The Displaced Nation

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Category Archives: Pot Luck

THE DISPLACED Q: What is the weirdest multi-cultural celebration you’ve ever attended?

3 Comments Posted by on April 30, 2012

So here’s today’s Displaced Question: “What is the weirdest multi-cultural celebration you’ve ever attended?”

Now, when two or more cultures collide you’re bound to get some strange combinations. Nowhere is this more apparent than at gatherings or celebrations, especially if they’re traditionally part of one culture as opposed to the others… and boy can they lead to friction! It’s that old traveller’s saw; do you eat all the food because it’s delicious, or do you leave some to show they served you enough?

I’ve drunk kava in Fiji in a very uncomfortable situation – invited by a  worker at our resort, we met the Chief to hear his legendary tales of the arrival of White Man. Of course, he can’t talk to us – he has to tell his right-hand man, who can then lean over and tell us. Or rather – he can tell me. Not the two women who are with me – not even the second-in-command can stoop low enough to talk to a woman whilst drinking kava!

And let’s not even get started on the two French girls that were also invited by the same worker. They were on a bit of a party holiday, and neither of them seemed to have brought anything less revealing than hot pants and bikinis… Yes, that was a tense evening. I wouldn’t have minded, if I’d been drunk – but kava, a rather bitter brown liquid, pounded (in a sock!) from roots, has only a mildly narcotic effect. So mild, I was painfully aware of every awkward glance – and the intense silence – which dominated that gathering. I’ve never wished so hard for a bottle of vodka in my life!

Perhaps stranger though, was a ceremony I got invited to by a Native American man, whilst checking out the artefacts in his store in Sedona, Arizona. He described it as a mass, much like I would have attended during my Christian upbringing. I was intrigued, and couldn’t really pass up the chance, so I went along on Sunday morning to a small room above his shop. There, the proprietor led us in chants and prayers offered up to Allah, Shiva, Buddha, The Earth Goddess, Jesus, Mary and the Spirits of the Dreamtime – all simultaneously! The small crowd, people from all walks of life, all colours and clearly all creeds, all seemed delighted with the equality shown to the reigning deities. If only the rest of the world could be like this, I thought!

And whilst I’m on the topic of Native American celebrations, I once took part in a ‘sweat lodge’. This is an awesome shamanic tradition, involving the building of a special domed hut of logs and sticks – kind of like an igloo. It’s then covered over with mud to fill in all the gaps. A fire pit is dug in the centre and lit, and all the participants – enough to completely fill the structure – squeeze in… naked.

Yup – I said it! Naked you go in, and the drumming and chanting begins… it’s like a sauna in there, incredibly hot and sweaty, with the chanting and the previously consumed herbal tea helping to turn your ears into wings! It was an incredible experience. Slightly odd, in that it was the only time I’ve sat naked next to my Mum and my sister – but the reality of the ceremony was so far beyond that, beyond such earthly concepts as clothing and embarrassment. It was… well, spiritual. I felt so pure, so cleansed, so in touch with the divine. If I ever get the chance again, I will go for it without reservation. But probably not with my family present  :0)

SO! The time has come for you all to spill the beans – what is the strangest experience you’ve had with a celebration of some kind? Where have the cultural boundaries blurred unexpectedly – or come sharply into focus? It’s a weird, weird world out there – what have YOU seen? Tell us in the comments!

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STAY TUNED…for tomorrow’s post, where we introduce the new theme for May: La Dolce Vita!

Image: Tony drinking Kava in Fiji, 2009

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In honor of Obscura Day, a tribute to 5 obscure treasures near places I’ve called home

6 Comments Posted by on April 27, 2012

It’s been a month of celebration for The Displaced Nation, beginning with the announcement of our very first birthday on April 1 (no fooling!).

We may be nearing the end of the month, but the festive spirit continues unabated. In fact, in today’s post I’m hosting my own little celebration of Obscura Day, which takes place tomorrow, April 28.

As you may know — or maybe not, since by definition, it’s a little obscure! — Obscura Day is where people all over the world get to show off the unusual and little-known places of interest near wherever they call home. Locals volunteer to give guided tours of such spots — and it’s all organized by the folks who’ve set up Atlas Obscura, a user-generated and editor-curated compendium of the world’s wonders, curiosities and esoterica.

To do my part in enhancing the Obscura Day cause, I’ve rounded up the 5 most interesting and unusual places near the various towns and cities I’ve called home in the past five years.

1. Sail Rock (Hin Bai), off Koh Phangan, Thailand

I happened upon this rock, which for me is one of the foremost world treasures, when living in Thailand in 2007. I was staying in Thong Sala, on the island of Koh Phangan, to train as a professional diver.

This small rock protruding from the Gulf of Thailand doesn’t look like much from the surface, but it’s a world-class diving site — and a comparatively undiscovered one, as it lies off a tiny island famed more for its party scene than its underwater exploration.

There is a vertical tunnel through part of the rock which is absolutely teeming with aquatic life.

I had to earn my way in there by learning enough control over my diving gear and techniques to keep the descent smooth and calm. My boss was very concerned that this place would be preserved for future generations of divers, and he knew how clumsy I was out of the water!

But at long last the day came when I was allowed to enter. I drifted gently downwards, spinning slowly in place to take it all in. I was in a tube filled with corals and sponges, surrounded by weird and colorful creatures like nothing on land. Tendrils waved, lethal looking spikes and spines protruded, fur-like coverings rippled. All in brilliant shades of blue, green, yellow…it was the closest I can imagine to being on some alien planet in a galaxy far, far away!

And yet this amazing world had been right underneath my boat the whole time!

2. Lookout Trees near Pemberton, in the South West region of Western Australia

It was not long after I started living in Perth (where I still am!) that I discovered the Lookout Trees near Pemberton — unimaginably tall trees that had been used as look-out posts for vigilant fire-spotters for almost fifty years. Now they can be climbed, just for the hell of it, by anyone who is a) curious, and b) has the balls of a concrete elephant!

It’s a long — LONG — way to climb on steel rungs driven into the side of the trees, 58 meters (or 190 feet!) to the viewing platform, perched rather precariously above the forest canopy. You can see for hundreds of miles from this towering vantage point, which is all the well; you certainly need something to take your mind off the twin thoughts that a) you’re ridiculously exposed, insanely high and supported only by a single tree, and b) you’re going to have to climb back down…

If you do make it up, you’ll be amazed. At your own bravery as much as the view. If you don’t…well, you’re not alone. More than three quarters of the people who try it never make the top.

3. Cheddar Gorge, Somerset, England

My list wouldn’t be complete without an obscure-ish (nothing is truly obscure any more on the overdeveloped British Isles) sight that’s near my original hometown of Highbridge, in Somerset. I speak of the Cheddar Gorge, a 137m-deep split in the Earth’s crust revealing a fantastic labyrinth of caves extending nearly half a kilometre under the ground.

It wasn’t until I was visiting last year that I made the effort to tour the gorge. There’s a company that runs a caving experience for any level of tourist — so I took my Mum! Bless her, she did have fun slithering across ledges, abseiling down underground cliff faces, and best of all — squeezing through tight tunnels carved by water flowing through the caves.

