Guest blogger for Bristol Foodie…

I’m still digesting the thought of the Bristol Foodie girls, who managed to chow their way through ten buffet meals during two weeks in August; all in the name of research for the Bristol Good Food Awards 2012 of course. Since launching their blog last year – ‘founded over a bottle of Pinot and a mutual love of all things edible’ – the site has gone from strength to strength, thanks to a great range of reviews, recipes and events around the city. It also helps that we’re completely spoilt for choice here for great eateries, from the quick lunchtime delights of St. Nicks Market, to blow out Michelin Starred restaurants. 

For me, hailing from the far flung depths of Cornwall, the most foodie fabulous thing about Bristol is the smörgåsbord of independent delis and Asian shops we have scattered around. Bristol Sweetmart in Easton is arguably one of the best; a mind boggling array of the the weird, wonderful and staple food stuffs. It has to be experienced. Read my review of the Sweetmart on the BristolFoodie website (thanks girls). Maldive fish flakes and Tamarind Paste anyone…?

Serendipitous #3

Papier-mâché head for my papier-mâché head.

Lion Heart Magazine

It’s arrived!

Very content, excited, but with a slightly nervous upside-down belly feeling, to see my piece included in Hel’s roaringly inspiring Lion Heart Magazine. 

From a fleck of an idea, illegible hand written sketches in a note pad, to the impending doom of the flashing curser on a white screen and miles of a blank white page to go. To this. My words. In print. On velvet smooth paper. Bound with other ideas, but released out into the arms of anyone who wishes to read it.

Buy the second issue here.

Serendipitous #2

'Come. It is time to keep your appointment with the Wicker Man.'

Eight feet of nasal wicker, freaking me out on every walk home.

Is home where the hearth is?

Is home where the heart is, the hearth is, the other half is, wherever you lay your hat, where your treasures are hoarded and hung, a place to pile accumulated clutter, the stage to craft future memories, or nothing more than a ruffled bed to crash as you flit between work and friends? Spending the last month unintentionally catching a glimpse of other people’s lives while searching for a room to rent, I found it’s the home attached to the room that can be the hard part to find.

The first I viewed was the new build, in the old hippy quarter. I was too busy admiring the skewed roof angles and clashing layers of paint along the street to notice I had cycled right past the uninspiring house I was supposed to see. High white security walls amongst tightly packed ecletic terraced houses, built and smog coated from every decade past. I was apparently unnoticed and unexpected too. The housemate didn’t know that the other had even advertised the room. I sat in awkward silence under house arrest, burnt the roof of my mouth sinking back the scolding tea and left as fast my bike could carry me.

The next were the two outdoor types, who left me waiting out in the cold and rain for 40 minutes - homeless. It felt colder inside than it did out. The upholstery felt damp to touch, water condensed on the window, the droplets slid down and absorbed into the sodden wooden frame. I knew the routine here, counting down in quarter seconds underneath the duvet, before throwing back the covers and braving the sprint to the warm embrace of the shower. University had proven I could hack an environment like this. Now it had nothing to warm too. I have a love affair with the outdoors, but not enough to invite it into my home.

Then there were the two twenty year olds who forgot about the 10am viewing invite after a drunken bender the night before. They answered the door flustered with parakeet quiffs and bloodshot eyes. Their laughter couldn’t detract from their home - as wild as their night.

Then the sterile slick city apartment, and the probation officer who worked in the same office as my best friend. Turns out the big bad smoke was just as small the countryside I had left behind. Too close to home.

On the verge of sticking my white flag in the air, came the final house. Rows of bay windows invited my glances as I walked up the road. The young family sitting down to dinner, upturned plastic garden furniture and weeds outside the student flat, a white haired pensioner engrossed in his book. Lives living back to back. The owner answered, every bit as eccentric, rough around the edges and inviting as the home in which he stood. Woodfield Road. My sanctuary on the cusp of the city. I knew before the door had even shut with its satisfying click behind me.

Late at night, I hear the walls creek and sigh under the weight of life which has lived here. The couples councillor, the Chanel counter girl, the charity worker, the frustrated musician searching for his muse. Muffled echoes, exchanges of nothing in particular talk. The low rumble, barely audible, of the rush hour traffic, and the deep sleep snores of the housemate next door. All this life, crammed inside four sturdy walls. I lean on both for support.

The place where players are free from attack. Where something flourishes. From where you originate. It’s warmth from the inside out - more than the fireplace, the dog, the sofa which swallows you whole – when you know your home.

