A Global Round Up

I’m in Zurich. After touching down yesterday, I was quickly whisked off to the Park Hyatt where I had a booked appointment with a highly recommended Brazilian manicurist. I’ve mentioned before that I think Brazilians do the best mani/pedi so for the last few days I’ve been curling under my gnarled looking finger (and toenails) till I arrived here. And it was worth the wait. My nail beds are now pruned and open and ready for their close-up. Amid the impromptu spa set up in my room, my host stopped by to check on the delivery of exotic fruits and orchids to my room and after a few cosmopolitans, the festivities in Zurich was on the way.

This past week my upside down sleep pattern had me waking up at 3am and lights out at 6pm. It’s been a brutal schedule but I’ve used it to my advantage. I leave again for Europe today and I’m still on Swedish time. I’m headed to the Swiss Textiles Award in Zurich, which I last attended two years ago when Marios Shwab took the top prize and I’m looking forward to helping Swiss Textiles awards celebrate their 10-year anniversary this year.

Last week’s trip to Stockholm was short a jam-packed four days of meet and greet. To celebrate Absolut’s 30th year anniversary of art collaborations, the label invited artists who’ve contributed to their history, international journalists and local scenesters to Stockholm for 3 days of parties and art tours. Sylvie Fleury, Douglas Gordon and David Shrigley were all there and the whole premise of the event was to celebrate art and creativity. Skål to that!

I arrived in Stockholm yesterday listless and bedraggled. My SAS flight that connected in Chicago was having refueling problems forcing us to stay another couple hours on the tarmac. Those unforeseen delays is one reason I insist on traveling business or first class, imagine being scrunched up in a legroom-less seat in the back of plane? Well, I don’t have to imagine it, I’ve done it, I simply don’t like that area of the plane that I call route 66.

I’m at LAX in the United Airlines Red Carpet lounge soon to board my flight to Sweden, so I’ll keep it short and sweet. Firstly, I hate these fancy names for nothing more than a lounge with stray apples, stale pretzels and tasteless coffee. What happened to the premium first class lounge concept where you don’t have to pay for proper food (Isn’t that included in the exorbitant price of first class ticket anyway?). Ok, this may not be the best attitude to starting off this day especially since I thought my flight departed at 3.30pm instead of 9.30am. I realized the error when I woke up early to finish an article and after re-checking the travel details, I noticed that 9.28 is actually the departure time, not the flight number. Who lists a departure time at 9.28 anyway?