Melting the Chocolate

Melting The Chocolate

Originally uploaded by Turtlepace.

Our traditional New Years Eve snowshoe hike on Mount Seymour. this time we came prepared with chocolate and fruits and all the camping gear to make a chocolate fondue. Great friends, great food, perfect weather!

Winter Wonder World

Winter Wonder World, originally uploaded by Turtlepace.

Magical snow world on Dam Mountain. Magical snowshoe hike with Pat and Michele. We live in a wonderful world!

Zwiebelkuchen

2006-12-06 Zwiebelkuchen 002, originally uploaded by Turtlepace.

This is a recipe from the area where I grew up in the area between the Black Forest in Germany and the Alsace region in France.

Ingredients:

• dry yeast
• a pinch of sugar
• 250ml warm milk
• 500g flour (I use whole wheat)
• 1 pinch salt
• 80g margarine or butter

Filling:

• 200g Creamcheese
• 2 Tblsp breadcrumbs
• 200g bacon
• 4 Tblsp oil
• 1000g onions
• salt pepper and caraway seeds

Glaze:

• 3 eggs
• 400g sour cream
• 150g shredded cheese
• 1 Tblsp minced parsley
• pepper and salt

Dice the onions and the bacon and sautee (do not brown) until well cooked (about 30min). Season with salt, pepper and carraway seeds. Set aside to cool.

Prepare a yeast dough and (after rising) press into a large baking pan (with high sides). Spread cream cheese onto dough, sprinkle breadcrumbs on top and with onion mixure. In a bowl mix glaze ingredients and spread over onions. Bake at 200C for 40min.

Serve warm with new white wine.

Kartoffelpuffer

2006-11-12 Kartoffelpuffer 001, originally uploaded by Turtlepace.

An old standby from my mom, Kartoffelpuffer (Latkes). I believe my mom cheated, she made them from a mix in a box. My kids like them, but I rarely made them as I don't have time to grate a kilo of potatoes and I hate anything made from mixes.

Well, I finally (after looking on the Buy and Sell and more recently on Craigslist for about 3 years!) found a used Cuisinart food processor complete with slicing and grating discs. I have used the wonder machine everyday since. Yesterday, to the joy of my children, I grated/shredded potatoes for latkes. Served with apple sauce they were a big hit.

Ingredients:

• 1kg potatoes, peeled and grated
• 2 eggs
• 1/3 cup of flour
• tsp salt

Mix ingredients. Place about two tablespoon fulls of the mixture in a frying pan with hot oil. Pat flat. You can fry several latkes at the smae time if you are using a large pan. Fry on medium to high heat until edges are crispy, then turn latkes over and fry the other side. Place on paper towel when done to drain oil. Keep warm on a plate in oven until all latkes are ready. Serve with apple sauce.

Post Jack O'Lantern Pumpkin Baking

Post Jack O'Lantern Pumpkin Baking, originally uploaded by Turtlepace.

Every Year, I fret about throwing the Jack O'Lanterns we carved for Halloween out into the compost. Last year, I laboured for hours, peeling pumpkins and making first pumpkin puree, than soup and pie.
This year, I was told that nobody in my familiy really likes pumpkin soup (and the pie was a disaster anyway). I had resigned to dispose of the pumpkins in the compost, only to find a recipe for muffins at the gym yesterday. They turned out great. Encouraged by the success I looked up a recipe for a pumkin loaf. It just came out of the oven. Not sure yet what the verdict of the testers will be...

Of Thieves and other Lowlifes

My bike got stolen. My trusted Norco commuter bike, complete with rear view mirror, fenders, bell, bottle holder, rear rack (for my panniers, which by sheer coincident for the first time in years were not on my bike), kick stand, attachment for a lamp and my helmet disappeared from my children's school yard.

My stupid fault for leaving - or rather forgetting - it there. Unlocked, left overnight...who wouldn't feel invited to take it for a spin? Oh, wait! This was not a fancy, expensive new bike unattended in a crummy neighborhood. We are talking about a 10 year old, dark green ladies bike that served as my transportation for buying groceries and getting the library books home left in supposedly one of the best neighborhoods (the Elementary School ranks as one of the best in the country) in Vancouver. Which leaves me to think that whoever took my bike did not need it. No more than they needed my nerdy helmet that I found the next morning smashed into a million little pieces.

No, whoever took my bike took it for the sheer thrill of it, maybe went on a joy ride and then tossed it into the bushes. Or worse, as happened to my little boys bike a few years back, vandalized it for the sheer thrill of destruction. Alas, I have not found any trace of my bike, despite constantly being on the lookout and having searched in all the local parks.

Now, this bike was a replacement for one stolen 10 years ago, when our apartment in Kitsilano was burglarized. I have gotten somewhat used (if you can call it that) to loosing property through theft. The police calls it minor property crime and it taught me not to get too attached to my material things.

What bugs me is not so much that my bike is gone...what bugs me is that there are people - probably young ones - out there who see a bike in the courtyard of a school and feel invited to take it. Apologies to all the honest, upstanding young citizens that I am sure must be out there somewhere. Just haven't noticed you lately.

The same night my bike was taken from the school, the school experienced - once again - vandalism. It's been about a month that my bike disappeared. A month of several incidents of vandalism and most recently, two accounts of arson. The week before Halloween the staff room at school got torched and Halloween night a store in the neighboring "village" was gutted by a fire. In both incidences it was sheer luck that the fires were relatively contained.

I finally found a second hand bike at a reasonable price to replace my commuter bike. It's a newer model mountain bike and came with a bottle holder and rear rack. I still need to replace the helmet, bell, rear view mirror (I am so used to navigate traffic with it) and kick stand (a must for parking my bike when the pannier are full).

What's the morale of the story? Is there one? Don't leave your stuff unattended (statistically, it's going to happen again - I am using my bike a lot, never forgot it anywhere and the one time I did it disappeared). I do feel the urge to find the people who are vandalizing our neighborhood, so do my neighbors. Eventually, they will get caught and the crimes will catch up to them...or so we all hope!

Beyond The Horizon - Expedition Canada

For the last two years I have been following the adventures of Colin Angus, Tim Harvey and Julie Wafaei who set out to circumnavigate the earth using human power. Last night, I attended their presentations at the Denman Theatre downtown. If you don’t have any plans for tonight yet, I highly recommend you attend their last engagement in Vancouver (then they are crossing Canada to present in different cities). You can find more info on their website at: http://www.expeditioncanada.com/index.html

The following is a brief excerpt from their site:

“On May 20th 2006, after 720 days, Colin Angus and Julie Wafaei completed Expedition Canada - the first human powered circumnavigation of our planet. Colin traveled 43,000 km by rowboat, bicycle, canoe, ski, and foot - a journey that voyaged across 3 continents, 2 oceans and 17 countries. Julie traveled with him for most of the expedition, including rowing 10,000 km unsupported across the Atlantic Ocean, making her the first woman to row across the Atlantic from mainland to mainland and the first Canadian woman to row across any ocean.

The team used zero-emissions travel to highlight issues with global warming and to inspire others to use non-motorized transportation.

Colin and Julie are currently traveling across Canada in speaking tour and film premiere. Colin’s book, Beyond the Horizon, will be released in March 2007 (for those of you that can’t wait he has two other books on previous adventures). An adventurer’s resource centre divulging hard-to-find information (cold weather travel, ocean rowing, etc.) and on-line store offering expedition films and books will soon be available on this website.”

Inspiration

I haven’t written in a while and don’t have much to report without going into whining about a nasty bout of bronchitis turned asthma that put a damper on my running since February. But before you feel pity for me, I thought I share a story with you that circulated on the Ontario Ultra Group today. Make sure you watch the video (link at the end of the story)

[From Sports Illustrated, By Rick Reilly]

I try to be a good father. Give my kids mulligans. Work nights to pay for their text messaging. Take them to swimsuit shoots. But compared with Dick Hoyt, I suck.

Eighty-five times he’s pushed his disabled son, Rick, 26.2 miles in marathons. Eight times he’s not only pushed him 26.2 miles in a wheelchair but also towed him 2.4 miles in a dinghy while swimming and pedaled him 112 miles in a seat on the handlebars–all in the same day.
Dick has also pulled him cross-country skiing, taken him on his back mountain climbing and once hauled him across the U.S. on a bike. Makes taking your son bowling look a little lame, right?

And what has Rick done for his father? Not much–except save his life.

This love story began in Winchester, Mass., 43 years ago, when Rick was strangled by the umbilical cord during birth, leaving him brain-damaged and unable to control his limbs.

“He’ll be a vegetable the rest of his life;” Dick says doctors told him and his wife, Judy, when Rick was nine months old. “Put him in an institution.”

But the Hoyt’s weren’t buying it. They noticed the way Rick’s eyes followed them around the room. When Rick was 11 they took him to the engineering department at Tufts University and asked if there was anything to help the boy communicate. “No way,” Dick says he was told. “There’s nothing going on in his brain.”

“Tell him a joke,” Dick countered. They did. Rick laughed. Turns out a lot was going on in his brain. Rigged up with a computer that allowed him to control the cursor by touching a switch with the side of his head, Rick was finally able to communicate. First words? “Go Bruins!” And after a high school classmate was paralyzed in an accident and the school organized a charity run for him, Rick pecked out, “Dad, I want to do that.” Yeah, right. How was Dick, a self- described “porker” who never ran more than a mile at a time, going to push his son five miles? Still, he tried. “Then it was me who was handicapped,” Dick says. “I was sore for two
weeks.”

