Praise the Lord and Pass the Examination

Monday, April 22, 2019

I feel a bit awkward writing about bagels during Passover, but I recognize my responsibility to provide a complete record on a timely basis.  Last week, in discussing the prospect of living in the lower Hudson Valley, I commented that bagels purchased in the Holy Land might still be warm when returning to your home north of the city.  That observation was based on two logical elements: a) bagels are a necessary component of the Good Life; b) bagels were not characteristic of the cuisine of the Hudson Valley.  Well, Tom Terrific has come along to set the record straight, based on his part-time habitation in Columbia County.  "The first bagel bakery to appear in my neck of the woods was in the village of Chatham, followed soon thereafter by two more in the adjacent villages of Kinderhook and Valatie.  I commend all three, with my personal favorite being the Kinderhook location.”  So, there you have it.  Tom’s word on this is authoritative, because, in spite of bearing the map of Ireland on his face, he had one Jewish grandfather.

. . .

Sometimes, even I get tired of Jewish whining; how hard to be a Jew, how many enemies we have, how we have suffered through history.  For instance, look how a Jewish publication makes Jews the focus of what is patently anti-Muslim legislation in the province of Quebec. 

https://www.tabletmag.com/jewish-news-and-politics/283594/kippahs-in-the-crossfire

But, then the Gentiles come to my rescue, reminding me of the relentless idiocy that attends us to this day.  This weekend, the U.S. Ambassador to Poland, in a fit of ecumenism, sent holiday greetings to that country’s Catholics and Jews.  Oh, the horror! 

https://www.foxnews.com/world/us-ambassadors-passover-wishes-spark-wave-of-angry-comments-from-poles

. . .

One thing that Jews rightfully complain about is eating during Passover, the doors to our favorite restaurants figuratively closed for a long week and our options at home somewhat limited by the ole time religion.  Here is one bright spot, though, a dessert that does not evoke sawdust.

https://www.tastingtable.com/cook/recipes/matzo-passover-chocolate-cake-recipe?utm_medium=email&utm_source=TT&utm_campaign=Daily&utm_content=Editorial

. . .

The New York Times sometimes offers wonderful interactive features.  This one is really good.  It provides, among other details, a financial profile of students at American colleges and universities.  It can be a road map for snobbery.  "The median family income of a student from Yale is $192,600, and 69% come from the top 20 percent.  About 2.1% of students at Yale came from a poor family but became a rich adult.”    

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/projects/college-mobility/ 

Would you believe that Barnard has the third highest percentage of low- and middle-income students, or that CCNY has the second highest mobility rate, or which 38 colleges had more students from the top 1 percent than the bottom 60 percent?  Good stuff here.

Tuesday, April 23, 2019

After Brown v. Board of Education, politicians counseled us to wait for change in the “hearts and minds” of white people to govern the desegregation of public schools.  Instead, we got white flight and disparities in public education that plague us to this day.  So, I am somewhat surprised that "Data from more than 4 million tests completed between 2004 and 2016 show that Americans’ attitudes toward certain social groups are becoming less biased over time." 

https://www.psychologicalscience.org/news/releases/implicit-attitudes-long-term-change.html

The study found “long-term durable change” in attitudes regarding race and sexuality.  By comparison, the elderly, disabled and overweight (a trifecta that I am approaching) have experienced little, if any, shift in acceptance.

. . .

Chinese food, Yes; Chinese medicine, Less.  Except, "China has been pushing for wider global acceptance of traditional medicines, which brings in some $50 billion in annual revenue for the nation's economy.”  And, it seems to be working, not necessarily curing ills, but changing responsible opinion.  According to the Scientific American, the World Health Organization, in "an egregious lapse in evidence-based thinking and practice," will include these remedies for the first time in its International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems.

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-world-health-organization-gives-the-nod-to-traditional-chinese-medicine-bad-idea/

Thursday, April 25, 2019

Unlike almost all residents of North Atlantic Treaty Organization countries, I am almost totally ignorant of the comings and goings of Harry Potter.  I acknowledge knowing a few names of key characters, because they have occasionally appeared in crossword puzzles.  But, that's the limit.  So, there had to be an external reason for sitting about six hours through both parts of Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, the very successful Broadway play imported from London.  It took the form of Grandson #1 and Grandson #2, visiting us together for the first time, both conversant with the Rowling oeuvre. 

Grandpa Alan found the show(s) to be very well acted, with some marvelous stagecraft, appropriate to a work about wizards.  However, the story line(s) began obscure, moved to obtuse and concluded at opaque.  I was able to understand some scenes on their own, but rarely discerned the connection to what came before.  I tried to follow the action, but the work includes time shifting, time travel and alternate realities, almost as difficult to understand as the double switch in a National League baseball game.     

This is not meant to discourage you spending a lot of money at the Lyric Theatre, especially if you have to entertain an 8-year old and an 11-year old. 

Friday, April 26, 2019

Here is a compilation of the best and the worst 2018 bar exam results.  The Ivies predominate at the top, with one interesting exception.  Liberty University's law school had the fifth best performance, close behind Harvard and Yale.  

https://abovethelaw.com/2019/04/the-law-schools-with-the-best-and-worst-first-time-bar-exam-pass-rates-2018/ 

Liberty was co-founded in 1971 by Jerry Falwell as a private Christian institution.  Its law school dates from 2004 and only had 44 graduates taking a bar exam in 2018, although with a very high success rate.  We don't know what percentage of Liberty law students are single, but, since the "Liberty Way" holds that “Sexual relations outside of a biblically ordained marriage between a natural-born man and a natural born woman are not permissible,”  a lot of free time is made available to study for the bar exam.  Other diversions are also difficult to pursue, because "the university conducts an on-going program of mandatory random drug testing."  Additionally, "the possession, use, manufacture, or distribution of alcoholic beverages" is prohibited, along with "movie content rated 'X' and 'NC- 17' and video game content rated 'A'."

