What Gives You Jetlag and Makes You Sneeze?

… a 5-day business trip to London and Milan!

Now, as most viewers know, I’m fairly incompetent at keeping a secret… particularly if it involves me. Mama Bear asked me to pretend, or “betend” as she calls it, that she was coming to visit me in Japan, when in fact her mission destination was Cape Town for her sister’s… ummm… special b’day (note: age remains undisclosed to protect the innocent)… to complicate matters, I’d been plotting a trip to the satellite offices (London, and Milan; Paris was deemed small potatoes) to do an audit and the stars aligned… not only was the trip when the covert sting was to take place, it also fell over my birthday!

I very reluctantly left Kept Ninja in the wee hours of Monday morning to fly to London – our first nights apart after 6 months of marriage! I travelled back in time and arrived in London in lunchtime and hit Oxford and Regent Street. I had little trouble navigating the underground… although the standards weren’t quite up to the Japanese subway. I had some success in my shopping endeavours – I found Ninja a few shirts from ‘High and Mighty’, bought a couple of GAP tees, and some much needed gossip and interior design mags!

I caught up with Bec and Skip for dinner at Jamie Oliver’s ‘Jamie’s Italian’ in Shepperd’s Bush – I had a fish stew and raspberry chocolate brownie for dessert – rather delicious, and great to see old friends.

Fish Stew

Dessert at Jamie's Italian

Piazza del Duomo

After a day in the London office, I flew to Milan… sounds glamorous doesn’t it? If only my hotel was closer to Milan centre rather than the airport… and a 20min walk from a metro line! Upon hitting the pavement, after work, I followed an obliging lady towards the station. 50 sneezes later, several tears and multiple giggles from my guide, we reached the station… ah dear, hello hay fever! I hot-footed to the first pharmacist I saw in Duomo and got what I thought were hayfever tablets… from memory they shouldn’t have pseudoephedrine in them!

Happy b'day me :)

I started with sightseeing – Piazza del Duomo, Piazza Scala, but gravitated towards Galleria Vittorio Emaluele and worked my way through Corso Vittorio Emaluele – the jackpot! Several purchases later, I emerged tired and weary and craving tortellini! I dined at ‘A Santa Lucia’ … so had Naomi Campbell, Bridget Monahan, and Salma Hayek, according to the pictures on the walls!

The next night I was led astray by a local colleague, and headed to Corso Buenos Aires… turned out to be more walking between quality stores than I’d like, so I headed back to my original turf and in complete tourist fashion, I had dinner on the pavement, overlooking the Royal Palace, with a glass of Moet and gelato for dessert… the seafood risotto wasn’t so flash, but that’s to be expected on the main street.

Back to reality now, and very happy to be! I came home to presents and a delicious white chocolate mud cake… make that 3 cakes… there were 4… one was eaten by the baker for QA purposes… diet will recommence after said cakes are consumed!

Chef Ninja's creation

xoxo

Karate Kate