That day changed Rick’s life. “Dad,” he typed, “when we were running, it felt like I wasn’t disabled anymore!” And that sentence changed Dick’s life. He became obsessed with giving
Rick that feeling as often as he could. He got into such hard-belly shape that he and Rick were ready to try the 1979 Boston Marathon. “No way,” Dick was told by a race official. The Hoyts weren’t quite a single runner, and they weren’t quite a wheelchair competitor. For a few years Dick and Rick just joined the massive field and ran anyway, then they found a way to get into the race officially: In 1983 they ran another marathon so fast they made the qualifying time for Boston the following year. Then somebody said, “Hey, Dick, why not a triathlon?” How’s a guy who never learned to swim and hadn’t ridden a bike since he was six going to haul his 110-pound kid through a triathlon? Still, Dick tried. Now they’ve done 212 triathlons, including four grueling 15-hour Ironmans in Hawaii. It must be a buzz kill to be a 25-year-old stud
getting passed by an old guy towing a grown man in a dinghy, don’t you think?

Hey, Dick, why not see how you’d do on your own? “No way,” he says. Dick does it purely for “the awesome feeling” he gets seeing Rick with a cantaloupe smile as they run, swim and ride together.

to be held by a guy who was not pushing another man in a wheelchair at This year, at ages 65 and 43, Dick and Rick finished their 24th Boston Marathon, in 5,083rd place out of more than 20,000 starters. Their best time’? Two hours, 40 minutes in 1992–only 35 minutes off the world record, which, in case you don’t keep track of these things, happens the time.
“No question about it,” Rick types. “My dad is the Father of the Century.” And Dick got something else out of all this too. Two years ago he had a mild heart attack during a race. Doctors found that one of his arteries was 95% clogged. “If you hadn’t been in such great shape,” one doctor told him, “you probably would’ve died 15 years ago.”

So, in a way, Dick and Rick saved each other’s life. Rick, who has his own apartment (he gets home care) and works in Boston, and Dick, retired from the military and living in Holland, Mass., always find ways to be together. They give speeches around the country and compete in some backbreaking race every weekend, including this Father’s Day. That night, Rick will buy his dad dinner, but the thing he really wants to give him is a gift he can never buy.

“The thing I’d most like,” Rick types, “is that my dad sit in the chair and I push him once.”
Here’s the video…. PLEASE watch it… http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ryCTIigaloQ

Harrison Lake Camping Trip

2006-10-09 Harrison Lake Camping Trip 099, originally uploaded by Turtlepace.

Can anybody tell me why anybody would travel to a beautiful wilderness area and leave their trash on the beach, in the water and in the woods? Are humans in general disrespectful of nature. Why do people who disrespect nature seem to have the urge to come to a beautiful wilderness spot. Why not add some trash to the pile under Burrard Street Bridge (not that I think people should litter there either!).

During our recent trip to a wilderness campsite on Harrison Lake we collected countless beer and pop cans and bottles, oil cans, plastic packaging and other junk left behind by people who probably drove in with a much bigger car than we used to haul the stuff out.

We like to go wilderness camping. Because of the age of our children we have been restricted to “close to the car camping”. Which means we are frequenting unmaintained, unsupervised sites accessible by car. I guess, yahoos who leave their junk pick the same kind of spots not because of their remoteness, beauty and serenity, but because there is nobody supervising their actions. They can let it all hang out, be rude to nature and other campers, be loud and obnoxious, be unaccountable, be irresponsible.

We are looking forward to resume our hiking/kayaking/cycling camping routine as our children are growing bigger and strong enough to carry their packs. In the meantime, we visit these “party” spots during the week, off season and always come prepared with ample supplies of garbage bags, a rake and work gloves.

Black Tusk

2006-08-27 Garibaldi Lake Hike 021, originally uploaded by Turtlepace.

Ever since abandoning a hike up from Cheakamus Lake to Helm Creek BC (before children) for reasons I no longer remember, I have wanted to hike in Garibaldi Provincial Park. On the last weekend in August I got a “Out of Jail Free Pass” and the weather and friends schedules lined up perfectly to attempt an overnight hike. In fact, this would be the first overnight hike for me in a number of years.
My suggestion to hike to Garibaldi Lake was accepted by my partners in crime, Pat and Michele. Nobody objected when I favoured the Helm Creek approach over the much shorter climb up Rubble Creek. I had read that the Rubble Creek ascent was one of the most popular hikes in southern BC and attracted hordes of hikers on weekends. That was enough for me to push for the 18km hike from Cheakamus Lake. 18km didn’t sound to bad. After all, we run this routinely (well maybe less routinely this past summer) before breakfast. Little did I remember that carrying your overnight gear puts a damper on your speed and endurance, especially, when I (not my husband) was the one carrying the tent and other heavy gear.

I volunteered to organize the food for everybody, to avoid doubling up. Well, we did end up doubling up a bit, I guess neither Michele and Pat wanted to get stuck without chocolate and I didn’t want to be the one to blame for not bringing enough nourishments. Needless to say, that we carried way to many supplies.

The morning dawned clear and mild and the weekend promised to be all sunshine. We left Vancouver shortly after 6:00am. Pat volunteered to drive the Sea to Sky Highway and the 9km of gravel road to the trailhead.

It took us a while to get our ducks in a row, food distributed, bug spray and sun tan lotion applied, shoes tied and retied, outhouse break… but finally we were off on the well groomed trail that meandered to the first junction before heading steeply down to the Cheakamus River. Pat had a rough time with her pack. She had never carried an overnight pack before and to make matters worse, the pack she had lent from a friend was a large frame. Pat is petite. We stopped a few times to adjust her pack, but Pat continued to be in pain and uncomfortable. Not that Michele and me were comfortable. I had not carried a big pack in years and even back then, my husband carried the tent and other heavy stuff.

After crossing the Cheakamus River on a nice bridge (there used to be a rickety cable car) the trail started to ascend. The grade was not very steep and I kept hoping it would remain that way. Progress was slow. We waited for Pat who took it one step at a time and stopped frequently to eat and drink.

I was starting to get worried that we would not reach Garibaldi Lake before nightfall.

Abundant Chili Peppers

Abundant Chili Peppers, originally uploaded by Turtlepace.

This years crop of chili peppers is going to be amazing. I planted about 6 plants. The "Super Chili" in the photo is the winner with lots and lots of fruit.

Zucchini Loaf

• 250g butter or unsalted margerine


• 150g sugar (original recipe calls for 350g)


• a few drops vanilla extract or vanilla sugar


• 3 eggs


• 1 small level tsp salt


• 1.5 tsp cinnamon


• 50g ground nuts (almonds or hazelnuts)


• 320-350g shredded zucchini


• 500g whole wheat flour


• 2 tsp baking powder

Mix everything well with electric mixer. Fill into 2 small loaf pans. Bake at 175C for 1 hour (165C for 45min in convection oven) Cool down in loaf pan.

Schwabenbroetle

Schwabenbroetchen, originally uploaded by Turtlepace.

These are cookies that my grandmother, Tinsel Oma, and then my mom used to bake. They are my favorite Christmas cookies.

The recipe I have in my binder is a photocopy of Oma Tinsel's handwritten original. Here is the recipe (in German)

3/4 Pfund Mehl
1/2 Pfund Butter
1/2 Pfund Zucker
1/2 Pfund ungeschaelte, geriebene Mandeln
1 Ei
etwas Zitronenschale
20g Zimt

Diese Zutaten arbeitet man auf dem ....brett zusammen, stellt den Teig kurz kalt, wellt ihn mit Mehl aus, sticht beliebige Formen aus und lasst sie ueber Nacht liegen. Den anderen Tag bestreicht man sie mit Eigelb, bestreut t sie mit feingewiegtem Mandeln und Hagelzucker und backt sie in nicht zu heissen Ofen

165C (Convection) - 12 min

2006-06-14 Making Pancakes 006

2006-06-14 Making Pancakes 006, originally uploaded by Turtlepace.

 

2006-06-14 Making Pancakes 008

2006-06-14 Making Pancakes 008, originally uploaded by Turtlepace.

 

Clematis in the rain

2006-06-13 On our porch 011, originally uploaded by Turtlepace.

Funny weather. It's been extremely muggy and hot. We even had a few thunder storms, which are rare in Vancouver. This shot was taken this morning on our porch when an almost tropical rain fell.

Mexican Corn Muffins

Mexican Corn Muffins, originally uploaded by Turtlepace.

Ingredients:

• 140g cornmeal


• 120g wholewheat flour


• 1 Tblsp. baking powder


• 1 tsp. salt


• 1/2 tsp baking soda


• 1/2 tsp sugar


• 1 medium onion, diced


• 1/2 tsp hot chili powder


• 1/2 green pepper diced


• 2 eggs


• 250ml buttermilk (or yoghurt)


• 125ml vegetable oil


• 200g shredded cheese


• 1 can corn

Mix flour, cornmeal, baking powder, baking soda, salt and sugar.  In blender pulse together onion, pepper, chili powder, eggs and buttermilk. Add to dry ingredients. add oil, cheese and corn. Mix well but not too long.
Bake at 210C for 18min. Yields 12-18 muffins.

