Now that I live in Georgia, going home to San Antonio is as exciting to me as Bradford's exotic travels must be to him. Thought some sort of explanation was necessary for my mundane travel post to follow Bradford's! That being said...

I love being home! It was a quick trip compared to my month long vacation last summer. I was there just a week but spent lots of quality time with my precious nephew, Ben, and the rest of the family. I ate wonderful meals at Piatti's, Los Barrios, Bistro Bakery, La Fonda on Main, Il Sogno, The Palm, Central Market, Jim's, Thai House, The Monterrey, Neiman Marcus, and Claire's and Mom's house.

Before Chris arrived, I stayed with my friend and running buddy, Carol, in the house I used to rent from her where she now lives. Started each day with a run in Alamo Heights or on the Riverwalk. Went for a Mission Trail bike ride with friends and Jim and Ben Judson one sunny morning. The weather was spectacular all week long and we took advantage.

Since the reason for the trip was Chris's Air Force One conference, we spent lots of time on the Riverwalk with the other advance agents, talking and drinking--A LOT. That's me with Colonel Turner, the President's pilot...a celebrity in that crowd.

The highlight of the trip, however, was bonding with Baby Ben. A 3 year old now, much different than the 2 1/2 year old I left last August. He's a talker, a music maker, a joke teller, a playground runner, an animal lover, a sweet singer and 100% boy. I miss him terribly and every minute with him is priceless. If other family members want to chime in on their positive experiences with nieces/nephews traveling across the country or ocean to visit aunts/uncles, please feel free.

We all gathered at Sara and Justin's one night for a casual family gathering. Such fun to be together and share big things happening in our lives. Conrad has the lead in his school's production of Aladdin in March. Lauren is taking the SAT. Justin was recently in D.C. on the same stage as Michelle Obama, both presenting to a national audience. Many of us have new jobs and projects we're excited about.

So thank you San Antonio and my wonderful family for all the good times. I can't wait to be with you again!

PS: Hi!

[Not sure why this got cut off from the last post...]

But we were there to be underwater, and it was very cool. I've only been diving once and I didn't like it -- I found all the gear to be way too distracting. I'm converted. It was several days of the courses, but since all the "training dives" were on the reefs, the whole thing was pretty exciting. We saw a bunch of animals, and bunches of animals. I never really appreciated what a coral is before -- that was nice. It's like an apartment block. So cool.

We went back down to Stone Town for a couple days. Learned about the history there. It was a hub of trade around the Indian Ocean rim. Interesting how for most people through most of history, the action all happened along coasts and in the bodies of water between them. Going inland was hard and unrewarding -- maps sort of petered out in interior lands. Now it's the opposite (except maybe for the oceanographers out there). Land is where the action is, we crisscross it with highways the same way that people used to crisscross oceans along sailing routes, and crossing water now seems so difficult and unrewarding that our awareness of it sort of trails off a few miles off the coast.

Also, Swahili culture is very mixed, which is cool. Arabs, Indians and Africans lived there. It was a slaving town, but they had this custom where slaves purchased as wives became free if widowed, and the children of free men and slave wives were free. The difference from American slavery shows, it seems, how our racism was separate from (and longer-lasting than) our slavery.

The food was disappointing, all around. Nothing to be said about it, really.

We went across to a smaller island, Pemba, for the rest of the stay. We rented a scooter for a day and explored around the south of the island. Ate my last octopus, for the rest of the year anyway (new year's resolution). Talked with some shipbuilders. Went to an outlying island for a day of snorkeling and admiring hermit crabs. The island is actually a massive coral rock that rose up out of the water during some ice age. Took another scooter to the northern tip of the island to a cute little joint that was full but had a tent and a beach. Then came back, by boat and bus.

Since then the massive news has been Clara's completion of her film workshop. It was a two-week sprint to finish up the six films, with the constant traffic of cineastes from December culminating in a 48-hr sleepless session and then, on Saturday, a premiere at the French Cultural Center. It was a huge success. The films were great (some greater than others, of course, but all great) the house was packed, the workshop participants dressed for a prom, and just the right combination of earnestness and irreverence from everyone.

Otherwise, things have been continuing along. My work is going ahead. Less photogenic: here's a photo of a lady salvaging some carrots from her field after government tractors plowed it to make way for a new presidential palace.

