THE SUMMER OF SEPTEMBER

Hi-ho, hi-ho, it’s off to work I go

Back home again after a swell week on the road with my friend Shirley. Although we are well into the autumn season we mostly felt warm summer temperatures throughout New England and returned to the same sweet sun in Hamilton. Yes, the trees are starting to have that reddish-around-the-edges look, and we noticed a proliferation of goldenrod on the roadsides, but I’m still wearing short skirts and sandals. My natural clock has not yet moved to the 11^th hour that chimes in the final weeks before winter sets in.

My mini-book tour of Vermont and Massachusetts (with a visit to Maine and New Hampshire thrown in) was very pleasant. We started out with a night in Lachine, just outside of Montreal Quebec, with my editor (once known as “the dastardly”) Jane Pavanel and her husband Sami and their kids. The night was beautiful enough to dine on the deck (pesto made fresh from a big buncha basil bushes in her garden) and for a walk along the St. Lawrence River watching a golden moon rise. Our roles as writer and editor of Walking with Wolf could be very mildly adversarial (“she just doesn’t get it!?!”) but the final result has been very successful. Our roles as friends will hopefully last forever – and maybe, if I ever get to writing another book, we will resume our professional partnership again.

We got across that big bad border just fine, headed into Vermont, and had lunch in Burlington on the waterfront, watching the boats cruise across Lake Champlain. Over the several hundred kilometers we drove through Vermont, we saw a lot of green forest, green pastures and green-consciousness. It would have been great to have the time to investigate some of the state parks, art galleries, interesting-looking restaurants and ecologically-concerned businesses but we had an agenda that didn’t allow for too much side-tracking.

We joined the Putney Friends Meeting fall retreat at Farm and Wilderness camp near Plymouth. A small black bear ran in front of our car just as we were arriving and we saw a loon floating on the lake. Being in this setting of wooden camp buildings surrounded by forest took me back to my years on Lake Temagami working at Wanapitei and Keewaydin canoe camps. These long-serving camps with their rustic cabins and large dining-halls hold the ghosts of a lot of summers – anyone who has spent time at one most likely has a keen sense of the history of the place as the long tales from the past get told and retold. Old photographs, names etched in the aged wood and strange artifacts reverently displayed on walls provide memories for those who return over the years and clues to the camaraderie that existed for those of us who weren’t so lucky to be part of it.   

Our little humble cabin Sassafras

Although we left our lunch spot in Burlington still soaking up the sun, we arrived at the camp under the only rain clouds we’d seen since the beginning of September. The lake looked tempting and that loon was calling me to join her, but it was just too chilly for this chicky who just returned from warm southern Caribbean waters (sad-to-say since I’m basically a northern bush babe used to refreshing waters.) Most of the cabins were long and three-sided with bunk beds on the three walls. The other non-existent wall opened out to the lake or the forest. I kept asking people if mosquitoes were never a problem.  I couldn’t imagine staying in those cabins in northern Ontario in bug season which is basically most of summer. Everyone I asked told me that mosquitoes had never been a problem in this part of Vermont. I’m wondering if these folks are either tougher than me or have a very selective memory. I just can’t imagine being anywhere in North America in that much forest without a bug season. We chose a small cabin called Sassafras which had four walls, open windows and electricity since I had to work on my laptop a little at night preparing for the book talk. Sleeping in that clear, clean cold air was heavenly.

The other highlight to being at camp was the large kitchen. I can remember my first time in one of those large industrial yet rustic kitchens on Lake Temagami (after finding a very large puffball and slicing it on the meat-slicer, frying it in butter and garlic in the over-sized frying pan, my friends and I made ourselves ill eating too much of it.) I love cooking in these super-stocked kitchens with their grandiose Hobart mixing machines and eight burner gas stoves. This one was extremely well-equipped including a dish room with lotsa stainless steel sinkage and a sterilizing washing machine. Enthusiastically volunteering for washing duty, I got to run the hose, rinsing off the dishes and filling and emptying the washing machine. I ended up quite wet but thoroughly enjoyed it, feeling like Igor behind the controls of a crazy steam-snorting machine.

I had a good time presenting Walking with Wolf to the assembled group, some of whom had been to Monteverde and had their own stories from there. Susan Slowinski had invited me to come to this retreat and was a warm host, as were all the Friends. I sold a few books and received some very positive feedback. I was invited by Francie Marbury to visit her public school in southern Vermont  and we arranged that I would stop there on our way through that area on Tuesday.

Since we were (by Canadian standards) in the neighborhood, we drove a few hours from Vermont to the coast of Maine to see Cocky (my soul sister I’ve written about many times in this blog). We got in a night of dancing (breaking in a pair of cowgirl boots recently given to me), some great food, lots of talk, sunshine and relax time. We watched “Shut Up and Sing,” the documentary about the Dixie Chicks and the horrible, hate-filled reaction to their simple comment that they were ashamed that George Bush was from Texas (during the period in 2002 when the US went into Iraq on the un-proven grounds that there were weapons of mass destruction.) I have loved their music but am now deeply moved by their commitment to speaking their truth in a country that proclaims this is one of the main principles of  its society. If I had known at the time what was going on, I would have gone to a Dixie Chicks concert just to support them (and dance a little too.) This doc is still well worth watching.

We spent a glorious evening on the local public dock as the sun set. It was still chilly enough to keep me out of the water, but Ms Cocky is more acclimatized and had what might be one of her last swims of the year. We were also visited by a man towing a dead deer (which someone had shot but not killed and it had finally died on the shore nearby) out to a more remote spot to let the buzzards at it. When I started taking pictures he thought we might be radical vegans ready to denounce him, but being northern bush babes ourselves, we are accustomed to carcasses and recognize he was just doing his job.

 

 

Shirley, Cocky and I, along with the beautiful Alpha-dog, sipped wine and ate sushi and watched the breeze play across the calm Atlantic water. It was hard to leave.

On our way to Amherst College in Massachusetts, Shirley and I stopped to visit Wolf’s son, Carlos Guindon, who has been translating the book into Caminando con Wolf.  He’s almost finished, down to the index and some blurbs. He’ll then send it to Costa Rica and the Tropical Science Center will figure out the next step. It’s very exciting that our book is going to be available in Spanish so that Costa Ricans, who have shown a very keen interest in reading Wolf’s story, will soon have the opportunity.

Shirley with Wolf’s grand-daughter Noelia

We arrived at the house of Benigno and Karen Sanchez-Eppler, who had invited us to stay while in Amherst. They are a very welcoming Quaker couple who own a big old house on the edge of the Amherst College campus that serves as an inn for the many guests that pass through. They have hospitality down to a fine art served up with great heart. They fed us a delicious dinner of Cuban tortilla, rice and fresh tomatoes before we headed over to the college for my talk. We were joined by their daughter Alma and her friend Benny, as well as Clara Rowe, who I knew as a young girl when she lived in Monteverde (she had arranged the talk with the Environmental Studies department) and Noelia Solano, one of Wolf’s grand-daughters who I had just celebrated his birthday with in Monteverde.  She is now at Mount Holyoke, a college nearby, and came for the evening – it is always wonderful to see Monteverde people in other places, especially Guindons.

There was a small group at the college for the talk and I have to admit I felt a little disjointed – sometimes it is like that. I switch my talk around for each audience, situation and length of time allotted, and usually am happy with how it goes, but sometimes feel a little off and this was one of those times.  But there were lots of questions and interest in the group about conservation in Monteverde and it was a nice evening despite my own criticism of my performance.

The next morning we drove north to Brattleboro, Vermont and I did another talk for the kids at Marlboro Public School. It was a short period and I had to talk fast but was much happier with how this went.  This school was very impressive – solar panels, vegetable garden, an open classroom with couches for the kids to relax on while reading – and almost made me want to go back to school. The school focuses on self-expression through creativity and learning through field research. The Grade 7 and 8s will be heading to Costa Rica in the spring and this was their introduction to where they would be going and some of the history there. It was a privilege to be part of their trip planning.

 

 

With the work done, Shirley and I enjoyed the last bit of back road driving in Vermont – once again sorry that we couldn’t stop for awhile at the interesting villages we passed through – but did stop for lunch in Wilmington at the Vermont House Tavern which I must mention because I had an excellent bowl of French onion soup there and highly recommend it!

 

 

Our last night, now safely back in our Canadian homeland, was at my friends’ Chuck and Carolyn’s near Westport. We arrived just as their band, String Tease, was beginning an evening rehearsal, and so we relaxed to a few hours of music, singing along with the songs they sing, mostly irreverent Canadian tunes that tell stories and feature their mix of accordion, mandolin, guitar and stand-up bass. 

 

 

Now safely home, feeling the air a little cooler than when we left, having had a successful few book-speaks, mixing up business and pleasure, I’m ready to get on to my next project which is writing Bosqueeterno history. A huge thanks to all those who helped put the tour together and took us in – Jane & Sami, Susan and the Putney Friends, Cocky, Clara, Benigno & Karen, Francie and finally Chuck & Carolyn. The world is small, full of friends and opportunities and, as such, is truly beautiful, whatever the season.

SPRING FEVER IN ONTARIO

Another week has passed – finally, time is going quickly. I’m less than a week away from heading back to Costa Rica. Although I’ve been super busy, these two months seemed to have passed very slowly. I think the pace picked up in New York City – since that great night in the Big Apple, time has been on my side. Now it is working against me as I try to take care of book business, prepare my house for Ben, who is going to come and live in my house this summer, and cut the vegetation in my urban jungle back as much as possible, including a rotten tree that has been dropping big limbs over the last year. What seemed like it was taking ages to get here is now around the corner and I’m rushed.

The pear tree is blanketed in blossoms, the tulips are kissing, the young leaves are stretching, and so the great summer growth has begun. Although I’m appreciating springtime in all its beauty, my heart is elsewhere and so I’m thinking more about what is happening with the sticks of ylang ylang and croton that I put in the ground back on Roberto’s land in Cahuita – he’s told me they are coming along slowly. For a gardener, planting in the tropics and planting in the temperate zones of Canada are total opposites, although here in the Hammer, it isn’t anything like the north where I lived for years. But the north is the north – while the temperature is just heating up here, I’m packing clothes for the constant warmth and humidity of the Caribbean coast.

