Off the air

Friends, I have much to write - of Paris and of the bucolic splendour in which I find myself - but alas, I will have next to no internet access until the 7th August. There will then be a deluge.

Must off. There are wildflowers to be a-plucked.

Great things about French Cuisine #29

Le Salade au Chèvre Chaud
Bitter salad leaves, dressed with a sharp, mustardy vinaigrette, punctuated by a few rounds of flash-grilled chèvre-topped baguette. This is an almost failsafe option at French restaurants. The quality of the chèvre can vary, the crispness and acidity of the salad might waver, a few redundant walnuts may be sprinkled on top (and find their match in walnut oil in the vinaigrette) but whatever happens, a salade au chèvre chaud – in France – will rarely disappoint. Most other countries have different ideas about goat’s cheese to the French, raw milk and fat content being the contentious issues, and hence it is a less reliable selection outside l’Héxagone.
I ate this salad chez Thoumieux, a restaurant in the 7th arrondissement that has been dishing up worthwhile far since 1928. This was billed cabecous en salade, cabecous being the cheese in question. Here, the conventional proportion of cheese to salad is tilted distinctly in favour of the cheese. I see no problem with this.

Queen of Pies

Mitzi called the 22/7 Pie Day. I answered that call, mes amis, and ate this pie in solidarity.

Purists may insist that this is a tart, or even a tartelette. This may be so as far as the subsets go, but I believe a tartelette may be factored into the greater food-group that is Pie without controversy.

Specifications: A sweet and crumbly tart shell, filled with vanilla-flecked crème patissière, on top of which a noble tower of raspberries was built.

Verdict: Délicieux.

Sideline: The menu advertised raspberries for dessert,with the option to eat them au naturel, melba or en tartelette. I love French restaurants.

Heave away

Le beau travail de notre ami ne cesse passe à Paris.
Paris might be the home of existentialism, but Sisyphus has clearly not been granted a ‘Friend of the Philosophers’ work exemption.
Not even out the front of the Louvre.

Weird things about Paris #113

Laundromats

All Parisian laundromats look like this. They are like an acid-trip into Mondrian-land. Fluorescent lights flicker. Cycles spin. First-timers fumble at the coin slots. Polygons complete with circles. Glamorous Parisians glare at other people and stare into the vortex of the washing machines. Mysteries of French intellectual life - le nouveau roman, existentialism, deconstruction, l'ecriture feminin - make sense. Clothes get washed.

You'll never get information like this from guidebooks, will you?

Parochialism

The poet occasionally known as Tom See caused these oysters to be eaten in the apartment of the artist occasionally known as Fergus K. Grabbledang. These Atlantic oysters, courageously shucked in the bath, were delightful. They were not, however, a patch on Sydney rock oysters. That is because Sydney Rock Oysters are the Best Oysters in the World.

Real time rambling

Walking through Paris on a sunny day without a set destination is one of the world's great pleasures. Just ask Walter Benjamin. Or any one of the Situationists.

It's a quarter past three on a Tuesday afternoon and I've wandered right across Paris today. I'm staying in Clichy, the Kings Cross of Paris - although Clichy has reigned for far longer as a red-light destination - and that's where I started. I ambled down the rue d'Amsterdam and past St. Lazare and got a little disoriented around the Grand Boulevards. I ate a crèpe (beurre sucre), found myself again, at least in a geographical sense, outside the Opéra and headed south to Place Vendôme and the Palais Royale. I got sucked into the forecourt of the Louvre and had to turn back and sit for a while in the Tuileries gardens, admiring the statuary, the hollyhocks, the crowd. I winked at Place Concorde, waved at the Eiffel Tower (actually, what I did was cop an eyeful of it), and headed east along the right bank of the Seine. East, east, past the bouquinistes and crossed over the Pont des Arts to the Ile de la Cîté. I'd made a firm decision not to stop at any museums or monuments, just to meander, but had thought I might
make an exception for the Ste Chapelle, an interior which makes my heart pound. The queues wrapped around the Préfecture so I kept going, crossing over to St Michel, hugging the left bank and continuing east until I reached the bridge to the Ile St Louis. Berthillon central being shut till September, I satisfied myself with a Berthillon icecream around the corner - scoops of rhubarb and ginger caramel icecream - and walked through St Germain, past the gorgeous Ste Séverine church and through the Cluny gardens and into a cafe with wireless and here I am, breathless, au bout du souffle, almost at the end of this sentence, and only halfway through my walk.

What remains this afternoon? The Lost Generation Memorial Stroll through the Left Bank. To do my sometime pantheon of literary and artistic heroes justice, I should probably take a pre-emptive apéritif, thereby turning the LGM Stroll into the LGM Stagger... Montparnasse, Ste Sulpice, rue Mouffetard, rue de lOdéon, rue de Fleurus, St Germain des Près. All full of tourists gawping must more conspicuously than I would dare. A kir or two and I dare say I won't even notice them.

