My Big Fat Half Ethiopean Party

It was my landlady Vicky's birthday and she threw a humongus party for her collection of very interesting friends.

If I calculated correctly (because I am too scared to ask, and she is too precarious to tell) according to her claim that she was born in the year of the Rabbit but she is older than my father, then she would have just turned 69.

What a kick arse number.

The Night Before
The festivities started the night before with the preparations that reminded me of the days when I was a child and my grandmother used to gather the family around the round table and form a production line making dumplings, wontons, sushi, bamboo leaf parcels (for Dragon Boat festival), a real ritual around food preparation and special times in the calendar to give meaning to mundane things like the passage of time. Vicky had gathered around 4 or five girl friends of hers all buzzing around the house slicing and dicing and marinating bits that make up of what I can see as a mountainous amount of food.

And then we kinda got drunk. Well, I had two glasses, no more than the others, except they are all about 40 years older than me and they had all been way too tired. So the evening ended slightly grimly with the mentioning of a few infamous events of various peoples lives and some vile cursing. Suddenly having realised that she had just cursed a few of the people that she in fact actually love very much (don't we all get that some times??) my landlady presented us with a vessel of water in a bottle made into the shape of the Catholic Madonna. 'This is Holy water from Mother Teresa - we must put it on our head to chase my curse away'. I have never really been that religious in my life but being slightly amused and tipsy at the time it just kinda made sense (and to be polite) to just slap the water on my head.

The Morning
I spent the morning giving out Berrocca tablets to my landlady and our various house guests, who at 7am in the morning went back to work on the mountains of food but obviously still suffering from the over indulgence of the night before. One of them that wasn't there last night (but was cursed at - I didn't say anything, of course) turned up with the flu. So I administered Lemsip and some phenylephrine action and wrapped her in a towel. She said Vicky would never talk to her if she didn't risk her life turning up to her party. Then there was the scratched elbow of Vicky's Jamaican Vegetarian son that needed a bit of Antiflame and patching up. Some one else had a burn that was also bound to happen and I whipped out the ice pack, and then the timely attendence to a cut from a broken plate. I do feel like a nurse. At lease useful because they won't let any one 'junior' near food preparation, even though I am the only one in the room that can boast a food blog. I do pride myself in my culinary skills, but given that there are five large elderly ladies yelling at each other welding their knives in the air in a very small kitchen I thought it just wasn't really my place unless was called upon.

The Party
Ding dong --- I think that was a flash back from one of the skits from 'Who's Line Is It Anyway' where you had to guess who exactly the party guest was and stuff? From 3pm they streamed in and the party was in full swing. Vicky has a pretty active life in her retirement, apart from being very active at her Church and the Ethiopian community, she does everything from yoga, bridge, acupuncture, majong, meals on wheels, the retired staff club, the Apartment Council, the anti-Madonna-adopting-Ugandan-Baby action group, and making her own curtains. And being both Ethiopian and Italian she feels like she has to invite everyone she knows. But because she is so eccentric and peculiar, not everyone and anyone are actually friends with her. so you can guess that the characters that filter through the system to be very very interesting. Particularly at the age of 60 - 90, a lot of these individuals have lived very full and adventurous lives. Some of them have not only lived through WWII, but things like the Hungarian Revolution, the Ethiopian Revolution, the golden sixties in San Francisco, deaths of their own children, suicides of lovers, bankruptcy, divorce, drug overdoses, rubbing shoulders wit the rich and famous, plane crashes, miracle cures and sordid affairs... So what's me the young lass of 28 to do when an oldie sits me down to dish out the dirt of their lives?










On the right is only a very small part of the spread. The Ethiopian curries spice the room and bring out some tears, while the Italian classics fill everyone up with comfort and satisfaction. My highlight will have to be the soft, moist Ingera bread (seen here rolled), the most typical Ethiopian carb, dipped in a prawn and octopus coconut seafood fanfare. And the Strawberries in Cointreau and orange juice is the recipe I'll be taking home with me.




























This is a bit of dancing action later on. Don't you think Vicky looked pretty hot in her bright green designer frock for a Nana her age??






Late into the evening
The dusk sank into a smokey grey and only three guests remain. Two very well dressed Ethiopian grandmas who sit very gracefully with their small handbags tucked on top of their closed knees, nodding to each other as they discuss family affairs, and Mrs J the 75 year old widowed Irish lady, who had just finished a conversation with poor Emma, who looked like she fled the party.

