Skip to main content

Travels in Siberia 4 -- cont

Amazing glass beach in Vladivostok--Eastern side of Siberia.  "Drinking" beach, bottles thrown down, waves work their magic, gorgeous . . . flight out never takes off . . . no refund, no reschedule . . . driving across Lake Baikal . . . "driving up from the lake into the regular streets of a city was an abrupt, peculiar experience." Page 380-81  Strange story of two flamingos falling from the sky into Siberia . . . rescued by boys and then given to strange Winter Garden . . . Yakutsk, at the latitude of Nome (p. 3500) has over 200,000 residents.  Wendell Wilkie visited (!) and said it reminded him of Elwood, Indiana . . . Today Yakutsk has The Gap, 31 Flavors, and many more American chains while Elwood, Indiana (a dying, manufacturing town) has NONE.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Happy Valley Season 4

 Weakest.  Tommy is in prison.  His son, Ryan, is now 17.  Catherine the cop's sister, Clare, takes Ryan to visit Tommy in prison, without telling Catherine.  Not good.  Sisters have a break when Catherine finds out.   Plot two:  PE teacher, abusive to wife.  She is getting drugs from local Indian/Pakistani pharmacist. Husband finds out and has wife arrested!  Pharmacist worried . . . plots to kill husband.  Wife agrees, then changes her mind.  Pharmacist in a rage kills her. (All a bit of a stretch, as he is a mild mannered family man.) Tommy escapes from his court hearing, hides out, gets in touch with Ryan.  Plan is to go to Marabella, Spain together.  Tommy's "helpers" get worried about Tommy and decide to do him in.  Instead, he kills them . . . and is knifed himself.  He returns to Catherine's house, looks through a photo album showing Catherine took good care of Ryan, and decides not to kill her....
Post a Comment
Read more

Creation Lake

 <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/207300960-creation-lake" style="float: left; padding-right: 20px"><img border="0" alt="Creation Lake" src="https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1707672124l/207300960._SX98_.jpg" /></a><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/207300960-creation-lake">Creation Lake</a> by <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/164139.Rachel_Kushner">Rachel Kushner</a><br/> My rating: <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/6948455482">4 of 5 stars</a><br /><br /> Definitely worth reading, though some editing (especially of Bruno's thoughts on the world) would have helped. "Sadie Smith" is embedded by a shadowy group into a radical commune. She is to spy on them. Kushner's characters are great; her insights terrific; her use of language awe-i...
Post a Comment
Read more

Tess of the D'Urbervilles, continued 2/3rds

"To all humankind, Tess was only a passing thought. Even to friends, she was only a frequently passing thought." Angel Clare is a good character. He's "enlightened," in so many ways, but when Tess's confesses her "crime," he reverts to ancestral form . . . Tess's "confession" comes earlier than I expected, right after Angel reveals that he has had a bad moment with a woman. Tess points out the similarity in their transgressions, though his is the only true transgression, expecting forgiveness. She doesn't get it. She returns to her mother . . . realizes she can't stay with her. Thoughts to suicide. Unhappiness that divorce is not possible. Departs. Tragic in that the two, if Angel could just see clearly, would indeed be a great couple, each adding to the other.  Nature as a definite force involved in the tragedy.  It's not neutral--when things go bad, the very skies mock Tess. Tess as unaware of the power of her bea...
Post a Comment
Read more