Zora O'Neill's Blog, page 4

Local Tourism: The Steinway Factory

You can tour the Steinway piano factory, you know. It’s just sitting up there, at the north end of Steinway Street in Queens, doing its thing like it’s done since, oh, right after the Civil War. Peter finally got on the stick and scheduled a tour–but you have to plan way ahead. Peter called in November, and the first dates available were for May.

So if you have a spring trip to NYC planned, call now! (718) 204-3175.

The place is a marvel of hand-crafted skill, scaled up and mechanized only slightly. And solidly union.

Steinway=sweet ride.

Safety glasses are required. Our tour guide (background) was a retired carpenter.

Wood choices.

Of course the wood floors in this place are beautiful.

And of course in a factory full of carpenters, you get a good dry-erase-marker holder.

A little bit of Astoria Ugly style in the shipping room.

Right after we took the tour, this spring, the Steinway company was bought by a hedge-fund bajillionaire. I hope it all works out OK. In the 1870s, Steinway was New York City’s largest employer, and it still provides good jobs for really skilled people.

I’m also still rooting for the Steinway Mansion. Check it out while you’re up here for the tour.

New Mexico: Vintage Motels

You know I have a thing for old hotels. Not just olde historicky hotels, but what I call vintage hotels.

One of the “rules” I have about vintage hotels is that they can’t be renovated to be old-timey–they just have to be that way. But after this last trip around New Mexico, where I spied some exceptionally good old motels, I think I have to lighten up a little bit. The people who are working hard to preserve them–which also involves some renovation, because they’re so far gone–deserve some credit.

Tucumcari, on the east edge of the state, is a great little outdoor Route 66 museum, starting with the Blue Swallow Motel. It may be the oldest surviving motel on Route 66 in New Mexico, and the owners make sure it feels like 1939, right down to the old black phones. Previously, this place was owned by an electrical engineer who fixed up the neon, and before that, it was owned by the same woman for something like forty years.

Just across the road is the Motel Safari, from a slightly later era, also very nicely re-old-vated.

I especially like how the old sign has been redone to mention Internet and flat-panel TV.

And down the road is the Historic Route 66 Motel, which to be honest, I was only able to peek out through cracks in the drapes, because no one was in the office, but I dig the floor-to-ceiling windows.

And just to give you an idea what the alternative is, let’s take a look at some of the motels in Tucumcari that haven’t been treated so kindly. Restrain your sobs, if you can.

That last one might be the worst, just because it was aiming so high. The Taj!

Raton, up on the northern edge of the state, is also a hot spot for great old motels. (What is it about border towns?)

First, of course, there’s the Melody Lane.

I wrote about the Melody Lane before, but the gist is: steam saunas in the bathrooms!!!!! Dreamy.

Less dreamy: the iron-fisted owner (required of a good vintage hotel; and actually, she was very nice, just intense about cleaning) retired, and sold the place to a new crew. No idea if they will keep the place up, but I am suspicious because their eyes did not light up when I asked about the saunas. They more like frowned, at the thought of how much maintenance they will require, and how many annoying people will roll up asking about them. On this visit, I left the place heartsick with worry.

But then! Just down the road, on the south side of Raton…is the delightful Robin Hood Motel.

It’s lovely and lemon-yellow, and has lovely flowers planted everywhere and a teeny-weeny pool and a woman who’s run the place for ages.

And then and then, even farther down the road, is this place.

I almost didn’t stop. I was pretty done with Raton by then. But something made me turn around and drive in. Here was the office:

Look at that paint job. Look at how orderly those little cactus pots are! Good signs.

I rang the bell, but no answered. I walked around the corner.

Aaaagh! I might have done a little dance right there in the empty parking lot, to release the overwhelming cute-oldness that was squeezing my heart. But it didn’t work, because then I turned around and saw these screen doors!

(Please note how the *hose* is even color-coordinated!!!)

