On Still Being An Inbetweener

Firstly I'd like to point out that the original series of The Inbetweeners started in 2008 when I was neither a teenager, nor male, however certainly identified with that late-teenage claw through life. Time was when everything was a potential embarassment or fuck-up and you really didn't know whether you were coming or going. Whether it was cringe-worthy encounters with the opposite sex, the endless quest for "cool" or the feeling of being slightly out of place in every possible situation.

I also identified greatly with the sentiment of the "Inbetweener", halfway between childhood and adulthood and not really sure if you want to be either. The thing is now in my *cough late twenties, I would have assumed that my "Inbetweener" stage was over and I'd be well into my adjusted adult phase where everyday life was a breeze and my problems were only important, real things like death and taxes.

I have since discovered that is not the case.

Desperately Seeking Banksy: Part One

 

About six months ago, I bought the Banksy London App on my iPhone for the princely sum of £1.99 with the full intention of channelling my outer (not inner) mainstream-graffiti-artist-loving self and challenging said self to walk around and see every single one. 

Because they're in the city that I live in and because it's important to break up the bed-tube-international coffee chain-office-pub-bed routine that we commuters all indulge in; whilst ignoring fabulous, touristy, sparkly London. 

Sometimes in life you just gotta take a deep breath and get out at Piccadilly Circus, ignore the cringe, buy a paper day travel card and stand stationary in the middle of Oxford Street. Go on, I dare you.

Plus the reason I love Banksy is that he is challenging and subversive and satirical, whilst still being popular. So it's OK to be a little touristy right.. 

Big Italian Balls at Belpassi Bros

The Greeks call it meraki I believe, a beautiful word, my Greek friend smiled when I asked her what it meant... "oh" she said, "but there's no English word for this.". The definition is lightly: 

to leave a piece of yourself (your soul, creativity, or love) in your work. When you love doing something, anything, so much that you put something of yourself into it. 

She said, "like cooking with meraki, it's from your soul, yes?"

And here's the point I'm making as I skip from Greece to Italy, because the Belpassi Bros restaurant concept has been created, strategised and now physically cooked by twins Lorenzo and Livio Belpassi with pure meraki. 

Put Out the Light & Buy a Poppy

On Monday night at 10pm, I turned off all my lights and lit candles for an hour. I sat in darkness and watched most of the World War I Centenary remembrance service and this year is certainly an important one.

In our unsettled times as conflict rages around the world, though not in our own backyards', it is important to remember the World Wars. I'm sure that those who relatives are employed in the armed forces feel this even more deeply.