https://archive.org/stream/TheLibertyWayLibertyUniversity/Liberty+University-Way+of+Liberty_djvu.txt

Since every state has its own path to success, we don't have a perfect apples-to-apples scenario.  Students apply wherever they choose, regardless of where they went to law school.  Pass rates differ widely state-to-state, suggesting that the examinations range from easy to hard.
http://www.ncbex.org/pdfviewe/?file=%2Fdmsdocument%2F205   

By the way, the University of Wisconsin had a 100% bar admission rate, but it had nothing to do with an examination.  Wisconsin observes "diploma privilege," a state law that allows graduates of ABA-accredited law schools within the state to skip the bar exam entirely.  Unlike Liberty, however, students are subject to very few dos and don'ts.  Even eating cheese is voluntary.

Let Some Of My People Go

Monday, April 15, 2019
I know that many of you would like to take up residence in the Holy Land, but are deterred by housing costs.  There is a path, however, that will bring you relatively close to Grandpa Alan without impoverishing you.  Aim for one of the charming towns in the Hudson Valley, north of New York City.  Many of our more successful citizens have already chosen weekend or summer properties in the area.  But, there is no reason that you can't trade Houston for Hudson or Peoria for Peekskill on a year-round basis.

The chart contained in the following article shows how remarkably cheap the region is and, to my surprise, how flat the prices have been in recent years. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/11/realestate/hudson-valley-price-check.html

While Fishkill isn't Forest Hills, bagels purchased in Manhattan may still be warm when you get back there.
. . .

“In 2016, my [10-year old] daughter Alice noticed girls weren’t raising their hands in class with the same confidence that boys were,” the CNN anchor Jake Tapper tweeted recently.  As  a result, the Girl Scouts have introduced a Raise Your Hand badge.

In 1963-1965, I taught classes in American and European government at Cornell University to some of the brightest college students in the country.  In fact, because of prevailing admission policies, the girls were a more elite group than the boys, on the whole.  But, just as Alice Tapper observed over 50 years later, the girls were mostly quiet.  Raised hands were typically attached to male arms.

Because of my CCNY background, I expected the classroom to be rich with give and take.  I instinctively adopted the Socratic method, posing challenging questions to the students, who had distinguished themselves in the solidly upper middle class bastions of Great Neck, Brookline, Shaker Heights, Evanston and Bethesda.  Years later, Debbie Halpern Silverman, sadly lost to us far too early, told me that, as a dorm counselor, she had to comfort young female students tearfully returning from my classes because they had suffered the indignity of being asked a question.

I only hope that when today's 10-year olds get into college (through merit or bribery), they are more verbal and forthcoming than their grandmothers were.

Tuesday, April 16, 2019
According to Brigham Young University's honor code, "Men are expected to be clean-shaven; beards are not acceptable.  https://policy.byu.edu/view/index.php?p=26

Guess who?

. . .

Some attempts to be helpful fall far short.  The New York Times offers: "Want to Escape Global Warming?  These Cities Promise Cool Relief"
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/15/climate/climate-migration-duluth.html

Duluth, Minnesota heads the list.  It seems that during winter it gets to minus 30 Fahrenheit, which gives Duluth a lot of room to absorb global warming.  The good news found in the New York Times has, so far, not spread very far.  "From 2010 to 2016, though, the city added only 56 people."
. . .

Royal Seafood, 103 Mott Street, was packed when the Boyz Club arrived for dim sum today.  We had to share a table at the greatest distance from the front door as possible with a Chinese family and I was jammed into a position where I could not see the contents of the carts that the ladies were pushing around the floor.  Fortunately, the stranger on my left spotted and translated for me, since I selfishly kept control of ordering even under those awkward circumstances.  Nevertheless, no one left hungry.

Wednesday, April 18, 2019
Notice to Jews: Get out the sandals and sunscreen, the trek through the Sinai Desert begins Friday.  However, I have to face sand, wind and sun without the benefit of being fueled by Aunt Judi's fabulous seder meals, which usually begin Passover on the highest of notes.  This year, to celebrate a major birthday, Aunt Judi is being treated to a week of pampering, no cooking, no cleaning -- no pushing the Kosher food envelope to delightful new boundaries.

Why is this night different from all others? is the question that starts the traditional seder.  The answer this time is I have to go to a vegetarian seder.

Thursday,  April 19, 2019
One beneficial result of the movement of populations across borders, sometimes voluntary sometimes involuntary, is the blending of cuisines.  One example that appeared in New York almost 60 years ago is the Cuban Chinese restaurant, a byproduct of Fidel Castro coming into power, emptying Havana's fancy hotels of guests and its kitchens of staff.

Flor De Mayo, 484 Amsterdam Avenue, is a remaining example of this blend, although it identifies one of its most popular dish as Peruvian Rotisserie Chicken.  It was this chicken that I had for lunch, with a large portion of shrimp fried rice ($12.80).  A small, unadvertised cup of chicken vegetable soup began the meal, welcome on this drizzly afternoon.  The food is good enough to outweigh the dingy external and internal appearance of the joint.  It was busy at lunchtime, most patrons Hispanic.  The only Asians that I saw were employees.
...

The parole of Judith Clark is front page news around here today, but is probably ignored in most other places.  https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/17/nyregion/judith-clark-parole-brinks-robbery.html
Clark is being released after serving 37 years of a 75-year sentence for driving the getaway car in an armored car robbery in which two police officers and one private guard were killed by a cell of black and white revolutionaries.  Relatives of the victims, conservative politicians, many law enforcement officers, law-and-order advocates and just ordinary citizens opposed this action.  They believe that talk of rehabilitation is inapplicable in a crime of this nature.  I have one degree of separation from these events. 

