Slurred speech and simple sugars
crash head-on with sunlit obscurity
Ticket scalpers cast your lots
and pick a number; my own private
nightmare is on display

Don’t forget your camera, we’ve got
life, death, and plenty of diet soda
to soothe your frayed synapses

Swerving in and out of reality
bile creeps up my esophagus
but birthday greetings help me
remain calm

It is poor joke, from my perspective, that runs, when a businessman sees a problem he asks, “how can I profit from this?” When a scientist sees a problem he asks, “what methods may I employ to evaluate this?” When a psychologist sees a problem he asks “what about my past or fear of the future led me to see this as a problem?” When a liberal arts major sees a problem he asks, “Do you want fries with that?” The joke of the liberal arts majors is that they are practically useless to society with the exception of doing the most demeaning work available to humanity. The assumption is that the skills acquired by this degree, such as writing, critical thinking, and an off color sense of humor, will gain one no advancement in “the real world.” Let us, now, put this notion to the test.

It was over a year ago when the Logbook Auditor came. An audit at my lab means that some client pays a consultant to come to your lab a poke around, asking you questions about how your work is done and whether you follow all the methods correctly. At the time the lab was in a state of dismal disarray both physically and in terms of morale. The hoods were rusted and non-functional, the countertops were warped, and every tile on the ceiling was stained with watermarks. Regarding morale there were a series of repressive and slightly psychologically off balance people who had managed to worm their way into positions of power, thereby demoralizing the larger body of workers.

When the Logbook Auditor came to my section of the lab he asked many questions that were par for the course. He strolled around nonchalantly making jokes of this or that discrepancy as My Absentee Manager laughed and promised reform. “What about the ICP instrument maintenance logs?” he asked. At this My Absentee Manager’s face turned to the shelf next to our main instrument with expectation, only to be disappointed. The green leather bound Laboratory Notebook he expected to see there was absent, much as he usually is when he is expected to be seen. It was in fact siting on my desk at home being used as my poetry logbook at the moment. Our lab is filled with notebooks that someone started and wrote one entry in and then forgot about. It’s my job to take care of these wayward children and fill them with my genius ideas. When I commandeered this particular notebook, months before, it had a date three years past on it and nothing else. It had been sitting on that shelf for as long as I could remember and I needed a fancy notebook to give my writings an air of officialdom. Instead of stashing it in the lab, as I often do, I took it home. That logbook would not have availed him anyway. If it had been there the same thing would have happened that did when the Logbook Auditor asked for the FIMS instrument logbook. My Absentee Manager grabbed it off the self and opened it revealing a blank first page despite the outer date of 1998. When that happened the Logbook Auditor’s face fell. To his eyes this could only mean that we did no maintenance on the machine in five years, not a pleasing prospect. Not pleasing but not as displeasing as not following The Laboratory Golden Rule, “do what you say, say what you do, and document it.” It was the latter dictate the we seemed to be shy on.

We were told when the audit was over that it was a point to be worked on. A new notebook was purchased for the ICP, though only a regular school composition notebook of black and white camouflage design, (I was glad I scored the fancy one) and I was charged with the task of keeping up the log. Normally this would mean nothing much, but when put in my hands the possibilities seemed endless. For the most part all that is recorded on a given day is the date and the line “Standard daily maintenance.” However form time to time I have problems with the instruments and it is at this point that my liberal arts degree shines through. Any drab scientist would make short pert statements not even filling out a sentence, taking a new line for each and marking each one with a preceding dash. I, on the other hand, saw this charge as an opportunity to practice my prose. My entries on those days often took up pages. I set the mood of the lab that day, discuss the weather, my person problems and how they may relate to the Flow Injection Mercury System on that day, or even write some small advertisement for a product I may enjoy, endorsing it with all my authority. Form is also to be practiced, like the time I wrote a whole entry using alliteration just to see if I could pull it off. It ran thus:

Due to stubborn blockage, the probe and probe-line were both back-flushed. This valiant attempt to troubleshoot the terrible trip-up of trash truncating the tubing turned us to less tepid tactics. Obviously, as observed by such overuse of alliteration, . . . the valve needed an overhaul. Finding the screwdriver we unsealed the valve and unseated it, with secure hand careful not to strip it. The blockage had built up haphazardly in the holes between the two halves of the valve. With wit, wire and water were applied, not recklessly, to remove the refuse, but the reconnoiter was rejected. Seeking stronger methods, solvents were brought in to stagger and sedate the sand that seemed to stuff the passage. The failure of this futile attempt only followed what was foreshadowed by the former folly. Finally! By precision use of a pipette, pressure was applied to the pernicious plug to purge it and the appliance was put back together.

