Category: travel

Easter

I spent Friday afternoon and Saturday in Milwaukee with my girls. The weather was as almost as bad as it could be, so we didn’t bike together as we originally planned, but we spent a lot of time together, which was very satisfying, especially after the last week as it was.

I packed several egg coloring sets and three boxes of cookies I baked last Sunday and decorated on Thursday.

After my escorting shift, I picked up more pastries from Vanille before heading to Union Station and boarding the Hiawatha train to Milwaukee. The first four days of the week felt like one gigantic workday, and I was more than tired, both physically and emotionally. I literally felt my legs heavy and difficult to move. On Thursday night, I sat on the floor in front of the opened suitcase unable to pack my stuff.

I feel tons better ow, although the to-do list didn’t become shorter. We had a great time in Milwaukee, decorating more cookies, coloring eggs, reading books, and talking. It’s amazing how much you can rechange just by being together with your loved ones.

Nadia had a group violin lesson, so we all went to the conservatory, and this time, I had time to explore this beautiful building.

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The Best Hot Chocolate

The best thing that happened to me in Pasadena was Amara Cafe! It was on the list of recommended places to eat from the hotel reception. I was a little bit suspicious because I didn’t know much about Venezuelan cuisine, and Mexican cuisine is not my favorite, but after some hesitation, I went there, and I was sold on the spot!

I asked the clerk what kind of hot chocolate he’d recommend, and he said: Venezuelan, of course! I ate my arepa and proceeded with hot chocolate. Never in my life, even in Lausanne, I tasted hot chocolate like this! I was sitting, sipping it slowly, and taking it in. It felt more than a drink, more than a food – a complete mind and body experience!

I returned to Amara one more time, on Sunday morning- thankfully, their opening time does not change, and although the city was mostly asleep at 7-30 AM on Sunday, the chocolate was ready.

The owner came out and asked me how I liked it, and I tried to describe my feelings:). He said: you can make it at home, and gave me a package: just follow the instructions! I am unsure whether I can really do it myself, but I will give it a try!

Norman Simon Museum

One of my old friends, with whom we unintentionally fell out of touch about ten years ago, lives very close to Pasadena, and I messaged her on my way to the conference. To my delight, she immediately responded, and we agreed to meet. We ended up meeting twice: on Friday night, when we mostly talked, and on Saturday night, when we went to the Norton Simon Art Museum.

The museum is incredible – the whole collection was put together by one person, and although relatively small, it contains an amazing selection of the finest works of world art. I also quite enjoyed reading the annotations to the artworks: detailed, clever, thought-provoking. I didn’t even notice the time when we were informed that museum was about to close.

Just a couple of artworks to illustrate my point: in an hour and a half, a complete history of European art from 13th to 20th century is unfolding in front of you, and each major trend and style is covered. I recall this visit and smile 🙂

National Arboretum

The most interesting part of our DC trip was the visit to the National Arboretum, specifically to their Bonsai exhibit. Vlad asked us whether we would be interested, and we said yes, but then all the plans got mixed up because of the weather, and I guess Vlad didn’t want to pressure us. We still said we wanted, and it was great! Vlad and Dylon are a lot into bonsai, and they train several bonsias on their deck. Vlad’s knowledge on the subject is really impressive and he talks about it with real passion. I learned a lot of new things from him, like the fact that most often bonsais are found in nature, and then people keep training them and guiding their development. A lot of bonsais in the Arboretum are more than a hundred years in training, and for many, the date they were discovered is unknown. Vlad explained to us the differences in bonsai styles, and which species are used most often. When he was in Japan, he was gifted a catalog of the first after-WWII bonsai exhibit, and we looked through it:).

I took a lot of pictures; I will post a small portion of them, just to demonstrate the variety of what we saw.

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Pasadena

Since I have already reposted my post about the conference, I will continue mixing up two trips.

I arrived in Pasadena on Wednesday evening. I had never been to Pasadena before. I have been to SF multiple times, and I’ve been to LA once, but never to Pasadena. I never loved California like many people do, and I didn’t expect anything different this time, but Pasadena took me by surprise. I entered my hotel room at 7 PM on Wednesday, looked around, saw a balcony and a couch by it, crushed on it, stretched my legs, and all of a sudden felt relaxed like I had never been for a long time. I didn’t even want to think “why”, I just enjoyed this moment.

During the conference, I used all the opportunities to walk around and look around.

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What We Saw In DC

My next trip is already in progress, and I still haven’t shown everything we saw in DC, so I will be brief.

