Frost Fair without the Frost

On Sunday evening we went down to my favourite place - Southbank - and checked out a Christmas Market festival called Frost Fair. It was outside the Tate Modern and there were a bunch of wiry deciduous trees all lit with green spotlights and it felt forest-like when you walked through them. There were also 70 stalls of christmas treats (churros - yum!) and crafts (glass ornaments).

I particularly liked a band of minstrels that really set the mood. And while it wasn't 'frosty' out with ice or snow (as we know it is back home!), we were quite chilly and enjoyed steamy drinks made by 'Ye Olde Fashioned Drink Co.". I had hot mulberry juice and Syd has spiced hot apple cider. His definitely rocked. We got a kick out of these 'frosty' guys from the Antarctic that walked among the fair.
There were also big angels and some elaborate elves and fairies. It was nice to escape reality for a while and enter this mystical place right during the Christmas season. Its a shame that it only ran for 3 nights or we would have gone back after work this week.

Masquerade Ball

So I went to my first masquerade in London last night! My company put on their annual christmas 'do', this one with a masquerade theme. Of course I was super chuffed (aka pumped) to find a great mask on ebay that I could wear. I got ready at work with the HR girls and then we headed to the party. There is a new hire in HR (above) who is also Astrid, and she is awesome so I don't mind sharing my name with her. It is certainly confusing for everyone though!

When we showed up at the club it was super packed, but everyone was joyous. Of course with free drinks all night who wouldn't be? Most people were wearing their masks on top of their heads (right from the get go!) but I made a point of keeping mine on for the first 2 hours.It was awesome to see people kick back and be themselves. There were mini-scandals going on in corners due to co-workers 'snogging' (making out), which totally added to the entertainment. I closed the bar and took the night bus home, that was conveniently located right outside our bar at trafalgar square. ;o)

Lebanese in Soho

This past Friday Astrid & I met up in the center of the city to find somewhere to have dinner. London is so vast that there are huge portions of the city we simply haven't seen. So, from Oxford Circus tube we just started randomly walking in search of a nice place to enjoy dinner.

I still get a kick out of the pub culture over here. It's maybe 8pm and every pub we come across (and there are LOTS!) seems to have lots of folks inside and out, since you can bring your drinks out onto the street, more common now with the smoking ban. This one pub, the WhiteHorse, was especially packed.... the pedestrian street outside was almost incrossable due to the sheer amount of people outside the pub enjoying a pint.

Anyhow, we finally came across Kaslik, this great little Lebanese place. We had a bunch of little dishes, but the lamb sausages and the hummus were definitely the highlight! The service wasn't anything to write home about, but just as we were finishing up, the tunes were cranked up, conversation died down, and the belly dancer came out. A nice finish to a nice meal indeed.

Christmastime in Edinburgh

So I came back to Scotland again. This time as a tagalong with Syd's company. They flew us to Edinburgh for a very memorable holiday party for Infusion London staff. We flew in Saturday morning after getting up at 5 am to catch the train to Gatwick. You know, I love the concept of getting up early to go somewhere so that you have the whole day there, but the actual practice of getting up early and travelling is hard to execute. Especially if you are NOT a morning person. However, we did get to Edinburgh by 9:30 so it was totally worth it and I woke up from the excitement of being in Scotland and seeing the castle in the clouds again!
We had some time to ourselves before lunch so Syd and I walked along Princess gardens where they had set up a carnival and German Christmas market full of gingerbread houses, nutcrackers, wooden ornaments and toys and other such things. It just opened this weekend so we were very fortunate. We came across some tasty gingerbread cookies and mulled wine. I had a glass with an amaretto shot in it and Syd had a glass of raspberry wine with a shot of raspberry schnapps. A nice pre-lunch buzz! hee hee. We also tried some german pasta called spaetzaele - it was basically a really tasty mac and cheese. ;o)
That afternoon we did a really fun scavenger hunt in teams along the royal mile which helped us learn a little bit about Edinburgh history. Our team came in second...so close! We followed that up with aberdeen steaks for dinner and a night out at a gorgeous club called the "Shanghai Club" near (on?) George Street.

The next day Syd and I took a hike up Carlton Hill to look over the city from above. In the top left corner of the picture below is the castle way above the city. As you can see it was an optimal place to guard the Scottish empire. The pictures don't do it justice, it was really fantastic up there - and the weather was reasonably warm too.
There was an acropolis-like monument at the top that the scots call "Edinburgh's Disgrace", but I quite liked it actually! It was nice just to sit on a bench enjoying the view, and watching an owner playing with her cute scottish sheep dog.