My favorite part was making her laugh by describing the look of just one end of her protruding from the tunnel. She found it so funny that she couldn’t stop laughing to pull herself any further, and was stuck half-in, half-out for quite some time!

Thankfully, there were experienced guides helping us along and tough overalls and wellies — every part of us was encrusted with mud by the time we saw the sun again.

It was quite a relief to emerge from the darkness, especially after the ritual of turning off our helmet lights in the deepest recess of the cave — experiencing an absence of light so profound I could touch my own eyeball without seeing my finger. Spooky…and awesome!

4. Knife-making in Barrytown, New Zealand

An unassuming little bay on the rugged northwestern coast of New Zealand’s South Island, you could be forgiven for thinking there is nothing in Barrytown at all. You’d mostly be right — I passed through there on a road trip in 2010, trying to get a better sense of the island I was living on (yes, I was living in Christchurch at the time).

I checked into a completely empty backpackers hostel (a novelty itself in tourist-mad New Zealand) and noticed a lone advertising flyer on the wall…which is how I came to meet Robyn and Steve, a couple of modern-day artisans, in their home-based knife-making workshop.

Steve is a self-taught blacksmith. Under his tutelage, I heated and hammered metal, ground and sharpened a blade, carved and polished a handle… and within the day I had created a perfect steel knife like something right out of Lord of the Rings!

It was a fantastic feeling to know I’d hand-crafted something so beautiful and unique — well, okay, I had a bit of help from the expert! As a skill, it was highly addictive.

I quizzed him late into the night about just how difficult it would be to make a sword the same way — and got the feeling I wasn’t the first person to ask him that!

If you ever get chance, do this. Obscure? Check! And absolutely fascinating.

5. Sedlec Ossuary, near Prague, Czech Republic

Okay, I wasn’t really living in Prague — I was just passing through in 2006 — but for obscure treasures, this one takes the biscuit!

Not too far from the city — in a suburban part of Southern Bohemia — lies a small Roman Catholic chapel beneath a small cemetery, known as the Sedlec Ossuary or Bone Chapel, as it’s decorated entirely in human bones. There are bones everywhere one looks, from streamers and chandeliers made from complete skeletons, artfully rearranged, to giant pyramids of skulls on display in the four corners. Altar statues and wall decorations are also fashioned completely from bones — it’s estimated that over 40,000 bodies have contributed to the décor!

Perhaps more macabre is that this isn’t some ancient monument to the grotesque, a product of some long-forgotten civilization like the Mayans; no, this is modern work. Although many of the remains date back to the Black Death in the 14th century, the artful sculpting and artistic arrangement of the bones happened just over a century ago!

It really has to be seen to be believed. Especially as photos aren’t allowed — unless you’re very persuasive, and happen to be in there on your own (which is exceedingly creepy)…and happen to have 100 Czech koruna ($4) to bribe the curator!

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So. What’s unusual about where you live? Are there any undiscovered gems nearby — cool places, crazy things to do, strange legends? Tell, tell! We want to know! Let us know all about them in the comments. Cheers to obscurity!

STAY TUNED for Monday’s post, another expat book review by Kate Allison.

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Images: Tony Slater’s own photos

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Is there a common theme — or better yet meme — for the expat life?

16 Comments Posted by on April 23, 2012

After writing, planning, commissioning, and editing posts for this site for just over a year — many of which were centered on the keyword “expat” — I have become rather fixated on that word of late.

Yes, we’re back to that old chestnut, but kindly indulge me while I rake it over the coals again and crack it open to take another look.

Back when I myself could have been considered an expat — first in England and then in Japan — I assiduously avoided describing myself in that way. It made me think of the kinds of people who go into a siege mentality, circle the wagons and say: “Right, it’s just us now.” I’m sure you know the kind of expats I mean, the ones who live in a colony or compound, or socialize as if they do. They hang out at the pool drinking G&Ts, exuding a sense of cultural superiority — along with great pride in having remained unassimilated.

After all, if you’re an expat, it means you come from the richer part of the world; otherwise, you’d be an immigrant.

Nowadays, I’m an American living in America, but I simply tell people that I used to live abroad. If I use the word “expat” at all to refer to myself, it’s in inverted commas: “Yes, I suppose I was an ‘expat’ for all those years. And now I’m a ‘repat.’ Hahaha…”

What about you? If you are reading this, chances are you are (or have been) someone who has ventured across borders to travel and/or live. How do you refer to your predicament? (BTW, my choice of “predicament” is the result of cultivating a British sense of humor over many years of living on that sceptered isle — no, not as an expat, but as an international resident!!!)

Maybe unlike me, you don’t have any hang-ups about calling yourself an expat — and think that people of my sort are inverse snobs for rejecting the label?

As the blogger Tabitha Carvan (The City That Never Sleeps In) has written:

To the Vietnamese who live around me, it’s clear where I fit in here: I don’t. The differences between us are as plain as the enormous nose on my big fat face.

So is it fair to say we’re all “displaced”?

One of the other founders of The Displaced Nation, Kate Allison, is an Englishwoman who has lived in the United States for more than 15 years. I sometimes think of her as an immigrant, except that she tells me she keeps a foot on each side of the Atlantic.

Strangely, I did not wince at all when Kate Allison proposed the word “displaced” as a descriptor for our common situation, when she and I were first chatting about starting up this site.

Well, perhaps I winced just slightly. I know from my studies of international affairs that “displaced” is often used for people who are forcibly removed from their homes by natural disaster, famine, civil wars and other tragedies.

In this narrow sense, “displaced” in no way applies to me, Kate or others of our ilk, who have led privileged lives.

But in a broader sense, I had to agree with Kate that “displaced” seems a good fit. As the Italian poet Cesare Pavese once said:

Traveling is a brutality. It forces you to trust strangers and to lose sight of all that familiar comfort of home and friends. You are constantly off balance. Nothing is yours except the essential things – air, sleep, dreams, the sea, the sky — all things tending towards the eternal or what we imagine of it.

If there is any common theme that applies to all of us, surely it’s that sense of being “constantly off balance,” as Pavese so aptly puts it. By trotting off to investigate — and live in — far-flung corners of the globe, we are casting off the balance of our lives and choosing a life where, for a while, the only things we have in common with anyone else are the basics: air, sea, sky, sleep, dreams — a life of displacement, in other words…

And in some cases — Kate’s would be an example — we are trailing others who have made this choice on our behalf, or on behalf of family and kids. (See her “Libby’s Life” series.)

Always look on the bright side of life!

In an article last month for the FT, Edwin Heathcote had this to say about what he called “a life less ordinary”:

The expat experience combines a cocktail of the thrill of the new and the ennui of global alienation, of displacement and dislocation.

Readers may wonder why the founders of The Displaced Nation have chosen to emphasize the negative ingredients of this cocktail. After all, the meaning of “displaced” is only a shade or two away from “misplaced” or “out of place.”

Why not look at the bright side instead — the allure and the thrill of a life overseas?

