Tuesday, August 28, 2007 Travels with Nique 10-24 August 2007

Europe 2007
New York to London: The seven hour hop
This is my niece’s 15th birthday present as we have taken our other nieces and nephews on trips when they are of age, The Grand Tour that many young have taken in times past with a tutor. Though she isn’t a culture maven, we may be able to incite her imagination a little bit.
Europe is expensive! The Euro is robust and the dollar is anemic, and the price of a coffee is about $5 whether in Venice or Marseilles. Nevertheless, traveling in Europe is a great joy, though for the savvy traveler it will require planning ahead to prevent breaking the bank or more accurately the necessity to rob a bank. Food in Europe even at the grocery store is twice as expensive as in the U.S with the exchange rate plummeting and the Euro at a robust height. Bring the peanut butter and jelly! Last year I was in Oslo and the prices were easily triple of the US. For years US Americans lived in Paris dirt cheap and now: Where are the writers of this generation holed up? Morocco? The Balkans? Is there any cheap place in Europe? I’m looking to Essouria for the winter this year and nestle my bones into the seaside splendor. But now with our trip before us in a wildly implausible trek: London for a quick stop, Milan, over to Venice, down to Ravenna and towards Chianti, Pisa and overnight train to Marseilles, up to Nimes and Ponte de Garde, to Fleurat in the back country, Severagac, to a night in Limoges then on to Paris.
9 August 2007
The night plane is a relatively painless seven hour flight. Surprisingly the American Airline staff is fairly cordial (they must have taken tranquilizers), which is something of a miracle for AA, why do so many seem like they’re suffering from PMS? There should be a course for passengers in dealing with Flight Attendants: Raise your arms in the arm as if to surrender and say: Ï am not the enemy. My hands are in the air. I bring greetings of peace from my planet. Please let my frequent flyer miles take me on Singapore Air, Quantas, KLM or any other airline.
Last year in Turkey we had been delayed and I got on to the plane and needed to use the toilet. The Flight Attendant did a full body block with a stiff arm and pushed me back as I was going to the toilet. Fly American – the Unfriendly Skys.
Travel Tips: Travel business or first class, the best is a private jet! However, as I can’t afford that, I try to make the best of steerage, as soon as you have a reservation, aim for the bulkhead seats they’re the best, though you’ll usually have to arrive early at the reservation counter to ask for them it’s far more comfortable. I also bring a bag of cough drops and face masks, as there is someone invariably with a vigorous tubercular cough. Also, order vegetarian food, it’s usually much tastier and fresher than the cardboard entrée that passes for beef or chicken. Screaming babies – offer them a boob or if one isn’t available can I offer them valium soaked pacifiers?
Night plane travel 11 am the plane is ready to soar. By the time we level off the food is served and it’s time for a bit of a nap and then breakfast of a sorts. We land in Heathrow half asleep and still manage to leap on a bus for a six hour splash in downtown London: Parliament and up Whitehall to Trafalgar square that looks barren without the hoards of pigeons. The heightened level of security is prominent with the Prime Minster’s residence swarming with security and the military. At one time you could leisurely stroll past the Prime Minster’s house on Downey Street, but with England back in its second attempt at conquering Iraq (War in Mesopotamia mid l930’s) it’s vulnerable to blowback. Parliament is completely blocked off with heavy iron black barricades and the trim lawns overlooking the Thames are only for ornamentation. Cameras are at every street corner and on each lamp post, I have the chilling feeling I’m living in the book 1984. It’s apparent the need for security when every malcontent can download instructions in how to build a bomb and blow himself and others up. Look at Oklahoma, a couple of dumb yahoos got a truck load of fertilizer and blew up a government building. Though I still want to know who really blew a hole in the Pentagon, but that mystery is another story.
With the increased security there is a lack of public toilets as you would find in Paris. Though it was particularly satisfying, though inappropriate, and with a very full bladder and not a toilet in sight, I found a relatively obscure corner on the outside of Westminster Abbey. My Irish roots felt a bit of satisfaction in this splendid release. I could see the headlines, “Foreigner busted for whizzing on England’s most sacred monument.”
