I don't talk about him often on this blog -not because I don't love him, -not because I don't think about him often, -not because he's a crazy man hidden away in a insane asylum in Alaska. No ... I love him tons, I think about him a lot, and he's definitely not a crazy man in an asylum (but if he was I'd still love him and think about him!).
My point is this: I have a brother.
My brother is amazing.
My brother lives in Vancouver (Squamish) half the time and in Albania the other half. Yep, you heard me right, Albania.
He's a chef and an EMT. He cooks a mean meal and carries a gun to ward off bears and other wild animals. He raises animals with local Albanians, butchers them and eats them. If you want to know someone who is in touch with his food source it's my brother Dan.
His job allows him to travel the world.
His ability to write makes his stories of travel a joy to read.
I thought you might enjoy a recent email he wrote about his travels through Rome.
Join me in encouraging Dan to start his own blog ... or even write a book!
"so this is one the coolest places i have had the luxury to visit. i am sitting outside my hotel in a great little wine bar that conveniently attaches to a kids playground so the parents can enjoy some vino while watching their children. why didn't we think of that? mostly we are just to uptight for that kind of thing. i don't know who is louder or happier, the kids playing or gramps and grams sitting beside me enjoying the evening.
i got in yesterday early in the morning and hit the ground running. owen lightly and his sister are here so we made plans to meet up in one of the open air markets. i don't have a cell phone here so was a little doubtful about the chances of meeting up but sure enough, there they were. enjoyed some of the best pizza i have ever had, one with zucchini blossoms and one with potato. some time the simple ingredients treated well are the best. scratch that. they always are. do we really need osmosis, particle accelerators and smoke machines to make good food? i think not. somehow we as chefs got lost along the way and thought that we in order for dinner to be good we had to confuse the customer enough that they were willing to part with the dollars for the meal. no one here has to have a society to slow down food or a movement to make them eat seasonally and locally. it just is. anyway, enough of that. went to vatican city with owen and gwen and into saint peters basilica. mamma mia. these people knew how to build a church. as a minimalistic kind of guy i was overwhelmed with the amount of guilding, mosaics and sculptures. this place is huge! the uppermost dome is 430 feet in the air. talk about close to god.
quick aside, my beer just about got knocked over by a soccer ball. i thought all these italian kids were super stars. bar owner yelling in italian at children, children laughing.
anyway, download rick steves audio tour so am getting all the info i need on the basilica. they spent so much money building it the had to start offering concession for things like murder just to pay it off. some guy get pissed off and starts a reformation. they actually mark on the floor where other churches end, just to show how really big this place is. owen insists on making anti pope comments and i wait for the lightning bolt to strike him down. does not happen so we make our way to the sistine chapel. long line up and then a weaving path to get into the chapel. i feel like i am at ikea and need to know the shortcut to get there. about two thousand missing penises later we get into the chapel. again, overwhelming. this guy really liked to paint. we are shoulder to shoulder with people all looking up and trying to keep balance. guards are shussing everyone without any real result and no epiphanous moments are to be had.
another aside, spell check won't let epiphanous get by. not a word?
so, twenty more minutes and four more gift shops before we get out. you can buy and erasure in the shape of the popes head. does it get rid of sins?
logs more walking and then a great, long dinner in the old district. like the rest of it is not old. gelatto at one in morning. cinnamon and rice. sooo good. get really lost on the way home and have to hop in a cab. can't really remember the name of the street my hotel is on but somehow got back.
today, owen and sis are gone to sicily so i am left to explore with old ricky steve. i see the colloseum and think of all those gladiator movies. go to the forum and look at lots more old stuff. piles of columns everywhere. i want to pick one up and take it home. fall in love with three more italian girls. at this point i have walked about 15 k in two days and am starting to gloss over the sights so decide to take the evening off and hit it all again tomorrow.
takes us to me sitting here thinking about my good friends and wishing we could be here together. why don't you all quit your jobs and start working for sharps camp solutions. so much fun. i fell pretty lucky.
i would send some pictures but i am on a really weak signal. somebody forgot to put password protection on their wireless. i am sure you will see them someday soon.
miss you all and will see you soon.
love dan"
No comments:
Post a Comment