Pet Peeve #1-
25 Jan 2010 Comments Off
in Uncategorized Tags: pet peeves
I hate it when people equate average size or curves women = realness and thin women = bony/anorexic. I personally am a size 10/12 myself, but my own mother was model-thin as a young woman and was about as real a woman one can get…It’s attitude that makes a real woman, not clothing size.
Tip o’ the Day- 22-jan-10
22 Jan 2010 Leave a Comment
The worst thing you can say to a person (as a lame attempt to score progressive points or disprove accusations of bigotry) is that “My best friend is [insert marginalised group]“. It makes you look like a complete tool and well…quite bigoted!
Don’t believe me- Just ask Scott Baio!
Special Shout-Out…
20 Jan 2010 Leave a Comment
To the state of Massachussetts who has a Cosmo centerfold model as a Senator now (aka Ted Kennedy’s old seat)…Regardless of how I feel about his politics, I’m pretty humoured by this and well, he still looks pretty damn good now @ the age of 50…
Don’t know what may come of health care reform or mid-term elections but hey, I just HAD to post this song! Cheers!
Happy New Year!
01 Jan 2010 Leave a Comment
My NYE was pretty uneventful. Originally I was invited to a party in NYC, but the snowy weather kept me indoors. So I spent most of the day cleaning house & watching movies. I passed out before midnight & missed the ball drop. To be honest, I am surprised by how much at peace I am with not going out to a party for once!
This afternoon, I decided to conjure up a little luck w/some black-eyed peas. I only started doing this 3 years ago cos I probably grew up in one of the few black American families that didn’t follow this New Year’s Day tradition. Normally, black-eyed peas are flavoured with smoked fatback and since I was already a vegetarian there was much improvision to do. All it took was my throwing in a few of my favourite ingredients that I had laying around and it produced an awesomely tasty dish that can be eaten all year round. I hope you enjoy it as well!
May your 2010 be wonderful & awesome! 
~K.
Black Eyed Peas (serves 2)
Ingredients:
- 1 15 oz. can of black eyed peas, drained & rinsed
- 2 strips of Fakin’ Bacon
- 1-2 tablespoons of olive oil
- 1-3 fresh garlic cloves, shredded
- 1/2 of a small red onion, diced
- 1 chipotle pepper in adobo sauce, julienned. You can remove the seeds if you don’t want much spice.
- salt to taste
- 1/4 cup of water
- 1 cup of cooked brown rice (I used jasmine rice for this recipe)
Instructions:
1- Heat olive oil in a skillet on medium heat.
2- Fry the Fakin’ Bacon strips skillet until they’re brown & crisp on both sides. Once done, put aside on plate & break up strips into pieces.
3- Replace bacon w/onions & garlic in skillet and fry until onions are soft & transparent & garlic is fragrant, about 5 mins.
4- Add rinsed beans, bacon pieces & chipotle pepper, salt & water to skillet & stir until all ingredients are well incorporated. Cook until beans are hot, about 5-10 mins.
5- Put beans over cooked brown rice. Bon appetit! 
Real Talk
04 Dec 2009 Leave a Comment
Mr. Peaches (my cat) and I discuss the important current events of our time. For example, the Tiger Woods scandal.
Me to Mr. P: Hey, Mr. Peaches! Tiger Woods cheated on his wife!
Mr. P.: *blinks* *blank stare* *turns to look @ wasabi soy almonds on dresser*
He cares, no?
Eurotrip Pt. 2-
01 Dec 2009 Leave a Comment
3-November: We get to Italy in the evening. Have dinner, which was lasagna. My vegetarian option- some roasted veggies. It was just okay.
My hotel room in Noale (a nearby town @ the Italian mainland) was bordeline dodgy…80s decor & cigarette burns in the carpet & nightstand…YEAH!!! Also- the toilet was in the shower and we had a bidet in the bathroom…Which was cool to use.
Watched Italian TV, went to bed…Was awaken by the racket outside…Didn’t get much sleep afterwards. It turned out that our bus driver got drunk and passed out in the hallway (he had the next day off, thank god!). One of the girls in our group took a photo of him w/her blackberry cam.
4-November: We took the train ride to the Italian shoreline and then a water cab to La Venezia Bella! Venice is romantic, rustic and the perfect atmosphere for amore! I saw two of my fellow travellers holding hands.
It rained all day in Venezia…It was cold and not a great day for touristing. First we went to a glass blowing demo, which was pretty cool! (Random odd sighting- Japanese tourists w/surgical masks on) From there we had our free time. While people were busy shopping for Venetian glass & carnival masks or getting great deals on Gucci, Dolce & Gabbana and other Italian fashion labels, I spent my time trying to keep warm & dry. First @ the Basilica di San Marco a Venezia, which is this ancient cathedral that is so massive & ornate, it’s an artwork in itself then @ a bookstore. My shoes wet and my pants were soaked up to my calves & I was so unhappy! Most of the people went on the gondola ride while I remained at the bookstore and contemplated life. How exciting…When the rain dried up, I roamed around Venice and took pics…It was an amazing city!
