travelnotes – ARUNDHATI BASU

Doozy Times in Seattle

We spent five short days in the Pacific Northwest with my sister-in-law and her lovely family, and even though five as a number is short — it felt short — it was enriching within a tight span of time.

Enrichment came our way through activities. We chatted endlessly, baked and cooked, when we were not tripping over to the city’s iconic marketplace to gather fragrant spices and delicious cheese, sipping on hot apple cider, tasting moreish butter, and buying braids of garlic and chillies that did the singular job of elevating our hearts to our mouths with the amount they cost (oh, but they are beauties). Amongst all of this was the scenic presence Mount Rainier, with its upturned conical tip sheathed in snow, and the Olympic ranges. A band of photogenic siblings.

The sun was shining, and the days were spectacularly cold, but boy, they added sass to the time spent outside.

To mitigate the chill, we slurped on Taiwanese food. Mere broth and garlic, yet divine. Xiao Long Bao (soup dumplings for the rest of us) and Sichuan noodles stole the highlight simply because we had never had them before.

Novelty is a cracking thing. You always remember that first trip you ever took, that first time you explored a new place and came across things alien to your culture, met a person who turned out to be a beloved figure in your life,…you never forget those, do you? The Taiwanese meal had left its impression upon us, indelibly.

Now, Seattle for us inevitably means Snohomish. A place the father-in-law chanced upon during a golfing trip and introduced the sister-in-law to. Ever since, she has been a fixture there. It’s her pick-me-up, a no-brainer, according to her. Snohomish has an assortment of shops that deal in antiques, time-worn, quirky objects that make your heart flutter with want. Safe to say, we have never returned empty-handed from there.

The nephew and niece have grown up a fair bit. If the little missy is all for mathematics, reading and baking — she made us delicious mini brownie pizzas — the nephew is a level-headed teenager with none of the angst of one yet. From them, we gained new knowledge. Of the concept of sneakerheads. We had zero idea of this. You can call it a subculture, if you please. Sneakerheads are sneaker collectors who like to accumulate limited edition shoes and even vintage ones. They then swap or sell them for exorbitant prices. There are other little details culled from the mouth of these babes that made my mind tumble and stumble, but they escape me now.

We wrapped it all up with a beautiful Thanksgiving dinner, decorated the Christmas tree, and nibbled into a sticky and lovely Christmas cake, the best I have ever had. It was baked by the sister-in-law’s neighbour. It was shattering and I cannot wait to replicate its goodness.

Now that I am back to reality, it is unsettling, but it is acceptable because Christmas is around the corner. The city has gone the festive route. We got our first batch of snow too yesterday, big chunky flakes that drove through the day, changing directions, and in all of it, through the slush that resulted on the pavements of New York City, I was out to meet a blogger. She turned out to be as humorous as her blog and wonderful company because the hours sped by as we prattled.

That’s the beginning of December for me. I cannot wait to see what else it brings.

I am hoping for more Christmas cake and snow.

Iconic Pike Place signage — The iconic Pike Place signage

Matt's in the Market at Pike Place — Matt’s in the Market at Pike Place

Tiramisu from the Chinese bakery 85°. Astonishingly good.

A chilly break from Black Friday shopping at a shingle beach in Kirkland

Brother-sister act at the gardening-decor store, Molbak’s.

Dec 3, 2019Feb 29, 2020

Arundhati Basu48 Comments

Cades Cove

The hunting grounds of the Cherokee people once, Cades Cove is an isolated valley of supreme beauty within the Great Smoky Mountains. The Cherokees called it Tsiya’hi. Translated, it means Otter Place, hinting at the fact that otters did abound here before European settlers arrived in the 1800s to dispossess the tribes of their land. They say that Cades Cove was named for the wife of a Cherokee chief, but no one really knows how it came about.

The road to the cove was straight out of my dreams. I have a weakness for those that curve through old forests, where the trees tower and look like they have a trove of stories, of the way the landscape has been moulded by the passage of time, of the generations of men that have come and gone. Limestone cliffs, creeks riddled with rocks, and from a sudden spell of shower, the roads gleaming green beneath the shadow of the trees. This had to be the naturalist’s definition of paradise.

At Cades Cove, the humidity was unbearable. We could not brook the thought of a hike despite the lure of seeing a bear. There are so many black bears in the area, roughly above 1,600, that you apparently could not, would not, miss a sighting. But here’s the thing, we did (no surprises). There are cherry trees and fields of blueberries, huckleberries and blackberries in the meadows. Plus there are people landing up with picnic hampers. Irresistible enough for bears to turn up from time to time.

