Eating Under the Sea at Houston’s Acquarium

Pictures by Giorgina Di Rocco

I loved eating under the sea while fish swam around your table.

Well, I confess I did not have lunch under the sea. However, the gigantic, 150,000 gallon fish tank in the center of Downtown Houston’s Acquarium Resaturant and the store’s decoration made me feel underwater.

The restaurant’s walls resemble coral rocks, the lamps on the roof are little fish that swim between the customers, the seat’s backsides are ondulating sea weeds and waiters are so polite they look like mermaids.

It is incredible to have lunch between sharks, shovel-nosed guitar fish, leopard rays, clown fish, color-changing fish, and flirty fish dressed in blue with large lips, so large they look like models right out of the surgery room.

I hade eaten in places with fish tanks before, but it was the first time I was a guest at a marine feast worthy of Ariel, the Little Mermaid.

I leave you the address in case you even want to enjoy a delicious meal as you explore the sea.

Downtown Aquarium Houston
410 Bagby
Houston, TX 77002
(713) 223-3474 (FISH)

Other cities where you can find Aquarium Restaurants

New York: More Romantic and Less Accelerated

I remembered New York as a noisy and fast-paced city, but when I arrived, I found a rather romantic city. Yet, since I was traveling by myself, I had to share Big Apple’s romanticism with myself.


In this occasion I chose to leave aside museums and stunning Broadway shows to enjoy New York in open air.


I strolled down Fifth Avenue while I window shopped in some of NY’s most famous shops, I entertained myself observing diverse and unique individuals, and relaxed walking across the SOHO, China Town, Little Italy and The Village.


At the SOHO and Little Italy I got inspired by paying attention to the decoration of all the petit restaurants and small stores that offered varied, fun, different and ordinary artifacts.


I got momentarily accelerated as I went through Wall Street, the world’s financial center, seeing how business people ran across the street to avoid loosing precious seconds of their valuable time.


I freed myself walking along the shore of the Hudson River while I watched how the tourists’ boats set sail towards the Statue of Liberty.


I was left gasping in the middle of Brooklyn Bridge, an architectonic wonder with an unmatchable view of New York City, where I ran into one of my graduate professors from Spain; a wonderful surprise worthy of my surrealistic life.


I enjoyed myself with ChinaTown’s baubles and got transported to some forgotten corner of Paris or Madrid as I walked down The Village; an area of low houses built very close together in an area of NY that was unknown to me until then.


In Central Park I fell in love with life as I admired trees painted with autumn and joyful skirls that jumped from one tree branch to the other.


It was a short, but incredible trip. It lacked museums, culture and extravaganza, but it was filled with the beauty of simplicity.


It was the trip where I discovered it is possible to enjoy romance without company.

Cómo llegar desde DC:
http://www.vamoosebus.com/
Bus diario de NY a DC y viceversa

Gorgeous Arlington Cemetery Cannot Disguise Horrid Effects of War

I prefer peace over war, and funny movies over scary ones. For that reason I was unsure if I wanted to visit the Arlington Cemetery in Washington DC, USA, where they burry all those who represented the United States in some war, or served the American army, naval, and/or air forces; there are currently 290,000 veterans along with their family members buried along the cemetery’s 107 hectares of land.

Despite my low desire to visit the cemetery, the outing was amazing: from afar, the headstones resembled white flowers over an perfectly trimmed grass carpet, and the Arlington House shone as the sun hid behind the hill where the Kennedy family is buried.

As if this wasn’t enough, we had the opportunity to witness the change of guard in front of The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier; a rigid and meticulous ceremony so structured that it gave goose bumps to its spectators.

While I observed the soldiers’ synchronized movements I imagined the precision needed to undertake military maneuvers and tactics successfully, and I turned uncomfortable watching how these boys slowly became less and less human.

Now I ask myself, do soldiers need to dehumanize themselves to avoid suffering from the psychological effects that war causes people, or are they only acting this way for the ceremony?

I am not sure, but watching this robotic ceremony and the large number of victims buried in this place (approximately 24 people are buried daily), helped accentuate my feeling of rejection towards war.

The cemetery’s park is gorgeous, but it is not beatiful enough to disguise the horrid result of war.

How to get there:
Arlington National Cemetery
Arlington VA 22211
Estación de metro: Arlington Cementery
Teléfono: (703) 607-8000http://arlingtoncemetery.org/

Turkey as Sales Icon in the United States

Run and get in line because it is thanksgiving and sales begin!

