London - Leaving Dos

Monday 24 September
After work, we had dinner with my parents at St. John in Smithfields, #34 on the World's 50 Best Restaurant 2007 List (and also on the 2003 to 2006 list). The restaurant serves "no nonsense" British food and is very different to the other World's 50 Best Restaurants we have been to in that it was a very "hearty" meal rather than gourmet and rich. In other words, meat, meat, meat, and more meat. St. John also has its own bakery so you can order fresh madeleines for dessert...which was great as they were hot and fluffy, and just had enough sweetness to end our meal on a nice note. This is a place you could easily come back to as it is also very reasonably priced compared to our last World's 50 Best Restaurant experience at Arzak. Yang and I also reached a milestone today having now dined at all 7 of the UK restaurants on the World's 50 Best 2007 list!

Wednesday 26 September
This evening, the current and old SOX crew meet up for Dan's and Tashie's pre Farewell to London party with a few drinks at Las Iguanas on Southbank, dinner at Ping Pong (it felt very weird having dim sum for dinner), and then more drinks at The White Hart (which has a great beer selection...but serves pinot grigio on tap...typical English Pub I suppose!).

Thursday 27 September
As the Shell SOX Tax Team's Social Co-ordinator, I organised our post-workshop dinner at Refettorio, an Italian Restaurant at Blackfriars which is directed by Michelin-starred chef Giorgio Locatelli of Zafferenos and Locanda Locatelli. Luckily the restaurant was well received by the 8 of us dining that evening as it is very reasonably priced compared to Locanda Locatelli, the atmosphere was really good, and most importantly, the food was amazing.

Friday 28 September
This evening, Yang and I headed to The British Museum's The First Emperor: China's Terracotta Army Exhibition, which has been housed inside the Reading Room (my favourite Library). There are only about 14 Terracotta Warriors on display, but the history and other artifacts on display are a real advertisement for visiting Xi'an, which I really can't wait to do! The First Emperor's Burial Mound in Xi'an covers an area of approximately 56 kilometres and due to the care that needs to be taken in archaeological excavations, these are not expected to be completed in our lifetime. Although the highlight of the exhibition was the Terracotta Warriors, it was actually a good history lesson about the First Emperor, who can be credited with unifying China, standardising currency, standardising weights and measures and building the Great Wall of China to keep the Mongolians out.

After the exhibition, we had dinner at Asadal, a Korean restaurant in Holborn. Then we headed to Leon and Julie's Leaving Drinks at the Sofa So Bar in Fulham. This is the 3rd Leaving do I have been to since Saturday...it's so sad...everyone is going back to Australia...and soon it will be our turn too...

Saturday 29 September
This morning, Yang and I headed to Bond Street to run a few errands before heading back east to the Borough Markets to have lunch and buy food (cheeses, joselita gran riserva pata negra jamon, foccacia, and prosciutto) for our "Please Help us Finish our Alcohol Party!". The purpose of this evening was to use up all the alcohol Yang and I had accumulated so we had less to move when we left our current apartment and London. Attendees at this evening's small gathering were Alli, Aaron, Jason, Tammy, Linus, Robin, Ryan, Phil, Ha, Ed, and Loreen & Felix (who arrived later as they were celebrating their 10 year anniversary). We had quite a bit to drink and eat, thanks in part to Ha & Ed and Phil for bringing some Aussie snacks, and Linus, Tammy and Jason for bringing meatballs and crispy aromatic duck (Jason was the duck-master who kindly assembled the rolls for everyone too). T&L also kindly brought their blender so that we could make fruit and creamy chocolate cocktail concoctions. It was an enjoyable evening, and despite finishing 2 bottles of champagne, 2 bottles of vodka, a few beers here and there and making a substantial dent in bottles of Choya, Baileys, Godiva, Frangelico, Scotch, and Gin, there were no casualties or hangovers the next day!

Sunday 30 September
We attended Tabitha's Baby Shower today, which was a bit different to the other Baby Showers I had been to because they invited the male partners so, it ended up being a nice gathering of friends. Another interesting thing was that half the group already had children so they brought food that they had prepared themselves, whereas the other half that didn't have children brought food that they purchased or that you could stick in the oven...you most probably have already guessed we were part of the latter group! The shower was organised jointly by Joanna, Indira and Esther, so each of them came up with a number of games to play during the day. We managed to win the first game, which was to guess which of the attendees were in various baby photos. Quite a feat since we had only met some of the people at the party that afternoon! After a lovely afternoon at Esther's apartment in Deptford Bridge, we headed back so that I could pack and catch my flight to the Hague.