Keeping the Past Alive Today - Los Angeles Travel Photographer

A much welcomed surprise in my kitchen recently had me think about this trip to the area in China that's known for this type of food for centuries.  Granted, I'm a trained microbiologist (that happened in one of my past lives), the whole thing about tofu being covered by cotton-like fluff that originated from the air is just mythical.  Even after tasting the food there, and even having watched the documentary by CCTV1 (China's national TV station), it's beyond my wildest imagination to create something like these cotton balls in my own kitchen.

In my mind, this food belongs to a place and people where it carries hundreds of years of history, where tofu (and many other types of food) is still sold on carrying poles, clothes dried in the open air and laundry done in the pond in front of their houses that were constructed and carved back in the Ming and Qing dynasties, and don't forget the  Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.  OK, this last part was a joke with you all.  But the movie was filmed there.

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Then, on my journey to seek traditional food preparation methods, the cotton balls made their presence in the most unexpected way in my house, on a fine spring day.  It seems they've been around all this time, including the years after the trip while I constantly reminisce about the incredible food, only waiting for the prime opportunity to debut.  So, is it the mental readiness that it's waiting for or that I started drying clothes in the open air?  Enlighten me, please.     

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Happy Valentine's Day - Los Angeles Travel Photographer

I don't know about you.  Where I live, I started hearing little birds in the back yard.  Some even came down for a help-yourself-all-you-can-eat breakfast.  Although I can't sing as well as the big and small vocalists out in the nature, I know they are telling me "spring is here... love is in the air..."

Ahhh, the love that we work so hard at and dedicate one day to celebrate.     

As anything in life, how we love and how we celebrate could be such a personal thing.  So, whether you spend the day like this:

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Or in this way:

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I wish you a happy Valentine's Day!

What has been your most memorable Valentine's Day experience(s)?  We are all ears (and eyes) for it. :-)  

You Say La Boca, I Say Genoa - Los Angeles Travel Photographer

For most tourists, no visit to Buenos Aires, the capital city of Argentina, would be complete without spending time at its neighborhood of La Boca.  The popular pedestrian Caminito ("little walkway" or "little path" in Spanish) is well known for tango performance, artist stands and colorful houses.  In fact, the pastel colors facing the once abandoned street was not applied until late 1950s by Argentine artist Benito Quinquela Martín that lived nearby.  

Life in Argentina was probably nothing comparable to that in the glorious Italian city of Genoa, which was once one of the so-called "Maritime Republics".  Had there been a Benito Quinquela Martín  earlier, would La Boca's early settlers from Genoa still be as home sick?

The famous song in the Genoese dialect, "Ma se ghe penso" ("But if I think about it" in English), written and composed by Genoese singer Mario Cappello (with Attilio Margutti's help with the music) in 1925, depicts the yearning desire of an Italian emigrant to return "to lay my bones where my grandmother's are":

"But when I think of it, then I see the ocean, I see my mountains and Piazza della Nunziata..."
 

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