The Montpellier Chapter

We made it out to the Cotswolds today.  

My Best Travel Buddy Ever!

We've found dog-friendly accommodation on Bayshill Road.

The Montpellier Chapter turned out to be a terrific surprise for us.  Contrary to some feedback read on Tripadvisor, the check-in process was warm and efficient.  I liked the way the common areas have been furnished and aside from the dining room, Bruno is welcomed everywhere else.  So we enjoyed an early dinner on the terrace, off a beautifully decorated bar-library area.

Bruno waiting for dinner patiently.

                                 

View of the terrace/conservatory from the street, with the chandelier/sculpture designed by Isabel Hamm

Reception to the left, with (round) sculpture titled Font 1 by Alison Crowther   

 Best of all, there is an incredibly well-curated contemporary art collection in the hotel!  Art is displayed casually, encouraging thought and conversation.

Foreground:  The Offering(sculpture) by Irene Gunston  Background:  Soldier Set(paintings) by Emily Lockren

I'm not crazy about all the design elements within our present room, but I appreciate very much the privacy offered, Ren bath products, and the eloquence of space expressed.

Extremely quiet and private.  Bliss!  No one else on this floor.  

(I'm just not crazy about built-in furniture... that wall of mirrors to the left needs to go...)

But the patio is great, and leaving cushions out on seats a nice touch.

Bruno agrees :)  The Montpellier Chapter, Bayshill Road

The Face of Happiness

I'm convinced that happiness has a face.  It kind of looks like this-

Or like this-

Yesterday was one of the best days ever of my London life.  My friend K brilliantly suggested that we visit the Highgate Woods, even if the weather threatened rain.  Notting Hill is currently a zoo.  At least a million people from everywhere else have descended for Carnival.  A walk through real woods seemed a much better option than being holed up amongst drunk, rowdy revellers. 

Highgate Woods is in North London, and consists of 70 acres of ancient woodland. We entered the woods, and were blown away.  The woods became a separate organism that enveloped us in green.  Bruno was over the moon.  Let off his lead, he behaved excellently, keeping us within sight, staying close at our heels, returning when called, and occasionally running a little further to explore and play.

Something about being in nature, "one" with nature, stirred primal feelings of joy.  I wished I was on a horse!  

Afterwards, we lunched at The Woodman Pub, right by the Highgate tube station, where my joy felt even more buoyant, with great friendship, booze and grub.  Ah... the Face of Happiness!

Operation Kelly

I have never ever had a more clandestine shopping experience.

I'm a bit conflicted about writing this post.  My daughter, The Shopaholic, is encouraging me to.  She thinks my experience may help someone else who covets this bag, or that bag.

Truth is, I have no patience, nor interest in "retail therapy".  I needed a new bag for fall.  I walked into the store.  I walked out.  I walked back in.

There was a lady at the store yesterday.  She is of Middle Eastern descent.  I've seen her on Sloane Street.  She is very beautiful.  Her face is impeccably made up, her hair artfully arranged beneath the correct silk scarf.  There is the requisite bag carried in the bent of her elbow, and her feet are covered in alligator heels.

Standing next to her in my blistered feet, balancing Bruno in his pod, I may have easily been mistaken as her personal help.

But, I have great posture.  And in the soft morning light, I have Kim's face.

So the Sales Assistant (SA) I suspect, mistakes me as an unidentifiable Asian celebrity, and offers me, X, in purple crocodile and diamonds.

Note- the SA whispers this to me like a ventriloquist- without once moving his facial muscles.

I whisper back- That's so kind of you, thanks!  But I can't afford that.  And my husband will surely have a coronary if he saw that charged to him!


The entire experience is shrouded in mystery and secret code language.  Blink and you will miss cookie crumbs being left your way leading you to the Holy Grail.  If you approach an SA and state a direct fact (I want to buy X), chances are you will be bitterly disappointed with a direct answer (We do not have any Xs for sale).  If you ask a direct question (When will there be new stock/ When will there be delivery), you will receive the swift crushing reply of No One Knows.

From my perspective, better to exercise patience, zen-like aura, and present yourself as bait.  The rules of consumerism are changed in this shop.  The customer has no authority.  You do not have the choice to buy.  It is the SA with the power to decide, if you are worth selling to.


The beautiful lady is breaking down.  Her voice shakes with hysteria- anger, frustration.  She tells the SA that she has been returning to the shop daily for the last ______.  And each day, the SAs are telling her there is no stock.


The store is crowded with Chinese tourists from the Mainland and clusters of women from the Middle East.  The SAs are harangued continually.


Summie, Bruno and I simply found a spot away from the madness and waited, and waited.  We kept calm, quiet.  Another SA approaches me.  She looks at me directly in the eye, speaking without words. When she finally speaks (in whispers!), she tells me to wait upstairs, so that I will be shielded from the public.

