Bonne nuit et bon courage

What a ride.

As I write, I sit; sat in my Paris apartment. The skies are clouding over, and rain is on the way. My bags are empty: It’s a habit of mine to completely unpack just to pack it all up again and hit the road.

Have to end one ride to start another.

Five and a half months have come and gone. It was fast, it was fun… At times it was rough. But the memories that linger are the good ones, ones that won’t get lost any time soon.

There is so much to say, but nothing I write now will say it the right way. 

The walls here are 50 shades of grey: Changing in the light, changing with the mood. Two well-loved leather chairs sit across from me. Their arms are welcoming, having hugged many visitors with bulging arms of comfort and stability. A stack of French magazines neatly occupies the glass tabletop shared between them – a large sturdy hardcover named Helmut Newton holds them tall. A black and white print of hundreds of parisiens and parisiennes sunbathing leans next to a painting of a woman in red dancing with a man in black on the wall. A faded vase of flowers hangs beside them, framed next to an upright lamp.

The sun has slipped away from the large window on the left even though dusk is hours away. It’s an early night for him, and a longer night for me.

Like this room, in this Paris apartment, the past half year has been a completely describable experience. And one day, I’ll get it all down.

But not tonight.

Run, baby, run

Another year gone by, another Sun Run missed.

Vancouver’s annual 10-kilometre jaunt/jog/sprint/crawl happened April 21st before I was fully aware that it was April. I was too busy executing an international marathon myself via train, plane, and automobile. It’s much less gruelling than it sounds; I was merely navigating my way from Greece back to England in a blissed-out stupor, the kind that can only come from several days spent remotely in sand, sun, and surf.

I’m too relaxed to write. Somebody should stop me. It’s exam time for other people, though, so I should show some sympathy stress. It wouldn’t be a bad idea to get some mediocre writing out of the way either, before tackling topics like terrorism, Taliban, and Tunisia.

* * *

This post is dedicated to my dear Aunt Eleanore: One of the nine people who read my blog, and a woman who, in the marathon of life, keeps a steady pace, her head held high, and an enthusiasm for living. She’s a remarkable person for many reasons, not just because she participates in the Sun Run every year at the spry age of 98.

In a few short months, she’ll add another year to the tally. She should really be acknowledged with her own special category, but as it is, she’s the only woman in the race’s F95+ class despite nearly surpassing the minimum age by four years. 

What’s even more incredible, though, is that she’s not just the female participant with the most life experience: She actually beat 4109 other female participants. Her time was better than the times of just over 16 percent of the other women racing. She’s a fast one, that Aunty Eleanore. And while there’s no way of knowing whether the others were just slow or lazy or quitters or late-sleepers, El beat them all with pace, persistence, and the preparation of a well-timed alarm clock (or finely-tuned internal alarm). 

From someone who has never once mustered the energy to even register for the run, I can’t quite express how much I admire this woman, and how proud I am to call her my Aunt.

Cheers from Northern England, all the way to the North Shore.

Reviewed

Down a few dark alleys and garbage-strewn streets from the city’s main road lies a restaurant that will make you wait two hours for a meal that takes 40 seconds to cook.

The modest-looking diner hidden away in the black heart of Italy has been dubbed “the Sacred Temple of pizza,” and claims to be the birthplace of the dish. The otherwise easily-missed dive is constantly surrounded by a sizable crowd of famished foodies – tourists and locals alike – who are taunted by wafts of olive oil, crushed tomatoes, and tangy oregano that escape the cramped eating quarters every time the host opens the front door to call out another number. Rain or shine, day or midnight, the always-long wait is out by the dumpsters that emit less pleasant smells.

But nobody seems to care.

Returning customers know that once you’ve been sat at a wobbly table and offered either beer, Coke, Fanta, or water, you can settle in and mentally prepare for the best meal of your life.

The secret is simplicity. The family-run pizzeria only offers the two choices written on the menus hanging from the green-and-white-tiled walls: The Margherita or the Marinara, with the option to double-up on the mozzarella.

There are no frills nor garnishes at L’Antica Pizzeria Da Michele either, because that simply isn’t the Neapolitan way. Besides, the pizza leaves no room on the large record-sized plates for anything other than the tender, oily-but-not-greasy, somewhat round circle of culinary heaven.

You can count the number of fresh ingredients thrown on the soft, warm dough with one hand: The red, juicy sauce that actually tastes like it’s made from tomatoes; the slightly stringy yet perfectly melted creamy-white mozzarella cheese. The crust – if you can even call it that – is charred and bubbly around the edges, substantial enough to dip into the pools of Italian olive oil that glisten on the paper-thin centre of the pie.

Every creation comes uncut, straight out of the traditional clay oven with a middle so delicate it has to be eaten with a knife and fork. Even though most of the servers speak some English, you wouldn’t be understood if you attempted to order anything other than a pizza to yourself; a decision rather easily-made after several hours of patience.

While the restaurant allows takeaways, half of the fun is experiencing the anticipation, the eventual admittance, and the atmosphere inside what is perhaps the humblest-looking eatery in existence boasting a world-renowned reputation.

At €5 a pop, the pizzas at L’Antica Pizzeria Da Michele are certainly worth the wait. 

Waterlogged

Too often I know the titles for these posts before I can think up some half-decent content to follow them.

