!).

So Blind Dave wanders off searching for #14.

I should have been looking for #30 where the street address was 14, but that's me.

So again, up and down the hills (different hills this time!), going through not-so-nice parts of town in search of Ginvinga.

No go.

So I wander back to our place.

AND I'M HUNGRY!!!

Jodi's up for real food and we go to Nilo for dinner. I have two entrees, Jodi has one and we feel good.

The next day, we took a Lisboa bus tour as Jodi continued to recover from her stomach issues and we tried to take it easy for her sake. In fact, we took two bus tours. Since we got hosed on a LISBOA PASS (TOTALLY not needed, since we didn't do enough sightseeing to make it worthwhile), we figured we'd make use of it as best we could.

Saw lots of stuff (from the bus) and listened to the same 5 or 6 fado songs between the English commentary. Fado is beautiful and a genre of music I'd like to explore more. I suspect that some of Portuguese friends (probably their parents!) will be able to help me out with this.

Ginjinha is a BEAUTIFUL drink. Especially at about 10 AM. It's a delightful cherry brandy/liqueur of sorts that I suggest all should try. YUMMERS!!!

We went to Belem, which has certainly been one of the highlights of our trip. Paseis de Belem is heaven on earth. No word of a lie. If you like Portuguese custard tarts, it's a MUST MUST MUST destination, since this is where they all began. Like going to Scotland for scotch, or France for baguettes.....this is where you go to experience them.

Now it was a Monday, so a few places we hoped to go were closed...further adding to our Lisboa Card disappointment. Alas.

Jodi and I tried to find the Castelo. No luck! Even Jodi couldn't get us there.

Jodi and I tried to find Ginvinga. No luck! Even Jodi couldn't get us there. (Lisboa is a bit confusing with the street names all being similar in nearby vicinity to one another. Yonge Street, Yonge Avenue, Yonge Alley, Yonge Way, etc.

We went to Gaucho for churrasco and ribs and YUMMY olives and cheap wine (common theme in Portugal: We didn't pay more than 11 euros for a bottle of wine in a restaurant and got them for 2.5 - 5 euros in the stores) and a good blow-up of a fight on the street. Another common theme. I think we've had disagreements/fights in every country we've been in. In public. WOO HOO!!! Now Gaucho wasn't busy, but it was tasty and there was only two other tables the whole time we were there. I guess it really is off-season.

We went on a day trip to Sintra, 'cause Noam and Jen told us to. We like them, so decided it was a good idea. We went to the National Palace, the Moorish Castle (a real castle/ruins, that's a LOT of walking!!!), but didn't go to Pena Palace (and got s**t, but more on that later!) 'cause we were walked/steps/staired out.

We had lunch in a Chinese restaurant in Sintra. It's interesting that EVERY city/town has had a Chinese restaurant. EVERY single one! Obviously, people leave a country and go to another for better opportunities. Having a dear friend who is half-Chinese and half-Portuguese, I see there's a connection, but I'm wondering historically where it comes from. James/anyone, can you help me out? Why does someone from China come to Sintra, Portugal to open a restaurant? Then again, why does Rick go to Bracebridge, Ontario to open The Rickshaw Restaurant. Anyone know if that's still in business? I haven't been since '88 when on a Saturday (AKA Fight Night) night off from Camp Shalom, our cabbie got out of his cab with a baseball bat in his hand and told the locals to "Get the F**K away from my fare!!!"

So we headed back to Lisboa and wanted to find out how to get to the English Bookstore. Well, Jodi did, since I don't read. I'm not much of a readist, in that I read magazines and non-fiction and Jodi reads S-M-R-T people stuff. Mind you, she's an English teacher, so I guess it's par for the course for her to be able to be a readist and talk about books 'n s**t.

At the tourist office, the woman started every sentence with "It's like this". Which is fine, since her English is better than either of our Portuguese. She said there was no tram to go up the hill, so we took the bus around the longer way. We got there sure enough, and Jodi managed to find a book. MANAGED I say because there were mainly text and course books for students of ESL. At the British Consulate across the street! I saw lots of books I'd be interested in reading, if I was at home and could the book down for months. That's what I do. I buy books and don't read them. Can't do that when rucksacking.

On the way back, we saw the tram. The tram that wasn't working. "It's like this". YOU'RE FULL OF S**T!!!

We made contact with Marcos' cousin Pedro, who had given us several suggestions about Portugal, and made last-minute plans to meet up with him and his lady-friend Ana, for Indian. The place was down the street from where we were staying, and it smelled DEE-LICIOUS when we walked by previously. They were game and we met up at Gandhi Palace.

Pedro is a superstar of a guy and Ana is great. She understands English, but I suspect she's not fully comfortable speaking it, so Pedro was her interpreter. It was like being at the United Nations. It was a good dinner, with good food and good people. We were completely blown away with Pedro's English ability. He learned English mainly from a summer in Toronto 25 years ago, and by studying it in school, like we Ontarians study French.

WOW!

That's a talented fella.

We look forward to his coming to Toronto with Ana in the near future and our having the opportunity to show them around and return the AMAZING generosity he showed by paying for dinner. TOTALLY unnecessary and unexpected and it just shows what a great guy he is. Mind you, he's related to Marcos, so how back can he be?

Pedro was flabbergasted we didn't go to Pena Palace, since he considers it a national treasure. We'll just have to go back to Portugal (I'm thinking about hiding in Marcos' luggage when he goes next!) and see it next time. Jodi says that you have to leave something to return for.

The next day we left for Porto, and in true heathen peasant form, I finished the first bottle of port on the train by drinking it straight from the bottle. YAY DAVE!!!

Our place in Porto was up a long hill. A VERY long hill. A REALLY REALLY LONG HILL!!! With all our stuff on our backs/fronts and in our hands. Ugh. But the place was nice and the breakfast was plentiful and included. It was a room that normally goes for 130 euros a night, that we got for 40, so we weren't complaining all that much. We had some issues with our metro tickets, which was a bit annoying, but we didn't get fined. The English on the machine stopped being English and we thought we bought two tickets, but we bought two trips.

So the station guard walked us up and I bought a second card and life was beautiful.

Jodi and I split a bottle of wine with dinner and she got tipsy. That's my girl!!! Back in the saddle and enjoying life. The stomach issues behind her and let's get on with the fun.

We climbed the cathedral the next day. I've been enjoying the churches on our trip, even though I'm not a fan of organized religion. The treasures, generally taken from other countries, should really be melted down and the money should be used to feed the hungry world-wide, but I'm a socialist that way.

Melt the (stolen!) gold, feed the hungry and stop the pomp and circumstance. People that are fed are more productive. This is how we can start to solve a lot of world problems. But that's the simpleton in me.

We went across the Douro to Gaia de Nova and were looking to do some Port tours. Truth is this is why I came to Portugal. I LOVE PORT!!! Unabashedly LOVE IT!!! Thanks to Jane Petrie (who I knew as a liquor rep at Walt's, who went from United to Churchill Cellars and I ran in to at a Food 'n Wine show in Toronto and she got me LOADED on port!) I dig it. I don't tend to spend a lot on my port (which is likely to change since the time in Porto), and Marcos says I should drink tawny, but I was there to experience.

We first went for lunch and had the Sister Sandwich. Really it's The Little French Girl, but Sister Sandwich sounds more fun and less dirty/creepty. "Ya, I ate the little french girl." Not cool for an elementary school teacher to be saying. Then again, there are a lot of things that this elementary school teacher says that aren't overly appropriate. Oh well.

We walked ALL THE WAY up the hill to Taylor's (known as Taylor-Fladgate in North America because of some American winery called Taylor's) and got a free tour with a free tasting. In fact, it was so far up the hill that I was pulling Jodi up 3/4s of the way up. It's something we've continued, as I like to help out my woman when she's in need. Or when I'm in search of food and/drink. We then bought a 10 and 20 year old taste and quite liked them. We also bought a bottle of 10 year old as a gift for Jodi's dad.

The tour was great at Taylor's, but we learned that by taking another tour (we paid for this one) at Calem, that we learned a few more things and also learned that we liked Taylor's better than Calem. Which is good, since Calem's not available in Canada. We got a sampler pack to taste with Jodi's dad, but all-in-all much more fond of Taylor's. Next was Kopke, where we sampled a few ports and got some dark chocolate to go with them. That was nice too.

Our first night in Porto was a fish dinner on the Douro that was quite touristy, and our second night was chocolate and port. Yep, chocolate and port. We've been buying VERY inexpensive 70-85% dark chocolate bars in Europe, and I bought a bottle of Kopke tawny for dinner.

We left Porto for a long day of travel. Train to Lisboa, bought food for lunch at the Pingo Doce in the station, took the train to Tunes (Tune-esh, not toons) and a train to Lagos (lah-goush) that sounded like a '57 Chevy in need of a tune-up. Loud 'n slow. Kinda like me!

Our place in Lagos was the Stumble Inn, and Jamie, the owner is a great Kiwi who has worked in bars and now wants to "settle down" a bit. He and his American g/f have opened this place. Cheap rooms, but the room was a bit musty-smelling and the shower was not overly hot (barely warm really) and with ZERO water pressure.

Oh well, it was cheap.

JUST LIKE ME!!!

Jamie had great suggestions for meals. Dinner specifically. We went to a Forja for fish, twice. YUMMY!!! We had DELIGHTFUL "other white meat" and clams at Casinha Petisco that was big enough to be breakfast reinterpreted a couple of days later. Fine, the food is salty in Portugal. But in Lagos it was cheap and TASTY!!! Again, cheap wine. Tasty too!

We went to the beach. It was a topless beach. Well...we were the only two people there and I was the only one topless. Can't win 'em all I suppose. As we were packing up, some tourists came by and two of the women were wearing dresses. Not beach/summer dresses, but full-on dresses. Again, it's "cold" now.

We drank port and vinho verde on the beach. I don't remember if that was bottle #2 or #3 of port, but I'm thinking that I'll probably find another before we're done our journey.

We went to a trivia night at a pub and came in second. Not bad for the foreigners from the other side of the Atlantic.

We had yummy Indian in Lagos and on our last day there did a grotto boat tour that was fun. Dude who did the tour asked if it was okay if we left 15 minutes later, since there was going to be 15 minutes of rain. Sure enough, the rain started in about minute and lasted for....anyone? Anyone? Bueller? FIFTEEN MINUTES!!! The guy is the southern Portuguese Kreskin.

We got some pizza in boxes on the way out of town and JUST got on the train for Tunes. When we got there, we encountered a gypsy camp on the platform that was interesting to say the least. They were there for a couple of hours and we were in the station (TINY really. About the size of a big living room!) waiting for them to leave. They did, and in the meantime, we read a funny English-language paper written by/for ex-pats Brits. Some of them sure are a cranky lot.

We went back to Lisboa, transferred stations there, and got on the overnight train to Madrid, transferred stations there and took a high-speed train to Malaga. I watched a Spanish-language movie called "Cobra" (NOT Sly Stallone) that was funny. No subtitles, no nudity, but funny. Honest.

Jodi's parents met us in Malaga and we took the metro to Fuengirola, where the car was parked. We were in transit for 24 hours, and this time on the overnight train Jodi had her breakfast, since she wasn't suffering with stomach issues. YAY for her! But I only got one breakfast. Oh well. Sucks to be me. That said, the coffee is OH-SO-GOOD on the train between Madrid and Lisboa. Just so ya know.

We went grocery shopping, which I DO LOVE TO DO!!!

We went to our casita in Mijas and never did end up wandering around Malaga. Oh well.

Dinner was in Fuengirola and we continued on with this pattern of eating dinner out, except once.

We went to Ronda, Granada (The Alhambra), went "outlet" shopping at El Plaza Mayor(feh!), Marbella, El Chorro, Nerja (caves) and the beach (fun rocks/pebbles on the beach), Gibraltar (crazy cute/fun monkeys RIGHT WHERE YOU ARE!!!!), grocery shopping at Hipercor (THE BIGGEST GROCERY STORE I'VE EXPERIENCED THUS FAR!!!!), Marbella again, Mijas for dinner (a few times), Sevilla (TINY streets!!!!, flamenco museum/school/dancing, the alcazar and cathedral), Jerez (Andalusian horse show, Sandemans and Tio Pepe sherry tours) and Cordoba (another cathedral, SUPER cheap and DEE-lish chicken sandwiches and a wee Sephardic Museum (really the first floor of a house!), followed by an Arab tea house that was fun, if only for the fact that the guy couldn't light the charcoal on his fire-heater doodaddie).

We watched a lot of the Food Network UK and Iron Chef America, Jamie Oliver, Nigella Lawson (what a sensually shot show), Chopped (interesting concept!) and BBC news.

Wally & Gitta got lost while he was driving. Me and Jodi got lost while I was driving. I drove into a fence while at the Alhambra, but GoldCar didn't care 'cause Wally's plan was all-inclusive. So there was front/right damage and it didn't matter.

The Ford Focus 1.6L automatic had no balls. It was a steep hill up to the casita and it moved VERY slowly.

Jodi and I had a few blowups, but like I said....it's been a theme. I guess it's bound to happen when you have a jackass like me and a strong-willed woman like her with each other 24/7 for weeks and months.

Wally & Gitta are great. Gitta gave us quite a giggle when she packed for our overnight trip to Sevilla and she had a VERY VERY VERY heavy bag. We're still not sure what she had in there, but we're thinking it was small children or gold buillion. Or what was in the briefcase in Pulp Fiction. Wally is so very generous, and asks for nothing in return. Mind you, being with him, meant that the bottle that was usually split two ways now had a third person. But it was usually him that was paying, so how in the world could I complain in all seriousness?

He's so easygoing, almost all the time, and minus the fact that he doesnt't like tapas (UNLESS it's good tapas, like in Marbella), it's great to be around him. There was a 50-funniest movies of all time on and he was giggling to the juvenile humour in "Spinal Tap", "American Pie", "Blazing Saddles".....he's a fun guy.

Not a mushroom!

So now we're headed to Roma after a few days in Milano, where I either lost my wallet or had it pickpocketed. No biggie. Just my Ontario drivers license and Health card. No money or credit cards. Teacher ID, Student Hostel ID, that kind of stuff. Oh well.

The wine is good here too! It's also not so warm anymore. The south of Spain was consistently in the mid-to-high teens (Celsius) throughout our stay, and it's low single digits here AND WE DROVE THROUGH SNOW TODAY!!!! F**K!!!

I suspect that Jodi will have a blog post soon. She's good that way.

I'll probably add pictures and more thoughts at a later date.

Buono notte.

Lagos

2009-11-29T02:02:00.000-08:00

That's it. That's the title. Lagos. (That's Lagos, Portugal, and not the one in Africa.)

As our hostel owner said, there's not much to do in Lagos but eat, drink, and hang out on the beach or do watersports.

So we did (everything but the watersports -- it's November, after all).

First, we sought out a beach. We found one. For some time, it seemed we were the only ones to find it that day. Then some other people came along. But in the meantime, there was only the sounds of the waves and the gulls. And us.

The sand was golden, the sky blue, the sun warm, the water... not too cold. (I didn't swim, though I might have if there hadn't been what seemed to be a respectable undertow. I just waded.)

Then, later, we went for dinner. Again, at the recommendation of our hostel owner, we sought out a local favourite where the two specialties we were told to ask for were prawns in the house sauce and a large dish of pork and clams. The former was apparently no secret -- we sat next to the open kitchen and a steady stream of platters filled with huge, saucy prawns came off the counter. We found them amazingly tasty, if salty.

