I believe Buddhists speak of “auspicious connections”. You have encounters one might believe are chance or random but really are more than that. So, last week I am driving in the Parkdale area of Toronto and drive by “The Paradise” an old theatre converted to an event venue. These days a theatre or even aContinue reading “RKS 2023 Films: “Midnight at the Paradise”: Monogamy and Sticky Flypaper”
Author Archives: Robert K Stephen (CSW)
RKS 2023 Hot Docs: “Seven Winters in Tehran”: Deadly Iranian Misogyny and Theocracy
Reyhaneh Jabbari was born in Tehran on November 6, 1987, as the first child of Shole Pakravan and Fereydoon Jabbari. Together with her two sisters, she grew up in Tehran in a protected, loving, artistic home. She studied computer science and worked part-time as an interior designer in the office of a family friend. SheContinue reading “RKS 2023 Hot Docs: “Seven Winters in Tehran”: Deadly Iranian Misogyny and Theocracy”
RKS 2023 Wine: Laura Hartwig Chilean Carménère: Pinot Noir on Steroids?
From the Colchagua Valley in Chile we have a Laura Hartwig Single Vineyard Carménère. In 1966 Laura Bisquertt inherited the “Santa Laura Estate” from Osvaldo her father who had planted traditional crops and raised dairy livestock on it. Laura’s husband Alejandro Hartwig bought adjoining plots of land and planting of traditional Bordeaux grapes commenced inContinue reading “RKS 2023 Wine: Laura Hartwig Chilean Carménère: Pinot Noir on Steroids?”
RKS 2023 Wine: The Superhero Wine Writer Humbly and Inadequately Explores a Chilean Carignan
Occasionally you encounter the superhero wine writer proud to be a judge at a wine competition or simply at some wine tasting event. Superhero has just tasted 83 wines and rated each of them maybe in the space of a couple of hours! Amazing! My crappy palate is put to the test on certain pressContinue reading “RKS 2023 Wine: The Superhero Wine Writer Humbly and Inadequately Explores a Chilean Carignan”
RKS 2023 Wine: A Georgian Wine Tasting at The Russian Gun Club
Most of my wine tastings have been at estates, chateaus, restaurants, ships and all sorts of event venues. The most memorable have been in various quintas in Portugal’s Douro region where I have been treated on occasion like visiting royalty. Perhaps the strangest venue in a Canadian city years ago was a Georgian wine tastingContinue reading “RKS 2023 Wine: A Georgian Wine Tasting at The Russian Gun Club”
RKS 2023 Wine: L.A. Cetto Petite Sirah: Treasure of the Sierra Madre?
I recently watched John Huston directed “Treasure of the Sierra Madre”. The 1947 film centres on the hunt for gold in the Sierra Madre Mountain range in Mexico. Bogart is a sociopath and Walter Huston an entertaining and honest old coot. Is there treasure in this L.A. Cetto Petite Sirah from Mexico? I saw aContinue reading “RKS 2023 Wine: L.A. Cetto Petite Sirah: Treasure of the Sierra Madre?”
RKS 2023 Film: “back home” at Vancouver International Film Festival
Canadian Nisha Platzer has crafted a moving documentary about the suicide of her brother Josh that occurring in Vancouver when Josh was 15 and Nisha 11. Josh was suffering from clinical depression at the time of his suicide. Nisha has dim memories of the death of Josh and convenes both family and friends to giveContinue reading “RKS 2023 Film: “back home” at Vancouver International Film Festival”
RKS Literature: Doctors as Empty Headed? (Thomas Mann)
“Indeed, the doctor’s calling is not different from any other: its practitioners are for the most part ordinary empty-headed folk, ready to see what is not there and to deny the obvious. Any untrained person, if he loves and has knowledge of the flesh, is their superior and in the mysteries of art can leadContinue reading “RKS Literature: Doctors as Empty Headed? (Thomas Mann)”
RKS Literature: School as Prison (Thomas Mann)
“I am only able to live when my mind and my fancy are completely free; and this it is that memory of my years in prison actually less hateful to me than those of the ostensibly more honourable bond of slavery and fear which chafed my sensitive boyish soul when I was forced to attendContinue reading “RKS Literature: School as Prison (Thomas Mann)”
RKS 2023 Wine: Italian Merlot Could be the Change You Need!
It is not frequently we encounter Italian Merlot as a single varietal in Canada. So we have a chance now with a somewhat unique Terre Magre Merlot from Friuli. Aroma: Black cherry, blackberry and cola with some intensity. Palate: A robust aroma for a wine does not always equate with a robust wine! Not muchContinue reading “RKS 2023 Wine: Italian Merlot Could be the Change You Need!”
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