 An arctic weasel performing the manic moves known as the Weasel War Dance. Who acts completely crazy on purpose? Weasels, for one! If they spot a rabbit they'd like for lunch, they'll suddenly start acting like lunatics, leaping in the air, rolling around on the ground, and doing backflips. The bunnies are so stunned at this peculiar display they stop and stare until the weasel works their way close enough to pounce. I think we can all sympathize with those bunnies about now. This past weekend, the world seemed to go mad before our eyes, pouncing on a law-abiding citizen as if he were lawful prey. Throughout a shocked nation, citizens are voicing a new sense of purpose, vowing to put an end to the madness. Purpose, which can give direction and meaning to our lives, comes in two types, according to psychologist Rob Archer. There's self-related, which is focused on personal goals such as earning money and getting ahead, and what he calls transcendent, defined as broader, more outward looking, and contributing, however modestly, to making the world a better place.  Whenever I feel gloomy about the state of the world, I go stand in front of this mural in my California town and feel grateful to my public-spirited neighbors for installing it across from the park. We are all hard-wired to pursue self-related interests, such as finding work and surviving our first day on a new job. The other night, seeking some lighthearted entertainment as a break from the news, I came upon a British comedy about a rookie animal control warden sent to remove a wild weasel from someone's attic. And before I write another word, let me assure you the weasel is FINE. So the rookie sticks his head through the trap door into the attic, the weasel jumps him, and the two tumble down the steps into the living room. The panicked animal runs into the fireplace and moments later runs out again — with his tail on fire. You can guess the rest. The ottoman, couch, and a large throw pillow go up in flames. After considerable pandemonium, the rookie smothers the blazing furniture and the room in fire retardant chemicals. The door opens, and the weasel — tail extinguished — races outside. The rookie’s supervisor steps in, looks at the homeowners, and says, “On a scale from 1 to 10, how would you rate our service today?”  In the sit-com Animal Control, Michael Rowland's character faces off with a formidable weasel. This is a handy reminder, as if another were needed, of the wisdom of Robert Burns’ famous line, "The best-laid schemes o' Mice an' Men / Gang aft agley" ("often go awry”). Clearly that adage applies to the plans of weasels, too. I imagine this little fellow down at the pub afterwards, telling his mates, “I was just browsing around for dogfood or cookies, and it morphed into a scene from Stranger Things!”  Giant monsters and flaming hellscapes abound in the Netflix series Stranger Things. No matter how often our efforts spiral into disaster, we all continue to hatch schemes in aid of some purpose we hold dear. The internet is awash with articles such as The Importance of Living a Purpose-Driven Life, reminding us that purpose can fill us with energy, give our lives meaning, and offer a staggering array of health benefits. “Imagine a drug,” wrote Professor Victor Strecher, author of Life on Purpose, “that was shown to add years to your life; reduce the risk of heart attack and stroke; cut your risk of Alzheimer’s disease by more than half; help you relax during the day and sleep better at night; double your chances of staying drug- and alcohol-free after treatment; activate your natural killer cells; diminish your inflammatory cells; increase your good cholesterol; and repair your DNA. What if this imaginary drug reduced hospital stays so much that it put a dent in the national health-care crisis? Oh, and as a bonus, gave you better sex?” Interested? Who wouldn’t be? Of course, this imaginary drug is actually — you guessed it — purpose. Clearly a wise choice.  So what kind of purpose are we talking about? A grand passion that lasts a lifetime or a sudden impulse to sneak into someone’s house to snack on dogfood and cookies? While we all act in self-interest, Archer’s research found those who also have some transcendent purpose tend to interact with the world in a richer, more fulfilling way. I'm lucky that living in Seville, my Home 2.0, and traveling the world creates so many opportunities to connect with people and learn about life. On my journeys, often I have an ostensible purpose, such as sampling traditional recipes for The Great Mediterranean Comfort Food Tour, and the deeper underlying goal of creating opportunities to chat with grandmothers willing to share their hard-won wisdom and young entrepreneurs exploring their dreams.  