 

Easy Pumpkin Muffins

Ingredients:

• 1 1/2 cup whole wheat flour
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 6 tbsp wheat germ
• 4 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp salt
• 1/2 cup dried cranberries
• 2 cups pumkin puree
• 2 eggs
• 1/2 cup orange juice
• 2 tsp pumkin pie spice
• vanilla
• 4 tbsp chopped walnuts

Preheat oven to 180C (165C convection). Combine all ingredients (except of walnuts) and mix until combined. Spoon the batter into lined muffin tins, sprinkle with walnuts. Bake for 25 - 30 min, until a toothpick inserted comes out clean. Remove from the pan, serve warm or cold.

Sour Dough Bread

Sour Dough Bread, originally uploaded by Turtlepace.

 

Ingredients:
- 3/4 cup sour dough starter
- 6 cups whole wheat flour
- 1tblsp salt
- 1 tblsp yeast
- warm water to make a soft, non-sticky dough

Mix ingredients and let rise in warm location until the dough has doubled in volume. Knead dough and form 2 small oval loafs or one large one. Place on greased baking sheet and let rise again. Bake at 200C (400F) for 50 minutes. In convection oven bake at 165C for 40 minutes.

 

May - Progress Report

Despite worsened asthma symptoms and a long recovery from a cold virus, I have been positive about training and running this month.  Given that I lost all the endurance I had built up earlier in the year, I focused on getting back on track and running shorter distances.

The weekend long runs are down to about 1:30h to 2h's of slow hike/runs.  Earlier in the month, I would find myself exhausted after these runs, but my energy seems to be slowly coming back.  During the week, I have been getting up early, to get a 30-40 min run or gym workout in before the daily routine.  This is working well and I am hoping to keep it up over the summer.  Being a long time insomniac, it is actually nice to stop the tossing and do something productive.

Tomorrow, I will get my asthma assessed. Big deal, because I don't like to take any medication. It is almost as if taking regular meds for this is an acknowledgement that I have asthma.  Still hoping that my symptoms settle down once the spring pollen season is over.  One thing is certain, I won't be winning the New Year's Resolution contest ;-)

Lions Gate Bridge stretching over Burrard Inlet

Lions Gate Bridge stretching over Burrard Inlet, originally uploaded by Turtlepace.

 

German Vollkornbrot

Ingredients:

- 500g whole wheat flour
- 500g oats
- 200g seeds (ground flax, sesame, pumpkin, sunflower, millet, amaranth etc)
- 1 tblsp salt
- 3 tblsp yeast
- 1000ml warm water
(you can experiment with different flour and seeds, the dough should be soft and sticky for baking in loaf pans. If you like to make oval loafs, add more flour to make the dough smooth and non-stick)

Mix everything with the dough hooks on your electric mixer. Let rise for 1h. Spoon into 3 small loaf pans. Bake in preheated oven at 200C (400F) for 50min or in convection oven at 175C for 45min. Let cool slightly then remove from loaf pan and let cool on wire rack. Can be frozen.

Marathon Shuffle

Here is one for next year!

Some of you might remember the "city boys" tackling the 180km Sunshine Coast Trail back in 2003 (the trail won) and again in 2004. I heard all the tales, saw all the photos, film trailers and met some of the Powell River crew. I have, however, not been beyond the second ferry on the Sunshine Coast in years.

This past weekend our family schedule allowed us a trip to Powell River for the annual Marathon Shuffle on a 29km stretch of the Sunshine Coast Trail (SCT). The weather forecast looked glum with 70% chance of rain for Friday, our travel day and Saturday. I was still fighting a lingering cold virus and felt pressured not to miss another run. Details of the Shuffle were sketchy. Was it 24km, 30km or even a full marathon as the name might suggest? With all these questions in my mind and wobbly knees from the cold, I decided not to run and just take in the atmosphere with my children.

The trip north west was magnificent. A short drive brought us to Horseshoe Bay and the ferry to Gibsons on the Sunshine Coast. On windy roads, often overlooking Georgia Straight and Vancouver Island in the distance, we made our way to the second ferry in Earls Cove and then on to Eagle's house north of Powell River.

Eagle takes credit for conceiving the Sunshine Coast Trail, to connect existing trails, stands of old growth forest and to raise awareness to the threat logging poses to this amazing landscape. Eagle and his wife Laura very kindly invited us to stay at their house for the weekend. The room were we camped out was facing the ocean and had windows on three sides. I instantly felt like being on holidays and listening to the trail stories I started to consider to hike the Half-Shuffle with my children. Luckily, they were on board, exited by the prospect of being first Half Shufflers and arriving before the rest of the field (more on that later).

Thanks to Laura and Eagle we sorted out the logistics of getting to the finish to carpool, then back to the start of the Half Shuffle somewhere in the boonies up a rough forest road for the kids and myself and getting to the start for Ean.

Equipped with a guide book, food to feed an army, water, spare clothes, camera and lots ot energy (the kids) we set out on a mossy, single track trail through old and second growth forest. We were immediately mesmerized and I forgot about the worried comments and looks from other runners that realized I planned to set out by myself with two kids in tow. The path was well marked and the book's descriptions matched every turn. Frankly, there were no chances to go wrong, as we were on the only trail in the middle of a dense forest. Soon we passed Elphin Falls and Troll Bridge and I felt like Frodo during his journeys in Middle Earth. The trail meandered gaining and loosing minimal altitude. The kids were happily running ahead, respecting my rules about staying in sight and earshot. They didn't fight. I felt like wonder mom, alone in the wilderness. Approaching a Theyeth Lake we were greeted by a frog concert. We were awestruck and crouched above the water on rocks covered with thick, spongy moss to listen to the strange music. Funny enough, as soon as we moved away from the water, the croaking stopped.

Past Kayach Bluffs with beautiful views of Sliammon Lake, Kokanee Creek, Dogleg Pond and Little Sliammon Lake we venture along. My son is getting tired, or rather he claims his heel hurts. We stop for a massage and some food. We are about half way and our speed slowed down considerably. This could take a while. I started to get concerned when we didn't see trail markings for a while. We traced our steps back to an abondoned shelter and looked for any missed turns. Nothing. We continue on the unmarked trails and double check landmarks in the guide book. Looks alright.

Eventually we hit a system of forest roads, but the promised aidstation was not set up yet. Good that I carried all our supplies. All of a sudden, Erik's enery returned. A woman hikes past us, as I made a pitstop...wouldn't you know it. We didn't see a soul for 2 hours. The kids get all excited. Their goal was to be first at the finish line. They race ahead and question the hiker. Yes, she is doing the full Shuffle. I am confused. Why is a hiker first. Where is Ean and his new buddy Dennis. Did Ean's knee buckle? No time to ponder this one, though. The children are bouncing ahead, determined not to let the hiker or any one else pass again. "Come on, mom!" Now, keep in mind that I was carrying this obscenely heavy knapsack, didn't wear my runners or a running bra and was cooking in my long pants. To add insult to injury the terrain all of a sudden changed and I found myself scrambling up a never ending mountain. Scott Mountain, as I read afterwords in Eagle's book. I panicked, as the children got further and further ahead of me, disregarding my pleas to slow down. Apparently, the hiker had told them that they could continue with her...which would have been fine with me if I had known. Eventually, my frantic screaming made them stop and wait, very upset about loosing the first place. It turned out the the lady had set out early then the rest of the runners/hikes, so technically the kids still were first.I had calculated, that we would finish around the same time than the first finishers of the Full Shuffle. Sure enough, we had just started the descent from Scout Mountain into Shingle Mills, when I heard Ean whooping and hollering behind us. I told the kids to go for it and they flew down the open trail. The sun was out, the air was scented from the dry grass and pine needles and life was good. Not letting anyone finishing in front of them included their daddy ;-) I was amazed to see my son and daughter fly up the last hill and off to the finish line. Ean and Dennis hardly could keep up. To their credit I have to say that they stopped 100m short of the finish to wait for me. My legs were shaking from the lingering cold and the blistering speed those guys put forward during the last 5km. Nobody offered to take the knapsack, though.

(No) Progress Report April

Not sure where my running training is going this year. At this point it seems to be going no where fast...

March I was lying low because of an recurring Achilles injury. Luckily, the rest and no running regime helped and so far the Achilles tendon is pain free.

After completing the Burnaby Mountain Run (12km) early April and fighting some motivational issues, Pat and I were back on the trails on Easter Saturday, enjoying the late season snow that greeted us in the Lower Seymour Conservation Reserve. April started looking good...until the flu bug hit hard. Missed out on the sunniest CFA run of this year last weekend. While a bunch of Fat Asses enjoyed the brilliant blue skies over Coquitlam at the Run To The Clouds (which clouds), I spent the day coughing and hacking in bed. Bummer.
Feel like any endurance is long gone by now, legs still feel rubbery from fever and doing nothing all week...we'll see how tomorrows planned run with Michelle plays out. What does not kill me only makes me stronger... Or so I hope!

Asleep and Trusting

Asleep and Trusting, originally uploaded by Turtlepace.

This is one relaxed fellow. Not only does he groom and eat when in my children's hands, he also falls asleep at times. Having his head rubbed makes him all drowsy until he drifts off. During this particular session he ended up sleeping on his back. Talk about trust!

