souvenirs

Dreaming of Prague

August 30, 2016 By Jillian

Souvenirs are like tiny memory capsules for me. When I hold the object in my hand I am instantly taken back to the moment of purchase. My favorite souvenirs are earrings – small, easy to carry, and as unique as the market in which they were purchased.

Earlier this month we moved into a new house and as I unpacked my earrings one by one to put them in my jewelry box I took a trip down memory lane. Wooden beads from Bolivia, earrings made of cowrie shells from Africa, and finally a set of hammered copper earrings from Prague.

I laughed holding the Prague earrings in my hand. Unlike most of the other earrings in my collection which had come from back woods type of markets or handi-craft stalls, these were purchased on perhaps the most touristy place in Prague – the Charles Bridge. Somewhere over the Vltava River on the way to see a smaller bridge covered in locks I decided I needed these, and the matching necklace. My husband of course, obliged willingly. 🙂

If you’ve never been on the Charles Bridge it is famous for the numerous statues of saints that line the bridge. Connecting the two sides of Prague, the Castle looks over the bridge, giving the whole area a medieval feeling. It’s also covered in buskers, artisans, painters, and any kind of performer you could ask for – it’s almost like a carnival during peak season as hordes of tourist move from one side of Prague to the other. Many hotels in Prague offer city tours that include the bridge, so you also have a lot of tour guides stopping along the way giving a historical perspective on the bridge, the statues and the city.

Holding the earring in my hand I was taken back to a very sunny day along the Vltava when we climbed to Prague Castle, picnicked in the park, watched street performers do magic, visited the clock tower, and did the traditional “tourist” Prague experience. It was an unusual day for the two of us, who generally like to stay off the beaten path. The rest of the time in Prague we did get off the beaten path, exploring neighborhoods, visiting outlying areas to see soviet era architecture and taking the Prague metro everywhere.

After several moves and three kids only one of the earrings remains in my jewelry box, but the memory of Prague lives on every time I hold it.

Are souvenirs the best memories?

October 1, 2012 By Jillian

I’ll admit it, I am a recovering market-a-holic. You set me free in a market somewhere in the developing world and a shopaholic previously unknown takes over my body and I’m like the hulk. I’m instantly feeling like a millionaire as I look through baskets of earrings, bangles and scarves for friends and family at home. And then I’m confronted with something else, something not made in China, something not mass produced and the traveler in me instantly thinks a-ha! This is it, this is the souvenir I want to take home. This will be an item I will always cherish and will always remind me of my trip to ____________.

Spice Market, Istanbul — Two stalls down I purchased 10 pairs of earrings for $.20 each. I gave them away to my friends and they turned their earlobes green.

Years later, even as it becomes harder and harder to remember where that item was purchased I look at it and I am transported back to the market or vendor’s stall. I look at the drum we purchased in Cairo at the Khan el–Khalili market and I’m reminded of sitting in a stall full of onyx down the street, debating for what seemed like ever on which items to choose, only to have many of them broken in transfer back home. “I package it well, I swear will not break madam,” I can still hear the vendor say. The drum is covered in abalone laid out in a geometric pattern. “Genuine mother of pearl,” the vendor said. I can still taste his sweet tea on my tongue, still remember the German couple that came in and proceeded to negotiate hard for small trinkets as we stood steadfast in our price for the drum. I remember how we walked out when we didn’t get our price and how upon a moment of reflection, the salesman came after us. I look at the drum and I remember.

Egyptian drum — The drum in question. Yes, that is “genuine” mother of pearl.

Are souvenirs the best memories from a trip? Perhaps, if only because they bring us back to a time, a place and a moment which we would otherwise forget. The object itself might be junk (what did you expect for $1 genuine mother of pearl earrings?), but the memories it holds are priceless.

That’s A LOT of pocket change

February 2, 2012 By Jillian

Have you ever moved on from a place only to discover that you still have an entire pocket full of change? Virtually no exchange houses, official or unofficial will take pocket change, no matter how much it may add up to. It is some sort of unspoken rule among the world’s money changers. A conspiracy to keep our pockets heavy and jingling.

world coin collection

It took us three countries to realize that pocket change might actually make for a great souvenir and not just a pain in the butt (no pun intended) to carry around. From that point forward we made it our mission to not only keep pocket change, but to keep an entire set of change from every country.

To make matters worse, or better depending on your opinion, we even started to collect old coins, buying soviet era tin circles off the streets of Eastern Europe’s capitals, coins that represented a currency now revalued, and even collectors coins for holidays in China. Oh yes, we sunk to a new low every city we went to, negotiating for more and more metal to add to our “light” backpacks. Literally, a new low, as the weight of each new set of coins added significantly to the weight on our backs.

international coin collection

Of course we didn’t carry it all around the world. Virtually every box or courier shipment that went home thanks to friends and family contained precious plastic baggies of coins.

