I got HIGHLIGHTS!

I tried taking photos of myself that would show that I have recently gotten HIGHLIGHTS in my hair, which I have never had done professionally. Tarlan and I once had a disastrous yet memorably funny experience at Princeton of trying to give ourselves "chunky" highlights, wherein we wore awful caps with little holes, from which we pulled out chunks of hair to bleach. We looked like two different kinds of skunks for some time.

In Rome with all its sunshine, I was inspired to get highlights in an attempt to catch more sunshine and light on my hair, which I have been trying to grow out long. I now have rather subtle yet quite intricate layers of highlights, and I really like them. I tried taking a photo of myself showcasing my first head full of professionally done highlights... but alas, it didn't really work (so far), one cannot tell in the photo (especially with flash), SO subtle as they are...

(I shall have David try to take a photo in the daytime sometime... to be continued...)

Oh, hot Toronto!

Back in Toronto -- and the heat is on! Literally. It's apparently around 34 degrees Celcius today, which is like... really hot Farenheit.

I am back in Canada for more auditions -- got in last night, here 2 nights, returning to New York tomorrow night. The staff at Le Germain Hotel knows me at this point, and I have a stash of office supplies left in their closet (printers, file racks, papers, etc.). It's a nice, chic hotel, with super duper comfy bed and pillows (so much so that David and I bought pillows for our home here on one trip) -- but I really have had just enough of casting for the time being, thinking about casting, trying to work out casting, keeping multiple shows in my head. My brain is about to burst! It has been so much traveling and so much casting, we are approaching the "creatives' holiday" period (where we are allowed holidays and are not expected to travel or be called upon to do so), and I must confess, it comes at the right time. I miss being at home in New York, seeing my friends, catching up, and I miss David and our non-work life in New York, even if we are only apart for a couple of nights. (Incidentally, this is David's first experience being in New York by himself and he is doing very well, eating left over melanzane alla parmigiana and tonight, he is having Robin over for a dinner of organic chicken sausages, salad and organic cider).

Toronto is summer hot, but it is nice here like this. There is a big "patio culture" -- drinking outside, on rooftops, mingling outdoors is a big thing, and there is a general buzz with the heat and the extended daylight. I have come to know this city and am fond of it, the people are nice. I am hoping that my New York friends will come visit me up here while I reside in this city (crossing fingers that the apartment they find for me is nice!). Tonight, Eleanor and I will go to Lee's, one of my favorite restaurants in Toronto, for a meal, which I hope will be delicious. And then one more day of auditions, then back to New York! There will be more auditions in New York (2 days), but at least I can go to them having woken up in my own bed, in my own apartment, next to my husband, and have a closet full of clothes from which to dress myself for the day. And then I will at least have the possibility, even if not realized, of seeing my friends in the evening, after work.

And this makes a whole lot of difference.

New Parmigiana Deliciana

Hi there - David here - yes Father Blogger I have sinned... it has been three months since my last post.
What has brought you out of your misery to blog again child?
It was... da da daan. Tomoko's Melanzane alla Parmigiana.
At first glance a simple, possibly slightly underwhelming (only on a dinner menu - NEVER if Tomoko is making it) mix of eggplant, cheeses, tomato, egg and herbs - but in the hands of a culinary poet (like my wife) it can transform into something truly surprising and yes, beautiful and extremely tasty.

Tomoko was cooking for three and a half hours to bring this particular masterpiece into life - but here it is - and boy am I glad to be alive!

Until next time,
DavidXXXX

Melanzane alla Parmigiana

(My first melanzane alla parmigiana -- not the best photo as it is taken quickly with my mobile, but you get the idea...)

I decided to attempt to cook my first melanzane alla parmigiana this evening, using mostly organic products (except for the cheeses). I had an image of myself very domestic goddess-like, cooking up the warm and homey dish as David returned home from his work trip to Toronto.

Unfortunately, my course of true domestic goddess-ness ne'er ran so smooth: (1) The dish took a lot longer to make than I anticipated. I began at 8:30PM and, now at 11:30PM, the dish is finally in the oven cooking. While it is smelling lovely and the apartment has filled with that gorgeous home-cooked-meal-in-the-making aroma, it is nearly midnight and really the dish might no longer be considered a "dinner" so much as a "late night meal." (2) David's flight has been re-routed, so he is still on his way home as I type. Apparently, there was some brake problem with his air craft -- fortunately, the plane landed safely, in Newark instead of La Guardia. So his journey home had more thrill than expected.

