the more you know.

we know that it is inevitable that when you travel, you learn. being recently back from a journey to amsterdam & belgium, i thought i'd share some learnin's. hopefully you will not find it *too* mundane.

•maps should be used as a last resort - it's more fun to find your way back/to/from/here/there/home.
•of course i can feel this way because i am blessed with a damn good sense of direction. but when that fails, i also like to be lost.
•while i only enjoy american pancakes sometimes, i could enjoy dutch pancakes almost all the time.
•maryjane is fun to hang out with here and there, but she's the kind of girl that gets boring after a while.
•if you're gonna hang out with mary, don't forget your sunglasses. what a pain in the ass.
•eavesdropping is fantastic. even if you don't understand most of what's being said.
•i will absolutely eat food out of an automat. and with gusto. krokets are a crunchy little piece of heaven.
•the vegetarian meals on the plane are not always better.
•bikes are cooler in amsterdam.
•anne frank's father barely knew the anne that we all know from the diary. this makes me sad.
•belgian waffles aren't really better in belgium, unless covered in belgian chocolate.
•when you are on vacation avoid checking your work e-mail at all costs. this means leave the crackberry at home. being completely inaccessible is fucking liberating.
•vacation shouldn't end until the jet-lag wears off. but it does.
•when writing on vacation, write every day. it's too hard to go back and fill in the blanks.
•amsterdam has a very new york feeling about it. i could absolutely live there.
•drunk people are way way way more obnoxious than stoned people. you can see this very clearly in amsterdam where cafe's are side by side.
•the red light district creeped me out more than i thought. the red lights mixed with the black lights is sinister and sad.
•i can go longer than i thought without showering. even in places where showers are completely accessible.
•i enjoy when people ask me for directions when i'm traveling, even when i can't really help them. i have a special "i-don't-look-like-a-tourist" grin.
•there are an oddly high number of south american steak-houses in amsterdam. anyone know why?
•i like the young dutch cheese a little bit better than the old dutch cheese. but not much.
•vondelpark is a calming place. better than valium.
•chocolate sprinkles on bread with butter rocks. mmmm.
•i finally mastered the art of not overpacking. it's about time.
•not trying to speak the native language in the place i'm visiting, even if everyone speaks english, makes me feel like i'm cheating.
•instead of wanting to come home, traveling always makes me want to travel more.

Feeling rather ghoulish . . .

...as I make my way down Hudson Street, the approach from the north down to Ground Zero mostly silent save for the rude honks from passing trucks and the occasional squeak of a bicycle. It's 11:30pm (a late night at the agency, duh) and the streets, usually empty, are punctuated by groups of three and four making their way down to the twin towers of blue light, a beacon of sorts. I pause, plastic bag in hand, as I spot a crowd of various PDs around a table (thinking that I will be searched) but breathe relief when I see they are just admiring the wares of a most enterprising vendor selling crystal statues of the twin towers lit red and blue.

A left takes me along the northern wall and I reach Broadway and the "flying bird" PATH station so heralded as a symbol of hope. I'm a bit overwhelmed by the sight of hundreds of folks either passing through on their way home to New Jersey, or making the pilgrimmage to Ground Zero. A photography exhibit adorns the metal grid walls surrounding "the pit," interlaced with wreaths, candles, homemade posters and collages. Most folks are quiet, except for the Seventh Day Adventist who has come to the site to spout religion and truth (apparently, as told by a prophet from 1903, documented in the books of the Adventists). It's easy to tell who is a local and who is just visiting, but difficult to tell who might be making a true 5-year anniversary return to the site. I'd bet that most are visitors, and very few are survivors.