When you order the second dish, the waiter laughs and warns you that there's a lot of food. No, really, a lot of food. Like, more than enough for two people (even though it's only priced at about 9 Euros, which is the standard price range for a single entree). We protested that David could eat his way through almost anything -- the night before we'd had two whole fishes (a grilled seabass and a grilled silver bream... mmmm...) and at a churrasquiera in Lisbon we'd had a whole grilled chicken plus a dish of spare ribs (though that had been shortly following my gastro issues, and I was, no exaggeration, starving).

The waiter shrugged and put the dish on the order. When it came up behind David on the counter, my eyes widened. "That's a LOT of food," I hissed. He glanced up over his shoulder. "Mmm-hmm."

To our table came a heap of saucy, salty, oily pork cubes, sausage, clams, potatoes, pickled cauliflower and carrot, and small black olives. We stared at it. We poked at it with our forks. We even ate some. It was delicious (if salty -- are you sensing a theme yet?).

At some point, David sat back, looked at the plate, and said, "Have we eaten any of this?" There was still a heap of saucy, salty, oily pork cubes, sausage, and potatoes (we had picked through the clams, veggies and olives by this point).

Laughing, the waiter wrapped it up for us. It's sitting in the hostel's fridge at the moment, and will make a good brunch all fried up again.

Chef grinned at us from behind his counter, madly flipping salty-meaty-seafoody ingredients in his pan and setting bursts of oil on fire for the benefit of me and my camera.

David watched, thoroughly enjoying the show.

After so much excitement (and food), all we could do was go to sleep. So we did.

SUPER BOCK IS THE BEST!!!

2009-11-22T04:30:00.000-08:00

So many names for this post.

Tropical Storm Dumbass.

The Day I Thought I Was Going to Die.

Thickie Comes Alive! (Like Frampton, but I'm not sexy in that 70s way (unless you were into the cop or leather guy from The Village People), can't sing and I have a shaved head (though I am hiding/harbouring curls currently) and I'm not from Down Under.)

Stepping Out. (I sorta wish I was Joe Jackson. The singer, not the baseball player. But I think he has bad teeth, which is not something I aspire to have.)

I decided on Super Bock is the Best! because that was the one that was most accurate. More on that later.

Jodi's been having some gastro-intestinal issues, and thanks to our friend Brigit, Rachel, Zarya (alphabetically!) and Zisimos (a Greek doctor we met in Barcelona at our hostel), she's been taking it easy and getting activated charcoal and acidophilus into her system to help her get better. We didn't see much in Barcelona (where the problems started) and Madrid (they continued) and while I felt like I shouldn't be out/about whooping it up, I was feeling cooped up. My primary concern was her health and happiness, since a wise man (Oren Rozen! BTW: If you're looking for a mortgage in Toronto/area, get in touch with him. He can be reached at 416.917.2346 or orozen@northwoodmortgage.ca and will work for your business!) told me that if his wife wasn't happy, he had NO chance at being happy.

Sage words indeed.

For a married man they rank up there with The Golden Rule.

So, we took the overnight train from Madrid to Lisboa/Lisbon Friday night and got in early Saturday. I've been looking forward to Portugal for a number of reasons. I have several Portuguese friends, two of whom are among my favourite people in this world, or any other. Spending time with James and Marcos is such a treat, and something that I miss dearly. I wanted to experience the people, the food, the pastel de nata (sweet egg custard tart) where they started and the port. OH THE PORT!!! Not to mention that after some expensive cities along the way, it would be nice to be somewhere that wasn't.

After a relatively on/off sleeping experience on the train (ear plugs don't help with rocking/stopping/starting of the train!), and a bit of a nap/lounge/chippy chap (AKA chit chat) with Jodi in our room, I decided I would venture out on my own. Bear in mind, I like to go places in North America (my “area of expertise” up to this point in my life) and overhear other peoples' conversations, and talk to strangers. I seem to have not listened to much my parents taught me - talking to strangers and all! Well, I do always show up at a function with something in my hand(s), I try my best to wear clean underwear (they're called “pants” in England!), I do have very good table manners (but don't always use them!), and I do VERY good laundry.

The truth is that most people speak a little bit of English in Europe, and if not, as my pal (and long-term/former platonic roomie) Emily said, facial expressions, pointing and using your arms/hands wildly comes in handy.

That doesn't change the fact that I don't speak Portuguese, even though I'm pretty good at impersonating Pedro, Marcos' dad. Mind you, I've never met him, but I think I do a pretty good job of impersonating Marcos impersonating his dad. Taking into consideration that Marcos' voice is 3 octaves lower than mine. I also like to use the “sh” and “zh” sound for “s”. “sh” if it comes before a vowel and “zh” if it comes before a consonant. This is someting I learned from Marcos.

I think I'd love to be here in Lisboa with Marcos, but that's a different story.

In any event, I wandered out of the very nice (up three flights of stairs) hostel in the city centre near Baixa-Chiado station.

I had a tourist map and conferred with the hostel lady (NOT hostile at all. All the women here are VERY helpful and friendly. Jodi watched Portuguese Idol with one of them, but she can tell you about that!) I had my camera(s). I had my umbrella. It called for “Light Rain”. (foreshadowing)

I didn't have any money.

FYI: All the pictures from the walk are up on Facebook.

I LOVE LISBOA!!! I love the roads/sidewalks. Mind you, they're marble/cobblestone and REALLY slippery (“Slippy” if you're Dylan from our HelpX stay!) if you're wearing Nikes and it's wet. Remember, “light rain”.

I felt alive and invigorated to be out/about and wandering around. Much like I do in NYC when I was there pre-Jodi/traveling companion. Mind you, I've done it a few times since we've hooked up, as she will do things that I'm not interested in. Like getting her hair done with the girls. I “do” my own thanks.

I was planning on heading towards the Santos Design District. It seemed funky and fun and I could window shop. Something we've been doing a lot of on this trip, since I'm not about to buy stuff (minus the bottle of 12 year old Cardhu for 30 euro ($200 CDN back home) in the Pyrenees – which was 22 euro in Barcelona!) and carry it around with me. I did buy a 2 euro t-shirt in Glasgow. And a 10 pound (that's UK money, not weight) shirt in London. I don't think there's a picture of me with my Stonewall shirt. I'll have to do something about that at some point.

So, no REAL shopping.

At first I went the wrong way, which was the right way, but I went the wrong way after the right way and after going the wrong way after the wrong way after the right way, I was going the right way.

Got it?

I was now heading in the direction. Down towards the water. The rain was still “light”. The roads/sidewalks were still slippery and I was happy. (I feel like I'm writing “The Giving Tree” by Shel Silverstein. “And the tree was happy.”)

My tourist map isn't the greatest map, but what can expect from a free map? Mind you, I'm not usually the map reader. Jodi's really good at it, and I'm usually driving, so she's usually reading the maps. This is something I should probably do more often. (foreshadowing).

I saw a bank machine and after fishing my new special travel wallet out – it's the velcro-closing, small-but-big-enough-strap-to-go-around-my-belt Eddie Bauer travel cutlery holder (minus the travel cutlery) and it goes in my pants (that's jeans/dungarees/trousers/MEC long-legged apparel and my not undergarments – unless I put it in too far, in which case it makes me feel “special” in a WHOLE new way). Getting it out at times can be a challenge. As I was trying to fish it out, a woman came up and said something to me in Portuguese. I did a Charlie Chaplin/Laurel & Hardy head/facial expression job, and waved her ahead of me. As I not-so-blissfully tried to figure out where my wallet was.

A-HA! (not the 80s Scandinavian (Swedish?) band) I found it! I felt like a baby that just discovered their feet. But different.

I got my money and was back on my way. After taking a picture or two of art work and palm trees.

Palm trees. Tropical. Tropical storm?

As I walked I saw a bunch of big squares with statues dedicated to military folks (AKA men) and lots of street names that weren't on my map.

I wanted to get down to Avenida Vente e Quatro de Julho. I eventually got there. The sidewalks are quite narrow at times and it's pretty commercial/industrial and not so “window shopping” friendly.

I sensed that I should be “up” from the street I was on, but I saw IT. A bridge. When I'm in NYC, I love to walk across the bridges. LOVE LOVE LOVE to do it. That was what I was going to do. Get to the bridge (the one at Ponte 25 de Abril), go up and take pictures from there. So I was on a mission. To get to the bridge.

Lesson: Don't always try to duplicate what you do in one city/country when in another.

I saw “Banco BiG”. Big Banks really do exist in Portugal!

I saw PAINFULLY crooked/messed up stairs. Several times.

I saw fun graffiti – and I do love my graffiti! (not an example of the really good graffiti I saw, but it was fun nonetheless. Since I don't think of the Beach Boys as Portuguese, but there are beaches here, with boys.)

I saw a really fun rainbow-type design on the side of an on-off ramp.

I saw a very amateurish looking street cover/plate/thing.

I wasn't really paying attention to where I was going, other than chasing the bridge. The bridge that I couldn't get to. So I turned right in an attempt to get to the bridge, not noticing that the landmark that I wasn't looking at (The Museu do Oriente) was there, and I thought I was somewhere else. (Again, foreshadowing and crappy map reading and me just being....ME!)

I figured, that much like Toronto, Lisboa would allow me to go north, south, east, west easily. NOT! I thought I was going north, but I was going north-east. I thought I was going east, but I was going north-east. Before I knew it, I was walking through a bit of a restaurant/bar area.

The skies opened up. And I mean they bloody-well OPENED UP LARGE AND IN CHARGE!!! The light rains were now heavy rains. And a bit of wind to throw in the mix. After all, Lisboa is on the Atlantic. So I was getting soaked. But I was prepared, in that the camera was in my Goretex MEC jacket (which held up VERY well thank you, for the second time on the trip in rain), I was wearing my lightweight MEC pants (MEC is Mountain Equipment Co-Op for those non-Canadians) which dry quickly, and I was wearing my Nikes, 'cause they seemed more appropriate/lighter/more comfy for walking than my hiking boots. But not as water resistant. Oh well. Can't win 'em all. Oh ya, there was also my wee umbrella, which held up well and my $3 hat that I figured I would have chucked by now, but it seems to be THE trip hat.

The smart thing to do would have been to go to a little restaurant/sandwich shop, have a sammich and a beer and then head back. Am I smart? NOPE! I decided I should walk along the road that wasn't going east, but north-east.

I went up a hill and to what I thought was a dead-end. I thought I was going to get mugged or hit by a car. I didn't. I went down the hill and ended up at the railway lines. I could have turned around, but figured I'd get mugged or hit by a car, so I crossed them. I looked both ways. SEVERAL TIMES. No trains. I remembered the third rail is the electrified one, but that's in Toronto. It was raining. If any of them were electrified, I figured I shouldn't step on them. I crossed. I went back to take a picture.

It seemed right.

Instead of turning left and going back, I went right and carried on. Why go back the way you came in a city you don't know, with a map that doesn't show all the streets, when you can carry on going north-east when you think you're going east? Geez, DUMB QUESTION!!!

I went by what looked like assisted housing/projects/government housing/social housing, call it what you want. They were bright and pretty but looked depressing/depressed. (This shot is not the best example)

They were in the middle of nowhere (where I was mind you), by highways and train tracks. People didn't willingly live in places like this. Since I teach in a government-housing neighbourhood that has a VERY bad reputation (some of it rightly deserved) I figured that as an outsider I was at risk. I was going to get mugged, stabbed, shot, beaten up. You name it. I was done for.

But I continued to take pictures. Like the bridge that goes over the road, the steps that lead up to the bridge and the grass worn away on the median where the people jay-walk to get to the bus stop.

If I was going to die, I wanted to at least have a chance of my photo story being told. I know, it's overly dramatic, but hey...I have a vivid/active imagination.

I thought about how I needed to get over the next little rise, so that I'd see stores and restaurants and bars and city life. It didn't happen. I kept saying to myself that I should turn around. Not listening to myself shouldn't come as a big surprise, since I've never seemed to listen to anyone.

The sidewalk ended. Shel Silverstein reference #2.

I kept walking.

I passed places that weren't on the map.

I seemed headed for a highway on-ramp. This would not be helpful at all. I'm not about to try and hitch-hike (nor take the bus) when I don't know where I am, in a country where I don't speak the language.

I sucked it up and turned around.

I stepped in the same muddy patches I had going there, until I decided to run across the three lanes of road to get to the middle/median and the grass. There's no mud in the grass, but there sure is a lot of water ON the grass. My feet were soaked. My pants were soaked. My jacket was soaked. But the camera was dry and I walking fast. Why walk slow when you think you're going to die?

I thought about the fact that I couldn't die. No one would be able to tell Jodi. She'd be in the room, wondering where I was. That couldn't happen. I couldn't die because there was no way that my parents, ESPECIALLY my mother would be able to handle that. She's tough, but at this point, not that tough. I thought about how I couldn't die, because I hadn't bought any port in Portugal. How I hadn't had a tour in Porto. How I hadn't toured through Italy with Jodi. How we were both looking forward to her parents meeting up with us in Spain. How we were going to our family and friends in Israel. How we were going to Greece.

I wondered about the affect it would have on my friends – but I've always wondered about that. About how people in my life would react/be affected by my death. I'm not the lynch-pin for my friends the way that an ex-girlfriend's friend was in her social circle, and when she was killed in an accident it sent several of them into orbit. I know my death would affect my friends, the same way that their death would affect me.

How I felt like I hadn't done enough with my life.

My life started to get amazing at 30. I have/had a sense that my life was going to get better at 40. That's two months away. My aspirations of becoming a professional baseball player are gone. I wouldn't have made it at 20, and I'm not going to make it at 40. I have a few dreams that are VERY much alive. To do something with my baking professionally. To be involved in the opening of an Urban Nutrition Education Centre, so that I can really make a difference. More of a difference than I can as a classroom teacher.

I realized while walking fast, in the grass, in the rain, with my umbrella either over my head or closed up as a “weapon”, that if I return to the classroom I want to be the best kindergarten teacher I can be. Yes, I want to go back to kindergarten. I want to be Jean Rehder and Geremy Vincent and me – I can only dream of being Agnes Hanna – all in some super hybrid.

When I got back to the area of restaurants and bars, I took a few pictures. Some of the locals were really surprised at the time spent in lining up the shots that I wanted. Partly because of things in the way, and partly because I just needed to do that.

I took pictures of the street intersection where I turned the right/wrong way.

The wrong way to get back to where I thought I was heading, but the right way for me at this stage in my life. I needed a bit of a wake-up call. Something to invigorate my soul and sense of self. Spending time in the Pyrenees with Jon and Deb and their boys showed Jodi and I that we could have some purpose in our time over here, without necessarily having to be in a big city. That was great for both of us. We're eternally grateful for them opening their doors and lives to us.

As I was walking on Av. de Ceuta 6 towards wherever, I wanted a Super Bock. Not because it was some kind of mythical beer that I had always wanted. Not because it was from a region of the country that was near and dear to me. This was not a hajj like I had been on in Scotland, in search of where my grandmother first lived. This was about my being alive and desiring a beer.

So, as I turned back on to Avenida Vente e Quatro de Julho, I wanted to find some place that I could walk into and say, “Ola, Super Bock per favor.”. Which is what I did. After a car swerving intentionally to spray me with water. I didn't care. I was alive and was already wet. All I could do was smile and laugh.

The half-pint was one euro. Even better! It wasn't the best beer I've ever had, but it was one of the most satisfying.

On the way there and back I took a few pictures for Jodi's blog (her paying gig) about knowing the roots of words and how it can help you in multiple languages.

