Plastic Forks, Styrofoam Plates, and the Plaza

Somewhere over Texas-Last night I ate my first meal in Texas with real cutlery. It was a great meal, worthy of washable plates, with new friends at La Playa. I was in Harlingen, Texas just miles from the Mexico across the Rio Grande.

I am back from hiatus, having resurrected Nikita's Swim Adventures due to recent hi-jinx and in particular, the visit of a fellow adventurous swimmer.

Last week was Spring/Summer 2010 Fashion week in NYC and Annamay P., was in town for the Ports 1961 show. She stayed with me and it was all I could do to keep up with her. She turned her 1 front row appearance into invitations to 7 more shows, endless parties, and an open invitation to return any time.

Ten years my junior, Annamay got the most out of her first trip to NYC, reminding me in the process just how much fun this city can be. The last few, make that 9 months have been pretty grim, both personally for the city. I had a feeling that summer would change things and it did. By her second night in town Annamay was making friends with Ice T at one fashion show and we were partying at the Plaza Hotel. By the third afternoon we were seeing fellow Canadian Jeremy Laing's show after waking at 7am to attend a fundraiser for Asphalt Green's Swim for the Future, which awards scholarships to AGUA swim team members in honour of two Master's team swimmers Andrew Fisher and Doug Irgang who died on September 11th.

We managed to swim as well and her breaststroke is faster than my free (this was not surprising), but more importantly Annamay took the city by storm and brought me back to the land of the living. But it didn't stop there! I ended the week with box seats to the Women's US Open final courtesy of Jane S. of the Daily Beast, who invited me to join her in the Olympus suite. They let us use their awesome cameras to snap pictures.

Unfortunately, I had to leave town for work and I missed the last two fashion shows that Annamay had hooked me up with, including another Canadian designer, Marlene Grotrian. Where I was headed turned out to be pretty far from Bryant Park. I just started a new job managing a national program that teaches children in immigration proceedings their legal rights as well as helps pro bono attorneys who represent them.

From my dinner at Chilli's Too at the Houstan Airport through my 4 days in Harlingen, I ate just 1 meal with silverware, instead eating my breakfasts, lunches, and dinners on styrofoam plates using plastic knives and forks. There seemed little to eat in Harlingen outside the world of Taquerias (and as in any city dozens of Chinese restaurants) but the Mexican I did have was delicious. I was also invited to one of the fostercare school's co-independence day celebrations for Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico and El Salvador. After presentations and dancing, we ate pupusas (Salvadorean meat stuffed flatbread) and corn on the cob covered in condensed milk, chilli powder and cheese. Oh it was good! And more importantly than the food, the people I get to work with here are absolutely lovely.

I am now off to Vermont to see Scott M. We are staying at The Archie Bunker on the Missing Links. Designed by my old roomie and great friend Trills' dad, Dave S., the Bunker is made completely of concrete.

Worlds apart, but within the same country, today I travel from the Texas-Mexican border to the Vermont-Canadian border. If the 50 degree temperature change doesn't get me, perhaps the culture shock will.

Darfur Fast for Life

Today I am on Day 5 of my 5-day Refugee Rations Only diet for Darfur. Yesterday I wrote this on the Darfur Fast for Life website:

June 3, 2009

I am on Day 4 of 5 of my Refugee Rations-only diet. While I feel lucky to be eating even the smallest amounts of food, the diet is bland and I find myself craving salt, flavoring, and anything that seems alive: fruit, vegetables, specifically something green or orange. In fact I crave anything but the beige rice, oatmeal, and lentils that I have been eating for the last four days.

When I am not thinking about food, I am thinking about how my body feels. As an athlete I am very in tune with my body. Although I am no longer in elite shape, I still take cues from my body to tell me when I am overstressed, overworked, or not well. I take happiness in feeling energetic and strong. However today I feel none of these things. My mind wanders easily and I keep forgetting what I am doing. I can’t concentrate, I don’t want to work, and I am functioning at half speed. Am I just tired from work? Or is it really a lack of food that makes me fall into bed as if I have just finished a day of double work-outs, with 4 hours of swim practice.

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Epiphanies and freebies in the unlikeliest of places…New York City

New York City-I've been back in North America for almost 2 months, 1 of which I have been officially unemployed. While being jobless in winter is not nearly as fun as it would be in summer, I have been indulging in all that New York City has to offer.

Today, in what I thought would be a dining experience filled with abuse and good food, I was gifted with 2 epiphanies, courtesy of the head chef at Shopsins, my new favourite eatery on the Lower East Side. While I had heard that f-bombs and verbal effrontery were on display at Shopsins, I was treated to much more. Stimulating conversation came as the main course with the hearty bounty of satisfying grub. (I ordered the Edmonton, and not just because my boyfriend is from there).

The first epiphany had to do with the TARP bail-out. Rather than focus on whether we should or shouldn't give the money to banks, our chef focused on whether we even want to go back to the place we were in the first place. Was the 'old world' of pre-banking collapse sustainable? Desirable even? This attempt to get the country back to a place of over-consumption and a growing gap between the haves and have-nots is perhaps the misguided part of TARP, not how and where the money is going to be spent.

The second one had to do with intellectual compensation for taking away someone's innocence. No, I'm not talking about that girl (who I think is made-up) selling her virginity on-line. I'm talking about the idea that when you teach someone something about how the world really works or is, the dark side of life let's say, what do you give them back to compensate them for the ugliness you have introduced into their world? For example, when you teach someone in a rural Kenyan village that he has to wear a condom to prevent HIV/AIDS, what do you give him in return for taking away the simple joy of sex?

Scott and I have also been busy playing 'tourist in your own home town'. Two must dos: the Tenement Museum on the Lower East Side and a walking tour of Lower Manhattan. The Tenement Museum offers guided tours through an old tenement on Orchard Street. We did "Getting By" and visited the homes of German-Jewish and Italian Catholic families as they tried to survive the Panic of 1873 and the Great Depression.

Every Thursday and Saturday at noon, Big Onion tours offers a free tour of historic Lower Manhattan. This is the second time I have done it, and it was even better despite sub-zero temperatures. We explored the history, architecture, and people of the neighbourhood stopping at the old US Customs House, Trinity Church, J.P. Morgan, the Stock Exchange, and Fraunces Tavern.

During Restaurant Week we pretended to be a power-couple, power-lunching on our delicious Jean-Georges lunch at Mercer Kitchen. The food was absolutely divine.

We also made a visit to the American Museum of Natural History where Scott spent 90 minutes looking at African tools and artifacts. Fortunately he agreed with the curators exhibits on the Maasai, otherwise I'd have been in for a real treat. Then we hit up MOMA, which is free on Friday nights. Can I just say that I enjoy a good Picasso like anyone else, but seriously, there are way too many at MOMA…give someone else a chance!

Coupling our free events with brown bag lunches to Central Park and runs up the FDR, we are getting quite a lot of mileage out being unemployed (and a PhD student). However a job, and a paycheck are starting to look really good right now. Fingers crossed.