It always is an exciting time in Abu Dhabi when you decide — or at least hope — that the season is changing. From summer to … what I think of as not summer. And a sign of that shift? No, not leaves falling. (We would have to have trees other than palms.) Not the […]

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We had just come out of the customs area at the airport when we were directed to one of the usual silver taxis that are ubiquitous in this town. We got our luggage in the trunk, with the aid of the driver, and settled in the back seat, in that semi-hypnotized state common to those […]

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Time for a list. We all love lists. Especially if they have a level of, oh, difficulty involved. Ten ways in which a reasonable person would prefer being in Abu Dhabi of the United Arab Emirates over The City of Light, Gay Paree … blah blah blah. Let’s count them down. Here we go.

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The planet has gotten more tribal, over the past century. Where once you could have covered the world in a United Nations-style organization with, maybe, 50 political entities, the actual UN of 2010 has 192 members. Empires have been broken up or voluntarily disbanded, larger countries have been partitioned into more ethnically unified states. Et […]

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One of the simplest charms of Paris is the baguette. The ubiquitous pain Francaise. (Don’t you dare call it a bread stick!) And it is one of the little things I will miss most. As always. Ah, the baguette! How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.

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Today marks the one-year anniversary of the day in 2009, October 15, a Thursday, when we got on a plane to leave the United States. We have not been back since.

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I have noticed that I don’t loathe the San Francisco Giants as I once did. It could be a direct correlation of not being around their fans in any numbers for several years now. (Giants fans, en masse, are crude and declasse, not at all what we would expect from the presumably cultured crowds culled […]

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The situation will be reversed in a couple of months, when Abu Dhabi will be in the midst of three months or so when it will be a haven for Europeans desperate for warmth and sun. But even in October, France has the more temperament climate. Let weather.com tell the tale.

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Rather a lost day. Well, apart from the scenery, which was rolling and green and a constant pleasure to scan. But if the idea was to find a place in Languedoc we could invest in … Have to concede we really didn’t make any progress. I suppose those things happen, when house-hunting. I’ve heard people […]

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This got a little weird. So, we’re out cruising around the Languedoc countryside, going from ville to ville, already feeling like unwitting participants in the HGTV show “House Hunters International” … when the second agent we meet is … someone who has appeared as an agent twice before — on the actual show. Anushka, is […]

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