Michele Roohani

White is the color of purity, cleanliness, and innocence…or is it? I am surrounded and inspired by it lately and these are my white (ivory, ecru, eggshell, etc…) images:

I went out to take pictures yesterday; I love the quiet that sits with the snow,

even when it gets dark early.

These are my shoes,

and this is not,

these are LeNôtre’s shoes:

on more recent creations, this is a white interior,

and a very expensive exterior,

and people who can’t afford it:

Four white dogs,

and some not so white ones,

a white wedding gown,

a much simpler one,

and some pretty pearls to go with it,

and a white church to complete it!

Some punctual white statues,

and some timeless ones:

Sunlight flirting with a quiet white curtain,

in need of music:

to dance the “Swan Lake”,

or some other dance in white pants:

back in good old California, some white table at the Huntley’s:

with some great coffee in white cups,

white on white:

and San Vicente’s majestic magnolias…

see “my green movement” here

my “red post” here

To be jolly…in Zurich?

It snowed last week here and I was giddy like all the snow-starved Californians until the -13 C (10 F) hit me…

The above image is Zurich’s Grossmunster, a beautiful church that I went to last night, on Christmas eve, to see how the Swiss celebrate Jesus’ birthday:

Before I got there I stopped at Lindenhof and I was surprised by this lovely bird (or a winged rat as some people call it) who was not afraid of me and kept drinking from the fountain in spite of me and my big camera…

I am so close here,

Frohe Weihnachten!

Strasbourgers in the Alsace region of France claim that they are the “Christmas Capital” of Europe so as a good muslim I went there to check.

Well, they keep saying it everywhere:

It was a very cold day but thousands of poeple were swarming the streets of this beautiful Alsatian city:

walking up and down narrow streets,

They have no pity for their babies fighting the cold,

maybe because they drink this mulled wine called “Vin Chaud” (hot wine) or “Gluehwein” (in german): a concoction usually prepared from red wine, heated and spiced with cinnamon sticks, vanilla pods, cloves, citrus and sugar. They sell it in every other stand on the big Christmas market in Strasbourg:

I saw my first chocolate covered “strawberry  kababs”:

Strasbourg is home to one of the most beautiful cathedrals in Europe:

where Jesus’ birth will be celebrated this year with pomp and thousands of little ornaments made in Alsace (read China):

The market is not close to the big church but right at its feet with Santa Claus himself selling some of the stuff:

Here is Alsace in all its glory (albeit in miniature):

and colors,

with little chefs baking for the big birthday (Jesus’, remember?)

and big chefs of course making macaroons:

but for people with a weakness for great pastry I have a better treat:

The above are Christmas Buches but Christian Patisserie—that I discovered a couple of years ago on my first trip to Alsace—is known for its chocolate:

and anything related to it:

Chocolate not being on my repertoire much, I opted for the fabulous chestnut cream “Mont Blanc”:

I went to the cathedral where a thousand Santas were busy clicking away on their cameras,

and a thousand candles promised to fulfill wishes…

By the end of the day, I was one of the few without a red hat,

Alsace’s emblem is a stork—you see them everywhere:

I couldn’t resist buying my first real mistletoe:

and looking at the holly,

I went to see the Fine Arts Museum:

where I revisited “the beautiful woman from Strasbourg”:

and the fabulous dutch still life paintings and my favorite Kessel insects of course:

By the time I got out it was getting dark but the market was still hustling and bustling,

This whole trip almost made me forget Copenhagen’s climate summit, the American Health Bill disaster and the Swiss minarets…

Have a golden Christmas everybody!

Drive forty minutes from Bordeaux, and you will get to the most amazing wine country of the region, Sauternais, or the only area around Bordeaux where the noble rot grows.

A most peculiar wine is produced here that has not much to do with the red Bordeaux wines that we all know (red or white). Sauternes is made from grapes that have been affected by a gray fungus, Botrytis Cinerea,  which causes the grapes to shrivel, leaving a sugary fruit with concentrated flavors resulting in distinctively flavored wines.

I had heard about the Noble Rot (an oxymoron of a name) but I was still amazed to see these grapes on the vine stocks:The grapes are definitely getting ripe here, all semi rotten! The best Sauternes come from vines that have been hand-picked—up to 12 separate times—to ensure that the grapes are not removed from the vines before reaching the perfect degree of ripeness required for these wines.The eminent Château d’Yqem, the most expensive Sauternes wine, is the only estate in France who has received a class of its own, one step above Premier Crus. Each grape is picked individually, and only when it is rotten enough. Thanks to the noble rot and a lot of hard work, the result is an exquisitely flavored wine that is acidic enough to avoid falling into the trap of being a mere dessert wine.

