London Town

In the weeks leading up to my trip to London, I constructed a perfectly concise image of what the city of all my books would look like.  There would be cobblestones, like Paris.  There would be parks, like Paris.  Palaces and castles, museums and cafes, my imaginings were of an ancient city dubbed in English for my listening pleasure.  To my immense surprise, this wasn’t the case.  Whereas France has strict laws about where modern buildings can spring up, London as a melange of the old and new, with18th century brick pubs perched inside gleaming glass monstrosities housing Mango and Starbucks.

My wanderings didn’t bring me to any famed street names, but the palaces were real.  Coming up from the Underground station, you can see castles and parks spreading before you.  On my first few hours alone in the city, I found Buckingham Palace and the adjoining green space.  From there, in the distance, I could see the London Eye framed by trees, a swan in the foreground.  

When I found the walk along the river, near the Tate and the Globe, I fell in love with a city I had only found tolerable before.  Away from the Westminster queues and Covent Garden crowds, there were ancient ships afloat in locks and newer ships à la Steampunk hidden inside shopping malls.  And always, just in sight and just out of sight, all around, there were the pubs.  Comforting in their branded similarity, the menus were the same and the silverware always brought to the table in pewter cups.  There was Guinness for Pepe and prosecco for me, with chips or nachos or fried fish, depending on our mood.

The best moments of the trip were not passing by the must sees, exploring the crypt of St. Paul’s or taking in Tower Bridge.  The best times were taking the overground out of the city proper and into Greenwich, where we climbed a hill to the Royal Observatory and listened to Neil de Grasse Tyson explain dark energy and matter or the surprise of finding “real” bacon at The Swan.  Sitting through Measure for Measure wrapped in a coat and seated on hard benches was as enjoyable as a dinner at Nobu and champagne cocktails.  Eating Italian with the “family” was better than any double-decker bus tour could have been.  As always, it wasn’t the place that made the trip, but rather the company, long conversations, and endless card games sheepishly played at pub counters.  

Even the grey weather didn’t dampen the visit.  In truth, it only reminded me more of Januarys in Paris and falling in love.  The modernity of London is overwhelming in a way that I was unprepared for in Europe.  In Paris and Grenoble and Turin, the modern exists, but separately, lending a charm to the everyday.  London’s patchwork makeup lends another mystique.  Rather than revering the past, the city flaunts her new appearance her ancient bits melding with her glass and steel exterior.

On Flight

I often try to fly, forgetting I don’t have wings.  Eyes closed, next to an open window, soaring downhill on a bicycle, the necessity of feathers fades away, as the wind picks apart individual hairs and invites them to dance.  I could attempt a flap, I could perhaps take off, if I found a high enough perch, but the angers of reality keep me grounded.

*******

On the floating bridge, I look at the roils beneath.  I can feel the unstable bounds of earth quivering.  For a moment, I want to dive low, like Javert, to feel weightlessness, then a cold press.  I can not.  The consequences of being unable to soar up, after diving down, are too grim.

*******

In dreams, flight is not the same.  There, in the misty confusion, it is always a sort of float.  You are a leaf caught in the wind, not a magician.

There is something much more appealing to the thought of hollow bones pounding through the air, defying gravity, choosing when and how.

Of feathers spread wide to feel a warm up current.

Of the ground growing closer and farther at your command, rising and falling.

You become the wind.  You create it.

As a group, we have conquered flight, but not in the proper way.  Not in the way that catches your breath and causes you to laugh at the beauty.

We have discovered the flight of a lumbering beetle.  Powerful, but without grace.  Heavy and confined.

Until my bones melt away from the interior, and my downed arms grow into colorful appendages, the perfection of flight will escape me, and I will be unable to escape the crushing earth.  

English Afternoons

Once a week I while away my afternoons under the old fort of Grenoble, the Bastille.  Sitting in the shade of the Café Cymaise, bordered on one side by the river, the part that roils and turns under a pedestrian suspension bridge, I listen.  To the other side is the old Italian quarter, always noisy with the bike tires rolling over cobblestones.  A single street squeezed on both sides by 5 story residential buildings leads through the shadows of a street that only sees light at midday.  Continuing, I would reach the crypte of Saint Laurent, a Romanesque church like any other on the outside, a catacombs on the inside, emptied of pews and open to the bones underneath.

