In short
Three-part episode on (1) women’s representation in the Louvre, (2) Roma history and identity, and (3) what American expats learn when relocating.
Guests/backgrounds
Journalist Elaine Sciolino (author, Adventures in the Louvre); Dr. Madeleine Potter (teaching/research fellow at University of Edinburgh; grew up in a Roma family in Romania; author, The Roma, A Traveling History); Paul Theroux (travel writer; Peace Corps volunteer; lived in Africa, Singapore, and Britain; author; wrote NYT piece on expats).
Key claims
The Louvre is “macho” despite featuring famous women; only 25 of 3,600 artists are women, and women are often depicted as seduced, victimized, or raped—yet the “superstars” are women (Venus de Milo, Mona Lisa, Nike of Samothrace). “Gypsy” is a contested term; Roma migrated from northern India and are diverse, with racism and forced settlement shaping experiences. Expats must be working participants (jobs, taxes, language, negotiation), not insulated spectators; “nirvana” often fades.
Notable examples
Louvre rape scenes (including a sculpture in the Tuileries Gardens); Fragonard’s “The Bolt” (seduction vs rape debate); Elisabeth Vigée Le Brun; Mesopotamian Ishtar statuette. Roma stereotypes: thieves, “bohemian” fashion origins, and music (Liszt; flamenco). Expats’ challenges: language barriers, dubious governments/cartels (e.g., Thailand/Mexico), and cultural “tight fit.”
Written by AI. May contain mistakes. Listen to the episode to check what was said.
Chapters
Tap a time to open that second in VOWomen Artists in the Louvre
0:53 to 2:15
Discussion on the representation of women in the Louvre and the challenges they face.
“They've been stereotyped and maligned for centuries.”
The Most Famous Ladies of the Louvre
2:16 to 4:34
Elaine shares insights on the iconic artworks featuring women, highlighting their significance and the surrounding male-centric narratives.
“Describe these three works in relation to how women are respected or not respected in the world of art.”
Contextualizing Historical Art
4:35 to 8:13
Exploring the implications of viewing historical artworks through a modern lens and the importance of context in art appreciation.
“There are 3 ,600 artists, painters, and 25 of them are women.”
Women in Art History
8:14 to 13:00
Discussion on the historical challenges faced by women artists and notable figures like Elisabeth Vigée Le Brun.
“And I don't think you condemn, and I don't think you take paintings off the wall, but you explain it so that people who want to can understand it.”
Understanding the Roma Community
13:20 to 14:00
Dr. Madeleine Potter discusses the history of the Roma people and their cultural significance in Europe.
“from writing a traveling history of the Roma, the people she comes from, next on Travel with Rick Steves.”
Understanding the Roma People
14:00 to 19:26
Learn about the history, diversity, and terminology surrounding the Roma community.
“Madeleine Potter describes in her latest book, The Roma, A Traveling History.”
Racism and Identity in Childhood
19:26 to 22:14
Explore the impact of racism on Dr. Potter's childhood and her journey of identity.
“She's a teaching and research fellow at the University of Edinburgh, and her book is Roma, A Traveling History.”
The Importance of Understanding Roma Culture
22:14 to 24:17
Discuss the role of understanding and education in combating stereotypes against the Roma.
“And I think a lot of racism is based on fear and not knowing something.”
Stereotypes and Cultural Misunderstandings
24:17 to 28:00
Delve into common stereotypes of the Roma and their cultural significance.
“And consequently, when half a million of that community get killed by the Nazis, there's nobody to coordinate and say, let's have a memorial.”
Cultural Misunderstandings of the Romani
28:00 to 31:06
Explore the complexities of Romani culture and the misconceptions surrounding it.
“He started imitating it without necessarily understanding the culture, without often understanding the culture.”
Show all 17 chapters
Reflections on Roma Experiences
31:06 to 31:43
Listen to Madeleine Potter's poignant encounter with a Roma community.
“La-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la.”
The Realities of Being an Expat
32:00 to 36:16
Delve into the challenges and realities faced by American expats.
“you know, who's in the White House, Americans from the far left or far right often dream about getting the hell out of this country.”
Travel and Cultural Identity
36:16 to 40:06
Understand the significance of humility and cultural identity in travel.
“those who are curious, those who are not curious, those who stay put, and those who venture out.”
Literary Legacy of Expat Writers
40:06 to 42:01
Discover how being an expat has shaped notable writers and their works.
“We could, hey, what you need is another golf course.”
The Expat Experience
42:01 to 44:36
Explore the lives of notable American expatriates and their reasons for living abroad.
“But you're in one of a long line of travel writers who have chosen to live abroad.”
The Reality of Expat Life
44:37 to 47:24
Understand the challenges and misconceptions faced by American expats.
“So because of less majesty, you say something about the king, you'll end up in jail.”
Reflections on Home
47:25 to 48:36
Learn about the emotional connection to home and the sense of belonging.
“This is, my family's been right here for 100 years, and there's something about it.”
Transcript
Automatic transcript. May contain errors.0:00Rick Steves:Out of the thousands of works of classic art on display at the Louvre in Paris, only a handful were produced by women. Still, Elaine Sciolino reminds us who the museum's superstars really are. The most important works of art in the Louvre are of women, but heck, it's a macho museum. Madeleine Potter has never felt tied to one place. That's no surprise, given what she's learned about her Roma family background. The Roma aren't just one big group. There's a lot of variety and diversity among Romani communities. And author Paul Theroux reminds us that moving abroad as an expat has its challenges.
0:38But I wouldn't delude myself into thinking that I share their culture. They have different pieties. They have different beliefs.
