Hotel at the Corner of Bitter and Sweet by Jamie Ford
This book had everything going for it, and still I had a hard time getting into it. The book was given by Little Diamond to my Mom – Little Diamond often passes along the very best, thought-provoking books, and in our family we pass the best along, so I knew it would be good. I love the title. The book is set in a part of Seattle now called – euphemistically – The International District, but as I was growing up, and among older Seattle-ites, it is called Chinatown, even though that is not politically correct, or geographically correct. Chinatown was never Chinatown, it was a group of distinct populations – Chinese, Japanese, later Vietnamese, Korean, even later Ethiopian, Sudanese, Somali, Pakistan . . . you could call it immigrant-ville, I suppose, if you were really, really politically incorrect. My Chinese friends still call it Chinatown.
Last, but not least, Jamie Ford started this book as a short story at a camp run by Orson Scott Card, one of my favorite authors, especially to recommend to young people. Orson Scott Card knows how to capture the painful contradictions of being teens and young adults, the conflicts with parents, the loves, requited and un, and most of all, he understands how the young see things clearly as unfair; it’s only later when we start seeing shades of grey.
In spite of all those positives, I hated his voice. I hated the smug little Chinese boy he started as, a scholarship student, first generation born in the US, mocking his parents, fighting off bullies. . . Here is what I hated the most. He had a girlfriend, and he didn’t understand chivalry, like walking her home. He protected her, but he was a pretty self-absorbed little boy.
I kept reading because he had some interesting friends. I liked his friend the jazz player, and I liked the gruff lunchroom lady, and I liked his friend Keiko. I understood his parents pushing him to excel, and their not understanding the struggles this caused Henry; I liked his parents. Because the book jumps around in time, I also liked his wife, and felt annoyed that Henry was all caught up in this old romance when he had a perfectly good wife, but I kept reading.
I am so glad I did. About a third into the book, we begin to see Henry transform into the man he will become. He gets help, he gets mentoring from unexpected people, and he becomes more likable.
The book also deals with a terrible time in US history, a time when we turned on our own citizens and sent our citizens of Japanese descent to concentration camps right here in the USA. The Japanese were a class act; most of them were hurt and outraged, but compliant. Many men volunteered to fight in the war in spite of this slap in the face, this accusation of potential treason. It is a shameful time in our own history, and particularly so for Henry, who loves a Japanese girl, Keiko.
By the end, I loved this book. I hope you will, too.
Car Rental Fees Update
So here is how my car rental looked:
The ACTUAL charge was like $142 for the week. “Fees” and taxes came to an additional $76.85. It is SO misleading when you are quoted a car rental price and it doesn’t include those charges until the final tally. It’s OK for me, it’s just what I have to do, but I remember being young, and when an extra almost $77 might have been a really bad surprise.
The check-in person asked me how I liked the car – a Ford Focus. I told her I hated it. I know it’s being advertised as ‘better than Toyota’ but it isn’t. It drives like a boat. It is clunky feeling, and it doesn’t get great pick-up. When I first got in, I had to drive those extra narrow, extra fast lanes on Seattle’s crowded I-5 going North, and it was raining and water is swooshing off the tops of trucks (who were passing me) and I just hated the car.
Toyotas are more nimble. Toyotas have better pick-up. You know, I would rather like to buy American, but first the automakers have to show me that they have a car that makes you happy to be driving.
People kid me about my Rav4, that it’s a young people’s car, but you know, I love the way it drives, I love the way it grips the road and goes anywhere, and still remains small enough and nimble enough to park in a tiny little spot. It has a much bigger feel, and is so comfortable. The Ford Focus is just clunky.
BTW, I asked the check in person if it was legal for me to rent a car for a week to get the better rate and then to turn it in early. She just laughed and said “It’s not illegal; it’s SMART!”
“You’ve Brought the Sunshine!”
As I was running errands in my old home town, people kept exclaiming on the weather, and they would say “You’ve brought the sunshine!”
They would say the same when I would come in from Kuwait and Qatar. I’ve forgotten just how grim and grey Seattle can be in the midst of January. When I arrived, I drove in a cold, steady drizzle; I’d forgotten how much fun it is to drive in the rain . . . . especially on the narrow lanes of Seattle’s freeway with water sheeting off the big trucks rushing to make their deliveries with 300 miles or so yet to go. No, I prefer the sunshine.
