The Pyramids, the Sphinx, and a drawing of a Pharaoh wearing a striped headdress—these are iconic images of Egypt that most of us learned to recognize in childhood. I know I did, and, now, after a lifetime, I’ve finally learned something of the reality behind them. Continue reading A Few Things Learned in Egypt
Author: Eric Farber
We’ll Always Have Paris
Spending Christmas in Paris is not a bad idea. It could be an even better idea if a million others didn’t think so too. Anyway, it wasn’t the holiday per se that had us in the City of Light for five days at the end of December. We were there specifically to view a temporary exhibition in the city’s newest great museum. The Fondation Louis Vuitton, designed by Frank Gehry, opened in 2014 in the north sector of the Bois de Boulogne. For those of you who know the Bois, it sits grandly next to the Jardin d’Acclimation, the playground for children. The exterior of the museum resembles other Gehry designs— great, winged, aysymetrical shapes.
What About Iran?
“Here with a Loaf of Bread beneath the Bough,
A Flask of Wine, a Book of Verse—and Thou
Beside me singing in the Wilderness—
And Wilderness is Paradise enow.”
Omar Khayyám d.1123
Standing by this poet’s tomb in the northeastern Iranian town of Nishapur on our last evening, I thought of this poem that I vaguely remembered from a reading in my youth. And I thought how different in mood today’s land of Iran is from when the Persian poet lived here a thousand years ago. Bread there still is, but sipping openly from a flask of wine is no longer possible in the Iran of today. In his poetry Khayyám celebrated worldly pleasures and didn’t believe in sacrificing what could be had then for the dubious promises of the hereafter.
Another Trip of a Lifetime, Part 1
We didn’t intend it to be so. After all, we were only going to spend a week in a remote corner of Scotland, in and around a village where friends of ours would be staffing a bookstore a few hours a day in exchange for occupying the pretty apartment above it. Then, we would drive a couple of hours south to England’s Lake District to admire its beauty and view the memorabilia belonging to William Wordsworth, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Robert Southey, and others who are creditied with beginning the Romantic School of English poetry in the early years of the 19th century. Finally, we would spend a few days in the City of Manchester, discovering its diversity and exploring its roots in the Industrial Revolution and the beginnings of capitalism.
Another Trip of a Lifetime, Part 2
The Lake District Continued
Pre-planning our itinerary from home in Istanbul, we chose to stay close to three different towns. Grasmere was obvious because of the Wordsworth connection, but we don’t exactly remember why we chose to be near Keswick (the ‘w’ is silent) in the north and Kendal in the south except that those choices would have us explore different parts of the district.
A Spain We Didn’t Know
Where? When it was decided that our literary society would meet in Teruel, Spain this year, Kay and I were nonplussed. The city and its eponymous province were not on our mental map. Turns out that Teruel province along with those of Zaragoza and Huesca together make up the autonomous community of Aragon, which shares borders in the country’s northeast with Catalonia and France. It is noted for its harsh climate, hot in summer and very cold during the winter months. Teruel city, with its population of 35, 675 in 2014, is the smallest of Spain’s fifty provincial capitals.
Three Days in Valencia
Sunday, July 3, 2016
Istanbul – Valencia, Spain
It’s been a long travel day. We got up early to close the apartment and drag our cases along the esplanade to the seabus terminal. It being early on a Sunday morning, the only time of the week when traffic in the city is light, we got to the airport more quickly than usual.
We had arrived early because of warnings that the airport, one of the world’s busiest, would be more crowded than usual due to the bayram holiday just beginning. We passed security, passport control, and 2nd security smoothly before spending a long time in the Primeclass Lounge, having some breakfast and reading.
Walking The Floating Piers
June 2016
You can still do it. Until July 3rd, you can walk on water if you can get to Lake Iseo in the Italian lake district and then get through the packed crowds and onto the Piers at Sulzano.
Mt Athos, Greece
Been There. Done That.
April 2016
The long, narrow peninsula known as Mt Athos extends south-east like a gnarled finger from the northern mainland of Greece and its region of Halkidiki. Unlike its two neighbors to the west, Mt Athos does not feature beaches or resort hotels. In fact, there is hardly any commercial development of any kind. It stands apart, as it has for centuries, sheltering hundreds of Eastern Orthodox monks among its twenty monasteries and other hermitages. Its terrain is rugged and dense with small trees and vegetation. It even has a true mountain with a soaring peak that looms grey over the green growth below.
St Petersburg
Footsore in Russia
March 2016
After two weeks of tramping around St Petersburg in the Russian winter we now have an inkling of what Napoleon’s Grande Armée must have felt like on its retreat from Moscow. I exaggerate, of course. It has been cold, but no snow, and, surprise, surprise, mostly sunny and blue-sky days. Nevertheless, my Eddie Bauer parka that I’ve hardly worn in the past fifteen years has served me well every day.