On Writing

This evening I'm sitting at a table in an outdoor cafe, surrounded by Middle Eastern men with burning cigarettes. It all feels very Covert Affairs. Like I'm a handler, waiting for my contact to show.

But my real purpose is much less exciting. The two older boys attend youth group on this side of the island and since this coffee shop is right around the corner from where they meet and it has a small playground, it makes sense to stay out this way. I'll do anything I can to save myself some extra driving. 

So I sip my cappuccino with a side of smoke and listen as words that I don't understand roll off the tongues of those around me. I pull out my notebook and read over my stories of Paris, deciding this evening I will write in the present instead of about the past. Meanwhile, my two blondies play with a group of dark haired little boys. They are different every week, but the game is always the same: chase. 

After three weeks Camille is finally comfortable enough to join in the game, shrieking along with the rest of them, rather than scaling the plastic playhouse and sitting on the roof where none of the littler boys can reach her. I think about how different her life is at age 5 from any of her brothers. I wonder if any of it will be relevant a decade from now. I wonder where we'll be a decade from now. 

As I'm finishing up, Caleb comes over and asks, "Do you always write everywhere you go?" I give him the writer's response: I write down what I see, what I think about things, and things I don't want to forget. Whatever comes to mind.  He goes on to ask, "Mom, have you ever thought, you know, when Camille goes to school..." 

And I think, "Wow, my son is going to speak God's calling to me and confirm that I should write a book. This is going to be a story I tell when people ask me how I became a writer." Until he finishes with, "...of getting a job?"

Bubble burst.

Flying Solo

Josh is gone for a month. I know there are people who never say when their husband is gone for safety reasons, but I don't worry about my personal safety here in Bahrain. First of all, I have a dog, which scares off 90% of the people he comes in contact with and second? The most dangerous thing I do every day is drive and that's the same whether he's here or not. So, if you're wondering why I haven't written lately, that's why.

Anyway, he's off playing games in the desert and I'm home playing war-games of my own.

This princess was on a roll last night. She was overtired and in a terrible mood and didn't want to go to bed, stay in her room, or have anything to do with me. She kept throwing her blankets and pillows at me (which I calmly took and removed from the room). I came back in to check on her and she had thrown her mattress off the bed and onto the floor. Possibly to try and spite me? It was a classic Robin meltdown from the early 90s era. That would be me at 20, btw. Not cute.

Earlier that evening I had said if she refused to brush her hair and she wouldn't let me brush her hair, then I would have to take her to get her hair cut so it wouldn't be so tangled. In the middle of her bedtime tantrum, she got a pair of scissors and started cutting her hair because, "[mommy] said we were going to cut it so FINE! I'm doing it myself!" Said with all the rage and attitude of someone a decade older and no wiser. 

She's going to give herself the Hicks girl "elevens" if she keeps frowning like that.

A parting shot. 

After about 90 minutes of "unpleasantness," girlie finally gave up and accepted that she wasn't getting back the stuff she threw at me (until morning) and that I wasn't going to let her leave her room, so she helped drag the mattress back on the bed frame and went to sleep under the one remaining blanket. On nights like these, I think I'd rather be up against ISIS. 

PS: She woke up happy and contrite and had a great day so whatever bug was up her butt, it's gone for now. No need to worry about us. And tonight she got ready for bed, tucked herself in, and fell asleep while I was on the phone with Josh. Customer service has clearly subbed out my broken baby for a working model. Amen. 

Day 2?

Really? All this and I'm still only on Day 2? I guess it shows how much more we can fit in when we're traveling as a group of 2 instead of 6!

As we left the Orsay people were opening umbrellas and sprinkles were falling from the sky. We decided to walk across the street and along the Seine in the misty grey air. Rain makes me so happy. We found ourselves at the end of the Champs-Elysees and decided to walk up it toward the Arc de triomphe. Before coming to Paris last year, the Champs-Elysees was legendary from all the times I had seen it on the final day of the Tour de France, but I was a bit disappointed to discover that it was just a big, busy, modern shopping street with a cool monument at the end. Oh well. It does have some high end shops, like Louis Vuitton and Tiffany. Josh and I popped in to this over the top version of . . .

