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Pa-pa-Mejicano and Other Random Musings

I've been trying to arrange my posts thematically to give them a more cohesive purpose, but it has made me leave out a lot that has been happening in and around my mouth recently so I thought that I'd go for a more disorganized approach today. Here are some of my most recent thoughts:

1. God created Mexican food for poor, starving, summer Brooklynites like me. Is there anything more delicious, filling or cheap as a good plate of Mexican food? A couple of places I've tried recently include Tacombi @ Fonda Nolita and Calexico in Red Hook. I went to Tacombi for some breakfast tacos and horchata with my gal Amanda EK earlier this summer and I gotta say, Mexican food works at all times of the day. Put some eggs in a tortilla, wrap it up and wash it down with some milky almond horchata (the chilled Mexican answer to chai, as Amanda put it) and you got some real fuel in you for the rest of the day. If you do it Tacombi-style, it's even better. The restaurant used to be a garage but they have since gutted it out and put a little VW buggy in there as decoration. The mood is festive with colorful jarritos lining the walls and blue-and-white ceramic tiles making up countertops. It's always a party at Tacombi.

Calexico started out as a food cart but now has two storefronts in Brooklyn. I went to the one in Red Hook, accompanied by my IHPeeps Sam and Jasmine with Sam's co-worker along for the ride. Their pinto bean quesadilla, dipped in any one of their unbelievable sauces, takes me to heaven, with a short stop in Tijuana. A side of grits may sound slightly unconventional, but believe me, dressed with extra-virgin olive oil, roasted corn and jalapenos, it is the best thing north of the border. Get some beer to sink it all down and you've made a night out of it.

I've also been trying my hand at cooking up some Mexican-style dishes myself. I've found relative success with my take on huevos rancheros, which makes a filling high-protein, low-carb meal for any time in the day. Here's the recipe, for those interested:

1/2 medium red onion, finely chopped

2 cloves garlic, finely chopped

1/2 medium red pepper, finely chopped

1/2 large tomato, finely chopped

1 can black beans

1 tsp cumin powder

1 tsp cumin powder

1 large egg

3 tbs hot salsa

salt, pepper and hot sauce to taste

- Fry up the onions and garlic in plenty of olive oil until translucent. Add the peppers, followed by salt, pepper, cumin and coriander. Keep cooking until aromatic. Stir in tomatoes, followed by the beans. Allow to simmer while frying the egg sunny side up. Spoon the beans into a bowl, top with the fried egg and some salsa. Heaven.

(I tried also topping it with avocado once and it was a little bit too much. If you do add avocado, make sure to squeeze some lime juice onto it to develop the taste some. Also, if you have cilantro lying around, add some!)

2.

My favorite song on the new Lady Gaga album. Not much to do with food; everything to do with my happiness.

3. Cafes I've tried since my last post:

Kava Cafe (West Village): Sleek design with a nice garden in the back, this place is cute, if a little too 'metallic' for the required dosage of cosiness.

Queens Kickshaw (Astoria): Mentioned in my heavy-handed post yesterday, the coffee is absolutely delicious, even if it seems like it came out of nowhere.

Bluebird Coffee (East Village): Accidentally wound up here after I found out another cafe I've been dying to try, Abraco, was closed in Mondays. Probably the best place so far. Adorable, quiet, quaint, airy, small...and the coffee made my day.

4. Best quick bites in the city:

Asiadog (Chinatown/SoHo): Hipsters-meet-Panasian-meet-hotdogs. Who would have thought it would be so incredible when they came together? A sudden hunger pang brought me in here one afternoon for a "Sidney" veggie dog topped with peanuts, cilantro and thai salsa. My plan for the end of the summer? Gotta try 'em all.

La Piazza at Eataly (Flatiron): Who came up with Eataly? An emporium dedicated to all things Italian, this behemoth of a store has little nooks everywhere that turns into dining venues. What seems to be a popular after-work stop is the piazza, where you can stand and grab some cured meats and cheese. I stopped in here with Hannah, Robert fresh from Rome and Elvria (always Italian) for a short afternoon stop in Rome. We gorged on proscuitto, ricotta, bread, fig preserves and the like, while I was the only one who indulged in wine (too common a theme in my life, I must say).

Punjabi Deli (East Village): A tiny place, their samosa and chickpeas almost brought a tear to my eyes. Samosa chaat is my favorite north Indian street snack and this place does it right. And for $2.25, things just got so much righter. I think I'm in love.

Russ & Daughters (East Village): Established in 1914, this Jewish delicatessen is still doing it up old-school. Their cured fish is incredible, so I picked up some curried pickled herring, a latke and some Romanian eggplant salad for a Hebraic feast. Now this is a place with chutzpah.

Food and Its Discontents

The reason why the emerging field of "gastro-anthropology" is so often laughed at is because societies look at food as one of two things:

1. basic sustenance

2. a source of pleasure

Why study it, then, right? You either need, love it or both.

But food says so much about us as people and communities, our traditions and heritages. Besides, as far as sociological development goes, there is something telling about the food establishments that come to shape our city neighborhoods.

You guessed it, boys and girls, the topic on my mind is the urban buzzword du jour: gentrification.

I've been thinking about this more and more, especially since I live in Brooklyn, where swaths of the cityscape have uber-cool cafes and vintage shops blossoming amidst some characterful grit and grime. Williamsburg has become a national poster child of the G-word, and its "successes" continue to spread south. My neighborhood of Sunset Park seems to be relatively free of organic-obsessed tattooed hipsters, but I have a nasty feeling that it might be headed in that direction regardless.

But this phenomenon hit me a little further afield, when I took a trip over to Astoria, a district of Queens that has been up-and-coming for a while now. And though it seems like it is taking forever for it to finally "arrive", there are some noticeable changes that are taking place as we speak.

The other morning, I met up with Ellen at the Queens Kickshaw: a cafe on Broadway that specializes in great coffee and artisanal grilled cheeses. Yes, that's right: artisanal grilled cheeses. Sandwiched between bodegas and nail salons, its industrial-cool feel seems slightly out of place. When I asked for a latte with skim milk, I was told they only had, "Delicious, whole organic milk." I have to say, the latte was delicious. So was the gouda grilled cheese with caramelized onions, served with a side of Napa cabbage slaw. But I felt strange paying $8 for a sandwich and $4.50 for coffee in a place where that could buy a three-days' worth of groceries.

