Live to Fight Another Day: A roundup of what I've been up to.

So I had quite an intensive June work-wise. I traveled from Bangkok to New York City for 10 days to attend an annual global retreat for GBV professionals, then I headed to London to attend the star-studded Ending Sexual Violence in Conflict Summit hosted by Angelina Jolie and William Hague, the Foreign Minister for the UK, and then I sat around Qatar for 10 days writing a manual while waiting for a visa from Saudi Arabia. Finally, I went to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia for 3 whole days to lead a training. Then I was back to Qatar to hang out with my college roommate Ann-Michelle on her birthday and finally, home in Bangkok 32 days later.

That was quite an airplane ride... 

BKK-DOH-JFK-DOH-AUH-LHR-AUH-DOH-RUH-DOH-BKK. 

The jet lag never seemed to end. I had no idea what time it was. I couldn't find my "deep vein thrombosis" stockings for one leg of my journey and any leg cramp sent me cowering in fear that I was going to die from "economy class syndrome". Jet Lag is why black out curtains were invented and god bless the person who did that. On the way to NYC, I worked maniacally on a paper that was only read by one person but on the other legs, I watched movies, tv shows, and played endless addictive rounds of tetris. Playing tetris is maddeningly addictive on long flights. I find myself in a zone where the little part of my mouse brain just wants to hit that bar and to receive a pellet. Very good for turning off the incessantly negative critic. Although I am pretty sure my therapist would say that its just numbing it out.  I DO NOT talk to my seatmates. Except for when I get trapped. My Bose noise-cancelling headphones are my savior. I've worn them so hard that the stuffing is falling out of the pads. 

This trip seemed to be a maddening whirlwind of happiness, exhaustion, and irritation. I got to see old friends, I connected with colleagues from work, and saw family. I saw people I hadn't seen in years. My emotions were heightened due to the jet lag and I had to keep reminding myself that the desire to slap the ambassador from South Sudan was just the jet lag talking. I had to remember that the feeling of being on the verge of tears was also just the jet lag talking. But the combination of jet lag, mindless meetings and disillusioning conference ennui made me wonder what happened to June? It's all a blur. Here's some snapshots as they whirled by...

Positives: 

Meeting up with my sister in NYC and spending some quality time with her. Being in Asia makes me feel so far away...but when I'm with her she never judges if I'm feeling lame and just want to lie on the hotel bed for another hour. Thanks for that, Alyson! 

Meeting up with my colleagues Lina and Devanna who I co-authored a presentation with... they were tired and exhausted from their work but the camaraderie, laughing, and quick creative thought never gets old. They inspire me and help me get through dull meetings. I also got to catch up with other favorite people like Beth, Sophie, Joan, Nicole, Jeanne, and Lauren. And meet new people as well. The GBV AoR meeting might have been dull but the after hours  (or bar module as we called them in MSF) were great. 

Fancy NYC restaurant with smart crazy Alec and Susanne in a funky haze of report writing and jet lag which culminated in sparkling Sake! Delicious! Then Brunch with the Esser-O'Leary boys and Alec's sister in Park Slope. 

Mexican food in NYC! And mixed drinks in the early summer sunshine. And walking through Manhattan in the warm summer night without sweating. I've been in Bangkok so long, I had forgotten what it felt like not to sweat. 

My tuberculosis/ smallpox/ mental asylum/ writer's bar/ high line tour of Roosevelt Island with my sister and friend Eoghan. It was hard to imagine Charles Dickens' words about Roosevelt Island that "everything had a lounging, listless, madhouse air, which was very painful" as we sat drinking beers in the sunshine and being marched in a quickstep by the intrepid Eoghan around NYC. I think we walked 15 miles that day according to my pedometer. But it was wonderful.  

Meeting Angelina Jolie in person and getting quoted in US Weekly about my "Brad Pitt" spotting! That's right- others aim for the New York Times, Huffington Post, or even the Guardian. But I know that all aid workers read US Weekly and this will bring me more recognition than those publications ever will... ;)

The positive benefit of being an unwanted visa applicant to Saudi Arabia - spending a week with my college roomie, Ann-Michelle and her family. Doha is not really the most exciting place in the world but their house is like an oasis of family in the middle of the desert. Always warm and welcoming and home made Dosas from Reema for breakfast! I also got a highly exciting tour of the underbelly of immigrant Doha as my Indian driver and I went on a mission to find travel agents, iPhone repair men, and other services provided by the mostly Indian/Pakistani/Bangladeshi men of Doha. I didn't see a woman that whole day. 

An unexpected dinner at a Gordon Ramsay restaurant, the Narrows, in London with my favorite person at MSF, Meggy. We met for dinner on the banks of the river Thames on a lovely warm summer evening and she gave me her lovely warmth to help me cope with remaining bad memories from those difficult 2008-2010 years. She was always the best hug to help me during those dark days.

Finally dropping off my documents to pursue my British citizenship. Let's hope I didn't leave it too long! I understand there is a huge queue at the UK passport authority! 

Negatives: 

The Ending Sexual Violence in Conflict Summit - while it was good to be in the presence of many activists, it ended up feeling like a huge waste of time and energy. Now that William Hague has resigned his position, I wonder even more what that was all about. There was an international protocol for documenting sexual violence in emergencies that to me, looks like it will never be used by service providers in emergencies as it doesn't allow any confidentiality. Check out the link above for my thoughts about the summit.

Running into former colleagues from those aforementioned unpleasant 2008-2010 years. While time has passed, I hadn't confronted my feelings about that time face-to-face and I needed to. As my therapist says "a growth opportunity". But I guess a positive too. 

