Long Lost Cousins

Saturday, March 05, 2005

Michael lives in the Fashion District - tens of square blocks of wholesale and retail stores dedicated to the shmata trade: fabrics, clothes, notions, trimmings, zippers, buttons. Store after store, block after block. It's truly an area unlike anything I've seen in New York.


Streets are teeming with people looking for bargains.


L.A.'s center of fashion and clothing.


Tassles? You've come to the right place.


Ladies' bags - 2 for $10! Nobody can resist a sale.


Need a bra?

After walking around the district for a while we picked up Lynn and Mike and headed to a brunch with my two cousins: Susan and Muriel, daughters of my father's first cousin (and best childhood friend).

In the late 40's, cousin Maxie moved his family to the west coast. They never returned and over the years, as it often happens, our families became separated... so separated that I never even knew I had cousins on the west coast. In recent years, we've reestablished contact and finally I met Susan last September when she made a trip to the east coast.

Now it was our turn to visit her and her sister, Muriel, and the rest of the family, on their own turf. We drove to Susan's house which she shares with her friend Carol. Muriel was already there and so was Susan's daughter, Tiffany, her husband, Jeff and their children, 4-year old Andrew and the newborn baby, Justine.

Bagels and lox were served, conversation ensued and plans made for the rest of the day. We were to be taken around to see some sights and meet up later at Muriel's bakery in Santa Monica where we would be greeted and treated by her husband, Ken, who runs the bakery with four of his brothers.


Tiffany and a very amazed Justine.


Susan, Carol and Justine.


Here's Andrew!


And here's beautiful Justine!


Susan and Carol's house.


The whole family - (less me, the photographer).
Crombie the poodle, Stacey, Mike, Susan, Tiffany holding Justine, Muriel, Carol, Andrew and his dad, Jeff.


And the family with me!


The younger generation: Jeff and Tiffany, Andrew and baby Justine.

Susan and Muriel drove us around for an hour or so, through UCLA (where Susan works) and the fancy Santa Monica shopping streets, then down the coast for a glimpse of Venice. This would just be a tease to give us an idea what we might want to see in the days ahead when we were out on our own. Then we rushed over to the bakery where a surprise birthday cake was waiting for me. The bakery serves magnificent and artistic creations and has a large and loyal clientele from the surrounding neighborhoods.


At the bakery - Muriel, Stacey, Mike and Ken.


Ken tells Mike how to bake a cake and run a business.


Beautiful creations at the Belwood Bakery.


Justine's snoozing while we're shmoozing.


Susan and her grandaughter, Justine.


My cousin Muriel behind the counter at the Belwood Bakery.

Mike had a job and had to get back downtown so he hitched a ride with Jeff who was driving in that direction. Carol suggested a trip to the Getty Museum and so right she was as it turned out to be one of the great highlights of trip. The billionaire had built a museum to house his collections and placed it high upon a hill. We parked our car and took a tram to the top. Admission is free. The museum, designed by Richard Meier, who has been called "the ultimate voice of twentieth century modernism", it is an awesome and breathtaking space. It was very late so we didn't enter the museum or view the art on display there. But it was enough to simply take in the astounding views of the Pacific and the city spread out below. The stark white of the buildings, built from massive blocks of rough limestone, stand out brilliantly against the sky. The gardens, the plantings, the endless panorma of sea and land left us breathless.

We drove back to our car which we had left behind at Carol and Susan's, said our goodbyes and then headed back to our hotel. We wanted to see my cousins again this trip because the day had been magical. What a wonder, I thought, to find new friends and family! And then, on top of that, to feel perfectly at ease and at home and to really enjoy their company ... well, what is better than that?


The tram takes you up to the fabulous Getty.


You can see for miles.


The fabulous view from the Getty Museum.


Wonderful sight lines - glass, limestone, fabulous views.


People come to sit, look and admire.


Los Angeles on the distant horizon.


Awesome architecture.


Sunset at the Getty - unforgettable!
.....

In the next chapter of my Blog - a visit with my old friend, Matty Berkelhammer.

We Visit The West Coast Families.