Dinnertime came. We went to an Italian restaurant, where we pigged out on unlimited pasta, bread & wine for 30 euros. I scarfed down food and got drunk off of wine. I will not tell you what happened to me afterwards, but it was REALLY embarrassing! Apparently, I nearly set the water taxi on fire cos I was playing with a lighter and I had to have it taken away from me.
We took the boat back to the mainland and ended up @ a bar in Noale. I was basically peer pressured into going cos it was the night before my birthday and people wanted to celebrate (like they needed a reason to get drunk off their asses). Drinks were flowing abundantly, glasses were broken and eventually some people started to get sick on themselves. One of the guys bought a round of jager bombs for all, which tasted like cough syrup w/o flavor or sweetener.
After an hour of these shenanigans, I left to go back to the hotel. Again, the Aussies came back to the hotel loud and rowdy! Woke me up and I barely got a wink of sleep after that.
5-November (aka my 32nd bday): We took the drive from Italy to Switzerland, which was very scenic and jaw-droppingly awesome.
Lucerne is a beautiful city which sits in the valleys of Suisse, surrounded by large snow-capped mountains and a river that runs through the land (like . Big pain is that they use the Franc, which is just as pretty as the Euro, but virtually useless anywhere else BUT Switzerland. While everyone bought Swiss Army knives & watches, I stocked up on chocolates and scenery!
We checked into our hotel, which was a converted women’s jail…My floor looked like a cellblock and my room looked like a cell. It even had bars on the cage & windows. It was kinda cool and I got to brag to my peeps back home that I spent the night @ a Swiss jail cell! If I ever go to Lucerne, I’d stay there again!
The tour manager arranged it so that we got into a nightclub + VIP seats 100% free! I had all the young guys buy me drinks b/c it was my bday..
The nightclub was meh…Reminded me of an early millennium throwback in a random NY suburb. Most of the guys looked like guidos and they played music I haven’t heard since the dawn of my 20s! But they had a go-go cage & light up platform…Which was hella cool! I swung off the bars, danced with everyone in the club…Including a girl from Portugal. I also high-fived a Turkish dude and danced my butt off!
The Aussie Crew (as usual) got annoyingly rowdy and drunk. One guy fell off the go-go cage and hit his head…Then he went and mooned a couple making out. Another one was so drunk he was cross-eyed and rubbing his crotch on peoples hands. *rolls eyes* It was annoying.
I wanted to take the walk back to the hotel and asked the tour manager for directions. They turned out to be all wrong because he was drunk. I got lost. Thank god the locals spoke English b/c I was walking into the Swiss ghetto! Got to my hotel…Tried to get some sleep, but that never happened.
6-November: Long drive from Switzerland to Paris (9 hrs). Tried to sleep on the bus but the girl behind me kept on pulling my seat back as she got up! We got to our hotel late in the night. By far the hotel in Paris was my fave because it was so cozy and neat…And it had a flat screen TV! Shortly thereafter, we had dinner (which was veggies and mashed taters for me) I don’t even think the French ever heard of vegetarians cos the waiter asked me if I ate chicken?
After dinner, we took a tour of Paris @ night. It sure is a magical city! Ended up @ the Eiffel tower, which had this wonderful light show to commemorate its 120th anniversary! Once we ducked the annoying souvenir vendors, we entered the tower and bought tix to go on the upper decks (I got up to the second level, while everyone else went to the very top). I walked around the deck of the tower, shot photos of the amazing Paris skyline and bought some souvenirs @ the shop.
After the Eiffel Tower, the bus drove around the city to see all of the typical touristy places- the Arc de Triomphe, the Louvre, Notre Dame, etc. Then back to the hotel and bed.
7-November (last day): The tour group went to a perfume factory to see how French makes their perfume. I ended up buying a bottle and now I am sans $55 USD haha! After that, it was free time…Do whatever you want.
I walked around the shopping district, picked up souvenirs for my friends back home and took the Metro to the La Grande Arche, where a friend of F’s lived. I had some American fare for her and since we didn’t meet in A-dam, I was gonna try and drop off her goods w/this friend so he could ship them to her. He wasn’t home and the concierge @ his building would not take my package, so I ended up making the long train ride back to my hotel room to drop off everything and dry out.
I went back out and took the Metro to the Louvre, which is MASSIVE. I knew I didn’t have time to go inside the museum, so I checked out the outside garden, where I took photos of these cooky sculptures. While taking pics, I am approached by a gypsy woman who asked me if I spoke English. I looked @ her like she was crazy and kept it walking…Mostly because she was about to pull the infamous card scam that Rick Steve’s website warned you about.
