Priceless #45

Homemade packed lunch - 2.50 Euros
Metro ticket - 1 Euro
Spot on the park bench - free
Sponsors hat - free
Sponsors stickers - free
Sponsors drink bottle - free
'Been there done there got the t-shirt' T-shirt - 12 Euros
Front row seat to the Tour de France finale at the shores of the Seine - absolutely priceless

Still Lost in Paris

It feels a little contrived that I gave Nice a really bad review and am about to give Paris a completely flying one. Perhaps I am looking for something to compensate for my misfortunes and disappointments, or that France is just one of those places that can bowl you up and down with their unpredictable nature, depending on the weather, the time of the month, or who serves you coffee. Or it could be just how I honestly feel about the contrast of my experiences in the fast train track in the last short week.

Paris is blowing me away with a seductive charm and tantilising sensual pleasures I’ve experienced no where else before. Comparatively, Berlin has a very ground breaking masculine energy about it and an in-your-face assertiveness. Paris has a gentle flowing femininity, so sure of itself in its ease that it doesn’t need to try to be cool. It purely defines it. At the same time it doesn’t loose the quirky, cheeky and fun elements of French humour and wit. A sense of post-human abandonment seem to take over the way of life here. Form is in preference of function, decadence comes before economy, style before comfort, attitude before efficiency, raunch before sterility, boldness before minimising… There is simply nothing to conform to, and the result is a whole world of continuous creativity and bright busy compositions of pretty things and people.

As I walked downstairs from the apartment into the buzzing street with hundreds of odd characters passing by, I realized that what I’ve been doing wrong in the past 27 years is simply not being in Paris.

The Parisian Apartment

I am again simply a lucky girl. I am crashing with Kathryn and Braedon who has rented a small apartment here for a month. The spot is just perfect, right in the middle of the Marais neighbourhood. Its ten minutes walk across to the Island to Notre Dame, the Left Bank, and a couple of stations from Louvre and Champ Elysee. Its concentrated with cafes, bars, bakeries, quirky interior and fashion boutiques and small old gardens.

While also being the central queer area, you can sit in the neighbourhood sipping an espresso while watching the world and his boyfriend and their lap dog go by in the maddest edgiest fashion possible. Don’t under-estimate these little puppies, they are vicious. I witnessed one, no more than the size of a kitten terrorise two little girls by chasing them out of a gelato shop. The personal activities of the neighbours become some what of an ongoing radio theatre show too. You can hear triple orgasms ringing through the atrium. And contrary to my preconceptions of French people, the locals have been extremely friendly and helpful. Despite looking extremely scruffy in my backpackers gear, I don’t feel that I am particularly excluded or snobbed just cos I am a foreigner.

I absolutely love strolling around the fancy boutiques, bookshops and galleries in the Left Bank, pricy eateries in the Latin Quarter, and the dreamy parks around town where many gardenless city dwellers read and sunbathe. Just taking in the atmosphere and watching interesting scenarios unfold is fascinating and entertaining. For two evenings now I finish the day off by snuggling up to tourists and locals alike to book readings at the Shakespeare and Co. bookshop which holds nightly recitals by their up and coming writers about to publish. There is something I can’t explain about this place that is so captivating.

Let me eat cake (& snails)

It must be a deliberate attempt to insult Marie Antoinette that now Parisians are all cake connesoires. Here are just some of the sweet little gems displayed in the shop windows.

Other culinary exploits included the famous escargot - snails in pesto near St Michaels. I was actually slightly disappointed that it tasted a bit bland. Honestly I thought it was going to be DELICIOUS, but it was a bit "oh well". Never mind better luck next time. In general It was a great night out with Kathryn (fabulous translations, otherwise I would have got some cricket bats in gravy or something like that), Braedon, Jeremy & Anna (who came down from London for the weekend). We had a fab time hanging out in the line to the Eiffle Tower apart from having the beer confiscated...

Rollerblading Paris

I thank my random parents for getting me into crazy sports like spring-board diving and roller skating as a child. My sister, third cousin and I formed a family relay team and took bronze in a speed skating tournament in Taipei for the Happy Angels Roller Skating Club’s 86-87 season.