Since the first go round of the Logbook Auditor there have been vast and far-reaching improvements in the physical quality of the lab, and the office politics went a very good way too. Without getting into the sticky details it’s enough to say that Our Fearless General Manager cleaned house in a way that sent a message and pleased those who actually earn their bread. Anyone who has ever worked in any environment can see what a relief this would be. The biggest tumult came on the day Our Fearless General Manager sent out an unannounced email to all employees under his charge containing a new organizational chart for the hierarchy. It was filled with pleasing rearrangements, one of which was the lifting of My Absentee Manager into a high place over our department and Water Quality, leaving me the only member of my department. Another was a newly hired supervisor in the Water Quality department. I eyed this with some interest. The manager in that department is at deaths door with a debilitating disease, and this person was obviously brought in to fill the void. But the level of supervisor was not one that was used before. It was obvious by the flow chart that Our Fearless General Manager had added about five new levels of bureaucracy between him and the common workers. When this new supervisor started I walked over to the old building to check her out. “What made her so special as to be a supervisor” I thought. As I walked through she regarded me not at all, seeming to be absorbed I her work, as if, even on the first day, she was in complete control. I was smitten with a lust, not for her, but for her power.

The cycle had spun through and it was time that the infamous Logbook Auditor to return. He took his tour accompanied by all the top dogs from the lab and upon reaching our area was quite impressed with the improvements. The time came, he asked for the logbooks. I assumed that he would pan through seeing that they were properly kept and move on, but he took my book and sat down laying it on the table in front of him. While speaking he flipped past a few pages of “Standard daily maintenance” and then stopped abruptly. He had reached my first real entry, it was about two pages long. As he read there was an uncomfortable silence in the room. Sweat glistened on the foreheads of all the labs big wigs, who were not sure what it was that he had seen that made him pause so. He read deeply and longly. The duration of the total lack of conversation seemed interminable. Then through that absolute stillness the thunderous burst of an undercurrent of a chuckle broke through. Eventually he turned to me and all that he said was “rubberbands are wonderful things aren’t they?” I nodded my agreement and he continued to flip through stopping to drink in all my past wisdom silently and grunting out his chuckles until it had become far too uncomfortable a space of time for everyone else, especially those who didn’t know what exactly was written in that book. Seeing that his schedule was now far delayed he tore himself away from the book congratulated me on a fine log and continued on. I am sure that that afternoon upon my retirement, my lab was raided by aid de camps of Our Fearless General Manager and my logbook pillaged for perusing by the man himself.

The next day a branch wide email was sent from the QA office congratulating everyone on a good audit. Only one person was mentioned by name in that email, the one who’s competence do to a liberal arts degree had wowed the Logbook Auditor. The next week My Absentee Manager came in for his customary two-hour workday and upon coming back from a meeting with Our Fearless General Manager informed me that they were going to promote me to supervisor within the next few weeks. “Something about that last auditor and your log books.” Shortly there after he left. My eyes brightened as I realized that soon enough I would be able to sit at my computer and justifiably ignore all those who walk through my domain, and they could say nothing because I, I was the supervisor.

Later that afternoon, I was at the front desk trying to clear up some problems I was having with the State of Alabama’s Office of the Attorney General when Our Fearless General Manager walked by. “Hey Phillip is Keith here?” He asked concerning My Absentee Manager. “No he had a doctor’s appointment,” I said, covering for my guardian. Every time I had seen Our Fearless General Manager over the past few weeks he has asked me if Keith was around, and every time I was forced to answer in the negative. It made me wonder if perhaps Our Fearless General Manager was doing a little more investigating to better put his house in order. He continued, “MaryAnn I’d like to talk with you, . . . Phillip I need to talk to you too, come on to my office for a minute if you would.” I walked in to his newly renovated fortress of solitude, and sat confidently in his chair. He proceeded to heap praise on me asserting that the last auditor claimed I had “all my ducks in a row” when he came by and was very impressed. He offered me the Supervisor Job on his own accord with one disclaimer. “I know you like to keep an eye on your overtime so I just wanted you to know that this job is salaried, and wondering if you have a problem with that?”

