Lausanne: A Beautiful Place to Get Lost

This is a wonderful city. While I am excited to see Basel, I am quite sad to leave Lausanne. I think that, throughout all of the places I have visited outside the US in my life, the only two cities so far in which I would truly want to live are Amsterdam and Lausanne. Lake Geneva and the Alps are simply gorgeous. The first night I was here, my host cooked dinner for me and afterwards we went out for a beer at a local brewpub. I had a great ginger beer there, and we talked about her research in psychology and my studies in religion and history. The next day, I rented a bike (!) and cycled and hiked up in the mountains to the East through...wait for it....vineyards! They were beautiful. I actually got lost for quite a while (I think I biked/hiked a total of about 15 km?), but I really didn´t mind in that beautiful setting, amidst the vineyards looking out over the vines onto small Swiss towns, the lake and France and the French Alps on the other side. I stopped at a couple of wineries and tasted and bought their wine. Here they grow a grape called Chasselas that is native to here. It is a semi-dry to dry wine with a decent body and fairly prominent acidity. I really liked it. It comprises something like 75% of all the wine made here, with Pinot Noir a distant second at like 12%. Then, I met up with two other couchsurfers (one from Deutshchland/California and the other from right here in Lausanne) and we went to a park, then I went home for a quiet night in by myself. I decided to spend a third night in Lausanne, changing my plans, and my host graciously welcomed me for a third night without a second thought. Her name is Ute and she actually grew up in the DDR in Dresden, and the wall fell when she was about 8 or 9 I think. She was fantastic. Not only did she cook for me the first night, but the third night, when the plans I had made with the other two couchsurfers fell through, the only one who followed through accompanied me to Ute´s apartment and she cooked for both of us! We shared a couple of bottles of wine and talked late into the night over Swiss Pinot Noir and cigarettes. Quite a great visit. I am sad to leave this great place, and this great host. If ever anyone who reads this goes to Switzerland, visit Lausanne.
Also, join couchsurfing! I have only great things to report, almost halfway through my trip.
See you in Basel oder Deutschland!

A Brighter Shade of Melancholy

Belgian Beer and
Dutch Cigars
in Switzerland
spells:
LUCKY.
This word tastes better than
PRIVILEGED,
but I feel OK about using it,
I hear that language is malleable,
constant flux
and all that.
But sometimes, happiness courses through your veins
like molten sapphire,
obliterating even the
innermost guilt,
and you cant but help
to smile at the world
and all thats in it.

