areiamus

When I catch the train later in the evening, which is any time after 6, I have a tendency to doze off. This seems to happen more often when I’m sitting in the aisle seat and the unfortunate window seat occupant must either: tap me awake, mutter ‘excuse me’, or lift their arms (and bags, I suppose) high in the air and attempt to navigate the 15cm gap between my knees and the seat in front of us – all of which rouse me and spark an awkward moment where it’s clear that they’ve broken the commuter code of non-interaction, and I’ve broken the social convention of impersonal helpfulness without acknowledgement.

The aforementioned happened at Taringa this evening, just one station from my destination of Indooroopilly. As I struggled to gather my thoughts and decide what to eat for dinner, salmon attacked - not grilled or fried, but perched atop ribbons of pasta with fresh basil. Inspired, I set off to Coles.

Ingredients:

• 200-300g salmon fillet (preferably not actually from Coles)
• 300g or 5 small or 3 big tomatoes
• 3 fresh basil sprigs
• 200g linguine
• 3 garlic cloves
• sea salt & cracked pepper
• olive oil

And so:

1. Set 2-3L of water to boil. Add linguine, stir briskly and cover until water reboils. Cook for the rest of the time uncovered, around 10 minutes. If you bite a strand and it’s the same colour all the way through, it’s ready. Tip some of the water off to a spare pot. Drain pasta in a colander, toss with a little olive oil to prevent sticking. Return the saved water to the main pot, set the colander in the pot and cover until you’re ready to serve.
2. Finely chop garlic, dice tomatoes and wash basil. Add garlic, salt & pepper to 2-3 tablespoons olive oil over high heat. As the garlic starts to sizzle, turn the heat down to medium and add tomatoes. Cover and simmer for until the tomatoes have softened and there is some liquid in the pan.
3. Cube the salmon not smaller than 2cm a side. Lower the heat and evenly space the salmon pieces in the pan - there should be enough liquid that they’re not frying. Scatter basil leaves over the mix and cover for 2 minutes. Very gently stir, turning the salmon over and mixing the basil into the sauce. Cover for another 2 minutes.
4. Serve immediately.

I discovered Vienna Teng through a piece of hers called Gravity, featured as the soundtrack to a well-executed if slightly melodramatic AMV of The Place Promised in Our Early Days, a film created by the current rising star of Japanese animation, Makoto Shinkai. I listened to Gravity a number of times, hearing the odd chord, a stray line of lyric, and knowing that these were really quite something I could listen to. Unfortunately, they were utterly lost in the trap of artificial intensity that so many apparently soulful songs tumble into.

Some months later, I happened upon her latest album, Dreaming Through the Noise, and commuted to it for a week straight. The style of the music is as eclectic as a genre that describes itself as ’singer-songwriter’ can be, and there are two pieces in particular that fit my mood of an evening pressed up against the glass on a crowded, silent train.

Vienna Teng - Transcontinental, 1:30 A.M.

wait
don’t let this line go slack
don’t go alone into the cold
wait
don’t give up on this yet
I know that there’s more you haven’t told
wait my love, just one more thought
wait my love, I haven’t got time in my life
to watch you drift out to sea

so please
wait
don’t let this line go slack
I want to bring you back to where I know you
wait
don’t give up on this yet
I just want you to let you let me hold you

wait my love, just one more thought
wait my love, I haven’t got time in my life
to watch you drift away
but I’ve all kinds of time if you’ll stay

I know we’re transcontinental, 1:30 a.m.
and there’s not even a wire
just a whispering in air
I know we’re transcontinental, 1:30 a.m.
but I’m here

What’s she asking for? The futile extension of an inevitably-doomed long-distance relationship? I can see the partner fielding a range of responses: faux resoluteness, circular pleading, distancing - it works with his clients but they’re rational and tend to do what they’re told if they see the logic behind it. She thinks she understands but wonders if perhaps she just hasn’t hit on the right trigger, revealing her true lack of grasp of the situation. She tells him, “I know we’re transcontinental”. His reply is whispered, she doesn’t need to hear it, she knows the sort of thing he’d say, all calm, all rational, too rational: “Yes, we are.” Her final plea: “But I’m here.”

Vienna Teng - Transcontinental, 1:30 A.M. [mp3, 5.2MiB]