Tag: Christmas

What would you do in another life?

… I would live in a village.

I would be part of the community and not be annoyed that everyone knows each other. I would wave at people in recognition while walking down the street. I would drive a small car (stick, naturally) to do my weekly grocery shopping. Go into town and buy flowers and cards for friends and family on a whim. Then send them or even better drop the flowers off, just to say hello.

My home would have a huge kitchen and it would be lovely and organised. Ha that’s a lie, not even in another life. My home would be messy but in a charming and hygienic kind of way. Maybe there would be a guy, maybe there would be a baby.

by mppfc.dreamhosters.com

Maybe two, or four. Babies that is, not guys – unless they all turn out male. Hmpf.
Four girls would be a nightmare too, imagine cycles synchronising, so preferably a mix.
Maybe I should start with one and take it from there. I digress, in any case: the house won’t be organised.

Ooh maybe I would have a cafe, that would be fun.

by annabelevelyn buzznet.com

A coffee place with liquor license (what else would the bloody point of a bar?) It would a cosy arty little place where people could hang out and eat. Nice simple, enjoyable food and pretty desserts of course.

What else would there be?

by Thomas Kinkade

Back at the house, I’d have a garden with a lawn and a pond, and big trees for tree houses and swings. Maybe chickens.
It would be full of colourful flowers in spring, a big garden table for BBQs in summer. Autumn would be pretty and winters would have snow – always. Not the traffic stopping annoying kind of snow of course, just the idyllic pretty sort. At night the garden would light up with Christmas lights, that miraculously appear.

by damonyoung.com.au

I’d look at the garden from my desk, surrounded by bookshelves full of books and trinkets from travels. I would close the door, sip my tea, open my laptop and I would write.

There are two things that seem to remain in both my “other life” and my reality: I write and I am happy.

 

 

 

For Ellie (10 Reasons to join the outside world)

(…aka for my gorgeous friend Gem whose due date it is today.)

1. We have ice-cream. In every flavour imaginable: strawberry, rocky road,

Bubbles... I guess a good number 11. by Steve Jurvetson

caramel, bubblegum…  I guess you won’t be able to have some immediately but it is worth the wait.

2. There are seas and beaches all around the world. They are fun, you can play on the beach and swim in the sea.  Sometimes you can surf or dive or snorkel and if you are lucky, you can see all the different creatures that live in the sea. You’ll be right amongst them and that is an amazing feeling. (Do try to avoid the sharks.)

3. If you come to London you can sit in the front on top of the bus. It’s like you are driving along by yourself or just magically moving around.

4. When you come out it will be your birthday! It will be remembered and celebrated every year of your life! There will be lots of presents, balloons and cake. There will be cake always, I promise.

5. Christmas, how could I forget. It is a once a year occurrence and you’ve just missed one, but it’ll be much better next December when you’re on solids anyway. Again, lots of presents by Father Christmas (great man, can’t wait for you to meet him), lots of yummy food, and beautiful decorations, lights and friendly company that make the dark days sparkle.

6. There are other children here in the outside world. You can become friends with them. You can laugh together and go on adventures or just play tag or hide and seek (they are easy enough games but hard to play by yourself).

7. Summer holidays. They are endless. There will be sunshine and if not you can watch films or make tents in the living room. You won’t have to go to school but it will be fun when you do return and see all your friends again (see above)

8. Music. There will come a time when you think that no one will ever understand you and your parents are crap (Hard to believe now, but trust me it will happen.) Suddenly you’ll discover all these people who have experienced the same or  have been through the same things and they’ve put it in a song.  For your sake, I do hope there won’t be a 90s revival then.

9. Falling in love. Not yet. (Until you are thirty! I hear your father scream.) but soon enough and you will know when it happens. There is nothing that feels better, crazier and more exciting. *Disclaimer: It will happen a couple of times, for the immediate aftermath of a break-up I refer to points 1 and 8 of this list.

10. There is so much to discover. You will learn so many different things from driving to reading, maths and making a mean Mojito. You will develop skills that some of us can only dream of. So please come and join us to as far as we know; then feel free to overtake, exceed and amaze us.

