I guess this year I’m more upbeat. Lots of things have changed for me, most of them for the better.
I met my love, who is all I could wish for in a man. I moved to London, to get closer to said love. Found a job there, as an employee, to settle in and smell the culture. Not all is perfect, but it never is – I’m definitely much happier than I was last time round.

Before some call me smug: I well know how fragile and finite happiness can be. I’m hoping that people who are where I was before see this as the proof that a ray of light may be around the corner.

The next day I wandered across town to get a nice breakfast (sweet potato pancakes at Slim Goodies), and then drove the car to Avery Island. It was a bit further than I thought, about 3 hours. Classic vinyl radio station on the way (Led Zep, Neil Young …).

Avery Island is the place where (according to myth) Tabasco was invented. The island itself is a salt bulge, a hill made of natural salt. The McIlhenny family imported Capsicum Frutescens peppers and grew them there. They invented a sauce mixing a pepper mash with some of the local salt, letting it ferment in oak barrels covered with salt for 3 years (according to myth), mixing this with a vinegar and bottling the result. They basically picked the name at random from a mexican map, but picked it well, since it basically became part of the kitchen vocabulary.

When I got out of the car, the whole place smelled like tabasco (or the peppers, probably). Along with other tourists I was treated to a 10 minute long commercial basically detailing the story above. Nowadays they grow most of their peppers in central and south america, but still use their jealously guarded receipe. They extended their range to have habanero pepper sauce (much hotter), green pepper sauce, garlic sauce, chipotle sauce, and a diversified products (like tabasco ice cream, not bad at all actually).

After this brief commercial break I drove to the ‘jungle garden’, which is basically a large park for local plants and birds. I walked the park for about an hour, it was again the lush vegetation of Louisiana, lots of snowy egrets in the water, old droopy mossy trees, palms, bamboos. I had a brief moment of pause when I was about to climb to the bird observatory, which was above the water: there was a sign saying “Caution: alligators are dangerous”. Suddenly, the darkness underneath the vegetation-covered banks left and right of me looked much more threatening.

I drove back to New Orleans, and went to Preservation Hall after dinner. Preservation Hall is an old-style pub with lots of bare brick on bourbon street, dedicated to the preservation of New Orleans Jazz. They had a good band playing, so I hung about for an hour with a local beer for company.

The local beers are decent, but nothing to write home about. I found two breweries: Abita, with a range of blonde, amber, dark, raspberry. The darkest, called Abita Turbo Dog, is the one I like best (maybe for the name). The other beer is Blue Moon, which is a white beer, not bad at all.

Next day I took it easy. I loitered in a nice coffee place’s courtyard, which had wifi, returned my rental car, and then wandered, with stop at another good coffee place. I saw the French Market, which is a covered market place, had a look at the National Jazz museum, walked through Bywater and its colorful neo-hippy feel, and skirted the edge of Treme.

Treme is a neighborhood that was founded by an enterprising freed man (and named after him). It was (and is) a mainly african american neighborhood. It was starting to get fashionable before the hurricane struck, but apparently has trouble recovering from the damage. I’ve been told not to go there at night by locals.

At night I went back to Green Goddess, one of the best restaurants I know in New Orleans, and had a cosy place at the bar, where I cheerfully chatted with other food lovers – funny how conversations about food cross boundaries. There seemed to be an anthropology convention going on, because the people I chatted with were anthropologists. The food didn’t disappoint, and I ended in style with their ‘notorious’ bacon sundae – ice cream with bacon, and it works !

Then I wandered the french quarter some more, listening to the music, watching the drunk people, and went back to my hotel.

Today I’m going home – I’m reluctant to leave this vibrant place and its fantastic weather, at the same time I’m looking forward to see friendly faces again. Traveling alone allows you to be much more open and observant, but there’s definitely something to be said for traveling with friends.

The car has an automatic gear shift, of course. I had to get used to that again, but it’s nothing a 3 year old can’t handle. The tricky bit proved the brake, which was much more sensitive than I’m used to, I nearly whiplashed myself a few times.

