The Displaced Nation

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Tag Archives: Europe

For author Lana Penrose, expat “curveballs” come in threes

Leave a comment Posted by The Displaced Nation Team on April 23, 2013

Today we welcome back best-selling Australian author Lana Penrose, who last visited us in December to commiserate with those who were spending the holidays separated from their dearest and no longer nearest. Today’s occasion? The publication of Lana’s third memoir on her life abroad in Europe. Wait, did I just write “third”? Yes, this indefatigable Aussie managed to get a trilogy out of her expat experience, and is here today to explain.

—ML Awanohara

I’ve been asked to explain what motivated me to write my latest mini-memoir Addicted to Love, and it’s a very good question—one that I pose to myself often, particularly while in the throes of insomnia.

For the uninitiated, I’m the author of To Hellas and Back, which chronicles my true-life tale of following the love of my life to the ends of the Earth (Greece) only to wind up losing my mind.

I then Nutbushed over to the UK to work for a world-renowned pop star and in the process wrote Kickstart My Heart, which details my attempt to negotiate my newly single life à la Bridget Jones—only with an axe through her head. As the book’s subtitle says: “A carnival of dating disasters”.

Now these two books are rife with comedy, tragedy and my own human failings, so why scoop out what’s left of my heart and smear it across my shirtsleeve?

Like I said … a very good question.

More to the story…

The truth is that my story absolutely did not end with me leaving London to re-sample Greece after again being lured by love’s enchantment. In fact what happened next is something that I’ve kept close to my chest because it was downright shocking. I spent considerable time deliberating over whether I should share it at all.

But as many of you displaced writers know, the problem with being an author (one of the many!) is that you can’t seem to stop writing. And life has been more than accommodating in throwing me the odd curveball, the sort of material I feel compelled to purge away with my pen.

And so Addicted to Love was born: a mini-memoir that proves once and for all that truth really is stranger than fiction.

It’s set on the beautiful Greek island of Kythera, where I faced an impossible situation that I can’t go into here without issuing a spoiler alert … but rest assured that it’s gripping and you’ll digest it quite quickly, because it’s been described as “a page turner.”

Finally, an answer (of sorts)

But back to the original question: What motivated me to write this book? Well, thankfully (and unfortunately), experience has shown that there are many people who go through similar triumphs and tragedies to mine, particularly while traversing the globe. I like to connect with such people, and book writing is my way of holding out a hand and saying: “What—you, too?”and “You’re not alone.”

To Hellas and Back, Kickstart My Heart and Addicted to Love form a trilogy of the victories and pitfalls I experienced as an everyday person hurdling life abroad.

Each book can be read as a stand-alone, but I (predictably) suggest that you start at the very beginning to understand the depths of where I wound up.

* * *

Hey, Lana—you wound up here, at the Displaced Nation! That’s not the depths, surely? Readers, any questions for Lana or words of support? If you’re not familiar with Lana’s works, you can find the entire trilogy on Amazon or Smashwords. And don’t forget to follow her advice and begin at the beginning: by going to hellas and back!

Sydney-based (and no longer displaced) author Lana Penrose has had various incarnations, including music journalist, record company promotions gal, music television producer and personal assistant to an iconic pop sensation whose name shall never be revealed unless she’s subjected to Chinese water torture. She also once worked with the now-infamous Simon Cowell, which she today finds really odd. You can read more about her and her works on her author blog and/or follow her on Twitter: @LanaPenrose

STAY TUNED for tomorrow’s post, when we’ll be revisiting one of the earliest themes on this blog, Alice in Wonderland, but from the perspective of an international creative.

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

Features, Memoirists Australia, Crosscultural marriage, Europe, Greece, London, Love love love, Memoir | Travel | Food Writers, UK, Writers we love

Eight months into my expat life, two roads diverged and I — I took the one home

11 Comments Posted by The Displaced Nation Team on March 27, 2013

Today we welcome back Kat Selvocki to the Displaced Nation. She wrote for us once before: a travel yarn about spending Christmas in Europe with friends. She had just been toiling in the farmlands of Iceland as a volunteer, and was about to head Down Under to begin a new life as a yoga instructor in Sydney. Now, just over a year later, she is back in the United States. What happened? Here is Kat’s repatriation story.

— ML Awanohara

As my year-long working holiday visa for Australia began to wane, I started considering my options.

Or rather, my option.

I teach yoga: a career that doesn’t generally allow for work sponsorship. I also had a rocky relationship with my Australian boyfriend.

The only I way I could feasibly stay in Sydney was to enroll in a course.

I’d heard tales from other expats of reasonably-priced options — reasonably-priced meaning anything under $8,000 a year — but knew in my heart it wasn’t going to work. I no longer had that kind of cash in the bank, and even if I had, you wouldn’t catch me spending it on some ridiculous “business basics” class.

It wasn’t that I necessarily wanted to stay; I just wasn’t sure I wanted to uproot my life after spending just eight months building a new life in Australia. There were places I still wanted to visit in that vast country, things I still wanted to do. And I loved the classes I was teaching.

But then I got glandular fever — commonly known in the US as mono, or the kissing disease. A month into fighting overwhelming exhaustion, all I wanted was for things to be easy again. In the end, it was having a such a debilitating illness that drove me over the edge.

I bought a plane ticket home.

The three emotions of repatriation

First came relief:

No more comments about how my tattoos, taste in music, or style were “too American.”
No more complicated calculations to figure out when friends or family would be available to Skype.
No more job rejections on the basis of not being a citizen.
And most importantly: central heating in abundance — finally, I’d stop getting sick so often!

Self-doubt followed. I’d spent years wanting to live as an expat, and when I finally had the opportunity, I’d been utterly miserable.

Had I failed, or not tried hard enough?