Living in the moment

It was brought to my attention yesterday that this blog has been updated so slowly over the past week, it risks obsolescence. It's a cruel world. As a gesture towards being in touch and being up tp date and being mighty darn organised, let me note the following:

1. I'm in Paris. Technology is difficult. Macs can't connect to most wireless networks. AZERTY keyboards quell prolixity.

2. Berthillon icecream is still fantastic. Yesterday brought scoops of passionfruit and raspberry to the table. Tomorrow must surely be the day to consume the Monica Kaplin Memorial Icecream at Berthillon central, Ile St Louis, being a cone of rhubarb and gingerbread, the hot weather, icecream equivalent to rhubarb crumble.

3. The stench of the Métro is unchanged.

Much more will surely follow, if slowly.

Raisons d’être

If the figure constantly digging is a good bleak metaphor for the human condition, and the lilt of the foot the sign that the dancer inside the digger cannot be repressed, that there is an irrational joy and satisfaction to be found as we shovel our way to the end of the tunnel, then we must surely do our utmost to encourage the dancer. My inner spangled flamenco superstar is greatly encouraged by the knowledge that the wonderful little pickled fishes known as boquerones exist. Boquerones make me want to sing. They make me think I can fly. I can’t remember when I first ate them but my love of them was sealed in San Sebastien, spiritual home of the boquerone, in the Basque country, some years ago. As once unctuous and pucker-inducing, boquerones are anchovy fillets which have bathed in vinegar, rinsed off, and doused with olive oil. If I had constant access to them, I would whistle as I worked. Whilst the approximations of boquerones produced in my kitchen in Sydney have been quite toothsome, most notably the garlicky pickled sardine fillets, they don’t approach the goodness of the boquerone. The tough truth is, Pacific sardines just ain’t Atlantic anchovies. (A related, and far more patriotic axiom: Sydney Rock Oysters are the best oysters in the world.)

Happily, I ate some of the best darn boqueronitos I’ve eaten in a long time at The Salt Yard, a charcuterie and tapas bar in London.

Look at them glistening there! This little smattering of delectability was but the appetiser, the first carriage in a truly extraordinary and really quite lengthy caravan of tapas. So engrossed was I by the food, I could not take photographs. Suffice it to say that the Monte Enebro goat’s cheese made my collaborator and I hallucinate with pleasure; rabbit, morcilla, and pancetta combine better than you could possibly imagine; I approve of feeding pigs acorns; excellent scallops can apparently be found in the United Kingdom; slow roasted peaches are all that… I returned home a happier, heavier - woman.

Keep digging

This is one of my favourite English warning signs. I call it Sisyphus de Londres and it lifts my spirits every time I see it. The pile of muck never gets smaller, but the lilting lift of the digger’s right foot remains ever merry. A model for us all.

I’m also a big fan of the sign that is posted on doors which says ‘Warning: Deep Drop,’ thus conjuring the possibility of a great and exciting leap into a far more exciting realm on the other side. Unfortunately I was unable to photograph a deep drop sign as I spied them only in train stations, either within view of stern looking transport police or as I was being swept along in a serpentine crowd of commuters.

Not keeping a particularly low profile

I know some people have been wondering whether this whole leaving the country and staying out of sight and seeing the world has been a glamorous cover for some kind of large scale cosmetic surgery. I haven’t had a nosejob and I don’t need to invoke a deity to prove it.

Et voilà: That which has been referred to as the Pike nose, in the shadowy and pungent surrounds of the British Film Institute at Southbank, London.

Northern Lights

I betook myself to the North of England to see the Andy Goldsworthy retrospective showing at the Yorkshire Sculpture Park. There are many reasons why this is a journey that should be made by anybody stuck on the narrow Isle of Blight in the next six months. Let me enumerate just a few reasons why - apart from the obvious: that it’s a park full of sculpture.

A Ripping Excursion
A visit to the park from London provides the occasion for a jolly trip through ye olde English countryside. Look! Charming towers poking out of the centre of bosky villages! And over there, ‘tis a man wearing gumboots! I caught a train to Wakefield (see The Vicar of ⎯., Goldsmith, Oliver), wandered around the cathedral precinct and then jumped on a bus to West Bretton before tramping my way down back-lanes and over stiles to the park. Of course the busstop was located on Sycamore Lane! Of course we passed through Crigglestone and Kettlethorpe! Of course I’ve edited out the skagbot teens marauding through the town! Of course I turned inwards as the bus drove through stock footage of industrial parkland!

Meeting Northerners
I do like friendly locals and the locals oop country are particularly friendly. All day, I delivered my inner monologue in a northern accent. I became especially enamoured of a bus-driver who heartily welcomed me to the civilised lands of the north, congratulating me on getting away from the sink of ignorance that is London. Said gent was a collector of militaria and had a question about the word ‘Melbourne’ mysteriously engraved on the back of a badge in his collection. We got along like a house on fire; before he dropped me off, he showed me photos of his spare room which was full of dummies dressed up in old military uniforms. Ace.