As a result of this promise, every driver turns into an oaf on the 11-mile scenic loop that gently winds through the valley. It is a one-way paved road that follows an old logging railroad track. The traffic here crawls. We spent not less than 3 hours on the loop, well-stewed apples by the end of it if you will, wondering when we would be done with the sight of the driver ahead sticking his feet out of the window, and generally, behaving like a certified jackass.

The only way to let off steam was to take these off-road trails that led us into log cabins of the first settlers and ‘primitive’ churches as they called them in the 19th century. The white log frames of the churches with austere, dark wooden interiors suggesting that they existed to serve the basic purpose of disseminating faith among the few families who lived in and around them. They must have had dirt floors and fire pits inside to begin with.

Within an interval of a few minutes there were three Methodist and Baptist churches, emphasising that life in this Southern Appalachian community must have been harsh. A world where men and women would have needed the crutch of faith to carry on in the wilds. Their reality would have been made up of temperance societies and Sunday schools, of gatherings at general stores and swapping stories. Books have been written by the children and grandchildren of these settlers — they tell of a time when spotting a red ear of corn in a pile of husks was a prize for a young fella, a sign that he could kiss the woman he had been eyeing for some time; they talk of the mettle of children who kept themselves entertained by inventing their own toys, such as fashioning balloons from pig’s bladders. Not to distill (and dismiss) it in the matter of a sentence, but it seemed to me then that those folks paid the price for simplicity as much as we city folks pay the price for modernity.

When we finally left behind the last of those homesteads beneath its canopy of thick vegetation, I could not shake off the image that rose in my mind. Of a lachrymose man upon its porch, in his overalls of faded grey, a pipe stuck in his mouth, strumming a banjo that must have seen better days.

Sep 27, 2018

Arundhati Basu55 Comments

A Cliffhanger of a Cabin on Old Smokey (Beloved of a Mamma Bear)

A band of cicadas serenaded us as we got off our Outback Subaru. Their singing seemed to intensify as we hopped off the car, me casting nervous glances at the cliffs and trees around us, the thought running through my mind that a welcome committee of bears might be awaiting us in the dark.

The drive from North Carolina to this chalet in Tennessee, built into the hills of the Great Smoky Mountains, had been one of unimaginable beauty. The sky, riddled with billowing clouds earlier on in the afternoon in Winston-Salem, was suffused now with a crimson glow that continued to intensify till it dissipated in pastel hues. The hills loomed large in front of us in the gathering gloom, clouds rushing in to envelop us at intervals. At others, they rose from the silhouettes of trees in wraiths of wispy white.

And then the spell was broken. We had reached Gatlinburg. Rows of flashy souvenir shops, ‘wine-tasting’ kiosks that doled out free fruity wines guaranteed to give one an unbearable insulin rush, barbecue diners, the crowds …I wanted to think, but I could not. Adi helpfully supplied the words, ‘It’s like Skegness on steroids?’ Skegness is a seaside resort town on the east coast of England – the lesser said about it, the better.

Gatlinburg’s flashiness evaporated as we drove higher and higher up into the mountains. How impenetrable the darkness seems in the hills. It presses in upon the mind. The desolate hairpin bends brought us at the foot of a road that shot up at a 35° incline, and lo and behold, there stood our rented chalet. No curtains inside to draw across the bay windows in the living room? I was unsettled. But there was nothing to do but stash my paranoia away.

The chalet was a two-bedroom affair built in wood — to withstand the winds that sweep through these mountains. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt had rhapsodised about ‘the winds that blow through the wide sky in these mountains, the winds that sweep from Canada to Mexico, from the Pacific to the Atlantic’ to ‘have always blown on free men’ at the Great Smoky Mountains National Park that he declared open for the public in 1940.

Where Nature gives, she takes too. And man, he survives despite the odds. The cabin being proof of this indomitable spirit. The previous chalet had been gutted in wildfires towards the end of 2016. Yet here it stood, well-stocked and utterly homey with its rocking chair, hot tub and wraparound porch, rebuilt after the fires. There were pots and pans and everything we could hope for if we wanted to rustle up our own meals (how cosy it must be to hunker down within its warmth during the cold months).

In the morning, we woke up to views. The windows, which in the dark hours had given me the heebie jeebies, in the early morning hours opened up to a vision of smoky blue mountains and clouds rolling off their peaks (there are photos below to confirm that I do not exaggerate).

We did what any sane person would do — tuck into a huge breakfast and sit staring at the drama of the clouds and the mountains, wondering if mamma bear (previous visitors to the cabin had mentioned her repeated visits in the logbook) would eventually turn up with her cubs. But were we to be so lucky? Naturally, we decided to do what could be done next. We headed out, chasing bears and clouds in the Great Smoky Mountains.