Eating in restaurants for 25 of those 32 days. No wonder I can't lose weight or stay on a diet.  No exercise aside from the quickstep around Manhattan. But delicious food... lovely delicious food.. :)

Non-stop jet lag. It gets harder and harder and harder to recover. I feel like I"m taking 15 years off of my life everytime I step onto an airplane. That there is no plus side too. 


Yet to be seen: 
My 3 days in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia...

Return to Myanmar: Kachin State

Another trip to Myanmar in April 2014 - this time to the Kachin State... a place high in the foothills of the Himalayas and filled with Christian fundamentalists thanks to British missionaries traveling through colonial India. There were more Baptist churches than Buddhist temples differentiating it as a foreign land from Rakhine State and Yangon with its sparkling golden temples and saffron robed fascist monks. 

Besides the altitude and the religions, Kachin was a less paranoid experience. The smiles and shouts I received from teenage boys on motorcycles felt more like innocent sexual harassment than anti-UN hatred. Even if the tension is less palpable, the conflict is more active and there had been recent conflicts right before I left Yangon. I was unable to make it to the non-governmental controlled areas or to see the flags of China fluttering over the frontier from Laiza.

The international community, which is quite small, is not seen as a threat to the locals as they are in Rakhine and people in general were friendly, curious and open. The people wear very colorful traditional clothing too and the textiles were amazing. Being so close to the border with China also meant there was a very Chinese vibe to the food and the amounts of cheap consumer items available, even in poor Myanmar. The state felt richer than Rakhine State as well.

Shop in market selling Kachin Textiles

Kachin reminded me more of my time in Manipur, India where I went in 2010 with MSF.Manipur suprised me because it was notning like the "India" of my imagination. At one point, Pakistan, Bangladesh, India, and Myanmar were all part of one giant colony for the British and the ethnic groups up in the hills of Northeast India, Myanmar, Thailand, Laos and China all seem quite similar. Like Manipur, there is a big problem with intravenous drug use, particularly heroin in Kachin. It seems ironic that evangelical Christianity and IV drug use characterize parts of India and Myanmar - opiate of the masses, indeed. The Christianity is a legacy of colonialism but the drug use is more recent and tied to the conflicts and the obscene influence of mining in the region.  

The north-east Indian states of Manipur and Nagaland, which lie along the border with Myanmar, have ethnic conflict, armed civil insurgency, a heavy military presence and high unemployment which is exactly the same description as Kachin, a state that has been wracked with ethnic conflict and sits right in the "Golden Triangle" In Myanmar. It's also the site of all the jade and gold mining in Myanmar and sits on a lawless border with China.  Some estimate that up to 70% of male youths are addicted to IV drugs in Kachin.  The jade mines of Hpakant in Burma’s northern  Kachin State have long been notorious for high rates  of HIV and IV drug use. A single shot of heroin costs about 1000 kyat or about a dollar. 

But I didn't see much of that when I was there. The weather was a lot cooler than Bangkok or Kachin so I spent my time cycling to the office and training Kachin women on gender-based violence. I adore being a trainer and I always get energy from meeting with women and men working on gender-based violence and trying to instill in them the skills to help the survivors. The Kachin women are so serious and earnest. We laughed a lot and played games but they never stopped trying to learn and they always wanted more. 

Good Counseling!

Importance of Eye Contact or Intimidating stare?

Bad Counseling

Trying out counseling for themselves.

Survivor-Centred Skills

Practicing

The Trainees

I went to the "Confluence" - the place where two rivers meet to form the Irrawaddy. Its going to be a site of a huge dam (a second "three gorges")  that will mostly serve China and Thailand's energy needs. The dam's reservoir will submerge important historical and cultural sites at the Mali and N'mai Hka rivers, as well as what is widely recognized as the birthplace of Burma. The areas is also seen as one of the world's top biodiversity hotspots and a global conservation priority: its a reserve for tigers and the river has an endangered dolphin species that lives in it. Groups within Burma oppose the dam not only because of its environmental impacts, displacement, and threats to cultural sites. But its also near a major earthquake fault line.  If the Myitsone Dam were to break during an earthquake, it would endanger the lives of hundred of thousands of people by flooding Myikyina.

There are some seriously sad photos of how much the gold mining and jade mining have ruined this lovely spot. It's a flashpoint for the conflicts here and the dam has been delayed, but for how long? After a relaxed day there eating grilled fish and picking up some interesting rocks, we returned to Myitkyina to discover that there had been a kidnapping there the same day we were there. The "troubles" in Myanmar are all around but only if you keep your eyes open - no wonder its becoming a popular tourist destination - but as we drove home, we saw a military patrol complete with rocket-propelled grenade launcher going through a local village. Although the women I trained didn't like to talk about it, the Burmese soldiers have been known to rape Kachin women and sexual violence is a big part of the conflict here.  

Me at the Confluence

The town of Myitkyina is very cute and not very big. Bigger than Sittwe in Rakhine but with some small interesting roads to cycle down and on the Irrawaddy river. There's a nice little market and the food is mostly vegetables and lots of fruits. It was mango season when I was there. The food was pretty tasty - much less greasy than the Burmese curries that I detest but I still was able to get my fill of fermented tea leave salads (lapet thoke), shan noodles (Shan Kauwk Swe), and Burmese fish and noodle soup - a form of Burmese Catfish chowder (mohingya). My friend Marise has set up a good life in Myitkyina and loaned me a bike and had me over for happy hour so it was the perfect balance of work, social life, and fun!

Honeysuckle

Road near the office

Training center in the Himalaya foot hills

Harvesting Guavas

Participants at the training

Lychee sellers at the market.

