Tag: Tourism

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Aesthetics Culture

Day 1854 and Will The Real Fake Fendi Please Stand Up?

I don’t know if I should be flattered or irritated but I learned funniest thing this week. Netflix “stole” my Real Fake Fendi story for their hit show Emily in Paris. Let me explain.

Emily in Paris wrote a plot-line into the current 5th season which appears to be riffing on one of my old blogposts “The Real Fake Fendi.” It is a true story & anyone who has known me awhile has heard me tell it.

I wrote about it in ‘21 on this blog five years long before this season premiered. I am on day 1853 day of writing a daily blog and published the story on Day 89 of my writing experiment though the actual experience took place sometime in the late aughts or early teens where I believe I first wrote about it on an old blog I took down.

Emily pitches a campaign to Fendi for a “real fake Fendi” on Emily in Paris

I suspect I would find earlier variants of this tale from my very first (somewhat popular) fashion blog as well. I suppose where fashion is headed is always where fashion has been. Or as they say on the show “it’s super meta and self referential”

The story goes like this. I was once was asked by a tourist for directions to find “a real fake Fendi” when I lived in Manhattan’s Chinatown.

I was honestly stumped by this inquiry. I didn’t answer immediately as my mind raced through the implications of their request. Imagine my mind retrieving.

Was there a fake that had inherent realness that other knockoffs did not possess? Was there a vendor who sold the most authentic mimicry of Fendi which the tourist wished to find? I had no clue how to answer.

Did they mean the realness one sees on the catwalks overseen by RuPaul? But which kind of realness? The creation that evokes the spirit of its inspiration? A realness so over the top and yet absolutely true to its essence?

Or perhaps the blunt direct feedback from being “read” by a drag artist that no construct, no matter how convincing, is the original artifact. Is is serving realness? I honestly didn’t know. I had Walter Benjamin’s The Work of Art in The Age of Mechanical Reproduction swirling in my head and still has no answer.

Apparently tourists looking for Canal Street want to buy the most authentic real fake Fendi

I just told the tourist that Canal was one block north and walked away. I don’t know if they ever found what they were looking for and I may have even given them the wrong directions I was so flummoxed.

Now can I really complain about someone taking one of my coinages and injecting it into a Darren Starr show about spunky brunette girl from heartland American who becomes a luxury fashion marketer by being good at social media. You see where I am going with this. That girl is me.

Perhaps my friend and fashion scholar Susan Scafidi of Fordham Law School’s Fashion Law Institute & author of “Who Owns Culture” would know who owns this cultural artifact. I bet I’ve told her this story too.

This life story archetype has been aspirational long before me. Murphy Brown anyone? It has been done in many different formats including Darren Starr’s best known work Sex and The City.

But it is my story too. So is Emily in Paris the real story of Julie in Manhattan? Is Julie in Manhattan the real Emily in Paris? Am I a retro causal multiverse prequel version of Emily?

Who is the real Emily? Am I the real Emily? Who buys a fake version of the real thing? Either way, I think Netflix owes me at a walk on spot. It would be very self referential. Or me-referential

Categories
Aesthetics Travel

Day 1848 and Call To Prayer

The call to prayer echoed out as I stood underneath one of many loudspeaker towers bristling with surveillance equipment.

Strong winds buffeted cell equipment and 360 degree video eyeball cameras as the firm melodic voice of the muezzin recited out the first words of the Adhan.

“Allahu akbar”

I wonder how many cameras were scanning my face as I watched the speaker quiver from the wind and snow as I shivered waiting for the black Mercedes driving me to Istanbul went through giant X-Ray machine.

Loudspeakers and surveillance cameras

I briefly let my eyes scan the area to see if this prayer would delay my transit across the Turkish border. I was in no-man’s land between Greece and Turkey and I felt alone. I prayed. God is the greatest.

I saw no one rushing to prayer rooms or unrolling prayer mats. Maybe others were praying as I did. Silently inside the privacy of their own mind. The siren indicated the giant car X-ray was on.

A kind of Doppler effect buffered the prayers from each tower over the sound of alarm, layering prayer and warning as sound rose and fell over my head.

I switched on my Bose noise canceling headphones and closed my eyes. I went to wait out the cold in the duty free but the smell of the perfumes made me nauseous. I went to the bathroom feeling ill. I finally found the prayer rooms. I was still the only one there.

I found the prayer rooms next to the bathrooms at the Duty Free shops inside.

This was my second time driving to Istanbul through the rolling coastal mountains of the Balkans into Greece. I had not expected this kind of life for myself but I seek to be exploring far reaches in this life and little of it makes sense. I experience reality as closely as I can.

To be a traveler to the crossroads of the great empires is a privilege for princesses not a lowly citizen but here I am. An America woman with a passport has power even a Venetian trader did not.