Groups of firefighters made their way through the crowd in formal dress while roving bands of motorcyclists gun their engines as they pass Century 21 and the Millenium Hilton, the dumb bastards; so disrespectful. An idiot drives by in some beat-up shitcan, yelling out the window, "YEAH, GO NEW YORK!" and some fool blasts Bon Jovi while idling in his convertible Mustang in front of the PATH station. Officers mill around what one can only assume are strategic points; no doubt their undercover comrades are mingling amongst the digital cameras, out-of-state hooded sweatshirts and coffee cups. Laughter is rare and lips are pursed; I see plenty of immigrants, illegal or otherwise, at the site. The stories of their friends lost in the towers are the least documented; or rather, the undocumented remaining the undocumented.

The hole in the ground looks far from built; mired in politics, greed and indecision, the most fitting tribute would be a vast 16-acre park; commerce does not belong here; commerce is what caused this ground to be levelled.

This is probably the only part of the city now where I can stand around and NOT feel like a New Yorker, even though I've spent almost my entire life in New York City. I arrived in London on September 10, 2001 and spent the next few weeks glued to the BBCs 24-hour newscasts. Having not experienced what has been called the defining moment of this generation, by the time I get back stateside, the city has completely changed, and I've not had any part in it. Any pain I feel seems undeserved, any feelings of depth far too shallow in comparison, no lives lost in my circle of family and friends.

Judith Nathan's voice suddenly breaks through the crowd, or rather a recording. A garishly noisy parade firetruck from the North Bergen Fire Department has arrived, sirens a-blaring. Looking and sounding like a Taiwanese election vehicle, the multimedia Frankenstein of a beast bears firefighters and flagwavers; six loudspeakers rigged to the truck destroy any peace that might have existed at the scene. Covered in large flat-panel television screens, the truck's vivid displays draw the crowd in like Pan; the plaza clears as visitors surround the truck. I myself am searching for some loose change, having heard that DVDs of the documentary were being distributed at the site, but apparently not at this late hour.

Visitors clutch what appear to be commemorative programs, much like those you would purchase at a baseball stadium. So who is the bigger devil? The person selling the programs for $10 or $15 a pop, or the printer producing the program, or the photographer who sold his photos for the program?

The sound from the microphone breaks up for a moment and I thought the man was choking back tears, but it was just a loose microphone cord from the "Freedom Truck." Testimonials from the firefighters onboard seemed genuine enough, and offers to the crowd to grab the mic to share their stories made things a bit more human but, call it the Patriot Games or the Patriot Act, it still felt phony and showmanlike. Applause permeates the town-hall-like revival but the rah-rah-rhetoric is the most craven thing I have seen since this morning, when the New York Post covered its front page with Bush propaganda and an ad for their contest, while the other newspapers played it classy.

The testimonials fall into a steady drone and I try to move away from the sound, secretly hoping the Seventh Day Adventist grabs the mic and spouts his truth. People ask for yet another shot in front of the lights, but this time without the flash, okay, honey? iPods are floating about; I wonder what's in their "5th Anniversary of 9/11 playlist"?

"Rudy Guiliani for President!" a man shouts on the microphone. And with that, it's time to go home. Port Authority security continues to patrol behind the fence on their golf carts; young firefighters look tough with the patches on their arms, south asians stand thoughtful and it's all a most grand display of humanity. Lives were lost on the site ("it's not a site, it's a shrine," says one man) and the handwritten cards to Daddy can wrench tears from even the coldest heart but the place is also an icon for greed and corruption; an unwillingness to compromise that will forever mark this land. If the lesson of the day ends up costing more lives lost (conservatively, over 3500 U.S. military personnel and over 45,000 Iraqi civilians), then it is a lesson best not taught at all, for what have we learned but to kill over and over again?

Kill, Kill, Kill. The fat man.

West Indian Day in Brooklyn lends itself to a nice bike ride across the B bridge, but the real motivation is to begin filming a piece on a friend's eating habits... 6-pack in 6 weeks.

What better way to kick it off than 4 rotis and some jerk chicken?

I feel a slight connection with the crowd from my ventures down to Dominica, but that goes as fast as the sorrel juice and the camera battery. So, I'll have to forget some beautiful "before" shots of Said Subject enjoying his last real meal to the tune of ass-cheek clapping. I was, however, able to set a workout sesh with the City Gym Boys.

