New Internationalist. The people, the ideas, the action in the fight for global justice.

Wet and cool UK summer: people gloomy but garden prospers

The rain was pouring down, no surprises there, as I made chutney on Saturday from our garden’s produce – courgettes that had swollen into marrows, windfall apples of various types and shapes, a few carrots and onions, plus some sultanas and a bit of ginger and cinnamon. I quite like making chutney… not too much to go wrong. I have to confess that I don’t use a recipe – just sling it all in with some malt vinegar and sugar. Perhaps not a good confession from a cookbook writer, but I guess we all do it!

The scene was just as I remembered from many decades ago, when my grade 5 teacher asked us to name one of the seven wonders of the world, and I stuck up my hand and blurted out "the Scarboro bluffs." My wife Lori and good friend Harriet joined me for a trip down memory lane on Canada Day when we went for a picnic in my old haunts. The secret trail through the woods was still there, as was the fragrance of clover and wild grape as we tramped over the meadow, until we came to a point where the deep blue eyes of Lake Ontario suddenly stared us in the face from hundreds of feet below.

It’s 8.30pm, and I have just returned from lunch. I was at Hannah’s house; she is a friend and colleague, and she invited eight of us over for lunch after work today. Gazans love their food, and so they should; it’s a wonderfully succulent and sensual diet of vegetables, meat, fragrant rice, salads and fruit, laced with garlic, lemon and olive oil, and served on enormous, tempting platters. Hannah cooked enough to feed about 30 of us.