Monthly Archives: June 2010

Royal Ascot – Part III

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Well, we have lost one of our crew for our now annual journey to Royal Ascot for Ladies’ Day – Pauline you were missed! – however that Su Yin happily stepped in this year to join our journey. The start for Royal Ascot went a little off-track when D missed the train we were supposed to catch though he managed to get on to the next one which was only 15 minutes after ours.

The seating and table arrangement had changed a bit when we got to Royal Ascot from last year. It seemed that the fencing had moved forward a bit and they’d added a whole lot more benches but as usual we went for a table which was useful for placing our giant food supplies for the day. Heh heh. They’d also moved the lavs even further away and though there were a lot more toilets than last year they were so far away I could barely be bothered making the trip to them. It also somehow didn’t change the long lines out the front! Hopefully they’ll change that for next year.

We had a really brilliant day weather-wise – mostly warm and always blue skies (last year was fine but quite overcast at times) – which could have explained why there were so many people at Royal Ascot this year. It felt like everyone in London was the races today!

Photo opps were taken at the start when there were less people around, after that it soon got so busy we could barely make our way around.

Race-wise I think Su Yin did the best out of the four of us and was probably the only one to finish in a net positive position. Unlike last year the race results were fairly unpredictable so if you had some money on the bigger odd horses you could have made a bundle.

It was once again a successful and fun day, and also another opportunity to say hi to the queen.

Lunch on a Boat

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Rache had a brilliant idea to have lunch on a boat near Embankment since it was such a lovely day. It was a lovely lunch except for the fact it did start to get overcast towards the end of it .. but it didn’t rain so that was good news for us!

Electric Hotel

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Outside theatre is always fun and the weather in London has been surprisingly conducive to it this season. Roops organised for a few of us to head out King’s Cross Street way to check out Electric Hotel – Electric for the neon-lit structure upon which we gaze to discover the goings on in the private lives of those residing inside. Against a backdrop of the gas holder and a setting sun the drama of the show was perfectly captured … though I’m not going to pretend to understand I understood what was actually going on!

We were handed giant headsets upon entering the show which made our voyeurism that much more intimate. Being a dance performance there wasn’t a lot of dialogue to listen to but the headsets were important for the music and the atmosphere.

It was certainly an innovative idea and individually and as a group the performers were excellent. Dancing in separate rooms I’m not sure how they managed to keep their timing but I didn’t see any mis-step at all – and in a show like tonight’s timing was absolutely crucial.

My only problem with the show was that I couldn’t understand what was going on – I still have no idea what the courier had to do with it, nor the random thieves, nor the pool at the top. I think it was supposed to be some sort of thriller (because I certainly felt there was always some sort of overhanging evil) with intertwined relationships but it was a bit hard to interpret who meant what to whom etc. The story is run once, then repeated again and again – each time from a different perspective with something slightly different happening every time.

For me this was one of those performances where it was better not to try and understand the story but to just go with the flow and enjoy the skills of the dancers and the choreographer.

World Cup 2010: Australia versus Germany

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I joined a few other aussies at The Green Man in Putney for the Australia v Germany game tonight. Surprisingly, being Putney, there weren’t very many other aussies in the pub – we were surrounded by english, all of whom were hoping Germany would kick our butt! This was not because they didnt like the Aussies but I guess they don’t want to face Germany in the next round (that’s presuming that England do well!)

It was a nice evening and venue to watch the game with a giant TV screen outdoors in a lovely garden setting. I love the way The Green Man has giant jenga, giant connect four and giant chess set!

Unfortunately the match didn’t go Australia’s way with a 4-0 drubbing but I still maintain it was the awful refereeing. If only they hadn’t allowed that first off-side goal …

Ronnie Scott’s

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After a hard day of elephant hunting it was over to Ronnie Scott’s for a relaxing evening of jazz. Our session started quite late so Laney and I had a chance to go home for quick change of clothes (and a cheeky nap) between hunting and the jazz. It was eerily quiet on the streets when I was heading back into town because of the England game – made for a nice calm journey on the tube!