Should I have fought to stay longer, or at least until the end of my visa?

Were my reasons for leaving the right ones?

Why hadn’t I applied for that job working at a roadhouse waitress in the Outback, so that I’d at least seen more of the country?

Next up: fear. As I headed off to Oxford, UK, at the end of last year, to spend Christmas with friends before returning to the States to seek work, the wheel had come full circle. As reported on this blog in December 2011, I’d spent my first Christmas away from family, in Europe, on my way to a new life in Australia.

Whereas before I’d been full of excitement and anticipation, this time I was full of worry. I worried about how welcoming people would be when I returned. So many of my relationships had disintegrated while I was away, and I wasn’t sure if that was because of distance or because people were fed up with my use of Aussie slang in our conversations … or was it all my whining about being so bloody tired? (Hm, there’s that slang again!)

I had no idea whether finding work would actually be any easier, especially considering the much higher unemployment rate in the US.

I didn’t know how to talk about my time in Sydney without sounding bitter or depressed — but was also afraid that even if I sounded upbeat, people wouldn’t care to hear about it.

Old habits die hard…

I’d always believed that if something doesn’t work, you can simply head back to the place you were before.

Suddenly, I wasn’t so sure about that.

I had decided to move back to Seattle, a city where I’d lived eight years earlier. But would that be a terrible mistake? I pictured trying — and failing — to recreate the life I’d loved before.

Last time I wrote for the Displaced Nation, I reminisced about the four months I’d spent living in Prague on a study abroad. What I didn’t report was the depression and reverse culture shock I battle against upon returning to the United States.

If that were true after a mere four months, what impact would a year-and-a-half away have? Would I be feeling even more out of place? I dreaded the long readjustment.

I also worried about money, and whether I had enough to get settled again quickly.

…or do they?

As it turned out, I needn’t have worried. (Except for the money concerns. Then again, I’m convinced that no matter how much I’d saved before returning, I still would have worried.)

From the moment I stepped off the plane, it was as if someone had flipped a switch inside of me. Even though things had changed — something that was particularly evident in New York City, which I passed through on the way to the West Coast (I’d lived there after Seattle) — it all felt normal. Easy. Almost as if I’d never left. My internal map and compass worked again; I knew where I was and where I was going.

And I still believe that — even though, two months after returning to the States, I continue to look the wrong way when crossing the street.

* * *

Thanks, Kat, for sharing your story. I found it very moving. Readers, any comments, questions for Kat — any similar stories to share?

Kat Selvocki — badass yoga instructor, photographer, writer and traveler — is currently kicking ass and taking names in Seattle after returning from her expat adventures. Learn more about her on her Web site: KatSelvocki.com. You can also follow her on Twitter: @katselvocki.

STAY TUNED for the final post in our fashion and style series, by the ever-so-stylish Kate Allison! (Well, she certainly has flair!)

images: (clockwise, starting top left) Chelsea Market, NYC; Capitol Hill, Seattle; Circular Quay, Sydney; Chelsea Market, NYC; The Rocks, Sydney; in the air when flying from Sydney to Melbourne; Pioneer Square, Seattle. Center shot of Kat Selvocki was taken in Seattle. All photos are Kat’s with the exception of the Circular Quay in Sydney, which came from Morguefiles.

Golden Oldies, Pot Luck Australia, England, Europe, Gothic tales, NYC, Pot Luck, Repatriation, Seattle, Sydney, USA, What a Displaced World

Catching up with this year’s Random Nomads over the holidays (3/3)

Leave a comment Posted by ML Awanohara on December 25, 2012

It’s Christmas Day and the holiday party continues for the expats and other global voyagers who washed up on the Displaced Nation’s shores in 2012. Remember all those Random Nomads who proposed to make us exotic meals based on their far-ranging meanderings? Not to mention their suitcases full of treasures they’d collected and their vocabularies full of strange words… How are they doing these days, and do they have any exciting plans for the holidays? Third in a three-part series (see also Part One and Part Two).

During the final third of 2012, we met some expats and intrepid world travelers who, I think it’s fair to say, have developed some rather unusual hobbies and eating habits. The two are one and the same in the case of Brian MacDuckston, who was featured on our site this past August. He has made a habit of eating ramen in as many Tokyo venues as possible — a hobby that was quirky enough to attract the attention of the New York Times. In addition to Brian — a San Franciscan who originally went to Japan to teach English — we encountered:

Liv Gaunt, an Englishwoman who became an expat accidentally, while pursuing her love of scuba diving and underwater photography. Now based in Australia, she told us she has a passion for sharks but would happily do without sea urchins.
Mark Wiens, an American third culture kid who now lives in Thailand and travels all over — he feels least displaced when sampling other countries’ street foods.
Jessica Festa, an American traveler who loves to venture off the beaten track and eat locally — she did not hesitate to eat cuy in Ecuador (even though it reminded her of her pet guinea pig, Joey, named after a school crush).
Larissa Reinhart, a small-town Midwesterner who lived in Japan for several years and, since repatriating, has taken up the pen as a crime novelist. She is now living in small-town Georgia but hopes to go abroad again. She provides recipes for Asian fried chicken, among other delicacies, on her blog about life as an ex-expat.
Patricia Winton, an American who responded to 9/11 by giving up her comfortable life in Washington to become an expat crime writer in Rome. She also invested in a pasta-making machine…
Bart Schaneman, a Nebraskan who wanted to see the world and has made his home in Seoul, where he is an editor for an English-language newspaper and author of a travelogue on the Trans-Siberian railway. He is a huge fan of kimchi.

Three of this esteemed group are with us today. What have they been up to since a few months ago, and are they cooking up anything special for the holidays, besides chatting with us?