Chef Michail shows us how he prepares a delicious Corfu Pastitsada with Free-Range Rooster and Pasta on a rooftop terrace in Athens, 2019. I have become addicted to being thunderstruck, a trait I share with many travel writers. Douglas Adams, best known for The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, expressed this in his own wry way in his travel memoir about endangered species, Last Chance to See. “Some fish were jumping up the beach and into the tree,” he wrote, “which struck me as an odd thing for a fish to do, but I tried not to be judgmental about it. I was feeling pretty raw about my own species, and not much inclined to raise a quizzical eyebrow at others.” I learned these tree-climbing fish, known as mudskippers, are at risk because their coastal habitats are disappearing fast. But because they are (and I say this lovingly) among the least attractive species on earth, and have a lackluster name to boot, efforts to save them aren’t attracting much attention.  Hard to understand why the mudskipper has failed to become a media darling. I haven’t managed to see a mudskipper yet, but on our honeymoon in Costa Rica I encountered its cousin the Jesus lizard, which walks on water. When startled, the creature rears up on its hind legs and sprints across the surface of the nearest puddle or pond, its webbed feet catching air bubbles, its light weight making it possible to traverse distances up to 66 feet. Watching one in action all those years ago, I remember thinking, “You really have to love a world capable of producing creatures like that.”  The basilisk lizard, also known as the Jesus lizard, is a miracle of nature. Photo: Bence Mate / naturepl.com I still feel that way. Yes, in spite of everything that's happening right now. One of my overarching purposes in life is lifting the spirits of my readers, to remind us all of the persistence of joy, even in dark times. So here's one of the most uplifting wildlife pictures I’ve ever seen: a weasel riding on the back of a flying woodpecker in a London park. Is it real? The BBC and world press confirmed it, and as it dates back ten years, to a time before everyone had ready access to AI graphics, I’m going to say yeah, I believe it's genuine. How did it happen? “Green woodpeckers actually feed on the ground,” explained a BBC commentator. “The female lesser weasel weighs about the same as a Mars bar — but is as ferocious as a lion.”  The weasel pounced, the startled woodpecker took off, and Martin Le-May got the photograph of a lifetime. You can imagine her surprise when she leapt on her prey and the bird took flight. When amateur photographer Martin Le-May snapped his now-famous shot, he distracted the weasel just enough for the woodpecker to shake free and fly off. I like to picture that little weasel down at the pub afterwards, telling the one from Animal Control, “Oh, yeah? Well, wait till you hear what happened to me!”  HOME 2.0 This is the latest in my series of blog posts exploring what it takes to create a better life for yourself abroad — or at home, for that matter. See all posts in this series. WANT MORE? To subscribe, send me an email. [email protected] SUBSCRIBED BUT NOT GETTING POST ANNOUNCEMENTS? Check your spam folder. If you still can't find it, please let me know. GOING SOMEWHERE? Enter any destination or topic, such as packing light or road food, in the search box below. If I've written about it, you'll find it.  This may sound a little squirrelly, but hear me out. As you no doubt know, today is National Squirrel Appreciation Day. Yes, it has rolled back around already! Time to get out your squirrel-themed dinnerware and gather the kids to listen to classic tales of squirrelly derring-do. Like the one about Idaho’s heroic Joey, who leapt on a burglar who was trying to steal the household guns. “Damn thing kept attacking me and wouldn’t stop till I left,” said the suspect, who was soon apprehended by the cops; positive identification was easy thanks to all the little claw marks on his arms.  Joey has become a national celebrity. "Any squirrel would have done the same," he modestly told reporters. Incredibly, not everyone celebrates this uniquely American holiday. My sister-in-law dismisses these fluffy-tailed rodents as “rats with better PR.” But squirrels are amazing creatures. They can leap across a space ten times their body length. Arctic squirrels spend eight months a year in the longest and deepest hibernation of any animal. Their California cousins can survive fights with rattlesnakes (scientists are still trying to figure out how they metabolize the venom). Do squirrels deserve their own holiday? I say hell, yeah.  