seafood stew

riverside cafe is one of the places we've been meaning to go to for years but just keep forgetting. have run past it once but it wasn't open for lunch yet, and it's been closed over the christmas / new year period. think the set lunch wasn't available till just recently. but it came highly recommended by a dear friend whose good taste i trust wholeheartedly. the next best thing was to go online and see what cooking videos they had, and this one was just asking to be tried. went to bute street fishmonger and got a whole lotta seafood and whipped out the le creuset. been a bit of a one trick pony with shellfish (repeated lobster pasta, alternating by adding squid / prawn) but hey why not.

virtuousity

after the blow out meal at ikdea, i felt compelled to improve my eating habits, if only for one meal. hence the kale salad at daylesford. but my salad had plastic in it (!!!) which they kinda replaced with a brand new salad. so i'd two. then i'd fish pie before succumbing to the baked alaska christmas pud. which no doubt undid all the damage the kale had done ;) 

did a waitrose run to use up vouchers (although i'm quite sure i got conned into spending...) cos for every £40 spent, i got £8 off. if not for the vouchers, i wouldn't have spent the £40 to begin with? but bought a whole trolley of christmas goodies for the office.

then it was off to kanada-ya for pre-theatre ramen. you know all those pre-theatre menus? yeah, nonsense. but ramen is cheaper and faster! especially when it's round the corner from theatre royale.

caught love's labour lost (i think) but was pretty much in agony for most of it and must've annoyed the theatre critics conspicuously scribbling into their spiral notepads no end with my fidgeting. something about having to sit in a chair for 2+h just did my back and sides in. did think it might be premature labour but disaster averted, was just tired.

bob dylan

passed the halcyon gallery when i was last in the area and clocked the fancy people and waitstaff serving champagne, not realising it was the private screening of bob dylan's art. later realised that it was opened to the public and after a disappointing visit to bedlam at the wellcome collection (so lacking in art and information!) figured i might redeem the afternoon by going to the bob dylan exhibit. nothing life-changing and got the feel that most of the paintings were copied off postcards or photographs but liked his easy, unpretentious style and a glimpse into american at the middle of the 20th century.

as the dust settles

it's been a whirlwind couple of weeks, to say the least. went on a last minute road trip post-exams because eight days of rocking back and forth in a padded cell was more than i could subject my mental health to, went to glasgow (!!!) to get my visa sorted and found out the next morning that i'd passed finals. the shock, the relief, the overwhelming joy. then it was back to toon for grad ball, a 'crisis management' driving lesson and then my driving test bright and early the next morning. passed that too, and felt like a rockstar. yes, been driving since i was 18 but was lazy and got an automatic licence in sg so thought it high time i grew up and learnt how to drive manual. which i did. so there!

was in singers for a couple of weeks then back to london. parents came up for grad and it was busy busy, with a short trip to the country after. funny story there - father had said we were going to the cotswolds before realising it was a 3h drive from london. he made the executive decision that a 45min drive was sufficiently heroic and we ended up at cliveden*house near maidenhead. beautiful setting, set in the national trust so lots of lovely grounds and walks. didn't have the heart to tell him that we could've just stayed in london and slept at mine, seeing how we remained so close to the city.

parents left and i pottered around the flat before deciding i needed a final fling before starting work (tomorrow!) and escaped north as i'm wont to do. lazy weekend with 12h zz, good food and good company, the perfect end to this five year sabbatical.

so i start work tomorrow and am more than a little apprehensive today. the responsibility! this is my career we're talking about! i'm working again (gulp) but the other part of me is thinking that this is about time, that this end point / starting point is what i've been inching towards for the last five years. and now i'm finally here, i should really be more positive.

last day

this is slightly belated but i went with newfound friends to a pub near medsch after our first day of class. i'd just moved from singers and my alcohol tolerance was abysmal. struggled to finish half a pint and didn't have a taste for beer because it burned my tongue. oh ho, the fizz! too much! let's not even talk about anything stronger. in the (almost) five years that have elapsed, this has sadly changed. and i'd be the first to suggest heading to the pub in good times and bad. funny story - called for emergency pub meeting after the first day of third year when i very accidentally needlestuck the dean (for real). in my defence, his pinky was in the way on the rubber arm. no infection control issue, no datix, no reporting because it was a rubber arm but i was mortified that it was his first ever needlestick in over 20 years of practice :/ oh well! lived to tell the tale? or never really lived it down because my clinical group mates haven't let me forget. it's great though, if there were an award for most improved i'm sure i'd be in the running.