Last week I left Philadelphia and New York City in temperatures hovering around 90 degrees Fahrenheit (that night out in NYC was like steamy mid-July), by the time I got to Petawawa and my friends the Bairs, it was much cooler, and there was still a big pile of snow trying to melt at the end of their driveway. It was warm enough to walk without a jacket in the daytime – but I feel like I’ve spent the last two weeks changing clothes, adjusting layers and looking out at blue skies that mask the chill in the air. Soon I’ll be where hot is just…hot.

While at the Bair’s beautiful home, I managed to sell a few books to visitors – among them my good friend Fretz, who I worked with for years at Camp Wanapitei on Lake Temagami in the 90s. It seems to get harder and harder to see each other, but she came for one of Al’s great dinners and we caught up – that will have to do for awhile. I’ve lived and worked in a lot of places throughout my life and hang on to my friends. I return to visit them when possible, love to see them when they come and visit me wherever that may be. Once in awhile you either lose touch or give up on friendships that are no longer working, but for the most part, if you have loved people, it is always wonderful to reconnect. Although time may change your situations, it doesn’t need to change the spark that made you friends.

That last week of my road trip was made up of visiting friends like that – people I have loved for years who live in eastern parts of Ontario – as I wound my way home to the Hammer. Al and Jean Bair are on the top of the list. I met them in 1995 when they had a home near Monteverde in Costa Rica.

They have a fascinating, dynamic, purely positive large family who I also adore – I was meant to be from a big family but missed my chance in this life. So I grasp onto large families like a street mutt – if they will take me in, I’ll love ‘em forever. And the Bairs are one of my favorite. Al and Jean came into my life right at the time my own parents died and although I don’t think of them as surrogate parents, they have been part of my Costa Rican life and my Canadian life and have dispensed great advice and supported me emotionally. And we constantly laugh and discuss serious politics and philosophy – Al’s favorite line about me is that I have a serious speech impediment – I have to stop talking to breathe once in awhile. I’d say he suffers equally but I’m not sure he’d agree.

We had four wonderful days together catching up on my travels and their recent trip to southeast Asia. They listened to me moan on about my kabanga blues, and sent me off down the road with renewed vigor, as if I had just spent a week at the spa. Love those folks.

Next stop was in Westport where there is a whole whack of friends who I can’t get enough of. I’ve seriously looked at property there a couple of times in the past ten years but never made the move. If things truly happen for a reason, perhaps I wasn’t meant to be there so that I could make this move to Cahuita – it would be much more difficult if I was in the middle of developing a beautiful piece of property in eastern Ontario.

I went and visited my friend Paul McKay – musician and investigative journalist extraordinaire. He has written several books, most recently on the scandalous marketing of nuclear reactors by the Ontario government at a time when the rest of the world is taking to the alternative technologies – wind and solar – that are available and functioning well. Speaking with people of great knowledge and intelligence like Paul always gives me great hope for the future – his optimism points to the good things going on in the world, advances that you don’t hear about in the media. Paul lives in the bush, where he picked wild leeks (one of my favorite Ontario bush foods – makes the best French Onion Soup) for our dinner, and then we passed the evening doing what we both love – listening to a wide array of fantastic music, dancing, talking.

This particular evening was augmented by his strange pilates machine I spent a long time exercising on (kinda gym-dancing) while I listened to the music – by the time I got off of it, my poor legs, atrophied from close to three weeks driving a car, were cramped from top to bottom, but a little more dancing was the cure. Although I expected to be crying out with cramps in the night, it didn’t happen.

I went into Kingston the next day to see Turid Forsyth’s beautiful artwork in a show put on by the Kingston Field Naturalists. I’ll be speaking at their October meeting (third Thursday in October) about Wolf and Monteverde. Turid lives near Kingston but also in Monteverde – and so I see her in both countries and it is always an interesting time. She is a very talented writer, gardener, artist and photographer. How lucky am I to know these people?

The night was a big fiesta for Carolyn – her 50th – played out at her and Chuck’s home on Faeries Hill. This is a house totally off the grid – a wind turbine was reeling in the stiff breeze, the solar panels were cooking in the sunshine, and the power came in to fuel the rockin’ band of Spencer Evans, the Cowen brothers and Bunny Stewart, a hot sax player from Kingston.

I’ve talked about these guys before, playing at the Cowen family’s bed and breakfast, The Cove in Westport. Spencer puts on a great show with his incredible array of tunes and sometimes it gets kinda “shticky” for the crowd at the restaurant – but those talented twins, Seamus and Jeff Cowen, just keep the whole thing going as a tight jazz duo behind whatever Spencer decides to do with his piano, clarinet and voice.

 

However, for this occasion, they lowered the “shtick” and raised the bar, and along with the smokin’ saxophone, performed a very funky show that kept us dancin’, dancin’, dancin’. This is always a dance floor that is full of spirit and joy and beautiful people.

So big happy birthday to Ms Carolyn – take it from your slightly older fifty-ish friend – it only gets better as long as you got the right attitude (and good health and a little bit of luck on the side) – and honey, you got it!

 

And just throwing in a plug for all the hard work Carolyn’s been doing with everybody’s favorite Basenji dog, Zig – he can now jump through her hooped arms – we made him do it a quadrillion times as I tried to capture the movement in the right moment on film…he was exhausted by the end of it (already worn out from a night of partying) but just kept jumping. Love that Zigmeister.

I carried on to Toronto, still heading home – to catch my friends Donna Akrey and Janine Miedzik’s show on the Danforth – “Oh”. Donna lives in Montreal where she teaches art at Concordia so I rarely get to see her anymore. Over the years I’ve gone to many of her art shows which usually involve documenting or collecting junk off the streets and creating installations and bizarre scenarios. Recycling and reusing with a fine arts degree. I’d say a great use of higher education. Oh yah.

The last night of my road trip was spent with my pals Jamie and Tory (along with Jamie’s mom, Joan, and their houseboy, Chris) in Toronto – dining outdoors, throwing toys for Mazie the beagle and enjoying the last night of these three weeks on the road with wonderful friends. It really has been a fantastic time. I put off returning to my house as long as possible – a full day in TO with Sol buying a Blackberry for a friend in Costa Rica was really pushing the limit on avoidance – as I knew that the moment I got in the door the work would begin, and now it has. So enough already, there is a tree to come down, a garden to seriously weed, and a blue sky to enjoy. And only six days left before my heart starts to sing again. Oh yah!

MY NOO YAWK MINUTE

I have arrived safely back in Canada – at the beautiful home of my wonderful friends, Al and Jean Bair – we are all in shock realizing that the last time I was here was for some of the final games of the last World Cup (futbol mundial – soccer to the rest of you) three summers ago.  Time is an amazing thing, especially when it races away from you. We now have four days to spend together – catching up on our Monteverde friends (where I met Al and Jean in 1995 when they had a house there) and our own busy lives and travels – these conversations will be augmented by Al’s delicious food, lively political discussion and visiting family and friends.  It is like coming home to one of the warmest and most enjoyable places I know of on the planet (and surrounded by bush – how happy am I?)

Last I wrote I was preparing for my Pendle Hill presentation in Philadelphia – in 90 degree weather, the sun blaring down, on that beautiful campus filled with lovely Quaker folks.  I am still thanking Wolf’s nephew Lloyd, the groundskeeper, for his invitation and warm welcome.

Instead of my usual power point presentation (actually, none of them are usual because they change each time), I told the story of Wolf, Monteverde and writing Walking with Wolf and read a couple passages while people ate lunch in the reading room and then we all talked.  Afterward I sold and signed books and continued to have interesting conversations with a number of people, some of who knew Monteverde, many who didn’t but were very interested as Quakers in that community. I also made some good contacts for future book presentations. All in all, it was a wonderful few hours of book business at Pendle Hill.

I then left Philadelphia and headed up the New Jersey Turnpike to Noo Yawk! There was a huge traffic back up for many miles heading south – I was very happy to be going north. I got to my friend Memo’s in New Jersey just in time to meet a bunch of his very friendly neighbours (mostly Brazilian ex-pats) over grilled food and wine before we headed out to the gigs he had that Saturday night in the big city.  His wife, Wendy, and his boys Sebastian and Estefan, continued on eating while we took off.  I had told Memo that I needed to be headed over to the Bronx as early on Sunday morning as possible so getting home at an earlyish hour would be a good idea - HA! Musicians! Early is a relative thing…

Memo Madriza is a hot sax player I’ve known for probably fifteen years – he was a young guy when he came up to Monteverde with the earliest version of Sonsax, a high energy quartet of saxophones which then added a percussionist.  I can remember these boys, guapos all, and how they not only played smoking music but became like superstars in the community, all the girls following them around. In 1999, Memo met and quickly married Wendy and moved to New York and Sonsax continued on playing, their members changing every couple of years – the last time I saw Memo was at the Montreal Jazz Festival in about 2002 or so when Sonsax played there. 

Now he is in New York and plays with a variety of Cuban timba bands – and we got to see three of them that night.  The first version was a six piece playing at a top dance academy right next door to Madison Square Garden.  I’ve danced all my life but never taken dance classes and still wouldn’t, though no doubt could learn lots about how to follow. I like to dance with strong leaders (you find them in Costa Rica) who know how to direct me and that I love.  It was great watching the variety of dancers and listening to the cookin’ band – there were two other rooms, one with a band playing east coast swing and another with western swing as well as a variety of dance performances. I danced with a few dancers but mostly with Memo when the band took a break. I actually almost ripped the arm off an older guy who had asked me to dance but he was obviously a little too soft for me (I told him I’m used to dancing with strong young Latinos who could stand up to the abuse – I don’t think he appreciated the comment as he walked off holding his sore arm.)

When that gig was over, we were joined by the Cubana pianist, Ariacne Trujillo, whose addition to the night was her high energy and raucous laugh.  We went on to the drom Lounge in the East Village of Manhatten where Memo played with the Carlos Boys Band – a very feisty Cubano band of two brothers with another female keyboardist playing all sorts of Cuban rhythms…and danced our little hearts out until about 3 a.m. 

Jose, a friend of Memo’s, a Costa Rican who works on a private yacht and had just arrived that evening in New York to get his visa for Morocco, joined us. So now I was surrounded by guapo Ticos and high energy Cubanos! What more could a Canadian girl ask for in Noo Yawk City!

