This is another story that, for some reason, is very successful. I don’t know if you noticed, folks, but I’m good at telling stories. I can’t make them up because I have no imagination but I can tell them well if they happened to me or I heard them somewhere.

There was this old-fashioned rotisserie in Montreal that had existed for many years. It was located in an area where new restaurants were springing up every day. The rent was high, and it was getting very hard for a place that served boring rotisserie chicken to a dwindling elderly clientele who came there for old time’s sake to survive.

This was why the owners if the rotisserie signed a contract with Gordon Ramsay. The world-famous chef (whom I absolutely adore so don’t even consider saying anything bad about him) had been planning to expand his business to Montreal for a while. He gave the rotisserie his name, some of his famous recipes, and his notoriously great personnel-training practices.

Montreal’s foodies are spoiled by the abundance of great restaurants. Still, Gordon Ramsay’s name was enough to attract them in droves to the rotisserie. The profits soared. And this was when the rotisserie’s owners demonstrated that there are blockheads of the worst order even in Montreal.

“Look how great we are doing,” they thought. “Why should we give a huge chunk of our profits to this Ramsay fellow? We are popular and people love us.”

It somehow didn’t occur to them that the popularity and the profits appeared only after they put Gordon Ramsay’s name in front of the entrance and his food on the table.

So they made Ramsay leave and take away his food, service, and fame. The rotisserie went back to serving its traditional roasted chicken that is notorious for how dry it is. The droves of customers disappeared and, once again, the place is struggling to survive.

Contrary to what I expected, my online course is proving to be a lot of fun. Since students get to express themselves a lot more, they come up with all sorts of interesting stuff. This is a question one of the students came up with:

Reading about the epidemic of the Bubonic plague that killed about 1/3 of all people in Europe within just a few years in 1300s made me wonder: what would happen if our society experienced something like that? Would we also react with growing religious intolerance, fear, hatred, pogroms, etc.? We like to see ourselves as better than the Medieval people. Would we act any differently in case of this kind of tragedy?

What do you think?

David Bellamy sent me a very interesting article which is written in the form of a letter addressed to girls. Here are some excerpts from it [emphasis mine]:

You may not “naturally” be interested in domesticity, piety, purity and submission, and they rely on your commitment to those things to order their worlds. Their actions, from one end of the spectrum to the other, are designed to fill you with self-doubt and, ultimately, fear — either bodily or spiritual — because otherwise you, and the young boys around you, will be fully aware of your strength and potential.

Because of this, they single-mindedly focus their attention on you, your body, your clothes, your hair, your abilities, your physical freedom. When their “manners” and “morals” are not universally applicable, but different for boys and girls, you can be sure that this is why. They seek to teach you, subtly, through small slights and gendered expectations, that you are “different,” weak, unworthy, incapable. The sadness is that, in their perception, if you are none of these things, then they are not strong, worthy and capable.

In the article, “they” stand for religious men. However, when every single one of the things listed here was done to me, it was not done by religious men. It was done by women who had no knowledge of or interest in any religion. Nor was it done to please or serve any man like the article suggests.

I’m not denying that patriarchally minded men, whether religious or not (religion is as relevant here as is their hair color*), do a lot to keep the traditional gender structures in place. There is, however, the exact same number of women who benefit greatly from those patriarchal structures. Such women see any female who subverts the patriarchy with any aspect of her personality or behavior as an existential threat. I insist that I have not met a single man who has condemned me and vilified me nearly as much for my professional and financial success and sexual freedom as my female friends, relatives, colleagues, and acquaintances. Contrary to what the article suggests, when men did that, it was always a half-hearted attempt to please women. Of course, other people have different stories. But this is my story, and I want it to count as much as anybody else’s.

I know that it is tempting to assign an easily identifiable enemy one can blame for one’s marginalization. Blame it all on religious men, what can be easier or more attractive?

Things are more complex than that, though. People who maintain and impose strictly defined, traditional gender roles are people who benefit from the patriarchal mode of existence. Those people can be male, female, religious, non-religious. The patriarchy is not a system that oppresses women. It is a system that oppresses people who can’t or won’t conform to traditional gender roles. The patriarchy is not a system that is upheld by men. It is upheld by people who benefit from the existence of traditional gender roles.

* I grew up in a fully atheist country where being a victim of rape was the most shameful thing you can be and got you shamed and vilified by everybody, where every other woman was a victim of sexual violence, where women who had sex outside of marriage were referred to as “damaged goods” and often brutalized by their family members, where raping a completely sexually ignorant woman on her wedding night was the most normal thing to do. So tell me once more how religion causes hateful attitudes towards women. Remember, we are talking about a society that had been atheist for generations and the real people whose stories I described here (as well as their parents, grandparents and great-grandparents) never even saw the Bible, the Torah or the Koran or visited a religious service.

