topotales

AKA, the post wherein it is revealed that living half one’s life abroad does not make one cool.  But in fact does encourage one to think about the strangest nuances in life.  And wherein I prove once and for all that - alas -I am not eurochic.

Here are some mental readjustments and silly anecdotes from the last month as we adjust to life in America and I experience the prickling sense that I no longer belong.

1A.   Eating and restaurants.  Yesterday, I ordered steak.  Pnut said “Remember when we first used to go to dinner, how you’d cut the the steak up into tiny pieces first, then eat?”.  Yes, like a little child.  Because American diners do this thing that makes them immediately recognizable anywhere: we cut with fork in left hand, knife in right hand.  Then, we lay the knife down and put the fork (tongs up) in our right hand and pick up our food.  Europeans keep the fork (tongs down) in their left hand, knife in right at all times.  They spear the meat and then somehow push veggies, potatoes, or whatever else is on their plate on top of the meat and balance the whole lot to the mouth.  This is a skill that takes several years to master.  However, it is a skill that will allow you to eat dinner peacefully with your European friends, so that they don’t feel compelled to stare, hypnotized, as you juggle your fork from hand to hand.  Fuck.  Do I have to unlearn it now?

1B.  Thank you, god, I will no longer have to act like cutting up a sandwich or hamburger is normal!!!

1C.  Free coffee refills? (Ok, it’s not real coffee, but still, it’s free?).  Free soda refills?  Are you kidding me?  Perhaps I’ve died and gone to caffeine heaven.  And free water?  Really, it’s free?!

1D.  Yes please, a doggie bag.  And you won’t give me the evil eyes?  Even better.

2.  Banking.  I went to the bank.  On a Saturday.  Without an appointment.  They took my money in a friendly fashion.  Belgian bankers, take note!  If you are nice, you get more money.  If somebody wants to give you money, they shouldn’t need an appointment to do so.  And if you are open on Saturdays, it gives you a chance to get even MORE money!

2B.  Uh, somebody please remind me how to write a check so I can teach Pnut?

3.  Social Decorum.  I stand walk down a quiet street, a passerby says “Hiya”.  I stand in a queue and a fellow queuee starts up a conversation about the weather.  I sit at a bar and the guy next to me says “howya doin’”.  Pnut and I go hiking and people we pass say “goodmornin’”.  We go to stores, restaurants, businesses and get friendly service.  I feel like taking all of these strangers faces in my hands and kissing them on the lips.  Thank you Americans, for being NICE.  It may be fake, but it’s just NICE to be NICE.

4.  Language.  Two weeks ago, we went to Burger King.  Paolo looked at the menu, and and asked the woman behind the register: “Uh, yes madam, could I please have a whooper?”.  “You mean a Whopper?” she replied.  “Yes madam, a whooper”.  Then she looked at me, I looked at her, and we both cracked up.  Why does whooper sound like something sexual when an Italian says it?  What is a whooper, anyway?

4B.  My mom and dad took a short holiday from Nashville, where they currently live, and went to Chatanooga for a weekend.  I tried to call my mom’s mobile a few times, but she didn’t pick up.  Paolo’s analysis?  “They must be doing plenty of Yankee-panky”.  When I finally reached my mom, she said “Tell him this is the South, no Yankee-panky here, just hanky-panky”.  “Oh,” said Paolo, “did I say it wrong?”.

5.  Fashion.  At the Grand Place in Brussels, Americans can generally be spotted by their flip-flop wearing ways.  The white-sneakers, of course, are a true give-away as well, but no self-respecting European would dream to wear flip-flops in public.  There being snow on the ground here in Jersey, I haven’t seen any flip-flops yet.  But I have noticed the new fashion in wearing house-slippers in public.  Finally, fashion has caught up to me.  I fully intend to parade around Venice in my houseslippers when we go back for a visit this year.

To be honest, I was going to write about something positive today.  You know, happy thoughts.  But I’ve got this Situation going at The Corporation, you see, and it’s making it extremely difficult for me to concentrate on anything.  The Situation is that I have been laid off… only I haven’t.  I mean, they told me I will be laid off, and there have been internal announcements of such lay-off.  But I haven’t actually been laid off yet, so I’m not really sure if I’m laid off or not.  Or when I will be laid off.  Or if this is all just a figment of my imagination. 