Tomorrow we're leaving to go to Rwanda for a couple days. We've heard really interesting things about Kigali and we want to check it out. Rwanda's president apparently runs a very tight ship -- too tight, as free societies are supposed to go. So it might be interesting to see the differences between there and here. We're going for just a couple days, and then I'm going to Mali for a few weeks to follow up on stuff from last year.

Missing you all, and the snow -

Hi!

Hi everyone -

It has been a while since I wrote, hasn't it? Not since Christmas.

Clara and I took a bus to Das Es Salaam and then the boat to Zanzibar. For those of you who think that the journey is the destination, I can report that the bus was 28 hours going (36 back), and that the boat caused some illness in some quarters, but that in both cases a sort of hibernation stasis allowed it to pass easily enough. I read recently about 36,000 year-old bacteria that was rehydrated and sprung back into action. It was like that.

We took diving courses on Zanzibar at a place that was really best experienced underwater. We found this really nice dive shop online and went there. It turns out that it was at this super touristy strip. Big all-inclusives where people had to wear wristbands and this kind of thing. The word was that the government has sold the entire eastern shore of the island to the Italian mafia, something that I've recently learned governments are capable of doing. Sure enough, there were lots of Italian-speakers there, including these young Maasai guys who come over from the mainland to sell baubles.

Clara and I had lunch with one of them. I mentioned, as a pack of Italian men strode out of the ocean, water dripping from hair all over their bodies except their heads -- and I mean all over their bodies seeing as how they like those speedos and all -- that Italian men are a lot like Massai men: proud. The young guy having lunch with us didn't see the resemblance. We were talking in a combination of Swahili and Italian, and so we were having trouble getting the concept of pride across. I said that everywhere Italian guys go, they are always the same. Also, everywhere you see a Maasai guy he is always wearing the red wraps and the jewelry and all that flair up in their hair. In both cases it is only their sheer unselfconsciousness that keeps them from being totally ridiculous. It doesn't occur to them to change. The Maasai guy totally agreed with this. "No, we don't want to change." After a reflective pause he added, "the Americans here all want to be rastas."

Birthday celebration

What a great week. Catherine and Wayne came from Maine to celebrate my birthday--well not exactly "to" celebrate the birthday but be present at my birthday celebration time! (You'll have to ask them for an explanation.)

It has been a great week--lots of good eats along the way.

It began Saturday with Wayne 'sleeping-over' at the Sisterdale ranch with Jim and his cousin, Reed. While the boys attended to meat-gathering Pam, Catherine and Gay dined at one of San Antonio's great restaurants, The Lodge. A memorable evening.

Sunday Chris took the 'girls' on a private, guided tour of a show at San Antonio Museum of Art featuring Egyptian artifacts from the Brooklyn Museum, titled "Life After Death" or something to that effect. Chris has taken several tours through the show (and SAMA's permanent collection of Egyptian artifacts--including several pieces owned by the famous collectors: Karen Keach and Chris Karcher) about which he is very well schooled. That was a treat.

Monday was the birthday with a gathering of the clan to celebrate.

Tuesday Ben and Callie took us to another great San Antonio restaurant--Italian this time. Really great meal! And that evening, Basil took the whole group to Paesano's for another great Italian dinner.

Wednesday Wayne was scheduled to return home--but bad weather in Boston kept him here till Thursday afternoon. Wednesday evening we baked salmon for our dinner at home.

We had a great Mexican dinner Thursday noon before taking Wayne to the airport to catch his flight home.

Speaking of weather. It was very disappointing that our winter wet, cold days set in as the Adams arrived in San Antonio and have persisted throughout their stay. Too bad. We were having beautiful weather before their arrival.

Friday Catherine's friend Chrlynn who lives in Austin arranged for a weekend get-away in Castroville. Word has it that it was a great weekend with lots of giggles and chuckles--though not much to report on the food front.

I managed to get sick on Friday--as Catherine was leaving town with Charlynn--which put me to bed for all of Saturday. But by Sunday I was on the mend and will be raring to go on Monday when we hope to close out the visit with one last great restaurant!

Wow, what a celebration! I imagine we all gained pounds--not intending to put a number to it!

As a PS I must add that in anticipation of the Adams' arrival we finally got the rug from Oaxaca hung. We are delighted--more than we expected. It is a great addition to our living room.