Florida Detour

I went on a bit of cross-country jaunt across the US last week. I was attending a work-related conference in Phoenix Arizona for the first part of the week but instead of flying straight back to NYC on Thursday (as was originally planned), I made a "small detour" (2 flights and 6 hours later) to Treasure Island for the weekend, a small beach community 45 minutes away from Tampa airport on the West coast of Florida.

My lovely friend FM moved there from New York about 6 months ago (I have document her endlessly fun goodbye parties before) and although I had promised to visit her, last weekend was the only conceivable time I could do it and also happened to be the one when our mutual and much, much beloved friends LJ and NS were visiting her, promising it to be a very merry time indeed.

I must first say that I didn't see much of Phoenix, a city that I expected very little of because it is new and has spread at an incredible pace in the past 50 years or so to become a very large and quite soulless suburban landscape (or so I have been told). The conference was in Scottsdale, an upper middle class neighbourhood in town (seemingly strewn with shopping malls) and most of my time was confined within the four walls of our rather luxurious hotel. We did however get time one day to drive the 2.5 hours it takes to get to the beautiful Sedona valley and its amazing red mountains towering high over the otherwise desert landscape.

But back to the fun Florida part. I didn't expect Treasure Island to be quite so beautiful but rows upon rows of pastel colored houses and the clear blue sea and powder white sand reminded me very much of being in the Keys. TI is primarily a retirement community but it somehow added to its charm. It's very laid back and the night scene, if you are a young and single, is non-existent. Which is probably why I liked it so much.

We spent our days on a motor boat rented from "Frenchy's" (the irony of that did not go unnoticed and was the butt of many jokes), roaming the open sea and adjacent canals, spotting dolphins, with music blaring out of our iPod speakers (the highly danceable Florida's "Club can't handle me" was our theme tune for the weekend - I still can't get it out of my head!) and drinking from mini-Chardonnay bottles (right in front of the sticker on the boat saying "Don't drink & drive" of course). The other part was spent lazily lying on the beach while a sand castle building competition was going on much to our amusement, or cooking a lavish and calorie-ladden breakfast for each other.

FM's gorgeous house was the perfect base for us, minutes away from beach, coffee (I learned to love 7/11's) and the infamous Captain Kosmako's restaurant/club. We ventured there on Saturday night and it was actually like stepping back into the 70s, from the decor, to the ambiance, the food and the clientele. But we loved everything about it - especially the fact that we were the youngest patrons by about 30 years! We danced the night away with these amazing, full of life, retirees. My family gatherings in France always include many generations and so I know how to dance (but probably quite atrociously) to most things. A skill that came in rather handy that night as LJ and I twirled around the dance floor and salsa danced without a care in the world.

The weekend I just had may seem like one in many - it is and that is very much a key component to my happiness. I love New York dearly and feel like I have mastered it as much as one really can - which is not very much. But nothing makes me happier than going away from it and coming back. I realize very much that my time here, and this moment in time in my life, is precious and probably counted. Surely no one can be afforded such unbridled fun for very long! So I want to carry on making the most of it, for as long as I possibly can ...

San Diego Fun

I was in San Diego with LJ (a.k.a my gay best friend) for a few days. We've been going together for the past 3 years as we attend the same annual Media conference there in beautiful Coronado Bay.

We've always managed to make a fun trip out of it and this year was no different.


We visited the fantastic and famous San Diego zoo and saw everything from Pandas to black Panthers and Flamingos.

We did silly things with inflatable ponies and took pictures of it (most 5 year-olds have a more sophisticated sense of humour than we do!).

We experienced the tremors of an earth quake in the middle of the night.

And we even cycled to Mexico - granted, the border is only about 8 miles from where we were staying but I certainly never thought I would ever be able to say that I actually cycled there!

Hamptons Weekend

I took my very first trip to the Hamptons last weekend. One of my friend's family has a 5 bedroom house in Amagansett so a group of six of us (including the adorable dog Baxter) headed off on the BQE and along the Long Island strip on Thursday night to beat the weekender traffic.

I knew exactly what I wouldn’t like about the Hamptons which is essentially a gated paradise for rich people to play together. It is the least multi-cultural and diverse place one can imagine and I had never seen so many men wearing pink pants and polo shirts with an upturned collar before. It was ridiculous.

However, if you stay out of “the scene”, the Hamptons are very beautiful and a lot more laid back than I anticipated. Every morning we would take the short drive to the Amagansett Farmers Market to get a big cup of coffee and one of their fabulous brioche buns with egg and cheese to be leisurely savoured at one of the tables in the shaded garden. We would also get fresh salad ingredients, bread and cheese for our lunch back at the house later and the rest of the day would be spent either in the gorgeous swimming pool or at the beach.

