barcelona to london 2020

“I’m going to go from London to Barcelona and if it’s bad, then it’s a connecting flight to somewhere, and isn’t that how life goes?”

(Overheard, Barceloneta)

I was so lost. 

A sweaty man with a Danish accent came up beside me and started waving a map, like with a little red bus in the corner, and asking where we were now.

I tried to help, but I didn’t quite know. I just arrived in the city that afternoon and had been walking and walking and walking. I didn’t have a map myself, but as the sun lowered in the sky, I followed the streets it still seemed to shine through to stay out of the shadows.

And now, I was still in Barcelona, exactly at the Bar Berlin, behind half a plate of olives and a half a plate of pits, and one Tanqueray-Flor-de-Sevilla and tonic.

I didn’t have a friend in the world I hadn’t made in the last 5 minutes. I didn’t have any battery left on my phone, and I definitely didn’t have warm enough clothes for the cooling seasonal weather. 

But after a while, I felt like myself. I felt myself receding into the place, a piece of decor like this  plain directive:

And the full bottles of Tanqueray lining the window sill.

I was still lost, but I kept my wits about me. So as it always is when you’re in a new city and someone starts waving a map in your face, I was wary, and found a natural ally with the other girl around, Charlotte, who had  flown in for the weekend, like me, but from Manchester city.

And did you know, she had just ran her first marathon, was traveling to every new place she possibly could this year, and was a writer, blogger and a fast friend?

What luck! We were laughing so hard the dignified Spanish octogenarian eating beside us was perturbed. I felt a little bad. Someone else asked, “How long have you known each other?”, as if we were old friends reuniting this weekend.

But truthfully, it had taken my brain a lag time of about 5 minutes to differentiate between Manchester English and Danish to be able to have a conversation. And then we got on like house on fire! And yes, we should run the London Marathon together! 

Why I was in Barcelona I can’t even tell you precisely. All my so-called plans had been going to shit since I arrived, actually for a few months now, but at the same time, life was totally flowing. 

When I arrived and felt the glow of the afternoon sun slogging my overstuffed carry-on through the Placa Espana, something it my soul smiled for the first time in a while. I cried, I laughed, I slept like a baby. I lost my laptop, I left my make up. I talked to everyone, I talked in Spanish, I talked to Spanish cab drivers about talking Catalan. I drank coffee. I drank in the air of Barceloneta beach as it rolled off the ocean then bounced off some guy’s heel in a game of foot volley. I ripped my long silk dress at the hem dancing, I ripped down the highway at 7am when the club closed to make my flight back home. I met writers, I started to write again. Something reached me in the peeling blackness of Opium. **

And now, almost exactly 2 years after I ran my last last marathon, I know I will go for the distance at least one more time.

There were more  400,000 applicants to the London Marathon, of which about 40,000 will run in April, including me and Charlotte, in support of VICTA, a national charity that supports blind children and young adults through programs that foster connectedness.

And I think that’s why I was in Barcelona after all.

——

DONATE TO VICTA UK via my London Marathon page

https://uk.virginmoneygiving.com/fundraiser-display/showROFundraiserPage?pageId=1120258

** it’s a proper noun- the name of long-standing establishment where you can pay $17 for a drink while you watch the sun set over the beach

y e l l o w s t o n e • p t. 1

 “As we passed on, it seemed those scenes of visionary enchantment would never have an end” - Meriwether Lewis

From Teton National Park, we passed into YELLOWSTONE, a place that, like most of Americans, seems to have been programmed into my first memory map of the world, although I hadn’t been until now.

Sign at the entrance of Yellowstone

Despite the vague passion I’ve kind of always had for Yellowstone as a U.S. citizen, I really had little idea before entering the park of the  treasures and wonders to come. 

Like when was the last time you thought about blue geysers, bubbling turquoise and sulfur smoke?

Walking through the geysers of West thumb on a wooden boardwalk felt like an extra terrestrial experience.  I read each plaque posted by the park service to try to make sense of this strange world. The explanations were simple, and seemed to emphasize the improbable heartiness of the tiny, invisible living organisms -“thermophiles” that actually thrived in these boiling hot geological spots.

“Can you imagine living in boiling temperatures?” the simple text read, and really I couldn’t. It was strange to even feel the wafts of steam from the geysers that blew into my face in every direction on this cold day.

It even rained a bit while we drove out to the breathtaking Grand Canyon of Yellowstone. 

The plaques surrounding this breathtaking valley noted it was a scene often painted yet scarcely captured. Our own souvenir was an impressionistic one, we spent just a few minutes at the lookout point as the cloudy sky broke into raindrops.

Then the rain cleared. 

The road gave way to its own attractions. Sudden traffic threatened to derail our plans to see the next scenic site on our itinerary. 

When we turned the corner we saw why-  a giant herd of Buffalo shared the road for half mile with the cars of  gobsmacked visitors, like us, in their camper vans. It was good day.

g r a n d • t e t o n

“let me be a free man. free to travel, free to stop.” - chief joseph, nez perce

Grand Teton National Park

The Grand Tetons from the air

Last week, I packed my tiny suitcase and hopped on an Amtrak train bound for Boston, Massachusetts. Or as one old cowboy I later met would call it- Boston, Connecticut.

I was headed for Wyoming, in a round-about way that would take me through Connecticut, Rhode Island, and Boston on my way out west.

My itinerary was part of my new travel “trick”, looking for flights in a huge radius of airports, which decreases the cost of tickets by increasing total travel time. It’s a sacrifice I’m willing to make for the past few weeks - I have the time- and I love a good train ride!

(And as a practical matter, connecting from the train to the airport in Boston is very simple by public transport on the T)

So there I was, waiting for my first flight to Salt Lake City on a rainy day in Boston Logan. I watched “The Inventor” on the plane, which I enjoyed so much I started in on the book, “Bad Blood” by John Carreyrou).

Then we were in Utah. The view out the window looked like “Big Sky Country” to me, although I was still a Wyoming away from Montana-  but more on that later.

From Salt Lake City, I flew one hour into Jackson Hole - the most beautiful landing of all as the sunset colors filtered through the clouds and the wings of the plane teetered into the mountains.

Flying into Jackson Hole, WY at sunset

Upon disembarking, an arc of antlers welcomed passengers to Jackson Hole airport, a tiny place that was more like a ski lodge with a baggage carousel than an airport.

From there, I caught up with one of my best friends from college and we drove into the small town, where we stopped for warm tea and soup and needled our waiter for travel suggestions - “Cathedrals” - the nickname for the highest points on the Tetons - proved a baffling one.

Downtown Jackson Hole

The next morning, we set out early - grabbing breakfast burritos, fixings for a picnic lunch, and a photo in Jackson Town Square. Then we pointed the rental car to Grand Tetons National park. Within a five minute drive, we were stunned by a first look at  the Tetons.

Mormon Row

We stopped at some amazing views, as well as landmark attractions like “Mormon Row”. a historic settlement now home to a delightful colony of prairie dogs. We tripped in the holes they made and laughed at their shrill “barks”.

Many times, we just stopped to take photos, everyplace we drove through was a picture. It was like this we came upon Jackson Lake.

Jackson Lake

But it was another lake named Jenny where we spent most of the day. We parked outside the ranger station and set off on a well-trafficked hike around the lake and up to “Inspiration Point”.

Jenny Lake

Out of habit, I took a backpack. We put our phones, wallets and water in the outer pocket. But most of the effort of carrying the pack and its weight came from the pairs of high heels I had last-minute packed in the backpack for part II of the trip (the Montana wedding).

Between a few pairs of chunky wedges, the altitude, and the uphill portion of the hike, at least I broke a sweat.

On the way back, we stopped at a massive waterfall, where I swear I saw a beaver or huge marmot dart by in the woods. The other wildlife was mostly big, prairie-dog looking chipmunks, who we ruefully forgot the peanuts for on the top of Inspiration Point.

Waterfall, Jenny Lake

Inspiration Point, Jenny Lake

But no matter, we had our own picnic to attend to. The provisions we had picked up in Jackson Hole had survived the car ride, and we briefed ourself on bear safety before setting up a scenic lakeside picnic.