The only people who have a chance of creating an intensely happy relationship are those who enjoy living alone and dig being single. Those who are terrified of singlehood will, in all likelihood, end up in miserable relationships. Such people never manage to end unhappy relationships and can never move on because the fear of being single makes them cling to something that clearly doesn’t work.

“But what if there is nobody better out there?” is the pathetic motto of such people’s lives.

A person who digs being single has an answer to that, “Then I just go on being happily single. Yippee-doo!”

If a happily single person meets somebody s/he likes, s/he will find it easy to defend his or her interests and boundaries. The fear of “what if I say / do / choose whatever I want and get dumped for that?” is simply not there because there is no value in being in a relationship for the sake of it. Only a happy, fulfilling relationship that is good enough to convince the lover of singlehood to abandon the contented single existence will be acceptable.

Of course, if you cannot be happy living with just yourself, then how do you expect anybody else to be happy living with you?

Reader Z asks:

Seriously though – can someone who likes all inclusive explain why? I think I would get claustrophobic. I´m all for not cooking but do not understand the attraction of the all inclusive concept.

As a huge fan of all-inclusive resorts, I can say the following:

An all-inclusive resort is my favorite kind of vacation. I don’t have to do anything, except lie on the beach drooling. It’s total relaxation because everything is resolved and done for you. There is also a very well-defined rhythm and a clear structure to life at such a resort. Chaotic environments (which, of necessity, accompany any kind of a more active vacation) make me very tired. I can only feel rested within a rigidly repetitive and structured framework. If you think about what my life has been since its very early stages, you’ll understand where this comes from (fall of the USSR, 100% a day inflation, bandit wars, multiple changes of the entire currency system, entrance into capitalism, emigration, immediate divorce and becoming a de facto guardian of a teenager on the day of the divorce, poverty, living between two countries for 5 years, a long-distance relationship, another emigration, packing and moving many times, traveling between countries every two months.)

People say, “What’s the point of a vacation where you don’t learn or see anything new?” I have to say, folks, after all of this change I’ve experienced and witnessed, I’m really into giving myself a couple of weeks a year simply to digest all of it without having any new information come my way.

There is nothing like this a Caribbean all-inclusive resort in the US, unfortunately. Every vacation involves either renting a car or staying in a city which is not at all relaxing. I find that only complete inactivity really helps me rest.

Last summer we had a great vacation in Florida, but:

1. There were only 2 restaurants with eatable food within the walking distance. And only one of them requested formal attire. A resort has 10 and they all insist people dress formally for dinner.

2. There were cars streaming behind our backs as we sat on the beach. This is hardly relaxing. And the need to inhale noxious fumes as one sits on the beach is very annoying. Plus there was a construction going on close to our hotel, and we kept hearing construction site noises.

These are grave defects.

And to people who want to giggle at my love for this type of vacation (I don’t mean reader Z, I mean other people who know who they are), I can only say that I wish you were at least 20% as self-aware as I am and as capable of creating restful environments for yourself that would be based on your psychological makeup and personality type.

Obviously, this is not a vacation for everybody. But people who have lived their lives in the state of constant upheaval and insecurity are perfectly suited for it.

I also want to say to any well-meaning fool who is likely to blabber about the “exploitation” of 3rd World people. Do that on my blog, and this 3rd World person who has no time for your ridiculous self-aggrandizement at the expense of 3rd World people will bite your head off.

We are a family of weirdos of the first order. If you thought I was weird, listen to this true story about N.

I make lunch for him to take to work every day except Friday. On Friday, the company orders takeout for all employees and they share a meal. Every time they try to choose a new restaurant.

N. never asks for the menu when he orders his Friday lunch. He likes to be surprised. So he enters the names of every employee in the company (it’s not a large company) into a program that assigns random numbers to their names. Then, he chooses a colleague who has been randomly assigned the greatest number and orders the same food as s/he does.

Is that the weirdest way to order food or what? To me, this sounds especially strange because, as a Ukrainian, I have a famine complex and the idea of relinquishing control over my food is terrifying.

Dear readers,

there has been a spam attack on this blog. For the past 2 days, spammers have sent over 1,000 comments to this single inoffensive post. I have no idea what about this particular post is so attractive to them. As a result, the spam filter on the blog is overworked and it sometimes erroneously places good comments into the Spambox. Since these spam comments are so numerous, it takes me a while to rescue good comments from the spam.

I apologize for the inconvenience and hope that this spam attack is over soon.

Some reviews of resorts are simply mystifying. Take this one, for example:

With the resort being so huge, you have a variety of choice of what type of vacation you want to have, the swim up pools offer a quite and almost private environment, the main pool offers a quite but more public venu, the beach speaks for itself and if you want a more vibrant and active area you can go to one of the many other pools located throughout the resort.

The “beach speaks for itself” part is very mysterious. I’m glad it speaks, but what does it say, exactly? I’d really like to know since the beach is pretty much the entire reason we even go to a resort (unlike the weirdos who go all the way to Punta Cana to sit in a chlorinated swimming pool).