When that gig ended, I’m thinking that, well, okay, if we leave now I can still be in bed by 4 and get a few hours of sleep.  Of course for musicians, when the gig ends, the night just begins, so we now headed off, joined by the second Cubana pianist, to Oliva’s, a little corner bar in Soho.  Soho!!! Memo drove us around the city like a crazy taxi driver – I don’t know how he doesn’t have each corner of his car smashed in but I looked and there wasn’t a mark. At 3 a.m. on an April night as steamy as mid-July, the streets were filled with partiers, the cabs were flying by, the  cacophony of lights were flashing, and  music blared everywhere. 

I was spouting effusive thanks to Memo for how he was providing the perfect night in the Big Apple for this out-of-towner who has never been here before (except for a few hours changing trains in Penn Station a few years ago.) The only thing that would make it more special (besides that beautiful rasta Roberto being there with me or my friend Cocky who had hoped to join me but had to cancel) was actually bumping into someone I knew…a pie-in-the-sky dream but hey, I know alot of folks and couldn’t help but think the thought. Whenever there are alot of people about, I always think I should know someone.

We walked into Oliva’s and there is another Cuban band playing, this time sitting in the corner of this very tiny bar – the Danny Rojo band made up of another six Cubanos.  Memo told me later that the music was kind of Cuban porn music (the lyrics anyway).  There was a friendly little crowd sharing the small sweaty dancefloor.  I looked at the band and noticed the guy in the corner playing the timba, hat on his shaved head, and realized that I knew the guy! When I asked Memo about him, he told me that his name was Marvin and he was from Cuba but had indeed lived in Costa Rica for a couple of years, playing with Ramses Araya. Ramses is very talented Tico percussionist now living in Los Angeles, who had studied in Cuba and had a  salsa band, Timbaleo – well, Marvin, this musician I was recognizing, had been with Ramses in Monteverde several years ago, and I had indeed met him. Now that’s a small world…

The music all night was super hot, the company extraordinarily friendly and the dancing satisfied my soul – and the Latin talk and rhythms kept my Cana-Tica soul satisfied as well. As I watched a clock up on a tower turn to 5 a.m., I was still standing but was starting to think that I really didn’t mean to do this, stay out till dawn the morning of my book presentation.  Memo then drove us over to a hole-in-the-wall famous joint called Joe’s Pizza in the West Village – there was a testimonial by the actor Ben Affleck on the wall that this was his favorite pizza in the city – and Memo told me that he had sat in there when Leonard DiCapreo had been there late one night. The place was packed inside and out, and really had the best straight-up cheese pizza – and after about seven hours of dancing, we needed this energy in its simplest and most delicious form.

I finally crawled into my bed at ten minutes to six in the morning, thinking that I was going to be suffering later that day.  I got about four hours sleep and as soon as the others heard me showering, knowing that I had to get going, they were up making gallo pinto (Costa Rica’s famous breakfast rice and beans) and strong coffee and sent me off with a “mi casa es su casa” – and believe me, I’d go back in a heartbeat to New York!

I headed over to Marian Howard’s, a resident of the Bronx and Monteverde, who taught at Bank Street College of Education in the Bronx. She had invited me to come and present the book at her house.  So a small group of her friends, family and neighbours came – including Edna and Linda, two teachers who taught in the early 90s at the Monteverde Friends School who I had known but haven’t seen since. 

 

It was a beautiful summery day and we sat outside and ate Monteverde cheese that Wolf had provided for me when I left a month ago, drank wine and Imperial beer, Costa Rica’s famous beer that Memo had provided me with cold out of his fridge that morning. 

 Marian and I managed to download Skype so that we could contact Wolf and Lucky who were at our friend Alan Master’s home in Monteverde and we all visited through that miracle of modern technology. I gave a slide presentation and we had a lively discussion – it was a wonderful afternoon, sold a few books, ate tasty food, and speaking with Wolf and Lucky was the icing on the cake. And I was surprisingly energetic and lucid and happy – not bad for a fifty-year old who had been out hard-core dancing all night.

I send a huge thanks to Memo and Wendy and to Marian for their invitations and hospitality and support on the grand finale of my northeast US tour.  I maybe sold enough books to balance the cost, maybe not, but I had a lot of fun (my mama and the Dalai Lama say..), met great people, finally made it to Pendle Hill in Philadelphia and, even crazier, Noo Yawk Noo Yawk!  I had the best 36 hours possible in that big city, and I drove through it and found out that it really is quite doable. Nothing to be shy of…so I won’t ever be again.

Yesterday I awoke refreshed after a good night’s sleep, got in my trusty rental car and drove back to my homeland to spend this week visiting friends and enjoying the Canadian countryside before heading for the jungle of Cahuita in two weeks…but I did the urban jungle just fine, leaving a little of my shoe tread on some dancefloors and copies of Walking with Wolf on bookshelves. Ciao chicos!

FEELING FRIENDLY IN FILLY

It is a warm evening here in Philadelphia. Today the sun was shining brightly enough to raise the temperature up close to 80 degrees (or 25 Celsius) – I returned to wearing the shorts I had been living in down in Costa Rica. I find myself in the heartland of the Quakers, Philadelphia Pennsylvania, and it isn’t just the air that is warm here. I’ve met a lot of friendly Friends over the last three days, kind-hearted souls with questioning minds.

 

When I left Maine on Tuesday, I stopped for the night at Carlos and Lidieth Guindon’s in New Hampshire. Carlos is getting near the end of translating Walking with Wolf.  It is very exciting. When he is done, his hard work will be passed on to an editor and we will be another big step closer to seeing Caminando con Wolf become a reality. The poor man is not exactly translating English to Spanish – he is translating Canadian and Alabamian to Costa Rican. Carlos is not a professional translator, just a very smart man with a big heart who wants to see his father’s story made available to those Costa Ricans who don’t read English. It was a very enjoyable evening, discussing details of the book and catching up on our lives. It was particularly great to see Lidieth, who I knew back in the nineties when they were still living in Monteverde but who I haven’t seen in at least a decade. No matter where I go, when I run into Monteverde folk there is a strong connection, a common thread that binds us – our mutual love of that community and culture and remarkable natural landscape. And when they are Guindons, it is that much sweeter.

 

 

I left early in the morning from New Hampshire to get to Philadelphia for an evening talk. It was a very easy drive, right through New York City, on I-95, across the George Washington Bridge. The only bad traffic I ran into in eight hours of driving was the bottleneck that occurs on the east side of that bridge – there seems to be eight lanes of traffic on four different ramps all merging – it took me an hour to get onto and over the bridge, much of which I spent sitting beside this cemetary -  not a particularly peaceful resting spot I’d say.

 

It gave me a chance to look around and snap pictures – I was sorry that I was moving too fast while on the bridge that I couldn’t take a good shot of the Empire State Building that I could see in the distance along with the rest of the famous skyline. Now that I have passed through the Big Apple, I am not at all intimidated for when I return there this weekend – maybe I’ll manage to get some good skyline pics this time.

 

I arrived mid-afternoon at my first Philadelphia stop, Westtown School.  A Quaker school started in the late 1700s, this beautiful campus sits out on the west side of the Philadelphia area, incorporating some of the last farmland as part of its grounds – much in the area has been eaten up by development, apparently in just the last ten years – McMansionland, as someone called it appropriately.

 

Whitney, Quincy & Nora

 

My contact there was Whitney Suttel, a teacher who taught a few years ago at the Monteverde Friends School. She arranged a beautiful room for me to do my slide show and present the book – and a room in the Farmhouse, the overnight accommodation for Westtown.  I was amazed at the size of the buildings of Westtown and the chimneys!

 

I’m not sure how many topped the high roof of the main building but they are so proud of their chimneys that they are spoken about in the school’s literature. Westtown is just one of many Quaker schools in this area – I’ve heard of so many Friends’ elementary, middle, high schools and colleges, I’ve lost count. There is no doubt that Philly must be the epicenter of earthQuakerism in the United States. 

 

The talk was attended by a few students but being their free time, they were more tempted to be elsewhere. But each time I talk, there is always lots of enthusiasm by those who know Wolf and Monteverde and the others pick up on it. This was no exception – Whitney told her own stories of her experiences of walking with Wolf and there was also a student, Laura, who had lived with the Guindons when she did an exchange with Wolf’s granddaughter Noelia last year. And the biology teacher who has taken a number of groups to Monteverde and stayed down at Eladio’s in the Peñas Blancas valley – everyone has their own tales of their times spent with Wolf. There could easily be a second and third volume added to our original book, Walking with Wolf.

 

Early the next morning, I had to make my way into the Center City to Greene St. Friends School.  The Spanish teacher, Sandra Rodriguez, had asked me to come and speak to the grade 7s and 8s – she goes to Costa Rica each year with the grade 7s – so all of these students had been in Monteverde.  I started out from the bucolic countryside of Westtown, leaving in plenty of time and should have been able to arrive easily half an hour before I was to talk. However I ended up getting horribly lost, driving in the morning rush hour traffic, following cars up and down the wooded hill and valley roads, past the mansions and numerous academic institutions housed in big old stone buildings surrounded by big old hardwood trees.  It would have all been lovely except for the fact that I was starting to think I would miss the whole class time and would be doing all this driving for nothing and leave Sandra very disappointed wondering where I was.

 

I finally drove past a corner store where I could ask directions and when I found out that I basically had to return to the point where I think I had gone wrong in the first place – by a different way, but still, miles backward it seemed – I was sure that I would never make the school in time. The traffic was thick everywhere and I was still not really sure how far I was and time was passing quickly. But just as I was truly feeling forlorn, I somehow miraculously came across one of the roads that I recognized as being where I was to turn to get to the school – and pulled into the parking lot with about 15 minutes to spare, enough time to set up the projector, get the power point in position, and wipe the sweat from my brow. 

 

As it would happen, that was one of the nicest audiences I’ve talked to – maybe forty kids from diverse backgrounds, all who understood Quakerism, all who have been to Monteverde, many of whom have aspirations to write themselves.  So when I finished my talk, there were lots of great questions and enthusiasm on the part of these young students. I always tell kids (well, anyone) that if I can write a book, anyone who can construct a good sentence and has a good story to tell surely can write their own book. It was a message that a lot of these kids seemed to want to hear.

