Most food has a story around it. It may be a very small story indeed, but nevertheless it is a story. I have given the story about why I cook in the Rolling the Culinary Ball page, but mostly the recipes I write on here have a story. In similar fashion there will be lots of story around our sojourn to Hanoi, mostly about food, but I’ll throw in some random stuff as well. Like now. Today at the most comfortable times of 1am, we left Melbourne for Singapore, and for my young 4 year old daughter Lyla (who’s nearly 5 I keep being reminded) this was her first ever flight. Kalam my 7 year old son is a seasoned traveller having breezed through the long-haul flight to England last year, but Lyla was an enigma. Would there be panic, tears, giggles, fear, or the most natural tendency for my kids, impatience for the next feed. I am writing this from Changi as we wait for the connecting flight to Hanoi, and I can say that she giggled as the plane sped down the runway, giggled even more when the plane took off and then said ‘I’m hungry’. And that in a nutshell was pretty much it; it was as if she had done this many times before. And that was my ‘very small story indeed’.
We are now very ‘up’ for Hanoi, arriving at midday later today. Just another three hours on the plane and we will be in this amazing city, which is regarded as the cultural, and probably food, capital of Vietnam. I think it will be settle in to the apartment, catch up on sleep and then go Pho Bo hunting.