London is over the top in price – it’s about $20 for one ticket to Westminster. The dollar is tanking and I’m feeling poor. They should have a better pricing system – Students, Retired, and US Americans. London, naturally in August is swarming with tourists, hot steamy day, and all I want to do is stretch out beneath a tree and take a long nap until the next plane.
We’re off to the Brown Hotel for a proper high tea with the clotted cream and jam and the towers of biscuits, sweets and small sandwiches. This is the England of old that I miss. The door man in long grey tails and a high hat didn’t seem a bit out of place, it brought back my longing for England before the war years. In the back country of Kent or in the Midlands there still is kind of quiet civility and reserve, but too much of pop television and football mentality has taken over, and the London of civility and quiet has almost disappeared.
Recollections of London: Several years ago I was in Putney, London totally sober and then realized I had stepped back in time. Transported back to l945 to the last day of World War Two, standing on a street corner and the church bells were peeling and the announcement from a speaker called, “The war is over.” After five long years the daily new of death and battle that pervaded every moment of the day was finally at an end. The last day of the war, I and others cried--- the end; though I, this writer, was born in l954. Surreal London.
MILAN
We roll into Milan and there are several hookers on the main boulevard with their boobs hanging out, wearing hot pants, and smoking cigarettes waiting for customers. They have the nervous twitching of crack heads. An American girl from the Midwest in the back of the bus says to her seat mate, “Are those prostitutes?”
Without pause I yell back, “No, they’re Italian nuns.” Pray to Santa Mona and all your sins will be healed.
At a small hotel near the train station we tumble into bed exhausted, rolled down the shades, and slept the sleep of the dead. We get a phone call from the front desk – It’s 12 noon do you want to wake up?
Porque no?
Disoriented even from the brief sojourn we make our way downstairs for some coffee. Good to be back in Italy though I’m completely dazed. We wind up at the Duomo it is absolutely stunning this cathedral from the 13th Century in this lovely Gothic style. Spires twist and turn, giving this massive building a whimsical light feeling, all points of the roof and towers reaching to the heaven. The best part is taking the elevator to the upper reaches of the cathedral and walking along the roof top with Milan stretching out below. It is a bit mind boggling when you’re walking on the roof of this massive cathedral second only St Peters in Rome can hold up to 40,000 people that it was built with the most primitive tools – sweat, block & tackle, & very simple geometry. The golden statue of the Madonna as the crown guards the city.
To the West is the Galleria named after Victor Emmanuelle II and the shopping arcades from the l800’s that was largely destroyed by Allied bombings and rebuilt afterwards. Sitting down for a six dollar coffee: Ouch! But we are drinking a café in the Galleria, transported in time to the late 1800’s when this was marvel to behold with its Victorian glass and steel design, light and airy, and a boy of thirteen is playing a lovely Mozart piece of the violin.
At the end of the passage of the shopping esplanade is the statue of Leonardo in his various roles as artist, engineer, scientist, and so forth: The quintessential renaissance man. Though I had seen it in an earlier trip, the Leonardo Museum with most of his inventions reproduced it’s staggering to see the wealth of his imagination with hundreds of contraptions from dredging machines, war machines, and his most famous attempts at an airplane. What is amazing is that he knew that one could build a flying machine and had all of the right ideas, but not the technology. If he had had a simple gasoline engine he would have had the means to do it. In one exhibit in Venice there was even the rudimentary idea of an automobile, if he had figured out the means to a steam engine or internal combustion engine, people would have been flying by the 1600’s
Unfortunately, I didn’t make the reservation for The Last Supper and though I’ve seen it before, I always relish in that experience. If there is one painting that you should see in Milan it is the Last Supper an enduring classic.
What is the saddest thing is the Joia the Mecca for vegetarians was closed in August. I asked the chef Pietro if they could at least make a doggy bag for me. Unfortunately, this magnificent 5 star (in Namaya’s International Guide to Vegetarian Restaurants) was not serving in August. If you are within a thousand miles and want a relatively inexpensive, delicious 5 star vegetarian meal, with terrific service… Joia is it.