Well, the fact is, the founders of The Displaced Nation don’t necessarily see displacement as a negative. As shown in numerous ways on this site over the past 12 months, it’s a necessary first step in making the leap beyond the known to the unknown — to feeding what for many of us is, or soon becomes, an insatiable hunger for new ways to knowledge.

By becoming displaced, we open up our minds to new forms of

Now if that isn’t the bright side, we don’t know what is!

Keep ’em laughing as you go

As far as our site stats go, readers have most enjoyed the series of posts where we’ve explored the good and the bad, the yin and the yang, of the displaced life, with a large helping of humor thrown into the mix.

1. Alice in Wonderland

Top of the charts is the month that we dedicated to the “curious, unreal” aspects of the displaced life with the help of Lewis Carroll’s Alice.

When you stop to think of it, barging into other people’s countries is rather like falling down a rabbit hole: full of adventure but also misadventure, of curious — and sometimes scary (because so incomprehensible) — encounters.

Kate Allison produced two brilliant posts illustrating just how unreal things can sometimes get: “5 lessons Wonderland taught me about the expat life, by Lewis Carroll’s Alice,” and “How many of these 5 expat Alice characters do you recognize?”

Meanwhile, Guest blogger Carole Hallett Mobbs kept us in stitches when describing the scenes of young adults dressed up in furry romper suits, “doormice folk,” and flying potatoes that formed the backdrop to her everyday life in Japan.

2. Pocahontas

Readers also appreciated the month when we recruited the legendary Pocahontas to help us understand, from a native’s point of view, what it’s like to be bombarded with clueless nomads.

In particular, we focused on the cases when displaced types befriend, or even marry, the natives, causing them to lead displaced lives (sometimes to tragic effect — I’m thinking not so much of Pocahontas, but of her tribe!).

I weighed in with a post that was partly based on my own experiences: “Cross-cultural marriage: Four good reasons not to rush into it.” Somewhat to my bemusement, the post proved extremely popular — that is, until it was surpassed by new TDN writer Tony James Slater’s hilarious (but with a hard kernel of truth) “Does love conquer all, even language barriers?”

Counterbalancing Tony’s and my cautious take on such matters was a two-part interview series with two cross-cultural couples — all of whom seemed to find their situation “no big deal.”

That blasé sentiment would later be echoed by Wendy Williams, author of the new work, The Globalisation of Love. In a guest post in honor of Valentine’s Day, she pointed out that in an era of increased international travel, multicultural unions are an inevitability — and even deserve their own label: “GloLo.”

3. Global philanthropy

Another monthly theme that earned high marks from readers was “global philanthropy” — the idea of displacing oneself on behalf of the forcibly displaced.

Readers responded with high praise for Kate Allison’s interview of Robin Wiszowaty, who immersed herself in Maasai culture and now runs development programs in Kenya on behalf of the Canada-based charity Free the Children.

Also popular was a feature on international aid worker and consultant Jennifer Lentfer. (Lentfer has received the most hits of any of the 40 Random Nomads who’ve been featured in the site’s first year.)

But even when covering this seemingly sacrosanct topic, we were hard pressed to prevent a note of skepticism, verging on irreverence, from creeping into the site. Guest blogger Lawrence Hunt stirred things up with his well-received post making fun of gap-year students who think they can save the world in just six months. And I wasn’t far behind with this one, still getting many hits: “7 extraordinary women travelers with a passion to save souls.” (Hey, the current generation isn’t the first to perform good works on behalf of those less fortunate!)

But is it a meme?

First, what is a meme exactly? My dictionary tells me it’s an idea, behavior or style that spreads from person to person within a culture.

Memes are the cultural analogues to genes that get selected and then self-replicate.

Is the kind of “displacement” we talk about on this site a meme? Not in the Internet sense — it hasn’t spread like wild fire throughout social media.

But has it been a meme within our community? You tell us — does “displaced” work for you, or is there some other organizing principle we should be using on this site? Expat, perhaps? (Groan…)

STAY TUNED for tomorrow’s post, a roundup of recent displaced reads by Kate Allison.

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Happy World Party Day to our virtual friends! Just because we’re Displaced doesn’t mean we can’t have parties!

4 Comments Posted by on April 2, 2012

By the time many of you read this, it will already be April 3. (Actually, if I don’t type faster, it will be April 3 by the time I post this – but I digress.)

The significance of April 3? It’s World Party Day, defined by Wikipedia as:

A synchronized global mass celebration of a better world and the active creation of desirable reality.

…which, I have to say, doesn’t sound a whole lot of festive fun. It doesn’t inspire me to hang out in someone else’s house, eat their food, drink their drink, nosy through their bookshelves, iTunes library, and  medicine cabinets, then spill red wine on their new rug, which is usually what happens at parties.

But it gets better. Sort of. Wiki goes on to say that:

World Party Day began as a grassroots effort in 1996 and…is observed yearly on April 3 through personal and public observances of party-like atmosphere. A basic premise is that the opposite of war is not passive action or peace, but party.

Aha! So you mean that while people have been campaigning for World Peace, waving CND placards, and making records in Amsterdam hotel rooms — it’s all been a waste of time? That they would have been better stockpiling boxes of peanuts and Zinfandel, then heading down to iParty for some paper leis and a plastic punchbowl?

It’s all clear now. This is where the world has been going wrong for so long.

Instead of chanting “Make peace, not war!” we should have been shouting “Party on!” and head-banging to Bohemian Rhapsody.

Quantity, not quality

Perhaps the real problem is that one day of partying a year is simply not enough to end global conflict. A trifling 24 hours shows no stamina, no devotion to the anti-war effort.

So, ladies and gentlemen, in the selfless interests of world peace — I beg your pardon; an absence of war — The Displaced Nation team, for April’s theme, will be bringing you a month of cyber parties. Just because we are all Displaced doesn’t mean we can’t have parties together.

Now, clearly, this is not an undertaking for the fainthearted. We expect, by April 30, to be exhausted and in dire need of Alka Seltzer and carpet cleaner, or at the very least, a new WordPress background.

But sacrifices must be made. Revelries must be organized. Balloons must be filled with helium and hilariously inhaled.

So what are we waiting for? Let’s party!

P.S.

Actually, we’ve already tested the punch and vol-au-vents, just a little bit, because Party Month started two days early for the TDN team. Nothing to do with the active creation of desirable reality, though.

More the creation of desirable unreality, in fact.

On April 1, 2012, The Displaced Nation celebrated its first birthday.

Cheers!

STAY TUNED for Tuesday’s Displaced Q, when Tony J Slater asks: “What’s been your most memorable birthday abroad?”

If you enjoyed this post, we invite you to register for The Displaced Dispatch, a round up of weekly posts from The Displaced Nation, with seasonal recipes, book giveaways and other extras. Register for The Displaced Dispatch by clicking here!

