OK, I’m back in blogging form and, as much as I love travel and beer (and am indeed writing this on an airplane with a newly malt-fortified Maes Pilsner in hand), headier matters come to mind.
This past weekend, I attended a conference called the European Summit for Global Transformation (www.europeansummit.org).
For the most part, it was an inspiring weekend spent with social entrepreneurs and activists from around the world. Included—women who founded high-performing schools in Nepal and Tanzania, a fellow who is spearheading an effort to buy 20 million hectares for reforestation (and thus suck and store CO2 out of the atmosphere--www.weforest.com), and a 23 year old from New Jersey who is now the “mother” of twenty seven orphans in the foothills of the Himalayas.
But I found one section of the event particularly disturbing—a three hour video session portending imminent environmental doom, and asserting that the only viable choice was some undefined notion of global economic “justice”.
I used to joke about being “pro-choice on the environment”. I accept it is no joke now. I believe that the current environmental crisis is the greatest threat to life on this planet since the ice age. But I also see its potential for enabling the greatest assault on human liberty since the end of World War II.
It does not need to be this way. Both extremes in the environmental debate—those who oppose any meaningful solutions for reasons of profit, inertia or laziness, and those who see the green banner this century as a way to achieve the totalitarian nirvana they failed to achieve under the red and brown banners of the last—are at cause for this duality.
But imagine this: what if the money, effort and energy being spent to refute right-wing denials of a problem could be spent on identifying viable alternatives and choices that can make a big difference for relatively little cost in terms of money and freedom? And what if people could see a viable environmental future that doesn’t require giving up cars, air conditioning, t-bone steaks and a child’s dream of being an airline pilot? What would be possible then?
A lot would be possible. Making some choices available would take some paradigm-shifting thinking. Some of this thinking is already going on—in aviation for instance, research is underway into bean-based jet fuel and high-capacity, fuel efficient turboprop airliners.
From a food standpoint, it is only starting to be well known that chicken production is far more carbon-efficient than beef production on a kilo-by-kilo basis. People are giving up some snobbiness towards boxed wine. Japanese breweries are brewing in Canada and trucking their “imported” brews over the border to the US. And Soda Club machines (www.sodaclub.il) are becoming increasingly popular, saving dozens of plastic bottles and eliminating the shipping involved in delivering sparkling water to the home.
Will a choice-based approach be enough? Are we really too far gone? In my view, free people will never be too far gone to fight for their freedoms, and even if things become dire, some choices will remain available, even if their cost may escalate to the magnitude of real sacrifice.
But at the same time, we also have the right to ask whether the world envisaged by those who place an environmentalist (and/or redistributionist) agenda ahead of human liberty is one that would be worth surviving in. And we certainly have the right to ask if there are indeed other ways of saving the planet that preserve those things we think make life worth living.
Tuesday, November 24, 2009
Sunday, November 8, 2009
Rejoining the Human Race in Luxembourg
The brasserie at the Hotel Koener in Clervaux, Luxembourg seems an unlikely place to rejoin the human race. But I chose to head for the Luxembourg Ardennes for some rest, relaxation and rejuvenation following a turbulent period in my career--to draw a line under it and contemplate the next adventure.
Following a four hour trip--which included a two hour journey through the Belgian Ardennes on a rail replacement bus, I arrived at the Clervaux train station, only to find I had missed the bus connection to my hotel, the Chateau d'Urspelt, a few kilometers away from this little town of 1800 souls.
The idea of staying at a Chateau had considerable appeal, not for the least to arouse jealousy among those I told. I also liked the idea of being in a completely different environment than anything I'd experienced in recent months--different languages, menus and beers.
When I arrived at the Chateau D'Urspelt after an hour-and-a-half bus layover and a non-descript omelet at a similarly non-descript lunch spot half-filled with Luxemburgers speaking Letzebuergesch, I found the place quite tasteful and modern. Not surprising, given that the place was restored in 2008 following 300 years of gradual but relentless dilapidation.
The Chateau has two spas, one of which I visited immediately upon arrival. There is nothing like a jacuzzi to make one forget what one seeks to forget.