It was also festive to see some carollers enjoying it as well before they ran through the streets for charity.
We got to enjoy the city from another vantage point as well - from the top of the ferris wheel - before heading back home to London.
Merry Christmas, and thank you Edinburgh for a magical time!

Infusion in Edinburgh

So I'm just catching up now from the fantastic, but exhausting last weekend in Edinburgh! It was a quick trip up Saturday AM and back Sunday evening, but surprisingly didn't feel all that rushed. I compare the journey with a flight between Toronto and Montreal -- if you took a train instead it'd probably take a bit over 4 hours from London up there.



Edinburgh is such an amazing city. The architecture is astounding and I could just wander around its' cool streets all day have a great time. The building are essentially all attached and have these little 'closes' between them, which are like little alleyways that usually have stairs going up/down to the next street over. There is often green moss growing on the old stone making it feel like you are back in time somewhere.



There was a ferris wheel in the middle of town for the Christmas festival, that Astrid and I took a ride on -- very cool views of the skating rink, city, and castle.

We topped off the trip by enjoying a Scottish delicacy: the deep fried mars bar! Yes, it sounds nasty, and looks even worse... but I don't even like Mars bars and this thing was tasty! Best comparison is probably like a chocolate crepe!

How's the weather? Excellent, actually.

So tonight we played our last football (Soccer, to you North American folks) game before the xmas break. Normally I play in a long sleeve shirt, but tonight it was warming up after work and was good enough for short sleeves. After the game back home in West Hampstead it was even warmer -- at 10pm! I was completely comfortable walking home in short sleeves and it musta been close to 15C outside... weird when in the morning its a brisk 5C or so.

Anyhow, strange to be actually loving the weather here -- though I will be looking for some fluffy white stuff in a few weeks time when we're back home for a visit.

More London Visitors!

For American Thanksgiving, our friends Maged & Cecilia came for a weekend visit. Another friend of theirs, Sam, also lives in London and not too far from us, so it worked out well. They arrived Thursday AM -- we left the keys hidden outside our place since we were at work. Inside we left our usual guest care package: a cell phone, local maps, and a pair of oyster cards (basically pay as you go tube passes that make it WAY cheaper to get around than paying the cash fare). Of course the cell phone's ring was set to nearly silent, so that didn't work out too well for the first day :)

Thursday night Sam and her roomates held an awesome Thanksgiving dinner, complete with turkey, stuffing (!), and cranberry sauce. Astrid was at a fancy black tie dinner with her HR colleagues, but the 3 of us had a great time with the 10 or so other folks at the dinner.

Friday the two of them shopped and after work we hit this great little pub near Bond street called The Marylebone Tup.

From there we headed to The Sea Shell, famous for its fish & chips. In fact, Princess Diana apparently used to eat there. They had quite the selection and overall everyone was impressed.

Saturday Mag & Ce hung around our place in the morning for an excellent "British Breakfast" consisting of sausage, beans, hashbrowns, baguette, croissants, and nutella. We then played some cards before they headed out to visit with Mag's cousin and then dinner with Sam that night at Jamie Oliver's restaurant, Fifteen. We also had some good laughs using the Mac PhotoBooth software (I bet you were wondering where that top photo came from :P).



Sunday we met up for a final pub lunch at the Prince of Wales pub near Covent Garden before saying goodbye.

What?, You bought a Mac?!?

Yes, that's right kiddies -- I have embraced the dark side and purchased a MacBook. This blog post is a few months overdue -- but basically we quickly realized my work laptop was not enough for both Astrid and I (especially since she was job hunting at the time). So rather than buying another Dell as I had planned, I'm happy we decided to go with the Mac. Kudos to Mark & Scott for influencing me over the years -- we are truly enjoying the experience. Most recently we've fallen in love with the iPhoto software, which all of you reading this who will be seeing us on the holidays will experience first hand.

Oh, and all that talk about Mac's being just for play and not for productive work? Well just check out this wonderful piece of productivity:

Pubwalks and Biscuits

On Nov 17 weekend I had the fortune of inviting new friends that I met that week at a London meetup group to to a pub walk put on by ‘london walks’. It was based in Southwark near Southbank, which is of course my favourite place to go. We started a pub called the Kings Arms which looks pretty small in the bar part, but then you go through a short alley and there is a whole back dining area with a hearth and everything. It was so neat!

We then walked on and had more history lessons, including looking at a Peabody mansion - which is a series of social housing buildings built in 1869 and funded by a Mr. Peabody of the US for $4.5 million (USD) to allow city workers to afford to live in the community that they worked within. They can be recognized by yellow striped bricks and a bank of lit windows crammed together at the top floor that are the communal bathrooms for all residents.