0:46Rick Steves:Advice for starting over somewhere else, plus an insider look at Roma communities and the women of the Louvre. Come along for the hour ahead. It's Travel with Rick Steves.
0:59Rick Steves:They've been stereotyped and maligned for centuries. Coming up, Madeline Potter pays tribute to her Roma heritage as she gets acquainted with the different kinds of Roma communities in the world. And author and travel writer Paul Theroux has a few words of advice for Americans who are eager to move abroad. He cautions it might not be as easy as you'd like to settle into a whole new culture. Let's start today's travel with Rick Steves in the heart of Paris with our old friend, journalist Elaine Shalino. I'd say that the Louvre in Paris is the world's greatest museum. But to be honest, the Louvre is a man's world.
1:35Rick Steves:While arguably its three most popular pieces of art depict women, Venus de Milo, Mona Lisa, and the Nike of Samothrace, the art is generally by and for men. In her book, Adventures in the Louvre, How to Fall in Love with the World's Greatest Museum, Elaine Shalino explores the hard truth that it's hard to find any painting done by a woman. Elaine writes that it was men who made the art and men who purchased the art, and most scenes of women show seduction by trickery, abduction, and rape under the guise of mythological and biblical references. Elaine joins us now to share her thoughts on this challenge in the world of art as it relates to her favorite museum, the Louvre.
2:18Rick Steves:Elaine, thanks for joining us. Oh, thanks for having me. You know, first of all, in your book, you note that while it's hard to find a woman painter featured in the Louvre, its three most famous pieces are the famous ladies of the Louvre, as I mentioned, Venus de Milo, Mona Lisa, and the winged victory, Nike of Thamothrace. Describe these three works in relation to how women are respected or not respected in the world of art. Well, you're right. They are the three superstars, and they are women. Venus is one of the most perfect and perfectly shaped sculptures with a sort of S-shaped body that kind of looks at you with this mysterious look and is almost more beautiful from behind because her garment is falling off her hips.
3:10And so you have to be, use the word seduction, you have to be seduced by her. And the fact that she doesn't have arms, I think, adds to her mystery and seduction. And then you've got the victory of Samothraths or Nike. You know, this is where Nike became inspired. At the top of the most extraordinary staircase. And she owns the real estate. and you can't help but being struck by her power and her force as she is about to land on this boat. And I would say the next time you're there, take a look at her navel, because I think it's the most beautiful navel in the world that is seen through this diaphanous fabric.
3:57And then, of course, you've got the Mona Lisa, who I think is terribly overrated, but that's because she hasn't been cleaned for a million years, and she's very small and hidden behind barriers and protective glass. But she became a world-class icon because of the story around her, because she was stolen early in the 20th century, just when journalism was becoming popular and globalized, and so she became well-known around the world. So yes, it's a long way of saying yes, the most important works of art in the Louvre are of women. But heck, it's a macho museum. There are 3 ,600 artists, painters, and 25 of them are women.
4:42You know, women are, you know, as you said, they're shown as mythological victims or they're shown as mothers or virgins or whores. There are innumerable rape scenes in the Louvre. There's even a rape scene in a sculpture in the Tuileries Gardens, which is outside of the Louvre for the public to see. I mean, can you imagine a sculpture of a rape in Central Park? You know, somebody would take a sledgehammer to it. There are very few women warriors in the Louvre, and the women warriors, many of them look deranged. But there are a few Amazons, so I did find a few power women.
5:19Rick Steves:Elaine Shalino writes about her favorite women on display at the Louvre in her book Adventures in the Louvre, How to Fall in Love with the World's Greatest Museum. Elaine has more about the Louvre and about Paris' famous river and bridges and her favorite gardens and neighborhood. It's in our show archives at ricksteves.com slash radio. You know, Elaine, I learned a new word in reading your book, and it's fesses. Is that it? F-E-S-S-E-S. The Louvre's beautiful fesses. And that really kind of sums it up. If you're going to learn that word, you learn about it by getting into the collection at the Louvre.
5:53Rick Steves:What is that? Well, it's fess. And it's a hard word to translate because it kind of means backside or it means derriere. But it's a part of the female anatomy that is celebrated in art in the Louvre in a way that we often don't celebrate in American art. although in the last 10 years... It plays into the male gaze, doesn't it? It does play into the male gaze. So we have the Renaissance, we have Botticelli, we have Leonardo and so on, and we have the Dutch masters and Rembrandt, but we also have the Rococo guys who made their money selling sexy stuff to aristocrats, Fragonard and Boucher. They're the ones where you have the half-dressed women bouncing on beds, basically, surrounded by pastels.
6:45Well, there's a very famous Fragonard painting in the Louvre. It's very small. It's called The Bolt. And it's a man who is grabbing a woman and locking the door at the same time. I mean, I looked at this and I thought, shoot, this is not seduction. This is rape. Yet, this painting is used on the cover of a book produced by the Louvre about love in the Louvre.
7:13Rick Steves:It's just a reminder that we're in a new sensibility these days, aren't we? And when we look at it, we kind of go, I can't believe that was celebrated. But there's some ambiguity because some experts in the Louvre believe that this is the ultimate seduction scene and not rape. But we coming at it with a more sophisticated sensibility, and me maybe as an American, I look at this and I think, gee, this doesn't look like seduction to me. but we each come to the work of art with our own view. You know, I've been struggling with this, Elaine, because we all know ethnocentrism is not a good thing and I don't know about chronocentrism either.