What does this mean for Astoria? Higher rents? People moving out? Who is going to pay eight-frikkin'-dollars for some cheese between two slices of toasted bread? (Delicious as it may be). And why is it that I get delight from grabbing breakfast in an "avant-garde" part of town? (A large part of its appeal, I'm sure). Who is this for? Who is living here that wants a piece of this action? How do the Hispanics and Arabs who dominate the cultural scene feel about it? Or do they not notice it at all?

This brings up a question of ethics, heavily intertwined with food. Can food actually precipitate gentrification? What actually comes first in this chicken-and-egg situation? And should we more thoughtful of the institutions we support? Or is this just the natural course of things?

So many questions. Too few answers. But this is a reason why I think gastro-anthropology is such a wonderful field of study. When coupled with economics, there's some thing to be learned from my day in Astoria, I'm sure. The trend of food establishments that start up in different parts of a city can tell much about the type of people moving in and out and a lot about identity construction among these micro-societies. What does a delectable grilled cheese say about a Queens Kickshaw patron?

I can't answer on a bigger scale, but as for this one patron, I have to say: as soon as I get past a small feeling of guilt, I'm left very, very satisfied.

It's Getting Hot in Here

Yup. It's actually a thing. Ran into it at Union Square pretty serendipitously on a day when the mercury was threatening to burst out of the thermometer.

What makes this simple ice-cream truck so gay? The fact that it is FABulous. The flavor I chose? The Salty Pimp: vanilla softserve, dulce de leche, sea salt, all dipped in chocolate. I practically had to put it all in my mouth at once because it was melting so fast, but it left me uber-satiated. Totally worth the HALF-AN-HOUR wait. Seems like New York likes things big, gay and sweet.

Crazy for Caffeine

As the hipster revolution continues, coffee rises to divine status. There is food out the wazoo in this city, but sometimes all you want is some delicious bean-y goodness. (Side note: who was the first person who looked at a coffee cherry and said, "I will peel this, take the slimy green bean inside, put it over a fire, add really hot water, let it steep and then drink it?")

Though it might not be Seattle, Portland or SF, there is no dearth of options here for coffee in this city, especially in Brooklyn, where organic-minded, PBR-obsessed hipsters all want the best brewed cuppa in town. I cannot claim to know much about coffee, but I'm a big fan of cafes -- just think about the number of times you've been to Tunnel City and have seen me crouched away in a corner.

My first stop in Brookyn was Park Slope's Gorilla Coffee. It's iced coffee season north of the equator, so I sat down with some cold brew and watched the world go by. There was a constant flow of people in and out of the shop and it made you want summer to last forever despite the unbelievable temperatures. There's something about sipping away on iced coffee as people saunter by that transports me to a very happy place. And so I continue to search for this feeling across the city.

Stumptown Coffee is slowly building an empire in this city and New York is lucky enough to have its own cafe in the Ace Hotel (Midtown) where tattooed, fedora-wearing baristas pour out some delicious drinks. Their iced coffee is just okay, but their mochas, made with Mast Brothers chocolate is otherworldly.

But perhaps quite unexpectedly, the best iced coffee I've had in this massive city so far is at a little spot named Saturdays Surf in SoHo. A surf shop smack-bang in the middle of an urban jungle, it somehow does not seem at all out of place. The store carries boards, clothing, books, bric-a-brac and some delicious coffee from a bar at the front of the house. Maya and I stopped in during a day of concrete-pounding shopping and it provided us with some much-needed respite. Grabbing a tall cup of their iced caffeine, dousing it with simple sugar and cream, I took it to the outdoor patio in the back where we city melted away into the swirls of my coffee.

Of course, in a discussion about the delights of coffee, I cannot leave out the cafe sua da (Vietnamese iced coffee with sweetened condensed milk) I've had during my search for some authentic South-East Asian eats. The first, which was maybe better than anything I had in Hanoi, was at Ba Xuyen - the sandwich shop around the corner. The second was made all the more fantastic with the company of Jasmine, my friend from my study abroad program. Eating some pho ga, sipping on some iced coffee, sitting on metal stools (though decidedly more for the cool effect here than cost-effectiveness), we went from the Lower East Side to its antipode in minutes. An Choi, on Orchard Street, translates the Vietnamese street food scene into 'Manhattanite', giving it an hip gloss that does not detract from the pretty authentic food.

Funnily enough, my favorite cafe is one at which I did not have any coffee. About two days ago, Eben showed me to a small neighborhood spot in Brooklyn Heights named Iris Cafe. It was very close to my idea of heaven. Set in the middle of a residential street shaded by trees, the cafe's door was set ajar to let the breeze waft through. We sat on rustic wooden seats eating simple but delicious egg salad sandwiches. The place was alive with a quiet energy, full with a love of good weather, good food and good drank. Absolutely adorable.

Since I don't know much about coffee in all its technicalities (brew? roast? what?), I just continue my search for the a place that really fits: where the drink meets atmosphere in a perfect union. And thankfully, there's no shortage of places to try, so I'm going to keep the ball rolling on my caffeine-driven adventures.

New York to Italy, via Long Island

My best friend from high school tells me I'm pretentious (she often points to my blog as evidence). And I have feeling she's right, because the delight I took in escaping to the East End for Memorial Day weekend, Great Gatsby-style, was all too palpable when I walked into Elvira's house. Okay, so it wasn't the Hamptons, Montauk or Fire Island, but Elvira's town of Shoreham is the quintessence of suburban delight. Even after only a few days in the city, I was happy to escape away to spend some quality time with friends... and of course, food.

Elvira's family is from a small town of 800 in Calabria and despite being an ocean away from home, her mom brings Italy to the dining table every day. Over the course of my four nights there, I had three different types of pasta: spaghetti with a zesty nut sauce, farfalle with zucchini and penne with eggplant. On the last night there, it was a Mediterranean smorgasbord of prosciutto and melon, cheeses including the deliciously pungent pecorino (which sparked quite the heated debate) and grilled eggplant with mint (as simple as it sounds, but exponentially more amazing). I had been transported without ever having to risk a flight with Alitalia.

I myself had two contributions that weekend: the lemon sabayon with berries and grapefruit that I helped Elvira make for Sunday dessert, and the pitcher of mojitos I made for a trip to the beach. I thought both went off without a hitch, but Elivra complained that the sabayon tasted metallic and Taida insisted there was not enough alcohol int he mojitos. Turns out sometimes you are not your own biggest critic.

