Well, vacation is almost over…I’m in Miami right now…I return to Providence tomorrow…so, stay tuned for more post…to come in the near future…hope all of you had a happy and very yummy Turkey day…
November 2007
Monthly Archive
November 26, 2007
November 22, 2007
I will post pictures from the actual dinner later this week…for now enjoy this one…
Mango & Lime is having a Thanksgiving contest for the best turkey day entry and well I am entering the race…so here it goes…
Since I arrived in the United States (many moons ago) my family has been celebrating Thanksgiving with some of my parent’s best friends. We love to spend Thanksgiving at their house because a) is a guarantee good time and b) food is delish.
All the food is cooked by Chef Jose. Now, he is not a real Chef but his hidden passion for food makes him one of the best household Chefs in Miami. He is beyond an amazing cook. He incorporates quite the menu for each Turkey day extravaganza. He takes some of the traditional dishes such as the actual Turkey and mashed potatoes and mixes them with Latin dishes such as rice with black beans (goes great with turkey) and maduros (plantains). The result is a mesh of flavors that really catapults the traditional Thanksgiving meal into a tasteful delight of colorful flavors that mesh nicely in your pallid.
This year the menu will be as follows:
1. Turkey
2. Mashed Potatoes
3. Sweet Potatoes
4. Maduros (plantains)
5. Green Beans
6. Black beans
7. Rice with corn
8. Sautéed mushrooms with crème
9. Pasta salad (antipasto)
For dessert:
1. Apple Pie
2. Pumpkin and pecan pie with a Whiskey sauce (I’m making this)
3. Bread pudding (my mother is making this)
After we stuff our faces we proceed to the second stage of our Turkey dinner…the dancing. We are Latin. And for the most part Latin people like being happy. And dancing makes us happy. So we conclude our dinner with a good 3 to 4 hours of non-stop Reggeaton, Salsa, Merengue, Samba, Tango and who knows what more dancing…at the end is about spending this special holiday and giving thanks for the many wonderful things we have…so we spend it with the people we love, we eat until we feel like we are going to pop and we dance until we drop (or until about half an hour before the stores open for black Friday)….Happy Thanksgiving to all…
November 21, 2007
Tonight I have a date with Soda Stereo at the Home Depot Center here in LA…sooo, a comprehensive report on this major event in my life will come soon…
Tomorrow at 6am…I fly to Miami…gosh…no sleep, no sleep…
Update: It was the best three hours of my life…beyond amazing…full report coming next week…wow…I literally jumped for three hours non stop…Soda…GRACIAS TOTALES….
November 21, 2007
Hall leading to the massage rooms of Pho-Siam Thai Spa
On Sunday after a wonderful breakfast, my two friends and I were supposed to go on a hike. But it was overcast (Marine Layer was definitely thick that day) and it was a bit cold. Mers had mentioned we should go get Thai Massages, so I mentioned it to the boys and well they both agreed. So we took a nice little drive to Echo Park.
I don’t know what I thought about Thai Massages before I got to this place, but I was seriously surprised. As we walked in, we were greeted in a very nice lobby by some lovely Thai ladies. The mood of this place was definitely relaxing. You felt as if you were transported to some magical Thai palace. The light was dimmer. Everyone was soft spoken. The walls were lined with intricate wood art work.
After we checked in, we were escorted to the waiting area. It was nice and comforting. We waited for about 2 minutes when we were called in for our massage. As you walked in to the “massage area” you saw a long hall with dark wooden floors. Shoes were a no-no here. The “rooms” were separated by very ornate curtains. Each room had some shelves to the side when you walked in, then a thin mattress and two pillows. The curtains separated and made each room completely private. And from the ceiling there were two wooden beams with two ropes hanging from the wooden beams. You are instructed to take your clothes off (I left only my panties) and you had to wear this weird robe that really does not cover much of anything, except maybe your upper thighs and buttocks.