When my jumbo water-bottle relieved itself inside my bag this morning, I knew I had a winner. The beauty of being a writer is that something can always be salvaged from the wreck, regardless of how messy it gets. I’m talking about the story and in this case, I also lucked out by managing to save a few watery pens from drowning. Islands of loose change I could not care less about saving have now sunk to the bottom of my one purse, reminding me that if my wallet were a boat, well, it’s time for a new boat. 

Now for the hard part… something actually worth reading.

I don’t feel like I’m drowning, that’s not what this is about. But sometimes, when you find yourself treading water for the eleventh hour on-end, a ledge to grab on to becomes more appealing than proving the point.

My arms are tired. And I never really was a swimmer. I lack buoyancy and it’s no secret I failed level four of swimming twice.

Being somewhere without anything to ground you is a lot like being in the middle of an ocean. There’s no sense of direction, and the only difference between up and down is two different shades of blue. You take on water; you give some back. You absorb the swills and you counter the swalls. You make up words just to feel in control: You can’t master your fate if you’ve lost your soul.

You just are, exactly where you are. 

All of this is to say that I’m tired of flailing my arms, wavering around like one of those air-fed stickmen that billow in used car lots. If the air-fed stickman were in an ocean. And somehow still functioning.

You can either let the waves of emotions wash over you while you stay put and tread, or you can go along for the ride and see where you end up. I mean, you’ll either hit land or you’ll just find yourself in the middle of another ocean, which can’t be that bad.

Across the Atlantic, people will wake up to read a post that doesn’t make much sense. But they can’t say I didn’t warn them: I delivered a great title, and have never promised to do more.

Gonzo in Sorrento: Part I

It was nothing like what I expected, but the best things in life never are. I looked around the room for something to hold on to as the mist crept in to cloud my mind.

No dice; just heads bobbing in a sea of people.

No faces; just eyes cutting through the distance between me and my thoughts. The underground room was crowded and space was scarce. There was no room for ideas.

There was no time for excuses either. I downed a drink and grabbed a mic out of sheer chemical confidence. It was time.

Nobody on earth knew where I was in that moment except for the three dozen bodies swaying left to right in lapping waves around the well-loved baby grand. Three dozen locals; the American and the Canadian were nowhere to be found. No consolation from familiar faces. All the better: Consolation wasn’t what I needed. I wanted a way out, and simultaneous shrapnel to the head and heart would have been preferable.

The band began to play the saddest song I’d ever heard. I turned to meet the eyes of the accordion player, realizing for the eleventh time that night that he only played guitar.

When I was young, I never needed anyone. I still didn’t, but I would have liked a drink to remind me; I would have liked a second drink to forget.

I was out of liquor and out of luck. So I worked myself up to whisper All By Myself to a dimly lit piano bar and a crowd of hands with upsettingly full drinks. The hot air from moving bodies rose up to cloud my judgment before sliding out of the basement to shiver like steam from vents on the streets of Sorrento.

I didn’t know better, but if I’d known less, I would have convinced myself someone had replaced my heart with a five-pound fish fighting desperately for life two inches from salty salvation.

That’s Sorrento – the seaside slice of paradise that will drown you with rain and wine if you dare confront it and ask for a place to rest three months before it’s ready to deliver.

In 48 hours I travelled 50 years into the future, only to travel 50 years back with a strong sense of nostalgia and the urge to make the most of everything. I ended up treading water in a sea of possibility. Time stood still; memories changed; I saw the future and I looked pained. So I came back and sang my heart out like everyone was watching: Humble, timid, alone but surrounded.

Consumed, enamoured.

Italy was having its way with me and I was too charmed to stop it: You become where you are when you think no one’s watching.

The people you meet

If there is one thing in common across all of the characters you meet while traveling, it’s that everybody has been somewhere. Whether it’s the Neapolitan pizzeria with a two-hour wait for the original thing, the hidden gem-of-a-beach littered with Indiana Jones-style ruins, that place in Rome – “you know the one” – or the local deli that shuts down mid-day. Sometimes it’s the end of the street; sometimes it’s the tourist hotspots: The nearest big city, or three-dozen countries around the globe. Everyone has been somewhere, and will at some point have somewhere to go.

But a lot of the time the places the people you meet are going take them right out of your life as fast as they flew in. It’s so easy to relate to perfect strangers that it feels like a week in a country leaves you with lifelong friends you will most likely never see again. So you carry them with you to new places as old memories.
 
It’s like this: The next time someone shows me a weird little tattoo they got at some point between the bar and the hangover, I’ll think of this guy…
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And the next time I meet someone from Tunisia, I’ll simultaneously think of the cool girl I met while navigating the streets of Rome, and Ali, who, after realizing that he was getting nowhere, stole some cash and ran. (As for where he’s going now, it’s probably straight to hell.)
 
Neila
 
The list goes on: The man from Senegal who proposed in French, the blacksmith I spent seven hours walking with, the person who took me to see the Colosseum at night, the two people from the previous post who turned my day around. Even the person who I had a greater chance of meeting back home as he has spent every other weekend in Vancouver, but who I probably wouldn’t have spoken to even if we’d been in the same bar at the same time. (Partially because he walks unbelievably fast and generally right into my shots)…
 
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It’s difficult to say whether things are meant to be; if there’s a reason why life brings you together with certain people at certain times. Some say it’s more a matter of things happening with potential, that wherever you are and whoever you’re with could lead to memorable experiences if you’re willing to let go and just go with it.
 
It can be a really small world if you’re out living life with your eyes wide open.
 
To the people I’ve met – safe travels, chin-chin.
 
Arik
 
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Kevin