Skin shallow

I'm not a great believer in the cosmetics industry. This is not a sentiment shared by a majority of the ladies. Googling found me the small (not) fact that " Though slowing, year-on-year growth rates in the global cosmetics and toiletries industry have been positive to date. Last year the world market for cosmetics and toiletries (C&T) was valued at US$201 billion, up 4.8% from 2002 (in fixed exchange rate terms)." Even if you give Toilteries half that share that's still a lot of makeup by any standards!

In theory the youthful twenties are when your skin is recovering from the angst and teenage bouts of acne -- your skin is clear, pores almost invisible, complexion positively rosy, even & taut. A light moisturizer and gentle exfoliating are all the 20 something skin needs to look good.

My twenties were skin-heaven time; I never had pimples, zits, acne, blemishes or poor self-esteem due to a darker that pale colouring. More importantly I could never bring myself to part with my cash on the latest lipstick/ blush/ foundation etc...My make-up kit consisted of kajal and lip gloss for the odd day, eyeliner and the palest blush for an occasion special. I convinced myself that I liked the natural look and accepted that I was too damn lazy to make any effort whatsoever.

The truth is that I have always had an oblique standard for "beautiful" and I never got caught in the race in which many (most) women I knew, regardless of their looks, felt they were failing to meet model standards of perfection. I always wondered how perfectly lovely women found time to layer on the make-up and if they were ever at all disappointed when all the layers were washed off and their face was nothing but a wrinkled up prune (from all those constant chemicals) underneath. Sorry, I'm trying not to be judgemental (but somehow that's not how this reads!). It's just that to my minds eye sometimes the vulnerability of a clear (I don't mean blemish clear; I mean concience clear) face and the innocence of a natural smile on a young woman is a far more attractive proposition.

The 'wise' thirties are quite another story. I'm told that although acne will no longer be an "issue" the first signs of aging will appear. Beside the grey hair springing up all over the head (yes, there's that delight to look forward to!) there is discoloration and premature wrinkles to look forward to (eeks!). It's awful, simply awful.

Here's what happens in the 30's: "The skin under the eyes begins to thin and puffy dark circles become commonplace, the skin's natural process of exfoliation slows down and collagen and elastin fibers decrease."

The suggestion is that I consider boosting my skin care regimen and upgrading my makeup routine. Looking good in my thirties will take more time and effort than in my twenties and I should prepare to be both out of pocket and time where my looks are concerned. I can no longer afford to be judgemental of women who makeup as soon I shall have to take this with some seriousness.

Apparently time stops for no one and no amount of bl**dy expensive Olay Regenerist regime creams and serums is going to help.

I would like to think that inner beauty is everything and that how I look sans makeup is statement-making cool. Yet I can't escape from the fact that in my thirties my skin is taking on a paler shade of grey.

So I shall continue to dabble in makeup to maintain 'natural' as a look. When it all clashes violently and I look terribly grey or way too bright will someone please please give me a heads-up?

Oriental outings

Busy busy weeks with lots of meals eaten out, with friends, with relatives, with each other. I am biased towards oriental food - Japanese, Chinese, Thai, fusion - all yumm in my books. V is not so. I mean he'll eat it with a smile on his face but Italian tops his favourite food bias without a doubt. Say 'Pizza' and the guy who agrees quickest and smiles broadest is V!

The first of our oriental outings was with our friend M to a Korean restuarant in far away Raynes Park, south west London. We combined the plan with a visit to Wimbledon to see friends with a newborn baby girl. On a cold Sunday evening the Korean place was warm and full of Koreans eating dinner (to me the surest sign of authentic and tasty cuisine is that people from the country of origin will slurp it down smiling - although I would say beware of snake and insect eating cultures). We'd never eaten Korean before and had no clue what to expect. Ga-Chi is on a lonely lane close to Raynes Park station. It's sign well lit and welcoming we went into the warmth and carefully read the menu. We made no decisions before M arrived (he's been before) except on Korean beer and a fried Calamari starter. We finally ordered 3 main dishes: the first was a traditional barbeque; the second a chicken in chill garlic sauce and the third a hot pot. The chicken arrived first. Fried chicken in a very light and tasty sauce, eaten with no accompaniment was excellant - it needed no rice or noodles to complete it at all. Then the kind Korean waitress brought the ingredients for the barbeque to our table and cooked them on the hot plate in the centre - marinated sirloin steak and pork with a few mushrooms. The Korean barbeque is eaten in a particular manner. A lettuce leaf forms the base on which you put a few springs of spring onion, some soyabean paste, spicy chilli kimchi. Then whip up a piece of cooked meat from the central hot plate, fold the lettuce leaf much like a dumpling and pop into the mouth. Simply sterling! The final dish was the hot pot. Rice, egg, korean hot sauce, meat and some quick mixing by the waitress at the table and this hot stone pot produced a fine small bowl of steaning food for each of us. It was the prefect ending to a sumptuous meal. It's all fresh ingredients, cooked at the very last minute possible to keep in the nutrients and taste, very neat and tidy and tasty - I am taken with Korean food and Ga-chi is highly recommended! Oh, I think you need a booking as they are very full usually.