I am a bit lost as to where I locked my bike, so I ask the first guy around. Careful not to pick a white person because I don't want to seem like I was scared of the rest of the crowd. "Hey man, which way is the Grand Army Plaza?" Pause. Stoically, "I couldn't tell you." With his arms still crossed and no turn of the head to look in either direction, I notice his merchandise: DVDs with titles spanning such interesting topics as How the CIA Wants the Black Man Dead and The Black Holocaust: It ain't no lie.

I go it alone.

The ride from Carrol Gardens to Williamsburgh is navigated using only The Force and a bright LED that illumates everything within 7 inches and for one twohundreth of a second at a time.

Hassidic Jews are single handidly keeping the minivan craze alive.

Upstate.

It's Thursday and I'm arguing with Dave over IM as to who has the higher credit score. It's the yuppie arm-wrestling.

Work ends uneventfully, except for the excitement of getting off the island this weekend. "Call me spicy," I relay to Steph. "Huh?"

"I want my nickname to be spicy. I've decided." She's quick to reply that one cannot name (or nickname) himself. After a bit of whining and refusing to do something she uses the new nomenclature, but very reluctantly.

In the morning I'm a bit disoriented because I'm not going to work and yet there are weekday noises outside my window. Kids being dropped off for school, traffic, no dominoes being played.

Dave and I start the pre-weekend-kickoff-bbq a bit late, but the turnout is solid for a weekday thang. Because of the BBQ we shove-off a bit later than expected, but avoid some traffic. We're six in the car which means one the in the back back, Dave volunteers. It seems this weekend accentuates how on the fence we are at this age. It's the constant battle between being mature and not giving a fuck (a.k.a. young). We rent a house to escape the crowds and loud noises, but our shorts have holes in them shirts are frowned upon. We buy organic goat meat at the farmers market, but canned beer on special as an apertif.

It's 11pm before we get to the house, and there are too many stars out. It just doesn't seem right. The house is old, rustic, and fantastic. It has everything we need so the first half hour is spent with exploring and telling others what you found, "Oh snap, they got a mortar and pestle!" and "Oh, that's nice, they have organic mosquito repellent."

A bunch of frozie drinks later we start getting cuddly and retire to our respective boudoirs.

I awake to a deafening hissing of crickets alternating between my left and right ear like a hearing test. The air is warm but lacks the urine of its cousin in the city. The stairs creak and the house seems to shift with my heavy head, but I fix a tall glass of ice water and trip out to the porch with nothing on but a towel. In the distance is a large vegetable/herb garden, a barn, a creek and a fire pit (which we thought was a scary, abandoned well the night last). The mature part of me wants this as an investment, the other part needs to fart.

The part of the day that is not wasted rousing ourselves is spent mostly buying groceries for today, tonight, and tomorrow. Having received word of a local watering hole, we venture out for a swim. Less white trash than expected, and hardly a secret. The water is just warm enough to make us go in, and just cold enough to make us all women. A late bbq, some fireflies, a pinch of rain, a hefty serving of rum mixed with dice poker and we're back in bed.

Awake. Repeat. This country tap water is so cold it hurts your teeth when brushing, but I feel the need to suffer a bit. You know, like they did "back when." I tend to go barefoot, even when the sharp rocks pierce my delicate pieds.

You gotten toughen up, Alan. What if you didn't have the luxury of flip-flops? Then what? "Ow!"
Suck it up!

After a 45 min hike with a few complaints here and there, we arrive at a splendid waterfall/pool/river thing. I'm not sure if we should stay because a couple of locals with a couple of teeth are lounging. "You should jump from 'dere!" points the tatted one. "We would do it with ya, but we gotta head back to the car to get some more Jäger," another retreats.

We stay.