A few U turns later, I’d found the interestate in the right direction, and I was cruising towards Natchez, Mississipi. Radio on an ’90′s alternative’ channel, trip down memory lane with Beck, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Soundgarden, Rage Against The Machine …

First there were miles and miles of swamp (aka bayou). I took an exit at some point and just parked the car. In the muggy heat, the swamp smelled sweet, with something like decaying leaves in it. Lots of birds and insect noises. Basically, the water started where the road stopped, I guess the only way to visit is by boat. The highway itself is built on high pillars. Civilisation and cars above, muck and wildlife below.

After a while, the ground firmed up, and swamps were replaced by forests, and I entered the state of Mississipi. The road became slightly hilly. Long stretches of highway, houses sparsely dotted left and right, once in a while exits advertising fast foods, petrol stations and motels.

It struck me then how based on cars the lifestyle is around there. We europeans like to feel superior about our non-reliance on cars, but truth is our lands were settled before the car came along.
Some of these trailers or bungalows would not have been built if the owners didn’t have a car to drive to the nearest strip malls. Most food places are drive-ins, and malls cannot be negociated on foot. To change that would require major restructurings, and something as vague and distant as global warming is nowhere near incentive enough.

I reached Natchez after sunset, and found myself an inn for the night, to visit the next day.
Natchez used to be a very influential town, where southern plantation society gathered and had town homes. There are about 40 of these gathered around Natchez, which itself feels like a small sleepy southern town. There is a vague resentment towards New Orleans for having taken over the role of hub of the region, ‘we were there first’.

On the visitor center lady’s recommendation, I visited two plantation homes.
The first one, Longwood, is a splendid octagonal mansion, is set higher up on a very pretty stretch of land with old trees, very scenic. It belonged to a family of cotton planters. They ran out of money after the civil war, and never completed the interior, only the first (ground) floor is finished, and that is where they lived for a good number of years. (it only hit me after a while, but it’s also the mansion of Russel Edgington in True Blood)

The ground floor feels a bit oppressive, it’s fairly dark and only the outside has high-set windows, like living in a basement. The second, unfinished floor is where they probably originally intended to live, with very high ceilings, splendid high arched windows with a gallery looking out on the surroundings – it would have been beautiful if finished. There was a plan to reflect light from the dome with mirrors down into the inner rooms of the house.

The next house I visited was Rosalie, a house originally built by a cotton and lumber merchant. The house was headquarters for general grant during the civil war, and is now headquarters for the Daughters of the American Revolution (urgh). It’s furnished with many of the original pieces, very ostentatious golden chandeliers, exotic hardwood furniture. Interesting doll collection, and stories about, again, glory and decay. Apparently having zero cost labor force was very lucrative – the contrast between this opulence and its origin grated.

The weather was nowhere as warm as back in New Orleans, cold wind whipping about, fall colors – jacket weather again.

I ate a good southern artery-clogging meal of smoked chicken, sweet potatoes and squash in Natchez at a place called Biscuits&Blues – fantastic salty tender biscuits (fat scones) – and then I drove on to Jackson, as part of my plan to drive on to Memphis. Again, many miles of hilly road.

I arrived in Jackson after dark again, found a nice hotel, and pondered what to do. At that point I started to realize that my plans were a bit ambitious for just a week’s traveling, and that I had only a fuzzy idea on what to see anyway … some mails containing tips arrived then, and I decided to turn back to Louisiana the next day. I’d seen town homes for planters in Natchez, where they showed off their wealth to their peers, and I wanted to see some actual plantations, along the Mississipi.

Next morning I drove all the way back to Vacherie (name is a bit funny for french-speaking people), which is near to New Orleans.
I first visited the Laura plantation. This plantation belonged to true traditional french creoles. The house was fairly simple, a wooden, sturdy house on pillars. The family worked there, partying was done in their town homes in New Orleans. The pillars apparently widened in the foundations to pyramids, to make a kind of floating platform so the house wouldn’t sink into the mud. Separate kitchen, as most houses around there, to lower the risk of fire.

The house had a view on the sugar cane plantations, and on the slave shacks. The plantation had been steered by four generations of women, the most intelligent person being chosen to rule irrespective of gender. That puts paid to any illusions that women ruling the world would somehow mean a gentler place (something I never believed): these women were tough as nails, and probably not gentle on their slaves, either.