Our next oriental eating opportunity was disasterous. V and I were roaming around Oxford Street in search of an elusive red jacket that I want to buy and as the sun went down and the cold fingers of the evening gripped us tighter we decided to nip into the relatively new (a couple of months I think) 'Yo Sushi!' behind the new Boots. What a disappointment! V and I both love Sushi and regularly frequent the other famous sushi bar chain Itsu. We'd never been to Yo! before and decided that some green tea and a plate each of sushi would be our evening warmer. The decor was neat and clean but the couches were mighty uncomfortable to get into. The passing conveyor belt was full of neat little plates of sushi making their way to every diner. Unfortunately not a single palte was marked. All they gave us was this menu. The problem is this: identify sushi that looks good, then flip through all the pages to find out what it is, like the description and decide that that's what you'll have, look up and its long gone, hovering three tables away, where another bewildered guest is doing the same dance. Why couldn't they just put a little holder on each one identifying what it is - like every other sushi bar in the world?! Next problem: two spouts coming up through the centre of the table marked fizzy water and still water, surrounded by numerous glasses. You'd think that it was a kind reaction to every tired Oxford street shopper asking for a glass of water. Or that the person who seated you would mention that it cost some money to use them. I finally gave up on the conveyor belt and chose a mackrel kedgeree from the menu (it was cold and disappointing - in sync with the theme of the place) - and V chose something from the escaping conveyor and pronounced it 'average'. Bill paying time and we've been charged £1 each for the water we drank - "per glass you use madam". Never again. I am on a boycott Yo Sushi stance now......

V's brother and my brother were here at the weekend and we went to Hamley's in Regent Street in search of toys to keep our young niece happy when her father got back to Mumbai. After an hour in overcrowded toyland, with our hands full of toys and goodies we made our way to the Japan Travel Centre in Picaddilly. The Toku restaurant has been revamped from a squashed few tables next to the travel desk to a bright red walled, many tabled and utterly buzzing restaurant. The last time I had been there with a friend the service and food had been delightful if hurried. The seating is still a bit constrained but the service was friendly and the food every bit as tasty as before. There is a large menu and its not cheap as chips but its good sized portions of fresh food. We had a selection of sushi (and even Nik - my bro - tried some - this is amazing but why is another post) and then all three boys had rice bowls with chilli pork (accompanied by 'can-able bottles' of Sapporo beer) while I devoured a chicken teriyaki set. Our meals were hot, delicious and so beautifully presented that even that quick meal felt wholesome and relaxed. I'm not sure where the travel desk has moved but the basement is a supermarket of Japanese groceries and the first floor a japanese bookshop. If ever in the area and looking for a quick, healthy fast food option the Japan Travel Centre is highly recommended.

There you are - 3 completely different oriental meals with 3 very different outcomes. I still love Oriental food!

Ga-Chi: 34 Durham Road, Raynes Park, London, SW20 0TW; Tel: 020 8947 1081

Yo Sushi! : All over the city like a rash - avoid any and all unless you are a glutton for punishment - don't say you weren't warned!!!

Japan Travel Centre/ Toku restaurant: 212 Piccadilly, London W1J 9HG; Tel: 020 7255 8255

Cold Snap 101

Frozen person = unloved blog

It's taken 5 days to defrost my fingers and drag myself out from under the world's warmest duvet to get to this post. UK is under the spell of a rather cold snap and I, the original Sun-catcher, is suffering for it. And it's only November.

Cuddlefest with simply adorable nephews aged 5 and 20 months helped warm the heart on Friday. Houseguests from afar (one whose tale is fodder for another post) since Saturday has kept me on toes - all the jogging around the house trying to keep some semblence of tidiness has got the blood flowing.

