Dancing with Lobsters

Recently, a group of us dog-park regulars, who are starting to coalesce into a group, were invited to the masia (an old farmhouse) owned by Patricia, one of the doggy people.  We were going to eat arros amb llamantol (rice with lobster) made by Josep, one of the other doggy people.  

And of course, dogs were invited too (although they were served dog food which all five dogs managed to eat out of one bowl with no fights, not even a growl).

We carpooled, as not everyone drives.  I picked up the chef at the market where he had gone early that morning to buy the fresh lobsters that he had ordered in advance.  We picked up Gemma, her son, and their rescued greyhound and drove over to the gas station where we were to meet some of the others and, most importantly, Patricia who would lead us out to the masia.

An hour and a quarter after arriving at the designated gas station meeting point, we finally headed out for the country.  Catalans are not known for their punctuality although I have heard that they are more punctual than people in the rest of Spain.  Getting a late start did little to dampen our spirits or keep us from enjoying the heck out of the day.

The masia is located on a hillside near the Costa Brava village of L’Escala.  It is old, simple, and totally charming, as was our hostess.  “Make yourselves at home,” she told us, and we did.

There were ten of us.  I was the oldest in a group that ranged from 32 to 67 (not counting the child).  As the only foreigner I wanted to contribute something not Catalan for an appetizer and so I brought my famous guacamole.  This was a hit and helped tide us over during the two hours it took for Josep to cook.

Getting ready to cook

Smokers waiting.  Several roll their own.

Rice with lobster is an incredible, aromatic, and richly flavored Catalan dish that deserves international fame.  

Eaten in far less time than it took to make, we then turned our energy to dancing.  With the dancing came gin and tonics for some of the hardy ones and that eventually led to those who were drunk as well as those who were simply young at heart getting everyone else soaking wet.  A huge bucket that kept the wine and beer cool was used at first, eventually being replaced by the far more efficient method of the garden hose.  Not being drunk or all that young at heart, I thought they’d forget about me (or let me pass because of my superior age), but no.  I got my dose too.

It was a fine day. 

Seat 600

The Seat 600 was built in Barcelona from 1957 to 1973 under license from Fiat.  It was an inexpensive little car that was for Spain what the VW beetle was for Germany or the Fiat 500 was for Italy -- allowing many families to hit the road.  There are still some -- either restored or very well maintained -- putt-putting around.  A group of owners gather each year to show off their wheels and parade around town at the Figueres festa major.  And when they do, I always try to be around with my camera.  I would get one if I could afford it!

Bagels

Bagels have come to Spain!  It may not seem like a big deal to you, but I hadn’t had a bagel in 14 years, so imagine my joy when I saw Thomas Bagels advertised on TV.  Not surprisingly, they aren’t as good as ones you get from a bakery, but hey.  I’m on my third package and enjoying the heck out of bagels, lox, and cream cheese, although here they say Philadelphia rather than cream cheese.

Sometimes I get annoyed with the narrow selection of products available here.  No graham crackers, no real vanilla extract, no fresh (or frozen) cranberries, no corn meal, no corn tortillas, (and very little fresh corn which is used for animal feed rather than human consumption) no yams, and sweet potatoes only in the fall and winter.  On the other hand, I just read an article that said that having too much choice (as in an American supermarket) was stressful.  And it’s true.  I suffer from very little stress these days, and for that I am grateful.

Now I’m waiting for English Muffins.  I hope those don’t take another 14 years to arrive.

Jews of Poland in Castelló d’Empúries

It was last October that I went to see an exhibit that one wouldn’t expect to find here.  In fact I wouldn’t have known about it at all if my Polish friends who vacation nearby hadn’t told me.  They are Polish Catholics and knew about the exhibit because it was housed in the church that they attend when they’re here. 

Titled “And I Continue to See Their Faces: Photographs of Polish Jews” the exhibit was the work of a Polish organization called The Shalom Foundation that in 1994 started a campaign asking for people to send them photographs.  So far they have received 9,000 images from people in Poland as well as many other countries such as Israel, Venezuela, Brazil, the U.S.A., Italy, Argentina, or Canada.  Some of the contributors were relatives, some friends or neighbors; all of them had kept the photos for over 50 years.  The oldest contributor was 90 and the youngest was 12 years old.

