The Canadian Adventure

Part 13 - 18th September 1997

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My French has expanded enormously, but unfortunately only into those phrases one finds on the outside of food packaging. I'll leave you to ponder what the French equivalent of Honey Nut Loops is, my current cereal "du choix".

[to Jeremy Cogman] Congratulations on having passed the magic six-month mark with Sarah. At that point hiding stuff begins to be too hard to sustain, so getting through it is a good sign. Eve and I have also broken through, and will be moving in with each other in a few weeks - the next big test. I'm not sure if I'd met her when I last wrote to you - she's Australian, tall and much fitter than I am, knows the difference between a mutual fund and a bag of monkeys, and all in all is worth spending lots of years with. My sudden change-around to contemplating marriage and kids snuck up as something of a surprise, but I'm not that frightened!

Canada has proved to be every bit as good as I thought it would be. When I broke through the one year barrier it occurred to me that I've done more in one year of being here than I did in five years in Farnborough. Now the problem is not having enough hours in the day to do the stuff I'd like to. Summer was fun (if a little short) and my roller-blading went from crap to intermediate. The locals are friendly and Vancouver has plenty to offer. I might be off to Australia to work for six months starting in November (take advantage of their summer) but I intend to come back here - I've got plenty left to see and do yet, and have made some good friends too.

I'll spare you the details of a long story involving a piece of soft bread at the start of a fantastically tasty meal in Whistler. I bit, my tooth broke, I continued to bite into my tongue, there was blood and bodies everywhere (nearly), and my command of language was in one fell swoop reduced to that of a dribbling inebriate. An entire packet of rinstead pastilles has hardly helped the situation, and the dental repair work has taken two appointments, and will need a further three. I am an oral nightmare (as it were).

To make matters worse, we were in Whistler specifically to see some people about buying into Interval International and Intrawest, a big "holiday ownership" (for which read "Timeshare") company. My little accident meant that I was unable to talk, just dribble and slur a bit. Totally embarrassing.

Actually I won't spare you the details - as it happens the subject came up in a speech I gave at Toastmasters, and subsequently won a competition with. Here is the speech text:

I’m in a movie theatre in 1995. Following the usual pattern I had bought my ticket and sauntered into the pick’n’mix confectionery booth. As I browsed the buckets of synthetic chewy delights I noticed that I’m the only inhabitant over 10. Undeterred I dived into the buckets and presented my selection to the cashier. "That’ll be $16.75 sir" - "What?! But I only have three gummi bears and a giant turquoise tarantula" - I peer into the bag and am surprised to see that it also contains a good handful of fizzy coke bottles, some raspberry wedding rings, some green worms and a single marshmallow, sitting rather incongruously amidst all the fluorescent plastic gum.

Mumbling to myself about how fizzy coke bottles should be afforded the status of life essential and available free on prescription, I wander into the auditorium.

I’m there to see Schindlers List - a film of drama and intensity, suffering and loss, but above all else extended duration. The knowledge that the unfolding of the saga will take the best part of the next four hours provides some meagre justification for the size of the sack of gummi stuff I am clutching.

The house lights dim, the credits roll, I pop the marshmallow into my mouth - and there’s a sickening crunch…

With a sinking sensation in the pit of my stomach I gingerly extract the offending marshmallow, only to find the surface of it dotted with the fractured remains of one of my teeth, looking for all the world like chopped almonds. But my enthusiasm has been lost.

What do I do now? I’ve paid the $10 to get in, my girlfriend is sitting beside me, clutching an entire packet of Kleenex, and looking expectant. I have a kilo and a half of Xantham gum and simulated fruit flavouring on my lap, a newly decorated marshmallow clutched between two sticky fingers and a rather gormless expression on my face. I have to sweat it out.

Have you noticed that when something alters the terrain map of your mouth your brain blows it out of all proportion? A small hole feels like a road worker has been in there with a pneumatic drill. As I sit I can think of nothing else. I try relaxing my jaw (this makes me drool lightly, but seems to escape the notice of my girlfriend), I clamp my tongue on the other side of my mouth, slowly, inexorably my resolve vanishes and I have to poke the remains of the exploding tooth with the end of my tongue.

This dislodges more pieces of the tooth, which I have to nonchalantly remove, and now I have a cut on my tongue. I consider fainting, but am pretty sure that no-one would notice. The rest of the film passes in a murky haze.