Thought I was kidding about the squirrel-themed dinnerware? Apparently some people go all out on this holiday. No, I'm not sure if Sophia is the squirrel or the householder. Photo: Rosabella Designs on Etsy Why not let squirrels have their day? By this time of year, the big annual festivities are (thankfully) behind us, leaving time to celebrate simpler joys. Today, for instance, is also International Sweat Pants Day, National Hugging Day, and National Grandma Day. So pull on some sloppy athletic pants and go hug your Nana — or the nearest squirrel. Your choice. This past week Rich and I celebrated National Shop for Travel Day, although to be honest I had no idea such a holiday existed, let alone that it fell on the second Tuesday in January. But when I happened across that fun fact online yesterday, I considered it a good omen. Clearly the Universe is supporting our intention (NOT a New Year’s Resolution) to travel more — and with even less baggage than usual. As my regular readers know, Rich is a die-hard fan of luggage-free travel. He’s never happier than when he’s strolling to the train station with nothing but a toothbrush, a passport, and a few odds and ends in his pockets, wearing sturdy outerwear and the world’s fastest-drying undergarments.  This is everything Rich brought along our first luggage-free trip, back in 2015. Going baggage-free is fun from time to time, but I generally like a few more creature comforts. (Call me a hedonist.) For road trips lasting weeks or months, we typically each take one small rollaboard, with mix-and-match clothes that will stand up to lots of washing. But for our current long-weekend road trips, we are going even more minimalist, sharing a single small suitcase, one that divides in half with zippered compartments to keep us sorted. Because how much do you really need for a couple of days without any social engagements beyond hanging out together?  Rich and I began considering ways to downsize our luggage following our January Ideas Club gathering, where the theme was “enough.” As you’ve no doubt observed, modern society pushes us toward a sense of scarcity in hopes of influencing our behavior, mostly our buying habits. We’re always being told that standards are rising and frankly, we’re not measuring up. Despite the fact that most people reading this blog have more than enough of life’s essentials — food, clothing, shelter, and heat, to name but a few — we’re told we should be as worried as one of our cave-dwelling ancestors who has just been chased out naked into the snow by a bear. No wonder 62% of Americans admit to overpacking. We modern humans may not have to dodge too many bears these days, but we are constantly chased by the expectation to compare ourselves to celebrities and 20-year-old influencers. And that requires massive amounts of clothing and grooming aids.  "There is no such thing as overpacking," wrote geekgirltravel on Instagram. She says she doesn't mind hauling that much stuff around to feel well dressed. You have to admire her stamina (and her hair). Luckily for me, I’m traveling with a man I’ve been married to for nearly forty years. He does not take me for granted, but I can’t say he’s always a keen observer of my wardrobe. Just the other day he glanced at the trousers I was wearing and asked, “Hey, are those new?” They were the oldest pair of pants I own, faithful companions on fifteen years of journeys around the globe. You can see why I don’t worry too much about satisfying his need for novelty in my attire. So what is enough stuff for a relaxed three-day, two-night road trip?  Everything I need tucks into half the suitcase, with room left over. The bag is an American Tourister two-wheeler, which I find maneuvers better on cobblestones. Basically I wear one outfit: pants (often those comfy old favorites), a warm sweater, a long-sleeved t-shirt, sneakers, puffy vest, long puffy coat, scarf, hat, and gloves. In my half of the suitcase I pack several long-sleeved t-shirts, socks, underwear, loose yoga pants, a pajama top, and furry slippers. I just bought a smaller toiletry kit for the bare necessities. That’s it! Rich packs even less. Which means there would be plenty of room for our devices (one laptop and two e-readers) in our common suitcase. But I prefer to keep those over my shoulder in a separate bag. On crowded trains we sometimes have to leave luggage in the common shelves by the exit, and why chance losing expensive electronics? This way, in the unlikely event someone ever swiped our suitcase, they would be deeply disappointed at the meager pickings, and it would be easy enough for us to replace our stuff. Now, some readers may be wondering why, if I am in southern Spain, I need a puffy vest, puffy coat, heavy scarf, hat, and gloves. Shouldn’t I be basking in warm sunshine, here in my Home 2.0? Yes, I should. But we’re experiencing an unusually cold winter, with temperatures often hitting freezing and lots of fog and rain. If you’re coming here in the next week or so, pack for London, not Seville.  