Wednesday, August 24, 2011

Gracias. And adios.


NOTE:  It’s been 8 days since I wrote the entry below.  I don’t know why I haven’t posted it yet.   Maybe the end of the blog signals the end of my adventure.  And I don’t like saying goodbye.  But it’s time.

* * *

Our departure from Barcelona was not without drama.  One last “Clasico” last night as Barca played Real Madrid in Bernabeu Stadium; a lackluster start by Barca that ended with a 2-2 tie—a fine result given that they will play in Camp Nou on Wednesday.  We’ll be watching from our living room in Brooklyn.  I went to bed just after Villa’s magnificent goal after an assist by Messi, knowing that today would be a long day, and I never sleep on airplanes.

We ordered a taxi for 6 am, and set our alarm clock for 5.  Our duffel bags were at the door and ready to go, piled up like so many sleeping giants.  We started to load the luggage into the elevator at about 10 minutes before 6—much more organized and calm than usual, for us.  Alec had turned from the elevator into the apartment to grab another bag when the elevator doors started to close.  He called for me to hold them open and I lunged for the door.  The back of my pants caught on the latch and I heard the ripping sound before I could stop.  Neither did I get to the elevator in time.

The doors closed, so I pressed the button to get them to open again.  They did not.  We could see the elevator from the side of the shaft, and it was not moving.  Alec raced down the 5 flights to the lobby to see if he could get it to descend, but it did not.  The elevator was stuck, with three pieces of our luggage inside.  The taxi arrived.  I woke up Laura to see whether the building had a super living there; no luck.  I went down to explain what was going on to the taxi driver, who volunteered to call the fire department.  By that time Laura had woken John, who was helping Alec bring the rest of our bags down. We figured we would just go to the airport and have them send the imprisoned bags later.

And then, miraculously, the elevator started to move.  It went down to the ground floor, and the doors opened.  We quickly removed our bags, but I did not get back in that elevator.  We had had the kids sleep half-dressed, so they were still groggy as we walked down the stairs together.  Milo rubbed his eyes, took my hand and said, “Mama, I’m kind of excited about going to New York, but also kind of sad about leaving Barcelona.”  “I know exactly how you feel, Milo,” I replied.  Exactly.

Everything else went smoothly—our flight to Geneva left and arrived on time, and we boarded our flight to JFK without a hitch.  The kids think we are in first class because they have their own personal video screens, and there is an ample supply of kids’ videos.  We land in New York this afternoon.  Alec’s brother, Nick, who drove us to the airport 13 months ago, will pick us up and bring us home.

As we fly over the Atlantic, increasing our distance from Barcelona and shortening the space between ourselves and New York, it seems right to end this blog.  I didn’t plan to write a blog—it was the answer to the problem of how to keep in touch with family and friends when so much was happening.  I sat down in the office one day during that first couple of weeks, surrounded by boxes, and thought—“Maybe I should start a blog—it can’t be that hard.”  A few clicks later and the blog was created, and I was on my way to writing my first post.

It didn’t take me long to realize that what I had initiated for other people fulfilled me as well.  I hadn’t written much besides emails and memos for the two years prior to our departure for Spain, and writing the blog made me remember how much I liked writing, and not just academic writing.  I started carrying a camera to capture the “photo of the day.”  And I paid a different kind of attention to my surroundings and my experiences because I wanted to be able to describe it all later.

Sitting out on John and Laura’s terrace the other night, Laura asked me what was the most important thing I had gotten out of this year in Barcelona.  I thought for a moment—but not too long—and answered, “Slowing down.”  I am one of the most productive people I know, but the truth is, I am a whole lot happier when I have less on my plate.  Slowing down does not come naturally to me.  Having a year of sabbatical in which I had no deadlines, no set meetings, and no concrete deliverables certainly helped.  And being in Barcelona—where the culture is much more about working to live than living to work, as it is in New York—provided the perfect context for my adventure in doing less.  I never received an email from a work colleague after 7 pm.  No one I know in Barcelona takes work home on the weekend.  Preparing a meal and sharing it with friends is a valid way to spend a day or evening.

Although I rose to the challenge of doing less this past year, I know the real challenge is about to begin.  In one week, I have my first faculty meeting.  The world in which I live in New York does not support the kind of life I learned to live this past year—New York is a powerful drug for a task junkie like me.  I have no doubt that I will ramp it up some—it would be hard not to.  But I’ll do my best to hold onto the calm, and practice what I’ve learned until my new habits become more, well . . . habitual.

There’s much more, of course, but if you’ve read this blog at all regularly, you know it by now.  I hope you’ve enjoyed following my adventures.  It’s been fun to live them and satisfying to write about them.

When I first started learning Spanish, in Guatemala nearly 20 years ago, I would sit in a church courtyard with my teacher, a middle-aged woman who would chatter on and on while I tried to follow her stories and reply appropriately.  It seemed as though every tale was sprinkled liberally with her saying “Gracias, Adios.  Gracias, Adios.  I couldn’t figure out why.  Finally, I asked the family I was staying with.  “Why is everyone always saying “Thank you, goodbye?” in the middle of their stories?”  The mother laughed and said, “It’s not “thank you, goodbye” they’re saying.  It’s “thank God!—Gracias a Dios.”  Too funny. I still think of that when I hear someone say it.  And so, dear reader, to you I say,  Gracias. And adios.