Sep 19, 2018

Arundhati Basu56 Comments

The Rome Diaries

We are back in Rome. Soporific Rome with her unbearable beauty that squeezes my heart with barely contained pleasure, ancient temples and theaters lurking around every corner. It is 4.30 in the morning and I am wide awake because I am just so and Adi is patting me to go back to sleep but I feel like pouring my heart out for it is brimming. From arriving in a boutique hotel in the old quarters of the city where Pope Julius II had wanted his architect Donato Bramante, the Renaissance master, to design the Palazzo dei Tribunali, the city’s justice system. It was an incomplete mission. The stone seats of the unfinished courthouse remain as a quiet reminder of the gap between aspiration and attainment. Every master must have a few tucked into his kitty of achievements.

We walked around in the evening after an afternoon spent drinking Champagne with tuna and cream cheese canapes. The hotel surprised us, throwing in a couple of flaky pastries, their hearts filled with apple and cinnamon, some profiteroles and chocolates, because it was in lieu of the six years we have been married. Eight years made up of frustrating, quiet, joyous, unsettling and delirious moments. For life is such a wonderful concoction of the drama and the dull. One cannot exist without the other and really it would be tedious with only the highs to ride. There are nudges of mortality from time to time with close relatives shedding their mortal lives behind, reminding us that ‘time’s winged chariot’ is ‘hurrying near’, undeniable and as tangible as this plush hotel bed I find myself in.

The neighbourhood around us is networked by medieval alleys aged by the stories of the giubbonari (jacket-makers) who worked in one, the calderari (coppersmiths) in another narrow cobbled one, the baullari (trunk-makers), the cappellari (hat-makers) and so on. You get the drift. The many workers who served the wealthy who lived in the palazzi in the area. At the end of our street lived Raphael once. I doubt the streets have changed much, the faded pastel houses and shuttered windows silent witnesses to the life stories of generations unfolding within.

At an intimate osteria we stopped for a spot of dinner. Fine, rich Merlot fished off the high shelves of the establishment by its owner with a bottle grabber and presented with a flourish to go with the carciofi alla romana which is stewed artichoke beloved of the ancient Romans, grilled seafood, creamy pasta and succulent chicken cooked in sweet Port, his craggy face wreathed with smiles as we thanked him for giving us a table meant for four. He had turned away customers even though we were about to finish up and he said, “No hurry, okay? Food is to be enjoyed. You walked in, I liked you both and I wanted you to relax.” A small place filled up with his relatives, their large families divided between the old and young tables.

Simple flavours married together with a dexterous touch. Italian food in an osteria tucked into the quiet alleys of Rome with its unassuming charm and modest menu, a beaming owner keeping an eye on his diners, dropping by to chat in bits,…then pressing our noses to windows of antique shops, armed with giant cones of gelato and swinging by that great Baroque masterpiece of Gian Lorenzo Bernini, the Fontana dei Quattro Fiumi at Piazza Navona, fingers freezing and nose tingling with the sudden icy winds that swept through the empty square. A few locals walked through the cobbled square. The crowds of summer have melted away. Vine-clad walls of townhouses towered above us in the alleys, festooned by canopies of fairy lights, as we passed in the shadows of the chiesas and returned to our hotel room to fall into bed with jasmine tea and exhaustion.

Carciofi alla Romana (stewed artichokes as the old Romans liked it)

Dec 17, 2017

Arundhati Basu72 Comments

Woodstock on the Ottauquechee

Last winter when we were in Woodstock – a few miles away from Winston Churchill’s family seat of Blenheim Palace in good ol’Blighty – sauntering down a quiet lane past a gaggle of Georgian cottages with their white-trimmed windows, limestone churches, Norman doorways and period buildings latticed with tangled ivy, I did not picture us in another Woodstock roughly a year later. A vastly different namesake.

But the passage of time is wonderful in that introduces change, an unsettling feeling which takes time to be slowly washed away by time itself, and along the way it also opens your eyes to places you would have not dreamt of seeing. As we found ourselves in this other Woodstock, I scoured google. It turned that there are 34 Woodstocks in the world if you will believe that, 22 of them in America alone. How utterly odd that people in 33 places around the world had the same brainwave – apart from the fact that these might have been settlers who possibly wanted a slice of home in new lands. I wondered if they had been enamoured of the old Woodstock. If they had found themselves warmed to the cockles of their heart on a cold, grey noon as they sat in an ancient pub there with a fire going in its equally ancient fireplace bordered by duck-egg blue walls, food procured locally and prepared with an expert touch.