It also has one restaurant, making it the only eatery within 3 km, a challenging statistic when one is without wheels amidst bucolic splendour. As the Chateau restaurant was booked, I had to take a hard-to-find taxi and head to the clutch of hotels in the centre of Clervaux, bringing me to the schnitzel at the Hotel Koener, washed down with the mild-but-tasty Diekirch Grand Cru, a local brew.
Going to Luxembourg, as much as anything, is a bid to reconnect with that which is Continental that I love.
A country with less than a half-million people, the size of a modest American county, with an affluent population that switches between four languages (including fair English), de-Luxembourg allows one to acclimate quickly and comprehensively while being sufficiently different from its neighbors topographically and architecturally. It feels more German than anything else, but less German than Germany.
A scene at a tavern near the Koener exemplifies. I can hear all three local languages, as American rock blares over the soundless broadcast of Schalke vs Bayer Leverkusen. Beers from Belgium and Luxembourg dominate the beer list, along with something called Humpen, which I've never heard of but feel compelled to order next. (As it happens, a Humpen proves to be the local equivalent of a "pint" of decent draft pilsner.)
Of course, spa-ing, eating and beering have not occupied the whole day. I also got in an uphill walk along the road from Urspelt to Fischbach, which intrigued me because I had a dorm-mate at Wisconsin named David Feshbach. Alas, Fischbach was a collection of a half dozen buildings, making Urspelt, a collection of two dozen buildings plus the Chateau, seem like a thumpin' metropolis.
One missing hygiene factor--Urspelt lacks a little shop, which was a bit of an irritant (the Fischbach walk was out of hope I could find a six-pack and some peanuts). But I'll take jacuzzi over peanuts if forced to choose...
Following a four hour trip--which included a two hour journey through the Belgian Ardennes on a rail replacement bus, I arrived at the Clervaux train station, only to find I had missed the bus connection to my hotel, the Chateau d'Urspelt, a few kilometers away from this little town of 1800 souls.
The idea of staying at a Chateau had considerable appeal, not for the least to arouse jealousy among those I told. I also liked the idea of being in a completely different environment than anything I'd experienced in recent months--different languages, menus and beers.
When I arrived at the Chateau D'Urspelt after an hour-and-a-half bus layover and a non-descript omelet at a similarly non-descript lunch spot half-filled with Luxemburgers speaking Letzebuergesch, I found the place quite tasteful and modern. Not surprising, given that the place was restored in 2008 following 300 years of gradual but relentless dilapidation.
The Chateau has two spas, one of which I visited immediately upon arrival. There is nothing like a jacuzzi to make one forget what one seeks to forget.
It also has one restaurant, making it the only eatery within 3 km, a challenging statistic when one is without wheels amidst bucolic splendour. As the Chateau restaurant was booked, I had to take a hard-to-find taxi and head to the clutch of hotels in the centre of Clervaux, bringing me to the schnitzel at the Hotel Koener, washed down with the mild-but-tasty Diekirch Grand Cru, a local brew.
Going to Luxembourg, as much as anything, is a bid to reconnect with that which is Continental that I love.
A country with less than a half-million people, the size of a modest American county, with an affluent population that switches between four languages (including fair English), de-Luxembourg allows one to acclimate quickly and comprehensively while being sufficiently different from its neighbors topographically and architecturally. It feels more German than anything else, but less German than Germany.
A scene at a tavern near the Koener exemplifies. I can hear all three local languages, as American rock blares over the soundless broadcast of Schalke vs Bayer Leverkusen. Beers from Belgium and Luxembourg dominate the beer list, along with something called Humpen, which I've never heard of but feel compelled to order next. (As it happens, a Humpen proves to be the local equivalent of a "pint" of decent draft pilsner.)
Of course, spa-ing, eating and beering have not occupied the whole day. I also got in an uphill walk along the road from Urspelt to Fischbach, which intrigued me because I had a dorm-mate at Wisconsin named David Feshbach. Alas, Fischbach was a collection of a half dozen buildings, making Urspelt, a collection of two dozen buildings plus the Chateau, seem like a thumpin' metropolis.