The Sauternes region is located 40 km (25 miles) southeast of the city of Bordeaux along the Garonne river and its tributary, the Ciron, which demarcates Barsac (Orange on the map) and Sauternes (yellow on the map). Barsac lies within Sauternes, and is entitled to use either name. Somewhat similar but less expensive and typically less-distinguished wines are produced in the neighboring regions of Monbazillac (which I tasted  a couple of years ago when visiting Bergerac) , Cérons, Loupiac and Cadillac (not the car)!

The moisture the Ciron brings, and the morning mists it causes, are favorable to the development of the fungus Botrytis cinereangus. This contributes to the high quality and renown of Sauternes wines.My guide explained that vines produce one to two bottles of wine everywhere else, but in Sauternes, you can only get one to two glasses per year! No wonder this wine is so revered (and expensive)…

Not having money to burn, I only bought some of the more modest bottles after the tasting:

Of course, there are myriads of labels to choose from:like these bottles with ample and intense golden liquid inside…You wonder how on earth with amazing wines like these in the region,some of the locals drink coffee…

My other post about wine:

A night with some dry drunk Persians here

Budapest, the neglected beauty on the Danube, is a city of friendly people, opulent buildings, golden domes, thermal baths and opera.

Budapest became a single city occupying both banks of the river with a unification on 1873 of right-bank Buda and with left-bank Pest.

A foreign city robs you of your prejudices about different neighborhoods—you look at everything with fresh virgin eyes.

Let’s start by my posh, but relatively inexpensive, hotel room and its great view:

grand cafés everywhere,

like the Callas :

The Hungarians are Opera-crazy and they have their elegant Opera Houses to show it:

There are plenty of beautiful Hungarian girls,

and boys:

and very proud ones at that: The Heroes’ Square welcomes you with seven Magyar chieftains (Magyar: Hungary) who led the Hungarian people in their proud history; I highlighted a couple that I liked best:

Now we’ll take the Budapest metro—super efficient and easy to use— to go places.

Like a good muslim, I first went to visit the great Saint Stephen Basilica:

the madonna looks friendlier in orthodox churches—somehow less aloof, more human…

In spite of all the gold in the public places, Budapest has its share of run-down buildings,

this huge metropolis is not as pretty as her smaller sister city, Prague,

but is as rich in history and as breathtaking in sights:

the sunset on the Danube is majestic:

Again as a good Shiite who does believe in Holocaust,  I went to visit the Dohany street Synagogue of Budapest, the world’s second largest that caters to a mix of Orthodox and Reformed Judaism unique to Hungary:

in spite of its Byzantine Moorish style, the similarities between this synagogue and a grand church are striking: there is an organ (Franz Liszt played on it once),

and even pulpits!

In the Jewish quarter,  you are constantly reminded of the Nazis’ atrocities:

Budapest is known for its 80 geothermal springs but I didn’t have the courage to accompany my friends to these pools in Szechenyi bath:

the Fine Art Museum was more pressing but that should wait for another post; the Hungarian parliament deserves a post all to itself as well.

If you want to stay in great affordable hotels in a great cosmopolitan European city, go to Budapest (or ask my friend, Reyhaneh, who is a champion in finding great deals!)

I leave you with this quote: “The stupid neither forgive nor forget; the naive forgive and forget; the wise forgive but do not forget” and “Clear thinking requires courage rather than intelligence” by Thomas Szasz.

p.s.  I am not writing about food because the only good meal I had worth writing home about was with my favorite Hungarian,  Professor Ungvari, at Remiz.

It’s one of those great (and gray) September mornings in Paris and I take my poor jet lagged body out to take pictures of a city that looks more majestic without its occupants or tourists like me!

I would like to take you with me; first we take the bus:

the streets are all empty—one of the oldest surviving buildings in Paris from the 16th century:

even the marché is not open yet,

Saint Michel is unrecognizable at 7 am:

the cafés are just opening,

walking along the river bank in Isle Saint Louis,

Notre Dame is majestically melancholic,

but pretty soon, life starts in the city:

I decide to go towards the Marais; I am surprised to see a Pain Quotidien on my way—so far from Brentwood and Westwood but exactly the same menu:

rushing towards Place des Vosges, the street signs stop me:

its’ too early in the morning for gooseberries,

I really need a strong coffee,

but of course the waitress cleans up the street and not the table left from the previous clients,

the galleries around the square are too commercial but I am glad to discover a painter from Rafsandjan, Reza Sarrafi, in one of the windows:

the wine paintings are from another painter, Annekov:

Voilà! Now you know.

