I am reading a book by Deepak Chopra on coincidences in life. I’m sure many have read it. Yesterday I went to my first Israeli wine tasting organized by the lovely Aileen Robbins of the Dunn Robbins Group. I confess to knowing very little about Israeli wines except what I have had for Passover through the years and those served at my lovely friend Ariel’s home. He has turned me on to some great dessert wines but this was my first sampling of a variety of wines. Before I write about the tasting though, I’d like to mention that today is the anniversary of Rabin’s assassination at the hands of an extremist on Nov. 4, 1995. I will never forget that day. I had moved back to Italy after finishing graduate school and was memorized in front of the tv watching the scenes of the peace rally and watching…

Yesterday, October 2, 2012 was Gandhi’s birthday and is celebrated as the International Day of Non-violence. I know this fact because of a client I work with, an NGO. Gandhi has always fascinated me and along with Nelson Mandela and Martin Luther King, he is one of my heroes. I wish the day were more widely celebrated and that non-violence was a way of life everywhere in the world.

Waking up in Japantown in San Francisco this morning was a perfect way to start my own celebration, despite the early hour. I was celebrating the full moon with a moon cake that my taxi driver brought me at 530am. He was Chinese but grew up in Vietnam after the Civil War in China. So many stories, so much war. Apparently, the moon cake is a good omen.

There is a true sense of peace and calm that reigns over the…