Serendipitous #1

serendipity:

Concise Oxford English Dictionary © 2008 Oxford University Press:
serendipity /ˌsɛr(ə)nˈdɪpɪti/ 

▶nounthe occurrence and development of events by chance in a happy or beneficial way.

– derivatives
serendipitous adjective,
serendipitously adverb.

– origin 1754: coined by Horace Walpole, suggested by The Three Princes of Serendip, the title of a fairy tale in which the heroes were always making fortunate discoveries.

I missed the tramp who cycled passed wearing a green plastic colander for a helmet. But I did find this.

End of the 'ski season'?

St. Jacob

Walking to St. Jacob from St. Anton

Spring. St. Jacob 

After a more than a couple sleepless nights spent listening to the howling wind outside, the chimney popping to deliver brown dirt on the hearth, and horizontal rain slapping the single glazing, it was nice to get back to work after New Year and be greeted by the headline: “Is this the best ski season ever?” This, from the Telegraph - the year after my ski season working in St. Anton Austria, which turned out to be a year of mediocre, if very little, snow. Bitter? Me?

Despite getting off to a slow start this season, the storms and 100mph winds affecting England and Scotland at the start of the year were apparently the European Alps’ gain, with some resorts having more snow in just 10 days than the whole of the last season. Indeed, Peter Hardy’s article reported that snow at the top of St. Anton’s Valluga lift was inching towards nearly 600cm with 200cm in the town some 1507m bellow. 

Looking at my friend’s photographs who are back doing another season now, it’s hard to believe that this is the same place they arrived at the beginning of December. According to the Mail, 2011 had been badly affected by the warmest and driest autumn in the Alps for 147 years. Worrying, but completely unsurprising to me who left in April with a tan after sunbathing on our chalet balcony in shorts and t-shirt. Yet, despite the lack of snow I had an amazing ‘ski’ season, and one probably a lot different to those that most seasonaires have. 

Hit with roasting temperatures in early March, a lot of skiers were complaining about the poor snow conditions, yet we still managed to get out everyday and enjoy some good runs after the morning ice had worn off and before the afternoon slush kicked in. If it wasn’t for this then we wouldn’t have hit the snow park as much as we did, literally and figuratively speaking, nailing a three-sixty and witnessing some hilarious stacks on the rails in the process.

By the end of the month there was barely enough snow for the new form of langlaufen that the boys had invented - namely, avoiding gravel patches and scratching the hire skis. Used to exploring off-piste, we swapped our ski-boots for trainers and went wandering in the woods instead. Situated at the end of the resort, the winding 6km route through the Ferwall Valley and just beyond to the perfectly still glacier-blue waters of the Ferwall Lake was my first taste of what spring in the mountains might look like. Breathtakingly serene in a completely different way. We sipped hot chocolates at the inn at the end of the road, hushed and contemplative, usually the end destination of rowdy off-piste skiers who eventually arrive after dropping off the back of Moroikopf. 

Ferwall Lake

Another more humorous adventure was scrambling up the steep wooded hills on the opposing side of St. Anton’s main slopes, much like the mountain goats we had seen from a chair lift a few days before. After traversing for over an hour and making little headway we stumbled across a deer farm and its startled inhabitants - nestled away in the woods above the town. One flinch from us and they scattered, twigs snapping under-hoof. 

Blurry, but definitely a deer

As the grass turned green, crocuses popped up. We pickned again with friends in their garden in St. Jacob, the next village down, with goat guests who actually came trotting over to us, bells-a-jingling, by the end of the season. Free-wheeling down the valley on our bikes, legs stuck out like prongs was a feeling of complete freedom. We dipped our toes into icy mountain streams in a steep rocky gorge and walked across the trunks of fallen trees like a balancing beam.

Cycling down the valley from St. Anton

Bach gorge

The gorge at Bach

Cycling up from Flirsch

Picnicking with the locals

Cleaning our chalet rooms, I often stopped and gazed out of the windows at the opposing mountains above, my eyes always catching a glimpse of a little black square at the top of one of the peaks and a hairpin line of a path, snaking up towards it. Four days before the end of our season came most satisfying escapade - we hiked up to it. I liked to think I was pretty fit but walking up Kaiserjochhaus was hard. I can still feel my calf's burning now. Reaching the top at 2261m dispels all pain and sweat. We explored the Leutkircher Hut, an unmanned refuge for summer walkers with 6 bunk beds perfectly made out in gingham sheets.

