On a Slow Boat to China

I got up at 6AM to finish packing and getting the room cleaned up for my sublessee.  I tried to go to Rite Aid for a few last minute items, but who knew that the pharmacies don’t open up till 7?  Even Duane Reade was still closed!  The SuperShuttle showed up 10 minutes early at 7:30AM, and I arrived at EWR around 8AM.  It’s now 9AM and I’ve been sitting at the gate for about an hour already.  Did I mention my flight leaves at 12:10PM?  I guess I’m happy I didn’t take the train because I didn’t want to lug all my bags through Penn Station, but the SuperShuttle takes getting people to the airport early way too seriously.  Now if only airlines also took being on time as seriously maybe traveling would be a less exasperating experience.

Reunions Mania

The last two weeks it feels like I’ve been going to reunions non-stop, and I think my liver is gonna go on strike if I keep it up. First there was Princeton reunions, which is an annual extravaganza of booze, bright orange jackets, and some of the most amazing fireworks I’ve ever seen staged. I worked the LGBT party at Princeton reunions for the last couple of years and this was the first year where I could actually enjoy the festivities rather than bartending.

The day starts with the P-rade, which winds through campus down Elm Drive. Apparently it used to be held on Nassau St, but the party got so rowdy that the town forced the university to move it inside the campus gates. The parade starts with the 25th year class, then goes chronologically through all the classes starting with the oldest returning alumni, which this year I think was a guy from the class of 1924, making him 104!

The party then goes to the tents set up throughout all the courtyards. The younger alumni mill around the 5th and 10th year reunions, occasionally sneaking into the older ones to get some of the good booze. After a few hours of the tents, with a pit stop at the stadium to check out the fireworks, I hopped over to the LGBT party in Whig. It was less crowded this year than when I bartended before, though towards the end it filled up a bit more. The last stop of the night was Terrace, which I am definitely way too old for, but since it’s just once a year I made an exception. All in all a good time was had by everyone, and I went back to NY the next day exhausted but happy.

Princeton’s score: 9 out of 10.

The following week was my own 5th year reunion at Harvard, which I’d been looking forward to for a long time. Even though I still see most of my best college friends in New York all the time, there were a couple that I haven’t seen since graduation. Events kicked off on Friday night with a cocktail & dinner in Dunster courtyard. As usual, it took our posse to get the dance party started, but that is a burden I’m always willing to bear. We hit up the Kong for old time’s sake afterwards, and I had my first scorpion bowl in yeeeeears.

Saturday was ridiculously hot, and we had a crappy BBQ in the yard where everyone was trying not to drip all over their food. The food sucked, which was a recurring theme throughout the entire weekend. They didn’t even have ketchup at the BBQ! Very disappointing considering I paid $210 for four meals… and I know that a lot of people just snuck in (DZ I’m looking at you!) and that there was an open bar with decent liquor and beer, but still you can bring some ketchup to the damn BBQ!

Saturday afternoon was the BGLT thing, which was ok but a little disappointing compared to Princeton’s. It’s in the afternoon, which is stupid and made it feel more like a networking thing than a party thing, and second, well, I hate to admit it but Princeton boys are cuter.

Saturday night was the “Gala Dinner” in Eliot Courtyard. It cooled down just enough for people to put on their blazers and dresses, but still way too sticky to be comfortable. After paying our dues and making our appearance, DZ and I made our way for the door and went with some of his HBS friends to the Roxy in Boston, which was an awesome time. I even ran into some of BA’s friends from his old Boston days! Of course it didn’t quite live up to my fondest memory of the Roxy, which was freshman year when JY cried us into the club, but it was still fabulous. NY definitely does not hold a monopoly on cute boys.

Sunday was the last day and things ended with an elegant brunch in good ol’ Currier house. Crappy food aside (can you tell I was a little disappointed with the food? are you sure?) it was a classy affair and a good chance to relive Sunday brunch memories from college.

Harvard’s score: 6 out of 10. Minuses for the bad food and the bad scheduling. Also Princeton has the right idea with allowing everyone to mix and mingle between the classes rather than keeping each class locked up in its own event.

Let me in!

So China seems to be taking a page from America’s playbook and has implemented very very annoying restrictions on getting a visa this year. I guess it’s timed because of the Olympics, but given the massive number of people traveling there this year shouldn’t the visa application process be simplified, not further complicated?

I showed up at the consulate to get my visa and gave them a copy of my plane ticket and my invitation letter from Tsinghua. The lady at the consulate desk, if you can call her a lady, I think her voice was deeper than mine, told me that I needed a hotel booking. I told her that I didn’t have a booking because Tsinghua is supposed to take care of my housing, at least for the first few weeks that I’m there. She said that’s a no go, and sent me away.