Once you are ready, you lay down on the mattress, and your massage lady comes in. She asked me if I wanted the massage “soft, medium or hard?” I said medium. A sheet was placed over my body and she started rubbing it with the sheet on, as if she was trying to warm up the muscles. After 5 to 10 minutes of that, she proceeded to lather me in eucalyptus scented oil. She massaged my entire body. I felt as if I was in heaven. Now the difference between the Thai massage and a regular massage is that as she massages certain parts of the body, she also incorporated her whole body. Not only did she use her hands, but she used her arms, feet and knees. She balanced her weight on my body using the ropes that hung from the wooden beams. Additionally, there were times she used what you would describe as yoga positions to bend some of my muscles. I can honestly say, my muscles released all the pressure they were carrying around. I felt like cupid bouncing off the clouds after. I had just an eternal smile.
Once we were done, I dressed, and went back to the lobby. My massage lady greeted me again and gave me some much needed water (water bottle included in the massage).
The best part—massage is only $40 for a full hour. Yep!!!
Here is the info:
Pho-Siam Thai Spa
1525 Pizarro Street
Los Angeles, CA 90026
213-484-8484
www.PhoSiam.com
November 20, 2007
I am in Los Angeles this week until Thursday, when I will fly to Miami so I can spend turkey day with the mother. I must confess I am happy to be here. I missed LA. I didn’t even realize how much I missed it until now. So I decided to compile a list of the top ten things that I missed about LA…here it goes…
1. I missed the radio stations—LA has some of the best radio stations in the country probably…KCRW, KROQ, 107.1…among others…even the Ryan Seacrest show is entertaining from time to time…
2. Breakfast places…hmmm….Miami, Providence, New York, Boston, all those cities have good breakfast places. But for some reason, LA has great breakfast places…there are tons of good places in Santa Monica, Manhattan Beach and Venice Beach to name a few
3. Santa Monica…need I say more…I just love Santa Monica…its gorgeous, the beach, the mountains…ahhhhhhh….
4. The Marine Layer…I never thought I would say this, but I like it…the nice cool moist breeze it brings in…I just missed it…
5. The fog…today I was driving amidst the thick fog and I just loved it…never seen such thick fog like here
6. The traffic!!! Can you believe that I am saying this??? Yes, well, in Providence I am in the car for maybe 5 to 10 minutes…it’s frustrating!!! I like being in my car for long periods of time…and that stop and go…lets me think about whatever…I missed it…
7. Downtown LA—the skyline…ahhh…I don’t know why but I have this fascination with LA’s skyline…I just love it…
8. TACOS!!!—love the tacos…King Taco is amazing…even Del Taco is pretty good…you can’t get that anywhere else…
9. The shopping!!! I know…so superficial…but I think every store in the world is here…it’s great…so many options…
10. There is always something to do…just as an example…you can go to breakfast, go on a hike, then go get a Thai massage, go to a museum and go to an amazing dinner all in one day…it’s great…there is always something going on…
November 19, 2007
On, November 10th, I went to New York City. The purpose of my trip: a concert. Pacha Massive and Los Amigos Invicibles were scheduled to play at the Fillmore at Irving Plaza in New York City. I bought my tickets and pretty much dragged my little cousin to go with me (he had never heard of these bands before).
Delicia Brasil
The night started with a sweet dinner at Delicia Brasil. A great little restaurant in the West Village. We were transported to some remote tropical Brazilian city just by tasting our food. It was glorious. Yummy yummy!!!
My dinner at Delicia Brasil
Delicia Brasil
322 W 11th St
New York, NY 10014
(212) 242-2002
Afterwards we hailed a cab, which dropped us conveniently a block away from the Fillmore. Let me tell you, walking a block when the wind is blowing feels like your bones will freeze and come off, it’s a major task. But we made it. Picked up our tickets at will call and entered the venue. Once you entered the theater there was a line for the coat check in. The bottom floor was decorated with dark red walls and couches. It gave it a nice loungy feel. As you went up the stairs, you could begin to see stage only after you passed several posters that highlighted who has played in the venue in the past. Such acts like Led Zeppelin, Arethra Franklin, Coldplay are among others. The Fillmore does not fit that many people. I would say around maybe 200 or so, which makes it a very intimate setting between you and the music.
