Back at the Cafe St. Germaine, Old San Juan...

Dateline, Old San Juan:

January 17, 2017

It's been a couple of years since I was here last, aimlessly wandering the streets in search of rum smoothies and inspiration.   I thought I had my fill of Old San Juan back then, when I almost burnt myself out spending those few weeks finishing my book "Cinco Calles".  In the end, the only thing that saved me from a complete literary meltdown were the five o'clock, five dollar happy hour mango mojitos and tapas on the third floor cafe of the St. Germaine at the corner of Sol y Cruz.   Here I gently drift into an alternative reality, channelling the zeitgeist of a time and place long gone and for the few hours that it lasted, I was in the zone, at one with the "lost generation", a raffish, Hemmingwayesque wannabe spewing meaningfully meaningless literary blather dressed to impress, masquerading as an exercise in self importance.  Poetry as a selfie of the soul.   So much so, that it brought to mind a poem I had written in the late 90's during my long cushy years of self imposed indentured servitude.

As if to deny their humanity,

the materialists have been heard to ask the question...

Suppose you were to take an infinite number of monkeys,

and place them in front of typewriters

to strike randomly at the keys

for an indefinite period of time,

could one of them product the great American novel,

a sonnet, or at least some mediocre poetry?

Why yes I could answer,

I am that monkey!!!

Now I'm back.  Perhaps you remember the interior photo I took at the St. Germaine back then and posted in the Cinco Calles posting of May 2015...

 For a change, nothing has changed.  Even me.  As luck would have it, they had not yet gotten their delivery of mint leaves for the day and therefore while mango mojitos were on the menu they would not be in our future today.  Had to fall back on a second choice which might have been a first choice anywhere else, the Boozy Colada, which lived up to it's name.  A thick, velvety rum smoothy that, with the help of a floater, got us to where we were going in no time at all.  The veggie centric tapas were few and since I avoid hummus (I am always disappointed by all but mine, since I don't skimp on the lemon and garlic) we shared a flatbread which was good.  As you don't need to be told, the photo below is the heart of the operation.

While it is not readily apparent at first sight, the next shot is actually a selfie of Jackie and I, just the way we like it these days.  If you click on the photo to enlarge it, and look in the mirror on the wall in the middle of the central area on the third floor which was still devoid of other patrons when we got there at 5:30, there we are.

The corner of Cruz y Sol from the window of our table at the Cafe.  Didn't take a picture of the exterior.  Don't know why, but there must have been a good reason that I can't remember right now.

Pablo

Three old dogs...

Pablo

The world's best potato latkes!!!

December 31, 2016

It is the last night of Chanukah and as good a time as any to mention that I make the world's best potato latkes.  I should clarify ...my mother, Elaine Shapiro, made the world's best latkes and I watched hungrily over the years as she slaved over the stove serving them hot and crispy right from the frying pan on Chanukah.  Sadly she is gone and the job of world's best latke maker has fallen on my shoulders.  It's amazing what you can learn by just standing around and watching.   Blintzes, chopped liver/herring, stuffed cabbage, ...I can do it all.

This is no idle boast.  Everyone who eats my latkes, even old pros, say that they are the best they have ever eaten and ask for the recipe.  Like all good intuitive chefs, I have never followed an actual formula.  I just work by sight and smell and feel, and hope for the best.  While I know the ingredients, I have always been vague about the amounts.   Last night, however, we made a small batch using 4 potatoes and an onion, and I realized that I had the measured amount of ingredients which would qualify as an actual recipe, ...so here it is.

Start with 4 medium sized potatoes (I use russets), peeled.  Using the safety grater below, grate them into a large bowl.

Then grate most of one medium-sized sweet onion into the same bowl and let the mixture sit for a  minute.  Next, squeeze out all the excess liquid by hand.

[Google "safety graters" and you can find one online for under $10 or buy one at a home goods store.]

Once well drained, add about 1/2 cup of matzo meal.  Don't use flour no matter what anyone tells you!

Stir, and then add salt and pepper to taste.  Careful with the salt; it's easy to overdo it. Then stir in three large eggs and mix well. 

 

In a large frying pan, heat 1/2 inch of cooking oil to a medium heat so the latkes cook thoroughly.  Spoon mixture into hot oil and flatten out the middle of the latkes so they are flat and cook evenly.  They should look like this one when done.  Hot, crispy and golden brown.  Great with sour cream or apple sauce.

Pablo

Addendum:

Jackie just found this picture of me in my prime, making latkes a couple of chanukahs ago. 

Over the past few years, the number of latke eaters has grown out of control to the point that we need 3 frying pans.  After I experienced an emotion meltdown over a frying pan that was not heating up quickly enough requiring me to be tranquilized and put to bed, help was needed, and my wonderful niece Leslie has stepped in, took over the pan, and hence forth became my apprentice with all things latke.  The tradition continues.  Elaine's granddaughter is poised to become the world's greatest latke maker.