Dressed for chilly weather in Córdoba The upside of this kind of bad weather, which I’ve now experienced in Cádiz and Córdoba as well as Seville, is that it helps me catch up on my sleep. I get up late in the morning and take long afternoon siestas, made all the more blissful by the sound of rain on the windows. I can see why many anthropologists are now coming around to the idea that proto-humans used to hibernate. That theory sprang from discoveries in northern Spain’s Sima de los Huesos (Pit of Bones), one of the world’s most important fossil sites. Skeletons from 430,000 years ago included adolescents with marks of a particular kind of malnutrition associated with going into hibernation without sufficient fat reserves. The adults apparently did just fine.  And if Sigourney Weaver and her spaceship crew are anything to go by, humans will be hibernating successfully in the future, too. Our furry friends in the arctic ground squirrel community get a solid eight months of sleep a year, which strikes me as a trifle excessive. But I can see the appeal of a long, deep sleep. Imagine being snug underground with a tummy full of fat and nowhere to go, nothing to do, no headlines to read. I don’t need to tell you this has been a tough winter — in many ways that have nothing to do with the weather. “These are the times that try men’s souls,” said patriot Thomas Paine. “Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered.” So what can we do? “In winter,” wrote Game of Thrones author George R.R. Martin, “we must protect one another, keep each other warm, share our strengths.” And remind each other that spring always comes.  Hibernating ground squirrels. I want to take a moment to thank all those who reached out to us after the terrible train crash in Córdoba on January 18. Thankfully, Rich and I are fine, although horrified at the tragedy that has rocked Spain. We’re also a bit shaken to think we were riding those same trains on those same railway tracks just one week earlier. We are counting our lucky stars. HOME 2.0 This is the latest in my series of blog posts exploring what it takes to create a better life for yourself abroad — or at home, for that matter. See all posts in this series. MORE ON HOW TO REDUCE LUGGAGE OR GO WITHOUT PACK LIGHT QUICK & EASY TIPS FOR TRAVELING EVERYWHERE WITH EXACTLY THE RIGHT STUFF WANT MORE? To subscribe, send me an email. [email protected] SUBSCRIBED BUT NOT GETTING POST ANNOUNCEMENTS? Check your spam folder. If you still can't find it, please let me know. GOING SOMEWHERE? Enter any destination or topic, such as packing light or road food, in the search box below. If I've written about it, you'll find it.  This weekend in Córdoba I don’t know why I bothered with the twelve grapes and red underwear on New Year’s Eve, because it has now become clear to me that the real luck around here is to be acquired in Córdoba. I’m just back from a long weekend in that city — a mere 75 miles from my Home 2.0 in Seville but light-years ahead of us in terms of opportunities to entice good fortune into our lives. And couldn’t we all use some of that right now? Naturally, I visited every luck-luring locale mentioned in the old legends. And although it wasn’t even on my wish list, right away I got a delightful little gift from the Universe. As my regular readers know, I love discovering offbeat words I can play with, words like gobsmacked and cattywampus (so emblematic of our times!) and recombobulated (a state I hope we’ll someday experience collectively). This weekend’s delectable new word is snicket. Of course I’m familiar with Lemony Snicket, author of A Series of Unfortunate Events, but I always assumed it was a made-up word blending snicker and snippet.  But this weekend, when the term cropped up in the novel Out of Time, I learned snicket means a narrow passageway between walls or fences. One online dictionary added helpfully that synonyms include ginnel, vennel, wynd, and twitten. My cup ranneth over, indeed. I wasted no time putting my new word to use. “Rich, Córdoba has a snicket I’d like to visit. It’s called the Calleja Pañuelo — Handkerchief Alley. That’s how narrow it is.” We found it and discovered the skinniest part was just 20 inches, the width of the traditional cravat that adorned the necks of horseback-riding gentlemen of yesteryear.  