Alas, things don't always go as impeccably as one imagines. But I do have high hopes for my melanzane alla parmigiana and David is sure to be hungry, having traveled much of the evening. And I discovered our new favorite white wine at our local wine store, so that bottle is chilling in the fridge (the wine is called Conundrum - a Californian wine, a blend, gorgeous and usually very expensive in restaurants...it was $30 at our neighborhood wine store, still not cheap but far cheaper than if consumed at a restaurant). So hopefully all will turn out fine in the end -- perhaps an evening that is a little later in kicking off than we wished, but nice nonetheless.

(I shall now go make a salad of organic mache...ha! I am so domestic goddess-like :)

Photoshoot with champagne bottles

Today we drafted the invitation for my impending 28th birthday. To this end we took a series of silly photos of ourselves with champagne bottles using Mac PhotoBooth (the "Warhol" effect) -- we hope to use one of the pics in the final invitation. We took quite a few and of them there were some solidly silly and perhaps campy/theatrical ones, so we thought we'd post some of our faves here.

Note that I tend to hit my "model mark" (ha ha) pretty consistently while David, being the less predictable and more experimental performer of the two, tries a few poses:

Back in NY and on the traveling merry-go-round again

David and I returned to New York Wednesday night. It's great to be back and become re-acquainted with our very own apartment and our very own clutter of the-rest-of-our-things-we-don't-travel-with.

But it won't be long before we're traveling again, and the next month and a bit looks like a whirlwind. This Saturday David will go up to Toronto for the day to work with a Johnny candidate; Sunday night I will go up to Toronto for 2 nights, come back to New York Tuesday night -- Sunday through Tuesday will be the first time David has home-sat in New York by himself! Starting Wednesday, we will have casting sessions in New York, joined by members of our team from London.

After these sessions, we should (crossing our fingers) have some downtime enough to party a bit for my 28th birthday coming up. Then David and I will have our much anticipated holiday in the Caribbean: one night in Barbados, then a week in Mustique. We can't wait!

Then the real whirlwind begins: it's unclear if I need to go back to London in late July, it's likely...then Amsterdam again for a couple of days...then to Hamburg for a couple of days... We have shows all over that are nearly cast but not quite, which makes these trips probable and necessary: London re-cast, Utrecht (hence auditions in Amsterdam), Toronto, and a possible Stuttgart production (hence Hamburg and David's most recent casting tour to see if there were enough talent to might support another German production in addition to Hamburg). While it is good to travel, these days I feel I am hardly home and, in some way, parts of my life are sort of passing by in all this traveling. Then, of course, David goes to London for 8 weeks for the re-cast rehearsals, and I hope to tag along with him for almost a week before I have to relocate to Toronto for the rehearsal process through opening night...

...so lots more traveling ahead. I am trying to take a deep breath, make the most of each day I have at home in New York. Today we went to Whole Foods and picked up a few groceries, muddling over this organic produce or that. This kind of domestic activity was nice. Sometimes, such activity is what keeps us sane.

Agata e Romeo

For our final dinner in Rome, we went to Agata e Romeo. Agata e Romeo is listed as one of the top 10 Rome restaurants in numerous books and foodie websites, but we never got around to going to it last year as we either had other plans or the restaurant was fully booked. On our last evening in Rome, we committed to going to it.

To be honest, I wasn't sure about the restaurant, which is probably why we didn't try harder to go last November. In various reviews I read Agata was touted as being a well-known "TV chef," and that sounded suspicious and potentially unappealing to me -- which is stupid, really, since I love Mario Batali and Jamie Oliver and they are TV chefs of a sort, too. Fortunately, my suspicions turned out to be totally silly. Agata e Romeo uses beautiful, seasonally fresh produce in a wide ranging menu, and its reputation is well-deserved. The restaurant is cozy and specific while being romantic and elegant, run by a wife (Agata) and husband (Romeo) team. Romeo greets you at the door and acts as the warm host and Agata is in the kitchen. At the end of the evening, when we were the only people left in the restaurant (as usual), we had the chance to meet them both and express our delight with the food. Agata and Romeo were both lovely and gracious, and seemed truly pleased that we had a fabulous time.

David and I shared a starter of stuffed zucchini flowers that had NOT been battered and fried, but baked, stuffed with ricotta cheese and placed over a cheesy soup flavored with saffron. For our first courses, David had a "timbale of hollow pasta stuffed with eggplant and smoked scamorza" (pictured above) -- basically, a pasta "log" with eggplant and a soft smoked cheese sauce. This dish was delicious. I, in turn, had grilled scallops wrapped in prosciutto with a garlic and leak sauce. For our mains, I had wonderful breaded loin of tuna and David ate quail. Agata's millefeuille is well-mentioned in various reviews, so this is what we had -- and it was a terrific sweet finish. Agata e Romeo has an extensive wine list, too, and we had a bottle of 1997 Traminer that went fabulously with our food and for our tastes. With dessert David had a liqueur made of hazelnuts and I had a proper absinthe, which was powerful but nice. We had a wonderfully romantic evening, and were pleased with our final dinner choice.