Sunday, August 14, 2011

Back to BCN


42 days, 5 countries, 8 ferries, 5,237 kilometers and 15 beds later, we are back in Barcelona.  We arrived on Thursday evening after two long days of driving.  Our friends Jon and Laura, who recently moved here for their own magical year, were kind enough to let us stay with them in their fabulous Barri Gotic apartment.  Their kids, Django and Xara, get along terrifically with ours, so it’s a good match.  Perhaps foreseeing the chaos we would trail in our wake, they left on Friday morning for a couple of days in Mont Blanc.  By the time they get back this afternoon, all should be ship shape.

Since we arrived, Alec has sold our car, closed our bank accounts, shut down our cell phones, and retrieved the luggage we stored at the movers’.  I did mountains of laundry and took the kids to the zoo.  Fearing that we would be over the weight limit with our luggage and wanting to avoid the nasty airport charges, Alec bought a luggage scale.  It is Sunday morning and nearly every bag is very close to the 23 kilo maximum. 

I took a break from the packing yesterday afternoon to meet my friend Isabel for one last trip to the baths.  It was roasting outside so I wasn’t sure if sitting in a steam room would be the right call, but somehow it was perfect—we spent more time than usual in the icy cold plunge.  I could feel my body temperature dropping, dropping, dropping.  We went for a cava in the Born afterwards and said so long, for now.  She is a good friend.

Meanwhile, Alec took the kids to the Museum of the Mammoth, which is right in this neighborhood and where we have never been.  They loved it.  Then it was more packing and organizing until bedtime.

Today we are headed to the Mies van der Rohe pavilion on Montjuic—one of those places we never managed to get to in a whole year.  Then dinner with Laura and Jon, and then, hopefully, an early bedtime—we have to be at the airport by 7 am for the long flight home.

Friday, August 12, 2011

That's A Moray!


One more thing about Venice.  It’s one of those places where there are sufficient numbers of tourists to support a market for wandering accordion players.  They stand on the fringe of the seating area, play for awhile, and then come in and pass the hat.  They all seem to play from the same songbook—Volare, the theme from The Godfather.  C.C., little biologist that she is, got confused upon listening to the lyrics of That’s Amore.  “Mama, why is that man singing about moray eels, and what does it have to do with the moon hitting your eye like a pizza pie?”

Wednesday, August 10, 2011

Venice!


Arriving in Venice by boat is pretty fantastic.  We began to enter the canal sometime after 8 am on Sunday, and we all went up on deck to get our first glimpse of the city.  It is a beautiful approach—I felt as though I was floating into a Renaissance painting.

A young man from our hotel met us at Piazzale Roma and walked the kids and I to our room with our luggage, while Alec went to park the car.  He ended up getting lost, and nearly two hours had transpired by the time he got back.  Which meant it was time for lunch. 

I had read about a place to get really good pizza, and it seemed like a reasonably close walk, but then again we had never walked in Venice before.  It is incredibly easy to get turned around, so what should have been a 10 minute walk ended up being closer to a half hour.  It was super hot, and after many promises that we were “really close” which turned out not to be true, Milo finally sat down in the middle of the street and announced that he would not walk another step.  Fortunately there are no cars in Venice, so while his move was dramatic, it was not dangerous.  It turned out that he had staged his sit in a mere block from the restaurant, so we were able to cajole him from his position to a seat at the table.  A big glass of water and a few bites of bread revived him.

Aside from the absence of cars, which means much easier walking with the kids as well as no vehicular noise and pollution, the best thing about Venice is that the canals are everywhere.  And canals, as we quickly learned, are instant entertainment. On our very first walk to our hotel, C.C. and Milo had discovered crabs in the canal.  It is nearly impossible to go to a restaurant that is not right next to a canal, so our kids spent the majority of every meal emptying our bread basket and feeding the fish and crabs.  It worked for all of us.

We spent most of that first day in the general vicinity of our hotel—walking punctuated by stops for meals and gelato breaks.  Venice really is an enchanting city.  But it also feels more than a little unreal.  Virtually everyone on the street is carrying a map of the city, and you are much more likely to hear people speaking English, German, or French than Italian.  The population of Venice has been declining and is currently about 60,000—not very big at all.  And, 15 million tourists visit every year.  I don’t know what the tourist/resident ratio is for other cities, but I would be willing to bet that Venice’s is very high.  Walking around, you don’t see much of the stuff of real life—grocery stores and hardware stores, doctor’s offices and schools.

On Monday we decided to brave the crowds at Piazza San Marco.  I had read on one website about visiting Venice with kids that a Magic Treehouse book takes place there, so I had downloaded onto C.C.’s Kindle and read it to them.  I had hoped I had read my last Magic Treehouse book—they are beyond formulaic.  But it turned out to be a good move because the book features the clock tower and the Doge’s Palace—it may have been hard to get our kids to get excited about sightseeing without the motivation the story provided.

We started out at the basilica—we had gotten tickets online so were able to walk right in.  Well, almost right in.  I was stopped because my sleeveless dress failed to cover me up sufficiently.  It’s a nice dress, really, but I guess there just wasn’t enough of it. The lack of sleeves and the fact that it did not reach my knees obliged me to plunk down 2 euros for a wine colored disposable “cape” and a clashing rust colored square to tie around my waist, sarong style.  I am quite certain that these items were actually disposable tablecloths—a smaller one for my shoulders and a larger size for my legs.  Many of the other female visitors were wearing tank tops, but most were magically pulling scarves and shawls out of their bags to cover their shoulders.  Somehow I missed the memo.

