Yearly Archives: 2019

the TWA flight center

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I forgot to include my TWA jaunt in the previous post about my summer trips in and out of NYC. I guess going to the airport doesn’t seem like a trip per se, especially because the only plane I got on was firmly stuck to the ground, having been converted into a bar.

We gathered at JFK just a week after the grand opening of the TWA hotel complex in the former TWA Flight Center, which had been closed for nearly 20 years. For lovers of mid-century design, fashion, and history, hanging out in this whopper of a space designed by Eero Saarinen in the early 1960s is a mind-blowing, nostalgia-inducing experience, even if you weren’t born until the very end of the 70s like me. The interior of the lobby / bar / restaurant area has been painstakingly re-done, inducing the feeling not that you are in a retro set-piece, but rather that you are in an exact replica of the Jet Age splendor that was the original TWA terminal.

I almost cried when I heard that once-familiar sound of a million birds flapping their wings and realized that they had rehabilitated an analog arrivals / departures board (which was later programmed to ask, “Will you marry me?” — someone’s clever marriage proposal that I missed while busy trying on TWA-branded sneakers in the hotel store). 

Anyway, I’ll let the pictures speak for themselves.

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summer trips, in and close to NYC

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It looks like I’ll be using my free time in Senegal (and Côte d’Ivoire, where I’ll be heading on Monday) to write about other places I’ve been this year. It’s ironic in some ways, but it’s also reflective of what I find so lovely about being here. This part of the world helps me to slow down and provides me with the headspace to sit still and think, and eventually, to write.
So, even though we are half a year out from summer, I’m going to post pics from a few days trips that I took from and in NYC in August(ish). I mean, next summer is halfway here! What better time to daydream about the possibilities than as winter sets in. (That is, for those souls unlucky enough to actually be in NYC at the moment. I’m sitting here in 80 degree weather listening to Youssou N’Dour and feeling like I have somehow cheated winter yet again.)

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catching up

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Mermoz_bougainvilleaHello from Dakar! Here again for work. I’m so glad to be back in Senegal and at Chez Lo, but I’m also feeling quite snacky at the moment and there are no snacks to be found. A couple of unripe bananas and a half-eaten bag of who-knows-how-old chips are all I could find. It also took me a week to recover from the jet lag this time around. I arrived on Sunday morning and only today did the clouds start to clear from my head. I had begun to think I had developed a physical imbalance.

…

I guess my brain is still a little foggy because I can’t think of one thing to write next. I want to post some interesting links that I’ve been amassing for months, but I have no good transition to get there. Oh well, here we go:

A colleague recently shared this amazing grammar-checking tool with me. It feels like magic and in addition to correcting what you’ve written in French (or another language), it also explains why, so you can learn (or re-learn, in my case) the language rules.

And here are some new mind-blowing translation devices that I can’t believe actually exist.

The famous Strasbourg Christmas market is coming to New York in December.

A fascinating photography series showcases kids around the world (including a few from Senegal) surrounded by the food they typically eat in a week.

Fuhgeddaboutit! Sorry, but there is no Brooklyn accent.

This article compellingly explores how in the Instagram age, enjoying natural wonders (and being “morally sound”) is secondary to getting the perfect shot.

Common English phrases with unexpected origins.

An interesting map for French learners and linguistics enthusiasts, that shows dialectical variations of “intensifier” words in European French.

Inclusive writing, or l’écriture inclusive, aims to make the French language more egalitarian.

A new study shows that thinking in a foreign language can reduce emotional biases.

A holiday shopping guide for UNESCO-designated crafts (that only seems to feature European traditions, unfortunately).

How children evolved to whine (and how to respond to it).

As a lover of midcentury West African architecture, I appreciate this round-up of African architectural gems.

And finally, this has nothing to do with languages or travel and everything to do with poop, which as of late has become another theme of this blog. It also happens to be one of those articles that makes you feel less alone as a woman.

Have a good weekend! I leave you book-ended with Dakarois beauty.

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siblings and niblings

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A few years ago, I realized that French has no real word for siblings. If you want to know whether a person has any, you ask if they have brothers and sisters. I find it clunky and annoying. At some point in the recent past, I discovered that une fratrie refers to a group of siblings, but it’s not a term in everyday usage, and I think people would look at me weirdly if I asked whether they have une fratrie.