Image: MorgueFile

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CLEOPATRA FOR A DAY: Fashion & beauty diary of Third Culture Kid Tiffany Lake-Haeuser

6 Comments Posted by on March 30, 2012

Let’s all line up and curtsy to the 16-year-old German-American Tiffany Lake-Haeuser, who has just disembarked on the shores of The Displaced Nation. Born in New York City to German parents, this Third Culture Kid returned “home” to Germany when she was six and then at age 13, moved with her family to Abu Dhabi, UAE. Now back in Frankfurt, she divides her time between this city and Paris, where her father currently resides. Today she will play the role of Queen of the Nile and let us in on the fashion and beauty secrets she’s collected from her travels.

BEAUTY STAPLES

I’ve become a big fan of black eyeliner after living in the Middle East. (The real Cleopatra would approve!) The more conservative Arab women in Abu Dhabi and the rest of the UAE don’t wear eyeliner, but those who are more modern or Westernized often wear quite a lot. They all have such nice eyes and long eye lashes, so it always looks striking. Eyeliner easily takes an ordinary make-up to something special.

BEAUTY TREATMENTS

Living in the Middle East also taught me that eyebrow shaping helps frame the face and makes people look elegant. Even though it’s painful, I get my eyebrows done regularly.

And from my various travels, I’ve learned how important it is to take care of one’s skin and hair, especially since those are two things people notice right away when they they meet you.

HAIR

My hair has been very long, but I recently had it cut to much shorter. I have pretty much done everything with my hair from long to short to all different kinds of bangs. The only thing I haven’t done is dye my hair, because I am afraid it will be damaged.

FASHION

My favorite piece of clothing from my travels is not so exotic. It’s a big dark blue woolly cardigan that I bought at the Urban Outfitters in London. I love that sweater because it is so comfortable. Sometimes it can be hard to combine with an outfit, but I’ve discovered some ways I think work well.

LINGERIE

I have never bought lingerie in any country other than my own but I would imagine South America to have nice lingerie so I would definitely keep an eye out for that if I ever travel there.

JEWELRY

My favorite piece of jewelry is a ring my mom bought me at a market in Sharjah (the capital city of Sharjah, one of the emirate states). It has a black smooth stone and a silver frame; the stone is slightly bigger, too. I really like the fact that it doesn’t come from a store that mass produces their stuff, but instead it’s different and individual.

WEARING RIGHT NOW

I am wearing a pair of black jeggings, which I recently got at the German clothing store People’s Place. In my opinion, they are flattering and you can never really go wrong with a comfy pair of skinny jeans. I am also wearing a light green sweatshirt, which is the softest piece of clothing I own (also from People’s Place), and a slightly cropped pastel-pink shirt. It’s also amazingly soft — it’s from a Roman boutique called Brandy Melville, their store in New York City. For accessories I have on a feather necklace from the Urban Outfitters in Frankfurt and a black flower ring that comes from a small jewelry store on the outskirts of Frankfurt.

DAILY FASHION FIXES

I always read Glamour magazine, especially since it has so many versions: German, British, American and Australian. I like to see the differences in fashion around the globe. (British and French magazines have the most cutting-edge fashions, though.) And I read a lot of fashion blogs: for instance, Birds of a feather flock together — by Cailin Klohk, an 18-year-old half-Irish, half-German girl who lives near Frankfurt — and Snakes Nest (an American one).

Actually, I created my own blog at the end of last year as my dream now is to become a fashion journalist. It’s called Girl on the Run. I chose the name because of my many moves and travels, which makes me feel like life never stands still and I am constantly discovering new things.

STYLE ICON

Alexa Chung is very present across Europe — I think she has a beautiful and individual style. She mixes some pieces no one would think of to mix, yet they work so wonderfully together. Also, she seems to follow her own instincts instead of being a slave to current fashion trends.

STREET FASHION

I like to go to the Zeil/Hauptwache area in Frankfurt to people watch; there are so many different kinds of people and fashion-forward styles. I especially like to look at people’s bags as I have a slight obsession with bags.

TOP BEAUTY/STYLE LESSON FROM TRAVELS

From all my travels, I have learned that it is important to follow one’s own tastes and cultivate one’s own style instead of just mimicking fashion trends. There are so many beautiful ways to dress in the world, and seeing them has really opened my eyes and made me open to experimenting with what really suits me.

Tiffany Lake-Haeuser is an 11th-grade student at Frankfurt International School with an ambition to become a fashion journalist some day. For more of her fashion impressions and beauty advice, follow her blog, Girl on the Run, which she plans to update regularly now that it’s spring break!

STAY TUNED for Monday’s post, a celebration of The Displaced Nation’s one-year anniversary!

If you enjoyed this post, we invite you to register for The Displaced Dispatch, a round up of weekly posts from The Displaced Nation, with seasonal recipes, book giveaways and other extras. Register for The Displaced Dispatch by clicking here!

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Images: (clockwise beginning with large picture on left): Tiffany Lake-Haeuser on the balcony of her father’s apartment in Paris, sporting her shorter hairdo; applying eyeliner; her Emerati ring (a gift from her mother); and a side view of her beloved cardie from London (Urban Outfitters).

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5 ways to rejuvenate when you’re on the road — a blokey bloke’s perspective

9 Comments Posted by on March 23, 2012

I’m not big on spas. In fact I’ve never been to one. Perhaps because I’m a bloke (and quite a blokey-bloke at that), I just can’t see the appeal of drenching myself in yoghurt or putting cucumber on my eyes. Well, not unless I’m going to a fancy dress party as a Greek salad. 🙂

But that doesn’t mean I’m not on the eternal quest for self-renewal and youthfulness. We all are! Well, anyone over the age of 21, anyway! It’s just that some of us would prefer to avoid the lotions and potions, if alternatives are available.

Here are 5 fail-safe techniques I’ve discovered for feeling younger:

1) Try martial arts — or if all else fails, work out at the gym.

I love yoga — so much so that I practiced it once at two thousand meters at 5:00 a.m., on a tiled floor in a house with no heating. Suffice to say, there were parts of me that remained stuck to that floor long after I was ready to give up! But I believe in yoga’s rejuvenating power, both mental and physical — just not enough to carry on doing it!

Instead I’ve found something more to my tastes: martial arts — specifically Wing Chun kung-fu.

Millions of people around the world practice some form of martial art — can they all be wrong?

Kung-fu offers me the chance to push myself physically. It also challenges me with its spiritual and philosophical components, which are based in passivity and meditation. Manipulation of the invisible life-force or energy flow — known as qì (also chi) in traditional Chinese culture — is a big part of it, with much of it done through breathing as with yoga.

My advice:

  1. Try it.
  2. Then try it some more…

I can’t think of anything better to be hooked on! You’ll feel happy and amazing and the years will start to pour off.

(If you can’t stomach the idea of punches to the stomach, then try going to the gym — treadmills and all that. It’s odd, but on the days I work out, instead of feeling tired I have the energy of a man ten years younger. It’s all those endorphins!)

2) Travel slowly.

A change is as good as a rest, or so they say. Who “they” are in this instance I’m not sure, but they certainly had a clever turn of phrase!