Milano, Pt. 2

Yesterday was quite amazing to say the least. I'm increasingly aware that, unless I spent about 20% of my waking hours in Europe at a computer, I'm going to have to leave a lot out, so I'll just hit the high points. I was invited to lunch--for all our loyal readers, it was the very same lunch I truncated my post yesterday to attend--at my couch surfing host's brothers condo north of Milano. It turns out that my host, Daniele, chose to host me in no small part because my CS profile says I was born in Wisconsin! His sister-in-law is from Wisconsin, and actually spent two years in Appleton when she was a kid! So my presence at lunch was a surprise for her, and one for which she was clearly quite grateful. She moved to Milano with her husband about a year ago, and, living north of the city relative isolation and speaking only the most basic Italian, she is understandably a bit lonely. So we shared a delicious lunch of pasta with pesto, bread, mozzarella, tomato and fresh basil, and delicious wine! I had both a Bonarda and a Barbera...that were frizzante! Even though we sell a sparkling shiraz at The Wine Thief, I had never tried it, so these were my first sparkling red wines. I have to say, I really enjoyed them. After that, one of my host's friends from his job offered to show me around the city. We went to the Duomo, two parks (Simpiore and Venezia...I think), and the Castle Sforza, built by the great merchant family of the same name during the renaissance. Later on, we went to meet up with Daniele and some of his friends for a drink and some food. He wanted to introduce me to the Milano Apertivo, where you pay for a drink and endulge in a huge smorgasboard of food for free after the purchase of a drink. Sadly, it was all gone when I arrived, but I had what was I think the best barfood I've ever eaten: brie, prosciutto and tomato on an olive and basil foccacia and only five euros!....mmmmm. Also, the mojito was fantastic, and the setting and company were even better. The bar was called The Art Factory, with a lot of modern art (my art history terminology is woefully unexacting) and mirrors everywhere. Also, it was a beautiful night so many people were outside, and we frequently stepped out for a cigarette or a cigarillo. I met a lot of Daniele's friends from university, as well as some of his friends from his link with the exchange program Erasmus (a link that Im still not quite sure what exactly it is...). I met a young woman named Helene from Belgium who is working on her PhD in medieval studies! Although she focuses on medieval literature and public readings as opposed to straight up history, we had a long and, well, for us anyways, fascinating conversation...that would bore most people to deat. Still, it was fun. I also met a girl named Perrine from Avignon who is going to be published in Science! I could hardly believe it, but she helped with research on some article about yogurt...so she gets her name in Science. Damn. Then, shortly after midnight, we got in a car and drove to the university where Daniele and his friends had studied, and where many of the Erasmus students were currently studying. We had some rum and coke in the bottle, and then there was a huge bucket of sangria from which everyone helped themselves. It was great. I met a friendly Italian guy named Marco with whom I drunkenly ranted about how the US had blown it against Brazil in the Confederations Cup, and an aspiring environmental engineer from Milano named Anna with whom I comiserated about America's dismal environmental legislation and the urgent need for attention to climate change. Finally, as the party was winding down...well sort of, a bunch of people jumped in the car and went to this club on the southside of Milano called Karma. My host, however, was rather tired, so he took someone home on his motorbike, and then just came to pick me up at the club before I went it. It was probably for the best though, as the cover was 15 euros, and in Italia, you dont go out to the clubs until about 2, and you don't come back until 5....I was not exactly in the mood to drink and dance until dawn and then try to navigate my way back to Daniele's apartment drunk and exhausted by myself.
Still, all in all, a great night.

Milano, Pt. 1

My first leg of couchsurfing is underway. Friday morning I said goodbye to my aunt, uncle, cousins and their kids then again to my parents at the trainstation at Camucia-Cortona. I spent the afternoon in Firenze, walking around, admiring the Duomo again, and eating delicious gelato at Perche No! There, I bumped into two girls from Wesleyan who, when I asked what I should do with the remaining 75 minutes before my train left, advised me to go to a library around there. It was really nice, for one thing, it was AIRCONDITIONED. For another, there was a beautiful terrace with a view of the Duomo.
I left Florence an hour late after missing my train :-/ and arrived in Milano at about 730. I took the metro almost to the end of the line, where my gracious host Daniele picked me up on his motorbike. We spent the evening in with some of his friends eating pizza. It was fun, but I certainly felt the foreigner as they were mostly speaking Italian, and I was thus oblivious. There was also one tense interaction in which I got into a verbal tiff with one of Daniele's friends. I brought in a bottle of Prosecco as a gift for my host, when Daniele was not in the room, and he made some comment, in English, to the effect of 'oh you are trying to poison us with that stuff, gross.' Needless to say, I was rather taken aback that he had insulted my gift. What insued, I did not expect; we ended up having a veritable battle of wine knowledge in which we debated good versus bad Italian wines, and whether or not DOCG appelation controls mean anything. In the end, he backed off from his insult, without actually conceding that I was right, and we never came to blows, so that was good! Ha, one night here, and already got into an argument with someone from Milano, hope today is a bit more relaxed....though I doubt there will be more English spoken.
Unfortunately, I know have to get going for lunch, but will write more soon!
Ciao

Rural Tuscany

The ceiling of the
living
dining
sitting
room
is stratospheric. Well,
maybe exospheric,
it depends, I guess.

The cyprus stand like shady sentinels,
while the flowing fields
of sunflowers ripple and burn in gold.

And the eyes of
their sun warmed faces
are deep and kind,
they shine with a certainty
that everyone here knows,
Jesus is really and truly inside
the bread is always unsalted,
something about a fifteenth-century tax
abd pride
and tradition.