Mar 6, 2005

I have never been to Los Angeles and Stacey only once, 35 years ago. So this was to be a full tourist trip - seeing the sights, breathing the air, feeling the feel of what it's like to be and live in L.A. But, like everyone else, there are often family and friends that have to be visited and, often, that's a thankless task. Not so for us. We have wonderful and interesting people to see out here and a whole section of my family who moved out here in 1949 who I have only recently rediscovered.

Friday evening , after our long walking tour of the Downtown area, we had made up with my cousin Jay and his wife, Beverly to meet them at a restaurant in Studio City. That location allowed us to discover the joys of using L.A.'s notorious freeways. We had to travel northwest from the center city to reach the restaurant. It was only 19 miles but it took us a good hour on the clogged 101.

Jay moved out to L.A. in the 70's and has been here ever since. Here he met Beverly (at a laundromat!) and they've raised two girls: Kenya and Lyric. Only Kenya was able to join us for dinner along with her parents. Of course, Lynn and Mike came with us as well. Mike is trying to break into the film industry and Jay, who tried his hand as a cameraman for many years and is now a lawyer, would be a good source of information.

Dinner was lovely at a restaurant dubbed The Good Earth. Conversation was lively and we re-established long last connections. I hadn't seen Jay and Beverly for 10 years - the last time they came east. That was when his father, Seymour, passed away. Seymour was my mom's brother and the husband of my aunt Sissy, who lives in Brooklyn and who Stacey and I are very fond of. (I hope she's reading this).

After dinner, we parted ways, hoping to have enough time to see each other again before our trip ended. But many other family members call and there are old friends out here as well. And then, we have to see the sights also! What are busy travellers to do?

Tomorrow, Saturday, we rediscover the long lost cousins: Muriel and Susan and the rest of their cabal. Then at night, dinner with my dear old friends, Matty and Maya. Stay tuned.


A family reunion at The Good Earth restaurant in Studio City.


Now Kenya and I have joined the reunion photo as well. L-R: Stacey Mike, Beverly, Matthew, Kenya and Jay.


Everyone back home - meet the lovely Kenya!

A Rainy Day in L.A.

Mar 4, 2005

Friday was to be a walking day - exploring Downtown on foot. Mike and Lynn had to work so we were on our own. We started at our hotel and walked up (up!) Grand Avenue, climbing a very steep Bunker Hill, past dramatic glass and steel skyscrapers that line the street, creating an ultra-modern, corporate dominated village. It's a sharp contradiction to the surrounding city that has decayed and been allowed to deteriorate from its once elegant past.


Looking up GrandAvenue, lined with dramatic skyscrapers.

When we reached the top of Bunker Hill we came upon the highly praised MOCA - the Museum Of Contemporary Art. We weren't planning to enter but strolled the outside spaces and perused the gift shop.


MOCA - the Museum Of Contemporary Art on top of Bunker Hill.

Our first destination was the Walt Disney Concert Hall. This is a spectacular complex of buildings designed by the famous California architecht, Frank Gehry . The buildings, in typical Gehry fashion, flow in free form shape and are clad in brushed stainless steel. Breathtaking!


The Walt Disney concert Hall - breathtaking!


Does this look real?


Credit to Disney is understated: The name was drilled into the stainless steel.

I wanted to take a look at City Hall, a well-known old building that has been featured in many movies and television shows: L.A. Confidential, Dragnet, Superman, are just a few of them. So we turned off Grand Avenue and walked east up Temple Street.

One thing I noticed as we walked that Los Angeles is no friend of bicyclists. Everyone knows about the infamous Freeways, and that perception is certainly true. This New Yorker, accustomed to congested traffic, was more than a little awed by the massive amount of cars that seem to constantly congest the highways that intersect the downtown area. Someone noted that there are more cars per capita in Los Angeles County than anywhere else in the country - and I'm a believer.

But even on the local streets, and acknowledging that this is a big city, not a small town, cars predominate. I saw not one on-street bike path, separating cyclists from the perpetual traffic, just signs saying "bike route". But who would want to share the road with cars zipping closely by at high speeds? Not many as I could observe. And many of the few I did see, were, unhappily so for both cyclists and pedestrians, on the sidewalk. One thing, though, which is long past due in New York and which is being embraced by more and more cities, is the presence of bike racks on the front of every bus. This allows one to bring his or her bike from long distances away to the downtown area for shopping or other business; use it locally where it's very efficient and practical and then head back home by bus once again.