It’s a lie of course — try having a week’s holiday in Fiji and see how rested you feel after two international flights, separated by five days of jet lag…

A rest is the only thing as good as a rest, which is why I love to take my time as I travel. Luckily for me, I can. These days I make a bit of money from writing, and I’m always keen to try new work experiences as I go. I’ve been a diving guide, a medical guinea pig, a toilet cleaner, a yacht delivery man, a gardener…

Living in a place for a while and taking a job is a great way to meet people and make friends, to get to know an area and its population — it’s also an endless source of ridiculous stories that I can spend the rest of my life turning into books.

If it’s not possible to simply vanish into Asia with a CV and a backpack, I fully understand — but then take longer holidays, with no fixed agenda (even if it means taking fewer holidays). Two weeks away gives you the time to properly relax, and your body will thank you for it.

And just imagine what a month in Fiji would be like! Sunny, is the answer. 🙂

3) Take long walks.

I walk a lot. Even in my bedroom I pace, but that’s not exactly rejuvenation!

I find it revitalizing to be outdoors. I now live in Perth, Australia, where I try to spend an hour or so each day roaming the streets, usually in the evenings (it’s a little on the hot side for casual strolling in the middle of the day).

And yes, I do sometimes get stopped by the police! Fortunately for me, Western Australia doesn’t have a version of Florida’s Stand Your Ground law. When I walk, I feel totally free. The rest of the world goes away, or at least becomes quieter, and I can finally think clearly with all that noise gone.

Some of my best writing has popped into my head spontaneously as I walk — almost as though it were there all along, just waiting for my mind to be still enough to tune in.

And if you’re looking for the ultimate rejuvenation, do a big walk! My wife, my sister and I are still reaping the benefits from hiking the Bibbulmun Track here in Western Australia. It’s 600 miles and took us two months.

After the first week you run out of things to say. After the second week, you run out of the desire to say anything anyway. By the time you’re done, I guarantee there will be peace in your heart and a youthful smile on your face. Because you’ll either be a strong, confident individual as a result of conquering such an epic challenge — or you’ll be dead.

I can’t recommend it enough!

4) Tap into the healing powers of universal energy.

In the course of my many wanderings I’ve acquired a fairly eclectic collection of beliefs — among them, Reiki, a spiritual practice developed in Japan. A sort of laying on of hands to unleash one’s inner energy and help boost the body’s healing system.

I did my Reiki practitioner’s course a few years ago. Though some of it was esoteric, it wasn’t too big a leap for me to imagine an invisible energy field inhabiting the body that we can gain access to, or the notion of supplementing someone else(the patient)’s energy with your own (as the practitioner). It somehow made sense to me, but the proof was in the healing: it really worked!

Feeling skeptical? I can relate — I have friends who chant to the angels and friends who believe in the power of color as a healing medium, neither of which do anything for me.

Still, I recommend giving Reiki healing at least one go in the interest of rejuvenating your body. It’s the furthest I’ve ventured into the bewildering variety of New Age therapies, and the closest I’ve ever gotten to feeling The Force — fantastic! And no, you don’t have to get naked! 🙂

5) Cuddle a furry creature or two.

Anyone who knows me, knows my passion for all kinds of animals. I have volunteered in animal refuges while traveling around and have met some amazing people. I’ve also been shot at, bitten, clawed, mauled, temporarily blinded — and head-butted in the balls by a wild pig. Hey, I never said it was easy!

But as the English writer George Elliot put it in one of her stories: 

Animals are such agreeable friends — they ask no questions, they pass no criticisms.

Having a dog or cat (or three!) to come home to after a long day at work is one of the best ways to soothe one’s fears about the world, and stay sane. But — before you indulge — be sure you can look after a pet, particularly if you travel a lot.

Oh, and if you rescue an animal from a shelter instead, you get double karma points!

STAY TUNED for Monday’s “Ask Mary-Sue” column.

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Images (clockwise from top left): Our family dog, Meg; on a loooong walk with my wife in Western Australia (no going back!); the fun Fiji scenery; Kung-fu Tony!

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Thoughts on beauty — and chinos

2 Comments Posted by on March 20, 2012

As regular readers of this blog are doubtless aware, The Displaced Nation always likes to have a monthly theme around which its daily posts pirouette. This month’s theme sees us turning towards the world of fashion.

That leaves me in the somewhat awkward position of having to foist a fashion article onto you all. I confess, and again regular readers won’t be surprised to learn this, that this is not a topic that I am well versed in, I am a skinny guy that has never worn skinny jeans. My own fashion tips begin and end with the advice that you cannot go wrong with a chinos and shirt combo. The shade of beige in the chinos varies and so does the color of the shirt, which can range from powder blue to salmon pink — but that’s still not very exciting, is it?  So unless you want to dress like an ITN foreign correspondent, I’m not really the person to whom you should be paying attention when it comes to fashionista matters.

Perhaps sensing my uneasiness with this topic, it was suggested by others here at The Displaced Nation that I might want to write about whether there is a universal idea of beauty.

This seemed like a better idea than my posting about fashion. I could, I quickly realized, start the article with the old cliché about how “beauty is in the eye of the beholder.” Once that was out of the way, I could suggest that beauty is subjective, doing so by trotting out all those usual cultural differences — very appropriate in the context of The Displaced Nation — that confuse a modern Westerner: the Kayan Lahwi tribe in Burma whose female members wear brass coils around their neck to give the appearance of an elongated neck; the ancient Chinese practice of feet binding; the Essex facelift.

Once that was done I planned to counter the idea of different cultural ideas about beauty by positing that beauty standards are in fact objective — that perhaps Plato was right and beauty exists in his perfect forms. This new point of view would necessitate trotting out the evolutionary psychologists who have conducted studies on infants as young as two months, showing that they gaze at faces judged more attractive longer than the faces of those judged ugly. This, the psychologists contend, could suggest that beauty is indeed innate, that they are objective standards. As babies tend to cry when they see me, it would also prove conclusively that I am one ugly fecker. I would then have ended the article by referencing Keats’ “Ode on a Grecian Urn,” (“beauty is truth, truth beauty”) in an effort to look more learned than I am.

However, that line of argument didn’t seem so convincing. As I tried writing that post, I kept catching sight of myself in the unfortunately huge mirrors that make up the sliding closet doors in my room. They are huge and as this is rented accommodation I can’t do much to change them. So as I typed away, I would keep seeing my reflection and think hmmm, it’s probably bad karma for you to be pontificating on beauty, Windram. So with that in mind, I think it’s probably fairer to nudge you in the direction of the BBC Radio 4 series In Our Time — specifically, the episode that discusses the history of beauty as a philosophical topic — while I go off and iron my chinos.

STAY TUNED for an interview with Random Nomad Annabel Kantaria.

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CLEOPATRA FOR A DAY: Fashion & beauty diary of former expat Anastasia Ashman

8 Comments Posted by on March 19, 2012

Continuing our feature, “Cleopatra for a Day,” we turn to Anastasia Ashman, an American whose love of the exotic led her to Southeast Asia (Malaysia) and Istanbul, Turkey to live (she also found a Turkish husband en route!). Having just moved back home to California, Ashman opens her little black book and spills the fashion and beauty secrets she has collected over three decades of pursuing a nomadic life.