We got interesting stories about the families, very highly strung, dramatic people, a Creole thing to be apparently (more akin to latin temperament than anglosaxon practicality). We also saw a price chart for slaves: a skilled worker of 20-25 cost the equivalent of 100 000 dollars, and the prices could go down to 18 000 for dim-witted or lazy slaves, and to nothing for elderly slaves. They lived 12 to a small house, and were encouraged to breed. The handling of the slaves followed the ‘code noir’, until the american laws came along.

Slaves could set a bit of money on the side by doing extra work, and could buy themselves out. Some of these freed slaves then started plantations themselves, and owned their own slaves.

The funny thing is, the civil war didn’t change that much, at least not immediately. Most ex-slaves had never known any other life than the plantation, and so they stayed on to work. They weren’t well paid, and they bought from the plantation stores on credit, so they ended up owing money to the plantation (sounds familiar from our own mine workers in the 19th century).

Somehow, when I read books about plantations and slaves, I’d always pictured the surroundings as being scorched and dry, maybe as a reflection to the emotional climate. In fact it’s positively eden-esque: palm trees, pecan nut trees, pepper plants, green glowing grass.

After the Laura plantation I visited the Oak Alley plantation, also sugar cane, mostly known for the oaks lining its alley. The trees are majestic and about 300 years old. The house is a nice classic villa, with 2 high floors and a gallery along the second floor. Apparently it was the set of (amongst others) ‘Interview with the Vampire’. The gallery used to have a direct view on the Mississipi and the boats passing by, but they increased the height of the levee to 40 feet, so you don’t see it anymore nowadays.

After this visit, I returned to New Orleans.

Last week flew by like a whirlwind.
The weather was fantastic for most of the time: t-shirt during the day, jumper at night. In november. Palm trees.
New Orleans never sleeps. Bars open all night. There’s lots of music going on. You can walk around with alcoholic drinks, something that completely amazes most americans visiting it, especially people from Utah. The consequence of this is that a lot of americans come to New Orleans to party, sometimes in excess. A local told me that many people did things in New Orleans they would never even consider back home, which amused and appalled her somewhat.

But for a conference it’s great. During the day attend sessions and the hallway track, and at night going out and exploring the cities’ possibilities. A bit exhausting, perhaps, I still feel like I could use more rest.

The people have that famed southern friendliness. I was a bit taken aback at first because people say hello to you in the street ! A local told me that a southern person will be hospitable and friendly by default, suspending judgment until given enough information, as opposed to the northern attitude which is to get to know people before being friendly (a bit like we do in belgium, really).

New Orleans people love their foods. I wasn’t too convinced by Po-Boys, a kind of sandwhich where you pile on seafood fried in lots of batter. Tourist places are to be avoided, as I found out. I had the opportunity to eat in two truly good restaurants: Atchafalaya, and Green Goddess, both with original cuisine made with local ingredients. Cafe au lait and Beignets at Cafe Du Monde of course, but don’t wear dark clothes because you’ll be covered in powdered sugar. I was taken to Curenola by some locals for some truly great cocktails, never would have found it myself, since it’s fairly out of the way.

The French Quartier is perilously close to being a alcoholic theme park. At any time of day you see people stumbling around, Bourbon Street is full of neon-lit bars blaring music, street musicians provide entertainment on the street. When you move away, Royal St is slightly more refined if still very crowded. Magazine St contains better shops, and nice coffee bars.

I love the street names. None of that First Street Second Avenue stuff here, streets have french and creole sounding names. Poydras St, Tchoupitchoulas St, Magazine St, …

I found out rather late in the week that for a good night out you go to Frenchmen St, just out of the French Quartier. More good live music, non-tacky clubs and bars, a distinctly hipper scene.

The walk along the Mississipi is called the Moonwalk (not entirely sure why). It’s a nice stretch with view over the river, and a more serene place to sit down and rest a while before going into the vibrant city again. Also pretty great to see steam boats (for tourists) paddle along and use their ear-splitting steam whistles.

