A PRIVATE LOOK INSIDE EGYPT: What you don't hear about.

EDITOR'S NOTE: YourLifeIsATrip.com executive editor, Judith Fein, received this letter from her friend Manal S. Kelig who lives in Cairo, Egypt. Manal is a devoted mother, wife, tour operator and peace promoter. We publish this with Manal's permission and with gratitude. 

An Egyptian man puts the flag of Egypt on his house with the words " Egypt for All Egyptians" written in Arabic and the sign of peace beside it.

Dear Judie,

Greetings, my apologies for the late reply. Every day I mean to reply but the escalating events are faster than me.

I have been overwhelmed by the chaotic condition that we are living in, and I am not talking about the deaths or the fires, I am taking about the polarizing status that we have been living for the past two years.

For the last 6 weeks all my efforts were directed towards initiatives that aimed to close the gap between the Egyptians. In every single event that ended in violence I knew someone who was harmed there. I had friends who participated in the sit ins and supported it with all their hearts and I had friends who lived in the neighbourhoods of these sit ins and their life became so difficult they had to move out. And yesterday other friends in Luxor had their hotel burned down and their church attacked.

It is very hard days for me as I know friends who are revolutionaries, normal civilians, journalists, MBs, cops, army officers who got shot, are dead or missing and each one of them believe they were standing for justice.

Burned houses, churches, burned police stations and police men, burned cars are all across Egypt. Families mourn the loss of loved ones, the sacredness of their holy places, their personal properties.

Each one of us is making his own sense out of this and --- it is complicated!

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Motorcycle Diaries in Vietnam

by Sasha Hill

When I think of Vietnam, I think of the motorcycles. 

My travel partner, Sierra, and I marveled at the sea of them, flowing in a colorful mass around the city streets. We zeroed in on individuals: tiny young women in heels, families with three generations along for the ride. What for us was a cultural statement of rebellion, of reckless daring, was for them just a means of transportation. My grandpa had once punctuated his description of my mother’s “wild” young adulthood by recounting a story of how she once rode a motorcycle up the East Coast with a friend. “I bet she never told you that”, he concluded, in dramatic satisfaction. If he could only see the middle aged Vietnamese ladies, demure in their business suits and protective masks. 

Vietnam was the final stop before we crossed the Pacific to home, after eleven months on the road, from Peru to Asia. We’d brainstormed the trip when we were fourteen, and spent four years planning and saving up. 

It was Sierra’s idea to rent the motorcycle. The trip itself was her idea. My role was usually to follow along, checking her only when the ideas got out of hand. Like when she proposed we schlep down from Granada, Spain to Meknes, Morocco a day early on no sleep to make it in time for a Halloween party. Sometimes I regretted my all too responsible reactions. Rent a motorcycle? We had no experience! What if we crashed? And right at the end of our trip.  

But I found myself saying yes. 

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Medellin, Colombia: Dance Capitol of My Heart

story and photos by Paul Ross

“I would do anything for love, but I won’t
             dance, don’t ask me.”
                                -Meatloaf & Fred Astaire

I’m an American baby boomer who doesn’t dance. It was an awkward social activity for a lot of guys in my generation and the excuse for not doing so was that I was always playing in bands –for other people’s dancing. The story is plausible because it’s partly true.  But, somehow, there I was, salsa’ing mi cola off at midnight in Medellin, Colombia.

Salsa dancers, Medellin, Colombia.

         HOW DID THIS HAPPEN?

Flashback ––

         Arriving in the capital city, Bogota, in search of stories with my wife and travel partner Judie, Chef Sofia Samper whisked us like compliant egg whites off to a large local market. There she shopped for select delicacies to be incorporated into a custom lunch at her cooking school/restaurant. Music thumped in the background throughout the marketplace.

         During the subsequent lesson in Colombian cuisine at trendy Casa 95, Chef Sofia danced around her kitchen to an infectious Latin beat. And I began tapping my toe.

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Searching For A Hidden Western Algarve Beach

by Connie Hand

Admittedly, the beaches in the Portuguese Algarve are famous for their beauty, but they are also very crowded.

Having been to the Algarve several times, I always wondered where the quiet, uncrowded beaches were. There had to be many since the coast was about 60 miles long. But how to find them?

My research always came to a dead end. I used a current Michelin map of Portugal. I went online. Not many beaches were noted except the usual—mostly eastern Algarve four and five star resorts.

I imagined beach after beach, cove after cove nestled under huge rocks and boulders. With so many coastal miles, especially on the Atlantic Coast, I was sure that the Portuguese and the German and British tourists or expats knew about dozens of these paradises, even if Americans hadn’t yet found them.