Abercrombie and Fitch. Yes, seriously. Gold trimmed gates and doors, looking like a palace, but inside are the same clothes, loud music, and pictures of half naked male models. They even have a live Abercrombie model as a greeter.

To go along with the ornate decor, they classed it up and turned the half naked guys into paintings instead of photographs. 

The store was huge (4 stories?) and attracted every pre-teen for miles. I heard loads of giggling through the cloud of cologne. It really is that dark inside. I'm not sure how anyone can even see the clothes. 

We are obviously too old for this. And too cheap. 

A line to get inside the Nike store? Crazy. Inside were 3 floors of athletic wear, wall to wall people, and it was as warm as a California summer day. It was damp and chilly outside, but the employees were all wearing tank tops. It was a sweatbox in there. 

We stopped for lunch at the top of the street and rested our feet, drank some wine and sparkling water, and ate gourmet hamburgers. Another great meal. After warming up, we headed across the street to the Arc de triomphe. Well, we actually headed around the circle since the Arc sits in the center of a huge, busy roundabout so we had to travel the perimeter until we reached one of the stairways that led to the underground tunnel access. 

After a million stairs up, round and round a small circular staircase, we finally made it to the top. The view of the city is beautiful, even on a wet day. It was the perfect amount of rain -- enough for us desert dwellers to enjoy it, but not enough to make us wet. We were both able to wear our regular jackets and didn't need raincoats. It was fun to stand at the top with the cold drops sprinkling our faces. 

Josh still hasn't been to the Eiffel Tower. I'm letting him catch glimpses of it from all over the city before we go view it up close. 

After our time at the top we headed inside to one of my favorite gift shops. I'm not a shopper, but the museum gift shops in Paris always have fun and unique things that you can't find elsewhere, especially the one inside the Arc. After picking up a few things for the kids (and a metro map dishcloth for me) we took the metro back to our neighborhood to pick up some food for our apartment. 

At the cheese shop. I had picked up a few bottles of sparkling water at the corner grocery next door while Josh picked out some cheeses. Then we went a few doors down to the charcuterie to get jambon (french version of prosciutto) and then to the bakery to get a baguette.  

And a few other pastry treats as well -- why not try them all?

Then we went home, crashed into a nap, and woke up and talked to the kids. I love them, but 5 minutes on FaceTime was enough for me to remember why I needed this vacation. Especially when Camille started demanding that she get to hold the phone and then went off sulking because she had to share the screen. She's an all or nothing kind of creature. We're working on that. 

Later that evening we ventured out as far as the restaurant downstairs from our apartment where I had a fabulous cassoulet (white beans with sausage and bacon), the perfect comfort food, and Josh ate duck breast. He ordered duck several times on this trip after our dinner with the chef because he wanted to see how it differed from restaurant to restaurant. I ordered a glass of Sanceere, a white wine that comes from a particular region of France. It was my favorite from the night before so I ordered it everywhere we went for the rest of the trip. It's clean and crisp tasting with very little aftertaste. Every version I tried was a little different, but they all maintained the qualities that I liked from my first tasting. Expanding our minds and our palates. 

Orsay

Writing about Paris from the comfort of a poolside lounge chair at a resort -- it almost doesn't seem fair until I mention the haze in the air, the potential sandstorms that threaten to ruin our day, and that I'm on day 3 without cooking gas because every time it runs out the delivery company says, "inshallah, inshallah" and then never shows up. Oh, and I have a broken water pump and a swarm of bees taking up residence outside my girlie's bedroom window. If you're ever envious of my life, remember, there's always a back side to every pretty picture.

But Paris was pretty beautiful both front and back. Day 2 we awoke to clear, chilly skies. I had read about a can't-miss patisserie so we hopped on Velibs to try more pain au chocolat for breakfast. I wish I could have taken photographs with my eyes (I'm sure that technology is on its way) while riding our bikes because some of the most beautiful views of our trip were the spires of Notre Dame stretching out above the Seine in the early morning light. Since I couldn't take photos of it I took it all in with my eyes, along with the feeling of the wind in my hair, as we pedaled over the bridge, across the river and down the left bank.