The kids hung in pretty well—they were fascinated by the jewels in the Pall D’oro and the remains of one of the saints—anything involving bones goes over pretty big with them.  They are also quite convinced that the white-robed priest they saw crossing the sanctuary was the pope.  It all started on our first ferry to Croatia.  It seems that the pope rode one of the ferry line’s boats, and the boats all feature a photo of the pope disembarking and waving.  Ever since then the kids think they see popes everywhere, and I can’t seem to get them to understand that there is only one pope, and that he is unlikely to be walking around the streets of Greece, or wherever we happen to be.

As you walk around the basilica, for which entry is free, you have the option to plunk down 4 euros here and 4 euros there to see the chalice collection, the big horses on the roof, the gold and jewels.  Once Alec gets going, he wants to see it all.  Milo was super thirsty and I was starting to get hot in my tablecloth schmata—whatever it was made of, it was not breathable.  So we moved quickly through the mosaics and made our way out to the piazza again.

We got some lunch, after striking out at three places that we had targeted that were closed for August, and then hit the Palazzo Ducale.  It is impressive and overwhelming—sort of a Who’s Who of the Italian renaissance.  And hot.  It was a broiling hot day and we didn’t spend a minute of it in air conditioning.  The palazzo has an impressive arms and armor collection, and we spent more time there than any other part of the place because C.C. has recently become fascinated with knights.  I think it is a consequence of her interest in dragons which is somehow connected to her dinosaur obsession. In any case, we looked at a LOT of swords, crossbows, helmets, daggers, and shields.  The kids were also fascinated by the prisons.

Alec really wanted to go to the Peggy Guggenheim museum, but the kids needed some down time and, frankly, so did I.  After a very long and crowded water bus ride back to the Dorsoduro, we revived ourselves with a little gelato, picked up our laundry, and went back to our room.  Our air conditioning had not worked for the first day, and we were beyond ecstatic to find our room to be chilly as an ice box.  I commanded the kids to strip down and take a cool shower, then set them up with the Rocky and Bullwinkle videos I had downloaded—I really like Rocky and Bullwinkle, and it seems to have stood the test of time.  I stood under water as cold as I could manage and then just lay flat on the bed until Alec returned.

We had promised the kids a gondola ride, and decided to take one to dinner.  Milo, in particular, beamed the entire ride.  It was the perfect time to go—out of the direct sun, just as the shadows were beginning to fall.  As we pulled up next to our restaurant, one of the waiters opened up a canalside window, and we exited the boat through the window, which was pretty cool. 

We ate at Osteria la Zucca, a restaurant Jody and Matt had recommended from their trip to Venice two years ago.  It was perhaps the best meal of our entire trip.  While not a vegetarian restaurant, la Zucca is a place that celebrates vegetables.  We shared an outrageously good pumpkin flan—its creamy texture underscored by the crunch of toasted pumpkin seed sprinkled on top, as well as carrots cooked with curry and yogurt, and spinach with butter and sesame.  I had a fabulous vegetable lasagna and Alec had a duck confit with apples.  It was a truly outstanding meal.

Today, we wound our way through several neighborhoods before getting on a water bus to take us to the Biennale. It was much, much cooler today, so perfect for lingering in the gardens. 

I really enjoyed much of what was in the central pavilion, and the kids dug right into the Norma Jeanne installation, which started out as an enormous block of Play Doh in stripes of red, black and white to evoke the Arab flag but which is now a room covered with the Play Doh creations of visitors.  A sign on the wall invited visitors to do what they wished with the Play Doh, and to either take the creations with them or leave them in the room, but not to leave them in other parts of the biennale.  We left the kids there for awhile to play, and when they met up with us, Milo had an enormous block of the stuff which he wants to bring back to Brooklyn.  It has made it back to our hotel room, but Brooklyn?  I don’t know.  We saw a lot of the show, but by no means all of it.   Not surprisingly, much of the art was overtly political—the Egyptian artist, Ahmed Basiony, died while documenting the uprising in Cairo in January. The American pavilion, an installation by Allora and Calzadilla, comments on war, capitalism and consumption.  We all liked “Algorithm”, a piece that consists of a pipe organ in which an ATM machine is incorporated—the organ plays loud, churchy cords when you take money out.  We stretched the kids as far as we could, and then retreated back to the hotel for a little rest before dinner.

After we got our mojo back, we walked to the Jewish ghetto, found a playground for the kids, and ate dinner in Canareggio.  Once again our top restaurant choices were closed, and we ended up having a truly mediocre meal, which is always unfortunate in Italy.  There is much more to do and see, but it’s time to get back to Barcelona.

Venice Photos







Saturday, August 6, 2011

Milo's Fruit Fiasco


On January 1, Alec announced that his new year’s resolution would be to eat more fruit, and he invited Milo to join him.  You need to know that, with the exception of apple sauce, Milo eats no fruit (and virtually no vegetables).   He accepted Alec’s invitation, but added:  “I’ll bet Greece has very good fruit.  I’ll start eating fruit this summer in Greece.”  Alec agreed to this compromise. So you can imagine that Alec and I were pretty excited when we finally arrived in Greece and made that first trip to the market with Milo.  He asked us to buy watermelon and apples, which, he declared, would be his first two fruits.  He asked for some apple slices on his dinner plate.

But then, when it actually came time to put the apple in his mouth, and the rest of us were leaning forward, holding our breath . . . he couldn’t do it.  Or he wouldn’t. I think we’ve been hornswaggled, that the little minx just bought himself seven months of not being badgered by his parents.