I felt a little like I was in a fairy tale when I went over and peeked at the screen doors. The inside doors were open! To let in the fresh breezes! I could see right into the rooms, and the beds were covered in powder-blue chenille spreads. And I’m practically crying while I write this. Everything was so intensely perfect, and not museum-like or kitschy-retro. I felt like if I’d opened up one of those doors, and walked in, I might never have gotten out of 1958.

But no one was around. I scuffed back to my car, got in, and drove away. But! Just as I was turning onto the highway, I saw a truck pull into the driveway of the motel, so I made a loop-de-loop back.

“Are you the owner?” I asked the guy in the truck breathlessly. He was old and weather-beaten and wore overalls.

“Yes, it’s my place.” He spoke just enough to let on that he had a German accent. What? Who comes from Germany to run an ancient motel? There was so much I wanted to ask him, but I just got the prices and went on my way. Kicking myself now. Planning my return trip soon, to sleep under one of those blue chenille bedspreads.

Thank you, Maverick Motel owner. You made my trip.

New Mexico: The Southeast

This trip, I made a beeline for the southeast quadrant of New Mexico, just to get it out of the way. Historically, let’s just say I haven’t been bursting with enthusiasm for this part of the state. There are tremendous natural attractions out here–Carlsbad Caverns and White Sands–but a whole lotta nothin’ in between, and if you go too far east, it’s like you’re in Texas, in a bad way (i.e., it smells like cows and oil).

BUT, lo and behold, it turns out that if one goes to the southeast first, when one is full of pep and vigor, and one’s eyes haven’t yet been dulled by hundreds (nay, thousands) of miles of scenery whizzing by at 70 miles an hour, then the southeast has a lot to like.

First up, Tucumcari. Which is barely southeast. It’s on I-40, not far from Texas, and the billboards all say “Tucumcari TONITE!” It’s one long strip of old motels, and honestly, I had never stayed the night there before. This time I settled in at the Blue Swallow Motel (more on this later), and chilled the heck out.

At the Blue Swallow

It was the golden hour, so all the ruination of Route 66 was looking immensely scenic.

Note the warning: You toucha my truck…I breaka you face.

(The person who did up this truck used to have a junk shop in a repurposed restaurant–the sign said Doofnac Xemi. Alas, it’s shut.)

I had some chicken-fried steak for dinner, garnished with a piece of kale. Yes, kids, there is still a part of the country where kale is just a hardy decorative green thing. If you want something green, have some Jell-O. Though to be fair, there is a farmers market in Tucumcari, and it was hopping.

Some of the farmers selling at the market also own the Odeon on 2nd Street.

“The Heat” was hilarious.

Before cruising out of town the next morning, I happened to see the world’s most wonderful murals on the wall of a public pool.

There’s a baby burro with a floaty mat around the corner.

Next stop, Fort Sumner, where maybe the guy who did the WPA mural in the courthouse could’ve used a little bit of that lighter touch from Tucumcari.

What is going on here? I just don’t know.

Hotsy-totsy.

In Clovis, I visited the Norman & Vi Petty Museum, commemorating the work of the producer behind Buddy Holly. It was all about the tubes.

Mmmm, those are some darn fine knobs.

And with my not-yet-road-damaged eyes, I could really appreciate this excellent example of bank architecture.

Bet they still give Dum-Dums to the kids…

Portales, peanut basin of the Southwest, has redone its movie theater.

But why it’s called the Yam, I could not tell you.

In Carrizozo, Roy was still mixing chocolate ice-cream sodas at Roy’s Gift Gallery, and my favorite sign in all of New Mexico was still there.

Now improved with an old truck and a donkey.

Up in Cloudcroft, I drove the Sunspot Highway and looked down on the wasteland of southeastern New Mexico. Not too shabby.

That white streak across the middle is White Sands.