I think it was about this time last year I was hiking to Cap Blanc Nez and taking mental notes on the windy, effortless kind of picniques the French were setting up with baguette, a bottle of champagne and a wheel of cheese.

With this in mind we had made our selections - a bit of local goat cheese, a (half) baguette (because we are not French women and can, in fact, “get fat”), prosciutto (maybe an unorthodox painting, but provided a kind of improvised charcuterie for the plastic knife set) and a bar of dark chocolate to split for dessert. In retrospect, perhaps the whole picnic shopping list was a nod to the kinds of things I ate hiking the Via Francigena - goat cheese and baguette in France, Chocolate in Switzerland and Prosciutto and tomato in Italy.

Thankfully, the most famous element of a lunch in the American West, the picnic-crashing bear (think Yogi Bear in Jellystone National Park), was nowhere to be found this time, and we made it to our next stop, Yellowstone, in fine shape.

i p a n e m a • f i l m

 “Surprise is key in all art.”

- Oscar Niemeyer 

••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• 

Today, I picked up a little packet from the local pharmacy labeled with my last name- and filled with 40 slick 4x6 photos. 

Pictures- all the result of spontaneous point and shoots from a disposable camera I brought to Brazil. 

Some came out better than I hoped - all dark with a little light shining on something special- a quizzical face, the brim of a hat, an electric blue skyline with a few bulbs out.

Others were a complete disaster, grainy and too dark to see anything- a collection of hands around an iphone, an unidentified nose. 

The best ones reminded me of old friends. Not old friends in the regular sense, but fast friends that I made, just in Rio for a week or the end of a trip. People that just by coincidence, perhaps in relation to the density of umbrellas posted on a beach in a particular moment, became acquaintances, friends, a photograph on the 40-film roll. 

The photos make me feel a kind of nostalagia- they are mostly warm and fuzzy, after all, but mostly content. For all the dark, unreadable faces and almost identical landscapes, I still feel they captured something special. 

They have a certain grace that I would like to look at more things with. They weren’t shot with the precision and perfectionism of a digital camera and the benefit of a million instantly tweakable takes, they just are what they,  faithful evidence to the sunny days and nothing more - that’s the magic. 

s a l v a d o r • b a h i a

“Life is a carousel, it goes up and down, all you gotta do is stay on” - Unknown

Bahia, Bahia! It seems everywhere I went in a Brazil and beyond, the name kept coming up. I watched people’s eyes as they talked about this place, looked at their beautiful photos (on instagram, and it’s worth noting, also a real photo album) and laughed when just the name of the place made one dance a little. 

Noticias de Bahia, I downloaded a song. 

“The north is really special, more different to Rio and São Paulo than even a major southern city like Florianópolis.” Noted! 

And finally, someone said to me, “You came from New York, what’s another two hours to Bahia?” and I found a flight on budget, and the GOL Airlines app worked just well enough, and I was on my way.  

I was so excited I took one little nap and then woke up and went to the airport at about 2am for my 6am flight. I felt physically awful, the airport was empty and cold, but there I was. I found my seat in the crowded configuration of the plane and fell asleep for the two hour flight.

When I arrived in Bahia the first thing I noticed was the heat, it was hot! The airport was half under construction, with less stores and sparkle than Rio or São Paulo. I still felt a bit tired, I took a coffee and split a kit kat with my uber driver.

At least I knew where I was going. As they say, independence is really interdependence. At least I knew Tamara, from Chile, from Rio who had moved on to Bahia the week before to live for a few months at a hostel there. 

Traveling friendships often are made with less spoken words. I scrolled through pictures of Brazilian everything in my phone to find it- the yellow and white booking.com screenshot where she had captured the address the hostel in Bahia.

Now the address was in uber and we were cruising. The haphazard highway outside the airport made me remember something about Bali. When we entered into the city, every corner jumped out at me with a colorful mural. My brain could hardly keep up. I wondered how conspicuous it would be in this new city to capture some portraits against the bright paint. These were instagram walls for sure, but we weren’t slowing down. 

I arrived at the hostel dizzy and with some time to wait before setting my things in the room. Fine by me. I sorted what I needed into a small purse, brushed my teeth, and dropped heavy backpack in the musty luggage room. I returned the key to the front desk and went out the door. 

But where was I going?  

With no real city life on the foreseeable horizon (the hostel is actually in a well-known neighborhood for dancing and nightlife, but what did I know?) and a bit of travel exhaustion setting was in, so I decided to travel again by Uber. Not the most intrepid choice, but moreso than a nap, I reasoned. And the historic center of Bahia, with its storied architecture, colors, and balconies was an estimate of 15-19 minutes away with  Cláudio Márcio in the white Fiat Uno. 

I closed the car door behind me in a main square selling tons of Bahia magnets and t shirts out of Canal-St. style stalls. Perfect! The place for me.  

I felt dizzy as I navigated the shops of percussion instruments, “sacred” beads, black cloth dolls, and cartoon capiohera renderings.  

The music on the streets was wonderful. As I took pictures of the rainbow colonial portuguese architecture reaching into the gray sky, I had the feeling I was on a movie set. 

I walked pass a cart on the street with grains and sage, manned by a man in a white robe.  

“What’s your name?” 

Sara! 

I said.

He starting sprinkling holy water on me, flicking off the leaves of some long green branches, was it sage?

A little paranoia asked if this was a blessing or a curse, I guess that’s always the question.

He added broken kernels of corn to the recipe and poured these over my head.  

The pigeons who were swarming the cart started swarming me.

I felt the gray wing of a sky rat on my leg, and I’m sorry because I know some people feel a real affinity towards pigeons, but that was about enough for me.

 ”Aghhhh!”

I freaked out and ran away at the slight contact with a pigeon, just I did too often when I would run along the East River in Manhattan.  

I got away. 

And the sound of some wonderful music brought me into a shop of rare recordings and music from Salvador. 

Truthfully, at first I tried to use the Shazam app from the street. But the music really was rare, I couldn’t place it.

So I did it the old fashioned way, and went into the store to spend a very lovely hour chatting with the owner and listening to discs track by track before making two purchases, the music I had heard and another I discovered.  

It was a very pleasant discovery, and I was happy to have this experience related to something so cool and distinctly Bahian- the music! 

It was getting late, at least past my normal lunch hour, almost 4PM, so I found a cafe and tucked into a plate of chicken, salad and farofa. It was delicious! I even took a picture.  

Satisfied, I headed back to the hostel.  

My friend was finished working and I could drop my bags, so we went to the roof and chatted.  

Yaccup! 

Pretty soon, I couldn’t stop hiccuping. How embarrassing! I held my breath with my cheeks puffed out and sipped water, nothing worked. By a lame hour 9pm, I was tired enough to retire to my bed - the bottom bunk, with absolutely no thought of going out. 

Sometime in the middle of the night I realized I didn’t just have the hiccups, I was sick. Stomach sick. 

I barely left that bed for 24 hours, then moved across the hall to room where I could  privately yack, sleep, and watch movies all day, for the next 24.

Was it something I ate?  

Probably, the irony is that the only thing I ate tasted so good I took a picture, that almost made me sick to look at again. 

By the time I recovered, my weekend in Bahia had ended and it was time for my flight back to Rio. 

There was more irony in that, but the weird thing is, I didn’t “feel” it at all. I mean there are so many beautiful beaches and places in the North I was so close to, but never discovered because I was holed up in a hostel (not a place to hole up at all), trying to hold down crackers and coca cola. 

There’s really no fomo when your body gives you a hard “NO”, you just slow your roll and enjoy that precious feeling when you finally come back to life.

Did I forget how wonderful it was to have the energy to walk down a flight of stairs or sit up in bed without a pounding head? 

