Life in Paris

Neighborhood Fromagerie

Paris was a really great trip – one of my favorites – but you probably got that from the last post.  What you probably didn’t get is what we actually DID in Paris.  So here is a brief rundown of the trip.

We rented an apartment that we found listed online.  We did this in Germany too – it was a great time and we’ll probably do it again on our next trip!  I landed a few hours before Paul, so I dropped the bag at the apt. and headed out walking.  I think I walked a spiral around our apartment trying to get the feel of the neighborhood (which was awesome!) and eventually made my way to the water, hoping for my first glimpse of the either the Eifel Tower or the Louvre.  Right as I sat down with my map – Paul called.  I quickly walked back to the apartment (okay...I had to go quickly to make up for the time spent in a scarf shop on the way there).

Friends recommended a few places for dinner, but it wasn’t even dark yet so we decided to walk and see if we found something cute and popular.  By the time the sun set and we’d found a place it was 10pm.  This happened most nights because a.) the sun set late, b.) we were snacking at every cheese shop we passed, and c.) we were just not paying attention to the time. 

Butcher in a market.

The next day was more walking, we do this a lot when we’re in a new city.  I think we’ve made my dad walk about 10 miles every day on every trip he makes to see us.  We even made my mom and little brother walk about that far at about 5am in January (yes, it was cold!).  Back to Paris…

We did picnics in the parks, at the Eifel Tower, walked around the beautiful neighborhoods, went to church, stopped at cafes, tasted tarts…it was wonderful.  What we didn’t do was museums or tours or schedules.  Paul had a conference to attend on the last three days so I wandered by myself.  The first thing I did was go to the Lourve. 

Lost.

I thought I’d spend hours enjoying the art – I was out of there so fast.  Too many tourists, not enough (if any) abstract pieces.  I had lunch with a friend and she pointed me in the right direction, to a museum full of abstract art from Monet and the Duffy brothers.  Well…there went my afternoon!  It was wonderful.  I was in such a good mood that I got lost walking back to the hotel…but getting lost in Paris means you end up in another beautiful neighborhood with a beautiful bridge and gold statues! 

On the second to last day I discovered the joy of shopping in Paris!  Yes, it took me that long.  I went into 5 Zarras (yes, I know they are all the same, but maybe I missed something in the first four!).  I loved every store and the experience of trying on clothes was so much fun!  They were so friendly (Voila! Here is the dressing room) and so cute when I didn’t buy the clothes (C’est non?!?).  And when I did buy something I was surprised by the price – I conveniently forgot to look up the exchange rate so everything at least looked cheap (I think the real price was about 20% higher) and a lot of times things were on sale (but there was no sale sign).

The last day in Paris was a wild goose chase as I went searching for that scarf shop from the first day.  I was in a hurry the first day so I didn’t actually BUY the scarf, but the thought of having it taunted me the whole trip.  Again, I spiraled the neighborhood for about 2 hours before giving up…and then there it was!  In my last few hours I grabbed a scarf, some macaroons, two limes (we usually can’t buy them here) and jumped on the metro.  The city really felt like home from the minute I got there, making the six days feel like I’d been there for months.  Sitting on the plane I was listening to my music and it sounded happier.  The people looked happier, the food tasted better.  Now it seems like it was such a short trip, taken so long ago. 

Picnic with a view.

Wedding in Israel

(I think a lot of post could or do start this way - but sorry for the long lapse.)

We went to our first wedding in Israel!  It wasn't the first we were invited to - but it was the first we could attend.  (And it happened to be the first wedding we'd been to since our own!)  A friend from work married an American - so it wasn't 100% an Israeli wedding, as there were many recognizable American undertones.

The whole event took place in old Jaffa - where Jonah left from before he was swallowed by the whale.  The venue was beautiful!  They started on the ground floor with a reception.  The walls and ceilings were stone arches (very arabesque) and there was a nice size patio on the side.  The chefs were Argentine! and made the best ceviche and salmon I've had since we got here.  Once all the guests were there and the time was right, we went up 3 flights of stairs to the rooftop balcony with great views of the sea and of Tel Aviv.  The sun was setting and the bride looked gorgeous!  The ceremony was half English, half Hebrew and I even knew one of the songs!