BEAUTY STAPLES

Like Cleopatra, I’m into medicinal unguents and aromatic oils. My staples are lavender and tea tree oil for the tropical face rot you can get in hot, humid places — and for all other kinds of skin complaints, stress, headaches, jet lag, you name it — and Argan oil for skin dryness. I take them everywhere. I also spray lavender and sandalwood on my sheets.

When living in Southeast Asia I liked nutmeg oil to ward off mosquitoes. (I know that’s not beauty per se but bug-bitten is not an attractive look, and it’s just so heavenly smelling too, I suppose you can slather it on your legs and arms for no reason at all.)

I didn’t even have to go to Africa to become dependent on shea butter for lips and hands, and I like a big block of cocoa butter from the Egyptian Bazaar in Istanbul for après sun and gym smoothing — less greasy than shea butter, which I usually use at night.

I’m not really into branded products. When you move around it’s hard to keep stocking your favorite products and I find companies are always discontinuing the things I like so I’ve become mostly brand agnostic.

I just moved from Istanbul to San Francisco, and I got rid of almost everything I owned so I’m seeing what basics I can live with. Because to me, basics that do a wonderful, multifaceted job are the definition of luxury. You’ve got to figure out what those basics are for you.

Oh, and when I am in Paris, I buy perfume. Loved this tiny place in Le Marais that created scents from the plants on the island of Sardinia. And wouldn’t you know it, the second time I went they’d gone out of business. Crushing.

My favorite perfume maker in Paris at the moment — very intriguing perspective, lots of peppery notes and almost nicotiney pungencies — is L’Artisan Parfumeur. I’ve got my eye on their Fou d’Absinthe.

In another life, past or present, I know I was involved with perfume…

BEAUTY TREATMENTS

Believe Cleopatra would drink them dissolved in vinegar? In Malaysia I used to get capsules of crushed pearls from a Chinese herbalist down the street from my house — apparently they’re good for a creamy-textured skin.

I’ll take a facial in any country. I like Balinese aromatic oil massages when I can get them, too, and will take a bath filled with flowers if I’ve got a view of the jungle. Haven’t yet had my chance to do a buttermilk bath. I also do mud baths and hot springs where ever they’re offered, in volcanic areas of the world.

Another indispensable: the Turkish hamam. It’s really great for detoxification, relaxation and exfoliation. When living in Istanbul, I’d go at least once a season, and more often in the summer. It’s great to do with a clutch of friends. You draw out the poaching experience by socializing in the steamy room on heated marble benches, and take turns having your kese (scrub down) with a rough goat-hair mitt. You hire a woman who specializes in these scrubs, and then she massages you with a soapy air-filled cotton bag, and rinses you off like a mother cat washes her kitten.

Soap gets in the eyes, yes.

I own all the implements now, including hand-crocheted washcloths made with silverized cotton, knitted mitts, oil and laurel oil soaps, copper hamam bowls (for rinsing), linen pestemal (wraps or towels), and round pumice stones. (For haman supplies, try Dervis.com.)

DENTAL CARE

I’ve had dental work done in Malaysia and Turkey and was very satisfied with the level of care and the quality and modernity of the equipment and techniques. I got used to state-of-the-science under-the-gum-line laser cleanings in Malaysia (where my Taiwanese dentist was also an acupuncturist) and worry now that I am back to regular old ineffective cleanings. I’ve had horrific experiences in New York, by the way, so don’t see the USA as a place with better oral care standards.

In general, I like overkill when it comes to my teeth. I’ll see oral surgeons rather than dentists, and have my cleanings from dentists rather than oral hygienists.

ENHANCEMENTS

Turkey apparently has a lot of plastic surgery, as well as Lasik eye surgery. One thing to consider about cosmetic procedures is the local aesthetic and if it’s right for you. I didn’t appreciate the robot-like style of eyebrow shaping in Istanbul (with a squared-off center edge) — so I’d be extra wary of anything permanent!

HAIR

I’ve dyed my hair many colors — from black cherry in Asia to red to blonde in Turkey — and had it styled into ringlets and piled up like a princess and blown straight like an Afghan hound. That last one doesn’t work with my fine hair, and doing this style before an event on the Bosphorus would make it spring into a cotton candy-like formation before I’d had my first hors d’oeuvre.

I’ve had my hair cut by people who don’t know at all how to handle curly hair. That’s pretty daring.

I looked like a fluff ball for most of my time in Asia, because I tried to solve the heat and humidity problem with short hair and got tired of loading it up with products meant for thick straight Asian hair.

Now that I’ve relocated to San Francisco (which, even though it’s close to my hometown of Berkeley where I haven’t lived in 30 years, I still consider “a foreign country”), I’m having my hair cut by a gardener, who trims it dry, like a hedge. Having my hair cut by an untrained person with whatever scissors he can find is also pretty daring!

FASHION

On the fashion front, I have an addiction to pashmina-like shawls from Koza Han, the silk market in Bursa, the old capital of the Ottoman empire and a Silk Road stop. I can keep wearing them for years.

I also have a small collection of custom-made silk kebayas from Malaysia, the long, fitted jacket over a long sarong skirt on brightly hand-drawn and printed batik, which I pull out when I have to go to a State dinner and the dress code is formal/national dress. (It’s only happened once, at Malacañan Palace, in Manila!)

I have one very tightly fitting kebaya jacket that is laser-cut velvet in a midnight blue which I do not wear enough. Thanks for reminding me. I may have to take out the too-stiff shoulder pads.

LINGERIE

I like state-of-the-art stuff that does more than one thing at once and find most places sell very backward underthings that are more about how they look than how they fit, feel, or perform. Nonsense padded bras, bumpy lace, and stuff that is low on performance and high on things I don’t care about.

I got an exercise racerback bra at a Turkish shop and had to throw it away it was so scratchy and poorly performing. No wicking of sweat, no staying put, no motion control. But it had silver glittery thread — and (unnecessary) padding!

JEWELRY

I like most of the jewelry I’ve acquired abroad and am grateful to receive it as gifts, too. All of my pieces have some kind of story — and some attitude, too.

From Turkey: Evil-eye nazar boncuğu pieces in glass and porcelain; silk-stuffed caftan pendants from the Istanbul designer Shibu; Ottoman-style enameled pieces; and an opalized Hand of Fatima on an impossibly fine gold chain. This last piece is what all the stylish women in Istanbul are wearing at the moment.

From China: White pearls from Beijing, pink from Shanghai and purple from Shenyang.

From Malaysia: I got an tiny tin ingot in the shape of a turtle in Malacca, which I was told once served as currency in the Chinese community. I had it mounted in a gold setting and wear it from a thick satin choker.

From Holland: A recent acquisition from Amsterdam are gold and silver leather Lapland bracelets with hand-twinned pewter and silver thread and reindeer horn closures. They’re exquisite and rugged at the same time.

WEARING RIGHT NOW

Today’s a rainy day of errands so I’m wearing a fluffy, black cowl-necked sweater with exaggerated sleeves, brown heathered slacks, and black ankle boots. They’re all from New York, which is where I’ve done the most shopping in recent years.

My earrings are diamond and platinum pendants from Chicago in the 1940s, a gift from my grandmother.