We culminated one long evening of wine drinking and discussion by singing Karaoke with new Kachin friends in a private karoake bar. I sang a heartfelt duet to Endless Love and received some polite applause before cycling home to my sparse little hotel.

I spent one day visiting the Women and Girls Centers that we have set up in Kachin to help empower women there. They are also a place where GBV survivors can receive support and counseling and referrals for services. I was providing some coaching and support to the center managers and met many of the women who were there for activities those days. Its the very beginning of the program but I feel proud to be involved in it and hope that my training helped in some small way to make things better.

Laughing at the WGC in Wai Maung

Feeling like a movie star in Myitkyina WGC

WGC provide day care too

Hungry WGC workers at the training

Unlike the dramatic events around the census and the attacks on aid workers that I experienced in March 2014 in Rakhine, I had an uneventful and fulfilling trip to Kachin. While I struggle from time to time with my decision to be a consultant and I feel so tired from traveling and airplanes and contracts and working from home, I love being in new places in this fascinating world of ours. I adore meeting and connecting with people from different countries. I'll always remember certain images that you can't capture with an iPhone: 

• the kind and lovely case worker from the Wai Maung center who always brought me lunch during the trainings - her kind and calm face made me wish she was my therapist. 
• Singing "If you're happy and you know it, clap your hands" in one of the women's centers in Myanmar, Jingpho, Japanese, and English. 
• playing "obstacle course" with the participants, teaching them to trust each other as we wandered around the church to the amusement of the local contruction workers. 
• watching an enormous beetle that looked like a prehistoric creature wander towards my brand new computer and freaking out until my male coworker got rid of it for me and then having to endure his jokes about my gender discrimination the whole trip
• cycling home at 11pm on a completely empty street with a mild buzz from Myanmar beer and the wind in my hair and a million stars in the sky.
• listening to the sound of the whistle from the train to Mandalay and imagining myself in the footsteps of George Orwell and climbing aboard to go backwards in time.

Myanmar (or Burma) is a special land. The people are amazing and beautiful and its fascinating and heartbreaking to see what the neglect and political corruption has done to this land. Trips like this remind me to be grateful for having the opportunities I have in my life and inspire me to see more and more and more. 

Check out my food blog!

I love food, traveling, photography, and writing! I tried to embrace the four things I love this week and update my blogs.  My food blog "Bleu Cheese and Red Wine" is not updated very regularly. I thought I would write much more about food than I do but now I'm trying to do more of it.

So I have created five posts filled with my Japanese travel's food photos. I won't be putting these on facebook (except for the one's I already instagrammed) since I keep hearing of a backlash about people posting food photos on facebook.

It's very difficult to take good photos of food, I know. I don't flatter myself to be a good food photographer. But I like looking at photos and learning about meals people had that they enjoyed. So I hope you'll enjoy checking out the meals I had in Japan too.

Stay tuned in the next five days to get a post a day about the Food in Kyoto and Tokyo. And feel free to browse further for photos from my trips to Paris, the Loire Valley, Vietnamese and Laos cooking classes, and trips to Thai food courts! 

Days of Wine and Roses

Wine, glorious Wine!

Last night I had dinner with some friends in Thailand. They had invited friends of theirs from Vietnam and so we sat around the table, five Americans. We were drinking prosecco as the Taiwanese-American (no, not me, although I was born in Taiwan) stir-fried chicken and wood mushrooms with a delicious ginger and white vinegar sauce and got to know each other. Aside from the fact that we were all Americans, we also share a love for good food and wine.

Now wine in Thailand is marked up immensely - the same stuff I can find in the US for $20 (which is cheap for the US) or in Europe for about 12 euros is usually about the equivalent of $45 or 30 euros. So wine drinking is not something that you do often in Thailand -despite all the wine bars flourishing on Thong Lor. I had been squirreling away bottles of nice wine in my fridge to share with honored guests everytime I come back from abroad. I had four nice bottles from Australia, a Saint-Emillion and two Sancerres, a Albarino, some California cabernet and zinfandel, two french champagnes (a Veuve and a Mumms), and an Oregon pinot Noir. I had a treasured bottle of Brunello as well. I ration it out to "wine worthy" friends. I'm down to four bottles right now. I pulled out a California Cab to take to the dinner since I liked these people and I thought they would appreciate it.

To celebrate the dinner, my male host brought out a bottle of Opus One. He had received it from a Thai friend one night. Now Opus One has an awesome reputation in my memory. When I was working in the restaurants of Columbia, South Carolina, I was learning about wine. My parents had always liked wine but being from Sumter and of limited means, we purchased "good wines" from the grocery store. My mother had a fondness for French wines and my father liked good cheap Italian wines. They had stories of visiting Spumante in Italy and I have a clay jug that they brought back from one of their wine tastings in the 60s. At the time, I thought Chilean wine for $3 was the height of sophistication and I actually drank Ernest and Gallo jug wine (including a memorable night in February 1986).

While working at Garibaldi's in Columbia, and then later Motor Supply Co. Bistro I learned about "good wines" vs "house wines". I learned that it was cheaper to order a bottle of something good than to get five glasses of the house wine at a much larger price. I developed a fondness for french sauvignons and chardonnays but not for the heavily oaked and popular California chardonnays. I liked Poully Fume and Pouilly-fuisse and Fume blanc and pinot grigio and orvieto and dry white wines. But I LOVED red wine. Loved it loved it loved it. Our wine lists included some beautiful cabernets and pinots and zinfandels from the Russian River Valley, the Willamette Valley, the Alexander Valley, Vineyards that still invoke awe and longing (at $40 a bottle much too rich for my blood) include: Stag's Leap, Jordan, Pine Ridge, Silver Oak, Gundlach-Bundschu, Clos du Bois, Clos du Valle, Chateau St. Michelle.

