Today Travalon and I joined Jilly Moose at the International Festival at the Overture Center, puzzled that this year they were having it in midsummer. Usually it's in late winter. I tried to call Cali, but her number was disconnected, and Tiffy wasn't interested in coming to town for it. Travalon wasn't that interested either; he said if a Spanish guitar session had the brother-in-law of the Daughter of Denni, then he would have gone to it. Jilly Moose and I stopped at a booth outside of the Overture Center selling various things, and she bought a Lady of Guadalupe necklace while I bought an Infant of Prague necklace and a smiling crocheted sunflower. Then we went into the festival and watched some Scottish Highland dancers, before meeting up with Travalon to check out the different vendors and have some pelmeni (me), goulash (Travalon), and chicken curry (Jilly Moose) for lunch. Jilly Moose and I had our names written in Chinese characters. Here's mine:
Here's Jilly Moose's:
She bought a crocheted flower from the Ukrainian stand:
Travalon left to go to Paul's Bookstore, Sunshine Daydream, the Union Terrace, and the Veterans' Museum, while Jilly Moose and I listened to Yid Vicious, watched Lithuanian dancers, ran into the Daughter of Denni and her family, including her brother-in-law who had played with the Spanish guitar group, listened to a Colombian band, and watched Bolivian dancers. My "lunch" of four little dumplings hadn't been enough, so I went to the West African food stand and asked for jollof, but they were out of both lamb jollof and chicken jollof, so they gave me vegetarian jollof with chicken from the chicken yassa. Later I also had a cannoli from the Italian Workers' Club. We went downstairs and listened to a duo called Last Gaspe who play French Canadian and Irish fiddle tunes, then Travalon returned and we listened to a Cuban guy singing and playing guitar. He actually did most of my favorite Cuban songs: "El Carretero," "Chan Chan," "Candela," and my absolute favorite, "El Cuarto de Tula." People were even singing along to that one, possibly including the author of this blog. Travalon made a video of that one, and I can hear people singing, and I think it's not just me... Someone shouted out a request for "Guantanamera." which I believe is Travalon's favorite Cuban song, but the guy didn't hear, or he didn't know the song, because he never played it.
Afterwards Jilly Moose, Travalon, and I took a walk on Governor's Island. There was someone in Three Foot Bay BLASTING music, and it wasn't even good music, but like weird club remixes of "Enter Sandman" and "The Safety Dance" and random things like that. As we walked along, we saw the boat police, and after that the volume of the music was at a reasonable level. Here is a photo Jilly Moose took of the Capitol Building from Governor's Island.
After that, Travalon and I went to the grocery store. Know who else went shopping together today at Costco? Rich and Kathbert. If they are not an old married couple, they are doing a good imitation of it. Rich told me that they did that on Night Prayer, because he knows I always joke that only married people go to Costco together on a Saturday, and I told him that Travalon said we are just like them, shopping together on a Saturday. Surprisingly, it wasn't crazy busy by the time we got there, but by then it was no longer afternoon but early evening.
Sorry that I forgot to take photos of the stuff I got today, including earrings, a fan, and thank you cards that say "Miigwech," which is the only word I really know in Ojibwe. When Travalon and I drove through the Bad River Res on the way to Tiffy's mom's funeral, we stopped at a gas station to use the bathroom, and we also bought some amazingly good pretzels (probably thanks to the artificial butter flavor listed in the ingredients). I said "Miigwech" to the guy and he had a huge grin, but I don't know if he was pleased that a white woman knew how to say Thank You in his language, or if he was trying not to laugh because I pronounced it so badly. (Did I? I have no idea.) Either way, I made him happy.
Famous Hat
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