7:54Rick Steves:Is it right for us to judge slices of culture by our sensibilities today or should we strive to understand it in the context of its day, celebrate where we've come and how we've advanced but don't condemn something from centuries ago because they weren't as hip and sensitive as we are today. What do you think about that? Well, I think it's both. And I don't think you condemn, and I don't think you take paintings off the wall, but you explain it so that people who want to can understand it. You don't just put up a painting of a rape scene without an explanation of what is happening at this time in history, what is happening in this mythological story, and how it fits in a larger context.
8:37Rick Steves:This is Travel with Rick Steves. We're talking with Elaine Shalino, and her book, her latest book of many books on Paris, is Adventures in the Louvre, How to Fall in Love with the World's Greatest Museum. And a fascinating chapter in that book is about the ladies of the Louvre. Elaine, when I think about art, and all of us travelers, we're exposed to it, we're steep on the learning curve, we're learning, we don't really understand the structural walls put between women and contributing to the great art of past ages. And I understand back in the day, you know, 100, 200 years ago, women would take a man's name in order even to be considered.
9:24Rick Steves:If you were a woman, you just were almost legally shut out of the game. Tell us a little bit about how that worked. Well, women weren't allowed the same entry into the salon or the clubs as men were, but there were some subversive ways in, and there's starting to be a lot more thinking about the power that women did have. You know, if you had a powerful father or brother who had access to a salon, you could sneak your way in. Or if your father or your brother lived inside a museum like the Louvre, you lived there too. And you could be trained by your father. And there were a lot of women who were trained by their fathers or their brothers or another relative.
10:07And there is starting again to be new thinking that some women did have power. Some women did have to put a man's name on a painting and now there is some discovery that they did more than just contribute, but they actually produced the work. So that it's not all hopeless that, oh, there were no women in European painting until the late 19th century. There is a rethinking of the role of women.
10:37Rick Steves:So Elaine, when we're thinking about the business of a painter getting a commission and doing great art, there are cases of female painters that really do gorgeous art. And one that I've gotten to know, because she's quite prolific as a portrait artist, is, forgive my pronunciation, but Elisabeth Vigilabrun? Yes. Tell us about her, because her portraits, well, her closeness to the royalty and her access, and she seemed to relate to the women in the royal class. They're just exquisite paintings. Well, you said it. You know, she had friends in high places. She was protected by the royals. She was protected by the nobility.
11:16She produced likable paintings, pretty paintings. And so she was accepted and she was exceptional.
11:23Rick Steves:And her name is spelled V-I-G-E-E, Elizabeth Vigie. And she's got the most works among women, I believe, in the Louvre. Now, you write in your book that the Louvre is like nine museums in one, and there's many different departments of the Louvre and most of us go to the famous paintings from Western culture. But you also write about your favorite woman in all the Louvre. Tell us about your favorite power woman in the Louvre just to wrap up this conversation. Well, there's a few favorite power women in the Louvre. If you really want to go for it, there are women with penises. There are hermaphrodite women of ancient Persia and ancient Mesopotamia.
12:07But I like this one Mesopotamian statuette. It might be the goddess Ishtar. She was the goddess of sexuality, fertility, battle, and power all in one. And she's got long, dangly earrings and black around her eyes, and she looks pretty fierce. And I'd say if I were going to take a little souvenir from the Louvre and put it in my back pocket for good luck, I would take her.
12:31Rick Steves:This is why they don't let you take a bag into the Louvre, I think. especially if you're looking for a woman who can break out of that cage and show her power Sex and power, it's the Mesopotamian Wonder Woman Elaine, thank you so much for helping us better understand this challenging dimension of art appreciation in the context of the Louvre and you can learn lots more about that in your book, Adventures in the Louvre How to Fall in Love with the World's Greatest Museum Elaine, thanks again for joining us Thank you, Rick Do you know what you want?
13:04Rick Steves:Elaine's website is elainechilino.com. That's spelled S-C-I-O-L-I-N-O. While Paul Theroux has often lived abroad, he has a few words of caution for Americans thinking about relocating. That's in just a bit. But first, Madeline Potter reveals what she's learned from writing a traveling history of the Roma, the people she comes from, next on Travel with Rick Steves. Europe's 12 million Roma people are spread across the continent, their populations larger than some entire European countries, and yet most have had little political voice or cultural presence in the wider society. Theirs is a history that's mostly unknown and misunderstood, punctuated by widespread fear and discrimination from people outside the Roma community.
13:53Rick Steves:But the Roma story is complex and beautiful as well, a portrait of resilience and spirit. That's what Dr. Madeleine Potter describes in her latest book, The Roma, A Traveling History. Madeleine grew up in a Roma family in Romania, and the book is a personal and historic portrait of her community. It sheds new light on their history and what it means to be Romani in Europe today. She joins us now from her home near the University of Edinburgh in Scotland, where she's a teaching research fellow. Madeleine, thanks for being here. Thank you so much for having me, Rick. You know, in our travels, we encounter Roma this and Roma that and gypsy this and gypsy that.
14:33Rick Steves:And I got to say, it's kind of confusing for a lot of people who even studied history. So this is so great that you've written this book, The Roma, A Travelling History. Let's just start off by defining who are the Roma. Thank you so much. And yes, you're absolutely right. Terminology tends to be so complicated. The Roma are a group who migrated out of northern India, roughly the 11th century, and reached Europe, roughly the 14th century, when we're talking about Eastern Europe, and roughly the 16th century, when we're talking about Western Europe, specifically Britain. Romani legends have at some point we had spent a lot of time in Egypt.
15:13So when the Roma reached Europe, sometimes they were describing themselves as Egyptian. So in Britain, they became known as Egyptians and then Egyptian got shortened to gypsy. And then that's how the term gypsy started being associated with the Roma. But then gradually it just started to take on a whole life of its own and it became associated with other communities who were traditionally nomadic. And then gradually it became more of an aesthetic, more of a vibe.