Roma Pt. 2

I need to be on a train to Tuscany here in just about an hour, and although I am looking forward to being there, I will nonetheless be sad to leave Roma. My first couchsurfing friend, Roberto, was such a wonderful friend to show me around the city. On Friday, I joined he and his cousin from Milano out at a club for a bit. The first one we tried had too long of a line, so we then went to an outdoor club that is right on the Circus Maximus! The cover is free until 2am (they go out WAY later here, stay out till 4 or 5 usually) so we didn't have to pay. We didn't stay too long, and actually left just a little before 2, but I once again had a great time talking with Roberto and his cousin. The sightseeing was, as always, amazing. I saw St Peter's, the Sistine Chapel, and the Vatican Museum which, altogether, probably took about 6 hours. Last night I had a couple of missed connections with couchsurfing people, so I ended up just staying around the hotel and having an espresso and a cigar on the Piazza Santa Maria Maggiore. Then, however, someone from CS did get in touch with me; his name was Luis and he was a really nice guy who was originally from Bolivia but has been living and studying in Brussels for a year or so. We just had one drink at the local bar/club (which caters mostly to the tourists at the hostel and hotel nearby), then walked all the way to the Colosseum looking for another bar or club....finding none. So we just walked back around 2, and he left. However, right before he did we bumped into some wasted Irish guys, asking frantically for a bar pub or club as though they were inquiring about an injured family memeber. Turns out, they were all cousins and were in town for a wedding. Luis bid me farewell and we exchanged a knowing smile as we watched the Irishmen stumble their way up to follow me. I showed them the bar right near my hotel, and, thinking I would turn away to go to bed, I was practically forced down into the basement to have a drink with them. It became immediately apparent that conversation down by the dancefloor was utterly impossible, so I went back upstairs to the outside patio (basically the sidewalk) with one of two of them (I think there were 6 of them in all). There, we met two girls from Norway who spoke the most fluent English I've heard from a European since arriving. They were FAR more sober, so I ended up mostly talking with them, as we watched the wedding party (most of whom were probably 19) get increasingly mashed, and eventually, thrown out. Then, after being teased about not being drunk on my last night in Rome by the bartender, I finally went back to the hotel at about 4am....at which time I woke my parents up.
AH! TRAIN! I have to run.

"Yawp," In The Literature Of The Northern English Diaspora, Uses, and Misuses, Of

I write a very relevant academic article.
While smoking a cigarette
while sitting on my hands (which is hard, and impressive)
while the fiery barber tries to
carve his name into the back of my head
without me noticing.
But now, now I have to go
to a conference about Africa
in Chicago. "Achebe, yes, yes
and....yes, yes" we agree.
But then my confidence is shattered
as the tenured snicker and sneer
"Heeeere's Johnny!" behind me.
But underneath the scalp named
"Johnny is the MAN!"
the overfed brain hoos and hums and
grapples violently with
itself, like a crazed mime,
dressed all in black, chalktone facepaint
muddled, dirty.