Now maybe I’m the idiot because I didn’t go and start the application process any earlier, but at this point it’s getting pretty late and I need to get the visa ASAP. So I asked my dad to write me a “letter of invitation” from my uncle in Beijing and I would try to apply as a pure tourist. I went back the next day with the letter and thankfully they took my papers and gave me a receipt, which (hopefully) means I should be able to pick up the visa tomorrow.

And if not, I just might start my own protest alongside the crazy Falungong people across the consulate.

Oh Yelle!

In the last year or so my Francophilia has taken shape as a love of French music. No I don’t mean Debussy and Ravel, but the latest wave of French house and electro-pop that was spearheaded by groups like Daft Punk and DJs like David Guetta, and has more recently seen acts like Justice and Yelle. There are also a whole bunch of DJ’s who broadcast their weekly sessions via podcasts and it’s a really convenient (and free!) way to check out new music. Some acts I recommend checking out include David Vendetta, Greg Di Mano, Bastien Sera, and David Guetta.

I found out about Yelle after hearing about the Tecktonik dance style in Têtu and checking out the videos online of Tecktonik dancers. The Tepr remix of “A Cause des Garçons” is pretty awesome and shows Tecktonik at it’s most fun, and after previewing some of Yelle’s other tracks on her debut album “Pop Up” I decided to buy the entire thing. Her songs are pretty hilarious, from “Tu es beau” which is about how a boy tries so hard to please her but can’t quite manage to close the deal, or “Mon meilleur ami” about her vibrator, or “Je veux te voir” which (according to Wikipedia) is dissing some French rappers for being misogynistic.

Shortly thereafter I found out that she was touring the USA and performing at the Highline Ballroom in NY so of course I had to check it out. I went along with CEO and GBB, and we had a smashing time. The doors opened a little late so we stood outside in the surprisingly cold May night chugging Amstel Lights. We were pretty buzzed by the time we finally got in and ready to dance! The opening act was Heartsrevolution and the singer came out holding something pink in a martini glass and clearly trashed. The singer, or rather screamer, was so loud that I ended up holding my ears through their entire act and I was cringing inside as to whether I’d come to the wrong show.

But when Yelle finally took the stage the vibe changed completely. She came out sporting her gold coat and her sexy swagger and instantly got the crowd dancing. She was backed up by Tepr on the turntable and GrandMarnier on the drums (so hot!) and they delivered an awesome set, which went through basically the entire Pop Up album, and she nailed every single song. I can’t wait for the next time they swing by the states!

A Tale of Two Towers

The Aya Sofia and the Blue Mosque stand opposite each other across Sultanahmet Park as if in an eternal duel for the most imposing structure in Istanbul. Each has its arsenal of advantages: the Aya Sofia has an additional 1000 years of history, the distinction of having been a church, a mosque, and a museum, and one of the most spectacular domes in the world. The Blue Mosque on the other hand has a sumptuous assortment of small domes surrounding the main dome, and an almost unparalleled six minarets pinning down the corners of the courtyard

But to be honest it really isn’t a competition, since each edifice excels in its own distinctive way. The Aya Sofia’s exterior is not very inspiring; the paint is faded and chipped in places and the dome viewed from outside seems like just any other mosque. But I dare you to enter within its walls and not be amazed. The dome soars impossibly above the main hall as if Allah himself were holding it up. The mosaic work which has been done, stripped, and redone over the past 1400 years according to the whims of the ruler are hauntingly beautiful. Even though during my visit the dome itself was being restored and there was a series of scaffolding filling the atrium, you still couldn’t help but be amazed at what the Romans were able to accomplish so long ago.

On the other hand the Blue Mosque is a beauty to behold from outside. The many small domes complement and reinforce each other in a composition of serenity and dignity. Viewing it from across the park creates an especially nice panorama as the green of Sultanahmet park contrasts against the blue of the mosque itself. The inside is also quite beautiful, though not as impressive as the Aya Sofia. The walls are decorated with Islamic motifs and patterns and seals praising Allah, but it doesn’t have the same weightless quality that the Aya Sofia does.

The most amazing moment to witness these two mosques is during the call to prayer. Sitting in the courtyard of the Blue Mosque, you can here the singers from the minarets of the two mosques call out and respond to each other, and the melodies of the two weave together into an intricate and inspiring call to worship (even for an atheist).

Eating in Istanbul

Istanbullus know how to eat, whether it’s on the street, in the cafe, or wherever. I’ve just barely had a few tastes of Turkish food and I’m in love already. None of it is too foreign since there are a great deal of Turkish restaurants in New York and they’re actually quite good, but the variety here is much greater and the ingredients are much fresher.

The baklava here is to die for… I don’t think I’ve seen them drenched in as much honey and rich sugary goodness as the place on Istiklal Caddesi where these photos were taken. The window arrangements would lure group after group of tourists and locals alike to come stare and drool.