We’ve tried most of the obvious tactics. We’re good role models.  We always have a variety of fruit and vegetables on hand.  Milo even grew vegetables at his school in Barcelona and loved selling them in the schoolyard, a la Alice Waters’ Edible Schoolyard.  But try them?  He is more of an entrepreneur than an omnivore.

If I could do one thing over as a parent, it would be to capitulate less to the demands for kid food—hot dogs, grilled cheese, macaroni and cheese, and all kinds of nuggets.  C.C., although she eats a very healthy and balanced diet, has no desire to take risks where food is concerned.  Like most parents of my generation, we have gotten ourselves into a situation in which we cook not one, but two or three dinners.  My parents would never have been so gullible.  Where did we go wrong? 

When we have had breakthroughs, such as the curry noodles Milo has come to love, they have been the result of going to places we really want to eat that do not have kid food.  And somehow, our kids don’t starve.  Although I have been grateful for every bowl of spaghetti Bolognese we have encountered on our travels, I sometimes wish the dish had never been invented.

We have no desire to have power struggles over food—although we did set up an unfortunate face-off between Milo and a tiny piece of mango in Mesta that lasted more than an hour.  We clearly lost the battle.  So we have resorted to a time-tested strategy that we probably should have implemented years ago.  We put something on Milo’s plate at every meal—a grape, a cherry tomato, a slice of cooked carrot—and he does not get a sweet unless he eats it.  He’s eating a lot less dessert these days.

The beginning of the end of the journey


A night in crisp sheets and an extra pillow to put beneath my knees to support my back did wonders for my constitution.  Alec took the kids down to breakfast early and they were back before I even woke up.

The Aegeon Beach Hotel is one of those places where there are lounge chairs and umbrellas set up on the beach for you.  We felt luxurious ditching our mismatched, salt-stiffened towels for the spiffy blue hotel ones, and sitting up off the sand in comfortable chairs.  We had the morning to hang out and swim, and go for one last snorkel in the sea, the Temple of Poseidon watching over us from a nearby hill.

Although we had to check out of our room at noon, the hotel folks were kind enough to let us use another room to shower and change before we left.  We grabbed lunch at the taverna next door and then hit the road.  One last Greek salad, one last order of fried cheese—it’s good stuff.

We had a 3 ½ hour drive from Sounio to Patra, where we would board our last and longest ferry.  We arrived in Patra early enough to stretch our legs in the square and get some pizza for the kids.  A local newsstand stocked a huge range of magazines and newspapers in English, which made me unreasonably happy—I picked up The Economist and People to catch up on the important and interesting news of the day.

Our boat was scheduled to depart at midnight, but we were able to board at 9:30, so we schlepped our stuff on board (including a few bags of food Alec insisted on stopping at the market for on the way) and got settled into our cabin.  We have a window which, although it is salt-encrusted, is a luxury.

There is something romantic about traveling by sea, and the fact that we are getting somewhere while we sleep—instead of driving for days through Albania and Macedonia, which Alec tried to convince me would be a good idea for awhile there—is terrific. In reality, however, the room is pretty much like a Motel 6 room, except with bunk beds and a smaller bathroom.

When we woke up this morning, we were in port somewhere.  I left the room to get some tea, only to find much of the floor space outside occupied by people sleeping on blow up rafts, sleeping beds, fold-up lounge chairs, and beach towels.  One guy had spilled out of the common room in which his family had settled, his large, hairy belly protruding into the hallway on the way to one of the coffee shops.  The ship folks seem to keep some of the lounges sleeper free, thank goodness.

There is a pool on board, and the kids have been swimming, messing with the new art supplies we brought with us, and playing in the room.  I’ve nearly finished my fall syllabus.  We sleep on the boat again tonight, and arrive in Venice early tomorrow morning.

Friday, August 5, 2011

The very bad ferry


Lemoinya cried when I hugged her goodbye.  We brought her a box of food that we couldn’t bring with us, and she insisted on giving me a bag of almonds, and a chocolate bar for each of the kids.  Her face is the color and texture of a baked apple, her whole life etched onto her face.

Alec has asked me to report that we did not, in fact, have too much food left over.  I guess he has been reading my past posts.  Perhaps I’m just in denial about how much we eat.

We boarded the ferry in Mesta Port, and before we even got going it became clear that the ride would not be as smooth as those we had had on our previous boats.  I know that I get seasick, having once practically overdosed on a seasickness medication you apply as a patch while in the Galapagos.  So as soon as I felt the rocking in the pit of my belly, I took motion sickness medication.  Our kids have never gotten sick on a boat before, and we did not want to medicate them without good reason, so we took a chance.  We weren’t out of port an hour before the summer bronze drained out of C.C.’s face and she began to turn green.  I ran to the bathroom with her.  She got sick, and C.C. does not handle the kind of discomfort she was experiencing well.  She was really wailing there for awhile.  We got her to keep some Dramamine down, and she calmed down in front of a movie.  Meanwhile, my medication kicked in and I could not keep my eyes open.  There were no couches for stretching out, so I spread one of our fleece blankets on the floor, laid down on it, and covered myself over with the other.  I was knocked out for about an hour. 

Two television sets were set in the wall in the front of the lounge where are seats were located, and they blared for the entire voyage.  I asked one of the stewards if they could turn them down—it was clear no one was watching them.  He seemed to agree, but then it never happened.  So we were subjected to years-old episodes of The Nanny and Janice Dickinson’s Modeling Agency.  I tried reading aloud to Milo but I was no competition for Fran Drescher.

