Toledo. Last December I took a one-day trip to Toledo while I was visiting friends in Madrid for Christmas. This little town on the Tajo River is one of my favorite places in the world. I love the quality of the light, which is that way all throughout the region {Castilla La Mancha}. (Read More)
biking with flowers
A few days ago, I played Mr. Rogers and got to know some folks from my neighborhood. I got to know Helen. Helen lives in Columbia Heights. She’s a native Washingtonian. I meet so few people who are native Washingtonians. It seems everyone comes to this city to get into politics or somewhere near it. Because the political dominates the professional (Read More)
london travel photo essay is live!
Good morning Thrill-seekers,
I’ve wrapped the best of the London posts into a photo essay! For all Anglophiles and those of who are swift of feet and may head there soon! Tips and tricks to do London on the cheap, included. Check it out. Let me know what you think. (Read More)
almost too hot
My brother, whose idea of fun is fishing quietly on a lake, has steel nerves. He will never pay anyone to hang him upside down in a silk hammock to meditate. He also has pretty sharp ideas for a 12-year-old. He told me “it’s all about determination and fear.” (Read More)
Best of London: Lost in Translation
Abeno. Japanese restaurant. It’s raining. We’re famished. Good enough.
It’s tightly packed at the front since several parties are waiting for tables. We look at the menu but it’s all Japanese to us. We have no idea what Okonomiyaki is but it sounds different and we aren’t sure if it is the kind of different we want to be familiar. We mull over our options (Read More)
Best of London: Pub Crawl
I’ve done the wine country in Napa, California and I’ve eaten with people who would swear they cannot digest without half a glass of red Rioja {Spaniards}. But I’d never met foodie fananics like Dick and Molly.
I met Dick and Molly in Pizzeria Paradiso in DC. This place is not your usual grease-in-a-box joint. It has greater aspirations than to feed (Read More)
Musical Transport: Lira
Music is often the first portal into a new country for me. It’s how I first learned English. {Thanks to Mariah Carey and Whitney Houston who articulated well in the 1990s}
I would like to get to Africa, Nigeria and South Africa in particular, sometime in the future. But until then there is music. I love the transporting power of music. I love that (Read More)
Best of London: Souvenirs
We do not remember days; we remember moments. ~ Cesare Pavese, The Burning Brand
When I travel, I don’t buy postcards. I photograph everything until I am sated or my fingers cramp up. I like souvenirs that will remind me of specific moments on the trip. I like to buy gifts I’ll use every day that way I have those memories with me all the time. The (Read More)
Best of London: Getting Schooled
There is a traveler who goes to another country armed with distrust and pepper spray. He is sure these people, his hosts, are waiting on the other side of customs to fleece him of all his belongings and dignity. So he takes friendliness as connivance, and invitation as entrapment. He spends all his time with people like himself, fearful travelers who’ve (Read More)
Best of London: Books
The other day I took a pen and notebook and sat down to write. I sat down on the couch, bereft of computer and Pandora playlist and tried to write out my thoughts deliberately in quietude. But, it was hard.
I saw that my handwriting was not my handwriting. Or at least what I remembered it to be. It was some ugly scrawl, that looked like footprints you (Read More)
Best of London: Hyde Park
I went to visit the famous Hyde Park the day before I left London. I don’t remember that day so well because I was in a veiled space, wrapped in the muslin of my thoughts. I wanted to reach out to people but I didn’t want to talk. Maybe it’s because I was about to leave the city the next day and I wanted to be quiet so as to absorb and take all (Read More)
Best of London: Portobello Market
The Market is a feast for the eyes! You can buy anything here. I wouldn’t be surprised if someone had a license to sell dogs, or Britain’s third favorite pet, rabbits, in the market.
Portobello Market had the friendly atmosphere of a place where you could come to get to know the vendors (and even ask them to look out for a specific piece for you!). You (Read More)