{photo credit}

But I’m not often at the crypte.  I am at the café overlooking the river, in the shadow of a mountain, discussing life with my English student protégé Denis.  Seventy years old, yet as spry as many forty year olds I’ve seen in the US, Denis talks about his mountain biking trips, the badger in his garden, and paragliding.  

We found each other online, on the French version of Craigslist.  He was looking for an English teacher, as his former one had left town.  In preparations for a summer trip to Wales, he suggested weekly meetings.  Since the first meeting, we have gone through several cafés, but no matter the location, our two hours always goes the same way.  Denis is prepared for conversation.  He opens his notebook, full of questions — or his current favorite, English insults.  We spend a few minutes discussing the week, perhaps a David Sedaris book, then turn to his notes.  When conversational fodder diminishes, we go to the topic that calls to us both, our preferred interest in life.  It’s not our families, though we do often talk about them.  No, these favorite conversations always revolve around food.  

We are both avid foodies and constantly discuss kitchen terminology and traditionally anglo-saxon meals.  Twice now we have taken cooking classes together.  The singular moment from the sessions : whilst making a communal bowl of melon soup, with the other 3 students, our instructor told me to add a bit of port to the mixture… Only I failed to understand the French word she was using.  I mimicked a movement and threw in a huge glug.  Even as the port was flowing, the mouths of  those around me opened wider than a split cantaloupe.  Needless to say, I was taken off any duties that required adding “to taste” after that incident.

Denis and I talk a lot about macarons.  He’ll mention the best macaronier in town, which I will subsequently visit.  Our second cooking class together was the art of macarons.  Before the class, I had tried to create them myself… an utter failure.  In class, the success was resounding.  I marcroned perfect circles, even sized evenly placed, I filled them with chocolate chantilly, and I ate the bites of heaven.  I haven’t tried on my own, but Denis has… and his latest batch will be ready for a taste test for our meeting next Tuesday.

On Travel : Inspired by the Vatican Museum

Soon, I will go into the accolades about the two weeks I spent roaming with family, but I need a while to let it all sink in, to form the memories into what they will be.  It is a thankless task, reviewing photos and erasing the least desirable aspects surrounding that moment of that day.

The following I wrote during the second day of my trip.  Completely disillusioned with everything surrounding me, I tried to battle the wonder of what I should feel with the distaste in my mouth.

I promise though, good stories are coming, after this rant...

Ramblings from 12 June 2015

The loss of wonder frightens more than the disappearance of innocence.  

When the vast creation of manly creations fails to interest, a part of humanity is lost. 

Trying to combat the jade doesn't work. I've tried. I stumble through the most beautiful museums of the world, only to find myself complaining, hating. 

No, the issue lies not with a lack of enthusiasm but the crush of others sucking it away. Crowded through hallways, restlessly pushed onwards, I am unable to take pleasure in the glories. 

The pace forbids discovery. The drone of a guide suppresses the possibility of a musical accompaniment. I will not remember these steps through the Vatican.

I have associated notes with other art, with corridors, with marble. Recalled to mind in innocuous moments, the memory continues unabated years after the shadows faded in the winding halls of the Musée du Louvre. When did the light turn to orange as a band of horses stomped? 

The guilt of the Catholic Church sinks into my discontent as I wonder about the morality of critiquing an experience while I am still shuffling through it. 

Even the security rushes you, presses you closer to a sacred chapel defamed by an irreverent populace. The idea of holy no longer shimmers through the air here, only the stale stench of hundreds together. 

In a corner of solitude, a surly tourist explains he has not taken a photo. The guard knows otherwise, and forces the man to follow to an unknown.  The solitude becomes  complete as I exchange the chatter for music. Next to me are fellow seekers of solitude. We smile to each other, but I am the only one who stays.  One by one, the others leave.  They smile at friends, at humans who look like them in tennis shoes and fanny packs.    