The first glimpse we had of sunshine was early in the morning, as the sun came up and turned the mountains pink:
Later in the day, the light changed and everything went gold:
I guess this little guy just wanted to get in my photo, and it tickles me that a part of him did:
Full Moon over Edmonds
Jet-lagging in a very small way – when I fly to Edmonds, it is a half day trip, not a day-and-a-half day trip, but I am still mildly jet lagged the first couple days. Sometimes it can be a good thing. When I was up at an inhuman hour this morning making coffee, I was able to watch the full moon over the Puget Sound off Edmonds Beach. Silvery, and lovely:
Car Rental Fees
I’m making a short trip, and as a mildly obsessive-compulsive person, I make and double check my reservations.
How can it be that a car rental that is around $25/day for five days can come out to MORE THAN DOUBLE what you could estimate the total cost would be?
Last time, I learned that if I rented the car for a week, and turned it in early, I still got a way better break on price.
I might have to try that this time. Taxes and ‘fees’. Tourist fees. Tire recovery fees. (They are always so surprised I read the rental agreements, LOL) Environmental fees. Fees for picking the car up at the airport. Oh, AAARRGH.
Air France Customer Service
At long last, my Mom is coming to Pensacola for a visit.
After days of to-and-fro-ing with Mom and Big Diamond, after countless visits to Expedia and Travelocity and Delta, I was able to talk with Andre’ at Air France who, once he heard I was booking for my 88 year old mother, spent an hour with me, finding flights she could handle, (not too early in the morning, not too many stops, wheelchair assists, etc.) finding first class seats and confirming them, making sure Mom would fly in comfort.
“Thank you, thank you so much” I kept babbling, as he clicked and clicked, trying to find days and flights that would work.
“It’s my job” he would say.
The very last time I thanked him, it changed.
“Well,” he said, “when you said the word ‘mother’ then I knew I could not stop until everything was perfect.”
🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂
Air France is lucky to have him. Bravo, Andre’.
Edmonds Market Day
It’s all rush rush rush but we make time on Saturday morning to go to the Edmonds Market, my very favorite thing to do. First, I wanted to show you how my little home town decorates the street lights with hanging baskets:
Street pots:
And one of my favorite vendors, the Cedar Creek Soap lady. 🙂
(My favorite soaps are Clove, Cinnamon Orange and Safari)
Short Day to Spokane
After breakfast, we hit the road early, stopping after a couple hours for a leg stretch and coffee. The weather is in the 50’s as we hit the road, and we are both ready for a warm-up. I was all set to order my normal ‘short non-fat Mocha, no whip cream,’ when I saw that they already have the fall specials on the menu, and oh, I love Pumpkin Pie Spice Latte . . .
While the roads are nearly empty, just us and an occasional truck, or pickup, the weather has turned ugly, rain coming down in drizzle, or torrents, or sheets, changing by the minute. By the time we stopped for lunch, I was ready to give up the driver’s seat.
Lunch was at the Fat Belly Deli, in Alberton, Montana, where we had Turkey Pastrami and Swiss sandwiches, oh, and ummm. . . . fries. They were having a little trouble getting the fryer hot enough to fry the fries, so I had time to take a couple photos:
On our way in, AdventureMan spotted a huge used book store – like catnip for cats, we could not resist. I found a copy of Elizabeth Warnock Fernea’s book “A View of the Nile.” If you have never read Elizabeth Warnock Fernea (Guests of the Sheikh, A Street in Marrakesh) read her biography in the link above. She was an amazing woman, who shared her insights in a very readable way. A View of the Nile is hard to find. I want it for my lending library. AdventureMan and I both found books. . . Too many books. We had to drag ourselves away.
(Update: AdventureMan reminds me that HE found the Fernea book and asked me if I wanted it. I promised to correct this entry and give him proper credit. 🙂 )
Soon we left soggy Montana to enter an equally soggy Idaho, although the weather cleared by the time we got to Coeur d’Alene:
By the time we hit Spokane, the sun is out and we are starting to feel warm once again. We could go on; we have gained an hour, but we see another Mariott Residence Inn along the road and decide to hit the pool and kick back for the rest of the day, with another short day on the road tomorrow to get us to Seattle, where the hard work will begin. We have accounts to close, a storage locker to clear, rugs to gather and plastic carrier boxes to pack. We are hoping we can get everything into AdventureMan’s Barcelona Red (the name of his Rav4) for the long haul back to Pensacola.