When we weren't eating, Elvira, Taida and I were either on the beach, napping, taking 4-mile runs or watching movies. A beautiful weekend away from the buzz of the city that left me delighted and obsessed with Italy all over again. Ciao, ragazzi!

Apples Baked In Brown Sugar: New York Edition

To all the chicas and chicos in my life: it's true, this papí moved to town a week ago. And it's about time I started blogging.

I'm living in Brooklyn's Sunset Park for the next two months - a place where you can go from hola to nihao to xin chao and back all in the space of a couple of blocks. Eclectic and diverse, with a side of flavorful grit, this is going to be my hood. A stroll through the actual park affords a view of lower Manhattan, Jersey City, the water and none other than the Statue of Liberty -- this is prime property, but let's just hope the hipsters don't find out or out goes much of the down-home ethnic eats. A Vietnamese banh mi (sandwich) place just down the street transports me back to the streets of Hanoi for only $4.00. I have a feeling I'm going to like it here.

I've been getting into the groove of living in Brooklyn - perhaps a little too comfortably. I've been hitting up gourmet grocers, snobby I-know-more-about-coffee-than-you-do cafes and vintage shops like I've been living this life forever. Needless to say, it might be the end of me ... and my wallet.

Dulce de Leche from Court Street Grocers (Cobble Hill); Grapefruit & Smoked Salt Jam and Pickled Okra from Green Grape Provisions (Fort Greene)

Though it might sending Abe's flying out of my pocket, taking control of my diet has been one of the most liberating parts of living an 'adult' life. Finding myself near Chelsea Market, I stopped by and waded through the tourists to go to the fruit and vegetable store - expensive, but the quality is top notch. I picked up a mango, an asian pear and some figs -- fruits that I couldn't even dream of in Driscoll. And all in season and delicious.

In my little time here I've also dropped in on some great New York dining gems. My friend Pinsi and I visited the Brooklyn Pharmacy and Soda Fountain before indulging the in the cinematic buffoonery that is Hangover II. The Brooklyn Pharmacy is an adorable '50's style place for egg creams and cherry lime rickeys, done up with hipster flair (what else could you expect for Brookyln?). This morning, after a run with my roomie/brother-by-a-cappella Eben up to Gowanus, we undid all the exercise by making our destination Four and Twenty Blackbirds, an incredible place for, say, Salted Caramel Apple, Lavender Honey and Lemon Chess pies, baked fresh every morning. What a way to start the day. And of course, at the Mexican place around the corner, where a hunk-o'-burrito costs six bucks, you leave satiated, satisfied... and slightly gassy.

Here's to a summer of great food and wonderful finds! Stay tuned.

Caffeinated in the Caribbean

It never ends. After returning to the Purple Valley in January, I thought it would be a while before I would have any adventures to talk about. But apparently, there's always an expedition lurking around the corner. I recently returned from a week in the Dominican Republic: now sunburnt and satisfied, I recount to you the spoils from my wanderings...

Few people know, but I write for Gusto!, the campus gastromic society. For spring break, the gastronomes decided it was time that we really understood our food. Food is, of course, incredible... we can continue to talk about how delicious the black truffle oil is on this quiche or in that pasta, or how to make the perfect hoisin glaze for your pork this evening, but there is a growing consciousness that our food doesn't just grow on supermarket shelves: it comes from living, breathing, working communities. So, in hopes of exploring the process of farming and the ways it effects the people involved in it, Gusto! organized a trip to Finca Alta Gracia: a small-scale, fair-trade, organic coffee farm in the mountains of the Dominican Republic. The farm is owned my famous novelist Julia Alvarez and her husband. It is about an hour and a half away from the nearest big city (Santiago) and forty minutes away from the closest town (Jarabacoa), up in the tiny village of Los Marranitos (The Little Piglets), population 400.

10 foodies from all different walks of life converged on this rural farm last Saturday, huddled in a cold cabin in the mountains. Who said the Caribbean was warm? Headed by Deanna, a Middlebury graduate working as a volunteer in the community, we started a five day-long exploration of a community whose labors and lives can be found in our mugs every morning. Through our crazy experiences, not only did we get to have one of the most informative breaks ever, but I got to make 9 friends for life :)

Surrounded on all sides by glorious vegetation and idyllic mountainscapes, we were in nothing short of paradise. But even in this land up in the clouds, the workings of global capitalism has made its marks with the good, the bad and the ugly. Expecting a micro-farm handled by loving owners, we were instead met with one that had been incorporated into a large network of Dominican coffee farms owned by the Ramirez company. Turns out Bill and Julia just couldn't keep up with the maintenance sitting at home in the US.
The farm has maybe one full-time employee: all others are hired on a day-to-day basis. Workers show up at the farm's gate and if there's work, they get paid by the pound of coffee cherries. Preference goes to Haitian immigrants, since they will work at a lower wage. (So much for fair trade, huh?) Hardly any of the processing takes place on the farm -- after the beans are picked, they are taken to Jarabacoa for most of the processing. Beans from Finca Alta Gracia mainly go to Vermont to be packaged under the Cafe Alta Gracia label, certified organic and fair trade. Very little of the coffee actually stays inside the country.

With most of the work contractual and going to Haitians, the rate of unemployment among Dominican men reaches almost 100%. The community is supported entirely by the women, who work in cabanas: elegant country homes for Santo Domingo's rich elite. Rates of alcoholism among the jobless men are high. If theirs is a difficult plight, the Haitian men (many refugees from the earthquake) have it rough, too. Haitian workers live in a slum-like setting - a wooden dorm, built by the Ramirez, houses 80 of them, who all use one latrine.

The schooling in Los Marranitos only goes to third grade, with older kids having to walk to the high school in Los Dajaos over an hour away. School gets out at 12, leaving kids with nothing to do all afternoon. None of these towns have much electricity (what there is is solar-powered) and there is no running hot water for miles.

We spent three out of our five afternoons playing with the kids after school, singing songs, reading to them and teaching them about basic sanitation and the need to keep their community clean (with more back-and-forth taking place between Haiti and the DR, there is a real worry of a cholera outbreak). They really gave my Spanish and my stamina a run for their money. We played infinite games of Duck-Duck-Goose and cooked S'Mores on a gas stove. WTF is S'more in Spanish?