“Well,” I said, “is the job going to involve a lot more overtime?”

“No. Not at all, if anything the volume will decrease when some of the larger present projects end. I mean if you were working five hours a week overtime you might come out behind, and I can understand that, but I don’t think you need to worry about that.”

This last line threw me. What did he mean come out behind. I recollected having a conversation with Hogan about not liking to work overtime, and realized that Our Fearless General Manager probably probed his knowledge on the subject, but made the fatal misinterpretation that the reason I was ill impressed with salary was because overtime made better pay. Nothing could be farther forming the truth. The reason I don’t like salary is because overtime is assumed. Hogan probably told him I don’t want to work a lot of overtime, but left it at that not adding that the reason is that I like to live a life apart work. I do not want to be devoured by it like so many I see, and was not disdainful of salary because I was afraid I would some how be jipped out of my overtime pay. The truth of the matter is that I haven’t worked an hour of overtime in three years. With that track record the fact that the volume of overtime might be decreasing could only work in my favor. Given that Our Fearless General Manager didn’t seem to be aware of my overall abandonment of the responsibility of overtime, I kept the fact to myself. He seemed to think that I was all about working over for the money, and he can think that. It gives him the idea that he has to bump up my salary to make up for that fictional after hours work, and keep me happy as I avoid it anyway.

As I returned to my lab I was very happy with how things seemed to be playing out. A greater title is always to be coveted and better pay for fewer hours can’t be beat. So my liberal arts degree was used to great effect in the real world gaining me advancement and better wages. There was only one oddity, that is that despite the fact that I’m now soon to be supervisor, I’m still the only member of my department. Oh well, I guess as long as it makes sense to someone . . .

Phillip G.

Statement
My current paintings and drawings are disjointed narratives evoking the conflicted emotions I feel when involved in a romantic relationship. I strive for an emotional tone in the work that mirrors my own ambivalent feelings towards my memories. As such the works reveal my need to pay homage to the feelings of euphoria with which I began these relationships, as well as the bewilderment, sadness and nostalgia that seem to be an essential part of my memories.

In the composition I try to convey the whirlwind of excitement that new love brings through the implied motion of the figures, the way the background itself seems to move about, the way the architecture seems about to disintegrate, or by the explosion of stars around the figure’s heads.

In these works I combine two types of images, the most obvious being universal romantic symbols from the collective consciousness such as couples kissing, a woman throwing her head back in ecstasy, or a teddy bear. The potentially saccharine quality of these images is deliberately subverted by more ambiguous romantic images from my own memory such as a snail shell, an oil refinery, or a spiral staircase. The combination of these motifs is used to convey the conflicted and convoluted nature of my memories. It gives the paintings a dreamlike atmosphere, which is reinforced by sleeping or introspective figures, by a dark bluish haze, and by an ominous murky palette for some of the secondary images.

Overall, the works express the poignant, bittersweet quality that is universally experienced when recalling even the most joyous events from our past.

-Adam Hall, 2006

Heaving open the throttle of my
memory
we glimpse the face of that
little girl,
one female,
age 10,
his friend,
my friend
Amy,
holding his mother responsible
with a moody righteousness,
ultimately assessing who fell from Paradise.

That scene
situated itself cozily
just this side of
bright blue pain
since I’ve admitted to getting old.
Sober, it’s difficult to speak
a dizzying cascade of confessions,
and perhaps, soon,
the head and heart game
she began
will fizzle into dust
making the wrong
instantly distant, hollow.

What I want to know now
is how to live
the present above and beyond
sleep, rhythms, stability…
to strike a beautiful balance
filled with resolve
not to take
advantage of familiarity
to cast a shadow.

It was advertised as a moving sale, and I guess, in the most straightforward of ways, it was. I believe she moved to a higher plane, though, and that it happened in the first room on your right as you enter the home. She lived in a third floor walk-up in an older part of town, where the apartments are classic and sturdy, dignified, with elegantly curved facades that create rounded walls in many living rooms in Chicago. It’s a curious architectural decision, this idea to bend a coat of brick and mortar to form walls that envelope you in cozy alcoves. I’ve always thought it was a considerate choice.

