CHINESE FOOD IN ALHAMBRA: TRIUMPHAL PALACE

I was just in the mood for someplace new to eat, someplace I hadn't tried before. And I didn't mind driving. My 2007 Zagat for Los Angeles is so worn already that I knew I was unlikely to get any new inspiration there. And then it struck me-- I had seen a story a few months ago in the New York Times about L.A. area Chinese restaurants. I hadn't had Chinese food in 4 years-- ever since my doctor told me they tend to cook the food in extraordinarily cheap and cancer-causing oil and to steer clear. But I was in the mood.

It was easy enough to pull up Mark Bittman's Times story, The East Is West: The Best Chinese Restaurants in Southern California, online. It was all about going out of town, away from the traditional Chinatown and east on the I-10 towards Jacksonville, Florida (just not that far). And not even as far as San Bernardino, although Bittman's point is that the whole 50 mile stretch of the I-10 between L.A. and San Berdoo is "a string of multiethnic communities that all have a large, dynamic Chinese population. There is strong evidence of this in the chains of Chinese supermarkets, the likes of which exist nowhere else in the country. (In these stores, announcements are made first in Mandarin, then in Korean, then Vietnamese; then Spanish, and last English. Really.)"

And one of those towns is Alhambra. Bittman was unequivocal "Follow my advice, drop everything, and rush to eat at Triumphal Palace."

The restaurant follows in the tradition of popular places such as NBC Seafood, Mission 261-- about which, more in a moment-- and the ill-named New Concept. Their menus are large and long-- several pages, at least — and often feature esoteric and very expensive ingredients such as abalone, shark’s fin and bird’s nest.

For my money-- and though it’s upscale by comparison, it doesn’t take much-- Triumphal Palace is the best of the lot, with food that is full-flavored, intricate and subtle, sometimes almost tame. The roast duck, which looks like every other Chinese roast duck you’ve ever had, is so good I suspect it’s not “roast” at all, but fried in clarified butter; it’s that crisp, tender and flavorful. It needs nothing, and certainly not the accompanying marmalade-like substance, which you should not allow to touch the duck. Other dishes are similarly simple, and just about as good: stir-fried Dungeness crab with scallion and ginger; pea greens with mushrooms and the distinctively flavored dried scallops; a pretty dish of chicken slices, huge shiitakes, ham and gai lan (Chinese broccoli), served in layers.

For all of this, Triumphal Palace is perhaps better known for its dim sum (served every day at lunchtime) than for its dinner dishes. Like many of the grand West Coast Chinese restaurants, from Vancouver on south, the dim sum is ordered from a menu-- you’re invariably given a short pencil and a printed sheet, to tick off what you want-- cooked fresh and served hot, rather than being hawked from steam carts. (Still, the problem of everything coming at once can only be solved by staggering your order.)

Six of us-- one of whom now claims she will be married here-- shared 24 dishes (about 18 of which came within 10 minutes), and while all except the predictably sad desserts were good, some were incredible. These were barbecue pork belly, firm cubes of slow-cooked, crunchy-skinned fresh bacon that, I swear, were a dead-on replica of a dish Alain Ducasse used to serve at about five times the price; Chiu Chow-style dumplings, with thick, chewy, slightly crisp rice-flour exteriors filled with (could it be?) jasmine-scented meat; deep-fried carrot cake, in fact a savory-sweet custard-filled dumpling; boiled baby bok choy in fish stock, which, like the duck I’d had at dinner, contained some secret ingredient that was the Bomb; and a wonderful layered creation of pan-fried sticky rice with egg.

On a recent Sunday morning, the place was packed, as usual. The design is faux Deco-slash-modern, not horrible, but with the inevitable stark lighting. Still, the walls are of wood, there are tablecloths, and the chairs are padded and comfortable. At dinner the napkins are cloth, and the plates are changed frequently.

Bittman is clearly insane. But I didn't know that until after I ate in this dive. Although I did know it before I came down with severe MSG poisoning. Before I left for Alhambra I decided to look and see what Zagat reviewers thought. The food rated a very undistinguished "20" (out of 30) and the review touted a "lit-from-behind Lucite bar" and "a spacious aquarium." Well, this New York Times food critic probably is a lot savvier than the John and Jane Does who did the rating for Zagat. Oh, was I wrong.

Let me take Bittman's review apart paragraph by paragraph. The menu was not "large and long;" it was medium-sized. The food was far from "full-flavored, intricate and subtle, sometimes almost tame." It was crap, MSG-flavored garbage and not "sometimes almost tame; always very tame. I took his advice and ordered the closest thing on the menu to what he called "pea greens with mushrooms and the distinctively flavored dried scallops," a soup that claimed those ingredients but which had no trace of scallops-- or flavor. I had asked the waiter if there was MSG in the food before we sat down and he shook his head enthusiastically. I figured he didn't understand. I was wrong.

I also asked him if the soup was enough for me and my friend. He said it was enough for 6 people. He wasn't exaggerating. All the dishes were oversized, which doesn't make up for quality in the slightest. My main course was a shrimp dish that was really bad and my friend had beef chow fun which he said tasted the same as beef chow fun does in any Hollywood dive.

Alain Ducasse should sue Bittman for comparing his creations to this swill. When I was around 16 I hitchhiked across the U.S. and a merchant seaman picked me up in a Cadillac and drove from Ohio to California. He claimed he had eaten in the best Chinese restaurants in Peking, Canton and Shanghai and that he would tale me to one that was better than any of them right down the road in Amarillo. I hadn't been to China yet but I had eaten enough Chinese food in Brooklyn to know that good Chinese food was not going to be served in a restaurant with baskets of rolls and rye bread on the tables. The restaurant was in a roadside mini-mall off Route 66, but it wasn't that much worse than the one off Route 10 in Alhambra. As for Bittman's other suggestions, if the Triumphal Palace is his "New Favorite Restaurant," I'll steer clear of #2, thru 5.

By the way, the next day I had the first headache I've had in many years and I was dizzy for two days. I didn't dare drive my car; something I never experienced in my entire life. I felt like I was going to fall over several times. My neighbor told me L.A. Chinese restaurants stopped using MSG years ago. I don't doubt it. Alhambra is like 30 minutes away though.

IF I DIDN'T ALREADY CONVINCE YOU OF THE WONDERS OF CAPPADOCIA, HERE ARE TWO MORE WITNESSES

A couple of months ago my old friend Kristin and her husband Nick were thinking about going to Turkey and Kristin checked out what I has to say about Cappadocia after I got back last year. After a quickly arranged lunch she went home and booked her flights and reserved a suite at the Esbelli. This morning I got an e-mail from her and Nick-- from the cave.

