perspectives

Last month Camillo and I spent 3 days in New York City (see prior blogs - travel outside Brasil) and one of the Museums shows that we saw is featured in the March 17 TIME Magazine. I scanned the photo they used in the article to use as a comparison with mine. Cool huh! of course you can tell that the photo on the right is mine and the left is theirs. I don't know if this is the reason for this photo shot being used, but it was only allowed for the 'public' to take photos in the rotunda of the Guggenheim Museum. I would have thought that a photographer from TIME could have taken his camera all the way through the show and that they would have feature the extraordinary 'mud men' sculptures - for me this was the best of the show. My photo was taken because I found the structure interesting not the art - cars with poles of flashing lights stuck through them did not do much for me. To tell the truth I didn't get it. It is not clear but possible the artist CAI GUO-QIANG planned the section of 'mud men' but it is not actually his work because the TIME says, "...Its a replica of more than 100 life-size clay statues that were originally crafted in Shanghai in 1965 as pure Maoist agitprop, ... In 1999 Cai had a team of artisans reproduce the ensemble...." The beauty of these statues and they struggle represented between good and evil, rich and poor, power and powerlessness I could understand. GingerV

more New York New York

The best dinner - Maria Pia (Italian) 319 West 51st Street
The worst meal (this is hard) - Breakfast at the NY deli across from the hotel - ordered a ham and cheese croissant - it was open faced, the size of a 10 inch plate, the cheese was coagulated, and the ham non existent. two breakfast $46.00
Most impressive - The Met - needs about 6 half days to see it all.
The most Moving - the mud men created by Cai Guo-Qiang "I want to Believe" at the Guggenheim. I was brought to tears - the faces of the Chinese revolution carved in mud - when the exhibition is over they will be broken down and re-created for the next show. A must see.
The most 'different' - the feel of the cold air blowing off the river - no matter how many layers I wore I was cold.
The streets were full of cars and buses and taxis and there was no noise, How is that possible? Rio streets 10 times as noisy maybe the noise was frozen too.

New York, New York

The lights of Time Square, NYC

I am finally back HOME in Rio and find myself just as happy to be here as I am when I go HOME to Houston - a mystery that applies to my 'between two worlds' blog of several months ago.

On our way back to Brasil Camillo and I spent 4 days, 3 nights in New York City. When we made our trip reservations nearly 4 months ago there were no seats available on the direct Houston - Rio Continental flights, and would have to fly via New York in order to get home - so we decided to make a three day stop. We were in the very expensive tourist center of NYC but enjoyed it anyway. Museums, Broadway shows (Chorus Line) and more people than taxis. In our three days of tourist-ing, we saw the museum of modern art (MoMA), the Met, the Guggenheim, Rockefeller Center including the observation deck on the ROCK, took a tour on the Hudson River around southern Manhattan, TIME square, ate some very bad food, got taken by one taxi driver, ate one very good dinner, got taken by the GRAY LINE City Tours, and almost froze our tooshes off.

One evening it was -6c. I bought a red hat.... but that's another story.

I decided I like the warmth big city Rio better than the cold of big city NY.

Prescott, Arizona - history preserved

From ice on the car every morning to a walk in the clear, bright sunlight of the desert this area in northwest Arizona is a delight in contrasts.
The Sharlot Hall Historical Museum celebrating the time when Arizona was a territory, showing a mix of how the pioneer and the native Americans lived - very often not in harmony.
The Rose, a modern resturant set in a house from the late 1800s with its excellent wine list, serving roasted lamb and homemade vanilia bean ice cream with carmel sauce that brought a look of utter delight to my mother's face, the Apple Pan, a cute and cozy hambergur joint full of colorful locals and friendly service.
Historic buildings, many on the national register and the starkly beautiful landscapes with fishing, kayaking and hiking, is enough contrast for all the family to enjoy.