When we finally arrived in Lavrios, after 9 pm, we were all tired and snappish.  We have gotten along remarkably well given that we have no spent nearly 5 weeks together, 24/7.  But sometimes you just have a bad day.

Perhaps Alec was prophetic when, months ago, he reserved us a room for the night at a rather nice beachside resort, the most expensive hotel of our entire trip.  We needed it.  We put the kids to bed and went down to the restaurant for a bite to eat, after which I filled the bath with hot water and bubbles, and sank down into it.  Our Mesta bathroom had a tiny shower and, like many of the Croatian and Greek bathrooms we have had the pleasure of using, had its hand-held shower head mounted at waist height.  Great for the environment, but not so effective for relaxation.  And really difficult if you want to shave your legs.  My butt kept bumping into the olive green shower curtain of unknown provenance.  So the bathtub was a real treat. 

When I was 4 years old, my family took a 9 week camping trip.  My sister Leslie was 8 (Jody was not yet born).  We had a VW camper and we did a complete lap around the continental US.  We had a portable Coleman stove and a cooler for food, and ate only twice in restaurants.  We didn’t stay in a single hotel. When the fish were biting, we stayed put for awhile.  When they weren’t, we kept driving.

Perhaps this early experience predisposed me to think nothing of a 6 week road trip with Alec and the kids.  When I mentioned our plan to a friend in Barcelona in the spring, she seemed surprised—“Wow, that’s a long time!” she replied.  I wondered, for a nanosecond, if maybe we were crazy.  I’m convinced that we are not crazy, and it has been a great trip.  But I admit that recently I’ve been wondering whether my mother every got any alone time during that entire 9 weeks. 

Thursday, August 4, 2011

Photos of the Day



Mesta's Web


There was a period, between 1975 and 1992, when the Greek Ministry of Tourism targeted a number of traditional towns for preservation.  The idea was not to create massive development, but to bring a small amount of tourism to these towns in order to help sustain them without damaging what was already there. It sounds a lot like slow cities.  Mesta was one of the towns the government targeted.  But somehow, the effort ended nearly 20 years ago, and only vestiges remain.  Although you see a handful of tourists when you walk through the town, most are day trippers who come for an hour or two, maybe a meal.  Hardly anyone stays here.

This has its problems and its benefits.  On the down side, the people who rent out their apartments do not have a good sense of what travelers need.  It took us days to figure out how to get our laundry done, for example.  Our kitchen lacks a coffee maker, a cutting board, a sharp knife (we bought a knife weeks ago and have been traveling from place to place with it).

But on the positive side, the village has not turned into Disneyland, as so many cute, small villages have.  It is a real working village.  Most of the people here have always lived here—their homes and land have been passed down for generations.  And there are not enough of us—tourists—to ruin the place for them.  As a result, we feel welcomed.  Having spent a week here now, we already feel ourselves becoming a part of the web of relationships that is Mesta. 

Our neighbor across the street brought us a cucumber from her garden one day, and told us to pick the herbs growing in pots on her steps whenever we wanted.  The woman who lives diagonally from us, Maria, runs the little market near the town square; she lent us her grill.  Lemoinya, who lives right next door to us, poked her head in our door on the first day.  I sat and “talked” to her for awhile out on the bench in front (I speak no Greek and she speaks no English). The next day she brought over a paper towel filled with freshly shelled almonds.  I brought her a copy of the picture of the two of us, below—she had been so delighted to see it on the screen of my camera—and she invited me in for coffee and cookies.  I sat with her in her immaculate room, a kitchen along one wall and a couch along another, with a table in the center.  Then she insisted on bringing a cup to Alec; he sat out on our stoop and drank it with Socrates, her husband.  Yesterday, we stopped at the market for cold drinks on our way to the beach, and Panayotis, the man who had taken C.C. and Milo fishing, happened to come in.  He motioned for us to wait there, and took off on his scooter.  When he returned, he had two gorgeous shells for the kids—from the smell of them, the shells had been recently inhabited.  We boiled them when we got home, and now have to figure out how to get them back to Brooklyn.

Having spent time in eight different countries in the past year, it’s easy to be tempted into making overly simplistic comparisons that could cross the line into stereotyping.  And yet it is interesting to note just which cultures one feels most drawn to.  I am attracted to the warmth of the Greeks we have met, and this is perhaps most in evidence in the way they deal with our children.  The Greeks we have met, both here in Chios and in the Peloponnese, have been very physical with the kids. Everyone tousles their hair, squeezes their shoulders.  C.C. and Milo are often kissed and hugged by near strangers.  Having spent the year in Spain, they are somewhat accustomed to the physicality, but it’s so clear that it is not what they come from.  Waiters, shopkeepers, and neighbors do not routinely embrace our children in Brooklyn.  So I’ll miss this little town, which has wrapped us up like a warm blanket.

Photos of the Day


Wednesday, August 3, 2011

Mastic in Mesta


Perhaps the thing that Chios is most famous for is mastic, an aromatic resin harvested from the mastic bush.  Mesta is one of three mastic villages on Chios, the other two being Olympi and Pyrgi. Although these bushes grow across the Aegean, Chios is the only place that grows it commercially.  Apparently, it is only here that the trees produce the valuable resin.  For centuries, mastic has been used in paints, cosmetics and in cooking.  People also like to chew on it, and an interruption in its production in the early 19th century caused a brutal revolt in Istanbul.  At one time, a kilo of mastic resin cost the same as a kilo of silver.

