GALFROMDOWNUNDER UPOVER

I got an interesting letter from someone today: Hi, Seeing that the Cubans are so poor and that dear old man has worked so hard everyday did you, will you or have you given him any money for using his picture?I was back to Cuba this past March and gave him a picture I took of HIM!!! I wonder what he would do if he saw himself on your book? I'm thinking there is something wrong with this ... Sandra It's a reasonable question: should I give the man on the cover of my book money? More to the point - just how much? This reader feels I am somehow taking advantage of this man - profiting from by having his face on my book. Here's my reply: Thanks for writing. I appreciate your thinking on this - though you're making a baseline assumption that he is poorer than me. In many ways, he's probably better off. He charges $1 for 2 little photos he processes in that bucket in a prime tourist location. He makes more money in a day than many Cubans do in a month. He...

New York never fails to redeem itself. A clinically certified New Yorker keeps quoting "either  E.B. White , ('Here is New York') or Joan Didion ('Goodbye to all that'). Actually, he now claims can't locate that passage anywhere in the above two writings, and I suspect in his rabidity about his domicile of 25 years, he made it up himself. No matter - how this blow in from Downunder spent New Year's Eve upover in 2009, is a testament to it. And I was nowhere near the mirrored ball in Times Square. Instead, I spent most of the day sheltering from the snow, working on a newsletter for Bike Friday. At 4pm I  wrapped myself up in everything Smartwool I own , pulled rubber rainboots, unfolded the Speeding tikit and pedaled uptown. The snow and ice were thick, with mirror-slick patches requiring careful negotiation in the icy bike lane. First, I arrived at Caroline Fu's office to take delivery of more Traffic Cone Bags to fulfil the orders th...

Occasionally it's nice to get an unsolicited gift in the mail - even if only snailspam. In this case, a rather cool cardboard "Eiffel Tower party hat" from  St Germain , maker of the classy elderflower liqueur of the same name. I stumbled across this addictive concoction at a Dr Ruth Westheimer book launch at BottleRocket  and must have tipsily given them the GPS coordinate of my bunker. The enclosed classy instruction sheet, resembling a menu from one of these places , asks recipients to take a shot of themselves with it - presumeably expecting overexposed snaps of the tower teetering atop boozy, high-fiving party animals @ some velvet roped club or midwestern garage BBQ or other predictable composition. No such luck from the Galfromdownunder, who, with no such luck of a St Germain-fueled party invite, came up with this: a  David Weekes Hanno climbing the St Germain Eiffel Tower with Manhattan's London Terrace in the background! Now setting up such...

6 years after my Cuba book was published, I still get nice emails from people who've found it in a library, on a shelf in a backpacker's hostel in Nepal (thanks Sarad),  or got it for 99 cent plus $10 shipping on Amazon. It's technically only published in the USA, Canada, Australia, NZ and now Germany, but has found its way around the globe. It's even in Iraq ... Here's are some from this week: Hi Lynette, We've never met; I just wanted to say how much I enjoyed your Cuba book!I finished it last eve, in preparation for a 3-month trip there next month, & I could barely put it down!  I loved your great honesty, modesty, insights, philosophy, humor, descriptions, etc (& this was the first book I've finished in 10-20+yrs)! If you're ever in the Phoenix area you're welcome to stay in my guest bedroom. Best wishes! Dave Foster, AZ Lynette, I have to agree with Peter Sutherland about the reviews of your book. I did have to put it ...

The Pink Panther demonstrates camel side plank and bow poses. You don't have to be this bendy to benefit from a little yoga!   I have proof: Yoga works. It really works. Remember how I put my back out in Tokyo last month? I was crawling around like a ninety-something, unable to even put my socks on, and having to get out of bed on all fours. As you will read, it is likely I suffered sacro-iliac joint pain, that is, the spot that joins the sacrum to the pelvis got locked up from walking by favoring my right side, and the muscles on the left lower back started spasming, trying to yank my pelvis back into alignment. Here's a very good article about the sacro iliac joint pain . After some chiropractic treatment then three weeks of making excuses so I didn't have to do anything, I gingerly took myself off to a yoga class. To cut a long story short: 90 percent of the stiffness and pain miraculously vanished after that class. In my Yelp Review of the studio where I...

