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Lunch today

Soup from home (boxed) and turtle from the coop.

Sleep over at home

A reversal of roles: the gals accepted my invitation and came over to spend the afternoon and the evening at ours.

I wanted to cook something special for them and chose beef rendang for lunch. E and woke up early to go shopping. Surprisingly we managed to source most of the rendang ingredients from the German supermarket - even the more untypical ones (eg lemon grass paste, desiccated coconut). The dish turned out quite well and E reckons it would also be a hit with his parents next time they're here.

We stayed up watching films: "A lot like love" which was suitably fluffy and entertaining and "L'appartment" - a film G and I liked from many years ago. I had forgotten most of the details and even the ending of the story - so it almost felt like the first time. One of the main characters was played by Monica Bellucci - she looked very fresh and beautiful. Watching the film - I was reminded of the times G and I caught discounted day films at the Swiss centre in London.

Happy that it's Friday

E's colleague EM is hosting birthday drinks tonight. She has been very kind, helping us (me) on various occassions relating to my settling here so we thought we would surprise her with a gift of luxurious food basket from here yesterday. We had a lot of fun picking the lovely packaged items to put in the hamper. It reminded me of the hamper G received from her employers in London which made us sooo happy and our attempt to replicate the joy by picking out interesting foodstuff from the shelves in Selfriges for her friend and ex-landlord who we used to spend Christmas with in Cambridge.

So, back to yesterday, E decided to splurge and get ourselves some of the colourful pasta and pesto at the last minute for dinner, to celebrate the fact that our offer to rent a flat in town had been accepted (big hurrah). This was nice. Out too came a bottle of rose.

Roast vegetables for dinner

I cycled home from the city centre this morning. Today´s adventure related to not knowing how to leave the city centre without having to be at a particular exit of the train station (i.e. my previous  starting points). I gave up after 1 hour of cycling back and forth and went back to the train station to restart the journey. It was drizzling and cold, yet I didnt feel as miserable as when I was caught in the rain in the UK. The key difference I think is the absence of wind of which I was very glad for.  I made a pit stop to the supermarket to buy some extra condiments for dinner (we are having guests tonight) and saw a lot of little old ladies with bars of chocolate in their shopping baskets.

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One item from tonight's dinner menu is roast vegetable which is a particular favourite of E´s. Chopping the items this afternoon made me think of a particular sit down Christmas lunch party I attended hosted by a now retired senior banker living in one of the spacious priviledged apartments on the peak in Hong Kong. I was helping him with the dishes after lunch and noticed him merely wiping his wooden chopping board before storing it away. He subsequently explained to me that the board has not been washed for some 10 years to better retain the flavours. Incredible that I didnt throw up then and there or die of food poisoning.