When I finally felt well again, the morning of my flight (and the last few moments I had in Bahia) I sat in the sun and remembered.  

arraial do cabo

“seek and see all the marvels around you. you will get tired of looking at yourself alone, and that fatigue will make you deaf and blind to everything else” - carlos castaneda

this is a blog about arraial do cabo, which the tour company guide, as I remember, told us was one of the travel guide’s top 5 most beautiful beaches of the world.

it’s why one of the most popular activities any hotel or hostel will recommend from rio is taking a bus for an hour and half to these blue water beaches, swimming off the boat, and snapping pictures to your heart’s desire.   

the first time i heard of this, i admittedly missed the boat. but the next weekend when some new friends that i made offered to add me to their trip, i was ready by 7am the next morning.

i wasn’t all the way ready, really. i switched hostels and lost my phone charger. but anyway, on 13% and 5 hours of sleep i got on the bus.

i laughed at my friends sleeping with their sunglasses covering their eyes and towels wrapped around their heads. i didn’t take a picture, because i didn’t charge my phone. 

the tour came with lunch at the end, but the guide advised us we would make an extra stop basically for the bathroom but also to load up on fun road trip snacks. i was in. 

the place was very clean, and had a colorful park. swings, treehouses and games that all looked built by hand and painted in primary colors. 

and something i’ve never seen before in the united states, a little old cowpony saddled up in the corner for DIY pony rides. 

i checked the girth. it was already secure, which i took as an indication, yes, this little pony really a playground attraction at this brazilian bus stop park.

to confirm, i asked one of the staff in broken portuguese, yes!  

i tried to convince the others on the bus in my little spanish that this was a thing. it had been years but i understood how to sit on a horse, even here.

i led the pony to a makeshift mounting block and climbed on. my heart was beating so fast! mostly because the last time i was on a horse was so long ago. my head forgets but something inside me always remembers, the feeling of being bucked off by an unknown horse. and definitely never went on a horse with bare feet before, but here i was.   

i took the only pictures of the scenic beach trip day here before the battery of my phone died.  

the water really was wonderful, cold and blue. i dried off in the sun petting moss on the rock. i jumped off the boat first and swam back last every time. 