15:47Rick Steves:You mean the term gypsy? The term gypsy itself. Yeah, exactly. So gradually over the span of centuries, people forgot that it was a term that was initially associated with the Roma. And then I think partly because of that, people forgot who the Roma are. Now, the term Roma itself comes from the Romani language, which is related to Hindi and descended from Sanskrit. Okay, so the Roma left India about a thousand years ago and they took with them their language. And that's the whole story of the world is tribes of people being bullied or whatever here and there. Stronger tribes taking this land, weaker tribes being shoved over there.
16:28Rick Steves:And some communities stayed nomadic and others became more settled. And I think one thing that distinguishes the Roma people is their nomadic heritage. I think so, yeah. And I think it's a complicated history. because some Romani groups have settled now, whereas others remain nomadic, especially in Britain. The history of nomadism continues. But I grew up in a settled community because in Eastern Europe, in Romania, nomadism has all but wasted away, partly due to political persecution, partly due to a history of enslavement. And I think it's important to mention, I think, here that the Roma aren't just one big group.
17:11There's a lot of variety and diversity among Romani communities.
17:15Rick Steves:Now, it's interesting because you distinguished your family story, that you're from a Roma family that was a settled Roma family rather than a nomadic Roma family. Yeah. So, well, two generations back on my father's side, they would have been nomadic. But during the communist period in Romania, all Romani communities were forcibly settled. So nomadism has pretty much disappeared in Romania and more broadly in Eastern Europe. But again, it very much also depends for how long on the particular subgroup. Because, for example, when the Roma were enslaved in Romania for 500 years, there was a particular group called the boyash who were slaves inside mines.
17:59So they were forcibly settled quite early on. So they've been settled for several hundred years.
18:04Rick Steves:Nomadic people don't want to be settled. So if they're settled, they're generally forcibly settled. 100%. There's Bedouins in the Holy Land that are being forcibly settled. I think the Kurds were forcibly settled. Indians in the United States, Native Americans, I think, forcibly settled. This puts that nomadic community at a huge disadvantage. I think it's interesting in your book you wrote about the feelings you had in your childhood before you were that tuned into the whole history. but it seems like you had in your blood nomadism, even though you didn't know just two generations ago your family was nomadic.
18:40Rick Steves:Tell us about that. Yeah, I think it's been interesting to me to think about how I interact with place. And I've always enjoyed traveling. I've always enjoyed road trips and train trips. I really love being on trains. Even now, I really, really enjoy traveling. I really enjoy going around places. But I think retrospectively, just thinking about myself, I've never felt particularly tied to a particular place. I write in my book, for example, when I cleared my old childhood flat in Romania, that I felt as if I should have been a lot more upset because I was never going to go back there. But I didn't.
19:19I was just leaning into the road ahead and just moving, being on the move.
19:25Rick Steves:This is Travel with Rick Steves. We're talking with Dr. Madeline Potter. She's a teaching and research fellow at the University of Edinburgh, and her book is Roma, A Traveling History. It looks at the stories behind Roma migration, including her own story, which really makes an intimate and engaging kind of read. It's a story about growing up in a Roma family in Romania. Maddie's website is madeline-potter.com. So, Maddy, think back again to your childhood. And when did this feeling that there's racism, and I'm part of a wider community that is at a disadvantage with the more settled world, how did that sink into you as a child?
20:13Rick Steves:Because racism is the middle name of the Roma reality, it seems like. Unfortunately, yes. I think one incident that really stands out to me, which I describe in my book, is when I was about six or seven and it was a beautiful summer's day and there were these girls who were playing Chinese jump rope. It was really, really, it looked really fun. And I was watching them from afar and I really, really wanted to join in. So I approached them and asked if I could. And at that point, they looked at me and they recoiled away in apparent horror at me, hissing what is essentially a racial slur that is very broadly used to refer to Romany people in Romania, which is tziganka.
20:54That's the feminine and tzigan is the masculine.
20:57Rick Steves:What does that mean, literally? It's, you could translate it broadly as gypsy, but it's got a slightly different etymology, which is also very contested, but it was used for a long time as a synonym for slave during the enslavement of Romani people in Romania. The translation, I think, to gypsy isn't perfect because they have distinct etymology, different histories, but they were hissing that at me and they didn't allow me to join into play. So I remember at that point, and I can still see my feet. I was looking at my feet and really trying to understand and just comparing myself to them. And then I realized I looked different from them.
21:38I was different from them. Wow. And I think I've had loads of racial abuse afterwards, but that particular incident during my childhood really, really stands out.
21:50Rick Steves:It would be disheartening for you to be in the middle of a happy childhood and then realize, wait a minute, I'm in a disadvantaged group or I'm in a group that doesn't fit in as gracefully as some other groups. And I'll be living with this all my life. Yeah, absolutely. Although I'm trying to fight it. So that's part of what the book does. I can't think of a more powerful way to fight it than to humanize it and to teach people the context. And I think a lot of racism is based on fear and not knowing something. And misunderstanding. Understanding, yeah. When we talk to each other, we become less afraid and therefore more, we embrace the diversity instead of our threatened environment.
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22:29I would hope so, yeah.
22:30Rick Steves:So we grew up, Maddy, just hearing songs, watching TV shows and movies, and the term was gypsy. And all of a sudden now it's Roma. Is there any case where gypsy is a permissible use of the word? Roma tends to be the term preferred broadly by Romany communities. Now, some people will tell you that gypsy is a slur. That's not necessarily my view, but it's a controversial term. Again, the Roma tend to be very diverse. There are so many subgroups of the Roma because we think of the Roma as one ethnic minority. But actually, there are so many other ethnic groups within the Roma community, which means that some of them will absolutely reject the term gypsy.