But that was before the age of rollerblades. Remember those skates with two wheels in front and two behind and you tie them to your shoes and can be expanded in case Dad wants to wear them too? Yep. Those were the days. I am now extremely envious the carefree Parisians on their quick blades whizzing about on the street cutting through traffic and tourists, and have decided to hire my own for a bit of a spin.

Just short of killing myself by plunging into traffic near Bastille, I made it to the beach (as in, temporary sand and traffic closure on the river front for two months) in one piece only having to take the blades off once.

As I was just getting the hang of it, some (hot) guy sitting at the side of the palage yelled out instructions at me like ‘straighten your legs’ and ‘don’t stick your butt out so much’ in an inheritantly bossy French way. He turned out to be the rollerblading coach of free lessons for beginners offered as part of the Paris Beach program. He invited me back to the next lesson for his beginners and I enjoyed an hour of rollerblade tips and hanging out with cute six year olds (they call me ‘madame’) doing loops of obstacle courses on the pavement. Yes it was amusing for all and I had a total blast.

Speaking of kiddies, the other thing I noticed about France is that its very child friendly. There seemed to be heaps of child friendly things going on here, like fun parks, holiday programs, toy shops, children’s music & theatre, not to mention Euro Disneyland just a stonethrow away.

Other touristy things I managed to get up to were:
- The Verseille palace and gardens – sensational, worth a side trip checking it out
- Montemare area – the heavenly Sacre Coeur church, Mouline Rouge club, and the Erotic Art Museum – amusing, particularly the ethnic sexology collection, but in general badly curated and just a kinky joint.
- Amelie’s Café – as in the one featured in the film. It was quaint and characterful like in the movie, and the famous toilet had some interesting quips on the back of the doors, but the service was the WORST I’ve encountered in Paris (France, for that matter) so far, and over-priced. But to the fair the coffee was pretty fantastic and the napkins and the sugar sachets did dance on the table just for me.

And finally caugh up with Johanna who was my flatmate last year ;-)

- this is us at the cafe downstairs

City of Lost Children (&Marbles): Images of Paris

Marseille Meets the Eye

Anna is a cool Italian woman my age that I met on the train from Nepoli to Rome. She works as a community radio announcer in Madrid and is fluent in four languages. She is a huge fan of Marseille, having lived there previously and recommended a list of things I should do in Marseille. I promised I'd report back on my progress.

Dear Anna

Thanks so much for the brilliant suggestions for stuff to do in Marseille, I had a fabulous time poking around and completely regret that I only had one day there.

The Chateau D’If was jus one of the most awesome and fulfilling things I’ve done so far on my trip. The Count of Monte Cristo (translated into Chinese) was one of the first ‘serious’ novels I attempted at Primary school, so taking the boat out and checking out the place has been a dream of mine for about twenty years. The boat ride itself was amazing, the brilliant views of the harbour as we pulled out of the thousands of fishing boats and yachts, the crisp ocean and rugged terrains of the mainland was magnificent and I’d recommend it for anyone even if they are not a Monte Cristo fan. Yep it did look spooky towering in that ocean even in bright day light, and I had not realized how close it was to Marseille. Mademoiselle Mercedes must have been gutted to find out that her loverboy Edmund had only been a stonethrow away from her all those years that she’d thought he’d employed a drastic method to get away from marrying her. And they must have also cleaned the place up and opened more ‘windows’ in the fort, because the place did not resemble for one moment the dark, wet, claustrophobic rat infested warren in Duma’s book, even though I’m sure he was very colourful or even exaggerative with his words. Its interesting in Europe that many former sites of trauma are often sterilized and monumented to distance visitors from being too close to the actual confrontations. These places are reinterpreted into spaces for leisure and entertainment, rather than a more vivid documentary of past events. As tourists we are there to be reminded of the traumas, but in actual fact sheltered by the passing of time and the removal of certain objects reminding us of human presence, as though it is important to know that the past is the past and we are ready to move on. True, practical, but also escapist. As if the struggles of yesteryear has been totally won, and every woman and man is free today and every where. The context of the space has changed from a place of suffering to a place of amusement. The experience becomes surreal, and at the end of the day, entertainment rather than like watching animals in a zoo rather than sympathise with the way in which they are incarcerated.