We would get itchy feet at around 5pm and get ready to go out. The first stop of the night was always Cyril’s, a tiny roadside outdoor bar packed full of people wanting to see and be seen. For us however, the main attraction of Cyril’s stemmed from the large, strong and frankly yummy cocktails they create. The B.B.C (Banana Baileys Colada) in particular is worth the trip alone and with a rum floater on top, we would all be tipsy enough to engage in some serious car karaoke after just one on our way to dinner! Luckily for us, the one man in our party was happy to be our designated driver for the entire weekend - yes, he’s a keeper!

My favourite evening was on Friday night, when after our usual pit stop at Cyril’s, we headed to The Lobster Deck in Montauk. There we had what was probably was one of the best lobsters I’ve ever had while watching the sun set slowly over a completely calm sea and the pink, orange and yellow tones of the skies only seemed to accentuate the bright red shell of the lobster.

Spending weekends at the Hamptons is most definitely a New York rite of passage. Many people buy into share houses for the entire summer (at often exorbitant costs) and so it is a little like the entire crowd you would normally find on an average Saturday night in the Meat Packing district magically teletransported themselves there to form a weird but wonderful "Manhattan on Sea" ...

Forgotten New York

Photo by Angel Franco (c)

 Through the always excellent New York Portraits, I found a link to the New York Times Lens blog and an interview of freelance photographer Angel Franco who followed police patrols in the Bronx between 1979 and 1984 and took chilling pictures of what he witnessed.

New York then was nothing like New York now as it was at the height of the drug plague and the streets were extremely unsafe. The photos tell just that and it’s hard to even recognize our City in those scary shots that sometimes look like they were taken in a war zone.

America had trouble believing the pictures when they were first published as the country was prosperous at the time and the violence and despair you can feel in the photos were at odds with the national mood.

You can have a look for yourself here.

Little Graduation

My “Little Sister” graduated from PS 131 Middle School at the end of June and it was quite a momentous occasion not only for her, but also for me as I have grown very attached to her over the 3 years that we have known each other.

She is a 12 years old Chinese girl called Jenny whom I started mentoring when I joined the Big Brother Big Sister of New York City charity in 2007. While not being the most child-friendly person (I don’t dislike children but I just don’t relate to them easily), I loved the premise of the program which is based on providing a positive role model in the life of children whose families often live in modest and sometimes precarious conditions.  I never realized until moving here that a surprising 16% of kids drop out of High School in the US and the program is designed to make them want to pursue further education to build a better life for themselves.

I feel I have been very lucky professionally and my career has taken me places I only dreamed of as a little girl. I therefore liked the idea of sharing that with a child and showing her that everything is possible if you work at it and pursue your dreams.

Jenny’s graduation was a great accomplishment for her and she is going onto High School in Manhattan in the Fall. It has been truly amazing for me to watch her grow from a frail little girl so shy that it was paralyzing for her, to a more self-confident young teenager who is starting to ask me about boys!

But the event, which I was very excited to attend in person (American graduation ceremony just like in the movies!), also marked the end of our time together as the program is not available in her new school. Her parents couldn't attend due to work commitment unlike every other parnts so me being there was even more important for her. We have sworn to stay in touch however and I can’t wait to see how she gets on next year and hopefully for many more years to come.

The Situation

 I had a great time with the girls in AC last weekend.

It was exactly what I needed - away from the unbearable heat of the City for a few days in a place where, despite temperatures reaching 102F on Saturday, laying out in the sun is actually possible due to frequent dips in the pool and where daytime alcohol consumption is not only tolerated but highly encouraged!

But of course Atlantic City lived up to its tacky reputation. I'm not sure that I have ever seen quite so many tattooed bodies in one place before and "tramp stamps" seemed particularly popular. I have nothing against tattoos but most of them were so bad that had I taken pictures of them, I would have been populating the pages of ugliesttattoos.com for months to come.

A trip to the ladies room in the club of the Chelsea Hotel was quite an experience as the air was thick with hairspray, cheap perfume and girls were giggling as they shared cubicles in groups of two - something that I haven't seen done since my University days in the UK and a strange custom I don't, and will never, understand.

What I was not expecting however was for it to be a little scary too. On Saturday night, all dressed up and teetering in our high heels, we were determined to venture outside of our hotel for dinner and went hunting for a highly recommended Italian restaurant we read up about, just a block away from the boardwalk. We were stunned to find streets lined with desolated houses and what looked like shacks and started to feel quite unsafe. After being propositioned by a couple of men standing outside a Gentleman's Club, we pretty much ran back to the safety of the boardwalk!

I know that all of the above will make me sound like a snob and maybe that's what I have become but with the right company and a great pool, any city can be the perfect getaway and despite all its shortcomings, that's what AC was to me.

Islamorada

I've said it before but one of the things I love the most about New York is its close proximity to tropical paradise, particularly in the midst of the bitterly cold winters, and short escapes to South Beach are now a January ritual for me. The Caribbeans are less than 4 hours away and it turns out that the Keys, despite being a couple of hours drive south of Miami are pretty straight forward to get to and equally heavenly.