Pity party at the airport

Yesterday I discovered at the airport that I would find it really hard to participate in Survivor or Big Brother. You know, anything that would require a group to pull together for a task… 

My flight was supposed to depart at 8.15am and after a really early start I arrived at the airport where chaos was starting at the door. Because City is such a small airport the queues needed to be looped around each other and they had decided to call out for people per company to lead them to the right queues in small groups. Obviously this was not communicated (no, that would be way to efficient…) and the crowd that was waiting outside was getting restless and confused.

As soon as you were in the building though, it was easy-peasy. You had the occasional jobsworth who tried to get everyone to stand in single file but was soon discouraged by the unmoving crowd. (Silly woman.) Still it was pretty smooth-running. All passengers on my flight, roughly 15, even got all the way to the gate . There we had to wait for the bus to bring us to our small plane. Ten minutes later however the ground-steward got a call that we had to wait because of the change in weather. Icy rain at the tiny airport where we should land, in combination with a small plane was going to be a problem.

As you can imagine, 10 minutes turned into half an hour into one hour into two – finally we were sent back to the departure lounge with sincere apologies (Poor man, every time the phone rang he had to give us worse news!). We were instructed to keep an eye on the screens for the next update.  As we were now a bit of a group, we stuck together in the lounge – my rookie mistake as this is where the whingeing started.

At first they complained the flight wasn’t on the screen, amongst the group until a fed-up girl decided to ask customer service, who apologised and placed it back on. Then it didn’t say anything more than ” Delayed” cue more sighs, but when 30 minutes later it said Delayed until 13:30, it triggered even more complaints that we had to wait for so long.  Wasn’t it ridiculous that we were the only morning-flight left, even the 12:45 to Antwerp (close to where I was supposed to go) was going etc. etc. etc. Lots of phone-calls home were made and it just included a lot of sighing.

It made me realise that you cannot win with some people. Surely it is better to see that planes are still flying than to be stuck with six more flights, imagine all those extra passengers in the lounge too… The fact that the flight to Antwerp was still going surely was a positive things as well: more chance our tiny plane would make it too.

People were worried they wouldn’t make it home for Christmas, when we still had 10 hours on the clock – and one extra day if necessary. It has been snowing for three days, everyone was well aware of chaos and troubles so what do you expect? As far as I could see it, we were warm inside, being able to sit comfortably and more importantly able to find oneself some food… Every time someone said something positive like “Well only an hour more to go.” a member of the pity-party would shoot it down with a “That is, if we are actually make it out of here.” Grand, just the spirit. The high-light for me was when six hours later, we finally made it back to The Gate and someone started complaining about how cold it was there…

So yes, we had a massive delay and the flight got diverted. We got met by two lovely ground stewardesses who waited with us until coach arrived. Ok, the coach driver had never been to the other airport either and at the very end decided it was a good idea to reverse back onto the round about, and  we did find out other planes had managed to land at our original destination throughout the day…Annoying? Perhaps. Not life-changingly so though, surely.

My parents who came to pick me up gave two fellow-passengers a lift to the station before heading home.  I’m typing this blog entry on the 23rd of December from my parent’s living room. Two days before Christmas, result.

 

“A positive attitude may not solve all your problems, but it will annoy enough people to make it worth the effort.” Herm Albright

 

‘tWas the night before Christmas…

…alright, perhaps not true but it’s definitely the night before my return home. Despite weather warnings and the

by glamoriginals.co.uk

recent snow malarkey, my sister made it home today so I am hopeful for my flight tomorrow-morning. I have packed my bags, quite sizeable for a change – mostly because of Christmas presents and the cold back home which will require me to layer up.

I am strangely excited to go back home after what seems to have been the most random month of this year. It might also be because I will be sleeping on a mattress instead of an airbed for the first time in two weeks.

And…

I am also rethinking the format of this blog for 2011 so watch this space!

First though: 5.30am alarm clock, so here’s hoping it will all go well.