On a related but totally different topic, when P and I came back from our paper-signing and first wedding frenzy in Chicago last month, I was soooo jetlagged and tired on Monday morning that I sent the following SMS to my team and boss:

“Hi folks, staying home today with a touch of the flu.  Don’t worry, haven’t been kissing any pigs.  See you all tomorrow.”

And then all hell broke loose.

My boss called to tell me that I could not come back to work without a certificate of health from my doctor that stated specifically that I do not have the swine flu.  I kid you not.  So I called my doctor.  No appointments were available until Tuesday.  So I called my boss, and she gave me Tuesday off.  Ok, whatever, one free day off for me.  My doctor and I had a really hearty laugh on Tuesday, and she didn’t charge me for the paperwork, she just told me that it was highly illegal to have been asked for it. 

And when I came back to work on Wednesday (yes, I know - I REALLY should have made that doctor’s appt for the following week!!), I found that as usual The Corporation is not without irony, for the instigator of this great illegal swine fiasco was none other than our corporate lawyer.

I present you here with snippets (she IS still a lawyer, so I need to be a TAD cautious, lest I do anything illegal here) of her hysterical mail. 

I’ve been told…came back from the US with flu symptoms and despite this was planning to come to work tomorrow…going to inform HR immediately so that…could only return…upon submission of a medical certificate…

we count on you so that the appropriate safety measures are taken in respect of …so that she would not put whole [The Corporation] staff at risk. Also… send out the communication to everyone coming from the US and regions with the most spread Mexican flu virus so that in case of such people have minor symptoms of flu, they should immediately consult the medical centres and not negligently put other colleagues at risk.

CALL THE POLICE, CIA, THE FBI, INTERPOL, QUICK!  BEFORE I BREATHE ON YOU!  NEGLIGENTLY!  I guess that’ll teach me to say “flu” in the same SMS as “pig” without a full understanding of the media’s power for disseminating hysteria. 

All said and done, I guess it was worth the extra day of sleeping in…which I may be doing a lot more of soon… if I’m really laid off.  Not to mention getting called negligent for the first time in my life, just for being jet-lagged.

Coming soon on an SMS near you…

Hey assholes! Staying at home until I find a new job.  Obviously didn’t kiss enough asses.  See you all in hell.

What do you think they’ll say to that?

Friday morning I heard about MJ’s death in the following manner: I called my logistics team in Wales and A.D. answered the phone.

AD: Heya, good morning- guess what, MJ had a heart attack and died!

me: REALLY?  No, you’re joking!

AD: No, I swear to ye, he really did!

me: Sheesh, I must live in a media vacuum…

AD: Yea, we’re completely bent over it here in the office.  Di’ye know what he said on the way to hospital?

me: (earnestly) No, what?

AD: Could ye drop me at the children’s ward, please?

God, I love Welsh humor!

Okay, I know this may be cheating a bit, but I have loads of writing tucked away and it’s always fun (in a self-humiliating, masochistic kind of way) to go back and rediscover the past.  So I’m going to try and do these two (years) and one (month) specials every now and then.

Two years and a month ago I wrote:

Today is reflective, romantic, melancholy, and hopeful.  Watched Henry and June, finally.  Had been on my list for a long time.  But was reading up on Anais Nin a couple of months ago - led there by a surrealist/erotica search for an abstract painting I loved but can’t remember the name of, nor the artist.  Saw it today and picked it up.  The Left Bank in that time period is an obsession for me.  I missed my time, you see - I should have been there!  I should have been young there!  I should have made love there!  Henry Miller, strangely enough, I have never read.  Started Tropic of Cancer once, quite a while ago, but couldn’t get through it.  Maybe I should try it again now that I’m older.

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What did I do this afternoon?  First, the dentist.  Yuck.  He didn’t wear gloves.  Is that normal?  Freaked me out.  But decent guy, explained before he touched, which I like.  Of course I marched in with my records from my last dentist, knowing what I wanted, ready to fight.  But it was okay.  Medicine is much more human here.  I like it more.  Then again, you’re walking into somebody’s house, which is always a little strange.  Paolo had part 1 of a root canal long over-due (I saw that tooth a couple of years ago and said so).  Yes, I know everything.