Pachaaaaaaaa
Once Pacha started playing, oh chills went down my spine. The singer actually sounds exactly as in the CD. Actually, I take that back. She sounded better. My cousin described her as “the hottest Mexican girl ever”, I happen to describe her as a wonderfully talented and gorgeous singer from the exotic land of Mexico. Pacha Massive is mix of Afro-Cuban, Colombian and tropical rhythms mixed with some electro pop. All in all is an eclectic mix that transports you to a wonderfully peaceful planet. Needless to say, I enjoyed their performance very much. They played several of their songs from their most recent album “All Good Things” and they played my favorite song…My love…so I was the happiest girl at the Fillmore…
Invisibles…
Then Los Amigos Invicibles finally joined the stage. Oh, it was amazing. They played a nice mix between the old and new. Including Sexy, El Cuatro and Yo no se. The whole audience was electrified by their mixture of a danceable disco pop mixed with some merengue, salsa and samba. If you can imagine it, well…you will be dancing right now. Moving and shaking…”ven a mi, tomame, besame, uyyyyyyyyyyyy” . They played for around 1:45, and the audience did not get tired of dancing and jumping. Everybody shared the same energy. Even the cousin, who had no idea who they were, was dancing and having a great time. If you looked around people from all corners of the world were there. It was a great nice little evening…that…danced itself away….
November 17, 2007
Sorry I have not written in a few days, but life has been crazy. I arrived in Los Angeles last night…so the jet lag has kicked in…I promise to write soon…keep posted…
November 14, 2007
“Love is a canvas furnished by Nature and embroidered by imagination.”
–Voltaire
November 13, 2007
I saw this article on the New York Times and I felt compelled to share…enjoy…
In Colombia, a War Zone Reclaims Its Past
Explorer: Tayrona National Park
CANTERING down a muddy path through Tayrona National Park in Colombia, we pulled our horses to a stop and listened as a high-pitched chant in an unfamiliar tongue filtered through the jungle. “That’s Lorenzo,” our guide told us, turning his horse off the trail and up a steep hill toward a solitary mud hut perched on the summit.
Moments later, a tiny, wizened man in a white smock, with stringy black hair that cascaded over his shoulders, emerged and squinted into the sunlight. He grasped our hands, introduced himself in broken Spanish and led us past a cooking fire into his grottolike home. A 1960s transistor radio dangled from a hook, along with some cast-iron pots and a pair of colorful knit saddlebags.
Lorenzo, a Kogui Indian from the adjacent Sierra Nevada mountain range, had recently moved his family into the park to take advantage of an explosion of tourism in this former war zone. Now he was selling the juice of the maracuyá fruit, and posing for photographs for tourists at 2,000 pesos, or about $1, a snap. “The government tried to throw us out, but they just gave up,” he said. “This land belonged to the Kogui long before it belonged to Colombia.”
Plunging down to the Caribbean Sea from the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, one of the highest coastal mountain ranges in the world, Tayrona National Park has long been known to connoisseurs as one of the wildest and most beautiful corners of South America. Its roughly 58 square miles, carved out of the equatorial rain forest by the Colombian government in 1964, is among the most biologically diverse of any coastal zone in the Americas: dusky titi monkeys, red squirrels, collared peccaries, jaguars and 200 species of birds ranging from Caribbean toucans to red woodpeckers.
Below the mountains sprawl wild, palm-fringed beaches, framed by sea-sculptured boulders and connected by footpaths through the jungle. The area is studded with archaeological sites left by Tayrona’s indigenous tribes — the Koguis and the Arhuacos — who settled the region in pre-Columbian times.
Until recently, however, Tayrona was associated more with civil war and the narcotics trade than with tourism. For years the park and its environs were a battleground between the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), one of the Western Hemisphere’s oldest Marxist guerrilla groups, and right-wing paramilitary groups, both of whom coveted the region as a base for cocaine processing and smuggling.
In 2003, armed gunmen kidnapped eight foreigners, during a raid inside the park. Three of Tayrona’s directors have been killed in recent years, most recently Marta Lucia Hernández, who was gunned down three and a half years ago, apparently because she resisted the demands of paramilitary groups to use the park as a cocaine-shipment point.