Roma, Pt. 1

I have spent one night in Roma, with two more to go.
I am already thinking of what I want to do when I get back.
Thus far, my time here has been simply awesome. Although my parents get on my nerves now and again, traveling with them has been really nice (and, you know, its always nice to have someone else say "Oh yeah sure, we should take that guided tour! Ill pay!"). Our first day, we arrived at 8:30 AM and, without having slept, I somehow stayed up until 2AM. We didnt really do much of the obligatory sightseeing that day, just taking care of logistics. Checked into the hotel, found the closest ATM (scusi, Bancomat, gotta get used to that again), and I got an Italian mobile phone! Then we had dinner at a wonderful Pizzeria called Dar Poeta on a recommendation from a friend. It was a bit of a walk (4 km maybe?), but well worth it. The house wine was pretty good...and €4 per half liter. The pizza was delicious, and equally affordable....I hate to say it, but Il Calesse, the wonderful pizzeria I went to in Venezia with Josh and Matt, might come in second after Dar Poeta; sorry Veneto, Lazio FTW.
After about 2/3 of a bottle of wine at dinner, I was feeling pretty good. But it was the night that was to follow dinner that I really will never forget. I called someone I had messaged from Couchsurfing and we agreed to go out for a drink after he finished eating, around 10:30. He came to pick me up on his motorbike and we rode aruond the city for a bit. It was both thrilling and enthralling, like a bikeride I didnt have to bike! He pointed out some of his favorite spots and we got off to walk around and chat for a bit. Finally, he took me down to one of his favorite areas on the banks of the Tiber and we had a beer.....yeah, I had an Affligem Rouge, again, if anyone but me cares what kind ^__^ I truly enjoyed having a drink with Roberto, we talked about everything from Italian hitory, to medical school, to (naturally following medical school) health carei in Italy vs. America, to the future of the European Union. Afterwards, when he was bringing me back to the hotel on his motorbike, he paused at an intersection and said "I have an idea." He showed me how to jump the fence around the Basilica of Maxentius (well, or Constantine, since he killed Maxentius at Milvian Bridge and finished the job himself), then we climbed the scaffolding, and finally we ascended the 1700 year old spiral staircase up to the roof. Looking out at Rome at 1:30 in the morning, on top of the massive temple that Constantine finished after he ascended to the throne of the Roman Emperor was something that I will never forget. We chatted for a little while longer while admiring the view (or rather views, as every direction offered a different, but equally stunning visage, though the view of the Roman Colosseum was probably my favorite) before finally climbing down.
Today my parents and I did a lot of the obligatory sightseeing which, despite its obligatory "if you go you have to see____" nature, was still astounding. We saw the Colosseum up close, the ruins of the Roman Forum, The Pantheon, St. Peters Basilica at the Vatican, and the Trevi Fountain. Though they were certainly breathtaking structures (ha, while looking up at the Roman Colosseum, my dad remarked, "it certainly illustrates the aesthetic notion of 'the sublime' perfectly," and my mom just scoffed at him ^_^), and there are tons of more beautiful buildings to see, the few minutes I spent atop Maxentius/Constantine's Basilica was doubtless the most remarkable moment of the trip, and one which I think bodes well for my future couchsurfing experiences in Europe.
Now, I'm going next door to shop for wine.

Couch Surfing....Sweet? Sweet! Sweet...Sweet?

Well, I'm ALMOST done planning my travels in Europe....almost. I have found hosts on couchsurfing.org for 12 out of the 17 nights I'll be traveling on my own. I'm actually really thrilled to meet all of the people who are hosting me!....and almost equally terrified that some of them will fall through. Still, I think the risk/reward analysis for me levels pretty heavily on the reward side, so I'm more excited than I am scared, and most cities seem to have pretty good SOS message boards to couch-ify those in desperate need. I'd just, ya know, prefer not to find myself in desperate need.
In other news, I went cycling today for a while on the CE trail, my old favorite bike path before I came to Mac and discovered the Glorious Greenway. Still, I like the CE trail.
In other news, I've spent the past 3 hours trying to network with couch surfers (with some success) and I'm exhausted.
In other news, bed.

Wafting

I evaporate—
diffuse into open air
spread wider than the sun.

I love the vapors.
Steam, lapping the rim of my coffee mug,
caught transparent in the bright hope of morning.

Smoke trailing from the tip of a cigarette at night,
slender and smooth as the beautiful fingers that hold it,
soft and sensual, smoke from burgundy lips.

I watch billows of cigar-smoke slowly escape my mouth,
and feel that I am a cauldron,

and bathe in the smoke of breath from
all my sisters and brothers,
day in, day out.

All the sages and all the prophets,
false and true,
bathed in and drank of this same breath
I find here at my bedside.

But I will not talk of the end
with pride of secret knowledge,
as though forecasting horses or stocks.

We drink the sky by moments,
and leave plenty after us.

