The seasoned traveler knows well enough that water is always suspect outside the western world, so I was fully prepared for the bottled/boiled water scenario in Cuba. But this fussy American princess says hot and cold running water are not optional in her holiday ghetto rental. As if Ozzy and Harriet were showing off their new television, we were proudly directed to the “luxury” hot water unit, housed in an ancient wood cabinet, in our Havanna bathroom. I was still getting over the fact that our toilet had no seat and had no patience for the old porcelain heater we would have to light each time we wanted to take a shower. Clearly in the category of “let the men handle it,” I got right out of the way. I remembered the old porcelain inserts from my grandparent’s gas fireplace and how we were threatened with visions of self immolation if we dared try to light it. 

I soon learned that hot and cold was an either/or proposition, as I subjected my bare flesh to successive rounds of scalding hot and freezing cold water while fumbling with the handles. That is, until moments later when the hot water petered out completely, and I was made to stand under the drizzle of cold water, teeth clinched. Making the the supreme sacrifice of forgoing conditioner, I got the hell out as quickly as possible. In the days to come we’d learn that we’d be so miserably hot and dirty, a cold shower, actually any shower, would be welcome and as I stood there with faucets open and prayed for the water to come on many a day, a drizzle was a gift. We got so we always had a big pot of water boiling on the stove for emergency drinking, dish washing and cooking. Who knew we were part of a complex shared water system? It wasn’t until I was jolted awake from a deep sweaty nap with the phone next to my bed ringing, that the problems began. 

Who is calling here and why is there a landline in a rental anyway? After the third call, I finally yanked the phone from its cradle, unleashing a barrage of Spanish. Despite my insistence that I did not speak spanish, that this insult was falling on deaf ears, that I could not help her, that this was a wrong number, the caller would not let up. On the 6th or 7th phone call, I simply, duh, unplugged the phone from the wall. At 6:00pm, another bell rang. This was the buzzer to our gate. There stood a man and two women all frantically speaking Spanish and imploring us to unlock the gate so they could get to the roof. With visions of ourselves tied up to a pole and robbed of our money and passports, we feigned ignorance until we could get our English-speaking tour guide over to translate. Hastening to the roof’s edge, we shouted across to his balcony and summoned him over. Quickly translating, it seemed that when there were guests in the rooftop apartment running water, there was no water to be had below. Ah hah! here was the source of the phone calls! The ring leader and clearly the obsessive caller was the one woman who kept throwing her hands up in the air and fairly spat out that she a university employee must have her water when she returned home from work. The other couple meanwhile busied themselves with the rickety bent metal ladder we had just been joking about and to our horror, commenced to climb on it to the crumbling roof to have a look. As my 16-year old son looked on, the second woman proceeded to carefully remove her good skirt revealing skin tight white leggings through which her hot pink bikini underwear could be seen stretched across her ample bottom. One careful step at a time, her butt swayed to keep balance on the ladder like a sight gag from a 3 stooges episode with nary a Cuban batting an eye. 

By now the haughty “professor” was screaming “why me, why me” and flailing her arms while the other two high above, looked deep into the plastic barrels only to find that low and behold, there was no water to be had, surprise! It seemed that the timing of showers and laundry was a complicated affair involving yelling down the stairs, air shafts and/or off hours showers etc. and our showers in the morning, afternoon and night were severely aggravating the balance of resource allotment. Our guide, the unspoken leader of our block, assured us that the impossible woman would be taken aside and reprimanded, which seemed a little harsh for the minor annoyance (and all that free entertainment) and well we didn’t think that was necessary, but I for one had no plans to skip showers. Our guide explained that the first American guests to come to his neighborhood block would be providing substantial employment for many of his neighbors. Our comfort, and the future of tourism to his block, had been made the business of all our neighbors. Turns out there was more to that trickle down than a lousy shower.

My Cuban Christmas Gift

Me go to an inclusive resort? What would I do for material? I didn't get interested in my Cuban vacation until I found out that the surprise stripper my husband hired for my 40th birthday party smuggled cigars with a guy who knew this guy that got us this place in his neighborhood in the barrio. While Siri was christmas shopping for your wife at the traffic light, I was stealing salt from a shaker into a gum wrapper to make an egg taste like something. Its 90degrees, geckos are running on a wheel to keep it at 80degrees, our pillows are little foam squares that smell of mildew, the sheets are 20 count polyester, and there are rusting bed springs under the mattress. My husband worked his rolodex until he found a porn film set to buy me for Christmas.