anyhoos it was nice to finish the last day of final year back at the same pub, this time having learnt to enjoy my alcohol and in a position to savour a pint of deuchar's :) couldn't believe that's five years done and just finals to go. and now finals have started it's just a couple of weeks to freeeeedom (and doctordom, i hope!)

toon

figured it was high time i watched a football match. watched the finals at the london olympics 2012 and thought that was pretty good already but apparently my education isn't complete till i watch a proper game, on match day. the mister knows my threshold for danger and violence is embarrassingly low so he splurged on really good seats so i wouldn't get spooked by the crowds (thank you!). that said, he did laugh at me when during some taunting on the grounds i was all ready to about turn and run away. fight or flight, hey? and again when i entered the wrong set of turnstiles, not realising our tickets meant safety in a separate entrance. found the game lacklustre and not the most rivetting of 90+minutes but defo good experience. wouldn't hurry back!

to reward my patience (hah) we went to fenwick's and bought overpriced artisanal gin and i made g&ts. the last time i made him a g&t i ended up removing a good piece of my thumb with the mandolin (someone insisted on cukes with his hendricks...) that ended up with a 4h A&E wait followed by even more time in the minor injuries unit. never again.

manila

was in manila for less than 48h. recounted the brief getaway to F who described it as 'bleisure' (bizniz+leisure) which's supposed to be the latest buzzword i'd yet to hear about. as usual, slow on the uptake! had the most gracious hosts who spoilt us rotten, taking care of everything. it was nice to go into man mode, army-speak for being a follower. they're old friends who very kindly let me stay in their berlin apartment when i was on exchange in stockholm all those years ago, so to finally visit in their home in makati was a real treat. the scale of which they've acquired art is nothing short of awe-inspiring. the level of curation, thought and expression of pure taste and class was sublime. 

will be the first to admit i know scarce little about art but always happy to learn, and no one better to learn from than experienced collectors with decades of good calls under their belt.

we'd dins at makati*garden club then 2h massages. silly me, only ever having had 1h massages thought 2h would be too long. turns out that they're onto something good and the 2h massage was a game-changer. 120min of pure bliss and left feeling like a very relaxed noodle. can't go back to hour-long massages now! relatively late night (past midnight! i zz by 9ish usually so this was wayy after my bedtime!) and early start at the polo club. delicious brekkie and i loved the arroz caldo (like porridge!). the thing about filippino food is that it's different yet familiar. same same but different? oops wrong SEA nation. defo shared elements with chinese / straits chinese cooking i'm accustomed to (garlic, ginger, sugar) and it was new but still comforting, to say the least.

breakfasts

am going through a sugar-craving phase and much as a i want to scoff honeynutcrunch before the sugar tax takes effect, i'm trying to resist giving my inner toddler free-rein. this probably isn't the healthiest of breakfast options but i tell myself that if something is (largely) made from scratch at home, it can't be too bad. baked the apples in butter and forgot to take them out of the oven so they conveniently dehydrated overnight and i feared the butter might've gone off. remembered i'd food the oven for breakfast and lived to tell the tale. paired with organic toffee banana yoghurt (so much for avoiding sugar) and my goodness that article about how fat with sugar tastes better than either individually (duh) was right!

skiing

after a couple of days of delaying tactics (day trips, exploring the town) i ran out of options. didn't hurt that the temperature had dipped some and the was 60+km of ski runs good to go. to be fair, they were good to go from the get go but i had defiantly held off attempting to ski. but it did seem a blooming waste to be in the middle of reputable ski country and not ski. also, the world ski championships were being held on the very same slopes that very same day and i was FOMO. 