Ronnie Scott’s is popular as ever. Most people know to book ahead to make sure they get tickets for a show. The bouncer out the front wasn’t exactly friendly or helpful though so when everyone was lining up there was a bit of confusion as to who had pre-booked tickets (turns out most of us had) and who hadn’t. Seating is unreserved (except to the extent that you book a more expensive ticket for unrestricted view) and on a first come first serve but also at the host’s mercy. She/he will seat you wherever. We were lucky to be seated in the second row on the side so we had decent views.

Tonight’s warm up act were the James Pearson Trio who played for about 40 minutes. It felt like they played three really long tunes and all mainly with improvisation. It was very impressive and brings me back memories of when I used to play the alto sax in high school – though I was nowhere near as good as I hated to practise (mainly because I hated carrying my alto around!)

Gill Manly was the main act. I’m not all that familiar with the jazz scene so I didn’t really know who Gill was. She was presenting the Nina Simone songbook (complete with Nina Simone’s original drummer!) For a white lady Gill sure had an awesome voice! She was quite the character too and made for an entertaining evening. Her story of how she came to be singing for us tonight was touching and brought a real authenticity to the performance – you could tell she really loved and felt the music.

Elephant Parade

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Close friends to random strangers (for some friends kept telling their friends about me and my mission) know that for the last five weeks I have been missioning it around London chasing down … Elephants! This year, for a limited time only, London has been home to nearly 260 elephant statues. Locating and hunting them down has caused tears, injuries to limbs, tearing of hair (from the parents letting their kids climb over the elephants), blisters, and fending off an angry Mickey Mouse it has been so very worth it to hunt down every single one of them.

The Elephant Family is a small charity working to save the Asian elephant from extinction in the wild. The Elephant Parade has previously been in Antwerp, Amsterdam, and Rotterdam though I don’t think it has had such a big impact as is has had in London. If Facebook posts are to be believed (yes I did join their page) people came from all over the world simply for the sole purpose of seeing these elephants. It was a fantastic campaign and I hope it really succeeds in raising the money it needs.

Tracking down these nearly 260 elephants has been quite a journey in the last 5 weeks (pictures were snapped of these jolly creatures on 19 days, with eight different friends, and with miles walked.) I tried to be as strategic as possible to cut down on wasted travel (sometimes even planning events around where the elephants were!) but sometimes the elephants weren’t there when they were supposed to be, or the map changed and the elephants moved, or the elephants were in hospital! On the other hand, sometimes it worked to my advantage too like when the elephant that was supposed to go to Heathrow Terminal 5 ended up sitting at the Paddington train platform instead.

That’s not to say I didn’t enjoy my time elephant hunting. In addition to meeting fellow elephant hunters I really enjoyed trekking around London and visiting places I’d never been to – it was a new way of discovering London that’s for sure. The elephants themselves were also a wonder in their own right. Various artists had volunteered to decorate them and I could go on all day (it would probably take as long as it took me to find them all) about the themes, the smart concepts and just pure inspiration that some of these elephants entailed.

My absolute favourite (and it was very very hard indeed to narrow it down) had to be #255 The City in the Elephant by the BFLS architects – ingeniously they’d put a literal city of elephants inside the elephant! From afar it looks merely like an elephant with bubbles:

But a closer look reveals something altogether unexpected:

My next favourite was maybe #184 The Human Disease by Nathan McKenna. I think it speaks for itself:

One elephant featured my home country:

Some elephants had a lot of bling (with some people even resorting to try and pick that bling off!)

And who doesn’t love cheese:

There were tributes to women:

The monopoly elephant was way impressive:

Finding the small details on the elephants was cool:

Last but not least were all the London themed elephants

The parade, however, was not without controversy. Gerald, initially sitting in a Selfridges window, apparently had something a little adult about the leaves painted on him. Something to do with one of them looking like a lady part! After the first week he was put away before emerging at China White, where you could see him by appointment only. I personally didn’t see what was so offensive about it:

Now I just have to figure out what I’m going to do with the photos of all 258 elephants …

Embankment Cafe

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Rache was down from Edinburgh for the weekend again and though I was packed in for the weekend I couldn’t not see her when she’d made the effort to come down. Nic took us to one of her favourite breakfast places near Embankment – the Embankment Café.

This little café is quite subtle and I’d say a little hidden gem. Food is very cheap and good (breakfast comes with chips!) and its location is fantastic – you can sit in the gardens and enjoy a nice bit of peace in an otherwise hectic and busy locale or sit on the terrace with views of the Thames.

