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English as a Second Language: A Walk on the Wild Side

I finally had time in my busy schedule to go for a walk today. It was nice and quiet, and I noticed as I headed up the hill that there appear to be some rather affluent people living up here. Part way up the road, I began to hear the strains of a live jazz band down the hill. I also heard kids laughing, and discovered a pack of little kids riding a rope swing. The jazz music could be heard loud and clear from below. A fancy fete? A wedding perhaps? Who knows?

Haslemere is everything I imagined the English Countryside would be, based on my voracious childhood reading of the Bronte sisters and Frances Hodgson Burnett. The homes do not have street numbers, but rather names, often reminiscint of the place names dreamed up by Edward Gorey. There really are places with names that sound like “Stodgy Pudding,” or what have you. On my Sunday stroll, I discovered one whole cluster of houses that were all named Gray something or other. Since there was a large mansion of a house among them, I gathered they had all been part of one estate at one time. It reminded me of visting friends in Denmark who lived on a property that belonged to a castle. The only vestige of its feudal past was the requirement in their lease to join with the rest of the tentants of the fiefdom in cleaning the castle once a year (I don’t recall, but I think the date was Christmas Eve.) No-one had ever really done it, but it was just some contractual thing left over from the Middle Ages somehow.

Being a California girl, it always boggles my mind the ubiquitous sense of history. All around are houses that have been lived in for literally hundreds of years, crazy walls that bound the roads medieval merchants and, I imagine, soldiers onced traversed. It also amazes me that even though people have been around here so long, they have managed to maintain some semblance of countryside. Southern California is just a giant real estate development. People came there a hundred years ago because it was so beautiful, and then they stripped it of most of its beauty. Here, there is some innate appreciation for the landscape that has managed to prevail for centuries, perhaps sustained by a certain noblesse oblige.

Noblesse oblige notwithstanding, in my little jaunt up the hill, I actually encountered my first-ever example of the British version of what my sister calls “wheel estate.” Also known as “trailer trash.” Hmmm…I wonder what the British term would be—“road rubbish?” Well anyway, the term was particularly apt for this little specimen, which was completely crammed with it (rubbish I mean.) It was parked across the street from a house which I gathered to be that of the “eccentrics on the block,” since the grounds was equally strewn will all manner of detritis, including a few appliances—washers and such.

Given that I spend so much time in London, I find Haslemere to be somewhat disconcertingly monotonous, and by that I mean literally mono-tone, e.g., white (as opposed to dull.) Unlike London, which is a veritable melting pot of a post-colonial crazy salad (sorry about the mixed metaphors), Haslemere is just so English. I suppose that’s part of it’s charm. And with my naturally pale complexion and carrot top I just blend right in. But being as I’ve spent about a quarter of my life in New York and the rest in Los Angeles, I tend to get uncomfortable if everyone around is the same color as me.

Well I don’t have to fret too much about that, since I’m heading home tomorrow via Heathrow, which is about the most colorful place you can imagine.

I'll end with my favorite picture from this afternoon's stroll, which somehow captures two of my favorite things about Britain—the English sense of humor, and an obsession with instructional signage:

English as a Second Language: The Zen of Raspberries

Picking raspberries form David’s garden at Little Shalwyn has become my morning meditation here. One of the positive side effects of the incessant summer rain is that everything grows insanely fast here. Heading in to the raspberry portion of the garden involves diving into a dense bramble, usually damp, which seems to expand daily. From what I can tell, the back part of the raspberry bushes belongs pretty much to the birds, so depending on what time you decide to go in, there will be a bit of a scuffle as they quickly disperse. This just adds to the general sense of going into a wild zone.

Little Shalwyn is its own whole ecosystem really, and it’s easy to sort of find your niche within it, and get into a routine. For me, it starts with the morning cup of tea. The dollup of honey I drop in comes from the bees in David’s beehive. After the first cup, I generally go into the vegetable garden and tackle the raspberries, which I collect for my breakfast of muesli and “biopot,” also known as what the Brits call, phonetically spelled, “YAHggert” (if you haven’t guessed already, it’s yogurt). While en route to the raspberries, I get the chance to say good morning to the bees, and thank them for the wonderful honey. I won’t go into my bee fetish just now, but I do enjoy spending quality time with them as they earn their reputation for being busy.

The raspberry harvesting process generally begins, as mentioned above, with a kind of bird melee. As soon as they see you coming, there is this kind of whirling, whooshing noise from under the patch, and then they scatter every which way. Usually by the time I get there, they are all gone. This is my least favorite part of the task.