Not deviating anymore. To battle the fog that envelopes your house and the cold that permeates those thick walls here are my top tips:

1. Hot home-made bubbling chai (not lukewarm latte from Starbucks)

2. Steaming bowls of soup (M&S or Covent Garden heated on the stove will do for the mixie-challenged)

3. Boiling hot baths with lavender oil in them (so what if you look a bit like a lobster by the time you come out, atleast you will be warm)

4. Hot water bottles (24 hour rotation - get your other half to go make them while you preserve the warmth left behind)

5. Knee high woollen socks (one pair or two)

6. Tights (under the socks please, a bit superwoman like?!)

7. Fluffy bedroom slippers (without the pompoms please)

8. Big old (therefore softest) himachali shawl you can find (don't be fashion conscious, this goes over anything, really)

9. Lots of candles - differest sizes, shapes, smells and colours (even when you don't have guests, it makes the place seem cosier and burns that cold smell out)

10. Hugs (endless supply from certain warm human being - I've got mine to take the week off and acclimatise me to this harsh tundra)

It's cold and I'm a bit like an ice cream container - sweet but cold! As you can see I'm suffering with the -5 temperatures that only promise to go lower when the isobars become closer and the wind is from the Arctic. Brrrr....

Any wise suggestions to keep warm O wise bloggers?!

'Christmas' by any other name

Political correctness is for wimps. People who can't or won't call an apple an apple. And people who couldn't find any other job but have remenant childhood desires to star in their own secret society.

A while ago V was pointing out someone to someone and was strictly reprimanded for saying 'blonde girl'. Apparently he should have said 'girl with golden hair' or some such thing because blondes no longer want to be called that. They are offended by the stereotype of 'blondes' being dumb. I simply have to shake my so-far-so-black head of hair and wonder what next? Should I be offended when someone points to me and says 'Asian looking' or 'brown girl'. Of course I would like to be pointed to as that 'gorgeous woman' but let's face it that ain't going to happen; 'Asian looking' or 'brown girl' is far closer the target and much closer the point. Blonde girl is accurate, its a description when a name is not known, not derogatory and whoever stuffed their heads with trash about stereotypes, well, they should have none of it -be proud to be blonde, black, brown or blue!

This is the latest row in the battle of the political correctness:

Apparently, someone fairly junior and overzealous to protect the 'diversity' of the London borough of Lambeth decided to rename its Christmas lights “winter” or “celebrity” lights, effectively banning the word 'Christmas'. Someone at the Daily Mail decided it was front page news enough and although Lambeth Council responded by quickly taking out a strong press release denying this and applauding the festival of christmas. But not before 'furore' among the christian public and discussion on every talk show on day time telly.

So I had to listen to lisping (and very irritating) Lowri Turner (Brit TV celebrity) tell us on the 'Wright Stuff' (Channel Five) and then the evening news about how she thinks that Christmas is archaic and that no matter how many Brits actually put 'C of E' on applications none of them is a real Christian. Her boyfriend is apparently Asian and she is trying to teach her children about other festivities (ie. 'diversity') and she fully supports this change of 'Christmas' to 'Winter'. Doesn't want her children to feel pressured into celebrating Christmas just because it's a tradition. How is it possible to get such dumb guests on such a great programme - Mathew Wright, get someone half decent to be an 'expert' (This is a rant for another post I think).

Anyway, needless to say I don't agree and I'm not even Christian. I think Christmas lights should be called just that. Changing someone's name doesn't change what it is. Re-branding for the sake of it should not be allowed. Little Christian children wait all year for Christmas and Santa Claus to bring them presents. Should we take away all innocence and just tell them Christmas got cancelled? Next they'll be saying that 'Winter' is cancelled and henceforth being called 'cold season'.

Indian's all over the UK celebrate Diwali with zeal, dressing up for parties, playing taash, eating mithaiyan and bursting pataka's. Wouldn't we hate it if Dwali was cancelled by the political correctness brigade? Whatever happened to tolerance? This is a Christian country for heaven's sake and if they can accept our festivals I think the 'diverse' population should learn to accept theirs. I'm all for political correctness when someone is being hurt or when the remarks are deregatory but not when it will remove a tradition that is revered or when the stereotype is half-baked and all in the mind.

I'm jobless but not desperate enough to join the political correctness secret society!

taash: Cards
mithaiyan: Sweets
pataka's: fireworks

A cricket bit

Guffawing a la ha ha interupted my nightly telly addiction last night. Turned around to see V trying desperately not to fall off his swiss ball while simultaneously shaking with laughter.

This is the reason. Indian cricketing fans (of whom V would like to be crowned King) will enjoy.

My poor brave Dilli

Sarojini nagar market is a teenage schoolgirls designer outlet on a budget. All through school thats where I went to shop for what I thought were cool clothes and were infact export rejects and seconds. Now it's a bomb site and all the gruesome pictures are playing havoc with the happy memories I have of it. It's where we'd go for Diwali gifts, to eat chaat, to buy our woolies, to buy myriad household items - from bedspreads to plastic containers of every size, colour and shape - to stock up on fresh fruit & veggies.

It's taking me more time than most (probably because of the distance) to get my head around what has happened - 3 near simultaneous bomb blasts in 3 crowded areas. Fleeting news pictures and sketchy accounts of the scale of things show my poor city bleeding and hurt. Even at a non-festive time these markets are always overcrowded and I can only imagine the terror innocent shoppers have gone through in those minutes and hours after the bombings.

