I never go to London to go to London – it´s usually on the way from Iceland to somewhere else, or a stopover to switch airports. I´ve been to London a dozen times, and always left the airport if I can, but never really wanted to stay long since London struck me as a grey and overpriced, crowded city. I also hate commuting, and the London underground is the most complicated public transport system in the world, but this was finally going to be the first trip to London for the sake of getting to know London.

For the first time, I started liking London. I stayed in zone 1 and tried to walk as much as possible, and actually saw blue skies more than once. Oxford street with all its Christmas cheer was undeniably charming, and the handful of parks around still had green grass. The trip was focused on wining and dining, since it will be my WSET Level III exam location in a couple of months, but a string of strange sights and events also made the trip quirky and memorable.

I don´t have any proof, but out of the window of my Gatwick airport express train, I saw a green parrot flying freely. I wondered where one could post to a Lost and Found forum about their missing exotic bird, or if its possible that it flew here, naturally and by its own will, from somewhere warm and tropical.

I had one of those moments where you wish someone had caught it on camera, or suspected there was a hidden camera and it was done on purpose to record your reaction, but it was simply a stroke of bad luck, being in the wrong place at the wrong time. I was walking along the sidewalk where a small puddle had collected in the curb, and a car drove by close and fast enough to send it spraying over me, head to toe. It was stinky, grey, icecold water, but the shock factor was too much for me to worry about that. The woman just behind me, who got pretty much the same splash, gasped and screamed ´that is SO unfair!´

British people are known to be pretty rude drivers, especially in city center traffic, driving on the wrong side of the road and all. But its not funny anymore when it gets racist, and I heard one truck driver screaming out of his window down to the guy in the Mercedes Benz that had just cut him off ´where´d you get your license? Moscow right? Learn to fucking drive!´The Mercedes guy answered and they started screaming all sorts of profanity at eachother, threatening to get out of their car, but luckily the light turned green and everyone went on their way.

The weirdest thing I saw was a car parked on its nose against a house. It had somehow driven, or slid, off the road and lay beside the window of a basement suite. It had taken out the railing, but missed the window and the garbage bins, even though it had fallen down a crack only one meter wide.

The most impressionable part of the trip was by far the food. Dinner by Heston, a double Michelin star restaurant in the Mandarin Oriental Hotel, was mind blowing. I ate chicken liver pate that looked like a plum and tasted the best chocolate tart imaginable. Street XO had a fusion of Mexican and Asian bites, with deliciously experimental cocktails, decor, plating, and even server outfits (think tophats and suspenders worn unconventionally).

We drank gluhwein and hot cocoa, made gingerbread men and had to catch up on our advent calendar chocolates. We had a private lunch at our friend´s work kitchen and ate the best African food in Picadilly Square at a place called Ikoyi. I brought even more of an African with me to London while watching the Lion King, but quickly started embracing the cold, crisp feeling of winter and the change of season. Christmas doesn´t feel right in the heat, you know what I mean?