Doodlin' in Tuscany (accompanied by a cup of cappuccino)

My little travel companion is a thin cardboard case that contains several old book pages and a couple of fine point pens. I bring these wherever I go when I’m traveling, and I try to find time to make little doodle. I’ve been working on the same book for quite some time now, as I seem to only work on these book pages while traveling. I worked on a few of them in New Orleans this April. And this summer, I brought them to Tuscany and Amsterdam. My old friend, Isabelle from Switzerland, had a place to stay for free in Motepulciano in Tuscany from her home exchange deal. She invited her friend, Claire, and me to join her on this not-to-be-missed opportunity. (She calls it "organized by Isabelle's dream travel agency.") There we found ourselves cozily settled in the old Italian grandma-fashioned apartment with a Scottish ghost. Luckily, none of us encountered the resident ghost while we were there.

The favorite place for the coffee lovers – that’s Isabelle and Claire– was a café in the Piazza Grande, five minutes walk from our apartment. We went to this café often, because Isabelle and Claire needed a good espresso to function well for the rest of the day. I had my first taste of cappuccino after nearly ten years of not drinking coffee. (That was actually a big deal for me.) I remembered how difficult it was to order a cup of tea in Italy five years ago. People just didn't understand that concept. It was so much easier to just be able to say, “cappuccino.” Needless to say, I enjoyed drinking cappuccino and felt more “Italian.” (Changing diet to eating pasta and drinking wine everyday, why not add cappuccino in the morning to complete my sense of being “Italian”?)

Many of these doodles were done while sipping cappuccino in the morning or a glass of wine at lunch. As we didn’t have WiFi in our old apartment, we had to go to the Piazza to get WiFi for Isabelle and Claire to check emails. We usually lingered at the café, drinking espresso and cappuccino, contemplating what to do the rest of the day, and me doodlin’ while they were checking their iPhones. (Thank god I don't own a smartphone!)

Can you see the inside of the cup? This cup is designed by Francesco Clemente.

5 empty cups of espresso? I only had a cup of cappuccino, but Isabelle and Claire each had two cups of espresso!

Travelogue: sweetness of each steps (and calories)

Traveling alone in an unfamiliar cities or hiking alone on the mountains, my mind wonders, escapes to some other reality, at times leaving utterly blank inside me, and returns with most unpredictable thoughts, silently conversing with others around me or with myself. I kept a little card stock with me when I traveled to Spain and Switzerland more than a decade ago. Along with the card stock was a tiny pedometer at my hip, counting each steps I made while traveling. I recorded the steps, mileages, and calories, and wrote whatever it was on my mind. On the other side of each card, I made drawings (see Experiment Diary/Drawings 1 & 2.) Later, I decided to refine what I wrote, and typed with an old typewriter on the found paper. Now, more than a decade later, all the details of the particular places and the feelings I was experiencing at that time still come back to me vividly when I read them. It is strange though, because things that I remember, I'm not sure if it was real or if I imagined. It’s like a diary, but sometimes it’s purely imaginable. These notes are my fleeting mind when I was traveling.

Songs My Father Sang Me from "Dear John"

Unearthing more old works. Not sure if this is a sign of resisting to finish my current drawing which has taken me over five months... But it's fun to dig up old works and see them in a different light. This particular work was done over two years from 1998 through 2000 with a year break in the middle. It was created when I was having a personally difficult time in my life. These book pages became my own diary then. Most of them were created while I was at the residencies at MacDowell Colony in New Hampshire and Centrum in Washington from 1998 to 1999.

Dear John \ - jän\ n (ca. 1945) : a letter (as to a soldier) in which a wife asks for a divorce or a girlfriend breaks off an engagement or a friendship.

"Dear John" is comprised of a total of 152 pages from a book called "Stories by Elizabeth Bowen", published in 1959. Each page is painted in watercolor, leaving selected words and sentences visible. Watercolor on book pages mounted on BFK paper. 152 pages. Originally presented in an installation. 1998-2000.