 

When that was over I bravely faced downtown Philadelphia and headed to the University of Pennsylvania to drop off a book at the office of Dan Janzen, the famous biologist/conservationist who wrote the Natural History of Costa Rica.  He has agreed to write a blurb for the back of the Spanish edition and I thought that dropping the book off at his office would be cheaper and easier than mailing one – ha! After driving up and down the busy streets then walking through the maze of university buildings for close to an hour trying to find his office, I once again questioned my reasoning.

 

I took the slow road out of the center of the city toward Pendle Hill, the Quaker spiritual and educational retreat. I have heard of this place from people in Monteverde but really didn’t know what to expect. It is a beautiful collection of old stone buildings on grounds full of native trees, with the magnolia flowers just fading, the redbuds shining brightly, the daffodils nodding happily and the leaves starting to appear throughout the canopy.

 

I spoke last night at Swarthmore College – originally a Quaker college made up of more large stone buildings on beautiful grounds very close to Pendle Hill.  Mark Wallace, another former visitor to Monteverde, had invited me. Unfortunately the crowd was super small – Mark and a student and Sybil, a woman I know from Monteverde but haven’t seen in a few years. She was thrilled to come out and get a copy of the book and we all engaged in a great discussion about our experiences in Monteverde. It turned out that Mark and his children had been on the same hike that Whitney from Westtown had been on with Wolf, doing his crazy Tapir Trail in 2004, the year that he wasn’t able to complete the trail. I made the connection when Mark started talking about how his daughter had seen a fer-de-lance while on that hike – and remembered that Whitney had told the same tale, of a young girl seeing a fer-de-lance. It is a small world – they don’t know each other but had actually spent a few days in the wild and wooly cloud forest of Monteverde together and now work only miles apart from each other here in Philadelphia.

 

Here at Pendle Hill, Lloyd Guindon, Wolf’s nephew, is the groundskeeper and today, under that sparkling sun, he took me on a tour – telling me the history of some of the trees – such as the Dawn Redwood, a native tree that completely disappeared in this area until some were found in China and brought back – they are meta-sequoias, similar to the California Redwoods but not the same, and were just leafing out like the Larch or Tamarack trees (as we call them in Canada) would be doing. 

 

 

There is also the State Champion American Beech tree on this campus – I always remember the beech trees at our cottage and how the smooth yet wrinkled grey trunks looked like elephant legs – this big ol’ tree was no exception. It is humungous – one has to wonder how much longer it can spread its big branches out but perhaps being recognized as the biggest in the state will keep it going for awhile longer. As do most of the staff here, Lloyd and his wife Robin and their children live in an old stone house on the campus. He is obviously and justifiably very proud of his work, taking care of this partially forested, partially meadowed land with a big organic vegetable garden and numerous flower beds, mostly filled with native plants and perennials.

 

At each meal I talk with some of the people studying and working here. There are several writers about and I find myself being the “published author” and sharing my own experiences – when did this happen? I often wonder to myself. When did I become someone who knows something about writing and publishing a book? I amaze myself – enough to think I can write another one.

 

Tonight I dined with Lauri Perlman, the director here at Pendle Hill.  She explained some of the history of the place to me – how a small group of Quakers decided that they wanted to start this spiritual retreat as an alternative to Swarthmore College – and made the decision to go ahead back in 1929, four days after the big stock market crash that brought on the Depression.  As she said, what a courageous move they made, and obviously a smart one as Pendle Hill is thriving eighty years later.  She said that she uses that as an example when people are so concerned about going forward in these times of great economic worry – if that group of visionaries could stick with their plan to expand the small meeting at the time into something of this relevance and make it work during the Depression, then maybe we shouldn’t be so worried about taking risks in these troubling times either. If you have a smart plan and work at it diligently, you just might find success despite the fears that rain down from the doomsayers that abound, in our neighbourhoods and in our media.

 

Tomorrow I will be reading from the book and hopefully having an interesting discussion with folks over the lunch hour.  I’ll then be set up to sell and sign books for a couple of hours in the bookstore.  It is supposed to be getting close to 90 degrees – I’ll no doubt be wishing I was swimming in the ocean. As soon as the work is done, I’ll be getting back in my car and driving a couple hours north, back to New York City, to go hear my friend Memo play with a Cuban band in the city and do a book presentation on Sunday afternoon. I am very thankful to Lloyd, Mark, Sandra and Whitney, the folks who brought me here to beautiful Philadelphia. I leave with very warm memories of the Friends, their stone houses and the rich green life that flourishes around them.

 

 

 

 

THE PORT OF FREE MAINIACS

I am still in Freeport Maine.  The weather has turned to spring bit by bit, but the clouds are moving in again and it would appear that we are going to be cold this weekend.  Oh well, if one dances harder, you warm up just fine.

 

Did a talk at the Maine Audubon Society’s Gilsland Farm in Falmouth the other night.  A nice crowd – half were Audubon folks, the other half friends from this area.  Was great to see everyone and they all seemed to enjoy the presentation. Only sold a couple of books but as long as I keep my expectation low (selling one makes me happy) then I’m not disappointed. 

I’ve stayed on here at Mast Landing Sanctuary with Peter and Cocky, who, as always, feed me healthy food, share whatever dancefloor we can find and keep the conversation stimulating.  We have decades of history together, much of it while being social activists in the Temagami area of northeastern Ontario, and never fault for political talk. They went to Cuba this year (I was there maybe five years ago) and what with the American government’s change in policy towards Cuba happening quickly at Obama’s hand, we are all wondering how Cuba will fare as the wealthy Cuban-Americans return to their homeland and the American tourists follow.  I sure hope that the Cuban government has some sort of transition plan ready.  Cuba will never be the same – and some think that is good, but ”progress” could just as easily turn against the people of Cuba as work for alleviating poverty or hardship. 

Best of…with Jacob Augustine on right

Cocky and I went to an event in Portland the other night – the Best of Portland – with free food and music, it was a celebration of the best of everything in the city.  It was quite the crowd – we met music promoters, the guy who did the interior design of the building we were in, musicians, insurance men…well, a wide swath of Portland’s finest.  The food was phenomenal – a bistro version of tamales, divine - and the music – well, we really only caught one act, Jacob Augustine, a great big bear of a man with a small horn and string section behind him – an act we’d both go and and see again.  Great political, social commentary with a rocking backbeat.

I am now preparing to talk to a class at Bowdoin College in nearby Brunswick on Monday.  I’m also staying on top of all the details of Philadelphia (which has grown to 4 presentations in 3 days) and the Sunday afternoon at Marian Howard’s home in the  Bronx in NYC. So each day I’m doing a little work, trying to keep the focus, but mostly enjoying being here with my friends, getting out for walks in the sunshine and dancing  most nights.  Our pal Dennis came over last night and you couldn’t stop us – put four dancers in a room with a huge selection of music and you almost have to shoot us to get us to stop (or remind half of the folks that they have work early the next day – that’ll get them home.)

And I made an executive decision to not go to the west coast this summer.  I haven’t got enough lead time to plan it properly and get booked in places I’d like to be (and my sister is starting a new job this year and therefore may not have the flexibility to spend time with me.) It felt like a huge relief when I finally decided that I can’t do it all.  I can now stay longer in Costa Rica when I return there in May and that sounds just fine to me.

I was invited up to the Chewonki Foundation, an environmental education center near Wiscasset Maine, just a half an hour north of here.  As serendipity would have it, Katy Van Dusen, a friend and great supporter of the book in Monteverde – along with her two sons, Richard and Francis – were visiting the area, checking out the colleges that the boys have been accepted to as they continue their education here in the States in September.  The director of Chewonki, Willard, along with his wife Jenn and their young daughter Sirena invited us all for dinner and I had the joy and privilege of seeing this world class outdoor classroom and dining with a table full of interesting people.  It was also wonderful to be with Monteverde people in Maine, to talk about Wolf,  get an update on Benito’s sloth, and tell stories from the Tapir Trail (Wolf has just sent me an email proclaiming this week Tapir Trail week – you had to have walked this difficult path over the ridges between Monteverde and Arenal, or minimally have read the last chapter of Walking with Wolf, to appreciate the significance.) I felt like a breath of home had whispered in my ear.

Since then I’ve danced away the kabanga blues with the Blues Dogs at the Freeport Cabaret (believing this sardine-packed house was a normal night out in the little LL Bean town), and swirled and swished and sipped a variety of great wines at the Freeport Cheese and Wine’s little wine tasting event.

I also visited with Cocky’s brother Henry and his wife Christine - even more stimulating talk aided by the addition of her mom Pat who is supposed to be suffering from alzheimer but seemed awfully witty to me - and today did the ten minute talk at Nat’s class at Bowdoin. 

A very interesting class for me, listening to Nat’s stories from Monteverde and about Dan Janzen, the well-known biologist and conservationist now at the University of Pennsylvania, who wrote the naturalist’s bible on Costa Rica - The Natural History of Costa Rica - and is also going to provide an endorsement blurb for the back of Caminando con Wolf, the Spanish version of our book. I’m going to be taking a copy of the English version to him in Philly this week, so hearing of his powerful work, his irreverent  personality and his intriguing style as a speaker which has all contributed to a new kind of conservation in Costa Rica has really got me excited about possibly meeting the man.

No two characters on earth could be more fun or better friends than Cocky and Peter -they’ve been so generous and supportive all week, giving me love and soul nourishment constantly along with their wisdom and advice. They know I love them – but here and now I declare it publicly!

With my gang of Mainiac friends at the Audubon talk

 

I’m going to get in that car tomorrow and start driving right straight on through New York City to Philadelphia – they tell me that’s the only way to go, I95 all the way. Last night, I spoke with Roberto, holding down la finca in Cahuita – giving me an update of the plants we had planted, the monkeys who were stealing his ripe bananas and the death of a character in the area who has haunted me for years – with all due respect, I can’t say I’m sad to see him go. Roberto told me that he prays for me every night, that I’ll be okay out on the highways.  I thank him for that, and promise to be very careful – and with that said, Noo Yawk & Philly here I come, highways and bi-ways make room!