I just loitered across the most ludicrous piece of advertising copywriting since leaving the land of Truth Entertainingly Told. In fact, I even made a video of me badly acting this $100-an-hour piece of unintentional Saturday Nite Live satire. Have a perve (3 Mb Quicktime movie) , as we say downunder. For those ill-equipped with the technology to see my C-grade performance, I reproduce the copy below. Put on your best Platoon garb, grab a whistle, strap on your Smith & Wesson and read with the trepidation of someone about to pull a big fat trigger on some Donalds and Daisy's out minding their own business ... As long as you're looking up, a little prayer couldn't hurt. You called. Begged. Pleaded. You did whatever it took to get them back, and now there's a whistling of wings coming your way fast. Though it might be your last chance, it's the only one you'll need now you're loaded three-deep with new UltraShok TM. It's from Federal Premium,...

Pictured above: With author and Japanophile Harris Salat and his book "Japanese Hotpots: Comforting One-Pot Meals" - music to a busy bachelorette's ears A month after returning from Japan , my obsession with it continues. Not only did I spend a good 60 New York minutes (= 10 outer-borough minutes?) browsing a book about Geishas in  Takashimaya , pleaded a Japanese friend to bring over some  cute cat-shaped dust-collectors , trekked across town in driving rain to eat  okonomiyaki  at Otafuku, and indulged in a few other things I'd rather not mention ...  I invested $22 to attend the Japan Society Hotpot lecture . I say "invested" because any casual Googling of the words 'japanese hotpot' or 'nabe' will reveal a ton of easy recipes and how-to you really don't have to pay for. Basically, cut up whatever you want, heat stock in a large casserole pot - preferably iron or clay - put the two together, and close the lid. $22 ...

I'm just back from rolling out the recycled green carpet for David Kroodsma, the winning Huffington Post Hopenhagen Ambassador. What's that all about? ' avaread ...

More Japan on a Friday stories Am I nuts? A friend is coming over to the USA and I am getting him to bring me this: a Maneki Neko cat . If you follow that link, you will learn that this beckoning/waving/money/good luck cat is a popular fixture in businesses in Asia. A raised left paw is meant to bring customers; a raised right paw brings money and wealth. This little guy has both paws raised, albeit with eyes firmly closed as if to say "Bring it on!" I didn't have this background when I spotted it in a store near Gotokuji station where I stayed in Tokyo. I thought it was cute, but not worth spending $10 on to clutter up my no-room-for-clutter life. But then, I land in the USA, and I'm pining for this little cat. Ever done that? Wish you'd bought something and then gone to the trouble and expense of getting it later? It has a double significance for me, as Wikipedia speaks of its legendary origins where I stayed in Setagaya-Ku, one of Tokyo's west ward...

After 30 years of keeping me fashionably late, my Golana watch has finally resigned. As if pining for a time when there were more hours in the day, it tells me it's brunchtime when people are heading back to their desks; it's ready to wine and dine when I should be hitting the hay. This tiny little watch - about the diameter of an Australian 5 cent piece - was the object of my desire for months, until I finally broke down and bought it with my very first paycheck: $A247. $247 was a lot to blow in one go, let alone on a watch. It felt like $1500 feels like now. I remember gazing at it through a plate glass window in Canberra, Australia, when I was 17 years old. The store, called Gold and Silver (I think),  jutted out from a very desirable little enclave of shops called Centerpoint, overlooking a pedestrian plaza. It was an exclusive little mall, selling fancy clothes by Aussie fashion icons like Nadjee menswear, Cue, and probably the best frozen yoghurt fruit salad I ...