I entered not long after the sale began, but many advertised things were already gone, and the woman’s personal effects were strewn about in absurd combinations. Glazed pottery lamps lay down weak circles of light on faded linoleum, their supporting tables purchased. Ashtrays were stacked on books and piles of firewood, left over from last winter, or stockpiled for next, occupied one corner. Several antique bottles of rubbing alcohol and hydrogen peroxide, half-filled, covered a desktop, along with a chocolate-colored typewriter and a box of pens and paperclips.

Nine black and white photos in cheap plastic frames lined the narrow hall, though a square of unfaded wallpaper suggested there had been a tenth. They were strange choices for wall hanging—fuzzy group shots at picnics with no one looking at the camera, a shot of two couples in a bar that looked like an ancient whisky ad, a woman standing alone in front of a rose bush. They were all of adult life—no family shots, but images of aging couples reading, drinking, smiling absently. There was only one of children: two boys. Did she hang the adult photos after the children left? Or did she keep them up always, as a reminder that she was more than a mother, but also a wife, friend, woman, and even, as one image confessed, a rollerskater?

In the kitchen, cupboards and cabinets poured dishes and cutlery onto the floor, table and countertops. She had so much silver…sets of serving trays, tureens, spoons, forks, knives, salt and pepper shakers. A Grey Poupon souvenir platter, dozens of polished corn cob holders with matching trays and delicate china service for 8. The shelves also held nearly twenty pint-sized green glass tumblers. They were solid and beautifully made, with deep sides and heavy bottoms. You could order a similar set these days from a high-end kitchen store. These, however, were originals, easily thirty years old. I knew instantly that these were the glasses that her friends and family still associate with her, in the same way that I can’t picture my father at the dinner table without the Kerr glasses we used in our home.

How many times did her son see her with a squat green glass, holding seasons full of lemonade, iced tea, water or beer? How many times did the clink of ice against that glass let her husband know she was awake next to him, wetting her lips in the soft dark of a summer night? As she grew older, alone, maybe she sat there in her kitchen every morning, turning the glass, letting the sun fill it, enjoying the column of green light that would dance between her hands and onto the pearly gray formica tabletop. This day, they are marked $3 for the set.

There in her kitchen, picking over a dead woman’s things, was I a harvester, a voyeur? I don’t think so. Walking through her home, I championed her good taste and fondly admired the things she found useful, important. This passing on of lives, and belongings, and spaces, just seems right. We spend our time making room in the world for ourselves, purchasing and filling our spaces with objects that make us happy. We amass shiny things, soft things, things that smell good. But at any random moment, we may be let go, or gathered up, however you like to think of it. And then our things fall away, into someone else’s hands, someone who sees the same value in that object. In fact, someone a little bit like you. That’s comforting, in its own way.

I left her home for the first and last time without the green glasses, or silver, or peroxide. I did leave one more square of unfaded wallpaper on that hallway, though. I guess I didn’t need more things—just one thing—something to remind me that every moment is heavy with potential; each may become the one you treasure when you recall the life you’ve lived. Even fuzzy group-shot picnic moments have that potential, if you really think about it.

Given that much of Luckyface is tied to New Orleans in some way, we’re particularly familiar with the recent sights and scenes in the news. Saraheva is a Tulane alum and Phillip just got married and bought a house uptown near Audubon Park. As far as we know, most of those we know and love are safe, but we’re all hoping for the best for the next few months and beyond.

NEW:
Travelogue of Displaced New Orleanians Adam and Pen

An interesting piece from Salon.
http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2005/09/19/homeagain/
Don’t be afraid of the ad…it’s quick.

Playlist for the Recently Displaced:
Songs for the drive back to New Orleans

• “You’re off the edge of the map, mate. Here there be monsters.” - Audio, Pirates of the Caribbean
• Feeling Good - Nina Simone
• Who Loves The Sun - The Velvet Underground
• here we kum - Molotov
• DUI - Har Mar Superstar
• Earthquake Weather - Beck
• Sad Sad Song - Tilly and The Wall
• Come on! Feel the Illinoise! - Sufjan Stevens
• Landed - Ben Folds
• Mushaboom - Feist
• Checking Out - Langhorne Slim
• Speak Easy - Maria Taylor
• Casimir Pulaski Day - Sufjan Stevens
• Hurt - Johnny Cash
• Walk Or Ride - Ditty Bops
• We Will Become Silhouettes - The Shins
• All the Morning Birds - Jolie Holland
• Hitched - Maria Taylor
• Transatlanticism - Death Cab For Cutie