I similarly find it clunky and annoying that neither French nor English has a real word for nieces and nephews… or so I thought. This article about 25 obscure English words introduced me to nibling, a neologism coined in 1951 to refer to either a niece or a nephew; niblings is the plural. Unfortunately it never caught on, which is a shame. I think it’s both brilliant AND remarkably cute, just like a word for beloved little people should be.

That is all.

[Photo: Ritmó]

 

seatmate fate

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I’ve gotten very lucky with airplane seat assignments lately. On my last two roundtrips, destiny dealt me fascinating individuals whose conversation made otherwise boring flights whiz by and whose perspectives I’m still reflecting on, long after disembarking the planes we shared. Continue reading →

Mozambique: Tete Province and Maputo Special Reserve

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Mozambique adventures continue… 

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Mozambique: Maputo

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My trip from New York to Mozambique back in July consisted of a 15-hour overnight flight to Johannesburg, a six-hour layover, and another hour-long flight to Maputo. Suffice it to say I was non-functional upon arrival. I got to the hotel on Saturday evening, was sound asleep in bed by 8pm, woke up late the next morning, had a leisurely breakfast, and only then re-emerged into the world of the living to figure out what this new city and country was all about. 

It turns out that Sundays in Maputo are exceedingly pleasant. The city was really quiet and calm, and many of the wide boulevards were empty of both people and cars. 

I had mapped out some hastily-compiled recommendations from the internet, and I set out on a walking tour to see as many of them as I could. Continue reading →

Detroit

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Back in June I took a weekend jaunt to Detroit with a friend who, like me, had been hearing great things and was curious to explore the city. Here are some of our Motor City highlights:

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Hello, I must be going

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It feels like a long time since I’ve written anything substantial here. I feel a little unmoored in general these days. I’ve been away so much of the past year, in places with climates and cultures so different from New York’s, that it’s sometimes hard to remember what season or month I’m in. I tried to Skype my sister in Portland the other day and even though I had been home for a week, I still calculated the time difference as ten hours instead of just three. Good thing it wasn’t the other way around or I would have called her in the middle of the night.

I love traveling and I once thought I could do it nonstop, but I have to admit that this last trip has taken a toll. I spent five weeks abroad in two countries, took ten different flights and hopped between more than fifteen locations. I switched hotels countless times and the longest stretch I ever stayed put anywhere was six nights. Every routine I held near and dear was shaken up to the point of non-existence. 

It’s good to be back, though getting back into the swing of things has felt a little rocky at times. 

I am way behind on what I’ve meant to post here, mostly impressions from various trips I’ve taken, including Detroit, Mozambique, and Kenya. I’ve also been wanting to commit to (digital) paper some vignettes about experiences abroad that I’ve had not only since the start of this blog but since the start of my life, or at least the parts of it I can remember.

So I’ll try to carve out time to write, not only because the feeling of playing catch-up irritates me but also because writing is one of those beloved routines I gave up while abroad whose lack I felt deeply. It really centers me somehow, even when I’m writing about frivolous things or in an inarticulate mood. 

So, see you here again soon, invisible internet buddies!

games a-type people play

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On the way to the Mombasa airport you pass through a thoroughfare of flags from all nations. It occurred to me on this drive a few weeks ago, that it might be cool to figure out how many countries there are in my biggest gap, alphabetically, between countries that I have visited. I then decided that it would be neat to commit to visiting, some time in the next five years, the country that would cut that gap in half.

And though this was the most arbitrary and silly of activities, I felt the hand of destiny at work, because it turned out that my biggest gap – 13 countries – is between the Netherlands and the Philippines, and that Oman is smack in the middle of the two, alphabetically speaking if not geographically.

Well, my last stop in Mombasa before heading to the airport had been Fort Jesus, where I learned all about the Omani influence on Mombasa and the region in general. As I walked through intricately carved Omani doors and looked at Omani pottery and jewelry in the display cases, it reaffirmed my desire to visit Oman, which first landed on my radar two or three years ago when I began seeing it (and Malta!) all over Instagram. The photos look straight out of “The Thousand and One Nights.”

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At around the same time, I was realizing that my exposure to the Middle East was minimal (one country, Israel) and that it is a region well worth exploring, not only for its fascinating history and breathtaking landscapes but also for its contemporary culture. 

Anyway, I now feel certain that the universe is calling me to Oman. Only time will tell if I’ll listen…

[Photos: Ian Sewell, bhart9070]