Friday 27 May 2011

BBQ, the South African Way…

The following pictures were taken two days ago, when ‘JJ’ organised a bbq in his back garden, for me and two of our friends. The good thing about his bizarre work schedule is that he can get weekdays off which means he can organise things like that without too much of a hassle. Knowing JJ however, I think he did stress himself to organise the perfect bbq. In a very strange way, he likes running around like crazy trying to set things up and he has a very good eye on small details that I would normally ignore.

South Africans must have a thing about bbqs. JJ shines like a star when mentioned and he’s always up for it. He’s told me that his parents have bbqs three to four times a week! They find it much easier to light a fire to grill stuff outside than cooking indoors. Probably it’s the weather. Greece shares similar warm and sunny weather but they are not that common for us. Maybe it’s the lack of space in the cities I was living in or the fact that when the weather turns warn, it gets so warm that lighting a fire is a torture. Don’t know…

The scene of the 'crime'


Chicken liver and salmon starters

Cocktails

Baby potatoes

Some boerewors (aka the farmer's sausage)

Chicken slow cooked in the oven in case it rained (always a possibility in UK)

greens


Looking again on these photos, I find it strange that they were taken two days ago. London saw lots of heavy rain and even hail yesterday. It was like we went straight from summer to winter in 24 hours.

While speaking to my mother yesterday, I mentioned the bbq. OK, I mentioned it more than once and at some point she got the bait. She asked me where we did it. She knows I leave in a block of flats which is very nice but it’s without outside space. So, I mentioned ‘JJ’. That was the first time ‘JJ’s name was mentioned in our casual conversations. Of course she knows about him, since she stalks me on facebook and checks my photo albums. She also knows about the trips we take together. However, we’ve never actually discussed about him and never mentioned his name.

Giving JJ a name, as silly as it may sound, changes some stuff. He’s not just a random guy I see behind their back. He suddenly gets a personality, a physical presence that he didn’t have before. Also, mentioning his name means that more conversation will follow and my mother might actually ask me about him and start accepting the truth about what’s going on. I think I dropped a small bomb on her and I’ll now have to wait to see the results…

Anyhow, have a lovely weekend! Enjoy!

9 comments:

  1. The space looks gorgeous! And the food looks wonderful! It's cool that you made a little headway with your mother. Drop JJ's name again in a week or two if your mother doesn't mention him first.

    As for stalking you, where can I sign up for that job?

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  2. That's a big step!

    Of course, my mom would be fishing for details. In fact, I tried to invite my parents to visit me when I had a free weekend, and my mom found it suspicious. She asked "Have you met 'Someone?'" She won't say "gay," "a man," or anything like that, but I guess she's getting used to the idea.

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  3. That is a huge step! :) I totally understand what you mean by sometimes the acknowledgement by your closes family or friends of your love ones - whether directly or indirectly means a lot. :)

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  4. i like how you mention jj by name to your mom. judging by what you wrote she knows about the two of you, but talking about it is something else. good start!

    ps, what a fantastic yard! hope the barbeque was a success :)

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  5. It all looks very good.... but I'm not sure we'd call that a BBQ. :-)

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  6. @Cubby I'm very happy to say that most likely, that will be my back garden in the future as well! LOL, you have my offline and online address. You can easily stalk me!

    @@Gauss_Jordan I can totally understand where you're coming from... We're still not discussing the subject though...

    @Aaron Thanks. :-)

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  7. @Luuworld Yea, it was a huge success. We had an amazing time.

    @CB Since there was a fire and some food was cooked on the 'bbq', I can call the thing BBQ! OK? It sounds much nicer! Bear in mind that we had dinner outside! That doesn't happen often... :-)

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  8. I am coming to London - this is my new blog!

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  9. @Traveller! Thanks for that... :-)

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