Moon Over City

Moon Over City, originally uploaded by Turtlepace.

 

Burnaby Mountain Run

Burnaby Mountain Run

Originally uploaded by ClubFatAss.

Gewuerzkuchen

Gewuerzkuchen, originally uploaded by Turtlepace.

After looking on ebay, Buy and Sell and Craigslist for years, I finally found exactly the convection range I was hoping for.

I've been baking up a storm since I brought the beast home last week.

This Gewuerzkuchen is the latest creation. BTW, family loves the stove...or should I say the end results ;-)

Ingredients:
125g butter
150g sugar (original recipe calls for 350g - yikes)
320g whole wheat flour
1 tbls baking powder
125g grated dark chocolate
4 eggs
1/2 tblsp ground gloves
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp nutmeg
1 cup milk

Combine all ingedients with electric mixer. Pour into greased bundt or 2 loaf pans. Bake on 175C or 75 min (less if using 2 loaf pans) or on 200C for 60 min. In the convection oven I baked at 175C for 50min.

Burnaby Mountain Killer Hill

I have to admit that in the 15 years I have been living and running in Vancouver I had never ventured to Burnaby Mountain. Fortunately, I tested the course descriptions a few weeks before the Burnaby Mountain Run and can vouch that the views are spectacular. Unfortunately, on the morning of the events, the clouds hung very low and none of the participants were treated to the breathtaking scenery.

Not only did the clouds hang low, rain also hammered down on the group of diehards assembled at the start line in Burnaby Mountain Park. Nevertheless, the majority of the Fat Asses planned to do the full 2 loops for a total of 24km. Not so Maureen and myself who gingerly set out to run 12km and were hoping not to be lapped by the hot shots...


Following Pandora's Trail steeply downhill through deep mud puddles we soon lost sight of the leaders and tried stay close to Craig and Sharon whose bright jackets lead the way. Alas, they took a wrong turn and we found ourselves alone on the course.

The first half of the course is either downhill or flat...which leaves the question what to expect from the second half. Answer: A killer hill! Old Buck and Homestead are benign in comparison to this ascent. As Maureen and myself huffed and puffed to the top, we traded war stories of being lost in the fog during some previous adventures. Thanks to Maureen for pulling me up there!

The rain was still coming down when we finally made our way back to the start. Luckily, nice restrooms allowed us to get rid of the wet gear and change into warm fleecies. I only thawed eating soup at the post party get together....

Gotta come back in the sunshine.

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March 27 2006 Book Club Meeting

The new read for the next meeting will most likely be "Blade of Grass" by Lewis DeSoto.

"A Blade of Grass "

(reviewed by Kam Aures JAN 11, 2004)

Set in the 1970's along the South African border, A Blade of Grass is a novel about survival, friendship and pride. The two main characters are Marit Laurens and Tembi. Marit is a young British woman who is newly married to Ben and together they have recently purchased a farm.

Tembi, a young black girl, works on the Laurens' land where she lives in a hut with her mother Grace who is the Laurens' housekeeper. Her father lives in the city where he works in a gold mine to help support the family.

After a series of tragic events, both women find themselves alone with no one else to turn to except for each other. With Tembi's support, Marit addresses the workers to let them know that she will continue to keep the farm going. "If you think that I can't do it, then you are wrong. If you think that because I am a woman I can't do it, then you are wrong. You will give me the same respect that you gave to Baas Ben. And if you cannot, then you must leave this farm. If you think that you can take advantage of me because I am a woman alone and without a husband now, then you must leave this farm. If you cannot help me to run this farm, then you must leave. I say these things to you now, at the beginning, to give you a choice. Because if you cannot accept me, or work for me, you must leave." In the following days the workers begin to leave the farm in groups eventually leaving Marit and Tembi to fend for themselves.

The main storyline focuses on the development of Marit and Tembi's relationship from master-servant to friends. In the beginning, after Tembi has taken her Mother's place as the Laurens' housekeeper, Marit is jealous of the attention that her husband Ben is showing toward Tembi. "There is an unspoken admission on his part that he has looked with lust at Tembi, and an unspoken admission on her part that she saw this."

However, when situations change Marit's feelings toward Tembi start to soften when she realizes that she needs Tembi in order to keep her farm and to survive. This interracial friendship, in apartheid South Africa is frowned upon by the neighbors and by the increasingly segregated community in which they live, but they ignore the scorn and let their friendship grow stronger.

Although the concept of the story is very intriguing, there are some parts of the novel that seem to drag with an excessive amount of description which causes the story to lose it's smooth flow. Without these long passages the book would be more gripping and engaging, as the story would move along at a faster pace.

All in all, DeSoto's novel is a good start for his debut work. He is very talented in the area of character development so much so that the main plot centers around it. I really enjoyed his choice of subject matter and the interesting way in which he crafted the story and relationships. Originally from South African, DeSoto has experienced the very surroundings that he is writing about and is able to paint us an accurate picture so we ourselves are able to visualize the settings in our heads. I do look forward to more of DeSoto's novels in the future and hope that as he grows as a novelist his words will flow less choppily and more smoothly. A BLADE OF GRASS, despite its minor flaws, is worth the read.

Vancouver World Run - View from the Back of the Pack

The day dawned blustery and grey and I knew it would be my turn to run. My other half just does not like to be out in the rain.

Being my meticulous Germanic self, I showed up at the deserted Centennial Theatre parking lot about 30min before the official start. A small group of enthusiastic runners slowly assembled and huddled around Craig's car. Where was the guest of honour, Jesper, and his host Karl? Luckily Jesper had mentioned Friday night at the presentation that he was not a morning person. A quick phone call threw him out of bed. He looked slightly hung over when he finally hopped out of the car. Where did you take him, Karl?

After a few starter photos we set off and the group spread out very quickly. The eager ultras taking the lead, the steady 25km runners coming next and the cautious 10km runners , consisting of newbies and injured folks forming the back of the pack. I had planned to do approximately five kilometers, by running to the bottom of Mosquito Creek at 16th and Fell and then saying bye to the group and heading home along Mosquito Creek. Maybe it was because the first 3km were downhill, maybe I just had given that Achilles injury enough time to heal, or maybe I just didn't want to leave the Seattle folks to get lost, but I felt good and decided to keep going to the 10km turn around at the end of Bowser. Heidi, from Seattle, and I had never met, and our chat made the km just fly by.

I eventually send Heidi back up that nasty hill along Larson and turned north up the trail system back to my house. As I huffed up along the creek, I felt very happy that the weather was cooperating and my Achilles tendon wasn't giving me any grief. The way things were looking I am seriously contemplating the Burnaby Mountain Run next Saturday. See you on the trails!

Back Running

It's been a good week all around. After taking a injury break from running for 4 weeks I gingerly hit the trails for the first time on Monday.

My first outing lasted a grand total of 5 min. The pesky Achilles tendon felt unused and slightly stiff. That first run made me worry. Tried again the next day and felt great. Not to overdo it, I stopped after 8 minutes and finished my workout at the gym.

With so many CFA events coming up I did feel a bit pressured to prove my heel was back to normal, pain free and able to take a longer run. Happy to report that I managed a 30min trail run yesterday without ill effect. Just signed up for the Vancouver World Run on Sunday. I am planning a very "custom" course, running with the group for the first few km and then making my own way back...but who knows.

See you on the trails. And thanks for all the good wishes over the last 4 weeks. Now, if we only could fix  Ean's knee!

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Slowly but Surely

It's been 4 weeks to the day that I haven't run. Thanks to lots of deep freezing I am glad to report that the acute inflammation in the Achilles tendon seems to be gone. Between Ean's Patella Femoral syndrome and my heel we were literally fighting for the ice packs. No nicer feeling than when you move your legs under the cover in bed only to come upon a half thawed bag of peas...

Funny, how I didn't miss running. I guess there was no pressure to train for anything. I was bummed about missing the Dirty Duo, though. Luckily, I managed to get quite a bit of skiing in, including a full day at Whistler with Pat (first time in three years) and an incredible powder day at Grouse. Shredded up my quads for sure. Add to that a few gym sessions on the eliptical trainer and spin bike (how boring) and a snowshoe hike to Dog Mountain today...I should be able to pick up my running were I left it off.

Of course, that is exactly what I shouldn't do.  How I hate to start back with 5 min running and increasing slowly, though.  Hopefully, by the end of the week I eased back into running mode and that nasty Achilles Tendon doesn't give me more grieve.

Encouragement

Since I can't contribute any progress or race reports - my Achilles is still on the mend and I am off running - I thought I share an email with you that I received over the weekend from a woman who wrote me late last year inquiring if Club Fat Ass offers beginner running clinics. I wrote her back, encouraging to join a clinic and offered to take her out for a run/walk. Never heard back until now. Here is what she shared:

"Hi! I don't know if I thanked you for getting back to my email way way back in November. Since November I have lost almost 30 pounds. I walk pretty much everyday, but lately I have started jogging and walking here and there. It feels great! I am going to start a running program where you walk and run for certain amounts of time, slowly taking away from the walking time. I think this may be a way for me to improve my fitness levels. One worry that I have is that I'll do too much and then stop. I'm sure other beginner runners have this same worry. I am a smoker too. I am going to quit today though. It is just such a waste of money and so bad for you. Anyway....where was I going with this? I would like to take you up on that run that you were talking about...but I would like to improve a bit more before I run with someone else. I worry that I will hold people back or not be in as good of shape as they are. I think this thought is in my head because I was an athlete in high school, and its embarrassing for me now to see what shape I am in. Another thing I was wondering is if you know of good places on the North Shore to run? I usually go along the seawall, and up by the ferry terminal in West Van. I don't like the sea wall though because there are always 50 million people there. Maybe you have some inside information.
Again, I thank you so much for responding to my last email!"

