In the Interlude

Pardon me, life's been busy since Christmas. I wish I could say I'd been caught up in a travel whirlwind but reality is far more mundane. The Christmas covid episode grounded us in Michigan for 3 whole weeks--no trip to New Orleans, no indoor restaurant loitering, no hanging out in coffee shops. 

Mercifully, Paul's second case of covid was mild and he began testing negative on day 5. The rest of us stayed negative. So we swapped romantic meals a staircase distance away 

for walks in winter gear to downtown Rochester, walks in winter gear down busy city roads to the mall, walks past winter permafrost backyards, front yards, schools, walks. 

I saw three friends but at a distance: from 6 metres masked up in the youth room at my mom's church; in the backyard across a fire pit in winter clothes in -10 degrees. What unites us is the toll the last two years have taken--with family, with mental health, with work, with our personal journeys. But maybe that's just us getting old.

Home, Michigan, America is a complicated place for me. It's no lie (or secret) that I felt a huge sense of relief upon wheels down in London.

And then we ran pell-mell into Term 2 of our third year of pandemic teaching. Student attendance dipped and staff attendance saw an all-time low. Paul got sick with a different virus that hit him much harder than covid, rendering him briefly deaf in one ear, and we cancelled a weekend away out of London. I finally succumbed to omicron in early March and must humbly apologise to anyone at the school musical, my barre studio, the pub whom I passed the plague onto. Symptoms started on Thursday morning but I didn't test positive until Saturday and new 'live with it' guidance meant no quarantine until you test positive. Although it wasn't as rough as it could've been, I got it worse than Paul and missed four days of school. It's the first time in my 15-year teaching career I've missed that many consecutive days. 

Of course I tested positive the week before Paul and my weekend trip away to Amsterdam. I downed litres of water, crossed fingers and, against all odds, tested negative two days before our weekend away. And so, after three consecutive cancelled trips/part of trips, we made a flying visit to the Dutch capital. And not a second too soon.

I'm not sure about you but I've grown accustomed to shoving up long q-tip up my proboscis. In this pandemic world, I don't think there's a better way to wake up. 

Covid Happens

Our story starts a short bump along the road from my last post. We did our airport covid tests and received two immediate negative results. So we packed, cleaned, shopped, cleaned in a frenzy of less than 24-hours because I refused to jinx our chances beforehand. 

Early the next morning we journeyed to the airport, an airport that laughed in the face of social distancing. We ate our breakfast in a jam-packed restaurant, sat down and waited in a jam packed departure lounge and then got on our plane. Which was the only place not jam packed. 

Eight uneventful hours later, we landed at a jam packed JFK to repeat the process in reverse. Getting through customs was laughably the same as ever. We queued like sardines, packed tightly into our little can. No one checked our documents, vaccination records, negative lateral flow tests. 

We picked up our luggage, walked straight through customs where the two TSA employs were more worried about their rapid-fire gossip than anyone passing by. We jumped into the world's most disorganised security queue that snaked and snaked and snaked again, only to have a queue jump access point for a range of families with prams who proceeded to cut in front of us. 

With 10 minutes left before we boarded and 1hr, 30 minutes into our 2hr scheduled layover, we finally made it to the front. And a nice TSA man opened a new window to let our panicky asses through. But then he tussled with another TSA woman who WAS NOT IMPRESSED with the setup for her afternoon. And Paul intervened because we were bricking it and was immediately, rudely, precisely shut down. We were told to calm down whilst the queue we'd exited moved swiftly and we stayed stuck in one place. 

So Paul did a thing that Paul never does. He played the kidney card, lifted his shirt and lamented: 'I need to take medicine for my health condition. Look at my scar!' He was shut down again: 'you should have prepared for this, sir...' to which I cut him off, showing our passports and telling him that OUR airline arranged OUR connection this way. I was stressed. Clearly he saw that. Because another agonisingly slow minute later, we were through. But the x-ray machine needed to be calibrated first. 

We sprinted through Terminal 4 carrying a laptop and a pair of shoes in hand. Our gate, unsurprisingly, was at the end of the terminal. We walked straight onto the plane, taking a breath and a moment to gather ourselves. The flight was uneventful. 

Arrival in Detroit was a reunion in waiting. Paul's not been back to the US for four years--my parents eagerly awaited our arrival. We hugged, walked to the car and took a lateral flow test perched on the bags in the trunk of the car. Negative, negative and home we went. 