I’ve also got on my platinum wedding and engagement rings. They’re from Mimi So in New York.

DAILY FASHION FIXES

I liked FashionTV in Turkey, which was owned by Demet Sabanci Cetindogan, the businesswoman who sponsored my Expat Harem book tour across America in 2006.

The segment of Turkish society interested in fashion is very fashion forward. I enjoyed being able to watch the runway shows and catch interviews with the designers.

If I could draw and sew I’d make all my own clothes but I am weak in these areas. In another life, when I get a thicker skin for the fashion world’s unpleasantries, I’ll devote myself to learning these things and have a career in fashion design.

STREET STYLE

In Istanbul, Nişantaşi is somewhere you’d see some real fashion victims limping along in their heels on the cobblestones and Istiklal Caddesi, the pedestrian boulevard in Beyoğlu, would be a place to see a million different looks from grungy college kids to young men on the prowl, with their too-long, pointy-toed shoes.

TOP BEAUTY/STYLE LESSONS FROM TRAVELS

In fact, I’m still assimilating everything — and everywhere — I’ve experienced in terms of fashion and beauty, but here are a few thoughts:

1) Layering: I learned from Turkish women to layer your jewelry and wear a ton of things at the same time. Coco Chanel would have a heart attack! But the idea is not to wear earrings, necklace, bracelet and rings all at once, but lots of necklaces or lots of bracelets or lots of rings at the same time.

2) Jewelry as beach accessory: During the summer Turkish wear lots of ropy beaded things on their wrists during a day at the beach — nothing too valuable (it’s the beach!) but attractive nonetheless. Jewelry stands feeding this seasonal obsession crop up at all the fashionable beach spots. Dangly charms and evil eyes and little golden figures on leather and paper ropes.

3) A little bling never hurts: I’ve also been influenced by the flashiness of Turkish culture, and actually own a BCBG track suit with sequined logos on it. This is the kind of thing my Turkish family and I would all wear on a plane or road trip. Comfortable and sporty, but not entirely unaware of being in public (and not at the gym). Coming from dressed-down Northern California, it was difficult to get used to being surrounded by glitzy branded tennis shoes and people wearing watches as jewelry, but I hope I’ve been able to take some of the better innovations away with me. I know I’m more likely to wear a glittery eye shadow now that I’ve lived in the Near East.

4) The need for sun protection: It was a shock to go from bronzed Los Angeles to can’t-get-any-paler Asia and then to the bronzed Mediterranean. In Asia I arrived with sun damage and then had lots of people helping me to fix it — I even used a parasol there. Then in Turkey everyone thought I was inexplicably pale and I let my sun protection regimen slip a bit. I’m back on the daily sunblock.

5) What colors to wear: I also used to get whiplash from trips back and forth between California and Southeast Asia in terms of color in clothing. In Malaysia the colors were vivid jewel tones — for the Malays and the Tamils especially. The louder the print, the better. Around the same time I was living in that part of the world, I witnessed a scuffle between shoppers at C.P. Shades in my hometown Berkeley, fighting over velvet granny skirts in moss, and mildew and wet cement colors. That kind of disconnect wreaks havoc on your wardrobe, and your sense of what looks good. Right now I’m trying to incorporate bright colors into my neutral urges. I’m still working it out.

Anastasia Ashman is founder of GlobalNiche.net, a work-life initiative for cultural creatives and mobile progressives that she calls “creative self enterprise for the global soul.” (Global Niche recently held a Webinar “Dressing the Inner You,” featuring psychologist and author Jennifer Baumgartner talking about the cultural displacement that shows up in one’s dressing style.) A Californian with 14 years of expatriatism under her belt, Ashman was the director of the online neoculture discussion community expat+HAREM and coeditor of the critically- and popularly-acclaimed expat lit collection that inspired this community, Tales from the Expat Harem: Foreign Women in Modern Turkey. Catch her tweeting on Pacific Standard Time at @AnastasiaAshman.

STAY TUNED for tomorrow’s post, a contrarian perspective by Anthony Windram on this month’s fashion and beauty conversation.

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Images: (clockwise beginning with top left): Anastasia Ashman holding her own with the ever-glamorous Princess Michael of Kent, in Turkey; with her sister Monika, rocking the traditional Turkish Telkari silver jewelry, Anatolian shawl and requisite deep Bodrum tan; displaying her hamam collection — including traditional silver hamam bowl and hand-loomed linen pestemal towels; and sporting ringleted hair (along with some fashion flair!) at the Istanbul launch of Tales from the Expat Harem.

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Fashion Speak: The Idiot’s Guide to Fashionese

2 Comments Posted by on March 16, 2012

Although “Couture” and “Haute Couture” get bandied around to mean any new clothing items that don’t come from Walmart, technically these terms have a very exact definition:

To earn the right to call itself a couture house and to use the term haute couture in its advertising and any other way, members of the Chambre syndicale de la haute couture must follow these rules:

▪ Design made-to-order for private clients, with one or more fittings.
▪ Have a workshop (atelier) in Paris that employs at least fifteen people full-time.
▪ Must have 20 full time technical people in at least one atelier or workshop.
▪ Each season (i.e., twice a year), present a collection to the Paris press, comprising at least thirty-five runs/exits with outfits for both daytime wear and evening wear.

(Wikipedia)

In an industry that sets such a definition for what is essentially “Manufacturer of overpriced frocks for people with more money than sense” it is not surprising that this is only the tip of the iceberg — especially recently.
Fashion jargon, it seems, is out of control.

Couture or calculus?

In a statement last year, Ed Watson, a spokesman for UK department store Debenhams said:

“It’s now easier to understand complex calculus than some of the words commonly used by commentators within the fashion industry to describe garments.”

While I personally disagree with him, on the grounds that I would find the Dead Sea Scrolls easier to understand than complex calculus, he has a point.

Debenhams, apparently, had to introduce a lexicon of fashion terms so its personal stylists could translate modern Fashionese into plain English for their customers.

Sadly, I couldn’t find a copy of it online to assist TDN readers, so I’m having a go at recreating it myself.

Fashionese and How To Speak It

Parts of Speech:

When translating Fashionese, one needs to be aware that it has an extra part of speech — the Absensicoun.

That’s a contraction of three words: Absolutely, Nonsensical, and Noun.

Contracting words is how much of Fashionese is derived.

For example, the Skort (Skirt+Shorts) and Jeggings (Jeans + Leggings). While we all might be familiar with these two, some more obscure Absensicouns are:

• Jorts = Denim hot-pants (Jeans+Shorts)

• Mube = a long, tight dress (Maxi + Tube)

• Spants = Harem pants (Skirt+pants)

• Swacket = something that is not quite Sweater, not quite Jacket

• Coatigan = a cardigan that resembles a coat (presumably for people who don’t want to admit they’re wearing cardigans)

• Glittens = Gloves that roll up into mittens

• Shress = a dress that’s like a T-shirt. (They couldn’t call it a Tress because that’s already a word. “Dirt” wouldn’t work, either. See how complicated this is?)

And my favorite:

• Whorts, which are winter shorts worn with woolly tights.