Our Christmas savior is this guy Chiqui who we don't know but we are moving in with him for Christmas in undisclosed location. I figure he is sending food pictures and he's healthy looking, so we will eat well. And no internet. How great is that? Wyatt is gonna lose his mind. This is Sylvia pajoli, your foreign correspondent signing off.

What the hell! There’s nearly a dozen people in here. I’d of thought 5 people could get 10 garments photographed. But it’s November and 20 degrees, the beginning of Detroit’s hungry months and the wind is whipping down a people-less Michigan Avenue. What creative wouldn’t want to be a part of this happening? I hug the wall where I won’t get stepped on or knock equipment over. There’s a stylist working some camera on a sliding tripod thing, a videographer capturing everyone’s move, an assistant to the photographer’s assistant, the make-up artist, my old friends Kim the designer, Christine the dressmaker and Steve the photographer all climbing over each other in the converted third floor studio in his 100+ year-old, Corktown home. Everyone is dressed in black looking very New York. I got a kid’s red coat and hunting cap on, it’s Detroit right here.

Christine is fussing over a tiny wrinkle right now, three people are studying this offense on a monitor. I’m gonna last an hour. Flash back: 20 years ago and the last time I was in the same room with Steve and Christine. Damn we’ve been friends awhile. More significantly, we’ve all been self-employed creatives in Detroit longer than that. Is it really tougher in New York? I don't think so. We should get medals. I’m gonna hand one to my ownself for “networking superstar.” I’m like a grandma, all proud of bringing my people together. Loyalty is a powerful currency, don’t under value it.

The clothes are glorious, effortless, but getting them there sure wasn’t. Kim wins the “Big Cajones” award for going the two-year distance for this moment. I spent a whole weekend in that dress they’re still shooting, never looked or felt better in a garment.  Christine has the hand-sewn neck seam spot on. Seam? who cares? Listen if your collarbone suddenly looked like a million dollars, you’d care. Let’s face it the rest of us would be checking ourselves in if we had to make such a seam. Of course she gets the “10,000 hour Master,” prize. I say charge it and slide the thing over your head already. If you’re lucky you might get one with a perfectly placed “1817” maker’s stitch, priceless. That earnest reverence for the uniqueness of each and every piece made treasure hunting with Kim a fabulous adventure. What fun to be with her in some middle-of-no-where country barn plowing through luscious piles of antique linens! My kind of job!!

I think about the “renaissances” this group of Detroiters has endured, not oh-so fabulous adventures. O.K. so Steve is actually a New Yorker but he arrived 15 years ago…and stayed, he's as Detroit as it gets. Winner of the “tenacious reinventor,” Steve’s gone way out on a “wide angle” so-to-speak to create a really cool business and lifestyle in his profession. If you want longevity here, you are creatively thinking your every paycheck. Look we “old-timers” are not gonna jump up and down every time some suburbanite buys a building or a punk pops up with their Brooklyn idea, but cautiously speaking things are good now in Detroit, very good. We have prospects and projects and joy. 

I look out the studio window before I go. That barren vista is where Tiger stadium used to be; as fallow as a Provencal field of flax in winter. Ok so not everyone is enjoying prospects, but if one woman can bring this many people to work today then? …right?  You got to believe in the power and spirit of human labor, season after season, year after tough and trying year. People do survive and thrive, for that matter, fabric and garments made of nothing but grass withstand and become magnificent. Kim swears she can feel 200-year old energy in those humble old sheets. Now that’s glory and glamour.

Atiba Seitu aka Kevin Zeigler

Pay no attention to the time lag. Todays inspiration is Atiba Seitu, aka Kevin Zeigler. Could two names be more different? like a character in an Elmore Leonard story, he just may be a two personality type dude. He wrote me a letter today, all caps, as precisely drawn as it was written, on stationery he made, stamped, delivered by my united states postal carrier to my door. The man knows what's on his mind and that act communicated volumes, and I hadn't even read the contents yet. He says he's all over the place, he looks right here and right now to me. He wants to do something meaningful, Atiba you just did.

He works at Avalon International Breads. Its a busy place, but Atiba has it organized in a vibrational sort of way. He calls working behind the counter, serving at the Altar. I just loved that. He takes this religion seriously. The zen of making cappucino, serving you this host, accepting your tithe. Just that spirit of purpose and propriety. It just occurred to me he doesn't wait on you, he is waiting for you. Oh yes, I wrote him right back. You are called, it's best to answer.