(Agata's millefeuille)

Rome is a wonderful city -- great for foodies like us. It was the perfect few days' holiday after grueling casting weeks in various cities in Europe. In Rome, we got a city holiday with a beach-and-sun-holiday attitude (as well as beach and sun), with plenty of delicious food. Next time we visit Italy, we hope to do a little bit more driving and touring through various places... and learn a bit more Italian.

(In the mean time, I think David has gained back the weight he lost while on his casting tour... and I may have gained some, too... but alas, that is a holiday in Rome!)

A couple more snapshots...

Another photo from our trip to the beach: David playing with Dylan, the cutest pudgiest baby around (he's half Indian, half British). Dylan is held up by Daniel, his godfather and our new Roman friend.

David drinking a fruity, frothy concoction of cantaloupe (rock melon, as Australians call it) and banana. We thought that the drink was alcoholic, but we could not figure out if there was any alcohol in it. The drink was delicious anyhow, and we enjoyed having a sit-down in the Piazza della Rotunda, right in front of the Pantheon (pictured behind David).

Another day of eating around Rome

(Tomoko grinning with delight over a wonderful dish of melanzane alla parmigiana...)

David and I went to lunch in the Da Giggetto, to re-experience the carciofi alla giudia and the melanzane alla parmigiana I ate the first night in Rome. The dishes did not disappoint, and we had a wonderful bottle of Italian Gewurtraminer while sitting outside overlooking the Portico d'Ottavia. It was interesting to be in the Jewish Ghetto during the daytime, which we hadn't done before, and walk around the Portico d'Ottavia and the Teatro di Marcello after lunch.

After lunch, we crossed the Tiber and to Trastevere, where David took me to a little piazza he had gone with the Dirty Dancing crew their first night in Rome. It was a pleasant walk, although the temperature seemed to rise rapidly as the clouds parted and the bright Roman sun shone again. On our return back from Trastevere, we decided to cool down with gelato on Tiber Island and ate on the bridge overlooking part of the river (the Tiber splits into two parts where we were, thus creating "Tiber Island" in the middle).

(David's gelato on the left, Tomoko's more piccolo gelato on the right...)

David, as usual, ate a massive copa of rather rich and creamy flavors: cinnamon, tiramisu, and panacotta.

I, in turn, had a piccolo copa of prugna (prune) and limone (lemon). The prune flavor gelato, more like a sorbet, was fresh and wonderful, with real prune bits. Since I cannot normally eat pit fruits raw (due to a particular allergy -- I can eat pit fruits cooked), the sorbet was a fantastic treat for me, as I could savor the prune flavors in a tasty cool treat without the itchy allergic reaction:

It is very hot in Rome today, so we walked some more, did some shopping (I purchased a carry-on suitcase with computer compartment from Mandarina Duck, and David purchased a cool polo shirt), and now we are back in our hotel room cooling down, chilling out, me having a little glass of limoncello and David Mirto, his new favorite liqueur. We have not decided what to do for our last meal in Rome... but, as we are in Rome, the options are plenty.

Porcini season... and a new obsession

So it may not be the season for carciofi or white truffles (which were in season when we were in Rome last year, in November), but it is currently the season for porcini mushrooms and, boy, are they delicious. Yesterday we went to Matricianella for lunch outside, and I had a fantastic plate of simply grilled porcini mushrooms (pictured above).

I have also discovered a new obsession, one that has replaced (for the time being) my obsession for chicken wings (probably a good thing). My new food obsession is melanzane alla parmigiana -- or eggplant parmigiana. I am hopelessly in love with this dish, and so ate it at Matricianella:

Melanzane alla parmigiana is different than the typical eggplant parmigiana one might find in the US. In the US, the dish often is comprised of bread-crumb covered pieces of eggplant that are fried, then covered in cheese and tomato sauce. Not so here. Here in Rome, I have discovered that melanzane alla parmigiana is a baked dish of eggplant -- not battered -- with lovely tomato sauce and cheese. It is a far superior and elegant dish than one's typical eggplant parmigiana one might eat at an Italian restaurant in New York. I must confess I think I prefer the melanzane alla parmigiana I had the first night -- but the version at Matricianella was lovely and I ate all of it anyway. I must learn to make this dish myself when I return to New York... perhaps organically.