I continued with my theme of taking pictures of roads/the ground.

I took pictures that reminded me of friends.

I took pictures of The Beatles.

I took pictures of street scenes.

I took pictures to be a s**t disturber.

I'm still me, but I'm better for the experience of having done what I did yesterday. I don't expect to repeat the same thing. Mind you, I'll still chase after bridges and wander around cities, but I'll be a little less hap-hazard about it in the future. Hopefully.

As I was walking back towards the city centre I realized that I had left around 1:00 and it was after 4:00. I hadn't eaten anything before leaving, and I hadn't eaten anything since.

I saw a fruit/veggie store and headed towards it. I got a couple of apples and saw they had wine. I went in to the store. I asked if the woman spoke English and she grabbed her co-worker. I said, “Dry, inexpensive (not the best word to use for non-English speakers! DUMBASS!!!) port?” She pointed at two for ten euros. She showed that they had open bottles and sampling glasses. The first was really good and the second was even better.

Quinta do Infantado Joao Lopes Roseira Reserva Especial is the one that did it for me.

But I still didn't have any food.

I decided I was going to get something from one of our guidebooks. That just seemed right. After the day I'd had, to do something simple. I got under an awning – yep, still raining, but back to “light rain” - and looked up what sounded good/cheap/fast.

The winner was a few doors down from where I was standing on Rua Augusta.

It just felt right. In Toronto, in Kensington Market, there's an Augusta Street. In Portugal, it's pronounced Aw-guzh-tah. I'm not sure if Augusta in Toronto was named by the Portuguese, but I don't care.

(The deep-fried fish pancake sandwich and pork/veal/mystery meat sandwich, along with a cod fritter and a hot dog fried log thing that tasted like liverwurst were delightful. The pastel de nata were heavenly.)

But I still didn't have sport drink and water for Jodi, as she had requested before I left. Nor did I have any sort of soup stuff, which also would seem to be a good idea. I spent an hour criss-crossing the neighbourhood, trying to find sport drink. Water wasn't too hard to find. Sport drink was PAINFULLY difficult.

Until I got down the street from our place.

**sigh**

I also found a couple of good Sagres beer. The Preta and Bohemia Reserva 1835.

Dinner in our room was GREAT! Jodi had some soup and I ate all the other artery-clogging/heart-stopping food.

And I started to dry off.

I haven't told her much of this story, other than I was happy to be alive, I had a Super Bock and I had an AMAZING day.

Now I feel like I need another kind of adventure. So I'm going to get ready to go out and wander somewhere. This time making use of the map a little more. It should be easier with a lack of rain.

Happy Sunday everyone.

It's good to be alive!

Mucking about in France

2009-11-13T05:36:00.000-08:00

On the day we arrived at the gite, Deb took us up behind the building to her vegetable garden plot and asked us to weed it out. At the time, it was a few small squares of turned-over and de-rocked soil bounded by a nice little slate border. Only one section still had growing vegetables -- cabbage and broccoli -- the other two, about the same size, were weed-covered and had a few last dried-out stalks of plants.

"Any rocks you find," said Deb, "just toss onto the wall. If you get a chance, you can pile the dead leaves from that big pile there onto the beds and cover the leaves with soil so they'll be ready for spring."

And so began an odyssey in soil.

Once the garden was weeded out, the soil turned, the leaves and soil piled back on, we realized that we could keep going. Beyond the prepped beds was at least three or four times as much ready space for a really big garden -- the soil just needed to be dug up and turned.

"Just."

Here is a photo of David turning the soil in the existing bed on, I think, the second day. You can see the massive pile of leaves on the right-hand side of the photo. The soil under it all the way back to the far corner was mostly unturned -- Deb had turned the very corner part earlier this year, but it had gone unused and in this photo is still covered in weeds.

We had gotten good and underway when we were hit with two or three days of more or less constant rain. Although there were a couple of breaks in the weather where we could work outside, we didn't make much headway until the weather turned fine again. In the meantime, we did indoor stuff like helping around the house, looking after the kids, and cooking (OK, mostly it was David doing the cooking). I even went to a yoga class with Deb one evening!

Then a few days ago we were finally able to get back to work. This photo is pretty deceptive -- it looks like a lovely garden plot. The pile of leaves is mostly gone, there appears to be a nice soil surface.

Ah... what lies beneath...

Rocks.

Lots and lots of rocks. Big rocks.

At one point, a tine snapped off the garden fork. At that point, David turned to the pickaxe to manhandle the rocks out of the soil.

This worked much better, and he was able to open up trenches that really seemed more rock than soil.

He really had to get in there.

It made a mess of his jeans.

Most of the rocks were about fist-sized, ranging up to about football-sized. A good number were watermelon-sized. But every little while, David, with much cursing and muttering, would haul a real doozie out -- there were seven or eight rocks each the size of one of those old computer monitors that were such a pain to have to move every time you wanted to untangle the cords behind them -- but much heavier and correspondingly awkward to move (we mainly just rolled them with much heaving).

Here's a photo of one of the "watermelons":

Mixed in with the soil and rocks was all kinds of detritus left by the previous owner(s): mostly broken terracotta roof tile and concrete chunks, probably dumped there when one of the buildings had been renovated; but also just plain junk like plastic bottles, bits of metal, old building material packaging; and enough roots that the handsaw came in handy on a couple of occasions. Deb and David agreed there was an element of archeology to it -- we even found an old shell casing!

Finally, yesterday afternoon, the whole plot had been dug up. Our co-HelpXer, Joey, had raked more leaves that had been added to the soil. At this point, David looked (deservedly) pleased with himself.

But we were left with a huge pile of all those rocks! So our last task today was to heave them over the wall and add them to the side facing the footpath that passes by the garden. Let me tell you, I have a newfound admiration for people who construct dry-stone walls (we saw a lot of those in Ireland) and even more so for various pioneering people who ploughed entire crop fields out of stony ground. I suppose we should have realized how much stone might be lying under the surface of a plot of land lying directly under a mountain, but it all looked so innocent when we started out!

So, now... go back to that second photo in this post. Now imagine that all the rocks that lie beneath the surface are part of a newly-enhanced wall. The largest ones hem in the cabbage-patch in a small feat of decorative landscaping.

Now imagine that that entire plot of land is filled with every manner of gorgeous vegetables. That's the image we've had in our heads, thanks to what we've (half-)jokingly called "The Vision" that David started out with whem all we were doing was weeding.

We hope Jon and Deb send us photos!

Remembrance Day, 2009.

2009-11-11T02:17:00.000-08:00

As some of you may know, we're currently in the French Pyrenees at Base Calames (http://www.basecalames.com/index.html)in Bédeilhac, helping out with reworking the garden, odd jobs, cooking/baking and helping out with the children. It's a beautiful part of the world, and Jon and Deb and their two little boys are great. Jon and Deb have come over from England to open a gite/guesthouse/B&B for people interested in staying in the area (FYI, the wine is SUPER DUPER inexpensive and really quite good!!!), but more importantly this is a mecca for rockclimbing, and Jon is able to give lessons and he and his ex-pat buddies are always up for a climb when the time and weather is right.

Jon asked if we wanted to go to the church that is pretty much in the backyard for the Remembrance Day service. I felt it important to represent Jon/Deb, but I was interested in seeing what the service was going to be, since it was outside of the church and in France. I've sat/stood through a lot of Remembrance Day "events" in my day. As a student and as a teacher. They've always been in school. Today though was the first time I was able to really pull something relevant out of what was going on. Mind you, it was in French, which I don't understand well at all.

We in Canada have not been attacked or bombed in our lifetimes. We in Canada have not had our country occupied. We in Canada have not gone to war with imminent danger at the front door. In France, regardless of how you feel about the French, their army or their language, this has been the case. Jon said he was told that every village in France has had someone killed in fighting in one of the two World Wars.

I carry a bag, and on it reads, "I will only believe war is the answer if as much money is spent on peace and it fails." I truly believe this. Please don't tell me about Afghanistan and how Canada, the U.S., the UK and others need to be there for any reason. Please don't tell me that the U.S. needed to return to Iraq after Operation Desert Storm. It's all about greed, ego and money. And about testosterone. Women don't start wars. In large part having to do with many countries (wrongly) believing that women can't lead a country, that women aren't equals and that women shouldn't vote.

I understand why there are armies in the Middle East, where neighbours fight neighbours. I don't understand why it's necessary in this day and age for war to continue with no rhyme or reason.

More than twenty years ago I wrote a poem. I was in high school and idealistic. I still am idealistic. I believe in the good of people. I believe that war is not the answer. For once the boys and their toys need to put up and shut up. George Bush/Barack Obama, Tony Blair/Gordon Brown, Jean Chretien/Paul Martin/Steven Harper need to strap on fatigues, a helmet and go into battle in the trenches with a rifle against Saddam Hussein, the Taliban, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and/or Kim Jong-il.

I'd like to see what they have to say about war after that.

There was recently an awful killing by an unbalanced man in Texas. He was a psychiatrist who treated army personnel returning from battle. He knew from hearing their stories how awful the realities of war are. Regardles of his religious affiliation, he came unhinged and shot more than 30 people, killing 13 of them, at last count. This was a personal war he was fighting in his head. Now think about all those men and women who are sent to war by the leaders of their country.

Some come home in a flag-draped coffin. Some come home with limbs missing. Some come home with a time bomb ticking in their head.

We're unleashing them on our society.

Still believe in war?

I believe in peace.

I hope that today you reflect on what you "have". The people in your life and your material possessions. What would you be willing to do to protect your way of life, the people that are important to you and the things you have? People all over the world have been faced with that question many times, with another country crossing their borders. I consider myself lucky not having faced the issue, and I suspect/hope that in my lifetime I won't have to deal with it.

Most people (back home) who will read this are still asleep. Most people in North America are quite asleep to the realities of war. Peace is something we know. I'd like to keep it that way.

d.

A moment on the farm

2009-11-10T08:42:00.001-08:00

We interrupt this blog to bring you a moment of farminess. Here's David in this video to tell you more:

The pigs eat more than just apples -- they eat almost any vegetable waste generated on the farm: kitchen scraps, pulled weeds, etc. Just no meat or animal products (verboten), potato peelings (not good for them, apparently), or citrus (they turn their piggy noses up at it). Walking garbage disposals!

David is quite disappointed that they won't be slaughtered until probably February, when it's good and cold to hang the carcasses. Maybe we should come back through before heading home?!

There's cold in them there hills!

2009-11-05T23:59:00.000-08:00

So, having left the big cities of Lyon and Paris behind us, we're still alive, and have arrived at a "gite" (guesthouse) David found through a new website, Helpx (as opposed to WWOOF, with which we were having zero luck). It's in a small village called Bédeilhac, outside the main town of Foix in the Ariège department, which is in the Pyrenees, very close to the Spanish border. It's most known for Neolithic caves, Cathar strongholds, and being on the Pyrenees leg of the Tour de France route.

Our hosts are a young (early 30ish) British couple, Jon and Deb, who met while working at a ski resort and decided to start a climber's gite here. They've been here for just over a year, and have just opened the gite for business, although it still needs renovation work (which is something we expect to be working on -- painting, plastering, etc.). They also have two little boys of 2 and 3, and there is another "Helpx helper", Joey, from the Boston area, who has been here almost a month. We are staying in the gite in a very cosy room -- DEFINITELY an improvement on the caravan we stayed in in Ireland! There is a nice common room with a wood-burning stove and a kitchenette upstairs, and Deb has already given David the go-ahead to make use of anything he finds in the main house, including the kitchen, so you know there will be plenty of kitchen activity in the days to come!

Just outside the gite and the main house/cottage where Jon and Deb themselves live is a huge precipice, going almost straight up. Apparently this is a prime location for rock-climbing, and it's easy to see why. There should also be some good leisure activities for those of us who don't scale sheer cliffs, like walking and biking, provided the weather lets up (it's been rainy for the past little bit, but apparently was glorious over the weekend, so fingers crossed). Beyond that, there is a small garden, some chickens and pigs, probably hanging out with the kiddies, and, as I mentioned, the renovation work. You can see the photos of the place and the area on the website, but I'm sure we'll have plenty of our own in no time!

I seem to have gotten over the homesickness and upset stomach that plagued me toward the end of our stay in Paris and arriving in Lyon. Corinne (my mother's cousin's sister-in-law, who lives in Lyon) took us out for a lovely dinner on last night in Lyon at one of her favourite restaurants, Olivier's, and we had a great time. It would have been a shame to miss out on Lyon gastronomie, one of it's main claims to fame, so I'm glad I had recovered in time to have a delicious fish dish. She also took some time to show us around the city a bit when we first arrived.

We are quite encouraged by the Helpx site, where people seem a bit more welcoming and flexible than those we encountered through the WWOOF website. Even better, membership at the site includes several countries/areas, as opposed to WWOOF, where each site and its membership was discrete. We are going to start looking for places in Italy ASAP, and ideally will have the remainder of our travels/timeline sketched out by the time we leave here.

In the meantime, my parents have started planning their own trip to Spain in a few weeks, and we will meet up with them to spend some time exploring the area around Malaga.

OK, I've been a bad girl, lounging in bed while David helps Deb take the older boy to daycare and go food shopping, and I should get myself some breakfast and get ready to earn my keep!

Paris.

2009-11-03T12:36:00.000-08:00

Paris.

Not the fulfillment/redemption capital of Ontario, but the City of Lights. Paris, France.

I don't know what I was expecting.

Well, that's not entirely true, I was expecting a few things. Style and culture, which was available in abundance. Mind you, the musicians coming on to the Metro and playing accordions (Unless it's Klezmer or They Might Be Giants, I REALLY F**KIN' HATE ACCORDIONS!!!! And they're in every European city, and they were in the UK too!!!), violins and clarinets was NOT what I was expecting. There is a very interesting style of coat that women are wearing in Paris this season that is tres “cool” (Apparently it's the same in English and French, and that's according to Jodi. She speaks French.) I believe I took a picture of a woman wearing one. It's like a patchwork coat full of coolness. Jodi says it's got brocades, but that's a word I wouldn't use, so I'm not going to. Regardless, way cool. Did I say they're cool? Just checking.

Tonnes of children here wear eyeglasses. TONNES!!! I don't know if the French have vision problems in general, but their children wear very stylish glasses. That's fer sure.

The cheese was TOP NOTCH!!!

The bread was.....well.....I could have eaten just bread, but hey, that's just wrong.

The mussels were superb.

The fruit and veggies were fresh and really tasted like fruit and veggies and not watered-down, genetically reproduced copies of fruit and veggies.

We did not eat any meals out. Sadly, that was the case. Mind you, I did a pretty good job of feeding us, and like I said, there was bread, cheese, chocolate (forget to mention that!), mussels (that I made in two different sauces – one with wine and one with beer) and....we missed out on the Paris restaurant/cafe/bar experience.

In fact, while we did have an amazing hot chocolate, for which I'm sure I can find the information on, plus the places we shopped in Montmartre - where we stayed – across from the produce store from Amelie (YES!!! I love that movie and only bought a crappy can of beer there.)

Oh, I haven't mentioned that French beer pretty much sucks, in that I couldn't find good beer. I tried. I bought Jenlain, Fischer, Saint Omer, a Heineken product made in France that has Scotch Malt Whisky in it and....OH WAIT!!! The Kronenburg 1664 was pretty good. Also there was a brown-ish beer that had added sugar (I should have read the ingredients!) that wasn't too good.