Mrs J said, as she sat me down, 'I thought your friend was only 15!! I didn't know you were the same age!! I'm sorry I gave her brain damage, haaaa haaaa haaaaa!!'
('Great,' I thought to myself)
'I'm a Catholic, but not a very good one. I wasn't a virgin when I got married. I started having sexual intercourse when I was only 17, when I moved to London. But it was all about just intercourse. I never loved any of them. '
To my absolute bemusement she went on to describe every detail of her sexual activities with her late husband, particularly elaborating the fact that he was very 'well-endowed'.
'You know, Sarah Brightman wrote in a newspaper article that although the marriage to Andrew Lloyd Webber ended badly, she enjoyed life with him because he was well endowed. And I think that has everything to do with sex with a man, don't you think dear?' She said.
'Musicians are generally renowned for that sort of stuff, I guess, Mrs J.' I replied.
'The ecstasy and excitement of having him inside me just made me want to forget myself. I would never want to look at another man again. I decided that it was then I wanted to spend the rest of my life with him. Have you felt that about a man before my dear? Well I guess you are still young, aren't you dear?'
I am speechless, I am blushing, the proper Ethiopian ladies are blushing. I am suddenly feeling like I am the biggest prude in the world because I am too shy to over talk a 75 year old widow on the simple matter of sex. When did they become so liberated and I so dull???

The Aftermath

They have all gone and its 1am. I am still eating and candidly making a small rocket fuel concoction in my goblet. Vicky pulls out her shisha and we have another good puff.

Apart from a slightly smaller mountain of food left over there is also a small mountain of empty plates. I am thinking of the conversations we are going to have next.

'They came, they ate, and drank, and then pissed off. All I did was clean up and worry and stress and stuck talking to people I don't even like. This is the last party I am ever going to have.' She said.

'They told me that's what you said last year.' I replied, exhaling.

'M-8' : Another Haiku

you and me, leaf, ice
falling burning rolling melting

.....................................- don't turn around

he and she, rock, fire

'M-8' : A Haiku

hesitations loom a strange land
enveloped, dancing thoughts too powerful too unknown
illuminations rim a star-dusted sky

The Zeelanders Kicks Arse at Hummus Fest 2008

Breaking News: Wendy and WaWa have just taken Runner-Up placing with their 'Ladies of the Ring Trilogy' in the 'first ever' Hummus making competition held by Hummus Bros & the Jewish Community Center for London.

http://flavorpill.com/london/events/2008/5/18/hummusfest
http://www.jcclondon.org.uk/Food_HummusFest.html

Full report to follow with video of the fierce competition. The recipe is now available on my food blog.

Some More Animal Friends

I am concious that I have been very slack at the moment with blogging but please believe me that I have been kept very busy away from my lap top. Updates to come below in a day or two, but thought I'd entrall you with images of some fuzzy friends for now.

Blakki the Pub Cat
This is the Pub Cat who would easily inspire a song by Andrew Lloyd Webber, that lives at The Seven Stars, a very classical hole in the wall English pub around the corner from the Law Courts near my work











Bird and Babies*
On a recent trip to Oxford, the Merton College Mummy Duck was not very impressed with me when I stood in her way to the river. My apologies again but I think your bundles of joy are just gorgeous.
*(Bird and Baby is also the nickname of a famous Oxford pub called Eagle and Child)




Meanwhile Back at the Farm in New Zealand
Dad sent me some pics of Merlin who's been busy on the job with Alma Thud. The crazy blood thirsty kid is not even five months old! Look at that strut!

Oxford's Dreaming Spires

One Week of Summer: Life in London @ 11 weeks

After a very late start to the summer and some odd April snowing, London is turning out the most surprisingly beautiful weather this week. Its been fine almost every single day since last Sunday, the temperature is just perfect. The sun isn’t scorching like the summers we have in the Southern hemisphere, and neither is it humid and sweaty like the summers in Asia or Southern Europe. The breeze is cool, soothing, fresh, calming... you can wear a T-shirt all day and you never get cold or sunburnt.

In a city where every inch of space is money, the precious pieces of lawns on gardens and squares and the outside tables of the pubs are filled with people, fighting for their little corner of summer. Absolutely everybody is out and about all hours of the day and into the night - picnicking, playing frisbee, lounging, flirting, forgetting themselves - just relishing in this weather that simply fell out of the sky. Mwwwaaaah!

So what am I doing now? I am traveling at a speed of 80km/hour directly underneath a packed and rowdy Oxford Street, onboard the last tube home on Friday night – aren’t I good? My reflection is rippling in the window opposite me against the passing lights of the station the carriage had just left. There’s a big burly black guy right opposite me, awkwardly avoiding touching knees with me, holding a yellow brochure in his hands which reads: “Travel is a means to an End. HOME”.

I don’t force myself to count the stations anymore after a boozy night – just in case I fall asleep or whatever – I just know. Nor do I need to look for the exit sign when I get off the platform, or hesitate at the top of the steep and churning escalators when I rush up, just in case it eats me. I push in and out of the doors just like any other impatient Londoner, and skit past the Oyster machine as if to demonstrate how grumpy I am about the fact that its holding me up.