We then went to the top of the OXO tower to view the Thames from above. It was just gorgeous in the dark up there and there was a great view of St. Pauls Cathedral lit up at night.

The second pub we visited was the Stamford Arms where the great train robbery was devised by a group of thugs in 1963 whereby they managed to steal 40 million pounds from a train that was en route to a bank. Most of the money was never found.

Lastly, we ended up at the ‘Fire Station’, which is a bar that was converted into a pub from an old fire station (duh). Very neat, and high ceilings too! I had a great time chatting with Caroline, her friend Alisa and 3 new friends that I met this week at a ‘citysocialising.com’ pub event. We made a great crew of 2 Canadians, 1 American, 1 Australian, 1 Turkish, and 1 Brit. ;o)

The next day I walked around High Street Kensington but soon realised that I couldn’t afford to buy anything. So I walked to the tube station to go home. At the tube station in this pretty mezzanine there was a shop that wafted wonderful scents. I guided my nose to the unassuming shop called Ben’s Cookies - which is actually a chain and UK/US online store. The cookies looked pretty boring and were quite expensive for their small size but I decided to give it a go. There were 14 different flavours and I ordered a milk chocolate one and a lemon one. I didn't expect what I found upon my first bite. The cookies were filled with melted warm liquid (chocolate and lemon respectively). They were honestly the best cookies I have EVER had (and I have had many). If you ever see to this shop, its worth the stop, believe me.

Halloween, Infusion Style: Bowling

This post several weeks overdue, but now that I have the pictures I can put it up. Infusion held a bowling party in celebration of Halloween, for which most of the company many of the execs and Brits were on strike) dressed up. Here's some pics:

Me, as a pirate, bowling:


Simon, as the devil:


Mike Hoyle, Alan Johnson, Niall Towmey and John Gerula (in front), all members of my team at work. In front (back to you) is Bryan Shiffman.

Alan Johnson, Carmen Klett, Mike Hoyle, and Andrea Richardson (our HR Manager)


Bryan Shiffman and me -- he's supposed to be a lumerjack, but I definately feel he looks closer to Earl from that TV Show :)


Yes, definately from "My Name is Earl". Nyla flew over the shirt from Doug's collection for the event.

Versailles avec Bicyclettes

I have always wanted to visit the Palace of Versailles, 10 miles outside Paris (1/2 hour by train). We could have taken a train there and walked around, but knowing that the grounds are 2500 acres large I thought it might be fun to explore them with a bike tour. After a couple days in Paris around town it was also a getaway from the everyday. That was the best decision we ever made and was the highlight of our entire trip to Paris!

Our bike trip started in Paris and we all boarded the train with our "cruiser" bikes supplied by the Fat Tire bike company. Then we went to the old city of Versailles where we stopped at a local market for picnic foods - cheese, wine and baguettes of course! When we got to the grounds we biked around past open fields full of ewe and a cute miniature village hamlet with houses and everything that Marie Antoinette had built and used to get away from the constant visitors at the palace and where she could play her billiards and carry on her love affairs. Riding bikes around the grounds gave us a chance to see the outer regions and cycle through beautiful autumn tree-lined paths such as this one. Nice pic Syd! I loved the Petite Trianon and Grande Triannon, which are located away from the actual castle and where many a grand party and love tryst were held by Louis the XVI and Marie Antoinette.

We then stopped for lunch at the end of the long river and looked out at the castle while enjoying our delicious lunch. It was still quite the ride up to the Chateau from there and then we had a chance to go through the Chateau itself, though we only had an hour to take in the grandeur of gold and marble detailing and artistic ceilings and tapestries.

The Palace of Versailles itself began as a modest hunting lodge. Well, as modest a lodge as one could expect from a French King. Then Louis XIV enlarged and enrobed the old lodge, turning it into the great Chateau we know today. It is not only astounding in size, but also very beautiful. You could explore the Versailles castle for days and find something new each time. As it is, there are 5 different tours of internal castle areas to explore and we only had time to do one! Naturally we chose the royal state apartments to see the Kings and Queens abodes. We only wish we had more time to explore the castle itself. Below is an example of one of the beautiful salons - called Hercules Salon and below that is the astounding Hall of mirrors overlooking the back garden and the river.There were a series of flat tires on a number of bikes that day including Nyla's bike such that the guide thought that she was on candid camera or something. The last flat happened in Paris just before we got back to the shop, so the father who had the bad bike ended up just jogging home while the rest of us hummed the Rocky tune. Too funny!