used to be a ski snob, only powdah puhleeze but unfortunately life is never that smooth sailing. and turns out i'd to eat my words (but thankfully not yellow snow) about the fake stuff. it's actually easier to ski on! and i had a lesson with a child (ok he's probably early 20s) who, bless him, after a 2h lesson magically took away my fear of heights and falling and uh it was the best skiing ever and i want to go again??? uhh where did that (and my inner cougar) come from ???? pretty crazy how quickly i go from one extreme to another, from being totes skiing averse to realising i can do this, i don't suck at it and oh hey it's fun!!! such was my stream of consciousness.

didn't even stop for lunch! tell a lie, had beers and bombardinos for lunch then kept going. liquid diet! also prob not the wisest of moves to hurl self downhill at breakneck speed after alcohol. liquid courage? but it seemed to take the edge off and make me a better skier. hm. 

the best part about the lack of real snow was that the slopes were almost empty! and my biggest fear is people coming too close / getting hit from behind so empty slopes were a joy. sacrilege but i'd pick empty slopes and artificial snow over crowded powdah any day.

and the world championships were fun! everyone gathered in the town square to watch the big screens and after the race it turned into an outdoor party with DJs on the stage. great atmosphere and i felt cool by proxy.

2016, let's gooO!

it's no secret that primrose hill is my happy place. am a one trick pony and it's my default 'things to do' suggestion when friends are in town. instead of squeezing into a stinky hipster coffee place, i suggest we take a walk to and up primrose hill if the weather is good. best views of london and have spent many happy hours there this year. so it was only fitting to spend NYE there too with the hordes of other revelers. just like 2012/13 (see, one trick pony!) was sandwiched between schoolgirls and rastafarians, second-hand smoke of the green sort aplenty. was also late (typical!) and ended up sprinting up the hill in wellies as the crowd counted down and fireworks went off. thank goodness that went on for awhile so i caught most of it when sufficiently elevated. at my height, every little counts and wouldn't have been able to see any of it otherwise! 

did a little 2015 review in the previous post so will spare you the self-indulgent reflection. in a way, 2015 was really hard and i'm so glad it's over. not quite good riddance but you get the picture. was recounting the year and it had more lows than highs, and the uncertainty about the future really got to be. there are definitely moments i'm not proud of, and moments i wish to never repeat. but that's life, isn't it. i'm hopeful for 2016, cautiously optimistic about a year that will see five years of hard graft come to fruition, to close one chapter and begin the next. since we got married in 2012 (yay, acquired a spouse and a house!), the years that followed have been a relatively happy continuum but i'm itchy for some action. growth is painful, and being stretched then stretched some more - even more so! but through it all i know Who holds my future, and who holds my hand.

onwards and upwards! here's wishing you a bigger, better and brighter 2016.

frieze

am far from cultured and am scared to purport to be. but was at our usual hole in the wall japanese one night when the proprietor who's since become a friend rather conspiratorially asked if we'd like to go to the frieze. capable of feigning a vague interest in art sale, jumped at the chance because they were the good tickets and i'm a cheap date that way. wasn't disappointed, but ended up enjoying people watching more than the actual art because the crowd was so hip they hurt, all artsy types dressed to the nines and making fashion statements left right and centre, if you get what i mean. 

am also a big fan of petersham nurseries and they'd a pop up so after a quick recce round the exhibition, we settled down at the cafe and drank till dinner time. more degenerate than classy! funny story there - dear friend we were meeting for brunch the next day happened to be at the frieze on a partially-successful second date so it was handy being nearby as her get-outta-jail excuse, albeit one she didn't need to deploy. 

sunday strolling

it's been pretty full on the last few weeks but did manage to squeeze in a stroll. one of the areas i want to be better in is exercise and discipline, something i was quite enthusiastic about after hepatology placement at st mary's earlier this year. the consultants were advising all their patients in fatty liver clinic to do 30min brisk exercise 5 times a week and yes while i like to think i'm far from fatty liver (hoho, one never knows!) it's a good rule of thumb. also met a senior reg with three young children who's working and doing her masters (!!!) who told me she gets an hour of exercise in every day if not she'd go crazy. now if someone like that who's juggling so many balls can find time to exercise, i've no excuses. again, easier said than done, but baby steps and i find brisk walking helps. it's nothing earth shattering but incorporating exercise into my daily routine seems easier than carving out time to pound the pavement. so i walk everywhere as far as possible. couldn't believe it when i could walk to work at the marsden for a few months this year, and then i got lazy and bought a travelcard for the other postings that were slightly further afield (GOS and st mary's) but oh well! 