Driving to Capocotta

(David very happy with our cute little convertible car -- the Nissan Micra...)

Sunday, David and I rented a car to drive to Capocotta, a beach outside of Rome. We were meeting our new Roman friends at the beach for lunch and some fun in the sun: Chiara and her roommate Ricardo, their old school friend Andrew from Milan, Elizabeth -- a dancer we met at auditions and an old friend of Chiara -- and her husband Daniel, as well as Elizabeth's friends from London, a married couple with two young children. (Elizabeth and Daniel are both half Brit and Italian.) While Chiara wanted us to rent motos (scooters/motorcycles) to travel to the beach, as the traffic is bad, we prudently declined and decided to rent a car instead (since I don't have my license, a moto would require that David and I ride tandem, and we are simply not that risk-taking). David was ecstatic to drive, and even more elated when we got a small convertible car at Avis.


Once we were able to find our way out of Rome, the drive to the beach itself was easy. We were able to take in he scenery and listen to a collection of great Nu Jazz CDs we'd purchase the day before. We felt quite glamorous and were pleased with ourselves...

(David very unhappy with the traffic and utter lack of any kind of parking in Capocotta...)

...until we reached the beach. We'd been warned that the traffic and parking was a nightmare -- we did not realize just how bad and chaotic it was. There were cars and motos EVERYWHERE, and it seemed a free-for-all in terms of parking. We didn't know what to do, and David, very unhappy and panic-rising, nearly turned the car around to go home. Luckily for us, Chiara came to our rescue and negotiated a deal with a guy who hangs around the road finding parking for cars and/or makes sure double parked cars are not towed by the police. We gave this guy 10 Euro and, voila, we had our convertible parked properly!

In Italy, it is very useful to have an attractive, Italian friend who seems to be able to fix and negotiate any kind of situation.


Once the car was parked, we had a gorgeous and relaxing day at the beach. After a lunch of fresh seafood (simply grilled tuna drizzled in olive oil and lemon, octopus, grilled calamari) and Falanghina (Chiara's favorite wine), we plopped ourselves on lounge chairs on the beach. We swam a bit -- the water was cold at first, but then was lovely once we got used to it -- and generally lazed about on the beach, chatting with our new friends and playing with Jasmine, 3, and her little brother, Dylan, 7 months old.

Chiara and her friends have been tremendously generous and hospitable to us -- they have made our second Rome trip special and specific, and have made sure we felt a part of their community. Whether it's dinner or a Sunday at the beach, or wine or carcioffi (which more than one person have very concernedly explained to me are not in season, as if they would not want me to think that the carcioffi I might eat now would be of the normative standard of the dish when they are, indeed, in season), our Roman friends are terrifically interested in our seeing all the loveliness and colors of Rome as they enjoy their city. And this has made our trip wonderfully memorable, and also, I think we will leave Rome with new friends we'd love to keep in our lives.


TM

Room with Our Roman View

A snapshot of sunset from our fantastic balcony from the Westin Excelsior. (I never did find my battery charger for my digital camera, which means all our blogged photos so far must be taken by my trusty Nokia mobile phone.)

Roman Holiday

(The Westin Excelsior Hotel gave us a bottle of Laurent-Perrier Champagne to celebrate our "honeymoon.")

David and I are in ROMA! And for a holiday, not for work! We truly love Rome, and are ecstatic to be back in this gorgeous city.

David has been in Rome since Thursday for casting -- the final city in his multi-city casting tour. I finished casting in London Thursday, and flew out to Rome on the first plane available Friday morning -- 6:50AM, which meant I finished packing at 2AM, slept for an hour, got ready, and left around 4AM in the drizzling, miserable London dawn. Eleanor traveled to Rome, too, as we wanted to see the final Rome casting day on Friday. Although sleep-deprived and bleary-eyed, Eleanor and I were delighted to leave gray London for sunny, summery Rome. We went directly to the audition venue from the airport, cast until a little after 5PM, and then retreated back to our respective hotels for a bit of a siesta before dinner with the crew. Although there was something strange about finding myself at yet another casting session in a different country (almost masochistic), my casting food consumption looked brighter at lunch time: gone were the terrible chicken slices and pre-prepared buckets of salad from Marks & Spencers (on a good day) or a McDonald's grilled chicken sandwich (on a bad day); at lunch in Rome, we sat down to lovely thin crust pizzas, still hot, and a bottle of Falanghina.

I like casting in Rome.

David has gotten fabulous feed-back from his German casting team (with whom he has been doing this European casting tour), and, indeed, it was wonderful for me to see him working with dancers again. It has only been a few weeks since we last worked together, but I realized how much I had missed his energy and generous spirit as a colleague.

