Saturday, December 6, 2008

Saturday Morning And I Want A Sri Lankan

It's 8.52 on Saturday morning and I've just woken up. I type this little snippet of a post while lying in bed naked except for one of Barefoot's finest silky sarongs.

It's also a gig night, a fortieth birthday party for a high powered lawyer somewhere in central London tonight. I'm looking forward to this one, though we have a singer with the cold that everyone else in the country's got at the moment, so there will be challenging moments for sure.

I can hear my Dad upstairs bumbling around, making coffee and doing those Dad type things, he's probably writing a post on his blog, words about me and the things I've been up to lately, a paragraph or two about Academic and how well he's doing at Academia, that sort of thing. Hearing his morning chorus reminds me of when the girls were younger and their morning chorus at weekends.

Of the sounds they'd make as they rose and went downstairs, trying to be quiet and not wake the parents. Of the hushed voices, the muted TV and the muffled clanking of plates, cereal, milk and sugar. It seems so recent and yet also so long ago. Kids grow so fast and these days memories of them are more precious than they ever have been.

As I lie here I feel the stomach rumbles of hunger and there's only one thing I want to satisfy it. None of that English breakfast business, none of your cereal or croissants or toasted things will do.

No, I want white string hoppers, a white potato curry, some pol sambol and a good prawn curry. And I want loads of it.

Mmmmm......

Fat chance though.

4 comments:

FINroD said...

mate isnt there like a sri lankan hopper shop somewher ther?? i remember cos my sis and them had taken her in laws for a birthday dinner or something there....

Rhythmic Diaspora said...

Finrod - There are a few around true, but I want plate loads of the stuff, like in a good old SL buffet breakfast or home cooking.

Anonymous said...

Hey RD - I found that 'Rice Sticks' were a reasonable substitute for strings (except they don't come shaped the way stringhoppers do). Easy to fix too - just dump part of the packet into boiling water and let it steep, then strain and it's ready. The rest of the menu should be a cinch for your mum!

Check it out!

A Virile Nagalingam said...

just don't try the rice sticks experiment at a family event--enraged uncles and aunties holding the suspiciously translucent and individual strands in fists of fury could be the result.

I looked for yalpanam food in Paris and couldn't find a decent example. Must've been my cricket sri-lanka hat. damn civil war.