I've Moved My Blog

Please follow my adventures at:
www.dvm2be.blogspot.com

By Train: New York To Connecticut

One thing my sister and I share in common is that we are both readers (neither one of us has ever owned a TV). Above I am reading an article on apoptosis titled "Genetic Control of Programmed Cell Death in the Nematode" (see the little C. elegans in the top right corner of my paper, Dr V?:) Below my sister is taking a break from her reading to check on her daughter. Her paper is on 16th century women's craft production, if I remember correctly. Last week on the train she was reading bell hooks, which is a bit more my speed.

Baby T At The Met: The Ming Gallery

Baby T At The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Above: Big stretch on the changing table. Note the "P is for penguin" shirt, mom loves penguins.
Below: Me and NieceT in the Egyptian gallery.

Below: My sister knew I would love the depictions of birds in the Egyptian gallery (yes, I am that predictable:) but my baby-calming skills failed me once again and I had to hurry through that section. Note to all those who gave advice: in my limited experience, no matter what one does there is little one can do to calm a crying baby who is either hungry or has a dirty diaper. NieceT rarely seems to fuss without a reason so if her diaper isn't dirty and she isn't ready for a nap, then I turn her over to mom for a feeding.

Finally Some Good Yemeni/Yemenite Food & Fond Memories

Above: My sister has no problem reading a menu or eating with her daughter conveniently suspended in a sling.

Below: Tasty Yemeni food:)



Once upon a time (when I was still a teenager), I lived in an insular Yemenite community in Israel. It was an interesting experience-- imagine constantly being referred to as "Ha-Amerikani" (= The American). It would be an understatement to say that I stood out with my light brown hair, fair skin and blue eyes. It would be accurate to say that everyone within twenty blocks knew of my arrival and who I was within 24 hours. (The most common question I got in those first few days was "Who is your husband?" and "Where is your husband?" as no one could quite comprehend why I would be there without a man or that a young woman could move halfway across the world all on her own).

In addition to having an eye-opening cultural experience, improving my Hebrew and learning a fair bit of Arabic, I also became a big fan of Yemenite food, despite a bit of a rough start. My first day in Israel, my host family siblings took advantage of my disorientation (hello jet lag) and poor Hebrew to dupe me into eating a spoonful of schug (mainly ground up hot peppers)-- HARIF (spicy/hot in Hebrew)! I was not amused, despite my penchant for spicy food.

Since then I have often longed to eat a meal of traditional Yemenite food, but alas, no such opportunity has presented itself in California, or even this summer in Washington, DC. Since this is the first time I have spent more than a few hours in New York city, I decided to hunt for a good Yemenite restaurant.

First problem: If you put Yemenite into Yelp or another online restaurant review or guide, it only comes up with Jewish/Israeli Yemenite food. However, Yemeni yields a full set of results.

Second problem: The Yemeni restaurants are in the Brooklyn/Cobble Hill area, quite far from my sister's apartment.

Solution: I decided to try Queen Sheba in Harlem, the only Yemeni restaurant listed outside the main area.

The food was quite good. I had tea, vegetarian shorba, fattah/fateh bread with honey and butter and fasoulia/fassoulia (kidney beans and rice).

I realize that the food I grew accustomed to in Israel is not the regular Yemeni cuisine. For example, the Jewish version of fasoulia is apparently called fasoulia bzait. Who knew?
If I could have any Yemenite food, I would love some jachnun (jachnoon), kubaneh or most of all, matrid. I was able to find recipes for kubaneh and Yemenite chicken soup in The Sephardic Table: The Vibrant Cooking Of The Mediterranean Jews by Pamela Grau Twena, but those are just a few of the recipes I would like to have.

What has eluded me completely, and most frustratingly, is a recipe for a Yemeni yogurt soup that I remember having after my family broke the fast on Yom Kippur and also that my family made for me one time when I was very ill. I could have sworn it was called matrid, but many fruitless searches have turned up nothing under that name. A search for Yemenite yogurt soup on google turns up one recipe for "zom" which sounds similar:

I have no idea why the entire internets haven't generated 1 recipe for yogurt soup. Seriously, this is the best comfort food on earth. spicy, creamy, satisfying. What more could you want? Oh - high in calcium, low in fat.

