Doing It All

The NY Times has a travel series called 36 Hours In (fill in the city).  We did all the 36 Hours In Tokyo things - in 8 hours.  With Miyuki, our intrepid guide (why are guides always intrepid?  I suppose if they're not intrepid they are insipid - or lost.  Out of business.)  And we did it by Train. Taxi.  Monorail.  Jinrickshaw.  Canal boat.  And a lot of walking.  

Without Miyuki we would still be wandering the subway.  
It's not just the trains, with thirteen main lines, or the ticket machines with instructions in Japanese.  It's the stairs up and down to change platforms (or to find your platform in the first place), the sinuous tile-lined tunnels that look like MC Escher drawings, the banks of escalators rising into the air in all different directions, the rivers of bobbing heads scurrying along...and just as you are congratulating yourself on getting on the right train and off at the proper stop, you see the dozens of exits, with arrows pointing in all directions, all with different numbers and letters and strange-sounding names that at this point mean nothing.  And you realize getting off at the right stop is only the beginning. 

Even Miyuki occasionally had to ask which exit from the station to take, and she lives here.  She led us down some narrow walkways precariously close to oncoming trains to get to our exits.  If you take the wrong exit, God help you; exits can be blocks from each other.  You may need a taxi.

In the morning the train was not crowded:

 But by afternoon things were a little different.  All calm and orderly.  It got a lot more crowded as we went along, but I couldn't get my arm up to take a photo.

Highlights: The Meiji Shrine:

Where the spirit of the dead Emperor and Empress are enshrined.  Popular place for baptisms (saw lots of babies but took no photos - it would have been too weird) and weddings (didn't see any brides, just school kids).  No qualms about photographing them; they are i-photoing constantly.

Take a boat along the Sumida river and down into Tokyo harbor- it's a completely different perspective on the city.  Check out the tsunami gates - Good luck with that.

Go to Tokyo Sky View - Tokyo makes New York look like a village.  Sorry New Yorkers.  Sad but true.  Dense as far as the eye can see.  Best guess: 38 million people in the greater metropolitan area (for you nitpickers who will come up with a smaller number and neglect to mention that it's for the city proper only).  Who can tell where the city proper ends?  There are high rises to the horizon in every direction.  And don't get me started on the traffic.  

As long as we were there - 52 floors up atop the Mori tower - we went to the Mori Museum.  And the Star Wars exhibit.  Weird to hear Han Solo speaking Japanese - I expected it from Yoda.

My favorite piece was thin fabric and fans, the fabric billowing and twisting, rising and falling.  Cannot remember the name of the artist, but the exhibit was about forms and was soothing, thought provoking, cool and elegant.

A few more memories from our madcap tour:

No, silly, that's not our jinrickshaw driver - that's Miyuki. 

At the Asakusa shrine, girls rent kimonos for their visit.  Have lunch at a noodle shop on a side street.  Get your fortune told at the temple (this involves shaking sticks and paper slips).  If your fortune is bad, tie it to the temple and leave it behind.  The smoke from all the incense in supposed to cure what ails you, and if nothing ails you, it's good for that too.  Holy Smoke, Miuki says.  

And some restaurant recommendations for your next trip to Roppongi:

Gonpachi for sushi - make a reservation for the third floor; you can't get sushi on the first two floors.  Altho they are very picturesque...but the third floor has a lovely garden.  And did I mention the sushi? This is where Dubya and Shinzo Abe dined.  Sushi here is smaller, fresher, and sweeter, not soft and mushy and too big for one bite - like ours at home.  A revelation.

Seryna Restaurant for sukiyaki or shabu-shabu.   Great people watching - the designer clothes, the handbags, the manners and family dynamics.

And Atelier Joel Robuchon in a weird underground warren attached to the Roppongi train station.  

Green beans with caviar and gold leaf, wasabi cream and grated hard-boiled egg...

Foie Gras on risotto with the most delicious vinegar-butter-cabernet reduction to balance the richness...

 And the unbelievably tender Wagyu beef.  

 Wally said it was as rich and tender as my foie gras.  Since he tasted both, he would know.

Off to rest up for our next meal.  

Friday, January 24th

Two Cubas

Ralphie (I’d shoot my parents if they gave me that name) is part of the one million Miami Cubans.  He talks about growing up in a Cuba frozen in time - the food, the language are all from the 50’s.  And there is great nostalgia for that life,  just ninety miles (and fifty years) away.

At dinner with out fellow travelers, we talk about the two Cubas, the remembered one of his parents, the one they always hoped to go back and reclaim, and the one that is just to the south.  I would add there is a third Cuba - the ideal socialist state, the one that hasn’t quite happened yet.  The one they're still trying for on the island.  The one with old American cars and crumbling buildings and CDR offices in every neighborhood - that stands for the Committee for the Defense of the Revolution.  Not a happy place. That's the Cuba we are going to tomorrow.