The Time Everything Went Wrong Or At Least We Thought It Did

For one thing, this Canadian whiskey is
way too fucking sweet.
But for me, he was out of Bourbon
and time. And for another thing,
the expressions on the faces of
all the ancient Gods
that are packed away in boxes in the truck
seem sad and full of pity. Didn't they used to be
noble and unstoppable? Like immutable doves?
Like Godward mountains?
But then, to be fair,
the movers took the mountains last week,
"just the bare necessities" they said.
So I find myself with a coffeepot, an automobile muffler,
three pairs of woolen socks
and a gun
and Canadian whiskey,
in a box next to me, when I'm
sitting cross-legged on hardwood floor
with ten feet of free in each direction
before bright white walls.
The painters were here last week.
I asked for "Eggshell,"
"Eggshell !" I shouted, but
they just painted "void."

Michigan (Part 1) or A True Story, Seriously, This IS A Blog Post! or The Giant Robot vs. The Über-Mosquito (Part 1!?)

Out somewhere on a trail in the West-Central Michiganian woods
I couldn't hear another human being. My cell phone was off, not that it would have mattered. I sat on a log where the sun broke through the canopy. Across the path, I noticed a Monster Energy Drink can left upside down on a tree branch
and frowned. I walked over to remove the can, and when I did, there were two fuzzy caterpillars inside. I actually felt bad, because
c'mon, if you're a caterpillar, you're not gonna find a better bird defense than
MONSTER ENERGY DRINK.
Who would have thought?
Not me.
I sat back on my log (it is my log now, finders keepers) and watched a spider bump into an ant; they frightened one another and scurried in opposite directions. Then the spider spun a web, and I wished that somehow we could collaborate to
kill all these damn mosquitos.
Then I saw the Über-Mosquito, and we had a showdown.
It was a draw. He left, so I spent a while pretending that I was a giant robot and the mosquitos were fighter planes trying hopelessly to defend their beloved Earth from rapacious alien might.
Then I wondered when the last time was that I couldn't hear or see human life.
Then I heard a plane and frowned.
Then I wondered if my tone wasn't conversational enough, too monologuesque (monologuey?), then wondered why or if it mattered, then wondered if this counts as poetry, but decided that it was, perhaps, not exacting, pithy, or polished enough to be poetry, and thus probably prose.
He is back! The Über-Mosquito! (A technical term)
He is large and very fast, so fast it is hard to tell that he is even a mosquito at all.
I leap to my feet and we have a battle so intense it requires
a shift to the present tense. After darting, feinting, bobbing and weaving, I finally land a solid swipe of my small, black-leather notebook to his backside (well, at least I think it was his backside) and the Über-Mosquito goes careening off into the distance--but I'm sure he isn't finished.
There will probably be a sequel.
BUT THEN! A WASP! He landed on my leg and in an instant I'd stamped him into the crisp brown leaves below. False ending; I guess the Über-Mosquito was just the second in command. But now, the dastardly plot of Wasp and Über-Mosquito has been crushed. The Giant Robot is the hero.
There'll be no sequel.
(Cut to shot of Über-Mosquito looking menacing, ominous music, fade to black).

The Ether is Real

Last night I dreamt that I could fly
like in the old days,
when gravity didn't tether me quite so tight
and the tips of my toes would barely brush the blacktop
and the feeling of being alive would
shoot through me like so many arrows,
and the mortar that held my soul
to my body was as solid and sound
as that which holds my hearth.
And as real.
When I felt as light and as brave
as the city finch that hops to my feet.

And I awoke and filtered these things
through the years and through myself,
and found each to be as true today,
with as much empirical reality
as the dirty dishes in my kitchen sink.

