EXCELLENT roads, lined with elegant pine-trees, make Herat an unusual Afghan city.
The calligraphy is graceful and elegant, but the pine dining table that faces it is rough hewn.
Another innovation is the creation of extremely thin-walled vessels, like Mr. Sudol's "Hawks and Owls" of birch and Ron Kent's elegant "Translucent Norfolk Pine Vessel," a simple, delicate bowl that tapers down to a near-conic bottom.
"The elegant and sophisticated Pine Bar is furnished with luxurious leather banquettes and comfortable armchairs," boasts the hotel's promotional materials.
In the dappled sunlight the forest was even more beautiful than I remembered, the stand of red pines elegant, and the paper-birch forest so enchanting it warranted a rest stop.
The sugary chicken, pine nuts, elegant eggplant — these were a watering down of Sichuanese food, she said, shameless pandering in a city where eating is not supposed to be easy.
My mother taught me how to appreciate a tree and so I begin to sort out the stiff and elegant spruces from the white pines with their long soft needles, the straight and lacy hemlocks from the deeply dusky firs.
Elegant hotels like the Hotel Cheval (1021 Pine Street; 866-522-6999; www.havelcheval.com) have sprouted.
Cushioned by wire grass, which evolved along with the resin-soaked pines to survive fire, this elegant ecosystem harbored nearly 200 species of plants and animals, like gopher tortoises, cockaded woodpeckers, indigo snakes and salamanders.
The appearance of their elegant plumage, normally seen flitting through dense Russian pine forests, is at least a seasonal bonus - whatever the weather.
