faggot and chips

The physical act of travelling seems to make time tick faster. After returning from a week of diving in Eilat (with a tan unlike anything since the bygone days of marching band rehearsals in high school), I was running. To find a place to sleep the night in London. To pack. To soak in whatever I might still have time for. I took a last walk around my aunt’s lovely garden, tasting an unfamiliar herb, eating something that I’ve only had off their tree—a cherry-sized bright red fruit, tart, sweet, and with a flavor (and shape) reminiscent of a bell pepper.

I hadn’t flown on a regular British Airways flight in years. Over half the plane was dedicated to first, business, and ‘economy plus.’ That left me in plain old economy, in the back, with a window seat that required significant contortion to get into and out of. Listen to me whining: ridiculous. It was just upon landing that the flight got weird. A born-and-bred Israeli was my buffer to the British Jewish woman who had apparently moved to Israel twenty-five years earlier. Approaching 50, she looked great for her age. Earlier, when food and drinks came around, I did the naïve thing of asking how much it would be for some wine. She had no such questions—she knew the alcohol was free, and had been sucking down nips of gin since we’d taken off. Then, as we taxied, she started her drunk ramblings. About how great Israel is, and how she’s a million percent behind it, but about how it does bad things, things that we didn’t want to know about. I was thankful to get left alone: the odd American out. I sympathized with some of her story, but could only take so much of her drunken cynicism, relieved when she finally got up to deplane.

The Israeli and I shared a cynical chuckle of our own, and 90 minutes later I was walking into the Anchor & Hope gastropub in London—the objective of tonight’s mission. It had been a couple of years since my last visit, and I was itching for some down-and-dirty English cuisine. The bartenders didn’t fail me. The duck consommé, though a bit peppery, was made all the better by the slice of foie gras terrine floating in it. The seppia I ate next was some of the best I’ve had—braised and rich (likewise for the “little gem” beans served with it), topped with a healthy dollop of green aïoli. The star of the meal—the reason I came here rather than some other fancier London bistro: the faggot. Uninhibited when it comes to food, when my charming waiter told me about the meatball of pork belly, liver, heart, and lungs (oh, and some minced onions), all wrapped in caul fat and braised in a white wine-based broth, well, I knew the faggot was my match. I only had eyes for the succulent ball of offal, and recruited Louise and Simon to help get rid of the evidence. We got to chatting about food and life and adventure—they were great conversation partners. I made haste for the last train to the airport and, once arrived, pondered on how to get to the hotel. I was fortunate to run into a young American couple in the same situation, and the three of us split a cab back toward the hotels near LHR. Well, not really: I didn’t have any currency they could use, so I mooched a ride—my visit was going like clockwork.

I slept four hours and got up to several different alarms, not wanting to miss my flight. After showering I got on the $8 shuttle that would take me the 2 miles to the airport. Not only did I have to wait for the shuttle, but then we made stops at several adjacent hotels, and stopped at terminals 1 and 2 before arriving at my destination. At that point, my plane was about 30 minutes short of taking off. As my bags were checked through already, I ran for the border, stripped of my ancient bottle of water along the way. The line looked long and slow, and I begged to be taken to the front—the guy told me I wouldn’t be long in line, that I should just wait. Fine. Five minutes later, and maybe three passengers had gone through my metal detector (I think I chose the wrong line). I asked another guy, and this time I got the royal treatment—a free cut to the front of line. Through customs, and even before my departure stamp was dry, I was running for the gate (a sign told me it was 20 minutes away). Entitled punk that I am, I found an electric cart parked on the way to the gate, and gave its driver my short of breath sob story. Sirens blaring (okay, more of a beeping than a siren), we raced (okay, it was more the speed of a good jog) to the gate, where I promptly hopped onto a moving plane (okay, it wasn’t moving just yet) [inhale], put my goofy eyeshades on, and went to sleep, engines blazing.