Eleven weeks in London – could I really be this comfortable?

My favourite part of the day is the morning, when I take the lift down with the charmingly flirtatious neighbour who always holds the lift for me. I walk past the Greek delis and the smell of coffee and onto Hyde Park. Saying hello to my brood of early squirrels and admire rows of tulips on the flower bed, past the horse riders, joggers and energetic dogs. I charge down Regent Street facing the sun. Greeting the English (or not) gentlemen in their light day suits walking my way with a beaming smile, taking in one whiff of warm cologne after another as we rub shoulders, assessing which one I’d rather like than another. Waltz out of Leicester Square and into Monmouth Street for a flat-white, and greet the receptionist as I push through the revolving doors with a gainly “Good morning Mrs Smith” before I swivel into my chair and a hot finger on the Start Button.

The fixed-term contract job is pretty straight-forward and I can’t say I am extensively stimulated, but I like the environment, the economic staff café, the girls that I go out with on a Friday, and beginning to get over the ‘We Are The Bastion of Institutionalised British Formality’ work-culture shock. After beating myself into accepting the eventuality of living a bureaucratic 9-5 existence through committees, user groups, advisory panels, editorial boards etc, I do find myself picking up ridiculous expressions like “Sounds reasonable,” (as in, "I’ll accept that for now, but don’t expect it to last for too long"); and “In the interest of fairness,” (as in “Hang on a minute Lady/Mister – but you’ve crossed the line") and “Oh dear me!” (as in “What the fuck have you done this time?”). At the end of the day, it is adding to a mental and financial stability for me, as this is the highest paying job I’ve ever had in my life, and it affords me a relatively comfortable city lifestyle. I’ll probably just scrape enough money for the traveling in the year ahead, but I certainly don’t expect to be taking much money home with me.

While I have been occupying myself with side trips out of London on most weekends at the moment, I am finding myself rather occupied on the week evenings drinking, doing various activities like live music etc, meeting a copious amount of interesting characters, and exploring hidden corners of London just for the thrill. On the evenings I have free I take another long stroll home through Hyde Park again along the Serpentine, just enjoying the colours of the sunset and the happiness of people when they are in a festive mood.

My landlady is going through a bit of a rough patch of late-life crisis which gives her quite dramatic moodswings. 50% of the time when I get home she will offer me half a bottle of red and I’d sit on the carpet having an apple tobacco shisha with her while she reminiscent the golden times that went by. The other 50% of the time she would be quite moody and we’d have ridiculous argument about my hair clogging up the drains or that I left the kitchen light for an extra ten seconds than necessary. Other than the fact that I am trying not to get my head done in by this whole passive-aggressive thing, I think I’ve got things pretty much sorted out at home, when I’m actually there…

Its all pretty physically demanding, but mentally it just feeds me on and on and on… I feel like I’m on fire. If I had come to London when I was 18 years old, I probably could have even been able to fit more in these days that are just not long enough, but I probably won’t have the political nous or street wisdom to know how to get the most out of it. I am really glad that I am at a stage of my life where I’ve reached a point of maturity and awareness that my accumulated experiences are helping me select and collect and rearticulate the further things I want to bring into my life. And If I’d come here at age 38 I’d probably be over the whole thing. So yeah, I am happy here for now. Comfortably cruising at 80km/hr.

Earlier this evening I was at a familiar waterhole in the East end, taking over a footpath next to an ancient graveyard between Liverpool St and Old St stations with my mates. A little weary too though, with the added complication of having to avoid running into ex-lovers, especially when I’ve only been in town for less than 3 months. Good form Wawa, good form. I had on a rather serious looking pinstripe work suit on the top, and a pair of jandals (thongs/flip flops) on the bottom that I strategically prepared earlier, but the ensemble made me look suspiciously like I’m attending a Big Brother premiere in Queensland Australia. I was bouncing around raving on about the wonderful weather, as one does, when Young Cambridge Graduate in the circle advised me oh-so-cooly: “You know, summer might be just this week. I hope you won’t be too disappointed.”

For a minute I felt a bit annoyed and a little deflated. But with this warming beer in my hand I thought to myself – hang on, I really don’t care. I don’t care if summer only lasts a week. Its right now and I am right here in the middle of it. When it gets cold I’ll find myself a bag of coal and some hot chocolate. I’ll find a stool to stand on and lift down the box of winter coats from the top of the wardrobe, turn the damn volume up on the stereo and find a big fluffy guerilla to snuggle up to. I will sing to keep warm and cry to keep warm. I’ll still be getting up early and hitting bed late, and I’ll still be having a fucking good time. No one, not even the weather, can it away from me.