Turkey is amazing.  This will have to rank as the best trip we have ever taken....Rein Daddy and Howie you were dead on and we are grateful for your education and advice...We had no idea how beautiful this country was, as well as how fantastic the people are.

We are in Cappadocia right now in the interior of the country. It is snowing outside, but we are toasty warm in a cave where we are sending this email (high speed DSL I might add) resting from a long hike into some deserted caves, valleys, villages, etc...

We have not encountered a single tourist here, let alone an American. We are truly living among the Turkish people, and they seem so fascinated with the site of an American.  On countless occasions, we will be walking into a tiny shop (like 40 sq') to buy a water or something when the owner rushes to grab some old chairs from the back for us to sit in while he serves us apple tea and then just sort of stands there smiling and looking at us.  It may sound strange, but their warmth and hospitality transcends all language barriers. Today, we were in a shop and this older woman (covered as most of them are here) comes up to Kristin like she just found her long lost daughter with a smile beaming ear to ear and just starts touching her face smiling and laughing and saying "Guzel...guzel" which we have learned means beautiful. The fact that this is a 98% Muslim country should not dissuade anybody from coming here. We have felt safe everywhere we've been, except for a crazy taxi ride in Istanbul a week ago.

So far, we have spent around 4 days in Istanbul, 3 days in Selcuk (Ephesus), and now we are in a small town called Urgup in Cappadocia. We have traveled region to region by airplane due to the size of this country and cheap tickets. Istanbul was a great introduction to Turkey, and the different customs and such. It's pretty crazy as you are walking down the street when you hear the Muslim Call to Prayer echoing from loud speakers throughout the city. This goes on about 5 times a day.  It's pretty cool, except at 5 am when you are trying to sleep. So, we went to the massive and impressive Blue Mosque, the Aya Sophia, Topkapi Palace, as well as shopped at the Grand Bazaar.  Of course, we did a lot of eating too. The food here is pretty damn good. Sort of a East meets West...The spices remind me of sort of a mix between Moroccan, Greek, and Indian, and Kapabs are the big thing here. I must have had a couple dozen by now. Turkish pancakes (like quesadillas) and Pide (like pizza) are also favorites of ours.

In Selcuk, we felt like personal guests of the hotel owner -- Erdal. We just couldn't believe he had other hotel guests, because he was our personal guide throughout the region. He drove us to all of the major sights, restaurants, and even to run our errands.  Anything we wanted, Erdal was there to provide.

Ephesus was, bar none, the best ruins that we've ever experienced. You are in an ancient city with tons of history-- Alexander the Great was here, Jesus's disciples Paul and John were here, the Virgin Mary was here, multiple Emperors were here. It's so easy to imagine what life was like 2000 years ago and what a bright and vibrant time the 200,000 citizens must have experienced. The frescoes, mosaic floors, fountains with multiple statues, and terrace houses were amazing and well preserved. The houses even had hot and cold water running in them!

If you come to Turkey, you are nearly required to purchase a carpet, and we've met our quota. We are thrilled with the 9x6 and 4x6 carpets that are on their way to California as we speak. Any carpet salesman is delighted to give you an education of Turkish carpet making (only women make the carpets), but we decided to buy from Erdal and his partner, Nazmi and we think we got a pretty good deal. 

We're on our first day in Cappadocia and we are in one of the greatest hotels that ever existed. We feel like we've landed in a parallel universe that is featuring "Cave Hotels of the Rich and Famous."  It's called Esbelli Evi (look it up online) and much like our experience in Selcuk, our host Ramazan has taken us under his wing and is directing our tour of the region. For the next three days we are hiring a driver to take us to see sights throughout the region. This costs nearly the same as renting a car and doing it by ourselves. We just can't wait!

Cappadocia's terrain is frequently compared to being on the moon with incredible rock formations, mountains, and valleys that are one of a kind. We were prepared for it to be a bit cooler in this region, but didn't expect snow. Don't worry too much about us too much though, 
today we bought 2 pairs of wool socks, 2 pairs of wool gloves, and 2 hats for about $15.00 and lunch consisting of 2 pizzas and 2 drinks set us back a cool $4.80 with tip.

Well, just as we were sending this a couple from Toronto just checked in to the "cave" and agreed to explore and hike Cappadocia with us and our driver making this even more affordable. I think $15 a head for an entire day with a private car and driver. As they say in Turkey, Hoshchacal for now.  We know about 7 words including two numbers (Bir, Ichi) but we're always learning more.

THE PAKISTANI EQUIVALENT OF STONEWALL? PROBABLY NOT

The first time I went to an Afghani wedding something very much astounded me-- well, more than something, many things. It was 1969 and it was in a small city southwest of Kabul, Ghazni. I was staying with some college pals who were living and working there and we all got invited to a wedding. The first thing I noticed was a total separation of the sexes. The women-- including the bride, the groom's mother and sisters, etc.-- were in a different part of the house and we never saw them. So the wedding was kind of like a bachelor's party or maybe two bachelor's parties, one for men and another for women-- although not seperate-but-equal. The men were served a sumptuous feast. Servants and dogs were fed after we were done and then leftovers were sent to the women. That was all pretty shocking-- and I know that less than 30 years later our clueless commander in chief thinks he's building a pluralistic, democratic, secular society there (on the cheap... and fast) which is safe for women. That's called arrogance, cultural imperialism and hubris.

But what I saw as the inequality-- and even abuse-- for the women wasn't even the most shocking aspect of the wedding. After dinner the entertainment commenced. There was a small band that had been hired-- and a troupe of young drag queens. The band played traditional music and the drag queens danced. They were pretty bawdy. And many of them were pretty young. Everyone was smoking some powerful opium-laced hashish from Mazar-i-Sharif but many of the guests seemed genuinely disturbed when the groom's grandfather grabbed one of the young boys and dragged him behind a building and had his way with him. Later the boy, straightening his disheveled garb, came back and danced some more.

When I first saw this headline online-- After Drag Queens Are Beaten Up... Villagers Attack Taliban-- my immediate thought was some kind of incident between transvestites and Muslim fundamentalists in NY's Greenwich Village. But it turns out to be a report on an incident in a small town near the village of Adbulkhel, Pakistan, not far from Afghanistan.

The culture of the Pathan tribes on either side of the Afghan-Pakistan border are identical. The border is a colonial construct that has no relevance to their lives except as a sometimes annoyance. When Taliban religionist zealots beat up the local drag queens, shaved their heads and took away their instruments-- they react to nonconformity and music the same way, albeit usually more violently, western religionist zealots do-- the villagers got into a pitched battle, using heavy weapons and rockets, with the Taliban extremists.