I am not kidding when I say I love this city—here are my other posts about Paris:

Alone in Paris

Paris and Paul Newman

Pretty girl in Paris

Giacometti, a post from Montparnasse

I met Arcimboldo and some Germans in Paris

Opera Garnier in Paris

Paris was a woman

Paris at 6 am

Bread and Music

An expression that can mean anything means nothing; when you want to please everybody, you please nobody.

Enrico Fermi, the great Italian physicist, killed all the aliens in 1950 by asking this simple/innocent question: “if extra-terrestrials exist, where are they?” This question has become the Fermi Paradox.

Even though I am a science fiction fan I do agree with the skeptics that, Houston, we have a problem:

a) the search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI) program to detect radio transmissions from other civilizations has been a failure.

b) the question of the Great Silence remains unsolved; if life is common, why don’t we detect their radio transmissions?

Today is the 40th anniversary of the first moon landing (July 20, 1969).

I remember the thrill of hearing about it on a hot summer day in Iran; the moon has not looked the same since!

Unlike my father, I am a lousy philatelist (postage stamp collector) but I was able to find the above page I bought in 1994—on the 25th anniversary of “the big step”—among my loose leaves.

The Drake Equation—an attempt to estimate the number of extraterrestrial civilizations in the Milky Way with which we might come into contact— is still fascinating to me but I see its light getting dimmer with every “silent year”…

N = R_* × f_p × n_E × f_l × f_i × f_c × L

This once serious equation looks more and more like this cartoon from this very funny site:

To commemorate the 40th anniversary of Neil Armstrong’s historic walk on the moon, Google is offering Internet users a virtual trip to the moon.

I empathize with Fermi’s passion for clarity. I am simply unable to let things be foggy. The Drake equation is literally meaningless because “an expression that can mean anything means nothing.”

Related and Suggested Posts and Resources:

Carl Sagan explaining the Drake Equation.

Google earth lands on the moon.

Other Life not likely to be intelligent.

The new Drake Equation by Susan Blackmore.

The SETI Institute.

Red—no matter what other name you call it by— is the color of  passion, anger, courage, sacrifice, warning, fire, sin, revolution, love, power, etc…

red is my favorite color and these are some samples of my reds; let’s start with a red heart or a scarlet letter:

red tomatoes,

red fish,

red Persian rug,

red literature,

a red fountain pen,

and a red pencil,

red lips,

a hot red car,

another hot red car,

an aspiring red rose,

and a real red rose,

lovelorn poppies,

red peppers,

high calorie red,

a small red door,

and a slightly bigger one!

the fabulous Miss Wendy:

Los Angeles’ red light district,

red beads,

wine is one of my favorite reds,

red steps in Prague,

and red steps in Buenos Aires,

a disobedient red strawberry shortcake,

and a red blog…

and this is the end of my Red post.

A NY weekend —short and sweet just the way I like it.

The Chrysler building is still magnificent—I like the upper east side best.

sometimes photographers have to take some risks,

New York is a walking city and the shop windows are fabulous—I have dedicated an entire future post to it—Bergdorf Goodman’s window displays are so sophisticated, they are like mini-exhibitions.

India is big on Fifth Avenue:

so is the cathedral…

Manhattan is a “hall of mirrors” with a maze of old and new architecture to dazzle you:

Brownstones are beautiful in springtime,

so are bluestones!

Prepare yourself to eat half a cow at Carnegie Deli,

and then the other half:

Jim Dine’s Venus on the 6th avenue,

The upper west side is younger and hipper—Amsterdam avenue leads you to a little gem of a café,  good enough to eat.

A hole in the wall, Zibetto espresso bar, is an ideal place to get you going again,

to see some more of this beautiful city:

its buildings,

and its skyline.

I visited the Metropolitan museum and the Frick Collection as my usual pilgrimage but the most exciting show was at the New York Public Library. I have two great exhibitions to tell you about but that’s got to be in the next post.

Related and Suggested Posts and Resources

Babooshka dolls and Franz Kafka in Prague

Just came back from a brief stay in Paris and these are some of my pictures:

The Louvre is glorious in early morning,

some jet-lagged tourists were the only people around,

early birds can witness the majesty of an empty Louvre Court.

When you wake up that early in the morning, everything is beautifully calm even in the nauseatingly crowded Paris,

Another lonely hyper-connected dude:

I met Jon Stewart at Deux Magots for breakfast that day—he made me laugh…

Angelina still has the best Mont Blanc of the city and it’s my duty to check the quality every time I am in town:

Of course my favorite is always “un petit noir au comptoir” (a quick small espresso at the cafés’ counter):

“Paris is a movable feast…”

Couldn’t resist adding this image of Maryam from a couple of years ago…