New Mexico: The Bootheel

This year was the third time I’ve updated my New Mexico guidebook. You’d think I would’ve gone pretty much everywhere by now, since New Mexico is not a heavily paved state and there are only so many roads to drive.

But in fact, there was a whole stubby little bit of the state I’d never set foot in–the so-called bootheel, which sticks down in the southwest corner. The closest town on the interstate is Lordsburg, which might explain why I’d never driven down there. Lordsburg is a pretty dismal ex-railroad town, with so much chain-link fencing that it kind of saps your strength to drive farther.

On my guidebook research trips, I try to put a couple of roadblocks in my schedule, to force myself to slow down and take a periodic break. So I booked two nights at the Casa Adobe, in Rodeo, New Mexico.

I wish I could’ve stayed a week. The house was lovely, and there’s no cell service in Rodeo, and no internet at the house.

And the light…ahhh.

Rodeo is just a mile or so from the Arizona border, and Cave Creek Canyon, which is famous as a great birding spot. I mean, famous in birding circles. There is something uncanny about the Arizona border–somehow the instant you cross it, the scenery gets better than what was on the New Mexico side. I’m not sure how they pulled that off. These mountains, just on the Arizona side, were freakishly lush and vibrant.

The trade-off, though, is you have to deal with Arizonans and their immigration panic:

(My New Mexico is such a hippie New Mexico that I didn’t even realize until the government shutdown that NM’s southern district had elected a Tea Party wackadoo to the House of Representatives. So the immigration panic isn’t limited to Arizona, I now understand. It’s just NM doesn’t have any warning signs on the highway…yet.)

On the second day, I drove back up to near Lordsburg and visited Shakespeare ghost town, which is open only once a month or so. On the way I stopped at the gas station, and saw this critter:

Imagine my thumb next to him for scale. BIG dude. Locusts! In little coral-colored bikini tops, they kinda look like.

Shakespeare is fascinating because it’s really nicely preserved, but it also has this layer of more modern history, of the family that has owned it for a few generations. One woman taught dance classes there for decades, and one cabin is lined with recital photos–worth the price of admission.

Quiet moment in the lynching room…anticipating the gun fights later.

Also at Shakespeare, I learned that the freakishly colored locusts are actually perfectly adapted to a landscape made of volcanic rock and mine tailings.

The really nice thing about being in Rodeo, in the middle of nowhere, for two whole days, is that I appreciated Lordsburg a bit more when I came back. There are a couple of good cafes, after all, and some choice neon. And the museum has a really good exhibit on German WWII POWs interned around here. And they were practicing roping at the fairgrounds.

If you don’t hear from me, it’s because I went to be a cowgirl in Rodeo…

New Mexico: The Green Season

Sorry–summer break lasted a pretty long time. Sugar Duck just told me in no uncertain terms that he was tired of being laughed at by the whole internet, so we’ll bump him down a post.

I spent a lot of the summer in New Mexico, working on my book about Arabic and updating my New Mexico guidebook. In the past, I’ve been a little mealy-mouthed in the guidebook about when the best time to visit is. Oh, all the seasons have their merits, blah blah blah (except spring; dry, hot, windy spring).

After this last trip, at the end of August, though, it’s just ridiculous to claim there’s any better time to visit. I drove around for about four weeks just gasping out loud, to myself, “It’s so GREEEEEEEEN!”

I haven’t been in New Mexico at the end of the summer in years, and I had forgotten how much a couple of months of decent rain can transform the landscape. I came back from my trip and raved to Peter too. “It was so GREEEEEEEN!” I told him.

This is the first photo I showed him.

Valley of Fires, near Carrizozo

Funny, he wasn’t all impressed. “But, but, that’s, like, a volcanic wasteland normally,” I spluttered. So I showed him some more photos.

The northeast, the edge of the great plains, was green.

That one didn’t do it either, really. “That looks terrible,” said the city slicker. All I could say was “Well, it is where the Dust Bowl was.”