When the ceremony finished we went inside to the third floor where a dance floor and dinner tables were set up.  They even had a coffee bar!  The food, again, was delicious and it was really fun to get to dance with some of our colleagues and friends.  There were quite a few Americans so we didn't feel out of place at all.

The two different things about the wedding that I'll tell you about here are:  a.) all wedding halls here are Kosher.  This means they can't serve meat and dairy.  Culturally, to show class, you choose meat for weddings (otherwise you'd have a vegetarian wedding).  I guess this fits in our culture too as Paul and about every American man I know would say it isn't a meal without meat!  This is odd for us because wedding cakes are made with dairy.  Yes...this means that if you have a meat wedding, you don't have a wedding cake.  I have only ever looked forward to the wedding cake at my own wedding (because I knew how ridiculously delicious it was!), but this time I was looking forward to it just to see what they would do instead of cake.  (I thought the same thing...why not have a sponge cake, frosting made without butter, a fruit topping, use soy products instead of dairy....But that is just not done here.  I don't know why.) 

I tried every dessert - I had to taste them!  They were all new! And my favorite was a shot glass with an undercooked brownie.  I'm sure they had some fancy name for it, but that is what it was.  Warm and Gewy...I had 2.

And b.) (the other different thing) was this song that just said "Barbara Streisand."  It was so weird.  Judging from YouTube it is actually a popular song...but we all thought it was just weird.  I wonder what she thinks of it.  She should sue like Rosa Parks.

Dead Sea Fashion Week

Okay, so it wasn't part of a Fashion Week, it was a fashion show...and I was a model!  Wearing a dress worth worth around $3000 - with accessories of equal scale.  I modeled a 150 year-old traditional Palestinian dress...from Gaza! 

Yes, it was awesome! Yes my head was covered! No, Paul did not recognize me! No, I didn't know they had women that tall but the dress went to the ground. Yes, the sleeves were too short (or maybe that was the style).  Yes, picture here.

As a part of a work retreat one of our colleagues worked with a museum in Jerusalem to organize a fashion show for the staff, using the staff as models.  They brought 8 Palestinian dresses from the area including Bethlehem, Jaffa (Jonah and the whale), and Gaza.  All of us had our heads covered by scarves, my face was also covered very creatively! and another girl had a head cover made coins - kind of resembling a helmet (worth $3000 for the head piece alone).  But they all did the job of covering your head.

The dresses were very intricate and heavy, leading us all to wonder when we could take them off and how the Palestinian women 150+ years ago wore these dresses in the heat.  The other interesting revelation was that they chose (among the 8 models) three of the tallest women at the mission.  Models are usually tall, but the average Palestinian woman 150 years ago...I didn't picture her as tall.  We thought for sure the dresses would be too short on us, but they weren't! They were just the right length. 

I was sworn to secrecy so Paul had no clue I was participating (or that he was attending a fashion show!), so he didn't know it was me until after I was off stage.  In fact, only one colleague recognized me.

Palestinian dresses.  I'm on the far right.

Beyond the pictures and the dresses, the interesting part of the fashion show is that the other models included my boss and a few women from work that I didn't know too well.  It was a lot of fun to hang out with them backstage, try on the dresses together and talk about how we should walk and where we should stand.  Half of the women were Palestinian, but for me - an American who doesn't fully understand the history or culture of Palestine - it was really interesting to think of myself presenting (or representing) Gaza.

How would a Gazan woman walk?  Would she be shy or bashful with her face covered? Or would she be like my colleague who presented the bridal dress (which was black with red embroidery too) who was dancing around and lively?  Would she strut her stuff, twirl around the dress, make large sweeping motions with her arms to show off the dress...where did the line between presenting the dress/culture and modeling? Unfortunately, or maybe fortunately, my "walk" was less then two minutes and I was instructed to sit on the ground and mortar coffee with the prop I was given. (Huh..throw in another trick of how to sit on the ground and stand back up in a 150 year old floor length dress...without stepping on it or ripping it!) 