One missing hygiene factor--Urspelt lacks a little shop, which was a bit of an irritant (the Fischbach walk was out of hope I could find a six-pack and some peanuts). But I'll take jacuzzi over peanuts if forced to choose...
The Family
Clervaux, for a town of 1800, is well endowed in a number of areas. Aesthetically, it is hemmed in between the Our River (if there was a local hydroelectric station, it would give new meaning to the phrase Our of Power) and the steep pine-covered Ardennes hillsides.
This stretches the town along the river making it seem bigger than it is. It also has a good number of traditional small hotels, whose dining rooms constitute the main atmospheric eateries in town, but Clervaux also has two Chinese places, a relative diversity in a town that has no identifiable Jewish population.
But the one thing that Clervaux has that no one else does is a castle that is the home of the Family of Man photographic exhibition. Commissioned in 1951 by New York's Museum of Modern Art, this collection developed by Edward Steicher, a Luxembourg-born American photographer, and seen by more than 9 million viewers during its travels, includes hundreds of images of the human condition before, during, and shortly after World War II.
Arranged in a procession of sections commemorating human existence--starting with the bonding of lovers and progressing through childhood, work, eating and playing--and then into war, religion and politics, the collection is inescapably moving.
While I found two photos most compelling--Orthodox Jewish kids in an old-style religious school on the one hand, and a German child walking with his schoolbag through a bombed out city on the other, the most powerful thing about this exhibition was its datedness.
To a certain extent, the Family of Man is a bit of time travel--incorporating the kind of images one would see in postwar editions of Life and Look magazines, the great publications which provided Americans with a visual context for world events in the days before television took hold. But to a greater extent, humans and the human condition remain remarkably unchanged in the last sixty years, and there are elements of the exhibition that demonstrate this dramatically.
The castle also is home to a cozy cafe, whose proprietor offered me a complimentary glass of red wine shortly after finishing a local beer (Diekirch Grand Cru). On figuring I was American, he gushed about President Obama, and was quite surprised that I joined in the gushing. It's a pity that the Dems weren't running a candidate for Governor of Luxembourg--Obama still has coattails here.
This stretches the town along the river making it seem bigger than it is. It also has a good number of traditional small hotels, whose dining rooms constitute the main atmospheric eateries in town, but Clervaux also has two Chinese places, a relative diversity in a town that has no identifiable Jewish population.
But the one thing that Clervaux has that no one else does is a castle that is the home of the Family of Man photographic exhibition. Commissioned in 1951 by New York's Museum of Modern Art, this collection developed by Edward Steicher, a Luxembourg-born American photographer, and seen by more than 9 million viewers during its travels, includes hundreds of images of the human condition before, during, and shortly after World War II.
Arranged in a procession of sections commemorating human existence--starting with the bonding of lovers and progressing through childhood, work, eating and playing--and then into war, religion and politics, the collection is inescapably moving.
While I found two photos most compelling--Orthodox Jewish kids in an old-style religious school on the one hand, and a German child walking with his schoolbag through a bombed out city on the other, the most powerful thing about this exhibition was its datedness.
To a certain extent, the Family of Man is a bit of time travel--incorporating the kind of images one would see in postwar editions of Life and Look magazines, the great publications which provided Americans with a visual context for world events in the days before television took hold. But to a greater extent, humans and the human condition remain remarkably unchanged in the last sixty years, and there are elements of the exhibition that demonstrate this dramatically.
The castle also is home to a cozy cafe, whose proprietor offered me a complimentary glass of red wine shortly after finishing a local beer (Diekirch Grand Cru). On figuring I was American, he gushed about President Obama, and was quite surprised that I joined in the gushing. It's a pity that the Dems weren't running a candidate for Governor of Luxembourg--Obama still has coattails here.