The hick was referring to a ledge about 45-50 feet up above a small pool that is fed by a series of small waterfalls. There is no doubt that all our men eyed that thing hatefully. Why would God put some like this here? This should be a place of relaxation, a place to reflect on times when you were less happy and more stressed than you are right now. The women are adamant that none of us are even coming close to that penis-proving-precipice, but I for one, can't get it out of my head. We toy around with an 8-footer that lands us in the same pool.

I had all but forgotten about the big boy, when a couple of 15-year-old girls arrive and head straight up the side of the hill. The first jumps with almost no hesitation. The second spends the next 35 min staring off the edge and asking technical questions about depth, circumference, wind to height ratios. She was done for 2 minutes into it, and retreats when all questions had been expunged. It made me feel a little bit better that a girl almost half my age and weight chickened out, but not much. Now the pressure was fresh again, the challenge reinstated.

I can feel the adventure coming to an end, so take a bit of a walk up the rocks just to see if we happened to miss a better pool above, and really came about the high jump by accident. From up there it looks like the circus stunt into a glass of water.

Just me and my fear. Weightless silence.

I have never been an adrenaline junkie, I don't even really enjoy the fear. What I do like is knowing how powerful the human mind can be in controlling the body. I enjoy logic beating the intrinsic. I saw other people make the jump and checked the depth of the pool myself. I also know that if you land properly the risk of you being injured or killed starts at about 100 feet. So the only thing that can hurt you is overthinking or freaking out...

ZZWOOOSSSSHHHHHHH. The whirling of water around my ear drums means I'm alive. My foot barely skims the rock bottom and reminds me what I just did.

Back at the house the weekend wraps with trying to soak in as much nature as possible in the last 30 min. Staring at trees, walking in the garden, killing mosquitoes and eating fresh tomatoes. And then it ends.

"I'm really not feeling the city, hueon."

Me neither, Felipe. Me neither.

Dominica - chapter 4 - the return

I think I'm allergic to New York.

I realized that on the plane ride home, the first thing I ate was also the first processed food I had in 2 weeks. It never would have bothered me before, but I was deathly insulted that American Airlines would pass out a bag of Lay's potato chips as a snack. "If you want to eat, and therefore, survive, you will support the fattening of our children," is how I read it.

My reaction to The States hardly got better as I got back to normal life: I felt sick with anything I ate and had to start consciously eating "better," resorting to a niçoise salad for lunch, 14 days in a row. My skin started itching and little red bumps appeared on my forearms. I would call it Overall Malaise.

The only reason I could come up with is that my body was in shock after getting used to fresh squeezed juices, eating fish that was caught from a spot you can see from your table, and not getting angry at a slow walker.

Dominica is the most beautiful society I have ever witnessed. And, what is more outstanding is that it's a beautiful black society. It might be wrong for a white kid to be surprised by this, but growing up mostly in LA and NY, I tend to think the worst about any demographic. Truthfully, before this trip I would have thought that kind of total harmony would have been impossible for people of any race, including my own.

I sit now on my balcony in Brooklyn hearing the ice-cream-truck melody mixed with reggaeton and try to think back on my stint in Dominica. Images of waterfalls and trails through the rainforest, rastas and juice, chasing rainbows and liquid sunshine, street cricket, pastries and honking hello, blinks before me. It is a fantastic place to visit, but an even better place to take home.

The moral: You don't have to be dread to be rasta.

here are all the pics.

Dominica - chapter 3 - pollo. oh no.

At the dive shop I have to wait a quite a while for the cruise ship to dock and some stragglers to join the boat. When the gargantuan vessel docks, white people belch over, "looks like pouring milk into coffee," I quip to some hang-arounders, they dig the analagy. I repeated it a few times to new audiences, and I think they could sense it had lost its luster.

Big Dave takes us out (he is very big) and the diving is amazing, but we come back one short.

Some may remember a rubber friend joining my father and I on our Machu Picchu trip, well, sadly he did not feel quite himself one fine afternoon, and took a beak-dive off the end of our sunfish in Turks. We were worried for many months, but being optimists, we knew that he would be happy swimming with the fishes. To all of our surprise, he found his way to Green Team just days before this Dominican voyage. Some naysayers said that he looked different and “he’s a changed chicken,” but I knew better.

