If you live in the Houston area, you’ve got to check out the Orange Show Center for Visual Arts & their Eye Opener tours. When discussing plans for upcoming installments of Tourist in my Hometown, my friends Neil and Ethun recommended this quirky little jaunt. I’m putting together plans to get down there and experience it myself.
Word is, Weird Tours of Chicago are similarly wacky and awesome. But in all this awesomeness, I can’t seem to find a tour of Dallas that isn’t same ole, same ole.
If you know of any out-of-the-ordinary ways to experience your city (or mine!), I’d love to hear about it.
For my first adventure in exploring Dallas, my mom, StepBob and I spent an afternoon at the Nasher Sculpture Garden. I knew that my friend Laura is a member, and always, in the back of my mind wondered why exactly one would want a membership to such a place. It’s not like the exhibits are constantly changing or there are dinosaurs or something (the main two reasons, in my book, for museums to exist). But now I understand.
It’s a piece of heaven in the middle of a bustling city. The art itself is really pretty impressive (Henry Moore, Matisse, Picasso, Miro - whom I capital-L-Love for being such a whimsical weirdo), but it’s further delight is that we’d been there over an hour before I heard even a whisper of traffic.
Anyway, here are some photos for your perusement (new word: perusal/amusement hybrid. Use it in a sentence today).
People, it’s like the calls are coming from INSIDE THE HOUSE.
Fish,
I’m a horrible… HORRIBLE.. packer. I studied abroad for 6 months in Cape Town and I brought 15 pairs of shoes.( I told you so!) I did some traveling in Africa and I’m still alive and I also lived in Denmark for a year and traveled while I was there. My point in telling you this is that I’m not a super experienced traveler but I know whats going on. It’s because of this that I realized I needed professional help with packing.
I’m leaving in two weeks to do my first ‘backpacking’ trip. I’m going to New York, London, Copenhagen, Athens, Santorini, Barcelona and Alicante over a period of three weeks in May. I’m staying with friends everywhere but in Greece… so I naturally want to bring tons of cool clothes to show my friends how cool I am. I also have an urge to pack all of my high heels… even though I know I can’t!
I’ve read your blog entry on packing but I might need more direction. If you have a chance do you think you could help me out!? Let me know if you have any questions!
- Susie G., AKA bad packer
I’m going to give you the answer that my mom would give you:Your friends don’t love you for your shoes.
Moms and their wisdom can irritate the heck out of me, but they’re dead right. Mostly. When you’re carrying all of your belongings on your back for an extended period of time, I promise you will care less and less about impressing folks with your footwear, and care more and more about holy mother of bob, my BACK is KILLING me. Which it will.
Here’s what you do. You wear your biggest shoes on the plane. Sneakers? Fine. Wear those. Pack clothes that work for every occasion. You know, like a low cut shirt or sweater that can be layered for warmth and modesty. Mine is a flimsy, translucent black sweater that I un-layer for going out to bars. Then, take one thing that is entirely for looks alone. Skimpy black dress is my go-to item. And one (ONE! Do you HEAR ME?) pair of sexy, non-functional shoes. If it’s warm enough, you’ll be padding around in flip-flops anyway, and those are plenty stylish for your friends.
Your friends will love you for being stylish, down to earth and awesome and not complainy about how much your back hurts from lugging all that stuff from country to country.
Louise intrigues me. She’s been places I (shamefully) didn’t know even existed. The Land of Oz? She’s probably been there and broken bread with the Man Behind the Curtain; she’s just that cool. So, I dropped her an email to see if she would be willing to share some of her experiences in East Timor.
For you short attention spanners, this might be a little lengthy. But I can’t tell you how much I loved reading her answers - so duh, you will, too.
A little background first:
I arrived in Dili, the capital of East Timor (Timor Leste) in January 2000. Just three months before this the country had been thrown into violent anarchy upon the withdrawal of the Indonesian military after 78.5% of the population voted for Independence. Evidence of the violence was everywhere- most building had been burned out, all windows shattered and most businesses had shut up shop. During the violence two thirds of the population had fled (either to Australia or, more commonly, to refugee camps in West Timor). I had been involved in East Timor support groups for a few years prior to my arrival, and was therefore lucky enough to know a local couple called Nuno and Maria who showed me to my temporary home- a once beautiful small villa near the Santa Cruz cemetery, that was now nearly falling down. The furnishings consisted of a wooden bed and nothing much else, and many of the windows had been replaced with sheets of corrugated metal after the builing had been fire-bombed.
I must admit that first night my thoughts revolved around how quickly I could go back home, but over the next few days I fell in love with the small island-nation.
What’s the weirdest thing you ate there (you know me, it’s all about the comestibles)?