I had read about mastic before we got here and then, coincidentally, heard a spot about it on The Splendid Table podcast sometime during the spring. “That’s where I’m going!” I thought.  The woman interviewed for the spot talked about mastic’s indescribably unique taste, its suitability for both savory and sweet foods.  I had never heard of it before we planned this trip, and I was eager to try it.  Indeed, it seems to be used in just about everything here—chewing gum, juice, seltzer water, liquor, ice cream, soap, and body lotion.  You can also get little pills that are supposed to be good for a stomach ache.

On our first night in Emporios Bay, we ordered a bottle of mastic flavored sparkling water.  Alec took a sip and slid the bottle over to me.  I couldn’t read his expression.  I took a swig—indescribable is right.  It tasted like someone had bottled “musty basement.”  I was sorely disappointed.  We tried some of the gum, which is a bit better, although weirdly textured.  I have no desire to load up on mastic face cream or shampoo, but I would like to taste it in a sauce or a sweet. 

Yesterday evening, Vasilio gave a “mastic tour”.  Much to Milo’s dismay, we all decided to go.  “I don’t want to go on any mastic tour!” Milo declared.  We started in the town square, where Vasilio told us about the pirates who came to the village hundreds of years ago and left with women, children, and mastic.  We walked out of the village through the locals’ gardens, and C.C. and Milo picked eggplant, tomatoes, and cucumbers from Vasilio’s plot.

Then we crossed the road, entered another field, and came upon what looked like an enormous shrub, about 15 feet tall and 15 yards wide.  A break in one end allowed us to enter into it and discover that it was actually about 30 mastic bushes, planted in four neat rows.  It is harvest time in mastic land, and Vasilio demonstrated how the resin is gathered.  First the farmers scrape and sweep away the leaves from a wide circle around the trunk.  C.C. and Milo were happy to demonstrate—city kids for whom farming tasks are still fun.  Next, a layer of calcium carbonate—a very fine, white powder—is thrown under the tree to cover the clean circle.  This allows the resin to drop without sticking to the dirt.  By now the kids looked as though they had been dipped in flour sacks.  The farmer then makes a series of small cuts—a couple of inches long—into the trunk and branches of the tree.  When you do this, and we did, you can see the clear resin begin to come to the surface.  The farmer makes 10 or 15 a day throughout the harvest period, and the resin drops to the ground.   We discovered the hard way that it is extremely sticky until it’s completely dry.  Once dry, the farmers scoop it into sieves, which help to separate out the dirt.  Then they throw what’s left into buckets of water; the leaves and pieces of bark rise to the top, and the resin sinks.  They scoop the resin out and remove any dirt.  All of this for 80 euros a kilo—a pretty labor-intensive practice for something that tastes like musty basement.

I haven’t given up, though.  I plan to buy a little container of the powdered stuff and experiment with it when I get home.

Vasilio had set up a table in the middle of the mastic grove laid with a range of tasty local treats—amazing bread baked in a wood-fired oven, the tomatoes and cucumber we had picked, salty cheese, almond-stuffed figs, olives, and a pickled green that comes on many of the salads here, all washed down with a raisiny local wine.  We chatted with our tour buddies—a man from France, a young couple, and then walked home as the sun began to set.  “That mastic tour was really cool,” Milo declared, having completely forgotten his earlier protest.

Photos of the Day






Monday, August 1, 2011

Fish


On our first morning in Mesta, Friday, we were awakened by the sound of someone shouting through a bullhorn.  This is a VERY quiet town, so the effect was quite dramatic.  Alec pulled on his shorts and went outside to find out what was going on.  It turns out that a man was driving a little white truck down the street—the interior of the back was set up as a fish stand, complete with crushed ice.  Alec told the guy that if he got a big fish—he only had small, fishy fish that day—we’d buy it.  Sure enough, on Saturday he had a medium-sized fish, big enough for Alec and I to share for dinner.  Alec borrowed our neighbor’s grill (she owns the local mini mart) and cooked it up for dinner.  It was delicious.

Our children do not get very excited about eating fish.  C.C., who has been asking to go fishing since the day we left Barcelona, maintains that she will eat the fish she catches.  You would think, with all of the beaches we’ve been near, it would have been easy to find someone to take us out on a boat.  And we have tried or, I should say, Alec has tried.  But finally, Vasilio found a guy for us in Mesta Port who would take us out for three hours on Sunday.   Vasilio, sensing the urgency of the situation, gave the guy strict instructions to make sure the kids caught fish.

C.C. caught her first fish with my dad, at the age of two.  She came back from the excursion with him clutching the little fish tightly in her fist, grinning from ear to ear.  Milo, although he has been fishing before, had never caught a fish. Until yesterday.  I opted to stay home—I needed a little time and space more than I needed a fishing trip.

When they found me in the town square upon their return, the kids had huge smiles on their faces; Alec looked a little weary.  Milo had caught his first fish.  It didn’t matter to him that it was tiny.  He was ecstatic. 

They really wanted us to cook up their fish for dinner.  Alec said the fisherman who had taken them out seemed surprised when Alec asked him for the fish to take home.  I think he would have used them for bait.  Our neighbor advised Alec to make a soup with them.  Let me just say that fish soup is about the last thing my kids would eat.  So we convinced them that the best thing would be to give them away to a neighbor, and to let us find them a fish they might actually enjoy eating.

