Most famous buildings are best known for their exterior. I’ve never, for instance, seen a photo inside the Taj Mahal. This may be one reason some visitors to Buenos Aires never go to El Ateneo Grand Splendid bookshop. I hadn’t heard of it before my first trip to Argentina. My friend Paula took me there…
Read More20
Mar
London 1991 London 1992 Sydney 1995 London 1996 New York City 1996 London 2007 New York City 2007 Perth 2009 Buenos Aires 2009 London 2013 London 2014 Perth 2014 New York City 2015? Give up? Please scroll down… They’re when and where I could have seen The Phantom of the…
Read More17
Mar
The Tierra Santa (Holy Land) theme park in Buenos Aires re-creates The Creation, cramming six days’ work into 15 minutes. Is this proof that the Garden of Eden had a gym? Is this baboon flipping the bird?
Read More13
Mar
Around the time I went through a phase of buying animal fur, I started kissing the ground when visiting new places. First was Paraguay. I was in bed with a sore throat the following week. Here, I’ve just got out of the subway in The Bronx. Technically, this was my first time on the North…
Read More10
Mar
A 21-year-old man with piercing blue eyes, chiselled face, smooth olive skin, tight rippled stomach and deep Latino accent tends to smuggle commercial quantities of cocaine if he’s not involved in a murder conspiracy. (From the Spanish movies El Niño and Marshland) Click here to see who I’m talking about. Jesús Castro. At the 2015 Spanish Film…
Read More8
Mar
One way I learned Spanish was reading Argentina’s constitution. Section 16 begins: The Argentine Nation admits neither blood nor birth prerogatives: there are neither personal privileges nor titles of nobility. All its inhabitants are equal before the law, and admissible to employment without any other requirement than their ability. I also looked at signs. On…
Read More6
Mar
Swimming in Antarctica? Doing the Polar Plunge? No problem! They said Deception Island had thermal springs. The deception was that the Polar Plunge meant a plunge in the water beyond the thermal springs. Which was not thermal. Witness my first courageous effort here. In my post on The King and I, I discussed how a reviewer saw the movie Once is Not…
Read More3
Mar
Have I become more camp over the years? Exhibit A: The Chris Evert fake rhinestone frilly knickers from Perth’s 1999 Pride Parade. Exhibit B: The blue wig I wore on Rose Hancock Porteous’ reality TV show. Sadly for some, copyright issues prevent me from sharing that with you. Exhibit C: Gertrude my pet fox. Sadly for some,…
Read More28
Feb
