Our family had to take separate vacations this year. While my husband and son went to Sardinia, our daughter and I opted for a completely different type of vacation.

Theirs, on Sardinia, is in a self-catering vacation apartment. To get around the island, my husband booked a rental car.

Margo and I enjoy All-inclusive this year, with a paid driver on the side.

On Sardinia, the temperature is a decent 27° (80 F). Where we are, the temp is hovering at 35° (95 F) for today, with 38° C – 40°C (100 F – 104 F) in the forecast for tomorrow. We have a nice view onto a beautiful park stacked with flowers and lounge chairs. There is an in-door pool and we are getting spoiled by room service versus the regular line-up at the buffet.

The staff is very kind and it makes me wonder if they had to go through a U.S. American customer-service training. We are being greeted every time we step in and out of the elevator. Doors are being held open for us. Special requests are delivered promptly.

And – I have never met so many men in my life. This place is just swarming with guys, suntanned from their extended stays. Margo has her own room boy, who takes her out for leisurely strolls.

In the hallway, there is a special room with only an ice-machine in it. We can help ourselves to ice at any time!

The other guests are extremely nice and kind, too. We open each others doors  as the staff is setting a supreme example. Meeting new guests is made very easy and we freely talk about how we ended up in this location.

We arrived by car. Special guests arrive by helicopter.

80% of the guests are male, ranging from young men to senior citizens. Everybody is so kind and helpful – I doubt it could be any better in a 5-star hotel.

Curious now  where we are spending our vacation?

We are having a lovely time at the Berufsgenossenschaftliche Unfallklinik (BGU) a.k.a. Workmen’s Emergency Clinic in Frankfurt.

Due to our daughter’s injury at school three days before the planned family holiday, we ended up here.

By the way, her knee surgery (avulsion fracture, torn ligaments) went well and we just learned we are booked for another five days with the ever remaining option for another extension.

Thinking about traveling somewhere on 01 May 2010? If you do and you live in the Taunus area, then either leave home early on Saturday, 01 May Tag der Arbeit (Labor Day) or check the bike race route beforehand as 01 May  is the big day of the Frankfurt/Taunus bike race.

Until 2008 it was called Henninger Turm Radrennen, but then sponsorship changed. These days it is called Rund um den Finanzplatz Eschborn-Frankfurt.

Throughout the years I have heard of several expat families, trying to leave for a short get-away to Paris or Keukenhof, getting stuck for hours as roads are blocked. The bikes go through pretty quickly, but the road block set-up by the police takes time.

One year we got stuck as the first car to be held back by the road block and we had to wait in front of the U-Bahn tracks with many other cars lining up behind us. What usually would have been a one-hour wait turned into two and a half hours. Well, we were the first car in line and got hit by a passing police motorcyclist. Of course, he could not investigate the accident himself and had to call his colleagues. They in turn took a bit longer to get through – as there was a bike race – and finally a report was made. Our little one got to sit in the police car for a couple of minutes, but by then, when all was done, I was just ready to go home again.

Expats, unfamiliar with this event, might reconsider their travel plans. Leave earlier (8 a.m. seems a safe time for me to recommend, no matter where your residence is on the route), or take an earlier train to the airport, etc.  Inquire at your local police station for the time your route is blocked.

I hope this post saves you some time and trouble.

Ocean glass, also known as sea glass or mermaids’ tears, can be found on most beaches. These are glass shards, which sharp edges got smoothed over the years by getting tumbled in water and sand. Their once shiny glass surface becomes frosted-looking after so many years.

For the past six or seven years I have brought back mermaids’ tears from our annual holiday vacations in places such as Virginia/USA, Croatia, Japan, Faroe Islands, Crete, the Azores, and the most recent one, Sicily.

I have always put them in a glass jar, and had one of my children label it (location and date). Over the years, I have come to learn a bit more about these pretty pebbles. As I usually add a couple of stones, snails, shells, etc. to the jar, each jar has taken on its own life in color, smell, and drinking culture.

By far, the Crete jar is smelling the strongest. One dip with the nose and your senses transport you to where the fishing boots are coming in.