Every bus - a bike carrier.


A cow's head tops this unique lock up.But no path to negotiate the tough L.A. streets.

After a long walk past various courts and other civic center buildings we arrived at City Hall. It's a building that's familiar to everyone. And it's visible from many vantage points throughout the city.


Los Angeles' famous City Hall.


L.A. City Hall.

Talking about City Hall, Los Angeles is in the middle of a mayoral race, the outcome of which will be decided this Tuesday. But watching TV ad the past few days we could only wonder why nobody was discussing the issues that we saw all around us: poverty, homelessness, a mass transit system, underfunded and overused, recurring police brutality that's always in the news. All we heard, repeated over and over again in television commecials, were appeals for more cops and less taxes. As a casual observer to this city, the commercials made me ponder the bankruptcy of politics and the political system in our sad country today and the need for candidates who will represent the increasingly dire needs of people instead of tying themselves to the corporate money-lords who dominate the two old parties today.

Our next stop was Union Station, which is no longer the great railroad station that it once was. Only a few commuter trains stop here now. But once upon a time, it was the nexus that helped build the city from a sleepy little town of into the megalopolis that it is today. Countless movies were filmed there and in the glory days of American train travel , stars such as Clark Gable and Charlie Chaplin, not to mention countless numbers of GI's during WWII, would set off or arrive at this former transportation hub built by the WPA in 1939.


Union Station - a beautiful old railroad station in the old style.


Union Station stands out with its simple, mission style design.


Beamed ceiling in the beautiful, old waiting room - no longer used.

From Union Station we headed south once again, making a very large circle, to head back to our hotel. It was getting late, we hadn't eaten a morsel all day and I, very spoiled, couldn't find just the "right" place to eat. The problem was that we were to meet my cousin, Jay and his wife, Beverly and their family for dinner tonight and I didn't want to eat too late. We had stopped at a famous, large, indoor market, the Grand Central Market, with fabulous produce, pepper and mole stalls, and lots and lots of greasy, fried food vendors. The prices were great but despite that, fried was not for me, although it was a very colorful place.


Grand Central Market on Broadway - a fabulous, indoor collection of produce, meat, cheese, chile pepper stalls and lots of fried food.


Hundreds of vendors selling all kinds of food.


Pinto beans anyone?

We continued back to our hotel and I couldn't resist one last shot of the skyscraper city that the world knows to be Los Angeles. I'm beginning to see that this is a phony facade that hides the miles and miles of city streets that spread out below the steel and glass towers. These are the tough streets of a city that has been left behind in Bush's vision of America, where poverty, homelessness, lack of decent jobs and health care are the order of the day.


From Pershing Square - a view of old and new Downtown.

Regards From Sunny Kaliforniya

Mar 5, 2005

We took Jet Blue to Los Angeles and flew in to Long Beach airport - a bit south of the city, it's a small airport with very few flights (nice). And, it's the only airport that Jet Blue flies to so we didn't have a choice. The flight was five and half hours and quite comfortable. One way that JB cuts costs is the elimination of airlines food. So we took old-fashioned, homemade sandwiches instead and had a feast as we flew over the Great Lakes, the Rocky Mountains and the Grand Canyon. Then Las Vegas, the Nevada desert and a few minutes later, Los Angeles.

Our bags were first on the carousel and then we were on our way, picking up our rental car - a convertible - and heading up the coast to the city and our hotel: the Hilton Checkers on Grand Avenue in Downtown L.A. You might not realize that L.A. has a downtown but it does. Most people visiting Los Angeles head for the hills (Beverly), Hollywood and the Pacific shore and, truly, that's the LA. that tourists know when thinking about visiting the second largest city in the country.


Our hotel on Grand Avenue in Downtown, L.A.