23:19And this is particularly the case with Romani people in North America who tend to view it as quite offensive. Whereas here in Britain, the British Romani people tend to prefer it as a self-identifier. Prefer what? They refer to themselves as Romani gypsies. I think the problem with the word gypsy in the English language is that it's often misunderstood. That we have songs, for example, about being a gypsy. we have all these aesthetics. There are stereotypes and there are aesthetics. There are people who are not Romani, who claim it for themselves as a kind of appropriation of an aesthetic rather than an understanding and engagement with the culture.
24:02And I think that's part of the problem. I think part of the problem is that people forget that it does mean Romani, that it originated to refer to Romani people rather than just anybody who is nomadic.
24:16Rick Steves:One unfortunate thing about the whole Romani story to me is that there's no central government that can coordinate to deal with the needs of the community. It seems so fragmented. And consequently, when half a million of that community get killed by the Nazis, there's nobody to coordinate and say, let's have a memorial. And for that reason, in Berlin, there was not a memorial to the Roma people until very recently. Yeah. And is that a frustration of yours if you want, you know, fairness and dignity and understanding for Roma people that it's at a disadvantage because you just don't have a singular voice?
24:56It is. And there are attempts to create a kind of unitary voice for the Roma. There are various organizations. There were several international Romani conferences where the Romani anthem, Jellum Jellum, was agreed upon, where the flag was. The first one happened in 1971 in London. Then there were several others. That's where the Romani flag comes from. Yeah. So there were moves in that direction. There have also been various attempts at dialogue with the Indian government to have Romani people recognized officially as diaspora. But it's complicated, partly because, yeah, we are very, very diverse.
25:37There are so many different Romani groups, and partly because sometimes a lot of Romani people live in abject poverty, face marginalization, racism, and then that kind of coordination is difficult when we've got more urgent needs of survival.
25:52Rick Steves:Madeleine Potters, our guest on Travel with Rick Steves, she's written The Roma, A Traveling History, based in part on her own life growing up in a Roma family in a Soviet-style high-rise in post-communist Romania. Dr. Potters traveled herself to explore the different Roma communities in the world and to learn how they've endured historically and today in Romania, Hungary, Bulgaria, in Austria and Germany, Spain, England, France, Sweden, and on the U.S. West Coast. Madeline is a scholar of English literature and works at the University of Edinburgh. Her website is madeline-potter.com. Madeline, let's talk just for a moment about the clichés.
26:36Rick Steves:We've got the thieves, we've got the bohemian aesthetic, and we've got music. Talk a little bit about each of those, please. Yeah, so thievery is a huge stereotype associated with Romani people, from accusations of child theft to pickpocketing to everything. It's something that we never quite managed to shake off. I was asked once, where did I steal my PhD from? Oh my goodness. Ironically. So that is a really, really big stereotype that seems to follow us around a lot. But there's other dimensions of the image of Roma people that are totally apart from that. Yeah. What about the Bohemian aesthetic?
27:25Rick Steves:I was just learning about that as I was reading in your book, and it never occurred to me, but that is Roma fashion. Yeah, it is. So the Roman were called Bohemians in France, partly because they were carrying a letter of protection from a king of Bohemia. So they became associated with the idea of Bohemia. They were called Bohemians. And as you may have noticed, Romani women tend to wear long flowery skirts. That's not just for aesthetic. That's because in our culture, the lower part of the body is considered impure. So it needs to be covered at all times. But this aesthetic started to fascinate the middle classes.
28:06He started imitating it without necessarily understanding the culture, without often understanding the culture. So they started wearing these long flowery skirts. They started wearing golden earrings. They started imagining that Romani culture was this culture of freedom and of wanderlust, when in fact we have very, very strict laws governing every aspect of our life. That's true.
28:31Rick Steves:It has that hippie, free spirit, individuality vibe. And ironically, it's kind of not the case. Very much at odds with traditional Romani culture. And then music. I mean, one of my first associations with the gypsy culture were the gypsy musicians in Hungary. And they were good. I mean, it's just a tourist show, but they are fiddles on fire, you know. That's a real one. So music, I think, is a real part of Romany culture across countries. Yeah, the music of the Roma in Hungary is brilliant. I mentioned in my book that they inspired the composer Liszt. And then today you go to Spain and of course you've got flamenco.
29:14Rick Steves:Flamenco, yeah. And it's an interesting mix of Arabic influence and Roma influence. And Jewish. And Jewish too, yeah. Exactly, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Madeleine, I could talk all day, but of course we don't have all day, and I just want to wrap it up with a moment I had in a Roma community in Romania where you were raised, and I was talking to these wonderful potters, and I gained an appreciation for the artisans there that were so well-respected in Romania for their copper work and so on. Yes, yeah. And I asked a friend I made, I said, what's the big challenge for you and your community these days?
29:50Rick Steves:and he said our challenge is to be modern and at the same time protect our traditions. What are your thoughts on that, just to wrap up our conversation? That captures the essence of the struggle so, so well because Romani, and you mentioned the coppersmiths and I come, my clan as it were, my group is the calderash who are traditional coppersmiths, so very much part of that same tradition. and the craft you know people go to supermarkets people order online people don't really buy traditionally made objects anymore and this doesn't just apply to romanian communities but applies broadly i think in oh yeah for sure across the world but that means that these crafts are dwindling and that there's a loss of a tradition there so how do you preserve it how do you value it, while also making sure that you can survive in this changing world.