If you are thinking of the Woodstock where the sixties peaked with the famous music festival that was the epitome of hippie grooviness, I have to quickly point out that we were not in That Woodstock in upstate New York.

We were in the Woodstock in Vermont that sits on the Ottauquechee river and was named after the Oxfordshire Woodstock as homage to one of Churchill’s ancestors, the 4th Duke of Marlborough.

At a glance it was obvious. Woodstock in Vermont has the patina of old money. It is written large over its central square designated the Green, the historic inn built by the Rockefellers where people tend to take many selfies, in its antique shops and leafy streets bordered by houses reflecting a mix of old styles of architecture. Late Georgian, masonic temples with Greek columns…The air of wealth arrived with industry in the 1760s when the first settlers set up a gristmill and a sawmill. They made scythes and axes, wool processing machines and woollens, guns and furniture and carriages and leather – leaving behind a legacy of industriousness. After all, wealth does not come about from sitting on one’s haunches.

There we had brunch in an old-style cafe, omelettes fattened with feta and veggies, fluffy pancakes and black coffee served by women who looked like they had been put on a permanent diet of pancakes. We overheard little girls sing birthday songs for themselves, friends exchange travel notes, a man telling the staff that he used to live there years and years before, possibly twenty years ago, which reminded me of that wonderful O.Henry story ‘After Twenty Years’. Then we set about town, peering at the old library and county house, stoked by signages that pointed the way to genteel ski resorts like Suicide Six where they say skiing started in the country. And then those covered bridges, ah. They stood upon the river that the Abenaki called the Ottauqueechee, ‘place of mushy land’, combining romance and functionality within their covered timber frames with such ease.

But the most interesting part of the day, as it is with any traveller, was a leisurely natter with a local. An elderly owner of an antique shop where we examined many vintage objects, Victorian wicker doll buggies, antique Dutch book presses, a gym dandy, grinding mills, old China ware…you know the kind of antiquated things that lie forgotten in those stores, waiting to be owned and loved all over again.

It was an unusual conversation. For the first time I met a woman who spoke differently of her country’s leader, that ‘my grandma would have turned over in her grave if she had heard the kind of disrespect people show to their own president’; that she dressed in black for Lady Di’s funeral; of lines drawn in the sand, the Sykes-Picot line and her brother, a director of Broadway plays, who’s been travelling to Israel for years seeking truth, the kind of truth that is hardly disseminated among the public, and of his screenwriter who has fixed notions and refuses to be budged by his view of the truth. A flow that bespoke stream of consciousness thoughts but you know how thoughts mingle – and when they mingle how they reveal fascinating aspects of people and their lives.

And there it lay – the crux of what travelling does for me. Introducing me to different ways of thinking, different lives, different stories, different characters, the ability to observe and distance the self from an obvious predilection towards judgment – it feels somewhat like reading a hundred different books at the same time.

2017-09-06 12.15.09 1.jpg — Taftsville Covered Bridge, built in 1836, lies on Route 4.

2017-09-04 01.34.54 1.jpg — The comparatively newer Middle Bridge located by the Green in Woodstock.

2017-09-06 12.14.58 2.jpg — Homesteads in Woodstock

2017-09-06 12.14.58 1.jpg — Congregational churches built in the 19th century

2017-09-06 12.15.00 1.jpg — The kind of stores where you can lay your (greedy) hands on precious junk.

2017-09-18 11.53.02 1.jpg — Adi, chuffed by the sight of Suicide Six.

English muffin, omelette and fried potatoes

2017-09-06 12.15.01 1.jpg — Reminded me of Bettys tearoom in Harrogate

2017-09-06 12.15.03 1.jpg — Signages that tell stories

2017-09-06 12.15.04 1.jpg — Masonic temple

What kind of grinding mill could this be?

2017-09-06 12.15.06 1.jpg — Victorian doll buggy

Teagle’s Landing named for a printer called Frank Teagle who lived in Woodstock, one who it is said took care of those overlooked and worked to make things better.

Sep 18, 2017

Arundhati Basu75 Comments

In Málaga…

Keeping in theme with the tone of the guest post on Seville by Sophie, I thought of my Andalusian adventures that kicked off from Málaga, the Andalusian port city of Spain, that lies across the tip of Africa. It was February and yet the heat, oh it was blistering. Ir ran along the lines of an Indian summer that tends to sear the mind and the soul. The day we landed in Málaga, the city was enveloped in a haze that was a curious shade of jaundice yellow. It is a common feature there in Málaga – the desert wind, Calima, blows in from the great Sahara Desert bringing with it poor visibility and high temperatures. During the course of the next few days, the haze gradually lifted but the heat, boy it was a stunner.