More to the south you’ll find the Garden District, which is known for its italianate mansions. Most houses in New Orleans are made of wood. The business district is full of stone and concrete buildings, but the stone needs to be imported, I’m told there is no local stone. In the garden district you have very old trees, and truly impressive houses with cast iron curlicues on the balconies and wood carvings at every cornice. Something that is not unique to the garden district is that most houses are brightly colored. The locals seem to love their pastels, and it all looks quite cheerful.

I saw one of the famed graveyards: the St Louis cemetary, where Marie Laveau the voodoo queen is buried. The tombs are built as small bright white temples above ground: apparently the technical reason for this is that the ground is too marchy to dig a proper, stable hole. The voodoo queen’s tomb was covered in graffitied Xes (sign of voodoo) and covered in plastic bead necklaces, bottles, candy, and similar junk put there by voodoo practitioners. At the center of the cemetery there’s a huge monument for the tombs of an italian regiment, topped by an angel, which was the setting of a bad LSD trip scene in easy rider (my guide tells me). Many of the tombs were crumbling, more and more resembling piles of brick.

I had the opportunity to walk to the Ninth Ward, which is notorious for having being hit the hardest by Katrina. To get there I crossed Bywater, a nice neighbourhood of smaller but colourful and well-kept houses, which is well on its way to attain hipster status.

As I was walking, the neighbourhood became gradually more desolate, houses looking more and more decrepit. You saw houses which had a not quite straight roof, lots of boarded up houses. The neighbourhood was probably not rich to start with. Rumor has it that many of the locals have not received the help they needed to fix it, and some have been not-so-gently nudged away from New Orleans, powers that be thinking that the city might be better off without them. People there (exclusively african americans) were still friendly and had a ‘Good Evening’ to spare for me (even though it was 2pm, but hey).

In fact, Ninth Ward is not the only neighborhood in this position. A taxi driver pointed out lesser and better neighborhoods to me as we were driving, and apparently there’s really this alternation of decent and ghetto, with the lesser neighborhoods still in a bad state from Katrina. Those neighbourhoods are of course even worse off than before, since empty, boarded up houses attract squatters, and scare away any businesses. He said that the taxi companies are taking as many security measures as possible when sending people in there.

A lot of contrast between the really vibrant, colorful New Orleans, and the blighted parts of the city.

Sunday the weather changed somewhat from the fantastic blue skies we’d had all week: clouds rolled in, and the weather became somewhat muggy. Today it’s raining, in fact. I’m going to leave for Natchez, where I hope to see a couple of plantation houses and maybe some nature. I’m hoping to drive through Bayou country on the way.

Don’t get me wrong, I think people are capable of rational thought, I just don’t think it’s their default setting. And political (or religious) convictions don’t fall under the rational umbrella at all.

It’s very simple, my intuition is that the opinions we hold are motivated by love and respect. In most cases our parents, or parental figures, are the ones we inherit them from. The feelings we experience when someone discredits those belief are often suspiciously close to hurt, as if someone was belittling the people we love. Not the best ground for cool logic.

Sometimes, someone’s worldview will change fundamentally during their lifetime, but it’s usually because they get emotionally close to someone who holds a strong and different view. You’ll see people adapt their opinions to their spouse’s or partner’s, for instance.

Then there are those who’ve never received much love or never had anyone to look up to in their childhood: those are prime territory for cult leaders or political extremists – an attractively blank slate. They’ll be much, much more likely to accept anyone feeding them a consistent, if simplistic world view, together with the notion that they’re somehow special. Love and respect again.

It’s an instinct that probably harks back to groups of primates following their leaders and their kin.

Ask yourself when the last time was you seriously questioned your core beliefs ? I bet that if anyone can make you do that, it’s someone you look up to, respect and like. If some random yahoo starts slinging argumentation your way, you’ll probably dismiss it out of hand.

On the other hand, we’ll all jump like caffeinated rabbits on any argument that bolsters what we already think, even though we’d never thought of it before. Sounds a lot like rationalization, doesn’t it ?

So anyway, I don’t think political discussions will truly change anyone’s mind. Probably not in the pub, and especially not on the internets. Waste of time.

