#3346: Thursday January 19 2025: Back to Cuenca!

Post 3346

- 14 years and 19 days since I started this blog -

Solo set at Lecker's.

Travel Journal

(written January 19, 2025)

Read this once, it won't change for the rest of the trip(s): 

I'll be linking this post to Facebook. If that's how you got here, here's some background: About 14 years ago I started this blog as a food journal. I had a Type-2 Diabetes diagnosis, and needed to lose weight. Initially, that's all I did here: Journal my food intake and my weight. It contributed to a loss of 20+% of my body weight in 6 months, and continuing has kept me on track since. I started adding commentary after a while, but recently it has returned to a food journal only. 

While I'm traveling, I let go of the weight-tracking and food journaling (except for food shots when I've eaten something interesting or pretty). I write about my experiences, and use it as a photo dump. And that's where we find ourselves now.

- - - - - - - 

I'm in Cuenca, Ecuador. I got here Friday night (more on that in a minute). As I write this, I have just got back from lunch. I'ver been here for about forty hours.

The last couple of days in Chiang Mai were pretty uneventful. I had an interesting jam, and then it was all about getting ready to leave, saying my good-byes. 

The trip to Cuenca from Chiang Mai is arduous. I have never found a single ticket (even with multiple stops) that could get me there. Basically, all my research has determined the best route involves the return of a round-trip from JFK to Chiang Mai, then JFK to Cuenca. The trip to Chiang Mai involves two flights, the trip to Cuenca, three.

Every year I book my flights in May, when the schedule for the first quarter of the next year becomes available. This inevitably means that there will be flight changes along the way. They are typically very minor - slight schedule changes. This year turned out to be the exception.

The flight out of Chiang Mai to Seoul, Korea, at the end of my trip, was canceled and then replaced with a flight on a different airline to Bangkok, and then a flight from there to Seol to meet my Seoul to JFK flight. This moved my departure time up by five hours.

Thus began the most difficult flying experience of my life.

After checking out, I took my baggage (checked suitcase, carry-on bass guitar and backpack) to my friend David's apartment. I was going to hang there until I had to leave for the airport at 4:30pm. At around 2:30, I got a text from the airline that my flight to Bangkok was going to be delayed. About 20 minutes after that, I got a call from the airlines that I had been rebooked on to what appeared to be my original direcrt flight, with a different flight number.

A good thing, except I couldn't stay at David's that long, he had things to do. And I was cought short and unprepared for the late afternoon. So my trip began with a five-hour layover. Not tragic, and I was glad for the better flight.

It was about an hour after takeoff when I realized the THC gummies I'd bought to get me through the long first two flights (a total of 21 hours flight time, plus a 3-1/2 hour layover) weren't working. At all. 

I can't sleep on planes. Except when I'm stoned. There was nothing to do about it, so I did a lot of meditation, and watched some movies whose dialog I couldn't understand because of the crappy headphones and my crappy hearing, and captioning available only in Korean or Chinese.

A 4-hour layover at JFK was pretty easy. I have never, ever had an easier trip through customs, and quickly found the path to the Avianca Airlines ticket counter - one stop on the AirTrain - walked right up, check my baggage, get my tickets (JFK-Bógota, Bógota-Quito, Quito-Cuenca). I was told I would have to pick up my bag at Quito to go through Ecuador Immigration, then re-check it (same tag) for the final flight.

The first - and longest, at seven hours - flight ran smoothly, but it was uncomfortable. I have never sat in a seat with less legroom. I literally could not sit with my legs straight out without my knees hitting the back of the seat in front of me hard, so had to put one knee in the aisle and the other between the seats in front of me. Oh, and no amenities.- no entertainment, no wifi.

By the time the flight took off, I hadn't slept since I woke up 40 hours hours earlier. I'd been in airports or on flights for 32 hours.

The Bógota airport was pretty. My ticket said I boarded at 11:05pm, another long layover. I went to the gate around 9pm, to make my plea (as I do every time) for early boarding for my section, so I could stow my bass out of the way. No problem. I asked. where I could charge my phone? Over that way. So I charged my pnone, set an alarm for 11:00.

At 11, I went back to the gate. There was nobody there but the agents. I went to the one I'd talked with an hour-and-a-half ago. I missed my flight? Yes. Doors closed ten minutes ago. But my ticket said this was when I board. A shrug. Didn't I hear the announcement? No, I did not. Because I was over that way, charging my phone. Look at my ticket: It clearly states boarding at 11:05. How can you help me? My bag is on that flight.

At that, the agent agreed to re-ticket me. The next flight, however, wasn't until six in the morning. And the next Quito-to-Cuenca flight after I landed wasn't until 7pm. I asked if they'd give me a hotel overnight - no, and it wasn't a good idea, because all the hotels were in town, and I'd risk missing the flight.