The Afghan-Pakistan tribal regions seem like an utterly different world-- or millennium-- from Pakistan's big cities. And, in fact, the central government is engaged in a fierce and probably unwinnable war-- a very bloody one-- against the tribal areas right now. Karachi has different tribes, different cultures, different mores than the traditional-- and very primitive-- northwest. Small town, traditional hijras are very different from drag queens in the westernized big cities.

GET TO FES BEFORE THEY OPEN A MCDONALD'S-- THE NY TIMES JUST FEATURED IT

The first time I went to Morocco, the 60s, it was all about the Marrakech Express. And once you got there, there were the gentle charms of Essaouira, not all that far down the road. On that first trip, before the Jamaa el-Fna was a parking lot during the day, Morocco and Marrakech were synonymous to me. I had driven my VW van down from Spain, taking a ferry to Ceuta and studiously avoiding what I thought would be Tijuana-like Tangier (a city I came to love in later years). We spent most of our time in Marrakech and Essaouira, slept in the van every night. But we also managed to visit many of the country's other main towns on that trip. I had a terrible case of dysentery when we got to Fes and I remember spending all my time in a camp ground outside of town.

I've been back to Morocco eleven times since then. And Fes has long since replaced Marrakech as my favorite city, although Fes has gotten a lot tamer and less dangerous feeling lately and Marrakech seems to have gotten cooler again, more like the way it was in the 60s. Fes, though, will always be exotic, basically because Fes is a functioning medieval city with streets too narrow and with too many steps for motor vehicles. Sunday's New York Times features it and calls it The Soul of Morocco. The title fits although you could ask almost any Morocco-hand and they'll think that title refers to Marrakech. The Times relied on a Fassi partisan, "a craftsman and cultural entrepreneur," Abdelfettah Seffar, to give them the lay of the land:

“Fez is really just the medieval city that it was,” Mr. Seffar went on, contrasting his hometown with its fast-developing jet-set sister and rival, Marrakech. “We are a little scared of what Marrakesh has become. Fez is the soul of Morocco. It’s the last bastion of what Morocco really is.”

Faded but stately, crumbling but proud, the walled city of Fez might well be the largest and most enduring medieval Islamic settlement in the world. It is indisputably Morocco’s spiritual and cultural heart.

You need only watch the daily procession of candle-toting mourners entering the tomb of the city’s founder, Moulay Idriss II — believed to be a great-great grandson of the prophet Mohammed — to feel the city’s connection to its past. A glance at the ninth-century Karaouine University, widely considered the world’s oldest operating institution of higher learning, reaffirms the impression.

As Marrakesh has opened to Tropezian swimming-pool clubs and branches of Ibiza night spots, Fez has turned ever deeper to its history, renovating architectural masterpieces and creating new festivals devoted to the city’s rich culinary and musical traditions.

REPUBLICANS ARE THE BUSINESS PARTY RIGHT? WELL... THEY'RE THE BIG BUSINESS CORRUPTION PARTY, YES, BUT WHEN IT COMES TO SELLING AMERICAN TOURISM...

It seems to be buried in the backpages, but you may have heard about a report on the airline industry that came out today co-authored by Dean Headley of Wichita State University. The short version: service sucks and everyone is pissed off.

More airline passengers bumped, more bags lost and fewer on-time flights. For the third year in a row, those problems grew worse for the industry, according to an annual study that rates airline quality.

"They just don't get it yet," said Headley. Who's "they" and what don't they "get?" Well, take this statement from a spokesman for the Air Transport Association: "We're going to see more delays and those delays translate to cancellations, mishandled bags and unhappy passengers," It's not a pretty picture." He doesn't expect that picture to get better soon and he blames... the weather. I think we could look for a better answer-- and solutions-- from Jonathan Tisch.

A lot of executives at my former company, Warner Bros. Records, used to stay at the Regency Hotel on Park Avenue in NYC. Before I started working at WB, an incident at the hotel became part of Warner Bros lore. One night during a series of executive meetings at the hotel all the rooms on an entire floor were broken into and 4 of our guys were robbed. The hotel handled their complaints so poorly-- practically blaming them for the problem and telling them that the hotel was too busy to help them or to even call the police-- that the Regency went from being the hotel of choice for our company to a hotel no one trusted... or stayed at. This was long before Jonathan Tisch became CEO of Loews Hotels.

In fact, reading Tisch's new book, Chocolates On The Pillow Aren't Enough-- Reinventing the Customer Experience, is almost like getting a response to the whole hideous incident. Something like that could never happen under his leadership. Tisch is one smart cookie and this latest book by him is a must read for anyone involved in marketing. But aside from being an author, CEO of Loews Hotels and one of the heads as the whole U.S. tourism industry (as Chairman of the Travel Business Roundtable for over a decade), he is also mixed up with government and politics. That's what I wanted to talk with him about when I got him on the phone last week. It isn't what he wanted to talk about.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, he's flattered people are pushing his name out there to be NYC's next mayor but he just wanted to talk with me about his ideas about customer service. He's got a great reputation as an old-fashioned-- or is it futuristic-- CEO who champions corporate responsibility and believes-- as well as acts on-- the premise that a company can do well and do good at the same time. That's a very hard line to sell to Wall Street. (He told me it's his cousin's job to talk with the Wall Street analysts, not his.)

He says tourism is 100% non-partisan and that it's part of the lifeblood of every state and every congressional district in the nation. He spends a lot of time working with government on issues critical to the tourism industry. A Democrat, in 2003 he was appointed to the Department of Commerce's U.S. Travel and Tourism Advisory Board and he was a founder of the Discover America Partnership. I asked him if the Bush Regime is trying to politicize the Board he serves on the way they have been politicizing the Department of Justice and the General Services Adminsitration. I could almost see him rolling his eyes on the other end of the line. "No," he said.

So what did Tisch have to say about today's report about the airline industry? By now you should be able to guess yourself. "It would be wonderful if the airlines could think of themselves like other parts of the travel and tourism industry, and not just in the business of transportation. These new numbers show that as a group, they may be wining the battle of profitability, but losing the war of customer service."

I don't know about you, but when I'm on a ridiculously long line 2 hours before my plane is scheduled to take off-- and it probably won't be on time anyway-- and I'm holding my shoes and praying my belt buckle won't set off an alarm and that I'll remember to take back my cell phone and keys, I'm just hating George W. Bush even more than usual. And every foreigner I've spoken to who either comes here to visit or contemplates coming here to visit, is a lot more pissed off than I am.

