Falling asleep on the wrong line at the wrong time (London)

It was meant to be a straightforward get-together between two old friends meeting up for a few pints.  

Satoshi and I had our few pints near my film company office at Warren Street (Zone 1, central London), and stayed until closing time before going our separate ways: I northwards to Highbury on the Victoria line and he westwards to Notting Hill on the Central line--about seven(?) stops away.  For him, one stop south on the Victoria line, then a change of trains at Oxford Circus to the west-bound Central line train.  Whereupon he promptly fell asleep.  

When he next opened his eyes, the train had gone past his stop, so he staggered off the train, crossed over to the other platform and boarded the next east-bound train that came along.  And instantly dozed off again.  

The next time he woke up, the train was no longer underground.  (For those who don’t know the London underground routes, the Central line goes as far east as Essex, which is not in London--and London is huge in terms of distances...)  

When he got to the exit, the station staff was locking up, so it was obviously the last train.  

He had no idea where he was, nor which direction London was, and wandered around trying to find some sign of human life.  

As it happened, a bit later, a car came along with three young people who were going in the direction of London and they kindly got him to a mini-cab place en route where he could get a cab back to London.  

He finished off the story with, “And don’t ask me how much the taxi fare came to!”  (It was Essex and past midnight, so it must’ve been eye-watering.)  

He added, “I won’t be able to afford going out for a drink with you again for a while.”

(London, 1983)

The bus that goes nowhere (Taiwan)

Simon, an English friend a year above me at SOAS (School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London), went to Taipei and found there was a No. 0 bus.  He immediately thought, "A bus that goes nowhere!"  It turned out to be a circular route: a clockwise one and an anti-clockwise one.  We did call it 0 南 (líng nán / “zero south”) and 0 北 (líng běi / “zero north”) though, so Simon had a point.

(Taipei, 1981)

Matter over mind in reverse? (France)

About twelve days before my departure from the French farm on 03 October, Serge and Jeanette started discussing at the dinner table locking up the dogs (and further away from the farm house as well) in readiness for the arrival of old friends Simon and Mauricette, so that they (Simon and Mauricette, not the dogs) wouldn't be disturbed by the nocturnal growling (from the dogs, not Simon and Mauricette).

    I chipped in with, "But if they're locked up, they'll be barking, which will still disturb Simon and Mauricette."

    Serge immediately commented that my French was now good enough for me to understand things and to communicate my opinions as well.  (Between you and me, he didn't notice that a lot of what I said was pidgin French and gesturing / miming.  He understood my message, so he took it to be French...)  

(See the other, related blog entry: Matter over mind in reverse https://piccola-chinita.blogspot.com/2011/10/matter-over-mind-in-reverse.html )

(Gers, S.W. France, September 2011)

Sopa minuta (Peru)

We were on the point of leaving a little cafe in Nazca after our so-so meal when we spotted someone eating an interesting-looking Singapore Laksa-type dish (something noodle-like in a bright orange red soup base), so we asked him for the name for future reference.  He told us it was sopa minuta.  Felt quite pleased with ourselves for having done a clever thing like that as we had always been too shy about asking and ended up not being to order a dish we’d liked on sight on a previous occasion, and looked forward to trying it out for ourselves at the next town.  Once there, we duly ordered a sopa minuta.  What arrived was an anaemic-looking dish: white without the noodle stuff.  We told the waiter he’d brought us the wrong order, and that we’d ordered sopa minuta.  He said, yes, this is sopa minuta.  It turned out that “sopa minuta” (literally "soup minute"?) only meant something like “soup of the day”.

(Peru, 1986)

Purrfect pals (France)

For some reason, the cats on the farm are not assigned any names (and have never been, I think).  

The dogs are called Patou, Fleurie, Mizou, and so on.  (Dino doesn’t count as he came already named Dino by his previous  [now deceased] owner — see blog entry Dino the dirty dog.)

The cats, however, are all just addressed as Mimi (see blog entry Minou), even when spoken to directly and individually.  (This reminds me of my family’s tradition of treating our cats and dogs differently:  speaking in English to the dogs and in Mandarin to the cats.)

