London diary: fox, rhubarb, tea
The tourists are at it again.
As you may recall, Alex and I were supposed to go to London last month, but then I got sick. We made our long-awaited voyage last week, and it was wonderful. Sunshine every single day. I can only assume London is always that glorious, so scant was the threat of rain. Can anyone confirm? London is never dreary?
We were visiting our friend Fredi, who used to work with Alex and is now a beloved person to me, too. Alex and Fredi are two peas in a chatty pod, although they’re very different: He never looks more pained than when I’m taking a photo of him, whereas she is a musical theater kid whom Andrew Garfield might describe as “a shot of espresso” and “like being bathed in sunshine.” We had a great time. We walked and talked and sucked down coffees and bubble tea and walked some more. A billion steps each day, according to my swollen ankles.
Here are my favorite things that we saw, ate, and experienced. One has a melancholy asterisk, but it is very important, as you’ll see.
Monet at the National Gallery
I’m not a Monet head, per se, but I really love when that guy does pale landscapes. Snow, fog, dawn. We popped into the National Gallery for maybe an hour — the beauty of a free museum is not feeling like you have to soak up all of art history in a single visit — and among the paintings that I got glued to was Monet’s “Snow Scene at Argenteuil (1875).” It captures the quiet beauty of late afternoon in winter, with those slight variations between the cloudy sky, the blue-white ground, and the snow-covered trees.
It reminded me of this sunnier snow scene at the d’Orsay in Paris and this misty view of the Seine at the Kreeger Museum in D.C.
Mariage Frères tea
To quote Dakota Johnson, “Tea is a big deal for me. But also, caffeine is a big deal for me.” Mariage Frères is a French tea company that Alex and I discovered in Paris. It’s obscenely expensive and therefore fits into the “very special treat” category. Fortunately, very special treats are permitted on vacation, so when we walked past the Mariage Frères outpost in Covent Garden, I compelled us to go in and restock on two of my favorite teas: Sencha Matcha Émeraude and French Breakfast.
The sencha matcha has a gorgeously soft flavor. Zero bitterness, all lovely pillowy sweetness. It makes me feel like a lamb napping in the grass on a breezy day in May. The French Breakfast, meanwhile, has this caramelized, biscuity flavor that temporarily leads me to believe I’m doing everything right in my life. While I’m waiting for either tea to steep, I’m usually standing in the kitchen with my nose in the tin, huffing the dry leaves.
(Is it rude to obsess over French tea in London? Comment below!)
Airplane mode for hours and hours while the U.S. economy melted down
It’s not sticking your head in the sand if it’s saving you $12 a day in international data charges.
A reprieve from each other at the British Film Institute
On vacation, there comes a time, nearing dinner, when everyone is tired and hungry and needs to take a leak. Alex, Fredi, and I behaved ourselves remarkably well, but it was under these fragile circumstances that we stopped off at the British Film Institute’s location on the Thames. In addition to movie theaters, the complex houses several restaurants and cafés, a shop, restrooms, and tons of seating. It was just what we needed: a public place to rest for a little while, not talking to each other.
In the BFI shop, Alex roved around looking for Blu-rays, as is his wont, and I squatted on the floor, pretending to look at books on the bottom shelf but mostly just doing hip-opener stretches. (I was also delighted to find a copy of my friend Esther’s book about Oscars fashion!) Fredi rested on one of the many circular poufs in the lobby. We all emerged happier people.
Leaf peeping
Sorry for being such a tourist, but we did go poke our noses through the iron fence of the private garden that Julia Roberts and Hugh Grant sneak into in Notting Hill. From the little we could see, it looked very pretty!
8 Holland Street
Alex’s friend Kristen has the best taste on the planet, so, at her recommendation, we stopped by 8 Holland Street, a home goods store-slash-art gallery. Kristen had described it as “special,” and boy, was she right. There were some gorgeous wall textiles by the artist Al Bates, as well as a couple of horrifying pieces of pottery that I would love to own. More and more, I find myself asking: What would traumatize a child in a good way, aesthetically speaking? These vessels qualify.
Fox
On our last night in London, while walking past a construction site on the way to dinner, Alex poked me. “Fox!” We squatted down, and there, behind a wire fence, was a beautiful London fox. Not six feet away from us! It was the closest I’ve ever been to a fox, and if you’ve read this newsletter for a while, you’ll know that, when Alex and I lived with his parents during lockdown, I was obsessed with the local foxes that ritually orbited the backyard.
She seemed quite calm, being a city fox, but she also made me very sad. There were floppy-looking growths on her stomach, which maybe meant she wasn’t in good health or maybe just meant she was breastfeeding. If she was, were her little foxes okay? Was she stuck behind the fence, or happily nesting there? I don’t know. I’m neither a fox doctor nor a fox expert. I wish I was.
I didn’t stop to look for very long, because I didn’t want to stress her out. But for the next few hours, I would bat at Alex’s arm and cry, “Fox!” And he would reply, “I know!”
A rhubarb knickerbocker glory
I continued fretting about the fox’s well-being all the way to Café Deco, a lovely little restaurant that had pink tulips all over the place. Not those arches of fake flowers bedeviling our dining institutions, but vases of real long-stemmed tulips drooping elegantly towards the floor.
In keeping with the pink theme, we got a rhubarb knickerbocker glory for dessert, which is the most British-sounding treat imaginable. I’d never had one before. Google says it’s basically an ice cream sundae, but in person, it was so much more: a whimsical layered mess of rhubarb sorbet, a sort of loose and languorous whipped cream, rhubarb jelly, and vibrant chunks of rhubarb stem. As we got toward the bottom, I kept getting flecks of something cold and fatty — tiny chunks of white chocolate? Butter? I don’t know. It was so good that I temporarily stopped worrying about the fox.
And now it’s raining in D.C.!
Eliza
I’ve always wondered if Mariage F tea was worth it; now I know! Will stock up on my next Paris trip.
“I love when that guy does pale landscapes” really made me laugh, danke