I met Alan Berkman in his first year at Cornell University.  We became good friends when he came to New York to attend Columbia University's medical school.  We were both single and would magically show up at the home of married friends at mealtimes.  If only one of us were present, we spoke of "the other Alan."  The night before I left to take a job in Los Angeles in June 1971, we had dinner together.  It was a dozen years before I saw him again. 

In the meantime, he was indicted and charged with being an accessory after the fact in that armored car robbery, because he treated a gunshot wound of one of the crooks.  Alan skipped bail, hid for years, committed crimes to further the fantastical revolutionary cause and, after capture, spent 8 years in jail.  https://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/15/nyregion/15berkman.html

Once released, he distinguished himself by treating and advocating for AIDS patients at home and abroad.  He died in 2009 of cancer that first attacked him in prison.  He was a great humanitarian, a great friend, a great doctor, one of the smartest people that I ever met and unquestionably guilty of pursuing a reckless criminal path, abandoning good and common sense.  Judith Clark was his comrade and you might be able to conflate the two, up to a point.  In prison, she had a record of self-improvement and service to the prison and general community.  Therefore, I regard releasing her now, at age 69, as the right thing.

Friday, April 19, 2019

Here is another one of my contributions to the marketplace of ideas that the New York Times has chosen to ignore: 

"It might help if Ilhan Omar addressed critical topics with less clumsiness than the President of the United States."
. . .


Which way to the Red Sea?

Lucky Number

Monday, April 8, 2019

The New York Times requires exclusivity on any submission.  Therefore, I waited until now to publish this marvelous tale from America's Favorite Epidemiologist, which they neglected to publish for several weeks in their "Manhattan Diary" section.

I was looking forward to our trip to Morocco in part to confirm the rapturous descriptions I’d heard of reasonably priced, high-quality leather goods.  In advance of the trip I’d decided to treat myself to a new leather jacket.  Arriving at the recommended factory shop, I was led to an upstairs room where sample coats and jackets were displayed.  The room was a riot of bold primary colors.  A salesman approached me and asked what style and color I was looking for.  I replied that I wanted a short jacket, probably black.  “Oh no madam,” he said, “how about this beautiful red leather jacket?”  I replied that I preferred to stick with black.  Next he suggested that I consider a bold yellow jacket, remarking how flattering it would be on me and again I replied that I preferred black.  A third time he led me to a blue leather jacket and again I replied that I preferred black.  “Oh madam,” he exclaimed, “are you from New York?”  “Yes” I said.  “Ok, I see,” he responded, leading me to the black jacket that I bought on the spot.    
. . .

Congressman Tim Ryan (D - Ohio) announced this weekend that he is running for president.  His goal, he told a hometown crowd, was "to bring this country back together."
https://www.cleveland.com/politics/2019/04/tim-ryan-tells-mahoning-valley-crowd-he-is-running-for-president-to-bring-this-country-back-together.html

This is a noble sentiment, although not previously unexpressed.  For instance, Republican Joe Straus, speaker of the Texas House of Representatives, said, "we need political leaders who can stop pointing fingers and start pulling our country back together."  https://www.mysanantonio.com/opinion/commentary/article/We-need-leaders-who-can-bring-us-together-13358936.php

Michael Cohen, once the president's personal attorney, hopes to "be remembered in history as helping to bring this country back together."   
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://freebeacon.com/politics/cohen-i-hope-to-be-remembered-as-someone-who-helped-bring-this-country-back-together/amp/&ved=2ahUKEwie_ozxqr_hAhXFhOAKHeyTAekQFjAJegQIARAB&usg=

Brian Redmond, a psychology professor at Penn State offers "[a] simple and old trick to bring a divided country back together." 
https://sites.psu.edu/movingpsychology/2017/01/18/a-simple-and-old-trick-to-bring-a-divided-country-back-together/

A web site of the Smithsonian Institution informs us that "Lincoln had plans for bringing the country back together again, but without his leadership, the country was plunged into confusion that would take many years to resolve."   https://americanhistory.si.edu/presidency/timeline/pres_era/3_677.html

The "many years" has now stretched into a century-and-a-half apparently.  I guess that some people believe that it is easier to make this country great again than to bring it back together.

Tuesday, April 9, 2019

The first love of my life and the attendant first heartbreak were situated at West 113th Street and Broadway.  I returned today for the relatively unsentimental purpose of having lunch at Junzi Kitchen, 2896 Broadway, a pan-Asian joint featuring "bings & noodles."  Bings are the Chinese version of blintzes or burritos.  I chose noodles, however, with furu (fermented bean curd) sesame sauce, grilled chicken thigh, mushrooms, stir-fried bean sprouts, kale, sweet shallots, scallions, cucumber, long beans and some other stuff that I told them to throw on at no extra charge ($13.49).  It resulted in a hearty portion of tasty food.

The place itself is two storefronts wide, the walls either white-painted brick or square white tiles, giving a bright, open feel.  About half the floor space is taken by the kitchen and prep area, the other holds 40 seats at blonde wood tables or ledges on the side.  Students from Columbia University, right next door, occupied most of the seats.  My appetite was almost spoiled by sharing a table with two from the graduate business school, who spent the time struggling with their summer travel plans -- Barcelona, Munich, London.  While I directed dirty looks at them, I resisted dousing them with soy sauce.

By the way, in seeking a definition of "furu," I found that it is also a Norwegian word for being an extremely good lover.  Keep that in mind.   

. . .

Still catching up with some reading after our vacation, I found this wonderful article, "Oops! Famously Scathing Reviews of Classic Books From The Times's Archive."  For instance, “Not one syllable of what Hemingway has written can or will be missed by any literate person in the world.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/09/books/scathing-reviews-classic-books.html

Wednesday, April 10, 2019

By coincidence, my new income tax preparer and the physical therapy facility that I have started visiting to strengthen my left knee are both in 1995 Broadway, in fact one floor above the other. 