I am back in Houston but for many reasons I will remember this time in Prescott with my mother for a very long time. GingerV

the familiar and unfamiliar

When I lived in Houston I never paid much attention to the Bromeliads in the garden centers, for all I remember there were not any. Now I am seeing them everywhere - garden centers, Target, and Wal Mart, all have had a wide variety of colors - perfect for brightening cold winter days.

Speaking of which, our readers in Brasil will love this, the day before yesterday we had a snow storm - if my knees had not hurt so much I would have run up and down the street like we did as kids, arms spread and mouths open - enjoying the novelty, the beauty of a fresh snow fall.

Mom and I had to leave an hour early to go get Camillo in Phoenix for fear that the roads would get icy

but by our return in late afternoon the roads out of phoenix were a big parking lot - no one seems to know how to drive in the rain but there was no ice. As we began the drive up the mountain on 69, we were rewarded with a typical Arizona sunset. A day to fill the senses with pleasure.

"Home, Home on the Range"

"where the deer and the antelope roam" can you remember this song sung by Gene Autry? The day before yesterday while Mom and I drove east out into the countryside this song from my grade school days kept running through my head - and to both our sorrow I finally broke into song. "where seldom is heard a discouraging word and the skies are not cloudy all day ...."

This high plane (5000+ feet) outside of Prescott and just west of the foothills of Mingus mountain, even with the trees stripped of leaves and the grasses bleached white from the cold dry air, is beyond beautiful. The sky is a clear bright blue that now I can remember running free under as a child. The sky is a big blue inverted bowl stretching from where you stand to the horizen - it is the feeling of freedom, oneness with the land.

Below is the complete poem on which the song was based.
"TraditionalWritten By: Brewster Higley
Music By: Daniel Kelley
Copyright Unknown

Oh, give me a home where the buffalo roam
Where the deer and the antelope play
Where seldom is heard a discouraging word
And the skies are not cloudy all day
Home, home on the range
Where the deer and the antelope play
Where seldom is heard a discouraging word
And the skies are not cloudy all day
How often at night when the heavens are bright
With the light from the glittering stars
Have I stood there amazed and asked as I gazed
If their glory exceeds that of ours
Home, home on the range
Where the deer and the antelope play
Where seldom is heard a discouraging word
And the skies are not cloudy all day
Where the air is so pure, the zephyrs so free
The breezes so balmy and light
That I would not exchange my home on the range
For all of the cities so bright
Home, home on the range
Where the deer and the antelope play
Where seldom is heard a discouraging word
And the skies are not cloudy all day
Oh, I love those wild flow'rs in this dear land of ours
The curlew, I love to hear scream
And I love the white rocks and the antelope flocks
That graze on the mountaintops green
Home, home on the rangeWhere the deer and the antelope play
Where seldom is heard a discouraging word
And the skies are not cloudy all day"

This is what holds me to the States, making me feel small and 'compressed' when in Rio. Rio with its smog filled skies, and streets running through tall buildings, fracturing the sky into small pieces and leaving one starved to feel a part of anything.

GingerV

American Peanut Butter: A Minor Miracle in Rio

Until now you had to have a willing friend traveling from the US to have peanut butter delivered here. What is available is an anaemic concoction so highly sweetened you can crunch on the sugar. No wonder most Brazilians say they would never eat it!

Yesterday I resolved to make my own by roasting tiny Brazilian peanuts in the oven at 300 degrees F for around 10 minutes. I then ground them with a bit of salt in my blender. The more I ground the oilier it became until it was the smooth, roasted, delightfully salted mess we love to spread on toast or make peanut butter cookies with.

Try this recipe. I've been using it for years.

PEANUT BUTTER COOKIES
1 cup sifted brown sugar, (remove the beads of molasses and put them in your morning oatmeal)
1/2 cup butter
1 egg
1 cup peanut butter
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1-1/2 cups of flour
1/2 teaspoon vanilla

Beat it up, roll it into balls and bake at 350 degrees F

They are crumbly and most deserving of the title "biscuit" the British love to use. note: A Brazilian made blender is not strong enough for making peanut butter