Pablo 

Addendum 9/18

Was over at Russ and Daughters on the Lower East Side a few days ago to pick up my usual order of delicacies to bring back to Albany when I was struck by this display of potato latkes.  I know you pay a premium for the luxury of buying just about anything in Manhattan and all things being equal, the prices at Russ and Daughter, probably the best appetizing store in the city are not bad.  But the latkes!!!

Just in case you can't see the price, they are $2.25 each!!!  I guess if you are from Kansas or something and think that they are the product of some super secret formula known only to the great rabbis or some mythical old bubbas with heavy Yiddish accents, why in the world would you pay $2.25 for a latke when, you could grate up a couple of potatoes, an onion, an egg or two, and throw in a little matzo meal and a pinch of salt and pepper, and mix and fry and for the cost of less than $1, you could have 6 or 8 latkes and have a little party for your 2 or 3 closest friends.  $2.25???!!!  Huh!

                                                           Pablo

                                                                  

Annual Report...

Its Sunday morning, December 11, 2016, coming upon the end of a long, challenging, and eventful year.   Jackie is down in NYC with her sisters viewing the tree at Rockefeller Center, and I'm sitting here on the couch procrastinating about heading out into the cold to do whatever it is I'm supposed to be doing today.  Seems like a good time to get going on the annual report.  First off, thanks to all my loyal viewers for tuning in over the past year.

Last year was an exceptionally good year for travel and some great pictures.  As I said during the annual report of 2015, the pictures were good, and it would be a hard act to follow.   I was almost right.  But it turns out that while Jackie was in Hong Kong last month on business, she took one of the great photographs of all time from her hotel room of Victoria Harbor at sunrise, a photo that could be easily mistaken for a Canaletto, which more than a few people have alluded to.  All else pales in comparison.  She has taken our ongoing project of "Room with a View" to new heights.

Her uncropped photo is a master class in composition starting with the placement of the ship in the lower righthand corner which is the organizational lynchpin that holds everything together.   Could say more, but "res ipse loquator", as they say.  The rest of the pictures are mine and pale in comparison, but the show must go on.

The post office is the only government agency we have no reason to fear.  Buy stamps, send postcards, support the post office.  They still care about you. 

As I reflect on my own photographs for the year, and for all previous years, for that matter,  I must confess my long standing awareness of the fact that I keep taking the same photograph over and over and over again.  Same organizing principle, different location.  Always symmetrical, and organized around a central figure.  Maybe the title of the blog should have been Monomania.

Jackie's photo is a good example of her ability to see the big picture and to shoot what's there.  I see what's there and then try to squeeze into the tight, compulsive constraints of how I obviously need to see the world, symmetrically organized around a simple but compelling idea.  Maybe I'm not the free thinker I like to think I am. 

Peace on Earth and a Happy New Year!!!

                                                                               

                                                             Pablo   

Paul Strand's "Wall Street" revisited...

Paul Strand's photo "Wall Street", shot in 1912,  continues to be one of the most powerful and iconic images in the history of the field, and with good reason.  The impact is visceral and haunting and needs no words of explanation to amplify its effect.  Like all good photographers, the camera was an extension of his soul.  If you don't feel it, its not him, its you.

I'm no Paul Strand, nor do my photographs carry the power of his images.  But I was raised on the images of Strand and Weston and Evans and Brassai and Atget and the Photo League, et al, and when I finally had my chance to get out there and shoot, I was more than disappointed to find that their world, the world  I dreamed  of, the America of my mind, no longer existed.  In fact you can only live in the world you have inherited and work with the tools available and it takes time to realize this and come to terms with it, if at all.  If you do come to find interest and revel in the visual environment of which you are a part, and shoot it in that spirit,  it will work out.  I persevered, and have been fortunate to find America on my own terms.

When I shot my photo "'Humans of New York' or are they bugs", all I saw was the two oversized posters, but when I printed it and became more acutely aware of the people at the bottom, I was struck by the similarities between it and Strand's photo in terms of the metaphor. While my photo lacks the dark, menacing power and haunting moodiness of Strand's it does convey a similar idea in the context of my world, the world I work in, and the fact that some things never change.  We are still bugs, negotiating our small lives through the corridors of power.  My familiarity with his photo may well have unconsciously informed the composition and sense of insignificance the city fosters in the photo "bugs".

Fretfully,

Pablo

Found Martha Holbrooke, now what...

Last summer while visiting Mady and Nate on the Cape, I went in search of an old gravestone I took a photo of many years ago, and while looking in the wrong burial ground, I took 2 pictures I liked a lot, (see posting...In search of Martha Holbrooke, 8/16).  While researching the stones, I found out  there is a whole school of study on the typology of old American gravestone etching art.  I also found that for the most part, the illustrative photos in these postings were not particularly good (poorly lit, tilted, out of focus, etc.), which gave me the idea for my next project.  Good gravestone photos.  I had not done this for a long time for personal reasons related to age and personal ethical issues, but I now had a justifiable purpose, and since Jeff and I were heading up to Provincetown this week, it seemed like a good time to spend some time at the Old North Truro Cemetery to see what I came up with.  Unfortunately, the first stone I was drawn to, of the winged head variety, quickly reminded me why I don't spend time in old cemeteries any more.