The frisky one (the little black cat) will totally disrupt my reading or journal-writing, endlessly nudging my fingers, hands and any other part of my body that he can mark.  By “mark”, I mean mainly scent, but he also leaves scratch marks (when he jumps on or all over me) and (playful but painful) bite marks (when he suddenly takes a fancy to my finger).  

As soon as the one with tiger stripes spots me (haha, word play on stripes and spots) on the sun-lounger, he will instantly leave his usual perch on the kitchen window sill (again, for food scraps), come over and claim my lap (or even chest if I’m sitting a bit reclined).  He’ll go to sleep straightaway, freezing me in the one pose until my legs go numb.  If I move him to de-numb my legs, he’ll immediately climb back on.  

If I’ve got something on my lap (e.g., dry haricot bean pods to shell), Tiger (my own name for him) will sit beside or behind me, leaning his body against mine — basically staying close throughout even though I'm too busy to stroke or cuddle him.  In case you think Tiger is doing it for the body warmth, I only went to the farm in the summer, when temperatures could rise to 42C.

If I leave the sun-lounger, so will he, which proves that he’s not there for the sun-lounger but for my company.  

One feels honoured, indeed, to be adopted by cats in this way, as the Gentle Giant used to say.  (He also called them “whores”, though, in his quaint usage of the English language, sucking up to anyone who will dish out the stroking and cuddling.)

Mummy Cat (as I call the variegated one with endlessly successive broods, poor old girl) will try to get to my face, for her to nuzzle, by climbing up my leg (or arm, if I bend down, say, to pull up some weeds) with her front legs.  Sweet, if rather painful.  

She has this lovely touch of planting her paws on my shoulders, one on each side, then wrapping them around my neck in a big hug while she nuzzles my chin or cheek.  

If I’m standing at a table, she’ll jump onto the table to try and reach me from that level.  If I stand back, she’ll try and reach out, sometimes to the point of nearly falling off the table herself, in which case she’ll even go to the extent of keeping three legs on the table and just use one to try and climb up my arm in her eagerness to get to my face for that nuzzle.  I find it rather touching (haha, word play).

Practically all the cats are highly responsive and interactive, though in different ways.  

Each looks different (in colour combinations and patterns) and each has his/her own very individualistic mannerisms and way of communicating with you.  

As I got to know each one, I found myself saying to them in turn every day — often more than once a day, “I wish I could take you back to London with me.”  I can see why Serge and Jeanette have them around, even though it means extra work and cost, because they fill one’s life with so much affection. 

The beige one (and mother of the black frisky one — they are both the same size and I’d mistaken them to be siblings) was the first to adopt me.  

It was the morning after I’d arrived from London.  I’d just opened the front door, to go out and start doing the chores for the day, when I heard this meow from somewhere by my feet.

The beige one had been sleeping (probably throughout the night) inside the bushy-climber-plant open-top wire cage by the front door.  She spotted me, however, the moment I opened the front door, left her comfortable nest inside that cage and came up to me, greeting me with a warm, welcoming meow — I was adopted.

After the first few days of my arrival, she took to sleeping in my bed (in the first floor bedroom).  Then in my open suitcase among my clothes.  And finally, on it — when I shut the lid (to stop her from sleeping among my clothes in the suitcase).  

She’d get to my room at night by scaling the ground floor shutters, then the stretch of wall between the shutters on the two storeys, thus endangering her nine lives.  

I’d spend most of the night getting out of bed, carrying her downstairs (cooing apologetically to her) and putting her gently out of the front door, only to return to my room to find she’d got back there and back into my bed before me!

The black canvas material of the suitcase was liberally covered with her pale hairs by my last day.  

When Mauricette (a family friend who was visiting for a week with her husband Simon, Serge’s old army comrade) offered to brush them off, I said no, I wanted to keep it as it was — as a souvenir, to keep the memory of these purrfect pals alive and fresh.

(Gers, France, September/October 2011)

Minou:  https://piccola-chinita.blogspot.com/2011/07/minou.html 

Dino the dirty dog:  https://piccola-chinita.blogspot.com/2011/07/dino-dirty-dog.html 

Aptly-named dog:  https://piccola-chinita.blogspot.com/2012/01/aptly-named-dog-france.html 

Completely free-range now (France)

I found a new development on the French farm on my visit this year: it has gone even more free-range.  