Well, to tell you the truth I never heard anything like this on the radio or on TV. However, this seemed to be the message Houstonians had received before Friday November 24, since at 8 p.m. there people lined up in front of stores so they could be the first ones to enjoy the mega sales (some stores opened at midnight, while others opened at 5 a.m.).

In the United States, people annually celebrate Thanksgiving the fourth Thursday of November. The festivity began in the XVII century when a group of American pilgrims organized a big meal to thank the natives for teaching them to harvest the items found in the New World, allowing them to survive through winter.

Since then, for Thanksgiving, Americans get together with their family members for a large meal with stuffed turkey with cranberry sauce, corn bread, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes casserole, and green beans, among other things, and apple pie, pumpkin pie and pecan pie for dessert (they have other pies too).

Thanksgiving is one of the most important festivities in the United States; it breaks though religious and cultural boundaries and all citizens enjoy the celebration with the same enthusiasm.

In 2007, the number of people who traveled to meet their family members broke a record: according to the Associated Press AAA Spokesman Troy Green said “Surveys indicated a record 38.7 million U.S. residents were likely to travel 50 miles or more for the holiday period of Wednesday through Sunday, up about 1.5 percent over last year.”

According to a survey done by Cowen & Co., this year “consumers who plan to shop that day expect to spend 42% of their budgets, compared with 36% last year.”

Even though Thanksgiving got started as an event to give thanks, and many Americans maintain this tradition, the date has also become an icon for sales, which undervalues the celebration and plays against family unity.

Nevertheless, I cannot deny that this year I enthusiastically joined the group of sale-hunting early risers.

Getting to know Washington DC: Natural, Historic, Cultural and Artistic

Washington DC , the capital of United States, resembles Europe more than other American cities; here, people go to The Mall for a walk, and not to buy, and people ride the metro or take a walk to get to work (something almost unthinkable in other cities in the United States).

In DC, consumerism does not take hold of The Mall because it is not a shopping mall, but rather a beautiful park that hosts the obelisk, the Lincoln Memorial, and other monuments that commemorate the Vietnam Way, Korean Way and World War II.

Throughout the week, visitors and Washingtonians have free access to culture thanks to the Smithsonian Institution, a research organization that owns 9 research centers and the world’s largest museum complex with 19 museums including National Museum of Natural History, National Portrait Gallery and Smithsonian American Art Museum, and United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.

The National Museum of Natural History is a recommended stop to learn about the living and inert beings that make up our ecosystem by taking a look at diverse embalmed specimens, fossils, dinosaurs’ bones and precious stones.

The National Portrait Gallery and Smithsonian American Art Museum is also worth a visit to observe how painting developed in the United States, beginning with the typical portraits painted during the colonization period and finishing with the contemporary paintings of our time. At the same time, visitors can learn about American history by paying attention to the portraits of American presidents and participants of the abolition of slavery.

Finally, the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum is another place visitors cannot miss when visiting Washington DC. Upon entering the museum, each person receives a passport with the name of one of the Holocaust victims to help him/her relive the stories exposed throughout the museum from one of the victim’s point of view. The section that displays the stories from the children point of view is particularly shocking and hair-raising.

It is important to point this is simply a bite of all the things visitors can do in Washington DC like visit the White House, go up the obelisk, sneak through the Spy Museum, etc. However, I think these stops provide wholistic picture of the United States from different points of view: cultural, historic, artistic and natural.



How to get there:
Korean War Veterans Memorial
Independence Ave. at the Lincoln MemorialPhone: (202) 426-6841
Metro Stop: Foggy Bottom-GWU
http://www.nps.gov/kwvm/


Lincoln Memorial
Independence Ave. & 23rd St. NW
Phone: (202) 426-6841
Metro Stop: Foggy Bottom-GWU
http://www.nps.gov/linc


National World War II Memorial
17th St. & Independence Ave. NW
Phone: (202) 619-7222
Metro Stop: Smithsonian

http://wwiimemorial.com/


Vietnam Veterans Memorial
Constitution Ave. & Henry Bacon Dr. NW
Phone: (202) 634-1568
Metro Stop: Foggy Bottom-GWU
http://www.nps.gov/vive


Museums:
International Spy Museum
800 F St. NW
Phone: (202) 393-7798
Metro Stop: Gallery Pl-Chinatown
http://www.spymuseum.org/


National Museum of Natural History
10th St. & Constitution Ave. NW
Phone: (202) 633-1000
Metro Stop: Federal Triangle
http://www.mnh.si.edu/


United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
100 Raoul Wallenberg Pl. SW
Phone: (202) 488-0400
Metro Stop: Smithsonian
http://www.ushmm.org/