So, I added twelve hours to my journey, just like that. 

I arrived in Quito - thankfully, only a two-hour flight - went through immigration in seconds - consumed by exhaustion and worry about the bag that had arrived there nine hours earlier. I went to the baggage claim, and circled the periphery looking for an office where my bag might be held for me.

But there were no offices. No holding area for unclaimed luggage. My stomach in knots, I vainly looked for some kind of official. None around. Finally, I asked a porter (having to explain that I didn't need his services) about bags that had arrived last night. He just pointed to the carousel my flight's bags were unloaded on. No, those were the bags from my flight just landed. My Spanish was overloaded, and I couldn't understand anything he was saying to me. But he walked me over to the carousel, rotating bags from my flight.

I got there, looked down, and my bag practically rolled into my hands. Unbelievable. I just had to laugh at the idea that my bag had been rotating around that carousel for nine hours, waiting for me.

By the time I arrived at wonderful Hostal Yakumama, whose Bistro Yaku has been a favorite place in Cuenca for its excellent restaurant and live music program, including the longest-running open mic in Cuenca, I hadn't slept for 71 hours, almost three days. I'd also crossed twelve time zones. And I was at an altitude 8400' above sea level.

I was a wreck.

I have never been more exhausted. I arrived at 8:15pm, to a warm greeting (by name, from everyone there) and was promoted to a better room for my troubles. 

According to my iWatch, I was asleep by 9:15. I have no idea. 

Claudia came to see me for 'lunch' (breakfast for me) the next day. I was playing with her band, the Blues Enigma Band, at 5pm.

I only have a few photos, of the last days in Chiang Mai, and my first hours in Cuenca:

People Pics

Playing at Lecker Bistro's open mic in Chiang Mai.

This is my friend, Nat (pronounced 'nut'). He recently opened up a tiny coffee shop near me, dedicated to selling local beans, and serving the best pour-over coffee I've ever had. Watching him prepare your cup - every single cup is made one-at-a-time - is entertainment of the highest order, and also a lesson in precision. Everything is weighed and timed. The quality of the cup is extraordinary, and Nat's care and precision are great to see.

My budtenders at 64Buds, who befriended me and gave me great weed throughout my stay this year. Wu and Mai. I think. I was pretty stoned.

Rychy and JoJo, two extraordinary singers. Rychy is a newly arrived expat. I've known Joyce (JoJo) since my first trip to Chiang Mai seven years ago.

Finally, in Cuenca, brunch with Claudia.

Wandering

Sunrise over Seoul. From the aisle seat.

Food Comment

Last breakfast at Kati Breakfast and Brunch, root vegetable salad with coconut green tea and scrambled eggs (not shown, because I'd already eaten them). A memorable breakfast. Kati is my favorite new breakfast spot in Chiang Mai.

Bistro Yaku has been one of my favorite places in Cuenca since I started coming here. Originally a live music and open mic destination, I quickly became enamored of the food and really enjoyed the warmth of the staff. Over the years, the relationship has only gotten better. BY is the restaurant of Hostal Yakumama, a hostel I only learned last year had a few private rooms to let. I made sure to make arrangements to book there before I left last year. On to the food. This is a custom dish I started having last year, and I think it is one of the best breakfasts an omnivore can eat: Vegetable omelet with cheese, a whole avocado, steak and a delicious salad. I don't have to order it any more. They know I'm going to ask for it.

 Please leave a comment when you visit my blog. 

Comments are anonymous, so leave your name, too!
Thank you!

#3345: January 12, 2025

Post 3345

- 14 years and 12 days since I started this blog -

Travel Journal

(written January 10-12, 2025)

Read this once, it won't change for the rest of the trip(s): 

I'll be linking this post to Facebook. If that's how you got here, here's some background: About 14 years ago I started this blog as a food journal. I had a Type-2 Diabetes diagnosis, and needed to lose weight. Initially, that's all I did here: Journal my food intake and my weight. It contributed to a loss of 20+% of my body weight in 6 months, and continuing has kept me on track since. I started adding commentary after a while, but recently it has returned to a food journal only. 

While I'm traveling, I let go of the weight-tracking and food journaling (except for food shots when I've eaten something interesting or pretty). I write about my experiences, and use it as a photo dump. And that's where we find ourselves now.

- - - - - - - 

Random musings: I realized recently that in all my visits to Chiang Mai I have never heard of a male masseur. It seems to be a closed shop for women only. The clientele are universal, of course.  for more than two weeks, now. For the first two weeks, my daytime activities were somewhat limited by a knee injury and the weather, which was about 10º hotter than I've previously experienced here, that, when walking, feels hotter than the upper 80s it has reached every day.

