One of the residents, a doctoral student, gave Part 2 of a 2-part talk this morning, on the Algerian Navy during the Ottoman era (about 1500s to 1830). For Saturday 10am, there were about 30, with a trickling in every 15 minutes or so right to question period. To call it the Algerian Navy is respectful; Barbary Coast privateers could otherwise be considered to have been an absolute menace that took in a million European slaves. Coastal communities were depopulated for centuries, as people either were taken or they moved inland. I begin to understand tall walls.
After the talk, the plan was to have lunch at the Hotel El Djezair, which is quite close but lunch was easier said than done.
The security portion was fine. I went by two national guards at the street, 3 hotel guards just inside, and a sort of flip-up mechanical roadblock set into the driveway that could probably resist a tank. Continued through to the back to a somewhat hidden entrance, through which I passed my bag and myself through airport-type x-ray machines. No problem.
- I'd like to have lunch here, and I heard that there is a nice place by the pool.
- Unfortunately the pool is not yet open. But you are welcome to go to the left here.
I go to the left, and pass by photographs of the various people who have stayed here.
- May I have lunch here out on the terrace?
- Unfortunately this is the bar. You will have to go to the restaurant beside.
I go back out and to the right instead. There is a woman standing just inside the doors with a badge. The place is deserted.
- May I look at a menu please?
- I'm sorry but I do not work here.
By virtue of its illustrious history and clientele, this is an absolutely renown hotel. If they need a few actors during the day to give an air of a functioning establishment, I'm sure they could make it happen.
I head to another restaurant, where I meet a semi-retired public sector banker who is from Sonoma Valley, and his young colleague from Kabylie. The former has been coming here for 10 years and brought his own pepper grinder, a thoughtful gift from his daughter. The latter speaks good English as he studied in Rochester on a Fulbright. We have an excellent lunch and at the end, I show them the study centre where I am staying.
Fun dinner tonight with "the girls." Justin Trudeau is hot, even in Saharan Algeria.
Saturday, 4 March 2017
Friday, 3 March 2017
Fil barbelé
A quiet Friday, after a Thursday where I launched myself into the bustling city to see the sights. I can report back that I spotted no tourists here. About 200,000 come each year to the country, and mostly from Tunisia. Vancouver receives about that many every week or two. I read that the government plans to develop its tourism potential by 2010, but alas that year has come and gone. It seems that the younger generation would like change, while the older generation would like peace and security.
Dinner soon. A small group tonight. We have had fairly esteemed people here, and more to come, and due to the wonderful system here we all come together to do the dishes after each meal. I went out for a walk in this area, which is full of embassy buildings. I google map a bit before, and see a few buildings with Chinese names. Someone joked at breakfast that perhaps the Grand Mosque (which "the Chinese" are building) might take the form of a pagoda when they're done, who knows. The air is very nice at dusk, and around one corner I do smell jasmine. There are lots of tall walls. And every nation has their own kind of barbed wire.
---
News flash at dinner: a Norwegian cruise ship came into the harbour today. Père G says this was the first time he's ever heard of one here, though Google tells me this is number 3. I take that there *has* been progress on tourism. The police presence on the streets either equalled or outnumbered the passengers. The boat fed them through the Casbah on its most inactive day, which is a pity. I imagine that many might have wanted to experience the area in its everyday, authentic spirit. But perhaps what we have here is a demonstration of both change and security.
The weather has turned, quite dramatically. Very high winds at the moment, causing even a car alarm to go off.
Dinner soon. A small group tonight. We have had fairly esteemed people here, and more to come, and due to the wonderful system here we all come together to do the dishes after each meal. I went out for a walk in this area, which is full of embassy buildings. I google map a bit before, and see a few buildings with Chinese names. Someone joked at breakfast that perhaps the Grand Mosque (which "the Chinese" are building) might take the form of a pagoda when they're done, who knows. The air is very nice at dusk, and around one corner I do smell jasmine. There are lots of tall walls. And every nation has their own kind of barbed wire.