To make it worse I have to wait until Monday before I can get a dentist’s appointment. And I can already imagine the humiliation that will entail. "So you’re telling me that your dental trauma was the result of an offensive, and unprovoked attack by a marshmallow, Mr Clark?". Hardly brimming with machismo is it? Not exactly on a par with "I was removing beer bottle tops with my teeth while having a tattoo applied to my buttocks". I’ll be laughed out of the surgery.

In the meantime eating becomes an absolute nightmare. I have to keep all the food on one side of my mouth, chew in a bizarre lop-sided manner, and avoid biting my tongue, all at the same time. The prehensile qualities I require of my (still swollen) tongue have to be learned fast. The effort renders every meal a compete chore.

So why am I leading you through this preamble? Only because, not ten days ago, I’m sitting with my girlfriend in a select restaurant in Whistler when the same sickening crunch informs me that tooth number 2 has bitten the dust. Quite literally as it happens. Once again I’m two days from my dentist, the offending food was a perfectly harmless piece of soft bread, but this time, in that single moment of dental fracture when reality crystallised around me I became totally aware of the alien environment we enter whenever we walk through the door of a restaurant.

Straight away I observe that I’m in a place where an entirely new language has evolved: Menu-English. At first glance it looks like normal English but closer investigation reveals a plethora of elaborate flowerinesses and inappropriate capitalisation. We have noisettes and duxelles, entrecotes and medallions, everything is seared, flambeed or sizzling, and god help me nestling on a bed of noodles.

The waiter appears to take our order. I order a filet mignon, rare, in a portobello coulis, with potatoes a la mode and a medley of charbroiled vegetables, under the assumption that "mignon" must be French for melt-in-the-mouth - I resolve to check the dictionary later on. As for what might constitute a medley of vegetables my mind is a blank, but am willing to be pleasantly surprised.

I’m amused to note that the waiter can speak "menu-english" and resolve to practise ready for his next appearance. This chance arrives 20 minutes later when he craves our indulgence momentarily, and regrets to inform us that a battalion of chefs are struggling against an unseasonably high demand to add the final finishing touches of perfection to sir and madam’s gastronomic selection. I decipher this as meaning that the kitchen is busy, but not to be outdone entreat him to furnish me with a lustre of water, hand drawn from the house tap, and served au nature in a goblet of crystal. And if he would be so kind, a fan-folded item of table linen, laundered and springtime fresh, to replace the one which had tumbled inadvertently to the horizontal walking surface anterior to my feet.

Deflated and with a single raised eyebrow he replied "Water and a napkin, coming right up".

In due course, and with due ceremony, our meals arrived. Instantly I was aware of the true meaning of mignon. "Small". The a la mode that had been applied to my potatoes was, so far as I could discern, that they had been dropped into a blender and whizzed to the consistency of wallpaper paste. And my medley of vegetables - oh the medley of vegetables! A single French bean. A single segment of something unidentifiable, but yellow in hue. And approximately one eighth of a carrot - sculpted! - into the shape of a flower.

Now then, here’s a tip for any of you who might be thinking of opening a restaurant at any point in your careers: there is only one secret to financial success in the food business. It’s not cordon bleu. It’s not value for money. It is simply this: Huge Plates. Teeny tiny servings. If I might translate back into real English, my small steak and mushroom gravy with vegetable clippings, all of which could have easily fit into the palm of my hand, were served on a plate the size of a garbage can lid.

And a further tip. When serving a minuscule quantity of food on a vast platter, stack the food vertically, one piece atop the other, so as to maximise the emptiness of the rest of the plate. When the minimalism seeks to overwhelm the observer, arrange a single frond of highly decorative, but totally inedible, greenery, just to one side of the edible miniature tower. And to the inevitable enquiry, reply: "Salad".

In the meantime, back in the restaurant, and with a rapidly emptying plate, I gesticulate to our helpful waiter. Attempting to continue the musical theme he’d started with his medley of vegetables I enquire whether he might see his way clear to composing his grand opus, culminating in a veritable concerto grosso of the aforementioned legumes.

I may have imagined it, but seconds later I could have sworn that I heard his voice wafting from the kitchen - "Hey Gaston - more veggies for lard-boy on table seven."