So, what's wrong with this picture?

Thursday, April 11, 2019

Even though the underlying motives here may be questionable, a Hungarian opera company presents an interesting challenge by casting an all-white version of Porgy and Bess.  "George Gershwin famously turned down companies that wanted to perform the opera in blackface, and his estate stipulates that the work should be performed by an all-black cast."
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/10/arts/hungary-opera-porgy-and-bess.html

Putting the legal issues aside, consider the sociology.  "Today, the mainstream belief among scientists is that race is a social construct without biological meaning."  https://www.livescience.com/53613-race-is-social-construct-not-scientific.html

Certainly, Catfish Row in Charleston, South Carolina (actually named Cabbage Row), the setting for Porgy and Bess was "on the wrong side of the color line" and, as in the opera, only cops had white faces.  And, jobs for African-American actors are still far from abundant.  But, after all, aren't actors actors?

Friday, April 12, 2019
There is another story of possible cultural appropriation in today's paper.  https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/12/nyregion/lucky-lees-nyc-chinese-food.html

I am not in the least bothered that a white, New York (Jewish?) couple have opened a Chinese restaurant. The more the merrier.

Do we really know whose bucks are behind most of our favorite joints?  On the other hand, learning that Jared and Ivanka fund Wo Hop, 17 Mott Street, would give me pause at the the top of the staircase leading down to its basement location.  Pray that it never comes to that.

What is offensive, however, is the attitude of the owner lady.  Her restaurant, unlike run-of-the-mill alternatives, would save patrons from feeling “bloated and icky” the next day, or one where the food wasn’t “too oily.”  She poses it as a form of "clean eating."  In other words, she is running a Chinese restaurant for people who don't like Chinese food.  This reminds me of a cluster of alleged Chinese restaurants in the East 50s that seems to pride themselves more on their clientele rather than their food, with prices proportionate to fees for plastic surgery, the common denominator for many seated on their plush divans.  

. . .

While Chicago is proving to be a very dangerous place for human beings, it is most dangerous for birds.  A new study claims that an "estimated 600 million birds die from building collisions every year in the U.S.," with Chicago, Houston and Dallas posing the greatest peril for birds on both the southern (Fall) and northern (Spring) migration.

http://news.cornell.edu/stories/2019/04/chicago-tops-list-most-dangerous-cities-migrating-birds

 

It is "a combination of light pollution and geography . . . [that put birds] at the greatest risk of becoming attracted to and disoriented by lights and crashing into buildings."  New York has the buildings, but is slightly off the densest migratory path, reaching eighth worst on the Spring cycle and fifth in the Fall.

. . .

 

Speaking of buildings and bad luck, "[a] Chinese court has ordered a media company to pay nearly $30,000 to a real estate developer after it published an article that suggested a flashy building in Beijing violated the ancient laws of feng shui and would bring misfortune to its occupants."  https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/11/world/asia/china-feng-shui-penalty.html

 

While the New York Times refers to feng shui as "an ancient pseudoscientific practice of harmonizing individuals with the invisible forces in their surroundings," it remains a potent force in today's China.  We learned a lot about this on our trip to China in 2008, shortly before the start of the Beijing Olympics on August 8, 2008, that is 08/08/08, thought to be a particularly propitious arrangement of numbers.  One big, new, brand-name hotel was being actively avoided because its front door faced the "wrong" way.  The Internet does not confirm this, but, more authoritatively, I checked with intrepid fellow travelers Jill & Steve and they remember the same thing.

 

Holding the Bag

Monday, April 1, 2019

I spent so much time last week speaking on the telephone to Air France, Road Scholar and its insurer about my (still) missing luggage that I fell behind in my reading.  Therefore, I read most of the March 24th issue of the New York Times Magazine yesterday, one week late.  I'm glad that I finally found the time, because it had several fascinating articles dealing with travel.  

While some of the articles were appropriately exotic about people and places outside my experience, one article brought back turbulent memories, "We're All In This Together," taking a train across the United States.  The author and her trip seem quite different from me and mine, but I was taken back to September 1976.  My Original Wife (MOW) and I decided to attend my cousin Michael's wedding in New Jersey.  He had, after all, been one of my very few relatives who attended ours in California almost 4 years earlier.  MOW had taken an extended vacation in Western Europe shortly before I met her, having a wonderful time traveling country to country by train.  She hoped to emulate it going coast to coast in America.  After all this time, I don't recall my reaction to her suggestion, although I don't imagine that I jumped for joy.  However, with the addition of her brother to our party, I went along figuratively and literally.  

The train ride was hellish.  We only had sleeping accommodations for small segments of the trip -- Kansas City to Chicago, for instance.  It seemed interminable.  We left Los Angeles on Sunday afternoon and got to New York midday Wednesday, 60-something hours.  And MOW and I fought bitterly.  About what?  Who knows, but our marriage had reached a point where any excuse to battle was seized upon, I regret to say.  Even her brother's moderating presence (we both trusted and respected him) was insufficient.  Thinking back now, I'm surprised that we stayed married three more years.

Other aspects of the trip, the wedding, sightseeing in New York, driving around New England, were pleasant enough, somehow not spoiled by our emotional chasm.  Possibly, fresh air had a salutary effect.  We even had a pair of good experiences.  On the necessary layover in Chicago eastbound, we ate at the original Uno Pizzeria, 29 East Ohio Street, well before it went national in 1979, which I knew from business trips to Chicago.  On the way back, we bought two uncooked pizzas and took them home, with the cooperation of the dining car staff, to cook in Los Angeles.  Maybe this served as a temporary balm to our very raw nerves.
. . .