---
News flash at dinner: a Norwegian cruise ship came into the harbour today. Père G says this was the first time he's ever heard of one here, though Google tells me this is number 3. I take that there *has* been progress on tourism. The police presence on the streets either equalled or outnumbered the passengers. The boat fed them through the Casbah on its most inactive day, which is a pity. I imagine that many might have wanted to experience the area in its everyday, authentic spirit. But perhaps what we have here is a demonstration of both change and security.
The weather has turned, quite dramatically. Very high winds at the moment, causing even a car alarm to go off.
Tuesday, 28 February 2017
Mardi Gras
A visit from the Soeurs Blanches tonight. One from Burkina, and we reminisce about the Village des Artistes in Ouaga. Another who arrived from France in 1958 (i.e. during the War, so quite in the opposite direction of most), and another from Spain 50 years ago, who I could barely understand, and who went directly to Kabylie (off limits area, but her home). The latter somehow correctly identified the cook (who I've not seen yet) as being from Kabylie, nothing short of amazing to all of us. She could barely hear, barely see, barely walk (all her words), and yet her sense of taste was very much exercised and intact. We all started with a 'petit gout' of an aperitif, but she asked for 'more than a taste.' We conclude with crepes in honour of the day.
Otherwise a lazy, jetlagged day. Walked a bit, and survived. This city has value-engineered out not only ATMs but also red lights. Maxed out my library borrowing privilege (5 books, via catalogue search and retrieved by the librarian only), which must remain in the reading room (sigh).
Otherwise a lazy, jetlagged day. Walked a bit, and survived. This city has value-engineered out not only ATMs but also red lights. Maxed out my library borrowing privilege (5 books, via catalogue search and retrieved by the librarian only), which must remain in the reading room (sigh).
Monday, 27 February 2017
Arrival
We have a wonderful dinner. The French language flowing well above my head, and everyone in good spirits. There are about 10 of us, all from France except one originally from Martinique and another from Morocco. With tall, lively Pere G at the head of the table, truly very open-hearted and full of life, air fills his lungs and blood runs through his veins. He gives directions to places that google cannot provide (like the municipal library), he tells of the different Algerian dishes we have, and offers a lemon drink, a gift made by the Sisters of Annunciation in Bobo, Burkina Faso. He tells me the library is particularly well stocked on architecture, and I cannot wait.
My arrival went smoothly. The plane was perhaps 20% full, and almost entirely of men. This continued right through into the airport, and it felt more like I had wandered into the wrong washroom, rather than I landed on a construction site. I chatted with the guy beside me, a Brit, who gave me a landing card. They don't offer these on the flight, he says. He comes every two weeks, and works on silicon chip manufacturing. He gave me tips on finding the ATM in the airport (it's the one with VISA on it), and quite successfully I found it, as it was the most normal thing in the world. There might be one other ATM in the city that accepts foreign plastic, and from what I gather from a blog, this required assistance from members of the Algerian Army. I asked for X dollars. It negotiated and said how about Y?
Two of the wallet-busting wad of bills went to the taxi driver. This was also a normal experience. They wait in line at a taxi stand, and they tell you a price a little more than what you've been told. He is perhaps in his 70s, but boy, drives like he owns the road. The judicial, psychological, and mechanical nuances were completely honed down by this guy. There were spaces in between cars I never knew existed. He needed no map; he knew exactly how to get me to my destination, even though he had never been there before. He sniffed the air, and went from there.
Traffic is an acknowledged thing to be wrestled and wrangled with. Like anywhere else, but very much more so here, traffic accidents cost far more lives than anything to do with terrorists. A group of four here are doing a programme on something to do with truck traffic. In the next month, there will be a lecture by urbanists and planners, on some sort of 'accidental intervention.' If I translate that right.