Ralphie walks us thru the Department of Treasury paperwork - when was the last time the DOT cared where you went?  and reminds us there are 220 laws - American laws - forbidding interaction with Cuba. Unless you're on a People To People trip - more about that later.

And there is a couple on our trip with their American-born daughter who both left Cuba as children 48 and 52 years ago.  This is their first trip back, and it's very emotional.  We are so privileged to be sharing this experience with them.

Off to bed, we have an early flight, and I swear the airport Hilton has skid marks on the roof from the low-flying planes.  Just as you start to drop off to sleep another plane screams overhead.  I think it must be similar to sleeping in a war zone.  Rough night.

Cuba!  Saturday, January 25th

At the Santa Clara airport we go thru security as we get off the plane.  Instead of plastic bins they have tiny beat-up wicker baskets that snag your scarf and sweater.  And dogs sniffing bags. There are lots of Cubans returning from Miami bringing soccer balls, microwaves, clutching teddy bears and dolls, toting flat screen TVs.  Like being in the Walmart parking lot at Christmas - minus the cars.

And that's one of the first thing you notice - there are almost no cars.  

A few old Yank Tanks, as they call the American cars from the 50’s.  

A few Soviet Ladas.  But the horse-drawn carts and bicycle taxis outnumber the cars.

At the local cultural center we meet the children:

one flirting, one reserved.  One beaming, one guarded.  The faces of Cuba.

They put on a production of Romeo and Juliet performed by four to eleven year olds - with bad lighting and worse acoustics.  And fabulous acting and dancing, and great enthusiasm.  

It’s a modified Cuban version, complete with baseball-capped homies and rifle-toting hombres, and of course a paper maiche pig roast.  The kids are adorable, and after the performance (and the obligatory audience-participation dancing) tell us what they want to be when they grow up.  Actors, singers, one stewardess.  

I say "What do they want to know about us?" and they ask us questions.  A five year old girl says wistfully, "You are from America - it must be very beautiful, and you have everything you need."  It breaks my heart.

Hector, our fantastic Cuban guide,

fills us in on the history and day-to-day reality of life in Cuba.  When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1990 the Cuban economy collapsed too.  No more subsidies, no more largest trading partner.   

Remember, after the Triumph Of The Revolution everything was nationalized -  houses, factories, schools, utilities -and the government 'gave' you a house (a house that they still owned) and food (heavily subsidized, bought at a deep discount with ration cards and long lines).  In exchange the government did everything for the people - free education, free health care, those food subsidies, even guaranteed jobs.  But when the USSR went away the Government couldn't afford all the things it had been doing - turns out the successful socialist state was heavily dependent on Russian subsidies.  Oops. 

If you don't own your house, and the government could take it at anytime, why would you maintain it?  So nothing has been maintained:

since the Triumph Of The Revolution.  Not just the revolution, every time a Cuban mentions it, it's TTOTR.  

This building in Caibarien is fenced off because it's about to fall down.  So is the church.  

This was Abelardo's home town, his old school is just behind the church, though both were closed after the revolution, and both are crumbling too.  Happy to see Caibarien again, sad at the state of affairs.  He and his family walk into his old school, surprised that the American Theatre across the street hasn't had a name change. But the church is closed, it's in danger of collapsing any minute.  

Cuba is trying to find a system of socialism that works, a hybrid with some free enterprise so the half a million people who've lost their government jobs can start businesses and make a living, so that the government can continue to subsidize food and education and health care - and probably a thousand other things we don't know about yet.  And it's confusing, for until the last few years private enterprise was illegal, private ownership was unheard of. It's hard to make that big a u-turn quickly.

But they're still working on it, and they’re still committed to it.  If you're not committed to it you're either in Miami or in jail.

We cross a 48 kilometer causeway (heavily guarded) to Cayo Santa Maria (Saint Mary Key) and the hotel Melia Buena Vista. Warm breezes, a flamenco show by the pool, mojitos...we drift off to sleep. 

Venice

I'm dreaming of Venice...

Love the light in this photo - wish I'd taken it. It's from the Italian Language gadget on Google - so are the ones below.

The Gritti Palace Hotel is my favorite place to people-watch...on the water. People act differently when they're in a boat. Go, have lunch on the terrace, check it out. 

Then, when the sun is going down, get in a boat yourself. Everyone should ride in a gondola once...then go for the water taxi - my preferred mode of travel. 

I wonder what Venice looks like today? Gray? Cloudy? Sunny and cold? Damp? Some day I want to see Venice dusted with snow. But today I have to settle for photos - and memories.

Villa Bartolomea

If you're going to share a ten bedroom house with twenty other people there are some basic things that will make it easier...

It's a beautiful old house on the banks of the Adige - 

with a killer entry. Remodel, anyone?

You know there's plenty of room when you can test your bike's fit...

...inside.