Hanging out with Seema

How to get in when you're locked out, originally uploaded by supafly.

Tuesday I got a chance to hang out with my friend Seema. We both lived in Lower Wallace house in Woodward Court at the University of Chicago. (Our dorm is now torn down and the home of the shiny new GSB building.) After school, I lived with her and her best friend Shani at the Windermere House, a great old building across from the Museum of Science and Industry. It was one of the biggest apartments I ever lived in and had great views. I hadn't seen her in several years. The last time I had seen her I went to visit her in LA and got a wonderful experience during my first visit to the city. Since then, she had been living in London for a year and was now back in LA. She was in London on her way back from a business trip to Naples.

We met on Regents street in front of the Burberrys and walked down to Wardour street on Soho to eat at Satsuma, a Japanese restaurant with ramen, yakisoba, udon, and sushi. (There seems to be many more Japanese restaurants here than in Chicago.) After lunch, we traveled to Seema's old neighborhood in Islington. She climbed onto the roof of her old building to show me how she used to get in when she was locked out. Then, she convinced the new tenant to let us see her old apartment. It was a nice, light-filled flat and had just been newly renovated when Seema lived there.

We walked down towards the Angel tube stop, stopping in St. Mary Magdalene Gardens to admire the roses. We took a pause at a pub for ginger pear cake with vanilla ice cream and caramel sauce (for me) and a beer and chips for Seema.

Next, we took the tube to Old Street where Seema wanted to take photographs of some of the graffiti she remembered from there. While were one Hoxton Square, we found Sh!, a women's erotic emporium. It was pink with frosted glass hearts on the windows and a sign that saying that men were only allowed in if accompanied by women. It was the most warm and welcoming sex shop I had ever been in. Almost as soon as I walked in, they offered me tea!

After that, we took the tube to either Charing Cross or Leicester Square and huddled under an overhang waiting for the downpour of rain to stop. When it slowed to a drizzle, we walked to an internet cafe so she could check her messages and then on to Soho where we met her friends in a queue for Busaba Eathai. I was happy to meet them as they enjoyed food as much as me and gave me many suggestions for inexpensive places to eat in London. Marshall met us for a delicious dinner of different curries and plenty of rice.