How long that lasts I can’t really say. Even in the panopticon of the crossing I felt safe but the world is in a strange place. Still for now I was welcomed. Constantinople welcomes all travelers.

Three hours later the open roads of Turkish farmland slowed to potholes and frantic taxis gummed up by city traffic. Istanbul drivers are terrifying. Each near miss I found myself saying God is great. Praying that I would make it to my hotel. That feeling would last through every taxi ride I took.

EDFM techno radio and a tricked out taxi expressing his love for the American Cadillac

Categories
Travel

Day 1847 and Cardio versus Packing versus Ski Bunnies

I’ll be on the road for a portion of tomorrow. Other members of my traveling party have already pulled ahead to parts unknown, as shifting obligations and vehicle needs turned schedules this way and that. Nomads as we adapt to a new world.

Europe is in a tense state and the weather hasn’t helped much. As I’m writing, Davos is awaiting Trump speech in the Swiss mountain town.

I finished a workout in the hotel gym but my room wasn’t quite ready for me, so I went down to the lounge to take in the BBC having had my fill of Bloomberg commentary while in the gym.

Management must keep up with their bosses

You can probably spot the hotel brand and imagine easily my experience intaking the World Economic Forum by proxy as I attempt to manage my life and health in the unspooling of the order of things.

I packed up a slightly unusual range of things for my transit tomorrow, as I had been going by car but will hop a low cost carrier to recenter. Somehow this has my large luggage separated from me. I’m carrying a very fine leather duffle I recently acquired as a gift for my husband.

Will this work for my carry on and personal item?

I have gone from doing a bit of cardio bunny as I work to improve my V02 max to a pack rabbit, as I moved around this and that to be sure my cascade of items and medications were within reach and packed appropriately. And would make weight but I’ll get to it.

I’ll not end my travels as a snow bunny in Davos though I have seen rather a lot of snow in Southern Europe as far south as Greece.

Why are bunnies on my mind? Well I have to keep in mind some odd weights for the low cost carrier I’ll be using for a short hop. Just look at this guide to baggage.

3kg is a silly amount of weight for a bag. That’s the weight of a house pet like a bunmy

3kg (3 kilograms) is equivalent to approximately 6.6 pounds. While this weight is roughly the size of a medium-to-large house rabbit rather than a “small” one, it is a common weight for many everyday household items like a large bag of flour or three liters of milk. Via Perplexity and Weight of Stuff

For whatever odd reason, the carrier listed your personal item or under seat bag as needing to weigh 3kg. This is about the weight of a house rabbit.

Which is honestly not a lot. I doubt any purse I’ve ever carried is under 3kg when you account for laptop, shoes, cosmetics, wallet and other sundries. But we shall see if my backpack can do it. Nothing but pajamas and medications ought to keep it light.

Categories
Biohacking Medical Travel

Day 1846 and Doctor’s Orders

I have had a lot of experience with doctors over the last few years. A chronic autoimmune condition isn’t the sort of illness that gets “better” like a virus. It can only be managed.

I have come up with endless ways of collaborating with people who far too often believe they are more informed, powerful and intelligent than me.

Sometimes they are even right about that perception. It’s a frustrating fact of life that doctors value their status occasionally more than their patients.

Today I went to a tourist hospital renowned for its extensive offerings and professionalism. My usual interpreter (it’s in a foreign country as many nations from Mexico to Turkey to South Korea serve American patients) had a number of procedures and visits organized for me. I felt confident I’d learn a lot and maybe find new pathways to healthcare management.

I happened to have an aesthetic elective treatment first. A plastic surgeon met with me to refresh some Botox. That seemed excessive given a nurse does my light work back in Montana but why not get a professional opinion while you have the chance.

I’d intended to spend the afternoon at the hospital doing a number of more productive activities than smoothing my fine lines. I’d set up rheumatology and immunology lines of questioning and I was excited to get some holistic work done including ozone and an IV infusion of vitamins and minerals.

Alas I was stopped in my tracks by a physician who simply would not approve the IV I had set up, the ozone work, nor would she approve the alternatives I suggested (an intramuscular B vitamin shot). I made my case with the interpreter and my AI.

The doctor wouldn’t budge. She even obfuscated suggesting that glutathione was illegal though backed down when it turned out to be a malpractice issue related to compounding pharmacies.

I very much wanted to buff up my immune system, especially having chosen something elective to go first, and I could not make progress. It shut down my whole afternoon. All that was left was tests and waiting.

There was no order the doctor was willing to give for short term immune improvements unless I committed to five weeks of procedures which given it was a tourist hospital seemed a little ironic.