Sunday was not much better than Saturday weather-wise. It was not raining, but it was very cold, and the wind blew worse than in Chicago! We still saw a lot, but it was going like this; DYlon would drive us to a place, we would get out of the car, see around, and jump back in :).

The neighborhood where Vlad and Dylon live
The Supreme Court
The Capitol
Continue reading “What We Saw In DC” →

Rose Luxury Dinner

That was the place we had the only dinner on this trip (Friday at Silver Lyan felt very much like dinner for me, but apparently not for Vlad :), and on Sunday, Boris and I had dinner at the American Airlines lounge). Vlad was going to keep our dinner destination a secret, but accidentally sent me an email which was meant to be for Dylon :).

The full pdf of the menu is here, and here is a picture I took in the restaurant:

As you can see, that’s another level of culinary art (I can assure you that everything tasted most unusual, like you never could imagine!). Since there were four of us, Vlad ordered the whole menu, and each dish was delivered with a story that was, unfortunately, not on the menu! Vlad also ordered a wine pairing for him and me to share. Not all pictures turned out well, but most of these dishes are below:

Only a spoon of ice cream with caviar in the middle is edible, the rest is decoration:)
Surprisingly, I didn’t like desserts that much, this one it the only one I liked

The ethical question I have is whether it is acceptable to have a dinner for four for the price, which is equivalent to some people’s monthly income. Yes, that’s because Vlad gives more than 30% tips, and yes, that’s in DC where people’s income is higher than in Chicago, and yes, this was more of an art than food, but still…

National Art Gallery

To say the weather in DC was bad is not enough. It was the worst you could imagine! There was pouring rain all Saturday, so we had to change our plans and head to the museums. Unfortunately, we were not alone: everybody who came to DC for a weekend, did the same, so there were crowds everywhere.

Boris and I headed to the National Gallery of Arts. The first thing we saw there was an exhibit of German Expressionism.

“Sorrow” by Egon Schiele
“In God’s Hands”
Gramatte “Self-pportrait with wife”. It took me a while to see “a couple”

We stopped by Cauguin an Van Gogh, because you can’t pass them, and then we saw the Flemish collection.

“An Old WOman Dozing over a Book” seems very familiar 🙂

Unfortunately, the side effect of all museums in DC being free is the requirement to get passes in advance, and since we didn’t plan for it, we couldn’t get into many of them. Once again, something for the next time!

Two Breakfast Places In DC

I know, I know… but when it’s about Vlad, it’s inevitably about good food :). And I still have one more food-related post in the making :).

I loved both breakfast places we’ve been, both the food and the aesthetics.

Silver Lyan

On Friday night, shortly after arrival, we went downstairs to Silver Lyan bar to see Vlad at work. Last time when we were in DC, he were in Silver Lyan for Hanami, and I wanted to see how it is during it’s “regular operations.” Most importantly, it was a chance to see Vlad doing “his thing,” which always tells about him more than anything else. So we went there, and it was pretty amazing. Now, that Vlad is not in Chicago, I do not have chances to try his cocktails that often and I almost forgot what an extraordinary experience it is! Each cocktail has it’s story (and Vlad told me that they write the stories first and then they figure out how to “make it happen.” He promest to give me the pdfs of all of these stories (I didn’t take the menu pictutures), so at this moment, images only.

Nimbus Spritz
(Bacardí Carta Blanca, carrot mead, mushroom caramel, spruce, White Lyan water, clay “champagne”)
Air Bee n Bee (Patrón blanco, almond blossom, hay-smoked bee larvae, mango vinegar, Mosel riesling)
Salmon Cannon (alcohol-free version)
Porter’s Tropical Old Tom, birchwood booch, douglas fir, ‘pink’ tea
Lychee Martini
(Roku gin, lychee sherbet, elderflower shochu,
black grape)
Silver Service Martini
(Fords gin, served 50:50 with Dolin vermouth
with oyster, olive, house-pickled onion and lemon)

Actually, I just realised that I didn’t take a picture of the cocktail I liked most – the one which Vlad made when he was in Tokio – Lychee Martini with elderflower shochu. And to be clear – Vlad made a mini-version of each of the cocktails for me, so that I could taste several (and I still didn’t finish even mini-versions).

All the different foods we tried during these two days of stay ended were great, and unfortunately, the rest of our agenda was severely affected by the weather. it was pouring rain on Saturday, and bitterly cold and windy on Sunday, so things went not exactly as planned, although I we still did a lot and talked a lot 🙂