The Faroe Islands jar contains mostly brown mermaids’ tears, which reflects their tendency to drink more beer from brown bottles in the Northern European countries.

The most beautiful mermaids’ tears, and best find so far,  are from the Sicilian island of Favignana. This was truly mermaids’ tears heaven as there were so many everywhere and it became clear that beach-combing was not a popular activity on this windy island (snorkeling is, I believe).

A good mermaids’ tear takes between 15 and 60 years of being tumbled around in the ocean. Some beaches might offer mostly premature ones (five-year old glass shards), while others, such as the beaches of  Favignana  offered many overly weathered, hence the most beautiful sea glass. Favignana also offered more white ones than other locations.

Ocean glass floating in the sky

Another thing I learned – while you ask your son to hold up the glass, make sure he does not have an itchy nose. A few tumbled over the fourth floor balcony, a few shattered on the floor. These mermaids’ tears still break like regular glass.

Besides putting them in a jar, you could also try your hands at making jewelry. For a few ideas, visit these websites:

Tears from the Deep and West Coast Sea Glass

The term mermaids’ tears itself is often also referred to in a negative way -  plastic polluting the oceans.

Americans traveling with Ryanair: Make sure your boarding pass gets stamped.

Ryanair: Get a suggestion box

I was just about to send a suggestion by e-mail to Ryanair, but after 30 minutes of searching for such a connection, I have given up. All they give on their website is a postal address for Complaints, Cancellation and Delay Complaints, and Refunds.

Mine does not address any one of them. I wanted to send a suggestion to help improve their services as we had just used the airline ten days ago.

The upshot is I cannot contact anyone unless I put it under complaints, (or any of the above) and this is not my intention. This good intention seems to be turning into a complaint after all…

Here goes the e-mail I do not get to send:

Reference No. AG7CNE

Trapani – Frankfurt

Passenger names:______

To customer service,

On 07 April, our five- family member group boarded a flight from Trapani to Frankfurt with your airline. My husband, the only American in our group, was held back by a flight attendant. The rest of us proceeded to take our seats and I could only look back to see my husband being escorted of the plane when it seemed ready for take-off.

He was given no chance to inform his family of where he was being taken to and for what reasons. I watched him being escorted across the airfield and had to wonder why. As we were one of the last ones to board, this gave me reason for anxiety. I tried to work my way up front to inquire, but it was difficult with the very last passengers coming down the aisle.

Why was he taken without the staff inquiring whether he was traveling with someone? Why were his flight companions (wife and children) not informed by a flight attendant? If they thought it was standard procedure, it surely was not standard for us to see my husband being taken off the plane without a reason.

We found out later, after he got on board as the very last passenger, that he had been missing a certain stamp on his boarding pass. At the luggage check-in, the clerk had failed to stamp his boarding ticket and we now know that Americans need this extra stamp.

My suggestion: Please inform your staff to insure that the escorted passenger’s remaining party is informed of the reason. These questions might help:

“Are you traveling alone?”

“If you travel with company, please point them out, so we can inform them that this is just a matter of routine.” (for Americans who did not get that extra stamp on their boarding pass)

I can see how somebody forgot to him him this stamp. No problem. But for all of us staring out the window to see when/if my husband is coming back at all, was a bit too much. Ryanair staff needs to learn to communicate.

or where to do your next shopping.

One of my friends, an expat living in Lagos, Nigeria, took these photos when he went to the market. At first glance, I was struck by the colors and they reminded me of a Thanksgiving arrangement. On second glance, I realized the tables were set with skulls, tortoise shells, and other mostly unidentifiable objects.

Voodoo market in Nigeria

Voodoo items are in popular demand.

Voodoo is used in many different ways for target management. For example, some madams in Benin City apply voodoo pressure to families with pretty daughters. Then these girls get sold off as prostitutes to Europe.

I guess, business is business. In Eastern Europe, they promise the girls a better life before being sold to a pimp in Frankfurt.

Voodoo market visitor

My oh my -  would this be a rat looking for leftovers?

I found these photos fascinating and worth sharing here on my travel blog. The anonymous photo credit goes to my friend who also gave permission to publish them.