there were cute stone lions by this that i took for my dear friend C who's just birthed the sweetest little spirit named leo

and some autumn colours - yaY!

ferry fun

it'd been a rough week. then again, the weeks usually are. started GP rotation and was feeling overwhelmed and out of my depth. nothing to do with the practice, that's been nothing but warm and welcoming, with great mentors who encourage and are patient with me and my multiple shortcomings. but it's first day (week?) jitters and i was being weaksauce. had anticipated more sociable hours after coming from women's health but oh no, ended up doing longer hours in GPland (?!). can't complain really because been fortunate to luck out with a practice near home and not spending hours commuting like friends who've found themselves assigned to practices in the middle of nowhere. and while it's a big-ish practice, it feels like one big happy family with each partner bringing something different to the table. great array of styles etc and their combined life experience is truly fascinating. that's something one of them shared about a vocation like medicine - it's not about age but what one has done before and what one brings with them. lots of honest, open bants and i appreciate the frankness and humility. they very quickly sussed out that i'd done something before and treated me like an equal from the get go, talking about family and relationships, the demands of the job and other fascinatingly grown up conversation that i've not always had. sometimes i don't like saying i'm older etc because expectations increase and i feel i disappoint people by not being as smart as they assume i'd be, but this was different and fun and i really like my temporary GP family.

but it was a long week and i needed a pick me up. actually, i always need a pick me up haha. there's a handy little ferry (random! i know!) and at the end of said ferry is a row of curry shops called curry mile. now i don't know about you but perfect autumn day, salty sea air and a curry to top it all is sort of my idea of sheer indulgence. was like a kid in a candyshoppe on the ferry because i like boats and all things nautical, islander heritage never far away haha, and just scampered to the top deck in wide eyed wonder. too easily pleased :)

phuket

didn't have many weekends in singers. stayed the first to avoid being world's most absent godparent (godson's first month!) but was in KL for the second weekend and broke free to phuket for the third to celebrate a birthday. very generous friends have a home in phuket and kindly invited us to spend some time there with them. they'd just moved in phuket and i was excited to see the new place, haveing spent many happy days at their previous home. they're the sort of couple i want to be when i grow up, nothing short of awe-inspiring and so giving of their time and energy. i love being around them and can sit and rapt awe listening to their stories and just absorbing their views on anything and everything. never a dull moment and i feel educated merely in their presence. i'm also humbled by how unassuming they are, side by side with the help mopping up the sopping wet dining table after yet another tropical storm. all hands on the deck and no airs nor pretense.

holding space

appreciate this is a relatively frivolous blog with happy clappy posts about london living, but it's a poor reflection of life in its technicolour glory. it's been a funny year with lots of sad news. thankful nothing too close to home, but it's been close to heart. and being thousands of miles away from our near and dear does render one helpless. embarrassingly, i've the florist on speed dial and have sent more 'cheer up' bouquets than celebratory ones of late. because, short of jumping on the next plane to singers, there's really nothing else to do. of course there's whatsapp and the other wonders of technology, but the last thing i'd want to do is impose on friends already going through a rough time. think people need space and should be allowed to engage on their terms, when they're ready. and whatsapp is brilliant for that. was reading this great article about holding space and it really resonated. 

without going into too much detail, and wanting to protect our friends' privacy, there have been some major losses (health, parents' health, marriage, parents, unborn babies, babies never conceived, jobs) and i've learnt how it's occasionally more kind not to ask after things because there's probably nothing more annoying than someone constantly badgering them. no one wants to be a curiosity, no one wants to constantly explain that they've still not conceived, or that they have but are cautiously optimistic this time round and aren't ready to talk about it yet. 