The first morning we were there, we attended a community meeting with Haitians that taught cholera prevention. Another morning, we attended a ceramics workshop with a Spanish woman who teaches the forgotten art of Taino pottery. (The Taino people were the indigenous people of the Dominican Republic who were almost completely wiped out by Columbus' men). She believes that art can be an invaluable tool for women: by taking ownership of an art form, women can derive empowerment through a creative outlet. The women we talked to, however, felt like they didn't have the time for it. They had a whole community to support.

When we were not learning about the wonderful community of Los Marranitos, we were off scurrying around the central DR. We went sit on rocks by a secluded river, trekked down to a waterfall that was featured in Jurassic Park, learned Bachata Merengue in the dark, got stuck in the back of our pickup truck in the pouring rain, hiked all the way to an old stone Taino settlement, explored the nearby town of Jarabacoa, sunbathed on the farm and took a starlit ride out to Manabao (I have never seen so many stars in my life -- the Big and Little Dippers were all up in my grill).

It was a five-day intense experience and it was life-changing. Coming out of IHP, I really felt like I was following up on some of the critical lessons I learned about community organization and local needs assessment. It also brought an incredible depth to an otherwise hedonistic interest in gastronomy. Our food comes from places where people live, fight and suffer. And it is important to know that. Think twice about labels like fair trade -- what does it actually mean? Very little can be done in five days, but most importantly, we learned and I for one am going to work hard to spread the message.

To Prim, Christine, Zara, Fiona, Brooke, Omer, Lily, April, Kim and Deanna: you guys are the best. I cannot remember having felt so refreshed in my life. MORE COFFEE, MORE GREEN BANANAS! For some awesome photos, check out the Williams Expedition Blog.



I left the group on Thursday to go to the beach on the Northern coast. What's a Spring Break in the Caribbean without A SPRING BREAK IN THE CARIBBEAN? I journeyed solo to the seaside surf town of Cabarete, where I checked into a hostel and parked my butt on the beach for two days getting my tan on, listening to music, eating Haagen-Dasz out of the carton and reading. I met a whole host of people: a PhD student at Georgia Tech who put the 'blond' in blond, two crazy Cornell kids on Spring Break, a beautiful Belgian girl who had been island-hopping for two months and a Norwegian girl who had been going kite-surfing every day for three weeks. In the course of the three days, I switched from English with the Americans, to Spanish with the Dominicans, to French with the Belgian girl to Portuguese with this dude who had spent time in Brazil. My brain was one crazy linguistic blur. A couple of mojitos cured that, though.


Before flying back to New York, I spent an afternoon walking around Santo Domingo, the capital of the DR and the oldest colonial city in the Americas. The colonial quarter is a little slice of Spain in the Caribbean: walking around the old buildings felt like I had been transported back to the 1600s when Columbus was running around the country with his men killing all the locals and instituting Spanish iron law everywhere he went... aaah, colonial history: why does it have to be so pretty?

I was welcomed back to the country with a romp through Manhattan with my boys Sam F and Malik!! Delicious breakfast sandwiches at No.7 Sub Shop, an escapade through the Museum of Sex and a whole lotta Chipotle in my tummy. Best morning ever? You betcha.

A Whole New World

It has been more than a week since I’ve returned to the States. At home with my sister, brother-in-law, two sick nephews, parents and a brother on the way today, I find myself contemplating this past semester and this past year as a whole. After all, with the new year looming, isn’t it natural?

2010 started at home in India. It took me to Georgia, back to the states, to Morocco and Spain, then back to the states, to Kuwait and then back to the states. To Brazil, South Africa, Vietnam and then back to the states one last time. I have lived out of a suitcase for the most part. My life took transience to new levels.

This past semester was a challenge. On the one hand, there was the feat of settling into a place and space within the short five weeks I had there; on the other, there was the constant battle to remain good-humored while dealing with the same 31 people day in and day out. There were definitely times when all I wanted to do was disappear. But now that I’m out on the other side and with the benefit of that tricky little phenomenon we call hindsight, I can’t help miss my constant travels. Though it might be a while until I begin to miss class time, I have already started to think longingly about the wind in my hair as I zoom by on the back of motorcycle through the streets of Hanoi, the countless glasses of Sauvignon Blanc in Cape Town and the kind of unsettlingly cheesy smell of pao de queijo in Sao Paulo. I did IHP because I needed a change of pace: a little taste of life outside of the purple bubble, where some people don’t own an article of J. Crew clothing, where people aren’t assumed to be liberal until proven otherwise, where dinner is always a great surprise. It certainly did the trick.

I’ve had three very different travel experiences over the course of the past year. I came out of each with some refreshing perspective. The hardest thing? It’s keeping that perspective while walking up and down the slopes of Mission Hill. If there’s one thing that this semester taught me (and it might go without saying, but it’s surprising how often we seem to forget it), it’s that there’s an ENTIRE WORLD outside of Williams. Everything that happens in that warped little Berkshire town has absolutely no impact on the greater globe and should not have an impact on you either. When I get back to college, I hope to devote myself more fully to the things and the people I love. My life is ultimately about me and I need to continue to make myself happy. For those of you who know my woeful tendencies at Williams, check back with me in a few months to see if I’ve kept my game up.

And so that concludes a year of travel. 12 months and 10 countries later, I’m headed back to Williams in less than 5 days. I’m excited to be settled, to be with the friends who I love and who have supported me over the past 7 months even in absence and to finally get back to Art History: I’VE MISSED YOU!

Down With The 'Rhea, Oh De-Ah!

So here we are in Hanoi, final destination and final frontier. I’m down with a case of the stomach woes so I’ve taken the day off and holed myself up in the favored IHP spot, Joma Café – an expat-run coffee shop furnished with a clean bathroom within easy access.

Apart from running a riot in my belly, Vietnam has treated us well. We have class in the Ho Chi Minh museum under the tutelage of a coordinator who has her s**t totally together. I have a wonderful, loving host family that gets incredible pleasure from seeing me and Andrew feasting on the spread every night. Also, the dong goes far, allowing us to live in a lap of luxury.

After having been the road for over six months, you’d expect me to suffering from at least some homesickness. Though I haven’t suffered from any heart-stopping yearning to be back at Williams or the U.S., I have found myself giving into the homegrown pleasures like eating a smoked salmon sandwich for lunch or going to see the new Harry Potter movie at the one English-language movie theater in all of Hanoi yesterday afternoon. I love being in Hanoi and I feel like I could be on the road forever, but I think it’ll be nice to settle down again with creature comforts like my own room, a closet to hang my clothes in, regularity to where and when I’m eating …

Last weekend, a group of us went to Halong Bay, one the most incredible natural wonders I have ever seen. Over 2000 limestone kersts rise from the water to make a haunting archipelago of islands, perfect for cruising along with friends for an entire weekend. We rocked the deck of the boat with karaoke and wine, the setting incredible, the company fabulous. That was an experience that will be etched into my mind forever.