Words purloined (“Worpurls”) by Fashionese

Just as the English language shamelessly pinches foreign words and gives them different meanings from the original, so do words purloined by Fashionese (“Worpurls”) take on a new dimension.
Directional —
English (adj): having a particular direction of motion, progression, or orientation.
Fashionese (adj): something that looks completely weird now but is so trendsetting that in a few months’ time everyone will be wearing it. It will look weird again in another few months, when people look through last year’s photos and say, “My God, can you believe we actually used to wear that?”

Faux pas —
French (n): Literally “wrong step”.
English usage (n): A social blunder or indiscretion.
Fashionese (n): Dressing in a way to cause minor embarrassment to oneself. Examples include shrimp cocktail toes (wearing open-toed sandals that are too small so the toes extend past the end of the shoe, like a shrimp cocktail dish), inadvertently leaving your flies undone, and all of the 1970s. (See Directional, Past Tense.)

Thrifting —
English: No direct translation, since Thrift is a noun, not a verb.
Fashionese: Hunting for vintage clothes (must be over a certain age to be considered vintage and not just last season’s cast-offs) which have taken on an aura of mystique due to the fact they were produced at the same time as, say, the Ford Edsel.

Arm party –
This should have been an Absensicoun, but it’s difficult to contract satisfactorily. (“Arty”? “Arparty”? “Parmarty”?)
English: Umm…Beats me. A variation on “Twister”?
Fashionese: An armful of bracelets, where less is less.

Covert couture
English (n): Not sure. Anything to do with James Bond’s suit?
Fashionese (n): Clothes that cost a fortune but don’t look as if they did. (See Joel, Billy; Still Rock & Roll To Me: “You can’t dress trashy till you spend a lot of money.”)

Play them at their own game.

Back to Mr Ed Watson, the Debenhams spokesman, who had this to add:

Ideally we would like to drop all these amalgamations, but our hands are tied due to the terms being used on search engines.

Indeed. So the only solution is “If you can’t beat them — join them.”
Which words would you like to see adopted by Fashionese?

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Related posts:

5 tips on how to look good when you backpack

Cleopatra for a day: Helena Halme

Dear Mary-Sue: Fashion tips for the hapless traveler

Displaced Q: What fashion souvenirs find their way into your rucksack?

Img: By mandiberg [CC-BY-SA-2.0 (www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

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5 tips on how to look good when you backpack

7 Comments Posted by on March 13, 2012

I don’t know about you, but I look terrible when I travel.

Not intentionally of course; jet lag notwithstanding, it’s impossible to look crisp and put together after an extended journey by public transport, no matter where in the world you are.

My problem has more to do with my style of travel — or lack thereof… There are two real options when you’re a backpacker: clothes that look good, or clothes that are comfy. Now, bearing in mind you’ll be spending quite a lot of time in them — alternating between the same two pairs of trousers every day until they drop off you and disintegrate — it’s not much of a choice.

Is that because I’m a guy? Maybe — see the note about my wife at the end of this post.

But I don’t care whether you’re male or female, there’s something about being a backpacker that makes keeping up one’s appearance a constant challenge. However fastidious you are about your personal appearance (and most backpackers I know are!), however much you shower before an 18-hour bus journey, you’re still going to look (and smell!) pretty bad afterwards.

So, bearing in mind the following advice from Mr Will Kommen:

If you look like your passport photo, you’re too ill to travel.

…here are five of my tips on how to look good as you bounce around the globe:

1) Haunt charity shops.

Many countries have these in some form or other, and the richer the country the more expensive and interesting gear you can pick up for next to nothing. They’re perfect for replacing an item of clothing that is giving up the will to live in your backpack; or something you’ve become so sick of wearing you daydream constantly about burning it. This shops are incredibly cheap, so you can go crazy — and then just give the stuff back when it’s time to move on.

I don’t travel with any technical clothing, so when my wife and I decided to do a two-month, 1,000 km hike, we had to equip ourselves from scratch — on next-to-no budget. Guess how we did it? Yup, “op shops” they call them in Australia — we visited every one. In a couple of weeks we had all the gear we needed for the hike — plus all the money had gone to charity! And when we were done, we gave most of it back as donations (except the t-shirts, which were too stained to be of use to anyone).

2) Adopt local dress.

Fisherman’s trousers in Thailand, those crazy-colored woolly trousers in South America — pseudo local fashions are cheap to buy, fun to wear and, if they don’t become a souvenir, easy to dispose of before onward travel. I say “pseudo local” because real locals wear the uniform of the world: jeans and a fake Nike T-shirt. Or a Manchester United strip (shirt and shorts).

3) Take any opportunity to wash.

It’s amazing how good it feels to be clean. Most people take it for granted, but then most people have never spent three consecutive nights on the same train, going backwards and forwards to avoid paying for a hotel room. Anyway, the point is there are opportunities everywhere: most major train stations have showers open to the public cheaply, almost all airports do too — and some places you wouldn’t expect, like shopping centres. Shopping centres are free to enter, with regularly cleaned public loos. A lot of them also have “mother-and-baby” rooms, with a table or fold-down shelf, a sink — in short, an open invitation for a full body wash and a change of clothes. Just be wary in Japan — a lot of the public toilets there are “smart.” They unlock and open if you’re in there for too long, which can be pretty embarrassing if you’re soaping yourself down when the door opens opposite Starbucks…

4) Take any opportunity to “dress up.”

Looking posh is a moral boost, and should be possible for most of us bedraggled travelers just by shaving and wearing all-clean clothes! I also travel with a shirt — just one — which transforms a pair of jeans into an outfit smart enough for a nice restaurant or swanky bar (well, as long as they don’t look at my feet, on which I have either flip-flops or hiking boots…).

5) Wear jeans!

The rest of the world will be. Seriously — for every sweat-wicking-fast-drying-wind-proof-mesh-venting-ThermaCELL-layering-system you own, there’s another person behind you who has none of it. And you know what? They look a lot better than you! This is why so much “technical” clothing ends up in charity shops (see above) just waiting for you to pick it up — people with lots of cash buy it, don’t use it for anything more strenuous than shopping, then realize that it looks pretty crummy when compared to clothes that were, you know, designed to look good whilst shopping. So they ditch it. You should too — or at the very least, stop paying outrageous prices for the stuff. Unless you’re headed to Everest Base Camp — in which case, buy it all from those people who’ve just realized that no matter how expensive it was, it doesn’t look right in Sainsbury’s.

* * *

Obviously, this is a bit of a male perspective on things. My wife swears by traveling with a small (for an elephant) bag of “essential” make-up. It’s the main reason she’s recently swapped her rucksack for a suitcase…but she assures me it helps her feel good about herself when otherwise she’d look as bad as I do. So I indulge her.

What do you do to look good while you travel?

Tell us in the comments section!

STAY TUNED for tomorrow’s post, a review of a new book on Asian beauty.

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Images: (clockwise beginning top left): Charity shop in West Street (© Copyright Basher Eyre and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence)  baby changing room sign and South American wool pants for sale, by Tony James Slater; backpackers (Morgue photos).

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