New Orleans-themed Luckyface highlights:

• New Orleans: 1996-2001
• Photo Gallery of Uptown Flood Waters
• Adam Hall
• Coffee Shop Critique
• PaperWings: Images of Adult Literacy in New Orleans
• Compounded Conspiracies
• Exodus
• Gin, Always Gin
• Kudos for the Klutz
• My Hot Water Box
• My Two Errands Gone Bad: Two Tales of Romance for St. Valentine’s Day
• Possessions of the Soul
• The Wedding Present
• Where Science Meets Metaphysics

We were sitting at our once weekly Mandatory Coffee meeting, at Luna�s, our local coffee shop. I was expressing the fact that due to my wife�s work, we see Sr. Helen Prejean from time to time. For most people this means nothing. One needs to further explain that this is the nun that was depicted in the award-winning movie Dead Man Walking. After that fact is known I am free to explain with glee how I am connected to the woman who plays Susan Sarandon in real life. Apart from the movie, this woman of the cloth is not particularly known outside the anti-death penalty community. But, within that community she is a great champion and is known throughout the land. Lawyers from across the country, working on such cases, jockey for position in order to meet with her, or gain her endorsement. At a recent �Holiday Season� party my wife�s boss was boasting of her advanced copy of Sr. Helen�s new book. I was so tempted to say, �Who�s Sr. Helen?� Knowing the puffing winds of pride making tight her sails would quickly be withdrawn. But she was my wife�s boss after all, and in a rare show of social tact, I kept my mouth shut.

My wife and I had just been to a book signing of that very book, The Death of Innocents. It was a point of contention between her and I as to whether or not we had to actually buy the book considering this was a duel work/social function. It was her contention that this was a social function and therefore we needed to buy the book in order to, �support the cause� and fully participate in the event. It was my belief that this was a work function, and she supported the cause by her involvement in the anti-death penalty Law Firm, and there was no need to spend an extra $30 toward the cause on a book that I was not really interested in reading . . . She won the debate.

We got the book and went to have it signed. As we were waiting in line my significant other�s work mates were coming back after having their copies John Hancocked. They would open their books displaying deeply personal messages about particular cases, or the work they do. I was quite pleased to see this. So often if you got to get a book signed you get a two or three word, �nice to meet you whoever you are,� type of comment with the signature underneath. At least the money we spent on the book was going for something personal for the one I care for. In that case it was worth it. Besides I had been to enough work functions to start actually believing that the average Joe might know who this woman was apart from the movie. Now I could get my hands on written proof that I myself was connected to this religious of great fame. I was not the only one.

I knew a nun who taught me second grade who once told me before my first communion, �Take your time. You�re up there with The Lord and this is one time when you should not rush.� Apparently similar advice is given freely, for the wait to see Sr. Helen was arduous. Each person indeed took more time than they most likely would in the communion line to connect with the woman who play�s Susan Sarandon in real life. Each person had their anecdote to share, �you know my brother worked on that film,� or �You know Joe Smith out of Bent-armpit Wyoming, he�s a Lawyer on this case�. Each one desperately tries to become a part of the fame present in the guest of honor either for her connection to the smaller community of anti-death penalty activism, or the wider Hollywood reality.

We got to the front of the line and greeted the crusading nun. She is not Susan Sarandon. She looks much older, and a bit rounder if I may take the liberty. She talks with a deep country accent that is not the charming kind. It is the kind that, if possessed by the person in front of you in the grocery store line, would make you shudder knowing that the inefficiency of the impending transaction is about to add 15 minutes to your wait. As we said our brief hellos my wife reminded her where she works. Sr. Helen praised her for her efforts in the cause. Then she leaned over and signed the book. We got it back and after a very short conversation we walked away. This allowed the next person to repeat the process, informing her of their own small connection and trying to get on the inside.

I opened the cover of the book and read the inscription, it had our names and said, �seek justice�, followed by the signature. My name was misspelled. I was not overly pleased with the stock response we got and inquired my wife about it. �I only met her a few times,� she said, and I hung my head. My brother was right to be suspicious of my connections to �Sister P.� I wondered on the road home as the book sat on my lap, whether or not famous people, ever have a chance to deeply connect to others, or do they only encounter those who would leech their fame, parasitically using it in conversations to bolster their own standing. I wonder if anyone ever really wants to know them, or if they one desire to have met them.