I'm thinking of my city this diwali and praying that all dilliwalas use the proverbial and very real lights to find their way ahead.

Diwali ki shubh kamnaye

Tired eyes meet a warm kitchen

To break the week up and give my eyes a break from this screen I left home on Wednesday for the greenery and clean air of Wimbledon. Our globe-trotting friends have a brilliantly sunny apartment on the top floor of a house just a stone's throw from the Common and I was invited to go and stay. She and I spent the afternoon a bit like kids in a candy shop, looking at toys for children. She had a long list of kids of all sizes and ages to buy gifts for and this was just the research run to see what was available. Wimbledon has every possible high street shop in its confines and we had a jolly old time ooohing and aaahing over adorable winter coats for kiddies, geomag, lego and leapad. All oohed and aahed out, research duly done, we headed to their home to a glass of fine fine wine, Faustino I.

We went to Cocum in nearby Raynes Park. We've been before a few times, V & I, with these friends and a few others. Cocum is an unassuming South Indian gem of a restaurant that makes a mean appam and Nadan meen curry. The Kathakali masks and other Kerala handicrafts suit the small space and make the restaurant feel cosy and inviting. An enjoyable evening was had by all!

Their home, in a very comfortable guest bed and after nights of strange insomnia I was out like a light (well almost - an hour of reading followed by 6 uninterupted hours of shut eye). Woke up to a bright, clear and sunny day. Sat on a swiss ball chatting away while my buddy, a fabulouso cook, dished out hot freshly made gobhi parathas from her tawa and onto our plates. There I was exhausted from sleepless-ness and staring at the computer and TV screen till my eyes smarted almost continuously, now tucking into a steaming delicious paratha in someones warm kitchen. How I needed that! Warm kitchen, the smell of freshly ground spices, a full tum and unseasonably warm sunshine for this time of year - all reminders of an Indian holiday.

Well, its back to reality now. My home. More applications. Still no V. But soon.

There is NOTHING on TV. Thankfully we live in a high-ish rise and from one of the windows (strategically, our sofa is opposite) of our living room there are continuous fireworks magically going off every few second - minutes. This is all practice, buildup to Guy Fawkes day which is round the corner. My refreshed eyes are still resting. Enjoying the starbursts and beautiful dislplays that ligt up the cold London skies. Ta da!

Cocum: 9, Approach Rd, Raynes Park, London, SW20 8BA. Tel: 020 8540 3250

Appam: fermented rice pancake

Meen: fish

Gobhi: Cauliflower

Paratha: Griddle fried Indian bread

Sleepless in London

My Other (and Better) Half is the other side of the pond, in another of the world's greatest cities, the Big Apple. Meanwhile I am still in London, having (stupidly) turned down the offer of holidaying for a week with him, in order to stay home and continue applying for jobs. How foolish am I!? Don't answer that, its a rhetorical q...

I won't say I was not tempted but common sense prevailed. Temptation was kept at bay by the hassle of getting a visa (high up on the pain charts) added to the tingles of guilt of not having a job for the last 6 months. It's been a productive few days though. I've spent the last two days fused to this computer churning out applications with supporting statements that make me sound holier than thou. I have a load of application deadlines to meet in the next few days, deadlines I would have missed holidaying, so I'm not feeling completely useless.

What I am though, is sleepless and sleep deprived. It's been 3 nights since I've had a good nights sleep. Applications all day and most of the evening, interspersed by plates of hot gyoza, followed by telly till midnight and then a book till about 4am. Dozing by 5am and sound asleep at 6am when I can see the first lights of day. Up at about at 9.30am and back at this machine. Whatever is the matter with me. I suspect it's a combination of missing V and all the shopping I could have crammed into my suitcases.

Went out to get some fresh air and groceries today. Both were first in a while and I had forgotten how refreshing cold air could be. Now I have chocolate to accompany the endless steamed gyoza!

I'm waiting for the applications to go, V to come back and my days & nights to return to a normal rhythm.

In the meanwhile I hope V goes and sees the Statue of Liberty this time round!

Please, sir, I want some more

What better remedy on a Sunday afternoon after a partying Saturday night than the new adaptation of Charles Dickens classic Oliver Twist? A remedy it was not.

Roman Polanski's mastery with 'The Pianist' was not in evidence in this much awaited autumn release. My benchmark is certainly the 1968 musical 'Oliver!' which I have seen many a time and for me, brings to life Victorian England through the eyes of young Oliver.