The local street food is quite good too. I especially like the balik ekmek (literally fish bread) which is a grilled fish sandwich topped with tomatos, lettuce, and a big pile of onions. SG and I debated whether the fish was actually caught by the fisherman tending their poles on Galata Bridge, but given how clean (or not) the Bosphorus is I’d rather not think about where the fish came from and rather think about how it’s gonna end up in my stomach.

I also tried this fried doughy thing, which was filled with feta cheese. It was sizzling hot and yummy, and the couple running the stand were definitely hogging all the business near the Aya Sofia.

The one disappointment so far has been the Turkish tea. I’d expected something new and interesting but it kind of tastes like a watered-down Earl Grey. Hmm can someone say Chinese tea snob?

Istanbul, not Constantinople

Gee whiz Toto, I don’t think we’re in Israel anymore! Istanbul is a frantic, crowded, chaotic, pulsating mess and it’s awesome! I’ve never been to a city that has more joie-de-vivre and later hours than this. It really puts New York to shame as far as night-time activities go, and I’m actually embarrassed to say that all the excitement starts a little too late for tired old me to actually enjoy.

We drove from the airport to the hotel along the sea of Marmara, which afforded nice views of both the water and the fancy seaside restaurants along the highway. They were actually quite fancy, much nicer than I’d expected, and when we pulled into Beyoğlu I was surprised by how modern everything was. I guess in my mind Istanbul was still shrouded in nargile (a.k.a. hookah) smoke and filled with busy, cramped alleys.

Our hotel is in Taksim Square which is kind of the Times Square of Istanbul minus the Broadway shows.  There are a lot of hotels in the area and a lot of shopping and entertainment.  Nearby is İstiklal Caddesi, which resembles a pedestrian Champs-Elysée, while its small side-streets are filled to the brim with restaurants, meyhanes, nargile bars, and plain old bars. İstiklal is one of the most crowded places I’ve ever been to, no matter what hour of day you’re there.  During the day there is a lot of shopping to do, while at night the restaurants start overflowing and the party-goers start strutting their glam club outfits.  The picture here was taken at 1AM!

The rest of the city shares the same liveliness, whether you’re walking across the bridge from Beyoğlu to the Sultanahmet district where all the siteseeing is, or whether you’re walking through the Bazaar district which is so full it’s hard to move.  I’d thought before this trip that Beijing or Shanghai would have the most crowded streets I’d ever see, but I’ve been proven wrong in my first day here.

Holy of Holy Molies

God definitely made me pay for being an atheist today. Not in a being-struck-by-lightening kind of way, but in a make-Jerusalem-as-inconvenient-as-possible kind of way. Somehow I spent most of the day walking against traffic, i.e. gaggles of tourists following their flag-waving guide through the narrow alleys of the Old City blocking the paths for everyone else. No matter which way I turned there was always an oncoming crowd, like this was Wolfenstein 3D and I was being cornered by legions of zombie soldiers.

Even the one time I managed to be going with the flow of traffic I had to turn around. I ran into a bunch of Chinese tourists (we’re everywhere!) who I’m guessing were some kind of religious tour group, because in the middle of the street for no particular reason they bursted into hymns and prayers. And I mean really for no particular reason; we weren’t next to a church or the site where Jesus was flogged or crucified or even the site where Jesus bought a really tasty felafel; we were next to the place where I wanted to buy a really tasty felafel! The problem was, being another Chinese person amidst a large group of Chinese people, I think everyone around assumed I was with them and so I had to immediately bolt the other way, lest someone revoke my gaytheist credentials.

The Old City was amazing though. It was exhilarating to be in the middle of a city holy to two of the world’s major religions and to a people that has persevered through millennia of persecution, a place where every stone is laced with untold history and permeated by faith, hope, fear, and awe. I stumbled on the Western Wall almost by accident so small is the Old City. Once inside the security check I was unsure if I was allowed to approach the wall, whose entire length was occupied by praying Jews. But after placing the paper kippa that’s freely available on my head I trotted over to the base of the wall and touched the stones that represented 3000 years of history. I understand how some people can get “Jerusalem Syndrome” here; the power of the history in this city is really palpable and I can only imagine the effect it has on the faithful.

Later on in the day I decided to head over to the Mount of Olives (the supposed site of Armageddon) to take some landscape shots of the Old City. After climbing through the old Jewish cemetary, I reached the summit where the view was indeed breathtaking. It was about 5:30PM when I got there, and I had the brilliant idea to wait for sunset so I could take pictures of the pink sky over the Dome of the Rock and the Old City. It was pretty chilly up there, but I toughed it out hoping the pictures would be worth it.