niterói+ cristo redentor

“My life, the most truthful one, is unrecognizable, extremely interior, and there is no one word that gives it meaning.” Clarice Lispector

 ~~~~~

last weekend was spent visiting family in niteroi.

niteroi is a smaller city that looks at Rio over the water. brazil is one of the most beach-rich places I have ever been. I learned that all the waterfront belongs to the government and public interest in Brazil, there is no such thing as a private beach.

In Niteroi, I saw smaller beaches, just along the city center, where people hardly swam or laid out, but preferred to walk their dogs, run, or play soccer. Over the water you could see the most famous points in the Rio skyline- The mountain top of Pao d’Azucar, and Cristo Redentor, a monument the locals told me was designed and constructed by a Brazilian artist and not a gift from France!

In Niteroi are also beautiful beaches with fewer people. Sao sebastio was a beach break where you could sit on the steps and only occasionally scoot out of the way for a troupe of 3mm-wetsuit clad boogie boarders. Their black hair bleached orange by the sun and “Aloha” tattoos made me recall  word I hadn’t heard in a while - Sponge boys! And I laughed a little while I brushed off the sand I caught in wave.

I have grown to love the endless summer climate in Rio, so after Niteroi, I took the ferry to spend another day by the sea. I reassured everyone it was almost impossible for me to get lost at this point in my travels, but still, I spent an hour trying to find the familiar subway station at Cinelandia from the ferry dock.

I avoided the shadows and accepted walking a few circles. When I didn’t want to cross a crowded boulevard twice, I detoured into Gloria / Lapa, and toured a huge modern church. The outside looked like a space station, and the inside like a beautiful light bright. On a Sunday the mass was going on, but still sight seers from the tour buses crowded in the back.

I thought I was following one of these crowds when I discovered the more animated, Pentecostal-style Christian worship service in the basement.

Hallelujah!

Teens in the back were selling pigs in a blanket for $1Real a piece. I took one in a napkin and ate it on my way out, it was a whole snack, and my meal for lunch.

I was delighted the Cristo came into view from this neighborhood, and followed the streets with open shops on a Sunday to Lapa.

I had heard of Lapa. Bright hostels played music and people were in the street. I thought about stopping, but a mototaxi stop caught my eye.

I had encountered mototaxis once before, but never took one because I had driven my own scooter! But a printed list showed a price for every destination in the city. Maybe was better than finding the metro - I could go anywhere from here!

I took a deep breath and pointed to Cristo Redentor. Nod, nod. I paused and climbed aboard the back of the bike.

I gripped the handles on the side and made sure my helmet was straight. I was scared but also excited for the ride!

The bike followed a trolley up sunny streets built into the mountains. Flower boxes, the occasional car to squirm around. The whole thing made me dizzy, I took in the Cristo from a distance as we zipped closer. The backseat was a weird place to be. I tried to focus on keeping my weight centered. I visualized how I could James Bond roll out of the inferno if one of the cars also jostling for a place on this narrow road came too close. Then, the ride was over. The lines, lunch options, and gift shops built up around the base of the Cristo Mountain felt safe and familiar. I bought a ticket and was ferried to the top.

There were more stairs and an elevator to the actual observation desk. Crowds of people hoisted their phones in the air, laid down on the ground, and in some case climbed forbidden parts of the deck to take pictures.

I liked the view from the mototaxi that I couldn’t capture, and how the image comes into sight unexpectedly sometimes when traversing Rio. But the Cristo outstretching his arms to the masses of people on the deck was for sure a sight to see...

rio: arpoador

 “Consider them both, the sea and the land; and do you not find a strange analogy to something in yourself?”

Herman Melville

On Tuesday morning, I woke up in the mountains, to the same dogs that had been barking all night plus the birds. I didn’t have plans, but by 10am, I balked at the thought of spending another day on dry land. The trip to the beach isn’t fast, but now I knew the way. I  got to the bus station and bought a ticket. 

The heat of Rio hit me in the face when I arrived, and I walked in Carioca to find lunch, a record shop playing all kinds of sounds I had never heard before. I arrived to the beach in the late afternoon and swam until dusk.

Then, I checked into a youth hostel by the beach (R. Joana Angélica)  and chose a bed by the window which looked out onto a concrete wall. 

R. Joana Angélica  

I ate dinner by myself, and then with a group I met at the hostel! I got soaked to the bone walking back in a sudden rainstorm, and barely slept. At 8am, I popped out of bed and checked  out, the only dry clothes I had left were my swimsuit and rashie. My havianas were cutting into my feet a bit but I hustled to the beach and had a breakfast of ice coffee and globo biscuits on the way.

When I arrived, the line up was calm, as promised, but the instructor I met the day before and their tent was no where to be found. 

I wielded my few words of Portuguese to arrange a new lesson with the school that up and running in the morning. I met my instructor and practiced popping up on the beach.  

Expectations were low, and when I stood up on the first wave they made me feel like I was surfing like Medina already.

The sections were short and most of the time I spent in the water was going under and over the salty waves, paddling as hard as I could for 5 seconds of calm water, and of course, being pushed into waves! 

I felt out of breath, It had been too long. 

“Are you tired?” Asked Anderson, the instructor. 

“No! ”

“Turtle roll!” 

A wave was coming. I happily realized that this expression translated directly, and thought how few words had actually been exchanged in this lesson, yet how beneficial it had been to borrow the eyes and discretion of a local for my first session at Arpoador.  

nogueira: um lindo dia para sair

“True happiness lies in taking a genuine interest in all the details of daily life”. - William Morris 

- 

My daily life in Brazil starts with breakfast, and I have learned to love tapioca, which is made into crepes for breakfast.  

Papaya is another fruit I have learned to love. Pumpkins are eaten year round, as I found out when we went to the supermarket and the open market this weekend. There are many sights to see in Petropolis, but first, I have concerned myself with the everyday ones, the small walk I took while making a trip to town for some errands, the bananas that hang on hooks from the ceiling, the banana yellow Volkswagen Beatle parked on the street.

The shadows of overgrown tropical plants on flat pink spray paint. 

Bright boxes of juice in the supermarket.  Sprays of vibrant pink flowers against the azure sky.  

Cloud cover over a charming pink house on the hill. 

Thick layers of trees, mountains and sky in every direction. 

 The time to see it. 

barra da tijuca: brazil + chill

“I have lived with many zen masters... all of them cats”

- Eckhart Tolle

Monday’s excitement led into a complete change of pace when the next morning I checked into the Pousada Barra Eco boutique on Ilha primera of Barra de Tijuca. It was far from the last day of parties in Flamengo, but a very good opportunity relax in a new place.

The islands in Barra are only accessible by water taxis- or “taxi boats” recalling a little bit of Venice (or Fire Island!). Admittedly, I first tried to put the address into Uber on dry land before realizing that.

The taxiboats are little rafts that run frequently until midnight. They have rubber tires on one end that bump right up to the docks, and somehow, everything stays in the right place when you disembark.  

I tentatively stepped aboard. The sun reflecting off the water was hot, but the view upwards into the mountains of Rio was delightful. I tried to take pictures of boats, but watched them sail out of my camera frame.  

Where was I again? 

My stop was the first, and when I landed on the backyard dock, I felt at ease. The street lanes were wide enough for one person at a time and I could tell just by looking for the adress of the hotel I was stepping through lots of peoples backyards, as they hung laundry and cooked lunch. Gosh these little streets smelled nice!  

I was a little confused about the address, but a barking dog put me straight.  

Two beautiful cats situated themselves in the maze of roofs and crowded homes. 

Bright flowers and plants grew freely. 

The small hotel was an oasis of beige tones and mid-century modern chairs and tables.

Check-in coincided with breakfast hours, which I didn’t question, and was happy to be greeted with strong coffee and pão de queijos! Is it dough or cheese inside or both? 

I spent the rest of the afternoon wandering around the streets, listening to the music that  came out of people’s homes and following the excited tones of people enjoying the holidays or watching rugby matches. I ate grilled squid at the restaurant (lula grelhada) and some yuca tatertots (possibly a mistake). 

I FaceTimed my mom from a yellow hammock and froze when a pack of marmosets (little monkeys) descended on the feeder near the patio stocked with black bananas and papaya.  

I tried to end a mosquitoes life in a single clap before giving in and turning up the air conditioning. 

I watched the Capivaras swim in the swampy water off the balcony with their babies.

Evem when the sun set, I felt good in the warm glow of this small place. I even discovered a new song by musicians called Grupo de lá Revelação to keep in my heart forever.

rio de janeiro: let it happen

“The most valuable possession you can have is an open heart” - Carlos Santana

—

Yesterday I took the bus in Brazil for the first time, from Petropolis to the southwest Itangha neighborhood of Rio. As I was looking out the window at the green mountains with an occasional herd of white and brown horses passing through, I felt so happy!

I was on my way to a party for carnaval, something I also felt excited about. I didn’t know exactly what to expect, but I felt in a way just this feeling driving through the mountains gave me was everything and would make it all worth it.

It’s a happy accident that I came to Brazil just one day before Carnaval. In some ways it is the best time, although it also presented a challenge  to arrive, get settled, take in my new city, and also make plans for holiday season!

I made one plan before I left New York. I bought a ticket to a brazilian music pool party Rio. It was just a word of mouth suggestion that there was a pool party on Monday in Rio. I found where to buy tickets online and hoped I picked the right one. I even chose a new swimsuit for the party. When I was packing, I noticed the label said “The fact that this garment is in your hands now means we are that much closer to our ultimate goal of you buying the ticket and taking the ride”.