The weekend's real estate section, addressing local property, asks "Where Will Sellers Get What They're Asking?"  https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/28/realestate/where-will-sellers-get-what-theyre-asking.html

Right now, the answer is Brooklyn.  8 of the top 10 neighborhoods where sellers regularly got over asking price in the last 12 months are in Brooklyn, the other 2 in Queens.  By contrast, 6 of the bottom 10 are in Manhattan.  Does that mean that there are bargains out there, somewhere?  Unlikely. 

. . .

Several articles this weekend discussed efforts by social media to curb/control/contain hate speech or incendiary rhetoric.  I fear that this will prove a fruitless pursuit, forgetting for a moment libertarian objections to censorship.  Ultimately, who will police the policemen? 

I know that there are people who believe that some (or all) of the child victims of the Sandy Hook school massacre are alive and well, participants in a giant hoax.  They read it on the Internet, after all.  Even though they are adults, able to zip up their pants or put on their brassieres, they seem unable to discern folly in a couple of sentences of text.  Suppressing one outlet or more of such bilge, I fear, will not stop the flow of disinformation, restore the gullible to reason or give the fearmonger a bright, new outlook on life.  Generally, the antidote to suspect speech is more speech.  It's not a perfect solution, but I am skeptical of any other.

. . .

Overnight, I dreamt that my doorman greeted me with a broad smile, indicating that my luggage had arrived.  It was only a dream. 

Tuesday, April 2, 2019

Connie and David gave us a copy of The 100 Most Jewish Foods, a new book edited by Alana Newhouse.  It includes recipes and commentary by the likes of Ruth Reichl, Mimi Sheraton and Joan Nathan.  You don't have to be Jewish.  Tom Colicchio, a very successful local chef and Italian restauranteur, writes about whitefish salad.  And, Chinese food merits a listing without question, as does Stella D'oro Swiss Fudge Cookies.

The entries are alphabetical; an attempt to prioritize the items would end friendships.  Some of them are foreign even to a fresser like me.  The book is obviously informative and, as a house gift, might get you invited back.
. . .

Punta Cana.  Punta Cana, Dominican Republic.  This afternoon, I got positive confirmation that my suitcase is at the Punta Cana International Airport.  I have before me a photograph of the suitcase that left Casablanca with me on Thursday, March 21st, on an Air France flight to Paris, to be transferred to an Air France flight to New York, now sitting in a storage area in the Punta Cana International Airport. 

While the property claim folks at Air France and Delta (handling US-based claims) were insisting in conversation each day in this interim that my bag had been tracked electronically to Paris, a young Delta employee in Punta Cana was curious about a bag that had been forwarded to a guest at a nearby resort hotel, only to be refused by him.  He was not and never had been Alan Gotthelf. 

Using a telephone number written on a luggage tag, she sent a "What's App" message to me, with a photograph of the unwanted bag, unwanted that is anywhere 1,564 miles south of New York City.  A flurry of telephone calls followed with several very caring staff people at the Punta Cana International Airport culminating in a promise to put the bag on a Delta flight to New York on Wednesday. 

By the way, there is one direct Air France flight daily from Paris to Punta Cana.  Otherwise, my bag would have had to fly another airline, changing planes in one or more of the following cities: Toronto, Montreal, Miami, Frankfurt, Dallas, Bogota, Washington, Dusseldorf, Moscow, London, Madrid, Dublin, Chicago, Ft. Lauderdale, Panama City, Mexico City, Geneva, Zurich, Philadelphia, Charlotte or Newark.  That might have been too demanding of one suitcase traveling alone.

Thursday, April 4, 2019
The Wall Street Journal examines why "[t]he New York Mets hit well in almost every baseball stadium in the majors — except their own."   https://www.wsj.com/articles/even-the-mets-home-stadium-is-mocking-them-11554292802?emailToken=db28f46bc58b6a4df4711b34fef5605aQuzFwbwmHzrMCkR6dig88keA5fMvhk5SBLGNaYTnooXbN1/p3nxcPgFHAQJ5nsSbhgQHjWMc6AxB1EOTA8DllKMcI0v1sKvnyNZ21jyVF3E%3D&reflink=article_email_share  

Many players blame the wind coming in from Flushing Bay that keeps balls in the stadium and playable.  That's almost as great a concern as the president's claim that wind turbines cause cancer.
https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/politics/2019/04/03/donald-trump-wind-turbines-chuck-grassley-iowa-idiotic/3356122002/
. . .

Katia Mesel is a Brazilian filmmaker, whose documentary The Rock and the Star, tells the story of the first Jewish colony in the Americas, in Recife, Brazil, her hometown.  She is here for its showing at the New York Public Library.  Today, Stony Brook Steve and I took her for a bit of a walk around lower Manhattan (then Nieuw Amsterdam), where 23 Jews from Recife landed in 1654.  

Steve led the way until I took over as we approached Chinatown, our lunch destination.  Befitting such a talented guest from afar, Wo Hop, 17 Mott Street, Chinatown’s gift to humanity, was the inevitable choice.  The beef chow fun ($8.25) and the shrimps in lobster sauce over shrimp fried rice ($14.95) may have earned a future film role.
. . .

8 P.M. tonight, our doorman phoned to tell us that our luggage had arrived, exactly 2 weeks after we returned to Palazzo di Gotthelf.  It had flown in from Punta Cana yesterday, arriving at JFK before 6 P.M., where it sat for another day before traveling the last 19 miles over land.  

Apparently missing are a pair of my shoes, two sweatshirts, a quilted jacket belonging to my young bride, a Baggallini® folding satchel borrowed from Next Door Susan, my prescription sunglasses and two 100 ml. containers of certified 100% Argan cosmetic oil, our last purchase in Morocco.  To tease us, the malefactor left one empty box that had held the Argan oil.  Fortunately, my new New York Mets slippers were undisturbed.