Authentic Countryside
The YSP lies in the grounds of an ancestral pile – Bretton House – which is still being used for farming. This means mud and animals and fences and stiles and dung. The well-informed art-lovers sensibly negotiated the terrain in gumboots. Myself, wearing Birkenstocks, I got oozily close to the earth of my birthplace. Not only do flocks of amiable sheep and cows graze on hillsides and rub up against plinths, wild ducks, geese, squirrels, and, I’d wager, porcupines, dwell in the nature reserve which cuts through it all. I will never again think of Henry Moore without hearing a gentle bleating in the background.

Aaaart
And, of course, an enormous and quite fabulous indoor-outdoor exhibition of the work of Andy Goldsworthy. Sculpture, archival drawings, photographs. Here are Striding Arches, en route to Cairnhead Forest, Dumfriesshire.

Extremely superficial law and order manoeuvre

Photographs of the Tate Modern and the Millenium Bridge, they’re a dime a dozen.


Photographs which acknowledge that the bridge is painted with anti-climb paint are rarer.
Anti-climb paint! Have the forces of magick been harnessed in service of public order? I’m not sure how anti-climb paint works. My first instinct on seeing the sign was to climb the bridge but, for some reason that I cannot pinpoint, I didn’t. This all gets murkier – anti-climb paint which works by mind control?

Mind the Gap

I have suddenly, alarmingly, turned into a social butterfly and through London I have been a-flitting, neglecting to update this blog. I assure you all, not only have I eaten at least three meals a day, there is a backlog of trenchant and insightful rumination to be posted soon enough. Was J. G. Ballard right in denouncing the Tate Modern as the architecture of fascism? Why has my allegiance to my former favourite museum in London taken a u-turn? How to deal with news media overload in London? What do you wear when the dress code calls for attire 'appropriate to a smart occasion'? Is gambling really the vice that will destroy me? How much Mahler can fit onto my hard drive? Is my intolerance of school groups touring London a sign of aging? Is London, as one London-dwelling friend vigorously asserted, the capital of the world?

In the meantime, breaking news. Today I met a caramel-coloured, honey-tempered bulldog named Hugo.
We seriously connected.

I've also been documenting selected street and warning signs of London. What further proof do you need that this is truly (a) funkytown?


Finally, the delightful Mitzi G. Burger has brought it to my attention that Sunday, being the 22/7, is pie day. I will most certainly be celebrating this auspicious occasion.

Heady times. Watch this space.

Minor literary landmarks

a) Westminster Bridge

An London summer morning for the Wordsworthians, and for English 1005 students and tutors. Note the incontrovertible evidence of encroaching (post)modernity. A sonnet to soothe a jaded Romantic sensibility?

b) Wakefield Cathedral

I went to Wakefield. Did I find a vicar? No, I did not. Instead, I found this cathedral.

Crab racing

Eating crab at the Cinnamon Club made my adjustment from life in South East Asia to life in London a little bit easier. The familiarity of crabmeat, beloved ingredient, soothed my residual jetlag.

That said, this crab risotto topped with a spiced, seared king prawn and doused with truffle cappuccino was like no crab I’d eaten before.
It was a charmed encounter, might I add.

Great sights of London #467

The roof of the British Museum.
If you have misplaced your inner Victorian scholar and lost your respect for Western Civilisation (sub-category Plunder), the British Museum is the place to find yourself once more. One glimpse at the Rosetta Stone and the job is done. Shock AND awe.

Quick conversion

I’ve been droning on about the execrable standard of eating in England for years. Over-priced, terrifyingly priced and/or mediocre food has been typical of my gastro-experiences in London. Sure, there have been a few noteworthy exceptions but for the most part, I have clung closely to the opinion that the best way to dine in London is to jump on the Eurostar and go to Paris. Bad food in London has also contributed to the promulgation of a very satisfying parochialism of the gullet. London may have the Rosetta Stone but you can get a decent cup of coffee in Sydney.

Finally, however, I think I’m going to eat with gusto, pleasure and satisfaction in London. Responsible types have kindly taken my culinary welfare in hand; suggestions have been made, directions have been provided, orders have been placed. All of a sudden, I find that I am actually prepared to change radically my position on the state of eating in the United Kingdom today on the basis of one trip to the Borough Markets. I’m caught between describing my response to this place as that of a bull in a china shop, a kid in a lolly shop or a sniffer dog at a warehouse party. I am pretty easily pleased when it comes to food. Here, I was ecstatic. Minor jetlag and consequent disorientation made the whole experience even more deliriously exciting. Baskets full of goose fat! Burnt caramel ice-cream! Pickled garlic! Chorizo!
Smoked fish and crab claws! Horseradish! Piles of fresh vegetables! A hot vat of cassoulet out of which a monsieur ladled bowlfuls of thick, ducky, beany, garlicky goodness à la Carcassone. Interminable delights.

