UK Diary Part 8: Bristol & London
Day 50
We spent the day largely on the train to Birmingham then to Bristol. We checked in at the Ibis Bristol Temple Meads then walked around the city centre and Castle Park.
Bristol is a city that gets it right - the centre is almost fully pedestrianised. It feels modern without being too fancy (looking at you, Birmingham, with your shopping malls). At the same time you feel a connection to the past, since Victorian engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel has left many marks here: Clifton suspension bridge, Bristol Temple Meads train station, the SS Great Britain.
People whiz about on bicycles and e-scooters here. Lots of students drinking, meditating, and probably shagging in the numerous parks.
Day 51
Bristol tour with Jon's local friend Keith, who showed us around. First we took the ferry to the SS Great Britain, which was fantastic. At least 2 residents of Bristol moved here from South London - the ferryman and a passenger, who struck up a conversation in typical friendly British fashion, reminiscing about Peckham's club scene in the '90s.
We enjoyed a repast of cider, pork pies and pickled egg (!) at The Orchard pub around the corner before moving on to look at the Clifton suspension bridge.
Another pub stop at the Bag of Nails to drink beer among cats.
At the Ibis Hotel we have a perfect view of builders at work at the construction site next door. I like that construction sites in Britain aren't hidden from sight - you can wave at builders and watch them goof around. Around mid-morning the builders, some shirtless and heaving, pour into Wetherspoons and buy themselves full English breakfasts and pints.
Day 52
We had to leave Bristol for the obligatory visit to Bath...
Bath has Georgian architecture, yes, but the effect is completely ruined by the numerous Costa Coffees and Fatface clothing chains. I don't see what the fuss is all about.
The Roman Baths were a complete waste of time and money. As a rule of thumb you should not bother with any museum that has audio guides, especially one in multiple languages. That is a sure sign of impersonal curation.
The Jane Austen Centre was moderately entertaining and only increased my admiration of the great writer. Bear in mind that as a woman and a dependent, she had no say as to where she lived, so her stay in Bath depended upon the hospitality of her relatives. Even so, she enjoyed herself, lapping up Bath society and immortalising it in her novels. A reminder that an artist is not her environment.
We ate a gimmicky meal at Sally Lunn's historic teahouse: "Lunn buns" and "trencher" of chicken stew.
Before going back to Bristol we fell into the Topping & Co. Bookshop, spent way too much $$ and accidently attended an Olivie Blake event. I think Olivie Blake is a terrible writer (source: a few pages of The Atlas Six) and now I can say she is also not a charming person. But then so many "successful" people today are like that: self-obsessed, with their greatest skill being that of self-promotion.
Day 53
Goodbye Bristol,
Hello Catford!
The last train journey to the last housesit of our 2-month people watching trip. Phew. I'm quite happy that we don't have any more train rides. The trains here aren't as nice as I imagined. Without a dining car, or bentos for sale at the station, or people peddling street food on board, a train ride is often simply a mode of transport and not an experience.
We arrived at Catford to meet our charges for the next few days: OAB Hughie and OAC Phoebe.
After washing up we dashed off to the Francis Crick institute for a live recording of a BBC podcast. Brian Cox looks like a sex doll.
Day 54
1. British Library and Somers Town
2. Salad bar at the British Library Terrace restaurant
3. SKOOB
No picture, but amazing used book store in basement of a shopping mall.
4. Dr Johnson's House
5. Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese
6. Fleet Street (nothing to see; better to read New Grub Street and Scoop)
7. Nigerian food (finally tasted fufu. OK noted.)
Day 55
1. Catford charity shops
2. Senegalese stall at Peckham Levels
3. Peckham on a hot Saturday
On the bus we saw what seemed like millions of people hanging out at Peckham Rye Park & Common. It is amazing how much fun the British can have with a picnic blanket and some beer. The wonderful practice of spending an entire day in an unstructured manner, just bantering with your friends, is lost on Singaporeans. We burn our free time rushing from one errand to another.
Clearly it's not our environment or weather either. Look at our foreign workers who entertain themselves all Sunday with big Valu$ bags of snacks, taking Tiktok videos with their friends. We live side-by-side with people who know how to have fun, and yet we don't learn from them. We complain we are "burnt out" and "so stressed" when we ought to be learning the art of the picnic from the very people who work for us - in much, much worse occupations.
4. BOOKS
5. Lewisham
No photos, but we took a sweaty bus ride to Lewisham to check out the fish market and charity shops.
6. Pets at Home & Sainsburys
Went to PaH wanting to buy some cat toys but didn't see any good ones. Sainsbury was meh.