(This is the truth.  It was that crazy and surreal a shopping day.)

Upstairs, we are alone and the next few moments pass in a very languid manner.  The SA helping me now presents the shopping experience as one of complete indulgence and without haste.  15 minutes later, my purchase is tied up with ribbons, and he then proceeds to escort us out of the store, so as to prevent a riot from breaking out.


Some Other Thoughts:
After successfully presenting yourself as bait, do not unleash any diva or bratty behaviour.  Security is at hand to lead such shoppers out.  Best be very, very polite.  Know what you are looking for.  Be honest if you don't.  The SAs have knowledge and they are there to help.  Take all cues from the SAs at ALL times.  Put on your best poker face.  Do not reveal that you are going to get lucky with a bag in front of others.  Speak in soft tones, and listen carefully to what is not said.  And if there truly is no stock that day, thank the SAs appropriately, try to establish a genuine rapport and show that you are a nice person.  Be authentically you.  Chances are the SA while saying goodbye to you, may just offer a glimmer of hope, for when she just might sell you something, the next time you return.


                                               Location:  155 New Bond Street, W1S 2UA

Columbia Road Flower Market

Took Bruno and Summie to the Sunday Flower Market on Columbia Road (E2).  Forget pausing to buy anything- just hang on to your purse and each other, and allow the crush of the crowd to move you through the stalls, where just about everything is sold for "a fiver".

The market opens each Sunday from 8am to 3-ish, in all weather conditions.  A highly recommended activity if you are sick of the usual London sights, not faint-hearted, nor claustrophobic.  There is also a row of quaint independent shops and cafes.  We had a great time.

Some Kind of Wonderful

Popo is in hospital.  She fell a day ago.  She's bruised her eye, hurt her elbow.  There's some evidence of a mild stroke.  My cousin B who tirelessly takes care of her, sends me an update- She's in her element, lucid, lively.   

There was a time when Popo said to me- Don't work so hard, don't work so much.  You need to stay at home for your daughter.  You have to take care of your daughter.  She is growing up quickly and the older she gets, the more she will need you.  You have to be home.  Cook for her, talk to her, listen to her.

photo credit- Cousin B

I think Popo is the only person whose words I follow with unquestioning obedience.  Popo said to eat up the liver, and I did.  Popo said, Finish up all your food, make sure your plate is cleaned, otherwise you won't marry a handsome man.  I did, and I did!  Lastly Popo said to not shake your legs when seated at the dining table or all your luck will be shaken away.

Popo has raised single-handedly seven children during a time when women had less opportunities.  I think she was possibly a difficult mother because her marriage was not easy, and then her husband suddenly died.  She also raised single-handedly, a bigger brood of grandchildren, and maybe by the time we all came along, the only energy she had left was, love.  And even though her love was divisive, I know all my cousins and I, share an unconditional love for her.

If and when her words lacked resonance, Popo had a cane.  When she no longer bothered using the cane, she turned to her kitchen, and used the threat of home-made belachan (the deadliest chilli paste) to be applied onto lying lips, cattiness, tell-taling.

Day 2 in London with Summie, and we attempt getting her a dongel, a pair of wellies.  We go to the grocery store and she insists on carrying all the heavier items.  She tells me, now I am here, Mom, so I can help you, let me help you, and off she goes, walking as briskly as she can in the rain, her cardigan sliding off thin shoulders burdened by bags.  She accompanies me to the park, throws her arms around me spontaneously, thanks me over and over again.

When I could not leave her alone at home, nor stay home for her, I simply brought her to work with me.

I'm glad I listened to Popo.  I am luxuriating in my daughter's company.  She is a young woman now, and I suspect, will do just fine without me here.  What makes me feel incredibly rich is that she is choosing to be with me, wanting me near, even as I continually step aside to offer her more space.  I keep wondering, what on earth did I do right, to deserve the gift of this daughter?  Ah.  I remember now.  I did everything as Popo advised.  I did not once, shake my legs while seated at the dining table.

The Empty Nest

Used to be that the drive along the 405 to LAX was one of the saddest moments in my marriage.  We would sit in silence, each not saying what the other truly felt, and instead busy ourselves with the mundane-  What are you doing for dinner later,  how's the upgrading works at Toa Payoh, please send love to your parents, Summie needs a pair of boots for soccer, I'll get my thesis done ahead of time.

Loving and leaving, leaving and loving is not easy to do.

This time round, I secretly rejoiced that I don't feel the same kind of pain as the last time we did a long-distance marriage. + London is so much closer to Singapore.  If I stay up, or wake early enough, we even share the same day.  

I spent my last hours in Singapore waiting for him.

But when the laughter died, and I saw how tightly her arms clung around him and her unexpected sobbing, something broke inside of me as well.  She loves her father so completely and so deeply.  Last night she learnt for the first time, that love in its purest form, brings in its wake, a blinding grief.

