Tales from the Big Apple

Living in Manhattan and taking all these classes has been cramping my vacation-ready lifestyle. Here on the Upper Upper West Side, on 121st Street, my idea of "far away" is somewhere in the 70's (and that refers to the location, not the year or the weather). Some of my friends, however, have been taking more time to smell the proverbial roses... or really, to fly those sometimes not-so-friendly skies. Two recent snippets, both from my friend Brian Platzer, who gets to hang out with me during writing classes here at Columbia:

In Thailand, I was watching a Tai-Kwan Do tournament, talking with one of the locals, and he asked me if I was Christian, and I told him that I was Jewish, and then he said, "Do you follow the word of Judas, the man who betrayed Christ?"

In Paris, a friend and I were trying to figure out what to do for Passover, so we went to "the jew street" (La Rue de Rosiers) to ask questions and we finally got a telephone number for a seder for people without a place to go, so we went, all dressed up in our holiday niceties, and when we arrived, we saw that everyone else there was homeless and it was a homeless seder and we felt bad about eating their meat, but it was a good time, all in all.

My mind has always wandered to exotic locales, even if my body wouldn't / couldn't / didn't follow. Please enjoy this issue, filled with tales of travels to amazing locales, and accept my apologies for a shorter message than usual. Blame it on my very unused passport!

Happy trails,

Audrey

[Posted 12/5/02]