    When I first spotted the chickens wandering around the defunct kitchen garden next to their corralled area late afternoon on my first day, I was rather alarmed and reported this to farm mistress Jeanette.  She reassured me that it was legit and intentional.  It was to let them scrabble around in that area for a change of environment and food source.

    Another thing I noticed — on my arrival at the farm house, because I nearly tripped over her — was that there was a dog lying down calmly on the floor of the living/dining room in front of the stove.  

    I say calmly because she didn’t even bother to try and shift out of the way, as most dogs would do if they were sleeping in the path of passing feet.  (This turned out to be Mizou — see blog Eats shoots and leaves.)

    Finally, the cats, which used to be banned from the house as well, bar one (see blog Minou).  This year there’re about a dozen of them — after the first ten, I gave up counting as I only have ten fingers — five of which are kittens a few months old (under a year, I’d say, although I’m bad at telling age — see blog Minou).  

    Not only have they increased in number, they have also increased in temerity — jumping in through any open windows (two in the living/dining room, one in [deceased] Grandma Meimei’s old bedroom, one in the master bedroom upstairs which was assigned to me for my month-long stay) and helping themselves to any soft surface for kipping on, including my lap — which has the added advantage of being warm as well.  

    Make the mistake of having eye contact with them, even if accidental, and they’ll make a beeline for you, leaping straight onto your lap without even asking for permission first.  They also help themselves freely to the shop-bought dry cat food — straight out of the bag.

(For more on the cats, see Purrfect pals.)

(Gers, France, September/October 2011)

Eats shoots and leaves:  https://piccola-chinita.blogspot.com/2011/10/eats-shoots-and-leaves.html 

Purrfect pals:  https://piccola-chinita.blogspot.com/2011/10/purrfect-pals_20.html 

Minou:  https://piccola-chinita.blogspot.com/2011/07/minou.html 

Eats shoots and leaves (France)

Colette said, when she told me her mother Jeanette’s cousin Francis and wife Nicole had invited us (Serge, Jeanette and I) over to theirs for dinner, that they were very nice people but loud.  

In the end, for some reason, they came over to the farm house instead, and I cooked a Chinese meal.  

The following day, Colette texted to find out how dinner at the cousin’s house had gone.  In my hurry, I left out a comma in my text back: “Dinner was here and loud dog died.”  

One of the dogs, Mizou, had been bitten in the leg (by a fox??) and been unwell, so she was allowed to spend all her time in the house, given all the juicy scraps, and fed special dishes (mashed potatoes in milk).  In my second and third weeks there, she’d had a couple of fits (like epileptic fits), requiring trips to the vet’s, and died in my final week there.  

Colette was trying to figure out which loud dog it might’ve been that died.  Dino immediately came to mind, being the perpetual woofer (not wwoofer — see Aptly named dog), but he’d been in rude health (naturally, being a rude dog with a dirty habit — see Dino the dirty dog) when she was at the farm the weekend before.  Of course, my text should’ve been, “Dinner was here and loud, dog died.”

(France, September/October 2011)

*For those who don’t know the implications behind my choice of the title “Eats shoots and leaves”: 

(1) The dictionary definition of a panda, among other things, says it “eats shoots and leaves”; 

(2) Inserting a comma after “eats” makes “shoots” and “leaves” verbs instead of nouns, thereby changing the whole perspective altogether.  A comic strip has a panda walking into a bar restaurant, (ordering and) consuming some food, then pulling out a gun, firing into the air and walking out, hence “eats, shoots and leaves”.  

Lynn Truss has written a book about punctuation, with this title, and I think the comic strip might’ve been done just for the book.  Google her if you’re interested in more information about her.

** This is just a word play on woofer and wwoofer.  There's an organisation called WWOOF (used to stand for Weekend Working On Organic Farms in the early 1980s when I first heard about them and was invited by a friend to go with her; it's now called Worldwide Opportunities On Organic Farms since extending beyond the UK).  The members are called WWOOFers, and people would say they go wwoofing.

Aptly named dog:  https://piccola-chinita.blogspot.com/2012/01/aptly-named-dog-france.html

Dino the dirty dog:  https://piccola-chinita.blogspot.com/2011/07/dino-dirty-dog.html