Da Nang: Eating my feelings

Sooo I tend to associate food with ~feelings~ and these memories have always been a bit, shall we say, peripatetic.

Back on the island there were coffee and croissant mornings in that house down a perpetually muddy lane, with a sky-blue gate and a chocolate Lab peeking playfully underneath. Then there was that homemade pollo rostizado con patatas for one last Friday brunch in the desert. There were Michelin-starred meals in Hong Kong and Turin, and lunch under the trees that one autumn day in Paris.

Here in Danang, my feelings are, quite literally, all over the place, and it began with souvlaki and chips on the beach.

Barefoot on the sand, keeping up my end of a surprising conversation while tucking into deliciously messy Greek takeout, drinking Huda beer and petting a stray cat.

Then there is a perfetly good pad thai by the river that runs through the city and oysters topped with chili and peanuts, slurped roadside, the shells casually tossed underneath the low-lying table the way the locals do. There are tacos enjoyed al fresco that evening we came from a theme park, ca phe sua da in that little coffee shop with the fairy lights perched atop a bookstore, noontime margaritas by a rooftop pool, and sushi boats on a rainy evening at a place called Edosushi. Who could resist reading aloud haikus by Edo poet Matsuo Basho then? (Not me, because I’m pretentious like that.)

There is a cafe with a rather good moussaka and hummus and whiskey sours made by a bartender who seems to have had a pat too many of their magical butter 😉 Then there are the poached eggs on avocado toast in the sunwashed blue and yellow corner that we ended up in the day we headed to our preferred pancake place only to find out it was closed on Sundays.

Then there is that generous tomahawk steak and wine we were treated to (still the fanciest dinner we’ve had in town all year) and there are the pancakes (yes, at the place that is closed on Sundays) on that morning we got pulled over by the cops on our way to a doughnut shop. So many clichés in that sentence!

Then there’s pizza, and chocolate-banana ice cream, and chips. There are always chips.

***

Didn’t expect much when I moved here, I admit, but some places have a way of sneaking into your heart.

And I realise this has somehow happened, to borrow from John Green, the way you fall asleep: slowly, and then all at once.