Memoir of a Multi-Passionate Entrepreneur, OR How Time Traveler Tours Came to Be, Ch 3

And We’re Off...

So we were off again, on another expatriate adventure, though as I explained here, this time an unexpected one. 

In early July 2004, exactly eight years ago today, the entire contents of our family home – sans brand-spanking-new white kitchen – were swallowed up by an international moving container on the hottest day of the year and sent packing, en route to Paris, France. Jimmy, the Lucky-one-and-only (Loo), and I would soon follow in the company of Wiggles, a once-bedraggled stray tomcat who adopted us upon our arrival in Brooklyn from China, just six years earlier.

Wiggles, then seven, and Loo, then eight, would not be separated.

That night we were giddy, tired, dirty, and very, very hungry after a full day in record heat, heaving and toting and directing a team of truly beefy moving men rendered immobile from heat prostration. So on this, our last balmy night in Brooklyn, we made our weary way up the slope to join our neighbors at the Prospect Park band shell for a beloved summertime tradition: Celebrate Brooklyn. We went to celebrate the home we would bientôt be leaving behind.

I don’t remember who headlined Celebrate Brooklyn that night. All I really remember is the warmth of friends who gathered to break bread and be with us. And I’ll never forget the handsome young Frenchman who stood in line before us as we waited for a plate of hot barbecued ribs, cornbread, and made-in-Brooklyn micro-brewed beer. Surely this was a sign!

As he yammered away on his cell phone, talking about something to do with perfume, I shifted my weight from foot to foot. Finally, he hung up. No sooner had he snapped his phone shut and slipped into his back pocket, when I engaged him.

“Excusez-moi, monsieur,” I said, exhausting the only French I knew at the time.

“I couldn’t help but hearing your accent,” I continued, all flushed and puffed up and proud.

“We’re moving to France tomorrow. To Paris. We’re very excited. We’ll be there for the summer. Do you have any recommendations for us? Any advice?” I nodded toward Loo by way of expanding my inquiry to mean, “any advice as to what fun things can be done with children?”

“Well,” said the handsome young Frenchman, the corners of his mouth curling decidedly downward. And he proceeded to deliver the kind of glass-half-empty-always-focused-on-the-negative comment that I’ve grown accumstomed in my eight years amongst the French. He waved his hands over the happy, bustling, communal, Brooklyn musical scene before him, the very scene I would miss even more than my brand new white kitchen, and failing entirely to see the point, he said, “You’ll never find this in Paris.”

Shivers ran up my spine.

And thus began a new life’s adventure. For my family. For Wiggles. For me.

Have you ever moved your family abroad? How did you feel about it?

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Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

Memoir of a Multi-Passionate Entrepreneur, OR How Time Traveler Tours Came to Be, Ch 2

A Page Turns…

It all started with the ringing of my wall mounted phone.

In the summer of 2002, my little family and I moved into our first real home after more than a decade of rental apartments and make-do furniture and backpacks and other trappings of the expatriate’s life on the road. We were finally putting down stakes, or so we thought, convinced that the next assignment abroad would no longer come.

We’d had our fun. Now we had a kid. It was time to settle down.

So we bought a fixer-upper townhouse with rental income in the up-and-coming Brooklyn neighborhood of Park Slope, where the Uber-mensch and I had been living off-and-on since the mid-1980s. And I set about designing the perfect kitchen:

• white cabinets -- not from IKEA -- with glass fronts and interiors painted to pick up the green flecks of the granite counter tops;

• a stainless steel sunken two-basin sink;

• a four-burner gas-powered Viking-wanna-be stove;

all trimmed with

• a back splash of handmade cracked sea foam-green glazed tiles.

Classic. Lovely.

My kitchen would be the heart and soul of our home. There, we would have dinner parties galore, and my daughter would enter adulthood with fond memories of winter evenings doing homework by the warm hearth, surrounded by the sensual smells of real home-cooking.