The story is much the same: Victorian England and an innocent orphan walks 70 miles to escape his terrible fate in the countryside, only to become entangled in the dark world of London criminal named Fagin. Innocent Oliver yearns for a better life and a chance meeting with a learned gentleman Mr. Brownlow shows this to be possible. However, this chance and Oliver's life are both threatened as Fagin and his associates want him to be kept in their grimy sordid lifestyle. Fairy tale ending with Oliver escaping to the good life offered by the kind Mr.Brownlow.

Polanski's version is certainly true to the novel and depicted with the finest detail, costumery and sets perfectly rendered. What it lacks is warmth, character building. The decadence of class war and the exploitation of women and children is shown clearly but the film did little else to grip me to my seat.

Young Barnaby Clarke certainly had the fitting look needed for the role but his wide-eyed trembling lip underplayed the part leaving me feeling as though he was an incidental arm to the whole thing. Polanski fell short as a director for this child actor. It was not enough by far.

I liked Mr. Brownlow, well projected by Edward Hardwicke (a familiar face as Dr.Watson from Sherlock Holmes) but the artful dodger was hardly convincing or endearing as he has been in other versions of this film. I was looking forward to Ben Kingsley as Fagin but again this representation with too much make-up and a much mumbled accent left the character cold in his tracks.

V was in office and I watched it with two friends. At the end both declared their love for the movie and quite evidently enjoyed it. I'm the more cynical type. I expected far more from Polanski than sets, costumes and depiction, especally since he chose to make yet another version of something that has already been rendered so well in the past.

I wanted more. I wanted to be transported to another time, to feel the vulnerability and care about the outcome. This was a mere storytelling, jumping from incident to incident without much fire in its belly.

Please, sir, I need more.

Where did all the good news go?

Maybe this is me being morbid.

Or maybe this is a reaction to just sitting at home and filling in job applications that make me sound holier-than-thou with no real results.

Or maybe I need a bit of sunshine through these grey skies.

Everywhere I look the news is bad. Everyday and night I watch the news and keep thinking that the next story will be one of joy, sheer unadulterated happiness. It is yet to happen. Most often the only cheery face is of the BBC weatherperson smiling at the prospect of a sunny day. That even makes me smile, often through a sheet of tears. Take your pick amongst the possible bad pieces of news;
Man-made: invasions, civil war, acts of terror, arson, murder, theft, muggings, cheating...
Nature's wrath: tornado's, typhoons, hurricanes, volcano's, earthquakes, tsunamis, floods, drought, famine...

Whether manmade or natural all this bad news is bearing down upon us. It's a miracle anyone on the news can smile anymore. In such a vast diverse world you would expect that some of the news filtering through would be good. So is it the media or the media-watchers (TV, online, newsprint) who want to know only about the usually terrible, often dramatic scenes that errupt daily somewhere on the planet.

And here's how the projected good news - keep faith - have hope - stories work. The good news is qualified by how good it is in the face of something bad. Like a vaccine for a disease that's killed millions; this cure may or may not work. Or weapons being put down to help people over the line of control because of an earthquake in a region where peace is a rarely used word. In my mind it's all too little, too late.

I'll be the first to admit that maybe I'm just a bit cynical because I intersperse job applications (even that is all horrible news, much closer home) with watching the sensationalist news. One way to feel a bit more cheerful might be to find good happy moments in my own life. That is all I have, the life around me, that's all I can somewhat control.

So here is the last picture I took that makes me smile. Maybe you'll smile too....or maybe you'll share a bit of good news from your own world!

being grown up is a terribly hard thing to do. its much easier to go from one childhood to another - f scott fitzgerald (& V agrees!); this is his birthday cake (from Paul) with a sugar tiger (from Patisserie Valerie) gleefully smiling in the centre.

Before the Booker

For lack of money time and space I rely on Random House’s Borzoi to keep me up to date on what authors are saying, reviews of new books in multiple categories and simple inspiration to read even though I can’t seem to write.

I read about John Banville in passing last year and it somehow stuck in my head that he had been nominated for the Booker Prize in 1989. A short while later, for lack of anything to read on a train journey to Leeds, I wandered into a WH Smith just before and bought ‘Shroud’ (Book 11).

The narrator is Alexander Vander, an elderly professor of literature with an international reputation of being one of the greatest scholarly writers of his time. Early in the novel he admits that his life is a lie: an identity from a friend of his youth, that friends’ bourgeois family in Antwerp that he has claimed as his own, an education fabricated. Alex fled Belgium during the second World War and established himself in California with his wife, whose recent death has brought on the new waves of guilt about his life. He is an unhappy old man, given to a violent temper, alcoholism, rudeness and self-destructive behaviour. His deception weighs heavily and is not helped by a letter from Cass Cleave, a young woman claiming she knows all his secrets. Knowing he must destroy Cass to save his past he meets he in Turin only to discover that she is slightly unhinged herself. His conversations with Cass in a Turin hotel room explore the morality of identity theft, sacrifices people in his life made, the enormity of a life of lies and the path to redemption.