(David working with Italian dancers... they happen to be the petite couple, so David towers over them.)

(Possibly the best carciofo I have ever eaten in Rome.)

(The eggplant parmigiana that makes me think it might just be possible to be a vegetarian.)

Last night, we went out to dinner with the casting crew as well as Chiara, a fierce Italian dance legend who apparently knows and is respected by everyone in Italian show business. She has been helping us with our casting in Rome, and is fabulous. She took us to a great, traditional Roman restaurant, where I very happily ate carciofi (fried artichoke) and eggplant parmigiana, and David ate stuffed zucchini flowers and some sort of grilled fish. We drank a lovely bottle of Roero Arneis. Chiara brought with her ten of her own friends, too, so dinner was loud and merry and spanned over two long tables. After dinner, we were invited to a party at Chiara's gorgeous apartment -- and oh, what fun was had. It was our first Roman house party, and WE LOVED IT. We met lots of lovely people, danced the night away, and decided that we would join some of the people on a trip to the beach this weekend.

Today, we moved hotels -- we left the hotel where David was staying for casting (arranged by work), and checked into the Westin Excelsior Hotel, where we will stay for 3 nights, maybe 4 if we can arrange it with work. We told the hotel that we were on our honeymoon, which we'd like to believe is pretty much true. After all, we only had 3 days of honeymooning when we honeymooned, because David had to get back to work -- then, it stands to reason that we still have some honeymooning days left for us to take. The Westin is great, and we have been given a gorgeous bottle of Champagne (photo at top) and strawberries. We have a great balcony overlooking Rome, and are happily situated. We spent the day wandering around the fancy shops -- I purchased a Missoni bathing suit, which is gorgeous (I have wanted one for some time, and what better city to buy a Missoni bathing suit than Rome?) and David bought swim trunks, as neither of us had brought our swimmers, not having anticipated a trip to an Italian beach.

And so begins our Roman holiday... we hope to eat, drink and rest!

Working together, traveling together or sometimes being apart...

As a reader of our blog, you would know that David and I have been "apart" whilst he has been on his European casting tour and I have been working on the Dutch casting and now the London re-cast. Strangely enough, a lot of people, from my friends back in the US to my colleagues here in London, have expressed their sympathy for me that "it must be hard for you and David to be apart so much."

Which is interesting -- do I show it in my face, I wonder, or in the tone of my emails or even blogs? Most likely. And it is true, it never gets easier being apart, especially when we married each other so that we could be together, after having spent months apart halfway around the world. But what's interesting about this sudden spurt of sympathy toward our being "apart" is that... well, we haven't been apart in some time, given our industry standards, and I have been feeling like we have gotten quite soft and wimpy about it all, missing each other when we have, in fact, managed to see each other every weekend since David's European casting tour began.

Don't get me wrong -- I say again, it's never easy to be apart. But I also have no illusions about how great we have had it, and hopefully, crossing our fingers and surviving being-apart-dom here and there, we shall. For a long while, whether its Hamburg or London or trips to Toronto or Amsterdam, David and I have managed to stick together as life partners as well as work colleagues. We have come into ourselves as a couple who can work and travel and live together. We work with colleagues whose partners are back home, who miss their families all the time. When working on the same production/territory, we get to travel together as well as work together -- we see each other a lot! And it's funny that after having been apart in more severe ways, this is the time when people seem to notice that we are apart. I guess that reflects how our colleagues and friends have become accustomed to seeing us together -- so when seeing one of us without the other, the physical, presence "lack" of The Other Half grows more poignant for third parties.

In reality, I think we might spend more time together than most couples who don't travel as much as we do for their jobs, since we live and work together closely.

The hard part is, indeed, coming up: when David works in London for the re-cast rehearsals and I will be in Toronto. But somehow, we shall manage. It's not simple, and not without the domestic negotiations that might happen within any household -- only for us, sometimes they must be conducted across countries or even continents, over time differences.

After being apart from each other due to the show for months at a time, we were, in many ways, desperate to log in as much time together as possible. Luckily, this feeling of wanting to spend as much time with each other as possible has not dwindled. But I find that we have gotten a bit better about being apart, and are learning each day how to prioritize our life together, not let work and other "stuff" distract us from what is truly important -- each other. We are constantly learning about communication, and empowering ourselves to make decisions that best put our life together forward -- like when David flew in from Stockholm to be with me in London, even if it meant waking up at an ungodly hour to fly to casting in Vienna on Monday, because I needed him.