First time was a mixed experience. The weather was good, and I enjoyed most of it, but ended the trip thoroughly cold and a little seasick. The sea wind is very efficient at sucking every heat out of you, and I was glad when the day was over.

So this time I came prepared for the cold, I had 3 layers of fleece over normal clothing, a windbreaker, and windbreaker pants. But, foolishly, I didn’t come prepared for seasickness.

The trip started out fine – the weather forecast was not promising, but we actually had a clear sky. The wind was whipping up large waves, and as soon as we left port, the boat started dancing on tall waves – impressive but fun.

The idea was to run a race. Races in that kind of boat means going through a virtual starting line as soon as the starting shot is fired, and doing a few loops around a couple of buoys. The buoys are dynamic so that you need to sail at least one of the legs upwind.

This being a race, the more experienced sailors got to steer and adjust the sails, and I was left playing intelligent counterweight. I listened to anything that sounded like ‘changing tack’ or ‘ready to gipe ?’ and scrambled over to the other side of the boat. Not that simple when you climb over a near featureless expanse of white plastic, and the boat is changing inclination dramatically, and you need to avoid a sail swiping past over your head.

As it was, it was fortunate that I didn’t get to do anything more complex than hanging over the correct side of the boat. About 45 minutes in, my stomach started playing up, and the fun part was over. I learned that seasickness comes in waves, like the sea: you feel steadily worse, until you start retching up (whatever’s left) a few times, and then you get a reprieve for about 10 minutes, until the buildup starts again.

During reprieves, I tried to understand what was going on. Sailing vocabulary takes some translation (starting with bloody ‘left’ and ‘right’, for god’s sake), especially when you have to parse it in two languages (dutch and english). There are many rules, and numbers in knots and degrees. We were at times surrounded by other boats, not that surprising, in a race, and priority was to be observed. Keeping two sails taut and functioning at all times in changing and violent winds also takes a lot of ongoing monitoring and action. A sailboat, like good open source projects, is no democracy, and you quickly understand why that’s necessary.

There’s no graceful way to be seasick. I puked a few times on myself before finding the right way to get everything to go down the side. The upside was that I was showered with brine on a regular basis, so the worst got washed off. Also I hadn’t eaten anything since 6o’clock in the morning, so I was spared anything solid.

I had a major case of cognitive dissonance. I love the idea of sailing, and have wanted to do it for ages. The waves glinting in the sun, the graceful shapes of other sailboats, would normally have me sighing with contentment. As it was, I was feeling way too bad to enjoy it, which felt like a shame, even through the nausea.

As I was hanging there, my feet soaked with seawater, painting Peter’s boat with the contents of my stomach, I reflected on how I could be sitting in my living room reading a good book, with no more movement than the slow, slow sliding of tectonic plates a few miles below. Not having eaten since six, being wet and violently sick left me a shivering wreck, just waiting for it to be over.

There was another unhappy sailor on board, so I was spared being the only one. The skipper ended up taking pity on us and cut the race short. He explained to me that at that point, there weren’t many points to lose anyway. As soon as we hit port and quieter waters, I felt better. I took a shower, changed clothes, and forced down some sandwiches, feeling almost human again. Then I scrubbed whatever traces of sick that were left on the boat.

If I’m allowed back, I’ll give it another try. This time I’ll take the pills, and I’ll wear the many layers, and plastic boots, and I’ll hope the experience will be somewhat more like what I keep imagining it should be. Arrrr.

It wakes you up when you’re starting to emerge, based on your movements, in the half hour interval preceding the alarm time you set.
Of course, the nerd in me was absolutely fascinated at first. In theory, you could check which kind of sleep would correspond to which state of mind the next day, and it’s just fun. And if it worked, it could make waking up just that little bit easier.

After a while, however, i got frustrated.
First off, in dream state (REM sleep) you don’t move, in theory. It’s only a short time anyway, and during that time just your eyes move, rapidly, as the name indicates.
Secondly, you have sleep cycles of about 3 hours at a time. Deep sleep, REM, deep sleep. A night having about 6 of them couldn’t be right. Errata: sleep cycles are actually 1h30 to 2h30
Thirdly, the smart alarm thing didn’t seem to work. Sometimes, I would wake up, check the time, without the alarm being activated.