We went to bed, woke up to sunshine, the first sign of impending apocalypse. Bad shit never happens on a rainy day unless it's the movies.

Paul picked up his laptop for his final remote days of 2021. His colleagues continued to freak out about omicron, about the outdoor Christmas party with four people who have since tested positive. And so we took tests. 

And now we're here, separated by a set of basement stairs waiting for tomorrow's PCR to confirm Paul's second bout with Covid-19. Despite three jabs. Despite previous infection.

I was joking with colleagues earlier this week that there needs to be a word for surprised but simultaneously not surprised. And this is why we need that word. 

Excuse me while I panic.

The New Frontier

Today starts the last week of summer 2021, an 8-week teacher holiday that felt more than deserved after the madness of a second school year consumed by Covid. Radio silence has been provoked by two predominant emotions: overwhelm and exhaustion. To suggest that the 2019-2020 school year combined with the 2020-2021 school year felt like my first year of teaching all over again, might be putting it lightly. 

I'm not sure there are words to cover the lacuna that has been the last year of life in London. We made it through lockdown 2.0 (a joke) and lockdown 3.0 (a really bad dream). I went to work for a spate of time between September and December before being contact traced by a member of staff. We abandoned socialising, planning and even being hopeful about when we might do these things. Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas came and went without any sense of occasion. I made no attempt to book flights home for the holidays, only the second time I've not been home since I moved abroad. 

In a story that's far too close to home to bear repeating, I acquired a very mild case of Covid in early January. So mild, I didn't get tested. But then Paul lost his sense of taste and smell and we became casa Covid for a window of time. But we got lucky; neither of us had it too badly. 

And then a bigger glimmer of hope in the form of science and a vaccine emerged. Paul was called in early Feb for his. Mine arrived much later, towards the end of March. We watched government ministers lie, profit and philander their way through the crisis unscathed. 

In a somewhat vain attempt to hope that normality might return in the summer, we booked flights back to the US to attend my little sister's wedding at the beginning of July. We waited and watched to see what travel restrictions and vaccination campaigns would mean for Paul being allowed in the country. US Travel restrictions, still as of today, mandate that anyone non-citizen or greencard holding who has spent the last 14-days in one of the following countries is barred entry: the UK; the EU (clearly, a homogenous 'place' according to the US); China; Iran; South Africa; Brazil. No matter that the US has the most number of Covid cases in the world despite its access to vaccines. No matter political dramas in a number of those countries. No matter. 

And so we begged, pleaded and applied for special status for Paul to travel. But we're not married so our relationship doesn't count. Apparently. 

And so, I cancelled Paul's flight, grappled with changes when my flight got cancelled, Covid tested two days before departure, smiled through graduation and prom and, against all odds, boarded a (first class!) flight bound for US soil early morning on the 26th of June. 

I'm not going to lie, upon wheels down in Atlanta, I burst into tears. When I eventually got to Detroit the next morning, I wept. 

And here we are, in the age of Covid travel. 

Chicago: A New Year's Tradition

I lived in the greater Metro Detroit area for the better part of 18 years and although most of those years were in my formative, non-driving days, it's still important to note that I can count on one finger how many time I went to Chicago. Naturally, now that I live an ocean away, it's the place I go.

The trip came about because Rosa turned 40 a few days before NYE; we wanted to celebrate together on American soil for the first time ever; Chicago was a middle ground (between LA and Detroit-ish); and it turns out that flights/accommodation to Vegas, New Orleans, Florida were all significantly more expensive than a trip to the Windy City at the height of winter. 

Rosa's got true California blood and so she packed several pairs of thermals for our three-day trip away. Unseasonably, when we arrived, the weather didn't even dictate a coat. Global warming, innit. And so we made for all thing Chicago. First stop, Giordano's, home to one of Chicago's greatest accomplishments: the deep dish pizza.

This is a small pizza. It contains several ingredients on a list that trigger a GERD attack, a list I flouted with wild abandonment for much of my time in the USA. I would later come to regret this culinary decision. In the short term, what's not to love about carbs layered with cheese stacked on carbs topped with sauce?

From there, we made for a drink or two, passing Redhead Piano Bar, a place Paul and I frequented years ago on a Chicago trip I never blogged. The place was legendary in that Paul showed up in Converse and they had a clear 'shoe policy.' As I turned away downtrodden asking for recommendations of where else we might go, the very kindly doorman noted: 'but we do have loaner shoes.' And a room full of them. So this became our favourite icon of the city. Since we'd arrived on a Sunday, two days before NYE, it was closed. 