Today's gentlemen favor somewhat more casual attire. Sadly, the oldest good luck source in town vanished millennia ago: Lake of the Tendillas, home of a wish-granting nymph. She was generous to a fault, oldtimers said, but selfish supplicants wanting wickedness would disappear into her waters forever. Today the spot is marked by a fountain, and I like to think she simply retired and downsized to more compact urban lodgings. On the off chance she was still listening, I went to pay my respects and mention a few requests. The town’s most famous wishing spot is on the outer wall of its most illustrious building, the Mezquita. This was the Great Mosque built in 785 when Abd al-Rahman I founded the Islamic Emirate of Córdoba and wanted to create a mosque so magnificent people would talk about it until the end of time. And he succeeded. The interior was simple perfection, a vast forest of columns that were ancient even then, stretching as far as the eye could see, enlivened with striped arches that were almost playful. Everyone who saw it gasped in wonder.  Repurposed Visigoth and Roman pillars, somewhere between 850 and 1250 of them, created a vast, non-hierarchical space for prayer. When the city fell to the Christians in 1236, a chapel was installed but the mosque remained more or less intact. Then in 1528, despite the furious opposition of everyone in Cordoba except the scheming local bishop, King Charles V ordered the center of the Mezquita to be hollowed out and turned into a massive Catholic cathedral. It’s horrifying what treasures some of those ignorant old despots would tear down in order to build a monument to their own ego. (Thank heavens we are far too enlightened to indulge in that kind of barbaric foolishness today.) Spanish amigos told me when Charles V finally saw the cathedral and realized what had been lost, he wept, saying, “They have taken something unique in all the world and destroyed it to build something you can find in any city.”  You can see where the cathedral was stuck into the center of the mosque. In our era, a further attempt was made to erase even more of the mosque. Church officials began quietly deleting references to the Moorish past from the site’s literature and signage. When Google Maps changed its designation from Cordoba Mosque to Cordoba Cathedral, that was the last straw. Irate citizens and local authorities raised such a ruckus that Google Maps quickly re-labeled it Cordoba Mosque. When I visited, the Moorish origins featured prominently in all the signage and materials I saw. Meanwhile, on one of the Mezquita's outside walls, a section of limestone has crumbled away, revealing the star-shaped fossil of a sea urchin. Naturally (or possibly launched by wily marketing people centuries ago) legends sprang up about this curiosity. Now viewed as an amulet, the Estrella de los Deseos or Star of Wishes, is supposed to make your dreams come true; all you have to do is touch it. As a modern, rational woman I know just how much faith to put in such allegedly lucky charms, but hey, I figured it couldn’t hurt. I couldn’t find any record of actual results produced by the Star of Wishes, but nearby, halfway across the old Roman bridge, stands one emblem of good luck with a solid track record: San Rafael. He’s the city’s Guardian Angel, credited with saving the populace from the plague in 1650, and his images, known as “triumphs,” are scattered all over town.  The Archangel San Rafael, 1651, watches over pedestrians on the old Roman bridge in Córdoba. Photo: Mariajo V. on TripAdvisor San Rafael is the perfect emblem for Córdoba, because he is honored across Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, religions that famously managed to co-exist peacefully for centuries in “the City of Three Cultures.” Yes, my friends, it is possible. During the city’s Islamic era (711 to 1031) Córdoba prided itself on being a center of enlightenment and learning, attracting scholars, scientists, philosophers, artists, and architects of every nation and creed. They had this wacky idea that studying the universe, learning how to think logically, and applying human intelligence to solving our most persistent problems might save our bacon someday. And who knows, maybe it will. Of course, human nature being what it is, there were plenty of egos, biases, and injustices at work, and not everyone flourished in Córdoba. For instance, in the 11th century residents were pressured to convert, causing the Jewish family of ten-year-old Maimonides to leave the city. Living in Morocco, Jerusalem, and Egypt, he picked up a wealth of esoteric knowledge. Maimonides became a rabbi, the most influential Torah scholar of the era, and author of many books including the marvelously titled Guide for the Perplexed that seeks common ground for scientific and spiritual principles.  