A couple of weekends ago, a group of about 15 friends and I headed down to Islamorada, a tiny spot about half-way down the Keys to celebrate our friend FM's birthday. She is originally from Florida and wanted to celebrate this significant milestone surrounded by her family, her closest friends and on the beach! Something we all agreed was a rather fine idea.

We only stayed in the resort for three days and most of our time was spent in the lagoon, where we could swim in the sea without worrying about the strong currents of the ocean or the creatures with sharp teeth that inhabit it!

CS, ES and I did get to swim with dolphins which was something I had dreamed about doing for a very long time. They are such amazing creatures - incredibly gentle and graceful in their movements - and I loved every minute of it, even when the dolphin trainer asked me to swim out to meet one of the dolphins, Sebastian, as she had something special in mind for me. As Sebastian had just "kissed" ES and gotten a hug from CS in the previous stunts, I got a little worried about the increasing level of intimacy we were asked to share with him and what mine might entail! Was I going to be used for a hybrid dolphin/human insemination project?! All joke aside, it turns out that when Sebastian emerged from the sea in front of me, all I had to do was shake his fins :-)

Much fun was had by our raucous group throughout our stay and I have to say that our behaviour would have made any prepubescent teenager proud - from jumping fully clothed in the pool at 2am while frankly very inebriated, to involuntary parodying "Dirty Dancing" when the lovely boys we met at Tom's bar one night invited us to a house party which turned out to be staff quarters as they all worked at our hotel!
No-one made us carry watermelons* but I have a feeling that, should I decide to go back to the resort and get tennis lessons, it won't be too much of a problem! Finally, we ended the weekend in style by driving back to Miami airport in a gorgeous, gleaming red convertible Mustang.

The weekend was bittersweet however as two of my closest friends (including the birthday girl herself) are leaving in the next couple of weeks. I've written before about the City's transience and it is again proving to be the case, reminding me that this place is not as easy to live in as we'd all like to believe. MT is leaving after just 2 years, as she missed her family back in the UK far too much and never felt at home here. FM is at a stage of her life where she wants to meet a decent man and settle down to have kids - something that's hard to find in New York unfortunately ...

I feel fortunate that at least we were able to spend an entire weekend together in an ideal setting with the rest of our girlfriends, all feeling connected by a friendship that is stronger than any physical distance that life may put between us.

* For straight male readers - this is a bad reference to a scene in Dirty Dancing!

Roadtrip

I finally have the time to report back from my trip with the girls. A roadtrip is always an exciting adventure but many of my American friends in particular were surprised by our choice of destination. As neither particular fans of country music or fried food, a drive through Virginia and Tennessee seemed like an odd choice but not one that I regret. It is a well known fact that New York is unique, almost an anomaly, but it became even more obvious to us as we progressed further South and we very much felt like we were visiting a different country altogether.

But first, there were two instrumental players on the trip. Starting with "Chad", as we had ironically named our beautiful convertible car. Chad drove very much like a tank but the trip would not have been the same without him. Having the roof down all the time, with the music blaring out (we evolved an amusing car dance routine to the Black Eyed Peas "Boom Boom Pow" which kept coming up on the radio) and the wind blowing in our hair added an invaluable thrill and fun element as well as guaranteeing a suntan. And how else would we have been able to dry our bikinis after a swim but by hanging them at the back of our seats and let the wind do its job!?
The second, but no less valuable character, was my beloved Iphone. We shunned traditional paper maps and relied on Google Maps to tell us exactly where we were, how to get to our destination and how long it would take. The Starbucks locator app was also a lifesaver, especially in the mornings - you can take a girl out of New York ...

It is difficult to pick out memories from such a diverse trip, filled with so many new experiences ... Enjoying a huge pile of steaming hot whole spice rubbed crabs at Obryki's on our quick pit stop in Baltimore. Staying in our first motel in Virginia which looked like it belonged to a horror movie film set. Driving through the verdant gentle hills of the Shenandoah valley. Arriving in Pigeon Forge Tennessee to find that instead of being the quaint village I had pictured it to be, it was essentially a miniature version of Las Vegas - minus the casinos but packed with themed restaurants and tacky souvenir shops. Staying in a secluded log cabin for a couple of days at the foot of the Smoky Mountains, complete with rustic decor, fireplaces and a huge terrace overlooking the forest with an outdoor jacuzzi and a barbecue. Falling in love with s'mores (a wonderful American bbq/camping tradition I had never had before) which consists of letting a marshmallow brown over the fire before squeezing it between two Graham crackers and a piece of Hershey dark chocolate.

Our short stay in the Smoky Mountains was also the more adventurous part of our trip as we went river tubing (a normally relaxing affair except for the part where Marie nearly drowned!) and also ziplined through the forest, which despite being a much tamer version of the ziplining I did in Costa Rica, was still a lung bursting experience. We even visited Dollyworld purely out of comedy value - we were disappointed to find no statue of Dolly Parton there which ruined our plan of having our picture taken groping her considerable assets although Marie and Libs improvised with a life-size picture of her instead!