Venison Sashimi
I've been of two minds about my Chateau-hotel in Luxembourg, the Chateau d'Urspelt. On the one hand, having been renovated to a modern, four-star (competent but not over-the-top) standard, the place reminds me a bit of a Chateau Novotel. On the other, it is self-consciously a family-run place, with references to the owning Lodomez family more visible than references to the mayoral Daley family in most parts of Chicago.
Where this place departs from the four-star into the stratosphere is its restaurant. Opting for sublime Luxembourgeois bubbly over an intriguingly unfamiliar Belgian beer, I've departed on a breathtaking culinary journey (which I am experiencing as I write, having my blackberry as a poor substitute for a date).
I could tell I was in for a ride when my first course was brought. I ordered "a tartare of smoked venison.".
What emerged looked at first like a lab experiment--a beaker that seemed a bit cloudy looking. But when the waiter lifted the "beaker", the fragrant smell of smoke enveloped the table--for the dish consisted of cubes of smoked-while-u-wait raw venison served on a bed of razor-thin sliced pears and red peppercorns. For the uninitiated, kinda like venison sushi, or more precisely, sashimi.
The main-a very-robust looking Magret de Canard, one of my favorite dishes of the Franco-Belgian-Luxembourgeois kitchen, served with a red peppercorn sauce. Interestingly, it was served with a side of fennel, my favorite vegetable, after fish. Excellent, if more conventional than the first course.
The wine list is interesting, more because of its presentation than its contents--it is printed as a label on a three-litre wine bottle. The vaulted ceilings do well as well. As for the clientele, they are all conversing in a number of languages, none of which I competently understand.
Hungarians have long been fond of saying that "Hungary is the only country in Europe surrounded by itself in all directions.". But they are wrong. Today's Rhode Island-sized Luxembourg is also a rump version of its former self, which once also included Belgium's (larger) Province of Luxembourg, and adjoining parts of Germany and France.
I ponder this as I ponder the dessert menu, which, written in French and German, offers but few clues about what is on offer. To be fair to my Level III London Business School French, this is more because I have no clue about what a "Fantasie autour d'un fruit d'automne" is than it is that I don't understand "fantasy" and "autumn fruit". Inquiring of the waiter, he says it involves a pear, but finds it otherwise difficult to describe. Convinced, I order it.
Another glass of Cremant de Luxembourg arrives. Cremant is a French-authorized term for "good sparkling wine that ain't Champagne.". I have long prized "Cremants" from around the world, partially because they are far better value than Champagne, and mostly because they marry the magic of effervescence with more varied grape styles (such as Riesling and Macabeo), and even colors (try sparkling Shiraz).
But this one beats Champagne at its own game--a full-blooded Pinot Noir rendition vinted less than 100 miles from Epernay, at less than half the price of the most basic chain-store Champagne.
It serves as a good complement to the Fantasie, which consists of a poached pear, a small chocolate-filled wonton, a tiny scoop of gingerbread ("speculoos") ice cream and a slash of raspberry sauce. Everything is excellent--but the ice cream is off the charts.
I am well and truly sated--a really first rate meal with intelligent, attentive and clinically multilingual service. And the location, overlooking the courtyard of Chateau d'Urspelt, could not be better. Particularly since it means only a short forklift ride back to my quarters.
Where this place departs from the four-star into the stratosphere is its restaurant. Opting for sublime Luxembourgeois bubbly over an intriguingly unfamiliar Belgian beer, I've departed on a breathtaking culinary journey (which I am experiencing as I write, having my blackberry as a poor substitute for a date).
I could tell I was in for a ride when my first course was brought. I ordered "a tartare of smoked venison.".
What emerged looked at first like a lab experiment--a beaker that seemed a bit cloudy looking. But when the waiter lifted the "beaker", the fragrant smell of smoke enveloped the table--for the dish consisted of cubes of smoked-while-u-wait raw venison served on a bed of razor-thin sliced pears and red peppercorns. For the uninitiated, kinda like venison sushi, or more precisely, sashimi.
The main-a very-robust looking Magret de Canard, one of my favorite dishes of the Franco-Belgian-Luxembourgeois kitchen, served with a red peppercorn sauce. Interestingly, it was served with a side of fennel, my favorite vegetable, after fish. Excellent, if more conventional than the first course.
