My rich Aunt Jill poured me enough Riesling at dinner last night for it to take me three stops to realize I had boarded the right tube line going the wrong direction. Aunt Jill retired at thirty through some lucky moves and a lot of work in the internet boom. She and my uncle have the resources to have the highest discretion over what they eat, and--in their excitement to drink and eat with me in a city we all love--they spared no expense.
The Indian cuisine I ate in Kensington was the best I have ever had in my life, and (unless literary interest turns into a form of great financial acquisition) probably the best I will ever have. We had artichoke soup, aloo chole, a salad of beets and naan, and devoured three entrees between us of chicken and prawn. We drank two bottles of expensive Riesling. For dessert we ate chocolate stuffed samosas. With six months between our last meeting, we had plenty to discuss. As connoisseurs of all forms of beauty, they were most interested about which books we were reading. I told them all about Brick Lane. They told me to read White Teeth by Zadie Smith which--in a lucky coincidence--I had just bought at Blackwells a few days before.
The food, wine, and conversation were exceptional. So was my tube mistake.
After realizing my blunder, I hopped off at the next station which was notably not quite as pristine as the one at Glocester Road. I scurried up the steps and over the bridge to the platform on the other side just in time to jump onto the approaching east bound train. Now having eight stops instead of three to Victoria Station, I pulled out Brick Lane. I read three words.
"Excuse me, are you a Londoner?"
"No. I'm not. I'm sorry."
"Where are you from?"
"I'm an American."
"I'm from Bahrain. Every one in London is misplaced. "
The man from Bahrain and I discussed Brick Lane. He did not like the novel because he found the main character unapproachable. I disagreed. I told him that I have not found a passage as moving or as approachable as the protagonist's internal dialogue about fate early in the book. He did not like that Monica Ali was not actually from Bangladesh. I was indifferent.
He introduced me to his wife who was fully veiled.
"Did you read the book?" I asked.
"Of course,"she winked, "I am the reader. My husband is the talker."
I asked them how long they had lived in London. They told me twenty years. I made a joke about them being almost fully Londoners. The man told me no, London may not be the most accepting place in the world, but it is a place that does not demand conformity.
My stop came. I minded the gap and got on my bus back to Oxford, but that phrase stuck with me more than anything said over dinner.
Everyone in London is misplaced.
Amazing. A very insightful frase indeed. But aren't we all misplaced in some way, even when in our homelands?
ReplyDeleteInteresting, accidental, meeting. I wonder if the man had read Ali, or were his opinions formed in conversation with his wife and the press.
ReplyDeleteMust be some Londoners in the world who feel "placed" here correctly. Wonder who they are.
It's interesting that they've lived here for 20 years (which means they were here during and after the 9/11 attacks), and the wife still wears a veil. I wonder how she felt reading a book about a Muslim woman who starts off in purdah but sort of experiments with Western clothing and customs. One of the most memorable scenes for me was when Nazneen tries on a pair of trousers and gets up on the bed in order to better see herself in the mirror. I wonder if the veiled woman you met has ever experimented in this way.
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