Then what?  Bank, to take care of some things.  Unusually hot in the lobby with the sun shining through.  Sweating and grimacing while transferring “large” amounts of money.  Then inside to set up some automatic transfers.  Charmed the guy behind the desk; had him laughing. Good-looking black guy, young, gave me some free stuff and a new password for my CD-banking thing.  Funny conversation about why I’ve had it for two years and not used it… basically, week 2 after arriving here, I understood “vous… madame… banque…transferer… ” and they handed me the CD.  “Oui, oui”.  That was the end of that.  Not to mention, I didn’t have a computer until this past September.

–

SO, after the bank, to the climbing shop.  Was supposed to be a brief walk-through.  Couldn’t resist, bought a new crashpad.  My other one is so small it starts to look like a postage stamp from just a couple of feet off the ground.  Good for extra padding, but not for motivation.  Also got new pants - on sale, “the ugliest things I”ve ever seen” according to Paolo.  But I like ugly.

After that, haircut.  Got the weird gay guy.  But I’ll look for him again next year - put my head in the little tank and he washed my hair.  I love my hair touched, and my head.  He scratched my scalp a bit under the warm water; I closed my eyes, it felt so good.  He did it for a couple of minutes.  I almost fell asleep right there.  He was very gentle the whole time, but never too gentle - knew also when to pull, and how to dry my hair so my scalp felt good.  Heaven in 6 minutes.  Then groceries, then home.  Long afternoon.  Hair smells nice - he sprayed some stuff in it, sweet, like smelling the wind come off an orchard of fruit… apples and lemons and peaches together?

–

I need to break the awful habit of using smiley-face emoticons, non-words like ”lol’ and “imho”.  If I can’t express those emotions creatively in words, then I shouldn’t be trying to write at all.  It’s bad for writing well, and writing expressively.  At least to an audience who you know is intelligent and capable of subtlety.

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I’m enjoying the Venice book immensely, but it’s incredibly distracting.  I need to look up and explore every character I come across.  So I’m only half way through.  Finished the Missouri Review in one night.  Still shitting myself over the quality of work, and the (lack of) quantity.  Interview in there with David Sedaris, one of my heroes of pulp literature.  Oxymoron in that phrase, I know, but you know what I mean if you’ve ever read Sedaris.

So, there’s this blogging game going around.  It’s so neato.  The rules are:

1. You leave me a comment saying, “topo, please interview me.”  … or, you know, something that means that.
2. I will email you five interview questions of my choice, providing, that is, you left me your email address.
3. You update your blog with the answers to the questions and link back to my original post.
4. You will include this explanation and an offer to interview someone else in the same post.

Here are my questions from Violet.

1. On your blog, you recently mentioned how it’s possible for people to be talking about things but not in a way that their partner can fully understand.  What subject do you find it most difficult to speak about in a way that makes other people understand (in a relationship
or otherwise)? Why?

I generally don’t have a hard time communicating.  Rather, my problem tends to lie in the overcommunication column.  Dissecting conversations and incidents and people and … well, everything into molecular minutiae is what I do.  I am kind of genius at it, but it’s definitely what makes my partners and friends a bit crazy at times.  All the “why” questions.  Paolo has been a great cure for this.  He doesn’t have many “why” answers, no matter how many times I ask, he just is and he just does. It doesn’t hurt that he’s so laid back he’s horizontal.

2. What’s the last thing you do before you go to bed at night? Is it always the same thing?

I am a total creature of the small habits.  Every night in precisely this order, I pee, brush my teeth (one leg has to be propped up on something… in most of my apartments it’s the toilet but here it’s the bathtub), weigh myself, groan loudly and then hop into bed.  After that, I spend ten minutes trying to coax my dog out from under the bed.  This is exceptionally stupid because I know that as soon as I turn off the light and snuggle in she will come out and plop herself on top of my legs in the most uncomfortable configuration imaginable.

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3. An internet friend (someone you haven’t met before but who you feel comfortable with) is coming to visit you. What three places in your city/area would you take them to see/experience so they could get toknow *you* better?

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OOooh.  This is a tough choice.  I suppose top choice must be Fontainebleau , three hours from here and just South of Paris for climbing, hiking, running, biking, playing in the woods, playing in the sand, castle-scoping, etc.  Other than that, Paris itself - not for the Eiffel tower, but to see the Left Bank and stare longingly through the gates of Natalie Barney’s salon.  Perhaps recite some Rimbaud.  If you love history, literature or art you can’t beat Paris for hidden-in-plain-sight treasures.  The lesbian clubs are fucking amazing, too!  After all the poetry and junk we’ll definitely head to Amsterdam (two hours north of here)… to… go to museums, of course… cough… cough…

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4. In your “about” section on your blog, you note that sometimes it sucks to be an “undercover brown” person.  What’s the worst part?