I was delighted to receive a visit from a gal I met in a cave in 2004. Does that sounds mysterious? I was crossing the Yucatan on my bicycle - a hot, dusty and dehydrating affair. I met Patricia Soto in a cave somewhere in the middle. We walked and talked and ate. She also rides bikes, making her an anomaly among chicas en Mexico. Sometime later did suffer from dehydration. I suspect is was not eating enough, rather than not enough water - food provides salts and eletrolytes the body needs in extreme heat.  I barely made it across to Tulum, and called her. She let me to recuperate in her house Cancun, drinking Pedialyte. Visiting Patricia and her mother in her native Cancun If you have ever gotten dehydrated, you'll know it's not fun. You ache from the middle of your brain to your big toe. Nor is it easy to fix just by drowning yourself in large vats of water or electrolyte solution. It takes time. Meanwhile you feel like utter crap. You can read about ...

Yesterday was Thanksgiving. I managed to rustle up a table of four to do turkey at the Standard Grill . It was OK for the price, considering it was Thanksgiving, New York City, last minute etc, although it was a bit mean on the sides, and the best dark meat was clearly spirited away for a more worthy class of diner. I jested with all my friends who had free invitations to eat  with families that only the friendless gotta pay! Walking around afterwards at Times Square - for want of nothing better to do - I came across the Charmin toilet man. This is a man dressed up as a toilet, inviting you to ablute in sanitary style at their pop-up toilet facility. He is accompanied by a pom pom girl, dressed far less imaginatively than she could be for such an important job - come on Charmin, don't tell me your political correctness prevented her from wearing a skimpy maid's uniform and wielding a toilet brush? This Charmin effort was all new to me, but Google tells me it's been a...

  Above: The view from the Standard Hotel's elevator - one you don't mind being stuck in The  Standard Hotel  - a shingle as chicly understated as the building is understatedly chic - has opened its lounge in the stratosphere. Straddling the wildly popular Highline aerial park, which I  filmed  just before it opened, this Polshek-designed, Andre Balazs-owned inn reminds of the Jolly Gray Giant.  I don't even know what the latest name of the lounge is - Manifest? Boom Boom ... Boom? The celebs have christened it of course, but this post is for us plebestrians who pass between the Giant's gray chino'd thighs, peering crotchward to see if those  mile high performances  are just a myth (here's another punny headline to add to the mix: Motel Sex - boom boom). You enter the hotel through a Lego-like yellow cylinder and reappear in a small lobby flanked by two very cool, white egg-crate like partitions. The maid in me wonders if someone is hired to feath...

Exquisitely excessive packaging at Tayashimaya in Japan and Singapore. A ball of rice is presented like a jewel; a cake resembles an architectural sculpture. You know how you come back from some exotic place, and all you want to do is keep prolonging the experience, eating the same foreign food for as long as possible, mincing around in your sari or kimono or toga, playing Pavarotti or koto music while ordering papardelle con ragu for breakfast and a bento box for dinner? Well, as I wrote in my Cheap'n'Choosy blog , today I made a beeline for Takashimaya , a Japanese department store in New York I'd roundly ignored prior to my recent 5 weeks in Singapore and Japan . I'd already cased out Pearl River and Sunrise Japanese grocery on landing, despite putting my back out in Tokyo, discovering that most of what I'd lugged home is readily available here in NYC. There is generally nothing in department stores that I really want, especially ones like Henri Bendels ...

Last post I wrote something "a society with a fascination with the minutiae of life is one you will never cease discovering." This is one example of minutiae. I found this miniaturized "curry rice meal" at Kid Robot in Soho, NY, day after getting back from my 3 week Japan trip. Oh how I wish I'd made it to geek central, Akihibara , where you can find wierd stuff like this and more. That's a definite for next time. It struck a chord because I learned curry rice is a staple of Japanese urban families - basically a just-add-water flavor cube of riotously tasty curry paste, that you team with veges, meat and rice in no time flat. I ate this at Richard and Haruyo's house in Nagoya. And on the United flight coming over. The little red pot has a real wooden knob. The lid fits perfectly and has a certain weight to it despite this whole thing being about an inch diameter. The ladle 'scoops' the curry nicely. You can remove the ladle from the sco...