The weather in port today was gorgeous, not stinking hot and coupled with a gentle flowing air, just like a light duvet in an early morning siesta. Marseille resembled Copenhagen in a way, the grand buildings on either side and the yachts packed on the edges of the wharf. The cute old fishing boats were still there at the centre pier doing the rounds for morning fish market when I arrived. Since we were discussing politics the other day, you might also be interested in the overfishing problem in the Mediterranean. I think by far the hardest social issue here is balancing local and traditional livelihoods with the ever increasing global demand for more (sea)food and the globalizations of environmental exploitation. How will the environment ever cope with this continuous onslaught for more and more and more?

Many people have told me that Marseille is very crusty and dangerous (‘full of Africans’ was one descriptions) , but quite the contrary I thought it was very attractive and clean, especially compared to Napoli. The only thing near ‘crust’ I bumped into were the faeces coloured abandoned 60s era small factories on the rim of the Panier (old town). I thought the rest of the centre and the port looked very scrubbed up.

I loved the Cour Ju area, it was just fascinating looking at the eclectic collection of food and bits and bobs you can get from different ethic shops and stalls. The sites and sounds reminded me very much of Morocco’s huge souqs. Because of the bold way that immigrants of all kinds have lived their lives here in Marseille for thousands of years, I find the streets just that tad more colourful and exciting.
I don’t understand why people automatically brand anywhere with African or Middle Eastern immigrants ‘rough’. (I mean, just look inside some middle class suburbs anywhere in the world and people would be amused to see the violence that are not spoken about). Its not only a huge generalization but it ignores the cultural blending so beneficial to any society’s further development. The things that are keeping many immigrants poor is prejudice, alienation, discrimination in things like education and employment that continues a cyclical pattern of unemployment, and drug and alcohol abuse as a direct result from the hardship they face. Its not just France or Italy, its everywhere. Its time people put away those ridiculous walls between themselves and others that they aren’t familiar with or get on with, rather than just the fear of ‘the other’.

Now the crazy Pastis Ricardo drink you said I simply must try… I made the mistake of getting into it too early in the afternoon, it definitely is a night drink. You were trying to murder me weren’t you? The waiter handed it to me and urged me to blend it down with water, and even after that it felt like meths evaporating on my tongue. The flavour was very very spicy, if not exhilarating. Aniseed is definitely one of those acquired tastes I just don’t see myself acquiring… So for the first time in my life I’ve actually left a fresh serving of alcohol unfinished. The Frenchies must have thought I was a total wimp!! Later I found out that Pastis is actually a later version of absinth. Great.

Marseille just oozed culture and history, its amazing to know that it was in fact the first ever settled French village back in 600 AD, and the maritime and military history its had over the years just made it so much more fascinating as a place to visit. It is to me the first French enigma I knew as an outsider. I really wished I had more time hanging out in Marseille, especially when you mentioned how wonderful the night life is like here particularly in the summer. Oh well, there’s so much I still want to do both in France and Italy so looks like I’ll have to pencil it in for the next trip (touch wood).

I hope you are having lots of fun in Madrid and hopefully we’ll catch up in person very very soon.

xx WaWa



--> If someone had a shop like this in NZ they'd be dragged out and shot. Well, only if we actually had guns...

Beer and Loading in Belgium

Who would give up a day in Paris to go to Belgium to buy beer and chocolate? Me, I guess. I had to use up my last travel day on my Eurail pass and though it is quite a huge mish to do this as a day trip, the temptation was too hard to resist. It turned out to be absolutely worth it, especially catching up with the beautiful northern European scenery and food that I couldn’t get enough of earlier in June.

Highlights include

• Boiled egg stuffed with prawn slush served by a scary lady who wore bright blue eye liners
• The Official Tin Tin shop
• Walking around grogeous canals of the picturesque Brugge
• Brussel’s classy shopping strips and stunningly beautiful Grand Place
• The EU parliament was actually a bit dull, but it was cool bumping into a diplomat friend of mine who was my dancing partner in a wacky stage show from way back
• This fantastic wheat beer that started with letter G… I knew I should have kept the label instead of madly stripping it off the bottle as a sure sign of sexual frustration.