1) BRIAN MACDUCKSTON

Have there been any big changes in your life since we last spoke?
I’ve been offered a few gigs on Japanese TV shows as a “ramen reporter” and successfully pitched my first magazine article about a best-of-ramen list. A start! I also started a ramen class aimed at non-Japanese speakers. Check it out!

How will you be spending the holidays this year?
A nice staycation in Tokyo.

What’s the thing you most look forward to eating, dare I ask?
I’m trying to eat more high-class sushi, but I’ll probably just stick to a lot of ramen for the next few weeks.

Can you recommend any books or films you came across in 2012 that speak to the displaced life?
I really enjoyed Jiro Dreams of Sushi, a documentary about the most revered sushi chef in the world. [Editor’s note: The film has been available on Netflix since last August.]

Do you have any New Year’s resolutions for 2013?
I want to train myself to stop using double spaces after periods when I write. Not a big goal, but important for someone who has an interest in being paid for my writing.

A worthy goal, imho! (I’ve had to correct quite a few in my time…) So, any upcoming travel plans?
My father will visit Japan, so I am planning a luxury week-long trip of eating and relaxing in hot springs. Two things I’m good at!

2) LARISSA REINHART

Any big developments in your life since we last spoke?
My second Cherry Tucker Mystery, Still Life in Brunswick Stew, has a release date of May 21, 2013. [Editor’s note: As mentioned in Larissa’s interview, the first in her Cherry Tucker series, Portrait of a Dead Guy, came out this year.]

How will you be spending the holidays this year?
We travel to visit my family in Illinois and St. Louis after Christmas through New Year’s.

What’s the thing you most look forward to eating?
There’s this Italian grocery, Viviano’s, in the Italian district of St. Louis, called The Hill in St. Louis, that I really look forward to visiting. I’ll stock up on cheap wine and Italian staples for the coming year.

Can you recommend any books or films you came across in 2012 that speak to the displaced life?
Yes, two Japanese films:

The fascinating documentary Jiro Dreams of Sushi. I highly recommend — even for non-sushi fans. The film is beautifully shot and reveals what it takes to be a true master at something. Incredible.
The gorgeous The Secret World of Arrietty (aka The Borrower Arrietty), scripted by Hayao Miyazaki. We were excited to see Arrietty because we saw the ads for the movie when we were still living in Japan (and I’m a big fan of Mary Norton’s The Borrowers, on which the film is based, as well as of Miyazaki).

Have you made any New Year’s resolutions for 2013?
To spend less time on social media and more time writing. I love chatting online, but I need to be more disciplined about getting away from the “water cooler” and back to work.

Any upcoming travel plans?
Disney World for spring break! Woot! And we’re hoping to get back overseas soon, but no definite plans yet.

3) PATRICIA WINTON

Any big changes in your life since we last spoke a couple of months ago?
The month after you featured me, I put my long-time WIP in the bottom drawer for a while and started a new one. I’ve written about 30,000 words. This one, also a mystery, is set in Florence. It takes place during the 500th anniversary celebration of the world’s first culinary society.

Meanwhile, my blog partners at Novel Adventurers are working on an anthology of long short stories. We are an adventurous group comprising (besides me):

an Australian who has lived in South America
an American of Swiss-German origin who is married to a man from Iran, where they frequently travel
an American with close family ties in India, where she frequently travels
an American specializing in things Russian, who is married to a Kyrgyz
a former Peace Corps volunteer who writes about the Caribbean
an American who grew up on a sailboat traveling the world and has lived as an adult in many countries.

We’ll be writing about travel and adventure from international perspectives. It will be some time before it sees publication, but I’ll keep you posted. I think it will interest the Displaced Nation!

Where will you be spending the holidays this year?
I’m spending the holidays quietly at home. I plan to visit a friend in the country for New Year’s weekend. The holidays here last almost three weeks, ending on January 6. Nativity scenes are a big deal here, and I plan to visit various churches to view, and photograph, them as I usually do. I’ll write about them on my blog, Italian Intrigues, on January 3rd.

What’s the thing you most look forward to eating?
Christmas Eve in Italy is devoted to eating fish — usually seven fish dishes from antipasto onward. I’m trying out a new recipe for sea bass stuffed with frutta del mare (non-fin fish). I’m using clams, mussels, shrimp, squid and baby octopus, all well laced with garlic. And I always make the holiday custard that comes from my Tennessee childhood.

Can you recommend any books you came across in 2012 that speak to the displaced life?
The Lacuna, by Barbara Kingsolver. While it was published in 2010, I didn’t read it until this year, and I think it’s a masterpiece. It’s about a man with one foot in Mexico and the other in the US — but that’s a vast oversimplification. After the young man’s Mexican mother dies, he works for Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera while Leon Trotsky is staying with them. He later moves to the US to join his American father. He eventually becomes a successful writer caught up in the McCarthy witch hunt. I don’t want to include spoilers here, but it’s fabulous. The boy/man is a foreigner in both countries and speaks both languages with an accent.

Do you have any New Year’s resolutions for 2013?
Not that I want to share.

Last but not least, do you have any upcoming travel plans?
No concrete travel plans at the moment. While composing these answers, I received an email about a tour of Uzbekistan that sounds really alluring. And I will probably go to the US to attend a mystery writers conference.

* * *

Readers, any questions for this rather motley (one former expat and two current ones) but highly creative bunch?

STAY TUNED for tomorrow’s post — expat Anthony Windram’s musings on spending Boxing Day in a country that associates boxing with punching, not (Christmas) punch.

Images: Passport photo from Morguefiles; portrait photos are from the nomads (Larissa Reinhart’s shows her family in front of one of their favorite Japanese manga characters, Shin-chan, a sort of Bart Simpson of Japan — the creator, Yoshito Usui, had recently died).

