We take it easier today. When I wake up, I wrestle with jet lag. I try the, ‘Five more minutes,’ excuse with Ryan, but he’s not having it. He’s right. All I have to do is throw on clothes so we can go down to breakfast. We’re eating at our…
Today we go to the Guggenheim, and to dinner at Nerua, the restaurant that sits underneath it, in keeping with our general travel philosophy of doing one-ish thing a day. I had seen a bakery during our afternoon wanderings, and want to start the day with breakfast there. We walk…
Ah, these moments. The ones where everything changes. ‘I don’t have my passport,’ I say to Ryan as we approach passport control in Barcelona. It’s not in my purse, or pocket next to my phone. I check, and check again. ‘I am feeling like an idiot,’ I tell him. ‘None…
If you ask me why I am drawn to cemeteries, I will muse that maybe it’s the quiet, the peacefulness. I will tell you how stepping into cemeteries in my adolescence always brought me peace. I liked walking through the old cemetery downtown in my hometown of Hampstead. Even though…
I have never showered in a shower truck before, so naturally I had to take a video of the accommodations to show others who might be wondering what a shower truck is like. It is a nice setup: Nicer than showers at campsites or at summer camp, clean and intuitive…
Tuesday The next day we check out of our first Airbnb apartment and prepare to meander our way along to our second half of the stay, moving from the part of the island where Monique’s maternal grandparents live to where her paternal ones do—from Rio Grande to Arecibo—and then on…
Thursday It’s a dusty outcropping overlooking the sea, at the top of the road that drops down on either side in both directions—a sandy parking lot with beer bottle caps long stamped into the dirt. A good sign. We walk into Richie’s Restaurant, unsure of mask protocol. The air has…
Saint Lucia and Ireland are the only two countries in the world named after women. Saint Lucia is even named after a historical figure, (perhaps unsurprisingly) Saint Lucia, although this name was given by Frenchmen who were shipwrecked here on her feast day. It’s impossible for me not to draw…
Monday we set out to call on some family. We’re staying just down the road from the village of Gros Islet where Jacqui grew up. The name of the village makes no sense apparently: gros means large, and islet means small island. We can walk there from our hotel, and…
Sa ka fete (which keeps trying to autocorrect to fête) is the ‘What’s up?’ of greetings here in Saint Lucia, and I love it because it sounds like you’re asking everyone if they’re having a party (which is fair here on an island where it seems like each day is…
After protesting in Boston against police brutality and the unjust justice system in this country, we do the only sensible thing to do: We get tested for COVID-19. The night of the protest, we take every reasonable precaution we can take, but—just as with pregnancy—the only 100% effective contraceptive is…
It was one of those moments that are such that I will never forget where I was when it happened: Sitting on the couch. I was on the left, Eva was on the right, and Matthias was in the chair playing Fortnite (killing it, obviously). I was scrolling through the…
We have set alarms for 3:30 in the morning, an unholy hour to be waking up. We have a car to the airport at 4AM—more unholy hours. Once we’ve successfully navigated the racist bureaucracy of the Indian domestic travel system, we settle at a café near our gate for breakfast….
We’re only here for two days here in Indore, really. We have a 6:50AM flight from Indore Wednesday morning, so we have Monday and Tuesday here to complete our work. We have even more difficulty than usually getting picked up at our hotel Tuesday, and it turns out to be…
We travel from the city with the worst air quality in the world to the cleanest city in India. Indore has banned plastic bags, and—like Delhi does in some places—employs compostable cups, bowls, and other dishware when providing street food. After our sojourn with Meenakshi, we allow ourselves a night…
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