Nashville's heart beats to the sound of country music, which I expected, but what I didn't was how much a party town it is. After a brief attempt at line dancing (which is much harder than it looks) at the Wild Horse, we spent our two evenings there crawling honky tonk joints. Bustling dive bars and a very friendly atmosphere where the backdrop to rugged looking singers in cowboy hats and boots belting out country music classics, one of which includes probably one of the best chorus line in music history: "save a horse, ride a cowboy". While I cannot possibly divulge whether we did save a horse while we were there, let's just say that if you are a girl looking for fun then Nashville is the place to be!

Memphis offered a stark contrast to Nashville, firstly by its size but also because of its state of derelict - lovely residential areas seemed to be lost in between long stretches of desolated buildings and boarded up houses, giving it a definite unsafe edge. I wanted to look beyond appearances but as we were making our way to a supposedly great soul food restaurant in the outskirts of town and drove past policemen handcuffing a group of teenagers in the street, I agreed with the rest of the girls that we should lock the car doors and head back downtown! But despite this, we very much loved Memphis. We stayed at the Peabody Hotel on our first night and watched its famous ducks march to the pond in the morning. We hit Beale Street and listened and danced to live music. We had the best ribs in town and a side a slaw at Rendez Vous. We visited Sun Studios, where a young and unknown Elvis walked in one day to record a song for his mum ... very much feeling the weight of history in this tiny place where not only Elvis but also Johnny Cash, Jerry Lee Lewis, Roy Orbison and BB King's talents, amongst many others, were first spotted. No visit to Memphis is complete without seeing Graceland of course, which is surprisingly not as ostentatious as one would imagine and feels more like a museum dedicated to interior design circa 1970 (not a good year for interior designing, that's for sure). A tour of the National Civil Rights museum was an eye-opening and emotional end to our trip as we learnt, much to our horror, that some of the last segregation laws were only abolished in the South in the late sixties ...

Throughout the trip, I was fascinated by some of the cultural differences we encountered. Small ones like people saying hello to us in the streets, strangers striking up conversations easily or the fact that every single waiter was shocked that we wanted to split our bill four ways (it appears people pay for their own share in the South). But also larger ones like the prevalence of religion everywhere we went. The church to inhabitants ratio was staggeringly high and it appeared that professing your religion with car stickers was mandatory, my favourite ones reading "Jesus loves", "God knows", "Keep Christ in Christmas" and the guilt-inducing "If you feel ignored, guess how God feels now". I also chuckled at all the self-proclaimed "Christian stores", selling anything from books to furniture, all approved by God himself I presume ...

Starting something

Marie, Libs, Caroline and I are embarking on our much anticipated road trip together tomorrow morning. We will be driving South over the course of a week, loosely planning to stop over in Baltimore, Blacksburg VA, Pigeon Forge in the heart of the Blue Smoky Mountains, Nashville and finally Memphis before hopping on a flight back to New York. I will no doubt be blogging about the trip upon my return, but we've already had a spectacular start.

We picked up our rental car at La Guardia airport tonight, a sleek and sexy Chryster Sebring convertible with the tiniest trunk ever designed once the roof is down - we are going for looks rather than practicality here, much in the same way we tend to pick our men come to think of it!

Marie bravely volunteered to drive us back to the City even though, like the rest of us, she had never driven in Manhattan before. After spending some time getting used to driving an automatic (as it turns out, using your "otherwise unaccustomed to being left idle" left foot to brake is really not a good idea!), we confidently set off, admired the view of the glittering skyline as we crossed the Robert Kennedy bridge and entered the City in Spanish Harlem.

We drove West on 125th and upon nearing the Apollo Theatre, we heard Michael Jackson's "Wanna be starting something" loudly playing in the street. The traffic slowed to a stand still in front of the famous landmark which was packed with crowds of fans waving pictures and banners, singing and dancing to the music while all the surrounding cars were beeping in unison. The atmosphere was electric, somewhat surreal, but I was happy to see people publicly celebrating his work rather than breaking down hysterically.

What a perfect way (and soundtrack) to be "starting something", even more so when it is a trip to America's historically laden Deep South with great girlfriends.

Miami

Sometimes a photo can speak a thousand words ... But in short, Miami in the winter = sun, sea, fun, friends and even snakes!

The Office

My office is not exactly the kind of a place where laughter is heard much. Rows upon rows of grey cubicles don't seem conducive to it somehow.

Humour does feature but in very cautious, "above the belt" ways, and when I moved to the US I was warned that my days of swearing outloud at work were over as it is very much frowned upon here - at least in the corporate world. It couldn't be more different from London where trading salacious remarks all day long is part and parcel of office life.

While I try my best to be serious and behave in the way that is expected in my position, I find it hard to completely stifle the rather British sense of humour I have acquired in my 10 years of living in the UK.