The foulard on a stick, held by my cattle herder is within sight now. I'm watching it pass. I know I must follow and be crowded once more against the ever angering sea of skin.

Later, I realize that the creation of the universe, God’s touch to man, was within my sight.  I didn’t notice it through the tousled head.  I did take note of the benches though.  I did wonder how the leaders of a billion people fit comfortably into this room.

Spa Day : QC Termetorino

I recently returned to Italy for spring break, my first time back since January.  The visit has sparked a dose of envy for a life that isn’t mine.  I love my little home in France, my roommates, my life.  But this crystalline apartment remains a bastion of peace.  It glows, as does my life here.  As always, a cloud surrounds me here, carrying me away to a simpler world.  

A taste of the terrace / An obsession with food porn {Photo Credit}

Friday night, walking home from a pub, I pulled Pepe into a corridor I had seen a hundred times before.  The building is imposing, old and impeccably kept.  QC Terme.  That was all that was written on the sign.

A Google search showed me my near future.  QC Terme was a day spa.  After watching their promotional video, I was hooked.

1. There were napping rooms.  Half a dozen of them, spread across the old bath house grounds.  There were rooms with water beds, rooms with swings, rooms with blob pillows dotted along the ground.
2. There were indoor and outdoor Jacuzzis and a waterfall.
3. Chocolate was included in the entrance price.  A chocolate experience.  Local hazelnuts mixed with dark chocolate.  Strawberries to by dipped, pineapple to be covered.  

Obviously, there was no option but to go.

Waking up early the day of, I pulled on cutoffs and a t-shirt and filled a borrowed bag with books and a bathing suit.  Out the door, I was skipping.  Inside the building, I began poking around.  My wrist was encircled by a wrist band and we wandered downstairs for our robes and flip flops.

Ensconced in a calf length (on me at least) swathing of white kimono and only slightly shocked by the brave regulars changing in the open air, I wandered out to the start of a wellness adventure.  We started by exploring, noting the reactive pool, the turkish bath, and presumably the reserved area for special treatments.  The next story led to the café, the massage room, and the terrace.  Up again were the aforementioned napping areas and higher still were saunas.

The warmth of the day called us outside, for an hour of relaxing jacuzzi time before a light lunch.  The magic of the water napping room lolled us to sleep on a rolling bed hidden in a dimmed room.

Somehow, eight, nine hours passed in a moment.  I devoured Perfume, an odiferous story that seemed proper considering the smells surrounding me.  I rubbed mud on my face, tingling cream on my legs, salt over my body.  I discovered that the reserved section wasn’t reserved at all, but a continuation of the experience.  I felt the force of water pressing into my shoulders, the cleansing heat of a sauna purging away my worries.  I forgot about the papers to write, the things to be accomplished, and realized the calm that shavasana normally brings.

Chocolate from QC Termetorino {Photo Credit}

A daze of comfort surrounded me, egged on by cups of sparkling wine and chocolate covered strawberries, by blood orange juice and bits of mozzarella.  As the sun set and the day disappeared, we made childish plans to never leave, to stay in the peaceful courtyard, stretched out over the grass next to the pools for days to come.

To QC Terme, I have a few simple words : Until Friday my friend.  Your perfumed oils are already carrying me back.

A Venetian Weekend: Part 2

Burgundy tapestries and gold-painted trim adorned the ebony skeleton of the gondola.  Four pillows made a perch at the front.  Two stools balanced next to the low sides.  The boat was sumptuous in colors, surprising in length, but touristic.  Ours nestled into the dock areas, next to dozens of others.  Together they bobbed in full sight of every group of attentive city goers that passed.  The visitors couldn’t see the boats over the insistence of the person shouting history and theatrically sighing in the direction of the Ponte dei Sospiri.