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Later that evening we went for drinks and italian dinner in the Latin Quartier near the Notre Dame, which is a small street of bistros and restaurants and bars. We went to a cool bar called George that has a signature touch of putting sparklers in their tasty cocktails! Syd also bought Nyla her first real gelato at a gelateria.

Exploring Paris: The City of Light

We took a Eurostar train on Thursday Nov 1 from London Waterloo station to Gare du Nord in Paris in just under 3 hours. It was a smooth easy journey and I recommend it to anyone looking to travel between the two cities who wants to avoid airport hassles!

After checking into our clean budget hotel we went to the Champs D'elysee to walk along the tree-lined posh shopping district and after realising that we can't afford anything we ended up at the Arc de Triomphe. The arch honours those who fought for France, particularly during the Napoleonic Wars, and today also includes the tomb of the unknown soldier.

On Thursday night we went to an irish pub in Montmarte near Moulin Rouge where there was a live band playing. The Metanoya is a rock band with a pair of twins singing harmonious duets of english tunes and a couple french ones as well. We were instantly drawn into their music, and the fact that they were dressed in medieval corsets and blouses with bell sleeves was a plus as well! Their sound reminded us a lot like Evanescence - so we bought the album!

On Friday morning we waited in the long line outside the Louvre and once in (30 min later) we followed to herd to see the Mona Lisa. Neither of us thought it was all that impressive, and it was much smaller than we imagined. I loved the medieval Louvre section in the basement where there are remnants and rooms leftover from the Louvre palace that was once the centre of royal life before a new palace was built out in Versailles during Louis XIV's reign.

Syd and I were really impressed with the Liberty Leading the People painting by Eugene Delacroix as it instantly reminded us of Les Miserables and the French Revolution.

After quickly exiting the Louvre after spending only a mere 2 hours there (which is nothing if you know the size of that museum), we enjoyed walking around Paris neighbourhoods to find food (cheese and meat and baguettes) and wine and shared a quaint picnic in Babylone park.

In the late afternoon we went to the top of an office tower called Mont Parnasse to view the city from the 56th floor. The views of the city, including the hotel des invalides and the eiffel tower were just amazing when lit up at night!
Lastly, we ended our Friday night with a trip to the Eiffel Tower and had fun with some night shots taken by our awesome digital SLR!

Observations:

The metro system in Paris has a massive amount of different lines, all numbered. However, the distance between stops is so short that the doors barely close before you are at the next station! So it is deceiving how far or how big the metro system actually is. What it does mean is that you don't have far to walk anywhere in the city before you run into a metro station.

As hard as I tried to speak French to get served in restaurants and cafes (and I think I did a pretty good job actually), the servers always looked at us with disdain and were quite rude. Nyla swore that one guy spit in her crepe the first evening! It was quite an adjustment to be in a city that speaks little to no english and is not willing to be nice about it either! Needless to say after 4 days in the city with the language frustration we were happy to get back to London on Sunday - the land of the English! ;o)

Avenue Q

We wanted to take Nyla to the theatre when she was here, and Monday was the day. We chose Avenue Q since we'd heard from several people that it was hilariously good. I actually thought it would be purely puppet based (from what I had heard) but it was a mix of puppets and real people. Its very adult themed (ie lots of swearing and sexual inuendos), but essentially is about several people who live on the same street (Avenue Q) out in Brooklyn. It did seem somewhat lame to see an American-based broadway show in the UK, but it proved to be quite funny and we all had a great time!

Halloween London Style: Pub Crawl

We joined a group called meetup.com last month. Specifically we joined the 'London fancy dress' group - a group of like-minded individuals that like to dress in costume and do pub crawls in the city dressed in certain themes. October's theme was 'halloween' (duh). We figure since Halloween isn' t huge here, we would go out with a group designed to do it right. And oh was it fun!!

We got all dulled up to go out on this pub crawl and we were pretty excited. Our costumes were awesome as pirate, sorceress and devil. We pulled ourstogether from a shop in Camden market, as well as existing clothes (I bought my shirt in Greece last year). It was really strange taking the bus to central London because no one was dressed up! Astrid used the mask to her advantage and just stared people down when they stared at us. Mwa ha ha!


The bars chosen were all done up real spooky and so it felt authentically Halloween. At the second pub Nyla and Astrid played a trick or treating competition where they had to 'sell' a pumpkin full of sweets to patrons in the bar and all proceeds went to charity. They did so well that they won the prize - a flashing 'tales from the crypt' skull! We had an amazing time meeting other ghouls and chatting the night away with some cool folks.