Phillip G.

I remember lights, police car lights. Loud knocking.

I was sitting on the bathroom counter, on the edge of the sink. He clipped my toenails. Maybe it was my fingernails.

Cold night.

Wind through threadbare pajamas.

Mom.

She had been on vacation for two weeks or other. Just gone.

A Peddington Bear book and Grandma was there.

Courtney recently returned from a globe-trotting trip as a staff member aboard the MV Explorer, as part a Semester at Sea summer program. Here, she offers her take on St. Petersburg, Russia.

It seemed to be a typical day at a park in St. Petersburg. Picture this: a woman being thrust backwards by her pet bear cub on a leash, a woman in a bridal gown posing in front of a tractor, and two women wearing matching polka dot outfits, taking a stroll. Oh yes, there are a disproportionate amount of twins in St. Petersburg who like to make it positively known that indeed, they do look just alike, down to their lipstick.

Because we witnessed at least 5 weddings a day (I guess in Russia Monday is the only day to NOT get married), we would like to create a fake pamphlet for wedding photography. It’s kinda cool how they’re simultaneously in the public eye, and involve lots of tossing (flowers, coins) and breaking bottles against historic statues (supposedly for good luck) … but like the destination wedding G witnessed in Mexico that had topless German tourists in the background of the altar pix, I am proud to say that there are now an abundance of Russian wedding photos that now have Kristi and myself in them. They should really pay us.

We spent our first afternoon in the city being pulled around at an inoperable pace while hearing a shipmate spill her guts while feverishly looking around for a post office (her agenda, not ours). Anyhow, at the end of the discussion, she decided that we didn’t have time to eat, and she would literally not let us sit down for a meal. Which was irritatingly funny, especially since she kept pointing out such gems as Subway and KFC as a viable option.

We went on our one and only Semester at Sea field trip that afternoon, and as “trip leader,” it was my reminder from God of why I am a traveler and not a tourist. I don’t know about you, but when I think of a tour in Russia, I think of a brash woman with big nails telling me how it is and not caring who has to pee. Unfortunately, many of our students were hoping for a Hilton tour, so they were upset when the bus didn’t have air conditioning and when it broke down. I can’t say I was happy about the fact that our trip to paint our own Matroyska dolls turned into a whirlwind adventure through a random 19th century architecture museum, and that we only ended up with 30 minutes to paint a doll in a room in the projects not at all resembling the “university” we had been set out for. But hey, I got to paint a doll. And there was this fantastic woman with FUTS (fucked up teeth) playing the banjo out in front. So all good.

You can never have too many chandeliers in one room, which is what I think they had in mind when they built the Hermitage. While the sheer magnitude and plethora of art in the museum (which is four buildings) is enough to make anyone who goes to St. Petersburg and does NOT visit the museum rightfully suspect to interrogation (well they should be), I have to say that I found the intricacies of the building more impressive than the art itself. There was definitely some amazing variety, including vast amounts of Renoir, Van Gogh, Matisse, Kandinsky, etc., and Kristi’s fave collection of Greek vases, though surprisingly a lack of gift shoppage. The Russians should really take a lesson on that one.

It is said that to spend 1 minute on each piece of art in the Hermitage would take 7 consecutive years to get through. Which is why I find it ironic that Kristi, Caterina and I seem to have discovered the Bermuda triangle of the Hermitage. We kept ending up in the same rooms, and could not figure out how to get to the rest of the building(s) for the first hour. We spent about four hours in total. And I think we can walk away knowing that we saw absolutely all that there is to see.

Followed by an appropriate Indian meal in the heart of Russia (blasting American techno), we decided to visit the infamous Church of Spilled Blood after the Vodka museum was closed for a private party. This is the vision of Russia I think we all have, so I am happy to report that the sockpuppets made an appearance in front of this one. It took something like 24 years to build, and they went back and renovated it for 17 years, ending in 1998. It is magnificently colorful, and the entire inside is created out of mosaics. Which just equals an insane amount of detail. So much so that they require each visitor to wear plastic booties so as not to scuff the floor.