So for your amusement, I will share some of the most politically incorrect situations I have found myself in.

* During an agency meeting - involving around 6 agency staff working for me, one of my direct reports and my internal business partners (including a VP) - we discussed the relative importance of ad formats in driving conversions. We were concluding that larger ad sizes drove the best results and to my utter disbelief, I found myself exclaiming outloud "well, bigger is usually better!". I just couldn't help myself. Cue much laughter in the meeting room and embarrassed blushing from me. I seem to remember that the VP was still chuckling to himself about it after the meeting was over.

* In a one-to-one meeting with a manager working for me, we were discussing an upcoming Affiliate Marketing conference we were both going to attend in Boston. He told me that they were holding a "meet market" where affiliates and publishers could network and mingle. I couldn't hold a straight face when I told him that I had been to a few "meat markets" in my time and always found them to be much fun.

* In another agency meeting, again involving agency staff and internal business partners, we reviewed targeting in Media buys. One of our media buyers was explaining that some forms of targeting available in the market still have to be vetted from a privacy standpoint and were therefore not quite legal yet. I looked up from the deck we were reviewing and said "barely legal?". I think they are still talking about that one.

* While in a meeting this week, Larry & I were both on our blackberries so I emailed him saying I liked his jumper. He replied asking if I wanted to make out later. We both managed to keep a straight face but still got caught by Larry's VP who jokingly asked us to stop sending love notes to each other in front of a shocked but amused room full of people!

I like to think that my US colleagues have accepted my rather unorthodox comments and ways. If anything, I seem to provide free entertainment from time to time.

Change

November 4th 2008.

The day started normally enough ... I woke up with only a slight pang of nervousness in the pit of my stomach. Made my way to the lounge, still in a slightly sleepy daze. Put the kettle on. Slipped a bag of Earl Grey (which I get specially brought by friends visiting from the UK) in the teapot. Turned on the computer to check the emails I had received overnight and glanced at my facebook newsfeed.

But how special the day was became quickly apparent. Most of my friends facebook status reflected their anticipation of the events that were to unfold throughout the evening - the hugely important choice that America had to make in the wake of it's 56th Presidential Election. I looked out of my window only to see a large queue of people forming at the corner of 86th and Broadway, the nearest voting station from my apartment. I dutifully updated my facebook status, expressing my own anxiousness and excitement.

At work, all conversations inevitably turned to the election - how many hours had been spent queuing to vote and what election parties would be attended that night. I spoke of my frustration at not being allowed to vote in such an historical election. I have always felt very strongly about civic duties - about the right and the need to vote. In fact, the most exciting thing for me when I turned 18 years old was finally being old enough to vote - sad but true and my parents can attest to that!

I unfortunately had to attend a business dinner that evening (preventing me from attending some of the election parties I had been invited to) as I have joined the Advertisers Advisory board of a major US Online Marketing vendor. Talking "shop" was far from my mind as by the time evening came, my state of "slight nervousness" had descended into mild hysteria. I went home as soon as I could and sat down to watch the coverage on CNN.

I found the whole process incredibly confusing - not understanding why everyone was more concerned about the number of Electoral seats being won, rather than the popular vote ... Numerous text messages were exchanged with American friends who kindly explained and also shed light on what "gubernatorial" means. I should clearly have done my homework ahead of time!

When Ohio was predicted to have been won by Obama, CNN proclaimed the election to be won without a doubt. I again found myself confused and unable to celebrate as it seemed a little premature to me ... until I heard the noise coming from outside my windows. I have not seen such an overwhelming display of public euphoria in a long time (the last time was probably when France won the World Cup in 1998!) - car horns were going wild, people were screaming, crying and dancing in the streets. I did my own little happy dance while exchanging calls and texts with my friends to share in the joy and relief. I became rather emotional and shed some tears when watching Obama's victory speech ... four consecutive times in a row thanks to the wonders of cable live replay! I don't think I have ever felt so inspired and moved by a politician in my life.

I wish I could say that the public exhilaration lasted for many days after the victory ... It did the next morning at least when I sat next to two ladies in the subway who loudly expressed their joy and encouraged the rest of the carriage to cheer with them - which we gladly did. But with America's economy in the most precarious position it has been in decades, I'm afraid that I went back to work worrying about redundancies and the incredibly challenging year ahead.

However there is genuine hope in the new government and trust that they will make the right decisions even if the road to recovery and change will be long and hard. At least, with Barack Obama at it's helm - yes, we can!

Intervention

Marie staged an "intervention" on me for Labor Day weekend, a few weeks ago.

I was at least 2 weeks past my "I have to get out of the City" point and was feeling sick and frankly quite low. We had talked about going to the Caribbean that weekend but by the time we looked into it more seriously, the prices had soared so I was bracing myself for a long weekend in New York, while desperately needing some peace and quiet, away from the noise and the energy of this place.

