Opera/Ballet/Musicals
Visiting Vegas, Part 2
Mar 28th
While in Las Vegas, we enjoyed a couple of great shows and some fine dining. Something one quickly realizes regarding food here: if it’s a venue in one of the major hotel-casinos, it won’t be inexpensive. Sure, there are still those spots near the strip that promise cheap steak-and-egg breakfasts all day and all-you-can-eat buffets. If you have a hankering for even a simple salad or a little snack and don’t want to leave your hotel, however, prepare to pay. Ah, well, I guess they’ve got to pay those water and electric bills somehow (but isn’t that what all those flashing machines are for?!).
We stayed at the Rio, which boasts “all suite” accomodations. I would define our room as not so much a suite as one large room with king bed, couch, small table with Internet connection that would have to serve as a work station (not handy for those convention-goers that do have to work while in Vegas) and TV atop the bar cabinet. Sorry, no coffeemaker, but a stunning view through the floor-to-ceiling window wall. Since the Rio is across I-15 from the Strip, the set-back allows a really great vantage from which to take in sights of the rest of the town and the mountains beyond. The bathroom/dressing area included a small ‘frig, sizable closet with safe, generous vanity area and a separate room with the commode, a second sink and tub/shower. I was delighted with this arrangement because it meant if one of us chose to get up earlier or retire later than the other, lights and noise wouldn’t disturb the sleepyhead. However, the design included a glass-block “window” over the shower which, with the bath light on, spilled a beam of light directly across the bed! So much for that advantage! (We solved the problem with a towel draped across the opening.) I was also a bit surprised at the dearth of bath products. We’ve all grown accustomed to those little bottles lined up on the vanity, along with shower caps, sewing kits, shoeshine cloths and the like. Because we didn’t want to check luggage, I had whittled down my ”liquids” to a bare minimum and was counting on the hotel’s supplies. We got a small bar of hand soap, one small container of shampoo and one of body lotion – and only the soap was replenished (without a request) during our three-night stay.
We had a very nice (though I wouldn’t rate it “outstanding”) meal at the Rio’s Voodoo Steakhouse one evening, and enjoyed the great views from its 50th-floor location looking out towards the strip. We then took in Penn & Teller’s magic show in the hotel’s theater and spent the next two days periodically asking each other, “So, how do you think they did that with the cell phone?” “Where did that guy from the audience go?” They REALLY put on an extremely entertaining 90-minute show which I would highly recommend.
The next night took us to the Mandalay Bay, where we had one of the most outstanding meals of our lives at Charlie Palmer‘s Aureole restaurant. Food, presentation, service were all first-class; and the wine list is incredible. We enjoyed a price-fix four-course tasting menu made up of a number of “parallel” small plates, accompanied by some perfect wine selections suggested by the restaurant’s very knowledgeable and pleasant sommelier. Then it was off to a thoroughly delightful production of The Lion King. It seems everyone I know has seen the show; and they were all correct in their descriptions of the fantastic costumes, masks, puppets and dance. If you’re one of the few people on the planet who hasn’t yet seen the show, I would urge you to take the opportunity to do so.
 There is certainly a restaurant and a show in this town to meet any taste or preference, and the human theater on display along the strip is as entertaining as any paid-for performance. And sometimes you see something that just makes you laugh. We saw billboards everywhere picturing four young, clean-cut guys in neat suits looking a bit like the Four Seasons. No, this wasn’t an ad for Jersey Boys. The billing proclaimed “Australia’s Human Nature — the Ultimate Celebration of the Motown Sound.” It just struck us as rather incongruous: four white guys from Australia were presenting the “ultimate” celebration of Motown? Really!!? Only in Las Vegas!
– Patty Vanikiotis, proofreader
She Loved New York
Mar 14th
My well-traveled daughter, Jenny, was back in Chicago for just five days after her Europe sojourn before she and her good friend Emily took off for their final spring break trip. The two seniors gave themselves a graduation gift (with a generous kick-in from Mom and Dad) of a five-day trip to New York City. It was a first-time trip to the Big Apple for both, and they were extremely excited to experience as much of the city as they could. Her trip triggered memories of my own college graduation trip to New York with my roommate Diane, 30 years ago.
Jenny believes one of the best parts of the trip was their accomodations at the Duane Street Hotel in the TriBeCa neighborhood. She had had her fill of youth hostels and the YMCA after her two months overseas, and she and Emily spent plenty of time researching to find a nice place that could accomodate their budgets. Located conveniently not far from Wall Street and the financial district and in a trendy area with great restaurants and shopping, the Duane Street Hotel sounds like it would meet the needs of both business and leisure travelers. The girls appreciated the fact that they could hop on the subway just two blocks from the hotel and get to the myriad sites on their extensive list of “to-sees.” With only 45 guestrooms, this was a good choice for them, and they found the staff friendly and very helpful with tips and directions. They also appreciated the property-wide free Wi-Fi, warm cookies available 24/7, plush bathrobes in the room and a spacious, well-appointed bathroom.