Happy Fourth of July

So I spent my Fourth of July alone and didn't see any fireworks at all;
it was awesome. My grandparents both went to my grandfather's opera. He composed and conducted it and my grandmother wrote the libretto for it and gave a short introduction, contextualizing the opera (it's based on the Hebrew Bible story of Ruth). I went to see it last night, and had previously seen it when it first premiered when I was in high school (2003?), so I stayed at the lakehouse. After a day of biking, reading and writing in the woods, I spent my Fourth of July evening alone on the shore of Lake Michigan with a glass of red wine (a 2006 Washington State Cabernet Sauvignon, if anyone else cares ^_^), cheese, crackers, and chocolate. I split my time between watching the sunset over the lake and reading a book--one which I actually just started today--about the need to contextualize the all too often self-contained American historical narrative within a broader view of international history. At one point, I think it was after reading the line "The raw materials of history rarely stop at borders. The nation cannot be its own context. No less than the neutron or the cell, it must be studied in a framework larger than itself." I exclaimed aloud "Yes." Then, I looked up to see the sky awash in pink and red, to which I responded aloud with an equally visceral, "Yes."
Happy Fourth of July? Yes.

Twenty-Seven Tips for Better Living

Yeah man, see, that's the thing about traveling right after heart-wrenching-stomach-dropping goodbyes, too much time to think when you least expect-most need it.
Existential angst doesn't sit well with honey roasted nuts and crying babies, plus the stewardess looks at you funny
when you ask for horse tranquilizers with your complimentary Sprite, but you shouldn't be having that stuff when you're in this state anyways (the state of travel I mean), that stuff screws with your homeostasis, or so I read/heard/thought. I mean, cheap $9 airplane Chardonnay; fine. But with Sprite, the carbonation sends that corn syrup straight to your brain and you start thinking too fast, and you realize how the geological time scale weighs on your every move and crunches your whispered hopes of immortality
like a carpenter ant under a paper towel under your thumb.
And then you get depressed. I mean real bad man, real bad. Not like "oh shit, I suddenly see the crossroads I've just passed and recognize all at once my impotence in the face of regrets and sudden death" depressed. I mean real bad. I mean "third drivers test failure in as many weeks, spilled punch on your new dress at homecoming, C- in Algebra II" depressed, "LA Clippers fan for life" depressed, "the CD playing in the restaurant stuck on repeat and you're the only person who seems to notice the 79 solid minutes of a purely instrumental rendition of "Can't Take My Eyes Off of You" depressed.
No, you don't want that kind of depressed, but don't worry, just follow these simple instructions:
First and foremost, don't drink the Sprite. Don't drink the water, filter the water, then drink the water (it doesn't matter whether or not you know what you're filtering out, just do it), take deep breaths, chew with your mouth closed, don't mix alcohol with
horse tranquilizers, have another Chardonnay, pretend to care about the vintage, but be nice to the stewardess, she's had a long day, call your mother, don't litter, make cute faces at the babies even though they are crying so much it makes you almost like the Clippers, don't overdo it, stop making that face, don't talk to strangers, fight the power, but pay your bills on time, sit still while we're talking to you, wear your seatbelt, wear sunscreen, don't wear flipflops, they're unbecoming, smile in the face of adversity, don't put your elbows on the table, sing in the shower, take the blue pill (but make sure it isn't a horse tranquilizer first, you've had a lot of Chardonnay you know), laugh at yourself, laugh at everything.*


*Should you find yourself in a tough spot in which these instructions are not at the moment readily accessible, please disregard the first 25 instructions.

America.

There is a heinous superabundance of coffee mugs.
Mickey Mouse, Minnie Mouse, I'd Rather Be Golfing,
My _____ went to _____ and all I got was this stupid mug.
And they are discarded.
At Goodwill, there is a special shelf for all of them.
It runs 20 ft. long and 2 ft. deep, and
it is full. The #1 Dads rub elbows with the obscene, bachelor parties,
and everyone shuns the once personalized mugs
as callous shells, all their singular meaning bled away.
And somewhere northwest of Piendamó, Colombia,
a young woman with slender, auburn arms and cinnamon hair
harvests small beans with her harshly callused hands,
just as she has done for the past fifteen years,
just as she will do
for fifty more.
And they are airlifted to a central roasting facility in  Enon, Ohio,
then ground, vacuum packed and trucked out to
A Super America Convenience Store Near You.
24 oz. $1.29. "100% Colombian."
Styrofoam.