Walking up Kaiserjochhaus

Keep walking

Leutkircher Hut

Picnic at 2261m

I wanted to jump under the covers and stay. As we picnicked with Bachensteiner cheese and stared down on the town and the past six months below, the lack of snow really couldn’t have been further from our minds.

All photographs by me and the other Kaluma Ski girls, Sarah Houston and Laura Higgs.

View Peter Hardy’s article from the Telegraph here: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/snowandski/9006670/Skiing-Is-this-the-best-ski-season-ever.html

High Hill Life

Where the common misconception of the Algarve is a mobbed deck-chaired beach, rudely affronted by apartment blocks, I have to admit that my heart sank a little when my parents finally settled on moving to Portugal. 


Leaving the appropriately nick-named Brizzle - an amalgamation of Bristol and its typical weather outlook – a few days before Christmas, the weather is the glaringly obvious reason why my parents decided to up sticks and move. But on touch down and a mere half-hour car journey inland from Faro, up into the hills, lies the real reason.  

Yes the weather’s good, but you feel a million miles away from the neon lights of a major Brits-abroad destination. Sao-bras de Alportel should have coined that Italian phrase ‘Il dolce far niente’; the art of doing nothing. It’s a sleepy Portuguese town with a decidedly anti-Albuferia feel. Replace beer-bellied-Brits with old toothless locals, reclining in plastic garden chairs by the side of the road, spinning yarns over a beer. It’s beautiful in a completely dilapidated kind of way; the plaster cracks in chunks off the façade of lived-in houses, weeds creep in an unruly manner over busy roads, gardens are littered with flowers and rusty bicycle parts.

I was pre-warned that winters in the Algarve can get cool and damp, but the weather during the day stayed warm, even hot at times. I ate my mince pies on a sun lounger outsider. I could hear the farmer next door, his outhouses of propped together corrugated iron, cough, hock, and spit away his day. Trees still burst with lemon and oranges - so many, you couldn't give them all away.

And at night, the temperatures drop. It’s cold enough to light the fires inside. And even when stray dogs bark well into the night. It’s somehow still right.

All photographs by me.

Georgian Jauntings

One day last week saw me transported to an Eighteenth-century simple life of country ramblings and fresh air: a lot like the characters of the classic book of the same period that I was reading. 

I’ve struggled with it over the last couple of months, reading little paragraph by distracted paragraph. Bit. By. Bit. But, I finally finished Jane Austin’s Pride and Prejudice. Probably the worst claim an English literature graduate could ever make. All I needed was a good couple days off work. I got my love of reading back at 8am each blue-skied morning, lazing around still wrapped up in my duvet engrossed in Austen. I finally know what all the fuss about this Mr. Darcey is, and yes, I loved the romance, and I loved the book. Worth the slog.

Similarly well worth the slog was the National Trust’s Bath Skyline walk, the 7km circular route that me and my mum tackled on the same crisp and cloudless day. I say 7km: we did about half of it, starting on North Road and ending up in Prior Park. There were multimillion pound Bath limestone houses all framed in firey Autumn colours. It was also hilly and muddy. I’ve been to Bath a lot but I have never seen the city from this high perspective before. Here’s to reading new old books and old new walks.

All photographs by me.

 “How beautifully leaves grow old..." John Burroughs

Retro Green - Eco friendly 'oma' style

My late German grandmother was 'green' before I could even say the word, well before I was even born, and most definitely long before it came - along with 'eco' - the buzzword of the 21st century. And it certainly wasn't a conscious effort of her tabard-clad self to be seen as being eco-friendly.

My nan was however - even despite her inspiring effort to be resourceful - part of a massive crowd. Without generalising, it really seemed like the whole of Germany was equally as keen to be practical, economical and assert simple common sense. As a country, it always seemed to be miles ahead of England in their recycling culture. 


Indeed, Germany was one of the first countries to introduce a container deposit legislation, or ‘pfand’, whereby single use containers such as cans, glass, and plastic are bought with a deposit charge. If taken back to recycling centre then you can reclaim your deposit: €0.25. That's a little, but it amounts to a lot. Just as my Austrian ski bum seasonaire friends found out when they cleared their tepid flat out of hundreds of beer bottles and made a nice tidy sum.

Living off a paltry minimum internship wage and scrimping every which way I can just to save a few pence has really taken me back to my mum and nan’s daily routine when we stayed in her big farm house in Germany. I scold myself now for being embarrassed of my mum, and her mum, for going about their ‘strange’ habits. It wasn’t in my Nan’s nature to waste anything and only now do I understand that it wasn’t embarrassing or strange at all. They were doing it to save money. This in turn happened to be ecological. And all the while they were bloody cool for doing it.