I can see myself coming back here time and time again.

Sex and the City: 2

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I went to see Sex and the City: 2 with Su Yin and Kelly tonight and I must say that despite the really poor dialogue and cheesiness of the script at times I really quite enjoyed it. Whether it was because I was enjoying the outrageous and weird fashion the girls were sporting, or reminiscing about the cities that the film was shot in, or just sitting back and enjoying the visual aspect of the movie who knows but it just worked for me.

Now don’t get me wrong this is certainly not going to win the critics over (and they are just going to absolutely massacre Sarah Jessica-Parker’s character) and it was probably funny to me for all the wrong reasons so don’t think it’s the best thing since sliced bread. For some light-hearted entertainment it did the trick (though I must admit I did cry when there was a particularly strong scene between Miranda and Charlotte.)

Bar Boulud

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The last time I was in New York I tried to get into Daniel by Daniel Boulud. Currently number 8 in the S.Pellegrino World’s 50 Best Restaurants for 2010 you can imagine you can’t leave it a few days before you want to go there to get a booking – which is what I did! (Safe to say I did not get a booking … heh heh)

Therefore, when I heard that Bar Boulud was opening up in London I got a bit excited. Though Daniel is the restaurant that Daniel Boulud is best known, he does have a few restaurants dotted around the world. The newest to his stable was the Bar Boulud in London that we went to tonight.

Our booking was for 6.30 and normally at this time any given restaurant isn’t actually heaving but Bar Boulud was packed to the rafters! I was quite surprised. It must be the buzz about being a new entry to the London restaurant scene but also maybe its location in Knightsbridge which didn’t hurt.

Dinner menu at Bar Boulud is French bistro/classical French. I’m not sure burgers are particularly French but I knew before I got to the restaurant what I’d be having for my main: the Piggie Burger! which when I read a review of the place for some reason struck a chord with me. LOL. Sandra agreed with me and also went for the Piggie Burger for her main. What can I say – we both have good taste …the Piggie Burger was a beef patty with bbq pulled pork, lettuce and slaw, green chili mayoannise and interestingly served on a cheddar bun. Sound yummy much? And I can say for sure that it was … though the serving was entirely too small. 😉 Pomme frites which came with the burger were well fried.

But before we got to burger we also had some starters. I think Sandra’s was the winner with her seafood platter which looked pretty darned good except the seafood was chilled which I don’t really enjoy. My sausage (Lyon specialty sausage pistachio and black truffle in brioche) wasn’t what I was expecting it to look like but it tasted pretty darn good.

For dessert, which we could fit since our mains were quite modest, Sandra chose a decadent mint chocolate dish. It came complete with hot chocolate sauce which was used to pour over the crisp top to break into the dessert. I went for a lighter option combining two of my favourite flavours coconut and ginger in the Coupe de Fruits Exotiques: Tropical Fruit Sundae with ginger, Mascarpone Foam, Coconut-passion fruit sorbet.

Overall I was very impressed with Bar Boulud. Service-wise they were very good at filling up our water whenever we needed it (my litmus test for good service) and had a balanced presence at our table (though it did slightly disappear when we actually wanted the bill!) Food was good quality. Atmosphere felt energetic and hyper though I was glad to note we didn’t have to shout to hear each other.

Paris – Torture Garden

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For the first time in all my travels I went overseas for the pure reason of attending only one event – so much so that I didn’t even really plan what we were going to do of the rest of the weekend we were in Paris. It actually made quite a nice change and unusually when I got back to London tonight I was feeling fairly relaxed … if a bit exhausted from not getting enough sleep on Saturday night.

Photos photos photos

The Experience

Laney and I caught the Eurostar mid-morning in to Paris. I love catching the Eurostar – it just seems so much more a civilised way of getting into the centre of the city than flying into Charles de Gaulle and it doesn’t take all that much longer than flying (once you factor in the checking in, travelling to an from the airport etc.) We arrived in Paris early in the afternoon and after checking in to our hotel had the rest of a glorious day to enjoy Paris.

This weekend was the finals weekend of the French Open and our own Sam Stosur was in the Women’s Final. She was heavy favourite and though I couldn’t get tickets to see it live we saw some of it on the TV. I don’t know what happened but unfortunately she lost! We were a bit disappointed for her!