Leisures in Cotè Azure

Where the moaning shall end and my holiday shall begin. hoh hodie hoh hoooo... thank you MzOki for tipping me to come to Cap D'Ail - this honestly has to be the most beautiful place in the Cote Azure to chill. Nice (only four beaches up) just doesn't measure when it comes to the privacy, the cleanliness and the tranquility. I wore away those endless afternoons away from the crazy in-your-face crowds just rolling about in the water and on the shores of the lagoon. No, all is not lost.

Home of Arnott Nice Biscuits

I have never seen so many Vietnamese restaurants, condom vending machines and dog shit (in that order) concentrated in one single area. This is going to be a hell of a ride.

.....................

I’m on my own again and staying at the very low end of the budget hostel strip near the train station. The hostel owner has a reputation of having a ‘loose fist’ amongst the online hostel listing reviewers. But as I left the accommodation bookings till the last minute (plan A to spend a few days in Marseille fell through) and I had no choice but to brave it at the dingiest shit hole I have ever seen. The bathroom smelt like a rat had died in the pipes, and the floor looked like a Gladstonbury Festival had been held there over night. To add to the insult, I was attacked two nights in a row by a large clan of bed bugs at the shit hole I was staying at. The hostel owners insisted that they were mosquitoes ‘le mosquito’, but I’ve never been bitten so badly by mosquitoes that all four of my limbs are swollen and infected with over 150 bite marks. I’ll spare you the trauma of looking at the photos.

Nice is a bit disappointing I must admit. At the moment the main street is in the process of being dug up and constant chaos of bulldozers, old ladies’ shopping trolleys stuck in the temporary holes, and sweaty tattooed construction workers with ogle-addictions complete a crazy picture.

The reputation of art deco era glitz and glamour is a bit distorted. Sure, the rich is still here but the really rich have actually retreated to beaches towards Cannes and Monaco and to the outer suburbs of Nice. Central Nice and its beaches at the moment is completely taken over by bright pink doughy Brit chavs complaining about everything from being sunburnt to the price of food and ‘Frog Rules’. Occasionally they are joined by Chinese tourists rolling up their trousers on the surf, with the smaller ones engulfed by an unexpected wave every so often. The afternoon I was there a young boy of about five covered himself in kelp resembling one of Jane Goodall’s jungle subjects or an obscure Sean Connery in a 007 love scene back in the 60s. And then there’s the compulsory (and compulsive) European bathers who are pretty much turning into prunes. Why is it that a stark naked person, say, one that feature in a Matisse or Klimpt could look perfectly graceful and dignified and beautiful, but as soon as they don a tiny black g-string or a pair of red speedos (aka budgie smugglers), which is essentially more than stark naked, can look absolutely trashy and tasteless? Yes and I do have a problem with the segregation of private and public beaches.

I only lasted a day at the beach in Nice before I escaped to greener pastures. I mean lets face it, who wants to clunk around unbearable giant pebbles and squeeze into a beach towel into a space only big enough for a size zero mademoiselle and her make-up bag when you have ninety miles of white sand so fine that you can sell it to the Arabs waiting for you at home?

My dash to Positano and Naples

It amuses me that two towns of such contrasts could exist a bare one and a half hours train ride apart. But that is how dynamic and fascinating Italian people and geography is.

Positano is a town on the stunning and cliffy Amalfi coast dotted with beautiful moorish style houses despite being a bit overrun by beach goers; it is still full of character and charm out of this world. You can get a fab view of Capri Island from the beach.

Naples is the Bangkok of Italy. Fast, crowded, dusty and multicultural. It was a real surprise getting off the train but the energy and the down to earth aggression tells me that some how I am finally in the real Italy.

A bad dream of Roman Empire

When in Rome, do as the Romans do

- St Ambrose

In the morning I woke to the telling bells of the basilica, taking a light communion wafer (now with gluten free option) from the priest. I headed over to the Colosseum in a chariot, and proceeded to my assigned door according to my gender, race, class, and age after some burly security guard emptied the contents of my bag (he finds nothing but a bag of pigeon feed). I yell and jeer as I watched rag-clad slaves being ravaged by mammoths and sabertooth tigers. Oh the dust, sweat and blood!! Hang on, there's actually a more interesting fight between Bruce Lee and Chuck Norris just up on the upper west wing.