But Marie came to the rescue and called me announcing that she had booked us train tickets to Poughkeepsie and a motel room in Kingston, Upstate New York.

To be honest, we really had no idea where we were going but we were on a mission to relax and take long walks in the woods. Exhausted but excited, we boarded a train from Penn Station to Poughkeepsie at lunch time on Saturday, but not before loading up on a stack of gossip magazines and a copy of the New York Mag of course. The journey itself was great as we travelled north past beautiful lakes and white picket fence houses. I love American trains as they are so large that they almost feel more like a plane. They also have old-fashioned controllers who punch your ticket on the train, which I find so quaint.

We arrived at Poughkeepsie Station where we expected to take a train to Kingston, only to be told that there were none and that we would have to take a 45 minutes taxi trip. Little did we know at the time that it would be one of the many taxi rides we would take that weekend ...

Our motel in Kingston was like the ones you see in the movies - a few buildings of connected rooms, with doors facing the car park but ours had the added advantage of a swimming pool. When we checked in, the clerk asked for our car registration number and when we told her we didn't have one, she looked at us as if we were aliens. We hadn't thought of renting a car, assuming that the country side in the US is the same as in Europe in that you can walk everywhere. How mistaken were we!

We ventured out of our motel only to find a residential street on one side and the motorway on the other. We wanted to find a convenience store to buy water and cigarettes and therefore bravely crossed the motorway on foot ... yes, you read this right. It was quite something ... But there was no store to be found so we went into a pizza restaurant to grab a coffee. The owner chatted to us and upon hearing our plight called his girlfriend (who was on her way over, by car of course) so she could pick up some cigarettes for us! And he refused to let us pay for the coffee ... at least, we found out quickly how friendly people were.

The lack of car was not such an issue in the end however, as we called upon the services of the local taxi company to take us to and from places we wanted to see. They thought we were mad too and perhaps this is a sign that Marie & I have spent too much time in Manhattan already ...

On Sunday, we decided to walk around the Ashokan Reservoir, which provides water to New York City. The size of it took us by surprise as it spans 34km2 but the sense of wide open space was amazing and very calming. We quickly realised that we would only be walking a very small portion of it and strolled along the banks, admiring the lush trees and the completely clear blue sky.
When we were ready to leave we realised much to our horror that we had no mobile phone reception and therefore no means to call a taxi! Thankfully, our driver had originally dropped us off near the only police station in the area (with the words "this will be a safe place for you to come back to", which we laughed at at the time) so we made our way back there and asked the nice police men if we could use their phone ...
We decided to go into Kingston itself, which is a lovely town, set by the Hudson river. The city was in a very cheerful mood as the annual Irish Festival was taking place, meaning that there were a number of stands in the streets and bands performing. I'm not sure how many Irish descendants still remain in the town, but it certainly looked like everyone wanted to be Irish for the day! This made for terrific people watching and it was wonderful to witness the sense of community and neighbourhood of a place where everyone seemed to know each other.

We ended our trip with a long, leisurely boat tour on the Hudson and got back to New York refreshed and ready for City life again.

Sweet Escape

Monday 17th March
1.03pm - My friend Marie tells me on gmail chat that she is thinking about going away somewhere hot for the long weekend.
1.07pm - I tell her that I am also desperate for a break in the sun.
1.09pm - Marie exclaims "let's go together!"
2.08pm - We agree to meet in Los Angeles.

Friday 21st March
9.30am - I board my Virgin America flight to LA, in a state of excitement that leaves me almost breathless.

Last minute decisions are the best ones by far.

I had booked us a suite at the Roosevelt Hotel on Hollywood Boulevard, in what seemed to be a fairly central area of LA, which is a difficult thing to work out not only as the city is so spread out that there is no centre as such, but also because I had no time to actually research hotels.

It was everything we could have wanted. Historically, it was were the first Academy Awards were hosted in 1929 and where Marilyn Monroe, Cary Grant and Montgomery Cliff permanently resided. More recently, it is where many episodes of "Entourage" have been filmed and where Lindsay Lohan partied one last time before collapsing and going into rehab.

The pool (complete with David Hockney underwater mural) is where we spent most of our time, only interrupting our sunbathing with a dip in the water or a sip of a champagne cocktail. It's a beautiful space, framed in contrasting primary colours - clear blue sky, dark wood furniture, bright white soft furnishings, vivid green leaves of the palm trees. The Roosevelt is clearly a hot spot for the movie industry judging by the number of people reading scripts by the pool, Vin Diesel drinking at the bar and the 3 writers we saw huddled together, typing furiously on their respective Macbooks.
But mostly, being at the pool was like walking into an Abercrombie & Fitch catalogue. The "square foot to hot men" ratio (a valid scientific measurement) was simply staggering. The women were beautiful too of course, although they all featured fake breasts, carefully styled blonde hair and size zero bottoms.