ON THE ROAD AGAIN

Maine in the springtime – what a lovely thing.  It’s still cold, but the sky is blue and the sun is shining as bright as a lighthouse beacon warning us of summer approaching. 

Peter and Alpha the wonder dog

Have some time here to write something so thought I better do it.  I’m reworking my powerpoint for tomorrow night’s talk to the Maine Audubon Society in Falsmouth.  My lovin’ family here, Cocky and Peter, have put a lot of time into make this work and inviting people and trying to get local media attention…we will see how it goes.  As usual, I approach it all the same – think of who I’m talking to and do the best I can to entertain them, hopefully sell at least one book (that makes it worth it and keeps my expectations real low) and enjoy the experience. You never know what might happen or who you might meet.  Each presentation gives me the chance of having something wonderful happen…and minimally enjoying myself. And gives me the opportunity to spread the story of Wolf and Monteverde a little further.

Before I left home, I went to Toronto to slurp oysters with my book boys, Ken and Bruce, and was getting interesting cellphone information from my pal Sol, when I ran into my cousin on the street.  I guess that often happens to people, meeting up with relatives you rarely see on the busiest street (Queen West) of one of the busiest Canadian cities, but when they are on a gigantic horse and dressed out in full winter police wear, it adds a new twist. What an imposing sight they were.  Stephen has been a policeman in Toronto for years and a cop-on-horseback for maybe eight years or so (probably many more and I just don’t remember.)  It was great to see him, chit chat while standing in the heat of the horse’s breath, realizing how little I see these relatives of mine from nearby Mississauga and Fergus – that it is more likely I will run into Stephen riding a horse through downtown Toronto than in one of our houses is crazy.

On Saturday I got my rental car and drove to the border listening to JP Reimen’s new CD, Love is a Dog – the first song, the first of this roadtrip, is Troubadour and its lines about spilling wine and leaving my troubles behind was an appropriate send off. Nice songs again from the boy from tobacco country.

I got through the border but did get processed and so I guess I will have to talk to a customs broker before I cross with books again.  The border guy – I have to be glad he was a nice one – let me through but warned me that since 911, boxes don’t just travel around the country, big brother needs to know what they are and who they’re with. Yeah, well, books. With me. Whatever.

I got to Ithaca, New York, near the Finger Lakes, where my friend Manuel Monestel is teaching a course in Music Industry and Society – the state of contemporary music in society and its relationship with the music industry and market. I’m betting it’s a fascinating course. I stopped for the night at his nice rented home in the pretty town that sits in a valley below Cornell University (a small city in its own right). I had come to not only see my friend (a Tico being only four hours from my Canadian home is well worth the trip) but it was also a good stop on my way to Maine and I had a favour to ask of him.  Manuel has agreed to write a new endorsement blurb for the back of the Spanish translation of Walking with Wolf – Caminando con Wolf. I’m honored that this well-known musician, author, professor and all-round wise and talented man is going to put his name to the book. So I dropped one off for him to read and managed to get a full  night of music in the process.

I did find out from Manuel, who has written a book on the history of calypso music on the Caribbean coast of Costa Rica and is very knowledgeable about not only the history and culture and music but the dialect there, that the term I’ve been using – cabanga (read former posts) – which Roberto taught me, does indeed, as he insisted, have Afro-Caribbean roots. It is in the Spanish dictionary and the Ticos know it but it comes from the southern Caribbean. It meant that you should be sharing something – and that kind of worked its way around to feeling that you lost something – and that further got fused with the idea that you are feeling a loss, melancholy, the lovesick blues. That’s what I’ve been feeling – and with a capital K – Kabanga – all the more apropos. Roberto will be happy to know he was right, the proof in a book on Afro-ethnicity.

 

There was a Peruvian celebration going on at the university, and the great Eva Ayllon, the beautiful star of Afro-Peruvian lando and festejo music, performed in the nice small room with her hot jazz band. That was a very sweet treat to arrive to a show like that – she took the chill off the wintery night. 

 

 

 

 

 

A dance and cajon  band from New York City, Carabumbe, also performed, including an Afro-Peruvian dance workshop (that I of course joined in to sweat a little).  It was powerful to hear six of those wooden boxes being beaten together. There was also a typical dinner served.  Viva Peru!

Afterward we went over to  the house of some grad student friends of Manuel’s – Marcela, a Costa Rican and Juliana, a Columbiana, both who know Monteverde well and bought a couple books (always working I tell ya.) Manuel and Juliana, along with friends from Chili, Mexico, Uruguay, Tennessee (and of course Canada), played guitar and sang till the madrugada, a variety of political, social and romantic latin songs (stirring my poor little tender soul again).  Juliana had a powerful expressive voice and Manuel is always butter in your ears (or that would be buttered rum in this case.)

By the time we got back to the house, I was lucky to get a few hours of sleep before getting back in my car and driving seven hours east to Freeport.  I was flying on the highway but without any sense of incident – it was Easter Sunday after all and the roads were relatively quiet as everyone was home eating turkeys and rabbits and pigs and things.  So here I be in Maine, preparing, relaxing, visiting, happy to be on the road again.

THE MAGIC OF SAN PEDRO

The community of San Pedro at the base of Volcano San Pedro on Lake Atitlan in Guatemala 

 

It is December 30, 2008 and I’m now in Costa Rica.  I arrived last night (blessedly put in executive class on the two planes that brought me from Guat City to Panama to San Jose – I took that as my Christmas present from Copa airlines, not that they owed me anything) and came directly to my friend Marilyn’s. After a day here in the barrio of San Pedro in San Ramon, I’ll head up the mountain tomorrow to spend the last night of the year, and the first manana of 2009, in my home away from home, Monteverde.

 

 

Before I’m steeped in everything Tico, I want to write a bit about the other San Pedro, the funky town on the shores of Lake Atitlan in Guatemala where I spent most of the last two weeks. The time went by in a blur of Christmas festivities, great food and sunshine. Thanks to the fact that I was visiting my friends Rick and Treeza (who treated me to all the extras including a superb Christmas breakfast), I was introduced to many locals, mostly folks from other parts of the world who now make their home and business there, but also a few real live Guatemaltecos. Without a doubt, the majority of people I met while in Guatemala, whether residents or travelers, were from Canada, many from Quebec. And here I thought they were all in Cuba.

 

 

Being a relatively short, round and generally dark-skinned person myself, I blended in quite well with the Mayan population. I was asked several times if I had Indian blood – not a new theme, as I grew up often being asked this, most specifically if I was an Eskimo – as in Kay Chor-Nook of the north. The phenomena of San Pedro is that for perhaps the first time in my life I felt very tall – at five foot three inches, this doesn’t happen often. One night I was walking home on one of the narrow paths through San Pedro, and found myself surrounded by more than a hundred Mayans who had just come out of a religious meeting, all dressed in their traditional woven wraps and tipica clothing. They were socializing along the pathway, sharing some refreshment.  I got caught behind the man collecting the cups and couldn’t move one way or another, so just had to shuffle along slowly, greeting those who caught my eye with “buena noche amigo.” Never in my life have I stood as the tallest in a crowd – but here I was, what felt like a good head above the rest – I could see from sea to shining sea – many of them laughed as they saw my predicament of barely being able to move, trapped amidst their brown smiling faces. My friend Rick, who could be my equally-short twin brother except for his Boston accent, also appreciates being in this population where he feels absolutely tall at times.

 

 

There was a steady schedule of events all week leading up to Navidad.  Every day and night, well practically every hour, you could hear the explosions of the bombillas – the fireworks that the people here love so much.  From multi-crackling poppers to the large boomers, you have no choice but to get used to them…I couldn’t help but think about North American dogs I know who would spend this season hiding under a bed but here I saw that most of the dogs seemed oblivious (although I’m sure there were many hidden under beds who I couldn’t see) as do most of the people. Every morning I would walk through the scattered left-over litter of the fireworks along the paths and every night walk through the lingering sulfur smells, and despite developing a resistance, still jump when a loud BOOM would burst beside me without warning. At midnight on Christmas Eve the firework display was super loud and impressive, a barrage of explosions set off higher up in the town, but also visible coming from every community around the lake.

 

As I said in my last blog, San Pedro may be described as a village, but it is actually a good-sized town (or very small city). I stayed in the lovely Sak’cari Hotel, at the recommendation of my friends – it sits on the edge of the lake with beautiful views and is right in the middle of many of the great restaurants. Treeza and Rick live in a small house a little away from the action and so they suggested that I might want privacy and to be closer to the nightlife. At $12 a night (private bath and cable TV – you can’t beat it and that is pricey in San Pedro) and the fact that I could sit in the garden and pick up the neighbouring café’s wireless for free, it was a great choice – and Manuel, one of the managers, and the Mayan folks who worked there where real nice to be around.

 

 

In reality, nothing was more than a ten minute walk from anywhere else. The central market of San Pedro and the bank machine both were up the hill in the central part of the town – the lower part closer to the water held the majority of the restaurants and bars, all linked by an intricate system of walking paths that were just recently paved with blocks. I can imagine how dusty or muddy these walkways would have been before the cobblestone was put in. Another big change in the community, according to the locals, was the arrival of the little tuktuks – these Italian three-wheeler carts that are used as cheap taxies. Dave, an ex-pat from Canada who runs the fine Bistro Sol restaurant, told me that about three years ago a man brought two into the community. Dave went to Canada for six months and when he returned there were more than forty! I can only dream how quiet this place was just three years back, before these little motors started squealing around everywhere. They can move people and their packages over greater distances and much faster than before but perhaps that is the point – once everyone feels the need to move further and faster, the wave of change is well on its way to being a tsunami.

 

 

One of the places that I really loved to be at was La Piscina. People generally don’t swim in the lake close to the communities (although the Mayan women do their laundry and bathe on the shore) but go to places out of town – a beach at La Finca, cliffs across the lake for diving – where people go to be in the cool water of the lake. A friendly guy from Quebec, Daniel, put this swimming pool in last year. He also happens to make the best bloody marys in the land. La Piscina is a great place to hang out, catch some sun, swim, or relax in the shade of the trees around the bocci ball and horseshoe courts. Recently Daniel began a friendly bocci ball competition on Saturday afternoons which is becoming an addiction for the locals. Having grown up around a lot of Italians, I’m familiar with the sport. I was at La Piscina for two of these Saturdays, hilarious hours spent with a large cast of characters, some who actually could play the game well. There was an eleven-year-old boy from the US, Cody, who was very competitive and managed to get into the finals the first week – I seemed to run into him everywhere and almost felt like he was the red-headed mascot of the place by the time I left. However it was the red-headed Kevin – the Guatemalan-born son of hippies who was born here in the early wave of grooviness in the seventies – who beat the competition both weeks and now is the undisputed and big-headed bocci champ. Rick has promised to keep me informed as to who finally dethrones him.