On that fateful late-December day in 2003, the dream kitchen of my dream home was nearly complete, just in time for a sumptuous holiday celebration, too. I was home from work with our building contractor. We were applying the finishing touches, mounting the decorative crown molding that had to be custom cut and fit to the specifications of the house's kooky, idiosyncratic shape. The contractor was banging on, yet again, about how “nothing is straight in this old place! None of the angles are true!” when I was saved from his brewing tantrum by the ringing of the proverbial bell: in this case, our old-fashioned land line.

I picked up the phone. It was the Uber-Mensch, he who shall be referred to henceforth by his real name: Jimmy.

“What would you say to Paris?” he said.

“I love Paris,” I answered.

“For two or three years?”

Silence.

Now, it must be said, I had always wanted to live in Paris. In fact, I had spent most of my college years wandering its streets vicariously as I studied French fin-de-siècle avant-garde literature, painting, music and film. I had lived in Nicaragua, El Salvador, Guatemala, China and Hong Kong, all the time roughing it, all the time wishing I could have just a minute in a more modern and famously-cultured place as Paris.

But I had always wanted my very own home as well. And now I had one. And the new cabinets were white. And they were not from IKEA.

“Well,” I paused. I held my breath.

“As long as it’s only for two or three years,” I said, thinking the time would be short enough that I could still return to my job and career, yet long enough to learn another language (remember what I told you in Ch 1 - I’m a linguist by training and as such love nothing more that collecting languages). Long enough to give the Lucky-one-and-only (Loo), then eight, another language as well.

“Start packing then,” said Jimmy. “We’ll be leaving in six months.”

At least I’d have half a year with my white dream kitchen.

Have you ever moved your family abroad? How did you feel about it?

Leave your comments below!

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Image of the CandleStick Telephone Gal, 1910, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons. 

Memoir of a Multi-Passionate Entrepreneur, OR How Time Traveler Tours Came to Be

I just celebrated a milestone birthday. Which one isn’t important. I’ll let your imagination fill in that blank. Let’s just say it was sufficiently significant to cause me to stare in the mirror and ask, Well, how did I get here?

I never set out to be a professional writer. I never envisioned myself developing story-based apps. (Hell, there were no such things as apps when I was starting out in the world. There wasn’t even an Internet!) And I definitely never imagined in a million years that I would be founding my own business one day.

Truth be told, if I were a kid right now I’d probably be diagnosed ADHD with a touch of OCD thrown in. I was never particularly focused on any one thing for very long. I was instead drawn to the connections between things. As a student, I was here and there, exploring how this linked to that and how that influenced the other. As an adult, I moved seamlessly, to my mind anyway, from producing performing events to working as a linguist and language educator; from teaching English all points abroad to facilitating large groups in conflict due to intercultural misunderstanding; to modeling the teaching of conflict resolution skills to primary school teachers through great works of children’s literature.

It all made sense to me. But over the years some have accused me of being scattered, others dilettantish, still others visionary. My own daughter tells me on a regular basis, “Mom, you’re all over the place.” And while that may sometimes be true, she also knows that when I get sucked into something I feel truly passionate about, I get sucked in 100% for as long as it takes. There’s just no pulling me out.

With Time Traveler Tours, I have finally – after more years than I would like to admit – found a way to wed my many interests and passions: history, story, language, education, culture, travel, technology and fun.

More accurately, I have discovered a way to present the connections I see between things in a nicely wrapped package for others' enjoyment.

This is the story of how Time Traveler Tours came to be.

It is also the story of a multi-passionate entrepreneur: Me.

What are you multi-passionate about? Leave your comments below!

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Happy Birthday Image, by Hendrike 16:12, 21 December 2007, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

This Month in French History: 1789

In the spring of 1789, France faced a crippling financial crisis. King Louis XVI called for a meeting of the Estates General – equal numbers of representatives from the nobility, clergy, and Third Estate (that is, everyone else) – to help him resolve the situation.

No French King had convened the Estates General for over 150 years.  So, new delegates to the counseling body had to be selected from all corners of the country. 

In June, 12,000 delegates to the Estates General arrived at Versailles, each sporting the dress of their social class: 

• The Third Estate wore plain black suits and three corner hats.
• The nobility were bedecked in silks and plumes.
• The clergy shouldered their traditional violet vestments. 

They came to help resolve France’s financial problems. They came to usher in a new, golden age for France. They carried with them the hope and optimism of the entire French nation.  Confidence reigned.

