The Regency Cafe

We started a birthday ritual at college which is going out for lunch at the Regency Cafe to celebrate our birthdays. The Regency is sort of an institution in our neighborhood (Pimlico) and is frequented by local business people and workers from the area. It is always packed and the food is fast and reliable. You have to go up and order then find a seat and then wait for your order to be called. The guy who works at the counter calls you 'love' and has this deep, booming voice that he uses to call out the orders. Here he is:

The food is classic Enlgish greasy spoon- traditional fry-ups with loads of variations. The classic is a full English breakfast consisting of eggs, bacon or sausage, baked beans, toast, grilled tomato, maybe some black pudding, and of course tea. I had an omelet with chips and salad, last time I had beans with it as well. Carla, the birthday guest of honor and on the right in the photo below, had the scampi, which is some sort of fish fried in a ball. Mate, on the left, had the same. I can't remember what Kayde had, but there were a lot of chips involved in everyones meal. It's a classic place with good, cheap food, and a great atmosphere.

C is for Cookie

I mentioned that I made my first batch of my peanut butter chocolate chips cookies recently and now I am on a roll. I spent the night at Lee's last week and made some cookies for Liza and Glen, who just welcomed a baby boy into the world. I left the cookies at Lee's for her to deliver and am not sure that any actually made it over.

Exhibit A: Ellie (Lee's very adorable 10 month old) stuffing cookies in her mouth.

I came back from Denmark saying grazie.

I just got back from a wonderful 3 nights in Copenhagen, Denmark. I was visiting an old friend, Tamira, who studied abroad with Nettie and lived with us for the summer of 2005. I hadn't seen her since that summer: she was just learning Italian for her then six month old relationship. I remember her saying "I'm just not funny yet in Italian." She is now fluent and has since earned a second BA in London, worked in Milan, and is now getting an MA at a school in Sweden (only 40 minutes from Copenhagen by train). Her boyfriend, Adriano (same one!) and her now live together in Copenhagen and were very generous hosts. It always felt like I had been friends with Tamira for ages, and the same went for this weekend. It was great to see her and finally meet Adriano and see Copenhagen.

I got in Friday afternoon and we spent a few hours catching up (Tamira: "Whatever happened to that guy who had come in from somewhere in South American that August?"). We all went for dinner at a restaurant near their apartment called Bio Mio - all organic, etc. and they even had sugar and gluten free carrot cake that was extremely tasty.

Saturday we went on a day of sightseeing. We took the bikes and headed to the harbor, the shopping area, a contemporary art museum called Charlottenborg, had lunch in a cafe in Christiania (a self-proclaimed autonomous commune in an old military area), and lastly to the Royal Palace with views of the Opera House (we were FREEZING by then and had to ditch the bikes because of a minor accident. Which, may I add, had nothing to do with me. Adriano skid on some ice when standing up on the little green bike and fell flat on his face and the handlebars broke off! He is okay, the bike, not so much. Fingers crossed).

Before the incident: Cutest Bike Ever. Adriano schlepped it all the way from Italy for her.

At the old Harbor:

A guard at the Queen's Palace:

Tamira cooked dinner and we were joined by some of Adriano's colleagues (who are both Italian as well). Not much English was spoken but between Tamira translating and some words being similar to Spanish I did pretty well. We then went to a bar and met up with some more of Tamira's friends. Fun night out ensues.

We slept in on Sunday, I made some breakfast, and around 2pm we piled into the car to go to Louisiana, an art museum about 40 km north of Copenhagen. It is an amazing space and right on the Øresund, the body of water that separates Sweden from Denmark. You can see Sweden when you are driving up the coast to get there. The cafe was amazing too, good snacks and great atmosphere. Warm candle light and cool ocean vistas, what could be bad?

Giacometti's at Louisiana.

I want my Mommy.

I had the "uh-oh" moment last night when my nose was running a little more than usual and I kept drinking water to clear my slightly sore throat. So naturally I ODed on vitamins, took nyquil and hoped for the best. My efforts were futile and I woke up with the same ailments. I think this is officially my first sickness in England. Luckily I have some soup in the fridge and my flatmate gave me a Lemsip, sort of like a theraflu but supposedly better (will get back to you on that).

And since my recent progress review left me a bit stranded on the art front and frustrated with my program again, I am happily taking some time to do reading and have a think. Maybe its not so bad that I am sick today. I just need to feel better by tomorrow or at least Friday when I am off to Copenhagen. Oh, and it's raining/snowing and tylenol is called paracetamol, FYI.