The Famous Five Go to Wales * (2)

Firstly the plan of action needed to include food. Team China (That is me and the man who claims to be quarter Chinese. Did you know that being a quarter Chinese is apparently enough to qualify for the national sport teams over there? ) just gets hungry. We managed to find some crisps in the fridge (don’t ask) and after briefly considering the tins (Sliced water chestnuts anyone?), bread and cheese were made into a midnight feast.

by apartment therapy

 

As it was late, we decided it was better to get some sleep and go to the neighbour first thing in the morning to gently notify the parents and call a plumber. We got the electric heater and the gas heater from the basement to try to warm up the livingroom. (This was obviously a boy-job, even if only because the gas heater was practically the same size as the girls.) The electric heater kept cutting the electricity in the house and after the gas heater briefly started working, it promptly set off the smoke alarm. It was 2am and still freezing. Someone mentioned it had all the ingredients for a horror movie and the chance to be beheaded or eaten by the vengeful flies in our sleep got bigger by the minute… Luckily it is a well-known fact that virgins never die in these tales, so we girls should be ok. Hoorah!

The bedrooms were to be divided: my friend and his girlfriend would obviously share a room but Team China decided to do the same to deal with the cold. Given that he is engaged to be married and I really do not know him that well, this could have been an awkward affair were it not for the cold. A trunk full of classic knitted jumpers, fleeces and skiing gear was discovered and it became a free for all. Layers were put on while drinking whiskey and Cointreau for warming reasons of course (“I could only find a sherry-glass to pour it in, I hope it won’t offend your palate.”)

I was now to be sharing a bed with a man dressed in thick socks, thermals and tight female skiing trousers, T-shirts, fleece jumper and a huge orange and black striped knitted jumper with a tigerface on the front. To top this stylish outfit off he wore a wooly hat. As I was dressed in similar attire, it was safe to say that his fiancée had officially nothing to worry about. We were fully dressed under two down duvets and a blanket which later turned out to be a very old camel mat (Whooooops! Sorry Mr and Mrs D, honest mistake.) It was 3am and it was still freezing…

The next morning the neighbour turned out to be a true legend, positively unfazed by everything. (After forgetting where we were and some un-PC comment about ‘Us Chinese’ in her kitchen, she casually mentioned she had Malay ancestry and was welcomed as an honorary member of Team China!)

Her kitchen table with coffee and a bacon sarnie breakfast welcomed our motley crew: dressed in pyjamas, dare I mention Ugg-boots and huge knitted Christmas jumpers with faces that showed signs of only a couple of hours sleep. Still we managed to walk into the village dressed as M&S Christmas advert rejects. We even made friends with the people in the corner shop (“Hmmm, you don’t seem to be from around these parts…”) who recommended more wine to cheer us up.

Back in the house it was time for the montage part of this film. The electricity worked again (alas-still no heating)and the kitchen was mopped and cleaned, the flies were dealt with by modern central hoovering system as well as the trusty dustpan and broom – with all the ornaments it was not an easy task – but the music was on, people were singing, wine was taken from the cellar that was luckily still dry and soon we only had to await the plumber and his verdict.

(to be continued…)

The Famous Five go to Wales * (1)

In this modern version of the Enid Blyton classic, we have two Scottish brothers, a lovely blonde girlfriend and instead of the gender confused girl, we shall include the token ethnic, like Disney in 2008.  Timmy the dog has been conveniently replaced by a white Kia Picanto: five doors but without central locking to keep that authentic feel.

The Famous Five by Disney 2008

I was invited by a friend to come along for the weekend to his girlfriend’s parents house in a Welsh village with him and his girlfriend. His brother would come along too, so I would not be the gooseberry. (I had met both girlfriend and brother before, see also The Famous Five explore Edinburgh.)

After arriving at Highbury station on a Friday night and a hike up to the meeting point,  missing the girlfriend who came to walk towards me after the directions that were given to me failed to enlighten me, I met my friends at the flat. When I say the flat, I mean her room that she’s been generously sharing with the two boys for the last two weeks: the woman is up for a sainthood.

We walked to the car which was parked by the church, one of the guys had actually attended Mass earlier that day: the things you have to do for a parking space in London these days. The size of the car meant that the girls (both a respectable 5ft3) were bundled in the back between the weekend-bags, coats and the groceries. Leg-space is overrated: jolly good, let the fun begin!