I find it incredibly annoying that the Indian side of my family still acts surprised that I understand family conversations in Hindi.  Seriously, they’ve known me for 33 years.  NOBODY can POSSIBLY be THAT WHITE.

I also find it super annoying to have the same conversation over and over.  It usually goes like this:

Random person: Woah, you went travelling in India?  Wasn’t that incredibly… hard? Did you get sick (this conversation also ccasionally also begins with “That’s a unique name”)

Me: Well, I’m half Indian and I spent my childhood there, so I don’t find it that hard, and I don’t get sick too bad.

Random person: Really?  Are you sure?  You don’t look Indian.  (occasionally followed by) You have light eyes… and you’re white!

It’s a bit of snobbery on my part to be annoyed by this because obviously I know I don’t “look Indian”.  But, you know, you’d say fuck it and get annoyed too after the 567th time.

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5. Is there anything in your home that’s totally out of place (either aesthetically or incongruous to the sort of person you are)? What it is and why do you have it?

The television set!*  I haven’t watched any actual tv in over ten years (except for a brief six-month period when I dated a guy who couldn’t live without one… during which I watched EVERY episode of That 70’s Show and Friends EVER made… which, now that I think about it, may say something about that “relationship” that just hurled it into the unhappy land of between quotations).  So I have a set that doesn’t get any signals, but we do rent hella videos.  Anyway, now I know what direction to point all the furniture.

*Interesting side note here, you actually have to PAY for television in Belgium.

………………

SO?  WHO’S NEXT?  HMMMM???

Some thoughts I had last night at TGI Fridays in Athens, Greece.  (Yes, I am slightly ashamed of myself.)  I’ll update on my awesome day today once I have pictures uploaded!

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Sitting in a TGI Friday’s in Athens, Greece.  This is not as strange as McDonalds in Mumbai (Bombay), but I am still finding it fairly surreal.  And annoying.  That people think this stuff is great.  That they … That they  I take it all back.  I think I’m jealous.  That other countries and cultures can take the worst of US consumerism and treat it properly like what it is, not warp it out of proportion.  Here, it remains as an interesting bit of AmeriKana - a treat.  I suppose there was a day when it wa like this in the US, but it is long gone.  Now we have to have the biggest and the most before we’re (n)ever satisfied.  Quantity over quality.  An ass-backwards approach.  Two major differences (TGI Greekies):  1.  Everyone smoking everywhere  (theme?)  2.  Soccerballs where there would be baseballs.

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Like other places I love in the Mediterranean, people here seem to enjoy being out and about, talking in a loud, smokey bar, making merry without being on a schedule - letting the night take them where it may.  Or is is it that I cannot see more subtle signals between parties?

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Dad would be pleased to see Newcastle Brown and Sam Adams in the bar fridge.

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The women here feel happier, more sure of themselves, stronger emotionally than women I’ve seen elsewhere.  They feel warm but balanced.  Not insecure enough to need gaudy baubles like the French or Italians, but not cold and unfriendly like the Northerners nor fake like the Americans.

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Female volleyball players have the best asses ever.  Or is it the shorts?  Doesn’t matter, I like volleyball.  And why don’t they show women’s volleyball more often, anyway?

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Strange to think of Greek Orthodoxy, traditional religious life, old women in black nylon.  Then remember that this is the country that had had gay rights BC.

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I keep remembering two things: 1. The stories my violinist friend told me about “Her Greek”, most of which revolved around his small penis being convenient for buttsex.  2.  My Big Fat Greek Wedding… “What do you mean, you don’t eat no MEAT!? …  … It’s okay, I make you lamb”.

I saw this menu posted outside of a restaurant in Belgium and it immediately forced me to re-think my entire “Belgium Food” post.  …I think I’ll have (2)! 

Fille Mignon, for the non-French speakers, means “Hot chick”.  Whereas what they were probably going for was Fillet Mignon, or …steak.  Either way, sounds better than frogs and snails!

Some pointers on eating and food consumption in general, here in Belgium…

1.  Milk: Refrigerate!?  Have you gone mad? Keep it in your cupboard until it turns green, then move it to the fridge as cheese.