I moved to Washington DC and started graduate school. One year, I got to go to San Francisco for a conference so I scheduled a trip to the wine country where I visited the famous Ravenswood Vinery (No Wimpy Wines!) in Sonoma County and I went to three other vineyards in a fit of happiness and feeling sophisticated. I returned with a poster of the iconic Ravenswood label and a desire to become a wine snob. I was dating an Austrian guy named Michael at the time. He was in the hotel business and worked at the Jefferson Hotel in Washington DC. He had studied wine, of course, as a hotel and restaurant graduate and was interested in the same things as I was - good food, nice hotels, great wine, and traveling. His brother ran a very lovely hotel outside of Vienna in the Burgenland - Austria's wine growing region.

One day his brother asked him to pick up a bottle of Opus One for him to bring back to Austria. I went with him to the MacArthur Boulevard Wine shop which had a good selection. I was shocked to see that the bottle cost about $125 dollars back in 1995. That was a fortune. One day, I thought, one day - I'll have a taste of that fabulous nectar. I'll be rich enough to buy a bottle myself. Michael kindly gave me the promotional poster/corkboard that came with it and it has decorated my kitchens from DC to Amsterdam to Bangkok.

So back to Bangkok, I arrived at my friend's house with my precious bottle of Kendall-Jackson cabernet sauvignon. Not too expensive, admittedly but when you are in the mood for a nice big California Cabernet, its easy to get and tasty. I had brought it back from the US and thought, well I'll bring it to the dinner party. It won't really go with the seafood but we can drink it afterwards.

Imagine my joy when our host pulled out a bottle of Opus One. "I received it as a gift from a Thai graphic designer," he said, "and I thought it would be good to drink it tonight." I was amazed and excited. After much discussion on how to get it to the right temperature (an issue in hot balmy Thailand), we got a glass each of the precious nectar. Oh the nose! and the beautiful dark ruby color...

According to the bottle, it contained "Aromas of black olive and minerals underlie more traditional notes of dark chocolate, cola and espresso. Showing flavors of ripe blueberry, cassis and licorice, this age-worthy wine simultaneously offers a smooth finish and a slight grip of tannin at the close." I have never mastered the art of describing the wine I am drinking in this fashion. I can sometimes get the aromas. Instead I'll just say that I was transported back to the dreams of my younger self. A place where I thought about how my life might turn out... a place of daydreams and hopes and ideals where a bottle of wine would represent "making it in life". 

As I swirled the wine and chatted with the diplomat to my left and the high-powered consultant to my right, enjoying freshly cooked chinese and thai cuisine and discussing United Nations reform and hiking in Bhutan, I breathed in the rich and complex aroma. The grapes had transformed themselves from simple fruit produced in California from the wine legends of Baron Phillipe de Rothschild and Robert Mondavi into the stuff that career fantasies are made of. I felt like an adult. I felt like I was living the life I wanted for myself finally. And the wine was oh so very very sweet.

Memorable Meals from 2011

Check out my food blog and the post I wrote about Memorable Meals from 2011

La Dolce Vita

Scenes from a fantastic weekend in Paris.... ooh la la.

As popular as Durian in an Airplane's overhead compartment

Ever get the feeling that no one wants you around? I'm trying to get to Pakistan to help with the "Gender Marking" process and its rather unfruitful. Difficult to get visa, difficult to get anyone to respond to emails or phone calls, I feel rather useless...  In a bit of a funk, I went to the grocery store at lunch and bought some durian on a whim. For those not familiar with durian, its a delicacy in Thailand and SE Asia and rather notorious for it's "aroma".

According to Wikipedia, "the edible flesh emits a distinctive odour, strong and penetrating even when the husk is intact. Some people regard the durian as fragrant; others find the aroma overpowering and offensive. The smell evokes reactions from deep appreciation to intense disgust, and has been described variously as almonds, rotten onions, turpentine and gym socks. The odour has led to the fruit's banishment from certain hotels and public transportation in southeast Asia."

But that's not all! 

'While  "the smell of the ripe fruit is certainly at first disagreeable", later descriptions by westerners are more graphic. British novelist Anthony Burgess writes that eating durian is "like eating sweet raspberry blancmange in the lavatory."^[23] Chef Andrew Zimmern compares the taste to "completely rotten, mushy onions."^[24]Anthony Bourdain, a lover of durian, relates his encounter with the fruit thus: "Its taste can only be described as...indescribable, something you will either love or despise. ...Your breath will smell as if you'd been French-kissing your dead grandmother."^[25] Travel and food writer Richard Sterling says:

“

... its odor is best described as pig-shit, turpentine and onions, garnished with a gym sock. It can be smelled from yards away. Despite its great local popularity, the raw fruit is forbidden from some establishments such as hotels, subways and airports, including public transportation in Southeast Asia.[26]

”

Other comparisons have been made with the civet, sewage, stale vomit, skunk spray and used surgical swabs.^[27] '

So I had a couple of bites. Creamy - sort of the texture of a ripe avocado or a steamed artichoke heart. And a perfume-y taste... I would say similar to almond/rosewater. But three bites was enough. Its rich. So what do I do with it now? I need to segregate it from the rest of the house. 

"Throw it away," advises my friend Lauren, "Preferably in another country." 

I double-bag it and put it out on the balcony. I gaze over at the pool - 12 stories down, maybe I could toss it down there. 