But it quickly soured.

The Third Estate demanded more voting power. They did, after all, represent 96% of the French population. But they had only as many votes as the clergy and nobility, and these two always voted with the monarchy. 

The demand of the Third Estate did not sit well with the King. He locked them out of the meeting.

But with the hopes and dreams of the entire nation weighing heavily on their shoulders, the Third Estate refused to leave Versailles. They held their own meeting in the king’s indoor games court, the Jeu de Paume, the only place big enough to accommodate their numbers and shelter them from the storm that raged like their fury with the old regime.

They proclaimed themselves “the true representatives of the French people.” They named themselves The National Assembly, an assembly not of the Estates, but of “The People”: France’s new government.

Forty-seven nobles and many clergy as well left the king’s meeting to join the National Assembly, among them Louis-Philippe Joseph II, Duc d’Orleans. They pledged an oath to write France her first constitution. 

It seemed the Revolution was won.

But King Louis XVI was not so quick to recognize France’s new, self-proclaimed government. Where did it put him? Where did it leave his son, the dauphin, the future King of France?  As he awaited the new constitution, he grew anxious of the rumble back in Paris. He sent troops to surround the city.

Parisians grew scared of the weapons now pointing at them.

***

Exerpt from: Beware Madame la Guillotine, A Revolutionary Tour of Paris. For more information or to purchase, click here.

Images:

David, Jacques-Louis. Serment du jeu de paume à Versailles, 20 juin 1789 (The Tennis Court Oath at Versailles, 20 June 1789), 1791. Photo credit © Sarah B. Towle, 2010, photographed with permission, Musée Carnavalet.

Unknown. L'Egaliité. Crédit photographique: Musée de la Révolution Françaises, Vizille, France, http://www.domaine-vizille.fr, Inv. MRF 1983-311.

 Unknown. Fraternité. Crédit photographique: Musée de la Révolution Françaises, Vizille, France, http://www.domaine-vizille.fr, Inv. MRF 1983-311.

Pushing Boundaries in Digital Publishing: Karen Robertson and Sarah Towle Talk about Apps

"I use Sarah’s app as an example of what can be done with story and the app format beyond the usual book app.

Enjoy this interview and Sarah’s vision!"

Karen Robertson is a children’s author and creator of Treasure Kai and the Lost Gold of Shark Island, a book app for the iPad, iPhone and iPod Touch, as well as marketing coach and all-around guru.

Click here to read find out more about Karen and access her free eBook, Author’s Guide to Book Apps, her training guide, How to Market a Book App, and much, much more.

Thanks for the interview, Karen!

Beware Mme La Guillotine Wins Stamp of Approval from HiP Paris Blog

There are so many tours to choose from in Paris…

A tour exists to help make every dream come true.

But, as Ariel Kocourek states, 

"having that many options at your fingertips can be overwhelming. That’s why we make it our duty here at Haven in Paris to scour the city tirelessly for the very best tours to recommend to our clients. I’ve been lucky enough to meet more than my fair share and have compiled a list of four of my favorites, chosen because they are so original, in depth and because the people behind them are amazing characters themselves!"

Click here to view the complete post.

Julie Hedlund talks with Sarah Towle about Time Traveling Apps and her Latest Big News!

Once upon a time, just a few weeks ago, the beautiful and enormously talented Julie Hedlund contacted me about an interesting new interview technology called a Vlog.

She wanted to experiment with it and wondered if I'd like to be her guinea pig and I said SURE!

So head on over to Julies's Blog and don't forget to tell us what you think of our little interview.

Writers Take Note:

There's an interesting announcement at the end ;).

France in the News: Festival de Cannes / Cannes Film Festival

And the 2012 Palm d'Or goes to...

Austrian director, Michael Haneke, for Amour.

I will always remember the 2012 Cannes Film Festival for the freak storm ripped through the swanky Riviera beach town on Sunday, 20 May, nearly tearing the roof off a screening room and soaking several of the world’s most glamorous as they walked the red carpet. Fireworks and outdoor screenings were also cancelled.

But the 65^th show went on!