Profundity and capitalism!

I had no idea how I was going to get to this party, actually they didn’t publish the address until 1 day before. I felt nervous to travel alone in a new country, especially Rio at Carnaval! But I knew that I had created some momentum for myself by buying that ticket in New York. I had a reason for this travel and place to go, I just had to find my way there.

Petrópolis (where I am based for my two-month program) is further from Rio than I had thought, and no one around me was really confident in my plans. Especially because there was no real address for the place. 

The tickets were sold through eventbrite, an online third party that requires an address. Only “Rio de Janeiro” had been entered, and the auto-generated map showed a point in the center of the city- one of the dodgiest neighborhoods! I showed this to my host family and they advised I should not make plans that involve 5 minutes of walking on the street there...

“This is the place you want to be RIGHT NOW - definitely not on Monday”, our friends in the ESL program said when we looked at the center of the city on Google maps. The carnaval parade was passing through centro on television.

And this was a 2-day discussion that continued and put knots in my stomach. On the one hand, I was so close to Rio and Carnaval! I had a ticket, and something new to wear that literally said “BUY THE TICKET TAKE THE RIDE”.

I could make the most of sitting quietly in the peace and ease through the last two sunny days of Carnaval, but something in me was saying SEND IT!

Sunday night, the discussion got longer. The real address of the party was posted, equally as foreign looking to me and further confusing the conversation about where exactly I was going in Rio on Monday. 

I felt frustrated. I resigned to my room on the tentative plans I would Uber the auto-generated location on my eventbrite ticket and pure stubbornness. Teimosia.

But even after deciding to go, something didn’t feel right. I got a new message from the source of all great travel tips, the DMs.

“Don’t worry, the party will be fine, just as long as it’s not in the city center”

And with that word “city center” the direct translation of “centro”, something in my head clicked 100% percent. I knew the address I was showing everyone on the map was wrong. There was no language barrier, no difference of age or attitude towards girls traveling by themselves, I had the wrong address.

The second address I saw posted wasn’t a further confusion, it was the real address. I zoomed in on the map. It was a beautiful little island with a pool! Next to a golf course! And an aeropark!

I found my host Marta and breathlessly updated her with this new development. Relief spread from her face to mine. The party looked beautiful and it would even be fine to take the bus there by myself! Local moves!

The Instagram fam even came through and called the customer service number for the event to confirm the right address. I was on my way!

The next day, I woke up so early and excited and got ready. My host family drove me to the bus. I had an hour and a half wait at the Petropolis station, which, like all of Petropolis, was totally chill.

I spent most of the time in the cell phone shop trying to unsuccessfully jailbreak my phone, but it didn’t work. Before I knew it it was time to hop on the bus!

I found the wrong seat, then the right one. The window- cool! I felt the good feeling I feel when I’m swimming, just happy about nothing.

Finally I arrived at my station, the last stop. I felt the heat of Rio and the grittiness of the bus station. After a few false starts, I made my way to the exit and the taxi line.

I felt more vulnerable now, now I was alone. There was another girl on my bus with lots of hand luggage and make up on. I asked her a question, she didn’t speak English but we walked together to the taxi line and as the drivers circled looking for new business, I asked her for advice through a translation app.

“Uber is cheaper” she wrote me back on the translate app.

An English speaking cab driver offered to translate between us too.

“She says uber is dangerous”. He said. 

I appreciated his honest attack on a hated competitor, but still, I waited with my girl ally before jumping in a taxi. Her boyfriend came to pick her up and advised the cab would be fine and should cost no more than 30R$.

Then between the two drivers, my business was directed to the cab driver who didn’t speak English at all. He got lost twice on the 10-minute car ride. I watched the meter run up with these detours, but was able to protest enough in Portuguese to pay only the fair price of $30R to get there. Score one for the girls! 

And then I arrived to the party. Which was not ready yet! I felt nerves about stepping into the party alone, and then the “What am I going to do now?” when I realized, despite arriving more than an hour after the time on the ticket, I would have to wait an hour more to go in. This limbo lasted about 4 minutes.

A group of 3 friends from New York apparently running on the same time as me (i.e. not Brazilian time) were just outside and had arrived to the same predicament. We made some jokes about the fyre festival and ubered to the beach!

After an hour or so, the party was ready. And Ja Rule jokes aside, the pool, stage and organization looked great! I promptly stepped on a giant raft with all my stuff and tried to figure out how to paddle back to the edge of the pool  without getting wet. First one in the pool!

Part of me doesn’t want to admit it, but I was happy to be in this little bubble with people who knew people who went to the same schools as me, singing along to Riptide by Vance Joy. After all the warnings I had absorbed about Brazil and Rio leading up to my trip, all this familiar feeling was OK.

And as the night went on, the Carnaval atmosphere built, culminating in the live band the event was built around - DDP. I really have no concept for what kind of band this is- they have lots of parties and kind of look like a boy band but can play instruments and dance with their feet the whole time.

Anyway, they were wonderful! And I realized when everyone started singing along in Portuguese that there were probably only 4 other Americans at the party already, all of whom I knew now- which was cool!

I even spotted someone else I had met celebrating my departure to Brazil last week in the New York. Small world for sure!

But maybe my best friends at the party became a fun group from São Paulo, who told me no less than three times, be careful in Brazil, not everyone is nice like us!

itaipava: meet the parentes

“Green is the prime color of the world, and that from which its loveliness arises”

Pedro Calderón de la Barca 

Since arriving to Brazil, I have spent the past two days trying to catch the rhythm of life in Petropolis, get comfortable, and create a new program with my host for improving our language skills. 

Brazil is on holiday at the moment, and yesterday was Sunday. In the morning we had papaya and a tea made of silicia (silicon?). We visited the other American who is staying in Petrópolis, and had breakfast together with her host family. 

They were completely lovely, and already knew my host through mutual connections. I learned new things about Brazil, like Goldfish crackera rank with iPhones as in-demand American imports and tapioca is a must try street food in Rio! We left with about a zillion  brazilian plans for the coming weeks! 

Then was lunch and small lesson. Marta was interested in the correct English phrase you would use to let yourself into someone’s house, a rough translation of “com licença”. I offered up “excuse me”, but I’m not really sure I know an equivalent in American English, the “open door policy” seems much more vibrant here!

“Remember our door is always open, except when we are sleeping!” Is how the family we met at breakfast sent us off, which is basically something we say in English too- but with another level of sincerity! 

Learning the words for familial relationships also seemed like a first priority, so we flipped ahead in the ESL textbook to the family tree. I learned that “parentes” in Portuguese means something like relatives, so it is a false cognate with our word for mother and father. 

After this casual lesson, we went for dinner with Marta’s sister for her birthday and toured some historic sites in Petropolis by night, including the assymetrical “house of the 7 mistakes”.  

We had pizza “portuguese style”, with onions, ham, peas and egg, and for me, a Coca Cola made in Brazil.  

The festivities extended to the next day, when we went for lunch in Itaipava. I realized that even though I think I get the gist of what is going on, I was surprised to be seated at a table of 10 when we arrived and realIze since it was Sunday lunch was happening with all the parentes! 

petropolis: welcome to brazil

  “To live is the rarest  thing in the world”

- Oscar Wilde

Yestersay, I arrived in Brazil for an extended stay language exchange program!

I have been hoping in this direction for a while. At one moment, though, looking around a lovely walk yesterday, I realized that there are many places I can say either “I would love to go” or “I loved it there” about, but nothing is really sweeter than “I’m here now!” 

To arrive, I flew at 10pm from JFK directly to Rio. I slept at least 7 hours (and pretty well!) and watched exactly one movie. It was a completely full flight including a one year old baby that was completely adorable and a real champ, as I observed from six rows away. 

At the airport, I met the taxi driver and student intern representing my exchange program and we drove to Petropolis, through the outskirts of Rio and into the mountains. 

The main road was closed for construction, so we bumped up and up. I learned some Portuguese words, like “cow” (vaca) and funk (a style of music made in Rio de Janeiro)

When I arrived, my host Marta was so lovely. We sat for lunch. After, we began to speak about goals for the program, of English, of Portuguese. Since Marta has a wide vocabulary in English the next level of speaking and understanding seemed to be wrestling with the different sounds each letter in English makes (or doesn’t make) when compared to Portuguese. The test will be watching movies in English without subtitles! 

I think my challenge will be to be engage with Portuguese, (even if it means using a translate app a lot!) to try words and not just wait for conversations to slip backed into English. The test could be literally any portuguese conversation! And there were a lot! 

Our first exercise was reading out loud the same passage 4 times, in Marta’s English, my English, Marta’s Portuguese, my Portuguese, was a good place to start exploring. We then went through the alphabet, something I had found so useful when attempting to learn Italian over the summer. Who would have thought the R sounds like an H? 

After that, it was time to have coffee with the cousins next door. 

I learned Gabriel Medina sounds like Gabriel Me-jh-ina, but everyone will still know who you are talking about. 

After brazilian facturas, we walked into the city center to begin the evening socializing with the rest of the family until late. 