Well, after traveling thousands of miles more, above sea level, the search is back on. Volunteers should start down-current of Champagne, Dominica.

* * *

Everything takes three times as long here because you have to say “hi” so many times. It's the 4th day and I now have about 30 people on the island that I say “hi” to. It’s quite inefficient, hence the New York method of ignoring even loved ones.

In Dominica, the horn is never used for evil, only good. Everyone honks hello, but locals can have full conversations while traveling in opposite directions:

One beep = hey.
Two beeps = hey, good to see you.
Three beeps = hey, good to see you, call me.
Two beeps and a honk = hey, wassup, see you at the party tonight.
Four beeps = I didn’t understand your last communication, please repeat.

Today I had the best juice of my life, guava, a.k.a. the sweet, sweet nectar of an angel’s teat.

Some Kung-Fu movie tucks me in at night.

We head up the coast in the morning and I fall asleep in the car as usual. There’s something about a bumpy car ride in the heat that puts me into a pre-natal coma. When I come to, I startle Clem to stop the car. He does, and I hop out to take some pics.

We enter “The Lab.” A very local rum stop with a few bumps-on-a-log in their normal positions (I can only assume). “Ya want buy some propaty?” the wiser looking of the 3 asks. I quickly counter with what I’m sure was a witty retort, even though I would love some (it is a defense mechanism that I learned from my father). Turns out he’s one of the richest guys in Dominica; he has a 16 bedroom house and when he needs some more rum, he sells a piece of land. I now call him “The Scientist” and yes, I am trying to get a hold of him, but his sidekick must be turned off.

It’s 5pm and I just realize it’s the Fourth of July. Yay, America.

Pearl’s (Clem’s suggestion) is closed, so I find some crap dinner spot that’s empty, but has a nice outdoor area for me to write all this stuff down. I ask the waitress to turn off the TV so that I can just listen to the crickets chirp for a while.

Ahhhh. Wait, those aren’t crickets, they’re squeaky fans above my head.

You’re 30 and…

The 30th birthday. One that many women dread. Not only do we face the same life-evaluating questions surrounding our careers, our futures, our past, our very souls…but we, I suspect more than men, get obsessed with the aesthetic implications of age: wrinkles, cellulite, cellulite, gray hairs, arm fat, saggy breasts, cellulite, dull skin, looking old, and cellulite.

I turned 30 on July 14th. While I am a relatively laid-back, sensible girl when it comes to what I deem to be “superficial” ways of looking at beauty…I admit the barrage of 30-related comments and questions started to get to me.

“Ooooooh 30, that’s a big one!”
“Happy 30th birthday! Do you feel old yet?!”
“Wait, is that a wrinkle there?”

Over the course of the weekend and celebrations of both my and my friend’s birthday, I started to head-spin a little bit. The interior-monologue went something like this:

Damn. 30 is old. Well, no, not that old, I mean in this day and age, you’re going to live at least until 90. Not if you keep sneaking cigarettes your not. And they’re giving you wrinkles. Clearly I’m not that wrinkly, I keep getting carded. That’s just because it’s law. Whatever, I am a vibrant young woman with years of cuteness ahead of me. Yeah, yeah, how about you go to the beach and forget the sunscreen again? That was an accident. And the [number censored] jackncokes the other night? Accident again? I am NOT a lush. Mmmhmmm. How about you refrain from being such a social butterfly and start doing something with your life? By the way, you really should get that butt to the gym unless you want to start to look like [name censored].

SHUT UP.

By Sunday, my sister and my friends were collectively birthday-ed out and in an effort to beat the humidity that descended upon the city we fled, by train, to Long Beach. With everyone else, their mother and their 2nd cousins.