Originally conceived in the 1930s as an international cinematographic festival to rival that of Venice, the 1st Cannes Film Festival was set to launch in 1939 under the presidency of the esteemed Louis Lumière, one of history’s earliest filmmakers. But hostilities on the European continent intervened. The Festival kick off was delayed until World War II. It officially began 20 September 1946 and was held each September after that until 1952 (except in 1948 and 1950 due to flagging finances) when the Festival was moved to the typically sunny month of May.

Today, the Festival de Cannes is the world's most prestigious and most highly publicized film festival.

The goal of the Cannes Film Festival is to highlight new films of all genres from all over the globe. To ensure equitability, the Festival jury may comprise only one representative from any one country. Jurors are presided over by the Jury President who changes annually.

Until 1972, it was up to participating countries to choose which films would represent them in the Festival. Since then, Festival committees made up of industry professional collaborate to select films for this invitation-only Festival. 

Cannes Festival Fun Facts:

1950s – The popularity of the Festival increases thanks to the attendance of celebrities such as Kirk Douglas, Sophia Loren, Grace Kelly, Brigitte Bardot, Cary Grant, Romy Schneider, Alain Delon, Simone Signoret and Gina Lollobrigida.

1955 – The Palm d’Or is introduced (Golden Palm), replacing the Grand Prix. It is the most honored Festival prize, presented to the director of the best feature film, among 20, of the official competition.

1966 – Olivia de Havilland, British-American film and stage actress, becomes the first female President of the Festival jury.

1978 – Gilles Jacob, then Director-General of the Festival, created the Un Certain Regard selection, 20 original films selected from cultures near and far, and the Caméra d'Or award, which goes to the best first film presented at the Festival.

1991 - The Leçon de Cinéma (Cinema Masterclass) is delivered for the first time in by Italian director, Francesco Rosi. Since then, this public event facilitated by world renowned filmmakers has been an annual event.

2003 – Italian composer, Nicola Piovani, winner of the 1998 Oscar for Best Original Dramatic Score for the score of Roberto Benigni’s La Vita è bella, delivers the first Leçon de Musique (Music Masterclass).

2004 – Internationally acclaimed Swedish-French actor, Max Von Sydow, follows suit with the first Leçon d’Acteur (Acting Masterclass).

2010 – The Festival introduces the Cannes Short Film selection to offer a bird’s eyeview on the worldwide production of short form films.

2012 - Nanni Moretti, Italian actor and director, takes the reigns as President of the Jury for the 65th Festival.

2012, May 27 - Today's Palm d'Or win is the second for Michael Haneke, following his triumph in 2009 with The White Ribbon.

Trivia Question: How many other directors have taken the Palm d'Or more than once in Cannes Film Festival history? Please answer in the comments below.

Images:

Palm d'Or by Karel Leermans, expo Servais Ostende, December 2008, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

Photo montage of Festival attendees by Georges Biard, 2007, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

New York in Three Days: Pt. 3 - Allez Go!

Day Three: Downtown & Brooklyn

We started our last morning together in the Big Apple all the way downtown in Battery Park, waiting for the ferry to Ellis Island. Our first stop was Liberty Island, home to the grand statue of the same name. But we didn’t stay. We didn’t stand in line to go up inside. We didn’t get stuck behind a bunch of other tourists for the long climb to the top only to be scooted back down by those coming up right behind.

Instead, we decide to give more time to the Ellis Island Immigration Museum and to enjoy the view of the Statue of Liberty from a number of awe-inspiring distances and angles

The Ellis Island Immigration Museum is extraordinary – a personal favorite. It’s very interactive and really succeeds in bringing history to life. Wonderful for kids of all ages. Its focus on the history of immigration tells the story of the USA, of where many of the nation’s citizens came from, and when, and what, their immigrant ancestors had to go through to make it in. There are movies and exhibits and best of all, as hinted at above, the view of Lady Liberty from Ellis Island is bar none!

We even found the name of Loo’s father's ancestors engraved on the American Immigrant Wall of Honor. Way cool!