And I would write more but it’s morning now, and the night ended with plans to meet more friends for 8:30am this morning! 

a l p s • d e u x

“You can never learn less, you can only learn more”

R. Buckminster Fuller

The third day of skiing proved to be both the most educational and cruisey. The day started with a coffee at the top of the Bissane lift, now my favorite spot. I filled my eyes and my camera roll with pictures, although nothing in me believed it was really my last day in the Alps. I put a kit-kat bar in my pocket for later. I watched the trickle from the roof of the restaurant and the figures of families on skis against the snow-covered mountains.

“Wowwww”

The kids on the chairlift behind were playing music off their phones - Post Malone.

The lift climbed into new territories, and I confidently anticipated the transition . The first two days had not been so smooth on the lift, aka le telesiege.

One time, I fell under the lift as it deposited me on the top, and had to duck underneath as it whipped back around the corner.

Another time, the elastic string on my mitten caught and stretched completely as I tried to ride away.

Most often, I faceplanted immediately at the top.

But by the third day, I learned to be smooth. lift my legs and place my back foot preemptively, tip my board and just push off down the slope. I could even edge to a controlled stop this way. Brilliant!

And I learned so much more. Like if you drop your cellphone off the ski lift, you should drop a ski pole right away to mark the spot in the snow (or if you’re a snowboarder ask the nearest skiier!)

When I actually got off the lift and on to mountain, there was so much more to learn.

My thought process changed since last season, since yesterday. I could now turn both ways without really thinking about it. So I challenged myself to subtler angles and more time in the middle of my board instead of braking on either edge. On the flat parts, I learned to balance in the middle and not on the edge at all. I started putting all of my weight on my back leg.

Then it was time to try a red!

I had learned from my furthest skiing excursion prior, the OVO bus from Union Square to Killington, Vermont, that red pistes were the difficulty between blue and black, a European thing, like the metric system or open borders. The chatty skiier next to us on the 6 hour bus ride was from the UK, and explained this as a matter of course. I understood being able to take “reds” was a level of skill. That day, though, I was most concerned with breaking through from the bunny hill to blues!

Would I advance to red today? ​

As the signs everywhere will tell you— and I mean, real signs posted at the window to buy lift tickets— and metaphorical signs like the ski patrol carrying someone down the mountain in a flat red shipping container—snow sports are inherently risky.

Staring down the first few red pistes, I felt this, but also a certain confidence. Was I too sure of myself? Was my desire to improve a bit foolhardy?

I often have these thoughts, but this is how I put them aside.

I remind myself that life happens moment by moment.

It is in my power to focus, to do my best, to look around me, to control my speed, every second.

If someone rushes down towards me and doesn’t see me, I can use my voice. If this unknown trail becomes impossibly steep, I can take off my board and hike.

Life is always about the choices you make, and there are a lot of them to be made. They don’t just happen while you are staring down the mountain, they happen second by second!

So I went! down the steep curves, and came up with a strategy to take on the mountain bit by bit.

Saturday was a kind of empty day, mostly locals who zipped past and knew their way around, i just focused on the radius of 7-8 feet of snow in front of me. It made me feel calm, my eyes scanned like a lighthouse on the steady white in front of me.

I realized I mostly fell when I lost the flow, and then it was extremely hard to get back. So I imposed an internal rythmn, 1-2-3-4, then turn 1-2-3-4, on the steeper parts, I widened my curve and counted 1-2-3-4-5-6 on each side.

A few times where the trail was the steepest, my board lost contact with the mountain entirely, and I skipped in the air down the side of the mountain! Yikes, what a feeling! But still I kept my rhythmn.

So mostly, it worked. When I fell on my backedge, I learned a new trick. I could use my hands to pull myself back upright, and continue on my back edge! This saved me from my old trick, of going switchfoot on the toe edge, which made my legs so sore from constantly bracing. Crucially, it also helped me keep my rhythm and recover.

And I made it! Wobbly legged and sweating to the whirring lift, time after time.

Blue, red, red, blue blue, this was getting easier! And fun!

I left the mountain brimming with the excitement of every good run.​

I would have just been happy to see the mountains in the snow! 

f r e n c h • a l p s

 "Never be afraid of life, never be afraid of adventure, trust chance, luck, destiny.

Go, go and conquer other spaces, other hopes. The rest will be given to you."

Henry de Monfreid

•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• 

On Tuesday night, as the first snow day of the year blew all over New York, my mind was elsewhere. I packed my usual gymbag with my snowpants, goggles, my passport, and a one-way TAP Air boarding pass, destination: Paris-Orly. I was lured by an airfare sale a month earlier, I didn’t have all the details worked out completely. I was monitoring my flight status because of the snow. 200 flights had already been cancelled at JFK, and I wasn’t sure my tight timing and sale ticket could absorb too many changes. I just felt strongly about one thing. If I had the chance to live this dream, and see the alps in the snow, I should GO!

So instead of schlepping to Grand Central after work at 6pm, I puddle jumped to the subway. Far-Rockaway bound A-train, that familiar feeling.

They are the old kinds of trains, with two-seaters by the windows. I found a window seat and rested my head against the glass for a nap, like old times. Just past the casino, I prepared myself for the transfer to the AirTran.

The subway platform was a slushy mess, dirty snow reflecting floodlight s from above. I took a picture, because something in me loves these moments.

As crazy as it all seemed, I was soon enveloped in the controlled and calm atmosphere of JFK for a few hours while I waited for my flight. Portuguese air was in a far corner, and I was one of the first to arrive at the gate.

There was no delay at all. I bought a return ticket from Paris to New York while I waited to board.

But it wasn’t necessary - they stamped my passport in Portugal without questions. I was only there for an hour but I felt the heat of the southernmost country- I bought Brazilian havianas to free me from my ski socks then walked to the gate.

It was an uneventful flight over the Pyrenees to Orly, where I caught a commuter plane to Geneva.

Finally I arrived, and from the Geneva airport it was a 1.5 hour drive into the mountains.

I pinched myself driving up the dark roads. The reality was I was never so sure this would happen, and now the snow was right before my eyes, I was breathing the cold air and reading the blue road signs as the kilometers counted upwards towards Chamonix - Mt. Blanc.

Past the glittering mod lights of Megeve, and resting at Les Saises, a perfect little mountain resort of mostly blue and red trails and views of Mt. Blanc from every one. The lower alps had just been blessed with three days of snow.

But next morning was bright and blue. I warmed up on a green trail around the S curve of adorable ski school parades, 3 ft high. The snow was soft and trustworthy. The fresh air in my lungs and white snow in my eyes sent a buzz to my head.

I went up the bigger lift to Bisanne and stopped for lunch, where all the charm of a little restaurant run on this mountain in the French Alps was not lost of me.

« Cheez - bah - gah ? » The girl behind the counter called out three times. It wasn’t mine, I just loved this elegant variation of something so familiar.

Outside, people lounged and scoffed down plates of frites against a background as towering and stately as any of the solemn cathedrals I had visited over the summer. I was just in a state of wonder. I realized my senses were a bit dull from the course of a few months of routine, and I wished at once to sharpen them so I could feel fully everything in front of me.

I took a blue down, I didn’t fall at all. My legs shook at the end of the run, where there was another option of lift « Chard du Buerre » .

I took as many runs as my legs could take and was exhausted by 5pm. I fell in some places, and at these points I happily took in the views from the middle of the piste.

The next day, I discovered the other side of the mountain, with some excitement as the first trail was a difficult blue with a steep section at the end. I fell sharply and cursed the mountain, still looking up in awe at the serene hill i was slipping down.

« you can take board off and walk down, it’s not a shame »

And on the one hand I like this about skiing. Many times there is no giving up, you must make it down the mountain, whatever way you can and be thankful every time it’s not the ski patrol.

Still, the idea of taking off my board set a baseline, and I was determined even if I had to plow my way down, or use my trusty crutch of « pizza » for snowboard (switching from goofy to regular to stay on the toe edge all the way down) I would not take off my board.

The reality, I had to do this, and perhaps shamefully- scoot on the seat of my snowpants down the soft snow on the steepest section.

Covered in sweat, but otherwise intact, I unbuckled both feet at the base of the mountain and retreated for some frites.

J’arrive! 

how to surf

“surf is where you find it”

 gerry lopez

I think the last time I surfed was at Old Man’s in Canggu, Bali, just over one year ago. 

There was an active volcano spewing smoke and threatening to close the airport everyday. I was was far from home as I’d ever been, on borrowed paid vacation time, and feeling the tug of stretching an already very long distance relationship (BSAS<>NYC) by just one more time zone. 

I wanted to live in the green sunny jasmine flower moment before me as my head and heart were exploding. I woke up at 3am and waited silently for the sun to rise so I could scoot myself to the beach. 

That was surfing. Then in the following weeks, lots of things fell apart and fell together and my legs stayed underneath me before I knew how to feel or make a plan, and that was surfing too.

I didn’t call it that.

But pretty soon after learn how to snowboard, and started skateboarding from my new apartment in the east village to everywhere. When I didn’t know what to do with myself, I would just skate around until something happened and it always did. 

I felt like that for sure was surfing by a different name!

Practically, I always felt the biggest difference between surfing in the ocean and surfing on the street or in the mountains was learning to read waves. The mountain or street can seem fixed in front of you - green, blue, black or double black. The waves you are always looking for and can miss by a second or a few strokes of paddling.