Follow up: Sorry for the pity party of one post. I am on the mend in time for my trip and I love Lemsip. It is effective without the drugged out feeling I get from other cold medicines. Also, I wanted to make my self proclaimed famous Peanut Butter cookies for Tamira, my lovely host in Denmark, but I was a little nervous to bake here. Which was silly because they came out fantastic. Now I have to not eat them all before I leave tomorrow...

Two things I never thought I would say:

Instant coffee is not that bad and I am excited to belong to a gym. On the coffee front, my expectations were low but when I need a little bit of home I like to drink coffee, so I thought I would give it a shot. Also, I am out of tea and Tore had some coffee. Turns out it is not so bad and similar your average drip coffee at a deli. It feels so good and foreign to say/write the word 'deli.'

As for the gym, Shauna and I went for the off-peak membership to the nicer gym (Virgin Active), which was a great move. There are more classes, a cafe with wifi where I can do work, and it is just way nicer. They even have a pool I will probably never swim in. And honestly, when have I worked out after 4pm if not for necessity? I am hoping the showers are hotter than ours, will get back to you, and am now going about making a 'gym bag' which seems like a fun task to me (I know how that sounds). Here are the top three reasons I joined: 1. For my mental health. 2. To have some ritual in my life. 3. So I can eat chips without guilt.

Also, I may need to buy a backpack (UK translation: rucksack). I don't want to but I think it is time. Any suggestions on UK backpacks? I don't even know where to begin. Here is a picture of me tasting Belgian beer, for good measure:

Aside from my camera in the toilet, a great weekend in Brussels.

Mel and I at the Grand Place. The weather was awesome.

I just got back from a great weekend in Brussels (or Bruxelles). My friend from Cornell, Dan Ruff has liven there for a few years and has an annual bash for his birthday. I went down on Friday evening with Melinee, a friend of Dan's who lives in London and I have become friends with. The weekend started off with meeting Dan's lovely girlfriend, Marie-France, and then going out to their favorite Thai place and a local bar were we sampled some fruity Belgian beers. The beers are always in a glass with the name on it:

We spent Saturday doing party errands, had lunch with some other friends, then Melinee and I had tourist hour and walked over to the Grand Place. I had been to Brussels before (8 years ago, to be exact) so was happy to not be 'super-tourist' and enjoy seeing the place through locals eyes, following along blindly and blissfully. The down side was no moulles frites, but I quickly got over that and enjoyed a cone of frites with Mel in the Grand Place.

The party was a black and white theme party and I decided since I skipped halloween to be Uma Thurman from Pulp Fiction (Mia Wallace). It was fun except no one was really dressed up so my wig lasted for about 2 hours. Also, it was giving me a headache! Here are Dan's shoes:

The party lasted until 5am and we woke up around 11, ate, and then Mel and I hopped on the train- security, passport check, and border control in 11 minutes flat- and I was back in London by the afternoon.

My camera is working now, by the way. 36 hours of drying out later and some weirdness behind the screen..yay.

So far, so much better.

I had been hoping that after break things would pick up at school (or just "college" as they say). Looking at the schedule it seemed like a fair assumption, and I am happy to report that I was right! So far. Lectures, a tutorial, and progress reviews (next week). Last week I booked a project space (just a white room you can have for a week and do whatever you want in) and projected my little sound/image piece to get feedback. My tutorial on Tuesday went well. I actually have to start thinking seriously about my thesis soon. In short, I actually feel like a student! A little pressure never hurt anyone (namely, me).

I am not painting for the time being and I took some pictures of my space so you can see how I am working/gathering material at the moment. The first one is stuff from my Paris trip:

Below is research about handwriting and experimenting with representing it. I am actually sending my handwriting and my dad's to a graphologist soon and having it analysed.

I have concluded that art school is hard, harder than any other schooling I have been through on an intellectual level, despite the laid back nature of my program. You are constantly questioning ideas- and not just any ideas- your own, which means doubting yourself, the school, your practice, your sanity. Its exhausting! But also exhilarating and makes me thankful for my friends at school. Speaking of, here are Kayde and Chris (Natalie on the far right) wearing the same shirt, for the second time. Naturally we were in the bar at school. It was the end of the day, honest.

My next post will be about my weekend in Brussels and way more fun that art school talk, I promise!