View from Two Grey Hills Trading Post

“This is the Navajo rez,” I said. “Look how green!”

“Enh,” said Peter, noncommittal.

Red Rock State Park

Zuni Mountains

“C’mooooon, look: Gallup! Totally green.” He was starting to come around. “Look–by the Very Large Array. Where the deer and the antelope play!”

The Plains of San Agustin

Peter: “Ohhh-kaaaaay.” Finally, I just cheated and showed him pictures of up north, where it’s green almost all the time.

Rain in Tierra Amarilla

Clouds on Taos Mountain

My last few days were during the crazy rainstorms that flooded so much in Colorado–and tons in New Mexico too. The clouds were wreathed on the mountains like this everywhere–I felt very briefly like I was in Hawaii.

But Peter still wasn’t wowed. I agree, the photos aren’t totally capturing it. You really need before-and-after pics. But I was wondering if Peter might just be color-blind.

Then this pic came up.

In Fort Sumner

“Mmm, green chile!” Peter said. Well, not color-blind.

And this, my friends, is the other reason the end of the summer is the best possible time to visit New Mexico. It’s green chile season. Hot DAMN. Like I said, I haven’t been there this time of year in so long, I forgot how intensely wonderful it is. On this trip, I even stopped in to Hatch, the self-styled green chile capital of the world. It was hopping. Packed with farmers and people in pickups who’d driven up from Cruces to buy 40-pound sacks of chile.

A little chile strip-tease for you…

Ooooh yeah, that’s how I like it…

Here you go, honey. Feast your eyes.

The deal is, you buy your 40-pound sack, and then the guy at the store–or in the supermarket parking lot, or wherever you’re doing your chile deal–tosses them all in a roaster, and lets it spin till the skins are all blackened.

Action shot. This would’ve made a good Vine.

Then the roaster dude tosses your blackened chiles in the cooler you brought, and you drive home with your loot, and you sit around and peel all those little f–kers until your fingers sting (gloves, what?) and in the process you accidentally touch your eye, or your nose, and then you wrap each chile up carefully and freeze the whole haul, to get you through the winter.

Hatch smelled so damn good. The smell of roasting chile is like a little Proustian overload for me. I was standing all swoony by the roaster, and told the guy, “Wow, it smells so good.”

He just looked at me, kinda tired, and didn’t say anything. I guess if you work all damn day for the whole month of high chile season, it doesn’t smell so good anymore.

I exercised my privilege as a tourist and breathed in deep some more, bought some salsa, and then went and stuffed myself at El Bruno’s, in Cuba, where every year a team of ladies sits under the cottonwood tree out back and peels those little f–kers all day, every day, until they have enough to last the rest of the year at the restaurant.

Hazel’s green chile, El Bruno’s

Now, Peter and I can agree, that’s so GREEEEEEEN.

SUMMER BREAK! WHOOO!!!

I’m not on summer break–I’m hard at work. But everyone’s favorite kitchen accessory, Sugar Duck, is on vacation, and he’s having a blast! All these postcards were “delivered” to me by Peter.

I thoooo like my new amigo, Theñor Thombrero Head! He is from Mexico. Here we are in the land of thun and fun!

Why, thank you, Theñor Thombrero Head, I would like thome tequila. Whoooooo!

Aw, come on Theñor Thomero Bread, let me try on your bromthero! Por favooor!!!

Graciass. Don’t I looook jutht thmashing?!

Yo quiero otro, bitchethz!!!

Whoooo! Thith ith going to be my lasthtest! Whoo! Whooooo!

Then everything got a little hazy…

[The next morning...]

I’m really not thertain why I feel so bad.

I think maybe the lime wasn’t washed or thomething.

Gosh. That Mexican sun thure is bright. Maybe a Bloody Mary would help…

………..

In other news that makes me feel hung-over, Lonely Planet appears to have been gutted in the name of the new digital era. (Much like, oh, Frommer’s and Zagat–and that worked out so well.) More on that later. Sigh.