OK, now we're getting into Tisch's territory. Foreign tourism is down nearly 20% since Bush, at heart a paranoid, provincial hayseed and a xenophobic nativist, took over the White House. The Republicans may have once been a business friendly party but now... well, during the Bush era our economy has lost $93 billion in revenue from global tourism (and $15 billion in taxes)-- not to mention 58 million fewer visitors and nearly 200,000 lost jobs. Last week the Department of Commerce released figures that reveal that overseas travel to the U.S. remains below pre-9/11 levels in six of the top eight overseas markets-- Mexico and Canada being the two exceptions. Travel to the U.S. in 2006 fell further in five out of the top eight overseas markets. A 2006 survey of overseas travelers conducted by the Discover America Partnership found negative perceptions of the U.S. entry process to be the greatest deterrent to visiting the country. That's not pro-Business and it's not good customer service. Tourists and businessmen from Britain, Japan, Germany, France, Italy, and Brazil are opting to go elsewhere.

Friends who stay at Loews hotels swear that service and overall product are noticably improved since Tisch took the helm. I couldn't find a dissenting view. When I asked friends in NYC what they thought of Tisch as mayor, those who knew who he is were enthusiastic. By chance while I was writing this my old boss, Seymour Stein, called me to fret about the possibility of Giuliani becoming president. I assured him it wasn't going to happen and when he was calmed down I asked him about Tisch. "He's very smart and he has a good heart. His family are equestrians and they once wanted to buy my ranch. He'd be a great mayor. That Giuliani... he was the worst..."


Tisch has been a super generous contributor to Democrats over the years, although almost all of the donations have been to button down Establishment and conservative Democrats, from the Blue Dog PAC, Harold Ford, Joe Lieberman (a former Democrat), Evan Bayh, Ken Salazar, Rahm Emanuel... and (many) hundreds of thousands of dollars to the big Inside-the-Beltway committees like the DNC, DSCC and DCCC. I didn't find many contributions for Republicans other than to Mark Foley, and token donations to Al D'Amato (once a cost of doing business in New York) and Conrad Burns. This week Jonathan made a very cool contribution to Blue America: a boxful of personally autographed copies of Chocolates On The Pillow Aren't Enough. We'll be giving them away this Saturday at firedoglake as part of a live blog session with the man who represents-- among others-- Jonathan Tisch: Congressman Jerry Nadler. Come over and join us at 11AM est. The book is great.

LIVING ON CARNIVAL TIME

by Michael Snyder

Every year, I head to New Orleans to participate in the pre-Lenten carnival. I’ve done this without fail for two decades-- even in February of 2006, mere months after the natural disaster-- and the less natural Bush-connected aftermath-- that has since come to define the area in many minds.

I choose the early weekend of the twelve-day festival that culminates in Mardi Gras, because it offers plenty of celebration with easier access to amenities, but fewer yahoos over-indulging, acting the fool, and making the rest of us pay for their folly. There is a stretch of Bourbon Street that should be overseen by the NCAA, since many nights, teams of drunken college students appear to be competing in the sport of distance vomiting. That sort of behavior increases during Carnival season, but it’s easy to avoid when you know where it tends to happen.

So I went back to New Orleans yet again. I couldn’t not go. And I was so happy to be there. In its own way, this trip was as lovely as all of my prior visits, despite the knowledge that so much has changed, will never be the same, and needs to be done to insure the town’s future. At least, the entertainment districts were in good shape-- with the exception of a few storefronts that remain shuttered. Music rang out of every corner, whether it was a ragtime band on Royal Street, trumpeter Leroy Jones at Preservation Hall, the old-timey New Orleans Jazz Vipers at the Spotted Cat, or vocalist John Boutte and his ensemble at d.b.a. As usual, there were moments that I’ll absolutely cherish:

Sunday night, I ate dinner at Coop’s-– an informal joint in the French Quarter-- with a buddy from San Francisco and the great singer-songwriter-guitarist Alex Chilton of Box Tops and Big Star fame. I was still recovering from the indulgences of the previous night’s costume party in the two-story warehouse of a renowned local artist. I’d had my fill of the weekend’s street parades with float-riding maskers tossing beads, aluminum doubloons, plastic cups and who-knows-what-else at rambunctious crowds. I’d had the thrill of watching the afternoon’s Krewe of Barkus dog parade as a thousand cleverly-costumed canines dragged their masters through the Quarter to the cheers of appreciative onlookers. (This year’s Barkus theme was “A Streetdog Named Desire.” Loved the dachshund in the torn t-shirt with the name “Stanley Bow-Wow-Ski” scrawled across its back.) I was ready for the joys of good Cajun-style cooking and good company.

Local resident Chilton lives in the Tremé, the primarily African-American neighborhood that spawned jazz giant Louis Armstrong, and he’s been happy there for many years. Yet these are troubling times. Between bites of an oyster po’boy, Chilton expressed his concern over the loss of thousands of hard-working lower-middle-class New Orleanians who were flooded out of their homes by Hurricane Katrina and may never come back. Suddenly, he noticed the sound of R&B queen Aretha Franklin coming over the restaurant’s sound system. She was singing the Burt Bacharach-Hal David classic “I Say a Little Prayer.” Chilton marveled at her stirring gospel inflections that clearly turned the object of the singer’s affection from a boyfriend or new-found lover to a certain Lord and Savior. “Not what Burt and Hal intended,” Chilton said with a grin, before devouring the rest of his po’ boy.

On Monday afternoon, the day after the Grammys, I was walking down Frenchmen Street in the Faubourg Marigny district next to the Quarter. I’d just been hanging out with fervent NoLa musician Kenny Claiborne, the guitar-slinging soul rebel who defied civic, state and national troops in the wake of Katrina; stayed in his home after the citywide evacuation; and, with the aid of a gas-powered generator, his home studio and a couple of speakers on his balcony, played DJ eight hours a day for his few remaining neighbors, the police, soldiers, and relief workers. With a microphone in hand, he asked passersby for requests, spun his favorites, and called it Radio Marigny. He’s a remarkable guy.

Anyway, I was heading back to Decatur Street to quaff a pint of Crescent City Brewhouse’s Carnival Bock, and suddenly, there was legendary producer-composer-keyboardist-singer Allen Toussaint driving his shiny convertible, top down, a female companion by his side. They slowly tooled past the strip of hotspots on Frenchmen: Ray's Boom Boom Room, Café Brazil, d.b.a., the Spotted Cat, and the venerable Snug Harbor where pianist Ellis Marsalis-– father of jazz masters Wynton, Branford, Delfeayo, and Jason-- is in residence with his trio every Friday night. The previous evening, Toussaint was in Los Angeles to attend the Grammy ceremony. “The River in Reverse,” his 2006 collaboration with Elvis Costello, had been nominated in the category of "best pop vocal album,” but John Mayer won the award.