I make it a bit "by ear" but.. you need this for a single serving:

Zom. Yogurt Soup.

2 cups of nonfat yogurt, fat free is fine, by lowfat is smoother

2 tablespoons of flour

water

some sort of spicey stuff - I like yemenite Schug but I suspect that comes from my historical love of the flavor. I bet other hot sauces would work just fine.

Hunks of bread

Mix water with flour in a small pot on the stove until well blended. Turn on stove to medium. Add in yogurt and stir until the yogurt breaks down into a smooth mix. Add small amounts of water to achieve desired consistency. I like it pretty thick - sort of "potato soup" thick. As the mixture warms, add some spicy sauce, to taste. Continue stirring until you achieve a boil and immediately remove from heat. (It's rather prone to burning, strangely).

Pour into bowl. Dip or submerge hunks of "good bread" in it (like giant fresh croutons). Enjoy.

The book Yemen by Anna Hestler curiously describes "a refreshing green yogurt soup called shafut ("SHA-fuht") made with sour milk mixed with chili beans and herbs, poured over bits of bread." There is also this online recipe for chefout:

• 2 pieces flat bread
• 2 tbsp chopped garlic
• 1/2 cup milk
• 2 cups yogurt
• 1-2 hot chilies (or 2 tbsp canned green chilies)
• 3/4 cup coriander leaves

Directions

1) In a blender, finely chop coriander leaves. Add all other ingredients except bread.

2) Put bite size pieces of bread in a bowl and pour over soup mixture. The bread absorbs the sauce and is refreshing.

And last of all, apparently the recently published Flatbreads and Flavors: A Baker's Atlas by Jeffrey Alford and Naomi Duquid includes a recipe for Yemeni yogurt soup.

I'll have to try some of these recipes out and report back...

Meanwhile, if anyone out there has any suggestions for spicy Yemeni yogurt soup, feel free to post a comment. I imagine getting the flavor and texture right in America is quite challenging, as our dairy products are quite different (and lacking in my humble opinion) compared to the variety and flavors available in the Middle East.

Baby T And Mom On The Bus

Out And About With My Niece

Above: My sister, my niece and me overlooking Harlem :)
Below: I seem to be threatening to throw NieceT out the window if she does not stop fussing...



Above: I'm not quite sure what to do to calm a baby except to lift her higher and higher.
Below: My sister outside her apartment building-- notice no coat, it was a relatively warm day.

Cell Fate, Cell Differentiation & Traveling Again

Above: Me in San Jose, all bundled up in preparation for my marathon trip to Cornell. I flew from San Jose, CA to Phoenix, AZ to Charlotte, NC to Philadelphia, PA to Ithaca, NY. It took me almost 24 hours due to delays.

Below: Me in front of the puddle jumper I took in and back from Ithaca. It was a 35-seater. The Thursday that I flew into Ithaca was extremely windy and both my flight into Philadelphia, on a much larger plane, and into Ithaca were pretty bumpy. Oddly enough, I did not feel in the least bit scared or nauseous. It might have had something to do with all the benadryl I took on the overnight flight to Charlotte. I remember thinking groggily, "Oh, a free roller coaster ride." But on that same Thursday a similar, slightly larger propellor plane crashed on the way to Buffalo-- probably due to the high winds-- so everyone in my family who knew where I was got a little worried. As it turns out, my flight was the last flight into Ithaca due to the wind so I was lucky to get there.


Below: Me on the commons in Ithaca. A nice couple was friendly enough to let me hold their 7-week old puppy. Can you tell I am happy after my three days touring the veterinary school?


Although I have done lots of journaling lately, it's been awhile since I've updated this blog. I've been pretty busy, with what it's hard to even remember. As most of you know, the most exciting news in my life is that I got accepted to Cornell's veterinary school. I am thrilled beyond belief (literally-- it took a full week for it to sink in that this was really happening to me after all the time I had dreamed of it). This weekend I went to visit the school. I loved it.