There was this little bar disguised as a ship that we made our local hangout, and was thankfully far enough away from our ship that it wasn’t busting away at the seams with SAS students … a sight avoided at all costs. Long story short, we ended up meeting these German firefighters who were on an exchange program with a Russian station.

The first night we hung out with them, we did some dancing along with this Russian girl named Olga. But Olga didn’t show up the second night, and we ended up at this amazing underground club on the other side of the river. It reminded me of a few other clubs I’ve been to in Europe, and was basement level, all exposed brick. It was very Russian, and full of scantily clad women, being courted by their men. Of course, our firefighters being German, they were very much into this machismo mindset. And were trying to coax us to not watch the Russian female strippers who occasionally did a number next to the bar. “Those are not for you,” they would say. Repeatedly. They couldn’t understand why we wanted to watch the strippers, just as much as we couldn’t understand why they would think that we wouldn’t.

Much like Venice, St. Petersburg is a patchwork of canals, so getting back and forth is a major operation. Our ship was parked island side, which meant that you had to be very conscious of when the bridges are passable. We were lucky enough to be there during what they call “White Nights.” Which means that the sun never really sets, and they bridges all throughout the city stay up all night so that large ships can pass through. It’s strikingly beautiful, and many people stay out all night along the riverbanks drinking and celebrating. And many people, like us, stay out all night along the riverbanks because you don’t make it back on time. Which is what we did one night until 5am.

Thankfully, however, the Germans got us back on time … hearing of a trick from a fellow Russian firefighter that one of the bridges opens for 15 minutes at 3:00 am. Unfortunately, the following night when Kristi, Caterina, Patrick and I tried to sprint to the bridge for such opening, we sprinted to the wrong one.

Most things in Russia are written in Cyrillic, which can make for some difficulty when you venture outside of the main city centers. For the most part, it was fine, and even with some extra effort you can get around on public transportation. We did run into some problems finding food one night though. When everything in a menu is written in foreign characters, and nobody speaks English, it is nearly impossible to order, especially in a place like Russia that isn’t particularly known for food. We literally spent 3 hours trying to find a place, and out of desperation, finally settled on an Irish pub. Things were in English, thank god, and Kristi ate the largest, most disgusting slab of pork ribs ever created.

It just so happened that the Swatch- FIVB world beach volleyball tour was in town, so Kristi and I spent a wonderful day at the beach (in Russia, who knew?), watching Brazilians play other Brazilians. We were nearly accosted by a blimp, which was almost as much as a highlight as watching the Russian girls do crunch warm-ups. And just to picture it, as a beach in Russia isn’t a common scene, there were these huge beach volleyball pits, beach around a fortress, and huge artillery tanks behind our view of the tournament.

I don’t think any trip to Russia could be complete without a trip to the circus, so we found a really off-kilter, local one to spend our rubles on. Circus Abtobo was the name, and my oh my, was it odd. It was literally under the big tent, using hand-pulled cranks for support on the trapeze wires (yikes). But I think the topper was the clowns. Everyone knows, I hate clowns, but these were of a special kind. Their humor was bizarre at best … a gyrating one in blackface, another that sniffed air freshener whippets out of a paper bag then made a bald audience member do the same, then a full-on clown attack. And the victim was our friend Patrick. He was up there for nearly 10 minutes, thrusting and shouting Russian delicates. Who knew? Kristi was also abducted by a man in white pleather pants, with somewhat of a resemblance to the early Siegfried.

Our much-anticipated trip to a Russian bathhouse (banja) where you swat each other with birch branches was botched by our unintentional visit on a men’s only day (sadly enough, it took us awhile to figure it out). We saw all of these naked men frolicking outside, but it took me awhile to make the determination that it was indeed a men’s only day, and that there were women inside in another section. Oh well, I guess we can break out the branches another time.

However, our trip to the bowling alley was a success, and I am happy to report that we took Caterina (our Italian friend) bowling for the first time!! We were the only ones in there, which was admittedly a bit bizarre, but they turned on the lights for us, gave us some shoes, and let us go. For the most part, there was nothing out of the ordinary, except of course for the décor, which had lots of sexual ads. But Kristi’s new nickname came out of the spelling error they had typed into the machine … “KRISH.”