Now Málaga is the underrated cousin of the Spanish biggies, Madrid and Barcelona, and I do not know why because it has infallible charm. Walking in the shadow of the grandiose Alcazaba, the towering cathedral and the baños (Arab baths), the imagination tends to be overwhelmed by tales of the Moors, that mixed race of Berbers and Arabs who crossed over from North Africa and occupied Andalucia for seven centuries. But ancient Iberians, Phoenicians and the Romans were here too and you see the strange confluence of cultures in its many alleys.

My first impression of Málaga was formed by the sight of the many palms that line one of its main avenues. Those trees bring upon me a wave of nostalgia for things left far behind in the past – hazy memories of the desert city that I was born in. A glorious park, the Parque de la Alameda, was my refuge from the heat of the morning with its green surroundings filled with exotic plants procured from five continents. It was but a paean to man’s potential for creating beauty from zilch. You see, the park was created on reclaimed land.

Sauntering down one of Málaga’s busy streets, I chanced upon an imposing horseshoe archway. The Ataranzas. A market for fresh produce and paella. Ah, now I could not leave it alone, could I? There is something alluring about the mercados of Spain. Be it in Madrid, Barcelona, Málaga or even a small place like Zaragoza. Is it an old-world charm, you wonder, with vendors and customers exchanging notes over fresh meat, seafood, vegetable and fruits? A plethora of colour for as far as the eye can see beneath the warm lighting of the market hall. My nose led me into a massive hall that was once a shipyard (in Arabic it is Ataranzas) with seven grand arches. Only one of those arches remain and it was the one that had lured me in.

A shipyard in the middle of the city, you might ask dubiously? Things were different till around the 18th century. The sea reached till where I was walking a while ago – on the streets around the present-day market. Once fishermen would have sat along the walls of the former shipyard and trawled the waters for the catch of the day. Apart from housing a shipyard, the Ataranzas had many avataars. Convent, military fort, hospital and subsequently a medical school. So many stories, so many memories, all embedded within its walls. Now only if those walls could speak, the tales that might tumble out.

This was just the start to my extensive rambles around the city, and lest I lull you into a sound sleep, I shall retire till my next post on Málaga.

20160223_104514 — The view from the hotel room was made up of water the hue of emerald, the blue shimmering sea beyond the blocks of concrete and then these pretty palm trees.

A section of the Alcazaba shows up between the old bank and town hall

Banco de España. If you are a fan of architecture, you will find yourself riveted by its neoclassical look.

Palacio de la Aduana. The new customs house for the port city.

The stained glass window in the Ataranzas that are fit to grace a cathedral

Aug 28, 2017

Arundhati Basu94 Comments

Guest Post: Saskia’s Adventures in Seville

The summer adventures of Sophie, a British blogger from Wiltshire, and her daughter Saskia in that sultry beauty of a place called Spain. Sophie’s previous guest post for me was on Bruges.

Seville in August is an experience; it is boiling hot (daily temperatures often reach upto the 40s), full of history and it comes alive at night for Tapas and Flamenco. We visited for a long weekend and we fell in love with this stunning city and its fiery and friendly people. Don’t be put off by your drive from the airport…..just wait and Seville will work her charm!

We booked an apartment – as we are a family of four – which was in the Jewish Quarter of old Seville where all the shops were and had air conditioning. This worked well for us and gave us the flexibility that we were after. It was a 10-minute stroll to the cathedral and a 20-minute walk to the Plaza de Espana. There are loads of places to stay in Seville but if I were to go again in the summer months, I would look for a hotel with a rooftop pool such as this one.

There are so many things to do in Seville! These are my top 6 things for you.

The Cathedral

This is a MUST and if you only have one or two days I insist that you go! It is the most beautiful cathedral I have ever visited and needs to be seen with your own eyes to be believed. It is a UNESCO World heritage site and it was completed in the early 16th century. The Giralda Bell Tower was once part of the city mosque which is even older. It is the largest Gothic cathedral in the world. It is immense. The ornate carvings and gold work are something to behold; all the wealth of old Spain sits in this place!

There are many tombs here but my favourite was the tomb of Christopher Columbus.

The Real Alcazar (palace of Seville)

The palace is one of the most beautiful in Spain and Moorish in design. The upper levels are still used once every three years or so by the present Spanish royal family. It is another UNESCO World Heritage site. As we waited to go in, a lovely lady called Isabel offered to be our guide, so we jumped at the chance to learn more and jump the queues. It was the best 10 Euros we spent as she was a resident of Seville and told us all about the history of this fascinating place. The palace has been used in many movies and TV shows; the most recent was in Game of Thrones. I came away though with the fact that under the rule of Alfonso X in the 1250’s, Christians, Jews and Muslims all lived together in peace and this is shown in the symbols around the palace that intermingle with each other.