And mostly, the moral aspect. It did make me that little bit more anxious. Without the application, I would just get up, and drag myself to the shower, no questions asked. With Sleep Cycle, the first thing I’d do was look at the previous night, and try to divine whether I’d actually slept well, looking at the statistics. Being a bit disgruntled when there was a lot of movement, and trying to decide whether it was something I’d eaten.

So I decided to give it up. There’s a whole movement out there about monitoring your own vitals. It’s understandable, we like control. But I’m starting to think that maybe, it’s wiser to just live, without anything telling us how we ought to feel.

At 35, one can no longer pretend to be a young adult, and it’s the slide into the Middle Ages.

I still don’t feel very grown up.
I’m braver than I used to be, but also more cowardly in some ways.
I’m more cynical than in my twenties, but people manage to surprise me quite often (in a good way).
I’m starting to know my limits.
I still have trouble showing affection, or asking for help.
I’ve loved and been loved, but I don’t know whether it’ll happen.
Friends and acquaintances have showed me by example that a family is still possible at this point.
I’m loving my job, but I know it will need to evolve, it’s just not clear how.
I’ve come to terms with the fact that life is never going to be constant bliss, but a succession of good and bad times.

In short, I thought I’d have it all worked out by now, but I’m still casting about … I guess that’s life.

• the day I spent biking in NY. Good to know: there’s a bike path going all round Manhattan. I started off in the lower east village, took that bike path, rounded the coast along Battery Park, biked a little bit on the Hudson Highway (not great), and then crossed over onto the Hudson Trail, which goes all the way up. The first bit is not really scenic, with mostly warehouses and underpasses, but then the bike path becomes lined with grass and trees.
  I could have gone the same way back, but where would have been the fun in that ? So I went into the city, biked in Central park, and crossed my way down from there. I even biked through Time Square (which is on one of the bike paths). It actually felt safer than doing it in Brussels ! The streets are wider, the drivers marginally saner, and in some streets there are separate bike lanes. The main problem comes from pedestrians, who see the bike lanes as a convenient extension of the sidewalk. In Time Square, where there are throngs or people, this becomes a hazard.
• Katz’s Deli: pretty well-known, mentioned in guides, and justly so. It’s a folksy place, with lots of pictures on the wall, as far from hip as you can possibly be. But they have great pastrami. I ordered a pastrami sandwich on rye bread, which came with pickles. The pastrami was warm, salty, juicy and delicious, the pickles were a nice green crunchy counterpoint (and they were salty too, not vinegared).
• In one of my wanders, I passed a place called ‘The Doughnut Plant of New York‘. It didn’t look like much, just a counter, but there was a queue of people looking like addicts waiting for their fix. 10 minutes later, I knew why: doughnuts that literally melt in your mouth. That day I had lavendar and mango. I had no choice but to come back the next day: I had a carrot cake doughnut and a creme brulee doughnut.
• In the ‘good beer pub’ category, the Blind Tiger is pretty decent. They had a Great Divide event going when I was there, so I didn’t feel like I’d wasted my time.
• The MoMa and the Guggenheim. The MoMa is in a fantastic modernist building, and the collections are unique. If you ever wondered how Mondrian got to his square thing, or what stages Picasso went through, or what kind of work led Pollock to his drips, you can see the it displayed there. They had a temporary exhibition on Henry Cartier-Bresson, with fantastic pictures from his whole career. Where the MoMa is more 20th century, the Guggenheim has a foot in the 21st, and displays more conceptual artists as well as the ones we know. Interesting if a bit more demanding.
• The Radio City Music Hall: it doesn’t look like much from the outside, but it’s Art Deco extravaganza by Rockefeller on the inside. There are guided tours, and ours was excellent, extravagantly gay and obviously into the whole broadway scene. The ceilings are actually gold plated (24carat), the light fixtures are amazing, everything is carefully preserved. It’s like a step on the movie set of a 30s pulp movie.

There, if you were wondering what to do next time you’re in the big apple (not likely).