 

Neil the sweet kiwi, Daniel and poor Santa

 

Daniel also had an “I Hate Christmas” party December 24^th which I went to, even though I don’t, where the highlight was the destruction of the Santa pinata. Lovely to see all that pre-Christmas aggression played out on a tissue-paper effigy of the Father of Consumption instead of in mall parking lots. Daniel also treated me to the music of Harmonium, a band that I learned French to while living in Lac St. Jean in northern Quebec many years ago. I haven’t heard any of their music in years and so he played several songs for me, him and I singing out – it brought tears to my eyes and took me back to crispy white wintery days living in the northern bush of Quebec.  Although I find it hard to string together a sentence in French anymore, I could still sing most of the lyrics to these songs! Amazing how the mind works.

 

The most popular girl at Daniel’s bar 

 

 

If you find yourself one day in San Pedro, I highly recommend Daniel’s place – a great outdoor space for relaxing through the constantly hot sunny days with the entertainment provided by the locals, the music, cocktails and the clear cool waters of the pool provided by Danielito.      

 

Speaking of those hot days, I was amazed at the intensity of the temperature on the lake. I can imagine that it is because of the dry climate – in the sun, it was very hot in that pure clean atmosphere – but the second you moved into the shade or a cloud passed over the sun, the temperature dropped several degrees. At about four o’clock each day, when the sun made its way behind the shadow of the volcano, the temperature would really drop and stay there. If the afternoon wind was blowing off the lake, and you were in the shade, it was downright chilly. It was a constant effort to re-balance my temperature in San Pedro and just moving a few feet could mean the difference between sunstroke and frostbite.

 

The lake itself was very high from an intense rainy season recently ended, the evidence apparent all along the shoreline.  Many trees were sitting in the lake along with crops and shore grasses. People who have buildings and businesses right on the shore are worried about the loss of their land. Treeza and I spent a morning walking outside of town along the shoreline where the public path has mostly disappeared. The distinction from town to country is slight – spaces not filled with buildings are filled with maiz or other crops such as coffee and a variety of vegetables or are small corrals for tethered horses. The land around the lake, on the hilly volcano skirt, has been terraced by the Mayans for generations.

 

On the path from town to Rick and Treeza’s, one passes through a crop of anise – I have no doubt that every time I smell licorice I will remember that bit of dusty trail where I had to stop and breathe deeply each time.

 

 

 

Many of the people I met were folks who came once and returned, now perhaps having built a home or renting a cheap house somewhere in town. Many of them, such as Eduardo and Beth, were volunteering in the local schools. Literacy has been a problem in Guatemala. Public schooling has not been a priority but as tourism grows and the locals find that speaking English is an asset for their childrens’ future, there is more interest in classes. So there is no shortage of volunteer work as a teacher in the area. And to do my little part to evict literacy, I managed to sell or trade a few copies of Walking with Wolf, so our story will live on in San Pedro long after I’m gone.

 

In my two weeks in Guat, I slowly became aware of the use of the word “they” – as in the Mayans. I have no doubt that “they” also have a similar word for the foreigners. “They” do things in very different ways than the folks who have come from afar and I listened to a lot of criticism and frustration by people attempting to run businesses based on their foreign standards. I’ve lived through this in Costa Rica – where “they” aren’t from as distinctly different of a culture as the indigenous communities in Guatemala. The influence of foreigners in Costa Rica is profound – I am not sure that the standard of living has improved here but the arrival of a large foreign residency has certainly meant that life moves faster, that time and money have taken on a different meaning, that people work hard to buy all the stuff that is now available, and there is great pressure on the next generation to be educated and capable of working in this newly-Americanized world based on consumerism. 

 

I’ve never quite understood it, as most foreigners I’ve met have moved to these beautiful countries not just for the sunshine but also for the slower pace of life…and before you know it, they are amping up that pace and demanding that the locals who work on their houses and in their businesses meet their standards that they’ve brought with them. It isn’t fair or right for me to come to any strong conclusions from my short time in Guatemala, but this concept of “they” hit me – I started to recognize who “they” were as I sat in a restaurant or at a bar eavesdropping on new residents discussing their Guatemalan realities. I certainly saw lots of very warm relations between the foreigners living in San Pedro and the Mayan residents.  It is very difficult to blend into an old culture without creating change – and no doubt some change, since as literacy and health care, is good change. But tourism is seldom a completely clean and healthy alternative – providing services that appeal to foreigners – and more often than not there are many conflicts that get swirled into the exploding waves of change. I would say that the Mayan culture has proven itself to be a very strong one and so I trust that they will hold their own against the tsunami that is building force in the area.

 

I had some great nights of dancing in San Pedro – at El Barrio, the Buddha Bar, and Freedom Bar. The embers of a big hippie fire are still burning in San Pedro and the longhairs and their influences are evident. A local band, Dr. Brownie and the Space Cookies, play original latin-groove music – couldn’t get enough of them – well, the name says it all. In reality there’s no shortage of organic local foods, street artisans, music wafting on the breeze, friendly folks and all that colorful Mayan cloth that is the national dress of the country. The place breeds originality and has attracted people with flare – this can be found in so many of the restaurants and hotelitos. 

 

A real sweetie of an ex-pat gringo, Blake, runs two restaurants with his partner Santos, a wonderful chef from a local Mayan community across the lake. They own La Puerta, an oasis with great breakfasts sitting right on the edge of the water, and recently opened the Ventana Azul, with asian/latin fusion cuisine. It has to be the smallest restaurant around in size but their attention to detail is impressive and their food divine. Once again, I send a high recommendation to visitors in San Pedro to check out either of these places and when you go, say hi to the boys for me.

 

 

When you arrive on the boat from Panajachel at the dock in central San Pedro, you look up and immediately see D’Noz, a restaurant that has been there several years, run by a beautiful couple named Dean and Monique. Dean is one of, if not the best, chef in the area. On Christmas Day they put on a buffet dinner (serving Space Turkey – the theme holds) that has to be one of the finest orgies of food in a restaurant setting that I’ve ever participated in. Every kind of food was represented, all beautifully presented, from exotic salads, to sage dressing balls, to bacon-wrapped beans, grilled eggplant – well the list is endless along with the turkey and your choice of gravy – straight or groovy-space-style. Unfortunately I had picked up a small stomach problem for a couple of days – best described as a gaggle of gurgling in my body – and couldn’t eat as much as I would have liked.  But every single bite that I took was delicious, each dish distinct, and it was all served up by Dean and Monique with their helpers in a way that made the whole thing look amazingly easy.

 

For the price (I think it was about $15), as their Christmas present to their guests, they also threw in a gigabite of music that they would download on your MP3 or on a DVD, out of their huge collection of digital music so I came away with several albums of music that will remind me of my time in San Pedro. After the main spread of fantastic foods, we were then treated to the fine desserts of Margy – carrot spice muffins and double chocolate caramel fudge to die for and her specialty, butter tarts.  Considering that she lives quite a ways out of town with no refrigeration, her ability to create these wonders for a crowd of about sixty and then transport them there and serve them crispy cold was amazing.

 

Those of you who read the last couple of posts, may remember that I was making butter tarts on my last day in Canada to bring for Rick and Treeza.  It was Margy’s tarts that had been their introduction to this very Canadian dessert. Our versions are quite different but equally delicious (I think). You will be happy to know that my tarts not only arrived in perfect condition, but that Rick, Treeza and I were able to indulge ourselves daily for most of the time I was there. One day we went across the lake to Panajachel, a very busy commercial center that perhaps has lost its charm that I had heard it once had. Treeza bought herself a gas oven that will move with them into their new house which is to be built in the coming months. The next day the store brought the oven over and a man walked it down the dirty path on his back to their rental house and hooked it up. One of my last evenings there, I gave Treeza a lesson in pie dough making (the rules – the right proportion of ingredients, touch it as little as possible, keep it cold, touch it as little as possible.) We ate a great quiche that night with perfect dough but I can imagine that back in San Pedro, Treeza is probably already making butter tarts. Give a man a butter tart, he’ll kiss you – teach a woman to make butter tarts, life between man and woman will be sweet forever.

 

 

So thank you Dean, Monique, Alex and Jaden at D’Noz, Daniel at La Piscina, Ben and Xena at El Barrio, Dave at the Bistro de Sol, Blake and Santos at the Ventana Azul, Eduardo, Beth and Sasha, Felicia, Jill, Axel along with the Guatemalan and other musicians, the sweet kiwi Neil, and especially Rick and Treeza – you all made San Pedro more than the beautiful place it is – you made it feel like I was home for the holidays. Ciao chicos, un abrazo fuerte.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And a very peaceful, healthy and joyful 2009 to us all!

 

 

In the land of the Mayans and the Hippies

 

After over thirty years of dreaming of this place, I have finally come to el lago de Atitlan in Guatemala.  I am so fortunate to have my good friends, Rick and Treeza, here – they’ve been spending winter here for the last five years or so and are now preparing to build a house in the lakeside community of San Pedro.  Although they, and others I spoke to while staying in Antigua for a couple of days, describe this place as a village, I think that the place is growing up around everyone faster than they are aware.  There are between twelve and fifteen thousand inhabitants, or more, now. Certainly it is a bustling place that laps the lakeshore and then winds its way in a series of paths, alleyways and terraces up to the volcano that looms behind – to this Canadian, it is definitely a good-sized town.

 

I came to Guatemala with the high expectations of a magical landscape that would be home to a colorful and friendly people and so far I have had these long held ideals met by the people and the place. Since I have some familiarity with other parts of Latin America, especially Costa Rica, I felt quite at home when I walked out of the modern airport in Guatemala City and saw the crowd of people pushing against the barriers, waiting for family and friends or to hustle a taxi fare out of the arriving planeloads of tourists. Arriving into that chaos in a new place always makes a big impact until you’ve done it a few times. Speaking the language helps to take away some of the confusion. 