Only two and a half more weeks to go. How’s that for a scary thought?

(Images courtesy of the magnificent Andrea Roman-Alfaro!)

Happy Happy Happy in Hanoi

Caught in a shroud of smog and incense, Cape Town is now set a distant time and place. With Vespas zooming by within a hair’s distance of my body and heaps of noodles being dished up at every corner, South Africa couldn’t seem any further away. And for the first time on this trip, I feel homesick – not for Kuwait, not really for India, not even for Williams, but for the glorious city of Cape Town. Hiking up Table Mountain might be strenuous and exhausting, but once you’re at the top, it’s nirvana: mountains and oceans come together in to find a city that is truly eternal.

The last week in South Africa was our one vacation over the course of the semester. I spent it in style, first heading to the glorious winelands followed by four days at a beachside apartment in the surfer’s village of Muizenberg. Camped out in the stunning university town of Stellenbosch, the wine country’s unofficial capital, I spent the first half of our holiday reveling in one long Bacchanal. From winery to winery, restaurant to amazing restaurant, I lived in a hedonist’s paradise. With friends in tow, we went to Paarl to muck around at the Taal monument, to Franschhoek to dine in delight and around Stellenbosch to discover its tranquil splendor. Pierre, an eighteen year-old French exchange student who was living with my first home stay family through his yearlong English program, had come to join us. With his boyish good looks and instant charm, he was an immediate hit with everyone – break just would not have been the same without this amiable Frenchman’s presence and his connoisseurship of wine and good food. I miss him and his lost puppy dog ways dearly already.

We spent the second half of the week lazing around an apartment and bumming around the beach. I got to do what I’ve always wanted to do in life: wake up early to get bread fresh out of the oven at the local bakery, pick up coffee and do yoga all before everyone else in the house had woken up. Over those four days, I cooked up a storm. Best creations? Maybe it was my Thai Ramen with chicken, shitake, baby corn and snow peas? Or possibly even some French Toast with melted Brie and blueberry coulis? Yeah, that’s what I’m talking about.

Four our last night in Cape Town, we went out with a bang. After having spent the day visiting with the penguins at Boulders Beach and then eating with the baboons at Cape Point, a bunch of us went to the Capetonian outpost of Nobu for a final celebratory dinner. Sitting on the eastbound flight the following morning, mere hours after saying goodbye to my Bo-Kaap host family, to Pierre and to Table Mountain, it was hard not to let my excitement get muddled up with the feeling that I had left something behind.

But Vietnam doesn’t allow for any sappy Eeyore-like pondering. Hanoi is has been amazing so far. As I sit under a fan, getting ready for bed in a mosquito net, I feel like I’m as close to be being back in India as I can get without actually being there. We spent the first few days in the Ancient Quarter of Hanoi where the hustle and bustle of nonstop activity had our senses abuzz. The best thing about Vietnam? The food, duh. Pho everywhere; noodles for every meal. Delicious Vietnamese coffee’s milky sweetness. It’s nothing short of amazing satisfaction.

Now if only I could be assured that I won’t get hit by a speeding motorcycle…

In Love With The Mother City: My Oedipal Complex

Looking out over the sweeping view of the city that the summit of Lion’s Head affords, I know that my eyes are drinking in every thing that is right with Cape Town. There’s the hipsterish Neighbourgoods Market held at Old Biscuit Mill in up-and-coming Woodstock every Saturday – it’s otherwise known as my idea of heaven. There are the soft, sandy beaches of Camps Bay hugged by the Twelve Apostles. There’s the verdant expanses of the Kirstenbosch Gardens displaying all the glorious flora the Western Cape has to offer. There’s the Company’s Garden to wile away the hours following the ducklings as they waddle across monuments and marigolds. There are countless great eats in breezy, open cafes and chichi froufrou restaurants. And then there’s Table Mountain: the one Godly presence that follows you everywhere in this breathtaking city.

Yes, I guess I’m in love. There are few other cities in the world that have so undoubtedly swept me off my feet. But of course, IHP doesn’t have you just frolick through a city for pure pleasure. They let you know what the problems are and they make you live it.

Despite Cape Town’s seductive beauty, it remains incredibly dangerous. Vestiges of apartheid keep people in desperate poverty and that has led to some of the highest crime rates in the world. Unfortunately, there have been plenty of uncomfortable run-ins to suggest that this is true (nothing awful, don’t worry – but some of us have come super-close to finding ourselves in trouble). One of the most pressing issues today is the stigma that is attached to the townships – areas designated for the blacks and coloreds* of South Africa to live under the apartheid government. In true IHP fashion, they have us living in a township for the second half of our Cape Town stay. I’m currently staying in Langa, the oldest township in Cape Town.

How can you blame the international community for misrepresenting life in the townships when South Africans themselves are so sheltered from the reality? After having only spent a few days here, you realize that ‘township’ is no synonym for ‘slum’. Yes, townships are prone to accruing informal settlements. But I am not staying in a shack. In fact, I live in a stunning three-bedroom one-storey house in which my host mother has fitted a surround-sound home entertainment system and a Jacuzzi tub. In no way is this the expected norm, but quality of life in the township can often rival that of inner-city dwellers. Unfortunately, it is these people who don’t come to the outskirts of town to see what life here is really like.

South Africa remains a very unequal society. But there are some obvious marks of a silver lining. South Africans, regardless of whether they are white, black, colored or Indian, can now all occupy the same public spaces – something that was unimaginable only sixteen years ago. Sitting at a bar on Long Street or at a bench on the V&A Waterfront, the most visited destination in all of Africa, you look past the lost-looking tourists to see a Cape Town that has hope. There might not be as many interracial mixing as one would look for in the ideal environment but it’s moving somewhere. We can only hope that time will heal the wounds… for my sake at least, because any city where you can see zebras on your daily commute into town needs to be the paradise it deserves to be.