Being eco-friendly 'oma' (that's nan in German) style

Catching water

My oma went to extreme lengths to catch any rainwater that fell by lining the house with millions of buckets, containers and watering cans, so she could water her plans during the baking summer season. A garden water butt might be a better option. In a country that famously moans about the amount of rain we get, do we really need to use our hoses as much as we do? On a smaller scale you can turn the tap of when brushing your teeth.

Keep your left-overs

It actually upsets me to think about the amount of food which is thrown away. Not only for the absolute physical waste, but for the fact that a lot of supermarket items have racked up some serious gold standard air miles. Most left-over’s taste even better reheated the next day and save you cooking up yet another meal after a long day.  Spare vegetables added to any meal. Potatoes, in true Bavarian style, can be fried up again and taste great with bacon, onions, eggs and seasoning. Even little things like oil left in olive pots can be used as an infused oil when cooking. If you’re food is going off still wrapped in its cellophane packaging, stop buying so much!

Composting

Any food waste can be kept for the compost heap and your garden will thank you by looking great. Egg shells are particularly known for providing a good source of nutrients for unfertile soil. If you don’t have a garden you don’t have to bin your food. Order a free brown food waste bin from your local council for any food waste: meat, raw food and tea bags included. Find out more about this and recycling in your local area by visiting: http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/HomeAndCommunity/WhereYouLive/Streetcleaninglitterandillegaldumping/DG_10026161

And finally…

"If it's yellow, let it mellow,

…flush it down, if it’s…"

This doesn’t need explaining does it?

Life is Life

Kahlil Gibran writes the most beautiful words. I was given him on a tiny piece of folded up paper on my travels, and I now keep it folded up inside my locket which hangs around my neck close to my heart. I remind myself of his words in times of need. When your heart gets broken. Or, when bleary eyed in the morning and that box of cereal falls and spills out all over the kitchen floor, scattering in a hundred million directions when you’re already running late. Sometimes they are both the same. When I think that I am having a rubbish week I remind myself that life isn’t rubbish at all. It is just life being life, playing out exactly how it is supposed to be. Sweep up the mess and carry on.

Kahlil Gibran writes:

Your joy is your sorrow unmasked.

And the selfsame well from which your laughter rises was oftentimes filled with your tears.

And how else can it be?

The deeper that sorrow carves into your being, the more joy you can contain.

Is not the cup that hold your wine the very cup that was burned in the potter’s oven?

And is not the lute that soothes your spirit, the very wood that was hollowed with knives?

When you are joyous, look deep into your heart and you shall find it is only that which has given you sorrow that is giving you joy.

When you are sorrowful look again in your heart, and you shall see that in truth you are weeping for that which has been your delight.

Some of you say, “Joy is greater than sorrow,” and others say, “Nay, sorrow is the greater.”

But I say unto you, they are inseparable.

Together they come, and when one sits alone with you at your board, remember that the other is asleep upon your bed.

Verily you are suspended like scales between your sorrow and your joy.

Only when you are empty are you at standstill and balanced.

When the treasure-keeper lifts you to weigh his gold and his silver, needs must your joy or sorrow rise or fall.

It’s Not How Good You Are, It’s How Good You Want To Be

The best gifts I have received recently have been books passed on from special people. Books which touch and affect you in a certain way, and make you want to pick up the giver in a big squeeze of thankfulness for being kind enough to think of you and pass it on.

‘It’s Not How Good You Are, It’s How Good You Want To Be’ is Paul Arden’s mini wonder book about making the most of yourself. As the sub-line says, it’s ‘The World’s Best Selling Book’, and that is exactly the author’s case in point. Although written for those in the creative industry it applies amazing well to life in general by being full of positive advice that you already knew deep down, but had somehow lost along the way.

“Do not covet your ideas. Give away everything you know, and more will come back to you… Ideas are open knowledge. Don’t claim ownership. They are not your ideas anyway, they’re someone else’s. They are out there floating by on the ether. You just have to put yourself in a frame of mind to pick them up.”

People are always anxious to be doing the right thing (whatever that is anyway!). One of the most important ideas to take away from the book is to avoid looking back into the past; we should always be concentrating on the now. Sometimes it’s hard not to look back into the past wondering ‘I shoulda, coulda, woulda’ (cannot express more thanks to little Eds for that one). Equally as hard is not to have some kind of outlook for the future. 