Hours later, Toussaint was back home to New Orleans, and cruising along in elegant fashion. People on the sidewalk greeted him with words of respect and encouragement. All on Frenchmen who saw him knew him and gave him his props. Toussaint-- local royalty-- acknowledged each of them with a gracious nod, and motored on.

Despite the banners and posters trumpeting “Rebuild, Restore, Renew” or similar positive sentiments, a number of T-shirts for sale at various souvenir shops in the Quarter tell a different story. Of course, there are the usual vulgar inscriptions such as the popular “I Got Bourbon-Faced on Shit Street.” Then, there are shirts of a different stripe, reading “Make Levees, Not War”; “FEMA: The New Four-Letter Word,” “F.E.M.A.: Fix Everything My Ass”; and, both lurid and pointed, “Katrina Gave Me a Blow-Job I’ll Never Forget.” All of it is justified. It’s been way over a year since the flood. The fix-up has been slow and, in some sectors, non-existent.

After what Katrina did, did the weather deities think that a tornado or two could faze the Crescent City? Lightning flashed, wind howled, rain came down, and at least one tornado ripped through and ripped up the streets on the night before I left town, by then, completely spent from my long weekend of food, drink, music, dance, and camaraderie. A number of buildings were leveled, some people were injured, and an elderly woman died. More tragedy for a locale that has far exceeded its recommended dose. Yet…

The next day dawned sunny and warm. Around noon in Armstrong Park’s Congo Square, the current model of Paul Kantner’s Jefferson Starship played a free concert sponsored by Microsoft. A polyglot crowd whooped it up to a lively Starship career retrospective, preceded by a few songs from a reconstituted Quicksilver Messenger Service.

Yep. The party resumed, and will continue into next week. It'll only stop when Fat Tuesday turns to Ash Wednesday, and Lent begins. Caught in the vortex of Carnival, people will willingly succumb to pleasure and (thanks to spicy food and excessive drink) pain until the madness ends. Then, it’ll happen again next year.

You can’t stop Mardi Gras.

HOW ABOUT A NICE CRUISE TO ALASKA?

Tongass National Park, Alaska [click on photo to enlarge]

(Ken posted this today over at Down With Tyranny, my political blog. How could I not share it with everyone here who doesn't go there?
-Howie)

"There'll be a morning 'Kaffee Klatsch' most days and panel discussions galore explaining how democracy eventually will sweep through the Middle East like wildfire, how to balance the budget and various other issues."
--Al Kamen, speculating in today's Washington Post about the Weekly Standard's upcoming Cruise to Wingnuttia


[For my mother, who has managed to travel a fair amount in her life, perhaps the most memorable trip was a cruise along the Inside Passage of Alaska--the place she often says she most regrets not being able to get back to. I imagine, though, that if anything could spoil that spectacular land- and seascape, it would be traveling in this particular company, as reported by Al Kamen in his "In the Loop" column.--Ken]

In Troubling Times,
Conservatives Head Out to Sea

By Al Kamen

These are obviously not the best of times for Republicans. The House is gone. Ditto the Senate. President Bush's approval ratings are around 37 percent, and ratings on his conduct of the war are closer to 30 percent. The war itself grinds on. What's a beleaguered conservative to do?

It's time to regroup! And what better way to do that than to join the folks at the Weekly Standard, one of the last great bastions of war boosters, on a fun-filled week-long cruise in Alaska?

Yes, it's a week of sightseeing, partying and deep reflection with publisher Terry Eastland and top editors William Kristol and Fred Barnes aboard Holland America Line's ms Oosterdam this June. Other featured speakers include former Bush speechwriter Michael Gerson and military historian Fred Kagan.

One of the true highlights is just the chance to be "traveling with like-minded conservatives," the promo material says, and not having to listen to we-told-you-so rants from the liberals and leftists that you might find on other cruises.

There'll be a morning "Kaffee Klatsch" most days and panel discussions galore explaining how democracy eventually will sweep through the Middle East like wildfire, how to balance the budget and various other issues.

The ship's show lounge "features Las Vegas-style productions," and while the invitation doesn't mention it, the luxury ship does indeed have a fine casino.

There will probably be cakewalk contests on the Lido deck each night, and spectacular Alaska each day, including a close view of the Hubbard Glacier [right], which, contrary to what radical-environmentalist, global-warming types would say, is "marching to the beat of a different drum . . . advancing while the rest of Alaska's ice rivers are receding rapidly."

There's a day in Ketchikan "in the heart of the Tongass National Forest" [top photo]. Maybe there'll be time for an optional anti-earmark pilgrimage to the proposed site of the famed "Bridge to Nowhere"? Weather permitting, there might even be a hunt for weapons of mass destruction. (Okay, okay, that was cheap.)

All this in your "penthouse suite w/verandah" for only $6,300 per person, double occupancy, or $4,500 per person in the deluxe suite. Single rooms in the cheapo category are only $2,600.

Do not miss the "photo/autograph session," where you can have your picture taken with Kristol, Barnes and Eastland. "Photos will be available for purchase," we're told. Priceless!

But hurry! There are only two penthouse suites available.

UPDATE: MITCH McCONNELL AND MARK FOLEY AREN'T THE ONLY CRUSININ' WINGNUTS... THE NATIONAL REVIEW IS OFF TO ALASKA

If you somehow missed the Weekly Standard's cruise to Alaska and you have a hankerin' to be stuck in a small enclosed space with a shipful of delusional hatemongers, fear not. All the Weekly Standard had to offer was a gaggle of the dullest propaganda scriveners in all God's Creation: Terry Eastland, Fred Barnes, William Kristol, Fred Kagan, and, to spice it up, a former Bush speech writer, Michael Gerson.


Now the National Review... these particular Republicans really know how to put on a cruise. Theirs starts in late July-- also to Alaska-- but what a lineup. How would you like to play some shuffleboard with Robert Bork? Go for a swim with Kate O'Beirne? (Come on; it's better than swimming with sharks, isn't it?) Soak in the jacuzzi with Dick Morris? Maybe take an aerobics class alongside Ed Gillespie? Or see "a Las Vegas-style production" with the likes of Rich Lowry, Ramesh Ponnuru, Michael Steele and Arthur Laffer? Does that sound like a vacation or what? And I didn't even mention certifiably insane rightist loons like Jonah Goldberg, Richard Allen, Mac Owens John Hillen and Jay Nordlinger. They're making some mighty tempting promises:

• Moderated panel sessions featuring our esteemed guest speakers, along with plenty of passenger Q&A.
• Plenty of chances to meet, schmooze and enjoy personal interaction with our special guest speakers.
• Exclusive Parties and Dining with our special guest speakers. You will dine with your fellow National Review attendees, so that you have the chance to meet many of your fellow conservative cruisers.
• Numerous private cocktail parties and evening smokers.
• And more...