We settled into our room and unpacked and then went out for a walk. Our destination: Mike's loft that he moved into a month or so ago in the so-called Fashion District. Mike's place was about 10 long blocks away and, as we walked there, we began to notice that beyond our lovely boutique hotel and the streets surrounding it; Beyond the fabulous skyline that the city is known for, with its towering glass and steel modernity housing the likes of Citibank, Mellon Bank, SBC Communications and other giant conglomerates, the rest of downtown is very poor, with huge numbers of homeless people, mostly Black and Latino and some poor whites thrown in for good measure. The contrast between rich and poor is very much in your face in Los Angeles.

The Fashion District is many, many square blocks of cut rate fabric, notions and trimmings stores and outlets and was unlike anything we've ever seen anywhere else. Sure, New York has its garment district, but it's all "upstairs." Los Angeles' district is all at street level (with a few higher rise buildings housing sweatshop factories) with hundreds, maybe thousands of small stores, one after another devoted to the wholesaling of anything and everything related to fashion and garment construction.

Mike's place is in a squat, brick building that houses a few businesses and a couple of residences (for which the landlord has apparently looked the other way). These are not zoned for living in but like many center-city areas across the country, people are now moving back in to what, a few years ago, would never have been considered a cool place to reside. Mike and his girlfriend, Lynn, and their four cats are on the second floor and the long stairway up to their space is shared with a mechanical runner that's used to deliver merchandise up and down to the lofts above.


Lynn, Stacey and Mike in the new loft on Wall Street.


Mike and Lynn's new loft.


Lynn - hanging out.


Mike and his bike.


In front of our hotel, waiting for the car.

Dinner was a car ride away down Olympic Avenue. First, the four of us walked back to the hotel and our rental car and then drove down the avenue through a sea of Korean restaurants, groceries and businesses. There, in the middle of this Asian community was a Mexican restaurant we read about on a few websites: Guelaguetza which specialized in the cuisine of Oaxaca. Reviewers and customers raved about the Mole (which simply means "sauce" ) Mole, as most of us know it, is a dark brown, thick sauce, typically spread over a piece of chicken, and it has a rich, intense flavor based on a complex slew of ingredients, the strangest and most unexpected of which is chocolate. Of course, when it's all put together, you don't taste the chocolate but it does add to the intense and delirious flavor.

I say "most of us" know it in the above-mentioned way, but this restaurant had not one but six mole sauces: green (verde), red (rojo), another red (coloradito), yellow (amarillo), black (negro) and mole manchamanteles, made from pineapple and plantains. Wow! Mike, like me, is a mole freak so he was in heaven and so was I.

We walked into a restaurant whose customers were all Latinos. It had to be good and it had to be authentic, we thought and indeed it was. Los Angeles is not New York. Most restaurants close at 10, particularly during the week. It was Thursday night and after eight when we arrived. Three musicians were performing some Latin popular tunes with guitars and voice.There were a few customers at various tables and one big table had about 15 people seated around it. This was an extended Mexican family out to celebrate an anniversary or other occasion (we couldn't tell). Around the table were seated four generations. This was a family feast with a lot of smiles and family warmth. Then the elderly mother and father got up, joined the musicians on the stage and held each other in a tender dance. We joined the family and the other customers in applause at this beautiful expression of love and age.


Guelaguetza restaurant on Olympic Avenue.


A romantic moment at Guelaguetza restaurant.


Enjoying the mole at Guelaguetza.

We had a lovely dinner with great food and memorable ambience. We drove Lynn and Mike back to Wall Street and then we returned to our hotel. We had started out at 9 am in New York. It was now midnight in L.A. (and 3 am back home). Were we tired? Yep.

Off to LaLa Land

Mar 3, 2005

Ah, the joys of retirement. A few weeks ago, Dominica. Now, we're off to the west coast to see our son Mike. He moved there, himself, just a month or so ago. So this is exploration for all of us. I've never been to Los Angeles. Stacey, yes, but not for some 30 plus years.

The cat, Pumpkin, knows something's up. Cats are much smarter than we think. As soon as the suitcases come out of the closet, she becomes aware that another trip is planned. That means that we, the can openers, as she refers to us, will be gone for an indeterminate time. We try to tell her it's only a week but the concept of time is not one that she's mastered. We'll be gone - that's all she knows. Our very gracious upstairs neighbors will be taking care of the cat so we know she's in good hands.