30:49Rick Steves:You know, that's a metaphor for the struggles of a previously nomadic culture, how to be modern and still protect who you are, your identity. So much. Yeah, absolutely. Maddie, thanks so much for joining us and best wishes. Thank you, Rick. Real pleasure.
31:13La-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la. La-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la. La-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la.
31:27Rick Steves:Madeleine Potter describes how it felt for her to stop at a Roma encampment that she encountered in England while she was out on a run. It's in an extra from today's conversation, and you can hear it with this week's show notes at ricksteves.com slash radio. Do you sometimes feel the urge to just pack up everything and resettle overseas? Well, up next, the well-traveled author Paul Theroux has a few words of caution for prospective American expats. Thanks for journeying with us each week on Travel with Rick Steves. Depending on political trends in our country, you know, who's in the White House, Americans from the far left or far right often dream about getting the hell out of this country.
32:10Rick Steves:It's a sentiment as old as Mark Twain's character, Pap Finn, hoping to find refuge away from the United States in some other country overseas as political forces and economic misfortune play with our emotions. It's something Paul Theroux has written about over the years in his dozens of novels and short stories and in his chronicles of his own domestic and overseas travels. He shared his thoughts recently in a guest column in the New York Times, which I found interesting. It was titled The Hard Reality American Expats Quickly Learn. Paul joins us now on Travel with Rick Steves to talk about just that.
32:47Rick Steves:Thanks, Paul, for joining us. It's a pleasure to meet you again, Rick. Yeah, and it's a pleasure to read your article about your take on expats and the hard reality they learn when they leave our country. You know, when we travel, we bump into expats. I'm often just blitzing through a country, visiting all the churches and the museums, you know, dutifully. And then you find people who have fallen in love with this country and literally moved in. And I get a bit envious, even jealous. Tell us about your take on that kind of travel, expats. I have a lot of thoughts about this. And like you, you go to Thailand, you meet expats.
33:26You go to Africa, you meet expats. You don't meet many in India, but you do meet them in Mexico. You meet them in Costa Rica. You meet them in the Philippines. And it's usually someone, they might be married to a local woman or a local man, or they might be retired living in a small community. Or they might be those people that I wrote about in this piece, which is saying, I'm going to get out of here. I'm sick of this. Like Huckleberry Finn's father says, I'm going to leave this country. I'm going to leave. I'm getting out of here. I mean, he has his reasons. He's a bigot. He's a racist. So he says, I'm getting out of here.
34:00This was the informing thing in the 1970s. A lot of people were saying it because of the Arab oil embargo. They were saying, this was a great country once. Now the Arabs are squeezing us to long lines at gas stations. Carter was president. Interest rates were very high. And people were saying, I'm getting out of here. I'm leaving. I'm leaving. Well, I found that fascinating. And actually, it was the basis of my book, The Mosquito Coast. So I had a guy saying, I'm out of here. I am out of here. I'm out of here with my family. I'm an inventor. At that time the Japanese were taking over, so Rockefeller Center was bought by the Japanese, Sony Studios, RKO was something like that.
34:44Rick Steves:Yeah. But these guys are leaving because they're disgusted with consumer-oriented society or whatever. Well, they have all sorts of reasons for leaving. But you left after being inspired in a positive way after Kennedy's inauguration speech, didn't you? Wasn't that your first inclination to go? That was the vibe. Yeah, the vibe was countries are becoming independent. This is early 1960s. African countries are becoming independent. Pacific Islands are becoming independent. And what's greater than that? You go to a country that's been a colony since the 19th century, the Congo, Kenya, Tanganyika, Rhodesia, Niasaland, they suddenly become free countries.
35:26They have an election for the first time. We build schools. So you're in the Peace Corps. Yeah, I was in the Peace Corps.
35:32Rick Steves:As a 20-year-old kid, you were in the Peace Corps. Now, that's quite a big introduction to the world. It was a big introduction because I was in the bush. I learned the language, and it was great. Actually, I loved it. I loved it. I was away from home, and I realized my ambition. I thought I had been planning to go to medical school, and I realized that I'm going to be a writer. But anyway, that opened my eyes to it. And also, there was, if I may say, there was a lot of hope in the world. There was hope in Africa. There was hope in the United States. So Kennedy was president, and hope was on people's list.
36:07Martin Luther King, hope. It was all about hope.
36:09Rick Steves:You know, Paul, it seems to me there's—this is kind of maybe a crude thing to say, but there's two kinds of people, those with passports and those without passports, those who are curious, those who are not curious, those who stay put, and those who venture out. Now, for 17 years, you ventured out. You were an expat. You spent six years in Africa, three years in Singapore, 18 years in Britain. That must have contributed to you being the prolific writer you are over the last decades. And to be able to crank out these books that really are based on the realities of the world, the people you meet, the people that carbonate the whole experience.
36:47Rick Steves:Talk about the value of your years overseas as a writer. They were very instructive. But I may say, before you say, it's true that passports are no passports. But, you know, one of the most instructive, enlightening trips I've taken in my life was, as a northerner, going to the Deep South. Yeah. Going to Mississippi, Alabama, Arkansas, South Carolina, those particularly, and writing a book about it, Deep South. I had friends, George Davis, a black friend of mine from high school, who later went to college. He was a runner and he was a great guy. When I went to Africa, he was in the civil rights movement and he was in Selma.
37:27He took the bloody march across the bridge in Selma, and he was encountering a new world there. And so you don't necessarily have to leave the country to find a different culture or challenges.