I walked around Paris and took photos of just about everything to the point where I was being scolded by vendors! It was embarrassing in the end.
And yes- it is true what they say about the French. While most Europeans in general know more than one language, the Parisians will not speak anything other than French to you. I saw an American woman approach a French man and asked him if he spoke English. He walked away from her saying nothing. I was like DAMN! COLD BLOODED!
That’s why I took the travel crash course. But magically, I regained most of the French I learned in school (and lost). Viva la survival mechanism…lol
I went inside the Notre Dame & roamed around a bit more to find a place to eat…But it was getting cold & dark, and most French cafés had no viable veg options. So back to the hotel room, where I found a pizza shop around the corner and had a kir royale @ the hotel lobby bar, while most of the tour went to see the Moulin Rouge.
Someone was knocking on my bedroom door @ 2am. I ignored them because @ this point, I was getting beyond annoyed w/people getting irresponsibly drunk and disrupting my sleep. Turned out later that one of the younger Aussies got drunk & lost everyone’s hotel keycards, so people were trying to find their hotel rooms.
8-November: Time to say goodbye. Dropped off @ airport. Bought a bottle of duty free liquor (absinthe). I flew back home.
pics!
Eurotrip Pt. 1-
01 Dec 2009 Leave a Comment
29-Oct: Was my overnight flight to London…Took off at around 11pm EST. It wasn’t bad but I didn’t get much in the way of sleep. Saw the Harry Potter movie on flight.
30-Oct: Landed into London Heathrow @ 9am in the morning. Bought an all-day tube pass and took the train to my hotel @ Russell Square…The tube was easy to use and the hotel location was pretty convenient…Right around the corner from the train station & lots of stores around.
I met up w/two of my travel group mates (another American & a British guy who took us around town). We saw all the touristy spots- Trafalgar Square, Buckingham Palace, Parliament Building, Big Ben, the ferris wheel on a quick whirlwind tour. I called two homegirls that I met through Black Women in Europe. They both lived in London and we had made tentative plans to hang once I flew across the pond. Had to borrow the British guy’s mobile phone cos mine went kaput.
Later in the evening, we met the tour manager & the rest of the group for registration, etc. The group itself is like a mini UN! There were about 6 Americans, one Brit, three South Africans, two Mexicans, one Colombian, one Brasilian, a Pakistani, a Saudi, three Kiwis a few Canucks and a large group of Australians!
Registration took only a few minutes, not long @ all. Afterwards, I met one of my BWIE homegirls and she gave me a tour of London @ night. We had coffee @ a really cute café, ran into a candlelight vigil @ Trafalgar Sq, for a gay man who was recently murdered there. It was interesting.
After that, we walked around to see the nightlife…And I went back to my hotel room, where I went to bed and prepped for the BIG TOUR!
31-Oct: Woke up early, called my mom to let her know I’m still alive…Got my bags weighted and got on the bus. The bus got onto a large ferry which transported us to the mainland. From there, we drove through Belgium to get to the Netherlands. Got to the hotel in the evening, washed up, had dinner and went into Amsterdam for our optional excursions- a river cruise (w/unlimited amounts of alcohol) and a live sex show!
The cruise took us around the canal and everyone was being filled up with an abundant amounts of wine & beer. I had about 4 glasses myself! After the cruise, we walked around the Red Light District which is….WhOOO! The old Times Square had nothing on this place!
First off- Prostitution is legal in Amsterdam & the hookers have their own union! You would walk into the side streets and see these storefront windows with the girls standing behind them like mannequins! If the shades were shut- that meant she was servicing a client. There would be seedy mofos to the left and right tryna get some paid stuff! And these dudes look sleazy as hell! I just passed by the windows and waved to all the hookers cos I had no idea what else to do!
And if the hookers didn’t get you, the random whiffs of mary jane would…yes, marijuana is legal in Amsterdam as well and people smoke them in cafes. Dutch weed is extremely potent and will stop you in your tracks!
And if that didn’t get you, then the open urinals will…They have open urinal stands w/no partition, no door and the guys just go there, whip out their manhoods and do their business. I guess it’s better than peeing in a corner, but still…OMG! :O
And then there is the live sex show, which I didn’t go to, so I walked around A-dam @ night. From what I heard one of the Aussies in our group PARTICIPATED in the show! :O
Everyone was pretty hammered @ this point. The Aussies were ROWDY as hell and I knew from that day, we were gonna have a wild group w/that bunch! A Canadian guy got sick on the bus…Vomiting everywhere! It smelled HORRIBLE! He puked once all over people & had to puke again…he ran to the bathroom, which was in the back of the bus near me. I flew over my seat and landed in a guy’s lap to duck flying barf. HAHA!