7. B&M Bargains
Did a whole lot of shopping at B&M then went home.
Day 56
1. Sunday roast at The Anchor
2. Humble Crumble
3. COMEDY OF ERRORS at The Globe!!
4. Daunt Books at Marylebone. I wanted a nice edition of the complete Holmes. Good thing I didn't buy the sherlock Holmes Museum edition as it had icky gold edges. We went to Daunt Books and found a much nicer Vintage edition for £5 cheaper.
5. Ethiopian food at Marathon restaurant
6. Italian Bear hot chocolate
7. Took the Elizabeth line then DLR to Lewisham as needed to rehearse a train-free method of going to the airport on Wed. It involved an extremely long wait for the bus from Lewisham...
It seems like many Britons feel comfortable saying completely random things to anyone without prompting. The waitress at Italian Bear came and told us about a customer who just ran away without paying and her thoughts on the current prime minister, apropos of absolutely nothing.
And she's not the first. We've encountered and eavesdropped on innumerable Brits talking rubbish for hours to just about anyone: their bus drivers, the cashier, any other passers-by. We've heard complete strangers bare their hearts on long train rides without so much as exchanging contact numbers thereafter. Even the notoriously stuck-up Londoners, who don't talk to one another on the Tube, can still be found bantering at the pub at 4pm on work days.
Day 57
I'm afraid there's not much to report today. We took the bus to Croydon and it was so rubbish.
After a hasty lunch (KFC and Sainsbury meal deal) we took the bus to Streatham to do a charity shop crawl.
A word on meal deals. I badly wanted to assimilate and pick up the British habit of getting a meal deal for lunch, but could not. Meal deals are found in almost all supermarkets and some other shops like Boots. From a given range, you select 1 main, 1 side, and 1 drink and it'll total up to £3.50 or £4 or whatever at the till.
The thing is, most of the meal deal selections are COLD. I'm fine with soba or gazpacho on a hot day, but have you tried eating an ice cold sandwich in sub-20 degree weather? It is awful. You don't smell or taste anything - the sandwich is cardboard in your mouth. The only meal deal sides that make sense are fruit and yogurt. Yet retailers offer ice cold samosas, chicken nuggets, pork pies as sides. I don't get it.
So. I haven't been into meal deals. I'd rather eat something hot at McDonald's, Greggs or Wetherspoons, sorry. The meal deal is simply too depressing.
Got on the bus again to Brixton, just to check it out and eat some Latin American/Caribbean food. That chorizo and lentil stew was really good.
There were some junkies in the Brixton train station underpass and some ne'er-do-wells on the steps; however, no one harassed us and we got back to Catford without incident.
London is so diverse. I like going to towns dominated by different classes and colours, just exploring different minimarts and eateries. You could never have that in Singapore because we don't want "ghettos".
Day 58
Our main errand on the penultimate day in London: to eat the XL cheese toastie at the Wigmore pub. The toastie was indeed good, but what stole the show was the £5 salad. No cheese, nuts, croutons, chicken, raisins or any other fuckery in this salad, no siree - it was a tightly packed bowl of beautiful complete lettuce leaves rubbed in a light mustard vinagrette. Too good.
At my insistence we went to Hamley's, even though Oxford Circus was a nightmare.
One final errand in the city: to go to Stick and Bowl on Kensington High Street and introduce myself to the distant relatives who run it. Anticlimactically, they weren't around. So we went to the charity shops to puke internally at Kensington toffs before going home.
Back at Catford, after having a quick dinner of reduced to clear food, we went to the local pub to try and go for quiz night. Alas, the proprietors failed to canvass a single team for the quiz, so we finished our pints and called it a night.
Day 59
On the final day, after breakfast, we went around Catford buying tea, biscuits, crumpets to take home.
As trains were down due to strikes, our host drove us to New Cross Gate. We took the Overground to Whitechapel and changed to the Elizabeth line for Heathrow, died under the weight of our bags.
We had time for one last fancy meal at The Perfectionists Cafe, which is Heston Blumenthal's answer to Wetherspoon's (we suppose). These are the first nice mushy peas I've eaten although I don't think they are traditional at all. These are made with fresh garden peas rather than dried marrowfat peas.
After this expensive meal we got on the plane(s, with transfer in Munich) back to Singapore. Our return flight was on an Airbus A350-900 (Lufthansa) and a lot comfier than the Boeing 777 with Swissair. I have no neat way to end this travelogue; my brain is taking a while to catch up with my body.
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