Without one skerrick of a doubt, I can state that I will return. Tomorrow. It’s a Thursday to Saturday market, you see. The weekend crowds will crush me. The Borough Market strikes me as a wholesome place – local food, slow food, organic food, artisanal food, regional food, preservative-free food, soul food, culturally authentic food, patriotic British food – and I have no doubt that my character will benefit from a repeat visit. It barely needs to be said that I did not quit my début empty-handed. After months of rice and noodles, I thought it necessary to reacquaint myself with some of the basics. And besides, I am a houseguest, it would be discourteous in the extreme were I to renege on my self-imposed duty to stock the larder.

a) Beurre de la France

Salty, sweet French butter. Is there anything better in the world? The man who sold this butter also sold salt, huge bowlfuls of pink and grey fleur de sel from Normandy. Lawyers, seachangers, career vacillators, take note. Here is a noble profession: vendor of butter and salt (with a sideline in fine yoghurt). Oh yes, and on the countertop, sadly out of sight, perch fresh pots of crème caramel. If one’s abdominal girth is to be expanded, if one’s cholesterol is to be raised, this is definitely a good way to do so.

b) British Cheese

Is this cheese made from cow’s milk? Yes. Is it a blue cheese? Yes. Is it a British cheese? Yes. This happy flowchart leads straight to Stilton, bought from a lovely how’s-yer-farver Cockney fromageophile here. Some weird Protestant restraint made me leave this large stinky refrigerated cheesemonger without any caerphily or Brie de Meaux or wonderful cheddar, all of which I submitted to sample. As I promised the cheesemonger, je reviens. There are raw milk cheeses to be rocked.

c) Jamon (jamon) español
Jamon serrano, to be precise. The charcuterie counter will ever keep me from making a whole-hearted commitment to a meat-free diet. I will be flexitarian till the end. I love jamon serrano with a passion that words will only defile. The boqueria which sold this also offered boquerones, the small pickled anchovies which are so very dear to my heart, manchego, and a dazzling array of chorizos, garbanzos, aceitunas, pimiento and other miraglos del España.

Touchdown

Forty six hours later, I arrived in London.

Twilight Zone

Weary me! Hip hop hooray! Deck the halls with boughs of holly! I’m still in Kuala Lumpur Airport! The slogan of KLIA is ‘The Airport in the Forest and the Forest in the Airport.’ I tell you, I can’t see the wood for the trees.

My flight was cancelled at three in the morning and the passenger body put up for the night in a hotel called The Palace of the Golden Horses. Six hours surrounded by gilded horseshoes made interminable transit seem almost bearable.

Someone must have told the friendly PR people at Air Malaysia that the best way to calm an angry mob is to feed them. Not only have I been bombarded with meal vouchers, I’ve been plonked in front of a buffet breakfast and told to eat. As a point of rigorous principle, I never knock back a free meal. Several platefuls of smoked mackeral later… My circadian rhythms are entirely confused. I am confused. I have no idea what timezone I am in. I have no idea what timezone I left, I have no idea what timezone I will fly into. I have spent approximately thirty minutes of the last twenty four hours in a non-airconditioned environment. I have lost track of how many meals I have eaten. The only physical exertion I have undergone is laps of Kuala Lumpur Airport. I am beginning to feel twitchy and paranoid. Perhaps I am being stuffed like a Christmas goose for a reason. Will my liver be harvested? Are They conducting experiments? I blame Thomas Pynchon.

As ever, watching other people deal with a minor crisis is moderately entertaining. My cohort includes those infused with Righteous Outrage (Who do these people think they are? How can they just cancel MY FLIGHT?), the Bitterly Experienced (I knew it, Air Malaysia… ), the Pep and Information Squad (Look, don’t worry, I’ve just got an update from one of the managers…) . I count myself as part of the Blithe and Resigned contingent. I’ve met a semi-retired computer scientist from Devon who is still wondering whether abandoning his Cambridge PhD on the Social and Economic impact of the Non-Conformists in Victorian England was the right idea. He’s part of my team.

Fear not, comrades. I’ve descended to blather but I’ve still got the Edge. I’ve got a weapon and I’ve got a camera.
Here’s me, post a mediocre croque monsieur, mid mediocre cappuccino wielding what looks suspiciously like a blunt knife. Upon my word, your Honour, it came with the meal.

Friends, I hereby pledge to drink three Bloody Marys on boarding the plane. This will break a long asserted but often feebly regarded rule of mine about drinking in the air. Such is life. Flexibility is the answer.

Over and out.

Live from KLIA

Kuala Lumpur Airport was judged the best airport in the world (15-25 million passengers per year) in 2005. I have had ample opportunity to investigate all the facilities on offer. I've been here for eight (8) hours. I only just discovered the wireless facilities.