1 More Counterintuitive Travel Tip (in process): Be Uncomfortable

I know, last week I gave the master list of counterintuitive travel tips. But, whaddya know, I thought of another one.

And that is: Discomfort is good.

You could say this is a variation on the idea of taking impractical transport. But there’s a greater sense of this, in which it’s generally a good idea to avoid typical luxury, even if you can afford it.

But don’t get too carried away!

There’s a little treadmill of travel style as you age and get a little more money to play with: you’re meant to go from hosteling to midrange hotels with air-conditioning to, phew, finally you’ve made it, some rambling resort in Thailand.

It’s a trap! Jump off! (Or, more realistically: Don’t seethe with envy over all those rich folks eating in them fancy dining cars, drinking coffee and smoking big cigars.)

Money just creates a buffer between you and the people you’ve come to visit. Money, if spent without thinking, buys space and distance: bigger rooms, bigger cars, private compartments on trains. But for that travel magic to happen, sometimes you need to be forced into proximity: in the cheap seats, on the sidewalk, at the public market.

“Discomfort” can also connect us to the past. I just spent a few days at Los Poblanos, hands down the best hotel I’ve ever stayed at (proof: this was my second visit, for vacation). Part of the reason it’s better than any typical “luxury” hotel is the physical reality of the place: the windows crank open; the thick old light switches are a little hard to flip; the door latches are intricate and don’t shut immediately behind you; the farm animals make noise. Of course nothing is truly painful: The beds are sumptuous, and I could turn on the a/c if I wanted to. But the irregularities haven’t been sanded away, as money tends to do, and the place is still filled with little reminders of how life used to work.

Then again, I’m writing this from a suite in Las Vegas, and I’m perfectly happy to be safely swaddled in a/c comfort, away from the masses (Masters of Beer Pong tourney happening downstairs!).

Oh, those wacky masses. (Sign in Albuquerque.)

This trip, in which we’re going across the Southwest without a car, was an experiment in applying travel strategies I use in other countries to more familiar turf. But on this trip, I’ve found myself choosing the more “comfortable” option frequently: the parlor car on the train to the Grand Canyon, the flight to Vegas instead of the long bus ride. Which may say as much about the United States as it does about me.

So: travel wisdom is a work in progress–and at least I have gotten my share of discomfort walking in 115-degree heat!

Your thoughts? When is comfort worth it? When did you feel like it was unnecessary or just got in the way?

9 Tips for Counterintuitive Travel (the master list)

I thought long and hard about this list…

Last fall, I wrote a series of blog posts about the rather cranky, not-immediately-logical way I have come to travel.

Here’s the master list of tips, with links back to the posts. Employ on your summer vacation, and tell me how it goes!

1. Go to the bad part of town.



Like nice families, nice neighborhoods are all the same. Money creates global culture and same-everywhere cappucino.

2. Go to the ugly places.



Learning to love the not-immediately-lovely is a skill. And fewer tourists go to nondescript spots, leaving more room and space for you to meet normal people.

3. Go where the tourists are.



I know, I’m contradicting myself. But sometimes it’s great to hang out with tourists–especially if they’re from the country you’re visiting.

4. Be lazy.



Slow down. Do less. Skip the sights, especially if they might make you so cranky you’ll resent the whole country.

5. Travel by inefficient transport.



Like they say, man, the journey is the destination.

6. Drink the water.



Actually, it’s probably safe in many more places than you think. That ice cube won’t kill you (probably).

7. Don’t negotiate with taxi drivers.



Click through to understand why.

8. There’s no shame in sleeping.



Enjoy the siesta–it’s a cultural experience.

9. Bonus: Get older.



This wasn’t in the first series, but it came up after. Travel just gets more fun as you go along.

Any other tips to add? What have you learned through travel? Share in the comments.