My room is a lovely 12'x12' haven of security, serenity and simplicity, looking out to a courtyard of cacti and succulents. Liketypical middle eastern architecture, and perhaps monastic, it does not have much of a facade (a door and a number), and the heart of the place is a fruitful, empty place. I opened two doors, and let in the call to prayer at sunset, the first I've heard for awhile. French maps dating from 1928 tell me about the local climate, of good and bad agricultural times, and the colour of the Sahara is matched by my room's walls. The entire place was built in 1962 or shortly thereafter. It is a place of simple hospitality for the purposes of supporting research on all things Algerian. I have a large oak desk, 'professor-sized,' which soon enough will support my own efforts.
My arrival went smoothly. The plane was perhaps 20% full, and almost entirely of men. This continued right through into the airport, and it felt more like I had wandered into the wrong washroom, rather than I landed on a construction site. I chatted with the guy beside me, a Brit, who gave me a landing card. They don't offer these on the flight, he says. He comes every two weeks, and works on silicon chip manufacturing. He gave me tips on finding the ATM in the airport (it's the one with VISA on it), and quite successfully I found it, as it was the most normal thing in the world. There might be one other ATM in the city that accepts foreign plastic, and from what I gather from a blog, this required assistance from members of the Algerian Army. I asked for X dollars. It negotiated and said how about Y?
Two of the wallet-busting wad of bills went to the taxi driver. This was also a normal experience. They wait in line at a taxi stand, and they tell you a price a little more than what you've been told. He is perhaps in his 70s, but boy, drives like he owns the road. The judicial, psychological, and mechanical nuances were completely honed down by this guy. There were spaces in between cars I never knew existed. He needed no map; he knew exactly how to get me to my destination, even though he had never been there before. He sniffed the air, and went from there.
Traffic is an acknowledged thing to be wrestled and wrangled with. Like anywhere else, but very much more so here, traffic accidents cost far more lives than anything to do with terrorists. A group of four here are doing a programme on something to do with truck traffic. In the next month, there will be a lecture by urbanists and planners, on some sort of 'accidental intervention.' If I translate that right.
My room is a lovely 12'x12' haven of security, serenity and simplicity, looking out to a courtyard of cacti and succulents. Liketypical middle eastern architecture, and perhaps monastic, it does not have much of a facade (a door and a number), and the heart of the place is a fruitful, empty place. I opened two doors, and let in the call to prayer at sunset, the first I've heard for awhile. French maps dating from 1928 tell me about the local climate, of good and bad agricultural times, and the colour of the Sahara is matched by my room's walls. The entire place was built in 1962 or shortly thereafter. It is a place of simple hospitality for the purposes of supporting research on all things Algerian. I have a large oak desk, 'professor-sized,' which soon enough will support my own efforts.
Sunday, 26 February 2017
Pitter-patter
I arrived at Heathrow in the afternoon, and my senses awoke, vaguely, to the feel that this is not Kansas anymore. 'Do you live in Algeria?' asked the customs officer. In the grand tradition of verbal exchange with authorities, I offered a simple 'No.'
Having transferred to the hotel near Gatwick, I soon discovered why I got such a good deal. In my mid-afternoon slumber, construction to improve facilities was in positive action. But as the drilling continued and the fire alarm rang, like a mound on a bed of comfortable soil, I was hardly to stir.
My flight is in the morning. The window (vinyl, right-hand inward casement, with restrictor) is open. It is an unexpected, rare treat in what seems to be a modern land of exposed exterior mechanical systems. The pitter-patter of rain layers with the occasional swoosh of a car, and the hum of an airport that perhaps sleeps little. I had a delightful, nourishing curry in the hotel restaurant for dinner. It served as a reminder that the extraordinary can come from the hands of the ordinary.