Overall, I’d have to say I was rather surprised at how European St. Petersburg is. Of course, learning about all of the history and culture surrounding it, it’s not surprising at all. But given the great American education I’ve received, all I really know of Russia involved Red, cold war, communism, Stalinism, and well, ice skaters with short hair and big mouths.

There is a lot of Russian culture around me in West Hollywood, so I was prepared for the long nails and tight hot pants. But really, I had no idea to the extent that the woman is commodity in that culture. Every woman, every age, everywhere is in a skirt and stilettos. No matter the time of day, no matter the occasion. And while I know many of us sometimes suffer to look beautiful, the fact that they walk around on cobblestones all day just makes me appreciate their looming examples of pageant-level femininity even more.

Every year the 1,000 friends and neighbors of the village of Utica put on a pot of coffee, unlock the back door and invite thousands of day trippers to call themselves neighbors for a day.

This tiny burg 100 miles southwest of Chicago draws thousands for its Burgoo Festival, named for the hundreds of gallons of hearty stew the locals prepare for the big day.
Crowds descended on the 500-foot stretch of picturesque Clark Street last Sundayfor crafts, a Civil War re-enactment, pork chops, pasta frittatas and, mainly, the burgoo itself.

Weeks before the event, the head chef, the “burgoomeister,” decides on the combination of meat, vegetables and spices that will become the stew. This year’s burgoomeister, 4th-grade teacher Joe Gurski, enlisted extra help: his high school friend and Edison Park resident Jerry Oskvarek. Neither chafes at wearing the apron in the family.

“Joe grew up in an Italian-Polish family, and I grew up in a Polish family. You learn to cook,” Oskvarek said.

The two have collaborated for the last several years with burgoo master chef Alberto Saorin, owner of Alberto’s Ristorante in Ottawa, to fine-tune the closely held burgoo recipe.

Working ahead

The day before the feast, locals gathered to help marinate the beef, chop the vegetables and set up the three outdoor cauldrons that hold the burgoo. The staging area is the back yard of City Hall, a simple brick building that doubles as a dining hall for this occasion.

Each pot has a 4-foot diameter and sits atop an iron cylinder that holds the pot off the ground, leaving room for a wood fire underneath. The stews simmer over an open fire for 12 hours or more, beginning the night before the feast and stretching through to the morning.

Right on schedule, the first shift of volunteers lit the fires at 9 p.m. Saturday. Gurski, whose right-on assessments of cooking temperatures and stirring techniques make it clear why he’s the burgoomeister, doled out seasonings and firewood as needed and gradually incorporated the meat along with gallons of a rich-looking stock and cabbage, celery and carrots.

A crowd of locals and tourists-in-the-know hung around until midnight or so, drinking beer and taking turns with the paddles used to stir the stew. People drifted in and out after that, until the last good-sized wave of stirrers straggled in around 3 a.m., when, as it happened, Utica’s bars close for the night.
That crowd lasted for only about an hour before heading home, leaving a core group of dedicated stirrers to hold out until morning.

Veteran stirrer Chuck Sherman moved his paddle conscientiously, last year’s lapse–not his–that burned an entire batch of burgoo never far from his mind.

Even the burgoomeister acknowledged that the night gets long around 4 a.m.

“The first sign of sunlight is a real spirit booster,” Gurski said.

Up with the sun

When the sun did come up around 7, the streets filled in a matter of 15 minutes. The morning was crisp, and vendors bundled in winter coats scanned the skies for clouds that could put a damper on the festivities as they unpacked crafts, antiques and homemade baked goods.

But the sun rose clear and golden, a textbook autumn day. By midmorning, customers eager to pay $2.50 for a bowl of the stew lined up the length of a village block. Saorin stopped by to add the final seasonings and pronounced the burgoo done. Volunteers from the LaSalle County Historical Society ladled the first bowl at 10:30 a.m., and all three cauldrons were empty by 2:30 p.m.

Every year during the Burgoo Festival, Utica residents turn the original story of stone soup on its ear. Instead of a band of travelers teaching the townies a lesson, Utica residents put up tables in their front yards and open their pantries. Folks such as Gurski give up a night’s sleep to cook for thousands while others put up jams and bake pies.

And somehow the magic of that secret recipe works on the crowd of 15,000, making it feel downright cozy.

Photos and text by Sarah Eva Krancic
Copyright (c) 2002, Chicago Tribune