Cape Town like Candy; The Buzz in Buenos Aires

Saying good-bye to Sao Paulo wasn’t hard. We were ready to move along. Nothing allowed me to wish it farewell better than a stop at the ballyhooed Biennial and popping Sonique. The Biennial, themed around the intersection of art and politics, was a sensory overload of art from all over the world housed in the never-ending layers of an Oscar Niemeyer building. Sonique, a bar-slash-club, kept the Lemongrass Martinis flowing and the Spicegirls playing. Z Carniceria is a mini-Meat Packing District: what was once a butcher’s is now a bar catering to the alternative hipster set, replete with meat still hanging from the ceilings. It is places like this that will make me miss Sao Paulo: the city is unbelievably grittysexycool. You need to peel away at some layers but you will finally get to something juicy. Maybe it’s a small store in Bixiga selling delicious pesto or a tiny pizza place on Rua Augusta with graffiti-covered walls and incredible slices – Sao Paulo will have you reeling at its hidden gems.

Our journey to Cape Town took us through the city of Buenos Aires. We had a twelve-hour layover and I wasn’t about to waste it. I cabbed it to Plaza de Mayo’s Casa Rosada to meet up with my darlings Emily and Kera, not just friends but sisters by a bond stronger than blood: a cappella. Streetphoria, Latin America edition, was on. Emily needed to go to a Bolivian festival out in the boonies for schoolwork so off we went on the rickety Subte to a far out part of the city where 65,000 people had gathered to celebrate the Virgin and the Bolivian community. Dancers, parades and different smells all came together in a complete inundation of the senses. After a guided romp through the festival, Emily’s coordinator was kind enough to drive me back to downtown Buenos Aires, pointing out the sites as we went along. We spoke in Spanish, but a month of Portuguese seemed always to get in the way. Once in Palermo, Emily and Kera were intent on giving me a quick taste of Argentina, since I had practically spent the entire day in Bolivia. They rushed me from empanadas to dulce de leche ice cream in a flash and boy, what an intensely phenomenal experience that was. But if there was one thing that made my race through the city worth it, it was being with two people that made me excited about Williams again. When I went back to share a cab ride with two people on my program to the airport in order to catch our 11:30PM flight to Cape Town, it turned out that they had left already, leaving me stranded in a city that I didn’t know without a peso to my name. Shocked, flustered and totally lost, I wouldn’t have known what to do without my friends. Emily and Kera handed me cash, hailed me a cab and got me on my way back to the airport. I owe them so much more than just the money they lent me. After over a month of resenting what waits for me back at Williams, they reminded me of a Williams that is a world of beautiful friends who will look out for me (and I them), no matter what.

In Cape Town now and life’s good. I’m living in the Bo-Kaap, a Muslim neighborhood of Cape Malays living in pastel-colored houses, just a couple of blocks up from the action of City Bowl. Table Mountain and the two oceans follow me wherever I go. The city is full of great eats (tons of breezy hipster cafes and restaurants to keep me satisfied), but the thing I drink in the most is the fresh ocean/mountain air. The colonial architecture, the imposing cloud-covered mountains and the crystal blue ocean are all enough to have seduced me for life.

Carioca Charisma, Porcine Paradise, Calming Curitiba and Flippin' Floripa

Steaming dumplings straight off the frying pan in Liberdade. Coffee and organic bread in Jardim Paulista. Graffitti art in Vila Madalena. Acai, passion fruit, guavas and star fruit at every turn. Wavy Niemeyer modernism on the streets and in the bends of downtown. Art and light at the Pinatoeca do Estado; Van Gogh, Renoir and Dali at the MASP. This is all that Sao Paulo has to offer.

No, it’s not a pretty city, but its tantalizing flavors keep me coming back for more. Unfortunately, this semester is not the hedonistic romp across the world that I secretly wanted it to be. With its highfalutin name, the International Honors Program takes itself pretty seriously. And that’s slightly inopportune for vagabond young souls like me who want to spend the semester goofing off in museums and cafes. The program does not leave you a second to breathe, with days jam-packed with lectures on politics, economics, development, urban planning, race relations and the list goes on endlessly. We spend hours discussing contentious contemporary issues, always wary about our stance as an outsider and always frustrated at our inability to access all corners of knowledge. The fact that there is so much going on means that the seams are often frayed and parts of the program are executed sloppily. At times it can all get a little exhausting, a little exasperating, a little claustrophobic… a little much. But though I often worry about the fact that I am traveling all around the world with a group of 31 students all affiliated with American institutions, I realized one thing today: that loving, caring atmosphere that I found at Williams is following me around uncomfortable situations across the globe and there’s a real value in that. It is quite the departure from my summer travels and I delight in knowing that I’ve dappled in two extremes.

I took a break from the hustle-and-bustle of Sao Paulo to visit what is arguably Brazil’s most iconic city: Rio de Janeiro. Nine of us piled into a bus at midnight to undertake the 6 hour-long journey to find shelter in the shadow of Cristo Redentor. We arrived Saturday morning to a rainy, overcast weekend. Was that going to stop us? Hell no. We put on our rain gear and headed out to the beach, welcomed into Christ’s open arms. We spent the morning running around Leblon and Ipanema before ducking into a café in Copacabana for some Irish coffee to warm our hearts up a little. We spent the afternoon eating Bahian food in a hut by the lake, the night in Lapa's bars drinking and playing games followed by clubs dancing to Carioca funky (imagine M.I.A on ‘roids). The next day it was to Sugar Loaf Mountain and the Ipanema beach hippie fair. One last walk by the Atlantic before we hopped back on a bus and came home to Sao Paulo for dinner. The image of Cristo Redentor swathed in a sheet of fog will be burned into my mind forever...

About ten days ago, the program took us to a site of the MST (Movimento dos Trabalhadores Rurais Sem Terra – The Movement of Landless Rural Workers). The MST is an organization in Brazil through which activists seize land from private owners of latifundias (large plots of land that stretch out for hectares and hectares) to allow the rural and urban poor to come farm the soil using sustainable techniques in a radical effort to redistribute resources in a highly unequal society. The encampent we visited was in the rural village of Itapeva, located in the south of Sao Paulo state. We arrived to a small community of dirt fields with basic lodging, a large pond and several agrovila settlements that had every thing from bakeries and pig farms to banana trees and pharmacies.

We even got to witness pig manure produce methane gas to power Our night in the village, replete with porcine company, caipirinhas and samba, brought our individual political ideologies to the forefront: dealing with a movement that stands on the far left is enough to bring out the most vehement of arguments. But we all left content, stomachs filled with rice and beans straight from the fields in the backyard and butts covered in dirt.