Now, however, Tayrona has been transformed. In late 2003, the Colombian president, Álvaro Uribe, began a military crackdown that defanged right-wing death squads, confined the FARC largely to the southern jungles and brought kidnappings down from about 3,000 to about 100 a year. With the Sierra Nevada now largely safe, the government has set about promoting Tayrona as a tourist paradise. Central to that effort was awarding the main tourism concession inside the park to Aviatur, the country’s largest travel agency.
The jewel of Aviatur’s operation is the $245-a-night Ecohabs resort, a complex of secluded huts built into the side of a jungled cliff overlooking the sea. “Before, it was just a patch of jungle with poorly maintained facilities,” said our taxi driver, Argemiro Toncel, of Tayrona. His wife is a chef at the Ecohabs. “It’s all so much better now.”
The jumping-off point for Tayrona is the coastal city of Santa Marta, Colombia’s oldest town, founded by the Spanish in 1525 and best known as the place where Simón Bolívar, the Latin American liberator, died. The photographer Carlos Villalon and I flew in one balmy September evening from Bogotá, and took a taxi 30 minutes along the coast to the city’s colonial quarter. The old part of town, anchored around a charming cobblestone plaza and a centuries-old cathedral, possesses a smattering of faded old hotels and apartment buildings with marble-tiled courtyards, fountains and other flourishes.
But the city, otherwise, is dilapidated, reminiscent of the most neglected parts of old Havana — but with Daewoo taxis instead of vintage 1940s and 1950s Chevrolets. The Colombian government has been talking for years about turning Santa Marta into “a new Cartagena”— the beautifully restored coastal city 113 miles west — but the renovation program has never gotten off the ground.
Santa Marta is worth a night’s stopover, if only for a visit to a piece of hallowed ground: Quinta de San Pedro Alejandrino, the butterscotch yellow hacienda where Bolívar, desperately ill with tuberculosis, died on Dec. 17, 1830. The hacienda — a modest adobe villa set around an ocher-tiled courtyard — still has the canopied wooden bed where Bolívar drew his last breaths. Across the courtyard is the smoking chamber where Bolívar’s host and others retired for cigars so as not to torment Bolívar’s deteriorating lungs.
A large glass case displays the carriage that brought Bolívar to the hacienda, and across the magnificently landscaped grounds rises the Benitez clan’s original sugar cane processing plant. The only jarring note is a massive neo-Classical memorial built out of concrete on the 100th anniversary of the Liberator’s death — more suitable to Pyongyang, I thought, than to this sleepy Caribbean outpost.
After visiting Quinta de San Pedro Alejandrino, we continued 20 miles east along the Troncal del Caribe, the two-lane coastal highway, to Tayrona National Park. At the park entrance, we turned off the tarmac road and followed a muddy path through the jungle toward the visitors’ center three miles away. Then, our driver plunged his taxi through a rain-swollen stream, sinking it to its axles in the mud. Each spin of the tires dug the car in deeper; nearly an hour passed before a ranger appeared with a tow rope and a Jeep Cherokee and dragged him out of the sludge.
It was our first indication that, despite the tourist influx over the last two years (at the season’s height, between Christmas and early February, the park can receive 1,500 visitors a day) Tayrona’s infrastructure remains maddeningly — or appealingly — underdeveloped.
At a thatched-roof hut in a dirt clearing, we hired horses for the 40-minute journey down a jungle trail to Arrecifes Beach. Black-faced, gray-maned titis darted through the dense mangrove forests that hemmed us in on both sides. The ground was alive with movement: violet crabs skittered in and out of holes in the earth, and armies of biting red ants carried tiny green morsels of the forest to their lairs. The trail leveled off, and we found ourselves in a grove of coconut palms, and beyond was a sweep of sand miles long and entirely deserted — with good reason. A sign warned that 200 people had drowned in its riptides since 1964.
At Arrecifes, we settled into comfortable beachside bungalows and dined barefoot at a fine outdoor restaurant on shrimp ceviche, grouper fillets and cold Colombian beer.
Tayrona’s swimming beaches lay farther west, reached by a trail that dips and climbs through the rain forest and over mounds of giant white boulders. We clambered over rough wooden bridges, ladders and staircases built into the rocks, offering splendid views of the sea, and arrived at a pair of horseshoe-shaped coves — the fabled beaches of El Cabo San Juan del Guía.
