Bite-size Stories

It is not terribly exciting to be a sandwich. Like it or not, you need to know your place in the stylish world of delectables. You can’t compare yourself to the ever-popular desserts. Those snobby chocolate types, draped in strawberries, won’t even look your way. Nor can you compete with fancy salads and hearty soups — they get to play with ingredients, stay on trend, and make themselves look handsome. It’s hard to be noticed when you’re a working-guy sandwich. All you can offer is a simple filling and an even simpler purpose: to feed the office types rushing about their daily business. They’ll have their moment later with sophisticated dinner sorts, but now all they want is a quick bite. But let me be honest. If you’re a sandwich from Earl Canteen - made to order, with roast pumpkin and gorgonzola piccante, or free-range pork belly with apple, cabbage and fennel — you’ve made it. You’re on par with the sit-down dinners served at night, with dim lights and grown-up conversation. I ...

For most, it’s just an odd-looking beetroot soup. For me, it’s much more than that. Kiev - the old town perched high on its steep hills, clasped by the river. In summer, its narrow streets are drenched in lilac and chestnut blossom, generous under the sun. In winter, snow falls in heavy flakes, turning the city shiny, grim, and mysterious in the dark. Kiev is grandma’s borsch. Flushed pink and pungent, impossible to forget, impossible not to return to. At twenty-three, I crossed Australian border security with two hundred dollars, a suitcase, a new husband, and a baby bump. Who needs more to start a life? What I didn’t know was that beetroot soup came too, undeclared. It was the most important of all possessions. Decades later, it still is. Because the most important possession is who you are.