Life in Mexico
It’s May, so I’m celebrating International Bird Month!
And what better place to party than Manzanillo. Hummingbirds fly at supersonic speed from blossom to blossom, totally buzzed out by pollen.
A pair of bright yellow caciques have fallen in love with their reflections on a glass door in my courtyard. They sit and coo at themselves for an hour each morning.
Buzzards love to swoop down and pick at the carcasses of blowfish on the beach. Falcons pluck baby rats from their nests in palm trees. Pelicans surf for red snapper fish. Even chickens get into the groove, wandering the streets eating ants and stuff.
So, next time one of our feathery friends divebombs your car, take time to give them the bird!
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Recipe: Thai BBQ chicken
This is real easy to make and absolutely delicious!
Ingredients
1 whole chicken, split open along the back (get your butcher to do it).
1 cup of brown sugar
¼ cup of fish sauce.
¼ cup of soy sauce.
1 tsp of red curry paste.
Directions.
Mix the sugar, fish sauce, soy sauce and red curry paste together. Smear it on the chicken
Cook the chicken on medium for 45 minutes with the BBQ lid closed. Cook 15 minutes with the skin up, 15 minutes with the skin down, then finish the final 15 minutes with the skin up again.
Let rest covered in tinfoil for 10 minutes, then serve with coconut rice and pickled ginger.
Enjoy!
Film Review
The Fugitive
Streaming on Amazon Prime
“I didn’t kill my wife.”
It’s been over three decades since I first heard Dr. Richard Kimble (played by Harrison Ford), utter these words.
He had just escaped death row for the murder of Helen (the gorgeous Sela Ward). US Marshall Sam Gerard (Tommy Lee Jones), and his team were in relentless pursuit.
But it was clear that Kimble would stop at nothing (including throwing himself off a dam), to find the one-armed man responsible for his wife’s death.
Based on a 1960s television show that ran for four seasons, the 1993 reboot is rife with plot holes and stuff that really doesn’t make a lot of sense, but the pace and action are so unrelenting that you just don’t give a shit.
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences certainly didn’t. It was selected for seven Oscars, including best picture (Tommy Lee Jones, who went on record saying this picture would never be nominated, won for best supporting actor).
So whip up a bowl of popcorn, plop down in your comfy chair and take a stroll down memory lane. I highly recommend The Fugitive!
Book Review
A Gentleman in Moscow
By Amor Towles
It’s been almost a decade since A Gentleman in Moscow cemented the author’s reputation as a stellar chronicler of the absurdities of life; even if you’ve read it before, it richly deserves savoring a second time.
Count Alexander Rostov is a wealthy Russian who is caught on the wrong side of history. When Bolsheviks take control of his country, fellow aristocrats are rounded up and summarily shot.
Thanks to a polemic poem he published ridiculing the Tsar, however, Rostov is spared. Instead of the firing squad, he is placed under house arrest in the majestic Metropol, Moscow’s premier hotel.
Over the ensuing decades, Count Rostov serves his sentence with panache and dignity, finding love and joy with the staff and guests amidst the crushing weight of the state.
In addition to insights into the tragicomic nature of human behavior, this is a rollicking good book that one will wish to never end. I highly recommend A Gentleman in Moscow!
Bonus Book Review
Death in the Air
By Ram Murali
Jo Krishna is a wealthy expatriate Indian living in London when he is invited to stay at the Samsara Spa over the Christmas holidays. The Himalayan resort is the playground of the rich as well as a spiritual retreat; the Beatles famously once studied yoga and meditation within its immaculately landscaped grounds.
The tranquility is broken by the brutal murder of Amrit, a beautiful, spoiled socialite. Inspector Singh is sent to sort out the mess, assisted by Ro and the owner of the spa, the delightfully bossy Mrs. Banerjee.
What follows is a wickedly funny whodunit as the guests trapped in the hotel, including a dodgy politician, international movie star and CIA spy are all revealed to be less than innocent.
In addition, this debut work by a very promising writer is a thoughtful and delightfully subversive study into the racial relations between Asian and European societies. I highly recommend Death in the Air!