Praia do Castelejo. Photo by Portuguesa72/flickr.com

A couple of years ago, I decided to find some people to speak with on the subject during my visit. But about a week before my trip, while reading a Rick Steves’ Portugal guide, I came across a small paragraph that mentioned Castelejo Beach on the Atlantic Coast of Algarve, Portugal. In his guidebook under “The Algarve: Cape Sagres” section, he listed “Beaches”. He stated that there were many little beaches from Salema to Sagres. And then...he mentioned Praia do Castelejo which is north of Sagres past Vila do Bispo. Rick wrote “If you have a car and didn’t grow up in Fiji, this is really worth the drive”. He said it was “the best secluded beach in the region”. 

At last, someone was as interested as I in the tucked away and little heard of western Algarve beaches! 

So my husband and I decided to go for it.

When we arrived at Lagos, we checked into the Romantik Hotel Vivenda Miranda. This boutique hotel is situated up on a cliff overlooking the Praia do Mos. (The hotel is beautiful and lovingly cared for by owners Vera and Urs Wild, and their friendly, helpful staff. I highly recommend it).

After lunch, we made our plans to drive out to Castelejo beach the next day. We would follow Rick Steve’s directions.

The next morning, after a delicious buffet breakfast on the hotel patio with its ocean view, we left on our adventure. 

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Molokai - the most Hawaiian of islands

by Deston Nokes   

When I flew from Honolulu to Molokai, the culture shock was akin to leaving Las Vegas for a small town in Utah. Gone were the towering hotels, expansive resorts, chain eateries, blinking neon, and surging swarms of humanity on Waikiki. 

On Molokai, it’s quiet. It’s gentle. The island is only 10-miles wide and 38-miles long. There isn’t a lot of structured activity and visitors should be prepared to entertain themselves exploring, snorkeling, hiking, making crafts and just enjoying the sensation of just being in Hawaii. Sportsmen find the hunting and fishing terrific, and there’s just one nine-hole golf course, where the pace is said to be …  leisurely.  

Halawa Valley: Okalani Ganeau-Brown chants permission to enter Molokai’s sacred valley Photo by Deston Nokes..

Kaunakakai, the island’s largest “town,” is just three blocks long, but we did find the island’s best ice cream at Kamo'i Snack-n-Go, and we lined up for the warm bread made daily at Kanemitsu's Bakery.

Here, every beach is public and no building is higher than a coconut tree. There are no traffic lights, escalators or elevators. The Hotel Molokai is the only hotel unless visitors opt for a vacation rental. And traffic? A local saying defines a Molokai traffic jam as “two trucks stopped in the road talking story.”

Mia Gains-Alt, an Oakdale, Calif., transplant and former Bravo TV’s Top Chef contestant, fell in love with Hawaii while shooting the reality cooking show on location in Kona. In a fit of inspiration, she applied for the chef position, and moved her husband, three daughters and even her mother to the rural island. 

“The people here are really tight knit, and there’s a certain amount of freedom in that,” Gains-Alt said. “And, as a parent, I love that Molokai is so safe for our kids. I have peace, sanity, and just don’t feel like I need to go anywhere else.” 

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In Pursuit of the Perfect Pasty

by Katie Richards

It’s probably fair to say that beyond English borders, our regional food doesn’t have the best reputation. But as an English girl who has lived in various parts of England and Wales for my whole life, not counting a brief flirtation with France in my early twenties, I am proud to say that English food is a great deal more than fish and chips.

First things first. You’ll only find a Cornish pasty in Cornwall. Now, while that might sound obvious enough, it took the Cornish Pasty Association a trip to the European Court in 2006 to gain this recognition. The story of the pasty, however, begins some 700 years earlier during the reign of Henry II when it was enjoyed by the wealthy and filled with exotic ingredients such as venison, eel and salmon. By the 18^th and 19^th centuries, the development of the mining industry in Cornwall meant that the pasty had become the food of the workers who required a nutritious and portable lunch to carry into the mine.

Cornish pasty. Photo by monkeymagic1975 via Flickr.com

From the outside, granted, the Cornish pasty doesn’t look particularly appealing. But the buttery pastry shell in a half-moon shape with a characteristic crimped handle made of pastry gives way to a mouth-watering mixture of steak, potato, turnip and onion all seasoned with a liberal dash of pepper. While the crimped handle is today a handy means of eating your delicious pasty on the go, the handle was originally discarded due to the high levels of arsenic in tin mines several centuries ago. The thick pastry handle allowed miners to enjoy their hot meal and avoid being poisoned by the arsenic and tin on their hands as a result of a hard day’s work in the mine. Another traditional characteristic of the pasty which hasn’t lasted to the modern day is the savoury and sweet combination. One half of the pasty would be filled with the traditional steak mix while the other half contained a sweet apple pie-type filling as a welcome end to the miner’s hearty meal.

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