Suddenly I found myself in the royal stand as some governess. My royal charge played by Audrey Hepburn sitting beside me less than a minute ago had disappeared and picked up by some filthy journo played by Gregory Peck outside and whizzed away in a Vesper. I flipped onto the chariot (with no helmet) and charged behind them. As I was about to catch the little bastard Greg panics and Audrey's Gucci skirt is unfortunately splattered with gasoline and requiring her a wash in The Fountain. The two lovers embrace in their wet clothes as a very VERY large crowd of tourists cheered on, taking lots of happy snaps. I was blinded by the overwhelming flashes and dragged off into an awaiting ambulance. Donald Trump glares at me to the sound of 'you're fired' and I narrowly escaped having to be put on the next day's gladiator schedule.

I went home to dust off the dirt on my sandals and to rinse the blood off my toga. I walked past a row of fiats parked down stairs of my apartment with my sunburned skin glowing in the twilight. I ordered house spaghetti from a choice of 200 dishes in the dine and go, soaked in rich red tomato sauce and extra extra parmesan, washed down with a can of ice cold Peroni. As I relaxed to a spot of accordion, I realised I was actually eating cockroach soup and stumbled my way to the nearest vomitorium. Except in this glorious republic most people spend a lot of time at the back of some sort of long and winding que. This time the vomitorium is in the Sistine Chapel and the sign next to me says my waiting time is approximately 4 hours and 20 minutes.

19 July 2007

oh shit... only two beroccas left...

Three Days in Tuscany

Excerpts from Lady Chatterley’s Lover flick through my mind as I peep over sidewards through the rums of my straw hat. The buff but not quite good looking enough groundsman is cleaning the villa pool five meters from me, putting bobs and pieces of tools away in the shed in which, earlier during the day when he wasn’t there, an episode of bikini-chainsaw photoshoot occurred on top of his tractor. (Ro and Helen encouraged me, really…) We dreaded he would walk in… Now I’m sitting on a blue and white striped deck chair sipping on white wine over a novel, but not concentrating because I’m feeling a little… No FB, No!

The town of Saint Rocco is small and tucked away in one of many hills rolling around this vast open country side. Its just like the post cards. Old stone villas, stretches of grapevines, sunflower fields, the dry scorching heat. We are terribly lucky to be staying in a huge family run villa for a very reasonable price only 30 minutes out of Sienna. The host family is absolutely friendly, and the property is beautiful – cool, spacious and gorgeously decorated rooms inside, and a lush garden outside complete with chickens and a blow-up swimming pool. Very easy to please us ladies.

By day we do nothing but lounge around and read, and on one occasion biked around the different villages and farmland in the area and exploring the country side, finding a stream to cool down and get tanned. By night we enjoy delicious delicatessen food and bargain local wine and watch the stars sparkle in the distance. Why would anyone want to leave?

further photos to be updated

Revelations of Italy

Italy is full of incredibly sexy bald men.
What?!
I know.

Up to the point of my twenty seventh birthday I've found bold men repulsively unattractive. I now find them strangely intriguing.
Its these sudden revelations that is scaring the crap out of me.

Apart from the subtle hoaring I am also ostentatiously regressing. For the first time in my life I've spawned a dread at the back of my head and have gone back to experimenting with body piercing. I even order house wine when I go into a bar. Horrors of horrors.

Other less threatening revelations in Northern Italy

In Venice

• Rialto is not a name for odd cinema but a gracefully aging market port in central Venice that is polluted with orange peels, fish bones, drowning dogs, and children's lost shoes. (other Indiana Jones fans will also recall it as the ferry station he got off when he was greeted by the saucy Austrian doctor in Last Crusade)
  
• Lido is not a name for an art deco cafe in Wellington which Deno and Wendy had their first date but an Island off Venice which charges 208 Euros a pop for a piece of shade as big as your lunch box on a private beach. (well, i do understand that 'networking' in Mafialand is priceless, but 208 euros??...)


• Madame Butterfly is not Puccini's best selling opera or a nickname for his moustache, but a nickname waiters call me when I flap my hands in the air indicating that I don't speak Italian.
  