National Portrait Gallery and Smithsonian American Art Museum
8th & F Streets N.W

Phone: (202) 633-8300

Estación de Metro: Gallery Pl-Chinatown

http://www.npg.si.edu/


Smithsonian Institution Museums: http://www.si.edu/museums/

Other museums

Iom Kipur in Israel, one of the Holiest Days for Jewish

By Sabrina Lenoir (Argentina)

Imagine that a bomb drops… and all of a sudden all motor vehicles stop working…cars, buses, motorcycles….all of them remain parked and people start owning the streets, by foot or on bikes…the sound of horns, traffic is transformed into tons of people in the street, avenues and even highways…although stoplights continue to work ignoring that today is a special day, they no longer have any meaning. It does matter what way traffic is supposed to travel, no policeman is going to write a fine for walking on the wrong side of the street; no matter how old you are, everyone is free to walk around and enjoy the show… that was Iom Kipur for me.

Yet, it is clear that not everyone lives the celebration the same way….

Iom Kipur is one of the holiest days for the Jewish religion. It marks the times for penance that begins in Rosh Hashana and continues for ten days until the last day: Iom Kipur.

It is a day to ask for forgiveness and atonement from sins between humans and God, humans and humans. During Rosh Hashana human beings are judged for their acts, and the final verdict is given at Iom Kipur.

The most religious people abstain themselves from basic needs: they cannot eat, or drink, they cannot wash, cannot use leather shoes (that’s why people walk using shoes made of cloth), cannot have sexual relations, and people must remove themselves from their daily routine to have strength to get purified at the end of the day and receive atonement from the sins incurred throughout the year, so they can return to God.

My experience began the previous day, Thursday…

One of my friend’s sisters invited me to Jerusalem, where people go to the Wailing Wall between 11p.m. and 6 a.m. to pray and ask God for forgiveness…

Since traffic is chaotic, we decided to walk for about an hour to reach the Wailing Wall, where half of Israel awaited for us…people, people and more people crammed together as I had never seen before around this place… very intense and very interesting.

The next day, families get together for a big lunch before they begin to fast at around 6 p.m. and those less religious are lucky to be able to go out in the street, ride their bikes and go around the car-less city… fasting lasts until about 6 p.m. of the following day.

All the pictures I took of Iom Kipur were taken at night, consequently, it was hard to capture the atmosphere and avoid the flash. Enjoy!

I lived a Poem as Julio Bocca said Goodbye in Houston, Texas

Last night I lived a poem, a musical poem, a dancing poem: “Bocca Tango”, stared by Julio Bocca and the Argentinean Ballet at Jones Hall, Houston, Texas, USA.

The dancers swung around the stage with the lightness of spores traveling with the wind as they exposed their tango-ballet fusion. Each movement was a work of art, a brushstroke of skill, harmony and perfection.

At the same time, the musical selection complemented the poem marvelously, helping transmit with word the essence of being Argentinean, and the profound nostalgia and longing felt by the person who leaves their motherland.

The message of the piece was intense and precise, and as an Argentinean away from home, I felt each movement and each word with heightened intensity.

Even though Argentineans tend to complain about their country’s bad economic and political situation continuously, when an Argentinean leaves their home they always leave behind part of their soul, since an Argentinean is not Argentinean without their family and friends, their caravan of memories, and after all Buenos Aires will always be their “Buenos Aires Querido”.


Songs of the Show:
Balada para un Loco – Astor Piazola
Naranjo en Flor – Virgilio Expósito
Mi Buenos Aires Querido – Carlos Gardel

Oil Platforms Unable to Erase Peace from Corpus Christi, Texas

I am a mountain girl because my body claims the vaiven of Avila´s trails (Caracas, Venezuela) and my retinas miss the mountainous horizons.

However, I haven’t been able to find refuge in the mountains lately, instead, my destiny has frequently placed me in places where I get lost in the serenity of beaches platinated by the falling sun; a novel feeling of tranquility that I am beginning to enjoy more and more every day.

Last weekend I found peace in Corpus Christi, a place in the South of Texas, USA that I had heard about many times but I hadn’t had the time to visit.

We got to Corpus around midday, and we headed straight to the beach to absorb the last summer’s sunrays (a wise decision considering Monday started with 52°F).

Since the season was almost over, the beach was practically deserted; we only shared to beach with about a dozen people, a group of seagulls, and an oil platform that looked strange in the horizon but was unable to remove me from that tranquil scenery.

I was tired and stressed… exhausted… my body was overworked and my mind was on fast-forward. I needed the sea breeze to oxygenate my thoughts and the pacifying and constant sound of sea waves to soothe me down.

