The Ambassador Who Came In From the Heat

Or should have!

We’ve seen some strange behavior from Ambassadors and Embassy staff in the past 20-odd years, but this story on the BBC takes the prize.

And I would tend to agree with Israeli State Controller – a little more effort should be put into examination but I think the Ambassador had the transparency thing down pat!

You Are BeeauutiFul!*

My late friend Ryan loved telling this Edith Evans story.

Dame Edith was not a beautiful woman by any standards - short, stout, hooded eyes and a rather plain face - but she was playing Millamant in The Way of the World and Millamant is described as the most beautiful woman in London and the most desired. A close friend was astounded that when Dame Edith glided on stage she was indeed incredibly beautiful and sexually desirable.

After the performance the friend demanded to know how she had done it? Make-up? Lighting?

"No," said Dame Edith "I sit quietly in my dressing room before each performance and looking in the mirror say 'You are beeauutiFul! You are beeauutiFul! You are beeauutiful!'* If I believe it so will the audience."

I made this birthday card (above) a few years ago featuring some of the actresses who have played Cleopatra - Katherine Hepburn, Tallulah Bankhead, Sarah Bernhardt and Dame Edith. On stage I've seen Zoe Caldwell and Maggie Smith and wish I had seen Judi Dench and Frances de la Tour as Shakespeare's seductive Serpent of the Nile. None of them great beauties but all of them capable of convincing you otherwise.

Now it appears the woman herself wouldn't have made it to the finals of the Miss Thebes 28BC pageant. A story in yesterday's Guardian reveals that a coin of the period shows thin lips, pointed nose and sharp chin - a rather shrewish looking woman. Hardly the creature conjured up by Vivian Leigh as Shaw's sex kitten or Elizabeth Taylor in that over-blown, over-budget studio wrecker from the '70s.

It appears that like Dame Edith and all those other actresses the real Cleopatra knew how to convince her audience that she was "beauutiFul."

*I admit it, this is an incredibly futile attempt to put Evans' viola-like voice into phonics.

Nap Time

My old buddy Don Keballs, from early Transport Canada days, will be pleased to read that a recent report suggests that an afternoon nap is beneficial to your health. This is a follow up to a statement made last week by France’s Minister of Health, Xavier Bertrand. M Bertrand wants to look into the benefits of encouraging napping on the job. I, for one, know that when Don had his afternoon siesta he certainly seemed to have more energy when it came time to put on his coat and boots to go home.

General Who? No, General Tzo!

Anyone who has spent anytime there can tell you that you won’t find Chop Suey or Chow Mein on a menu in China. Nowhere in any of the many ethnic cuisines will you find either of these purportedly Chinese dishes. Apparently it was the Chinese cooks on the U.S. transcontinental railways who dreamt them up using some basic Chinese cooking techniques – stir frying - with what they had at hand. Surprisingly Canadian-Chinese chow mein differs from the American-Chinese variety and in Canada we have three different styles depending on where you are in the country. Who would have thought?

Now according to an article in this weekend’s New York Times magazine General Tzo Chicken is also a culinary myth. What we in North America consider the ultimate in Hunan cookery doesn’t fit into that Province’s traditional palate of flavor combinations. They have thoughtfully included a recipe for a version that has the hot-sour mixture that is more truly Hunanese. I may try it for a dinner next week. I’ll let you know how it turned out.

I See England, I See France....

According to a report in today's London Times, in 1956, then French Prime Miniter Guy Mollet proposed a union between Britain and France. Burdened with debt, Suez and Algeria he was willing to have France enter the Commonwealth with the Queen as acknowledge head of state.

Hmm... Elizabeth Queen of ... Grande Fratagne? Brance? Le Royaume United?