Yesterday I snowboarded just gently enough for a few hours to think about this more. The mountain was steeper and icier than I had encountered. Part of me wanted to give up but I saw people around me were still surfing.   I realized that it didn’t matter if it was an icy, northeastern delight. All I needed to find, by sight, by feeling, in the snow, was that thin edge to balance on with either side of my board. That tiny line to take me down the mountain. 

It’s an art just as subtle as squinting into the distance to find the nascent forms of a wave.  

I thought about how on a skateboard, I had become so attuned to every manhole cover, slope, asphalt variation, and gravelly bit of the street I had never seen before.

I thought about the times the city was brilliant with people, opportunities, and new things, versus when it was icy or flat. 

You can’t control the conditions, just learn how to surf better! 

c a p e t o w n

capetown, june 6, 2017

i flew from durban to capetown 2 days after running comrades on a short, inexpensive Mango flight. I considered renting a car and driving on the garden route, or some other slower transportation, but received  advice to fly instead- as a safer, streamlined option. when I arrived, I tuned into the gorgeous accent of airport shop attendant (nothing like what I had heard in Durban!) and got a city buss pass to go straight to table mountain then my accommodation.

the cable car was closed at table mountain due to wind (capetown gets crazy windstorms- poke around YouTube for videos of baboons getting picked up and people hanging on to telephone poles for reference) so, I took pictures halfway up the mountain with some friendly people from a double decker bus and then bounced. I saw a lot of comrades runner hiked or ran up the mountain to make up for the cable car closure- but I think I went straight for another coffee instead (call it it jetlag or self-care). I also ubered part of the way because I confused the bus lines. Uber works great in South Africa, and is reallly cheap, so enjoy your recipes for those $1.80 fares! Even getting lost on the bus line added something to the excursion, Capetown has such an incredible mix of people (South Africa has like 7 official languages after all) and the coolest style so literally injecting myself in the middle of all this on a public bus was memorable. And if I had followed instructions properly it would be have been way cheaper! 

i stayed at an airbnb that was organized like a small hostel in the greenpoint neighborhood. since we have a hip neighborhood called greenpoint in ny, the choice felt familiar and nice. I had a dark a-frame room with its own kitchen and a small porch for $16 a night. I remember the Afrikaans woman who ran the house, she was a true gem who washed all my clothes and I introduced her to Peanut Butter and Jelly sandwiches! That’s not to say book this AIRBNB because the propertier will wash your laundry and carefully lay everything out in the sun- your mileage may vary. But what I generally love about AIRBNBs is that they are very reasonable with plenty of opportunity for hosts and guests to help each other.

Outside the AIRBNB there were cute coffee shops and a kwik-spar in walking distance. spar supermarkets are ubiquitous in SA, as is woolworth’s. both excellent places to peer  around for new snacks. look for biltong, rusks, stoney gingerbeer soda, roobois tea, and my all-time favorite CRUNCHIES!

I went to one “fancy” dinner at a Portuguese restaurant  called Pigalle, also in Green point (SA has a great vein of Portuguese influence, the national condiment is Perri-Perri sauce!) and tried ostrich for the first time, followed by a super sweet Malva pudding. I became a regular at the Italian grocery down the street where I met more comrades runners who just got back from a ParkRun!

There was no 5K for me, though. The next day, I met another runner who had rented a car already and headed to the vineyards- Stellanbosch! We ate lunch watching the crazy weather patterns out the window, it was about 5 courses, excellent, and $30 USD. We drove to a couple more, some were closed. We learned baboons are a pest to the  winemakers, they eat the grapes and love a sweet white.

One place on the itinerary was closed due to weather maybe, but a business card stuck in the back of my wallet from a rosé cruise on the Hudson River in NY was the Hail Mary of the day.  

I took the suggestion of a rep I had met in NY selling South African wine as a matter of course, and now here I was at the Boschendal Estates vineyard, it was sweet. 

The next day, I let more karma from my life in the US play out in Capetown and rented a car to drive down the coast with a friend of a friend I happened to see at a wedding right before I left for SA. 

We found a cute Cuban restaurant filled with colors and swings.  We climbed over a fence to a cliff cave overlook, we watched surfers in wetsuits at Long Beach.

We drove back to the city and ate pizza on Long St. We stuck around when the unassuming California Pizza Kitchen  -esque restaurant and bar cleared tables to create a dance floor and installed a cute DJ.

I felt happy to be alive and chatted with everyone, we ended up sticking with a rowdy group of ~Bishop’s (School) Boys . One was a blue-eyed Namibian named Allie. They pestered him all night by howling “ALLEZ LES BLEU” at the bar. We all ended the night eating pizza and samosas at at a cheap late Indian place. I even got my own nickname, “the Americano” -weird flex but OK!

And of course I would be remiss if I did not mention THE SOUTH AFRICAN PENGUINS.  Somewhere in making plans around the weather and a million distractions, I actually did spend one afternoon lifted from a top 10 list of things to do in South Africa- visit the penguins at Boulder Beach! 

I took an Uber there, and that’s it, you pay for a ticket and you look at these funny little penguins and take care to follow rules so you don’t anger them. And they’re fluffy and funny and nestle in little holes and hustle when these zookeeper like people come around. And of all the fun and new experiences you can have in Capetown, African penguins are a good place to start. 

n y c

i’m terrified of the designated role “tour guide”.

of course i love to travel, and write about travel, and encourage others to seek out new experiences for themselves and yet, when i think of all my best travel moments, they are all squarely in the category of the “unexpected” or the “never in a million years would i have thought i’d find myself here”.

and yet…

i’d like to share what I can, so here’s a description of what happened when my family visiting from arizona designated me a “tour guide” of new york city.

phase one: discovery

travel is like a limitless expression of the human experience. the internet is full of lists of “countries to see before you die”, “cities to you must visit”, “dishes you must eat” and there will always be the “8 wonders of the world”. this is one form of inspiration, but I like to get more specific than that when charting a course. what makes me feel alive? maybe i can find it all over the world. that’s how i started running marathons in foreign countries. it’s what i love about surfing.

so to plan a nice day in new york, an endless smorgasburg of choice unto itself, i started by asking my family what they wanted to do. actually, they knew what was up - the shop for best chocolate chip cookies, italian food, village walks, specialty retailers- they just needed someone to help them swipe their metrocards at the right speed.

phase two: how does this make a plan?

shout out to someone i met once with a travel blog titled “my no-plan-plan”. if i’m asked to make plans for anyone outside myself (and even myself, in the beginning), i have this inevitable freak out where I try to create a slick and detailed schedule to show that everything’s under control. one of my favorite mental soundbites is from an early surf lesson in rockaway. my brooklyn native instructor let me get a few extra waves past the 1-hr lesson mark because “this ain’t the military”. -which is basically my approach to scheduling vacations. they require a different time plane, that’s subject to being pushed back 3 hours and changed at any time. my advice- make a nice-looking schedule if it instills confidence in your group, but more importantly, have a head full of ideas for variations that will make everyone happy.

phase three: prioritize

after a discovery process of voraciously scanning time out nyc for a show-stopping weekend plan, then talking to my sixteen year old cousin, it became clear, the real highlight item would not be getting into the “museum of pizza” opening or meeting the barefoot contessa on pier 96. no, the #1 make-or-break the day item would be a massive cookie pull at Levain Bakery. Experience told me there could be ferocious lines on the Upper West Side, so we headed there first, a convienent subway transfer from the LIRR in Penn Station. After that, we had a bucket of different ideas - Chelsea Market, The High Line, Washington Square Park, Opening Ceremony, Eataly, Glossier, but it seemed wherever the day took us would be OK if we ate this bucket-list cookie of Blake Lively fame. Pro tip: Cookies usually make everyone happy.

phase four: make it up as you go along

what else in the upper west side? well, we could walk along central park to get out of the upper west side again. where are we going? well, no one’s hungry now that we each ate our own meal-replacement cookie, so let’s go for that walk around the village. more walking you day? sure, we can get off a subway stop early. once we were in the village, my cousin seemed set on direction: glossier showroom, and it was a pretty satisfying retail experience. a light line outside to build the hype, an instagram-worthy interior, and reasonably priced but sleekly packaged cosmetics for a chance to shop and leave with things that wouldn’t push your carry-on over the limit or break the bank like shopping soho for hours.

final phase: food made with love

italian food in little italy? apart from taking a hard line NEVER! let’s just say i’ve been burned before. there’s no shortage of places to eat in the city, from Mott St. holes-in-the-wall to something high end like Le CouCou, that’s well, just around the corner. i am adamant that what makes any culinary experience is love. food that’s lovingly prepared and shared with love. that’s why my grandmother’s eggplant parm will always be better than any i’ve ever found at a restaurant, that’s the true tragedy of fast food or tourist restaurants. in the end, we took the train uptown to flatiron and ate at the restaurant on top of eataly with a wonderful view of the flatiron building, the pasta and cheese was fresh and the company was great.

P.S.

Levain Bakery / Glossier Showroom / Serra @ Eataly / Le Cou Cou / Smorgasburg / Chelsea Market / The High Line / Opening Ceremony / MTA Subway Map

recently a faithful reader (my mom) said this about my summer blog- “you never wrote you were in pain so we had no idea”. and it’s true. I have been a little injured probably since july (i.e. ‘lame), I just kept walking. I didn’t write about it often. my mental byline was “this isn’t a blog about blisters (or back injuries)”. I  wanted to be positive, I wanted to finish what I started, and I wanted to focus my energy forward. I also didn’t have a lot of experience dealing with injuries, so on one hand, I didn’t have the words. after a few months of being the slowest person in the room, though, I have a new point of view.