Yet, despite the "scene", the atmosphere was incredibly laid back and there was a lack of pretence that surprised me. I fully expected to want a liposuction and breast augmentation procedure while I was there, but I never really felt uncomfortable. Perhaps because there were plenty of normal looking people too but also because I felt so removed from it - it was like being in a zoo, catching glimpses of these incredible creatures flexing their impressive muscles while hiding behind the security fence of my dark sunglasses.

On Saturday night, the hotel secured us a table at Ketchup (which I have since learned is the new hip restaurant in town) and we enjoyed a delicious meal, served by an even more delicious waiter. Marie & I were both tired and decided to head back to the hotel pool bar for one last drink. Anyone who knows us both will guess the rest ... A group of very friendly people started talking to us and we ended up having a wild night of partying with them, first at The Standard, then at their poolside cabana, until the early hours of the morning.

On Sunday, after soothing our hangover with a solid room service breakfast and a couple of Mimosas, we were picked up by a chauffeur who took us on a tour of the area in a big Lincoln town-car with tinted windows.
We headed to Griffith Park for a great view of the Hollywood sign and gigantic LA. As we were taking in the sprawling panorama at the observatory, a Mexican guy approached us and gesticulated at his camera. We thought he wanted us to take a picture of him & his friends but instead he wanted to have his picture taken with us! Stunned, we silently complied but barely managed to hold our hysterical laughter & tears before they walked away.
We then drove to Santa Monica where our driver left us to stroll along the crowded promenade of Venice Beach, which was bursting with colourful things and characters: tarot readers, middle-aged oiled up perma-tanned body builders, Johnny Rotten from the Sex Pistols (yes, really), an actual freak show, beggars, hippies, paintings of vaginas ... We felt overwhelmed after an hour or so and headed back to the safety of our car. After a detour in Beverly Hills and Rodeo Drive, we arrived back at the Roosevelt and collapsed in exhaustion.

On Monday we had planned to have lunch at the Ivy but couldn't physically peel ourselves away from the pool and sipped more champagne until it was time for us to head for the airport, slightly tipsy but deliriously happy.

The highlight of our trip however came upon our return. As I landed back in New York from the red-eye flight at 7am, I noticed an email from my sister. Unbeknown to us, a paparazzi had taken a shot of JC Chasez (from N'Sync) and Chase Crawford (from the series "Gossip Girls") at the Roosevelt pool and Marie & I were in the foreground! My sister had randomly stumbled upon the picture while browsing a gossip website!

I can't think of a better, more fitting way, to end a trip to Los Angeles.

Priceless

Warning - this story is borrowed from my lovely friend Esther.

In boutique handbag shop in the World Financial Centre:

Sales girl: "I make some of these bags myself you know".

Esther: "Oh, they're great, I really like them".

Sales girl: "I love your accent, where are you from?"

Esther: "Australia, I live in Sydney".

Sales girl: "Wow, your English is amazing!"

Esther (puzzled but not wanting to embarrass the girl): "Thank you ..."

Sales girl: "So what language do you speak in Australia?"

Esther (as the next customer in line giggles): "Err ... English ..."

I better go and submit this on http://www.overheardinnework.com now!

The age of innocence?

I went to a "Big Sister Big Brother" training session last night and only wish I had attended it earlier in the programme, as it gave me some terrifying context into what my little sister's life is like.

My childhood was clearly so sheltered & idyllic that I didn't even conceive of the kind of things that the children we are mentoring are exposed to or are experiencing first hand.

Sure they are going through the same upheavals we all did as young teenagers - peer as well parental pressure, the desire to fit in, feeling uncomfortable about how they look, worrying about grades ...

But this is New York City and they face a lot of other, darker problems I never confronted as a child. Gangs - not just as a victim of them but also the pressure to actually be in one. Crime - the police raid their schools regularly, weapons are commonly carried and it is likely that they have seen someone being stabbed at some point. Drugs and alcohol - pot is passe and mixing up cocaine and amphetamines is all the rage apparently. And even sex - I was shocked to hear that the city had to eradicate the very popular "rainbow game" that girls as young as 10 were playing in all the schools: they would wear bracelets of different colours, each representing a sexual act and if a boy snapped one of them, they would have to perform that act on him.

Our "Littles" (we're the "Bigs") all come from inner city schools and receive benefits. This means that they live on or below the poverty line, which is a shocking $17,000 a year for a family of 3! I can't conceive of anyone being able to survive, let alone live, in one of the most expensive cities in the world on just $17,000, when this figure barely covers half of my rent for the year.

This leaves me with a moral dilemma ... How can I possibly justify my rather shallow lifestyle - centered around working, going out, traveling and dealing with boy troubles - when someone much younger and more vulnerable than me is going through trials I will never experience in my entire life? The guilt is something all the Bigs go through but it doesn't make it any easier to cope with.

I am more determined than ever before to make a difference for my Little, to be there for her and to be as much of a positive role model as I can be. Our last session was a vast improvement on the previous two as she is starting to feel more comfortable around me, and me around her.