 

An elegant modern tipica Mayan – notice the great shoes…

 

The first language in this country is a variety of the different dialects of the Mayans but Spanish has been here for centuries and the Mayans speak it in a more understandable way than anyone else I’ve heard, probably because it is their second language. They speak it very cleanly and patiently and politely for the most part, and so my personal version of Spanish – learned in the campo of Costa Rica, spoken with a French accent that I picked up in the northern bush of Quebec, colored by my lack of attention to detail and perfection – well it works very well here. I find very little problem in understanding anything except the new vocabulary that is indigenous to this place.

 

 

I took a $10 shuttle van to Antigua as people uniformly seem to recommend getting out of the city, or Guate, quickly. Antigua is a smallish ancient cobble-stoned city where people have headed for years to study Spanish.  The Mayan population there is accustomed to the ways of foreigners and tourism runs the economy but the traditional aspects of the place are still strong. Although I just arrived in this new country and city, I was eased into its comfortable slow and friendly pace.

 

I met a nice guy from Montreal, Georges, on the shuttle and we stayed at the same hotel, the very pretty Mayan-family run San Vicente Hotel, right downtown but off the street with a plant-covered courtyard, very colonial looking, with Hugo the talking parrot and Toby the terrier mascot. Georges and I discovered the joys of the city together, heading out by foot and just walking and circling, visiting the big cemetery that houses the ancestors, taking pictures in the amazingly clear mountain light, and trying out a variety of restaurants – great breakfast at La Escudilla, sunset at Cafe Sky. 

Antigua sits on a flat table at the base of volcanoes – one of those places where you feel peaceful and protected by the shadowy mountains but are aware that this tranquility can be fleeting if one of those volcanoes decides to roar or an earth tremor wants to well up from below. Signs of destruction are all around in the old churches and traditional houses but there is a very modern energy that permeates out of the painted facades and old stone walls.

 

The mercado central, as is present in so many communities in the world, takes up blocks at the northwest end of town, where mostly Mayans dressed in their bright woven clothing are selling everything from fruit and fresh patted tortillas to bootleg CDs and plastic conveniences. Because of it being Christmas time, there was a whole section of decorations – many cornstalk and grass nativity figures, seasonal plants, and religious figures, but also tables of singing strings of Christmas tree lights that made me crazy just walking past as well as the aluminum-foil wreaths, hanging stars and garlands.  I have been amazed in the past when I’ve spent December in Costa Rica at the art form I call tinsel-creations – I bought an intricate tinsel snowflake ball to take to Rick and Treeza – an Antiguan snowball.

 

 Everything about Antigua was low key yet vibrant, steeped in the past but with signs of the 21^st century all around. I will return for my last night to Antigua before heading to Costa Rica and already have ideas in my head of what food I want to taste and what streets I want to visit more closely. I have really enjoyed the food here – access to lots of fresh fruit and tropical vegetables as in Costa Rica, along with traditional corn tortillas and a variety of salsas. And because there is a significant foreign population here now, you can enjoy fusion cuisine made with local products, something that often takes food to new heights.

 

Hand-painting La Merced, a beautiful decorated cake of a cathedral…

 

From Antigua, it was a two and a half hour drive in another comfortable shuttle van up to Panajachel on the other shore of Lake Atitlan.  From there you take one of the many lanchas, small boats, across the lake to San Pedro.  I have now been here over a week – Christmas just passed, and I have a couple of days before heading back to Antigua and onward to Costa Rica before New Years.  I’ve been writing this but actually have been too busy to finish up – and now just want to post it with a few pictures. It will surely be next year before I’m writing about this great community that I’m loving called San Pedro.  Instead of trying to carry on, I will just leave you with what’s been said and will write about the lake, the food, the people and the beauty of Lake Atitlan later.

 

Suffice it to say, it’s been a comfortable, friendly and truly gorgeous place to spend the Christmas season. I hope that wherever you are, you have felt the same joy and contentment that I have, and been able to partake of the wealth of love that comes from family and friends. I am finishing 2008 in a very beautiful, peaceful place and hope that bodes well for the future. May 2009 be better in every way than anything that has passed before – and if it is meant to be a trying year, as fate sometimes predicts, than may we have the strength and humor to survive it gracefully.  Hasta la proxima chicos.

 

 

 

 

i said….BOO!

 This is the scariest week of the year. Of course, many of us say that every year, especially those of us who jump into Halloween festivities with a fever.  I have always loved Halloween - probably got started with the candy thing. We didn’t have access to candy then the way I think many kids do now. Candy was doled out on special occasions or we saved our little quarter-a-week allowance to indulge ourselves. I remember how big a pillow case of candy seemed, even before the days of king size pillows.

 I do know that it was always the costume-making and masquerading that was the big draw for me. I can remember a long line of great costumes, each year learning something more about what makes the perfect outfit.  Besides being silly, sexy, literal, conceptual, colorful, creepy, and highly original, the costume receiving high marks from me has a lot to do with how functional it is, as in you should be able to walk. I learned that when I was about eleven, when I tried walking around the block trick-or-treating wrapped up like a mummy – forced to take miniscule steps, barely able to lift my legs up stairs, generally being so slow and awkward that I was left behind by my older sister and her friends, who, let’s face it, were happy to ditch me.

  Then once I was older and going to parties and bars, there was the matter of dance-able costumes as in you must be able-to-dance… not too hot, not with extremity add-ons that can trip you or hurt other people on the dancefloor, not masks that you can’t breathe or see, or an ensemble that has to be pulled apart and tossed aside within the first half hour. One of my favorite works-of-costume was transforming my mother’s wedding dress into a mermaid outfit years ago – green shiny sequined material for the long fish-tail sewn onto the lacy white bodice of Mom’s dress.  I controlled the tail with a string attached to it from my wrist.  It was all-in-all a very comfortable fun costume - the only trouble was when I got too far into character and jumped into the kiddies apple-bobbing basin like a mermaid-outa-water who had just returned to the sea.  The big galvanized bobbing tub fit me nicely – but sent all the kids running to the parents crying, ”Mom, Kay just sat in the apple-bobbing water. YUCK! We can’t bob for those apples now!” I tell ya – some people’s kids…

 

So I carry on each year, searching for great costume ideas, always happy when something works out real well.  This year, having just returned from several weeks away in the US, England and Spain, all I could do was throw a bunch of sarongs and pearls into a bag along with a great pair of shoes that I had bought at an amity years ago for a costume but never worn. I arrived on Friday at my friend Carolyn’s and said, “Please make me into a costume”.  These thrown-together things often work out just swell – and so it was that I became some sort of Haitian voodoo queen with cleavage…and great shoes.

 

 But first, being the scariest week and all, there was a freaky story to be told when I arrived at Carolyn and Chuck’s house near Westport.  They have the cutest little dog, Ziggy (or Zigmeister, Ziggidy-dooda, the Zigster…).  He is a beauty, a mid-sized dog of African descent – a Basenji – that Chuck brought home about a year and a half ago.  All the extended family and friends have fallen in love with him. Reading about the breed, I found that Basenji’s are hunters with cat-characteristics and ”silent voices”….it is true, Ziggy doesn’t bark all that much, always a loveable trait especially in small dogs.

About three weeks ago, Carolyn had gone walking with Zig, leaving their home, across Faerie’s Hill (where the magic people dwell), through the backfields, her eye to the colored foliage along the windrows.  They heard coyotes as they went along, Zig’s ears perking up with each sound. Being a natural hunter, he doesn’t particularly shy away from things, but up until this point it has only been a case of keeping him inside at night so he doesn’t mess with the skunks.  At one point Carolyn saw three coyotes a good distance away, walking along a path that follows the edge of the field.  Zig took notice and went running to them – so fast that Carolyn couldn’t stop him - and the coyotes advanced towards him.  Next thing, one of the coyotes had picked the Zigitito up and tried to run, little black and white body in his mouth. 

As Carolyn told it, this all happened in a few loud heartbeats. She went running, arms flapping, screaming toward the canine chaos.  The other two coyotes ran away but the one with Zig tried to keep him. Zig isn’t that small and no doubt fought back. The coyote finally had to drop him as Carolyn arrived. 

 Ziggy was gashed up pretty good but had survived – nipped Carolyn as she tried to pick him up so we figure he had got a few good ones in on the coyote as well. Carolyn carried him back over the fields and took him to the vet for a buncha stitches.  When Chuck came home a few hours later, as he put it, Carolyn was more freaked out than Zig – who was basically just stoned on pain killers and (maybe) just happy to be alive.

I’m happy to report that Zig is now, three weeks on, feeling back to himself and the hair on his shaven wound areas is growing back.  Everyone I talked to in town was talking about poor little Zig (and poor big Carolyn) and we are all glad that he survived and wasn’t taken into coyote slavery – or worse. There is a sad story out in eastern Ontario this week – very scary for the owners of the missing wallaby known as Wendell – who got loose last week and has been spotted far from home (but, come to think of it, getting closer to Chuck & Carolyn’s home). I hope that he is caught and returned home, because this wallaby won’t survive the winter, that alone dogs, cars, coyotes, etc. So if you see a fleeing wallaby, you know what to do (throw a pillow over his head and call…)

Saturday afternoon I spent a couple of nice hours at Stillwater Books in Westport – hanging with my friend Steve Scanlon and signing books. We had a few visitors – and sold a nice number of books.  It was great to see some folks I haven’t seen in awhile and don’t get to see often, and trade Wolf stories with some other folks who have been to Monteverde and met him.  Steve and I are going to think up a different approach next summer – maybe an outdoor table, some music and food?? 