Friday, April 5, 2019

The Upper West Side's Power Couple are off again.  This time not Nairobi, not Marrakesh, not even London.  We are headed to Philadelphia for the weekend and, having learned our lesson, we are carrying our own luggage into and out of our own car. 

Spill On Aisle 3

Monday, March 25 2019

I am consumed with envy.  I sat home the entire weekend while my luggage spent the whole time in Paris.  I wonder if it is even experiencing separation anxiety.

. . .

If you need to answer questions about voting and political systems in just about every corner of the world, such as what countries allow voting at age 16, here's your source.

https://interactive.aljazeera.com/aje/2019/how-the-world-votes-2019/index.html

. . .

In case you doubted the value of a good education, read the following excerpt from a wedding announcement in the Sunday Times.

"The groom, 37, operates the Queens International Night Market, an open-air night market in Flushing Meadows Corona Park, Queens, featuring vendors selling food and merchandise, as well as cultural performances celebrating the diversity and heritage of Queens and the rest of New York City. He was previously a corporate lawyer with Simpson Thacher & Bartlett, the Manhattan law firm.

He holds three undergraduate degrees from the University of Michigan, a bachelor of arts in philosophy, and two bachelor of science degrees, one in biopsychology and cognitive science and the other in mathematical physics.  He also received both an M.B.A. and a law degree from Yale."

. . .

I am unsure if my sense of deprivation caused by the absence of Chinese food for the last several weeks is greater than that of the president in not receiving the Nobel Peace Prize.  I didn't take my situation sitting down, however.  I hied off to Chinatown to have lunch at Wo Hop, 17 Mott Street, the sancta sanctorum of Chinese food.  I ate alone; none of the usual suspects were available on short notice to accompany me.  That allowed me to selfishly devour a very large plate of Singapore chow fun ($9.75), exquisitely prepared at Wo Hop, containing wide noodles, chicken, shrimp, pork, egg, yellow onion, green onion, and bean sprouts dusted with yellow curry powder.  Note that this dish, even at Wo Hop, does not usually appear on menus, but, if you see Singapore mei fun listed, you can expect Singapore chow fun on demand.

I took another big step to return to my dubious state of normalcy tonight by going to a Ranger game at Madison Square Garden with my brother.  At least, lunch was a great success.

Tuesday, March 26, 2019

We are delighted that Marianne Motherby, an attorney from Berlin, is on vacation here for a week.  Since she studied American politics at the University of Massachusetts in the past, we chose to go to "What the Constitution Means To Me" on Broadway, an excellent one person work that weakens when two peripheral characters are introduced for some unneeded balance.  Don't worry if your hearing aid batteries run down towards the end; you'll relish all that went before.

Before the show, we ate at Bocca Di Bacco, 635 Ninth Avenue, one of a trio bearing the name on the West Side.  Prices were reasonable and the quality good.  Most notable was the enormous list of wines by the glass, mostly in the $12-15 range, consistent with the restaurant's name -- Mouth of Bacchus. 
. . .

Professor Barry Seldes, a devoted reader, has forwarded a study by The Economist of the cost of living worldwide.  https://www.eiu.com/public/topical_report.aspx?campaignid=WCOL2019

This link requires registration to open, but it is worth it if you want to see where the Holy Land stands among the world's most expensive cities or the comparative price of a loaf of bread today and in the past.  I'll give you a little taste; Singapore, Paris and Hong Kong share the #1 position as the most expensive city in the world.  

An alternative list is available from Mercer, a management consultancy, with Hong Kong, Tokyo and Zurich at the top.  No registration is needed, at https://mobilityexchange.mercer.com/Insights/cost-of-living-rankings#rankings  

Thursday, March 28, 2019

As soon as I walked into Little Alley, 550 Third Avenue, I realized that I had been there before (August 7, 2017).  I enjoyed my lunch then, as I did today, but I observed that "it is awkwardly located on Third Avenue between East 36th and East 37th Streets, more than a quarter of a mile from the office towers around Grand Central Terminal and even further from the massive NYU medical complex on First Avenue, both suppliers of huge lunch crowds."  In that regard, nothing has changed.

Little Alley offers a lunch special costing $11-14, including hot and sour soup and a spring roll with choice of a main dish.  I had Savory Scallion Beef, thin slices of beef, yellow onions and scallions cooked in a rich, dark sauce, quite delicious.  The portion barely reached medium sized, but the white rice served along side helped fill out some of my creases.

So, the next time your car breaks down in or near the Queens Midtown Tunnel, the only nearby landmark, go to Little Alley while waiting for the tow truck.
. . .
     
"Subway Bathrooms: Are They as Bad as You Think Bad as You Think?"
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/27/nyregion/subway-bathrooms.html

The first bad news is the inventory, "operative restrooms" in only 51 of the 472 stations in the transit system.  The reporters found that the quality was no better than the quantity.  I don't think you should bother reading the article.  Instead, wait for the day when the headline reads "Subway Stalls Sparkle."  Just keep waiting.
. . .

I usually don't comment about art because I don't know a damn thing about it.  But, I recommend reading this review of the work of El Anatsui, a Ghanaian living in Nigeria, unless you happen to be passing by Munich, where his show is being held. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/28/arts/design/el-anatsui-art-review-munich.html

I can't remember exactly when and where I saw his work, but a look at his CV shows several times that our paths crossed.  In any case, it left a very strong impression.  He works not in stone, bronze, wood, marble or on canvas.  El Anatsui assembles hangings (tapestries, curtains, drapes, reliefs?) from discarded liquor and beer bottle caps and foil bottle seals, bent, shaped and woven into large, colorful undulating pieces. 

