Thanksgiving London Style

On Saturday, I was invited to spend Thanksgiving dinner with my good friend Chip and his partner at their friend MW's house in the middle of nowhere Hackney. Seriously, we took a ten pound cab ride from Liverpool Street Station to MW's flat, which is in a converted synagogue. Can I just say this flat was to die for? Oh my god, I just wanted to move in. It's not large but it's amazingly decorated and on two floors so it seems bigger than it is, plus it has a bath and a half, so if you have a guest staying in your living room they have their own bathroom.

I met an amazing group of people at this Thanksgiving dinner. MW has an eclectic group of friends. There were people from South Africa, Australia, Egypt and also the States at this dinner. Prosecco was flowing. I could feasted all night on the spinach artichoke dip alone it was so good, but Chip made this amazing green bean casserole from scratch instead of the usual way with cream of mushroom soup and those Durkee crispy onion things on top. I don't even like green beans really but I could have eaten the whole thing. I've begged for the recipe so I can make for myself. It's one of those dishes that you could eat as a side dish for the whole week. Everyone contributed something to the dinner. One woman even made pumpkin pie although I could tell she'd never made it before and was worried that it might not be right but it was so good. Since I don't eat turkey, I just feasted on the mashed potatoes which I could eat a vat of and the green bean casserole (I do talk a lot about food in this blog don't I?)

Much of the talk at the dinner party was about the murder of Meredith Kercher, a young English woman who may have been killed by her flatmate (a young American woman) and her boyfriend. I'm ashamed to admit that I really didn't know much about the case until recently. After the whole Madeleine McCann and the young woman who may have been killed by her older husband, I'm a little true crimed out. Particularly since they haven't figured out what the motive was for killing Meredith yet. Was it drug induced? Does hashish make you violent?

One of the other cool things about the evening was discussing things of a spiritual nature with Chip's partner. It seemed that everyone I met had something to say about spirituality. But what Chip's partner told me was interesting about the concept of time. What if there really wasn't any such thing as time, just the here and now. There is no past and no future really, just the present. Wouldn't it make it easier to enjoy life as it is instead of worrying about what might happen tomorrow or what happened two weeks?

I also went to a revival of this Caryl Churchill play Cloud Nine at the Almeida which is this really groovy Off West End theater in Islington. I love the way the British have appropriated the term Off-Broadway and then changed it to Off West End. It used to just be West End shows and then the fringe, and theaters like the Almeida, the Donmar and the Soho Poly were all fringe theaters. So Cloud Nine is neat because it's really about sexuality and how fluid it can be, not to mention the British Empire. The first half of the play is set in the Victorian era in Africa where this typical English family is living with their faithful African servant who may not be so faithful and the parallelogram of relationships that are going on amongst the various characters. Women play men, men play women, some actors play more than one character.

The second half was set in the 80's in England, but with the same characters. Only they're not much older than the characters they played in the Victorian half which is kind of weird but neat. The daughter Vicky grows up and leaves her husband for another woman and her brother who is gay moves in with them in some kind of weird menage a trois. Very thought provoking for a Saturday afternoon in Islington.

Thanks for reading,

EKM