Tag Archives: Holiday

New York

Home for the Holiday

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Shana tova! Happy New Year!

I was more than delighted to leave New York City this past weekend and spend Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, at home in Rochester with my family. My brother is a sophomore in college who flew home for the holiday and my sister is a grad student in Rochester, so she was already home. The three of us overlapped in my parents’ house for all of 24 hours over the summer and I was almost childishly excited to be together again.

My grandparents drove from Montreal and Toronto to be with us, as well. I know that I am very lucky to have all of my grandparents and that they are all healthy and able to drive long distances. Without traffic (almost a certainty at Customs) Rochester is five hours from Montreal and three from Toronto, so it’s a significant amount of travel time. I am so grateful to be able to be with my family at any time, but especially at the start of the new year. So far, this is absolutely the best part of returning to the US.

Rosh Hashanah started Sunday night and I arrived Saturday morning, which meant I had time to do a few Rochester-related activities before contributing to the Rosh Hashanah cooking that my mum had been working on all week. I ended up making two cakes, stuffed vegetables, and doing a variety of prep for other dishes. Before getting involved in holiday preparations, however, we had time for a trip to my favorite local place, the Rochester Public Market.

There are a number of farmers’ markets in various Rochester suburbs, but the downtown public market is the largest and definitely the best, both for quality of produce and variety of options. It’s open year-round Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays with an increasing number of vendors as we get closer to the weekend. When I lived in the Park Ave neighborhood after college I went to the market every Saturday morning to buy my produce before heading to our local grocery chain, Wegmans (which I dearly miss!), for the rest. I knew which vendors would have what I wanted and where they were located, who would sell half baskets for half the price, and who sold parsley leaves in little bags instead of large bunches. Some vendors have changed in the last few years, but the market is still my favorite Rochester place.

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Market shoppers! There’s more diversity here than any other place in the city. (Note: Statement based on personal experience, not empirical evidence.)

My parents picked me up at the airport on Saturday and we headed straight for Juan and Maria’s Empanada Stop for a late breakfast. I meant to get a picture but I was too distracted with my empanada and fried plantains. Next time!

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This is NOT Juan and Maria’s. Juan and Maria’s has a cult following complete with bumper stickers, but this place also looks tasty.

And then it was time to buy vegetables, fruits, and pumpkins fresh from the farmers at ridiculously low prices:

 

In addition to produce, there are meat and cheese stands, local wine vendors, family bakeries, flower stalls, and several craft beverage specialists:

 

Part of the market is reserved for small household goods and occasionally clothing stands:

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Afer completing Mum’s shopping list and heading back to the car, we passed Duke’s Donuts. I’m not a huge fan of sweets but they have apple cider and that’s a very good thing:

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Great place to spend an hour, even if you just look around. There’s lots to see, free samples at many stands (my favorites are cheese and wine), and excellent people watching. Planning a trip to Rochester (at a time when I happen to be home)? Let me know when you’re visiting and I’ll wander around with you!

As good as the public market is, however, it doesn’t top being with my family. I have yet to find anything better than that.

 

Travel Guide

Travel Guide: Ubud, Bali

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To recover from our grade 10 trip to Cambodia and to celebrate Chinese New Year, I headed to the city of Ubud on the Indonesian island of Bali. The stereotypical Bali experience is one of beaches and parties, but Ubud is actually located inland without a beach. This helpful map comes from Lonely Planet:

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I honestly didn’t do much while I was in Ubud and it was fantastic. My very wonderful Airbnb hosts directed me to the Yoga Barn where I bought a three-class pass and thoroughly enjoyed myself. Not only was the studio beautiful, but they also had a delicious juice bar! I took the photos below standing on the deck of Yoga Barn’s complex:

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When I wasn’t in the studio, I walked around town, visited a few must-see sights (the market and palace), ate top notch vegetarian food (Ubud is perfect for those on a health kick with all the yoga and organic restaurants), drank local wine, and wandered in and out of shops.