Yep, so, transit for eight hours in KLIA. What delights do tempt the global commuter! This is apparently the world's first environmentally sound airport. I'm not sure how the reception of aviation fuel burners is factored into this great achievement. I am actually quite a partisan of the airport experience for reasons that I cannot coherently explain or defend this early in the morning. I like the limbo-ness of airports. I'm fascinated by their similarities. I like the way the same old questions arise in every airport.
Bombay Sapphire or Tanqueray? Bombay!
Do I change my signature scent? No!
What's on offer at the Made in Malaysia shop? Spicy tapioca crisps and Beryl's Durian Cookies! (Digression. Has anybody ever noticed that you can buy caskwine at Sydney Airport?)
What to do when the fair use policy for the free internet terminals is violated? Remain passive!
Is there anything decent to eat? No! Wishing to be attentive to the local cuisine, meal #1 was, of course, a Penang Laksa. A vat of oily, bland, awful laksa. Meal # 2 was a freebie, some feeble recompense for the dire delays being withstood by a generally unhappy body of passengers. Imagine the worst tuna mayonnaise baguette in existence and leave it in the sun for a few hours. Then bite into it and wonder whether to name the debacle in your hands the product of a vicious ooze or a restrained explosion.
What overpriced magazines will I buy? Vanity Fair! (June issue.) The New Yorker! (Early June issue.)
Yep. Consumption under neon lights. Riveting stuff. I must confess, my fascination with airports is somewhat diminished. I may not even stop to admire the trolleys at Heathrow tomorrow morning. I have discovered a new facet to the term 'terminally bored.' I've been trying desperately to get lost whilst wandering around in order to have something to do. I'm getting a little shrill and hysterical. This is what my webcam tells me it looks like.
Hang on. Is that a boarding call?

Preliminary explanations

Q. What sound do dogs make?
A. Woof!
(Those who answered bark, bowwow, arf arf, I am a sentient being, grrr, etc, scroll through your answers till you get to woof.)Woof, woof, woof!

Q. If you were to make the words Willing Workers on Organic Farms into a catchy acronym, what would it be?
A. WWOOF! Sounds like… Woof!

Woof, woof, woof! WWOOF, WWOOF, WWOOF!

Hilaaaarious!

Brace yourselves, because I’m going woofing in France all through the month of August. First stop, herbs in the Auvergne. Second stop, strawberries in Corsica.

Two Margaritas

My arrival in Hanoi was not as smooth as I might have liked. My flight from Danang was delayed by three hours. The hotel who had promised to pick me up from the airport didn’t show. I arrived at the hotel at 11pm and they didn’t have a room for me. They did, however, have a room at their ‘sister’ hotel. The sister hotel was being renovated such that whilst water and power were in dubious supply, loud drilling noise and dust were in constant supply. And I had to fight for the privilege of leaving the next morning. I re-established myself eventually but my good humour was rattled.

Every guide to Saigon speaks of the wooonderful colonial hotels which have just faaaabulous interiors and bars which don’t just serve drinks, but are historically significant in and of themselves. Having installed myself just down the road from the Rex, apparently famous for having hosted American brass during the war, I betook myself to the rooftop cocktail bar for a drink, well-earned, in my opinion, and a snack. I found, to my disappointment, that the heyday of the Rex had passed. I should have known: any bar in Vietnam which has bratwurst on the bar snacks menu is a little suspect. The sound of ice against cocktail shaker cheered me no end and I could have drunk fourteen more margaritas but still… even with a fibreglass elephant in the background, this was not the post-colonial drink of my dreams.

Fast forward to my last night in Saigon. I had a plan and that plan was to eat at a swanky Vietnamese haute cuisine type number. Everything else in Saigon is shut on a Monday night and so was dinner option number one. Fortunately, I had been tramping around town all day and so had scoped out the B-List. Somehow, and I fear this is not entirely to my credit, I wound up spending my last night in South East Asia on a Tex-Mex jamboree. Plenty of time for breakfast pho and swanky Viet-lunch tomorrow.

Anyway, La Cantina screamed Tourist! Expat! Margarita! When I arrived, I was the only one in the restaurant upstairs. Orange couches, no small talk. My entirely excellent margarita arrived fast and so did tortilla chips and loads of salsa loaded with onion and garlic. I had a pang of Newtown nostalgia when the baby burrito, all cheese and beans, hit the table with a hearty, wholesome, leaden thump. Is Guzman y Gomez licensed yet? And why not? All that place needs is a few more tables and readily available Coronas and margaritas. Back to HCMC. I had vetoed sushi as a dinner option earlier in the evening on the grounds that raw fish on the eve of a long haul flight is not a good idea. This sensible approach fell by the wayside when I was faced with ceviche on the menu. Glorious, glorious, ceviche! And jalapenos, in this land of birds-eye chillies! Of course this warranted another margarita. Note that the martini glass full of ceviche is smaller than the margarita glass full of margarita.

I got excited by my coaster and took a picture of it. Instead of treating me like the crackpot who takes photos of coasters, as she would have been entitled to, the waitress brought me a box of coasters to go. Splendid.

As I soaked up my margarita, I realised that there is a nexus between Tex-Mex food and Vietnamese food. The marvellous combination of lime, tomato, coriander, onion and chilli (with or without coconut) shared by the two cuisines mandates all culinary intersections. Whensoever I should make my way to Mexico, I pledge to eat Vietnamese food. And drink margaritas.

Best non-smoking ad ever

Ho Chi Minh City, where the air you inhale tastes like daisies.