She made my day!

Achilles Tendonitis

It's official. I acknowledge that I am off running with Achilles tendonitis. After last Saturday's test run on the Burnaby Mountain Run course, the pain and stiffness worsened. I pondered the situation a day or two and sadly made the decision to pull from the upcoming Dirty Duo race.

Luckily, the tendon seems to respond well to icing. I have also been able to use the eliptical trainer in the gym - although I don't get my oxygen fix in the stuffy gym and any machine gets very boring after about 20min.

From past experience I know that this injury can be very pesky and long lasting. Hopefully, by doing the smart thing and not running on this, I'll be back on the trails before too long.

A New Trail - Burnaby Mountain

Against better judgement I headed out for a run today. My right Achilles tendon had improved over the last few days - thanks to lots of ice - and I was hoping for a miraculous recovery....

Alas, it wasn't meant to be. The Achilles tendon felt stiff right from the start and didn't limber up either.

Michelle, Pat and I had chosen to run the Burnaby Mountain Run course, a new CFA event, slated for 1 April. We were not at all familiar with the course and were relying on the course descriptions from Peter, the Event Host. The course description turned out to be flawless, with the exception of the start. I guess during the actual event, that is not a worry, as Peter will point us in the right direction. For us however finding a trail head proved impossible. Run west...yeah right, dang, I didn't bring my compass. Heading towards what we thought was due west, we crossed a big expanse of grassy parkland, but could not identify a visible trail. Via cell phone Ean pointed us in the right direction down along a fence high above Burrard Inlet.

The views of the mountains to the north and the city to the west were breathtaking. Most be stunning on a sparkly sunny day. The trail meandered downhill and via a few legs on the road eventually brought us down to the waterfront. We could see the look-out near the start way above us...Yep, somehow we have to get up there again. We followed parallel to the water and eventually turned uphill. And what an uphill it was. Peter made reference to an 8% grade and raising heartrates and stomach contents. Definetely a killer of a hill.

Running uphill proved difficult on the Achilles and we walked most of it. The last few km's the route flattened out again and rolling back into Burnaby Mountain Park we were even rewarded with a downhill stretch and more beautiful views of the North Shore Mountains.

Mark 1 April on you calendar for this challenging, but rewarding CFA run. You can do one loop of 11.2km or repeat the whole thing for a total of 22.4km. I will update the instructions so that anybody training on the course beforehand will be able to find the initial trail.

Chilie Con Carne - The Secret Ingredient

I love chillies. Comfort food. Easy to make, so many different possibilities. This one is my standart recipe. It always ends up tasting different because I don't measure the ingredients.

Ingredients:

• onions chopped


• garlic, minced


• red and green bell peppers, diced


• jalapeno peppers, minced


• lean ground beef


• can of red kidney beans


• can of diced tomatoes (or fresh tomatoes when in season)


• can of pureed tomatoes


• sugar


• chili powder


• paprika


• cocoa powder


• ground coffee


• salt

Brown the onions and garlic, add the peppers, add meat and brown. Add remaining ingredients. Add water if to thick. Bring to a boil. Let simmer for at least 1h. Serve with rice and corn bread

Book Club Meeting - 20 February 2006

Due to lots of other commitments we were a small group yesterday, but the discussions were good.  We seem to agree that "One Hundred Years of Solitude" was a book worth reading, even though we might have had a hard time with the magical realism and the confusion around the similar names and personalities.

Our next book as suggested by Debra is "The Continuity Girl" by Leah McLaren.  It's supposed to be an easier read.

Next meeting is on the 27th March.  Gabi volunteered to host, but requested a back-up.  In absentia, we "volunteered" Gayle (Gayle please let us know if you would be available as a back-up).

I still think we need a name for our group, don't you?

Injured...

How can an old injury that has been kept in check by regular stretching and specific strengthening exercises pop up out of the blue without warning?

If you know the answer to this I'd like to know if I can make this disappear as fast as it came?

This being my old and formerly chronic Achilles tendinitis. It plagued me for two years. Icing, stretching, strengthening, heel wedges...tried it all. In the end it was probably just time that improved it and finding the balance between too much and not enough running. The mean thing was that the heel always felt best about 1h and more into a run. Lately, it only reminded me with some slight stiffness if I ran too much or ran roads.

Last week, towards the end of a 1:40 trail run in the icy evening air, I noticed that my right calf muscle (or what I thought was the calf muscle) was quite stiff. I stretched and to my dismay could hardly walk on it the next morning. Stubborn as I am, I ventured out for a 60min run with Michelle the next afternoon, only to have to walk it in. I realized that this was the Achilles tendon and not my calf muscle. More ice and no stretching, as it hurt like stink.

Then of course there was the Capilano Canyon Night Run. Can't miss that! It's a tradition. It's my favoured run. So after much soul searching I toed the start line. On the whole the tendon felt fine during the run, just slightly stiff. The last 2k of gently uphill were a blur as the nice Mick family motored uphill and after guiding them through the dark canyon trails I didn't want to get dropped on the last meters.

Off running right now. I registered for the Dirty Duo in 9 days and hope to get rid of this inflammation by then. Wish me luck!

Cornbread

Made this last night for the Capilano Canyon Night Run potluck party. It’s an easy recipe and very yummy.

3 cups cornmeal
1 cup whole wheat flour
6 tsps. baking powder
1 tsp. salt
2 tsp. cayenne
4 eggs slightly beaten
2 cups buttermilk or yoghurt
2 cups grated sharp cheese
2 cups creamed style corn (canned)
1 cup chopped jalapeno peppers
1 cup corn oil

Blend all ingredients well. Pour into a well oiled baking pan (large) and bake for about 45min or until a cake tester comes out clean. Serve warm or cold.

Greek Salad

Spicy Squid Salad

Ingredients

• cooked squid


• onions


• ground fried rice


• lime juice


• fresh chili


• mint leaves


• fish sauce


• garlic


• sugar
  


• lettuce


• tomatoes


• cilantro
  

Instructions

Mix cooked squid, rice, onions, garlic, chilies, lime juice, mint leaves, fish sauce and sugar in bowl. Present on bed of lettuce with tomatoes and cilantro

Phad Thai

If Thailand were to have a national dish, this would be it. There are lots of different variations on the same theme, so be sure to experiment the second time you prepare this.

Ingredients:

• 4 tblspn oil


• 50g hard tofu, finely cut in strips


• 2 cloves finely chopped garlic


• ½ tblspn dry shrimp


• 1 egg, beaten


• 150g vermicelli or glass noodles


• salted radish (ready to use)


• 3 tblspn soy or fish sauce


• 1/2 tblspn sugar


• vinegar


• 1/2 teaspoon ground dried chili


• mung bean sprouts


• 1 tblspn crushed peanuts


• spring onions


• lime


• vegetable stock or water

Instructions
Heat some oil in wok, add tofu, stir add fried shrimp and garlic, stir well while stirring , add egg, noodles, stock and let cook. Add vinegar, soy, 1/2 tablespoon of sugar, ground chili and ground peanuts cook until dry add bean sprouts and spring onions

Notes
Serve extra chili, sugar, ground peanuts and sprouts on the side for personal taste. Decorate with half a lime. Eat with chopsticks

One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabri...

One Hundred Years of Solitude

by

Gabriel García Márquez

(New York: Harper and Row, 1970)

Author:

Gabriel García Márquez was born in Aracataca, Colómbia, near the coast of the Atlantic Ocean, on March 6, 1928. The eldest of sixteen children, García Márquez was raised by his grandparents until he was eight. His grandmother, Tranquilina Iguarán Cotes, not only lends her names to One Hundred Years of Solitude, she spoke to García Márquez's about the supernatural as an accepted part of the world. His grandfather, Colonel Nicolás Márquez Iguarán, had fought in the Colómbian civil wars. The influence of both grandparents is clear in the novel.

At first, García Márquez prepared to study law, even as he wrote for newspapers in the late 1940s, but in the early 1950s he decided to become a writer. His first short story was published in 1955. After spending three years living in Europe, García Márquez returned to Colómbia to marry the woman he had fallen in love with when he was 18 and she was 13, Mercedes Barcha. They have two sons, Rodrigo and Gonzalo, which, in the book, are the names that Amaranta Ursula wants for her own imagined, ordinary children. The family went to live in New York and then Mexico, where, in 1965, García Márquez decided to focus on writing his novel. Like Melquíades, García Márquez isolated himself for 18 months while finishing the book. When One Hundred Years of Solitude appeared in 1967, it met with great critical and popular success.

García Márquez then published many more works, including The Autumn of the Patriarch in 1975 and Chronicle of a Death Foretold in 1981, Love in the Time of Cholera (1985), The General in His Labyrinth (1989) and News of a Kidnapping (1996), a nonfiction work about the Medellín drug cartel in Colómbia. In 1982 he won the Nobel Prize for Literature "for his novels and short stories, in which the fantastic and the realistic are combined in a richly composed world of imagination, reflecting a continent's life and conflicts."