37:40Rick Steves:Yeah, I guess that when I say passport, it's sort of like the attitude. Would I want to go out of my comfort zone? No, I know you said that. I understand the shorthand there. Right. But what it taught me was it teaches you humility. It teaches you negotiation. It teaches you how to deal with other people. I was in the Peace Corps with guys who were arrogant. I mean, some of them, most of us were humble, trying to learn. But there were people that were saying, you know, look what we've given you. We built schools. We built roads. We got a lot of money. You know, do you know who I am? And then there was that attitude.
38:13But you need, you know, Flaubert says one thing about travel. Travel teaches you how small you are. I love it. Yes, how small. You are so small. all. You're there in the big world, and you're really a non-entity. And you need to understand that, that you're a non-entity, and you have no great importance.
38:33Rick Steves:You know, that's a topic for an essay that anybody who's done a lot of traveling or a lot of thinking could write. Travel teaches you how small you are. I love that. It's a humility. You talked about humility, isn't it? Yeah, and also, I mean, it's true. So I live in Hawaii. This culture is thousands of years old Hawaiian culture. It's a great culture. It's a nurturing culture. But lots of people came. Missionaries came. Captain Cook came. Captain Cook died here, actually. The Hawaiians killed their first tourist, James Cook. Then the missionaries came soon after the taboos were broken. Then after the missionaries married, they bought up land.
39:14Then speculators came. Then the pineapple people came. Then the sugar people came. Every person that came took something away from the culture, I believe. Whenever people say, oh, either Hawaiians are unfriendly or they call us haoles or whatever it is, did anyone ever come to an island and make it better? It seems to me that everyone who ever came to Hawaii took something from it or profited by it, that no one made it better. You could say, okay, we're turning into a city or urbanizing it. Is that better? I don't think so. I really don't think so. So it's become crowded, polluted to a certain degree, urbanized, and a lot of traditional culture has been lost as a result.
40:01So we have to understand when we go to a place, we're not going to make it better. We're strangers. We're aliens. We could say, oh, I got a great idea. You know what we could do here? We could build a restaurant. We could, hey, what you need is another golf course. You think, who the hell needs another golf course?
40:16Rick Steves:Humility, yes. Paul Theroux has written nearly 60 novels, short stories, and works of nonfiction. Paul's joining us on Travel with Rick Steves from his home on Oahu in response to a guest essay on American expats that he wrote for the New York Times. Paul's latest collection of stories is The Vanishing Point and looks at what we can learn from the emotions that arise with the passing of time. It's set in Hawaii, New England, and Africa, all places he's lived in and gotten to know. His website is paultharou.com. So, Paul, we've just got a couple of minutes, but I would like to, first of all, you say that anyone with money can be an expat, but a real expat, dot, dot, dot.
40:57Rick Steves:How does a real expat become more than just a spectator or a parasite or an alien? The real expat is a working person, has a job, pays taxes, negotiates it, gets a driving, takes a driving test, has to negotiate, has to live in the real world, not in the bubble of expatriation, not in a community of retired people with a fence around it, but actually is up against it, dealing with local people. Now, you're living in basically a working class corner of Oahu. Are you a Massachusetts Yankee or are you a local yet after so many years in Oahu? I'm not a local. I'm not a Malahini. A Malahini is a new person, but I would say that I'm conspicuous for being a haole, obviously.
41:46So I'm not local. I've lived here 35 years. I have many friends, local friends. I paddle an outrigger canoe, and I paddle with other people. We have a little hui, a little group, and we go paddling together. And to that extent, I feel I'm one of them, but I wouldn't delude myself into thinking that I share their culture. They have different pieties. They have different beliefs from me. And politically, they're different.
42:15Rick Steves:But you're in one of a long line of travel writers who have chosen to live abroad. Give us a little rundown on some others that made a similar decision in their lives and a decision that has contributed to their production as great writers. Mark Twain, Sam Clements, lived in Germany, and he wrote two books, two great travel books relating to his travel. One is called The Innocence Abroad, and the other, A Tramp Abroad. Oh, Henry, the short story writer, William Sidney Porter was embezzler, and he was fleeing the law. He went to Honduras. You know the word banana republic? Well, Sidney Porter was living in Honduras.
42:53He invented that phrase. He invented Banana Republic. D.H. Lawrence was a great traveler. In fact, he kept on the move all the time. James Baldwin? James Baldwin lived in France. He started out in Turkey, actually. He lived in Istanbul, or a little bit north of Istanbul. And then he moved to the south of France. He lived there. He felt happier because he lived there at a time during racial strife in the States. He was very happy living in France.
43:21Rick Steves:Bill Bryson, he's like a country squire in Britain now. Yeah, Bill Bryson. Well, he actually has dual citizenship now. He's a country squire. He's out there. Yes, he's Tweedy. He probably has green Wellington boots and goes striding around the village. He's from Iowa, for goodness sake. I have a good friend, John Irving, you know, the side of house rules and the world according to Gop. Now, he lives in Toronto. He's married to a Canadian, good friend of mine, very nice guy. And he's in Canada. It happens to a lot of people. But, you know, you don't have to live in a place for a long period of time to experience travel in that way.
44:04to feel as if you don't.
44:06Rick Steves:Paul, the point of your article is the hard reality American expats quickly learn. So you've talked about how to be an expat, which is to be a participant, not just a spectator, to contribute rather than being an alien. But then you also talk about how maybe they were going out there to find some sort of nirvana and where do they end up? A lot of times they finish their lives back home. Well, it's true. I mean, a lot of people leave because they don't like the government here. So they go to Thailand, which has a corrupt government and a crazy king. And they also have less majesty. So because of less majesty, you say something about the king, you'll end up in jail.