Thankfully Josh was navigating so he got us to a Velib stop near the bakery. Then we fought at breakfast about something stupid while eating perfect pastries -- oh, you thought this was going to be all smiles and sunshine? Nope. What I realized from our disagreement is that we haven't spent enough time together lately and our communication is "off." Josh has been working long hours and who knows what I've been doing, but the end result is where we used to be able read each other well and communicate clearly, we have lost part of that and it is resulting in misunderstandings and frustration. So we got through breakfast and I was only mildly miffed by then (and past the point of refusing to join in eating breakfast and saying that I should have come to Paris with Carter) so we decided to go to the Orsay Museum because it was right around opening time and hopefully that way we would miss the long lines to get in.

It turned out to be a great move because there was a line several hundred people deep, but because we had bought museum passes the day before, we strolled right in through an alternate entrance. The museum was just opening and I told Josh we needed to start at the top floor, with the gallery of Impressionists -- the reason everyone comes to the Orsay.

This is a one in a million shot -- we had the place to ourselves. 

Hello, Monet! How nice of you to display all of your churches just for me!

No joke. We had a private showing. Last year, on a February weekday morning there were several hundred people milling about. It was still beautiful, but to be able to view room after room of famous works in silence and solitude was an experience that will probably never be repeated.

My high school English teacher's favorite artist is Camille Pissarro. I think of her every time I see his work. She gave me an excellent background in both art and literature. One of very few instances where I can give a positive example of my OPS education. (As opposed to my "Don't Worry, Be Happy" teacher who would leave the classroom to wander the halls of the school for 40 minutes and didn't care what we did as long as we stayed inside the classroom and didn't report him. I heard he later went on to become Vice-Principal. sigh) 

There's nothing under his fig leaf (yes, I checked).

this one reminded me of Camille and her kitty love

I know I'm experiencing something special.

Just Josh, me, and Degas' ballerina. 

After about half an hour or so, a few people started making their way up and into the Impressionist wing, but by then we had seen it all and headed back downstairs. 

The Orsay is on the Left bank and looks out over the Seine to the Louve on the Right bank

The building is an old train station that was converted to a museum so the building is as interesting to look at as the paintings and sculptures themselves. 

Oh gosh, more selfie takers. Yep, you and Van Gogh. BFFs forever!

Best field trip ever! Seated in a room full of nudes. How very French. 

Bon Appetit!

After kicking up our feet and soaking in the sun next to the pond in the Tulleries, we completed the trek down the length of the garden to the Orangerie, the museum that was designed specifically to show off Monet's enormous waterlily paintings. 

The ceiling is a skylight covered by a sheer curtain. The paintings are always changing depending on the amount of light available. Paris annoyance number 1: the number of people taking selfies with iconic works of art. A year ago people weren't allowed to take photos in this museum and while I'm sure all these folks are happy to go home with their own copy of the lilies, it made the viewing of them in person much less enjoyable. 

Yeah, yeah. I took one too. Not cause I really wanted to, but when I wrote about this museum last year I had to find a photo of it on google images and this time I can actually use my own. I'll probably go back and delete it now to save space on my hard drive . . .

After we finished at the museum we decided it was time to head back to our apartment to rest for a few hours before dinner. We were both working on only a few hours of sleep from the plane ride and though we felt fine, we didn't want be too tired to enjoy the special chef's table dinner that I had booked ahead of time.

This was our first time trying out the Paris public bike system, the Velib (Vuh-LEEB). The name is a cute play on words combining "Velo" (bike) and "liberte" (freedom). It's an apt name. Flying along Parisian streets on a bicycle felt incredibly freeing. There are stations all over the place with racks of bikes like in the above photo. We purchased a week-long pass for $8 each. We would type in our code, select an available bike, and be off. We could use the bike for up to 30 minutes free of charge before dropping it at any available spot at any of the stations. If we wanted a bike for longer than 30 minutes we could stop at a station, quickly switch bikes and the 30 minute clock would reset.

We rode all over the right bank, passing landmarks like the Pompidou modern art museum (which has an exterior as crazy as the works of art it houses in its interior), along the river Seine, and in and out of traffic until we finally made our way to the Velib stop closest to our apartment. 

Then I fell into a sleep so deep it made me glad that I set my alarm to wake up for dinner.  

We headed up to the hills above Paris, the Montemart area (which is pronounced more like Mo-mar than what you'd naturally assume from its spelling). For dinner we were going to a class/event at a cooking school. We arrived in the area a few minutes early so I showed Josh the bakery that we found last year that had the best French macarons. We bought a few to eat later -- didn't want to ruin our appetite for the amazing meal that was ahead of us. 