Photos of the Day



Sunday, July 31, 2011

Stargazing


We let Friday be lazy.  I met our next door neighbor, an ancient woman who is drying a whole lot of tomatoes out on her roof.  She doesn’t speak any English, but we smile at each other a lot, and she likes to tousle the kids’ hair as they walk by.  Speaking of hair, Milo’s Dubrovnik haircut is growing in kind of crazy.  It was cut so short that it lay flat when he first got it, but now it looks like there are two horns growing out of the top of his head.  Meanwhile, it’s been months since C.C. had a haircut, and her bangs are now long enough to obscure her eyes.  We’ve starting clipping them aside so that she doesn’t bump into things.

We have been trying to do our part as parents to prevent the “summer slide”—the educational regression that happens when kids don’t spend any time in the summer reading and reviewing what they learned during the school year.  Milo’s teacher sent home a packet of worksheets and activities with him, along with a stack of books at his level on the last day of school, and we’ve been picking through them as we travel from place to place.  C.C. reads and writes a ton, so we subscribed to a math website so that she could keep up her math.  The problem is, she hates it.  It’s a worse struggle than homework, and she cannot believe the injustice that is forcing her to do “homework” on summer vacation!  Despite our attempts to incentivize her participation, we might be on a sinking ship.

So we went through that fiasco on Friday, connecting to the internet in the town square.  It’s a lively place with a few coffee shops and restaurants, and seems to be a good mix of tourists and locals—not the kind of place that has been completely overtaken.   Most of the villagers here work the land, whereas many villages of this type that we’ve visited shifted from an agricultural based economy to a tourism-based economy long ago.

We spent the middle chunk of Saturday at a secluded beach, and snorkeled around a small offshore island with the kids.  I am hugely impressed by what good snorkelers they have become.  We paired off, and I was Milo’s snorkel buddy—he was terrific.  There isn’t a whole lot to see here—a few fish here and there—but they are in good shape for an open water snorkel now.

Vasilio had arranged a nighttime stargazing activity, and we all wanted to go, so we imposed a mandatory rest time when we got back from the beach.  All of us slept except for Alec.  Milo had a tough time settling down.  He flipped and flopped despite all attempts to rub his back and settle him down.  “I’m just too hyper-accurate!” he shouted.  I put on the Winnie-the-Pooh audiobook to calm him down.  That, and lying on Alec’s chest, did the trick.

The stargazing started at 10 pm.  Vasilio led several cars up, up, up a windy road to the top of a dark hill, where we met three astronomers from the island of Lesbos who had already set up their two enormous telescopes.  It was beautiful.  We saw Saturn, some other galaxies and—a personal favorite of the kids—the eagle nebula.  They had seen it on the Star Walk app on my iPad and were so excited to see the real thing?  For me, Saturn was the highlight.  It was cool enough for me to go back to the car and get a fleece blanket to wrap up in.  I lay down on a bench and just watched the meteor shower playing out overhead—much better than any telescope.

Friday, July 29, 2011

Emporios Bay to Mesta


Mesta, small walled village a few kilometers from the southwestern coast of Chios, is only about 13 kilometers from Emporios Bay (which is on the southeastern coast).  Milo having been all swimmed out, had fallen asleep on his bed at our hotel while we packed up, so we had to carry him into the car and strap him into his seat.  Once in Mesta, we were met by Vasilio and Rula, a young couple who own a business called masticulture; we had rented our apartment from them.  We drove as far as we could, until the town became pedestrian only and the streets too narrow for cars, and found our place.  It is a bit more, shall we say, “rustic” than the other places we have stayed, but charming in its own way.  It has thick stone walls, a kitchen and bath dating from the 60s or 70s, and a nice little terrace and courtyard.  We’ll be just fine here for the week, but it’s a far cry from the Jacuzzi tub, crisp sheets, fluffy towels, and comfy couches we had in Drosopigi.  Then again, it only costs 78 euros a night.

After we unloaded, Alec went out for groceries.  The kids were too lethargic to go for an explore in town, so we cuddled up on the bed and watched Night at the Museum.  And then ensued a well-rehearsed scene that has played itself out over and over in my relationship with Alec.  Here’s how it goes:

Alec goes out to do the grocery shopping.  Although I actually like grocery shopping, and find it to be a really interesting activity when in other countries, Alec has more of a need to do it.  And, truth be told, he does more of the cooking these days.  So he goes off, and it takes him longer to do the shopping that I can possibly imagine, at least double what it would take me.  He studies labels, considers every aspect of every product—where it’s from, how much it costs, how much sugar, fat, wheat it contains.  I can’t really explain it.  I can’t even explain it when I shop with him. I can lap the entire store and return to still find him in the produce aisle, or wherever it is he started.

And then he returns, hours later, with a mind-boggling amount of stuff.  He is excited at his finds—local goat yogurt! Olive paste! A tin of stuffed grape leaves! (they are on all of the menus, but no one seems to have them when we ask.  I stand there speechless, wondering how we are possibly going to eat all of this food in one week.  There are only four of us after all, two of us are children, and we will likely eat some of our meals out.  I try to suppress my negative comments—“Do we really need another jar of peanut butter?” “Wow, that’s a big bag of spinach!” “Two kinds of rice and two jars of pickles!”  But I am largely unsuccessful.  Alec’s enthusiasm is dampened, my anxiety rises.  In the end, I must admit, that we do not generally have much waste.  But this time, I swear, he’s gone too far!

We unpacked the perishables and walked into the village square for dinner.  Vasilio had told us that there would be a big dance performance starting at eight, with several groups from Chios and a few from Chicago!  How random is that?  As we approached the center, we could see the dancers gathering, all in traditional costumes, from as young as 2 or 3 to very old.  Musicians playing drums and fiddles strolled around, too.