I am demoralized but doctors will be doctors. I never seem to manage to convince them when I really need it. Doctor’s orders are not always for the benefit of the patient. Maybe no one wanted a woman sitting around hooked up to a vitamin infusion. Who knows. I probably would have skipped the Botox though.

Categories
Aesthetics Travel

Day 1822 and Frozen Mountain Time

I feel as if I somewhere between time and place as my present requires so much focus. My body and my mind are some distance from my soul though and I cannot seem sync up the sum of myself.

I spent much of yesterday at maximum attention as driving along mountain roads of variable quality requires focus. My body needed my mind on the job. My soul may have hidden itself away inside as I silently prayed the road would deliver me safely.

I’d enjoyed a few days of safety and quiet for Christmas and am now off on adventures that might be a bit more than I can handle. Crossing borders atop mountain passes is a bit of an adventure by any standard but add in ice and it kicks it up a notch.

Ice storms

I’m a little lost and potentially overwhelmed in my adventure as the logistics of making it from one city to the next becomes bogged down in challenging weather and road conditions.

Hotels aren’t quite as readily available as I’d hoped, nor are they priced for adventure. Between Christmas and New Year, it would seem everyone books ahead of time.

It’s one thing to toss a few Euro or dollars on a Best Western, but quite another to find yourself scouring Airbnbs on the mobile app as sundown nears and all you can see are $600 a night rundown flats. Inflation they say. Opportunistic nonsense perhaps.

Because really who wants to pay that much for a middling apartment in a small city just because you happen to be driving through on New Year’s Eve?

From the Alps the Rockies, variable pricing pops up at the worst times. And in principle I’d rather not book it. Maybe frozen mountain time should be enjoyed with a nap in the car instead.

Categories
Travel

Day 1790 and On The Road Again

The Tuesday before Thanksgiving is a weird day for travel. If you could get the whole week off, chances are good you already traveled over the weekend. If you couldn’t swing the time off, you are probably running with the masses on Wednesday.

Those only taking one day off of work is a bit of a no man’s land for transit. I am oddly in that camp this year. For many years I worked Black Friday and simply didn’t consider any portion of the week a holiday.

I’m lucky that the Bozeman airport is one of the most pleasant airports in all of America. I breezed through security with a golden retriever puppy behind me and a chocolate lab puppy in front of me.

Part security you have gorgeous views of the Bridgers, friendly people, hilarious warnings to leave your bear spray behind, and a spot to get a wood fired pizza before takeoff that is actually good.

The woman checking my bag in said the record was 30 confiscated in a day but the most she had personally handled was 5 of them.

Even more exciting was finding I’d been upgraded to first class on my commuter flight. Sometimes you do just get lucky when you hit the road.

Categories
Aesthetics Culture

Day 1779 and Panic at Disco, Panic In The Waymo

I don’t quite know what it is about San Francisco but it’s just not my town. I love so much about it San Francisco. And it has much to love. But I’ll never love it the way it deserves.

I love what once represented in culture, technology and history, I love its portrayal as the epicenter of a certain kind of future. Whatever universe got us to Star Fleet Academy seems even if 2025 was pretty bleak for them too. Most importantly I love my friends San Francisco. It’s impossible to base a career on startups without spending some amount of time here.

But I just do not love being here for any amount of extended time. I find myself in an absolute misery adjusting to it every time.

Even when I lived and worked in neighborhoods with microclimates more suited to my preferences, I struggled. Dry, sunny and friendly is surrounded by gray, damp and miserable. And you can’t easily get out of where you live. Everything is 30 minutes away by car and the only way around that is biking.

The rolling hills in the 7×7 block that make up the core metropolitan area are a fair representation of my moods and the city’s fate. You can enjoy spectacular highs but you see the lows spread outward before you and it makes you question why you should have this unfair vantage point. Right up until you are trapped by the mountains at the horizon. San Francisco makes it easy to forget the rest of the world.

Some people manage to find an entire world here. I envy that. All I ever feel is hemmed in. It deepens whatever mood I am in, and heaven forbid I experience a depressive fit as you can roll very dark and deep here.

The expense, the hassle, the status games, and somehow (still!) the lack of women are all points in its disfavor. You can tell it’s a boom town because it’s where men seek their fortune and women don’t seek the men with fortunes. San Francisco is probably the best advertising for women seeking men beyond their utility. And they have tried importing the art hoes it just work. I promise it’s been tried.

Categories
Reading Startups

Day 1771 and Virtuous Cycles for Wise Readers

It’s hard to say that there is a best part of living in Montana. If you like mountains, seasons and being outdoors it is hard to beat. One thing I particularly enjoy is how often people will come to our state either as tourists or for retreats with their companies and coworkers.