The article has some good pictures, but you really have to get close up to see the challenge that the artist faced.  One work on display is 45 feet by 26 feet; it must consist of hundreds of thousand scraps of metal stitched together with fine thread or wire.  

I can't help contrasting El Anatsui with an action painter, such as Jackson Pollock, or a color field painter, such as Mark Rothko.  Those guys might have agonized over their work and reflected long before actually executing their art, producing works that appear simplistic to my (philistine) eyes.  But, El Anatsui's labor and intensity are immediately on display.
. . . 

Well, some people lose their luggage, while others lose their fortunes, their reputations  and their souls.  That was the lesson from "The Lehman Trilogy," a very imaginative work brought over from London to the Park Avenue Armory a/k/a the Seventh Regiment Armory.  The building itself is fascinating.  It centers on a block-long drill hall, where the play is performed.  In addition to this stark space, where tanks used to rumble, there are interior rooms that are furnished with stunning ornamental woodwork, marble and stained glass. 

The play is prodigious, the Lehman brothers moving into Lehman Brothers, a journey of 164 years.  At almost 3-1/2 hours, it feels like it.  The acting is brilliantly handled by three men, Englishmen in fact, whom we first meet as the three German Jewish immigrants, opening a small store in Alabama selling fabrics and clothing.  I found this to be the best part of the evening, maybe because they were more interesting than their progeny and other characters encountered along the way or maybe because I was still fresh.  Not unlike "What the Constitution Means To Me," "The Lehman Trilogy" weakens at the end when peripheral (non-Lehman family) characters come front and center.  Go see them both; that's the word.

Morocco Unbound

Monday, March 18, 2019

We arrived in Marrakech at lunch time Saturday, after a day and a half of bus travel.  Fortunately, the Hotel Sofitel was our destination, just about the most luxurious hotel that we have ever stayed at.  For a few hours, I was able to retreat to bourgeois comfort, ignoring the squalor that I saw in the countryside getting here.  I'll have to call up The Nation on-line (https://www.thenation.com/) to try to restore some balance, but I might go down to the pool first.
 

The hotel had a copy of the New York Times International Edition, which gave me the opportunity to do a good crossword puzzle.  One answer was a place name that, decades ago, caused American politicians to breathe fire -- Matsu.  If you are not collecting Social Security, you never heard of it.  If you are, it's likely that you don't remember anything about it, along with so many other things in your past.  How long will it take before so many people, places and things that agitate us now fade from our consciousness?

. . .

Even the little that we have seen distinguishes Marrakech, the fourth largest city in Morocco, from Fes, the second.  Prosperity is more apparent; the neighborhood of our hotel reeks wealth and privilege.  The Marrakech Medina is not surrounded by a wall and is much lighter and airier.  It was founded in the 11th century, 200 years after the Fes Medina and seems to have learned something from its mistakes.

One charming aspect of Marrakech is the limitation on building height; no building can be higher than the Koutoubia Mosque at about 70 meters, 230 feet.  None seems to even come close.  In addition, all buildings must be more or less the same color, salmon pink to my eyes, but giving Marrakech the title the Rose City or Red City.  It reminded me of Jerusalem, where all buildings must be clad in "Jerusalem Stone," a name applied to various types of pale limestone common to the area.  The uniformity proves more attractive here in Marrakech.

. . .

We walked through the Medina yesterday afternoon and the adjoining Casbah,  which gave me the chance to learn the difference.  Every sizeable Moroccan city has a Medina, its old town.  Next to or within every Medina stands its Casbah, once home to the local elite and usually its arsenal.  It covers less ground than the adjacent Medina.  Its walls are higher and, during periods of conflict, shelters women and children, while the men do battle.  Fes's Casbah has effectively disappeared, while in Marrakech it now provides additional space to sell goods made in China.

. . .

"How much salary do you need to earn in order to afford the principal, interest, tax and insurance payments on a median-priced home in your metro area?" 

https://www.hsh.com/finance/mortgage/salary-home-buying-25-cities.html

In brief, it's crazy expensive to live in San Jose, California, where an annual income of $254,836 is needed, while in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, you seem to be able live off of petty cash, $37,660.  They both have hockey teams, by the way.

. . .

Wrapping up the weekend was an interesting question to the New York Times weekly ethics column, hosted by a philosophy professor from N.Y.U.  Usually, the inquiries he handles are of no more than academic interest to me, for instance: "I've just learned exclusively that our family's beloved medical doctor is really licensed as a veterinarian.  Shall I tell my elderly parents as they approach hospice care and/or my brothers and sisters?"

 
Instead, a person using his real name, a highly unusual event in this column, asked about conduct that he witnessed with some regularity at lunch at a Chinatown restaurant.   https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/12/magazine/is-it-ok-for-a-chinese-restaurant-to-favor-chinese-patrons.html

A Chinese patron is handed a lunch menu, while a round eyes is handed the dinner menu, which lacks lunch specials and carries higher prices. The questioner is concerned about other non-Chinese patrons, including many tourists. "I am always tempted to tell them to ask for the lunch menu. Would that be an ethically sound decision?"

Over the years, I have encountered this myself, but only once lunching with Michael Ratner at Wu Liang Ye, 36 West 48th Street, on October 25, 2018, did I unthinkingly go ahead and order from the dinner menu, at retail so to speak, without asking for the lunch menu.  Maybe I was so entranced by Michael's ever good company that I failed to take corrective action.  In any case, we enjoyed the food very much, but my blog entry noted that the prices on the restaurant's takeout menu were 15-25% lower than what we paid.  I never noted the absence of a lunch menu.  