It's time to go: our Georgian (not as in Atlanta, Georgia but rather, Tbilisi, Georgia) driver, Thomás, will be here momentarily to whisk or drive us away to JFK airport and Los Angeles. More on the trip, later. Stay tuned for another exciting adventure.

The White Stuff Is Here Again.

Mar 2, 2005

The freakin', feckless media. I detest them, the not-so-news outlets you love to loathe. So controlled and so controlling.

Take the Oscars. First we're "treated" to several weeks of pre-Oscar "excitement." Then the bloated, boring program itself. Finally, another week of constantly repeated video replays, sappy speeches, endless gossip about this one's dress and that one's breasts, ad nauseum. Curiously, but then again, so true to their scripts, there were virtually no repeats of, let alone passing reference to, Chris Rock's fabulous opening monologue on Bush which truly brought a blast of fresh air to insipid network television. Oh, I'm sure that Fox did a number on him, picturing him as at least a traitor, perhaps worse. The rest just ignored it as if it had never happened. That "newspaper of record", the New York Times devoted a couple of sentences to it. To me ... it was the brilliant, wonderful and hysterical highlight of what was a most tedious and tiresome affair.

The nattering extremists of the right will say he slandered the President. But that's just so much nonsense. Because everything he said was just, well, the truth.

In case you missed it, here's what he said --

Rock On Bush
"I'm not going to bash Bush here tonight. I saw 'Fahrenheit 9/11.' I think Bush is a genius. I think Bush did some things this year that nobody in this room could do. ... Because Bush basically reapplied for his job. And can you imagine applying for a job and while you're applying there's a movie in every theater in the country that shows how much you suck at the job? It would be hard to get hired, wouldn't it? I watched 'Fahrenheit.' I learned some stuff. Bush did some things you could never get away with at a real job.

"When Bush got into office, there was a surplus of money -- now there's like a $70 trillion deficit. Now just imagine you work at the GAP. You close out your register and you're $70 trillion short. The average person would get in trouble for something like that. Not Bush. Then he started a war. ... Now just imagine you work at the GAP. You're $70 trillion behind on your register and then you start a war with the Banana Republic because you say they got toxic tank tops over there. You have the war, people are dying -- 1,000 GAP employees are dead, bleeding all over the khakis -- you finally take over Banana Republic and find they never made tank tops in the first place."

Chris just rocks.

.....

What number snow storm is this? My friend Ted tells me that we have had less snow than an average year. Anyone else believe that? True, the media (them, again!) hypes each impending "blizzard" as if we were to be hit by the storm of the decade, if not the century. As a former store owner I remember what their incessant shrieking about impending weather did to business: it killed it, that's what.

When I was a kid we had real snow storms (I can't believe I'm talking like this). As a young one, my brother once got stranded across the street at his friend's house...the drifts were insurmountable - or maybe he just wanted an excuse to sleep over. And yet, we survived. In fact, it was fun and wonderful and exhilarating (as long as they didn't come too often). But today is another story. The media whoops it up. And then nothing seems to happen. So strange. I'm watching TV this morning and the weather man, that very white-toothed, almost Aryan looking, Sam Champion on ABC says Central Park got seven inches last night. I go to the window and if there were more than two inches on the street it was a lot. What's going on here?? There is such a huge disconnect between what we see on the Boob-Tube and what we know to be the truth as told to us by our own two eyes. That's why Chris Rock's comments on the Emperor and his new clothes were so refreshing. The truth will out. No kidding.


From my window at midnight last night. Underhill Avenue in the rather gentle snowstorm - a cold, lonely, but beautiful, street.

.....

Stephanie and Emily are back in town. Another show and so they sew and then off they go...to the show. We picked them up at the F train (they were supposed to catch the Q - but they get confused by all those letters on the trains). We drove to Bay Ridge to fetch their belongings - they had been staying at a colleague's apartment for the last few nights. While we were there we had dinner at Samm's on Third Avenue and 89th Street. (that's Brooklyn, by the way). Quite good. Try it.


