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Loving - The Movie. A beautiful portrayal of a forgotten civil rights story

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Ruth Negga (2 nd from right) stars as Mildred and Joel Edgerton (right) stars as Richard in Jeff Nichols LOVING, a Focus Features release. Credit : Ben Rothstein / Focus Features   Mildred Jeter and Richard Loving grew up in the rural unincorporated town of Central Point, Virginia. They met in high school, spent time together, and eventually, when Mildred became pregnant, decided to marry. But this was the 1950’s and Mildred was African American and Richard was white. Virginia had anti-miscegenation laws which made their marriage illegal. How did these two young people get beyond Jim Crow and fall in love? Well that had a lot to with Central Point VA. Central Point was and is still a very rural area. At a distance of about 90 miles south east from Washington DC it was community with a history of poor farmers, black and white, ignoring the rules of segregation, living together. According to a 2012 article in the Washington Post , Central Point and Caroline Count...
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Food Tour in Valletta, Malta

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  One way to get to know a place you have never visited is by taking a “food tour.” It is a quick introduction to the history and culture of a city. So, when I visited the city of Valletta, on Malta, one of the first things I did was to sign up for a culinary excursion of the city. Valletta City Walls I used the Viator app and found the highly rated (4.9/5.0) Valletta Food Tour. Our guide was Romina, a Maltese native. She met us just outside the city gate, at the Triton’s Fountain. The fountain was finish in 1959, in conjunction with the construction of a new bus terminal for the city. It underwent restoration in 2017. The plaza is paved with limestone tiles that are chockfull of fossils. Triton's Fountain Fossils in the paving stones Romina started us off with two wonderful pastries called pastizzi. These are traditional Maltese treats made of a dough similar to Greek filo. They usually filled either ricotta cheese or mushy peas. Ricotta Pastizzi  Pastizzi with mushy peas We ...
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Location: Valletta, Malta
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The New Museum, New York, New York

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  In 1977, the New Museum opened in The New School for Social Research. With the goal of giving space and attention to contemporary artists that have not yet been “discovered” by the traditional art world. Over the next thirty years it bounced around in several sites, but it always looked to bring forward “new artists and new ideas.” In 2007, The New Museum moved into its permanent home on The Bowery. Part of what drew me to visit now was the reopening of the museum after a two year renovation and expansion that has doubled the size of its exhibition space. To celebrate its new space, the New Museum has put together a fascinating exhibit that fills its entire space. New Humans: Memories of the Future (ongoing) “explores how technological developments have inspired evolving definitions of the ‘human’”(from the museum’s website). It brings together works that explore the ideas of humanity that span the past 120 years, from Jules Verne and H.G. Wells to ET to today. From the series ...
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Location: 235 Bowery, New York, NY 10002, USA
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Ybor City. Tampa, Florida

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  You can make the argument that the city of Tampa, Florida, might not exist today if it were not for the neighborhood of Ybor City . Yet many people, especially visitors to the area, know very little about this historic district. In the 1880’s, Vicente Martinez Ybor was looking for a new home for his cigar factory. He had already moved his business from Cuba to Key West, bringing it closer to his main market in the United States. He felt that there were two drawbacks to remaining in Key West. The island gave him very little room to expand the industry. And while Key West was close to Cuba, that proximity meant that progressive and pro-union organizers could easily move back and forth, building their relationships with workers in his factory. At this time, Tampa was a small town of around 700 residents, but it offered two important benefits to the growing cigar industry. First, it sat along a protected deep water bay, allowing ships to bring in raw materials from Cuba. Second, in ...
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Location: Ybor City, Tampa, FL, USA
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