Then I realize - I should keep and finish my durian. Because today I feel unwanted, ignored, and useless - about as popular as a durian in an overhead compartment of a plane on a long-haul flight.  So maybe instead of that old childhood song "Nobody loves me, everybody hates me, I think I'll eat some worms" - I'm going to eat some more durian.

Saturday in Bangkok

Wednesday and Thursday: Days one and two – a blur of jetlag, air conditioned high rises, indecipherable UN jargon, taxi cabs, and room service.

Friday: Day three –I finally shook off the jet lag funk and decided to explore and have a thrilling adventure! I took a water taxi home with two Finnish ladies from my office who showed me the way – we paid 8 baht (the euro is currently at 1 = 41 baht so approximately 20 euro cents or a quarter in the US) and rode a speedy motorized canal boat under bridges and through the canals that hide inside Bangkok. I got off a short walk from my hotel, headed into a seven-eleven, bought some milk, beer and snacks and tried to see what was going on around me. I went into the mall across the street which was chock-a-block crowded with trendy little dress and t-shirt shops with names like Gin/Tonic, Vodka, and Buttermilk. Everything looked doll-sized. I felt like a tall Irish milkmaid awash on the shores of a manga cartoon.

On the Saturday morning, I got up, organized my crazed hotel room (big suitcases everywhere that spewed my belongings form where I had rifled through them trying to find things to wear in this tropical environment). After a dip in the pool, I headed to the sky train. There is a very efficient (although not very big) metro system here in Bangkok. The Sky train is an elevated train system that is incredibly easy to use – it cost about 20 baht to move from one part of town to the other. The stops are clearly marked in English and Thai and its air-conditioned and quick. I headed towards a part of town called Sukhamvit between the Nana and Asok stops to look at the neighborhoods in anticipation of moving to the area. It’s a very expat friendly area but also quite business-y. There were Au Bon Pains, Dunkin’ Donuts, McDonalds, and shopping malls everywhere but also street vendors selling squid on a stick, noodle soups, and sweets. It’s also the home of the infamous Soi Cowboy – a Vietnam war left-over strip of go-go bars, sleazy drinking establishments and yes – even a Dutch bar that sells bitterballen and Frikandel. I can’t get away from that food!

I went to get a massage at a lovely spa called Divana – a small garden house at the end of one of a soi (Soi means alley or lane). It was so luxurious – I chose which massage oil I wanted to have and the ladies lead me to the room where I was asked to change into mandatory provided disposable underwear (size XL for the large American posterior, of course). After 70 minutes of being climbed on, prodded, kneaded, and tugged – the knots and tension from the moving process dissolved. I felt completely zoned out. That blissful feeling was quickly undone by my next stop – the Consumerist paradise known as the Siam Paragon mall (Siam Paragon Food Hall.) It was overwhelming!

I had so much to choose from that I had to be really strict with myself and force myself to choose the first thing I saw that I wanted. Otherwise, I would have been crippled with indecision! So I had Hainanese Chicken and Rice (which I discovered in Singapore) which was delicious. Its so simple but so good that I learned how to make it at home just so I could have it again! I washed it down with some Thai Iced Tea (so sweet it made my teeth hurt) and to counter balance the sweetness of the Thai Iced Tea, for dessert I decided to have Green Papaya Salad which they prepared right in front of me.

After I fed the beast within, I wandered through the food court looking at everything for offer just for future reference. Next time - I can choose between the Pad Thai stand, the noodle soup stand, the curry stand, the sushi bar, the satay bar or if I want to wander away from Thai food, I can have noodles from Vietnam, Japan, China, Singapore, or even Italy! And for the more discerning palate, there is McDonalds, Burger King, and Dunkin Donuts!

I love food and I love choices in food and I love trying things that I have never had before. This is the sad thing about traveling alone.

I had big intentions of going to a movie that night. Since Thailand has a thriving bootleg DVD business, I had read that all the big movies air here at the same time as Hollywood releases them so as to cut down on having them bootlegged. The Fighter, an Oscar nominated film, was playing at the posh theatre but the air conditioning ws so cold that I didn’t think I could hack 2 hours sitting in a sundress. Just like Holland, I’m going to have to learn to carry a sweater with me everywhere I go! So I skipped the movie and headed home to the hotel to watch a mawkish Richard Gere and his dog movie while chatting with friends in the US over the internet. The good thing about this move is that it has made it easier to communicate with my friends from the US but now I’m 6 hours ahead of Europe and can’t seem to get in sync with anyone there. Hello- friends from Europe! Email me when you are up so I can call you!

Next up – a Sunday at the weekend market….

Pubs I visited in London

Check out some of the pubs I visited in London on my food blog....

Chronicle of my eating adventures in Paris

So I'm going to chronicle my eating adventures in Paris to the best of my ability on my "food blog", Bleu Cheese and Red Wine.

So far, I've written about my purchases at the local grocery store (a bit different than what I can find at the Piggly Wiggly but not THAT different!) and my tastings of the cheeses that I purchased.

On the hunt for Mexican food in Amsterdam

I reviewed a Tex-Mex restaurant on my "food blog", Bleu Cheese and Red Wine.....

On the Hunt for Mexican Food in Amsterdam

Bests and Worsts

While sitting in a little bungalow in Kerala reflecting on the sad state of my recent manicure, I decided to reflect on some of the best and worst things that I've learned while traveling these past 15 years. In no particular order:

Best Manicure and Pedicure: Boston Day Spa in Addis Ababa, 2009:  My manicure lasted for almost two weeks – a lifelong record! I was served hot tea, had a massage chair, and nice ambience. Not too expensive either!