A Beautiful Detroit Begins with Monica and Ashley (and their green army)

 Monica Tabares                                             Ashley Atkinson

The Greening of Detroit                     The view from GM's Headquarters

The Greening of Detroit is looking for new members. It's sort of like fundraising, but maybe you have to do something. To say this to outsiders, especially those just over the 8 Mile divide, would be like bringing up the bad marriage, "the money wasted!"  Some hard-core hippie-types are looking for more money and help to throw it away on plants for all that vacant land. Is this how they are going to make up for what other cities have i.e. real grocery stores with fresh food? 

It wasn't a very big gathering, there were some Birkenstocks, and they were looking for people to "join" this organization that plants gardens and trees.  It could have been a deja vu moment, that is until you heard the statistics.  Obama couldn't have dreamed up a better grassroots movement nor this winning green party ticket:  Monica Tabares, Events Coordinator and Ashley Atkinson, Director of Project Development and Urban Agriculture for The Greening of Detroit. 

They stand up in their cargo pants and flip flops, coolly lay out the statistics that have put Detroit in the international driver's seat of a cutting-edge urban agricultural movement. Monica tells how 15 years ago she decided she wanted to save the world and couldn't as just a new mom and an attorney in Detroit. She was one of three staff members in this fledgling organization whose mission was to plant trees in the blighted city. This is going to save the world? (the power of postpartum thinking?!). 

Well it turns out those darn "hippies" were planting more than trees. The Greening of Detroit has grown a citywide food movement, and it's feeding more than a few people. Where there were once only 18 gardens, Detroit now has more than 1500. Then an idea to involve kids became the training of hundreds of kids and adults in green jobs, paying green jobs. The initial staff of three has become thirty.  One board member flew to an international conference on urban agriculture, and found out there was nothing new to learn. Detroit knew more than any other city about how to cultivate a successful urban agricultural program. Monica's idea to expand the mission beyond tree planting, despite limited funds and few troops, paid off.  

Ashley is the field marshal presiding over a not so small army, getting acreage planted, food disseminated to markets and people across the city and the projects keep coming. All this on a budget and they're so fiscally efficient, they've earned a 4-star rating because of their money management. Ashley and Monica  explained that when the money isn't available, they simply all work together to find another, creative way to get things done. How novel. Ashley whispered that a 3-acre garden is going in at the 200-plus year-old farmer's market in downtown Detroit and a whole world is watching to see if Detroit can cultivate a financially viable model that can be exported. People watching this food desert to see if a grass roots movement can grow food in it? As a business concept? Like an unwanted weed, turns out you just can't kill the D, and actually, you might want to live there. 

Trees are still getting planted. One impassioned homeowner reported how The Greening organization helped his neighborhood replace dead trees and in the process a strong community took root. They're moving from places like Ann Arbor and Chicago, it's such a positive, futuristic living experience here. There's money being wasted on some ugly ideas in this country, but not in this beautiful backyard. One woman's company moved from one of the well-heeled suburbs to downtown Detroit. She said that looking out her new window from the GM headquarter's building, the trees are blooming and it's quite beautiful. Would you believe the people who planted them are on their way to saving the world?

Jack Kervorkian

He was a slight, older man living above what's now Mr. B's bar in Royal Oak. I use to see him heading to the lamplighter diner north of 11 Mile Rd. Other than the nazi memorabilia collector he hung around with, most of us didn't know the unassuming townie had subversive tendencies. Then he Rube Goldberged a "death" machine and helped Janet Adkins end her own life in the back of a beat up VW van (keep this on the down low, but my husband sold him used parts to keep it "operational"…the accomplice).  

By the time he had his art opening at Ariana Gallery in town, he was well known as Dr. Death and a media superstar. I could only imagine the circus. Of course a preeminent  business owner like myself needs to represent, this is gonna be good.  His attorney was showboating for his own reality show in front of all the cameras. I braved the crowd and finally got to the paintings. A bleeding neck stump and the soldier with weapon, I fairly squealed in delight. Provocative, so my move.  I should have bought it. Jack was so small you could barely see him in the crowd, the horrified bourgeoisie of Oakland County couldn't tear themselves away.   

That he would not be the best spokesman for this important cause notwithstanding, he put the issue on the docket, served his time and put his life on the line. God forbid anyone should be trapped in a tortured body with no way out. That's beautiful, that's Detroit. Now who has those bus keys. Only qualified drivers should apply.