The food was pretty simple, as the country was still getting back on it’s feet: lots of rice and instant noodles. I did eat a lot of plain boiled rice with soy-sauce, as I had a bad reaction to my anti-malarial medication and couldn’t stomach much else. The fruit, however, was amazing, and it was where I fell in love with Custard Apples and giant red bananas that are as thick as your fist.
Who was the most memorable character you met?
The most memerable character I met was a 4 foot 10 inch tall petite nun called Fabiola. Fabiola is famous in Dili for standing up to authority and getting things done for the good of the people- be it standing up to the Indonesian government prior to their withdrawal, or to the beaurocrats within the UN administration during the transitional period. I once heard a story of a gang of violent youths stopping cars trying to reach the Dili airport, and Sister Fabiola jumped out of the car, in her nun’s habit and sandals, and started swinging kicks at anyone she could reach. In spite of her diminutive status, the gang cleared away.
I feel like I’m grounded. Now that I’m back working a full-time shtick, I’m slowly and painstakingly accruing PTO (which is just a simple way of saying, your sick time and your vacation time is the same darn thing) to blow on a trip to Prague in the fall. It’s freaking torture. Spending those many weeks abroad in October and November only made my wanderlust stronger - kinda like hawking a loogie on the Hulk when he’s already green and angry - and I want out.
I want to museum, and eat new things and wear out a new pair of sneakers on unfamiliar sidewalks and trails.
And I’m going to.
Right here in Dallas. It turns out, people come to Dallas as tourists. On purpose. I have no idea what they do here, but I’m going to find out and do it. Sculpture garden? Okay! Cowboy art museum? Sure. Botanical gardens? Yes, please.
I think it would be kind of awesome if you wanted to play along. I want to hear about the treasures your hometown has to offer. Like, say you live in… Iola, Kansas. You’ve got a famous historic town square! That’s pretty great. Or you’re within driving distance of Burlington, Vermont and you haven’t been to the Ben & Jerry factory. That, my friend, would be a serious shame.
For a while, I was just too busy to go blog-hoppin’ like I used to. My lunch hour is pretty freakin’ precious and usually I spend it outside, in the sun, reading. But the other day, I was doing some googling and found this site.
France, China, Vietnam, Benin - these people are going everywhere I’m not, and that’s what I love about it. Escapism. It’s why the Internet was invented.
It’s raining in Dallas. It does that a lot, I’ve discovered. For every sunny day, we get three or four that drain you of the will to live. Know what I do when I should be going out for my lunch-time walk? I plan imaginary get-aways
Brazil is top on my imagination vacation list, because I am so open to suggestion and just reading the word, “Brazil” got me thinking that it MUST be the most glorious place in the world. On my trip to Brazil, I will spend all my imaginary time:
Hammocking. My favorite sport.
Horseback riding on the beach.
Scuba Diving. Have I ever before? No, but this is my imagination and I can do anything I want. And in that vein… what about cliff diving?
My lunch is almost over, but I’m having a hard time closing the window of photos.
Before last week, I didn’t even know such a place existed. Okay, maybe I did (my junior high geography teacher was on the ball) but I didn’t really know. And then Louise mentioned all the great uses for dental floss while traveling in East Timor. And then, not two days later, I found this news article about the attempted assassination of its leader. Oh, East Timor, what an exciting place you are! Your president is hiding out in Australia while his BULLET WOUNDS heal! Crazy.
Anyway, before I interview Louise about her travels/work there, I want to hit you with some of the crucial facts about East Timor, you know, so you’ll know, if it happens to come up again in the news or random conversation. And won’t you look smart?
Its official name is Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste
It’s in Southeast Asia on the (duh) eastern half of the island of Timor, about 400 miles from Darwin, Australia, where, incidentally its president José Manuel Ramos-Horta is hanging out recovering from being shot.
It’s mostly Roman Catholic.
The per capita income is something like, $800 a year.
Did I mention, its president got shot?
Okay, that oughta get you somewhere with the current events nerds in your social circle. If you know a little something about East Timor, I wanna hear it!
I had no idea. None. Dental floss has about a thousand uses for the backpackin’, hostel-stayin’, clever-like-MacGyver traveler. To save you a scroll through the comments, here are a few of the most ingenious ones.
I’ve used it as a clothes line. Seriously. - Anna
Plain floss is excellent for things like cutting cheese. - Shanna
Joining my sandals back together after they broke one hour in to a 15 hour bus trip.
Holding a fan’s electrical up out of a pool of rising water on the floor in the monsoon in East Timor…. - Louise
Two things and now very clear to me. One, I need to add about 100 yards of floss to my travel kit. And two, I have got to interview Louise. Because she has been to East Timor. And, hello, do I even know where East Timor is?