This is an intelligent and detailed novel to say the very least, and it required much more attention than my train journey could possibly give it.

A few weeks later I found 'Eclipse' (Book 12) in a Greenwich bookshop for a fraction of the cost and bought it. What I had not realised is that in 'Shroud' I had inadvertently read the second of the Alex Vander novels. So, upside down I shall continue.

Alexander Cleave faces collapse of his 30 year career, both physically and psychologically. He retreats to his childhood home, now abandoned, in the hope of redeeming his life and being himself rather than all the parts he has been forced to play to the world. Simply be, rather than be for an audience, as it were.

Unfortunately, his abandoned home is full of memories, of his childhood years, his crumbling career and marriage, his estranged relationship with his daughter and his fathers suicide. Also in the house are a strange caretaker and a teenage housekeeper. Memories, inhabitants and apparitions of a woman, a child and a third figure all intertwine to make it a struggle for Alex to confront his own problems. Challenging himself to figure out exactly what has gone wrong with his life Alex comes to realise the ways in which things, time, events and people are not always what they seem and how in time they reveal their true colours.

I wish I had not read them upside down because I knew what to expect with 'Eclipse'. Banville’s prose is brilliant, almost poetic. In both his books he is a bit like a magician, wandering around, setting the scene before with one flash revealing a most amazing trick.

Banville has just yesterday been declared the winner of the Man Booker Prize 2005 for his novel 'The Sea'. This interview with Banville by a brilliant lit blog is evidence though that it takes getting nominated for a Man Booker (as Banville was in 2002) to jump from 4000 copies to 100,000. I’m thrilled Banville got this far. He is a treasure.

I do wonder though, how many brilliant writers are languishing in anonymity, waiting for a literary nomination. If you read something good please buy it, lend it, suggest it, gift it, blog about it.

Rumal(i) chaahiye

This brought tears to my eyes. I miss India so.

Thank you Deirdré Straughan!

Whats in a postcode?

Numerous discussions, different sets of people, lots of loud opinions, semi-correct information and no finality on how the postcode system that identifies each home in the UK works.

This is how it's done.

So now we know.

Smell those roses

Look at a mainline tube station between 7.30am and 10am and you will see a platform full of tense-browed commuters all of whom are packing themselves like sardines in a tin can train. Purportedly they are all rushing to get to work before their company collapses without them. If we did a one-question survey of the office-goers on that platform I can bet most of them would choose 'yes' to a slower pace of life than 'no'. I feel a wistful longing.

When I worked my hours were never too long but travel and looking after my home meant that I was a bit of a speedaholic, constantly juggling lists in my head. Now, thanks to the fast paced life of one such urbanite, I have taken the summer off work and am able to take my time looking for a new job. All summer I have remained gleefully, gainfully unemployed for the moment. Life has expanded (oh so easily) to fit in all my free time. Continuous houseguests, piles of books, coffee in the sunshine and the odd job application are just a few of the gainful (life experience, not moolah) activities that fill up my day. I have had a few months of the slower pace of life now and consider myself somewhat an authority on the vie paresseuse. With the chance to stop and smell the proverbial roses I've discovered that they smell really nice!

Having said that I'm ready to go back to work and the only change I'd make is to constantly remember that smell. I want my work life to mingle easily with a combination of summer-like laziness (want to think that thought even in dreary winter) and a flurry of social activities.

The work-life balance argument goes both ways. This is the only time in life where we have enough energy to do more, see more, read more, eat more, earn more, be more, more more more more..... By the time we have enough money to stop and smell the roses its our knees that will buckle under! Flip side, we all become slobs, rolling out of bed at noon to soak in the summer sun, doing little else but spouting how this is the time of life to smell those roses, before we're too old and mouldy. result: little or no moolah to bide our elder years by.

So whats the balance? How much should we do, how often should we stop and smell those flower, how much money is enough etc? All questions that have no correct answer or rather an unique answer for each and every individual. While you do some soul searching for your unique answer do stop and smell those roses. May they inspire you!

Nothing but a pile of sand

The brochure that the S-team picked up from somewhere promised the '4th Car free maritime Greenwich festival' at its best with 'car free events'(??) and a 'buzzing programme of free outdoor events'. Greenwich is one of my favourite London weekend destinations with its arts & crafts markets and numerous food stalls. The suggestion of more stuff happening in an already buzzing Greenwich was alluring to say the least. So come mid-day V and I legged it with much enthusiasm and the promise of being 'awash with fun performances, activities and displays'. A brochure picture (I know I know, all pictures look better than the real thing) of a sand sculpture of a horse in the middle of the road by some famous guy was another thing I was keen to see.