A tiny bit of investigating led us directly to some of what that "And more" means: Chocolates on your pillow AND

• Spacious, elegantly appointed staterooms, many with private verandahs
• Luxurious Euro-Top beds and premium linens
• Daily housekeeping to tidy belongings and keep staterooms immaculate
• Large, extra-fluffy Egyptian cotton towels
• Lighted magnifying mirrors; massage shower-heads; salon-quality hair dryers
• Luxurious terry cloth bathrobes
• Televisions with DVD and VCR players
• Generous storage
• Complimentary fresh fruit
• Complimentary 24-hour in-room dining
• Nightly turndown service
• Complimentary shoeshine service
• Complimentary ice service

So leave that ice-machine at home; you are covered!

JESUS! PEOPLE ARE GOING TO KABUL AGAIN!

Sunday's New York Times did a story on "the next great adventure-travel destination": Kabul. "Even though much of Afghanistan remains dangerous, tourists are beginning to trickle back in, some lured by the thrill of the unknown, others by the pleasures offered by such new tourist spots as the Kabul Serena, an elegant $36.5-million hotel that claims a 'five-star ambiance' in the heart of the city. As many as 5,000 Western tourists visited Kabul last year, Jonathan Bean told me, most of them affluent Europeans and Americans who have traveled to '30 or 40' countries, including developing ones. 'Most our clients are experienced travelers,' Jonathan said. 'They’ve trekked in Nepal, gone on safari in East Africa. Some have returned after coming here in the 1960s and 1970s. They see Afghanistan as the next great adventure-travel destination.'"

I'd love to go back to Afghanistan some time. I'm sure I won't; too dangerous. I first went close to 40 years ago, right out of college. It was a major way station on the "hippie trail" from Istanbul to New Delhi. I was driving a 1969 red VW camper I had bought in Weisbaden and Afghanistan was far more than just a way station to me. Driving across Asia, by the time you get to Afghanistan you know for sure you're not in Kansas anymore, nor in Europe. It was the most foreign place I had ever been. So different from anything I had ever experienced. It felt as much as like traveling in time (backwards) as traveling in space.


There never were any railroads to Afghanistan so the only way to get there before the late 50s was as part of an army. Then the U.S. and the Soviet Union built a road around the country. The U.S. built one from Herat on the Iranian border south and east to Khandahar and up to Kabul and the Soviets built one from Kabul up to Mazar-i-Sharif and then on to Herat. Basically it was the only paved road in the country and now, from what I understand, it is mostly unpaved... destroyed by decades of war and civil neglect.

I drove my van from Meshed in Iran to Herat. It was love at first sight-- mostly with the cheap, powerful hash and the Afghan people who were all stoned all the time. It always boggles my mind now how the mainstream media reports on the wars in Afghanistan but never mentions that every Afghan is stoned-- really stoned-- all the time. It probably has a significant effect on their way of fighting. Herat was like this magical medieval city, completely outside my realm of experience. And the next stop, Khandahar was even more bizarre, most strange, more mysterious and foreign. I felt like I was in Biblical times. Before going up to Kabul I visited some college friends who were in the Peace Corps, stationed in Ghazni. So primitive! But wonderful, warm, friendly generous people. They shared whatever they had.

I spent a lot of time in Kabul. Two Canadians who I had driven across Asia settled in to the one western hotel in the city, the brand new Intercontinental. It was a luxury high-rise in the middle of a basically mud city that looked like it would take a week of strong rain to just wash away. I'll never forget the Kabul River, more like a series of trickles and puddles in the middle of town. I recall standing near the royal palace, one of the few substantial buildings in the city, and looking down at the river. Men were on the bank brushing their teeth, washing their clothes, bathing, going to the bathroom, washing a donkey...


The other new thing in this ancient city that year was the Kabul Zoo. It was a wonder for the Afs... a little rinky-dink for the foreigners. But everyone was stoned and everyone was enjoying everything. Except the Kabul Runs. No one enjoys that-- much worse than Montezuma's Revenge. Up and down Chicken Street there were European and Australian hippies staying in cheap flop houses and sick with the Kabul Runs. The music was great and the hash was the best and the food was fine and everything was so cheap. And you'd sit around and talk with people who had come back from Bamyan and the Hindu Kush and Mazar and the Khyber Pass and figure out where you wanted to go next. The king was still in charge and the Russians hadn't invaded yet. I remember seeing some mullahs, straight from the countryside, outraged that 2 young women got out of a car unaccompanied-- albeit covered head to toe (with just a little grill for the eyes) in a chadris (what they call a burqa everywhere else). They spat all over them. The scene has stuck with me for all these decades.


UPDATE: NOT SO FAST

I slept in my van the whole time I was in Kabul in 1969 and in 1972. But friends of mine stayed at the Intercontinental, the only western style hotel in the city country. Various rebel groups over the past 30 years have used it for target practice and blown it up pretty badly. Now foreigners stay at the Serena-- or at least they did 'til today. The NY Times just reported that some Taliban insurgents blew that up too. Yeah, probably a little early (or late) for Afghan tourism just now.

A thunderous explosion struck a 2-year-old Kabul luxury hotel frequented by foreigners on Monday, and the Taliban took responsibility, calling it a coordinated assault by four men armed with guns and suicide belts.

The Interior Ministry said at least six people were killed and at least six were wounded in the explosion at the Serena Hotel, including two foreign officials it did not identify... The Associated Press quoted an American who was exercising in the hotel gym as saying that she heard gunfire after the explosion, and saw a body and pools of blood in the lobby area and bullet marks in the gym area. She asked not to be identified for her safety. Ambulances and American troops in Humvees rushed to the hotel after attack, the A.P. reported.

Things are obviously deteriorating? You think so?

One Year On And Nothing's Any Better

This is a post from a western woman, a filmmaker, working in Kabul. It very much captures the Kabul I recall, only it's much worse. Is it a place you'd be interested in visiting? I recommend reading the whole thing at the link. Here are some excerpts:

Going out to dinner is always an interesting experience. Fully covered from head to toe and always paranoid about forgetting a headscarf (or having it slip off your head in the car) generally make the experience more worrisome than enjoyable. Add checkpoints and Afghan police to the mix, along with bone-shaking car rides (no paved roads) and you get the picture.