literally, after a  morning meditation was in the MRI machine. eyes closed, deep breaths, and 20 minutes of stillness. I had some new thoughts on injury so I thought I would share them here.

what my injury is teaching me -

be kind - most people are invisibly broken

a writer I like, alain de botton, once suggested treating everyone like they have a broken arm, because most people are broken in ways we can’t see. this certainly strikes a chord after walking around with an unknown injury for a few months. many people can’t see that i’m pausing to take a step, waiting for the elevator, standing in their way, because i’m in pain. but I feel their impatience and it further frustrates my own. it’s a good reminder to be “generous in one’s interpretation of another person” as I would like for people to be with me

 sport is  a privilege 

“don’t it always seem to go that you don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone?”

not even being able to walk without pain  has showed me just what a beautiful privilege I have enjoyed by running all these years. I think I used to kind of pat myself on the back for waking up to get in workouts. now I realize everyday I woke up able to train was a gift, that’s quite humbling.

caution comes from experience  

in the same vein, because I never had pain while running, I had a hard time understanding other people when they told me about their injuries. i just couldn’t empathize very well. I had only had the types of aches and pains you can walk off. because I never experienced a lot of pain with a long, slow, recovery, I didn’t understood how it can make you apprehensive towards new movements on a deep level.

the body is a habit machine

I like to focus on an ability to switch gears quickly and be open to new experiences. this doesn’t work on every level. when I came back from an impromptu trip to bali last year with my hair a complete mess from a mix of seawater, pool water, and a dubious conditioning product, I got a resonant piece of advice at the hair salon - it’s just good to make a routine around anything that has to do with your body. I think this is true. human genetics are developed over thousands of years so if we have any chance of improving upon them it takes as much consistency as we can manage. healing and growing requires a commitment to daily habits like stretching, exercising, eating well, and sleeping. also I should probably stretch before physical activity

and finally the thought that -

you can be 1000% on less than 100%

it seem fatalistic, but I often run through the scenario in my mind where the pain I am experiencing now never goes away - what would I work on? what would my dreams be? how could I grow? you can only ever work with what you have. many people live brilliant lives despite physical handicaps. they use their creativity, their voice, technology! i try to use my injury as an opportunity to develop new parts of myself.

UPDATE: After beginning this blog on Monday, I read a very relevant interview with emerging author/illustrator Mari Andrew. I found her thoughts so insightful and relevant to my experience (in some ways similar, in many ways less traumatic) that I am linking them here: What This Illustrator Learned from Being Temporarily Paralyzed

w h a t • i • l e a r n e d

a reader submitted a formidable writing prompt a few weeks ago that inspired this post. “maybe you can write a post like top 10 lessons of the francigena” I held off on a response, because my immediate thought was really - in the words of John Lennon - the more I see the less I know for sure. and yet, I want to try. if anything, I hope what I can say will inspire you to see more. so here’s what I’m offering - my (8) life-altering lessons of the Francigena-

freedom is something you give yourself

I think it’s easy for people to look at my life from the outside and say, it makes perfect sense that I would make a long walk right now. I’m pretty young, unencumbered, have a passport, and save. yet, I was in this situation for a while before I decided to leave. I was just waiting for a more favorable situation - more money, more future, more youth- to travel. I often looked back and wished I studied abroad as  a 20- year old student. I looked at how other people made things happen and thought I needed that exact situation. The day I looked at what I actually had and saw possibility was the day I decided to act. I realized no perfect situation would exist for me in the future, I must always work with what I have. I changed my idea of what I needed to start, decided to worry about the rest as it came. nothing about my situation changed but my attitude, but that was enough to set off.

it all flows from you

have you ever read inspirational accounts of people who start with nothing or overcome great adversity, and become huge successes in the eyes of the world? have you ever thought about your greatest accomplishments in life, the things you hold most precious, and realize that you literally got to that point from when you once were a helpless baby, crawling on the floor? Every person in the world has an amazing and unlimited capacity to grow, change, create and connect. Instead of looking at the good things I had found in life so far- friends, a place to live, work- as reasons to stay where I was, I realized, that once, I had none of these things, but everything within myself to make it happen. I trusted would not lose this by venturing into something new.

there are infinite possibilities, you only need one

once I actually started walking the francigena, my life and thoughts became drastically simple. where was I going to sleep tonight? what was I going to eat? walk, walk walk. I used to be overwhelmed by choice in my normal life - what’s the best place to eat? the optimal place to make a booking? Is my hair conditioner doing the most? Am I tired of boring salads for lunch? When I was walking, I stopped running these little analysises and learned to make the most of what life gave me. I stopped comparing all the possibilities, and just appreciated the many choices. When things were uncertain, I reminded myself that there were a lot of good options out there - I only needed 1 place to sleep and - 2-3 things to eat, and I was grateful for the ones that life gave me. Everyday day I woke up healthy and rested to continue, I figured whatever I found had worked out great.

barking dogs ≠ biting dogs

from the reaction of the people around me when I decided to of walk, to the last days of my actual walk, I encountered a lot of barking dogs. Naturally, I felt scared! But I learned literally and figuratively, a dog that barks in not necessarily a dog that bites. There was a golden retriever I met in a lonely town in northern France that I took a few pictures of from behind a fence. He literally started barking when I walked away, because he liked the attention. There were dogs that weren’t confined by fences in Italy, that ran at my heels while I walked, and barked so close I could feel the sound and breath of them on my ankles. They were trained just to defend the house they lived around by barking, and weren’t going to bite me or follow me past their territory.  It’s scary to learn this in the moment, but you have no choice, and the next time it’s certainly much easier to stay calm.

stay calm

the first day I was walking, I met a tiny rabbit that was stuck in a wire fence. Rabbits are terrified of people. But I like animals and feel empathy towards them. I was horrified to see it panicking when it got stuck; trying to push its tiny body against the strong wire of the fence to the point it could barely breath. When I found the eventual solution, to carefully use a nail clipper in my backpack to carefully cut the fence and set the rabbit free, my looming presence terrified the rabbit to more suffocating pushing, but eventually worked. It reminded me of something I learned surfing. When you are held under by waves, the only way you can help yourself is to stay calm. The official term is “rag doll”. You can’t try and fight your way to the surface or you will use all your oxygen quicker and drown. you must stay calm to survive.

higher consciousness is perceptible

Another thing I learned from my encounter with the tiny trapped rabbit; was a very plain and non-mystical way of thinking of “higher consciousness”. I have a different consciousness than the rabbit, I understand how the fence is made and know that nailclippers are strong enough to solve his problems. I have a higher, or different consciousness than the rabbit that actually helps him. In another scenario, I am helpless when I arrive in a foreign place and begin to look for a place to stay or eat, but someone local who has a higher or different consciousness can help me with what is beyond what I know. 

people are kind*

yes, “ faith in humanity” and the “goodness of people”. this was something I believed in from the start of my walking. I never felt like my “faith in humanity was being restored”, because people and life have showed me a lot of good things before my walk. but the asterisk is really important. People did not help me 100% of the time when I needed help. I needed to also help myself. I also needed help from above. The asterisk* represents one the most important things that I’ve learned, and constantly remind myself navigating the world of people and personal relationships. PEOPLE CAN ONLY GIVE YOU WHAT THEY HAVE TO GIVE. And actually, they almost always will give you - what they have to give. But sometimes we need or ask for things of people, that they simply DON’T HAVE, and then feel discouraged or betrayed when they do not give them to us. For example, if you ask someone for directions in English, and they don’t understand English, they might not help you. Not because they aren’t good - they simply don’t have the words. On the other side, many people were incredibly kind and gave me things that helped me greatly - a place to stay, a home-cooked meal, friendship, a telephone to make a call - because they could. This principle seems to apply to long-time friends as well as new acquiantances. I learned years ago that just because someone cares about me, does not mean they will run marathons with me. It would be silly for me to feel personally hurt by someone declining an invitation like that. of course creativity and energy is limitless- it’s not always impossible for someone to train for a marathon to run alongside me- or to find a translator app to help me - but it’s much easier for me commit to be the kind of person that stretches themselves to help other people when they ask for something I can’t easily give them - than it is to demand that exceptional reaction from others. does that makes sense?

little steps add up

and now for something completely obvious; walking from Canterbury to Rome taught me little steps add up. You can cross four countries and mountains in no time at all if you are willing to take millions of little steps in the right direction.