Also, the problem with going to Paris on a budget is that wine drinking becomes problematic. I don't tend to spend a ton of money on bottles of wine at home, usually between $12 and $17, but more often closer to $15. I don't speak/read French very well, and the wine shops/grocery stores near us were either cheap ($6-$8 )or more expensive $20+. In retrospect, I should have gone to a wine shop, told the dude/dudette that I was looking to spend about $12 and wanted something dry and bold. Red or white, I wouldn't have cared. So, we got a cheap “Fuzion-esque” (For those of you familiar with Fuzion, you'll know what I'm talking about – leave it in the decanter for a day, and the $7.45 bottle of wine drinks like a $12 bottle of wine.) red that ended up being used in salad dressing (in lieu of vinegar), and in a sauce for ground beef. Only after the quality had been established.

Then we also found a relatively acceptable white on the cheap, that was easy to drink, and wasn't offensive. It was the white used in the mussels. Blah blah blah. Jodi told me that I'm talking too much about booze, and my mom told me in an email that I seem to do is take pictures of breweries.

Women.

Anyway, back to Paris.

As I said, I don't speak French. I took it until grade 10, and after encountering a teacher who was not my favourite, dropped it in favour of.....well, maybe it was Dance. :) For those of you who have heard about my high school dance experience(s), you'll know I made the right choice. Maybe not for aiding communication in Quebec, New Brunswick, France and French-speaking Africa, but it certainly aided my life otherwise. Wearing tights in Dance class, and having a fire drill builds a certain amount of character. Arts-based school or not, when you're in grade 12 and really just starting to get your sense of self, having the whole school seeing you in dance tights in front of the school puts a little steel in your spine. FAST!!!

So, I wasn't really able to communicate with the masses in Paris. That was mildly soul-sucking. I like to talk to strangers. I like to compliment people on their fashion choices, hairstyles, and just shoot the s**t with the peeps out there. Alas, that was not to be for a week. Oh wait, we're not going to be an “English-speaking” country until January. That's London for a bit and than Israel, where most people speak English. Sure, most people can speak a little English in Europe, but it's not their first language and it's not their responsibility to speak English for my comfort. I know this. That said, it doesn't necessarily make it any easier for me to be.....well....me.

If you're reading this, you most likely know me, or know of me through Jodi, and you know that I like to talk. Sure, I'm a good listener (at times), but I'm a talker. I'll take up the oxygen in the room and make you pass out in no time flat. I have that ability. I talk about anything. I talk about stuff I love, stuff I hate, stuff I know a little bit about and stuff I know Bo Diddley 'bout. That's me. Love it or hate it....it's not apt to change any time soon.

I live life with a passion. Most of the time. Sure, I'm indifferent to things. In fact, the word “sure” is an issue with Jodi and me, since she'll ask me a question and I'll answer with, “Sure.”.

Not usually her fave answer. (It's also the tone in which I say it that pisses her off, hey....can I always sing, “Confident, confident, dry and secure. Raise your hands, raise your hands if you're Sure.” Oh wait, that's an antiperspirant commercial. Oh, by the way, Tom's of Maine wasn't quite doing it for me with their all-natural deodorant, so I bought Sure and I'm poisoning myself with aluminum and other nasties. But I don't smell.)

I'm trying.

Anyway, back to my feeling like an immigrant. Ya, I know I didn't say it yet, but I suspect I have a pretty good idea of how an immigrant would feel in coming to a country they've never been to, with a bag of clothes/belongings that they consider relatively important, and an inability to speak the language. While I'm better off than most immigrants (Or am I?) in that it's a temporary situation, and my partner speaks the language well enough for whatever we need to happen to get done, I still feel/felt isolated.

It's a feeling I wasn't used to. We spent five weeks in English-speaking countries, and while accents come in to play in Ireland, Northern Ireland, Scotland (Glasgow, as I've already mentioned) and England, they speak/understand English. So my ignorance about what I was going to encounter (only having been in Europe once before, for my friends Sheila and John's wedding in '99 when I was relatively sheltered amongst Canadians, Americans and bilingual Italians for ten days) was/is HUGE!

I don't want to be the North American who expects everyone to speak English to make me feel better. I've tried where possible, with my “pigeon” French, to communicate. It seems to have been appreciated, especially by the cute young women in the boulangerie around the corner, where I would go to get the tasty thin baguettes.

So, I got some culture. Two churches, big landmarks/monuments, cemetaries, and museums. Here's my take on what I saw. I don't care if you like what I have to say, because it's my take on things. I think by now you know I'm not like the other boys. (Oh geez, there's another Michael Jackson reference. Speaking of Ola Ray, Playboy Playmate and “girlfriend” in the “Thriller” video, Pigalle, which is right next to Montmartre and where the Moulin Rouge is, really just resembles a sad version of Yonge Street. Between Dundas and Gerrard. Back in the 70s and 80s. Or a sad little version of Times Square when it was seedy. Very feh, and not “red light” at all. Just so ya know. Also, Fashion Television in France, which is a network (surprise, surprise) has “Midnight Haute” (pronounced “hawt” in this case) from 12 AM to 1 AM. They show topless fashion shoots for calendars and Penthouse Pet shoots. It's mildly amusing, but really tame. Oh, and they showed “Caligula” in French a few nights ago at about 9 PM. It was funny to see a mud/oil slapping/wrestling match between two women in a “historical” movie. But that's me.)

Okay, culture. The Notre Dame Cathedral was pretty cool, but the see-through confession rooms was weird to see. I thought it was supposed to be through the wooden wall/shielded opening. Oh well, that's the Jew in me showing through. The River Seine smelled like urine, probably because French men/dogs (not necessarily one-and-the-same) seem to find it necessary to relieve themselves on cement and not grass, which allows the urine to enter the ground and not be smelled. Oh well. The Champs d'Elysees was disappointing, and the Tuileries was different/enjoyable. The Arc de Triomphe was big. The Eiffel Tower was big and interesting. I was surprised that Paris is not as “green” to view as Toronto. I've also come to realize that Toronto is not a world-class city, but a smaller version of a world-class city. I'm not slagging Toronto, but it's not a major world city size-wise and certainly not up there with other cities for things to do.

The Catacombes (bones under the city) were closed, owing to vandalism. F**KERS!!! I really wanted to see that. I hope a dog pisses on your new fabric sneakers and then the cats does likewise on your pillow. The Jardin du Luxembourg was nice, but not overly interesting. Probably because it was the end of October and not-so-in-bloom. I didn't go into Shakespeare & Company, 'cause I'm still reading Tucker Max's “I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell”. I do not recommend you read it, but it's..umm...well...he's an ass. He treats women worse than he treats his liver, and that's not very well at all. I won't tell you who suggested I read it, but I will say that he works in the book/publishing/reading/entertainment business, and I only reading it for one reason. He said that he doesn't read books, and he read this. He also said he would read James McBride's “The Color of Water” if I read this. I'm trying. Lord, I'm trying.

Don't get me wrong, there are parts that make me laugh out-loud, but there are also parts that make me wonder if it's true or not. He swears it is, but there have been more important liars and embellishers of the truth before him.

We saw a few famous graves in Pere Lachaise, like Jim Morrison and Jodi took pictures of Heloise and Abelard – no clue who they are, don't care who they are, and Cordelia apparently would never forgive Jodi if she didn't. Whether they were under scaffolding or not.

St. Chapelle was another church, and really lame. TONNES of stained glass, but it was overcast and I'm SUPER DUPER glad I didn't have to pay extra (we got a museum pass) or have to stand in line for a long time to get in there. Otherwise I'd be making more noise than a wolf howling at the moon with rabies, while hungry and in heat. Georges Pompidou was a really cool museum, where Jodi and I had an extended “debate”/discussion about my finding some of Matisse's work to look like kindergarten cut and paste, and whether or not Keith Haring's work was in some inspired by what I saw of Matisse's, that I was interested in learning about Matisse. Sure, there are some Matisse pieces of work that I like, but I'm not fond of everything. I LOVE Damien Hirst, but his paintings suck. S-U-C-K!!! At least the blue skulls at the Wallace Gallery.

We went to the Jewish Museum, which would have been much more enjoyable if I wasn't Jewish. There were a few interesting things, but I knew most of what was explained in the audio tour, and the pronunciation SUCKED!!! It's not Ha-noo-kah, but CH-ah-noo-kah. I expected MUCH better, and in fact was pretty much offended at how non-Jewish the names/word sounded.

The Picasso Museum was closed for renovations. Don't plan on going for three years. Three years to reno a museum? That seems overly long, but Jodi tells me everyone goes on strike in France. Maybe they're just building in extra time in case of the inevitable.

The Louvre. BORING!!! Yep. BORING!!! SUPER BORING!!! I felt like an 8 year old at the ROM (Royal Ontario Museum) or AGO (Art Gallery of Ontario), but without anything modern or dinosaurs to look at. It's all old stuff, and the Mona Lisa is 2' x 3' and the Venus de Milo was good only 'cause she's got plumbers buttcrack showing. The best part of the Louvre was the floors. Yep, the floors.

Now seems like a good point to once again point out that I don't find Paris to be an overly attractive city. ESPECIALLY around the Louvre, where it's all monochromatic and blah/grey. There are parts of the city that are really funky 'n fun, but generally it's old. I'm a modernist, in that I like variety. I don't like the Upper West Side of NYC (Sorry Zarya) for the same reason. It all looks the same.

I'm a heathen, a simpleton and a cretin. And I'm okay with it.

The Orangerie was pretty cool, in that the Monet paintings (“Water Lilies”) are really well displayed, with four paintings in a room, and two rooms. Four directions, morning in one room and night in the other. There were also a bunch of paintings I liked from Rousseau, Renoir, Matisse, Picasso, Gauguin and maybe some more.

The D'Orsay was also good, because there was a lot of more modern stuff and a number of famous paintings. It was cool because it used to be a train station (like my house of worship, the Summerhill LCBO store in Toronto) and there are several different kinds of paintings, which pick up time-wise from where the (boring) Louvre leaves off.

Finally, the first Sunday of the month in Paris means free museums. We were kind of “museumed out”, so we headed to the Cinematique Museum, which was dry (mind you, it was raining!) and I'm glad I didn't have to pay to get in, otherwise I'd feel ripped off.

WARNING: I can't speak for all of Paris, but in Montmartre, almost everything is closed on Sundays. Or they close very early on Sunday. So, if you're planning on preparing meals, either be prepared to scrimp and scavenge for ingredients, or plan on eating out. Walking around in the rain, looking for ingredients for an unknown meal, is not my favourite thing to do in the world. Jodi was enjoying it even less than me.

We're headed to Lyon now on the TGV (The High Speed train that is supposed to go 300 km/h, but it sure doesn't seem to be going that fast.) for a couple of days of whatever, and visiting with Jodi's cousin's sister, who lives in Lyon. After that, we're looking at several different options for France, as we (thanks to Lavinia!) stumbled on a website that seems much more active than WWOOF. HelpX.com has both hosts and helpers look to meet up, while WWOOF just seems to be helpers contacting hosts. In fact, just after signing up for the site ($35 for 2 years), we got a message from a host in Spain, looking to have us come.

It looks like the troubles we had in finding something in France are changing, as we had someone from France contact us this morning, and HelpX.com includes France, Spain and Italy, which will make things more interesting/easy for us in the long-run. Or so I hope.

Bonne journee for now.

On homesickness

2009-11-01T01:01:00.000-07:00

Today, as hard as it might be to believe, I'm homesick.

I think it might have been triggered by reading people's posts on Facebook about Hallowe'en, which in Paris is such a non-event that we saw barely any signs of it last night when we took a turn about the neighbourhood. There were a couple of tourists on a walking tour who were dressed up, but otherwise it seemed to be just a normal Saturday night, with people sitting in cafes or hanging out with their friends.

Hallowe'en isn't a big deal for me in any way. There's usually some kind of dress-up day at school, but I've lived in an apartment for some time and haven't even had to deal with trick-or-treaters. So it was less about the day itself than it was about reading about people at home dressing their kids up or having parties... the sort of thing that one takes for granted unless suddenly one isn't in the middle of it.

It's strange. In this internet-connected age, you'd think that connectedness would be an antidote for homesickness. But in some ways, it's more alienating to read about what people are doing on a daily basis and not be able to participate.

I remember when I was a counsellor at summer camp, we would suggest to parents of homesick kids that they not write letters that ran along the lines of, "Last night we saw all the family at a great big dinner and everyone askeed about you. We had a great time, and everyone sends their love. The dog sleeps on your bed every night -- it's so cute! Can't wait to see you!" For the kid to imagine all these things in her absence, to be reminded of all the beloved and familiar things at home, would only make the homesickness worse. I mean, I don't know what a parent would really write about if not about the daily household events, but I totally understand the child's feeling of not being surrounded by the comforts of home, of missing out, or simply of no longer being connected to a world that's going on without her -- a world she is usually such an integral part of, and didn't realize it until she wasn't.

When you're feeling blue like this, it's hard to force yourself to say, "Forget it -- enjoy yourself!" During about 95% of this trip, I've been enjoying myself immensely. I probably could have done without the food poisoning/stomach flu in Galway or the cold that's finally petering out in these last few days. I would have liked to have had a better experience on the farm in Ireland, and I am disappointed in not having been able to find anyone willing or able to take us on their farm here in France. Otherwise, though, the experience has been amazing.

But in the midst of this unanticipated wave of homesickness, with the weather today grey and unappealing, our museum pass (and our current tolerance level for museum-going) expired, and our "up in the air" plans staring us in the face with a big expanse of unplanned time beyond our Paris departure, I'm fantasizing about getting on a plane and going home. (Though, technically, we don't have a home at home -- though the apartment is still not sold, it's empty and on the market.) Or about tossing in the towel when it comes to the remainder of our Europe itinerary and skipping straight ahead to Israel and family.

It often helps to articulate why you feel homesick and then try to figure out what to do about it. I'm hoping that we'll get some more solid plans worked out, a greater sense of direction and connection for the next little while. But at the moment, against all rationality, I'm very blue, and Paris is very grey.

Impressionists and impressions

2009-10-31T11:15:00.001-07:00

I know that many of you are just gutted that you cannot be here with us in Paris as we wander through the endless museums on offer.

So, always mindful of my audience, I thought I would take this opportunity to give you a vicarious taste of today's visits to the Orangerie and Musee d'Orsay. As you know, these museums are where some of the best Impressionist works can be found.

The Orangerie mainly exists to house the massive Water Lilies paintings by Monet. In two oval rooms, you are surrounded first by water lilies in the morning, then water lilies in the evening, enhanced by daylight from skylights far overhead, filtered through vellum canopies. I don't remember whether this setup existed when I was there last; certainly I don't remember the music that they pipe in to accompany your viewing experience:

Because we were there so early, there were hardly any people. When I was there last, there were so many people crowding the rooms that I could hardly see -- let alone appreciate -- the paintings.

(Note: there doesn't seem to be any "off-season" for tourists in Paris. No matter where we go, there are tourists jamming everything -- especially at the Louvre, Notre Dame, and, no surprise, the Eiffel Tower. This is exacerbated by the fact that it appears to be mid-term break in many schools, and Paris seems to be the place to drag the kiddies if you're a European parent.)

We spent a good long time in the Musee d'Orsay, but we haven't downloaded the photos from the good camera yet, and besides, you've probably seen most of the notable works that are there if you've taken any kind of art history classes in school. What you probably haven't seen are these shadow-puppets from the "Black Cat Cabaret" that was started at the turn of the century by a group of artists and writers who liked to create improv puppet-shows with topical subject matter -- kind of the SNL of their time, I guess.

