picked at random at the library... 

Hurray that Maeve Binchy has not retired! 

A Fortune Teller Told Me part 2

I found this book oddly compelling. Having now finished it and absorbed the places the author visited and people he met, I have a few more quotes to share.

This one really sums up the dissonance the author feels. He has just been told a somewhat dubious yet magical story of a young woman who through her clairvoyance was able to find a historical temple some two hours into an overgrown jungle:

"I could not bring myself to ask him what I did not want others to ask me: 'Do you believe it, then?' If he had said yes, I would have taken him for a fool. If he had said no, I would have been sorry, because it is, all said and done, more pleasing to live with the thought that such a story might be true." (p175)

Near the end of the book, Terzani learns to meditate as many during the year have advised him to attempt. He really struggles, especially having trouble with clearing his mind. Finally he has a breakthrough, really achieves a state of calm peacefulness:

"This experience reinforced my theory that our exclusive faith in science had cut us Westerners off from another sphere of awareness, that we had embarked on the high road of scientific knowledge and forgotten all the other paths we had once known. Here was the proof: pain was not merely a physical phenomenon to be controlled by a pill. By training the mind one could achieve the same result." (p362-3)

And this one pretty much sums it all up:

"It seemed to me that the point of traveling is in the journey itself, not in the arrival; and similarly in the occult what counts is the search, the asking of questions, not the answers found in the cracks of a bone or the lines in your palm. In the end, it is always we ourselves who give the answer." (p318)

Following Fake Man

Emily recommends... and I agree! I read probably more than my share of children's literature so let me say this is a highly enjoyable book. Meant for 10 and up, Following Fake Man is the story of a 12-year old boy finding bravery for the first time in his life, and reaping great rewards. It also has good stuff for kids like spying and suspense!

A Fortune-Teller Told Me

Thought-provoking. Tiziano Terzani has written a great book. A Fortune Teller Told Me is his personal journey between the 2 sides of himself - his Western skeptical side (he is Italian by birth) and his increasingly Eastern half (he has lived in various parts of Asia since the 1970s). A fortune-teller in 1976 tells him in 1993 he must not travel in any planes for the whole year. He decides when the year arrives to heed that advice, partly as an experiment in looking at the world from a new perspective (as a journalist he is constantly hopping on planes to write stories) and partly to explore the parts of himself that wonder if there is any truth to the prediction.

Terzani is full of big thoughts and slowing down to travel by train, bus, taxi, etc. he sees a different world he has been missing by rushing around. I am only about a third of the way through the book and have already marked several pages that have memorable quotes. Here are a few. And thanks Eden for lending it to me!!

"Or have we all, through some monstrous deformation, lost the instinct for what life should be: first and foremost, an opportunity to be happy. Are the inhabitants (of rural Burma he refers here) happier today, gathered in families chatting over supper, or will they be happier when they too spend their evenings mute and stupefied in front of a television screen?" (p55)

"Is there such a thing as chance? I was coming to believe that a lot of what seems to happen 'by chance' is in fact our own doing: once we look at the world through different glasses we see things which previously escaped us, and which we therefore believed to be non-existent. Chance, in short, is ourselves." (p78)

"Travel is an art, and one must practice it in a relaxed way, with passion, with love." (p109)

Frommer's Toronto 2005

My favorite guidebook - if Toronto is in your future, I recommend this guide. Good maps, useful recommendations, well organized.

Sleeping Over

Not what I expected...

I expected Sleeping Over to be a bit of brain candy, a light, fluffy, romance novel. And while it does have its share of romance it is more the story of the women, the friends in the book and their lives, good, bad and ugly. Some parts are so realistic you think you're there. Honestly I don't know if it's because I live in a house with men (my husband & son) but I found this scene amusing:

Harrison and I rush up the stairs to his condo, pained expressions on our faces.

"Me first!" yells my beloved, throwing off his coat as he hurries down the hall, leaving me pacing and sweating in the living room.

"Hurry up, mister, or you're in big trouble!" I yell after him.

We've just returned from dinner with Mark and Gemma at Geja's on Armitage, truly one of the best places in Chicago. A dark quiet boite with the feel of an old wine cellar, Geja's has been doing proper fondue for ages, and the classical guitarist accompanying the delicious food makes it one of the ultimate romantic meals of all time. Unfortunately for us, we had much wine and water with the meal, and coffee after, and then got stuck in traffic on the way home, so by the time we got here, we both had to pee something fierce. (p245)

A Trip to the Beach

Reading this book made it clear to me that I am not a risk taker. A Trip to the Beach: Living on Island Time in the Caribbean chronicles Melinda and Robert Blanchard's life as they decide to sell their home in Vermont and build a restaurant on the beach in Anguilla. They have no experience building or running a restaurant but that does not deter them. (I am the opposite - I can't even go to the grocery store without a list and a plan!!) I enjoyed hearing how they transitioned to "island time" and the way the community in Anguilla embraced them.

A bonus is that the book is peppered with recipes including this one I am excited to try.

"Banana Cabanas

"To make two banana cabanas, put 1/2 cup Coco Lopez into a blender. Add 1/2 cup Baileys Irish Cream, 2 ripe bananas, 2 cups ice cubes, and if you like, 2 ounces white rum. It's great with or without the rum. Blend on high speed until smooth and creamy."

Books to Read

Once again my to-be-read pile is getting higher than my return-to-the-library pile. Too busy traveling and hosting parties!!

Here are few interesting books I hope to get my hands on.

Jonathan Safran Foer's Everything is Illuminated and Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close.

Elaine Weiss' Surviving Domestic Violence: Voices of Women Who Broke Free.

Amy & David Goodman's The Exception to the Rulers - big fan of the radio show Democracy Now- listened often in Houston on KPFT. (In the late 90s I read everything I could get my hands on about the conglomeration of power in the media in the US (best on the subject are Ben Bagdikian's The Media Monopoly and Project Censored's annual Top 25 Censored Stories of the Year books) and changed my viewing and listening habits accordingly. Only a handful of companies control everything you see and hear - support independent media!)

Laura Flanders, editor The W Effect: Bush's War on Women.

How to cook a tart

I just finished How to Cook a Tart: A Novel by Nina Killham - an entertaining read. Hard to characterize though - not quite a romance, not altogether a revenge story, not quite a comedy (though parts are laugh-out-loud funny), not a cookbook though it is rife with food. The characters are 3-dimensional (so is the food) but it's almost as if it takes place in an alternate universe where food is text and not subtext. Obviously food is everywhere in our lives, and plays a big role for all of us - but in this book, attitudes about food and everyone's relationship with food is the central-most part of their character. An interesting way to look at the world.

The descriptions of food and recipes being prepared are very realistic!! The food as metaphor works well also. Here is a passage I particularly enjoyed:

It was all about absorption, Jasmine thought. In cooking as in life, the more you absorbed of life and the world and flavors around you, the richer you would be. The better tasting you would be philosophically. But Jasmine had been careless. At the last minute, unsure of herself, she had sprinkled in too much salt. Maybe in life she had been careless too. Maybe she had not absorbed enough of what was going on in her own household. Maybe someone close to her was simmering with troubles and she had tossed in too much salt. Instead of testing and tasting and finding out what was really going on.