Golden Oldies, Random Nomads Acquired tastes, Asia, Australia, Domestic expats, Ecuador, Europe, Gothic tales, Italy, Japan, Korea, La Dolce Vita, Pot Luck, Random Nomads, South America, South Korea, Southeast Asia, Thailand, UK, USA, Writers we love

An expat author on why he can’t get enough of Beirut — and your chance to win his thriller named for that city!

2 Comments Posted by The Displaced Nation Team on December 5, 2012

We here at the Displaced Nation simply can’t get enough of the displaced thriller-writer Alexander McNabb. Last month he gave away his first book in his Levant series, Olives — A Violent Romance, to several lucky Displaced Nation readers. (Yes, they were thrilled!) And today we announce a couple of more McNabb giveaways, including of his second book, Beirut (see below). But before we explode with excitement, let’s hear what Alexander has to say about that notoriously dangerous city…

— ML Awanohara

To start off, I’d like to present a passage from my new book, Beirut, that I hope captures the flavor of this historic and extremely dynamic Middle Eastern city. The scene centers on the displaced Gerald Lynch, the British Secret Intelligence Service officer we encountered in Olives:

It was late in the afternoon as Gerald Lynch hopped along the uneven paving that lined Gouraud Street, the heart of Beirut’s bustling Gemayze area. He wore jeans and a leather jacket against the chill spring air, his hands in his pockets as he squeezed between the parked cars.
Gouraud’s bars, as ever, welcomed those who wanted to party and forget the woes of a world where violence and conflict were a distant memory but a constant worry. Orphaned by Belfast’s troubles, Lynch appreciated Beirut’s fragile peace and sectarian divides, the hot embers under the white ash on the surface of a fire that looked, to the casual observer, as if it had gone out. Lynch scowled as he passed a poster carrying Michel Freij’s smiling face, encircled in strong black script: “One Leader. One Lebanon.”

There can be few places on earth so sexy, dark, cosmopolitan and brittle as Beirut. At night the city celebrates with a vigour that borders on the manic. Louche young things puff cigarette smoke up into the air, DJs make music, poets dream and artists stencil the walls with the painful irony of youth. Drinkers drink, dancers dance. They celebrate life there as only people who realize how slender the tightrope they walk is — as only a people who collaborated in a 15-year-long enterprise designed to wipe themselves, and their country, off the face of the earth can.

But first, the country

It’s important to understand that Lebanon is a country of divides: north and south; mountain and coast; Shia, Sunni, Christian and Druze.

The country was born out of Greater Syria and the collapse of the Ottoman Empire following World War II. The French as the reigning colonial power created it by cobbling together communities who had been in conflict since the Crusades and legislating their way through ancient attitudes and rivalries.

Lebanon’s answer? To enshrine the sectarianism in its constitution, with each religious sect being given its own proscribed role.

Beirut, the Monte Carlo of the East

From its early days as Roman Berytus, Beirut — Lebanon’s capital and largest city — has been a city with greatness in her heart. Surrounded by lush Mediterranean countryside, the verdant Chouf mountains and the glorious fecundity of the Bekaa Valley, served by the sea and a history of maritime trade going back to the Phoenicians, Beirut developed in the course of the 20th century into a major financial center and trade entrepôt.

It was “the Monte Carlo of the East,” the jewel of the Mediterranean. Rich Arab playboys tossed cash around them like leaves; mean-eyed British spies clung to the hotel bars, trading waspish observations and gathering undiplomatic innuendoes. And the women! The olive-skinned beauties of the Levant, like Beirut itself, were so welcoming, so corrupting!

The impact of the Lebanese Civil War (1975-1990)

Lebanon tore itself apart in a war as senseless as any other, admirably abetted by the Palestine Liberation Organization, Syria and Russia, America and Israel. It’s always the outsiders who throw kindling on the hot passions of Lebanon’s divisions. And then the Lebanese pay a heavy price for their lack of moderation and willingness to invite those outsiders in.

After the war, Beirut dragged itself wearily to its feet, slowly but surely rebuilding its commercial heart — the efforts to rebuild dogged by constant conflict, corruption and terrible old men who weave together influence and fear to maintain their profitable status quo.

When the war finally ended, in 1990, the travel magazines were starting to gush about Beirut again — its stunning restaurants, funky bars and glorious sights.

But the potential for violence remains. As you may recall, a deadly car bomb attack occurred in October of this year. It tore a busy square in Ashrafiyeh apart, killing the head of Lebanese intelligence.

A bomb as big as the monstrous blast that had taken the life of Rafiq Hariri in 2005, the man who had led the effort to rebuild Beirut — an explosion big enough to make the Syrians finally quit Lebanon.

Both of these car-bomb assassinations left three-meter craters.

The book Beirut

Although Beirut — An Explosive Thriller is set across a swathe of Europe and not just Beirut, the book is about Beirut at its core. It’s about sectarianism and power, corruption and sex. It’s about wealth and poverty, love and betrayal.

While writing it, I spent hours walking around the city, along the curving corniche and up into the busy streets that cling to the foothills rising from the coast up to the snow-capped mountains.

Walking with friends, walking alone — day and night, spring and summer. From the maze of funky little bars of Hamra to the boutiques of Verdun, from the spicy Armenian groceries of Bourj Hammoud to the cafés overlooking the famous rocks at Raouché, I have long reveled in the city’s beautiful wealth and its grim poverty.

How can you not write books set in the Levant? I’m only amazed I’m in such scant company. As a playground for spies and powerful men, beautiful women and deadly conflicts you can’t beat it. And yet, as a writer of novels, I have it pretty much to myself.