Dirty Dancing is such an ever-expanding enterprise, it is often easy to get consumed by it or feel overwhelmed, especially when both parties in a couple are working on it. But we have learned a lot from it, gained a lot from it, and are always evolving with each other, inspired by the often unusual or literally foreign circumstances thrown in our way.

We do miss each other, and it would always be better to be together. But it is funny these days when people express lovely sympathy for our being apart. I remember when I used to feel sorry for myself for not having my love right by me all the time. These days, while I miss David, I know I will speak to him a hundred times that day and grow abreast of each other, and that, in the end, we are always just a flight apart -- and I am proud of how we have each come along in our part with this show that we may, sometimes, be apart, but this is only because we have become legitimate players in it. And this is a nice feeling.

On dining alone, A LA MODE

I *did* end up mustering up the courage to eat at Roka by myself tonight (thanks to a couple of glasses of Australian Sav Blanc afterwork) -- and what a wonderful treat it was. I sat at the best spot on the counter around the open kitchen, directly in front of the executive chef. Being a young woman dining alone at a trendy restaurant has its perks: I was taken care of tremendously well. As soon as I sat down, the waiter brought out butterfish tataki over white asparagus, drizzled with a yuzu and soy sauce mixture, compliments of the chef. I craved sashimi and sea food, which is exactly what I ordered: a 5 sashimi platter, Roka grilled salad (beautiful), and a miso glazed sea bream (pictured above). Everyone from bus boys to waiters and waitresses checked in on me and made sure I had everything I wanted. The food was delicious and precisely what I craved, and the jasmine shochu was stunning. The restaurant was buzzy as the evening turned out to be a fabulous early summer eve. It was a treat to see how the executive chef, Guillaume (sp?), operated -- he was like a young Elvis Costello being an air traffic control center. Amazing number of orders, calm, patient orchestration of dishes to be grilled, plated and served, and directions to waiters and waitresses. I felt as if I were at the front seat of a phenomenal athletic event, or, better yet and perhaps more comparably, a theatrical extravaganza. As I finished my meal, paid the bill and got up to leave, the entire kitchen staff acknowledged my departure, to which I could not resist but saying, "I love this restaurant -- can't you open one in New York?" To which the lovely chef answered, "Well, next year, come visit us in Phoenix, where we are opening." Phoenix?! All I could say in response was, "I've never been to Phoenix, Arizona, but when I'm in town, I will look you up."

I truly feel Roka would do well in New York. A fabulous shochu bar and selection, fantastic, healthful robata-yaki (grilled) dishes... but in the immediate future, it seems us New Yorkers will have to travel to Arizona for it. Or Miami, as apparently they are opening a restaurant there, too. Miami seems more probable, but in the mean time, Roka is one of my favorite restaurants to revisit in London, as a couple, as a group, or, as I found out tonight, by myself. And I recommend sitting at the counter. Hey, David and I have seen Gwenyth Paltrow and Chris Martin dining there on a mellow Sunday evening -- it must be healthy! (If not exactly micro-biotic as Gwenyth is rumored to be.) I prefer Roka to Zuma, its more upscale sister restaurant. Highly, highly recommended.

TM

On the Less Glamorous Food Options of a Globe-trotting Creative

David and I had a mellow weekend in London, eating better than we had been on our own.

4AM Monday David left for the airport to fly from London to Vienna; that same night, David flew again, this time from Vienna to Zurich. The European casting tour is winding down to its last week, and the traveling pace has picked up. As I type, David is boarding a plane in Zurich to head for Paris, where he will spend the night. Tomorrow night, he will travel from Paris to Rome.

All this traveling may sound glamorous, but it is too often far from it. In Stockholm, David changed hotels at midnight, just having flown in from Hamburg, because the hotel room was literally the size of a closet with no windows -- which even my taxi driver in Amsterdam, who overheard my conversation with David, confirmed is a fire hazard. One's diet of any kind goes awry on these types of tours, too. For the last couple of days, David has been surviving mostly on a box of gourmet chocolates I'd bought for him in Amsterdam. When he rang from Zurich a little while ago, he told me that he had managed to stuff his face with a bratwurst at an Italian restaurant before his flight. "Bratwurst at an Italian restaurant? After you'd been touring through Germany all this time, unhappy with the food?" I asked. "You don't want to know," he said. I suppose this exchange gives an insight into what the restaurant had to offer.

Food during casting is notoriously bad. Most of the time, the creatives work through the day with no lunch breaks -- we are lucky if we get 10 minutes to chew our food. And it seems that a creative has an option of either (1) eating whatever food is offered during a casting session and get fat and/or ill (because the food items tend to be sandwiches or, in Germany and Holland, bread pieces smeared in unknown creamy substance and laden with meats) or (2) of scrounging for edible, more healthful bits and nearly starve. David and I joked today that we could begin a Dirty Dancing casting tour diet: It's not easy to eat healthfully, but it's sure easy to starve if you are not careful and are too picky. (We don't recommend it.)