The gardens are equally stunning and are worthy of a visit. We stayed here for many hours and you really need at least half a day to see everything.

Plaza de Espana

Built in 1928 for the World Fair of 1929 to showcase Science and Technology they are now government buildings.

Take a horse and cart to explore Maria Luisa park which surrounds the Plaza. Spot parrots that fly above your head or relax amongst the cool trees. There is a lot to see here and many other points of interest such as The Museum of Arts and Traditions is worth a visit if you have time. Or just relax and enjoy a drink at one of the local bars or cafes.

4. The Metropol Parasol

The Metropol Parasol is the largest wooden structure in the world and gives a great view of the city as you can climb to the top for 3 Euros and even get a free drink! Roman relics were discovered during construction and these have been preserved in the underground Antiquarium museum. We visited in the daytime but apparently is beautiful at night as it is lit up.

Maestranza (the bullring)

Whatever your feelings about bullfighting, the bull ring is worth a visit. There is a tour which includes some of the bullfighting costumes and art work.

Tapas and Flamenco

There are numerous Tapas bars and cafes throughout the city but the place to go is the district of Triana. This is a 20-minute walk across the Isabel bridge from Old Seville. Here, under the mist that is pumped out to keep you cool, you can sample wonderful food. Don’t go too early though as Seville is the place for a siesta between 2pm and 8pm. Many of the bars play Spanish guitar music and offer Flamenco. Well, Triana is the birthplace of Flamenco!

Aug 22, 2017

Arundhati Basu70 Comments

Trotting Around Trotternish

In Kilmuir, a tranquil village on the Trotternish peninsula where they speak the Scottish Gaelic tongue of their ancestors, we came across a strange sight. A prodigious Highland cow on a pasture staring at the sea. Add a single horn to that profile and we were in the exalted company of a one-horned meditating creature. I walked closer, yet keeping her at arm’s length, since startling cows and earning sharp pokes in the ribs was not on my list of things to do on Skye. The good news is that the Highland cattle do prefer to save their horns for more useful things like foraging during harsh winters than goring meddling humans.

As she turned her head towards me and watched me with bovine curiosity through a sheath of feminine fringe , I realised that I had besmirched her beauty. There was a second horn. It shot straight down, past her ears, hugging those bonny cheeks. Of course there was a customary one-sided conversation (what am I without those?) after which she decided she had had enough of this odd human. Swaying her sizable hips in slow motion, she turned her back to me and plodded through the long grass in the direction of the sea. There are a couple of shots below of this picture of highland gentility, but if you could pardon their poor quality. In those days I was afflicted by the overt use of effects, and for the life of me, I could not fish out the original frames.

It is a given that you will meet more cows and sheep on the Isle of Skye than your own fellow creatures. And you know what, I was content with that. No intelligent questions to deal with, no curiosities to fend off, nil judgement…it is easy to bask in the company of the four-legged beauties of this world. In the backdrop, the blue stretch of the Sea of the Hebrides, in the foreground a whitewashed cottage or two and a couple more stone cottages with thatched roofs on open grasslands.

There’s a cluster of stone cottages on Kilmuir for the history buff. The Museum of Island Life. An old croft, barn, smithy and weaver’s cottage. Inside they have recreated the picture of how a highlander and his family would have lived in the old days. When there was no electricity – even now on one of those islands on the Outer Hebrides they do not have electricity, if you will believe that – when life was hedged in by the simple chores of existence.

In his typically single-room home, after a long day of eking out a hard living, the highlander would have sat around a cosy peat fire with his family, reading well-thumbed copies of Gaelic bible, possibly instructing the children in the art of playing the bagpipe or the harp, the women busy sewing bed linen, cooking and performing other such household chores. Entertainment would have been cèilidh – gatherings in Gaelic culture where storytelling, dancing and singing form an intrinsic part of merry evenings. Tankards of home-brewed ale or drams of whisky would have made the rounds. It spoke of a hardy life, one of self-sustenance, and as a traveller you might view it with dewy eyes, but how lonely life must have been and still is for the islander… the kind of loneliness that is bound to get to you unless you are born into this way of life, in which case any other way of living would surely be unbearable.

There is also buried nearby that great icon of Skye, Flora Macdonald. The rescuer of Prince Bonnie Charlie. A woman whose story inspires this woman sitting in the middle of the 21st century.

