A very pleasant day today, on my own terms for once. It was a working day but unexpectedly light as something didn’t come in when it was supposed to. Meanwhile the GF had a meeting at lunchtime, so I went off by myself, first to a very well known lo rou fan place where I had a nice meaty bit of rice, quite delicious, and was pleased at having ordered from the Chinese menu without having to look at the translation app (admittedly, I had already translated it, but still, it felt like an accomplishment, a sign that characters are ceasing to be a jumble of lines and curves). The only mistake I made was that on the side I accidentally ordered some braised tofu instead of green vegetables. Nevertheless, it was an excellent lunch at a busy little spot where they had set up plastic dividers on the tiny tables so two people could sit across from each other, close enough to knock heads, and yet be able to practice social distancing. Far more sensible, if less stylish, a solution than the cafe we went to a few days ago.
After lunch I went to the Chiang Kai Shek Memorial – another point of pride that I can recognise his name in Chinese now, though admittedly it’s all over the place – and into the basement to see the ukiyo-e exhibition. This rather benefited from having no labels in English, so I just enjoyed the images without considering what they represented necessarily. Too often I find myself looking at labels instead of the art. It was a highly respectable show, all from one man’s private collection, with some well-known pieces such as a few fantastical Kuniyoshis (to whom I was introduced by a blockbuster show at the Royal Academy many years ago), as well as iconic images like Hokusai’s wave. The latter was accompanied by a room in which an immense animated wave was projected against mirrored walls, so inside one was surrounded by a woodcut sea. Other highlights was a couple of pictures, clearly a stock theme, of a baby gnawing at its mother’s nipple and pinching her skin between its thumb while she looked down in pain and fear. Or so I interpreted it. Properly paedophobic.
Within an hour of my return the GF was ready for some coffee so off we went again, this time to a cafe with a little garden, though by now it was cool enough that sitting outside was not comfortable, even had it not been for the mosquitos. So we sat inside and had our lattes. I have decided, however, to end this daily coffee habit I’ve slipped into. It’s both expensive and (when I have a brown sugar latte instead of a drip) not the healthiest of habits.
For dinner I went desi and made something my mother used to cook, ginger chicken following her instructions. It was excellent. For the vegetarians I used the same masala to make okra and tofu, also very good, especially the okra. I’ve gradually been compromising less and less on what I cook, it’s nice to have some home cooked food.