García Márquez has run into trouble with several governments, including the United States and his native Colómbia, for his political involvement, particularly in his writing. He has lived many places, including New York, Chile, and Paris, but he has spent most of the last few decades in Mexico.

Summary:

One Hundred Years of Solitude is the story of the Buendía family, a clan with such complicated connections and repetitive names that the family tree at the front of the book is essential for keeping everyone straight. While the exact location of the fictional town of Macondo is unclear, it is similar to Marquez's native Aracataca, Colómbia. Both the town and the family reappear in many of Marquez's works. Ursula Iguarán's parents fled after Sir Francis Drake destroyed Riohacha, Marquez explains, and so ended up in a small town in the foothills, where the Buendías lived. When, three hundred years later, Ursula married her cousin, José Arcadio Buendía, she so feared having children with pig's tails that she refused sexual relations for a year. When Prudencio Aguilar teases José Arcadio, he retaliates by throwing a spear through his taunter. Both Ursula and José Arcadio are so torn by guilt, not to mention haunted by Prudencio Aguilar, that they leave with some friends, arriving two years later at the edge of the mountains and establishing Macondo. This background, coming at the start of the second chapter, sets up many of the foci of the text: the way time flows, the entangled family history, the dead interacting with the living, the power of sexuality. This early background also establishes the parallels between Colómbian history and the Buendía family tale that run throughout the text.

Urusla and José Arcadio (I)* have three biological children. Their youngest is Amaranta, who lives her whole life an austere virgin, although she is sexually aroused when caressing both her nephew Aureliano José and her great-great-grandnephew, José Arcadio (III). Colonel Aureliano Buendía is a Liberal leader in the civil wars against the Conservatives. José Arcadio (II) leaves with gypsies and returns many years later as a gigantic, tattooed man. Both of these men have an affair with a much older woman, Pilar Tenera, resulting in their sons Aureliano José and Arcadio. The two young boys are brought into the Buendía house and raised by the Buendía women. Ursula and José Arcadio (I) also have an adopted child, Rebeca, who eats dirt and whitewash off the walls.

An old gypsy, Melquíades, captures José Arcadio's (I) imagination with wonders such as ice and alchemy. He then disappears for awhile, returning to cure Macondo, where everyone has lost his or her memory because of an insomnia plague. Melquíades settles down to live in a little room in the Buendía household, writing a mysterious parchment that no one can understand. That parchment becomes a fascination for various members of the family over the next one hundred years. Melquíades is the first person to die in Macondo, and so he puts the town on the map of the dead. Thus, José Arcadio (I) comes into contact with many of the dead and goes mad, so his family ties him to a tree in the yard where he lives out most of the rest of his life.

Although Rebeca and Amaranta are raised as sisters, they fall into a bitter rivalry over the foppish Pietro Crespi, an Italian pianola tuner. He chooses to marry Rebeca, but fate and Amaranta's bitterness keep stepping in the way. Then, José Arcadio (II) returns, looking very manly and impressive, and he marries Rebeca, who had joined the family after he left with the gypsies. Pietro eventually begins courting Amaranta, but she rejects him and he commits suicide. Amaranta intentionally burns her hand and then wears a black bandage on it for the rest of her life as a sign of her virginity.

Colonel Aureliano Buendía, when he is young, cannot find a woman he wants to be with, until he meets the prepubescent Remedios Moscote. When she reaches puberty, they marry, and she moves in with her many dolls, having a surprisingly good influence on the family. She cares for Aureliano José, her husband's child by Pilar Tenera. She also cares for old José Arcadio (I), who is tied to a tree and speaking only in Latin. She is the means of a truce between the old Macondo families and her father, the representative of the national government. Remedios dies with pregnancy complications, and her picture becomes a central place in the house, with a light kept burning for the length of the story.

After Remedios's death, Colonel Aureliano Buendía realizes he is meant to be a Liberal leader and he goes off to lead the civil war. He leaves his nephew, Arcadio, in charge of the town, but the younger man becomes a virtual dictator. Arcadio marries the gentle Santa Sofía de le Piedad, fathering three children before he is executed by the army. Meanwhile, Colonel Aureliano Buendía, off leading the war, fathers 17 sons by various women on his travels. Those sons later come to the Buendía house to be baptized. When they go to church on Ash Wednesday, they are permanently marked, and much later they are shot down by their father's enemies right through the ash cross on their heads. Colonel Aureliano Buendía, after fighting in so many wars, realizes he was fighting for pride and he becomes a recluse in the house, making and melting down little gold fishes. The Liberals all come to be just like the Conservatives, and sometimes the government even wants to honor Colonel Aureliano Buendía for all he did.

Santa Sofía de le Piedad's three children are Remedios the Beauty, Aureliano Segundo, and José Arcadio Segundo. Remedios the Beauty is of legendary beauty but is so simple that she prefers nudity and is dismayed by the men who want to see her. She is eventually carried away to heaven by the sheets. Aureliano Segundo and José Arcadio Segundo are twins who in their childhood keep switching identities, to the point where Ursula is convinced that they eventually traded places. Indeed, when they die of old age at the same time, their coffins are accidentally put in each other's grave. Aureliano Segundo marries Fernanda de Caprio, a stuck up woman of good lineage from the highlands. She is very cold and formal, and Aureliano Segundo keeps a mistress, Petra Cotes, in whose house he lives most of the time. Fernanda bears him three children, Meme, José Arcadio (III), and Amaranta Ursula. They give José Arcadio to Ursula to raise, and she is convinced he will be a Pope. He is sent off to Rome to study while Meme goes to a convent to study the clavichord. She has a rebellious heart and ends up conducting an affair with Mauricio Babilonia, a beautiful man who is preceded everywhere he goes by butterflies. While Mauricio is trying to sneak in to see Meme, Fernanda has him shot in the back. Meme stops speaking. Many years later, Mauricio dies a lonely death of old age, paralyzed, while Meme dies a lonely death of old age "with her name changed and her head shaved, and without ever having spoken a word, in a gloomy hospital in Cracow" (p. 302).

Fernanda is left to raise Meme's child, Aureliano. She tries to keep him hidden away, but eventually Aureliano Segundo finds him. Since this grandson is only a few years younger than their own daughter, Amaranta Ursula, they play together as children, often using the periodically senile Ursula as a plaything. Aureliano Segundo takes an interest in the two children and plays with them a good deal.

José Arcadio Segundo becomes a union leader at the banana company that moves in to the town and begins to exploit all its workers. One day, after the lawyers have managed to prove such things as "the demands lacked all validity for the simple reason that the banana company did not have, never had had, and never would have any workers in its service because they were all hired on a temporary and occasional basis" (p. 307), the union goes on strike. The authorities call all of the workers to the train station, saying that someone is arriving to resolve the issue. Instead, they begin firing on the crowd and then pile all the bodies into a long train. José Arcadio Segundo wakes up on the darkened train, surrounded by dead people, and manages to jump off, only to find upon his return that the authorities have managed to cover up the slaughter of over 3,000 people. José Arcadio Segundo is broken by this, and he goes into Melquíades's study to try to read the old gypsies parchments. When the army searches the house, they cannot see him in the room. Occasionally, Melquíades's ghost comes to visit José Arcadio Segundo, who otherwise becomes a hermit until his grand-nephew, Aureliano, begins also come to the study. When José Arcadio Segundo and Aureliano Segundo die, and his playmate Amaranta Ursula goes off to school in Brussels, Aureliano closes himself up in the room, trying to read the parchments that no one has yet been able to decipher.

After Ursula and Amaranta die, Santa Sofía de le Piedad leaves forever. The only Buendías left in the house are Fernanda and Aureliano, who does not even know how he is connected to this family whose name he carries. Fernanda has long been engaged in writing letters to doctors far away, detailing the ailments she suffers. The letters do no good because she uses euphemisms to refer to everything. She is also involved with a fictitious correspondence with both of her children, Amaranta Ursula and José Arcadio (III). She lies to them about how things are going in Macondo, and they lie to her about what they are doing with their lives. When she finally dies, the reclusive Aureliano preserves her body for four months until José Arcadio (III) arrives. Greedy and shallow, José Arcadio (III) continues to restrict Auerliano to his room while he laments the lack of the fabulous inheritance that Fernanda had pretended existed. Only shortly before his murder at the hands of four children he befriended does José Arcadio (III) find hidden gold and make friends with Aureliano.

After José Arcadio's (III) death, Auerliano begins to leave the house more, making a group of close friends. He is sorely out of touch with what passes for reality: he believes José Arcadio Segundo's tale that 3,000 people died, rather than the official reports; he only knows what he has read in Melquíades's parchments; and he does not even know his connection to his family. His friends help him to begin to join the outside world, and he meets Pilar Tenera, who is now well past 145 years old. She gives him much the same affection that she has given so many other Buendías, but eventually she dies. Amaranta Ursula returns with her husband Gaston, awakening a passion in Aureliano. As neither one of them know their blood relationship, they become lovers. When Gaston leaves for an extended trip, they lose themselves in their passion, forgetting to maintain the house or his friendships. She dies giving birth to their son, Aureliano, who finally has the long expected pig's tail.

