One one things

I woke up very feeling very antsy this morning. It probably has something to do with my dream that there were bears outside the house and the windows were open. I also dreamt that I was a five year old boy working in a street shop with my ex-military father who was paranoid that ppl were out to get us. One day he saw a hidden camera on the tree in front of our shop and said, “putha, get my shotgun, they’ve been filming us all along”. Thankfully I woke up and didn’t have to find out the outcome of that one. The building has stopped next door and our new neighbours have moved in. I know this bc their baby started shouting early morning. The father’s warning was ominous, “The noise from the building will stop in a couple of weeks, but once we move in I can’t guarantee silence from the baby”. He obviously hasn’t heard of gags.

Anyway I’m trying to lead a balanced life from now. Splitting my time between doing some useful revision and ploughing my way through the big bad essay (dissertation) whilst leaving room for some London fun. I’ve had a deficiency of testosterone of late. Well not exactly my own testosterone but that of others. That sounds terrible. Anyway, point is i’ve not had much male company over the last few months and there were some worrying signs developing. I’ve begun to notice things like girls’ shoes, accessories and make up including the finer points of mascara, to such an extent that my opinion is sought on the compatibility between attire and accessories on certain occassions. I once caught myself saying “Good lord no, not that handbag with that lipstick!” All very butch of course. So it was not with a small amount of joy that I discovered that a school friend of mine was back in London looking for employment.

Last weekend a couple of other school friends were in town so we all met up for some fun and frolic. First things first so we went to some Arabic place in Edgware road for some lunch and shisha. Edgware Road is another example of London’s variety. This part of town is very Middle East/ North African with lots of restaurants serving food from that part of the world. In the night the cafes spill on to the road and groups of men dressed in Arab attire sit around a Hookah puffing away with tea or coffee in a glass waiting to be sipped. The shops are also generally brighter and shinier in typical Middle Eastern style, Arab music drifts across the road and the wonderful aroma of shisha wafts into your nostrils beckoning you to the closest hookah. The population haunting Edgware rd is primarily of Middle Eastern origin so you get a lot more women in full Hijab and men in Arab clothing too, and they all appear to be quite laid back in their approach to most things. Service is no exception here, the mandatory wait for a shawarma is about 35 mins, regardless of whether it has been pre-cooked. But I never really mind bc it’s hard not to be relaxed with some shisha, a comfy couch and leisurely conversation. That’s pretty much the theme for the entire length of the main road and then you turn the corner and you’re in Marble Arch, a different world in the same City, that’s London for you.

Today there was an amusing incident with a waiter, a yoghurt drink and mistaken FOB identity. On the menu card there was something called yoghurt drink with it’s arabic name printed next to it. The following ensued.

Me: Turkish coffee please
Friend: I’ll have the yoghurt drink
Friend (pointing to arabic name): How do you say the word?
Waiter: Yo-gh-urt dr-ink, you pronounced it quite well actually.

Hilarity of course. Both Turkish coffee and yoghurt drink were quite terrible. The coffee was like a double espresso with lots of spices in it and the yoghurt drink, well the less said the better. It was much like the liquidy layer that forms over a pot of curd. It reminds of another day when my friend tried to order a Lamb Liver Shawarma, the waiter didn’t understand him so my friend pointed at the menu, and the waiter goes “ahh chicken?”, my friend just shrugged and agreed to the deal. Food is food after all. But the food on Edgware road is a secondary attraction, the main event is shisha. It is possibly the nicest thing to smoke. Whenever I have shisha it feels like my nose has developed taste buds and that I can smell the sweet taste. It’s incredibly relaxing and soothing, except rose water flavour which is crap. Grape, apple and Strawberry are the solid bets. That cafe was strange though, they had hip Arabic music but the music video playing on the big screen was a soft-pornesque Danni Minogue flick. Worryingly there was a shotgun attached to the wall, but reassuringly it looked like it hadn’t been used since a 12th Century Jihaad.

We decided to watch The Producers in Covent Garden so had to kill time till around 6.30 so we walked around the West End and thought it’s about the right time to see what this Soho place is really like, with no ulterior motives, purely explorational. I always see signs pointing in its direction but have never gone there. The signs were rather misleading, and it took a good half hour of meandering between dodge alleys to see the first indication that we had arrived, Licensed Sex Shop. As my friend pointed out, it was a classic case of Parangaya Soho giya. Whilst keeping a weary eye out for the upstairs windows, where there are rumoured to be scantily clad females beckoning customers to join them, we walked around trying not to look too suspicious. Soho isn’t all its made out to be, at least not at 5 in the evening, and we ambled off. We decided to muck about in a pub until it was time for the show, but after going in we discovered that it wasn’t really a pub but a restaurant disguised as a pub. And a pricey one at that. We split a bottle of the house white, ate the carrots that had been laid out as a nibble and when they asked if we’re ready to order we said we’ll just step out and come back, which naturally we never did. Oh but we did pay. That said, the restaurant looked very good, it was designed for pre and post show goers and the decor was made to resemble a stage set. It could potentially have been very tacky but they had managed to pull it off very well indeed. It’s on Drury Lane just next to the Producers.

Unfortunately the Producers wasn’t doing student discount that day so we decided to watch an average stand up comedy in Leicester Sq. instead. I was coerced into having a couple of pints of beer despite my lifelong contempt of what I call glorified cowpiss. But one must give everything a fair trial, and unfortunately for brewers the world over, the beer failed to give me anything apart from a bloated stomach and very unpleasant burps. We got home late that night and fell asleep half way through The 40 year old virgin. But a good day of much needed testosterone.

P.s. Happy birthday Murali!!