After watching Sam sadly lose the French Open final our port of call was the Eiffel Tower, well, the area around the Eiffel Tower anyway. It was a hive of activity but most surprisingly there were a number of dance groups that were scattered around. Some were asking for money but some seemed just to be dancing for fun. I loved how they all made it about performance pieces so it was like they were telling a story so it wasn’t just dancing to music. It really made for quite a fun atmosphere and some of the performers were very talented.

The funniest chat up line I’ve ever had happened whilst we were hanging around. You know in Paris there are heaps of African men trying to sell you random stuff from pieces of string you unknowingly let them put on your wrist to fake watches etc. well this dude came up to us and tried to sell us these Eiffel tower watches. We refused of course but then he started to chat me up saying I was beautiful, could he get my email blah blah blah and then he asked me where I was from. I just left it hanging and then he was like “You’re from Brazil aren’t you”. Um … I’m wondering if he was slightly blind cause even though I might have had a Brazilian I certainly wasn’t Brazilian. He was really genuine too cause he started to speak to me in Portugese! I nearly wet myself laughing after he left. Poor bloke.

There were sooo many tourists that just watching people and moving around them made me feel tired! so Laney and I decided to go over to the green near the Eiffel and lay down. It was lovely. Randomly I saw this in the sky. Make what you will of it but I know what I was thinking … hint: what I see is pointing left ….

Somehow it was suddenly time for dinner. I never know where to eat in Paris but a friend of Laney’s recommended Chez Papa. I think its actually a chain but the food was very delicious and filling. There were so many nice looking options on the menu but everyone around us had these gorgeous giant salads topped with a fried egg! They really did look but I was feeling greedier than just salad so, after enjoying some snails (tasty!) went for this veal and cheese option which ended up being served in a large ceramic pot.

I clearly wasn’t thinking when I went for such a heavy meal cause I’d forgotten that I then had to squeeze into my outfit for the evening! A PVC corset and skirt! Umm … yes, not my usual wardrobe …

So the evening brought along the reason for our trip – a visit to Torture Garden – supposedly the world’s leading fetish club! It probably sounds more dramatic than it actually is. Normally there is an event in London kind of every month however for some reason neither Laney or I could make any of the dates but we could make it to the Paris one! It seemed fitting that the event was held at La Machine Du Moulin Rouge. I’ve never been to a fetish club but was interested to see what went down in one.

Getting dressed for the night was very interesting. I could barely get into my corset – Laney had to literally get her knee and knee me into it. Once it was on I couldn’t even sit without feeling like my ribs were breaking. Not sure how ladies used to do it in the olden days! Still it actually kind of felt empowering … even if we did get some funny looks as we made our way to the club. (Turns out that most people changed AT the club!)

I’m not going to go into detail about what went on at Torture Garden but fair to say it was eye opening. Though we had worried about what we were wearing it turned out we were way more conservative than everyone else – the first two girls we saw were basically naked but for bits of rope hiding nothing but strung around their body! During the night (we got home at 6am) there was entertainment on the big stage and entertainment by individuals around us (there were a few frames and stirrups around …) We met some interesting people but what I found strange was that it was only when I was with this guy that I was suddenly getting approached – one guy in a full body suit wanted me to play with him and another time this guy in a rabbit suit came up to us. However, despite the nature of the club I actually felt it was “safer” than a normal nightclub – people are respectively of boundaries and no means no and they respect that without being all sleazy. The funniest incident was when I was standing at the top of the stairs leaning over a banister not realising I was stepping on someone’s hand. When I went to apologise he was like – that’s very okay. I think he deliberately put his hand under my foot!

Due to our activities of the night Sunday was a very relaxed affair. We basically slept until check out, then after a quick stop at the Arc de Triomphe, had a lazy brunch, strolled down the Champs Elysee and visited the car stores and Louis Vutton – which had a long queue outside it to get in. As we were waiting we were surprised to see this Buddhist Monk turn up, with followers, and pose in front of the store!

After this we took a long walk around and then along the Seine where we made a pit-stop at the Diana Memorial (strange flame) and the tunnel where she had the accident. I was very moved by the inscriptions on the bridge above it …

… before having a snooze at Jardin des Tuileries. It was a great way to end the weekend.