Honorable Mentions: Washington DC, 2003 - 2007: The pedicure place across the street from my house on 18th and T streets was reliable and fast and not too expensive. Downside: Constantly trying to make you feel bad and insist that you needed facial waxing.

Singapore, December 2009: In a mall somewhere with Suzie. I have never had such shiny toe nails. And they lasted almost two months.

Worst Mani/Pedi:
(Three-way Tie Amsterdam/Mexico City/Delhi)
Near Nieuwmarkt, Amsterdam, 1999:  They scrubbed my foot so hard they cut it open and I bled, and poured such hot water on my feet that they scalded me. I could barely walk afterwards.

Zona Rosa, Mexico City, Mexico, 2005: Again, the pedicurist believed that my right big toe just needed a good digging to get the nail bed to right itself (it’s never been the same since I dropped an ice bucket on it at Garibaldi’s in South Carolina). Not only did it hurt like hell and bleed, I got an infection and had to lance it with a needle and a match in Guanajuato a week later.

Defence Colony, Delhi, India, January 2010: I could still see through the nail polish after two lackluster coats of varnish and the lady painted over my cuticles. On the way home from the salon, it began to chip.

Best Journey in a foreign country: Train from Fort Cochin to Alleppy, India, January 2010.Inside: chai salesmen, sleeping business men in the bunks above me, and an ambience unchanged from the 1920s. Outside: Water buffalos and green palm trees and canals and bridges.

Drive from Port Elizabeth to Cape town, South Africa, October 2003Most spectacular sunset ever seen somewhere  between Mpmulenga and Knyssna, riding along the Garden Route, riding an ostrich for the amusement of German tourists in Outhoorn, drinking a Castle beer at Ronnie’s Sex Shoppe in the Klein Karoo, crossing the Drakenberg Mountains, coming down into Cape Town to see Table Mountain.

Riverboat ride north of Bangkok, April 2002.Trees so filled with fireflies that they seemed to glow and levitate, heavy smell of dark brown water of South East Asia, green jungle on every side.

Worst Journey in a foreign country: Car ride from Nyala to Kass, South Darfur, Sudan, October 2004We were shot at and it broke out a window. Old pimped out hoopty that we rented broke down and the Janjaweed helped us get back on the road. Lots of tales about bandits that got all the cars on either side of us but not us. Potholes. Tense and frightening. Two weeks later we heard a woman from USAID was shot at the same point we were at. She lost her eye.

Motorcycle Ride from Sigiriya to Polonnaruwa, Sri Lanka, September 2005Styrofoam helmet, aching back from too many books in my backpack, scared out of my mind by the weaving and dodging traffic, screaming buses and 18 wheelers. “A supposedly fun thing I’ll never do again”

Car ride from Port-au-Prince to Gonaives, Haiti and Gonaives to Cap Haitien, Haiti: February 2005A backbreaking trip across the moonscape of a devastated land, it took four hours to go about 60 miles.  The 2nd part of the journey was over an extremely treacherous mountain pass with no guard rails, potholes and people in every treacherous hairpin turn. Afterwards, the driver informed me  about the brake problems in our car.

Best meals in foreign countries:Side of the road from Boguila to Bangui, Central African Republic, March 2007A piece of freshly caught fish grilled over a charcoal flame with hot peri peri powder and tomatoes and onions, washed down with a cold coke, eaten with fingers. It might have been made better by the fact that I was on a 10 hour land rover trip squashed in the front seat with another person and with a big barrel that reeked of oil behind me.

Beirut, Lebanon, August 2006:
Everywhere we went, we would get some sort of street food and it was ALL divine - from zataar filled croissants to labneh to zataar pizzas with fresh goats cheese on them to the Arabic and Italian ice cream parlours where we conducted our meetings. At night, we went to divine little bars and drank "Malcom Lowry's" and ate fresh Ceasar salads prepared by beautiful men while listening to the latest lounge music. All war zones should be so gorgeous.

Le Quartier Francais, Franschhoek, South Africa, October 2003: Freshly caught salmon trout grilled and served on a plank of wood accompanied by a divine South African Sauvignon Blanc by the glass in a beautiful old French Huguenot farmhouse overlooking a vineyard. Downside: My traveling companion had a stomach virus and couldn’t even eat her broth although she tried valiantly.

Califa del Leon in the Colonia Condesa neighborhood, Mexico City, Mexico, May 2006: My first Taco al Pastor - roasted pork served with cilantro and pineapple on a fresh tortilla. All you can eat until you can’t eat anymore. Washed down with a cold beer and eaten on the street corner in a beautiful neighborhood in Mexico City on my first night there.

Camel Market, Khartoum, Sudan, December 2005:Freshly slaughtered lamb purchased and then brought to Sudanese women who stir fried it over charcoal briquettes with salt and pepper -served with a leafy green like arugula, tomato salad, freshly baked bread, and peanut sauce. Washed down with lukewarm plastic bags of water while sitting on plastic garden chairs and swatting flies away in the mid day heat of Sudan. Sometimes the setting isn’t that important.

Malabar House, Fort Cochin, Kerala, India, January 2010: Seafood Uttalpillum (?) – a spicy mix of freshly caught Sea bar, tiger prawns, and squid cooked in a spicy tomato curry sauce with tapioca mashed potatoes served with sparkling water and a Kingfisher beer in the courtyard of the Malabar House next to a Sitar and tambla concert under a full moon. I sat under a mango tree next to a pool of water.

Somewhere outside of Saint Johann in Pongau, Austria, May 1998: I fell off the meat wagon and was trying to get back on. My boyfriend at the time wanted to stop at a famous place for Frankfurters dipped in mustard and grated horseradish. Even though I was a vegetarian, I couldn’t resist. It was delectable and I’ve never looked back since.