For so long I have worried and wondered about my career path. I wrote in a post this fall:

I was nervous of course, dreading what I call "terminal differentiation" (which is something I picked up in a biology class, meaning when a cell becomes so specialized it can no longer be anything else; the cell loses the ability to change course, reverse direction, perform another function in the body-- the term appealed to me because it sounds so harsh, which is how I feel about specialization). But I knew I couldn't stay a pluripotent stem cell forever...

However, I think I know what my path will be. I am now comfortable differentiating, specializing. I know my cell fate. Finally.

And now, I am enjoying a short trip to New York city, to be followed by a visit to Aunt K in Connecticut. Then, it is back to California, where I will immediately get on the road to Davis to tour the veterinary school there.

I am traveling again. On the plane I could hear Dar Williams' song by the same title in my head:

Have I got everything? Am I ready to go?
Is it going to be wild? Is it gonna be the best time?
Or am I just saying s-o-o-o? Am I ready to go?

And I'm afraid, oh, was there any good reason to go
When all I know is I can never come back

I Ran My First Half Marathon Today

Here I am grinning ear to ear, perched above the town of Pacifica, after running my first half marathon this morning.

I didn't actually wake up this morning intending to run a half marathon. I had switched my registration from the 21k to the 9k after hearing from a number of runners that the Pacifica PC trail run is a very difficult course. But on the car ride to the race, the other runners that I was carpooling with strong-armed me into running the 21k. So I set out to do my first half marathon. (Note to self: Be careful who you carpool with. But in all seriousness, despite being much better runners than me the other three were very supportive, coaching me and making me drink water and eat even though I didn't feel like it).

It was indeed a very challenging course. The first 6 k was completely uphill, with the 1700 foot ascent culminating at the top of North Peak. Then it was back downhill on the same treacherously rocky trail. I did twist my ankle at the bottom, but it wasn't too bad and I kept going. Thinking I had the hard part of the run behind me, I set out on what I thought would be a short 9k loop after eating some oranges and PB&J squares at the aid station. The next part of the race was killer. We did a short uphill then a really long uphill that was just endless switchbacks, until we reached an elevation of 850 ft (making the total elevation for this run over 2500 ft!). The downhill back to the finish was shorter, but by that point even it seemed long to me.

I now have a better feeling for the exhaustion long distance runners experience. And it was a humbling experience, as I placed 25th in my age group and in the bottom half of the 21k finishers overall.

Still, another beautiful day spent outside on beautiful trails is a blessing. So far I've done an 8k at Rodeo Beach, a 5 mile Resolution Run on New Year's day in Los Gatos, a 16k at Angel Island and today the 21k at Pacifica. Next up is the San Francisco half marathon Feb 1 which promises to be much flatter!

A Picture Perfect Pacific Coast Trail Run On Angel Island

Above: I'm jubilant that I reached the summit on Angel Island without walking at all-- though I did jog in place for a few photo opportunities.

This morning I ran a 16 kilometer Pacific Coast trail run on Angel Island. It was what my Aunt K would call a "sparkling day."

The views were absolutely stunning-- all three bridges and San Francisco.

Below are some views of Tiburon in the foreground and Mill valley in the background:



And here is a view of Alcatraz in the foreground with San Francisco in the background, and below a photo of me with my BerekelyRunningPartner and the Golden Gate bridge behind us:



And then some more of me-- me in the morning, on the ferry in Tiburon, leaving for Angel Island. Me on the run with Tiburon and Mill valley behind me. Me and BerkeleyRunningPartner stretching out after the run:




This is one of those days when I feel lucky to be alive and immensely grateful to be healthy and able to enjoy running. The views were heartbreakingly beautiful and the good cheer of the other runners bouyed my spirits when I was tired. I'm grateful to have all these photos to remember them by.

I Can Now Say I Have Tried Lesbian Speed Dating

I imagine some of you have been waiting with bated breath to hear about my lesbian speed dating experience. So here goes...

The event was held at a Mexican restaurant/club/lounge near the SF MOMA. It was a small place, there were 16 women participating. Mostly in their twenties, one or two older (that's including me folks, I am 30 after all). I was pleased to see that not everyone was white, there was a good mix, at least one third of the women there were African-American. Range in education from community college to graduate school. Dressed from casual (jeans and a sweatshirt) to dressy (me and a few others). Some who grew up in the Bay area, others from the East coast or the South.