2.  Fries (Fritjes or frites):  Invented in Belgium, not France (wink, wink), so it’s really nationalism to have them with every meal.

3.  Asparagus:  Why buy it green when you can starve the plants in the dark underground and then eat them with a clammy, sickly-white glossy sheen?

4.  “Haute Cuisine”: Requires nothing more than a trip to your garden, where you may find rabbits, frogs, snails, slugs and any other manner of creature to trap.  Throw it in some butter, garnish with garnish, and charge a ridiculous price.  Goooood eatin’!

5.  Mussels: Jean Claude Van Damme is from Brussels, did you know that? Yep, they call him the “Mussels from Brussels”.  Don’t let that scare you off, though.  Just remember, mussels are best eaten in months ending in “R”.  Van Damme ends in “E’.

6.  Chocolate: Some places in the center of Brussels, you can see it in shop windows for hundreds of Euros per muffin-size cake.  Lots of small chocolate boutiques with yummy (free!) stuff to try.  If you live here, you’d better scope out the nearest shop to your house because you’ll need to bring a box to every damn occasion, including your own birthday.  And this is a Catholic country.  That’s a lot of chocolates.

7.  Waffles (gaufres): Only the tourists eat the (delicious, warm, melty, sweet) loaded ones with Nutella, whipped cream, strawberries, banana, chocolate sauce, … hold on… funny feelings happening… ahhhhh yes!  Real Belgians eat them out of the converted ice-cream trucks, plain.  Still good, I guess, … just not orgasmic.

8.  “Ethnic” stuff: Oh, you mean like a late-night Pita?  They can also be plonked on cous cous.  ‘Cause that makes it - you know - exotic.

9.  Breakfast: War rations of the business age, apparently - you are allowed one croissant (this could maybe be replaced by a brioche if you ask real nice) + a coffee.  And NO YOU CANNOT TAKE THE COFFEE WITH YOU.  You have to drink it right here because we have never heard of carry-out cups. [I'm not bitter, really!  But if anyone wants advice on how to open a Starbucks - I used to hate Starbucks- in my building, let me know!]

10.  Beer: Helloooo.  This requires its own special list, and vocabulary, which is why I will let a real, live Belgian guest-post on the subject (if they don’t all hate me by now).  Plus, this is the one positive point regarding nourishment in Belgium but since I’m almost entirely a (cheap, shitty) wine person it’s totally wasted on me.

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In case you actually wanted to know what to eat that’s “really Belgian” while you’re here (it’s pretty obvious what you’ll be drinking), I recommend waffles, chocolates and mussels as listed above.  Also, the following dishes: Carbonnades a la Flammande (Flemish beef stew cooked in beer), Stoemp (mashed potatoes and sausage), and Waterzooi (creamy chicken). Really, considering the high concentration of Michelin-star-rated restaurants and great chefs in Belgium, it’s a disappointment that a common man on a budget can’t easily find excellent food.  Excellent food - for me - means something more interesting than meat and potatoes with the occasional side of that nasty white asparagus.  I know somebody who will argue this point with me, and I welcome it (hansosan)!  So if you have a suggestion for a great place in Brussels to eat for under €20 per person (that includes my two glasses of wine), I promise to try it out and then write what I thought.

Ok, I wasn’t going to post anymore today because fistulated cows and Catholic lesbians seemed like a pretty definitive subject mix for the day.

But then Amy (thanks, Amy!) totally cheered me up by sending me this photo of a supermarket in (Italians, hold your breaths… nah, just kidding) Spain:

And who could sit on something like this for more than 15 minutes?  Not I, … no, not I.

Super-maxi-bitch super market now has some serious competition.

I mean - good lord, what ARE those things?  “Shop here, we have - PSYCHO PHAT GERMS!”  These little guys look like something you’d find stuck to Spongebob’s bootie after a day cruising male nurses in the oncology ward.

Also, why is the hairy green penis-cucumber grimacing?  Oh… wait, probably because the worm is begging at his feet to save him from the ADHD purple four-eyed rectangle dude.  And in the upper right-hand corner we have a green sock-puppet whose nose looks like my parent’s dog’s… eh, nevermind.  I’m just feeling bad for the blue thingy- he looks as alarmed to see the rest of those toothy insectoids as the human in the picture!  His eyes are saying “Save me!  Save me!”.

There’s also this Croatian supermarket, whose name suits the above picture.  I can’t wait to shop there- it’s not just SUPER GROSS!