Pave d'Auge in Beauvron-en-Ange, Normandy, France, July 2009: A Michelin 1 star – foie gras,  a chilled red Sancerre, divine fish, vintage calvados, exquisite service

Castelmuzio, Tuscany, Italy, August 2009:
My first taste of pecorino cheese dipped in truffle honey served with a Vino Nobile. To die for! Eaten in a small little apartment overlooking the hills of Tuscany, an olive grove, and the abbey from an English Patient.

The Royal Thai restaurant at the Cinnamon Lake Hotel in Colombo, Sri Lanka, September 2005:Thai Seafood Green Curry with Joel. “Make it how it should be made” he answered in response to do you want it spicy. We sweated and ate and sweated and ate until we almost passed out and had to stagger back to our hotel rooms. We came back the next night for more.

Hotel La Cayenne, Les Cayes, Haïti, 2001-2003 :
Poisson au gross el or Lambi Kreyol for dinner. Served with a big boiled plantain and spicy rice and beans and cold Prestige beer. Or Spaghetti with avocado and hot sauce for breakfast. Something about that hotel and the food brings back good memories.

Little restaurant near a great small Fado joint in Alfama, Lisbon, Portugal, February 2008:Grilled sardines, a bottle of vinho verde. Divine!

Worst Meals in a Foreign land:
Saclipea, Liberia, December 2004:Boiled cow head with hard rice in eaten out of a communal bowl with five Liberians and a Congolese. “That white woman can’t eat that hard rice!”

ICRC party in Nyala, Darfur, October 2004: Ate nothing but rancid “La Vache Qui Rit” cheese and sandy bread for three weeks, came to a party at the ICRC rooftop and lined up for the barbecue. My mouth was literally watering. The par-cooked goat meat that I swallowed almost without chewing was bad. I had to decide whether to make myself vomit then or hope for the best. I hoped for the best and got food poisoning. That’s when I learned about Oral Rehydration Salts thanks to my friend Mamie and the MSF clinic.

Most Monotonous Diets in foreign lands:
Everything at our hotel in Pretoria, South Africa, March 2004:
All you can eat buffet. You had to fight off hordes of German tourists to get to the food and then it was bland, over cooked, and sauced with what seemed to be paste. Terrible in its nothingness particularly compared to what I knew South Africa was capable of.

Traveling through Kinshasa, North Kivu, South Kivu and Ituri, DRC , May 2005: Almost every day we ate beef brochette, pommes frites, and a beer. By the end of three weeks, I was dying for vegetables and was pretty convinced that I had “trigger finger” from gout.

The MSF Cafeteria, Amsterdam, the Netherlands, 2007-2010:Every day you have your choice of dried out breads, processed mystery meats and cheeses packaged in plastic wrap or odd salads such as canned beans, celery, canned corn, and olives in mayonnaise or red peppers, canned black olives, fake tofu/feta, celery, and raw onions swimming in olive oil with no vinegar. Deep fried cutlets that when cut open are made of spaghetti. Soups that are either grey or brown and taste vaguely like paste or canned beef flavor. Buttermilk or milk to drink. “But it’s free!”

Worst book to read in a war zone:
David Rieff’s Bed for the Night in Darfur in 2004. Will kill any sense of hopefulness that you might have and replace it with despair.

Best Book to read in Haiti before the earthquake:
The Comedians by Graham Greene. I was reading it all night and woke up in La Cayenne hotel to open my door to the blinding bright Caribbean light. Outside was a Haitian man in mirror shades, a red speedo, with a big gun. I thought it was the tonton macoute. I closed the door and splashed water on my face. When I reopened the door, he was still there. Turns out President Aristide was coming to the hotel and he was in the advance body guard team.

2nd best book to read in Haiti before the earthquake:
The Comte de Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas – French. Rackish. Dumas was rumored to have black blood. Keeps you endlessly entertained and is long enough that you don’t have to carry another one around with you.

Best Song to enter a war zone to:
“Rock the Casbah” by the Clash. I listened to this as I drove overland from Syria to Beirut during the August 2006 Israel-Hezbollah clash.

Best song to dance to in a refugee camp in Sudan:
“African Queen” by 2Face Idiba  – at the Bulls eye night club in Kakuma Refugee Camp near Lokichoggio, Kenya.

Song I’ve heard on every continent that I’ve traveled to:
"Aisha" by Khaled. Sung live in a nightclub in Cairo, innumerous car radios in Beirut, on an iPod at a Save the Children party in Darfur, at the nightclub in Honduras, at a house party in Papua New Guinea, at a hotel party in Mumbai, India.

Books I didn’t like about places I’ve been to:
The Catastrophist, Kinshasa, Congo. All I remember is that the author kept describing the so called irresistible woman as having extremely thin hair. What woman wants to be described by a man who is obsessed with her as having thinning hair? Why did that even occur to the author as a way to describe the heroine? There was something in there about someone spitting in someone’s face. Everyone was annoying and I wanted everyone to die by the end of it.

The God of Small Things, Kerala, India. At this point, I don't know why I didn't like it but I recall not liking it.

 Books I did like about places I’ve been to:
Anil’s ghost in Sri Lanka
The English Patient in Tuscany, Italy
The Comedians, Haiti
The Heart of the Matter, Sierra Leone
Country of my Skull, South Africa
Berlin by Anthony Beevor, Berlin, Germany

Shopping in Singapore

I've always said, you can tell a lot about a country by the flavors of potato chips it sells. Pringles in particular is very adapt to adjusting to the local market.