The beach was wall-to-wall people when we arrived, despite the fact that it was almost 4 in the afternoon. The late-afternoon sun was just as strong as we wove our way through the colorful variety of glistening bodies of every size, shape and color imaginable. We sweated our hangovers away and went swimming despite there being just a little too much seaweed (the wispy, frond-like kind, not the slimy kelp-y kind).

As 7 approached, I decided to take one last swim before heading up to the train, but was thwarted by the lifeguards keeping everyone out of the water. Sharks? I peered intently looking for fins or other signs of Jaws lurking under the waves. Nope – nothing so exciting - merely the lifeguards leaving for the day. Apparently their last act is to shoo everyone out of the water, and then everyone hops back in.
I stood near the waters edge people watching, when a child decides to hit on me. Okay, not a child, but definitely a teenager. His post-pubescent ‘stach gave him away.

“Hey girl can I holla at you for a minute?” He blatantly looked me up and down and his skinny sidekick grinned.
“Um, actually, I’m going to go back to my friends over there.”
“That’s okay, I got people over there too but I got my priorities straight, you know what I’m sayin’? We’re just lookin’ for some interestin’ conversation.”
“Ummm.”
“What’s your name girl?”
“Roxie.”
“Roxie, my names James, but my friends call me Supreme and if you hang with me for a bit, you will understand why. So what do you say, you want to hang for a bit?”
[stifling giggles] “I am way too old for you.”
The man-child looks me up and down again. “How old are you? You can’t be that old.”
“Trust me, I am too old for you.”
“How old are you?” he insisted.
I sighed. “I’m 30.” It was the first time I said it out loud.
“DANG girl!” Supreme looked me up and down again – ewe. “No WAY you be 30.”
“I promise you, I just turned 30.”

He licked his bottom lip LL-Cool J style, and with that he said magical words that both horrified and flattered, dissipating any lingering 30th-birthday doubts:

“You’re thirty, and I’m dirty.”

Dominica - chapter 2 - Why so blue, Panda Bear?

“The Fort Young is the nicest hotel in Roseau,” Dominica Tourism reassured me, “You’ll be right next door.”

The Garraway is supremely adequate and just around the corner from my hotel, I discover the perfect pastry shop. Normally that's the sort of thing you figure out on the way back to the airport, but I had plenty of time to sicken myself of its delights. Some fantastic banana bread and some Local Juice, mmm... passion fruit (slightly too sweet, but I'm a positive person).

The weather is hazy all over the island so I get to know my guide, Clem. Educated at Cambridge, he has almost no Caribbean accent, but bumps it up when talking to the street, much like I would probably convert “sure” to “sho” when talking to a black guy, we all want to fit in.

I later realize that he studied in Cambridge, not at Cambridge, but he’s still a very smart bloke.

The island is amazing to explore, but the best part of the day comes at lunchtime in the Botanical Garden. After a huge shower forces us to cut the tour short and make a run for the restaurant, a fantastic Callaloo soup makes it all better like mommy would.

The day with Clem ends uneventfully as the light wasn’t great and I haven’t found my groove yet. I take a walk around town solo and pick a shady pool bar to wait for sunset. Quickly I figure out that "shady" does not exist here. What would be thugs at home are teddy bears here. The people of Dominica are friendly and welcoming, even when a white man landing on a foreign island usually means the locals will have to convert religions and learn a new language.

“Those are the greatest jeans ever! I would have taken you for a 31!” is something a Dominican would never say. I leave the Creole restaurant before ordering, but after drinking a glass of water, assuring myself that not all Americans are like that. How could I even let that bother me in this Post 9/11 world?

There are fewer tourists in the Chinese restaurant, but that’s probably just because it’s empty. The fried rice is terrible, the shrimp is whatevs, the Kubuli is warming quickly, the salad was stupid, but the egg rolls are to die for.

I don’t want a cigarette.

Dominica - chapter 1 - God's Day

I can never remember which car service I like and which I hate, so I go with instinct and dial the sixes, 666-6666. A friendly voice reassures me, later confirmed at 4am by a cheery Indian driver, go with the six, seven is weaksauce.