Dinner tonight at Samm's in Bay Ridge.


Emily - "Matt - I told you, No Pictures!"


Stephanie - Too much Bling??


Two cousins at Samm's.

Don't Believe Everything You Read On A BLOG.

Feb 20, 2005

My friend, Elisabeth Rucell, writes to tell me that the so-called Crocuses that had blossomed earlier this week were, in fact, Snowdrops. She, no doubt, was one of those who got sent to the Botanic Gardens by her parents as a kid. Me? I always thought crocuses were the first flowers to appear. You learn something new every day. Elisabeth, by the way, taught Earth Science at John Dewey High School for many years. Maybe that's whereby she knows the difference between a snow drop and a crocus. I stand corrected.


Yep, these are snowdrops, not crocuses. Sorry. (photo by Jim Mercer)


Here's Crocus, pushing their way through the snow. (not my photo).

Winter Park

Feb 19, 2005

It's very cold today. But beautiful. Last night the temperature descended to 16 degrees. It has barely reached 30 today and a frigid wind is whipping out of the north. Too cold to bike. Um, no. I thought I would run a few errands - visit the bank, mail a letter at the post office. But just riding a few blocks, my face started to numb and my fingers froze. I rode over to Prospect Perks on my way back, stopping for a bowl of Mary's homemade chicken soup. Reinvigorated (and warmed) I decided to check out the park. What was it like on a winter day like this? Would people brave the cold and venture out?

Not many. Here and there was the occasional jogger or a lone walker lost in thought. A gaggle of cyclists whizzed by intent on circling the park in the fastest time possible. Not I. No, I bicycled gently - feeling like I had the entire park to myself. Some of the vast meadows were completely empty - not a single soul to divide me from my commune with a frozen nature.

The last time I cycled through the park was the fall when it was ablaze with autumnal splendor. Now the leaves were gone and the trees stood bare and silhouetted against a brilliant sky.


A lone runner, a few cyclists, a walker lost in thought- that's the park on a cold winter day.


Such stark beauty in the trees without their leaves.


Walking with long shadows and a frozen pond.

Crocus Update

Feb 19, 2005

And so frigid winter weather has returned. It was 16 degrees last night. But Mother Nature had other ideas. The crocus shoots that poked through last week have, hard to believe, blossomed. I took this photo on February 17th, just a few days later. What will become of them now with these freezing temps?


Crocuses - go back down before you freeze!

Visiting Dani And Erik To See Their New House

Feb 18, 2005

My daughter Dani and her husband, Erik, have a new house. They moved from Connecticut to Saratoga Springs, New York and bought a sweet little house there. While I was on Jury Duty in January, Stacey went there to help them move in. Now it was my turn to see the house so we drove up for a couple of days.

They're actually outside of Saratoga in a town called Clifton Park. Saratoga is so very chichi and, thus, house prices are much higher there. Folks of more moderate incomes tend to live a bit removed from that famous old watering hole of the very well-to-do.

Dani has done a very quick and lovely decorating job (she takes after her mom in that respect) and I was quite impressed.


Dani and Erik's new house -- with me in it.

We hung out for a while at home and then drove the few miles to Saratoga for a walk and a shop. Then the kids took us out for dinner at a lovely restaurant on Broadway, Wheat Fields, specializing in home-made pastas.


Stacey and Dani at the Saratoga Springs Gap.


On Broadway, Saratoga Springs.


Here's Dani and Erik's new house!


And here's Dani and Erik. And Brooklyn (left) and Annapolis (right).

The next day we enjoyed bagels, lox and whitefish salad (brought from Brooklyn, of course) and then walked a bit down their road to a pretty park and ball field. We headed into the snow-covered field and the dogs and the people cavorted. Besides cavorting we also threw snowballs at each other. Fun.


Out for a walk in Clifton Park.


Brooklyn catches a snowball. Dani chases Erik.


Having snow fun.

That afternoon we drove back to the city. Saratoga was a nice place to visit and we'll be back many times after this. Nicer still was seeing Dani and Erik and their new house.