With this lesson, I think, my precious Summer, you have finally taken a step into adulthood.  And with your step, Mom and Dad then begin a new moment in our marriage, titled, The Empt Nest.

Bi-City Living

My best friends know how very little I like to live with, and how very light I often travel.

Today/yesterday, I take traveling light to a whole new level.  I have a 15:25 Heathrow Express, 17:10 KLM (Amsterdam-bound), 21:00 KLM (Denpasar, via Singapore) to catch.

And guess what... after I cleaned up the flat, hung laundry in the sun?   I realized, I didn't need to pack any bags at all!  Gosh.  All I needed were simple toiletries for the flight, something to read, a little bit of cash, and my passport for this journey!

15:10, August 6, Paddington Station

It's a little disorientating to be without The Faithful Wolf, Bruno Chan.  My mind keeps straying to him... I also keep thinking, he should be here with me.  After 5 weeks of lugging, hauling, carrying, foraging, I can't believe all I have to be responsible for in the next few hours, is myself, and a light carry-on.  My hands are free.  I wish I was holding Bruno's lead and carrying the Pod.

15-16 hours later, it is August 7, 15:40hrs in Singapore.  I hurry off the plane, change pounds into Singapore dollars, hop into a cab, and my daughter is home to smother me with hugs, kisses, and LURVE.  Angel the Beloved is also home.  

16:00, August 7, Martin Road

He's looking very well, put on a bit of necessary weight.  Oh Angel!

My husband gets home from work slightly before 18:00 hrs.  He feeds us dinner, heads back to work.  He tells me I am too thin.  I tell him, I have been doing manual labor in London.

I think he is very wise.  A long time ago, he asked me to give up New York City for, him.  I did that because the choice of marriage and a returning to Singapore scared me more than my dancer life in New York City.  I like to think, that sometimes the best way to overcome fear is by dealing with it head on, even if fear paralyzes you, or blows up in your face.

I think the unspoken promise that laid between the lines of his proposal was that someday, somehow, we would not grow old in Singapore, and we would relocate.  Well, it's been almost 18 years.  The last time, we relocated, I went back to graduate school in the US, and we ended up with the wondrous task of finding each other again, and rebuilding a marriage.

I know we are the same people that we were in 1995, holding hands, racing across Central Park in the blistering cold.  But we are not the same couple that wedded in the fall of that year.  I really like who we are now.  It's taken a lot of work.  It still takes effort.  I don't think we have every answer and possibly never will.  But truly an expression of his wisdom has been his sense of  timing.  He never lets go, and then he says- go, you have to go. 

I think he sends me across still waters knowing that with his push, I would paddle far, paddle hard.  Then I simply turn back.

My Wise Man  XXOO

Call of the Wild

Bruno has a new ritual.  Early in the evenings, no matter how exhausted he is, as long as it is not raining, he would really like to complete his day with a visit to the neighborhood park.  Something about the feel of grass on his feet, the scent of ducks, swans, pollen in the air and the overgrown trees.

His joy is palpable.

His joy is infectious!  

We keep walking.  We walk from the northern-most point of the park to the very southern-most gate, as well as roam off pedestrian paths so that Bruno can practise some off-lead work again.

I am a city-slicker.  But sometimes in my more fantastical moments, I think of retiring to a tiny turn-of- the-century cottage perched high above the Pacific, with a horse, a pig, and a pack of dogs, a little barn for art-making and some kind of Noguchi sculpture along the driveway.  (This cottage of course would only be a 30-min drive from a main city, so that I can still stock up on sun-block, mascara and get my nails done.)  Come to think of it, I had thought this would one day be my second home.  I had never envisioned a London flat, nor a Royal Park instead!

There's a lake in the park.  Up close, it actually looks au natural, with a "shore".  I was pleasantly surprised.  

All this nature makes me think of Kim, my mother in the most far-flung of lands.

photo credit:  Simon, shot of Kim's backyard in the far-flung land

Before they got divorced, my father used to take us camping.  As in military-style camping with limited access to mod-cons.  He would teach us to pitch a tent, cook out of a mass-tin, make fire from gathered sticks/fallen branches.  Then we had to swim, laps, in the ocean.

Walking through the less trodden paths with Bruno, surrounded by the "wild", my thoughts retreat to childhood, and to my parents, who first taught me this deep love and respect for animals. It is a lesson I increasingly cherish as I grow older.  Because often running my hands along the Grumpy horse's back, or soothing Bruno to sleep, I think, I am like a blind person, my hands tracing braille.  Bruno and Grumpy are decoding the mystery, of what it means to be human, to be man, leading me back to, God.

photo credit:  YL, The Happiest Day in 2012

http://www.royalparks.org.uk/parks/kensington-gardens