Three men

If this blog is to document my activities with any accuracy, then the severe spike in internet use (wireless in the hotel room…) must be reflected.

Hence, three wise men online.

a) Jeffrey Steingarten wrote a book called The Man Who Ate Everything. He also wrote this article instructing the novice omnivore. He is greatly to be admired. I am lamentably bereft of a clear vision of desirable employment. I do, however, think I could manage being Jeffrey Steingarten’s witty and youthful offsider and platonic dinner companion. Who am I kidding? I don’t want to be Jeffrey Steingarten’s Girl Friday and I certainly don’t want to be his mistress. We are in All About Eve and Single White Female Territory here. I want to be Jeffrey Steingarten and usurp his life. Condé Nast, I'm waiting for your call.

b) This excellent article, which I first read in an anthology of travel writing abandoned in a guesthouse, is not normally the kind of thing I get excited about. It’s written by a professional hardcore-adventurer-dude, Mark Jenkins, who used to write a column on extreme outdoorsiness for Outside magazine – macho mountaineering, climbing, paddling, biking, preferably in unstable political environments. This article is about his efforts to trek the Stilwell Road, a road built by an American general to link strategically India and China via Burma. Military history, again, not often my first choice of subject matter. I read ‘Ghost Road’ in an anthology of travel writing and was absolutely engrossed Anyway, this is an extraordinarily interesting, well paced, and ethically engaged account of the author’s attempts to get off the beaten track in Burma. My own travels in Burma had little of this kind of hardcore about them – staring down armed officials was about as tough as it got – but his confrontation with his compromised, egotistical position, playing the role of a romantic vagabond against the backdrop of a scenic and brutal military dictatorship did make me squirm a little.

c) Cable television is the fragile strand which has kept me vaguely in touch with a select version of popular culture of late. Thanks to hotel cable, I know that there is another Harry Potter movie on the way. I have been utterly captivated by Who Wants to be a Millionaire in Russian and my resolve to get to Mother Russia and to trounce the language of Rasputin has thus been steeled. Who knows, maybe Wheel of Fortune à la Russe will be my ticket to greatness. I’ve watched many, many crap movies; I’ve been mesmerised by repeats; I’ve had ample opportunity to indulge my slightly shameful love of MTV; I have scoffed and snorted at CNN… Character building exercises all.

I have also discovered David Tutera’s Party Planner. This is sublime reality television, so far beyond awful, so many light years beyond irony that it is sublime, delirious, hypnotic, divine. I watched this man stage manage a lavender themed divorce party. Solid gold. And of course he has a website.

Choose your own epitaph

My arrival in the narrow land of my birth is, all of a sudden, imminent. I hit the tarmac of Britannia on the 11th of July, as a matter of fact and I am muchly looking forward to some interaction with my long lost human peers. I am also, however, eagerly awaiting the chance to renew my relationships with the dogs of this world. Since my arrival in Asia, I have been a little reluctant to get too friendly with the local canine population, mutts and mongrels the lot of them. My reluctance can be explained in one word: rabies. I was ambushed when cycling near Chiang Saen in the north of Thailand by a pack of overfriendly dogs. It was close to twilight but I’m sure there was a little frothing going on in the glistening fang area. Certainly, maniacal rays glinted from bloodshot eyes. Numerous encounters of this ilk have rattled me.

It is the human tragedy that we cannot, except in extreme circumstances, determine the means by which our mortal mosquito coil will burn out. It is of course possible to take some steps to reduce the likelihood of certain modes of exit. Preventative health. Stopping smoking will cut down the chances of lung cancer and emphysema, for instance. (Here, the nicotine-free author pauses to inhale deeply, clearly, and not a little self-righteously.) Similarly, avoiding getting bitten by rabid dogs will reduce your chances of dying a frothy, painful and extremely undignified death.

Lord knows I have availed myself of many opportunities to act in an undignified fashion. But to die in such a fashion? Jamais! Imagine if one of my poor grief-stricken little sisters had to hack into this blog (no need right now) and post a notice reading: ‘The Pike Family regrets to inform you that Catriona was bitten by a Rottweiler poodle cross outside the Post Office in Hanoi. Unfortunately, this dog was rabid and so, briefly, was Catriona. She died as she lived. Etc.’ Would you even believe this? Nice girl, died of rabies. Shame, really. Would you think of me and guiltily swallow a sad snicker every time your egregiously hungover self started to intone on the curative powers of the hair of the dog that bit you? Would you be able to think of me as anything but a rabid feminist/gourmand/partisan of the mangosteen/lush/bookworm? Would this bring me posthumous gravitas? No! I would be forced to whimper like a kicked cur in the corner of the dingiest doghouse the sky has to offer in perpetual bloody purgatory. And of course all the rumours propagated by that bloody Alighieri about purgatory would turn out to be true if I happened to shuffle through the gates with a dog bite on my calf and froth still settling on my chin.
I do know that there is a widely available rabies shot which, if administered within two hours of a nip, will ward off doom. I would still rather avoid this. As far as I am concerned, lining up for a rabies shot is tantamount to an extremely overfamiliar slow dance with death. My death-drive has been weakened by the heat. Rabies is my primary concern, but mange and all manner of fleas are also on my mind, as are good old-fashioned dog-bites. I have felt sorely compromised in withholding demonstrations of my love because, to generalise, the dogs of South East Asia are not showered with affection. The pampered pug-uglies and yapping pedigrees of Rushcutter’s Bay are not what the proverbial they mean when they talk about being treated like a dog. The dogs around these parts are much put upon – deprived and forlorn and neglected. Their insecurities are understandable. After all, you can order dog for dinner. If you pat at them, they snap. If you throw a stick and there’s more than one dog around, you’ll start a fight. If you make silly barking noises at them, they (and their owners) look at you like you’re off your rocker and then snap.