* * *

Now it’s time for the freebies! Displaced Nation readers, you can get your very own copy of my latest book. Here are 2 ways to do so:

1) For TDN readers with an iPad or ePub compatible reader (Nook, Sony, Kobo, Android etc): Get your copy of Beirut — An Explosive Thriller free of charge (and save $4.99) on Smashwords. But first, you’ll need to sign up for the DISPLACED DISPATCH to get the code (it will come in the issue delivered this Saturday, December 8). NOTE: The code is valid ONLY FROM THIS SATURDAY, DECEMBER 8th TO MONDAY DECEMBER 10 — and then, pfft, it’ll disappear. Dear readers, you are MORE than welcome to share that code with family, friends, strangers, dogs in the street — even lawyers.

2) For TDN readers with Kindles: Leave a comment on this post with your e-mail, and I will send a Kindle file and instructions how to install it. Best I can do, I’m afraid — Amazon doesn’t let me do freebies! Do remember to use “name dot name at domain dot com” so the spambots don’t find you! Or you can hit me up directly at @AlexanderMcNabb on Twitter.

If you miss out on these opportunities and/or would like to read something else I’ve written, my first novel, Space (a spoof of international spy thrillers), is available for free download on Amazon from today onwards for three days.

TO ALL READERS: If anyone wants to add their voice (whichever way it leans) about my books on Amazon or Goodreads, that’s welcome feedback. The more people know they exist, the merrier! 🙂

Finally, congrats to Apple Gidley, who left an engaging comment on my last post and will be getting a print copy of Olives by post!

STAY TUNED for tomorrow’s post, consisting of some 2012 highlights from the Anthony Windram series, Expat Moments.

Images (of the book, of Beirut): All from Alexander McNabb.

Features, Fiction writers Europe, Expat novelists, Lebanon, Middle East, UK, What a Displaced World, Writers we love

Grim Reapers around the globe: 7 creatures that say “Time’s up!”

1 Comment Posted by Kate Allison on October 23, 2012

Before we had civil lawsuits, and lawyers wanting to find someone to take the fall for all Life’s misfortunes, we had mythological creatures to take the blame and who couldn’t be subpoenaed.

This Halloween, in the interests of banishing our modern litigious society, perhaps we should consider reintroducing some of these ancient ghouls to replace the ambulance-chasing variety.

1) Banshee (Ireland)

A fairy woman — omens of death are nearly always women — who weeps and wails when someone is about to die. Usually appears as an old hag, but can be a beautiful woman of any age. Or a hooded crow or hare. Or a stoat. Or a weasel.

Evidently a creature that hedges its bets.

The ever-practical Scots have a version called the bean sìth, who makes herself useful by washing the blood-stained clothes or armour of the nearly dead.

2) Aswang (Philippines)

A generic term for witch/vampire/shapeshifter, etc, responsible for various human misfortunes, including but not limited to:

Grave robberies
Miscarriages
Kidnappings
Any mildly strange incidents reported in the local tabloids that would benefit from supernatural sensationalism.

Certain areas of the Philippines have a high prevalence of the neurological disorder dystonia; one theory is that this disease, with its characteristic involuntary muscle contractions, gave rise to the belief in the aswang.

3) Rusalka (Slavic mythology)

Another mythological, wily, conniving female; the unquiet spirit of, say, a jilted woman or unmarried mother who has committed suicide, or a drowned, unbaptized baby.

The rusalka lives at the bottom of a river, emerging in the middle of the night to dance and sing and thus lure unsuspecting males back to the river for a watery death.

Nothing to do with the unsuspecting males having one pint too many at the local hostelry and falling in the river on the way home, then.

4) Sihuanaba (Central America)

Seen from the back, she’s an attractive woman with long hair; from the front, it’s a horse. (No jokes about Sex and the City, please.) Another female creature that lures innocent men astray, this time to lose them in deep canyons.

All very Freudian.

5) Bäckahästen, or Brook Horse (Scandinavia)

A white horse, appearing near rivers. Not a good idea to catch a ride on this creature, because once you’re aboard, you can’t get off. The horse will jump in the river and you’ll drown.

But hey. At least this one isn’t a woman.

6) Hellhound (Europe)

Fierce black dog of super strength and speed, who often has the job of guarding entrances to the underworld, such as graveyards. Why this is mystical, I don’t know. There’s nothing mystical about a dog hanging around a place full of buried bones.

Its howl is an omen, or even cause, of death. Stare into its glowing red/yellow eyes three times or more and you will die, for sure. The mythology books don’t specify what you will die of, though.

Rabies, is my guess.

7) La Sayona (Venezuela)

A beautiful woman from the jungle, appearing to guys who are indulging in extra-curricular love activities, or even just idly contemplating having a bit on the side.

Depending on which story you believe, she either takes the errant man into the jungle to eat or mangle him, or she covers his nether regions with an eruption of boils that he has to explain away later to his wife.

“Look, I’d run out of toilet paper, OK? The only thing handy was poison ivy.”

At this point, the errant husband is probably wishing he’d met the kind of sayona that eats and mangles.

STAY TUNED for Wednesday’s Random Nomad, another crime writer!

Image: The Banshee (Wiki Commons)

Just for Laughs Eastern Europe, Europe, Gothic tales, Ireland, Russia, South America, Southeast Asia, What a Displaced World

BOOK REVIEW: “The Englishman” by Helena Halme

5 Comments Posted by Kate Allison on October 8, 2012

Today we are delighted to review Helena Halme’s book, The Englishman. Helena is a regular visitor to The Displaced Nation, where she has been featured both as a Random Nomad, and as Cleopatra For The Day. The Englishman is available from Amazon (UK and US) — and for a limited time this week, is free to download as a Kindle ebook!