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I loved this.
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Balinese people love beautiful objects. This was set on the sidewalk in front of a jewelry store.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Example of the offerings I saw everywhere. There was one in front of my door each morning when I woke up.

Most families live in compounds, each of which contains the family temple. Balinese Hinduism is quite different from the more familiar Indian Hinduism, and I was glad to learn about it from my hosts. All around Bali people were erecting bamboo poles like the one below to prepare for the Galungan celebration, marking the return of gods and ancestors. I saw multiple families sitting outside and around their homes stapling together the bamboo flower decorations that wrap these poles, as well as putting together other offerings like the ones seen above.

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As I wandered, I took pictures. While many of the photos below are the exteriors of temples, others are family compounds. Many of these, like the one where I stayed, are used in part for guest houses. The hospitality and tourism sector is the primary industry in Bali right now, thanks in part to the artists who came to Bali in the 1980s in search of an “untouched” place for inspiration. Rice farming, which still happens in Bali though not in trendy Ubud, was basically the only industry before the tourists arrived.

The architecture was probably the most interesting aspect of Ubud for me. I loved the stonework and the solidity and stateliness it gave to the city. Ubud felt solid, strong, and anchored in tradition. The more I talked to my hosts, the more I learned how family and religion are the center of Balinese life. In a very old world way, most people know each other, are related in some manner, and have been in their homes for generations. As a result, people are happy and comfortable and crime is relatively low. Add that to the yoga and it is no wonder being in Ubud left me feeling calm and centered.

Ubud Market, on the other hand, is the opposite of calm and centered. It is as cluttered and chaotic as any market I’ve seen, which made it a wonderful spot to take pictures:

Yes, it started to pour shortly after I took these photos. I ran into a nearby cafe for cover.

 

And that was my time in Ubud. Yoga, food, shopping (I actually made purchases for once!), and wandering. I took it very easy this trip (for once) and thoroughly enjoyed myself. How can you not in a place that has flower patterned sidewalks?

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On My Mind

So Long, 2015!

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On New Year’s Eve, the clock strikes midnight and a new day starts. And that’s about it. I was about 10 years old the first time I was allowed to stay up to watch the ball drop, and I was sorely disappointed. The adults kissed, sipped champagne that no one wanted, turned off the TV, and ushered us kids up to bed. Happy New Year.

People in a variety of lunar-based religions and cultures around the world ring in a new year at different times, and follow different calendars that track different years. The Jewish new year celebration, Rosh Hashanah, takes place in the month of Tishrei (usually September or October) and this year we welcomed 5776. The Islamic calendar has changed a bit in recent years, but the new year often falls in October or November. Chinese New Year usually falls in January or February, and this year will be the Year of the Monkey.

However, most people live their daily lives on the solar Gregorian calendar, which has decided that December 31 is New Year’s Eve and that 2016 begins on January 1. Parts of the Western world adopted the Gregorian calendar in 1582; it replaced the Julian calendar, reforming leap years, leap days, and certain Christian holiday observances. As with any change, switching to the Gregorian calendar did not happen over night. Europe’s majority Catholic countries (Italy, Spain, Portugal) were the first adopters, with China waiting until the revolutions settled down in 1929. And because of time zones, we all ring in the new year at different times over a period of 26 hours. Yes, 26. Because not all countries have daylight savings time. Samoa and Christmas Island are the first countries to enter 2016 and most of the US Minor Outlying Islands are the last.*

As I wait for 2016 to cross over into Eastern Standard Time, I generally like to think about what I’ve done over the course of the past year, as well as what I hope to do in the coming year. I’m not one for New Year’s Resolutions, mostly because I’m stubborn and make commitments to myself on a regular basis (and then, because I’m stubborn, actually follow them). That being said, I have goals. While I’m not going to share them on my blog, I will write them down in my journal so they’re documented for the sake of progeny.

In the meantime, today is just another day – with a big party and a whole lot of glitter at the end.

 

*The information in this paragraph comes from this website. (I am forever reminding my students to cite their sources and feel guilty when I don’t do the same.)