Never has a festival been as disappointing as today. The 'car free' was only one small road at the start of which the Dhol Academy was belting out some good stuff (ie loud stuff) to distract from the street art which was nothing like a horse but instead a pile of sand with tiny children crawling all over it. Maybe it was a horse to start with and the 'art' was to unleash 50 kids (average height 1.5 ft each) on it and see what their feet could do to enhance it. I bet some smartie festival organiser thought it would be easier (and much much cheaper) to clear the street by siphoning off the sand in the shoes, clothes and hair of all the little tykes. Let baby shampoo and tub plugholes deal with it.

The market was hardly expanded (face painting stall and unbelievably ugly overpriced art stall do not count) and was so crowded with people looking for those elsuive expansions that we got moved along by sheer sea of humanity.

Olives, feta in chillies, stuffed vine leaves, sun-dried tomato foccacia, lamb megriz and cumberland sausages tucked into our bags (all this is normal fare, nothing added by the so called festival), we decided to lunch at the Coach & Horses, which is a corner pub in the undercover market. Very popular eatery and as a result very overcrowded. We had to share our bench table with two twats who went on (simultaneously) about completely different things to each other; one about diving and the other about his upcoming birthday at Edinburgh; so much so that at one point I wondered if they were part of a conversation with god or just high on something. Here's a sampler:
spiky haired guy 1: I can't believe it's only 170quid for the diving course man
spiky haired guy 2: my birthday party is going to be in Edinburgh in 3 weeks
spiky haired guy 1: I'll be able to go on all these trips before the year is out man
spiky haired guy 2: I think Alisa and Jaime will be there. The party will rock man
(Wierd hanh!?)

V & I ate scrumptuous burgers with fat (truly fat) chips. One of the S's from the S-team had a goats cheese on veggies baked (OK, he said) and the lady-S had a mushroom risotto (horrid campbells soup combined with rice and fried mushrooms).

One book purchase later (Three Junes by Julia Glass) we were home sweet home and a relaxed evening has led me here, to the end of another weekend. All with the disappointing taste of a festival gone awry. Greenwich I love, it's festival I didn't.

The Coach & Horses: 13 Greenwich Market, Greenwich, London, SE10 9HZ; Tel: 020 8293 0880

Growing old is mandatory; growing up is optional!

V's birthday today. I bought him a baby chocolate mousse (in lieu of a forthcoming cake) but carried it around all day and it was quite squashed and resembled chocolate mashed potatoes(if there is such a thing!) by midnight! Proper cake today and I promise you a pic....

So my V, remember that a birthday is just the first day of another 365-day journey around the sun. Enjoy the trip!

A fishy start

4am alarm screeches from my mobile. Why did I choose that utterly inane and joyous tune on my sony ericsson - because there aren't any other less zingy ones - more importantly why did I set it for a Saturday morning? Well for almost 3 years now we have lived within a fairly close proximity to Billingsgate Market. (yes that's the one in the lyrics of Mary Poppins song, Well done sister suffragettes: From kensington to billingsgate
one hears the restless cry from every corner of the land womankind arise!)
The 5am to 8am opening hours of Friday and Saturday (for retail customers in addition to the wholesale purchasers who are allowed every am) was a real stumbling block. Friday because it was always a workday and it was a rush to just get to work and Saturday, well just because it's the weekend and it defies all commonsense to wake up before the birds when you don't have to. So Billingsgate has been so close and yet so far.

Our houseguests (whom I am going to moniker the S-Team) are enthusiastic fish-eaters and were keen to check it out. So Saturday 4am alarm, a cup of tea and rubber slipper lopping along later and we were there. It was 5.05 as we entered the gates to find a stream of people coming out. Even 5 minutes after it opened we managed to be late. The market is a well-lit, bustling-at-the-seams affair. Wholesale means that they usually don't sell you less than one zillion cases (yes, I am into extremes at the moment)of the same fish; retail (as defined by the King of Billingsgate) apparently means atleast one box. One of the S-Team managed to secure two huge King Sea Bass and some smoked salmon (that was our Saturday night meal; he stuffed them with garlic, red chillies, parsley and tumeric before baking it. The salmon was added to blanched green beans as an accompaniment and a potato&scallion salad completed the meal; we polished off the meal enthusiastically before I remembered that I should have taken a picture of it!? You'll have to imagine it and take my word for it's sumptuousness)

I bought a box of cod fillets (I'm picky about skin, bones etc; I know I know whats a fish without, but hey that's just me), 24 of them to be precise, from the stall of Lobo Fisheries. Mr Lobo, if indeed that was he, assured me and the S-Team that all his fish including two incredible looking pomfret had come all the way from India (woohoo!).