Falling asleep thinking of how to waterproof my underwear. 4 hours later I awake unprovoked, 45 minutes early. Thinking of waterfalls.

1st song on the iPod (shuffle all songs) is Road Trippin.’ Second song is PYT.

I did everything in my power to avoid American Airlines, short of swimming to the Caribbean, but they seem to have a monopoly on this route. So I’m stuck in a terminal at 5am that has locked down any outlet or internet signal in order to make $5 each 15 min. It's like my dad cutting the cable feed after being sent to my room. Checking out a website of monkeys doing it is almost worth the quid, but I pass.

Flight.

I meet a Dominican guy, his sister, and his friend (whom I later realize is his “friend”). He is about 32 with braces and his family lives in Grand Bay; maybe give him a call for some photos on Friday.

Martin Tavernier’s name sounds classier than the man himself looks, but the quasi-rasta turns out to be a cool brother. When the Ministry’s driver doesn't show up at the airport it commences a bidding war among the cabbies. “Someone wants to speak to you,” announces the fattest of the gang as he shovels his cell my way.

“Ello mon, you da one 'aitin for da Mistry?” I am.
“Well, he ain’t comin’ cauz it’s Sunday, das Gods day.” Silence is usually the best answer if confused.
“So my man will take you and you just gib dem da receipt.”
Nice try chief, I'll go with Martin Tavernier.

It’s an hour drive so I’ll give it about 45 min before easing into the ganja conversation, although it hardly seems like a subject that will be difficult to breach with a guy in an matching jersery outfit that would fit Shaq, two cell phones, dreads tucked into a do-rag, and a song on the stereo chanting “Maa – ri – waaaana, I love it. Maa – ri – waaaana, I miss it. Maa – ri – waaaana, I need it. Shez mine.”

Turns out they have it here too.

At the spectacularly adequate hotel I try and figure out if I like cricket: The match’s focus has been turned to an inflatable object that has drifted onto the field, and tracks it for 47 seconds in silence. On the other hand, it’s tough to dislike a sport where Austrailian commentators say things like, “I bet his first cry, just out of his mother’s womb, and onto dry land, was...”

I order the roti. I guess it’s Domingo Loco here.

1 click north-northeast

A new way to work today.

A fat lady was brown-bagging a pastry. I can only assume that she was a bit ashamed of her pre-breakfast and didn't want to show us strangers.

Arriving to work, après completion of her illegitimate snack, she gaily fixes herself a fruit medley, showcasing her breakfast proudly by slowly stabbing the selected fruit with a small, white, plastic spork; turning it over before sliding it off with just her teeth. Her colleagues must wonder why she's so fat with such a steady diet of flaunted fruit.

Continuing north, one block further than my normal route. Canal is made to be ignored by those considering themselves locals, with the needed avoidance of bumping elbows, "rolex" chanting Africans, and purse-picture carrying Chinese ladies.

Swinging my arms with a slight twist of the wrist, hoping that someone will catch a glimpse of my watch. I bought it on Canal and although I don't care if anyone thinks it's real it would be nice of a vendor to comment on what a nice fake it is and wouldn't I like to see some more.

I had never seen the word clairvoyant written down before and it seems an odd one to use in an ad, but there it was, proving my ignorance. I didn't know what it meant even though I'm sure I've used it before as "claireboyant," meaning excited and floating. Digging deep into my one semester of seventh-grade Latin and a few more of French I was able to decipher the two parts of this riddle: claire=clear and voyant=seeing. I think of myself as just shy of genius for figuring out the meaning of a word that I should have known.

Who knew there was a Blimpie here? On the west coast Subway is better, but on the East Coast Blimpie is better.

I just remembered that I owe the fruit guy 50 cents, cross the street. The street is oddly large from this side and the sidewalk broad and empty.

Moral: Latin helps you later in life.

-Alan