One of the pleasures of travelling to the east (Europe) is waking up at midnight and having a lot of quiet time. Usually I do some timed-release reading preparation for a trip, and there was no exception in this case. I wandered in the woods of Camus in the fall, watched The Battle of Algiers, and stumbled upon the Algerian nationalist Abdelkhader in the biography of Anglo-Syrian Jane Digby. Literature on this place, however, a vast desert in the English-speaking world. The first Lonely Planet on Algeria was published in 2007, and the copy which is accompanying me is in relatively pristine condition - a complete set of pages, a good spine, and perhaps a greyness on the edges due only to dust and not to handling. And in this quiet time of pitter-patter, I journey into my Bradt and LP and Petit Fute, into a vast landscape with pockets of the incredible. How one guidebook, and indeed a single country, can fathom what it does is a bit beyond my comprehension. Who *hasn't* been to Algeria would be the question. There may be, in fact, more in Mandarin on current affairs here, and if I am lucky I may find a noodle shop, and need to brush up on how to request 'not spicy.' I will acknowledge my arrival to a kind of heaven if I can have a bowl of foul for breakfast and shrimp rice rolls for lunch.
And if this is the humble promise and potential of the unknown, so be it.
Having transferred to the hotel near Gatwick, I soon discovered why I got such a good deal. In my mid-afternoon slumber, construction to improve facilities was in positive action. But as the drilling continued and the fire alarm rang, like a mound on a bed of comfortable soil, I was hardly to stir.
My flight is in the morning. The window (vinyl, right-hand inward casement, with restrictor) is open. It is an unexpected, rare treat in what seems to be a modern land of exposed exterior mechanical systems. The pitter-patter of rain layers with the occasional swoosh of a car, and the hum of an airport that perhaps sleeps little. I had a delightful, nourishing curry in the hotel restaurant for dinner. It served as a reminder that the extraordinary can come from the hands of the ordinary.
One of the pleasures of travelling to the east (Europe) is waking up at midnight and having a lot of quiet time. Usually I do some timed-release reading preparation for a trip, and there was no exception in this case. I wandered in the woods of Camus in the fall, watched The Battle of Algiers, and stumbled upon the Algerian nationalist Abdelkhader in the biography of Anglo-Syrian Jane Digby. Literature on this place, however, a vast desert in the English-speaking world. The first Lonely Planet on Algeria was published in 2007, and the copy which is accompanying me is in relatively pristine condition - a complete set of pages, a good spine, and perhaps a greyness on the edges due only to dust and not to handling. And in this quiet time of pitter-patter, I journey into my Bradt and LP and Petit Fute, into a vast landscape with pockets of the incredible. How one guidebook, and indeed a single country, can fathom what it does is a bit beyond my comprehension. Who *hasn't* been to Algeria would be the question. There may be, in fact, more in Mandarin on current affairs here, and if I am lucky I may find a noodle shop, and need to brush up on how to request 'not spicy.' I will acknowledge my arrival to a kind of heaven if I can have a bowl of foul for breakfast and shrimp rice rolls for lunch.
And if this is the humble promise and potential of the unknown, so be it.
Tuesday, 26 July 2016
7:17
7:17 am. The horizon between when I feel slightly chilly, sitting outside on the terrace in the courtyard, and when the southern Californian sun rises up in all its majesty. I wonder if there are local words here describing the sultleties, if any, of the sun here. For it would seem to me that it is either mid-day sun, or it is not. But then I am just a foreigner, accustomed to clouds which mediate my relationship to the sun.
It was a beautiful, rosy evening yesterday at the Getty. I had spent the day driving up the coastal highway, in search of what I always do here - lunch, trinkets, a shady parking spot. The sunset was soft and long. We, again waved our gallery opening invitation and our badge, and to our surprise, were directed to drive up the holy, sacred way to The Parking at the Top. Not even other researchers here at the house were permitted this. We must have done something good.
The Getty is an extraordinary setting. And it created one also. One does feel like a god or goddess in the clouds. Many beautiful people, and there was an endlesd supply of food and drink. Think that the food outlasted people's appetite. Such was the pervasive generosity that evening presented.
G showed me around this kingdom - the plants, the views, her office. Of the four walls in it, the two opposite walls each have a door to a terrace. It was a space in which the idea that fresh air, a view, and productivity need not be exclusive of each other.