After just an hour in London traffic both brothers showed their impatient nature. The designated driver (who claimed to be a quarter Chinese, a quarter Irish and half Grouch…) started complaining that it would take us seven hours to drive there and that we could have driven to Scotland in that time. It is amazing how quickly women can bond just by rolling their eyes…

Between snacks and short stops to attend to calls of nature as well as calls from fiancees, I was told that the house was currently empty as her parents were away: we would go there to start decorating and make it homely for their Christmas return. It had four ensuites and a sauna that she had designed and built with her brother. (At this point, she omits the fact that she has actually designed the whole house. Modern day little Annie is no home maker, she is an interior designer.) She does warn me about the fly- problem they had and when she last left, she had left a fly bomb: we might had to deal with the aftermath of that. The flies would turn out to be the least of our problems.

We arrived at a dark drive-way and walked towards an impressive looking house. Inside it was spacious and perfectly decorated with foreign ornaments, all tokens from extensive travels. The living room was a beautiful open space with big windows and there were stairs leading to the bedrooms and small stairs going down to the kitchen. Excited by the sight and keen to fight the freezing cold of the empty house with mulled wine, we brought in the bags and descended into the kitchen…

There we found the floor covered in water and water still dripping from the ceiling. The boys considered it could have been the frost bursting a pipe from the floor heating that heats the whole house. The electricity had tripped and the freezer and its content had defrosted. After a quick assessment we concluded all toilets in all the ensuites were either over flowing or were frozen solid; so under the header of damage-control it was decided to switch off the main tap. At 1am we found ourselves in a freezing house without any water or heating and no electricity in the kitchen or gas to cook on. Oh and there were thousands of dead flies by every window in the house.

There was only  one solution: lashings of mulled wine.We managed to find the camping gear in the basement and opened the doors to the terrace to heat up the wine. Going outside was a strangely tropical experience for a Friday night in December, especially considering that our sound scape was made up by the cracking sound of the thawing river . Mugs in hand, breath visible in the cold, we sat around the kitchen table: it was time for a P.O.A …

(to be continued)

Dank U Sinterklaasje! (Thank you St Nick)

Sinterklaas or Saint Nicholas, considered by m...
Image via Wikipedia

Today is St Nicolas Day,  Nick is the predecessor of Santa Claus / Father Christmas. Back in the land of the Dutch this tradition is huge.

St Nicolas is the patriot saint of children and boats. According to the story he was a bishop from Myra. (Turkey, although these days  St Nick comes from Spain by old- fashioned steamboat. Maybe he moved house…) Now in short, this darling bishop did either two things: Story A he saved three children from death (or resurrected them in version A2) or in Story B  he left gold coins in the shoes of three sisters who could now pay their dowry and get married. (God forbid they ended up spinsters at the age of 25.) He also had a love for ships and once when stuck in a storm he started praying and the sea calmed down; the boat and all the passengers arrived safely. (Maybe that is what Rose and Jack should have done in that car, pray.)

So steamboat, coins (mostly in chocolate form) and a feast for children instead of children are all that remain today.

Children have welcomed St Nick into the country a couple of weeks ago, a tradition that is broadcasted yearly on national television, kicking off the celebrations. Young children will get presents in their shoe, after they have sung St Nicks songs and left carrots and hay or sugar for the horse St Nick rides on. (Yes, forget about mince pies and brandy, St Nick is the leaner version of the jolly old man in red.)

Adults get together and buy each other gifts Secret Santa style, which they will have to wrap in some arty way related to the recipient. Most importantly there are the poems, the witty filled with puns- poems about the person in all his or her glory. Board games are played, biscuits and sweets are eaten. Every family has their own traditions (my parents preferred the non-arty, just poem route especially because we had to make art-works for our school friends already!)

This year, year eight in the logbook of the captain, in midst of sorting out work and moving house, St Nicholas day approaching passed me by a little. So how surprised was I to wake up on Saturday (before leaving on an early Christmas weekend) and find a glass sweet jar in front of my bedroom door (very much like the one that I had to mournfully leave behind ages ago in the flat of the ex…) filled with chocolate coins and mini St nicks (or Father Christmases)?

Hoorah! Thank you St Nicolas!

Magic of a cuppa

Some days it doesn’t look good out there… Student protests, dead miners, bail-outs and potential snowstorms.

by the perfecttea.com

Some days you realise that all the weight that you ran off in 3 months has slipped back on in two.

Some days you find out that nothing is as simple as it seems and that next time you think of a good idea…

Some days you wonder how you ever will be able to write all that is now  in your head down in a word document.