Jungle-covered hills rose precipitously over cream-colored strips of sand lined by 70-foot coconut palms — like something from the set of “Lost.” On this hot September afternoon, the only other visitors were a dozen young Israelis recently finished with their army service. We lazed on the beach and splashed in the aquamarine water until distant rumbles of thunder roused us from our reverie. With flashes of lightening on the horizon, we leapt from the sea and beat a retreat back toward Arrecifes.
We ended our visit to Tayrona with a stay at the Ecohabs, a dozen secluded luxury cabins meant to suggest traditional Kogui dwellings, built into the cliffs high above the Caribbean. Despite the name, the place evinces no special environmental consciousness — electricity is provided by a diesel generator — but the setting is extraordinary. A stone path switchbacked steeply above the sea, winding 200 feet to the highest bungalow, where we were booked for the night. Far below, the surf was thundering, and the sky over the jungled Sierra Nevada glowed peach and gold in the fading light.
I settled on a hammock on the stone base and listened to the waves crash- ing against the rocks. Not long ago, that very beach might well have been a launching point for boats laden with cocaine; but from this vantage point, Colombia’s war seemed a distant memory.
VISITOR INFORMATION
Carriers including Avianca and Delta fly from Kennedy Airport in New York to Bogotá with round-trip fares starting at around $640 for travel in January, according to a recent Web search. The flight time is slightly under six hours. Flights from Bogotá to Santa Marta take about an hour and a half and fares start at around 560,560 pesos, or about $280 at 2,015 pesos to the dollar. Domestic flights are best booked through Aviatur, Colombia’s largest travel agency (57-1-382-1616; www.aviatur.com).
Just in front of Santa Marta’s small terminal you’ll find plenty of taxis for the half-hour trip to Santa Marta, the jumping-off point for Tayrona National Park; expect to pay about 100,000 pesos ($50) for the one-way ride.
WHERE TO STAY AND EAT
The crumbling colonial neighborhood between the beachfront promenade and Santa Marta’s main cathedral contains a handful of hotels that are adequate for a night’s stay. Our choice was the Hotel Imperial Caribe (Calle 17, 3-96; 57-5-421-1556), a couple of blocks from the sea; the place has about a dozen spartan, clean rooms, with air-conditioning, for 40,000 pesos a night. In the same neighborhood you’ll also find the Hotel Mar y Mar (Calle 16, 1 C-25,; 57-5-423-4759).
The restaurant scene leaves much to be desired. We found a decent seafood place right off the sea front, Restaurante Ricky’s (Carrera 1, 17-05; 57-5-421-1564). Dinner for two cost 52,000 pesos.
Entry to Tayrona National Park costs 23,000 pesos; you can drive as far as the Visitors’ Center at Cañaveral, and then hire horses for 17,500 pesos each to take you down a muddy jungle path to Arrecifes Beach. There the best place to stay is the Cabañas, a dozen simple, comfortable two-story thatched roof bungalows that cost 220,000 pesos a night. There’s also a small camping area with room for 20 tents; maximum 100 people allowed on the site.
If you want to go further upscale, stay at the luxurious Ecohabs at Cañaveral, which is 495,000 pesos a night for lodging and breakfast; MasterCard and Visa accepted. Both the Cabañas and the Ecohabs have excellent seafood restaurants where you can get a fine meal — French wine, ceviche, grouper fillet — for about 60,000 pesos.
It costs roughly 125,000 pesos to hire a horse for the four-hour round-trip excursion from Arrecifes to Pueblito, a set of ancient Kogui Indian dwellings high up a mountain trail, with spectacular views of the sea.
During the busy season, which runs from the beginning of December to the end of February, as well as Easter, lodging in the park should be booked well in advance through Aviatur in Bogota (57-1-607-1500 for park reservations). During the off-season, it was easy to get a room on the spot. There are also numerous small inns outside of the park, but one should, if at all possible, arrange to stay within Tayrona’s borders.
November 9, 2007
¿Porque no me miras?
Estoy acá…
¿No me vez?
Tus ojos. Mirando. Viendo. Que pueden encontrar.
Talvez otro corazón.
U otros ojos.
¿Pero los míos que?
¿No son suficientes?
Que tristeza es saber que no te lleno.