We headed home relatively early (last night we stayed out late because the Louvre was open until 10) to buy some groceries and cook dinner (to be fair, David did the cooking) in the little apartment we're renting for the week in Montmartre. While dinner was in an in-between stage, David decided he wanted to be interviewed about his impressions of Paris:

He may come off as jaded, but he still conceded to a romantic moment under the Eiffel Tower the other night -- and I even had a cold!

A Few Travel Tips:

2009-10-27T07:22:00.000-07:00

Amsterdam is not an overly safe city for pedestrians. I don't care how cycle-friendly it is, it's bloody confusing to get around on two feet. But that's my two cents worth.

Bruges doesn't seem overly safe for stilettos/high heels. I don't know this from personal experience, but the fact that it's mainly covered in cobblestones would lead me to believe that heels are the not the best choice for a walking shoe.

If you're not good with accents, good luck in Glasgow!

If you're from Canada, get used to people assuming you're American. Everyone loves Canadians, but we're not the first guess for most.

A lot of people who are from Canada, say they're from Toronto. It seems to be easier for them to say instead of Guelph, Windsor, Ottawa, Trent/Peterborough.....

People still smoke indoors in Bruges. It's like an “old school” experience. Sitting in non-smoking and coming out of the establishment smelling like an ashtray. Oh well.

Scotland: My Real Ancestral Homeland.

2009-10-27T07:21:00.000-07:00

I was born in Toronto. I'm Jewish. I've been told my whole life that my homeland was/is Israel, but I've never felt that way. Mind you, I've never been there either. (Though we're headed there for four weeks in the middle of January!) My grandparents were born in Poland, Russia and Scotland, making me ½ Polish, ¼ Russian and ¼ Scottish.

As I've said before, I never met my dad's mom and barely knew my dad's dad. That's the Polish side. I knew my mom's parents quite well, or as much as I was capable of knowing them, based on my not asking questions and them not volunteering much by way of information about their formative years and lives in general.

I'm not really sure what it is about me and Scotland. I know there's certainly my mom's mom as the primary link; the start of it all. I know there's a love of plaid/tartan/kilts. So much so, that I gave serious consideration to wearing a kilt when I married Jodi. Mind you, that was not a popular option with anyone other than me! I know that my parents' friends, the Livingstones, are both born in Scotland and I've always thought very highly of them. And not just because Alan worked for Laura Secord in the 70s and their front room was PACKED with chocolate!!!

Regardless of where or when it started, I've always wanted to go to Scotland, and when the whole five months away came up....well.....Scotland happens to be one of Jodi's favourite countries. It was a no-brainer really. Had I really been on the ball, I would have done a lot of research about my family before we left, but I didn't, and this (unfortunately) resulted in Jodi (and me) spending more time in libraries in Edinburgh and Glasgow then I/we had planned.

Thanks to a great website, www.scotlandspeople.org, while in Belfast, just before closing time at the Starbucks (FYI...when in the UK for an extended period of time, and in need of “free” WiFi, get a UK Starbucks card for 5 pounds, and use that to access free Internet in the Starbucks. It's the same in Toronto too. I can't speak for other cities or countries though.) I found my grandmother's birth record. It brought me to tears, and is doing the same thing now. I don't know what it is, but I'm very emotional as it pertains to mom's mom, and think the greatest compliment I can pay towards Jodi and my sister-in-law Julie, is that she really would have liked both of them. A lot.

We left Belfast for Scotland, and I finally stepped foot on the land that I had cherished for as long as I can remember. Upon getting on the train in Stranraer, I saw an Irn Bru (Yes Scott Gaertner, the Holy Grail!!!) machine. I put in my pound coin and pushed the button.

Nothing.

I pushed it again.

Nothing.

I pushed the next one down.

YAHOO!!! Down came....

diet Irn Bru.

So wrong in so many ways, but hey....it was close to what I wanted needed. “Scotland's other national drink”, after (scotch) whisky. Since then, I managed to get several smaller bottles and a monstrous 2 litre bottle. I was a happy man. Apparently, it's quite a hangover remedy, but I don't drink that much and don't get hangovers, so I wouldn't know. The first time I had it was when I went with my dad to Hamish's Fish & Chips, near Pharmacy and St. Clair, about 25 years ago.

That was a regular thing that we'd do, me and my dad. Go somewhere to eat or grocery shop. It seems I'm more like my dad than I've been willing to admit. Until recently. We'd go to Spadina for Chinese, and not just because he grew up in Kensington Market (just west/north of downtown Chinatown), but because that was where the authentic Chinese was to be found. Now, Toronto has five or more “Chinatowns”, but there was always be one for me, and Kum Jug Yuen remains from the restaurants that we used to go to: Lung Fung, Kum Kuk Yuen and Goodyear are no more. I'll always remember being asked for “I.Q.” when we'd go down there for dinner and (underage) beer in high school, and the look on Doug Martin's face, when a guy came out of the kitchen at Kum Jug Yuen with hip-waders on.

So, I'd had Irn-Bru with “nasties” (artificial sweeteners), and we were on a train for Edinburgh (Ed-in-bra is the way to pronounce so you're in the “know”). We saw cows, horses and sheep, but no “Highland Cows”, which would have to wait. If you haven't seen one, they're really a sight to behold.

Edinburgh was great. Great beer at great prices. The salads are painfully small, but the produce tastes way better, so buying apples, pears, carrots and peppers at grocery stores helped with my/our vegetation intake. We have not had a bad tour yet, in Dublin, Galway, Belfast, London or Edinburgh. As teachers, we really appreciate a good entertaining and informative tour!

As good as Edinburgh was, Glasgow was where I wanted, or needed, to be. Agnes (AKA Grandma) was born in Shettleston, which was a suburb of Glasgow, and is now a part of the city. South-east of the city centre. Interestingly enough, Shettleston is the only place in the E.U. (European Union) where the average life expectancy is dropping. Yep, dropping. She lived to be almost 82, but she also left Scotland for Canada at 18.

I knew her first place of residence was 96 Gray Street, and that the street didn't exist anymore. I emailed the Shettleston Housing Authority about the change in street names. I got no reply, and in fact, still haven't. Lazy f**kers. I did however get a TON of assistance from librarians in Edinburgh (at the National Archives and public library) and Glasgow (at the public library – thanks Hazel!) and found out that the street name had changed to Denbeck.

Thanks to Google Maps, I found Denbeck.

By now, we were staying with our friends Zoe and Alex, between Glasgow and Edinburgh, in Carstairs (near Lanark). We rented a car in Glasgow, and had LOTS of adventures with driving on the left-side of the road, and also figuring out how to start the car, as we drove up to the Highlands. Sight-seeing, whisky tours (Glenmorangie & The Macallan – two of our three faves – Highland Park being the other), LOTS of pictures, beaches, walking, and a rather eclectic hostel/hotel in Balintraid.

Getting back to Zoe and Alex's was easy enough, mainly because Jodi did the navigating (which seemed to be rather arduous with the maps we had!) and I did the driving. Then came Friday morning. Me taking the car back to the rental agency, after trying to find Denbeck Street. In what is considered to be less-than-ideal Glasgow. Using Google Maps again, I had directions from Carstairs to Shettleston, and then Shettleston to the rental agency.

I got “lost” twice on the way to Shettleston. Once, because there was construction at a roundabout, and subsequently, there were no signs saying which entrance/exit was which. My visit to the Shell station was less than helpful, as the guy said he didn't live in the neighbourhood, and the woman said she wasn't sure about where I was going.

So I went back the way I came and decided (after a mental coin flip) to go straight at the roundabout. Then I got to a street where I decided to go left and ask for help. The first place of business was closed, and the second was open. Woohoo! The two people in there were really helpful, and I got some directions from there to where I wanted to be going – which was only a couple of miles away.

After a couple of wrong (and corrective illegal) turns, I saw a street name I recognized and parked the car, hoping/praying that it wouldn't be stolen or damaged. I walked the ½ block to Denbeck and saw that the corner house was 92. I walked down, and the numbers got lower. I looked at the other side of the street and the numbers weren't any bigger. There was no 96. There was however a church across the street from 92, and I wondered if that had been 95 in 1908.

Two engineers, getting out of their service truck in front of the church, weren't from around there and of no assistance. I took some pictures of 92, hid my camera in my bag – lest we forget we're in council housing (that's what they call it in the UK. The projects/slums in the U.S., and assisted/government housing in Canada) and I'm not too keen on losing The Baby. There was a social work facility around the corner and I asked some questions of staff, and they pointed me towards a 79 year old blind man. He confirmed that Gray Street became Denbeck, and that the church had been there for as long as he could remember. He had to go to a meeting, but he was quite interested where I was from.

(Which brings me to the whole accent thing. Spending 39 years in Toronto has meant that everyone else has an accent, except me. Most people assume I'm American when they hear me speak, but I'm frankly confused by this. What do I sound like to others? Aside from the fact that I hate my voice when I hear it played back.)

I didn't make any wrong turns heading to the rental agency, minus the whole wrong off-ramp/illegal turn to get back on thing. Oh, and the ending up too far down the one-way street to leave the car, so I did a circle. But it was relatively stress-free, PLUS, I got to listen to Fred on BBC Radio Scotland, and I do like Fred. He's a funny fella. fred@bbc.co.uk. I need to remember to look him up. I do believe he's a comedian on top of his radio work.

So, I got the car back, and had a few hours to myself in Glasgow. Having navigated the city a few times with Jodi – okay Jodi navigated and I walked and picked up a thing or two about where things where, and I had walking directions to The Wee Curry Shop, I was all good! FAN-FREAKIN'-TAS-TICK curry at The Wee Curry Shop. If you're in Glasgow and like curry, it's a must. But they don't open for lunch until noon. Getting there at 11:20 meant that I wandered around, found a bar and had a cheap pint of yummy beer. The beer in Scotland is second to none! That includes Canada, the U.S., England, Holland and Belgium. World-class, in my mind.

Had lunch, bought some bottles of beer (as I'm apt to do!) and headed to the train station. I just caught the train before it headed off to Lanark, and I just caught a bus headed for Carstairs. Getting back was a breeze, which was MUCH easier than the trials/tribulations that Jodi and I had trying to get back to Zoe and Alex's after a night in Glasgow earlier in the week.

We headed up to Fort William (and the Nevis Mountain Range) with Zoe and Alex – YAY NO MORE DRIVING FOR ME!!! Their vehicle being standard meant I was off the hook, since I haven't driven stick since I was 17 and only did it a couple of times. We stayed at a great place on the locks (where they're twinned with the Rideau Canal in Ottawa, so seeing the Maple Leaf (Canadian flag) was uber-weird!) and took a gondola up part of the range and walked down. We went to a tasty (but small portioned!) restaurant that night, and then wandered around in the misty rain the next morning/day, in search of a water fall. Steil was where it was, I do believe.

Before we knew it, we were headed for Glasgow, and an overnight bus ride to London.

I was sad to be leaving Zoe and Alex, sad to be saying goodbye to Glasgow, and saddest to be leaving Scotland. The people are great, even if Glaswegian “English” is an adventure to interpret – which is probably why the city is hiring interpreters to help out those more challenged than me. The sights are mind-boggling, but we did get lucky with the lack of rain and warm-ish weather we encountered.

As I walked along Denbeck Street I felt like I was with my grandmother once again.

As I've said before, this journey/adventure that Jodi and I started September 20th was a difficult one to wrap my head around. It was made even harder because of my father being in ill-health. He's been in the hospital four times in two months. This is a pattern that I recognize from my grandparents. It's not a pattern that makes me warm and fuzzy. I'm bothered by the fact that I'm unable to help my mom to do things around the house, or to cook some food for them, or anything for that matter – since I'm not in Toronto. Having a sense that I was taking a few steps in my grandmother's past has made it a little easier on my mind, as it's something that I can share with mom when I get back home.

Or online for now.

Things I Learned in the UK

2009-10-24T13:34:00.000-07:00

1. They do NOT drive on the "wrong" side, but rather the "other" side. It's a complete and utter mindf**k driving from Glasgow up to the Highlands, and that's with Jodi as my navigator/co-pilot. Driving from Carstairs to Glasgow with nothing but a couple of Google maps and a mission was insanely bizarre.

2. Glaswegian "English" at its finest/worst is harder to understand than French. I only took French until grade ten. They're even hiring translators for Glasgow to aid in the comprehension of what they're saying.

3. Beer is SUPER good and SUPER inexpensive in Scotland.

4. They don't seem to understand the meaning of bite size pieces of lettuce.

5. Side salads are really just a tease in most places. But when you don't order a salada, it's amazing how big they can be when they magically arrive on your table.

6. Haggis is good. REALLY good. Salty, but really good. Don't knock if it you haven't tried it. I suspect I'll be making a Dave version in 2010.

7. I can pretty much distinguish between Irish, Scottish and English accents. Not always, but I'm rarely able to do anything "always".

8. Changing directions on the highways can be stupidly easy or stupidly hard. It's all where ya are.

9. Making illegal turns in Glasgow is only illegal if you get caught. I didn't. Remember, I was on a mission.

10. Pheasant calls are really annoying.

11. I didn't so much learn this as do it, but I've know urinated on two important "landmarks" related to Canada. One in Toronto and one in Scotland.

12. Sometimes budget hotels are better than hostels.

13. Sometimes hostels are better than others.

14. Air-dying laundry in Scotland takes a long time.

15. You don't need to live in Scotland to get a library card. For the National Library or the Glasgow Public Library.

16. Euros do not have Queen Elizabeth II on the back. Repeat after me, euros do NOT have Queen Elizabeth II on the back. (Still working on this)

17. Highland cows can gallop. As much as cows gallop.

Who Am I?

2009-10-20T15:22:00.000-07:00

This is a question I've been asking myself for a long time now.

I am the youngest child of three. My parents are Beverley and Stanley. My siblings are Ellen and Jordan. This I've always known.

I never knew my father's mother, as she died as a result of an accident in 1960, ten years before I was born. My dad's father died when I was a boy of 7 or 8, and I barely knew him. Well, I knew him in the way that a young boy knows their grandfather, who comes over once a week for fish dinner and then I'd put my pyjamas on and we'd drive him home.

I was fortunate enough to know my mother's parents until they died, my grandmother when I was 21 and my grandfather when I was 23. I knew them the way a young man knows their grandparents, in that I would seem them at family functions and holidays, where we would kibbutz a bit, from what I remember. We would go over to visit, for dinner (home-made macaroni & cheese, with bacon!) or to hang out and play gin, or watch the baseball game (usually the Blue Jays, whom my grandfather quite liked) or Wheel of Fortune, or whatever. Sure, there was the time when I was an adolescent, or thereabouts, and I slept over at their place for New Years, and my grandfather asked me if I wanted some prune juice. We'll leave it at my being up into the wee hours of the morning, but not for celebratory reasons.

I'm eternally grateful for my mother talking to me when I was about 15, and saying that her parents weren't going to be alive forever, and that I should make sure that I didn't have any regrets about not having visited with them. And a few years later my grandmother almost died on the night of her 75th birthday, or the party, I don't remember which it was.

Up until she died, I cherished going to hang out with my grandparents, often on the way home from university. I went to school in-town, and I was able to stop off at their place to chat, play some cards, watch some TV or go grocery shopping for them if the weather was foul. That said, I still never really got to know my grandparents as people. I never asked them about their childhoods in Shettleston (Glasgow) and Toronto. I never found out my grandmother's journey via ship from Scotland to Canada and her instant love affair with Coca-Cola upon her arrival (though it was Coke or Pepsi in her later years, whichever was cheaper).

