Shipping up to Boston: Me and a Quick Trip to Beantown.
All of a sudden, and somewhat by accident, I’ve fallen into that strangely ambivalent life of the “business traveler.” Right now, I am hunched over my laptop in the lobby of a rather elegant hotel, which is listed as ‘expensive’ in my guidebook to Boston. Being more of a Lonely Planet on a budget girl myself, this is not a world I’m used to.
Oddly
mixed sets of people mill back and forth, like extras on the
set of an Alfred Hitchcock movie. Uncomfortably thrown together
conference attendees, be-suited men, nursing brightly colored messenger
bags on shoulders, and brightly made up female work colleagues on arms,
traveling in packs. English accents, carefully arranged gray hair,
overcoats draped Mafia style, laughing a little too loudly, too
politely. And doubtless enjoying the fact that they are on vacation
from their wives for a few days, all expenses covered, all bets off.
It’s strangely enticing, this limbo, with its swirling Persian carpets,
shiny marble floors and ridiculously ostentatious crystal heavy
chandeliers. Not to mention the pianist, tinkering away with his
inoffensive cocktail tunes in the background - presumably to offset the
harshness of (god forbid) silence in this huge hangar-like space.
My first ever work trip was to a conference in Philadelphia, a few years ago and the experience was somewhat different. Our office manager had been charged with the task of booking accommodation and keeping costs to a minimum. My boss and I arrived at the train station on a clear summer morning and jumped in a cab, assuming that we would be spirited downtown, to a clean but serviceable and hopefully convenient hotel. Instead, the taxi swung around and hit the highway. The Philadelphia cityscape got smaller as we twisted to stare out the back of the car window in growing panic. It wasn’t looking good. 50 minutes later, the taxi pulled up in front of a motel. At least, I think it was a motel, although it might well have been a half way house for violent offenders, or perhaps, even, for the criminally insane, lately released from a nearby mental institution.
A forty-something woman staggered out the front door, muttering obscenities. She was gamely dressed in a faux leather mini-skirt and ripped fishnet stockings, cigarette hanging out of a thickly lipsticked mouth and a wild, glazed look in her eye. We ventured inside, somewhat warily. The foyer was infused with the aroma of stale tobacco, burnt coffee, old sweat and alcohol.
On one of the tattered sofas was a heavy set and heavily tattooed biker who might have been a bounty hunter and probably answered to the name of Earl. An elderly woman sat across from him, rocking back and forth and engaged in a very animated conversation with at least one invisible friend beside her. Earl hacked enthusiastically in between blowing gum bubbles and stared menacingly as we walked up to the reception desk, which was safely located behind three inches of bullet-proof glass. All communication with the desk clerk had to be done through a microphone. He didn’t speak much, if any, English. Propped on the table were photos of room upgrades available. For an additional $25, the “Deluxe Honeymoon Suite” offered a giant plastic Jacuzzi – happily situated just two feet away from the King Size Bed.
We checked in, and my boss promptly disappeared to his room to call the office and organize an urgent relocation to the safety of a hotel in town the next day. “Assuming we make it out of here alive, that is,” he said cheerfully. I found my room, took note of a bullet hole in one of the walls, sat down on the bed and wept.
Needless to say, I much preferred Boston to Philadelphia. Especially
because the hotel was just a block or two away from Newbury Street,
which is like a little Madison Avenue: Chanel, Hermes and Burberry stores
lined the sidewalks together with 18th century churches, wine-bars and
restaurants. The hookers and bounty hunters, if any, were discreet and
probably dressed better than I was.
An idyllic Sunday afternoon was spent wandering around the JFK Library
and Museum in Dorchester. Housed in a sharply modern building,
surrounded by a ten acre park overlooking the ocean, this was absolute
heaven for a JFK nut like me.
The museum tour covered all aspects of
President Kennedy’s life, captured in time with television and audio
clips from his nomination at the Democratic Convention, the
Inauguration and the White House years. There were exhibits on the
Cuban Missile Crisis, the Peace Corps, the Civil Rights movement
together with a replica of the Oval Office.
I practically fell on both
knees at the sight of the carved wooden desk, made so famous by the photograph of a young JFK Jr. peeping through the inbuilt door at the
front. Several minutes were spent, frozen in time, hand on heart,
gazing upon it in awe. “To think, to think he actually sat there” was
all I could say to the bemused, bespectacled pensioner beside me. The
historic significance of being so close to such an iconic piece of
furniture left me quite spellbound and breathless. Until I read the note on the side explaining that it was a mere replica, not the real thing at
all.
Feeling unreasonably cheated, I progressed onwards to “Jackie
Kennedy Entertains: The Art of the White House Dinner” - one of
the main reasons for my day trip in the first place. This exhibit included
handwritten memos and notes written by the First Lady to her staff,
(deliberating, anxiously, over napkin and table cloth colors), seating
plans, flower arrangements and menus, along with lots of photographs,
newspaper clippings and even some of the evening gowns she wore to
various parties. On one such occasion, November 13, 1961 the famed
cellist Pablo Casals performed at the White House in honor of the
Governor of Puerto Rico – this was an historic coup for Jackie, as he
had always refused to play in the United States after the government
recognized the regime of General Franco in his native country of Spain.
The last part of the tour focused on that ill-fated trip to Dallas, simply relayed on three black and white televisions. Two minutes into the news coverage, my emotions took right over. "Such a sad day for America, such a sad day for the world," I said to my pensioner friend, wiping tears, and mascara, from my eyes, the only non-American in the room. He shifted nervously a few steps to the right and quietly told his wife to turn around and keep walking.
The World Series was on while I was in Boston, so it was all about the Red
Sox and very difficult not to get swept up in the citywide frenzy. Not
knowing the first thing about the game, I did a little reading and
learned about the Curse of the Bambino, the delight of the 2004 World
Series victory after 86 years of defeat not to mention the intense
rivalry that has developed with New York over the past few decades.
Always a fan of the underdog, I promptly fell in love, deciding that
baseball is now my favorite American sport and the Red Sox were now my
favorite American team. A fact that has not been well received by my
Yankee supporting friends back home, some of whom told me (1) I may as
well just stay in Boston and (2) never, ever to call them again. While
I did consider buying myself a Red Sox cap, I thought better, knowing
that riots would likely ensue if worn anywhere south of Massachusetts.