Our reward for good behavior will be a few meals with friends and family before we depart. We are looking forward to that part. 🙂
One Thing I Really Like About Pensacola
As I was driving along an unfamiliar highway around 11 on a Friday night in Seattle, it occurred to me how tame the driving in Pensacola is. For some reason, the traffic lanes on the highway in Seattle are narrower than in other countries. You get used to it, but it’s like the whole personal space thing; when first invaded, the adrenalin starts rushing.
In Seattle, there are just too many cars for the roads to handle with grace. Same as Kuwait. When I first got to Qatar, the roads were adequate, but no longer.
Pesacola is sweet. You can get anywhere you need to be in under half an hour. From the airport to my house is like 8 minutes, max. My house to the shops, my house to the YMCA, my house to church – all about eight minutes. There are a lot of stop signs and a lot of stop lights, and I rarely see anyone run them. I never see traffic gridlock. There is one really dangerous intersection in town, and I rarely see a problem there.
It’s not that driving in Pensacola is so consciously mannerly, as in Seattle. It’s just more laid back. No one seems to be in that great a hurry to get anywhere. Every child is in a car seat. People are careful, even if they are driving while impaired.
You can get spoiled. When you get used to calm driving, then just about anywhere you go with real traffic seems chaotic. Once you have a large number of people on the road, you increase the chances of running into a cowboy (or cowgirl), or an inexperienced driver, or a half-blind older driver, etc.
Driving in Pensacola is just uneventful. 🙂
A Wing and a Prayer
We are taught to pray for all things, great and small. I really take that to heart; I pray for the smallest things, and most of the time, my prayer is answered (with a ‘yes’ although sometimes the form the answer takes gives me a grin at God’s great sense of humor.) Today, I had to drive an unfamiliar stretch to return my loaned car – a wonderful Lexus – Little Diamond had loaned me, and that was good for some serious and lengthy prayer, and then I was also praying that the check-in people would overlook the fact that my bag was seriously heavy. Like 60 lbs.
Both prayers were answered. I only got minorly lost and got it worked out fairly quickly, and the guy who checked my bag in didn’t bat an eye, just put a tag on it that said ‘heavy’.
What I had forgotten to pray about was security, but since I was only flying within the US, I didn’t think I would have any trouble.
But here’s the thing. For a long time, I thought we would be retiring to Seattle, so slowly over the years, I would take things to Seattle and store them at my Moms or in a storage locker I rent there. So when I went to my Mom’s this last week, I took few clothes, and a big suitcase, so I can start shifting some of these household items to Pensacola. It wasn’t enough, but I packed it really really full, and then I also had stuff packed in my backpack.
So forgetting to pray about security was a big mistake. The security scanner girl kept squinting at the innards of my backpack, and then called others over, always a bad sign.
Sure enough, they went through my things with the explosives tester and their fine tooth combs.
“Are these silver plates?” the security guy asked incredulously.
“Serving plates,” I responded, and gave no further explanation. I don’t believe in telling people too much, it just confuses them and complicates things.
“What is this??” he asked, holding up two cans that said clearly on the side “smoked salmon”.
“Smoked salmon,” I replied.
Back to the scanner. Twice, back to the scanner. When he brought back all my stuff he asked if I wanted him to repack it.
“No,” I said with sheer disgust. No one can get everything back the way I had it packed but me. Even without the two cans of smoked salmon, which they confiscated. Damn.
Other than that, it was a smooth trip, and my son was there to meet me at the Pensacola airport, and I was home within 20 minutes of landing, how cool is that? Sure wish I had those cans of smoked salmon . . .
Recent Comments
Catherine on Donna Leon Crossing Cultu… intlxpatr on Ignoring the Law thani on Ignoring the Law Anon. on British Soldier Kidnapped, Esc… Reeva Mills on Cahors to Bordeaux, Preparing… Wikipedia Donate Button
Amazina
Early Voting in Florida
Here There and Everywhere 