In Holland you get a lot of Indonesian spices (reflecting their former colony). In France, you get Roast Chicken with Thyme. In England, Vinegar and Salt, Cheddar Cheese, or Worcestershire sauce. In the US, Nacho cheese, buffalo wings and blue cheese, or barbecue.


This is what I saw in Singapore

Deli

Tuscany Adventures

The Omnivore 100

So there's this thing going around on the food blogs that I've become obsessed with about the top 100 things that every omnivore should eat (at least once). The ones in italics are ones that I've tried already. I'm at 67% - some are never going to happen (whole insects) and others are just waiting for the opportunity (3 course meal at 3 star Michelin restaurant).

1. Venison: prepared it for the first in college when my boyfriend bought me some venison that he had killed. Turned me vegetarian.
2. Nettle tea
3. Huevos rancheros: LOVE them from the Austin Grill in DC.
4. Steak tartare : the best steak tartare I had was in Brussels after a month in the Congo. We had it prepared in front of us by an old Belgian waiter and drank it with a bottle of Saint-Emilion.
5. Crocodile: First time I had it was in a fancy restaurant as carpaccio in a mall in Pretoria, South Africa. I ate Gator in South Carolina several times.
6. Black pudding
7. Cheese fondue: I even have my own fondue pot!
8. Carp
9. Borscht
10. Baba ghanoush: but eggplant doesn't like me.
11. Calamari
12. Pho
13. PB&J sandwich: strawberry jelly, por favor.
14. Aloo gobi
15. Hot dog from a street cart: the best ones are in Copenhagen.
16. Epoisses
17. Black truffle
18. Fruit wine made from something other than grapes (raspberries, cherries, crab apple)
19. Steamed pork buns : Dim Sum! Still looking for a good one though.
20. Pistachio ice cream : My favorite. I've always associated it with father's though as this was my father's favorite flavor in Belgium.
21. Heirloom tomatoes :and I've grown them!
22. Fresh wild berries
23. Foie gras :Oh god... what made me a omnivore again after 10 years vegetarianism.
24. Rice and beans :Best are blackeyed peas cooked with jalapenos, onions, tomatos, and butter and cajun seasoning with jasmine rice!
25. Brawn, or head cheese
26. Raw Scotch Bonnet pepper
27. Dulce de leche
28. Oysters : Roasted, raw, fried. I love them! Bowen's Island, Felix's in New Orleans! Central Station Oyster Bar in NYC! Fried in a curry!
29. Baklava
30. Bagna cauda
31. Wasabi peas
32. Clam chowder in a sourdough bowl : had clam chosder in Boston but not in a sourdough bowl.
33. Salted lassi : but my favorite is Masala lassi
34. Sauerkraut
35. Root beer float
36. Cognac with a fat cigar
37. Clotted cream tea
38. Vodka jelly/Jell-O
39. Gumbo
40. Oxtail
41. Curried goat : ate it in Port Antonio, Jamaica the first time.
42. Whole insects : that's never going to happen.
43. Phaal
44. Goat’s milk
45. Malt whisky from a bottle worth £60/$120 or more: Not yet... give me some time.
46. Fugu
47. Chicken tikka masala
48. Eel : I'm in holland - its almost the national dish.
49. Krispy Kreme original glazed doughnut : HOT DOUGHNUTS NOW!
50. Sea urchin
51. Prickly pear
52. Umeboshi : the best hangover cure!
53. Abalone
54. Paneer
55. McDonald’s Big Mac Meal
56. Spaetzle
57. Dirty gin martini : with blue cheese stuffed martinis at Le Bar in DC is good.
58. Beer above 8% ABV
59. Poutine
60. Carob chips
61. S’mores
62. Sweetbreads
63. Kaolin
64. Currywurst: BERLIN, Salute!
65. Durian : in San Francisco with my friend Colin.
66. Frogs’ legs : in Haiti with Antoine!
67. Beignets, churros, elephant ears or funnel cake :elephant ears and funnel cake at the Sumter County Fair, Beignets in Cafe du MOnde in New Orleans and churros in Mexico City and Madrid!
68. Haggis
69. Fried plantain : I prefer the soft plantains fried with fried eggs and black beans and sour cream... yum.
70. Chitterlings, or andouillette
71. Gazpacho
72. Caviar and blini
73. Louche absinthe
74. Gjetost, or brunost
75. Roadkill
76. Baijiu
77. Hostess Fruit Pie
78. Snail
79. Lapsang souchong
80. Bellini
81. Tom yum ecstasy!
82. Eggs Benedict: Corinne Risler makes some of the best of them! But I was introduced to them at Polly's Cafe and I like them better with smoked salmon to replace the canadian bacon.
83. Pocky
84. Tasting menu at a three-Michelin-star restaurant : NOT YET!
85. Kobe beef
86. Hare: in a ragout in Rome.
87. Goulash: I even learned how to make it from a Hungarian woman in my kitchen!
88. Flowers
89. Horse
90. Criollo chocolate
91. Spam
92. Soft shell crab: The first time I had one, I ate it fried in a croissant. I didn't bite hard enough and the crab dangled from my mouth like a bug in my cat's mouth.
93. Harissa
94. Catfish :I'm from South Carolina, bien sur!
95. Mole poblano :in Oaxaca!
96. Bagel and lox
97. Lobster Thermidor
98. Polenta
99. Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee
100. Snake :Boa constrictor in Central African Republic. Rattlesnake in South Carolina. In retrospect, they are very similar locales.

I'm thinking about starting a food blog but I need some help in learning how to photograph food to make it look as beautiful as some of the others. Maybe we could have a collaborative food blog where those of us who love to cook add new recipes that we've tried!