We moved on to the city of Curitiba in the state of Parana. Curitiba is supposedly world-renowned for its efficient transit systems, green spaces and waste management. Well… I had never heard of it. Curitiba is a buzzword for urban planners worldwide and its system of flood drainage and transport interconnectivity is a model for cities all across the globe. The classes we had might have been informative, but the best part of our Curitbano experience was our host family. Rob, Andrew and I got to live with Yara, her daughter Gabriella, her son Rafael, his wife Juliana and their six dogs. They were the warmest, most welcoming people I have met in a long, long while. They showed us around the city’s many beautiful parks, took us out drinking, sent us off to clubs, fed us happily and then drove Rob and I to a fantabulous weekend in Florianopolis, the magical island. Florianopolis is nothing short of amazing. I knew it was destined to be good when all Rafa played on the four- hour-drive down was a Glee medley. Beautiful beaches, palm trees everywhere, breathtaking panoramas, an expansive lake, dunes, amazing bars… yes, it was the winter and yes, it did rain, but it definitely did not stop our parade. We went out to a bar on Saturday and got the band to let us join in on their cover of “Save Tonight”. We spent a lazy Saturday afternoon walking the beach, eating fresh mussels and going out shopping in little island stores. Though we left early on Sunday, I still got to go do early morning sun salutations on Barra da Lagoa beach. The most unfortunate part of the trip? My camera was out of battery. Oh, and that now, I’m broke.

It’s now our last week in Brazil and there are a lot of different emotions surfacing among the group: restlessness, relief, happiness and sadness are all mixed in together. In such a tight group, it’s hard not to be confused about what you think. Personally, I am ready to move on, though I will miss this place dearly, just like I do any city I’ve spent a lot of time in. People who came to Brazil expecting an island paradise were disappointed – as they should be, since that Brazil exists only in the imaginations of tourists. Sao Paulo is a driven city of the future and I will think about its smorgasbord of delights for months to come.

One to Cape Town, with a brief 12-hour sojourn in Buenos Aires!

As Sweet As Sampa

"Why did I never back to Buenos Aires? Well, the air here smells so sweet"

That's one of the first things our local co-ordinator told us. Sao Paulo's six million cars emit fumes that smell like caramel due to the use of sugarcane ethanol as fuel. While this may evoke fantasies of a world where people burp rainbows and poop butterflies, Sao Paulo is no Never-Never Land. It's gritty. It's lurid. It's choked, jammed and piled up, layer upon layer. When people think Brazil, they think beach, Carnival and beautiful people. Sao Paulo, the world's third largest city and the largest city in the southern hemisphere, gives this image a run for its money. Its maze of streets and gray concrete, its oppressive crowds and its unbelievably fast pace, however, do not make this a city without soul by any means. This is one city that is alive.

After just a little more than a week in Brazil, I seem to have gotten a feel for Brazilian culture. What exactly is Brazilian culture, you ask? Funny: it is difficult not to draw up parallels with the US. Brazil, just like the US, is a country built on several waves of immigration. Interestingly enough, Sao Paulo is home to the largest Japanese and Lebanese communities outside of Japan and Lebanon respectively. When you ask, "What is Brazilian food like?", you are likely to receive an answer that strays away from staples such as feijoada and encompasses sushi, pizza and kebabs.

This diversity gives Sao Paulo an indescribable electricity. Whether you're chomping down on dumplings at the Sunday Street Fair in Liberdade or watching world whizz by on Avenida Paulista; whether you're sipping on coffee with the beau-monde at Rua Oscar Freire or ambling by the graffiti murals downtown, Sao Paulo is abuzz.

Notes on the vida brasileira:

1. The hardest cultural adjustment in Brazil? Toilet paper. In Brazil, toilet paper is not made to be dissolved in water and the water pipes are too narrow, so used toilet paper is discarded into wastepaper baskets rather than flushed down the toilet.

2. Caipirnhas, Brazil's national drink of lime juice, sugar and cachaca (sugarcane alcohol), are lethal. But caipiroskas, a bastardization that replaces cachaca with vodka, are much more to my taste. Especially with lychee or mango in them :P

3. It is absurd how much meat people eat here. They love their beef and sometimes, it's almost moo-ing.

4. Portuguese is a hard language to get your tongue around, but I'm getting there. In Brazilian Portuguese, 'Hi!' is 'Oi!' which is still difficult for me to wrap my head around (I still want to slap people for greeting me so 'rudely')

5. Passionfruit, guavas, pineapple and mango are as common here as apples, oranges and bananas anywhere else.

6. Sao Paulo is home to the Havaianas flagship store. Need I say more?

My home stay family is great. I share a room with a guy from my program in an apartment with my host mom and host brother (who is hardly ever around). My host mom is friendly and caring, but totally cool and hands-off, which allows us a lot of freedom. The apartment is in the upscale Jardim Paulista neighborhood, about a 15 minute bus-ride/45 minute walk from class, which is held at Mackenzie University (a private Presbyterian college). Class at IHP isn't really "class". Our days are filled with lectures and panels from experts in various fields and site visits. Most days run from 8:30AM to 5 or 6PM with an hour's allowance for lunch. There is very little sleep involved and very little rest. It's Go!Go!Go! all the time but somehow, this business is pleasant after a pretty lax summer. We've had lectures on race relations, immigration and Brazilian history so far -- all fascinating.

The stress of this program can be slightly debilitating and I found myself with an awful cold and ear infection last weekend. Thankfully a weekend in Rio cleared all of that up! (More on that later...)

Beijos do Brasil!

Put Your Hands Up For Detroit

Detroit is a city of overhaul. It is unlike any other city I have ever been to. The downtown area, rather than being a bustling hub of activity, is a deserted ghost town. All over the city (which is an expansive metropolitan area that could fit San Francisco, Manhattan and Boston in its parameters) there are abandoned houses in a state of disrepair. It is eerie. But over the past two weeks starting up IHP, I have learned there is hope yet for this city.

Two weeks ago, I started my semester abroad… in Detroit, Michigan. I am enrolled in a program entitled International Honors Program (IHP for short), Cities in the 21^st Century: People, Planning and Places. A group of 32 students and 4 faculty members travel to different cities across the globe to get a better understanding of how cities work. We are headed to Sao Paulo and Curitiba, Brazil; Cape Town, South Africa and Hanoi, Vietnam. The 32 students represent a large number of colleges and nations. This semester, I get the honor of working, learning and traveling with students from Wesleyan, Sarah Lawrence, Carelton, Wellesley, Trinity, Davidson, Brown, Middlebury, University of Michigan, Macalester, Yale, University of Pennsylvania, University of California Berkeley, Skidmore, Harvard and Barnard who come from the US, India, Nepal, Peru, South Korea, the Virgin Islands, Bangladesh and Mexico.