Let the Bluebells Bloom

With the main agenda being getting out of a London which is now ruled by Boris Johnson the Hideous Clown, the exploration of the English country side continues this weekend as we head over to Hampshire. Wendy & Emma’s relos, Janice and Derek live in Petersfield, a town about 1.5 hours train ride Westwards from London. They were kind enough to have us over for the Bank Holiday weekend, with the intention of showing us around in Winchester and further afield in Dingledell, where the bluebells bloom in the month of May.

Janice (family lineage research extraordinaire) and Derek (Snooker commentary extraordinaire)’s typical suburbia house made me homesick. It’s a cute little house tucked between others like itself in the quarter acre that I am so used to seeing back home in New Zealand. The screetching of the front door when a neighbour or family arrives, the rug under the wooden coffee table, the sound of the kettle, the smell of freshly cut lawn, the glass door that leads out to the back yard with pot plants and moss-covered ornaments, a shed that the boys tinker around in… and a giant soft couch that moulds around the shape of your body when you throw yourself and your hang over in it…

The rides in J & D’s car through the leafy country roads was ecstatically beautiful. Every corner we turn in the windy roads there is something cute and characterful to admire. The thatched roofed houses that has been sitting there for centuries nurturing generations and generations of families; the regally painted and traditional road signs, the bold buckles and belts on the horses along the road, the hardy plants that spur out of cracks of geriatric stones of abandoned walls that once probably was the fort of a forgotten war. Rather than the awesomely dramatic and bleak scenery in the open spaces of New Zealand, the Hampshire country side is quaint and elegant, humble but cultured in comparison. The fact that human habitation and economic need has been shaping the landscape and negotiating existence along the rivers and the meadows means that every stretch of space here appears to be a co-created art work between human and nature. The aesthetics of the little villages and hamlets along the windy roads expresses a way of life that has been forged and carried on for thousands of years, a way of co-existing with nature and making the somewhat unvaried everyday existence creative and meaningful along the way, and the ever abundant country-folk humour of the country folk.

Here are some pictures of Winchester – founded by King Alfred, first King of England in the late 800s BC, and famous of its stunning cathedral. Jane Austin is buried in the Cathedral, and John Keats lived here and penned a number of poems here. In fact Deno took us on a tribute to him on the walk he would have done every day around the meadows and
the streams behind the town. Apart from the soothing views, here we found some very cute water birds and their young.

Moorhen feeding young in Winchester
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moorhen
http://www.rspb.org.uk/wildlife/birdguide/name/m/moorhen/index.asp

Duck and Ducklings

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duck

Here are pictures of the bluebells at Dingledell on Sunday, surrounding a completely different setting of a Buddhist monastery, where we took a laid back walk through the incredibly tranquil hill side with waterfalls and English pines.

Lastly, I'd like to end with the beautiful poem by John Keats, which he wrote as he walked upon the beautiful little country path.

Ode to Autumn
by John Keats c 1819

Seasons of mists and mellow fruitfulness,
Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;
Conspiring with him how to load and bless
With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eaves run;
To bend with apples the moss'd cottage-trees,
And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;
To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells
With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,
And still more, later flowers for the bees,
Until they think warm days will never cease;
For Summer has o'erbrimm'd their clammy cells.

Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?
Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find
Thee sitting careless on a granary floor,
Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind;
Or on a half-reap'd furrow sound asleep,
Drowsed with the fume of poppies, while thy hook
Spares the next swath and all its twinèd flowers:
And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep
Steady thy laden head across a brook;
Or by a cyder-press, with patient look,
Thou watchest the last oozings, hours by hours.
Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they?

Think not of them, thou hast thy music too,—
While barrèd clo uds bloom the soft-dying day
And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue;
Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn
Among the river-sallows, borne aloft
Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;
And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn;

Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft
The redbreast whistles from a garden-croft;
And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.

A Frolick in Suffolk

Orford Castle (built by Henry II in 1100s) ; Emma & I losing ourselves in flower power

The Clan and I went for a merry little weekend out in Suffolk - staunch towering castles, quaint villages, grey sea side fish'n'chips, star studded night, snoring campers (ok - that was me), unstable piers, endless yellow rapeseed fields and warm little tea rooms. Due to unrealiable wi-fi I am going to have to leave you with very little commentary for the moment. Please don't go away because I will soon upload pictures from Shakespeare's Birthday Party @ the Globe Theatre from the weekend before.
















Beach @ Southwold close to our camp ground













Tearoom @ Thorpeness; The Line @ fish'n chips shop @ Aldburgh (one thing I've learnt about the English is that they are attracted to ques)

Shakespeare's Birthday @ The Globe Theatre

Shakespeare turns 444 years old this year and Natalie and I invited ourselves along to the big party at the Globe on Sunday 18th - a recontructed theatre with adjoining museum along Southbank (of Thames River - once mostly marshy type land which surprisingly made it easier to preserve things) at pretty much the same place the old man would have had his plays shown. More commentary and videos later when I get this Wifi thingy sorted out.