I fared better than David in Amsterdam: I've learned to order lettuce bits, tomatoes, cucumbers and cheeses at the cantine, and to demand that there be nothing else added onto my order (the chef really would like for me to cover my salad with creamy slop of what seems to be cole slaw and gherkins). And if this rudimentary salad tactic failed, I knew there was a Burger King down the road from where I could get chicken wings. The dinners were mostly good, since the creatives would eat out together and these dinners were jolly with nice food and plenty of wine.

Now in London, casting and without David here, I am running into a bit of a "food depression." Last night, I went to see the show (Dirty Dancing), after which I had great trouble finding a casual, decent meal. It's difficult enough to eat by oneself in London, let alone at 11PM. I didn't feel like going to a show-biz late night restaurant, but I didn't feel up for the miserable food options at the hotel I am staying (which I hate). I wanted a pizza, but didn't know of anywhere for late night pizza near my hotel. I finally found myself at a late-night Subway on Oxford Street around midnight, amongst drunk people, ordering a meatball and cheese sub with lettuce, tomato and cucumber, knowing that I really would just pick at the cheese and maybe the meatballs. I just wanted some melted cheese (like a pizza). When I went back to my hotel room and unfurled the soggy, disgusting sub with sad pieces of cheese, once melted, now hardened to resemble plastic, I knew I'd hit a new low.

Until today, lunch.

At lunch the casting assistant takes everyone's lunch orders. I thought simple, and ordered a Greek salad. Apparently, any kind of salad is difficult to find in the area of London we were in. So at 2PM today, after having eaten only 6 mushrooms for breakfast as the scrambled eggs at my hotel are totally inedible (the Radisson Kenilworth, NEVER stay there if you can help it, the one in Covent Garden is far superior and that in itself is a sad statement), I found myself with a chicken sandwich from MCDONALD'S, picking through for the chicken bits and the shredded lettuce. The casting assistant had told me that there were no salads of any sort to be found, but perhaps I could eat a chicken kebab. I thought, okay, that will have to do. But I guess one person's kebab is another person's chicken sandwich from McDonald's. Any glamorous visions of my being a globe-trotting theater sensation died then. I am a sensation, of course, and surely globe-trotting, but in that moment, picking through a sandwich from McDonald's, having eaten almost nothing all day, ravishing on shredded lettuce and chicken from, shall I say again, MCDONALD'S, I felt that all this casting and traveling is, as I know all too well, extremely hard work and, too often, not at all as glamorous as it sounds to people who are not having to sit through person after person dancing or singing or acting and picking through a sandwich from McDonald's trying to find some sort of food source.

When David and I are together in a city, our food intake is far better, since we make a point of going to restaurants as a way for us to enjoy ourselves and relax. When alone in a city, unless catching up with friends in that city, dining options become bleaker. I stocked up with nuts from M&S to bring with me to auditions tomorrow, while David bought another box of chocolates at the airport for himself. Tonight, if I get the courage, I intend to go to Roka and sit at the sashimi counter myself, but that courage to dine alone at a nice, chic place with lovely food is more difficult to muster than it seems.

This Friday, very early, I will join David in Rome -- and we both look forward to this. We are starved for a breather, during which we might eat lovely food and relax before going back to New York and heading straight back into Toronto casting -- and a long weekend in Rome is the perfect remedy.

In Memory of My Grandfather

My grandfather died very late, Japan time, last Tuesday.

My grandfather had a great impact on me, I looked up to him in many ways, valued his spirit, and the news of his death shook me. I knew that he'd gone into the hospital that morning, Amsterdam time, and all day at work I tried to figure out a way to travel back to Japan. When I returned home and opened up my email, my brother had written me to inform me that my grandfather had died.

The remainder of the week was a strange one, being in Amsterdam by myself as I worked flat out everyday, with a professional facade.

The nights were odd -- at once good and bad, as I had a lot of peaceful, quiet time to think on my own.

I am back in London now, and David generously flew in for the weekend from Stockholm so that he could be with me.

The funeral was today. I am spending this weekend with David in London remembering the charismatic spirit as well as history of my grandfather.

Mobile phone snap shots of Hamburg

I left my camera charger in London, so I have no digital camera at the moment (it's out of battery), which makes me feel slightly naked, as it were. But, I did take a few choice photos with my mobile phone, which will have to do for the blog.