And so they were scattered around the homes of friends and family when we returned and their temporary keepers were more than pleased to return the coinage as soon as humanly possible.

Fortunately we had a plan for the 100 pounds of coins (or so it felt).

coins from around the world

A coffee table.

Yes, we were going to cover the top of a coffee table with these coins. For months after our return I hunted high and low (online shopping!) for the perfect coffee table to cover in coins. I did not find it and loosing patience with putting his drink on the floor, Danny implored me to just buy one.

Then the fun began. Coins are metal and if you remember Chemistry 101 in high school you know that metal reacts with other chemicals. Mainly oxygen. And so those coins we so carefully collected around the world? Well without oil deposits from human touch, they tarnished, darkened and in some cases changed color completely (why hello rust). And so Danny set upon cleaning them. After probably 20 hours of soaking, scrubbing, rinsing, scrubbing and drying the entire collection is virtually there. They’ve been “cataloged” or better yet organized and sorted, piled according to country and region and finally stacked in a 3″ binder.

Czech coin

And sometime in the next few days, those coins, which morphed from annoying pocket change to a precious souvenir of our travels will make their way onto a coffee table where they will live on to cherish one drink at a time.

Have you collected any one thing from your travels? What have you done with your collection?

Photo: A Snapshot in Time

April 21, 2011 By Jillian

There was something sad about the flea markets in Tbilisi. Hundreds of makeshift stalls lined the streets, often just a person with a folding table or blanket on the ground. It was different than any other flea market, there was a sense of resignation in the air. Many of the vendors were old women selling off what appeared to be whatever was left of their valuables and some of the collections had an air of sadness about them. Many of Georgia’s elderly are in difficult financial situations, having lived their high earning years under communism.

Not that there weren’t art dealers, jewelers and even coin collectors in the mix. This photograph was taken near the front of the market where a 30 something year old man had set up shop. A camera collector, he was selling off his collection bit by bit. We spoke with him at length about his collection and it was clear from the first words out of his mouth he loved these machines. In the end we bought a pre-WWII camera from him, complete with glass slides instead of film!

To see more of our favorite photos from around the world check out our travel photo page. Let us know your favorites and we’ll include them in our photo of the day series.

Glittering diamonds

March 3, 2010 By Jillian

We have hardly any space for souvenirs, so our purchases tend to be small and insignificant. I buy myself earrings in every country- usually aiming for something “crafty” made from local materials at an insignificant price ($4 or less!): coconut, coins, shells and sacred stones. It didn’t take a long time for me to start making jokes about purchasing earrings made from South Africa’s famous stone, the diamond. Although Danny continues to point out that he already bought me one of those, I heard a rumor that diamonds are found on the coastline of Namibia pretty regularly. As the first line of the guidebook states: “The shifting sands of the Namib Desert conceal the world’s largest stash of gemstone diamonds.” Now before I start an international diamond rush, let me assure you, the Naimibian government doesn’t let anyone get near their coast, deserts or diamond mining areas. Marked on the map as “restricted” areas we’ve heard stories of tourists receiving a visit from Namibian Police in the evening after stopping near a restricted area for a picture that afternoon, a violation which had been spotted from the air. Needless to say wandering into a restricted area, including the beach to scoop up diamonds isn’t really feasible.

No diamonds were to be seen along the road in Namibia so we headed to the next best place: Kimberley, home of “the big hole”. Trust me, its one big hole. Almost a century of diamond mining has left a big hole in downtown Kimberley, one that you have to see to believe. The story is not unlike that of the California Gold Rush: desperate for fortune people came from around the world to toil in the sun digging, sorting and mining for these precious stones.

In the chaos of the “diamond rush”, small time miners dug their claims to the very edge of their boundaries in the hope of finding the big one. Within a few years open mining had reduced the hillside to a honeycomb like structure, with small walkways separating family claims. As you can imagine, you can only dig so deep with a shovel and pick ax, and by the turn of the century a consolidated diamond mining company had been formed, laying the structure for today’s diamond giant: deBeers.

Having taken over the industry, the consolidated mining company moved to more modern mining methods, extracting diamonds from much deeper in the earth, leaving us with the “big hole” today. Although diamond mining continues to this day in and around Kimberly, the big hole is no longer an active mining site and has been turned into a wild west/frontier like tourist attraction. The museum tells the story of mining in Kimberly, but more interestingly of various diamond myths from around the world. Their vault contains diamonds of various states, cuts and polishes, although the most famous diamonds in the world are only displayed in replica.

A large percentage of the worlds diamonds come from southern africa, but none found their way into our souvenir collection. Granted, given the controversy surrounding some African diamonds frequently called “blood diamonds” or “conflict diamonds” its probably not such a bad thing.

Dreaming of Prague

Are souvenirs the best memories?

That’s A LOT of pocket change

Photo: A Snapshot in Time

Glittering diamonds

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