spent an entire day with a friend recently who shared she was in the process of trying to become a single mother this year. but she didn't bring it up when we next met (maybe there was nothing left to say?) and i didn't dare ask in case it wasn't going well. there's something very azn (sorry, hate to generalise) about people asking you to eat , sleep , not work so hard (or work harder). and people projecting their idiosyncracies onto you. it's kind of naggy and incredibly off-putting and i need to consciously stop myself every time i find myself lapsing into auntie-mode. no doubt well-meant but surely there's a better way to express concern. 

so how does one go about supporting friends experiencing tough times? i'm still figuring that out and if you've a better idea, please tell me! after all, it's so individual and in a way harping on the issue (cancer / miscarriage / unemployment) isn't productive. i tend to do a general check-in, share my own challenges and let them guide the conversation i.e. we'll only talk about the issue if they bring it up first because maybe all they want is a break from the noise surrounding whatever it is they're facing. not saying to forget and most definitely not being dismissive of the massive emotional (and/or physical) trauma they've been through but time and place, really.

sand in my cone!

had to head north for talks and thought to make the most of its coast and sunshine. silly me hadn't factored in windchill (rookie mistake!) and was skipping along with my 99-er, determined to have it on the beach when these awful awful gusts of wind blew sand into my ice cream :( it was a crunchy cone. and because i was being vain and had my hair down, suddenly hair was whipping everywhere and it got into my ice cream and left sticky streaks across my face. i was a right mess and then my cone blew over. absolute disaster. was inconsolable and needed coffee and shelter from the wind after. not a roaring success, unfortunately. but the view was good. and i might've trespassed to take this photo of the chairs but they were too cute. also, you can't tell because the water looks deceptively calm BUT IT WAS WINDY. otherwise uneventful time in the city. 

super grateful to A for letting me stay and entertaining me after a long day of back-to-back theatre lists. she's such a star. we'd go for a late, leisurely dinner, take our time over pudding and coffee, get back to hers, stay up talking even more before she casually mentions she needs to do some reading (head&neck anat, for example) because there was a thyroid list the next day. by which time i'm looking at the clock in horror because it's past midnight and she's been so kind and indulgent and giving of her time AND SHE STILL HAS TO WORK BEFORE BED???

she's also a font of wisdom and dispenser of sound advice. when i'm off on a rampage being all anti-baby she reigns me in with gentle words. not many people are able to talk me off a ledge (bad jo) but she's one of the few who get me to see sense. it was a restorative time being with her and i'm ever thankful for good girlfriends.

brompton cemetery

maybe it's fatty liver clinic but i've been overwhelmed by the urge to overhaul my lifestyle and get healthy. no more sitting around subsisting on frozen pizzas and ice cream when the mister is out of town. no siree, left to my own devices i'd be the first to admit rapid regression and degeneration. thankful for C, the best thing that came out of GOS elective, who sense checks my bad habits and tells me to start cooking for myself (i.e. no more take out despite living next to a chinese takeaway :( ) and gently encourages me to be more active. baby steps! nosey by nature, i'm inclined to explore new neighbourhoods and the brompton cemetery was in a pretty part of chelsea i couldn't resist. made the most of the jetlagged mornings (post sg i was waking at 6 for a spell) and go for brisk walks before work. thankful we're edging towards summer and longer day light hours. feel relatively safe and not pantang so the place made for a serene, contemplative walk.

and back to fatty liver clinic - i'm such a sucker for a deal that i took the coupon for two sausage mcmuffins with egg for £2 from the flyer distributor by the tube exit and stopped by maccas before clinic. thought to have one for breakfast and the other for lunch, but who am i trying to kid. obviously had both for breakfast then went to face an onslaught of morbidly obese types and tried to block visions of joining their ranks the whole morning. it's terrible, really, this gluttony has to stop. the fatty liver consultants were patient and encouraging, telling everyone to exercise at least 45min daily. and that put me to shame because i'd be lucky if i get in 45min in a month. this sloth is nothing to be proud of and i'm taking their advice to heart, trying to walk more and make form good habits. feel so much of it is about sustainability and not doing something overly restrictive (eg no sugar) only to regress and unleash the sugar vampire (oho she's there all right!) on a cheat day. that becomes a cheat week then cheat month.