I got a kick out of Jenny’s Facebook posting on her first morning in New York: “You know you’re in NYC when: they are filming Law & Order right outside your hotel.” Another New York moment (on the other end of the thrill scale) was spotting rats on the subway platform, but it seems everything else was pretty much a thumbs-up. Both girls were moved to tears at the National September 11 Memorial & Museum (just blocks from their hotel) but were glad to have experienced it. They also visited MOMA and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, took the ferry to Liberty and Ellis islands, stopped in at a jazz club on the Upper West Side and saw The Lion King on Broadway. They wandered around Little Italy, compared New York pizza with the Chicago variety they know well and, of course, enjoyed the shopping (“Mom, no sales tax on clothes!!!”). One disappointment: They weren’t picked up by Cash Cab.
Arriving back in Chicago late Friday night, Jenny now looks ahead to her final months of school. She will graduate not only with her formal degree but also some great real-world experiences gained on her travels. Best of all, she’s grown in confidence in herself and her ability to navigate a big new city (even if she mistakenly ends up in Brooklyn at some point!) and has gained a grand appreciation for the world and its peoples.Â
– Patty Vanikiotis, proofreader
Not Your Typical London Sights
Feb 13th
This month’s issue of Global Traveler has a wonderful article on London, with plenty of great suggestions on what to see and where to stay and dine. I shared the piece with daughter Jenny, as she and her fellow students would be spending a month in the area during their study abroad experience. Our family had actually stayed in London for several days a number of years ago when Jenny’s big sister was studying in England, so she had already had the opportunity to experience some of that delightful city’s offerings. We visited St. Paul’s, the British Museum and the National Gallery, shopped at Harrods and took in a play in the West End. There was not enough time to see everything we wished, so Jenny has been looking forward to getting back to London.
 In just the last two weeks on daytrips in to the city, she has toured the Tower of London (and has decided the jewels alone would make it worth being Queen of England), spent some time in the museums, visited Harrods (again!) and thoroughly enjoyed a production of Sister Act: The Musical at the Palladium Theatre. That is not all she’s taken in, though. No, as a nursing student, Jenny has also visited some lesser-known attractions in London that have been, at the very least, eye-opening.
First stop was the Hunterian Museum, located at the Royal College of Surgeons. John Hunter, an 18th-century surgeon, collected and preserved thousands of specimens of plants and animals (and assorted human body parts) in order to better understand anatomy and improve medical treatment and surgical techniques. His original collection was purchased by the government in 1799, given to the Royal College and grew exponentially over the decades. Even though a large portion of the collection was lost during the bombing of London during World War II, Jenny was amazed at the number and variety of items on display.
They then proceeded to the Old Operating Theatre, dating back to the 1820s and the oldest in all of Europe. It’s actually located in the attic space of a church which adjoined St. Thomas’s Hospital — convenient, I guess, whether the surgery was successful or not. Actually, a large skylight just above the operating table provided good light, and the gallery gave apothecaries and physicians-in-training the opportunity to observe and learn. This was, of course, in the days before anaesthesia was available (except for opium and alcohol, that is), so speed was important. Jenny’s group saw a demonstration of how an amputation might be done, including the knives and other instruments used. Her one-word assessment: “Gross!” Usually, these modern nurses-to-be would also visit the Florence Nightingale Museum, also located at St. Thomas’s, but it is closed right now for updating.
Just this past Wednesday the group took in a little more medical history when they visited St. Mary’s Hospital and the lab where Alexander Fleming discovered penicillin in 1928. Fleming had been working with staph bacteria before he’d left on a two-week holiday. On his return, he was clearing away Petri dishes that had become contaminated with mold and happened to notice that the bacteria in those dishes seemed to have been killed by the mold. Jenny found this quite instructive and deduced a few nuggets to live by: Taking a break from work can be good for you in unexpected ways, and perfection in housekeeping could be detrimental, also in unexpected ways. (I would say that when she was a teenager in our house, she had already embraced that last philosophy!)
It just goes to show that there are always fascinating places to see and new things to learn that are often off the beaten track from the usual tourist destinations in the cities we visit. Follow your own interests and inclinations, grab a map or Google a bit and create your own personalized tour.
– Patty Vanikiotis, proofreader