Because the bushes are so thick and green, the raspberries can be a bit difficult to find. Thankfully, Nature in all her Evolutioary Wonder had the good sense to color the raspberries bright reddish pink, which coincidentally(?) happens to be complimentary to the green leaves, if you go by the colorwheel. It’s not to hard to get into what I like to call “the raspberry zone,” which is sort of this sort of trance state where you are reaching for the plump, juicy raspberries in a sort of instinctual way—maybe the way the birds do, or the way the bees gravitate towards the flowers. But the thing is, in the end, you don't really pick the raspberries—it's more like they pick you. There are times when I have the distinct feeling they are hiding from me, but more often, I could swear they actually reach out and say “Pick me! Pick me! Pick me for your muesli or your crumble!” I don’t blame them. Raspberries that don’t get picked suffer a rather unpleasant fate. At best, they grow mouldy on the vine, which can’t be fun. At worst, they are ravaged by birds, who poop on, peck at and tear them limb from limb. No doubt if they had the choice, they’d rather meet their end nobly perched atop a pile of YAHggert and muesli, or in the bubbly molten sweetness of a fresh-out-of-the-oven crumble. But maybe I’m just projecting. :)

Today, since the weather was pretty nice, I also decided to put together some flower arrangements. Since my motto is, “If it’s worth doing, it’s worth overdoing,” I ended up making seven altogether. Some of them are really more leaf arrangements than flower arrangements. Sort of an early Fall theme, I guess, but the leaves around here are so amazing they rival the flowers. I also picked an enormous bowl of raspberries so Rob could make a delicious crumble. It's always nice when there's someone around the house who can bake. I now understand why the English have such a knack for recipes requiring overripe berries!

English as a Second Language: Little Shalwyn Revisited

For longtime (f)e-mail from abroad recipients, you will recall that two summers ago I spent the month of July at Little Shalwyn in Haslemere (see archives), the country home of David Furlow, Citizen of the World, who always seems to leave for Los Angeles as soon as I arrive. Coincidence? Hmm…

The day after I arrived, we got a visit from some of David’s friends with whom we enjoyed a lovely tea in the teahousre with scones, fresh-picked raspberries from David’s vegetable gardne, and clotted cream. Naturally, it was raining, but the teahouse was quite cozy and it was the perfect way to launch and English country holiday.

Next day, we once again enjoyed an expat 4th of July. This time, we had a barbecue which was…shall we say protracted…by the rain. But that was okay because when it was raining out, we could sit in the house and watch Wimbeldon…which was also protracted by the rain. The other notable event of the day was the World Cup, which was ultimately taken by Greece over Portugal. The Guardian captured it best in next day's headline.

To help facilitate the holiday, we had a visit from Peter, the pyromaniac biker, which is exactly what the occasion called for. Peter rode his motorbike (that’s “Queen’s English” for motorcycle) from Brighton in the rain with a small cache of fireworks on his backs. (We didn’t ask how they were acquired.) In addition, Peter became highly engaged in the rather entertaining pastime of trying to build a cooking fire in the rain. Fortunately, David keeps firewood in the basement, which is DRY. Therefore, there was dry wood. Peter was quite expert at everything having to do with burning things. He and David decided to build an open file and make coals from that. It was a good thing too, because we were all rather chilly sitting there in the damp orchard, so the fire was a big help with that.

It was delightful of them to embrace our national holiday with such enthusiasm, but the English always have to do things the hard way. “You know in America,” I pointed out, “we usually use a grill, and we actually just buy the coals instead of making them from scratch.”

One thing I enjoy about English summer is that the Sun always seems to come out just as it is going down. So we more or less waited all day for it to stop raining, which it did around dusk, which is quite late this time of year.

By the time we were eating ,it was dark and clear, but Peter and David had managed to make coals from the fire, and build a quite respectable double-grill, on which we were able to make a veritable feast.

About half those in attendance were American as per usual. Marc’s wife asked me at one point “What do you usually do for the 4th of July.” I thought for a moment. “Well, actually, I’m usually here on the 4th of July so…this is what I usually do!”

After dinner, David and Peter went onto the lawn and started the fireworks display. This provided a good test case for the pros and cons of digital cameras. On the one hand, they are much better for shooting nighttime scenes, and do especially well with neon and fires as such. On the other hand, the delay in shutter activation makes trying to photograph fireworks sort of like a really frustrating twitch game where you have to hit the target just so you and you never can. Here's one of the more successful shots.

Much later, after Peter, Marc & Co. and Lizbeth left, David lugged out the telescope and we were able to get incredible shots of the moon by placing our digital camera lenses into the viewer.

All in all, it was a delightful evening and a good time was had by all. In thinking about it, though, I'm struck with the irony of American Independence from Britain. The main news story of the week was that Tony Blair is under fire for pressuring British Intelligence to deliver trumped-up charges regarding Iraq's weapons of mass distruction. Since this is largely considered to be a case of pandering to pressure from the Bush administration, I think the feeling here is that, perhaps it’s time for England to be a little more independent of the United States.