The wine list is interesting, more because of its presentation than its contents--it is printed as a label on a three-litre wine bottle. The vaulted ceilings do well as well. As for the clientele, they are all conversing in a number of languages, none of which I competently understand.
Hungarians have long been fond of saying that "Hungary is the only country in Europe surrounded by itself in all directions.". But they are wrong. Today's Rhode Island-sized Luxembourg is also a rump version of its former self, which once also included Belgium's (larger) Province of Luxembourg, and adjoining parts of Germany and France.
I ponder this as I ponder the dessert menu, which, written in French and German, offers but few clues about what is on offer. To be fair to my Level III London Business School French, this is more because I have no clue about what a "Fantasie autour d'un fruit d'automne" is than it is that I don't understand "fantasy" and "autumn fruit". Inquiring of the waiter, he says it involves a pear, but finds it otherwise difficult to describe. Convinced, I order it.
Another glass of Cremant de Luxembourg arrives. Cremant is a French-authorized term for "good sparkling wine that ain't Champagne.". I have long prized "Cremants" from around the world, partially because they are far better value than Champagne, and mostly because they marry the magic of effervescence with more varied grape styles (such as Riesling and Macabeo), and even colors (try sparkling Shiraz).
But this one beats Champagne at its own game--a full-blooded Pinot Noir rendition vinted less than 100 miles from Epernay, at less than half the price of the most basic chain-store Champagne.
It serves as a good complement to the Fantasie, which consists of a poached pear, a small chocolate-filled wonton, a tiny scoop of gingerbread ("speculoos") ice cream and a slash of raspberry sauce. Everything is excellent--but the ice cream is off the charts.
I am well and truly sated--a really first rate meal with intelligent, attentive and clinically multilingual service. And the location, overlooking the courtyard of Chateau d'Urspelt, could not be better. Particularly since it means only a short forklift ride back to my quarters.
Lux City
My intention was to keep my trip brief, with two nights at the Chateau and then back home to start the job-search jihad in earnest. But the fates--in the form of a nationwide rail strike in Belgium--intervened. I thought another day in Clervaux would be a bit much, and after seeing an EUR 49 hotel special in Luxembourg City, I decided to head for the capital.
Much of the trip was spent on a bus, as the tracks between Clervaux and Ettelbruck were "gefuckt", as they say in Letzebuergesch. Buses in rural Europe offer better views and countryside than trains generally, so I hardly minded.
The journey finished on a train, which meant a ringside view of the spectacular cliffs and fortifications that make Luxembourg one of Europe's most visually spectacular capitals. Off the train, meandering through its cobblestone streets, you get the idea it is one of its richest, though it's low value added tax rate means good deals on the everyday and luxury items found in its many shops.
There is one beef I have with Luxembourg City--the vast majority of its hotels are located in the neighborhood by the train station, which, while not dangerous or possessing of really seedy businesses, lacks the attractiveness Lux City otherwise possesses in abundance.
My favorite hotel here, the Parc Plaza, is a notable exception-overlooking the ravines in a nice neighborhood near the centre-ville. But at EUR 120 midweek, that seemed excessive after two nights of Chateau at EUR 89. So I opted for the Hotel Delta at EUR 49, including breakfast.
The Delta has four stars on the outside, as did the Chateau. Its renovation, however, has been more selective, as I noted in a quick look at the unlocked rooms. Mine was unrenovated. It was much more reminiscent of the one and two star rooms I stayed in on earlier Europe travels. But somehow I liked it--it brought me back to the time when Europe was just an adventure.
Much of the trip was spent on a bus, as the tracks between Clervaux and Ettelbruck were "gefuckt", as they say in Letzebuergesch. Buses in rural Europe offer better views and countryside than trains generally, so I hardly minded.
The journey finished on a train, which meant a ringside view of the spectacular cliffs and fortifications that make Luxembourg one of Europe's most visually spectacular capitals. Off the train, meandering through its cobblestone streets, you get the idea it is one of its richest, though it's low value added tax rate means good deals on the everyday and luxury items found in its many shops.