TITLE: The Englishman
AUTHOR: Helena Halme
AUTHOR’S CYBER COORDINATES:
Blog: Helena’s London Life
Twitter: @HelenaHalme
PUBLICATION DATE: August 2012
FORMAT: Ebook (Kindle)
GENRE: Fiction
SOURCE: Review copy from author

Author Bio:

Helena Halme grew up in Finland and Sweden, and left Finland for good when she married her English husband. She now lives in London. The Englishman is her first book.

Summary:

At the age of twenty, Kaisa has her life mapped out. After university in Helsinki, she’s going to marry her well-to-do fiancé, Matti, and live happily ever after. But in October 1980, she’s invited to a British Embassy cocktail party, and meets a dashing Naval officer. In the chilly Esplanade Park the Englishman and Kaisa share passionate, secret kisses and promise to meet up again. But they live thousands of miles apart – and Kaisa is engaged to be married.

At the height of the Cold War the Englishman chases Russian submarines whilst Kaisa’s stuck in a country friendly with the Soviet Union. Will their love go the distance?

(Source: Amazon.com book description)

Review:

The Englishman is semi-autobiographical, based on the author’s blog posts on How I came to be in England, which, after an enthusiastic response from readers, she was inspired to turn into a fully fledged novel.

It is a love story: the account of the long-distance romance between English Naval officer Peter and Finnish student Kaisa, as this star-crossed couple discovers that Shakespeare’s words are still true, even in the 1980s, and the course of true love never runs smooth. Together, they contend with a broken engagement, long separations, the Falklands War, inevitable cultural differences, and the small matter of a member of the British armed forces wanting to marry a citizen of a country bordering the Soviet Union.

No matter where you are from, or even if you and your partner are from the same cultural background – if you’ve ever been in a long-distance relationship, The Englishman will strike a chord. Loving from afar in the early 1980s was a different matter than it is now: no Skype, no Facebook, no texting, but instead the sweet agony of waiting for letters in the mail and for the landline telephone to ring. Kaisa and her Englishman remind us of the forgotten pleasures of delayed, rather than immediate, gratification.

TDN verdict:

Especially recommended for romantics who grew up listening to Chrissie Hynde and wearing leg warmers the first time they were in fashion.

“The Englishman” can be purchased from Amazon.co.uk and Amazon.com, and from October 8 – 12 is available to download free of charge.

STAY TUNED for tomorrow’s ghosty posty, a spooky Displaced Q from Tony James Slater!

Image: Book cover — “The Englishman”

RANDOM NOMAD: Jessica Festa, Backpacker, Offbeat Traveler & Locavore

2 Comments Posted by ML Awanohara on September 26, 2012

Place of birth: Long Island, New York, USA
Passport: USA — but I’m planning on starting the papers for my Italian passport soon (my grandparents were born there).
Overseas history: Australia (Sydney): 2008. I’ve also backpacked through western Europe (for partying and food!), South America (for surreal landscapes and hiking trails), and Southeast Asia/China and Ghana (for volunteer projects).
Occupation: Freelance travel writer. I have my own site and also write for Gadling, Viator and Matador, among others.
Cyberspace coordinates: Jessie on a Journey — Taking you beyond the guidebook (travel-zine); @JessonaJourney (Twitter handle); Jessie on a Journey (FB page for backpacking community); and Jessie on a Journey (Pinterest).

What made you leave the United States for the Land of Oz?
I chose Australia for studying abroad because I wanted to be able to communicate in English — it was my first time going abroad alone.

On your site you describe yourself as a “natural backpacker.” How did you find living in one country?
It’s so different living somewhere than just traveling to it. When you have a part-time job, class schedule, gym membership, local hangout, go-to grocery store, etc, you really begin to feel a strong connection to a place. Sydney is such a great city. That said, I did not give up my backpacking habit entirely. I also traveled a lot through Australia when studying!

Tell me about the moment on your travels when you felt the most displaced.
I had many moments like that when I did a homestay for a month in Ghana, in West Africa. I was doing orphanage work, and absolutely loved the experience — but the culture is just completely different. Especially in city areas, it’s very loud and chaotic, and people will shout at you and grab your skin to feel if it’s real. They don’t get many tourists, so they’re just curious and wanting to get to know you — but sometimes it got a little too intense.

When have you felt the most comfortable?
In Sydney. I actually called my family crying the night before my flight back to New York, saying I had a new home and would not be returning. I had this camaraderie with my neighbors and so many connections to the community, I really felt like a local.

You may bring one curiosity you’ve collected from each of the countries where you’ve traveled or lived into The Displaced Nation. What’s in your suitcase?
My collection of paintings, jewelry and handcrafted items:

Ghanaian artwork and wooden masks
Handmade jewelry from Sydney and Bolivia
A handwoven purse from Peru
Alpaca socks from Ecuador
Banksy artwork from the UK
Masapán (bread dough art) from Calderón, Ecuador
A hand-sewn water-bottle holder from Thailand

You are also invited to prepare one meal based on your travels for other members of The Displaced Nation. What’s on the menu? 
Appetizer: Locro, a thick soup with potatoes, avocado, cheese and vegetables from the Andes.
Main: A pesto pasta with some kind of meat mixed in from the Cinque Terre in Italy.
Dessert: Salzburger Nockerl, a sweet soufflé from Austria.
Drink: Malbec wine from Argentina.

I wonder if you could also add a word or expression from one or more of the countries you’ve visited to the Displaced Nation’s argot.
“No worries” from Australia. Such a great phrase for life. I have it tattooed on my foot!