After Ellis Island, we returned to Battery Park and from there wandered up Trinity Place and Church Street to the 9/11 Memorial. I hadn’t been back to this area since I helped feed the relief workers from a boat in the Hudson River in the wake of the tragedy. So I was especially keen to visit. However, we were not able to get in to view the Memorial on this particular day. Until its completion in 2014, only a limited number of visitors’ passes are available and they must be acquired in advance. So plan ahead. You can book your Memorial passes here: http://www.911memorial.org/.

No matter, it was nice to witness life, and great architecture, returning to Ground Zero once again.

Another hop, skip and jump and we were at the Park Place subway station where we grabbed the 2/3 line toward Brooklyn, exiting at Clark Street, the first stop on the other side of the East River. Now in the heart of Brooklyn Heights, we meandered through the best of Brownstone Brooklyn to the Brooklyn Heights Promenade. Here some of us took to the benches to soak up the breath-taking sight of lower Manhattan while also resting their feet. Others of us enjoyed the view while strolling the Promenade. And when we were all ready for a fill up, we made our way toward the Brooklyn Bridge and down the hill to Front Street and Grimaldi’s Pizzeria.

Grimaldi’s quite simply serves the best darn pizza in the world! I kid you not. You can’t really know New York unless you’ve bitten into a Grimaldi’s brick oven pizza with fresh mozzarella. My personal favorite is their margarita pizza. No frills pizza - just plain, simple goodness!

Then you must be sure to do exactly what we did – indeed, what we always do after pizza at Grimaldi’s: You must follow up the best darn pizza in the world with the best darn ice cream.

Just down the hill from Grimaldi’s, right on the river, you’ll find the Brooklyn Ice Cream Factory. And if you’re lucky, they will have just mixed up a fresh batch of peach ice cream. Yum Yum!

As you can imagine, we then needed to walk off our meal. And so will you. So do what we did: Walk back up Front Street and wend your way to the feet of the Brooklyn Bridge. Tucked in amongst the 169+-year-old pillars you will find a staircase.

Take it up as far as it goes, all the way to the pedestrian walkway far above the traffic. From this perch above the city, revel in extraordinary views as you walk back to Manhattan over the Brooklyn Bridge.

Now, turn in early. You deserve it!

Bon Voyage!

Images:

Statue of Liberty on  Liberty Island, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

Ellis Island Immigration Museum by Simeon87, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

View of Manhattan from the Brooklyn Heights Promenade by Cnb, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

Brooklyn Bridge cables by Ad Meskens, found on Wikimedia Commons.

New York in Three Days, Pt. 2: Allez Go!

Day Two: Central Park & Museum Day

Start your day by offering your gang a choice: The Metro-politan Museum of Art (Fifth Avenue at E. 82^nd St) or The Museum of Natural History (Central Park West at W. 79^th). Either way you can’t go wrong: visual art and cultural history or physical history and natural science. Both are great for teens and tweens.

Whichever museum you choose, plan to spend a few hours there. There’s so much to discover and time will fly. Plan to start on the early side to beat the inevitable crowds.

Our group chose the latter and we were off and running. 

When you're done at your museum of choice, exit into Central Park and wander in a southerly direction and toward the middle of this veritable 8th wonder of the world. Look for the Sheep Meadow. There, at the top of the hill nestled under the trees, you will find a restaurant called Le Pain Quotidien.  Pick up lunch to go and take it onto the grassy lawn just in front and to the south of the resto. Enjoy one of the most spectacular views of NYC while you eat: the majesty of the New York skyscraper really can't be beat, especially when seen from within nature. Just wonderful!

Now rested and fortified, head south again and toward the east in the direction of the Central Park Zoo. This is not to be missed -- penguins and polar bears in New York? Oh My! Though called a Zoo, it’s fun for kids of all ages.

After the Zoo, you’ll be getting hungry again. You’ve already had your French-ish repast. So now I recommend dinner at a real New York Deli: Carnegie’s (7^th Ave at W. 55^th Street). Have a pastrami sandwich on rye with spicy mustard for me. And don’t forget to wash it down with an egg cream!

PS There is no egg in a New York egg cream.

Stay tuned for day three…

Images:

Central Park images by Ed Yourdon courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

Central Park Zoo polar bear by Stavenn courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.