I don't want to write anything personal about any of the people I met just out of respect for their privacy on the small world of the internet. I found most people very easy to talk to (for all of three minutes before the bell rang). Typical questions were:

• What kinds of things do you like to do for fun? (Me: Run, read, swim)
• What kind of work do you do? (Me: Veterinary nurse in an emergency room. I don't know if it is how I said this or if people are actually impressed but lots of people reacted with strong admiration. I realized that out of the group I was one of the people who was most passionate about her job. I feel so lucky to have a job that I love. The only other people I spoke to who loved their jobs were the teachers-- there was more than one PE teacher there.)
• Where did you grow up?
• Where did you go to school?
• Do you live alone? Who do you live with?
• What type of women are you attracted to? (Which inevitably led into a discussion of butch/femme and how that didn't describe anyone perfectly. The most interesting tidbit I picked up was from a woman who had just come back from spending six months in Beijing, where apparently the scene is still heavily into butch/femme and butch women are called "T's" and femme woman are called "P's." I was pleasantly surprised that most of the women at the event were on the femme side of the spectrum, though as always I was one of the most feminine of the whole bunch)

I'm not dying to date, I'm happy single and I'm super busy so I don't even know when I would have time to date, but I checked off my secret scorecard showing interest in a few women that I liked so if they checked me off on their scorecards then I will get an email informing me of a match and I can follow it up from there. I did have one woman ask me for my number outright and I gave it to her, though I think she is a bit more into the bar scene than me, and I gave my email to one other woman who was fun to talk to and interested in meeting more gay women in the South bay as well as a potential running partner.

I went into it viewing it as a combination of an adventure and an anthropological investigation of speed dating among lesbians. Also, I view any group setting as good practice at improving my social skills.

I came out of it having gotten a boost in confidence. I did just fine talking to a whole bunch of strangers, I enjoyed it and didn't feel awkward or shy, just happy and curious to meet new people. It helped that I got some positive attention and feedback too. What I'm hoping for is not so much a relationship, but a new friend or two, and I think that there is a good chance that will happen.

After the speed dating, I stopped by work and posed for photos with Muscles and LaMexicana. Muscles then obligingly took some very nice candid photos of me. He is a talented photographer. In case you are wondering, the dog in the photo is LaMexicana's pooch, previously featured on this blog, Frida (Not Kahlo).

Come Back, My Readers, I'll Try Anew

So I've gotten several concerned emails about my lack of posts. I am alive and well, thank you :)
I'm still busy settling into my new place. And though I have been writing (those of you who know me well know that writing is a bit of a compulsion for me), it has been too private to post publicly.

Now that I am so far behind a synopsis of the past few weeks seems overwhelming. I may tackle that when I am more rested and have more time. Today I will just give you a brief history of my day.

I woke up early and sat through four hours of calculus class. It was not the most interesting part of my day because I have already had calclulus with a fabulous teacher, back in high school (and why am I taking it again? long story!). Then I went to the saltwater pool in Menlo Park (a gem of a find) and swam 160 plus laps in the unheated, outdoor pool (water temp in the high '60s, brisk but pleasantly cool and not frigid).

Though I have been rather dismayed by the amount of stuff I have accumulated in the last four months that I am forced to confront in the process of moving, I have continued to purchase things. Tidbits: I finally caved and bought a hat, since I didn't own one, something my running partner in Berkeley found hard to believe (we'll call her LongDistanceRunnerMom). I also bought my first purse (in a thrift store for $4).

Weirdest thing that I moved: a 12 pound butternut squash that was in my closet that I plan to turn into soup sometime this week. I got it at a bargain at closing at the farmers' market awhile back.

I want to publicly thank Sunshine for her help with my move. She is a good friend. It is the first move I have done in years where I had someone to help me. Also another kind nurse (who I think of as StableSaneNurse) helped me move my bed.

I will try to keep up with this a bit more, though forgive me, the last two weeks there have only been two nights where I have gotten more than four hours of sleep.

One last update: I got on the list for the second lesbian speed dating event in San Francisco this Thursday. Wish me luck!