Alex and I drove down to Paradise Valley today to meet up with the founders of one of our favorite products. Having a company meetup in Yellowstone’s off season is a smart choice and as Montana citizens we love it when folks come to visit and center themselves and their work here.

A villain’s lair in Paradise Valley or a cozy lodge for discerning visitors to Yellowstone?

Daniel and Tristan have made one of our all time favorite and most used set of reading applications. The first is called Readwise. It’s hard to fully describe the product except to say that it makes you a better reader through your own highlights and notes.

I came into the application with more than a decade of highlights from my Kindle and found myself deepening my experience with all of my prior reading. It’s one of the best research tools a heavy reader can purchase and I was a very happy customer.

They didn’t stop there though. To make things even better, they launched a reader product which further cemented a virtuous reading. My highlighting, annotating and review cycle is now integrated with my reading and note taking across all my different content formats and sources.

Majestic vistas help us all feel wonder and spark creativity through nature’s beauty

Taking a few hours to drive through some of the most beautiful countryside in America and catching up with talented and passionate founders is an incredible way to spend a few hours.

The passion and care that Tristan, Dan and their team have brought to making reading an even better experience brings me so much joy. As a power user of their apps, and a voracious reader of all forms of written content from books to Twitter threads, I appreciate the incredible feat of product management they have pulled off. Making reading better is no easy task.

Categories
Chronicle Travel

Day 1743 and Noticing Anarcho-Tyranny Through Habits

I’m coming up on the 5-year mark of writing every single day. It doesn’t feel like I’ve been at it that long, if I’m honest with myself. When you commit to doing a basic task as a daily habit, you don’t expect it to change your life.

I’m not actually sure that writing every day has changed my life, though I think I’ve gotten better at the process of writing and the habit of finding space to think, organize, and get my thoughts together. That is a positive change.

When I first started, there were a number of goals I had in my life that seemed a lot more achievable than half a decade of writing.

Once you’ve achieved such consistency, you notice how little gets done in other areas when you regularly do things for yourself. One of my goals that I’ve had almost as long as this blog was a visa for family friends so they could travel freely to America to see me just as I see them. Pandemics and problematic presidents sure slowed that down and now I despair it will ever happy.

I honestly had no idea that the United States was so broken in its state capacity that granting a travel visas would consume more time than blogging and I’d achieve much less working to obtain a visa for years as its functionally impossible to get a legal visa.

Here I am with all of this writing (fantastic training date for an artificial intelligence) and yet I’d still have failed at obtaining a travel visa for family friends. We have so much power and yet not quite enough to get around America’s failures.

Maybe this is why projects like the Network State appealed to me. I’ve worked on policy like the Right to Compute which has taken on more and more meaning as I go through my life.

I can’t believe I was able to pass a bill into law before I could get the state department to do its job. And government workers wonder why some of us wouldn’t mind if they got fired.

I know I can rely on my own skills, my capacity to use the hardware and software at my disposal, and that the currencies of the web will happily engage with me in trustless and transparent manners.

This is not something I can guarantee when working with the United States and our State Department. It’s a hard thing to look at straight on as it traps me and my family into a kind of anarcho-tyranny where because we follow the law to the letter we are discriminated against while others brazenly broke laws.

High trust people who display their commitment daily are worn down by this bitterly painful reality that what we put in doesn’t guarantee us all that much when the state is concerned. We move fast and keep at it. The American state department moves slow and failed at every step of the way.

Categories
Travel

Day 1714 and Bum Rush The Airbus

I’ve got a long travel day ahead of me with multiple transit hops. Given the state of geopolitics, I expect the international hub that is a transit point for most of the better MENA carriers will have some extra security measures.

In situations where I know my planned itinerary could go awry, I have my three bag cascade system.

I always pack a toiletry bag that can manage all grooming for at least 3 days, all crucial medications are kept on my body with a full supply in my backpack and finally a change of clothes should I find myself with an overnight.

Match-y Match-y

If you are interested I use Aer, Muji and BagSmart and a labeling system so I always know where things are. I’ve found having extensive labeling really makes the crankier airport workers in big hubs like Frankfurt and Heathrow happy.

Boarding a Lufthansa Airbus 321

We got the hurry up and wait now that we’ve boarded in a clusterfork of infrequent travelers who insist on manners like rushing the doors when they are not in the proper class and bringing 3-4 pieces of luggage.

Watching an older lady throw a fit in broken English to a German flight manager that she should have the open space in business class because no one is using it was funny. She didn’t understand that because it was a bum rush that many of the travelers in business and first were behind her.

We just got the news that Poland is closing its airspace after a Russian drone attack. Over 100 people on the plane on my first jump have connecting flights across Europe and internationally so I’ll be interested to see what things look like at the hub. Add in bad weather in Germany and I’m sure this will have some exciting moments.