Vacation

Mumbai (Bombay) is a small, congested, polluted, tiring place. People need a break. Consequently, holiday destinations near Mumbai make big bucks :)

People usually go out during summer and the monsoons, since its the most unpleasant time to be in Mumbai. I went to Mahableshwar and Lonavala last week. It rains a lot there, and its quite pleasant. The area is practically barren during other times of the year, but its completely green in the monsoon.

(December)


(August)

Its not the same place, but thats the general view during these 2 months. Its amazing how much the landscape can change in a single year!

small town chat

some like to call it gossip and are annoyed by it. yes, there is a lot of gossip in small towns. but there is also the enjoyable small town chat.

since june we feel very privileged to have a small store in our little village. it opens early enough to get a breadroll before work. so sometimes I stop. and whenever I do I will of course chat a little to Sandy, the owner. And most of the times I meet a friend or neighbor on the street or in the shop. Everybody is on the way to work and everybody is happy to see a face that you maybe haven't seen in a few weeks.

very often we meet people from our village or the places we have lived in when we were children on the road. and there is always time to stop, right in the middle of the road, and to chat a little.

this morning on my way to work I met a neighbor. He was driving right in front of me and two towns further he stopped to get the newspaper. So I stopped, too. Afterwards he was driving behind me for quite a while before our ways separated.

A 450-inhabitans village is surely no vibrant city, but live in a village like that can be very vibrant! :-)

Alaska Native Heritage Center

At this point I would like to recommend a museum I have been to last month: The ALASKA NATIVE HERITAGE CENTER in Anchorage.
The museum offers not only many exhibitions but also a theater where you can listen to the native storyteller or watch movies and documentaries, a stage where natives show and teach their dances, music and games. You can walk through seven villages of native tribes (and you can take a guided tour if you want to) and many many more interesting things.

The Alaska Native Heritage Center is a non-profit organisation. If you would like to read more about it, please click on the logo.

A short thought...

Isn't it odd that where ever we go, we see ourselves in others? Maybe we are just all looking for a connection to the rest of the human race. On vacation, where ever we went, someone in our group would pick out the family that had hats or jerseys for our home teams. We would strike up a conversation with them, and find out that they lived a few cities over from us. Here we were, three states away, and finding neighbors. I look for redheads. I think that I've already expressed my thoughts on that, so I won't go into them here, but it's funny how we all look for something. Maybe it's a clothing style, or a type of glasses or a way of walking, but sometimes even without knowing it, we look for people with whom we can identify. Maybe we are looking for a piece of home.

Cincinnati, OH Redheads

It's not uncommon to see several redheads when walking around in Cincinnati, OH USA. Although redheads make up only 4 or 5% of the world's population, I have a feeling that the percentage in this Metro area is much higher. This is probably due to the fact that Cincinnati is home to many families of German origin. In modern times, I don't think that Germany has been known for it's redheads. Most of the time people think of Ireland or perhaps Scotland as the origins of the redhead gene, but Germans definately carry the recessive trait, and it shows up in Cincinnati!

Redheads aren't the only place Cincinnati shows it's roots. The first Mayor of Cincinnati was actually born in Heidelberg, Germany. Cincinnati is home to the second largest Oktoberfest in the world (The largest being in Munich). Residents of Cincinnati love Americanized versions of German dishes such as Goetta and Sauerkraut.

Growing up in the Cincinnati area I didn't really understand how unique it is to be a redhead. There was always another redhead in my class at school, and although people always commented on my hair, it wasn't as uncommon as in other parts of the US. This was never more clear to me that when I visited San Francisco, CA, where we saw one other family of redheads, who were also tourists! Even now, when I live just and hour and a half south of the city, there are significantly fewer redheads than in my home town. (There's also a lack of Goetta and Sauerkraut!)

travelling

Two Japanese girls in London using the underground trip to rest their feet as well as to find out about the next sight to visit.

gossip

I met these three ladies in a pub in Dinge, Ireland.
They meet here on a regular basis to chat and to have lunch together.