We pottered through Portree (the Pride of Portree, if you get the quidditch ref., played for this very village), which happens to be the single biggest settlement on the isle and its capital. Then onto the pride of Trotternish, a landslip. Pinnacles, cliffs, buttresses, gullies, waterfalls. An antiquated landscape that reinforces that it has been shaped by the elements for more years than the mind can grasp.

Meet Bodach an Stòrr. Scottish Gaelic for Old Man of Storr. A giant who was buried on the peninsula and his thumb stuck out. An ancient landslide that left jagged ridges sticking out like digits. Moody and mysterious even on a sunny day, stoking the imagination with possibilities. And that wonderful escarpment, the Quiraing, which looks like someone decided to unfurl a length of cloth and it froze with the folds in place. Folds that helped in the concealment of cattle from Viking raiders once. More Highland cattle nestling at the foot of the round-topped slopes of the Red Cuillin.

Beaches with prehistoric footprints of dinosaurs and towering above them vertical columns of basalt that look like they have been pleated together like a tucked kilt. So the name Kilt Rock. And streaming down it, waterfalls that free fall into the turquoise waters of the Sound of Raasay below. To add to the overall effect, a bagpiper braving the cold wind to pipe out tunes that tear through the isolation with a haunting certainty.

A rugged land of crofts, waterfalls, sleeping giants, princes, shaggy cows and whisky. Is it any wonder that fairies people this remote land where you are stuck in time?

2017-07-16 03.31.06 2.jpg — On Kilmuir he sways to the tune of the wind in the grass

Beinn Edra, the highest point on the Trotternish Ridge.

Processed with VSCO with preset — Dreamy noons

2017-07-16 05.05.37 1.jpg — Scottish Gaelic bands in the house

20140421_123429 — Mealt Waterfall with Kilt Rock in the backdrop.

Aug 1, 2017

Arundhati Basu79 Comments

Glass for Princes in Murano

A mile north off Venice is the cluster of islands called Murano. We crossed in a vaporetto (water taxi) from Venice to Murano on a day that was joyously sunny. The kinds that come wrapped up in a bow only once during a few miserably cold and foggy winter days spent in Venice. When we got off the boat at Murano, the first sight that greeted me was that of a bearded local dragging a sizeable carton on wheels . He looked like a fisherman, the lines of the years marked out on his weather-beaten face.

A rustic, atmospheric introduction but what lay after was anything but unassuming. Workshops, boutiques and factories cropped up in a row, flanking the grand canal. Stepping inside them, my senses were dazzled by the rich colours of delicately designed glassware — and, may I add sheepishly, the prices.

There we were at the heart of it all – Murano thrives on the art crafted by the glass blowers of the island. They have been at it for centuries. Somewhere towards the end of the 13th century, the Doge ordered the glassmakers to move their factories to Murano. Now there is a bit of dilemma about why he did so. But it sways between two schools of thought – one that the Venetian authorities did not relish the thought of their wooden buildings exploding with the danger of fire at large, and secondly this that they did not want the craftsmen to divulge their secrets to outsiders.

The glassmakers achieved exalted status soon. They could carry swords, evade prosecution by the Venetian state, and by the late 1300s, their daughters could even be wedded into blue-blooded families. The only glitch was that the glassmakers could not leave the Republic. If a glassmaker had plans of setting up shop on lands beyond his own, it would mean two things for the fellow – he would either lose his hands (sounded to me like Shah Jahan’s edict for the workers behind the Taj Mahal had travelled far – the Mughal emperor was supposed to have had their hands lopped off so that they could not replicate the glory of his tribute to his empress), or, he would be killed by the secret police.

We had to watch one of the glassmakers at work. It is quite a touristy thing to do, yes I know, but sometimes I feel that you have got to be a tourist to the hilt. We marched into one of the factories and paid up about 8 euros each to watch a third-generation glassblower go about his job with incredible ease. Within the time that we spent gaping at him twirling a long pole, the tip of it encased in a glowing cone of fiery melted glass, he had moulded a handful of pretty pieces of coloured glass including one of a horse rearing up.

Veneto-Byzantine summer palazzos and cathedrals apart, I was taken in by the iridiscent blue sculpture at Campo Santo Stefano. It was a veritable starburst in glass. I gaped more – by which time Adi was fairly tired of sulking and being ignored while I kept staring at glass. To not have your sulk acknowledged is worse than your partner shopping on the sly. My husband shall confirm both. He does the first, I do the second. At that point of time he had made the transition to Mr. Grumps. He had not been fed gelato on time.