On Saturday night was the spook-tacula-fiesta. This was the fourth annual at Chuck and Carolyn’s off-the-grid music hall out there on Faerie’s Hill (where the spooky people lurk) and keeps growing. This year was the best hardcore group of dancers you could wish for. At most points in the night there were more people on the dance floor than around the edges.  My kinda crowd.I used my sarongs and pearls and Carolyn not only put a great face on me (she knows how to make great lips) but tied her and my hair up around yogurt containers to great effect. I think I’ll try it with coconut shells some night I’m going out and see if anyone notices. I was colorful (check), comfortable (check), sexy in a creepy voodoo kinda way (check), and had the best dancing shoes on that kept my feet moving all night (check check). We danced our dead souls alive – but also wandered out into the frosty forest and looked at the dozens of carved pumpkins that were waiting out there.  A store in Westport (the Life is Good people) had organized a hundred or more pumpkins to be lit along the town dock and once Halloween was over, encouraged people to take them.  Carolyn and Chuck were able to bring a bunch to light along their long drive, their flickering orange faces welcoming the folks, and then scattered through the woods of Faerie’s Hill (where the pumpkin people grow).

 I really appreciate when people put a little thought into the costumes and this was no exception - we had tall shiny people, finely dressed damsels, a lovely whirling dervish and a whole bunch of men in various costumes but with very similar hats. 

 

 

 

 

            The best costume though was the simplest – by putting on just the right duds – bicycle helmet, rayon summer shirt and shorts – and gluesticking a little ball of white cotton fluff on his chin, a friend of Chuck’s came dressed – as Chuck. We all knew who Brin was immediately – if Chuck hadn’t been so made up as Beetlejuice, we wouldn’t have known the difference between them. 

 

 

 Great food, good friends, hours of dancing with an enthusiastic gang, a starry sky outside - another great Halloween on Faerie’s Hill (where the good people linger).

 

 

 

 

 

 

Now the scariest part of the week. It is the eve of the Great American Election. I can’t even imagine how most people I know would feel if Obama isn’t elected. I refuse to dwell on it, but the thought crosses my mind. And the safety of this courageous man and his young family also crosses my mind, as I know it does most people I know.

  

 Keep him safe.  Let things be as they should.  Give the world some good news so that we can at least for awhile believe that positive change is possible in the too often over-whelmingly long tunnel of negativity in this world.

AOUT & ABOUT IN LONDON & BARCELONA

 Last night the northern winds of October suggested that the plane and I blow south rather than north, but instead of following my instincts, I returned home. As it happened it was to perfect cool, sunny and colorful autumn weather. It is warmer here than what I left in London – where it snowed!! on Tuesday night. That was a treat for a Canadian who never minds the first snow of the season and knowing it was a strange event for that city and I felt that it was a wonderful white thing to witness. 

I had arrived in London two weeks earlier to cool autumn weather and quickly left for Barcelona where my friend Chrissy and I stayed for several days, before returning for three days to the land of the queen who was surely wearing her woolies this last week.

 So I thought I’d share some photos and some impressions, but just to show that I was still on the job, here is a picture of me about to take Walking with Wolf into the Quaker Book Store on Euston Road in central London where it is now for sale.  I also took the opportunity to talk with a nice fellow at The Friend journal office about doing a review.  I must admit that was the only book related work I did for the last couple of weeks.

 

  We only had time in London to visit the Abney Cemetary Trust in the Stoke Newington area where I was staying at Chrissy’s. We walked around what is the largest wooded area in the central area of London, 32 acres of overgrown trees, lichened tombstones and moss-mottled monuments. It was perfect to be there on the gloomy day we were, that alone being there in the spooky season. Turns out that it was at one time used by a Quaker girls school and also is home to the remains of the Booths, the founders of the Salvation Army. We wandered the paths between the granite monoliths and creeping vines, England’s history slowly seeping into my chilled bones.

 Chrissy, who I met eighteen years ago on the beach in Montezuma, Costa Rica, has invited me to visit her in England since that first year. I haven’t made it over before, initially due to dealing with cancer, then to my parents’ final years, then to the book.  So it was important that I go.  She has a cozy flat in the Hackney area of northern London but also a walk-up in downtown Barcelona.  That was where we headed, to usually sunny Barcelona, though while we were there the rain in Spain didn’t just fall mainly on the plain, if you know what I’m sayin’. Fortunately even when it was raining, we could sit at the open terrass doors of the flat, sipping wines, eating chorizo and cheese, playing scrabble and watching the tree-lined social scene below us. One of the main beauties of Barcelona is the constance of people out on the street – all day, all night - Chrissy says it is because so many live in dark flats and the nice weather makes it conducive and nicer to be outside. It is also obviously the social nature of the Spanish and the pleasure they take in eating, drinking, talking and participating in life.

 From Chrissy’s flat in a rare moment with few people

 

 

 

 

Besides the extreme gregariousness of the people and the balminess of the climate, the other outstanding feature of Barcelona is its architecture and outdoor art.

 

 Everywhere you look there aren’t just really old or really new buildings, big and shiny or organic and stony constructions, but this city is filled with whimsical and inspired, rule-bending and extravagant creations. Much of this is due to Antoni Gaudi, the architect who was behind the design of a great number of intriguing complex colorful  buildings incorporating nature’s idiosyncratic forms into each. His work is a warped form of gothic  – Gaudic you can call it – and ventures into Art Nouveau.  

 

There is the Park Guell where he lived the last few years of his life (before being struck down by a trolley – poor guy) surrounded by ceramic-tiled pillars and sculpted railings over cave-like bridges, a number of casas commissioned by wealthy families, and the notoriously unfinished Cathedral of the Sagrada Familia – which looks (to this American-influenced chica) like someone plopped Disneyland in the middle of this already gothic city.  There are building cranes still suspended all over the rising twisted spires which have been worked on since 1882 yet people don’t hold out hope for it being finished in this life time. 

Each building is more ornate and magical than the last.  There are various other examples of modern architecture throughout the city as well as medieval and gothic, with countless large works of art and designed gardenscapes interspersed throughout. Any city that would let an obviously obsessed, child-like, brilliant designer like Gaudi rule their skyline and build these non-traditional creations is a city that I have to love.  Dali and Picasso also played here – well, the influence of the city on the artists or the artists on the city leaves behind a trail of magical genius for the rest of us.

 

Outdoor art – and stainless steel kiddies slides in a garden park

 

 

I guess a big turn around in the city came with the Olympics in 1992 when architects reworked the beachfront, landscape designers built artistic garden parks and artists were commissioned to fill spaces with large installations. The waterfront became miles of beach along the Med and cafes and bars put up their umbrella-sheltered tables to cater to the happy sunbathers.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Riding our bikes we got to cover a great part of the city, winding through the back alleys and through the cafe-strewn boulevards. Although I ride my bike everywhere here in Hamilton, I’m seldom in this kind of density of pedestrians or on as busy streets, but I just followed Chrissy, who is a very experienced cyclist in both London and Barcelona. I enjoyed the days when we walked, as I could actually see more without having to keep my eye on the road.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 We took the metro as well as the exterior escalators that climb up the elevations that surround the city – where Park Guell sits and Montjuic, home of the big art gallery and the football stadium where the Olympic programs took place. Everywhere there was art, everywhere there were people, and everywhere there was food – as long as you understood the hours when lunch was served, when shops were closed so people could eat lunch, and when other bars were open or not…it took a bit to catch on to what was open and when, when we were supposed to be eating and what, but it was always worth the effort to be in the right place at the right time…and the menu lunches – about ten euros for three courses of fresh food off a changing menu, with a glass of wine and a cortado (little cup of coffee), was always a great deal. And we had a great sushi lunch at Cirkus – part clothing store, part excellent sushi in a very cool environment.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Food and its presentation took alot of our attention, as it is prone to do anywhere in the world. We also spent a lot of time checking out music – from choirs in old monasteries and big cathedrals, to street musicians playing intriguing instruments, to smoky jazz clubs – the Harlem and Soul Jazz Clubs - and the best night – LaRumbe, a Catalonyan/South American fusian rumba band with Violeta, their flamenco dancer, three drummers and hot guitarists – I’ll go looking for that gang again somewhere in the world.

Choirs singing in spectacular places

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

On the left, a mournful digeridoo player 

On the right are Swiss Hangs echoing in the stones - a recently developed percussive instrument

 

 

This looks worse than it is – they were preparing for a movie shoot – but it looked real, the police going after the illegal sellers on the street – great thing to come across.

 

 

 

We spent one day taking a train an hour away to Montserrat. Here a mountain of rounded rock spires rises up out of the otherwise pretty flat land and a huge monastery sits protecting the quiet lives of the monks and welcomes the feeding frenzy of the tourists. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Chrissy and I spent the day hiking through the wooded rocks and once we got away from the very loud group of out-of-control kiddies and the chatty womens’ hiking group, we found ourselves walking in silence…the first true quiet I had heard since arriving in Barcelona.  Although I live in a small city and love to be surrounded by laughter, chatter and music, I also seek out peace and solitude - we both felt the privilege of finding some private space up close to the blue sky, hidden from the crowds by a couple hours of walking. It reminded me of the canyonlands of the southwest of the US or the mogotes of Cuba - I’m not sure if Dan Brown put Robert Langdon in these hills in Da Vinci’s Code, but he could have.  A beautiful peaceful day.

 

 

 

 

 

The time flew, and so did we, back through a very clear sky, above the Pyrenees and over France to cloudy cold England.  We did get a couple chilly days of sun – one we went biking along the River Lee and the canal to the Quaker bookstore to drop off the books; the last day I went alone through central London – arriving at Buckingham Palace in time to see the changing of the guards which I didn’t stay for as there were already thousands of people ahead of me and that wasn’t on my personal list of must sees.  Instead I walked and walked through the huge old buildings, marveling at how big London is; through the free Tate Art Gallery, marveling at how huge it was; and returning to Hackney on the buses, marveling at just how big this whole city is.  I was constantly amused and impressed with the wall art and graffiti - some samples:

 

 

 

 

 

 

WHAT? Oh you Brits – lighten up!

Then it snowed, as it would be, the first time since 1934!  And it was time to go home, in time for a book-signing in Westport on Saturday followed by my friends’ big Halloween costume party. And to anticipate the outcome of the American election on Tuesday!  November will be spent working at getting Walking with Wolf out further – still chipping away at media, at reviewers, and making plans for next spring.  But going to Europe was inspiring – I think I will have to return soon. Particularly to Spain -  I like a country where people love people, where men look you in the eye, and life revolves around eating, talking and dancing. And even though the language of the area, Catalan, was difficult to understand, my Spanish held up fine.  Gracias Chrissy, nos vemos!