• Most of you will know that continental Europeans greet and part with three kisses to the cheek. The kiss of death is a fourth kiss which enthusiastic Italians give to complete strangers. This involves one's face being slowly eaten and the right ear being intensely chewed, so it is definitely time to run away as quick as possible if you don't have an expatriation clause in your insurance policy.

In Verona

• That Juliet's heart lies under her right breast not her left (referring to the statue). Contrary to popular belief, not touching it will find you a Romeo, rather than the other way round.

In Florence

• David by Michelangelo has staying power as number one teen idol for American girls in boob tubes. Justin Timberlake eat your heart out.


• Its totally cool to be biking to church on a sunday in an Armani suit on your great grand father's beat up push bike

and here are pictures from Lake Gauda (one hour bus ride from Verona) and Bologna (hip student town near Florence). I am now travelling again with the lovely Helen who's just finished up work in Amsterdam and soon to be joined by Ro before heading to Tuscany. WOO Hee!!

Venice is a Glass Mirror

Floating - a hundred million pairs of haunted eyes

Watching - an idyllic mindless playground

Glittering - sparkles of lives thats dashed by and flashed by like mine

Reflecting - is a mirorr made of glass under this bridge I stand - and I see a face beneath - could this be the one I was seeking but will never hold in these hands

Escaping - through my fingers like the water in this celestial canal and the sunlight through the leaves that climb the church wallsBreathing - a rush of blood to my head and I hear the tide

Rising - and clashing against the ancient marble stone face that has seen more than it should ever had

but Venice is for fools and merchants and I want to be neither so I am

Fleeing - like pidgeons into the sheltering sky and if I come

Crashing - finally through and break you and me into a thousand tiny pieces I want to be released and sent

Drifting - back to the clouds and repaired with silver threads of lightning

Day 4 At The Pool & The After Party

Day 4 at the pool was pretty chilled because the only finals are held in the afternoon and most competitors have completed their events and are all in the mood to party more than anything else. We saw another two world records being broken today in both the mens and womens no fins finals, it was incredibly exciting and the crowd almost brought down the rooftop. This is such a fun sport I might just have to give it a go when I find the money.

The Flying Baroness's Slapping Six Packs In Slovenia Awards today are: Gold - Denmark, Silver - Finland (get it? FIN LAND??) Bronze - Greece

The After Party
I've been fantacising about this after party for a long time, and I was definitely not disappointed.

Due to intensive training programs, most of these people haven't had a drop of alcohol for months so you can imagine how keen they are to catch up with the rest of the world. It pretty much all started at the end of the Women's B finals when our English lass Liv was handed a red card (disqualification) in the form of a bottle of guiness dangled at the end of a fishing rod handled by a couple of Finnish boys. She took a drink from the pool and completed her "I'm OK" surface protocol. Very classy.

A note on the wacky Finnish while I'm on the subject. I think too much ice and ocean make their brain cells freeze. They come up with funny competitive sports like underwater rugby, spare fishing (by size, weight and species), underwater ice hockey, and underwater poker. Over the course of the week I met about 6 of them all with world titles in the above events.

Anyway so Kathryn and Braedon hosted a very nostalgic university dorm style pre-party in the room straight after the finals, firstly attended only by the Kiwi and Aussie contingent but as you know the sort of noise our lot makes just attracts the entire building. Managed to polish off four 2 litre bottles of special Slovenian wine.


The coaches made sure we were on time for the medal presentation ceremony held right in the middle of the Lent Festival stage. The Japanese kindly offered their team Dominatrix to present the medals - she's kinda cool, she does splits while standing on her head when ever she's in a good mood. Heres a pic of me also with their other team mascot - The Sunshine Suit Man.

Rest of the evening was a bit of a blur really, I remember being wisked off to some sort of ski lodge ?? place on a bus for all you can drink horrid wine and all you can eat unidentifyable black and brown stuff. The debauchery peaked when the athletes all started swapping shirts (I wish I wasn't so drunk otherwise I could have given out more of Slapping Six Pack awards for the evening...) and I belive Kathryn ended up with about three, and one each for me and Braedon. The party continued back into town in this old school brick basement which looked like it was a wine cellar. We seem to be sharing the afterparties with lots of local wedding goers, given that it was the 7th of the 7th 2007. Good times.