I was walking back to my room after breakfast, and had an encounter with a middle-aged Thai man on the street. As I passed him, he asked, "How many months?" I was intrigued, and said, "Only one week." He patted my full stomach and said, "No, 'til baby!" I had to laugh. It's a fact that you can easily tell when I've just eaten - the swallowed basketball effect. We ended up chatting for a while. When he found out I was from New York (everybody assumes when I say I'm from New York, I mean New York City. They are, of course correct), I found out he had visited the city forty years ago, part of a Thai boxing exhibition. I asked him how he liked New York. His eyes lit up: "I saw a Ricky Martin concert!"

A lot of my friends here are under the weather. A lot. But they are all suffering from different things: pneumonia, flu, covid, common cold, stomach distress. It has affected my music schedule.

Last week I got all upset for a few hours in response to hearing that Troubadour, one of my favorite hangs in Chiang Mai, had been ordered to stop live music. I mean, I started doom-tripping, and got myself all worked up about it: I was sad and angry (outraged!). But when that happens, I do exercises for letting go of the unproductive (and largely self-generated) emotions. So, when I stopped by to have a drink and commiserate with Sebastien, the owner, I found instead a full house watching a performance by my friends Jojo and Ron, aka Sensitive Side.

It turns out, the whole story was that some 'neighbors' (unknown) had made noise complaints. There would be no bands for a while. But it's Chiang Mai. This week the new schedule went up, and lo and behold, my favorite bands are back playing at Troubadour.

Another weird encounter, this time with a cab driver. After an unusually prompt pickup and quick easy trip, as I prepared to leave, the cabbie said, in clear English, "Please make sure you take everything with you." Over the last seven years I've spent more than eight months in Chiang Mai. In that time, I have in fact, left things in cabs: my phone, an umbrella, even my wallet, when it fell out of my pocket, once. It's happened more often in Cuenca. But, in all that time, In all that time, nobody has ever made this suggestion at a time it was useful. I had to ask, "Did I drop something?" "Please check, he replied. 

It's like he knew me. (I did check, and had not left anything). 

Across the street from where I'm staying, there's a cat bar, one of a few I've seen in Chiang Mai. No, not a place for cats to drink, you pay about $3 an hour to hang out in a bar with a roomful of house cats. I haven't checked it out and probably won't, but a couple of days ago met someone who had, and she loved the experience. My encounters with cats here (people bring their cats to work, they are tolerated in restaurants) have convinced me that Thai cats are 'way more chill than American cats. They are unafraid and affectionate without reserve. I'm sure there are cats like that in the US. I just haven't met them in this lifetime.

Butter Is Better Diner and Bakery, a New York City-style deli, is one of my favorite restaurants, and I've been talking about it since my friend Harry (RIP) took me there on my first visit to Chiang Mai. Today, I got my usual pastrami and eggs. I was ready to dig in, but no silverware on the table. I called the waitress over and asked her for some silverware. Ollie, sitting next to me, thought I asked for cebolla (Spanish for onion), and he and the Thai waitress looked at me in bewilderment. I repeated my request, with appropriate pantomime of knife-and-fork work.

The waitress laughedt and pointed at my plate, where a knife and fork were indeed sitting there wrapped in a napkin. I corrected Ollie about what I was asking for, and we thought it was a) kind of typical for me; and 2) hilarious.

In less than three days, I begin my trip to Cuenca, Ecuador. When I booked the flights, it was six flights, but a cancellation and rebooking added a flight, and six hours to my total flight time. I will arrive in Cuenca 48 hours after my first flight lifts off from Chiang Mai, although only one day/date will have elapsed since I cross the International Date Line (the other way, subtracting 24 hours from the 'clock'). Basically, thirty hours in the air, eighteen hours of layover. I'm packing some very strong edibles.

On to the photos:

People (in this case, just me) Pics

At my fave dispensary, 64Buds (which was medical before it had to be), I got to help sort and assess some new product. My idea of fun.

UN Irish has been one of my go-to breakfast places from the beginning, but I haven't really gotten any pics there, until now.

Wandering

Lots of Buddhist temple (wot) shots, from new-to-me wots, the result of going on longer walks, earlier. 

This is one of my favorite Thai restaurants, Dash. Besides being the place I met one of my Thai musician friends, who's been doing solo guitar-and-vocals there since before my first visit seven years ago, and serving above-average Thai food, and being very popular, it's really pretty at night.

Food

From Kati Breakfast and Brunch, Overnight oats, the new winner and oatmeal champion of the world (except for my own homemade). With a side of the most perfect scrambled eggs I've ever been served - and consistently - this is my new favorite breakfast in Chiang Mai. 