Abigail Adams, whose stone caught my eye, died in child birth at age 24 in 1774, while her husband Dr.  Samuel Adams stood helplessly by.  I felt badly about finding this tragic event as the basis for my artistic pursuit, and questioned myself about following through on the gravestone project, but as good hearted Jackie pointed out, I have probably spent more time thinking about Abigail Adams, her husband, and their suffering than anyone in a very long time, and isn't the purpose of the stone to keep people alive in someone's heart.  And its true, I only photographed a few stones this day, but I have felt a connection.

Then there is Jemimah Atkins who died in 1778 at age 28.  The winged skull and cross bones style here marks a transition from the last 3 stones posted expressing a sense of loss, hopelessness, despair, and possibly anger over the cruelty of the fates more clearly expressed than in the others. 

The curious case of one Israel Gross was one that interested this Jewish observer.  While the records do not directly indicate that Israel had Jewish roots, in fact the records list him as Methodist, but the first Gross to come over here in the early 1700's was a Simon Gross, Simon being a common Jewish name.  At the time, there were no Jewish cemeteries, and the thought of making a new start in the new world may have led to leaving behind an identity that suffered the slings and arrows of great prejudice in Europe.

Took some more photos over the weekend, but need time to mentally process them and see if I want to go ahead with the project .  There are a lot of mixed feelings now that I did get back and took a few more photos of the winged heads morphing into winged skulls variety.  Maybe thats enough for me for now.  But this does seem like a good place for another orphan picture taken at the Old Burial Ground in Halifax, Nova Scotia.

Pablo

Lark Street, USA

We have spent the last 6 or 7 years driving around and satisfying our curiosity about the US of A,  visiting all of the lower 48 states at least once and have seen more of Nebraska, Florida, and the Southwest than anyone I know, but nary a posting about our home town of Albany, NY.   Not that it is an uninteresting place, but its often the case that you don't see things that are right under your nose (literally).

On April 3, 2015, for example I was walking down Jay Street on the way to the gallery, and there on the sidewalk, a few houses down, were these wonderful old shoes, apparently left by some well meaning neighbor for someone to make good use of.  Used clothes give me the willies but taking a photo is ok.  This one was taken as is, with no effort on my part to pose them, proving the point that you don't need to go to Prague or Venice to get a good picture (although it helps, of course).

Sam's on Lark Street...

Up the block from us is Lark Street, the main drag in our section of the city, an area which has tried, unsuccessfully over the past 20 years, to reinvent itself into some kind of upstate Greenwich Village kind of place, but like most places trying to reinvent itself, it takes one step forward and two, sometimes three steps backward.  There is frequent business turnover, and presently a quarter of the storefronts are vacant, including both stores at the top of our block, and the last real art gallery is closing this month.  Restaurants, bars, tattoo parlors, two or three gift shops, and three second rate pizza places round out the picture.  Late at night as the bars empty, our streets are filled with hoards of squealing,  howling drunk 20 somethings from the burbs who have parked on our block and at 2am are heading back to their Subarus to drive home or to another bar, hopefully far away.   But I'm not here to rant., I'm here to report.   Sometimes I just can't help myself.  Sam's....

Three blocks from our house on Lark Street is Sam's, one of the last authentic greasy spoons in town, where an old guy can find peace and a bottomless cup of coffee in a questionably well washed cup, greasy eggs and fried potatoes of uncertain vintage that may leave you queasy,  even before you've tasted them, and pancakes that photograph well, but were dense, heavy, under cooked, and severely tested Jackie's aversion anything falling outside of her narrow comfort zone.  She was brave enough to accompany me on this dangerous assignment, and has nothing but regret about the food, but did find  the patrons welcoming and the conversation  intelligent and interesting.

The above photo was taken September 13, 2011, when our nephew Billy B. was up visiting for a few days and looking for some action on the wrong side of town.  These days, almost all of Albany could qualify as the wrong side of town so we started the day with breakfast at Sam's.  I hadn't been back since, but did remember the food to be surprisingly good and have looked forward to returning, but maybe 5 years was too long to wait.  The guy waving to us is John who lives across the street from us and judging by his placement in the next photo, he is still there, same seat.

I always kind of liked the 2011 photo and thought I should do a posting on Sam's, but thought it would be incomplete without some food photos, which I never got to,  so now that I convinced Jackie to join me on this urban adventure, the job is complete.  There is nothing cute about Sam's, but if you are in Albany and looking for the greasiest spoon in town, Sam's won't disappoint.

                                                            

                                                   Bon Appetit  

                                                        Pablo