This week you received a “Food Alice” from the Displaced Nation for your post about the first time you tried cuy, or guinea pig, in Ecuador — you said your dinner reminded you of your pet guinea pig, Joey, named after a school crush. So, does food play a big role in your travels?
For me it’s about trying new things. It doesn’t need to be in the fanciest restaurant or prepared by a Michelin chef, just something truly local. For example, in South America while many of the other backpackers went to guidebook-rated restaurants, I always opted for the tiny, simple, dimly-lit local hangouts. I ate 2- and 3-course meals for a $1, and the food was fresh and local. It was exactly what everyday people in the community were having, and that was important to me.

If you were to design a world tour based on food, what would be your top five recommendations?
1) Mendoza, Argentina — try asado (barbecued meat) with a glass of Malbec.
2) Cinque Terre, Italy — try the pesto pasta that I served to you in my meal!
3) Naples, Italy — try the pizza.
4) Cuzco, Peru — try the cuy (guinea pig) or, if you’re too squeamish, the lomo saltado: strips of marinated steak served over white rice and with French fries.
5) Munich, Germany — try the brätwurst. It is like no other sausage I’ve ever tasted, and tastes so much better in Germany!

To be honest, I’m not so sure about going to Cuzco for cuy.
Really? I love it. I’m planning to go back, and possibly move, to Peru or Ecuador in March. I’m already looking forward to getting my fill of cuy again!

Readers — yay or nay for letting Jessica Festa into The Displaced Nation? At least she’s not planning to serve us guinea pig for dinner — that’s a mercy! (Note: It’s fine to vote “nay” as long as you couch your reasoning in terms we all — including Jessie — find amusing!)

STAY TUNED for tomorrow’s post, which will most likely be on food. (No, we haven’t finished gorging ourselves yet!)

img: Jessie Festa enjoying one of the biggest and best empanadas in all of Peru, at the Point Hostels in Máncora (May 2012).

Pot Luck Acquired tastes, Africa, Argentina, Australia, Austria, China, Ecuador, Europe, Expat interviews, Germany, Ghana, global philanthropy, Italy, New York City, Peru, Pot Luck, Random Nomads, South America, Southeast Asia, Sydney, UK, USA

And the Alices go to … these 7 writers for their revealing posts on food and world travel

9 Comments Posted by ML Awanohara on September 24, 2012

© Iamezan | Dreamstime.com
Used under license

Autumn is finally here, and those of us who lost our appetite during the onslaught of this summer’s heat and humidity find that we can breathe — and eat — again!

Accordingly, the Displaced Nation has turned its attention to food — though in a way that conjures up the magical dreamscape of Alice in Wonderland rather than a blog populated by posts on typical and traditional world cuisines.

On the one hand, we’ve heard from the Top Hatter — I refer to Anthony Windram’s avatar — on the pleasures of indulging in beef tongue at a Kyoto restaurant. On the other, we’ve encountered Duchess Kate (Allison) just as she was pronouncing on the Queen’s favorite chocolate and inviting us to join her in a chocolate cocktail.

Last week when Tony James Slater appeared on the site, he was looking for all the world like Lewis Carroll’s Caterpillar, smoking his hookah and talking in short, somewhat rude sentences. His topic was the time he became violently ill (to use more polite language than he did) on mansaf on his visit to Jordan.

And personally I’ve yet to recover from last week’s encounter with the curious and curiouser Mark Wiens, who said he

would be very happy to fly to a destination and not do any of the normal tourist attractions, but just eat.

What’s more, he had the cheek to propose serving durian to The Displaced Nation! Off with his nose!!!

While putting together this menu of “It’s food!” posts, I’ve found it entertaining to read as many foodie posts as possible on other expat, repat, and travel blogs. And today I’d like to acknowledge some of their writers for what they’ve taught me about food and world travel.

A year-and-a-half ago, I had the pleasure of handing out the Displaced Nation’s Alice Awards to 7 writers who clearly understand — and aren’t afraid to reveal — the curious, unreal side of international travel.

Today I will hand out another set of Alices — you might call them the “Foodie Alices” — to writers who share the Displaced Nation’s down-the-rabbit-hole disposition toward world cuisines, i.e., who aren’t afraid to try mushrooms that make you grow, potions that make you shrink, tea parties where they don’t serve tea, and also feel duty bound to report these experiences to the rest of us.

So, without further ado, the Alices go to (in reverse chronological order):

1) AMANDA VAN MULLIGEN

Awarded for: “Do I Not Like Mushy Peas”, in A Letter from the Netherlands (personal blog about life as an Englishwoman in Holland)
Posted on: 19 September 2012
Choice morsel:

[Regular readers will know I am a fan of the Great British fish and chips.] However, there is no way, no how, I will eat fish and chips with mushy peas. They are vile. Foul. By far, mushy peas are … [t]he most disgusting monstrous green mess that has ever passed my lips. They turn my stomach.

Citation: Amanda, we award you this Food Alice or the feat of turning the typical “foods I miss from home” post on its head. That’s what it means to step through the looking glass. You’re a smart cookie and the rest of us would do well follow your example and focus on the “evil” accompaniments to our native cuisines that for health reasons alone, we’re lucky to have escaped from.

2) ANDREW COUCH

Awarded for: “Making Pancakes from a Bottle,” in Grounded Traveler (personal blog covering expat life in Germany), Posted on: 21 September 2012
Choice morsel:

We do not have a griddle. I imagine very few Germans have a griddle, at least not one useful for pancakes. So I get a set of 3 in a pan and the whole bottle [of Mondamin Pfannkuchen Teig-Mix] makes 12 or so, so I was doing several batches. … It works great, but well.. umm.. the Celsius temperatures still seem hard to understand for me. So while I didn’t overcook the cakes, I did almost burn my finger…

Citation: Andrew, you showed derring-do in experimenting with using bottled German pancake mix (and no griddle) to produce one of your favorite breakfast foods from home. Such bravery merits an Alice as does your acknowledged befuddlement over temperatures in Celsius, the vagaries of baking soda performance across the globe, and the extortionate prices of maple syrup. (Hey, we’ve all been there…)

3) KATE BAILWARD

Awarded for: “Sunday Supper,” in Driving Like a Maniac (personal blog about life as an Englishwoman in Sicily), part of her “Eating like a maniac” series.
Posted on: 3 September 2012
Choice morsel:

A Sunday night chuck it together kind of a lazy supper for one, to use up whatever you’ve got left in the fridge. I had a medium aubergine, a small courgette and some ricotta, as well as a jar of passata vellutata. You could say it was a very bastardised version of parmigiana alla melanzana, or you could just take it on its own merits and call it courgette, ricotta and aubergine rolls in tomato sauce. Or something else entirely. Whatever takes your fancy.