Some days you try to convince the world that you are the perfect Christmas sales associate. (And I am! You should see me wrap!)

Some days you look at the empty moving boxes and wonder whether you should just go home and forget about it all.

Some days you understand the look that the bank manager gives you when you tell her you are indeed a freelancer.

Some days you just have to embrace the magic of a blanket and a cup a tea.

Some days you cannot be more proud of yourself for keeping everything in perspective and keeping sane.

Homeward Bound

My alarm goes off at 4.15am, three hours before my flight home leaves. The quote adverse weather conditions unquote (honestly never mind nuclear wapens create a snowstorm to get Europe on its knees)  cause chaos and I have been told to leave in plenty of time – that combined with a nervous nature make for a stupid o’clock get up.

The taxi drives chuckles when I tell him I am heading to London City Airport, not a good sign, but when I enter the departure/arrival hall it is quiet. Almost too quiet – cue the before noon Western movie music and tumble weed rolling.

At 6am when the check-in opens, two flight have already been cancelled and people are being queued up by destination country rather than actual flight. The self check ins don’t work- but they have forgotten to tell us. Like they have forgotten to tell us about the already 90min delay. It is not the weather that’s irritating – let’s face it we all knew about it before coming here – it is the lack of communication and inefficiency of some staff. Beautiful examples:

  • Queue gets split in two so there are clear lines in front of desk 16 and 17, only for a member of staff to stand in front of the queue for desk 16 blocking any movement there and ‘manage’ the people of queue for desk 17 to both desks.
  • The security guard who tells the queue to move backward to make some walking space and the customer service attendant who urges the queue forward to get things moving.

Come on England, surely queuing is what you do –  for heaven’s sake!

Meanwhile I get a text from my ex who has been stuck in Amsterdam for the last 36 hours – oh the irony- and who had even boarded a plane for three hours only to be told it was cancelled anyway. He is now on his way to London City Airport.

My plane has a 90min delay – plain sailing if you imagine a flight to Milan being shown with Indefinite Delay on screen. My phone rings once again and my ex tells me he has just arrived – we are in the same building and decide to wave at eachother through the glass when we pass. Alas, my flight is boarding and I call him back- voicemail. This is how I will leave London for 2009: so close to the one I once loved, yet so far away.

Then the plane finally takes off and as we burst through the clouds, golden rays of sunshine warm my face through the window of seat 11D and I feel a sudden surge of inexplicable but complete happiness. I know- mid air sitting next to a grumpy stranger who really should rethink his facial hair I was happy; how is that for deep philosophy.

Happily I bounce off the plane, queuing once again for passport control when they just let us pass. Ah, they have given up I think optimistically; I wave my passport to the guy behind the desk who gives me the thumbs up and Iwalk to the luggage belt… when a security guard stops me – not sure whether I speak Dutch he tries in his best Denglish: Lady, you have to leave now. We are all shovelled out; once again without explanation. Somebody says in Dutch they have found a package in the airport – no one explains anything in English. Panic starts when security starts shouting in Dutch at the masses: Move now, you have to leave now! Confusion for the tourists who cannot understand what is going on. People carrying big suitcases just won’t fit through the gap of (Oh!) one door that easily…(If  ever anyone wants to do a safety evaluation- call me.)

Outside I find my parents and everyone waits in the snow for instructions. Which are brief and come every 10 min: Move further back ( No joke – for half an hour we are constantly moved back, another 2 meters. Just a little further, well maybe a little more. I hoped there was no timer on this bomb as we would be screwed. I was also worried about my Christmas presents.) Then somebody makes a decision and after a walk following the lady in the illuminating jacket and no idea where we are heading ( My dad complained that the parking meter was still running…) we are all led to an industrial space where they conveniently have placed a temporary cinema as a Christmas novelty. The eight year old boy in front of me got excited: DAD! we are just going to the cinema! It was cute. Not so much after three hours mind…Twice they made an announcement which made people run to the front just to be told to stay put, but the third announcement was the all clear. Hoorah! Survived!

After the ordeal was over, those who were to depart had to queue up again but others could stroll right back in, pick up bags and drive off.

Anti climax? Yes. Absolutely.

But to my dad’s relief at least the parking was free.