Celebration of Oil

What I knew about Hanukkah before today: "Hanukkah is...the festival of lights;" it is around Christmas; there is a game with a dreidel; they only had enough oil for one day but the candle stayed lit for 8 days.
Today is the second day of Hanukkah and I am in Jerusalem for work. What this means is: I know now infinitely more about Hanukkah than I did three days ago. You see, I am here for work (sans Paul). My two Canadian/Israeli co-workers are here with me and spending all day with them...eating every meal with them for 4 days...you learn a lot!
Tonight we happened to be sitting at an outdoor cafe between the Old City and Zion Square (in a young, popular, Jewish part of town). Just before sunset a couple hundred people can down the street with music and lights on a stick. Apparently they had walked around the Old City and were on their way to the Square to light the manora at sunset. About half of this group was new soldiers (in uniform, with guns). There was a stage and lots of happy Hebrew music which I didn't understand, but my co-worker sang along and said it was all traditional holiday music.

As the sun set a soldier said two prayers (I understood only the word Adoni, Lord) and they lit their second candle. More interesting than this was the 2nd floor balcony of someone's apartment in a very old beautiful building where a young man came out a sunset and lit a two small candles. He went back inside and sat at the dinner table. The dark night made his lit up dining room look like a stage. He sat down to dinner with his family and in the background fireworks began to go off. "One of the rules of Hanukkah is that you have to show your lights." This made infinitely more sense as we walked back to the hotel and saw manora lightings and singing on the sidewalks and balconies.
Apparently, Hanukkah also has a slightly political undertone to it. You see, the rest of the story of the candle that stayed lit for 8 days is this. Jerusalem was occupied by the Greeks and was a secular (like Tel Aviv today). The Macabees (either a rebel group that wanted to restore the right to practice Judaism or a conservative sect that wanted to restore strict Jewish law, depending on your interpretation of it) after a series of battles retook Jerusalem and went about cleaning out all of the pagan symbols and altars - some of which were in the Second Temple. They wanted to work through the night to restore the purity of the temple but only had.....(enter the story you know)...enough oil for one day of work. The oil lasted 8 days.
This is interesting to me because it happened here in Jerusalem. I am here. Though I didn't bring my camera, I hope to go to the Western Wall tomorrow, ie. to the only remaining part of the Second Temple. While I'd love to see them light the third candle - I think work will get in the way of that.
More than the festival of lights, I'm told it is a festival of oil. Most of the foods associated with Hanukkah include lots of oil. And I saw several altar-like manoras on the streets where the candles were actually oil! It was pretty cool.

Jordan Part Three: A Lemon Scotch

A lemon scotch - it's a drink.  You've probably never heard of it.  It is the English translation of the Arabic translation of whiskey sour.  Let me start at the beginning.

One of my favorite and most interesting things to write about is cultural difference. You learn quite a lot in the first few hours and days within a new culture and my trip to Jordan to see Dusty was no exception.

As I noted in Part One of the Jordan "chapter," I was greeted with smiles as soon as I crossed into Jordan. I stopped in at the tourists information/police office before heading into to town to make sure I didn't get ripped off, or do something dangerous and stupid, or end up in Saudi Arabia. While we technically live in the Middle East, Israel (and Tel Aviv in particular) is nothing like its neighbors. (Exageration - it is clearly much like Jordan than Alaska is like Jordan, but Alaska and Israel are probably more similar than Jordan and Israel...but I digress!)

Where to start....the Middle East is not homogeneous.  If you read our post from Egypt on womens' clothing (see photo on the left) you would see that there are variations in the level of conservativeness within the Muslim communities in the Middle East (in addition to the other large communities that are other religions). Within some of the most conservative sects women are almost completely covered in black except for their eyes and must be accomapied by a male family member when leaving the house (our friend here refers to them as ninjas).  Dusty had alertered me that the women he had seen in Aqaba (which weren't many) all had their heads covered.  So you can see that a young white woman, traveling by herself, without her head covered might draw some attention. But I'd learned my lesson in Egypt and came prepared to try not to offend the locals by wearing conservative tops, pants and having my scarf ready to wrap around my head. I don't mind covering up because then I don't get as many stares, I look like a smart and informed Westerner and I secretly feel like Jasmin from the movie Aladin when she sneaks out to the market! 