Here are photos of us very happy on our first night back together at the East Hotel restaurant in Hamburg:

(David very happy with the sashimi and tuna/avocado tartar starters...)

(And me feeling quite glamorous at the happening restaurant...)

Today, before I left for Amsterdam (from where I type), I went into casting with David for a few hours. It was an interesting experience, which I shall write about it hopefully in the next couple of days. Because we slept in as much as possible, woke up after breakfast and did not have time to go out for lunch before David was due at the casting session, we ordered room service instead. What did I order? What else but CHICKEN WINGS. And they were delicious. However they make them at the Madison Hotel, they remain memorably delicious and remind me why they my have inspired my obsession with chicken wings:

TM (blogging very late in the PM from her Amsterdam hotel)

Back in Hamburg

David and I are back in Hamburg staying at the very familiar Madison Hotel, where we lived for 3 months last year. David and his European casting tour team took the train from Berlin to Hamburg last night, while I flew from London. I never thought I'd say this: it is nice to be back in Hamburg, especially in the spring.

In the taxi from the airport to the hotel, I recalled many funny and fond memories David and I have of our life in Hamburg. As I found out upon our reunion, David had similar such trip down memory lane as he approached the hotel: our adventures in finding more comfortable bedding (I searched all over Hamburg, quite literally, for a king size flat sheet under which we could both sleep -- Germans do not believe in king-size bedding, just 2 twin-size bedding); going to the fair ground during our break for a bratwurst dinner and a couple of rides; face planting in the snow due to excessive sangria consumption at our beloved Portuguese restaurant; various food incidents, naturally, such as a crepe Amaretto flambe that I blew out too early in order to retain some of the alcohol content only to ruin it (I blew out the flame too early, and it was inedible), and David trying to resuscitate it by re-lighting it -- which failed miserably -- we ended up with match flavored Amaretto covered crepe, which is not tasty.

Now that it is spring, there is green in Hamburg and the city looks more appealing than I remember. The food tastes better too, fresh, and salads are available. David has been starving so far in his German casting tour -- food in Dusseldorf and Stuttgart left him rather thinner than I last saw him in London a week ago. I purchased shortbread cookies and fudge at Harrod's in Heathrow Airport, thinking David might bring them as treats for everyone in casting, but he hungrily opened them last night and started on them. Apparently, he has been living mostly on Snickers bars, which reflects what kinds of foods have been available to him at the cantines at work or restaurants to which he has been taken with his work colleagues.

Last night, to celebrate our reunion and in an attempt to feed David food other than Snickers bars, we went to East. East is an extremely chic hotel restaurant built to an impressively cavernous yet airy design, with an Asian-fusion menu. We went there last year for Valentine's Day. The food was fantastic, better than we remembered, mostly because of how fresh everything was. We had a delightful "catch of the day" sashimi, tuna tartar with avocado, crispy duck, and spargel -- white asparagus, which are in season at the moment. We had the spargel with a white fish, which had been grilled with vanilla bean pierced through the skin; the spargel themselves are drizzled with olive oil and parmesan cheese. David loved this dish, and has vowed that he will eat as much spargel as possible on his casting tour. The fish in Hamburg is excellent (since it is a port city), and we had a fabulous selection of them last night, as well as gorgeous spargel and mixed green salad (something we do not recall finding easily the last time we were here).

Today, we slept in -- we needed it -- and then wandered over to our favorite Portuguese restaurant for some grilled sepia and dorade. The restaurant does grilled, simple items well, nothing fancy and we used to rely on their friendliness and potent sangria, sometimes even grappa, to get us through the coldest, darkest days in Hamburg. The waiter remembered us, and was lovely. We sat outside as the weather was great, and had a great lunch. After lunch, we went to see the matinee of Hamburg Dirty Dancing. The show is good shape, although David and I both took notes we'd love to see incorporated. The cast was thrilled to see David, whom they see as their wonderful dance teacher. We met some of the new cast members we hadn't met, and the familiar ones were keen to hear about how the casting tour is going. They were friendly and nice.

One of the wonderful things that is happening in Germany is that smoking is being banned in restaurants and building. When we worked here last year, we could not sit in the cantine because of the smoke. Now, there are apparently designated times when smoking is allowed. Same with the restaurant last night -- last year when we went, people smoked in the restaurant. Now, we discovered to our delight that there is no more smoking allowed. This makes a big difference when eating dinner.

Tonight, we are off to Indochine for dinner. So far, maybe because I am not having to work here and the weather is nicer, Hamburg is turning out to be a nice, mellow city to have our weekend together before David and I go our separate ways again.