Off we went on a gelato hunt which concluded the visit to the island on a fairly satisfied note. Not to mention the few colourful pieces of suspended, ceiling lamps that we bought before boarding the boat to Burano.

2017-03-21 08.38.53 1.jpg — **Baked and bearded Murano locals**

2017-03-21 08.38.56 1.jpg — **Grand Canal**

2017-03-21 08.38.55 1.jpg — **Boutiques that line the canal**

2017-03-21 08.39.08 1.jpg — **Glass blowing – at the very heart of Murano is this art.**

2017-03-21 08.38.57 1.jpg — **Inside a glassmaker’s workshop**

2017-03-21 08.38.58 1.jpg — **The focal point of this shot being the horse.**

2017-03-21 08.39.02 1.jpg — **Emerald hues of the Grand Canal and cathedral walls looming alongside.**

2017-03-21 08.39.03 1.jpg — **Blue glass sculpture at Campo Santo Stefano, the 19th century clock-tower.**

2017-03-21 08.38.50 1.jpg — **Post mint chocolate chip gelato, all is usually well.**

2017-03-21 08.39.10 1.jpg — **Murano’s lighthouse made of Istrian stone.**

How to Get There: Look out for Vaporetto 41 and 42 from Piazza San Marco in Venice. You can also stop at the cemetery island of San Michele, that lies between Venice and Murano.

Where to Buy Glass: Go with your instinct. We stopped at a shop that was quiet but the owner refused to haggle (which was a bummer) but the relief was that we did not come out with products made in China.

Where to Eat:

La Perla Ai Bisatei. An Italian eatery where I stopped for cappuccino and a spinach puff pastry that delighted my tastebuds with its flakiness. The food is supposed to be good here and the prices reasonable.

Osteria al Duomo (www.osteriaalduomo.com) is a family-run affair and known for the freshness of the locally-sourced food it serves up.

Apr 3, 2017

Arundhati Basu79 Comments

Church with the Witch’s Hat

It is a gloriously nippy day because we have driven up north to Yorkshire for the weekend. A walk in the green, green dales can only do us good, right? We drove last night for about four hours and passed through Derbyshire. Descending the hilly roads in the county, a crooked spire much like the twisty hat of a witch loomed up ahead. For me, the market town of Chesterfield has become synonymous with its crooked spire.

One Samuel Bromley even wrote a few lines for it in the mid-19th century.

“Its ponderous steeple, pillared in the sky,

Rises with twist in pyramidal form,

And threatens danger to the timid eye

That climbs in wonder.”

I don’t know about ‘danger to the timid eye’ but it certainly challenges the mind to come up with stories or go with legends that come with it. St Mary and All Saints is a late-13th century parish church upon the spire of which Satan is supposed to have landed while flying from Nottingham to Sheffield. He must have been a great sneezer that Satan – because the entire burden of the twisting of the spire is laid upon one sneeze.

There is another story that goes with the church – a stunning bride with great virtue entered the church and inspired the spire to bow. It froze in that posture clearly.

The power of satan or the power of great beauty? Well, the more non-ludicrous and staid reason is probably that the spire built straight could not bear the weight of 32 tonnes of lead tiles placed atop it. The herringbone pattern of the spire cements the twisted look.

As we left the lights of these towns behind and made our way through the dark country, we took a few minutes to get off on the grassy knolls, shiver and throw our heads back to stare at an upturned, inky bowl shimmering with stars.

None of the magic of it could but compare with the lardy and wrinkled nude back of an old woman in a hotel room. After midnight, we reached the hotel bleary-eyed, collected the room card, crawled to the room and inserted the card. Adi opened the door and to my astonishment I heard voices issuing out of the room. The telly is on it seems, I thought, and before I could get any further with commenting on the oddness of it, Adi looked scarred and a disgruntled man appeared at the door simultaneously. “But there seems to be a mistake, this is supposed to be our room too,” he said. Since they were comfortably settled in – the lady of the room had even decided to discard this modern inconvenience of clothes – it was only fair that we rushed back to the reception where the gentle, bald man was startled enough that he did not know how to react. It also meant that at that moment when Adi looked appropriately grave and annoyed (the best way to get extra hotel points for occasions when the hotel goofs up), I was shaking and vibrating. You know how it happens when you try and repress peals of laughter. The large desktop computer on the till in front of me was my refuge or so I thought. Adi assured me it was not.

We did get another room (thunk god) whereupon we threw ourselves upon the bed, laughed till our stomachs ached and then just passed out.

How is your weekend going? If you have any nude, old ladies and crooked spires featuring in them, we might be in the same part of town.

Mar 25, 2017

Arundhati Basu23 Comments