I've told you all of this so that you can fully appreciate this story:

If my traveling solo without a head cover wasn't enough to offend the locals, my presence in a bar (Gasp!)and the audacity to order my own drink would (oh the promiscuity!). Not only does the Middle East lack to wonderful drinking culture of Germany (in that it is controlled and tasty and cultural), but Muslims don't drink alcohol. This translates into more than just a bar of only tourists.  Because there aren't locals in the bars they are less busy. Because they aren't busy, the bartenders make fewer drinks. Becuase they make fewer drinks, they aren't so good at it. Thus, my general rule is to stick to beer which may be watered down but it won't be vinegar like the local wine and it won't be an overpriced softdrink with a splash of alcohol.  But as long as I was breaking so many cultural rules just by being there - I figured I may as well go ahead and take my chances with a mixed drink.

"Can you make a whiskey sour?" This was a question, not my order. Are you CAPABLE? Do you know HOW? The eager bartender smiled and rushed around the bar consulting with his colleagues. "Yes!" was the enthusiastic reply 5 minutes later. The poor guy confused Jim Beam and Johnny Walker, mixeing one part scotch with one part lemon juice.  I don't know the recipe - but it involves whiskey, not scotch and I'm prety sure it is more than lemon juice or they'd call it a whiskey lemon.  He did shake it up and serve it over ice.  :)

The bar staff all watched as I took the first sip. Mmmm! According to my Flavor Bible (thanks Greg!) our perception of taste is equal parts a.) chemical reactions to flavors, b.) temerapture and c.) the emotional environment (think of Thanksgiving dinner - as long as the food is hot and you are with family you will remember it as being a great meal).  I don't know if it really tasted refreshing and great, or if the genuine effort by the staff to make us feel welcome and fact that I was having a drink with my big brother compensated for the taste.  Either way - I made the bartenders day when I ordered another and I was more than happy to sip a lemon scotch if it meant more time with my brother!

Tel Aviv & Coffee

Tel Aviv is an odd city with regards to its coffee. On the one hand it has a thriving cafe culture - much like my beloved Buenos Aires - in which there is a cafe on almost every block and you can find people enjoying a cup of coffee at almost any hour. There is wireless internet at the cafes, light food, a good atmosphere and friendly baristas.

While there are many smaller independent cafes, the most popular is Cafe Cafe. You can think of it as the Starbucks of Tel Aviv. (There are no Starbucks in Tel Aviv - I guess they came in a few years back, failed and fled.) Our neighborhood loves cafe so much that we have 2 Cafe Cafe's right across the street from each other! (One is Cafe Cafe and the other is Cafe Cafe Kosher.)

Anyway, the other hand of the cafe culture here is such that people drink great coffee in the cafes, and really crappy coffee at home. The grocery store has a section about 2 feet wide with coffee - 80% of which is instant! There are a few bags of expensive "Turkish" coffee which are about the size you get in your hotel room (and look to be the same quality).

The conundrum here is that Jen LOVES coffee. I think this is in large part thanks to her dear friend Alexandria who shared her great coffee with Jen in college :) Jen has a coffee bean grinder, a french press, coffee cups and these adorable little red espresso cups (thanks Kathryn!)....and no coffee to put in them :( The "Natural Foods" grocery store (in quotation marks because they also sell fruit loops)had a bag of coffee that looked decent for about $8, but it was finely ground and that doesn't work too well for my french press.

Lamenting the lack of coffee - a coworker told us we could buy good whole bean coffee at The Coffee Bean. So, Jen biked the half mile to the Coffee Bean in search of the infamous whole bean coffee, and there it was! A large bag for 190 Shekels! ($51.35)!!! Oh my gosh! Needless to say, Jen still has no coffee. Any recommendations for online coffee stores that ship internationally???