I've heard stories from my mother, my aunt (my mom's late sister) and their cousin, but I never thought to ask those questions when my grandparents were alive. I'll chalk it up to being immature, self-centered and male. I don't dwell on it much, nor should I. I've certainly heard stories from my father's childhood, where he grew up in Kensington Market, a part of Toronto that was once full of Jews, and recently said goodbye to the last remaining Jewish merchant (it really is a market) in the last month, as he sold his butcher shop. I've heard stories from my mom about a lot of things too. Stories of my grandparents as parents, and also a few stories about my grandfather as a boy. He grew up in Toronto and his family was all here too, unlike my grandmother, who left Scotland at 18, leaving behind siblings (except for her brother Bill (I don't know who came to Canada first, Agnes or Bill) and sister Elizabeth, AKA Bessie – who came to Canada later in life) and her parents, and never saw them again.

I suppose my quest for some sense of who I am began in grade six. That was when the seed was planted, as my teacher, Mr. Tindall, spent a good deal of time going through my report cards from JK to that point, and put all the relevant information into a hand-written document which I still have. He pointed out that my intelligence would seem to be such that the regular school system wasn't challenging enough for me, and that's why I was continually disrupting, distracting and otherwise getting myself into trouble. My parents only found out about the Gifted test the day before it was to take place. Long story short, I entered the Gifted program in grade seven, leaving behind my friends and local school for one further away.

This posed a problem, as I was not socially ready to handle the change in making new friends, and I had never learned how my brain worked, or I had never learned how to learn. I got by on my ability alone and had no clue what it was to work. I struggled for some time, probably until at least into grade ten or eleven. The Gifted program focuses on questioning.It's not about 1 + 2 = 3, but rather the reasons why. The student is asked/forced to think in class and can't really just get by on intelligence alone.

This saved me.

Otherwise, I suspect I would have dropped out of the local high school (which was just at the end of our street) instead of thriving (in as much as I allowed myself to thrive) at Earl Haig. At Haig I was surrounded by people smarter than me, people who were talented in all disciplines of the arts, and people who all hung around with each other. I learned about not just the books and courses, but about myself. I went from being a jackass to being a class clown, but starting to become a more socially aware individual.

Thanks to a few friends and a girlfriend, I started to express myself more. To be more aware of that which I was not: gay, female and black, specifically. Instead of listening to the rock music that seemed to surround my “old life”, I was listening to New Wave/Alternative and Rap. It was the mid-to-late 80s and it was beautiful. I don't know too many people who liked high school so much they'd go to school early and stay late.

Sure, school life was made better because I was skipping classes and getting intoxicated in one way or another, and the parties at Haig were legendary.

While I didn't exactly give it my all, I certainly got myself into where I wanted to go for post-secondary. In retrospect, I should have gone to the University of Toronto (downtown) or Ryerson for journalism.

But I didn't.

Instead, I went to the cold, grey, desolate campus of York University. I wanted to be in business. I wanted to be rich. My pre-BBA changed to Political Science in 2nd year, and I added Mass Communication as a Double Honours major in my 3rd year. I decided in my final year that I wanted to be in advertising, since I was a pop culture fanatic and I could write.

(Or so I thought.)

A three year course in advertising meant that I knew I could succeed in any of the three streams of advertising, but I only wanted to be a creative, and write. I saw that it was a soul-sucking, and painfully difficult, world to enter and continue along. I waited tables for a year and by chance ended up in sales for a couple of years, selling anything and everything you could put a logo on.

I was pretty successful and would have continued to be even more so, but I wasn't fulfilled. The world of the dot come beckoned, with a downtown address (versus the industrial wasteland suburbs) of exposed brick and big windows. I was going to become a millionaire, and get my parents cars and send them on vacations and buy a downtown home and gut/reno/retrofit it.

Needless to say, it didn't happen.

But, what did happen is that I learned a little more about myself. Shortly after turning 30, I found out that my borderline high blood pressure wasn't borderline anymore, and I was going to be starting on medication.

I decided that if I was going to have a heart attack or a stroke, I wanted to “go out” on my terms.

I quit my job and sat on my butt for the summer, and then I volunteered in a few classrooms at the feeder school to Earl Haig's arts program. I wanted to “pay it forward” for what Mr. Tindall had done for me, and I wanted to make a difference.

I was accepted to teachers' college at OISE/UT (I had applied in '97 without having done any research and was promptly rejected by York and U of T's programs), and I was finally going to be going to school downtown. My going to school as a “man”, and not living at home with my parents, and not working throughout the school year, threw my personal finances into turmoil.

I'd never been happier though.

After putting so many teachers through difficulty (truthfully not on purpose) I was now able to see that this was wanted I wanted to do. Teach grade six. Right out of teachers' college I was hired by the Toronto District School Board (the only one I applied to!) and placed in grade 5/6 class at Nelson Mandela Park Public School in Regent Park.

As inner city as it can get in Toronto. It was a rough ride, and after a month I was transferred down to kindergarten because of a staff restructuring based on student enrollment numbers. I was there for six years, with the last year being a grade 4/5 class, and a very difficult year. I know that should I return to teaching after my year off, it will be for kindergarten, as my personal life suffers much less that way.

At most stops along the way, I've made some phenomenal friends. I can count friends from just about everywhere I've been for work or school. In fact, some of my best friends are the ones I've made since I started to have a better understanding of who I was. From Saul (camp) to Emily (school) to James (bike ride to Montreal) to Marcos (professional course) and the many others I count as friends, they understand me.

As much as someone can understand me. After all, sometimes I don't understand myself. I view things differently than most, and I can thank people in my life for offering different ways of looking at things. I have met some of the most amazing people as a result of being involved with Jodi, for almost four years now.

As most of you know, my father is 80, and hasn't been well of late. When Jodi floated the idea of taking a year off (she had a paid sabbatical year coming up right after we got married) it seemed profoundly bizarre. Initially, she was going to do a masters in some form of English or Education, and I figured I'd work and we'd take a few fabulous vacations in the Winter and March Breaks and Summer.

Instead, we're in the early stages of five months in the UK, Europe and Israel. I had a really hard time packing up my life (literally) in Toronto and putting it into a storage locker. I had a really hard time saying goodbye to my father, not knowing if I was going to see him again, considering he almost didn't make it to our wedding, and that night was back in the hospital.

I had a really hard time leaving Toronto because I felt like I was abandoning my mom, even though I only see her about once a week. I knew I could leave my friends, because thanks to email, Skype and Facebook, they're never really that far away.

Thus far, this has been an amazing experience.

I've been away from home for almost four weeks now, and while I'm out of sorts because I don't have a chance to cook and/or bake in my kitchen with my utensils, spices, pans, pots, etc.....I can deal with this.

Living out of a rucksack/backpack is something that I've learned to deal with. I'm now used to looking like a tourist and subsequently being ignored by all around. At least at home I get a look or two from a female or male.

Not now. Not here. Oh well, I'm married!

Jodi has been the perfect person to do this with, as she's been to many of the places we're going, but we're doing a lot of different things that are new for her. As I near the end of this ramble, and I've digressed from where I was headed (as is par for the course), I’ve decided to share this to perhaps give some of you a better sense of me. I plan on continuing along this vein, perhaps as an attempt at self-help, perhaps just to share.

Regardless, there will be more to read, and more for me to ramble on about.

The Heilan adventures of we twa

2009-10-20T13:08:00.001-07:00

I've mentioned to a couple of people that Scotland is one of my favourite places, and, besides the fact that Edinburgh is one of the most amazingly beautiful cities, the whole country is just gorgeous. But really, it's difficult to appreciate most of it without a mode of transportation, so we rented a car for three days and drove up to the Inverness area via the scenic A82 along the shores of Loch Lomond (of "ye take the high road an' I'll take the low road" fame).

Here again, for your entertainment, are some video moments from that trip.

First, meet our car!

We discovered after our first photo stop that this car had some interesting security features...

Some helpful German tourists were able to help us free the locking mechanism so the car would start, and we were again on our way.

Loch Lomond (or, as David likes to say it, recalling the Auld Alliance, perhaps, "Loch Lamond") is ridiculously photogenic. It was hard not to stop every five minutes to take photographs of its ever-changing scenery.

But every so often, we did succumb.

This, of course, meant that we didn't arrive at our destination until quite late, but it was worth it -- Balintraid House, about half an hour north of Inverness, outside of the small town of Invergordon, was not your typical hostel. Our room was huge, with a sitting area that comprised a sofa and two armchairs, and had a view over the water from a large bay window! The kitchen was excellently equipped, so we were able to cook dinners and breakfasts while we stayed there.

On the second day we visited the Glenmorangie distillery. Glenmorangie is one of our favourite whiskies (thanks to Tony's introducing me to it years ago -- thanks Tony!). It was a nice little tour, and the distillery itself is a very pleasant place, as you can tell here:

Then we spent the rest of the day driving around the Highlands, including Portmahomack (as pretty a beach as when we were there, Dawn), and in some cases on some very narrow roads indeed!

David did eventually get the hang of driving in Scotland, though, never you worry.

We still felt compelled to pull over every five miles or so to take photos. But can you really blame us??

And now, as a special treat, we bring you "the sounds of the Highlands":

Now, with so few cars on the back roads, the cows get a bit chippy about sharing, so we had to remind them who was boss:

But no cow is quite like a Highland cow (or, as they call them in the actual Highlands, "Heilan coos"), and we got a good opportunity to visit with some on the Macallan distillery lands. They are the cutest!

All too soon, it was time to head back to Glasgow, but we would be hitting the Highlands again briefly with our friends Zoe and Alex, spending a glorious weekend in Fort William, in the shadow of the impressive Nevis Range.

At the moment, we are back in London en route to Amsterdam in the morning. So cheerio until our next post!

Belfast and other things Irish

2009-10-20T12:53:00.000-07:00

Here is a post I wrote for my Bedford High School Bits blog about the Black Cab tour we took in Belfast, recommended to us by many people and well worth it. It doubles pretty well as a travel blog post for now -- we're working up to some more, soon to come!

If you're interested, you might also enjoy my other Bedford Bits post about Dublin and the recent Lisbon Treaty vote they had there.

Things I've Learned/Decided/Realized Since Leaving Toronto

2009-10-07T01:19:00.000-07:00

I suspect this is something I'll be adding on to in the next few months.

I've learned that produce tastes better in (Northern) Ireland than Canada. The peppers are tastier and the apples are crisper. The millk may taste better too.

I've decided that I do not understand why religion is the cause of so much conflict around the world. Most recently and evidently in Northern Ireland. I know that I will also see this in Israel.

I've learned the Irish love to talk, give amazing tours and are full of craic (pronounced “crack”).

I'm beginning to decide/believe that organized religion is the cause of more grief than it's worth. Spirituality seems like a more positive road to travel. Believing in the “Golden Rule” and the goodness of people, rather than something/someone that you can not see, touch or feel. I see people, but I do not see “God”. I see graves and pictures of deceased, killed in the name of “God”. I see heartache and tragedy, but I do not see “God”. Maybe I'm just not a true believer and therefore not privy to seeing “it”, but I see heartache and suffering in the name of “God” and this seems a bit too primitive for me.

I've learned that some hostels are better than others. Some are amazing, social and fun. Some are acceptable as a place to sleep. Some have awful mattress covers that result in you having your sleep interruped. These same beds can also creak WAY too much. Annoying to say the least.

I've learned that most hostels have painfully awful kitchens.

I've decided (realized?) that five monumental events have happened in my life which have truly shaped “where” I am today. One, entering the Gifted Program in grade 7, thanks to Mr. Tindall and my mom's diligence and perseverance. Two, following Deborah Levy up to Camp Shalom in 1988, and meeting Saul Colt. Three, deciding to go back to school for teachers' college when I was 30. Four, doing The Friends for Life Bike Rally the summer before I started teachers' college and meeting James Anok. Five, meeting Jodi.

I've learned that I tend to view things photographically now.

I've decided that travel to learn about people and cultures is a beautiful thing, in order to figure out more about the “world” that I live in.

I've learned that I do not understand why the conflict in Northern Ireland has continued for as long as it has.

I've decided that things and stuff are less important to me now than they have ever been, but what I have with me right now keeps me warm and dry.

I've learned that marrying Jodi was the greatest thing I could have ever done.

I've learned the Irish serve Guinness too cold for my liking.

I've learned I like Magner's cider more than Bulmer's cider.

I've decided that all toilets should have a bidet and dryer. Mind you, I haven't encountered one as of yet.

I've decided that Starbucks is not evil, but a gift to humanity, for their consistent quality and "free" WiFi.

I've decided this trek isn't about farming or slaughtering a meal, but is becoming a quest to learn more about the world and try to make sense of (in)humanity.

I've learned that I can run and take pictures quickly. Belfast is a good place to learn this!

I've learned I like Scotch whisky more than Irish whiskey because it's more challenging. Which is somewhat analogous for my relationship with Jodi.

I've learned that Jodi is right at least 85% of the time.

I've realized I REALLY miss being truly connected to my friends and "weekly" visits with my parents and in-laws.

I've realized that 2.5 weeks into our five month adventure I'm really excited about my "hajj" to my truest ancestral homeland (Scotland) and not at all burnt out. I've never really desired to go to Poland or Russia, and we'll be in Israel at the end of our travels, but I'm more excited about the geography and people than it being "the Jewish homeland". Probably in large part to being Jew-ish and more cultural with my Jewishness than anything.

I've learned that tea is better in the UK and Ireland than North America, because everyone here seems to boil the water for tea, whereas back home it's just "hot water". Feh.

I haven't had any fried food yet, but I know that fish and chips is on the horizon in Scotland. Maybe even a fried Mars bar for s**ts 'n giggles.

I've realized I'm really emotional about finding birth information on my grandmother, both for me (and my mom - who hasn't asked me to do any of this), but also because of my father's uncertain health in the past few months. (On that note, as I know people will ask, he's going to be starting a six-month low dose antibiotic that should help with the infections he's been dealing with for a few years. That said, I'm not a doctor (though I play one on TV), but I'm also concerned that it could lower his overall immunity and make him susceptible to something else.)

I've learned that Tim Horton's is available in Belfast (Northern Ireland otherwise?) at SPAR. That said, I'm not a Tim Horton's fan. I know, I know. I'm Canadian. I also don't like hockey. As my mother frequently reminds me (I used to say this a whole lot more than I do now), "Suck it up and deal with it kid."

I've realized it's sort of ironic that I'm going to take a boat to Scotland today. I learned from Billy Connolly (on the plane from Toronto to London) that people leaving Scotland frequently had their wake done at the boat docks, as the family/friends left behind knew that they probably would never see them again. My grandmother left Scotland as a teenager and never saw her parents again. I can't fathom that.

Galway to Belfast, the abridged version

2009-10-06T01:24:00.000-07:00

Dateline: Wednesday October 6th, 2009.
(Written Tuesday October 5th)
Posted in a Starbucks in Belfast.

I initially thought that I'd be blogging more often about our UK/European adventure. I was wrong. Some times the internet is hard to come by. Some times there isn't time to sit down with the computer and write something. Some times I'm just too flippin' tired to think about writing about what's going on physically and in my head. Some times I'm just overwhelmed with how many pictures I've been taking and the sheer amount of time/work necessary to get them online. Whether it's on Flickr or Facebook, it's a lot of time and effort, and we've just been busy touring around.