1-November: I woke up an hour behind…And found out my tour group left without me no note, nothing! I was scared shitless. Thankfully there was another Contiki group in the hotel. That tour manager gave me the mobile # of my tour manager, who told me where they were and how to get there.
After I got to Amsterdam Central, I only had two hours left of tour time before the bus left to Germany, so I roamed around town and took pics. Ate their famous fries w/mayo. I didn’t get a chance to meet up w/F or her gf, who wanted to give me the grand tour of A-dam! 
Amsterdam is a beautiful old city, with their 500 year old churches, leaning buildings and cobblestone streets. However, it is not one of my favourite places as it is pretty dirty (There would be piles of garbage on the streets!) and overcrowded w/tourists. And if you didn’t get damn near hit by an obnoxious biker, then it might be a car or trolley. Grr.
It does get nicer though the farther away you are from the red light district.
From there we drove to St. Goar, Germany, which was in the Rhine Valley. We made pit stops along the way. What I noticed about Europe is how expensive things are. A 20-oz bottle of coke can run you about $4-5 USD and candy bars, chips, etc. about $3 or more. Plus, their sales taxes are high up into the teen percentages (in France it’s about 20%)…I never want to hear Americans complain about paying taxes or cost of living again after seeing my money being sucked up as bad as it was in Europe.
Once we crossed the German border, there went my chance to have a decent meal. It was all about sausages, large legs of lamb, whole chickens and plenty of beer to wash it down with. So I ate yogurt, fruit & pastries. Which wasn’t a problem because the food was phenom! The yogurt was thick & creamy, the fruit fresh and the sweets so buttery and flavourful (as opposed to the pure sugar & preservatives that is loaded onto US snacks). I felt filled with that little bit of food.
We arrived in St. Goar @ night. It’s a very small & picturesque village, with hilltop castles hidden behind thick fog…The hotel room was little to be desired. No heat/hot water and the bathroom was a throwback to the 50s. Was super happy to check out in the morning.
2-November: We had breakfast & did do a little souvenir shopping, where people bought beer steins and Birkenstocks for super cheap. I just got postcards and a medallion for my co-worker @ job #1.
We drove to Munich, which was in the state of Bavaria (Bavarians separate themselves from the rest of Germany). It rained the entire time. Regardless, the drives throughout Europe have been really scenic and beautiful. On the sides of the where you see old farm houses, cows, horses & sheep roaming freely in the grass and often times, small cottages &/or thick, dense forestry. I could see myself living in the middle of all this nature & serenity.
It was really pouring by the time we checked into Munich…I loved my hotel room and didn’t want to leave. But I already paid for an excursion- walking tour around Munich.
The whole time we walked around Munich, it was raining and cold. I was miserable. But Munich was a gorgeous old city. By the end of the tour, we dried out @ a beer hall. Where large platters of dead animals were served by waitresses in dirndls and the lager was free & flowing in liter sized mugs. The Aussies were chugging them bitches down like water! And I got hit on by a drunk German. Ew.
I had tea w/rum & a platter of kasespatzle, which were these cheesy noodles w/onions atop. Nom!
After the beer hall it was back to my hotel room for a bit of rest, relaxation & a little German TV…Which of course was all in Deutsch. Even the American shows were dubbed in German…LOL
3-November: We left Munich to make the drive to Venice, Italy. En route, we stopped in Innsbruck (Austria), which was stunning! Snow capped mountains, lush, green hills, cozy cottages, clean streets & air! Sadly I had no pics of this place as I locked my camera in my suitcase.
We only spent an hour in Innsbruck, where we visited & toured the Swarovski crystal shop. Those who were able to, stocked up on jewels. I didn’t. We also had pizza in Austria. The slice was HUGE and about the size of two NY slices. But it was amazing. From Austria, we went to bella Italia!!!
Part two to come: Italy, Switzerland & Paris! Oohlala!!! :O
Are we still our hair?
21 May 2009 Leave a Comment
This is my favourite scene from the movie “School Daze”…Although it’s pure satire, it does pose interesting commentary about “the hair issue” (aka the straight vs. nappy hair wars) that has plagued the black American community since slavery.
In the 21 years since School Daze hit the theaters, natural hair has become wildly popular, perhaps even mainstream…There are so many websites dedicated to natural hair, that I trip over them whenever I surf online…Admittedly, you wouldn’t have seen this back in ’88 (even if the internet was existent, haha).
Now that we’ve gotten comfortable to the point where one can assert “I am not my hair”, does this mean that the hair wars are over? I would like to think so (for the most part at least). I haven’t seen hair being a major sore spot around my neck of the woods. I’ve been dreadlocked for 5 years, relaxer-free for 10 and I’ve yet to receive any negative comments about my hair…My friends and family are natural, relaxed, weaved or whatever they wish to be at the moment…
So…In your opinion, is the hair war still on? Share your stories…
Hello world!
18 May 2009 Leave a Comment
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