Travel Blog

“What brings you back here?” asked the PR person who knew me in my travel editor days. We were standing outside the Media Center in the Fort Lauderdale Convention Center on the second day of Seatrade, the annual meeting of the cruise industry – and everyone connected to it.

“Nostalgia,” I replied.

Yet minutes later, walking through the exhibition hall, I realized it was delight at the international richness, the opportunity to meet people from all over the world. Appreciated when I worked in a newsroom, it is even more valued now that I work at home.

The first person I ran into was a PR woman from Mexico City who took me to see her client from Buenos Aires. A short while later, eating a rye bread canape topped with ham and red cabbage served by a Dane, I got talking to a Norwegian. I congratulated him on his country’s performance in the Olympics and expressed disappointment that he wasn’t wearing the pants of the national curling team. When I asked him where he lived in Norway, he told me “the north.” When I suggested it must be dark and dreary he assured me it wasn’t. “In Oslo in winter you also go to work in the dark and come home in the dark.” The secret, he said, was having the right clothing.

At the Finland-Estonia booth I fell into conversation with a National Park ranger, an American, who works in Glacier Bay National Park in Alaska. He told me that passengers on cruise ships there often never leave the ship, as they can stand on deck and see bears on the beach, orcas in the water. He added that the ships close the casinos while in the park to get people outside.

The folks from the Port of Tampa showed me on the blown-up photograph on the wall of their booth the proposed location of the Rays new ballpark, which is adjacent to Ybor City. If it happens, the citizens of Tampa will be able to take streetcars to games.

In the French pavilion I asked a woman about her president. “He’s OK,” she said, with a Gallic shrug. “But most of my salary goes to paying taxes. I don’t have money for vacation.” She said she takes weekend hikes, with her dog.

I met another French woman, now living in Boca and running D-Day remembrance tours in Normandy. The night before visiting the beaches, she lays out on the bed the uniform that a GI wore; she plays Glen Miller records; she employs old jeeps so people can smell the gasoline. Her tour engages all the senses.

It was nearing 5, so I headed over to Holland for the annual beer-and-cheese social. Walking with my plastic cup, I came upon three men with small orange pins in their lapels that rather resembled ornate pitchforks.

“It’s a tulip,” one of the men informed me. And with that he took his off – it was affixed with Velcro – and stuck it on my lapel.

Across the way I noticed that Victoria, Canada, was having its own small party but with better beer. I downed my Heineken and got a Blue Buck. Back in The Netherlands, I saw a man named de Vries and wanted to ask him if he’d ever read Peter. But so few Americans do, I doubted that a Dutchman would. Instead I struck up a conversation with a pretty young Dutchwoman who, when we started talking about Belgium (she lives near the border), told me to never order “water rabbit” there because it’s what the Belgians call rats on menus. “Lapin de l’eau,” I said, which sounded pretty good – if you like rabbit.