There is a certain irony in the fact that it is taking a child to make me grow up a little at last ...

What happens in Vegas ...

doesn't necessarily have to stay in Vegas ...

My trip started well. I picked up a book on my stopover in Chicago, something of a ritual of mine. I like seeing books on my shelves and remember which far flung airport I happened to buy them from, my choices either influenced by the trip itself, friends or random encounters.
This time, I bought "Naked" by David Sekaris because I spotted a guy reading it on the subway in New York a little while ago. He couldn't stop laughing to himself during the whole ride and the title intrigued the vixen in me. I highly recommend it by the way.

It got a little less smooth however, when I reached Las Vegas. My luggage hadn't been transferred and I had to go to Caesar's Palace, tired and crumpled, without them. I was meant to attend my friend Lia's (whose wedding I was going to Vegas for) bachelorette party that evening in the Belaggio but didn't get my luggage until around midnight, by which time I had collapsed from jetlag anyway.

As soon as I started walking through the airport, I realised that I was not in the normal world as we know it. The slot machines and bars everywhere were the first clues. The crowd around the luggage carousel was an interesting mix of morbidly obese American tourists and size zero girls sporting enormous fake breasts that even I couldn't take my eyes off.
Driving to the strip and spotting the billboards advertising "hot babes direct to you" and places named "Fat Burger" were other unmistakable signs that I had arrived in the land of hedonism.

Las Vegas is like no other place in the world.

It is where one doesn't bat an eyelid upon seeing women wearing full ball gowns at 4pm. Where one can get beer, drugs and or whatever else they desire at 7am – and not realise it is 7am anyway as there are no clocks anywhere. Where one can share an escalator with Cleopatra & Marc Anthony impersonators and be unfazed by it. Where one gets asked if they want to sit inside or outside while dining in a fake Italian trattoria inside the Venician hotel, despite being very much indoors either way. Where one can get sickly sweet cocktails by the yard in brightly coloured plastic receptacles. Where one can get severe sunstroke by standing outside for less than 15 minutes. Where one can lay by the pool and feel that they have wandered onto the set of Baywatch - in a "face like Crimewatch, body like Baywatch" kind of way.

However, the wedding was wonderful and much fun was had in the form of reckless dancing to 80s tunes late into the night.
I didn't gamble and therefore didn't have to sell my body to cover my debts. I didn't marry my gay best friend and therefore didn't have to get divorced. All in all, a good weekend away.

I had to catch an early flight back to New York the morning after the wedding, in a drunken daze, the flashing lights of the slot machines torturing my sensitive eyes.
The crowd at the gate looked like they had all just come out of a nightclub (which they probably did) - bloodshot eyes, shaky hands, slumped uncomfortably over the chairs.

The air crew team on Southwest Airlines was another Las Vegas stereotype - a freaky Barbie & Ken type pairing. Her - too thin, penciled in eyebrows and lips, caked on foundation and unnaturally jet black hair. Him - too muscular, penciled in eyebrows and lips, caked on foundation and unnaturally jet black hair. Maybe they do each other's make up or at least share clumsy beauty tips.

Las Vegas is like no other place in the world ... and it's probably better that way.

Living in America

I’ve been watching some old “Sex and the City” episodes thanks to HBO on demand and a hangover and just texted my gbf exclaiming how much our lives were like the series. The fun, the trials, the cocktails, the no-cooking under any circumstances policy, the reliable friends, the unreliable men … and the fear of leaving the city, even for one day, for god forbid, the suburbs …

I only ever realise that I live in America when I leave the city and the experience invariably terrifies me. The big houses with a front porch, the white picket fences, the 2.1 children, the patriotic flags, the SUVs … quiet suburbia disturbs me.
The thing is I am really a country girl at heart, I love nothing more than spending a weekend in my parents’ country house in the middle of nowhere, going on mushroom picking expeditions or just walking in the forest. But I can never take it for too long and need the vibrancy and energy of a big city to feel truly alive. I need madness around me to distract me.

Of course, having watched “Sicko”, the latest Michael Moore documentary doesn’t help with my reservations about America. I was horrified by how brainwashed this country really is.
Moore, as usual, over-simplified how great things are in France, the UK and Canada but the message was clear – it’s a fucked up country, ruled by blind capitalism and Bush really is the dumbest man alive.
It made me realise that I would never, ever, live outside of Manhattan and that I want to grow old back in Europe. Of course, I am part of the lucky few with a good medical insurance policy but even that might not be enough and I don't feel comfortable living in a country with such inequality.
As usual, Moore's documentary leaves me wanting to take action and change things ... but what can I do apart from trying to convince a few thousand people to march in the streets, french style?!

Having said all this, who wants to bet I will end up with 2.1 children in a big house with a front porch living in Irvington, Upstate New York when I finally grow up? If I do, can someone please remind me of this post?