Whilst I understand that the British Isles are not 100% rabies free, I think the odds swing a little better in my favour over that side of the world. Once I clear the pack of sniffer corgis at Heathrow, I’ll be accosting the first British Bulldog I see. I might even have to go to a park and impersonate a barmy Brit for an afternoon, talking to the dogs and ignoring their owners. I suppose too the change of scene will allow me to befriend chickens – similarly off limits for the last few months. Not being a poultry fancier, this is less exciting.

Things to eat before you die

After a not immoderate amount of stuffing around, I have finally installed myself in a hotel in Saigon, my last port in South East Asia. Fortuitously, the hotel has wireless access and I have been taking refuge from the heat and humidity in the cool breezeway that is the internet.

And so it was that I came across this post which called on foodies and bloggers to nominate five things to eat before you die. Being vacillatory by inclination, I generally loathe top-fives but this call, I could not ignore.

And so, this is what I added to the list. By way of qualification, I note that the below shouldn't be understood as favorites or anything so foolish. I would think of them as a non-binding, highly partisan list of good things. Obviously, as soon as I wake up tomorrow morning, I will want to revise the lot. If I were to get into the realm of particular dishes as cooked by particular people or as eaten in particular restaurant at particular times, then I would be entering the world of sentiment and that, my friends, is a dark abyss into which I refuse to plunge.

1. Freshly shucked Sydney Rock Oysters with lemon and salt.
2. Freshly picked raspberries, still warm from the sun.
3. Hot-smoked salmon.
4. Mangosteens au naturel.
5. Brie de Meaux spread on very fresh bread.

(But wait! there's no room for pickled anchovies, chanterelles, any other kinds of cheese, chorizo, freshly picked tomatoes, spring garlic in France, mangos, homemade gingerbread, clam chowder, creme brulee, hollandaise sauce, lime sorbet, an excellent steak bearnaise, any kind of crab, pho, marquise au chocolat, freshly made rice noodles, coq au vin, peking duck, cornichons, scallops seared on the shell, dumplings of any variety, croque monsieur, Byron Bay organic doughnuts, sauerkraut, gazpacho, salade au chevre chaud, olives, home-cooked quinces, avocado on toast, wasabi mayonnaise, eggplant anyway, gratin dauphinoise, tabouleh, homemade pate, poached eggs with truffle butter, jamon serrano, strudel, harira, borscht, rhubarb crumble, arancini, dulce de leche and all the rest... And there's no alcohol involved. See, lists are a pain in the neck.)

Anyway, the Traveler's Lunchbox post links to an Observer article which lists 50 things every foodie should do before they die. I have done 21 of these things. 29 to go. Sigh.

Of course, if I were to make my own list of 50 foodie type things that I have done that I think other people should do, it would again be entirely different. Not only would I include the international jet-setter, big money, eating for status entries, I think there would have to be some character building exercises high on my list. Challenge someone to a vodka enhanced chilli eating competition. See how long you can function for on a diet of bread, cheese, coffee and red wine. Chop up a clove or two of garlic, mix with flaky salt and sprinkle on hot buttered toast. Add pepper. Eat it and enjoy the pleasant sensation of immediately improved health and the disappearance of residual inhibitions about garlic. And so on.

More pedestriana

Put your best leg forward when you cross the road in Hanoi.
That’s because this is what a break in the traffic looks like.
In ridiculously picturesque Hoi An, on the other hand, it more a case of the blind leading the blind.
So picturesque is Hoi An, as a matter of fact, that even the signs warning the hapless away from death by electrocution have a certain charm.

Pho fur or Faux Pho?

As prefaced a few days ago, I took the PHO CHALLENGE in Hanoi a few days ago. How far can you go on three bowls of pho (and a pain aux raisins)? The answer is, a long, long way. In the past, I have, I confess, been a little reticent about ordering pho because I have had pronunciation issues. Is it ph-oh, as in, ‘I wish that little pho and pho over there would quieten down’? Is it ph-urr, as in, ‘Egad, sir, that is a devilish pho you cast on my good reputation’? Or, again, ph-ah, as in, ‘Do, re, mi, pho, so, la, ti, do’? These vowel sounds, I can now inform you, are open too wide to pass muster. My friends, I summon the schwa and exhort you all to engage in the great Australian sport of vowel squashing. To get a fabulous bowl of noodle soup, call for ph-er, rhymes with, the, as in ‘She was askin’ pho trouble.’