Citation: Kate — Katja, if we may — we give you an Alice for your versatility in writing foodie posts. Just after you published this piece, you wrote a post for Travel Belles on the joys of rustling up one’s own caponata, which you described as the “very essence of traditional Sicilian food.” Clearly, your training as an actor has borne fruit (and veggies!) if you can segue from harried EFL teacher chucking together a pseudo-Italian dinner, to full-fledged cookery expert. (What’s wrong with trifle, btw?)

4) JESSICA FESTA

Awarded for: “Eating My First Pet in Ecuador,” in Jessie on a Journey (personal travel blog)
Posted on: 24 August 24 2012
Choice morsel:

The body is sliced down the middle, opened like a thick book, on top of sizzling coals. Tiny hands, still with finger nails, reach into the air as if their last plea for help had gone completely unnoticed. Bright white teeth gleam out of mouths open in a scream and faces twist in agony. Apparently, the miniature murder scene I am witnessing is about to be my dinner.

Despite having been excited to try the popular Ecuadorian meal, something inside me feels a bit uneasy. My mind wanders back to my first pet, a guinea pig I named Joey after a school crush.

Citation: Jessica, we award you this Alice for your refusal to let “mental discomfort” stop you from ordering cuy, a popular South American dish, just because it resembles your Joey. (I for one never let sentiment get in the way of my enjoyment of koi, or goldfish, in Japan.) You’ve more than delivered on your promise to take us “beyond the guidebook.” We’re also very pleased that you found the dish delicious. Another one to add to our “must try” list, alongside Anthony Windram’s beef tongue.
COMING ON WEDNESDAY: A Random Nomad interview with the cuy-eating Jessie!

5) GERALDINE

Awarded for: “7 Badass Bavarian Foods You Must Try,” in The Everywhereist (personal blog about a trailing spouse’s adventures)
Posted on: 8 May 2012
Choice morsel:

Do you want to eat Bavarian food? OF COURSE YOU DO. It is rich and doughy and filling and is the only thing on the planet that can soak up German beer. Every other fare will simply hide in the corner of your stomach, petrified at the sheer awesomeness of the brew that resides in there with it, and it will never get digested.

In short: if you don’t eat Bavarian food while in Germany, you could die.

Citation: Geraldine, you’re full o’ beans, but we love you for that. Most “10 best foods” posts are about Southeast Asia or, more specifically, Thailand, home of cheap, tasty yet healthy food. But you realized that the market was already satiated for such posts and that it was time to give “badass Bavarian” food — of the kind that puts hairs on one’s chest — more of a chance. Not only that but you persuaded us. Pass the schweinshaxe.

6) & 7) MICHAEL HARLING & TONY HARGIS

Awarded for: “Is America too Sweet or Britain too Bland?” in Pond Parleys (joint blog, now defunct)
Posted on: 13 March 2011
Choice morsel:

Mike: I was surprised, on our recent visit, at how sweet America was: the beer, the bread, the pretzels (sugar-coated pretzels—honest to God) and even, oddly enough, the candy. And if it wasn’t infused with sugar, it was too salty and/or covered in cinnamon. After nearly ten years in UK, I found it all a bit too cloying.
Toni: While I do agree that American food has some strange stuff added to it, I wouldn’t call British food particularly bland. Rather than sweet, there is often a surprisingly savoury taste when you least expect it. While Cumberland sausage can have a peppery bite to it, Americans actually build their sweetness into the sausage, with maple syrup mixed right in.

Citation: Mike and Toni, we know you aren’t publishing Pond Parleys any more, but surely this post goes down in the annals and therefore deserves an Alice. I commented on it at the time it was published, wrote a post about it on TDN, and here I am writing about it again. The pair of you had a genius for pinpointing the kinds of things that routinely throw off American expats in Britain and vice versa, without their even knowing it. In the case of this food post, it turns out that we Yanks, just like the Duchess in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, may be allergic to all that pepper in the sausage! And who would have guessed that the sweets-loving Brits would recoil from our foods for their high sugar content?

* * *

So, readers, do you have a favorite from the above, and do you have any other writers/posts to nominate for our next round of Alices? I’d love to hear your suggestions!

STAY TUNED for tomorrow’s post, another Displaced Q focused on food by the anti-foodie Tony James Slater!

Acquired tastes, Alice in Wonderland, Ecuador, Europe, Germany, It's Food!, Italy, Memoir | Travel | Food Writers, Moveable feasts, South America, The Netherlands, UK, USA, Writers we love

BOOK REVIEW: “The Elopement: A Memoir” by Dipika Kohli

3 Comments Posted by Kate Allison on September 12, 2012

TITLE: The Elopement
AUTHOR: Dipika Kohli
AUTHOR’S CYBER COORDINATES:
Website: kismuth.com
Twitter: @DipikaKohli
Kismuth on Facebook
PUBLICATION DATE: July 2012
FORMAT: Ebook (Kindle) available from Amazon
GENRE: Memoir
SOURCE: Review copy from author