Notice how shiny the tip of his beard is; people love to visit this statue, which stands in downtown Córdoba, and rub it for luck. When Córdoba put up a statue to him, it soon became another good-fortune charm, which according to scholars who know such things, would have appalled the ultra-rational Maimonides. Yep, I visited him too. And what was I asking for, at all these magical places? Well, I don’t want to risk jinxing things by revealing full details, so I will just say that if you have been at all worried about the state of the world lately, I’ve enlisted the most powerful thinker, angel, nymph, and fossilized sea urchin available, and they’re now working on the case. You’re welcome.  HOME 2.0 This is the latest in my series of blog posts exploring what it takes to create a better life for yourself abroad — or at home, for that matter. See all posts in this series. WANT MORE? To subscribe, send me an email. [email protected] SUBSCRIBED BUT NOT GETTING POST ANNOUNCEMENTS? Check your spam folder. If you still can't find it, please let me know. GOING SOMEWHERE? Enter any destination or topic, such as packing light or road food, in the search box below. If I've written about it, you'll find it.  Merrymakers pose for pictures in front of the Cathedral of the Holy Cross over the Waters in Cádiz, Spain, during the final days of 2025. “I’ve met someone,” confided my friend, a widower in his 80s with a twinkle in his eye. “What’s she like?” I asked, hoping she wasn’t 20-something with expensive tastes. “How old is she?” “My age. And one of the things I like about her? She eats dessert first.” “Sounds like a keeper.” She was. They had a lovely late-life romance, made all the more fun because they decided not to marry; they didn’t want to give up the wicked pleasure of scandalizing their kids and grandkids. I admired her attitude toward life, embodying Erma Bombeck’s famous advice: “Seize the moment. Remember all those women on the Titanic who waved off the dessert cart.” This week, nearly half of all Americans made resolutions to seize the moment and become healthier, happier, thinner, richer, and blessed with a more thrilling love life. Yep, another stunning triumph of hope over experience. Studies show that 60% to 80% of all resolutions will be in the dumpster by the end of this month.  As for me, I’m not making any resolutions, I’m just wallowing in a brief moment of gratitude that I somehow survived the perfect storm known as 2025. “Life is a hurricane, and we board up to save what we can and bow low to the earth to crouch in that small space above the dirt where the wind will not reach,” wrote novelist Jesmyn Ward. “We love each other fiercely, while we live and after we die. We survive.” Yes, 2025 was a Category Five hurricane, and hunkering down until it passed qualifies as a triumph. “When you come out of the storm,” says author Haruki Murakami, “you won’t be the same person who walked in. That’s what this storm’s all about.” Like 2020, this year has marked us all. But hey, any year you can walk away from…  "So much for 2025. What do you think 2026 is going to be like?" If I sound cynical, I’m right on trend. “Cynicism is vastly on the rise,” says Jamil Zaki, the director of the Stanford Social Neuroscience Lab, in a NY Times article about finding hope in 2026. Studies show hope really helps; it’s is a major predictor of well-being, affecting our health, longevity, even how tall we grow. So how can we get ahold of more of this hope stuff? One of Zaki’s top tips: “Replace cynicism with skepticism.” He suggests that instead of automatically assuming 2026 will turn out to be a disaster of biblical proportions, we should try to believe that it only might turn out to be a disaster of biblical proportions. Really? This is our ray of light in the darkness? We only might be doomed?  