The organizers say that those who helped to save someone from the Holocaust are called “The Just.”  But they believe that The Just also includes those who have done something to preserve someone’s memory.

This beautiful collection of photographs was first exhibited in 1996 in Warsaw and has since traveled to over 40 cities around the world, including Frankfurt, Munich, Hamburg, Saint Petersburg, Brussels, The Hague, Prague, Los Angeles, Detroit, New York, Toronto, Montreal, Mexico City, Buenos Aires, Jerusalem, and Castelló d’Empúries!  Castelló is nearby.  The exhibit was hung in the Basílica de Santa Maria – the village church which, oddly enough, includes a Star of David in its architecture.  Some of the photos reminded me of ones from my parents’ albums.

Cupcake Goes for a Walk

Cupcake likes to go for walks.  He likes to sniff things and walking gives him the opportunity to do lots of that.  We go for longer walks a few times a week.

Sometimes we walk the path to Vilabertran.  Once you work your way through Figueres, which isn’t particularly nice, it’s a pleasant dirt path passing through fields where in winter and early spring you can get a beautiful view of the snow-capped Pyrenees.

Although it means first driving to a nearby village, I also like to walk on the multi-use path that follows the Muga River until its outlet at the sea.

The problem is, we’ll be walking along a country path and little by little he starts to slow down.  Where before he was sniffing here and there, he has started to sniff every plant we pass and soon enough he’s sniffing each leaf.

The path to Vilabertran

Snow in the Pyrenees

The Muga River

I haven’t yet figured out if it is the heat (summer is not yet upon us and the heat, such as it is, has been pretty mild), if the walks are too long, or if he simply doesn’t want to go and is being a drama queen.  But he is small and he isn’t that young and who knows what hardships he’s endured and I don’t want to do him any harm.  So when he slows to a crawl and starts with the leaves, I turn around and we go back.  

Meet Cupcake

In January a local dog rescue group called me to say that a small dog in a nearby shelter would be having surgery that week and since the weather was so cold, could he come to stay with me to recuperate in a warm home?

They sent a photo, but the photo wasn't important. My vet had advised that I not adopt a dog because one of my cats is chronically ill and living in a stressful environment would likely take a toll on his health.  But I have always wanted to have a dog, and I finally decided that I could give it a trial.  If the sick cat didn't seem too stressed, the dog could stay.

Meet Cupcake.

Life changes when you adopt a dog.  First of all there are cute little jackets and hats to buy, doggy costumes for Halloween, doggy shampoo, doggy booties for the cold.  Just kidding.  The main difference is that I now have a shadow who follows me around the house and I walk (outdoors) much more than I ever have. There are the compulsory three walks a day, some of them turning into outings to a nearby village, a multi-use path, or the beach.  

Occasional visits to the dog park have become a daily event, and one highly prized by Cupcake.  He loves the dog park.  He was a little shy in the beginning, but with each visit he’s gained confidence and blossomed, running with small and large dogs, and in spite of his short legs, running even with the greyhounds.  

The dog park is not a very large space but the dogs have enough room to run if they don’t mind going in circles.  Since most people live in apartments, it gives the dogs a chance to run, be outdoors, and to socialize.  And, as it turns out, it also gives the owners a chance to socialize.  It’s the most socializing I’ve done in years.

Cupcake & Co.

And what do you know.  The cat likes the dog far more than the dog likes the cat.

Paris in the Drizzle

Paris was good for me.  It was good to walk in the place where so much of what I've read took place.  It was good for my tummy and for my soul. 

One evening, with Elaine and Jin, there was the outstanding fish soup followed by to-die-for small steamed (Spanish) mussels done the French way with wine and lots of butter.  As someone once said, you can never have too much butter.  With the whole group there was the outstanding galette (salty crepe made from buckwheat flour) with cheese and bacon and I-don’t-remember-what-else in a neighborhood creperie that Brigitte, our fearless leader took us to on the day when we braved the rain climbing the hills of Montmartre.   If my galette didn’t recharge my batteries, the apple crepe with Calvados that I had for dessert certainly did. 