Today, a bit of packing, and then the Eames House No. 8.
It was a beautiful, rosy evening yesterday at the Getty. I had spent the day driving up the coastal highway, in search of what I always do here - lunch, trinkets, a shady parking spot. The sunset was soft and long. We, again waved our gallery opening invitation and our badge, and to our surprise, were directed to drive up the holy, sacred way to The Parking at the Top. Not even other researchers here at the house were permitted this. We must have done something good.
The Getty is an extraordinary setting. And it created one also. One does feel like a god or goddess in the clouds. Many beautiful people, and there was an endlesd supply of food and drink. Think that the food outlasted people's appetite. Such was the pervasive generosity that evening presented.
G showed me around this kingdom - the plants, the views, her office. Of the four walls in it, the two opposite walls each have a door to a terrace. It was a space in which the idea that fresh air, a view, and productivity need not be exclusive of each other.
Today, a bit of packing, and then the Eames House No. 8.
Sunday, 24 July 2016
Breezes
A slight breeze blows. So long as this city remains by the coast, this shall always be. The sun preheats us this morning, in unadulterated strength. The sky is blue, unlike yesterday, when haze from the fire in the mountains just north cast its veil over the city, precipitating a dusting of ash on all our cars, as if it were trying to bury the cause of its ignition.
The morning started with breakfast by the pool, G brings out newly baked flat buns from the oven. They are called bathtub buns, as it takes as long for them to bake as it takes one to take a bath.
G is at a research institute on a scholarship, which includes lodging here. I have met a few here around the pool, and a few more at brunch yesterday at the director's house. It was a modest, elegant house, small and generous, much like the hostess herself. The company was made of mostly German speaking researchers, freelance writers, and others involved with art history of various commands. It was a casual, beautiful company to be with.
We planned to visit the Getty Villa. Being who we were with, with gracious people who enjoy opening doors for others, we were tipped with the location of the back door. We showed the guard a badge, sang sweetly, and were let in through otherwise private gates. A 'brand new' Roman villa, for me the most exciting aspect was where the different whole spaces came together, much like a vertical labyrinth.
In the afternoon, I type in my cousin's address. In the quiet of my mind on the flight here, I lamented how far my relatives are in Australia. They are simply nice people to be with, and it is nice to be forever connected to them. The next morning a vague recollection bubbled to the surface: that I have a cousin here. 'Here' means a 2 h freeway drive, draining the battery on my hot phone on Waze. All I can say is that I can't wait to see my nephew again - 7 years young going on 30. We had a lovely time by the pool and bbq, in a neighbourhood where neighbours own the houses they grew up in.
The morning started with breakfast by the pool, G brings out newly baked flat buns from the oven. They are called bathtub buns, as it takes as long for them to bake as it takes one to take a bath.
G is at a research institute on a scholarship, which includes lodging here. I have met a few here around the pool, and a few more at brunch yesterday at the director's house. It was a modest, elegant house, small and generous, much like the hostess herself. The company was made of mostly German speaking researchers, freelance writers, and others involved with art history of various commands. It was a casual, beautiful company to be with.
We planned to visit the Getty Villa. Being who we were with, with gracious people who enjoy opening doors for others, we were tipped with the location of the back door. We showed the guard a badge, sang sweetly, and were let in through otherwise private gates. A 'brand new' Roman villa, for me the most exciting aspect was where the different whole spaces came together, much like a vertical labyrinth.
In the afternoon, I type in my cousin's address. In the quiet of my mind on the flight here, I lamented how far my relatives are in Australia. They are simply nice people to be with, and it is nice to be forever connected to them. The next morning a vague recollection bubbled to the surface: that I have a cousin here. 'Here' means a 2 h freeway drive, draining the battery on my hot phone on Waze. All I can say is that I can't wait to see my nephew again - 7 years young going on 30. We had a lovely time by the pool and bbq, in a neighbourhood where neighbours own the houses they grew up in.
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