44:48You need to learn a language. You feel excluded on holidays. They go to a country. I mean, it's not just Thailand. They go to a country. People in Mexico, the country, it's dominated by cartels. Well, there are little bubbles of expatriation there. but they have very dubious governments in Mexico. You can be happy with the people. They live in communities. But Henry James once said, people who've moved to England realize it's a tight fit. Everyone in England is a tight fit. You're a tight fit in your job. You're a tight fit in your community. In your church, you're a tight fit. And he said, we're kind of loosely hung.
45:23As Americans, we're loosely hung.
45:25Rick Steves:Maybe it's a kind of an example of, to put it very simply, the other man's grass is always greener, and you get over there, and maybe what you were searching for, you could find it if you had a different attitude in the place where you call home. In most of the places where expatriates go, the people are dying to come to the States. The local people are very poor. Thailand, there's great poverty. Burma, great poverty. Mexico, poverty. But there are expats there saying, I love it here, I love it here. And their Mexican neighbors are dying to leave. Paul Theroux has been called a dean of travel literature with his prolific volume of stories, novels, and writings that explore the human psyche set around the world.
46:09Rick Steves:Paul's best known for works such as The Mosquito Coast, Dark Star Safari, and The Great Railway Bazaar. He imagines what writer George Orwell's life might have taught him while on assignment for the British military in Burma in a recent novel called Burma Sahab. Paul wrote an opinion piece for the New York Times on the hard reality American expats quickly learn. He's explaining for us now on Travel with Rick Steves the lessons and insights of exasperated expats. What I was going to say, do you know that Doris Lessig in her autobiography talks about living for a long time, she said she made a mental list of all the places she'd lived, and she concluded that you may live in a place for months or years, but you spend a weekend or a night in another country, and you feel as if your whole being has been sprayed with the equivalent of a cosmic wind.
47:01So a weekend in a place can change you radically. And you live for a long time in a place and you can become blind to the place. I mean, I was an expatriate for 27 years. I used to come back to the States every so often. And then when eventually I did, I realized this is my home. This is where I belong. I'm among my kinfolk and my people.
47:23Rick Steves:I feel that way. People tell me, why don't you just move to Europe? You know, no, I belong right here. This is, my family's been right here for 100 years, and there's something about it. But I certainly enjoy the opportunity to get out there and spread my wings. But that's because you're a traveler, and you realize that if you lived in a place, you need to negotiate it. You need to learn the language. You have to be part of it. And you realize you will never, you will never acquire the cultural norms that that place has. All you will do is you're trespassing there. You're an exile there. You're an alien there.
47:57And when you realize you can get sick of being an alien, if you're really living in the culture, but if you're living in a bubble, if you're living in a gated community, that's different. You're playing pickleball with your neighbors and they're outside the community. They're mopping your floor.
48:11Rick Steves:Paul Theroux, thank you so much for sharing your point of view and the adventures you've had and the thoughts that they've kindled with your latest book. a collection of fascinating short stories. The book is called The Vanishing Point. And, Paul, I'm glad you found your home on a beautiful beach on the north coast of Oahu. Happy travels and best wishes on your writing. Thank you, and aloha from Oahu. Aloha. An exile from home Splendor dazzles in vain O give me my lonely That's taught it again You can also hear Paul Theroux's conversations with us from his non-fiction travel accounts across the American Deep South and Mexico.
49:02Rick Steves:And we hear that Paul's working on a new book from recent travels across Canada. We provide links to our podcast archives at ricksteves.com slash radio. That's also where you can send us an original haiku poem about the impressions you gain from your travels, like these that our Travel with Rick Steves listeners have sent us. Deborah Guy from Columbus, Ohio, drove almost 4 ,000 miles during a two-week Roots Music pilgrimage across the Deep South. She shares this haiku from a meal she enjoyed at the Onward store in Onward, Mississippi. Delta Fine Dining, pulled pork sandwich and salad with comeback dressing.
49:43And she adds this haiku about the infamous intersection near Clarksdale, Mississippi, where blues legend Robert Johnson was said to have sold his soul to the devil in exchange for his talent as a blues guitarist. Highway 61. Headlights pierce delta darkness. Crossroads at midnight. Larry Berger from Sinks Grove, West Virginia, writes us this haiku about his youthful wanderings. He says his mother called him a migrant vagrant. I went for a walk. Twenty-some-odd years later, I came home again. And Sarah Tuttle of Corvallis, Oregon, writes us a haiku to celebrate the end of her daughter Eliza's year and a half of traveling and working abroad.
50:30It's time to come home, dear daughter, world traveler. No more Skype for me. Travel with Rick Steves is produced by Tim Tatton, Kaz Murrah-Hall and Donna Bardsley at Rick Steves Europe in Edmonds, Washington. Thanks to Gretchen Stroud for reading our listener travel haiku. You can share impressions from your own travels with us in an original haiku poem. We might even read it on the air someday.
50:55Rick Steves:There's a link at ricksteves.com slash radio. The Rick Steves Guidebooks originated as the handbooks for our Rick Steves tours, but these are designed to give you all the details so you can do our tours without us. From Spain to Finland and from Scotland to Greece, we've got over 50 titles, each of them lovingly updated so you can be your own guide and a dang good one. Find them at your favorite bookseller and at ricksteves.com.
From the publisher
Author Elaine Sciolino gives us the history behind the famous women — both artists and subjects — to visit in Paris' grand repository. Then a Romani author shares what it was like growing up in her culture as we trace the lineage and influence of the vibrant Romani people. And the well-traveled Paul Theroux provides aspiring expats a realistic assessment of what it means to leave the US in the rearview mirror.
For more information on Travel with Rick Steves - including episode descriptions, program archives and related details - visit www.ricksteves.com.