Onwards then. Pho is reason to sing the praises of a good chicken stock. As I’ve been eating alone, I’ve been humming small songs of tribute to the stockpot. All the pho stocks I’ve eaten have been chicken-based with plenty of onion thrown in. The best have had lots of star anise and coriander root and ginger added to the mix and have brought tears to my eyes. Basic pho involves poaching rice noodles in stock and chucking them in a bowl with some sort of protein and some chopped spring onions, dredging the lot with stock and serving it all up. Good pho has poached bean shoots, lots and lots of coriander and garlic chives, a bowl of greens on the side and plenty of lime wedges.

Breakfast pho ga
Chicken pho for breakfast at a hole-in-the-wall restaurant. This was the pho of the day, even if there were no accompanying greens. Aromatic stock,plenty of herbs, excellent condiments (pickled garlic…) and good squishy noodles. It provided me with the fortitude necessary to admire the lines of the Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum.
Ah, totalitarian architecture.

Lunch pho

I perched on the pavement and had tofu pho for lunch. I ordered this with extra tomato and it arrived with a bowl full of intriguingly bitter greenery. Alas, the tofu pho wasn’t much chop. The stock tasted of chicken bones and tomato soup out of a can, the tofu resembled upholstery foam in texture, taste, and appearance, and the noodles were overcooked. This is a shame because the best pho I have eaten in my entire life was a tofu and tomato number.
I ate this at the markets in Sapa, in the mountains in the north of Vietnam. I didn’t need to wait to see the chook being hauled out of the stock-pot as I was slurping away to know that there was nothing vegetarian about this soup. If you look closely, you can see the plateful of innards I could have elected to have in my soup. This is the Ur-pho (try saying that out loud). Freshly fried tofu, handfuls of greenery, outstanding stock. Oh my, would that word could wield the matter. I fumble for superlatives. How good was it? Firstly, it was a little chilly in Sapa and as I started to eat, steam fogged up my glasses. The glasses went; the eyelashes did not bat. Secondly, this bowl of soup has twice figured in my dreams.

Dinner pho bo
I moved to pho with brisket at another hole-in-the-wall. This was good, workaday pho. A strong stock, decent noodles, lots of herbs, and no weird bits hanging off the slices of brisket. I suspect that one encounters a truly excellent beef pho if one braves more weird cuts of meat. There were crowds outside a pho bo joint down the road. I joined them until I got to the menu and had an attack of squeamishness when I realised that I had arrived in offal central. Specials included beef heart, lots of intestines, beef penis and testicles (way beyond my budget), beef liver… Had I not had a sixteen hour train trip ahead of me, I might have discovered a cache of culinary courage. Instead, I wriggled out of the queue and grazed in slightly more mundane pastures.

Still alive

This is what boats on Ha Long Bay look like in the rain.

Scenic, non?

I came into contact with a generally very accurate adage regarding cruises when I was a naÔve lass at Wesley College: You can run, but you can’t hide. This little nugget of wisdom was administered to first year girls, aka freshettes, by senior boys, and usually accompanied by a schooner of goon and the words ‘Scull, freshette.’ Fortunately, my experience of cruising on Ha Long Bay involved neither running nor hiding but far more wholesome pursuits like lounging and kayaking and eating crab.

Here's proof that I haven’t grown an extra head and that the one I have isn’t in danger of being blown off. C’est moi, windswept on Ha Long Bay.

On this day in 2007

Today...

... I went to view the embalmed corpse of Ho Chi Minh, as one does in Hanoi. Habitual may it well be to shuffle through the mausoleum housing the mortal remains of the father of the nation, I find this nonetheless a very strange activity.
... the sun shone on Hanoi, rain bucketed down on Hanoi.
... I discovered that traffic collisions are the number one cause of child mortality in Vietnam. This is not a surprise.
... I leave Hanoi on a sleeper train bound for Hue.
... I turned down a marriage proposal from a dwarf. If the proposal was not a serious one, it was certainly delivered in earnest.
... is Franz Kafka's birthday.
... I went to the Vietnamese Ethnological Museum and wondered why there was a couple having their wedding photographs taken in the exhibition halls and the gardens.
... I ate pho for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

Herpetophiles rejoice, gourmets lament

Not only did I survive two days on a not-so-leaky boat on Ha Long Bay, subsequent to the below, I found myself companions prepared to banquent on snake in Hanoi. I found companions, we made a rendez-vous, I failed to make it. Naps and navigational ineptitude have thwarted my good intentions many times in the past and this time, they arose like a hissing cobra to keep me from my destination. Should you be reading this, Leon, Cathy, - brave souls - I apologise.

As already stated, I'm not eating snake on my own. Unless I happen upon another willing party before I leave Hanoi this evening, I'm going to content myself with a far more modest gastronomic investigation. Pho for breakfast, lunch and dinner. What happens?

Rhapsody in pho to come.