The good professor gave a thoroughly unsatisfactory answer.  He claimed that the restaurant staff is "motivated by in-group preference."  But, "we'd feel very different about white servers favoring white customers."  On the other hand, the restaurant may just be trying to make more money.  "The tourists . . . tend to be more affluent."  What if "less price-sensitive people are guided to pricier versions of some food?"  Remember, we are advised, "in New York's Chinatown . . . every potential patron faces an embarrassment of gastronomic riches."  Oh, come on, prof.  Keep it simple.  Denying a customer information to make a rational decision is unethical.  Next question.

Tuesday, March 19, 2019

I am proving to be as ineffective in dealing with Moroccan businesses as the current occupant of the White House is in dealing with North Korea.  Following the suggestion of dear Elaine C., I sent a request to dine with Madame D., a Jewish woman resident of Marrakech, who welcomes people to her home.  Giving her one-month advance notice, I told her that we would like to visit her on Monday, March 18th.  She asked to be reminded a few days in advance and we exchanged messages over this past weekend.  While she gave me her address, she urged us to use the taxicab she would send to our hotel.  Okay.  19:15, the local way to tell time.  

Of course, at 19:15 we're standing in front of the hotel, asking every taxicab and hired car driver if they were looking for us.  We bridged the language barrier with the help of hotel staff members, but to no avail.  Then, I received a cryptic message.  "Please taxi is in the réception."  So, we walked around the hotel's circular driveway again and checked the street in front, to no avail. 

I called Madame D., but I only heard the sounds of a busy kitchen when she picked up.  Then, one of the hotel guys and a taxicab driver swept up in our mini-drama took turns calling her as well.  After several tries, she informed one of our volunteers that her taxicab driver was in the hotel lobby.  Indeed, missing several teeth and wearing a Yankees baseball cap in a non-regulation color was the driver from Madame D., with a surprise for us, two hot meals, ready to eat, in a shopping bag.  This was not what we expected, as I tried to explain to the driver, who seemed to regret not spending more time in the mosque.  

The next message from Madame D. was confusing and contrary to our understanding.

I said you i can t in my home i send you in your hôtel 

You had to pay the taxi race

C is the least politeness

Thank you

...

With that, we bid adieu to her driver and the shopping bags and sought guidance from our hotel's concierge.  He made a reservation for us at Dar Zellij, 1, Kaa Sour, Sidi Ben Slimane, deep in the Medina, possibly an Arabic homage to Woody Allen.  A taxicab took us as far as a vehicle could penetrate, where an employee of the restaurant met us to continue the journey on foot.  We took a path that would defy any tracking by satellite navigation, with so many twists and turns and taking so much time that we expected Wednesday's paper to read "Hunt For Tourists Resumes."  Fortune smiled on us, though, and we eventually arrived at a beautiful, restored 17th century riad with its original painted ceilings intact.  Food and service were commensurate with the setting, but there was no evidence of a Jewish woman in the kitchen.

Wednesday, March 20, 2019

According to a new book about Mr. & Mrs. Jared Kushner, "contempt for the entitled, venal couple may be the one thing that unites all of D.C.’s warring factions."  Isn't that heartwarming?

. . .

After too many hours on the road, we got to Casablanca, Morocco's largest city, with about 3.4 million residents, most of whom were in front of us in cars, trucks and buses.  We had a chance to see the King Hassan II Mosque, sitting at the edge of the Atlantic Ocean, the third largest mosque in the world, standing 210 meters high, 690 feet.  It was too late to take a daytime tour open to non-believers, but even from the outside, it was impressive.

Not so was an ersatz Rick's Café, a tourist trap opened in 2004, which we also did not enter, but by choice.

. . .

With the threat of a wake-up call at 3:30 AM tomorrow, our visit to Casablanca ended soon after it began.

Thursday, March 21, 2019

Air France provided one great silver bird and then another to return us to Palazzo di Gotthelf safe and sound, that is if I don't mind arriving without my luggage.  Actually, it was nearly a singular accomplishment, because only 2 other people on the Airbus A380-800 from Paris had their luggage disappear, when the plane was just about full to its capacity of 516 passengers.  I'll provide an update tomorrow.

Friday, March 22, 2019

After a few minutes reflection, I can look back on Morocco through the three lenses that define my world view: Food, Politics and Jews.  Moroccans are very generous hosts.  The helpings of tagines and cous cous exceeded even my capacity on a regular basis.  The problem was that tagines and cous cous were the main course at lunch or dinner every day.  While I cycled through lamb, beef and chicken, there was ultimately a sameness to the dish, although when served in a beautiful riad, such as Dar Zellij, it's forgivable. 

I never reached my goal of at least one Chinese restaurant, although a few popped up as we rode through city streets.  We had excellent sushi, however, on the rooftop bar of The Pearl Hotel, 3, Rue des Temples, Marrakech, brought up from Namazake, the Japanese restaurant off the hotel's lobby.

. . .

Morocco is a constitutional monarchy, with a multi-party system in a viable parliament. For now, it's working, but it poses a tension between liberal values and democracy.  The parliament is in the hands of an Islamist party, kept in check by the king, who is both the secular political leader, under the constitution, and the Commander of the Faithful as a direct descendant of the Prophet Mohammed.  The latter role gives him clout in a society that has a large rural population, about one-quarter of the adult population illiterate and high unemployment among youth and women.  Yet, he avoids the faith-based policies advocated by the Islamists and supports, overtly and covertly, progressive economic and social policies.  His wife and daughter, for instance, do not wear a hijab (hair covering), unlike the majority of women we observed in public during our ramble through the country.  So, the autocrat is the good guy and the democrats are the bad guys, the same scenario that the late Stanley Feingold identified in "High Noon."

. . .

Finally, last and definitely least, the Jews.  To borrow from another movie, Gone with the Wind.
. . .
I had a very nice conversation with Air France this afternoon.  I was informed that my luggage will enjoy another night in Paris before rejoining me tomorrow. A small reunion is planned for the immediate family.