The bad signs started around 6PM, when clouds started rolling in from the West. I actually got some nice shots of the sunbeams poking through the clouds, but then I got my second punishment from the Almighty today. After waiting 1.5 hours at the top of the Mount of Olives the clouds took over and blocked whatever sunset there would have been… sigh. I guess you can’t ask for too much when trying to take pictures standing on the spot where Armageddon’s supposed to occur.

Eating in Tel Aviv

The food here is great even if it’s not any more affordable than NY, especially with the awful exchange rate. Friday night I went to this cute cafe called “X-Ray” on Bograshov St where I had a Haloumi cheese salad and a plate of gnocchi with marinated mushrooms in a cream sauce. The Haloumi cheese was great, fried to perfection and matched with some leafy greens and cherry tomatoes bursting with tart juice, and the gnocchi was delicious, and the sauce was perfect, not too heavy and not too light.

Saturday I went to this restaurant Manta Ray suggested by TR for a late lunch. The restaurant is right on the beach with beautiful views of the sea and of old Jaffa, where the old lighthouse sits perched above a small promontory overlooking the sea. The food at Manta Ray is tapas style, and even though the choices all looked amazing (most were meat-free too so I theoretically could have ordered almost all of them), I ended up picking the ceviche, roasted eggplant with sour cream, and a chickpea and calamari dish. The ceviche was great, a nice balance of onion, lemon, and fish, the eggplant was soaked in delicious olive oil and topped with a dollop of sour cream, and the calamari and chickpeas formed a light complement to the heavy eggplant dish. The tapas came with this Balkan bread that was kind of like focaccia, straight out of the oven and drizzled with more olive oil.

Drinking in Tel Aviv

Tel Aviv is like a Jewish New York, but since that’s redundant I should be more precise. It’s similar in its diversity (Jews of all shapes colors and sizes!), its love of eating and drinking, its beautiful people, and its cosmopolitan appeal. It actually has us beat in a few departments: its beaches, its sunshine, and its higher concentration of hot hot hot Israeli men (and to be fair, hot Israeli women too).

So since this is the Israeli New York I decided to experience it as I experience NY, namely by eating and drinking. Friday night I went out to this bar Evita suggested by TR around midnight and I was surprised by how empty it was. Now this is supposed to be one of the institutions of gay Tel Aviv so I assumed it would be much more packed; to this day I’m not sure if it was empty because (a) midnight is way too early to go to a bar or (b) I’m so used to the crush of bars in New York that an average, uncrowded bar seems empty now.

The bartenders at Evita were very friendly, which I’m not sure was because of their general disposition, or because they like foreigners. In any case the service definitely came with a smile, and after about a half hour it also came with a free round of shots too! Now if only I could get that kind of service in New York maybe I could drink excessively and live on my grad student salary without having to think about where my next meal’s coming from…

The next stop on the stumble was Cedamus Amori (“Surrender to Love”), which was a slightly more subdued yet also slightly more cruisy bar. I met up with IC here, a friend of a friend from New York, and after a few drinks we were ready to really kick the night into high gear. That’s when things started flailing.

First we checked out this place -1 suggested by TR that’s supposed to be one of the new “cool clubs” in Tel Aviv. Unfortunately when we got to the door there was a line (or rather a mob, since Israelis haven’t been introduced to the concept of forming lines) that was about 5 people deep and 20 people wide. Even more discouraging was the crowd, which looked like they were either in or had recently graduated from high school, and probably high on some kind of substance they don’t sell at bars.

We decided that it probably wasn’t worth the trouble to get in past the tweaked out club kids so we tried going to this other place HaOman. After a 15 minute cab ride we end up in this warehouse district near the old port; sketchy doesn’t begin to describe the atmosphere. We wander towards the entrance of HaOman and after being frisked by some guards (why are the ones who frisk you never hot?) we went into the entrance. IC talks to the girl at the register then immediately turns around and walks out. I catch up to him and ask what happened, and he says that the cover is 120 shekels (= $35) and that he’d rather just call it a night than pay the cover and deal with the crowd inside. At this point it’s about 2:30AM anyways and I’m starting to lose the partying spirit so I don’t try to convince him otherwise. In retrospect it was probably the right decision, since IC says that as we were walking to find a cab he heard some old gross guys who’d also just left complain to each other “Who knew the club was going to be full of fags.”

We take one last detour before calling it a night for some malawach megargel, which was this filo dough thing wrapped around melted cheese and served with a hot tomato sauce. As far as late night drunk food goes this stuff rocked. Kind of like a greasy pizza with greasy filo dough and greasy cheese stuffed inside. (The picture doesn’t really do it justice; it was huge and dripping with oil.)

Final verdict? Tel Aviv’s nightlife gets points for its late hours and plentiful options, and it loses some points for its palpable trashiness and excessive covers. But I’d do it again in a Tel Aviv minute!