Okay, so when last I blogged, our heroes Dave (that's me!) and Jodi (not me) had gone to the Oyster Festival in Galway, in the west of Ireland. After that, we took a bus trip to the Cliffs of Moher. They're pretty cool, in that they're a big freakin' load of cliffs on the southwest coast of Ireland. I was told that the Aran Islands and Dingle are two must-sees, but hey....no time. Plus, Jodi's been there, and as Jodi says, “It leaves something to come back for.”

That Jodi's a smrt one sometimes. Well, usually. In fact, most of the time. Almost always. But I catch her sometimes. Not very often mind you. Okay, back to our heroes. The bus trip was lengthy but worth it. Our bus driver, Eamon (or Eamonn, since we never saw his name) was GREAT! We saw a ton of cool stuff, heard a bunch about Ireland and fairies (like I don't know a few fairies!) and took a crapload of pictures. APPARENTLY “crapload” isn't a word. How about crap-load? Hyphens always make the red squigglies go away! Oh. APPARENTLY “squigglies” isn't a word either. AH....

We also wandered a bit along the Burren while on the bus tour. In case you were wondering.

Good fun regardless.

Then Jodi got sick. We think that I got a bug of some form and went through me the way that most things go through me. In one end, out the other. In one ear, out the other. If you know me, you know this is the case. It was quick and that was that. Well, not so quick 'n easy for Jodi. Her being "under the weather", meant that our bus trip from Galway to Tubbercurry was on hold for a day. Not having our cell working meant that I Skyped Farmer Brian to let him know we weren't going to be there on Monday.

This meant that I spent the day editing/culling pictures and uploading five photo albums to Facebook, but because I wasn't finished until 1:00 AM, didn't comment on them. Maybe at some point I'll get around to commenting on the first two days of our travels. Considering we're two weeks in already! Oh well.

We met some great people in the hostel in Galway. From New Zealand, Germany and this country called Canada. Maybe you've heard of it? Oh ya, and a lovely young lady from the U.S. It's always nice to meet good folks from the States, so as to not end up saying bad things about Americans. Too many people already do that and I don't want to add on to the s**t heap if I can help it.

We took the early bus to Tubbercurry the next day, and were met by Elona, Brian's wife. She's German and Brian is English. APPARENTLY the Irish don't take WWOOFers (World Wide Opportunities in Organic Farming) unless they're single/widowed women or not Irish. Interesting. The farm isn't too far from Tubbercurry and for whatever reason, it didn't look the way I thought it would. That said, I didn't know what I expected it to look like. Go figure, but it's me, so go with it. One thing that stuck out in my head was something that was said in "The Blue Collar Comedy Tour" about car parts and tires on the lawn, and there was an old VW van that was in the back with oodles and zoodles of old assorted electrical items that literally filled it up. FILLED IT UP!!!

We had tea, chatted for a bit and then went outside to throw wood that Brian was cutting up on a circular saw, that he had reclaimed from an old church roof somewhere near there. The wood had paint on it, but they didn't seem to care that this would be used for firewood. Elona made a good point when she said that it would be burned one way or the other, either by them or by whomever took it away as trash. Sad, but probably true. Regardless, I wouldn't want to burn painted wood inside my home, and have my children/family breathing it in.

Another reality that threw me for a loop was the caravan. It was a trailer/camper out of the 60s that wasn't in the greatest shape, but it was where we slept for four nights. It was cold and "rustic". Remember that this trip was the first time I slept in a hostel (no big issues thus far) and was used to motels and hotels, or our tent. The caravan wasn't quite what I expected, but I sucked it up and dealt with it.

They have a lot of animals, and they all seemed to smell. In their own way. The pigs smelled like pigs. I wasn't prepared for how bad the pig barn smelled. The dogs (one Border Collie (Liz) and two English Bulldogs (Bonnie and Edward) smelled like smelly dogs. The ducks, geese and chickens didn't smell, but the roosters seemed to crow all day and the geese were INSANELY territorial. Did I mention how territorial the geese were?!?! The turkey and peacock were also not smelly, and not overly “fresh” and healthy looking. The pony and cows were mostly kept off the property. They found a badger in a trap and put it into a big ole cage and fed it cat and/or dog food. They had two guinea pigs that were kept outside, and several cats/kittens that they breed/sell. Oh ya, I'm allergic to cats, but it wasn't awful, which was nice.

Brian and Elona are chain-smokers, which made for memories of my grandparents' place, as everything was coated with tar/nicotine/tobacco/whatever cigarette smokers coat their inside stuff with. Frankly, they're really good people. They take in complete strangers through WWOOF and that was super for us. They also have two children. Sophia is 12 and Jonny is 7. Jonny loves to take things apart, build things and wonder about lights and electricity. For Christmas, he wants a 12 V car battery. Sophia is a 12 year old girl. Enough said there. She's a good girl, but I suppose it can be a bit much with going through life as a 12 year old girl and having strangers coming into your house.

There wasn't much to do at night, so we would watch TV in the farmhouse. The bulldogs would come and hang out with us, the cats/kittens would come into the TV room, or want to go outside (which involved getting up and opening/closing the squeaky (and tough to open) sliding door for them – and open again when they came back.

Brian and Elona were very open with us, and I truly believe we learned a lot from there.

Our work wasn't easy. Moving the cut wood, mucking/cleaning out a pig stall, emptying a large compost heap, chasing after cows on a bicycle (more on that in a bit!), moving gravel from beside the house, picked/pulled grapes for wine, pulled an electric fence (NOT on!) and made dinner for them. Dinner was the easiest, FER SHURE!!!

The most memorable part of the farm was my cow herding. Brian had brought two cows from the field down the road on to the farm in order to have them tested for TB, as is mandated by the Irish government. He called to me, and asked me to block off the farm driveway, in order to corral them into the barn. We had mucked out the stall in order to have them go there. Well, apparently the cows didn't get the memo on this and they were having no part of it. Remember, I'm 5'11” and about 220 pounds. I'm not Slim Jim or Skinny Minnie. I'm also not a 600-800 pound cow. I'm not overly confident around large animals. This makes sense.

Brian told me to get a stick, which I did. He told me to give them a whack in order to let them know they shouldn't get going the way that they were.

I replied, "I don't think I can do that."

So, this meant the cows didn't want to go in the barn, and Brian and I wanted them to go in the barn. They decided they'd go down the driveway toward the road. Brian ran after them, and I ran after Brian. He told me to get the bike. Sophia's metallic purple bike, that's the right size for a 12 year old girl. With a seat that's not quite tight and no brakes.

I've ridden a bicycle to Montreal from Toronto five times. No biggie. Right? But wait, I was wearing wellies (rain boots) too! Jodi will attest that this was quite a sight. Me, riding off after Brian and the cows, on a bicycle that was too small for me, in wellies.

When I got to the road, I went left. This too made sense, since the cows went left down the road. The driver of the oncoming car found this amusing too. I didn't much care about her, since I didn't want to get knocked off the bike by one of the cows. I decided that it was in my best interests to wait for them to end up on the right side of the road, and I'd "sneak" by on the left.

It worked.

But I had to stop now. No brakes. I pulled a Fred Flinstone, and used my feet and turned the bicycle sideways, saying firmly but nicely, "NO! STOP!".

They did.

Yay me.

I don't speak Cow, and they don't speak English. So I pointed in the direction of the farm. This too worked. Brian steered them back on to the farm, and had me close the gate. No more cow herding on the road. After getting them to the barn again, they again turned around and got back to the gate. This was getting more and more annoying, but once Jodi and Brian figured out how to block their escapes in every direction, they finally got themselves into the barn.

After this, we drove down to a neighbouring field and got another three cows into a pen on that land. WAY EASIER!

As a kindergarten teacher I referred to myself as a cat herder. Now I'm a real cow herder. On a girls' bicycle no less.

We left the farm on Saturday, as they didn't have work for us and we were looking to head off to travel anyway. A drive in to Tubbercurry – and I left my stainless steel water bottle on the farm or in the car (oh well.) and then the bus to Bundoran and I was going to surf.

Except for the fact that it was BLOODY windy and BLOODY cold. No surfing. Lots more pictures and lunch at the Grand Hotel. It may have nice rooms (don't know) but the food and service was far from grand, but hey...it didn't smell like a farm.

Oh ya, I wore the same clothes for four out of five days that I was on the farm. The same socks, underwear, pants and shirt. I didn't even take them off. Now that's a real farmer. Or, someone who doesn't want to get more clothes dirty and smelly.

We went to Supervalu to buy stuff for dinner and made pan-fried trout with a veggie/tomato pasta. It was lovely. Oh ya, and the white bread toast with garlic butter. Jodi was a mighty fine sous chef and people kept coming in wondering if they get some food. Oh well, all gone on the trout and we left the leftover pasta in the fridge for whomever may have wanted it.

In Bundoran we had a shared room, and the two guys we were with are living in Belfast. Bryan and Damian are both (civil?) engineers and good chaps! We went to Brennan's on the main street for a pint (two!) of Guinness. The boys said that it was a mighty fine pint of Guinness and that you weren't allowed to talk on a mobile or you'd get turfed out. There were two Mrs. Brennans there Saturday night. They're both in their 60s or 70s and I asked them the rules.

No loud talking on a mobile. No cussing. No singing.

The four of us were constantly concerned about whether or not we'd get turfed out for #2, but it worked out fine. When the boys were in there in the afternoon, they were the only patrons, but when we went in, it was quite busy. We lucked into a booth and good craic (Gaelic for chat) and by fluke ended up also chatting with Bryan's cousin and his g/f.

The boys said they'd come in about 4 AM and apologized in advance if they were noisy. Regardless, we had earplugs and they never showed up, so it was ALL GOOD!

Sunday morning (when Ireland in general seems to be quite shut!) we took a cab to Ballyshannon, the bus to Enniskillen and transferred to a bus to Belfast. Now we're in Northern Ireland.

The hostel is an HI (Hosteling International) establishment, and it was all we could find for the days that we're going to be here. For those of you that haven't done a hostel before, HI isn't the best, but it's not awful. It's not “fun” like some of the others, like the one in Dublin or Bundoran (with a rock 'n roll theme!), but it's clean and a bed. Albeit two single beds, but hey....c'est la vie. Oh, and they're not moveable. Ugh.

I talked to my parents on Skype last night and when my dad told my mom that "David" was on the phone, she replied, "DAVID KRUGER?!?!". Nice. Two weeks, and she's not sure. Mind you it could have been Mr. Erskine, or my cousin, our dentist.

We took a bus tour today to the Giant's Causeway (via the Glens of Antrim), the Carrick-a-Rede rope bridge (I'm not too good with heights, and the upcoming video is telling of that!) and The Old Bushmills Distillery, where we had an ounce of 1608 and an ounce of 16 year old. Not bad at all, but we both prefer Scotch to Irish whiskey.

We're going to take a Black Cab tour of Belfast to see the murals, which give a lot of history of Belfast/Northern Ireland and The Troubles (the conflict between the Catholics and Protestants, and England and the Irish) and wander around on our own otherwise. We're trying to figure out the best way to get a ferry to Scotland on Wednesday, and then spend some time in Edinburgh, rent a car to tour up the east coast (Aberdeen, Aberdeenshire (BrewDog!!!!), Northern Highlands, Loch Ness (feh!) and back down at some point, maybe getting to the Isle of Skye) and then heading to Glasgow. HOPEFULLY, I'll find a way to see where my grandmother lived, provided I can figure out where that is/was. She lived in Shettleston, which is seemingly a suburb of Glasgow, before emigrating to Canada way back when.

We'll be hanging out with Jodi's longtime friend Zoe, and spending a weekend with her and her beau Alex in/near Ben Nevis and maybe getting ourselves to another distillery like Glenmorangie, Highland Park or The Macallan. After that, it's off/back to London (or maybe Belgium and the continent) and trying to find a farm in France to WWOOF on, and probably looking to line something up for Italy and WWOOFing as well.

I hope you're well while reading this, and feel free to comment on places that you think are visit worthy in London, Amsterdam, Belgium (Brussels/Bruges), Paris and/or France, Spain, Portugal, Italy, Israel, Greece, Jordan, Egypt.

Later.

Oysters oysters everywhere!

2009-09-26T12:52:00.000-07:00

Hi from Galway, Ireland! Today we have a special treat -- a video blog!

We are here for the big Oyster Festival, at the recommendation of Patrick McMurray (known for his restaurant, Starfish, his book Consider the Oyster, and, most recently, his Leslieville pub Ceili Cottage), who is himself a former World Champion Oyster Opener at this very competition.

In fact, we ran into him just as we arrived at the main event -- the Oyster Tasting, a bargain at 55 Euros a person (as opposed to the 110 Euros for tonight's big Gala dinner) -- and he took us backstage to get a bit of insight on the action as the competitors in this year's Oyster Opening Championship warmed up. (I apologize in advance for the sound quality in the latter part of the video. There was a ton of background noise and because I had to stay out of the way of the servers carting stacks of oyster platters out into the main room, I couldn't get the camera close enough to Patrick for the mic to pick up well. If you can make any of it out, he is mainly talking about the different shucking techniques of the various competitors.)

Before the competition began we feasted on a delicious seafood platter that included smoked salmon, baby prawns, some sort of seafood paté, and salad, plus, of course, a plate of six lovely oysters!

The competition is very spirited and pretty intense. Before they start, each competitor must provide a psedonym so that the judges will not know whose platter of 30 oysters is whose. Audience members shout out suggestions, which the MC takes or leaves at his whim. The first round included competitors nicknamed "Obama" and "Clinton." There was a "Michael Jackson" and a "Shakespeare." This is the third and final heat, featuring the Swedish, Canadian, American, and Estonian competitors. Naturally, we were rooting for the Canadian!

Oyster openers get penalties and bonus points for presentation of their opened oysters, which are added on to the time it takes for them to open 30 oysters in order to arrive at the winner. Watch the American in this video -- the way his knife cuts through the oysters makes them look like they are just made of butter. Also watch the Swede -- cool as a cucumber and perfectly focused! He later won for presentation.

Oysters may be the main event this weekend, but of course the Irish love their trad, so there was music and dancing too. I'll leave you with this last clip -- enjoy; we certainly did!

After Galway: WWOOFing in County Sligo for about a week.

PS to Dawn -- we are staying at the Salmon Weir hostel, where you and I and Sean and Heather stayed in Galway 10 years ago! It hasn't changed a bit. :)

Hmmmm.....where to begin?

2009-09-23T15:15:00.000-07:00

Okay, picture this....Sicily. 1929.

Okay, so it's not quite Sofia from "The Golden Girls", but it seems like forever-and-a-day since I was in Toronto and living a "normal" life. Then again, what is normal? I don't know that I'd qualify, that's fer sure.

Let's see, we've gotten married, packed up our one bedroom place and put it into a 12" x 15" storage unit off of Steeles (which we finished doing shortly before leaving before the airport - MANY MANY THANKS TO MARCOS for allowing us to dump some stuff on his porch while he was on Toronto Island basking in his under-60 minutes 10 K run WOOT!!! WOOT!!!), and Jodi's mom and dad took us to the airport. For those of you that know me, you know that I have a lot of stuff. Just stuff. Not necessarily crap, but stuff nonetheless. Somehow (largely due to Jodi!) I managed to pack 4.5 months into a backpack and carry-on.

This includes a supplement (Chondroitin/Glucosamine/MSM) that I take to aid a slight degenerative cervical (neck, not cervix!) vertebrae problem I have, daily allergy pills, two hypertension medications I take (FYI...my pressure was about 121/83 when I saw my doctor last week. Mind you, my doctor also wrote me a script for 3 months with a refill, even though I told him that I was going away for 5 months. MANY MANY thanks are due to the pharmacy staff at the Forest Hill Loblaws for putting together enough to last while we're away.), and all the other stuff I felt I needed. Like Pepto, antacids, Robaxacet Platinum and green tea extract pills (caffeine and apparently they're good for heart health and potentially weight loss).