Home, cod seperated, date marked and put into the freezer. Smelly box thrown out of the house, into the main bins and it was only 7.30am. Sleep long gone I set about cleaning my kitchen; scrubbed till it shone. Could not get back to sleep as hard as I tried, so read till V woke up and went for brekka to our local Saturday haunt cafe. A carefree Saturday sparkled and shone ahead of us.....relaxed and replete with the promise of a brilliant meal.

If today were a fish I'd throw it back.

Billingsgate Market: Trafalgar Way, London E14 5ST; Tel 020 7987 1118

Day out, pictures in

Trudged to Ikea today (the one that's in Neasden) and got away fairly lightly. Is it that it's not as enamouring as before or just that I have no more place to keep a 5 piece set of bamboo baskets, 3 trillion tea lights and 1500 hundred types of paper napkins????

I think its the space because I thoroughly enjoyed myself, just looking at the set-up rooms had me wanting to move permanently to a showroom. Perhaps for the first time ever I listened to the little voice whispering into my ear that keeps saying "it's only things you want not what you need!". Oops sorry that's not my voice or my conscience, it's the voice of my cuz 40in2006 all the way from the US of A!! How thrilled V will be that I have not spent my meagre fortune on an oversized futon, sets of filing racks, 200 glasses and 13 spotlights (I was soooo tempted, just the packaging and economical price bowl me over and make me into an Ikea-hungry maniac)

I have to go now. My cousin A has sent me 4 gazillion photographs to trawl through - all of his wedding in Patna, reception in Madras and my aunt's birthday. All my cousins and spouses and aunts and uncles and nieces and parents and brother and grandfather and family friends from before I was a tinytot.......when will we be together again I wonder.....

It's time to feel nostalgic and homesick all in one......my eyes are geared for the feast of colour and laughter and my heart is geared for the feast of memories.

Music and laughter

It's a combination of a terrible cold and sheer laziness that kept me away from posting till just now. An endlessly runny nose is not a great farewell to a great city, but nonethelss it was the gift that sunny Prague left me with. A days worth of fever when I came back and then just the general run down feeling till about 2 days ago.

A day after we returned we welcomed a couple into our home, friends who have just moved to London from Frankfurt, and so they are staying with us while they househunt. It's like deja vu - remember we had globe-trotting pals stay in Feb-March - the lovely long dinners and general excitement of having more friends in London combine to give a heady feel to things.

Saturday night we went to the Jazz Cafe in Camden (on the advice of another friend) to help celebrate the 20th year anniversary of the release of Snowboy's first album. Now for those of you not familiar with the Afro-cuban Jazz scene, it is quite apparently Snowboy's forte. Yumptuous dinner at Raavi Kebab in Drummond Street before the show set the scene and lined our stomachs for the drinks to come. Jam packed house at the Jazz Cafe and the music was brilliant with everybody swaying/ shuffling to the music. Supported by the Latin Section and with a whole host of guest stars from the Jazz and R&B world, the stage/ music kept our attentions till fairly late on.

The next interesting thing we did was go for the Canary Wharf Comedy club on Tuesday the 6th. This Comdey Club convenes about once a month in the rather grand Cabot Hall in Canary Wharf and each time a whole host of stand-up comics turn up to regale the crowd. At £7.50 a person the 2.5 hours of laughs was well worth the time and effort.
Compered by a rather funny guy himself, John Moloney (endless gags, mainly picking on some poor guy from New York named Alex), the line-up included the wonderful Simon Evans (dry wit), Terry Alderton (brilliant mime) and one not-so-wonderful substitute for Papa CJ (whose name in itself had me curious enough) whose name I have conveniently forgotten! This was a brilliant evening and V & I thoroughly enjoyed ourselves and are quite keen to become regulars at this monthly event.

Music and laughter has been my medicine....

Raavi Kebab: 125 Drummond Street, London NW1 2LH. Tel: 020 7388 1780

Letting our pictures do the talking

The mighty Powder Tower - once used to store gunpowder


Staromestska Square - the Old Square, huge and its periphery made up of unimaginably beautiful buildings. Completely swamped by the endless tourists .


The Strahov Monastry (near the Pohorelec Tram stop) atop the hills near the Prague Castle; the ringing bells in our memories make this our most magical picture.


Picture postcard from the Strahov Monastry - that's the famous Vlatava flowing under the Charles Bridge.


The magnificant Rudolfinum - where we spent a wonderful evening listening to the Bohemia Saxophone Quartet - music to our ears!


Tyn Church - partially hidden by some newer buildings, this church nonetheless dominates the Staromestska Square skyline. And what a clear blue sky we got....


Looking down the stair well of our very very grand hotel !!! Art Deco at it's very best.