Another favorite breakfast, and another repeat, is the green shakshuka (with falafel) from Hummus Chiang Mai. This is not really a shakshuka - they have a great classic shakshuka - it just has a kind of similar form. Nonetheless, it is just amazing, and completely unique to Hummus. It wasn't on the menu in previous years, so represents another new find this trip.

From Alice's Kitchen, Chiang Mai-Thai classics: Papaya salad, tom kha (chicken) and fried rice, with iced green coconut tea.

 Please leave a comment when you visit my blog. 

Comments are anonymous, so leave your name, too!
Thank you!

#3344: January 4, 2025: Happy New Year

Post 3344

- 14 years and 4 days since I started this blog -

Travel Journal

(written January 4, 2025)

Read this once, it won't change for the rest of the trip(s): 

I'll be linking this post to Facebook. If that's how you got here, here's some background: About 14 years ago I started this blog as a food journal. I had a Type-2 Diabetes diagnosis, and needed to lose weight. Initially, that's all I did here: Journal my food intake and my weight. It contributed to a loss of 20+% of my body weight in 6 months, and continuing has kept me on track since. I started adding commentary after a while, but recently it has returned to a food journal only. 

While I'm traveling, I let go of the weight-tracking and food journaling (except for food shots when I've eaten something interesting or pretty). I write about my experiences, and use it as a photo dump. And that's where we find ourselves now.

- - - - - - - 

I want to start by dedicating this episode to my brother Andy, who would have been 73 today, if he hadn't died 2-1/2 years ago.

Things are mostly the same as they've been. I've been playing pretty regularly. I even got to play a couple of gigs at a nice club (gigs are where I get to play a whole set of music. Pay is not involved - that would be illegal (I'm here on a tourist visa), and I don't ever want to take money out of the pockets of Chiang Mai's working musicians). 

I've been to a few new-to-me restaurants, but have largely gone to the known-and-loved restaurants that are still around. I've been eating more vegetarian meals than usual, but that reflects my love for certain vegan restaurants. But it is definitely not a lifestyle change, I'm still omnivorous.

The hot days have returned, so most of my outings have happened in the evenings. It's high season here, and the omnipresent traffic has reached new heights - or depths - of horrendous-ness. Exacerbated by Chiang Mai's 700-year old non-grid, streets-and-alleys layout, where two-way traffic has to contend with one lane for both ways, and streets are closed off, seemingly randomly, to create pop-up markets; I have never seen it this bad. 

Still, patience is its own reward. After all, when you're in traffic, you are traffic.

On to the photos:

People Pics

The Dee Band is my friend Roddy's new band. I saw them for the first time a week or so after I got back, and was really impressed - and moved. A week later, they played a gig at one of Chiang Mai's upscale malls. The gig was amazing: Big stage, great sound. It showed the band off wonderfully. Unfortunately, Roddy was coming down with something at the gig, and they've canceled their dates since. The top picture has, left to right: My friend David, bassist for the group, my friend Oliver, guitarist and top Dude, Roddy's daughter Belle, and Roddy. 

In the Fred MacMurray room of Butter is Better Diner and Bakery, my favorite deil in the world right now. That's David and Rychy with me in this shot.

At the open mic at Free Bird, a very cool place, new to me this trip. At the top, jazz singer Rychy, followed by my old friend Hunter (aka Mac Tavish, also the name of his stuffed bear) performing some magic. Finally, me, with the Unknown Guitarist at my side.

Rychy at Thae Phae Gate, looking down Thae Phae Road.

Guitarist, singer, band leader, bar owner, friend, and John Wick look-a-like Sebastien in front of his club, Troubadour.

Holding down the bottom end in a jam at Lecker Bistro.

Selfies

At Downtown Garden, one of my favorite restaurants, the newest of three sister vegan restaurants I love (Reform Kafe and Goudsouls are the other two). These restaurants all serve my favorite dessert in th world: their raw brownie cake. Pic by Rychy.

Not Superman.

Mac Tavish and I. Photo by Mac's alter-ego, Hunter.

Wandering

New Year's Eve

I did New Year's Eve at Thae Phae Gate, the Times Square of Chiang Mai. Last year, the gate was turned into an electric theme park. This year, they invested in the music, with a huge stage and Chiang Mai's most famous Thai bands. It seems that that was a very well-received idea, because the Gate seemed much more crowded - that bottom picture was a cheat, taken January 1, because on New Year's Eve I couldn't get a shot of the LOVE 2025 light sculpture because of the crowds. It got so heavy, I began to find it oppressive, and didn't stay for the fireworks. I did get a decent shot of some lanterns going aloft.

Food Comment

Pastrami and eggs at Butter Is Better.

Falafel plate at Downtown Garden.

 Please leave a comment when you visit my blog. 

Comments are anonymous, so leave your name, too!
Thank you!