Graffiti I spotted in Cådiz says, "Health and luck." Followed by a little "OK?" that to me suggests, "But only if it's not too much trouble for you, God!" Just how inauspicious is this year? “Nostradamus’ predictions for 2026 include rivers of blood, plague of bees, and death by lightning,” says a NY Post headline. When I read this aloud to Rich, he just laughed. His attitude is more like author Nancy Mitford, who said, “Life is sometimes sad and often dull, but there are currents in the cake, and here is one of them.” Rich and I have lots of currents in our cake these days, including a promise to ourselves (NOT a resolution) to do a bit more traveling. Over several long Sunday lunches, we discussed how great it feels to be part of our beloved Home 2.0 in Seville but agreed we shouldn’t get so comfortable that we stop exploring the wider world. So we hopped a train south to Cádiz, one of Europe’s oldest continuously inhabited cities. To be in its streets felt like walking through history. Pre-history, even. At the Cádiz Museum, I gazed in awe at 100,000-year-old arrowheads and 250,000-year-old bashing stones. But those were new tech compared to the Acheulean hand axes.  600,000-year-old Acheulean hand axes found in Cadiz They look like they’d be perfect for cutting, chopping, and mashing, but archaeologist have learned you can’t really grip one without endangering your fingers. Despite this pesky drawback, untold millions were painstakingly crafted and carried all over the planet for 1.5 million years. They are the most enduring tool in human history and nobody can figure out why. The ones found in Cádiz were fashioned 600,000 years ago, when our ancestors were just developing cumulative culture, the uniquely human ability to build on past innovations. One theory suggests the hand axes were created by men solely to show off prowess and attract mates, a skill that is still a work in progress today. The museum was founded to house a Phoenician fellow’s sarcophagus unearthed in Cádiz in 1887. A century later a female sarcophagus turned up and everyone got misty-eyed over reuniting the couple. But then they learned the female’s coffin was 70 years older than the male’s and that the body inside it was, in fact, a robust middle-aged guy. A romance? A bromance? Who knows?  Mystery surrounds these 2500-year-old Phoenician sarcophagi in the Cádiz Museum. Cádiz is famously the friendliest city in Spain, and we were welcomed everywhere. In the medieval quarter, we came upon a crowd gathered around a fire, dancing and singing to the beat of a cajón (box drum). Mostly it was flamenco, popular there since the 15th century, but as a nod to the season, there were villancicos (carols), too. People made room for me in the circle and I joined in on Los Peces en el Río (The Fish in the River). Years ago I asked amigos about this villancico; did people think fish were present at the nativity of Jesus? They explained the song’s popularity rests on the line, “Beben y beben and vuelven a beber,” (“They drink and drink and go back and drink some more”) which listeners often take as an invitation to open another bottle.  People from the crowd jumped into the middle of the circle to dance flamenco by the fire. The Spanish are not shy about enjoying themselves. In 1912, when the lavish Café Royalty opened, it became the city’s hallmark of splendid excess. The moment I stepped inside, I realized it was the closest I’d ever get to eating in the Titanic dining room, lost at sea that very same year. Rich and I dined at Café Royalty with friends who agreed it would be a crime to wave away the dessert cart. We ordered picatostes, literally “croutons,” but in this case meaning thick, sweet bread toasted to golden crunchiness with an interior almost as soft as custard. Are you drooling yet? That was hands-down the best dessert, but my favorite meal of the trip was in La Isleta de la Viña, a cozy restaurant filled with families and bullía (joyful noise). Someone had written on the wall “Compartir es vivir” (“To share is to live”). In Cádiz, you’re all in this together. “Cádiz is a city of magic, like Cracow or Dublin, to set the mind on fire at a turn of a corner,” wrote British travel writer Honor Tracy. “The eye is continually fed, the imagination stirred, by a train of spectacles as charming as if they had been contrived.” Cádiz does more than dazzle; it embraces visitors. Let’s hope Nostradamus is wrong about 2026 being full of bees, blood, and bolts of lightning. But just in case, I’m keeping these warm memories close to give me comfort until the next storm passes.  One of my favorite memories of Cádiz is Rich saying, "Look! This is it! The arc of human achievement. From the hand axes to my cell phone." HOME 2.0 This is the latest in my series of blog posts exploring what it takes to create a better life for yourself abroad — or at home, for that matter. See all posts in this series. WANT MORE? To subscribe, send me an email. [email protected] SUBSCRIBED BUT NOT GETTING POST ANNOUNCEMENTS? Check your spam folder. If you still can't find it, please let me know. GOING SOMEWHERE? Enter any destination or topic, such as packing light or road food, in the search box below. If I've written about it, you'll find it. |
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