There is one beef I have with Luxembourg City--the vast majority of its hotels are located in the neighborhood by the train station, which, while not dangerous or possessing of really seedy businesses, lacks the attractiveness Lux City otherwise possesses in abundance.
My favorite hotel here, the Parc Plaza, is a notable exception-overlooking the ravines in a nice neighborhood near the centre-ville. But at EUR 120 midweek, that seemed excessive after two nights of Chateau at EUR 89. So I opted for the Hotel Delta at EUR 49, including breakfast.
The Delta has four stars on the outside, as did the Chateau. Its renovation, however, has been more selective, as I noted in a quick look at the unlocked rooms. Mine was unrenovated. It was much more reminiscent of the one and two star rooms I stayed in on earlier Europe travels. But somehow I liked it--it brought me back to the time when Europe was just an adventure.
Remembering Private Levine
Figuring out what to do on the last day of a trip is always a challenge. Sometimes it becomes a jihad to see all that is unseen, other times a shopping trip to pick up local goodies. But one compelling destination had eluded me on previous Luxembourg trips-the US Military Cemetery in Hamm, Luxembourg.
The Cemetery is best known as the final resting place of General George S. Patton, buried under the marble Latin cross engraved with name, rank, regiment and home state common to the vast majority of the 5000+ soldiers buried here. But 116 of those soldiers are marked by a Star of David, and, as I walked around the stones, I inevitably was drawn by those markers.
Before I entered the cemetery, I gathered a handful of stones--commonly used as a mark of a visit to a Jewish resting place. Most of the Stars of David already had a stone or two on them already, and I ran out quickly as well. But I saw one Jewish marker with no stone, that of Private Stanley Levine of New York, who fell-like most here-at the height of the Battle of the Bulge.
What must it have been like for Private Levine? Did he he realise the contribution he was making for his country, his people and indeed for freedom itself? Or would he have rather been home watching the Yankees win yet another baseball World Series? His stoneless headstone offers no clue.
At the other end of the notoriety spectrum was Patton's cross, reluctantly exhumed from the main group of graves and positioned to the front and centre, as the flow of visitors wreaked havoc on the neighboring gravesites. Seeing the real gravesite of Patton inevitably reminded me of George C. Scott's portrayal of him in the eponymous biopic, Patton, which deptcted the General as crusty, brilliant and psychotic.
Yeah, Patton was a bastard. But he was our bastard. And does anyone disagree that the world and its current challenges could't benefit from a few (and I do mean a few) leaders who are a bit crusty, brilliant, and perhaps a little nuts?
The Cemetery is best known as the final resting place of General George S. Patton, buried under the marble Latin cross engraved with name, rank, regiment and home state common to the vast majority of the 5000+ soldiers buried here. But 116 of those soldiers are marked by a Star of David, and, as I walked around the stones, I inevitably was drawn by those markers.
Before I entered the cemetery, I gathered a handful of stones--commonly used as a mark of a visit to a Jewish resting place. Most of the Stars of David already had a stone or two on them already, and I ran out quickly as well. But I saw one Jewish marker with no stone, that of Private Stanley Levine of New York, who fell-like most here-at the height of the Battle of the Bulge.
What must it have been like for Private Levine? Did he he realise the contribution he was making for his country, his people and indeed for freedom itself? Or would he have rather been home watching the Yankees win yet another baseball World Series? His stoneless headstone offers no clue.
At the other end of the notoriety spectrum was Patton's cross, reluctantly exhumed from the main group of graves and positioned to the front and centre, as the flow of visitors wreaked havoc on the neighboring gravesites. Seeing the real gravesite of Patton inevitably reminded me of George C. Scott's portrayal of him in the eponymous biopic, Patton, which deptcted the General as crusty, brilliant and psychotic.
Yeah, Patton was a bastard. But he was our bastard. And does anyone disagree that the world and its current challenges could't benefit from a few (and I do mean a few) leaders who are a bit crusty, brilliant, and perhaps a little nuts?
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