But worrying is futile; what does it achieve, apart from a splitting migraine? Worried about a future job? Concentrate on doing things now that can get you there: don’t think “We’ll make the next [job] good. Whatever is on your desk now, that’s the one. Make it the best you possibly can.” As Arden also says: “Being wrong isn’t anywhere but being here. Best place to be eh?” As a self confessed worrier, I have found this to be the best piece of advice to soothe a worried soul and it rings true with another book, ‘The Power of Now’ by Eckhart Tolle, which preaches similar ideas.

As with life and all advice, we have to negotiate a myriad of contradictions. But life isn't supposed to be easy: "Failures and false starts are a precondition of success". Arden, regarded as the top dog in the field of advertising before his death in 2008, was himself fired five times. 

As a book that can be easily read in a single hour sitting, Arden encourages us to aim for our highest goal. If a stranger and a piece of work can remind me to try my best and quit worrying in less than an hour then I hope to pass this book on to the next special person.

Concrete Circus

Too often lately, I’ve been reduced to banging my head on the coffee table as I’m forced to watch another episode of (insert one of the following here), Jeremy Kyle, Jersey Shore, X-Factor, Holyoaks, as I ‘catch up’ with friends. Just when I’m about to throw the remote across the living room in a rage about the feces on TV, I stumble onto a programme like this and my faith is instantly restored. 


Channel 4’s documentary ‘Concrete Circus’ aired last Monday and showcased some of the world’s best up and coming urban sport stars who have teamed up with four uber-talened film makers (Stu Thomson, Brett Novak, Claudiu Voicu, Kendy Ty). The result of this artistic combination? Jaw dropping, awe inspiring footage and editing which is both a thrill and joy to watch.


Recent news has been stuffed full of the sickening ignorance of those participating in the London riots. Commentators and young rioters themselves have been quick to jump on the band wagon by complaining that today’s ‘yoof’ are bored out their minds; trapped in an ugly urban landscape which has nothing to offer them. This documentary is living proof that you CAN make the most of whatever environment you are born and brought up in and not all hoody wearing adolescents are looting yobs.


While social commentators have attacked the internet and social networking sites as stoking the flames of the London riots, pro BMXer Keelan Phillips is one of the many urbanites from Leicester who is riding on the international success of his YouTube footage. Danny MacAskill, on the other hand, born and bred on the Isle of Skye (population 10,000), has gone from the un-concreted, picturesque jagged backdrop of the Inner Hebredes to one of the world’s top BMX riders.


If anyone else was shocked to hear about the BBC’s decision to broadcast a radio programme under the heading “Is there a problem with young black men?” following last week riots, then Paul Joseph, the professional Parkour or free-runner, would be the young black antithesis of this. Joseph’s performance (these are, after all, creative displays) are seemingly unreal, as he twists and turns through London’s concrete maze. If there was one critique to be made with director Voicu’s film in which Joseph appears, it would be that the dark and violent undertones of gang culture sit uncomfortably in the post-London Riot context it will now be watched in.


These young directors and sports stars have heaps of raw creative talent, and are articulate even whilst donning hoodies, god forbid. OK, so we can’t all become professional skaters or free runners, but this documentary definitely inspires to get out there and make the most of whatever you have got. Check out Stu Thomson’s earthy ‘Industrial Revolutions’ featuring Danny MacAskill below. (Beautiful music by Ben Howard, who, incidentally, rocked out this Saturday at the Boardmasters Festival in Newquay and made our weekend.)

Watch the whole documentary on 4OD:

http://www.channel4.com/programmes/concrete-circus/4od

'Cat's Dream' Pablo Neruda

How neatly a cat sleeps,

Sleeps with its paws and its posture,

Sleeps with its wicked claws,

And with its unfeeling blood,

Sleeps with ALL the rings a series

Of burnt circles which have formed

The odd geology of its sand-colored tail.

I should like to sleep like a cat,

With all the fur of time,

With a tongue rough as flint,

With the dry sex of fire and

After speaking to no one,

Stretch myself over the world,

Over roofs and landscapes,

With a passionate desire

To hunt the rats in my dreams.

I have seen how the cat asleep

Would undulate, how the night flowed

Through it like dark water and at times,

It was going to fall or possibly

Plunge into the bare deserted snowdrifts.

Sometimes it grew so much in sleep

Like a tiger’s great-grandfather,

And would leap in the darkness over

Rooftops, clouds and volcanoes.

Sleep, sleep cat of the night with

Episcopal ceremony and your stone-carved moustache.

Take care of all our dreams

Control the obscurity

Of our slumbering prowess

With your relentless HEART

And the great ruff of your tail.