To the North

"What's a heath?"
"No idea. Let's check it out!" So we set the coordinates for Hampstead Heath on my bro's nifty sat nav and off we went to places unexplored. One of my bros was down for the weekend and since he had a car, we thought it would be nice for the Fantastic Four a.k.a moi and my trois freres to drive out somewhere, especially with the sun making a very rare appearance. Hampstead Heath is in the leafy borough of Haringey in North London. The houses here are red-bricked and big, with wooden window frames and pretty gardens. We parked on Sheldon Avenue where sizeable detached houses had architecturally distinct and modern front porches (and most definitely not according to borough regulations where I live). Except for one house, which looked like a 70s ski lodge. I wish I'd brought my camera. I considered knocking the door of one of the porches that I liked and ask if I could take a closer look. But then I noticed the cctv cameras that some of the houses had in the area. And then I looked at the four of us. We were a motley dressed crew: a hoodie with bigass kicks, a semi-hoodie with sparkly sandals, a hobo-uni student-needs a haircut, and one normally dressed guy. Maybe another day.

The heath turns out to be a park sort of thing. We decided to follow the unmade path route which took us through yellow meadows that looked stark and barren under the overcast sky. 10 minutes later it got cold and windy. 5 minutes later it started raining. Sigh.... So we turned back after our vigorous 15 minute stroll. So.... cinema? Shrug. Yeah. Guess so. The closest was a Phoenix Picturehouse, a small independent chain that shows mainly alternative and foreign cinema with occassional blockbusters. The earliest show was at 9pm. It was only 6:45pm. So we headed to Odeon in Muswell Hill.

"This must be where the yuppies live?" remarks my bro. "What's a yuppy?" asks another. I can see what he means, with the well tended streets, numerous well-established trees lining the pavements, redbricked semi-detacheds and redbricked terraced flats with private fire escapes. "No, I don't think yuppies exactly but definitely well to do people. Like Notting Hill." I wouldn't mind living in a neighbourhood like this one day. We passed 3 independent bookstores, an independent toystore, another independent store of some sort. Yep, mostly indie stores with the exception of Sainsbury's opposite the Odeon. We had 3 options: the latest Harry Potter, Bruno, and Public Enemies. It was an easy desicion made by two of us. Public Enemies turned out to be a way-too-long overdramatic piece of melodrama with gag-inducing lines and epic pieces of soundtrack that made you cringe. Michael Mann. What did you do?

Give them cake

A giant cupcake you say? In Covent Garden? Do I wanna go? Hell yeah! What do you take me for? Have I EVER turned down cake? According to Le cool London, there was going to be an unveiling of the most bigass cupcake. Luckily, I was heading out to central London anyway as upon surveying my wardrobe it occurred to me that I could quite easily dress like a 12 year old, but couldn't actually teach any in what I had. And seeing as Germany is quite a conservative and "proper" country, I had a feeling that my new place of employment would not appreciate me turning up in my hot pink patent adidas and 80's multicoloured-triangle patterned windbreaker.

I was expecting to find a gigantic cupcake that towered over me. It turned out to be a 1.25 x 1.2m artificial looking thing of which I couldn't see much of and had to climb onto a chair to just catch a glimpse, as there were burly mean-looking guards securing the immediate perimeter. What was in fact more impressive was the massive queue of people that snaked along towards Tavistock road, hoping to get a look and a bite of it. Many of them looked to be in their early teens. Don't they have school? Anyway, I had better things to do than to queue for cake, even if it was the most biggest record-breaking cupcake in the world. This included checking out the Covent Garden Real Food Market which I've been told is running till October.

There was a stall selling mini-cupcakes, yep that's right, mini- "I can't see it"-thumbsized-"I need a magnifying glass"- "one lick and it's gone" cupcakes for £1. Each. Each?!! Are you high?!! Forget that. I'm going to get my cupcake elsewhere.

Which I did later after getting bored bored of shopping, at a place called Candy Cakes located in the basement area of Covent Garden. The cake was good though half of it really was just sickly sweet icing that I had to scrape off. Dear Joma, will you please open a branch on this island?