This is the class I took with my friends last year. They had just come back from the market and were learning how to prepare their fresh finds. When I was looking at the schedule of classes to take for this trip (cause I knew we had to do some kind of cooking experience together) the chef's table class was exactly what I wanted. A chance for us to sit and eat together, try wines that have been picked to go with each dish (since I'm a terrible wine drinker -- I always think food makes the wine taste bad so I'll have a sip until my first bite and then quit), and relax. Especially for the first night of our vacation. 

We headed past this classroom and down a set of narrow wooden stairs to a wine cellar type room where the chef and a sommelier were waiting. We were seated at the table, met our dinner partners and examined the menu for the evening. We were a group of 4 (I like this particular school because they max out at 6 instead of 10-12 like other places) and the other two women were traveling solo, one on a repeat vacation to Paris from Quebec and another from LA. They were both 

Hydrate or die.

I'm not a foodie photo taker so I refrain from taking pictures of my food -- I don't want to be that person. Even on this night,  I only took two and Josh took one, but in hindsight, I wish I had sucked it up and taken photos of all of the courses because it would have been easier to describe how heavenly each dish was. 

First course was baby asparagus tips (newly in season) bathed in a velvety cream soup. Paired with champagne. Pro-tip: asparagus is notably difficult to pair with wine, but everything goes with champagne (according to Preston, our sommelier).                          

A pile of truffles, meaty whitefish, and a buttery sauce. Earthy and rich. And expensive. And now I know I love turbot. The chef would start each course by explaining what he had prepared while doing final preparations and plating. Meanwhile the sommelier, Preston, would pour the wine he had chosen to go with the dish and explain where it was from, what properties made it a good pairing, and then we would eat and drink. 

I thought I had tasted truffles before, but I clearly have not. The chef had several on a small plate and said that he was holding about 80E worth of truffles and then proceeded to take one and shave an abundance of it on each of our plates. This might have been my favorite dish of the night. 

My only experience with a sommelier was the guy on Top Chef who thought he was the Best Chef Ever because he had also been to wine school, but after tasting Preston's wine parings, I have to give the sommelier thing some credit. The wine served with this course was crisp and tart, almost like a green apple, and it didn't give me the wine shudders (when a wine tastes ok up front, but then the aftertaste is either too dry or too sweet and I have to shake it off. This happens often. Josh thinks it's hilarious.)

I said the turbot and truffles was my favorite, but this third course is a close call. I've never had Foie Gras before, but I always thought it was a cold, liverwursty thing. Our chef explained that the best Foie Gras is fresh and that the stuff we were eating came from ducks that had been killed the day before. I don't know that I'll ever have Foie Gras again because I doubt anything else will be able to compare. First he seared it to caramelize the surface, then finished it off in the oven. It was served with pearl onions in a balsamic glaze. The FG melted in my mouth -- firm edges, soft in the middle. It was buttery, rich, and like nothing else that I've ever had. It was earthy, but more like a truffle than a mushroom. 

Darn us for being too busy having a good time and eating to take a photo of the duck and cheese courses. All I've got is a photo of Josh eating Foie Gras. So the foie gras was served with a sweeter white wine (not super sweet) that cut through the richness the dish. It totally worked. Chef Alex's food was divine, but I was even more impressed that Preston could pick wines that I actually enjoyed drinking with my food. It's a Paris miracle. 

The next two courses were duck and then cheese. The duck breast was from the same geese that "grew" the foie gras so they had an extra layer of fat on them which the chef managed to get perfectly crispy. The duck breast itself was like steak, like a fillet wrapped in bacon with the salty, crispy skin on the outside. It was served with a pepper infused butter and now I can't remember what else -- darn my prideful refusal to take out my camera. Oh yeah, the wine. This one was a smoky red, which is totally Josh's favorite kind, but not mine. It was fine, but I passed it off to Josh after a few sips so I could focus on my duck. 

But the wine that went with the cheese course was a sweetish red and mixed with the blue cheese -- taste explosion! I don't even remember what else was on that cheese plate, only that the blue and the wine was a marriage that I was fully in support of. 

