#119: Our Second Spring

A (belated) postcard from Providence, RI.

After Mexico, Ivan and I flew to New York for a night, and then—after heeding my body’s call to double up on Asian food at Sukh and Raku—took the AmTrak to Providence, Rhode Island, to spend time with our friends Simon and Zeynep. It was my first experience of a living, breathing, capital C Campus—I went to uni in London, where “the city will be your campus” really means you float around and make fewer friends. I’ve visited other schools, but more as a tourist among other tourists than as witness to anything collegiate.

Providence, with its quads where students would luxuriate and play frisbee on sunnier days, felt almost meme-like to me after years of imbibing Gilmore Girls and other takes on American campus life; it was almost exactly as I’d imagined it, but as with all things, better with friends. Our timing was perfect, with everyone essentially done for the school year by the time we arrived. And the city’s long winter meant we enjoyed our second spring, and feasted on all its literal and proverbial fruits.

This included my first ever group screening and discussion of the Real Housewives of Rhode Island, conducted with the rigour and curiosity one would expect of academics at one of the country’s finest educational institutions. Other highlights below…

A homemade rhubarb tart was the exclamation point to our first dinner prepared in S&Z’s kitchen, heretofore only glimpsed through Facetime. As you’ll see, the theme—and in a way, joke—of this email is that in many ways this was a consummate first week of spring. Growing up in Hong Kong, and even living in London, I hadn’t realised that quintessentially Spring-y things like bunnies and farmer’s market ramps are real, and enjoyed by actual people once a year.

We surveyed the farmer’s market scene on the occasion of its first al fresco weekend (in colder months it is held in an airplane hanger-like space). It was nippy and a bit grey but you could tell everyone was excited at the prospect of summer.

At the cool new boutique in town, Silver Line, which in selling Auralee and Flore Flore to chic Rhode Island moms heralds, in Zeynep’s words, an epochal shift. I liked the striped Florentine knives they stock, which you can also buy online.

Aforementioned bunnies, which were everywhere.

I was lovingly peer pressured into playing my first ever game of (friendly) football, and thought that I could essentially quiet quit the sport by volunteering to be goalie. I was wrong, and promptly gave the other team a 2-0 advantage. But it was all good fun, and importantly, Ivan evened out the score at the last minute so I didn’t have to feel too bad. I even, at one point, kicked the ball, which was then deflected so it almost went in goal—I swear. To celebrate, I repeatedly mentioned ice cream until our kind friends drove us to get comically large scoops in cinnamon cones—the closest I will come to feeling like an American child after a sporty extracurricular.

I went to my first ever Big American Thrift Store (BATS) and it was everything I imagined and more. Aside from one item (a 90s sports bra in good old cotton, not polyester—side note, it’s so hard to find activewear that is not super synthetic), my haul was very Brooke Callahan inspired: a tomato red button-up from the men’s aisle; pool blue cotton capris; and a pair of drawstring magenta workwear pants from the scrubs section. I went back to the flat and immediately tried everything on (the tyranny of Saver’s is they don’t let you do so in store), coincidentally matching with S&Z’s place mats on which we then ate fried rice for lunch. All in a day’s work.

Our culinary tourism also included a big bucket of fried chicken, copious condiments, and a personal highlight, the curly fries.

We also ate eggs and pancakes at glorious Modern Diner. I tried lobster and grits for the first time, and it reminded me of congee (complimentary). Other favourite restaurant meals included Pizza Marvin and Amy’s, whose ‘Hangover’ breakfast sandwich is high on my list of things to recreate. I cannot place why it tasted so much better than every other breakfast sandwich I’ve had; it was probably the bread.

I documented and smelled as many blooms as physically possible, often holding up the group on walks. The cherries that blanketed the sidewalks won when it came to looks, but Viburnum had the most addictive smell.

Among our greatest pleasures was cooking with our hosts. On our last night we had a tremendous send-off, with a menu inspired by the contents of Marcella Hazan’s The Classic Italian Cookbook (Savers, $1.50): spatchcock barbecued chickens and veg; homemade pasta in mushroom sauce; and homemade stracciatella ice cream (served alongside espresso martinis), which convinced me that we need to buy an ice cream machine.

I was sad to leave the next day, but grateful to have such life-affirming friends, meals with whom are enough to plan a summer around. Thankfully we won’t have to wait long and will see them in London next week. Spoilt, as always.

Thank you for reading and I hope you get to eat ice cream in the sun this week,

Zoe