Since the closing week of June, it has been unbearably hot in London – a heat people will talk about for generations, grannies wrinkled, remembering the great heatwave of ’26. It is the type of heat one reads about in novels, where women sit with flannels pressed to their toes, in baggy clothes, desperate to doze.
I have been experiencing the “Great London Heatwave” (as it will now be called) with a myriad of highs and a myriad of lows, as I have come to understand is the pattern for the rest of my adult life. No more is it the summer of turning 19, when I was at my social, economic, physical, and mental peak.
Today, my highs are met with: a humbling £1,000 every month to live in what is essentially a glorified wardrobe, unimaginably privileged Hackney ‘creatives’ complaining we don’t serve espresso ginger tonics (?) and perhaps most prevalent of all, the worst job market in all of space, time and history.
Having said all that, I am also living a life that I dreamt about before moving to London. For instance, drinking overpriced orange wine in trendy, nondescript, small-plates/vinyl-listening/workspace/Dua-Lipa’s-favourite-quick-drink-spot-according-to-someone-who-has-never-met-her cocktail bars! Often, my evenings are spent cooking, whereby I fundamentally cannot measure portions for one person, end up cooking for at least six and force one of my dutiful three flatmates to share my dinner with me.
For as long as I can remember, I’ve loved cooking for people, and as I’ve grown up, I wonder if that’s partly due to my Iranian heritage, which is a part of myself I’m spending my 20s learning more about. However, what any Iranian will tell you is that we love to share food. Maybe this can lead me nicely into my first London recommendation: Berenjak. Constantly full, this Persian restaurant is hidden away in both Soho and Borough Market. I’ve been a handful of times now and the crispy tahdig rice and salty yet rich mirza ghasemi are some of the best I’ve ever had.
To resume my trail of consciousness, since leaving uni last September, where I studied English with Creative Writing, I have been trying to keep up written work as much as possible, whether that’s freelance copy, volunteer work, poetry, or simply scribbles of thoughts on scrap paper. But I’m hoping this site will encourage some more literary adventures, more recipe exploration, podcast recommendations, observations from the Central line, or simply provide somewhere to make sense of my 20s.
I’m not quite sure who will read this, but I hope it can be a space to relax, to learn things together, to feel less alone, and maybe even to feel seen if you’re in a similar chapter of life.
Okay, so with that, this has been Notes In The Heat Wave.
– Tallulah Armani
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