And finally dessert. Raspberries and chocolate are my two favorite things in the world. It's like Chef Alex knew I was coming. The chocolate cream/mousse is made from this top of the line brand of chocolate that in its purest form, starts as a 10lb brick (he pulled it out to show it to us) that all the finest restaurants and bakeries use. God bless the French and their love of dark chocolate. 

I know we had a red wine with this course too, but I didn't take a mental note of it. Who needs wine with dessert when there's coffee to drink? The exception to that is when Josh and I were in Bodega Bay and the chef sent out an incredible blue cheese cheesecake with a red muscato wine that was the only perfect food/wine paring I had had up until today. (Again, the blue cheese and sweet red works! Try it sometime.)

It was a perfect evening. In between courses we chatted with the women at our table and the one who had been to Paris many times gave us recommendations on what to see and do and the woman from Los Angeles turned out to be a writer and entertained us with stories from the different TV shows she has worked on (Mad Men and Heart of Dixie).  We headed home to our Parisian apartment, happy we still had four days ahead of us. 

Springing Forward

We don't Spring Forward or Fall Back. It would be nice because then it might not get light at 4:30 am (thank God for blackout shades and learning to sleep through the Call to Prayer), but no, we stay on Saudi time all year long. Now I have to do new calculations to find out what time it is in various parts of the US. I think we were 11 hours ahead of CA and now we're 10? Or maybe it's the other way around. And the East Coast is 7 for part of the year, but I'm not sure if that's right now or if that's how it is with standard time. Good thing I'm a writer and not a talker. I'll just send messages when I feel like it and the recipients can read at their leisure. This way there's no need to worry that I'm waking someone up in the middle of the night with a phone call.

The kids went back to school today. Our last big break before summer. Boo. But for one of us, spring break is only 1/2 finished. We found out over the weekend that the base sponsored teen leadership organization had been approved to take 6 kids to a Military Teen Ambassador conference in Orlando and Calvin was one of the kids invited to attend. The only catch was that they departed the following evening. (they had been working on getting it approved for months, but it didn't come through until the last minute.) Calvin's initial reaction was that he shouldn't go because he was concerned about missing that much school, but Josh and I told him that was crazy -- he was going. Did I mention that it's all expenses paid? Airfare, hotel, and food?

So he spent the day at school arranging for his absence, came home, packed his bag and was off to the airport by 7pm. He flies into DC and then on to Florida and will be back in a week. I don't really care what he learns at the conference, but the experience of more international travel on his own and seeing a different part of the US is something that's worth doing. He might decide he loves Florida and want to go to college there (currently he's only considering California).

All in all, it's been an excellent spring break. Thursday night we went to Caleb's play performance. Three times a year a children's theater company comes to Bahrain and puts on a production with the kids. Kids (aged 5 to 18) audition on Sunday morning and are assigned parts, rehearsals begin Sunday afternoon or Monday (depending on your part) and on Thursday night they perform an entire musical show. The quality of their productions is impressive and the fact that they can get even the littlest kids on stage for their choreographed numbers is pretty amazing. 

Waiting for the show to start

Each show is loosely based on a popular children's story. This year was Robinson Crusoe and Caleb played an octopus that helped to provide entertainment on the island's resort (remember, I said loosely based). 

I've tried to convince the boys to do the play before, but they never wanted to. It surprised me when Caleb, out of the blue, wanted to participate this time. 

The grand finale

taking a bow

One other unique thing we did over spring break was to go to a BMX show. Every so often, bands or other special performers come to our base and put on a show for the military that are stationed here -- a taste of home. This week they had a group called Bikes over Baghdad -- 12 or so BMX riders that have all won medals in the X-games, etc. 

The heat is on -- it came early this year. It really never left . . .

There were a few hundred people in attendance to watch them do flips, spins, and jumps. 

They asked the crowd, "is anyone here brave?" and Carter's hand shot right up. They pulled him out of the crowd as a volunteer to be jumped by one of the guys on his bike. Then they decided that one person was too easy so they pulled 15 or 16 other kids to join him. 

He's going to jump them without a ramp

He cleared them with room to spare!

More tricks -- the kids were all cheering

Amazing. And the ab strength you'd need to perform this trick is unreal. 

he's flying!

It's been a great break -- can't wait for summer vacation!