In fact, I felt so fortified that instead of inspecting the two churches on offer at the top of the butte, I stood in the drizzle arguing with our lecturer James about whether Vincent committed suicide or was shot by someone.  I am of the latter opinion but James, who is a graduate of the Sorbonne, holds a Ph.D. from Southampton-Solent University, and is an expert on art history, didn’t agree.  Even experts can be mistaken.

Passing by the apartment building where Vincent van Gogh lived with his brother when he came to live in Paris, James gave the group a brief history of the artisst.  A history full of errors.  Vincent went to teach in England before he became an evangelist in Belgium.  Maybe it isn’t important the order of his jobs, but it is important to mention that he couldn’t keep any job, not even his first one that had been for an art dealer – a family member.  His whole working life was a failure.

James also said that Vincent was mad.  That he had shown symptoms earlier and then had the crisis when he cut off his ear.  Madness ran in the family.

In the 1880s people talked of madness because there were many illnesses that had not yet been defined.  Look a little further back and madness was thought to be the work of witches or the devil.  But no one talks of madness now.  Now, people suffer from schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, epilepsy, and other illnesses that doctors couldn’t diagnose or didn’t have treatment for in Vincent’s day.   Vincent’s illness had a diagnosis, even if it wasn’t known at the time.  A recent theory was that he had bipolar disorder, but it has lately been convincingly argued that he suffered from temporal lobe epilepsy.  Ironically, epilepsy was the diagnosis of Dr. Reyes who initially treated Vincent in Arles when he mutilated (but did not cut off) his ear.  Unfortunately, even though Dr. Reyes was probably correct, there was no treatment for it then.

James went on to say that Vincent went to Avers-sur-Oise in order to stay with Dr. Gachet and because there was an artist community there.  Vincent’s brother Theo knew Dr. Gachet, who was an amateur painter and art collector, and had arranged for him to stay with the doctor in order to receive treatment for his illness.  There was no artist community.  When he arrived Vincent discovered that the doctor was not able or willing to have him in his home, so he went to stay at the village inn. 

Some of these erroneous bits weren’t really important, but all together they painted a picture taken out of Lust for Life rather than any real biography of Vincent. 

The most important error, in my opinion, was to say that Vincent committed suicide.  There is convincing new research presented in the excellent book Van Gogh: The Life by the Pulitzer Prize-winning authors Steven Naifeh and Gregory White Smith that says that Vincent did not kill himself, but that he was shot by someone – probably by a wealthy teenager whose family summered in the village and who used to taunt Vincent.  Earlier research pointed to the same conclusion.  If he had shot himself and walked back to the inn, what happened to his painting kit?  His easel, paints, brushes, and canvas were never found.  And the gun?  Where did he get and what did he do with the gun?  That was never found either.  He hadn’t been out in the wilderness; he was in the cultivated fields by a village and yet none of these things have ever been found.  But besides these questions, there is new forensic evidence that makes it very unlikely that the gunshot could have been self-inflicted.  (Link to article)

All these myths being presented as facts annoyed me enough to stand in the drizzle and argue.  Vincent is one of the world’s most important artists who never found the love and understanding he sought during his lifetime (except from his brother) and deserves the respect to be presented accurately.

Calvados crepes and Vincent aside, my food highlight in Paris was our dinner at Miss Lunch, a tiny restaurant and food shop run by Claude, a food artist.  The food was good but Claude was the tour de force of that tasty and very entertaining evening.

Other highlights?  The Van Gogh and the Art Nouveau collections at the Musee d’Orsay, walking in the Marais, seeing the Allee des Justes with the names of those brave people who had helped French Jews escape the Nazis, the evening boat ride on the Seine, paying my respects at Colette’s tomb, just BEING there where so much of what I’ve read about happened.

I took no food photos at meals.  In fact, I took fewer photos than usual during the whole week, partly because of the weather, and party because I didn’t want to be bothered.  Of the ones I did take, a good number turned out to be rubbish.  I think if I want decent church interiors and night shots of the Eiffel Tower and Notre Dame Cathedral taken from a moving boat, I need to take my better camera that has more possibilities for settings.  And I never did make it into Shakespeare and Co.   I guess I’ll have to go back.