As lunch drew closer,  the gondoliers lost interest in attracting potential clients.  Instead, hats folded over eyes and the waves rocked the world into a doze.  When roused later, the men began talking.  They greeted each other by name as there boats stilled in the currents.  As they uncoiled ropes and pushed off, the murmuring voices became sharp whistles and hees that carried around sharp corners, announcing their arrival long before the bows could meet.  In all of the noise surrounding us as we tripped into the boat, there was no singing.

I had imagined singing, as I always do when I am confronted with Italy.  A kitsch “When the moon hits your eye” bellowing deep from the belly of the striped man dancing with his pole would have sufficed.  My normal preference for “O Sole Mio" was too heavy to balance here.  Pizza pie was an easier thought, more palpable than an opera.

As we passed others like us, I thought of the sexism of gondoliers.  There must be hundreds of them in Venice, weaving around as the canals narrow, floating up and down with the tide, scraping against barnacles— but not a single woman was to be found on the back of the boat.  Men texted as they pushed.  Men wore Northface.  Men shouted at each other over the water.  But women were non-existant.  Was the work so arduous?  It couldn’t be.  I chalked it up to the stereotypical Italian sexism.  Only, stereotype is the four-letter word of academics.

Leaning back on the cushion, I tried to forget the word.  A boat passed to the left of ours.  The striped man was there, a mirror of our own, but there was another as well.  A man tapping at his accordion with vigor and singing to the six tourists squished along the edges.  We glided by too quickly to hear what song was playing.  It wasn’t the one I had imagined.  It wasn’t “In the Jungle” either, which I had heard earlier from a rowdy group of Americans overflowing to boats.  Like always, the accordion sounded like Paris.  Like metro rides and quayside walks.  Like full-sized cups of espresso and open space.

A Venetian Weekend: Part 1

Every time I enter a new city, I expect the glamour to be immediate.  I imagine an artist waiting for me at Charles de Gaulle a pastel-covered canvas under her left arm, her right extended toward me, beckoning.  In Rio, an entire a samba school dances toward me, quivering their feathers as they pull me into the melee.  In this world, my first steps into the city are straight from the concourse to the quais and beaches.  

Only, it is never like this.  I fly into a city and see the poverty of the surrounding areas, then the pseudo-location of the airport itself surrounds me.  I am in a queue with hundreds of others as I wait for my baggage to make an appearance on the slowly turning belt.

No matter where the final destination is, the transit between airplane and city drains the imagination.   As the graffiti thickens and the potholes widen, the allure of the city disappears, and I become cynical of the very idea of traveling.

Venice was the same.  I arrived after an hour bus ride to the Lyon airport, an hour wait (and delayed boarding), an 80 minute flight, then a twenty minute bus ride.  The limbo of between was overwhelming, more so than the terrestrial change from mountains to seaside.  Before I could lose myself in the wandering streets, I saw the industrial power plants, canal covered farmland, and crawling barges.  Before I experienced a gondola, I became car sick in a bus as it wound around the suburbs.    

   

Then though, then I was met by the city, more welcoming than any artist.  The first bridge engulfed me and the canals began to flow.  Despite the press of others, the footpaths became mine.  The people took wider paths, as my own narrowed until outstretched fingers brushed the walls of two embracing buildings, forever leaning closer to each other.  In the sinking sunlight, the cobblestones shone.  Pheasants sang from inside the cloistered churchyard gardens.

As the sacred bells began to ring, I stood enthralled.  Venice came alive, as one tower then another beckoned in the coming evening in a cacophonous medley of different times.  Five minutes separated the first note from the last one.  

Time there, was a notion different than in other places.  It was fluid.  Exactitude is of no import in a city of tides.  Dinner reservations could bend and morning plans change.  The bells would continue in their own way, without acknowledging the seeming certitude of the hour.

As the final noises faded, I crossed the last bridge of the afternoon and I entered into my two day home, another pseudo-place I could have found in any quaint city the world over.  I was greeted in English.  A British couple was next to me.  The warmth and glass doors separated me from the closeness of Venice.  Fifteen minutes later, when the bells should have begun again, I couldn’t hear through the thick walls of the hotel foyer.  Inside, you couldn’t see the disappearing gold of the sun either.