As we settled into a table at a restaurant in the square, the groups assembled and began to parade to the local school, where the performance would take place.  After a really good dinner—stuffed tomato and pepper for me, a spicy pork stew for Alec—we got some ice cream, picked up a jar of local honey, and made our way over to the school.  A stage had been set up nearby, and the performance was in full swing.  It was quite beautiful—the starry night, the live music, the earnest, joyful dancers.  We stayed until the kids got tired, and then headed home to bed down for the night.

Photos from Along the Way



Emporios Bay, Chios


We arrived at the ferry with plenty of time and without incident, until I nearly scraped the roof of the car off driving it onto the boat.  We’ve learned that, even if you have assigned seats, which are sort of like airplane seats, it’s a good idea to board early to scope out a nice, comfy place to settle in.  Personally, I wanted a couch long enough to lie down on—it had been a short night and I had a good nap planned.  We found a table with a couch and two soft chairs pulled up around it, and staked our claim there.  Unfortunately, it was right below a television blasting out inane Greek programs, including one that seemed to be the local version of Top Chef.  There was no apparent way to turn the volume down, or to turn it off.

One critical item I neglected to pack was my sleep mask.  My sister Jody gave me the perfect one as a gift a few years back and it is invaluable for just these types of daytime napping situations.  I had to make do by stuffing earplugs into my ears, then donning my noise canceling headphones, and pulling a fleece blanket up over my head.  I managed a good, hour-long nap.

The ferry was supposed to arrive in Chios at about 9 pm, or so we thought.  By chance, Alec learned, at about 6, that it would be arriving at 6:30.  We still can’t figure out if we had completely misunderstood the arrival time, or whether it really did arrive 2 ½ hours early. 

Chios is a small island.  Although the port is located near the middle of the island, and we were staying near the southern tip, it took us less than a half hour to drive from the port to Emporios Bay.  We got to our hotel in time for the kids to have a quick swim in the pool before dinner.  This is the first—and only—place we are staying that has a pool (unless you count the tiny ferry pool), a huge asset when you have kids.  Our kids are good enough swimmers at this point that they do not require constant, eyes-on vigilance while swimming in the pool.  You can actually sit poolside and read a bit, as long as you glance up frequently.  The ocean is another story.

Emporios Bay has a real island feel—it’s right on a small harbor fringed with a handful of tavernas sporting thatchy umbrellas and open fronts. It’s hard to believe it ever rains there.  We had a now familiar taverna meal—I eat a rotating diet of Greek salad, or tomato cucumber salad (which is the same as the Greek salad only with no feta), stuffed vegetables, vegetable stew, chicken kebabs, and sometimes beets or tzatziki or saganaki.  I can’t complain—the food has been consistently fresh and good.

We spent the following day mostly on the local beach, which consists of rather large black rocks—really hard to stick an umbrella into.  We tried various configurations, building rock structures around our umbrella posts, but to no avail.  We swam, and retreated into the shade in between dips.  The water was delicious, but a bit deep for the kids, necessitating constant vigilance.  We ate a late lunch at another of the tavernas, which had the exact same menu as the first place, implying that they are in cahoots.  A man who was born on the island but raised mostly in Philadelphia was hanging out there—it was odd to hear that familiar accent so far from home.

On Wednesday we decided to check out a beach that the Philly guy had told us was sand and “like a swimming pool” for the kids.  It was about a 10 minute drive, with a slow climb up and then a quick, incredibly steep descent to a small parking lot with a cantina overlooking a gorgeous bay.  We were still pretty high up, and had to descend a flight of concrete stairs to the actual beach.  Incredibly, though it was nearly noon, we were the only ones there.  The kids started chanting “Skinny dip! Skinny dip!” so slipped out of my bathing suit and dove into the water, managing to get in a delicious little swim before I spied our first intruder, a lone woman, making her way down the steps.   I got out and put my suit back on, mostly out of respect.  Greece is more conservative than much of Europe when it comes to topless and nude sunbathing, and explicitly so when a beach is in sight of a church.  Don’t get me wrong—I have no desire to expose my whitest parts to hot sun, gritty sand, or strangers.  But there’s no feeling that compares to skinny dipping.  When I was younger and spent my summers on the jersey shore, two of us would swim out to deep waters and swap bathing suits before coming back to shore.

Thursday was departure day from Emporios Bay—we got a late checkout and let the kids spend the entire morning at the pool while we took advantage of the internet and worked poolside on our laptops.  Then we packed up the car, yet again, and headed out for the short drive to Mesta.

* * *

If you have followed this blog at all or know our family personally, you may be wondering how we are managing on a 6 week road trip in a not so big Citroen C4.  Packing light is not one of our strong points.  We own a Chevy Suburban in New York City.  The answer?  My husband is a really good packer.  He has turned our trunk into a virtual puzzle, each item fitting precisely into its allocated space.  In addition to the two layers of bags in the trunk, fitted over the kids’ two scooters and my rolled up yoga mat, we have dirty laundry and extra toiletries under the front two seats, sunscreen packed around the spare tire in the wheel well, and a backpack full of kids’ activities sharing the legroom on the passenger’s side.  As it turns out, there are a lot of things you feel you have to bring on a trip as long as this one that you do not actually end up needing.  A few examples of things we have not used—umbrellas, long pants, sweatshirts, rain gear.  The kids’ scooters win the prize for items that take up the most space and have been used the least; all of the places we’ve been have had streets too bumpy or too hilly for them to get much use out of them, but how could we have known?