No bother. The next morning we were meeting Kimberly, who was home for the holidays from her new life in Salt Lake City. As tradition mandates, we met at Brunch, an Orleans Street staple, and Kim regaled us with everything she learned about Mormonhood. 

The time between Christmas and New Year is a bit of dead time and the city was fairly quiet. The weather took a turn towards the more expected for December and we bundled up to brave the elements. We showed Rosa the ropes, passing through Navy Pier, home to the world's first Ferris Wheel, 

Millennium Park and Anish Kapoor's Cloud Gate (less pretentiously known as the Bean) 

and heading up to Cindy's for a cocktail and view over the city. 

And that was just the morning. In the afternoon we took a stroll down Michigan Avenue, took in some shopping and Rosa and I attempted a barre class at Barre Code.

Unfortunately, we accidentally booked into separate studios and so I endured 55-minutes of post-Christmas burn alone. I briefly felt virtuous before the pain set in. Post-burn we made for Quartino's, a Chicago staple, recommended by several friends of mine. The small plates Italian restaurant was stuffed to the rafters but Kim being Kim had a story involving getting booted out early the day after her wedding and she had the manager on speed dial. We picked up another one of Kim's Chicago friends and spent three hours having a very delicious, very leisurely meal. It was the perfect end to a wonderful day of reunionising. 

On New Year's Eve we woke up bright and early to do something I've never done in Chicago before: go to the Shedd Aquarium! It's an institution and we loved every minute of it. The view to Lake Michigan reminded us that being inside was ideal. By 4pm, the snow had begun in earnest.

This didn't stop us from our final activities of 2019: a foot massage and tamales in Wicker Park, a return to the hotel for extra layers, a late-night Thai dinner and then a voyage by public bus to Lincoln Park Zoo.

Lincoln Park Zoo

The zoo holds a 21+ party with a DJ spinning a set well away from the animals, that are all asleep anyway. Fairy lights and alcohol are plentiful and the whole thing is entirely civilised. Rosa's newfound 40-years appreciated it, as did my little old soul. At something like $12 a ticket, it was hardly breaking the bank. 

After meals of deep dish pizza, spicy tamales, red wine and Thai food, I made one final drink decision that ensured a world of pain--the Bailey's hot chocolate. It seemed appropriate as we walked around toasting to the new year, the new decade. But at 4am, well after we'd arrived back to the hotel, I lay wide awake with gut wrenching stomach pain that endured into the next morning, afternoon and evening. 

As Rosa and I said our midday farewells heading to separate airports, her to O'Hare and me to Midway, the pain, a dully sharp ache, continued. I felt sorry for myself the whole train ride and arrived to Midway still feeling rough. The pain was made more acute when the man at security scanned my ticket, looked up at me with big eyes and told me what I'd just figured out. I was at the wrong airport. 

On the flight to Chicago, I laughed as a I eavesdropped on the man behind me tell his story of his flight disasters. He'd gone to the wrong airport and the re-booking took him to Detroit, back to Chicago and then home to LA. I scoffed at him. What kind of idiot goes to the wrong airport? Me. I was that idiot.

And so this is how I ended up speeding through Chicago, from one airport to another, in the back of a taxi driven by Irvine, my wonderful 65-year-old Jamaican-American cab driver. $100, a never-ending security queue and a sprint through the terminal later, I was reunited with Rosa, whose gate was, and I'm not joking, literally across the aisle. My flight was already boarding and so I gave her one final hug, knowing I'd be seeing her in London in a few weeks' time, followed by a May-time final trip to Valencia.

2020 had other plans. When I got back to Detroit, I jokingly quipped that I hoped the decade hadn't started as it meant to continue. Hahahaahahaha, joke's on me. 

Detroit: City of Understated Goodness

When people ask me where I'm from I say Detroit but anyone 'from Detroit' will know that's a lie. I'm from a bougie little suburb of Detroit, a place that sees D-town as somewhere you go when you're looking for a bit of an edge. In my childhood, Detroit wasn't even seen as that, it was downright dangerous. For four years running, Forbes has listed it as the most dangerous in the USA. And with gang violence, years of local government corruption and the white flight of the 1950s, it's a city with an infamous past. 