Corpus might not be the glorious white-sanded/turquoise water beaches that we see in postcards from the Caribbean, but it is the closest “paradise” to Houston, a fabulous cosmopolitan city where traffic stills your life away.

AIDS Communities in Swaziland, Africa

Carlo Capua (Toluca, Mexico / USA)
(translated by Laura Vaillard (original version)
Pictures by Carlo Capua

From the day of my arrival, people of Swaziland rolled out the red carpet for me. My schedule was very full, and considering the time and resources, I walked away feeling like I had accomplished everything I could have.


I had my share of eye-opening experiences, starting with my first visit to a real African church. My friend and host Bongani had told me a lot about his church. It was in the middle of a very rural area. There were about 30 members, and the sermon and prayers were all in siSwati. I could sense that he was a little hesitant about inviting me, but I told him that I was excited to go and take some candid pictures of people.

After the half-mile trek through the mountains (he wasn’t kidding!) we arrived at a very modest white tent with a group of about 15 people waiting inside. I asked Bongani why the other half of the parishioners didn’t come. “They don’t have any clothes or food at the moment,” he said.

It is indeed sad that while many people suffer from lack of food, others are dying from overeating. What really kills me is that at the current “growth” rate, in the next five years 4 out of 10 adults in the USA will be obese while 2.6 million people will continue to starve in Africa.

The most memorable experience I had was during a visit to one of Swaziland’s rural communities. The Mbabane GAP Alumni students and I went to learn more about the situations of many “child headed households.” As HIV is sometimes (not always) passed from a mother to her newborn, there are literally entire communities of orphaned children whose parents have died as a result of HIV.

We went to visit a girl named Cassandra. A frail 18 year-old, she had a beautiful smile and warm spirit that I will never forget.

Cassandra was a victim of her own culture. In Swaziland there is a misconception, primarily on some rural areas, that having sex with a virgin can cure your infection of HIV or AIDS. Consequently, one day an older family member raped her with the hopes of curing his illness.

After Cassandra became infected, her health began to deteriorate. When we visited her she was bedridden. And although she didn’t say much, just the fact that she welcomed us for a few moments into her house, her life, was touching. I promised to visit her next year.







Two weeks later, she passed away.






About Carlo Capua and Sister Cities International

I travelled on behalf of Sister Cities, for a program between Fort Worth and our newest partner of Mbabane, Swaziland. I went on a fact finding trip to start a young professionals exchange and visited communities of HIV patients, orphaned children, and brought attention to our new Sister Cities relationship through media events and visits with City Council.

In June 2008 I will lead a group of our young alumni to develop projects to create mutual understanding between students in both countries, increase the partnership between Fort Worth and Mbabane and create opportunities for cultural exchange and friendship between students.

Interesting Facts: Swaziland, Africa

Carlo Capua (Toluca, Mexico / USA)

(translated by Laura Vaillard (original version)


Pictures by Carlo Capua

The Kingdom of Swaziland, sandwiched between South Africa and Mozambique, is one of the last and longest reigning monarchies in the world. Originally a colony of England, it achieved a peaceful independence in 1968.

Interesting Swazi fact #1
Polygamy is an accepted part of Swazi tradition and is still legal (but very rarely practiced today). Upon stumbling onto this little piece of information, I told my family and co-workers that I would be personally bringing as much Swazi culture back as I could. I think everyone found it funny except for my parents.

Interesting Swazi fact #2
Just about everyone loves King (Inkhosi) Mswati III. He holds absolute power – political parties are banned and he can veto any legislation. People love the king; he is a symbol of what it means to be a Swazi.

Interesting Swazi fact #3
Elephants can run up to 45 kilometers per hour (30 miles per hour). And as one of my Swazi students put it best, “Carlo, I don’t have outrun the elephant. I just have to outrun YOU!”

Interesting Swazi fact #4
The HIV/AIDS infection rate is 26% (highest in the world) and average lifespan is around 33 years (lowest in the world).

About Carlo Capua and Sister Cities International
I travelled on behalf of Sister Cities, for a program between Fort Worth and our newest partner of Mbabane, Swaziland. I went on a fact finding trip to start a young professionals exchange and visited communities of HIV patients, orphaned children, and brought attention to our new Sister Cities relationship through media events and visits with City Council.

In June 2008 I will lead a group of our young alumni to develop projects to create mutual understanding between students in both countries, increase the partnership between Fort Worth and Mbabane and create opportunities for cultural exchange and friendship between students.