It’s been a full and testing two weeks. I’ve met a model-turned-restaurateur, heard Jay-Z and Eminem shake the streets of downtown, bought ice cream from a vendor behind bulletproof plastic, visited a vacant lot-turned-art installation, heard Grace Lee Boggs talk about activism and eaten great Greek food. Most importantly, however, is that I’ve gotten a chance to really get to know the peers who I will be adventuring with for the next three and a half months. It’s off to Brazil tomorrow and I’m ready for the ride.

New York No Work

New York makes me bleed. It makes me bleed money from my pores, day and night, filling in the cash registers of restaurants, bakeries and bars. Ever since I flew back from Kuwait a few weeks ago, the Big Apple has chewed out a sizeable chunk of my wallet’s reservoir. I continue to be amazed at the revelry this city inspires. And I continue to spend, filling up my stomach and emptying my cashbox.

I wasn’t very happy to leave the comfort of home, but if there’s one place I would want to go to drown myself in the happiness of company, laughter and food, it would be New York City. I

thought that somehow, I'd be immune to New York's seduction and pull. How wrong I was.

Where else can I spend a night drinking Tamarind Margaritas and chomping down on tacos with my girl Holly after getting off a 13-hour plane ride? Noho’s Hecho En Dumbo

is the neighborhood’s newest cooler-than-thou Mexican joint. I still had my sweaty travel clothes on and my backpack slung over my shoulder, but that didn’t stop me.

Where else do museums look this cool, with exhibitions that are so thought-provoking?

Where else can you sit at a cute coffee shop and then go shopping at Muji, Japan's leading brandless design store (which ironically has become a coveted brand in and of itself) while I wait for Yanie to take her sweet time getting to Manhattan from Joisey so that we can have lunch at Freemans, my favorite mellow hipster-central lunch locale?

Where else can you go to the inimitable MoMA to chill with Eve (who worked there) and Tommy while walking through exhibits loudly flaunting Williams ARTH101-102 expertise, following it up with an unmatchable noodle dinner at Rai Rai Ken when the wait at Momofuku around the corner is just way too long?

And where else can Tommy find a bar that would whip me up a Pomegranate Daiquiri? Where, might I ask?

Where else can you pack snacks for a car ride from Momofuku Milk Bar where David Chang's compost cookies and bagel bombs can keep you content for hours as you zoom along the highway? Where else is coffee, imported from the West Coast's Stumptown Coffee Roasters, this good?

Where else can you have a "Five-Dolla' Date" with Michelle from Whole Foods and then eat your spoils in Union Square? Where else can you find a place like Brooklyn Larder, where there's rich dark chocolate sorbet, hard-to-find-outside-of-Italy San Pelligrino citrus sodas and sea salt caramels all under one roof? Where else can you and Michelle go sit out in Prospect Park with a dulcimer singing "Paparazzi"?

Where else can you take a crash course in how to be a hipster anywhere other than Williamsburg, where Spoonbill & Sugartown Books teaches me about all things Foucauldian and forward and where chorizo tacos come out of a non-conformist truck? Where else can I get coffee from my favorite San Francisco roasters that will change the way I think about beans? Where else can I find Brooklyn-made chocolate in gorgeous wrappers and where can I find stores like OAK that will sell me cropped deconstructed jersey pants?

Where else can you buy a meal wrapped in banana leaves from a woman who doesn't speak English in Chinatown? Where else can you find cute gluten-free spelt-made cupcake stores? Where else can you get Grapefruit Margaritas at a painfully hip Chinese-Latino fusion bar in a shady corner of the Bowery? Where else can you catch ultra-mod theater at the Fringe Festival? And where the hell else can you go out with friends to a Jazz Club in Brooklyn's Flatbush and laugh endlessly over glass after glass of white while being enchanted by a singer who sounds just like Norah Jones?

The answer is to this endless string of questions is simple: New York has it all. Everything and anything that my heart desires. But most of all, this summer, it had my friends.

My endless love to Maya, Rachel, Tommy, Holly, Yanie, Michelle and Eileen! The time I spent at Rachel's grandpa's Upper East Side river apartment, Eileen's beautiful Jersey home, Maya's bangin' crib and Holly's Prospect Heights digs I will never forget.

ADDENDUM 1: Week at Williams

Rachel and I drove up to Billsville a couple of days after I got back from Kuwait, stocked with goodies courtesy of David Chang's genius. I ended up staying at Williams for over a week just being a (happy) bum surrounded by beautiful friends. Mornings at Tunnel City, evenings with dinner from Sushi Thai or Chopsticks and group forays into Bennington for meals at the Blue Benn Diner and the Rattlesnake Café: that’s the Williamstown summer lifestyle. We had movie marathons with screenings of Mean Girls and Mulan and many lazy, dozy days under the sun. We reveled in picnics at Williamstown’s Sundays at Six (at four) and seats at Summer Theater Lab’s “Viva la Evolucion!” (a sneak peak at a New York Fringe festival show with a Cuban-meets-Fruit Loops flavor). More generally: good times with good friends in a setting that kept me almost deliriously happy in the summer sunshine. Impromptu parties were always popping up around bottles of wine or tubs of hummus. I almost forgot for a minute how messed up Williams can be during the academic year and in my state of bliss, I questioned my desire to study abroad (Don’t worry: I quickly snapped myself out of it). I ended the week with a trip down to Rockland County, New York with Amanda, Madeleine and Vanessa. We spent an afternoon at Woodbury Commons, a night at Amanda’s with delicious Puerto Rican food and a morning in the town of Nyack.

ADDENDUM 2:

I've spent most of the past week in the suburbs of DC with my sister and her two little 'uns being uncle-extraordinaire. I have now read Curious George Rides The Train a total of 4 times and the Cat in the Hat at least 3 times. I know that if you poop in the toilet, you're rewarded with chocolate ice-cream but a simple peeing only gets you a lollipop. I now know the answer to anything is "Why?" and that Goldilocks is the flag bearer for all things rude. I've also learned that music in its immaculate form constitutes Twinkle Twinkle and the Macarena. I come out of this truly cultured.