In New York and New Delhi, I savored going out; dressing up, wearing new jewelry, getting to try new restaurants before meeting friends at a local bar for a drink. I don’t miss these things in Afghanistan – I came here knowing full well that my social life would change drastically (after all, I could’ve just stayed in NYC or Delhi if that’s all I wanted). But what I didn’t expect to change was the very vocabulary of my behavior.

In other cities, I have never thought twice about the fact that I couldn’t enter places without ensuring that I wouldn’t mistakenly brush past a man, that I had to give all men the right of way, and that I wasn’t allowed to speak to strangers or look at other men in the face. In Kabul, I do.

My first weeks here were the most painful-- having to unlearn everything I had picked up in rambunctious, loud Delhi. In Kabul, I felt like as if I was a captive-- wrapped around the head with a scarf that acted as a leash that instructed me to behave in a certain way. My first week was a string of commands from my male, Afghan co-workers and crew, who for my sake taught me how to behave on the streets – “don’t laugh too loud,” “keep your hands hidden,” “don’t say things too loud,” “try and keep your chin down,” “stop walking like you own the street!” And the ever familiar, “wear your headscarf tighter, Anita-jaan, it is falling off!”

...Like all local women in the neighborhood, I can’t leave the house alone. People outside of Afghanistan are shocked to hear this – “but the Taliban have left, no?” Yes indeed, but the Taliban did not make these rules. Many of these rules were actually enforced and created during the time before the Taliban by warlords who, bloated with arms and cash from Pakistan and the US (in order to defeat the Russians), fractured the country.

After the Taliban were defeated, those same warlords were brought back into power by the US. The Karzai government resumes must read like a list charges at an international tribunal. The human rights’ violations are endless. And it is thanks to them (and not the Taliban) that I have to live in a capital city shuttered by extreme conservatism.

A male partner must accompany me at all times outside the house. This ranges from the chowkidor to my husband to friends. Sometimes my husband’s translator comes along, humming as he walks ahead expecting me to follow blindly. When I want to stop, I ask the shopkeeper a question-- usually the price of something – making sure I’m extra loud to ensure he has heard me, and will stop humming and hurry over to where I am.

He carries everything after I’m done shopping. Per his instructions, I shouldn’t carry anything since I’m a woman. By month three, I have learned to walk behind him, lift nothing and simply head home as quickly as I can. He is a Pashtun from the south and older than I am.

The same translator is puzzled when my husband asks me what I want for dinner or lunch. He looks at our exchanges quizzically. We look Indian to him, and yet behave so differently from the Indians he sees in the soap operas he and his family watch at home. In that world men and women are often just as conservative as the Afghans, with each gender culturally filling very different roles. The women are meant to be docile, devoted wives, while the female evildoers are the ones who break the mould and wreak havoc among the orderly. My husband and I don’t seem to even understand that we’re different genders. We speak as equals. This is clearly confusing.

In the end, we finish dinner and make our way home through the dark and quiet streets. We paid the bill in dollars. Price-wise it would amount to the same if I had dined out in New York City. “Restaurants for expats charge expat prices,” explained a friend when I first arrived, “make sure you always have enough cash.” On the way home, my housemate reminds me that we are paying for more than just plates of pasta – we pay for the experience of normalcy. Or the closest thing to normal at least. We both agree it wasn’t for the food at any rate. It wouldn’t survive a New Yorker or New Delhi-ite’s expectations of a good meal (for the price we paid). But tastes change once you’re living in Kabul.

The only meals I have coveted here have been home-cooked Afghan vegetarian dishes prepared by a friend’s mother. Seated on their living room floor, with huge slabs of naan to catch the oil and juices dripping from our fingers, I have devoured bowls of red kidney beans steamed with onions and tomatoes and spices with plates of eggplant slices sautéed with tomatoes and topped with a tangy yoghurt sauce.

CRIME IN ARGENTINA, TAKE TWO

One of the highlights of traveling is always the folks you meet. My trip to Argentina was especially rich in this way and I was lucky that so many people in Argentina speak English and that my L.A. Spanish got me around otherwise. One of the people I was most impressed with is a remarkable woman named Amelia, a music business connection, who I went to dinner with when I first arrived. Our mutual friend Steve, k.d. lang's manager, had introduced us via e-mail. Amelia had been arrested during the time when the generals ran a fascist state in Argentina (the most recent, historically speaking)-- and she's a vegetarian; we got along great. Today she e-mailed me with a critique of a blog I wrote a couple weeks ago about safety in Buenos Aires.


ABOUT THE UNSAFE CITY

by Amelia Lafferriere


Think back to the ear of Menem, our Arab Muslim-converted-Christian-(for the sake of politics) president (1989-1999), who introduced Argentina to the quick fix policies of neoliberall economic politics with its systemic unemployment policies and de-industrialization. strong introducer(the first after the militars),and Supposedly a close friend and huntig companions of the Bush family, Menem followed the military dictatorship. His policies converted the country into a desert in terms of productive industry and real jobs-- which continued under De la Rua-- and created a deep chasm between rich and poor, nearly annihilating the middle class (a middle class which had been the pride of Argnetina, the only country in Latin America that had managed to maintain a strong and healthy middle class over the decades).


Buenos Aires, where, as you so correctly mention, half of the population live if we put together the Capital and Gran Buenos Aires, started its process of economic and then social degradation. Menem presided over recession, hyperinflation, privitiziation of ultilities and a tidal wave of foreign "investment." Menem's endemic corruption and his quick fix policies got him re-elected but they were catastrophic for the long-term financial and social health of Argentina, leading to bankruptcy and severe dislocation in every sphere of human endeavor. Parallel worlds began to take root-- a world of the rich and a world of everyone else.

Shopping centers and gated communities for the wealthy were sprouting up, here and there-- like gentrified Puerto Madero, funded by international capital... while social welfare was left to rot and whither away on the vine.

People of the suburbs, with no work and no future started to invade the city, sometimes taking empty old abandoned houses and turning to street robbery to get by. The result: growing unsafety and insecurity for the society. (Current policies about this issues are not helping, but that s another song.)

There are a lot of tourists coming all the time and sometimes they are very visible for these desperate people, making them obvious targets, not to say that locals do not suffer this unsafety as well, probably far more, in fact.

Regarding major crime-- like kidnapping and car theft sometimes leading to murder-- it is often that we find bands of ex-policemen working in combination with lumpen proletariat from the exurban villas (barrios), doing all this, most frequently in the suburbs. I'll call this a residual of last military government (what is called mano de obra desocupada, this meaning that these people were employed in kidnaping and robbing people for political reasons and when democracy came back, they had no "legitimate" work... so they changed their targets. We have been in "democracy" since 1983 but this situation continues today.)