Covent Garden shopping was getting old so I wandered towards Leicester Square and decided to head to the National Portrait Gallery. I was in luck. The BP Portrait Awards 2009 was still on. And many of the entries this year were outstanding. My particular favourite was the winner of the BP Young Artist Award (http://www.npg.org.uk/bp-portrait-award-20091/the-exhibition/prize-winners-home.php?prize_position=4). It was definitely a painting because up close you could see the paint (!), brushstrokes etc. But when you stepped back you couldn't help but stand there puzzled and think, it couldn't be?! It HAS to be a photograph. The definition, the lighting, the shadows....It was most incredible.

Boutiques and antiques

London is beautiful in the summer. Unlike Paris which is stunning all year round, London is a flower that needs the sun to blossom. And today was a gloriously sunny day with a gentle breeze. Perfect for doing what I should've done when I first got the wedding invite- acquire a suitable outfit and buy a gift, though to be fair I already had half the gift sorted out. I just needed a "box" to put it in. So I shed my recent hobo-traveller look, which I was starting to grow fond of, and donned my yellow trench and bashed up Rays. I was ready to face London and it's gazillion shops. Also I figured this would be the best way to deal with my jetlag and delay the onset of any post-travelling depression. So where to guv'nor?

The last time I went to Notting Hill was sometime last year. Couldn't see much of it as there was a carnival going on with lots of people covered in chocolate. Today was more civilised with people wandering in and out of boutiques and antique shops. Though I much prefer edgy Camden Town, I thought I'd have better luck with my task in the more refined Notting Hill. Made famous by the film of the same name, Notting Hill is now always swarmed with too many tourists blocking the narrow paths for photos, or just plain standing around and being an annoyance. Kinda like what I was for the last month. Nevertheless, Notting Hill is very pretty with it's pastel coloured terraced houses and numerous cafes, especially along Portobello Road.

I walked into a gorgeous shop called Yates Buchanan and met the lovely Katherine, who turns out not only to be from somewhere close to Cologne (her dad's from there) but also lived in Singapore many years ago. She gave me a whole load of dresses to try on. By the 12th gorgeous dress it dawned on me that a) the dresses I liked were a lot like the dresses I already owned, b) I was jetlagged and didn't want to try anymore dresses, and c) I still had to buy tix to Deutschland and hence ain't got the buckaroos to be splurging on pretty things, no matter how much I liked them, which was a lot. I said my goodbyes to the dresses and Katherine. A few doors down, was a lovely antiques shop that Christina would've loved, filled with wonders from China, Mongolia and Tibet. And! I found the rest of Samira's present. Result!

Feeling really amazingly good about my accomplishment, I thought I deserved a treat. So I strolled along Portobello Road, looked at old cameras, new clothes, quirky trinkets and there is was. Gail's. A french cafe with the most sumptuous delights that it took me 10 minutes to decide what to eat. Finally, I decided on the fruit salad as part of this detox programme I thought I may try out which involved eating a lot of fruits. I then ordered a blueberry-pistachio cake (blueberries= fruits) and a lemon drizzle cake (lemon= fruit). Unfortunately, instead of the blueberry-pistachio cake that I requested, they brought me a raspberry-almond cake. I was miffed. Until I took a bite. And the lemon drizzle. Di-vine. This detox programme is going to be so easy.

Day 0

"We will shortly be arriving in Bangkok in 15 min where the temperature is 30 deg." 30 deg! Perfect! After being up for almost 24 hours, the prospect of experiencing temperatures above the UK average of 15 deg was too good. It got even better. On my ride to the hotel, I saw a bunch of kids sitting at the back of a pick up truck. On the highway. Where cars were travelling over 50 mph. Hell, even I wasn't wearing a seat belt. Mainly because there wasn't one. As we drove along the highway under the cloudless sky, the Bangkok skyline was beautifully lit up by intermittent lightning.

Got to the hotel and bumped into Adam who's also in the group. We went out for dinner and came across a night market where they sold almost everything. There was even bread with pre-spread butter! I also saw a guy selling deep-fried grubs and crickets. Tasty! No photos of these loveliness because I was too tired to take out my camera. You will just have to use your imagination.