But Detroit also has a beautiful past. The automobile industry, although destructive to public transportation, also brought opulence and glamour. The Detroit Opera House, the Fox Theatre, The Fisher Building, The Masonic Temple, amongst others, are all world-class. Diego Rivera's murals adorn the walls of the DIA. And stalwart institutions like the DSO and Eastern Market continue to pedal their wares to Detroiters and those suburbanites who pass through the city. 

Hipsters, love them or hate them, are bringing their entrepreneurial excitement to the area. New breweries, distilleries and even a local winery have popped up. The restaurant scene is having a revival. And a range of initiatives, from urban farming, to a goat grazing lawn service and urban beekeeping, are thriving. This city has a lot of heart. 

And so I tapped into my childhood friends to show me the beauty of a city they know better than me. Since our reunion in London, Erin and Lauren have a renewed sense of wanderlust attached to our friendship. They took me out for a glorious afternoon to wander Eastern Market, a place I've never been before. 

Eastern Market 

The market was founded in the 1800s and is home to food, flowers, wholesaling and most recently, various holiday markets. At over 9 hectares, the market takes up considerable space. Their mission statement is all about supporting the local community, through food programmes, love for local businesses and even free community fitness classes. The first stop for us was pierogi:

Detroit and surrounding Hamtramck are home to a large Polish-American population. From pierogi to paczki, a fried doughnut eaten on Fat Tuesday, lots of Polish culture has been subsumed into metro Detroit's culture. We took to a plate of fried cheese pierogi with sour cream and sauerkraut. 

The remainder of my indoor market pictures are a bit mundane; essentially, the Sunday market is a lovely indoor artisan and street food market. Outside, graffiti and other store fronts abound. Many of them were closed for the day so perhaps a not-Sunday visit would be better.

Eastern Market Brewery 

Around the corner from the main market, Eastern Market Brewery was doing a swift trade. Founded in 2016, it's bought into the hype of craft beer. I can't say much about this; beer is beer to me. But my friends attested to the quality and so I'll trust them there. 

Modelling the fun hat I bought in the market...

Campus Martius Park

From here, we hopped into the car and over to downtown proper. At the corner of Woodward and Michigan Avenue lies a pedestrianised area, home to an ice rink, Christmas tree and covered market in November and December. This part of the city is a bit sanitised and was full of people jostling their way around the market. We stayed for an hour before moving on to our final downtown stop. 

Belle Isle 

This little island in the middle of the Detroit River has also seen better days. It's home to an Aquarium, Conservatory and Nature Centre, as well as a golf course and beach. There is a beautiful stately home on the island too. Due to the city of Detroit's bankruptcy coupled with drug use and violence on the island, the state of Michigan took over management of the park in February 2014. Entrance by vehicle now incurs a fee and the park closes after dark. Fortunately, we got there just in time. 

Detroit Curling Club

On a separate excursion, Lauren organised an outing to go curling. The adventure started at Erin's house with Detroit-style pizza, a square, crust heavy concoction that I didn't even realise was unique to my homeland. No picture, I was hungry. Back to the curling! 

We had to book this weeks in advance; curling is a competitive sport in Michigan and amateur night only comes a couple of times per week. Much like other Detroit institutions such as the airport, the CC isn't actually in the city. It's in nearby Ferndale and walking in is like stepping into a 1970s time warp. In the best way possible. 

The walls of the reception and waiting area off-ice were dressed in dark wood panelling. Various trophies and award from over the year were proudly on display. Each lane was appointed a table to drop their bags and coats on; free cookies accompanied the table. And there was a bar but for members only. Think old-school bowling alley and you've captured the spirit of the DCC. 

Before we could start, we had to wait for the two other members of our 'team.' Teams of four play against one another and we were only six people. So when two 13-year-olds arrived with their dad in tow, I laughed. They were nerdy and quiet--I think we scared them. 

Before any team can begin curling, you have to complete a curling induction. I think this is partially so you don't hurt yourself and partially so you don't break the ice or the equipment. Under the watchful eye of two lady curlers, we passed the requisite tests in order to begin a game. 

The only thing we struggled with was the old school score board. And I couldn't tell you who won, or even who played on which team. What I do know is that we had such a good time that we're planning on making it an annual activity! 

Ferndale: Urbanrest Brewing 

Our final stop of the evening took us to Ferndale's Urbanrest Brewing, another community spot churning out delightful craft beers. Just outside, two food trucks also operate, although they were closed when we were there. In the post-Christmas daze, the brewery was quiet and we enjoyed a beer (and me a sparkling cider) before making our way back to the bougie suburbs once again. 