Aureliano is stunned to realize how alone he has become again. As he watches ants carry off his son, he suddenly understands Melquíades's parchments, which many others failed to comprehend because it was not yet the appropriate time. He runs off to the study, and as the wind pulls the Buendía house down around him, he reads the story of his whole family that Melquíades predicted. Melquíades did not write linearly, but rather "had concentrated a century of daily episodes in such a way that they coexisted in one instant" (p. 421). As Aureliano skips forward to read about the last of his family's being destroyed once he finishes reading the parchment, the reader realizes that she has been reading Melquíades's manuscript.

COLÓMBIAN HISTORICAL CONTEXT

Much of One Hundred Years of Solitude reflects the violence of Colómbia, as do many of García Márquez's other works. Colómbia has been independent since 1810, but since the middle of the 1800s has been besieged by violence between the Liberals and Conservatives. These are not so much political parties as warring factions. Their ideologies are not really all that different, and both parties are violent and corrupt. From 1899 to 1902, the groups fought the War of a Thousand Days, which led to the death of 100,000 people. García Márquez's grandfather, a veteran of this war, told him stories about the violence.

The banana company of One Hundred Years of Solitude is based on the United Fruit Company, a corrupt and abusive American company. In 1928, the Conservatives massacred hundreds of strikers and later made more disappear. Eventually, they made the whole event disappear, striking it from the history books. The period from 1946 to 1953 is know as la violencia, a time when 150,000 Colómbians died due to battles for power between the Liberals and Conservatives. Each group had its own guerrilla army, and assassinations and killings were common. While García Márquez fictionalizes all the events in his book, the Buendía family story reflects much of the reality of twentieth-century Colómbian political history.

Questions:

While answers are provided, there is no presumption that you have been given the last word. Readers bring their own personalities to the books that they are examining. What is obvious and compelling to one reader may be invisible to the next. The questions that have been selected provide one reasonable access to the text; the answers are intended to give you examples of what a reflective reader might think. The variety of possible answers is one of the reasons we find book discussions such a rewarding activity.

Is Remedios the Beauty retarded?

Remedios the Beauty disregards most social conventions, seeing them as unnecessary or even incomprehensible. She is unbounded by the clothing, desires, and expectations that restrict people like Fernanda. Her long baths, we are told, may seem to be "deserved admiration of her own body." Actually, however, she bathes because she feels like bathing; the baths are "a way of passing the time until she was hungry" (p. 238). We can interpret this either to mean that she is so stupid as to have nothing better to do than sit around in a bath killing scorpions and waiting to be hungry, or we can interpret this to mean that she is so wise as to realize that there is nothing that is really all that pressing for her to do. When we contrast the way she spends her morning with the man who watches her, we can understand how ultimately practical her line of thinking is. While this man is so conventional that he considers the opportunity to watch her bathe a great boon, she tells him "that she would never marry a man who was so simple that he had wasted almost an house and even went without lunch just to see a woman taking a bath" (p. 239). The bath, for the man, is a waste of time because it is dangerous and he does not get to eat. For Remedios the Beauty, the bath is a place to spend time because she does not bother with conventional timetables and so it is suitable to her situation to stay in the bath. She is, rather than retarded, the extreme version of the artist who is able to free himself from the limits that society will place on his visions. She does not produce writing like Melquíades, because she is the spirit of artistry, free to live as she pleases and ascend beyond all the foolishness of the earth, and even writing is earth-bound. In the end, we see one more contrast between her divine sense of doing that which best suits her and those whose devotion to convention causes them unhappiness because they focus on the most unsuitable ideas. Stating that she "never felt better," Remedios the Beauty gives a "pitying smile" to Fernanda, who is obviously incapable of understanding anything but the ordinary, and calmly rises into the skies with the sheets, transcending "the environment of beetles and dahlias" (p. 242-3). She has moved beyond the physical boundaries most people must abide, just as she moves beyond all conventions, to spend her time in the upper reaches that are most suitable to her. Fernanda, meanwhile, wastes her time "praying to God to send her back her sheets" (p. 243). The first woman does the extraordinary quite naturally because she is not bothered by conventions, while the second woman has only conventions to occupy her mind.

So what role does the writer have in One Hundred Years of Solitude?

Writers can be problematic when they are mired down by convention. Fernanda's "pernicious habit of not calling things by their names" is a result of her over-attention to modesty. When she writes to the doctors, bound in by this conventionality, she is incapable to communicating anything useful and they have no idea what is wrong with her (p. 353). And, when she writes to her children and they write to her, everyone lies to everyone else because it is easier just to present what the reader expects. This leads to frustration and confusion, but it does not provoke any real understanding. Really effective writers are free of conventions, writing not what the reader expects, eventually leading to a complete understanding.

Such is the case with Melquíades, who, as the writer, transcends the usual boundaries. He is not limited to fiction or fact in the usual sense of those words because he writes the future (a type of fictional creation) that is an actuality. In addition, he creates his own readers by magically drawing the various Buendías into his text, and creates the context in which his text will be understood by setting it up so no one will understand for one hundred years. This parallels the way that García Márquez also transcends boundaries when he writes of supernatural occurrences in the same tone that he uses to discuss ordinary ones. He also clouds the boundaries between the reader, the writer, and the characters when, at the end, the reader realizes that she has been reading a text by a writer, García Márquez, but also by a character who is the writer, Melquíades. This is all very confusing, as she is a reader right alongside a character who is also a reader, Aureliano. As both readers come truly to understand the full impact of the manuscript at the same time, García Márquez succeeds in creating a very fluid relationship between reader, writer, and character. None of this can really ever be pinned down with certainty, which is part of García Márquez's charm, so discussions of this issue can be very fruitful. What is certain is that this text produces much more real understanding than Fernanda's silly, proper letters ever could.

How is the house itself significant?

This is a tale of the House of Buendía, which is both the family and the home. For the Buendías, it is almost impossible to escape the home, and even those who leave eventually return. The seventeen Aurelianos, for example, all come to the house to be baptized into the family, and when Aureliano Amador is wandering, hiding from the gunmen who have exterminated his brothers, he remembers this house as "the last redoubt of safety left for him in life" (p. 380). This house is not, however, really a refuge for the family; rather, it is a part of the family itself. Aureliano Amador is rejected from the house because the family has forgotten its past. As the family corrodes, so too do the foundations and walls of the house. When Fernanda is in charge, the windows are closed off, much as the family is closed off from the community. And, as the last member of the House of Buendía faces his end, the house itself is falling down around him.

What does it mean to be masculine?

There are certainly many macho men in this book, but their brand of masculinity is not necessarily admirable. For example, José Arcadio (II) is quite macho when he returns. He can lift an entire bar and he raffles off his virile sexuality to the women. But this is not the type of masculinity men strive for. In fact, it is not actions that are masculine, but rather intentions. Colonel Aureliano Buendía fights in a worthwhile war, but since his motive is pride, he cannot even respect his own involvement. These are men who are macho without being admirable, but there are also men who are foolish because they are so effeminate. For example, José Arcadio (III) is so concerned with his own physical appearance that he is drowned in one of his many long baths. What all of these men lack is a masculinity that is concerned with the well-being of others.

Aureliano Segundo's story is telling. When he is younger, his relationship with Petra Cotes is mostly about his own gratification, as is his eating. But, when the rains come, he loses weight and begins to take an interest in his daughter and grandson. After the rains, he does whatever it takes to do right by his family. Because of this, "For Petra Cotes... he had never been a better man than at that time," (p. 344) and "Both looked back then on the wild revelry, the gaudy wealth, and the unbridled fornication as an annoyance, and they lamented that it had cost them so much of their lives to find the paradise of shared solitude" (p. 345). All those hyper-masculine activities made him macho, but when he begins to focus on people other than himself, he becomes admirably masculine. He may be in solitude, but his solitude is shared.

What does it mean to be feminine?

Admirable femininity, like admirable masculinity, requires the woman to think of others besides herself, and it calls for sensuality. Women are not feminine just because they behave properly, or Fernanda would be feminine. But she has no sexuality and causes others discomfort, not comfort. However, The Elephant is very feminine even though her great distinction is being able to out-eat a man. She is feminine because she is strong like a man but has manners and, most importantly, she has cultivated her way of eating as a part of her concern for her family (p. 261). She is the only female character, other than Ursula, who has the combination of strength, sensuality, and concern for others that makes a woman truly feminine in the context of this book. Santa Sofía de le Piedad is sensual and caring, but she has little strength. Meme is strong, but she is thoughtless, while Remedios is caring but too weak to survive her own fertility. As with masculine men, feminine women are scarce in this book. Of course, this is why the characters are so captivating, because they fail to live up to the expectations that they set for their own genders.

How does time function as a character within One Hundred Years of Solitude?