What I can conclude is that Buenos Aires at this time has more insecurity and less safety than it had ten years ago. There are neighborhoods that are more exposed , especially those visited by tourists, although all neighborhoods throughout Buenos Aires suffer the situation, Fortunately we can say that so far the kinds of robbery prevelent in Buenos Aires is NOT followed by murder... most of the time. 

Anyway the climax of unsafety of Argentine society comes with the fact that we have a high profile political missing person for over 3 months. Mr Julio Lopez, a worker who had been kidnapped and tortured in the seventies, and who remained alive by chance, has given in the trial to one of his captors ,a miliray government sanctioned murderer named Etchecolaz. After his testimony-- on his way to hear the judge read Etchecolaz' sentence-- he vanished.  

Etchecolaz is now in prison, where he belonged many years ago, but Mr Lopez, a 78 years old man, seems to have suffered a kidnapping for the second time, and we all presume he is dead.

The very idea that this could happen now, is really frightening-- and although it does not affect everyday life on the surface, the way it used to in the seventies, for me is the most serious security and safety problem we have at this moment...

Like in all big cities, but starting in Buenos Aires in the '90s, drugs have become a terrible problem, mostly cheap and low quality drugs that are readily available in the impoverished suburban neighborhoods. That and the lack of opportunities for people are the keys to a developing culture of crime here.

Still, I like to think that the pulse of this city has to be taken in view of the continuous work in the cultural arenas. People are massively working in the fields of music, cinema, theatre, education... putting on festivals. Universities are still free in Argentina and the fact that two graduates have recently won Nobel prizes are a great source of inspiration for many people. Buenos Aires is a place where you find friendly peopl everywhere, where you can spend several hours in a cafe-- and for the price of a cup of coffee, you can read the newspapers of the day, or a book, talk with people who see conversation as a living art, people with open minds who make it possible to have so many different cultural expressions welcome all the time in the city. Still today Buenos Aires is a city with a pacific coexistance of different religions, as Jew (Argentina is the second country in numer of Jewish population after Israel and the U.S.) and Arabs and Muslims. We have often ecumenical ceremonies of all the religions together with Catholic and different Christian churches, together with the Jewish and the Muslim faiths. 

Could this be-- the remains of what Argentina was going to be and didn't come to be, but still a part of it.-- breathing... and helping us all breathe and hope.


UPDATE: A SLIGHTLY MORE POLITICAL LOOK AT THIS

I did a piece over at Down With Tyranny if you'd like to look at it from an even more political perspective.

WHAT'S BETTER-- RENTING YOUR OWN PLACE OR STAYING IN A HOTEL?

I think the first time I figured out that, generally speaking, renting a place was better than staying in a hotel was 1970. I rented a house for a couple of months on the beach in Goa. Once I figured out the function of the herd of pigs on the property, everything was smooth as silk and I settled in for a nice leisurely stay in my very first post-college home-of-my-own. It took me about 3 days to convince myself that I was actually a Goan and start, relatively speaking, integrating myself into the pulse of the community. I don't recall ever seeing a hotel in Goa although I'd hear from the hippies and other travelers who came to our beach-- the one that was 30 steps from my front door-- that there were hotels.

When you're staying in a place for less than a month, renting a place is tough. After my 10th trip to Thailand I finally figured out that a secluded villa on Phuket was way more what I was looking for than a berth at even the nicest of hotels. I don't think I ever put on any clothes for weeks at a time. And then a couple years ago I rented a villa overlooking the Ayung River in central Bali. Except to go pick up a friend who was staying at the Ritz, I never even visited the tourist ghetto on the island and, as far as I could tell from my vantage over the Ayung, I was indeed the only non-Balinese on the entire island.

These days, whenever I can, I always rent an apartment or a house rather than stay in a hotel. So, when planning my trip to Argentina a few months ago I was delighted when Lieber, an Argentine waiter at my favorite raw foods restaurant, told me that renting apartments was a very normal thing to do in Buenos Aires for anyone staying at least a week. Perfect! I found what looked like a reputable rental agency that specializes in dealing with foreigners and quickly found an apartment in the part of town (Recoleta) everybody was telling me was the safest and best located.

The apartment was perfect, right on Posadas, across the street from the Four Seasons Hotel-- a light, airy, well-kept one bedroom, with a living room, dining area and kitchenette, fully supplied with everything from sheets and silverware to a free phone for local calls, Wi-FI, a doorman and daily maid service. And the price? Prices vary based on location, size, all that stuff, but generally it costs for a week what you would pay for a night in a comparable hotel.

The agency I used was BytArgentina and I couldn't find anything online about them being unscrupulous or anything like that. My experience with the agents I used on Bali, BaliVillas, was superb and I just assumed-- uh oh-- that BytArgentina would be as good. They weren't-- and I mentioned what went wrong in a story I did a couple weeks ago about safety and scams in Buenos Aires.

In this case, the company (or perhaps the owner of the apartment, more likely), shrewdly not accepting credit cards, only cash, managed to separate me from $500. I had no recourse other than to suck it up. Something similar had happened to me in Tangier decades ago at the El Minzah Hotel (best in town), a $100 travelers check having been removed from the safe behind the reception desk! Left me with a bad taste in my mouth, but, after trying a couple of less grand hotels, I wound up back at the El Minzah a few times since. I know for sure I'd never rent an apartment through BytArgentina again (nor from Graciela Ujaque, the owner of the apartment). Would I rent an apartment in Buenos AIres again? 100% yes. Let me tell you why.

Aside from getting a sense of belonging to a culture that most hotel guests can never experience, there are some tangible reasons I like to get my own place. I don't eat junk food and I take breakfast seriously. Even in NYC, where I do stay in a hotel, I always get one with a kitchenette. That way I can stock up on healthy goodies (fruits, nuts, etc) and on breakfast goods (blueberries, melons, papayas, lemons...) and have a place to store them and prepare them conveniently. It is virtually always much less expensive to rent your own place than to stay in a hotel. And it's far more personal.

Not everyone agrees, of course. One of my friends found my luxurious villa (with 4 servants-- including the best cook on the island of Bali-- and a swimming pool) akin to camping out. She was eager to move to the more... sterile environment of the Ritz. (I talked about that syndrome a little when I discussed the Park Hyatt in Buenos Aires a few weeks ago.) Some people, maybe most, would prefer to be pampered and to have everything done for them, something more likely in a hotel. Me, I like going to the local markets and shopping for day to day stuff. You start to feel the rhythm of the town's life. Last time I stayed in Marrakesh, I gave up on the Mamounia and stayed in a riad instead, sort of halfway between a hotel and an apartment; well, not halfway, but we definitely had the feeling of being part of the neighborhood.