Rugby Foils A Quest For Fish And Chips

My friend Rachel (singer/songwriter, fellow UBC student) proposed a fish-and-chips-motivated field trip to Cardiff Waterfront this afternoon. Google Cardiff—just do it. I guarantee 90% of the results you’re looking at are the Wales Millennium Center—the bronze facade with the words “In These Stones Horizons Sing” cut out in English and Welsh—and the Pierhead Building (the brick building with a clock tower that used to have some function related to the coal trade). These are waterfront buildings. Interestingly, they’re about a 40-minute walk from downtown. (It must be said that Cardiff’s downtown area, while beautiful, is not terribly photogenic.)

Our expedition was ill-advised for two reasons: 1. Wales was playing Italy so the pubs were thronged. 2. There is a scarcity of fish and chips on the waterfront.

The game actually compounded the fish and chips problem, because the pubs were overrun with fans with red and white-striped faces who had apparently already consumed every single chip in Cardiff.

Here is a pub where we did not eat because there was more rugby than food:

Here is the waterfront as seen from the patio of another pub we also did not eat at because everybody in the building kept leaping out of their chairs whenever our guys scored a goal (and also there was no food):

(Rachel and I are not the best pair when decisions must be made, because I’m indecisive and she’s Canadian: “Where would you like to eat?” “Oh, I don’t know, where would you?” “I’m up for anything.” “No, really, it’s your call—shall we eat here or keep moving?” “Oh, I don’t know, there’s no fish and chips here, but there might not be fish and chips anywhere, what would you like?” “At least it’s warm in here…but look, the rain stopped, so we could keep going, or we could stay here if you like.” “Want to keep looking?” “Oh, really, up to you.”)

When we had investigated three or four pubs and determined that the nearest fish were definitely still swimming free in the bay—and after also wandering into two bakeries, three Italian restaurants and a coffeeshop with jumbo pasties—we finally washed up in a pasta place with a waterfront view and a Mother’s Day two-course special that we decided to split. We picked butternut squash four-cheese gnocchi and a vegetable lasagne. We were definitely anticipating more food, and the gnocchi was the color of Rachel’s raincoat, but live and learn. (We should have known. Anyplace with the wineglasses already on the table is obviously too nice for students.)

The waterfront was very pretty and the weather even occasionally cooperated, so the rest of our afternoon evolved into a photo shoot in which we traded phones and ran all over the place taking photos of each other. Rachel actually knows how to pose for a camera. In my photos, I generally look stiff and a little confused. Unfortunately, I neglected to get many waterfront photos in which I was not in the way of the landmarks, so here you go, here’s me.

This is me in front of the Wales Millennium Center:

Here’s me in front of the Pierhead Building:

Here’s me in front of a weird gold tree:

Here’s me realizing there’s a spider in the weird gold tree:

(The reason it’s blurry is that I was in the process of teleporting out of the chair.)

The game had ended by the time we walked back to our respective places. Judging by all the frolicking and inebriated Welsh and the morose Italians we passed, we surmised that our guys trounced Italy.