From a review of a resort in Punta Cana:

The gym was sad. It needs major renovations. I like to work out on vacation but this gym should be closed down. The attendant was useless and walk around outside the gym area most of the time.

The most fascinating people of all are the ones who pay a boatload of money to come to a resort and, instead of playing volleyball and running on the beach, swimming, diving, snorkeling, deep sea fishing, parasailing and doing all the other athletic things the resort offers, choose to go INDOORS to run on a TREADMILL in an air-conditioned environment. Because, obviously, they don’t have the same gym with the same treadmill and the same AC back home in Indiana.

My favorite athletic activities at a resort are swimming, table tennis, and dance classes on the beach. There is also this great activity where you can play chess on the beach with huge chess pieces that you have to lift and carry in your arms. This activity exercises both the brain and the body. But I tend to lose all of my chess games before the 4th move, so it doesn’t work for me. My sister, however, is a brilliant chess player.

Since N. and I first met five years ago, it has been our dream to go to a beach resort in the Caribbean. He’s never been and I’ve traveled quite a few times, always hoping that one day I’d meet a man who’d be special enough for me to want to share my vacation with him. As soon as I met N., it became clear that he was plenty special. There was only one problem: he was in the US in a student visa and people with his passport (Russian) tend to have trouble coming back into the country. Obviously, we didn’t want to take the risk of having them denied the chance to return.

For five years, we’ve been telling each other stories of what a great time we would have on that Caribbean resort once we finally get there. And now that our papers have arrived, we can go. Of course, I want it to be the kind of a resort that will not disappoint hopes we’ve entertained for all these years.

Choosing a resort can be weary work. On the positive side, the reviews one finds are hugely entertaining. Here are some that I want to share with you (mind you, I didn’t change a single letter in them):

“There is one thing that bugged me at the RST and it is the fact that most of the staff (there were some nice ones) look bored and just didn’t look like they cared. We don’t need much out of a resort and don’t ask for anything special but when we are spending good money for weekly winter vacation we at least want to see a couple of smiles… I tried everything: jokes, extra tips, extra extra extra thank you’s and smiles…nope…I got the bored face most of the time. ” – Well, have you considered that maybe you are a boring person, lady? Maybe your jokes are not funny (or incomprehensible to Spanish-speakers) and your attempts to buy smiles with tips are non-inspiring.

“Let’s get one thing straight. No matter where you eat, it’s not like eating at Hy’s or Ruth’s Chris. But for the Dominican, food here was top rate.” People who travel to foreign countries in search of the same kind of boring food they can get at the neighboring chain steakhouse are a mystery to me. I remember reading a review where a tourist scoured the world in search of food that would equal in quality that which is served at the Outback Steakhouse. The world disappointed him, so he was happy to go back home to Buffalo.

“Yeah you get a butler in your building. It’s not really a butler though, it’s more of a concierge. If you want to make a reservation you make it through this person. They’re not going to fold your underwear so lower your expectations.” Some people have watched too much Wooster and Jeeves, it seems.

“For all those people that say the people here do not speak english,well i found that they tried there hardist and for most part understood what you were saying after all you are in a differant country I would like to give a little shout out to our butlers Andy and Mickey for being there when we needed them and Tomas the lobby guy they were great.” The saddest part is that many of the American tourists don;t speak their only language either.

“Who knows what’s behind the walls of a building built in the DR.” I know! Bored Dominican butlers who don’t fold underwear are lurking there.

“Having observed some of these chairs to remain empty for hours on end, it would be nice to see some policing of unused chairs so others can use them. ” I can imagine that brave Dominican who will dare to police the tourists. Yeah, right.

“I laughed at the fact that I have a few pair of very nice shorts and could not wear them to most restaurants but saw many pairs of worn and torn jeans that were ok. I have been in many, much better restaurants in southern Florida that have no problem with patrons wearing shorts.” Then go back to Florida where you can expose people to the sight of your ugly hairy legs, knobby knees, and dirty feet with peeling heels while they are eating! It is extremely aggravating to me hear people bitch about the horrible inconvenience of dressing in normal clothes every once in a while. People over the age of 18 who wear shorts in any context other than the beach are incomprehensible to me. One of the things that attracted me to the resort I’m considering is that every a la carte restaurant there insists on formal attire. For the lovers of eating in their beach towels and swimsuits, there is always the buffet. I want to dress nicely for dinner and see well-dressed people around me.

And if you are wondering why I say that reading these reviews can be tiresome, see the following: “The grounds of this resort are well kept the grouds crew are always working hard to keep it beautiful.The srevice at this place was good.It seemed everyone went out of there way to help you with your needs.One day were walking back from lunch and Tomas was going buy on a golf cart and stopped to see if we needed a ride.” Almost all of them are written this way. I get a headache after spending 15 minutes deciphering them.