With all the time in Detroit and its greater area, I was left with a profound sense of happiness. In fairness to the city, there's always been pockets of wonderful. So perhaps I'm grateful that I'm now in a place to experience this. And that people continue to believe in this little diamond in the rough.

The Perks of International Friendships (and more Boston)

My real reason for a wintertime Boston visit was to spend time with my friends, Karen and Laura. Karen teaches at the international school and Laura at a public school in Waltham, another suburb of Boston proper. I met Laura at Warwick Uni back in 2006; she was on my course but we didn't really become friends until I moved to London. As is wont to happen, you choose the part of the city you live in based on where you know people. I didn't know her entirely well but Laura was kind to another American abroad and let me sleep on her Clapham couch while I did the mad London flat search. She introduced me to Jen and a beautiful friendship was born. She dated Dave's brother and moved in with him before it all blew up into spectacular fireworks of a doomed relationship. 

Laura moved back to Boston in perhaps late 2008/early 2009 and we kept in touch online. Life moved on for both of us--she got married and went on to have three kids, I moved across London, to China and back. Despite the crazy, we remained friends. She came to London for a very long weekend last November and we all picked up right where we left off. Our roots run deep and, to get to the point, I was very excited to see her in her natural habitat. 

On day three of my trip, I took a taxi across the suburbs and made my way to Laura's classroom for an end-of-term peek into life in an American high school. It looked a lot like what I'd remembered from my formative years. And from there, I got a glimpse into the three-child school run, snack time and karate drop off. Libby, Laura's oldest, has a penchant for history, so Laura drove us around to the green that once housed the Battle of Lexington and Concord. No pictures, my phone sucks.

In a brief flash, Laura and I did a handover of the children to her husband, whom I briefly met in the flurry of making grilled cheese en masse. And then we headed into downtown Boston to meet Karen for dinner in Boston's North End, the city's oldest residential neighbourhood, and home to a sizeable Italian-American population and the restaurants that feed them. As we sat down for dinner in one of these candlelit brick-walled institutions and conversation flowed, I got to see the upside of living all over the place. 

It's having people you can pick up with right where you left off. It's knowing that you don't need to explain yourself for long absences in communication. And it's knowing that these people will drop everything to spend a little bit of time with you when you're in their part of the world. I was drunk with good feelings, not to mention red wine.

We rounded off our dinner with a trip to Modern Pastry, one of North End's many family-owned bakeries famous for their cannoli, amongst other decadent pastries.  

Laura drove us home and both she and Karen reiterated my need to come back to Boston in the summer sunshine and/or to work and live. They'd show me the ropes, they'd help me settle into a ready made community. I have no doubt. 

The next morning, only a tad bit hungover, I made my way back into Boston proper to see the North End in daylight. A wander down little side streets and allies yielded tiny bakeries, long standing delis and more Italian restaurants packed with charm.

 

A turn in another direction takes you to more historical sites, such as the church Paul Revere rode into to let his compatriots know that the British were indeed coming. Revere's house, now a museum with limited opening hours during Christmas-time, also lies down a back street of North End.

If you venture just a bit too far West, you'll cut through West End and end up in the Beacon Hill district. Here, the streets feel distinctly fancier. Gas lamps line narrow streets with row house buildings and it's not hard to imagine a long-standing community and their horses dating back to the early days of American colonisation filling the streets. Imagine stepping into Brooklyn Heights and that's the feeling. I felt underdressed to step into one of the many chi chi shops so I just did a window browse.

And since I'd just about frozen through at this point, I found my way to the nearest transport hub and made my way to Harvard. Because it bears being seen. After walking around the town of Cambridge, MA and through the empty university campus, I will say something controversial. 

It was pretty. But it wasn't that pretty. It was old. But it wasn't that old.

And if I'm honest, I don't know how I'd feel about being a student there. The surroundings felt VERY expensive, particularly for someone on a student budget. There was a pretension that didn't exist at my little old state university. Projection, I suppose. 

And so I made my way back to Karen's apartment for one final evening of pre-Christmas festivities. We made our way to some of Karen's favourite Brookline haunts, for drinks, Mexican food, margaritas and gossip. With some perspective away from Shanghai, we reminisced about the good and not so good moments of life on the opposite side of the globe. It was a warm hug after a long term and one final Boston reminder of the strength of long distance friendships. Seeing Boston was just a bonus.