Traffic on the 401 meant that there was a little bit of stress in the car, but not from me. I just kept my mouth shut (for once!) and we got where we needed to be, when we needed to be there.

I guess I should backtrack, as I've gone a bit too far along in the story. I have been to Italy, and a number of cities in Canada and the U.S. My trip to Italy was in '99 for my friends Sheila and John's wedding, and otherwise I have not left the continent. Jodi has been to several different parts of the world, and of all the countries we'll be going to, she has only not been to Greece and Portugal. Well, she flew into Belfast and then went elsewhere, so North Ireland is going to be new for her too.

A very large part of the backtracking (versus the backpacking) is about my parents. I am who I am in large part owing to them. Not in the traditional sense of nature/nurture, but a little more complicated. I've heard stories about how my parents were as children, teens and young(er) adults, but I haven't seen too much of the wild 'n crazy Bev and Stan that they used to be. One thing I can say with certainty is that my parents are good people who have never really asked for anything from their children. They have given and given their whole lives, or at least my whole life. They didn't finish high school, but they made sure their three children did.

I wasn't the easiest child, teen, young adult, or even now. In fact, at one point my mother told my father to go to the Parent/Teacher interview in junior high, because she didn't want to hear what the teachers had to say. (I know. I'm a teacher.) My father went with me to try and keep from charges being pressed when I was caught giving away free movies to friends at a video store I worked at when I was grade 13 and hoping to get into university. My mother has always had an open door, fridge and wallet, and truth be told I still owe my parents money.

My father hasn't been well the past few years. He turned 80 in June. He almost didn't make to our wedding, and had to leave early to go back to the hospital. He has since been hospitalized again. Saying goodbye to my parents was one of the hardest things I've ever had to do in my life. Much much harder than saying sorry for something(s) or things I've done wrong.

And that has always been hard for me.

Very hard.

Almost as hard as saying, "Thank you" when someone complements me.

So, we got to the airport in time. Going through check-in/customs I was "Lucky #8". Normally, that would be a good thing, since 8 is one of my fave numbers. Thanks to Willie "Pops" Stargell, captain of the 1979 World Series Champion Pittsburgh Pirates. This time I almost got the rubber glove. I was asked if I wanted the random check to be done in a room or in line and I chose in line. I figured if I was going to get a finger in the ass that EVERYONE should see it. No internal exam, it was all external. Jack went through my carry-on and the other fella patted me down. Quite thoroughly, but not near the genitals or butt.

I've flown to five places before this: Dallas, Italy (Rome/Venice), New York, Halifax and Los Angeles, and didn't get on a plane 'til I was 28. We weren't a family vacation sort of family. In fact, we never went on a Kruger 5 vacation that I can remember. We had food on the table, roof over our head and clothes on our back. Not much by way of frills, but we didn't lack for anything. My parents work(ed) hard, and we helped out with chores around the house to make things a little easier for them.

The flight to London on British Airways was GREAT! The food was lovely, and the personal "TV" was grand to pass the time. Dinner was chicken with a wild rice pilaf and I had a couple wee bottles of '07 bordeaux. Which made me think of Paul Taylor. But I digress. Breakfast was not Jodi's favourite, since she doesn't like raisins (nor does Emily or Louie Goodfield) and there was a pineapple/carrot/raisin bread, fat free yogurt (she doesn't much like yogurt or fruit!) and O.J. She had water.

Got into London Monday morning, and headed to our hostel. Only problem with that was that we couldn't check-in until 2:00 and it was 9:00. I wanted a shower, Jodi wanted a nap. We didn't get either one. SO...after a stressful Sunday, and having been up forever, we put our bags in storage and wandered.

Again, for those of you that know me, you know I love to shop. WELL....I LOVE to grocery shop, and I LOVE to shop for Nikes, and I LOVE to shop for a deal. 4.5 months away means that anything I buy has to be consumed, carried or sent somewhere. So I didn't buy anything at Uniqlo or TK Max (TJ Max in the U.S.). I will endeavour to put a picture of the Doc Martens that I fell in love with for 17 Pounds (about $30). Alas. C'est la vie.

We wandered to Kensington Palace and the Gardens there, and then after sitting around, we wandered back to the hostel in Earls Court. Now, remember, I haven't traveled much. My idea of a hostel was something out of "Soldier's Story" with barracks. Lots of bunk beds and not much else. Boy was I wrong. It's quite a nice place. Our double had bunk beds (we're married now!), WiFi and the bathroom/shower was right next door. Anytime I wanted to go use the facilities, it was no problem. In fact, I never saw anyone on our floor.

As we wandered back to the hostel, we encountered Odd Bins. It's a wine/beer seller (liquor too?) and they had Brew Dog, a REALLY fine Scottish beer. I paid $20 CDN for a "Paradox" in Toronto. Here, I got a Trashy Blonde, Punk IPA and "Paradox" (Speyside, whereas I had the Isle of Arran in Toronto) all for about 7 Pounds. $11 maybe. LOVELY!!! Mind you, I drank them out of my stainless steel travel bottle. No drinking fine beer out of the glass bottle for me. Right Roger?

We went off in search of dinner, after our Marks & Spencer (AHHHH....Marks and Sparks from the old days in Toronto and Richmond Hill. When driving to Hillcrest Mall seemed like driving to Guelph) breakfast of a boxed sandwich, crisps (chips) and a "nasty" drink, and our non-existent lunch. We were heading off to Soho, not just because of sort of the gaybourhood in London - remember I'm a HUGE fag hag and Oren did nickname me Gayvid. We were heading there in search of Wagamama. We didn't find it. Jodi almost cried she was so tired and hungry. Oh ya, she was frustrated and we did manage to get in a couple of hours of nap-time after we checked in.

We gave up on Wagamama and instead went looking for Busaba Eathai. John Arvanitis suggested we check it out. Or maybe he suggested we go to Soho and I saw it in a guide book. Regardless, we couldn't find it. So we went to Melati. It's Singaporean, Indonesian and Malaysian and it's REALLY good!

We got back to the room and Jodi passed out.

Short story about day two in London - Simple breakfast at the hostel, Covent Garden, Trafalgar Square, Portrait Gallery, St. Martin's in the Field (and the crypt), lunch at Pret a Manger, talked to the lovely David Shaer on the phone, saw MANY MANY MANY well-dressed (lots of pinstripes!) men and women, Westminster Abbey, took a boat ride/tour on the Thames, Greenwich (Naval Museum....well, took some pictures and Jodi used the loo), had a Scrumpy Jack (Just for you Dan Powell!) and then went to Wagamama in Earls Court. If you get a chance to go to Wagamama, it's worth it.

We packed ourselves up last night, knowing that Ryanair would try to have us "bend over" with their cabin and checked luggage restrictions. We were concerned about costs, and many thanks to Shannon for a great idea. But I had a better one. Buy a larger carry-on bag for 9 Pounds and put some of the heavier stuff from our check luggage into that and it worked! No 15 Pounds/Kg over 15 Kgs, as we were under on all their restrictions.

Took the Tube to Victoria Station, took the National Railroad to Gatwick and found ourselves there VERY early. And for once, it was not of my doing. HA!!! (Jodi.....) So I went through the several hundred shots I took yesterday and we got ourselves on the Ryanair (bargain flight and it worked!) plane and flying to Dublin. Quick flight (about an hour) and I think I got some good shots on the plane. The landing was abrupt and relatively violent, but not traumatic. I'll fly 'em again!

Got a bus/city pass, came to the hostel, checked in, and realized it's not quite as good as the Earls Court hostel, but better in other ways. Much more social and fun, and we've met some good people already. Dan from outside of Ottawa and James from Australia. We got a free beer (6 oz) coupon. For something or other Hooker. Yep, Hooker. Not a call girl, but a boat. Had O'Hara's Stout (LOVELY LOVELY LOVELY!!!) at the Bull & Castle and then went off in search of The Market Bar.

I'll say this. If you come to Dublin, it's TOTALLY worth going to the Market Bar. For the food, if nothing else. Nice space, spotty service, but the food was TOP NOTCH!!! Chicken breast on greens, fish stew from heaven (creme fraiche is my new turn-on) and a lovely bowl of mussels.

Speaking of mussels, I think my biceps are getting bigger in my old age. I also think that I'm getting too much hair on my stomach. Jodi said I should wax it. I just might.

So, I've gone on WAY too long, and I'll sign off for now. I suspect that I'll get some help from the Mrs. on the tech front to upload pictures.

Several more adventures still to come. Oh ya, I've now gone through three duty free opportunities and have not bought anything.

Believe it or not.

Slainte.

Last Day in Canada

2009-09-21T06:24:00.000-07:00

We made it!

Well, to the airport at least, as I write this (it will have been posted after the fact, since I'm not willing to pay $10 for 40 minutes of internet access).

It was definitely down to the wire as David and I raced around Toronto running last-minute errands. Still carting stuff to storage just hours before we were due to leave for the airport, we left apartment 605 in our little building for the last time. Look how empty it is!

Strangely, when we started to empty it, it seemed to look bigger, but fully emptied out, it appears pretty small after all. It's hard to believe that the two of us – and all our stuff! – lived here for three years. It's also hard to believe we managed to cram the entire lot into a 12x15' storage unit. There was just enough room. David performed a few minor miracles finding the last few nooks and crannies for the final carload.

Now, our lives have narrowed to just two packs and a couple of daypacks.

And, of course, those same lives have broadened to twenty-one weeks of new places to explore!

Snee Farm

2009-09-17T20:35:00.000-07:00

Hey folks, just like in real life, my blogs won't be as pretty as Jodi's.

We have a confirmed location for the first stop on the farming adventure. Snee Farm.

We run a small-holding in an isolated area at the foot of the Ox-Mountains. We mainly specialize in Pigs and Bees, but keep a vast variety of other animals like cows, a Pony, Chickens, Ducks and Geese and many more. We bought our house two years ago in a derelict stage and are busy with the finishing touches. We grow our own vegetables, cut our own Turf for heating in the winter, kill our own animals at times and, if time allows, spin wool, make baskets and definitely preserve our veg and fruit. We also make our own wine. During the winter (if the cow won't let us down) we'll make butter and cheese. Work with us can be hectic and we work and play hard, but if you're easy going, motivated and don't mind work, you'll have a good time at " Snee ". Unfortunately we won't accommodate vegetarians, but let's face it, this is mainly a Pig farm. If you like to stay and work with us please send applications straight to our E-mail or phone us. We simply haven't got the time to access your mail through another website. Thank you

Brian Jackson & Elona Ambrey.

I think I'll slaughter my meal.

First official days of no school

2009-09-12T21:51:00.000-07:00

On September 8th and 9th, instead of heading back to school with the rest of the world, we took a "mini-honeymoon" in Niagara-on-the-Lake and Stratford. Yes, we did purposely time it to co-incide with the first day of school. :)

Thanks to a wonderful gift from my department, it couldn't have been a more perfect experience. We stayed at a friend's lovely guest cottage, Wisteria House, and we had perfect weather. The Zoom Leisure bike tour of the historic old town and three wineries was idyllic, and it certainly is fun wobbling along the bike trails with just a *wee* bit of wine running through your system! :D

We visited three wineries: Lailey, Reif, and Jackson-Triggs (basically, small, medium and large), and, in addition to some excellent whites and quite good reds, got to sample quite a bit of the local ice-wine, which is world-renowned. The Jackson-Triggs tour also included a brief foray into their vineyards, through their fermenting facility, and down into their cellars, where they often hold wine-pairing dinners amongst the oak barrels.

Dinner at the Charles Inn was delicious: we shared a gazpacho that has inspired David to attempt his own; I had pan-seared salmon over pureed spinach with a wild mushroom tartlet that was to die for; David had halibut in a nice gingery broth; and we finished everything off with a trio of fantastic Quebec cheeses.

Our cottage-owning friend had recommended we ask them to seat us at a "special" table (not sure what she had in mind, but ours gave us a nice view of the sunset over my shoulder. We were also highly entertained by the bizarre conversation of the couple at the next table -- the woman seemed to feel it necessary to read the entire menu aloud to her husband, and to repeat to him everything the server said) and because we had mentioned that we were on our honeymoon, they presented us with a local sparkling wine from Konzelmann that chased our three courses of excellent food down with a little extra something.

The next day, we spent a bit more time visiting market stands and wineries on our own time. Southbrook has a gorgeous facility designed by the same architect who designed the new opera house in Toronto. They also make a spectacular framboise dessert wine. Konzelmann (they of the great sparkling) has vineyards that overlook the lake, making for a most picturesque setting.

Feeling a bit odd every time we saw kids being dropped off by their schoolbusses, we took the long road on secondary highways to Stratford to see West Side Story. Since David's not a fan of musicals, this was a bit of a coup for me, but the show was fabulous, so he couldn't complain. I seriously highly recommend seeing it if you can get down there before it closes!

Thanks so much to my department for such a thoughtful and amazingly apropos gift! It was the perfect way to kick off our year-off travels.

Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.

Preparing to get lost

2009-09-06T14:17:00.000-07:00

For the past few days we have been working hard at getting ready to sell our place.

This involves some serious de-cluttering, minor repairs, painting, and packing everything we own into storage.

It's amazing how much crap you can fit into a 650 sq ft apartment without even trying. We've rented a storage unit that's somewhere between 150 and 200 sq ft, and it's almost packed to the rafters. Teetering towers of boxes, clothing vacuum-sealed bags, furniture. Pots and pans, towels, winter coats. Our mattress and boxspring, our sofa, our dining room table.

Yeah, you read that right. We don't have any "real" furniture in our place anymore. We pulled the mattress from the pull-out sofa, topped it with an air mattress, and hauled the camping chairs up from the downstairs storage. Add a couple of milk crates, and we're camping out in our own apartment! Here's David waving from amidst the chaos:

Every time we come back from storage, we're somehow faced with still more stuff. Though I have to admit that what you can see in the photo is about half of what's left, so I guess that's a good thing.

There's literally nothing at all in the bedroom except, now, painting supplies, and a few lonely items of clothing hanging in the closet.

Other things we've been busy with in getting the apartment ready: meeting with the real estate agent, eating what's left in the fridge and deep-freezer, and ripping up carpet to reveal quite lovely parquet underneath (and I'm not a huge fan of parquet):

And today we primed and painted the bedroom. If we can get it emptied out some more, we can tackle the main room starting tomorrow.

On the travel front, we've been doing some planning too. We've been contacting WWOOF hosts in Ireland, and so far haven't had much luck -- who knew autumn was such a popular WWOOF season in Ireland? Almost everyone who's gotten back to us (and we've contacted about 20 hosts so far) is full up through October. We did have one recommendation that we're waiting to hear back about, friends of one of the full hosts, and another host who contacted us today with an offer based on our posting our availability to the noticeboard.

Based on how difficult it's been to secure a host in Ireland, we've started looking at hosts in France earlier than we'd planned to. I'm hoping we can find something in the south of France, where November and December are harvest season for things like olives. Fingers crossed!

Image by Vincent Ma via Flickr

This week we head to Niagara-on-the-Lake to take advantage of my department's lovely wedding gift -- a stay at Wisteria House, dinner at the Charles Inn, and a biking wine tour of Niagara wineries! The following day we're off to see West Side Story at Stratford. Good way to start our non-school year!

posted by Jodi