Mumbai New York Scranton

I stayed up till 3:30 am reading this book, Mumbai New York Scranton, by Tamara Shopsin. I started it on the walk back from the library*, weaving down the sidewalk. I made Peter read the first 20 pages, about India and old taxis, the pots of paste for sticking on stamps in the post office, the vintage hotels that feel like 1943 inside.

In late 2005, I got sick with a freak bacterial infection in my heart. In early 2006, I had to have emergency open-heart surgery in San Francisco. Which turned out to be for the best, in so many ways. (One: nurses in California are just plain nicer.)

It was jarring, to say the least, to be dumped in the deep end of the American medical system. There’s a certain preparing-for-the-apocalypse streak to my traveling. Going to countries where the sidewalks are broken and the buses wheeze and you can’t drink the water–and yet, everyone is still pretty happy–gives me a feeling that when the U.S. slides down the pole, I’ll be able to cope. (I was going to mention squat toilets here, but that reminded me I already wrote a tiny bit about this back at the time–here’s the post.)

I just took a whole paragraph to set up how endocarditis and surgery was a big check-your-privilege moment. Tamara Shopsin does it in one sentence, as she’s wheeled into surgery: “I am glad it doesn’t feel like 1943.”

I’m grateful to Shopsin for describing both the charms of India and the horrors of sudden surgery with such economy. Peter was so taken with the India section, I think he might actually want to go. I was so gripped by the surgery section, I was right back there, in that odd hospital-exhaustion zen space, where I was OK with whatever happened, but just felt sad for everyone around me.

It was good to read about an experience that mirrored mine, in a way that wasn’t maudlin or epiphanic. A near-death experience didn’t change me, even though everyone kept asking if it had. It was relief to read Shopsin’s book and have it not be about transformation. Maybe the best thing about being lucky enough to get into the American medical system, and then get out of it unscathed and in fact improved, is that you can be the same old person in the end. I’m blind in one eye now (byproduct of the infection), but otherwise, I can carry along with my life, and travel to strange places, use squat toilets and the whole bit, and just generally not worry.

A few months ago, I wrote thank-you notes to my doctors in San Francisco, on the seventh anniversary of my surgery. This is one for Shopsin too.

*Support your local library! Mine in Queens had this book as soon as it was released. I bought a copy later, because the photos (by Shopsin’s husband) are so great.

Morocco, Come Back!

I never properly blogged about my Morocco trip. That’s because I came back and plunged right into writing about it for my book.

Actually, I spent a lot of timing tuning up my chapters on Egypt, and Lebanon, and the Emirates. By the time I really focused on Morocco again, I was in less of a Morocco frame of mind.

Of course, I had my notes and photos and everything, and I remembered what happened. I just had lost a little of what it felt like to be there. I didn’t realize I was forgetting until I was in a movie theater, watching Lincoln, and in one scene, someone’s wearing some elaborate silk dressing gown, and in a close-up, you can see the little silk-thread buttons on it.

And I felt this sudden pang. Morocco, it’s slipping away!

Why did the buttons spark this sensation? Djellabas and caftans, the standard Moroccan clothing, are often done up in heavy brocade, and these very lovely buttons. They’re emblematic of a certain level of luxury and comfort and care that’s everywhere, every day, even in rough settings. Flashes of beauty, rich colors, ornate detail–and not covered in grime or left to ruin, but well kept, and in many cases, freshly built or even being made before my eyes.

I walk around New York and look at old buildings and sigh: “Why can’t people build things like that anymore?” I harrumph. Rockefeller Center. The General Electric building–that kind of thing.

In Morocco, it’s still happening! I’m not saying every new construction is lovely, and the country is aesthetically seamless. Not at all. But a certain, very specific style is completely intact and vibrant.

So here are some photos, to try to recapture a little of that feeling, the silk-button feeling. I recommend looking at these while wearing comfy slippers and drinking mint tea… (I also recommend opening each one in a new tab–the details are key!)