García Márquez presents time as anything but linear. Time plays games with the characters, interacting with them as another character. As Ursula notices, just as the characters' names keep recurring, so too do the events of their lives. For example, Colonel Aureliano, José Arcadio Segundo, and Aureliano all become entranced by Melquíades's manuscripts and repeat the same pattern of becoming hermits. In the same way, Ursula Amaranta repeats the behavior of both of her namesakes. Like Amaranta, she cannot keep her hands off of her kinsman, Aureliano. In a larger circle, she finally fulfills the fears that Ursula had of a child with a pig's tale. Time is then circular, either in repeated full cycles or as one large cycle that comes to fruition at the end. But, time is not that predictable, which is why it is in a sense a character that interacts in unpredictable ways with the others. Sometimes it passes so quickly that everything changes completely without anyone noticing, such as when Aureliano emerges and realizes that the whole world has changed and the town is totally different (p. 418). Yet, sometimes it barely passes, so that Pilar Tenera lives for a century and a half. Then, just when it seems that time will have no effect on her, she dies and is not there for Aureliano when he needs her and when the Buendía she has supported for so long most needs her. At the end, the reader realizes that this is because Melquíades has written the manuscript that way, effectively making time a character. As García Márquez has blurred the lines between manuscript, writer, reader and character, and the character Melquíades has turned time into a character in the manuscript, this treatment of time is a part of the larger playing with conventional boundaries that García Márquez so relishes throughout the text.

What is García Márquez saying about the nature of solitude?

In this book, everyone essentially exists in solitude. Those in love may have "shared solitude" (p. 345), but no one escapes solitude. Some, like Colonel Aureliano, turn to solitude as an escape into futility, as he creates and destroys little golden fish. Others, like Melquíades, use their solitude to do something meaningful. The characters are differentiated by the nature of their solitude, because, although a person cannot avoid aloneness, she certainly plays a role in determining what that experience will be like for her. So, for Amaranta, solitude is about bitterness and loneliness and for Fernanda it is about propriety and restrictions. However, for Remedios the Beauty, solitude is a wonderful way to spend long hours in a bath and, as is also the case with José Arcadio (I), a kind of divine madness. The characters who rebel against solitude, like Meme or José Arcadio (II) and Rebeca, trying to deny solitude in love, end up either dead or sad, lonely and alone.

What brings about the destruction of the Buendía family?

There are many factors that hurt the Buendía family, such as the persistent incest, violence, and hermitism. However, these things are symptoms rather than causes of the problem that the Buendías have, which is a mixture of pride and selfishness. As most of them choose a solitude that is based on their own self-aggrandizement, they bring about their own downfall. Colonel Aureliano Buendía, for example, spends his youth steeped in the "pride" that compels him into the "desolate wasteland of glory" (p. 247). He creates eighteen sons, seventeen of whom are destroyed because of his prideful involvement in the war and one of whom, Aureliano José, is destroyed by his own overconfidence (p. 157-8). As Ursula realizes, "Colonel Aureliano Buendía had not lost his love for the family because he had been hardened by the war, ...but that he had never loved anyone... . She sensed that he had fought so many wars not out of idealism, ...but that he had won and lost for the same reason, pure and simple pride" (p. 254). The Colonel himself comes to realize that he is full of pride, but what Ursula realizes is that his pride stems from an inability to love, an immersion in himself away from other people. This is a way of living that many of the other Buendías share, such as José Arcadio (II) and Amaranta, who as a result has no offspring. In the end it is Aureliano's immersion in passion that secludes him from his friends and his fascination in his own fate that causes him to neglect his newborn son. In his self-involvement, Aureliano lets ants carry off the infant, the only hope for the family's continuation.

What authority does the written word have?

While writers are obliged to create real understanding, official writing seems altogether separate from the writer. One Hundred Years of Solitude underscores the incredible authority that society gives to the written word. But, for García Márquez, the written word is only valuable when it is connected to the physical world in a meaningful way. So, the documents that the banana company creates to defeat the workers legally and the history books' reports of the massacre are grotesque because they are falsehoods that obscure reality. On the other hand, when Aureliano Segundo decides that the Tartar warrior in the encyclopedia is Colonel Aureliano Buendía, it is in some sense true because that connects the written and physical worlds in a satisfactory manner. The parchment itself is worthless until the very end of the book, when it suddenly collides with reality and is revealed as containing all of the reality of the whole book. Thus, García Márquez gives his book credibility because it is the very manuscript that at the end becomes one with reality.

Why is Meme the only family member who does not return to Macondo when she leaves?

The daughters of the family do not marry, except for Amaranta Ursula. But, even her marriage does not last long, as she prefers instead to procreate with a male of the family. This is much like Rebeca, who is, interestingly, not listed as a daughter of the family but as a wife of one of the men. Nonetheless, the only two women who are raised in the family who marry eventually turn to the men of the family as mates, even though both of them originally try to find men outside of the family. Ursula has set this standard years before when she married her cousin, and so even though the men do find wives and mistresses from outside the family, the women are condemned to keep returning to Buendía men. Thus, when Meme has a child with a man from outside of the family, she is effectively making the choice to abandon her family in a way none of the other women have. So, when she changes her name and never returns, it is more a reaffirmation of her desertion than the desertion itself.

Further Reading:

William Faulkner. The Sound and the Fury (1929)

Faulkner was one of Gabriel García Márquez's strongest and earliest professional influences. While García Márquez sets many of his stories in Macondo and often returns to the Buendía family, Faulkner sets many of his stories in the fictional Yoknapatawpha country, Mississippi and often returns to the Compson family. The Sound and the Fury is a complicated read, especially the first two sections, but it sheds a good deal of light on García Márquez's work and provides an interesting contrast to One Hundred Years of Solitude.

Franz Kafka. Metamorphosis (1919)

This story of a young man who wakes up to find himself transformed into a huge bug was also a big influence on García Márquez. When he read the book in translation, García Márquez realized how effective a nonlinear plot could be and he began to think of creating a similar text.

Isabel Allende. The House of the Spirits (1985)

Allende is one of the better known writers to follow in García Márquez's footsteps as he paved the way for global recognition of Latin American writers and the magical realism genre. While this Chilean writer does not specifically refer to García Márquez as an influence, she does give credit to all the Latin American authors that came before her. This is the tale of the Truebas and their interactions with their political, spiritual and emotional worlds.

Poetry by Pablo Neruda (e.g., Poems: Late and Posthumous Poems, 1968-1974. New York: Grove Press. 1988. An edition in English and Spanish.)

Neruda is a twentieth-century Chilean poet who uses imagery that compares nicely with García Márquez's imagery. It is quite interesting to discuss a poem of Neruda's like "I Crave Your Mouth, Your Voice, Your Hair" with One Hundred Years of Solitude.

September, 2001

This Book Discussion Guide was prepared by Emily Rosenbaum, who is a graduate student in English at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

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Magill Book Review of One Hundred Years of Solitude

From Magill Book Review: At the center of this extraordinarily vast yet oddly claustrophobic novel is the Buendia family, whose fortunes--or, more commonly, misfortunes--Garcia Marquez chronicles for the one hundred years of the title and whose story ultimately encapsulates the entire history of mankind, from genesis to apocalypse.

Appropriately, this novel of five generations of Buendias begins with an original sin, the murder of Prudencio Aguilar by the family patriarch, Jose Arcadio Buendia, whose subsequent wanderings lead to the founding of Macondo. The patriarch's vision of Macondo as a city of ice situated in a tropical landscape inimical to man never comes to pass. Instead, the city suffers through an insomnia plague, endless revolutions, exploitation by a banana company (modeled on United Fruit), as well as more familiar disasters, including thwarted ambitions and unrequited love. The novel's central character is not only one family member--not the patriarch enthralled by the wonders of the world beyond Macondo, nor his superstitious yet utterly practical wife Ursula, nor their son, the legendary rebel leader Colonel Aureliano Buendia, nor Remedios, the Beauty who is assumed into heaven while hanging out the wash--but the incestuous family itself, whose history is cyclical, rather than progressive. The same names, personalities, dreams, and failures repeat from generation to generation until both the book and the family come to their fated and sadly lyrical end. Their end is in their beginning, however, in the patriarch's original sin and, as it turns out, in the (for a time) undecipherable parchments on which the gypsy Melquiades has inscribed the lives that the Buendias have been condemned to live.

Condemned to such an end, they are condemned as well to the love which drives them blindly together and to the solitude that is both their worst punishment and their sole refuge. Time eventually destroys them, but in solitude they defeat time, using their memories to recall and so reclaim the past, to savor what once was and, in the savoring, still is. Solitude isolates each of them from the others, but it also leads them to compassionate understanding of one another. The novel's characters share this powerful nostalgia as in their more frenetic moments they share the same dreams, obsessions, and loves.

ONE HUNDRED YEARS OF SOLITUDE is a stylistically extravagant tour de force, at once matter-of-fact and magical. Although much praised as the epitome of postmodernist writing, it is also a deeply compassionate novel in which the exuberant storytelling celebrates man's creative abilities in the face of inevitable catastrophe.

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1. Book Discussion Guide - One Hundred Years of Solitude

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Author Web Sites:

1. Gabriel García Márquez : Features a biography and bibliography of Garcia Marquez.

2. Gabriel García Márquez: Macondo : Provides information about the author and his works, news, reviews, & literary criticism; the author’s Nobel Prize for Literature, including his speech to the Nobel Foundation; links, FAQs, and much more.

Other Contributors:

Rabassa, Gregory: translator

ISBNs Associated with this Title:

0072434236 : Paperback

1570421129 : Cassette - Audio

0060883286 : Paperback

006112009X : Paperback

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• Hennepin County Public Library

• Baker & Taylor

• Magill Book Reviews, published by Salem Press

• Novelist/EBSCO Publishing

• Added to NoveList: 20010101

• TID: 028844

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